I have a message from another time...

                     Eyrie Productions, Unlimited
                               presents

                UNDOCUMENTED FEATURES FUTURE IMPERFECT
                   - SYMPHONY OF THE SWORD No. 4 -

                          In for a Penny...

                         Benjamin D. Hutchins
                          with Janice Barlow

           (c) 2004, 2005, 2014 Eyrie Productions, Unlimited


                       TUESDAY, AUGUST 25, 2409
             MEITNER HALL, NEKOMI INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
                        NEKOMIKOKA, TOMODACHI

        There was one other thing Utena Tenjou had to do before
leaving Tomodachi, and to be honest, she felt a bit silly doing it.
        In July, when she'd accepted Gryphon's request that she take
over the International Police Space Force fleet, Utena had duly filed
with the NIT Registrar's Office her intention not to return to the
Institute for the fall semester.  That had been a bit of a
bureaucratic hassle, but she'd managed to get it all sorted out
remotely, except for one final requirement, which she had to take care
of in person.
        So here she was in the office of Professor Alan Schepartz, her
faculty advisor, preparing to submit to perhaps the silliest formality
of an exit interview ever conducted.
        The saving grace here was that she knew Prof. Schepartz pretty
well, and liked him.  He was sure to see it all as just as silly as
she did, which she expected would make the interview both painless and
short.
        Utena looked around the office, a small, cluttered, homey
place where she'd spent quite a few hours over the past couple of
school years planning out her course of study.  She'd chosen chemistry
as her major for no better reason than it sounded interesting, and not
like anything she was doing in her non-academic life.  And indeed, it
had proven interesting, and fun, too.  She'd had a lot of good times
in the chem labs in this building, and, truth to tell, she was a bit
sad about leaving.
        On the other hand, it wasn't like she was going to be gone
forever.  If she missed more than one semester she'd have to re-apply,
but her grades were good and there was little chance she'd be
rejected.  Getting back up to speed might take some doing, but since
when was she afraid of a bit of work?
        The door opened and Prof. Schepartz came in, looking slightly
harried and disarranged, as usual.  He was a boyish man of forty or
so who wore his black hair long and usually pulled back into a loose
ponytail, and his lab coats were perpetually rumpled and often
interestingly stained.  Chemistry wasn't the sterile, intellectual
exercise to him that it had become to many modern chemists, which was
one of the reasons Utena liked him and worked well with him.
        Now he was frowning deeply as he greeted her and took his seat
behind his desk.  Utena wondered what was bothering him.  Something
not going right in one of the labs?  There were no students about
right now - summer session was over and the fall semester still more
than a week away.
        Schepartz sat for a couple of minutes rummaging through the
files on his desk, then gave up the hunt for whatever it was he
wanted, folded his hands, regarded Utena steadily through his glasses,
and said without opening pleasantries,
        "Utena... I'm really disappointed."
        Utena blinked.  "... What?" she said.
        "I'm disappointed," he repeated.  "That you're leaving us this
way.  I think you should really reconsider taking a semester off in
the middle of your undergraduate career like this.  It shows a lack of
commitment on your part that I frankly find shocking - I'd never have
expected it from you - and you have to know the break in your studies
won't look good to prospective employers later on.  They'll want to
know why you broke off... and so do I, if it's not an imposition."
        Utena blinked at him again, baffled.  "Um... did the
Registrar's Office not tell you what I'm -doing-?" she finally asked.
        Schepartz shook his head.  "No, only that you'd called them in
July and told them you weren't coming back for the fall semester,
possibly not for all of next year."
        Utena stared at him for a moment, dumbfounded, and then burst
out laughing.
        The professor frowned.  "I don't see what's so funny.  I
thought you -liked- what you were doing here.  You're one of my best
students - one of the best I've had in my -career- to date."
        Utena settled herself down, realizing that he was taking
everything the wrong way, and said, "I'm sorry, Professor.  I'm not
laughing at you.  It's just that I can't believe the Registrar didn't
tell you -why- I'm taking the time off.  It's not because I'm planning
to go lie around on a beach somewhere, I promise you that," she said
with a wry grin.
        "Then what -will- you be doing, if you don't mind my asking?"
Schepartz inquired.
        "Well, you know Kaitlyn Hutchins is my best friend."
        "Mm-hmm."
        "And you know who her father is."
        "Who doesn't?"
        "And you know what I do in the summers."
        The professor nodded with a wry smile of his own.  "It's hard
to miss when you make the news like you did at Tau Ceti," he said.  "I
was telling everyone I met for a week, 'You know that girl's in my
chemistry division.'"
        Utena gave a slightly embarrassed smile.  "OK, and you know
Dad's taken a leave from the International Police."
        Schepartz raised an eyebrow.  "I don't think you've ever
mentioned your father."
        "Gryphon," Utena said, and then explained when the professor
raised the other eyebrow, "We more or less adopted each other.
Anyway, he's taken leave from the IPO to deal with Kei having gone
missing."
        "Mm-hmm, and Steve Rogers is filling in for him."
        "Well, see, Mr. Rogers is only filling in on the regular
police side of things.  Dad asked me to take over the Space Force
fleet for him once this summer's Valiant tour was done.  That's what
I'm going to be doing instead of coming back here, Professor
Schepartz.  This time tomorrow, I'll be on the flagship meeting my new
command staff."
        Schepartz dropped the pen he'd been fidgeting with and stared
at her.
        "You're... not joking, are you," he said.
        Utena shook her head, raised her right arm, and pushed her
sleeve back to show him her Lens.
        "Well," said the professor.  Then a broad grin flowed onto his
face, and he slapped his desk with the palm of his hand and said it
again: "Well!  Why drop out for that?  I'm sure that kind of thing can
be wangled into a co-op credit project if we just dig deep enough into
the system."
        Utena grinned as Schepartz pulled the keyboard of his
dataterminal toward himself and started tapping furiously away.  This
was what she liked about him - he was almost as adaptable as she was.

                      WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 26, 2409
                      INTERNATIONAL POLICE YARDS
                            ZETA CYGNI II

        IPS Valiant stood down from her fourth summer cruise with the
least amount of ceremony possible.  After securing the ship for
storage and handing her over to Zed Cochrane and his yard crew, her
skeleton crew of eight divided.  T'Vek and Klaang went straight to
Challenger, to report in and get reacquainted with their old posts
before the transfer of command in the afternoon.
        The rest went to the next segment of the shipyard ring, where
a shuttle waited to take them to New Avalon.  There Dr. Ajlond-Mui
said his goodbyes at Fleet Medical, on his way to report for another
assignment.
        It was often hard to tell with Ajlond-Mui - he was reserved to
a fault, almost withdrawn - but Utena suspected he was pleasantly
surprised to find a young woman waiting for him in the corridor
leading to Fleet Medical.  After a polite but warm welcome, he
introduced the newcomer as Dr. Memory Gene, a "friend and colleague."
Utena suspected there was a bit more to that, judging by the way he
loosened up in her presence, but said nothing.
        Duty called; both doctors excused themselves.  Utena noted her
wife's subtle, knowing smile as Dr. Gene squeezed Ajlond-Mui's hand.
        "They make a cute couple," Anthy commented as the two doctors
rounded the corner, already deep in discussion of some arcane medical
matter or another.
        "Hm," Utena acknowledged.  He never -had- quite gotten into
the freewheeling spirit of Irregular Projects as well as either of
them would have liked, but it was at least nice to know that
Ajlond-Mui wasn't -all- business.
        Their mood lightened, the rest continued their trek to the
acting chief's office.
        Unlike the Chief's office on the 38th floor, which was small,
old-fashioned and featured a certain degree of friendly clutter, the
office of Steve Rogers at the back corner of the 39th was large,
sleekly modern, and perfectly tidy.  Rogers had a big, black,
glass-topped desk with holographic data systems built in, not the
battered industrial-green antique specimen Gryphon was fond of, and he
kept his papers filed, not scattered around.
        Though neat and modern, Rogers's office wasn't sterile or
cold.  The lighting was warm and full-spectrum, and there were a few
mementoes and trophies tidily displayed, to give the visitor an idea
of the owner's character.  The most arresting was the large striped
flag displayed on the office wall opposite the entrance.  Most people
in the 25th century didn't know what the flag of the former United
States of America on Earth looked like, nor had they any idea why an
IPO deputy chief would display one.
        The three other items of character hanging on the wall by the
flag were no less inscrutable.  One was a photograph of a man in a
colorful costume and antique soldier's helmet shaking hands with an
older man, who stood stiffly with the aid of a cane.  The second was a
black-and-white group photo of a bunch of soldiers in old-fashioned
uniforms, rumpled and grimy from time in the field, with that same
costumed man standing among them.
        Last was a much more recent holo of what seemed to be the
-same- costumed man surrounded by soldiers wearing the battle gear of
the United Earth Defense Force, circa the War of Corporate Occupation.
One of them, a shortish but burly black man with sergeant's stripes on
his body armor, was holding up the head of a GENOM 90-series combat
Buma like a hunting trophy.  Behind them, the rubble of a war-shattered
city could be seen.
        With a mild shock, Utena recognized the man with the Buma
head.  He had changed a lot in the years since the holo was taken, but
after a few seconds' scrutiny, she knew he couldn't be anyone but
Charles Kallon, lately governor of the former colony at Tau Ceti.
        It's a small universe, she thought with a little smile as she
turned to present herself to the Acting Chief.
        Steve Rogers was a tall, broad-shouldered, lantern-jawed man
just beginning the transition from "middle-aged" to "elderly", but he
still moved with an athlete's panther grace as he rose from his chair
to return her salute crisply and precisely.  His close-cropped blond
hair was going grey at the temples and his face was a bit lined, but
his blue eyes were clear and bright and his hands powerful-looking.
They reminded Utena a bit of Corwin's hands, except that they weren't
slightly out of proportion to the rest of him, as Corwin's still were.
        "Commodore Tenjou," said Rogers, smiling.  "Welcome back to
New Avalon."  He gestured her and her companions to seats and sat down
himself.
        "I saw the Art of Noise's last show on television," Rogers
added.  "Wedge Entertainment picked it up from WGBS.  An impressively
upbeat performance, especially given all the knocks the lot of you
took over the course of the summer."  He smiled at the person sitting
(slightly nervously) to Utena's left.  "You showed us an unexpected
dimension, Your Highness."
        Princess Koriand'r of Tamaran beamed beatifically.  "I am
happy to have done my part," she declared.
        Rogers chuckled.  "Well, I won't hold you all up," he said.
"I know you have places to go.  Kori, I have a special assignment for
you.  I know you were hoping to go back out with Commodore Tenjou on
Challenger, but you're needed elsewhere.  You'll go with them as far
as Babylon 6, but you'll have to leave the ship there.  The rest of
your orders are in your inbox."
        Kori kept smiling.  "Duty comes first," she agreed happily.
"At any rate, I am sure I will have another opportunity to work with
the Duelists in the future."
        "No doubt," Rogers agreed with a smile.
        "We'll be glad to take you out again sometime, Kori," Utena
said.  "It's probably just as well you're finding something else to do
for this trip, though," she added.  "It ought to be a pretty dull
cruise."
        "A good thing to hope for," said Rogers, "but in our line of
work it's not all that likely.  On the face of it, it -is- a pretty
straightforward mission.  I don't know that I'd call it dull, though."
        Utena nodded.  "That was a joke.  I've read the brief on the
mission," she said.  "Tac Div special squad training operation -
should be interesting."
        "That it should.  You'll meet the force commanders and special
elements when you pick them up tomorrow," said Rogers.  "We're
borrowing the opposing force from the White Legion - ever work with
them before?"
        "No," Utena said.  "But I eat at Chet's," she added with a
grin.
        Rogers laughed.  "Well, the op-for commander is a former Chet
himself, so you should get along just fine," he said.  "Anything
else?"
        "Just a question about the 'special elements'," Utena said.
"I lost my AEGIS to one of Yuri's projects, and I figured if it was
all the same to you, I'd just take Sunderland with me."
        Carmela Sunderland, the former Psi Cop who had been with the
Valiant as a sort of probation for her political asylum request,
blinked.  Utena had told her a couple of days before that she wouldn't
-mind- having Sunderland along for her time on the flagship - but
she'd never said anything about specifically -requesting- her.
        Rogers frowned thoughtfully, then turned to the visibly
startled dark-haired woman.
        "I've read the Chief's file on you, Miss Sunderland," he
said.  "I don't feel it would be proper for me to make a final
decision regarding the disposition of your request.  After all, I'm
only acting temporarily on his behalf, and your case is a sort of
personal project of his."
        Sunderland arched an eyebrow, unsure of just how she felt
about being regarded as a "personal project" by a man as famous for
womanizing as the First Lensman.  On the other hand, she hadn't
thought the idea was so terrible when she'd mistakenly believed that
was what -he- was talking about, in their meeting back in July...
        "Commodore Tenjou's idea is as good a one as any for the use
of your time until he gets back," Rogers went on, "but I don't know
about it.  Sending you out on the Valiant, where you could be policed
by an AEGIS operative, was one thing... sending you out on the fleet
flagship in -lieu- of an AEGIS is another."
        "Other options?" Utena inquired reasonably.  "I suppose I
could just do without, but I'd rather not go out without a telepath,
and we don't have time to wait for another AEGIS to arrive from
Jyurai.  Besides, you'd have to get Rob Shannon to disrupt some other
agent's assignment.  Why not make use of the resources we already
have on hand?"
        Rogers looked pensive.  "Hmm," he said.  "Well, Commodore,
it's your fleet."
        Utena nodded, smiling a bit wryly as she pushed some of her
feathery pink hair back from her face with a hand.  "So they keep
telling me," she said.
        Rogers laughed.  "I won't hold you up any longer," he said,
rising.  "Good luck out there."
        "Thanks.  I appreciate it.  See you soon, I hope."

        They parted from Kozue here; she was remaining in New Avalon
while the other four - Utena, Anthy, Kori, and Carmela - returned to
the shipyard.
        "Well, you guys," said Kozue as she shouldered her duffel bag
in the lobby of IPO HQ.  "When you're out having fun amongst the stars
this fall, think of me, back here slaving away at fighter school."
        Utena laughed.  "Yeah, sure.  We'll try not to enjoy ourselves
too much."  Then she sobered slightly and said, "And hey, good luck
with that.  We're all rooting for you."
        Kozue looked slightly abashed.  "Ah, g'wan," she said.  Then
she put her bag down again, came to attention, and saluted.  "Clear
skies, Commodore," she said.
        Utena waved off the salute and gave her friend a hug, quick
but not perfunctory.
        "Clear skies and happy landings, Kozue," she said.

        The trip from the transporter station to Challenger's docking
bay took ten minutes on a high-speed magnetic tram running inside the
shipyard ring's main structural tube.  The four who remained of the
Valiant's crew rode in a small group up at the front of the car,
mostly unnoticed by the yard personnel who got on and off at the
various stops.  Utena had on her Space Force dress uniform and kept
polishing her Lens with the tail of her jacket, but otherwise showed
no outward signs of nervousness.
        As they rode, Anthy sat down next to Utena, rummaged in the
one small bag they'd brought with them (all the others had been
whisked away by blue-jumpsuited IPO support personnel), and then
changed the rank pins on the shoulder strap and sleeve of her uniform
for her.
        Utena raised her left arm and admired the new pin.  It was at
heart the same captain's bar she'd worn since joining the force,
embellished with a pair of golden deltas halfway down the long sides
to denote her new and temporary job.  The IPSF had no actual rank of
commodore; as in navies of old, it indicated someone with the proper
rank of captain placed in temporary command of a fleet.
        Still, it was a nice addition to the bar.  Utena lowered her
arm and gave her wife a smile.
        "Thanks," she said softly.
        Anthy took her hand, gripped it firmly, and smiled her most
warming smile.
        "You'll do fine," she said, and beamed.
        Utena chuckled, patted their linked hands, and said, "As long
as you're backing me up."
        The tram arrived at the destination Utena had been told to
make for, a rather cryptic stop simply labeled "A14" on the tram map.
The four emerged to find themselves at an empty stop with a single
corridor leading out of it.
        Utena shrugged and led the way down the corridor.  It went on
for some small distance, then ended at a smallish square room that
reminded Utena of a lounge or small lobby.  It had blue carpet, a
couple of couch-like upholstered benches along the side walls, and a
big picture window opposite the door.  The window looked out into
space, past a filigree of spacedock structures, some empty, some
filled with the recognizable shapes of Defiant-class destroyers and
Surprise-class frigates at various stages of completion.
        A slender, dark-skinned woman in the coverall of an engineer
was waiting for them there.  She greeted them with a salute and a
smile, then went to a small control station near the window and plied
the controls.
        Utena felt the room rock a bit and the deck become very
slightly springy under her feet.  She knew what that meant: the
"lounge" was really a travel pod which had just undocked from the
ring.  They were going to board Challenger in style.
        Nadia played the moment for all the drama she felt it
required.  She flew the pod along a flightpath delineated by a glowing
stripe of holographic light, carefully keeping their destination out
of view to the starboard, until finally she pivoted the pod on its
axis with a flourish and the vast open mouth of Dock Alpha flooded
into the viewport.
        And there, moored in the center of the dock with the complex
floodlights gleaming from her silvery-grey tritanium armor, was
Challenger.  All the windows and viewports in the hull glowed, as did
the scarlet-orange ramscoops and cool blue coils of her long, graceful
warp nacelles.
        Anthy and Utena had seen her before, but never quite like
this, and all four passengers were transfixed as Nadia swooped the
pod low over the flagship's curving foredeck, past the bridge module,
and then down into the gap between the warp engines.  There, she
stopped the pod, then backed it deftly up until, with another gentle
thump and rock, its docking module locked home to one of the boarding
airlocks alongside the huge main hangar doors.
        Nadia shut down the pod's manevuer controls, turned from the
pilot station - and then, to Utena's moderate surprise, unfastened her
battered engineering coverall and shrugged out of it, revealing a
fully-decked IPSF officer's dress uniform very like the one Utena
herself was wearing.
        "If you'll come this way, Commodore?" she said with a smile,
tabbing open the airlock's outer door.
        The five emerged into Challenger's main hangar deck, the
biggest room on the ship - a vast, cavernous space like a domed
stadium, with a vaulted ceiling three decks high and revetments for
the ship's complement of shuttles, fighters and gunboats ranked along
the sides.  Normally several of the light spacecraft were kept in
ready-to-launch condition on deck, but right now they were all parked,
tucked neatly out of the way.
        They had to be, because all the deck space was taken up by
rank upon rank of uniformed people - the flagship's entire crew,
mustered into parade formation.
        As Utena crossed over the threshold of the airlock and into
the ship proper, Luornu Durgo came to attention next to the door,
raised a bosun's pipe to her lips, and gave the regulation piercing
whistle.  Then she dropped the pipe to hang from its chain around her
neck and barked,
        "ATTEN - HUT!  Commander, International Police Space Force,
arriving!"
        Challenger's crew came to attention as one, saluted, and then
returned to parade rest.
        There was a small podium standing at the end of the ramp down
from the airlock, and next to it stood the pasty-skinned, yellow-eyed
form of R. Lore Soong, the ship's executive officer.  The android
officer had his best dress uniform on, like everyone else here, and
his black hair was slicked back so that it looked like a solid helmet
in the shape of a hairstyle.
        As Utena, feeling about as conspicuous as she ever had in her
life, walked down the ramp toward him, Lore snapped off a crisp salute
and announced,
        "Commander Lore Soong, ready for relief, Commodore."
        Utena blinked, searching her memory for anything that might
apply here, and then the words she was groping for popped to mind.
She returned the salute and said,
        "Commander, I relieve you."
        "Commodore, I stand relieved," Lore replied.  Then he pivoted
smartly and went to take his place at the front corner of the
black-clad block nearest the podium, where all the ship's officers
stood.
        Utena stepped to the podium, looked out over it at the
assembled crew of the ship, and wondered for a brief moment just what
the hell they expected her to say.
        Then she caught herself and relaxed.  The hell with it.  This
is Dad's crew.
        " ... Hi," she said.  "I wasn't expecting to have to make a
speech, so I don't have anything prepared, but as we work together,
you'll find that that's usually how I work best."
        A laugh rippled through the assembled crew.  That was good;
that was what Utena was aiming for.  She felt herself relaxing
further.
        "Anyway, I'm not here to tell you how to do things or make any
big changes to the way this ship works.  You're the First Lensman's
crew.  You all know your jobs - you don't need or want me holding your
hands.  So there's really only one thing I want to say to you today."
        Utena put her hands on the edges of the lectern and said, "The
18th-century English statesman Edmund Burke once said, 'The only thing
necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.'"
        She paused, making sure she had everyone's attention (as
though there could be any doubt of -that-), and then went on,
        "Let's go do something."
        Cheers filled the hangar deck; then Lore dismissed the crew
and he and the other officers headed for the bridge conference room to
confer with their new captain.

  /*  James Horner  "Enterprise Clears Moorings"  _Star Trek II_  */

        Two hours later, the initial introductions and orientations
were done with.  Utena sat with only mild and fading unease in the
center seat of this, the most powerful starship in the IPSF fleet,
listening to it hum and work around her as the crew got ready to put
to space.
        "Status, Mr. Soong?" she asked.
        Lore pivoted from his exec's station and replied gravely, "All
ship's systems function at maximum capacity, Mighty One.  Challenger
awaits your command to carve your name in fire and blood across the
very stars themselves.  Kai kassai!"
        "Kai!" the rest of the bridge crew echoed.
        "I see you're still on that Klingon thing," said Utena,
unflapped.
        Lore grinned.  "Chicks dig it," he said with a waggle of his
eyebrows.
        Utena smiled and settled a little more comfortably into the
seat.
        "Helm," she said, "clear all moorings."
        Lafiel Abriel, the ship's elfin Abh helmswoman, jacked her
pilot control system into her console, brought the ship's drive
systems to life, and ran a finger across a strip of green lights, each
turning red as her fingertip passed.
        "Moorings clear," she reported.
        "Hoshi?" asked Utena.
        Comm officer Hoshi Sato held a fingertip to her earbud, then
nodded.  "Shipyard control confirms we're clear to launch."
        "Sphere departure course laid in," said young Jinto Kirk, the
ship's navigator, with a rather disarmingly businesslike air when
compared to his normal youthful earnestness.
        "OK, then," said Utena.  "Time to make the donuts.  Lafiel -
do that thing you do."

        The Dock Alpha floodlights went out as Challenger's own hull
lighting came on, an automatic response to the clearing of moorings.
As the ship's giant main impulse thrusters flared to life and she
eased from the dock, tiny spacesuited figures and little silhouettes
in windows waved "bon voyage" from all around the bay.
        Challenger slid gracefully from the Planitia ring, then made a
great, sweeping bank to port and accelerated.  Within moments she was
out of sight of the shipyard, heading for her assigned sphere gate and
the great wide galaxy beyond.  Two minutes out from the gate, Jinto
finished calculating their course to Bajor and the great ship jumped
to warp speed, leaving the system behind in the blink of an eye.

        The first leg of the trip was simple and uneventful, a routine
flight from New Avalon to Babylon 6.  The ship was scheduled to pause
there for only a day, in order to pick up the tactical forces
scheduled to participate in the exercise at Tantalus.
        Utena didn't have much to do - she hadn't really felt like
joining Anthy in a browse through the markets of the station's Zocalo,
and didn't want to get in the way of the troops loading their gear and
whatnot.  It seemed like an overbearing-captain thing to do.
        Instead, she decided to use this bit of free time to take the
Swordfish II over to Jeraddo and see what was going on at old Satori
Mandeville Memorial.  By a happy coincidence, her old revetment was
free at the Port Jeradar spaceport.  She parked the scarlet fighter
there, wrestled the Cyclone out of its exceedingly snug storage
compartment, popped it up into cycle mode, and had a pleasant ride
around the lake to the campus.
        She arrived at the Duelists' Castle (the sight of which always
brought a smile to her lips) to find nobody around outside.  Leaving
the Cyclone standing outside, she climbed the steps, went inside, and
stuck her head into the Great Hall.  Nobody was in there, so she
looked in the library, then headed upstairs to the Duelists' Society's
club offices on the second floor.
        In the corridor she saw a small group of Duelists, most of
whom she didn't recognize, clustered around the doorway into the club
president's office.  They looked like they were trying to watch
through the window built into the door, which was tough, since it was
frosted glass.
        "What's going on?" Utena asked.  The young Duelists turned to
face her, then blinked almost as one in surprise.  It wasn't every day
that one of the founders appeared on Jeraddo - let alone the legendary
Rose Knight, the one whose presence gave the Society its connection
with the Order of the Rose.  A few of them went rather starry-eyed,
which Utena always found a little disconcerting, especially when
strangers did it.
        None of them seemed to know how to answer her question.  A few
of them tried, but their answers all overlapped and didn't make much
sense to begin with, so Utena waved them quiet again and asked a more
specific question.
        "Is the president in?"
        "He's with someone, Lady Utena," said one of the younger
Duelists, a slim redheaded girl who looked to be a sophomore and whose
name Utena couldn't remember.  "But I think he'd appreciate your
help."
        Utena looked mildly puzzled, realized she wasn't going to get
anything more out of them, and instead went through the door into the
office.  The younger Duelists crowded close, trying to see inside, but
the door shut behind her and closed them out again.
        The corner office was more or less as she remembered it, with
the vice-president's small desk off to one side and the president's
larger one backed into the arc formed by the curved tower wall.  She
and Kate had spent many content, if not terribly exciting, hours in
here, doing the administrative work that made the Duelists' Society
work.  Now the desk that had been hers was vacant, and another person
was behind the one that had been Kate's.
        The current president of the Institute Duelists' Society was
just entering his senior year, and he had grown a lot since joining
the club as a freshman.  When Utena met him, he was a small, wiry boy
with curly black hair, his voice not yet broken.
        Now he was a rangy young man well on his way to "strapping",
his hair was cropped close to his skull, and his voice was a resonant
tenor.  He wore a garment that resembled a flightsuit, its grey fabric
well-worn but sturdy, and he was regarding his visitor with a sour
expression just a little short of a scowl.
        Utena was impressed.  It took quite a bit to make Boba Fett
scowl, especially in the Castle, which was one of his favorite places.
She paused to take a closer look at the person who had done it.
        The visitor was a human woman who looked not much older than
Boba, perhaps in her early or mid-twenties.  She was dressed in a
peach-colored outfit with leather panels and fore-and-aft skirt set
into it, a style Utena recognized as Bajoran.
        The woman had brown hair drawn back into a pair of short
plaits and a face that would have been pretty if it hadn't been so
haughty.  She had the little ridges on the bridge of her nose that
marked her as a Bajoran, but, oddly, she wasn't wearing an earring.
Every Bajoran Utena had ever seen had been wearing a complex
cuff-and-chain earring.  It had some sort of cultural or religious
significance to them.
        "... convince you to be -reasonable- about this, Mr. Fett,"
she was saying.  Her voice bore more than a trace of a British or
Commonwealth Colony accent - another oddity for someone from Bajor.
        "I don't see what there is for me to be reasonable -about-,
Lady Bastila," Fett replied.  "Your request is what strikes me as
unreasonable in this situation.  Surely you can see the absurdity in
what you're asking us to do."
        Bastila made a partly-contained gesture of frustration.  "I'm
asking you to accept a -gift-, Mr. Fett.  A gift of a new home for
your club."  She looked Fett straight in the eye and said in a calm,
even voice, "You would be -happy- with a new facility."
        Fett got slowly, deliberately - and to Utena's familiar eye,
dangerously - to his feet, his dark eyes locked on Bastila's.  Placing
his hands flat on the top of his desk, he leaned forward and said in a
low, very calm voice,
        "No, as a matter of fact, I wouldn't."
        Bastila contained herself well, but she still recoiled a
fraction of an inch before catching herself and squashing her
surprise.
        "And," Boba Fett went on, his voice getting even lower and
calmer, "if you ever try that on me or any of my Duelists again, I'll
have another lightsaber for our trophy wall."
        Bastila stared at him, trying to form words, but nothing came
out in the time it took Fett to draw another breath, straighten up,
fold his hands behind his back, and say in a much brisker tone,
        "We're done here.  You just forfeited any right you had to
courtesy, so you can show yourself out.  Please inform the Jedi
Council that, if they want to have any further dealings with the
Institute Duelists, they'd do well to send a diplomat rather than an
enforcer."
        He smiled, not very nicely, and added in an advisory sort of
tone, "We Duelists don't take well to enforcers."
        "Wait," said Bastila, her tone and manner suddenly
conciliatory.  "Mr. Fett, please.  I apologize for that; it was...
tactless.  But you must understand that this is all very frustrating
for me.  You're being needlessly obdurate when you are clearly - "
        "Excuse me," said Utena.  "What's going on here?"
        Fett glanced sharply toward the door and saw Utena advancing
into the room.  A smile of welcome touched with relief erased the grim
disapproval on his face as he recognized her.
        "Utena," he said.  "Welcome back to Jeraddo.  I'll be
with you in just a second."  He turned a pointed look on Bastila and
added, "Lady Bastila was just leaving."
        Bastila didn't make any move to leave, however.  Instead she
looked at Utena with a spark of recognition in her own eyes.
"Utena... Tenjou?  You're one of the founders of this club, aren't
you?  Captain Utena Tenjou?"
        "Commodore, at the moment, and yes, I'm a founding Duelist.
And you are?"
        "My name is Bastila Shan," said Bastila with an elegant
obeisance that was part curtsey, part bow.  "I am a Jedi Knight, and I
must speak with you."
        Utena looked dubious.  Another puzzlingly un-Bajoran thing
about this woman - "Bastila" was clearly her given name, but she'd
given it first.  She put it out of her mind - none of her business,
was it? - and addressed the matter at hand.
        "I'm not involved in the operations of the Jeraddo chapter any
more," Utena said.  "I graduated some years back.  I'm an officer of
the Interscholastic Duelists' Federation, but if it's a matter
concerning the local club you're already talking to the right guy,"
she added, angling her head toward Fett.
        "Please, hear me out," said Bastila.  "I'm sure you're not
without influence, and perhaps you'll be more reasonable."
        Utena shook her head.  "I won't undercut the chapter's elected
officers," she said.  "This is their club now, not mine.  They don't
need the alumni meddling in their affairs."
        "You're one of the officers who brought this club to Jeraddo,
though," Bastila insisted.  "So my business here -does- concern you."
        Utena glanced at Fett, who gave a philosophical little shrug.
"Go ahead," he said, and then smiled a sardonic little smile.  "It's... 
interesting."
        Bastila cast an uneasy glance at the door, as if sensing the
expectant crowd beyond it.  "Is there someplace more private we can
talk?" she asked.
        Utena shook her head again.  "If you've got something to say
that affects the club, you really should be saying it in front of all
the members," she said.  "But we're here already, so go ahead."
        The Jedi considered this, clearly unhappy with the
arrangement, then seemed to resign herself to it and began speaking.
        "You know of the Jedi Order, of course," she said.
        "I don't know many Jedi personally, but I know what you are
and what the order does, yes."
        "Well, I doubt you have any very good idea of that, actually,"
said Bastila in a blandly, pleasantly patronizing tone that set
Utena's teeth instantly on edge.  "But if you know anything of our
history, you must know that the Order has been in existence, upholding
justice and teaching the ways of the Force in the galaxy, for
thousands of years."  The Jedi gestured at the walls around them.
"This building is one of our temples."
        "Yes, we know," Utena said.  "One of our early members is a
student of antiquities; she identified the building from a drawing in
an ancient Atlantean text on the Jedi."
        "Mm, yes," said Bastila, quite well concealing her surprise
that the Duelists knew any such thing.  "It is of a very early style,
probably dating from very shortly after the rise of Atlantis and the
Jedi proper.  This must have been quite a remote outpost in those
days."
        Utena nodded.  "What's your point?" she asked bluntly.
        "My -point-," replied Bastila a bit testily, "is that this
temple was raised by the Jedi Order, and I would see it returned."
        "Sorry," Utena said.  "The Castle's not for sale."
        "I wasn't offering to -buy- it," said Bastila a trifle
impatiently.  "It rightfully belongs to the Order."
        Utena gazed at her for a long, silent moment, then said
slowly, "... OK, so lemme see if I've got this -straight.-  Your order
abandoned this place -thousands of years ago-, so long ago that the
-Bajorans- don't remember when the Jedi were here - and you may be
aware that the Bajorans can remember quite a long way back," she added
archly.
        As a gratifying touch of color came to the Jedi's cheeks
(apparently she did have a bit of shame after all), Utena went on,
"-We- found it abandoned in the woods, no roof, interior shoulder-deep
in crud, and -made- something of it... and now you walk in here and
expect us to just -give- it to you?"
        "Your society wouldn't be dispossessed," Bastila assured her,
completely missing the point.  "The offer I made to Mr. Fett was that
the Order would pay for the construction of a new facility for the
club here on campus."
        Utena folded her arms.  "That's not the point," she said.
"The point is, this is the Duelists' Castle.  Vedek Bareil gave it to
us.  -We- made it what it is today.  It's the seat of -our- order, the
symbol of our federation.  It's our -home-."
        Bastila looked unimpressed.  "Your 'order' is a sporting
club," she said, a trifle scornfully.  "You could practice swordplay
anywhere!  We Jedi hold these temples as sacred places.  They were
raised with the power of the Force.  For centuries, Jedi lived and
trained, taught and learned, within their walls.  You can imagine how
it feels for me to come here and find this one converted into a... a
clubhouse for violent children."
        Utena's face darkened, but she kept her composure as she
replied, "The Duelists of the Rose are much more than 'violent
children', Master Jedi.  Characterizing us as such would be like me
dismissing the Jedi as religious fanatics."
        Bastila drew back, her grey-blue eyes widening in outrage.
"How -dare- you - " she began.
        "Mm," said Utena with a thoughtful nod.  "Shoe doesn't fit so
well on the other foot, does it?"  Before Bastila could come up with a
response, she went on, "Anyway, what I'm getting at is, you guys don't
have a monopoly on doing good for the galaxy.  We haven't done so bad
ourselves in that regard."
        "Yes, yes," said Bastila with an irritable gesture.  "A bandit
here, a rogue Psi Cop there.  The Jedi have served the galaxy for
fifteen millennia.  Your order has existed for... what?  Not quite
five years?"
        "I wasn't aware the pursuit of justice was dependent on
seniority, Master Jedi," Utena replied.  Inwardly, she was smirking a
bit at herself.  This icy-politeness routine was a trick she'd learned
from Anthy.  It was great for getting self-important types like this
as tightly wound up as possible, and it certainly seemed to be doing
the job here.
        All the same, her patience only extended so far.  It was time
to wrap this up before she ran out of it entirely.
        "Listen," she said, trying to be conciliatory.  "This is a
stupid argument for us to have.  The Order of the Rose and the Jedi
Knights ought to be allies, not adversaries.  We're both aligned with
the International Police.  We're both dedicated to bettering ourselves
for the good of the galaxy."
        "-Bettering- yourselves?  Without supervision, without
instructors, without even a consistent -philosophy-?" Bastila shot
back.  "I've observed your Duelists at play for several days, Captain
Tenjou.  This isn't an order of galactic protectors, it's potentially
lethal adolescent -chaos-, and I'll thank you not to compare it to the
ancient and august ways of the Jedi," she finished, elevating her chin
to give Utena a haughty look.
        Utena looked back at her for a moment, visibly controlling
herself.  Then she closed her eyes, held them shut for a long count,
and opened them again, fixing her gaze on Bastila's eyes.
        "... OK, that's it," she said.  "Listen, you.  I had to fight
against exactly that kind of attitude to get this club established in
the first place, and I'm not going to stand here and listen to you
spout that same nonsense five years on, Jedi or not.  Come with me.
I'm going to show you what we are here."
        Bastila looked momentarily puzzled, realized what Utena was
getting at, and then gave an exasperated expression.  "I don't have
time for this."
        "-Make- time," Utena snapped.  "You came into our home and
insulted our ways, and now you have to back your words according to
our custom.  Or don't the Jedi teach respect for cultural diversity
any more?" she asked.
        Bastila gave her a long-suffering look, then sighed.  "Very
well," she said.  "But don't blame me when you get hurt."
        Boba Fett coughed, his face wearing the expression of a man
who is exercising all his considerable willpower not to laugh out
loud.
        Utena paid no attention; instead she pivoted on her heel and
led the way out of the office.  The clot of young Duelists outside the
door parted for her like a docking bay's atmosphere shield for a
shuttle, waited for an irked-looking Bastila and a rigidly-formal Fett
to follow, and then fell in behind with an electrified murmur, except
for one who dashed off to rally the rest of the Duelists from the
kitchen and library.

        They crowded into the upper gallery of the Great Hall, lining
the railings to watch what promised to be a great fight.  The fighting
reputation of the Jedi preceded their representative here, and as for
Utena, well, what was there to say about her?  She was the Rose
Knight, the greatest of Duelists.  She'd never been beaten.  The last
time she fought in this room - last April, against no less a personage
than the First Lensman - had been an event so spectacular that no one
who witnessed it would ever forget it.
        Not only Duelists were there, either.  Word of the impending
duel had reached Challenger at Babylon 6, and some hurried transporter
relaying had sent Princess Koriand'r to the Castle with a camera drone
from the sensor-probe stock, to provide coverage of the fight for the
bridge crew.  She stood at the rail next to Boba Fett, watching with
the usual great interest she took in all non-Tamaranian customs.
        As was her custom, Utena did a few stretching exercises while
she waited for her opponent to finish preparing herself.  As she did,
she looked around the room.
        The Great Hall of the Duelists' Castle was a large room with a
high, domed ceiling.  Two of its walls - the ones to either side of
the entrance and galleries - were covered with various melee weapons,
ranging from plain swords to exotic bladed weapons from a dozen worlds
as well as wooden practice variants of all of them.
        The wall behind Utena - the wall opposite the entrance - was
different.  It was mostly bare, except for the central of its five
large stone panels.  That one was covered with a different display of
weapons, both melee and ranged.  Blasters, pole arms, mundane and
exotic blades all hung in an artful arrangement.  This was the trophy
wall - the place where the Order of the Rose displayed all the weapons
with which outsiders had tried, and so far failed, to end the careers
of various members.
        The central of the room's three entrance doors opened, and as
it did the murmuring students in the gallery went silent.
        Bastila Shan came into the room with quiet tread, having
changed from her peach-colored dress into garments of a style Utena
recognized much more readily: the dogi-like tunic, simple breeches,
and sturdy boots of a Jedi Knight.  She had a lightsaber at her belt.
Its projector struck Utena as unusually long for such a weapon.
        Utena, too, had changed for the duel, though the costume she'd
adopted took Bastila slightly aback.  She'd exchanged one uniform
jacket - that of the IP Space Force - for another, a scarlet-edged
black one in a style the Jedi didn't recognize.  The rest of her
clothes were even odder, since they consisted of little but a pair of
red bike shorts, matching socks, and black and white saddle shoes.
        She had a sword belted at her waist, its black, intricate
basket hilt cocked forward for the draw.  Bastila took note of it and
raised an eyebrow.
        "We fight our true duels with live weapons here, Master Jedi,"
Utena explained.  "The wooden ones are only for practice - our staff
fighters excepted, of course."
        "I see," said Bastila, who couldn't decide whether to be
impressed or mortified.  "Well," she went on, "obviously you haven't a
lightsaber, so I'll have to borrow one of your ordinary weapons."
        "Don't put yourself out on my account," Utena replied
offhandedly as she settled into another hamstring stretch.
        Bastila gave her an odd look, but went to the left-hand Wall
O' Weapons (as trademarked by one of the freshman Duelists the
previous year), looked it over, and selected an Echani brand -
basically two swords affixed to the ends of a short pole.  This she
whirled around herself in a singing, swooping kata for a few moments;
clearly she'd had some training in the weapon's use and felt quite
comfortable handling a double blade.
        Ah, thought Utena.  That explains why her lightsaber grip's so
long.
        One of the younger Duelists - the redheaded girl Utena had
spoken to earlier, Sakura somebody, Utena still couldn't remember her
last name - came in from the storeroom, carrying with her a white and
a yellow rose.
        With the proper amount of ceremony, she fixed the white rose
in Utena's jacket pocket; then she crossed to Bastila and pinned the
yellow one to her Jedi robes.
        "The rules are simple," she said in a quiet voice.  "Lose your
rose - lose the duel."
        Bastila gave her a look.  "This is absurd," she said.
        "You fight under our roof," the young Duelist replied calmly,
"you fight by our rules."  Then she stepped back, bowed to Bastila,
turned, bowed to Utena, and left the Great Hall at a respectful,
dignified pace - breaking into a run only once outside the Hall, at
which point she pelted upstairs for the gallery with all the speed she
could muster.
        Utena drew the Thorn of the Rose, its gun-blue finish
twinkling in the light pouring down from the Great Hall's skylights.
With easy, practiced grace, she whipped it through a short flourish,
raised it before her face in a crusader's salute, and turned it
sideways so that the light caught the runic inscription on the flat of
the blade.
        Bastila sprang, making a lightning-fast frontal assault that
rather reminded Utena of something -she- would do, and the duel was
on.

  /*  Marty O'Donnell/Michael Salvatori  "The Long Run"  _Halo_  */

        Within a few seconds, Utena had the measure of her opponent
and knew she was in for quite a fight.  Bastila wasn't the most
technically skilled opponent she'd ever faced - that honor would
probably have to go to Gryphon - but she had a lot of speed and power,
and her fighting style had an edge of fury to it that Utena found
surprising in a Jedi.  Like her opening move, the Jedi's fighting
style reminded Utena a lot of her own, as adjusted for the exotic
weapon Bastila favored.
        They clashed, withdrew, clashed, withdrew, and then circled
each other warily, each looking for a crack in the other's defenses
before they rushed together again.  Bastila handled the Echani brand
like an expert - her martial skill was such that she would easily have
qualified to be one of the Duelists she scorned.
        Utena wondered, though, exactly where this 'Force' the Jedi
kept talking about came into it.  Bastila didn't seem to be
anticipating Utena's movements any more than Utena was anticipating
hers.  The Asagiri Katsujinkenryuu, Gryphon's family fighting style,
was partly based on Jedi teachings, and its practitioners also claimed
to touch the Force.  Utena thought she'd seen its workings in duels
against Gryphon and his daughter Kaitlyn, her best friend - but it
didn't seem to give its users an edge she couldn't overcome.
        Then she stopped trying to analyze things and just settled
into the rhythm of the fight.  The honor of the Order of the Rose was
at stake here, and though that might not be quite as significant a
prize as the Rose Bride had been, it was reason enough to give this
battle everything she had - and anyway, her opponent was worthy of it.
        They clashed and re-clashed, turned and wove, parried and
riposted, their attack and defense becoming faster and more showy as
they found one another's level.  From the gallery, the duel just kept
getting more and more thrilling - the Jedi moving so fast her
loose-fitting robes snapped as if in a heavy wind, Utena's bright pink
hair a streak like lightning.
        A dull red glow started to surround the Rose Knight as she
fought, as her adrenaline started running and her power stirred within
her.  Bastila felt it and nearly faltered in her surprise - for a
moment it was almost as though her opponent had touched the Force
herself, an absurdity - before recalling herself to the moment and
stepping back into the rhythm.
        The runic inscription on the Thorn of the Rose's blade flared
to life as Utena spun out of a counter to a particularly complicated
strike from Bastila's brand.  A shower of golden sparks suddenly
surrounded her as her Rose Duelist's accoutrements - epaulets, chain,
petticoat and cuffs - sprang into being on her uniform.  She whirled
and sprang, the Thorn leaving a visible streak of light in its wake - 
        - Bastila blocked the blow, but Utena's blade shattered the
end of the brand the Jedi had used for the parry.  Off-balance,
Bastila spun out of the way and let Utena's charge carry her past.
        What she should have done in this situation was drop the
broken weapon, scan the Wall O' Weapons for a similar one, and call it
to her hand with the Force; but Bastila's blood was up now and that
strategy never occurred to her.  Instead she abandoned the brand and
drew her -real- weapon, the only one that struck her battle-tranced
mind as appropriate for a clash of this magnitude.
        The snapping hiss of her double lightsaber's yellow blades
extending was matched by the sharp intake of breath by just about
everyone in the gallery.
        Utena, on the other hand, wasn't daunted at all.  She
continued with her follow-through, turned, and set herself for the
next clash.  Bastila bored in, her double saber humming violently as
she whirled it into position.
        About a quarter-second before one of her glowing yellow blades
touched the Thorn of the Rose, Bastila suddenly snapped out of her
battle trance and realized that she was about to do something very bad
indeed.  Her lightsaber would carve through that steel like a
blowtorch through Jell-O, and she would be very lucky indeed if she
could stop it before it went on from there to take off the side of
Utena Tenjou's face.
        Her mind working much faster than her body, Bastila set
herself to try to pull the blow, whatever the cost to herself - 
        - when the saber blade smacked into the Thorn of the Rose
and... stopped, just as if she'd struck it against another
lightsaber.
        Time seemed to pause for a moment while Bastila considered
this.  How was that even -possible-?  She'd heard rumors that there
had once been, during the truly ancient days of the Jedi, a race of
people who could make ordinary-looking weapons out of exotic materials
that could stand up to a lightsaber's blade; but that was millennia
ago, and may not even have been true.  So how - 
        A solid impact broke that thought apart entirely and brought
time percussively back into step with itself as Utena dealt Bastila a
withering sidelong kick to the midriff and so broke the saber lock.
The Jedi was flung back several yards, stumbled, nearly fell, and
caught herself as much with the Force as with her own skill.  She
regrouped, staring at the Rose Knight in astonishment.
        Utena grinned, set herself again, and raised her blade in
salute once more before receiving Bastila's next attack.  All right,
so her sword could block a lightsaber somehow - Bastila wasn't going
to dwell on it right now.  First she'd defeat this smug upstart who
dared to smirk at a Jedi in battle; then she'd get the answers she
wanted, see if she didn't!
        The fight ratcheted up another notch as they resumed combat,
Bastila now with her double lightsaber's blades humming and crackling
around her, Utena with her scarlet aura clearly visible on the Thorn.
Despite the setback and her momentary paralysis from surprise, Bastila
was still an excellent fighter, and now her wind was well and truly up.
        She swept in with a series of lightning-quick and violent
strikes, her saber blades seeming to come from all angles.  Utena
blocked them all, but the penultimate blow left her in a bad position
and the last one wrenched the Thorn from her hand.  The basket-hilted
blade clattered sparking across the stone floor of the Great Hall,
well out of reach of anyone without a Jedi's telekinetic powers to
retrieve it.
        The disarmament did seem to faze the Duelist momentarily, but
only momentarily.  She evaded Bastila's next blow with fluid grace,
using a move she'd learned from Kaitlyn.  Then she saw an opening,
stood her ground, ducked a swing from the saber-staff, and headfaked
to the left.  Bastila went for it, pivoting - and Utena swung back and
clobbered her with the left hook she'd been saving, sending the Jedi
reeling.
        While Utena took advantage of her opponent's momentary
incapacity to make a dash for the nearest wall, Koriand'r leaned
toward Fett and whispered, "Mr. Fett?  Did Captain Tenjou just... "
She paused and searched her Standard slang vocabulary.  "... 'rope a
dope'?"
        Fett nodded with a grimly satisfied smile, not taking his eyes
off the action.  "She sure as hell did," he replied.
        Kori smiled, proud to have gotten another Standard turn of
phrase right.  If she continued at this rate, she would soon be
speaking the language like a native!
        Meawhile, on the floor, Utena reached the far wall only to
hear a sort of "whoosh" sound and the growl of Bastila's lightsaber
behind her.  She whirled to see Bastila rising from a crouch not five
feet away, having clearly just covered about thirty feet in a single
bound.
        "Looks like you're out of room," she said, whirling her double
saber around her and presenting its tip to Utena.
        Utena threw herself back, her right hand slapping the trophy
wall, and then tumbled sideways as her back hit the stone.  Bastila's
blade carved a glowing scar in the tough alien stone of the wall -
this room had been built to be a lightsaber dojo and could take quite
a lot of abuse.  She reversed the strike, whirling her blades over her
head, and brought them down at a sharp angle, trusting the Force to
guide her so that just the tip of the blade would vaporize the flower
clipped to her opponent's jacket and end this foolish game -
        - when the harsh, snarling hiss of a lightsaber ignition met
her ears and, to her immense surprise, a scarlet-edged blade leapt
from the silver-chased black metal cylinder in Utena's right hand,
crossed her body, and blocked Bastila's blade.
        Bastila drew back, startled, and whirled into a new en-garde.
        "You should put that down," she said, her voice a trifle
harsh.  "In your untrained hands it's orders of magnitude more
dangerous to you than the game we've been playing - "
        Utena gave her a small, sardonic smile, and then whipped the
lightsaber through the same round-the-body draw-style flourish she'd
done with her black blade at the duel's beginning.
        "I'll manage," she said.  "We're not done."

         /*  Rob Dougan  "Chateau"  _The Matrix Reloaded_  */

        Then, without waiting for Bastila's reply, Utena went back on
the offensive.
        Now the contestants were really in top gear.  Their blades
growled and sparked, sending out bright flashes whenever they
collided.  To the eyes of her fellow Duelists, Utena shone almost as
brightly in her own right.  Her technique with the unfamiliar and
dangerous weapon was brilliant, combining familiar maneuvers with her
talent for wild improvisation to create, on the fly, a style that
perfectly countered Bastila's looping, swirling double blade.
        Sometimes Utena held the scarlet lightsaber in one hand,
sometimes in the other, sometimes in both.  Occasionally she even held
it backward as she constantly adapted her technique to meet that of
her adversary.
        As their battle entered this last stage, both combatants
seemed to slip slightly outside the normal laws of physics.  Bastila
had already demonstrated a leaping ability that was well beyond
anything a normal human could do, and now Utena seemed to have
manifested the uncanny ability - often noticed by other Duelists in
Kaitlyn - to see her opponent when not actually looking at her,
countering first a strike that came from behind, then the opposite end
of the saber-staff trying to capitalize on that parry to take her rose
from the front.  What was more, both seemed to regard gravity less
than a person should on Jeraddo as they rebounded from walls and made
creative use of the corners of the room.
        It was by far the most thrilling duel to grace the Great Hall
since the First Lensman's last appearance there - maybe even slightly
more so.  As it built toward its inevitable climax, all the spectators
seemed to feel it too, leaning slowly forward as a single body.
Bastila struck, struck again, whirled, lunged.  Utena parried the
first blow, slipped away from the second, anticipated, ducked - 
        - rolled clean under Bastila's lunge and burst to her feet
like a popup mine, spun on the ball of her foot and interposed her
lightsaber to the compensating downward blow she knew was coming,
knocked the yellow saber away, spun, and flicked Bastila's rose from
her chest without so much as scorching the fabric of the Jedi's tunic.
        For a moment the two contestants stood frozen, Bastila
slightly off-balance, Utena in her follow-through, their sabers still
humming in the sudden dead silence.
        Then Bastila's twin blades drew back into her saber grip with
a muffled "psscht!"  The Jedi slowly sank to her knees, settling into
a seiza-like pose with her hands before her and her eyes cast down.
        Utena whirled the red lightsaber back, shut it off, and hung
it on her belt.
        The gallery exploded in cheers.
        Bastila stayed where she was for several seconds, looking down
at her hands, the right one still gripping her extinguished saber.
        Utena, blinking, crouched to be nearer her eye level and said
under the cheering, "Hey, uh... are you OK?"
        "This... this cannot be," Bastila replied in a small voice,
sounding more like she was talking to herself than answering Utena.
"This is impossible."
        Utena looked unimpressed.  "What?  That you lost?"
        Bastila raised eyes full of plain shock to the Duelist.  "No.
Not that.  But... when you took up that lightsaber... when I made that
last strike and you countered it... I felt the Force... -leave- me."
        Utena tilted her head inquisitively.  "Why?  Break your
concentration?"
        Bastila shook her head.  "No," she said, sounding deeply
shaken.  "I was still concentrating, I could still -feel- the Force.
But... it flowed -away- from me.  Away from me... and into you."
        The Jedi raised herself to her feet and put an hand on Utena's
arm as the Duelist straightened with her.  "How did you do that?" she
asked.  "Even Master Yoda can't do that."
        "Oh, uh, really," said Utena.  She put a hand behind her head
and chuckled uneasily.  "Would you believe I have no idea what you're
talking about?"
        Bastila looked put out.  "Don't be coy," she said, "it's
unbecoming.  I'm talking about - "
        Before she could get any further, they were mobbed by jubilant
Duelists, who picked Utena up on their shoulders and carried her
through the halls of the Castle to the library.  It wasn't until more
than an hour later that the congratulations ceased and Bastila found
herself alone again with Utena and Boba Fett, this time in the
otherwise-vacated library.
        "I think you owe me a few answers, Commodore Tenjou,"
Bastila said, the old coolness back in her voice now that she'd
regained her composure.
        "I don't," Utena replied frankly, "but what the hell, I
haven't got anywhere to be until 4:30."  She leaned back in her
favorite armchair, put her feet up on an ottoman, and regarded the
Jedi calmly.  "Ask your questions."
        "Who taught you to use the Force?" Bastila asked sharply.
        "Nobody.  I don't.  Next question."
        "Nonsense!  I felt you use it in our battle - and use it in a
way I've never seen it used before.  Where did you learn the
technique?"
        Utena began to look a bit testy.  "Look, I'm serious, I don't
know what you're talking about here."
        "Can that be possible?" Bastila mused doubtfully.  "Can you be
so strong in the Force and not even know it?"  She trailed off, lost
in thought, and then adopted a determined look.
        "Come with me to Alderaan," she said.
        Utena blinked once in surprise, then chuckled (a little
darkly) and said calmly, "Er, sorry, Master Jedi, but no thank you.
I'm married, and anyway, I don't think I like you that much."
        Bastila looked very puzzled, then blushed scarlet, her
nostrils flaring.  "Can you not be serious for -one- -moment-?" she
snapped.  "You must come with me to Alderaan at once!"
        Utena felt her hackles rise.  "The hell I must," she replied
conversationally.  She got to her feet and went on, "Listen, sister, I
don't know who died and made -you- the End of the World, but I've got a
-job- to do."
        "(... the end of the... )" Bastila murmured, looking deeply
puzzled.
        "Never mind," said Utena irritably, shaking her head.  "The
point is, I'm not going anywhere but Tantalus.  I'm too busy for...
whatever your problem is now."
        "This is important," Bastila said in what she thought was her
most commanding tone, not realizing that that was the best way to keep
Utena from even paying attention to what she wanted.
        "What," asked Utena rhetorically, "could be more important
than keeping a promise to my father?"
        "Your training," Bastila replied in exasperation, as though it
were the most obvious thing in the world and Utena was being willfully
obtuse.  "Your power is much too great for you to be left untrained,
unregulated.  You don't even realize what you are.  That makes you
fodder for the Dark Side, and with your level of power, that could be
disastrous.  A Darksider with your power could unbalance the whole
galaxy."
        Utena glanced sharply at the Jedi, her eyes flashing.  "So we
Duelists aren't important enough for you to deal with, yet I suddenly
threaten the balance of the galaxy?  Why don't you get stuffed.  I've
got places to be."
        With that she broke eye contact with the Jedi, turned to Boba
Fett, and said, "I have to go, Boba.  If she gives you any more
trouble about the Castle, call Mace Windu and tell him Dad and Vedek
Bareil set us up here years ago, AND that she just lost a duel to me
over it, so as far as I'm concerned, the matter's closed."
        Fett nodded.  "Will do.  Clear skies, Utena."
        "Thanks," Utena said, and turned to go.
        "A moment.  Please," Bastila said, her tone a unique
combination of grudging and beseeching.
        Utena paused in the doorway, her desire to get the hell away
from here warring with the courtesy Anthy had long told her she needed
to work on.  Then she turned and said in a barely civil tone,
        "Yes?"
        "You know Master Windu?" Bastila inquired.
        "Casually," Utena replied.  "He's a friend of my dad's.  I
figured you'd know that."
        "Well, yes, I did know that, but I didn't know -you- knew
him," Bastila said.  "(That explains a lot, actually,)" she mused
under her breath.
        "What's -that- supposed to mean?" Utena inquired archly.
        "Ah - nothing," said Bastila, looking faintly embarrassed.
"Just thinking out loud.  Bad habit, really.  Listen - I realize I may
have come on... a bit strong... just now, but it's only because I'm
very concerned.  If you won't come to Alderaan, at least let me come
with you for a time, observe you further, and report my findings to
the Council.  It may be very important."
        Utena would have liked little better than to tell this
officious snot to go fuck herself, slap commbadge, and beam out right
in front of her face.  On the other hand, there was no point in
burning bridges that completely.  She had to work with the Jedi -
there was one assigned to this very mission, in fact - and by and
large she admired them.  Also, she had a natural tendency to at least
try to be fair with people.  Maybe this Bastila was just having a bad
day?
        Besides, if she left that way, who would get her Cyclone and
the Swordfish II back to Challenger?
        "Well... "
        Utena hesitated, warring with herself a little more, but her
natural tendency toward fairness won out.
        "All right," she said.  "But if you get in my face -one more
time- once we're aboard ship - you're walking home."
        "I'll go and get my things, then," Bastila said.  Now it was
her turn to make as if to leave, then pause.
        "By the way," she said at the doorway.  "Where did you get
that lightsaber?"
        Utena glanced down, as if she hadn't expected to find it still
on her belt, then turned to Fett, who smiled.
        "Took it from a Dark Jedi who tried to take me out in
Anchorhead on Tatooine last summer," he said.
        "Indeed?" said Bastila with a mixture of interest and
skepticism.  "You've defeated a Dark Jedi?"
        "Two, actually," Fett replied - not boasting, just telling her
about it.  "The other one only had a vibrosword."  He shrugged.  "I
guess credits are tight for the Sith these days."
        "There are several known Dark Jedi factions besides the Sith
themselves," Bastila told him.  "Most of them are much less dangerous.
You probably encountered members of one of those, since you're here to
tell us about it."
        "Oh, no doubt," Fett replied, nodding.  "I'm sure no non-Jedi
could ever -hope- to defeat a -real- Force-user like -yourself-, Lady
Bastila," he added earnestly, putting a hand on Utena's shoulder as
he spoke.
        Bastila took a moment to parse his meaning, then flushed
bright red again.  Fett remarked to himself that the effect was really
rather appealing.
        "Well," she said with forced casualness.  "I've preparations
to make."  She did that odd curtsey-bow gesture again.  "Good day to
you, Mr. Fett, Commodore," she said, and then she swept from the room.
        "... Damn, Boba," said Utena after she was sure the Jedi was
out of earshot.  "That was cold."
        "She deserved it," Fett replied, putting his hands in his
jumpsuit pockets and scowling.
        "Oh, no question," Utena replied.  "But it was cold."  She
smiled.  "I'll have to tell Anthy about it.  She'll be very proud of
you."  She patted the lightsaber.  "Listen, do you mind if I hang onto
this for a while?"
        Fett shook his head.  "Not at all," he said.  "You're a
founder - you can have whatever you want in the Castle, you know
that."
        Utena smiled.  "Sure, but I didn't want to just abscond with
one of your trophies."
        Fett gave her an elegant bow.  Given his background and
general disposition, she had to wonder where the hell he'd learned it.
        "Take it with my compliments, Commodore Tenjou," he said
formally, then grinned to dispel the effect.  "Figure you'll have to
put her in her place again before the trip's over?"
        Utena laughed.  "I hope not.  No, I just... it was...
interesting," she said after weighing words for a moment.  "I'd like
to experiment with it a bit."  She looked down at the silver-inlaid
cylinder hanging next to the Thorn of the Rose, then grinned and
added, "And it's a hell of a lot more convenient to carry."
        "It is that," Fett said.  "Actually, I'll be a little relieved
to have it out of here.  Sometimes someone gets an urge to try it out,
and Lady Bastila was right about one thing - it IS dangerous if you
don't know how to handle it."
        Utena nodded.  "Well, I'll take it off your hands, then, for a
while, anyway."  She sighed.  "Not exactly how I wanted my visit to
go, but I guess I better hit the road.  Good to see you again, Boba.
Looks like everything's under control here."
        Fett smiled.  "We do our best, Commodore.  Come again
anytime.  And thanks for handling our, uh, Jedi problem."

        Utena got back to Challenger about half an hour later, feeling
slightly out of sorts.  She didn't like it when days got as weird as
that without any warning.
        She arrived to find the hangar deck bustling with activity and
featuring a pair of craft that hadn't been there before.  When she
finished parking the Swordfish II, she crossed the bay to take a
closer look at one of them.
        It was an aerodyne transport craft of a type she hadn't seen
before.  Its main body was blocky and sturdy-looking, with a snub
cockpit up front, slab sides, and stubby high-mount wings.  It had
four swiveling thrusters mounted at its upper corners and a ramp on
the back.
        One of these craft was thermocoated in a dark grey and carried
International Police markings.  The other was white and had only
cryptic number codes visible.  Orange-suited deckhands moved around
them, lashing things down, carrying crates, and generally squaring
away.
        One of them noticed her, came to attention, and saluted.
        "Afternoon, Commodore!" she said.  "We're just getting the
Pelicans squared away.  The ground forces are being shown to their
quarters now."
        Utena returned the salute and smiled.  "Everything going all
right?"
        "Just right, Commodore.  Once we get the last of these crates
stowed we'll be ready to roll."
        Utena nodded.  "Carry on," she said.  The grinning deckhand
snapped another salute and then dashed off to get back to work.
        The commodore, meanwhile, went down the row of white Pelicans
and was just about to leave the hangar deck altogether when a buzzing
alarm sounded in the cavernous room.  It was the attention signal
informing hangar personnel that another craft was on approach.
        Utena turned and saw a familiar but unexpected sight: a sharp
little arrowhead of duralloy, decked out in red and white thermocoat
and docked into an old-fashioned hyperdrive ring, was passing through
the atmosphere barrier field and into the hangar.  The little ship
disengaged from its FTL ring, hovered while the deckmaster maneuvered
the ring to a storage hanger with a tractor beam, then deployed its
landing gear and skimmed about an inch over the deck on its repulsors
as the pilot deftly maneuvered it into the parking space next to the
Swordfish II.
        Utena grinned and recrossed the bay, standing next to her
fighter and waiting for the new arrival's pilot to disembark.  A
moment later, the arrowhead-shaped craft's aft-mounted bubble canopy
hinged forward and a form in a rather bulky old spacesuit clambered
out.
        Anne Springsteen unfastened her helmet, pulled it off, shook
her head (her blonde hair was still trimmed just shorter than
shoulder-length, Utena saw, and this month it appeared to be sporting
an iridescent red highlight job), and dropped the helmet into her
Delta-7's cockpit before turning with a smile to Utena, saluting, and
saying,
        "Permission to come aboard, Commodore."
        Utena, still grinning, returned the salute, then shook the
Jedi's hand.  "Granted.  Welcome aboard, Anne.  I'm glad to have you,"
she added wryly.  "At least you were -invited-."
        Anne nodded as she pulled a duffel bag out of a small
compartment in the ancient Atlantean fighter's tail.  Then she patted
R4-P17, her ship's permanently installed astromech droid, on the dome
and told him to watch the ship before following Utena across the
hangar deck.
        "I saw most of your duel," the Jedi said.  "It was quite an
eye-opener.  I mean, I'd seen you fly before, but never fight."  Anne
smiled.  "You're everything the Chief says you are."
        Utena gave her a sidelong glance.  "The Chief talks about me?"
        "He and Master Windu have had several interesting
conversations regarding you and your connection to the Force."
        Utena skidded to a stop in the corridor, about halfway between
the hangar deck entrance and the turbolift.  "Wait, wait, OK, rewind,"
she said.  "Does everybody know about this whole me/Force deal already
-except me-?"
        Anne blinked in surprise.  "You mean you... how could you -not
know-?" she asked, incredulous.
        "I guess I just haven't been paying attention!" Utena replied
sarcastically, throwing up her hands.  "Or maybe," she added grumpily
as she started leading the way toward the turbolift again, "it's just
that I haven't been lucky enough to have Bastila freaking Shan around
to run my life for me before now."
        "Ah... yeah," said the Jedi with a mildly uncomfortable look.
"Bastila.  That's... kind of a problem."
        "What is her -deal-?" Utena demanded as they entered the
turbolift.  "She's the most un-serene Jedi I've ever heard of.  When I
got there today she was trying to make Boba give her the Castle."
        "That's vintage Bastila," said Anne with a mild roll of her
eyes.  "She's a Sentinel of Light, which means she's obligated by
training and character to take everything way, way too seriously."
        "A what?"
        "The Sentinels of Light are a subsect of the Order," the Jedi
explained.  "Part of their self-appointed mission is to keep an eye
out for untrained Force-sensitives they think might cause problems,
but mainly they're there to safeguard other Jedi against unbecoming
behavior, abuses of power... you know, all that Siren Call of the Dark
Side stuff."
        "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" Utena inquired sourly.
        "Indeed," Anne replied.
        "So how many of these Sentinels are there?"
        "Ten," Anne replied.  "Not all of them are as irritating as
Bastila.  She's especially gifted.  That's why Deadbolt took it upon
himself to train her personally when her old master died."
        Utena cocked an eyebrow.  "'Deadbolt'?"
        Anne laughed.  "Master Jason Lock.  He's the Prime Sentinel -
the Jedi Council member charged with maintaining the charter of the
Sentinels of Light.  He's also a first-class pain in the butt, and
Bastila's grown up just like him."
        "So you know her."
        "Oh, sure.  We're about the same age.  When I was an
apprentice, Master Windu and Deadbolt would cross paths about once a
year, and so naturally Bastila and I would too."  She looked a bit
glum.  "Our teachers have never gotten along, and we didn't either.
This trip could be awkward with both of us along, but... "  She
shrugged.  "It's part of her job as a Sentinel to keep an eye on
powerful Force-users who might go the wrong way."
        Utena gave her a look.  "I think I resent that."
        "I'm just saying what I imagine Bastila thinks.  -I- don't
think you're a threat to the galaxy."
        "Well, that's reassuring," said Utena with a slightly tired
grin; then she leaned back against the turbocar wall and said, "I
think this is going to be a long month."
        Anne patted her arm.  "Don't worry.  I'll try to mitigate her
impact as much as possible.  I have quite a bit of experience dealing
with Bastila.  Do yourself a favor, though, and try to limit contact
between Bastila and Anthy as much as possible," she added.  "Jedi
Sentinels historically get along -very- poorly with witches."
        Utena gave an involuntary snort of laughter.  "Thanks for the
tip," she said.  "I'm glad you're here."
        The turbolift stopped and opened.  "I'm glad I'm here too,"
Anne replied with a grin.  "The usual room?"
        "Yup," Utena replied.  "Jinto has a system for that kind of
thing, apparently.  See you at the tac meeting?"
        "Oh, wouldn't miss it," Anne replied.  "I just have to get out
of this suit and wash up."
        "OK, see you there," Utena said, and she let the turbolift
take her up one more level.
        There she had a hurried shower and told Anthy the short
version of her weird day simultaneously, threw on a fresh Space Force
uniform, and then went to the big conference room aft of the bridge to
meet the new crewmembers.

        She'd been in the conference room for only about a minute -
just long enough to get herself a cup of tea from the pot on the
minibar and take a seat - when the door opened and the first of her
tactical personnel came through.
        Though not particularly small, the door from the bridge's
turbolift lobby to the conference room was not generously proportioned
either.  The person who arrived first didn't seem, once he'd made it
through, as if he possibly could have fit, but obviously he had.  He
did it so quickly and with such peculiar grace that it seemed like a
kind of magic trick.  One moment the startlingly large being is on
-that- side of the door; presto!  He's on this side of the door!
        For the being standing before her -was- startlingly large.
She would, in fact, go so far as to say it was -huge-, an immense
reptilian creature whose broad shoulders nearly touched the ceiling
above its forward-thrust, bullet-shaped head.  It had skin covered in
leathery pale-blue scales and wore a dark blue coverall of the sort
favored by IPO Tactical Division soldiers out of combat.  It was
vaguely humanoid, in that it had limbs and head in the right places,
but its arms were proportionally longer than a human's and its legs
were sharply digitigrade.
        The creature moved with a quick, fluid grace, much more so
than Utena would have expected from something of its size and obvious
power.  It looked around the room with bright black eyes under a
beetling scaly brow; when it saw her, four mandibles below those eyes
swung open like the tines of a collapsible grappling hook, revealing a
funnel-shaped forest of glittering, wickedly pointed teeth angling
back toward a mouth-shaped opening at the back.
        Despite its massive size and generally frightful appearance,
Utena didn't feel particularly intimidated by this creature.  Not only
was it wearing the uniform of a Tac Div trooper, she recognized it.
They'd never met before, but it would have been hard for her not to
recognize him.
        This creature was the last survivor of a huge army of alien
beings which had invaded the galaxy in the 22nd century.  A group of
several disparate races from unknown worlds beyond the Rim, they were
bound together by a complex and harsh religion calling for the
eradication of all other sentient life in the universe.  They called
themselves the Covenant.
        The war with the Covenant lasted for the better part of a
decade and devastated parts of the Outer Rim Territories and the outer
Salusian Empire.  The invaders became galactically famous for their
stunning ruthlessness and fanatical brutality.  Their customary method
of dealing with planets which put up significant military resistance
gave the Standard language a new verb: "to glass".
        Because of the vector of the Covenant's invasion corridor, the
forces that ended up in most direct and consistent opposition to them
were the Royal Salusian Armed Forces and the Wedge Defense Force.
Neither force had ever faced a foe like the Covenant - a force which
never surrendered and never took prisoners, and which viewed the lives
of its own soldiers, its enemies, and civilians alike with equal
indifference.
        The Salusians and the Wedge Defenders were not accustomed to
the concept of waging genocidal war, but against the Covenant they
literally had no choice.  Their options were to wipe out the Covenant
or to be overrun and eradicated.  In the end, they prevailed, and the
Covenant were all but exterminated.
        Midway through the war, a single member of the large, powerful
reptilian species the defenders had dubbed the "Covenant Elite" defied
generations of religious dogma and genetic programming.  He rejected
the Covenant's doctrine of death to unbelievers and turned against his
fellows, defecting to the Salusian forces.  Normally, doubters and
schismatics among the Covenant were found and destroyed by the alien
juggernaut's own internal defense mechanisms, but that one Elite
escaped death and found acceptance among his people's enemies.  When
the dust settled at the end of the war, he was the only one of his
kind left standing.
        His name was Shakaar 'Volkaelree, but he abandoned that name
along with the religion that had shaped it.  Among the Salusians he
would come to be known by a different name: Tuncer.
        Utena knew all this partly from history classes and partly
from, of all things, comic books.  Tuncer was the star of his own
Bacon Comics series, "TUNCER: The Last Elite", which had spawned a
minor cross-marketing empire and an animated series of which Utena was
a casual fan, mainly through her friend Wakaba Shinohara.
        She hadn't known that he was going to be involved in this
effort, though she knew from the comics that he worked as a
squadleader for the special-missions branch of the IPO's Tactical
Division.  It pleased her; she'd enjoyed reading of his various
adventures, fictionalized as they probably were for the comics.
        "AaaaAAAaaaa wataga boko TENjou kabakata WURT wurt!" Tuncer
declared, in a snarling, staccato language Utena didn't understand.
She caught her own name in there, unless that was just a coincidence,
but the rest of it was a mystery.  It did amuse her to notice that he
sounded just like he did on the cartoon show, though.  She wondered if
he voiced himself.
        Fortunately, the next person through the door solved the
mystery of what he'd just said for her.  He was human, looked to be in
his mid-thirties, and like Tuncer he was dressed in the day uniform of
a Tac Div trooper.
          "Sgt. Pete Stacker, 131st Special Mission Squad," he said.
"Tuncer says it's a great honor to finally meet you, Commodore."
        Tuncer drew himself up into a very respectable attention and
saluted.  "Karaga bokowama croda-ka'ata gaKINjai wama bokata," he
said.  "Kapaka boko shaLOtaaaaa, wurtwurt."
        "He looks forward to slaughtering the godless enemies of
freedom, peace, and fine dining by your illustrious side," Stacker
translated.
        Utena gave him a puzzled look.  "... fine dining?"
        "He's a big fan of the lasagne recipe you submitted to IPO
Quarterly Review," said Stacker with a grin.
        "AaaAAaa bataka WURT REEEEpomen wurtwurt taba kaAAaagata,"
Tuncer added.
        Stacker chuckled.  "He says everyone else will be along
shortly, and not to let Mendoza get away with any commentary."
        Utena chuckled.  "I'll keep that in mind."
        A moment later the door opened again, and in came Anne
Springsteen, damp-haired and dressed in the traditional robes of a
traveling Jedi.
        "Am I late?" she asked.  Then, noticing the hulking Elite, she
grinned.  "Oh, hey, Tuncer.  What's up?"
        "Kapata WAAga gojika naaa, JEDiii wamakopataa," Tuncer
replied.
        Anne laughed.  "Oh, the usual.  I'm not gonna be your advisor
on this one, though.  They're assigning me to work with the Legion."
        Tuncer tilted his head inquisitively.  "Taka go WAKATAmobo
bokoba tai?"
        "Yeah.  You guys get Bastila this time," Anne told him.
        The Elite surprised Utena by producing a sound that was
unmistakably a dark chuckle.  "Heh heh heh.  Dubbo wa taKAIbo
jakapaka."
        Anne laughed again.  "Oh, probably."
        Tuncer chuckled again, then turned to Utena.  She wasn't sure,
but she thought the look on his alien face was querying as he
addressed her.
        "TENjou.  AaaAAAaaa pakawa KRUMmell wurt wurt kapata KOtai
naaaa?"
        Anne smiled.  "Tuncer wants to know if Sergeant Krummell has
served the Valiant with honor."
        Utena raised her eyebrows.  "... Neal?"
        "Old squaddie of ours," Stacker explained.  "Before he jumped
ship for the soft life in CID," he added with a grin.
        "... Neal.  Never would have guessed," Utena mused.  "But
yeah, he has.  And he has a girlfriend now.  My security officer."
        Tuncer recoiled slightly, the ridges over his beady black eyes
flexing in a manner that would have evinced astonishment in a
humanoid.  "... WURT!"  Then he nodded sagely, with a look of
satisfaction - his alien expressions weren't so hard to read - and
said, "AaaAAAaaa.  boko naaa KAPAKAwaaa."
        Stacker stifled a bark of laughter, leaving Anne to translate:
"He says they'll have fine cubs someday."
        Everyone was still laughing when the door opened again and the
next person came in.  Utena had been expecting the rest of Tuncer's
group, so she was slightly surprised to see a group of people in black
uniforms filing into the conference room instead.
        Like most people outside GENOM Corporation, Utena wasn't
accustomed to seeing the day uniform of the company's elite infantry.
The standard picture of the White Legionnaire was of a man or woman in
the distinctive plastoid armor whose color gave the Legion its name.
Out of the field, however, Legionnaires wore a plain black uniform,
cut similarly to the grey uniform of the GENOM Military Arm's
starfleet.  Since they never wore the non-armored uniform when on
assignment, few people outside the company ever saw it.
        The person in the lead of this group was a rangy man of about
Utena's age, with short dark-brown hair and a lantern-jawed, honest
face.  If he'd been a blond, he could have passed for a young Steve
Rogers, and he moved with the same kind of easy precision that Rogers
had.  He wore his uniform like a seasoned soldier despite his youth,
and as he entered the room he squared off to Utena and saluted.
        "Second Lieutenant Jay McCandless, 7th GENOM Corporation White
Legion, reporting for duty, Commodore!" he reported crisply.
        Utena returned the salute - it seemed the thing to do, since
he'd offered it so earnestly - and said, "At ease, Lieutenant.  Glad
to have you aboard."
        McCandless seemed about ready to assume a military at-ease
posture, which didn't really have anything of ease about it, when Anne
spoke up:
        "-Lieutenant- McCandless?  Well!  You must have been busy
since I last saw you... "
        McCandless turned and blinked in surprise, then grinned
brightly, his military bearing momentarily erased.
        "Jedi Springsteen!" he said, delighted.  "I knew we'd be
working with a Jedi for this exercise, but I had no idea it'd be you."
        Anne smiled and made the same curtsey-bow gesture Utena had
seen Bastila do earlier.  Utena decided it must be a Jedi thing.  She
rather liked it; it was classy, a bit more feminine than just bowing,
but not servile like a curtsey could be.  She made a mental note to
ask Anne about it later.
        "It's good to see you again, Jay," she said.  "And I think I
recognize a member or two of your squad, don't I?"
        McCandless smiled and turned to indicate the troopers behind
him.  "Well, my top sergeant is hard to miss."
        Indeed, the second Legionnaire to enter the room -was- hard to
miss.  He was a veritable giant, standing nearly as tall as Tuncer and
sporting much greater visible muscle mass.  Utena was immediately
reminded of her Hoffmanite friend Moose MacEchearn, except that this
man wasn't barrel-shaped like Moose; he was simply -huge-, with vast
muscles rippling under the taut-stretched fabric of his uniform.  Also
unlike Moose, who was about the color of unadulterated coffee, this
man was very fair-skinned and had a vertical brush of yellow hair.
        Anne grinned.  "I've never seen you without your armor, but
you have to be Van der Groot," she said.
        The giant nodded to the Jedi, his craggy face creasing with a
smile.  Then he turned to Utena, saluted, and said, "First Sergeant
Julius Van der Groot, ma'am.  An honor.  I've followed your exploits
with interest since the Battle of Titan, but I must say, the holos
didn't adequately prepare me."
        In the back of Van der Groot's head (or so it seemed to him),
there was a scratchy puff of static, and then the muffled but clearly
audible voice of McCandless:
        <Julius, c'mon.>
        <I speak only the truth, O Lieutenant,> Van der Groot replied
silently, reflecting as he did so that the new bionic mastoid comm
units were the best invention to come out of White Legion SPECFOR's
quartermaster corps in years.
        To the Dutchman's great delight, Commodore Tenjou went a
little red as she replied, "Well, thank you, Sergeant.  Are you a
Hoffmanite by any chance?"
        "No, ma'am," Van der Groot replied.  "I come from Dutch
Valeria."  His smile widened a little as he went on, "Our gravity is
point two factors higher than Hoffman's.  Not that they aren't
perfectly nice people," he added helpfully.
        The rest of Tuncer's squad arrived a few moments later,
stuffing the conference room to its limits.  Utena greeted them all,
welcomed them aboard, and then sat down with them to go over the plan
for the exercises they were going to perform.
        They were about twenty minutes into it when the intercom panel
on the table beeped and the voice of Hoshi Sato said,
        "Excuse me, Commodore.  Lensman Koriand'r is ready to depart
at the command airlock if you'd like to see her off."
        Utena smiled and stood up.  "I'll be right there.  Thanks,
Hoshi."  The intercom clicked off, and Utena said to the assembled
troops and Anne, "If you'll excuse me for a moment... "
        She left them discussing the impending operation and went down
the hall to the command-deck airlock.  Kori was there waiting, dressed
in plain traveling clothes and carrying a small backpack.  She smiled
when she saw the commodore round the corner.
        "I fear the time has come for me to leave you, Commodore," she
said, saluting.
        Utena grinned.  "Take it easy, Kori.  And I thought I told you
to call me Utena."
        Kori's cheeks reddened a little, and her smile became a bit
sheepish.  "I am sorry," she said.  "I am still not accustomed to the
level of informality you promote.  I will try harder when we next
meet."
        Utena laughed.  "Do that," she said.  Something seemed to
occur to her as the Tamaranian keyed open the airlock's inner door.
"Are you going clear out there on your own?"
        Kori shook her head.  "Oh, no.  I am only going to Babylon 6.
Mr. Rogers has chartered a transport to take me the rest of the way."
She smiled, a little ruefully, and added, "I -could- do it on my own,
but it is a long walk to Ishiyama."
        As she walked back to the conference room, Utena wondered why
Rogers was sending Kori to Ishiyama.  Nothing much going on out there,
aside from the Chief in retreat and Kaitlyn spending the fall with
Sumire Kanzaki.  Neither one of those seemed like it warranted a
Special Assignment 7 agent on the scene, especially since the Chief
had left strict orders that he wasn't to be monitored... 
        Well, Steve has his reasons, I'm sure, Utena thought, and she
went back into the conference room.
        In her absence, the last of the ice seemed to have broken
between the two groups of troopers; they'd intermingled a bit and were
chatting.  Two, an Asian woman in the uniform of a Legionnaire and
Stacker, were comparing their sidearms.
        "... So this can generate a forced compounded charge?" the
woman mused, sighting along the top of Stacker's oddly-shaped weapon,
which had a pincer-shaped main body with a gap in front instead of a
conventional barrel.
        "Take the side right off an APC," Stacker replied, nodding.
        "Wicked," the Legionnaire replied with a grin.
        The troops composed themselves again as Utena entered;
smiling, she waved them back to their seats, and the briefing
continued with a lighter, more casual atmosphere.
        A few minutes later, Bastila Shan swept into the briefing room
with a casual "Sorry I'm late - Jedi business," then took up a post at
the far end of the conference table.
        Utena mastered her annoyance admirably, nodded in Bastila's
general direction, and said, "Tuncer, Sgt. Stacker, this is Bastila
Shan of the Jedi Order.  She'll be accompanying your force during the
exercises."
        "WURTwurt JEdi kobobobo," Tuncer said, inclining his fearsome
head in Bastila's direction.
        "He's pleased to make your acquaintance, ma'am," Stacker said.
"This is Major Tuncer and I'm Pete Stacker, 131st Tac Div Special
Mission Force.  You can call us the Repo Men."
        Bastila raised an eyebrow.  "Why 'Repo Men'?" she asked,
clearly baffled.
        "Well, ma'am," said Stacker with a grin, "see, an ordinary
person spends his life avoiding tense situations."
        "REEpoman bakado kinjai INTO watabo WURT wurt!" Tuncer
bellowed with a positive nod of his head.
        "And that means?" asked Bastila with cool bemusement.
        "Repo Man spends his life gettin' INTO tense situations!
Oo-RAH!" Stacker declared with a fierce grin.
        "OO-RAH!" all the other blue-clad troopers chorused.
        One of Tuncer's men, a wiry Hispanic man, took that moment to
look over and emit a low whistle.
        "Hey, Senorita," he said to Bastila, grinning.  "You gonna be
our Jedi, huh?  Adrian Mendoza, at your service."
        "And he means that very literally," another one of the Repo
Men said.  "Ignore him, everyone else does."
        "C'mon, Tucker," Mendoza protested.  "She's a pretty lady,
right?"
        "Er," Utena said, clearing her throat.  Mendoza turned and
winked, but laid off, leaning up against the wall and watching
Bastila's discomfiture with amusement.
        "Hey!" a disembodied voice protested.  "Mendoza's all right.
It's Caboose we've gotta watch out for."
        Utena's hand went reflexively to her lightsaber; she noted
that Bastila echoed the gesture, though Anne seemed unconcerned.  The
Repo Men didn't seem terribly surprised or upset either... except for
the one Mendoza had called Tucker.  He turned to face the empty space
next to him and frowned.
        "Church!" Tucker said, looking pained.  "You're -invisible-,
for Christ's sake.  What does Tuncer -tell- you about that kind of
shit?"
        "Sorry, Tucker, geez," the air replied, sounding miffed.
        As Utena watched, baffled, the empty space was suddenly filled
with a spectral light that coalesced - with some obvious difficulty -
into the form of another Tac Div trooper, this one wearing a slightly
older-looking combat-issue Ragolian Frame.
        "Um, hi," he said.  "Nice to meet you, Master Jedi.  Private
Leonard L. Church, Tac Div, deceased."
        Bastila stared at him in obvious disbelief for a moment, then
blurted, "You're a GHOST," looking from Utena to Tucker and then to
Church with an expression of pure horror.
        "Uh, yeah.  That's my fault," Tucker said.

<< BACK
                      TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 2407
                      IPO TAC DIV TRAINING RANGE
                      GAMMA VECTRA, RIGEL SECTOR

        "I'm telling you, rookie, you picked the best unit in the
whole IPO to volunteer for," Tucker said.  "We've got the best
leadership, we've got the best gear, and we draw the best missions."
        "Yeah," the new guy agreed.  He was so new his jumpsuit wasn't
broken in yet; although wrinkled from the several-hour flight to Gamma
Vectra, it still showed the creases from where it had sat folded on a
shelf in the quartermaster's storeroom on Meizuri.  The crisply
embroidered tag over his breast pocket, unblurred by sweat and dirt,
clearly read "O'MALLEY".
        "I read about the equipment you guys get here," O'Malley went
on eagerly.  "Especially the new Ragolian powersuits.  Do they really
have energy shielding?"
        "Bet your ass they do," Tucker replied.  "With our Frames
powered up and our shields fully charged, the Repo Men are all but
invulnerable.  Check this out."
        Tucker pointed to another trooper, a tallish young man who was
standing about a dozen yards away near the entrance to a tent, dressed
in the shiny blue armor unique to the 131st SMF.  The light but potent
powered suit made him look bulky and intimidating, and the visored
helmet hid his face, giving him an air of detached invincibility.
        "Hey, CHURCH!" Tucker yelled.
        The man in the blue armor looked up, his body language clearly
saying, "What?"
        Tucker pulled a silvery sphere from his web harness, thumbed a
button on the top of it, and hurled it.  Trailing bluish radiance, it
arced through the air, struck Church's breastplate - and stuck there.
        "Oh, shit," Tucker said, his blood freezing in his veins.
That wasn't supposed to have happened.  Church's shields should have
prevented the plasma grenade's adhesion field from taking hold; the
grenade should have strobed his shields, fallen at his feet, and then
exploded, blowing him backward into his tent and flatlining his
shields, but leaving him unharmed.  It should have been really funny.
        Unfortunately, Church's Frame's power cell was down for
diagnostics right now, and no power meant no shields.
        Church had just enough time to snap his visor up, make
horrified eye contact with Tucker, and say,
        "You fuck - "
        before exploding.
RETURN >>

        "Well, OK, if he'd gotten out of the -way-," Tucker mused.
        "How was I supposed to know you were going to toss a fucking
-plasma grenade- at me, Tucker?" Church said.  "I was just minding my
own business, running diagnostics on my armor, and BOOM."
        Utena looked at Stacker.  "Do they, uh, do this often?" she
said.
        Stacker shrugged.  "Every man has his demons," he said.
"Tucker's demon just happens to be a squaddie of ours."
        "That man is -dead-," Bastila said; she'd advanced on Tucker
and was staring at him.
        Tucker looked back at her, put his hands behind his back, and
was clearly repressing the urge to comment.
        Church, on the other hand, spoke freely.  "Uh... wow," he
observed.  "I can totally see why everyone says you Jedi have
superhuman powers of perception.  Yep.  I can't argue with that.  I am
sure as hell dead."
        Bastila rounded on the ghostly figure, but before she could
speak, Stacker got between them and gave the Jedi a stern look.
        "IPO regs give the undead the same rights as any of us living,
ma'am, with all due respect," the Sergeant said.  "If Church wants to
be in our unit, we're glad to have him."
        His body language dared her to gainsay that, and Bastila
relented visibly.  She turned to Church and stretched out a hand,
obviously deep in contemplation of the Force.
        "How can you bear to be so... disconnected... from the
Force?" she nearly murmured to the spectral trooper.  "It must be
terribly painful for you - "
        "Um, ma'am?" Church replied, shifting from foot to foot and
looking at the floor.  "I have no idea what you're talking about.
Sure, Tucker was a total cockbite and -killed- me, but it's OK.  I'm
mostly over it.  I mean, I wouldn't have lobbied the Chief not to
shitcan him if I didn't think he had -some- value.  Don't, like, have
a huge issue over it on my account."
        Utena cleared her throat again, wondering just when she'd
managed to lose control over this briefing.  OK, probably when the
-ghost- materialized, if that was the right word, in her conference
room... 
        "Now that we've all been properly introduced," she said dryly,
"perhaps we can get down to business?"
        Just then, another Repo Man came in.  This one was rugged and
tanned, and wore a completely non-regulation Australian bush hat.  He
was carrying a battered black leather briefcase.
        "Sorry, all!" he called, in an accent to match his hat, as he
sailed into the room.  "Forgot that Frank needed an oil change, had to
take 'im down to Sickbay."
        "Can't see!  Frank can't see!" the briefcase chirped.
        Utena sank into her chair and eyed the briefcase warily,
thinking only, -Now- what?
        "Whups, sorry, mate," the Aussie said.  "Oh, Commodore Tenjou.
Certainly an honor, ma'am.  Corp'ral Chips Dubbo, armored vehicle
commander, and this's Frank."
        He removed from the briefcase a small, transparent container -
rather like a snow globe, Utena thought - full of a viscous-looking
blue substance.  The globe contained numerous connections and ports to
a small...
        "Is that a BRAIN?" Bastila said incredulously.
        "It's a Frank!" the globe chirped; Utena looked more closely
at it and saw the small vocoder in its base, next to a brass plaque
that did, indeed, read "FRANK".
        "Frank drives our armored fightin' vehicle," Stacker said.
"As you can see, he's some sort of, uh... brain-in-a-jar thing.  We
got him from a Salusian scientist on a mission some years back.  Don't
really know what he is, but he's a hard worker, and he drives well
enough.  Takes a lot of the stress off Dubbo."
        Dubbo positioned the globe on the desk within sight of
everyone, settled into a chair, and smiled.  "So, right," he said.
"What'd I miss?"
        Bastila shuddered.  "What a horrible little thing," she said
in a small voice, and retreated to the corner nearest the White Legion
and Jay McCandless - as far away from the brain and the dead man as
she could get.
        Anne Springsteen met Utena's eye and stifled a laugh.  Utena
grinned and relaxed again.  They weren't exactly Rose Duelists, but
the Repo Men had a certain charm all their own.

        Utena returned to her quarters in the early evening, tired but
pleased with the way the rest of the planning session had gone.  The
Repo Men and McCandless's Legionnaires seemed to be meshing nicely,
which would make things go that much more smoothly when they arrived
at Tantalus and got down to business.
        Anthy looked up from the book she was reading as Utena entered
the stateroom.  Utena took a moment to greet Wolfgang, who woke from
his nap at Anthy's side to bound across the room at the sound of the
door.  The Beagle of the Lens was the flagship's official mascot, and,
as such, roomed with whoever was in command.  Neither Tenjou minded
that at all; Utena liked dogs and Anthy was good with animals of all
sorts.
        Scooping up the beagle, Utena crossed the stateroom and
plopped down on her back on the bed with an explosive sigh.
        "How was it?" Anthy asked with a smile.
        "You're not gonna -believe- this," said Utena, grinning
tiredly, and she told Anthy about it - the Jedi, the Last Elite, the
ghost, the brain in a jar, everything.
        Anthy absorbed the lot with quiet equanimity; then she thought
about it all for a moment, smiled, and said,
        "Well, it sounds like the next couple of months ought to be
very interesting."
        Utena laughed and scruffled Wolfgang, who had assumed the
sphinx position on her stomach and laid paws and head on her chest.
        "Yeah," she agreed, "it'll certainly be that."

                      MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 2409
                INTERNATIONAL POLICE STATION BABYLON 6
                    BAJOR SYSTEM, CENTAURUS SECTOR

        Susan Ivanova was having one of those days.
        She would have thought life would get -easier-, not harder,
with the Valiant's summer tour over, the IPO's space fleet back under
flag command, and Operation Counterweight underway.  And indeed, none
of her current problems could be traced to anything involving the IPO
at all.
        Instead, the -local- situation was causing her tsuris.  She
wasn't sure exactly what was going on - as she was a good and
upstanding mostly-lapsed Jew, the complexities of the Bajoran
religious establishment were quite beyond her - but whatever it was
had the planet's airspace hopping as vedeks and prylars and ministers
and whateverthehell else flew in from all of Bajor's various nearby
colonies.
        It also had the liaison office and most of the Bajoran
personnel stationed aboard Babylon 6 acting kind of squirrelly.
Ivanova gathered from fragments of conversations she'd caught in the
corridors and on the Zocalo that it had something to do with some kind
of war-crimes matter relating to the Cardassian occupation of Bajor,
which began during the War of Corporate Occupation and ended in 2400.
        Whatever it was about, the cacophony it was causing was
getting up her nose.  Between that and the fact that what seemed like
about half the damn Klingon Defense Forces were staging through
Babylon 6 en route to a fleet exercise at Krodath Minor, she was busy
enough to make her mildly peevish at the best of times.  As it was,
she also felt like hell today, and the combination was making her
quite hard to deal with.
        She had just finished informing the captain of a Klingon
bird-of-prey that if he didn't keep to his assigned flight path and
speed, she would have the station's tractor array explain it to his
helmsman directly when she became aware of an unfamiliar presence next
to her command station.
        "Excuse me?" this presence said in a quiet, pleasant voice.
        Ivanova turned.
        "Yes?  What?" she asked, a trifle more harshly than necessary.
        The young woman standing there blinked, taken slightly aback
by the reception.  She was small, almost childlike, with a round, open
face and jet-black hair cut short and tucked behind her ears.  She had
big, honest blue eyes and appeared human except for the band of brown
speckles that began at her forehead and ran down both sides of her
face and neck to disappear into the collar of her uniform jacket.
        The uniform belonged to a Starfleet ensign, with the blue
jacket panel indicating that its wearer was a science or medical
officer.  It included a holstered tricorder but no weapon.  The girl
inside it had a USS Ticonderoga duffle bag slung over her shoulder and
looked slightly nervous, but also very eager.
        She was so damned cute and earnest-looking that Ivanova was
struck by the sudden, irrational desire to punch her on the nose.
Fortunately, she had long experience repressing such urges, so she did
nothing of the sort; she just narrowed her eyes and repeated,
        "Yes?"
        "Uh - Ensign Ezri Tigan, reporting for duty, Commander," the
girl said.
        Ivanova gave her a skeptical look.  "Nobody told me about any
new science officers coming in, and you're too young to be a doctor,"
she said.
        "No, sir," Ezri replied.  "I'm a counselor.  Well, I will be.
That is - I'm in my third year of the Academy.  I've been posted here
for my field internship."
        "Your field internship," Ivanova repeated, her voice flat.
        "Yes, sir," Ezri replied, nodding.
        Ivanova gave her an exaggeratedly judicious look.
        "So let me get this straight.  You have no field experience
whatsoever; you're not even a real ensign; you're in training to be a
-counselor-; and your Academy faculty advisor sent you -here-."
        "... well... yes."
        Ivanova threw her hands up.  "Bozhemoi.  What are they
-thinking- in San Francisco these days?"
        Hesitantly, her eager expression fading, Ezri asked, "Do you
not -need- an assistant counselor here, Commander?"
        "No.  No, Mock Ensign, we do not," Ivanova replied.  "We are,
as it happens, all -quite incurably mad- here, and as such we have no
need of a counselor of any kind.  Besides, what would we need a
counselor for?" she went on expansively.  "We have Mr. Garibaldi.
Whenever any of us is feeling down, we can always count on
Mr. Garibaldi to do something to cheer us up.  Like filling our
underwear drawer with oatmeal, or billeting visiting Klingons in our
quarters."
        "I thought you liked General Martok," said Ivanova's deputy
operations officer.
        "I do, actually, but that's not the point.  He had no business
crashing on my sofa when we have all those empty rooms in Red Sector,"
Ivanova grumbled.  Then, returning her attention to Ezri, she went on,
"Anyway, kid, I'm up to my commbadge in traffic and His Excellency the
Captain is sleeping off Taco Night, so I really don't have time to
handle you right now.  Odo!  Take Little Miss Bright Eyes here down to
Medlab and see if Dr. Charming has any legal use for her."
        A tall, thin man with slicked-back blond hair and a brown
uniform turned from a conversation he'd been having with the station's
Bajoran liaison officer, gave Ivanova a momentary puzzled look, then
nodded, stepped to the young woman's side, and guided her from the
command deck.
        In the corridor, Ensign Tigan looked as though the only thing
preventing her from bursting into tears was the fact that she was with
a stranger in a public place.
        "I... don't think Commander Ivanova likes me very much," she
observed after a minute's walking, trying to make her voice light and
mostly failing.
        Odo's voice was gruff but not unkind.  "Don't take it
personally, Ensign," he said.  "Commander Ivanova doesn't like anyone
very much."
        She glanced at him sharply, as if unsure she'd heard him say
it; he smiled very slightly and added, "Besides which, she and Captain
Bacon were Captain Krontep's guests for dinner last night, and I don't
believe blood wine is entirely compatible with the Russian
constitution."
        Ezri blinked, startled.  "You mean she's -drunk-?  On -duty-?"
        Odo shook his head quickly.  "Oh, no, never that.  It's just
that she was drunk OFF-duty, and now she wishes she were dead.  When
Commander Ivanova wishes she were dead, her tolerance for the
continued existence of -other- lifeforms is marginal at best."
        "Well," Ezri said after a moment's reflection, "I don't think
she was very professional."
        "You caught her at a bad time," said Odo with a faint shrug.
        She thought about that for a second, but didn't offer any
comment.  Instead she asked,
        "Who's Dr. Charming?"
        Odo chuckled darkly.  "Commander Ivanova's pet name for Julian
Bashir, MD, the station's chief medical officer.  She finds it hard to
forgive him his excessive savoir-faire."
        "This is a very strange place," Ezri observed.
        "You don't know the half of it," Odo remarked.  "She was
right about one thing, though: The station doesn't need another
counselor."
        Ezri's shoulders slumped.  "So now what?  I go back to the
Academy?  That'll look good on my record.  Rejected by command staff
at my internship posting.  Time spent in posting: 11 minutes."
        "Not necessarily," Odo said.  "The station doesn't need a
counselor, but it happens I know a place in the neighborhood that
does.  You'd need to be put on detached service by Dr. Bashir, but I'm
sure he would agree to that, especially if you would trouble yourself
to bat your eyes at him," he added dryly.
        "Well... "  Ezri mustered a slightly wan smile.  "I guess I
could give it a shot, if it means finding something worthwhile to do."
        "That's the spirit.  And don't worry about Commander Ivanova.
She'll transmit a formal apology for her treatment of you by the end
of the week."  Odo smiled tightly.  "I'll see to that."

        The meeting with Dr. Bashir went about as easily as Odo had
predicted, and now Ezri Tigan found herself aboard a runabout with her
unexpected benefactor, bound for one of Bajor's moons.
        They hadn't spoken much since leaving Medlab.  Odo seemed
preoccupied with something, and Ezri was trying to absorb how strange
her day had become.  After chasing that around in her head for a
while, she gave it up as a useless pursuit and turned her attention to
her pilot, who sat with his eyes intent on the orbital navigation
system.
        Ezri had initially taken him for a human, but now that she
looked more closely, she wasn't so sure.  Odo wore the uniform of a
Republic of Bajor Department of Public Safety officer, but he didn't
look Bajoran either.  His ears were odd, just featureless ovals on the
sides of his head, and he had deep-set eyes made even deeper by the
flat, heavy bridge of his nose.  If he was a Bajoran, he'd received
some clumsy burn treatments or something at some point, clumsy enough
to eradicate his nose ridges and the structure of his ears.
        He seemed to feel her staring at him and turned to look back
at her.  Unconsciously, she shrank away slightly, but he only smiled
his tight little smile again.
        "Don't bother trying to place my species," he said.  Turning
his attention back to the viewer so she had his profile again, he
added, "I'm trying to look Bajoran, but I've never been able to get
it quite right."
        Before her eyes, his face changed a little - the heavy bridge
of the nose and brows receding slightly, the ears settling back a
little - and a band of dark spots appeared on the side of his face.
        "I can do your species a little more effectively, but I still
can't get the -ears- right," Odo went on conversationally.  He held
the Trill-like appearance for a moment, then reverted back to his
original face, looked at her again, and chuckled dryly.
        "I've gotten accustomed to looking as much like a Bajoran as I
can manage, since I've lived here all my life, but the fine details
still elude me."
        "Are you a Durlan?" Ezri asked, but Odo shook his head.
        "I don't know what I am," he said, "but I know what I'm not,
and that's any species on record."  He shrugged.  "I'm a citizen of
the universe.  It's enough for me."
        She took that in for a moment.  He didn't sound entirely
convinced, but she decided if it was good enough for him, she wasn't
in a position to question it.
        Instead she asked, "Where are we going?  You told Dr. Bashir
something about 'the Institute'."
        Odo nodded.  "I'm chief of campus security for the Deedlit
Satori Mandeville Memorial Institute on Jeraddo.  Surely you've heard
of it... "
        "The prep school.  Of course.  A few of my Academy classmates
graduated from there.  And of course there's Capt - er, -Commodore-
Tenjou.  I -do- watch the news occasionally."  She eyed him.  "That's
a strange place to be taking a Starfleet counselor."
        "You need field experience, the Institute needs an assistant
counselor," Odo replied pragmatically.  "Your immediate local
superior's approved the arrangement.  I don't see the problem."
        "It's not a problem," Ezri said.  "At least not to me.  But
given the tension between Zeta Cygni and the rest of the Federation
right now, I'm not sure my uniform's going to be very welcome at a
place like Satori Mandeville.  It's no secret which side Bajor's on,
after all."
        Odo gave a short bark of laughter.  "'The rest of the
Federation'," he said.  "You may watch the news from time to time, but
it's obvious you're no political scientist."
        "OK, so, it was an oversimplification," Ezri said, a trifle
defensively.  "You see my point, though."
        "I do," Odo allowed.  "But I don't think you have to worry.
DSM's students are a pretty even-handed bunch.  They tend to judge
people on their actions rather than their allegiances.  Your uniform
may be a handicap, but it won't be a crippling one.  Now, if you were
a member of the Psi Corps... "  He let it hang.
        Ezri shifted uncomfortably in her seat.  She well remembered
the day, during her application process to Starfleet Academy, when
she'd had to face the inquisition of the Psi Corps liaison to the
Admissions Board.  It hadn't been a pleasant experience; in fact, it
had left a bad taste in her mouth that lingered faintly to this day.
The whole experience had seemed so contrary to the ideals Starfleet
was supposed to represent that...
        She pushed it out of her mind and said simply, "Well, I'm
not."
        Odo nodded.  "And so," he said, "you stand a chance of being
accepted on Jeraddo.  Not immediately, and probably not easily, not by
everyone... but all in all, you'll find it a reasonably welcoming
environment."
        A moment later, almost under his breath, he went on, "They've
accepted -me-, after all... "
        Ezri might have been young, naive, and in the middle of a
disorienting day, but she was still a trained counselor, and the
mixture of wistfulness and bitterness in Odo's voice was
unmistakable.  She hesitated for a moment, then patted his arm and
gave him a reassuring smile.
        He glanced sidelong at her, gave another dry chuckle, and
turned his attention back to the piloting controls.

        Odo parked the runabout behind the Campus Security building in
the middle of the DSM campus.  Ezri got her first look at the famous
institution as they walked from there to the administration building.
It was a handsome campus, more so than Starfleet Academy, and the
Academy was not unattractive.  If there was one thing wrong with it,
it was the weather.  Ezri had been expecting to stay aboard Babylon 6,
so she hadn't brought any warm clothes, and it was an unusually crisp,
almost Octoberish day out; her uniform just wasn't cutting it against
the biting chill of the wind today.
        She was shivering a little when they got to the admin
building, something Odo only noticed when he got the door for her.
Tsking at himself, he guided her into the blessedly warm entrance hall
and up a flight of stairs to an old-fashioned half-glass office door
with painted lettering on the window:

                        COUNSELOR OF STUDENTS
                             A. HAINELEY

        Odo knocked; a mellow voice with an English accent bade him
enter.
        The office beyond the door was even warmer; it was an
old-fashioned study with a fireplace, and in that fireplace was a
lovely crackling wood fire.  There was a big desk over by the windows,
but no one seated at it.  The room's lone occupant, an elderly
white-haired human gentleman, was sitting in a leather armchair by the
fire with a book in hand.
        "Ah, Odo," said he - A. Haineley, apparently.  He put his book
aside, got to his feet, and extended a hand.  "Julian told me you
would be by bearing gifts."
        Odo smiled slightly and indicated his companion.
        "Arthur Haineley, meet Ezri Tigan."
        Haineley bowed and said he was pleased to meet her.  Then he
gave her a curious look, reached into the top pocket of his tweed
jacket, produced a pair of spectacles, put them on, and looked her
over again.
        "My, my, you're even younger than I would have expected," he
mused.
        Ezri felt her cheeks get a little hot.  "I look younger than I
am," she said.  "I'm twenty."
        "Ah," said Haineley, his eyes twinkling, "but how many times
have you -been- twenty?"
        "Oh, no, sir," she said hurriedly.  "I'm not Joined."  Then
she tried out a grin and added, "What you see is what you get."
        Haineley nodded.  If he was disappointed - a lot of humans
were when they learned she was just a regular old ordinary humanoid -
he didn't show it.  His kindly smile remained unchanged.
        "Ah," he said.  "Sit down, sit down, both of you.  You must be
about frozen, my dear, crossing campus with nothing but that uniform
to keep out the wind.  It's been unseasonably brisk for the last
couple of days.  Take my chair by the fire."
        Ezri tried to protest, but Haineley would have none of it; he
went and sat at one end of the couch by the wall, with Odo at the
other end.
        "Well," said the counselor after they were all situated.
"They tell me you need a job."
        "In a manner of speaking," Ezri said.  "My orders are to gain
real-world experience in my field until next May, then return to Earth
for final exams before summer break.  If all goes well, I'll spend my
senior year in a full field posting, and then my commission will be
confirmed the following June and I'll get my first standard duty
assignment."  She shifted uncomfortably.  "I expected that I'd be
working in a Starfleet installation, but there's nothing in my orders
that says I have to."
        Haineley nodded.  "And they sent you to Babylon 6.  Not the
wisest choice of postings for a Starfleet cadet nowadays, but tact
never was young Carcatera's strong suit."  Ezri was puzzled by that
remark, then surprised to realize that he was talking about Admiral
Carcatera, the Commandant of Starfleet Academy.  It was the first time
anyone had ever called the grizzled admiral "young" in her presence.
        "I'm... sure he had his reasons," she said hesitantly.
        "No doubt," Haineley said, his expression making it clear what
he thought of Carcatera's reasons.  Then he brightened and said,
"Well, you've come along just in time for me, at any rate.  I need an
assistant to handle a job here on campus, and it'll take a particular
sort of person to do it right.  I need someone young, energetic,
accustomed to dealing with bright and independent-minded young people.
        "As someone who's in her junior year at Starfleet Academy, you
strike me as all of those things.  The question is, would you rather
just go back to Earth and try again?  I'm sure Command will recognize
that it wasn't your fault that the senior staff on B6 had nothing for
you to do."
        "What -is- the job?" Ezri asked.
        "One of our residence halls is in need of a counselor, what we
call a House Guide," Haineley began, and he could see Ezri's face fall,
though she tried hard to hide it.  He smiled, his eyes twinkling again,
and said, "Ah, but this is a very... special... residence hall."

        Well, Ezri thought, he was certainly right about -that- part.
        She'd heard, of course, of the Interscholastic Duelists'
Federation.  There had been talk of starting a chapter at Starfleet
Academy, but relations between the Earth Alliance and the Republic of
Zeta Cygni made such a thing problematic at best.  She had heard that
there were small chapters aboard a couple of Starfleet ships, vessels
whose captains were experienced and influential enough to absorb the
political inexpedience of such a move, but she didn't know whether
that was true.
        She did know that DSM was its seat, the place where it was
founded, and she'd heard that the "mother chapter", the DSM Institute
Duelists' Society, had a very impressive clubhouse they called "the
Castle" - but she had never seen a picture of the place.
        It really -was- a castle - a big, solid building of beautiful
cream and orange and dull-red stone, like a sunset rendered as a
fortress, with a golden dome in the center and a flat-roofed tower a
level taller than the main building at each corner.  From its position
at the top of the highest hill on campus, it had a commanding view of
the school in one direction and the lake in the other, with the low
skyline of Port Jeradar nestled against the mountains in the distance.
        Ezri and Odo went through the entrance hall, Odo in the lead,
and through a door off to one side.  Beyond it they found a
well-appointed, comfortable-looking library with a fireplace -
currently in service - and several overstuffed leather chairs and
couches.  A group of young people were gathered before the fire,
listening with grins and eager eyes to a lanky brown-haired youth, who
was in the middle of telling a story.
        "... so Jason says, 'Boba Fett?  Boba Fett?  Where?!' and
spins around - remember, he still can't see - and accidentally jams
his force pike into Boba's backpack!" he said, making appropriately
illustrative gestures.
        "Oh, no," said a dusky-skinned young woman with the ridged
forehead of a Klingon, shaking her head with a smile.  "I see where
this is headed... "
        "The impact sets off the thrusters," the brown-haired fellow
continued, barely able to hold in his glee and continue the story,
"and Boba goes SHOOTING across the pit, TOTALLY out of control,
AAAAAAAAAH _WHAM!_ into the side of Jabba's sail barge, BOUNCES off,
and then - "
        " - oh NO - " interjected a younger girl, a pretty blonde who
looked like a first or second-year student, covering her face with her
hands.
        " - _SHWOOP!_  RIGHT INTO THE SARLACC!" the storyteller
finished, then dissolved into chortling laughter, as did most of his
audience.
        "Ooh," the Klingon girl said with a wry grin.  "THAT must've
been fun."
        The burly young man with the black buzzcut who sat next to the
storyteller snorted, arms folded.
        "Oh yeah," he said dourly in a voice with a marked accent -
Concord Dawn, Ezri thought, or maybe New Brisbane.  "I had a GREAT
time.  In the Sarlacc."
        "Oh, don't be such a baby," the brown-haired youth said,
slapping his compatriot - the eponymous Boba Fett, apparently - on the
shoulder.  "You were only in there for an hour."
        Fett was unmoved.  "Tom, you remember what it smelled like on
the OUTSIDE?" he asked.
        The blonde girl recovered from laughing enough to wave a hand
and asked, "Wait, wait, was that before or after the Trandoshan stole
the Slave 1?"
        The Klingon girl goggled at Fett.  "You LOST your DAD'S
SHIP?!"
        "We got it back!" Fett protested.  "And I could tell you some
things about Tom, too.  Like the fact that we were only away from the
ship that day because -he- thought those two twi'lek dancers wanted to
-party- with us."
        "They -did-!" Tom said.
        Fett threw up his hands.  "They thought we were musicians,
Tom!  Not quite the same thing."
        "Did they, or did they not, think we were hot?" Tom asked.
        Fett shook his head.  "No.  They thought -it- was hot.  As in
the weather.  And since we were in Mos Espa, that made perfect sense.
You and your stupid 'How To Read Lekku' chip."
        "OK, so, there are still a few glitches in it," Tom said with
exaggerated dignity.  "I still think it'll go platinum once it's ready
for the mass market.  And come on.  Pub crawling Mos Eisley with the
Solos was fun."
        Fett relented with a grin.  "Yeah, OK, that I'll grant you."
        "Jane was totally into you," Tom added with wagged eyebrows.
        "Shut up," Fett said, but he was still smiling.  "She's old
enough to be my mother.  If I had one."
        "So?  She's half-Salusian."
        "You're not helping my credibility with the underclassmen
here, Tom," Fett noted, gesturing to the blonde, who was helplessly
giggling at their byplay.
        Odo cleared his throat diplomatically, having waited quite
long enough for them to notice him.
        Fett turned his head.  "Oh, hey, Odo," he said, standing.
"What's up?"
        "Who's your friend?" the Klingon girl added, looking mildly
surprised at the sight of someone in a Starfleet uniform.
        "Allow me to introduce Ensign Ezri Tigan," Odo said, making
the appropriate gestures.  "Here we have some of the officers of the
Institute Duelists' Society.  Tom Palmer; Boba Fett; B'Elanna - it's
O'Brien now, isn't it?"  The girl with the Klingon ridges smiled and
nodded.  "And Lindsey Willows," Odo finished, indicating the blonde.
"The rest of them will have to shift for themselves," he went on.  "I
can never keep the whole crew straight."
        "Nice to meet you, Ensign," B'Elanna said.  "What brings you
to Jeraddo?"
        "Ensign Tigan is a counselor-in-training assigned to the
med-sci department on Babylon 6.  Since they have something of an
embarrassment of medical personnel up there, Dr. Bashir has been kind
enough to loan her to Mr. Haineley.  She's your new House Guide."
        Tom Palmer raised his eyebrows.  "No kidding?  Well, hey.
Welcome to the Castle.  We never actually had a -counselor- before.
Hey, Boba, we've still got that spare office down the hall from yours,
don't we?"
        Fett nodded.  "I think so," he said, "provided Lindsey hasn't
turned it into a crime lab," he added with an arch glance at the
youngest officer.
        "I haven't touched it!" Lindsey said.  "I don't even have
a key."
        "I don't recall that keeping you out of the records office,"
Fett replied.
        "I was just looking around!" Lindsey protested.
        "Well, I'll leave her to you, then," Odo said.  "I'm sure I
must have... -something-... to do elsewhere."  He turned to Ezri.
"Good luck, Ensign."
        Ezri smiled.  "Thanks, Odo," she said.  "For everything."
        Odo harrumphed.  "I just can't stand to see a resource
wasted," he said, but there was a twinkle in his eye as he nodded to
her and left the room.
        "C'mon," said Palmer, gesturing.  "I'll give you the tour."

                      FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 2409
                         THE CASTLE, JERADDO

        The Vulcan entered the Castle's main dueling room and stood,
hands folded behind his back.  He was watching a sight that must have
surprised him at least a little, though being a proper follower of the
Way of Surak he would never have shown it.
        He knew, of course, that Ezri Tigan was a fencer.  It was in
her file: She'd been on the Starfleet Academy fencing team both years
she'd spent in the regular curriculum, before being posted to the
advanced field training program.  Still, it never would have occurred
to him that he might find her at a high-powered private high school in
the Bajor system, having a swordfight with one of the students.
        However, expectations must always give way to reality, and the
reality was that that was just what Spaldek was seeing.  Ezri, dressed
in black warmup pants and a Starfleet Academy Athletics tank top, had
a slightly curved dueling saber in her hand - and, curiously enough, a
rose pinned to her top, about where the commbadge would be on her
Starfleet uniform.
        The student she was engaged with was a teenage Cardassian,
probably a first- or second-year student.  He, too, had a rose pinned
to the front of his T-shirt, and he wielded a pair of tajiran.
Spaldek had to search his memory momentarily for the word.  The tajir
was a Cardassian dueling weapon, forearm-length with an offset
perpendicular handle - shaped rather like a riot baton, but with a
double-ended blade where the baton part belonged.
        The young Cardassian had his tajiran crossed in front of
his face when Spaldek entered the room, catching Ezri's saber in
between them.  Grimacing with effort, he twisted his body, let the
saber slide down until it caught against one tajir's handle, then
freed his other weapon, reversed it, and drove the shorter end of the
blade toward Ezri's chest.
        She responded by shoving his blocking weapon aside, then
ducking back as though doing the Limbo, which allowed the strike to
pass cleanly over her.  She lost her balance in the process, but
rather than fall straight back, she twisted into a sideways roll and
came up on her feet.
        The Cardassian chuckled - it had been a nice move - and moved
to attack her off-hand flank while she was recovering.  She responded
immediately, altering her countermove to block.  Spaldek knew this was
a mistake; the Cardassian's attack was a feint.  A moment later he
pivoted, swept his right-hand blade out, and came within inches of
cutting the young Trill's throat.  The tip of his blade passed barely
over the modest slope of her upper chest, caught the rose pinned
there, and swept it away.
        "Not bad, Counselor," he remarked, his voice surprisingly deep
for so young a man's.  "You're improving."
        Ezri grinned.  "So are you," she said.
        She went to the far wall, hung her saber up amid a large
display of other melee weapons - Spaldek even saw an ahn-woon up
there, of all things - and then picked up a towel from the table by
the wall to mop sweat from her face.
        "Phew!" she said, shaking her head and draping the towel
around her neck.  "You'd better get going, Dukat.  Don't you have
class this afternoon?"
        Her erstwhile opponent grunted an amused laugh as he put his
blades away in a hardshell case not unlike that of a musical
instrument.
        "Introduction to Galactic Political Science," he said, then
added with grave amusement, "Spending the first twelve years of my
life on Cardassia Prime was introduction enough to -that- subject, I
assure you."
        "All the same, you can't be missing classes because you were
sparring with me," Ezri said with a grin.  "Get a move on!"
        Dukat tucked his weapon case under his arm and bowed to her in
a way that struck Spaldek as slightly, but not maliciously, mocking.
        "Yes, ma'am," he said.  "You'll be in your office later?"
        "From three to five, barring some kind of emergency," she
said.  Then, as they turned to leave the room, she noticed the
uniformed Vulcan standing by the doors for the first time.
        "Oh!" Ezri said, surprised.  "Commander Spaldek!  What are you
doing here?"
        Spaldek arched an eyebrow slightly.
        "I could ask you the same question, Ensign," he said dryly.
        Ezri gave him a puzzled look.
        "In fact, you may consider it asked," the Vulcan went on.  "I
expected to find you on duty aboard Babylon 6, not at play on one of
Bajor's moons."
        Ezri didn't bristle at this, for the simple reason that
Spaldek didn't mean anything by it.  A lot of Vulcans masked
overbearing, superior attitudes behind statements of fact and
expectation like that one, but she knew Spaldek.  He'd been her
faculty advisor for her entire time at the Academy, and she'd come to
realize early on that when he said things like that, he really was
just stating the fact, not trying to make something out of it.
        "I -am- on duty," Ezri told him.  "This is my duty station."
        Spaldek looked around the dojo with an expression of faint
interest.
        "Not just the dueling room, the Castle as a whole.  I'm the
House Guide for the Institute Duelists' Society," she explained.
        Spaldek didn't seem to know what to say about that for a
moment; then he blinked slowly and said, "Fascinating."
        He didn't seem inclined to say anything else for the moment,
so Ezri gestured to her young companion and said, "This is one of my
students."
        The young Cardassian bent in a precise bow and said,
"S.G. Dukat, Esquire, at your service, Commander Spaldek."
        Spaldek raised an eyebrow again, then said, "I must speak with
Ensign Tigan privately."
        Unfazed by the Vulcan's bordering-on-rude bluntness, Dukat
grinned and said, "And I must get to class.  Our goals overlap quite
nicely, n'est-ce pas?"  Bowing again, he raised his hand in the
split-fingered Vulcan sign and added, "Live long and prosper,
Commander."
        Spaldek returned the salute and replied impassively, "Peace
and long life, Mr. Dukat."  Then he waited for the young man to leave
before turning to Ezri and saying, "If you please, Ensign?"
        "My office is this way, sir," she said, leading him from the
room.

        For all his easy cheer in the dueling room, Dukat was thinking
about the Vulcan as he went up to his room on the third floor, stashed
his weapons, changed into his uniform, and then bundled his heavy
overcoat around him and headed down the hill toward campus and
Professor Nilsson's class.  He knew that Ezri's assignment to the
Castle was unconventional, and the appearance of her faculty advisor
on campus, unannounced, on a Friday afternoon struck him as ominous.
        He wondered whether Spaldek had come to cause trouble for
Ezri, and if so, whether he could remove that trouble without causing
more in the process.  He wasn't seriously considering the assassination
of his House Guide's advisor, of course; but he was Cardassian, so the
unexpected arrival of a severe-looking authority figure automatically
triggered the response in his brain.  It was more a thought exercise
than anything else.
        He was so wrapped up in that exercise, he didn't notice at
first that he'd acquired a shadow.  No - make that shadows, he
thought, as he realized that not one but several other people had
fallen into step around him.
        That wasn't good, but it was familiar.  The same sort of thing
had happened to him a few times before, but never since he came to
Jeraddo.
        What made him most certain of what was about to happen was the
fact that none of these people seemed to be students.  They weren't
uniformed, but none was old enough to be attending the Institute's
university division, where the uniforms weren't required.
        His's suspicion was confirmed when another appeared in front
of him.  This was a Bajoran teenager, looked a couple of years older
than Dukat, and he stood with his arms folded and a scowl on his face,
blocking Dukat's path.
        Hmph.  Surly townies.  What was Jeraddo coming to?
        "You've got a lot of nerve showing your ugly face around here
after what you people did to Bajor," said the one who'd blocked him.
        Dukat sighed.  He knew what was coming, and he was fairly sure
he wasn't going to be able to talk his way out of it, but he might at
least postpone it for as many seconds as possible.
        "Think for a second," he said reasonably.  "If I were one of
'you people', would I -be- here, and not on Cardassia Prime?  Bajor is
my homeworld too; I was born in Dahkur."
        "I don't care if you were born in B'Hala," the spokesman
snarled.  "You're a -spoonhead-."
          Dukat felt at the spoon-shaped ridge in the middle of his
forehead.
          "I suppose I am," he said with some resignation.  "And if I
had a wrinkled nose instead?  Or spots?  Or Klingon ridges?  Would
everything be all right then?  Because I have to tell you, they
wouldn't really make much difference to who I am.  I'm -not- an enemy
to your people."
        "All Cardassians are enemies of the Bajoran people," the
leader said.  "My father died fighting to drive you scum -out- of our
star system, and now you think you can just come -back-?"
        "I'm a Bajoran citizen!" Dukat protested, but one of them hit
him before he could get it all out, and the next thing he knew, he was
on the ground and it was raining blows.
        A fine situation for a Duelist to be in, he told himself with
faint peevishness as he did his best to protect his vitals.
        He wasn't sure how long it went on - consciousness became an
iffy thing when one was undergoing a stomping like this one - but
after a while he became faintly aware that something had changed.  He
was still hearing the sounds of a furious beating... but he didn't
seem to be receiving one any more.
        Slowly, painfully, he uncoiled from his defensive posture and
opened one eye.
        What he saw surprised him on several levels.  He wouldn't
necessarily have expected to see someone doing battle with his
assailants at all - even this close to the Castle, they had been
clever about their choice of spots for the attack, and the building
couldn't actually be seen from here thanks to a windbreaking wall.
Even if he had, though, he'd have expected his defender to be another
Duelist, but she wasn't.  He didn't know who she was.
        Most surprising of all, though - she was Bajoran.
        She had something in each hand, but Dukat's vision was
blurring in and out and he couldn't tell what they were.  Sticks,
perhaps?  They made a harsh whipping sound as they cut through the
air, and a painful-sounding whack whenever they met flesh and bone.
She was skillful with them, too, whoever she was - able to hold off
the lot of them.
        One of them drew a knife.  She didn't see him, busy as she was
beating down the leader.  Dukat tried to warn her, but nothing much
was working.
        "WHAT is going on here?!" a familiar raspy voice demanded.
        The girl didn't let it distract her; she finished neutralizing
the leader before she turned to see who had asked.  The interloper
saved her skin, though.  The knife-wielding tough whirled at the
sound, instinctively striking out at the speaker.
        His blade sliced into the chest of Constable Odo - followed
by his hand, since Odo allowed his malleable body to go liquid at the
point of impact, resulting in much less resistance than the knife-
wielder had been expecting.  Then, once the teenage assailant's hand
had plunged into his chest up to the wrist, Odo made his body solid
again, trapping the hand within him.
        The young man with the knife had had no idea the chief of
DSM's campus security force could do any such thing as this; like most
people, he'd assumed that Odo was just a Bajoran with some kind of
medical deformity.  He screamed in terror and tried to pull his hand
free, but Odo didn't let him go until he had a firm grip on the
youth's collar.
        "I'm only going to ask once more," Odo said patiently.  "What
is going on here?"

        Ezri did her best to explain to Spaldek just what the deal was
with her assignment to DSM, but she had to admit to herself as she
spelled it all out that the truth did seem rather improbable in this
case.
        Spaldek certainly seemed to think so.  He sat across from her
in her smallish but pleasant office on the second floor of the Castle,
at the end of the hall containing all the dueling club's administrative
offices, and gave her the old Vulcan eyebrow trick again as he digested
what she'd told him.
        "That is most illogical," he observed at length.
        "It is," Ezri agreed, a trifle sheepishly.  "But these are
illogical people we're talking about.  Commander Ivanova had no use
for me at all, and Dr. Bashir... "  She shrugged.  "It seemed like a
good idea at the time."
        Spaldek nodded slowly.
        "Are you gaining field experience in your area of expertise?"
he asked.
        "Oh, yes!" Ezri assured him.  "Working with these kids - well,
it's not exactly like counseling the crew of a starship, but I'm
learning a lot.  They're a very diverse bunch, learning to live and
work together in an unusual common setting... seems like there's
always something that needs to be smoothed over.  Not that they behave
badly, or anything like that!" she hastened to add.  She knew that at
this point she was just rambling, a trait she was reasonably sure
Spaldek found to be her least endearing, but she wasn't sure how to
stop herself.
        The answer provided itself when her desk phone uttered the
tone that meant she was getting a call from an on-campus personal comm
unit - in this case, a commbadge worn by a member of the campus
police.
        "Odo to Tigan," came the constable's voice.
        "Go ahead, Odo," Ezri said, glad of the interruption.
        "Could you come down to the Infirmary, please?" Odo inquired
politely.  "Young Mr. Dukat is asking for you."
        "Dukat?"  Ezri blinked.  "What's he doing in the Infirmary?"
        "It appears," Odo replied dryly, "that he's been in a fight.
I'm still trying to get the details sorted out; I may have more to
tell you when you arrive.  Odo out."

        Ezri arrived at the Infirmary three minutes later, with
Spaldek following unobtrusively.  She found Dukat laid out in one of
the emergency wing's biobeds, looking bruised and uncomfortable.  Odo
was standing off to one side, conferring with a white-coated medtech.
A young woman Ezri didn't recognize was sitting in a chair next to
Dukat's biobed.  She looked to be young - probably a first-year
student - and she was Bajoran, with short blonde hair swept straight
back.  Her uniform was a bit disarranged, as if she'd been in a fight
herself, though she seemed to be uninjured.
        Dukat brightened at the sight of her.  "Hello, Counselor," he
said.  "Pardon me if I don't get up.  Once I recover, it seems I need
to work on my multiple-opponent drills... "
        "What happened?" Ezri asked.
        "He was jumped, of course," the Bajoran girl said grumpily.
        "Not by students," Odo cut in.  "The ones we've been able to
pry IDs out of so far are from Port Jeradar.  Fortunately, Miss Nita
here was able to drive them off before they did more than superficial
damage to young Dukat."
        Nita cracked a sardonic little grin.  "Right place, right
time," she said.
        "Right armament, too," Odo observed.  "If you'd had a blade,
I'd have to run you in, since you're not a Duelist.  As it is, you'll
have to leave."
        "All right," she said, standing.  "But I'll be back tomorrow."
        "Do whatever you like," Odo replied with his long-suffering
tone.  "-After- I've completed my investigation."
        "Hey, wait," Dukat said as Nita turned toward the door.
        "Hm?"
        "I have two questions," he said.
        "Yeah?"
        "First - why did you help me?"
        "You said it yourself," she replied, shrugging.  "You're not
an enemy to my people."
        "Most of you don't exactly consider me a friend, either,"
Dukat said wryly.
        "Well, maybe we'll have to work on that," Nita replied with a
grin.  "Second question?"
        "What's your given name?"
        Her grin widened slightly.  "Daran," she said.  "See you
around, S.G. Dukat."
        He watched her go, looking as impressed as his injured face
would let him, then shook his head and turned to Ezri.  "Thanks for
coming," he said.  "I have a favor to ask of you."
        "Name it," Ezri said.
        Dukat glanced warily at Spaldek.
        "I gather some confidence is about to be offered," the Vulcan
said, his tone utterly dry.  "You may rest assured of my discretion.
I am an absolutely disinterested party in this matter, except where
evaluation of Ensign Tigan's performance is concerned."
        Dukat considered that, then turned back to Ezri and looked
slightly pained - more so than was normal at the moment.  "Well... you
see, my father will probably be here shortly, and... I was wondering
if you might... smooth things over with him."
        Ezri blinked.  (For all that he professed disinterest, Spaldek
was unable to keep one of his own eyebrows from arching as well.)
        "... Your -father-?" Ezri finally managed to say.  "He's not
-dead-?"
        Dukat shook his head.  "No, no - not yet, anyway.  This little
incident is sure to get his blood pressure up, though, and... well, he
may need a bit of... handling."
        Odo folded his arms.  "I'll 'handle' him," he said darkly.
        "That's what I'm afraid of," Dukat said.  "Just talk to him,
would you, please?" he asked Ezri.  "Let him know that I'm going to be
all right, and that Odo doesn't think the ones who attacked me were
students.  He's probably going to want to pull me out of school, and
I'm afraid I can't permit that right now."
        The calm authority with which he said the last part brought a
little smile to Ezri's face - his blithe self-assurance was one of
Dukat's most endearing features, and one of his most infuriating,
often at the same time.
        Of all her charges, she found Dukat was the one with which
she'd achieved the quickest rapport.  The young Cardassian had a
natural charm, the kind of charisma that had made his infamous father
such a powerful and persuasive leader.  He himself would have made an
excellent counselor, and it wasn't long before she was telling him
-her- problems.
        [ "... and that's when I recognized that my primary motivation
in joining Starfleet was to escape from my tyrannical, domineering
mother."
        "Well, I think we've made excellent progress today, Miss
Tigan.  It's time for me to get to class.  Same time next week?"
        "Wha - ?  Did you?  Was I?  How do you DO that?"
        "It's a natural gift." ]
        Now she smiled and agreed to his request.
        "I'll see what I can do," she said.  "You rest, OK?"
        Dukat nodded, settling back on the biobed.  "I intend to do
very little else," he said.  "Oh, one other thing, Counselor... "
        "Mm?"
        "Don't be taken aback by my father's appearance.  He won't
look quite the way you recall him from the holos... "

        No, indeed, he did not.
        The man who the campus police directed to Ezri's Castle office
didn't look much like the infamous Gul Skrain Dukat, the last military
governor of Cardassian-occupied Bajor.  In fact, he didn't look
Cardassian at all, but Bajoran, and he wore the uniform of a captain
in the Bajoran Militia.
        Still, as she took a closer look at him, she could see the
resemblance.  His skin might be pink instead of grey, his hair brown
instead of jet black, and the myriad of details that set the
Cardassians apart from more fully humanoid species missing, but the
general lines of his face were reminiscent of that famous hawk-nosed
visage, and the eyes... the eyes were the same, black but bright with
intelligence.  This was the face of a clever man, and a dangerous
one...
        "My son tells me you're going to convince me to leave him
here," Dukat - or, as his ID made known his name, Anjohl Tennan -
said.  Folding his arms, he added huffily, "I sincerely doubt that,
but I might as well give you the chance."
        Acutely conscious of Commander Spaldek's presence in the back
of the room - though Anjohl didn't seem to care that he was there -
Ezri folded her hands on top of her desk and said in her mildest
voice,
        "Please sit down, Captain Anjohl."
        Anjohl sat, but kept scowling.
        "My purpose isn't to convince you to leave S.G. in school,"
she said.  "I'm not the Dean of Students.  I'm a counselor.  My job is
to help the students who live in this building to the best of my
ability.  S.G. asked me to see you and assure you that he's going to
be all right."
        "I could get that from the medical staff.  Or Odo," Anjohl
said.  Then, with a thin-lipped smile, he added, "I know my son.  He
didn't ask you to do any such thing.  He asked you to -handle- me."
        Ezri returned the smile, though hers was a little warmer.
"Maybe," she allowed.  "But it amounts to the same thing.  The people
who attacked him weren't students here."
        "But they were Bajoran."
        "Legally, so is your son.  So, apparently, are -you-," Ezri
pointed out.  "I won't pretend to understand the circumstances, but
there it is.  You should also know that the person who jumped into the
melee to -protect- him, at considerable risk to herself, is -also-
Bajoran, and she -is- a student here."
        "How reassuring," said Anjohl dryly.
        "Look, Captain," said Ezri, spreading her hands.  "You have me
at a disadvantage.  You'd already made up your mind when you came
here, and S.G. has -also- made up his mind.  The two of you are on a
collision course, and from what little I know of you, I'll bet you're
just as pigheaded as he is.  Now, if you want to turn this into some
kind of contest, then that's your prerogative, but I have to tell you,
if you do, you've got quite a fight on your hands."
        Anjohl stared at her, his jaw clamped, for several seconds;
then he leaned back in his chair and laughed.
        "If nothing else," he said when he was finished, "the boy
knows how to pick a persuasive advocate.  You win, Counselor Tigan.
He can stay here if he likes."  He got to his feet and extended a
hand.  "Well played."
        Ezri got up and shook it with an impish grin.  "Thank you,
Captain.  And before you ask," she added, showing him a palm,
"anything S.G. might have told me about his father falls strictly
under the counselor's privilege."
        Anjohl smiled again, nodded in acknowledgement, and left the
office.  Ezri watched him go, shut the door behind him, then went to
her desk and slumped into her chair with a sigh of relief.
        "You could have been more diplomatic," Spaldek observed,
making her nearly jump out of her skin - she had completely forgotten
he was there.
        "I could have," she agreed once she got her heart rate down
and turned her chair to face him, "but it wouldn't have gotten the job
done.  Dukat is a very direct young man, and he responds best to plain
talk.  It was my assessment that his father shared those traits."
        "You had no file data on Captain Anjohl," Spaldek pointed
out.  "Your assessment was little more than a guess."
        Ezri smiled and gave a little shrug, conceding the point.
        "Sometimes a hunch is all you have to go on with an unfamiliar
patient," she said.  "Emergencies happen.  There isn't always time for
research."
        Spaldek nodded gravely.
        "Just so," he said.  Then, rising, he straightened his trouser
seams fastidiously and said, "Very well, Ensign.  Your assignment here
is most unorthdox, and I would have thanked Dr. Bashir to log the
precise details at the time, but I see no reason why you should not
remain.  My report to the Review Board will so state."
        Ezri blinked as she got to her feet.  "The -Review Board-?"
        "Admiral Carcatera was slightly distressed to learn that you
were not aboard Babylon 6," Spaldek said.  "He feared you might have
gone AWOL from your duty station.  Dr. Bashir's notes on your
assignment were... somewhat less than enlightening.  However, all is
now well."  Raising a hand in the Vulcan salute, he added, "Live long
and prosper, Ensign.  I will see you back at the Academy for the
miderm examinations next month."
        Still somewhat shocked that Spaldek's visit had been the
prelude to possible disciplinary action, Ezri took a moment to catch
up before raising her own hand, making her best try at the salute, and
replying, "Uh... peace and long life, Commander."
        Spaldek left her office, closing the door behind her, and she
slumped into her chair again with another sigh of relief.

    /*  Joe Satriani  "Mountain Song"  _Strange Beautiful Music_  */

                      Eyrie Productions, Unlimited
                               presented
                         UNDOCUMENTED FEATURES
                            FUTURE IMPERFECT
                    - Symphony of the Sword No. 4 -
                      Entr'acte: In for a Penny...

                                The Cast
                        (in order of appearance)
                              Utena Tenjou
                             Alan Schepartz
                            Aaron Ajlond-Mui
                              Memory Gene
                              Steve Rogers
                     Princess Koriand'r of Tamaran
                           Carmela Sunderland
                              Kozue Kaoru
                              Anthy Tenjou
                              Nadia Davion
                              Luornu Durgo
                             R. Lore Soong
                             Lafiel Abriel
                               Hoshi Sato
                             Jinto Lin Kirk
                             Sakura Byakuro
                               Boba Fett
                              Bastila Shan
                            Anne Springsteen
                                 Tuncer
                              Pete Stacker
                             Jay McCandless
                          Julius Van der Groot
                             Sachiko Asaki
                             Adrian Mendoza
                              Mike Tucker
                           Leonard L. Church
                       Dougal "Caboose" O'Malley
                              Chips Dubbo
                                 Frank
                      Wolfgang, Beagle of the Lens
                             Susan Ivanova
                               Ezri Tigan
                             "Bruce" Corwin
                                  Odo
                            Arthur Haineley
                               Tom Palmer
                            B'Elanna O'Brien
                            Lindsey Willows
                                Spaldek
                            S.G. Dukat, Esq.
                     The Port Jeradar Surly Players
                               Nita Daran
                             Anjohl Tennan

                                 Chief
                          Benjamin D. Hutchins

                               Repo Woman
                             Janice Barlow

                 Assist with Commodore Tenjou's speech
                            Kris Overstreet

                              Jaws of Life
                              Pearson Mui

                          With special nods to
                          Bungie's "Halo" crew
              BioWare's "Knights of the Old Republic" crew
                   and the guys over at redvsblue.com

                             and of course
                           The Usual Suspects

                          E P U (colour) 2014