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CHAPTER THREE
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And so you see I have come to doubt,
All that I once held as true,
I stand alone without beliefs.
The only truth I know is you. (Kathy's Song –Paul Simon)

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The diversity in the universe never failed to amaze John. As he, Shayera and Rex walked to the restaurant the clerk had suggested, he marveled at all of the life forms they saw on the street.

Yes, he was a Green Lantern and had seen sentient life in many forms.

Yes, the mother of his child was a bird-like being.

Yes, the people he worked for were blue-skinned dwarfs.

But the variations of life he saw in this spaceport still caused him to stare in awe.

It was twilight. The restaurant had a sign on its door in multiple languages and symbols that said it catered to bipeds only. It was dirty and dark, but business was good. That is, the place was busy, noisy, but not too loud.

When they walked in the restaurant, they were greeted by a hostess, who looked at Shayera and then looked around Shayera back to get a peek at Rex. The woman nodded and then shook her head at John. She gave John a booster seat that looked more like a large ice cream cone to him and signaled that they should follow her.

They were shown to a booth in a corner where they sat down. To John's amazement, Shayera turned the "ice cream cone" booster seat upside down and strapped Rex in the device. It fit him and his tiny wings perfectly.

Shayera placed Rex next to the wall and placed her mace between Rex and her. John sat across from them. His laser rifle was next to the wall beside him. The booth was uncomfortable, but apparently only for John.

The back of his seat had a large "mound" that poked between his shoulders and there was a gap of almost one foot between the seat and the booth back. As he glanced at Shayera, he realized that the seat was designed for winged beings. Her wings fit neatly in the contours of the booth, just as Rex's had in his booster. John leaned back and tried to position himself so that he didn't slip in the foot gap between the seat and the seatback. At that moment, he considered the possibility that for years, she might have been uncomfortable on regular human chairs.

Shayera placed the order for food. John didn't care what she ordered. He was going to eat it because he was hungry and he enjoyed listening to her squeal like an excited child when she saw something on the menu she hadn't had in a long time. Secretly, he was pleased that they got to spend a little time off-world and in a place where she didn't have to eat food that he knew didn't make her happy.

He looked around the restaurant and saw that most of the patrons seemed to be ignoring them. This was a good thing, John thought, because it meant that they had not attracted any undue attention to themselves. Of course, he found it hard not to stare at the different colored bipeds of the universe gathered at this restaurant. Then he realized that he looked as strange to them as they did to him.

The waiter, a Jennian, set down two tankards of flurb in front of Shayera and something green in a cup. She took one of the flurbs and passed it to John. Then she poured the green stuff into a bottle for Rex. The baby drank for a minute or two and then dropped off to sleep.

"Tell me you didn't just kill my kid?" John asked as he took a small sip of the flurb. It tasted as bad as he remembered and he decided that maybe he wasn't as thirsty as he originally thought. He took another small sip being careful to strain out the small worms with his teeth. But I guess I could get used to it.

Shayera grinned. "Just something to put him to sleep in case things should get ugly. It's no stronger than warm milk…well maybe a little stronger, but not much."

"We've not starting a fight in this place. We're going to eat and if that other Thanagarian doesn't show, we're leaving. But we're minding our own business. Got it?"

"Oh, I got it," she said. Then she nodded her head toward a winged man approaching them. "But you might want to tell him."

As he turned to look, the Thanagarian stopped, not three feet away. John stood and placed the rifle on the table. Shayera, who remained seated, took a swig of her drink and belched. The man said something in Thanagarian to her. She didn't move, but answered him in a calm voice and then pointed at John. The man looked at John with a flat expression on his face.

"What did he say?" John asked. He understood Basic, which was the universal language spoken throughout the cosmos, but he couldn't understand Thanagarian without engaging the ring's auto-translator. He hesitated to do that for fear the ring would cause him to glow with green energy and identify him as a Lantern.

"He calls himself Nurda Pal," Shayera answered. "And he wants to know if I'm mated to you. I told him to ask you. He asks because I'm not wearing earrings, so he's not sure how to address me or you." She took another sip of her drink and frowned.

"Okay. So how do I tell him you and I are life partners?"

"I'm sure you'll figure it out because in another minute, he's going to call your child a bastard and me a whore."

What?

Shayera nodded at John as she took another sip of her drink. Then she took Rex out of the booster seat and placed the sleeping infant in her lap. She picked up her mace and set it on the table in front of her with a loud clunk.

Nurda Pal looked away from John toward Shayera and the noise. She smiled at the man and pointed back at John. The winged man never got to turn to face John completely before John slugged him with the butt end of the laser rifle. The man hit the floor hard and crashed into a nearby table. The restaurant suddenly became quiet. A waiter started to come over and intervene, but thought better of it when John drew his laser pistol and aimed it at the man on the floor.

Nurda Pal brought his hand up to his lip, looked at his hand and saw blood. He started to reach for the laser axe at his side, but saw John's pistol trained on him. He said something else to Shayera in Thanagarian. She stood and put the sleeping Rex on her back. Then she looked at John before sitting back down. She leaned back in the booth so that the sides of the seat back and her body completely protected the sleeping child. She energized her mace and held it where Pal could see it.

"He apologizes for the misunderstanding," she said. "He says no insult was intended. He hadn't seen a female Thanagarian in years so he followed us in here. He was hoping I was available for…" She paused and sighed before continuing, "An adult party, if you get my drift."

"Loud and clear. Tell him to get up so I can hit him again."

She shook her head. "No, don't hit him again. Remember, we need information from him," she said softly. She said something else to the Thanagarian who rubbed his chin.

"Do you speak Basic?" John bellowed at the Thanagarian. He nodded.

"Good," John said. "Stand up." Nurda Pal didn't move. There was anger in his eyes as he looked at John and brushed more blood from his lip.

"Then, stay there," John said. He pointed to Shayera, but didn't take his eyes off of Pal. "This is my mate, you understand? That's my son."

Nurda Pal nodded. John tossed him a napkin from the table. Pal caught it in mid-air and pressed it against his lip. John handed him his tankard of flurb and motioned for him to drink. Pal held the drink in his hand for a long moment as if contemplating throwing it back at John.

Shayera loudly cleared her throat and leaned forward toward Pal. "Don't make this your last great act of defiance. Drink up," she said to him in Basic. Pal nodded again and took a big drink of the brew and gave the mug back to John. John nodded at him slightly as he set the tankard on the table.

John spoke to Shayera as he kept his eye on Pal. "Tell him I accept his apology," John said. "Tell him he is welcome to stay and eat with us provided he keeps his hands on the table where I can see them. Tell him you're always looking for information about home and you're glad to see another Thanagarian."

Shayera translated for John. The man slowly got up and pulled up a chair and sat down at the edge of the table. He put his hands in the air and slowly placed them palms down in front of him. He's hungry. Good. Hungry men talk. John glanced at Shayera again, then back to Pal. "Tell him I consider this misunderstanding finished. However, if he doesn't, he should tell me now so I can kill him and be done with him."

Her eyes widened. "What?"

"Just tell him what I said," John snapped keeping his pistol pointed at the man. Shayera cleared her throat and said what John told her to say. The anger in the man's eyes dissipated and was replaced with fear as Shayera spoke. He raised his hands in the air again. "We are finished," Pal said in Basic, waving his open hands. "I am sorry and didn't mean to offend you or your family."

John holstered his pistol and motioned for Pal to put his hands on the table again. He wasn't concerned about Pal as a threat. If this Thanagarian got stupid, he'd dispatch him with his ring in a heartbeat and wouldn't give it a nanosecond of thought. What was important was that this man might know enough about Thanagar to answer some of Shayera's questions.

The waiter who'd witnessed this incident looked relieved that there wasn't going to be more fighting and asked if he could bring out the food. John nodded. The server set down plates in front of Shayera and John. Shayera turned off her mace, but kept it at the ready.

John pushed his plate in front of Pal and watched as the man hungrily shoved food in his face. Shayera had started to eat, but stopped when she saw that John wasn't going to. He motioned with his hand for her to eat. She shook her head and positioned herself back in the corner of the booth protecting Rex.

"Been on Galtos long?" John asked. This guy is young. Hungry and young.

Pal looked up and pointed toward John's tankard of flurb. Stewart pushed the mug toward the man and signaled the waiter to bring another round of drinks to the table.

Pal gulped down the drink and said, "About two weeks now. I'm between jobs."

"What do you do?" Shayera asked.

"Whatever job needs to be done. Whatever I can get paid for."

Shayera was quiet, but John knew she was thinking what he was thinking. A paid assassin.

"When was the last time you were on Thanagar?" John asked.

Pal looked at him curiously. John pointed to Shayera. "You know…off-world." He held his hands apart by about eighteen inches and motioned toward Shayera.

Pal frowned then suddenly smiled at her. "Oh I see. You were born off-world."

"It's been a really long time since she was back there," John answered.

Shayera said nothing, but looked hard at the man.

"About five years ago was the last time I was there," Pal said. "Right after the occupation ended."

"The occupation ended?" Shayera repeated. John was surprised that she managed to keep her voice under control.

Pal was silent. "Yeah, guess you didn't know that, did you?"

"But I heard Thanagar was still a protectorate," John said. He watched Shayera for her reaction, hoping she wouldn't give too much away with her body language.

Pal shoved more food in his mouth. "Sorry, but I haven't been able to afford more than Travelian lizard soup for the last couple of days."

Shayera grimaced as shoved her plate toward Pal. "Here, help yourself," she said. Good girl.

"Yeah, Thanagar is a colony of the Gordanians now. They provide protection for the planet and defend it against attack. There's a small self-defense force, but no military is permitted to leave the planet without Gordanian approval."

"Oh," Shayera whispered.

John cleared his throat and looked at Pal. "She's surprised because she remembers hearing about how great the Thanagarian military was."

Pal laughed and looked at Shayera. "Someone fed you load of gharnot droppings. That military was stupid."

"How so?" Shayera asked now clearly sounding defensive.

Pal drank some more flurb. "Oh. That's right. You weren't educated on Thanagar, were you? During the War of Liberation, the Thanagarian military built all these hyperspace bypasses to get to the Gordanian Homeworld, but the Gordanians simply used the bypasses to attack Thanagar. If that dumb military hadn't built the bypasses, who knows how the war would have turned out?"

"But I heard the reason they lost was because they didn't get the last bypass built in time," Shayera said softly. John noticed how she cringed when Pal said 'War of Liberation.'

Pal laughed again. "Nah, the reason they lost is because they built the bypasses in the first place and gave the Gordanians a direct route to Thanagar. Rather than make allies in the fight, the Thanagarian military destroyed worlds. We had no friends to help us defend our planet."

"So it didn't matter that the last bypass didn't get built," John said looking directly at Shayera. "Thanagar was going to lose the war anyway."

Pal nodded and took another swig of the brew. "Yeah." He paused and then added. "In fact, in school they taught us that some of the military troops building the last bypass rebelled and decided not to finish the job because they knew it was hopeless and didn't want to kill any more people. When those troops returned back to Thanagar, the Government had them all killed for not obeying orders. We were taught that those nameless soldiers were the real heroes of the war."

Shayera's jaw dropped. "You know," Pal continued. "It was a good thing we lost. I know how that sounds, but Thanagar is a beautiful place now and I don't think it would be if we were still fighting." He smiled. "I plan to go back there as soon as I can get enough money."

"I'd like to visit there some day myself," John said. "Want my son to see his other home planet."

Shayera pulled her tankard of flurb closer to her, but didn't drink. Instead she stared into the liquid.

"He'll like it there," Pal said as he continued eating.

Shayera was silent for the remainder of the meal. Finally, she looked at John again. "I've lost my appetite. Completely. Can we go?"

"Sure." John motioned to the waiter. He asked that the waiter retrieve another two servings of what they'd originally ordered, this time to go.

In a few minutes, the server came back with food in a bag. John stood and wished Nurda Pal a long and peaceful life. Shayera said something to Pal in Thanagarian as they prepared to leave. John didn't know what it was, but Pal nodded and said something back. John collected the check, paid for the meals and escorted Shayera out the door.

John had lost his appetite, too.

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The trip back to the hostel was a quiet one. Shayera said nothing and John wasn't sure what he could say. He suspected it wasn't what the Thanagarian said that was really bothering her. Although that was bad enough. He didn't know what it could be, but he knew there was something else.

It was a known fact that the victor in war wrote the history of the conquered. Nurda Pal had been educated by the Gordanians during the occupation. The Thanagar that Shayera had taken a military oath to defend was gone and maybe the Thanagarians of today, like Pal, thought it best that history turned out the way it did. John realized that she'd come to the realization that all that she'd believed in and her entire way of life were gone and apparently not missed by anyone.

"What did you say to him?" John asked.

"What you said, a long life and peace. He wished me the same. I don't know if I'll ever have it." She said nothing else until they were in bed.

"Do you want to talk about what's bothering you?" he said as he turned toward her in the darkness.

"No."

"Will you answer a question for me then?"

"What?"

"Why aren't you wearing earrings?"

"Go to sleep, John. It's late and I don't want to talk about it now."

"We're going back to Earth tomorrow. You know that, right?"

"Good night, John."

"Good night."

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Neither one slept well that night. Rex was cranky and Shayera got up with him several times during the night. John woke up each time she got out of bed. Finally, they looked at each other and decided to get up for the day.

They'd dressed silently, saying nothing to each other beyond a perfunctory, "Good morning." He was about to pick up Rex when she said, "Leave him there for a moment." She paused and added softly, "Please."

She sat on the bed, placing her helmet beside her. He sat next to her. She took a deep breath.

"For years," she said. "I thought about nothing else other than going back to Thanagar. I was going to lead the resistance, fight the Gordanians, restore the old order and try to atone for all the damage I've done. And now…now I find out that I was on the wrong side all the time."

John shook his head. "No, you weren't. You were on the right side all the time. Didn't you hear what Nurda Pal said? Those that didn't build the bypass were the ones they considered heroes. That's you."

She was silent for a moment. "We both know that's what the Gordanians have taught them for thirty years and we both know it's not true." She paused and then sniffled. "In my nightmares, I am executed because I betrayed my people." She sighed. "I tell them I am sorry and beg them, John… beg them to please give me another chance."

John said nothing. She needed to get this off her chest. He held her hand.

"Don't you see," she said. "In my dreams, I beg them to let me live. In my dreams I tell them that I can deny you and Rex…I can deny that I love you…I can deny that I would do it all over again if I had the chance."

A small tear ran down her cheek. "John, I haven't been fair to you. Last night, that man was right. I am a whore and Rex is a bastard…in Thanagarian eyes because I'm not wearing earrings."

John's eyes narrowed. "You are my mate. You are no whore and Rex is no - "

"Stop," she interrupted. "You don't understand what I'm saying. I thought about this all last night. I love you, but I haven't sealed my love to you the way I'm supposed to…the way a Thanagarian should. Do you understand? When I was promised to Hro, I wore earrings that said that. I wear nothing that says I am your mate. Nothing."

She shook her head. "Not wearing anything from you made it easier for me to look at you and say, 'You mean nothing to me.' It made it easier for me to deny how I feel about you. And I don't want to do that anymore."

She sighed. "Maybe I was afraid that one day, I'd be captured and if I wore earrings, I couldn't deny I loved you…that I threw away all I grew up with because I loved you…that I sacrificed my world because I didn't want to lose you."

She shook her head, then looked him through teary eyes. "When we get back, I want to get earrings. I want to wear earrings that say I am your mate and the mother of your child."

Her smile was shallow as she patted his hand. "I'm not worried about Thanagar anymore. But I do worry about you not knowing how I feel about you."

John removed his hand from hers and smiled weakly as he stood up. Using his ring he opened the pocket dimension where he'd stored his battery and took out a small box. "Now seems to be as good a time as any. Will these do until we get back?" he asked as he handed her the box.

He watched her expression as she opened the small package. Inside were two opal earrings. Each opal lay on a large oval white-gold backing. She gasped and then she hugged him.

"These are perfect," she whispered in his ear. "I love you, John." Then she suddenly sat back. "Wait a minute. When did you get these?"

He took an earring out of the box and gently clipped it to her ear. "I bought them years ago. A long time ago, Batman and I had an adventure I'll tell you about on the way back to Earth. I didn't know when or even if I was ever supposed to give you these, but I hope they'll do until we get back to Earth…until we can get the kind you want." He reached around and attached the remaining earring to her other ear.

She threw her arms around him again and just before she kissed him whispered, "These will do for a lifetime."

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(Now on the second moon of Galtos)

He felt a hand stroke his cheek and he opened his eyes. Shayera was sitting on the armrest of the recliner. There was a gentle smile on her face. "Hey," he said.

"Hey yourself," she answered. "You know you shouldn't sleep in the chair."

It was his turn to smile. "How's Arthur?"

"He's fine. He got a star in school and – wait didn't he talk to you?"

John shook his head. "Nope. My job is to pass the phone to Nana."

She laughed and slid off the armrest and into his lap. "And you do a fine job of phone passing."

"I strive to please."

She kissed him on the cheek. "You'll do. Did you take your cholesterol medicine?"

He pursed his lips together in a fake pout. "Yes."

"What about your blood pressure medicine?"

He cleared his throat. "Now you sound like a wife."

She smirked. "And that sounds like a 'no.'"

She got up and returned a few moments later with a pill and a glass of water. He took the pill and drank the water, returning the empty glass back to her.

She turned to walk away. He called out after her, "Puqni'lodj." He didn't know many Thanagarian words that weren't profanity. But early on, he made a point of having her teach him that phrase.

She stopped and looked back at him. Touching the earrings he'd given her years earlier, she smiled and said softly, "Puqni'lodj. Dinner is in fifteen minutes."

John nodded. "You know sometimes I wonder if we did okay."

She flashed a quick smile at him and said as she walked away, "We're not finished doing, you know. Not by a long shot."

He closed his eyes again. "I know," he said softly.

I know.

END