Rose said to Thena, "You're sure you don't have ANY next of kin?" Thena shook her head, looking lost. Rose felt for the little human girl and sighed. "Go ahead and ask. Sunshine already told me she told you most of that day, but I'm sure you have questions only I can answer." Thena blinked and blurted out, "Are you a killer?" Rose said calmly, "Sometimes the world needs a killer, so yes, sometimes. Sunshine pay attention to this learning opportunity. Humans want to reduce complex things to one word descriptions. THIS should be avoided at all costs! No person living or dead is only one word." Rose looked over at Thena and said, "I'm also a mother, commander, soldier, leader, historian and many MANY other things. Soldiers kill when ordered to. I'm rather fond of humans and their antics. In fact, one of my sons is human. I adopted him on the same mission that I killed your parents on. I caught hell for that action,too. Most of my people at that time were of the 'Kill all the humans and let's get on with making this a Cyclops world' movement. They could NOT understand the value of compassion. I would have endangered my family if I hadn't followed orders." Thena asked, "Aren't you gonna apologize?" Rose asked, "For what? I carried out my orders and did what was necessary. I am sorry you have no parents now. For that, I can never make ammends, and that is something..." Sunshine grabbed her mother's hand and yanked, exclaiming, "MOMMY! LOOKIT! It's YOU!" Rose's mate's sister stumbled into view at the end of the hallway and weaved towards them. She staggered to a stop, with Rose putting a hand on her to steady her. Rose exclaimed,"Hawkwing! WHAT are you doing up? You were just put in that body two days ago! You are not healed!" Hawkwing muttered, "Starships crashing and thousands of causalities, base in chaos? I can function. Let me help!" Sunny asked, "WHAT HAPPENED?" Hawkwing said, "Human Liberation Front terrorists with an IED in Apharis. We were getting some of these Mark 30 bodies out of a depot there, and I got blown in half." She looked over at Thena, "Cyclops do not faint or go into shock. I got to enjoy every millisecond of being torn apart and the pain of knowing who else died in the blast." She looked back at Rose, "I always wanted one after seeing you in a mark 30 body, but NOT like this! Damn!" Rose shouted at a passing doctor, "ALDUS! I need a hand. Can you find out about a man named Ensign Dokka Aurora. He was admitted at eight fifty-two this morning." Aldus Panchetta paused and asked, "The twenty-something man without legs from warehouse 32? He's still in surgery, getting installed into a cybernetic body. Since he was already a cyborg, we have his neuron map and genome on file, so it's going very well. He should be out of surgery within two hours." Thena gasped in horror, "LOST HIS LEGS? My big brother lost his legs?" Rose growled, "Narchi WAS right. You Do have a shitty bedside manner, DOCTOR Panchetta!" He went over and patted her on the shoulder. "He'll be fine! Rose saved his brain before it cooked or died from lack of oxygen! She almost got killed rescuing him. She's up for a medal for it." Rose rolled her eye and imagined strangling Aldus. She whispered to Sunny, "I don't want a medal, or wanted Thena to know." Hawkwing said, "Your compassion will get you killed one day, Rose." Rose smiled tightly and looked over at Thena who looked at Rose with conflicting emotions and said, "Cold hearts are for robots and immortals. Without love and compassion, life is without value." Thena nodded. Rose said, "I already have guilt for the actions I've already taken. I didn't need more guilt from the actions I hadn't taken. You had no one else. Sunny valued you. She's good judge of people. That's all I needed to know." Thena came over and hugged Rose, "Thank you." Aldus smiled at her, "Your bedside beat mine all hollow." --TO BE CONTINUED!--