

# Fragments Part 1

# Getting to Galen

### Lotta Bangs

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### Smashwords Edition

### **ISBN:** 9781301641475

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### PUBLISHED BY:  
Lotta Bangs on Smashwords

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### Getting to Galen 43,260 words

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### Copyright 19 October 2012 by Lotta Bangs

### Cover by coverageart

### Cover title fonts: Bangkok, Baskerville Semibold Italic

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All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author / publisher except for the use of brief quotations in critical articles or reviews.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes  
This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. Please do not re-sell or give away this eBook to other people. If you would like to share this eBook with another person, please purchase/obtain an additional copy for each reader or send them to Smashwords to obtain their own copy.  
If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to smashwords.com and purchase/obtain your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work and many years this author has spent at her crash-prone computer to produce this series.

This is a work of fiction and does not in any way advocate irresponsible personal or sexual behavior. Names, places, businesses, characters, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, actual events or locales is purely coincidental.

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Dedicated in homage to James Cameron, whose creation

Dark Angel _, inspired me to start writing. Thank you._

However, my characters wouldn't obey and play nice.

They each went their own twisted way.

Perhaps that was for the best.

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Acknowledgements:

My thanks

to Alex Papadimitriou for information about Tryptophan,

to Ashleigh Willis for veterinary advice,

and to my beta-reader Amanda for the welcome criticism and

suggestions which have greatly improved my work.

Getting to Galen

Fragments Part 1

# Table of Contents

Chapter 1 Taj's Early Life

Chapter 2 Breakout

Chapter 3 Reaching Fermina

Chapter 4 Trying to be Normal

Chapter 5 Alone

Chapter 6 First Encounter with Langdon

Chapter 7 Evan Turns Up

Chapter 8 Evan's Transformation

Chapter 9 Evan's Betrayal

Chapter 10 Evan Returns

Chapter 11 Working as a Vet

Chapter 12 Dropping Langdon

Chapter 13 Galen University

Chapter 14 Sucked Back In

Chapter 15 Handling the Estrus

Chapter 16 Reincarnation?

Chapter 17 Magdalena Arrives

Chapter 18 Head of Galen Security

Chapter 19 Finally

Chapter 20 Gathering the TYs

Chapter 21 Again and Again

Chapter 22 and Again and Again and Again

Chapter 23 Emergency

Author's Note

### Book 1 Taj

### Chapter 1
###  Taj's Early Life

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I am Taj. My mother gave me that name. She said it meant 'the finest, the very best' which she believed I was. I have tried to live up to her expectations, but it has not been easy.

She began speaking to me _in utero_ , probably accentuating the spoken words with telepathy, so that I understood her clearly from the first. Mother always passed on her love and hopes for me. She told me about the world outside the wire—how beautiful and free it was, though dangerous too. And she told me always to be very careful.

My mother gave me practical advice as well. She told me to be very aware of my surroundings and always to look out for spies and listening devices. She explained how to network with the other children, to form cells with different tasks. How to keep a lookout and how to spy on the adults who would be around us, to learn their plans. She told me never to trust any of them because they didn't really care for me or the other children I would grow up with.

I have many memories of my mother's speaking to me, filling me with her love as she fed me her milk. She apologized for birthing me in such a terrible place where she would soon have to leave me. She told me she loved me and would never stop trying to get me back, and that some day we would be together again.

My mother also told me to hide my abilities as much as possible. Not to show off what I could do until the other children could do the same things. But also to be careful not to be slower than the others, so I wouldn't be left behind. And _always_ to think carefully before speaking to the adults. To reveal as little as possible about my friends or myself.

My mother said my life here would be harsh and difficult. When things became too unbearable, I should remember her loving me. And try hard to love all my friends who would also be suffering. To teach them to love and be kind and supportive to each other.

They too, had been taken from their mothers. So they also needed to be loved and comforted. She said that all children needed love to help them grow straight and true.

She said the grown-ups here weren't loving people. We couldn't expect anything but harshness from them. We should never trust any of them.

We had to provide the love we needed for each other.

She also said that I should remember that she would always love me. And that she would be outside in the world waiting for me.

And then she was gone.

* * *

So I already understood language when I was born. But I didn't speak until the other children in the nursery did. And I used only the sounds and words they spoke.

For years afterwards I woke in the night, feeling her presence envelop me in her love. I heard her voice inside my head telling me once more that she loved me and that we would find each other again. I wanted to speak to her too, but I didn't know how to reach her. There were so many questions I needed answers for, but I couldn't ask them.

I often dreamed of her too. Her message was always the same: to remember that she loved me, to be wary of the adults, and to love all my friends and comfort them. So I did love the other children in the dormitory and tried to touch each of them at least once every day, and to comfort them whenever the adults hurt us.

There were over a hundred of us TY7s, some a little older, some younger, and our company was divided into platoons of 20 to 24 children. None of the others had been given names, only me, and I was one of the oldest. Eventually the others too all chose names which we used among ourselves. The adults called us by the numbers we had tattooed high on our right upper arms.

There was one girl who was a natural leader. She was very intelligent, big and strong with a dominant personality and a certain way about her. The other kids in our platoon looked up to her. Ava became our platoon leader and eventually the Company Commander and Evan was her second.

I managed to tell Ava most of what my mother had told me. She put the ideas into effect, organizing our company into 5 platoons and then into small squads of 4 to 8 persons specializing in certain functions. The cell idea caught on and the older companies reorganized themselves on the same principle.

There were 4 boys and one other girl in my squadron and our task was spying. There were also other squads of specialized spies with different tasks and talents in other platoons. Evan, who was big and stocky, was our squad leader and platoon strategist and he reported back to Ava. The three other boys, Vene and I were small and skinny.

Lim excelled at being unobtrusive, somehow managing to disappear into the background. Even when I knew he was there I often forgot about him, so he was a natural for this work.

Zane had a talent for finding the listening devices and soon learned to temporarily disable them.

Cute looking Tam and Vene were our charmers. They managed to get around some of the more amenable adults and even get special favors from some of them, such as comics and books and videos that weren't part of our curriculum.

Despite our days being crammed with planned activities, we managed to organize an extensive internal spy network, not just in our company, but including the older companies too. We bugged some of the adults' areas to discover what they might be planning for us, cobbling together the bugs from parts of their devices, which we sabotaged so they didn't work properly and by stealing others from stores.

We small ones who could easily wriggle into tiny spaces, took shifts just hiding in closets adjoining the adults' dining and rec. rooms. We listened in with the aid of paper cup megaphones and our heightened hearing.

Vene and I did that a lot as we both had enhancements that let us function without much sleep. She and I were usually paired with one of the boys, all of whom were very light sleepers and could be awoken in an instant to listen in on anything either of us thought important.

Two sets of ears were always better than one.

Because we worked together and had to trust and depend on each other so much, I became great friends with each of the boys. Several times, they helped me evade discovery or provided me with an excuse to be caught out of bed. And many times, Evan would appear and move us out of where we could have been trapped just before some patrol would do a spot check of that area.

Lim was especially good at sneaking around. He found a way of getting into the kitchens and stealing food which had been placed on carts to go to the grown-ups. He would fill his pockets with this, and give me some, so when one of us did get sprung, they could say that they'd woken hungry and gone looking for something to eat.

My most special friend was Vene. We were very close, and understood each other very well. Sometimes, but not all the time, we could even read each other's minds, like some identical twins are supposed to be able to do. We could send each other private messages, which at times was very handy to pass on warnings. Yet we had been born to different mothers.

Vene was about five months younger, and had no memories of her mother at all. At times I wondered whether we may have been started from eggs produced by the same mother and gestated separately.

We were fairly similar physically. We were both small and dark-haired with dark brown eyes. But Vene's hair was thicker, much more luxuriant and grew faster than mine, even with the short buzz cuts we all wore most of the year.

We were careful never to show the officials just how little sleep we needed. And we always slept in whenever we had the chance because we enjoyed the luxury of being cozy and dreaming.

Because we were almost always together, I loved everyone in our platoon and especially our little squad, easily. But whenever I had the chance, I also loved any of the children in the other platoons that I could reach, making eye contact, smiling at them and touching them when I could.

Luckily, a friendly smile, a touch in passing and a hard hug couldn't be overheard and was rarely observed. So, many of the other children adopted my methods to connect with each other. Soon this spread throughout Typhon, even to the older companies.

We all knew that there were listening devices planted everywhere in the buildings and grounds. Whoever found one, showed it to everyone else. Zane inspected each one and decided whether to just leave it alone, disable it permanently or use it occasionally. He even found some in tree cavities in the forest outside the wire where we learnt orienteering, tracking and to live off the land.

We all knew better than to attempt to run away during these times outside.

So we had to learn to become wary and self-contained, not to talk idly about anything important. And we passed messages soundlessly in a simple sign language we developed, or spoke only after Zane had just checked and disabled the bugs or where some loud noise covered our voices.

Sometimes we all were hurt by the surgery and the chemicals they fed us. I found that in trying to comfort my platoon mates and those in the other platoons whom we saw occasionally in the corridors, at meals and during various activities, I also was comforted and hurt less.

So this became part of my strategy to survive at Typhon. The more I loved all my friends, the more they loved me back, and the stronger we all felt. Thus we all could cope better with the horrible life there.

This was the only life we knew, but even so we picked up enough information from movies, books and eavesdropping on the idle chat of the adults to understand that they had more joy and kindness in their own lives.

And . . . occasionally, I would receive a great burst of love.

It energized me; I could feel it flow through me, more potent than my blood. It made me feel really great, and so strong, that I could give everybody else more love than before. This love felt quite different to that from my mother—it had a dissimilar flavor—but it was nice to know that there was someone else besides my mother who loved me so strongly.

I always tried to send back some love to the source of the love fountain as a thank you, but never knew whether or not it was received. After a while, I sent love there just because I was grateful for the person's affection and because he was within reach, whereas my mother wasn't.

I worried that he or she might be all alone and lonely, as trapped as we were. Usually I received an answering pulse, like a thank-you, not as strong as those he initiated, but still lovely. I thought that was probably an acknowledgement of his receipt of my sending. I hoped he might be my dad as that idea gave me great comfort.

* * *

We TY7s weren't the only group at Typhon. There were smaller companies of TY6s and TY5s, both groups older than us, which had started out as big as ours but had suffered casualties over time. And later there were younger TY8s.

All of us were being trained to be special soldiers—a secret corps of elite, genetically-enhanced and later cybernetically-augmented cyborg assassins. We were indoctrinated to believe what our superiors told us and taught to kill our country's enemies.

But we were also taught to be flexible, to think creatively, to search for unconventional solutions and to make decisions quickly, so we could escape from tight situations. Most of us learned to think for ourselves and to trust only each other. To keep part of ourselves locked away from the adults and to present a facade of openness.

We had classroom lessons in languages, sign, codes, world geography and history. We studied mathematics, physics, chemistry, botany, anatomy, electronics, computer technology, hacking, mechanics and strategy. We learned survival techniques, orienteering, tracking, infiltration and explosives. We learnt about poisons, every possible way to kill slowly or quickly, how to handle our various genetic and surgical enhancements, and anything else that might be associated with soldiering or killing.

The cybernetic enhancements would usually be put in later when we were close to our full growth. But we already knew a lot about them as two of the girls received theirs early. They had to seduce a fat old man and arrange a series of compromising photographs for future blackmail.

Vene and I were fortunate that the special fittings were too large for us. Otherwise it would have been we who would have had to suck and fuck the disgusting creature.

Dena and Lorne were changed when they returned from their assignment, quieter and sadder. I heard Dena crying softly their first night back and slipped into her bed to hold her as she wept. She pulled the covers over her head and buried her face in my chest and held on to me tightly to drown the sounds of her misery. I soothed, patted and comforted, radiating my love at her until she calmed and fell asleep.

Then I had to return to my bed before the night patrol caught me. After the two guards had left, I went to Lorne, held her rigid little body and loved her. Lorne didn't hold me, but she had become less stiff by the time I had to leave again before the next patrol.

I kept up these nightly visits to comfort the two girls for several weeks until they seemed better. They had been debriefed on return from their assignment. But they were never given any form of counseling by the adults, which I know now should have been mandatory. Typhon didn't look after their valuable properties very well.

We drilled endlessly until all the movements and exercises were second nature and we could move like robots ruled by one mind. But we would never have a public marching out parade to display our synchronicity. I guess the drilling was just a carryover from regular army training, designed to condition us to learn basic responses without needing to think about them.

We ran complex obstacle courses and spent weeks at a time living rough in the wilds, living off the land outside the wire.

For recreation we played chess and every computer game ever devised.

For sport, we swam, skated, and skied—mostly cross country, and hang-glided. We learned and gained proficiency in various schools of yoga, martial arts of all kinds, and every form of recreational sport and game imaginable.

The violent sports were for letting off steam; the milder ones for fitting into characters when we were on a mission. The Eastern techniques were for personal development, self-discipline and fighting.

All the TY7s concealed or minimized as many of our talents as possible.

We had learned early not to stand out too much from the group, nor to lag behind, but to stay up with the others, and never to volunteer anything about ourselves or anyone else. It was never good to draw personal attention of any kind. Some who had done so disappeared forever. My mother's advice had proved to be spot on.

We exchanged relevant information with the older soldiers too. They told us something of what the world was like outside and warned us of anything they heard that might pertain to us.

A very important fact we picked up early was never to interfere with our tattoos.

Several of the older soldiers decided one evening to enhance their tats with frames, enclosing them in fancy scrollwork, hearts, leafy vines or concentric ovals. All of them had seizures hours later and were rushed away for treatment. They didn't appear again for several weeks. Another soldier experimented by giving himself a hickey over the tat, with the exact same result.

Then, from various sources, we learned that there was to be another round of TY7-only surgery, because the adults didn't think we were responding to the 'indoctrination' (read brainwashing) as well as we should. This time, instead of cutting and hurting our bodies some more, the medicos would be trying out new techniques in brain surgery on us.

Somehow, brains feel more personal than all the other limbs and organs we'd had augmented and altered for no good reason. None of us wanted to have our heads messed up any more than they already were, so we got serious about the escape plans we had been working on for years.

Chapter 2

Breakout

Some TY5s created a diversion, arranging several electrical fires in their barracks and near our dorms. In the resultant confusion and noise of alarms, most of the TY7s, some TY5s and even some opportunistic TY6s escaped.

We fled in small groups of 5 to 8. Once we were outside the wire we broke up into smaller groups of two or three. We all hid when any guards appeared, then fled in separate directions when they spotted us.

I saw Ava get shot in the chest, and knocked down. So did Evan, but he yelled at us not to waste her sacrifice and to keep going.

Vene and I were together with Lim. Then we separated and Vene was caught. I doubled around to help her, but Evan beat me, jumping the guard who held her. The guard let Vene go as he fell, but managed to grab Evan and cuff him.

I was armed with a sling and a flint knife I had made, so slung two stones at the guard and knocked him out. I found the key, but somehow Evan had already broken the cuffs. We fled together for a while, finding Lim again. Then we separated and kept running alone.

It was at the end of winter and cold, with mushy snow on the ground. The thaw had already started and streams were moving again. Our hair was near its maximum permitted length and we had prepared well.

I wore sneakers and had a cotton blanket wrapped and belted around my body under my knee-length nightdress. And I had a loose, puffy, quilted jacket on top. Worn unzipped, this camouflaged my extra bulk while appearing to have been grabbed in a hurry.

I also had 3 very large, heavy-duty, black plastic garden waste bags, 2 coils of nylon rope, a flat metal water canteen, several small bottles of water and some packaged food in the many inside pockets. There were also jeans, track pants, t-shirts, panties, a hooded sweater and socks, most of the clothes in dark colors.

I had slept well the previous night, so could run for two days or more before tiring. We all knew to avoid the main roads, to orient by the stars. Mostly I followed deer trails where possible—a trick we had learnt from the TY6s, which the officials hopefully knew nothing about.

I ran through the forest, staying in the mountains under the trees. I avoided snow fields where I would have left tracks visible from the air. Finding a fast narrow waterway, I stripped off my upper garments. I wrapped everything around me inside the blanket with the tripled plastic bags over it. I tied these tightly under my armpits, wrapping the ends of the plastic several times around the nylon ropes.

I had to stretch upwards, exhaling hard to narrow my chest as much as possible. This was necessary to get the ropes tight enough to keep everything inside dry. Only my naked arms, shoulders and head were free.

I dived into the icy water, swimming downstream, drinking delicious mouthfuls freely until I found I needed frequent bladder breaks. These necessitated getting out of the water and the bags.

I found the safest way to avoid leaving footprints was to grab hold of an overhanging branch to pull myself up into a tree. I would urinate down the other side or from an adjacent tree before rewrapping and diving in again.

This wasted so much time I was more sparing with the drinks from then on. Occasionally I needed to descend to defecate. Stepping into the space under the pine branches, I used a stick to dig a small hole among the rotting old pine needles to make a latrine. Then I covered it to keep away flies which might give away my route to trackers.

The air trapped inside the bags and jacket down aided my buoyancy and would reveal any leaks quickly. The blanket, clothes and hard exercise kept most of me warm, so I was never unbearably uncomfortable.

To avoid tearing the bags I had to swim like a fish, keeping both legs together and moving them up and down. This propelled me faster than my arms could manage alone, and became easier as I grew used to the movement.

When I grew really tired I took a big drink of river water, again climbed up into a tree, stripped and urinated. Climbed down again for a good wash, wrapped up warmly, ate some food, and tied myself into a branch fork.

My bladder usually woke me after three hours and I would set out again. I noticed each time I climbed out that the climate had grown much warmer and the trees had changed. There were fewer evergreens and more bare deciduous trees which were easier to climb into.

Also the river water was now dirtier, so I had to use my store of bottled water. I spent some time making a small fire, boiling up water in my metal canteen and decanting it into plastic bottles.

The river must have been flowing southwards sometimes, not just east as I had judged. But it's easy to get directions confused when riding a current. That's one reason so many people drown in rip tides.

Chapter 3

Reaching Fermina

Four days after the escape, I reached the far side of a small town near morning. I climbed out of the river under a large boatshed which was partially built over the water.

I finger-dried my hair and body, dressed in trackies, the hoodie and sneakers. I packaged all my stuff but the sling and its stones in the inner bag, wrapped the middle one around it, then the outer one and hid everything in a nearby corner. Then I had to hide too, as the heavy doors opened and a launch with its lights dimmed slid silently inside.

An unusually large number of people disembarked, adults and children, who must have been packed in like sardines. From their whispered conversations I figured they were wetbacks—illegal immigrants from Mexico and further south. A middle-aged woman was in charge of them.

I heard her answer a question about papers. She told the inquirers that they would all be photographed during the next week and get their papers a week later. That was most interesting to me as I now had no legal identity so also needed a source of official papers.

Small groups of the illegals began slipping out a personnel door and were driven off to safe houses by people waiting outside, until only the woman remained to lock up. I slunk out the small door while her back was turned and found a place to hide where I could watch for her, then followed her home. Fortunately she walked, so must have lived nearby.

Still, it was a bad area for a woman to walk at night, poorly lit too. Just as she drew abreast of an alley on her left, two men armed with knives moved out. She must have heard them and turned, brandishing a gun, a Colt .45, she had kept hidden in her coat pocket. They backed off, and she moved away, walking backwards, not seeing the other two now sneaking up behind her.

I moved up fast, calling to her to look out behind, and quickly took care of the first two while she held the others at bay, then making a wide circle around her and getting behind them, I leapt up and knocked their heads together too.

She held the weapon on me. "Who the hell are you?"

"Your guardian angel. And there are at least four more of them around." She turned the gun aside and I knocked her to the pavement, then slung a stone at the knife-thrower and another at the guy with him.

_The_ _Clan of the Cave Bears_ had been my favorite book growing up. Circulated by one of the medics, the author described how to scrape and tan animal skins and then make slings. We had all secretly made our own and practiced every chance we had.

Each of us had learned Ayla's trick of throwing two stones in rapid succession. I and three of the others could now throw four stones fairly quickly, with great force and accuracy.

Middle-aged women don't fall well, though she didn't complain. I had to help her move into the slightly protective shelter of a doorway, then scooted off and took care of three more pairs of hoods. They would all have severe concussion when they roused. Then I escorted her home and was invited in.

That was how I met Fermina.

She had been a hairdresser and worked throughout her childless marriage. She retired when her husband died seven years earlier and left her in a comfortable financial state.

Fermina had had several discreet suitors since. Most of them had relatives and friends who were trying to escape the intolerable conditions of their part of South America in the hope of finding more freedom and opportunity for a better life in the USA.

One of her suitors had sent money for the two children of his younger sister to get to America through one of the risky Coyote smuggling networks. Something had gone wrong. The two teenagers had been found locked inside a stolen refrigerated meat truck abandoned in the Arizona desert only a few miles over the USA-Mexico border along with 52 other illegals, all dead of dehydration. The uncle had learnt of this when police had rung his number which had been discovered on both the kids.

So Fermina had arranged her own much safer network to help recommended friends of friends enter America.

I didn't have the highest opinion of the US system. We had all figured out that 'the enemies of our country' we would have to assassinate were usually just persons who spoke too openly about the abuses of democracy perpetrated by our authorities. Or they were the few elected US officials who had somehow managed to retain their consciences, and couldn't be frightened, blackmailed or bought off easily.

But suppressive dictatorships could be a great deal worse.

Fermina had set up a safe way of vetting applicant migrants, bringing them in and getting them accredited. This system had been working very well until recently. Then some less honorable competitors had discovered it and were trying to take over her operation.

None of the punks I had attacked had seen me or knew that I was a girl. They didn't even know how I had managed to knock them out as I had picked up most of the stones afterwards.

I told Fermina my story and need for a new identity. As I had fluent Spanish and Portuguese, she contrived to set me up as her recently orphaned distant niece from Argentina. And in just two days she arranged for the necessary properly witnessed legal documentation, already signed by the parents, for Fermina to adopt me in the event that anything happened to them.

My age was reduced by nearly three years, and though I didn't know it until many years later, Maggie, my future dear friend and ally, altered my physical fingerprints and DNA signature so the trackers would never identify me by my traces.

Fermina permed what hair I had and added extensions to give me soft ringlets. She taught me how to look after and maintain the style and to apply mineral-based make-up, the kind used for strawberry birthmarks and scars, over tattoo concealer to cover my tattoo. She gave me a pedicure and manicure and taught me to do this for myself, to care for my cuticles and to cream my hands and feet to keep the skin soft so I would appear upper class.

Fermina dressed me up very girlishly in good quality pre-owned designer outfits that couldn't be traced back to a particular locality. They were all fussy things I normally wouldn't have worn. Dresses with puffy ruffled short sleeves in bright feminine colors and full, frilled dirndl skirts. Not a single pair of jeans or plain t-shirt in the lot! At least she bought the plain, sensible underwear new.

She trained me in how to walk, move and behave in a simpering feminine manner. She arranged a history for me in Argentina. My father had been a University professor. And my mother had been an American-born archeologist before falling in love with and marrying him.

These people had actually existed until they and their two children disappeared a year earlier, just before they were denounced. Their daughter had been raised multilingual and home-schooled by her parents and several short-term tutors. She had even reached black belt level at taekwondo. Her education was very advanced and she had already reached university entrance level. The identity was absolutely perfect for me, so I was set.

After three days of this intensive training, Fermina had me smuggled to Argentina. There I turned up at the American embassy, demanding asylum, still pristinely befrilled and curly-haired. I had a little blue, wheeled, monogrammed, Louis Vuitton suitcase containing my clothes, curling iron, manicure set and make-up kit, a packet of family photographs and bundle of genuine letters and documentation.

The embassy took a while processing me as I had no passport of my own, being included on my mother's at her last renewal. I also seemed to have too much attitude for a 5½-year-old refugee orphan. I refused to tell them with whom I had been sheltered for the previous year.

I didn't like all the questions, nor the people who pretended to be my friends to gain my confidences. They made me feel very lonely and vulnerable.

When I feel bad, I always try to love my friends more, but there were none here. I had been sending love to each of my squadron mates every few days, but never received even a tingle in reply. This time I sent a great burst of love back to my fountain guy to let him know that I was alright and still free.

He immediately sent me one of his own, which gave me a great boost and helped me handle the situation a lot better.

Months later, during which I had to be very careful that nobody looked too closely at my growing out extensions, or tried to help me bathe and possibly saw the tattoo I always covered up, they flew me out for a reunion with my mother's very distant cousin who had arranged with my parents to adopt and raise me if anything happened to them.

Chapter 4

Trying to be Normal

Fermina met me at the airport and we played out a little drama for the press, where she got all gushy and tried to hug me and I held her off at a distance, as I had been doing with everyone at the embassy.

Fermina settled me into her home and arranged for me to take university courses mostly by correspondence and/or internet. I became the daughter she had never had and she was all that a mother should be to me. I loved her deeply.

Fermina taught me how to look after a house, to cook, sew, knit, crochet and embroider, all apparently skills that were important for an Argentinean girl to know as preparation for marriage and to augment her glory box.

I gained a good education, largely in Languages, Literature and the Humanities to round out and fill in some gaps. I continued to provide her with protection as needed, always wearing dark close-fitting garments when guarding her. Thus nobody would ever identify me with her frilly, bookish, prodigy niece who had arrived in the country months after the occasional bodyguard had appeared.

The only difficulty we had was in my having to attend Sunday school after church.

I had memorized Prayer books and read both the King James Bible and a modern one as soon as I realized this was the basis of her religion. I also read a bunch of commentaries on the Bible and some very opinionated interpretations of it. The Bible was a very violent book, not at all what I had expected.

At my first Sunday school class, I was seated next to a small girl also wearing a frilly dress. All the desks and tables were stacked in the back of the room so we had to sit cross-legged on the floor of the church-run preschool building. The class had learnt a prayer the previous week, which every child had to stand up and recite in turn. It was one I already knew.

Then we had a lesson on the Perfect Goodness of Jesus.

After a few minutes of this crap, I put up my hand and told the teacher that Jesus wasn't always good. He was angry and annoyed that the priests of the Jews had not believed or immediately welcomed him as the promised Messiah, as he arrogantly assumed they should, even though he allegedly already knew his future.

And he was a poor environmentalist, as he then deliberately destroyed a leafy but fruitless roadside fig tree. Apparently this was supposed to be a prophetic metaphor for the spiritually corrupt condition of the Jews of Jerusalem, who had rejected him and so would all be rejected by God in the afterlife.

That was also high-handed and presumptuous, usurping God's prerogative, as the acceptance of souls into Heaven wasn't Jesus' concern but his Father's. Jesus had no idea what good things these people may already have done or would do that could earn them a place Upstairs. So he had no right to condemn them just because they thought he was as fake as all the other pretend-Messiahs who were appearing frequently at that time.

The Sunday school teacher Mrs. Burns, was only a parishioner and it turned out that like so many Christians, she had never actually read the Bible, just the expurgated child-friendly Jesus stories. She was certain I was making all of this up. She was sure Jesus would never kill a tree, especially a fruit tree.

I quoted Matthew 21:18-19; 20-22 and Mark 11:12-14; 20-25. Flustered but trying hard to show she was being fair, Mrs. Burns looked up the relevant verses.

"The Bible also says that the devil can quote Scripture to suit his purposes," she snapped, her face bright red.

"Actually, no ma'am, it doesn't. Though in Genesis 3 Satan misquotes scripture to tempt Eve, and in Matthew 4 and again in Luke 4 Satan misquotes scripture to tempt Jesus, that particular saying is a misquote from Shakespeare's _The Merchant of Venice_ , spoken by Antonio:

"Mark you this, Bassanio,  
The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.  
An evil soul producing holy witness  
Is like a villain with a smiling cheek,  
A goodly apple rotten at the heart:  
O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath!"

* * *

That was the end of my Sunday school attendance. Mrs. Burns sent a note to Fermina asking her to keep me home as I was a bad influence on the other children.

My notoriety spread throughout the local Catholic community, but instead of making me a pariah, it made me very popular with the small fry. I was invited to a lot of kiddy birthday and pajama parties. As I was so much older and more mature than the other little girls I found these exceedingly tiresome. I wasn't interested in playing dress-ups and slathering on excessive make-up. I didn't see it as any great favor to be allowed to play with anyone's latest walking doll or the weeing baby dolls either, though I politely thanked the donors for this obvious honor. And Barbie dolls—erkh!!

A few times I managed to use my sewing or knitting skills to make some small garment for some child's favorite doll, and that kept my hands busy so I didn't actually have to play with the doll.

Then I discovered one of the birthday girls had an older brother with a collection of computer games, so I challenged him to a game, and of course beat him easily. I showed him lots of tricks he could use in most other computer games so he wouldn't feel too humiliated and let him almost beat me twice.

The 12-y-o brother of another girl had some karate trophies in his room. I asked where he took it and discovered there were several local martial arts schools. My Argentinean identity had studied taekwondo, so I took that up again, adding jujitsu, hapkido and aikido, then Kyokushin, Gōjū-ryu and Shotokan karate styles.

As I already had advanced proficiency in each of these martial arts, I joined at instructor level, which really inspired the young students. I perfected my Korean language skills too. My Japanese was already fluent. I dropped Kyokushin and Gōjū-ryu karate when I realized that the instructors were mostly faking.

Not being interested in acquiring dan markings I always wore an all-white _do-bok_ , with the cross-over front jacket and a plain black _dti_ tied around the waist. I also entered no competitions or exhibitions, but I really enjoyed the heavy calisthenics and hard workouts again. My body seemed to need them.

Most of the dojos were sited in gyms which gave me access to other equipment. I ran for miles on the treadmills every day, swam regularly at one of the pools and taught Fermina and a few other people to swim. But I had to avoid using the weights when other people were around. It would have been too difficult to explain how I could easily bench press triple my own body weight.

I showed Fermina a series of water aerobics exercises which could be done even by frail old ladies and she became so interested in these, Fermina took over a swimercise class and gathered her own students. I also persuaded Fermina to work out in other ways occasionally.

Then Fermina said that she had to put on a birthday party for me and I had to invite all the girls who had had me over. I seriously considered running away rather than have to go through that. I didn't want a party with a bunch of 6-year-old girls.

Fermina suggested I opt for a mixed party with all the kids and young adults I taught at martial arts and we could hold the party at the gym with the swimming pool. I arranged a self-defense exhibition showing how a properly trained small person could not only keep off and escape from untrained larger attackers, but disable them too.

The gym owners were very happy to allow us free use of their resources, and my guests were fascinated to see how I disarmed and disabled a series of volunteer assailants. Some of these guys were really trying to hurt me too, because they didn't want to look like milksops. I had to pretend to pant and be out of breath after taking on two guys at a time for the last three demonstrations.

The food was great too and much healthier than regular party food. Fermina's swim aerobics ladies did some synchronized exercises in a sort of aquatic conga line. A lot of the guests jumped in and joined in that, and we raised a lot of money for a local children's charity because I had asked people to make donations to that rather than buy me presents.

Attendance rates at the swim aerobics and martial arts classes tripled after that too, so it worked out very well all around and I wasn't loaded down with a pile of unwanted toys and dolls.

My annual birthday party became a successful social event after that, and even though I didn't attend school with any of the local kids, I became quite popular with a wide range of age groups. I no longer felt so stifled having to talk about dollies and made a few fairly close older friends with whom I had something in common. They accepted me as the person I pretended to be, so I managed to have a fairly normal social life.

* * *

Before leaving Typhon we had all arranged to leave coded messages at various internet sites. I placed mine: 'Searching for little sister Wendy,' but never received an identifying reply. And I could find no messages from any of the others. This was disheartening, but there could have been many reasons for it: lack of internet access, not yet being secure, being continually on the move, and fear of being trapped or betrayed.

Perhaps some of us had been recaptured and the others had feared that all previous known codes were suspect. But then my message should have entrapped me, and it hadn't.

Fermina though impressed by my independence and determination, was worried for me. She never revealed any fear that I might leave her if I found my birth mother, though I guess she must have felt some trepidation. She understood that I was compelled to find her and my friends. I had to be sure they were alright, and try to help them if they weren't. Fermina allowed me the freedom and wherewithal to search, helping in every way she could.

I had told her most of my story, which didn't shock her too much. Fermina already knew of even greater horrors and accepted them as part of life on this cruel earth.

She sold off some of her stock market investments to finance my search. We arranged a few older fake identities and I learned to dress and use make-up to suit them. I also added lots of pectoral-building exercises to develop my chest to give me a bit of cleavage and got a driving license under an older ID.

So after a few years when her competitors had been thoroughly discouraged, I was able to drive off several times to seek my old friends in places they had shown interest in visiting.

Each time I returned I was shocked to see how badly Fermina's health had deteriorated. Finally she admitted that she was dying. Her options were extremely limited, the cancer so virulent she would be dead in six months without treatment. With radiation or chemo she could stretch that to a year in which she would feel very bad from the treatments. She decided to take pain medication only, and when that became insufficient, to overdose and end her life.

In the meantime she liquidated all her assets. We placed the cash into solid metal boxes that fit into Styrofoam car coolers which I took and hid in the wilds. She even sold her home and good furniture, renting a small furnished apartment for us by the month.

Fortunately, by then, we had already set up four more alternative identities for me, each progressively older than my actual age. I was able to include copies of all my papers in several of these caches.

Fermina weakened rapidly. When her medication was no longer effective, I bought her high quality street heroin which helped more. She really hated feeling so out of it. When she eventually asked, I gave her the last dose, adding one of the poisons I knew which sends a body into an irreversible coma.

She was placed into hospital and slipped away four days later by which time all the drugs were out of her system, but nobody requested an autopsy.

Fermina had been a religious woman, attended church and took confession regularly. Her religion forbade suicide. My method of providing her with a peaceful death allowed her a proper Catholic burial in consecrated soil, which I hoped would ease her soul. I arranged her funeral and the gravestone and mourned the beloved friend, mentor and mother who had given me so very much.

Chapter 5

Alone

I was now almost 14, totally alone, but provided with nearly $6m in accessible cash.

I had come into puberty at 11 and soon after discovered the absolute horror of my estrus period, which occurred quarterly and lasted for 3 days. At least this was better than monthly, like my menses, but it was still extremely difficult. Only Fermina's understanding and my ability to sink deeply into a meditative state for the duration helped me get through it safely.

Fortunately, being only a small part kitty, I didn't appear to be producing discernible pheromones. So I didn't attract the hordes of slavering steroid-insane male toms or humans wanting to fight over me that entire female cats had to contend with.

Nevertheless, just in case I was caught out sometime, I saw a woman gynecologist, had my hymen perforated and was fitted for a diaphragm. I added that and several prophylactics to my carry-around kit, replacing the latter every six months.

I was missing my Typhon friends quite desperately now with no-one left to love and be loved by. Many times I had sent out undirectional love aimed at specific friends, especially my old squadron mates, but never received a twinge in return and never knew if it reached anyone. So again I sent a great wave of love to my fountain man, and received an even bigger one in return.

He, at least, could always be relied upon.

Another estrus period was due shortly after the funeral so I locked myself in our flat and waited it out. Then I disposed of all Fermina's remaining possessions, keeping only some jewelry and photographs which I boxed.

I sold the car, bought a more practical powerful motorbike and a strong new matte black mountain bicycle, a good set of leathers, black wet-weather clothes, two crash helmets and bike hats, camouflaged camping gear and lots of waterproof sheeting and bungee cords.

I had a special carrier fitted to the back of the motorbike so the bicycle could be strapped on in a vertical position when I needed to travel. This also proved handy for attaching more baggage and the large opaque plastic containers I used to carry extra fuel. Those also held my other papers and cash in their false bottom and hollow side compartments. A friend of Fermina's made them for me.

Fully prepared for anything, I took off on my search, sometimes picking up and traveling with a new friend for a short while, but usually staying alone. It was nice to have the facility of getting along easily with strangers; something I would never have learned without Fermina's forcing me to mix socially. I met some fascinating people and others who sometimes needed a little help. It's quite sad that there are so many homeless people in this wealthy country, many of them abandoned women with young children trying to reach family in other states.

* * *

A few months later came the Nuclear Pulse and everything became even more confused.

You would think that the country would be inured to terrorist attacks after 9/11, but everyone seemed to have believed America was safe again. They assumed that the Bushes' Wars on Terrorism, the conquering of Iraq and the deaths of many well known terrorist dictators, had taught all the 'bad guys' a lesson.

This new attack, not only knocked out Wall Street records and brought on a recession, but stalled all forms of transport except pushbikes, rowboats, scooters and skateboards.

It also fritzed _all_ electronic manufacturing machinery and communication systems: computers, telephones, television, radio and all the small handheld devices. These all had to be replaced, but first they had to be imported or made.

The local machines used for manufacturing these also had many electronic components which had burned out and had to be replaced with imports. Few of the smaller companies could afford to change and update so much and just folded.

The populace was terrified because many suddenly lost their jobs. There were wild rumors flying around but no facts. People could no longer discover what had happened, or what was happening, or what if anything, they should do about it.

After decades of people's being able to connect to each other easily through every conceivable technology, they were suddenly back in the Dark Ages. The tech savvy and sophisticated veneer of civilization crumbled. Not being able to contact others or know what to think caused a kind of madness.

This led to riots, opportune looting, and consequent police/militia brutality to put down those riots. Looters and probably many terrified innocents were shot down. The cities were too dangerous to stay in.

I had to have all the electronics on my bike replaced and buy a new watch and laptop at a Galen shop. I did have a protective cover for my old laptop, but nothing protects against a nuclear pulse.

Galen were the first people to get in new undamaged electronic components and must have made a killing, though their stuff was really reasonably priced and exceptionally well made. I bought a perpetual water supply there and a GPS unit that is still accurate and has never malfunctioned. Galen goods don't have inbuilt obsolescence, require no batteries and last forever.

Having access to almost unlimited cash, I got off very lightly compared to other people who lost so much more.

* * *

Refugees streamed out into the countryside where there were no facilities for them. Tent cities were set up to help the homeless, but resources were scarce as the supply systems had been destroyed.

I had started out with a good supply of tryptophan which prevented and temporarily allayed my convulsive condition. But it was rapidly depleted and proved difficult to replenish, as—surprise, surprise—the supply was controlled.

It generally wasn't available on the street. When I did manage to score some, I always asked about other customers, joking that we should get together and buy shares in a cow as I didn't much like goat milk. But again I found no takers.

Milk chocolate, dried powdered spirulina—the dark green pond scum, sesame, pumpkin and sunflower seeds were all high in tryptophan. But they also weren't easy to get hold of with the disruptions in distribution caused by the Nuclear Pulse and damaged economy.

Oats were easier to find, so I made a rolled oat porridge for breakfast nearly every day. Occasionally, when I could get some, I gorged on chocolate, feeling quite virtuous because it was more than just an indulgence.

Milk, which is a good source of the protein, was also difficult to obtain. I couldn't exactly carry a cow around with me on the bike. And the powdered and tinned varieties disappeared from shops as soon as they arrived in stock.

Only once, I managed to score a carton of condensed milk. But at one of the transient camps, I had to give it away to a mother with a screaming, hungry baby. She hadn't been able to find any formula. The can had a note saying it wasn't suitable as an infant food. But in the short term it had to be better than starvation, which was the other choice.

Stupid thoughtless woman had opted to take medication to have her breasts dried up. She joined up with the weirdo religious sect who owned the Galen shops and towers. They promised to bring her milk back and look after her and the baby until it did. At least I got back most of the canned milk.

I survived by riding out regularly to rural areas, eating and loading up with as much red meat, milk, cheese and eggs as I could get as payment for farm chores, and ate as much fish as I could catch or buy. Can't say that I enjoyed fishing, or cleaning and gutting the cold things either.

The country was in turmoil. Masses of people were on the move looking for work and safety. And many predators were preying upon them. There were so many young kids who had nobody to look after them.

I picked up a 9-y-o boy and his 6-y-o sister whose father had been jailed for stealing food for them, and helped them to reach relatives three states away.

I tried to help other children where I could before they were picked up by the gangs or religious nuts, but there were just too many kids in trouble and too many human predators.

It was easy to recognize the pedophiles and their procurers. My diminutive stature and slight boyish build made it easy to get in with them and rescue the kids they had taken.

I left each of the perverts with a concussion and a large neatly serifed capital 'P' carved deep into their foreheads and down their noses, blackened with the wood-ash of the ash tree which prevents infections but leaves the scar darkened and very visible. The bastards wouldn't be able to approach kids again until they'd had massive plastic surgery.

I looked through every transient camp I found, but never stayed in one, camping out alone instead. To prevent getting robbed, I hid my bike and luggage well off the road, in shrubbery or among rocks, under a double-sided camouflage-fabric tent, desert one side, forest the other. Then I'd carry the bicycle back to the road and pedal through urban centers and the large camp sites, searching for my friends.

On returning in the morning to continue my search, I noticed that children I had seen the previous afternoon had disappeared during the night and nobody seemed to care.

There were many do-gooder groups around too. Some church societies, offered meals and a safe place to sleep, though you had to attend one of their services to score those. They also preferred to target family groups with at least one adult in charge who could keep the kids under control.

Most of the lone youngsters were collected by the weirdo Galen sect. They would end up indoctrinated with their crazy ideas. But the Galen kids they brought to help in the recruiting appeared healthy, happy and self-assured, so at least they would be fed and safe.

Eventually, I herded most kids with nowhere else to go in their direction. Not knowing where the rest disappeared to was quite frightening. At least I never found any dead bodies or mass graves.

The outside world was so rough and so different to what we had been led to expect. Our loose contingency plans proved completely useless.

I never encountered any other Typhon escapees. With the breakdown of the communications and computer system, I couldn't even locate their messages on any of the sites we had planned to use.

It became harder to travel with all the imposed restrictions and checkpoints, and extremely difficult to maintain and fuel my bike.

The mountain bicycle which had the advantages of silence, portability, invisibility at night and not requiring fuel, became indispensable. I kept a spray can of paint for touching up the inevitable scratches.

I obtained more large opaque plastic containers, without secret compartments this time, to carry extra gas and refueled at the Galen garages which never suffered any shortage.

The Galen shops seemed to stock everything I could want. Their packed salad sandwiches, vegetable juices and milkshakes were unbelievably fresh and soon became favorites of mine.

Their electronic goods and torches required no batteries and were incredibly efficient and cheap. I bought more than I probably needed while waiting for their mechanics to fit carriers for two sets of spare wheels either side of my bike, making a sort of cage for my baggage. I could even hold sleeping children strapped in safely in that.

At one time I had six small children squashed together behind me in the cage. Two larger ones were strapped vertically to the bicycle at the back and three more were strapped on each side to the spare bike wheels, with a tiny one-year-old hooked into my backpack. Four toddlers were strapped in front of me on the tank and surrounding six spare fuel bottles which fed directly via feeder tubes through a specially adapted lid into the tank. Another 6-y-o was strapped into the basket seat in front of the handlebars.

I drove very carefully nonstop for 6 hours, using dirt back roads when the sun came up, stoically ignoring the screaming and bawling because I had no baby food or napkins. At least their noise proved the kids were still alive. But we finally made it, straight up the wheelchair ramp and up to the Galen reception desk.

There, hordes of motherly types immediately descended to detach and take away the kids as I gave them my GPS details and all the information I had. A guy in mechanic's overalls helped me get off the bike which he took away to be cleaned and serviced.

They gave me a room to crash in, with a shower built over the bath, so I could wash off the vomit and urine the littlies had draped me with. I had a long hot soothing soak to ease away the stiffness and trembling, then a warm shower to finish.

In that time Galen had somehow cleaned and reblackened my leathers so they looked and smelled brand new, though still broken in to my body's conformation. They also had cleaned my boots and other garments and laid out a cute tank and tap shorts set for sleeping.

I couldn't resist, so crawled into the inviting bed and slept around the clock. I woke to find my sparkling clean refueled bike reloaded with my now-recovered dumped baggage. The plastic jerries were refilled and stored as usual. The adapted lid and its feeder tubes were packed away too. And though I didn't feel as empty as expected, there was a large packed lunch for me to take away.

I wouldn't eat with them because I had heard odd stories about their food. But I figured take-out couldn't hurt, and it was all delicious. They even included a large packet of hulled pumpkin seeds and containers of tryptophan and multivitamins. They certainly tried hard to suck people into joining up.

Galen managed to round up all the marked pedophiles, and traced their network, rescuing more kids, as I heard next time I used their services.

* * *

Every transient camp had message boards but there seemed to be no central information base where people could register and leave information. There was no communication between the various camps for a long time.

I continued using my arranged identity code message 'Searching for little sister Wendy,' as I hadn't any other. I left it on the now restored internet sites as well as resuming my interrupted university courses, still using the younger Argentinean identity.

I would add a date on the message boards, then return two weeks later, hoping for contact information. Yet my call was never answered and I never came across messages from any of the others. I worried that they all may have been recaptured but refused to give up the search. At least they would know that I was alive, safe and actively searching, even if they were unable or unwilling to contact me for whatever reason.

* * *

I enjoyed working at farms, as this seemed more like 'real' work to me and provided the hard exercise which my body needed. Rural people also seemed more genuine and open than those encountered in the cities and I made friends with many, and returned to stay and work with them on my rounds of the transient camps.

And then I found myself falling in love with a sweet, shy, older boy, though he never knew my true age.

I was very short, slight and barely developed. When the breast tissue finally began to come in, it was widely spread over my well-developed pectoral muscles like a pancake. So I appeared to have more than there actually was, though I never needed to wear more than a sports bra.

He knew my physical strength, and I was very mature in my attitude, with a lot of life experience, so easily passed for anything between 8 and 18, and with make-up and the right clothes could look 24.

His name was Bertram Hughes Rainier, a rather unfortunate group of names which offered no standout easy nickname that he liked though I offered Berm, Bram and Tram. So he went by Jim and called me Taj. He was dark-haired, green-eyed, fairly tall, strongly built, gentle and sensitive, wrote poetry, and was also interested in the martial arts.

We often practiced sparring together, which improved his technique and reflexes greatly. With all the physical touching that entails, we both became physically aroused and eventually became occasional lovers. We had almost 18 months together before Jim joined the Marines and went away.

We kept in contact by email for a while and got together every time he came home on leave, and it was a fun, relaxed, accepting relationship which might have become more, but he was killed during some hush-hush exercise. I don't know whether it was a good thing or not, but Jim was never home when I came into estrus, so he never found out about that.

I had to send another burst of love to my fountain guy to help me get through the sadness of this loss. He reciprocated as always, sending me so much, that I was able to share more with Jim's grieving family.

* * *

Then one day up north, I came near one of those giant HoloVid screens which had sprung up suddenly in lots of public places recently. It had just started to play one of those pirate _Wise Monkeys_ HoloBombs.

I had seen these before without getting greatly excited. But it was rather nice that there was at least one do-gooder out there trying to alert people to corruption in high places. I wished him luck, but didn't expect his efforts to have much overall effect.

There was just too much corruption in too many spheres, not just in government and the executive levels of big businesses, but in the various street and biker gangs. The original Italian Mafia, the copycat Mexican, and other South American drug-based gangster groups, the Chinese, Japanese, Russian and European imports, all were trying to steal a slice of the action and rip off the ordinary American people.

Though founded by good men with powerful minds and the highest ideals, and designed to be a utopia, America now seems to be organized around corruption. Removing a little here and there will make little difference in the long run.

You'd need to tear down the entire system and rebuild it from scratch, which would cause irreconcilable collateral damage. And as you can't alter or hasten the development of human nature, you'd probably end up with something just as bad.

Or even much worse, like the Communism that Marxism turned into, and that also was originally idealistic. So I'm not a revolutionary, though, like anyone, I would love to live in a perfect world where everyone was decent and nice.

Fat chance of that ever happening!

The program was actually titled _The One Who Speaks_ , but nearly everyone referred to it as _The Wise Monkeys_ because it began with Vid of the proverbial three wise monkeys, each with a kerchief tied over his eyes, ears or mouth, which they removed one after the other, before the last monkey proved to be a man in a monkey mask who then started not just dishing dirt on his latest criminal victims, but showing visual evidence of their crimes which the police could not ignore.

Our corrupt cops were quite willing to accept bribes and look the other way, until the monkey man targeted someone and came up with irrefutable evidence, and then the culprit had to do his time.

I watched the whole short program, marveling how this man had managed to find so much incriminating information about so many public figures. And have them removed from office and jailed. Yet I had spent over a third of my life searching for my friends with no result.

He must have had a whole network of secret informers and contacts in many fields who could find him information not generally available to the ordinary public. There was even a contact website and phone number to deliver information to.

I'd necessarily had to work alone and in secret.

I bet myself that it would be much easier to discover his secret identity than to find any of my old friends. I decided I would do exactly that and try to secure him and his resources to help in my quest. So I sent an email to his informant site and warned that I was going to find all the holes in his security system and come to see him within a month.

Chapter 6

First Encounter with Langdon

It took me only one week and 2 days. I was 15 when I identified Langdon Kane and broke into his penthouse apartment.

And I was absolutely appalled when I fell head over heels in love with him at first sight. I mean, he was an old man! Over thirty! More than twice my age!

Tallish, thin, scrawny and nerdish, with rather short dark blond hair, vivid blue eyes behind wire-rimmed specs and hardly any knowledge of martial arts at all, just a little jiu-jitsu. Some Bruce Wayne!

At least Langdon was a perfect gentleman; he welcomed me graciously, and cooked dinner for me. To cover my uncomfortable feelings, I smart-mouthed a bit about how easy it had been to get around his security. I dissed his artwork too—all shapeless modern lumps and paintings of jagged sprawls in hideous colors which he said were investment pieces. Not one was even worth looking at twice.

I guess it was fortunate that I had learnt to control the ghastly waves of lust of my estrus times. Hiding my completely unwanted and inappropriate feelings for him proved a breeze in comparison. It was only a little difficult that first time because of the unexpectedness of the whole thing.

I pinned down and analyzed the feelings ruthlessly. They seemed to be mostly a type of lust, one much weaker than the estrus-induced kind and thus fairly easy to ignore. There didn't appear to be any real love involved on either side, and I had become expert at identifying the real thing.

Neither of us trusted the other at first, which was good as he certainly wasn't trustworthy. Langdon did already know about the existence of the cybernetically enhanced soldiers, which helped. But he didn't know much, and was disappointed that I refused to go on national TV or Vid to expose this newly uncovered, secret government conspiracy, of experimenting with human DNA to build a superhuman army.

He was so naïve and unrealistic in some ways! I would have been arrested before the show finished airing. Or been torn apart by mobs of wild fundamentalist Christians blaming me for being born, instead of the government for creating me. And I would never be safe again.

Langdon proved a difficult person to get to know. Being older, more sophisticated and more manipulative, he easily conned me into working for him to uncover dirt on more people he disliked. When he discovered how great I was at hacking, he used my talent mercilessly.

I was quite surprised to discover the computers we had used at Typhon 7 years ago were still generations ahead of those available to the public nowadays, despite ours having had no fancy entertainment options.

Still, hacking was one of the easiest things I had to do for him. I had always had a knack for it, and never realized until many years later that Maggie had been aiding me and teaching me more.

In fact she had helped me ever since I'd had to obtain my new legal papers, even physically changing my fingerprints without my realizing it. Who, after all, ever memorizes those loops and whorls?

Langdon seemed to have a death wish; he kept getting into situations there was no way out of, and several times I had to risk my own neck to extract him from them.

I had no choice in the matter—remember involuntarily falling in love with the old fool?

I couldn't just stand by and leave him to suffer. There was also the worry that there might be some important reason for these feelings hitting me.

I really hoped to grow out of them any day now as I didn't like him much. I was usually barely polite to Langdon; disagreeing and arguing with him on every single point.

He was supposed to pay me back for my work by finding information about the other Typhon escapees. But the little he learnt was long out of date and proved utterly useless. He wasn't even ashamed of not keeping up his end of the bargain. In fact, Langdon seemed to believe that I should feel honored to help him out. As if I had no life outside of what he needed me to do.

I never told him what else I was doing with my time.

Chapter 7

Evan Turns Up

Then one day Evan turned up and I didn't even recognize him. I caught him following me early in the day, and just assumed he was a reporter, or someone else trying to uncover the monkey man's secret identity. No fugitive, genetically-enhanced super-soldier assassin should ever have been so obvious.

I led him all over the city from one bar, café or sandwich shop to another, as if I were looking for someone, but he never approached me. When it grew dark, I climbed up to the rooftops, dropped a couple of bricks on his head and doubled back to get away.

Of course, I had pre-arranged many rooftop stacks of bricks all over the city for just such purposes. I usually found them in dumpsters when people were having home renovations done.

I had also worked out lots of ambush spots in hidden areas and escape routes from them too. This was the first time I had actually needed to use one.

Then I discovered that he also was being followed—by Typhon trackers who were acting much more professionally.

I still didn't know who he was. But if the trackers were interested in him, then he had to be worth saving. So I dropped a bigger load of bricks on the two trackers. Then hit them with a volley of accurately slung stones as well.

Collected all my stones as usual, then went back and quickly checked Evan's grubby matted hair for electronic bugs by combing through it with a flea comb. As a trainee veterinarian I always had one handy and disinfected them between uses—I actually carried three.

I had to wrap his heavily bleeding head in my tank top with Kleenex stuffed against the wound so it wouldn't leave a blood trail. I needed the larger tee-shirt to drape over my shoulders as a barrier to prevent getting his foul fromunda cheese stench on my good leather jacket. Way to make friends!

The great lunk was more than a foot taller than me, big boned, very muscular . . . and still growing. He weighed a ton and he reeked.

I turned him onto his back with his arms at the sides. Then I bent his knees until his feet were flat on the ground. I took both his hands and walked back to his feet and stood on top of them. Changed my grip so I held each of his wrists, then pulled and rocked backwards, using all of my 95 pound weight to pull him upright.

Luckily, I have great strength which makes up for my lack of mass. As he came upright at my sixth yank, I quickly bent my knees, grabbed hold of the leading edges of my tee-shirt so he wouldn't dislodge it and dropped my shoulder into his stomach so that he bent over it. Then all I had to do was to catch hold of his nearest floppy arm and straighten my legs to stand up.

I skinned back up to the rooftops with his great heavy dead weight slung across my shoulders. There, I lay him down, and checked his pupils again. I stripped him naked, finally identifying Evan by his tattoo.

I gave him a great surge of love because I was so relieved to have found him and he really needed it. Even unconscious he felt it; his muscles immediately relaxed all over. Then I became furious, insulted that he had dared approach me while so filthy.

The thin-skulled lout was also badly concussed from my great shots with the bricks and needed medical attention.

I washed off his armpits, then wiped down the rather impressive downstairs package as best I could, using up my bottled water and little packet of moist towelettes. Then bundled and hid his clothes and shoes in a chimney shadow. They had probably been bugged. I weighed them down with the retrieved bricks.

I tied a large silk scarf around Evan's hips, because who wants a still-smelly naked butt so close to her nose? Unfortunately he was far too big, heavy and wide to put over one of my shoulders which would have left both my arms free. The best I could do would be to thread both my arms around his forward arm and leg and press them against my body.

I loaded the great lunk up over the tee-shirt again and took him the easiest way across rooftops to Lang's penthouse. I had to swing us both across the gaps between buildings using the strategically placed ropes I had previously hidden. To make that a little easier, I tied his forward arm and leg together so he wouldn't slip off in mid-air.

Thankfully, Langdon had been well prepared for making surreptitious entrances and exits, though a rooftop entrance would have been handier for me today. His own keyed entrance, leading straight into his personal elevator, was hidden between two big dumpsters in a back lane. I now had keys, so didn't need to sneak a big, stinky, naked guy through the lobby past the security guards.

Lang, who had also studied medicine, though he didn't know that I was doing it, was home. I dumped Evan there, grabbed another tank, tee-shirt and scarf from my emergency supply, took Lang's two scanners and returned to check Evan's clothes for bugs.

There was one down in the bottom turn corner on his button-up plaid flannel shirt where the lint always collects. And another inside a tiny split in the seam of his jacket collar. I crushed both and threw them as far away as I could.

I returned to find Evan now conscious, wrapped in a sheet, sitting in a straight-backed chair. He and Langdon were eyeing each other warily.

I attacked immediately and blew hell out of him.

"You stupid overconfident lackwit! How could you have gotten so sloppy as to let your clothes get bugged! Who the hell d'you think you are to follow me all over the city with Typhon trackers on your tail? Don't you ever bother to check your back trail anymore? You fuckwit! Were you deliberately trying to break my alias?

"How many of my friends have you already betrayed with your stupid lack of caution? Is that why I haven't been able to find anyone? Because they've all been recaptured? Some great leader you've turned out to be."

Langdon watched with great amusement.

"You give it to him, Taj!" He actually laughed.

That made me even madder. The situation was far too desperate to be funny, so I snarled at him too.

"Butt out, old man. This is not a Vid script. There are precious lives at stake here."

Evan had looked stunned, then angry at my diatribe. Now he stood up to have the advantage of towering over me and decided to have his say.

"Oh, get off your high horse, Taj. I did no such thing. You're just making up a story to cover your uncontrollable lust to get at my naked bod. Did you have a good perve, Sweetheart? Did I measure up to your expectations?"

I knocked Evan down again for his impertinence, far too easily.

"What! Did you want me to write a letter of recommendation for your next conquest? I doubt she'd be interested in anything I had to say about your hygiene standards." I sneered.

Actually that body would have been quite attractive, broad-shouldered, muscular and lightly covered with curly blond hair, except that it had been far too long since he had last bathed. And remembering it made me start to soften towards him.

Evan had been such a sweet boy, such a dear friend. His smart-mouthing had to be part of the stupid guy pissing-contest thing—trying to prove his dick was bigger than Langdon's. Well I wasn't buying into it.

"You're also shockingly out of condition and can't even defend yourself against a girl less than half your weight. You'd better get yourself back into training, _Sweetheart_ , if you don't want to get beaten up regularly.

I threw the resealed plastic bag of used wipes at him and snarled: "And I've already _been_ at your naked bod in a far more intimate capacity than I ever wanted Evan, trying to clean it up enough so I wouldn't vomit while carrying you.

"Have you forgotten all your field training? There's no excuse for letting yourself get so filthy. Haven't you discovered Galen's perpetual water suppliers? They're only a few dollars. You dial the temperature you want, place one on a rock or up in a tree, set it to spray and shower under it.

"My flat would have been the first place the trackers would have looked, thanks to you, so I couldn't take you there. Instead I had to lug you here 2 miles over the rooftops. I did not enjoy having your stinking, hairy, lilywhite ass so close to my face all that time. You'd do better to wash that bod more frequently if you plan to flash it around.

"And get some sexier undies than the shapeless, saggy, once-white rags I was forced to search through," I grumbled, winding down.

Now I was feeling very confusing, unwanted emotions for Evan too, so punching him out and yelling a lot to keep him off-kilter seemed the best way to cover them. By this time I was shaking and close to tears.

I really _was_ dreadfully worried that some of the friends I had been trying so desperately to find may have lost their hard-won freedom because of his stupidity.

Still, it felt very satisfying to see Evan crimson, now he bothered to smell how ripe he had grown under the fresh covering scent of the wipes. Just as well he didn't open the little packet in my presence.

Chapter 8

Evan's Transformation

I made Evan shower, scrub and shave in the guest bathroom I occasionally used at Lang's, while I wiped down my jacket with Nilodor.

Langdon gave him clean underwear, socks, jeans, a long-sleeved tee, a hoodie and a great leather jacket from the store he kept for his fugitives. He was probably hoping to impress me with his generosity to a friend of mine to wipe out his earlier _faux pas_. Evan looked a new person when he re-emerged, clean, sweet-smelling and sooo spunky.

We smiled at each other. I came up and gave him a hard hug, feeling Evan bend to kiss the top of my head as I enveloped him with my love again.

We left Lang to soak out the bloodstains and stink from the other clothes. Returned to the dump where Evan had crashed, to collect and check all his other gear. We found four more bugs in his stuff. He removed and left them on the bed. There were also listening devices in the room which I located and left intact.

We had been silent during the search and while packing up, but as we moved out I pointed out another of the Typhon trackers whom Evan again hadn't noticed on the way in.

He seemed shaken now that I had been proven correct. When we were well away, Evan respectfully asked if I knew of a secure phone line he could use to call his last two contacts.

Each of the Monkey squad has their incoming and outgoing phone lines (and these are kept separate,) secured by being threaded through the worldwide Galen network. They are completely untraceable to anyone outside Galen.

I led him to Ron, another of Lang's associates, where Evan managed to get through to both Tina and Josh and suggest they move again immediately. I was even allowed to say hello and pass each of them my love, which gave me a great lift.

I asked Evan about his I.D. papers, and he had only one lot, so I arranged with Ron to get him three more full sets in different names which I would pay for. These were all a great deal older. With his crinkled eyes and weathered skin, Evan could easily be taken for someone in his twenties.

We first camouflaged Evan's forehead wound to look like a bad case of zits, giving him a few more on the cheeks, chin and neck. Then I covered the wound, with extra hair combed forward and lastly with a side part and comb over, finding my fingers tended to linger and caress his skin and hair now that he was clean. Evan noticed and smiled at me again.

My childhood love for Evan had developed into stronger and more adult emotions. I was pleased that these feelings weren't purely lust-based, so weren't as unwelcome as my lust for Lang.

Ron took several photos each way against different plain backgrounds, with different shirts and jackets.

I then cut Evan's originally bushy, overgrown hair into different styles, mussed it a bit, and gelled it a little, with the part and stick-on zits changed slightly. He ended up with three different sorts of genuine photo I.D. for each identity which also possessed qualifications in fields for which Evan had expertise. Laminated copies of the relevant certificates also appeared. Each I.D. set appeared to have been made on a different date at a different location.

Most importantly, all three sets were hacked into the system so they could be checked on and authenticated by anyone with the power to check up on him.

We cracked, scraped and scratched up the plastic laminate with the scarifiers Ron provided, rubbing dirt and a little grease into the documents to age them a bit, too.

The reason the I.D.s were genuine was simply that they had belonged to actual persons who had joined the increasingly popular weirdo religious sect Galen and no longer needed them, so they were offered up to anyone who did.

The very amenable Galen computer simply found a close appearance match with appropriate history, for each set of photos and provided that person's name and personal history, then hacked the new updates and photos into the US records.

It was the same system Fermina had used.

We also each picked up three new throwaway Galen cell phones, of which there was always a ready supply. I thanked Ron, leaving him the scanners to return to Langdon.

I took Evan shopping for plain white tee-shirts, ribbed white cotton canvas, draw-string _karategi_ pants in light and heavy weights, a heavyweight jacket, black obi, singlets, underpants, socks, toiletries, handkerchiefs and a good long coat split at the back, warm shirts, 2 tracksuits, a bike helmet that fit him correctly, strong work boots, more jeans and a large strong canvas bag to carry everything. I paid for it all with my debit card.

Then we returned to my flat to collect more funds as Evan was almost broke. I stashed him nearby and went in alone, grabbed my always ready travel pack, leaving behind only clothes, a little jewelry and lots of veterinary and medical texts and literature.

Anything important was always stored in one of my locked boxes, or if good extra clothes, at Lang's.

I took off on my bicycle, rode around the block, then through a couple of narrow alleys, pulling up behind the fruit shop where I'd left Evan.

I doubled him on my bicycle to where my bike was hidden, then drove him to one of my farms. There Evan worked with me for a fortnight before we moved east to another farm.

Unfortunately, there is little privacy on a farm, especially during the busy seasons when extra workers come in. The guys sleep in the communal bunkhouse, while I had always been given a room with the family in the main house, so we only saw each other at meals and while working.

The hard physical work, fresh air and good food agreed with Evan who soon lost the tired, pasty look, filled out a bit and gained some color and tan, looking more attractive than ever.

I showed him several common plants and told him of household chemicals which could be used to quickly raise a harmless angry red rash which he could call a nervous condition to use with the acned identity. He could say it always flared up for important occasions or when he needed to be photographed.

In the evening we provided entertainment for anyone interested by practicing our various martial arts together, testing each other's attacks, blocks and reactions. Evan's were still as sharp as ever, now that he had recovered from the concussion. Being, smaller I was faster and he had to work hard to contain me.

I enjoyed sparring with someone bigger and stronger, teaching him the new katas and techniques I had learnt. And I especially liked the touching and grappling, getting to know the texture of his skin, how it warmed in response to my touch. I felt very at ease with Evan now, with hopes our relationship would soon progress to a more intimate one. But Evan didn't reveal any such interest in me.

And with a bit of pushing I had persuaded him to talk to me. He caught me up on my friends' lives, but without going into much detail. I got the impression that he either didn't know any of them really well or was deliberately keeping their lives private.

Evan had very little to say about himself. I had to drag the information out of him a few sentences at a time. I tried to respect his privacy, but he left many gaps in his account. I had to read between the lines to get a fuller picture of his life.

He had tried to find work in a dojo as I had done, but the sensei proved too interested in his body. Evan had barely escaped with his virtue intact. Only his wide knowledge of other disciplines had helped him evade the more experienced older man. He tried to make the story funny, but I could read his horror while carefully keeping mine contained.

It also seemed that some of my squad mates had been keeping tabs on me, collecting the news articles of my turning up at the Argentinean embassy and arrival in the States and others which mentioned me and the birthday parties.

Evan had worked occasionally as an interpreter, but never managed to get in with a family, living on the streets most of the time, not even able to get Welfare. Always a loner, never joining any of the gangs, so he'd had no buddies to help him through rough patches.

He moved frequently to keep a check on his platoon members, but always conscious of his position as their commander, never allowed any of them to get close to him either. Too proud to ask for help they would have given gladly, he'd had to resort to petty crime to stay alive.

No wonder Evan had grown so used to his body's stink that he didn't consider it remarkable.

* * *

We bypassed the Rainier farm as I didn't want to call there with another guy, in case they misunderstood our relationship. I showed Evan where it was but kept going through a small town to a wilderness area where I had camped before.

I was concerned to see a group of eight motorbikes parked at a roadhouse at the edge of the hamlet. I always try to avoid biker gangs on principle as they're not the best of citizens. I continued a few miles past my favored campsite. Then we got off the bike, lifted it over the roadside gravel and wheeled it silently through a rocky area to approach the site from a different direction.

I was sure that I had heard a single motorbike following behind for a while, but it continued on past the spot where we had left the road and though I listened carefully, I never heard its return.

I had been looking forward to seducing Evan that evening while showing him my camping techniques, planning to start by showering together in the open. A bit of mutual back-scrubbing could easily lead to other, more interesting things.

I use a large flexible bowl-shaped plastic container, stiffened at the rim, as a basin to catch and hold the shower water, stomping clean small clothing items at the same time. This handy basin also locks together around a small wash and can be shaken thoroughly to clean and rinse. It also doubles as the top of a waterproof tent. After our shower we'd eat, set up the tent and go to bed, hopefully zipping our sleeping bags together.

Sadly that never eventuated. I could feel eyes on me as I dug the latrine ditch.

"Evan, we're being observed," I murmured. "Can you feel them?"

"Yeah, the back of my neck's been crawling for two minutes. What do you want to do?"

"Keep everything packed and ready to move out, for starters. Do you have your sling handy?"

"Always, but I only have a few stones."

I've got plenty in this satchel. Come and load your pockets."

As he helped himself to my supply of river-smoothed stones, I continued: "I didn't hear the bikers approach. Did you? And I'm pretty sure it would have to be the gang we saw outside that little roadhouse."

"I heard no bikes, but there was a heavy truck which seemed to stop and idle a few times before moving on."

"Yes, I heard that too, Ev. The bikes must have been loaded on that truck and dispersed around us. That means they probably plan to rush us on the bikes. They'll be wearing helmets and leathers, so we'll need to hit their eyes, mouths or noses to blind them and make them bleed."

"We can improve our position here by dragging in some of the large rocks to hide your bike and to stand behind in case they have rifles."

"Good idea."

We dislodged three large columnar rocks from a nearby outcropping, rolled them over, then buried their bases, standing them upright in front of the bike with the centre one placed forward. There was a small cliff to our rear with a little overhang, which protected against weather, but more importantly, would provide us cover from any rifleman trying to sneak up behind us.

I made us mugs of hot soup and we sat in the open on smaller rocks to drink them while listening very carefully as the bikers approached in what they probably thought was silence. Even over nature's evening cacophony our augmented hearing let us hear one of them swear as he dropped the bike he was pushing. We counted at least eleven individuals, eight pushing bikes, and three sneaking in on foot, probably armed. None of these guys had any wilderness training.

I washed out the soup cups, then made us tea, so we could continue to sit and appear relaxed. I asked Evan if he had ever received the love I'd been sending regularly as I'd never felt a reply from anyone.

"Oh yes, Taj, thanks. It often helped me get through difficult times. Everybody in the platoon remarked on it every time we got together, but you never explained how to broadcast it, so we couldn't send you ours."

That idea had never occurred to me, as I had always been able to feel their love at Typhon, but when I tried to show him now, I discovered I had no way to explain the process.

To fill the time I told Evan stories about the people and animals I had worked with at the Veterinary Hospital, and tried to think why anyone might target me.

Evan thought that my enemies may have publicized a description of my distinctive motorbike with the bicycle fitted on the back and my regular movements had been reported. That made sense and caused me to remember the pedophile group and the children I had rescued and brought to Galen.

I had camped in this spot twice before but had never seen any evidence of others' using it and I had left none of mine . . . except the wet spot left after my shower. That would only have lasted a short time, but if someone had been following me, it would have pinpointed my camping site.

I used my lap top to contact Galen, gave Maggie my GPS details and explained the situation. She promised to have someone come out to clean up after we'd taken care of the bikers.

Evan was interested that I could use a lap top in such a remote spot, and I explained that it was a Galen product with guaranteed lifetime power and internet accessibility. Like nearly everything from Galen, it appeared too good to be true. I had shown him the water supplier when I made the tea, pulling out the extendable control cord and demonstrating the shower and jet functions.

It was beginning to grow dark and we could hear that the bikers had stopped moving and were waiting for something.

Suddenly the twilight frog and insect courting clamor was drowned out by the louder roar of hotted up motors and they came racing towards us, their lights on high beam, probably expecting to blind us in the glare. Evan and I slung our stones. Three of the bikers on my side were wearing sunglasses. Even through the glare of the bright lights, I was able to aim to shatter those. The fourth had protective goggles, so I smashed his nose. Evan did equally well.

The bikers presumably had expected to run us down. Instead they were all blinded by either their eyes being hit or their noses painfully exploding in a cloud of blood. They ran into each other, except for one who ran into one of the rocks we'd used as seats and came down catching his chin on the other rock, breaking his neck.

Evan had pulled on a dark balaclava to cover his pale hair and face, and faded into the night to take care of the three pedestrians while I disabled and tied up the riders. I had immobilized five of them when one who must have been less hurt than he appeared, grabbed my foot and yanked hard. I fell heavily, hitting my unprotected head on a rock and was knocked out.

I sort of awoke, very groggy, to find Evan shining a torch in my eyes. I tried to evade the unwelcome brightness, but he persisted, announcing that I was concussed and my head was badly cut and bleeding. But he had captured and secured all the bikers. The one with the broken neck was dead and another who had been pierced through the left eye with glass slivers was critically injured. Galen would take care of him.

Evan cleaned and padded my head wound with gauze pads, disabled the alien bikes, packed up our gear, strapped me to my bike and wheeled us back more directly to the blacktop. Then supporting me in his lap between his arms, because I was too weak to hold onto him, he drove us to the Rainier farm.

Sadie Rainier placed me in Jim's old room. She and Evan looked after me well for the two days it took for my pupils to match again, waking me hourly to shine a torch in my eyes. I'm afraid I was a very bad patient, complaining bitterly and even swearing because they wouldn't leave me alone when all I wanted was to sleep.

Her husband Mitch told us later that the biker gang had been hanging around for two months, getting into fights and generally causing trouble in the area. They had also been questioning the itinerant workers, asking if they'd seen me lately. As most of those men knew me from previous years, they covered for me, but the gang had still stayed.

The Rainiers weren't happy about my refusing medical attention. Sadie Rainier had trained as a nurse and was pretty sure I had cracked my skull. I agreed with her, but knew that I would heal well without any help as long as I could rest quietly.

Evan joined in doing the farm work on the third day when I could get up and sit in a chair.

I was bored out of my brain. Everybody was too busy to entertain me. My head hurt too much for reading or watching videos. The only other option was listening to music. Jim had been into classical music and had an extensive collection of disks, but I had to put on his walkman as Sadie wept when she heard the music again. It revived sad memories for me too.

I was so pleased when I could get up and walk around again. I helped Sadie with the cooking and housework for a few days, but it was another week before I was fit enough to do strenuous work, and by then the seasonal work had been completed and it was time to move on to the next farm.

Maggie had left me a message requesting contact. It turned out that there had been two men who had escaped the original Galen round-up. That error had since been taken care of. One was the father of a captive, and it was he who had put out the contract on me.

The bikers themselves hadn't known that they were avenging a pedophile gang, and became quite incensed at discovering this. Like most criminals they had a soft spot for children and loathed pedophiles, doing them harm whenever possible.

Maggie was actually impressed that the bikers had been the most difficult group Galan had ever had to convert because they enjoyed their old way of life and hadn't wanted to change at all. Apparently most evil people don't really like being bad, but the bikers did.

Chapter 9

Evan's Betrayal

Evan hadn't asked me about my own life nor explained why none of my messages had ever been answered. We were getting along so well that I didn't want to ask questions which might have uncomfortable answers, so kept putting it off.

We had worked at three more farms and just arrived at the last one, when Evan finally asked how I had managed to get to Argentina so soon after our breakout.

I explained about my long swim and fortuitous meeting with Fermina and how she had arranged my paperwork the same way I had his, then smuggled me down south through her own coyote network.

Evan flatly refused to believe that I had swum directly to Fermina's boatshed or other parts of my story. He kept digging, trying to discover the 'real facts,' not 'some invented fantasy' until he had me all confused and flustered. He didn't quite say that he thought me a traitor who had sold out, but that was obviously the thought.

I was horrified to learn that Evan had known exactly where I was most of the time, though he couldn't tell whom I was with. And it was these 'accomplices' that he wanted me to identify. Despite feeling free to enjoy the love I sent so frequently, he had deliberately avoided me for eight years because he didn't trust me and believed me to be some kind of turncoat. Suspicious both of my good fortune and my unrelenting search for my old companions, Evan also had kept the others from contacting me.

I sucker-punched him in the guts for that, as hard as I could hit, pleased that I was always capable of catching him unawares, and as he doubled over retching, snapped: "You were just jealous that I had managed my life so well. I bet you kept the rest of the guys away because you were afraid they would leave you for me."

Then I burst into tears and wouldn't speak to him for three days or allow him to approach me.

I was so hurt that Evan could have thought me capable of such evil after what we had all gone through, and after getting to know me better, still believe I was untrustworthy. I went and dug up one of my money boxes containing about $350,000, handed it to him—still without a word—then rode off again and left him at the farm.

Let him believe I was trying to buy him off. I didn't care anymore. I had always planned on giving him a box of money to help out the others who might be in need, but if he used it just to set himself up in a better life, that was fine too. At least someone would be benefiting from it. It was painfully obvious that Evan would never allow me contact with my old friends again and there was absolutely nothing I could do about that.

But I still had faith in the love of my other squadron mates. They wouldn't put up with this separation for much longer. Zade especially would be able to reach me eventually. He wouldn't submit to Evan's unreasonable rules forever.

I rode into the mountains to wait out and get through my estrus period by meditating on a mental map of America's river systems. And I wondered how I HAD managed to arrive where I did from whence I had come in only four days, and why I had never wondered about this before. I remembered also my own surprise at the rapidly warming climate, before giving up the search for an impossible answer.

I decided that his distrust of me must have been what had prevented Evan's reciprocating my caresses and coming onto me. So at least he had enough respect for me not to take advantage of my attraction. But I was still shattered, and it took four tubs of my favorite mocha, caramel and vanilla swirl ice-cream to bring back my confidence.

I returned to my occasional job at the veterinary hospital and to Langdon who at least valued me for the work I could do for him.

And I exchanged another burst of love with my steadfast friend the fountain guy. He loved me no matter what.

* * *

Months later, Evan began sending up one or two of our old friends at a time to get new papers made. We arranged genuine paperwork for each of them under several aliases. Each of these could be renewed legally when they expired. Though not in the same place or at the same time, of course.

It was wonderful to catch up again and be able to love them as I used to. Nobody ever mentioned their lapse of trust and I didn't refer to it either. Just said that I had missed them all and was glad we had found each other again.

None of them knew more than vague details about the others. Evan had kept everyone isolated so only he knew how to contact them all. Also, not one left me an address or phone number. None offered to keep in touch, either, leaving again after a few days.

I saw nine of the fellows that year; but learned no news of anyone else, other than that which Evan had passed on earlier.

None of my especially close friends from our old squadron ever arrived.

And none of the girls! I really wanted to discuss how they managed to cope with the estrus. And I needed to know if anyone else was falling into inappropriate lust with the wrong men.

It was actually a bit disappointing that I didn't develop lust feelings for any of these lovely friendly guys. We greeted each other with hugs and brother/sister kisses and just renewed our friendship bond.

They stayed at my flat. And all treated me respectfully. Not one ever made a move on me. So we weren't even friends with benefits!

I continued helping out Langdon, though trying to limit myself to the less dangerous tasks and discourage him from risking his life.

I also continued my computerized university courses, studying and completing degrees in nursing, medicine, veterinary science and law. I fulfilled the residency requirements and found that very interesting, especially at the large veterinary hospital.

* * *

Later I learned that it was customary procedure to have newly qualified veterinarians care for the hopelessly injured animals to test their dedication, compassion, character, resilience and squeamishness. This was to weed out those who couldn't handle the blood, gore and sadness.

Nobody told me that these badly hurt creatures were beyond help, so of course I did my best to save their lives.

I had found that I had a great affinity with all animals. Even badly injured creatures calmed and settled easily in my hands. They allowed me to work on them without sedation or restraint.

Animals are love sponges. They also give back at least as much love as they receive.

Love is the great healer and my patients all recovered! I never lost one, no matter how hopeless the case seemed to others. And they didn't appear to suffer at my hands either—they just healed.

I was offered a permanent fulltime job at the veterinary hospital but had to decline because of other commitments.

The only disadvantage I found to veterinary work was the damage inflicted on my hands. All the constant thorough hand-washing between patients dried out my skin and lifted off my nail enamel in one day.

Rubbing in hand cream after each wash didn't help much. I had to give up using nail lacquer, and resort to rubbing in a very heavy nourishing cream and wearing cotton gloves to protect the bed clothes each night to repair them.

In honor of Fermina, I had kept up my hand and foot care routines, even while travelling around the farms with Evan, though I had long ago given up the perms, curling iron and frills. When I explained to him that Fermina believed that regular hand and foot care marked a person as belonging to the upper classes, Evan had even permitted me to give him a manicure one evening.

I showed him how to use the nail clippers, cuticle remover, cuticle cream and diamond file I'd placed in his toiletry kit. I didn't believe in polish for men and trying to paint his nails would have really freaked him out.

My hair was my biggest problem. It continued to be thin, limp and rather lifeless, no matter what kind of product I used to give it more body. Having to wear a helmet destroyed it completely. My sweating inside the hard hat flattened any style and spread grease through it. So I had to shampoo at least once daily and usually wore it up.

I used very dilute apple cider vinegar and herbal tea rinses: rosemary, parsley, hibiscus, horsetail, squawvine, nettles, lavender, linden flowers, lemon verbena, chamomile, and orange and lemon peel I save and dry myself. The vinegar removes built up residue and flattens the hair cuticle scales to improve shine. The herbs generally strengthen my hair and also add gloss.

I have never used a hairdryer—don't even own one—because they permanently dry out the hair shaft and turn it into straw. Fermina had warned me to avoid them. I always towel-dried using several towels, then combed it through in the sun, or at least outdoors on my little balcony. So my hair always looked great for a short time immediately after washing.

For a while I even avoided ponytails which revealed how scant the tail was, until I found a fake tail piece attached to an elasticized band. This could be wound around my own tail to make it appear thicker and more luxuriant.

I completed my nursing and medical residencies easily, with no difficulty over the long hours and lack of sleep. These weren't nearly as satisfying as the veterinary work, because human patients are not very appreciative and difficult to love. They tend to blame medicos for all their health problems, no matter how carelessly unhealthy their own lifestyles were.

I often returned to the veterinary hospital. Ostensibly this was to keep my hand in, but actually it was because I needed to pour my love into all those sad hurting animals. Although I continued to send love to all my old platoon mates, that wasn't enough any more. I needed to know that I had at least made a difference in some lives, even if those weren't human.

Eventually I accepted a part-time position there where I could make my own hours. I also made several new friends and dated a little without getting serious with anyone.

Chapter 10

Evan Returns

More than a year later, Evan returned on his own motorbike, fitted out similarly to mine, with the same camping equipment. I allowed him to park it in my garage with my bicycle and was quite irritated to find I still cared deeply for him. It didn't seem fair. My first sweet lover had died, then I had fallen in lust with a man I couldn't stand nor get over, and now was still wasting my energy on this loser.

Evan said that he had adopted my idea of visiting and working on farms regularly. He now brought fresh food to the guys he visited so they all benefited.

He also brought me a very welcome gift of four 1-kilo bags of powdered tryptophan.

Two of the older guys had been employed at the chemical factory which produced the pills. They learned that the powdered tryptophan was imported in bulk from a company in Japan which apparently had created a monopoly. They willingly sold it to anyone, regardless of US controls, which applied only to the packaged pills.

So Evan had ordered a container load, picked it up at the terminal, and this was the result. No more shortage!

Though I'd sent him no love during the past year Evan acted all friendly, as if there were no bad feelings between us. Maybe he was hoping I would have gotten past my little hissy fit after so long and his gift would win me over again.

I had just been about to leave for the mountains to sit out my problem time and offered him the use of my place while I was gone.

I'm not sure if he were joking or being a smartass, or even making a clumsy but serious proposition, when he suggested that I stay in the flat so we could have some fun together. But he backed off quick smart when I gave him the hard face, turned and left.

Unfortunately, Evan seemed to make a habit of spoiling every good thing he did by immediately doing or saying something totally inappropriate.

The guys had all seemed to think the girls' involuntary estrus period was some huge smutty joke, an invitation to make lewd remarks. Even my recent visitors appeared to treat it very lightly.

But as soon as we had discovered it was going to happen to us, all the girls had loathed this offensive, dehumanizing ordeal that some perverted, chicken-cocked, can't-get-any male had thought up for us.

I'd learned that the reality proved even uglier and more humiliatingly loathsome than any of our guesses or assumptions.

I'm a person who cannot tolerate being controlled by outside forces or losing control of myself, so perhaps I fought against the estrus harder than the other girls. Evan's comment seemed to imply that some of the girls actually enjoyed their estrus time and spent it making whoopee. I sure didn't take kindly to frivolity on the subject.

Evan was very far from being my favorite person now, so I was very surprised to find him still in residence when I returned and he opened the door before I had my key out.

"Were you waiting for another handout?" I asked bitterly, as I couldn't think what else he might need from me.

Evan turned a deep unflattering red color, seeming to struggle with himself as I walked past him.

It took him a few minutes before he could speak: "I guess I deserved that Taj. I always seem to get off on the wrong foot with you. It's just that I like and respect you so much, and want to impress you, but you're so prickly you make me nervous.

"So to avoid an uncomfortable silence, I usually blurt out the first thing that comes into my head without thinking it through. And then it's always the wrong thing and offends you."

He grinned tentatively at me.

I returned a small noncommittal smile and dumped my travel pack in the laundry area. I hauled out the groceries I had bought and put them away in the kitchen. Evan followed me around, still talking.

"I think you were probably right when you said that I was afraid that the platoon would prefer you as a leader, instead of me. Ava was much smarter than I am and handled the leadership better; I miss her dreadfully. I've been feeling very inadequate since we lost her."

Evan had left two lovely steaks in the meat keeper, so I prepared a red wine marinade, heavy on the garlic, gave them a quick bashing with the tenderizing mallet and put them to soak. I put 5 eggs in a small saucepan of cold water on to boil.

Evan continued: "I _was_ angry and jealous that you fell into such a fortunate life when most of us were struggling. It would all have been so much easier if I had come to you earlier. You could have arranged our papers and helped us out. But I wanted to prove I could do the job myself. Not just take your charity or let you take over."

The eggs started to boil. I turned off the gas, replaced the saucepan lid and let them sit.

"You have many of the same qualities Ava had, Taj, plus you held us all together when we were at Typhon by the way you loved us. You always looked on the bright side of things—you gave us hope.

"The rest of us didn't even know there was any bright side to find. But you always saw it and shared it with us."

Great—he sees me as the Typhon Pollyanna!

I prepared the simple virgin olive oil and white vinegar dressing, adding the same dried herbs I had put in the marinade, screwed on the lid, gave the jar a good shake, then set it aside.

I pulled out some vegetables, scrubbed, rinsed and dried them. Pulled the lettuce apart and washed each leaf carefully, then dried them in my lettuce spinner and passed the container to Evan to tear into smaller pieces.

The egg I tested rolled freely on the table, so I poured off the hot water and dropped the eggs into the lettuce water to cool, then put on a large pot of water for pasta.

Evan scrubbed and dried his hands at the sink before setting to work, while I cut up the capsicum, dumping the pieces directly into the large bowl between us.

"I think I did a very mean, hurtful thing in keeping the group from you Taj. I think you really needed all of us even more than we needed you."

I glanced up at his serious face. That was really perceptive of him. I hadn't thought he would pick up on that aspect of me. I wondered whether Zade may have suggested that idea to him or if Evan had come up with it by himself. I gave him a real smile this time and Evan's face lit up.

I passed him the English spinach.

"How much of this do you want to add? About half?"

"Yes, that would be fine, thanks."

He split the bundle, removed the stalks, washed and rinsed the leaves and put them through the lettuce spinner. Evan kept talking as he tore up the larger leaves.

"I can see that since I spent time with you, the world has changed for me and I am seeing and thinking more clearly. So are all the guys I sent to see you. They're all much happier, more optimistic, enthusiastic and relaxed. They ask about you every time I see them. Just visiting you for a few days did that for them.

"And I feel ashamed to have to tell them that I haven't been in touch with you since, because I've been avoiding you out of guilt for the rotten way I've treated you."

I had finished cutting up the cucumbers, radishes and brown onion, so also cut the tomatoes, straight into the bowl.

"I've never seen anyone cut vegetables like that before. Is there a reason or do you just hate chopping boards?"

I couldn't help grinning. At least I hadn't laughed, but it was going to be hard to keep my mad at him.

"Fermina used to do them this way. By cutting obliquely around the cucumbers and tomatoes you get small thicker bite-sized, wedge shapes. Those don't stick together like straight slices, which can often be too big to eat comfortably. And all the pieces get covered with dressing."

The water was boiling, so I added the spiral macaroni and started the cheese sauce from a packet mix.

"I don't need any more of your money, thank you. It was very generous of you to share it with everyone, Taj. It's come in very handy a few times when people got into trouble. But they saw it as a loan and paid it back as soon as they could, with interest too. So there's more in the box now than there was before. We treat it as our bank."

I rolled the eggs on the table to crack the shells then peeled them off and sliced each egg with the wire cutter gadget. I threw the first four into the bowl and reserved the last for decoration.

"I haven't dared tell them how much you gave me. I didn't want them to act greedy and demand to share it out right away. But as an always available emergency fund it has been a tremendous help and morale booster. Just like you always were in your quiet way."

I put a plastic cloth on the table—who needs to try to wash dressing spills out of linen? Evan helped me set the table. I liked that he knew where things were—so he'd probably done some cooking while staying here."

Evan oiled and heated up the grill, then threw on the steaks.

I added the dressing to the vegetables and stirred it through thoroughly, adding the slices of the last egg in a circle on top.

"So, the reason I waited for you to come back is to explain all this to you, to apologize for being so mean and thoughtless to you and to humbly ask for your forgiveness."

Evan had drained the pasta and now poured on the cheese sauce. I added a handful of chopped spring onion which I grew in a window box and cut with scissors.

I placed the fresh sliced wholemeal bread on the table. Evan served the steaks and we sat to eat, serving ourselves, as everything was in reach on the small round table. Evan had a glass of the rough red with his meal. I shook my head when he offered me some and had veggie juice instead.

It was a simple meal, nicer for being shared. It was wonderful to be so easy with each other again.

"I've never had salad with egg in it before. This is really good."

"Yeah, I like the way the yolk mixes with the dressing to make a sort of mayonnaise. I nearly always do it this way, except when I'm adding avocado, beans or canned salmon.

"You did a great job on the steaks, Evan. This is just the way I like mine."

"The marinade is what makes it. I didn't know it was so easy to do."

Evan resumed his long-winded apology as we did the dishes together. He washed; I dried.

"Taj, I talked over your story with some of the other guys. And it turns out all of us have recalled previously forgotten memories of inexplicable advances in our escape. We each suddenly found ourselves hundreds of miles beyond where we were moments before. Though always in the same kind of territory.

"So that was probably what happened to you—you were just moved to a more southern river each time, and being in water the whole time you wouldn't have noticed anything except the different trees and the rapidly warming climate.

"And we often found helpful people without looking for them ourselves, as you found Fermina.

"Not one of us knows how we actually got over the high electrified double outer fence. Remember, we had planned for the first guys to reach it to build a human pyramid close to the wire. Those coming after were to climb up that and jump over both fences. Then those first over were to get some logs or downed trees from the other side to throw back over for the kids in the pyramid to use.

"Instead, we just suddenly were outside the fence."

I was shocked to have forgotten that. After all, it wasn't the kind of thing anyone could take for granted.

"Evan, who was the first person to remember that?"

"Zade was. Nobody else remembered until Zade mentioned it. And everybody I've told it to had the same astonished look you're wearing.

"And not one of us who got past the fence was recaptured. Those that were taken and cuffed, suddenly found their cuffs open, as I did, and were able to get away again. It's really eerie, _Twilight Zone_ eerie."

We put the dried dishes away together and I found the chopping board he'd bought me.

"I'll need it next time I visit and make dinner for you," Evan said quietly. I smiled at him.

Evan had wiped down the cloth, so I folded and put it away.

"But the part I know you'll like best is that not a single other member of our little original squad ever doubted your loyalty and integrity, though they still obeyed orders and didn't sneak behind my back.

"I'm just sorry that I didn't have the ability to get closer to my people so I could have learnt all this earlier and saved you so much worry and loneliness."

I was so touched that Evan could open up, admit his error, humble himself and reveal so much, that all I could do was open my arms to hug him.

Evan immediately took me in a huge bear hug, lifting me off my feet and raining kisses on the top of my head in his enthusiasm. One part of him became rather extremely enthusiastic, and when I growled a bit, he lifted me higher.

Then still holding me close, he let me slide down his body, feeling that long hardness all the way until I was back on my feet.

While his arms were still around me, I tentatively placed my open palms on his chest, but instead of closing in and getting tender as any normal red-blooded person would have done, the oaf let go of me and took a step back.

He grinned unrepentantly at me and ruined what might have become a perfect seduction lead-in.

Maybe I just should have continued sliding down onto my knees, grabbing the tab and pulling his zipper open with my teeth. He may have understood then.

Unfortunately, I was far too shy back then to be so blatant.

Then Evan made things worse by apologizing for getting a hard-on.

"Sorry, that's just a natural physiological response to my happiness and relief. I also apologize for being so whiffy last time. I had been travelling hard for four days and was so used to the stink I didn't stop to shower.

"But I have obeyed your commands, and though still hairy, my ass is no longer lilywhite and my new undies are sexy and colorful and should come up to your best esthetic expectations the next time you suddenly get the urge to strip off all my clothes and carry me off to your bat cave."

I laughed out loud, the mood gone. I had naturally assumed that his lift and slow slide-down had been a come-on, and had been trying very hard to be seductive in return. And Evan hadn't even noticed! Maybe he'd thought I'd been trying to push him away?

Now he expected blunt suggestive remarks would get him into my panties!

"Live in hope, Evan!"

He grabbed my hand and rained kisses onto it. "Thank you, thank you, thank you, that's the most encouragement you've ever given me. I shall indeed live in hope that one day you will realize the extent of my feelings for you Taj, and return my love."

What a blind idiot! Well, I couldn't declare my feelings for him when he seemed to be joking, so I laughed again.

"You're totally crazy Evan! If you woo every girl by ostracizing her for life until she clonks you over the head with a brick, carries you off and strips you, you'll have a terrible love life, not to mention all the possible accumulated brain damage.

"Anyway, why are you feeling so inadequate? You haven't suffered many recaptures, have you?" I gestured him to the loveseat and sat close beside him.

"None, actually, and the only person we lost temporarily was Barry. He suddenly developed bizarre symptoms and we had to return him to Typhon for treatment. His skin seemed to be breaking up, cracking open into deep fissures and peeling off in chunks. Getting him back into Typhon was actually harder than breaking him and the four guys he recruited out again."

"You've been raiding Typhon?" I couldn't believe it and placed a hand on his forearm as if in concern.

"Yeah." Evan was so proud and with good reason. "The first time we grabbed the five TY7s who'd had the brain surgery we ran away from." He patted my hand then gestured dramatically so it slid off.

"They're real strange, sort of robotic and cold and nobody trusts them. They have no initiative. Just can't think for themselves at all. Only obey orders literally. They proved a complete bust, so thankfully no others were given the operation.

"Actually, they were probably deliberately set up as a lure to trap us all. I'm sure it was one of them who bugged my clothes and set the trackers on me. Anyway, they've been well isolated and none of the others has been near them since.

"I've got them working for their keep on a farm owned by an elderly couple who can't manage alone anymore. I don't think Typhon cares about them at all.

The interesting thing is that in over eight months the two girls haven't gone into estrus. So there must be some way to turn that off. Hopefully, that wasn't just a side-effect of their brain surgery."

Just as I leaned closer against him, Evan suddenly turned to face me, banging his bony knees into my thigh and stabbing his elbow into my side. He mumbled an apology and scooted away into the corner where he could safely windmill arms and legs without injuring me.

"Then a week later we grabbed 42 TY8s who were a bit older than we were at the escape. And they've turned out great. We took both lots while they were living wild outside the fence. And two weeks ago we shanghaied two TY6s off a mission before they killed. They were very happy to come with.

"We have a lease on a rundown farm where we raise chickens and a few animals. Now we grow and preserve a lot of our own food. The TY8s are very happy there. We arranged all the necessary photos which I brought up here for the computer to match and make the papers, and because I needed to humble myself and apologize for being such a louse."

"Well, I can't find any great judgment errors there, Evan. What part were you worried about exactly? The guys are self-supporting. None are hardened criminals or crazy. They're not a drain on the economy and they're healthy. They're doing better than three-quarters of the people in this country. So, what have you done wrong?"

"I don't know exactly. We're all sort of drifting without any purpose. I get the feeling we should be doing great things. Changing the world somehow. Making it a better place. Using our powers for good purposes. That kind of thing."

"Well, if you want to do great things, you could try helping Langdon with some of his projects. He's into saving underdogs and exposing and punishing the bad guys."

"No thanks, I don't trust that fellow. And I don't like the way he looks at you either. As if you're his personal property. He's way too old for you, Taj. And he's dangerous to be around. He takes too many risks. You should stay right away from him."

I completely agreed with that judgment. But I couldn't allow Evan to dictate how I should behave, so just shrugged and let it pass.

"There's time yet to make our mark, Evan. Nobody knows what the future will bring. It is a shame that we can't all live together in a community. But as long as Typhon exists we'll have to remain underground and isolated most of the time for our own safety.

"Anyway, there's no reason to just drift. You all have access to valid I.D. and the internet. You can now afford to do university courses by computer to improve yourselves and earn useful credentials. That's what I've been doing and it's fun. Just because we don't know what the future holds doesn't mean we can't prepare for it.

"I've been doing a lot of thinking. Maybe it was a good thing that you were all away from my mother-henning. So I learned to stand alone. And you had to struggle a bit to make it by yourselves.

"So now we're all stronger for that. And you don't owe me anything important.

"And I do very much like the way you handled the money. I've also returned more to the boxes than I took out. The security of knowing the money is there if needed is fantastic."

We discussed the university courses available on computer. Evan was very impressed with those I had managed to complete. I thought doing nursing, medicine and vet science together made them all easier. The subjects overlapped so much. They approached the same thing from slightly different perspectives, allowing a better understanding of it.

Law was very dry and basically depended on developing an eidetic memory, which we all already possessed. And then learning millions of cases and judgments, and being able to draw comparisons and inferences from them. I was looking for alternative medicine and animal psychology courses next, to go with my masters in veterinary science. They would be the spice to make my next law course more palatable.

Then, out of the blue, Evan announced that he had studied many caveman cartoons during the past year. And he had noticed several recurrent themes in them which he attributed to racial memory.
He had reached the conclusion that my knocking him out, stripping him and carrying him off to my lair was tantamount to a declaration of my interest in and ownership of him.

In modern terms, that would be an affiancing or engagement. Now it only remained for me to take the final step and have my way with him, for us to be legally married in caveman terms.

I laughed it off. After all, who could take that as either a serious proposition or a marriage proposal? But it was very nice to spend time in gentle flirtation with a guy I could trust completely. One who would kill or fight to the death, for me or any member of his platoon. So I rather liked being called his primitive fiancée.

Evan stayed over without trying anything. If he'd just given me a decent goodnight kiss, I could have pulled him into my room and bed. But he remained completely oblivious of my subtle little overtures and lifted face, and I just couldn't act forward.

And he kept to the spare bedroom. I had really hoped to encounter him in my bed sometime during the night, even with the mutual garlic breath.

I couldn't just climb into Evan's bed, in case he decided that would constitute a marriage. I wasn't yet ready for that level of commitment. And it would have been more humiliating if he rejected my stronger advances or treated them as a joke. For whatever reason, he stayed in his room, and I in mine.

I'd never had any such problems with Jim. I'd had only to lunge at or grab him in a mock attack for him to take hold of me, and my little caresses underlined my intentions. Jim had always been a gentleman and given me what I needed, joyfully and thoroughly. I missed him very much.

After he had washed his sheets and towels and my laundry next morning, Evan hung them to dry on my sunny balcony. He shared breakfast with me. Then Evan gave me a last brotherly hug and kiss on the cheek, and left.

Later, I found he had left me a short thank you note and a phone number where I could reach him any time I felt lonely and needed someone to talk to. Or if I suddenly needed to take up my option on his body and check out his undies collection. Somehow this was very comforting though I never rang the number.

Chapter 11

Working as a Vet

Life continued as usual. I was heavily involved in my studies and work at the animal hospital, still with my perfect record of cures.

For a while I had a run of reptile patients: turtles, many snakes, including a cobra and two rattlers, but also an alligator, two giant Australian crocodiles and a Komodo dragon from the nearby zoo. The Komodo had the world's worst case of halitosis because of an abscessed back tooth infected with the most horrific collection of oral bacteria on the planet.

And all of these creatures behaved as if I had hand-raised them and they couldn't love me enough.

A photo of me with my head next to the Komodo's, scratching his chin while he looked blissful made the local papers with the caption 'Even Dragons need Love.' It created a mild sensation and lots of people bought prints. I was given a framed copy of the blown-up photo which I hung over my computer table. I was very pleased with it, knowing Zade would also obtain a copy, so he and the other guys would know what I looked like now and could picture me every time I sent them love.

I had no fear of a little publicity, though I didn't seek it out. I now looked quite different from the always-smiling little girl I had been at Typhon. Nobody who remembered my running around hugging and touching all my friends would ever associate me with the serious sad-eyed vet. This girl was more interested in critters than people, though she was qualified as a human doctor too.

Long past frills and ringlets, I now put up my hair in a sensible bun or chignon for work or business. I even pretended to near-sightedness and wore half-spectacles for close work. Sometimes I even wore colored contacts, usually blue, green or amber, which gave me the opportunity to experiment with eye make-up.

My lead identity was well established. There had been a little flare of publicity when I turned up at the embassy 10 days after the Typhon break-out two continents away. And again when I had arrived at the airport two months later and had been greeted by an over-effusive Fermina. I felt quite safe.

* * *

I enjoyed working with a non-maternal pregnant tigress. She had accidentally stepped on and killed her first two cubs. I taught her how to be a mother. Having been hand-reared after her own mother rejected her, she had no learned maternal instincts and simply didn't know what to do.

I gave her supervised visits with a pregnant experienced domestic cat until both were relaxed and comfortable with each other. Together we watched the smaller animal arrange a nest, give birth, lick her babies clean, chew through their umbilical cords, eat the afterbirths and suckle the kits.

The tigress watched and learned, carefully came closer for a better look and took a few licks at the new kittens herself while the little mother cat watched her anxiously. And she did everything the same way herself two days later.

Both cats then brought up their kittens together in the same cave. Both sets of kittens learnt to use a litter box and bury their business. The keepers really appreciated the tigress's learning this new trick too. And later both lots learned to catch mice and rats, though not on public viewing days.

My tigress vindicated my faith in her and did an excellent job on this and two subsequent litters. She was so grateful for the mother-care education; she always came up to rub against me when I visited. And she always enjoyed being scratched behind her ears, purring her love back to me in her deep rumble.

Chapter 12

Dropping Langdon

Langdon became more demanding as I cut back further on my time doing his research so I could spend more at the hospital.

One day he snarled: "Surely they could hire someone else to clean the cages."

I stared at him unbelievingly. He thought I was some kind of kennel maid, doing demeaning work for a pittance.

Despite my several local write-ups, even a page one story and pic with the Komodo, he didn't know I was a qualified vet. He hadn't bothered to find out anything at all about me. Too wrapped up in his own heroics to care about anybody else, he only noticed when someone took something he depended upon away from him.

As I saw it, he had no right to expect or demand anything of me. He had never really done anything for me. Not ever. Yet I had always been expected to give up everything I was doing to work for him for free. I had never been paid for anything I did, in information or in wages. And I really didn't care about his work. It didn't change anything.

I had probably helped more people than he had in my short life. And I had never made a production of it. If I could help I did so, and that was it. I didn't need to announce my great good deeds on national Vid. Nor to show off by naming some politico and proving he was on the take. What politician wasn't? Corruption went with the territory.

Lang had been a successful tele-journalist. He regularly wrote an editorial column for a renowned Democrat newspaper. He had already won two Pulitzers for his journalism. Now he was probably hoping for something like the Nobel for his monkey work. Except that nobody gives prestigious awards to anonymous monkeys. So he was feeling frustrated. But that was his problem, not mine.

I really didn't care. I had had enough of him and wasn't interested in his manipulative games, so I told him I quit.

Langdon looked shocked. "You can't quit." He says.

"I just did. Goodbye."

"No, you can't quit. You can't leave because you love me."

"What are you blathering about?" I was really shocked. "I don't remember ever making any declarations of love, or even mild affection or respect in your direction. And I certainly don't feel any.

"I came to you for help finding my old friends and you couldn't even do that. But you inveigled me into working for you. The work has never really interested me. I don't wish to do it anymore. And that is all there is to it. We've never had a work contract. You've never paid me anything. So I don't even need to give notice. I just quit."

"You never needed to say anything about your feelings. I know you fell in love with me when we first met. Just as I did with you. We belong together. We have been fated lovers through the eons in thousands of lives. So you cannot just turn around and walk out on me. Your love for me will bring you right back again."

"Don't depend on it, Langdon. I've been hanging around here for over two years. Mostly I've been trying to keep you out of trouble. You're too old and too unfit for the Bruce Wayne role. You really need to grow up and stop playing this silly game.

"And you're an even worse lover than you are a hero. You've never shown a spark of interest in me as a person. You don't even know what I do."

"Of course I do, you're a soldier and an assassin."

"No, I'm not. I may have been created to be that and received some early training. But I've never fought in battle and I've taken no lives. I'm a veterinarian, a very good one, too."

"Don't be silly, dear. Lots of young girls dream of becoming vets when they grow up, but it's hard work and it takes years of difficult University study."

"Langdon, I have been doing University work by computer and earning degrees for 8 years, usually working on 3 or 4 at the same time, and I am fully qualified, as a medical doctor and bachelor of veterinary science, working concurrently on my masters and Ph.D. of vet science."

"Oh, at gimcrack computer universities who'll give anyone the paper if they pay the fees and send in assignments occasionally?"

"Mine are from Oxford, Yale and Sydney University, all fairly prestigious. I'm sure you've heard of them. And I've done my residencies at well known teaching hospitals too.

"Anyway, if you think so poorly of my intellect and maturity, why on earth are you trying to hang on to me and talking nonsense about love when you've never given a hoot for me. Your most intimate touch was to place your hand on my shoulder for a moment, and I think that was to save yourself from tripping."

"I want you where I can keep an eye on you and know you are safe. And I can't speak of love yet because you're under age."

"Well, whatever age you consider is suitable for such things, I haven't been waiting for you. Though it's none of your business, I wasn't virgin when we first met and I've been dating regularly since. Even Evan spends the night at my flat when he is here."

Lang's nostrils flared at that but he didn't say anything.

"To me, you are already an old man and not sexually interesting, so you can stop waiting right now. Goodbye Langdon."

"No, that's not good enough. You are fated to be mine, and you must keep yourself pure until you grow up. I will court you when you reach your legal majority but until then we can only be colleagues."

"Not even that Langdon. Goodbye," and I left, believing he was a complete fruitcake. Who could think anything else after hearing that unwillingness to see, hear or believe anything but his own weird point of view. Whatever that actually was. I couldn't really understand what he wanted or expected. I just wanted no part of it.

Of course, in the clarity of hindsight—and this book, whose events chronologically precede my first journal, is being written after that one, while I'm away honeymooning on his world with the man I can never get enough of—it is obvious that the real Langdon persona was thoroughly suppressed at the time.

Beey was taking time off from playing God.

With His complete lack of understanding of human behavior and feelings, He had taken charge of the Langdon persona. Beey was enjoying playing His version of the great undercover hero. And wondering why there were so few accolades in being anonymous.

He must have picked up some superhero comics or Vid and probably would have preferred being Superman instead of Bruce.

Chapter 13

Galen University

Evan continued to send me Typhon guys, more frequently now, to obtain identities which permitted them university entrance. They discussed their options with me before choosing courses. He came himself every month or two. And laughed that he may have to ask for another box of money soon, as so many of the guys and girls were signing up for several courses at a time.

I happily showed him where to obtain two more boxes. Money was meant to be useful, not to be buried away. As I couldn't share more of my friends' lives, I was glad to enable their further education. As it was, I realized that I was now seeing more of the guys than anyone but Evan.

Some of the fellows hacked directly into the Galen system to arrange their own identities. They discovered they could do fully accredited degrees at the Galen University for free.

These courses were actually designed to feed information at the speed the individual could handle. And the courses were even custom-designed to fit individual requirements and interests. There was no stopping them after that.

The Galen computers accepted their Typhon education and allowed them entry at whatever level they wished into any course they could handle. The only downside of this as far as I was concerned was that they no longer needed new identities. So I didn't get any more Typhon visitors after that.

I tried out some of these courses and couldn't find anything about weirdo religions. Just a comprehensive history of religion, taboos and superstitions. If anything, the courses were all very secular and environmentally oriented.

So, very belatedly, I began wondering if the government propaganda labeling these people as lunatics had any basis in fact. After all, the family of my persona had been very intelligent people. And they had voluntarily chosen to go to Galen instead of the States when they found themselves being watched.

Evan and I were getting along well. He solemnly continued to notify me of the color and design of his undies. Usually he offered to model them for me and let me check the color of his bottom, but still he made no moves on me.

I continued to treat his tactics as a joke. But after one visit when he didn't once mention the undies or his tanned fundament, I found myself a little distressed. I thought he might be going off me.

It was a little daunting to realize how insecure this made me feel.

So the next time he visited, I gathered my nerve and tried to guess what color and pattern he was wearing that day. Evan's face lit up at this. Without making a production of it, he continued the banter as usual, suggesting I should check for myself instead of taking his word for it.

I just couldn't come out and say that I was taking up my claim on him.

If he had just once approached me seriously, taken me in his arms, held and kissed me, our relationship could have segued easily to the next step. Instead this wall of banter and suggestive comments fenced me in, allowing me no easy access to him and I remained horny and frustrated.

I even thought of ambushing him and getting Evan into a martial arts hold where our touching could have led to an embrace, but somehow the opportunity never arrived.

Chapter 14

Sucked Back In

I had taken no more notice of Langdon's activities until I read in the paper that he had been shot in the spine and was now paraplegic. I sent flowers to the hospital with a card, but didn't go myself. He sent a pleasant acknowledging note hoping I would visit when he returned home, so I did.

Langdon looked and acted like a different person, cheerful, appreciative, mildly affectionate, good company. And all the exercise he'd been doing to strengthen his arms and shoulders had actually given him some muscle for the first time. Even his legs were more muscular because of the passive weighted exercises he endured while strapped to special machines.

He had a lovely live-in therapist with flashing black eyes, large, very white teeth and dark brown dreadlocks. Cahdo, an enormous, 6'5" tall, muscular, mixed-race fellow with that attractive Jamaican lilt to his voice, was teaching Lang to cope with his disability. Cahdo was a sweetheart and obviously fond of Lang and proud of his progress.

Unfortunately he also knew about Lang's secret identity. And Cahdo was actively aiding and abetting Langdon to continue the monkey man program as therapy to keep him interested in living. I was horrified that Cahdo, with no training in undercover work and with such a distinctive appearance, had been out three times on monkey missions I would have hesitated to take on.

Before I knew it, I had been sucked in again to help, not only with the hacking, but also the field work. There I was—breaking into secure guarded establishments to obtain proof of various nefarious activities.

In the next case this turned out to be child prostitution! In America! That really got my goat, and I ended up rescuing 65 children, while Cahdo drove the stolen getaway truck.

Despite whatever Langdon wanted, I took all the kids to the nearest Galen center, explained the situation and copied them all the records I had found. Galen took over and the next day there was no trace left of that business. All the men and three women involved had been arrested for interfering with Galen citizens—the children. Galen had some kind of deal with the government which made them responsible for all orphans, exloonybin residents, abandoned kids, homeless and street people.

The pedophiles and enablers were incarcerated for processing through the weirdo's brainwashing system which was guaranteed to turn them into decent, untwisted, useful persons in a month. That in itself was quite frightening, especially as these creeps inevitably opted to stay in Galen voluntarily.

I just hoped Galen managed to get such good results helping the kids get over their traumas.

Galen's intensive investigation located three more centers of such activity, rescued another 203 children and arrested more people. Langdon couldn't figure out a way to gain any kudos from the exercise without making Galen look more heroic than himself, so he dropped the whole story.

Unfortunately, that wasn't the end of it. Langdon wanted a big spectacular win, so sent Cahdo and me out wired on the next job. We were taken captive and badly beaten up, though we both left many sore heads and a few broken bones behind us. Lang ransacked my flat and found Evan's note and contact number.

Evan came charging to my rescue with eight of his nearest soldiers and Lang himself driving a huge black armored van fitted for hand controls that he'd obtained from somewhere.

We were well and truly rescued. I was thoroughly hugged and kissed by the guys I hadn't seen for years until they noticed I had cracked a few ribs. The rest were more careful.

Cahdo was most impressed by the rescue, but fortunately decided this game wasn't for him and returned to being just a therapist.

Despite his previous pronouncements, Evan joined in on some of Langdon's cases and they carried on scoring points off each other as if they were two cocks competing for the favors of a particularly desirable hen.

Meanwhile, I was bruised, battered and nursing two cracked ribs, furious with everybody and having none of it, or them.

Langdon then had the hide to plan an exercise using the Typhon team. The guys thought it great fun and went along willingly, so with my ribs taped I had to accompany them too, to restrain their enthusiasm, and being a bit slow and awkward, got my left thigh shattered by a heavy steel door's slamming shut on it.

We had to be extremely careful realigning the bone pieces and splinters to cause as little internal flesh damage as possible, as this was the exact situation which had set off Barry's bizarre symptoms that had necessitated his return to Typhon for a cure.

That was when I discovered Evan had been studying field medicine, as learnt by Army medicos, and had scored a small portable sort of x-ray-imaging-type device made by Galen which didn't use actual x-rays, so he could check on the placement of the smaller bone fragments.

Evan did a brilliant job, first cutting open my track pants and removing the whole left leg fabric almost to the waist. He commented favorably on my nifty little cerise undies which had stretch-lace legs and side panels.

Then Evan grabbed my knee and while watching the machine's read-out screen, very slowly stretched my leg straight, jiggling and easing the broken splinters back together while someone pulled gently and steadily back on my hips.

Meanwhile two guys gagged and restrained Lang, who didn't understand what was at stake but still wanted to take charge.

After Evan had realigned all the bone pieces correctly, he had another chap hold my foot firmly in place. Evan then slathered Comfrey ointment over the whole area, applying it with a very light, almost caressing touch. He wrapped the leg to mid calf in first plain cotton wool then the plaster-impregnated kind and wet it down, kneading and smoothing the plaster even.

The guys got me home safely with my leg in a huge cast with the knee flexed so I could sit in a chair without its sticking out.

But my bad time was due in three days and I couldn't change gears to ride a bike. Evan had one of the girls go out and buy me ten pairs of pretty rip-offable side-fastening undies, some loose wide-legged drawstring _karategi_ pants that would fit over the cast and two canes to help me walk, saying they were more comfortable than crutches.

He made me a gallon of strong comfrey tea infusion, told me I should drink some six times a day and arranged for Elly, who understood the problem and whose estrus was on a different schedule, to keep me company.

I managed to work the cerise lacies off over the cast without damaging them and Elly helped me sticky-tape a large plastic bag over it so I could shower.

Chapter 15

Handling the Estrus

Two days later, Evan drove us both where I directed and carried me up the mountain to my usual retreat, a little log cabin I owned. He acted terribly macho and tried not to breathe heavily. I had offered to ride on his shoulders, but he declined, preferring to hold me in his arms. Snuggling up to him and holding on with my arms around his neck while being carried was very comforting. I liked that Evan didn't crack fool jokes or try to take advantage.

It was nice having company at this stressful time. Elly really helped make it easier for me and we talked about how sharing this experience with someone who was going through it at the same time, made it easier for both, though just having another woman who had been through it and understood and could provide support, was also beneficial.

Evan had chosen her because she always shared her time with Tonya and had guested other girls with them occasionally. Elly showed me techniques they had learnt which had helped them, and these were indeed useful. She was also interested in a few things I did that she hadn't seen before, so we both learned something new.

Elly was sexually active but refused to use her boyfriend during this time because she didn't feel fully human. She didn't wish to show him her animal side or possibly hurt him. He wasn't one of us and wouldn't be able to defend himself if she got out of control.

Her friend Tonya loathed the extreme estrus she suffered so much, that she was still virgin and planned to stay that way, though she didn't hate men and neither was lesbian. She had found herself getting so strongly aroused by just a little petting with a chap she fancied that she was afraid of bringing on the estrus outside its normal time and hurting him. So she just gave up men.

Spontaneously going into estrus with a man who didn't understand it was indeed a terrifying idea.

Later, two of the girls apparently had spontaneously gone into estrus and shocked their men during sex, though neither fellow had been permanently injured. That confirmed Tonya in her belief that she was susceptible to the same problem.

Both Tonya and Elly wanted to have children eventually, but had no idea how to fit childcare and estrus into their schedule because no woman (that they knew of,) had yet done so, and some of the possible consequences were quite frightening.

Some of the TY6 women had already delivered children, but they didn't have the estrus problem, and nobody yet knew whether the TY8s would have it. They hadn't been told anything about it at Typhon, but then neither had we. We had only learned about it by eavesdropping.

And still, its advent had come as a great shock to each girl. Estrus appeared to be of different strength in different girls and sometimes for the same girl at different times. The estrus period closest to Winter or Autumn usually was the most severe and the Summer one the mildest.

Elly agreed that I had the extreme type like Tonya. Her own estrus was milder, though still debilitating. For several other girls she had heard it was nothing worse than feeling very horny. So they just took advantage of it to have a good time with their boyfriends and were able to stay in the city.

But one of the girls Eira, had an extreme bimonthly estrus which lasted five days. She always looked exhausted and hollow-eyed afterwards. As she was unable to relax her clenched jaw enough to eat or drink during her time, it took her weeks to recover. Going on retreat alone had been very dangerous and almost killed her the first few times.

Now she always had at least two attendants keeping a suicide watch during her suffering. And everyone was very worried about her.

Being placed on an intravenous glucose drip had helped. Then having her body packed in ice to drastically reduce her temperature had been the first thing yet tried that had given her any ease and allowed her to finally reach and maintain a meditative state for the first time.

Most of the boys had been using an improved niter-based compound called SP **+** to ease their own high libido problem which they had tried to hide from the girls. This was the first I had heard of it. The girls had tried the stuff and also found it somewhat beneficial in reducing their problem.

This had been the second thing that helped Eira a little. The girls were now teaching her all the little yoga-based exercise techniques which had helped them. My discoveries would be added to those.

I mentioned the drug used to suppress some prize animals' sexual phase and offered to check it out to see whether it helped me next time, and if so, to pass some along.

Elly suggested she find the next girl due for her time and send her to me to be the experimental patient, because Eira really needed every possible help ASAP.

I agreed to handle that.

I was pleased to learn that Evan had been very understanding of the problem. He gave the girls every assistance in coping with it, allowing and encouraging them to get together and experiment with group therapy and to try out anything which might help. Rather as we two were doing on a small scale. He also organized patrols around retreat areas so the girls there would not be stressed further by having to cope with intruders.

One girl had been discovered on retreat by two ruffian types who thought they had got lucky when she started coming onto them. Instead of having sex with them, she had gone berserk and killed them both, just tearing them apart with her bare hands. Afterwards she had rung another girl who contacted Evan to send help and was found covered in gore, sobbing hysterically.

The guys who cleaned up the site afterwards were freaked out that she had first ripped off the men's penises and testicles which she stomped to a shapeless pulp before dismembering and disemboweling them.

She evidently had been carrying a lot of anger against the men who had thought up and perpetrated this humiliation upon her body. All that fury, frustration and outrage had erupted at once. So nobody went on retreat alone anymore.

Knowing how I felt when alone during estrus, I sympathized fully.

Elly offered to discover if anyone shared my time so I could have supportive company next time too, which was nice of her.

But she couldn't help with my other problem. She hadn't heard of any other girls' falling in love or lust with men they didn't even like.

For the first time since we had escaped I actually felt like part of the team again and it was a good feeling. I did some Googling before we phoned Evan for pick-up service and he arrived suspiciously quickly, so had probably been on patrol nearby.

As Evan carried me down the mountain, again cuddled in his arms, I thanked him for sending me Elly.

"I do wish you had sent me another girl much earlier though, Evan, as there were things I needed to network with them. Or at least you could have kept me informed about the other girls' estrus difficulties. Elly says that I have one of the extreme forms like Tonya and you know how badly she has been affected."

Evan gave me a little squeeze and stopped walking.

"I'm sorry Taj. You seemed to be handling everything so well. It never occurred to me that you might need help. And you never said anything to me about it."

"You never asked either, and you knew about the other girls' problems with it. You ever heard of shyness, modesty and keeping a stiff upper lip, Evan? I've never been one to load my problems onto someone else, especially someone who twice already had made denigrating jokes about this subject. I assumed all the guys thought our estrus was an excuse for lewd jokes.

"The one time I did open up to you, you practically called me a liar and a turncoat and didn't come near me again for a year."

Evan's facial muscles tightened but he didn't say anything. He resumed the downhill walk, but his forefinger gently stroked my upper arm in a gesture of atonement.

When we reached the car and I'd made myself comfortable, I resumed: "I've learnt so much _confab_ bing with Elly. I've been thinking hard, and did some Googling before you arrived. I believe I've found a solution to do away with the estrus period completely."

That really grabbed both Elly's and his attention.

"But I think I'll wait until we're safely home before I tell you more. It's a bit complicated."

Evan took me home, scanned the leg and removed the cast. He asked Elly to help me take a shower, exfoliate and shave that leg.

After I had put on a rarely worn denim skirt, Evan packed a warm comfrey poultice on the leg, with bandages and plastic wrap to hold it in place. I could see him appreciatively eyeing my red rip-off bikini undies but he made no comments.

He gave me more comfrey infusion. I was now permitted to straighten my knee and exercise the leg, by air-bicycling or swimming, but not to put any weight on it for four more days. By then I should be fully healed as the comfrey speeded up even the normal rapid healing our people enjoyed.

While he was attending to my leg, I began my little lecture.

"You may know that there is a method vets sometimes use to suppress estrus in animals.

"All of the veterinary estrus-suppressive drugs that I know about are based on a synthetic form of progesterone, the hormone produced by the body during pregnancy.

"This is also the basis of the contraceptive pill, and for both purposes: to suppress estrus or to prevent ovulation, it works by fooling the body into believing it is already pregnant.

"That would seem to indicate that we girls should have no difficulty with pregnancy which would naturally suppress the estrus.

"Breastfeeding on demand, which is the most primitive method of birth control, and can suppress menstruation for years, possibly may also suppress our estrus as it does with cats and cattle. Then when the woman recommences menstruation, she could start the progesterone pill again or risk the estrus and wait until the child was fully weaned as the pill could possibly dry up her milk.

"For chemical castration," and here Evan's face showed his utter horror, "also more gently termed 'sexual _suppression . . .'"_ Evan _relaxed a little. ". . . which is used on male sex offenders,_ the medication is classed as an antiandrogen because of its effect in reducing, but not totally stopping testosterone production.

"But it is still just progesterone labeled differently because used for a different purpose. The stuff used for this in the US is medroxyprogesterone acetate (MPA), also known by its brand name, Depo-Provera.

"This same stuff is also used for estrus suppression on working race horses, resting mares and other large animals. And to keep circus and zoo animals from turning males mad with rut until the female is considered mature enough to breed. And while training and working animal actors.

"This is so they don't distract the males of that species and can all stay focused on their work. It is also used a lot on mares and bitches that are entered in skill competitions, such as breed shows, dressage, rodeo or herding.

"Sometimes we use it on pedigreed cats and bitches that are to be shown at breed shows. And this also is the common birth control pill Depo-Provera, containing a synthetic version of the female hormone progesterone."

Elly looked shocked. "Why haven't the doctors told us of this before?"

"How many doctors have you ever told of the severity of this problem?" I countered, annoyed that one of us was also blaming the medical profession for not curing problems it hadn't been aware of.

"Any doctor can prescribe you the contraceptive pill Elly, but most will offer the gentler ones with some estrogen content before Depo-Provera. It's not popular because it produces more side-effects. It can cause you to retain an uncomfortable quantity of fluid. This can give you painful, tender breasts and feet, and a swollen abdomen. It can also cause flushing, weight gain, and increased breast size.

These are all symptoms encountered by many women during pregnancy. Of course none of these uncomfortable side-effects can compare with the horrors of involuntary estrus, and not everyone gets them anyway."

"But if you knew about it through your veterinary practice, why haven't you already used it on yourself?" demanded Elly.

"Because, even though I studied medicine and veterinary science together and noticed the parallels, I still think of myself as human. I hadn't thought of equating my artificially induced problem with the natural estrus cycle of other critters.

"It's just a common blind spot most humans seem to have. We forget that we were apes before we became people. And for some reason, probably because I was too close to it, I never thought of the estrus as a medical condition that could be handled. It was just this foul curse some misogynistic pervert thought up to humiliate and degrade us.

"I've never needed to use Depo-Provera on my zoo patients either. In fact I have never had to prescribe any estrus suppressor because the staff triages the patients. I almost always get the difficult cases and trauma patients where I can save a life.

"I'm well known in veterinary circles for having never lost a patient in my care, so they're always testing me.

"And, having a city practice, I don't have show mares or heifers among my patients. Those are the animals on which the drug is mostly used. For heifers it readjusts their cycle, making estrus come earlier. Thus they can conceive at a younger age and produce offspring more often and more profitably.

"Also, doctors are not taught about the male high libido thing. It is believed to be a problem only of the sex offenders who get caught by the justice system. They are treated by psychiatrists, and I haven't yet studied that field.

"And that 'chemical castration' label would put most guys off from trying that route, though it is nothing like gelding." I smiled reassuringly at Evan who again had winced at the phrase.

"It's not a complete stoppage of sexual function, but a minimizing of it. It still allows the man to have an erection, perform sexually and father children, and is completely reversible. The effects stop soon after you go off the meds.

"The great thing is that I can obtain all the Depo-Provera we will need almost free by ordering it through the Free Clinic I work at sometimes, where we distribute contraception pills and devices to anybody who needs them.

"I can get you some today for the girls who are closest to their time and for Eira. The sooner she is on it, the safer she will feel. Only thing is that I think we will all need to take it every day of the month without a break, and that will also prevent menstruation."

"Oh shucks. I'll really miss that," grinned Elly.

"Depo-Provera comes in several strengths, and I'd suggest the strongest for Eira to start with. She can always reduce or even increase the strength later, once she is confident she can handle it. But we other girls and the guys who need it, can probably use the more common one. In fact most of the fellows could probably use a half-or quarter-tablet to reduce their problem to a bearable level.

"There are also other substances: triptorelin, a gonadotropin-releasing hormone and luteinizing-hormone-releasing hormone (LHRH) agonist which can be used with the Depo-Provera for guys, to prevent some of the unpleasant feminizing side-effects, but I don't yet have access to those or know much about them. Just that they have proved very effective for the sex-offenders. But we might discover they will also help girls who get uncomfortable results from it.

"The LHRH agonist apparently avoids the unwanted feminizing side effects seen with progesterone-only treatment. It can be given in monthly injections or in a subcutaneous implant, though those methods wouldn't work for us. Maybe one of those old needleless spray-on jet injector syringes with the single use nozzle fitting would be best.

"Anyway, the Depo-Provera will do the job for the guys too. After I've qualified as a psychiatrist I'm sure I'll know enough to be able to tailor the treatment better to individual needs, okay?"

Evan had been sitting stunned, not saying a word all this time. Now he shook himself and grinned.

"You're right as always, Taj; I should have kept you in the loop. You could have fixed all these difficulties before they became such huge problems. Let's get you to the clinic and pick up the stuff."

But he didn't act happy; it seemed my news had caused him some other, more personal problem that was now gnawing at him. Yet I didn't think he was one of the over-sexed guys with a too-high libido problem. Surely he wasn't castigating himself over having delayed my discovery by not burdening me with everyone's problems earlier.

We went and picked up the Depo-Provera. I separated and bundled the heavy dose packets for Eira, and decided I wouldn't start taking it until a month before my next time was due, then stop a month after and see if that prevented the onset or simply changed my regular schedule, as with the heifers.

And if the thing did come back, I could try taking a massive dose at once, perhaps the equivalent of the abortion pill, though that is a totally different compound, to see if that killed the estrus onset.

Now I had the key I could experiment freely on myself. Just the knowledge that we now had choices about the estrus was wonderfully empowering.

Elly too, was thrilled and couldn't wait to tell Tonya. She wondered also if reducing the dosage by taking only a half or quarter pill would weaken the resulting estrus to the horny level where she and her guy could have fun with it. There would obviously be a lot of experimentation happening in the future.

Evan smiled at us, but wasn't really paying attention, and even Elly's most ribald plans for her boyfriend didn't raise a comment from him.

He was still rather glum when we said our goodbyes, so I gave him a daring little farewell kiss on the cheek with just a touch of tongue to cheer him up. He did smile at me then, but seemed even more depressed.

Chapter 16

Reincarnation?

I told Lang I was fed up with his fool schemes and that Evan wasn't interested in taking further part either. Again I managed to avoid doing anything but a little hacking for him.

I added Galen's Psychiatry, Criminal Psychiatry and Creative Hacking courses to my studies. And worked two more _pro bono_ days a month at the Free Clinic. So with the veterinary work, I was quite busy.

Langdon remained pleasant, friendly and mildly affectionate, without the previous off-putting attitude, and I actually started to like him a little.

One day, I felt confident enough to ask what he had meant by the weird stuff about our being fated lovers.

Lang seemed weary and a little sad as he thought about how to answer me.

"This is going to appear very difficult to accept until you get your memories back, Taj, but then you will understand and it will all be clear."

"I think my memory is fine, thanks. I have some _intra utero_ memories, can remember being a baby, suckling off my mother, and hearing her speaking to me, and nobody else I know can remember that far back in their own lives."

"You must have picked up language in the womb to do that. That is rare; you're very lucky. My memories of this life seem to start around 2-years-old and are very fuzzy and patchy until I was about four or five.

"But I have some memories of earlier lives. They're not the full recall I'll get back later when she turns up, but they're enough to prove that reincarnation is a fact."

"So who is this mysterious 'she'—your mentor Shirley MacLaine?"

He grinned boyishly. "No, it's nothing like that. Shirley is only one of many people who remember something of their past lives. Most people just rationalize these recollections and put them down to ideas picked up from historical movies, Vid or books.

"Your lives and mine have been bound up with those of another woman back since before the beginning of recorded history. Our destinies are intertwined and she is the one in control. She already has been reborn in this time. I know that because I almost met her again five years ago, but she escaped before that happened."

"Escaped? Are you trying to capture her?"

"No, I'd just like to force a confrontation. I'm so tired of waiting. My life has been stuck in limbo. I can't get on with it properly until she turns up. She's very powerful; you'll see.

"I'm sure she won't be much longer. Five years should be time enough to prepare whatever she's been working on.

"Anyway, she has this involuntary special power. When people meet her, she causes them to remember all their past lives at once, in a sudden memory cascade that can be quite overwhelming."

"Are you sure she doesn't just hypnotize you into believing stuff that she puts into your head?"

"No, Taj, you'll see when it happens. It will happen, and then you'll believe it, no matter how much you doubt it now."

Langdon wouldn't answer any more questions about this mysterious woman nor tell me anything about the lives he remembered or my role in them.

I still wasn't sure that I believed him. It did seem a weird idea, but only from the Christian point of view. Millions of Indians and Buddhists, even ancient Greeks, Romans, Druids, Native American and other tribal societies, Scientologists and many modern sects believe in reincarnation. And we do live in the age of recycling. So why not allow God to recycle too?

Conservation of matter and energy are two of the fundamental laws of science. The soul seems to be made of some kind of energy. It has even been weighed. All the religions say it is eternal. So if new souls were required each life, where would all that soul energy come from?

I do like the idea of its being reborn and trying to improve and grow each lifetime until it gets things right. That _would_ take more than one life.

You wouldn't need a heaven or a hell that way either. You would just be reborn to the station you had earned in previous lives. Seems a lot more sensible and more productive than wasting eternity sitting on clouds praising God.

And having to restart as a cockroach, tapeworm or tick would be more appropriate than punishment in hell. Especially if you retained some human consciousness. I wonder what the various steps up would be?

Chapter 17

Magdalena Arrives

Langdon hadn't been wrong in his prediction. She did turn up soon. Only a month after our little talk, early on a Saturday evening. Which proved she also didn't have much of a social life.

Perhaps it's a myth that good-looking women live in a social whirl, being courted by loads of fantastic guys. Or maybe that only applies to the dumb bimbos and the great guys steer clear of smart women.

And she was definitely gorgeous. Wild dark red curls with loads of body and bounce, tamed into an old-fashioned sort-of-Grecian-goddess updo. Lots of piled up swirls, little braids and short ringlets trailing down the back, apparently held together with a single leather barrette and tapered stick in a matching color.

Her face was ultimately beautiful, with the kind of beauty which surpasses every previous definition you've ever thought of for the word. A lovely golden skin like a nice fresh tan, without the green tinge of most olive complexions. The only coloring I've seen that came close was in very young, auburn-haired boys of Greek heritage in summer, but theirs wasn't as vivid.

And the eyes! A deep transparent aquamarine pool fringed with impossibly thick long lashes which must have been dyed brown-black. And with brows dyed a mid taupe shade, because there's no natural way they would have gone with that hair. And she wasn't wearing a skerrick of make-up!

She had to be at least 6 feet tall with wide shoulders and a slenderly voluptuous body with a really tiny waist. She wore a plain, long-sleeved, round-necked, mid-calf length, blue-grey dress of a soft fine-knit fabric.

When you looked closely, it was utterly seamless. The whole dress, though shaped to her body, was somehow knitted in one piece. So though it was loose, it clung without wrinkles in all the right places. Without being blatant, it revealed more than a skin-tight mini would have, but in a classy, ladylike way.

She was braless too, with magnificent, full, perky breasts without a hint of sag. I would have felt inadequate if I weren't quite comfortable with my pancake tits which suit me perfectly.

Gray, patent leather, court shoes with thick 2" heels and silver buckles matched the dress and looked comfortable.

Her jewelry was minimal: a pair of black pearl studs, a silver chain tucked inside the neckline and a very serviceable-looking silver-colored large square-faced watch. This had an elasticized band that hid a multitude of other functions as it had more buttons and knobs than a computer keyboard.

She had Langdon's number too. He made a feeble attempt to dominate her, and though he almost blew her control for a moment, she rallied and got the wood on him and kept the upper hand from then on. It was quite amusing.

Apparently Langdon also suffers from the painfully high male libido. He'd been using something to counter it. Magdalena neutralized it with a touch. She certainly is as powerful as promised and has healing powers far beyond my small gifts.

But the memory cascade didn't happen for me, though its effect was evident on Cahdo and Langdon. Cahdo was utterly overwhelmed by his memories; he shook and could barely stand alone until she touched him. Then suddenly he was at ease; and somehow appeared to be communicating privately with her.

Lang was also hit hard despite knowing beforehand what would happen, so it shouldn't have been as much of a shock for him.

Sitting in a wheelchair helped conceal his dazedness. But he almost didn't notice when she'd taken his hand and somehow powered him upright for a long embrace. That action should have blown his mind. Just being pressed against that bosom would have done it for most guys. I'm sure she did that just to show us her power right away.

And this amazing woman was also having difficulty fighting her own intense physical attraction to Lang. She didn't trust him at all. And also didn't like him much, despite not being able to keep her hands off him. Very interesting!

I did get some memory in starts and dribbles, but it was all very patchy and incomplete. It was as if there were a thin super-strong membrane between the memories and me. I could feel the pressure of all those lives trying to push through it, but the barrier held.

Every now and again a tiny bit would squeeze through a narrow pore. But none of these fragments matched any other. They always seemed to be part of a different existence and didn't fit in with any previous segments. It was irritating and so frustrating.

Trying to ignore them didn't help at all. It just seemed to slow the trickle-through further. I tried attacking the barrier film from my side. I pushed harder around the leaky pore to thin the film and stretch that opening. And I did get one full life through before my effort collapsed.

But I had caused a breach. The new pieces squeezing through were now much larger, though still fragmented. I made further attacks. Caused a few more breaks, and one long hairline fracture. I worried at that until it became a small rupture with a steady flow-through. That was exhausting and left me shaky.

Magdalena noticed and offered me tryptophan. Even Lang hadn't known about that problem, though it had to have been in my Galen dossier for them to give me the stuff without being asked. So she had kept watch on him and had researched me and probably his other visitors. She gave me some sound advice.

I had never thought to look up the tryptophan content of vegetables. No wonder I was practically addicted to my daily celery, carrot and apple juice. She gave me other information I should have discovered for myself about how to make the stuff work more effectively. And bottles of samples. Impressive!

Magdalena had been accompanied by a tall upright mobile container which disgorged more, smaller ones. They stripped the apartment of everything it contained, at the same time making and leaving copies of each item in its place. I couldn't tell the copies from the originals. They were identical. But the copy of a not-quite-alive Langdon she'd brought with her in the tall box was subtly different—skinnier, somehow more dissipated.

Apparently the apartment was to be attacked shortly. That's what had precipitated this visit to save Langdon and leave a fake body in his place. I was sure Magdalena would have preferred to wait a lot longer before having to meet him again.

She offered to arrange my death too and seemed confused when I declined.

Then she really put Lang into shock by having illegally purchased his apartment building—he had owned ALL of it! But it wasn't the illegality that staggered him. It was the astronomical sum she had paid for it. You could see the dollar signs ringing up on his internal cash register, just like Scrooge McDuck. All it needed was the cartoon balloon.

She certainly knew how to work that guy. When she also gave him stock in Galen, which of course, she had started and owned completely, he meekly did all she asked. He made two Monkey Man tapes to her scripts. Cahdo took them somewhere, leaving via that busy container.

But the poor woman was having real problems with her physical attraction to him. Lang kept flirting with her and making her tension worse. So after she'd disappeared with a little touch the ugly patchy beard he'd recently sported, I happily complied when she asked me to kiss him.

It was extremely gratifying to get Langdon steamed up to boiler-bursting point while keeping myself detached by working on those confounded memories. He did have a wonderful, very experienced kissing technique. But without any spontaneity, it just left me cold as he was so obviously imagining I was her.

Still it did the job and relieved the pressure on Magdalena for whom I was developing very protective feelings. She appeared in some of those life fragments. We seemed to have been really close, especially when she had been male. So I accepted and trusted her without further worries.

We three also left via the container moments after the missiles blew the back out of the dummy Lang and his old wheelchair. We arrived in some fabulous apartment complex built into a deep cavern. Under the Indian Ocean, she said.

* * *

Lang and Mags have an odd tangled relationship. He is besotted but insecure, unsure of his hold on her, She, like me, would like to shake him loose. But for some inexplicable reason, she also feels beholden to or responsible for him. I also suspect she's hoping to palm him off onto me.

I flirted with him a little to make her feel more comfortable. I was safe, knowing Lang wouldn't reciprocate until I was legally of age. Though I was already eighteen, he believes my age is that of my youngest legal identity, so I've got over two years yet to work on getting him out of my system.

He presented us both with flowers and tried to lay on the compliments. His to her were apparently sent to her mind, and she wasn't receiving. I nudged him into using words, and honestly, you've never heard such heartfelt eloquence as then poured forth. Completely unrehearsed, I swear.

Mags and I were both deeply touched. She said that he had written the Songs of Solomon for her and she had transcribed them for posterity, and that there were more songs, too personal to publish. Way to hook someone in.

Yet, despite his real interest in getting to know her better and discovering as much as possible about her so he could 'love her more', Lang wasn't greatly concerned about her welfare. She had mentioned several times being very tired and needing him and he hadn't once asked how he might help, even after I pointed this out to him. And when he still hadn't got the food on the table the third time Mags complained of her hunger, I told him off for it.

Seemed to me he loved the idea of Magdalena, but wasn't so much interested in the real woman.

Chapter 18

Head of Galen Security

The next few hours were very educational. Confusing though, as Mags was playing some weird game with Lang. She often lied to him and was obviously setting Lang up for something. She passed out at one stage and ranted like a madwoman. Then she appointed me her new Head of Security and in charge of all Galen under her.

She claimed to want to be only a lazy, inactive figurehead for a while. The trust worked both ways then.

Lang was spitting mad—all that stock and no authority—but he hid his feelings.

The Central computer ran a taped lecture on Galen's history. It concentrated on child-care, breast-feeding, restoring the environment and the cleaning up and composting of the Earth's filth that the robots or 'bots it controlled had been responsible for. At the end she revealed that she was the Maggie with whom I had been interacting for years.

I had been wondering why the computer I knew well had been acting so artificial. Then when I had my ear bone-mic fitted and she could speak to me privately, she had asked me not to recognize her.

Mags and Lang told some fascinating and rather frightening snippets and stories of their history which rang only a few bells with me. He kept trying to embarrass her, to shock some information out of her. She countered well while continuing to tell him lies.

Mags used my body to teach Lang to heal. I paid careful attention to that too, but couldn't properly feel the chi from my end. Then she left me on the examining table for him to check out all my differences. Apparently she thinks he will heal me.

I found the whole procedure very uncomfortable. I didn't like having him look inside me. But I couldn't see any way to get out of it.

Seems Langdon was once JC, but the version I heard was quite different to the accepted Bible story. From the way Mags kept emphasizing JC's grandmother I got the impression Anne was one of my previous lives. And apparently she was a rather lousy, uninvolved mother, though an excellent healer.

Partway through, when Mags was analyzing Miriam to show how she became the crazed harridan, Lang began crying. Mags ignored him and expected me to comfort him and beam love at him.

Bloody Hell! I didn't want to touch him. But I _had_ been his grandmother once. So I acted as I thought a grandmother might. I "there, there'd" and patted him on the back. And Langdon reverted emotionally to a clingy little kid, so I must have done it right, even wearing this very ungrandmotherly outfit.

White mid-riders and a short, below midriff burnt orange tank showed off my tanned middle, with a heavy, ball-ended gold chain draped loosely around my waist—the perfect symbolic weapon for a Head of Security! A magnificent genuine antique Incan (according to Maggie,) armlet on my upper arm, a narrow gold chain Galen necklace, a gold clip holding my freshly shampooed hair together and lots of gold eye-shadow and black liner completed the look. Gold look so great with a tan that I may have overdone it slightly.

There were also some interesting Mohamed stories and some about Muslims generally.

And Mags revealed that she knew the Archangel Gabriel, who was a dear old friend of hers. She _does_ move in high society! What kind of person could be on familiar terms with angels?

* * *

Mags stripped off and walked out naked to have a swim to loosen up. Seeing that buff hourglass body and looong legs almost drove Langdon over the edge. Her bottom was absolute poetry. I definitely envied those legs too.

Lang called Cahdo back and taught me to heal on his body.

That was amazing! I could see that this was something like the unconscious healing I'd been doing as a veterinarian. But to be able to do it properly with full control and understanding was a fantastic rush.

I saw my bifurcated cat-type uterus which Mags says is easily repairable, and the frightening grey webbing in my own body. That must be what had caused Barry's scary symptoms. I will be able to heal myself later after that stuff has been removed.

I enjoyed cleaning out Cahdo's arteries which were a bit messy, but when I checked his bowels, I found them pristine, as were Lang's and mine. Maggie advised that that area was always cleansed immediately anyone donned a necklace.

Admirably sneaky way to adjust a major problem without getting into an argument over it! It's strange how proprietary people get about the internal filth nobody is willing to acknowledge or reveal to others.

I 'ported Cahdo's and my arterial blockage material into one of Lang's colon pockets for Mags to recycle later in his repairs. I'm definitely going to cut way down on my hard cheese intake.

I'm looking forward to my next day at the Veterinary Hospital to really test my new abilities.

Lang and I checked out Galen through the computer and I discovered how wide-ranging my new job as Head of Security could be. Security inside Galen itself wasn't much of a problem because the people behaved themselves. Even those in the violent section were actually trying hard to improve their natures. Most of them were very excited that they were being offered real cures, not palliatives. Mags had been right. Considering their problem as some kind of chemical imbalance really did help them work at it.

There were a few freak accidents like the retarded chap who had tried to mow Mags down while she wandered the hallways. Apparently she had caused him a memory cascade at an earlier meeting and aroused a stronger old personality who had hated her, thus the assault.

I got the latest report on the soldiers whose attack had led us all to Galen; none of them was under duress. In fact they were heartily enjoying a late supper.

I called up all the Security Department Heads on a party VidPhone line, introduced myself and took their reports. Everything seemed to be running smoothly. I asked for an outline of their responsibilities, areas of concern and suggestions on possible improvements to the system. I asked for their thoughts about the impending threat that worried Mags so much. Those proved interesting and very enlightening.

Mags returned looking more relaxed, wrapped in a fluffy robe. I told her about the saved arterial muck, she nodded, said goodnight and took Lang off to bed for his great cure.

* * *

Maggie explained how to 'port between portals and I practiced that for a while. Then tested my suit's capabilities. Fortunately Maggie ballooned it for me just before I ran through a fire or I would have singed off all my hair.

Decided to get to bed early as this had been a very big day and tomorrow promised to be even more exciting. Mags had asked me to bring in the escapee TY7s. She apparently knew where most of them were located and I was so looking forward to seeing my besties again.

This would also be my very last chance to lay claim to Evan. Though he had sometimes acted like an asshole in this life, he was worth trying to get a hold of. Regaining his own old life memories could only improve him.

Mags had told me enough of her history so that I knew from my own life memories that he was her Zeke. There had been lives before where he'd been mine until she turned up. Once he laid eyes on Mags, he would be totally hers and she'd never let him go again.

Dreamed about other things I may be able to do with the suit, so talked these over with Maggie on waking and had them programmed into the wristcomm.

Maggie gave me some advice about erecting a mind block for privacy. Otherwise my new telepathic powers would leave my mind wide open for any telepath to read. And she knew I had secrets I didn't want Lang or Mags to know.

I put in the block, and she made further suggestions about what to leave out on view if someone did try exploring there, so that it wouldn't be evident that I had blocked anything. This was a very handy idea. More subtle, and better than being completely blocked all the time.

I went to Mags' suite where Cahdo had already strapped both Mags and Lang into quadriplegic chairs and finished the force-feeding part. They were both terribly emaciated and weak from the backlash of the power flash, though quite happy. Yet somehow there was a lot more of them and of Cahdo too.

That was really startling, as Mags and Cahdo looked more beautiful and Lang uglier. It was as if their inner natures were out on display. I locked this perception away behind my mind block and helped Cahdo wheel them out to the huge main room. There a low table had been set up with many rows of dishes.

Cahdo tended Mags, so I fed Langdon. I kept up a 'pathed conversation with him as they still were unable to speak, but I did feel Mags search through my mind, so she must have noticed my startlement and wanted to know what had set it off. Mags now appeared unhappy.

Then she flashed us a series of images explaining how she had always detested blancmange and had just eaten one that she enjoyed. And suddenly we were all laughing.

She and Langs continued eating all the soft stuff we shoveled into them, vacuuming it up as if starved. Occasionally they made appreciative noises and recommended dishes to each other. But mostly they were too busy eating to talk.

By the time the solids arrived, they had filled out enough to look fairly normal. Now they began to feed themselves. Lang ordered tiny portions of their favorites for Cahdo and me to have for our breakfast. These indeed proved so delicious we also made similar pleased noises as we ate. Then Cahdo left for a stint in Surgery.

I flirted a little with Langs to keep Mags happy. She explained the work that had been done on his back and what still needed to be done.

You should have seen his face when he realized that he'd had to pay for all this healing and checked his bank account. Rich guys always seem to think they're entitled to freebies and huge discounts. As if their wealth has to be as sacred to everyone else as it is to them.

Mags gave me more great suit ideas she had just thought up.

She mentioned that her kids were going out today to attend a giant world eisteddfod with about 275,000 other Galen youngsters. I already knew about that as we hadn't been allowed to provide any security in the halls. I hadn't liked that, so stationed a squad outside each venue covering all the exits.

Her son sings and dances, and apparently Mags herself is a great singer. So I will be sure not to do _any_ singing while here. Then I discovered that Lang has actually danced _ballet_ and plans to take it up again to strengthen his bone density. Spending years at the computer and driving everywhere has left him with osteoporosis.

Learnt that Mags had located and traced our group and Langs through their use of SP **+** and Maggie had indeed been watching Langdon carefully. Mags wanted me to go out today and bring them in to Galen because she needed more strong healers. She had no idea as yet that Evan was her reborn missing lover Zeke, but I think Lang had recognized him.

Mags seemed to think I was deliberately resisting the memory cascade, probably because of Typhon conditioning to avoid spilling information, even when full of psycho-active drugs. That did seem possible. I was still receiving an occasional partial life, but more slowly now as the pressure on the other side of my metaphorical membrane had eased. If I couldn't get the damned thing broken through I might never regain more than half my lives.

She called up an upright full-length mirror and showed me how to change my body to that of past avatars, how to age them and mix and match body parts, instantly changing my appearance to confuse watchers. I hadn't even caught the lives of most of the women she changed me into. And they were all women—I don't appear ever to have been born a guy.

I asked for an explanation of the changes they had made. Mags misunderstood and explained in great detail how the relationships of past lives caused an instant attraction when the partners met again and locked eyes.

When Mags finally got my drift, she realized that I was somehow seeing auras. Unfortunately not in the conventional way, nor in the way she sees them, as I picked up no colors. Langdon, however, was catching the colors without understanding where they came from.

Then I found that Mags had got Maggie to break ancient binds both had placed on each other. But both Mags and Lang still had other binds placed by a Capitalized Somebody Else. And during the power flash, Maggie had caught 3 more of those aimed at Langdon.

Both had continued to eat prodigiously, though even her huge hunger couldn't keep Mags quiet for long. She is a real motor mouth and a fount of interesting information.

She explained that it was my persuading Lang to use body-language reading techniques on his memories of her which was responsible for their aura growth.

I tried to apologize for butting in there, but Mags made me promise that whenever I had another sudden urge to butt in, I would just go ahead and do it, without thinking it over or trying to talk myself out of it. She said I had a gift for making everything suddenly clearer, and that Maggie would always put me through to her on a private line.

Langdon noticed that she had stopped eating all the fancy gourmet dishes and was tucking into a huge tureen of meat and vegetable stew, while chewing on slabs of hot crusty dark bread. That smelled heavenly, so we too were soon pigging out on the same.

Lang showed me how to grow my own aura by remembering people I had loved.

I recalled my mother and Fermina. Then sent a great burst of love to the old love fountain source and was thrilled to get a huge one in return. I had been neglecting him lately. It was lovely that he still remembered me, but sad that he was still trapped there.

Jim was the only one who had been my lover in this life, so I used those memories too. Four years had made that pain less raw. I still missed him dreadfully but it was easier now to remember the good times we had shared. I remembered his family too. They had treated me like a daughter, and we had grown even closer in our common grief after his death.

I had formed many friends among the children and adults I had taught to swim and took for advanced martial arts and the farm folk I visited regularly. Also the vets and nurses at the veterinary hospital, some grateful pet owners, zoo-keepers, other doctors, nurses and a few patients at the Free Clinic. I added them all to my collection as well as each of my animal patients. After all, they had been there to be loved and to love me when I needed them. Komodo dragon love should give my aura an interesting flavor.

Not being able to see the effect of my efforts was annoying. I'll have to check out the aura researchers here and see if they can help me see them better.

Mags showed me how to condense Langdon's aura to keep it in tight, so I tried the same technique on mine and actually felt something happen.

So I worked on remembering loving all my friends at Typhon, especially Evan, the love fountain fellow, my squad mates and the others I had seen recently, and on everything I could remember about Mags and Evan and my children from my pasts, and again I could feel something happen when I compacted my aura.

I deliberately decided not to think of or remember anything about Lang in case doing so reinforced our ties and trapped me tighter into his life.

Mags helped me choose a loose stretchy, light-colored pants suit with plenty of pockets, to wear on the search and showed me how to use the suit under it to alter my body shape. I could thus make me a fat rear, potbelly, big hips or shoulders, thick ankles, a dowager's hump and slouch. Or I might alter the color and pattern of my outfit by wearing the suit over my clothes, and to change my height or gait by making differently shaped cushions of air under and around my shoes.

As if that weren't enough, Maggie or I could use the suit to darken, muddy or blur my skin, make it sallow, florid, grayish, blotchy, pitted, scarred or birth-marked. Or I could give myself a rash, pimples, boils, warts, beetling gorilla brow, flat broken nose, wobbly double chin or heavy monobrow. My appearance could regularly be changed completely by Maggie whenever I wasn't being observed. All these alterations could also be used on the rest of the group after I fitted their wristcomms.

Then Mags warned that she would be dumping Lang that night, and as I suspected, asked me to stick by him. She left me alone with Lang while she changed, but all he did was keep eating until she returned, now wearing a sage tank and pants.

Chapter 19

Finally

Maggie 'ported me to as near Evan as possible and I had her cap him as soon as we saw him, so there would be no accident. He was just leaving the office where he worked as a cubicle jockey temp to eat lunch in a nearby park. I followed him to the park, threw my arms around him, pulled his head down and gave him a passionate kiss.

He was startled, but after noticing my strength as he tried to remove my arms but couldn't, he gave in gracefully. He picked me up, sat on the bench behind him with me firmly held on his lap and kissed me back quite thoroughly. Then finally Evan demanded to know who I was.

I showed him my true face for a moment and grinned cheekily as I ground myself onto his rapidly rising erection. This would probably be my last chance ever for sex with Evan, so I had to make it memorable. Mags would certainly pre-empt him as soon as I brought him to her.

He looked so shocked and confused. Not making smartass comments now.

"Taj? I'm so glad you're alive. I tried to ring you at your flat, the Animal Hospital and the Free Clinic, but nobody had seen you since the explosion. But what on earth are you doing?" he hissed.

"Taking up my option, Love. It's still viable, isn't it?"

"Yes, of course, for always Taj. I love you. But here? Out in the open?"

"Why not? Fresh air and sunshine are good for you, Evan. Don't you think the cavemen did it out in the open too? This way, I stake my claim in public for the whole world to see."

Evan shivered thinking that one over. By the way his erection expanded under me, the idea obviously pushed his buttons.

I had already ballooned and stiffened the suit to make me appear a lot wider and rounder. Now I opaqued it to mimic my clothes. I 'ported my pants and panties right off inside the suit, raised myself and stood in front of Evan, leant forward and placed my right knee alongside him on the bench.

Shielding both sides with my unfastened jacket fronts and suddenly wider sleeves, I opened his pants, 'ported off Evan's bright green undies and hid them in one of my capacious pockets.

Then I freed his uncircumcised erection, running my nails appreciatively up its height front and back.

I adore a penis that I can't get a hand around, especially an easily excitable Cavalier. I gave a few extra-light flicks to his wonderfully sensitive Tarzan cord and its delta of ridges.

Evan's facial muscles suddenly collapsed as if he had suffered a stroke and his mouth hung open. I quickly checked his vital signs, but it was only ecstasy. He was so unbelievably responsive to me!

I moved his hands inside the open suit to my naked breasts and put my arms around his neck. Evan quivered all over again and began stroking my boobs and teasing the nipples once they contracted into hard little nubs, frustrated that he couldn't get his mouth to them and still keep our pastime secret.

I 'ported in a glob of lube high inside myself so it would warm as it melted, opening the suit further as I slowly lowered myself until I was astride the mushroom head. I smeared hot lube all over his knob as it trickled down.

Evan was moaning now. I rubbed that sensitive glans around my vulva and over my passion button in slow small horizontal figure-eights, heating up myself as he trembled. I leaned forward and kissed him gently, drawing up both knees until they were on the bench alongside him and squeezed his hips hard between my thighs.

Evan's eyes rolled up in his head. He was really into this and I had barely started.

I had the suit cushion my knees comfortably, then had it make another wedge-shaped cushion under Evan to lift his groin higher for a better connection.

For all my pretended bravado, I was still quite nervous. Though eager for him, I was not yet fully aroused. But the scenario, Evan's flattering reaction to me, his gorgeous penis and my own libido built me up quite quickly.

I could only nibble at his lips and kiss him fairly softly as his reactions were so strong I was afraid I might interfere with his breathing.

Very soon I was breathing rather hard too and producing all the natural lubrication required, and then some. I slowly proceeded to work him in deeper. My vaginal muscles continued to massage him internally and pull him further into me.

Despite his shock, Evan was intrigued, extremely aroused and more than willing to cooperate.

Apparently one of his fantasies was to be overpowered by a strong woman and forced into sex, as he had begun to cooperate as soon as he'd noticed my strength and _before_ he saw it was me.

All my memories of shared pasts showed that he loved my getting aggressive and that was probably what he had been hoping and hinting for before in his clumsy heavy-handed way.

Like Langdon, Evan evidently had some past life memories. But he'd had no idea at all how to handle or react to my uncharacteristically shy self in this life.

So here I was, taking charge. Trying to, anyway.

There were people all around, but nobody took any special notice of us. One middle-aged chap sat next to us for a while without suspecting anything, then left when his friend arrived, nodding to us courteously. I smiled and nodded back.

Being so much shorter than Evan, I could easily stand on my knees and pull his head around a bit as I kissed him to cover my up and down movements.

His uncircumcised knob was so deliciously wide, the corona so rigid, just a small movement was giving me fabulous sensations. I tightened my vaginal wall muscles harder around the head as Evan groaned and I had my first little orgasm.

He felt sooo gooood inside there. It had been far too long since I had had a man. Ever since he regained consciousness and cleaned up I had wanted Evan.

I really should have raped him as soon as he mentioned the idea. It was obvious now that was what he had wanted.

Shyness can be such a handicap, but my old life memories had given me so much vicarious experience, and knowledge of Evan, that I was now a lot less modest.

To make him last longer I arranged my suit again to press firmly on his perineal ridge. With occasional sudden lifts and restarts, I continued my slow movements in tiny descending increments, loving the feel of that huge penis stretching me.

I nibbled at his ears, chin and neck, using my teeth as he groaned, slowly lowering myself further each time I bit him. I had enveloped about a third of his length when a pretty girl approached us.

I read her mind. Janice and several other women who worked with him, had been flirting with Evan for a week without winning his attention and now she wanted to check out her apparently overweight competition.

She wasn't at all sure what we were doing, despite seeing Evan's agonized face with his eyes rolled up, so tapped me on the shoulder and asked: "What are you doing to him? Giving him a dryie?"

I smiled up at her sweetly. "No, I'm fucking him blind." Evan gasped at my blunt language and his penis jerked inside me. So he liked my talking dirty? I could do that easily. I had memorized all the thesauruses, even the sexual and slang ones, though some of those self-praising synonyms were utterly ridiculous.

Bald-headed giggle stick, mayonnaise cannon, Buster McThunderstick, ham howitzer, pogo stick, purple-headed love truncheon, sexocet missile, stout warrior, virgins dream, womb broom, zipperfish—could anyone seriously say any of those aloud without laughing?

Big ones like Evan's were called anaconda, ankle spanker, barge pole, beaver cleaver, Excalibur, swordsman, tally whacker, _walloper,_ whalebone, whanger, whopper and phone-pole.

I might be able to say some of those without laughing aloud, but what if he laughed first? I'd break up. Better not risk it.

His magnificent specimen did deserve something better than the basic cock, dick or prick, which were also used as insults. I wonder what he calls it? I read him. 'Old Wrinkly'? Nope, I'm not using that one either. Who'd have thought this would be so difficult. Maybe I'll just stick with Cavalier, the nicest of the names for an uncut penis, as opposed to the cut Roundhead.

Janice watched us for a few more minutes as I had another little orgasm and Evan began to gasp again. She grinned at me, said: "Enjoy yourselves" and left, wondering if she too would have more success wearing a rigid fat-suit.

That exchange had been surreal.

Gratifying our carnal desires out in public like this was proving unbelievably erotic. It wasn't just the exhibitionist factor, either. The need to appear innocent was forcing me into unfamiliar constraints that were bringing fascinating new discoveries and opening whole new worlds of pleasure.

In all my previous lives I seemed to have been sexually aggressive, as now, and had always preferred hard, wild, pounding sex. With Jim I had let him lead and that had been very sweet. This was so different, so exquisitely gentle, so beautiful. I was melting inside, and I don't mean the lube.

A few other people looked at us suspiciously, but as I was now snuggled up to Evan with my head on his chest or nibbling at his open collar, I just appeared affectionate and clingy.

I moved my hips discreetly in fairly small circular gyrations interspersed with back-and-forth, side-to-side and horizontal figure eights well inside the ballooned suit, with only occasional lifts when I stretched up to kiss his lips and Evan now had an arm draped around my back, so there was no visible external movement to give us away.

Nobody would believe that we were actually doing the deed unless they came close enough to smell the sex as Janice had.

Evan was very near coming now; I moved further back towards his knees so I had only the most sensitive end-third of his roger still inside.

I rearranged the suit again to cover him too and keep his face looking calm and smiling while mimicking his closed pants with a bulge behind the zip, and my loose jacket covering our joined area.

Then I took his hands for support and leant well back to change the angle of entry so his bulbous head rubbed up and down directly on my very happy G-spot. There's something that has very few synonyms. I'll have to think up some more.

The new position felt fabulous. With his knees moving to jiggle me up and down a little, it soon gave me a lovely wet orgasm, which I shared with Evan.

Feeling very relaxed, I moved up close again and slid down the whole length of him. I had to bounce a bit and push down rather hard, holding the slats of the bench seat for leverage to get the lot inside, but I managed. That felt quite terrific for both of us.

Then I worked him firmly with my internal muscles until Evan exploded, when I pulsed my vaginal muscles, alternately squeezing extra hard and releasing until he collapsed, almost unconscious.

I was ready for more immediately, but being unpowered, Evan needed recovery time, so I tidied us and restored our clothing. Maggie simply 'ported our clothes back on again and his cap and my suit removed excess fluid and freshened everything. He didn't even get any damp spots on his pants.

I cuddled close and held him tight until Evan recovered.

Maggie had sent us a basket of lunchtime goodies which I pulled out from under the bench, and sitting sideways on his lap I fed Evan delicious Galen finger food as I explained that he and all the TY guys and girls would be joining me at Galen where we could live safely and be useful.

"No way," he protested vehemently. "We're not going anywhere near those psychos—they're all crazy nut jobs."

Then he turned suspicious.

"How did you know where to find me Taj? Do those Galen people know about us? They want us to fight in their wars against the government, don't they? They tagged us somehow through the computer courses. We'll have to run again. I have to warn everybody."

He pulled out his cell phone, but I clamped my suited hand over his so he couldn't call anyone.

"Calm down Evan. Get a grip on your paranoia. Accept it as fact. You know I'm always right. You said so before.

"Yes, you definitely are coming to Galen. In fact Evan, I'll bet that within minutes you'll be urging me to hurry up so you can get there faster."

He made a very rude noise.

"Don't believe the government propaganda, Ev. We all know they tell lies whenever it suits them.

"It's just because what Galen achieves seems so incredible that we all attribute weirdness and heavy brainwashing to them, but that's not how they do it.

"Galen now has over half the world's population, and all those people are happy, safe and working hard to improve themselves.

"All the TYs are doing courses at Galen schools and Universities and nobody has yet discovered anything bad about them. I've dealt with their people many times in the past, back when I also was very suspicious of them, but they were always straight and generous with me. Now I've been in Galen and seen how it works and the place is perfect for us.

"I noticed you weren't at all surprised when I shared my orgasm with you, so you already knew about telepathy and probably about past life memory recall too.

"Galen is run by telepathic healers. I think all the TYs are going to fit in there perfectly. It's where we belong.

"You might have the same problem I had, getting only a trickle instead of a cascade of memory when you meet Magdalena. She thinks it's because of the resistance conditioning Typhon gave us against psychoactive drugs, but we'll find a way past that. And if not, recovering half our past lives is still better than having none of them."

Evan still sat glaring at me. He probably hadn't heard a word I'd said, so convinced that he knew better.

"Taj, you're talking crazy and acting unlike yourself. They must have drugged you. I thank you for the fantastic sex. It was glorious, but I'm never going in that place."

"Yes you will, Love. In fact you probably will never again give me a second thought because you'll be so desperate to get back to your Rowena."

His expression altered immediately at hearing that name. "You remember the woman you have always loved, don't you, Evan? She used to be Yeva when you were Addai, and Rowena is in Galen waiting and yearning for her Zeke."

I felt suddenly cold and lonely as Evan's expressive face changed again and he moved away from me emotionally to some inward place where she was all-important. I couldn't prevent the tears filling my eyes. I had expected this, but it still hurt. A lot!

We had just made love and it _had_ been fantastic, despite my being unable to relax enough to really get into it. Having outdoor public sex is an erotic fantasy many people have but few ever achieve. Especially without making a disgraceful spectacle of themselves or getting arrested.

Evan would remember it forever.

I was sure Mags would never be able to top that. She was too square to do anything really kinky.

Evan had said that he loved me, for always, but now I had lost all personal importance to him. All that mattered was the message I had brought him. He wanted to go to her immediately.

He wouldn't have cooperated at all if I hadn't told him. I still needed his help to gather the rest of the group, who wouldn't have believed me any more than he had at first. I didn't know if any of them also had some relationship with her, but I couldn't count on that. And I certainly couldn't bring on a memory cascade myself.

While Evan sat and glared at me, probably furious that I had tricked him into sex when all he wanted now was his beloved Rowena, I placed a wristcomm on him and explained how to use the suit.

He rang his workplace and told someone he was sick from something he had eaten that disagreed with him. He was told not to bother returning, ever. Janice hadn't waited long to spread her story. That was fine. He wasn't going to go back anyway.

Chapter 20

Gathering the TYs

Evan began ringing his people and arranging to gather them in groups. We 'ported to the residences of the stay-at-home wives, had 'bots pack up all their possessions, collected children from carers and sent them on to Galen.

Two of the women were heavily pregnant and very relieved that they wouldn't need to do their own packing. Though as the group was accustomed to moving at short notice, they were all remarkably well organized. There was only dry-cleaning to collect and library books to return. Maggie sent androids to do that.

I wanted to meet some of our old squadron next, so we 'ported to Zade's flat where Maggie had set up a portal in an outside wall. We just walked straight into his crowded lounge room.

There was a moment of shocked silence, then I was swept up in Zade's strong arms and hugged and kissed until I was breathless. I had no chance to recover before Tam grabbed me from him and took his turn, holding me very close and whirling me around, then giving me a long luxurious pash which promised much more if I allowed it.

I just melted against him, finally feeling that I had come home, seeing Zade watching us anxiously and Evan apparently steaming up with—jealousy? I couldn't believe he really felt that—possessiveness, maybe—he probably thought I should retire to a nunnery now that I'd had sex with him, live with my memories and forget all other men while he cavorted with Mags. Fat chance, now that I had some of my favorite guys back.

Lim came in from the kitchen with Siri and Tianna just as Tam put me down. Lim vaulted over the sofa to grab me and we both rolled back onto it, hugging, kissing and laughing. I was so overcome, crying with the joy of seeing my beloved old friends again.

Lim sat up and took me onto his lap. Zade brought a box of tissues and sat beside us and Tam took the other side rubbing the tension from my back and shoulders. Siri and Tianna came over grinning and also gave me a hug and little kisses.

Everybody was talking at once, so it was difficult to catch everything.

Zade: "Taj, you're gorgeous—no wonder mean old Evan kept you hidden away from the competition."

Me: "You should talk. Last time I saw you, you guys were all skinny little squirts; now you're giants and all major spunks. I'll bet you can't fight the girls off."

Tianna: "They don't even try to!"

Siri: "Why are you wearing that oversized outfit Taj? It doesn't fit properly and camel is definitely not your color."

I changed the suit to emerald green with giant fuchsia polka dots and grinned at her shocked expression. The boys looked surprised too.

"I'm supposed to be undercover. Galen has a lot of enemies outside trying to prevent more people joining, and they would especially like to get hold of me as I'm Head of Galen Security and 2IC of the works. You will also have to change your clothes, faces and body shape occasionally as we move around, unless you want to go straight to Galen while Evan and I gather everyone else.

Tam: "So are you and Evan a couple, or what?"

Me: "Well, he said we were engaged nearly 2 years ago, but despite a lot of suggestive remarks, never once made a move on me. He never even noticed my modest little attempts to seduce him. And as he's the secret, many-lifetimes soul-mate lover of Galen's founder and can't wait to get back to her, I doubt I'll ever get another look in, so I'm fancy-free and available, guys. Who's offering?"

There was a heartening chorus of "Me!s" as the girls giggled. I could read that this group were all friends with benefits but nobody was serious about anyone else, so whoever I chose, I wouldn't be stepping on anyone's toes. But how could I possibly choose?

All three guys were gorgeous, well-built, sweet natured, strong, and dependable. They adored me as much as I loved them and kissed enthusiastically and with great expertise. Everything any girl could possibly want, and I had felt passion with each of them. We had been separated for ten years, but the absence had only made our love stronger. And of course I still loved Evan just as much too.

Me: "You fellows all have such great long hair. I'm so jealous; mine gets straggly once it reaches my shoulders. Lim yours is even longer than Tianna's and it's so beautiful." I pulled a long tress forward and ran my fingers through its heavy jet black silkiness while he smiled down at me.

Zade: "So we all have to go to this Galen so Evan can get together with his old lady? Well, as long as you'll be there for us and we can see you every day, I reckon we can handle that. You'll take care of us, won't you, Taj?"

There were so many hidden meanings in there that I wasn't sure what I might be agreeing to, so blew him a kiss and leaned back into both Tam and Lim and said: "As Head of Security I'm sure I'll be able to fit you all in under me."

Everybody laughed at that except Evan.

Tam had the rather frizzy tightly curled dark hair of his mostly Maori heritage and wore it in a cloud around his head, then gathered into a thick waist-length braid.

Zade combined his straight-hair Oriental genes with the curlier Polynesian ones and had ended up with lovely wavy blue-black hair cut short at the front so that it framed his face, while at the back it waved and curled at the ends, reaching almost to his waist.

Pretty Tianna's dark hair had been straightened, the old frizz gone, so it also looked smooth and lovely.

Siri, a really beautiful Caucasian/Indian mix, with perfect classical features and thick, rich chestnut, waist-length hair, was the mother hen of the group and had looked after and placed all the others, as well as finding homes for lots of other stray youngsters.

Evan was our only blond. His hair just touched his shoulders. He was still glowering and steaming, leaning against one of the walls with his arms folded.

"It's so good to see all you guys again, but we'll have to finish catching up later. Evan and I still have to get everybody else organized." I placed wristcomms on everyone and Maggie inserted their earbone mics while I gave them the standard lecture.

They all seemed to have friends and adopted family who wanted to come too and hoped to take advantage of the easy packing and transport so they all left with bundles of necklaces and a 'bot each to handle that. Zade's flat had been emptied as we talked, the sofa being the last item removed.

I had noticed that each item that was carried past me, while modern in style, was of exceptional quality. Even the bookcases were made of solid hardwood, not pine, and certainly not IKEA pineboard. As the apartment belonged to Zade, and the other two guys roomed with him, Zade apparently had managed to make himself a fortune, probably in something to do with electronics. More power to him.

Chapter 21

Again and Again

Reluctantly I turned to Evan for the next destination. He was still leaning and scowling fiercely, but straightened and grabbed me as I approached, kissing me hungrily.

"I can't give you up Taj. I was devastated when I thought you had died in the explosion and I'm not going to lose you again now."

The way he was enfolding me so I could hardly breathe showed he meant those words. But now that he knew about Rowena and could hear her siren call, he also knew he couldn't resist her. Evan was fighting an internal battle with himself and at the moment my side was winning.

"I really need you, Taj. We've only just got together. I love you, and I want you again, right now."

Well I was hornier than ever after cuddling up to my favorite guys, so didn't need another invitation. I just 'ported off all our clothes before he changed his mind.

Evan hadn't been kidding; he was all up and raring to go. I didn't need any preparation either, so swung my right leg sideways and up in a great arc, hooking my ankle around his neck while standing on tiptoe. Evan had to bend his knees some to get down low enough to enter me, but then he lifted me up so I could wrap my left leg around his waist.

We became rather frenzied after that, heaving and pulling at each other in our great need, breathing raggedly.

I pushed against the wall behind him with my right arm and dragged him back inside me with my left leg and both arms while Evan pounded into me, supporting and playing with my bottom, gathering moisture from our joined area and using it to tease my balloon knot open, then to insert a finger there.

I quickly 'ported in more lube as he worked my ass with two fingers and then three while pumping vigorously and deeply in front as I moaned and gasped, and then screamed through dozens of rapidly succeeding orgasms.

Greedy for even more sensation, I moved my right leg over onto his right shoulder and Evan helped me spin over until both my legs were wrapped around him. I had one arm hooked back around his neck to keep me upright, the other around his chest.

One of his arms, the right, I think, was wrapped around my chest. My back was towards him so his penis was bashing into my sexual sweet spot and hitting the sides of my vagina as well, as Evan figure-eighted his hips and his fingers too.

I was in ecstasy, yelling my head off, when he suddenly removed my arm from his neck, bent me over, pulled out and entered my rear, stopping with just his huge head inside. I roared in delight and frustration, thrashing back and forth until he gave me the lot. I was more than ready for this.

He used his other hand to fill my well-stretched wet vagina, thrusting it deeper and deeper until he was in to the wrist, his bony knuckles and crooked fingers having an unbelievably terrific effect on my firm ecstasy spot.

I was incoherent, feeling my own eyes roll up. Though I'm not sure how we had got there, we were both down on our knees now—Maggie had padded mine again without being asked—and Evan was driving me into the carpet, pistoning into both my entries as I heaved back at him and tried to mangle his hand with my strong inner muscles, drumming my fists into the floor, and finally, at last, shattered into the ultimate orgasm which I again shared with him as seconds later he had his own.

We collapsed onto the floor. Evan separated his parts from mine; I turned over and pulled him down on top of me. I enjoy a man's weight on me for the aftershocks, which were spectacular too. We were both wrung out, but still had so much work to do. Evan climbed off when I had calmed, helped me up and cuddled me tenderly as we walked to the bathroom.

Maggie had laid out my usual shampoo and shower requirements, so we hopped in the bath with the overhead shower, shampooed, washed and caressed each other as we did so.

I surprised Evan by sneaking his penis into my mouth and licking around the sensitive coronal sulcus, the groove behind his corona, along his responsive banjo-string and over the frenular branching and within moments he was stiff and ready to go again.

He sniffed his fingers and looked a question at me. I explained how healer panties worked, coating and keeping everything pristine so there were no hygiene problems in changing from any passage to another. Just another perk of being a healer, as he would soon learn for himself.

Then I pushed him down so he sat in the tub with his legs extended in front of him. I straddled him, lowering myself onto his lovely huge erection. Evan slipped the big fellow in fairly easily this time as I was still well stretched and creamy from our previous session, though also swollen from that delicious battering. When I had his big Cavalier completely inside I placed his arms round me, gave Evan an evil grin, arched well back, pulling him forward with me until I was lying supported on his knees with my head between his legs and reached back to grab hold of his feet as Evan gasped.

I thrust my boobs high and shimmied them at him until Evan bent further to pay them homage. Bracing myself against his legs, I tightened my thighs around him and began to thrust and rock back and forth, using all my inner muscles to massage his merry Cavalier, and my grip on his feet as my fulcrum.

We had never been connected so tightly. The sensation was incredible as we both strained and rocked and pulled at each other in small but so intense movements. It was only minutes before we exploded together, but totally worth the extra effort involved in this position.

Evan had to support me so I could move my legs back and get my feet under me again. We finished our shower, rinsed off again and dried ourselves on the big fluffy towels.

I felt far more relaxed as we continued with our task, arranging for more of our guys' friends to go directly to Galen. Mags hadn't mentioned the older and younger TYs, but I was sure they would be wanted too. We 'ported out to their farm and rounded up all the TY8s, sending them directly to Nursery and the livestock to wherever Maggie thought expedient.

Evan made a few phone calls to contact the leaders of the older groups, but they were reluctant to join us. He had no authority over them so couldn't push it too hard. Eventually they all agreed to wait a few days and see if he found the Galen reality as good as hoped for before deciding on a course of action.

Chapter 22

and Again and Again and Again

Suddenly my clothes were off and I turned to see Evan naked too. He and his Cavalier were both giving me the eye. Fast learner! With the farm empty of people and livestock we had our choice of locations.

I just jumped up onto the nearest sofa and spread my legs wide, standing there ready and dripping and beckoned him over to me. Evan ducked a little in front of me and brought up his penis in a hard fast thrust, sheathing himself completely.

I grabbed his shoulders, moved one leg in a little closer and let him do most of the work, thrusting deep and hard, rubbing up firmly against my eager clit as my fingers stroked and tickled his testicles and his sweet miracle inch, my nails scratching lightly over his _perineal_ ridge, so we both built up rapidly.

This time I had no little orgasms, just the one huge one which blew me apart as Evan slammed into me and exploded too before collapsing slowly, bringing me with him to lie on the sofa, cradled in his arms as we both slowly calmed again.

I felt very contented now. I was pleased that Evan was desperately making the effort to fight his real need to get to Mags, in order to make our love-making so memorable. But I still didn't believe his passion would outlast his first sight of her. Perhaps he didn't either, and that was why he was trying so hard.

As I finally climbed off him and stood, Evan grabbed me again and pulled me down for a long passionate kiss. His Cavalier sprang erect again, and within moments I was on my knees on the arm of the sofa with Evan entering me doggy-style. That felt fantastic. I reached my arms out for the farther end of the seat cushion, stretched and leaned as far forward as possible with my face pressed into the cushion and my bottom lifted up high.

I soon felt the erotic inversion effect as the blood flooded into my head, away from my pelvic region. That combined well with the erotic thrill of his penis rubbing hard against both my happy button and G-spot. Evan slapped me hard on both buttocks and bit my shoulder as I howled with my huge orgasm this time and collapsed, boneless.

He scooped me up into his arms and triumphantly carried me to the bathroom, where again Maggie had laid out the necessities. This shower had a much welcome deep bench seat which I immediately parked myself on. Evan turned on the water jets and knelt in front of me, gently spreading my knees and placing my legs over his shoulders, then lowered his head between them and began nibbling and licking very lightly as his magic fingers worked on my sphincter while the other hand stroked my already overworked G-spot and his beard bristles moved in circles over my entire sensitized vulval area.

Without my needing to do anything, the Cavalier was up again and eager to get back to work. Evan moved closer and entered me deep, still with my legs up on his shoulders. I had Maggie arrange firm non-slip pads for his knees so he could thrust into me as hard as he wanted.

The access was great like this, but I wanted to be more active, so slid one leg off his shoulder and wrapped it around his waist which felt different for him and changed the area he was stimulating inside me. Then I moved that leg back to his shoulder and brought the other down to wrap around his hips, exposing more fresh areas to be bashed by his penis. We didn't last much longer and again exploded together in a super shared orgasm.

We both stayed seated on the bench for the shower and body gel we rubbed onto each other, then stood very carefully and supported each other as we turned around slowly to rinse off and got out of the enclosure equally carefully, both jelly-legged and unsteady now.

* * *

We had taken far too much time for our own pleasure this day, but the TY7s were all used to thinking for themselves. With Maggie's help they had all been braceleted .Now they were taking tours of Sea Kingdom Aquarium with their own kids and another group of schoolchildren while they waited for us and two late-working partners to arrive.

Vene was running the tours, so had fitted them in easily as Maggie changed everybody's appearance regularly. The kids especially thought this was a great game, though some of the adults were growing bored.

Evan and I arrived just as Vene came off shift and took back her baby from Tianna who had been looking after him. I checked the child's genes, and he was Evan's.

So that explained Evan's unhappiness and discomfort last time I'd seen him when Ellie and I had been worrying about how our estrus would impact on a pregnancy.

Eira rushed up to thank me effusively for saving her life by removing the ghastly estrus she had suffered, and Tonya was only slightly less demonstrative in her thanks.

Tam, Zade and Lim gave us knowing looks. It was so obvious what we had been doing to make us so late. We both were lavender-scented from the shower gel, too fresh, clean, happy and shagged out.

I smiled tiredly, shrugged and gave each guy a long passionate kiss because I still loved each of them, then kissed every other guy and each girl there, including Vene last as she hadn't rushed up to me like the others.

"So this is your son, Evan; he's gorgeous. Congratulations. I know you're very proud of Thad." I spoke this secret loudly, angry that he hadn't already told me, and that Vene had covered up for him. Evan hadn't even known the 11-month-old child was a boy or what Vene had named him, though he had been generous in his financial support.

I could read from Vene that he had visited her at the onset of her estrus and she had taken him by surprise and seduced him, coming on aggressively and all but raping him. But he had stayed with her a full week and they had made love every day and night before he tore himself away.

Vene loved him and had thought that he cared about her too. She was a proud woman and didn't deserve to be treated so shabbily.

_< <_Evan! Get over here, you great lunk. Give Vene a kiss and cuddle your son. Now! _> >_ I 'pathed without looking at him.

Evan did as he was told, generously giving Vene as good a pash as any I had received. Then he took his son and almost melted with the emotions which swept through him. I mentally recorded the whole scene and all of his expressions to play back for him later.

Although I don't think he had yet done any painting in this life, Evan had been Leonardo and several other great artists, and he would want to paint these images later.

The other TYs were awed seeing their tough leader in tears, cradling his baby. I doubt they had ever seen him act so human before.

After a while I wandered over to Tam who drew me into a hug. He seemed to know that this was a shock for me and was offering his support.

Zade and Lim came and crowded me too.

Evan glanced at us then and his eyes flashed. I don't know what that signified. Jealousy? Resignation? Apology? Then he turned back to his son. I had definitely lost him now. Well at least we both had lovely memories of today.

I asked Maggie to show him how to hide a few private thoughts behind a barrier that Mags couldn't find.

"Has everyone arrived now," I asked

Tam replied: "We're still waiting for two guys who work late like Vene."

Zade, the tallest chap in the room announced: "Here they are now."

Chapter 23

Emergency

Just then Maggie broke into the ear mics of everyone who had them fitted: **Everybody, there is an emergency. Please stay together and guard yourselves.**

**Taj, Evan, if any of your group go into convulsions, please 'freeze them immediately.** I felt her pass him instructions on how to do that.

A young couple had lingered after the tour ended and were wandering around together. The girl had fallen to the floor. Her companion staggered a bit. I was over there immediately and 'froze her.

"It's okay. This is just a temporary thing. She's stable. I'm a Galen doctor." The box I called stood open alongside her body. I lifted her easily and placed her inside. The young fellow stepped in with her. "This box will take you to the medical centre at Galen and they'll fix her problem for free. I'll probably see you there soon."

Maggie had been explaining the situation to me and Evan and updating as things changed.

Mags had been the first to fall into convulsions and had apparently sent out an emotive wave which downed every receiving empath at Galan and everywhere else on the planet.

Langdon had taken charge and made a live Monkey Man worldwide broadcast to ask people to report any convulsing persons by holding down the number 6 on any electronic device to bring immediate help.

I asked the significance of the 6.

Maggie said it was just a random number Lang had chosen. Her cells could pick out any number deliberately held down and beam back the location.

Maggie had had to take my handy, widely located, security forces away from the eisteddfod halls to collect all the downed people and bring them in.

Maggie was still in telepathic contact with Mags who had urged her to play a Virginian news station on a wall screen.

That revealed that Langdon had made a previous Monkey Man recording about a local mayor who was a pedophile murderer. He had even included some film of the little girl's being tortured.

Unfortunately what Lang didn't know was that Mags had a psychic link with Tagardy. When the enraged mob dragged him from his car and tore and stomped him to death, Mags had received it all and sent out her empathic scream.

Then the fool egomaniac had made another live Monkey Man _worldwide_ broadcast apologizing to the world for causing so much disruption and pain. He said he hadn't realized that his own reaction of fury, disgust and loathing that his _wife_ had had to read the disgusting mind of the foul child murderer Tagardy, would also be shared by his entire audience. He regretted arousing the mob which tore the mayor apart.

Langdon then took off his monkey mask, announced his name and took full credit for murdering Tagardy, by inciting the mob.

Boy, he really wanted that bloody Nobel Prize! I hope they don't give it to self-confessed murderers.

And after he had announced it to the whole world, Mags was going to have a hard time getting out of marrying him.

I called all the TYs together.

"Guys I desperately need a favor from you all. I have ID that makes me 2½ years younger. You all know my age, but could you please pretend that I'm still under 16, the youngest of our group? There's an old creep dogging me who thinks we're going to marry, but as long as he believes I'm under-age, he'll leave me alone."

My guys thought this hilarious, but everyone agreed.

Zade: "Taj, you're obviously irresistible. Marry all three of us and we'll take shifts to keep the creep away."

I gave him a thoughtful look. "That's actually not a bad idea, Zade. I love all three of you. This way I wouldn't have to choose between you. It might even be legal at Galen. But would it be fair to take all three of you out of circulation at once?"

Maggie: **You're right, there. Mags has often had several husbands in the past, and will do so again this life, so there's no reason you can't.**

Zade: "Well, if you get to have three such spunky husbands, we may need to extend our favors to the needy ladies occasionally when you're busy with one of us."

All the nearby ladies laughed at that one.

Tam: "I wouldn't need anyone else if I could share a small part of your life, Taj."

That caused feminine groans, even from Vene.

Lim just smiled and looked at me hungrily.

Maggie: **Mags is un'frozen and is tearing strips off Langdon now.

**David is training the girl you sent us. She is a very strong Creative healer and her fiancé has a minor talent too.**

Suddenly Maggie almost screamed: **THE CHILDREN!! THEY'RE BEING ATTACKED!! By _flamethrowers_!!

**Ours are alright. Their suits worked. Outsider children have been badly burnt.

**Our kids have 'frozen all the invaders and casualties. Taj, have a close look later at the synchronized Vid of all the scenes together. I can't believe what I just saw.

**Your Security men have taken charge of the attackers and the injured are being labeled and 'ported back.

**Mags is busy giving orders. Everything is under control.

**But those injuries are dreadful. We'll need every healer we can get. Taj, can you all get back ASAP?**

I handed out wristcomms to the late-comers and explained them and the suits.

_< <_Evan, you MUST be the first one back to her. Take all the kids, Vene and the partners with you to Reception, send Vene and Tad to Nursery so she can settle him in and check the facilities for herself, then go to the Mother. I'll take the TYs with me after we've collected these late guys' families and friends and got the boxes packing. Okay? _> >_

_< <_Yes, absolutely. Thank you. For everything, Taj. Don't forget, I'm still your first husband. _> >_

I felt the love and unspoken promises he also sent and grinned back at him. _< <_We'll go into that later, Caveman. Now scram. _> >_

Evan took his people out.

Finis

Author's Note

Thank you for downloading and reading my story. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I have writing the books. I really would love some feedback, so please review or email me at gmail.com.

I have been very disappointed that in over four months not a single person has reviewed _Destined Lovers_ or written to me about it.

I have been writing this series for just over ten years and it has become part of me, another child as beloved as the one I birthed. I am proud of it. It feels great to me, but I don't know what anyone else thinks of it. Perhaps I've just been fooling myself.

*

I've also been working on _Reacquaintance_ the book which begins the whole series. It is still far too long-winded in parts, though I've been trying to remove all the waffle. I have taken out about 20 pages, but the rest all seems essential. Yet it still doesn't feel right.

Most first books of most authors are not their best work, so I guess I'll just have to swallow my pride and publish something with which I'm not completely happy. At least there will be plenty there for the knockers to criticize, so I should finally get some feedback. It will be out shortly.

