Undaa, Hakar, Stardate 2270.135

Velekh knew she was dead even before he and Kadren had deemed it safe to pick themselves up off the ground and look around. The area immediately surrounding them was undamaged but he didn't notice.

"My mother's dead."

"What?"

"My mother's dead."

"How do you know?"

"I can sense it. She's dead!" Velekh felt like the words were coming out of someone else's mouth.

"Can you be sure?"

"Yes."

"What about my grandfather?"

"I don't know, but a lot of people are dead!"

The next three days were a blur for Velekh. He could only think about how he might find a way to speak with his father. He was last in the Algeron system but Velekh was unsure whether he was still there and he had no way to contact him. In his own despair, he was only vaguely cognizant of Kadren's. In later years he would regret that he had only been thinking of himself at the time.

The center of the explosion had been the southeastern part of the 17th district, which was adjacent to the northwest part of the 9th district, where the apartment building on Alseren Street was located. The amount of debris blocking the roadways prevented them from accessing Alseren or any of the adjacent streets. Rescue workers had directed them to a shelter, where they found themselves among dozens of other people who were unable to return to their homes. Velekh didn't sleep and he couldn't remember if he ate at all during that time. Kadren was constantly checking the database containing the names and locations of those who had been rescued. Some survivors were at other shelters, some at hospitals. Neither Kadren's grandfather's nor Velekh's mother's name appeared in the database.
On the third morning after the rocket attack, survivors staying at the shelter who had not been reunited with missing family members were directed to several hospitals around the city were bodies of victims were being housed. Most family members would have to visit multiple hospitals as unidentified bodies were only listed by gender, approximate age, and the location where they had been found. Kadren informed Velekh that they would be going to City Hospital #3. Velekh did not want to go. He knew his mother was dead but he did not want to go to a morgue and look for her body. Kadren, however, pulled him along, insisting that not going was not an option.

On the tram ride to the hospital, for the first time since he had become aware of his mother's death, his own emotions subsided sufficiently for him to pick up on Kadren's. He was surprised that Kadren had already accepted the idea that his grandfather was dead. He did not seem emotional about it but instead, resolute. Had he determined from the description in the database that Orat's body was among those at the morgue? Surely there must be a number of old men who were killed in the attack.

The morgue at the Undaa City Hospital #3 was the first place Velekh had ever seen a dead body. Although Velekh had sensed that "a lot" of people had died, the actual number would later be determined to be 123. It was quite a small number considering how densely populated Undaa was. Rescue workers had been able to free many people trapped in debris. A man with a tablet sat at the entrance to the morgue, asking questions about each person's missing family member and directing them to bodies that matched the description. As Velekh and Kadren approached, the man's lips pursed. His gaze was focused on Velekh.

"I am looking for my grandfather. He is 79. He is looking for his mother." Kadren glanced at Velekh.

"The woman is on the left. Number seventeen." Then, glancing at the tablet, he said, "Try eight and...twenty-four for the man. On the right. My condolences."

Velekh did not want to enter the room but there were people waiting behind them. Kadren put his hands on Velekh's shoulders and pushed him through the doorway and off to the left. The bodies were laid out on trays, covered in silvery cloths. Each tray had a piece of paper affixed to the end. #15, adult female, Alseren Street was the first one he saw. Then #22, young adult female, Alseren Street. Then #17, Vulcan female, Alseren Street. Velekh froze.

"Do you want me to look?" Kadren asked.

Velekh didn't know what to say. Obviously, this was his mother. Could there be more than one Vulcan female who happened to be on Alseren Street at the time of the attack? He hadn't seen a Vulcan in Undaa in several months. When a minute or two passed and he hadn't responded, Karden asked again.

"Losha? Do you want me to look?"

"Yes." He didn't know what else to say. He continued to stare at the paper reading #17, Vulcan female, Alseren Street and tried to ignore the noise of Kadren moving around the tray.

"I'm sorry, Losha. It's her." Velekh did not look up from the sign.

"Do you want to see her?"

"No," he said, but found his legs moving of their own accord until he had come around the tray until he was standing beside Kadren. Her face was pale, dirty, and the right side had smudges of dried blood on it. He turned his head away.

"I need to find my grandfather."

"Maybe he's still alive." Velekh didn't know why he said this.

"I don't think so." Kadren turned and walked to the other side of the room where the bodies of the men were laid out.

Orat had been #8. Like his mother's face, Orat's had been pale and dirty but Velekh remembered that there had been no blood. Later, Velekh often wished that he hadn't looked at them. That night at the shelter he was unable to get their dead faces out of his mind. When the lights had been turned out, he found he was unable to stop from crying uncontrollably. He hadn't even looked at her when he had left the apartment building. He had just run out the door. It had been his last opportunity to look at his mother and he hadn't. Now his last memory of her was the dead face. He tried to stifle his sobs in the pillow, embarrassed at the thought that the strangers in the beds around him would hear him crying. Soon Kadren appeared, helped him out of bed, and brought him out into the small courtyard behind the building.

The stone courtyard was filled with potted plants, benches, and a few solar-powered lights on poles. Kadren directed Velekh to a bench and when he had sat down, he covered him with a blanket he hadn't even realized Kadren had been carrying. It was a warm night and a blanket was unnecessary, but he pulled it over himself nonetheless. The two of them sat there for some time, saying nothing. Velekh finally realized that he had stopped crying. The silence made him uncomfortable.

"Can I ask you something, Kadren?"

"Of course."

"On the tram, on the way to the hospital, I sensed something from you…" He trailed off. He knew people found it uncomfortable that he could sense things from them. His mother had repeatedly had to remind him of this when he was younger. Should he not be able to block certain things out, he was to keep his mouth shut. But he was unable to stop himself from asking in the same way he had been unable to stop himself from looking at his mother's face in the morgue.

"What did you sense?"

"You had already accepted that Orat - your grandfather - was dead. Your mind was calm. Even now your mind is calm. How is it that you are calm? I can't make my mind calm like that."

"I'm used to death. I learned to accept it a long time ago. My grandfather lived a much longer life than most of my family and, in the end, he was free for a time."

"What do you mean?'

"My whole family was killed in Ursai. Everyone except me and my grandfather."

"There was a war in Ursai too?"

"No, not a war. The political situation there was very bad. The government killed millions of people."

"Millions of people?" Velekh couldn't believe it. Orat had never mentioned anything about this.

"Yes, over the course of maybe thirty years. Things are better there now but still not good. That's why we came here."

"Your grandfather said he came here because he didn't like the cold."

Kadren chuckled. "No, he didn't like the cold."

"So he really came here to escape the government in Ursai?"

"Yes, even now, no one is really free there. You can only be free in your mind."

"That's why my parents left Vulcan too."

"People aren't free on Vulcan?" Kadren looked surprised.

"You aren't free to have emotions. People aren't really even free in their minds because they don't allow themselves to feel emotion. Their minds are like prisons."

"Well, I suppose a prison of the mind can be just as much a prison as a real prison."

When Velekh returned to his bed that night, he thought about this surprising revelation from Kadren. Would he come to accept death as Kadren did, so calmly? It seemed impossible. He did not want to accept it. He wanted to will his mother back to life.

Within fifteen months, Kadren would also be dead, killed by an explosive dropped from a drone small enough to get past Sheyhaar undetected. Velekh had been there when they pulled his body, along with those of the three other victims, out from the debris. He forced himself to look at his face.