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optimum choice for aerial attack. The effectiveness of the rocket attack against the Danish flagship Christiania was due more to the intrepidity of Captain Richter in the attack, than to the inherent suitability of the weapon. It should be noted that the same weapons, when fired from longer distances by surviving elements of the U.S. Air Force, resulted in only minor additional damage to the Danish fleet. In the opinion of the Chief of Staff, U.S. Air Force, a maximum effort should be made to develop an efficient dive bomb technique for use in future hostilities.

Jesse poured himself another drink.

So why didn't you press in, like you wanted to, hero? Oh yeah, that magic word, 'duty.' Only one aircraft left in the entire world, after all. Are you sure it wasn't cowardice?

8. In conclusion, the defeat of the Danish invasion fleet was due more to the effect of surprise and the determination of U.S. forces under the leadership of Lieutenant Cantrell, than to any superiority of weaponry or tactics. U.S. military forces should immediately review pre-Ring of Fire concepts of joint operations, in order to ensure greater effectiveness in the application of combat power.

Joseph J. Wood Colonel, Chief of Staff, USAF Richter Field, Wismar

Attachment:

Admiral Simpson, it looks as if it is our mutual responsibility to recreate a system of awards and decorations. I thought it likely you would prefer to write any award recommendation you thought appropriate for Lts Cantrell and Wild, though I would, of course, be pleased to endorse anything you submit. I attach my own recommendation for Capt. Richter at Tab F. I would have preferred the Medal of Honor for Hans, but, as I see it, the DFC is within my personal discretion. I find myself unable to wait for the politicians to do the right thing.

Jesse Wood, Col, USAF

Finally finished, Jesse rose to take the messages to the radio operator. For a moment, he stared at what was left of the hooch on the table. A bit to his surprise, there was still half a bottle left. He started to reach for it; but then, almost angrily, turned away and strode out of the room.

The least you can do now is face Sharon half-sober.

After a bit of searching, he found Sharon where he'd first seen her when he landed his plane. At the edge of the airfield, staring out to sea. All that had changed in the hours since, while Jesse had radioed an immediate short account and then forced himself to write what needed to be written, was that Sharon was now sitting on the ground instead of standing up.

It was after sundown, but there was still enough light in the western sky to allow him to see her face clearly. The tears had dried. He thought she had none left to weep.

Awkwardly, he sat down next to her. 'Sharon, I'm sorry-'

'Don't apologize, Jesse,' she said softly, not moving her eyes from the same spot on the now-invisible horizon where, hours earlier, columns of smoke had marked the funeral pyres of her fiancй and two of his closest friends. 'You owe Hans that much, at least. The world owes him that much.'

Her dark eyes were shadowed, but Jesse was relieved to see the composure in them. Grief-stricken Sharon Nichols might be, but she was not struck down by it. In that moment, Jesse could see the lines of her father's face in the daughter. Not the roughness and near ugliness of his features, simply the strength in them.

'Hans was not a complicated man, Jesse. Bright, yes. But not complicated. I think that was the reason I fell in love with him, even though part of me thought the whole idea was nuts. I just… couldn't resist that simple, uncomplicated adoration.' The last word ended with something of a gasp. She covered her mouth, holding in the sorrow.

Jesse took a long, deep breath, fighting off his own tears. 'No, he wasn't complicated. Paladins never are. I guess, anyway. Not sure. Hans is the only paladin I think I ever met.'

A half-sob, half-laugh came from behind Sharon's fingers. 'Paladin!' She lowered her hand, exposing a sad little smile. 'Not a bad word, actually. If we ignore the 'chaste' part of the business. That he wasn't, I can tell you. He threw himself into lovemaking with the same enthusiasm he did everything else.'

After a bit, the smile faded away. 'Oh God, Jesse, I'm going to miss him. So much.'

'Yeah. Me, too.'

She shook her head. 'But-promise me. No apologies. That would detract from his sacrifice. From his whole life. He was no boy, led astray. Never think it, just because he wasn't complicated. Never think it.'

Jesse started to weep. Sharon put her arm around his shoulders and hugged him close. Her own eyes were moist, but no tears came.

She lifted her head a bit. The stars were coming out, with all the clarity of a sky not polluted by a later century's flood of lights.

'The only reason they seem to twinkle,' she murmured, 'is because the air gets in the way. The stars themselves are pure and bright and simple. Don't confuse what you see with what there is, Jesse. Hans Richter was our bright shining star. And that's all there is to say. Now, and forever more.'

***

That night, Mike found Veronica Dreeson at the Simpsons' house. Hans' grandmother had been staying there since she arrived in Magdeburg.

Admiral Simpson was still at his office in the shipyard. Mary Simpson, who had left the naval base an hour earlier, let him in the door.

'I haven't had the heart to tell her yet, Mr. President,' she whispered as he came through. 'I should have, I suppose, but…'

'Not your job, Mrs. Simpson. Mine.' He saw that Veronica was preoccupied with reading something, and was seated far enough away not to hear them. 'God damn it all to hell,' he muttered wearily. 'How do you tell someone that the nation which saved half her family just shattered it again?'

But he didn't have to tell her. Once he stepped forward into the room and Veronica looked at him, something in his face did the job.

'Which one?' she asked.

Mike looked away.

'How many?' she asked.

Still, he couldn't meet those hard old eyes. 'Gretchen and Jeff are fine, Veron-'

'How many?'

'All three. All of them.'

Silence. Then, quietly, Veronica spoke. 'They drove them off, then. Yes?'

A bit surprised by the words, Mike was finally able to look at her. He was even more surprised to see that the hard face showed no signs of grief beyond something faintly discernable in the set of her eyes.

'I could tell by your face. You understand very little, Michael Stearns. Someday you may come to understand the difference between sorrow and despair. But I hope not. I would like to think my young boys did not live and die in vain.'

That same night, after getting the news from Frank Jackson, James Nichols stared at the walls of an empty house. Realizing for the first time how much he had been looking forward to a grandchild.

An empty house. Melissa gone. Sharon gone. Hans gone forever.

There was a knock on the door. When he opened it, Tom Stone bustled through with his three teenage sons. One of them was carrying a cardboard box.

'Bummer, man,' Stoner pronounced. 'Really is.'

'How'd you know?' James asked.

'The whole town probably knows by now,' said Tom's oldest son Frank. 'There's a line of people standing outside Mayor Dreeson's house, waiting to give their condolences.'

'We just came from there ourselves,' added one of the other boys. Ron, that was. 'Annalise is taking it pretty hard, but she's trying to bear up. It'd be a lot easier for her if Gramma were still here.'

'The whole town's bummed out,' said Stoner. 'Really bummed out. Those kids were… you know. Special.'

He gave Nichols a scrutiny. 'I figured you'd be in bad shape too. That's why we came over. Keep you some company and-'

He gestured toward the cardboard box in the hands of his son Gerry. The box was covered, so Nichols couldn't see what was in it.

Given Stoner, on the other hand, he thought he could guess.

'I am not in the mood to get high,' he growled.

Stoner's eyes widened. 'Hey, doc, take it easy. It's not grass. It's flowers. I grow them too, y'know.'

'Oh.' James felt a bit sheepish. 'Thanks.'

He started to reach for the box but Stoner took his outstretched arm and started leading him toward the door. 'They're not for you, man. They're for the shrine. But we thought-you being Sharon's dad, and all-that the honor of placing the first flowers should go to you.'

'What shrine?'

When they showed him, James felt his spirits lift. Not much, but some. Stoner and his boys had already set up the receptacles for the flowers-two very large terra- cotta pots, placed on either side of a little walkway. The walkway led to the trailer complex where, in the days after the Ring of Fire, Jeff Higgins and Jimmy Andersen and Eddie Cantrell and Larry Wild had taken into their home and hearts a man named Hans Richter and his family.

It was fitting, he decided. That somewhat ramshackle trailer complex was perhaps the truest symbol of what those courageous youngsters had died for. And, somehow, an old hippie had figured out the perfect memoriam to paint on the flowerpots.

One read: Gone but not forgotten.

The other: We remain.

The next morning, sitting at his desk, Admiral John Simpson finished reading Colonel Wood's after action report-for perhaps the tenth time since it had arrived the night before. His jaws tight, he set it aside and picked up the attachment. That, he had read perhaps twenty times. Whatever comfort there was to be found, would be found there.