MATT HAD LAUGHED at how excitable the middies were when they had a new bone to gnaw on…and just about anything qualified as new to them. It had been funny on Wardhaven. Here, with all the other problems Ray had, he didn’t need an out-of-control bunch of boffins freelancing on him. He followed Kat’s parade down the hall to a large room where a dozen middies huddled over equipment or around lab tables lit by glaring lamps. Jars of specimens reeking of preservatives half-filled a wall of shelves.
“Kat, good!” a young man shouted from one dissection table. “This thing has a heart in every segment. At least I think this muscle pumps what it uses for blood. Come take a look. Oh, hi, Colonel, you might want to see this, too.” The good doctor’s scowl at the mess they had made of his medical unit was ignored; nothing but enthusiasm and excitement came from the youngsters.
Ray kept his face unreadable. When he came down on the doc’s side he didn’t wait the kids screaming he hadn’t given them a fair hearing.
“You’ve cut up a woolly leg-legs!” Rose cried in nine-year-old outrage.
“We put it to sleep first,” the young man defended himself against the accusation of innocence. “And we have to study it.”
Ray caught Mary’s eye, nodded her toward the door with the little girl. Mary declined the order with a quick shake of her head. Rose clung to Kat, and Ray’s Chief of Security’s curiosity was clearly piqued.
So for the next hour Kat did her best to update Ray’s academy biology course; most of what he heard went over his head.
Not all. The computer image of three skeletons side by side was impossible to forget. One was ours, skull perched on a backbone of vertebrates, rib cage dangling from our shoulders. Next to it was one with vertebrates, too, but long bones hung vertically from the shoulder, intersperced With four arms. The third skeleton featured three backbones, all long and looking like our leg bone. Studying the sockets of the hip and shoulder bone that allowed this version to twist gave Ray a headache; still, the middies insisted it was as flexible as ours, and its spinal column just as protected. The last of Kat’s three evolutionary lines was the woolly leg-legs. Rose’s terminology had been adopted and scientifically sanctified.
When the middies grew silent, Ray turned to Doc Isaacs. “Could all these have evolved here?”
The young medical professional rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I don’t know, Colonel. I’ve never heard of anything like this. A small number of exotics in a biota usually are imports. But three totally mixed. Is this sun unstable? Could these all be mutations? I’m no geologist, but until someone digs up a fossil record, I’d be reluctant to say they couldn’t all be native to this planet. After all, it is a big universe.”
Kat frowned, but nodded. “We don’t know enough to draw a conclusion,” she said, pained to admit such a limit.
“And it’s only going to get worse,” Ray sighed, and took over. “Doc, we’ve got three kids who need thorough examinations. If we can solve their problems, we’ll be well on our way to winning a lot of credit with the locals. As much as I hate to restrict you middies’ play privileges, Doc’s got first call on his diagnostic gear for Rose and her friends.”
“And you, Colonel,” the doc cut in.
“Me?”
“The meds that saved your backbone have side effects. I checked your records. You’re several weeks overdue for a full workup. I’m putting you in line ahead of the kids. Middies, I want my diagnostic center back, and I want it back now.”
“All of it?” one squeaked.
Jerry took a deep breath, surveyed his appropriated domain like a monarch reclaiming his throne room, then let the air out through a quirky grin. He pointed to one corner. “Clean up Bay One and I’ll share the rest. For now. But if I need it, you’re out of here, fast.”
“Yes,” “Thanks,” and an argument from someone evicted from Bay One that they should have priority in Bay Three broke out immediately. Ray turned to leave, but Jerry nabbed his elbow.
“You’re not going anywhere. You’re my number one patient.”
Ray surrendered with as much grace as he could muster. At least this medical exam would not be invasive. He turned to Mary. “Leave Rose with me. Go corral David and the other one.”
“You promised me my own telephone for my arm so I could call Mommy,” Rose reminded him as she sat down beside him. Kat surrendered her wrist unit. Ray showed the girl how to use it and helped her place her first call. Ms. San Paulo came on the line at the tenth buzz. Ray spent the next ten minutes smiling through a nine-year-old’s perspective on the day, with few comments from Mom, while the doc and middies cleared the wreckage of several dissections. Ray put an end to the call only when Mary dragged David and a seven-year-old in from wherever they’d been playing. The dirty clothes and faces attested that they’d been having fun.
“Thank you for caring for Rose,” Henrietta finished.
“Everything’s fine here,” Ray assured her. “How are things at your end?”
“We had a fire at the archives this afternoon. Initial reports says it was a faulty electric wire.”
Ray nodded. “I’ll make sure Rose calls you about this time tomorrow,” Ray said and punched off. Mind elsewhere, he watched Rose slowly approach her two new playmates. “I’ve never seen anyone else with white hair, except old people,” she said, twisting the hem of her dress in both hands.
“I hadn’t either,” David answered back quickly.
Jerry took one look at both kids and growled, “Mary, run those two through a dunk tank while I start on the Colonel.”
Mary left with all three kids in tow. Ray shed shirt, belt, and shoes and let them help him up onto the exam table. From practice, Ray’s fingers rapidly adjusted the contours of the table, adding more back support and raising his legs…and the table’s temperature. It was cold.
“Give me a minute to reset these systems. Lord, but the middies have hashed the setting.” Jerry provided a running commentary on youngsters who had no respect for the designed intent of systems. Ray cleared his mind, letting it wander. He’d learned the hard way that moments like these could easily turn to remembrances and regrets. Three evolutionary lines. Interesting, but for three hundred years the people of Santa Maria had pretty much ignored them. It was probably fascinating for the middies but of no relevance to the mission. Somebody wanted Ray dead. Not unusual in his old line of work, but a tad upsetting in his new job as ambassador to these lost sheep. Maybe sheep wasn’t the right metaphor. Sheep don’t carry knives. Didn’t cause fires. Around Ray, the scanner systems came alive. For long minutes, Ray hardly breathed.
“Let’s redo that scan,” Jerry ordered, voice doctor-cold.
“Problem?” Ray asked.
“Just want to make sure the middies didn’t louse things up,” Jerry said, words suddenly sterile medical efficiency, Ray fought to keep from shivering as ice traveled down his mending spine. The exam continued, the doctor consulting his techs in quick, quiet phrases. Ray tried to relax, but as the exam stretched, tension grew.
“Doc, how much longer?”
“I want to rerun a set. See if I’ve got it calibrated.”
Ray struggled up and slowly swung his legs off the table. “Check it on the kids.” Ray could hear them playing tag noisily in the hall. “You’ve had enough of my time.”
“Colonel, I’d like to—”
Ray cut him off. “You know where I live. If you still aren’t sure about your machine, I’ll give you another half hour tomorrow. Now help me off this damn table.”
“Yes, sir.”
Ray had to put up with the doc’s sour face for about five more seconds. Then Mary turned the three kids loose on Jerry, and no one can stay sour-faced while drowning in puppies. They wanted to know what did what, who did it, and how he would take away their headaches…all at once and in chorus. Ray hobbled off with Mary. He felt fine; that was all he needed to know. He came to a stop outside the hospital door. “Where’s headquarters? My quarters?” He surveyed a collection of identical temporaries.
Mary pointed to the left. “Headquarters is across from the hospital. We’ve set up your quarters in the HQ, sir. If Matt can have his bunk next to the bridge, why should you have to commute?” Put that way, Ray couldn’t argue. They covered the short distance to the HQ slowly. In the fields beyond the base, men and women hoed crops in the late-afternoon sun. On base, work parties moved about purposefully, if on missions Ray knew nothing about.
“Who’s in charge?” Ray asked as he and Mary entered the orderly room.
“Nobody” came as a happy bellow from a room marked Leading Chief. At its door in a moment stood Command Chief Barber of Second Chance. “Captain would have sent down his supply division head, but Ernie Nuu hired her away just before we left, so I’m trying to keep this lash-up in order while you’re traipsing around, though how an enlisted swine is supposed to ride herd on marines, Doc, and middies is anyone’s guess.” Despite his complaints, the chief had done a great job of setting up the base and maintaining security. Now Ray needed more. “Mary, with the chief’s help, can you command the whole base, security, ops, mining, and manufacturing for mules and workstations?” Ray asked. Mary grinned like a fox offered command of the chicken coop and called a meeting of the Ours, by Damn, Mining Consortium to get things going.
Jeff was incredulous. “Tiny miners that slip through the cracks in the rocks and extract minerals, molecule by molecule.”
“Show me a place that’s mineral-rich and I’ll make us rich,” Mary answered his challenge. Ray adjourned them to a command table that Mary quickly turned into a map of the surrounding area. Jeff’s eyes got bigger as she added streams, roads, and 3-D elevation. “Show me the minerals,” Mary said, making a shallow bow and inviting him to the map.
“This is the village. This is the base,” Jeff muttered as he got his bearings, his finger roving the map. “Yeah, you cross that stream, then head up this one, branch off here…” He walked off three or four more finger lengths, then got low over the map and sighted off in one direction. “Yes, you can see the mountains between those two hills.” He turned to Mary: “There. I was standing in that stream when your shuttle came over. My assay kit was sparking every mineral that’s worth digging.”
Mary eyed the map. “So where did it wash into the river from?” Now Mary ran her fingers over the map, following streams uphill, then zoomed the map into an area. Jeff’s eyes got even bigger. Mary took one hill, Cassie another.
“I got a major landslide here,” Cassie observed. “Created a bit of a pond. Did you check below that?” she asked Jeff.
“I didn’t even know that pond was there.”
Mary followed several streams up her hill. She zoomed the board again, checking for scouring above the headwaters. Drawing a pen from the table’s drawer, she circled areas of interest. “Calculate all areas circled. Add in all streambeds. Total area,” she ordered.
She and Cassie examined the report. “You’ve got a lot more total land under erosion than my landslide area,” Cassie agreed.
Mary tapped her hill. “I think we’ve found the source of all your goodies, Jeff. Tomorrow you run a check just below that wash while we thump that hill. I’ll show you how we get the good stuff out without harming a blade of grass. Now go get your room back at the village inn.”
Jeff looked none too happy to be ushered out, but he headed for the door. As he opened it, Dr. Isaacs barged in, face white as his lab coat. “Colonel, we need to talk.”
Ray motioned the local out the door while the doctor made a beeline for the worktable. Mary stepped aside, surrendering the controls to the doctor without a word and went to check the door. She nodded; Jeff was gone. Ray had given away one secret today; he didn’t want to try for two. Without preamble, the doctor converted the display from a mountain to a skull. The miners backed away. “Is this a private medical matter?” Ray asked.
“I wish to hell I knew,” Jerry answered. “Kat, I want you in on this.” He waved at the young middie who had followed him in the door but hung back. “Colonel, under normal conditions I’d be dusting off my bedside manners and hunting for nice ways to say nasty words. You’ll excuse me if I just bull into this?”
Ray felt the bottom drop out of his gut. He leaned on the table as the shock wave swept through him. He’d had doctors say that before. He was still alive, and if not kicking, at least hobbling. Mary motioned Cassie out. As the door closed, Ray swallowed hard. “What do you have for me?” in the voice an officer of the line cultivates for moments like this.
“Damned if I know,” the doctor shot back. “Keep that in mind.” The doc paused, took a deep breath, and started slowly. “They saved your spine by giving you a cocktail of drugs and viral stimulators to patch what was broken.”
“They said it was something like mending a rope.”
“Right out of the textbook on bedside manners,” the doc nodded. “Close but not exact. Your cells had to grow new receptors at the break point, then new cells to connect them. You’re growing cells your body never planned on. Did they warn you of the risk of inciting other cell growth?”
Ray glanced off for a moment, trying to recall what was at best fuzzy. “They may have. I wasn’t paying much attention once they got past the place where they said I might walk again.”
“Most people aren’t. Damn tough to get informed consent in situations like that. Anyway, one of the rare side effects of your therapy is a sudden increase in tumors, usually benign.”
“Cancer!” Kat breathed. “But that’s easily cured,” she said, to take the ancient death curse from the word.
“In any decent medical facility, a minor problem.”
Ray saw where this was leading. “Do we have access to a decent medical facility?”
The doc took in a long breath. “No. Any ship personnel with a problem like that are dropped off at the nearest base and we pick them up two months later, cured.”
“Another reason to wish we were home,” Ray breathed.
“Except.” The doc tapped the board, bringing up four skull scans. “Rose, David, and Jon all have tumors in the exact same place as you.”
As Ray bent over the board, Kat quickly joined them at the display. Mary was beside him, a gentle hand resting on his elbow. Ready to catch him if his knees caved on him? Ray tried to process what had been thrown at him. Doc had given him a potential death sentence, then changed it…to what? Ray studied the four skull scans as if one of them weren’t his, as if they were just terrain his troops had to maneuver over. Detach, Colonel, detach. You can feel later. There’s something important here. Find it.
“The tumor mass is here,” Doc was saying, “between the right and left lobes of the brain. There shouldn’t be anything there.” Ray focused on the four skulls, checking each. To his eye, they all looked the same.
“No way to tell from this if it’s benign or malignant?”
“I ran the blood tests on all four of you. Didn’t find anything malignant, but…”
“Keep talking, Doc,” Ray ordered.
“There’re fragments of virus in your blood. Kids’, too. Again, we all have them, but this stuff isn’t in our database. I’m still trying to put them together, do an ID.”
Ray could think of nothing more to say. It was moments like these, at funerals and bedsides, that left him at a loss for words. “Let me know what you find” was so empty.
Doc headed for the door. “Mary, it’s time to put the kids to bed. I’m keeping them in the clinic tonight.”
“Excuse me, Colonel, I promised Rose I’d bunk with her tonight, just in case she needed to call her mom.”
Ray ushered them out the door. Somewhere in the past hour or so, the HQ staff had left. Even the chief’s light was off. The office with Ray’s name on it had a door leading into a spartan bedroom with its own facilities and shower.
Someone had unpacked his kit; he couldn’t even lose himself in the mindless duty of assigning underwear to drawers. He settled in his bed and opened the shades. Thirty or forty yards away was the hospital. He found himself looking into windows, watching Mary and Kat wrestle three youngsters into an unfamiliar bedtime routine. He smiled, thinking of what it would be like to do that with Rita and their own little ones.
He’d had plenty of experience with young men and women, rifle-high and in hormone hell. What would it be like to tackle one that was tiny and innocent and full of energy and didn’t want to go to bed, thank you very much? Don’t worry, Rita, I’ll make it home soon. Real soon.
With Mary busy taking care of someone else, Ray found his pills and set them beside his bed with a glass of water. He doused the lights and settled into bed. With the blinds still open, he had a front-row seat to the bedtime production across the way. It was gentle distraction from a day full of things he could do nothing about.
He fell asleep with a smile on his face.
Mary had never put in time at a crèche. As a qualified miner, she wasn’t required. She was catching up fast on all that she’d missed, “Can I have a drink of water?” came from the darkened room for the umpteenth time. Kat had younger brothers and sisters; she’d warned Mary this could take a while.
“I’ll handle this one,” the young middie said. Mary was glad to let her.
“I’ve got your blood results” came from behind Mary. She turned. Doc Jerry, holding three pages of test results, absently scratched his bandaged elbow, showed where the third batch of blood had been drawn. Inspired by example, Mary rubbed her own bandage. Medical tests these days required little more than a pinprick. Doc had found an ancient blood kit with a huge needle and gigantic blood holder and gone hunting for both Mary and Kat. He’d drawn enough blood to fuel a small starship.
“Anything interesting?” Mary asked.
“Both you and Kat have virus fragments in your blood. Not much, but you and the colonel are in the same general range.”
“And you?”
“Some. Maybe a few. I don’t know.” Doc shrugged.
“When’d you come down?”
“Day before yesterday.”
“Retest when you’re down a week?”
“Yeah. Mind if I run a quick brain scan on you?”
Mary tried to control rising panic. “Are my levels up?”
“A bit elevated. Not outside the norm.”
“Close to the Colonel’s?”
“No.”
Mary tried to get the old terror out with a deep breath. Cancer was easily cured, but she’d seen old miners with too many hours in the radiation of space, faces and bodies disfigured from long-ago cures. Yeah, cancer didn’t kill you, but it could sure mess with your smile. “When do you want to do the scan?”
“Now, if possible.”
Glancing in the room, where Kat was providing another round of drinks for all and refusing to read a third bedtime story, Mary figured she had time. The doc had the scanner prepared for her and did it quickly. “Nothing, no tumor, not a damn thing,” he muttered as he put her through a second scan. Mary was glad for the immediate feedback.
Back outside the kids’ door, Kat was keeping watch. “They’ve been quiet for ten minutes. They may be down for the night. Rose wondered when you’d come in.”
Mary yawned and stretched, the bandage pulling on her arm. “I’m about ready now.”
Kat nodded toward the still-lit lab. “Doc done yet?”
“Yeah, our blood’s got virus, just like the Colonel’s. He ran my head through a scanner and didn’t find anything.”
“I knew marines had empty skulls,” Kat grinned.
Mary gave her a sarcastic bow, having intentionally left the opening. “Why don’t you wander down and let the doc sort through the cobwebs in your head.”
Kat gave the doc’s direction a worried glance. “Think he’s still mad at us over his lab?”
“Doesn’t strike me as the kind to hold a grudge,” Mary said, “for more than five or six years.”
“Gee, thanks,” Kat said, but headed down the hall.
Mary edged the door to the kids’ room open and slipped in. From the outside lights, Mary could easily see the little ones. All three had kicked off their blankets. Since it wasn’t that warm, Mary made her way from one to the other, slipping a single blanket back over each sleeping form. She’d heard that kids had such angelic visages when they slept. Rose, Jon, and David’s faces were scrunched up, intent on something in their sleep. Their breath came short, jerky, in near-gasps.
Done with blanket duty, Mary slipped out of her shipsuit and slid under her own covers. Lying on her side, she rested her eyes on Rose, wondering what it would be like to have such a child, to be responsible for another small person’s life and welfare. Strange thoughts for someone who’d never even tried to pass the requirements to have a kid.
Rose stiffened in her sleep. A small fist jerked out; a leg twitched. The blanket was half off again. With a sigh, Mary got out of bed and rearranged Rose’s covers. Then she made another round of the other kids; their blankets were half off already. What made these kids so restless?
Back in bed, Mary remembered she hadn’t laid Ray’s pills out; he probably took care of them himself. He was a big boy, didn’t need her. So why was she always looking out for him? Hell, six months ago she’d wanted him dead. Well, he’s my boss, she thought, knowing that wasn’t the answer. Now that she knew him, she’d found the kind of man she might have cared enough about to have a kid with. But that door was closed; he had Rita and their own child on the way and deserved better than to be chained to canes and hobbling through the world. With luck, he wouldn’t always be like that. If she could do something to make this period better for him, she would.
What did she want?
She’d fought like a demon to stay alive as a marine, and she’d do it again if she had to. She’d done her job at the mine, keeping her nose clean and her head down, but none of that was her. She was happiest with her friends, part of their lives and they part of hers. Right now, the job let her be just that. Tomorrow they’d put their own twist to running a mining operation. For now, that was enough.
Two blankets hit the floor within seconds of each other. Yawning, Mary made the rounds again, wondering how long this could last. Tomorrow she’d find a complete set of pajamas for each of the kids. PJs with padlocks. As she tucked the kids in, she watched as their breath slowed, became steady, almost in cadence with each other. Good; maybe now Mary could get some sleep herself. She slid back into her own bed, pulled the covers up, took one last look at each of her kids, and went to sleep.
Jeff tossed his bag on the table nearest the public room’s door and shouted, “I’m home! Don’t all cheer at once!”
Annie might have, but her da and ma were in the kitchen getting tomorrow’s bread started, and her kid sister was helping sweep the floor. “Nikki,” Jeff asked, “could you carry a message to old Ned? I’ll be going out mining tomorrow with the starfolk and I’ll need a horse.”
“And what do the starfolks think they’ll be doing?” Mrs. Mulroney asked, coming from the kitchen with a dishrag to wipe the flour from her hands.
“Taking all the metal a man could ask from a hill without disturbing a blade of grass,” Jeff answered, fishing a coin from his pocket. The one he pulled out was mainly ceramic, with a thin wire of brother Mark’s aluminum wound through it. Out here, the aluminum standard had caught on quickly. In the cities, they still wanted copper in most coins. Sooner or later that would cause trouble, but it made it easier for Jeff to catch a little sister’s eye. He tossed it to Nikki, who made for the door.
“Straight to Old Ned’s door and back, Miss Nikki, and no dawdling,” her mother warned as the girl raced out.
“Humph,” Mr. Mulroney said as he came from the kitchen, two mugs of beer in his hands. “That will be the day a hill gives up good metal without the likes of you tearing it apart, shovel by shovel. I’ve heard the tales of what your brother’s doing up among the Bible-lovers. Whole hillsides gone, rivers flowing full of mud. What you’re doing ain’t natural.”
“Well, Mary says it doesn’t have to be that way.”
“You’ve spent a lot of time with her,” Annie said.
“I’ve spent a lot of time with their ambassador,” Jeff corrected.
“And the two of them never apart,” the mother assured her elder daughter.
“Anyway, I’d like a lunch for me and twenty or so more,” Jeff cut in. “The starfolk will probably have their own food, but wouldn’t it be nice to show them how good they can eat from your larder?” he pointed out to Annie’s dad.
“I could take along an extra keg or two and sell it by the glass,” Annie offered.
Jeff started to say he’d pay for the kegs, then thought better. Much better chance of getting Annie up in the hills with them if her dad thought she was doing business. Jeff would pay for the beer, whether it was drunk or not.
“I could see what they do to the mountain, Ma, and tell you and your friends exactly what happens.”
“As if they’d trust your word where young Jeff is concerned,” her mom muttered, but did not second-guess her man when he said Annie should take two kegs. Jeff went up the stairs two at a time, light of heart. He was staying close to Mary. That would keep Vicky happy. And close to Annie, which made him happy. What more could a man ask for?
Ray was in darkness. It wasn’t the pitch dark of a moonless night but total darkness, the complete absence of light. Sound as well. Feeling also. He moved. Which left the rational part of his brain wondering how he could be so sure he was moving when he had no reference point. Then he spotted a distant speck of light. No question he was moving toward it, and rapidly. In no time…which, considering this situation, might not be a bad image…he shot into the light, transitioning from the total absence of the stuff to the total presence of it in hardly a blink. As he floated in the brilliance, he could feel the ping of every photon as it struck him.
Ray had never been tickled by light waves; he found the sensation rather pleasant. He reached out, spreading himself to take in as much of the stuff as he could…and discovered his body. He had beautiful yellow petals and a long, reddish-brown stem. Around him were a million flowers like him.
Ray remembered when he was a kid, a spiritual guru or fakir or something had chained himself to the base fence and started a hunger strike. On his way to school, Ray remembered the guy yelling at one and all that they had to become one with the animals and the flowers. The base commandant left him there for several weeks, until he started to stink up the place and looked really wiped out by his hunger strike. One morning he was gone and his area hosed down and restored to proper military spic-and-span status. To Ray it had seemed about time.
Still, he often wondered, usually late at night after several beers, what it was like to feel one with everything. Now Ray felt it. The sun fed him, the air flowed over him, his roots reached down, soaking up water and minerals, photosynthesis pulsed through him, filling him, enlarging him. A bee came along. The experience wasn’t quite as enjoyable as a night with Rita, but, for a flower, it was fulfilling. He pushed out seeds.
And something came along, cut him off at the roots, and swallowed him down. As Ray took a ride through an alimentary system with three stomachs, he found that he wasn’t bothered by the outcome, but rather enjoying the experience: digestion, respiration, and a wild trip around the circulatory system before he settled down to a single viewpoint. He was the cow, or sheep, or whatever this critter was; it had six legs and clumped together in a herd, side by side, cheek to rear. Ray got busy nipping at flowers before his herdmates gobbled the best.
I’m experiencing life as a flower, a sheep. Why?
Ray was not surprised when the carnivores showed up.
Given a choice between being eaten as a flower and eaten as a sheep, Ray would take the flower any day. The sheep spotted the wrong smell on the wind. Its little brain wasn’t geared for friend-foe identification; it settled for WRONG. Adrenaline started pumping, panic took over, and Ray took off along with every other six-legged woolly in the herd.
He didn’t know where he was going; he didn’t care. He just knew that he had to get as far from that wrong smell as possible. He didn’t have to be faster than it, just faster than his neighbor. The military officer in Ray evaluated the data and concluded raising an army of sheep was a lost cause.
Whoever the smelly, hungry things were, they weren’t dumb. Running upwind, the sheep stampeded right into the ambush before they even knew it was there. Ray took a mercifully quick blow to the head, found himself in darkness again, and got ready for another lesson in alimentary canals.
Instead he was in his freshman biology classroom back at the Academy. The gardener stood at the front of an otherwise empty class. “What have you learned?”
“To stay at the top of the food chain.” Ray shot back the freshman quip just as he would have years ago.
The gardener shook his head sadly. “You are older and wiser than that. Have you learned the lesson, or must you repeat it?”
Ray felt the darkness coming for him. He had a distinct feeling this school only got harder the second time around. “No matter what color the uniform, we all bleed red,” he said.
His father had told Ray that once. It had taken him years to understand the full impact that his enemy was human, too.
Ray came awake, grimaced at his bladder’s demand, and reached for his canes. Done and back to his bed, he wondered what his next dream would be about. He placed little weight on dreams, just the subconscious mind’s way of discharging electricity. He rolled over and went back to sleep.