suppose that goes with the territory. Anyway, you'll meet them later.'
'Oh, good,' said Owen. 'Two more homicidal women in my life. Just what I needed.'
'What was that?' said Mother Beatrice. 'Don't mumble, sir Deathstalker. It's a very annoying habit. Now then, we seem to be in a quiet phase at the moment, so why don't you all take a walk through our little community? It'll be good for their morale, and give you some idea of the kind of people you'll be fighting alongside. Don't be nervous of them. Bits of them won't fall off if you speak too loudly, and you can't catch it just by shaking hands. They're just people. I suggest splitting up into ones or twos; you'll be less… intimidating that way. It's not every day we get living legends walking among us. Be back here in an hour, and there'll be a hot meal ready. Now, be off with you. I have my rounds to make in the infirmary.'
She gently but firmly shooed them all out of the common room, and shut the door behind them. Owen shook his head slowly.
'So that's Saint Bea. I was expecting one of the nuns who taught me as a child. All loud voices and stiff necks and a devil with the steel ruler.'
'They probably went on to become Sisters of Glory,' said Hazel.
'Wouldn't surprise me at all. Now pay attention, people: forget what she said, no one goes off on their own. We don't know enough about the situation here. I don't think Saint Bea would necessarily lie to us, but there could be all kinds of undercurrents here she knows nothing about. So, Hazel and Moon, you come with me. Bonnie and Midnight, stick close together and watch your backs. We'll meet here in an hour.'
'He just loves being in charge,' said Hazel to Bonnie and Midnight, and they nodded knowingly.
'Let's get out of here before he starts making one of his speeches,' said Midnight, and she and Bonnie went off to meet some lepers.
Owen looked haughtily at Hazel. 'I have no idea what you were talking about.'
Hazel grinned at Moon. 'The trouble is, he probably doesn't. Lead the way, sir Deathstalker, oh savior of Humanity.'
Owen sniffed loudly and set off. Hazel followed, grinning, and a rather mystified Moon brought up the rear.
Bonnie Bedlam freaked the lepers out. She loved sweeping back her clothes to flash people, and show off her many piercings and body modifications, and soon a small but fascinated crowd had formed around her. After a while Bonnie and some of the braver lepers began comparing mutilations and trying to one-up and gross each other out. There were shrieks and mock shocked gasps, and soon they were chatting away as though they'd known each other for years. The idea that someone would voluntarily cut and pierce and modify their own flesh fascinated the colonists. That Bonnie took pride in her differences from the norm just blew them away. It wasn't long before she had fervent disciples sitting at her feet, working out how to start some piercings of their own.
Midnight Blue stood quietly behind Bonnie, trying hard to be shocked in the face of the lepers' obvious enthusiasm. It had never occurred to them that their disfigurements didn't have to be ugly. The lepers revealed more and more of themselves as they grew more comfortable in Bonnie's presence. Midnight was horrified at what the disease had done to some of its victims, but fought to keep it out of her face. Missing fingers and toes were common, and many had eaten-away noses and ears. It was always the extremities that went first. Many had sores and open wounds that would not heal, sometimes bandaged, sometimes not. There were drugs that helped slow the symptoms, but there'd been no deliveries for some time. The Empire needed all its cargo ships for the war, and even a Saint's pleas had to take second place to the military.
Abandoned yet again, the lepers refused to give in. They watched themselves and watched each other, and tried to live as normal a life as possible as they fought to establish a self-sufficient colony. Children were being born for the first time, most of them free of the disease as yet. And for the first time there was hope. For the future, if not for themselves.
When things got too bad, there was the Mission infirmary. Not so much a hospital as a resting place before the end, when they were no longer capable of caring for themselves. Mother Superior Beatrice ran the infirmary. The lepers couldn't say enough about her. She gave them hope and faith, and a reason to live when it would have been so easy to just lie down and die. The lepers worshiped her, much to her discomfort. Among themselves they had declared her the patron Saint of lepers.
Eventually Bonnie moved on, word of her appearance moving ahead of her so that there were always people waiting to meet her. Many of the lepers were pathetically grateful that anyone had come to fight beside them. They'd been told they were the lowest of the low for so long that many had come to believe it. Bonnie blew that notion away on a cloud of raucous laughter. Midnight began adding the occasional dry comment, just to provide a balance, and found a ready audience for her sharp wit. It had been a long time since the lepers had had anything to laugh at. Bonnie and Midnight moved on through the small village of low buildings, smiling and chatting and making themselves known, until finally they had to beg for a little time for themselves. The lepers withdrew to a respectful distance, while Bonnie and Midnight pulled up their hoods and lowered their voices so they could talk privately.
'Oh, Jesus,' said Midnight softly. 'The poor bastards. How can you keep smiling like that? They're dying and they know it and they haven't given up. I think of the kind of guts that takes, and I feel like nothing in comparison.'
'I smile and laugh to make them laugh, because the last thing they need is some outsider weeping buckets over them.'
'They break my heart. It's so… unfair. These people had lives, futures, dreams… they had friends and families and loved ones. And now they have nothing but the disease that's killing them. And they still believe in God. If I were in their place, I'd curse Her name every day. They put me to shame.'
'If you so much as sniffle, I'll slap you a good one,' said Bonnie fiercely. 'We have to be strong, for them.'
'Strength through piercing,' said Midnight. 'A novel approach to psychotherapy.'
'Whatever works. Their bodies have ruled their lives for so long, it's only fair they should get back some control over their flesh.'
'They're strong people,' said the warrior woman. 'They'll make good fighters when the Hadenmen come again.'
'Of course they will. But can we defend this place indefinitely?'
Midnight shrugged. 'Depends on how many Hadenmen we have to fight off. Which in turn depends on how badly the Hadenmen want this planet. The Mission's walls are sturdy, the attackers have to come to us across an open clearing, and apparently we don't have to worry about large-scale weaponry. And there's the Sisters of Glory that Hazel was so impressed by. The situation could be a lot worse. Anyway, the question's redundant. We'll hold out because we have to. Because there's nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, no starship to get us off-planet.'
'And no reinforcements,' said Bonnie. 'There's just us.'
'We don't stand a chance, do we?' said Midnight Blue. 'Not a hope in hell,' said Bonnie Bedlam.
At first Owen and Hazel had to walk on either side of Moon, with their hands hovering over their weapons, because once the lepers recognized a Hadenman, they either ran or tried to attack him. The atmosphere got very bad very quick, until Owen identified himself, and just like that the mood changed. People came running from all over to meet the legendary Deathstalker, and once he'd vouched for the Hadenman, things calmed down a lot. Everyone wanted to meet the great hero of the rebellion, and he warmed in the glow of appreciation, and was soon at his most charming and gracious. Hazel smiled determinedly in his shadow, and did her best to be polite. Owen kept his smile steady as he clasped hands that weren't always complete, and had a kind word for everyone. No one wanted to get close enough to Hazel to shake her hand. Soon the crowd around them had got so dense no one had room to move anymore, so Owen led the way to the compound before the main gate, and the crowd sat facing him in neat rows, filling the great open space.
Owen had never felt at ease in front of large audiences, but the hero worship was unnerving him even more, so he overcame his natural tendency for speech making and opted for a questions-and-answers session. After a little prompting, people began introducing themselves and asking questions, most of them so familiar to Owen that he could have answered them in his sleep. Soon the lepers became just another audience to him, a little better
