I shiver. Someone’s just walked over my grave. And I like it.I put the kettle on for the coffee I promised him after he drove me home from the party.... He knew I hadn’t been in the neighbourhood long, and wouldn’t allow me to hail a cab at this time of night. Too dangerous he said. I remember gawking at how ridiculous that sounded. But he was right. I wasn’t from around these parts. I didn’t know what I was dealing with. Yet. Coffee, I wondered as I added a spoonful into each mug, does he think. It is not much; only ten thousand dollars US, but enough to impel me to seek safer surroundings."He noticed that I was smiling and I think that he knew that it was not because of his situation, but because of what I was contemplating."I get the feeling that Mister Ellison needs my help and is trying to figure out how we can benefit each other. Am I correct?"I thought it was funny that he referred to me in the third person and laughed a little."Mister James, are any of your friends or. "That's where the Army, Navy and Marines fail us. They wind us up, but whenever what they wound us up for is over, they cut us loose. There is no period of winding down, of getting what they pumped into you out of your system. One day you are clearing a house room to room with grenades and bayonets and then suddenly you are in a house and fixing the storm windows. Some made the adjustment, but a lot of us didn't." That's why you left us?" I had to get away. I had to, for lack of a better way of. 'I still have much to do, ' Béla thought to herself, not realizing that wasn't her own thought, but knowing that getting her sisters to New Eden was only part of what was needed. Earth – and her dear friend, Frank, as well as her lover, Jake, pulled at her, deep inside. She was anxious and eager to return to them.It wasn't just the weather that made her feel cold. She felt like she had already lived an eternity, but still had an eternity's worth of problems to work out, and time passed so very.