Chapter 56
May - 3,390 BC
Earth: Village of Assur
Colonel Mikhail Mannuki’ili
MIKHAIL
Mikhail set down a rickety bucket filled with water. The second bucket, alas, he clutched to his chest. Or more accurately, he clutched a bundle of sticks.
"Ma'am?" he greeted Ninsianna's mother.
Needa glanced at the broken pile of twigs.
"That's the second one this week!" she snapped.
"I'll fix it," he lowered his wings in shame.
Needa's expression softened.
"Come. Sit." She gestured at the bench. "Let me look at that wing."
He sat dutifully and extended one black-brown wing, five meters in length, almost the entire width of the room. Steady hands slipped beneath his feathers and probed the once-powerful axillary muscles which had begun to deteriorate from lack of use. He grunted as she dug
