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Copyright ©2002 by Linnea Sinclair

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---

"You think they might hold the answer to Serafino's implant?"

Captain Tasha Sebastian retrieved her third cup of coffee. “What do you need me to do?”

“Keep Kel-Paten out of Sickbay as much as possible, for one,” Eden replied.

“That means you won't be seeing much of me. Where I go, he goes these days. What else?”

Eden took a deep breath. “As you said, Kel-Paten has no great love for telepaths, or for Psy-Serv. I have reason to believe he has an extensive personal library of Psy-Serv's history, their methods, their means, everything. I need access to those datafiles.”

“You think they might hold the answer to Serafino's implant?”

“Maybe not Serafino's specifically, but at least its medical pedigree.”

Sass pursed her lips and regarded her friend carefully. “You're asking me to break into the admiral's security locked datafiles. Files that are probably loaded with every defensive hacker trap he could create with his mega-million credit mind. Files that probably have more security devices, hidden alarms and fail-safe programs than anything else in civilized space, Psy-Serv's own databanks included.”

“Yes.”

“Files that are located in his quarters, which are again no doubt the most secure location on this ship; hell, probably in this fleet.”

“Yes.”

Sass shrugged. “Piece o’ cake. Anything else?”

---

This is a work of fiction. While reference may be made to actual historical events or existing locations, the characters, incidents, and dialogs are products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright 2002 by Linnea Sinclair

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and review. For information, address NovelBooks, Inc., P.O. Box 661, Douglas, MA 01516 or email publisher@novelbooksinc.com

NBI

Published by

NovelBooks, Inc.

P.O. Box 661

Douglas, MA 01516

NovelBooks Inc. publishes books online and in trade paperback. For more information, check our website: www.novelbooksinc.com or email publisher@novelbooksinc.com

Produced in the United States of America.

Cover illustration by Linnea Sinclair

Edited by Anita York

ISBN 1-59105-064-2 for electronic version

ISBN 1-59105-089-8 for trade paperback

---

This bit of space opera silliness is dedicated to:
'Doc’ Janie, RN, the best friend an unorthodox
spacefleet captain could ever have;
Daiquiri, my Maine Coon cat, who should
have been named ‘Tank';
Dr. Alexander Keith and the staff at Advanced Wellness,
the best friends an author's aching shoulder
could ever have;
And as always, to Rob, husband of infinite patience
who after more than 20 years, still finds me amusing.

---

CHAPTER ONE

SHIP'S GYMNASIUM, TRIAD HUNTERSHIP VAXXAR

There might be worse things in the galaxy than a lethal alien virus, Captain Tasha Sebastian mused as her Chief Medical Officer angrily paced the huntership's locker room aisle. Evidently an admiral with an attitude, and an agenda, was one of them. Especially when that admiral's actions directly impeded finding a cure for that same lethal virus.

“People are dying, Sass.” Doctor Eden Fynn flung her hands wide in exasperation, narrowly missing smacking her hand on the metal wall. Her honey blonde hair, normally tucked neatly behind her ears, was tousled and unruly. Her lipstick had

either been chewed off, or left on the rims of too many cups of tea—all sure signs that the Vaxxar's CMO wasn't happy.

Sass fully understood why. The Nar'Relian virus had proved to be a stubborn puzzle. Then the admiral provided an additional obstruction to its solution. She scrubbed at her face with one end of the towel draped around her neck before responding. “The Triad's priorities have often been different than ours. And they do make up half the Alliance.”

Eden didn't seem to hear her. “I'm so close to finding a cure. But now he announces we're going in the complete opposite direction. All because some damn pirate turned informant has decided to go on an unscheduled vacation!”

The admiral's announcement had also, and not for the first time, forced Sass to delay her regular zero-g racquet-lob game. It was almost as if he saved all his senior staff meetings for when she was off-duty.

A politically savvy friend had warned her, when she'd agreed to accept command of a huntership in the newly formed Alliance fleet, that just because the Coalition-Triad war was over didn't mean former enemies would stop sniping at each other. She'd hoped the threat of invasion by the Illithian Empire would create cooperation, not conflict. But Admiral Branden Kel-Paten, the former Triadian admiral, seemed to have made it his personal mission to trip her up whenever he could.

This latest was a little more serious than her disrupted racquet-lob schedule, however. This involved an outbreak of a lethal virus all through Coalit—that is, Alliance space. It was, as Doc Eden Fynn had said, life and death. Eden could save lives—if she had indeed found a cure.

It was a life and death issue to Admiral Kel-Paten, too. He wanted Jace Serafino—that damned pirate turned informant, to quote Eden—dead. He'd all but said so in the staff meeting earlier.

She rested her hand briefly on her CMO's shoulder. “Let me see what I can do.” Her commbadge trilled as if to punctuate her words. It took Sass a moment to find it under her towel, clipped to the neck of her pink workout shirt. “Sebastian.”

“My office. Five minutes.” The admiral's familiar deep voice brooked no argument, and was also, considering she was still off-duty, not unexpected. She wondered what crisis he'd uncovered now, just to occupy what was left of her free time.

“By your command, sir.” Sass tapped it off and caught Eden's wry grin. “What?”

“Good shirt.”

Sass looked down. My name's No, No, Bad Captain. What's Yours? was clearly visible now that she'd removed her towel. She grinned back. Maybe she could present Kel-Paten with a crisis of her own. “Want to try double-teaming him?”

Eden fell into step with her. “If he still refuses to change course, there's no reason I can't use one of the shuttles, take a med team with me, and—”

The red alert sirens erupted as the corridor doors irised open, stopping Eden in mid-sentence.

Sass slapped her commbadge. “Captain here. Status, Mister Rembert!”

“Incoming energy wave. Eight-point-two on the Graslan scale. McAbian residue readings—”

“On my way. Captain out.”

Sass bolted down the corridor for the lifts, her heart pounding. She didn't have to hear the residue reading figures. An eight-point-two Graslan wave was more than enough to tear a huntership the size of the Vaxxar apart.

She almost collided with the tall, dark-haired man in a black Triad uniform as she lunged out of the lift. Kel-Paten. He slanted her one of his infamous scowls before grabbing her elbow and forcefully guiding her through the double sliding doors that led to the upper-level of the bridge.

The two-tiered, U-shaped command center of the huntership was already frenzied with activity. Voices were terse, commands clipped. Every screen streamed with data.

Kel-Paten hadn't released her arm. “You're out of uniform.”

She was also off duty, but the possibility they were at death's door prevented her from reminding him of that fact. There wasn't time to argue with him. Again.

She offered him a brief “acknowledged” as she headed for the closest scanner station to check incoming data. What she saw wasn't pretty, but they had time. Five, maybe ten minutes to try some fancy dancing that could either save their lives or send them to their graves in infinitesimal pieces. She glanced over her shoulder. Kel-Paten had slid into the left command seat. With a practiced familiarity, he thumbed open a small panel covering the dataport in the armrest and linked into the ship's systems through the interface feeds built into his wrist. He frowned slightly, then his eyes flared bright with that eerie, luminous hue that signaled his cyber systems were at full power. He was spiked in, as much a part of the huge huntership as the drives, scanners and bulkheads.

Except, unlike the drives, scanners and bulkheads, he could talk.

She turned back to her console, knowing he could hear her just as well from there as if she were seated next to him.

“Kel-Paten, my data shows a major energy disturbance at oh-five-seven-point-four.”

“Oh-five-seven-point-four-three-two,” the voice through her commbadge stated; yet she knew if she turned, Kel-Paten's mouth wouldn't be moving. “Preliminary residual shock waves created no perceptible damages. Ship integrity is sound. Secondary waves—”

“Damn!” Sass swore as she was thrust abruptly sideways. She clung to the wide console with both hands.

“Forward shields down to eighty-five per cent,” a crewmember's voice announced below her.

“Acknowledged!” came both her reply and the admiral's.

She tapped furiously at the console. Kel-Paten was no doubt eons ahead of her calculations in his inner journey through the data, but he looked for the known, correlating and synthesizing.

She looked for the unexplainable.

It was one of the reasons they worked so well as a team, in spite of the fact they'd been on opposite sides for over ten years: she had a knack for understanding the illogical data; he was brilliant in instantly utilizing the available data. Granted, his cybernetically-enhanced thought processes were a million times faster than hers, but he was linear where her analysis tended to do pirouettes and somersaults.

“Tell me what we don't have, Kel-Paten,” she said tersely. The huntership shuddered as another line of shock waves impacted against its shields.

“Energy signature is not indicative of ionic storm formation. No indication of natural stellar trauma.”

“Space-time rift?” she ventured, her fingers rapidly tapping instructions into the sensor pads.

“Highly improbably with no previous black hole activity recorded in this quadrant.”

“We might just be making history then, admiral,” she quipped as she scanned the results of her latest data request. “We have abnormally high levels of McAbian particle residue at the sub-atomic level.”

“Stellar wind shear—”

“This ain't no damned stellar wind shear,” she barked as the Vax heeled hard to port and everyone's stomach made corresponding lurches to starboard. “Kel-Paten, help me out here. Look at those damned levels!”

The few seconds of studious silence from the admiral were filled by the sounds of voices around her: reports of minor hull damage on Deck Seven; a fluctuation in shield integrity portside; two crewmembers with broken arms on Deck Ten. Down in Sickbay, Eden would be up to her pretty blue eyes in contusions and broken bones, Sass knew. After this, they'd both need a pitcher of iced gin!

“McAbian levels are increasing at the rate of seventeen parts per nanosecond,” Kel-Paten reported. “Probability of vortex formation is eighty-seven point six-five percent in the next ten minutes.”

At his words, a chill surged up Sass's spine. A vortex—a hole violently torn in the space-time continuum. It could be anything from the universe farting to the birth of a major black hole as the result of a dark star implosion perhaps hundreds of thousands of light years away. And here they were, stuck at the wrong place at the wrong time with nowhere to go but down the galactic shitter.

“Can you spike out, Kel-Paten? We have to do some fancy dancing. I need you at the con.”

“Agreed. Acknowledged.”

“Rembert!” She called to the science officer two consoles down. “Monitor this station—we've got a rift coming.”

The tense look in the officer's eyes reflected her own concern. She slapped at the shipboard comm button on her seat's armrest before she took the seat next to Kel-Paten. His pale eyes were losing their eerie luminescence.

“This is the captain. Secure all decks. Repeat. Secure all decks. We're on a rift horizon. Sebastian out.”

She turned to him, asked the question whose answer could well seal their fate. “How big?”

He'd swung open the small comp screen attached to his seat and watched the data closely. “Projected diameter of thirty-seven point two kilometers, given the current state of emissions.”

“How close are we to center?”

“One-six-five-three-oh point nine five kilometers from the epicenter; again, given—”

“I know, I know! Did you re-work the shields?”

He glanced at her. “Of course. They're back at optimum.”

“Well, praise the Gods and pass the peanut butter,” she said, noting the undisguised superiority in his tone. “Remind me to tell you how much I love you, Kel-Paten. If we live through this.”

The ship lurched sickeningly again. Alarms wailed and the data on her screen relayed everything she didn't want to know. This was a different kind of reminder, a deadly one.

One that stated that when huntership met vortex, vortex usually won.

---

CHAPTER TWO

Remind me to tell you how much I love you, Kel-Paten.

Something in Kel-Paten's chest tightened sharply at her quip. He struggled to maintain his usual impassive expression. He'd wanted to hear her say those words for so long that even now, laced with sarcasm, and in the midst of an emergency situation, they still had the power to send waves of heat rolling through his body.

He swallowed hard and forced his gaze away from the petite blonde woman in a captain's uniform, and back to the comp screen on his left. It took a moment for him to refocus his vision. When he did, he saw that Sass had already taken the hyper-drive engines off line and dropped power on the impulse engines to eighty per cent.

Good girl. The mistake most novice—and nervous—captains made when encountering a rogue energy field was to buck it full bore. That only resulted in tearing the ship apart. It was better to ride the field, navigate the energy waves. But that took some very delicate handling.

Both civilized and uncivilized space was littered with debris from ships whose captains had tried to tackle Lady Nature head on. His ship, he knew with complete certainty, would never be one of them.

Not as long as either he or Tasha Sebastian was in command.

He checked the status in Engineering. “Warp core secure,” he reported; then changed screens with a tap of his finger. “Fifty-five seconds to primary flare.”

“Great,” Sass intoned, following the same data on her screen. “The galaxy decides to fart while we're sharing its undies.”

There was a ripple of nervous laughter from nearby crewmembers. He felt some of the tension on the bridge abate, in spite of the seriousness of their situation. He wondered if he should chance a commiserating smile but she'd already swiveled around and was nodding at several officers, Triad and United Coalition.

“I love you all, you know that,” she announced blithely.

“Yes, ma'am!” came back several replies from around the bridge.

A high-pitched beep returned his attention to his screen. “Thirty-five seconds.” He glanced again in her direction. Was she aware of how little time they had left? She regarded him questioningly. The words he ached to say died in his throat. He turned back to his comp screen and wondered, not for the first time, if he were going to die without ever being able to tell her how he felt.

“Ten seconds,” she reported.

“Switching helm control to manual.” He keyed in his clearance code.

She finished hers, nodded. “Helm control on manual. The admiral has the con. Hang on, boys and girls. It's going to be a rough ride.”

He watched the primary flare explode on the ship's forward view screen like a thousand suns colliding in some crazed dance, streams of energy suddenly spiraling outward. Without thinking, he reached for her, locking her small hand in his. When she turned to him, he called up all his courage and said her name. “Sass, I—”

The Vaxxar collided with the full force of the expanding vortex. His words were lost in the wailing of alarms and groaning of metal bulkheads straining under impact as the ship lurched violently, first to port, then to starboard.

Bridge lights flickered and went out, though it was only microseconds before auxiliary emergency lighting kicked on, bathing everything in a murky red glow. The ship lurched again; two crewmembers went sprawling down the stairs. Only Kel-Paten's firm grasp on her hand kept Sass from flying out of her seat. A pressure vent ruptured in a lower wall panel, sending a mushroom of hot, moist air across the bridge.

The fingers of Kel-Paten's left hand moved in rapid staccato over the control pad at his seat as he coaxed the huntership through a series of snake-like maneuvers.

Sass had both his data and her own on her comp screen and adjusted the braking vanes with her right hand as he called them out to her.

“Three percent, port and starboard.”

“Three percent, sir,” she responded.

“Steady as she goes. I'll need a ten percent increase on my mark in eighteen point two seconds.” He paused, watched the numbers flick by in familiar yellow-green. “Mark!”

“Vanes at ten percent, sir.”

The Vax seemed to glide then, for a moment, before another shock wave sent her careening to port.

“Damn it!” Sass swore, jolted out of her seat, almost landing in Kel-Paten's lap.

Muttering something about “opportunities lost", he picked her up and set her back in her seat.

She looked at him. “Sir?”

“I want to try feathering the aft braking vanes.” He'd lost his grasp on her hand and knew this wasn't the time to claim it back.

Her questioning gaze turned to one of understanding. “Do it.”

There had to be forty different edicts prohibiting the feathering of braking vanes in the Triad's operational manuals. He'd probably authored thirty of them. Braking vanes on hunterships weren't designed to be feathered, to be angled in such a way to let energy flow over them instead of stopping it. Vanes were there to create resistance, not decrease it. Vanes feathered had been known to shear off, taking whole sections of the hull with them. Or create vibrations that threatened the stability of a ship.

At least, that's what they did under normal, logical circumstances. But the eye of an erupting vortex was not a normal, logical location.

“Retract forward vanes,” he ordered.

“Vanes retracted,” she replied and the ship began to shimmy in response.

Immediately, reports of structural slippage were heard around the Bridge. Kel-Paten ignored them.

“Invert aft vanes, fifteen percent.”

She tapped at her screen. “Fifteen.”

“Let's start with a five percent pitch, Sebastian, then give me a two percent increase on my marks.”

“Affirmative, Kel-Paten. At five.”

He watched twenty seconds click by on his vision field.

“Mark.”

“At seven.”

Twenty more seconds.

“Mark.”

“At nine. Must be jelly ‘cause jam don't shake like this,” she added.

“Mark.”

“At eleven.”

At nineteen percent, the shimmying noticeably subsided. He could feel the helm responding to his commands. At twenty-seven percent, the Vax seemed to find her space-legs again. Overhead lighting flickered back on and at least five of the fifteen-odd alarms ceased to wail.

It was an encouraging sound. Almost as encouraging as ... Well, he could think about her words, later. Right now, he had a damaged ship to deal with and two of his officers demanding his input at Damage Control.

He pushed himself out of his seat and headed for the Lower Bridge. They had lived through the worst of the vortex. Someday, perhaps he would remind her of what he'd waited for more than a decade to hear her say.

Upper Bridge, Command Sling, THS Vaxxar

It took almost two and a half hours from the moment of the first flare for the huntership to finally clear the vortex and for operations on the Bridge to return to some semblance of normality, with only the never-ending litany of damage reports hinting at the severity of what the ship and her crew had experienced.

“Bridge to Sickbay. Hey, Doc. Come up for air, yet?” Sass could almost see Eden's responding grimace to her question.

“We're still treading water, captain, but I think we'll make it,” said Eden's disembodied voice over the comm. “Briefly, we have four concussions, fifteen broken arms, eight broken legs, three steam burns, and more bumps and bruises than I have space in my medical logs to record.”

“Nothing more serious?”

“Gods be praised, no!” Eden said.

“Sounds like you earned this week's pay anyway, Doc. Keep me informed. Sebastian out.”

She flicked off the comm, leaned back in her seat and let out the sigh she had been holding in for she didn't know how long. The sound must have drawn Kel-Paten's attention. He turned from where he stood at the upper bridge railing.

“I'd like to do a physical inspection of ship's damage,” he told her after a lengthy moment of silence.

Why not? she thought. Hell, it was only 0145 in the morning. She'd been on duty since 0800; about seventeen and a half hours straight, save for her racquet-lob game. She glanced down at her pink sweat pants and realized she was still in her No! No! Bad Captain! shirt. A hands-on of the ship would probably take another two hours. After that, she could fall directly into bed, still in her sweats and wake up two hours later for her ritual workout with Eden Fynn. Still in her sweats. How convenient! She grinned in spite of the dull ache between her shoulder blades.

She stood, stretching, saw Perrin Rembert almost walk directly into a pylon at the sight and dropped her arms abruptly. Well, it wasn't as if she was naked under the t-shirt; she had an exercise top that matched her shorts: pink. But from the distance it must look ... oops! Ah, well.

Kel-Paten waited for her by the bridge doorway. Well, not quite at the doors. It was as if something had stopped him dead in his tracks just before the entry to the corridor.

“Want to start in Engineering?” she offered.

“Engineering?” he repeated. “Um, no. No.” He ran his hand over his face. “Let's start in Sickbay. Engineering after that.”

The suggestion surprised her, though she said nothing as she followed him down the corridor to the lifts. Sickbay was where she would've started after any trauma on board the Regalia; her crew's welfare always came first. But Kel-Paten ... it was well known he rarely showed up in Sickbay except under the direst of circumstances. Maybe, she mused, all that shimmying had finally shaken some compassion into that cybernetic system of his.

If it had, he might be willing to give credence to her and Eden's request to send a med-team back to Farside Station. They may have bested a vortex, but they still had a virus to fight. And Kel-Paten had some damned runaway pirate named Serafino to find.

Sickbay, THS Vaxxar

Eden Fynn was too tired to hide her surprise when Kel-Paten showed up in her E.R.. His dislike of medical facilities was well known. She didn't blame him. If someone had cut off her arms and legs when she was a teenager and replaced them with bio-cybernetic limbs, she'd not have pleasant memories of the place either. However, any comment she might have made was preempted by an emergency call from the bridge.

Again.

Kel-Paten moved immediately to the intraship vidscreen on the nearest wall, with Sass only steps behind him.

“Status, Mister Kel-Faray,” he ordered the round-faced First Officer.

“It's an unidentified ship, sir. We seemed to have dragged her out of the vortex with us. She's badly damaged and breaking up.”

“Life forms?”

“Four, humanoid, and one's fading fast. But it won't matter if the ship—”

“Lock a transbeam on all survivors. Transport them directly here to Sickbay. And send a full security team.” He glanced to his left. “You're about to have a few more visitors, Doctor.”

“We can handle it,” was her professional reply. Already, her med team angled equipment into position.

Four broad beams of light shimmered in rainbow colors before coalescing into human forms on top of the emergency diagnostic tables. Blue-coated personnel swarmed around them, with Eden heading her own team at the first diag bed. She ran the medicorder briefly over the still form clothed in a tattered gray spacer's uniform. An elderly man who had died from his injuries minutes before being transported.

She recorded time of death and moved automatically to the next bed, her scanner parading the important data before her eyes:

Male. Humanoid. Forty-one years of age. Six foot three and one-half inches. Two hundred twenty-two pounds. Respiration was fast, but not life threateningly so. Blood pressure elevated.

The medicorder categorized his injuries: concussion, broken left wrist, some minor internal bruising to the left side. She was about to move on—he'd make it on his own for now—when her patient stirred and groaned softly.

Immediately, she reached out and laid her hand gently against his face, which felt stubbly from several days’ growth of beard.

“Shhh,” she crooned, aware that Sass had come up next to her and leaned over the man. “You're safe,” Eden continued. “You're going to be all right. You're on board the Alliance ship Vaxxar.”

Jet dark lashes fluttered against bruised cheekbones.

“Admiral,” said Kel-Faray's voice from the vidscreen. “We have a positive ID on the ship that broke up.”

The lashes parted, revealed startlingly deep blue eyes. Not pale like the admiral's, but dark like the jeweled waters of the Isarrian Ocean.

Something buried deep under several layers of professional medical training in Eden's mind sent her a message: Damn, but this guy is gorgeous! Right from the tips of his scuffed boots, to the gray pants that hugged well-muscled thighs, to the torn shirt that revealed a flat, hard stomach, to the square jaw with that damnably attractive cleft, to his jet dark hair that had escaped its careless tie and now lay against his shoulders ... he was unequivocally gorgeous.

Quickly, she shook herself back to reality and mentally readjusted her ‘doctor's cap'. “Just lie still. You've been injured and—”

“The Vaxxar?” The man's voice rasped painfully. He licked at dry lips.

“Go ahead, Kel-Faray,” Kel-Paten said from where he stood at the comp screen.

“Yes, you're on the Vaxxar,” Eden repeated calmly.

The man's gaze seemed centered on her chest. Eden belatedly realized her blue labcoat had come undone, revealing the thin v-necked shirt underneath. His gaze shifted towards Sass's pink t-shirt with its unorthodox logo and came back to Eden again.

“We believe the ship destroyed was Captain Serafino's ship, the Novalis,” Kel-Faray's voice informed Sickbay.

Kel-Paten turned and a low, bitter expletive escaped his lips. The sound drew the man's attention and slowly, painfully he turned his head in Kel-Paten's direction.

In three strides Kel-Paten was next to Eden. “Serafino.” He spat out the name, anger tingeing every syllable.

Jace Serafino responded with a cocky, lopsided grin. “It's good to see you, too, Tin Soldier. And you are—?” He grasped Eden's hand and brought it to his lips.

Eden stared in shock. This was the damned pirate? The morning's staff meeting outlining the mission to find him had clearly detailed all his sins—but hadn't provided, she realized with a start, one clear holoimage of the man. She wasn't sure even a clear one would've done him justice.

She drew her hand away immediately. “I'm Dr. Fynn, Chief Medical Officer.”

He laughed softly at her discomfort, then coughed from the effort.

“Captain Serafino,” Eden said sternly, “you really must—”

“Wait. Don't trank me out yet, sweetling.” His voice rasped. “No! No! Bad Captain!” he read out loud. “Gods, this has to be Sebastian.” He winked at her.

It was Sass's turn. “Captain Serafino—”

“Damn, Kel-Paten, I really have to compliment you,” he said, turning away from her. “A truly creative and inspiring choice of uniforms for your officers.”

And with that pronouncement, Jace Serafino promptly passed out.

---

CHAPTER THREE

CORRIDOR, SICKBAY DECK, THS VAXXAR

Tasha Sebastian lengthened her stride in an attempt to keep up with an angry Kel-Paten, who barked orders into his commbadge on their way back to the bridge.

“I want every bit of debris you can find, do you understand me? Every bit that's out there, lieutenant!”

They turned the corner. Two gray-clad maintenance crew dove out of their way.

No need for my morning jog with Eden, Sass thought as she trotted alongside, listening to the salvage crew lieutenant try to reason with Ol’ No-Excuses Kel-Paten.

“I don't care what the current equipment limitations are, lieutenant! If you have to, you get out there with every Gods-damned sieve from the Gods-damned galley and bring me everything that may have been even remotely connected to the Novalis!”

They reached the lifts, both breathing hard. Sass considered taking her pulse and jogging in place. She certainly was in appropriate attire, but doubted that Kel-Paten, standing with his hands shoved in his pants pockets and scowling fiercely at the closed lift doors, would find her actions the least bit funny.

That she found them downright hysterical only told her how bloody tired she was.

With all the activity on board—emergency repair crews, relief shift personnel, medical personnel—the lifts were bound to be delayed. Of course, she knew none of this mattered one iota to Kel-Paten, who had now added impatient foot tapping to his repertoire of fierce-scowl and don't-mess-with-me-hands-shoved-in-pockets attitude.

She propped herself up against the wall next to the lift. The metallic sheeting was pleasantly cool against her bare midriff and she closed her eyes, pleading with the Deities for five seconds of peace and quiet and silence. Well, as much peace and quiet and silence as one could expect after what the Vaxxar had just gone through. But after all her years in space, the continuous chatter over shipboard comm requesting Lt. So-and-So to report to Such-and-Such or advising Team Whatever that the Who-Gives-A-Lubashit Drill was about to commence, no longer even registered in her mind.

Kel-Paten's deep voice, laced with undeniable bitterness, did.

“I gather you do not find the sudden appearance of the Novalis disturbing?”

Sass opened one eye, peered up at him. His gloved hands had left his pockets and were crossed over his chest. Classic defensive posture. My, we're a bit testy this morning, aren't we? And Gods, it was morning—about 0230 or later if the aches in her body were correct.

She closed her eye. “I find,” she said, after a deep breath and the requisite counting to ten which was supposed to help but never really did, “the sudden appearance of the Novalis, and Captain Serafino, to be a major annoyance right now.”

“Sebastian—”

Pause.

Oh, get a life! she thought wearily. I really, really wish you would just get—a...life! Reluctantly, she shoved herself away from the wall. “With all due respect, admiral, the appearance of Serafino at our doorstep has certainly saved us the time and expense of going to look for him. Do I find that a bit odd?” She rephrased his earlier question. “Yes, I find it odd. But disturbing?” She shook her head. “Not yet, not at this juncture and without further information.”

“You mean you don't find it disturbing that within twenty-four hours of when we were commissioned to find Serafino—he suddenly shows up?”

No, I don't have your rampant paranoia, she thought as the lift signal pinged. But Eden does have a virus to cure and this will only delay us more. This morning's meeting had detailed the two hundred and fifty thousand credits that Serafino had allegedly absconded with. It was part of the Alliance's payment to him for undercover services that had never been rendered. The Triad Ministry of Intelligence was having furzel-fits over it. No doubt they'd want Serafino delivered for prosecution, and that meant, again, going in the opposite direction of the latest virus outbreak on Farside Station.

Kel-Paten stepped back, allowing her to enter the empty lift first. He gave the voice command for the bridge as the doors closed.

“Admiral, I will not jump to conclusions before I have all the facts and, right now, we don't have all the facts. We are in the quadrant where Serafino was last sighted, according to HQ's report. You yourself suggested at the staff meeting a few hours ago” —Gods, was it only a few hours ago?— “that it was your opinion that we weren't far behind him. Actually, it seems we were in front of him because somehow he got piggybacked to our—oh, never mind.” He was giving her one of those sideways-warning looks. She decided to glare back up at him.

They were still glaring at each other when the lift pinged again to signal they'd reached Deck One. She didn't wait for him to step back to allow her to exit, but barged past him and strode down the corridor.

“Sebastian!” he called after her.

She stopped just short of the bridge doors and turned. A smile? Was that a glimpse of a smile just now leaving his face? She must be more tired than she thought. Ol’ No-Excuses Kel-Paten never smiled. He scowled.

“Let's...let's get some coffee,” he offered, waving his hand towards the other end of the corridor. “My office. I need to do some thinking aloud. I do it a lot better if you're there to punch holes in every theory I come up with.”

“Sure,” she said, unable to hide the note of surprise in her voice at his sudden change of tone. “I desperately need some coffee right now.”

“Agreed.” He slapped the commbadge on his shirt. “Kel-Faray, the captain and I will be in my office. I want an update on all damage reports in fifteen minutes. And everything and anything that Salvage comes up with on the Novalis as soon as you hear from them.”

ADMIRAL'S OFFICE, THS VAXXAR

Sass had her back to him, leaning one hip against his office wall while she waited for the replicator to kick out two cups of coffee. Kel-Paten permitted himself a few moments of pleasurable indulgence at the sight, then clicked open the comm on his console before he totally forgot why the Keltish Triad had bestowed the rank of admiral on him. “Dr. Fynn, Kel-Paten here. What's the status on Serafino?”

“He regained consciousness briefly,” Fynn told him, an undercurrent of exhaustion in her voice. Sass pushed a steaming cup across the desk towards him, then sat. He nodded and focused on the CMO's report. “We've given him a sedative and he's resting comfortably. His injuries are serious but not life-threatening.”

“Good. Your orders, Doctor, are to keep him alive, but that's all. Just keep him alive long enough so I can have the pleasure of killing him. Kel-Paten out.”

He sifted through a short line of messages from various division commanders that had blinked on his comp screen just as he finished with Fynn. He could've spiked in through the interface in the armrest of his chair and downloaded the information directly into his memory, but Sass was there, sitting, sipping coffee, watching him.

He knew what he was. He knew she knew what he was. He just didn't like reminding her of it. Spiked in, he'd be on full cybe power, and his eyes would take on a luminescent hue. He'd had no choice on the bridge earlier when they'd encountered the threat of the vortex. But he had a choice here.

“I apologize for the delay.” He reached for his coffee as he turned away from the comp screen. “But there were a couple—” And he hesitated, stopped in his mental and verbal tracks by the enigmatic grin on Sass's face. “—a couple of things I was ... um, Sebastian?”

Sass wiped the grin off her face and pulled herself upright in her chair. “Oh, sorry. When I'm tired, the mind wanders, you know.”

“Looks like it wandered into a rather pleasant place,” he commented as blandly as the suspicious and jealous thoughts bouncing around in his head would permit. What, no, who had she been thinking of? The look on her face had been absolutely blissful—like a furzel licking fresh cream off her whiskers.

“Just a couple of ideas I've been playing around with,” she replied with a shrug.

He hoped like hell it wasn't ideas about one of his Engineering officers. “If I can be of any help...” he offered, all the while knowing that if she ever did confide in him that she was interested in someone, he'd be duty-bound to kill the man. Or at the very least transfer him to the farthest reaches of the galaxy where nothing, human or otherwise, would ever wish to be.

He would have no choice. And while he was at it, he'd send that bastard Serafino with him.

Serafino. A thought occurred to him, so chilling that even the mouthful of steaming coffee he took did nothing to melt the rock hard feeling that had suddenly lodged in the pit of his stomach.

Had Sass been thinking of Serafino?

Serafino's effect on—and prowess with—women was legendary. Kel-Paten hadn't missed the wink Serafino had given her, had seen the way Serafino's gaze had raked over her half-naked form...

She'd been reluctant to leave Sickbay; wanted to check on the rest of the crew there, she'd said, and he had to all but order her to return with him to the bridge.

Serafino.

He hadn't realized he'd spoken the name aloud until he heard Sass's voice.

“What about Captain Serafino?” she asked. “Besides the fact that he's here and our house guest for a while.”

House guest? He'd prefer to see him an occupant of the morgue. He tapped at his screen, bringing up a series of folders on Serafino. All intelligence gathered by the Triad over the last fifteen years.

“Just what do you know about Serafino?” he asked. “Not,” he touched the screen, “what's written here. But what do you know? Have you meet him before?”

“Probably not that he'd remember.”

“You've met before.” The tone of his voice dropped the room temperature about forty degrees.

“My life's been full of interesting characters. It's part of my job description.”

“You find Serafino interesting?” He steepled his fingers in front of his face and peered at her from over their black-clad tips.

She sighed. “I thought you wanted to run some theories by me.”

Why are you being evasive, Sass? Then, out loud: “I do. And I will. Tell me why you find Serafino interesting.”

“Why not? You find him disturbing,” she challenged. “I think interesting might fit right in there. Especially when you consider the circles he's run around the Triad, the U-Cees and the Illithians for years. And, oh yes, the T'Sarii. Let's not forget the T'Sarii. In some ways, I admire his ... creativity,” she added with a flip of her hand.

He closed his eyes briefly. Creativity? Unorthodox methodology was more like it, and not unlike his own Sass in that. A devil-may-care attitude. Of course she found Serafino interesting. What woman wouldn't?

“So you've met before. How many years ago? Just how well did you know him?” He fired the questions at her.

Anger flared in her eyes. She sat upright. “I don't know what you're getting at, but if you're accusing me of any collusion with Serafino—then let's just come out and say it right now, shall we? And cut all this twenty-questions lubashit.

“You can check my service record. And you can talk to my crew on the Regalia and on the Goldstar and all the other ships before that and you will find that I have never and will never sell out my allegiance to the U-Cees—or the Alliance, or whoever the hell we are now!” She slammed her fist down on the armrest of her chair, punctuating the end of her sentence.

Before he could reply, she rose to her full five feet in height and pointed her finger at him. “You think that because the Novalis shows up right after we get ordered to find him that I leaked that information to him somehow, don't you? That's what you meant when you said you found his ‘sudden appearance disturbing', isn't it?”

“Sebastian—”

“Why would I do that,” she continued, leaning her hands on his desk, “and drop him just-so-pretty in your lap if I were working with him? That would make no bloody sense!”

“Sebastian—” He wiped one hand across his face.

“Do you really think I'm that stupid?”

No, but he'd begun to wonder about his own mental faculties. Somehow he'd lost control of this discussion several minutes back, and he wasn't quite sure how or where. His discussions with Sass often contained heated exchanges; though not the kind of heat he'd have liked. They'd clashed, amicably, for years. Yet there was something different in her forcefulness this time. An element of hurt, or fear?

“I don't think you're stupid. Now sit down.”

She sat, though he could tell by the way she folded her arms across My name's No! No! Bad Captain! that she was none too happy about it. Or with him.

“I don't think you're stupid,” he repeated. “I just need to know how you know Serafino, and from where.”

“From Queenie's,” came the terse answer after an equally tense silence.

Queenie's? The name had a faint ring of familiarity but he couldn't place it. “What's Queenie's?”

“A whorehouse and casino on Farside Station.” She leaned back in her chair. “Don't look so shocked, Kel-Paten. I spent two years with U-CID doing undercover work. I have a knack for ferreting out illegal arms sales.”

“I've heard.” He tapped his fingers against his mouth. He'd read and damn near memorized her personnel file, knew about her training with the United Coalition Intelligence Division. But her mention of casinos brought up his old fantasy of taking her to T'garis, the Triad's casino world.

“It's in my personnel file,” she reminded him.

“And Serafino was...”

“A player. I doubt he'd remember me. That was almost fifteen years ago. Plus, even if he did, he wouldn't remember me as ‘Sebastian'. I didn't even—” And she stopped, gave her head a small shake. “—I couldn't use my real name,” she added quickly. “We all had nicknames. That's what we used.”

“Sass,” he said.

“What? Oh, yes.” She nodded. “Everyone called me ‘Sass'.”

He tapped his fingers against his mouth again before speaking. “Appropriately descriptive.”

She shrugged. “I won't argue that.” She drew a deep breath. “Have we cleared up any possible charges of treason against me? Or should I anticipate spending the night in the brig, just to be safe?”

Oh, Sass, he thought, how very appropriately descriptive. He now knew more, yet knew nothing. He'd never doubted her loyalty to the Alliance or her crew for a moment. That had never been the issue, though she'd thought it was.

It was her allegiance to himself that had him bone-chilled worried.

“I don't think the Vax's brig could hold you,” he answered truthfully.

That finally evoked a small smile from her. “Not for long,” she agreed. “Now, are you finally ready to discuss whatever it is you think we should be working on?”

He shook his head, closing his eyes briefly. Even with his eyes closed, those damn yellow numbers still glowed in the lower left corner of his vision: 0342.15.20. No matter how many numbers were attached, it was still very very late.

Or very very early.

He always had the option of switching to his surplus power supply to stay awake for another thirty-six to forty-eight hours. Under normal conditions, he rarely slept for more than four hours a night.

But Sass had no auxiliary cybernetic power supply. And any feasible and productive time for discussion had long since passed.

“No,” he said. “It's late, Sebastian. Your temper's sharp and my mind is not right now.” He waved her off. “Go get some sleep.”

“You sure? Look, Kel-Paten, I'm sorry I popped off at you like—”

“I'm sure. Go.”

“I really am sorry.”

“I doubt it,” he said and forced his mouth into what he hoped looked like a smile. It wasn't an expression he was used to wearing, and it felt as if his mouth fought him every time he tried. “If you ever stopped arguing with me, I'd worry because I'd know there was something very wrong.”

“Okay.” She eased herself up out of the chair and headed for the door. “We'll pick up where we left off tomorrow morning—today. Morning. Hell, you know what I mean!”

“Oh-eight-thirty, this office,” he told her as the door whooshed open.

“Oh-eight-thirty?” she squeaked.

“Oh-nine-thirty, then. In uniform. And on time.”

“Who, me?” she asked in mock innocence then saluted him, hand over her heart. “By your command, admiral.”

“Dismissed,” he replied and then, ever so softly, and only after the door had closed, said a gentle benediction: “And may the Gods keep you in their care.”

That had been his private blessing to her for years, so much so that it was almost automatic, though rarely spoken out loud. Yet this time, he added extra energy to the plea. Something about Serafino's appearance bothered him. Something more than just the fact that the man was a pirate, a rogue—a decidedly romantic figure.

Something about Serafino bothered him deeply. He steepled his hand in front of his mouth and tried to identify the source of his disquiet.

He couldn't. And that bothered Admiral Branden Kel-Paten, the infamous Tin Solider, even more.

---

CHAPTER FOUR

SICKBAY, THS VAXXAR

Halfway through downloading a report regarding the medical status of Serafino and his crew, Eden Fynn came to the conclusion that there must be, at the very least, a racquet-lob game going on somewhere in Sickbay. A silent racquet-lob game, which only Captain Tasha Sebastian could see. Or was trying to see.

The booted foot propped against the edge of Eden's desk rocked the captain's chair, now tilted at a precarious angle, back and forth, back and forth. It was a motion, Eden noted, that was in direct relation to the sound of Sickbay's doors opening:

Phwoosh.

Sass tilted back, head turned slightly for a second.

Thwip. The doors closed. Sass sat forward.

Phwoosh.

Sass tilted back.

Thwip.

Sass sat forward.

Given the amount of traffic through Sickbay on a normal day—and they were less than twenty-four hours after the vortex rift incident—there was always a lot of phwoooshing and thwiping. Most of which Eden had long ago learned to ignore.

But the captain's seesawing movements were, after all the stress of the day before, just a bit more than Eden could take. However, she at least waited until Sass was in the thwip stage before she reached over her desk and grabbed the older woman's boot.

Startled, Sass almost went ass over teakettle right out of Eden's office.

“Hey! What are you—?”

“What are you doing?” Eden chimed in. “Are you rocking yourself to sleep down here? Or am I missing Fleet finals in racquet-lob being played in my ER?”

“I'm—? Oh, sorry!” Sass grinned sheepishly and dropped her foot to the floor. “It's him,” she explained with an upward wave of her hand that delineated something larger and taller. “I swear to the Gods he's following me around. If I go down to Engineering, five minutes later, there he is. If I'm in the Mess having tea, bingo. He shows up. He's driving me—how do you like to put it? Nucking futz?”

“This is something new?” Eden asked in obvious disbelief.

The answer was preceded by a sigh. “No, just worse. And I'm just getting less tolerant, losing my patience.” She rubbed the heels of her hands over her eyes. “I really popped off at him last night. This morning. That was wrong. Unprofessional. I should know better than to let him push my buttons. But his paranoia is getting to me.”

“Paranoia?”

“Yeah, you know. Questioning everything I do, everywhere I've been, everyone I talk to ... paranoia. I think he thinks I'm going to wholesale Triadian secrets to the Kalfi, or some such lubashit.”

“Like what?”

“Like what?” Sass repeated. “I don't know. I don't even know what secrets the Kalfi would be interested in. Or don't already know.”

“No, not that. What kind of questions—what makes you think Kel-Paten is paranoid?”

“You mean besides the fact that he insists on personally reviewing just about every damn report I write? Or tries to fill up what little spare time I have doing this-that-or-the-other thing with him where—and I know this is true—he can keep an eye on me? So I don't go wholesaling stuff to the Kalfi.” She raised her eyes in a pleading gesture. “Like yesterday, after the staff meeting. ‘I'll require your attention for a moment longer',” she mimicked, lowering her voice in a bad imitation.

Eden chuckled.

“Multiply that by one hundred and you've got my week.”

Eden nodded. She understood Sass's frustration. She also had her theories about Kel-Paten's reasons, but she wasn't sure enough to voice them. Especially if she were right, and the bio-cybernetic construct in charge of the newly formed Alliance Fleet actually was experiencing emotions. Then she, as Chief Medical Officer, might just have to Section Forty-Six him. She didn't think that would go over well in the Triad part of the Alliance. It might even start another war. Then a puzzling virus would be the least of their problems.

“Then when he finds out I knew Serafino—”

“You know Serafino?” The information surprised Eden.

“Gods, not you, too!” Sass groaned. “Yes, I knew Serafino. Past tense. Briefly. I worked at Queenie's, years ago, remember?”

Eden nodded.

“He was a player. I knew the name that went with the face, that was all. Didn't mean a whole lot at the time; his kind at Queenie's wasn't exactly unique.”

“Would Serafino remember you?”

“I doubt it. Why?”

“Because I'm a little worried about his condition,” Eden admitted. “He regained consciousness—briefly—after you left. I was working on the T'Sariian, Dr. Monterro was attending Serafino. Did what was necessary to make him comfortable. Nothing out of the ordinary. Trouble is, he should have fully come out of it by now, or at least be showing some signs— I don't know. Maybe, because of his physical condition—” he was incredibly fit, Eden had noted. “—he's strong, very strong, very healthy. An older, weaker man might require more time. Not Serafino.”

“You don't ride through a vortex flare and come out smelling like a blossom,” Sass pointed out. “And the Novalis wasn't the Vax.”

“True, but—”

“But, what? Talk to me, Healer.” Sass leaned forward, lowering her voice. “You've picked up something, are sensing something, and you don't like it. I've known you too long, Doc. What do we have here?”

“I wish I could answer that,” Eden said truthfully, folding her hands. “It's nothing I've encountered before. But whatever it is, it's keeping him unconscious. I just thought that, if he knew you, if he heard a familiar voice, it might draw him out.”

“I could try standing next to him and say ‘place your bets, please’ or ‘ante up’ but I don't think that's really going to help.”

“No, probably not,” Eden admitted. “I—uh-oh.” She reached for a stack of reports to her left and quickly dragged them to the middle of her desk. Her voice, when she spoke, was a bit louder than normal and almost authoritative. Eden did many things extremely well. Acting was not one of them.

“—and I think that if we can make the crew understand the importance of proper nutrition—oh, hello, admiral. Can I help you with something?”

“Doctor.”

Sass raised her eyes in a pleading gesture before turning in her chair.

“Sebastian,” Kel-Paten said. Pause. “I didn't realize the doctor needed to report to you concerning the crew's nutritional requirements.”

“We were covering a number of topics,” Sass told him blandly.

Eden quietly replaced the report into the stack, hoping the admiral hadn't noticed the large graphic of a furzel on the top. It was a report on the pet-rescue system she'd designed for the few domesticated animals allowed on the Vax, including Sass's furzel and her own. Had Kel-Paten seen the graphic and tied it in with her words, he would no doubt think they were going to serve sliced furzel in the Mess Hall.

“You'll be off duty shortly, Doctor.” It was a question, but as with most questions posed by Admiral Kel-Paten, it was issued in the form of a statement.

Eden glanced at her watch. “Yes.”

“Then I'm sure you have things to attend to before leaving.”

No, she'd done most of them, anticipating Sass's arrival so they could then have dinner in the Officer's Mess together. “Actually, the captain and I were—”

“I'm afraid I'll be requiring—” and at this point, Sass turned her head so that only Eden could see, and exactly mouthed Kel-Paten's words. “—Captain Sebastian's attention at this time.”

Then Sass stood and faced Kel-Paten so Eden would have time to recover from her coughing fit. “I don't suppose it can wait until after dinner? I made plans to—”

“I'm sorry, but you'll have to cancel those plans. I'll have something to eat brought to the Ready Room.”

Sass sighed theatrically. “Ahh, dining by starlight, eh, admiral?” The Vax's Ready Room had large floor-to-ceiling viewports set into the outer wall. “How can I resist such an invitation?” And with that, she waltzed out of the office, singing strains from a corny but romantic musical number that had been popular many years before.

The mask dropped. Eden saw it. Kel-Paten's usual impassive expression had suddenly blurred into something heavily tinged with emotion as Sass had turned her face up to his, coquettishly, and purred about being unable to resist his invitation. And Eden had seen more than that. She'd seen the auras that only she, or another like her, could see.

Kel-Paten's aura pulsed with an intensity not unlike the hot flare of the vortex he'd fought yesterday.

He was fighting this, Eden realized, but it was a losing battle. She didn't need her ability to read auras to see the hunger in his eyes as he watched Sass leave Sickbay.

He looked back at Eden for a brief moment, as if he were about to say something. Then it was as if he realized what had happened: the perpetually flippant captain had responded, as she often did, with sarcasm. And he'd misread her, badly, because he wanted to—badly.

But this time, Eden had witnessed it.

Section Forty-Six.

The mask fell back into place.

“If you'll excuse me, Doctor.” He inclined his head slightly.

“Of course.”

Eden leaned back in her chair after he left and released the tension of the past few moments with a large sigh. Sass's natural lighthearted and often flippant attitude was going to lead her into big trouble. Sass teased everyone, but Kel-Paten was not something you teased. She doubted if teasing was even in his emotional programming. Which meant he was subrouting all his responses through whatever last known human emotional levels had been present when the psycho-cybernetics had been added.

Which would have been when he was around sixteen or seventeen years old.

Eden groaned out loud.

Paranoia? No, Kel-Paten wasn't suffering from paranoia.

He was suffering from adolescence!

EDEN FYNN'S QUARTERS, THS VAXXAR

Something bothered Eden all through dinner with Caleb Monterro and Dannar Kel-Minra, but she couldn't quite place what it was. Dann, a lieutenant in navigation, was pleasant, about her own age and made no attempts to disguise his interest in her. He was a kind and gentle man, and kind and gentle enough not to push himself on her or make her feel uncomfortable in any way.

But he didn't make her feel anything else either. In the years since her divorce, she couldn't truly remember a man who had. Though she'd known, and dated, many nice men.

Who were...nice. But that was all.

She prowled about her quarters after dinner and wondered if that's what made her feel so restless. Her life was fulfilling in all areas except one: romance.

Maybe she expected too much. She hadn't signed on with Fleet while still in medical school because she'd been husband-hunting.

She thought about taking a sedative—she had the night before only because of sheer exhaustion. But tonight, other than that odd restlessness, she felt better, more rested, with just the usual aggravations of a huntership CMO. So a cup of Orange Garden tea and the comfort of Reilly, her large black furzel, nestled against her, was all she needed. Not surprisingly, she fell asleep shortly after her head touched the pillow.

Or she thought she did.

Over the years, she'd tried many times to figure out if the space she now occupied—this gray, hazy yet palpably solid space—was real or just a dream.

It never felt like a dream. It felt as if she stood in a large, dimly lit room. Or building. Yet she had no sense of walls. But she had a definite sense of floor and, as she'd done for years, she took a few steps forward once she realized where she was.

She wasn't afraid. This wasn't a frightening or lonely place. Rather, it was a place of immense peace, immense calm. A waiting place. An in-between place.

There was always a gentleness in the gray mists about her, as there was now. It was a place that calmed her mind and often, when she was troubled before sleep, she would wake, if that's what she did, to find herself here. And she knew that if she waited long enough, thoughts or images would come into her mind. She wouldn't physically see them—she'd never physically seen anything here except for the soothing gray mists.

Except now.

She almost stumbled over him in the fog, sensing his presence more than seeing it only moments before they collided—she, moving dreamily forward and he, just rising from his seat. And then there was the warm and very reassuring pressure of his hands on her arm and about her waist as he drew her against him, then back down to the bench.

A bench. A stone bench.

And a man.

Jace Serafino.

“I'm sorry, I—ohmygods!” she gasped as she recognized the deep blue eyes staring intensely at her.

She was dreaming, she had to be dreaming. But her hand, now pressing against the soft fabric of the shirt covering his chest, felt the presence of a heartbeat.

He studied her face. “I ... know you.” Like Kel-Paten, it was a question, yet a statement.

She nodded. “Dr. Eden Fynn, CMO on the Vaxxar.” And winced when she heard the formality of her own tone. Why the hell didn't you just add ‘reporting for duty'? she chastised herself mentally.

Jace was smiling at her. “Why didn't you?” he asked.

“Why didn't I—” And she stopped, frozen by the realization that he'd heard her thoughts.

You're a telepath. She whispered the thought in her mind.

Yes. Like you.

Like me? He was wrong! I'm ... I'm not a telepath. To be a telepath in the Triad was to be feared, to be manipulated. You were either an agent with Psy-Serv, or you were declared legally insane. I'm a healer, an empath! I'm—

You're here, aren't you? His question was gentle, as gentle as the hands that now rested against her waist. She knew she should object to this sudden familiarity, except that it didn't seem all that sudden. The way he held her, the way he'd guided her to the bench, even the way he now used that light, teasing tone in his voice—his mind-voice—raised no internal alarms in her. Even her doctor-patient concerns didn't exist on this level.

This telepathic level. This here which she had known all her life and now didn't understand.

Here? she questioned.

In Novalis.

She shook her head. I don't understand. The Novalis was your ship.

Novalis is a place. This place. I named my ship after it.

How did you ... how did you know the name? Did you name this place?

His soft chuckle was audible. The Ancients named this place, I think. Or maybe the Gods did. It depends on which legend you're taught. Don't your people have songs about it?

I don't know. Not that I remember. But I wasn't raised ... my father was human.

Ahhh. He touched his fingers lightly on the left side of her face, first at her temple, then twice on her cheek, about an inch apart. His thumb came to rest under her chin.

She was trembling. She knew what he'd done and who—no, what, he was. She had felt his touch beyond her mere physical existence, though the physical sensations were admittedly pleasant.

He'd marked her. It was an ancient benediction; a ritual blessing some said was older than the U-Cees, older than the Triad. It was a blessing of a Nasyry warrior-priest that denoted safekeeping: “May the Gods keep you in their care” were the words that often accompanied it.

Innocuous words, but said by a Nasyry they carried power.

A power that hadn't been seen or heard from by either the U-Cees or the Triad in over three hundred years.

“Who are you?” She spoke out loud now, afraid what her thoughts would reveal.

He looked at her quizzically and withdrew his hand from her chin. “Jace Serafino, last time I checked.”

“You're Nasyry.”

His eyes narrowed for a moment. “Your studies have not been totally lacking, Doctor.”

“I...no. There were things I've wanted to know.”

“Self-taught, Healer?”

“Mostly, yes.”

His hand was back, cupping her face. She felt his feather-light touch in her mind.

You're a touch telepath, Doctor, do you know that? At least, you are with me. You can link to my thoughts by touching me.

I'm an empath, she repeated.

The two aren't mutually exclusive. You experience your strongest empathic readings when you touch your patients, don't you?

Yes. But in Sickbay, I tried with you. There was nothing.

A small smile. I beg to differ. You underrate yourself. Especially in that delightful outfit—do you always wear see-through clothing in Sickbay? And I found that touch of blue lace rather memorable...

Eden saw what he'd seen as he flashed the mental image to her: she'd chosen that shirt for comfort and had forgotten that its low-cut neckline would gape when she leaned over. And the blue lace—Gods, that bright blue bra of hers!

That's—that's not what I meant!

You blush beautifully. I'll have to keep that in mind.

Captain Serafino—

Jace. There was a firm but friendly insistence in his tone.

She sighed. Jace, I received no telepathic readings from you in Sickbay. Why?

A waft of negative emotion now; a slight tension from him that quickly faded. That was Psy-Serv's best effort.

Psy-Serv? You're agent for them? A frisson of fear ran up her spine before she could stop it.

No! His answer was emphatic. May the Gods strike me dead if I ever...

He drew her against him, fitting her against his broad chest, his face resting in her hair. She could feel the warmth of his breath on her neck and it was calming, reassuring, like the gray mists around her.

And there was something else: safety. Protection. Like the ritual blessing he'd traced on her face, he now wove a pattern of wholeness in her mind. Eden imagined that she couldn't feel more protected were one of the Gods to suddenly come down and cup her in His hand. There was a tremendous power in this man called Jace Serafino. And a tremendous benevolence.

Suddenly he tensed, his breath catching hard as sharp pains, thin and cutting as microfine wires, laced through his body. He thrust her from him, but she grabbed for his hand.

“Eden, don't, Gods, Eden don't, it might kill you!” he rasped.

“Jace, what is it? What's wrong?” Where they touched her flesh stung and tingled, like a thousand insects dancing a fandango of death on her skin.

He managed a pained smile. “Psy-Serv. Years ago.” He gulped for air. “An implant. There's an implant. That's why you can't—”

He slid to the ground, his body shaking. “Oh, Gods. Eden, help me!”

Then he disappeared.

She bolted out of her bed, rudely dislodging the sleeping furzel. She pulled on her workout shorts and the nearest sweatshirt, grabbing for her sneakers and commbadge. It trilled just as she exited into the corridor.

“Sickbay to Fynn! We've got a Code Red on Captain Serafino!”

“I know, Gods damn it, I know!” she barked back at the tiny transmitter. “I'm in the lift and on my way!”

---

CHAPTER FIVE

SHIP'S GYM, THS VAXXAR

Sass called it the “Kiss Your Ass Good-bye” stretch—bend over, grab your ankles and try to yank your head through your legs. That was Sass's position when she saw Eden walk in. Well, perhaps ‘walk’ wasn't the right word. Even from her upside-down vantage point, the CMO's method of perambulation was better categorized as ‘trudge'.

And Eden Fynn rarely trudged.

A tall full-figured woman of a comfortable beauty, Eden Fynn had sparkling blue eyes, golden blonde hair, a well-proportioned distinctly feminine form and, as had been overheard more than once from the lips of various male crew, “legs that didn't quit". But, of course, that reference had nothing to do with the act of walking, an act that Eden wasn't performing with her usual bright gait. Especially not at 0630 when she normally bounded in to the gym to accompany Sass on their morning jog.

“Captain, we need to talk,” Eden said as Sass slowly straightened out of her stretch.

Captain. Eden only called her ‘Captain’ in the presence of pompous muckety-mucks (like the admiral) or when both of them were totally trashed and trying like hell to act sober.

Or when there was a problem. A big, big problem.

Sass took an intuitive leap based on the fact that Eden was still in her Sickbay scrubs: “Serafino.”

A confirming nod.

“He's ... still alive?”

“Yes. Don't ask me how or why, but yes.”

“Kel-Paten didn't—”

“This has nothing to do with Kel-Paten. At least, not at this point,” Eden said with a tired sigh.

“Then what does it have to do with?”

Eden's answer was barely audible. “Psy-Serv.”

“Oh, damn.” That wasn't a term Sass wanted to hear. She grabbed her friend by the elbow. “My office. No. My quarters.” The latter was the only place she could be sure Kel-Paten wouldn't barge into, unannounced.

The replicator in the captain's quarters dutifully produced a steaming cup of tea and a cup of darkly pungent Mahrian blend coffee while Sass sat at the small dining table, hands folded, and listened to Eden's recitation: her inability to use her empathic senses to diagnose Serafino; her nagging feeling of something being very wrong; and her inexplicable encounter with Jace Serafino in a place called ‘Novalis'.

“Tell me again,” Sass said. “This place, this is not just a dream. You'd know a dream from, from whatever this is.”

Eden plucked one of the plump lushberries from the bowl in front of her. “I guess you could liken it more to a meditative state; an ‘out of body experience'. I, you'd have an existence there.You can touch and feel things.”

“Like when Kel-Paten spikes in. He's on the bridge but he could also be in engineering.”

“Sort of,” Eden agreed. “Except that he's not physically in both places.”

“And you are.”

“Yes.”

“Okay. More like a simdeck program. Simdeck programs have substance. Temporary substance, but substance.”

Eden thought for a moment. “If Kel-Paten were to spike in to the simdeck and recreate himself—”

“Which is illegal,” Sass cut in.

“Yes, which is illegal. But if he did that while he was spiked in and was also physically on the bridge, and then had a secondary substantial existence on the simdeck—that's probably the closest to what I'm talking about.”

Sass sat back in her chair, popped a large purple lushberry in her mouth. “Damn!” She chewed thoughtfully. “So okay, so you do this. I mean, you are Zingaran. How did Serafino get there?”

Eden waited until Sass swallowed the berry. “He's a telepath,” she stated.

Sass felt her jaw drop open. “Ohhh, damn.”

“I know.”

“You mentioned Psy-Serv.” Sass's words came quickly, her brain pumping out worried thoughts even faster. “If Serafino's a telepath—and you're sure of this, I assume—If Serafino's a telepath, and the Triad, I mean, the Alliance, had ostensibly hired him for the Illithian mission, that means he's on their payroll, which means he's also on Psy-Serv's payroll ... am I right on this? Are you following me?”

“Yes. I mean, no, he's not on Psy-Serv's payroll. He's on Psy-Serv's shit list.”

The proverbial light of knowledge clicked on in Sass's brain. “A rogue telepath.”

“I think that's probably correct.”

“You think—?”

“I'm not sure. We hadn't gotten that far into an explanation when his physical body in Sickbay had a seizure. Courtesy of Psy-Serv. That much he did manage to tell me.”

“Courtesy of Psy-Serv?”

Eden nodded. “There's an implant in his brain. It doesn't show up on any of my med-scans—that's how treacherous it is. I had to use other methods to find out what little I know. It's triggered by the resonance of any telepathic activity and makes such activity excruciatingly painful.”

“But you said he met you, telepathically, in this Novalis place. How could he if he has this implant?”

A sigh of frustration blew through Eden's lips. “I don't exactly know right now. It's one of the things I'm working on. He seems to be able to override it for short periods of time.”

“Why did Psy-Serv put it there?”

“That I don't know either,” Eden admitted.

Sass grabbed Eden's empty cup along with her own and stuck them in the replicator port. “Tea, Orange Garden blend, and coffee, double black, Mahrian,” she ordered. Then, as the beverages materialized, “Behavioral implants have been used with homicidal psychotics.”

“That was outlawed over sixty-five years ago. I even checked my medical journals on that.”

“Lubashit.” Sass handed the steaming cup to Eden and sat back down at the table. She held Eden's gaze with her own for a moment, then looked away. “There were cons on Lethant who had them. There was talk that they should have done that with me. I don't know if I ever told you about that.”

“Only that it was a horrible experience,” Eden replied.

Sass’ eighteen-month stay on the U-Cee's prison world—a desolate, lawless wasteland populated by what the legal system adjudicated to be human filth—wasn't easy for her to talk about. Not even now. Not even with Eden, who was one of the few people who knew the truth.

“Were they recent implants?” Eden asked, bring Sass's thoughts back to the present problem at hand.

Sass shrugged. “Depends on what you call recent. I was there seven years ago. Gods, was it only seven? Seems like yesterday.” She tilted her head back and downed the last of her coffee. “How time flies when you're having fun.” She smiled thinly. “Anyway, to answer your question, yes, seven years ago they were still doing brain implants as a way of behavior control. They had a med facility on Lethant.”

“I don't suppose they'd risk doing them on Varlow,” Eden mused.

“Right next door to HQ? Hell, no. The public outcry would've toppled the government faster than a fleet of Triad hunterships. Oops, sorry. I forgot; we're one of them, now. But where were we?” she asked, her fingers pinching the bridge of her nose for a moment. Talking about Lethant invariably gave her a headache. “Oh, yes. Serafino. The implant. Are we sure we're not dealing with some serious psychosis here? I take it you want to remove the implant.”

“I think if I don't, it'll kill him.”

“Are you sure if we do, he won't kill us?” Sass challenged.

“At this point, relatively sure.”

“Kel-Paten's not going to like ‘relatively',” Sass said.

“Kel-Paten ... Sass, I need a favor.” Eden leaned over the table towards her friend. “I don't want the admiral brought in yet.”

“Because of his well-publicized hatred for telepaths? I can understand your concern, but Eden, he hates Serafino pretty thoroughly already. I don't see where telling him Serafino's a telepath is going to add to that much.”

“It's not just Serafino,” Eden answered quietly. “I'm a telepath, too.”

This time Sass's mouth gaped all the way open. “But...” she managed finally. “How?”

Years ago, Psy-Serv had set up their own system of identifying telepaths and drafting them into service. The official line that it was all volunteer, yet no one knew of any telepath who had said no, and lived. And just in case someone tried to hide his or her talents, Psy-Serv routinely scanned the populace, starting in grade school, for the slightest twinge of telepathic ability.

If there were ‘rogue’ telepaths, and there were always rumors there were a few, it was because they had grown up outside the system, on desolate rim worlds, never being exposed to formal schooling. Or regular medical exams.

Sass knew what that was like.

But Eden had been raised in a nice little dirtside colony and had attended all the proper schools and all the proper birthday parties. And that was the center of Sass's question—how had Eden escaped Psy-Serv's scans?

“I'm not sure,” Eden said. “But I think it's because I'm half-Zingaran and was recognized as an empath when I was still small. Whatever they sensed from me they probably just chalked up to empathic talents.

“That, and I don't really remember experiencing what Serafino calls Novalis until I was in my teens, maybe thirteen? Fourteen? The telepaths I'd heard about developed their talents much younger, around four or five.”

“But when you went for your Fleet physical, didn't they scan you again?”

“Yes. But—I don't know. That's something else I don't have an answer for right now.”

“But you're sure?”

Eden nodded slowly. “That I'm telepathic? Gods help me, yes I am. Though obviously not well trained or I wouldn't be running into the problems I have now.”

“With Serafino.”

“I'm hoping I can contact him again. I'm hoping he may have the answer to the implant.”

Sass retrieved her third cup of coffee. “What do you need me to do?” she asked when she returned to the table.

“Keep Kel-Paten out of Sickbay as much as possible, for one,” Eden replied.

“That means you won't be seeing much of me. Where I go, he goes these days. What else?”

Eden took a deep breath. “As you said, Kel-Paten has no great love for telepaths, or for Psy-Serv. I have reason to believe he has an extensive personal library of Psy-Serv's history, their methods, their means, everything. I need access to those datafiles.”

“You think they might hold the answer to Serafino's implant?”

“Maybe not Serafino's specifically, but at least its medical pedigree.”

Sass pursed her lips and regarded her friend carefully. “You're asking me to break into the admiral's secure locked datafiles. Files that are probably loaded with every defensive hacker trap he could create with his mega-million credit mind. Files that probably have more security devices, hidden alarms and fail-safe programs than anything else in civilized space, Psy-Serv's own databanks included.”

“Yes.”

“Files that are located in his quarters, which are again no doubt the most secure location on this ship; hell, probably in this fleet.”

“Yes.”

Sass shrugged. “Piece o’ cake. Anything else?”

“If you get caught, we'll both be court-martialed, you know that.”

“No,” Sass replied. “We won't both be court-martialed. If I get caught, I go down alone.”

“Sass—”

“No buts about it, Fynn. I survived Lethant. If I get caught, and it's still an ‘if', they'd probably send me back there, or someplace like it that the Triad has, since it would be a Triadian officer's secure files I violated. In any case, as I said, I've done Lethant. Been there, done that, bought the vidloop, as they say. And I can tell you, you wouldn't survive. Nothing against you, but you weren't raised like I was.”

Eden shot her a look that clearly stated she was in disagreement with Sass's opinion. “It's not an issue,” Eden said, “because, number one, you won't get caught, right?”

At the optimistic pronouncement, Sass grinned broadly.

“And number two, if you are, I'd bet you Kel-Paten won't tell a soul.”

Sass burst out laughing. “Lubashit! Are you kidding? He'd be so righteously pissed that my biggest problem would be talking him out of venting me out the port exhaust just so I could be formally court-martialed!”

* * * *

No, Eden thought as she trudged a little less wearily back to her quarters, the last thing on Kel-Paten's mind if he found Sass in his quarters would be any kind of disciplinary action. Unless of course it involved silk whips and Sass in a black leather bustier—

No, No, Bad CMO! she chided herself as she stripped off her scrubs and stepped into the shower. Her friend never did strike her as the ‘whip and leather’ type. With Kel-Paten, there was no telling where his fantasies lay. Eden had a feeling that as long as they included Sass, in person and in his cabin, he wouldn't give a hoot for what she'd be wearing. As long as it could be removed quickly.

She glanced at the clock on her nightstand and told the computer to wake her at 1330 hours. That would give her about five hours of sleep, which she desperately needed. And with Serafino sedated after the seizure, she felt safe that she wouldn't be meeting up with him in Novalis right now.

They both needed a good night's sleep.

EDEN FYNN'S QUARTERS, THS VAXXAR

The last thing Eden remembered was Reilly snuggling against her arm, purring loudly. Then Jace was rising from the stone bench, hand outstretched to greet her.

“I hoped you'd be here.” He took her hand in his as they sat down. “I thought I might have scared you away.” He smiled, but it was a smile touched with a nervous tension.

“You shouldn't be here,” she said, the concern in her voice evident. “I don't know if I can pull you back from another seizure.”

“I overstayed my limit last time, I'm sorry. But—”

“Your limit?” Then her guess had been right. He had a way of temporarily bypassing the implant.

He nodded. “Twelve minutes and fifteen seconds is max at the moment. I try to keep an internal clock running, but it got away from me last time. It's just been so long...” he closed his eyes briefly. “I have so much to tell you, so much to explain. I just don't know if there's time.”

A feeling of deep loneliness emanated from him.

“You haven't been in touch with another telepath in quite some time.” It wasn't a guess. She was primarily an empath.

“More than four years. Not since Bianca.”

“Bianca?” she questioned and immediately an image flashed into her mind: a woman, dark-haired and beautiful. She recognized the azure-blue eyes. They were like Jace's. She felt the bond of strong affection he had for his older sister. And she also realized how much more could be transmitted telepathically than through words. In those brief moments when she experienced Bianca Serafino, she completely sensed the woman's personality—her serious, protective nature towards her wayward younger brother; her deep love for her son, Jorden. She saw, no felt him, too. All this in a matter of seconds.

And then she felt Jace's fear and his anger and knew that the implant had something to do with Bianca.

“It was a trade,” he said out loud. “My life, or my talents, for hers and Jorden's. He's a lot like me, you know,” he mused sadly. “Scares the hell out of her sometimes, she used to say.”

“Used to?”

A feeling of loss. “I haven't seen her in four, almost five years. I don't even know if she's alive, although I was promised as much. Still, Psy-Serv is Psy-Serv. No one dictates to them. Not even Captain Jace Serafino.” He squeezed her hand and she knew he needed just to feel her warmth right now.

She squeezed back. “You said you needed my help. What can I do?”

“In eleven minutes? Oh, Eden, I do need your help but understand you may have to take a lot of furzel-naps to get the whole story.”

“But couldn't you, couldn't we talk in Sickbay? Jace, the seizure was serious but unless we mistime this meeting now, the implant shouldn't activate again. I hope to have you responsive by tomorrow.”

A sad smile crossed his face. “When you talk to me tomorrow, I won't know half of what I need to tell you. The implant does more than just prohibit telepathy.”

“You won't—?”

He shook his head. “I probably won't even remember your name. Eden, the Jace Serafino you have in Sickbay is only part of the person I am. I'll be honest with you right now. It's not my better part.” He brought her hand to his lips and lightly brushed them across her knuckles. “Gods, woman, you are a gorgeous creature. I think I've told you that, haven't I? And yes, you are blushing beautifully again. The Jace Serafino ‘out there',” he continued, with an upward nod of his head as if Sickbay were off somewhere in the distance, “is a rake and a scoundrel who has only one use for beautiful women. It's not friendship and right now, Eden, I really, really need a friend. I just wish you were ugly. It would make dealing with you so much easier.”

“Captain Serafino,” she said, gently withdrawing her hand from his, “we are both professionals. There's no reason we can't work together in that atmosphere.”

“No, of course not.” He laughed. “You underestimate yourself, Doc. But then, you probably have a fleet of men who tell you that daily.”

“We're getting off the subject,” she warned.

“You do that to me.” The twinkle in his eyes was unmistakable.

“Jace!”

“All right. Back to business. We have seven minutes. I'll talk or transmit, whatever is easier. You listen.”

She nodded.

He was, as Sass had termed it, a ‘rogue’ telepath. He and his sister were the products of a liaison between a Nasyry priest and a highborn but rebellious daughter of a wealthy Kel family.

But the Nasyry haven't been present in this System in several hundred years, Eden pointed out.

The Nasyry come and go as they, as we please, was his answer. We use the space-time continuum as a means of travel. A ‘yesterday’ to us may be one hundred and fifty years ago to you.

Why aren't you with your people? Couldn't they help you?

A twinge of anger mixed with shame. They have no love of half-breeds.

Then you and Bianca—

She's all I have. She and Jorden. He has my ‘talent', by the way—his mother doesn't. Which may be how and why Bianca made the one big mistake in her usually orderly life and that was her Psy-Serv lover. Jorden's father. That's how this whole thing started.

Eden saw and felt how the quiet, methodical woman had been totally unprepared for the handsome and flamboyant Psy-Serv agent who'd swept her off her feet—solely to gain access to Jace. It had taken the agent twelve years; twelve years of pretending to love Bianca, twelve years of playing father to a son who meant nothing to him. Twelve years for Bianca to trust him enough to arrange for him to meet with her brother, who by then had already established a reputation for himself as a daring mercenary.

Jace had hated the man on sight and later blamed himself for Bianca's marriage. He'd spent little time with his sister over the years; the nature of his ‘career’ keeping them out of touch for long periods. The first time he ever saw his nephew was the first time he met with Bianca's husband. He was in importing and exporting, the man had told Captain Serafino. Perhaps they could do some business together?

So good was this agent, so strong were his talents, that even Jace didn't pick up on the fact that he was a telepath. Not until it was much too late.

And then he was given the choice—work with us—or your sister and her son will die.

That had been a little over four years ago. Jace made the only choice he could have.

You're the only telepath I've found since that time, he told her. The only one not with Psy-Serv. There is so much you need to know, Eden. It's almost providential you're on the;Vaxxar, that you have access to everything this ship represents and can do. I need your help, I really need your help, or else more than just the Triad, and this new Alliance, will suffer.

He raised her hand to his lips, kissing her wrist this time, then spoke out loud. “I'm just about at my limit here. Trust me, Eden, but do yourself a favor and keep your bedroom door locked. My ‘evil twin', you know!” He grinned.

“I've asked Sebastian to help,” she said, ignoring the pleasurable little chills that ran up her spine at his touch.

“If you trust her, then I do too.”

“I think Kel-Paten has some files, some med files from Psy-Serv. They may give me some insight into your implant. Do you have enough time to tell me what you know about it?”

In a micro-second an image of a small red and silver device flashed into her mind along with the words: That's all I saw; that's all I know.

It's a start, she told him encouragingly.

He drew a deep breath. I have to go. His lips brushed against hers in a feather-light kiss just as he disappeared.

* * * *

Next to her, Reilly shifted his considerable furry weight, demanding more bed space that she automatically granted him. He rubbed his soft face against her arm, sensing that his humanmommy was not quite asleep and not quite awake. If he nudged her a bit more, perhaps a can of food might appear.

But no, she only sighed and settled deeper into the coverlet. Reilly sighed also, purred for a while and snuggled closer, only to be dislodged a bit later.

Mommy up?

But no, humanmommy wasn't up. But something ... something was. Golden eyes narrowed, searched the shadows of the cabin.

Protect mommy. Must protect mommy.

Then it was gone.

Reilly slept lightly after that, furry ears alert, twitching.

Must protect mommy.

---

CHAPTER SIX

ADMIRAL KEL-PATEN'S OFFICE, THS VAXXAR

Eden disliked being called into the admiral's office, especially when it was only a half-hour after she'd awakened. Especially when she hadn't even finished her first cup of Orange Garden tea yet. And especially when she plotted with two captains against him.

At least, that was the way Eden's overactive conscience viewed the situation.

She acknowledged Kel-Paten's request from the vidcom in her cabin, gulped down the rest of her tea and, with a quick glance to make sure Reilly had sufficient food and water to last until dinner (woe be unto her if the always vocal furzel didn't!), headed down the corridor to the lifts.

In the few minutes it took her to reach the bridge deck, she mentally catalogued what Kel-Paten might want of her. The rareness of his appearances in Sickbay was matched only by the rareness of his requests to deal with his CMO personally.

Most likely, she mused as she exited out into the main corridor, he wanted to discuss either Serafino's condition (she had been required to log a report on his seizure) or the condition of his two surviving crewmembers: a middle-aged T'Sarii male whose internal injuries included a punctured lung, and a Keltish engineering techie in his late twenties with a broken jaw and shoulder. Only Eden's orders as CMO had kept them, to date, safe from the admiral's interrogation skills.

She smiled at Timmar Kel-Faray, the Vaxxar's amiable First Officer, who exited the admiral's office just as she arrived.

“You here to see him?” Timm Kel-Faray asked after the doors closed behind him.

There was no question as to who “him” was. She nodded. “Another command performance.”

“Heard you had a rough night, Doc. Thought you'd still be sleeping.”

“So did I,” she replied, then changed the subject. “Anything come in from Farside Medical on your shift?” She'd shared her frustrations over the troublesome virus with the First Officer a few days ago.

“Not that I know. The Bridge usually doesn't comm me when I'm in conference with the admiral.” He nodded behind him. “He's in one of his moods again. Sorry.”

That was one thing Eden had noticed shortly after coming on board the Vaxxar. Both she and Sass had been prepared for the usual protectiveness and loyalty a crew would exhibit towards their captain, or in this case, their admiral. With Kel-Paten, they found there was an undeniable loyalty and unequivocal trust, but also an undeniable honesty. The bio-cybe commander-in-chief was well respected. But Eden knew of no one who considered him a friend.

She smiled her thanks then, assuming her best professional mien, laid her hand against the office door scanner. It read her identity and the doors parted to allow her entry.

The admiral was at his desk, head angled slightly away from her, but she clearly saw the eerie luminescent glow in his eyes. He'd been spiked in, probably looking for the latest reports on Serafino. Or tracking Sass's location on the ship. Or both. Eden knew he was quite capable of doing both, and many more things, simultaneously.

“Doctor.” He leaned back in his chair and motioned to one of the two empty chairs across from his desk, his eyes once again their usual pale blue.

Eden sat and rested her folded hands properly in her lap. “Admiral, what can I do for you?”

“Serafino, I gather, is still unconscious.” As usual, he wasted no time with pleasantries or small talk.

She'd checked with Sickbay immediately upon awakening and so had an answer for him. “Correct.”

He glanced briefly at what she recognized as her report on the comp screen. “Do you have an explanation for the sudden decline in his condition?”

None that I'm going to give to you at this moment, she thought, then out loud: “Dr. Monterro and I have some theories, but I don't want to get into them until we can present you with something conclusive.”

“Such as—?”

Mistrust. She empathically read that, coming strongly from him. She was dancing around the facts and he knew it. Damn! She fished around for something close enough to appease him.

“It is possible he had a previous brain injury that was aggravated by his injuries sustained in the vortex flare.” Well, that was somewhat the truth, after all. The implant could be considered a previous injury.

“Or—?”

Damn him! No wonder Sass headed for her gin stock so quickly at the end of each day. She tried to remember what little she knew of Serafino—the physical Jace Serafino, rake and scoundrel.

“It could also be the result of trefla addiction or an overdose.” Potent and dangerous recreational drugs were a well-known pastime for many ‘rim-runners', as mercenaries and other fringe spacers were often called. Trefla crystals were one of the more popular. When she'd performed her volunteer work at the clinic on Farside Station, she's seen first hand just what it could do.

Kel-Paten seemed to accept that. He touched the comp screen with one black-clad fingertip. Her report on Serafino vanished; another report appeared in its place.

“T'Krain Namar.” He said the name of the T'Sarii crewmember and looked back at her.

“Master T'Krain still has difficulty breathing, not to mention speaking. Sir. He needs at least another twenty-four hours on the respiratory regenerator.”

“I need some answers before the next twenty-four hours, Doctor, and with Serafino unresponsive and Kel-Pern sedated,” he told her, leaning forward across his desk, “I don't have a lot to choose from. I'll be down in Sickbay at 1630 exactly, Doctor. I expect to have T'Krain available for questioning.”

“That's not possible—”

“Then do the impossible!” he barked.

Something in Eden snapped. Maybe it was the tone of his voice, the tone of someone who knew he was making an unreasonable request, and didn't care. It reminded her of several bad tempered adolescent boys she'd had to deal with on Station Triad One, when she and Sass had arrived there to attend the Peace Conferences almost a year ago. There had been a minor accident; an escalator had malfunctioned, causing two major injuries and several minor ones. One of the teenage boys had suffered a small facial laceration. She'd been attending to a shabbily dressed elderly woman with a broken hip and crushed left ankle when the boy had roughly grabbed her shoulder, almost turning her around.

“Healer!” He'd been frowning, much like Kel-Paten was now. It was a petulant frown, his typically dark Keltish eyes focusing on the signature blue-stone ring on her left hand that bespoke of her craft and her heritage. “We're already late for the party and this stupid thing breaks down, and look what it does to me! Just look!”

And he'd pulled his other hand away from his face, revealing a long thin gash that had left a smudge of blood on his palm. “I'm scarred for life! Do you know who my father is? He'll sue! We'll own that stupid company who made that lubashit escalator!”

She'd quickly removed his hand from her shoulder. “You'll be fine. Just go wash your face.” And she'd turned back to the old woman, only to find herself spun around again.

“I said, do you know who my father is? You don't deny my requests, Healer!”

She'd grasped his thin wrist forcefully. “I have a severely injured patient here, young sirrah. I told you. Go wash your face. Now—”

“Do you know who I am?” he shrilled at her.

“Yes. You are a rude, foolish, ill-mannered and ill-bred child, badly in need of a spanking. And if you do not leave me alone to attend to my patient, right now, I will administer that spanking myself. Right here, in front of all your friends. Do I make myself clear, young man?”

The teenage boy blinked. There was something about the authority in her voice that even he recognized, and probably, in all his spoiled and pampered life, had longed for from one of his parents. And had never received. “Y-y-yes, ma'am. Doctor.”

She'd turned back to the old woman, the sound of the boy's departing footsteps drowned out by the solitary applause of her friend nearby.

“Bravo, Eden!” Sass had halted in her ministrations to one of the less injured to offer her approval. There were chuckles also from a couple of security officers on the scene.

“These high-pocket politicians’ kids, people just don't tell them ‘no’ because of who daddy or mommy is,” a short, pudgy officer remarked. “Might do them good to hear ‘no’ a little more often.”

Just as it might do the admiral good to hear ‘no’ a little more often as well. She squared her shoulders and met Kel-Paten, blue stare for blue stare.

“Admiral Kel-Paten,” she said from between clenched teeth, “you may run this ship, you may run this Fleet, you may even run this entire Triad, for all I know. But I will tell you one thing you do not run, and that is my Sickbay. My patients’ lives are not to be hazarded by whatever political machinations you may currently be involved in. You will talk to Master T'Krain, Master Kel-Pern and Captain Serafino when, and only when, I give you medical clearance to do so. Rest assured you will have that clearance at the earliest opportunity that I deem to be safe. But know that is my decision and my decision only. Do I make myself clear?”

Kel-Paten blinked at her—a blink not unlike that ill-tempered teenage boy's. And for the first time she wished she wasn't just a touch-telepath. She'd give anything to know what was going on in his mind right now. The little her empathic senses picked up showed confusion, with a small bit of admiration.

“Perhaps I didn't explain myself well,” he began.

My oh my oh my! she thought. Is the unshakable admiral backing down?

“No one is more aware of your concerns than I am,” she offered him. “But it was your order that I keep Serafino and his crew alive, at all costs, just so that you could have the pleasure of killing them. I have to assume that ‘at all costs’ includes even yourself. Sir.” She smiled but it was not a warm smile, and he knew it.

He leaned back and steepled his gloved hands in front of his face in what she had come to recognize as a typical Kel-Paten gesture.

“You wouldn't have given that answer to Captain Sebastian,” he said after a moment, but there was no accusatory tone in his voice. If anything, he seemed amused.

“Captain Sebastian would have known better than to make that request,” she told him.

“Captain Sebastian has not had the aggravation of Serafino in her back pocket for the past fifteen years,” he said. “Nor a veritable flock of petulant Triad Senators who expect, no, demand the impossible out of me simply because I am Kel-Paten.” He looked at her from over steepled fingertips and raised one eyebrow. “If I can't intimidate you into getting what I want, dare I ask for your sympathy?”

His mouth twisted and with a shock Eden realized the Tin Soldier was trying to smile! It was a small smile and a bit crooked, she admitted. Barely visible between his gloved hands, but it was there. She saw it.

He could be almost charming if he ever gave himself half a chance, she noted. She wondered if he'd ever tried that crooked half-smile of his on Sass.

“You have more than my sympathy, admiral. You have my complete cooperation, as long, and I must repeat this, as long as you allow me first to do what I'm here to do. I promise I'll never try to advise you on tactical or military matters...” And she let her sentence drift off, knowing he could fill in the rest as well as she could.

He nodded. “When do you expect I'll be able to speak to either Kel-Pern or T'Krain?”

“I think within forty-eight hours is reasonable and safe.”

“And Serafino?”

“His condition is more fragile until we can identify whatever unknown factor or factors caused the seizure.” It was a great non-answer and she congratulated herself on it.

“Understood, Doctor.” He touched the comp screen, dumping its contents. “I have nothing further. Dismissed.”

She stood. “By your command, admiral.”

“Doctor Fynn.” His voice stopped her just as his office doors slid open. “Tell Captain Sebastian she's trained you well. Very well.”

She didn't try to suppress her grin this time. “It's not totally the captain's doing, sir. I spent my university summers as a camp counselor. Dealing with Triadian officers is not all that different from tending to teenagers.”

And with that, she stepped out into the corridor, the doors whooshing softly closed behind her.

SICKBAY, THS VAXXAR

With a frustrated sigh, Jace Serafino folded his telepathic self back inside his mind. There was so much he had wanted and needed to share with the Vaxxar's CMO, and he'd let himself get distracted by a too soft mouth, a blush of pink on pale cheeks, by the very womanly roundness of her body. That wasn't like him. Well, that was like the human Captain Jace Serafino but not the Nasyry Jace Serafino. He was a highly disciplined, well-trained warrior.

All that had gone to hell when he'd touched minds with Eden Fynn.

He'd been totally unprepared for her impact on him. It wasn't just her physical beauty; he'd known many women as sweetly beautiful as the Zingaran healer. In fact, he'd known women who were so exotically beautiful that their very entry into a room caused all conversation to cease.

But then, as his often-so-wise sister would point out, an eight-foot tall, three-hundred pound foul-smelling grenkbeast entering a room would also cause all conversation to cease.

That wasn't necessarily the hallmark of beauty, and he'd never really understood her comment until he met Eden.

Eden Fynn didn't cause all conversation to cease. She caused his heart to start beating again. She caused him to want to find a garden and pick the perfect bloom, just for her. She caused him to search his repertoire for the witty phrase, the play on words, just to see her smile. She caused him to feel young and silly and foolish and he couldn't seem to get enough of her. His twelve-minute time limit was going to drive him out of his mind.

Literally. Because if the Nasyry element of Jace Serafino felt that way, the human, womanizing, certified rake and scoundrel element of Captain Jace Serafino was going to go completely out of control once he “woke up".

He'd tried to warn her; would have to warn her more. The last thing he wanted to do was hurt her, and hurt her he would. There was no room in the human Captain Jace Serafino's life for the kinds of emotion, the kind of commitment she made him want. There was a price on his head, in more than just the Triad, or now, the new Alliance. Strewn across civilized space were a series of individuals who would not hesitate to strike out at Serafino through his feelings for Eden. Just as they had through Bianca and Jorden.

He couldn't let that happen, again.

But Gods, how he wanted her! How he wanted to know, just once in his life, what it would be like to be loved, truly loved, by a woman like Eden Fynn. He needed her warmth, her compassion, her intelligence. And her innocence; oh yes, there was an innocence in her that comes only from a truly loving heart. It was a rare, rare quality. That was what he'd first noticed when their minds had touched, and it had sent his jaded senses reeling. He felt that he'd spent his entire life in a dank and musty room, and suddenly a window had opened, and it was spring and every fruit tree was in blossom outside.

He'd gotten drunk on her perfume of gentle innocence and he was now, he knew, a confirmed alcoholic. Or Eden-holic. A mental chuckle echoed in his thoughts but it was tinged with sadness.

Why now? Why when his life was in such a wretched state? He wanted to offer her the sun, the moon and the stars—and all he could bring her was pain.

He sighed, physically sighed this time as the damage from the seizure faded. His other wounds had healed; he was Nasyry and had the enhanced Nasyran recuperative powers. Even now, his ears picked up the sounds and voices in Sickbay. Eden's voice was one of them. A warmth flooded his veins at the sound.

She was discussing with someone named Cal the fact that Captain Serafino's vital signs were rapidly improving.

You want vital, Eden my lovely, come here and I'll show you vital! The thought and accompanying sensation raced through his mind before he could stop it.

A surge of heat flowed from his mind-body directly into Eden. She'd been standing near the foot of his bed, close enough that he heard her surprised intake of breath as his heat touched her.

Jace felt her question the sensation and tried to throw a mental bucket of cold water on him, but it didn't work. His physical senses were coming around too quickly, and he was now aware of her perfume and the soft sound of her breathing as she moved closer to him.

He groaned softly but audibly.

There was a slight click as Eden placed her med-scanner on a nearby table. With his psychic senses, he could ‘see’ her as she leaned over him. “Captain Serafino? This is Doctor Fynn. Can you hear me?”

His mouth moved slightly but no sounds came out.

He shifted his focus. On the wall above his bed, the diagnostics panel rapidly kicked out data on his improving condition as the sensors built into the bed monitored his physical changes.

Eden leaned across him to key in some adjustments.

“Cal,” she called out, her fingers tapping in instructions, her attention on the readout, “I think Captain Serafino is about to return to the land of the living—ohh!”

He yanked her down on top of him, his mouth hard against hers, his tongue taking advantage of her surprised exclamation to probe her warm sweetness. His left hand had already threaded its way into her hair, his right arm tightening around her waist.

Warm. Soft. Sweet. She was all these things, this woman.

The man she'd called Cal looked up from the file in his hand. “Yes, it appears he has returned,” he commented lightly.

His warm, soft, sweet woman tried extricating herself from his passionate embrace. He lost his grip. She fell off his bed and landed squarely on her rump on the floor with a very unprofessional exclamation.

She was still sitting there, glaring up at the bed when Jace rolled over and, propping himself up on his side, extended one hand down to her.

“Come back up here, nurse. I think I need a little more of your special medicine.”

“I think you've had quite enough ‘special medicine', Captain Serafino,” she snapped at him, ignoring his hand and his chuckles as she pulled herself off the floor.

He liked what he saw; womanly curves accented by the well-fitting black and tan jumpsuit uniform that even her shapeless blue labcoat couldn't hide.

“Fynn,” he said, reading the nameplate on her coat. “Does Fynn have a first name?”

She squared her shoulders. “Yes. It's ‘Doctor'. Now, please lie back down. I'm going to have Dr. Monterro run some tests on you.”

He rested his head against the pillow. “Dr. Monterro, eh? What a coincidence! Two people in the same Sickbay with the same first name.”

She shot him a withering glance. He grinned broadly in answer. She snatched the med-scanner from the table and thrust it towards the other doctor as he walked in. “I'll go advise the captain that Serafino is awake.”

Eden ... sorry. He reached out, softly, haltingly into her mind just as she exited Sickbay. She turned, startled, then shaking her head, strode out into the hallway.

He didn't know if she'd heard him, or had turned for another reason.

He didn't know ... he couldn't remember what it was he didn't know.

DECK TEN, THS VAXXAR

At Eden's request, the ship's computer had informed her of Captain Sebastian's location in Drive Thruster Maintenance in Engineering Deck Ten, though by the time Eden arrived Sass had left maintenance and walked down Deck Ten's main corridor on her way back to the Bridge.

“Just making my rounds,” she told her CMO.

“Alone?” Eden asked with a smile.

Sass chuckled. “Oddly enough, yes. The admiral's in the middle of a vidconference with both Captain Kel-Tyra and old Admiral Rafe Kel-Tyra. I heard Rissa put the link through. I thought I could use the time to check on some of our people without ‘Himself’ breathing down my neck.”

“Well, I've got some good news and some bad news,” Eden said, carefully lowering her voice.

“Want to discuss it over tea in the Lounge?” Sass asked.

Eden nodded, and nothing further on the subject was said until they were seated at a quiet table next to one of the floor-to-ceiling viewports in the Officers’ Lounge on Deck Eight Forward, two steaming cups before them.

“Okay. What's up?” Sass asked.

“Serafino.” Literally, she thought, remembering the telling hardness of his body beneath hers. “He's awake. He was right about his memory. He didn't even know my name.”

“So your link with him is broken now that he's awake?”

Eden remembered the soft, sad apology in her mind and shook her head. “I don't believe so but I think it'll be more difficult. When his physical body was unconscious, his subconscious or telepathic sense had free rein. Now that he's physically awake, his conscious mind will dominate. It's only when he releases his conscious mind, during sleep, for example, that his telepathic sense will be active. Though after he woke up just now he was able to, very briefly, contact me. But I could feel it was a strain.”

“Do you know anything more on the implant?” Sass kept her voice low.

“You have a copy of the drawing I made of the unit as he showed it to me and the results of my research through our computers. Other than the three possibilities I listed, nothing. I'm sorry to have to give you so little to go on.”

“I'm not going to have time to do any specific searches when I access Kel-Paten's files, anyway, so don't worry about it, Eden. It's going to be a ‘get and grab'. I'm going to dump whatever I can find and hope to hell you can use it.” Sass sighed. “I figure some time in the next three days I'll make an attempt to get in. I wish I had had more notice about this vidconference with Kel-Tyra—Rohland usually keeps the admiral chatting for a while. That would have been an ideal time to get into his quarters and access those data files.”

“He's going to interrogate Serafino and T'Krain tomorrow. Kel-Pern is still out of commission,” Eden said. “Maybe then—?”

“Maybe, but I have a feeling he's going to want us there when he talks to them. You, for your empathic readings as to who is telling the truth and who isn't. And me because I'm more fluent in the street lingo dialect of T'Sar that T'Krain speaks than Kel-Paten is. The admiral can handle his own in a diplomatic situation with the T'Sarii, but this T'Krain is as far from a book-fed highbrow as you can get. I doubt if he could even converse with one of his own educated people.”

“T'Krain's Standard is pretty bad,” Eden admitted. “Though he does have an impressive command of our swear words.”

“Yeah, well I think the ‘fuck you very much’ is Serafino's doing. Probably his idea of a joke.”

Eden sipped at the last of her tea. “Captain Serafino certainly does have an interesting sense of humor.”

“Around the admiral, that could be fatal,” Sass warned. “You'd better get the message to him to behave himself or that implant will be the least of his troubles.”

Behave? Eden had no idea how she could get Captain Serafino to behave. His inner self didn't seem to be doing a very good job of it, if their recent encounter was any proof.

“I don't think Kel-Paten appreciates being called the ‘Tin Soldier',” Sass was saying, referring to Serafino's brief but notable comments when he was first transported into Sickbay.

“I'm sure Serafino knows that. I'm equally as sure that's why he said what he did. It's like he wants Kel-Paten to get angry.”

“I thought ‘cybes couldn't experience emotions,” Sass said. “I mean, I've seen Kel-Paten act as if he's angry. But I thought it's just all some response simulation program. Why would Serafino care about that?”

“I don't think it's a simulation,” Eden said carefully.

“Kel-Paten?” Sass looked at her incredulously. “It has to be. He's a ‘cybe.”

“I'm an empath,” Eden countered. “And he's not just a ‘cybe, not in the sense you mean. There's still a lot of human biology there.”

“You're telling me you've sensed genuine anger from him?”

More than just anger, but Eden didn't say that. “Yes.”

“I was under the impression ... hell, the U-Cees built their strategies around the fact that, between the cybernetics and Psy-Serv's emo-inhibitor programs, Kel-Paten is one six-foot-three deadly emotionless son-of-a-bitch. That was the whole point of him, don't you see?” Sass asked, her index finger making the point in the air. “No emotions to sway decision making. Only hard, cold clinical facts. Data in, data out.”

“You've seen him lose his temper,” Eden said.

“And I've heard your medical diag comps use a compassionate tone of voice when interviewing patients, and a firmer tone response if a patient starts to babble on too much. There are a couple of programs in Engineering that have a definite warning tone. I even know of bar-'droids in the high priced Glitterkiln casinos that tell jokes. And laugh. That doesn't mean they feel anything. Those are response simulations, Eden. Mimicry. Not feelings.”

“I know.”

Sass looked quizzically at her. “What are you telling me here? Does Kel-Paten need a tune-up or do we have a Section Forty-Six situation?”

Section Forty-Six. Eden had read the regulation so many times the key phrase stuck in her mind: behavior, attitude and/or reactions clearly in contradiction to the accepted norm.

“As I don't have access to his full medical profile,” Eden told her, “I can't answer that.”

“So in the meantime,” Sass said, “we're going into a potentially explosive situation between a lethal ‘cybe who just might have a screw loose, and a rogue telepath who has the ability to pick up and use that very flaw. Lovely!”

Would Jace sense the same emotions she had in Kel-Paten? Of course he would. Eden hadn't even thought of that; she gave herself a mental kick. But could he use that information? His subconscious, telepathic self would sense it, yes, but would he be able to transmit that to his conscious self?

With a sinking feeling she knew he could, just as he'd sensed her discomfort after he'd kissed her in Sickbay and then sent his apology. There was communication, albeit limited, between his telepathic level and normal level.

When it was important enough.

And she knew that when it came to the fifteen-year feud between Kel-Paten and Serafino, it was definitely important enough.

---

CHAPTER SEVEN

BRIDGE, THS VAXXAR

“All I know, admiral, is that Doctors Fynn and Monterro still have tests to perform on Serafino. They don't want anything to occur that could cause him to relapse.”

Kel-Paten glanced down at Sass as she stood next to him on the bridge. Her face was in profile to him. She watched the starfield flowing by the large forward viewport as the Vaxxar traveled at sub-light speed towards the nearest Fleet Base on Panperra Station.

He hated when he couldn't see her eyes when she spoke. He was learning, sometimes the hard way, to read her expressions, the nuances between her words and thoughts. True, he'd been trained—he liked that word better than programmed—to correctly interpret over one hundred and forty human facial expressions and another sixty-seven non-human ones. But these classifications were useless when it came to Tasha Sebastian.

He needed to know more than the fact that her facial expression designated, for example, mild amusement. He needed to know if that amusement were directed at him or against him; if it were an amusement she felt he'd understand and wanted to share with him; if something he said or did was the source of that delightful pixie-ish smile. He needed to know if he made her feel something.

And nothing in his progr—his training allowed for that.

Right now, the little he could see of her face told him she'd adopted her “professional expression"—a noncommittal, almost bland mien. She simply reported the facts as she knew them, and had no opinions of same.

Or else she had deep opinions and wasn't about to share them with him. He'd known her long enough, studied her long enough, to see that also as a viable option. It was at those times he felt the most left out. She didn't trust him enough to share her concerns with him.

Or, like most of his crew, she believed he wasn't capable of caring.

He was. She'd taught him that, too.

So he probed, asked a few more questions about Serafino's condition, and got nowhere. Except that now she thought he didn't have any faith in Fynn's medical abilities.

“I assure you, Sebastian, I have a great respect for the doctor's assessment here. However, her focus is different from ours.” He liked that as soon as he said it. It aligned Sass with him under the heading of “Command", breaking from her usual allegiance with the CMO.

“As I understand it, we'll have nothing to focus on if Serafino is comatose again. Or dead.” She looked at him briefly, a slight raising of one eyebrow as if to say, ‘Are you following me on this, flyboy?’

She hadn't called him “flyboy” since the peace talks. Before that, it had been one of the names she'd taunted him with from the bridge of the Regalia. Flyboy. An ancient aviator term for heavy-air fighter pilots. The first time she'd leveled it at him he'd taken offense, but she'd used it so often after that that it had become almost a term of endearment. At least, he liked to think of it that way.

Now, all he rated was the raised eyebrow.

“I only intend to question the man, not torture him,” he told her.

“At least not yet, eh, Kel-Paten?” she replied, her voice lowered a bit and with a hint of a smile.

“Sebastian.” He paused.

“Kel-Paten,” she replied and then paused in turn.

This game was one of their few rituals that had continued after the peace talks. He would say her name, followed by the appropriate warning-filled pause whenever something she said or did warranted his supposed disapproval. And she would reply with his name, either matching his warning tone or, more often, mocking it.

This time it was the latter.

“When we reach Panperra he'll be turned over to Adjutant Kel-Farquin,” he said, watching her carefully for her reaction. “That should be torture enough.”

She choked back a laugh at his comment, which told him she remembered what he did. Homer Kel-Farquin's whining, nasal voice and supercilious manner had been one of the low-points in the peace talks. Kel-Paten would steeple his hands in front of his face every time the adjutant would launch into one of his obnoxious diatribes. After one such painful session, Sass had sarcastically complimented Kel-Paten on his ability to appear so focused on Kel-Farquin's every word.

“I am not focused,” he'd told her without expression. “I am sleeping.”

He'd been rewarded then with one of her—heart stopping—smiles. Not dissimilar to the one now teasing across her lips.

“Why, Admiral Kel-Paten,” she drawled. “I heard you were so impressed with Kel-Farquin's oratory talents that you ordered copies of every one of his speeches from the peace talks.”

“I believe,” he countered dryly, “that would be grounds for a Section Forty-Six.”

“Unless one had a justifiable reason for ordering them. You know,” she said, continuing their verbal game, “those tapes may contain the very thing we need to defeat the Illithians.”

He thought for a moment. “A subliminal transmission of their contents into Illithian space could be very effective,” he posited, matching her feigned concern.

“Or considered cruel and inhumane methods.”

A slight shrug. “Who would be left to complain?”

“There might be a few. After all, I found copious amounts of gin to be a workable antidote.”

He glanced down at her. “I slept.”

“And well I remember your ingenious defense. Better than mine. No hangover.”

“It's a methodology I developed after a long association with Triad politicians. Let my experience be your guide.”

She clasped her hands behind her back and rocked on her heels. “I'll keep that in mind for your next staff meeting.”

Had he misread her? Was she aligning him in her mind with the likes of Homer Kel-Farquin? He wasn't sure until she grinned up at him.

“Gotcha!” she said softly.

Smile back at her, his heart prodded, but his brain and his lips refused to cooperate. By the time he'd managed to edge up one corner of his mouth she'd turned away from him, her attention on a nav-tech on the lower tier of the bridge. There was a problem with some incoming data. She stepped quickly down the stairs.

Some of her warmth, however, lingered behind.

Gotcha.

Yes, indeed.

EDEN FYNN'S QUARTERS, THS VAXXAR

The deeply luminous yellow eyes staring at Eden relayed only one message: Feed Me. As usual, Reilly had maneuvered into position at the head of Eden's bed exactly five minutes before her cabin lights would flicker on at their preprogrammed time of 0600 hours. So it was his purring, and the occasional tap of a soft paw against her face, that functioned as her wake-up alarm—or pre-wake-up alarm. And a much more pleasant one than the tinny computer voice that would intone, just as the cabin lights would reach full brightness, “It is oh-six-hundred, Doctor Fynn. Would you like Orange Garden or Sunrise Spice this morning?”

She was opening Reilly's ‘Tuna Platter Supreme’ when the question was posed.

“Orange Garden,” she answered, and only then realized that she'd slept through the night with no contact with Jace.

That information warranted a mental Damn! There was so much she still needed to know about him, not the least of which was his physiology. The Vaxxar's med files contained little information on the Nasyry. There were things that troubled her, such as unknown compounds in his blood analysis that could be results of the implant. Or could just be the Nasyran norm.

And here it was, 0610 hours, and she had no answers.

It was one more thing, then, she'd have to ask Sass to look for in Kel-Paten's datafiles. If anyone had information on the Nasyry, the Tin Soldier did.

The ship's gym was empty. It was agreeable to both women to use the treadmills rather than the simdeck jogging programs, which were crowded this early in the shift. They choose side-by-side machines facing a large viewport that, as the gym was located in the aft end of the ship, gave them a backwards vista of the Vaxxar's journey.

“What's our ETA at Panperra?” Eden asked while they were still in a slow jog and conversation was comfortable.

“Late tomorrow, about 2030 hours,” Sass answered. “But we're too large to dock there. Access will be by shuttle.”

“I suppose any R & R is out of the question.” Panperra had a few good pubs that Eden wouldn't mind spending some relaxing time in.

“With Kel-Paten, I think that's a given. At least for me. You remember what happened on Triad One.”

Eden did. The Triad HQ had been their last stop before embarking on their present mission. Sass, Eden, Cisco Garrick and several other former crew from the Regalia had planned a great evening of pub-crawling and pool halls. That had come to an abrupt halt when Kel-Paten had shown up at their first stop and attached himself to Sass's side. She and her people, he had stated, knew little of the station and Triad ways. To which Sass had retorted that whether one got shit-faced on U-Cee gin or Triadian gin, it still gave you a bitch of a headache in the morning.

Finally Sass had waved off her friends, told them to continue on without her. She'd informed Eden later that she'd spent the rest of her much-awaited shore leave with the admiral in the very sedate Triad Officer's Club, sipping watered down gin and discussing military strategy.

“If you're lucky,” Sass continued as they both increased their inclines, “you won't be stuck with Homer Kel-Farquin. Chances are, I will.”

“Hazards of the occupation,” Eden quipped. “Maybe you can convince Kel-Paten afterwards that you need a couple of good rounds of iced gin. Tell him it's your doctor's orders.”

“I doubt very much if he'll let me catch up with you and Cal and Cisco, if any shore leave is approved at all.”

“Bring him with you,” Eden told her.

Sass shot her an incredulous look. “Surely you jest.”

“I jest not. Bring him with you.”

“Why ever would I want to do that? Don't you think I see enough of him as it is? Or are you looking to file me for a Section Forty-Six?”

“Hardly,” Eden grinned, starting now to puff a little as the treadmill's speed picked up. “I just think ... I have a couple of new theories on our Tin Soldier and this may answer some questions.”

They both jogged in silence for a few minutes.

“The emotional programming thing, you mean,” Sass said finally. Sweat beaded on her forehead.

“Umm-hmm.”

“What are you planning to do? Get him drunk and see if human emotions surface?”

Eden dabbed at her face with her towel. “Hadn't thought of that. Not a bad idea.”

“Great!” Sass panted. “And the next morning—not only will he be ... his usual miserable self ... but his usual miserable self ... with a hangover!”

Eden laughed and coughed at the same time. Laughing and jogging were not the two most compatible activities. “Well, actually...” she said, thinking out loud, “his cybernetics ... probably don't permit—his getting drunk ... or allow a toxic reaction.”

“You mean ... he's too bloody perfect ... for a hangover?” Sass laughed and coughed now too. “How incredibly...annoying!”

“Speaking of .... annoying ... having some problems ... with Captain Serafino.”

Sass snatched her towel from the treadmill's safety bar and wiped her face before looking at Eden. “Such as?”

“There are some ... physiological questions ... I can't answer.”

“Implant?’

Eden shrugged as best she could while jogging. “Could be.”

“Then ... what?”

“Sass ... what do you know ... about the Nasyry?” She lowered her tone even though there was no one near enough to hear.

“The Nas ... oh, lubashit!”

Eden nodded.

“He's...?”

Eden nodded again. “Well, half ... anyway.”

“Damn.”

“It's not ... in any of my ... reports,” Eden told her. “And I'd like ... to keep it that way.”

“Got it,” Sass said. “No need to report ... unconfirmed suspicions.”

“Well put, captain.” Eden grinned.

“Who else knows?”

“Cal. That's all.”

“And the med files ... here?”

“Damnably ... incomplete.”

Sass shook her head knowingly. “I guess ... I'm adding this ... to my shopping list.”

“If you don't mind.”

“Your wish ... Doctor ... is my command,” Sass said breathlessly. The treadmills were cranked all the way up and it was difficult to hear, let alone talk, over the pounding of two pairs of sneakered feet.

They finished their workout without further conversation, other than the friendly acknowledgments to two crew members who'd started their own workouts on nearby machines.

That left only the short trip in the lift and down the corridor to their cabins to shower and change and start their day by 0800.

Eden's quarters were closer to the lift; the captain's quarters farther down the corridor, next to the admiral's and the Ready Room. They stopped at Eden's door.

“Are we talking to Serafino today?” Sass asked.

Eden shook her head negatively. “Not Serafino, not until Cal and I can pin down those unknown readings in his blood. I'm thinking...” she hesitated for a moment, pursing her lips as she attempted to convince herself she was on the right track. “I'm thinking of trying to make some form of telepathic contact with him today, maybe after you and Kel-Paten talk to T'Krain. I figure whatever discussion follows will keep Kel-Paten busy enough not to hover around Sickbay, waiting for me to give him clearance on Serafino. Especially if you'll run interference.”

“Got it. But can you make contact with Serafino while his physical self is still awake?”

“It's not the easiest way,” Eden agreed. “But he said something about my being a touch-telepath. He managed to reach out to me yesterday, shortly after he woke up. I heard him clearly in my mind, though it was very brief.” A very brief apology after a rather startling encounter, Eden remembered. “If I can strengthen that link through physical contact—”

“Not an altogether objectionable task, Doctor,” Sass teased, her eyebrows raised. “I haven't seen that much of him, but what I have seen is damned nice to look at.”

Eden pulled herself up to her full height and looked haughtily down at the shorter woman. “I am a professional, Captain Sebastian!” she teased back.

“Keep a bucket of cold water handy,” Sass retorted, punching her friend good-naturedly on the shoulder before she headed towards her cabin.

“For him or for me?” Eden called out to her.

Sass stopped at her cabin door. “For both of you! And should you need any help—”

She quickly ducked inside to avoid the balled-up gym towel hurled at her by the professional Dr. Fynn.

TASHA SEBASTIAN'S QUARTERS, THS VAXXAR

Once inside her cabin, Sass was met by another moving projectile. This one was fur covered and known as Tank.

“No, you can not have any more food!” Sass told the small black and white furzel who murrupped and purred and wove in and out of her legs on her way to the shower. She'd discovered Tank curled inside a container of hover-tank repair parts shortly after they'd left Port Bangkok. Upon inspecting the fidget, as baby furzels were called, Dr. Fynn had pronounced him healthy (once he was minus a rather large colony of fleas) and about five months old.

Now, Tank happily inhabited the captain's cabin. He flopped down on her bed when she emerged from the shower, presenting his belly to be rubbed. She obliged. His loud purr filled the room, softening as he fell asleep.

“You,” Sass said, giving him one last stroke, “are spoiled.” She grabbed a clean jumpsuit from her closet. Her commbadge pinged as she pulled on her boots.

She tapped at it. “Sebastian.”

“Kel-Paten here. I'd appreciate it if you could be in my office as soon as possible.”

It wasn't even 0800 yet and still a full hour away from her usual 0900 briefing with the admiral. She knew an interview with one of Serafino's crewmembers was on today's schedule, however. That was no doubt going to be the highlight of the admiral's day and he probably couldn't wait to talk about it.

“You promise me coffee and I'll do anything,” she responded.

There was a moment of silence, then: “That can be arranged.”

“Good,” she replied. “On my way. Mahrian blend, black.”

A hissing sound stopped her before she reached the door. She spun around. “Tank?”

Another hiss, and a low growl.

She headed back to her bedroom. “Tank?”

The long furred fidget's back was arched, his ears flat to his head. Sass followed his wide-eyed gaze ... and saw nothing. Nothing but the starfield outside her cabin viewport.

“What's the matter? You just realize you're in the spacelanes?” She patted his head, shook her own, and left.

Kel-Paten didn't like to be kept waiting. And she really could use a hot cup of coffee.

ADMIRAL'S OFFICE, THS VAXXAR

He knew how she took her coffee just as he knew how she took her gin and what vegetables she liked and how seedless black grapes, chilled, were one of her favorite snacks. After eleven years of following her, challenging her and studying her, he knew all of those minute, concrete details.

But he still, no matter how hard he tried, didn't know how to read between the lines of those light-hearted quips of hers. You promise me coffee and I'll do anything.

He wanted desperately to believe that even a mild flirtation existed in those and many other things she said to him, as he tried to ignore the fact that she also frequently traded quips with others. He wanted desperately to believe he wasn't the “Tin Soldier” to her, wasn't a cybernetic construct that so many of his crew viewed as simply another extension of the ship. He wanted to be real and warm and as human as he could to her, and had no idea how to do that without making more of a complete fool of himself than he already had.

So as much as possible, he kept her with him, in unscheduled meetings, extended conferences, detailed inspections and whatever other ways he could think of to commandeer her time.

He heard her step through his office door just as he retrieved two hot cups of coffee from the replicator set in the far wall. He held one out. She accepted it with a bright smile and sipped at it as he stood in silent, appreciative appraisal in front of her. Then she moved towards the chair in front of his desk, and there was the light, seductive scent of sandalwood in the air around her. He could see where her short hair was still slightly damp at the nape of her neck. He had to willfully restrain himself from reaching out to touch it.

He took his own chair and placed his cup on the desk to the right of the datafiles he'd pulled as an excuse for this discussion. He granted himself another moment of the silent pleasure of just looking at her before clearing his throat and selecting a thin crystalline file, pushing it into the appropriate data slot. “As long as we have to be on Panperra, we might as well acquaint ourselves with some of the adjutant's recent projects.”

Sass groaned loudly. “If this is one of Kel-Farquin's reports, I'm going to need a lot more than just coffee to get through.”

“If this were Kel-Farquin's, I would've brought pillows,” he replied blandly, his tone hiding the deep pleasure he felt at her responding wide smile. “No, this is some data on the recent ion storm activity which Panperran sensors were in prime position to record. Now...”

Sass leaned on the edge of his desk in order to better read the data on his monitor. The incisive analysis he'd spent over an hour perfecting fled from his mind.

“Now—” he began again, but her face was inches from his own and he could, if he wanted to, and oh, how he wanted to, close that gap by pretending to reach for a datafile. Their faces might even brush. Their lips—

“Now?” she asked.

Damn her, damn her! He'd worked and reworked the storm data just to be able to show her he wasn't the linear, narrow, by-the-book analyst she often accused him of being. He could use his intuition, he could be creative, he could—

He couldn't remember anything of his painstakingly crafted theory about ion storms and wormholes.

“This is a large storm,” he blurted out.

One-point-four-million credits they had spent perfecting his flawlessly synchronized cybertronic brain interface and that was the best he could come up with.

She cocked her head slightly to one side. Perhaps she knew of the amount and was just now realizing what a tremendous waste of funds it represented. “Sure is.”

He cleared his throat again. Maybe his creative theory was hiding in there and the act would release it. It didn't. But his one-point-four-million credit brain was packed with linear, logical deductions and before he could stop it, they flowed from his mouth. Just as they always did.

Besides, if he didn't keep talking, if he didn't keep quantifying the data and redacting it, he was going to kiss her.

That, he knew, would impress her even less than his dry recitation.

“If there's nothing else, admiral?” she asked after a half hour of facts that could have been found in any fleet cadet's textbook.

He'd failed, lost yet another chance to show her he was more than the Tin Soldier. It was almost as if his very bio-cybernetics thwarted him at every turn. Betrayed by his own body. He turned quickly, and with a few quick touches on the comp screen, he called up a selection of files of unknown subject matter, only peripherally aware they were there. But at least it looked as if he were doing something productive. “Nothing else. Dismissed, Sebastian.”

Sass inclined her head slightly. “By your command, admiral.”

He waited until the doors whooshed closed before he let his head fall wearily against the high back of the chair. Why was he so incapable of being human around her? He'd yet to manage anything more than a smile and even that was an effort. Was he fighting his own fear of rejection—or something else? Something he didn't want to think about.

What if his humanity had been programmed out of him?