Gazette remained attentive to her meetings with Doctor Jones and didn't complain about having the sessions. She didn't necessarily think that se really needed the sessions, but the people at the Meat Market had insisted on voicing their worry and had never said anything hateful. It was something that she tolerated over the things she remembered having to endure during the thirties and during the war years. As back then, tolerance seemed to be something that seemed to be in short supply. In this, the safety she felt talking with Doctor Jones was quite real and she easily volunteered information.
"Life actually wasn't too bad before he came around," Gazette said to Doctor Jones as she looked at him, "People were fairly nice and never drew that much attention to the fact that my family was Jewish."
Of course as she said this, her mind drifted back to the early thirties, when so much in her life changed, and that was even before Animalia.
++++++++++++++++++++
"Boy, Gaz, you seem to be quite good at this," a friend commented as she and Gazette kicked a soccer ball around an open park in Essen, Germany.
While her name was officially Olivia Goldsmith at that time, there were a few people that called her Gazette or Gazelle in reference to her enjoyment of soccer and the fact that she could run and kick just as well as anyone else could in Germany. Olivia smiled and let go of her skirt for the moment as she beamed with pride. The park was clean and orderly, pretty much like anything else one expected in Germany, and spires of the Krupp's Works could be seen in the distance, and it was a place where she and her friend had commonly come to play soccer, though Olivia figured that her friend mostly did it to attract the attention of one of the Krupp's workers who would often take his lunch in the park before returning for his afternoon shift.
"It's fun," Olivia answered, "and it's nice to show what one can do. Maybe they'll have a woman's team in the Olympics one day... A woman's football team."
Of course, in Germany football was a reference to soccer. Her friend slowly nodded when there was a great commotion coming from one of the nearby streets that caught both of their glances. They turned to see a crowd of young men in brown military uniforms with red armbands with a black swastika on them berating an older man just outside a bakery. The bakery was old and Oliva's mother had told her the man had run it for generations, and had done a lot to feed as many as he could during the last war, though the British blockade made that near impossible to do well. Olivia was shocked to watch as these uniformed men proceeded to then strike the elderly man with batons.
"That'll teach him," her friend said in a huff and with an almost sneering grin.
"Teach him what?" Olivia asked, "My mom said he's been a major part of the city for generations! He tried to feed people in the last war."
"He tried to feed JEWS in the last war as they betrayed the country and sold us out," her friend answered, "now WE are getting even, Oliva. Getting even for all the wrongs they put us through. Remember if it weren't for them, Paris would be a provincial hub of the Reich and NOT an independent French capital, as it SHOULD have been since the French started the last war by being stupid... i.e. French."
"My dad didn't say anything about having won the last war," Olivia warned, "and his says that Hitler is a dumb blowhard that ran messages and nothing more."
"Your dad doesn't know everything," her friend replied quickly, "and we're now setting things the way they should have been..."
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
"And that was just some of the early warnings that my family saw that things weren't going well and weren't going to go well," Gazette continued to Doctor Jones.
"I take it things didn't get much better?" Doctor Jones asked.
"Not in a way where people recognized that we were victims," Gazette said with a sigh...
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
It was 1934 when the Goldsmith family found themselves at a series of offices in Strasbourg, France. This time there was the hanging of the French blue, white, red tri-color, but as they talked with the man in his blue uniform complete with red kepis it soon became fairly clear that there wasn't an awful lot of trust going on here either.
"So, you are from Essen?" the border official spoke.
"Yes," Olivia's father said slowly and in a tone that didn't hide the defeated tone very well, "though... we didn't feel safe there."
"Munitions plants can always be tough," the border official answered without any care or concern, "how long do you intend to stay in the Republic?"
Olivia felt her father hold her to him with one arm before he spoke.
"We were actually hoping for immigration status, sir," Olivia's father spoke and produced a brown colored briefcase which he presented to the border official. He opened it and then presented the French official with a large stack of paperwork that was there to show that all things were in order.
The official looked through it and Olivia could hear him "click" as he looked through it.
"It says here you fought against France in the last war," the official said slowly.
"I was drafted and called up in 1914, sir," Olivia's father answered, "I really didn't have much choice then... and then it was a different world. People weren't being beaten in the streets for their religion."
"I doubt that," the official answered and continued to look through the paperwork, "but everything seems in order. As a German citizen, I'm afraid you won't qualify for benefits as a French citizen, but given the general atmosphere... you may be able to apply for certain charities through the Church. You can also expect questioning from national authorities on what you know of the German military projects."
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
"It'd seem like they were just as interested in making use of your family as the Nazis were in persecuting it," Doctor Jones said slowly and watched Gazette nodded, with her horns going back and forth.
"Yes, though they weren't quite antagonistic toward my family as the Nazis were," Gazette answered, "and they did earn French citizenship... but by that time the war in Europe had begun and my dad felt that the Maginot Line for all its bells and whistles wasn't going to amount to much... and too old to fight, the safest place for him and my mother was in Switzerland, which accepted them as refugees."
Doctor Jones nodded and wrote down his notes from the session, "but you couldn't let the Nazis get away with their aggression...?"
"What they stood for wasn't right, by ANYONE'S book," Gazette answered, "people have the right to be who they want to be, regardless of their religion, race, or species."
Doctor Jones caught a bit of inflexion in Gazette's voice as she finished which sounded interesting to him. He narrowed one eye and raised the other to her as she sat there across from him.
"Do you feel any threat of that here?" Doctor Jones asked, "Not being accepted?"
"What?!" Gazette gasped with wide eyes, "I... I don't think so... or... at least I hope not."
Doctor Jones didn't say anything as Gazette took a deep breath. He watched as she gave a heavy sigh before she spoke again.
"At least the rejection isn't quite like it was in the thirties," Gazette spoke, "No one is flat out denouncing me because I'm not human anymore..."
"Well... that's good," Doctor Jones gave a small smile, "but something must be stressing you..."
"There are some times..." Gazette said slowly, "when I think they're judging me... for... things...."
She didn't want to say that it was because she wanted sexual attention. That sort of thing was nice, and to her was no different from any other Animalian. After all, all Animalians seemed to be built for sex and those that had mates seemed to enjoy each other's company as much as they could. Gazette didn't find anything wrong with that. It didn't matter if they were other Animalians or Humans that took a fancy to them, as since she was vaccinated there was no risk of spreading the infection. And a good time with no consequences of pregnancy or disease wasn't a bad thing, and was something she'd noticed people actually LIKED over the years.
"Maybe... maybe I'm a bit more into it than other Animalians," Gazette spoke, "but I'm not out to harm anyone or force them into marriage or parenthood. I'm just looking for a little fun and acceptance... Which isn't that what ANYONE wants?"
Doctor Jones gave a slow nod, but said nothing. He was pretty sure what was at the core problem of Gazette's nymphomania and that it wasn't solely limited to being horny. Certain elements of it were pretty standard for any kind of Animalian, regardless of whether or not they had a mate, but that a lot of her past life made what problems there were bigger and for different reasons. It was similar to those Animalians that had been rescued from animal fighting rings before being uplifted. While other Animalians of their species were quite competitive within the various combat sports being formed for Animalia, those coming out of fighting rings avoided those sports like there was no tomorrow. It served to help remind Doctor Jones on his theories that while the Animalia Virus was a great physical cure all for diseases, cancers, and injuries that it wasn't able to outright cure mental stresses.