Original Flavor (anime influenced)
Rated: R

RULES OF ENGAGEMENT (Part VII:  The Universe Does Not Forgive Stupidity)

VI.

IT'S THE LITTLE THINGS THAT GET YOU

VII.

THE UNIVERSE DOES NOT FORGIVE STUPIDITY



		The realization that Nathan MacLeod was a Majestix agent and that this 
entire exercise had been a trap was the last coherent thought that I had 
for a very long time.  I felt whatever sort of flunkies the woman who'd 
blasted me lifting me half off the floor, hoisting me by the arms and 
dragging me down the tunnel behind her; then I blacked out.  And I mean, 
totally blacked out.  My primary, secondary, and tertiary C3 systems went 
into total shutdown while my internal repair systems tried valiantly to 
deal with the trauma to my cybernetics; the only thing that kept going 
was cybernetic life-support, the systems that replaced my autonomic 
biological functions.  As for my organic mind, it was out--not out and 
about as it occasionally went when my body was this severely shocked, but 
completely out.  I don't remember anything of what happened next, and I'm 
fairly grateful for that, I think, simply because of the manner in which 
I woke up.
	My C3 systems came back online when the Majestix SciTechs popped open 
the cranial access ports set into my skull, plugged me into their 
computer mainframe, and began scanning the contents of my cybernetic 
mind.  I jerked back online, my systems registering several immediate 
protests, internal diagnostic sensors flashing across the yellow-red 
spectrum that indicates they don't like this very much at all.  Confusion 
and disorientation followed immediately thereafter, and I tried to move, 
only to have any attempt to do so utterly arrested.  A full body 
immobilization platform, the collar pinioning my neck and skull having 
inserted a neurologic inhibitor into my spinal column and motor cortex, 
selectively paralyzing most of my higher motor functions.  The restraints 
across the wrists, ankles, and chest were primarily to keep me from 
thrashing around involuntarily if something went wrong anywhere along the 
way.  I knew this because I'd been in one before, while the Enforcer was 
off loading the contents of my brain in a hidden Majestix installation on 
Darkworld, and the connotations didn't exactly fill me with joy as I felt 
the Majestix probe running through my wetware, examining, probing, 
opening encrypted files, scanning programming data, rummaging through my 
life experience with not particularly caring hands.  My auditory sensor 
gain was fluctuating slightly and I tried to tune it in a bit better; the 
Majestix probe in my head didn't interfere, and my hearing settled down 
enough to allow me to listen.   My optics flicked around, my organic eye 
slightly blurry with pain, my scaneye already stripped of its cover and 
translating raw sensory data into images inside my visual cortex.
	The sounds I was hearing were primarily voices, SciTechs babbling about 
my systems' structure and how advanced it was in comparison to similar 
cybernetic generations they'd observed in Network productions; their 
computers occasionally talked back, which is not exactly uncommon on 
Majestix vessels, but which is always chilling to hear.  Unlike talking 
computers in most ships, the Majestix usually don't bother to give their 
computers personalities unless they evolve them on their own; 
consequently, it's a little discomfiting to hear your internal bits 
discussed by them.  It's not like they actually care or anything.  The 
SciTechs themselves were only a little better: imagine the most obnoxious 
science geek you can, and then give them the callousness of a bunch that 
helped engineer the destruction of two whole galaxies, and you'll have 
the faintest understanding of Majestix science types.  Eventually, my 
optics began linking voices and faces, and the images came into better 
focus: the grey-and-yellow clad science types milling about the room, lit 
low enough to be comfortable and high enough to be functional, attention 
on various bits of esoteric Majestix scanning machinery, making comments 
to each other and to their equipment.
	"He has regained consciousness, Commander."  A voice said off to my 
right; I couldn't see the speaker, my line of vision didn't extend that 
far off to the side.
	"Excellent."  I didn't need to see that speaker; it was the cold, 
hungry, empty voice of the woman from the dream, the woman that had hit 
me with the fates alone knew what in that access tunnel.
	Footsteps.  I felt every inch of my body tensing in preparation for the 
sight of her, and when I did see her, I felt every ounce of tension drain 
from me.
	It was her.  The woman I'd seen during my hallucinations on Luxura; I 
knew now, for certain, that I hadn't been hallucinating--I'd been having 
a precognitive flash.  She was tall, but, then, I'd discovered that most 
Tevlarian women are, or at the very least, most Tevlarian women in my 
acquaintance.  She was closer to my own height than Elyena, though, at 
the angle that my restraint platform was set, I had to look up at her 
anyway.  Her body was slender, almost gaunt, outlined in armor that 
enhanced the skeletal quality, and a long cloak that she wore wrapped 
around her like a death shroud; from the sound of her labored 
breathing--and I'm not talking Darth Vader labored, I'm talking the sound 
of someone whose next breath might very well be their last--a good deal 
of that chest armor was for life support, rather than show or protection. 
 I couldn't get a good look at her face; she wore the faceplate I'd seen 
during my forward flash, a death's head mask that covered everything but 
her lush, red-lipped mouth, dark red hair tumbling over her shoulders and 
down her back.  Her eyes rested on mine, the same colors of the blast 
that had hit me, blazing white edged in shimmering golden, and hungry, so 
empty and so hungry despite all the power that I could see surging in her 
ruined body.  He voice was edged in that same hunger and, despite myself, 
I couldn't pull my eyes away from hers.  "Your companions are dead."
	I clenched my teeth against the pain that would have constricted my 
heart if I'd had one.  "I sorta guessed.  You people aren't real big on 
taking prisoners that you can't use."
	Her lips quirked in a slight smile, a chill running through me at that 
expression on those lips.  "You are not at all afraid of me, are you?"
	"Should I be?"  I tried to keep my tone casual.  It probably wouldn't 
work to draw her out, but, hey, you never know until you try.
	The smile broadened fractionally.  "Yes."  So much for that plan.  She 
glanced at the SciTech hovering at her side.  "What were the initial 
results of the scans you performed?"
	"Our scans registered negative temporal or spacial contact with any 
possible future or concurrent representations--as MacLeod pointed out, 
this one is a true temporal anomaly.  He has no other existence outside 
of his current incarnation."  The SciTech consulted his hand-held pad 
while I tried to decipher his technobabble.  "We found, as our previous 
reports indicated, traces of Majestix technology in his command and 
control networks at the subatomic level--whatever else he is, he was 
partially made from our early generations of technology."  He looked up 
at the sound of shock I made--well, shock and supreme, uncontrollable 
horror.  "The genetic scans--"
	"What did the genetic scans yield?"  The woman leaned close to me, 
stroking her horribly cold hands through my hair gently.
	"He carries the Starbourne genetic matrix, intact and only partially 
altered, Commander."  The SciTech glanced up from his pad.
	The smile, hovering only a few inches from my face, broadened even 
further.  "You and your men may go, Giles.  I would like to speak with 
this prisoner alone."
	I somehow didn't like the way that sounded, and I think it must have 
showed on my face as the other members of the SciTech crew filtered away 
from their stations and exited the room where I was being held.  The 
woman waited until they were all gone and the door sealed behind them to 
turn back to me.  Her smile had faded a bit and she was watching me 
through eyes narrowed down to gleaming slits.  "Do you know who I am?"
	"This is just a wild guess but I'm assuming you're not my fairy 
godmother?"  The reference went over her head with a foot to spare and 
she was clearly not amused by my attempt at humor in any case.  She 
gently caressed the control pad mounted on the restraint bed and I felt 
every nerve in my body simultaneously catch fire, my back trying to arch 
and my body trying to shake at the sudden pain; I was very grateful that 
my stomach didn't have anything in it at that moment.
	As abruptly as it started, it stopped, and I found myself falling back 
into the restraints, biting my lips against a cry that was as much relief 
as anything else.  Her voice, when she spoke, was serene and empty of 
emotion, "You are not in a position conducive to resistance....What did 
they call you?  Manslaughter?"  There was a hint of amusement in her 
tone.  "My name is Deathshadow...though, given what I have seen in your 
memory download, I imagine the name Khelestyn veriseyt-Enkidu might mean 
slightly more to you."
	Khelestyn variseyt-Enkidu.  Suddenly I found it even harder to breathe 
than it had been before, and I knew everything I was thinking was written 
on my face.  When Elyena had told me that Javan seyt-Ashkelon was an 
Artificier, things had gotten bad.  The Morahk, unlike many species I 
could mention, don't exactly put a very high premium on race--and they're 
just as phenotypically diverse as every other species.  Family is the gig 
for the Morahk, who are divided up into Clans, which are just big 
groupings of Houses, and the Houses themselves nothing but collections of 
individual Families.  Each one of these Clans can trace their bloodlines 
back to the dim and misty past of their homeworld, Parashura, and their 
earliest people, which they believe were created by their goddess, 
Shimakh, and her son, Diarre, who was the First Artificier.  Diarre it is 
said, sowed his blood among mortals by taking a substantial number of 
wives, and every Clan has a couple Houses in it that have some of the 
Godson's blood behind them--which is to say, every couple generations 
they spit out an Artificier.  The Artificiers themselves are about the 
strangest part of Morahk culture, because they believed to be literally 
half-divine--and their abilities bear this out.  The Morahk Artificiers 
quite literally have the ability to warp reality to a limited extent: 
what they want happens, and they can alter the very shape of reality by 
sheer force of will.  By some kind of ancient law and for reasons that I 
don't really understand, there are no female Artificiers--the power only 
breeds true in the male line, women can carry the power in them but can 
never use it, that's the gift they give their sons.  Khelestyn 
variseyt-Enkidu.  `Variseyt' is the feminine form of the masculine 
`seyt'--it indicates membership in the ruling House of the Clan, a 
Princess of the House of Shimura, Clan of Enkidu.
	It meant one thing.
	Khasamar seyt-Enkidu's sister was standing in front of me.
	Working for the Majestix.
	I was dead.  I knew it.
	"Well," My voice sounded amazingly casual despite the little voice that 
was gibbering in terror of my existence in the back of my head, "I have 
to tell you, Khasmar was never really talkative about his family.  Didn't 
even mention you, I'm sorry to say."
	"I am afraid that I am something of an embarrassment to him."  Her smile 
vanished completely, cold, empty, hungry eyes settling on me and roving 
over me slowly.  "You are a unique specimen, Manslaughter.  You were made 
from technology stolen from the Majestix, a genetic structure stolen from 
a fairly odd family, and the stolen souls of several others."  Did I 
mention that the Morahk believe the soul is a genetic thing?  "You exist 
as no one but yourself, here and now.  I would hate," she paused slightly 
for emphasis, "to have to destroy you."
	"That's nice to know.  Why would you want to destroy me?"  My arms and 
legs wouldn't move, wouldn't even think about working, and silently raged 
at my helplessness, looking up at that woman--I couldn't bring myself to 
think of her as Hitman's sister--who was gazing down at me with such 
cold, empty eyes.
	"Because I know, from having observed as my technicians dissected your 
thoughts, that you are, underneath it all, more loyal to my brother than 
nearly any other person in this universe."  She ran her finger slowly 
down my chest, the nerves jumping uncontrollably at the ice in her 
fingertips.  "You would die to protect him, as he would die for you.  You 
are, in many ways, the son he does not dare to have."  Her fingertip 
caressed the smoothness of my half-armor, a small smile tugging at her 
lips.  "And you are the only one that can help me find him--that can help 
me get at him.  And you are going to help me get at him--aren't you?"
	I don't remember much of what happened next.  I'm grateful for that.  
Grateful because even when I'm not thinking about it, I can still feel 
the pain.  She hurt me.  Hurt me in ways that I didn't think it was still 
possible for me to be hurt.  And she didn't stop with the physical pain.  
She did things to my heart, to my mind and my soul, that I didn't know 
were possible, even for the strongest telepath, even to the most power 
psi-talents that I knew.  She ripped apart my body and then she 
dismembered everything else--showed me things about myself that I never 
wanted to know, that I didn't want to see ever again.  She showed me the 
faces of the people I'd killed and all the things about them that I'd 
never known, that I'd never thought about, that I hadn't considered 
important as they died.  She broke me so easily it was almost pathetic.  
And then she continued on past the point of just making sure, past the 
point of impressing her will on me, simply because she could.  Because 
she liked watching me suffer, because she loved hearing me scream.
	Because she could.
	I don't remember a lot of it.  But I remember enough.
	I was still hurting when I woke up, and I had no idea how long I had 
been out.  My whole body was a throbbing mass of pure anguish, because 
she'd somehow been able to make even the cybernetic parts that hadn't 
been wired to register tactile sensation feel pain.  I was trembling so 
hard, all I could do was lay there in whatever cell I'd been tossed into, 
curled in a fetal ball and sobbing, because I hurt so much and so badly 
and because I hadn't been able to even think about fighting her.  I'd 
given her exactly what she had wanted.  She knew how to find Khasamar.  
She knew how to get at him.  And she'd have me there to use in whatever 
plan she had to bring her little brother back to her.  I wanted to die, 
right then and there, just shut down my cybernetics and let my organic 
parts die without the support, but self-termination had never been 
included in my wetware package.  I couldn't stop shaking, and I wanted to 
cry so badly that my eyes and throat and heart ached with the need to 
just scream out my pain and grief and guilt.  Elyena was dead because of 
me.  Dansyr and Turalev were dead because of me.  Khasamar was going to 
be either dead or enslaved to the Majestix because of me.
	I wanted to die.
	A hand touched my shoulder where I lay, curled in the corner of my cell, 
shaking and sobbing softly.  "Leave me alone."
	"Kieron Starbourne."  The voice was soft, dark, husky....and I knew it.
	I looked up and blinked the bleariness out of my eyes, staring stupidly 
at the individual kneeling at my side.  I'd seen him before, it slowly 
dawned on me, though in slightly different circumstances.  I remembered a 
tallish, slenderish figure dressed in red-and-gold, black hair hanging 
loose around his face, a narrow, angular face made even more striking by 
jet-black markings covering the pale skin, his golden-white eyes flaring 
in twin arcs of energy as his reality warping power rippled space around 
him.  Moleculan.  The name flashed through one of my implants, while 
another memory came up: Vandal Tvoriak, screaming his name as the 
starship on which we were all standing--my team, WildStrike, and the 
Majestix unit that Moleculan himself served with--detonated with a force 
roughly similar to a star going supernova.  It had been his power that 
had saved us all, displacing us in space just long enough for me to 
teleport my crew free and Beau Jack Devereaux to make off with 
WildStrike.  Khirzon Tvoriak, Vandal had screamed at that moment, and, 
despite the shriek of the disintegrating starship, we had both heard her, 
and understood what she had intended.  Khirzon Tvoriak, alias Moleculan, 
one of the few Morahk Artificiers who actually served the Majestix--and 
also served the Majestix' own internal fifth column, ranking officers who 
subtly worked to undermine the Majestix' control of the peoples and 
territories they'd conquered, leaving almost imperceptible weaknesses in 
their cybernetic structure for rebels of the more direct sort to exploit. 
 That bit I didn't learn till much later, of course, when Val had finally 
unbent enough to trust me just a little.
	The red-and-gold combat armor I'd seen him in before had been replaced 
somewhere along the line with the greyish jumpsuit that the Majestix slap 
on all their prisoners, his always slender body looking closer to gaunt 
and wasted through the fabric, his burning golden-white eyes dulled down 
so much they didn't even glow anymore.  I was shocked, though I probably 
shouldn't have been, given that his own expression was telling me I 
didn't look much better.  "Moleculan?  What the hell are you doing here?"
	"Much the same as you, I would imagine."  That strange Morahk accent 
tagged all his words, a very light lilt, a sort of restful cadence that 
could put you to sleep or drive you to knew highs of energy depending on 
the circumstances.  He held a squeeze bottle of water flavored with some 
kind of fruit to my lips and made me take a swallow; I was grateful for 
it, because I was suddenly aware of how raw my throat was, and how rough 
and mechanical my voice sounded because of it.  "We are both 
prisoners--and, for the moment, prisoners too useful to kill."
	"Sniffed you out?  Figured out you weren't exactly wholly loyal to the 
Majestix World Order, that is?"  I moved, which my body didn't appreciate 
at all, and tried to sit up; after a few minutes of trying I finally gave 
up and slumped back against the wall.
	"No."  His tone was drier than any voice ever since the dawn of time, 
and I suddenly got the impression that there might be worse things than 
getting caught, and I was about to find out one of them.  "Deathshadow 
desired my presence.  And what Deathshadow wants, she usually gets."
	"Somehow I can believe that."  A quick internal systems diagnostic 
showed that my systems were reading mostly in yellow and orange, not a 
very happy situation; my response time was sluggish, visibly so, and even 
the smallest motion caused more pain than I like to describe.  I focussed 
back on Moleculan in an effort to distract myself from how miserable I 
felt.  Suddenly, what he'd just said to me filtered all the way through.  
"Wait...you're a prisoner here but you didn't get caught?  What the hell 
is going on here, Moleculan?"
	"Khirzon," He corrected quietly, he settled down closer to me and gave 
me another sip from the bottle he held.
	"Yeah, and you can call me....What the hell did you call me?"
	"Kieron."  His voice remained quiet, and it suddenly dawned on me that 
he couldn't speak any louder than that at all.  He looked as bad as I 
felt, even in the dim, even lighting of our little cell.  "Kieron 
Starbourne."
	Kieron Starbourne.  A cold little chill ran up my spine.  `Odessa' was 
the name that Jordan took when his father pitched him out of the family 
and disinherited him for being something less than the perfect son; 
`Starbourne' is the name he had been born with.  "I don't have a name, 
M--Khirzon."
	His black hair shifted slightly as he tilted his head quizzically; at 
least, I thought it was quizzically, because the black birth markings 
etched across his face--the sign that he was of the Godson's get, an 
Artificier--made him look inscrutable, anyway.  "Perhaps not.  I may have 
been mistaken."  He gave me a sip from the bottle.  "Manslaughter, I do 
not know what brought you here...."
	"Stupidity," I muttered under my breath.
	"...But I was brought here--" He paused, took a breath.  "I was brought 
here to feed Deathshadow."
	"...'Feed'...?"  I let the question trail off.  "I don't want to know, 
do I?"
	"No, you probably do not."  He smiled wryly.
	"But you're going to tell me anyway, right?"  I finally managed to prop 
myself into a reasonable sitting position, a part of me reflecting how 
absolutely strange my life had managed to become, sitting in a Majestix 
prison cell with a Morahk Artificier, exchanging stories.  It was just 
too bizarre.  "How long have you been here?"
	"I--several months."  He paused.  "It is easy to lose track of time 
here.  I was brought shortly after the Enforcer's demise, when 
Deathshadow came through to direct operations in this galaxy and time 
period." 
	"I've....errr...I have no idea how long I've been here."  I blinked and 
checked my internal chronometer but, as it was something less than an 
essential system function, it was offline.
	"You were unconscious for the better part of a day, hallucinating quite 
violently.  I had to restrain you to keep you from harming yourself in 
your delirium."  He picked up an object that I hadn't recognized 
immediately as a blanket and tucked it around me; it suddenly occurred to 
me that it wasn't the room that was dark--it was my optics malfunctioning 
severely.
	"A few days, then.  I don't know how long I was with--her."  I didn't 
want to say her name...somehow it made what had happened to me come into 
sharper focus and, at the moment, I wasn't really prepared to handle it.
	Khirzon nodded, brushing the hair back from my face with long, cool 
hands.  "I would have done more to ease your condition, but, 
unfortunately, even had I been able to use my abilities, I would not have 
had the energy to do so."
	"Psionic dampers?"  I hadn't heard a thought since I'd woken up, and 
since there was no bulky psionic restraint collar, it meant my telepathy 
was either totally burned out or there was some kind of restraint field 
damping it down.
	"Indeed...suppressing your abilities as well as my own--though I do not 
doubt that you are at least as drained as I."  Another sip of the water.
	"I do feel...empty."  There was a hollowness somewhere inside me, I 
couldn't say exactly where, and I didn't know what was going, I just felt 
something missing--something I might never have again.  Hunter.  For the 
thousandth time I wished I could just cry as my painfully raw throat 
constricted again.
	"That much is to be expected."  He ran a cloth across my face, even 
though I didn't think I was feverish, the coolness feeling nice against 
both my skin and my cybernetics.  "Are you in any pain?"
	"Yes."  My internal systems were glitching trying to process all the 
pain input I was getting, and I suspected that was primarily why I 
couldn't focus any better than I was.  "I hurt all over....Khirzon...what 
the hell is happening here....?"  I heard a frightened, hurt little boy 
in my voice and for the moment that didn't bother me very much.  I 
figured I had earned a couple hours of it, after all.
	"Why did you come here?"  He put something that felt like a gelpillow 
beneath my head and neck.
	"My team...Elyena and Dansyr and Turalev and I...we were hired to rescue 
someone's kid...turns out the `someone' was a Majestix agent and the kid 
was an Artificier like you...if he even existed at all...."  I forced 
myself to focus despite the wretched condition my cybernetics were in.  
"Javan seyt-Ashkelon."
	"Oh, yes, he exists.  He is being held in the same cell block as you and 
I."  He forced another sip of the water down my throat.  "As are two of 
your colleagues."
	My eyes flew all the way open despite the protests of my aching face.  
"What?!  They're here?!  They're alive?!?  How?!?!"
	"They were brought here shortly before you were--a large reptiloid 
Dy'killian and a small, rather savage woman."  He squeezed more water 
into me despite the fact that I kept trying to move and talk.
	"Turalev Beigh and Dansyr." I swallowed rather than drown.
	"Even so.  The Galatican guards were discussing it when they dropped you 
in here."  He tossed the empty bottle into what appeared to be a 
self-sealed matter recycler...my optics were getting better, I could see 
across the room now.  "What about the third member of my group--Elyena 
Demerath?"
	"I heard no mention of her being made."
	My thoughts started racing then.  Elyena hadn't been captured.  If they 
hadn't killed her, that meant she was still somewhere on the station, 
probably thinking about what to do next.  I hoped she had the good sense 
to snatch the kid and run and let the rest of us take care of ourselves.
	"As to what is going on here," Again with that wry smile, "Deathshadow 
is waiting for something.  An opportunity, I expect.  And for the 
excavations on the planet below to bear fruit."
	I opened my mouth to say comment on that, and he laid his hand over it 
before the words could get out.  "Listen to me carefully.  I know that I 
have very little time left--I will no doubt leave this world long before 
you do.  We have all come together at this point for a reason.  I have 
come here to make atonement for my cowardice in helping the Majestix at 
all, in any way.  You have been brought here to make certain that 
Deathshadow is stopped.  And she must be stopped, Kieron Starbourne.  If 
she is not, her hunger will consume all that exists--even life itself."
	I closed my mouth and he moved his hand.  "She told you, did she not?  
Who she is?  You were raving about it in your delirium, how you had given 
Khasamar to her."
	I nodded wordlessly; the pain of that was still raw, and I felt my 
emotions drawing tighter and tighter every time I thought of it.
	Khirzon sighed softly.  "I do not know how much he told you of our 
people...but among the Morahk, it is the highest of honors to a family 
that their blood carries the seed of Diarre, the Godson, and is capable 
of birthing those like him--Artificiers, with his power to shape and mold 
the world.  Like the Godson, we are regarded as divine...or, rather, 
touched by the divinity of our Lady and her Son.
	"For long, the power and how it appeared was random.  The Godson had 
taken many wives from among my people, and his blood was spread far and 
wide, enriching many lines.  Eventually my people learned that by 
breeding different lines together, the probability of producing a child 
born with the Godson's gift fully realized increased.  They began doing 
so in certain controlled circumstances--many times, lines that carried 
the Godson's blood were bred together after wars and other conflicts as a 
sign of peace and solidarity, for with the aid of an Artificier of both 
families, any damage could be more easily repaired and the wounds of the 
conflict healed and forgotten."  He paused and took a sip from his own 
bottle of water.  "For long, only boy-children were born with the 
Godson's power--no, I cannot even say that.  No one really knows how many 
female Artificiers were ever born, or how often--they often died in 
infancy or early youth, consumed before their abilities could even fully 
blossom.
	"It was, perhaps, a symptom of growing tendency to breed Artificiers 
whenever possible that lead to the births of more and more female 
Artificiers.  It became apparent early that the females of my breed were 
decidedly different than the males.  Our power is limited by 
definition--we are not all-powerful, even though we can warp reality in 
our immediate vicinity, it is limited by duration and distance.  We can 
only maintain out maximum effort for so long before our strength abandons 
us.  But the female Artificiers...." His voice trailed off.  "Female 
Artificiers are not so limited.  They have nearly all power within their 
hands, they have the power of the goddess herself, Shimakh's gift of 
creation, consumption, and destruction.  Nothing human, nothing limited 
to human perception and the frailties of human existence and experience, 
could hold such power and remain sane.  And they did not remain sane.  
The earliest of the female Artificiers were mad, violently destructive, 
uncontrollable."
	"I had wondered where that bit about `no female Artificers' had come 
from."  I smiled slightly, and the expression didn't hurt my face for a 
change.  "It's not as though your people are all that sexist in other 
ways."
	"Yes.  We adopted that belief for the safety of all our people."  He 
sighed softly.  "Female Artificiers underwent a procedure at birth that 
eradicated their ability to command their power.  They knew always that 
it was within them, but they simply could not access it.  Families that 
refused the procedure would often find their infant daughters taken from 
them...and never returned.  It was a great bitterness among many of the 
houses, including House Shimura, and the Clan of Enkidu, who had many 
lines within them that carried the blood of the Godson, and resented the 
laws that were passed to control the breeding of Artificier lines.  But 
even the most strident opponents of the process could not argue with its 
effectiveness--or the fact that it was for the good of all.  Or so it was 
believed.  As it happened, those beliefs were false."
	"The Shimura deliberately bred to produce something like Deathshadow?" 
	"They bred in an effort to produce a sane female Artificier, who would 
bring greater glory to their House and Clan.  Enough glory and honor for 
the Enkidu to proclaim themselves the greatest of the clans and claim the 
rulership of the Morahk.  Since the Godson had left our world, we had had 
no singular ruler--it was the ambition of the Enkidu to become that one." 
 He closed his eyes, his face twisting momentarily in pain.  "Khelestyn 
and Khasamar's mother was the youngest daughter of the reigning Prince of 
House Shimura.  For her, her father made an alliance marriage that was 
within the safe degrees of kinship for Artificier lines, with a young 
noble of House Ashkelon.  His heart, however, was promised elsewhere, and 
their marriage was an unhappy one, for he was deeply in love with a young 
woman of the House of Zhandrian--"
	"Of Clan Tvoriak."  I sat up straighter.  "Oh, boy.  You're telling 
me...."
	"Yes.  Dameon Ashkelon fathered, upon his Enkidu wife, Khelestyn and 
Khasamar, twin children, the girl of whom was the Artificier, and quite 
thoroughly mad.  He also fathered, on his Tvoriak lover, Vandalamar and 
Azrael Tvoriak, likewise twins, and the male of whom is possibly the most 
powerful Artificier ever to draw breath."  He smiled humorlessly.  "Upon 
learning of the proscribed breeding by the Enkidu, the Council of Clans 
stripped them of all honor and had them cast from the homeworld and 
Morahk space...."
	"And, after all this happened, the Majestix came about and Clan Enkidu 
finally found its way back into power--through the good graces of the 
Mecha Gods."  My brain worked rapidly and I repressed the urge to pace as 
I thought.  "Let me see if I can guess what happens next.  Little Miss 
Khelestyn doesn't have her powers ripped out and grows up just a little 
bit torked at the treatment she and her family have received.  Khasmar, 
seeing this, realizes he's in serious danger if he hangs around and, when 
the opportunity to get the hell out of dodge comes up, he takes it."  So 
many things that he'd never told me were suddenly terribly clear.  "The 
Majestix stomp the Morahk, and, in the chaos, a bunch of folks get away, 
including Vandal and her family and Javan and his family, not to mention 
Khasamar himself.  They all end up here, in our space and time.  Hither 
comes Deathshadow with some nasty ideas...am I right?"
	"Deathshadow seeks her brother to either provide her with a mate, in the 
form of a son of his blood, or to become her mate himself.  In her 
hunger, she has...consumed...all the other Artificiers that survived the 
Majestix assault on our homeworld.  Those that she did not personally 
devour in an effort to claim their power for herself, she gave to the 
Majestix...."  Again, his voice trailed off and I felt my eyes widening 
as I understood.
	"The Morahk Artificiers are the Majestix' living power sources..." I 
whispered. 
	Khirzon nodded tiredly.  "The masters, the most powerful among us, 
became the power sources of Majestix vessels and technologies...linked to 
them through the Majestix organic technology and bled for their power.  
Others...many, many others...were drained of their power and their souls 
both by Khelestyn variseyt-Enkidu in a desperate effort to fill the 
emptiness within her...and nothing can fill the emptiness within her.  I 
escaped because I chose willingly to serve the Majestix, and my wife's 
position with them protected me somewhat...but, now, there are so few of 
us left...."  He turned his tired eyes to my face, and I saw how terribly 
he was strained, how deeply he was hurting.  "There is me.  And Azrael.  
And Javan seyt-Ashkelon.  We are all that is left.  The others...they are 
all..."
	"We have to get you out of here.  Both of you."  I whispered.  A part of 
me still felt dead and hollow where I had felt that woman's hunger 
touching me--I couldn't imagine how it had been for Khirzon, who was 
methodically having bits of his soul carved away to feed a hunger that 
couldn't be satisfied, not really.
	He shook his head.  "I am not meant to leave this place, Kieron 
Starbourne--"
	"I am not Kieron Starbourne, so stop calling me that."  I tried not to 
snarl, but I couldn't help myself.  "And I don't believe your goddess is 
calling you to judgement for surviving, so you can stop that line of 
reasoning right now.  We're all going to get out of here and we're all 
going--"
	I stopped as the door of the cell popped softly and began to vibrate, 
the internal locking mechanisms disengaging.  A look of utter, almost 
mindless terror crossed Khirzon's face and he shrank back away from the 
door, more from reflex than anything else I think; even with my dimmed 
vision I could see there wasn't much in the cell that could be used as a 
weapon by a body in ideal physical condition, let alone the general 
weakness both of us were enjoying.  There wasn't even an imaginary place 
to hide, and something told me from his reaction that this was not going 
to be a happy time for him.  I checked my internals, which informed me 
getting into a fight with a jackbooted Galactican stormtrooper would not 
be in my best interests, but I prepared for one anyway, pouring as much 
power as I dared into my enhancements and hoping that my half-regenerated 
systems would handle the load.  A tall figure strode in to the cell, 
muffled in armor and weapons, a shadow falling before her that mostly 
obscured her face; another figured appeared behind her, slighter and more 
lightly armed.
	It hit me the moment I saw them both, a surge of incredulous relief 
running straight through me as the first Galactican turned to face us, a 
familiar smile etched across her face.  "Hey there, brat.  Miss me?"
	"Elyena!"