"NO!" she screamed and staggered off the altar and ran through the cloud of ash and dust. They had been hit by a shell; it had opened a giant hole in the roof of the old church and exploded in the nave.

She saw a hand then, coming up through the ash cloud, and she dove onto the floor, frantically brushing away the pile of rubble. It was Woody, reaching to her as he coughed out a chestful of dust.

"Woody! Are you hurt? Are you all right?"

"I'm fine. Where's the doc?" He scrambled to his feet as the cloud began to lift. The bombardment was over as quickly as it had begun, and there was now an eerie quiet.

"Garret? Can you hear me?" Damn the formality. This was Garret. She saw him then, a foot sticking out from under a section of crumbled wall. She and Woody knelt beside him and pulled the stones off in a frenzy. "Garret! Hang in there! We'll get you out!" He was ominously still, and she choked on her own words. Her heart sank when she saw his bloodied torso. He had caught shell fragments in his chest, and the life was rapidly oozing out of him.

They pulled the last of the rocks off, and she leaned in to check his pulse. She turned to Nigel and Bug, who had climbed out of the undercroft.

"He's alive! Set up the instrument tray in the OR!" Nigel and Bug traded looks of incomprehension. "Move!"

"But you can't..." Bug fumbled.

"I'm not going to let him die! If we can stop the bleeding, he has a chance! Move! Now!"

The two blinked themselves back into action. There was a flurry of movement. The "OR" was ridiculously unsterile, but there was no time. Woody and Nigel lifted Garret's body and stretched him out onto the table.

She stood there, summoning her courage, and began to pull the fragments from his chest. "Hang in there, Garret! Hang in there!" she repeated as her voice rose to a frantic pitch. "You're going to be fine, you hear me? You're going to be fine!"

Her voice was the only sound in the stillness. No one else spoke. Finally, there was Nigel's voice, small and strained. "Jordan..."

"What?"

"He's gone."

"No! He's going to be fine." She reached one bloodied hand out to Bug. "Clamp!" Bug took a step back from the table, his eyes cast down in resignation. "Did you hear me? I said clamp!"

"Jordan..." Woody said quietly and reached out for her arm.

"No!" She yanked away from him.

"Jordan, he's gone. He's gone." He took her elbows in his hands, and she looked up at him.

"No...no..." She broke down then, her knees gave way, and he caught her and pulled her into his arms. "He can't be..."

"Ssssh. I'm sorry. You did your best," he whispered, stroking her hair as she sobbed. "I'm so sorry."

Lily and Father Rene crawled out of the undercroft then. Bug ran to her as she let out a mournful wail. The old priest collapsed in tears at the ruin of his beloved church and keened in French.

They all stood, unable to move for a long while, as they looked down at Garret's body, the sound of sobs filling the still air.

XXXXXXX

They solemnly covered Garret with a sheet and and moved him down into the crypt. No one spoke.

Jordan had gone into a kind of shock. Woody had draped a blanket around her shoulders, and she sat shivering on the floor. The others were now going about the business of trying to clean up after the devastation.

Woody finally came and sat beside her on the ground. "They'll be here in a couple of days for you," he began quietly. "You can take him with you, then." She didn't respond. He covered her hand with his. "You did everything you could, Jordan. He never had a chance."

She shook her head. There was no way she could make him understand what she had been through already, no way to make him understand what Garret had meant to her.

He was silent for a long moment. She turned to him, and his eyes were dark. "I've got to go, Jordan."

"Go? Go where?" She could feel the panic begin to rise again.

"HQ. I'll just be gone for a couple of days."

"Don't. Don't go."

"I have to. I'll be back."

"You won't. I know it."

"I will. I told you that. I'll always come back." She lowered her head onto her knees. "I hate to leave you like this, Jordan, I really do. I'd give anything to hold you in my arms all night. I would." He leaned down and kissed her on the top of her head.

"If you're going to go, then go."

He looked back at her with hurt eyes, but then kissed her again softly. "I will see you again, Jordan. I promise you."

He was gone then, climbing over downed beams, and out the door.

She pulled her knees tighter to her chest, sitting there in a daze, when she suddenly realized what she had done. She scrambled to her feet and made it through the door and out onto the street.

The jeep was about to disappear around the corner. She called to him, screaming his name. He turned and looked over his shoulder as she jumped up and down waving her arms over her head.

He smiled, she could see that even from a distance. He lifted his hand, turned the corner, and then he was gone.