Shredded. Her small body was absolutely shredded. She pushed herself up on the remainder of the wall, hearing the cheers of her comrades as if from far away. Blood trickled down the side of her freckled face. She tasted her blood mixed with ashes, gun smoke, and dirt. Every breath was agony. Her steps were leaden as she made her way outside. The noon sun shone through the hole she had blasted through the wall. Outside the brilliant azure sky was clear and friendly.

She stumbled out into the bright desert sun, squinting at the sudden brightness in her eyes. Her red-gold hair stuck to the side of her face because the blood the hair had been immersed in dried as soon as the sun hit it. “Suma!” The girl heard the name and looked up to the best of her ability. Her vision was hazy and she was dizzy. She could not recognize the face of the man running towards her. She tried to take a step away from him but tripped and toppled into the dirt, where she lay motionless.

It was nerve wracking. Tomo sat in his kitchen, waiting for the doctor to come back up from the cellar with his assistant and all Tomo and Suma’s friends. He slammed his fist into the table. Why did he have to be the only one who couldn’t stand the sight of blood?

A shadow was thrown across Tomo’s face. He looked up to the doorway. “Who?” he asked, blinking.

The shadowy figure in the doorway answered with a thick voice. “Your sister’s boyfriend,” he said. He entered the room, furrowing his brow worriedly. He hurried to the open cellar door and looked down. “How are they doing?”

Tomo leaned back in his chair. “Last I heard things were going pretty well. How was your mother, Nicolaas?”

Nicolaas looked back at Tomo. “She was fine. She insisted that I come check on Suma’s progress.” He looked back into the darkness of the cellar. “Is she still in surgery?”

Tomo shook his head. “I don’t think so. I think they’re just setting bones now. We can go check.”

Nicolaas looked back at Tomo, who wasn’t moving. “Well?”

“Oh, yeah,” said Tomo. He stood and joined Nicolaas in going down into the cellar.

“Another roll of gauze tape! Stat!”

“I’m moving as fast as I can, Doctor!”

“Here’s your tape, Doc!”

“Thank you, Gabriel. Miss Ikuko? I need you!”

“Coming, Doctor!”

Watching this pandemonium unfold from two chairs in the corner, Fujita and Adrianus couldn’t help but giggle. They turned to each other and continued their former conversation. “She looks pretty bad, Adrianus,” said Fujita.

“Yes, Fujita. I don’t think it’s ever looked worse.” They both looked other at Suma being worked on by the Doctor, his nurse Miss Ikuko, and the young Gabriel.

“I hope she makes it,” stated Fujita flatly.

Adrianus nodded. “Me too,” he said.

“She looked pretty bad.”

“Yes she did.”

“I don’t think that she’s going to be able to shoot again, Adrianus,” whispered Fujita.

“I agree. She’s going to be heartbroken. Shooting is her life.”

“She always has Nicolaas.”

“But he comes with us on our missions. She won’t be able to. She might not even be able to walk after this. Fujita? Did you realize that every other time she’s done something like this, she could walk away? She blacked out.”

Fujita nodded. “That was odd. Did you notice also, Adrianus, that when Nicolaas was running to her, she didn’t move towards him, rather away from him? What do you think that was?”

Adrianus shook his head. “I truly don’t know.”

They lapsed into a silence and watched the Doctor set countless bones.

Nicolaas and Tomo came down the stairs just as the Doctor finished. They nearly ran into each other. “I’m glad you’re here,” he said. “I need to speak to both of you on a matter of most serious importance.” The two men glanced at each other, alarmed.

“She must remain at home. She cannot lift anything over twenty five pounds, even if that means when she has children that she can’t carry them when they reach twenty months, and she can only hold one at a time. She cannot break her probation, or, and I’ll be frank, she shall die. Her vertebrae, ribs, arms, legs, and all organs have taken countless beatings, which add up to serious damage on all fronts.”

Nicolaas shook his head. “Can’t you fix her?” he demanded.

The Doctor shook his head. “One can only be ripped into pieces so many times before it’s final. I’m sorry.”

“Please,” Tomo begged, “she’s very important to our team. We need her.”

“And she needs her rest!” The Doctor stood, his chair scraping across the floor. “You gentlemen obviously do not understand what I am saying. She will die if she tries to surpass herself again.”

Nicolaas stood to face the Doctor. “She’d rather die fighting than die as just another civilian!”

“You think I don’t know that!?”

Tomo stood. “Guys, Please,” he said. “The important thing is that Suma is okay for now and that-” He never got to finish.

Miss Ikuko’s voice called frantically from the cellar. “Doctor! She’s come to!”

The first thing she noticed was that it was cool. She remembered a desert from before. A vast desert. Maybe she was imagining that little bit. She sat up, but immediately wished she hadn’t. She felt sick and dizzy.

“Suma,” said a voice full of relief.

The girl looked to her right, from where the voice had come. A small boy wearing pressed khaki pants with brown suspenders, and a white shirt with a brown tie, a young woman in a brightly colored desert poncho, and a man in Arabian dress stood smiling at her bedside.

“Suma,” repeated the boy. “Oh thank goodness, Suma. We thought you were a goner.”

The girl stared at the boy for several long moments. She looked down at her comforter. She suddenly dug in her back pocket. She pulled out her identification card. She stared at it for several long moments. “Suma Mesla,” she mouthed. She suddenly jumped up and ran over to the mirror across the room.

“Uh, Suma?” asked the boy. The girl paid no attention. She stared at her reflection, noting her red hair with golden streaks, her bright green eyes, her freckles. She glanced back at the identification card. It was definitely she. Suma Mesla…so that was her name.

Suma turned to the boy who was addressing her. “Who…who are you? Where am I?”

The woman at the boy’s right blinked. “Suma, dear, are you okay? It’s Fujita, can you see straight?”

“Fujita…” said Suma as if tasting the word. Suma put her hands on her hips. She felt a bump. “What?” She slipped her hand under her coat, which had been put back on her. She pulled out a gun, loaded it, and held it in the ready position, aiming at the man.

“Suma!” cried Fujita. “Have you lost your mind!?”

“What’s your name?”

The man didn’t blink. “Adrianus.”

“Why do I carry such a weapon?”

“Backup.”

Suma twirled it on her finger and placed the gun back in its holster. “And who are you?” she asked the boy.

“Suma? Don’t you know me? You were there when my mom gave birth to me. I’m your cousin, Gabriel. Suma, what’s wrong?”

Suma shook her head. “I don’t know who I am. Where am I?” she asked.

Adrianus stepped forward. “Suma you’re in the cellar of your home. You just came out of a horrible accident. I think you have amnesia.”

“Amnesia?” asked Gabriel, looking up at the two adults.

Fujita nodded. “When something traumatic happens to a person, sometimes they lose all or some of their memory. We’ve seen it happen elsewhere. Suma must’ve knocked something out of place.”

“So I’ve lost my past.”

Adrianus nodded. “That’s a simple way to put it.”

Suma sat on the floor. “I’m tired,” she said.

Nicolaas, the Doctor, Tomo, and Ikuko came downstairs moments after Suma’s diagnosis. Nicolaas ran towards her. Frightened, she drew her gun and pointed it at Nicolaas. He froze in his tracks. “Who’s he?” she asked Adrianus.

Adrianus answered, a look of amusement playing on his lips, “Your fiancé, Nicolaas.”

“And them?” Suma motioned with her gun the people behind Nicolaas.

“Your doctor, his nurse Ikuko, and your twin brother, Tomo.”

Suma nodded, putting away her gun. Nicolaas stared at Suma, astonished. “Suma,” he whispered.

Suma stood, brushing herself off. She glanced at Nicolaas. “Nicolaas, Doctor, Tomo,” said Fujita, coming up to them. “Suma remembers nothing about her past. She has amnesia. Adrianus and I have seen such things countless times before and with the blast that she took, I’m not surprised.” Fujita looked thoughtfully over at Suma. “She seems psychically okay, though I’m not sure whether she’ll recover from this amnesia. I…” Fujita faltered suddenly. She looked tenderly at Nicolaas and Tomo. “She…she doesn’t know either of you. Give her time.” Nicolaas stared at his fiancé, who studied her many pistols. Gabriel was identifying and explaining each one as she showed it to him.

“Will she be all right?” Nicolaas asked weakly.

The Doctor nodded. “You’re going to adjust, Nicolaas. She’ll be fine.”

Tomo walked until he stood next to Suma and Gabriel, who were on the floor, studying Suma’s large arsenal. He looked down at Suma, who pointed to and named each gun. She looked up into Tomo’s face. She smiled. “Hello.”

“Hello,” he answered.

“You’re Tomo, right?”

“Yes, Suma, I am your brother.”

Suma nodded. “We are the same age. We are twins.” She looked down at her guns again. “I remember having more.”

“More what?” asked Tomo.

Suma stared into some undefined point in space. “I remember pushing myself up in a dark room, with sun on the far wall. I remember carrying large, metal weights all the way to the other end. I remember stumbling and falling into the dirt before blacking out. I remember…blood and dirt and…gun smoke…”

Tomo’s eyes widened. “What else do you remember?”

Suma shook her head. “Nothing. That’s it. I know that the square root of seven is two point six four five seven five one three one one. Why do I know that?”

“You…you liked math,” said Tomo.

Suma nodded. She stood, brushing herself off. “So, what now?”

Gabriel pointed to the next can, about two hundred yards away. “It’s an impossible shot.”

Suma smiled. “Watch and learn, Junior.” She knelt, bringing her gun up in front her face. She lined up the shot, brought her arm under the pistol to steady it, and fired. She heard the clink of the bullet hitting the can and she saw the can spin off the fence and into the dirt.

Gabriel clapped. “Impressive,” he called. “Try two fifty!”

Suma nodded. “That beer bottle?”

“Yep,” said Gabriel.

“All right, then.” Suma lined up her shot. She fired. The bottle shattered, sending pieces of glass glittering in the sun. Gabriel nodded.

“You weren’t this good...” He realized what he had said and then looked off into the distance, avoiding her eyes and blushing. “I’m sorry…I shouldn’t have said anything. You’re just so different now, and so much better at some things and worse at others…and…I’m sorry…”

Suma smiled as she stood up and brushed off. “It’s okay; I don’t mind… I am different now, I suppose.” She holstered her gun. “I don’t remember being different, but I suppose it’s a possibility, isn’t it?” She laughed, and then turned to walk away.

“Suma,” said Gabriel, staring at the dirt.

Suma looked at him over her shoulder. “Huh?”

Gabriel looked up at her. Suma turned back to him. There were tears in his eyes and on his face. “We miss your old self. Can’t you be like her? Can’t you miss your shots and curse the gun or targets? Can’t you love Nicolaas no matter what he did and yet always side with Tomo? I don’t understand, Suma! What happened to you!?” He turned away, crying.

“Gabriel…” Suma took a step towards him.

“You used to call me Gabe. Go. I can’t have you seeing me like this.”

“But…Gabe…”

Gabriel hit the dirt with his fists in a fit of temper. “Go!”

Suma sighed, and then turned away. “Very well, Gabriel…” She shoved her hands deep in her pockets and walked away, wondering what she had done wrong. Gabriel’s tears turned the dust to mud at his knees.

Suma wandered into the house she had been told belonged to her. Her sunglasses caught the orangey rays of the sun, reflecting it across the forehead of the sleeping figure at the table. Suma studied this man in silence. Had they been in love? Why couldn’t she remember? His face was relaxed, happy. She smiled some. She shifted in the doorway, her shadow falling across his face.

Nicolaas opened his eyes sleepily, looking up at the shadowed figure in the doorway. “Hey, beautiful,” he said with a dopey grin. “How was the range?”

Suma removed her glasses. “Was I a bad shot?” she asked.

Nicolaas’ brow furrowed in confusion. “What? Why?”

“Gabriel got upset when I made the one-fifty shot,” said she, gliding through the room, taking off her jacket and holster. “He said that I was very different now.” Nicolaas stared at her. She turned to him. “They say that we were in love. You must know. Am I very different?”

Nicolaas looked at her in silence for a moment. “I can’t tell, Suma. Sometimes I think that you havebecome someone entirely new, and then, other times, I look into your eyes and I see the same girl who I fell in love with years ago…”

Suma blushed and looked down at the floor. “I suppose I can understand why I loved you.”

Nicolaas smiled. “We only recently started seriously seeing each other, but I’ve loved you since the third grade.”

Suma looked up at him, setting her things to the side. “But I don’t even know…” Her voice wavered slightly, her eyes a little bit teary.

Nicolaas tilted his head to the side. “What don’t you know?”

Suma took a step nearer him. “I don’t even know you.” Her lower lip trembled as she spoke, her eyes shimmering. “I don’t know that I love you….Nicolaas…I’m so sorry!” She burst into tears, turning from the room.

“Buh-” started Nicolaas. But Suma was already gone. He sighed deeply, staring into the recesses of the darkened doorway she had thrown herself through. He shook his head. “I may not know this side of you yet…but I love you. That I do know…”

Tomo had polished these guns three times today, now. His mind wandered over his sister’s condition, and possible cures. He very much wanted things to return to normal, and he could tell that the others felt the same. Adrianus held little hope for her, however, saying that she was probably changed for good.

But that wasn’t the only thing troubling him as he sat, staring off into the dusty horizon from underneath the relative safety of the adobe veranda. Their enemies made him nervous, hiding like trap door spiders in the barren landscape. He almost wanted them to attack. At least he knew where he was in a fight. And Suma…He refused to acknowledge the tears on his face for her. He lay awake at night, praying that at the sun’s first rays, Suma would remember everything, but it hadn’t happened yet, and he doubted it ever would.

A hot breeze disturbed Tomo’s hair, pushing it into his eyes. He sighed, running a hand through his hair.