I’m sorry for the pain.”They rolled me on my right side and packed my hip wound with gauze and bandages. All I could do was gurgle moans. My left ...lung was punctured. That was the last thing I remembered as I slipped into LaLa land.My phone rang. It was Janice. “Robbie, you have to get to the hospital quick. Melinda’s been shot. It doesn’t look good. That guy the police gave us the picture of, Jack what’s-his-name ... drove up and shot her as she was wallking across the parking lot. Robbie, she. Fucking high school dropout.It was a bumpy flight, United from KC to Philadelphia. And Rachael Adams didn’t even get to keep the frequent flyer miles. Matt hadn’t lectured me, just said, “It’s not safe, not now anyway.”He thought some, he knew I could be frugal. “Tell you what, don’t use them, not yet. But they won’t expire anytime soon so they’ll be available. If and when.”“If and when.”I’d been through Philadelphia on Acela, but had never been to the airport. Rachael would rent a car and. We had asteroid mining down to an art form. We used the ship's reactionless drive in concert with our high-powered tractor beams to increase the density of areas in the drift. Then the mining ships went out to Hoover up the ores. It worked like clockwork. We were overloaded with rare earths once again, but this time it only took us seven months. The Miranda company actually had to stockpile the refined metals we brought back so as not to glut the market and cause the prices to plummet.Merry and. It was not a process she was unfamiliar with. She kept several prisoners in her tower, after all, emergency sources of blood should she or an ally need them. Dealing with biological functions was a necessity. But, with her prisoners, normally they were of no threat, and could be handled easily. The Begotten, on the other hand, was a dangerous foe, and it paid to be wary with such creatures.She waited until her thralls were done, before she closed the door of the cell, leaving her and Daniel in.