Just a simple ceremony, as always - simpler even. There was no body to inter, no ashes to scatter. The latter might have spread alien contaminants for miles across the countryside, while the former couldn't be trusted not to crawl out of the grave.
But the turnout was astounding. Not only vets and rookies, but engineers and research scientists, pilots and greasemonkeys from the hangar floor, medical orderlies from the Cauldron and coms specialists from Mission Control. Seems Mitchell knew everybody, and everybody knew him.
Apparently there are regular amateur folk sessions at XCOM Knowle. Two labcoats, the quartermaster and an engineer played a lurching, mournful rendition of Sloe Gin as they lowered Mitchell's fiddle into the empty coffin.
Someone else let fall a tatty script, scrawled with notes, saying that the show wouldn't be the same without him. Another dropped a sheaf of sketches and skits, with a valiant attempt at cracking a joke. Projects put on hold by the invasion.
I gave a speech, raising my voice above the white noise of the wind turbines all around. Pinned medals for valour, service and sacrifice to a velvet square, lowered them in. There was something else in my hand too. A postcard forwarded to me by the Council - a rare kindness on their part. The front bears some scene from provincial France, the back a message of thanks for Cpl. Mitchell (l'homme à la grande barbe) from two women, a man and a child.
I'd meant to bury it with his medals, but somehow it was still in my hand when I sat down here, at my desk.
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| Cpl. Calum Mitchell, KIA. We will remember. |
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