"It _is_ an ill wind," she agreed, smiling wryly, "but don't let me
catch you thinking that way, Kevin. Can't you see it would be better
that there should be no war and you should remain useless?"
I couldn't see it, of course, and she knew that, with her wretched
talent for stripping away my feeble attempts at privacy. Psi-powers
usually included some ability to form a mental shield; being without
one, I was necessarily devoid of the other.
My attitude didn't matter, though, because it was definitely war. The
aliens came back with a fleet clearly bent on our annihilation--even
the 'paths couldn't figure out their motives, for the thought pattern
was entirely different from ours--and the war was on.
I had enjoyed learning first-aid; it was the first time I had ever
worked with people as an equal. And I was good at it because psi-powers
aren't much of an advantage there. Telekinesis maybe a little, but
I was big enough to lift anybody without needing any superhuman
abilities--normal human abilities, rather.
"Gee, Mr. Faraday," one of the other students breathed, "you're so
strong. And without 'kinesis or anything."
I looked at her and liked what I saw. She was blonde and pretty. "My
name's not Mr. Faraday," I said. "It's Kevin."
"My name's Lucy," she giggled.
No girl had ever giggled at me in that way before. Immediately I
started to envision a beautiful future for the two of us, then flushed
when I realized that she might be a telepath. But she was winding a
tourniquet around the arm of another member of the class with apparent
unconcern.
"Hey, quit that!" the windee yelled. "You're making it too tight! I'll
be mortified!"
So Lucy was obviously not a telepath. Later I found out she was only
a low-grade telesensitive--just a poetess--so I had nothing to worry
about as far as having my thoughts read went. I was a little afraid of
Sylvia's kidding me about my first romance, but, as it happened, she
got interested in one of the guys who was taking the class with us, and
she was not only too busy to be bothered with me, but in too vulnerable
a position herself.
However, when the actual bombs--or their alien equivalent--struck near
our town, I wasn't nearly so happy, especially after they started
carrying the wounded into the Psycho Center, which had been turned into
a hospital for the duration. I took one look at the gory scene--I had
never seen anybody really injured before; few people had, as a matter
of fact--and started for the door. But Mother was already blocking the
way. It was easy to see from which side of the family Tim had got his
talent for prognostication.
"If the telepaths who can pick up all the pain can stand this, Kevin,"
she said, "_you_ certainly can." And there was no kindness at all in
the _you_.
She gave me a shove toward the nearest stretcher. "Go on--now's your
chance to show you're of some use in this world."
* * * * *
Gritting my teeth, I turned to the man on the stretcher. Something had
pretty near torn half his face away. It was all there, but not in the
right place, and it wasn't pretty. I turned away, caught my mother's
eye, and then I didn't even dare to throw up. I looked at that smashed
face again and all the first-aid lessons I'd had flew out of my head as
if some super-psi had plucked them from me.
The man was bleeding terribly. I had never seen blood pouring out like
that before. The first thing to do, I figured sickly, was mop it up. I
wet a sponge and dabbed gingerly at the face, but my hands were shaking
so hard that the sponge slipped and my fingers were on the raw gaping
wound. I could feel the warm viscosity of the blood and nothing, not
even my mother, could keep my meal down this time, I thought.
Mother had uttered a sound of exasperation as I dropped the sponge. I
could hear her coming toward me. Then I heard her gasp. I looked at my
patient and my mouth dropped open. For suddenly there was no wound,
no wound at all--just a little blood and the fellow's face was whole
again. Not even a scar.
"Wha--wha happened?" he asked. "It doesn't hurt any more!"
He touched his cheek and looked up at me with frightened eyes. And I
was frightened, too--too frightened to be sick, too frightened to do
anything but stare witlessly at him.
"Touch some of the others, quick!" my mother commanded, pushing
astounded attendants away from stretchers.
I touched broken limbs and torn bodies and shattered heads, and they
were whole again right away. Everybody in the room was looking at me in
the way I had always dreamed of being looked at. Lucy was opening and
shutting her beautiful mouth like a beautiful fish. In fact, the whole
thing was just like a dream, except that I was awake. I couldn't have
imagined all those horrors.
But the horrors soon weren't horrors any more. I began to find them
almost pleasing; the worse a wound was, the more I appreciated it.
There was so much more satisfaction, virtually an esthetic thrill, in
seeing a horrible jagged tear smooth away, heal, not in days, as it
would have done under the cure-all, but in seconds.
"Timothy was right," my mother said, her eyes filled with tears, "and
I was wrong ever to have doubted. You have a gift, son--" and she said
the word son loud and clear so that everybody could hear it--"the
greatest gift of all, that of healing." She looked at me proudly. And
Lucy and the others looked at me as if I were a god or something.