“What can you do to stop a man who’s bigger than you are? But, you’re free, now. You can do what you want to do.” Suma, that lady who helped Stacy, came near.

Myrillis didn’t look up. “H-How do you know?”

“My name is Suma, and I’m the Rainbow Therapist. I know a little about you because I read your file. The man who held you prisoner is in jail without bond, but he can’t come here. You were never married, so he’s charged with kidnapping, rape and other charges.

“We are worried about you because you got scared. Here, you have choices. Tilla is your healer, but if you want a different healer, you can choose. But, you need medical care. You are too thin. There’s plenty of food here. Want to sit someplace and eat?”

When she didn’t answer, Suma kept talking.

We brought a dorna because you’re shaking, and you need to get off your feet. You can ride a dorna, or we can make a car, or a cart for a dorna to pull, anything you want.”

She looked at her feet. “I want too much.”

“It’s okay to want to eat, or to sit down, or have a safe place to go. Want to sit in these flowers? Your dorna can lie beside you and you can pet her. You like flowers?”

“Yes! I love flowers! Can I have one, just one?” She looked at a rosebush.

Suma went over to it and picked a bouquet. These didn’t have thorns. Then she came back and put the armful in Myrillis’ arms.

Myrillis cried.

“Come over here and sit down for a little while. You don’t have to go anywhere yet. It’s overwhelming, isn’t it, not to see what you expect?”

She nodded and walked slowly, so her kids could hold onto her dress. We walked a little way and Myrillis sat in the sand. “Oh! It’s soft?” She giggled and mushed some.

The kids started doing that and giggled, too.

Suma sat with ‘em and waved. Now they had buckets and little play shovels. And an assortment of holos of various toys floated. “Want more toys? You can have anything here.”

The older girl reached for the dorna, who knelt and laid down with her front legs tucked under. Very slowly, she put her head down.

Both kids petted her soft fur, and Myrillis did, too. She cried. “It’s a dream, isn’t it? But, I’ll have to wake up.”

“It’s not a dream. This is real. Your dorna is real, and she loves you. They don’t come to you like that if they don’t love you. Here, pets choose their owners.”

“I don’t have a job. I can’t afford a horse.”

“Here, you can. Healers won’t release you to work until you get healing and are able to work. Right now, you just need to rest, eat, and enjoy your dorna, and get medical care. Is that okay with you?”

“But, I’m lazy and need to work.”

“I think you worked too hard. You take care of your kids, and that’s enough. You can have help to care for them, too. Here’s your food menu. Everything here is free and you can have as much as you want.” Suma waved up the menu and explained how to use her terminal to change her clothes, and get to her things. “Your parents brought your things. They kept your room just the way it was the day you didn’t come home.”

“Oh, my Barbies! My books! Oh!” She touched little pictures and they floated to her hands. She set all of her Barbies in a row, posed them, and showed ‘em to her little girls.

The older girl reached, and she had one, but it was her age. She giggled. One of her mother appeared by it. Little toys, too. They came to life and played in the sand and she watched.

Finally, Suma let Tilla touch her head and Myrillis watched. After a while, she let Tilla check her.

She asked Elsie to come, and Elsie wrote progs. She needed epilepsy progs and anxiety meds and heart meds because she was starved. Tilla also let her eat and sang healing, and she kept eating and gaining weight until she was almost normal weight. Her hair grew out. I helped her set her hygiene and pick a haircut.

Other healers looked at her kids and did the same thing. They still looked thin, but the younger one looked around more.

Then she picked another dress, with a lot of encouragement. I showed her a lot of designs, frilly dresses like she always talked about wearing, and I made a princess dress for her in pink.

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

She liked that one and wore it. Then she put on some kids’ jewelry. “Oh, it’s pretty! Thanks, Becky!”

“You deserve it, Myrillis!”

“I need a nickname. You’re Becky, short for Rebecca. Call me Rilley!”

“Okay, Rilley! It’s your new start!”

“Yeah!” She hugged me.

“I’ll be your friend, too! I’m Elsie! I like Barbies, too!”

“Oh, but you’re a grownup. I’m—how old am I, Becky?”

“You’re 16.”

“So’m I!”

“You are? But you have a job!”

“Ella taught me to do programming, ‘cause I tried to do computer science but I couldn’t pass the math. I like helpin’ healers with progs—that’s what we call programs. But they said I could have a tutor and learn anything I want. What would you wanna do?”

“I used to want voice lessons. But, Daddy said it wasn’t practical.”

“Sug, you can have voice lessons. I won’t say it’s not practical any more.” He got tears in his eyes.

She stared at him. “Really? I can learn to sing?”

“You can learn anything you want. I found out, living here, things are very different. People can do what they want, for a living. How do we find a music tutor?”

A young man stepped out of a portal. A yellow Zheien, very thin, and his green eyes turned light.

But, Rilley gasped and looked down. His eyes went black, and he stepped away!

Suma took her hand. “Don’t be scared. He’s Zheien. They’re kind of Victorian.”

“What’s that?”

“You ever read Little Women?”

“Oh, in Victorian or Edwardian times, yeah.” She looked up. “So, uh, hi. What’s proper, here?”

The young man looked scared to move. Suma reached for his hand. “It’s all right. Sit here, by me. Myrillis—”

“Rilley!”

Suma smiled at her. “Rilley, here, wants to learn to sing. Can you teach an Earthan?”

“O, I can learn, and then I will teach. King Nitomahan asked us to learn many subjects, and I learned much Earthan music from many countries, and instruments such as piano.”

“How can you play piano with fingers that wide?” My sister stared at his hands.

“I practiced.” He smiled. He had green eyes that went lighter. Like her, he had brown, straight hair.

He waved up a piano and picked her up, leiwege and all, and sat her on the padded piano bench. She giggled. “Oh, a white grand piano! The only way this would be better would be a pink one! Barbie pink!”

Another wave, and it was. The black keys were gold and the white ones, lavender.

She hit a key and it was beautiful, like the upright grand Mama had in the living room. Mama smiled.

Another piano appeared and she got the girls interested. This one was smaller, for little hands. They banged, but made harmonies and giggled.

All of them nodded sleepily after just a few minutes.

Pirad came to talk to us. “I can take the intensity out of these memories, as I do for diplomats who were tortured. Or, I can remove them and make Myrillis 13 again with no memory of being away from you. You can tell her she was injured. I can give her Elshar traits to return intelligence to her. I can do this for the children so they only remember their mother, and kindness.”

Mama and Daddy talked about different options. But, Mama didn’t want to pretend the kids were theirs. “Let’s tell her the truth, and let her remember just enough to know these girls are hers. They can all live with us, and she can live in her old room. We can comfort them all when they get scared.”

Suma sighed. “She won’t be as you remembered. But I can stay with them. I think they need a Zheien bed in her room so we can all sleep there. They need to stay together. Life here is different than on Earth. We’ll have to see what she wants to do, and just help her do it. We can help her find strength to go on.”

“I will help all I can. Music helps many sorrows. I am Osanor, and I can come as oft as she wishes.” He smiled. “If she is 13, we will be the same age.”

Daddy giggled. “She needs a friend who’s male to teach her men aren’t bad. Thanks, Osanor.”

“I can bring my family, when she can bear. We make instruments, and Fa is learning to make a piano the way Earthan piano-makers do. Mea is also learning Earthan music, and we study together.”

Pirad touched Rilley’s forehead and she looked 13 again. Slept in Tilla’s arms. Mama held the older girl, and Daddy, the younger one. When he touched the 3 year old Vera, she looked 2. The younger one, Christine looked like a baby.

We all ported home to Rilley’s room, which had the same French Provisional furniture, but the bed had seven posts and a canopy with hot pink ruffles and matching covers with Disney princesses on it. The old bedspread just had three on it. This one had all her faves! And the posts had Carousel horses that were merhorses, unicorns and princess horses. She’ll love that! All of ‘em looked like angels, sleeping.

Osanor added a bay window big enough for that grand pink piano, and played instrumentals from Disney movies, beautifully. He had a hot pink Prince outfit.

Mama and Daddy got their tutors to teach them in her room. The bed was big enough. Mama was learning to play a stringed instrument from Osanor’s mother, and Daddy’s tutor taught him about how trading worked in Alb, and possible businesses he could run from here.

A couple of his employees came here with their families and they were getting houses designed by Ella’s dad. My daddy did engineering on Earth, and inspected old structures to see if they were sound. Several of them had relatives who were also civil engineers and they learned to write progs for this.

But, a diplomat came and bowed. “Yea Becky, Wasa Mai wishes to meet with you. Have you time?”