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May 3, 1949

Pevensie Residence, Finchley, England

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The arm was healing nicely; Lucy had been a fine nurse. Now he sat on the couch, convalescing quickly and desperately wanting to be out of the sling, to be free again. But he had no idea what lay ahead, once his arm was healed. His mind still seemed trapped in the jungle; no path opened before him.

The bell on the door rang sharply and Edmund remembered that the others were all gone. Setting aside his book reluctantly, he slipped on a dressing gown and forced himself to his feet. The kettle of boiling water on the stove drew his attention, and he shut the stove off. What a pity, he thought; he had waited eighteen months for a cup of good English tea…

His heart sank as he opened the door and saw the officer, dressed in immaculately pressed khakis, with hat in hand. "Mr. Pevensie, formerly of the Second Battalion, Coldstream Guards?" the man asked crisply.

Edmund nodded. He did not recognise the insignia on the officer's uniform, but perhaps things had changed since his battalion was deployed. So many other things seemed strange in England now...the music, the clothing, the people...

"It is an honor to meet you," said the officer genially, offering his hand. "I've heard of your bravery during your tour in Malaya." He paused and looked Edmund up and down. "Lieutenant Colonel Calvert, commanding officer, Special Air Service."

Edmund was puzzled. "Colonel Sterling's chaps?" he recollected. "I heard of your exploits in the desert during The War. I thought you had been disbanded? Well, please come in and have a cup of tea."

Calvert nodded but gratefully sat down and watched Edmund brewing the tea, remarkably well for a man with one good arm. He took the offered cup before continuing. "Well, shall we cut to the chase? You are right; the SAS was mustered out of service. We've been reorganised, though, under my command. As you certainly saw during your service, our current tactics are not working in the jungles, against a guerrilla enemy. My plan is to create a force of Britain's finest…men who will be trained in jungle warfare, masters of survival, capable of operating in small teams…and of carrying the war to the enemy's front lawn. In short, men like you…once that arm's healed, of course."

Edmund poured a little of the precious cream into his tea. Four years after The War, rationing still affected their lives. "I served my eighteen months of National Service, and was lucky to survive," he said finally, watching the last bit of white dissolve. "I don't think I'll be going back."

"Your conduct in action would seem to indicate more than a man fighting to survive," noted Calvert, taking another sip of the tea. "You risked your life time and time again for others when you could have escaped. No, I don't think you're as selfish as you make yourself out to be."

"I'm not going back," Edmund said firmly. "It's not that I'm afraid of death or this broken arm…" Far greater battles and injuries flashed through Edmund's mind, images of Beruna and charging centaurs and the glint of the sun off the shards of Jadis' wand before it impaled him. He would have to try to explain the deep emotions he felt to this officer. "It's one thing to grow up with stories of knights in shining armor, to talk of glorious charges and damsels in distress. But I saw a different type of war there, and it's an ugly thing. "

Calvert could sympathise with the younger man. He had seen far more things than he cared for in his own experiences fighting the Japanese. But there was a deeper horror in Edmund's eyes. "You seem to speak of lost heroism and idealism," he said finally, not entirely certain of what to say. "But that medal …your survival for days in the jungle cut off from support, how you fought to the very end, your devotion to your men..."

The Distinguished Conduct Medal pinned to the sergeant's uniform in his room upstairs weighed heavily on Edmund. "That medal seems like almost like a mockery to me," he said, cupping his face in his hands. "It's a reminder of all those that didn't make it, while I did. The least I could do for my men was protect them."

The Lieutenant Colonel was puzzled. With Sergeant Pevensie's reputation, he had expected him to wear the uniform once again with immense pride when given the chance to serve in such an elite unit. After all, his entry into the Coldstream Guards had hardly been proper, but by the time the mistake was discovered he had become far too valuable to ship off to a regular unit. This young man was different, but exactly the type of person the he needed. And having fought through miles of bureaucracy and opposition to reform his unit, Mike Calvert was not going to be stopped from recruiting the men he needed to make his dream a reality.

"And that's why you are so valuable," he said, setting his cup down on the table between the two men. "Mr. Pevensie, you saved the lives of every men in the squad that you could. The Lion of Tapah, I believe they called you. You would fit perfectly in the SAS. Now, I've gone through all the experiences you have, in Burma, and we can put an end to what those terrorists are doing…"

Edmund almost laughed at Calvert's words. "But not in two worlds," he felt like saying. The memory of Jadis had been nearly expunged from his mind, only to be reawakened by all the treachery he had encountered in Malaya and by the reign of terror that the rebels had unleashed on the regions under their control. He was tired of war; he was tired of being a hero in this dark world…

"You likely won't earn many medals with us, Mr. Pevensie. It will be war in the shadows, where only your comrades and the people you protect will know of your deeds. But Britain needs men who are willing to make that sacrifice. We need you."

The word sacrifice meant many things to Edmund. He thought of the local policemen he had seen, captured and tortured by the guerillas. He thought of the frightened Malayan villagers they had gone to protect, and of seeing them dead mere days after leaving them. He thought of his old comrades hacking their way through the dense tropical jungle and fighting and dying in that foreign land. Hopelessness had filled him then at not being able to solve the problem, at being a little ant in the grand picture of things, and he knew this time would be no different. And so he thought of the enormity of this sacrifice Lieutenant Colonel Calvert was asking for.

Then he remembered another great sacrifice, one that had been made for him, the ultimate sacrifice of all. And it was a sacrifice that had been made twice over, in two worlds. Almost frighteningly, his path was becoming clear as daylight.

"Britain calls, and I shall answer," he said firmly, taking Calvert's offered hand. "For God and country."

Edmund Pevensie had decided to offer his life for a higher good. He did not know that Aslan had accepted the sacrifice.

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Malaya was Britain's equivalent to Vietnam. However, spearheaded by units such as Calvert's SAS and using successful hearts-and-minds tactics, the British and the Malayan government were able to achieve victory by 1958.