"Do you know what Colonel Liebenstein told me on Rembrandt?" He shook his head, eyes closed.
"He told me that he was recommending you for a Medal of Valor—-that you held together a destroyer group consisting of twelve ships, in which nine were knocked out or severely damaged. . .and held your position against an attacking forced nearly twice your strength, for thirty-six hours without relief or reinforcement. Do you know what else he told me?" He could only release a troubled breath, that seemed to have been caged inside him for years. "He said that you defended Dracus with equal tenacity, and landing, kept your head when more experienced men couldn't. He said that you've been sick and hurting throughout, but all the while have been an exemplary officer." He felt hot tears flow down both sides of his face. "It's true, isn't it?"
"Yes….. But I wish I didn't cry so much. It makes me feel weak, and
I think that in your eyes——" Again the finger touched his lips.
"Stop, Olaf." She kissed him, then snuggled close. "It takes so much more courage to admit your feelings than to deny them. Why do you think I fell in love with you?"
He turned toward her as he had longed to do from the first night of their separation, and buried his face in the soft hair about her neck.
"Dear God, I love you." And in that moment he could not bear to hear his son cry, because he knew that he was nothing more, and never would be, than the helpless creature beside them.
As his wife rose to nurse the child he recovered himself, and like Ara, continued the thought.
SUCH IS THE LOT OF HUMANITY. And who nourished and protected them, the children who had grown? Was there a God, or was Man truly alone in his walk through the world of flesh? In all that he had lived through these past months, he could not begin to answer that question. There had to be something—-he had only his own experience to go by—-because….. As close as he had come to death and despair, they had never been able to completely overwhelm him. But had he, and Ara, survived because of something outside, or inside? And was that something God? Was God internal, some invisible undercurrent of Life and Nature, or external, some being or beings who watched it all from without? And where to find the answers? If there was an answer.
He remembered the words to Johann Schiller's 'Ode to Joy,' set to angelic chorus by Beethoven. "For surely, beyond the stars there dwells a loving father. Seek Him there, beyond the stars." And this seemed particularly relevant and true, until he remembered that Schiller had been unmade by the hands of men.
And he remembered the horror of Dracus, which had made him see, and feel, all others.