"Alright, I'll just change the one on your left arm now, and then you can go." James carefully pulled off the bandage on the man's dark arm, then walked across the room to retrieve a new roll.

"Great. I need to get back to the meeting," said the tan-skinned man sitting on the table. "Greystone's support group is now about half of the three units combined. He'll be named Boss for sure, there's not doubting it."

James doused a small cut with a slimy, clear liquid, then began wrapping the arm. "Well, that's possible, Atashi. But who is the other half of them standing behind?"

Atashi grunted. "That activist, Sean Trowing. I swear to you that if he were named Boss, this whole place would collapse onto our heads. There's no way his crazy ideas would work. No way. The best thing to do is to stick behind Greystone. He knows what's going on; he could lead well, I'm sure of it!"

"Now, didn't William Greystone purpose the same thing that three others did?"

"Well, yes," Atashi replied, frowning. "But not exactly. Rosin wanted to use some of the treasure to make better weapons, but the weapons we have now are perfect! They have not failed us. And Barak Temosh suggested that we allow the pregnant women to continue participating in heists until the third month, can you believe that! No way. We should stick behind Greystone; he knows what to do. He will be named Boss, no doubt about it."

James finished wrapping the arm and tied the cloth tightly. "You know, of course, that Boss will be asking every group in the brigade, not just this one," he informed Atashi.

The man's eyes became wider. "Well, surely no one else in the brigade will have the same marvelous ideas as Greystone, nor the leadership abilities. He'll be Boss for sure, no doubt about it."

"What about Masters?" A third voice called. The great, hulking Tom strode into the room, looking rather coldly at both Atashi and James. "Now there be a lad who knows his business."

Atashi laughed awkwardly. "Andrew? Become Boss? Why, that's almost worse than Sean. I mean, at least Trowing kept order in the whole; Andy totally blew the entire thieving industry to bits with his speech. It was embarrassing, and--" The glare in Tom's eyes cut the man's sentence in half.

James cleared his throat, and said quietly, "You can go now, Atashi." The tan man nodded and exited the room hastily. "Is there something wrong, Tom? Something I can help you with?"

Tom stared James down coldly for a moment; the doctor returned the gaze. Tom grinned.

"Ye know I don't like ye much, doc, with all yer medicine and such...well, we be different, ye an' I. But we've got somethin' in common, ye know?"

James nodded and sat in a chair in the corner of the small room. He signaled to another, and Tom sat across from him.

"Andrew," James said.

"Aye, that boy. I've got a soft spot fer 'im, ye know, more so than the others."

"I've noticed," James stated. "I've often wondered why. I know he is a good kid, but what's so special about him? Why do you keep such a close watch on him but not the others? He isn't even originally from this segment of the brigade."

"It's been two days since I've seen Andy eat anythin'," Tom said slowly, ignoring the doctor's questions. "Even at the banquet, He left before the foods were even passed out. I know the young ones can go a while without eatin', so I wouldn't be so worried if it wasn't normal for 'im. He neHer eats more often than that, and when He does, it's cheese, bread, and ale. It doesn't seem natural, is all. Not to mention his gettin' so...emotional...at the banquet this afternoon. I've ne'er seen 'im so riled up about somethin'." He cleared his throat and sat up straighter. "So what of it? Yer the doc."

James nodded slowly. "Yes, I've noticed his peculiar eating habits. It may not comfort you to know this, but he also hardly sleeps more than an hour a night; more often than not he doesn't rest at all for days." Tom's mouth opened in protest, but the doctor cut him off. "Now, I've tried talking with him, of course. I've brought the matter to his attention many times, but the boy doesn't recognize this as a problem. He's perfectly healthy besides all that anyway--" James stopped suddenly, wishing he hadn't said those words, and now wishing even more than he had finished his sentence.

Tom leaned far forward. "He is perfectly healthy, aye doc?"

James hesitated. "Well..."

"If there be somethin' wrong with that child, you'll be tellin' me now, doc."

The older man nodded. "Yes, of course." He looked Tom in the eye sternly. "Earlier today, just after Andrew and Rachel returned from Taji, I'd gone up here to retrieve some medical supplies for that nasty cut Andrew received during the heist. When I returned to the common room, the boy was on his knees next to the table, and holding his head in his hands as if to stop it from exploding. I asked him what was wrong, but he couldn't speak, or maybe couldn't hear. Maybe he didn't even know who I was. I got him over to a chair, and his hands lowered, and he could see again. He said it felt as if he'd been cut through, but with all the pain swarming to his head. I'd never seen anything like it before. But it went away, and he seems to be back to his normal self again. I'll be looking into it, of course, but there is nothing else I can do now."

Tom sat back in his chair, deep in thought about this new information. "I suppose we be in the same boat, then, aye? Neither of us have got an 'old on 'im. Neither can make much of a difference."

"It certainly seems that way."

Tom stared the man down for a long moment; James steadily met his gaze. Tom's eyes slowly focused on something past the doctor; something only he could see; something projected from his memory onto the cold dirt wall.

"He's not like the rest of us," Tom said distantly. "He knows it. I know it. No one else." His gaze finally met the doctor's again. "Y-ye can't be tellin' no one, now, doc. What I'm about to tell ye. I don't know if it'll 'elp, but I know ye'll not tell." James nodded slowly. "No. Ye won't tell."

The great man sighed, but his deep blue eyes turned to ice again as he began to speak. "Andrew Masters was not born into this segment, that ye know. Everyone knows it, it be common enough. Folk come and go from other parts of the brigade; sometimes they leave and sometimes they stay. Sometimes they become a part of other segments, and it seems they'd always been there. After awhile it made no difference to anyone is the newcomer was stayin', 'cause we were all a part of the same group, really. Well, that's just how I made it seem with Masters."

"Made it seem?" The doctor repeated slowly.

"Aye. He-he weren't born into this segment, no," Tom's voice became strained again. He clamped onto James's gaze tightly, as if in warning, and would not release it. "Masters weren't born into this brigade. He weren't a part of another segment, or livin' in the Care Ward the first six years of 'is life, no. I found 'im. On the outside. In the very streets of Taji."

James gaped at him. His face was numb; all he could feel was the sinking in his heart as his mind tried to comprehend how his friend could be something completely different from anything he had ever thought possible. He's not real, he mind kept repeating to him, though he tried to block it out. Images of beggars and peasants from the city streets races across his thoughts in a manic battle of the average against the exceptional. Andy was born in a world in which there was no exceptional; there were only the rich and the poor, the ignorant and the afraid, the corpulent and the starving, the blind and the blind. Suddenly, the image of the dark-haired boy at age six flashed through his mind; the child was dirty, disheveled and pleading passing pedestrians to buy pieces of shriveled, brown apples held lightly in the boy's tiny hands. His eyes were lifeless.

"No!" James that he had screamed out loud only when Tom shoved him back down into his seat by the wall.

"Shut yer lips, man!" Tom whispered fiercely. "How'd ye like someone to sneak up to yer door to see what all the screamin's about only to discover Masters's little secret, hmm? Now shut yer mouth and stay seated!"

"You're not serious!" James half-whispered back, completely missing Tom's lecture in secrecy. "He cannot be an outsider! You must be mistaken! There has never been an outsider in these caves, and-and there cannot be one among us now! Not parading as a thief, it is impossible! Not parading .."

"Masters be parading as nothin'," Tom said coldly with a threat hidden in his words. "He is 'imself. Bein' born on the outside changes 'im in only one way: he knows what real life is like."

"What are you talking about? Real life! Living on the outside is not real life; it is a trap set to the world! It is a giant pit that all the peasants fall in when they are born!"

"A giant pit?" Tom cried. "Look around ye! We be livin' in one of 'em now! Outside is not the pit, especially to 'im. No, to 'im Taji be real life, and this," he gestured around the small dirt room packed wall to wall with cabinets of medical supplies and candles, "this be a prison: the worst kind of cell. The kind full of 'is only family and friends; the kind he'll never try to escape."

"Do you realize what this means? He's an outsider! If anyone gets wind of this, he'll be killed! How could this have happened? How did something like this slip by?"

Tom held out a hand to silence James. "It happened because I made it happen, doc. I be the one who brought 'im into the brigade. I found 'im wanderin' the streets, doin' dirty work for some lowly apple-snatchers when he was 'bout five, an' I Helped 'im out a bit. Wasn't doin' any 'arm. Then, found 'im a week later in an alleyway outside of Taji. Poor thing'd been beat unconscious, an' by some big lout no doubt. So I brought 'im back to one of our bases in the city. When he woke, the boy looked a bit confused: a bit curious. But I'll be damned if I saw a drop of fear in that boy's face. He fascinated me, I suppose. 'is eyes--they were solid enough, but when I looked at 'is eyes they sort of turned to liquid. Like water: trying to see the bottom of a deep pool, but not having anythin' to focus on. Ye notice what was missing rather than what was there, an' there was always somethin' missin' from that boy's eyes. Somethin' deeper than fear, but that can only be called by that name." Tom shook his head, staring off into space. He turned back to James. "Have ye ever seen him afraid?"

James recalled the look on Andy's face earlier that day, when the boy had been struck down by some invisible foe. "Once," he replied.

Tom nodded, but did not press the matter. He continued, "After seein' that tiny child black an' blue like a bad apple, I couldn't bring myself to toss 'im back into the streets. An' 'is eyes wouldn't be removed from my memory. He was different from the rest of 'em; enough so to fit in down 'ere. I brought 'im down. I told 'im what to do and what not to do. He followed my every word, and no one questioned 'im. The rest I took care of; the official business."

"You used your position as unit leader to incorporate an outsider into our midst." James said squarely.

"That's right," Tom replied. "It was probably the best thing I've e'er done, or'll e'er do again."

James stared in disbelief. "How could you say that?"

"He's a great kid, just as I'd thought. An' he fit in perfect in 'ere. An' he'll continue to get along just fine, I'm sure, as long as nothin' 'appens to shift the tides."

"Getting along perfect?" James exclaimed. "He just told Boss himself that he wished to throw all of our earnings to the poor beggars in the city! No one agrees with him now despite the fact that they know nothing of his being born on the outside! Perfect indeed!"

Tom cut him off. "Do ye know why he wants to give the money to the poor?" James frowned. "He knows what the word 'poor' really means! No one down 'ere does! But he's told me of it, and it makes the way we live seem extraordinary. He's told me of sleepin' on the streets, bein' kicked around by every single other person around 'im, and eatin' only when he could snatch enough bread fer 'im an' the apple-snatchers that he worked for. He had no family, no friends, no home, nothin' save for the rags on 'is back an' the street under 'is tiny feet. There were neither banquets e'ery night, nor a warm bed waitin' for 'im when 'is eyes drooped. That is real, doc, not livin' in a cave an' waitin' for the cooks to finish the roast. Ye've to know that to know Masters. He isn't like us, no. He knows what life is like."

James's face fell, and suddenly the doctor looked ten years older than he had the moment before. His head swam with images, ideas, and Tom's words all mingling together and trying to make a single sentence, but only accomplishing chaos. He closed his eyes.

"Why are you telling me this, Tom? You should have kept it to yourself," the doctor said painfully, rubbing his closed eyes with his fingertips.

"I'm sorry ye feel that way," Tom replied. "I only hoped it'd 'elp ye with figurin' out what be wrong with Masters." He paused for a moment, then stood. "I suppose I'll be leavin' then. New mission fer tomorrow. Tell the boy meetin's at two tomorrow morning."

James opened his eyes and nodded. "I'll tell him." He could barely force his voice above a whisper.

***

The large common room had been transformed into a meeting hall; the great table was replaced by fifteen small chairs facing a long wooden table with three larger and more luxurious chairs behind it. Bright candles revealed layouts for a house in three different views that were hung on the wall behind the table. Andrew, standing near the doorway, recognized the plans as the same house he had been in the day before: Lord Chester Cedco's mansion in Taji. He supposed that one of the three unit leaders decided to try for the treasure room again since they were unable to find it the last time they searched. 'Which was probably my fault,' Andy reminded himself.

Most of the crew was already inside the room, sitting or standing against the walls and talking amongst themselves. Andy had yet to see Tom or any of the unit leaders, and he wasn't in the mood to converse, so he stood against the cool dirt wall in the hallway and waited for the meeting to begin.

"Andrew," a light voice from down the hallway called. The brigand turned his head to see Rachel and Sean walking arm in arm towards him. Sean walked directly into the common room, his eyes straight ahead of him, while Rachel stopped in front of Andy and smiled.

"Where have you been, Andy? You missed a delicious dinner," the girl said.

Andy sighed slowly, feeling nervous. "I took a quick nap. Did it go well? Did you get to speak at all?"

Rachel shook her head. "No, I didn't. But I suspected as much from Boss; he never looked at women as more than waitresses and baby machines." She moved in closer and whispered, "I hear he tried, once, to eliminate females within the units and shove us all into the maternity division with the pregnant women and the children. Can you believe that?"

"Why did you lie to Boss about the last heist?" Andy asked suddenly. The girl looked surprised for a moment, and then her eyes turned down. As if suddenly realizing how close she was to her friend, she backed away a step and smiled apologetically, almost nervously.

"I didn't want to see you get in trouble," she replied. Andy watched her closely for a moment, until a smirk rose sharply to her lips, and she spoke again, backing up further. "Besides, it would have been my ass on the line as well if they all found out we were." her voice trailed off. "What were we doing?"

Andy smiled slowly and uncertainly, a few answers calling to him, nudging him to tell. He finally grinned, and said, "Fighting hyenas."

Rachel smiled back. They clasped shoulders and Andy watched her enter the room and walk up to Sean. When the youth turned back around he saw three huge figures walking toward him, one of which he recognized as Tom. Andy furrowed his brows in confusion and looked at his friend's face closer. It almost seemed that the great man was marching to the executioner's block rather than walking to a meeting.

One of the men with Tom, Chris Corbin, who was just as bulky and strong, snarled at the youth. "Get in there, Masters," he said darkly.

Andy was shocked for a moment; unit leaders were usually nothing less than polite to underlings, even if they were of a different group. Finally, he frowned and walked into the room.

The row of fifteen chairs was divided into three sections: one for each unit. Tom Childs's unit was on the left; Andrei Levsky's, on the right; and Chris Corbin's, in the middle, since he was the eldest of the leaders. Most of the brigands had moved to their respective areas, but a few were still mingling in the corners of the room and talking to each other. After Andy entered, that changed.

The boy gazed across the room at Rachel. She was standing with Sean, Geoff and a man from Chris Corbin's group, Atashi Mitsketa. Rachel, who was facing Andy, saw him enter the room and had a sort of panicked look on her face. Andy realized the room was silent. Every single underling had turned toward him. The youth, dumbstruck, looked back at their faces. Most looked angry; some, just confused.

"What is going on?" The youth demanded out loud.

Just then, the unit leaders passed him on their way to the table. Everyone's attention turned to them, and the last of the underlings took their seats. Andy growled and sat in Tom's section next to Rachel.

The girl immediately took his arm in her hands and whispered to him, pleadingly, "Andy, you have to leave, now! You have to get out of here!"

Andy searched her panicked eyes for something that made sense. "Wha-"

"The meeting is now in session," Corbin announced, cutting off the boy's question and drawing his attention to the table in front of him. "Before we began the arrangements for the next mission, there is a little matter of business we need to take care of." Corbin motioned to his group. "It has come to our attention that one among us is an outsider." Andy's confused look disappeared. "I, personally, would hardly call this person 'one among us'. He is as apart from us as we would expect an outsider to be. And just as weak for hiding his true nature. He never was one of us. It took just one person to discover this, and to realize what kind of lowly coward would pass himself off as a member of this brigade--"

Andy stood up abruptly, his fists in tight balls at his sides. His chair toppled over and the entire room was silently watching him. Every face in the room turned to him. Only the protruding veins in his hands betrayed any emotion coming from the youth, as his face was calm and his eyes were clear and crisp.

"Andrew Masters," Corbin echoed through the silence. "You have been accused of treachery against this entire brigade of men. How do you plead?"

"Who made the accusation?" Andy demanded calmly, ignoring the unit leader's question. He could feel everyone looking at him. He wanted to glance over at Tom; he had to know what to do, and his friend was the only person who could possibly know how to solve this problem. Tom was the only one who knew about him up until now, so surely he wouldn't have told.... No. Andy brushed the thought from his mind an instant later. He didn't trust himself to look away from Corbin.

"Your trial will be held now, regardless of what you plead, Masters, but if you admit your treason the punishment will be far less severe, I guarantee it." The man was smiling. Andy's heart speed, and his breathing quickened as he ran through every possible alternative to doing what he was about to do; he knew it would be the end for him. After living in the brigade for eleven years, he knew exactly how they felt about outsiders.

There was no way he was getting out of this one.

"Who accused me?" He said more slowly, his hands unfolding and letting go of their rage.

Corbin frowned hesitantly. "Does it really matter?"

"Yes, it matters!" He had not meant to cry out. Andy's eyes inadvertently scanned the room and stopped at Sean Trowing across the room in Levsky's unit. Sean's eyes were angry, but not at Andy; his gray eyes glared at Corbin with indescribable hatred that most everyone else had saved for Andrew.

"You were accused by Atashi Mitsketa," Corbin informed him proudly, "who heard of your origin with his own ears. How do you plead?"

Andy finally moved his eyes to Tom. The great man sat hunched over his portion of the table, as if unable to lift his head and meet the youth's gaze. Andy looked back up at Corbin. He didn't know what to do. For once, words failed him. He knew that should they find him guilty, no matter what he pleaded, he would die. The boy smiled hopelessly into the face of his executioner.

"This is ridiculous!" A voice cried out from the far side of the room. Sean shot up out of his seat and gestured angrily toward the table. "You have no proof of any sort of treachery save what some wriggling worm claims to have heard! We cannot base a trial off of this information!"

"You will take your seat now, underling!" Corbin cried back.

"Even if Masters did come here from the outside," Geoff began, rising beside Sean, "he has passed as one of us all this time, maybe that is proof that it is possible to recruit from the outside. This could revolutionize our entire training--"

"We will not have outsiders inside this base and parading around as one of us!" A woman from the same group called.

"This should not even be an argument," William Greystone proclaimed, standing calmly from Corbin's unit. "It is the law that outsiders are not to be allowed into this base. To even grant someone knowledge of it is treason in itself."

"That's true!" cried Van Johnson of Levsky's unit. "How could Masters have gotten inside the base without anyone knowing? He must have had accomplices! They should be punished as well!"

Amid the uproar, Andy stood glued to the spot, staring wide-eyed at the shouting figures of Sean and Geoff, wondering why they would possibly be vouching for him. Rachel suddenly stood up beside him and took hold of his arm again.

"Now! Go, Andy! You have to get out of here!" she yelled, her words muffled by the angry cries of those around her.

Andy hesitated. Everything seemed quiet and clear for an instant as he looked into the girl's eyes. "I may not be able to come back for you," he whispered almost inaudibly, without thinking.

Rachel winced and closed her eyes, looking angry. "Go, Andy."

He didn't move. He wanted to kiss her, to take her in his arms and hold her there, amid the explosion, and never let go. He wanted to take her with him away from her home and her family, and to leave this place forever. He wanted to tell her...

Andy turned and ran as fast as his legs could take him. He heard startled cries behind him, then skin hitting bone as someone in the crowd was punched in the face. Alarmed voices rose above the rest; Corbin was yelling. "Trowing! Chase! You will stop this right now!" Andy swung out the exit and pounded down the hallway. He ran blindly between the dirt walls and tiny candles. The ground was cool beneath his feet, but the air felt thick and too often used. He felt that he was being suffocated, and that the tunnel would collapse at any moment, leaving him buried a mile beneath the desert sand. Forcing himself to concentrate on getting out, his breathing slowed and his panic subsided. All thoughts of who may be following him and the fate of Sean and Geoff for standing up for him were pushed into the depths of his mind, and he could see clearly again.

The passage to the Terrian Desert was only forty feet ahead. As he ran now, Andy thought of only two things: the password he would use to get through the passageway, and the distinctly sour taste that stale bread used to leave on his tongue.