Baby

Oddly, her hair seemed to be changing color as it grew in. It looked like spun gold. Hard won pride left a pretty smile on her face. Her days just got better and better.
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    Baby stretched quietly in his picnic basket. He gave up trying to remember the purpose of his mission. He casually wondered about the whereabouts of his offspring. Not that it mattered. His species was fully prepared to face life upon Emergence, as they were born with the memory of their eternal history.
    His life with his new Sister passed quite pleasantly, his species not meant to be alone. He did not understand many of her customs, but not much seemed to be required of him, so he fell into an easy routine. Shockingly, he began to accept the fact that here on this planet, his physiology behaved differently. Luckily, it appeared he no longer ran the risk of expiration.
    Occasionally, his mind turned back to the moment he met his new Sister. He felt a twinge of fear as he realized the life force he called to feed on turned out to be a Sister, a grave mistake as it was always forbidden to heal a human. He should have waited before he sent her his grateful healing. He wondered if he angered the Womb with his carelessness. Unfortunately, he could not stop himself when she touched him; he automatically helped himself to her life force. That in itself was allowed. It was just the bad timing of the state of what Sister called eating , the unexpected changes to his molecular structure brought on by his penetration into this new atmosphere, and the shocking discovery that his tail had fully evolved. Only Elders sported fully evolved tails. Only Elders could heal other organisms. The control over his tail nonexistent, the ability to discriminate, temporarily arrested. He knew it was sinful to heal a Sister of this planet, so he carefully kept his eyes on her, watching for the signs. So far, her changes did not frighten him. If she began to develop signs of an Elder, he knew the Womb might decide to take action. He had no idea what the Womb might do to punish him. After all, it was well-known throughout most universes that the Womb resented the humans because of the defiance their creation represented.
    Addressing his attention to his tail again, he felt the weight of the new membrane, all doubt removed. It was fully mature and functioning. He tested it on the Sister’s trees that were dying and on the tiny buttons she called seeds. Some were already dead. No help for them. But the rest were easy to correct. A gift; he did it happily for Sister; she seemed so distraught over the dead ones. He recognized they involved something to do with her eating. He sure knew how important that was. Warily, he considered what the maturity of his tail portended. Surely, he was on his way to being the first Elder of his species in a millennium; and along with that came, of course, immortality. Did the Womb realize this would happen? Did it have anything to do with his long forgotten mission? Baby stuck his head out of the picnic basket, looked around, climbed out, shuffled his way behind the fruit stand, lay down, stretched out his extremities and started to eat .

Chapter 4
    Wil emerged from his room for the last time. He saw that the sky was gloomy and overcast. He did not do well on days like this. He always felt depressed when the sun went into hiding. He already said goodbye to his pa and ma last night. His two brothers were not interested in his affairs, so goodbyes were not needed. He felt he was leaving very little behind. His pa and ma had income from the large boarding house that had been in his Italian father’s family for generations. Both of his older brothers still lived at home with no signs of wanting to take a bride. He knew his pa and ma would be looked after. He sure would miss his ma. He favored her with his bright clear blue eyes. She was Irish, from a big family. He had hopes that someday he would have a family full of healthy little boys and pretty little girls. He thought of all the time he had wasted on his halfhearted courting of Lexa, the only daughter of an Italian family from a town next to Boontown, where his family lived. More accurately, it really was a case of her courting him. She was a big unfortunate looking girl, very domineering, with a negative habit of constantly belittling him. Let’s face it, she was a beast . With him out of the running, he was sure she would have little chance of another suitor. Why he allowed himself to