"There, now," Samuel said with a broad grin once they were set down. "You're all set. Elijah here will see you safely to your destination."
"Thank you both so much," I said. "I'll see about getting more hands out here to assist with the cleanup effort."
"Don't worry about it," Samuel said. "We're a hardy bunch out here. Besides, aren't most of them busy in Shiganshina? I think we got off relatively well, all things considered."
I nodded at him, though made the mental note to check for any extra hands that could be sent here, anyway. Julie released my hand and stepped away. "Safe travels," Julie said warmly. "Best of luck to you and your family."
"To yours, as well," I replied. "You have a beautiful one; please keep it safe."
"I hope our paths cross again one day," she said. "It was an honor to help you, captain."
I wasn't sure why the use of my title had me tearing up, but it did. I nodded through a watery smile, deciding against speaking more, or run the risk of openly crying.
"All set, Eli," Samuel said. He closed the carriage door, and I shifted slightly in my seat to get comfortable as the carriage lurched forward, marking the beginning of the journey. I twisted to look back at the family out the window as we rode away, and with a smile I waved back to the kids who looked terribly sad to see me go.
They were a lovely family, to be sure. Endlessly kind and generous, with love pouring out of their hearts in such a way that they felt the need to help a soldier that had been an unwelcome guest in their home. One that had gotten tortured right in their living room, staining the room indefinitely. But they all wore brave faces when looking at me and helped me to the best of their abilities.
That was a kindness that I could never repay.
No amount of money I could ever make would be enough to account for them saving my life and not leaving me to bleed out on their floor once the Yeagerists took off to investigate what had happened at the harbor, leaving the job unfinished and me to die. There weren't enough presents in the world to make up for the scare that the whole ordeal had granted them. No number of words could possibly portray my gratitude for them.
It was because of them that I was alive. If they'd done the smart thing and left me to die, instead of helping me as they did and running the risk of the Yeagerists returning and harming them in return for what they did, I'd be dead. If they acted with their own self-interest as their top priority, I'd have been left there to suffer until I died.
But they didn't. They chose, bravely yet horribly stupidly, to save me.
They didn't think about the potential consequences if the soldiers had returned to finish the job. They didn't think that maybe I was a bad person, maybe even the one in the wrong and deserving of the treatment I was receiving. They didn't think that maybe hearing my pained screams were enough for their kids to have nightmares for months, and maybe even years.
Because this was war, and a little bit of kindness could go a long way.
Because this was war, and we would all be scarred by the end of it if we weren't already.
Because their kids had the right to know just how horribly people could treat others, but also because they could show just how wonderfully people could treat each other.
Because they knew that I would never be able to repay them for my life.
There was no way to quantify a life. Material things were nothing in the face of the natural gift of getting to see another day. If there was one thing that unified everyone in this world, it was that we were all born here. All of us had been granted the grandest gift of all: life.
Borders and allegiances meant nothing in the grand scheme of things. In a constantly shifting universe, there was but one constant for us. We were all human. Maybe not of the same race, religion, gender, sexuality, or moral compass, but we were all human. With beating hearts, full of love.
That was the best thing life could bestow upon us: love.
Life granted us a chance at finding love. Platonic, familial, romantic. Love as a driving force was much stronger than hate.
It was why Mimi hesitated to kill me. She once looked up to me. Her hands had been shaking because how could she kill someone who had taken her under their wing so readily and maintain her conscience?
Conversely, it was why I did not hesitate to kill who I had. I had a family to return to. It was painful to admit but I'd go through so many to return to my family. So many had already fallen by my hand. Familiar faces would not get in my way to returning to them.
...Not that I was proud of that.
Those people felt love, too. For different people, and in different ways, but everyone loved something. Everyone loved someone. And everyone is loved. For so long I'd battled with the idea of whether my love was worth destroying the love of others.
But in a world where bloodshed was so common, and it was mine against theirs, I would choose my own every single time, without fail. I'd always been that way. It was just who I was. It was the unfortunate result of growing up where I had.
No, not unfortunate. I couldn't call it unfortunate, not when it meant that I was so much better at fighting to return to what I did love. If being a bad person meant that I would have a better shot at protecting my daughter and husband, then so be it. I could not be ashamed of what gave me an edge in this world, no matter how terrible. They were far and few between, anyway. I had to take what I could get and hold tight to it.
I was not a good person. At my core, I was a criminal, a killer. I'd always lived with the intent to protect who I loved and help who I can but when it came to it, I was not above violence, and I was not above killing. I could take a life so easily.
At certain points in my life I prided myself on it, to allow it to prove my worth as a soldier in a global conflict. Killing came easily to me, just as it came easily to my husband. The act of killing itself was something we'd gotten used to. The consequences of if were what we continued to struggle with.
And yet despite all of that, we created life. Our beautiful little girl who even now was waiting for us to come home. I might not have fulfilled my promise to her, in bringing her father home with me, but he was... not dead. I was sure of it. My heart and soul were so finely tuned to his that I was sure I would be able to tell if he had died. Our lives were so entwined, so uniquely intertwined that I would feel if the connection wavered.
Even if it wasn't true, it was what I chose to believe, because I didn't have any other option. I couldn't let myself think that he was dead. Not yet.
Believing that would mean that my anchor would have been lifted out of the sea, and I would be left adrift. It would mean that the tree that was his being had been uprooted, lifting with it so many of my own roots, close as we were. It would mean that I would be lost at sea without my guiding light, that singular star that was always there to lead me home.
I couldn't afford to think like that right now.
I had to be strong for Emiko. That little girl thought the world and more of me and I couldn't let her down. She was already so strong, to be without her parents for even this long. She'd been without her father longer. No apology could ever make up for it, for our extended absence.