I slump into the pillows, curl up and sigh. Candy bars. Life is sweet. All I have to do is lie here where it’s cozy and warm and wait for them. They heated blankets for me. Someone’s bringing me candy bars in bed.

I’m going to sleep for days.

I wonder what happened. Dying to talk to Dancer. But it’ll have to wait.

I’m drifting, just about to pass out again when I suddenly get wired, struck by a certainty that pisses me all kinds of off.

I know why Ryodan gave Jo that look!

Because they’re in his office right now, talking about me! Conspiring, with Jo all worried about me because I almost died.

And they’re trying to figure out what to do with me since I don’t follow rules and almost got myself killed tonight. I hate it when adults have their stupid powwows about me! They always end with me getting read the riot act and handed a whole new list of rules that nobody in their right mind could possibly obey, most of which aren’t even logical or smart.

How the feck was I supposed to know if I touched one tiny little thing it would snap me out of freeze-frame? Why couldn’t he have just told me that? I would never have done it!

Thinking about how I didn’t almost get myself killed tonight, really he did, I start to steam from the inside and warm right up from sheer temper. I crawl out from under my huddle of blankets, get my sword, stumble to the door and wobble out into the hall. I look up and down but don’t see anybody. ’Cause, like everybody’s probably already in his office, dissing me.

I careen down the hall, stumbling from wall to wall, using them to steady me until I make it to his door, then I slap my palm where I always see him put his, and the door slides open. I don’t even wait for it to finish opening before I begin airing my gripes.

“It is not my fault I almost got killed, dude. It’s your fault and here’s ho—ooooww—Ew!” I shake my head, horrified and … and … and …

Horrified.

My mouth hangs open, with nothing coming out.

Ryodan looks over his shoulder at me.

He’s got Jo in there but they’re not talking. She’s bent over his desk with her skirt up. And he’s doing that thing I wish I’d never seen him doing. Holy travel agent! Did I, like, go through a time warp or something? How long did it take me to get here? Don’t grown-ups do other things before they get to this point? Like maybe hug and kiss, make out for a little while? I move fast and all but, dude! Kind of thinking some things’d be nice, a little slow, like maybe give you a chance to get ready for stuff that’s happening!

Jo gasps and turns bright red. “Oh! Dani! Get out of here!”

I’m seeing more of Jo than I ever wanted to.

They aren’t talking about me.

They weren’t even thinking about me.

Like I wasn’t even lying a few doors down the hall on my deathbed with obviously nobody worrying about me at all!

“You are such a traitor! Sleeping with the enemy! What’s wrong with you? This is just too gross for my eyeballs!”

“Go back to bed, Dani,” Ryodan says, looking at me funny.

I hate him and I hate her and I hate his stupid retracting door.

I can’t even slam it on the way out.

I wake up feeling amazing. Usually I wake up confused and cross. I’m thinking maybe I should almost get killed more often. I have no clue why I feel so good but I love it so I stretch, milking it for all I can get. My muscles are totally smooth and happy and relaxed, and I don’t feel a bruise anywhere, which is impossible. My muscles are always knotted somewhere. Bruises are me. This feels like a brand-new body! I figure I must be in some kind of pre-waking state I never been in before, where the brain’s been turned on but the body’s still numb. I feel candy bars in bed with me, melty in my warm nest. One’s mashed between my cheek and the pillow, I feel another plastered to my butt. I scootch them both out, tear one open and eat it without opening my eyes, blissfully happy. I could get used to this. No pain from assorted bumps and bruises, breakfast in bed.

Then I remember where I am.

Chester’s.

And I remember what I saw before I fell asleep.

Ryodan doing the dirty with Jo.

On his desk.

Gah!

Like I’m ever going to be able to look at his desk again! How am I supposed to sit in his office now?

I’m so pissed off I shoot bolt upright in bed and swallow the last half of my candy bar so fast it gets stuck in my throat.

I start choking and all the sudden a fist slams into my back. My mouth pops open and half a mangled candy bar goes flying into the glass wall with a gooey chocolate splat. It’s too gross for me so early in the morning. My stomach heaves and I double over trying to keep it down.

Yeah, this is more like how I wake up. All screwed up and confused. When I lived at the abbey, Ro told me I have growing pains and that superheroes have them worse than most people. She said that’s why I need to sleep so hard and deep, and wake up so slow, because my body has to do more work to repair me on a cellular level. Makes scientific sense.

“Might help, kid,” Lor says behind me, “if you chew more than once before you swallow.”

“I never chew more than once. I wouldn’t be able to eat fast enough if I did. I’d have to spend my whole day chewing. I’d get jaw muscles the size of Popeye’s biceps.”

“You’re too young to know who Popeye is.”

When you spent most of your childhood in a cage in front of a TV, you know who everybody is. I can sing the songs for Green Acres and Gilligan’s Island. I even know who That Girl was. I learned everything I know about the world from watching TV. There’s a whole lot of psychology in there if you’re paying attention, and I was a captive audience. Ro said I got all my melodrama from growing up that way. That I think folks are supposed to be larger than life like they are in shows. Dude, of course I do! But I didn’t need TV to tell me that. Life’s a choice: you can live in black and white, or you can live in color. I’ll take every shade of the rainbow and the gazillion in between! I push up from the bed, grab my sword and head for the door.