Baudelaire's

Baudelaire's: Part IX

The first dead body Cattleya Baudelaire had ever actually seen was her Great Grandfather Jean Baudelaire laying in state before burial. She was 10 years old. He looked so peacefully asleep. She had waited for him to wake up, but then her mother and grandmother took her away so that he could be buried. It was the first and the last time Cattleya saw a peacefully sleeping dead body.
She, along with Benedict, had lost count of all the dead bodies they both had seen since then. Most shot to death out in the street, many ran through with sabers or bayoneted, some in the way of shrapnel from explosives, and still others, the ones that were condemned to be made an example of (her mother) hanging by the neck in trees, and lamp posts.
The explosions and the fires seemed to go on forever and Cattleya and Benedict hid behind whatever they could find and slash at anything and everything that was Gardarik, while, again, dodging more dead bodies. More and more of these dead bodies, however, were Caprian folks they knew, especially the brothel workers. But there was no time to mourn. Had to keep slashing until they could pick up firearms out of the hands of dead soldiers and fire the bullets left in the chambers.
They both had near misses from flying bullets. Cattleya felt blood run down her leg from a bullet grazing her upper thigh. Somewhere behind her Benedict cried out, after a bullet imbedded itself into his upper arm. He assured her to not worry, to keep going, for it was his left arm and he was a righty.
They, as well as the dispatched Leidenshaftlich army, defended Baudelaire's effectively enough, until the blasts from the thrown explosive caught the building on fire.
"NO!!!!!" Cattleya screamed out, running for it until Benedict tackled her to the ground and pinned her there, covering her body with his own.
"Come on!" he growled at her ear, "We've gotta move! The gas lines will want to explode soon!" Benedict jumped to his feet, gasping with the pain in his arm and forced her up off the ground. "Come on!! MOVE!!"
And she did, but blindly. If Benedict had not pulled her back, she would have ran into the flames of her beloved tavern. Being as he DID pull her back, she felt her own will slipping away and she let him lead her by the tightly grasped hand, her violet/indigo eyes staring straight ahead.
Benedict headed for their home, still ducking still jumping there and again to dodge flying ballistics and dead (or dying) bodies on the ground. When they finally reached their street, several abodes were on fire. . . including their own.
Benedict and Cattleya stared dumbly at the burning structure.
"Maybe the girls made it out. . ." he said slowly, in shock, kneeling to the ground with Cattleya clinging to him, her face hidden against his shoulder.
*. *. *
The girl now known to Claudia as Violet was found unconscious at the bottom of a stone staircase in the blasted out cathedral.  Major Baugainvillea was nowhere to be found. His bloodied identification tags that had been found in the debris, was all anyone was able to recover of him.
     Claudia Hodgins looked down at the girl's broken body, covered in her own and most likely,  Gilbert's blood. He did not know what shocked him the more, the fact that she was truly only human, or the fact that this little human had survived (at the moment, anyway) such trauma.
The medic doctor had wrapped the stumps where her arms ought to have been, controlling the bleeding the best he could.
"We are not going to keep it here, with the other wounded." General Koffour announced as he debriefed all the ranking officers.
Claudia saluted. "General Koffour."
"Yes, Lt. Colonel Hodgins."
"I had been given the order from Colonel Worschoski to bring the weapon back to Capria to be under his orders."
The General shook his head. "I will override those orders, Hodgins. The weapon will be taken to recover or die in a non-disclosed civilian hospital. It will be treated and rehabilitated there, if it survives. Its role as a weapon is to remain classified information."
Claudia mentally breathed a sigh of relief.
"As for its care after that. . . It belonged the Baugainvillea family. It can be released back to them."
Claudia saluted again. "Yes, General, sir."
"There's been another development, Hodgins, speaking of Capria." said the General.
"Sir?" Claudia's heart lurched.
"There seems to have been a strike of approximately 200 Gardarik soldiers acting rogue. They attacked those who remained of Colonel Worschoski's troops. Set fire to what was left of the city.  Now that we are squaring away here, I'm ordering you back to Capria with your regiment."  The General gave Claudia yet another official document, then leaned back in his chair and linked his fingers complacently across his belly. "I've been told through reliable sources that you had warned of a covert strike, Hodgins, and Colonel Worschoski ignored it."
      "My regiment was sent out immediately, General, sir." Claudia answered, again keeping his emotions off of his face. "But the Colonel seemed to have little to no interest in securing the city from such strikes, the riverfront, in particular."
       "Ah. . ." said General Koffour thoughtfully. "Mobilize your regiment and leave out as soon as possible.  That will be all, Hodgins."
       In all,  it had been the strangest, most emotionally ravaged few weeks of Claudia Hodgin's life. He did not have any notion of what he would find back in Capria.  He would have to expect the worst, meaning Cattleya Baudelaire and Benedict Blue were no longer alive. 
      It was very odd. These people had been strangers only a week prior. Since then, so much had happened involving all three of them. 
"I'd rather die with dignity than be spat upon as a refugee in Leiden." Cattleya had said to him.
Well, darling, you most likely got your wish. . . and possibly now in a fresh mass grave, mass grave number sixteen, to be exact,  Claudia thought bitterly, clenching his teeth against an unexpected lump in his throat.