But it was somewhat isolated. I mean, I had always lived near other kids my age. I had walked to school since kindergarten and always had friends with...n a few houses. Here the nearest house was almost a half mile off and as far as I could tell no one under fifty lived anywhere within a couple of miles. It was definitely a big change for me and it was taking some getting used to. Mom and Dad both worked and were gone all day, but that wasn’t really a problem. I was an only child but was old. “And you, I see are the reason we are here, a policeman too. Oh, I do love a man in uniform. Where is yours, in your room? I guess you are staying here?”I was almost, but not quite, taken aback by how fast this was progressing. Taken aback, but not complaining.“It’s at home. I live in the houses along the city wall, close you where you work in fact.”Victoria, as I saw from her nametag, looked at me over the rim of her wine glass.“Oh, that must be nice. I’m right out of the town. I will have to. Whenthe nurse told me to take the newspaper down to Room 101,I felt my heart jump. As I walked down the hall with thepaper in my hand, I didn’t know if the lump in my throatwas from fear or anticipation. This time, I knocked at the door and heard the man saycome in. His privacy curtains were open, so I mustered upmy courage and walked over to the bed and held out thepaper to him. He just sat there and smiled, and it wasalmost like he was reading my mind.“Please put the paper on the. Most of the guests were milling around on the dance floor when this happened, and chaos reigned. I don’t know what might have happened if everybody had kept his head, but one of the guests pulled a gun and started shooting at the invaders.They returned the fire, and there quickly resulted a melee of firing guns from all around the dance floor. Most people had been smart enough to hit the floor at the first sound of gunfire, but a few people were slow to react, and they picked up some of the.