Chapter Eleven: Part Two
‘The people of Alegria are originally from South America. Their village held ninety-two people and was a regular, thriving little jungle village, with a few added amenities. Dominique senior, Dom’s father, had been sponsoring the village for nearly four years at Edison’s behest. Edison had met Juanita, married her, and sired JC all within a year of arriving there, quite literally by accident. Juanita’s father, Carlos, found him still in his Jeep, hanging upside down in a tree, very drunk, and happily singing his lungs out, but that’s another story. Things were going along fine until an illegal gold mining interest started spilling mercury and cyanide into the river upstream. Without warning, the village’s river was barren and toxic. Eight people in total died from that contamination.
‘When the local drug cartel’s goons came a week later, it was pure coincidence that Dominique was there with Edison, working on the water problem. The goons knew all about the water problems already, of course. They shot Juanita’s father, who was the village’s leader, in cold blood. Then they killed her two brothers. They didn’t say a word; they just gunned them down. Dom and Edison were in the bush and unarmed, and it took both of them to hold Juanita silent. JC was about four, I think. When nobody else came out to challenge them, the druggies told the villagers they would now be processing and growing coca leaves in exchange for drinkable water.’
The girls were silent, reeling at the horror of the story, and thankful for the lack of colour in Rick’s recounting of what happened.
‘They gave the village until sun-up the following day to be ready to learn how to process coca leaves for them, or else. In the morning, the village rose and fought them, mostly with single barrel shotguns and arrows. Dominique and Edison made the difference. Their unit was in country and they had pretty much their full field-kit with them, including modern small arms. They took the druggies down, losing only two people. That afternoon, the druggies came back in greater force and more people died.
‘Nearly two weeks after the fighting started, Juanita was caught in the open by a goon during another raid. JC saved her life with his slingshot. A goon was taking swings at her with his machete and misjudged his range after JC got him in the eye. JC’s second rock got the guy between his legs just as he was taking another swing; he was a great shot, even then.’
‘Her scars!’ Dee said, voicing their collective thoughts.
Rick nodded. ‘Juanita got clipped twice before she reached her shotgun. She shot the guy as she fell, and Edison and Dominique both nailed him too, the three of them, all at the same moment. They patched her up as best they could, but field medicine is not cosmetic surgery. Mum still says it’s a miracle that they saved her.’ Madison nodded in affirmation before Rick continued. ‘That battle was won, but the conflict was far from over. The fighting had left thirty-three people dead by the end of the third week, plus eight more from the poisoned water.’
After a moment of silent contemplation, Mason said, ‘All of Dom’s unit went ‘on leave’ as soon as word got back of what was happening. They arrived two days after Juanita was hurt. They were eleven trained soldiers with modern arms, and they took the fight to the local cartel in some very unofficial, but completely one-sided engagements. The local army started to sniff around when there were no bad guys left. Their streams of bribes had dried up, and they were looking for revenge. The big cartel was sniffing around too, looking for someone to blame for the halt in production. It was a bad time.
‘Dom Senior, Dad, and Dad’s brother had great political connections. When the water pollution first happened, they had started calling in a huge number of favours to have the people relocated and resettled here. Dominique Senior had half inherited and half bought this whole area ten years before the fighting as a private conservation project.
‘In the end, forty-six of our people were lost, including five who later died of wounds on the way here. Because of political and logistical situations, it took just over five months to get the people here. It took them nearly three months just to walk out of the jungle. They had to avoid the army and cartel, who were both still looking for them, so the rivers and usual methods were not available to them, and they had some badly wounded people as well. The first death from the pollution happened on the morning of the Spring Equinox. The people remember and celebrate each person, in turn, for the next forty-six days.’
The girls reeled at the incomprehensible brutality of the history. By unspoken but common assent, they asked no more questions. They ate in contemplative silence before Natalie lifted their mood with some cheerful small talk.
Finishing a small sweet-rice-and-fruit dish, Kate blinked in her recall of Rick’s introduction by JC when they’d first arrived. ‘Rick, what the hell is a pongo?’
Mason howled with laughter and Rick blushed a little. Looking teasingly at his son, Mason said to Kate, ‘Pongo is a nickname for a ground soldier.’ For added effect, Mason was holding his nose as if exposed to a foul odour, saying in nasal tones, ‘Anywhere the army goes, the pong goes.’
Rick growled in a sullen but clearly feigned manner, ‘Nobody smells very sweet after four weeks in a dry field exercise with only just enough water to drink, even if they did fall out of a plane first.’
Back to his normal, cheerful self, Rick looked at Kate and the girls. ‘Dear old Dad, along with Dom, Edison and JC, are paras. I should say were, but once a para, always a para. Paras are paratroopers, airborne commandos. The silly buggers who jump into enemy fire from a perfectly sound aircraft, saying things like, ‘They have us surrounded, the poor bastards!” The worst part is, they mean it!’
Mason added proudly, ‘My son served his country’s army well, if briefly. He would have been the army’s youngest full colonel.’ Father and son exchanged a look, recognising a topic best left alone.
Madison intervened, saying in tones of mock exasperation to the girls, ‘My men are chronic overachievers!’ Like a pressure release valve, everyone laughed.
Rick continued quietly, ‘I was asked to take a promotion and I said no. I have never once regretted that decision. It took a year of lodges and journeying to square those demons away.’ Seeing the questioning looks on the girls’ faces, he added, ‘Like Dad, I joined as an engineer, but went on to different duties.’
Natalie said to the amigas, ‘Ricky was in special operations. The guys that do the necessary and ugly shit that never makes it to the History Channel.’
Father and son looked gratefully to Natalie for her simplification of an otherwise hard to describe subject. Facing the girls, she continued, ‘You don’t have to worry though. Grandmother, Uncle and Dom are very good at their skills. You saw about as much flashback on the beach today as you ever will. PTSD does not live here.’
‘The wrestling and horseplay,’ Kate said.
Rick said, ‘Nat, you remain as wonderful as ever, thank you.’ He looked at Kate and said, ‘Yes, those games are a spill over of our common history. I did a few years – most of my seven years really – doing a lot of things that never officially happened. Things that left ghosts in every corner, and had me swinging between destructively angry, and darkly suicidal. Grandmother, Uncle and Dom, along with Dad, Natalie and Edison, sweated and journeyed me back. My memories are at peace now, as am I.’
When Carrie asked, ‘And Dominique?’ everyone looked at Rick.
‘Dominique is Dominique. He was a special kind of paratrooper, so was Edison. The sort reserved for when the shit is really hitting the fan and failure is not an acceptable outcome. Dad was their commander,’ he said, looking at his father with pride. ‘Dom was wounded and discharged 18 years ago. Next time you see him shirtless, look carefully, just under his armpits on both sides. There is a through and through bullet hole that should have killed him. Truly a one-in-a-million kind of wound to survive. Especially with nothing more than a collapsed lung and some cracked ribs. Edison was injured in that same engagement, and he followed Dom into civilian-life.’
Dee whistled and said, ‘No wonder they surprised the druggies. Not the sort of resistance they’d normally expect, I imagine.’
Mason answered, ‘Dee, you are very right. Dom and Edison served with me. Their fathers served with my father. Dominique Senior and Edward met their wives on the same leave, and even had a double wedding. Edison was born first, Dom a few years later.’
Mason continued after a brief pause. ‘Dom’s dad was Dominique Senior. Edison is ‘Eddy’s son’. That’s why Edison takes no nickname; his father was Ed, Ted and Eddy. It was poetic that they reprised their father’s roles in the service. We lost all four of Dom’s and Edison’s parents in a plane crash the same week Dom and Edison were hurt. A student pilot flew straight up and into them from below.’
After a few moments of deep silence, Mason added quietly whilst looking at the middle of the table, ‘They were good people. You can see that through their sons.’
‘Mason, by what I can see of the sons here, that goes for all of you,’ Carrie said, looking at Rick.
Mason said, ‘Thank you, Carrie. We are quite proud of the way our lads have turned out. We were worried about Ricardo for a while. He has his godfather’s lust for testing the limits of adventure and luck. JC is even worse.’
Rick said, ‘Do you know anyone luckier? If some of Dom’s luck rubbed off on me, I am richer for it. They didn’t die for running out of luck, Dad, none of them did. They died because an inexperienced pilot and his inattentive instructor did several things that they shouldn’t have. They paid with their lives as well. I am far more pragmatic than Dom. I’m my father’s son, Dad.’
Rick lightened the mood, adding with a smile, ‘And I’m the only one here who can put the Godfather on his back half the time.’
His father burst out laughing, releasing the tension from around the table. ‘Yes, you are the only one here who can claim that title. Edison comes next, JC, and then me. I tell you, even when they were young, they moved like-’
‘Smoke!’
The Myers blinked at Kate’s assertive description. Madison recovered first. ‘I normally say like cats, Kate, but smoke works well. Perfectly, in fact.’
‘Kate said that about JC the first time she saw him at the opera,’ Dee remembered aloud.
Carrie asked, ‘And the Godfather is?’
Rick answered, ‘Dominique is my godfather, and JC’s, and a good number of others around here. Hence, he is the Godfather.’
Kate looked at Rick, asking, ‘I saw a good number of scars today. Are they from the military times?’
‘Most of them, Kate,’ answered Madison for her son.
‘From what I saw, a few of those wounds must have been serious.’
‘After Juanita’s injuries, Dom’s was the worst, Juan-Carlos was once very badly injured, but came out mostly unmarked on the outside. You will see where a few holes got made though.’ After a moment of thought, Madison added, ‘Rick was damn close once. See that little mark there?’ she asked, pointing to a small scar on her son’s neck. Kate nodded. ‘That was the worst after Dom’s and it nearly killed him. He got blood poisoning from it.’
‘What happened?’ Kate asked Rick.
‘A tiny bit of shrapnel got me that I never even felt. We were bugging out after a heavy job and had to evade through dirty old swamps for nearly two days. Whatever was in the water got into me. I didn’t even know about it until I was sick on the chopper the next day and the medics had me in a hospital a few hours later.’
Changing the subject, Natalie said to the three amigas, ‘Okay, since we are playing getting-to-know-you, why don’t we do occupations?’ The Myers looked happy at the thought, so Natalie continued. ‘I am a private practice psychiatrist, specialising in facial analysis and sexuality. No military service.’