He became so bemused with his objective study that, the night Annie withdrew her barriers, Baxter fell into her mind like a lion into a game-hunter's animal pit.
He was, again, in his leather chair. Rolanda had just put Annie to bed and passed his open door. He probed for Annie's mind and leaned the heavy weight of his own strong mind on the expected barrier. It was gone!
He sank deeply into his daughter's brain and caught his breath. He had forgotten what it was like, this total absorption with her physical and emotional sensations.
Annie was feeling good. Her stomach was full, she was warm, dry and pleasantly tired from her evening romp. She stretched and yawned, and a feeling of euphoria swept over Baxter.
Never had he completed such a transfer. He could feel every little primitive pleasure sensation that rippled through Annie's healthy, growing body. Conversely, two dozen trivial but annoying twinges, aches, pains and bodily pressures that slowly accumulate with the years vanished from his 46-year-old body.
The abscessed tooth that he should have had pulled a month ago quit hurting. The ache from the slightly pulled muscle in his back faded away. The pressure from the incipient gastric ulcer in his stomach eased off and disappeared. All the tensions and minor infirmities that had slipped up on him, almost unnoticed with middle age, vanished; and Baxter knew once again the long-forgotten, corporeal ecstasy of a young, human animal in the rapid-growth stages.
He awoke to see the fuzzy image of Rolanda over him. It was morning. Her face was faintly troubled, but she smiled with a rare warmth when he cooed at her. She caught him up in her arms, murmuring endearing sounds. Snuggled to her breast, he felt the satisfaction of a great subconscious yearning as the scented woman-smell pervaded his nostrils and her strong, warm arms cuddled him tightly.
There was the unpleasant business of a diaper change, during which he became sharply aware of hunger. He yelled lustily for food, and soon he was sucking hungrily on a deliciously flexible rubber nipple that yielded an ambrosia of warm sweetness.