Given time, she—she alone—like the magician Prospero in The Tempest could create some paradise of cloud-capped towers and gorgeous palaces and solemn temples and winding brooks and crisp channels and green lands that need never (the Calibans being transmuted by power beyond the lust for power) dissolve into air, thin air, leaving not a cloud behind.
If all the people were as she, the great globe of the world could become an enchanted island: with wars and bloodshed and prejudice and inhumanity forgotten.
Some such was her thought. It washed over her, the vision, and vanished in the acute reality of the moment. Such a dream was athwart the invasion plan of the aliens.
She was out of the car. She was opening the rear door. She stood at Walt's head. He'll have to help me, she thought, he has information I want.
She felt for the pattern of his body. She experienced it. Concentrating with the full force of the human brain, she began to mend the breaks and ruptures and wounds.
It took time.
Don't reheal his mutant bridge, she thought. Leave him defanged.
His jaw returned to its socket. The dried blood on his skin no longer led from vicious gashes: they had closed and were knitting.
She was finished. He was still unconscious.
Even as she turned to heal the farmer, a section of her brain drew conclusions from the fact she could be relieved of her powers. Some outside force was responsible for holding the bridge closed in her mind. It could be turned on and off.