Author's Note: And now I beg your forgiveness for the sins I am about to commit against the French language. I blame my high school Languages teacher... she should never have passed me!

Unbreakable Camels
part five, Angela of Mercy

Mac followed the nun into the run-down building that he had been looking at earlier. The man leaned heavily on him for support, mumbling rapidly in Arabic. Mac just smiled at him, shaking his head a little to show he didn't understand. The man continued to ramble as Mac helped him over the threshold.

The first room they entered inside of the building was as dilapidated as the outside. She motioned for Mac to continue to follow her as she pushed aside a heavy blanket that was strung over a doorway. Mac obliged, entering a hallway that turned a corner and led to another blanket-draped doorway. They went through this and entered a larger room. Mac looked around, mildly surprised to see neat beds lined up along clean-whitewashed walls. It looked like footage from old 8mm reels of WWII hospitals.

Mac eased the old man down on one of the few empty bunks. There were many people in the room, some lying prone and others moving around slowly. Those who were not asleep stared at the newcomer suspiciously. Some tried to sink down beneath notice, turning their faces away in fear.

The nun knelt by the bed and spoke to the old man. He began waving his one good hand at her, as if shooing her away. She tugged at his bloodstained shirt, saying something insistent, but he growled something at her and crossed his arms, refusing to let her examine him. She sat back on her heels and sighed.

Mac watched them, feeling useless. "What can I do to help you?" he said.

"Shh." With one hand she drew a blanket over the man on the bed, then motioned for Mac to follow her again. She said something soothing to the rest of her charges and they settled back, no longer unconcerned about Mac's presence.

She led him to a small room adjacent to the ward. This room was filled with shelves to hold supplies, though the shelves were mostly empty. She turned toward him, her eyes intense over the veil that covered her face.

"You should not be here," she whispered angrily. "You must leave at once!"

Mac backed up a pace, startled by her anger. "Um... you asked me to come in."

"Non, I do not mean here... I mean in Jiru! This is a dangerous place for an American! This is a dangerous place for the people who live here!" She gestured back toward the ward full of injured and sick people.

"You don't have to tell me how it is, Sister," Mac said softly. "I don't want to be here at all, but I have a job that I have to do. If I manage to do it, then maybe I can help you, too."

"Je ne pas... I-- I don't need any help," she retorted, her voice breaking as she began to cry. "And don't call me Sister! I am not a nun!"

Mac wasn't quite sure what to do. He gently put his arm around her and patted her shoulder. At first she stiffened at his touch, but then she turned her face toward him and stifled her sobs against his chest.

"My name is MacGyver," he said, grasping for something to say that might calm her. "Um... what's a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?"

She coughed a little, laughing through her tears. "C'est terrible! Do you often come to third world countries to try to pick up dates?" She pushed herself away a few inches, pulling the veil down to uncover her face.

"I can't afford the fancier places," Mac said with a smile. "I'd offer you a handkerchief, but I'm afraid I'm fresh out."

She laughed again and used the veil to dry her eyes. "A gentleman as well as a hero! Merci, monsieur. All you need now is a bar of soap and a bouquet of flowers, and you'd be the answer to my prayers!"

Mac chuckled, brushing at his filthy robe self-consciously. "I'm trying to blend in." He looked at her closely, a curious expression on his face. "If you're not a nun, then why are you here?"

She turned away from him to look out of the small window, the light of laughter leaving her face. Through the dirty glass, Mac could see a courtyard of dirt. Along one edge of the yard were several raised mounds; freshly dug graves.

Her voice was so soft that Mac had to move closer to hear her words. "I'm supposed to be a nun... to look like one, anyway. That was my cover when we came here. Padre Deigas," her voice caught a little, and a single tear escaped from her eye, "Padre Deigas needed an assistant, someone with a little medical training who could help support his work, who could speak the local languages. I... I volunteered to help, but I... I never dreamed that they... that they would..." She closed her eyes and wept again.

"Tell me what happened," Mac said gently.

"Padre Deigas was working for..." she stopped, turning toward him with her eyes wide and fearful. ”Who are you? I mean... why should I trust you?"

Mac spread his hands in an open gesture. "Because you can. Because I want to help."

She sighed, leaning her forehead against the small windowpane. "I guess that there's no reason no to tell you... it isn't like they don't know who Padre Deigas really was."

"Tell me something first," Mac said, touching her shoulder to get her to look at him. "What is your name?"

"Angela," she answered weakly, "Angela Marquis. Or... as I have come to be known here," she added, lifting the veil to cover her nose and mouth, "Seour Anne Christine. My patients call me 'xêhær’." She let the veil drop and began to massage her injured wrist gently, her eyes drawn to the dingy window again.

"And that means..." Mac asked, leading.

Angela sighed. "It means... it means 'sister'," she responded reluctantly.

"Well, if everyone else gets to call you 'sister', why can't I?" Mac asked in a mock-petulant tone.

Angela turned toward him with a laugh, but her amusement turned into puzzlement. "I guess you can... what are you doing?"

Mac had been looking around as she spoke. He found a bottle of alcohol and a couple of thin towels. Aware that her supplies were limited, he folded one towel and stuffed it into a plastic bag he pulled from his pocket. He poured some alcohol into the bag, soaking the cloth, and then sealed the bag. He took her hand from her and gently applied the homemade icepack to her bruised wrist.

She made no sound to show her discomfort, but the skin around her eyes tightened. "Can you move those fingers?" Mac asked, concerned about broken bones. "I might be able to cobble together something to use for a cast..."

"Non, it is not serious... just a sprain." She flexed her wrist slowly, wincing in pain. "I'll just have to limp on it for a few days." She looked at him with gratitude, and Mac found himself wondering what kind of terrible things she must have endured, to find so much to be grateful for in a simple act of kindness.

As if sensing his thought, Angela dropped her eyes. She took her hand from his, still holding the cold bag on her arm, and withdrew a few steps. "Padre Deigas was a man of God, but he worked also for an international organization that promotes peace. His assignment was to come to this place and learn the identity of the men who have been stirring up conflict to this region. Of course, missionaries are not terribly popular in the Middle East, but we were accepted by the populace of Jiru simply out of desperation for aid. The people are barely living above poverty, and anyone who cannot work is useless to Them," the implied capitalization was clear in her voice. "Padre Deigas was given this building to use for his mission only because the population threatened to riot if he was not permitted to stay. They allowed us to build our hospital, even donated supplies once in a while... when they needed the goodwill of the community. That didn't last long.

"What They were really doing was giving Padre Deigas enough time to reveal himself as an agent. He told me one night that he had learned who was bringing weapons into the region, and that he suspected that this man was working closely with the magistrate to keep the border wars going and increase the demand for weapons. Just for the profit!." Angela spat in disgust, as if her own words tasted bad.

"One day, Padre Deigas received a request that he should come to the Fortress." Angela's eyes filled with tears again, but she didn't stop talking. "No one saw him for two weeks. A few days ago, he was thrown on the doorstep in the middle of the night. He was already dead."

Angela raised her eyes to Mac's, and though full of tears, her eyes were burning with anger. "I knew Padre Deigas, and he would never have told them his purpose here. They must have killed him simply because he was trying to help people!"

Mac wrapped his arms around her, trying to provide some comfort to her in her misery. "Why don't you leave now? There's no reason for you to stay here alone..."

Angela shook her head, her face buried again in Mac's shoulder. "I can not... I am needed here. There is no one to take care of these people... I can not just leave."
Her robe hood had slipped down to reveal a mass of wavy hair the color of brandy. Mac laid his face on the top of her head. He felt sick to his soul to see anyone so upset, and he understood how trapped she must feel. "You can't stay here alone, Angie. What if they come for you next?"

She trembled in his arms, and he felt like an bum for frightening her. But she lifted her head and laughed. "Do you know how long it has been since someone called me 'Angie'?"

Mac smiled at her. He placed his hands on her shoulders. "Angie, what you've been doing here is a wonderful thing, and I know that these people needed your help. But you have to let them go. You have to get out of here and report what happened to Father Deigas."

Angela became uncertain as his words sank in. "I... I don't know who to talk to... I was just hired to help. I'm not one of the agents..."

"That doesn't matter," Mac said firmly. "Can you be ready to leave by tonight?"

"Tonight! I don't know... Iban is injured. And Falgas refuses to take his medicine..."

Mac took her chin in his long fingers, forcing her to look at him again. "He'll remember to take it if you aren't here to wait on him. Believe me... I know. Men are big babies as long as there's a woman around who's willing to take care of them!" He took the veil that she'd been using as a handkerchief and wiped her face. "Now, since you're working one-handed, I expect that you'll need a little help. Tell me what to do. But by sundown we need to be going.

"But what about your job," she asked, fighting the return of tears. "Did not you have something important to do here?"

"Nothing more important than this," he said gently. "And besides, I think the answers are going to start coming quicker now." He moved over to the basin and began to wash his hands thoroughly. "We'll have a look at our friend with the bruises out there, and then maybe you can tell me what's been going on around here and who's behind it all." He dried his hands on the clean white towel. "Listen, Angela. It might be that they already knew about Father Deigas. It doesn't really matter why they killed him, but because they did, we're going to make them know that they can't get away with it. But in order to do that and make them pay for what they did, we have to get out of here with the truth." He ducked his head a little, searching her eyes for something. "Are you with me?

Angela stared back at him and nodded. As she did so, she felt the skin of fear that she had worn since coming to this forsaken country slough off from her. She let Mac fashion a sling for her arm from a scrap of torn bed sheets, and then they went out into the ward to help the man that they had brought into the hospital.

But he was gone. The bed where they'd lain him was empty, the blanket discarded on the floor.


~~~tbc