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    <section>It was always survival that was the most important. Our culture might be lost to history, our people might be scattered, but as long as we survived, as long as any of us survived to continue the fight: that was the important thing. The necessary thing. Some of us had to survive to continue the fight.</section>


    <section>-Log Fragment A-011</section>


    <section>Courtesy of the Alliance Department of History</section>


    <section>----------------------------------------------------------------</section>


    Maggie woke late in the afternoon to a throbbing pain that radiated up through her arm, and a nagging need to use the bathroom. But the memory of her dreams made her reluctant to leave her cozy nest on the couch. They were a blur of wide, cold crystal hallways and flashing emergency lights. With a mental grumble, she pushed the need to pee to the back of her mind, listening instead to the soft murmur of her aunt’s voice in the kitchen.


    She tried to make out what her aunt was saying, snuggling deeper beneath the covers in defiance of her bladder.


    “-looks like what they did to you.” She barely made out the words, muffled by the kitchen door. “-Doc Zimmerman said-”


    Her bladder grew more insistent, and Maggie let out an incoherent grumble. There was no way around it, she was going to have to abandon the comfort of the couch to deal with it. Reluctantly, she pushed off the blankets, pillows spilling across the carpeted floor as she climbed off the couch and headed to the bathroom. She paused outside the bathroom, listening to her aunt’s voice through the kitchen door.


    “-a human, and how would they find us? Let alone Maggie!”


    Maggie frowned and looked at the door. What was her aunt talking about? She wanted to listen further, but the need to pee was becoming more urgent now that she was out of her cozy cocoon. She headed into the bathroom, closing the door behind her.


    By the time she came back out, whatever mysterious conversation Aunt Electra had been having was done, and she had moved on to more mundane topics. “-left Becky in charge of the shop. We’ll shorten the open hours for a few days but that won’t hurt business much.”


    Maggie pushed open the door to the cheery little kitchen, warm evening light flowing through the window over the sink. Crystals dangled between cheerful yellow curtains, catching the light and flinging it across the ceiling in tiny rainbows. She shuffled over to the fridge in her bright green furry slippers, retrieving a soda before dropping into one of the squeaky old wooden chairs at the kitchen table. “Morning Aunt Electra.”


    The older woman looked up and laughed, shifting the old landline phone to her other hand. “More like evening. Did you want to talk to your mother? We were just finishing up.”


    “Yeah, I’ll talk to her.” Maggie perked up a bit. It had been a few days since she had talked to her mother, and it would be a nice pick-me-up to hear how she was doing out at her fancy country rehab center. Aunt Electra handed the phone over. She took a moment to pull a pill bottle and a tube of ointment from a paper bag on the table, shaking out a couple of pills for Maggie.


    “Take these, it will help with the pain. We’ll change your bandages after dinner. How’s pizza sound?” Aunt Electra picked up her cell phone and pulled up the local delivery app. Maggie took the landline phone, nestling it between her head and shoulder as she fumbled to open the can of soda without jarring her hand.


    “That sounds great Aunt Electra! Extra cheese and garlic sauce please.”


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    Aunt Electra flashed her a smile. “Of course dear, I’m not a barbarian.”


    Maggie grinned as she managed to get the can of soda open, air hissing out with the sweet promise of caffeine and sugar. “Hi Mom, how’s things at the resort?”


    Familiar laughter filled her ears, the faint accent a comfort after last night’s drama. “Maggie-my-dove! It’s lovely of course. They’re havin’ me do water therapy for my legs. But I’m more interested in your adventures. Electra told me what she knew. Are you alright? How are you feeling?”


    Maggie had never quite been able to place the accent but assumed it was Irish or Scottish. That was similar to what they sounded like on TV at least. She slouched in her chair with a smile and popped the pain pills into her mouth, chasing them down her throat with the pleasant tingle of soda. “My hand and arm hurt, and I’m hungry. But otherwise, I’m fine. Is the water therapy helping any?”


    “Oh heavens if I know. The legs still feel about as useless as ever but the water is nice, so I won’t be tellin’ them to stop. Now don’t go tryin’ to change the subject, tell me what happened!”


    Aunt Electra gave Maggie a look of disapproval at her slouching. “I ordered us some pizza, it should arrive in about ten to fifteen minutes. Sit up straight.”


    “Thanks, Aunt Electra.” Maggie mouthed and reluctantly sat up straight in her chair. She should have known better than to slouch at the kitchen table. She looked down at her hand, flexing her fingers. “It wasn’t much of an adventure, Mom. Just some drunk that left something at the laundromat and wanted it back. I would have just given it to him if he didn’t act like a crazy person!”


    “But he did, and you pepper sprayed him. Then you did the smart thing and ran. Good girl. Although you know better than to take things from the laundromat to begin with. What in the world did he leave that was so important to him anyway? I doubt that it was just loose change!” Her mother tried to sound casual, but there was real interest in her voice.


    Maggie thought back to the snippets of conversation she had heard from her Aunt before she went into the bathroom. What had they been talking about? Who would be looking for them? And why would her aunt think the man in the alley had anything to do with them?


    “Just some weird paperweight thing, or worry stone, whatever. It was pretty and looked like something they’d sell at a planetarium. But I doubt it was expensive. The weirdest thing about it is that it exploded. I guess it must have had a battery or something in it because it lit up too. It was pretty... shame it exploded.”


    “And burned you pretty good from what I hear.” The worry was thick in her mother’s voice now, and Maggie could imagine her tapping her fingers. “Well, I’m glad you’re alright. But if you see that man again you turn and run, got that?”


    “Yes, Mom.” It wasn’t like she would hang around and talk to the guy! Not unless it was a nice brightly lit area with lots of people. Maybe with Ross or Chance nearby. Or Ross and Chance.


    “Good girl. Now, why don’t you put your auntie on so I can say goodbye? It’s almost dinner time for both of us. Speaking of which, you two best not be eating nothing but pizza while I’m gone!”


    “We aren’t!” Maggie smiled, deciding not to ask what they had been talking about for now. She could ask Aunt Electra later, but she didn’t want to spoil the short chat with her mother. “Love you, Mom, have a good dinner.”


    ‘Love you too, my dove. Put your auntie on.”


    Maggie handed the phone back to Aunt Electra. The pain pills had started to take effect, and the pain in her hand dulled enough that she could ignore it. As she stood up, she also noticed that it made her a bit light-headed, the room spinning around her at a dizzying speed. She stood still for a moment under Aunt Electra’s watchful eyes until the room steadied. Then she gave her a thumbs up and headed back to the living room. “I’m fine.”


    “Of course dear. Go sit down for a little bit, I’ll be right in.”


    Just then a gentle chime rang through the house. Had it been fifteen minutes already? “I’ll get it!”


    Electra watched her go, calling after her. “It’s already paid for, and I already tipped. There should be three boxes.” As the kitchen door swung closed, Maggie could hear her aunt’s affronted voice. “No, I am not just feeding her pizza all the time! The night before last we had Chinese.”


    Maggie grinned and stifled a laugh as she headed to the door. Aunt Electra was many things: a good baker, an excellent coffee slinger, and a successful entrepreneur. But a good cook she was not. So when Maggie’s mother wasn’t around, they tended to eat out a lot or survive off frozen pizzas and TV dinners. Although Maggie could make some great scrambled eggs herself.


    Maggie pulled open the front door, the smell of pizza wafting in on the crisp fall air. But it wasn’t Sean standing there with the delicious garlic and cheese goodness.


    It was the tall man from last night, his face creased with regret.


    She barely had time to register the weird little gun in his hand before her vision was filled with blue light, and she fell into the velvety darkness of sleep.


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