I promise on my honor, to do my best, by Aliseo Bentu Novo 

Sunday afternoon.  

The bus rolled gently along the winding roads of the Lombardy mountains. The driver cheerfully      hummed “Il tuo bacio è come un rock - Che ti morde col suo swing”. A heavy silence hung in the  air among the 24 boys and 2 adults of the North Star Troop. Sixteen-year-olds Matteo and Daniele sat close, not far behind the driver. One could notice that they held hands tightly under fluffy sweatshirts ruffled in the middle of the seats. As they looked outside their windows at the passing  scenery, their mind went back to the events of the hours leading up to this somber last journey,  going back home. 

Sunday morning.  

A quiet group of boy scouts hastily loaded backpacks onto the bus. No festive atmosphere. No  laughs. No guitar music. Broken guitar chords. Dark faces. A young man in his late twenties counted the boys and checked their presence on a roster. His left hand was covered by yellowed bandages. 

Saturday night.  

Group Leader Marcello scanned the camp from one end to the other. The breathing was short  and irregular when he finally reached the local emergency helpline after a long wait on his Nokia  3310. 

” ...two ambulances...yes multiple wounded...one is... no, one is losing blood from his forehead.” In shock, he didn’t feel the pain of his left hand badly scraped against dirt and rocks.

A few minutes before the emergency call, Matteo and Daniele ran to the edge of the camp. The  scene that greeted them was one of chaos: clothes, backpacks, books, debris, leaves, branches – everything strewn across the ground as if someone had diligently scattered them. With growing  terror, the two boys realized something had happened, and it happened violently. 

Shortly before. 

Not far from the camp, the two boys held each other close as the incessant rain beat down on  the flat roof of the small porch attached to the wooden cabin. A sudden loud blast of thunder  made them jump. The intense wind howled, whipping an icy mix of rain and cold air at their  exposed legs prickled with goosebumps. Their faces, still intimately near each other for a swift  kiss, the first kiss for both, were now covered in light raindrops. 

In that same, precise moment. 

A June storm, born with sudden natural fury, ended the last joyful night of the North Star Troop,  summer 1998. Screams of young boys ripped through the air. Confused and scared young men caught off guard by the whirlwind. And many end up on the ground, violently pushed by the wind and flying twigs. 

Shortly before. 

Matteo and Daniele cautiously slipped away from the center campfire where everyone had  gathered for songs, games and storytelling. Exactly 10 minutes after the start of the evening  meeting, during the prayer, while everyone had their eyes closed and their heads bowed, the boys made their move and started heading towards the nearby cabin. A suitable place to hide for a few moments, for a few stolen hugs between two boys whose feelings blossomed over the past  few days. 

At the same time, a mass of warm rising air collided with cold and dry air descending downward.  The flow of warm air expanded, forming a cumulonimbus, a thunderous cloud. A whirlwind  formed. A dark, twisting column would reach down from the storm clouds. Its roar, a growing  threat up in the sky, went unnoticed over the laughs of the campers below. 

A few minutes before. 

Across the crackling campfire, Matteo and Daniele locked eyes. Trepidation flickered between  those quick gazes. One of them held a crumpled note in his pocket that the other wrote as a  secret message. At first glance, only lines and dots.  

To an attentive eye, a message written in Morse code: -... .- .. - .- / -.. ..- .-. .- -. - . / .--. .-. . --. .... ..  . .-. .- * 

* Cabin, during prayer.