Rising up on an elbow, Macurdy looked at the watch on his bedside stand. The luminous hands told him it was past three, and the officers' mess stopped serving breakfast at 0800. Tiredly he got up and sat on a metal folding chair, to still his mind through meditation.

In a few minutes he was nodding off, and lying back down, fell quickly asleep. To dream of Yuulith-of Vulkan and Varia and dwarves-and Kurqosz. Though he wouldn't remember it when he awoke.

The next morning he flew to Munich with Von Lutzow, and by noon was on a plane to London. Within hours he was on another, to New York, via Reykjavik and Gander.

Beginning to feel eager. He was done with war, he told himself. There was still Japan, but he'd get around that. Something would intervene. Maybe he'd start limping again; he was good at that.

And he was done with gates. He and Mary would make a new life for themselves, in Nehtaka to start with, then elsewhere. The problems weren't that great. If he looked at them right, they weren't problems at all.