May 5, 2001.

Allison took her lucky scarf off of the antique brass hat-stand on her Louis XIV dresser. This was the day to pull out the big guns, and she'd need the extra boost she got from wearing it. The white and silver fabric always seemed to pick up the colors of whatever she was wearing, reflecting a touch of blue or a hint of scarlet, just barely enough to create an elegant look. And today she wanted to look smashing.

After putting on just a hint of Calvin Klein's Escape, she looked at herself in the mirror, admiring the lines of the pale blue, Italian crepe suit.  The color was offset nicely by the cream gabardine Manifesto blouse, and the small gold eagle pin was exactly right with the gold shell earrings.  The Simon Chang outfit had been a bit too blatant, but this was understated elegance.

The NPR program from Seattle blared on about Autocrat’s ultimatum about Europe, with the liberal talking head suggesting negotiations and that war-hawk Pat Buchannon suggesting the nuclear option.  She shivered.  Buchannon was insane.  Even nuclear weapons were unlikely to have an effect on Autocrat’s fortifications, at least not without irradiating Ireland beyond habitability.

Hmm.  With Bush in the White House, there was no telling what might happen.  Of course, Al Gore wouldn’t have been any better in the current state of affairs.  Once again she wondered why in hell she had bothered to vote for Nader.  Her dual citizenship was sometimes more trouble than it was worth.  She sighed and turned the radio off, returning to her preparations.

She arrived at her office feeling powerful, but George’s huge but graceful figure quickly cut her down to normal size. Charlie Nguyen at ILM had put some sort of bug in his rear end, since Nguyen was not convinced that she could handle the technical requirements of the operation.  George’s musical Haitian voice cut through her mood within minutes, with the question, “Don’t you think we should get some reinforcements for this one.  Maybe call in IB2Tap?”

Allison fumed.  Right, she wanted that busy little faceless bee mucking around in her system some more, and infiltrating Industrial Light and Magic to boot.  No thanks.  “If the Redcoat can go against an alien armed only with a mop bucket, I can make this upgrade happen myself.”

George Mutalebi laughed, his big laugh. "That's a myth, young lady."

Allison's eyes flared. "No it's not."

"Certainly it is! It comes from those old Pine Sol commercials." He laughed again, enjoying this great joke on the world. The commercials had portrayed a Mountie with a mop "cleaning up" aliens. Then there had been some sort of law suit by the RCMP and Diane Olivier-Garner, the daughter of the final Redcoat, which had forced the company to stop using his likeness to sell its product.

Allison's eyes teared. "No. It's not." At first she didn't know why it made her so emotional, and then it all came flooding back. "I was there."

May 5, 1985.

Bralag 2 Drahss used a standard skimming approach to the target. She flashed and signed to the rest of strike team Bralag 2 that landing was imminent, and received from each a single flash of acknowledgement in the combat dialect. Her tentaxelles monitored the instruments, and several manipulative tendrils made minor adjustments to the speed and angle of approach. In a few seconds they would be down.

Samuel Olivier took another sip of the excellent coffee, and a bite of beignet. The Café Cajun was his favorite haunt in Montreal, where he relaxed amid the roasting smell and read his newspapers every morning. Between The Wall Street Journal, The London Times, Le Devoir Montreal and The Montreal Gazette, he gleaned all the information he needed in his quest to protect his country. Olivier had been forced by time pressures to drop his subscriptions to several foreign language newspapers, because even at his current reading speed of 2700 words per minute, there were only so many minutes in the day.

Usually anything relevant to him would be mentioned in at least one of the papers, and he could then look up more specific information. Right now each paper carried front-page articles and special sections about the alien negotiations and the so-called imminent invasion. The Wall Street Journal also included an interesting article about how this could affect the fishing industry in the South Seas.

A woman and her daughter came into the restaurant from the street, the little girl jabbering in mixed French and English. Ignoring the pastry case, she wanted a beignet, with extra powdered sugar, and coffee with lots of milk. Philippe grinned and served his regular customers with his usual excessive charm, giving little Allison two extra sprinkles of the white powder and raising an eyebrow to see if that was sufficient. Allison curtsied her thanks.

Olivier smiled, briefly remembering his own daughter at that age. Talkative or not, this one was far ahead of his own in manners. Allison had always been quite polite and charming during the few times she had gathered the courage to approach The Redcoat, Guardian of Canada. He chuckled at himself, then he returned to the newspaper, and yawned mightily.

He had been through many wars, usually as an active participant. Generally there was a point to them, but this whole thing seemed completely pointless. From the official reports he had been given, the alien physiology didn't seem compatible with Earth's biosphere. Sure, they could live in Earth's atmosphere for a few days at a time, but it wouldn't be comfortable and they certainly wouldn't want to stay long. It seemed highly unlikely that they would attack.

Allison looked around the room as she delicately nibbled on her beignet, gingerly avoiding dropping any of the powdered sugar on her blue frock. The Magic Mountie was sitting at his usual table, glancing through a stack of newspapers, one page at a time. Either he read as fast as she could have turned the pages, or he was merely looking at the pictures. He paused to stare at one picture, and Allison nodded to herself in satisfaction.

The high whine outside died down as Olivier took another sip. Someone had just shut off a leaf-blower or something, and the absence of the sound was more noticeable than the presence had been before. Olivier stirred slightly, feeling vaguely uneasy.

The artist's rendition of the alien ambassador was fascinating, though. Apparently the thing looked like a giant starfish mating with a squid in a kelp bed. Olivier looked around for a moment to see if that was a labeling mistake - maybe it had to do with the fishing story. But, no, that was what they were supposed to look like. It would be interesting to see one in person, if the opportunity arose.

It arose.

The front windows of the café shattered, and a huge alien clambered through them, tentacles waving and colors flashing on its body. It looked like something out of H.P. Lovecraft. In an instant The Redcoat rolled out of the chair, kicked off the wall and landed in a combat stance roughly between the alien and the other customers. The alien's colors flashed muddy greens and oranges as it advanced towards him.

He had to move the battle away from the innocents.

"Philippe, get them out the back," The Redcoat yelled as he dived toward the alien. He didn't need to listen for acknowledgement -- the proprietor was an old friend, as well as an old soldier. Philippe would follow his instructions without hesitation.

The alien struck him in mid-dive with a trunk-like walking tentacle and two of the whip-like upper ones. The Redcoat felt the blows like an explosion, only some of the damage being sapped by his protective coat. Nonetheless, as he impacted and destroyed the main counter, he felt a sharp pain against his barely protected head. He heard Philippe's yells and exhortations from the rear of the shop, and heard the cocking of Philippe's shotgun.

"Battle mode," he told the coat, speaking out load even the words were unnecessary. Sometimes it felt good to speak commands. The coat reformed around him as he pulled himself out of the shattered counter. It stiffened and reinforced the joints, covered his head with a steely helmet, and brought online a skintight force field. By the time he stood fully upright, he was adequately protected against the alien barreling toward him.

The alien looked just like the picture, except for odds and ends of hypertechnical equipment strapped onto various limbs and tucked under the central belly, or whatever the right word would have been. The coat displayed simplified schematics of his opponent, but most of the equipment was currently labeled as unknown. A warning flashed briefly as a coil of metal swept out from the alien to lasso him.

The Redcoat jumped straight up to grab a hanging light, kicked off the wall and landed near the window, all while the alien's lasso swept harmlessly through glassware and the alien crashed through the counter to leave a bull-sized impression in the wall. The Redcoat laughed, then a beam weapon from outside the window slammed him against a wall-high bookcase.

He staggered, shaking his head both to clear it and to survey the arena as his uniform colors repaired from singed black to serge red. He couldn't fly in this enclosed space, and the aliens apparently weren't equipped to fly at all.

"Display overhead view, aliens red, friendlies green," he told the coat. Superimposed on his vision was a map of the ground floor, some green dots behind him, three large red dots in front of him and outside. He could hear Philippe urging the customers along towards the rear. The civilians were moving far too slowly for The Redcoat's comfort. Have to stall, he thought.

"Blast mode, medium." For right now he needed to ration his energy while he learned about the alien tactics. He aimed for the sensory tendrils and fired a wide blast of pure energy.

Bralag 2 Shramn moved toward the human again. He had proven more agile than expected, but her equipment readings were always merely an estimate, especially in a quick strike like this one. A blast of energy left her briefly blinded on one side, but she rearranged her tentaxelles to provide vision coverage while those tendrils recovered. This target would not escape that easily, especially if that was the best he could do. How did these flimsy creatures do so much damage to the Gumina'aad? She approached to grab the human.

The Redcoat leaped aside at the last moment, letting the alien lumber into the bookcase while he soared like Barizhnikov. Several tentacles slapped at his legs as he spun in the air, landed on a table and sprang back. He momentarily considered landing on the thing's back, but then he noticed the ridged opening there, most likely a mouth. Not this time... he kicked the bookcase over onto the alien soldier and dived to the front wall to glance outside, protected from the street by a brick pillar.

The Redcoat smelled ozone and burned wood. He couldn't see the aliens, but his overhead display showed the two outside aliens maneuvering for the window opening. The green dots were almost all out the back door when another red dot appeared at the rear of the shop. The green scattered, except for two inside the café and a single one who ran towards the alien. Philippe was again earning his pension.

The Redcoat heard a shotgun report, and saw the red dot lash out to send the green flying. The green lay still, then flashed out. The Redcoat heard a crash at the back of the café, and then Allison's voice screaming, "Mommy!" The red dot was breaking through the back door.

Bralag 2 Shramn shook the chemically impregnated wood particles off her back, and spit one out of her mouth. No telling what the damn things were for, but the taste was awful and her tentacles and tentaxelles would itch for days. She flashed irritation, and rose to her full height. It was time to end this. Bralag 2 Sordish was breaking through the back of the building, and Bralag 2 Drahss and Sleeh were approaching the front. Soon there would be a crossfire the human icon could not escape.

The Redcoat didn't have much of a choice - the front of the building was crawling with aliens, so the back would have to do for his strategic withdrawal. There were also, of course, the two civilians to be evacuated. He dived behind the remains of the counter to a position where he could see down the corridor to the back door. The mother had retreated into the bathroom with her daughter, and the alien was waving tentacles at them and flashing purple and orange colors. This alien was smaller than the first, probably only one hundred fifty or two hundred kilos.

The mother grabbed a mop from the bathroom and swung it at the smaller alien, splashing the wet end across its upper tentacles. It screamed with the weirdest bubbling noise, then thrashed her with several tentacles. She landed in the bathroom like a rag doll.

"Blast mode, full power." The Redcoat ordered, then blasted the wounded alien out the back door. It flopped against a car behind the café, then twitched once.

Bralag 2 Shramn arched her back and leaped for the human. It had just fired at Bralag 2 Sordish, possibly killing her. This would not go unpunished. She landed full on the human icon, crushing it to the floor and accidentally knocking over several glass objects filled with hot black liquids. They splashed Shramn, and she screamed with the pain of the burning. Was there no end to the vile chemicals of these humans?

The Redcoat felt a thousand kilos of alien starfish land on him, pinning him to the floor and twisting his neck severely. He didn't have any leverage against the thing, which he would need badly, if it were not for a certain coat he wore. Battery pool level was still over 85 percent. In the distance he heard a girl crying, and his display showed another alien cautiously approaching the window.

"Eel mode, now!" An electric shock went through the starfish, convulsing it violently. It began to constrict on him. "Again!" The alien went limp, but it was still nearly a ton of dead weight on him.

"Okay," he told the coat. "This requires a few modifications." He quickly visualized an auto lift apparatus, with a slick surface for the alien to slide down, and two hydraulic jacks at one end to tip the whole platform up. The suit complied, intelligently modifying itself slightly two more times as the angles changed. The limp alien slid partly off onto the floor, and The Redcoat slid out and ordered the coat to reform on him. His battlesuit was half reformed when a blast from the window knocked him through the pastry case.

"Battle mode," The Redcoat instructed again, noting the battery pool was dropping towards two-thirds. He jumped for the hanging lamps, abandoning the tenth of his suit that was still under the large alien. He knew from experience that the fragment would slowly extract itself and reform into a neutral fabric that would reintegrate easily with the main suit. Meanwhile, he had to stay alive. The coat extended a tendril into the light cord, sucking power greedily.

"Blast mode, full." he instructed. When the alien put a leg over the shattered windowsill, he released a blast of power that singed the appendage. Nonetheless, a small object landed inside the café and began to shriek. His coat automatically countered the sonic attack, but by the time he had blasted the grenade, his power level had dropped to 61 percent. He needed to change the rules.

He called up the schematic of the enemy equipment, noting with satisfaction the data which had been filled in during the prior battle. The equipment on the first alien was pretty specific - the big one had been trying to capture him alive. The ones outside, however, were armed with more deadly items. Best to retire and consider his options. Meanwhile, confusion to the enemy.

"Scrambler mode. Full defense." His right sleeve ruffled slightly, then formed a series of needles. The air around him began humming with the power of his force shield on full. He dropped in front of the opening and fired a wide spray, hitting both aliens outside. The return fire was simultaneous, but one beam went wide and obliterated a wall, while the other melted against his defenses with no effect but a slight drop in his battery levels, now under half.

The firing stopped outside, while the preprogrammed needles infiltrated and destroyed critical elements of the alien technology. Whatever items his shots had hit, they were being thoroughly messed up. It would buy him a few moments.

"Battle mode." He dived over to grab the fragment, then somersaulted to the bathroom. Allison was lying on top of her mother's broken body, crying. The readout showed her mother still green, but flashing. She would die without immediate treatment. He made a hurried decision, and explained quickly. "Allison. Listen to me. Hold this over your mother's wounds till the ambulance arrives. Think about healing. She will be all right, and one day you will give it back to me. Understand?"

The look of genuine concern on his face penetrated her fear. This was a matter of grave importance. Allison sniffed and nodded.

"Good Girl." He rapidly modified the fragment for stimulating healing, keyed it to her mind, and gave it to her. "Never lose it, and never forget who it belongs to, eh?"

How could she ever forget? Of course she would return the magic handkerchief to him.

A schematic popped up showing the surviving equipment on the alien approaching the front. It was armed with a close-range heavy beam weapon, with theoretical output at the top of his defensive abilities. The Redcoat started to prepare, then his eyes caught the broken mop outside, and his nose the scent of pine. In the bathroom there was an entire pail full of cleaning liquid. With battery pool at half, he'd take what advantages he could get. He picked up the pail and dodged outside.

Allison watched the Magic Mountie dodge outside and position himself by a brick pillar. He was so brave, preparing to fight the bad aliens with only a pail of water. His red coat and black pants with yellow flash were so dazzling, she somehow knew he was going to win, no matter what the odds.

Bralag 2 Drahss knew this was not going right. She had lost both Bralag 2 Shramn and Sordish in the primary assault, and was left with herself and Bralag 2 Sleeh as sole teammates. She sign-called a brief update to the mother ship, requesting a level-3 backup, then made her decision. She and Bralag 2 Sleeh would both commence the secondary assault immediately. The power readout seemed to show the human icon tiring, and no other action would be acceptable to the Bralag'Arahhn'Ssa.

So be it.

The Redcoat waited behind the brick pillar, holding the pail at ready while a tendril from the coat sucked power from a wall outlet. He was at 53 percent and rising, and every second the aliens held off was a few thousand more ergs of power in the battery pool. He doubted they would wait the ten minutes or so that it would take for him to fill up completely, but it was very likely that he could get enough for a few more electrical assaults. The large one had fallen to that fairly easily.

"Open mayday channel. This is The Redcoat. Alien incursion at Café Cajun. Electricity and cleaning solvent are both effective against alien starfish. Power blasts have moderate effect."

"Yeah, right, 'Redcoat.' This channel is for emergencies only, so get your fooling ass off it."

"I've taken out two, and there are two more outside. I'm the target, unless they just hate coffee. Pass the bloody word, eh?"

"Sure, fine."

A human-sized starfish loaded with high-tech equipment leaped through the window, landing and spinning to face him - face being a relative term, generally describing the forward pointing of gun muzzles. The Redcoat tossed the whole pail of wash water onto the alien, simultaneously being blasted back into the bricks by its weaponry. The bubbling scream was barely perceptible above the ringing in his ears. He fell to his knees.

The bricks exploded in a cloud of grit and plasma, blowing him back on top of the first alien while the front of the café collapsed, burying the third alien. The dead alien had faded to the same pale gray as the mortar dust. He shook his head. A few more hits like that on the café and the girl and her mother would be joining it. He had to take it to the street.

"Speed mode." He flashed through the opening, sprinting faster than Eckehart Stahl, dodging faster than the eye could follow. But it wasn't eyes that were following. A blast caught him and tossed him over a car to the street, vaporizing the car in a spray of incandescent metal droplets. He landed in a heap on the oily tarmac, weakly checking his display to note that there were only he and this alien left standing. Or crouching, or whatever a starfish did when it was pointing a complicated weapon at you.

Not today! he thought, and fired several more needles. One impacted the nozzle of the alien weapon, showering the alien with sparks and warping the weapon seriously. The alien burped angrily and flashed an obscene shade of blue, then tossed the weapon away and stalked toward him. Groaning, the Redcoat rolled away from the approaching alien, glancing about for tactical aids. His power was at about twenty percent. The lamppost would have to do.

Bralag 2 Drahss knew she was going to die. Three members of her team had already gone gray, and the human evaded her grasps and blasts as easily as it had evaded theirs. The level 3 team would arrive soon, and her duty was now merely to prevent this human icon's escape, and keep it drained of energy. Accordingly, she charged it.

The Redcoat neatly dodged the alien, letting the alien plow into the lamppost and break it off at the base. Now was the time. He dived onto the alien's back, avoiding the mouth and sending a tendril under it to connect to the lamppost's power grid. Being daylight, the power was dead. He grimaced.

"Eel mode, full power, Now." He commanded the suit. Electricity surged through the alien, which twitched. "Again." A lesser charge surged through the alien. It lay still.

The Redcoat's battery pool was almost completely discharged, and his muscles sore. He looked around for a live light socket, then settled for trotting across the street to the ruins of the café, as the sounds of sirens slowly penetrated the thrumming in his head.

"Redcoat?" came a sheepish voice on the emergency channel.

"Yes."

"Thank god. We just got civilian reports about your fight."

"Pass on the tactical data to all points. Electricity, cleaning solvent. Specifically Pine Sol."

"Will do. Good luck."

"With what?"

"The second ship."

The Redcoat looked up, his face going pale at the sight of the huge glistening ship hovering over the park.

Bralag 2 Drahss lay dying, listening to the sound of the level 3 ship landing in the park nearby. What an ugly, blasted planet. Shteleg 3 Drahss would have much more luck, with a dozen team members against a drained human icon. At least the sacrifice of Bralag 2 would not be in vain. She laughed weakly, the triumphant colors rippling weakly over her skin as she died.

May 5, 1985.

Sergio Banatillo shook his head at the destruction of the café. The proprietor was carried from out back in a body bag, but the woman didn't look too bad. The police said the little girl wouldn't leave her mother's side. She kept pressing that little piece of cloth against her mother until Sergio's ambulance arrived and took charge.

Sergio grinned slightly at the girl as he pocketed a small piece of alien equipment for a memento. There may not have been any medical reason for it, since the mother appeared to have only scrapes and a mild concussion, but he couldn't fault The Redcoat's psychology. Give the little girl something to do other than worry, and keep her from wandering out into the battle. It was not for no reason that the man had been a legend.

He would be missed.

March, 1988.

Allison Drake remembered the Redcoat. There was no way that she could forget him. She had made a promise to him, and she intended to keep it.

Even though he had died in the Alien War, Allison honored his request to keep the handkerchief. It didn't matter how much her mother explained that it was not really magic. It didn't matter how much her father explained the rational basis for telling a little girl that a handkerchief could heal her mother.

What mattered was that she had promised.

Her parents eventually acquiesced to her keeping the cloth, and they finally decided to treat the whole episode as if it had never happened. The gentle white fabric was treated as an heirloom, although it spent many hours wrapped around various stuffed animals, spread across little tables underneath toy tea sets, and then finally, wrapped around the neck of a growing young woman. Once she cried for two days when she thought it had been lost, but then it turned up under a bed where it had been dragged by her mother's terrier. From that day forward, she never liked dogs.

Eventually, she didn't consciously remember its source, although it always seemed to be very special to her, and made her feel honored to wear it. She wore it only on very special occasions, like when she was going into battle with teachers and counselors, or later, recruiters and managers and bosses.

It was her lucky scarf.

March, 1994.

Allison Drake stared at her Master's thesis for the seventh straight hour. Why in God's name did she choose History as her major? She was a whiz at Math, especially when she wore her lucky scarf, and could program computers with the best of them. If she had chosen Chemistry, she'd only need to do a little project and she'd be free. But here she was, stuck with a thesis that was refusing to hang together, and a thesis committee who were totally unreasonable.

Okay, she was the arguably world's best living expert on The Redcoat. She was, in fact, the last Canadian civilian to have seen him alive. But that wasn't enough for the members of her committee that wanted something original in her dissertation. Which meant something stupid or unheroic or at least something spicy. Like he was gay or something.

She sighed, and absently played with the white scarf she was using as a belt for her jeans.

The final holder of the Red Coat, Samuel Olivier, lived a public life for over forty years. He was exactly what he was, no more and no less. A hero. At least that was how she remembered it.

And no one ever reported it differently, least of all those who knew him best, like Avatar.

June, 1985.

The coat had already been dismantled and drained. Olivier felt the loss, felt the link leaving his consciousness, and he knew that he would never again be The Redcoat. Even worse, the aliens appeared to care little about him now that the artifact had been destroyed. He was allowed to wander about a small marked area of the laboratory, and merely shushed back into the markings when he wandered out of it. Having already destroyed Samuel Olivier, the Redcoat, they would deal with Samuel Olivier, the Man, later.

The aliens manipulated levers and moved a great ball of amber light into the focus of the draining machine. With a start, Olivier recognized the form at the center of the ball. It was Avatar. He was being held by the ball, then within the ball by the field, then within the field by heavy shackles. Olivier admired the power that Avatar must have. They had been able to hold the Redcoat so much more easily.

The aliens moved some more controls and the ball opened like a flower, leaving Avatar pinned within the field, at the focus of what Olivier thought of as the draining machine. A golden glow assaulted the amber light, and Avatar screamed.

Olivier watched in horror as Avatar's figure seemed to become fuzzy and indistinct, before reasserting itself. Avatar stopped screaming and stared, a penetrating stare that would terrify any human. The starfish seemed not to notice.

Then there was a subsonic crumping sound, and all hell broke loose. The aliens scuttled for all the exits, leaving no one in the laboratory but Avatar and Olivier. Shaking his head, Olivier moved to the controls he thought operated the draining machine.

Unfortunately, they were not human controls. There were levers and flat places, and holes that looked about the right size for tentacles. If he had the coat, it would have been no problem. But once again, he was just a man.

He turned to focus on Avatar. The shackles on his hands and legs looked heavy, but the locking mechanism was obvious. "Looks like I'm going to have to come in after you."

Avatar grimaced, his impassive face moving briefly through a rictus of pain. "No. This energy field is deadly. Ten seconds to get a lethal dose, and thirty would kill you outright. I can hold on for... a few minutes."

The Redcoat grimly surveyed the shackles. "And only twelve seconds to get you free."

"I forbid it!" Avatar commanded with the voice of a god, with thunder from the approaching war providing counterpoint. He groaned. "Wait for reinforcements."

"Without the coat, I'm just a man. But you? Mankind can't lose you." Olivier practiced the motions of unlocking the manacle.

"I forbid it!"

"When you're free, you can forbid all you want, eh?" He breathed deeply, twice. Then he leaped.

The force hit him like a thousand poison needles. His vision went red, then black, then cleared to the golden amber that he knew was probably right. His hands found the locking mechanism for Avatar's right hand. He began the motions, but his left hand suddenly refused to work. Six seconds.

He fumbled the first latch, its motion finally following the prescribed course. Suddenly he doubled over with pain, sickness and an ugly blackness overtaking his brain. Using all his will, he straightened up and moved the next slide on the catch. One final pull and the manacle came free.

Avatar swept him out of the field to land like a sack of potatoes on the floor. The God freed his other hand, then his feet. Finally he dived out of the amber light, and called upon all his strength to smash the golden emitter to pieces. He knelt over Olivier, feeling the man's wounds with the enhanced senses of a god, a bit dulled by fatigue. The man was very far gone, perhaps even gone beyond Avatar's healing powers to save.

"I forbid you to die!"

It was the demand of a God, and Olivier heard it. He opened bleary eyes, watching colored light play out of the god's hands across his body. Waves of nausea crashed over him, and he vomited. When he finished retching, he closed his eyes again. The sounds of fighting were getting closer.

Avatar, exhausted, called upon the powers of strength, the powers of healing, the powers of luck. They came to him, phantoms of their former selves, but they came. He played them upon the man. Healing had never been his strong point, but he would not allow this sacrifice. He forbade it.

Olivier lay back, fighting the blackness moment by moment. He had to tell Avatar. Avatar had to know. Wave after wave of red and black nausea washed over him, pulling him down, pulling him apart. Finally, hoarsely, the words came. "Everybody dies. When you're lucky, you get to choose how."

Breathing hoarsely, Avatar heard the man's request. Understood it. Honored it.

The last things Olivier felt were the tears of a god.

May, 2001.

Allison's eyes misted up, and her voice broke slightly. "Sorry, I... he saved my mother."

George Mutalebi looked down at her wet green eyes, then wiped the tears away with two broad strokes of his huge black hands. He was suddenly serious. "I did not know."

Allison sniffed. "You couldn't have. I don't even think about it anymore... much."

George nodded, then reached across to her and pulled a chocolate bar out of her lucky scarf. He broke it in half and gave half to Allison. She accepted it gracefully and with only a tiny amount of surprise -- George was always doing things like that. He had been a stage musician in a former life.

Allison took a dainty bite, then felt she had to continue. "And it wasn't a mop -- just the bucket." She straightened herself. "My mother used the mop."

George's eyes widened. "Somehow I believe it. I have met the woman."

After a moment's silence, they began laughing with the joy of the living.
 

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