May 17, 1987*

Had a talk with Lucky today. Not sure if we'll ever understand one another completely, but it looks as if we're both a little more willing to try these days. I was doing something in the kitchen and she made a crack about my height, which for once I dealt with somewhat gracefully: "I don't need to be able to reach the shelf, silly. Want me to kick your ass at pool and prove it?" I could probably use the practice anyway.
    "Since when have you ever 'kicked my ass' at pool?" she inquired with a lifted eyebrow. "I won the only game we ever played, if you recall."
    "We'll have to have one when I get back from vacation."
    "Vacation?"
    It was the first I'd mentioned to anyone my plans to get away for a while, and something of a slip, as I'd been thinking about a more formal announcement. "Uh, yeah. I'm going away for a couple of weeks, if no emergencies crop up."
    She nodded. "I can understand the urge. I was thinking of taking some time off myself. Mind if I smoke?"
    "It's your house, too." I even managed not to wince, though the smoke does give me a headache.
    "Yeah, well. Just being polite. Didn't know I was capable of it, did ya?" she grinned.
    "I know you can be polite when you want to." My tone was mildly serious, letting her know I knew what was behind the grin, that preemptive attempt to disarm her opponent. She does it a lot. It seems funny now to remember my first impressions of her, as someone entirely confident and self-enclosed. Lucky responded with a thoughtful glance at the floor while she lit her cigarette.
    "Hm. That reminds me. I wanted to talk with you about some things. Do you have some time?"
    "Yes." Wondering what it could be this time.
    She blew smoke nonchalantly to prove that she wouldn't have cared one way or the other. "Cool. Do you want to talk here, or is there someplace you'd like to go—say for coffee or something?"
    "Dawn's back, we should have some decent coffee around. What do you want to talk about?" I headed for the cupboard, saw Lucky glance out the window before she parked a hip on the table and took another drag, cleared her throat.
    "Um. I'm sorry I didn't lend you a hand the other night—after you were rescued. You looked like you wanted to be alone." She blew more smoke.
    Gee, what could have given her that idea? I was somewhat grateful that she had perceived the need and left me the time. "That's all right. I really just needed a few minutes by myself to get myself back together." I retrieved the can of coffee from the top shelf, where my taller teammates tend to set it.
    "I guess it was pretty rough." Her glance was direct and concerned.
    My turn to play nonchalant, given that every morning since then I've woken up with a start, not sure where I am. "Not something I ever want to do again, leave it at that. In a weird way, I kind of wish I'd at least gotten a chance to look around the place before it blew up, though," I admitted. "Get a better idea what they were up to." Maybe it's morbid, or maybe it's just normal curiosity about the place I came from, I don't know. Lucky cringed and shot me a quick look.
    "You really want to know?"
    "Well, I saw what left of some of them," I pointed out in a reasonable tone, guessing what had made her so uncomfortable—very little does. "When we were doing the cleanup. Not that there was much left. I don't know, I just wanted to see it all. Make it real, sort of?" I want to be able to line reality up with my memories somewhere, and it doesn't look as if that's going to happen. It's all gone.
    Lucky paced for a couple moments, pulled up a chair and sat down like she'd all the sudden run out of steam. "'Them'? You saw the... um... the... Hell. I don't know what to call them."
    "Mistakes," I suggested evenly. "I don't envy the Poughkeepsie coroner's staff." Some of the bodies I'd seen pulled from the wreckage had only the faintest evidence of a human origin. There but for the grace of God, as the saying goes. No way of knowing if any of those poor creatures were born as a result of the Tempest Scenario.
    "They're not mistakes. They were... they were human, Needle. At least as human as Scott, or you, or even me." Her voice betrayed a trace of pain, and an edge when she mentioned herself. She took another drag and went on, "It was mostly a scientific installation. There was an upper floor that I—er—'came through' on my way in from the roof. There were vats, I guess that's what you'd call them, of partially formed clones floating in a greenish oily liquid. I broke one of the vats on my way down. There were lots of men—no women," she mentioned with a trace of contempt, "in white lab coats. I assume they were scientists. And some burly looking guards who were obviously chemically enhanced by the scent I detected coming off of them. It didn't take them long to come after me, of course. Rather than fight my way through them I went through the floor into the chamber where they kept the mutated clones." She stopped there and looked at me again. "Are you sure you want to hear this?"

Editor's Note: This segment is based on an in-character e-mail conversation another player and I had after the end of "Family Reunion."

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