"You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today."
~~ Abraham Lincoln

On the Great American Railroad, summer faded to fall, greens turning gold and red, and then finally departed with the arrival of the winds of November. Arctic chill flowed down from Canada in frigid rivers. The autumn that year was remembered for the gala wedding of Pat Ryan to Ev's sister Elizabeth in late September, and for the birth of Max O'Connell's second child, a daughter, in October. There was much celebration, though the events were a month apart.

By the time the second week of November began, the cold weather was there to stay, and everything had settled down to a relative quiet in the terminal of Cameron. It was as tranquil as it ever got in that busy railroad yard.

Following daily custom, Rig Dawson arrived at the Yard Office only a few minutes early for his 759 Transfer job. He was surprised to find Ev Rykoff, his closest friend, and his crew drinking coffee in the lunchroom. He fetched his own mug of yard brew; it was strong, hot and lethal to anyone sensitive to caffeine. "Hey, Ev, what's up?" He inquired.

Ev looked up from the newspaper that he was reading, and smiled. "Called for the Beloit Transfer, and midnight trick hasn't finished building our train. At this rate, you and your fearless switchologists will have to dance the rest out on days."

"And I suppose they left a lion's share for us?"

"You got it," Pat intoned. "We'll be lucky to get outta here by ten or eleven o'clock. There's a winter storm warning out."

"This early in the season?" Rig groaned.

"Yup," Ev replied, stretching. "Might get up to ten inches."

"Damn! It's only November. We may be in for a bad winter."

"Rig, what're you worried about?" Pat Ryan, Ev's conductor on the Beloit Transfer, snickered. "It's not like you're going to be out in it."

"Shit. I just hate winter..." Rig muttered, watching Pat eye Rykoff, who just smiled and shrugged. The other trainmen in the lunchroom smiled, but made no verbal comments--until Rig's Foreman walked in.

Ron DesCartes called from the north lunchroom door. "Yeah...he hates winter, all right. Just watch how smug he gets when we freeze outside while he stays warm and dry with his toes wrapped around the heater box. He throws a fit if we open a window..."

Rig grumbled, shaking his head. "Monday..." The disgruntled engineer stalked out the lunchroom door, passed Ron, and walked down the corridor towards the outside door. Taking a deep breath, he pushed open the screen door to the cold world outdoors. The temperature was hovering just below freezing, and the wind was in the process of shifting. Rig shivered slightly, dressed for the engine cab, not the lead. As he walked out towards the yard tracks, he scanned the sky. Low, scudding clouds covered the sun.

Sure smells like snow, he thought, searching across the west ends of the closest tracks to find 4190. The 1159 Top End was still switching in the middle, their noise a counterpoint to his thoughts. Where are you?

I'm on the North Lead Pocket, T'raagahr informed him.

Rig turned to his right, and sure enough, there was his engine, big as life. "I'm getting old," he muttered.

No, you're not. The hostler just brought me over from the sand tracks. I wasn't here five minutes ago.

He could've parked you closer, he carped as he walked the equivalent of a block and a half to get where T'raa was tied down.

You can always just lite-in, his silicrys reminded him, as a large cut of cars rattled past on the lead headed for Ev's embryonic train.

"Did Ev bid back on the Beloit Transfer?" Rig asked rhetorically, knowing his invisible companion T'raagahr could hear him. He was apparently talking to himself as he strolled down the lead.

"No, just the Extra Board," a familiar voice replied from right behind him.

Rig turned.

"Mind a little company?" Ev grinned at him, his white hair tousled by the fitful wind.

"'Course not," Rig said. "Y'know, we haven't really done anything together since Pat and Elizabeth's wedding, and before that it was..."

"I know." Ev watched his feet, trying to avoid Rig's eyes. Both knew what Rig was thinking of.

"I promised something I had no right to promise, after the Ferris wheel thing. It wasn't my place."

"Forget it. It's not your fault you don't have the p'raanahr."

"I never really minded until I met all those kids at the Fair. It was then that I learned how helpless I really was. I've been meaning to speak to you about--"

"The Dahlgren girl?"

"Yeah. Maybe I'm just taken with her personality, but I was very impressed with her. Since the Fair, I've been volunteering over at Rock County Children's Hospital. I've visited her lots of times, twice when she was very sick. She's dying. It won't be long before her cancer makes her life totally unlivable. I want to help her--in fact, I want to help all of them. If only I had that damned p'raanahr. It would be so easy."

"It's not as easy as it seems, Rig." They stood at the foot of 4190's rear platform ladder in an uncomfortable silence. A few snowflakes drifted around them, chased by the gusting wind.

"I realize..."

"No, you don't, Rig. You don't know what it feels like to invoke the p'raanahr." Ev looked hard at his friend, their eyes locked. Rig had a pained expression on his face.

Softly he answered. "You know that I don't."

"I wish I could help you, but if I start healing every kid with cancer--just flat out curing them--then where will I be?" There was anguish in Ev's shining blue eyes.

Rig gazed down at the crosstie beneath the edge of 4190's running board and kicked it. "Probably on the front page of the Clarion," he admitted, not looking up.

"Exactly. Can't you see why I must say no? Forget about them, Rig. We can't solve all the world's problems."

"Damn it, Ev! I can't forget about Melody! She's my friend. I promised I would try. I promised her mother."

"You should know better than to promise something you can't deliver."

"Ev!"

"I know, I know!" His voice held barely contained torment as he gazed at his friend. "Don't you think I understand? Don't forget I had a daughter once, too..."

Rig regretted ever asking for his help. "I'm sorry."

Ev swallowed hard, his voice a bit unsteady. "Hey...forget it. Neither of us chose what we would be able to do with these silicrys, did we? I don't think they even knew what we would be able to do until after our siivahnurahs were completed."

"It just seems like you're the lucky one..." After he said it, Rig immediately wished he hadn't.

Ev closed his eyes, unforgettable memories mirrored on his face as he lowered his head. "Get up on your engine, and get to work. I've got to go." For a moment, Ev looked up at Rig, and he saw all the heartache he held inside reflected in his pale eyes. Then, before Rig could say anything else, he vanished.

Rig dejectedly stared at the spot Ev had vacated. I can't really blame you, buddy. I'm one son of a bitch that sure as hell doesn't know when to keep his big mouth shut. He stared up at the red and white enameled unit at his elbow, and sighed. Muttering self-recriminations, he slowly climbed up on 4190 to begin the day's work.

That evening, the snow fell deep and drifted high. It turned out to be quite a storm. Visibility was severely restricted, and Ev was very glad that they had made it back to Cameron before the worst of it had begun. 1019 was on one of the Pit Ready tracks that evening. Even though he was off duty, he watched the blinding snow from his seat at the engine controls.

His mind was not on the storm, however. He was thinking of the conversation he had had with Rig that morning. He was also thinking of the things that he and Janet had discussed in the summer. Although some of Rig's comments had hurt badly, Jenine had agreed with them--as she had agreed with Janet. That did not sit well with him. Staring out at the wildly blowing snow, he talked with Jenine, his own silicrys. "I can't."

You must! You have the gift, just as Janet and Rig have said. Not to use it is to deny what we are. Is that what you wish?

"Jen, don't do this to me!"

You do this to yourself, siiur'kiirehn. The pain must be borne, though I believe there must be a way to deal with that. I do not remember there being such a pain factor in this. I will think on it more thoroughly. As for the factor of discovery, I believe you may have a point. We do not need to share this gift with the entire world--unless you are personally called to that.

"I'm not. Believe me," he assured her.

Then use your gift with discretion. We will work on dealing with the pain memories.

"Why can't I forget them?" He whispered, remembered pain coloring his voice. "Why is there no way to dull that aspect?"

I do not know. It seems that you have the extremes of the p'raanahr. Most have no pain memories--and most are less gifted. I will think on it.

"Until then," he sighed, "I'm going to talk to my sister Beth. She's a volunteer at the Rock County Children's hospital. If anyone can help with the discretion end of this, she can. I'd still rather not do it, though."

Everett. Her thought was strong with her certainty. You cannot escape what you are...what we are. I feel your pain, also. Never forget that fact.

That was news to him. He hadn't realized she endured it, too. He then understood the enormity of his survival after the fire in the spring. "I won't forget, Jen."

Then promise me by our kihn'ur that you will use the p'raanahr when there is need.

"Jen, I--"

Promise me, Everett.

He took a deep breath, watching the snowdrift on her engine nose. She was very serious when she used his name like that. "I promise you, Jenine. By whatever powers you believe in, I promise." He prayed he wouldn't regret that promise to her.

I mean this to be for Melody Dahlgren, Ev. Jenine's chiming voice was softer, gentler in his mind.

"Just because of Rig's promise?" He shot back, irritated anew by the corner Rig had painted him into.

No. Melody is one of us, though she is still unchosen.

That statement surprised Ev. "How do you know this?"

T'raagahr and I feel it. She has the mind for it. She desires it. One of my race will find her--if she lives long enough. Her call is very hard to ignore.

Ev smiled, laughing to himself. "Wouldn't that just fix Dahlgren's wagon?"

I believe that is a true statement, but, if you do not find your destiny, Melody will not be able to find hers.

"I hate to say it, Jen, but you're right. I'm sorry," he whispered to the empty cab. "I'll do as you ask."

Though the snow had gone south and east, in LaCrosse the cold had stayed, reducing the temperatures to the teens. The midnight switch engine had just tied up. Dawn was painting the eastern sky in greens and oranges, streamers of cloud reaching far to the west, the only visible remnants of the storm that had swept through Cameron the night before.

Janet Newman, brakewoman and midnight yard rat, fell gratefully into her bed as the first rays of the morning sun beamed into her open curtains. The night had been difficult. There had been a lot of switching to do, and she had been the 'pin-man.' She felt as if she had not stopped moving all night long.

Damn, I'm tired, she thought, settling herself into bed. The northeast wind was rattling the windows, foretelling another storm in the works. It was the beginning of her third winter on the railroad. She knew what to expect, but wasn't enthusiastic about it. She was currently happy to just rest her aching muscles and sleep. Within a few moments, she had drifted off.

It was sometime later, the sun gone from her eastern window, when she experienced a very lucid dream. It was a very tactile, emotional dream, full of strange images and impressions. It was a vision of vast interstellar space, with glowing lines of force that knit the stars together in an unimaginably huge web. In this place, she dreamt of a being--best described as a cross between a graceful flower and a butterfly--who navigated that streaming web with ease. There was no apparent plot to the dream--just flashes of indelible images and sensations. Tying it all together was a personal, intense need that woke her up crying sometime after dusk.

She sat up in bed, tears streaming down her face, an intense longing filling her with pain. "What does it mean?" She cried, her throat aching and constricted. She remembered the images, the sensations, but felt them slipping from her conscious mind as she tried to make some sense out of what she had experienced. What did stay with her was the impression of need, of desire--a longing.

"What is it that I'm longing for?" She whispered, confused. It seemed the answer was just out of her grasp.

She yawned as the tears dried on her cheeks. Darkness filled the room, but for the shaft of light shed by the streetlight outside. The wind still rattled her bedroom windows, still out of the northeast. She shivered, pulling her dark green, ivy-patterned quilt closer around her. She sighed as her head touched the pillows again; sleep washing over her, the dream filed away in her subconscious.

The snow was slush, and another storm was on its way before Ev got time to do anything more than mention his hospital visitation idea to Elizabeth over the phone. She had set a time and a date for them to meet. It was the Tuesday afternoon before Thanksgiving when Ev drove over to the Rock County Children's Hospital to meet with his sister. He had planned his first visit only as an orientation trip, to familiarize himself with the place. He wanted to know how the place was run, where everyone worked, and where the patients were. He wanted to do his real work alone--late at night.

Elizabeth met him at the reception desk, slightly surprised that he actually had shown up. "I can't believe you really want to help," she said enthusiastically, as they walked down the main corridor towards the volunteer's locker room. "When you called, I thought you were pulling my leg."

Ev gave her a withering look. His concealing contacts showed the telltale pale ring around his irises. "You told me you could help me. I don't need you examining my motives," he said through his teeth. He was not looking forward to what he would have to do.

"I guess a spontaneous change of heart wasn't it, eh?"

"No."

"Didn't think so. Jenine put you up to this, didn't she?"

"Yes...in a way. I wish it were otherwise."

"Do you still want to go through with this?"

"Yes. I don't have any choice."

"Then let's go."

Clad in a white volunteer's coat, much like the staff wore, Ev followed Elizabeth around on a grand tour. It took more than an hour to walk through the facility. More than once he had to restrain himself from reaching out to a crying child, from relieving a searing pain, or from curing a coughing, sick infant. After a while, he was trembling from the excess empathic energies in the place. Elizabeth noticed his distress, and took him to a quiet, unoccupied room.

Ev sat down on the neatly made bed and closed his eyes, his whole body shaking. In his mind, all the energy of all the sick children whirled in a disturbing dance, overloading his senses. With great effort, he corralled the sensations, putting them into the compartment where such pain was hidden. He gasped in surprise as the trapped memories exploded into his consciousness.

Elizabeth watched his face pale as he went into a convulsion. She held him as he struggled, his eyes wide with shock. After a few moments, he lay back on the bed, still, his breathing ragged. Tears ran from the corners of his open eyes.

"Ev! Can you hear me? Ev..." She spoke to him, her hands clutching his shoulders. She watched as his eyes refocused on her face.

"I hear you." He sounded very tired.

"Can you sit up? What happened?"

"If I was to use railroad terminology, I'd say 'ground fault...' or maybe 'flash-over' would be better..." His voice faded. He closed his eyes again, going through a milder seizure, a groan coming from his lips. "I don't think I can do this. It's too much." He breathed.