Wrapped up in their own work and conversations, the pair were completely unaware of Max Thorne’s presence by the pillbox below them, nor had they heard the approach of Eileen’s car over the sound of the generator as they’d worked on the tower’s roof. It was after they’d completed their work and finally exited the fortress at ground level, engaged in an intriguing discussion regarding the assassination of an American president named Kennedy, that Trumbull first noticed Donelson running back up the hill from the direction of the pill box, Max Thorne behind her and closing as he called out her name.
“Well, they’re usually the other way around…” Trumbull observed: the sight of Thorne running after having made some joke at Eileen’s expense and incurring her wrath had been a relatively common sight about the base, but the situation was reversed here, and things just didn’t look ‘right’. There was still a reasonable amount of daylight left that evening, and even from a distance it was apparent she was crying.
“Looks like a problem, sir,” Lloyd observed quietly, also noting the tears and a little apprehensive as the pair halted by the flatbed Ford.
“Yes,” Trumbull agreed slowly as the officer within him took over. “You just wait here, corporal… I’ll find out what on earth’s going on…”
Donelson’s boots were more easily adapted to running on grass than Thorne’s slick-soled dress shoes, and she could easily have outrun him in a fair race, but her heart wasn’t in it and determination was on his side. He finally caught her a few metres from her car, grabbing her by the upper arm and able to turn her around without too much effort.
“Eileen, I’m sorry,” he began, breathing heavily. “I shouldn’t have…” He was prevented from saying anything more as she threw her right fist across in a roundhouse punch, striking him squarely on the jaw. He was more shocked by the fact that she’d hit him than by the actual impact, although it was nevertheless powerful enough to knock him backward and sit him squarely on his backside.
“Fuckin’ leave me alone!” Eileen snarled angrily, turning away from him again and climbing into the Austin sedan without looking back. This time he decided against going after her, preferring to sit for a while and contemplate the bruise he knew would rise on the left side of his chin. He dabbed gingerly at his offended jaw with one hand and found a smear of blood where the decorative ring Eileen wore on her middle finger had left a small cut beside his mouth.
“Fancy talking about it, Old Man?” Alec Trumbull asked, standing a metre away with hands on his hips as the car powered away along the track in a spray of earth and gravel. “I’d have asked Eileen, but she didn’t seem likely to stop for a chat.”
“I don’t doubt it,” Thorne said sourly, shaking his head.
“Was this something to do with what happened yesterday? I’d hate to think that was a disagreement over professional matters.”
“It wasn’t,” Thorne reassured as he slowly dragged himself from the dewy grass, the seat of his trousers soaked through, as was the rear of the great coat. “That was a purely personal matter, and if there was one thing I did deserve, it was a smack in the mouth!”
“You were acting less than a gentleman?” Trumbull tried to lighten the situation a little, noting the unusual severity of the Australian’s expression. “I find that difficult to believe, of course…”
“I was acting like a complete arsehole!” Thorne growled, fixing the man with a stare that was far angrier over his own actions than anything else. “And you can believe that!” He shook his head. “I really don’t want to go into the details, and you probably don’t want to hear them, anyway.”
“Possibly,” Trumbull agreed slowly, nodding. “I hope it was nothing serious between the two of you,” he ventured, immediately thinking the statement stupid; any altercation such as that could hardly be considered minor between friends.
“Well, I sort of struck her on a raw nerve.” Thorne shook his head sadly this time as he walked over toward the tower, Trumbull in tow. “We’ve known each other now for over ten years, and I thought she’d gotten over it a long time ago…”
“Over what…?”
“Being in love with me,” Thorne answered softly in a matter-of-fact tone that surprised the squadron leader. “I met her as she was about to graduate, while I was doing some lecture work for the Royal Navy Academy at Dartmouth.” Thorne was suddenly and rather unusually gripped by a great need to talk about serious personal matters. “We became good friends and we went out a couple of times… one thing led to another and we were suddenly more than just friends… but in the end we found she cared a lot more about me than I did in return. To me, we were really just good friends, and I preferred things that way. She said she was all right with it too… at the time…” The last sentence sounded as obviously lame and sheepish to him as it did to Trumbull.
“Do men of the Twenty-First Century know so little of women that they’d believe such a statement?”
“Sounds naive, I know,” Thorne forced a slight grin, still dabbing at the corner of his mouth, “but it’s a bit hard to see things objectively when you’re talking about yourself. My ego’s not so big I think women are beating doors down to get at me…”
“I suppose she still should’ve gotten over it by now, though,” Trumbull observed thoughtfully. “It seems to me a bit ill-advised to have come back with you if she still felt that way: problems dragged back from the future like that might well jeopardise your mission here.”
Thorne nodded slowly, solemn once more. “I think she was actually trying to tell me the same thing!” He winced as he considered his next actions. “Think I’ll keep out of her way for a bit… let her cool down a little before trying to apologise…” He nodded slowly again to himself. “That might be a better idea.”
“Mmm,” Trumbull mused, smiling ever so slightly. “I shouldn’t think I’d like to face a right hook like that twice in one day either!”
“Anyone tell you you’ve learned how to become a smartarse too bloody quickly?” Thorne observed with a wry expression.
“My commanding officer has been an exemplary teacher,” Trumbull replied glibly and Thorne actually laughed at some rare and welcome humour.
“Smart bastard…!” He said, shaking his head and almost not wincing in pain because of his jaw. “I’ll have to watch what I say from now on when you’re about.”
“Probably a ‘good call’,” Trumbull nodded sagely, getting the last word.
Thorne cried out as he woke, bathed in his own sweat as usual in the middle of the night. He was also shivering, but that was no reflection on the temperature within the strange room that was his new quarters. The intensity of the nightmares had set every nerve in his body on edge, and he was almost hyperventilating, each breath rasping in his lungs as his bare chest heaved in exaggerated movement. His hands clutched at the covers of his bed as he drew them up, trying to reassure himself of the reality of the room. The voice he heard to his left at that moment almost startled him as much as the dream from which he’d just escaped.