Chapter 13

David and Jacky were sitting with their old team of sappers, Stan, Ernie, Tommy, Pete, and Bluey, when Anton came to find them.

Anton stopped and looked around the nearly deserted mess hall and then at the group. Then to their surprise, he wandered around the table, looking at each of them individually. He knew that he was making them all nervous.

He stopped when he got back to David. “How long have you worked with these men?”

David looked at his team and had to think about that. “Most of them, nearly eight months, Sir,” he finally said.

“And you?” he asked Jacky.

“I’m the newest member, and I’ve been here since the nineteenth of February, Sir.”

“Where did you train?” Anton asked him. The date wasn’t lost on him, nor was Jacky’s suspiciously empty record.

“Umm, we don’t know. I was injured when the Japs attacked, and since no one has claimed me, Captain Thornton just kept me here as part of David’s crew, Sir.”

“No, I couldn’t find you in the records before that date either, and I did look. Be that as it may, you’re considered a soldier of the Australian Army, so you shall be treated as such.”

Jacky nodded. He knew he had a service number, and he was being paid. As long as he was with David, he would do whatever was asked, within reason. He did have ways to make sure people didn’t ask the unreasonable.

“So, how mad do you think Captain Thornton will be if I absconded with all seven of you?” Anton asked the group with a grin.

“I’m in!” cried Tommy excitedly. “If Jacky is going, I want to go, too.” Tommy had not been happy to learn that David and Jacky were shipping out.

Anton was not the least surprised by this announcement. He suspected that Jacky had formed a close comradery with these men, and he had influenced them to protect him, and in turn, he shielded them.

His relationship with David intrigued Anton as he suspected they were lovers since they both wore an item of magical power. Anton looked at Jacky more closely, and another suspicion came to mind.

He didn’t think they still existed here on Earth, but it was possible. If this were true, ‘she’ would make an excellent infiltration agent. Except he doubted that ‘she’ was in the business of killing as most of the changelings he had known weren’t.

Anton surmised that this core group with half a dozen other men would make an excellent squad for the jobs he had been assigned to find people for.

He liked engineers, as they tended to be very resourceful people.

“What’s going on, fellas?” Eddie Russo asked as he came in and took his usual chair.

He knew that it was unusual for them to be in the mess between meals. He had ignored the out of uniform Major since he didn’t know any better. Anton was dressed as if he was a regular soldier.

Eddie looked at Anton when he was asked, “And you are?”

“I’m Lance-Corporal Eddie Russo, one of the AA-gunners. Hum, Sir,” Eddie added for good measure since the bloke just had that look about him.

“Is he any good?” Anton asked David.

The men chuckled, and it was Bluey who replied, not realising he was sealing Russo’s fate, “He has a Kate and a Zero to his name, and he has winged a couple of others.”

“Hum, I gather he is also part of this little group,” Anton came back.

The men all looked at each other and realised that, while Russo wasn’t always their favourite person, he had preferred to sit with them rather than his own team for some time. Other than Tommy, none of the rest knew why.

“Fine, you six go pack and be back here in fifteen minutes, or you will be left behind,” Anton ordered.

The six men all scurried from their seats and took off.

“Feel better now, Jacky?” Anton asked.

“Pardon, Sir?”

Anton sat next to Jacky and leaned in so his words couldn’t be overheard. “You have put protection spells on all of them, so I gathered that they were important to you.”

Jacky looked at him sheepishly.

Anton sat back and asked, “So, have either of you been to Cairns?”

Jacky shook his head, but David nodded and replied, “I was born down the coast in Coral Cove, Queensland, but I lived in Cairns with my uncle for most of my life, before I joined up.”

David’s mother, Jane Anne May, was sent to Cairns to live with his Uncle Daniel May when David was one year old. David didn’t mention that he had been left to live with his uncle when he was old enough to attend school. His mother had remarried and just left him behind.

Jane’s two, much older brothers and her parents had not been happy with her as she had been barely fifteen when she got into trouble. She didn’t wish to be reminded of her indiscretion or that David was a bastard from a dalliance with a good-looking part-aboriginal man.

They had even tried to pass David off as Daniel’s son, even though he was old enough to know better. His Uncle Daniel ran one of the few permanent electrician businesses in Cairns at the time, and he wasn’t married.