#scarsdale

Finally Ratchet looks over, faded but just as stubborn. "Zara, I don't have strength to argue. He needed a doctor, so... They think he'll be ok. You can go."

"I can. But let me help? Please?"

He chuckles, raspy. "Help how?"

"Can't do anything about flu... but this place?" She shudders. "I've got enough. Can share it."

"Feh." And yes, he is tired. "No point right now. Wait."

"We get home, then."

"...." A frown. "Okay."

"A waste, now. He'll be here..." a heavy sigh "...a few more days. At least."

"Oy..." She squirms, knotting herself up in a tangle. "That long? It must be..."

"Must be what?" He sits up and stretches, wincing and one-handed.

"Bad."

"106.8 was bad. No choice. Hadn't kept anything down, not even water, in three days."

She shrinks further inwards, nodding.

He runs a hand over his face; stubble.

She whispers something, too soft to carry past the gust of the ventilator or noise of the hallway.

"Hmm?"

"I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"Not being here. I should have been here. But Earl... she'd taken Earl, and she was...." A shake of her head.

"Someone took Earl from you?" Ratchet scowls. "That momzer. Another momzer. Princess, you're too good for him, he runs off with someone else... Bah. Good riddens! Don't you worry, you want I should introduce you to someone arty-farty like that? I know this one guy...."

"... maybe not so smart but pretty clever hands and he's training in wire-work so...."

"No, no, no... No, Earl is loyal." She shakes her head, miserable.

"I should hope so, with the blue skin and all but..." He sees her misery. "Bubalah, Hirim'll be fine. I been watching out for him all these years, I know."

"She... hurting him would hurt me, vershtay? I'm worried... you, and Mama and Papa... Miriam, she's far away, harder to find..."

"Wait, what? No one's hurting Hirim, he's got the flu. Sometimes we get sick, Bubalah, even -us-."

"I know, Ratchet. I do. I mean... I mean, she could get you next, maybe? Hard to scry here, at least. Too much.. this..."

"Just be careful, please? Maybe I give you a little, so you have strength when you leave, shouldn't be vulnerable in the in-between..."

"She who? What? Zara, I'm tired....."

"A bad person."

"Just one?" Mystified.

"Well, she has friends."

"But it... it.. Ratchet, it's fine. You don't need to worry about it. Hirim needs you."

He sighs heavily. "Hirim needs medicine, fluids, and a good kick in the tuchas. Zara, what are you -talking- about? From the start, please?"

Very softly. "I have sisters. Brothers too, maybe."

"What?" Not sure he heard it right.

"I have siblings."

"He... Miriam's.. Spinning wheel."

"Probably lots of them. "

Ratchet's comprehension is slow to watch, almost like dawn breaking, but it gets darker and not lighter. "Siblings. But Miriam.... they didn't...." He looks sick. "She never said they...."

"Half."

"Oy Gevalt...."

"Half. He... Miriam... " She frowns, struggling. "He p-planted seeds. To be... plants, aye? Agents..."

"All over. For the Tower. And... and Golnaz, she found me... she's the oldest of us, I think."

"Wait, he-who?"

"Him."

"Paler."

"Paler than what?"

"Arawn Paler. The... Him."

"There are other children. At least a dozen."

"Most found... earlier. Turned, or dead."