Alek drove his Stormwalker – or really, shuffled it along the ground under the cover of night – with a careful hand and watchful eye, usually. Tonight however, he was tired, tired out of his wits from running away from the damn Germans that pursued him relentlessly, mercilessly, day after day, night after night. He was tired of fighting and he was tired of not being able to properly mourn for his parents' sudden death. He worried that he would simply breakdown and be reduced to a quivering, sobbing mess on the floor of the walker if they didn't make it to Switzerland tomorrow.

Slowly and somewhat against his will, the side-to-side rocking motion caused by the walker's mechanical gait began to lull him to a state of semi-sleep, semi-waking, and semi-remembering.

"We're all going to make a difference in this world someday," his mother had said, "your father and I, and you too, of course!" She would tickle him lightly. His young laughter echoed in his own ears. "We are going to do something great for this world, something worthwhile." This would puzzle little Alek.

"But why, Mama?" he used to ask, keen about such things even at that tender age. "The world never did us any favors. The world doesn't care that you and Papa are happy and in love. The world doesn't like any of us just because you're more common than Papa. Why should we do anything good for a world that's so…so…unfair?"

His mother would just shake her head and say, "You'll see, Alek. One day you'll realize that the world isn't anything without other people. Life is not always fair, but as long as other people are there, it's worthwhile. You'll see. We're all nothing without each other." Then she would scoop him up, giggling, and run around the garden with him in her arms, depositing him, still laughing, into his father's lap.

Alek snapped back into the present. Now he thought he could see. Staring out the viewfinder of the walker, watching the trees roll by and the stars get dimmer and the clouds swell with rain, he saw how the world was nothing without his parents.