This is story #3 in this little "series". There's one more after it... You
must have read "Good Intentions" before this one. You can get away without
having read "In Circles", but you really can't not have seen the first
one. Thanks.
-amkt 

"Pieces" - Prologue

November, 1970
Somewhere in Nevada

  The noise was incredible. Like a harsh rushing noise, it beat on her
until she was fighting the urge to cover her ears. Then, abruptly, it
stopped. The cold bit into her first, fighting its way through the thick
winter coat she wore and numbing her toes in spite of her boots. When
focus was brought to her, she noticed the gun held between two very
unsteady hands and lowered it slowly in astonishment. Its weight was an
unfamiliar but real sensation to cling to while she weeded her way through
her excess confusion.
  Her eyes flicked up and to the side and met unexpectedly with the dark,
expressive eyes of a man standing about a hundred yards from her. A
familiar sensation  came over her, but she pushed it aside, determined to
understand why she was in this position. The look he gave her was a
mixture of sadness and anger and she shied away from it. She took a stop
forward to talk to him, but lapsed back into inactivity as she followed
his gaze, now focused on some distant object. Three people were struggling
to cross a stream: two men and a woman. One of the men was carrying the
other, a sight that was in and of itself rather incredible considering
their respective sizes. The woman was slender and tall with longs dark
hair flowing over her coat. She could see, even from this distance, that
the woman was upset.
  She stood and watched the struggle, transfixed with the scene. When she
finally focused her attention back on her companion, he had gone. A swift
visual search revealed him to be on the opposite embankment. Barring her
confusion as to how he had moved there so quickly, she assumed he was there
to help the hapless people out of what had to be an incredibly cold
stream. Instead, he just watched, stone-faced and silent, as they pulled
themselves out and collapsed, almost, at his feet. Words were spoken far
too quietly for her to make out and then man - boy, really - who had
carried the other fell on top of him, the woman close by. And she knew
without asking that he had died.
  Then reality faded and she was gone again.