The copter landed ten minutes later. Umluana left in a shower of bullets. A Russian private, the ranking man alive in the station, surrendered the survivors to the Belderkans. * * * * * His mother hung the Global Medal above the television set. "He must have been brave," she said. "We had a fine son." "He was our only son," her husband said. "What did he volunteer for? Couldn't somebody else have done it?" His wife started to cry. Awkwardly, he embraced her. He wondered what his son had wanted that he couldn't get at home. THE END