"Any last requests?" he asked him sneeringly as he knelt in the dusty road. He'd traversed its winding expanse so many times throughout his twenty-six years without ever imagining it'd take him to the next life.
"In the heart," he stated with a dignity only conceivable in the voice of a man who knows he'll soon be no more.
A series of images ran through his head, some more pleasant than others. He'd want that face saved for those who would care enough to give a proper burial; wanted the mind that had served him so well for so many years preserved.
Cecilia. If only he could see her one last time. She'd been sent away to a convent after the incident that roused her family's suspicions. In her absence he started buying guns. When the revolution came a few months later it only made sense for him to partake. What was death in the face of heartache?
He thought back to the time he took the busload of nuns hostage. "Friends of the Republic," the guerrilla leaders had said from their hidden soapboxes "are enemies of our cause." That had justified the plan he'd suggested to commandeer the bus. What better way to show ones enemy the extent of your conviction than to strike out against God himself in the form of the establishment? When he and four other masked men boarded that bus all he could think of was finding his Cecilia sitting amongst the sisters. His bloodshot eyes scanned the faces of the terrified nuns until they found their mark. It took all he had inside himself to refrain from dropping his shotgun, tearing off his mask, and telling her not to worry. He longed to lick away the tears that were rolling down her face, but had to settle for a brief glimpse of her beauty now strangled by black-and-white robes. "The money's not here!" one of the marauders yelled after rifling through the mother superior's briefcase.
"Let's get out of here before the Federals show up." Not a second went by. "Yes, let's go." There was no disapproval in his reply. He'd gotten what he'd wanted out of the ambush.
But was that all so trivial now, or was it all that mattered? He knew that he wouldn't live long enough to find out.
"As a captured member of the radical party in opposition to..."
He knew the recital by heart. Officers were required by law to give that deceptively righteous speech to those about to be executed. From the safety of bushes, rocks, and riverbanks present after numerous raids gone wrong he and his cohorts had heard these words given to brothers in arms about to be shot. "We can't let them die like dogs," he'd argued the first time it happened. Without the slightest hesitation the three men laying low beside him cocked and aimed their weapons at his chest. No words needed to be exchanged at that point. Joining up meant understanding the importance of living to fight another day. No mourner would know the true circumstances of your death from the newspapers, but they might taste the glory of a future victory if you could live long enough to accomplish it. It was a selfish way to live, but the only way.
This was the second time he'd heard the false justification for murder that day, though. The first time had been a mere ten minutes prior as his best friend, now dead by his hand in the road beside him, was in the same position where he currently found himself. The Federals had had his friend at gunpoint and were about to send him to his Maker when a shot rang out from the reeds near the river. The man fell face forward into the dirt as three of the guards turned their baffled faces towards the source of the gunshot. He reloaded his rifle and fired two more rounds, killing one soldier instantly and maiming another well enough to bring him to the ground. In the heat of the moment he had not heard the patrol boat approaching upstream behind him. By the time the bullhorn sounded commanding him to throw down his weapon it was already too late. A bullet from the man prevented from executing his friend had torn through his left shoulder, causing him to drop his rifle into the current behind him as the exit wound exploded in a gush of crimson jelly. The shot was a lucky one, a blind act of desperation into a mass of vegetation. Great men are not supposed to die by such flukes, though they often do.
They dragged his half-conscious body from the bank of the river and into the road where the initial execution was to take place. Knuckles made a firm connection with his cheekbone, bringing him back to the world that would soon be going black. For the first time since being shot he felt the pain in his body. His right hand reached up and fingered the bloody hollow of shattered bone and loose skin where the socket of his left arm had been. Cecilia. Cecilia. How she once loved the broad shoulders that were now half of what they used to be. He hoped she'd never see the corpse.
"On your knees, traitor," the officer commanded. A closer look at his captor's face revealed his identity. He had been the local tailor, a humble man of meager means, before the revolution had started. High mortality rates on both sides had forced men up the chain of command faster than what was customary. Power went to some heads more than others, the simplest men often becoming the most ruthless butchers. "Any last requests?" he asked, spittle at both downturned corners of his mouth.
"In the heart," his answer came.
An adrenaline induced sweat poured off his face and made tiny craters in the dry dirt below him. He could hear their impact like meteors between the pounding of his temples. The scorching sun caused his perspiration to evaporate as soon as it made contact with the ground. The day was so hot that many had ignorantly wished for death.
"Dogs have no hearts, only stomachs," the tailor in battle dress said as he kicked his prisoner in the ribs. "Ready! Aim!"
But that was the last thing his victim ever heard.
He was on that tranquil coast where he'd made love to Cecilia, the two of them trying to evade the curious sight of passing boaters. An innocent giggle came from between her perfectly square teeth as she gathered her skirt around their hips to try to conceal their love from the world. Great men should have such memories to reflect upon.
A government issue .30 caliber bullet tore through the back of his skull just as her laugh ended, thus destroying what Cecilia had truly fallen in love with well before their rendezvous on that beach.
The family lost the option of an open-casket service. Cecilia lost her will to pray with conviction. The world lost one more reason to keep spinning at such an urgent rate. And great men? What are great men, really?
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