First, there’s the oldest, the one shaped like a melon,
Him with the big nose who doesn’t know his name anymore
Mister, so much does he drink or so much has he drunk

The next several days were very hard for me. The duty in the Army wasn’t hard, but it was difficult changing back into my “he self” after the scene the other night. I felt different, as thought I had completed some rite of passage. Coming down from that took discipline that I knew I had, but that I felt very reluctant to use.

I threw myself into my work. There was always training to do, skills to be honed, competitions to hold and the other ordinary activities of a platoon of warriors. I continued to supervise people, take care of arguments as they happened, all the while continuing to keep my body in top male physical form every day.

Their usual lack of chatter drew the loneliness of the vacuum about them as they soared through the deep, far off sunlight turning them half golden with glinting, unbearable brightness, obscuring the other half of each of them in blackest night. It was a sight to bewitch lesser souls, that dichotomy of light and absolute dark they each portrayed. An observer might even have said that it was a true vision of their being, but there was no one there to see it.