Still bringing my main character into the present.

Ol' Shadow didn't have a happy life before he ended up in his desert idyll. Somebody's almost bound to ask how much of this is autobiographical, since he's about to undergo something I've described in my own life. It's not an autobiography. Shadow isn't me. For one thing, I'm a lot happier than he is and have a higher tech base and standard of living. But since he's a hermit in the desert and so am I, I am taking certain liberties with events from my own life to describe his.

This, for example, is pretty much exactly what happened to me...



6 – Torn

Meet Neal Higgins. Neal is looking forward to a relatively pleasant day, as such things go for him. Neal has glowing health, a new/old bike that actually starts on the third or fourth kick, bugs in his teeth, and absolutely no idea what's in store for him on this bright, peaceful morning.

It's early yet. Though it's a school day, Neal has almost two hours he can call his own and he intends to spend a sizable percentage of that time throwing his new/old bike into the s-turns at Murrow Park. That's not going to happen, but as we've already mentioned he doesn't know that.

Now let's introduce … Oh, we'll call her Mrs. Smith. Mrs. Smith is in a terrible hurry, and her mind is on the long list of things that she needs to see to today. There's that conference with Megan's councilor at school – and what, she wonders, hardly for the first time, has that brat gotten herself into this time? Since she made the cheerleader squad she's been pretty clearly doing a lot more than widening her social circle. Her grades have gone to hell, and Mrs. Smith has been detecting an awful lot of rumblings about disciplinary issues. She has a property owner's association meeting this morning, and let's see if we can finally shake loose the funds for those potholes on Eucalyptus Road. She's absolutely got to find time to go shopping before this afternoon, the Pontiac is due for an oil change she'll never get George to take care of, the yard men – she learned this morning – have taken a chunk out of her azalea bed with a lawnmower again and somebody is going to catch hell for that, she's just sick of it. Mrs. Smith's mind is in a dozen places. We could wish it were primarily at the helm of her heavy station wagon, but these things happen.

She pauses at the Stop sign at Atlantic Highway, flicks her eyes to the left to check for traffic, sees no oncoming cars, and accelerates to cross to the island for her left turn. An instant later, her day's schedule becomes completely disrupted.

Neal sees his open lane abruptly blotted out by the slablike left side of a sea-green late-model Pontiac, which appears out of nowhere from the right. There is no time for panic, for coherent thought, for much of anything but a brief spasm of instinctive and futile avoidance. He releases the throttle and leans the motorcycle hard to the left. It doesn't help much. A millisecond after this final maneuver the front wheel of the bike contacts the left fender of the Pontiac just behind the front wheel well, at approximately 45 miles per hour. Physics takes control of the situation.

The effect on the massive Pontiac is minimal, though temporarily crippling. It will spend considerable time in the body shop, getting those pesky dents and scratches taken care of and correcting a severe case of toe-out. Thank God for comprehensive auto insurance. The motorcycle, on the other hand, experiences a profound and very brief transformation into a ball of crumpled steel, plastic and rubber. It stops abruptly, having struck something it couldn't possible brush out of its path, and in so doing it sheds 155 pounds of mass that wasn't bolted on. But the momentum that mass had imparted remains, and the only part of the old motorcycle which later remains salvageable is the rear wheel. No one ever bothers to salvage it.

As the seat he had been straddling suddenly stops, Neal's own momentum causes him to part company with the motorcycle. Just as the bike had shed itself of his mass, so his own body is now shed of the mass of the bike. This factor, along with the limpness that often accompanies sudden traumatic shock, is one that makes many of the most horrendous motorcycle collisions survivable for the rider, but unfortunately for Neal this is the early 1970's. His motorcycle was built in the middle 1960's, and certain design considerations which later become routine have not yet been incorporated. In short, there are obstacles in Neal's path and he is in no position to avoid them.

The obstacles of particular concern at this time are the two handlebars. As the velocity difference between Neal's motorcycle and Neal's body suddenly changes from zero to approximately 45 MPH, the bars which a moment before had been handy aids to navigation suddenly become hazards to it. Neal's momentum lifts him from the seat, but not so high that his legs can avoid the bars. The twin impacts have severe material consequences. No object is immovable, and no force is irresistible. But both object and force give it the old college try.

The right handlebar loses the fight and snaps off, now connected to the vehicle only by throttle and brake cables. Neal's lower right leg pays for this insult with two severe compound fractures, but a couple of broken bones are about to become the least of his worries. The left handlebar is made of sterner stuff. Neal clears the Pontiac's engine hood at a low ballistic trajectory, narrowly avoiding the leading roof pillar which surely would have ended all his worries forever. The lower half of Neal's left leg, freed of the greater mass of the rest of his body, achieves a higher altitude but shorter range before impact.

Atlantic Highway is a four-lane boulevard with a wide, sandy island that, to the despair of those city groundskeepers who give a damn, has stubbornly refused to support grass for its entire existence. Having been driving at the speed limit in a heavily-policed area, Neal had been in the left lane. His brief, useless effort to turn out of the station wagon's path sets his ballistic course in the direction of soft sand rather than asphalt. Given that the forehead region of his helmet is crushed in the initial impact, this – plus the presence of the helmet – is very likely another factor in his continued survival. Nevertheless the impact is severe and imparts further insult to his already outraged frame. Unconscious of having done so, he reaches out with his left hand to fend off the collision. Upon impact, every bone in his left wrist collapses from its normal configuration and makes intimate contact with the bones of his left forearm. His helmet padding sacrifices itself in a successful attempt to save the bones of his skull, but he will suffer severe neck pain, headaches and brief memory lapses for months.

Neal Higgins is seventeen years old. He has no serious congenital defects, good nutrition, and is in perfect health and physical condition. Except for certain attitudinal issues, he'd probably have made a fine soldier – though that's not going to happen now. He is as near immortal as mortal man ever manages to be, and this will serve him well in the next few minutes. The elasticity of his youthful arteries causes them to attempt to seal themselves against the severe ruptures they have recently experienced, slowing his blood loss and extending his projected lifespan to a few minutes rather than the seconds an older and less healthy man might expect. If not for the natural anesthetic of shock, he might not consider this a blessing.

Neal Higgins wakes to find himself lying on his side in soft sand. He notes a tuft of scraggly grass growing, apparently sideways, very near his nose. Internal alarms are telling him that he is very badly damaged. He cannot feel either of his legs or any part of his left arm, on which he is lying. That can't be good. He hears someone begin to cry out. A calm, detached part of himself is surprised at the sound, a drawn-out wail of fear and abysmal pain. He remains conscious only long enough to realize that the voice making the sound is his own, and then his mind simply shuts itself off.

It is just before rush hour in a heavily-policed urban area. A local highway patrolman, traveling in the opposite direction, is close enough to actually witness the accident. He turns on his lightbar, whips his unit through the traffic island, and blocks traffic. Rushing to the Pontiac's side he finds a white-faced but apparently uninjured female subject. The crumpled motorcycle is unoccupied, but the rider is not hard to find as he lies full-length on the island thirty feet from the point of impact. He is unmoving, but painting the sand red with grisly determination. The next few minutes make the patrolman's career – he doesn't get many opportunities to actually save a life at a traffic accident. Frantically attempting to remember his rudimentary first aid training, he whips off his necktie and uses it as a crude tourniquet on the bleeder's left thigh. Mindful of possible spine injury, he is careful not to move the subject more than necessary. Then, since this is 1972 and patrol officers do not yet routinely carry personal radios, he rushes back to his unit and calls for an ambulance.

Neal Higgins is seventeen years old, and as close to immortal as it's possible for mortal man to get. This serves him well in the painful months to come. He has suffered severe trauma to three of his four original limbs – much of one of them simply isn't there anymore – but heals much more completely than a quorum of the orthopedic specialists working on him predict. But he has one last misfortune to endure. Ten years earlier, orthopedic surgeons in Massachusetts had achieved the Golden Goal of their specialty – they re-attached a severed arm and restored it to full function. Of course that was a perfect case – a very sharp, clean amputation right at the shoulder. Though advances in microsurgery have made it fairly common in our time, at the time of this accident the procedure has rarely been done successfully. This case isn't a good candidate, for the leg is mangled almost beyond anything recognizable as such and the knee to which they wish to attach it is smashed and needs extensive reconstruction itself. But it's the goal toward which all orthopedic surgeons of their time yearn, so instead of working on a good solid stump to interface with a prosthetic – the usual procedure – they try to re-attach it anyway.

Five days later, they cut it off again.

Oh, Mrs. Smith is fine. Her daughter pulls her social life together. The yard men are fired and replaced with Cubans who do a much better job. But those damned potholes go on for another two years before they're finally dealt with.

Six months after the accident, the city installs a traffic light at the intersection. Drivers spend the next decades cursing the useless thing.