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                     Eyrie Productions, Unlimited
                               presents

                UNDOCUMENTED FEATURES FUTURE IMPERFECT
                   - SYMPHONY OF THE SWORD No. 2 -

                Third Movement: Another Christmas Rose

                         Benjamin D. Hutchins
                          with Janice Barlow
                               MegaZone
                             Pearson Mui
                           Kris Overstreet

                "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening"
                           by Robert Frost

                (c) 2001 Eyrie Productions, Unlimited


                     SATURDAY, DECEMBER 24, 2405
                              HIGHWAY 72
                         TITAN, SOLAR SYSTEM

        Kaitlyn Hutchins was slightly disappointed as she drove her
old Impala down Highway 72, southward out of the port city of Beltane.
She supposed it was nice and Christmasy enough for there to be snow
falling, but there was already plenty of it on the ground, giving the
piney forest surrounding Beltane a festive air as it flickered past
the speeding black car and the rest of the convoy it led.  Kate felt a
little self-conscious about that last part, but mostly she was
disappointed that it was overcast.
        They were quite an interesting little caravan, following in
train behind Vlad the Impala: Corwin's black Griffon limousine, Moose
MacEchearn's converted school bus, Kyouichi Saionji (insane! out of
his freaking mind!) bundled up like a polar explorer on his old sidecar
motorcycle, Kate's father (in heated powersuit, no fool he!) on his
old navy-blue Garland, all beamed into the WDF cargo-handling facility
in Beltane from the holds of the IPO starship Challenger for the
occasion.  They got off at the exit for Route 11 (a much less
impressive thoroughfare), then rolled up into the mountains to the
southeast of Beltane, leaving any trace of civilization (aside from
the road) behind.
        In the Impala's passenger seat, Juri Arisugawa sat with her
chin propped on the knuckles of her right hand, looking thoughtfully
out the window at the snowy trees.  Quietly, she murmured,

"Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow."

        Kaitlyn glanced across the car at the redhead, smiled, and
said,

"My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year."

        Wakaba Shinohara suddenly appeared, leaning over the back of
the seat between the two, her elbows touching their shoulders, and
chimed in,

"He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake."

        Then all five of the car's occupants, four girls and Miki
Kaoru, said together,

"The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep."

        "And they say," said Dorothy Wayneright dryly into the
companionable silence that followed, "that students always forget
everything as soon as final examinations are complete."
        Behind them, Corwin Ravenhair squinted through the falling
snow and the small rear window of the convertible ahead, and wondered
what all the laughing was about.

        Not long after, they came around the last long, sweeping
right-hand turn (Utena Tenjou, gauging it from the passenger seat of
Corwin's Griffon, thought it looked like it would be a lot of fun to
take, on -dry- pavement, at about eighty-five) and arrived at a set of
wrought-iron gates in a high stone wall.  The gates were standing
open, and above them, an iron arch carried the words:

                             CASTLE EYRIE

        Below that, in smaller letters whose more elaborate font made
them harder to read, it added:

                       Beware!  Cranberry bogs!

        "Cranberry bogs?" asked Azalynn dv'Ir Natashkan from one of
the seats of Moose's van.
        "Kaitlyn's parents have very peculiar senses of humor," Liza
Shustal informed her airily.  "Oh -my-," she added as the structure
whose name the gate had announced appeared out of the pines, the road
rising up to meet it.
        It was, as the name implied, a castle - but a very different
sort than the Castle on Jeraddo, where the Deedlit Satori Mandeville
Memorial Institute Duelists' Society and some of their best friends
lived.  Where the Duelists' Castle was made of smooth, reddish and
gold stone, with four flat-topped towers and a large golden dome in
the center of the roof - a vaguely Moorish style, if it had to be
compared to something Earthly - this looked more like an old-fashioned
Welsh castle, all in grey stone blocks, with many mullioned arch
windows, crenelations all along the roofline, and four corner turrets
like chess rooks.  It loomed stark against the white sky, flags flying
from poles on its turret roofs, perched on the pinnacle of the hill up
which the road ran from the forest below.
        They passed through the outer curtain wall, and found within
it a thing that no Welsh castle ever had: a parking lot, one that
already had a number of cars and small spacecraft in it.  The Duelists
and company had driven over from Beltane because Kate insisted on it,
saying you couldn't properly appreciate Castle Eyrie's location
without coming to it overland for the first time.  Apparently, some of
those who had already arrived had been here before, since it seemed
obvious that a few had flown in directly from orbit.
        They parked, disembarked, and went inside, not quite knowing
what to expect.  Castle Eyrie looked rather forbidding from the
outside, unlike the warm, welcoming colors and texture of the
Duelists' Castle.  Would the inside also be chilly and grey?  They'd
heard that Kate's father hadn't used the place in a while; many were
envisioning scenes like the old, dilapidated castles they'd seen in
history vids, with moldering tapestries and cobwebbed suits of armor.
It was not without some trepidation that they stepped through the
man-door set into one of the huge main portals and into the castle's
entrance hall behind its beaming owner.
        What they found was clean, bright and warm, lit by the
friendly yellowish glow of hololamps set to mimic bright fire and a
respectable number of actual candles.  There were hardwood floors and
nice rugs over them, clean unmoldering tapestries and paintings on the
walls, and a nice, wintery smell - a subtle and hard-to-define
combination of woodsmoke, the freshness of winter air, and hot cocoa.
Rug-covered stairs led up in the center, then branched off to both
sides; beyond them on the ground floor, twin archways led to what
looked like a ballroom.  There were doors off to the sides here and
there, and many more off the landings upstairs.  On the wall above the
central landing was a banner emblazoned with the scarlet star of the
IPO Space Force.
        Their host, Captain Benjamin Hutchins, better known as
Gryphon, stopped at the base of the stairs, turned around, and faced
them, grinning.
        "Not quite what you were expecting, is it?" he asked.
        The Duelists and company admitted (a bit sheepishly) that it
was not.  The answer seemed to delight their host even more; he
actually giggled, rubbing his hands together.
        "I'm actually relieved that the place is so clean," he
admitted.  "I haven't used this place in several years - been too busy
setting up the IPO and whatnot - and although there's a sizeable
maintenance drone contingent, I'm never sure about these things until
I check them out for myself.  Anyway, let me show you to your rooms,
so you can get freshened up from the trip.  Dinner's at six."
        The man was obviously enjoying playing host.  Those in the
group who hadn't met him before, or had only met him a couple of
times, and so knew him better by his public reputation - defender of
justice, immortal warrior, etc. - were somewhat taken aback by the
almost childlike glee he was taking in showing off his "summer
house".  He took them up the stairs, through one of the doors in the
back, and up another flight of stairs, eventually bringing them to a
long corridor with doors off to both sides.
        "Now," he said, "I wasn't sure how you'd want your rooming
arrangements set up, but there are plenty of rooms in this wing, and
the drones tell me they're all ready for occupation, so I figure the
best thing to do is to let you figure it out amongst yourselves.  Just
don't make any kind of mess you're not willing to clean up yourselves,
and try to keep the noise down.  OK?"
        A number of pairs of eyes blinked back at Gryphon in varying
levels of astonishment, which made him grin a little wider.
        "Hey," he said, "I know better than to try and micromanage.
You're all smart kids.  You all know how to play it safe."  He
winked.  "Urd will have seen to that."
        Even though she had no intention whatsoever of getting up to
any kind of mischief over the holidays, Utena Tenjou felt her face
burning with a furious blush as she went to stake out one of the
corner rooms.  With parents like that guy and Skuld, she reflected,
how could Corwin have come out any way -other- than brutally honest?
        Kaitlyn grinned at her as the two put their suitcases on the
room's king-size bed and started unpacking.  "W-why the s-s-surprised
look?" she asked.  "You kn-knew my d-d-d-dad was c-cool."
        "Yeah," Utena replied, stowing her pajamas in the top drawer
of the room's big oak dresser, "but I didn't think he was -that-
cool."
        Kate shrugged.  "He kn-knows if he t-t-tried to p-police us,
w-we'd just be s-sneaking around.  All h-he'd acc-c-complish would be
to t-t-turn it into w-work and k-kill the f-fun.  He h-h-hates to
k-kill people's f-fun.  Anyw-way, he t-trusts us."
        "If he's trusting Liza and Azalynn, he's in for a rude shock,"
said Utena wryly.
        Kate smiled.  "He's t-t-trusting them n-not to hurt
anyb-body.  Other than th-that... he's n-not p-p-picky."
        Utena shook her head.  "Quite an approach.  Part of my
surprised look is because you're here, though," she went on.  "Special
occasion, and all that... I mean, your dad just gave you a license to
steal," she added with a grin.
        Kate smiled again, but shook her head.  "Not y-yet," she
said.  "M-m-maybe soon, b-but... n-not yet."  She looked up from her
now-empty suitcase.  "Unl-less I'm inc-c-conveniencing you?"
        Utena kept grinning, vaulted the bed like it was the hood of a
car, and put her arm around Kate's shoulders.
        "Yeah," she said dryly, "like -I've- got big plans for this
weekend.  C'mon, give me a tour.  This place is amazing."
        "I w-wish it w-w-wasn't overc-cast," Kate said ruefully as she
followed her roommate's instructions and led her out into the
hallway.  "Then you'd r-r-really see am-mazing."

        With such a large group of guests, the gentleman and lady of
the house didn't have a lot of time to spend one-on-one with anyone
present, but the kids found agreeable ways to pass the time.  That
afternoon, the Duelists wandered the castle, alone and in groups,
exploring its passageways and towers.  The grounds out front, from the
curtain wall down to the edge of the road, made for an excellent
sledding ground, though one had to be careful to wipe out where the
ground flattened so as not to go speeding into the precinct wall.
Kaitlyn's brother Leonard, always an enthusiastic proponent of
sledding, put together a sizeable group which spent the afternoon
pursuing this very activity.
        Liza Shustal found herself up at the top of the East Tower,
wrapped up in her grey traveling cloak, looking out over the
Tsiolkovskiy Sea.  On this snowy day, the wind was raising whitecaps
on the choppy surf far, far below - the castle's height plus that of
the cliff it stood on, so far down that the pier jutting out from the
beach at the cliff's base looked like a model from up here.  The
overcast stretched away into infinity, light grey blending into dark
where sky met sea.
        It ought to have been a rather oppressive view, all in shades
of grey, but to Liza it wasn't.  She found the wind bracing, and the
faint scent of the sea which reached her way up here added a certain
extra something.  So did the knowledge of where she was.  Never, in
her wildest imaginings (which were admittedly not that wild before
June), had she ever thought she would be here, at one of the most
privately held of the Hutchins family's domains.
        For Titan, the entire moon, belonged to Kaitlyn's father; he
had purchased it from a real-estate holding consortium in the chaos
following the War of Corporate Occupation, and by the time Earth had a
government worthy of the name again, they had nothing to say about
it.  It was all perfectly legal.  The moon's hundred thousand or so
inhabitants paid a nominal rent and had well-secured leases; the owner
was quite benevolent, as feudal overlords went, and by and large
things ran quite smoothly in his absence.
        All of which meant that Ephrem Broadbank, sworn foe of Kate's
father and all he stood for, could never expect to step foot on the
place, much less send one of his children there.  Liza had heard of
it, of course - it was held repeatedly up to her during her childhood
as one of the best examples of the wretched excesses to which "the
immortal frauds" were given.  She'd never expected to see it, though,
and now here she was, by express invitation of Kaitlyn.
        "All my f-friends will be there," she'd said, and smiled.
        All my friends...
        Liza raised her left hand from within the folds of her cloak
and looked at her wristwatch for a moment.  It was an expensive one, a
Philippe Jardin, studded with gems, extremely gaudy.  There had been a
time when it was her most prized possession.  Its overdone, conspicuous 
costliness was a badge of honor under her old value system.  Her father 
had given it to her ten years ago, in appreciation for services 
rendered.  She unbuckled it, turned it over, and read the laser-etched
inscription on the back, though she knew it by heart:

                            For my darling
                             Elizabeth -
                              Well done!
                                 ECB
                               03/17/95

        "Well done!"  The highest accolade Ephrem Broadbank could
convey, the most shining praise his soul contained.  Liza snorted
bitterly at the memory, then reared back abruptly and hurled the watch
out in a glittering arc away from the castle and the cliff.  She lost
sight of it long before it plopped into the sea.
        "Liza?" came a voice from behind her.  "Are you OK?"
        Liza turned, smiling, to see Azalynn dv'Ir Natashkan emerging
from the hatchway leading down into the East Tower.  The Dantrovian,
bundled up against the cold in a green cloak not too unlike Liza's,
slogged through the snow to the blonde's side, looking curious and
concerned.
        "Everything's fine, Azalynn," Liza told her.  "I was just...
thinking about old times."
        "What was that you just threw?" asked Azalynn; so Liza told
her.
        Sunday, March 17, 2395, Kaitlyn's sixth birthday... she'd
invited Liza Broadbank to her party, hoping that extending the hand of
friendship to her most determined enemy could end the misunderstanding
and make a friend.  And if it had been a misunderstanding, it might
have worked; but of course it wasn't, and Liza, five-year-old Liza,
cunning and cruel, had exploited her opponent's naive goodwill and
sent Kaitlyn, in tears, fleeing to her room.  It had only taken a few
well-chosen remarks, made quietly enough that no misbehavior could
ever be pinned on Liza, and the party had, of course, been ruined.
        Liza had come home covered in glory - the first major success
of the campaign, her father had called it, and the Jardin had been her
reward.  It had never been any kind of secret, what she'd done to earn
it, and from then on, Kaitlyn had never made the mistake of trying to
find Liza's better nature again.
        Azalynn, who had heard much of Ephrem Broadbank over the
course of the last month, shook her head in disbelief.  "Dvhil, what
an awful man," she murmured, looking out at the choppy sea.  "Treating
his own daughter like... like an employee."
        Liza nodded.  "I don't take it personally," she replied
philosophically.  "Daddy treats everyone like an employee.  Even
Mother.  -Especially- Mother.  I can just see him, sitting at the
breakfast table in 2392, looking at the society section in the Avalon
Herald-Bulletin.  'Hrmph, see here that Morgan woman's got herself
another one in the oven.  Guess that means we'll have to have
another ourselves.'  'If you say so, dear.'"  She shook her head.
"What a way to run a railroad."
        "Did that really happen?"
        Liza shrugged.  "How should I know?  I was three in 2392.  But
it's the -kind- of thing I could see him doing."  She sighed.
"Anyway.  Did you come up here with some sort of news, or were you
just looking for me?"
        Azalynn grinned.  "They're done sledding," she said.  "Kate's
mom made hot chocolate.  She wondered if you'd want any."
        "Is Mary here yet?"
        "No," Azalynn replied, shaking her head.  "They won't be here
until tomorrow after breakfast - they're doing Christmas morning on
Tomodachi before Aunt Bell brings them over."
        Liza nodded.  "Well, in that case, let's go have some cocoa.
You look cold," she remarked as they made their way toward the hatch.
        "I am, a little," Azalynn replied.  "I've been outside most of
the day."
        Liza smiled.  "Well, then, once we've had our cocoa, perhaps
I'll have to warm you up."
        "Oh, I'd like that."
        "I thought you might."

        They were a convivial group, chatting and sipping cocoa in the
castle's big library, a great fire going in the fieldstone fireplace
that dominated one whole wall.  Liza and Azalynn were curled up
together in one end of one of the couches, bundled under Liza's cloak,
talking with Moose MacEchearn about Kate's plan to have her band, the
Art of Noise, perform at tomorrow night's big Christmas party.  If
they thought the group that was here now, on Christmas Eve, was big,
tomorrow night's was going to be positively gargantuan.  Gryphon had
a habit of inviting everybody he and Kei could think of to the Castle
shindigs, and over four hundred years of life, a person can build up a
lot of friends and acquaintances.
        For tonight, though, it was all a bit more... -intimate-.
There were little groups, pairs and trios mostly, of people scattered
around the room, drinking cocoa, talking, reading, playing games.
R. Dorothy Wayneright and Miki Kaoru were hunched over the marble
chess set; Liza would have made even odds that they didn't -realize-
they were holding hands along one side of the board while they moved
their pieces with their free hands.  (Dorothy had to keep shooing
Peril off the board; he seemed to have developed a fascination for
bishops, and kept trying to knock them over.)  Corwin and Utena were
playing eight-ball.
        Presently, Kaitlyn started playing something light and festive
on the piano.  Moose excused himself, got up, and disappeared upstairs
for a few moments; when he returned, he had his bass guitar with a
plug-amp rigged for practice.  Kate noticed him entering so equipped,
and smiled; when she finished the little song she was playing, she
nodded to him, and he leaned against the curve of the piano and began
playing a pretty, faintly haunting melody with a deliberate walking
pace.

      /*  Big Country  "Bass Dance"  _Steeltown_ (Re-Master)  */

        Kate played an accompanying line, sympathetic and nicely
harmonic, which was probably intended to be played on another bass
guitar.  Their collaboration grew slowly more and more complex, as
both started adding chords to what had been a simple overlapping
solo.  They grew it and layered it until it seemed that it couldn't go
on without losing its calm, deliberate pace, and then, just as their
now-rapt audience felt it threatening to slip from their control, it
ended, fading away in one last resonant harmony that left the room in
silence.
        Then the room filled with applause, and the beaming Hoffmanite
bowed to his accompanist, then to their audience.  Miki Kaoru smiled
at Dorothy and then returned his attention to the chessboard.  His
intention to resume his concentration on the board was thwarted again,
though, as Moose and Kate weren't done.  The impromptu bass and piano
recital continued for almost half an hour, during which no progress
was made on the chess game, but neither Miki nor Dorothy minded much.
It was a rare opportunity to hear Moose MacEchearn in a classical
mood.  He was a hell of a rock bassist; as his bandmates, they got a
chance to hear that pretty frequently.  He let his classical side out
to play less often, though, and Miki had come to very much enjoy the
rare occasions when he got to hear Moose's version of Beethoven's
"Moonlight" sonata.  He still had some hope that he could convince the
Hoffmanite to play that one on stage for an audience someday.
        Moose and Kate were interrupted by the call to dinner, which
proved as pleasant and cheerful an affair as the afternoon gathering
by the fire had been, albeit with less of a soundtrack.
        After dinner, most of the Duelists and friends retired to
their rooms to make an early night of it, while the family and those
closest to it - Utena, Dorothy, Miki, Juri - returned to the library
to observe a family tradition and open one gift early.  Saionji and
Wakaba found themselves invited this time around as well.  In Wakaba's
case that was understandable; she'd been Utena's best friend back at
Ohtori Academy and was still in the top three.  In his own case, it
struck Saionji as slightly surreal, given that only a couple of days
before Christmas vacation started a year ago, he'd tried to kill
Kaitlyn.  This year, though, he was her student, and as such, he was
deemed part of the family.
        He stood, a bit uncomfortably, by the smaller of the castle's
two Christmas trees (the bigger one, in the ballroom, was -immense-)
and watched as Kate's younger siblings ransacked the trove under that
tree to make their one choice, then were packed off to bed one by one.
(Well, age band by age band.  Saionji decided he didn't want to think
very much about the glee in the eyes of Priss Morgan and Sylvie
Daniels as they all but dragged Priss's poor twin brother Guy up the
stairs.)
        Like last year, and every year, books were a common theme;
this was a very literate group of friends and relations.  This year,
Utena went into the progression between Corwin and Kate, having been
accorded something above 'guest' status; hers turned out to be a
beautifully painted new addition to her collection of rose-themed
teacup sets, discovered by Kei Morgan at random while she was on an
IPO mission to the far-flung former Japanese colony world Ishiyama.
        When Kaitlyn's turn came, no one nudged her toward any
particular package, as had been the case the year before; and the
package she selected at random was almost certainly a book, a fairly
large and heavy-looking one.  She tore away the wrapping paper and
examined the cover, then laughed and held it up so the others could
see the bold black title emblazoned across the orange cover:

                         YOUR TIGER AND YOU:
            Sharing Space with the Greatest of Great Cats

        A wave of laughter rounded the room; everyone there was well
acquainted with Kate's fondness (sometimes bordering on obsession) for
the striped creatures.  She had a huge collection of stuffed ones, her
pajamas were patterned after them, her formalwear hinted at their
colors.  Kate went pink and smilingly thumbed through the book.
Despite its tongue-in-cheek title, it seemed to be an actual handbook
for keeping a tiger as a pet.
        She looked at her father, who was beaming with that special
look he got when he'd just pulled off what he felt was a particularly
clever gift.  Some of Gryphon's clever gifts had a tendency for their
recipients to miss the point, but Kaitlyn caught this one all right.
It was her father's half-joking way of acknowledging, or maybe
reminding her of, her dream, for future reference.
        Kate tucked the book under her arm, gave her father the "OK,
you win, good one" smile, and the gift-opening baton was passed to
Dorothy, technically the eldest of the "children" involved.  The one
she chose turned out to be from Corwin, and it was some small,
intricate piece of equipment whose function no one in the room could
divine - except, presumably, the recipient, who was delighted with it,
and the giver, who was pleased at its reception.  Dorothy tucked the
device away in a pocket and only answered Miki Kaoru's querying look
with an enigmatic little smile.
        From there, the honor passed to the guests, in ascending order
of age, which meant that Miki was next.  (And what a surprise, a book
on piano techniques!  "Well, what was I supposed to get him?" Wakaba
grumped later, when Utena kidded her about it.  "The Kama Sutra?  It'd
probably -bore- him."  "Oh, now you're just exaggerating," Utena
replied.)
        Gryphon was very pleased that Juri liked the bowling shoes
he'd found for her; he never quite knew how to shop for people as
elegant as the redhead, and he wanted to make a good impression, since
she was apparently Kate's girlfriend or something now.  They were the
most damned elegant bowling shoes he'd ever seen, though.  He'd been
just amazed when he found them in the pro shop at the Crescent Heights
Bowladrome.  Looked like the kind of thing rich socialites went
dancing in - with a Sure-Grip heel and a Super-Glide sole.  Just the
thing - he hadn't wanted to cop out and go for the -obvious- thing,
and get her something fencing-related.
        That left Saionji, the "old man" of the group at nineteen, and
there wasn't really much sport in the package that awaited him.  If it
wasn't a bokuto, it couldn't have been much of anything else, except
possibly a rather deficient oar.
        On the other hand, it was a very -nice- bokuto, its grip
carved into the semblance of a katana's braiding, its blade decorated
with patterns that almost looked Celtic.  He accepted it with humility
and pride, taking it as the mark of the fact that, though an
experienced swordsman, in the Asagiri Katsujinkenryuu he was but a
novice.
        With that taken care of, they cleared away the wrapping paper
and scattered to their various activities again.  Miki and Dorothy
returned to their interrupted chess game; Kate curled up on one of the
couches next to Juri and started reading her book.  She wondered
briefly at the curious grin that her father gave Juri when he walked
by the couch on his way out of the library, but passed it off as his
usual holiday expansiveness.
        "It's good to see he's happy for you," Juri noted with her
little Vulcan's smile, as if to confirm Kate's suspicions.
        Kate grinned, feeling her cheeks get warm, and replied,
"W-well, w-w-why w-wouldn't he be?"
        "Why indeed?" asked Juri philosophically; then she fell
silent, letting Kate enjoy her book.  That was one of the many things
Kate liked about her: if anyone understood that friends didn't have to
-talk- all the time, and recognized the value of a companionable
silence, it was Juri Arisugawa.

        Utena was wandering through one of the castle's corridors
pretty much at random, and thinking in pretty much the same fashion.
It struck her as curious how much of her life seemed to involve, in
some tangential fashion or another, castles.  She lived in one on
Jeraddo.  The little one up on Bancroft Hill had shaped several
important events of her and her friends' lives in Worcester.  Much of
her life in her last year at Ohtori Academy had revolved around one.
And here she was, spending her second Christmas in this world at one.
        Except, it occurred to her, none of them were real.  The
Duelists' Castle on Jeraddo wasn't a castle at all, only looked like
one; it had actually, according to Mia Ausa's research, been some kind
of ancient temple.  The same went for Bancroft Tower, which was too
small to be much of a -tower-, let alone a proper castle.  This
castle, medieval-British though its style might be, was less than
twenty years old, and had been raised in this spot on the whim of a
man who was well-known for his whimsy.  It defended nothing, except
perhaps its master's privacy on the rare occasions when he came here
to use it.  And as for the Hanging Castle of Cephiro... in their last
confrontation, Akio had claimed that it never existed, that it was
just another one of his illusions.  No dueling floor, no Castle in the
Sky, nothing but that big room at the top of his Godforsaken tower.
        But... somehow, Utena couldn't shake the suspicion that -that-
was the lie, not the rest of it.  There was something -different-
about that last encounter, something she couldn't put her finger on;
some extrasensory wrongness which set it apart from all the other
times she'd taken the floor against an opponent with the Castle's
lights glowing above her.  There was nothing concrete she could point
to and say, There, you see, he's lying; but the suspicion remained,
and with it a frustrating compulsion to go and see, have it proven one
way or the other.
        Oh well, she thought, sighing.  Another thing to put on my
to-do list when I get back, right after finding Anthy and gutting her
brother.
        She decided she didn't want to think about him any more, and
was just in search of something else to divert her mind when Corwin
Ravenhair came around the corner ahead of her, Nall perched on his
shoulder, gleeful expressions on both their faces.  They only
brightened when they caught sight of her, and without warning Corwin
lunged forward, grabbed one of her hands, and started pulling her
along the corridor, saying,
        "Oh, good, there you are.  C'mon - Kate and I - "
        "We," said Nall importantly.
        " - WE want you to see something.  Where's your coat?"
        "In my room, why?"
        "You'll want it," Corwin replied, his blue eyes twinkling.
        Utena allowed herself to be conducted to her room without
demur, collected her black woolen overcoat, and then followed Corwin
to one of the far corners of the castle, then up and up and up a
spiral staircase, climbing one of the towers.  She was under strict
instructions not to look out the windows, and such was the look of
gleeful anticipation on Corwin's face that she obeyed without
complaint.  She had a suspicion of what he wanted her to see, anyway,
and the anticipation was mounting with each step upward.
        Now, eyes closed, she was led out through a doorway into the
cold outside air, her shoes scraping on bare stone, hand tucked in
Corwin's elbow.  There were voices up here - Kaitlyn's soft, slightly
husky murmur, talking in a hushed, unintelligible tone to Juri, whose
low tone in response was pitched almost like a purr.  Utena smiled
slightly as she was led closer to the voices, and they broke off their
conversation to greet her and Corwin.
        "Can I look yet?" she asked Corwin with good-natured wryness.
        "Not yet," Nall replied; then she felt Corwin's warm hands on
her shoulders as he carefully aimed her in the right direction.
        "There we are.  Now then.  I'd like you to meet a friend of
mine.  Utena Tenjou... "  He tapped her on the shoulder, and she
opened her eyes to see him gesture with a flourish into the sky and
say, "... Saturn."
        The overcast had gone, leaving the night crystal-clear and,
out here in the boonies, far from any source of artificial light
pollution, almost unbelievably starry.  They were standing at the top
of the castle's tallest tower, surrounded by the low crenelations of
the turret roof, so far above the Tsiolkovskiy Sea that the sound of
the surf was almost lost in the cold but gentle breeze.  The scene was
flooded with a soft golden light, what Utena imagined moonlight would
look like if it were gold instead of silver.
        The source of that illumination was plain to see.  Hanging in
the sky off to the south-southeast, reflected choppily in the
still-rough Tsiolkovskiy, was Titan's planet, Saturn.  The Ringed
Planet was waning, just past the last quarter.  Because Titan was more
or less coplanar with them, its rings were nearly invisible from this
vantage point - just a thin bright line dividing the planet in half at
a rakish angle, slanting sharply upward from lower left to upper
right.
        "... oh -my-," said Utena softly, gazing up at it.  It was
-huge-, three times the size of the Moon from Earth or Bajor from
Jeraddo, so big it almost felt like she could reach up and touch it.
Not that she'd want to, because that would disturb its serene, gently-
striped golden beauty.  Earth's Moon was beautiful too, in its way,
silver and remote, like a calm observing presence; and the view of
Bajor from Jeraddo was inspiring, its soft blue-green light speaking
of the life to be found there.  Saturn, though, was big and warm and
friendly, the golden tint to its light having much the same quality
that the yellowish light of a good fire lent to a room like the castle
library.  Its glow almost seemed to -embrace- her, as though the
ringed giant were welcoming her to its back yard and telling her to
make herself comfortable.
        "Remarkable, isn't it?" Juri inquired softly.  Utena noticed
that the redhead's gloved hand was firmly laced with Kaitlyn's, and
grinned at her before turning her attention back skyward again.
        "Incredible," she replied.  "Let's see... there's Orion...
Sirius... Aldebaran... "
        Corwin grinned.  "No test today," he said, and pointed to a
star slightly above and to the right of Saturn.  "That's Epsilon
Eridani - Bajor-B'hava'el," he said.
        "I thought so," said Utena, nodding with a smile.  She put her
arm around his shoulders, gave his hair a ruffle, and went on, "Thank
you, Corwin.  It's beautiful, just like you said it would be."
        He blushed a little, though in the golden light of Saturn it
was hard to tell, and replied, "You're welcome.  I'm actually kind of
glad it was snowing when we got in - I think this is the best place in
the world to see it from."  Then he chuckled and added, "Sometime I'll
have to take you up to Mimas.  There's no atmosphere there, so we'll
have to wear the suits again, but it's a lot closer to Saturn."  He
held out his hands a couple of feet apart.  "Takes up about -this-
much of the sky."
        "Wow."
        "It's something, all right," Nall chipped in as he performed
his ritual abandonment of Corwin's shoulder for Utena's.
        Kaitlyn was always very impressed to see Saturn, and Juri's
reaction to it had been worth braving the cold.  It was a rare thing
for the redhead's face to show actual wonder, but when she'd opened
her eyes and seen the Ringed Planet, then, just for a moment, it had.
Kate froze that sight in her memory with a private little smile,
knowing that she would savor it for a long time to come.
        But right now she was freezing, and so she gave her brother a
kiss on the cheek, wished him goodnight, and went back inside with
Juri.  Utena, who wasn't bothered much by cold, Corwin, who was
bothered by it even less, and Nall, who didn't mind it at all, stayed
out there for a while, sitting on the crenelations, talking about the
sky and their future plans to show its wonders to a certain somebody.

        Azalynn and Liza didn't have to brave the cold to see Saturn;
they could see it from the window of their bedroom, which was on the
east wall of Castle Eyrie overlooking the sea.  For this very reason,
the room had a window seat, a padded leather bench built into the sill
of the big main window, and that's just where the two girls were
sitting, bundled up in Liza's cloak and looking up at the golden gas
giant.
        "Seems like it's going really well so far," said Azalynn, a
little drowsily.  She reached up with a lazy gesture and brushed some
of Liza's slightly damp blonde curls away from her warm, flushed face.
        "So far," Liza agreed, closing her hand around the one Azalynn
had outstretched, then kissing the Dantrovian's knuckles.  "Tomorrow
will be the real test, though.  There'll be a lot more people around
who I've given reason to make me unwelcome in the past."
        "Yeah, but none of them are the host," Azalynn pointed out.
"And he - seems - to like - the new you," she added through a
prodigious yawn.  "Mmm... well... bang goes that old myth," she mused.
        Liza cocked a pale eyebrow.  "Mm?"
        "Oh," said Azalynn with a drowsy smile, "it's a commonly held
misconception among humans that Dantrovians are insatiable.  For the
record... "  She yawned again, then added in a thicker voice, "For the
record, 's not true."
        Liza smiled, then gathered Azalynn up and got to her feet.
"Well, then I guess I'd better put you to bed," she said.  It was half
bravado, of course, as she herself was also very tired; but it was too
classy a gesture to pass up.  She got them both arranged under the
covers, tossed her cloak across the room to fall hanging on one of the
hooks near the door, then reached up and extinguished the lone
holotorch that had been left lighting the place when they'd arrived
from the library two hours before.
        "Good night, Azalynn," she murmured, kissing the Dantrovian's
forehead.  "Do you suppose Santa will bring us anything nice in the
morning?"
        "Doubt it," Azalynn mumbled sleepily.  "We've been AWfully
naughty... "
        Liza chuckled, burrowed down just a little deeper in the
covers, and drifted off to sleep.

        Utena came strolling around the corner from the East Tower,
Nall on her shoulder, hands in her pockets, whistling "The Carol of
the Bells", just in time to see Juri kissing Kate goodnight in the
doorway to Kate's room.  There was a time when to be spotted doing
something of the sort would have been a matter of great embarrassment
for Juri, earning the spotter a cold shoulder (or worse if she were
foolish enough to make some overt acknowledgement of what she'd
witnessed).  Today, though, Utena's knowing little smirk just got
returned in kind as Juri passed by her in the hall with a nod and a
quiet, "Good night, Tenjou."
        "Y'know," said Utena with cheery thoughtfulness as she elbowed
the door shut behind her and hung up her coat, "I think you're good
for her."
        Kate went a little pink and replied, "W-well, I h-h-hope so.
I m-mean, I'd hope I w-w-wasn't b-BAD for her... "
        "No, I mean it," said Utena.  She sat down, took off her
shoes, and went on, "I mean, some of it can be put down to just
getting out from under that damned Tournament.  That's helped all of
us.  But I think you're... I dunno, teaching her that it's OK to
smile.  She's taking herself less seriously."
        "Which is good," Nall observed, "because if she'd taken
herself any -more- seriously she'd have snapped by now."
        Leaving Nall on the bed, Utena went into the bathroom, brushed
her teeth, changed into her pajamas.  Then she came out and sprawled
back on her side of the bed while Kate took her turn.
        "You're looking a bit more chipper this year than last
yourself," Nall observed as Kate emerged.  "I think maybe the redhead
agrees with -you-, too."
        "H-hush, Nall," said Kate with a modest little gesture.
        Nall performed a little ducking maneuver that, for him, was
like a shrug.  "Hey, I call 'em like I see 'em."
        "Shouldn't you be getting off to your pile of gold, dragon?"
asked Utena with a grin as she punched up her pillow and got under the
covers.
        "I could," Nall replied; "but I'd much rather while away this
Christmas Eve in your sweet arms, my treasure," he added with a rather
cheesy grin.
        Utena tried to give him a stern look, failed utterly, and
then, laughing, said, "Who am I to resist a line like that?"  She
raised the corner of the coverlet, and Nall, grinning wider still,
scampered in and arranged himself.
        Kate chuckled, climbed in on her own side with the
rather-more-passive Seven, and switched off the lights.
        "G'night, Kate," said Utena softly.
        "N-n-night, Utena," she replied, adding, "N-Nall."
        "Nnt," mumbled Nall, already half-asleep.

        "Well," said Gryphon as he settled himself down in the master
bedroom up in the North Tower, "I think this is going pretty well."
        "Mm," Kei replied sleepily.  "I wonder how many of the kids
we'll be able to get up in the morning after your little 'do what thou
wilt' speech," she added with a chuckle.
        "Oh, I dunno," said Gryphon, smiling.  "I expect they'll all
turn up for breakfast."
        "'M not so sure," Kei mused.  "I remember being that age, even
if I never actually -was-.  Somebody told me what you told them this
afternoon, I wouldn't come out for -days-."
        Gryphon chuckled.  "Wild child, were you?"
        "Oh yeah," Kei asserted, stretching lazily.  "Blonde streak
bleached in my hair, devil-green contact lenses - a hundred pounds of
hell looking for a place to break loose.  Priss's gonna be just like
me in a couple years.  Start dreading it now."
        Gryphon made a face.  "I started -last year-," he informed her
wryly.  "That's why I shocked poor Mrs. Savage by sending them to
intro biocontrol so early.  I'm thinking it's time for Guy to get his
own room... "
        "I'm thinking the twins will assassinate us if we try it," Kei
replied.
        "Mm... there is that," conceded her husband.  "Though I expect
he'll be asking for one pretty soon on his own."
        "Well, we can burn that bridge when we get to it."
        "I suppose."  There was a pause.  "Green contact lenses?"
        "Yup.  I thought green eyes were sexier than boring old
brown."
        "Mm.  Well, what a shame, then.  By the time I met you, you
were already a staid, mature, responsible, boring nineteen-year-old."
        Kei nodded sadly.  "Yup.  And now we're old, decrepit
-parents-," she said, inflecting "parents" in that teenage way that
means "older than the freaking Hittites".
        Gryphon sighed, feeling the weight of years pressing down on
his frail old bones, patted her hand, and replied in a wistful tone,
"Yup."
        Silence.
        "So... " said Kei.
        "Mm?"
        "You wanna?"
        "-Oh- yeah."

        To his eternal chagrin, the lord of the manor and his lady
were the latest ones of all to the breakfast table on Christmas
morning, and the look in his eldest daughter's smiling eyes as he
passed her at the head of the table let him know that she knew
precisely why.  It made him feel very, very weird, but at least Kate
didn't wink at him.  That would have been a little too much to bear on
a Sunday morning.
        He sat down, yawned, wished everyone a good morning, and
unfurled his festive holly-edged napkin from its candy-cane napkin
holder.  The exquisite care with which the table had been set for
Christmas breakfast informed him without having to ask of the answer
to his next question, so he didn't bother asking it.  Instead, a
moment later, Belldandy Morisato bustled out of the kitchen with a
large platter of pancakes.
        "Good morning!" she said brightly, putting the platter down in
the middle of the table.  "I trust everyone had a good night?"
        Gryphon coughed, almost spraying Urd, seated opposite him,
with English Breakfast tea.  (The elder Norn didn't help matters any
by reaching across under the table and playfully caressing his calf
with one bare foot.)
        "Spectacular," Kei assured Bell, who took it in the spirit in
which it was meant, said she was glad, assured them that bacon and
hash browns would be right out, and vanished back into the kitchen.
        "You know," Gryphon observed as he recovered his composure,
"one of these days I'm going to have Bell for a guest at something and
-not- end up having her cook everything."
        Kate grinned.  "Oh, she's n-n-not c-cooking ev-v-verything."
        "Oh?  Who else?"
        "I believe," said Juri dryly, "Iron Chef Tenjou is assisting."
        "Mm," said Saionji, nodding.  "This is definitely her toast."
        Wakaba gave him a funny look.  "You can identify people's
cooking from the way they do -toast-?"
        Saionji shrugged.  "It's a gift," he replied.
        "God, you're weird," said Wakaba.
        "I thought that was why you liked me," he protested.  "Only at
the time you pronounced it 'exotic'," he added with a little grin.
        Wakaba smirked.  "I didn't say it was a -bad- thing."
        A moment later, Bell returned with a tray of bacon and hash
browns; Utena, bearing sausage links and a syrup assortment, was right
behind her.
        "There," said Bell.  "That's all taken care of.  Thank you for
your help, Utena dear."
        Utena grinned, taking her seat between Kate and Corwin.
"Happy to help, especially since you were pressed for time."
        "Mm - and speaking of, I'd best get back.  I'll see you all at
lunchtime," said the Norn, and she disappeared back into the kitchen.
        "There's a mirror in the kitchen?" asked Wakaba.
        "For just that purpose," Utena replied.  "Well, go on, grab a
pancake.  Plenty for everybody... "
        "Oh my," said Belldandy, emerging from the kitchen again.  "I
-must- be in a hurry, I'm forgetting things."  She put a large plate
down in front of Moose MacEchearn; on that plate was an even larger
omelet.  "There you are, Mr. MacEchearn, just the way you like it,"
she added with a theatrical little flourish.
        Moose's pleasantly unhandsome face split in a huge grin.
"Gosh.  Thanks, Mrs. M," he said, then took a deep sniff and grinned
even wider.  "Genuine wiffle fruit and everything."
        Bell smiled.  "Only the best on Christmas morning," she
replied.  "Oh dear.  Now I really must go," she added, then said
another round of goodbyes (interrupted by the mock-irritated shooing
motions of her elder sister) and fled once more.

        From the dining room, they went to the library, where the
number of stockings nailed up along the mantelpiece almost gave the
room the look of a stocking factory for a moment.  As the previous
year, everybody in attendance got one, and all of them had a mix of
standard items (orange in the toe, jar of dry-roast cashews) and
personalized ones (guitar strings for Miki, super-heavy-duty picks for
Moose, flechette blocks for Sylvie).  Everybody got a crystal copy of
the Art of Noise live album recorded in Toronto back in March, which
Miki and Liza had finished mixing down and mastering during her
training period on the band's sound gear.
        Liza was startled, surprised, and really quite touched to find
that there was a stocking there with her name on it.  She hadn't been
expecting one; just being tolerated between these walls was enough for
her; but Kate's mother, bustling around relishing her hostess role,
was quite insistent, and so Liza had a stocking.  With her lip
trembling, she delved into it and found:
        A whetstone;
        Ten Lindt & Spruengli amaretto "Lindor" truffles;
        The aforementioned music crystal;
        A pack of bright purple pens which nicely matched the silk
swashbuckler's shirt she'd been wearing the day she reappeared at
Mandeville Memorial, perfect for signing her new name with a great
flourish on documents of varying importance;
        Ten blackberry-scented votive candles;
        The aforementioned jar of dry-roast cashews; and, stuffed way
down into the toe to give the stocking body...
        ... a chunk of anthracite about the size of her fist.
        Upon dragging this prize out, thinking it was awfully hard and
lumpy to be an orange, Liza stared at it for a few moments, her lovely
blue eyes going wide, and for just a second, Gryphon worried that he'd
gone too far with the joke and upset her.
        Then she turned to Azalynn and they both burst out laughing.
        Relieved, Gryphon grinned.
        "A fat man in red told me that's for the last of your karmic
debt," he told her, pointing at the coal.
        Liza wiped the tears of mirth from her face, put the lump of
coal down on top of the cashew jar, and told him with twinkling eyes,
        "I'll treasure it always."
        "All right!" said B'Elanna Torres excitedly.  "Check it out,
Mia - a Toynbee coil calibrator!  Awesome!"
        "That's... lovely," replied Mia Ausa, who had no idea what a
Toynbee coil was, nor why B'Elanna should care to calibrate one.
        Once they finished with their stockings, it was time for the
tree; and with the lighting in the room lowered and the tree's lights
turned up, the library became even cozier, lending to the overall
feeling of warmth and family that permeated the occasion.
        "Boy," said Wakaba, voicing the sentiment that all of them
were feeling, "this is cozy.  'A Duelists' Family Christmas'."
        Utena snickered and looped an arm around her old friend,
threatening to muss up her onion-like hairstyle.  This elicited an
indignant demand from Wakaba for Saionji to defend her honor.  The
green-haired Duelist informed her that, it being Christmas, he was off
duty, and that, as far as he knew, -he- was the only current threat to
her honor anyway, so he wasn't the best source to seek aid from in
that matter in the first place.
        They dove in without the orderly procession that had
characterized Christmas Eve; by Hutchins/Morgan family policy, the
tree sort-and-unwrap was a free-for-all of tag-reading, package-
passing, and paper-shredding.  Everybody had presents; that was also a
family policy.  As before, as always, there were a lot of books.
Datacrystals of music were also popular; also clothes, which were not,
in this family, met with the stereotypical dread.
        There were also a few special things.  Tiny Robo and Lesser
Mazinger got certificates entitling them to a performance upgrade in
Corwin's New Avalon lab as soon as the festivities relocated to that
city, later in the week.  Utena had a large box from Kate which turned
out to contain, to her delighted surprise (or perhaps surprised
delight), a nicely compact ten-inch catadioptric telescope and some
accessories for same.  Miki, inspired by Dorothy's birthday gift for
Kaitlyn last time around, gave Dorothy an elegantly beautiful pocket
watch with a replica of the Turing Institute's sentient-certification
medal built into the back of the case.  Technically, Dorothy didn't
need a watch, but the delight on her face showed that she appreciated
the sentiment all the same.
        There were a few more tongue-in-cheek gifts, too, like the
little tuxedo jacket for Nall ("Oh cool!  Now I can look sharp at
Rocket Boy's wedding, in about a hundred years"), a book from Juri to
Kate about improving one's bowling game, and of course Priss Morgan
tried to give her twin brother Guy to Sylvie Daniels, much to Guy's
dismay.  Miki Kaoru also received a timepiece, a very elegant and
stylish wristwatch which was cunningly constructed to tell the time on
a planet called Barrayar - a world whose solar day was something along
the lines of twenty-six and a half hours long.
        There were also a couple of gifts that didn't make much sense,
at least at face value.  Another of Utena's gifts was an isolinear
memory keyrod, without any explanation enclosed of what it was for.
Corwin and his father, whose names were on the tag, just smiled and
told her, "When we get to New Avalon, you'll find out."
        At just around the time the mess of paper and foil was taken
care of, MegaZone sloped in, unheralded and unannounced, with his arms
full of boxes.  Some people seemed a little startled, since he'd just
wandered in from the kitchen, an area that didn't have access from
outside, but Utena was used to it and just gave him a welcoming grin.
        "Sorry I'm late," said the burdened Chaoswalker.  "You
should've seen the traffic."
        As he passed the packages around, the bell on the extremely
incongruous Santa hat he wore jingling merrily, the stack he carried
seemed not to get any smaller for a while, until at last he was left
with only one box - which seemed to be about the same size as the
whole pile he'd entered with.  It was silver, and not wrapped, just
tied across the top with a large red bow.
        This, the big man set down carefully, almost gingerly, in
front of Kaitlyn.
        "Kate," he said, "this is from me, your parents, Aunt Urd,
Juri, and Bernie Kaltenjen."
        Kate looked puzzled for a moment - Bernie Kaltenjen? - then
blinked, then blinked again.  Then, slowly, almost dreamily, she
reached forward, pulled one of the streamers to undo the bow, and
removed the lid from the box.
        Her face, halfway between confused and trepid, melted into
complete astonishment, then blazed into pure, glowing joy.
        "Ohhhhhhhh," she said, the sound almost unvocalized.  Slowly,
carefully, she leaned forward, reached into the box, and removed its
contents.
        For a second, Utena thought it was another stuffed tiger.
Kaitlyn had over a hundred of them, and it had seemed a little odd to
her roommate that she hadn't received any for this Christmas.  This
one made up for it, though - it was quite large, about the size of a
middle-sized dog, and very well-detailed.  It had a rich, silky orange
coat, bushy white 'sideburns', the brightest amber eyes Utena had ever
seen in a stuffed animal... 
        ... which blinked... 
        ... and its tail, hanging lazily over Kate's cradling arms,
just moved...
        "Ho... ly... COW," said Corwin reverently.
        "That's... that's a real tiger," Utena murmured, as if trying
to explain it to herself.
        "Oh COOL!" said Sylvie, Priss, Azalynn, and B'Elanna.
        The tiger - just a young one, apparently, but already trading
the clumsy shape of a kitten for the sleekness of a full-grown cat -
made a pleased little grumbling noise and batted at the side of Kate's
face with one oversized orange forepaw.  Its tail flicked nonchalantly
back and forth, dangling down like an inverse periscope.  Kaitlyn
blinked at it as if she couldn't believe she was holding it, then
looked in turn at Zoner and everyone he had named - with the exception
of the absent Bernie Kaltenjen, of course.
        "He's Monty's son," Urd explained, reaching to scruffle the
tiger's ears.  "Full Neo-Siberian, six months old.  His name is
Sergei, after Prokofiev.  Bernie usually called him Serge."
        "S-S-Serge," said Kaitlyn softly.  She shifted her hold on the
striped creature, freeing a hand to very tentatively pet his head; he
made that grumbling sound again and leaned closer, tail flagging
contentedly.
        "Now -that-," said Nall approvingly, "is a -cat-."
        "Don't listen to him, Peril," said Dorothy Wayneright, hugging
her cat.
        "What?" said Nall.  "Peril's a good cat too.  He's just...
small."
        "You're small too," Wakaba pointed out.
        "You just haven't seen me big," Nall replied smugly.
        "Uh-huh," replied Wakaba, unconvinced.
        "All the paperwork - " Gryphon began, then looked over the
edge of the box and stopped.  For no apparent reason, he adopted a
bad German accent.  "Ist not in ze box.  Zoner!"
        "Jawohl!" said Zoner, stiffening to attention.
        "You haff ze papervork?  You hat -better- haff ze papervork... "
        Zoner reached into an inside pocket, looked thoughtful, tried
another, then another and another, muttering as he did so, "Vas, if I
can't find ze papervork, zo I forge -new- papervork, vhere ist ze
problem?" before at last producing a sheaf of papers out of the first
pocket he'd tried.
        "Here we go," he said, reverting to his normal voice.
"Breeding certificate, LSD affidavit of authenticity, neocat behavior
certification, Avalon County Department of Animal Control pet license,
import authorization from the Bajoran government, Vedek Bareil's
letter of approval, President Tiefeld's same... yup, this's
everything."
        "Why don't you hold onto these for the time being," said Kei
to Juri, and handed her the documents.  "Kate's hands are full," she
added, grinning.
        Juri smiled, folded the papers double, and tucked them away.
        Kaitlyn seemed to return from a long way away, blinked again,
and looked at the nearest person on the list, her mother.
        "H... h... how?"
        "Thank Mr. Strange Attractor there, mostly," said Kei, aiming
a thumb at Zoner.  "Back in June, through a strange quirk of fate, the
K'trayylin Brothers Circus ended up with an unexpected neotiger cub.
They were looking for some other reputable circus or animal act to
take him off their hands once his initial training was complete, and
damned if Zoner didn't happen to surf by their website."
        "Just pure luck," Zoner insisted piously.
        "From there," said Kei, "it was just a matter of convincing
the circus that you weren't the average dumb citizen looking for a
cool pet."
        Urd smirked.  "I had a little to do with that."
        "(Could've just given her a circus, but nooo,)" muttered Zoner
with a mock-put-upon air.
        "So did Bernie," said Gryphon, grinning.  "He remembered you,
Kate, and lobbied hard.  He says Monty seemed to like the idea, too.
I guess you made quite an impression."
        It had taken Kaitlyn a little while to remember where she'd
heard the name "Bernie Kaltenjen" before, but as soon as she'd seen
what was inside the box, it came back to her in an instant.  Once,
when she was a little girl, Kate had met a neotiger, a Neo-Siberian by
the name of Monty, when the K'trayylin Brothers Circus came to New
Avalon.  Her mother, knowing her fondness for the cats, had arranged
it with Monty's keeper, the very same Bernie, a cheerful Salusian with
a ready smile and a big, booming voice like Moose MacEchearn's.
Four-year-old Kate had been enchanted, not only by Monty himself, but
also by the obvious bond that existed between Monty and Bernie.
        From that day to this, she'd dreamed of having a companion
like Monty; but neotigers were uncommon creatures, and well-tempered
or not, they had to be handled with care and respect simply because of
their size.  They made a lot of people nervous and they required a lot
of space to be happy.  They were also expensive to feed.  Kate knew
that if the day ever came, it would take a lot of luck and a lot of
doing to arrange, and it would have to be after she got out of school
and was out on her own somewhere.  Somewhere roomy.
        But then, of course, she'd never expected that she'd be -in- a
school on a nearly-uninhabited forest moon, with a large castle for a
dorm.  Plenty of room there...
        Kate's arms were starting to get tired; Serge was pretty small
for a tiger, but he still got heavy after a while.  She carried him
over to one of the couches and sat carefully down, arranging the young
tiger in her lap.  He sprawled out contentedly, not a care in the
world, his tail hanging loosely over the front of the sofa.
        When Kate looked up again, her eyes were full of tears.
Utena, with the ease and grace of long practice, reached over and
eased off her glasses before her eyes could overflow and stain the
lenses with salt.  (Normally, when she did that to Anthy back in the
day, it was to prevent her from nodding off and squashing them into
the bridge of her nose, but the technique worked just as well in cases
like this.)
        "I... I... "  She shook her head, then smiled an enormous,
teary smile and whispered, "Th-th-thank you."
        "Say," said Utena, crouching down next to the couch and
reaching over the arm to touch the neotiger's glossy back.  "Is this
guy going to grow up to be an honest-to-God Siberian tiger?"
        "Yep," said Kei.  Serge, noting the contact, rolled over and
started swiping playfully at Utena's hand.
        "Damn," said Utena - the impressed "damn", not the upset
 kind - as she played a little impromptu game of patty-cake with the
tiger.  "I guess Kate's gonna have to reinforce her bed."
        Kate snuffled explosively - a laugh colliding with a sob - and
said, "I g-g-guess so."
        Utena leaned over so the rest of the room wouldn't hear her
and murmured, "(You bet you will.  Once he's full-grown, add in Juri,
and that'll be something like 700 pounds of snuggle.)"
        That erased the crying from the equation; Kaitlyn laughed
until -new- tears came, then wiped them away with her sleeve, accepted
the replacement of her glasses by her roommate, and said to Serge,
        "W-well, Serge, w-w-welcome to the f-f-family."
        "Hrm," said Serge, and he whacked her gently in the face with
his tail.
        "Poor Seven's going to be so jealous," Azalynn observed.
        "He'll j-just have to l-l-learn to sh-share," said Kate
gamely.  "W-won't he, Serge?  B-but you'll m-m-make it easy f-for
him.  W-won't you?"
        "Hrrmhm," said Serge, and batted the other side of her face
with his tail.
        "Um... I hate to be a wet blanket," said B'Elanna hesitantly,
"but... isn't a tiger kind of a... -dangerous- pet?  I mean, he's all
right now, and he's definitely -prettier- than a targ, but when he
grows up... "  She shrugged.  "They're wild animals, after all."
        "Oh, no, it'll be fine," said Miki Kaoru cheerily.  "Serge is
a neotiger."
        "Which means... ?"
        With the patient tone of a professor, Miki explained what it
meant.  In a nutshell, what it meant was that Serge was not a wild
tiger; that would be both inhumane and really quite stupid.  Rather,
he was a Neo-Siberian, one of the five breeds of neotigers -
engineered variants on the great cats which were created during the
Genetic Revolution of the twenty-second century in order to improve
the lot in life of the performing animals in circuses and the like.
        Originally, Miki explained, this process was developed for
lions.  The sad truth was that normal lions being wild animals, they
were, however cleverly tamed, always dangerous; as such, they always
had to be -treated- like dangerous animals.  They had to be caged when
not performing, handled with great care and circumspection, sometimes
treated roughly just to keep them from hurting someone, or themselves
for that matter.  They didn't seem to enjoy their lives much, which
was the main thrust of animal-rights activists' constant calls for the
abandonment of the performing-animals tradition.
        So some enterprising geneticist at the Wedge Defense Force
Life Sciences Division (whose unofficial motto was "You should
because you can") came up with the idea of twiddling the genes of a
normal lion to simulate the centuries of breeding and acculturation
which had produced the domestic housecat from whatever wild creature
had been its forebear, without the unfortunate side effects which had
led the modern domestic cat to its gloomy fate of birth defects,
congenital diseases, hip dysplasia, and whatnot.  The result, the
theory went, would be a gregarious, intelligent, fun-loving animal
which -enjoyed- doing silly tricks for the pleasure of humans, and,
since it wasn't a dangerous wild beast, only looked like one, it could
be let free when not performing - kept in the lionkeeper's home as a
pet, like the dog-show master's dancing dogs.  Meanwhile, the wild
lions go back to the wild, run, rut, eat gazelles, whatever makes them
happy.  No muss, no fuss, everybody wins.
        The process took ten years to develop, and cribbed fairly
heavily from the earlier Military Utility Genetic Higher Intelligence
program, whose famous creation resembled like a cross between a cat, a
bear and a particularly shaggy throw rug.  The MUGHI creature was
certainly intelligent and personable, though, and those were exactly
the traits that the neolion engineers were after.  In the end, the
prototype neolion, Samson, was perhaps a bit -too- smart; in addition
to personability and the capacity to learn complex tricks, Samson
displayed a profound capacity for mischief and a very well-developed
sense of humor.
        But that was all to the good, and the engineers promptly
labeled the whole project a rousing success, developed the tooling to
translate it to several other popular species, and then sat back
waiting for the accolades.
        Instead, they were highly bewildered when those same animal-
rights people got on their case for "playing God" and "engineering a
slave race".  The LSD engineers involved with the project shook their
heads, concluded that there was just no pleasing some people, and went
on with their lives.  Neotigers went on to become the most popular and
successful of the neocat line, normal great cats went back to the wild
(except for the ones in zoos - purists!), and aside from the
anti-genetic-engineering crowd, everybody was happy.
        "That's why he's so... -playful-, then," said Sylvie
thoughtfully.
        "His kind were engineered to be," Miki confirmed, nodding.
"Also highly intelligent.  There's a good chance he understands some
of what we're saying."
        "Wow, Miki," said Sylvie, taking the blue-haired Duelist's arm
and leaning her head against his shoulder.  "You know so much stuff."
        Miki gave her a glance - not nervous, as it once would have
been, but sort of detachedly amused - and said dryly, "I read a lot."
        "Mmm, I'll bet you do," Sylvie replied.
        Zoner considered admonishing his daughter, decided Kaoru could
take care of himself, and stayed out of it.

        Kate was occupied for the next couple of hours; inside the
box, she discovered several toys, including a large striped rubber
ball of which Serge seemed inordinately fond.  They were still playing
when the mirror on the far wall glowed and, to the utter amazement of
B'Elanna Torres, out came Aunt Bell and her family.  Several of the
people here had not met Bell's husband, a pleasant-looking fellow
named Keiichi, or their children, fourteen-year-old Hiroshi,
twelve-year-old Mirai, and the five-year-old twins - and, of course,
the little blonde form of Mary Broadbank, contemporary of Mirai,
Sylvie and the Morgan twins, who looked so much like her two elder
sisters that those who knew Liza and Clarissa were a little startled
by the common resemblance in the family.
        For a second, looking at Corwin's youngest cousins, Wakaba
Shinohara had decided that they were a pair of little twin boys; then
she revised her estimate and decided they were girls.  Then Bell
introduced them as Makoto and Fatora, and she realized that there was
one of each - but they looked so much alike it was eerie.
        "(Gosh,)" she whispered to Miki Kaoru.  "(They look more alike
than you and Kozue!  It's -scary-!)"
        Miki nodded.  "(Mm.  If it weren't impossible, I'd say they
were identical.)"
        "We -are- identical," said Fatora (identifiable only by her
longer hair) in a didactic tone of voice.
        Miki blinked, then crouched to have his eyes on a level with
her.  "But you can't be," he said - not in the tone of a grown-up
correcting a child's misconception, but as one adult to another,
seeking clarification on a confusing point of data.  "Identical twins
come from a single zygote.  They're genetically identical."
        "We -were-," Fatora said; then she nudged her brother with an
elbow and said, "until -genius boy- here mutated himself a Y
chromosome."
        Makoto rolled his eyes.  "Fatora, we don't know that's what
happened."
        "Well, what else -could've- happened?" said Fatora.  "You
explain why we're genetically identical except for that one factor."
        "I can't," Makoto replied in a patient, I've-had-this-
conversation-way-too-many-times-already tone of voice.  "That's why
it's called a freak occurrence."
        "You guys are -five-?" said Wakaba.
        "That's right," said Fatora.
        "Almost six," Makoto added.
        Fatora snorted.  "Our birthday's in May, Mr. Wizard."
        "Sometimes," Makoto replied, "I -feel- like I've been stuck
with you for -sixty- years."
        "You just complain 'cause I'm smarter," Fatora replied
haughtily.
        "In your dreams," Makoto muttered.
        "Don't fight on Christmas, dears," said Belldandy.
        "Yes, Mother," replied both twins in dutiful stereo.
        "... Man," said Wakaba once the twins had been led away out of
earshot.  "Creepy."
        Miki watched them with a pensive look for a few more moments,
then blinked, checked his watch, and said, "Mm.  Sorry, Wakaba?"
        Wakaba smiled and patted him on the shoulder.  "Nothing.
Sorry.  I shouldn't've brought Kozue up."
        "No, it's OK," said Miki, shaking his head.  "I just hope
she's not too miserable today.  Kozue's never liked Christmas," he
explained.  "Backlash against our parents' mistaking-money-for-love
philosophy.  She used to call it 'Bribery Day'.  But it was the one
day out of the year, even when she resented me, that she'd call a
truce and let herself act like she loved me."
        "She -does- love you," Wakaba told him.  "That was the
problem.  Look, I know this is kind of a sad thing, but maybe you'll
be able to see the good in it - she missed you an awful lot after you
disappeared.  But she didn't get frantic or go into a funk or turn
bitchy again... she just... sort of took over for you.  She told me
once that she was determined to do things so that when you returned,
you'd be proud of her."
        Miki gazed at her for a moment with a grateful look on his
face, then said, "Thank you.  You've never told me that before."
        Wakaba grinned awkwardly.  "It's, uh... never really come up
before," she reminded him.
        "True," he conceded with a smile.  "Well, with any luck," he
added, glancing across the room to where Utena was meeting the twins
(from the look on her face, she was receiving an uncomfortable
grilling from Fatora, probably about something to do with Corwin, who
was nearby turning red), "I'll get the chance to be proud, before too
much longer."
        "If I could figure out how to send you back, I would," Wakaba
told him.  "Hell, I'd send us all back.  We could all form a huge,
complicated murder plot to bump off Ohtori.  You know, like in 'Murder
on the Orient Express'."
        Miki, who had taken the same literature course the previous
D-term, did indeed know.  He chuckled and said, "I think Utena might
have an objection to that plan."
        "Yeah, well, I only hope that when she does go back, someone
can convince her to just use a -shotgun- and get it the hell -over-
with.  What is it Kaitlyn says?"
        "Honorable battle is for honorable foes?" asked Saionji.
        "Yeah.  That's it.  ... How long have you been standing
there?"
        "I heard the name 'Ohtori'.  I got curious."
        "Oh."
        The Morisato children were duly introduced to (and enthralled
by) Serge; then Liza and Azalynn came in from the walk they'd taken,
and Liza had a joyful reunion with Mary, who'd only seen her eldest
sister a couple of times since Liza's return from the Outer Rim.
        "Is that a tattoo?" asked Mary, tracing the violet lightning
bolt on Liza's face.
        "Not quite," Liza replied.  "It's dye; I have to refresh it
every couple of weeks or it fades.  I do have tattoos, though," she
added with a wicked grin.  "If you ask me really nicely later, in
private, maybe I'll let you see them."
        Mary laughed, delighted.  "God, Mama would have a stroke."
She leaned back, placing the back of one hand over her eyes, and
gasped in the tone of a woman about to expire, "'Oh!  Oh!  My own
flesh and blood, marking herself, disFIGuring herself, in such a
heathen, alien manner!  Oh, what would your sainted grandmother whose
name you bear say at a time like this?'"
        "From what I remember of Grandma," said Liza, "she'd laugh her
ass off, then bake a cake.  Aside from you and Grandpa, she was the
only sane one in our family.  That's why I kept her name when I threw
away the other ones."
        Mary nodded, still grinning, and then turned to her sister's
golden-eyed companion.  "And you must be Azalynn?"
        Azalynn nodded.  "That's right."
        "You're Dantrovian."
        "Uh-huh."
        "Daddy says Dantrovians are dirty, wanton creatures without
even the morals of common alley cats," said Mary bluntly; then, a
moment later, she pursed her lips thoughtfully and added, "But then,
Daddy doesn't get laid very often, so I suppose his grapes are pretty
sour by now."
        Azalynn goggled at her for a moment, unable to speak, then
burst out laughing.
        "I can tell you hang around with Sylvie, that's for sure," she
told the youngest Broadbank when she had enough control to speak
again.
        "You've got a good sense of humor," Mary noted.  "That's good.
I think you'll need one if you're going to spend much time with the
Dread Pirate Liza."  She grinned at Liza again.  "So every night when
you went to bed, did Captain Ariane tell you, 'Good night, Liza.  I'll
most likely kill you in the morning'?"
        Liza laughed.  "Unfortunately no, but there were plenty of
nights when I thought the -work- might kill me in the morning."
        "You promised you'd tell me all about it," Mary reminded her,
mock-petulantly.
        "And I will," Liza told her.  "Right after lunch.  We'll go
look at Saturn and I'll tell you the whole story, start to finish.
Will that satisfy you, or will we have to be rude and -skip- lunch so
I can get started now?"
        "No, no," said Mary magnanimously.  "I never make anyone skip
a meal.  It's the first thing you learn if you stay at Bell's."

        Mary held her sister to her word, though, and once lunch was
out of the way, the two of them disappeared for several hours while
Liza told her whole story.
        As such, they missed the rounds of arrivals that kept
happening during the afternoon.  People kept turning up, in ones and
two and threes and more, their vehicles crowding the car park near the
front gates, their footprints trampling the path up to the grand
entrance.  The cloakroom filled with their coats, and still they came,
effusively greeted by Keiichi Morisato.  The host had vanished into
the kitchens (vowing that Bell wasn't going to do -everything- for
once).  That left Kei to run the castle's air-traffic control system,
such as it was - Kei called the duty "parking cars" - and Keiichi to
stand by the door greeting people and taking their coats.
        Serge was not unduly put out by the ever-growing crowd; after
all, he was bred to -enjoy- crowds.  Once, noticing that more than ten
people were standing around in a loose semicircle looking at him, he
spontaneously climbed up onto his ball, balancing on all fours and
using his tail for a counterweight.  Unfortunately, he lacked a
full-grown tiger's coordination yet, so he almost immediately tipped
over sideways and flumped to the rug.  There was a brief, awkward
silence until his audience saw that he wasn't hurt; then they laughed,
assuming it was part of the show.  Undaunted, he tried twice more,
then gave up and started batting the ball around instead.
        Peril took an interest in that, and despite the fact that the
ball was somewhat larger than he was, the grey cat put in a pretty
good showing.  This attracted Nall, Lesser Mazinger, and Tiny Robo,
and before long, quite a lively little soccer match was under way.  It
went on until one of the robots almost knocked over the Christmas
tree, at which point the revelers were sternly instructed to take it
outside.
        But the ball didn't roll very well in the snow, so it turned
into more of a freestyle scuffle in the side yard.  Before long, a
number of the children had come out to join in.  That eased the
congestion inside somewhat, for still they came.  Mia Ausa's father,
Network 23 reporter John Trussell, and his pilot, a sharp redhead who
went by the somewhat suspicious name "Jung-Freud"; the Roses, Martin
and Eiko; Tom and Danilia M'krelth'nyr'knet; Hanson and Nadia Davion,
and some other members of the Challenger command staff, including
Klaang, T'Vek, and Ensign Kirk.  Janice Barlow, who had come over from
Jeraddo on Challenger but stayed aboard to take care of some paperwork
regarding her IPO internship, beamed down with them.
        A few of the invited had, of course, sent their regrets.  One
of the more notable absences was Aya Nakajima, who had just finished
the Sixth Carrier Task Force's post-refit shakedown cruise and cycled
back into the Babylon 5 patrol duties to replace Ky Tung's Third Task
Force, going to the yards for its own refit.  A last-minute attempt to
come had run aground on the Earth Alliance's strong diplomatic request
that the CFMF please keep its warships and its Nakajimas out of the
Solar system.  Still, between her normal efforts and the added
ingenuity of Krontep, Derek Bacon, Jer Johnson and Michael Garibaldi,
B5 was experiencing a Christmas party to remember.  Similarly, Noriko
Takaya, Dave Ritchie, Jim Kirk, Jean-Luc Picard, and their various
staffs were prevented from accepting their invitations by duties
elsewhere.
        Kei was up in the West Tower, watching the comm panel, when it
bleeped for her attention.  She'd been expecting it to, since she'd
been tracking an incoming blip for the last couple of minutes, and
now, as the hailing ship swept in over the bay and banked into a
holding circle over the parking area, she got a good look at it
through the windows.
        The new arrival was most definitely a starfighter, but with no
discernable lifting surfaces.  About the only concession to
aerodynamics were two vertical fins (or were they wings?) mounted aft,
obscuring the oversized engines.  It had a blocky, almost chunky look
to it, and the slate-grey thermocoat merely added to the surreality.
        What really caught Kei's attention, though, waa the engine
note, clearly audible through the tower control room's windows.  It
wasn't the high-pitched near-whine of conventional fusion thrusters.
This craft's engines were throaty in an atmosphere, almost growling.
Thankfully, the pilot was keeping it subsonic.
        The comm crackled to life.  "This is WDF Excalibur, requesting
permission to land."
        Kei recognized the voice.  "Funny, I thought the Excalibur was
a Miranda-class cruiser," she remarked.
        "You want me to say that the ship shrunk in the wash?" the
pilot retorted.  "Besides, I like the name, and I didn't want to call
it the King Arthur.  This is Techie, by the way, and Chip is riding in
the back seat."
        "I could kind of guess," Kei said, amused at Techie's
trademark bluntness.  "Where's the rest of the family?"
        "Elana and Reiyna are a few minutes behind in my car.  I
finally got this thing refitted, and I figured this'd be a nice
shakedown cruise.  Anyway, I think I see space enough down there, if
it's not reserved?"
        "We've got plenty left, Techie.  I'm sending you a vector for
area 11 now; just slide it on in."
        "Roger that.  Techie out."
        Aboard the old starfighter, Percy "Techie" Mui turned off the
comm, chuckling.
        "Hey, Dad... weren't we going to test the cloaking device?"
Chip asked. 
        "Later, son.  Besides, it's not polite to sneak up on your
host." 
        "Does that mean that you were thinking about it?"
        Techie spared a glance back.  "Rule number one of parties,
Chip: Never piss off your host."

        Not long after that, the Overstreet contingent arrived.  The
Right Honorable Ambassador Pleniopotentiary from the Confederate
Freespacers Alliance to the Republic of Zeta Cygni, Adm. Kristan O.
Overstreet (ret.) thought that it was a damn shame Gryph didn't have a
chamberlain to announce people this time, because his party would have
been a hoot to have announced; as it was, he just resigned himself to
go around glad-handing and individually introducing his younger
charges.  His wife, Professor Washuu Hakubi of the New Avalon
Institute of Science, certainly needed no introduction; nor did Rianna
and Mayl, who were well-known to almost all in attendance.
        His daughter disappeared almost immediately, plunging into the
crowd to search for playmates and apparently ignoring his bellowed
instruction to be CAREFUL, and he sighed an oppressed sort of sigh.
The tiny redhead standing in front of him, very tidy in a little
holiday frock (as opposed to the slightly less tiny one in the holly-
print lab coat), looked up at him and said,
        "She's a trial, isn't she?"
        "(Kettle, thou art black,)" Redneck muttered, then was spared
having to answer for real by the appearance of his hostess.
        "Well, howdy, Redneck," said Kei, shaking his hand.
"Professor," she added, greeting Washuu as well.  Mayl and Rianna had
already vanished into the crowd; Rianna was probably looking for her
father, who was on the guest list.  (In this she would be frustrated,
as he hadn't arrived yet.)
        "H'lo, Kei," said the Redneck, grinning.  "I don't believe
you've met Lina Diggers."
        Kei hunkered down to be at something like eye level with the
tiny girl.  "I don't believe I have," she said personably.  "I'm Kei
Morgan.  Nice to meet you, Lina."
        Lina dropped a somewhat haphazard curtsey - she didn't seem
-unwilling- to be properly polite, just sort of inexperienced at it -
and said she was pleased to meet Kei (albeit only after demanding,
rather bluntly, the location of the food, and receiving a bit of a
thump on the head from Washuu for her trouble).
        "Lina's staying with Washuu and me while she goes to school in
New Avalon," Redneck explained.  "She's in the G&T program."
        Kei, three of whose own children were in the same program,
nodded with a knowing smile.  "Ahh," she said.  "Say n'more.  Hey,
Lina, do you like tigers?"
        Lina looked a trifle confused.  "Tigers?  Sure," she said,
just polite enough not to add the unspoken but obvious, "But what's
that got to do with anything?"
        "Well, then, come with me for a minute," Kei went on.  "My
daughter Kaitlyn has something you might like to see."

        And still they came, well past nightfall and into the early
evening.  More snow began to fall a half-hour or so past dark, and as
the gathered group got too big for the library, most of it moved to
the great hall of Castle Eyrie.  The Clan Shannon arrived at a quarter
to 7, allowing Tenchi and Achika to complete the Ragnarok Wave.  Their
elder offspring were unable to attend, but sent their regrets.  The
canapes started appearing at 7.  Utena Tenjou emerged from the kitchen
along with them to inform the group that dinner would be ready
promptly at 8.
        Having conveyed the canapes and this message, she didn't
return; Aunt Bell had thanked her for her help and informed her flatly
that if she didn't get out there and enjoy her evening, Bell would be
Very Disappointed.  So Utena meekly took off her apron, hung it up,
and stayed out in the great hall to enjoy her evening.  Immediately,
she spotted something that made her laugh, getting her off to a good
start: Serge had apparently developed a fascination with T'skaia's
long, mobile tail, and was chasing its constantly-moving tip all
around as the t'skrang circulated.  Sky obviously knew about this, and
was playing along, much to Kaitlyn's delight.  Utena picked up a
couple of canapes and a drink and headed off to see what the others
were up to.

        Skuld scanned the great hall with a grin; it looked like the
party, as always, was a rousing success.  Liza Shustal's transformation 
had attracted its fair share of attention, the children of the Ragnarok 
were huddled in a corner plotting some kind of mayhem, and Bell was
keeping all and sundry plied with food and drink with the able 
assistance of her Duelist volunteers, Saionji and Shinohara.  
Everything looked like Gryphon had pulled off the event of the year,
yet again...
        ...until her gaze fell to one side of the buffet table, where a
young woman with a ponytail of dark auburn hair sat with a cup of punch
in her hand and no real expression on her face.  Skuld frowned.  That
was Janice Barlow, Gryphon's latest IPO recruit - what could possibly be
wrong?  The Norn grabbed a cup of punch off the nearest tray (leaving
Kyouichi Saionji thrown somewhat off-balance by the speed at which the
acquisition was performed) and made a beeline for the side of the hall.
        Janice looked up after a moment; Skuld had chosen a seat close
enough to her for conversation, but not so close as to imply intrusion.
The Ragolian girl immediately forced a smile and said, "Oh, uh, hi.
You're Professor Ravenhair, right?"
        "Off-campus, it's just Skuld," Skuld replied with a grin.
"You're Janice, right?  Hannibal Hamlin 2's RA?"
        "That's me," Janice replied.  "It's been good this year so far.
No one's too out of hand, everything's going pretty well... "
        She trailed off.  Skuld frowned internally and tried another
tack.  "How's the IPO business going for you?  Had a chance to talk to
Ben tonight?"
        "Oh, I saw the Chief earlier," Janice said.  "He was going over
to talk to Liza Broadbi - er, Liza Shustal.  Still can't get used to
THAT one, sorry."
        Skuld chuckled.  "I can see why.  I'm surprised you're over
here by yourself, though."
        "I'm... not very good at parties," Janice replied.  "And,
well... IPO reserve officer, not a Duelist, not from Zeta Cygni - I
feel kind of out of place here."
        Aha, Skuld thought to herself.  "Well, I'm not a social
butterfly myself - I'd rather be in my workshop - but why don't we go
find someone else who feels out of place and see how they're doing?"
the Norn asked.
        Janice made a half-horrified grimace.  "With my luck, they'll
be doing perfectly fine without being made to take on a project," she
mumbled.
        "A project?" Skuld asked, puzzled.
        "Someone they have to make nice to because they were told to,"
Janice said.  "I'm used to it from school back on Ragol."
        Skuld found herself at a momentary loss for words.  Just then,
Kei Morgan wandered over to say hello to Skuld.  She summed up the
situation in a glance, and took a moment to introduce herself to
Janice, exchange holiday wishes, and mention that there was a young
man here from Kei's own homeworld of Niogi.
        "Seems he couldn't get home for Christmas; Marty caught him at
the IPO office in Beltane and invited him along," Kei said.  "He's
over at the sound system, investigating it a bit too closely.  Maybe I
should bring him over before he tries to take it apart... "
        "Certainly!" Skuld agreed, giving Kei a grateful wink when she
was sure Janice wasn't looking.
        Kei returned the wink and strolled across the hall to a young
man - tall, burly, with brown hair in an unremarkable cut and friendly
hazel eyes, in a polo shirt and khakis.  She tugged on his arm,
smiled, and said something Janice couldn't quite lip-read properly
even with her eye turned up to full magnification.  (Must not be
talking Standard, she mused.  What language do they speak on Niogi?)
They returned in a moment, Kei looking pleased, the newcomer looking
politely bemused.
        "Officer Janice Barlow, International Police Organization, this
is Officer Neal Krummell, IPO.  Neal, this is Janice, and I'm sure you
remember Skuld," Kei said, with a small, private smile.
        "Hard to forget," Neal replied, shaking Skuld's hand with a
smile.  "Janice.  Hi!  Nice to meet you.  So, what's your duty
assignment?"
        Janice blinked, took the offered hand almost absent-mindedly,
and replied "Um, actually, I'm a reserve officer... I go to Mandeville
Memorial on Jeraddo.  Chief recruited me earlier this year."
        "Really?" Neal replied with a raised eyebrow and a grin.  "That
must be some story.  C'mon, let's get a table and something to eat and
you can tell me."
        The two IPO officers drifted off, Neal amiable, Janice warming
to him slowly.  Skuld and Kei exchanged a discreet high-five before
going their separate ways.  The duties of good hostesses were never
completed.
        Right now, though, Skuld had another duty she wanted to attend
to, one which had little to do with hospitality.  She scanned the
crowd again, returning to her original search.  When she'd been
interrupted by the sight of Janice Barlow not having any fun, she'd
actually been looking for -
        - There!  Wakaba Shinohara, who stood out even in this crowd
in her gold-buttoned black and white Ohtori Academy uniform.  She and
Saionji, when asked by Bell if they wouldn't mind playing staff until
dinner, had dusted off their old uniforms for the simple reason that
they were the most formal clothes they had.  Skuld smiled, then
intercepted the girl as she headed back toward the buffet table to
load up with more canapes.
        "Oh, hello, Professor Ravenhair," said Wakaba.  "Sorry, I'm
cleaned out.  Marty Rose scarfed every last one of the barjaag puffs,
the pig," she added, grinning.
        Skuld smiled.  "That's all right, I'm saving space for dinner
anyway.  Can I talk to you privately for a minute, Wakaba?"
        "Um... sure."  Curious, Wakaba put her empty tray down on the
table, then followed Skuld around a corner and into a side room that
looked like some sort of den or office, small by the standards of the
castle.  "What's on your mind?"
        "Have you heard of the Test of Light?" Skuld inquired.
        "Sure," Wakaba replied.  "It was in Captain Bacon's book.
It's the test that the Experts of Justice use to screen Lensmen.
Why?"
        "Would you like to take it?" asked Skuld.
        Wakaba blinked.  "You don't waste time," she said
appreciatively.
        "In some matters, I don't have a lot to waste," Skuld replied.
        Wakaba nodded thoughtfully.  "Well, I... sure, I'd be honored,
but... I'd think there'd be others more suitable than me."
        Skuld smiled.  "I've been doing this for fifteen years," she
said.  "I like to think I've gotten pretty good at knowing who's
suitable."
        "Of course, I didn't mean to imply - it's just... "  Wakaba
stopped, realizing that she was starting to babble, shook her head,
and said, "Deja vu."
        Skuld looked a little curious.
        "If... if you're what I've been told you are," said Wakaba
slowly, "then you probably know I'm from another world - we all are,
Utena's old schoolmates."
        Skuld nodded.
        "I'm a little different from the others," Wakaba went on.  "I
was sent here on purpose.  I'm... "  She shook her head, laughing.
"This is nuts," she said.  "A year ago I was nobody.  Just another
girl going to a good school.  Six months before that my best friend
was changing the world, but I was too normal to notice.  I was just
going through the motions.  And now... now I'm in another world, and
I'm... different.  Taking charge of things.  Rescuing my friends,
fighting for justice, traveling in space!  My life is everything I
never thought it could be... and on top of all that, you're offering
me a chance to be a Lensman."
        "If what you're trying to say is that it's too much to absorb,
I understand," said Skuld.
        Wakaba grinned.  "Nah, that's not what I'm saying," she
replied.  "I'm just saying it's a crazy world.  But listen, what about
my original question?  I mean, if -I've- got what it takes to wear the
Lens, then what about the others?  What about Utena?  She was doing
this kind of stuff while I was still writing stupid love letters to
upperclassmen."
        Skuld smiled.  "I have my eye on several of your circle, not
least Utena," she said.  "You're right - she has all the qualities
necessary.  But... "  She shook her head.  "She isn't ready yet."
        "And I am?!" Wakaba blurted - not as if she thought Skuld was
lying, but as if she couldn't believe the whole concept.
        Skuld's smile became a grin.  "That's what the test is
supposed to find out," she said.
        "Well... OK then," said Wakaba.  "When do you want to do it?"
        "How about now?"
        "Now?!  Right here?"
        Skuld shrugged.  "I can do it pretty much anywhere.  It only
takes a few minutes."
        "Oh.  Well... all right, then."
        "Good," said Skuld.  "Now just relax; this won't hurt."  She
stepped forward, placed the cool palm of her right hand on Wakaba's
forehead, and closed her eyes.
        Light surrounded them; the mark on Skuld's forehead glowed
like a beacon, emitting a glow that could almost be felt and heard as
well as seen.  Wakaba froze; part of her wanted to panic, and the rest
thought that the light was the most soothing thing she'd ever seen.
It was like the light that had surrounded her when Clef had made her a
gift of magic - whatever -that- had meant.
        Then it was over, and Skuld opened her eyes.
        "Well?" said Wakaba, her voice quieter.
        Skuld grinned at her.  "Quite remarkable," she said.  Then the
Norn of Tomorrow stepped back a few feet and closed her eyes again,
holding her hands in front of her, palms facing each other and about
six inches apart.  The mark on her forehead glowed again, still
brighter this time, and light began to gather between her hands, rays
of it streaking together to add to the brilliance suspended there.
She began to murmur in a language Wakaba didn't recognize.
        Between Skuld's hands, the light began to shift, changing
color, shifting from white to yellow and then rising up the spectrum
to a brilliant violet before falling back to a bright, clear green.
        Then a beam leapt from the corona of light to strike Wakaba
squarely in the forehead.  She went rigid with surprise, but didn't
cry out or topple.  She merely stood, transfixed, while the beam
played over her forehead for several seconds.
        Then the beam snapped off, the glow faded, and Skuld opened
her eyes and smiled.  Wakaba gasped at the sight of the small
object that floated between Skuld's still-separated palms.
        It was a jewel, round and lenticular, about an inch and a half
across and a rather dull green.  It floated between her hands, turning
slowly, glittering in the light of the holotorches.  Wakaba's eyes
gleamed, reflecting it.
        "Well, go on," said Skuld.  "Take it."
        Wakaba reached tentatively out and closed her hand around the
gem.  The instant her skin touched it, it flared into brilliant life,
emerald light raying out from between her fingers to play over her and
Skuld, and vanished.  She gasped again, jerking her hand back, but the
stone was gone.  She turned her hand over, then looked at the other.
And there it was, clasped around her left wrist by a silvery metallic
band - just like a wristwatch, but glowing softly.
        Skuld grinned.  "Success!" she announced.  She grinned her
broadest grin yet, then came to attention and saluted, saying,
"Congratulations, Lensman Shinohara!" 
        "Does this mean that I'm an Expert now?" Wakaba wondered,
mentally chiding herself for not finding this out -before- agreeing to
the procedure.
        Skuld shrugged.  "It does if you want to be.  Any Lensman can
join the IPO, though not all of them have.  Some are what we call Grey
Lensmen - free agents, not assigned to any particular group or
station.  That's Ben's call to make, but given your special
circumstances and all that you've already been through, I'd be
surprised if he -didn't- make you Grey."  Skuld clapped her hands
together then, became brisk and cheery, and announced, "Now, listen
up, Lensman!  This is the only orientation you get, so pay attention."
        Wakaba grinned.  "Yes, ma'am!" she said.
        "Just 'Skuld' is fine, when school's out.  OK, listen.  That
Lens is yours and yours alone - it's part of you.  It can't be removed
except by you... well, barring amputation."
        Wakaba glanced at her wrist and shrugged.
        "When it's glowing," Skuld went on, "it's safe - it's with
you, it's happy.  If it's not touching you, it goes dark.  If anybody
but you touches it while it's dark, it'll hurt them; if they touch it
for more than a second or two, it'll -kill- them.  So be careful and
don't leave it lying around!"
        "Important safety tip," said Wakaba appreciatively.
        "OK.  That's the hard part.  The rest of it's simple.  The
Lens has certain innate abilities.  They vary slightly from person to
person - you'll need to discover what special abilities yours may have
for yourself - but they all have a few things in common.  They all act
as psi barriers, powerful ones.  No Psi Cop will ever be able to mess
with your mind now that you've got your Lens.  If they try too hard,
they'll hurt themselves, badly - the Lens will throw back at them
double whatever they throw at it.
        "They're all telepathic communicators, too.  By concentrating,
you can make surface mind-to-mind contact with any other Lensman,
anywhere in the universe, instantly.  With practice you can even
contact non-Lensmen, or more than one person at a time, sort of a
telepathic conference call.  The conversations you have that way are
secure - nobody, and I mean -absolutely NOBODY-, can hear them except
you and whoever you called.
        "The Lens also sends out a low-level telepathic signal to any
sentient lifeform that can see it, identifying you as a Lensman.  That
way the Lens can't be counterfeited and neither can you.  You have
Wakaba Shinohara's Lens, you -have- to be Wakaba Shinohara.  There's
no way around it.  You can stop it from doing that, though, if you're
trying to be inconspicuous.
        "That's it for the basic stuff.  Like I said, all Lenses are
unique - yours more so than most! - and they all have special
abilities that depend largely on the owner.  You'll discover yours
with time, as you and the Lens get used to each other.  Don't be
afraid to experiment.  Any questions?"
        "Hmm," Wakaba mused.  "What happens if I die?  Does the Lens
lie around, killing anybody who tries to pick it up, for the rest of
time?"
        "No.  If you die, your Lens will no longer have any reason to
exist; it'll disintegrate within a few minutes."
        "Oh.  Well, that's good.  I... I guess that's it."
        "Are you sure?  You don't look convinced."
        "Well... "  Wakaba shrugged.  "I figured there'd be an oath or
something.  Promising not to use the Lens for evil, that kind of
thing."
        "'In brightest day, in blackest night,' that kind of thing?"
        "Yeah, something like that."
        Skuld smiled.  "No, no oath necessary.  Assuming I misjudged
you before I made the Lens for you in the first place, if you were the
kind of person who would misuse the power of the Lens - or your -own-
power, come to that - it wouldn't have accepted you as its wearer.
You'd be lying there dead on the rug.  That's why the integrity of
Lensmen is so readily accepted around the universe; because anybody
with an education knows that a Lensman wouldn't be a Lensman if he
weren't worthy of his Lens."
        Wakaba blinked.  "Gosh," she said wryly, "thanks for
mentioning -that- up front.  Has that ever happened?"
        "Only once," Skuld replied with a touch of sadness in her
eyes.
        "Oh," said Wakaba.  Her demeanor softened, sobering a bit
from her smiling flippancy, as all she'd just been told started to
sink into her brain.  She looked again at the Lens, then at its maker.
"That's...  wow.  I don't know what to say... "
        "You don't have to say anything," Skuld replied with a smile.
"Just do your best.  It's all I ask of you - it's all the Lens will
ask of you.  Do your best."
        Wakaba gazed into the shifting light of her Lens for another
few moments, then let the sleeve of her black uniform jacket fall and
grinned at Skuld once more.
        "I always do," she said.
        Skuld clapped her on the shoulder.  "Good.  Well!
Congratulations again.  I guess I'll let you get back to work before
my sister wonders what's become of you."
        Wakaba smiled and followed the Norn out of the room, back into
the Great Hall.  There, Skuld vanished into the crowd again, and
Wakaba returned to the buffet table to complete her interrupted
errand.
        Saionji was there too, getting more drinks.  He gave her a
curious look as she approached.  "(What was that all about?)" he asked
her in a low voice.
        Wakaba leaned toward him, stretched up to kiss him on the
cheek, and murmured with a sly smile,  "(Oh... stuff.  I'll show you
later.)" 

        "That h'ors d'oervure usedta be somebody's mommy."
        Utena took a sudden, horrified look at the sausage impaled on
the toothpick in her hands.  Reassured that it was still pork and not
something entirely other, she looked for the source of the bright,
high-pitched voice that had given her the scare.  Looking down, she
noticed a little girl, perhaps five years old or so, looking back at
her with big lavender eyes.
        Utena had never thought she'd ever meet a person with hair of
a more peculiar shade of pink than her own, but this little girl's
hair shaded almost to transparent white at the ends.  Where Utena's
mane was a bright splash of color that made her stand out some
distance away, this girl's scalp was like a pastel explosion, cropped
short except for one lock of hair held together by a rubber band on
one side of her head.
        "That's a very unusual thing to say to someone you just met,"
Utena said diplomatically.
        "'still true," the girl replied.  "I'm Wapiko.  What's your
name?"
        "I'm Utena.  Nice to meet you."  Now things dropped into
place.  Once or twice, Kate and Corwin had related horror stories
about babysitting a little pink-haired dynamo for the Overstreet
family.  Utena had thought the stories exaggeration at the time; after
all, no little girl could ever be that destructive, not even a
Hoffmanite girl wearing a rocket pack.
        "That's a nice name," Wapiko said, smiling so cheerfully that
Utena couldn't help smiling herself.  "Wouldja like me ta get you
somethin' different ta eat?"  Wapiko pointed at the sausage and made a
face.
        "Ummm... sure," Utena said.  "Could you do that for me?"
        "No problem!  Wait here!" 
        "WAPIKO!"
        With one foot raised to step off, Wapiko froze in place.  A
man of medium height, his blond-red hair and red beard bristling every
which way, stepped over to the two of them and said, "Remember, you
-walk- here.  No running.  Right?"
        "Yes, Daddy," Wapiko nodded obediently.
        "And what else did I tell you?"
        "'Always open doors afore y'go through 'em,'" Wapiko quoted.
        "Very good.  Now ru - I mean, go along," the man said, and as
Wapiko walked briskly off towards the serving tables, he turned to
Utena and said, "I'm sorry if she was bothering you, miss."
        "No, no, that's quite all right, Mr... Overstreet?" 
        "That's me," the Redneck nodded.  "And I'm already told that
you're Kaitlyn's roommate Utena.  Enchante," he smiled, bowing deeply
to her.  "I'll be having a barbecue in March, and I've asked Kate if
her band would provide some music... could you maybe put in a - "
        A figure shimmered from thin air into hard reality over the
Redneck's shoulder.  "Hey, Stepdad," she said.  She was a long,
full-figured woman with cyan-tinted hair, floating on her side in
midair - a curious position to adopt, certainly, but it seemed
comfortable.
        "Ryouko, I told you, don't call me that," the Redneck
grumbled. 
        "Thought you might like to look over by the buffet," she said.
Looking over to Utena, she added, "Hey, kid.  Nice duds.  Y'look like
an Atlantean fighter pilot at a funeral."
        "Oh, no," the Redneck groaned, as he saw one of the most
heavily-laden buffet tables rise about a foot in the air, turn ninety
degrees, and begin bouncing its way towards them.  "Did Wapiko offer
to bring you something?"
        "Yes... you mean... ?"  The heavy timber table had to weigh
fifty pounds empty, and the food piled on top of at least a hundred
pounds more... and it was pushing slowly through the crowd towards
her, carried aloft by a five-year-old girl...
        "WAPIKO!!  I beg your pardon, Utena, -really- sorry," the
Redneck muttered as he walked out to meet the table midway.  "Wapiko,
how many times do I have to tell you, if someone asks you to bring
them a snack USE A PLATE!"
        "But I dunno what she wants," a voice said from under the
table.
        "And Ma wonders why we don't get invited to parties," Ryouko
giggled.  "Ah, well.  Later, kiddo."  Smirking, Ryouko floated up
towards the ceiling, fading out well before reaching the crossbeams.
        Utena stared up for a moment, then watched the Redneck herding
the buffet table back to its proper spot, and thought that she ought
to know better by now than to doubt -anything- Corwin or Kate told
her, no matter how outlandish.

        Shortly thereafter came another group from New Avalon: Kei's
longtime 3WA partner (and current IPO field partner, when missions
came along that required two Experts of Justice-level field agents)
Yuri Daniels, GENOM executive Larry "R-Type" Mann, their five-year-old
daughter Afura, and R-Type's Mutt-and-Jeff Red Legion bodyguards,
burly Charlie Kawalsky and wiry Louis Feretti.
        As she was reintroduced to R-Type and met his daughter for the
first time, Utena filed this away as another of the domestic oddities
of the extended Hutchins/Morgan/Daniels/whatever family web.  So, the
girl with the horns was R-Type's adult daughter by Dani Tom's-Wife's
elder sister, Sylvie was MegaZone and Yuri's, and Afura here was
R-Type and Yuri's.  OK.  And she thought she'd needed a scorecard LAST
year?
        Zoner sloped out of the crowd, having divested himself of his
Santa cap at some point (the pompom was sticking out of one of his
coat pockets), and greeted the pack of them effusively.  He shook
R-Type's hand and told him with a grin,
        "Only you would wear a suit to a Christmas party."
        "I like this suit!" R-Type protested, smoothing his lapels.
"It's regal and manly."
        Zoner laughed, clapped Kawalsky and Feretti on the shoulders,
then kissed Yuri before crouching down and exchanging friendly
greetings with Afura.  Rianna, over by the canape table, noticed that
her father had arrived and came over to greet him, Hyelian sidekick in
tow.
        Just before 8 - just, in fact, as Gryphon and Bell were
emerging from the kitchens to announce that dinner was ready - the
last expected contingent arrived, and even in this crowd, they made
quite a splash - six women in rather old-fashioned uniforms, with
swallow-tailed jackets each of a different bright color, cravats,
several carrying weapons; a lone man in a uniform similar to the
women's; and a teenage girl in a very formal kimono.
        The women were all youthful and lovely - two blondes, a
redhead, one with black hair (the younger girl had black hair too, and
looked a lot like her - sisters, perhaps?), a brunette and one, a
humanized Salusian, with a mop of bright purple drawn down into a
thick pair of plaits.  (She was the only violet-haired person Utena
could remember having seen since Anthy, and it was a totally different
shade.  Anthy's was a very deep violet, in some lights almost indigo;
this girl's was very bright, a shade that could only be called
purple.)  The man was a graceful middle age, perhaps seventy, his
black hair going grey at the temples; he had a cheerful, handsome face
and very bright eyes, and one of the raven-haired girls on each arm.
        Gryphon blinked, blinked again, and then bounded over to them,
his arms wide.
        "Well, I'll be damned!" he declared.  "I didn't think you
guys were going to make it!"
        "What, miss the first one of these you've had in years?" said
the redhead.  "Are you wack?!"  She scanned the crowd, blinked, said,
"Aaah!" and sprang past her host with a hasty "'scusemecap'n!", making
a beeline for...
        ... Moose MacEchearn, whom she blindsided with a flying
body-check that nearly sent him through the nearest of the room's
tall, vaulted windows.
        "-What- the - " he began, then saw his attacker and grinned.
"Well, howdy!" he remarked, and then Moose MacEchearn, the soul of
gentleness, a man whose friends all knew he abhorred violence, reared
back and punched her in the stomach.
        She rolled back from the blow with the easy grace of an
experienced fighter, as the crowd of guests suddenly parted, leaving a
large, raggedly circular opening for the combat to take place.  Some
of the guests seemed inclined to break it up, but Gryphon grinned and
shook his head.  Confused, his other guests subsided and let the two
of them fight it out.  Utena, especially, seemed inclined to get
involved, but Kate put a hand on her forearm and smiled her little
smile, her eyes twinkling, and that was enough for Utena, even if it
-didn't- make any sense.
        It was a curious little brawl; the broad-shouldered redhead
didn't use the martial skill her movements clearly announced that she
possessed, and Moose didn't use anything like his full strength.  They
knocked over a few chairs at one of the unoccupied dining tables, but
were careful to stay clear of the buffet.  At one point, Moose grabbed
one of the decorative shields from the wall and clobbered his
assailant with it, making a great BWONG sound that filled the
curiously hushed room.  The redhead reeled, then grinned, swept his
legs out from under him, caught the shield as he dropped it, scooped
him onto it like a pancake on a spatula and slammed him face-down onto
the floor with the shield on his back.
        That seemed to be some kind of signal for the combat to end;
the redhead stepped back, dusting off her hands with a big grin on her
face, and Moose shrugged off the shield, climbed to his feet, hung it
back up, and then turned to face her.
        "The Honourable J. Maurice MacEchearn the Fourth," he informed
her cordially, as if they hadn't just been trying to beat the
daylights out of each other.
        "Kanna Kirishima," replied the redhead.  "Nice to meetcha.
From the Buckminster City MacEchearns?"
        Moose nodded.  "Friends call me Moose."  He grinned.  "I don't
have to ask which Kirishima family."
        Kanna grinned back.  "Yeah, I guess not.  Get you something to
drink?"
        "Well, that went well," Gryphon observed.
        Utena gave him a funny look.  "What the hell?" she asked.
        He grinned.  "When greeting their own kind," he informed her,
"Hoffmanites prefer greetings which make more of an impression than a
simple handshake."
        "They were just saying hello?!"
        The auburn-haired woman in the purple jacket smiled and said,
with feigned haughtiness which was so WELL-feigned that Utena didn't
realize it was for a moment, "Barbarians, the lot of them."
        Still grinning, Gryphon said, "Let me introduce you to the
Teikokukagekidan Hanagumi."  He turned to the raven-haired (one
greying) trio.  "General Sakura Shinguuji," he said, indicating the
taller of the two women, who had very long hair that, except for its
color, reminded Utena of Aunt Bell's.  "Her husband, Admiral Ichiro
Shinguuji; their daughter Sumire - usually known as Mimi, so as not to
be confused with her namesake, Sumire Kanzaki," he went on, shifting
his indicating hand to the auburn-haired woman who had spoken earlier.
        The ash-blonde, faintly sardonic-looking woman in black was
next.  "Detective Chief Superintendent Maria Tachibana."  Next to her
was a tall, beautiful, elegant girl with wavy gold hair and a uniform
jacket to match, and a dazzling smile.  "La Vicomtesse Iris de
Chateaubriand."  Then he put his hand on the shoulder of the purple-
haired Salusian girl, whose round glasses and shy smile reminded Utena
of Kaitlyn, and said, "And of course, last but certainly never least,
Professor Li Kohran.  Everyone, this is Kaitlyn's roommate, Utena
Tenjou."
        "Oh!" said Mimi Shinguuji, brightening.  She looked, now that
Utena looked at her more closely, to be about the same age as Corwin;
Utena wondered if she were also part of the group Achika Shannon wryly
called "the Ragnarok Wave".  "I've really been looking forward to
meeting you.  I've heard so much about you - how you're practically
almost a Valkyrie and everything."
        Utena felt herself blush a little and said, "Well, uh - "
        An arm encircled her shoulders from behind, and then Skuld was
standing there,  grinning.  "Yep!" she said, squeezing the pink-haired
Duelist a little.  "Did Gryphon-sensei tell you yet how she humbled
him last Christmas?"
        Utena felt herself blush a little more and said, "Um, Skuld - "
        "No KIDDING!" said Mimi, looking mightily impressed.  So, for
that matter, did her elder namesake (though it didn't show as much on
Sumire Kanzaki's look of studied elegance) and her parents.  "That's
awesome!  What'd you do?"
        Utena chuckled.  "I, uh... knocked him into the koi pond."
        "Right on my butt," Gryphon said, nodding.  "Shoulder still
hurts when it rains."  Utena looked like she was about to apologize
for breaking it again, but he defused that by grinning and winking at
her so she knew he was kidding.
        "Wow!" said Mimi.  "That's so cool.  Even -Mom- can't take
Gryphon-sensei."
        "Now, Mimi," Ichiro chided her gently.  "They haven't fought
in years."
        "Maybe we should have a rematch later this week," said Sakura,
her eyes twinkling.  "Unless you'd rather throw down with Sumire
again," she added with a mischievous smile.
        Gryphon went a little red and coughed; Sumire Kanzaki looked
as though she hadn't the -faintest- idea what the Northern barbarian
could be talking about, but her dark eyes were sparkling.  Li Kohran
looked embarrassed, Maria and Ichiro valiantly stifled laughter, and
Iris and Skuld didn't bother.  When they'd recovered, the Norn of
Tomorrow turned to Kohran, her brow furrowing in mock annoyance.
        "And -you-!" she said, pointing an accusing finger.
        Kohran shrank back a little bit.  "Me, Professor Ravenhair?"
she said meekly.
        "Yes, you!  You don't -call-, you don't -write-... I have to
read about your inventions in 'Gorgeous Ladies of Science Quarterly'
just like the rest of the Great Unwashed.  I ask you, is that
gratitude?  And when are you going to meet another nice young genius,
settle down, and start a family?  The next generation of genius
awaits!" she declared, raising an imperious finger.
        Kohran blushed furiously and stammered, "Uh... Pr-Professor,
please... "
        Skuld relented, grinning.  "Relax, I'm kidding," she said,
putting her arm around Kohran's shoulders.  "You raising kids?  The
universe quakes with fear."
        Kohran didn't seem to think that was much of an improvement.
        Still laughing, the Hanagumi scattered into the general melee,
to mingle for a few minutes before sitting down to dinner.  Ichiro
Shinguuji and Gryphon walked together over to the table with the
drinks and got themselves a couple of pints of Beltane Brown Ale.
        "You're looking well, Ichiro," Gryphon observed, raising his
stein.
        "Oh, I get by all right for an old man," Ichiro replied,
clinking his own stein against it.
        "Given any more thought to my offer?" Gryphon inquired.
        Ichiro nodded.  "Tempting," he said, "but if what you say
about the galaxy's coming troubles is true, then Ishiyama's going to
need Sakura and me right where we are."  He grinned.  "Especially
without Peter Moreau around."
        "Well, let me make you a counteroffer, then," said Gryphon,
undaunted.  "We're going to need a presence on the Rim, and you know
Kohran is designing a class of light attack ship for the Space Force
anyway.  Why not let me deputize the Teikokukagekidan?  Skuld gives
the Hanagumi the Test of Light, you put the red star on your banner
somewhere, we share information, and you go right on doing what you're
doing."
        Ichiro pulled at his beer, then nodded thoughtfully.  "Sounds
like a good idea to me," he said.  "We'd have to clear it with the
Emperor, of course, but if Sakura suggested it... "  He trailed off,
smiling, and Gryphon nodded.
        "Thanks for sending the coal, by the way," he said with a
grin.  "It was put to a good use."

        Dinner was a huge, crowded, talkative, festive affair.  All
the children were on their best behavior, grouped into little gangs by
age and prior acquaintance.  The eldest group, the Duelists and their
company, just on the edge of adulthood; the Ragnarok Wave and their
coincidental contemporary, Mimi Shinguuji.  Miki Kaoru sat with them,
eager to make new friends, reminding Utena once again of how -young-
he was - almost a year and a half younger than she was, only a few
weeks older than Corwin.  Then Priss, Sylvie, Guy, Mirai Morisato and
Mary Broadbank, chatting and giggling over whatever nefarious plan
they were hatching lately.  The five-year-olds and younger - the
alarmingly precocious Morisato twins, Wapiko Overstreet, Afura Mann,
and the -distressingly- precocious Lina Diggers - had their own table
off to the corner, with a couple of Skuld's robots and Washuu
cheerfully chaperoning.
        Scattered in and among the older kids were all the various
adults, deliberately mixing up their separate groups to renew old
acquaintances and make new ones.  Kei and Skuld noted with
satisfaction that Neal Krummell seemed to have successfully rescued
Janice Barlow's night; the Ragolian looked like she was actually
having fun now, as she and Neal sat at the end of one of the tables
and talked about God knew what.
        As massive dinner parties go, it was quite a success, and
everyone agreed that the various menu items - baked chicken, roast
belgad with snabs, lasagne Asgard (Utena's main contribution to the
menu), and so forth - were superb.  Afterward there was an assortment
of pies available, ice cream for the kids (and several of the adults),
and then the tables were cleared away to open up the great hall's
floor for dancing.
        This was the moment Kate had been waiting for all day.  With
equal parts obvious reluctance and anticipatory glee, she left the
sleeping Serge (worn out by all the fun) in the trusted care of Utena
and Wakaba on a couch Moose MacEchearn obligingly lugged in from the
library, then went to start setting up on the little stage at the far
end of the room.
        While she was doing that, Zoner wandered over to admire, with
fond chuckling, the sleepy tiger (who was presently curled up in
Wakaba's lap, snoring in a way that the auburn-haired Duelist found
very amusing).  While he stood there, he suddenly found himself
encircled from behind by arms.  This wasn't a totally unheard-of
condition, of course, but Yuri was over there, and though Kei had been
known to do things like this on occasion, she usually had to have had
a few more beers first... 
        Then his embracer released him and rounded him like a corner,
and he grinned.  "Hey!" he said, and hugged her again, from the front
this time.  "You made it after all."
        The new arrival, a very, very pale woman with coal-black hair,
jeans, t-shirt and overcoat, nodded, grinning.  She'd apparently just
come in from the cold, but Utena noticed that the bracing outside air
had failed to raise a blush in her ash-pale cheeks.  She was almost
grey, like a Nebari - a woman in black and white.  If it hadn't been
for the brightness of her eyes and the cheerfulness of her expression,
Utena would have thought she looked -sick-.  She did look a little
harried, but the dark rings around her eyes were makeup.
        "I can't stay long," she replied to Zoner's delighted
announcement.  "This is my busiest time of year, more's the pity.  But
I wanted to stop by and say merry Christmas, and Didi will stay a
couple days if Gryph doesn't mind."
        Gryphon drifted over from a laughing exchange with Iris de
Chateaubriand.  "I heard my name.  Oh, hi, Tel - glad you could make
it."
        "Gryph," said she, giving him a grin and a hug of his own.
"Nice party.  Glad you're finding the energy to do these things
again.  Does that mean the job's settling down some?"  As she spoke,
a grinning Zoner fitted her with his abandoned Santa cap, which
somehow fit and which made for about the most outlandishly incongruous
combination of images Utena could have pictured.
        "Well, with B5 online and a few months before the new
attack-ship prototypes are ready for field test, I get a bit of a
breather," he replied.  "I'm sorry, have you been introduced?"
        "Oh, duh, sorry," said Zoner.  "How rude of me.  Teleute, this
is Utena Tenjou, Kaitlyn's roommate, and her friend Wakaba Shinohara.
Utena, Wakaba, this is Teleute."  He looked around, resembling, with
his height advantage on most of the crowd, a periscope.  "Our daughter
Diana is around here someplace... "
        Another very pale girl, like a taller, rangier version of
Teleute, wearing a black leather trenchcoat like the one Zoner
commonly affected and the most outlandishly colored pair of tanker's
boots anyone there had ever seen, came striding up.  "I see you found
Dad," she said, grabbing Zoner up in an embrace.
        "He's not easy to miss, even in a crowd like this," Teleute
replied wryly.  "Gryph - you mind if Didi stays on a couple days here,
maybe catches a ride to New Avalon when you all head out?"
        "Not at all.  We missed you last year," he told the taller
girl.  "I thought you were planning to stop by."
        "Well, I was," Didi replied, sighing, "but you know how the
lanes from the Rim get this time of year.  I got stuck on New Prydonia
for a week and a half when the government fell on Christmas Eve.  What
a pain in the ass."
        "You never call, you never write," said Zoner fussily.
        The Art of Noise started tuning up then, and over the noise of
Moose tuning his bass, Tel said she supposed Forseti wouldn't be -too-
mad if she stuck around for at least the opening set, but then she
-really- had to get back.
        The band finished tuning a few minutes later; down in the
little space in front of the stage where the sound board was set up,
Liza Shustal finished making adjustments, gave Kate a thumbs-up, and
then went around to the little steps, climbed up onto the stage, and
started double-checking the wiring.  A couple of the musicians fiddled
with their instruments; Miki Kaoru, in particular, kept worrying at a
little riff until he'd got it right.  Belldandy wasn't with them.  She
stood off to the side, hands folded in front of her, beaming as her
apprentice stepped at last into the place she'd held for him.
        Satisfied with the wiring, Liza smiled around at the assembled
musicians, then turned to face the audience, which stopped its
burbling undercurrent of chatter and paid attention to the
brightly-clad blonde figure as she spoke.
        "Ladies and gentlemen," she said simply into Kate's standing
microphone, "the Art of Noise."
        Then, grinning broadly, she jumped down from the stage,
landing back behind her board, and snapped her headphones into
position just as the band started laying down "Higher Place".

        The Art of Noise played two sets with a ten-minute break - a
short show, but then, they didn't get started until nearly ten
o'clock.  If there had been any doubt among their friends that Bell
had succeeded in her self-appointed task of making a proper rhythm
guitarist out of Miki Kaoru, they were laid to rest; those who had
been in Toronto back in March agreed that this show, though much
shorter, was easily as well-done.  By the time they finished, almost
bringing down the house with a razor-perfect run-through of "I Think I
Like It" (dedicated to their new engineer, Liza Shustal), it was
midnight, and shortly thereafter the party began to break up.
        Teleute, who had stayed much longer than she expected, ducked
out first, noting wryly that Forseti was going to be very cheesed off;
but first she extracted a promise from Zoner to visit soon, and sealed
it with a kiss.  The Morisatos packed their sleepy offspring and Mary
back through the mirror to Tomodachi and their beds; many of the other
guests took to their ships and the air, filtered back to Beltane
Spaceport, or beamed back to Challenger.  Others would be put up at
the castle until morning.  Within an hour or so of the end of the
concert, the party was effectively over; only a small group of guests,
mainly the ones from Ishiyama, and the hosts remained in the library,
talking over the issues of the day and making plans for the future.

        Utena sat on a crenelation at the top of the East Tower,
looking up at Saturn, and thought about the day.  Christmas had never
been much of an occasion for her back in her old life; she didn't have
a family (except for Wakaba, and she had a family of her own to spend
the holidays with), and it wasn't much fun celebrating a holiday
alone.  Here, though... here, thanks mainly to Kate, she had a family,
one that made this season more fun than it had any business being.
        There was only one thing missing, and it was on that one thing
that she ruminated as she sat and looked up at the Ringed Planet.
        "Beautiful, isn't it?" a soft voice asked beside her.  She
didn't jump; merely turned her head and smiled as the slightly
transparent form of Dios sat down on the crenelation next to her.
        "It is that.  I haven't seen you around much lately," she told
him.
        "Our integration proceeds apace," he replied.  "You've felt
it, haven't you?"
        She considered, then nodded.  "Now that you bring it up, I
guess so.  I've felt -something-, anyway.  Since... since I visited
Asgard."  She gazed thoughtfully at his beautiful face for a moment,
then said, "You helped me save a dear friend.  Thank you."
        Dios smiled peacefully and sketched a seated bow.  "You're
welcome," he said, "although I did very little.  It was the strength
of your heart that saved him; I only gave you the way."
        "Even so.  I couldn't have done it without you."
        "True for several interpretations of the phrase.  You
-couldn't- have done it without me - because you and I are one."
        Utena nodded, then smiled a bit sadly and said quietly,
"We're not going to get to have many more of these conversations, are
we... ?"
        Dios shook his head.  "No.  Every day, you grow... every day,
the day when I cease to linger draws nearer."
        "I wish... there were some way to save you," she said slowly.
"Since we started talking, back in Toronto, I've come to know you...
to -like- you... and... and when you're gone, I'll miss you."
        The ghostly prince smiled beatifically.  "Don't grieve for me,
Utena.  You've -already- saved me.  Because of you, I'll live on in a
strong, beautiful, noble person, a worthy successor.  My sister will
be saved.  My world will be protected.  With all that accomplished...
I'm content."  He put his hand on her shoulder, solid enough that she
could feel its weight and its warmth there, and they both fell silent,
looking up at Saturn.
        A few moments later, the door behind Utena opened, and there
was the sound of shoes on stone as someone emerged.
        "Ah, there you are," came Corwin's voice.  "I - oh!  Sorry, I
didn't realize... "  He trailed off, puzzlement obvious in his voice.
        Utena turned, surprised, to see him standing in the doorway,
about to back through it and return to the castle.  Dios, too, turned,
looking interested.  Corwin looked back, confusion on his face; then
he looked more closely at Dios, and recognition flickered in his eyes.
        "... I'm sorry," Corwin repeated, lowering his eyes.  "I
didn't mean to intrude."
        Utena blinked.  "You... you can see him?"
        Corwin nodded, then turned to the spectre.  "Prince Dios, I
presume," he said, bowing.  "Corwin Ravenhair, of Avalon and Asgard -
I believe we met once, although there wasn't time for introductions."
        Dios smiled.  "Indeed we did.  And I never had the opportunity
to congratulate you after that - what you did was well done."
        "Thank you."  He turned back to Utena, who still sat there
looking surprised.  "Sorry," he said once more.  "I'll go... "
        "No," she said, holding up a hand.  She glanced thoughtfully
at Dios, then went on, "Why don't you... why don't you stay and talk
for a while?"
        Dios nodded.  "Yes, Sir Corwin, do stay," he said softly.
"There's so much I'd like to ask you about this world, and we may not
get another opportunity.  If I may impose... "
        Corwin hesitated in the doorway, looking uncertain; then he
smiled, came back out, and shut the door behind him.

        Miki Kaoru, still flushed with his first success as a member
of the Art of Noise, emerged from the bathroom of the guest quarters
he and Dorothy had claimed on their arrival to find himself alone in
the room.  A note left behind on her pillow informed him that she'd
gone for a walk around the compound, and would return in an hour or
so.  Peril, tired out by his very busy day, was curled up in his
basket, sleeping peacefully.
        Miki sat down in the chair next to the basket and regarded the
cat with a smile.  Peril was looking a lot better now than he had been
when Dorothy had adopted him.  He'd filled out under her careful
attention, becoming sleek and healthy, and his coat had grown in from
patchy dullness to an even, soft battleship gray.  Despite the fact
that he was a foundling, abused and abandoned before his path had
crossed Dorothy's, he was a sweet-tempered and playful creature - and
apparently fearless, since he'd been undaunted, so far, by
triggerhappy soldiers, the destruction of much of the Wedge with him
in it, space flight, or a tiger playmate already twice his size.
        There was a soft knock at the door.  Miki, barechested in
pajama trousers with a damp towel slung over his shoulders, went to
answer it, feeling slightly curious - Dorothy wouldn't have bothered
knocking.  He considered finding his pajama top, decided it would be
ruder to make whoever it was wait until he found it and put it on;
anyway, he was wearing pants, that was the important thing.  He went
to the door and opened it.
        Immediately, a soft, warm shape slipped through, pressing
against him, a hand splayed across the faintly defined muscles of his
slim chest.  He took a couple of stumbling steps back as Sylvie
Daniels pushed into the room and shut the door behind her.
        "Hi," she said breathily.
        Miki blinked.  "Er... hi," he replied.
        "You were terrific tonight," Sylvie told him, backing him
toward the bed.  His knees hit the edge, and he sat rather abruptly.
She slipped down next to him, her hand still on his chest, and went
on, "You're great.  Better than Amanda was.  I mean that."
        "Thank you," replied Miki equably.
        "You're so talented," she murmured, leaning closer.  "And
smart.  And handsome... "
        Miki's brow furrowed, but Sylvie was too busy playing her game
to notice.  He let her push him down onto his back, to keep her busy
while he thought, and thought hard, about what she was up to.  Since
he had met her, the previous Christmas, Miki had taken note of
Sylvie's playful demeanor - more sensual than a person really ought to
be at her age.  She and Priss Morgan, her near-constant companion,
were both like that, but Sylvie more so; the redhead seemed to have
some measure of reserve, or possibly she just hadn't developed quite
this fast.  Sylvie was twelve, barely starting to make the transition
from mere girl to something more, and she sometimes acted as though
she were in a great hurry to have that transformation over with.
        But how much of a hurry was she really in?  How much of her
seductive play was just that - play, calculated to make an impression,
to shock, to gather amusing reactions?  Certainly Miki had provided
those amusing reactions last year; he'd been shy, a bit prudish, a
perfect stooge for Sylvie's seduction games...
        ... but that had been before Azalynn.
        Now, he decided to do her a favor.
        As she leaned down over him, still murmuring compliments, Miki
raised his shoulders from the bed, reached up, casually flipped the
towel from his own neck to hers, and pulled her down with it,
silencing her platitudes with a hard, fierce kiss.  She gasped,
stiffening, and tried to pull away, but he held her fast, his wiry
frame stronger than it looked from constant fencing and dueling
exercises.  Then, without giving her time to think about it, he rolled
her onto her back, his hands on her shoulders, released her from the
first kiss, and said in a harsh whisper,
        "I've been wondering how long it would take you to come to me."
        Sylvie gave a little shriek and writhed beneath his moderate
weight, then got a hand on his shoulder and tried to push him off.  He
held her for a few more seconds to make his point, then let her go.
She nearly balled up the covers recoiling to the other end of the bed,
crouched against the headboard, her dark eyes wide.
        Miki sat up, all composure again.  Calmly, he went to the
dresser, found a pajama top, methodically buttoned it on, and checked
the stopwatch he'd left lying on top of the chest of drawers.  Then he
turned, walked back to the bed, and sat down on the end, one leg
tucked up under him, facing the still-shocked girl.
        "So," he said softly.  "I take it you -don't- actually intend
to go to bed with me tonight."
        Wordlessly, she shook her head.
        Miki nodded.  "I thought not," he said.
        Sylvie blinked at him, then found her voice.  "You -thought-... 
then what was -that- all about?"
        "A lesson," he replied simply.  "You're not the type to listen
to simple words of caution, so I had to -show- you.  It's a dangerous
game you play, Sylvie.  If I weren't me - if I were someone else, just
as charming as you say I am, but more in tune with his... baser
instincts - and there are such men in the world, believe me - you'd be
getting a great deal more than you bargained for right now, and it
would leave its mark on you forever."
        Sylvie flushed scarlet from her hairline down to the notch of
her collarbone, revealed by the open-throated blouse she wore, and
said nothing.
        "With me, you're safe," Miki told her.  "I'm not interested in
conquest for conquest's sake, and - call me old-fashioned," he added
with a wry little smile, " - I think you're too young yet.  But you
must be more careful, Sylvie," he told her, his tone more pleading
than lecturing.  "I'm not saying it's never OK to flirt - but you have
to be careful whom you flirt with, and how you do it.  Don't put
yourself into a situation where you could lose control so easily, not
with anyone you can't trust as completely as you can me... or, well,
you've seen how fast it can go wrong."
        She tried to put on a tough-girl scowl, but it didn't quite
fit as she said in a too-small voice, "I'm not such a pushover.  I can
take care of myself."
        Miki shook his head.  "There's always someone stronger," he
told her.  "I'm not saying you have to lock yourself away and live in
fear, but... "  He sighed as his train of thought got too confusing to
articulate, and at the look in her eyes.  "I'm sorry.  This was stupid.  
I should just have turned you around and sent you on your way, rather
than try to teach you a lesson this way.  It was high-handed of me.
Maybe even cruel.  It's just... I've -seen- the sorts of things that
can happen to the careless.  It's a harsher world than your life so
far has prepared you for, Sylvie, and there are monsters in it.  I'm
only trying to help."  He closed his eyes, and a tear ran down his
cheek, surprising Sylvie out of the last of her shocked paralysis.
        "Hey," she said softly, crawling nearer.  "What's that for?
I'm sorry - you're right - it was a stupid thing to do - but I thought
it'd be funny to see your face, and... "  She smiled a little, trying
to buck him up, and added, "... and it -was- a pretty nice kiss.  Kind
of rough, though."
        Miki chuckled, opening his eyes again, and wiped the tear away
with the back of his hand.  "It's for someone else," he explained.
"Someone, God help me, you remind me of - which is the real reason
why, now that I think about it, I did this.  Trying to keep you from
making the same mistakes... "
        Sylvie came a little closer, then curled herself into
something like a lotus position and asked, "You want to talk about it?
I think... I think maybe I owe you one."
        He looked at her thoughtfully for a few moments, then smiled -
more like his old smile, without the frighteningly cold edge of
sardony it'd had when he'd played his little charade and frightened
her almost out of her skin.
        "If you don't mind hearing," he said.
        Sylvie shook her head.  "I won't tell anyone, either," she
promised.  "Not even the twins.  I can keep a secret, I swear."
        "Swearing's not necessary," Miki replied with an indulgent
grin.  "Most of my friends know about it, at least the broad strokes,
already.  You see - back home, I have a twin sister named Kozue... "

        Utena said a quiet goodnight to Corwin at the door to his
room, backed it up with the usual hug and kiss on the cheek, and went
yawning down the corridor.  She glanced at her watch and saw that it
was nearly three.  Lines of light showed under a couple of the doors -
that one was Miki and Dorothy's room, that one Liza and Azalynn's -
but all was quiet.  She reached the door to the room she shared with
Kate, noted that there was a light on in there too, and wondered if
Kate was sitting up reading, waiting for her to get back.  The thought
made her smile - Kate's habit of doing that was one of the traits she
shared with Himemiya, that made life without her a little more
bearable.
        She opened the door, stepped in, then paused on the threshold,
at a bit of a loss.
        Kaitlyn wasn't reading - she wasn't, in fact, awake.  She was
in bed, curled up, fast asleep, with Seven stationed near her head and
Serge in her arms - and Juri next to her, also with an arm over the
tiger, her hand on Kate's upper arm.  The arrangement, so close and at
the same time so completely innocent, was approximately the sweetest
thing Utena Tenjou thought she'd ever seen in her life...
        ... but it meant she had to find someplace else to sleep.
        Smiling, Utena changed into her pajamas, then gently removed
Kate's glasses, put them on the bedstand, and switched off the lamp.
Then, carefully, she went back into the hall and quietly closed the
door.
        As she did so, she noticed someone else doing exactly the same
thing, two doors down - Dorothy, coming out of the room she'd shared
with Miki the night before, in her black and white nightdress.  She
noticed Utena at the same time, and the two met in the middle.
        "Dorothy," said Utena softly.  "Is there a problem?  Did you
guys, uh... have a fight or something?"
        "No, not at all," Dorothy replied.  "Miki... "  She paused as
if searching for the right wording.  "Miki is having a private
conversation," she finally decided.  "I'll sleep elsewhere tonight."
        Utena considered this for a moment, then nodded.  Dorothy
wasn't given to euphemizing; if she said Miki was having a private
conversation, then that was exactly what he was having.  She wondered
with whom, decided it was none of her business, and murmured, "Well,
as it happens, I don't think Juri's using her room... "

        The next afternoon, the castle was abuzz with activity, as the
party guests who'd stayed the night packed up and headed out, followed
not all that long afterward by the rest of the group.  For Boxing Day,
Liza and Azalynn - tousled and sleepy-eyed - won the "last ones down
to breakfast" award (and accompanying smirk from Kei).  Breakfast was
a somewhat less elaborate affair today, which was somehow appropriate,
given that it was taking place at about one in the afternoon.
        Once they were done, everyone packed up their things and got
ready to head back to Beltane, thence to Challenger and their eventual
destinations.  Some of the Duelists were returning to Jeraddo, since,
unlike WPI's, Satori Mandeville Memorial's residences didn't close for
the holiday.  The others (Kaitlyn, Utena, Juri, Miki, Dorothy, Saionji, 
Wakaba and Liza) were heading to New Avalon, intent on being there for
the New Year's Eve revels.
        "S-sure you d-d-don't w-want to c-come along?" Kate asked
Azalynn as the Dantrovian shouldered her bag and prepared to take her
place on the transporter pad for beamdown to Jeraddo.  "P-p-plenty of
r-room... "
        (In truth, there wasn't - they'd be a bit packed in, some of
them sleeping on couches and the like, as it was - but Azalynn didn't
take up much space, and they were going to be giving Liza someplace to
sleep anyway... )
        Azalynn smiled apologetically.  "No, I'm sorry, Kate... I'd
love to, but I've got some stuff I really have to do here that day."
        Kate looked a little confused by that - what could Azalynn
possibly have to do on Jeraddo on New Year's Eve? - but she let it
pass, not least because of the look of understanding on Liza Shustal's
face as she stepped up and embraced Azalynn.
        "Have a good time in New Avalon," Azalynn told her; then she
grinned wickedly and added, "Say hi to your father for me."
        Liza chuckled.  "If I see him, I'll give him your love," she
replied, then leaned down and kissed the Dantrovian briefly, but
passionately.  "Until I see you again," she added.
        "I'll count the hours," Azalynn said, smiling.
        "Only the hours?" Liza replied, raising an eyebrow.
        "I don't have the patience for anything more granular,"
Azalynn told her, then hopped up onto the platform.  "Have fun,
everybody - I'll see you back here next week!"
        The others on the platform - Mia, B'Elanna, Moose, T'skaia,
and their intrepid House Guide - echoed the sentiments, and then they
were away.  With the rest of the crowd already dispersed and
Challenger en route to New Avalon by metaspace, the five Cephireans
and two Avalonians (and robot, and tiger, and cat, and demigod, and
dragon) retired to the Forward Lounge to scope out the metavoid and
talk about their plans in the Magic City.
        It would be the first visit for Wakaba, Saionji, and Juri.
Kate, Utena and Miki were eager to share its wonders with them.
Corwin offered tours on foot or by air, and Utena encouraged them to
take him up on the zeppelin tour, as it was quite remarkable.  As they
chatted, the doors in the back of the lounge opened, and MegaZone and
Yuri came in, looking intent about something.  The two elder Experts
of Justice approached, stopped just outside the circle of chairs and
couches the Duelists had assembled, and waited for their presence to
kill the conversation.
        Then Zoner said, "Kaoru, we need to talk to you outside."
        Miki blinked, then got up.  "Er... certainly.  Excuse me," he
added to the others, then followed Zoner and Yuri out of the lounge,
down the hall, and into a conference room.
        He knew what it was about, of course; they were Sylvie's
parents, they must have found out that she'd spent the night in his
room.  They'd ended up talking for hours.  When Dorothy returned from
her walk, she'd assessed the situation, determined that it was a
private conversation and, with great tact, excused herself.  (That
tactful understanding was, Miki reflected, one of his favorite things
about Dorothy; it rather reminded him of Juri in her better moods, and
explained why the two women made such good roommates.)
        At any rate, Sylvie had wound up spending the night.  They
talked, and talked, and finally fell asleep ("Heh, I could tell people
I -did- sleep with you and I wouldn't be lying!" she'd observed as she
left)... and now her parents were here, and apparently they thought
that he'd done the very thing he'd warned her about.  What irony!
Miki would have chuckled, if the odds hadn't been so good that it
would be completely misunderstood, and if MegaZone's black gaze and
Yuri's calm, appraising look weren't unnerving him so much.  Even
though he had no guilt of anything, they made him feel as if he
-should- have been guilty of something, looking at him like that.
        "Er... " he said, and triggered his watch.  "I realize... ah,
what last night must... must look like, from an outside perspective...  
but I assure you... "
        He trailed off as Zoner stepped off from the edge of the
conference table he'd been leaning on, closed the distance between
them with two slow, measured strides, and stood looking down at him.
        Then the big man grinned and clapped him on the shoulder.
        "Thanks," he said.  "That's needed doing for a while now, but
there hasn't been anyone to do it."
        Yuri nodded.  "Guy doesn't dare, and anyway, he's too young to
pull it off."
        Relief almost made Miki sway on his feet.  He stopped his
watch, checked the time, and then said, "You know what... what really
happened?"
        Zoner nodded.  "Sylvie told us."
        "I knew she'd gone to see you last night, and that she didn't
come back," Yuri said, "but I believe in giving people the benefit of
the doubt, so I waited until I'd had a chance to hear it from her
before doing anything about it.  She told us what you did for her, and
how you did it."
        Zoner grinned.  "And that you had a long talk about -why- you
did it, but she wouldn't tell us about that part."
        Yuri chuckled, then drew herself up importantly and said, in a
fairly good imitation of her eldest daughter on her dignity, "'It was
a private conversation, Mother, and frankly none of your business.'
Took a lot of guts to tell me that when she'd just admitted spending a
whole night in a boy's room," added Yuri with a laugh.  "I respect
that."
        "Anyway," Zoner chipped in, "I don't really care -why- you did
it.  I'm just glad you did.  I've been worried about her for a while
now, but couldn't think of a way to get through to her.  She's a good
kid," he added ruefully, then grinned slyly and went on, "but she
inherited her mother's wild streak."
        Yuri hit him on the arm.  "MY wild streak?  Et TU,
Chaoswalker?!"
        Zoner rubbed at the spot where she'd hit him and chuckled.
"Anyhow, you gave her something to think about, and you did it in a
way that neither of us ever could have done... so we wanted to thank
you.  You might've saved her a big, big problem later.  That's it.
End of speech.  If you want, you can limp back into the lounge and
pretend you're having trouble sitting down."
        Yuri tsked and shoved Zoner out the door into the hall.  "Get
back to work, you," she said with mock irritability.  Then she turned
to Miki, smiled, and said, "But in all seriousness, Miki... thank
you.  It was a very good thing you did for her."  She leaned, kissed
him on the cheek, patted his shoulder, and then went off up the hall,
herding Zoner ahead of her.
        Miki watched them go, then smiled and went back to the lounge.

        They arrived in New Avalon that night at eight, just in time
for Corwin, Kate and Utena to take the three newbies on the Grand
Motoring Tour around Highway 29 before rendezvousing with the others
again to invade Tanjordan's Ultimate Shyamata and Grill for MegaZone's
birthday dinner.  Then, replete, the whole company made their way to
Crescent Heights and the houses on Morgan Lane.  Gryphon and Kei spent
a few minutes opening up spare rooms (of which their house had
several), rounding up extra bedding for couches, and so forth, and
before long they had their guests situated.
        The following day was Kei's birthday.  They spent the day
making a trip to the IPO's New Avalon shooting range (it was the first
time Kyouichi Saionji ever handled a firearm, which made Wakaba
slightly nervous, but he did fine), then descending upon the Black
Angus Steakhouse downtown for her birthday dinner.  In keeping with
her anyone-who-tells-the-restaurant-staff-it's-my-birthday-will-be-shot
policy, no one did.
        Early that evening, the Duelists were sitting around in the
den at 105 Morgan Lane.  Utena, Miki, Dorothy, Juri and Liza were
reading.  Wakaba was sprawled on the floor, having her shoulders
rubbed by Saionji after an impromptu sparring session with Kate's
brother Leonard, who was almost ready to take his journeyman's test.
Kaitlyn was playing with Serge - two days later, she still had kind of
a dazed look whenever she looked at the tiger, as though she were
still not quite convinced that he was really there.
        Utena, sitting crossways in an armchair with her shoulders
against one arm and her knees hanging over the other, glanced across
the room, watched as Serge once again failed to balance on his ball
and fell into Kate's arms, and chuckled.  She was half-convinced now
that he was failing on purpose, just because each failure got him a
hug.
        "That's a happy girl," Nall observed from his vantage point on
Utena's stomach.
        "Mm," Utena replied, scratching at his ears.  "And a happy
tiger."
        "And I'm a happy dragon," Nall purred, winding his tail around
her arm.  "Keep doing that riiiiiight there."
        Utena chuckled again, did as instructed, and went back to
reading.
        A few minutes later, the bookshelf on the far wall slid back
(much to Wakaba's surprise) and Corwin came in, a smudge of greenish
cross-bearing lube and a grin on his face.
        "Utena," he said, "can I see you down in my workshop for a
minute?"
        "Sure," she said, putting up her book.  She displaced the
slightly-put-out Nall (who subsided a bit when she put him down again
in the warm spot she'd left in the chair and promised to return), then
followed Corwin into the elevator.  To her surprise, his father was
there too, with a look of expectant pleasure so similar to Corwin's
that it really drove home the fact that they were father and son.
        "It's time you found out what that isorod you got for
Christmas is all about," said Gryphon as Corwin keyed the elevator
into motion.  It followed a different path than Utena was used to,
traveling sideways for a bit longer and in different directions once
it was clear of the initial downshaft.  Eventually, with its usual
bright "ting!", it delivered them to a short hallway leading to a
double door.
        "Normally," Gryphon went on as the three of them went down the
hall toward the doors, "I don't hold with sticking people whose
birthdays are near Christmas with combination gifts.  It's always
struck me as a cop-out.  My only exception to that little personal
rule is that if you're going to do that, you'd best make the gift you
give -worth- enough, in some sense, for two big days like that.  In
this case, we hope you agree it is."
        With mirrored smiles, he and Corwin opened the doors and bowed
her through like doormen at an exclusive restaurant.  Utena stepped
through, then stopped and blinked in amazement.
        It was one of the hangar-like rooms, like the one she usually
saw first upon descending to the workship, with big rolling doors,
rails in the floor and a high ceiling studded with industrial lamps.
Where Corwin's main hangar was a chaos of Destroid parts,
half-disassembled machinery and oddments, though, this one was neat
and tidy, containing only two things.  One of them was a truck-mounted
starfighter fueling and maintenance module.
        The other was a scarlet aerospace fighter, stiletto-pointed
and sleek, with a pair of straight, T-shaped wings and a large
underslung cannon, its entire body aft of the cockpit bubble taken up
by a brawny vector-ringed fusion turbine.  It stood on wheeled
reverse-tricycle landing gear, cockpit canopy standing open, boarding
ladder deployed, waiting.
        Utena turned to look at Corwin and his father, who had closed
the doors behind them and stood with their arms folded, grinning.
        "You... you're GIVING me the SWORDFISH?!" she burst out.
        "Well," said Gryphon with exaggerated nonchalance, "I haven't
used it in decades; it was just gathering dust.  And since you liked
my asteroid racing stories so much, I figured you might like to have
it."
        He winked, grinning again, and in that instant Utena knew that
he -knew-, somehow the man -knew- that she and Corwin had done that
spot of unauthorized asteroid racing during her small-craft training
back in August!  Knew, and wanted her to know that he was letting them
get away with it.  The perfect expression, the perfect example, of
that endearing anarchist streak that he had - she wanted to hug him
for it, but was afraid that would break the facade of deliberate
ignorance-of-the-whole-incident both of them were adopting.
        "We dug it out of storage when you passed your master's cert
exam," Corwin explained, "and started refurbishing it nights.  For a
while there we thought we might not have it ready in time."
        "Corwin couldn't work weekends on it much, though," Gryphon
added.  "You'd have gotten suspicious if he didn't show up for your
weekly dinner."
        "Want to try it out now," Corwin asked, "or wait until
morning?"
        Utena took the isolinear key out of her pocket, looked at it
for a moment; then she -did- hug them, first in turn, then both
together.
        "What do -you- think?" she asked.

        That night, the Zeta Cygni asteroid belt hosted its first
Unlimited-class race in more than a decade.  It had no audience, only
its two participants and an official scorer from the Galactic Asteroid
Racing Alliance, but that was enough.  Against the signature of the
Alliance's founder and president emeritus, Benjamin D. Hutchins, the
race's winner went into the official record book, just like all the
others: Swordfish II (single-place, experimental, WX-9295), New Avalon,
U. Tenjou piloting.
        Then, true to her word, the new grand champion of the GARA
Unlimited Class returned to that chair in the den, put Nall back where
he belonged, and finished her book.  In the two hours she'd been gone,
the only thing that had changed was that it was now Saionji's turn to
get his back rubbed.  Utena chuckled to herself, at that and at
everything else, a little smile that just never seemed to want to fade
playing at her lips.
        Before their race, Corwin had proposed a course of action for
Thursday, to which Utena had agreed in all particulars; and for the
first time in a while, she found herself looking forward to her
birthday.
        She glanced across the room, to where Kate was brushing her
tiger, and the roommates made eye contact, then grinned spontaneously
at each other.  Nothing need be said.
        Juri, from her spot on the couch behind Kate, noticed the
exchange and gave Utena a curious look, but Utena only grinned at her
and went back to reading.  The redhead regarded her thoughtfully for a
moment, then smiled herself and returned to her own book.
        Outside, it was snowing again, and Leonard had predicted
terrific sledding on the Koopman High Hill by noon tomorrow... 

                /*  Rush  "YYZ"  _Moving Pictures_  */

                     Eyrie Productions, Unlimited
                              presented
                        UNDOCUMENTED FEATURES
                           FUTURE IMPERFECT
                   - Symphony of the Sword No. 2 -
                           Third Movement:
                        Another Christmas Rose

                               The Cast
                       (in order of appearance)
                           Kaitlyn Hutchins
                  The Hon. J. Maurice MacEchearn IV
                           Kyouichi Saionji
                         Benjamin D. Hutchins
                            Juri Arisugawa
                           Wakaba Shinohara
                        R. Dorothy Wayneright
                              Miki Kaoru
                           Corwin Ravenhair
                             Utena Tenjou
                       Azalynn dv'Ir Natashkan
                       Elizabeth R'tas Shustal
                           Leonard Hutchins
                                Peril
                              Kei Morgan
                             Priss Morgan
                            Sylvie Daniels
                           Gai "Guy" Morgan
                           Nall Silverclaw
                    Verthandi Wishbringer Morisato
                           B'Elanna Torres
                               Mia Ausa
                              Tiny Robo
                           Lesser Mazinger
                               MegaZone
                                Sergei
                             Urd Snowmane
                           Keiichi Morisato
                           Hiroshi Morisato
                            Mirai Morisato
                           Makoto Morisato
                           Fatora Morisato
                            Mary Broadbank
                            John Trussell
                              Jung-Freud
                             Martin Rose
                              Eiko Rose
                        Tom M'krelth'nyr'knet
                  Danilia Santova M'krelth'nyr'knet
                            Hanson Davion
                             Nadia Davion
                           Klaang varKalaan
                                T'Vek
                            Jinto Lin Kirk
                            Janice Barlow
                              Percy Mui
                               C.P. Mui
                           Kris Overstreet
                            Washuu Hakubi
                       Wapiko Janet Overstreet
                       Angelina Inverse Diggers
                            Rianna Santova
                             Mayl Popp'fl
     T'skaya Vorokoshiga'ar Ixtixtaaqitl't'chl'Vraihelt Ishkarat
                           Skuld Ravenhair
                            Neal Krummell
                            Ryouko Hakubi
                             Yuri Daniels
                           Lawrence R. Mann
                              Afura Mann
                           Charles Kawalsky
                            Louis Feretti
                            Robert Shannon
                         Aeka Jyurai Shannon
                            Tenchi Shannon
                            Achika Shannon
                   Vicomtesse Iris de Chateaubriand
                           Maria Tachibana
                           Kanna Kirishima
                           Sakura Shinguuji
                       Sumire "Mimi" Shinguuji
                            Sumire Kanzaki
                              Li Kohran
                           Ichiro Shinguuji
                               Teleute
                          Diana "Didi" Drake
                                 Dios

                            Sleigh Driver
                         Benjamin D. Hutchins

                 Janice Barlow/Neal Krummell's agent
                            Janice Barlow

                            Master of Muis
                             Pearson Mui

                         Overstreet Wrangler
                           Kris Overstreet

                         Death's travel agent
                               MegaZone

                         Neotiger concept by
                              Anne Cross

                       Planetology Consultants
                           Anne Springsteen
                       (An actual astronomer!)
                                 and
                           Philip J. Moyer

                Fanfiction Performers' Guild Ombudsman
                             Jer Johnson

                    Astronomy research powered by
                        Starry Night Backyard
			(www.starrynight.com)

                       The Symphony will return