A/N: Thank you all for bearing with me in this series of shorts. I'm not sure where they are going; or what they'll turn out to be. But, I'm finding it an interesting journey. Always-Underrated, babybluerhino, Gaben, GoHead, Lolli-x, saides, thanks so much for the alerts, favoriting, and reviews. I really appreciate them Gaben, Whereintheworld, and Always-Underrated: Thanks so much for the help, encouragement and for putting up with my insecurities!

Chapter 4: Veteran's Day

It was a week that had been bad from the start. The job that they'd been working had been complex and more difficult than it should have been. Parker had a burn on her back and bruises everywhere, and Hardison had two bruised ribs. He'd survive; but, he was going to whine a lot for the next couple of weeks. Nate, as always, had pretty much escaped unscathed; and Sophie sported a bruised cheekbone and much to her dismay had lost a pair of shoes. Eliot swore that New Hampshire heard her complain about losing that pair of very expensive sling-backs. He didn't have the heart to tell her that sling-backs, even maroon crocodile ones were useless and more than that were a safety hazard. Almost as soon as they'd gotten back into Boston the hitter had slipped away and driven out of the city.

With a little bit of help from Parker he'd relocated his shoulder in the van on the way back to Boston. It hurt like an SOB; but, it wouldn't cause any permanent damage. He did need to make a dental appointment; the loose tooth was a bit worrisome. Pulling up his long driveway Eliot, grimaced at the jarring the potholes was giving his bruised and battered body more grief. The hitter could feel every blow he'd taken, and was really happy that he'd called ahead and Sonny's wife would have brought over some groceries. Grocery shopping wasn't something he really felt like doing looking like the loser in a bar brawl. With what Adele would have dropped off that morning and what he had canned plus what he had in the freezer he'd be good for quite a while.

Eliot walked in the house and carefully reset the alarm. He felt stiff, and old. Very old. Carefully, he grabbed a roll from the bag in the bowl on the counter and ate it standing over the sink with a glass of apple juice and two of the strong pain pills that would let him sleep through the night. The apple juice and the roll would keep his stomach calm; these pills usually gave him quite an upset stomach. The hitter didn't usually take heavy drugs; or plan to sleep for eight hours; but, on nights like this he knew that it was what his body needed.

The next morning Eliot came to wakefulness slowly; feeling both the after effects of the pain killers and the fight. He felt like he had been beaten with a length of iron pipe after going out for a long night of drinking. But, the iron pipe had been last month; and that had just been a glancing blow. Stretching, Eliot felt his shoulder protest with the movements and the stiffness in his entire body.

Eliot slowly stood up and drank down the bottle of water he'd put on his bedside table. The curtain was open enough that the soft morning light was coming through. He walked over and stared out at the rain that was coming down at a slow steady pace.

Recognizing his body's needs and the needs of his mind, the hitter sank into movements he hadn't practiced in too long. The structured movements of small form Tai Chi Chen soothed not only Eliot's mind, but slowly stretched his body and relaxed his stressed muscles.

Breathing out slowly, Eliot concentrated and moved. He felt his muscles slowly awaking and responding. The small form of Tai Chi was about internal energy and the elasticity of muscle. Looking deep within himself, the hitter found his inner peace and summoned it like a small ball of pulsing energy and sank into the rhythm of the movement. He let the movement become himself, become the light, become the rain. Pushing the ball of energy away from him; and pulling it back into his core Eliot felt the aching weariness retreat a little and his soul lighten. He felt the connection to the ground, peng jing, in Chinese.

Eliot became one with the drops of rain hitting the window and swayed with the sound of them on the tin roof. Slowly his heart beat became one with the rain drops. Eliot's whole body moved slowly, and continuously. His movements mimicking silk being spun. Motions he'd learned in a country that no longer existed, in a place that technically never existed, and from a man that was probably dead by now.

Finishing the long series of movements Eliot bowed to the window. Thanking the morning for allowing him the time. Thanking the ground for giving him peace. And thanking the master that taught him.

Pausing for a second before he walked downstairs the hitter remembered something that his teacher had told him:

"In order to understand a move you must practice it 10,000 times.

This is called The School of Ten Thousand Repetitions."

"The Way is in training."

And he wondered how many times he'd practiced over the years? How many times his body had gone through the movements focusing on his dantien, his core; focusing on his connection to the peng jing, the ground? Taking the movements he'd been shown and making them his own.

Walking down the stairs feeling the cool fall air on his skin Eliot thought he should probably check out the furnace because it was going to need to be started up soon. He stood in the kitchen and looked out over the grey misty landscape. You could barely see the barn because it was so gloomy with mist settled across the yard.

Eliot started going through the motions of making a pot of French press coffee. While he was waiting on the water to heat, the hitter turned on the radio to the local news and music station. Their news was always interesting.

"And the radio just keeps on playing all these

Songs About Rain...

Now there's all kinds of songs about babies

and love that goes right,

But for some unknown reason

Nobody wants to play them tonight…"

He flipped the radio off, figuring he must have missed the news. Gary Allan's Songs About Rain was a very fitting tune for the weather; but, not one he really wanted to hear.

Pouring the almost boiling water into the glass cylinder the hitter carefully placed the lid onto the pot and hummed:

"Here Comes That Rainy Day Feeling Again,

Blue Eyes Cryin' in the Early Morning Rain

They go on and on, and there's no two the same

Oh it would be easy to blame all these

Songs About Rain"

He stared out the window by the stove and thought to himself that Gary Allan knew how to pick a song that reflected a mood. This was definitely a gloomy song for an overcast day. Eliot looked over at the calendar to remember when he had an appointment with Elambert, his massage therapist and saw that it was Veteran's Day. Fiercely he pushed the plunger down and poured his cup of coffee. Taking a sip he decided it was a little too strong; that is what he got for being distracted.

"Veteran's Day." Eliot thought bitterly. "That one day a year when people actually thought about those that served." He took a sip of the bitter coffee and started thinking.

The hitter thought about the friends he'd made. The friends he'd lost. Dom. Master Sergeant Dominic Daniel Labrutta. The latest in a list that was way too long. Ricky Dewater, Jeremy Lasher, Jay Hoskins, Tim Poole, Adam Davis, … Staring at the mug of coffee, and wishing it was something stronger, Eliot lifted it in a silent salute. A salute to lost friends, lost relationships, and lost time.

Finishing off the cup of coffee Eliot felt the tension that had returned to his muscles. He ate an apple and drank another cup of coffee. This was going to be a very long day, even though he had no concrete plans. He stood up and carefully pushed his chair into the small metal topped table, and sank into the first of the large form Tai Chi movements. Over the next fifteen minutes the hitter mindfully moved through the twelve movements in the sequence. He gracefully flowed from movement to movement, and position to position, feeling the earth, worshipping the sun, and thanking the sky.

As he finished the series for the third time with 'Slanted Palms Flying' Eliot could feel some range of motion back in his battered and bruised muscles. He quickly scrambled three eggs and ate them standing up over the sink. It was easy and made less mess.

Noticing that the rain had let up at least for the moment, Eliot pulled on an old sweater and walked the quarter mile down to his mailbox to get the newspaper. He had an understanding with Sonny; he'd pay for the newspaper and when he was around he'd get it. Any other time Sonny would get it. Even with two sets of stretching the hitter still felt stiff. He grabbed the Globe and checked the mailbox to see if the mailman had showed up yet. Surprisingly he had; not too much came here. Most things came into Boston. There was a letter, hand addressed. The postmark was Montana. Huh, he muttered, as he tucked it into the paper and walked back up the driveway as it started to rain again.

Going back into the old farmhouse, Eliot looked at the coffee pot; another cup sounded really good. No, too much caffeine wasn't a good thing. Instead, he started his tea kettle heating on the gas stove for a cup of herbal tea and sat down to open the letter from Montana. Inside was a simple card with a black ribbon going around the outside with the United States Army crest in the center. A sick feeling gathered in the pit of his stomach as he opened the card and read:

Services for Sgt. Glenn Davis of Bridger Montana will be held on Tuesday at 2:00 P.M. in the Chapel in Billings, Montana with the Revs. W.J. Shelton officiating. Burial with full Military rites will follow in the Montana Veteran's Cemetery in Billings, MT. Preceding him in death were his parents and brothers; Glenn is survived by his wife of twenty-eight years Jean L Davis.

A fist clutched at Eliot's heart. He hadn't kept in touch too well with Glenn, but knew that the side effects of Agent Orange had really been affecting him over the last couple of years. Jean had been driving him into Billings three times a week for the last year for dialysis, and it had been a fight for them to get the VA to pay for it.

Repeating a ritual he'd done too many times over the years, Eliot got a glass out of the cupboard and splashed a couple fingers of Jameson's Irish whiskey into it and sank into one of the kitchen chairs with his eyes looking out blindly into the rain. He raised the glass in a silent tribute to a friend, and a mentor. To someone that had pulled him out of a couple of tight spots when he'd been starting out. To a man who had cared enough to make sure that a young retrieval specialist learned the right way to do things. "Glenn, a gentleman and soldier."

The words might seem clichéd; or have been said too many times. But, they were true, and the hitter felt them deep in his soul even as it ached from one more loss. Eliot sat and sipped and remembered Glenn. The ex-soldier who had transitioned into well… More private work and he'd had been on the cusp of retirement from private work when Eliot had been making his own transition into retrievals. Glenn had always been willing to share his knowledge with the 'toddlers' as he'd called Eliot and others like him. Willing to sit down and share a drink, a story; or often a first-aid kit.

Finishing off the whiskey, Eliot grabbed a jacket and headed out into the rain. It was a day for a walk. A day to spend with the ghosts of the past and to remember those that no one else remembered. Veteran's Day.

E/N: Other than Dom; the names are all real Iraq casualties. Just some of the 2,746 casulties that the coalition forces have sustained in Iraq. Too many soldiers, too many parent's children sacrificed, … Glenn is real; just not an Iraq veteran; he's a Vietnam Veteran. Lift a glass, a thought, a prayer – more than one a day a year for those who died.

Again, and as usual; the poem is NOT mine. It's by a Japanese poet Miyamoto Mushashi. And the song; it's sung by Gary Allan.

I've been pondering mulliganing the first three chapters to tweak them and fix my end-notes.