Voodoo, for his part, taps out the tune on his knee, trying to clear his mind as best he can. A tense trigger finger's no good to anybody.

And someday we'll all be together once more / when all of the ships come back to the shore...

There'll be the post-battle shakes afterwards, of course (if there's an after). There always will be, so long as he does this for a living.

How long that'll be is another matter entirely.

I'll realize something I've always known / I still call Australia home...

The room falls silent. There's no applause, no whistling, not even nods of acknowledgement among the group. Someone sniffles.

It feels like an eternity before Voodoo checks the stopwatch again. 45 minutes. They're ready.

He clicks the stop button and sets the stopwatch aside.

"Let's go."