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admired
men from ancient etchings, painted vases, marble statues and oil
paintings. LaDaven
looked
like an oil painting. His bone
structure was not of this century.
    The body—twitched. Fenimore LaDaven coughed.
Chet caught his breath, his eyes round.
    He wasn’t the only one. Everyone surrounding
the twitching body was
reacting
. It was pandemonium. “He’s
alive!” people yelled. Students were running around in circles,
bumping into one another and babbling nonsense, while others sat on
the ground and hyperventilated, apparently overtaken by shock. Chet
didn’t move. He cradled LaDaven in his arms, overcome by
emotion.
    Professors Tibbets and Clementina arrived,
along with the promised policeman. The officer had a bored, acerbic
expression and seemed unimpressed with the dusty man in Chet’s
arms, but Tibbets and Clementina were immediately enveloped by the
chaos. Fenimore LaDaven groaned, his eyes still closed. Chet almost
forgot to breathe.
    “Call an ambulance!” Tibbets said to the
officer, his spindly arms flailing with enthusiasm.
    Even Clementina seemed to have forgotten why
the authorities had originally been summoned. She hovered right
beside Chet, poking at LaDaven with a proprietary air. She probably
felt that—this being the dig of the century taking place on her
private property and all—the excitement should belong to her. Chet
didn’t want to be the one standing between Clementina and her, um,
target. Despite a twinge of regret, Chet awkwardly handed off
LaDaven’s body to her and backed away. He joined the Flame at the
back of the crowd, feeling glum as he brushed himself off.
    “Medical intervention is entirely
unnecessary,” Journey said, arms crossed. The only reason Chet
heard was because he was standing right beside her. “People have
been surviving lucid mud for thousands of years.”
    She was ignored. In fact, both Flame were
ignored, standing apart from the action. Curious, he studied their
reactions. Journey was calm and watchful. But Knife... Chet thought
he’d be cool as a cucumber, but the Flame was jittery, agitated.
Knife nearly danced in place and jumped to see over heads, though
he was currently over six feet tall.
    Chet touched his arm, and Knife jerked
around, startled. “Sorry,” he said, shooting Chet a rueful grin. “I
haven’t seen Fenimore in three hundred years. I never got a proper
chance to say goodbye.”
    When Knife had been telling his story, he’d
referred to the man as
LaDaven
. Now he was
Fenimore?
It was as if... Chet frowned. Normally, he
wouldn’t have even thought they could be, um, involved. Two men and
all. But Knife was
Flame,
a god affiliate known for being
homophiles with bizarre sexual perversions beyond the knowledge of
normal folk. Knife could become female, too, Chet realized
abruptly. Neither Flame had changed sex yet, but it was what they
were known for. Maybe Chet was seeing things where there were none.
Maybe they’d just been friends.
    The ambulance arrived just as the police
left. More chaos ensued, spreading outwards like ripples in a pond.
Fenimore’s unconscious body was strapped down to a gurney and
hauled up the dusty grade by ambulance techs. Chet’s shoulders
slumped, and he gazed at the ground. They were taking Fenimore
away. He turned to find Knife watching him closely.
    “You want to go with him, don’t you?”
    Chet nodded, ashamed for no reason he could
discern. Of
course
he was fascinated by this potential
glimpse into the past. The man was three hundred years old!
    Knife assessed him with a measured look. “I
would be there by Fenimore’s side, but everyone at the hospital,
from the secretaries to the chief physician, would bar my way. I’m
Flame; I might as well be leper in their sterile ward. But
you
can go.”
    “But—”
    “
Someone
has to ride with him in the
ambulance. If you ask first, Tibbets might let you. Besides us,
you’re the only one here who knows anything about him. Ride with
Fenimore. Answer