Reingold was holding a compress tight to his nose as Kael tended to what was left of his mouth. The cell door opened and Andrews was thrown in. Dropping her rags, Kael caught the Marine’s slumping body before it hit the ground, staring up at the guards as they sneered at the captives. After a long moment, they turned and left.

Kael gathered Andrews close to her, examining what was left of his face. His eyes were horribly swollen and blackened, his nose crushed, his mouth a bloody hole. “They didn’t break me, Gunny,” Andrews slurred through a mouthful of broken teeth. “The bastards tried, but I didn’t tell ‘em anything.”

“Ya did great, Andrews,” Kael said gruffly, ripping another swatch from her robe and tending to his heavily bleeding facial wounds. “Rest now and let me take care of your face, alright?”

Andrews struggled against her, straining to open his swollen eyes. “No, Gunny. Don’t waste your time. Please. I …I did it this time …but not next time. Next time, I’m gonna crack, Gunny. I can’t hold out anymore. You don’t know what it’s like in there. You don’t … .” The young soldier began to choke on his own blood.

“Shhhh, Paul. Shhh. Relax now. I won’t let them hurt you anymore. I promise.”

“No! It’s too late. Too late …for me, Gunny. Please …please fix it so I’m still a hero, ok?”

Kael’s blue eyes widened. “What are you saying, Paul?”

Andrews’ tortured eyes met her own. “Please, Gunny. End it. Here and now. Please. Don’t make me sell out.” He struggled weakly again. “Please, Gunny. I’m beggin’ ya. Don’t let me die a traitor.”

Kael tore her gaze away from the pleading, anguished soldier, looking over at Reingold who was staring at the scene with wide, frightened eyes. She looked back down at Andrews who met her gaze unflinchingly. “Are you sure you want this, Paul?” She tenderly stroked his swollen face, needing desperately to know the answer. “Absolutely sure?”

“I’m positive,” he gasped. “Help me. Please.” The last word came out in a tortured whisper.

Taking in a deep breath of stale air, Kael nodded, reaching over with her free hand and gently cupping his face on either side. “Anything you …want to tell your family?” she asked uncomfortably, her throat suddenly dry at the duty she had been given.

Andrews closed his swollen eyes for a long moment. “Tell them …tell them I died well, Gunny,” he whispered. A small smile crossed over his face. “Good luck,” he added softly.

Kael’s eyes, pale orbs which could freeze the heart of any mortal, warmed with compassion, pride, and the quiet strength which always characterized her. “Good rest, my friend.”

“Thank you,” he whispered.

A quick twist and it was over.

Releasing her hold on his face, Kael gathered the body up to her chest, supporting the lolling head with one hand as she supported the limp form with the other. A sad, haunting melody sprung forth from her lips of its own accord, filling the chamber with its somber beauty as she rocked the unfeeling body of her comrade in her strong arms.

The last note hung in the air for a long moment before it faded out and Kael lowered her head to rest her brow atop the dark hair of Andrews. “Goodbye, my friend,” she whispered.

Reingold cleared his throat to break the silence. “That was beautiful,” he said in a strangled voice. “I’ve never heard you sing it before.”

Kael lifted her head away from Andrews, her brow furrowing. “I don’t know where it came from,” she said, puzzled. “I’ve never heard that song before in my life. It was just …there.” Shaking her head to clear her confusion, the C.O. gently laid Andrews’ body on the cold damp floor of the cell, crossing his arms over his chest and brushing an errant lock of hair from his face. Shifting her position slightly, she moved to sit next to Reingold, who slipped an arm around her shoulders in an awkward hug. Kael sighed. “Let’s try and get some sleep before the hoses come again.”

Within moments, all was quiet save for the steady dripping of water into the cell.

It was nighttime. And warm, at least when compared to the damp chill of her prison cell. The freshening breeze caressed her clammy skin delicately. The air smelled clean, with just a hint of woodsmoke which came up from the bonfire in front of her, being born off by the wind in the other direction before it could sting at her eyes. She noticed trees in the periphery of her vision and wanted to look around, take them in, but her eyes were focussed squarely on the bright burning pyre that grew as she walked closer to it. The haunting melody continued to spring forth from her soul, borne, like the smoke from the pyre, up in the wind’s gentle embrace.

Her heart was heavy and sad as she stared into the fire, the last note of her tribute fading in the night breeze. Off to her left, very nearby, came a voice which touched deep chords in her soul, though she had never before heard it. The words were foreign, but she understood them, as she suddenly understood the words to the song which had borne Andrews to his death, the song she had just now sung again, though to whom, she wasn’t sure.

“I wish I could have met him,” the unseen figure at her side said, her voice full of warm compassion. “I’m sorry.”

“He was my friend,” she replied in the same unknown language, but speaking it like a native born.

“To be remembered like that is a good thing.”

She wanted to turn her head; to look at the person who thought to offer her comfort through this un-understood grief, but her feet carried her closer to the fire before she could force her head around. “My friend,” she found herself saying, stopping a short distance away from what she now realized to be a funeral pyre. “My friend.”

The sharp sound of a door slamming off concrete walls as well as the sudden convulsive stiffening of an arm around her shoulders woke Kael from her dream. Still half unaware, she jumped into a fighting crouch, flinging off the arm pinning her against the wall and clenching her fists.

Two guards burst into the cell, both eyeing her closely, their hands tightening on their weapons. Kael stared back, then relaxed against the wall, taking a deep breath to calm her racing heart. The dream, which seconds ago had seemed so real, scattered and dissipated like fog in the morning sun.

Fully entering the dank cell, the guards grunted as they bent down to grab Andrews by the arms. The Marine’s head, unsupported by his broken neck, lolled backwards, the close cropped hair fuzzing the back of his skull pressing close against his shoulder blades. One of the guards eyes’ widened and he dropped the arm he was holding as if the chilled skin had burnt the tender flesh of his palms. His companion, taken by surprise by the action, dropped the other arm, allowing Andrews’ body to fall back to the water-pooled floor, his neck cocked at an unlikely, grotesque angle.

The first guard grunted and squatted, reaching out a hand to rest on the captive’s marble-like neck. Cocking his head, he felt around some more, before raising his gaze, his eyes taking in first his companion, then the two prisoners who sat against the wall opposite him. “This man is dead.”

Kael allowed a smirk to form on her lips. “What tipped ya off, Einstein?” she replied in flawless Arabic.

The second guard snarled, lifting his weapon and stepping toward the seated captive before he was stopped by his comrade who stood and dusted his hands off on his immaculately pressed trousers. “We don’t have the time,” he informed his companion, releasing the guard’s arm to force him to the cell door. “The Commander needs to know of this.”

Grunting, the second guard allowed himself to be guided out of the cell, turning back only once to imprint the face of the woman into his memory.

Al-Hassein turned his head to look at the clock for the third time in as many minutes. Time, once a cherished friend, had turned into a deadly enemy over the course of one day. His evening prayers, once a bastion of peace in his otherwise chaotic world, had seemed to drag interminably. For the first time in his life, he found himself rushing through the rituals, needing to get them over with so he could attend to his duties.

He looked at the clock again, growling under his breath and slamming his clenched fist down on his desk, causing the myriad of scattered papers to shuffle in protest. He had an hour at the most before his superiors would call demanding answers.

Closing his eyes and rubbing at his temples, the commander forced himself to relax, contenting himself with the vision of the battered soldier when he had last seen him. The man would break quickly now, he knew. He had been a hairsbreadth from cracking during the last session before his pain carried him away, and with his consciousness, his secrets also retreated.

‘Not this time, my American friend,’ Al-Hassein promised himself. ‘This time I’ll have you begging me to reveal all your dirty little secrets.’ A malicious smile bloomed on his face as he pictured his new, opulent office in the Presidential palace and the “Friend of Saddam” ribbon that was sure to adorn his chest. His name would be spoken of in reverent whispers as the man who single-handedly prevented the loathsome United States from entering a war that was sure to begin just as soon as the first Iraqi tank entered the boarder into Kuwait.

His blissful reverie was interrupted when the empty-handed guards stepped diffidently into the room. “Where’s the prisoner?” he barked, his vision shattered in pieces and laying on the ground at his feet. Time suddenly sped up again and a nervousness totally foreign to him planted its seeds into his gut.

“He’s dead, my Commander,” one of the guards replied.

“Wha-at?” Al-Hassein demanded, rising slowly from behind his desk. “What do you mean ‘dead’?”