Free Citation Series 1: Naero's War: The Annexation War by Mason Elliott

hand gently on the normal portion of his scorched left arm.
    He started and woke up if she tried to slip away.
    Naero stayed with him for two hours before another crew from The Hippolyta took her place, and Kelment’s arm.
    F rom what the other doctors said, the more people who could be around them to be supportive, the better and faster the healing process would go. Including the emotional component.
    From the outset, t hese wounded wanted desperately to get back to being their former selves. To escape from their nightmare.
    Many like Mariisha and Kelment elected not to allow family, friends, or loved ones to visit or see them, until they would be more or less completely restored and healed.
    For them it was , in fact, better if strangers sat with them. It was better to be around someone who hadn’t known them before.
    They wanted to spare their family and friends the same pain and terror that they themselves were going through.
    Naero still marveled at the modern, advanced medicine of their time.
    How terrible it must have been, before people had possessed advanced regeneration and restoration techniques. Medical procedures that were now nearly taken for granted, by those who did not need them.
    Naero finally went back to her flagship after each visit–exhausted–but usually she slept fitfully.
    She struggled not to blame herself .
    The war was at fault, not the people conducting and fighting it.
    And their war still just both just and necessary.
    Each crew member took his or her own chances.
    Any of them could die .
    Any of them could be wounded .
    At any moment , including Naero herself.
    Naero ignored her own slight wounds and superficial burns. They were alrea dy healing. In a few days or weeks, they would be completely erased.
    Nothing like what Mariisha and Kelment were going through.
    But s he or anyone fighting the war could still join them at any time–or the dead, for that matter.
    That was what everyone needed to understand. Not dwell on or obsess about it, but simply rationalize it. Perhaps each person did so in their own way, and the path of denial simply worked best. 
    Naero returned to The Columbia each day for the majority of the next few days.
    Sometimes, if the hospital ship was particularly overloaded, Zhen would hunt her down and put her to work .
    “Get to it, N. You’ve had lots of medtek training. We need every pair of hands today.”
    In those situations, Naero pitched in directly, rank or no rank .
    If she was off duty, she could do whatever she wanted to with her time , just like any one else.
    Strangely enough, it was half-Yattai empath Shalaen who could not handle being around so many wounded all at once. She visited the hospital ship–only once. Then she balked and departed quickly, and never came there again.
    Being around that many people in pai n was extremely difficult for an empath.
    The way Shalaen explained it to Naero–with haunted eyes–not being able to heal like her fully-Yattai mother could, it frustrated and tormented Shalaen greatly. It left her helpless before the suffering and torment of so many others, gathered together in one place.
    When Shalaen could feel everything so many felt at once, and yet she could do nothing to help them, or ease their suffering.
    For all of her empathic powers and Cosmic abilities, there were some things that remained beyond Shalaen’s amazing abilities, and that lack served only to torment her beyond what she could bear.
    After Naero’s latest visit to The Columbia to help the wounded, she finally understood why Admiral Kinmal insisted that she should go among them at such length.
    Casualty numbers would have a much greater and poignant meaning to her now.
    And despite their heavy losses, at least the wounded still had a chance to recover and take up their lives again, whatever they endured .
    Life remained sweet to all of them, and hope endured, as long as there was life and a chance at life.
    But never for the dead .
    The dead lost