I have a message from another time...

                     Eyrie Productions, Unlimited
                               presents

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

		Fifth Movement: Requiem for a Lensman

                         Benjamin D. Hutchins
			     Martin Rose
			   with Anne Cross
			     Geoff Depew
			     Pearson Mui

                (c) 2003 Eyrie Productions, Unlimited


		       SATURDAY, JULY 11, 2409
			       10:43 AM
		INTERNATIONAL POLICE STATION BABYLON 6
		       BAJOR, CENTAURUS SECTOR

	It had been a pretty thrilling week for Shiori Takatsuki.
First she'd gotten up on stage and subbed for Miki in an Art of Noise
concert to a packed and screaming house on Tau Ceti.  Then she'd
participated in a couple of very exciting actions as a sort of
quasi-official special deputy to the International Police.
	-Then- she'd been made a -Lensman-, and along the way had some
pretty solid confirmation of her long-held belief that she and Juri
had, indeed, salvaged something strong and beautiful from the awful
tangle their friendship had become back in the Ohtori Academy days.
	All in all, a pretty big week - and this morning, it was
getting just that last little bit bigger.  Not only had her
performance against the Black Omega datasystems gotten her noticed by
the Lensmaker, it had impressed the Chief of International Police
Operations as well; and now Shiori found herself invited to go along
with him on the forensic datadive to figure out how Black Omega had
compromised the Valiant's security systems so effectively.
	She knew the Chief already, like all of Kaitlyn's friends, but
she only saw him a few times a year, and always in unofficial
situations.  There was something a little awesome about being asked to
do actual -work- with the First Lensman, and important work, at that.
It had her hand trembling just a little as she reached for the big
green GO key on her Excalibur.
	Shiori's icon rezzed up in the staging area, a small "room"
which was, if anything in cyberspace could be said to be anywhere,
inside the system built into Gryphon's desk.  Looking around, she saw
she was alone.  While she waited for the the Chief to arrive, she
pulled up all her status windows and checked them out.  She expected
she'd need everything in her bag of tricks on this run - well,
everything except her really heavy-duty icebreakers.  She didn't have
room in even the Excalibur's vast memory for those today.
	As she ran the checks, she was struck by the contrast between
her sleek, modern Fairlight-OS menus and the look of the room she was
in.  The Chief's staging area was flat-shaded and very angular, with
smooth dark walls that had subtly pulsating slanted lines and chevrons
just below their flat, unreflective surfaces.  To a modern decker like
Shiori, it was the online equivalent of one of those chrome-and-
checkers 1950s hamburger joints - massively retro, but in a cool sort
of way.
	While she was pondering this, a disk of blue light rose up out
of the floor to a height of about seven feet with an echoing electric
sound, drawing in its wake the wireframed outline of a man.  A
half-second later, another one did the same, merging with the first
disk and filling in the surface textures of the icon at the same time.
The merged disks then flickered and winked out, and the Chief had
arrived.
	His icon was in the same old-fashioned style as the room.  It
was a man-shape wearing sleek conformal armor, something like Wedge
Defense Force CVR-7, but with a small visored helmet like a hockey
helmet instead of CVR-7's full-head environment helm.  The armor was
grey and covered with glowing blue patterns like circuit traces, and
though the face below the helmet visor belonged recognizably to
Gryphon, it was in black and white.
	He turned and regarded Shiori, in her "skin"-tight
semitranslucent suit of burgundy and white with its levitating
yellow-light buttons, her wine-red hair and violet eyes glowing
softly, and grinned.
	"Well!" he said, his voice flattened slightly.  "It's been a
while since I saw a genuine Shimas GS-type icon base.  That's pretty
old-school for somebody your age."
	Shiori grinned back.  "Thanks for noticing," she said.  "I see
your custom environments use the Lisberger protocols.  That's cool."
She winked one glowing violet eye and added, "I love a man who
respects the classics."
	Gryphon chuckled.  "In my case," he said wryly, "I'm helped by
the fact that I'm an antique myself."
	Shiori rolled her eyes slightly.  "Oh, what, just 'cause Utena
calls you 'Dad'... "  She shrugged.  "You want to go out sometime?"
	Gryphon blinked.  "That's direct," he observed.
	She shrugged.  "I tried to be clever once.  Almost cost me my
best friend.  Since then I've learned the value of the frontal attack.
So how 'bout it?"
	The First Lensman's icon regarded her for a moment, his face
thoughtful; then he chuckled, shook his head, and said, "You'd better
ask Kei before you ask me.  That's the way it seems to work."
	Shiori took this with equanimity.  "Oh," she said.  "OK, maybe
I will."  Then she grinned.  "In the meantime, wanna cyber?"
	Gryphon raised an eyebrow dryly, which made Shiori crack up
laughing.
	"Kidding!" she said, waving a hand.  "We've got work to do
anyway.  And I could never get into those programs - too weird with
all the colored light and stuff."
	Gryphon chuckled again, opened up a connect window, and
started prepping for transit to the isolation grid the Valiant's
system had been put on while he talked.  "You know, when I was your
age, we did that kind of thing with plain text."
	Shiori raised her eyebrows.  "No kidding!  Did it actually
-work-?"
	"Sometimes," replied Gryphon with a faint smile.  
	"FREAK-y.  Brings a whole new meaning to the term 'raw ASCII'."
She leaned over his shoulder, watching him work on the transit gate,
and smirked.  "Is that why one-handed typing methods got such a big
development boost in the decade immediately pre-Contact?"
	"Um, work time?" Gryphon replied, affecting to be more
distracted by the gate than he really was.
	"Sorry," said Shiori with something like real contrition.
"I'm just really interested in history."
	"I can see that," said Gryphon dryly.
	The gate blinked; across the top of the window, the words
"DIVE READY" scrolled in flashing red type.
	Gryphon held out his hand, Shiori took it, and, their sessions
thus linked, they dove.
	The isolation grid was small compared to the vastness of the
Internet, but just the fact that it was enclosed made it give a
sensation of hugeness that the Net, with its lack of boundaries,
didn't give.  It, too, was "built" with the Lisberger texture set,
giving it something of the appearance of a cavernous spacedock of
black glass, every surface flat, every angle right.
	Moored in the center of this dock, connected to its walls by
columns, shafts, and catwalks of light, was a beautifully rendered
photorealistic model of the Valiant.  If Shiori hadn't known she was
online, the only way she would have known that it wasn't the real
thing, besides the unrealistic surroundings, was by the fact that it
lacked the minor damage the real ship had suffered in being recovered
from its hijackers.
	"Wow," she said.  "IPSF didn't spare any expense on the system
icon... "
	"Vision does all the internal stuff.  It's a hobby of hers,"
Gryphon noted.
	Shiori took note of that, finding it odd, now that he'd
mentioned Vision, that the machine intelligence wasn't on this run
with him instead of her.  Surely for a major security audit of a
critical system, it would be better for him to be accompanied by one
of the galaxy's most powerful ACIs, one who knew him and his working
patterns intimately, rather than a well-equipped but largely untried
indy hacker who hadn't finished college yet.
	Gryphon didn't say anything about it, but Shiori wondered if
this were a test, or at least an assessment of a new Lensman's
capabilities.  Or maybe he just wanted to get to know one of his
daughter's friends a bit better.  Or maybe she'd earned the invitation
with her accomplishments on Tau Ceti... 
	She wasn't going to figure it out just by wondering about it,
though, so she gave up and concentrated instead on doing the best job
she could.
	Some distracted corner of her mind, though, wondered if he'd
been serious when he'd said she should talk to his wife... and if she
had the gall to actually do it.
	But right now, to work.
	She'd given up most of her Excalibur's memory capacity for a
reason.  That reason was a mingling of two desires: one, to show off a
bit for the Chief; and second, to perform a practical test of a
project she'd been working on, a test under something like controlled
conditions rather than the operational chaos of her intrusions into
the Psi Corps systems on Tau Ceti.
	Standing on the "hull" of the Valiant's systems icon, Shiori
opened a program-load window and tabbed "execute".
	Around her resolved a cluster of five small icons, hovering
around her own icon like small moons around a particularly nubile
planet.  It took a moment for Gryphon to realize what they were.
	Each one was a representation of a pint-sized, grim-faced,
comically proportioned man in a dark suit with matching tie and white
shirt, rather predatory-looking dark glasses, and a discreet radio
earpiece.  Tiny, super-deformed stereotypes of government agents;
Gryphon suppressed a snicker.
	They looked identical to him, but Shiori seemed to be able
to tell them apart as she started briskly giving them instructions.
	"Alpha, get me a complete analysis of the Valiant's dataspace.
Look for any points of compromise in the barrier elements.  Beta, I
want a complete network activity report for the last hour of the
concert, pull the exact times from my recording.  Gamma, search the
logfiles for any unusual activity, including gaps in the timestamps
where entries might have been erased.  Delta, run a sub-ether trace on
all comm activity for that same period.  It's a waste of time, but do
it anyway, you might get lucky.  And Epsilon, get me a danish."
	In eerie five-part surround, the five agents replied, "Yes,
Miss Shiori," their voices flat and so unaccented that it was almost
an accent in itself.  Then they flitted off on their assigned tasks.
	While they did that, Shiori pulled up a diagnostic window and
started running checks on the Valiant's systems herself; she'd been a
sort of unofficial assistant engineer for information systems on this
summer's run, and though the Valiant's datasystems had been locked
into security mode, she still had access to some of the secondary
diagnostics.  That would have to do until Epsilon completed his job,
which was to get his mistress administrative access to the core system
(legitimately or otherwise).
	With a challenge in front of her, Shiori settled quickly into
the routine, consulting with her agent subroutines as they reported
back from their tasks.  She got far enough into the groove that she
forgot the First Lensman was with her, watching her work.  For his
part, Gryphon just stood back and let her do her thing, watching her
technique, impressed with her efficiency and that of her agent
program.  He'd never seen one quite like it before, and wondered if it
was home-brewed.
	Suddenly, while consulting with one of the agents - Gryphon
though he'd heard her address this one as "Gamma" - Shiori smiled
nastily, and then vanished in a shower of silver sparks, taking her
cluster of agents with her.
	"Huh," said Gryphon thoughtfully.  A moment later, a
"maintenance hatch" not far from him on the ship's upper surface
popped open and Shiori leaned partway out, grinning from ear to ear.
	"C'mon in," she said.  "I think we've got it figured out."

	"They got in through an overrun on the MBTP port.  Alpha found
it and Epsilon confirmed that it's a known vulnerability in the
version of the listener we're using," Shiori said as the two walked
down one of the virtual Valiant's corridors, heading for the bridge.
Around her, her little constellation of men in black continued to
flicker this way and that, muttering quietly to themselves as they
continued checking the ship's systems.
	Gryphon chuckled ruefully.  "It's always some piddling little
thing like that, isn't it?" he said, shaking his head.  MBTP was the
Metaspace Beacon Tracking Protocol, a low-level communication protocol
which did just what it said: monitored the metaspace beacon tracking
network, the system of subether transmitters which provided
navigational fixes in the referenceless void of metaspace.
	One of the agents flew up and presented Shiori with a readout
window; she perused it for a moment, then slid it across to Gryphon.
"The exploit seems to have been discovered just that morning.  We
must've missed the CERT advisory on it."
	Gryphon tapped a key on the vambrace computer his old-school
icon wore; a comm window appeared in front of him, switching in a
moment from the IPSF "please wait" pattern to Vision's face.
	"Yes, Chief?"
	"Vision, would you reference this advisory - "  Gryphon copied
the readout window and dropped the copy into a slot at the bottom of
Vision's comm window.  " - and see if it's been implemented on the
rest of the fleet?  Better give the WDF a heads-up on it too, just in
case.  We use a lot of the same computer systems."
	Vision looked thoughtful for a moment as she parsed the
readout, then said, "Oh, sure, I remember this one.  The fix was in
place on all ships by 1630."
	Gryphon looked puzzled.  "All ships?  It seems to be the
vulnerability that Black Omega used to compromise the Valiant."
	Vision blinked, thought some more, and then said sheepishly,
"All regular ops ships.  Irregular Projects isn't in the standard
TO&E and... um, I didn't think of it."
	Gryphon sighed, smiling ruefully.  "Neither did I.  We're
going to have to do something about that.  OK, that's all for now."
	Vision nodded and the window closed.
	"Well.  Slight loophole in our IT operations plan," said
Gryphon wryly.  Then, changing tracks, he nodded toward one of the
miniature men in black.  "That's a very efficient agent program.  Did
you write it yourself?" 
	"Kind of," said Shiori.  "He's a combination of the best parts
of several different agent programs I tried.  Like, he has the data
retrieval algorithm from Super System Agent, but the trace routine
from NetHound.  I did the porting myself, though," she added as they
entered the dimly lit virtual bridge.
	In the far corner of the room, near the darkened main viewer,
something stirred in the shadows, then hissed and lunged for them.
	"Attack sleeper!" Gryphon cried, but before he could react -
which, in this environment, was very fast indeed - the agent program
he'd just been admiring did something else.  The five small figures
all shot forward, converging in front of their mistress and combining
into a single entity.
	The new icon lacked the comical proportions of the individual
mini-agents; it was the icon of a tall, thin man with a humorless
face, narrow black sunglasses, and a neat black suit, rendered in a
photorealistic style rather than the retro neon of Gryphon's icon or
the showy light-clad webdiver style of Shiori's.  When he'd finished
resolving, the reinvented agent reached into his jacket, pulled out a
truly enormous handgun, and blasted the charging attack program
several times.
	Very nicely rendered shell casings tinkled to the Valiant's
bridge floor as the weapon routine cycled, savaging the sleeper's
operating image.  Halfway through its leap across the bridge, the
Black Omega program disintegrated, de-rezzing in a storm of yellow
sparks which scattered to the deck and vanished.
	When he'd finished with the attacker, the agent carefully,
professionally swept the bridge.  Finding no other sleeper programs,
he holstered his weapon and turned to his mistress.
	"Hostile program... neutralized, Miss Shiori," he said in that
same over-carefully-enunciated flat accent.
	"Uh... thank you, Agent Smith," said Shiori.  "Carry on.
Until we have the system fully secured, maybe you'd better stay in
priority mode."
	Agent Smith nodded once, with just the faintest hint of a
smile on his face.
	Shiori turned to Gryphon with a slightly sheepish smile.  "The
combat programming, Professor Ravenhair helped with a little," she
admitted.
	"Hell, you don't need me here," he said, laughing.  "I might
as well go back to my office!"
	"Don't say that!  I need you," Shiori protested as she sat
down at the virtual conn.  "You can fulfil one vital function that
I've never been able to get Smith to do right."
	"What's that?"
	"He's a rotten conversationalist," said Shiori with a grin.
"He tries, but he just doesn't get it.  Watch.  Agent Smith?"
	"Yes... Miss Shiori?" said the agent.
	"So how about those Knights?"  
	Agent Smith considered the question for a moment, then
replied, "Their offense is adequate, but the bullpen... cannot handle
the pressure.  Acevedo's best seasons are... -behind- him."  He shook
his head judiciously.  "They have no future."
	"See what I mean?" 
	Gryphon suppressed a snicker.  "You're right... that's kind of
sad."
	"He's a work in progress," said Shiori with a shrug.  "Aren't
you, Agent Smith?"
	Smith nodded in grave concurrence.  "I currently represent
approximately... 2,751 person-hours of programming work."
	Gryphon did a little mental math.  "You've been working on him
since last spring?"
	"Uh-huh."
	"No wonder you almost flunked out of NIT," said the First
Lensman with a grin that belied his critical words.
	"Pretty much," Shiori agreed, smiling.  "OK.  Let's see what
we've got here," she went on, becoming businesslike as she pulled up
the master diagnostic system.
	The rest of the sweep took them two hours and passed
relatively without incident.  By the time it was done, Gryphon had all
the information he needed about the ways in which Black Omega had
compromised the Valiant's data systems - and a good deal of data on
the abilities, working habits, and personal style of Shiori Takatsuki.
	He anticipated that all of that would be useful, though in
some cases he failed to predict exactly how as he thanked her for her
help, congratulated her on her abilities, and punched out.
	Back in the Lisberger-rendered "staging area" where she'd
started, Shiori watched his icon de-resolve, leaving her alone except
for the five miniature components of Agent Smith, back in normal
operating mode.
	She looked around the empty staging room for a moment, unable
to keep a grin off her face after such a successful afternoon.  There
was just nothing like the feeling of pulling off a cool hack when it
mattered most, and having such an audience for it made it all the
sweeter.
	Then she punched out and went to see if she could find anybody
to have lunch with.

	Gryphon figured his next errand probably wouldn't be quite so
enjoyable, but he was trying to keep an open mind... so to speak.
	He jacked his arm computer out of his dataterminal, tidied a
few things up at his desk (not much to do there; he hardly ever -used-
his office on Babylon 6), and then concentrated on his Lens.
	<Lu?>
	<Yes, Chief,> replied the mental voice of his yeoman,
Lieutenant Luornu Durgo.
	<Is Officer Sunderland here?>
	<Security just brought her down,> Lu replied.  <Are you ready
for her?>
	<What's your take on her?>
	<She hasn't said much to me - I'm only the secretary, after
all,> Lu replied wryly.  <I don't think she has any aggressive
intentions.  Anyway, that would be pretty stupid, considering, and she
doesn't strike me as stupid.  We'll just have to see.>
	Gryphon nodded mentally.
	<Well, I guess it's time, then,> he said.  <Send her on in.>
	<Will do.>
	A moment later the door opened and a woman entered the room.
She was of average height and slender, olive-skinned and dark-eyed
with curly dark-brown hair to her shoulders and an aristocratic sort
of face.  If there was anything wrong with the face, Gryphon decided
after studying it for a moment, it was that the mouth was a little too
wide, but he suspected that would be nicely offset by how mobile and
expressive it was, if she'd only let it be.
	Having been trained from childhood to look severe and
uncompromising, however, Carmela Sunderland had never really learned
to do that, and so she ended up wasting her natural charm by looking
dour all the time.
	She was accompanied by a Babylon 6 security officer, one of
the thirty percent or so of the B6 security force who were IPO Tac Div
blue-suiters.  He didn't have a weapon, but Gryphon, recognizing him,
realized with a private little smile that this was because he didn't
need one.
	"Thank you, Garth," he said, nodding.  "I think you can leave
us alone."
	The redheaded security officer, barely out of his teens, eyed
Sunderland dubiously, but the Chief was the Chief.  With a nod and
another significant glance at the Psi Cop, he said with palpable
emphasis,
	"I'll be -right outside-, sir."  Then he turned and left the
office.
	Gryphon let the door close behind him before smiling, then
shook his head and said, "Kids these days.  Have a seat, Officer
Sunderland.  No need to stand on ceremony.  What's on your mind?"
	Sunderland blinked.  This wasn't the way she'd imagined her
encounter with the legendary First Lensman would go at all.
	She sat, trying to gather her thoughts back up from where the
surprise had scattered them; then, slowly and haltingly, she started
to tell the story of what had happened and, as far as she knew, why.
	Sunderland left nothing out.  Gryphon sat and listened
attentively, not interrupting, as she ran through the entire story,
from her early days in the Psi Corps through the sudden, shocking
disillusionment she felt during her telepathic conversation with Ahmed
Garcia.  (He didn't tell her that AEGIS operatives had been carefully
disassembling Garcia's memories of the entire incident all night;
their report, when it arrived in a few hours, would provide some
corroboration for what she was saying.)
	At the end, she repeated her request for political asylum and
her assertion that she could be useful to the International Police,
then waited on tenterhooks for his reply.
	He gazed at her for a few moments, his eyes calm, steady,
unreadable.
	Then he frowned thoughtfully and said, "Hmm.  A puzzle.  On
the one hand, I believe you may be genuinely sincere; but you're
certainly doomed either way if you go back to the Earth Alliance, so
you're well-motivated to convince me.  And then there's the little
matter of your treatment of my daughter and her friends - especially
Juri."
	Sunderland looked back at him, not challenging, but not
backing away either.  "I've made my peace with them," she said.  "I
was wrong and I've admitted it."
	Gryphon nodded.  "So I've been told.  All the same... "  He
looked back at her for another moment or so, then sighed and stood up.
"Well, I'm the Chief, and that means I get to take the occasional
calculated risk.  Miss Sunderland, I'm going to grant your request for
asylum - but provisionally.  You're going to have to do a bit of...
community service, you might call it, to demonstrate the seriousness
of your intent."
	Sunderland cocked an eyebrow at him.  The man couldn't
possibly mean... although, now that she got a good look at him, he
wasn't unpresentable, and it -had- been a while... that might not be
so bad - 
	"I'm assigning you, or sentencing you, as the case may be, to
the Irregular Projects Division."
	Oh.  What?!
	"You're to serve six weeks aboard the Valiant - the rest of
her summer tour.  You'll be expected to do heavy lifting, pass tools,
help in the galley, whatever needs doing.  You'll be the lowest
creature on the ship, and that includes Dorothy Wayneright's cat and
Utena and Kaitlyn's pet robots.
	"You're going to have to demonstrate that you can play well
with others, take instructions, and get your hands dirty before I'm
going to take a permanent chance on a Psi Cop," he explained to her
dumbfounded expression.  "If you come back without a complaint against
you, and your performance reviews are good, well... then we'll see."
	Smiling slightly to himself, Gryphon sat down and started
working on a bit of paperwork.  "That's all," he said, not looking up
again.  "Dismissed."
	Carmela sat slack-jawed for a moment, then pulled herself
together and said hesitantly, "Sir, I'm... I'm grateful for the
opportunity, but... do you really think the Valiant's ship's company
will -accept- me after what I've done?"
	Gryphon looked up from the form he was filling out and
observed matter-of-factly, "You said you'd made your peace with them."
	"Respectfully, First Lensman, making one's peace is not the
same as living cheek-by-jowl for six weeks," said Carmela.
	"Well, then, we'll find out just how adaptable you all are,"
Gryphon replied, unconcerned.  "It'll be another great Irregular
Projects experiment.  On your way, now.  See you in September."
	Realizing that this was all she was going to get, Sunderland
slowly got up.  Not knowing quite what else to do, she came to
attention and saluted, then turned to leave.  The redheaded security
officer who'd escorted her in gave her a suspicious look but didn't
try to stop her as she left, and Carmela realized that Gryphon must
have informed his yeoman of his plan via their Lenses.
	Hmm.
	Well, she hadn't thought it was going to be -easy-, but... 

	Liza Shustal was accustomed to having people stare at her.  In
the first place, she was beautiful, tall, blonde and athletic, moving
with a swordmaster's easy grace - and she knew it.  In the second, she
was colorful, dressed in the bright silks and leathers which comprised
almost all of her wardrobe.  In the third, she was bold, wearing those
colors and materials in styles that accentuated her other attributes.
	There was an extra reason for people to stare, or at least
give her a double-take, as she walked the corridors of Babylon 6
today.  Though it wasn't unusual for people to be carrying on
conversations with other people while traversing the station's
hallways, they generally didn't carry their conversational partners on
their backs as they did so.
	Liza didn't mind.  For some reason, possibly because she was
by nature arboreal, Azalynn dv'Ir Natashkan liked to cling to people's
backs, and Liza didn't object to the practice.  Her Dantrovian lover
was warm, and soft, and not heavy, and there was something reassuring
about her embracing grip.  They were apart for so much of the year
because of their divergent lives that both enjoyed spending what time
they had together, as -close- together as possible.
	They were having the kind of conversation - totally frank and
personal - that was only possible between true intimates.  No one
around them was paying any attention to their words, though they might
spare a startled glance or two for their appearance; but they wouldn't
have minded much if anyone had listened.  Their overhearer's
discomfiture might even have amused them.
	"I'm not saying I feel any different toward -you-," Liza said
as she followed the well-remembered path from the command area to the
docking sector.
	"Uh-huh," said Azalynn, nodding agreeably.
	"I'm still as much in love with you as I ever was."
	"That's good."
	"And it isn't just that I get lonely out there on the
spacelanes without you, though God knows I -do-."
	"Understandable."
	"It's just... I don't know exactly how to put it," said Liza,
and Azalynn knew what a painful admission that was.  If there was one
thing Liza hated, it was being at a loss for words.  The condition
wounded her pride as a storyteller as well as her swordmaster's
fondness for witty repartee.
	After thinking on it for a moment, Liza said, "I just feel...
I feel as though there's something -missing-.  Not -instead- of you,
never that, but... perhaps -beside- you.  Does that make any sense?"
	Azalynn chuckled.  "Well," she said pragmatically, "I -can-
think of at least one thing I don't have to offer you... "
	"I'd like to think," said Liza, just a trifle stuffily, "that
my problem is a little more sophisticated than 'what that girl needs
is a good sound rog - '"
	Busy being half-jokingly indignant, and still preoccupied with
the train of thought which had led her there, Liza rounded a corner
without any of her usual grace or physical wariness.  At full, brisk
walking speed, her head turned aside in an attempt to make eye contact
with her giggling burden, she slammed full-force into somebody coming,
and coming fast, the other way.  Both victims rebounded and fell in
matching heaps.
	Azalynn, born of a race accustomed to getting out of falling
trees before they hit the ground, jumped clear and landed lightly off
to one side.  Then she knelt at her fallen lover's side and asked,
"Dvhil, Liza, are you OK?"
	Liza sat up, groaning with a combination of annoyance and
pain, and put a hand to her head.
	A couple of feet away, the person she'd hit did likewise, with
a mirror image of Liza's semi-sprawled posture which Azalynn felt free
to find quite amusing now that she knew Liza was all right.
	For her part, Liza shook her head to clear away a mild stunned
feeling, then opened her eyes and gasped faintly at the sight of her
unfortunate victim.
	She wasn't sure what species he was, but he didn't look human.
He was dressed in a very human fashion, in a natty navy-blue
three-piece suit and silver tie under a flappy black trenchcoat (now
rumpled, his tie askew); but his slightly unfocused eyes were bright
yellow, his skin was dark blue, and the hand he had pressed to his
forehead only had two fingers and a thumb.
	"Ach," he said, shaking his head.  "Are you all right,
Fraulein?" he continued.  His voice was mellow, with a touch of an
accent - Niogan?  Indeed, as his eyes came back into focus, he looked
momentarily surprised and muttered something to himself in what Liza
thought was German, though she couldn't quite make it out.
	(Unfortunately, Liza didn't -know- German, so even if she'd
heard him clearly, she wouldn't have known what "Hallo Apfel, nenn
mich Adam!"  meant.)
	Liza blinked several times; her head was perfectly clear, now
she was just trying to think of something to say.  At length it
occurred to her that he was speaking to her.
	"Oh, uh - yes, sure, I'm fine."  She got to her feet, dusting
a bit at her clothes for effect, then offered her victim a hand.  He
seemed to hesitate for a moment, then shrug internally before clasping
it and using it to haul himself up.  With this, she discovered that,
aside from itself being blue, his skin was also covered with dark blue
fur, short and very soft, like velvet.
	"Sorry about that," he said, brushing at his coat.  "Should
have been paying better attention to where I was going, ja?"
	Something moved behind him as he straightened up, and it took
Liza a moment to realize that he had a tail - one about as long,
relative to the rest of him, as Azalynn's was to her, but one which
ended, unlike the Dantrovian's, in a point.
	He smiled self-deprecatingly as he spoke, revealing slightly
enlarged canine teeth.  Then, with a nervous sort of gesture, he
pushed some of his long, straight blue-black hair back, revealing that
his ears were pointed like a Vulcan's.
	Liza had no idea what the hell he was - he looked a bit like
one of the standard interpretations of the Devil, except he was blue
instead of red - but whatever he was, he was certainly handsome.
	"Oh, uh, no," she said.  "My fault.  I should have taken that
corner more carefully."  With the initial awkwardness over and her
mind falling back into its accustomed patterns, Liza felt her usual
aplomb returning; she smiled and introduced herself.
	"I am Elisabeth R'tas Shustal, master of the t'skrang trading
vessel Kuratai," she said with a slight bow.  "And this is my - "
	"Hi, I'm Azalynn," the Dantrovian interrupted, nudging Liza
gently with an elbow.  "Nice to meet you."
	The blue-furred man smiled again, rearranged his tie, and
bowed to the waist.  "A pleasure also to make your acquaintance.  My
name is Kurt Wagner."
	A thoroughly non-alien name for such an alien-looking fellow,
thought Liza.  Perhaps his parents emigrated from... wherever... to
Niogi?
	"Well, I was just leaving," said Azalynn airily.  "Liza, I'll
catch up with you at the Marche tonight, OK?"
	Liza did her best not to look surprised - Azalynn didn't have
anywhere to be this afternoon - then leaned down and murmured softly
to her grinning partner, "(Azalynn, what - )"
	"(On Dantrov we have a saying,)" Azalynn replied in a murmur
that didn't carry past Liza's ear.  "('Lightning is random, but not
much else.'  Don't worry about being the only one without a tail,)"
she added with a wicked little grin.  "(We'll make do.)"  Then, as
Liza flushed slightly and searched in vain for a reply, Azalynn said
in a louder voice, "Right.  The Marche at 6, I won't forget.  See you
there!  Nice meeting you, Mr. Wagner!"
	Wagner waved, looking faintly bemused, as the Dantrovian
trotted off down the corridor, humming.  Liza stared after her with
open puzzlement on her face, then turned back to Wagner.
	Well, OK, she thought, you're an adaptable soul; adapt.
	"So," she said.  "Where were -you- headed in such a hurry?"
	"The IPO offices," Wagner replied.  "Reporting in.  I just
arrived."
	Liza smiled.  "You're an IPO officer?  What branch?"
	"Experts of Justice," said Wagner, returning the smile.
	"I work with Irregular Projects sometimes," Liza told him,
falling into step as he headed for the sector elevator.  "I'm a
classmate of Captain Tenjou's."
	"Ah, of course.  Your ship mounted the recapture operation.
That was nicely done."
	"Thank you.  I'm surprised you've heard of it so soon."
	Wagner smiled, raised his left hand, pushed back his sleeve,
and tapped his Lens.  "I keep pretty well informed," he said.
	Liza laughed.  "So I see.  Are you just coming off a mission,
or in for a briefing?"
	"Probably both," said Wagner with a rueful grin.  "They keep
us pretty busy these days.  I had expected to be sent to Tau Ceti to
back up your group, but the crisis ended before I could get here."  He
shrugged.  "That's the way it goes sometimes."
	Liza nodded.  "We thought we were going to -need- some serious
backup, but it worked out.  We're all still a little stunned by the
Earth Alliance's reaction.  Not that I'm complaining," she added with
a smile.  "But it would have been an exciting way to spend a weekend."
	Wagner chuckled.  "Ja," he said.  "It would at that."
	"Have you had lunch?" Liza inquired, seeing that that
conversational thread was about played out.
	"Hm?  No," the blue man replied.  "I just got here."
	"Well," said Liza, her blue eyes twinkling merrily, "I was
just on my way back to my ship for some.  Once you're finished with
the office, how would you like to join me?  It's the least I can do to
make up for knocking you down."
	Wagner smiled.  "That's very kind of you, Captain Shustal," he
said.  "I'd be delighted."
	"Please - call me Liza," she said, taking his arm.  "What do
your friends call you, Agent Wagner?"
	"Usually Kurt," he replied, "though I have also been known to
respond to 'Fuzzy', 'Elf', and, on very rare occasions, 'Bamf Boy'."
He drew himself up a little and raised the index finger of his free
hand, making his German accent thicker as he went on, "But in ze
Munich Zirkus I vas known as ze Incrrredible Nightcrrrawler!"
	Liza raised an eyebrow.  "'Nightcrawler'?" she said
dubiously.  "That's a kind of -worm-."
	"Er, well, yes," Wagner admitted uncomfortably.  "But not in
Germany!" he added.
	"Even so.  Mm, no."  Liza smiled and squeezed his arm a
little, feeling solid, smooth muscle under his sleeve.  "I'll call
you Blue," she said decisively.
	This time it was Wagner's turn to raise an eyebrow; then he
grinned, showing his pointy teeth again, and said agreeably, "As you
like."

	Utena Tenjou stood in the middle of the Babylon 6 detention
center, arms folded, surveying the specimen in cell 3 with a
thoughtful scowl.
	In good light, the resemblance was muted, especially now that
Ahmed Garcia was rumpled, unshaven, and baggy-eyed from lack of
sleep... but she could see why Juri and Shiori had both been startled
by his appearance in bad light and under confusing circumstances.  Had
it been her in their place?  Yeah.  She'd have done the same.
	Garcia, who had said nothing while she stood and looked him
over, finally turned his head and asked hoarsely, "Well?"
	"I'm not here to ask you anything," she told him curtly.  "I
just wanted to get a look at you.  It's been a while since I saw the
enemy so clearly."  She unfolded her arms and put her hands in her
pockets.  "Sometimes I like to reminds myself what I'm fighting for."
	Garcia chuckled bitterly.  "Posture all you want, flatline,"
he snarled.  "Your species is ending and mine is rising.  It's
evolution.  We'll see who has the last laugh."
	Utena nodded dismissively.  "Uh-huh.  You know, you're damned
lucky it was Juri that you caught, instead of me or my wife.  If it
had been Anthy, you'd be sitting in that cell right now in a puddle of
your own waste, begging the monsters in your head to leave you alone...  
and they never, ever would."
	Garcia looked unimpressed.  "And if it had been you?"  
	Utena regarded him with a look combining total sincerity with
an utter lack of humor.
	"Me?" she said.  She stepped a little closer to the forcefield
and looked him in the eye, and Ahmed Garcia believed her as she went on
matter-of-factly,
	"I'd have killed you where you stood."
	Garcia looked back, his throat suddenly tight, and no words
came to him.  A moment later, he looked sharply away, feeling anger
and shame at giving up even this petty victory, even in his already
total defeat.
	She was only a teenage girl.  She was only a -normal-.  She
had no weapon, she hadn't raised her voice, she hadn't even made a
direct threat.  She was on the other side of a -forcefield-...
	... and he was afraid of her.
	He curled up on the cell's narrow bunk, elbows on knees, and
refused to look at her, his face screwed up into a look of such
petulance that Utena almost laughed.
	Almost.
	Instead, she turned without another word and left the brig.
	In the corridor, she met Gryphon coming the other way.  Seeing
her, he smiled, which helped to pull her own mood out of the dark
place seeing Garcia had sent it to.
	"Utena, hey," he said.  "I was just looking for you."
	"What for?" she asked.
	Gryphon looked mildly wounded as he fell into step beside her.
"Am I allowed to just want to see you?"
	Utena chuckled ruefully.  "Sorry," she said.  "I'm just a
little... edgy."
	Gryphon nodded.  "I heard about Garcia's unfortunate resemblance 
from Shiori," he said.  "We found out how the strike team got on board
the Valiant, by the way.  It won't happen again."
	"That's good to hear," Utena said, brightening.
	"Vision's working up a new set of security protocols for the
fleet," he went on.  "And I think it would be a good idea to send out
a dedicated information systems officer with you from now on."
	"Mm, yeah, that probably would be a good idea," she concurred.
"Got anyone in mind?"
	"I thought I'd ask T'Vek if she minded a few weeks in the
field," he said.  "And Shiori's got real talent in that area.  With
some proper training in starship security to go with her base skills,
she'd be good for next year.  I haven't talked to her about that yet,
though.  Don't know if she'd be interested."
	Utena laughed.  "Are you kidding?  She lives for that kind of
thing now.  She'd be all over that."
	"Well, next time I see her, I'll ask her about it, then," he
said, "and if she and T'Vek hit it off, T'Vek can train her."
	"Sounds good."  Utena paused pensively for a moment, then said
in a different tone, "Listen... there's something about all this
that's got me confused."
	"What's that?" Gryphon asked.
	"Why are we letting the Psi Corps get away with this?"
	"By letting them get away with it, I assume you mean why
aren't we telling the galaxy about Black Omega."
	Utena nodded.  "Exactly.  We've got everything we need to go
public with it.  We took three of them alive, captured a bunch of
their equipment, Shiori has all the records from their Tau Ceti
databank, Sunderland can confirm that the outfit is an open secret
within the Corps... so why aren't we blowing the lid off?"
	Gryphon nodded.  "I should have called a meeting with you guys
and explained it instead of just asking you to keep quiet, but I've
been so damn busy I haven't had time to chase you all down.  The
reason we're not going public about Black Omega is simple - I'm afraid
public knowledge of a secret Psi Corps strike force, exceeding even
the overly-generous public mandate of the Corps, would destroy the
Federation, and we're not ready for that to happen."
	Utena thought about that as they entered an elevator.  "You
think if some of our anti-Corps allies found out about it, they'd
demand that the Federation Council shut it down," she said.  "And
they wouldn't, so our allies would secede, and... "  She made an
expanding gesture.  "Boom."
	Gryphon chuckled.  "Very -big- boom," he confirmed.  "Things
are very tense in the Federation Assembly right now as it is, with the
Tau Ceti breakaway and all.  The provisional government is dealing
with the Feds, and the permanent government will probably apply to
re-join separate from the Earth Alliance, but all the same, it's a
sticky situation."
	He smiled darkly.  "Don't think that's the end of it, though.
Your team's work has given me - and Zoner - a powerful weapon to keep
in reserve, and Earthgov knows it.  They don't want the Federation to
fall apart any more than we do, at the moment, and it would probably
hurt them more than it would hurt us."  He sighed, leaning back
against the elevator wall with his hands in his pants pockets.
	"It's like playing chess in the dark," he complained.  "You
can't see your opponent's pieces, you can't even see your -own- pieces
most of the time, but you keep playing anyway.  Zoner's better at this
part than I am - he could probably explain it to you better."
	Utena, remembering MegaZone's tendency to be impenetrably
cryptic, laughed.  "I doubt it," she said.  "Anyway, at least we'll be
on our guard now.  They won't be able to pull the same trick twice."
	The elevator stopped and the two emerged into another corridor
which looked much like the one they'd left.  "I can't help but be
nervous about Earthgov's acquiescence in the Tau Ceti matter," mused
Gryphon as they walked.  "Part of it, I'm sure, is to do with the fact
that they know we can blow Black Omega... but I have the creepy
feeling that they're planning some other kind of reprisal."
	"Well, we'll have to keep an eye out," Utena said.  "Same as
always."
	Gryphon nodded.  "Yep."
	"Corwin tells me repairs are coming OK," Utena offered after a
few seconds of silence.
	"Oh, good.  I haven't talked to him yet either.  Say - are you
free for lunch?"
	"Sure," Utena replied.
	"Good.  Not only have I not seen you much lately," he said
with a grin, "I still need to talk to you about - "
	As they rounded a corner, heading toward the Zocalo, he
stopped, not because he'd decided not to tell her what he needed to
talk to her about, but because they met Kei Morgan coming the other
way.
	"You're off?" Gryphon asked after greeting her with a kiss.
	"I must be off to have taken this mission," Kei replied
wryly.  "Yeah, the team's loading up now.  Hey, Utena," she added,
giving the younger woman a hug.  "Nice work on Tau Ceti, even if you
did disappoint some people by pulling it off so slick.  We had half
the Experts ready to jump in if Earthforce invaded."
	"That's good to know," Utena said with a laugh.  "We were
pretty tense for a while there, waiting for the other shoe to drop."
	"Well, you didn't look it," said Kei.  "I saw the signing on
TV.  You carried it - better'n I would have," she added with a wry
grin.  "Everything about you at that press conference said that the
IPO means business."
	Before Utena could respond, Kei looked mildly annoyed and
raised her fingertips to her ear.  "OK, OK, jeez," she muttered.
"I'll be there in 5, John.  Saying so long to my family - you know,
those groups of other people some folks surround themselves with?
Uh-huh.  Out."
	She sighed, rolling her eyes.  "Mr. Schedule doesn't like
to be kept waiting," she grumbled.  "Bitch, bitch, bitch.  I only
agreed to go out there as a courtesy anyway, and because I'm curious."
	"Where are you going?" Utena wondered.
	"Planet out on the Rim," Kei replied.  "3WA thinks it might
have something to do with all the weird shit that's been going on out
there lately.  They asked for an Expert to come along, so I'm going
for old times' sake.  When are you guys leaving?"
	"Tuesday, I think," Utena replied.  "Assuming Corwin gets our
repairs done on time.  Kate's got a show here tonight, one for the
summer session kids at DSM tomorrow, and one in Bajor City on Monday."
	"Damn," said Kei.  "I'm not gonna be back until Friday.  Oh,
well, I'll catch 'em in New Avalon.  Look, say hi to Kate and the rest
for me, willya?"
	Utena smiled.  "Sure.  See you when you get back."
	Kei hugged her again, then did the same to Gryphon and added
the kind of kiss that reminded Utena (with a slight blush) that the
"young" couple saying goodbye in front of her had -been- a couple
since years that started with 19.
	"Behave yourself," Kei said, her forehead to his, one hand on
the back of his neck.  "Bea said she might stop by, middle of next
week, so you don't get too lonely," she added with a grin.
	Gryphon chuckled.  "You be careful."
	"Bah," said Kei, waving dismissively as she stepped away from
him.  "There's nothing out there.  That stupid computer Goulet bought
to 'improve' mission assignments is a piece of crap.  See you Friday."
	She took a couple of steps away, and as she did so, Utena
suddenly had the strangest feeling.  It struck her, abruptly and for
no reason, that Kei's breezy good cheer, which was the mood she almost
always presented in public, was -forced-.  She had no idea why she
might feel that way, and Gryphon - who surely knew his wife's moods
much better than Utena did - didn't seem to feel that way... 
	I must still be rattled from talking with that slime Garcia,
she told herself.
	All that took the time Kei required to take three steps away;
then she stopped, turned, retraced her steps, put a hand on Gryphon's
shoulder, and said to Utena with a smile,
	"Listen, you're in charge of this guy while I'm gone, OK?
Make sure he doesn't get in with the wrong crowd."  She winked.  "You
know how easily led he can be."
	Utena laughed, the strange feeling disappearing.  "I'll do my
best," she promised, nodding.
	"OK, now I -really- have to run," Kei said, kissing Gryphon
one last time.  "I gotta get down there before Lieutenant Morden calls
Security to track me down.  If the transport was a car he'd be revving
it and honking the horn."  She broke away, trotted off, turned back to
wave, and then disappeared around a corner, leaving her husband and
Utena waving goodbye.
	"... So," Utena said.  "What else did you need to talk to me
about?"

	Aaron Ajlond-Mui was deep in thought as he watched the crowds.
His attention, however, was not directed toward the tourists or the
other inhabitants of Babylon 6.  Rather, his ruminations were of a far
more immediate and personal nature.
	He was considering his performance on the last mission, and by
his standards, he had done an abysmal job.  Granted, nobody had died,
but the circumstances could have been easily avoided... if someone had
decided to trust him.
	This left him with two options.  First, he could resign his
post for the remainder of the Valiant's tour and arrange for a
replacement.  This would unfortunately impact the crew's morale, but
it would serve them better to have someone they could obviously count
on in the position.  The second option would be to... re-evaluate his
methodology.
	Aaron surrendered things neither arbitrarily nor easily.  He
was not a quitter.  This was all the more paradoxical because he had
an annoying tendency to take a laissez-faire attitude toward matters
other than medicine.  Thus, while the first option was feasible, it
left a bad taste in his mouth.
	Re-evaluating his methods, on the other hand, would be
difficult.  He had spent the vast majority of his career, and indeed,
his life, fine-tuning what he believed was an efficient, yet
compassionate approach to medicine.
	He sighed, and hung his head.  He wished that Memory was
there.  She was one of the few people outside of family that he'd
grown fond of; but she was currently in New Avalon, helping with the
Robocop 2.0 project.
	His ruminations were interrupted by a gentle tap on his
shoulder.  Given that Aaron had excellent hearing, it was no small
feat to sneak up on him.  Looking up, he was somewhat surprised to see
the green-jacketed figure of his father, Pearson "Doc" Mui.
	"Hey, kiddo," Doc greeted him.  "How's it going?"
	"Father," Aaron returned with a cordial nod.
	This, of course, elicited an exasperated sigh and a rolling of
eyes from the elder doctor.  Doc could deal with "Dad," "Dadoo,"
"Poppa," and under certain circumstances, "Pop," as appropriate titles
for his paternal status, but "Father" never failed to get his goat.
What was more annoying was that Aaron derived no malicious pleasure
whatsoever from the reaction.
	"Are you, by chance, taking Prozium?" Doc joked.
	"I haven't used that particular treatment in decades," Aaron
replied mildly.  "What brings you to Babylon 6?"
	"I just had a feeling that I should be here.  Damned if I can
figure out why, though."  Doc rubbed his chin in frustration.  "I know
it's important, but...well, it'll probably come to me in time."
	"Where's Mother?"
	"Shopping.  She'll be done in, oh, three hours or so."  Doc
winced for effect.
	"I don't suppose that you'll need an extra hand?"  Aaron
offered.
	"Always, kiddo.  First things first, though.  You look like a
man who needs to talk to somebody."
	"Father, it's really nothing - "  Aaron stopped short as Doc's
eyes drilled right through him.
	"Don't give me that," Doc said softly.  "I can tell in your
eyes that you're wrestling with something.  Seeing as how you almost
never doubt yourself, it's gotta be something important.  I'm gonna
buy you a drink."  he concluded.
	"Father, I don't indulge - "
	Again, Doc cut him off.  "Neither do I.  Therefore, I'll be
keeping it to soft drinks.  In any case, you can talk to me about it,
or you can wait three hours and I'll have your Mother wear you down."
	Aaron sighed.  "You don't fight fair, Father."
	"You kidding?  Compared to your Uncle Techie, I'm a Boy
Scout."  Doc grinned as he led his son to a local watering hole.

			TUESDAY, JULY 14, 2409
			       11:23 AM
		      IPS VALIANT, AT BABYLON 6

	Three days and three good, solid shows later, the Art of Noise
joined the rest of the Valiant's company in the lunchroom for the
usual pre-launch briefing-slash-pep-talk Utena liked to give whenever
the ship left an IPO port.  The repairs and cleanup were complete and
the Valiant gleamed like new from stem to stern.  At a glance, it
looked like all the dirt and wear had been transferred directly from
the ship to its two engineers, Corwin Ravenhair and B'Elanna Torres,
but they looked triumphant, if weary.
	"OK, everybody, this one's going to be short," Utena said
briskly.  "Repairs are complete and we're back in business.  We
managed not to lose anyone in our last adventure, for which the Widows
and Orphans fund is grateful.  And we've got a new person joining the
crew by order of the Chief."
	Kanna Kirishima, acting as chief of security on this
particular cruise, looked startled.  "Hey, you're not saying he - "
she began, but Utena cut her off with a nod.
	"You'll all remember Carmela Sunderland, I imagine," she said
wryly.  "She's been assigned to us for the rest of this cruise as an
engineering assistant third class, which basically means she'll be
handing Corwin and B'Elanna a lot of wrenches."
	Utena turned to Anne Cross, Kaitlyn's junior kenjutsu student,
and said, "We've given her the empty at the end of the hall, Juni.
Try not to shoot her unless she really needs it, OK?  Dad wants to see
if she can get along and play well with others before he lets her into
the sandbox full-time."
	Anne (sometimes known to her friends as Juniper) looked
somewhere between bemused and concerned, searched momentarily for
words, and then said slowly, "... I will try to be worthy of your
faith in my ability to not go com-PLETE-ly batshit at the thought of
spending another six weeks in the company of a Psi Cop, Captain."
	"Now, now," said Wakaba Shinohara, raising an admonishing
finger.  "Ex-Psi Cop!  You should be able to adapt.  After all,
Saionji's an ex-total asshole, and you get along with him all right."
	"(Oh, thank you,)" murmured Kyouichi Saionji, who happened to
be Wakaba's boyfriend.
	"Well, yeah," Anne allowed, "but Saionji was never a
total... you know... when I knew him, and you never get a second
chance to make a first impression, right?"  She sighed.  "I'll try not
to radiate mistrust -too- loudly in her direction, but if she goes
rummaging around in my head I'm going to... to... I don't know -what-
I'm going to do, and I don't want to find out either."
	"I'd recommend just shooting her," said Torres offhandedly.
"It'd be a lot less work for the atmospheric conditioning system than
setting her on fire."
	"Thank you, B'Elanna, that'll be all," said Utena.
	"I probably won't kill her," Anne said with a game grin.  "I'd
feel -really- weird about killing someone whose life I saved a week
ago."
	Utena chuckled.  "She's promised to be good; we'll see.  In
other news, Juri's got the tour rearranged, and would like to know if
we're ever going to have one which goes entirely according to plan.
She should know better - she went to Ohtori Academy - but some people
never learn."  She paused to let the laugh go around the room, then
said, "The next show is Thursday night at Jezebel.  You'll notice
Azalynn isn't here; she's hitching her ride over with Liza.  OK, gang -
end of briefing, let's go make things happen."

	They shoved off at a little past noon, heading out into the
wild black yonder.  The ship's company spent the afternoon settling
back into their places, having spend the repair time in guest quarters
on Babylon 6, and dinner that evening was a bit of a celebration for
having resumed their interrupted ramble around the galaxy.
	Early that evening, Utena stood outside one of the cabins in
officers' country and took a deep breath.  She wasn't exactly looking
forward to this little detail of being a captain.  The age discrepancy
didn't exactly help.
	On the other hand, she was in charge, and there were things
that she needed to say to her CMO.
	She touched the cabin buzzer.
	"Yes?"  Aaron's tinny voice inquired from the speaker.
	"It's Utena.  Do you have a few minutes?"
	There was a hesitation.  "Certainly."
	The door hissed open, and Utena was mildly surprised to see
Aaron looking a bit disheveled.  Running a hand through his shock of
dark hair, he smiled and gestured inside.  "Please, come in."
	The cabin was a rather small, plain affair.  She noticed that
the only distinguishing features were a largish suitcase and two
framed pictures.
	"Would you like to sit down?  Some tea, perhaps?"  he offered.
	She shook her head.  "No, thank you.  This won't take long."
	"I see," he said neutrally.
	She stifled a curse.  The man was not making it easy for her
to do this.
	"Dr. Ajlond-Mui... you are an excellent doctor," she began.
	He shrugged.  "I do what I can.  I do, however, sense a `but'
coming... and I don't mean what you sit on."
	Utena paused for a moment, thrown slightly off her stride.
Was that humor?  Or at least an attempt at it?  The guy was so
strange it was hard to -tell-.
	"Well, yes.  It's... it's the crew.  You may have noticed that
we're a little more... tightly-knit than most."
	"Captain, I would have to be blind, deaf, and mute not to
notice that," he joked, then sobered as he saw that Utena wasn't the
least bit reassured.
	".... right.  This isn't - I'm not punishing you for anything.
It's just that I really think we need to talk about you... and the
crew."
	Aaron raised an eyebrow.  "Ah."
	"You're not a -bad- doctor.  In fact, you're one of the best
in the fleet, or the Chief wouldn't have sent you with us.  But I
really think - "
	"Captain," he interrupted her calmly.  "If you'll pardon me
for saying so, you don't need to talk to me about my relations, or
lack thereof, with the crew."
	She blinked.  "I don't?"
	He shook his head.  "As it turns out, my father and I had this
very same discussion recently in the Zocalo."
	"Oh," was her response, her train of thought derailed.
	"Are you sure that you won't have a seat?  This may take a few
minutes to explain."
	Somewhat confused, Utena sat down.
	"I'm sure you remember how Agent Hyatt nearly died.  The fact
is, I was rather despondent about the whole affair; despondent and
disillusioned."  He took a seat and sighed.  "As I'm sure you're
aware, one of the most important aspects of medicine is the trust
between doctor and patient.  It is something sacred, and not to be
taken lightly.
	"However," he went on, "Agent Hyatt obviously did not feel
comfortable sharing her condition with anyone, not even someone who
was bound by oath not to reveal secrets.  Because she believed she had
nobody to confide in, because I obviously did not engender trust, she
very nearly died."
	"It wasn't your fault," Utena told him.
	"If she -had- died, would I still be blameless?  I think not."
He ran his hand through his hair again.  "I've spent years - no,
decades studying just about every form of medicine I could find,
finding the right balance between caring and professional detachment.
All those years of practice and experience... and someone nearly died
because she didn't trust me with her life."
	He fixed Utena with a tired look.  "Truthfully, I had
seriously considered resigning my post."
	Utena couldn't quite suppress the flash of anger and
disappointment she felt at that.  She'd never figured him for someone
who gave up so easily.  But then - 
	"`Had?'" she asked.  "Why didn't you?"
	"It was at that point that my father tapped me on the shoulder
and proceeded to strongarm me into a local drinking establishment,"
Aaron explained.  "We both abstained from alcohol, of course, but we
certainly needed to talk."
	He sighed, breaking up the eerily Vulcanesque aspect his
stilted speech pattern tended to give him.  "Good Lord, we haven't
talked to each other like that in years.  He told me about what he
believed medicine should be.  It was then that I realized both the
hubris and the arrogance in my methods.  I was a textbook doctor, but
not all lessons come from textbooks."
	Utena absorbed this for a moment.  "So... what now?" she
asked.
	"Now?  Well, if you'll still have me as your CMO, I'll do my
best to be a bit more... involved.  I won't guarantee immediate
results; after all, a 300-year-old mindset is difficult to break.  I
will, however, do my best.  If you'll still have me, of course."
	Utena couldn't help but smile.  The openness and earnestness
he'd exhibited... -that- was what she wanted out of her CMO.

		       WEDNESDAY, JULY 15, 2409
			       3:02 AM
			      BABYLON 6

        John "Truss" Trussell scowled at his monitor.  There wasn't
anything wrong with it; it was a Panasony P-Metal Series 44, a nice,
mid-range, twenty-inch plasmachrome panel, in perfect working order.
Nevertheless, he scowled.
	Scowled, and fiddled with a pen, clicking its point in and
out, in and out, flipping it around in his fingers, tapping it against
his desk.
	Scowled, and fiddled, and bounced one heel up and down,
tap-tap-tapping rhythmically against the plastic anti-static panel
that covered the floor under his desk and chair.
	Scowled, and fiddled, and bounced, and periodically went "hmm"
or "rr" or "hmph" under his breath.
        All of which, except possibly the scowling, Nanami Jinnai
found exceedingly annoying.  It hadn't bothered her at first, but that
was largely because it had slowly escalated over the course of the
last ten minutes or so.  First the scowling, then the "hmm"ing, then
the bouncing, then the fiddling.  Next he'd start squeaking his chair,
or, if whatever problem he was up against this time particularly vexed
him, muttering to himself.
        Before he could get to that point, his partner took action.
        "John," she said.
        He didn't hear her.
        "John," she said, slightly louder.
        Again there was no response.  A moment later he began, on the
counterbeat of every heel-bounce, moving his chair ever so slightly
back and forth on its swivel, making it squeak softly in syncopation
with the tap of his heel on the floor.
        "John, I went to the doctor this morning," said Nanami,
"and he gave me some bad news."
        "(god dammit, what the hell?)" Trussell muttered, still
bouncing, fiddling and squeaking.  "(you were working a minute ago.
all i changed was the color code, why did that break -you-?)"
        "John, I'm going to have your baby," said Nanami, who, being
possessed of much better sense than to get into any such predicament
with the best years of her broadcasting career still ahead of her, was
going to do no such thing.
        "(i don't get it,)" Trussell didn't reply.  "(i just don't get
it.  wait... ah.  no.  what the -hell-?)"
        "John, my father knows about us.  My doctor told him."
        "(this was -working- a second ago!)"
        "John!  My father is coming over here with a shotgun!"
        Trussell stopped scowling, muttering, bouncing, fiddling and
squeaking, quarter-turned left to face her desk at the end of the
small room that served as the Babylon 6 bureau for both Network 23 and
Big Time TV, and said, "Sorry?  Did you say something, Nanami?"
        Nanami sighed, blew her honey-blonde bangs up away from her
eyes, and said, "No, John, I didn't say anything.  Could you pick
a nervous habit and stick with it, please?  I can handle one at a
time, but when you start making combos I can't take it any more."
        Truss grinned sheepishly.  "Sorry... what was I doing?"
        "You were fiddling, bouncing, squeaking, and muttering."
        "Sorry."  Truss got up from his chair, crossed the three steps
to the mini-fridge at the other side of the office, and took out the
day's fourth Diet Hassy.  "It's just that there's a bug in this stupid
script someplace," he went on as he returned to his seat.  "Every time
I set the background color to anything but ACACAC, the 'check out'
button disappears."
        "And that's bad, right?"
        "It is if Reg ever wants anybody to actually -buy- anything
from Big Time Online.  No 'check out' button, no database transaction,
no credit transfer... no sale."
        Nanami nodded her "right, that's bad" nod and went back to the
copy she was trying to write.  It wouldn't do to pester Truss too
much; after all, he -was- doing her boss's website work on his own
time, for free.
	A moment later, Truss started squeaking again.
        Nanami sighed, yawned, and considered giving up on the
detailed Tau Ceti post-mortem for now, in favor of just going to
sleep.  It -was- three in the freaking morning, after all.
	Before she could declare her intent to turn in, however, the
telephone on her desk rang, and she was all business again as she
scooped the instrument up.
	"Big Time News, Jinnai," she said crisply.  "Yeah.  Uh-huh.
... WHAT?"
	Truss dropped his pen and swiveled as Nanami's normally mellow
voice curved up into an outright squeak.

				 3:07 AM
		   IPS VALIANT, EN ROUTE TO JEZEBEL

	On this particular evening, Kaitlyn Hutchins was sleeping
alone, except for her pet tiger Sergei.  There was no special reason
for this.  Sometimes she and her lover slept together, and sometimes
they didn't, and tonight happened to be one of the nights when they
didn't.  Kate had been up fairly late reading a book she'd borrowed
from Yomiko, anyway.
	She awoke at the first ring of her door chime, wasn't sure
she'd heard it, and waited for it to ring again.  Then she sat up,
switched on the dim nightlight built into the bulkhead at the head of
her bunk, found her glasses on the bedside stand, and said, "Y-y-yes?"
	The door hissed open, and it took Kate only a moment to
identify the figure in the doorway, silhouetted by the low night-shift
lights of the corridor, by shape.
	"Juri?" she murmured, still trying to get her brain in gear.
In a crisis - if attacked, for instance - Kate could spring from bed
in an instant, sword in hand, defending herself as befit a master of
kenjutsu; but that was mostly her body working on its own, and it took
her brain a little while to catch up.
	"What is it?" Kate asked as Juri advanced into the room.
The door closed behind her, cutting off the corridor light, and then
Kate could see her face in the nightlight's glow - her expression
blank and somber.
	Juri sat down on the edge of the bed, one of her slim hands
toying with Serge's ears out of sheer habit.  "I... just got a call
from Luornu Durgo," she said, her voice restrained in a way different
from Juri's usual calm reserve.  "Something... something went wrong
with your mother's mission to the Rim.  Lu isn't sure exactly what -
your father's out there right now - but... the transport was
destroyed."
	Juri took Kate's hands as Kate blinked uncomprehendingly at
her.  She bowed her head for a moment before meeting Kate's eyes and
saying, "They can't find anyone from the expedition."
	Kate stared at her lover in dismay.
	"Some kind of problem in transit?" she asked in a small,
unbelieving voice, but Juri shook her head, her green eyes closed.
	"The transport reached its destination," she said.  "Luornu
said the pilot called in that they were down and ready to disembark,
and then... they lost the signal.  Your father rounded up anyone he
could find and got out there as fast as he could go, but by the time
they got there... "  She shook her head.  "They're still putting the
pieces together.  Gryphon is still out there, but Lu said he was
heading back to New Avalon... "  She opened her eyes, which glinted
wetly in the dim light, and gave her lover an uncharacteristically
helpless look.
	"I don't really know what's going on yet," she said quietly.
"I just... it looks like Kei might be... gone."
	"B-but... " Kate murmured, her stutter - normally conquered
when speaking to Juri, as of recently - returning.  "... she's a
L-L-Lensman."
	Juri nodded.  "I know," she said.  "She's... they've tried
that.  -I've- tried it myself."
	"And g-got n-n-nothing?"
	Juri gave her a somber, helpless look and shook her head.
	Kaitlyn looked back at her lover for a moment, her face
entirely blank.  Her lower lip trembled slightly, but that was the
only visible sign of emotion.  Only after several seconds did she
speak, her voice flat and low, almost inaudible.
	"we... have to go... to dad."
	"Utena took us into metaspace as soon as we got the word,"
Juri said.  "We'll be in New Avalon in an hour or two.  We might beat
him there."
	Kate nodded, looking down and murmuring, as if to herself,
"good, that's good."
	Then she met Juri's eyes again, and for a second, it looked
like she was going to make it through... 
	... but then her face crumpled, and she tore off her glasses,
threw her arms around Juri, buried her face in the redhead's chest and
-wailed-.
	Juri wrapped Kate in her arms, stroked her back, and absorbed
her cries.  Over Kate's shuddering shoulder, her own face was upturned
in pain, silent tears running down her cheeks from tight-closed eyes.

	The word spread around the ship fast - on a ship as small as
the Valiant, it couldn't help but do so, even in the middle of the
night.  People rousted each other out of bed, sent pages to each
other's cabin dataterms, and exchanged expressions of shock, sadness,
and disbelief.
	Janice Barlow was a case in point.  She should probably have
been sleeping, but instead she was wearing a gloves-and-goggles
semi-neuro virtual-interface set and playing an immensely popular
multiplayer VR game that happened to be set on her homeworld.  She had
never quite been sure -why- a game about the Early Colony Period of
her homeworld should rejoice in the name 'Dreaming Moon Online', given
that Ragol didn't even -have- a moon, but, she reflected, that was
probably why she wasn't the head of marketing for SegAtari.
	At any rate, Ragol hadn't really changed that much since the
Early Colony Period, so roaming around the simulated 21st-century
Ragol and blasting obstreperous monsters with Photon (as the local
dialect insisted on calling Getter rays) weaponry was kind of like
going home on vacation, except without the risk of running into a
family member and having to have an awkward conversation.
	She was just on her way to the Hunters' Guild headquarters to
see if one of the technologists there could tell her if she had, in
fact, just found a Magnarok when someone appeared in front of her.
The appearance was abrupt and silent, without the usual flashy
transport effect that means someone has just joined the game, and
anyway, this wasn't a designated entry point - someone had just hacked
into the game world, which was a reasonably impressive achivement.
	A moment later, she realized she knew who that someone was,
unless the person in front of her had hijacked that icon, which
wasn't overly likely.
	"Shiori," Janice said with a mixture of civility and
surprise.
	"Hi, Janice," Shiori Takatsuki replied.  "Listen, I hate to
crash in on your game like this, but nobody's answering your door."
	"Oh," said Janice, then chuckled.  "I'm all wired up and
Neal's probably asleep.  What's up?"
	In the real world, Janice's body sat completely still for
about a minute.
	Then, with a muttered "... shit!" she came to life, yanking
off her interface visor and unplugging the leads from her gloves.
Taking the gloves themselves off would take too long; she ignored them
as she turned, plunged across the room, and joggled her recently-
acquired roommate by the shoulder.
	"Neal," she said urgently, and when that failed to rouse the
big Niogan, she all but yelled at him, "NEAL!  Wake UP!"
	Neal Krummell did as he was told, blinking blearily at his
redheaded girlfriend's distressed face.  "... uh?  What?" he asked.
"What is it?"
	"Shiori just hacked into DMO to tell me," Janice replied, the
words almost stumbling over each other in their haste to get out.
"Something went wrong on that 3WA mission to the Rim.  They think
Kei's dead or something."
	Neal kept on with the bleary look for a short while longer.
"... What?  No fucking way," he declared after a few seconds.  He gave
her a dry scowl and made to roll over and go back to sleep.  "Next
time try something plausible.  Like Dorothy quit the band and Doctor
Doom is her replacement, maybe."
	Janice grabbed his shoulder and flipped him onto his back
again.  "You dumb shit, I'm fucking serious!" she barked.  "Something
took out the transport as they were touching down, blew it all to
fuck.  Shiori said they've only found pieces of most of the team."
	It seemed to sink into Krummell's skull that she -was-, in
fact, serious; the wild look in her one organic eye and the tears
gathering at the corners of both were good tip-offs.
	"Wait a minute," he said, "you're not kidding - Kei MORGAN?
Got KILLED?"
	"They're not sure, I guess, but... "  Janice trailed off, her
powergloved hands working at the bedspread.  "Like I said, the
transport's blown all to hell and... none of the Lensmen can raise
her."
	Krummell stared at her, then regarded the dull glow of his own
Lens for a few moments.
	"Holy shit," he murmured, sounding far away.  He seemed to
like the way that summed the matter up, or maybe he just couldn't
think of anything better, because after a moment, he said it again,
louder.  "Holy SHIT."

	In a different part of the ship's crew accommodation area,
Gunnr Brynjelfr hung up her bunkside telephone and said much the same
thing, except in Alvish, so it sounded much more elegant and refined.
	Anne Cross, who was standing with a curious, concerned look in
the doorway of the shared bathroom that linked their two cabins,
asked quietly, "What's wrong?"

	Corwin Ravenhair was sitting up in his bunk in the little
stateroom next to the chief engineer's office, with his covers as
disarrayed as his hair, talking to a holographic representation of a
ravishing redhead with an extremely somber expression.
	"I... I can't even take it in, Vee," he said after a few
moments.  He raked his hands through his jagged black hair, shook his
head, and blew out a sighing breath.  "How are the girls taking it?"
	"We're all devastated," Vigdis Brightblade replied
unsteadily.  "Poor Gudrun can't stop crying."
	Next to Corwin, Kozue Kaoru - the ship's helmsman on the day
shift and Corwin's girlfriend when it suited her - looked mildly
puzzled.  "Gudrun can't... ?" she asked.
	"Oh," said Vigdis, looking sadder still.  "She's been in love
with Kei for years, ever since the Ragnarok.  It was one-sided, of
course, but Kei was awfully good to her about it, and that just made
Gudrun love her more.  She's inconsolable.  No doubt she'll go
drinking with Thor tonight, if she can but bring herself to leave the
Valkyries' Hall."
	"Wait a second," said Kozue, holding up a hand with a
thoughtful expression.  Then she hesitated.  "... OK... I don't want
to seem insensitive here, but... uh... look, if Kei was dead, wouldn't
you guys know it?  I mean, you're the Valkyrie."
	"We would know if she came to Valhalla," said Vigdis.
	"Oh, come on," Kozue protested.  "Where else is a woman like
that going to go?"
	"That... would depend on what killed her," Corwin said slowly.
 He turned to look her in the eyes and said, quietly and seriously,
"It's all... not as simple as that."
	"But we -haven't- seen her, and Teleute and Forseti haven't
either," Vigdis confirmed, "so... there -is- hope.  But I don't want
to give you too much of it.  She had... has... very powerful enemies.
Everyone who was at the Ragnarok has."
	"Powerful enough to interfere with the natural order of
death?" Kozue asked.
	"Yes," Corwin and Vigdis replied as one.
	"... wow," said Kozue softly.

/*  Thomas Dolby  "One of Our Submarines"  _The Golden Age of Wireless_  */

			   108 MORGAN LANE
	       CRESCENT HEIGHTS, NEW AVALON, ZETA CYGNI
			       3:08 AM

	Martin Rose stood alone in his bedroom, regarding his bed in
silence.
	He paused from that contemplation for a moment to raise his
left hand.  He considered the back of that hand for a long moment, and
the soft violet glow of the gemstone mounted there.  It gleamed just a
bit under his scrutiny, shimmering as if with anticipation.
	Yes, he'd considered making his own effort to call for Kei, to
see if this was all some sort of cruel hoax.  But the sheer absurdity
of that thought, and the deep undercurrent of worry - in some cases
near-panic - bleeding through the Lens network put the lie to that
almost instantly.
	Ordinarily it wasn't possible for anyone other than the
participants in a Lens conversation to tell that such a conversation
was even -happening-; such was the nature of the system, it had been
designed for ultra-secure communications.  But there was -so much-
activity out there right now, so much directed toward a single
apparently futile goal, that it was seeping into the awareness of
everyone who had a Lens.
	So Martin could tell that his voice would be just one more in
a chorus, a cacophony, of Kei's friends and acquaintances crying out
through the whatever-it-was for some glimmer of hope.  Had there been
any sort of response, any hint of a sign, it would have been joyously
and instantly relayed.
	Instead, all he could feel was the ongoing murmur, with the
occasional frantic outcry.
	He clenched the hand into a tight fist, let it fall to his
side, slipping under his cape, and returned his attention to where it
had been before.
	Eiko, his wife, continued to slumber as soundly as she ever
did.  She didn't wear her Lens in bed; the armbrace in which she'd
mounted it was comfortable enough when she was awake and moving about,
but not when she was trying to rest.  Thus she was spared the
unpleasant psionic wake-up call that had pulled Martin out of a dream
that had already fled his memory, but which left a faint nagging of
relevance and illness-at-ease.
	So she lay there, tossing occasionally, a faint mutter
escaping her throat every so often.  Even with no direct word of the
news, her own sleep seemed disquieted, as if she could feel the crisis
revolving around her dearest friend in her dreams.
	Martin sighed, torn once again by his quandary.  He knew he
should be the one to tell her what had happened - but in just a few
minutes he was leaving on the next jumpship headed out to the
Godforsaken planet where everything had gone so wrong, to look for
clues, hints, -anything- to indicate who had done this, and why, and
how.  And once he told her, he would definitely have to stay with her
for a good, long time, because she would absolutely need him.
	So much to do, so little time.
	He slipped soundlessly from the bedroom, making his way to the
house's control panel in the living room.  With a few quick taps he
ensured that neither the telephone nor the doorbell would disturb her
slumber.  He'd be back in a couple hours at the most, anyway, but
there was no sense in leaving this to chance.
	<All set, Lu,> he noted, clutching his left wrist in his right
hand and focusing through his Lens.
	<Acknowledged,> the Chief's assistant replied; he felt her
location in his mind and began concentrating on it.  But just before
he vanished, one final stray thought slipped across the link:
	<Dammit, I never told Kei I could do this.>

			 1275 STRANGE STREET
		  CLAREMONT, NEW AVALON, ZETA CYGNI
			       3:15 AM

	At the end of Strange Street, the aptly named narrow lane
which slices diagonally through the bohemian district of Claremont,
there is a peculiar feature, one of many peculiar features that dot
the city of New Avalon.  The street ends at the edge of Lake Daniels,
where a person would expect it to end, but the -land- does not.
Rather, the street ends at the border of an arrowhead-shaped park,
located on an excrescence jutting out into the lake.
	If the park is the head of the arrow, Strange Street is its
shaft and the side streets radiating off from Belkin Circle are its
fletching.  And right at the point of the arrowhead, almost in the
lake, stands a round stone tower, five stories tall with a crenelated
roof, like a gigantic chess rook.
	The park is a pleasant little triangle of green at the edge of
the lake, with a good view of the spires of downtown.  It reminds
people who know New York City, on Earth, of Battery Park at the
southern tip of Manhattan, except rather smaller.  It is, in fact,
private property, but its owner isn't too hung up about people
strolling or picnicking in his yard, and though tourists almost never
go there, residents of Claremont can often be seen lounging around its
green expanse during the day.
	At night, lacking streetlights, it's a different story.  At
night, Mignola Point is a rather forbidding place, its wind-gnarled
trees and spike-topped wrought-iron fencing standing stark against the
sky.  The nightglow of New Avalon didn't reach very far into the park,
and the shadows there always seemed sharper than in the rest of the
city.
	With all that and the crenelated bulk of the Rook standing
sentinel at the lakeside, the place was really rather... well,
-creepy- at night, and so not many people ventured into it, even
though the nearest building to it, standing at the end of Strange
Street proper, was the Little Sisters of Althena convent.
	The man who lived in the tower was just as unusual as his
living quarters, and had much the same imposing effect when
encountered in the dark.  He was in the dark right now, struggling up
through layers of unconsciousness to answer the ringing telephone next
to his bed with his left hand - always his left hand.
	"Urrrnnnngh," he said concisely, then managed to get the phone
handset to his head right end up.  "Hellboy."
	The phone murmured in his ear for a few minutes.
	"Uh-huh," he rumbled.  "Yeah.  ... What?  Are you shitting me?
... No.  Right.  Uh-huh.  Sure.  OK.  I'll be here.  Yeah, fine.  OK.
Bye."
	He hung up, turned, and sat for a moment on the edge of the
bed, silent, his faintly glowing yellow eyes regarding the darkness of
his bedroom impassively.
	Then he got up, opened the French doors, and went out onto the
balcony, his hooves clicking softly on the stones.  A chill wind raced
in across Lake Daniels, but he didn't care.  It took a lot more than
that to make a demon bred in the fire pits of Muspelheim feel cold.
	He stood there for a minute, looking out across the blackness
of the lake, his heavy-whiskered, lantern-jawed face inscrutable, his
eyes blank and yellow under the flat stumps of what should have been a
grand and wicked pair of horns.
	Then he sank to his knees, threw out his hands (the normal one
and the great, ponderous stone one), and -roared-, splitting the
silence of the Avalon night like a great wounded animal.  It went on
and on, like an air-raid siren, pouring from his massive lungs and
through his corded throat, a huge, awful, inhuman noise.
	After many seconds it abated, trailing off to near-silence
before ending with a stifled gasp like a sob.  He slumped, head bowed,
hands slack at his sides, the right one falling to the balcony with a
dull clacking thud of stone against stone.
	Lights flicked on in the houses bordering Mignola Point,
including the dormitory of the Little Sisters convent, whose windows
faced the lake.  So, too, a light flicked on behind Hellboy, its
yellow glow streaming through the open French doors to silhouette him
like some red-stone gargoyle just inside the balcony rail, if
gargoyles ever sat in seiza.
	A slim female form in a floor-length flowing black silk
nightdress emerged from the doors, her dress and her long blonde hair
blowing behind her in the wind.  She approached the kneeling demon
slowly but not timidly, then knelt down beside him and asked in a very
lightly accented voice,
	"Hellboy?  Are you all right?"
	"Yeah," he replied, his voice even hoarser than usual.  He
tried to soften it a little, but mostly failed as he added, "I'm fine,
Snowflake."
	The girl brushed some of her hair behind her ear to keep it
out of her face, then touched the side of his face, feeling wetness on
his cheek.  "What was that noise?" she asked.
	Hellboy paused for a long moment before replying gruffly,
"Something I learned from a Klingon mystic one time."  He raised his
stone right hand, clenched it into a massive fist, then let it thump
slackly to the balcony again.  "Warning Death," he went on, looking up
at the dark night sky, "that a warrior's coming."

			  775 ALLARD AVENUE
			NEW AVALON, ZETA CYGNI
			       05:17 AM

	New Avalon's sky was pink-streaked grey; dawn wasn't far off
when Kaitlyn beamed into the city.  She went not to the International
Police headquarters building, nor to her father's home in Crescent
Heights; both were mobbed with members of the press clamoring to find
out how the First Lensman "felt" about the apparent demise of his
longtime paramour.  Unsurprisingly, neither he nor his daughter felt
like dealing with -that-.
	Instead, she had arrived in a secluded courtyard behind a
Victorian mansion a short distance from downtown, in that nebulous
border zone between the Business District and Claremont.  She was
alone.  Several members of the Valiant's crew had offered to come with
her, but she had declined them all.  Some undefinable sense told her
that this was a thing she needed to do by herself.  Even Sergei had
stayed behind, to offer comfort to the others of the crew who had
known Kei.
	Kate felt very small and alone as she crossed the courtyard, a
pleasant brick-pathed expanse of grass and shrubs with a few stone
benches, to the back door of the building.  She climbed the steps and
pressed the brass button next to the door, and a few moments later the
door opened, revealing a tall woman in white.
	Kaitlyn knew Emma Frost only casually, to say hello to; she
was an industrialist, one of the New Avalon corporate scene's movers
and shakers, and Kate gathered that she had some connection to several
friends of hers, but they'd only met a handful of times and she didn't
see where they had anything much in common.  Kate knew her as a
breezy woman with a tendency toward inappropriate familiarity and an
affected English accent - kind of a snob, and rather irritating.
	Today, though, she was positively subdued, for a woman dressed
in white leather jeans and a lace blouse Kate could see her underwear
through.
	"Kaitlyn, dear," she said, and she seemed to mean it more than
usual.  Her face was sad, her blue eyes slightly reddened, but if
she'd actually shed tears she'd done a good job of cleaning up after
them.  "I'm so glad you could come.  Welcome."
	Kate was in no mood to be welcomed; she was having a hard
enough time holding things together without trading pleasantries with
practical strangers in vestibules.  She didn't mean to be curt, but
with her problems speaking, she couldn't really help coming off that
way anyway as she nodded once and asked,
	"W-w-w-where's my fff... ff... f-father?"
	Emma seemed to understand, at least enough that she wasn't
offended by the curtness.  She only nodded and said, "This way."
	She led Kate through the corridors of the mansion, up a flight
of stairs, around a corner, and into a large, high-ceilinged room
whose walls were lined with books.  Whatever wasn't covered in books
was dark paneling, and there were a number of overstuffed red leather
chairs scattered about, as well as some writing desks.  The floor was
dark hardwood with several expensive-looking Oriental rugs.  It was
the very picture of the library of a Victorian gentlemen's club.
	The people in the library sort of broke the metaphor, though.
They were much too scruffy to be members of such a club, and too few
of them fit the Victorian concept of a gentleman, either.  Three were
women, and one of the men was black.
	Kate recognized them all, though she knew some better than
others.  The white-skinned woman with the black spot around one eye
she had only a passing familiarity with - Beatrice Watanabe, Domino,
an Expert of Justice and one of her father's on-and-off lovers.
Luornu Durgo she knew well - only one of her tonight? - and the
worried-looking redhead was Jean Grey, of course, Gryphon's novice
kenjutsu student.  Kate had to search her mental files for a couple of
seconds to identify the tall black man in the Jedi robes - Mace Windu,
the Jedi Master her father had recruited to help him gather together
that splintered order of mystic warriors.
	They all looked battered and weary, their clothes rumpled and
even torn in a couple of spots, and they were all hovering silently
around an armchair in which sat the First Lensman.  Gryphon's form was
hunched and silent, his face hidden in his hands.  He didn't move; his
stillness was so perfect and awful that Kate could half-believe he had
-never- moved, -would- never move.
	As she took in this tableau, Kate's eyes fell on the billiard
table standing in the middle of the room, and she drew up short with a
sharp little gasp.
	Arranged on the green felt of the table were several jagged
fragments of golden metal, their battered, scorched surfaces covered
in barely visible angular tracery engraving, like circuit patterns.
The pieces were arranged in more or less the right relative positions,
close enough to show that they had once been part of a single object.
	Kaitlyn's blood ran still colder in her veins.  This was what
was left of the Cosmic Rod, her mother's mystic weapon - a device
forged by the hands of Skuld Ravenhair herself.  What in the universe
could do such a thing to a weapon made by the Goddess of Tomorrow, the
armorer of the Valkyrie themselves?
	Kate had no time to consider this.  With an effort, she pushed
it, the shock and horror of it, out of her conscious mind, cramming it
into the closet with all the -other- shock and horror of this night.
There would be time to indulge all that later.  Right now her father
needed her.
	Domino was sitting on the floor next to Gryphon's chair; as
she saw Kate approaching, she reached up and gently touched his arm.
	"She's here," she said softly.
	Slowly, Gryphon stirred.  He raised his face, and the pain in
his eyes as they met hers almost stunned Kaitlyn.  She'd only seen him
look anything like this upset once in her life, and that was when he'd
learned, years before, that she had been raped.
	He got up from the chair and came toward her with a shambling
gait totally unlike his usual easy stride, and all but fell into her
arms, crushing her against him with his own.  He said nothing, merely
held onto her as though he was afraid she would vanish like smoke if
he let go.
	The others discreetly excused themselves, so that when father
and daughter finally parted, they were alone.
	They went to one of the larger chairs, almost a couch, and sat
together, almost like they had when she was a little girl, Kate across
his lap with her arms around his neck and her feet hanging over one
arm of the chair, his arm around her waist.  For a long time, there
was silence.  Then Kate spoke, her voice even quieter and huskier than
normal.	
	"The others?" she asked, and he knew she meant her younger
siblings, the twins, Guy and Priss Morgan.
	"They're... dealing," Gryphon replied slowly.  "In their own
way.  Sylvie's with them, and... Domon and Rain."  He chuckled, though
the sound had little mirth - it was almost a dry scraping sound rather
than a laugh.  "They'll probably go out and break something."
	Kate nodded, mustering a weak chuckle herself.  "Probably,"
she agreed.  There were many others whose location and condition she
wondered about, but she was hardly about to ask her father for chapter
and verse on a long list of her mother's friends and acquaintances.
Kei Morgan had a -lot- of friends and acquaintances.
	"Skuld is in Asgard," Gryphon said abruptly, as if searching
for something to fill the silence with.  "She says she'll come as soon
as she can, but... there's probably nothing she can do."  He clenched
his fist and thumped it on the arm of the chair behind Kate's back,
then added in a soft, bleak voice, "There's nothing -anyone- can do."
	Kate wanted to know what happened, in more detail than she
already had, but she wasn't going to ask him, not now.  Instead she
just sat with him, held onto him.  The only thing she could do was be
there for him, as he'd been there for her in her time of greatest
need, while her thoughts ran in circles.
	Her mother was missing.  Lost on a mission.  Probably dead,
though nobody had been crass enough to say that out loud yet.
	Her mother.  It struck Kate with a shock like cold water down
her back that, thinking about it, she didn't really feel as though she
-knew- her mother very well.  They weren't terribly close.  Oh, she
loved Kei, and she knew Kei loved her, but... they weren't really
-friends-.  They got along with an easy sort of... well, it seemed
heartless to think of it as -indifference-, and that wasn't quite
accurate, either.
	The simple truth of the matter was that Kate was, and always
had been, her daddy's girl, and that was all there was to it.  Kei had
accepted that and not tried to compete.  She'd provided what was
needed, and that included the space that her eldest daughter had
always required.  If she hadn't given Kate as much attention as might
be expected from a mother to a firstborn child, that was only because
Kei recognized early on that it wasn't wanted.
	That kind of thing could have caused a major rift, the kind of
thing that led to slammed doors and lapses of speaking terms, but for
the remarkable inner peace and serenity Kei had brought back from the
Ragnarok.  The old Kei would have been infuriated that her daughter
apparently didn't want to be close pals and do all the things that
mothers and daughters did, hurt and jealous that Kate preferred the
company of her father - but after the Twilight of the Gods, she simply
accepted that it was in Kate's nature and not an expression of any ill
will.
	It had never really occurred to Kaitlyn before now how
valuable that was, and how grateful she was for it, and how remiss she
had been in expressing that gratitude to her mother.  When was the
last time she'd even told her she loved her?
	Something like shame welled up inside Kate as she considered
that, and she hung her head, tears rolling down her face.
	And her father demonstrated the rapport they had, the one
which could have unbalanced the family if not for Kei's quiet, knowing
peace, by patting the back of her head and saying softly,
	"It's OK, sweetheart.  She knows."
	That could have broken Kate down completely, but she knew that
if she let it, it would bring him down with her; so she marshaled her
strength, almost as if she were going into a swordfight, and thrust it
back.  She had to be strong right now, for her father.  Later, when he
didn't need her strength any more, she could let it go.  Later, in
private, in quiet... 
	"What will you do?" she asked him softly.
	"I don't know," he replied.  "Sakura called a little before
you got here and invited me out to Ishiyama if I wanted to get away
and think for a while.  They have that little cottage way at the
corner of the Shinguuji estate, you know.  She said I could stay there
for a while.  I might do it... but I don't know what to do about the
IPO in the meantime."
	Kate considered that, realized at once what he meant.  Yuri
Daniels was the Deputy Chief - Yuri, Kei's old 3WA partner, the only
person in the universe who had known her longer than Gryphon had.  She
had to be devastated too, and it would be the height of unfairness for
Gryphon to ask her to take on a burden -he- was laying down in order
to try to cope with Kei's loss.
	Though she'd resolved not to ask about everyone, this seemed
important enough to bend that vow a little, so Kate asked him if he
knew where Yuri was, and he nodded.
	"When I left, she was still out there," he said.  "Zoner got
there just as I was leaving, though, and he said he was going to try
and get her to leave with him.  She wasn't getting anything done,
just... you know.  Kicking over rocks, cursing, getting frantic.  I
couldn't do anything with her, not when my own guts felt like broken
glass... "  He sighed, a shivery, shuddery sigh.  "So that's her,
anyway.  I don't know where Larry is - probably with Priss and Sylv if
he's anywhere.  And Marty... Marty's still out there, like Yuri.  Or
he was when I left."
	Another factor Kate hadn't considered.  Martin Rose, the
grown-up she'd been closest to, after her father, as a child - he and
Kei were old, old friends as well.  Sometimes they even joked that
they were having an affair.  They weren't, of course - the Roses,
unlike Kate's parents, were strictly monogamous - but the joke
persisted, and she -had- seen her mother kiss him very occasionally,
when she managed to catch him and thought no one was looking.
	Sometimes it seemed to her as if Marty's life had been an
unending string of crushing blows.  Of course, anyone living to the
age that he and her parents and the others had attained would
automatically have been in for his fair share of hard knocks, but all
the same, there was just something about the way things had gone for
Martin Rose all his life that made a person wonder how many puppies he
had kicked in the previous one.
	She could see him there, on that distant and desolate world,
searching with a dogged persistence that made it seem as though he was
prepared to personally turn over every rock and look in every hole on
the planet for that missing clue.  It was the persistence that made
him such a great police detective... but this case wasn't like any
other he'd encountered, and all his determination would do was
frustrate him further.
	Kate hugged her father again and said nothing.  There was
no more to be said than there was to be done... and that was nothing
at all.
	Nothing.

	Kaitlyn returned to the Valiant late that day, grim and
determined and tightly controlled.  She went her her cabin, packed her
things, then got her band together in their studio on the Lido Deck
and told them, slowly but with apparent calm, that she was sorry, but
it didn't look like they were going to be able to finish the tour.
She intended to stay in New Avalon, at her father's side, until he was
ready to do whatever it was he was going to do, and if that was go to
Ishiyama, and he wanted her to go with him, she would go.
	She also told them, that being that case, they may as well go
home, and she didn't seem to notice, over the next couple of days,
that nobody did.  Some stayed with the Valiant; others went to the
house on Morgan Lane, occupying guest rooms and quietly staying out of
the way but keeping themselves nearby in case they were needed.

			FRIDAY, JULY 17, 2409
			       2:11 AM
			     IPS VALIANT
	      AVALON SPACEDOCK, ZETA CYGNI DYSON SPHERE

        In spite of her expectations four days earlier, dealing with
the Valiant's crew and company had proven to be a much easier thing
for Carmela Sunderland than she'd expected.
        On the other hand, that was because most of them were gone and
the rest were ignoring her entirely.  After the frantic dash back to
New Avalon and the subsequent dispersal of most of Kaitlyn Hutchins's
friends as they attempted to help console both her and her father,
Carmela had found herself almost completely forgotten.  B'Elanna
Torres, the half-Klingon engineer who seconded Corwin Ravenhair, had
been the sole exception - she had found her twice in the preceeding
two days to tell her that there was nothing she needed her for.
        Some of the Valiant's people were still spending their nights
on board, however.  Carmela knew for a fact that Anne Cross, the blip
who had saved her life, was still aboard - mainly because she was
radiating an intense frustration and unhappiness that was almost
impossible for Carmela to ignore and seemed rather stronger than
secondhand grief could explain.  Even at 2 in the morning, the girl
was still going strong.
        Finally, Carmela got out of bed, put on her bathrobe, and went
to see if she could help the girl lock it down.  She was supposed to
be making an effort in good faith to prove her worth to the IPO, after
all, and if Anne told her to get lost, well, she'd have at least made
an attempt.  And anyway, sleeping with full shields was about as
restful as dozing on watch.
        She padded down the hall to knock on the girl's door, and
realized that Anne wasn't in there.  She followed the emotional blast
wave down one deck and forward, and found the door to the dojo was
open.  Looking inside, she saw Anne moving through kata with her
bokuto, her face pouring sweat, and her expression set in a mask of
frustrated concentration.
        Carmela watched her for a little while in silence, until one
of the turns of Anne's kata turned her toward the door.
        "GYAH!" the girl gasped, staggering back and raising the
bokuto before lowering it slowly, panting.  "What do -you- want?" she
demanded angrily.
        "Some sleep would be nice," Carmela answered dryly, realizing
with a sense of vague, detached amusement that she was on the verge of
becoming the furious teenager's punching bag.  "But I'll settle for
you calming down enough that I stop dreaming your emotions."
        Anne turned away, her face suddenly a cold mask.  "I'll shut
the door to the dojo; that should block me.  I'm -only- a P3 after
all."
        "Given the level you're worked up to," Carmela observed
wearily, "I wouldn't be surprised if a little leaked out even then."
When Anne turned back to glare at her, she sighed.  "I -am- a P12, and
I was trained to pick up on things like this.  I'm not scanning you;
given the level you're broadcasting at, it's really not necessary."
        "If you close the door and go away," Anne snarled, "you won't
have to worry about scanning me.  I'm not -trying- to bother you."
But Carmela could feel the girl's radiated emotions shift to fear and
then begin gradually diminishing, probably as she struggled to calm
herself down in the face of a Psi Cop.
        Carmela sighed again.  I seem to be doomed to accomplish
nothing meaningful this week, she thought wearily.  "All right, but
you shouldn't be bringing emotions like that into a dojo anyway," she
observed, reaching for the door control.  "You're supposed to leave
them at the door, if I remember correctly."
        "Shut up!" Anne screamed, raising the bokuto again, her fury
boiling back up to rabid-animal levels.  "What do you know anyway?
You're not my sensei!"
        Well, -that- touched a nerve! Carmela thought nervously,
eyeing the bokuto.  "No, but I do - or did - fence competitively," she
answered, trying to sound calm.  "And undirected anxiety isn't much
use to anybody.  Unlike what you're probably thinking about doing to
me right now," she added, trying to smile and feeling it fail.  It
appeared that levity wasn't a useful tool in a situation like this.
        There was a long pause as the girl stared at her, anger
boiling within her, and then Anne slowly lowered her bokuto as her
fury drained away, leaving an aftertaste of weary misery.  "You're
right," she said finally.  "But would you -please- go away?  You...you
still make me -really- nervous."
        As the level of radiated unhappiness diminished to levels
where Carmela couldn't sense it without trying, she nodded slowly.
"All right."  And then she added, hoping quietly that she might get
through to the girl, "But if you want to talk..." she managed what
felt like a real smile from the inside, albeit a weak one, "I think I
probably feel about as useless as you do right now."
        Anne shook her head, turning away.  "No...you being here
reminds me that I'm not totally useless anymore.  Maybe you feel
worse.  I just... am not much use right now.  Please go away, and I'll
try not to be so damn loud."  She slowly sat down in seiza, resting
her bokuto across her knees, and appeared to begin meditating.
        ... I guess that's the best I can hope for tonight, Carmela
thought wearily, closed the dojo door, and turned to go back to bed.
	She was startled to see Gunnr Brynjelfr in the corridor,
leaning against the bulkhead with her arms crossed over her chest and
her head bowed, eyes closed.
	Gunnr opened her eyes when she knew Sunderland had noticed
her, looked steadily at her in silence for a few moments, and then
said in a low voice,
	"It was a good try."
	Sunderland blinked - she hadn't expected that - and then gave
a rueful, dry little laugh.
	"Not good enough," she replied.
	Gunnr shrugged slightly, levering herself away from the wall.
"The deck was stacked against you anyway, and the timing -stinks-,"
she said.  "It was still a good try.  Out of all of us, though, she
was probably the worst one of us to try to connect with, especially
right now."
	"It surprises me that she's so upset," Carmela admitted as
they walked to the companionway leading back up to the residence
deck.  "Was she particularly close to Lensman Morgan?"
	"No," said Gunnr.  "I don't think they ever met.  It's not Kei
she's upset about, anyway.  I'd have thought that would be obvious to
a trained observer like you," the elven Valkryie added, just a touch
pointedly.
	"I'm not at my best," Sunderland replied, and then, coldly,
"Having one's life turned upside down by one's moral standing will do
that."
	Gunnr glanced sharply at her, then relaxed visibly, chuckling
a little darkly at herself.
	"You're right," she said.  "Sorry.  That was out of line.  I'm
upset myself.  I'm just a little better at handling it than Anne is."
She stopped at the door to her stateroom, then stood looking at
Carmela as if she wanted to say something else.
	Then she sighed and said, "Well, it was a good try, anyway.
Keep trying... this'll get better eventually."  She paused as if
searching for more words, then gave up, keyed the door open, went
inside, and shut it behind her.
	"I certainly hope so," Carmela observed glumly to the empty
corridor; then she turned and went back to her own room.

			      NEW AVALON
                               6:45 PM

        Fetchingly sprawled in her chair, slouched over her elbow at a
round eight-person table at Chet's Chow - an all-ages theme restaurant
franchise centered around that lovable GENOM icon, Chet the Safety
Trooper - Captain Utena Tenjou lazily used her straw to stir the ice
in her soda.  She wondered, not for the first time, when someone was
going to invent an off switch for the paparazzi, besides the good old
Mark One fist.
        'Captain, how do you feel,' indeed.  How the hell did they
-think- she'd feel?  Kaitlyn's Mom was like family - hell, she -was-
family, she and everyone around her, more and closer family than
Utena'd known for most of her young life.  How she -really- felt was
like decking the next person who tried to ask her that question.
        Then there were the other questions, each as maddening as the
first.  Like that one about the possibility of restructuring.  Not
likely, and not even her department.  Sure, the Red Lensman was
important and well-liked, but she was only one person.  The IPO
definitely wouldn't collapse in her absence.  And the Chief may not be
ready to continue day-to-day operations, but he'd also collected some
of the most competent and capable lieutenants in the galaxy who could
easily keep things humming in his stead.  Hell, if he weren't so damn
high-profile the press twits wouldn't even notice he was missing.
        There was so much more in her mind to silently rage against,
but instead she closed her clear blue eyes and released a deep sigh.
She knew none of them were the thing that was bothering her the most.
        "Hey, Utena!"
        The Valiant's captain looked up and smiled.  Her crew, or most
of the members she'd called for anyway, had finally arrived.
        "'Bout time you got here," she complained with a good-natured
smile.  "Too much longer and I really -would- be hungry."
        "You could have been a bit less cryptic in your invitation,"
Juri replied, settling gracefully into the seat chivalrously offered
by Miki, who then eased himself into the one right beside.
        "I've never been one to be suspicious about the possibility of
free food," Gunnr noted as she dropped into yet another, "but she's got
a point.  I get the feeling appetizers aren't the first thing on the
menu of your mind today."
        "Wow, Gunnr," Corwin noted, doing for Kozue what Miki had done
for Juri.  "That was downright poetic."
        "Thank you.  Warrior, poet - I'm a regular Renaissance elf."
        "I don't need a scrying glass," Anthy noted as she took
Corwin's second proffered chair, the one directly next to Utena, "to
tell what's on your mind, love."
        Anne, for her part, hopped into the seat between Gunnr and
Captain Tenjou, looking around the assembled.  "Kaitlyn-sensei's not
here," she observed.
        "Which is exactly what I need to talk to you all about," Utena
stated with a nod, confirming everyone's heretofore unspoken guess.
"I've been trying to keep an eye on her behavior lately, for what
little time I get to -see- her, and I need to know if it's just me."
        "No need to elaborate on that, if it's a cold reaction you
need," Miki opened, clicking his stopwatch without looking at it.
"Since her mother's disappearance, she's become rather..."
        "Sullen?" Kozue suggested.
        "Withdrawn?" Gunnr volunteered.
        "'Intense,' I think, is the best word," Miki completed.
        "Yeah," Anne sighed, her head sinking a bit between her
shoulders.  "She usually acts a lot different between when she's
teaching and the rest of the time, but these past couple days, it's
like she's in Dojo Mode all the time."
        "Driven," Juri nodded in agreement.  "But, unfortunately, not
driven toward us."
        "Unwilling to share her burden," Anthy opined.
        "But that's the way she is," Kozue pointed out.  "She's never
wanted to be a burden on anyone, especially not the people she cares
about."
        "Particularly not her father," Miki elaborated thoughtfully,
tapping his chin as he slipped the stopwatch into his shirt pocket.
"He's the one she's always been closest to... and come to that, she
probably feels that now, she's all he has."
        "Hardly fair to the rest of us," Corwin added, "but as the
firstborn, she likely sees taking care of him as her duty.  And she's
always been his favorite, that's no secret."
        Miki nodded.  "And as his self-appointed emotional support, I'm
certain she's keeping her own grief in check, for his sake."
        "She -has- been with him a lot," Gunnr said.  "I hear she only
goes back to the house to shower, change, maybe eat, and sleep."
        Juri folded her arms.  "I'm afraid even that isn't quite true,"
she muttered, barely audible.
        Utena and Anthy glanced at each other, and then turned to look
at Juri.
        "What do you mean?" Utena asked.
        Juri sighed, closing her eyes and brushing her hair away from
the corner of her forehead.  "I do understand," she elaborated, "that
Kaitlyn will need her space, and her own time, to deal with this.
But... Wednesday night, before going to bed, I stopped by her room to
see if... well, if she needed a shoulder to cry on, or perhaps something
more."
        She sat forward, leaning on her elbows, gazed meaningfully at
Utena, and continued:
        "She wasn't there."
        Anthy blinked.  "Are you sure she wasn't just not answering the
door?"
        "The door wasn't locked," Juri sighed.  "And I tried again last
night.  Again, she was gone."
        Corwin's brow furrowed.  "That -is- troubling.  Kate values her
sleep.  It's another trait she gets from Dad."
        Juri allowed a wry smile to play across her lips.  "So I'd
noticed."
        Anne, having quietly taken all this in, sat up straight again.
"Well, one thing's for sure - we can't let this go on much longer.  It's
not good for her.  But... how do we get her to stop?"
        "Which is the real problem," Utena noted.  "Who do we know that
she'd listen to?  Or who'd know what to -do- about it?  I'd say we've
established that nobody here feels up to taking her on."
        "Not her father," Miki advised.  "Kaitlyn may be taking her
protectiveness to an extreme, but she is right on that count - the man
has quite enough problems as it is."
        "Almost everyone else I'd've suggested is sitting here now,"
Utena sighed.  "Damn it."
        "And Saionji's out, too," Kozue grumbled, slouching back and
folding her arms.  "Where the hell is he, anyway?"
        "That's something I'd like to know," Utena replied.  "He -was-
invited here, but I never heard back from him."
        "Truth to tell, he's become just as elusive as Kaitlyn," Juri
mused.
        Kozue's lips twisted into a humorless smirk.  "Heh.  Bet
Wakaba's about ready to skin 'im alive."
        "Actually, she seems to have expected something like this,"
said Miki with a shrug.
        Anne slumped back down in her chair.  "So we're it."
        Anthy, who'd been sitting with a finger to her lips in deep
contemplation, looked up as a light dawned visibly behind her eyes.
"No," she said quietly, "that's not true."
        Utena gave her a sideways look.  "What?  I know you're not going
to suggest Kanna."
        In reply, Anthy just gave her that beatific smile.  "Have the
waiter bring one more chair," she told Utena with a pat on the shoulder.
"I'm going to make a phone call."
	As she got up and crossed the restaurant to the pay phones, a
waiter in the white and black armor of a White Legion scout trooper
appeared at Utena's elbow, almost startling her out of her seat as he
asked,
	"<chk> Are you guys all set to order?"

	They'd just finished up at Chet's when the call came in,
conveyed by a curiously formal Lu Durgo - would Captain Tenjou please
report to the Office of the Fleet Commander at her earliest convenience, 
a phrase Utena knew was a polite way of saying "right goddamn now".
She left the others at the N stop near the restaurant, she headed
intown while everyone else was outbound for Crescent Heights, and rode
downtown thinking over their plan, hoping it would work, and wondering
what this call was about.
	Headquarters wasn't exactly deserted, even at 8 o'clock on a
Friday night, but it wasn't exactly bustling either.  The lobby was
completely deserted, feeling cavernous and cold in its darkened Art
Deco emptiness, as Utena crossed it to the elevator.  The 39th floor,
Administration, -was- deserted at this hour, and the only light she
could see upon emerging from the elevator was the one shining into the
corridor through the window in the Chief's outer office door.
	She entered the outer office expecting to find Lu at her desk,
but she wasn't there; this room, as well, was empty.  Utena paused for
a second, unsure what to do, and then went into the inner office.
	When she entered, Gryphon looked up from a mass of scattered
forms that threatened to inundate his desk.  Utena had to exert
conscious will to keep herself from reacting visibly to his
appearance.  She'd seen him briefly the day after the Valiant first
arrived at New Avalon, and he'd looked about like you'd expect a man
in his position to look - not that good.  Now, though, he looked
positively -awful-, not only exhausted and careworn but perhaps
physically ill.
	He got up from his chair, probably intending to offer a hand,
but she rounded his desk and silently embraced him.  He took it
gratefully, wrapping her up in his arms and holding on for several
seconds, and then, still without saying anything, they separated and
he sat down behind his desk again.
	Utena took a seat in one of the chairs facing the desk and
waited.  The First Lensman looked at an uncharacteristic loss for
words.  He pushed papers around on his desk for a few seconds, as if
trying to look busy while he thought of what he'd intended to say.
Then he gave up, sat back with an explosive sigh, and said,
	"I'm sorry... I think I called you down here for nothing.  I
hadn't thought it through."
	Utena cocked her head inquisitively.  "Hadn't thought what
through?"
	Gryphon made an ineffectual gesture and shook his head.
"Never mind.  It's not... would have been an imposition.  Not
something I have any right to ask for."
	Utena leaned forward in her chair, elbows on knees, chin in
hands, and said, "I'll be the judge of that."
	He gave her a look that combined skepticism with helplessness,
and she sighed.  "Dad," she said, "I don't just call you that for a
joke, all right?  I hope you know that."
	His look changed to one of surprise.  He said nothing, and
Utena used the silence to gather her thoughts before continuing, "I
don't remember my real father.  Both my parents died when I was
little, and my earliest real memories are of what happened after
that.  Ever since you took me into your home... you've been that to
me.  So if there's something I can do to help you through this, I
wish you'd tell me what it is.  If it's too much, I'll tell you, but
it'd have to be a hell of a lot to be too much."
	"It -is- a hell of a lot," Gryphon said gravely.
	"Well, let's hear it," Utena replied.
	Gryphon sat and looked at her for a moment, then smiled
faintly, shook his head at himself, and said, "All right, I'll tell
you.  I'm going away for a while - going to take Sakura up on her
offer and spend some time on Ishiyama, getting myself back together.
Steve Rogers will be filling in for me while I'm gone, with Lu's
help."  He chuckled.  "She knows more about what goes on around here
than I do, anyway."
	"That's good to hear," Utena said, nodding.  "Where do I come
in?"
	"Steve's a master at special ground ops, investigations, and
so forth," Gryphon said, "and he'll do just fine in the Chief of
Operations role; but he doesn't know anything about starship ops.  I'm
going to need someone to step in and head up the Space Force while I'm
gone."  He smiled darkly and added, "I want that to be someone who
Earthdome has already learned to fear."
	Utena double-blinked at him, her face blank with surprise.
	"You mean... "
	Gryphon's smile changed from dark to rueful.  "I did, but
after I asked you to come down here, I realized it wasn't fair of me
to ask."  He shook his head, unsmiling now.  "You have your own life.
I'll find somebody else."
	"Hold it," said Utena, a spark in her voice now.  "Did you
think about maybe asking me if I -want- to do it?  Sure, I have other
plans, but plans can be changed."
	Gryphon gave her a thoughtful look.  "-Do- you want to do it?"
	"Damn right!" she replied immediately.
	"Are you sure?" he asked.  "Don't feel you have to do it; do
it because you want to."
	Utena gave him a deadly-serious look.  "The last thing I did
because I felt like I had to didn't work out real well," she pointed
out.  "I don't -use- that reason anymore."
	Gryphon regarded her determined face thoughtfully.  At moments
like this, he found it very easy to understand how his eldest son
could have found himself so completely in love with this young woman.
In another time and place, she'd have claimed the father just as
easily, just as completely, and just as accidentally...
	... but the way he felt right now, that would've been a very,
very long time ago indeed.
	He smiled tiredly.
	"OK," he said.  "You've got the job... Commodore."
	Utena reached across the desk to shake his hand on it, then
covered their clasped hands with her free one and turned the gesture
into a more personal thing, a sort of seated embrace.  Nothing else
needed to be said.
	After a few seconds they separated, sitting back.  Utena
looked around the darkened office and said, "Where's Kate?"
	"I sent her home," Gryphon replied, rubbing his eyes tiredly.
"I have to order her to go or she won't.  She's starting to worry me."
	You have no idea, Utena thought glumly, but she said nothing
except "Mm."  It wouldn't do to add that much more worry to the man's
life, especially after she'd just taken off one of his burdens; and
anyway, she hoped the evening's plans would sort that problem out
without involving him.
	"You ought to go get some rest yourself," she told him.
	"You're right," he agreed, wiping his hands down his face.
"The paperwork has completely stopped making sense.  Not that it ever
made all that much, but at one time the invididual symbols on the
sheets did have meanings."  He pushed a few things around.  "I'll just
tidy up a bit and then go.  I promise."
	Utena smiled.  "OK.  If you're not home by 9, I'll send
someone to get you."
	She left the office, still letting what had just happened sink
in.  Had she really just agreed to take over the Space Force in his
absence?  The WHOLE Space Force?!
	Halfway down the corridor, still lost in thought, she jumped
and squeaked as someone emerged from one of the side doors and touched
her elbow.
	"Sorry," said that person softly.  Utena recognized her
instantly, dropped the defensive posture she'd recoiled into, and
hugged the newcomer firmly.
	"Where did you come from?" Utena asked.
	Skuld smiled.  "The records office girl keeps an aquarium,"
she said.  "I was hoping to catch you before you left."
	"Your timing's perfect, as always," Utena said.  "I was just
on my way out.  Trying to get my head around my new promotion," she
added with a rueful grin.
	"I thought you might accept," Skuld said, nodding.
	"Accept, I practically had to force him to offer," Utena
said.  "He tried to get out of it, said he'd rethought it while I was
on my way up and decided it was too much of an imposition."
	"It is a big job."
	"I know," Utena replied, though she really had no idea how
big; but when had anything like that ever stopped her before?  "But if
I can step in for a few months and help, then I'm going to do it."
	"I figured your answer would be something like that," said
Skuld, her smile widening.  "I've had this feeling since Tau Ceti,
actually."
	"What feeling?"
	"The feeling," Skuld replied, "that the time was almost
here... and now it is."

	Utena returned to the Valiant at 9:15 in the evening, equal
parts disquieted and elated.  The mixture showed plainly on her face
as she entered the captain's stateroom.  Anthy glanced up from the
book she was reading, saw it, and marked her place before commenting,
	"I'm guessing, my love, that you've had a remarkably
interesting evening."
	Utena gave her a slightly wan smile.  "You... could say that,
yes."  She pushed back her right sleeve, examined what she found there
for a moment, and then raised her hand, back toward Anthy, to display
what was clasped to her wrist.  It glowed a soft rose color, the same
hue as the aura of power that surrounded the Rose Knight when she was
at the peak of her strength, and it touched Anthy's consciousness
gently as her gaze fell upon it.
	Anthy smiled.  "Congratulations," she said.
	"That's not the half of it," Utena replied, and sat down to
tell her the rest.

                               11:29 PM
                         1175 COLAN BOULEVARD
                        NEW AVALON, ZETA CYGNI

        Contrary to popular belief, New Avalon -does- have street
crime.  Not as much of it as in most other cities of its size, thanks
to its efficient police force and generally high standard of living,
but it's there.  Some districts, as in all cities, are worse than
others.  The worst is a neighborhood to the southwest of downtown,
bordering Salutown and Claremont, which has, over the city's
twenty-odd years of history, earned the nickname "Hell's Kitchen" in
reference to the famous neighborhood of Old New York on Earth.
        The Kitchen is as close to an urban purgatory as New Avalon
gets, and at its worst, it's as bad as any other bad neighorhood you
care to name.
        Colan Boulevard is the unofficial border line between the
Kitchen and the districts to its northeast, Claremont and Salutown. At
the top of the tallest building on the avenue, an Art Deco office
tower which held the Avalon County record for fastest descent into
dilapidation, a tall, caped figure stood looking northward into
Claremont, his arms folded.
        A few moments later, another man joined him, this one
appearing from the south.  He swung lightly into position on the
narrow ledge next to the caped man, seeming unconcerned with the
yawning depths awaiting him if he misstepped, and holstered the
baton-like climbing device he'd used to get there.
        Hammer turned to the red-clad, masked figure who had just
arrived and nodded courteously, the gesture of one professional to
another.
        "Hammer," said the man in red, returning the nod.
        "Thanks for coming," Hammer said.  "What's the street buzz
saying?"
        "Not much," the other replied.  "Whoever our new player is,
he's got the scum running scared.  They're coming into the Kitchen
from Claremont and Salutown even though they know I'll be waiting for
them."
        Hammer pulled down his scarf and cracked the faintest hint of
a smile.  "I guess they figure, better the devil they know."
        The man in red chuckled grimly.  "Perhaps.  Anyway, that's all
I know for certain.  I don't think anybody's been killed yet, but..."
He shrugged.  "I hear the newcomer uses a sword.  If that's true, it's
only a matter of time."
        The Hammer stared out into the darkened streets of Claremont
for a few silent seconds, then nodded, sighing faintly.
        "Well," he said in a weary voice, "time to make the donuts.
Thanks for confirming my darkest fears, Double-D."
        "Uh ... anytime, I guess," replied Daredevil.  He turned to
leave.
        "Keep your eyes open," said Hammer; then he winced visibly and
added awkwardly, "So to speak.  Sorry."
        Daredevil chuckled again.  "Don't worry," he said.  "Happens
all the time."  He drew his grapple baton, paused, and said, "Good
hunting, Hammer."
        "Thanks," said Hammer, and with a zip of line paying out,
Daredevil was gone, back into Hell's Kitchen.
        Maybe I should've asked him to come with me, Hammer thought;
then he shook his head and drew his scarf back up.
        No.  This is my business.
        And anyway... I'm not sure he could stop her.

        New Avalon also had a more organized criminal element, and
this week, it was taking some advantage of the fact that the local
police and the IPO had been knocked for a bit of a loop.
        The local station head for the interstellar criminal
organization Big Fire, for instance, was using the opportunity, not to
further her overall agenda of destruction and terror, but to run a
quick and simple little operation to increase her operating budget.
        Tonight, promptly at midnight, a flotilla of vans left an
anonymous warehouse in the Dockyards district and fanned out through
the city.  Each was manned by a crew of four Black Hoods, the rank and
file muscle of Big Fire's criminal army.  Each had a specific order
which wanted filling, passed on via their chain of command from the
contracted customer, in this case the Hutt crime syndicate of the
Outer Rim.
        Van Number 3 cruised into Salutown in a leisurely way.  At
half-past midnight on a Friday night - well, technically Saturday
morning, now - the Salusian district of New Avalon was still hopping
along its main drags, but the secondary streets were quiet and
dark. Everyone was either at home in bed or still in the clubs on
Arconian Square or the Avenue Queen Shiva.
        Elza Kiraly, a student at New Avalon University, was on her
way home from her summer job, bagging groceries at the Big N
supermarket on Aldzinjal Place.  It was past midnight, but Elza's day
was far from over.  She planned to go home to her walk-up on Crown
Street, change into her clubbing clothes, and then head for AQS, where
some friends of hers were saving her a place at a table in the
Magnifica Club.
        At first, she didn't quite know what to make of the dark van
that lunged out of a side street and blocked her path with a squeal of
brakes.  She thought perhaps it was a delivery truck for one of the
newspapers, taking the late edition around - but was unmarked, which
was weird.  Those vans were usually rolling adverts for the papers
they carried.
        Before Elza could consider this further, the back doors of the
van popped open and three men in black jumpsuits jumped out.  They had
pointed hoods covering their faces.  One of them held a nasty-looking
submachine gun, the other two weapons Elza didn't recognize.
        Suddenly, it hit her exactly what was going on, and she
screamed.
        So did the stubby weapon in the hand of the guy on the right,
and Elza went down.
        "Well," observed one of the Black Hoods, "that was easy."  He
slung his SMG on his back and bent to collect his team's stunned prey.

	/*  Danny Elfman  "Roof Fight"  _Batman_ OMP Score  */

        Something flickered in the corner of his vision.  More out of
instinct than conscious knowledge that something was wrong, he
abandoned his planned course in favor of whirling to face the movement
and yanking his weapon from his back - but there was nothing there.
        He heard a scrape, as of a bootsole on pavement, very close
by.  He turned, and something appeared - a grey shape, or rather
shapelessness, flickering toward him like a fog.  Something long and
dark appeared from it, and before the gunman could react, it had
smashed into the side of his head, sending him down in a boneless heap
with his subgun under him.
        The middle Black Hood reacted instantly, whirling and leveling
the bulky rifle-like weapon he held.  He fired, and a weighted net
exploded from its muzzle, spreading out to fill the space above the
fallen Hood's body.
        There was a metallic sound, and the net parted as it flew, its
halves immediately collapsing like a severed parachute and clattering
off into the darkness.
        The shape that had clobbered their teammate resolved itself in
that spot, appearing as though emerging from a dense fog, or possibly
-condensing- from it.  It was humanoid, but more than that they
couldn't really tell, since almost all of it was hidden by a
voluminous, tatter-edged cloak the color of woodsmoke.  Eyes glittered
from inside the peak-browed hood, but the only thing that could really
be made out was the straight and gleaming sword held in the person's
hands.
        The phaserman thumbed his power setting up and fired.  With a
frightening sort of gliding grace, the figure in grey moved to one
side and interposed its blade.  The phaser bolt reflected from the
steel and vaporized the netgun, burning its wielder's hands.  He fell
to his knees, screaming, only to be silenced by a solid sidelong kick
from a black-clad leg that emerged from the cloak as its wearer made
for the one with the phaser.
        By this time, the van's driver had disembarked and was
rounding the back of his vehicle.  He saw the sword-wielding figure
closing on his teammate and did the only thing he could think of,
grabbing a fistful of its grey cloak.  The hood fell back, and the man
with the phaser gasped at what this revealed - a woman's face,
half-masked by a grey scarf pulled up to her nose but with the
angriest, most piercing brown eyes he had ever seen, and a heavy fall
of curly brown hair that flowed freely back once released from the
hood.
        She whirled, driving back an elbow.  The driver ducked,
drawing a combat knife from his belt, and took a hack at her - but she
seemed to disappear again, fading away from the blow, and all that
fell to the street was a slice of her grey cloak about the size of a
handkerchief.
        Elza Kiraly woke - it had been only a light stunning, the
better to avoid injuring her; they had, after all, planned to have her
trussed up in the back of the van by now - and found herself still
where she'd fallen.  She wondered why her assailants hadn't done
anything past stunning her, but only until she raised her head and saw
them all sprawled in the street by the back of their van