CHAPTER 38 B

Kacey returned to her office and continued to work on her reports. Without interruptions, she was able to make a good sized dent in her reports. The stack of reviews lay untouched. Those she would leave for another day as Natalia was on the late shift all week.

Her communicator beeped. "Colonel O'Malley are you still in your office?" Natalia asked.

"I am." Kacey responded.

"Good, stay there I will bring dinner. Be there in ten minutes."
"Sounds great beautiful."

Kacey got up and poured herself another coffee. She heated water to make Natalia a cup of tea. She cleared the stack of files from the coffee table in front of the couch and washed it down. The door chimed. Kacey looked at the monitor.

"Come in you sexy woman." She called out.

The door opened. Natalia pushed a cart with their dinner into, the room. "Is that a regulation greeting, Colonel?"
"It is when the aforementioned sexy woman is married to me." Kacey helped her with the cart then put her arms Natalia and kissed her.

"Whoa Colonel, I take that greeting to mean you are happy to see me."

"You bet your sweet ass I am. How about we forget about dinner and just sit on the couch and make out for awhile?"

"Oh sure, then I will have you mother pissed because we did not eat? No way do I want that. However I have no objection to your being awake and naked when I get home. I will make it up to you then."

"That is a plan I can certainly get behind, or in front of, or under, or on top of." Kacey said with a rakish smile.

"Lets eat and you can tell me all about your trip this morning."

"It did not go exactly as planned." Kacey told her everything about the trip, ending with, "Then Kate accused me of becoming a daredevil."

"Are you?"

"Not you too, Natalia." Kacey jumped to her feet. At the hurt look on Natalia's face Kacey crumbled. "I am so sorry. To be honest, Natalia, I don't know. I don't know." She repeated. " If I was turning into a reckless dare devil I would have flown at those damn rocks at full throttle instead of approaching the slowly and cautiously. It really was just an experiment, Talia."

"Kacey I don't think you are reckless at all. It there anything else bothering you? I mean other then what we have talked about?"

"No. Yes, there is. I am afraid Talia."

"Afraid of what sweetheart?"

"I am afraid I lost some of myself when I was unconscious. And these headaches I have been getting lately. What are they all about?"

"The doctor said they were stressed related."

"What if she is wrong?"

"Meaning what exactly?"

"What if all that junk my brain absorbed and is still in there and blocking part of who I am or even doing some sort of damage which causes the headaches. Even though medicine has made great strides in the last hundred fifty years, there is no way something like that would show up on an x-ray. What if I am no longer me?"

"Sweetheart, I think I would know if you were someone else. Remember I know you intimately. You have not changed at all."

"You would tell me, wouldn't you? If I start doing things so totally out of character. You would tell me, right?"

"Yes, I would tell you." Natalia reassured her.

"Can we keep this just between us. I do not want Kate or mom finding out."

"Of course, for now." Natalia told her. "Eventually you will have to talk to Kate. If not Kate then Doctor DiMarco, she can not repeat anything you tell her unless you give her permission."

"Your shrink? Then you have noticed something." Kacey started pace.

Natalia stepped in front of Kacey to stop her pacing. "That is not what I am saying at all. I am not any sort of doctor. I do not pretend to understand how the mind works. The Doctor can help you sort everything out and put it into perspective. She did that for me after Marcus Prime was destroyed. You have been worried for a couple weeks. It is evident the lapses in your memory are starting to bother you."

"Maybe you're right."

"Of course I am right. Now come over her and kiss me before I have to return to duty."

"Yes ma'am" Kaceystated and took Natalia in her arms.