Anyway I haven’t thought about Bobby in ages. Then, out of the blue, he asks to be my friend on Facebook. Turns out we live one neighborhood apart. ...’m in this wanna-be poshy neighborhood where the young, hip, rich and gorgeous live. Trouble is I’m too old to be “young,” I’ve never been hip, I’ve got too goddamn much student debt to be rich and I’ve never been considered gorgeous. So I don’t exactly fit in, but I found a house I really liked and I bought it. Bobby lived about a half-mile from. Or rather used to. We now mostly are too large to ‘upset’ and used terraforming to expand our demesne internally. Though we have taken worlds in reparations for acts of war against us.”“Terraforming?” Elloson asked, suddenly looking very interested indeed.“We use gigantic ships to convert useful, if uninhabitable, planets and moons to human norms.”“Isn’t the cost prohibitive?”“Not really, most of it is just time consuming and making tailored algae that introduce oxygen into a reducing. But now... oh, this was terror! I felt... alive! Not just alive; I felt the deep-rooted need to STAY alive that is inherent in all animals.And then I heard it... footsteps! Heavy footsteps behind me. It was like something out of a bad movie, except for one very important difference: I didn't run. I could have; I kept telling myself that I could, that I should; but suddenly my mind began thinking very terrible things. All at once I realized that I deserved this. This was my punishment for. When Mike regained consciousness he was looking into Kelly’s blue eyes. She was looking at him wryly and shaking her head. He heard her say, “My poor babies.”He was in their tent with a shielded lantern providing light. She had stripped off his flak vest, combat jacket, and tee shirt and had him resting on his right side.“Here we go again,” he said softly. “Dr. Jackson is preparing to operate, I can tell. Where’s the release you want me to sign?” He grinned at her. His arm and shoulder hurt.