h
straggle of his eyebrows. That had been the one area where the plastic
surgeons had been unable to restore living hair and skin---the forehead
and cranial cap. The new stuff looked real enough, but felt,
especially the hair, coarse and unnatural.

Flashing back, he saw in memory the thick gut of blue flame rush toward
him as the ship tore apart---closing his eyes in sudden, brittle shock,
striking the flames from his forehead with wild slaps of his hands.....
Not that such memories retained much terror for his waking mind. It
was in sleep, in the subconscious worlds beyond his control, that such
images were deadly.

He remembered also the first grim reawakening, the grotesque nightmare
of ruinous skin and flesh before the surgeons had begun their work.
The days of fever, the endless crises. He had not, like Prince Andrei
near death, felt a comforting presence calling his soul from this
life..... Though now at these memories he felt it shrink back, yet
again, from human existence. And seek escape in his work.

"And the desire to strike back, too soon, that the younger commanders
are always advocating. Urging attacks that can only end in ruin.....
But the impulse. Haven't I felt it? Lying there in that bed."

"The helpless, trapped feeling. . .the rage that rises inside you,
tearing through your fatigue. And you're just so tired. . .so worn out
physically. . . that some desperate instinct takes over, telling you to
attack. Half crazy from the constant pounding. So that you want. .
.not even want. . .that you're forced into this thing. Like your will
is being pushed out through the top of your skull. Something. And
saying no to that urge. . .almost sexual . . .seems so unfair, and
beyond the strength of any man.

"But it's wrong, an irretrievable mistake, and you know it. A fatal
error that you're just not allowed in that situation.

"Internal warfare. . .and its relation to....." At last the weariness
of true sleep was coming over him. But one more thought remained
unspoken.

"And the hardest thing, unlike before. It's not just my own life
that's at stake, but those of all my men..... My men. How did I ever
get into all of this? This power and responsibility. I never wanted
it. Just my own piece of mind..... Aahh."

Tomorrow was another day. Maybe in the morning things would look
brighter. Morning. How meaningless the pilgrimage from Earth had made
that word. There would be no d