Roberts stared at his clothing in his dresser. He knew he should get dressed, he was standing in front of his dresser with only a towel wrapped around his waist, but for some reason he couldn't seem to focus this thoughts. Roberts stared at his underwear, socks, and t-shirts. They were all folded, and it looked weird to him. They should have been rolled, six inches wide. It looked cluttered, strange to Roberts.

The tighty-whitey underwear was particularly strange to him. Like something a child would wear, not something that he personally owned.

Still feeling slightly off center, Roberts went over to the suitcase, heaving it up with one hand, wincing slightly as pain from the surgical wounds flared, and set it on top of his dresser. He popped it with one hand, then stared inside.

That was his underwear and T-shirts. Patch had lent him a couple of T-shirts and flannel shirts, some jeans that were brand new but apparently Patch had outgrown his first year in the unit.

Roberts got out a T-shirt, noticing that the logo on the front was a popular cartoon from a few years ago, his boxers, and a pair of button fly jeans.

Dressing one handed was tough, but at least Roberts could button his pants with his right hand. He was glad his shoulder hadn't taken any damage. He'd seen Patch wake up unable to use his right arm at all, his fingers swollen and purple. It was hard to get the T-shirt on without pulling at the gauze pads covering his chest and the upper right side of his back, but he managed it by moving slowly.

When he was done he looked in the mirror. He had dark circles under his eyes, his face sunken and pallid. The OD green sling holding his arm looked odd. His neck was still discolored from iodine, even though he'd showered a few minutes ago.

I look like Hell, Roberts thought to himself. I'd look a lot worse if Sergeant Cromwell hadn't saved my worthless ass.

Roberts shuddered, pushing away the memories of being half-conscious while Cromwell worked on him to keep him from bleeding out.

After everything I said to her, after I pushed her from behind like a little bitch, and she still saved my worthless ass, Roberts thought.

He closed the suitcase, snapping the catches shut.

At least I didn't leave Taggart behind and run away. I should have held position, kept them pinned longer so they didn't try to push us into the Gap, he thought.

Again he heard the echo of rifle fire and the M-60 LMG in the back of his mind.

Roberts sat down, his knees shaking as he remembered what had happened at the railhead and afterwards.

"It's simple, Roberts. If you think we've been overrun, press the 1 key eight times, then hold down enter and pound sign," Patch said, kneeling next to where Roberts was propped up against the side of the bed of the five-ton. "It won't hurt. You won't feel a thing. I promise."

Roberts pressed the heel of his hand between his brows, making a slight whining noise in his throat at the memory.

A light rap on his bedroom door made him look up.

"Jamie, are you all right, son?" His father asked.

"Yeah," Roberts said, standing up, wiping his face with his shirt. He moved over to the door and opened it. His father stood on the other side, his face worried.

"Just wondering, son," David Roberts said. He looked his son over. "New t-shirt?"

"My room-mate gave it to me. He outgrew it," Roberts admitted.

"Huh," David said, then motioned to his son. "Want to watch TV with me?"

Roberts shook his head. "It took a lot out of me to shower and get dressed, dad. I'm gonna lay on my bed for a little while," Roberts started to turn away from his father.

"Son," David Roberts took a chance and grabbed his son's arm. Roberts turned and looked at his father, feeling sweat bead on his back.

He knows his son is a coward, Roberts thought to himself.

"Don't hide in your room. Please, son. At least come out in the front room and watch TV," David implored his son.

"The plane ride really took it out of me, dad. I'm really tired and need to take my medication," Roberts said.

"I'll get you something to drink. You want a Pepsi?" David asked.

"Please," Roberts said. He couldn't handle the way his father was looking at him, like Roberts had failed his father somehow.

You won a Bronze Star for Valor. I saved myself instead of protecting a pregnant woman, Roberts thought.

"I'll be right back, son," David said, smiling.

God, the boy looks like hell. I wish he'd talk about what was wrong. About what happened. It's peacetime and he still earned a Purple Heart, which is only given for being wounded by enemy fire. What happened to you, Jamie? David Roberts wondered as he headed into the kitchen.

Roberts sighed, heading over to his bed. He set the pillows to cushion him and leaned back, trying not to put too much pressure on the wound in the middle of shattered and then surgically repaired shoulderblade.

After a few minutes his dad came in, carrying a glass of soda with ice in it. David handed it to his son, watching as his son tossed back some pills, then took the glass to wash the pills down with soda.

"Just painkillers and antibiotics," Roberts told his father. He put the glass between his thighs.

"How bad is the, ahem, crash injury?" David asked his son.

Roberts shook his head. "They had to reassemble my shoulder-blade, put fixators in my ribs and collarbone, fix my lung."

David Roberts nodded, mentally drawing a line between his son's shoulderblade and collarbone. His son had to have been bent forward or shot from below.

Vehicle wreck my ass, David thought to himself. His son wasn't limping, no other injuries, just his chest on the right side.

"Your mother let some people from church know you're back," David said. "She went to pray for you."

"Oh," Roberts said, looking at the soda.

"I told her I'd stay here in case you needed anything," David said.

The awkward silence stretched out.

David had opened his mouth to ask his son what really happened when the sound of the doorbell shattered the silence.

"I'll get it," David said, standing up.

"All right," Roberts said, staring down at his drink.

His father left the room and Roberts sighed. He wanted to tell his father, but he'd been told flat out that the details around Operation Fat Cricket were classified and considered National Security as well as being under something called "Keyword Omaha" that made it even more secret.

Roberts had asked Patch about that part during the drive to the airport. Patch had explained that Omaha was one of the oldest security keywords, and fell under old protocols from World War 2 and the Trinity Project, and was only used for atomic and nuclear devices. Apparently Omaha operations were often restricted from Presidential authority and only handled by the Department of Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

The explanation had gone over Roberts head for a lot of it, but he'd gotten the gist.

It's just something we have to live with, Roberts. Nobody will know what he did here, and if people like me ever have to actually do their job, there won't be anyone left to care about what we did.

Patch's voice.

"He's in here," His father was saying when the memory suddenly shattered.

It was strange. He had been able to smell the inside of the Nova that Patch had driven, hear the hiss of rain under the tires, the squeak the right windshield wiper had made, almost like he was still there, still in the car with Patch as the big NCO drove him to the airport.

Did I actually die on those railroad tracks? Am I dying in the back of the Gypsy Wagon right now? Roberts wondered.

"Be careful, he got hurt in a vehicle wreck," his father was saying. "He just got back today and had to take his painkillers."

"Oh my God," the visitor said.

Roberts recognized that voice right off. Carol Adams, his ex-girlfriend.

To Roberts surprised anger and hatred welled up inside of him so much he could taste the bitter, sour taste of it.

His father rapped on the wall next to his door. "Jamie, Carol is here."

Roberts looked up as the young woman entered the room. She looked exactly the same to Roberts's eyes. Teased blonde hair in soft curls that went down her back, wide blue eyes set off by her eye shadow, pouty lips with pink lipstick. She was wearing stone washed jeans that were pre-ripped and a Stryper - To Hell With the Devil T-shirt. On her feet were Velcro closure Nike running shoes with striped socks halfway up her shins.

Roberts blinked, looking at her.

She looked... different somehow. Almost like he remembered her, but... different.

Roberts wasn't sure how, but she looked weird. Like she was missing something.

"I'll leave you two alone," David said.

"OK," Roberts said softly.

"Let me know if you need anything, son," David said.

"OK."

David moved away, heading toward the frontroom. His son had it bad. The 1,000 Yard Stare. The long silences. The way he had moved into the corner, his back against the headboard and wall at the same time. The way he stared at his lap, at nothing, or, when he looked at his father, something that only he could see.

It's peacetime. What the Hell did my son get into? David wondered. He walked to the phone, picking it and keeping his thumb on the button so it didn't open the line. He headed out to the garage, the extra-long cord behind him. When he got to the garage he stared at the phone.

I shouldn't do this. I have no right to intrude on his life, but I want to know what happened to my son. If anyone knows, if anyone can find out, he can, David Roberts thought. Christ, I haven't seen him since the reunion a few years ago.

David Roberts, formerly Sergeant Roberts, 11B (Infantryman), 5th Special Forces Group; checked the number on the card in his wallet. The card had been given to him during the reunion, in case he had any problems with the Department of Veteran's Affairs finding his records since black bag operations in Vietnam weren't very well documented. More than a few veterans had ran into problems getting the VA to admit to what had happened in Vietnam. It was getting better than it had been in the 1970's, but problems still cropped up.

Problems that David was worried his son would run into.

David hoped that Carol could get Jamie to talk.

"Your dad said you got hurt, Jamie," Carol said, sitting down carefully on the bed.

"I was in a vehicle wreck. Pickup truck rolled over," Roberts said. To his surprise, the lie was easier to say. Maybe it was because he'd said it several time, maybe it was because he was telling Carol that lie. He didn't bother looking at her, just stared at the glass in his lap. The ice filled up the last 5th of the glass, the dark brown cola fizzing with tiny bubbles.

"How bad did you get hurt, Jamie?" Carol asked.

"I had to have surgery a couple times and spent two weeks in the hospital," Roberts said. He watched the tinny fizzy bubbles popping on the surface of the soda. "Why are you here?"

"Your mom said you were home and I thought you'd like to see me," Carol told him. "We haven't seen each other since you left for Basic Training, remember?"

Roberts looked up at her. "Yeah, I remember."

Carol flushed slightly. "Jamie, come on. Don't be like that."

Roberts stared at her, looking into her eyes. It suddenly struck him that Carol's eyes looked strange. Empty, like there wasn't anything there. Nothing like Groom's humor that made her eyes sparkle, Sawmoth's faint cynicism that darkened her blue eyes, no hint of the faint pain hidden in Cromwell's purple eyes, no wariness like in Stokes's brown eyes, no shining of compassion and care like in Taggart's expressive eyes. Carol's blue eyes were clear, empty of anything that Roberts could understand.

Carol suddenly drew back, her face going pale. "Jamie, what's wrong?"

Roberts looked back down at his drink. "Nothing. Just... tired, I guess."

"Why didn't you write me, Jamie?" Carol asked him.

Roberts stared at the fizzing bubbles. "There wasn't a reason to."

"Come on, Jamie," Carol sighed. "I mean, I was afraid you were going to be like this, Jamie. I came here to try to make you feel better, and here you are trying to make me feel guilty."

"Didn't mean to," Roberts said. "Sorry."

Look, man. If you have problems, call me, all right? I'll leave instructions to have your call transferred out to Atlas if I'm not at the barracks. Just remember the time difference, all right? You might run into problems that you didn't think would happen, but things are different now, man, Patch's growling voice surged up.

"Can we just let bygones be bygones, Jamie? Start over, maybe?" Carol asked, reaching out and rubbing Roberts's leg.

Roberts had a sudden urge to shove her off the bed. Her touch felt... weird. Alien. Like it was going to start leaving slime on his jeans, like it was leaving some kind of invisible grease on his leg.

"Sure," Roberts said, still staring down. He yawned suddenly, feeling tired.

"Tired, Jamie?" Carol asked, still rubbing his leg. It felt weird.

"Yeah," Roberts said, nodding. He stared at her hand. The nails were painted pink, the polish smooth and perfect. The nails perfectly curved. Her hands were pink, no scratches, no scars, no bruises. They were soft, plump looking in a strange way.

"We're going to start over, right, Jamie?" Carol said.

"Yeah," Roberts said. Her wrist was thin, a thin bracelet made of silvery metal on it. The tendons didn't stand out on her hand, the muscles of the forearm connecting to her wrist weren't bulging out.

She looked strange to Roberts.

"OK. I'm glad we can start over," Carol gushed, standing up.

Roberts was just glad she stopped touching him but didn't know why.

"Can you look at me, Jamie?" Carol said. When Roberts looked up she bent down, putting one soft hand on his cheek, and kissed him slowly. Roberts stared at her face, looking at her closed eyes. He noticed that her makeup was clumped on a few of her eyelashes.

When Carol broke the kiss she smiled down at him.

"I'm glad we started over. I'll come over later tonight, after you've had a nap," Carol smiled.

"OK," Roberts said, looking back down.

I wish I was home. Patch is probably out at the club or reading field manuals and drinking Wild Turkey.

Roberts suddenly realized he missed the grouchy, limping, one-eyed bastard.

"OK. See you tonight, Jamie," Carol said. She turned off the light. "Sleep well."

Humming to herself, feeling satisfied, she almost skipped to her car. It felt good to have a boyfriend again.

I made a mistake breaking up with him, She thought to herself. He went to Germany. It's nice that he's back, and that he wants to start over.

She got in her little car, a little Chevette her father had bought her. She fired it up, the radio blaring, and drove away, already planning her evening with Roberts.

In the garage, David Roberts carefully put in the number, then held the phone to his ear. It rang twice before it was answered by a young woman.

"Stillwater residence, Tabitha speaking. How can I help you?" The young woman asked.