1300h. 7th JUN. 1944 - London.
Viola and Ben talk about their past, and how they feel about their impending mission.
It was an early afternoon when Ben Rapp decided to take his lunch out onto the street. The mess hall was crowded with busy elbows and half-chewed discourse, and Rapp needed some quiet moments to sort out his thoughts. Across the street he found a bench. He laid down a piece of the London Roost - he had picked up the paper earlier that morning - across the bench and sat down. He sat his lunch - a bowl of thin rations - in his lap, and the rest of the paper - Front Page up - across his knees. He ate.
"Mind if I sit here?" Viola stood in front of Ben, a mug of coffee in her hand.
Rapp looked up at Viola and smiled. "Viola, right? Sure. Sit down. I was just looking over today's news. Most of it depressing. Did you hear that an orphanage got bombed out last night while we were coming into the city?" He scooted over to clear a space for her and placed down another sheet of paper for her to sit upon.
"It's war-time," Viola responded, as she took her seat. "It would be news if there was something not depressing." She took a sip of coffee. "So you don't like crowds either, hmm?"
"Generally don't mind them, but I have last night weighing on my mind and I wanted to sort out my thoughts," Ben said.
"Funny way you have of doing it," she offered by way of humor, indicating the newspaper.
Ben chuckled. "I can do both. Actually, the reading helps me clarify some things. Reminds me what kind of world we live in."
Viola was quiet for a moment, thinking about how lucky those people were that needed reminding. Then she nodded, "Although I'm pretty sure that none of us will need reminding soon enough." Another beat. "Not to be depressing or anything," she said with an ironic smile
"Why? You think this wolfman thing is real?" Ben asked, a little skeptically.
"I was talking more about the war, but yes, I do think that there is something to the wolf-man story." Viola quirked an eyebrow at Ben, "Frankly, if the stories are not to remain stories, I'd rather our wolf-man be a fairy."
"I'm afraid I don't quite get you," Ben said.
"Foley was sincere, and so was Vetz. The damn...excuse me, the government wouldn't go so far as to create a separate, classified division to deal with Hitler's Ghost Machine if they didn't think it was real. Governments are stubborn that way. Which means," she turned in her seat to look directly at Ben, "That we have a werewolf on our hands. I was simply remarking that if legends and fairy tales were true after all, I'd rather we be dealing with fairies than things that can only be killed with silver bullets. Mostly because we don't have silver bullets. Yet, I suppose." She took another sip from her mug.
Ben scratched the back of his neck as he listened to Viola. "You know how crazy that sounds, right? I've been running what you said through my mind since last night -- that there's no way the government takes a hoax this seriously. But a wolfman? We start believing that, we probably belong in an asylum."
Viola sighed. "Believing in the impossible? Yes, it's probably crazy," she said, with overtones of stiffness in her voice. "On the bright side, we can't be checked into an asylum." She gave him a sidelong attempt at a smile, "We don't exist."
Ben grimaced. "Right. Another disconcerting development. I wonder what they told my editor. This deal I made with the government better be worth it." He paused to consider something and then asked Viola, "I made a deal, and Foley said he made a deal. What kind of deal did you make?"
"None." She drained her mug. The coffee was cold. The military should really reconsider using metal cups.
"None? Why would someone agree to this sort of thing if they weren't getting anything out of it?" Ben asked.
"I had nothing to lose, and perhaps something to gain." Viola looked down. "If the impossible can indeed happen." She turned the mug around in her hands. "My husband... he's missing. Didn't think I'd find him sitting at home."
"He was a soldier?" Ben asked.
"In the Army, yes."
"Where was he stationed?"
"I stopped receiving letters from him a couple of months before I got notice of his disappearance, but his last letter was from Sicily."
Ben nodded silently for a moment - considering Viola's words. "I'm sorry to hear that," he finally said. "I hope you find him."
"Shot in the dark, if I am to be objective," she said, controlling the catch in her voice. She tapped a finger against her mug a couple of times, before standing up. "I suppose I'll see you tonight, Ben, and we'll find out if what we heard was truth or hysterics."
Ben nodded. "I hope for both our sakes it's just craziness," he said and turned back to his newspaper. His hot meal had turned cold over the conversation, but Ben suddenly found that he wasn't particularly hungry. He dumped the bowl out onto the sidewalk for solitary ants and birds to stumble upon later.
As she reentered the hotel, Viola swallowed the catch in her throat; tears never helped.
