HEATHER

That predawn bombing raid was one of the most surreal experiences of my life.  I clung, terrified, in the meager shelter of the doorway.  Men shouted.  Medical personnel alternated between scrambling to look after the patients and scrambling for cover.  Dust and grit rained down as the building groaned and shuddered with each successive blast.  The air was hot and dark and stunk of smoky sulfur and the coppery scent of fresh blood.  My stomach rolled.

I can hardly even describe what it is like to experience a bombing.  You smell it.  You see it- even in the dark- these bright flashes of light followed by the sound of debris raining down.  You hear it.  Far away, the bombs make this low, distinctive thoomp.  Up close, they are deafening.  You can literally feel the blast against your eardrums as the concussive force of the explosion displaces the dirt and air and pushes it outward.  Windows exploded.  Glass rained down.  The walls shook.  I shook.

I wrapped my hand around the simple wooden rosary Lach had given me.  Already on my knees, I sent a desperate prayer skyward and then had this sudden surreal moment where I wondered what it was like to be God, to hear the frantic scrambled thoughts of hundreds of people- on both sides- calling on Him for protection... for themselves and for others.

My knees ached.  My back ached.  My stomach was knotted with fear.  I prayed for myself and for our little baby... and for Lach.  The steady pattern of the thoomp.... thoomp.... thoomp had slowed and become more erratic.  I knew what it meant.  Our boys had just entered the fray.  Somewhere up above us, Lach was engaged in the dogfight, locked in mortal combat.  Flying his heart out to save us.   

I couldn't imagine how he must have felt, knowing not only his life, but the lives of his woman and child, hung in the balance.  Everything he held dear rested on how well he could pilot that plane.  Every enemy fighter he shot down would be one less that could harm us.  He would know where we were.  In the building with the big red cross against a field of white painted on the roof.  'X' marks the spot, hey?  What had been a sign of the last bastion of hope for so many injured men now felt like a target.

There was yelling and general confusion as reports began to filter in.  The generators had been hit.  Barracks strafed.  Runways had taken heavy damage.  Casualties were already starting to come in.  I saw men and women with blackened faces holding burned and broken limbs.  People were groaning and screaming, their bodies slick with blood and their faces a ghostly white.  The images spurned me forward.  I ran to the door and out into the peachy-gray light of the dawn. 

It was like some scene from a dream.  I felt apart from it all, distanced from the carnage around me... and I had the sudden, shocking realization I wasn't any safer inside than I was standing out in the open.  Squinting up, I watched the firefight above me.  Watched planes swooping and diving.  Heard the guns chambering round after round after round.   

Bullets sprayed the dirt and made tinny popping sounds as they penetrated the metal roofing of the hospital doorway where I'd stood moments ago.  I paid them little mind.  I couldn't take my eyes off the swarm of planes above.  It was like some macabre aerial ballet.  I simply couldn't fathom what I was seeing.  Couldn't understand how the deadly choreography could flow as it did.  How did they keep from running into each other?  How could they shoot each other with any degree of accuracy?  And yet they could.  And did.  The proof was all around me.

A plane exploded high overhead.  Wreckage rained down, chunks of blackened wings and burning fuselage and broken men.  A severed hand landed to my left.  It was wearing a wedding band.  I felt my heart seize in my chest as I imagined it to be Lach's tender hand.  Some woman would never again feel her husband's loving touch.  This woman might not either.     

Please, God... keep my Lachlan safe.  Let him at least see his little baby....  just once...... please, God... please...

Men were scrambling to fill in the craters blown in the least damaged of the runways so our planes would have a place to land.  I felt a tug on my arm and turned my head.  A man was speaking to me.  I could see his lips move but couldn't hear him.  He shook me roughly, jarring me from my strange trancelike state.  The horrible sounds of the battle rushed back, like a volume knob suddenly turned up high.  I winced. 

"Are you hurt?"  He was pulling at me, trying to get me back inside.  "Are you hurt?!"  He motioned to my skirt.  I glanced down.  It felt like I was looking at someone else.  A dark stain was spread across the front.  Blood?  I brushed at it.  The dry earth had been stained a dark brown where I'd been standing.  Oh my God!  My water had broken. 

My first thought was that it was too soon.  Too soon!  My second thought put the fear of God into me.  What had I said?  What?!  I wracked my brain for my desperate prayer.   

Please, God... keep my Lachlan safe.  Let him at least see his little baby....  just once...... please, God... please...

Be careful what you wish for.  I was terrified.  What did it mean?  Was it just the trauma of the raid that had triggered my early labor or was it something else?  What had I done?  I felt my belly knot again and realized what I'd been feeling hadn't just been fear induced nausea.  It was contractions.  The early stages of labor.  This couldn't be happening!  I still had a month to go.  I thought I might be sick. 

I swallowed hard, pulling against the firm grip he had on my arm.  "I think my water broke," I said stupidly.  I was suddenly embarrassed to be standing there with a hand pressed to my groin in front of a virtual stranger.   

His mouth rounded into an 'O' of surprise and then he pressed his lips into a firm line as he bodily dragged me inside and ordered me into a chair, running back out a moment later when he heard more cries of: Medic!  Medic!! 

I didn't stay seated, of course.  Some part of me knew childbirth wasn't instantaneous and I had absolutely no intension of waiting around with nothing to do but worry when I could be doing something useful to take my mind off what was happening.  And off the fact that I might never see my Selkie Man again.  Oh, God!  What would I do?  What if his plane was one of those that had exploded overhead like some macabre firework display?  What if his beautiful body was in pieces, strewn across the ground?  The world wavered unsteadily before my eyes and I forced myself to think of something else.  I had to move.  I couldn't dwell on that.  I just couldn't.  I suddenly understood the phrase 'crippling fear'.  I needed to find something to do. 

Now.  

I got up as quickly as my awkward bulk would allow and launched myself into the fray.  The last of the enemy fighters had peeled off, having done enough damage, and the first of our planes had started to land.  I looked around at the people rushing everywhere.  Righting things, clearing rubble, helping the wounded to the hospital.... There were too many.  The small hospital was packed to overflowing so they sat them outside.  People littered the ground like bloody confetti.  Five minutes ago this place had looked desolate outside.  Now it was swarming with people, like an angry hill of disturbed ants.

Looking around me, I realized I was seeing the great beast that is the Military Machine in action.  It looked chaotic, but there was method to the madness.  Everyone seemed to have somewhere to go or something to do.  Someone handed me a clipboard and the next thing I knew, people were barking names at me as they dragged men by.  One list at first.  Then two.  As the minutes ticked by, I started a third.  Another page began to fill up, not with the names of the wounded, but with the names of the dead. 

My hands shook as I wrote, but I was glad to have something to do, and all the while, I watched the one functioning runway, desperately checking every plane that landed in the hopes that I'd see the one with 'Curry' painted under the starboard window.  The planes started landing faster and faster, their engines coughing and sputtering as they touched down one right after the other.  Way too close to be safe.  I suddenly realized that many of them, especially Red Flight who had engaged the enemy on their return to base, would be dangerously close to running out of fuel. 

The number of wounded grew and grew.  I struggled to keep up, fumbling with the spelling of unfamiliar foreign surnames.  And suddenly, I heard a frantic shout that seemed to cut through the din.

"Blue!"  I think my heart stopped.  My hand froze above the page as I looked up and saw Lach running in from the airfield.  Oh thank you, God!  He stopped in the center of the complex and turned in a full circle, scanning frantically for me.  "BLUE?!"

I shoved the clipboard at someone and just ran to him.  "Lach!  LACH!"  His head jerked sharply around at the sound of my voice and he sprinted over to me and grabbed me up so tightly I almost couldn't breathe. 

"Are you OK-"

"I was so scared-"

We talked right over each other, frantically running our hands over each other's face and body, looking for injuries.  Assuring ourselves the person we loved was safe from harm.  At first, I don't think either of us realized we were being touched back, so intent were we on making sure the other was safe and whole.  Lach looked terrible.  His face was dirty and blackened by the oily smoke of burning fuel.  He smelled of fuel fumes and sweat and his uniform was soaked with it.  He'd never looked better to me. 

We kissed, a desperate meeting of salt-tinged mouths.  Two lovers who thought the other gone forever.  I could feel him, half hard against my belly already, but not in a sexual way.  He'd told me flying sometimes makes him hard- and I knew from experience that returning from a brush with death often had that effect on him as well.  It wasn't about lust.  It was about a need to affirm life.  He lifted his mouth from mine.  "Are you two all right?"  His hands slid over my belly protectively.

I threw myself in his arms and buried my face in his neck, suddenly unable to keep myself upright another moment without his support.  "I'm OK... but my water broke... Oh, Lach... I'm so scared... it's too soon...."  The words came tumbling out in a rush. 

"What?!"  He swore under his breath.  

"My water broke... the baby's coming."  

"Christ!"  He seemed to pale under his golden skin and his lips thinned.  "What the bloody hell are you doing in the middle of all this, girl?!  Have you no sense at all?"  He scooped me up in his strong arms and looked around, trying to decide if he wanted to take me to the overflowing hospital or back to our quarters.  I suddenly realized how affected I'd been by everything.  Making a list of the wounded when I should have been sending for the midwife?  What was I thinking to have done something so completely nuts?  I knew the answer, though.  I'd been thinking of him.  Trying to get through this the only way I could think to do it without going mad. 

I felt bad for leaning on him now.  He appears and I just crumble.  I should be the one supporting him.  He nearly died.  And yet, I couldn't be strong a single moment longer.  Not with him there to watch over me.  And I think maybe a part of him needed me to need him that way.  He was exhausted, that much was clear, but he needed to be my rock as much as I needed him to be that for me.  What else could he do for me now besides that?  He would feel useless if I took that from him.  And to be honest, I just needed to let him take over right then.  I felt it inside me.  Like the calm before the storm.  Like I knew I needed to gather myself for what was coming when it would be my turn to be strong for us both as I pushed our little baby into the world.   

Lach gave the hospital a disgusted look.  "I won't have you giving birth in that place."  He strode purposefully back to our room and deposited me gently inside.  "Stay here.  I'm going to get a doctor-"

I tugged on his arm.  "You can't... the wounded-"

His eyes glinted and he lifted his chin stubbornly.  "Bloody watch me."

"You can't, Lach.... there are so many wounded, people who need to be looked after right now..."  To say nothing of the fact that I wanted no part of the military's doctors.  I hardly think they'd take the time out for a non-critical patient now, anyway.  I touched his cheek gently.  "They're needed there to save lives, Lach... you know that..."

Tears of frustration sparkled in his eyes.  "And I need to be assured your life is safe...." his voice broke.  "I can't lose you, Blue... I can't.  Not you.... and not our baby."  He buried his face in my hair and held me tight.  "I can't lose all my babies...."  I felt his chest hitch on a sob and then he suddenly seemed to gather himself.  He pulled back and his eyes were steely and determined.  "I won't let anything happen to either of you.  I won't!" 

"Oh, Lach...."  I tried to comfort him but a strong contraction left me gasping for breath.  It hurt so much.  Seeing me in pain only wound him tighter.  I saw the hard set of his jaw and the anguish in his eyes that he could do nothing to help me.  I tried to breathe through it slowly, aware he was moments away from forcibly pulling nurses away from the wounded to tend to me.  I held his hand tightly, partly for support, partly to restrain him if he tried to bolt. 

It seemed strangely right, somehow.  He was my rock and I was his too, in a way.  The voice of reason, calming him.  Giving him a moment to regroup.  A breather.  He needed to switch mental gears.  A few minutes ago he was engaged in a dogfight.  Now he was about to be engaged in a very different sort of fight for life.  But pilots are notorious for their quick thinking in moments of extreme duress.  The contraction passed and he eased me back on the bed, telling me he was going to go get the midwife. 

I thought that sounded like the best idea I'd ever heard.

LACHLAN

There was a knock at our door before I even had her settled on the bed.  I swore.  "Bugger off!" 

A barrage of heated Italian followed.  It was a wonder it didn't bloody peel the paint from the door, but I was never more glad to hear it.  I opened the door to reveal Signora Gallatti, the midwife, who somehow seemed to know we'd be needing her.  Thank you, God.  She listened to me as I related what I knew, but her eyes were on Heather, bright and sharp.  She tensed as another contraction tightened her belly into knots but Signora Gallatti just nodded, seeming to expect all she was seeing and hearing.

I suppose this was hardly the first birth she'd attended that was sparked off by a stressful situation- but it was the first one for us.  I knew I needed to be strong for Heather, but I could hardly keep my wits about me.  I'd just seen four of my good mates blown out of the sky and had taken a few lives myself in the space of the last few hours.... to say nothing of the icy terror that had gripped my heart when the news the base was under bombardment cracked over my radio. 

Somehow, we both made it through... but to find her in labor was almost more than I could process on the heels of all that.  And somewhere in the back of my mind was the knowledge I had precious few hours before I'd be called back to duty.  As soon as we'd had a kip and the planes had been repaired, refueled and reloaded, we'd be off after the squadron that had done this before they got too far out of range.  Jesus.  I needed a drink. 

I hate this helpless feeling.  I translated as best as I could between them but the truth is, I was glad when Signora Gallatti ordered me from the room so she could check the baby's progress.  The idea of being in the room while she had her gnarled old hands up Heather's skirt made me uncomfortable.  I felt Heather's eyes on me as I left, but I needed a few minutes to have a good think.  Or maybe not to think.  I dunno. 

I threw myself down in the chair outside our door and lit up before I tilted it back on two legs to lean against the wall, pulling my flask from my pocket as I did so.  I took a healthy swallow and then another, welcoming the warm burn.  A few minutes later, I was called back inside.  I was more nervous and apprehensive than when I climb into the cockpit.  At least there I have some control over what happens. 

I'm not really sure what I expected to find.  Heather in bed?  Signora Gallatti boiling water?  What I know about childbirth could fit in a thimble with room left over.  I sure wasn't prepared to come back in only to find Signora Gallatti gathering her things to leave and my girl wrapped in her blue shawl, resting quietly in the rocking chair I'd scrounged up for her.  Had the world gone mad?  Didn't they know she was having a baby?  My baby?  Right the bloody hell now?!

I had a brief conversation with Signora Gallatti.  She would be back in a while to check on Heather's progress.  She was needed in the village to help take care of the wounded there and she said it would be hours still before the baby came.  She told us both to get some rest and then she left.  She actually left!  I damn near dragged a doctor back for a second opinion but a few soft words from Heather brought me up short.

She watched me pace back and forth before the little window.  "What do you see out there, Lach?"

She rocked in the chair as I looked out at the base through the cracked pane of glass.  I saw death and destruction and people clinging tenaciously to life.  I censored my answer for her.  She didn't need talk of blood and gore now.  "I see a whole bunch of people rushing around, love."  I finally offered.

"Imagine them all....."  I turned to look at her, impatient and unsure about what she was trying to impart.  "Everyone single one of them started off life with a moment like this."  She stroked her belly gently.  I suddenly wondered who was trying to be strong for who here.  "Think of all of them, Lach... if all of their moms could do it... I can too."  I wasn't sure whether she was trying to bolster my spirits or her own- but I understood her point.  Childbirth scared the crap out of me but I suppose it's a natural process.  Think of all the people who have ever lived?  She's right.  All of them, every last one, started out as little babies pushed into the world by their mums. 

I knelt by her and kissed her softly.  "Yeah, Blue... but only one of them is my girl.... and only one is my little baby's Mum."  She sighed softly and we shared a quiet moment together.  I could feel that desperate franticness draining away, could feel us both begin to drift into a slower rhythm as we got more used to the idea that this was really happening right now, and also more familiar with how it felt.  Reckon it's a bit like an aerial engagement.  Flaming well scares the pants off you 'till you're in the thick of it... and then you just do what you need to do and suddenly, it's not so scary anymore.     

It was this golden moment I'd never even imagined ever having.  Our child was on the brink of being born and I wasn't frantic.  I was worried and I knew that later, when she was in the thick of it herself, that I'd be a nervous wreck, but somehow, we were granted a few hours of peace at the most unlikely time possible. 

HEATHER

It seemed so strange to have those few quiet hours with Lach after the chaos of the morning.  The world outside faded away, and if it wasn't for the contractions that were slowly becoming stronger and closer together, I almost could have imagined we were just sharing a peaceful day together at home.

On the surface, everything seemed so mundane.  We shared a pot of tea.  I rocked in the chair and watched Lach take a pan bath.... but under it all moved deeper, more serious things.  He wouldn't let me get up to help him, but I noticed he was too exhausted to even heat any water for himself.  He just dumped it in cold and wet the washcloth in the tepid water.  Watching another person bathe is so intimate, seeing how they touch and groom themselves, but never more so than it was that morning.

He wasn't shy about his scars with me anymore.  He unzipped his flight suit and pulled his arms out, letting it hang from his waist while he reached up and removed his soiled undershirt.  He bent at the waist and splashed his face with the cool water, sighing softly as he rinsed the sooty grime from his skin.  He soaped the small rag and washed his face and then his underarms.  I saw gooseflesh rise on him as the cold rag made contact with the warm sensitive skin under his arms.

He washed perfunctorily, rinsing out the rag and setting it aside as he bent to remove his boots and the rest of his clothing.  He soaped his chest and between his legs, gently stroking the rag over the heavy droop of his genitals.  His arms fell away.  For long minutes he simply stood there, eyes closed, head bent.  Exhaustion was etched across every sinew and fiber of his body.  Putting the pan on the floor, he washed his feet last, sighing again as he dipped them in the cool water to rinse away the last of the soap. 

I watched it all, an intimate scene so familiar to me now and yet I committed it all to memory as if I was seeing it for the first time.  The way his hands moved with such familiarity over his body.  The sight of his lucky penny hanging with his dogtags over his heart.  The way he no longer shied away from revealing his scars.  The way the fingers of his free hand rubbed absently at that scruffy line of golden-brown hair below his navel before he took his penis in hand.  I smiled at how he lingered there just a bit.  Lachlan is a very sensual man.  He likes touch, his own included. 

I rose and brought him a small towel.  He protested a little but when I whispered to him and pressed a kiss over his heart, he let me gently dry him.  I fetched his clothes.  He put on fresh socks and underwear, but pulled a face at rest.  He prefers to sleep naked.  I was lucky he'd consented to wearing that much.  He probably only did because he didn't want Signora Gallatti to cop a view of his good bits when she came back.  I sat him down and gave him some food and another cup of tea, heavily laced with sugar and a splash of whiskey from his flask.

We didn't talk much about what had happened.  We often don't when he returns from a sortie.  He can chatter like a jay, but when it comes to things that touch him deeply, he has a hard time expressing himself in words.  Usually we just go to bed and hold each other or make love.

This time when we crawled into bed together, he wanted to talk about the baby.  He spooned up behind me and wrapped his arms around my middle.  The gentle pressure felt good and I slowly began to relax.  He wanted to know how I was doing.  What it felt like.  If I was scared.  We spent precious minutes talking, reassuring each other and ourselves too, I think.   

Lach tried to fight sleep at first, wanting to experience every minute of it with me but I knew he needed to rest and I was tired too.  He made me promise to wake him if something happened but he finally succumbed as I stroked him gently, soothing him as he soothed me with his presence.  The simple fact that he did sleep told me everything I needed to know.  He wouldn't have slept at all unless he knew he was flying tonight.  I knew he needed the rest.  If he wasn't fresh, his reflexes would be too slow and he'd be killed... and yet it seemed so sad that we couldn't even share the whole experience of bringing this child into the world together because of this war and the terrible toll it exacted from us both. 

I cried then, soft silent tears as he slept.  I knew a woman's first labor often took hours and hours.  What if he had to leave before our baby was born?  What if he was killed?  What if he never got to hold our baby?  What if I never saw him again?  I was a wreck.  The trauma of the morning finally caught up with me and I cried myself to sleep, snug and safe in his arms.

I drifted in and out most of the day but sharp stabbing pains woke me shortly before sunset.  I let Lach sleep and got up.  I made some tea but couldn't drink it.  Mostly I just walked, alternately rubbing my back and rocking in my chair as I watched my Selkie Man's slow, even breathing.  He looked so peaceful, like a boy with his hair rucked up and his foot hanging out over the end of the bed.  My pacing woke him a little while later.  I felt bad for disturbing him but was glad in a way too.  I needed his strength.  He took one look at my face and threw on his pants.  This time, I didn't argue with him when he said he was going to go fetch Signora Gallatti. 

He was lacing up his boots when I heard her outside the door.  I'm not even sure Lach's feet touched the ground as he scrambled to the door and opened it.  She gave his shirtless chest an appreciative look, she is still a woman, after all.... but she tutted at us both when she saw my pinched face.  I wanted Lach to stay but Signora Gallatti wouldn't hear of it.  She was immovable. 

He goes or I do! 

It was a sentence that needed no translation.  Lachlan seemed torn between wanting to help me and wanting to escape.  He is not a modern man and though he was willing to stay with me, the very idea of being present at a birth made him uncomfortable.  He kissed me softly and tucked his lucky penny into my palm as he whispered a soft 'I love you' into my ear.  I whispered back 'ever and always'... and then Signora Gallatti was clapping her hands at us and driving him out as she soundly shut the door and rounded on me with a purposeful gleam in her dark eyes. 

We had work to do and it was time for me to get down to it.  

LACHLAN

Bloody big lump of nothing is what I was.  I cannot abide idle waiting, nor that feeling of helplessness.  I couldn't do a blessed thing for her.  Don't suppose I'd have been allowed to even if I could have done something anyway.  Soon after I was expelled from our room, I was drafted into service, handed a shovel and ordered to help fill in the craters that had been blown into the runway.  Common practice.  I should have expected it and the simple fact that I didn't showed me how off my stride I really was.  I was still exhausted but the physical labor felt good.  Monotonous.  Something to keep my hands busy.

Too bad it couldn't numb my mind as well.  All I could think about was her.  My girl.  Every shovel full of dirt that I moved seemed to be this timer ticking down.  Like I was moving the sand in my own hourglass.  What if I had to leave her before she pushed our baby into the world?  What if something happened to her? Or to our child?  Christ, what if something happened to me tonight and I didn't make it back to them?

I'd made the arrangements, of course.  Just in case.  What responsible father wouldn't?  I'd already written home that I'd 'married' and had a child on the way.  The war wouldn't last forever.  I had visions of us raising a little son or daughter back home in Cloncurry.  And if I didn't make it, my family would take her in.  She was as much a Curry as any of them.  She would be looked after... they both would.... but the thought of our little baby taking its first steps on that red dirt back home without me there.... God, it just killed me. 

"Jesus Christ, Curry!"  The gravelly voice of my CO rang out loudly.  I kept on shoveling.  "Who the bloody hell put one of my best pilots on the line?"  He ripped into the shitbird Major who'd ordered me to shovel dirt when by all rights; I should still have been sleeping.  Wouldn't be the first time I'd shoveled dirt before a flight, but when a ranking officer gives you and order, you do it... even if he is an arsewipe. 

"Put down that goddamn shovel, Curry!"  I handed it off to the sorry bastard who'd been ordered to replace me.  The holes still had to be filled, after all.  Takeoff does tend to work a hell of a lot better when the ground doesn't swallow up your plane.  My CO stepped closer and lowered his voice.  "I hear your family's about to increase by one.  Beckett says Gallatti's with your wife now.  That true?"  I nodded and he gave me a hard look.  "You all right, mate?" 

Fuck, no I wasn't all right.  I looked away but nodded again.  "Yes, Sir."  He harrumphed and clapped his hand on my shoulder, leading me away from the flightline. 

"I ever tell you I have three kids, Curry?"  I shook my head.  A smile cracked his grizzled old face.  "Two boys and a girl.... Apple of my eye, she is.... 'bout to make me a granddad."  His smile softened but then he pulled up short.  He was letting me know he understood my concerns... but he was still my CO, too.  We would never be good mates. 

He offered me a smoke.  I took it gratefully.  My hands were stiff and blistered from the shoveling.  It took three flicks on my lighter before I could get the bloody thing lit.  I took a deep drag, savoring the rich flavor of the tobacco and blew a stream of smoke out into the twilight.  Neither of us said anything.  Finally, he finished his fag and ground out the butt under the heel of his boot.  "You're a lucky bastard, Curry.  Tonight's rotation has Blue Flight and Green Flight up first."  He tucked another smoke between his lips but didn't offer me one.  "I'll give you what time I can, son, but Red Flight will fly tonight, you included... make no mistake about that."  He flicked his lighter and ignored my quiet thanks.  "And if I see you back on my airstrip tonight before you're called, I'll put you in the next plane leaving this rock, you got me?"  He tossed me his packet of smokes. 

"Yes, Sir!  Thank you, Sir."  

"Good. Now get out of here."  I pocketed the fags and left while the going was good.  

Found myself back in that chair outside our room, tilted back on two legs as I stared up at the night sky.  It was the best- and worst- place I could have been.  I was glad to be back at her side (or very nearly) but now I was close enough to hear her soft cries of pain.  God, how they ripped at my insides.  I'd have borne every last one of them for her if I could... and yet I was helpless.  Back to being a big lump... good for nothing but holding up the bloody wall outside our quarters. 

I raked a hand through my hair.  Fidgeted.  Smoked.  Prayed.  Paced for a while only to throw myself back down in the chair.  I don't know how long I sat and listened to her soft cries grow louder and more frequent.  And then I heard something that made my blood run cold.  Her voice.  Crying out for me.  My name called out desperately, in fear not pain.  I'd damn well listened to it long enough to tell the difference.  I was out of that chair like a shot.

Nothing would keep me from her.  Nothing.  I was prepared to break the door down if I had to and then I realized it was my own fucking room.  Stupid.  I just turned the knob and went in.  Everything seemed to hit me at once.  Heather was on the bed, nude, legs spread.  She cried my name and reached her arms out to me the second she saw me.  Signora Gallatti spouted off at me in Italian for invading the room at such a delicate time. 

Too fucking bad.  

Her sharp rebuke fell on deaf ears as I gathered my girl into my arms.  My first instinct was to protect her- and my second was to cover her with a sheet.  Strange, I know, but that's how I felt.  She seemed unaware of her nudity and my discomfort.  She was beyond terrified.  Both women bombarded me at once, talking over each other. 

"I'm so scared, Lach!  I think the baby's too big.... She has a knife... don't let her cut me... don't let her cut me..." 

Signora Gallatti's voice was measured and calm where Heather's was frantic.  The knife was only a last resort... which they were approaching, but hadn't quite reached.  Not yet- but soon.  The baby was big and she was having a hard time pushing but Signora Gallatti felt there was still a chance it might not be needed, but only if Heather could focus and push and she was too scared to do that right now.  I could understand that.  How would I feel if I was in agony, naked on my back with my legs spread- and then someone flashed a knife and told me in a language I didn't understand that they might have to stick it up my arse and cut me before it was all said and done?  No fucking wonder she was panicking. 

The thought of a blade slicing into my girl, especially there, between her legs were she should only have the softest of touches, churned my guts- but I was prepared to let it happen if it would save their lives.  Just like flying, mate.  Dogfights scare the piss out of you 'till you're in the middle of them, doing what you know has to be done.  I made a decision.

"Blue... Blue, listen to me."  I stroked her face, soothing her.    

"It hurts, Lach... it hurts so much...."  

"Shh... I know it does.... you have to listen to me, love.  Don't fight her.  She's here to help you.  She says you need to push the baby out now."

"The knife-"

"Is only a last resort, Blue.... but you can't fuck about any longer."  Saw a spark of heat in her eyes at that.  Good.  Now I had her attention.  "You have to do this now, girl."

"I'm scared."

"I know you are, love."  I pressed a kiss to her temple.  "I am too....."  I bent to whisper in her ear, private words just for her.  I couldn't lose her.  I couldn't lose another child.  It would kill me.  "You need to do this right now." 

She nodded and her gaze grew more focused as her hand found mine.  I winced as the sweat on her palm made my open weeping blisters sting but I somehow managed to ignore the blinding pain.  It was a pittance next to what she was feeling.  "Lach-"

I knew what she needed.  "I won't leave you, Blue."  I squeezed her hand, biting back the hiss of pain.  "We're in this together... you and me, love... for ever and always, hey?"

At my words she seemed to... settle.  To find her own place in the dogfight.  And though Signora Gallatti seemed uncomfortable with my presence, even she couldn't argue with the positive effect it had on Heather.  For all the awkwardness, it seemed right somehow.  We'd made this baby together.  We'd chosen to be banished together.  And now we were going to welcome this new life into the world... together. 

Those minutes, though harrowing, comprised the most golden moments of my life.  Heather drew on some well of feminine strength I'd never seen before.  Her frantic fear disappeared and was replaced by that quiet stillness that had first attracted me to her.  I was still uncomfortable sharing this most intimate moment with another person looking on, but some higher power seemed to be whispering into my ear to not let anyone else dictate to us how this experience should be between us.  They might very well be the last moments we ever had together.

Giving into that was the easiest- and the hardest- thing I've ever done.    

I felt a blush rise but I looked upon her anyway, not just her face as I'd done when I'd first walked in, but the rest of her as well.  She was so beautiful to me, and as always, seeing the heavy swell of her belly made me think of the incredible act of love that had led to our baby's conception.  What was happening now almost seemed an echo of that moment, her legs bent and spread, her naked sex bared to me, her body sweaty and straining as she moaned softly. 

I was unprepared for the eroticism of it.... though in some strange way, it made perfect sense.  This was the culmination of an act of sexual love.  I wasn't aroused, but I felt as close to her now as I did in that moment inside the portal when our bodies came together in love and we made a life.  This was that same intimacy, just expressed differently.   

Staring in absolute wonder, I watched as she pushed hard and then put a hand between her legs.  Her smile was so soft.  "Lach, the head... I can feel it...."  Her eyes met mine and I felt this indescribable feeling flood my body.  In that moment, she seemed to me to be everything a woman was... feminine, fragile, sensual, nurturing, powerful... it was bloody amazing.  And then it hit me.  Washed over me in waves.   

Clarity.

This feeling like you finally, finally get it.  It made me think of Mayflies.  Life is so very short.  They have their wings only a single day.  They reproduce and then they die.  Imagine those poor bastards who are afraid to fly?  In that moment, I realized that we'd both taken to the air.  Her wings were as beautiful as mine and if something happened and we didn't make it?  Well, it was all worth it to have this one golden afternoon flying together in the sun.

My hand joined hers between her legs.  Signora Gallatti tutted disapprovingly but one hard look from me shut her up.  I would not be one of those Mayflies who died without experiencing the full measure of the wind, who never touched all of what life had to offer.  I touched the beautiful whorls of her sex.  Felt her tenderness.  Felt our little baby's head.  I stroked them both gently, wanting to give them both what comfort and support that I could.  Wanting to ease them both.  My touch helped relax her, helped open her.  No knives were necessary. 

The first touches our little baby knew were from Mum and Dad.  How could that ever be wrong?  I didn't take my hand from between her legs the entire time.  I probably did everything wrong but I was determined that this birth would be as much an act of love as the conception had been.  I remember that I talked to her the whole way through, but I have absolutely no idea what I said. 

She squeezed my other hand in hers and pushed with every fiber of her body.  Our baby slipped into the world with a lusty cry.  I cried.  She cried out too, in pain and love, slumping back, spent and shaky but already reaching for our baby.  For our little son. 

A boy.

"My baby... my baby... Look at him, Lach... our little baby..." She crooned to him, to us both.  Her boys, she said.  My family, I said.  She rocked him, holding him against her naked breast, weeping openly.  It was like breathing joy.   

He was so perfect.  Little fingers and little toes and a little willy as perfect and beautiful as the rest of him.  Signora Gallatti checked him over and then busied herself cutting the cord before she took him to clean him up.  I wanted to shout a hundred things that there weren't even words to express.  My mouth opened and shut.  Heather reached for me.  We kissed deeply, softly... giving to each other in that moment all the words we would ever need.  Moments later, Signora Gallatti delivered to us our little boy, wrapped snugly in the blue shawl I'd bought. 

I laughed as the first thing Heather did was unwrap him.  Neither of us paid much attention as Signora Gallatti did whatever it is midwives do between a woman's legs after she gives birth.  Both of us were enraptured by our child.  Heather gave a few more pushes and one sharp cry that frightened me but it passed quickly and then Signora Gallatti was excusing herself and saying how she would return in a little bit.  I think I kissed her.  I can't really remember.  All I can remember was how it felt to hold my girl and our little baby in my arms.  A family. 

My family. 

How did my father ever bear losing Angus?  I will never know.  I simply couldn't stop looking at him.  Heather and I spoke quietly, words I cannot begin to bring myself to share.  We marveled over his thick brown curls, over the perfect arch of his little eyebrows, over his wide gray eyes that were fringed by long dark lashes.  She sighed so softly as he rooted at her breast and finally latched on to her nipple.

It was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen.  I stroked his soft plump cheek with my fingertip, helping her cradle his tiny head against her breast.  We watched, fascinated by the soft suckling and the way his little lips pursed.  And for that precious, precious hour we had together, Heather and I were two Mayflies who never, ever touched the earth. 

I took him from her gently when he was finished.  There was a drop of fluid clinging to her nipple.  Cradling my son in my arms, I bent and caught it on my tongue.  It tasted sweet.  I drew her nipple into my mouth and suckled, just once, as my little son had done, sighing as her sweetness bloomed over my tongue.  I kissed her afterwards.  Deeply.  If the Piper took me tonight, I would go knowing what it was like to share that intimacy with her.  Her pale, wan face flushed prettily but she didn't stop me.  She curled her fingers into the hair at my nape and stroked me lightly, an echo of the way she held our small son to her breast. 

Our son stared at us with wide slate-colored eyes.  We stared back.  "Hello, little mate..."  I put my finger in his fist and his tiny fingers grabbed hold.  I smiled.  "I'm your Dad and that's your Mum and we're so glad to meet you."  I kissed his little head softly.  "Quite an entrance you made, my boy.... gave us both something of a fright." 

Heather was smiling but tears there were leaking from her eyes.  She sniffed, laughing through her tears, and touched his little feet.  "I don't blame you, little man.... I wouldn't have wanted to hang around in that shelling either....." Her voice got a little choked up.  "Your Dad's really brave though...."  She looked from him to me and our eyes met.  "He saved us both."

My eyes misted over and I looked back at my son before I started crying again.  "Don't you listen to her, mate..... it was you and her who saved me."  The words were for her but I couldn't look at her and say them.  "You just remember that, no matter what."  I heard her sniffle and felt her arms come around me but I didn't stop playing with him.  I simply couldn't stop touching him.  He was so perfect.  So tiny.  A whole real person- just in miniature.  I touched his little nose and ran my fingers down his chubby arms.  Smiled as he wiggled when I touched his full little tummy.  I touched his little willy and his fat little legs, marveling at how tiny his foot was in my palm.  He kicked and I winced as he connected with one of my blisters. 

I heard Heather gasp.  "Oh, Lach... your hands...."

"It's nothing."  I pulled them back and turned them palm down, trying to keep them from her but she was having none of it.

"What happened to your hands?"

I shrugged and grinned.  "Bloody plane bit me again, gorgeous."  Standard excuse.  I wouldn't have her worrying any more for me than she already does.  I pushed her dark hair back from her pretty face and kissed her.  "Never you mind about me, love."

"I always 'mind' about you, Lach."  Her voice was so soft.  

"I know you do."  I took our fine hale son into my arms.  "Now for your name, mate..."  Heather smiled.  "It's a good job you look like a Tristan..... cause that's the only name either of us fancied for a boy...."  It's a good Celtic name.  Fitting name for the son of a Selkie and a little Scotch flower, hey?  Doubly fitting because it means tumult, outcry.  We reckoned he was sure to cause one no matter what we did or who we told.  I had a laugh over it, thinking he'd started with one right off the bat, coming early as he did. 

"What's so funny?"

I told her and she laughed too.  She laughed even harder when the little bugger wet on me.  For such a tiny baby, he sure did make a big wet spot.  It was this crazy silly moment in the middle of a night you just couldn't believe unless you'd lived it.  I handed him back over and stripped off.  Couldn't resist holding him against my naked chest before I redressed.  Best hug I'd ever had.  I fetched one of my shirts for her, too.  She wanted a bit of cover now but left the front open so she could nurse.  She held him.  I held her.  And that's how they found us a few minutes later when Signora Gallatti came to look after them both while I returned to duty.   

HEATHER

Saying goodbye to Lach that night was like tearing out my heart.  Confined to the bed, I couldn't even help him dress, as is our usual ritual.  That feeling of uneasiness grew, even as I was drowning in the indescribable joy of finally getting to hold our little baby against my breast. 

We did not share a long goodbye.  What could possibly be said after what we'd just experienced together?  Nothing could eclipse that moment.  Nothing. 

In the background, I was aware of the others.  Signora Gallatti was accompanied by Vivian Hewitt, the wife of Lach's CO.  Her friends called her Vivi.  I'd only ever called her Mrs. Hewitt.  They busied themselves making tea, giving us what privacy they could in such small quarters so we could say our goodbyes. 

It was very soft.  I hurt so much but was afraid to let Lach know, afraid worry over me would dull the combat edge I knew he needed to survive.  I tried to give him back his lucky penny but he tucked it into Tristan's blanket instead and then kissed him before he kissed me.  He cocked his head and grinned.  "I miss your tummy already, love."  There were tears in his eyes.  He touched the little snowflake charm on my bracelet and then my ring.  I touched his.  We said only one thing to each other in that moment.

Ever and always.

In this life or the next.

It went unsaid but not unheard.  He touched us both one last time, smiled, and then walked away without ever looking back.  His dangerous calm frightened me.  It reminded me of Scottie that day..... but I hurt too terribly to do anything more than slump back against the pillows the moment the door had closed.  I felt like I wanted to curl up into a ball and rock but I was too weak and cold.  Both of the women eyed me with deep concern. 

They asked me a bunch of questions.  Answering them sapped what was left of my energy.  Signora Gallatti's face was pinched as she handed Tristan off to Vivian and uncovered me, lifting my legs up and out.  When my position changed, I felt a gush of liquid trickle from me.  Signora Gallatti's back stiffened and Vivian's face turned white.  Her lips thinned into a hard line.  They had a rapid conversation in Italian that was much too fast for me to follow. 

I think I knew though.  I'd felt something give way inside me when I delivered the afterbirth.  Vivian translated but there really wasn't any need.  Do you ever just know something?  I mean know it down so deep you never even question it?  I think I knew at the Temple what making the choice to follow Lachlan would cost.  I knew again when I made the decision to stay with him here on La Maddalena rather than be flown to the larger, more equipped hospital on Sardinia. 

Something inside me was bleeding and they couldn't stop it.  Even if the doctors here could save me, none were free.  They were still working to save the lives of the men and women injured in this morning's bombing raid.  I was afraid.  I didn't want to die.  I wanted to live, to have a lifetime with Lach, loving each other and raising a family together... but in my head, I heard Terry's words.

There's always a price, lassie.

Always a price.  But I didn't just roll over and give up without a fight.  I'm too stubborn for that, even if I felt like I already knew what was coming.  Signora Gallatti and Vivian worked so hard.  They tried everything.  Pressure.  Gauze packed between my legs.  A bitter herbal tea... and on and on.  But Signora Gallatti was a midwife, not a surgeon.  I stopped them after nearly an hour.  I was sleepy and cold.  I wanted to hold my baby. 

I watched the two of them talk.  It was interesting.  The head of the village woman and the head of the military women.... two people who usually clashed had found themselves working side by side.  I could see the grudging respect they had for each other as they worked to stop the bleeding.  It was like one of those moments when you realize you're simply a small part of something much larger.  I rocked Tristan and nursed him while they spoke in low tones.  Vivian translated for me afterwards.  Signora Gallatti had a tea that could ease my passing but it would make me sleep.  I shook my head.  I wouldn't give up any of the precious minutes I had left with my baby.

It wasn't dramatic.  It was actually very quiet.  Signora Gallatti gathered her herbs and left after assuring me she would find a wet nurse for Tristan.  Vivian stayed behind.  Watching her rock in my chair, I realized she was sitting with me the way I'd sat with those boys in the hospital.  Death watch.  I suddenly remembered Thomas O'Leary's letter.  Vivian took it from my skirt pocket and promised that she'd see that it was posted for me. 

Speaking about that letter was like this bridge between us.  A bond born of shared experiences and motherhood.  Sisters in pain and joy.  Another moment where I realized I was a part of something so much larger.  I was now numbered among those who and suffered to bring forth life.  It allowed me to open my heart to her in a way I could not have done before.

I spoke to her of Lachlan... of how to help him through my passing and also of silly little memories that I wanted someone to know so they'd be remembered... after.  I took off my bracelet and my ring and gave them to her to keep for Lach.  Bits of precious metal that carried memories that were even more precious.  We spoke of Cloncurry and Lach's family back home.  I could see them in my mind.  Lach watching Tristan grow, showing him how to be a good man.  He couldn't have a better teacher.

Vivian took my sweet little baby when I couldn't hold him anymore.  I made her swear if something happened to Lach that she'd find a way to get Tristan home to Cloncurry.  And if by some miracle Lach made it through tonight.... I made her promise to give him something for me.  A letter.  I'd written it the first night I'd spent alone in this bed while he was flying.  I think I always knew what the price would be for the choice I'd made.  Security or love.  I'd chosen to follow my heart.  I'd chosen Lachlan.  Though the pain of leaving him was overwhelming... it was but a drop in the bucket next to the joy I'd found in our brief time together.  And if I had it all to do over again, I wouldn't change a single thing.      

A strange peace seemed to envelop me.  I was so cold.  It would be very soon now.  I closed my eyes.  In my head, I saw our little son, swaddled in my shawl.  It made me smile.  Like father, like son.  Both my boys wrapped up in delirious burning blue. 

It was time.  I drew in a breath, reached out my hand... and touched the face of God.  

LACHLAN

Bogeys all over the sky.  Black water under us.  The scirocco blowing like a bitch.  I grit my teeth and rolled her hard to starboard.  Cursed as two more Jerries came around on my tail.

To my left, I heard my wingman open up.  Heard the fifties start pumping.  Bap.  Bap.  Bap.  My own plane was vibrating as I fired on my target while trying to keep my arse from being fired upon.  Eyes on the bogey.  Hand on the stick.  Ear attuned to the com chatter. 

"Bogeys on your six, Red Four."  

No shit.  "Copy that, Red Leader."  I banked steeply trying to shake them off my tail.  No luck.

"Watch out!  Here they come!"

"Two diving low."

"Take them, Red Two."

"One bandit, eight o'clock.... I'm on him...."

A ball of fire erupted off to my left.  "Scratch one!  Got the bastard!"

Ping.  Ping.  PingPingPing.  FUCK!  Bullets tore through my plane.  "I'm hit!"  Did a quick damage assessment.  Fucking lucky is what I am.  The bullets had passed straight through the fuselage.  "No worries.... just a scratch."

"Here they come again.  One o'clock low...."

"Move your tail, Red Four."

I moved it, but not fast enough.  Squeezed off a shot and blew one of the Jerries from the sky even as another bogey's bullets ripped into me.  "Scratch two."  I rolled her hard and saw smoke.  Shit.  "Hit again."

"Red Four- flames shooting out of your cowling.  Looks bad."

"Watch it!  Another on your six-"  More bullets.  That's how it goes.  Take one hit and then you're too slow to dodge the rest.  Adrenaline spiked. 

Come on... come on!  Move!!  She was sluggish.  Losing oil pressure.  I was sluggish.  Exhausted from the events of the past twenty-four hours.  Another spray of bullets.  This time, one skipped off a piece of metal and ricocheted around the cockpit like an angry bee.  Nothing to do for that but keep on doing what you're doing and hope it doesn't hit you.  You start ducking and you're liable to move into its path.  Fucker clipped me in the calf.  I though to myself... another scar for her to kiss better.  Stupid thoughts that come to you in moments like that.

Losing altitude now.  Fuck!  Tried to send a message but the radio had gone cold and dark.  I wasn't finished yet, though.  This Mayfly might be falling to earth but I put a few more rounds into the enemy on my way down.  Took another spray of bullets.  And then another.  This time there were two ricochets.  The first cracked the canopy.  The second lodged in my chest.  I coughed and tasted blood.  I could hear the whistle of the wind.  The black water was rushing up. 

I thought of the last time I'd plunged to earth, knowing that this was it.

I was a ton of flaming wreckage falling from the sky. I knew I was going to die.  And you know what?  I didn't see my life pass before my eyes.  I felt no burning desire to live, to grasp at life, to cling to my final moments like a drowning man fights for air.  I was lover to a dead woman and to a woman who was dead to me, and father to two dead children.  No, I didn't feel any more desire to fight.  I felt only acceptance and peace.  Finally, thank God.  Take me home.  No more shadows.  Just light.

This time it was different.  I wanted to live.  I wanted to hold my family again.  And this time, I saw a string of golden moments.  Saw Angus in his uniform.  Saw Lil on her tractor.  Saw Uma in Paris.  Saw Heather in Manila.... in Oz.... in Italy.  Saw her sweet smile when I gave her the bracelet.  Saw her with snow on her lashes when we made Tristan.  Saw her beautiful round belly as we splashed in the ocean on holiday.  Saw her naked and straining to push our son into the world.  Saw her cradling his little head to her breast.  Time seemed to flash forward.  I saw her raising him on the red dirt of Cloncurry....

I tasted her sweetness on my lips.  Heard her words in my ears.  Felt her peace in my soul.

Did I want more time?  You bet your boots I did.  But I was willing to pay the price.  To give up my life to have the golden moments that made it all worthwhile.  Dea can never take that from me.  I might have just been a Mayfly, but what a bloody good flight it was.  For all Her power, it is the nobility of the human spirit that raises us in our golden moments from an animal response to something truly divine.  A God can never know that because they are already immortal.  Reckon that's a bit like making Gods of men, now isn't it? 

They will never be a Mayfly, falling back to earth after the flight of a lifetime.  They will never know the ultimate test.  Are you brave enough to fly?  To let the wind - and life - take you where it will from one moment to the next?  And when all is said and done, do you have courage enough to glide back to earth with grace?            

I felt a strange peace envelop me.  The black water rushed up faster and faster.  It would be very soon now.  I closed my eyes and saw my family.  It made me smile.  Do Mayflies ever thank their Creator for their brief flight?  I did.  And then I twisted the ring on my finger one last time, reached out my hand... and touched the face of God.