Senior wept long and hard over Kaalize's sandals, blaming them for the loss of her bright young twins.

She made a dream-space for the youngsters, filling a niche in the wall of her hut with fruits, flowers and colored pebbles. On a small dais in front of the space, she placed the sandals.

Day after day Senior fixed her gaze on the dream-space willing her dead offspring to appear to her. One day she was rewarded by the sight of Kaalize. She appeared, pale and shimmering in the dream-space. Pointing at the sandals, she intoned in a faint but firm voice: "Those are not my sandals".

Senior wanted to ask her many questions, but Kaalize promptly disappeared. She never reappeared, nor did Kaal ever show himself to Senior.

As she went mournfully about her daily business, Senior was aware of a figure on the periphery of her vision, coming into view then disappearing when she turned her gaze on it. On the third day, the figure did not move when she turned towards it. Instead it stood shyly in front of her.

"Kraa - it is you!" exclaimed Senior. "I thought it might be, but I wasn't sure. Why did you not show yourself sooner?"

"I wanted to let you mourn, just as I had to," he said simply.

Kraa, a small, insignificant male, had admired Kaalize from afar. The athletic girl seldom noticed his presence as he never joined in The Games at which she and her brother Kaal excelled.

Despite his lack of physical prowess, all Kraa's being was intent on avenging Kaalize. Senior welcomed the move but urged him to be careful.

"You must use see-forward," she told him firmly. "But don't let them catch you. And don't go at night when they're out and about."

"Don't worry," replied Kraa with an assurance he didn't feel. "I'll be back before you know it."

One of Jade's myriad suns had punched a hole in some cloud and was glaring down, red-faced, at Kraa. He was glad of the light, white covering he wore as protection. A small figure tugged at his sleeve. It was Kanoa, his neighbor Senior II's daughter.

"Be careful," she whispered before fleeing.

Kraa smiled to himself as she watched him from the shade of some bushes. Settling on his haunches by the Seeing Stone, he set his shadow so that it slanted across the "see-forward" symbol.

Suddenly Kraa was at the entrance to the cave system of the aboriginal zing-zing drinkers. Looking down at his physical frame, he saw he'd become taller, broader, more muscular than when he's left home. Of course that was nearly five danas ago, though he'd been transported to this moment in time in an instant. It was the time when the shadows of the Three Moons of Jade were about to overlap and the zing-zing drinkers would carry out their regeneration ritual.

It was also the day of The Games, when all the young people of Jade would compete with each other for prizes of bead ornaments and rare fruits. Sometimes, one of the victorious males would claim a female as his prize - but only if there was already an understanding between them.

Peering through the darkness, Kraa saw a scene that made him catch his breath. Normally, whenever the aborigines put in a brief, after-dark appearance, they looked like thinner versions of the members of his kind. But the creatures he saw before him had greedy, pointed faces and bloated bodies.

An eerie glow lit their features as they clustered around a central stone on which stood a pair of sandals. They fixed their gaze on the sandals, sewing furiously and using them as a model from which they made numerous copies. While they worked, they passed a bowl around, taking it in turns to drink gluttonously.

A glimmer of understanding flitted across Kraa's mind. "So that's how they do it," he whispered to himself.

Soon the creatures had produced many pairs of identical footwear, copied from the model pair. One of the bloated beings bundled them up into a sack and made for the cave's opening. Kraa ducked out of sight as the creature came towards him. To his amazement, the bulbous body turned instantly into a slender version of one of Kraa's kind. It then placed the sandals in pairs at strategic points all along the beach where The Games were due to take place.

Kraa was sure then that the sandals were a form of "bait" for the innocent youngsters. There were always at least two or three who found it more comfortable to run barefoot and there was always at least one who left his or her sandals behind in the excitement of the occasion.

No sooner had the aborigine returned to its cave than Kraa raced around, collecting up all the sandals which he heaped at the entrance. With all the speed he could muster, he called at every hut in his village, urging his neighbors to join him on the beach. Among their number was his little friend Kanoa. He was pleased to see she had grown into a beauty in the more than four dana that had passed in an instant since he last saw her. It also pleased him that she looked at him in the way she had when he left her to take his great leap into the future. He privately vowed to speak with her when he returned to the present time.

At Kraa's request, the villagers made a bonfire of the sandals. Within a very short time, the aborigines fell out of their cave entrance, choking and gasping. Peace-loving Kraa was shaken by the ferocity of his neighbors' attack on the aborigines, but he knew it was something that had to be done. Fittingly, it was Senior who dealt their leader his final blow. Afterwards, she hugged Kraa, tears streaming from her eyes.

Kraa had just one more job to do. He went back into the cave and returned with a flask of liquid - the zing-zing juice. He poured some of it onto the sand and it glowed with many different colors, spreading along the beach like a forest fire. It was then they all knew for certain it was the zing-zing juice, not the blood that regenerated Jade. It was painfully clear the aborigines simply liked blood.

Quietly, Kraa used see-back to return to the present. He didn't explain to Senior exactly what was to happen. He just told her the twins would be avenged when the shadows of the Three Moons of Jade overlapped. She accepted his words without question.

As he basked in Senior's unspoken gratitude, Kraa hugged a secret joy. It concerned his future with Kanoa and a shared hut that he would one day build with his own strong hands....