To Kill For

by speedfweak

Sorry, not this time. Anything I write would give too much away.

TITLE:  To Kill For

AUTHOR:  player

RATING:  R - Graphic violence, language, and some sexual suggestion.

SPOILERS:  Season 1, and Season 2 up to OoTM

SUMMARY:  Sorry, not this time.  Anything I write would give too much away. veg

DISCLAIMER:  I don't own the characters, the Jim Henson Company does, and…whatever.  I'm too lazy to write out the entire disclaimer.  Yeah, I could copy and paste it, but I'm too lazy to do that, too.

ARCHIVING:  If you want it, ask me first.  Otherwise, I'm going to…  Frell, I don't know.  I'll just do something.

AUTHOR'S NOTE:  This is the third of six fics in the "Natalie Grant Series", or…whatever you want to call it.  I haven't come up with an actual name yet.  Anyway, the previous two fics are "Going Home?" and "A Mother's Love".  "Going Home?" takes place two weeks after OoTM, so none…well, most of the events that happened after that episode never occurred in this AU.  If you want to understand what's going on in this story, you NEED to read those two fics.  They're not that great, but you still need to read them.  You can find them in the Farscape Library or at various FanFic archives including Redbeard's (http://fffa.soliii.net/cgi-bin/archive.pl) and The Void into the Uncharted Territories (http://www.geocities.com/farscapevoid/).

Sharon, you inspire me in ways that one else can...  Saying 'thank you' just isn't enough for all that you've done for me.  I don't know what I would've done, and would do, without you.  Thanks, once again, to 13thNight and Aleria (and their "red pens") for being my absolutely fantastic beta readers.  And I have to thank White Zombie.  It's amazing how listening to their song 'More Human Than Human' helps you get into the writing mood. :D

Flashbacks denoted by asterisks.

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"Dren."

John looked ahead of him and to the right at D'Argo through his night-vision monocle with a worried expression on his face when he heard the Luxan break their silence.  "What?"

"Just what I said," D'Argo responded, as he pointed his qualta rifle up and lifted his boot off the ground.  "Dren."

"Just be sure to wipe it off as soon as we get back to Talyn," Chiana said from her position behind John.  She held her breath and took a few tentative steps back in the waste conduit, which was large enough for even D'Argo to stand upright.  She looked down at the ground around the pulse rifle she was holding while she stepped back, being sure not to get any dren on her boots, just as John shot a glance her way.

D'Argo turned around to look at his companions through his monocle with an annoyed look on his face as John turned back to face D'Argo.  They couldn't see D'Argo's exact expression, only his body heat, his stance showed them exactly what he was thinking.  What D'Argo felt didn't matter, though.  They had to get Jothee out of the barracks they were heading for, and get him off the mining colony.

"Shall we?" John asked.  "This is your son who we're trying to rescue here."

"I know he's my son," D'Argo yelled.

"Dammit, D'Argo," John quietly warned through gritted teeth.  "Don't yell.  Do you want everyone on this frelling planet to know we're here?"

D'Argo just growled in response, turned around with his tenkas flailing in the slight breeze flowing through the conduit, and stormed off towards the barracks.  John turned around to look at Chiana who only shrugged and they both followed their Luxan shipmate.

Carefully and quietly, the armed trio continued down the waste conduit attempting to avoid stepping in, on, or through anything that would alert their 'enemy of the week' to their presence.

Unfortunately, the three unknowingly walked past a motion detector as they made their way to the drainage conduit leading up to the grate in the floor of the barracks.

Walking around a steady trickle of cleansing fluid flowing down the side of the drainage conduit behind the ladder, they came to stand directly under the opening to the conduit and looked up.

"There it is," John whispered.

D'Argo converted his rifle back into a blade, sheathed it, and said, "Let's go."  He reached up to grab the lower rung of the ladder that was bolted to the side of the conduit and hoisted himself up into it.

Chiana slung the strap of her pulse rifle across shoulder as John got into position under the conduit to help push her up.  Unfortunately for him, he also had to stand under the cleansing fluid, which flowed off his hair, down his face, and over his black jacket, to help her up.  Chiana walked around John, put her foot on his knee as he put his hands on her hips, and she put her hands on his arms.

"On three," John said, with Chiana nodding in response.  "One…two…three."  John held his breath, straining his muscles, and pushed Chiana up into the conduit as she pushed off of him.  She grabbed the lower rung and John pushed her once more.  He continued to hold his breath and Chiana climbed, first using John's shoulders for leverage, then his head.

"Dammit, Chiana, watch where you're steppin', will 'ya?" John ordered in an annoyed tone.

"Sorry," she said sarcastically.  "Frell…would you rather have me fall?"

"No, but could you at least start laying off the sweets?  You're getting heavy…"

"Hey…" Chiana started, but D'Argo stopped and interrupted.

"Shut up, both of you," the Luxan warned.

"Sorry," Chiana sheepishly whispered as she looked up at her ex-lover.  John just looked on, showing no emotion whatsoever.

With a growl, D'Argo started up the conduit again.  He reached the grate and cautiously pushed it up far enough for him to take a quick look around the barracks and see what was inside, or rather what wasn't inside.  "What the frell?"

"What?" Chiana asked, but didn't get an answer.

D'Argo didn't respond.  He just pushed the grate to the side and climbed into the barracks.

"D'Argo, what the hell are you doing?" John asked through gritted teeth.  He didn't get a response, either.

"What should I do?" Chiana asked John, anxiously.

"Follow him."

"Dren."

Chiana started back up the ladder and followed D'Argo out of the conduit while he covered her.  Raising her pulse rifle, she took position on the opposite side of the opening from D'Argo to help cover John.  She looked around the barracks through her monocle with her mouth gaping in disbelief.

Once John had climbed out of the conduit he pulled his two pulse pistols, one holstered on his right thigh and the other the behind his back, and took aim, looking for any threat.  But there was nothing there, nothing at all.  "What the frell is going on?" he asked.

The trio moved around the room to check for any threats and to look for anything that would tell them where everyone went.  All they found were a few canvas cots folded and stacked up against the wall at the far end of the barracks and a door at the opposite end.

As they walked back to the drainage conduit, John and D'Argo reholstered their weapons and Chiana moved to make her way down the conduit again to move to the next barracks, as per the plan.  A blinding light suddenly engulfed them, forcing them to take their night vision monocles off.  John, D'Argo, and Chiana were blinded for a few microts, but when they regained their vision they heard pulse rifles charging above them.

"Oh, frell," Chiana yelled as she looked up, raising her pulse rifle mirroring John and D'Argo who also aimed their weapons upwards, and saw dozens of guards on the catwalks above with their weapons trained on her and her friends.

It was a tense standoff, with no one making a move or saying a single word after Chiana's initial outburst, but the standoff lasted for only a few microts.

The guards opened fire.

D'Argo went down immediately as the pulse blasts cut through his body like a hot knife through butter, spraying his blood and gray matter everywhere, even on John and Chiana.  Seeing that there was nothing they could do for D'Argo, John tried to pull the screaming Chiana, who was firing her pulse rifle maniacally at the guards above, back into the drainage conduit, but one of the guards threw a charge down at them to block their escape route.

"Frell," John yelled.  "Chiana, run!"

They tried to make a run for the door, dodging the pulse fire, when the charge exploded sending John and Chiana to the ground with shrapnel embedded in their bodies.  The smoke from the explosion caused the guards on the catwalks to fire blindly into the cloud, and John did the best he could to avoid the blasts as he tried to find Chiana.  Unfortunately, the smoke started to clear leaving John out in the open, and once the guards saw him they all opened fire on him.

The pulse blasts cut through John with gruesome ease, and he immediately found himself on the ground unable to move, his blood flowing freely from his numerous wounds.  Across from him was the lifeless body of Chiana, a horrified expression frozen on her face, laying in a pool of her own thick, light blue blood.  He looked at her, hearing only his own diminished breathing and slowing heartbeat.  A number of microts went by before one of the guards slowly came into his field of view.  John watched as the guard slowly turned around.  To him it looked like the guard was yelling, but everything was happening in slow motion.  As he listened to his own breathing, John watched two more guards come to stand on either side of their comrade.  They spoke to each other, but John couldn't hear what they were saying.  He lay helpless as they raised their rifles, aimed them, and fired.

Everything went black.

Aeryn shot up out of her bunk on the left wall, waking up from her nightmare shaking and covered with sweat.  She frantically looked around for a few microts before realizing that she was still in the small, sparse quarters she shared with John, and found that she was alone once again.  She wasn't surprised, though; she usually was alone when she woke up.  Not that she minded.  She didn't want John to see her scared out of her mind because of a nightmare that just happened to be the same one she had been having for the past weeken.  She had started having that particular nightmare of John, D'Argo, and Chiana being killed on the mining colony after they had gotten information two weekens earlier that Jothee was being held as a slave and had been put up for sale.  Of course, that was after Chiana had somehow managed to procure the layout to the colony.  Unfortunately, that nightmare was no better than the one it had replaced.

In the eight monens since she and John had rescued each other she'd continuously had nightmares of being tortured in the Aurora Chair with Scorpius and Crais looming above her, and of what the Aurora Chair had forced her to remember.  Her dreams were horrors that she had been forced to relive nearly every single night, and they had taken their toll on her, both physically and mentally.

Getting up from the bunk, Aeryn stripped off her black Peacekeeper standard issue underwear and walked over to the recently constructed private alcove in her quarters to take a shower.  Frankly, the crew had all grown tired of bathing in Talyn's small communal shower that was similar to the communal bathing areas on Peacekeeper ships.  No matter how much they all, except John and Aeryn, tried not to take a shower at the same time, someone always ended up having to bathe in front of one or two other people.  For D'Argo, Natalie and Chiana, it was very disconcerting.

As Aeryn walked to the alcove, she noticed John's black vest, which had once been the black jacket Chiana snurched for him eight monens ago, laying on top of his new, ankle length, black, all leather duster on the small table jutting out from the opposite wall.  Seeing it there concerned her because John always wore his vest unless he was in a hurry to get out of bed, and Aeryn knew why.  She watched him at times when she couldn't sleep.  He was having nightmares just like she was, but he didn't normally wake up shaking and in a cold sweat.  John would usually toss, turn, and, on occasion, he would quietly moan in reaction to his nightmares.  Then he would wake up, get dressed, and leave to go to the bridge, the center chamber, or the docking bay rather than staying to talk to her about it.  On some nights, such as this night, the nightmare would be so bad that John would only get partially dressed before leaving to clear his mind.

Aeryn knew she had to talk to him to get him to open up; she even wanted to talk to him.  But no matter how much Aeryn wanted to talk to him she couldn't bring herself to open the subject.  At least not today, because in a few short arns they would be arriving at the mining colony to rescue Jothee, and they all needed John to be focused on the task at hand.  That was, of course, if she couldn't convince the others to try something different; something other than a suicide run.

As Aeryn activated the shower and stepped inside to let the warm, refreshing cleansing fluid cascade down her body, she thought, I'll just have to find the time to talk to John later about that…among other things.

----------------------------------------------------

"I still don't think this is a good idea," Aeryn stated as she looked around at her friends scattered around the bridge.  She turned her head to look at John who was standing next to her behind the left main console.  All she saw was, as usual, an emotionless stare.  "There are other ways…"

"Aeryn, look," John interrupted.  "This time, we don't have any other options…"

"No, John, there are always other options.  We have two Marauders and five Prowlers.  We could go to a commerce planet and sell one of the Marauders and three of the Prowlers for money to buy Jothee.  At least that way the chances of your being killed won't be as high as they are with your plan."

"No," D'Argo yelled from his position at the back of the bridge with Chiana nearby, leaning against the last support pylon on the right.  "We are here and we have to do this now.  If we do as you say, there's the chance that my son will be sold before we get back."

"How do you know he hasn't been sold already?" Aeryn yelled back.

"You just want to keep me away from my son," D'Argo yelled, going into the beginning stages of hyper-rage.  "I should kill you for that."

"D'Argo, no, I'm not trying to keep you away from your son," Aeryn said softly.  "I want to help you get him back, but I don't want to lose you, any of you, in this suicide mission."

As John would say, all of Aeryn's cards were on the table, and she just hoped she had a winning hand.  While Aeryn hadn't understood John's references to 'cards on the table' or 'a winning hand', she understood his meaning when he said that expression himself a few monens ago.

"Aeryn," Natalie said from her usual spot on a recently installed stool at Talyn's right main console.  Getting everyone's attention, she continued, "I don't like this anymore than you do, but there is no other way.  And D'Argo's right.  If we leave to try to sell the Prowlers and Marauders now, there's the chance that Jothee will have been sold by the time we get back.  But you're right, too.  Right now we don't know if he's been sold or not.  But, that is exactly the reason why we have to go down now.  We have to be sure if Jothee's there."

Aeryn had known from her Peacekeeper training that Grant was right, and Aeryn didn't need to be lectured like that.  In the end, though, they had to go down to be sure whether Jothee was there or not.  She looked around the small bridge, pausing to face each person who had come to mean so much to her, and stopped as she came to look into John's eyes.  In his eyes, she saw the barest hint of understanding, which, she knew, was all she was going to get from him, but at least he understood what she was going through.  She knew he understood that she didn't want to see any of them die, but she also knew that despite understanding, he didn't agree with her.  She came to a decision and said, "Alright, we'll do it your way."

D'Argo then turned around and abruptly left the bridge to retrieve his qualta blade from his quarters.  Chiana followed him out to grab a pulse rifle, go to the docking bay, and board the Marauder while John and Aeryn stayed on the bridge, looking into each other's eyes.  While John saw sadness and fear, Aeryn saw nothing in those blue eyes that used to convey most of what John was feeling.

The two stood like that for a few microts before John turned away and walked off the bridge to get his black vest, duster, and pulse pistols. Aeryn dipped her head, closed her eyes, and leaned back against the console as John walked out.  She wanted the old John back, or at least the person he was before Scorpius captured him for the second time.  They all wanted the John they once knew back, but they also understood the need for John to be the way he was now, since Aeryn's renouncement of being a warrior eight monens ago.

With a sigh, Aeryn pushed herself off the console and walked off the bridge to ready the Marauder for their so-called 'mission'.

Natalie sadly watched as the Sebacean who had grown to become a close friend walked dejectedly off the bridge.  When the two had first met, Aeryn would never have shown as much emotion as she had in the past few moments.  Natalie thought, I wonder if she even realizes just how much she's changed.

Not dwelling on the thought and focusing on the 'mission', Natalie swiveled around on her stool to face the console, then turned her head back around to look at the beta channel in the floor and on the ceiling that the Leviathan used to communicate with his crew.  She asked, "You ready, Talyn?"

Talyn responded to Natalie the only way he could, with a series of low tones and flashing lights that indicated an 'affirmative'.  While Talyn wished he could communicate better with his crew, especially Natalie, he still had issues about trusting someone with the power that they would have over him with the neural transponder, due to Crais' betrayal.

"Alright.  Let's do it," Natalie quietly said.

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With Aeryn behind the helm, the Marauder blasted out of Talyn's docking bay.  She piloted the large craft around Talyn and tucked in under him to avoid detection when he made his strafing run on the mining colony to destroy the power generator.  She wished they had the time to come up with another plan, but they didn't, so here she was piloting the Marauder.  She figured that, even though she didn't like the plan and didn't consider herself to be a warrior anymore, she was still the best pilot they had.  By piloting the Marauder, Aeryn gave the others a better chance at living through what they were about to do than if she hadn't helped.

As the Marauder came to a halt under Talyn's tail, Aeryn activated an internal comms channel to the jump bay where John, D'Argo, and Chiana were waiting.  "Are you ready?"

"We're ready, Aeryn," John responded as he, D'Argo, and Chiana took their seats with weapons in hand.

Aeryn lowered her head, closed her eyes, and sighed as she thought once again about the situation she and her friends now found themselves in.  She just hoped that they would be successful in finding Jothee, and that they would all be able to leave the system alive.  She then pushed the thought out of her mind and activated an external comms channel to the small, but powerful gunship.  "We're ready to go back here."

"Alright, we're going in," Natalie responded from Talyn's bridge.  The Leviathan activated his cannons, fore and aft, and shot out from behind the small moon of the mining colony with the Marauder tucked underneath him like a remora to a shark.

As Talyn approached the planet's atmosphere, he fired on the approaching self-tracking weapon platforms, but there were so many they nearly overwhelmed the small Leviathan as he approached.  Undaunted, Talyn pressed on, destroying as many weapon platforms as he could with his five cannons in order to protect the small Marauder that was hiding under him, and to get into the planet's atmosphere.

Talyn tried to maneuver out of the line of fire of the platforms that were swarming around him, weaving in and out, avoiding the pulse blasts as best he could.  But one platform managed to stay in front of him.  As soon as he got a good lock on it he took the shot with his main cannon, disintegrating it as the other weapon platforms tried to get into position to fire at him.  Fortunately for Talyn, he was now too far into the planet's atmosphere for them to harm him any further, and he managed to get away from them with major damage to some non-critical areas and minor to others.

Luckily, Natalie fared slightly better than Talyn, suffering only minor scrapes, cuts and bruises from being tossed around, but the last hit had thrown her across the bridge and sent her crashing to the floor.  She picked herself up off the floor, walked back over to the right main console, took a seat on the stationary stool, and said, "Talyn, we need to get you some seatbelts.  Anyway, how are you and the Marauder?"

Talyn immediately activated the holo-imager in the console that Natalie was seated at and an image of him appeared on top of the console, showing the worried human exactly where he had been damaged.

"Well, all you need is a few days of R&R with a hot, female Leviathan with a pair of huge 'thrusters', and I'm sure you'll be as good as new."

Talyn responded with many positive sequences of low tones and flashing lights, and Natalie could've sworn that the lighting on the bridge had become brighter.

"Boys will be boys," she mumbled with a smile.  "Alright," she said, becoming serious.  "Enough of that.  How's the Marauder?"

Talyn then became silent and showed her a holo image of the Marauder, which was still flying underneath him.

"Aw, shit."

=================================

"Aeryn?" John yelled into the thin, black comms pinned to his vest as he picked himself up off the floor and helped Chiana up, too.  Seeing D'Argo rise uninjured, John tried reaching Aeryn again.  "Aeryn, answer me, dammit!  Are you okay?"

"Just frelling wonderful," Aeryn yelled as she put out a fire in the console next to her.  She put down the fire extinguisher and began checking the Marauder, ignoring for the moment the large scrape over her right eyebrow and the small pieces of shrapnel that were embedded in the right side of her face when the console to her right had exploded.  Fortunately, her leather coat managed to protect her body from the flying shrapnel, but she did receive a few bruises from being tossed around and knocked out of her seat.

"So how are we?" John asked.

"Not good," Aeryn responded.  "There's a hull breach on deck two...and…frell…"

"What?"

"We have a cesium fuel leak.  It's not that bad now, but it's bound to get worse.  We have to get back on board Talyn now and abort or we're frelled."

"No!" D'Argo yelled.  "We've come this far and we're not turning back."

"Sorry for eavesdropping guys," Natalie interrupted, as she listened in on the comms channel the others were using for their conversation.  "But D'Argo's right.  We can't turn back now.  Not because of Jothee, but because Talyn can't take another two beatings from those weapon platforms."

"Damn," Aeryn whispered.  "How is Talyn?"

"He'll recover, but if we abort, leave the planet and try again, Talyn might be too severely damaged to help.  So we have to do this now."

That was something Aeryn didn't want to hear.  She didn't want to have to choose between risking the lives of her friends and the life of the man who meant more to her than anything, and the life of the Leviathan she had befriended when he was born.

"We don't have time for this," D'Argo yelled.  "Talyn, you will destroy the generator.  Aeryn, you will land the Marauder now!"

"Damn, D'Argo, you don't have to yell," Natalie said, with Aeryn responding at the same time.

"Fine."

"I'm not deaf, you know," Natalie added.  "Alright, Talyn, let's go kick some ass."

With Natalie's exclamation, Talyn quickly made his made his way to the large building holding the power generator as Aeryn piloted the Marauder to the waste conduit that lead to the barracks Jothee was being housed in.

Aeryn wished that the frag cannons the colony guards used to shoot down invading ships were connected to the power generator instead of having individual power generators so that they would be knocked out with the rest of the colony's systems, but as usual she and the others weren't that lucky.  And the guards and mine owners weren't that stupid so she was forced to make her way to the waste conduit.

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Staring out of Talyn's forward portals, Natalie could just barely make out the colony's large hundred-story main complex where the generator was housed, and where most of the mine owners lived along with hundreds of other people.  She knew that they needed to destroy the generator if they wanted to succeed in rescuing Jothee, and she was ready to give Talyn the order, undoubtedly killing everyone inside.  But a part of her still didn't want to kill them.  They had found out while on the commerce planet where they found the slave manifest with Jothee's name on it that the mine owners worked their slaves to death, and she couldn't ignore that part.  But, killing so many people...

The others were depending on her to give Talyn the order since he would only listen to her and Natalie tried to push that part of her to the back of mind, but she couldn't.  She knew that destroying the complex would haunt her for a long time to come, but she didn't care at the moment nor did she have a choice.  It was either the mine owners or her friends, and she would choose her friends and family over anyone, any day.

Seeing that they were coming up on the complex fast, Natalie said, "All right, Talyn, start your run and fire when I tell 'ya…"

Talyn dove and began flying about a hundred metras off the ground at top speed with his guns at the ready.  As Talyn flew in, the frag cannons on the ground began firing.  He managed to roll and maneuver around most of the frag discharges, but took a few head on.  The hits slowed him down and knocked Natalie off her feet a few times, but didn't stop them.

As Talyn neared the complex, he charged his main cannon, readying himself for Natalie's order to fire.

Natalie watched on through the small forward portals as the ground passed beneath and the frag discharges whizzed by when two discharges managed to hit Talyn full-force throwing Natalie over her console onto the floor where she hit her head.  She was knocked out briefly, and Talyn worriedly tried to awaken her with frantic sequences of tones and flashing lights.  Slightly dazed, Natalie regained consciousness after a few microts, opened her eyes, and slowly stood up, using the console for support.  She noticed Talyn's frantic flashing and beeping, and said, "Don't worry, I'm alright."

As Natalie began to remember what was going on she confusedly looked out the forward portals and saw that they were getting closer and closer to a complex.  As they got closer to their target, Natalie managed to shake off her confusion and in realizing just how closer they were, she yelled in surprise, "Shit!"  She then braced herself back against the console and ordered, "Do it, Talyn!  Fire!"

Talyn did as ordered and fired five shots into the large complex, causing it to collapse in on itself in a huge explosion.  Talyn pulled up hard, avoiding the explosion and the resulting large mushroom cloud.  The g-forces from going vertical pushed Natalie even harder back against the console, and she felt like she was on a space shuttle during lift off again.

Reaching the upper atmosphere of the planet, where neither the weapon platforms in orbit nor the frag cannons could reach them, Talyn leveled off.

With a sigh Natalie slumped to the floor, brought her knees up, smoothed back her tousled hair, and said, "Talyn, open up a comms channel to the Marauder."

With a few tones, Talyn let Natalie know that he had done so.

"Hey, Aeryn," Natalie started.  "The generator's been destroyed."

"Right, we're going in," Aeryn responded over the comms, then closed the channel.

"Now comes the hard part."

----------------------------------------------------

Making a few flybys over the entrance to the waste conduit, Aeryn checked the immediate area to be sure it was clear of any hostile forces.  When she was absolutely certain that no one was there waiting to ambush them, she set down the Marauder just as D'Argo jumped out with qualta rifle in hand and night-vision monocle on his head, ready to kill anything that moved.  Chiana then jumped out with John right behind her as D'Argo ran into the conduit.

"D'Argo, wait for us!" John yelled, then ran after his Luxan shipmate with Chiana right in front of him, but stopped when he heard the Marauder take off just in case someone saw them land and was on their way to take them out and their method of escape.  He noted that the departing craft didn't sound right so he turned around to look at it through the monocle he wore, and he didn't like what he saw.

"Frell," he yelled, and activated his silver comms with a red center microphone.  "Aeryn, you better set down somewhere.  That fuel leak is getting worse, and if someone takes a shot at you, you're toast."

"I know," Aeryn responded.  "I'll try to find some place safe to land, but I doubt I will.  So I'm going to try to see if I can get back to Talyn and get the other Marauder."

"We'll all be waiting when you get back."

John watched as Aeryn made her way to the upper atmosphere in the Marauder, then turned around to run into the conduit after Chiana and D'Argo, just before the ship disappeared from view.

With the night-vision monocle John wore, he could see the silhouettes of D'Argo and Chiana running ahead of him, and at their speed it would take him a while to catch up.  As John ran, his duster catching in the wind blowing through the conduit, he tried to ignore the smell of dren that permeated the conduit, but to no avail.  The running wasn't helping his nausea and twice he had to swallow the bile that rose up in this throat as he tried to catch up with his two friends.  Normally he would've stopped to throw it all up, but this time he couldn't afford to stop for something like that.

John saw D'Argo abruptly stop with Chiana ahead of him, and heard D'Argo say as the Luxan lifted his boot up off the ground, "Dren."

D'Argo just sighed and began to run towards the drainage pipe again.  Chiana ran after him again, and said, "Just be sure to wipe it off as soon as we get back to Talyn."

John watched on as Chiana and D'Argo, who had converted his rifle back into a sword and sheathed it, reached the drainage conduit.  He saw D'Argo jump up to grab the lower rung of the ladder and hoist himself up with Chiana right behind him.  After Chiana disappeared from view John began to sprint as fast as he could.  When he got close enough to the drainage conduit, he jumped and caught the lower rung with his momentum swinging him forward.

As he pulled himself up, he looked upward and saw that D'Argo and Chiana weren't there and that the grate at the top of the conduit was gone, and he started climbing.  John reached the top of the conduit, but instead of getting out he threw back the side of his coat and grabbed the pulse pistol from his thigh holster.

John took a few breaths and popped up out of the conduit to make sure the area was clear.  What he saw when he popped out surprised him and he stepped out of the conduit and walked over to stand next to D'Argo who was holding his rifle in hand.  He looked around the barracks, and said, "Frell."  Keeping his eyes forward, John added, "D'Argo…I'm sorry, man.  I know how much you wanted to be with your son, but…I'm sorry…"

Turning around to go back down the drainage conduit, John said, "C'mon, Chiana, let's go."

"No!" D'Argo yelled, gaining John's and Chiana's attention.  "He has to be here, and we will keep looking."

"D'Argo, take a look around, will 'ya?" John frustratingly said.  "Jothee isn't here.  We're too late."

"No, the information we had could be wrong and he could still be here..."

"D'Argo," Chiana sadly interrupted.  "The information wasn't wrong.  I know, especially because of the price I paid."

D'Argo responded to Chiana's statement was a growl and a cold glare before saying in a low menacing voice, "We keep looking."

Neither John nor Chiana could tell if D'Argo didn't want to believe that Jothee was gone, or if Chiana had hurt him, but they weren't going to argue with him, especially because he seemed to be on the verge of hyper-rage.

Walking to the door of the barracks to check out the others, the armed trio heard a massive explosion coming from a few metras away.  They worriedly looked at each other before John activated his comms.

"Aeryn, 'ya there?"

He didn't get a response.

"Aeryn?  Natalie?  C'mon, talk to me, you two."

"I'm here, John," Natalie responded.  "What's up?"

"Is Aeryn there with you?

"No, she isn't.  Why?"

"That fuel leak had gotten worse and she said she was going to try to make it back to Talyn…but we just heard a pretty big explosion…"

"What?" Natalie surprisingly asked.  "Shit.  I'll try to find a way to contact her.  Did you find Jothee?"

"No, not yet, but we're going to keep looking."

"Alright, good luck then, and watch your ass."

"I always do," John responded, and closed the comms channel.  He then turned to D'Argo and Chiana as he threw back the left side of his duster, unholstered his second pulse pistol from behind his back, and said, "Ready when you are."

"Alright, let's do this and get the frell out of here," Chiana said as she brought her pulse rifle to her shoulder.

"We'll split up," D'Argo stated.  "That way we'll have a better chance at finding Jothee, and we'll be able to get out of here sooner."

"I don't think that's a good idea, D'Argo," John said.  "We have to stick together; watch each other's backs."

"No!" D'Argo yelled as he stood nose to nose with John, looking down at him with fire in his eyes.  "You will do as I say."

John, in turn, stared back at D'Argo with an icy cold glare.

Before, John would've been more understanding of what D'Argo was going through, but this time John wasn't going to take any of D'Argo's controlling attitude, whatsoever.  And on any other day, D'Argo would've been worried about the change in his Human friend, but today he was more worried about Jothee than anything else and in D'Argo's state of mind he wasn't going to have anyone tell him what to do.

"Hey," Chiana interrupted.  "Will you two stop thinking with your mivonks so we can get going?"

John and D'Argo turned their heads to look at Chiana, who had a 'very annoyed at men' look on her face.  The two men turned back to each other for a microt before they turned away from each other and walked to the door.

"We'll start with the barracks nearest to this one," D'Argo stated.  "Chiana, you take the one on the left.  John, take the one to the right.  I'll go up the middle."

Both John and Chiana nodded, letting D'Argo know that they were ready to go along with his plan, but John had seen one too many movies that had this exact situation in them.  He knew that things weren't going to go as planned and he was worried, but he pushed his fear and his emotions to the back of his mind to focus on the task at hand.

D'Argo positioned himself right beside the door with John behind him and Chiana to his left ready to palm open the door.  Once he was ready, mentally and physically, D'Argo nodded to Chiana, silently telling her to open the door.  She did, and D'Argo shot out and ran across the street to the barracks straight ahead of him.  John followed him out and stayed close to the barracks' wall ready to shoot anything that moved, covering D'Argo's back as he ran.

Once John was sure that the area was clear and there weren't any threats he signaled Chiana to come out and she ran along the wall for the barracks to their left just as D'Argo entered the barracks he had run to.  John watched on as Chiana ran to the barracks, looking for any threat to his friend's life, and saw her palm open the door and go inside.

He took one more look around to make sure no one was there and he took off as fast as he could, sticking to the wall, for the barracks to the right.  As he ran he took off his monocle to see where the shadows on the building were.  Seeing one large shadow next to the door of the barracks he was running for being cast by the building next to it, he ran to the shadow and dove into it, rolling out of the dive and planting his back next the building's wall.  He put his monocle back on to check things out, and once he saw that the area was clear he stepped out of the shadow, palmed open the door, and with his pistols at the ready, he carefully and silently went inside.

----------------------------------------------------

Fortunately, when Chiana opened the door, the mechanism that opened it was nearly silent, and it didn't awaken the slaves inside.  Because she wouldn't be able to open it from the inside she left it open, and she stood there in the doorway looking at the rows of bunk beds with three beds to a bunk on either side of a center aisle, and thought to herself, Frell.  This is going to take me forever.

She checked the lower bunk to her right and, seeing that it was a Banik, she climbed up the ladder to the next bunk, then to the next.  She continued checking the bunks on the right side of the barracks and when she climbed down the ladder to the bunk that was halfway down the aisle she heard the distinct sound of a pulse rifle charging up.  Chiana froze in terror at that sound, and managed to whisper, "Oh, frell."

=================================

"Drop the rifle and turn around."

Chiana did as the guard ordered and dropped her rifle, and turned around to face an armor-clad Peacekeeper.  She worriedly thought, Oh, dren…  Regaining her composure, Chiana cocked her head to one side, and flashed a smile at the male Peacekeeper, secretly coming up with a plan to take out the bastard.  She took a few steps forward, her hips swaying seductively, catching his attention, and said, "You look like you could use some fun."

"Stop right there," he responded, and tightened his grip on his rifle.

"Oh, c'mon…a guy like you…and a girl like me…"

"Well…you could have other weapons on you…" the guard started with a sadistic grin growing on his face as he lowered his rifle a little.  "And I'd have to strip search you to find out…"

"If that's what you have to do," she replied, and began to unhook the clasps on her gray bodice, slightly revealing her breasts while walking towards the guard again.  "Then that's what you have to do."

The Peacekeeper hungrily licked his lips and lowered his rifle to his side as he watched Chiana unhook the last clasp on her bodice and remove the garment, revealing a see-through mesh undershirt and her ample cleavage

Seeing that his attention was entirely focused on her breasts, Chiana made her move and charged the soldier, taking him completely by surprise and knocking him to the ground.  While on top of the guard, Chiana tried to grab his pulse rifle, but he punched her in the jaw with his free hand, knocking her off him.  Then he sat up, rolled over on top of the young Nebari, grabbed her neck, and pointed his rifle at her.

Chiana then flung her right leg up and around his neck, choking him and pushing him away.  Once she got him off her, he laid at her feet perpendicular to her and she kicked him in the balls with her left heel, kicked him in jaw with her right heel.  He rolled onto his left side, facing her, and howled in pain awakening the slaves.  He had curled up into a ball while grabbing his crotch, forgetting about the charged rifle that lay behind him.

Getting up, Chiana tried to run, but the Peacekeeper, ignoring the searing pain he felt in his crotch, grabbed her boot, causing her to fall flat on her face.

As she rolled over, he stood back up, cradling his crotch in his left hand, and said, "Now we're going to have some fun, slut."

Terrified, Chiana crawled backwards as he loomed over her.  He stopped and knelt down between her legs, his feet holding her legs in place.  He grabbed her arms, pinned them above her head, and kissed her hard on the lips, shoving his tongue into her mouth.  Chiana tried to struggle against him, but that only aroused him even further.

The kiss went on for a few microts, until he tore his mouth away from hers and smiled sadistically at Chiana.  He took both her hands in one of his and with his other hand, he made a move for her pants when a shot rang out from nowhere.

The Peacekeeper tensed and looked at Chiana.  Then he quickly stood up and spun around as he tried to grab his pulse pistol, but another shot came out of the shadows and struck the Peacekeeper in the chest.  The Peacekeeper stood there with a shocked expression on his face then fell to his knees before keeling over onto his side with blood spilling out of the wound in his chest.

Surprised at what had just happened, Chiana sat up and watched as the person who just saved her life stepped out of the shadows.  When she saw who it was, she looked on with her mouth wide open in shock, and all she could say was, "Frell me."

----------------------------------------------------

John took a few tentative steps out of the barracks he had searched with his pulse pistols at the ready, looked around the immediate area with his monocle, stepped into the shadows, and squatted down on the ground, looking for any threats.  He saw movement coming from the barracks that D'Argo had gone to and aimed one of his pistols at the doorway while keeping his other pistol at the ready just in case another threat came up.  Fortunately, it was just D'Argo, and John lowered his pistol.  Unfortunately, D'Argo was alone.

As John stepped out of the shadows to let the Luxan know he was there, D'Argo raised his qualta rifle and aimed it at John, not realizing it was his friend.  John stopped and raised his pistols up in the air to let D'Argo know he wasn't a threat.  Once D'Argo realized that it was John he lowered his rifle and ran across the street into the narrow alley between the barracks just as John ran into the shadows of the barracks in the alley to join him.

"Did you find him?" D'Argo asked as they both kneeled down on the ground for better cover.

"Sorry, I didn't, but I could've sworn I heard weapons fire."

"I did, as well," D'Argo stated.

The two knowingly looked at each other and simultaneously said, "Chiana."

Just as the two were about to come out of hiding they spotted Chiana walking out of the entrance to the barracks she had searched, but she wasn't alone.  Both D'Argo and John were astonished at who was with her, and they both shared a look at each other then looked as Chiana spotted them and made her way towards them.  As John watched the person Chiana was with draw nearer, he whispered, "Well, son of a bitch…"

Chiana and her companion joined John and D'Argo in the shadows in the alley and knelt down on the ground.  With a grin, Chiana said, "Hi, guys.  Look who I found."

Once John got over his initial shock at seeing the person who was now kneeling across from him, he said, "Stark, what the frell are you doing here?"

"I came to a commerce planet not too long after I left Moya on the transport pod you gave me, and I was trying to find anything about other Baniks there.  But I was jumped from behind and knocked out.  I found myself here when I woke up…" Stark began, then turned to face John, and added,  "It's good to see you again, my friend."

"It's good to see you, too, man…" John started, but D'Argo interrupted.

"You have been here for nearly a cycle so you must have seen my son," the towering Luxan began.  "Where is he?"

"Your son?  Jothee?"

D'Argo nodded in response.

"Yes, I have seen your son," Stark began.  Seeing D'Argo's hopeful look saddened him, but he had to let D'Argo know what happened.  "But…he was sold a weeken ago in a lot of ten thousand slaves, and was shipped out three solar days ago.  I am sorry, Ka D'Argo."

D'Argo didn't say a word.  He only blankly stared straight ahead of him at the barracks wall.

Chiana and Stark worriedly watched their friend and his silence only increased their fear for him.  Outwardly, John wasn't showing any emotion whatsoever, but on the inside he was just as worried as Stark and Chiana.  None of them could imagine what it must be like for him to come so close to finding his son only to have Jothee slip away.

"D'Argo?" John said, trying to get his friend's attention.

D'Argo didn't answer.  He just sat there blankly staring at the wall and was also trembling slightly.  The others could see that he was, and could tell that he was getting really pissed off.

"D'Argo…" John began, but shut his mouth at the sound of laughter coming from the street.  He took his eyes off D'Argo to look out at the street, and saw two Tavleks coming their way.  "Frell."  John turned back to D'Argo to try to talk to him, but D'Argo was focused on the two Tavleks.

With an ear-splitting battle cry, D'Argo shot up from his position and ran towards the Tavleks, converted his rifle back into a blade as he ran.

"D'Argo!" John yelled as the Luxan ran towards the two Tavleks who were caught off guard.

The two Tavleks saw D'Argo coming at them, but for one it was too late.  D'Argo spun around, bringing up his qualta blade as the Tavleks raised their gauntlets, and swung his blade around to take the head off the nearest Tavlek.

The other Tavlek tried to fire at D'Argo, but the Luxan used the body of the dead Tavlek as a shield, protecting himself and inadvertently covering himself in blood.  D'Argo threw away the body of the dead Tavlek, and ducked as the remaining Tavlek fired.  As D'Argo ducked, he swung his blade up and sliced the Tavlek in half.

D'Argo stood up with his massive chest covered in blood and looked down at the bodies of the dead Tavleks.  One lying in a pool of blood with his intestines sprawled out all over the ground, the other in a pool of his own blood, but missing a head.

John had barely set foot out into the street to join D'Argo when a spotlight on a nearby watchtower suddenly activated and shone down on the carnage in the street causing D'Argo to pull off his monocle.  John stepped back into the shadows in the alley, and thought, Dammit.  How the hell did they get emergency power up so fast?

John, Chiana, and Stark watched on as half-a-dozen guards (including Tavleks, Peacekeepers, and Scorvians) surrounded D'Argo and aimed their weapons at him.

"Drop your weapon and get on the ground now!" one of the Peacekeepers standing at D'Argo's side ordered.

D'Argo just turned his head and coldly glared at the Peacekeeper.  He then looked past the Peacekeeper and with the help of his night-vision monocle, he noticed John getting into position to fire at the spotlight with a pulse rifle.  Turning around slightly to get a better look at the two guards behind him, a Tavlek and a Scorvian, D'Argo slightly raised his qualta blade, getting ready for when John shot out the spotlight, and turned back around to face the three guards in front of him.  Fortunately, they were all standing fairly close…and were really dumb.

John looked over at D'Argo and saw that he was ready.  He looked into the sight on the pulse rifle and, seeing that he had a clean shot, he fired.

Once the spotlight was taken out, D'Argo quickly spun around, swinging his qualta blade in a wide arc, and sliced open each one of the guard's necks.  If D'Argo could've seen them in the darkness, he would've seen the shocked expressions on the guards' faces as blood flowed out of their throats.

Suddenly, a spotlight on another tower behind him lit up and beamed down on D'Argo and the carnage at his feet.  The guards in the tower began firing at him, and the Luxan converted his blade back into a rifle as he spun around, and returned fire; but he forgot about the watchtower behind him.

John tossed the pulse rifle back to Chiana and pulled out his pulse pistols.  He ran out into the street as the guards in the tower behind D'Argo began to fire at the Luxan.  With both pistols, John fired at the two silhouettes that he could see in the tower with his monocle.  As he fired, John ran up to D'Argo and pushed him across the street into the small alley between barracks for cover.  They made it just in time, too, for as soon as they made it between the barracks a platoon of guards arrived, half at one end of the street and half at the other, and started firing at the four shipmates catching them in a crossfire.

"D'Argo…you alright?" John yelled as he removed the chakan oil cartridge in one of his pistols.

"No, I'm not alright," D'Argo yelled back.  He stood up and, using the corner of one of the barracks as cover, began firing at the guards at the end of the street with the spotlight shining down on them.  He hit a Peacekeeper in the gut with his first shot, but the other guards took cover before he could kill them.

After replacing the chakan oil cartridge, John stood up and, using the corner of the other barracks as cover, began firing at the guards at the other end of the street.  John managed to hit two Peacekeepers before a spotlight on another tower at his end of the street lit up and momentarily blinded him because of the sensitivity level of his monocle.  He spun around as he ripped the monocle off his face, closed his eyes, and braced himself up against the wall of the barracks.

John could hear pulse fire whizzing by his left side.  From the sound of it, he knew that he and his friends were outnumbered and that they had a very slim chance of getting out the situation alive.

He blinked a few times trying to clear his vision, looked up, and could barely make out D'Argo's back and tenkas in the bright light of the spotlight through the afterimages he saw.  He then looked to his left through the pulse fire and could barely make out Chiana and Stark in the alley across the street.  Chiana was taking cover against the barracks on the right and was helping D'Argo by firing at the guards at the right end of the street.  Stark was flat against the barracks, taking cover, on the left and was firing at the guards on the other end of the street.

John figured he might as well make the best of the situation, and straightened his head and opened up his vest to activate his comms when D'Argo spun around.

The large Luxan looked at his friend's nearly blank stare, and worriedly asked, "John?"

"Don't worry about me," John said.  "I'll be alright."

D'Argo paused for a beat to watch his friend before spinning back around to kill some more guards.

John activated his comms, and yelled, "Chiana, give your comms to Stark.  I wanna talk to him."

"What?" Chiana responded.  "Are you crazy?  You want to stop and chat in the middle of a fight?"

"Chiana, don't argue!  Just do it."

"Fine," Chiana yelled as she took off her comms and threw it to Stark before going back to firing at the guards at the end of the street.

"Stark, 'ya there?" John asked, his sight beginning to return.

"Yes, I'm here."

"Is there any way we can get the other slaves to help us out here?"

"No," Stark responded as he fired at the guards down the street.  "The mine owners and their guards have been so brutal that the other slaves are too terrified to do anything."

"Frell.  Alright, then explain to me why the Peacekeepers are here, and what the frell are they doing working with other so-called inferior races?"

"They're not Peacekeepers, Crichton.  They're ex-Peacekeepers and Sebaceans who were never conscripted…" Stark began, but was interrupted when a blast from a pulse cannon hit the barracks D'Argo was hiding behind, sending shrapnel into the Luxan's side and throwing him to the ground.

Both Stark and Chiana looked across the street as John rushed to D'Argo's side and checked the Luxan's wounds.  Chiana took her comms back from Stark, and yelled, "Crichton, how is he?"

"Not good," John responded.  "He's unconscious, has a large chunk of metal in his left side, and his blood is black."

"Well, do something!  You can't just let him die."

"There's nothing I can do here, Chiana.  He'll lose more blood if I pull this frelling thing out than if I leave it in.  We have to get him back up to Talyn.  But…there's our obvious problem…"

"Frell," Chiana whispered.

"What do you mean, problem?" Stark asked, beginning to sound panicky.

"We can't get off the surface…" Chiana started.

"What?" Stark interrupted frantically.  "Why can't we get off the surface?"

Chiana was about to explain what happened, but was interrupted when the ground started shaking and Stark and Chiana looked up.  They saw a large black and red blur pass directly overhead, and watched on as the powerful Leviathan passed above them firing at the three watchtowers with his fore and aft cannons, causing them to erupt into massive fireballs.

The fireballs dissipated, sending flaming debris to the ground, and John watched as Talyn looped over, inverting himself, and fired at the guards at both ends of the street with his main cannon, killing them all in massive explosions.  All that remained were charred skeletons and huge firewalls at both ends of the street that lit up the entire area like daylight.

Talyn started to circle the camp when John holstered his pistols, ran out of the alley, and yelled, "Stark, get over here.  I need your help with D'Argo."  As Stark made his way over to D'Argo, John yelled into his comms, "Natalie, am I glad to see you."

"Well, I figured you might need Talyn's and my help."

"Did you…" John started and was about to ask Natalie if she had contacted Aeryn when suddenly a Marauder appeared over the horizon.  He thought it might have been Aeryn and was relieved by her appearance.  But at closer inspection, John saw that the Marauder wasn't leaking any fuel, and there was no way that Aeryn could've patched up that fuel bladder in that short amount of time.

"Stark, Chiana…we've got company," John yelled as he watched the Marauder close in on them, and pulled out his pulse pistols as he ran back into the alley to join his friends.

As the Marauder set down, Chiana, kneeling down on the ground, and John, who was standing above her, used the barracks as their cover once again.  They aimed their weapons at the ship, waiting to fire at anything that came out while Stark tended to D'Argo and tried to make his blood run clear.  Time seemed to stand still for John and Chiana as they waited for whoever was in the Marauder to make their move when suddenly a voice rang out over their comms.

"Get in.  What the frell are you waiting for?"

John and Chiana just looked at each other, then looked back at the Marauder, and simultaneously asked, "Aeryn?"

"Yes," she replied in an annoyed tone.  "Now, will you get the frell on board?"

"We're coming, baby," John responded as he holstered his pistols, and moved with Chiana to help Stark carry D'Argo.  "But give us a few microts will 'ya?  D'Argo's hurt pretty bad and it's going to take us a few to get him inside."

"Well, do it fast.  That firewall isn't going to hold for very long, and I saw more troops on their way here as I was coming in."

"We're going as fast as we can, Aeryn," John replied as he carried his wounded friend.  John tucked his arms under D'Argo's and wrapped them around his chest while Stark held onto the Luxan's feet.  Chiana stayed behind Stark and John as they carried D'Argo, with her pulse rifle at the ready.

Once they were on board, John, Stark, and Chiana all managed to get D'Argo strapped in, being careful not to jar his wound and make his blood run black again.  When the three shipmates were strapped in, John yelled into his comms, "We're in, Aeryn.  Hit it."

Aeryn 'hit it', as John said, and took off just as the troops reached the firewall, and started blindly firing into the flames, hoping to hit something or someone.  The guards began firing at the ship through the firewall as it took off, but fortunately, to no avail.  All they could do was watch the ship fly away.

They all felt the g-forces pressing down on them as the Marauder shot up off the ground with Talyn providing cover, and John got the feeling of being on the shuttle during lift off.  And was he glad that he had the training to handle it, otherwise, he probably would've thrown up.

Reaching the upper atmosphere, Aeryn prepared to dock with Talyn when John called her over the comms.  "Aeryn, we heard an explosion down there…what happened?" he asked.  He had wanted to find out what happened, but getting D'Argo on board and getting the frell off the surface had been more of a priority.

She heard the hint of worry that laced his voice, but she knew he wouldn't ask how she was; at least not now…not any more.  "One of the frag discharges hit the cesium fuel trail and ignited it.  I was forced to dump the fuel bladder.  And when it exploded, it knocked out my comms.  I managed to repair it, but the patch won't last long."

"Alright…" John paused.  "I'll help you out with the repairs once we get outta here."

Perfect, Aeryn thought as she maneuvered above Talyn in the planet's upper atmosphere and entered his docking bay.

Talyn closed his outer doors after Aeryn landed the Marauder and Natalie, from her usual spot at Talyn's right main console, said into the comms, "Hang onto something, everybody.  This is going to get a little bumpy."  She then looked back at the Leviathan's beta channel on the ceiling, and said, "Alright, Talyn, let's haul ass."

Talyn pulled up, and with his cannons at the ready, he began firing at the weapons platforms as soon as they left the planet's atmosphere, trying to make a hole to escape. 

Just like their last encounter, the approaching weapon platforms tried to overwhelm Talyn with their numbers and swarmed around him, firing at full power.  But instead of trying to run as the self-tracking platforms had predicted, Talyn was getting extremely annoyed as they slowed him down, and he began picking them off one by one with his four aft cannons.  With his main cannon, he concentrated on the platforms in front of him to make a large enough hole.

The platforms firing at Talyn's belly managed to puncture his elastic skin, creating a hull breach.  Other platforms beneath Talyn saw this with their sensors and began firing at the breach, trying to disable him.  All they did was annoy him even further.

Talyn rolled and began firing at the platforms that were under him and picked them off, destroying them in massive fireballs.

As he rolled and fired at the platforms surrounding him with his four aft cannons, he managed to create a large enough hole in front of him and shot through the hole at full speed.

Once he was clear of the platforms, Talyn retracted his guns and starburst to safety.

=================================

"You what?"

"That's what I've wanted to do, Chiana," Natalie said as she popped a food cube into her mouth.

After Talyn had starburst to safety, the crew had carried D'Argo to Talyn's medical facility, which was filled with scavenged medical supplies.  They had watched as Stark expertly tended to D'Argo's wounds before eventually splitting up.  John and Aeryn had gone to the docking bay to repair the damage the Marauder had acquired, while Natalie and Chiana had met in Talyn's galley to share a meal of food cubes and water.

"You're serious?" Chiana asked, holding a food cube in her hand, waiting for Natalie to go on.

"Yeah, I'm serious," she responded before taking a gulp of raslac.  "All I ever wanted to do since I was a kid was walk on my planet's moon.  That's why I wanted to join the space program back home.  I hoped that humans would go back to the moon someday, and that I would be the first person to do it.  But then I turned sixteen…and had Jason…"  Natalie popped a small food cube into her mouth and swallowed before going on.  "Don't get me wrong…I love Jason, and I would never give him up for anything, but…"

As Natalie ducked her head, letting her hair hide her face, Chiana reassuringly put her hand on the woman's arm that was now resting on the table.  "But what?" she softly asked.

Natalie looked back up at Chiana as a single tear rolled down her cheek.  "My parents made me choose."  She reached up to wipe away the tear then took another gulp of raslac.  "They were being such assholes…they made me choose between Jason or being cut off from the family.  They said that they had plans for me and that my having a son didn't fit into those plans.  Being the rich, arrogant, self-centered little shits that they were, they expected me to either give Jason up for adoption or have an abortion because they always got what they wanted...  Of course, being in the Navy made my Dad even worse."  She looked down at her tray, pushed it aside and folded her hands together on the table before looking at Chiana.  "But I didn't give Jason up."

"So what'd they do?"

"They cut me off…just as they said they'd do."  She looked back down at her clasped hands and continued.  "So the family of a close friend of mine took Jason and me in.  They helped us out…and I won a scholarship to MIT..." Natalie stopped at Chiana's confused look.  "MIT is a major university on Earth.  It's the same university John went to.  Anyway, after I graduated I joined IASA.  A few years after that happened, my parents and I managed to patch things up, but I still think they're assholes.  Anyway, I had hoped IASA'd put me up, but I was also realistic.  I knew that there was a very slim chance of me actually going up, but here I am.  On my first goddamned mission, I ended up here in the Uncharteds.  And Jason is no doubt with my parents."

"What's so bad about that?  You did say they were rich," Chiana said, and popped a food cube into her mouth.

Natalie let out a small laugh at that as she looked at her friend who was almost like a little sister.  "Why am I not surprised you said that?"  She shook her head as she looked down and looked back up at Chiana who let out a small laugh of her own.  "Well, they are rich…  My Dad inherited his wealth.  But like I said…they're assholes and arrogant, self-centered little shits.  Just like Rygel.  I don't want Jason to grow up to be like them, and I'm afraid that because he's staying with them…he will."

"What about your brothers?  He could be with them."

"No…  Knowing my parents, they took Jason.  Besides, my brothers were at sea when I left.  There was no way they could take Jason in.  So I know they're with my parents."

"Well, you could get lucky and he won't grow up to be like them," Chiana reassuringly said as she took one of Natalie's hands and gave it a squeeze.  She cocked her head and smiled.  "Who knows?  He could grow up to be like me."

"Oh no…" Natalie started as she sat back, and shook her head with a smile.  "There is no way that my son is going to grow up to be like you.  Besides, my son is a guy.  There's no possible way that he can grow up to be like you," she laughingly said.  "If he does…he and I are going to have a long talk."

"Well…" Chiana started, but was interrupted when D'Argo walked in.

Natalie turned around to watch the Luxan with Chiana as he grabbed a tray of food cubes and a bottle of water and slowly made his way to the other end of the table.  As he sat down, Natalie asked, "Hey, D'Argo…how're you feeling?"

"I'll live," he said as he took a swig of water.  When he put down the bottle, he turned to look at Natalie, and then gave Chiana a cold stare.

Chiana looked away from D'Argo, and with a sigh she stood up, collected her tray and bottle, and said to Natalie, "I'll talk to you later, alright?"

"Alright.  I'll see you later," she said as Chiana put away the tray and bottle and walked out.

Natalie sighed herself as she wondered when D'Argo and Chiana would patch things up.  It was pretty hard being the friend of two ex-lovers who would barely talk to each other anymore.  She wanted to be loyal to both and stick by their sides, but she also wanted to stay neutral.  Unfortunately, they weren't making it very easy on her, especially D'Argo.

After Natalie and D'Argo had had their talk about Jason, and Natalie's need to get home, the two had become pretty good friends.  Although they would normally avoid the subject, Natalie had on occasion tried to get the two ex-lovers to talk to each other about what happened between Chiana and McDaniel, but D'Argo would hear nothing of it.  He didn't want to have anything to do with Chiana anymore, but Natalie knew that somewhere deep down inside, the hyper-rage prone Luxan still had feelings for her.  And frankly, Natalie was getting pretty annoyed with D'Argo and his Luxan ways.  Well, she was pretty certain it was his Luxan ways, but it also could've been a D'Argo thing.  Either way, she was getting tired of it and had to do something about it.

Rubbing her eyes, Natalie sighed, and thought, I hope he doesn't kill me.  She got up, walked over to D'Argo, smacked him in the arm as hard as she could, and yelled, "What the hell's the matter with you?"

D'Argo turned his head to glare and her, and let out a low growl.

"Oh, don't you 'grrr' me.  And don't even think about tonguing me, either…" she paused for a second at that and thought about just how that sounded to human ears.

She shook her head to get that thought out of her mind and walked around the table, planted her fists on it, and leaned forward on them to glare at D'Argo before continuing.

"Yes, Chiana fucked McDaniel.  But, duh, she's a trelk.  What did you expect?"

D'Argo didn't say a word.  He just kept glaring at her, but his expression softened slightly.

"D'Argo…" she paused, and pulled out a stool from under the table in front of her and sat down.  Her expression softened along with her tone, and she started again, "Chiana knows that she messed up, and she's very sorry that she hurt you.  But Chi is Chi…  It's in her nature.  The only way she knows how to get things or make things go her way is by selling her body to both the highest and lowest bidder.  You can't change that.  And you should've accepted it."

Natalie sighed and rubbed her eyes again before looking back at D'Argo.  She noticed that his expression had saddened.

She took one of his hands in hers and gave it a good squeeze.  "D'Argo, I hate to have to say this, but this is as much your fault as it is hers.  You imposed your values onto her.  Values that she doesn't, and will never, have."  With a sigh, she stood up, planted hands on the table to lean on them again, and with a stern tone she said,  "So…now do you got it through that head of yours, or am I going to have to draw you pictures?"

"I got it."

"Alright…" she started to get up to go back to her meal, but D'Argo interrupted.

"But…I also knew that it was my fault."

"You what?" a startled Natalie asked as she turned back to look at D'Argo.  She watched him as he looked down at the table, and sat back down on the stool.  "Whoa, wait a sec…if you knew, then what the hell's the problem?"

He looked at her and in a hurt tone, he said, "She betrayed me…"

"Dammit, D'Argo…you didn't listen to a word I said, did you?  Look…yes, she betrayed you.  But, you drove her to it.  So don't you dare try to put all the blame on her," she yelled and stormed out of the galley, leaving D'Argo there alone to think about what she had said.

----------------------------------------------------

"Hand me the welding torch, will 'ya?"

"Here," Aeryn said as she handed the torch to John, and went back to work repairing the hull breach on the Marauder.

She paused to watch John as he pounded the metal back into place.  He put a new plate of metal that they got on a commerce planet a few monens ago for just this occasion over the hole, and began to weld it into place.

He was too quiet.  Usually, in a situation such as this where it was just the two of them, he would be talking nonstop about something…anything, but he was only working on repairing the breach and not saying a word other than 'hand me this' or 'hand me that'.  And Aeryn was afraid that she was partly responsible for it.  She did, after all, blow up at him and tell him that he didn't know her after they had both been through what John called 'hell'.  She was afraid she had pushed him away with her words...and her actions.  After everything they had gone through and everything they had accomplished, all it took was a few short words yelled in anger to begin to bring it all crumbling down.

At least he was recovering from his second experience in the Aurora Chair, Aeryn had to admit.  Well…he was kind of recovering.  He still had sleepless nights full of nightmares of Crais and Scorpius and the Aurora chair, but now he wasn't as paranoid or angry, or neurotic and unpredictable as he had been after Talyn had gotten them out of there.  However, he was almost as cold as ice now.  He rarely let his emotions show, but when he did, it would usually be anger, an anger that was frightening in its intensity.  And the crew was frightened, but not of him.  They were frightened for him because of his anger.  Yes, John Crichton had been angry before, but never like this.  The anger he showed made him seem more and more like a certain leather-faced Peacekeeper.

John Crichton needed help.  They all knew that, but they didn't know how to help him.  Unfortunately, they all also had their own problems which made helping John even harder.  But how do you help someone who doesn't want help?  That was just one of their many problems.  John didn't think he needed help, that he would be able to work it out all on his own.  He hadn't said as much, but they all knew that's what he meant.  But from what Natalie had told them about Humans, the odds that John would be able to work it out on his own were slim to none.  They had to help him, whether he wanted their help or not.

In trying to help John, they would try to get him to talk about things.  More specifically, what he had gone through while imprisoned by Scorpius.  They managed to learn from John that Scorpius had implanted a neural-chip in his head during his first imprisonment because John supposedly had wormhole technology in his brain.  They had also learned that eight monens ago Scorpius had removed the chip.  John wouldn't open up any further than that, but they were all determined to give him the help that he needed.

And this was the perfect opportunity to do just that.

"John, we have to talk."

"Alright…just give me a microt," John said as he finished welding the plate into place, turned off the torch, and turned to her.  "What's up?"

"We have to talk about you."

" Aeryn…we've already been through this.  I don't want to talk."

"No, John, you have to talk to me.  You have to tell me what's going on inside your head.  I need to know…we all need to know…"

"Look, I've told you before and I'll tell you again, I don't want to talk," John yelled, then turned and left.

"He doesn't want to talk…"

----------------------------------------------------

Leaning back against the right main console, she looked out at the vast field of stars through the forward portals.  They were like billions of tiny fireflies that were suspended in time.  Back on Earth, she used to love watching the fireflies at night with Jason.  It gave them both some quiet time together, and Natalie could never get enough of it.  He had outgrown watching the fireflies, but they still shared some quiet time when they could.  More specifically, when he wasn't out with his friends or drooling over girls, and when she wasn't training in Houston or at the Cape.  She missed him and missed spending time with him and hoped that when she got back to Earth they could spend some quiet time together again.

The only good place on Talyn where she could see those stars was on the bridge, and depending on how you looked at it, it was a good thing or a bad thing.  It was a bad thing in that Talyn only had five very small forward portals, unlike Moya with her massive forward portal and numerous other portals that dotted her hull, and her terrace.  The terrace was an amazing place onboard Moya, and she missed it.  But if she were still on Moya, then she and Talyn would never have met.  That was the good thing: Talyn.

On the bridge, she could talk to Talyn whenever she wanted.  He was kind of like a second son to her and she loved him as a son, but she wondered how Jason would feel about having a 'big' little brother.  And she loved to talk to Talyn, but it was still pretty hard to have a conversation with him.  A few monens ago, he would show her some of the memories of his short past in the main consoles, Natalie would ask some yes or no questions, and they would go on like that all day.  Of course, now Natalie was trying to teach him Morse Code to make it easier to talk, but it was going pretty slowly.  Talyn would rarely use what she had taught him because he couldn't form complete sentences and was too proud to embarrass himself like that.  But, when Talyn and Natalie were alone, like now, he would try to talk to her with the code, but today Natalie wasn't really up to talking.

She was thinking about what she had done a few arns before on the mining colony.  She had killed hundreds of people.  Technically, Talyn was the one who killed them since he fired the shot, but Natalie had given the order.  She was the one who sent hundreds of people to their deaths, and she felt dirty because of that.  After the first time she had killed someone, she had talked to Talyn about it, but she had still felt dirty and had tried to wash it all away with a shower.  She had scrubbed and scrubbed, but no matter what, she still felt dirty.  This time, she didn't see the point in taking a shower.  Not just because it wouldn't do anything, but from a practical sense, it would just be a waste of water.

But what would Jason think of her now, of what she had done and become?  She also had to wonder what her friends and family would think of her now, along with what the rest of the Earth would think.  Would they all see her as some kind of a monster that had to be locked up in a prison somewhere, or as some kind of psycho who needed to be put in a mental institution?  Natalie didn't have the answers to those questions, at least not yet and, frankly, she was pretty afraid to find out, no matter how desperately she wanted to go home.

Hearing the hatch opening behind her, Natalie turned her head around to see John walking through with the hatch closing behind him.  As she watched him walk over to the other main console, she said, "I thought you were working on the Marauder with Aeryn."

"I was," John said as he checked the readings on the console.  "Nothing on Moya yet, huh?"

"Nope.  So…what happened in there?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Right," she said as she went back to thinking and looking out at the stars.

John looked up at Natalie and although he was slightly behind her, he could still see her brown eyes, and he saw a look of sadness there.  "Hey, Natalie," he started, gaining her attention, but she didn't look at him.  "What're you thinking about?"

"A lot of things…" she paused, still looking out at the stars.

"Like what?"

"Jason…my friends and family…Earth…my Harley…"

"What?" he asked in surprise.

"My Harley.  A '92 Softail…" she paused to turn her head and look at him, and continued.  "Metallic blue."  She then turned to look out at the stars again with a small smile on her face.  "Gawd, I love that bike…"

"You owned a Harley?" John said with a small smile of his own growing on his face.

"Yup," she said as her smile grew bigger.  "And the guys at IASA hated it."  With a laugh, she started again.  "I would always blow through all the security check points before they had the chance to close the gates after they had let another car pass through.  And I always got away with it."

John laughed at that.

Natalie thought she was hearing things when she heard his laugh, but when she saw the smile on his face, she knew she had a good thing going and she couldn't stop, especially not after getting John to show an emotion other than anger.  She stood up and walked around the console to sit on the stool.  Looking up at John with an even larger smile on her face, she said, "Then there's DK…"

"DK?" he asked with a smile still etched on his face.  "What about him?"

"Oh, man…he hated my bike even more than security did.  I would usually park in the lot that's right in front of his office, and on my way there I would always ride in with the throttle wide open.  When I first rode my bike there, he came up to me during his lunch break and he was so pissed off at me.  He was so focused on what he was working on that the exhaust note made him jump and he spilled his coffee in his lap.  You should've seen his face…"

They were both laughing so hard at that point that Natalie couldn't go on, but they immediately stopped when Talyn tried to gain their attention with a series of frantic tones and flashing lights.

"What's up, Talyn?" Natalie worriedly asked as she looked back at his beta channel.

Talyn activated the comms on the right main console, and Natalie got up to look with John.  They were in complete shock at what they saw, and they turned to look at each other.  They then looked back at the text version of the signal when John activated the internal comms and said, "Y'all better get up here.  We just got a signal from Moya."

----------------------------------------------------

Talyn pulled up to a stop above his mother with trepidation, allowing the crew a perfect view of her from above through the forward portals.  They were all worried and nervous as they watched their former home drift aimlessly with her opened outer doors.  What made them even more nervous was the fact that the first signal they had received from her had been, to this point, the only signal they had received from her.

"Anything, Talyn?" John asked from his spot next to the center right pylon with Aeryn standing next to him.

Talyn responded with a negative series of tones and flashing lights.

"So, what do we do now?" Chiana asked as she leaned up against the forward right pylon.

"Someone's going to have to go over there," Natalie said.

Silence reigned on the bridge for a few microts when D'Argo suddenly asked from his spot in the middle of the bridge, "Does anyone want to die?  Because if any of us go over there, we will be walking to our deaths."

"Yeah, well…" John started as he looked at Moya's dorsal hull.  "We have to find out what's going on over there."  He turned his head to look at the others, and continued,  "I'm going.  Anyone want to come?"

"I'm sorry, Crichton, but I cannot go," Stark said from the back of the bridge.  "I just got my freedom back, and I'm not going to risk it.

John looked at Stark and asked, "Anyone else?"

"Frell it…" Aeryn said.  "I'll come."  She turned her head to look at John and continued, "Someone has to get you over there."

John flashed her a small grin, then looked back at the rest of the crew with a straight face, showing no emotion whatsoever.  "Anyone else?"

D'Argo let out a low growl as he looked down at the floor with his arms crossed over his chest, then looked back up at John, and said, "I'll go."

"Do you wanna die, D'Argo?" John asked.

"No.  But someone has to watch your back."

----------------------------------------------------

Aeryn set the Marauder down in Moya's nearly pitch-black transport hangar just as John and D'Argo jumped out with weapons in hand.  They ran to opposite sides of the hangar and aimed their weapons at anything that moved, or at least they tried to.  They couldn't see a thing.

Just then Aeryn turned on the Marauder's flood lamps, illuminating the forward half of the transport hangar.  But that wasn't the only thing that they were illuminating.

There were at least two-dozen Nebari surrounding them with their weapons at the ready.

John watched as one of the Nebari aimed his weapon at D'Argo, and he raised his pistols at the Nebari and yelled, "Behind you!"

D'Argo turned around, but not in time, and was shot in the chest.

John helplessly watched as the Luxan fell to the ground.  John was about to fire at the Nebari, but a pulse blast hit him in the right shoulder and he yelled out in pain as he dropped one of his pistols.  He spun around to his left to fire at the Nebari behind him, but was shot in the chest himself at point-blank range.  He was thrown back onto the floor, but he didn't feel the impact of the floor.  He had gone completely numb from the shot.  John lay there helplessly as he watched one of the young Nebari stand over him, pointing a Nebari version of a pulse pistol at his head.

John saw a blue flash of light…and everything went black.

=================================

He barely heard it, but he knew someone had called his name.  He couldn't quite make out the voice, but it was definitely female.  He thought, God, please let it be Aeryn.

"John, wake up," Aeryn said.

He tried to open his eyes, but the light blinded him and he shut them again with a groan.

"John?"

"Yeah, I'm up…I'm up," John said as he tried to open his eyes again.  His vision was pretty blurry for a few microts, but he could definitely make out Aeryn's blue eyes above him.  Once his vision cleared, he saw her face surrounded by her raven hair, and she was as beautiful as ever.

"Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I'm alright.  Except for the fact that I have the hangover from hell, and that some damn Nebari shot me in the head.  So where are we?"

"You're on the floor with your head in my lap."

"Very funny."

"Well…" she started as she looked around the room.  "We're in a cell somewhere on tier 17.  I can't tell you any more than that."

"Great…" he said with a sigh as he reached up to rub his eyes.  "Just frelling wonderful…"  He turned his head to see D'Argo, who was weaponless, leaning up against the right side door staring out through the latticework with his arms folded across his chest.  He was probably glaring at the Nebari guard standing there, but John couldn't see from his position on the floor.

John sat up with a groan and confirmed that his pulse pistol was gone as he scooted over to sit right next to Aeryn, their shoulders and hips touching.  He leaned into her and back against the wall, brought up his knees to rest his arms on, and sighed as he closed his eyes and rested his head back against the wall.

He opened his eyes, looked at D'Argo, and asked, "You okay, Big Guy?"

D'Argo didn't answer and just kept staring at the Nebari guard stationed outside their cell.

"I'll take that as a yes."

That brought a small smile to Aeryn's face as she rubbed her chest.

John turned his head to look at her and asked, "How 'bout you?"

"My chest hurts a little," she said as she turned her head to look back at him.

"Any trouble breathing?"

"No.  I'm just a little sore.  I'll be alright in a few arns."

"Good."  John turned his head away from her and looked down at the floor.

Aeryn had noticed that look in his eye suggesting that he was thinking about something.  Then he brought his thumb up to his mouth and started to nibble on it, and she knew he was thinking about something.  She asked, "What?"

"Aeryn…" he started as he took his thumb away from his mouth and rested his arm back on his knee.  "Did you see anyone other than Nebari on board?"

"No.  Why?"

"Hmmm…" John paused and ignored her question for a microt, and turned his attention to D'Argo.  "How 'bout you, D'Argo?"

"No," D'Argo said, never taking his eyes off the Nebari guard.

"John, what is it?" Aeryn asked.

"Well…" he paused as he looked out of the latticework on the door then turned back to look at Aeryn.  "If everyone onboard is Nebari…then why aren't we wearing control collars?  You know, like the one Chiana had on when she came onboard with Salis and Durka."

"You should've just come right out and asked that, John," Aeryn said as she looked at him.  "It would've saved you the trouble because D'Argo and I already talked about that while you were unconscious."

"And you didn't think it was necessary to tell me about it?"

"Well, it's not like there was the chance to bring it up.  Oh, unless, you'd rather not know how D'Argo and I are doing?"

"No, Aeryn…look…just…" he paused.  "Never mind," he said with a sigh and dipped his head to look at the ground again.  After a few microts of an awkward silence, John began again while they both looked down at the floor.  "So…did the two of you come up with a plan to get outta here while I was out?"

"Unfortunately, no.  We couldn't come up with anything."

"Great," he sighed.  After another few microts of silence he asked, "What about Natalie?  Chiana, or Stark?"  John paused for a beat, then quietly asked, "Talyn?"

Aeryn heard the hint of jealousy in his voice, and she closed her eyes as she answered.  "Nothing."

Of all the emotions he had to show now… Aeryn thought.  She couldn't blame him though, especially not after the way she treated him in favor of Talyn for a while after they had starburst to safety.  John had given up his home for her, was willing to give his life for her, had devoted himself to her, and he was still devoted to her no matter what.  But she hadn't shown him that same devotion once they were on Talyn.  Aeryn realized that the words she had yelled at him in their quarters that first night they were onboard was what began to push him away; but by blaming him, ignoring him, and focusing on Talyn, she had pushed him even further away.

Focusing on Talyn was her initial defense against what had happened to her in the Aurora chair.  She had a strong bond with Talyn and she thought that would help her in those first few weekens, and it had helped very much.  She made rapid progress in her recovery, but she had changed.  Aeryn had become more emotional and everyone saw it, except for John.  After a while she realized what she had done to John.  She realized that all the blame she'd put on him for her being put in the Aurora Chair was unfounded; she was partly to blame as well.  It had been her plan to go down to get him, after all.  And Aeryn realized that ignoring him was, in his words, 'the last straw'.  The Aurora chair had changed him, it had made him cold and angry, but she was also partly responsible for that because of what she had done to him.

After that, she began focusing on John again, but she had done too much damage.  He ignored her and only spoke to her when necessary, but she hadn't given up on him.  In the past eight monens, she had made great progress with him.  They were sharing quarters again, they were talking again, and they supported each other again…sometimes.

Depending on how one looked at it, it was unfortunate for Aeryn that she and Talyn had begun to grow apart because she focused all her attention on John.  But it was also fortunate for Natalie because it opened the door for her and Talyn.  They had grown extremely close and Aeryn was happy that Talyn now had someone whom she could trust.  But she was still saddened by her loss, even though she was making progress with John.

A sound drew the pair's attention to the left cell door, and they saw, through the latticework, a male Nebari standing there in dark blue leather with a fairly high collar.  He had a square face and spiky hair that reminded John of some of the punk rockers on Earth in the Eighties.

Both John and Aeryn got up at the same time that D'Argo walked over to stand by their side.  The three watched and waited for the Nebari to make his move, but he just watched them.

They stood that way, staring each other down for several microts.  Then the Nebari finally turned all of his attention on John, and said, "You are the one called Crichton, are you not?"

"Yeah, I'm John Crichton.  Who are you?"

"Who I am is not important," he said as he palmed open the door and stepped inside the cell.  Four other Nebari followed him, while another four stepped into the cell through the other door, surrounding the three shipmates, and aiming their weapons at them.  "And you will come with me."

John coldly glared into the lead Nebari's eyes.  A few microts passed and John finally ended the glaring match by making eye contact with Aeryn.  He gave her a look that said, We don't have a choice.

Aeryn nodded in grudging acceptance.  She didn't like it one bit, but John was right.  They didn't have a choice.

John then turned his attention to D'Argo, and gave the Luxan a look that said, If I don't come back, kill 'em all.

D'Argo smiled and nodded in acceptance at John.  He knew he had also managed to intimidate some of the Nebari there, and his smile grew larger.  No one, not even the Nebari with their powerful weapons, were stupid enough to go up against a pissed-off Luxan.

Walking out of the cell, three Nebari led John while another three followed with the head Nebari walking beside him.  As they walked down the golden corridors of Moya, John asked, while staring straight ahead, "So, where we goin'?"

"You'll find out soon enough," replied the lead Nebari, who stared straight ahead as well.

"I'll find out soon enough, huh?  Well, I say why don't we cut all the bull and you tell me what the frell is going on now?"

"You talk too much."

"Yeah…" John mumbled.  "Like I haven't heard that before."

John was led down corridor after corridor until he finally realized that the Nebari were taking him to the central chamber.  He thought, They want to wine and dine me before they mind-frell me?

As they walked, John wondered about Zhaan, Pilot, and Rygel.  He hoped that they were still on board and that they were okay so that maybe, just maybe, they could work out a plan of getting the Nebari off the ship and freeing Moya.  If they weren't, then they were all frelled unless Natalie, Chiana, and Stark could come up with something, which he doubted they could.  John would trust those three with his life, but they never had to plan and execute a rescue mission on their own.  Aeryn, D'Argo, nor he had been with them when a situation like this had occurred, and they hadn't had to plan anything.  They just did what they were told.

The group approached the open door to the central chamber and the leading three took up positions on either side of the doorway.  As the head Nebari went inside, John heard someone say, "What the frell do you want, Meelak?  Can't you see I'm eating?"

Jesus… Rygel? John thought.  He walked through the doorway and stood there to see the little slug at the table facing the door, stuffing his face with food cubes.

As Meelak walked towards the table to stand next to it with his hands behind his back, Rygel looked up and stared at John.  In complete and utter shock, the tiny Hynerian dropped a food cube he was holding, and began to choke and gasp for air.

"Heya, Sparky.  How's it hangin'?" John asked as he walked towards the table and took a seat across from Rygel with Meelak watching on.

Meelak turned to Rygel and asked in concern, "Dominar Rygel, are you alright?"

"You don't have to worry about him," John said as he planted his hands on the table and leaned forward on them as he watched Rygel.  "It's just another case of the intons."

Meelak looked at Crichton as if the man had spores growing on his face, but he assumed that since Crichton had spent more time with Rygel, he would know more about Hynerians than the Nebari did.

As Rygel began to calm and get back his breath, he said with a cough, "Cri…Cricht…"  He coughed again, and asked, "Crichton, you're alive?"

"Of course, I'm alive..." John started with a look on his face that said 'duh', but then it dawned on him.  "You didn't steal our stuff did you?"

"Of course not.  Pilot wouldn't let me anywhere near your quarters."

"All right.  So how're you doing?  They haven't tried to mind-frell you, have they?" John had a feeling that the Nebari hadn't, but he had to ask, anyway, just to make sure.

"What the yotz are you babbling about this time, Crichton?"

"Have they tried to start that one-hundred cycle mind-cleanse on you?"

Rygel let out a huge guffaw from deep down in his tiny gut, and said, "Mind-cleanse?  Are you fahrbot?"  Rygel started laughing again, but calmed down just enough to let out, "These Nebari are with the Resistance, Crichton.  They don't mind-cleanse people."

"Resistance?" John asked as he straightened up slightly and looked at Meelak.

"Dominar Rygel, please excuse us," Meelak said as he looked down at the tiny Hynerian, then turned to look at John.  "Crichton and I have business to discuss."

"What?" Rygel yelled, nearly standing up in his thronesled.  "If there is any business to be done, then it should be with me.  I am, after all, the Dominar of over six-billion subjects."

"Stuff it, Rygel, and get out," John calmly said as he stared at Meelak.

"I am Dominar Rygel XVI, and I will not…"

John abruptly turned his head to look at the self-centered Dominar, and quietly said, "Rygel, shut up and get out.  If you don't, I'll kill you.  Do you understand me?"

Terrified, Rygel sank down in his thronesled and nearly wet himself.  Crichton had never threatened anyone like that before, but that wasn't what scared Rygel.  It was the look in the human's eye that terrified him beyond belief.  Rygel saw ice in Crichton's eyes, and saw that he would make that threat a reality.  If Rygel could have gotten beyond his terror to be able to think, he would have wondered what happened to Crichton to turn him into what Rygel now saw as a cold-blooded killer.

Slowly backing away from the table, Rygel never took his eyes off Crichton.  He slowly flew around the table, being sure not to turn his back on the human, while John straightened up and turned around to watch Rygel leave the room.  As soon as Rygel made it to the corridor, he hit the throttle on his thronesled and sped off down the hall as fast as he could.

"We have business to discuss, Crichton," Meelak said, gaining Crichton's attention.

"Before we discuss anything," John said as he brought up his forefinger.  "I want to see Zhaan and Pilot."

Meelak stood there for a few microts, and to John he looked like he was thinking it over.  But he also knew that Meelak could've been thinking about anything.

"Very well," he finally said after a few minutes.  "I will take you to see the ship's servicer first."

=================================

Pilot watched through the DRDs as Crichton and Meelak walked side-by-side down the corridor leading to his den, and he was anxiously awaiting the arrival of his long-lost friend.  He was not only awaiting the chance to talk to Crichton but to the others, as well, if there was time to do so.

And, Pilot wasn't the only one who was anxious.  Moya was getting pretty anxious herself, and Pilot was having a hard time trying to keep her calm.  She desperately wanted to talk to her son after having been separated from him for eight monens and having to live with the possibility that he might have been killed along with the crew.  But Meelak and the rest of his people had disabled her communications system, including her ability to talk with other Leviathans, and restored it only when necessary.

Pilot raised his massive, shelled head up from looking at his console when he heard the door to his den open.  As he watched Meelak and Crichton step inside, he excitedly said, "Commander, it is good to see you again.  How are you and the others?"

"It's good to see you, too, Pilot," John said with a straight face as he came to stand next to Pilot's console; Meelak stood behind him and to his left.  "And, I'm fine.  So are the others.  How 'bout you and Moya?"

Pilot was taken aback by Crichton's abruptness.  Crichton would usually go on and on without shutting up and would be happy to see his large friend.  But now, Pilot observed, Crichton seemed as cold and emotionless as a Peacekeeper.

"Moya and I are both fine, Commander," Pilot softly said, then turned to face Meelak.  "But, she is quite anxious to speak with Talyn and she wants to know all that's happened to him."

"Pilot," Meelak began.  "You know the Establishment will be listening and we cannot take the chance that they will learn of our presence here.  I am sorry, but Moya's ability to speak with other Leviathans will remain disabled."

"But with Talyn's close proximity to her, Moya feels that the Establishment will not be able to hear their conversation.  Even if they did, Moya would never let the knowledge of you being onboard go over an open channel or even a secure channel."

"I understand, Pilot, but I will not restore the comms.  I realize how much Moya wants to talk to her son, but when it comes to the Resistance, we cannot and will not take any risks whatsoever unless absolutely necessary to our survival."

"Meelak," John said as he turned around and leaned back on the console.  "It's Meelak, right?"  At the Nebari's nod of acknowledgement, John went on.  "Bring Aeryn up here."  John turned his head to the left towards Pilot and looked down to address both Pilot and Meelak.  "She'll be able to fill you in on all that's happened.  But, there won't be any ship-to-ship communication between Moya and Talyn."  John turned his head back to look at Meelak.  "How's that?"

With a sigh, Pilot responded for a disappointed Moya, "It will do."

"I will have Officer Sun brought up here immediately."

As Meelak turned around to speak to his people through a comms, John turned his head to look back at Pilot.  "Sorry, man, but it's the best I can do."

"Moya and I both understand, Commander."  Pilot paused and looked down at his console then back up at John.  "How is Talyn?"

"He's doing good.  Natalie's been good for him.  She's been teaching him things that Crais never could have."

"Both Moya and I are happy to hear that, Commander, but is he happy?"

John turned his head to look down at the floor and was silent for a few microts.  With a sigh he turned his head back to look at Pilot, and said, "I honestly don't know."  He looked back down at the floor and continued.  "Talyn and I aren't very close so I can't say if he is or not."  He paused to look back at Pilot and harshly said, "But, I'm sure Aeryn will be able to answer that."

"Officer Sun is on her way," Meelak interrupted as he turned back around to face Crichton and Pilot.

"All right," John said as he looked at Meelak.  "Then, lets go see Zhaan."  He then turned back to look at Pilot and took his claw, giving it squeeze.  "I'll talk to you later."

Pilot only nodded his head in response.

Giving Pilot's claw one last squeeze, John pushed himself away from the console and walked out of the Den with Meelak right behind him.

----------------------------------------------------

John came up to the door of Zhaan's quarters with Meelak close behind.  He looked through the latticework to his right and saw the beautiful blue, bald-headed priestess sitting on her bed with her back to the door, meditating in the nude.

John stood there with his left hand resting on the door and his right thumb hooked into his belt, watching her for a few microts while Meelak watched him.  He was about to speak when Zhaan interrupted him.

"Hello, John," she serenely said.

John jumped slightly when she spoke, and thought, Damn, she's good.

"You may come in."

John moved to palm the door open, but Meelak stepped forward and grabbed his wrist.  He snapped his head to glare at the Nebari and ask why the frell he did that, but Meelak interrupted him.

"If you want to live, I suggest that you do not go in."

"What?" John asked incredulously.  "You're going to kill me for opening a door?"

"Not me."  Meelak turned his head to look into Zhaan's quarters and said, "Her."

John followed Meelak's gaze and looked into Zhaan's quarters to see the Delvian standing next to her bed, naked, with red eyes.  He stood there shocked and yanked his wrist from Meelak's grip.  All he could say as he stood there in disbelief was, "Frell."

Looking away to think for a microt, John put his hand on the wall and leaned against it as he brought his thumb up to his mouth to chew on it.  He came to a decision and moved again to palm the door open but, again, Meelak stopped him by moving to stand in front of the door sensor.

"She will kill you," the Nebari said.

"She's my friend."

Meelak paused for a microt then continued.  "When one of my men tried to bring her some soup, she tried to kill him with the spoon."

John stared at Meelak then turned to look at Zhaan who was still standing naked beside her bed with her hands folded in front of her, patiently waiting.  "I'll take my chances."

"Very well," Meelak said as he moved out of the way.  "But first…" he paused as he reached behind his back, pulled out a pulse pistol, and held it to John grip first.  "You should take this."

John looked down at the pistol suspiciously, then back up at Meelak.

"You and I still have business to discuss, and we can't talk if you're dead."

Looking back down at the pistol, John was trying to decide if he could trust Meelak.  After a few microts, he figured Meelak was right; it was better to be safe than sorry.  He took the pulse pistol and looked down at it, still wondering if he could trust the Nebari.  He looked back up to Meelak as he pointed the pistol at the floor to his side and fired.

"Satisfied?"  Meelak asked.

As he reached for the door sensor, John just gave him a look that said, What do you think?

Once John was inside Zhaan's quarters, Meelak shut the door and locked it as he watched John walk towards the nude Delvian.

As John circled Zhaan, he kept his pulse pistol down at his side, but he had his finger on the trigger.  He noticed a tray of untouched food cubes and a cup of water sitting on the table next to her Delvian urn, but he had other more important things to worry about than whether or not she was eating.  He looked back up into Zhaan's red eyes as he stood to the side of the room and stayed close to the door with Zhaan between him and her bed.

She looked down at John's pistol then looked back up into his eyes and said, "I thought you said we were friends."

"We are."

"Then, why that?" she asked as she glanced at the pulse pistol John was holding at his side.

"It's for your sake, not mine."

"My sake?" she asked as she slowly walked towards John.  "Is that because of the madness?  Are you going to kill me to put me out of my misery?"

John raised his pulse pistol at her head as she walked towards him, and said "Zhaan, stop right there.  I don't want to hurt you, but I..."

Zhaan suddenly charged at John and pushed him up against the wall, causing him to drop his pistol as she pressed up against him, her face mere centimeters from his. 

She whispered, "You'll what?  You'll hurt me?"  She let out a small laugh, and continued.  "I don't think so.  Not when I need your help…"

She reached up with one hand to grab John's ear and gave him a Delvian Kiss as she whispered to him, "They did this to me John.  I need your help to get out of here and to get revenge for what they did to me.  If you do this for me, I will be very…" she paused as she slid her other hand down to John's crotch and gave him a squeeze.  "Very grateful."

"Oh, yeah," John shakily said through gritted teeth with his eyes closed as he shuddered from the sensations.  "I have no doubt about that."

With a great deal of effort, John barely opened his eyes and looked through the latticework of the cell door.  He saw at least half-a-dozen Nebari, with their weapons at the ready, gathering to charge into the room.  Shakily, as Zhaan sent waves of pleasure throughout his body, he raised his hand to call off the troops.

Meelak saw Crichton's gesture and finally looked at Crichton's face seeing pleasure there instead of pain, despite the initial appearance that Zhaan was pushing Crichton up against the wall to try to kill him.  He called off the troops then turned around to give the two some privacy.

"Look, Zhaan…" John paused as he shuddered, then reached up to pull her hand off his ear.  "I'll do what I can…but I can't do anything for you while you're acting like Viagra and have me pinned up against the wall."

"Of course," she peacefully said as she pulled her hand out of his grasp and her other hand away from his crotch.

John bent over, making sure not to look at Zhaan's breasts and hairless crotch, picked up his pulse pistol, stood back up, and holstered it.  As he looked into Zhaan's red eyes, he reached up to put his hand on her cheek then stroked it with his thumb, and said with a cold determination, "Don't worry, Blue.  I'll help you…in any way I can."

As Meelak unlocked the cell door and opened it, John backed away from Zhaan and walked out of the cell, his eyes never leaving her, to make sure that she wouldn't try to escape.  Once John walked out of the cell, Meelak closed the door and locked it.

Backing towards the opposite wall and pulling Meelak along with him, John whispered, "What the hell happened to her?"

Meelak looked through the cell door at a still naked Zhaan and watched her as she lay down on her bed, then motioned for John to walk with him down the corridor.  Once the two had gone far enough down the corridor to be sure they were out of earshot of Zhaan, Meelak turned to John as they stopped in the middle of the corridor and said, "She was cleansed."

"She was what?"

"She was mentally cleansed."

"Wait…you want to run that by me again?  I thought the cleansing process took a hundred cycles."

"It does, but this was drug induced.  It produces an immediate effect, but it's only supposed to be temporary."

"Frell," John said as he put one hand on his hip, leaned on one leg, and dipped his head as he brought his other hand up to rub his eyes.  "Okay, you said it's supposed to be temporary…"

"It is, but something happened.  Instead of removing all violent and improper thoughts, it accentuated them."

John looked back up at Meelak and put his other hand on his hip.  "Do you know why that happened?"

"Unfortunately, no."

"All right," he said with a sigh.  "How did she get cleansed in the first place?"

"A few monens ago, a Nebari named Varla came aboard looking for Chiana.  She and her crew placed a control collar on Pilot and cleansed Rygel and Zhaan to get them to tell her where 'the sister' was, but Zhaan went mad and killed them all.  Rygel managed to make it to Pilot's Den before all access points to the chamber were closed."

"How do you and your people fit into all this?"

"We had heard that the Establishment was close to capturing Chiana.  So, we came onboard to try to stop Varla from taking Chiana back to Nebari space.  When we got here, we discovered Zhaan.  We managed to sedate and contain her before she could kill any of my people.  That's when we decided to stay.  We needed a ship with the capabilities of a Leviathan, so here we are."

How could he have known all that if he wasn't here? John thought.  Either Rygel or Pilot could've told them, but neither of them had any reason to do so.  John decided to pocket his suspicions for the time being.  He wanted to know what Meelak wanted with him.

"So," John said as he folded his arms over his chest.  "You said we had business to discuss."

----------------------------------------------------

"How did your talk with Pilot go?" John asked.

"It went alright," Aeryn answered as she walked into command with D'Argo and Rygel following behind her.  She glanced at the image of Natalie, Stark, and Chiana on Talyn's bridge projected on Moya's forward portal before sitting at the strategy table next to John, who was waiting there for them.  D'Argo took a seat on the other side of the table in front of the viewing shell where Pilot's image was, and Rygel maneuvered his thronesled into position beside the Luxan.

"I just told him about what happened in the past eight monens," Aeryn continued, answering John's question.  "Now, what the frell is going on?"

"Meelak wants us to do something for him," John said.

"He wants us to do something for him?" D'Argo suspiciously asked.

"Yup."

"First of all," Aeryn started.  "Who the frell is Meelak?  And what does he want us to do?"

"Meelak's the guy who came to get me earlier.  And he wants us to steal something for him."

"What does he want us to steal?" D'Argo asked as Aeryn looked over at the forward portal and saw that Chiana had perked up at John's revelation.

"He wants us to steal a data crystal."

"That's it?" Rygel asked.  "Just a frelling data crystal?  Well, how hard can that be?"

John turned to look at Rygel, and said, "Ryg, if it was that easy don't you think that Meelak and his people would've stolen it themselves?"

"Oh," Rygel said as he lowered his earbrows in embarrassment.  He then perked up again, trying to cover his embarrassment.  "Well, of course it won't be that easy, but why a data crystal?"

"I don't know, Rygel," John replied, annoyed.  "And, honestly, I don't care.  All I care about is what we're going to get out of it."

"All you care about is what we'll get out of it?" Aeryn asked in shock.

"Aeryn, look, Zhaan is in big trouble.  She's gone into madness."

They all silently looked at John in shock.

"Yeah, I thought that might get your attention," he said as he looked around the strategy table and at the forward portal.  "Meelak said that if we do this for them they'll help us find a way to help Zhaan, and they'll leave Moya and give her back to us."

"Whoa, hold on a sec," Natalie piped in.  "Why didn't they just help her before?  It's not like they couldn't."

"Actually," John softly said as he looked down at the table.  "They can't."

"Why not?" Stark yelled.

"Meelak told me they don't have the resources to do it.  They need to concentrate on their own people and they can't be bothered with trying to help an alien.  But, if we do this for them, they'll do whatever they can to help."

"And you buy that?" Natalie asked.  "The crap about them not having the resources?"

"No, I don't.  And I don't believe Meelak's story about how it all happened either, but we don't really have a choice.  Either we do this or Zhaan will die from the madness, and we'll lose Moya.  So what's it going to be?  Are y'all in?"  John paused as he turned his head to look at each of his friends.  "Or out?"

"I'm in." Aeryn immediately said as she and John locked eyes.

"Of course, I'm in," Chiana enthusiastically said with a smile.  "This is going to be so krell."

Both D'Argo and Natalie rolled their eyes, and Natalie said, "I'm in, too."  With a shrug, she nonchalantly added, "Hey, I might not have stolen anything before, but I ain't got nothing better to do."

D'Argo smiled at that and said, "Neither do I.  I'm in."

Talyn let out a few positive tones, and Natalie translated for him, "Talyn's in, too."

"I have just regained my freedom.  I will not do anything to risk losing that freedom or my life," Stark said.  "But I will do this for Zhaan and Moya."

"If you all are going to do this, you're not going to leave me out of it," Rygel said.

"Alright…" John said as he got up.  "I'll tell Meelak."

=================================

"Pilot, put the commerce planet up on the strategy table."

When they heard John's voice, Aeryn and D'Argo both turned around to see him walk into command and joined him at the strategy table as Pilot brought up the image of the planet.

"That's the commerce planet where the data crystal is?" Aeryn asked as the three stood around the table looking at the holographic image.

"Yup," John replied.  "Well, at least that's what Dalek said.  It's also where the guys who are holding it are."

"Who's…" D'Argo started, but was interrupted by the sounds of people walking into command and turned to see who it was.

"Sorry we're late," Natalie said as she walked into the chamber.  She was wearing her black cargo pants with the standard issue ten-hole PK boots and her new dark blue tank top.  As Chiana and Stark walked in, with Rygel floating right behind her, she added, "We ran into a little traffic."

As Natalie and Chiana sat down at the strategy table opposite John, Aeryn, and D'Argo, Natalie noticed D'Argo was staring at her, not because of what she had said, but because of what she was wearing.  She shook her head and with a sigh, she thought, Men.

"D'Argo?" Aeryn said, trying to gain the Luxan's attention.  When he didn't respond, she snapped her fingers in front of his face and he snapped out of it.  "Are you finished?  Did you enjoy the view?"

D'Argo just folded his arms across his chest and looked sheepish.

John changed the subject to save his friend from embarrassment.  "You were saying, D'Argo?"

D'Argo cleared his throat, looked at John and said, "Um, right.  Who's Dalek?"

"Dalek is one of the Nebari who's been studying these guys in the event that they were going to steal the crystal.  Since we're the ones who are going to steal it instead, he's been telling me all about the guys who have it."

"Okay, now that we've gotten all that outta the way, just how're we going to steal the damn thing?" Natalie asked.

"We should go in at night, quietly, while they're asleep." Aeryn said.  "That way we can limit the number of casualties."

"No can do.  Dalek told me they live in a fortress down there," John replied as he sat down, putting his elbows on the table and clasping his hands together.  "Pilot, display the compound for me, will ya?"  Once Pilot brought up the image of the massive fortress that, in human terms, covered the area of a football stadium on the strategy table, John continued.  "The perimeter wall is about a tenth of a metra high and is lined with self-tracking pulse cannons.  They've also got at least a hundred troops - mercenaries actually - patrolling both the outer and inner perimeter."  John and the others watched as the holographic image spun, and with a shake of his head John added, "No.  We'd never make it past the gate."

"So, what do we do?" Stark asked from his spot at the end of the table facing the forward portal with Rygel floating at his left.

"Take them while they're in transit," John answered.

"If we're going to do that, you should take them while they're away from any major marketplaces to avoid any civilian casualties," Aeryn suggested.

John sighed as he brought his clasped hands up and rested his chin against them.  He looked as if he wanted to say something, but was holding back.

"What?" Chiana asked.

With another sigh, John started.  "That compound is surrounded by a marketplace.  Sylla told me that they've got civilians working, shopping, and living all around it, and that the people who have what we want only travel in that marketplace when the crowds are at their peak.  They probably figure that anyone who wants to get to them won't be able to make it past those crowds before they could get to safety."

"Frell."  Aeryn mumbled.

Simultaneously, Natalie mumbled, "Shit."

"Wait," Chiana chimed in.  "Who's Sylla?"

"She's the other Nebari that's been filling me in on these guys.  She and Dalek are nearly attached at the hip," John responded.

"Are we interrupting something?" they all heard immediately after John had spoken.

The group turned at the sound of the voice and saw Meelak standing at the back of command in front of the open door.  Behind him were another male Nebari, who looked like he could be Meelak's twin, but had a longer face and hair, and a menacing female who had a square face, and hair that was cropped slightly like Chiana's, but was teased up higher.  Of course, they all wore the same style dark blue leather jacket and pants with dark blue boots.

"I'm guessing those two are Dalek and Sylla?" Natalie said.

Meelak glanced back at his two subordinates, then turned back to look at Natalie and said, "Yes, they are."

"Now that we've gotten past the introductions," John said.  "Yes, you are interrupting."

"Then I apologize.  But I came to inform you that we just received word that the buyers of the crystal are on their way to meet our target, now.  You must leave immediately.  Sylla and Dalek will accompany you to provide any assistance you may need."

"Now?" Chiana asked, surprised.

"That doesn't give us very much time to plan," D'Argo piped in.

"We'll just have to plan along the way," John responded.  "And, Rygel, you're staying behind."

"What?  I'm a part of this and I'm coming with you," Rygel yelled.

"Rygel," John said as he got up and walked around the table to stand in front of the Hynerian.  He bent down, putting his hands on his knees, and leaned down against them to look Rygel straight in the eye.  "We need someone here to be sure these guys don't double cross us and to keep an eye on Zhaan.  Since you used to be a Dominar, I figured, who better to trust."

Everyone turned away from Rygel to cover the smirks on their faces from John's last line.

"In that case…" Rygel paused as he considered what John had to say.  "I accept.  It's about time you recognized my abilities."

----------------------------------------------------

"Well…" Natalie paused as she looked out the forward portals at the commerce planet.  "There it is."

"Where do you suppose the buyers are right now?" Aeryn asked.

"I think they're still a few arns away," Dalek said in a calm, deep voice.

"So we still have time," Chiana said from her spot behind the left forward pylon.

"You have a keen grasp of the obvious," D'Argo said.

Natalie, who was standing to D'Argo's right under Talyn's beta channel, elbowed him in the side for his remark.  D'Argo growled and looked down at her in response as Chiana flashed a smile of gratitude at her.  Natalie returned Chiana's smile, ignoring D'Argo, then walked over to the pylon to join her Nebari friend.

"What I was trying to say," Chiana said as she leaned against the pylon and crossed her arms while Natalie leaned back against the center pylon.  "As long as we still have time, why don't we go down there?  Do a little…'shopping'?"

"You'll never change, will you?" Natalie asked with a smile as she shook her head.

"Not if I can help it," she answered with a naughty grin on her face.

"You know what, Chiana?" John said as he stood next to Aeryn at the front of the bridge.  "You're absolutely right.  I'm going down to do a little shopping of my own.  Sylla, you're coming with me.  The rest of you better stay up here."

Nearly everyone started shouting simultaneously at John's announcement.

"I'm going with you?" Sylla asked.

"What?  Why should we have to stay up here?" Chiana yelled.

"Just wait one frelling microt…" Aeryn said.

"John, I am not letting you go down there alone…" D'Argo yelled.

"Everyone, please, calm down," Stark softly said.

"Shut up!  All of you," John yelled.  "The map we have is not the land.  So I'm going down there to see what it's really like.  It'll be a helluva lot safer if only Sylla and I go, and the reason why she, and only she…" John paused as he pointedly looked at Chiana before continuing, "is coming with me is because she can provide some much needed info while we're down there.  And, Dalek…" John paused as he turned his head to look at the Nebari.  "Before you say anything…it'll look a lot less conspicuous if a male Peacekeeper showed up with his own female personal server."

"Fine," Chiana pointedly said.

"All right," John said as he put his hand on Aeryn's arm and gave it a reassuring squeeze.  He started to walk towards the hatch saying, "Talyn, prep the transport pod."

"The transport pod?" Sylla asked as she caught up with John.  "Don't you think it would be best to take a Prowler or Marauder rather than a slow and unarmed transport pod?"

"Yeah, it would, but a Prowler or a Marauder would attract too much attention to us, which is something that we do not want to do.  So, give me a microt to grab my coat, and I'll meet you down in the docking bay."

----------------------------------------------------

"Damn, this place stinks."

"Our target owns this whole area," Sylla responded as she and Crichton walked downwind, his duster catching in the breeze, down one of the filth-covered streets in the marketplace that surrounded the compound.  "He makes the shop owners pay a fee to set up shop here, but he keeps all that money for himself and doesn't maintain the marketplace."

"In other words, he deserves what we're about to do to him."

"Exactly."

"So…does that make me Robin Hood and the rest of you my Merry Men?" Crichton mumbled.

"What?"

"Nothing."

The two uneventfully walked side-by-side through the marketplace for nearly a quarter of an arn, passing various booths of vendors selling pottery, food, medicines, weapons, clothing, tools, trinkets, and fuel, most of which could've been used on Talyn.  At the moment, however, they needed to concentrate on their mission, and, unfortunately, they didn't have the currency to buy any of it or anything to use for barter.

Crichton was looking at the booths they passed when Sylla suddenly grabbed his arm and yanked him towards a clothing booth to their left.  As she pulled him towards a clothing rack, she whispered in his ear, "Guards."

Crichton didn't turn around to look, but instead started looking through the rack of shirts, trying to look like a regular customer, while Sylla looked through a rack of dresses.  She squealed in delight, then pulled out a red strapless dress made of fire-silk as the group of four guards walked towards them, and said, "Oh, look at this dress!"  She held it up against her body, modeling it for John, and added with a naughty glint in her eye, "So, what do you think?"

Playing along, Crichton walked up to her, wrapped an arm around her waist, drew her against his body and said with a grin, "I think I want to frell you right here, right now."

As the guards walked past, Sylla leaned into him, brushed her lips against his and said, "Keep your mivonks in your pants.  Remember what we have planned for tonight?"

"I don't think I can wait until tonight," he said as the guards walked down the street and turned at a corner.  With a sigh of relief, he let Sylla go.

"C'mon," she said, and turned to start back down the street with Crichton by her side.

"So…" he paused and cleared his throat as they walked down the street side-by-side once again.  "Why did you do that?  It's not like we were in any danger, right?  And where'd you learn that little trick from anyway?"

"A Peacekeeper with a female personal server might look a lot less conspicuous than a Peacekeeper walking around with a male Nebari at his side, but a Peacekeeper walking around is still conspicuous, nonetheless.  So it was for the best if we actually looked like we were shopping.  And, Dalek taught it to me."

"So, you and Dalek are pretty close then?"

"We were lovers before he joined the resistance," she answered, feeling that she could trust him with the information.  "He left me.  Then a cycle later, I joined.  I didn't expect to see him again, but when we were put in the same cell, we were forced to work together and we eventually became friends again."

"I'm sorry."

"What for?"

"About Dalek."

"Don't be.  It wasn't you he left."

"No, it wasn't, but I'm still sorry."  The two walked on in silence, turning at corners and doubling back to be sure they weren't followed.  After a quarter arn of silence Crichton asked, "So, why'd you join up?"

Sylla didn't answer.  She only walked on and kept her eyes straight ahead of her.  After a few microts of deciding how much to tell him, she unexpectedly said, "My parents."

"Excuse me?" Crichton asked, surprised.

"My parents."

"They were with the resistance?"

"No.  They're being mind-frelled," she said quietly.  "My father yelled out in anger at one of our neighbors one day.  The Establishment heard about it.  They came at night.  They knocked down our door and dragged my father away.  My mother attacked one of them, trying to save dad.  So, they took her, too.  I was only seven cycles old, but I vowed that I would save them some day.  That's when Dalek and I found each other.  We got close…and here we are now."

Crichton remained silent after he learned about Sylla's past.  It reminded him of what the Nazi's did to the Jews during World War II and he became even more committed to their mission.  If the crystal they were going to steal helped the Resistance in any way, then he was going to get it for them.

As Crichton and Sylla walked in silence, a group of four guards rounded a corner a quarter of a metra ahead of them.  "Frell."

He pulled Sylla over to a stone wall to their left and led her to a corner.  He pressed himself against her as she leaned back against the wall, wrapped his arms around her, pulling her against him, and kissed her soundly on the lips.  Her eyes widened in surprise, then closed as she played along, but she did enjoy it.  As the guards approached she opened her mouth, allowing Crichton to slide his tongue inside her, deepening the kiss.  Sylla slid her arms under his duster and around his waist as she wrapped her left leg around him, rubbing her crotch against him.

Most of the guards passed them without a second glance, but one of them stopped and turned around to walk back to them.  He suspiciously watched them, and once he reached them again, he stopped and asked in a deep surly voice, "Who are you?"

Crichton slowly broke their kiss with a fake frustrated sigh and turned his head around to look back at the guard as Sylla dipped her head to kiss and suck on his neck.  He looked at the gray, scaled alien that had a crown sort of like that of a triceratops and said with a contemptuous Sebacean accent, "Do you mind?  We're in the middle of something here."

"Answer the question."

"No," he pointedly said while Sylla continued to kiss his neck.  As she slid her hands down over his butt and gave him a squeeze, he continued, "Who I am is unimportant."

The guard swiftly raised his rifle at Crichton and said, "You will answer my question, now."

With an annoyed sigh he broke out of Sylla's embrace, spun around as he pulled out his pistols, and aimed them at the guard.  "If you must know, I am Larraq, Captain, Peacekeeper Special Forces.  Satisfied?"

With a growl, the guard lowered his rifle, swiftly spun on his heels, and walked back to his waiting comrades.

Crichton let out the breath he was holding as he reholstered his pistols.  Sylla walked up beside him, and he turned his head to look at her and said, "So…was it good for you?"

=================================

"They've left the main building and are heading for the perimeter wall."

"Can you tell how many there are?" John asked through his comms as he waited, hidden from view, in the entrance of a shop on a wide and crowded street that was supposed to be their Sebacean target's route.

"No," Sylla responded from her spot perched in the prone position atop one of the larger buildings at the end of the same street.  She looked down at the compound through the high-powered scope on the long-barreled sniper's rifle she brought with her from Moya and added, "The view is partially obscured."

"All right," John responded with a sigh as he poked his head out and looked up and down the street, seeing only a crowded market. 

"They're passing me now," Stark, who was wearing a cloak, suddenly and discreetly said through his comms as he pretended to look over some medicines.  Dalek, also adorned in a cloak, acted as if he was examining some weapons in a booth across the street.

"How many guards are there?" John asked as he pulled back into the entrance.

Dalek turned his head to look at the massive front gate of the compound as it closed, and counted the guards in last group to enter the marketplace as they walked towards him.  Once he finished, he closed his eyes as he lowered his head in despair and said into his comms, "There are twenty; a group of four in front, a group of four in back, and a group of six on either side of the target.  That's twice as many as we had predicted.  Add to that the guards who are already patrolling the market…"

"What do you want to do, John?" D'Argo asked through the comms from his position in the entrance of a shop opposite John.  "We don't have enough manpower or the firepower to take on that many guards."

"We'll find a way," John responded discreetly, looking at D'Argo.

"John," Aeryn said over the comms from the waiting Marauder on a nearby, dilapidated landing pad.  "We may have to abort.  We can wait until the buyers and the target make the deal, then we take the buyers."

"No," John harshly said.  "We've come this far and we're going to keep going.  We can't lose that crystal, which is what might happen if they make the deal.  We still have half an arn before the buyers get here so we still have time to do this, and we have to do this."

John discreetly poked his head out, looked down the street, and saw the first group of four guards.  He quickly pulled back and continued, "Dalek, get ready.  We're going to do this as planned.  And, yes, before any of you say anything, the plan sucks, but it's our plan so what did y'all expect?  So, Sylla, take only four shots, then get your ass down here."

"I can get off more than that by the time they find out where I am," she responded.

"I don't want you taking that chance, so get down here once you've taken that fourth."  John checked the power level on the pulse pistol in the thigh holster underneath his duster and said into his comms, "Chiana, you ready with your skeleton key?"

"Yeah," she responded excitedly as she took the key she had recently made out of a metal serving tray with the help of Talyn's DRDs out of her hip pouch and dropped it between her breasts to keep it safe.  "I'm ready."

"Natalie?  You and Talyn ready?" he asked into his comms.

"Yup," Natalie responded from Talyn's bridge.  "As soon as you get back up here, Talyn'll be ready to starburst."

"Stark?" John asked.  "You ready to back Dalek up?"

"Yes," Stark assured him.

"Let's do it," John said as he walked out of the shop and intentionally bumped into the lead guard causing him to drop the rifle he was carrying.  The other three guards in the lead group immediately aimed their weapons at John while, simultaneously, the other guards swarmed around the target to protect him and the case containing the data crystal that was cuffed to his wrist.

John put on his game face, worriedly looked at the guard solicitously, and asked, "Are you okay, man?"

"Yes," the reptilian-looking guard replied, embarrassed and annoyed.

"Here, let me get that for you," John said as he moved to pick up the guard's rifle.

"Back off," he said, forcing John to put his hands up in the air and take a step back to the guard's side.  "I'll get it."

John quickly glanced at the other guards as the one in front of him bent down to pick up his rifle.  They weren't watching him and he saw the opportunity he was waiting for.  John suddenly kneed the guard in the head causing him to fall to the ground on his back as John pulled out both his pistols, aimed at and simultaneously shot two guards - one in front of him and one beside him - in their heads, instantly killing them.  Then he quickly aimed at the guard on the ground, who was still dazed, and fired at him with both pistols as D'Argo pulled out his qualta rifle and shot at the last remaining guard in the lead group, who was too surprised to react to John's actions.

Recovering, the remaining sixteen guards took up positions to protect their employer and to take out John and D'Argo.  Six of the guards covered the other ten, sending John, D'Argo, and other civilians diving into the shops on their respective sides of the street, while their employer was pushed into an open-air market.  But Stark and Dalek threw off their cloaks, pulled out their weapons, and began firing before the ten guards could get their employer into the market.  Dalek squeezed the trigger on his full-auto rifle and sprayed pulse fire into the group of guards who were staying with the target while Stark did the same with his pulse rifle.

Sylla watched through her scope as Stark and Dalek began their assault and pulled the trigger on her rifle, dropping the last guard to enter the market.

Sylla, Stark, and Dalek managed to kill four of the guards and wounded one.  Unfortunately, they also wounded two innocent bystanders as they fired into the shop, sending pieces of all types of food everywhere before the guards returned fire and made it necessary for Stark and Dalek to take cover in a shop behind a metal stand.

Meanwhile, at the other end of the street, the six guards took cover behind carts, stands, support columns, and anything else they could find as they fired at John and D'Argo.  The pulse fire sent D'Argo diving for cover behind a stone support column and sent John diving behind a wooden fruit cart.

"Hey, Sylla," John yelled into his comms.  "We could use a little help down here."

"I know," she responded.

"Well?"

"I'm looking," Sylla yelled as she looked through the scope on her rifle for any target.  "I can't get a shot."

"Damn," John muttered.

Taking advantage of there being no walls, John popped his head up to see exactly where the guards on his side of the street were taking cover.  But a guard, who was hiding behind a cart in another shop at the other end of the street, saw him.  The guard fired at the fruit cart, sending shards of fruit shells and wood into the side of John's face.  He fell to the ground due to the force of the impact of the shards, losing his pulse pistol.  "Frell!" he yelled.

D'Argo saw his friend fall and shouted, "John, are you all right?"

"Yeah," John yelled back from where he lay on the ground and rolled over to look at D'Argo.  "I just never thought I'd get killed by exploding fruit."

D'Argo smiled at that, then popped out from behind the support column to fire at the guards, but heard pulse fire coming from in front of him and to his right and spun around, his tenkas flailing, to take cover behind the column.  As he put his back against the column, he poked his head out and looked around the other side.  He saw that Chiana had managed to get in front of him into a better position and was firing at the guards, trying to help take them out.

Simultaneously, John turned his head slightly to look under his fruit cart and noticed the exposed feet of the guard who had shot at him under the cart the alien was hiding behind.  John picked up his pulse pistols and, with ice in his eyes, he took aim at the guard's feet with both pistols and fired.  The guard cried out in excruciating pain as he fell over onto his back.  Underneath their respective carts, John and the guard looked at each other, their eyes locked in a deadly stare.  As the guard moved to pull out a pistol, John opened up on him with both of his.  The impact of the numerous hits sent the guard flying back into a support column.

Sitting up, John put his back against the cart and turned in time to see D'Argo run around the right side of the column that had been his cover.  Crouching behind a counter in the next shop, Chiana covered D'Argo as he joined her.

John turned and reached over to grab his pulse pistols, then sat back against the cart as he ejected the empty chakan oil cartridges.  Just as he pulled out two more cartridges, one of the guards fired at the cart he was hiding behind, causing one of the hard, coconut-like fruits to fall on his head.  He yelled out in surprise and pain as he dropped his pistols and cartridges and grabbed his head.

"Dammit," John cried as he reached over to pick up the fruit.  He shot up from behind the cart and threw the tough fruit as hard as he could at one of the three remaining guards on his side of the street, catching the man by surprise.  The fruit hit the guard right between the eyes and he keeled over onto the ground with a large circular welt on his forehead.  To John, it looked like the guy had been knocked out, but he hoped he had killed the little bastard.

As he grabbed his head to protect his wound, John quickly sat back down behind the cart.  He felt his wound and pulled his hand back to find that it was covered in blood.  He reached up to explore his wound again and decided that he probably had a fractured skull.

Looking around for a rag to wipe his hand with, John crawled over to a nearby counter as pulse fire passed overhead.  He found a clean rag, wiped his hands off, and crawled back to the fruit cart, grabbing his pistols and cartridges along the way.  He put his back to the cart as he slid the cartridges into his pistols and popped up momentarily to see where the remaining two guards on his side were.  They were both hiding behind a wooden counter that looked like it had been pushed at an angle to give them a better firing position.  John needed to find a way to get them out in the open so either he, Sylla, D'Argo, or Chiana could take them out.

A small grin started to grow on John's face and he spoke into his comms.  "D'Argo, Chiana, when I give you the word, cover me.  And, Sylla, get ready."

D'Argo shot at the guards on his side of the street, then ducked down under the cover of the counter as Chiana did the same and yelled, "What're you going to do, John?"

"Just cover me when I give you the word, all right?  I've got a plan," John said as he put one of his pistols down on the ground and repeatedly ran his fingers back and forth through his hair, mussing it up.

D'Argo and Chiana looked at each other skeptically, shook their heads, and got ready for John to give them the "word".

Once John was sure his hair was thoroughly tousled and bloodied, he put a fake psychotic smile on his face, picked up his pulse pistol, raised both of them up into a ready position, and yelled, "Now!"

Chiana and D'Argo popped up from behind the counter and began firing at the remaining four guards at the other end of the street.  John stuck his head out momentarily to be certain that the guards had been pinned down, then leapt up from behind the cart, darted around the left side yelling maniacally, and ran in an arc towards the two guards on his side while raining pulse fire down on them with both pistols.

One of the guards behind the counter turned to his reptilian comrade, after seeing what they assumed was a psychotic Peacekeeper, and yelled, "We have to get out of here."

"No," the other guard replied to the Sebacean.  "We have to stay."

The Sebacean guard ignored his companion, got up, and tried to run across the street to join the other two guards there.

The two Sebacean guards taking fire from D'Argo and Chiana saw their fellow guard running towards them.  To cover their comrade, they immediately popped up and fired at the Luxan and the Nebari.

Sylla, perched atop one of the buildings, saw a Sebacean guard running across the wide street through her scope and thought, Idiot.  With the proper lead, she pulled the trigger on her pulse rifle, hitting the guard square in the chest.  The shot killed him instantly and caused him to flip side-over-side onto the ground before he could get anywhere near his companions on the other side of the street.

John watched the Sebacean guard go down as he fired at and ran towards the other guard still hiding behind the counter.  As he ran past columns, carts, stands, counters, and pedestals, he continued firing at the reptilian guard who he noticed, after the guy popped up slightly to take a peek, was the same guard who had questioned him earlier when he was with Sylla.

The guard looked like he was getting extremely angry and annoyed at the pulse fire John was trying to throw at him.  He shot up, pushing the counter onto its front, off to the side and away from him, as he started shooting at John.  When the guard got up, John jumped to the ground, feet first in a baseball slide while still firing at the reptilian guard.  John's shots hit the guard in the chest and abdomen, breaking through his thin skin, as John slid up to the reptilian's legs before the he could get a good lock on John.  The guard fell back onto the ground dead, with blood pouring from his wounds.

One of the guards across the street started to fire at John after seeing another comrade fall, while his partner continued to fire at D'Argo and Chiana.  John got down behind the tipped-over counter for cover but, because the counter was very thin, John had to plant his back on the ground to avoid the pulse fire.

"That was your plan?" Chiana suddenly yelled at him in his covered position.

"Well, what did you expect?" John responded.

D'Argo growled in response as he and Chiana looked at each other again, then shot up simultaneously, catching the guards at the other end of the street by surprise.  The pair's pulse fire hit their mark - the Sebacean firing at them - and killed him.

The remaining Sebacean, seeing his comrade fall, stopped firing at John and tried to make a run for it through the shops to join the others at the far end of the street.  John, D'Argo, and Chiana all got up and began raining pulse fire down on the man as he ran past stands and columns.  He didn't make it very far before D'Argo managed to hit his leg, but he started firing at D'Argo and Chiana again, causing the pair to take cover.  Seeing that he was close to the market where the others were, the Sebacean got up and started running again, but with a time-consuming limp.

John stopped firing momentarily and looked ahead of the guard to see how far away he was from the target when something caught his eye.  He saw half a dozen gold tanks that were filled with various fuels.  He looked back at the guard and saw that the Sebacean was coming up on the fuel tanks fast.  John quickly raised both pistols and fired at the tanks causing them to explode.  The massive explosion engulfed the guard, burning him to a crisp, and caused the stone wall that made up the rear of the stores that were lined up against it to collapse on top of three innocent bystanders who were hiding on the other side.

The nine remaining guards saw the wall fall and surrounded the target as they prepared to make their way to what was once the rear of the market, but was now their only means of escape.  They all fired simultaneously at Dalek and Stark, pinning them down as they made their way towards the back of the market.

"If you three are done now, I thought you would like to know that the target is escaping.  I repeat, the target is getting away," Dalek yelled as he tied a rag around the large wound he had just received in his left arm, then leapt up to join Stark in firing at their target to keep him from escaping.  The two had managed to kill three of the guards when, suddenly, four more guards came running towards them from the compound with guns ablaze, pinning everyone down on the ground.

"For the amount of money these guys are paid, you'd think they'd be smarter than this," Sylla mumbled to herself as she aimed her sniper's rifle at the four guards as they made their way down the street towards Stark and Dalek.  With the proper lead, she fired twice, hitting the first two guards.  The other two took cover in a booth and began firing at Stark and Dalek.  Becoming increasingly annoyed, the Banik and the Nebari looked at each other, then shot up and fired volley after volley at the thin wood counter behind which the guards had taken cover.  With only a few shots they broke through the counter and killed both of them.

Stark and Dalek walked out from behind the stand as John, D'Argo, and Chiana walked out from behind their positions to join them.

"Frell," D'Argo yelled as soon as he saw that their target had escaped.

"Sylla," John yelled into his comms.  "Where are they?"

"They're on the next street over, but they're under cover.  I can't get a lock on them."

"All right.  Now, you took your four shots, so get down here."

"I don't think so," Sylla yelled as she aimed her rifle at another group of six guards running down the street and fired twice, killing two of them.  The other four ran straight for John, D'Argo, Chiana, Dalek, and Stark, and tried to take them out with hand-to-hand combat.  As one of them ran towards John, wielding a knife, Sylla lead him with her scope and fired, hitting him in the chest and causing him to flip over John who had dropped to the ground as soon as he saw Sylla's shot hit its mark.

Seeing that the others pretty much had control of the situation down in the street, Sylla turned her attention to the next street over, which curved to the right, and tried to find the target through her scope.  She couldn't locate them.  Sylla checked the next street over, but she still couldn't spot them.

She sat up, loosening the strap on her rifle as she did, then stood up as she slung it across her torso with the barrel of her rifle pointing down and tightened the strap, planting the side of the rifle against her back.  She grabbed the full-auto pulse rifle that lay next to her, ran to the hatch leading down to the next level of the building, climbed down the ladder, and ran as fast as she could to the level riser.  Once inside, she punched the control panel, and the riser came to life, quickly taking her down to the first level.  As the riser flew past level after level, Sylla slung the strap of the pulse rifle over her shoulder, grabbed her Nebari standard-issue pulse gun (which just happened to be the very same pulse gun that the Nebari official had dropped when her mother had attacked him for taking away her father) and checked the power level.  Seeing that the weapon was at full power, she stuffed it back into her belt next to her knife and retrieved her pulse rifle.

Once the level riser reached the bottom and the doors opened, Sylla bolted out of it and ran towards the building's main entrance.  She pushed open the glass door as hard as she could, shattering the glass as she ran out of the building, taking a shortcut down a narrow alley towards the last location she saw the target.  As she rounded the corner, she coincidentally ran into the group of six guards and the target, causing them all to fall to the ground.

Disoriented, they all groaned in pain and tried to untangle themselves from one another.  Quickly regaining his focus, one of the guards saw all the weapons Sylla had on her as she shook her head, trying to get her bearings.  He tried to pull out his pistol, but she saw him going for it and immediately kicked him in the head with her right foot as she pulled out her pulse weapon and shot him.  Once the other guards heard the shot they immediately went for their weapons, but Sylla pulled out her knife with her other hand and threw it sideways at the guard next to her.  The knife lodged itself in the guard's throat, spraying his blood everywhere.  She quickly picked up her full-auto rifle and squeezed the trigger.  Sylla sprayed everybody with deadly pulse fire, killing the other four guards and the target; she also, regrettably, killed three innocent bystanders who were trying to run across the street to escape the battle.  Unfortunately, one of the guards got a shot off before he fell and the shot caught her in her left shoulder.  She fell back onto the ground in pain and cried out as light blue blood poured from her wound.

Slowly getting up, she dropped her pulse weapon and reached for the dead guard lying next to her.  She removed his leather jacket to get to his cloth shirt, tore the shirt into strips, and threw away the strips that were soaked in the guard's blood.  Taking the strips of cloth that were still dry, she wrapped them together, put one end of it in her mouth as she wrapped the other end around her shoulder, and tied the two ends together in a knot using her hand and mouth.  She tightened the cloth around her shoulder and cried out in pain, biting down on the cloth in her mouth.

Once Sylla was sure her makeshift tourniquet was secure, she grabbed her pulse weapon and shakily stood up, her breathing labored.  She slowly walked over the dead guards towards the target, stood above him, and breathlessly spoke into her comms.  "I got our target.  He's dead.  So, get over here with the lock pick, Chiana, so we can get out of here."

"I'm a little busy right now.  So are the others," Sylla heard over her comms along with some pulse fire.

"Frell," Sylla sighed as she dizzily stumbled back slightly due to her blood loss.  "All right.  I'll take care of it…somehow, and I'll meet you at the Marauder."

"Sylla, are you all right?" Dalek asked, concerned.  "You don't sound very well."

"You wouldn't feel so well, either, if you had just been shot," she tried to yell.

"Where are you, Sylla?" Aeryn asked from the waiting Marauder.  She had heard everything from the beginning of the battle, but had kept quiet so as not to distract the others as she waited.  "I'll come get you."

"No, don't come," Sylla tried to yell.  "There's nowhere for you to land, and we can't take the chance that the other guards still on this planet will destroy our only means of escape."

"Sylla, stay where you are, but find cover.  I'll come to you," Dalek yelled as he fired at a group of guards who had positioned themselves across the street.  He spun back around to take cover, then quickly ran towards Chiana and yelled, "Chiana, give me the key."

Chiana reached inside her bodice between her breasts, pulled out the key throwing it to Dalek, and yelled, "Take it!"

Dalek caught the key and, with the others providing cover fire, he hurriedly ran through the various shops to make his way to Sylla.

John ducked down behind the overturned cart he was hiding behind, and as he watched Dalek run to get to Sylla he thought, He still loves her…

----------------------------------------------------

What's taking him so long? Sylla impatiently thought as she stared at their target.  She sat on the ground leaning back against a wooden column and waited for Dalek to show up with the key.

She reached up to readjust her bloodied tourniquet and was glad that she had managed to stop the bleeding.  But she still had lost a lot of blood and was feeling the effects of it.

"Oh, frell it," she said exhaustedly, getting increasingly impatient.  She slowly stood up with pulse rifle in hand and wobbled backward slightly from the dizziness.  Sylla slowly made her way to the Sebacean target and planted her foot on his wrist above the handcuff.  She held her rifle in her right hand, not moving her other arm, and aimed her pulse rifle down at his forearm.  Pulling the trigger, she fired at his forearm above her foot and burned her way through his skin and muscle.  The intense heat generated by repeatedly firing at the same spot cauterized the wound on both sides, sealing it.  She kept firing at the two bones in his forearm trying to break them, and after a few microts of repeated firing, she pulverized the bones.  Deactivating her pulse rifle to keep it from overheating, she slung the strap over her shoulder, bent down to pick up the case, severed hand and all, and tried to pull the hand out but it was stuck.

"Frell," she mumbled as she closed her eyes and fell to the ground, exhausted.  She opened her eyes and started singing to herself to try to stay awake.  Sylla had to laugh when she realized she had been inadvertently singing the lullaby her mother had sung to her when she was a child.

"Sylla?" she heard Dalek yell.

"Shut up," Sylla quietly responded.  "You're going to get yourself shot."

Dalek ran up to her and knelt by her side as he put down his rifle.  He lifted up the rag she had used as a bandage to check her wound and let it go to reach up to comfortingly caress her cheek as he asked, "How are you feeling?"

"Like dren," she replied as her eyelids fell.

"You look it."

She let out a small laugh in response as she opened her eyes to look up at him and watched him as he picked up the target's severed hand still attached to the handcuff.

Dalek quickly glanced at the hand and looked back down at Sylla with a question on his face.

With another small laugh she said, "You took too frelling long."

Dalek laughed at that as he grabbed the handle on the case, stood up, and suddenly turned around, looking for something behind him.

"What is it?" Sylla asked, trying to stay alert.

"Oh, it's nothing you need to concern yourself with," Dalek replied as he slowly turned back around while pulling out a Nebari pulse weapon and aimed it at Sylla.

=================================

"What's taking them so long?" John mumbled as he stood behind a stone column with his pistols at the ready.

The remaining two guards across the street popped up from behind an overturned fish cart and opened fire at the four, forcing D'Argo and Chiana to duck behind a pile of rubble that was once a stone column, while Stark hid behind an overturned table.

John let out an annoyed sigh as they also shot at the column he was hiding behind and yelled into his comms, "Dalek?  Sylla?  Where the hell are you two?"

There was no response.

"Dammit, answer me," he yelled.

There was still no response.

"Aeryn," John started.

"No," Aeryn interrupted, anticipating his question.  "They haven't gotten here yet."

Suddenly, one of the guards' shots hit the column, sending small shards of rock into John's right hand and causing him to drop his pistol.  He cried out and doubled over in pain, dropping his other pistol to clutch his hand.

"Crichton," Chiana yelled.  "Are you okay?"

"No," John yelled back through clenched teeth and picked up his pistol.  He spun around aiming the pistol at the guards on the other side of the street but, before he could fire, one of the shots from the guards grazed John's left side, burning him and putting a hole in his duster, vest, and shirt.  However, John didn't notice and began firing.  He hit one of them twice - once in the eye, popping it, and the next between his eyes - killing him.  He hit the other in the shoulder, knocking him down to the ground.

John walked around the column with his pulse pistol still aimed at the overturned fish cart as D'Argo and Chiana got up from behind the rubble they were using for cover.  Stark walked out from behind the table, joining them as they watched John.  Using his bloodied right hand, John motioned for D'Argo and Chiana to stay put, and after seeing the look in John's eyes they knew it would be best to obey and that they weren't going to like what was about to happen.  John lowered his right hand, allowing his blood to drip off his fingers as he walked across the street, his pistol still aimed at the cart.

Chiana, Stark, and D'Argo nervously watched as John walked across the street, around the overturned cart, and came to a stop while aiming his pistol down at the unseen guard.  He threw a kick, and the three assumed that John had either kicked the guard's weapon away or kicked the guard.  They watched in absolute horror as John squeezed the trigger on his pistol and fired round after deadly round down at the unfortunate Sebacean guard.

John had fired at least fifteen rounds into the guard - Stark, D'Argo, and Chiana didn't know the exact number - and had killed him.  The three then watched as John reholstered the pistol behind his back and turned around to walk back to them.  They saw the pure rage in John's eyes that belied the blank look on his face.  That look terrified them beyond belief as it was something none of them had seen before from their human friend.

Walking around the column he had been using for cover, John bent down to pick up his other pistol with his left hand, placed it in his right, and painfully returned it to his thigh holster.  He turned to face Stark, D'Argo, and Chiana, who were nervously and worriedly watching him, but John didn't notice their looks.  He ordered, "Get back to the Marauder.  I'm going to try to find Sylla and Dalek."

"John," D'Argo started, but Crichton ignored him, turned around, and ran towards the fallen stone wall to make his way to Sylla's last known location.  D'Argo yelled after him, "John!"

"Crichton!" Chiana called out simultaneously.

John just ignored them as he ran to the debris that used to be a wall, pulled out his pulse pistols, and ran into the deserted street on the other side, ready to take down any threat that presented itself.

He spun around in his spot on the street, looking into the shops that surrounded him.  Seeing that there weren't any visible threats, John cautiously ran down the street while keeping an eye out for movement.  Turning left following the curvature of the street, John saw a body ahead of him and quickly took cover behind a wooden support column of a shop as he aimed his pistols down the street waiting for something to happen.

Not seeing or hearing anything, John slowly moved out into the street with his pistols at the ready and cautiously moved forward.  As he followed the curve of the street, he saw the body he had seen before, then another body, then another, and finally, found another four bodies, one of which was their target, lying beside Sylla.  She was laying half on top of one of the dead guards, with her right hand pressing down on a pulse wound in her abdomen, and was also coughing up blood.  John slowly approached her, looking for Dalek and anyone else, fearing a trap.

Sylla opened her tear-filled eyes and saw Crichton looking around.  With her mouth filling up with blood, she said quietly, "It's okay.  You're the only one here still left standing."

John walked up and knelt down on the ground next to her, putting one of his pistols down within easy reach while still holding his other pistol.  He looked down at the wound in her stomach and reached for her hand to lift it up slightly.  He saw just how bad it was and sorrowfully thought, Oh, man.  He put her hand back down on the wound and pressed his own hand down over it, trying to slow the bleeding.  Looking back up into her eyes, he sighed and said, "I'm sorry, Sylla.  What happened?"  He glanced over at the target and noticed that he was missing a hand and the case with the data crystal.  "And where's the crystal?"

"It was that bastard," Sylla started, but was overcome by a fit of coughing as blood and bile flowed up her throat and into her mouth.

All Crichton could do was watch her as death slowly approached.

Once her bout was over, Sylla continued with a small laugh, "The least he could've done was shoot me in the head."

"Who, Sylla?  Who shot you and took the case?" John pressed.

"Dalek."

"Dalek?" John yelled, not hiding his shock.  "Why the hell did he do that?"

"How am I supposed to know?  I'm not a frelling telepath," she yelled back as blood trickled out of her mouth and down her chin and cheek.

"Sorry.  But did you see which way he went?"

"Yes.  He looked like he was heading for the loading docks."

"Thanks…" John started as he moved to stand up, but Sylla, interrupting him, grabbed his arm and pulled him down.

"Wait.  Don't go yet, Crichton."  She closed her eyes in pain and gulped down the bile that was slowly rising, opened her eyes again and, looking up at John as tears of pain streamed down her cheeks, said, "Please, end it.  I don't want to die like this."

John looked down at her, his face neutral.  Sylla couldn't tell if he was debating whether to do it, when he suddenly said, "Don't worry.  You're not going to die.  As soon as I take care of Dalek, I'll come back for you and we'll get you back to Talyn.  Aeryn, Natalie, or Stark might be able to take care of you.  The least they can do is keep you alive long enough for you to get some real help.  I promise."  He gave her hand a reassuring squeeze and added, "You're not going to die."

With a sigh, Sylla slowly nodded and said, "I'm going to hold you to that."

John gave her hand a pat while looking into her eyes.  He picked up his pistol as he stood up, still looking reassuringly down at Sylla, then jogged down the street to the loading docks, keeping his eyes open for Dalek.

As John followed the street to the loading docks he noticed that the panicked crowds were growing larger and larger and were clamoring to buy supplies.  Some fights even broke out between people as they demanded certain items that others had and it was all because the Resistance wanted a data crystal.  But if the crystal helped the Resistance, then it was worth it.

As he approached the loading dock trying to find Dalek, John searched through the people boarding the different ships.  But the panicked hoard scattering around him and the ships taking off made it difficult.  At the other end of the docks, he noticed an old Ilanic transport facing him but paid no attention to it as he scanned the other ships.

A sudden movement behind the Ilanic transport's left main landing strut caught John's eye and he walked to his right to get a better look at who was behind it.  He saw a flash of dark blue leather and quickly ran over to another transport to take cover behind its strut just in case.  As John settled into cover, he got a better look at who was behind it.  Dalek.  John looked down at the ground next to Dalek's leg and saw the case with the target's hand still attached to it.  He looked back up to watch Dalek for a few microts as the Nebari looked like he was trying to hotwire the door controls.  Fortunately, it didn't look like he was having very much success, and John smiled as he pulled the pulse pistol out from behind his back and aimed it at the traitorous Nebari.

"Gun," someone cried, and all hell broke loose.

People were frantically running every which way, looking for friends, loved ones, and a place to hide and were, unfortunately, blocking John's line of sight.  He tried to see Dalek through the mass of people and saw that the Nebari was frantically trying to get the hatch on the ship to open as he looked around for John.

"Crap," John mumbled in frustration, trying to aim at Dalek.  He lowered his pistol as he clenched his jaw, trying to think.  With a sigh, he raised his pistol in the air and fired, causing people to scream in fear and duck for cover on the ground just as Dalek accessed the door controls, opened the hatch, and lowered the ladder on the left side of the transport.

When he heard the shots and saw everyone jump to the ground, Dalek looked up to find Crichton taking cover behind the landing strut of one of the transports at the far end of the docks.  He raised his pulse rifle as he grabbed the case and was about to fire, but John fired first.  The first shot hit the landing strut and the next grazed Dalek's leg, but he spun around behind the landing strut before any of the other shots could hit him.

John squeezed the trigger on his pistol one more time, but nothing happened.  "Damn," he said, and spun around as he ejected the empty cartridge and painfully grabbed another cartridge, sliding it into the pistol.

Taking the opportunity, Dalek spun around the landing strut.  Holding the case in one hand and his full-auto rifle in the other, he started firing at the strut John was hiding behind.  Keeping Crichton at bay in a storm of pulse fire, Dalek ran around the strut towards the ladder and walked backwards up it.

As Dalek walked through the open hatch, he paused momentarily to hit the door controls on the side of the door frame to bring up the ladder and to close the hatch.  John took advantage of the opportunity and spun around as he grabbed his other pistol, trying to ignore the pain.  He aimed at Dalek and fired before the Nebari could raise the ladder.  The shots missed Dalek, who spun around to take cover inside the ship, hitting the doorframe and bulkheads in the interior of the ship instead.

Running over to another landing strut while sustaining his fire, John tried to get into a better firing position to take out Dalek, but the Nebari was too well protected.  As John ran, Dalek spun around into the doorway and fired at him.

One of the shots grazed the back of John's left shoulder and he fell to the ground in pain, dropping his pistols as he yelled, "Frell!"

Grabbing his pistols, John quickly got back up, ignored the pain in his hand, left side, and now his left shoulder, and ran behind the landing strut of another transport.  Dalek took the opportunity to retract the ladder and shut the hatch as he fired at Crichton, keeping himself under cover.  Once the firing stopped, John spun back around and started firing at the transport, hoping to disable it somehow before Dalek could take off.  But the transport was too well armored and the pulse fire did nothing.

"Crichton," John heard Dalek say through the comms.  "Stop firing.  This doesn't concern you."

"Get frelled, Dalek," John yelled, and fired a single shot at the transport to accentuate his insult.  "You know damn well the Resistance needs that data crystal, and you know damn well that I need that crystal to get Moya back and to help Zhaan."

There was no response.

"Dammit, Dalek…" John started, but was interrupted when the transport's engines activated.  "Frell."

John fired at the transport with both pistols, hoping that he would get a lucky shot, as the ship's engines powered up.  Unfortunately, the transport lifted off as John walked up beneath it, continuing to fire at it as the transport sped away.

"Natalie," John yelled into his comms as he lowered his pistols and watched the transport merge onto the transit lane with the other ships leaving the planet.  "An Ilanic transport just took off from the loading dock I'm on and is leaving the planet.  Can Talyn track it?"

"Are you kidding me?" Natalie responded.  "There are thousands of transports leaving the planet and there are at least twenty Ilanics.  There's no way Talyn can track it."

"Frell," John yelled at the top of his lungs in defeat.  He reholstered his pistols and ran off the docks, jumping over people still lying on the ground to avoid the shooting, to get back to Sylla.  He tried unsuccessfully to ignore the pain he was beginning to feel all over.

"Aeryn," John yelled into his comms as he ran down the street.  "Are D'Argo, Stark, and Chiana there?"

"Yes, they're on board," Aeryn responded.  "Now, where the frell are you?"

"I'm going back to get Sylla.  Meet me at the loading docks.  It won't take me as long to get there from where I am."

As John ran, following the right turn the street took, he saw Sylla still lying there with her right hand covering her wound.  In her left, she held a guard's pulse rifle.  Slowing down as he came up on her he saw that she was out, but couldn't tell if she was still alive or not.  He knelt down on Sylla's left side and reached down to check her carotid artery, one thing that most species seemed to share.

"Damn, you're still alive," John mumbled in surprise as he pulled his hand away from her neck.  Planting his feet underneath him, he reached underneath Sylla to gather her in his arms.  He stood up carefully, trying not to jostle her, and ran back down the street toward the loading docks.

"Stark, Chiana, anybody - have a medical kit ready for Sylla," he yelled as he ran.

"How badly hurt is she?" Stark asked.

"Bad.  She's lost a lot of blood and has shoulder and stomach wounds, but she's still alive," John replied as he looked up at the Marauder passing overhead.  He watched as the ship landed ahead of him at the now deserted docks, with the hatch opening and ladder descending almost instantaneously.  Running out onto the docks, his vision beginning to blur, John tried to fight the dizziness that was overtaking him and saw D'Argo and Stark run down the ladder toward him.  As he ran up to the two, he handed Sylla over to D'Argo, then collapsed to the ground from blood loss and exhaustion.

"Get her onto the Marauder; I'll take care of Crichton," Stark yelled to D'Argo as he grabbed John's right arm, picking him up off the ground.  Holding onto his bloodied hand, Stark slung John's right arm around his neck while wrapping his other arm around the human's waist and helped John walk to the Marauder and up the ladder behind D'Argo and Sylla.  Once they were all inside the craft, Stark shut the hatch, raised the ladder, and yelled into the comms, "Aeryn, go!"

"Hold onto something," Aeryn yelled back as she took off and piloted the Marauder at full speed towards Talyn.  "How's John?"

"He'll…" Stark started, but was interrupted.

"I feel like dren, Aeryn," John said, his voice rough.  "But I'll be all right…eventually."  John closed his eyes and rested on the floor of the jump bay.  Then he opened his eyes in sudden realization and yelled into his comms, "Natalie, as soon as we get on board tell Talyn not to starburst.  Tell him to get us out of the system once we're on board, but make sure he doesn't starburst."

"I know…" Natalie yelled back.

"D'Argo, Stark, how's Sylla?" Aeryn interrupted.

Stark walked over to where D'Argo held Sylla and put his hands over her, reading her.  He looked up at D'Argo in alarm, and the two looked back down at the Nebari as Stark sorrowfully said, "She's dead."

----------------------------------------------------

"How's that?" Aeryn asked, looking into John's eyes, as she taped the bandage to his side while he sat on an examination table at the back of the sickbay.

"That's fine," he answered as he watched her.

"You know," she started as she grabbed a wet rag to wipe his blood off her hands, then she paused.  She threw the rag away once she got as much blood as she could off her hands, grabbed a black shirt for John, and held it up for him.  "If you keep this up you're going to run out of clothes sooner than later."  She flashed him a smile and added, "That's not necessarily a bad thing, but you get the point."

John took the shirt without saying a word and tried to put it on without opening his bandaged shoulder and hand, but Aeryn grabbed it and helped him.  He nodded to her in thanks and pushed up the sleeves.

Aeryn looked at John worriedly as he sat on the examination table looking down at the floor.  He was unusually silent, even for the way he'd been lately, and he seemed fairly melancholy.  It seemed pretty unusual to her since it was the first emotion other than anger he had displayed in front of her in a long time.

She stepped over to his right and sat down next to him with her hands clasped in her lap.  With a sigh she said, "While we were on the Marauder, D'Argo told me about what you did on the commerce planet."

"I did a lot of things on the commerce planet," he quietly said as he looked at the console ahead of him in front of the examination table where Sylla's lifeless body lay covered with a black sheet.

"But you know what I'm talking about?"

"Yeah," he answered as he looked back down at the floor.

"You didn't have to kill him, you know," she said quietly but pointedly as she turned to look at him.  "The guard was wounded and he wouldn't have been able to cause you any more trouble.  He couldn't have caused you any more trouble."

John didn't say anything and continued to look down at the floor.

"So?  Why did you kill him?"

"Aeryn, look," he said as he turned to look at her.  "I don't want to talk about it, all right?"

Knowing from experience that this wasn't something she should push John on, Aeryn let the subject drop and the two looked down at the floor together in silence.  After a few microts, Aeryn sighed, looked up at Sylla, and said, "We should get ready to space her.  We'll strip her first.  We could sell her clothes or use them for barter.  And we'll have to take some of her blood just in case Chiana may need it…"

"No," he quietly interrupted as he looked at Sylla.  Aeryn turned to look at him, and John went on.  "We leave her be.  We should ask Chiana about Nebari death rituals and give Sylla a proper funeral.  She deserves that much."

In surprise, Aeryn watched him and remained silent, knowing that there was more he wanted to say.  She took his hand and laced her fingers with his, giving it a squeeze to silently encourage him to go on.

"She wanted me to kill her, to end it…"  He shook his head slightly as he blankly stared at Sylla and continued.  "But I couldn't do it.  I couldn't kill her.  She was in so much pain and didn't want to die like that, but I couldn't kill her.  So, I promised her that we'd be able to keep her alive long enough until we could find help for her and told her that she wasn't going to die."  John turned to Aeryn, looked into her eyes, and added, "But she never had a chance.  She had lost too much blood and her stomach wound was bad, real bad.  When I got back to her after I tried to get the crystal, she was still alive.  I hoped that we could do something for her, but in the back of my mind I knew she was going to die."

"John, I'm not happy that she's dead, either, but she knew the risks.  Any one of us could've been killed."

"But Sylla didn't deserve to die, especially not by Dalek's hand.  Like us, she had something to live for.  She didn't deserve this."

"No, she didn't," she quietly said.  After a few microts of silence, she added, "So what do you want to do now?"

John turned to Aeryn with determination written all over his face and said, "We're going to find Dalek.  Then I'm going to kill him."

=================================

"So where could he have gone?"

"Well," Aeryn began, answering D'Argo's question as she brought up a holographic diagram on the table in the strategy room.  "The ship Dalek stole is a short range transport, so he couldn't have gone far."

"The only place he could have gone is a commerce station a short distance away," Stark piped in from his spot in the corner of the room as everyone turned to look at him in astonishment.  "This entire region of space is completely devoid of any inhabitable planets, with the exception of the commerce planet we just came from, so the station is the only place he could go in a short range transport."

"And you know this how?" Natalie asked incredulously with a shake of her head as she stood facing the Banik from behind the strategy table, Chiana standing beside her.

"I have traveled in this region of space before," Stark replied.

"So, you get around a lot, huh?" John asked from his spot next to Aeryn, across the table from Natalie.

Natalie groaned at John's question and brought her hand up to rub her eyes, trying to block the mental image of a naked Stark out of her head as the others turned to look at her.  She sarcastically said, "Thank you so much for that, John."  She lowered her hand, planting it on the table, as she looked up at John and added, "That mental image was just what I needed."

The others, with the exception of John, gave each other annoyed 'there she goes again' looks as Chiana asked, "What the frell are you talking about?"

"Never mind," Natalie said.

"Talyn, do you know about this commerce station?" Aeryn said, getting back to the subject.

In response, Talyn brought up a holographic diagram of the station on the strategy table.  The station's center consisted of three pods stacked one on top of another, with two docking rings for large ships in between the three center pods, and a hangar in the upper pod for smaller transports and one-man crafts.  The center was surrounded by three tiers of four elliptical shaped pods, with each pod connected to another and to the center pods with large conduits and level riser shafts.

John whistled in astonishment at its size and said, "That's big."

"That's very big," Aeryn added.

"So," Natalie started as she studied the diagram.  "Just how are we supposed to find Dalek in that?" she asked, nodding her head at the diagram for emphasis.

"All we have to do is ask if anyone's seen a Nebari," Stark said, looking through the diagram at Natalie from his corner.  "Not very many Nebari come through here unless they're bringing someone back to be mind-cleansed."

"Right," Natalie replied as she stared at Stark.  She paused to look at John and Aeryn, walked around the table to leave the room, and said, "I'll tell Talyn to set course for the station."

Chiana looked worriedly at D'Argo and John as Natalie left the room.  For as long as Chiana had known her human friend, she had never seen her be that - for a lack of a better term - hostile to anyone.  She thought that it might have been the fact that Natalie was still feeling guilty about giving the order to fire on the mining colony's main complex.  Whatever it was, it was really bothering Natalie.

Giving D'Argo one last look, Chiana jogged out of the room and caught up with Natalie on her way to the bridge.  As she walked up to her friend, she smiled and said, "Hey."

"Hey," Natalie answered nonchalantly as she continued to walk to the bridge, keeping her eyes forward.

"Natalie, what the frell's going on with you?" Chiana blurted out as looked over at the human.

"What?" Natalie replied in exasperation, looking at Chiana.

"You heard me.  What's going on with you?"

"Nothing's going on with me."

"No," Chiana mumbled as she grabbed Natalie's arm, stopping her.  "Something's wrong.  I know you, and you've never been like this before.  So what is it?"

With a sigh, Natalie turned to Chiana, placing her hands on her hips as she closed her eyes and dipped her head.  After a few microts Natalie looked up at Chiana, finding her expectantly waiting for an answer, and said, "It's Stark, all right?"

"Stark?" Chiana asked, confused.

"Yeah…" Natalie awkwardly answered as she protectively crossed her arms.  "He just creeps me out."

"It's the 'dead thing', right?"

"Yeah."

"So, he just creeps you out?"

"Yup."

"And that's it?"

"Yeah, pretty much," Natalie responded with a grin.

"Frell," Chiana said with a playful smile.  "If your son is anything like you, I can't wait to meet him."

"Hey," Natalie responded, her grin becoming a smile as she pointed at Chiana, trying to hold back a small laugh.  "You stay away from my son.  I don't him want hanging around people like you."

Chiana let out a laugh as she sauntered back down the hall to the strategy room and yelled over her shoulder, "Yes, Mother!"

"Hey, that's not funny!"

----------------------------------------------------

"Hold here, Talyn," Natalie said from her usual spot.  According to the plan, the hybrid Leviathan came up on a position that was just out of sensor range of the commerce station.  The crew had all agreed that it would be best if Talyn stayed behind just in case Dalek was watching the incoming ships.  They had also decided to take Moya's transport pod, since Leviathan transport pods were pretty common and identical, while John would take his Prowler for the speed and firepower that they were sure they would need.

"Can you have the DRDs ready the transport pod and one of the Prowlers?"

Talyn responded in the affirmative and redirected several DRDs to carry out Natalie's request.

"Thank you."

"Hey, Natalie," John said as he walked through the open hatch to Talyn's bridge with a black Peacekeeper jacket in hand.

Natalie turned around as John walked up to her and answered, "Yeah, what's up?"

"Here," he stated as he handed Natalie the jacket then closed the clasps on his own identical jacket, both of which he had found in storage in Talyn's cargo bay, left over from the Peacekeepers' brief occupation of the gunship.

"Uh, are you trying to tell me something here?" she jokingly asked as she held up the jacket and glanced at it.  "I know that I might not be that great of a dresser, but I'd like to think I have some fashion sense."

"No, that's not what I'm trying to tell you.  What I'm trying to tell you is that you'll attract too much attention in that," he replied as he nodded at Natalie's tank top.  "Attention that we don't need."

"Oh, and dressing as Peacekeepers won't attract us any attention?"

"Just put on the damn jacket, okay?"

"Fine," she said emphatically as she put on the jacket.  "Geez, you don't have to be snarky."  While she closed the clasps on her jacket, she mumbled at John's retreating back, "And while you're at it, get that stick out of your ass."

"What?" John said as he turned around to look at her.

"Oh, nothing," she replied, trying to keep an innocent look on her face as she fastened the last clasp and walked past him off the bridge.

John rolled his eyes with a sigh and moved to catch up with Natalie.

As he came up on her to walk down the corridor next to her, Natalie asked, "Are the others getting ready?"

"Yup."

"So, how'd Chiana take the news?"

"I haven't told her yet."

Natalie looked over at John incredulously, with a small grin as the two walked.  She faced forward again and dryly stated, "I hope you realize you're a dead man."

----------------------------------------------------

"What?"

"You heard me, Chiana.  Now get out of the way," John said as he tried to push Chiana aside to get to his Prowler.

"Hey," she yelled, stepping in front of John to block him.  "Just what do you mean I'm not going?"

"Just what I said, Chiana.  You're not going," John pointedly repeated, looking intensely at her.  "Someone has to stay behind with Talyn."

"If someone has to stay with Talyn, then why not Natalie?" she asked as she pointed at her human friend who was standing off to the side with the others in front of Moya's transport pod, watching the argument.

"Unlike Natalie, you will attract too much attention and you may get into trouble, which is something we don't need."

"And she won't?" Chiana yelled.

"Look at our track record, all right?  Every time we go somewhere with you, something always happens because someone wants to get between your legs."

"That's not my fault."

"Fine, it's not your fault," he softly said.  "But, it happens.  All I'm trying to do is save us some trouble, all right?"

"All right," she acquiesced and stepped aside to allow John to board his Prowler.  "But next time I'm going."

"I promise you're going - next time.  Okay?"

"All right."

"Wow," Natalie said as she watched Chiana and John.

"What?" Aeryn asked, turning to Natalie.

"She didn't kill him."

Aeryn smirked and turned around to board the transport pod with Stark, D'Argo, and Natalie following.

----------------------------------------------------

Roaming the promenade in the middle center pod, Natalie gawked at the size of it.  There were at least fifteen levels she could see of shops, markets, kiosks, restaurants, carts full of various items, even a small lake or two, and parks all around her.  It was like walking through a massive mall and Natalie felt like a kid all over again.  However, she tried not to let her astonishment get in the way of what she was supposed to do, which was to find Dalek.  Of course, it would've been safer if one of the others was with her as she searched so they could watch each other's backs, but by splitting up, the crew had a better chance of finding Dalek and could search the station faster than if they had paired up.

Searching the massive station for the past two arns, along with not having had any sleep or anything to eat for the past two solar days, had started to take its toll on Natalie.  Instead of searching for Dalek, she started to search for some food and a place to rest.  As she walked toward a kiosk she saw with food that actually looked edible, she glanced into a mirror that was attached to one of the four support posts that were holding up a canopy on a cart with different types of candies on display.  She noticed two Sebacean looking men (in the Uncharted Territories you never knew) whom she had seen in a restaurant she passed after initially coming onto the promenade.  They were walking behind her, and they didn't look like they were shopping, at least not for anything that didn't have breasts.

She turned to her left and stopped at a kiosk where an assortment of meats and vegetables were being cooked in pots and pans and discreetly glanced to her left to see if the two men were there.  She saw that they weren't, but wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

"Do you see anything you like?"

"Excuse me?" Natalie asked, realizing that someone was in the kiosk.  She looked up to find a little old lady who looked like a giant elf, but with black skin, silver eyes, and only four fingers on each hand.

"Do you see anything you like?" the proprietor repeated, hoping to make a sale.

"Oh, uh, yeah…" she answered as she looked down at the cooking foods.  She pointed at a pan with white meat and an assortment of vegetables being cooked in it and asked, "What kind of meat is that?"

"That's fellip meat."

"Fellip?  As in fellip nectar?"

"Yes."

Natalie was about to decline the food and ask for some fellip nectar, but suddenly a pair of arms wrapped around her, pinning her arms to her sides.  She struggled against her captor and yelled, "Get off me!"

"Now is that any way to talk to your saviors?" someone said from behind her.  He walked around to stand in front of her, but was facing the old proprietor, and sternly said, "Leave, now."

As the old woman shut off the stoves, the Sebacean turned around to face Natalie with a hungry grin on his face.

She saw that he was one of the men who had been following her and assumed that the man holding her, whom she couldn't see, was the other guy.  She spat, "My saviors?  What the hell are you talking about?"

"Yes, Rallin and I are your saviors…"

"Barig and I are here to save you from the Peacekeepers," the man confining her added as he licked her cheek.

She struggled against Rallin, but he was too strong.  She thought of the conversation she and John had before they left Talyn for the station and mumbled, "I knew it.  I'm gonna kill him."  She looked around to see if anyone was willing to help her, but everyone seemed to be going about their way, not caring that she was about to be kidnapped.  She sighed and added, "Look, boys, I'm not a Peacekeeper, all right?  Hell, I'm not even Sebacean."

As Barig sidled up to her, putting his hands on her hips, he said, "We'll take you away from here…"  He paused as he slid his hands down over her thighs and pressed himself against her, blowing into her ear.  "And we'll teach you what it's like to be free."

"Hey!" she screamed into his ear forcing him to jump back and cover his ear in pain.  "Are you fucked in the head?  Didn't you hear me when I said I wasn't a Peacekeeper?"

Rallin tightened his grip on her as Barig straightened up, walked towards her, and backhanded her, hard, across her cheek.  "You are coming with us, do you understand?"

"No, I don't," she said menacingly, and head-butted Rallin, forcing him to let her go.  Once her arms were free, she quickly pulled back and punched Barig as hard as she could in the face, knocking him down as he covered his nose.  She turned around to find that Rallin was beginning to recover, but before he could straighten up, she kicked him in the balls.  He cried out in pain and toppled over onto the floor.

"You broke my nose, you bitch," Barig screamed as he lay on the floor covering his bloodied nose.

"Aw, shut up," Natalie yelled as she grabbed one of the pans off the stove in the kiosk and hit Barig upside the head with it, knocking him out.

----------------------------------------------------

John slowly walked into a pleasure bar with his hand on his pulse pistol and searched for his latest target, Dalek.  He had questioned numerous proprietors, shoppers, security guards, prostitutes, and pushers to see if they had recently seen any Nebari come onto the station.  After two arns of searching and asking he finally learned from a shopper who had seen a Nebari fitting Dalek's description in a pleasure bar.  After searching for the bar for nearly half-an-arn, he had finally found it at the top of the first central pod.

He walked through the dancing crowd looking for Dalek while loud music played with strobes and lasers flashing, which wasn't helping him in any way.  As he walked, he noticed people at the bar, at tables, and in booths at the back of the bar drinking and taking all kinds of drugs.  They were sniffing, snorting, shooting and swallowing all sorts of things, and he even noticed some men and women secretly mixing drugs into their distracted partner's drinks.  He even noticed that some of the people in the booths at the back of the bar were having sex; some were fully clothed - in what little clothes they had on - some were partially nude, and others were completely naked, not caring that other people were there and watching.  In a way, the pleasure bar reminded John of one of the raves he had gone to in college.

As John walked to the back of the bar, he noticed Dalek seated at a table on a stool facing away from him.  He walked through and around dancing couples and threesomes, making his way toward the traitorous Nebari, the loud music covering his approach.  He flipped the clamp on his thigh holster, releasing his pulse pistol, and held it as his side, the darkness of the room camouflaging it.

"Hey, Dalek, how 'ya doin'?" John drawled loudly over the music as he took a seat at Dalek's left with his pulse pistol still at his side.

Dalek jumped when he heard John's voice and tried to quickly go for his pulse weapon, but anticipating his move, John shoved his pistol into Dalek's side.

"Ah, ah, ah," John warned as he shook his finger.  "Don't even think about it."

"Crichton," Dalek uttered as he relaxed slightly and gulped down the rest of his drink.  "I was wondering when you'd find me."

"Well, it's not like you made it very hard for us."

"I didn't have a choice.  Not with that piece of dren transport I took."

"They don't make them like they used to, huh?"

Dalek looked away for a microt to think about what John said and answered, "Yes, you could say that."

John sighed as he glanced at the all the people dancing, having a good time.  He turned back to Dalek and said, "Well, since you knew we'd be here, then I guess you know the question that's on my mind."

"Yes, I know…" Dalek started, but was interrupted when a drunken couple bumped into him and John, causing John to slip.  He lost his lock on Dalek and the Nebari took the opportunity to knock John to the ground, consequently knocking over the table, as he pulled out his pulse weapon and started to fire at John, the blue pulse blasts adding to the flashing lights inside the bar.  When the shots rang out, the partiers started to scream in fear and run for the door pushing each other out of the way, trying to get out before being hit by stray weapons fire.  John quickly recovered and dove onto a metal table flipping it onto its side, and hid behind it as he pulled out his other pistol.  He popped up and started firing at Dalek, forcing him to take cover behind another table.

Dalek quickly glanced at the entrance to the bar, using the strobe lights to help him see, and saw that the entrance was still blocked by the panicked crowd trying to get out all at the same time.  As Dalek looked back at the entrance, John ran out from behind the table and charged him.

He jumped over the table onto Dalek, sending the Nebari crashing to the floor.  Dalek quickly recovered and stood up near an exposed and haphazardly wired circuit breaker.  As he aimed his weapon at John, the Human rolled out and stood up with both his pistols trained on Dalek.

"So you want to know why I did what I did, huh?" Dalek asked.

"Yeah."

"Do you actually think I'm going to tell you?"

"Humor me."

"Very well.  I'm tired, Crichton."

"You're tired?"

"Yes.  I'm tired of fighting, I'm tired of taking orders, I'm tired of the Resistance, and I'm tired of the Establishment.  I'm just tired of it all and I want to disappear."

"That's it?" John asked in disbelief.  "Then why are you doing this?"

"It's easier to be tired and disappear when you're rich."

"Oh, naturally," John responded, incredulously.  "All right, then why did you kill Sylla?"

"Does it matter?"

"Yeah, it does."

Dalek angrily glared at John for a few microts and finally said, "She killed my brother.  He was an official with the Establishment and he came to take her to an orphanage after her parents were taken.  She and I were lovers at the time…  She didn't want to go with him, so she shot him."  Dalek paused as he closed his eyes for a microt to control his anger and went on.  "He might have been with the Establishment, but he was still my brother and I still loved him."

"Did she know he was your brother?"

"No."

"Frell," John said as he shook his head.  "She didn't deserve to die.  Hell, she didn't even know he was your brother."

"No.  She deserved to die," Dalek yelled back.

John remained silent after Dalek's outburst as he icily glared at the Nebari.  Changing the subject before being clouded by his own anger, he said, "So, who are you selling to?"

"Does it matter?"

"No.  I just like to know who my competition is."

"Well, he's right there," Dalek said, and motioned with his eyes to the figure dressed in black suddenly standing next to John who pulled out a pulse pistol and placed the barrel next to John's temple.

"Hello, Crichton," Crais said.

=================================

"My boy, Crais," John drawled as he turned slightly to look at his nemesis.  "Isn't this a 'pleasant' surprise?"

"That's Captain Crais to you, human," Crais answered, pressing the barrel even harder against John's temple for emphasis.

"Whatever you say, Cap'n Crunch.  So, I guess you still got that implant in your head and you're still Scorpy's bitch, huh?"

"I have no implant, Crichton."

"Oh, yeah?  Then why the hell are you with the Peacekeepers again?"

"I have always been with the Peacekeepers.  Previously, I was working as a disrupter under Scorpius' orders.  But then he ordered me to return to his Gammak base to place Talyn in Peacekeeper custody."

"Do you really think anyone's going to buy that?"

Crais just glared at John.

John shook his head and turned back to Dalek with Crais' pistol still at his temple.  "Do you even know what's on that data crystal you're going to sell?"

"Does it matter?" Dalek answered.  "The Peacekeepers are going to pay me a fortune for it and I can 'retire'."

"Well, what if the instructions to create a virus designed to kill Nebari was on that crystal and the Peacekeepers made that virus, released it into the galaxy, and it infected all Nebari?"

"Do you think I care about them?"

"Oh, that's right…you're tired.  So, you just don't care if your species gets killed off?"

"No," Dalek answered, annoyed.

"All right.  Then what if it was just you?  What if you were infected?  What would you do then?"

"I'd buy a cure."

"They're paying you that much?"

"Yes."

"Thought so…"

"Enough, Crichton," Crais said pointedly, interrupting John.  "You will speak no further.  You are under arrest for the murder of hundreds of Peacekeepers, destruction and theft of Peacekeeper property, and for the murder of forty-five people on a commerce planet in the Korith System.  There is no avoiding it.  Scorpius will be very pleased to have you back at his Gammak base where he will rip your mind apart."

"Don't count on it," John said and grabbed Crais' arm, twisting it around as he gave Dalek a Pantak jab with his other hand, knocking the Nebari to the ground.

Crais tried to fire at John, but missed as John planted Crais' arm under his and kicked the captain in the gut.  Before Crais could recover, John threw him at Dalek, who was trying to get up, causing the Nebari to fall to the floor on his back with Crais on top.  Dalek, still in a firing position, shot at John forcing him to run and dive behind the bar for cover.  As John dove, Crais stood up and began firing at John, but he stood up on top of Dalek's free hand causing the Nebari to cry out in pain.

In retaliation, Dalek kicked Crais in his side and sent him crashing into the exposed circuit breaker.  Making contact with the circuit breaker, Crais yelled in excruciating pain as electricity coursed through his body and sparks shot out of the open panel.  The lights and music immediately shut off, engulfing the bar in darkness save for the bright sparks from the circuit breaker.  The short circuit left the first three levels powerless, while Crais fell to the ground unconscious and at the brink of death with nearly half his body burnt.

Taking the opportunity, John jumped out from behind the bar with his pistols drawn.  Knowing that there was nothing between Dalek and him that would hinder him, he ran in a straight line towards the general vicinity of where Dalek was as his eyes adjusted.  Unexpectedly, John tripped over something in the darkness and landed on the floor.  He turned and saw a silhouette at his feet that was trying to get up.  Knowing it was Dalek, he raised his pistols as the Nebari turned his head to see who had kicked him.  John hit Dalek on both temples with the barrels of his pistols, knocking the man out.  Hearing a thud, John tried to see Dalek in the darkness, but it was difficult with the black floor.  Finding Dalek, John kicked him in his head with the heel of his boot to make sure that he was out.  He crawled up to Dalek and gave the Nebari a thorough pat down to find the data crystal, but it wasn't on him.

With a sigh John stood up and mumbled, "Where the hell are you hiding it, you bastard?"

He stared down at Dalek for a few microts then walked over to the bar to retrieve a flashlight he saw behind it, but not before kicking Dalek in the gut out of spite.  He walked behind the bar as he reholstered his pistol behind his back, bent down slightly to reach underneath it and fumbled around with various items including a cord before brushing the handle of the flashlight.  Sliding his hand over the handle to grab it, he flipped the switch to activate it, and aimed the beam down around the pleasure bar.  All he saw was overturned tables and chairs with cups, bottles, and broken glass scattered on the floor.

With a sigh, he shone the beam of light down on Dalek, saw that he wasn't moving, and raised his pulse pistol, steadily aiming it at the treacherous Nebari.  He gently squeezed the trigger, wanting to kill the little piece of dren for betraying them and for killing Sylla.  But he couldn't do it, at least not at that moment.  They still needed the data crystal and only Dalek knew where it was.  Only after the retrieval of the crystal would Dalek pay the price for what he had done.

Hearing a groan to his right, John quickly shone the beam and aimed his pistol in the general direction and saw Crais sprawled out on the floor, his back a bloody mess.

"So long, Crais," John said as he looked down at him.  He bent down to grab the cord he had felt before and walked out from behind the bar and added, "I can't say it was nice knowing you."

Activating his comms, John said, "I've got Dalek.  We're in a pleasure bar on the first level.  But he doesn't have the crystal on him.  I'll bring him down to the hangar so meet me there."

As he walked towards Dalek, John tried to holster his pistol, but someone suddenly knocked him over, causing him to lose his pistol, the cord, and the flashlight.  The flashlight hit the floor with the beam shining in his direction.  Recovering quickly, John immediately flipped over and looked up to see who his attacker was.  It was a Peacekeeper standing at John's feet in a red and black command level uniform with a pulse pistol in hand aimed down at his head.

"Who the frell are you?" John asked, annoyed.

"I'm Lieutenant Braca."

"Is that supposed to impress me?"

"Shut up, Crichton.  Where's Captain Crais?"

"He's over there," John said, motioning back with his head where Crais lay.  "And, aren't you a little old to be a Lieutenant?"

Braca stomped down, hard, on John's abdomen and sternly said, "That's enough, Crichton."

Gasping for air, John rolled onto his side while curling up into a ball and protectively wrapped his arms around his abdomen.

"So, you're the infamous John Crichton?" Braca said contemptuously, as he watched John get on all fours at his feet.  "You're not much, are you?"

Rearing back with a vicious grin, Braca stomped down on John's face, knocking him back to the ground with a bloody nose.

John groaned and brought his hand up to wipe away the blood trickling from his nose and over his lips while Braca laughed sadistically.  Again, John got on his hands and knees, pushing himself off the floor, but once more Braca reared back and stomped down on him.  John cried out in pain as Braca's boot came in contact with his injured left shoulder and he collapsed onto the floor again, his eyes shut and teeth gritted.

"I though you'd be tougher than that," Braca stated, still sneering as he reached down to remove John's pulse pistol from behind his back and threw it off to the side.  "I was hoping for more of a fight from you."

Seething, John looked up at the pompous Lieutenant.  He quickly turned over onto his back, kicking the pistol out of Braca's hand and onto the floor at the other end of the bar.  Turning onto his side, John kicked Braca's legs out from under him, sending the Peacekeeper crashing to the floor.  As Braca hit, John ruthlessly kicked Braca in the side of the head with the heel of his boot and swiftly stood up.  Braca rolled, ignoring the immense pain from John's kick, and pulled out a dagger with the beam from the flashlight reflecting off the blade as he stood up.

Crouching slightly in a defensive posture, John kept his hands out in front of him for protection as Braca held the knife, looking for an opening in which to stab John.  Thrusting at the human, Braca swung his knife in a wide arc slashing at John's chest, but John jumped back, grabbed Braca's wrist, twisting it forward, and kicked him in the gut.  Braca grunted and staggered back slightly as he bent over, protectively wrapping his free arm around his abdomen.  He recovered quickly and straightened up, turned into John, and backhanded the human across his cheek, causing him to stagger back, spin around from the impact, and lose his grip on Braca's wrist.  As John stumbled back, Braca swung at John slicing open his right sleeve, but John jumped back enough to avoid being cut open.

John looked down to inspect the tear and drawled, his southern accent more pronounced, "Oh, c'mon, Braca."  He looked Braca in the eye and added, "You're a Peacekeeper, right?  I thought you'd be better'n that."

Enraged, Braca charged at him, but John spun around at the last microt, stuck his leg out, and tripped Braca.  He fell to the floor with a loud grunt and quickly turned over to look at a snickering John.

"Braca," John drawled, his southern accent heavy.  "You're a Lieutenant in the Peacekeepers.  You're better than that.  I know you can do better than that.  And I know you're not going to let some 'inferior' Human get the best of ya."

Braca, infuriated, deftly flipped the dagger over in his right hand, gripping the blade, and suddenly threw it at John.

"Frell," John yelled and jumped out of the way, but the blade buried itself to the hilt in John's right arm in front of the tear in his sleeve causing him to cry out.  He hit the floor hard with a grunt as blood poured out of his arm.  Braca slowly stood up and watched as John curled up in pain, his eyes shut and teeth gritted, shakily reaching across his chest to pull the knife out of his arm.

Arrogantly strutting up to John, Braca sneered and said, "I am better, Human."

John, ignoring the pain in his arm, flipped the dagger over in his hand, gripped the blade, and unsteadily threw it at Braca.

Caught off guard, Braca tried to jump away at the last second, but the dagger embedded itself in his left thigh.  He fell back onto the ground as he howled in pain, and curled up while clutching his thigh.

"If you were better," John started, his voice hoarse as he stood up with his right arm planted against his abdomen.  "Then you should've seen that coming."

"Frell you, Crichton," Braca snarled.

"Oh, please, take it back?" John asked, feigning hurt, while he covered his heart with his hands.

Braca let out an annoyed sigh as he reached down to pull the dagger out and prepared himself to throw it back at John, but John ran over to where one of his pulse pistols lay, grabbed it with his left hand, and aimed it at Braca.  In defeat, Braca threw his dagger off to the side.

"Please, take it back.  I can't bear the pain your words inflict," John said with a tiny grin, knowing that he was annoying the Lieutenant.

Braca sat up, looking into John's eyes, fury burning deep within him from being defeated by an inferior species.

Unexpectedly, a sound came from Crais' general direction, and John jumped in surprise and turned, aiming his pistol toward the sound, just in case Crais had woken up.  He saw that Crais was still out cold and that a goblet was rolling around on the floor.

Taking the opportunity, Braca jumped up, ignoring the pain in his thigh, and charged John causing the human to lose his pistol, again.  They both grunted as they hit the ground and Braca jabbed John's wounded arm with his thumb, grinding it into his arm.  John cried out and shot an enraged glare at Braca with bloodshot eyes.  In retaliation, John jabbed Braca's wound with two of his fingers and dug them into his thigh.  Braca yelled as he lifted his thumb out of John's arm and punched him, giving the astronaut a bloody lip.

Rolling back, John quickly took his fingers out of Braca's thigh and stood up.  In his rage, he no longer felt the searing pain in his arm.  Braca rolled back as well and shakily stood up, putting all his weight on his right leg while blood poured out of his left thigh.

Lunging at John, Braca punched his human opponent in the gut, causing John to bend over.  Lifting up his arm, Braca elbowed John on the back of his neck, forcing him down onto his knees in pain.  Retaliating, John elbowed Braca in his midsection, then stood up and gave the Peacekeeper a Pantak jab with his injured arm, with hardly any effect.  Braca stumbled back slightly but didn't fall from the weak blow, and tried to give John a Pantak jab of his own.  John blocked the move, grabbing Braca's arm and twisting it around, arching Braca's back.  With his left hand, John gave Braca another Pantak jab to the forehead, putting him in a daze.  John kicked Braca in the gut as he loosened his grip slightly on the Sebacean's arm, causing him to fall to his knees.  With Braca hunched over and on his knees, John backhanded him across his temple knocking him out.

With a tired sigh, John gripped Braca's sleeve and let go of his arm letting him fall to the floor in a bloody mess with a thud with his sleeve tearing off his jacket at the seam.  John looked over at Crais to make sure he was still out or hopefully dead as he wrapped Braca's sleeve around his arm as a tourniquet, then brought his hand up to wipe the blood off of his lips and chin.  He flicked his hand, flinging droplets of blood around the room, and walked around the pleasure bar to find his pistols.  He reholstered them, walked over to the bar and sat down on the floor leaning back against it with his legs outstretched in front of him, figuring he had a few microts to rest.

Leaning his head back against the bar, John closed his eyes and said, "What I wouldn't give for a cold beer right about now."

Unbeknownst to John, Dalek had awakened while he was looking around the bar for his pistols.  In the darkness of his area of the floor in the bar, Dalek knew that John couldn't see him.  But he wasn't going to take any chances and cautiously moved his hand to reach into a pouch on his belt.  He slowly pulled out a micro-syringe and pushed the needle through his skin on the inside of his wrist.  Soundlessly depressing the plunger, Dalek injected himself with a stimulant that gave him the strength of three Nebari and waited.

Groaning, John stood up, stretched, and made his way to where he had dropped the cord.  He bent down to pick up the cord and as well as the flashlight while he tiredly walked towards the Nebari.

Dalek listened as the footsteps came closer and closer and remained perfectly still, waiting for John to get close enough.

Stepping up to Dalek, John bent down to push the Nebari onto his abdomen, but Dalek suddenly turned over and stabbed John in his burnt left side, leaving the syringe halfway embedded there.  John cried out and stumbled back to his side as he brought his hand up to take the syringe out, but Dalek spun around on the floor kicking John's legs out from under him before he could remove it.  Dalek shot up as John reached around to pull out the syringe, picked him up before he could pull it out, and punched him in the side above the syringe, knocking the breath out of him and breaking two ribs.  John dropped to his knees again as he tried to catch his breath, but his broken ribs and the syringe in his side sent sharp searing pain through his body every time he inhaled.  Almost immediately, Dalek bent down to pick John up by his collar and threw him across the room over the bar.

His breathing labored, John tried to get up but collapsed onto the floor.  Instead, he struggled to turn over onto his back, hearing Dalek's heavy footsteps slowly getting closer and closer.  He pulled out the syringe with a muffled cry through gritted teeth and threw the syringe off to the side.  He grabbed a rag that was behind the bar as quickly as he could, stuffed it into the hole in his side and, through clenched teeth, he whispered, "Oh, God."

As he heard Dalek's footsteps nearing, Crichton grabbed the top of the bar and pulled himself up into a seated position.  He hazily looked behind the bar and saw a discarded welding torch.  With a crooked smile he reached for the torch, grabbed a bottle of raslac, took a huge swig and held it without swallowing, and threw the bottle away.  He hoisted himself up onto his knees and rested his forearm on the bar as he icily glared at a slowly approaching Dalek.  Certain that he had the Nebari's complete attention, John brought up the torch for Dalek to see.  Dalek saw it in the dim light that the flashlight provided and stopped dead in his tracks, not knowing what John was planning on doing with it.

John flipped the switch on the torch, lighting it, as he and Dalek stared each other down.  As he slowly brought the flame in front of his mouth, John gave Dalek a cheeky wink.  Realizing what John was planning, Dalek suddenly charged at him with a battle cry, hoping to stop him.  John spewed out the raslac into the flame sending a ball of fire at Dalek as he charged but, unfortunately, the Nebari ducked rapidly before the fireball could reach him.

As John threw away the torch he reached for his pistol and brought it around to fire, but Dalek shot up off the ground after seeing John going for his gun.  With the stimulants still flowing through his veins, Dalek made a run for the door knowing that with his increased speed and agility he could dodge the injured human's shots.  John tried firing at Dalek, but his blood loss made him too slow to follow the Nebari, who suddenly seemed like Superman.  He watched helplessly as Dalek ran out of the pleasure bar and out of his line of sight.

Activating his comms, John tiredly yelled, "Dalek got away…"

Aeryn heard the pain behind John's voice as she roamed the second central pod.  Not hiding her concern, she asked, "John, are you all right?"

"No," he responded with a cough.  He shakily stood up and slowly jogged towards the exit, stumbling every once in a while, with his arm protectively wrapped around his abdomen to hold the rag in his side in place.  "I think he's heading for the transport hanger so get there before he does, but be careful."

----------------------------------------------------

Dalek hurried into the transport hangar, his feet pounding on the bulkheads beneath him, and ran up to the first ship he saw.  It was small, silver, one-man fighter with an elliptical center containing the cockpit, and three oblong triangular shaped winglets.  Dalek hoped that the canopy wasn't locked and that it didn't have a security system.  Unfortunately for him, the canopy was locked and he didn't have the time to override the locking mechanism.

He ran around the bow of the craft to check the transport on the next pad over.  As he ran, someone from behind him shouted, "Stop right there."

From the accent, Dalek knew it was one of the Peacekeepers Crais and Braca had come with and he smiled.

"Keep your hands out to your sides and turn around," the armor-clad commando ordered as he stood in front of a Marauder and aimed his rifle at the bloody Nebari.  The Peacekeeper watched as the Nebari turned around, and from the description Lt. Braca had given him, the Peacekeeper knew that the Nebari was the person they were doing business with.

"Is there something I can do for you?" Dalek asked with an innocent look on his face.

"Where are Captain Crais and Lieutenant Braca?"

"Who?  Crais and Braca?  I'm sorry, but I don't know them."

"You double crossed them didn't you?"  The commando turned his rifle up to full power and yelled into his headset, "Corporal, bring out the restraints.  I'm placing this lower lifeform under arrest."

Dalek stood there with a small grin on his face as two Peacekeepers approached him and waited to make his move.  The commando with the rifle stood to his right as the corporal came up on his left and grabbed his left hand to put on the restraint.  Suddenly, Dalek grabbed the commando's wrist before he could put on the restraint, twisting it around, and threw him into the other commando.  As they stood there momentarily dazed, Dalek tore the pulse rifle out of the Peacekeeper's hands, quickly thrust the barrel into the corporal's gut, then immediately brought the rifle back, jabbing the other Peacekeeper in the gut with the butt-plate of the rifle.  Next, he rapidly thrust the barrel of the rifle through the corporal's visor into his eye, and swung back to thrust the butt-plate through the other commando's visor, breaking his cheek and knocking him out.  Swiftly turning back to the dazed corporal, Dalek took the shoulder strap, wrapped it around the Peacekeeper's neck and yanked, snapping the commando's neck, and flipping him over onto his back.

Dalek knelt to search the corporal and found his pulse pistol, several chakan oil cartridges, and a few grenades.  He grabbed the Peacekeeper's pistol and continued his search, but he immediately stopped when he felt the barrel of a pulse rifle pressed up against the back of his neck.

"Stop and stand up, slowly," another Peacekeeper ordered menacingly.

Dalek did as the commando ordered, but he still had the pulse pistol in his hand, hidden from the Peacekeeper's view, and had palmed one of the dead commando's grenades.

"Turn around with your arms out to your side."

Dalek did as he was ordered and turned around to his left, keeping the pulse pistol out of view of the commando.  As he turned, he pulled out the pin on the grenade with his thumb and deftly stuffed it into the commando's belt with a grin, without the man noticing the movement.

"What are you smiling at?"

Slowly letting his gaze fall, Dalek looked down at the grenade in the Peacekeeper's belt with that grin still on his face.

Following the Nebari's gaze, the soldier looked down, saw the active grenade stuffed into his belt, and yelled, "Oh, frell!"

With the stimulants still active in his system, Dalek grabbed the commando's arm, spun around while still holding onto the armor-clad soldier, and threw him across the hangar.  The peacekeeper never made it to the other end.  In mid-air, the grenade went off, disintegrating the Sebacean and spraying the entire hangar with his blood and internal organs.

"Some superior species," Dalek said with contempt as he turned around to walk back to the other dead Peacekeepers.  Knowing that the explosion had alerted the remaining two Peacekeepers in the Marauder along with station security, he knelt down to grab a pulse rifle and stood up to wait.  As the two remaining commandos jumped out of the Marauder, Dalek shot them.  They were dead before they ever hit the ground.

With a tired sigh and feeling the effects of the stimulant wearing off, Dalek walked towards the Marauder to take it, figuring that it was the best ship in the hangar to boost.  He didn't get very far.

"Dalek, stop right there," Stark shouted, aiming his pulse rifle at the Nebari's head.

"Stark," Dalek cheerfully greeted with a tired but sinister smile.  "I was wondering when I would see you again."

"You and I are not friends, so do not act as if we are.  Now drop your weapons.  You're coming with me."

"Of course," Dalek answered, faking submission, and held the pulse rifle out to his side.  He dropped the pulse rifle, but he immediately brought around the pulse pistol he held, aiming it at Stark.  Before the Banik could react, Dalek squeezed the trigger.

=================================

With pain coursing through his body, Braca slowly regained consciousness and groaned as he brought his hands up to rub his eyes.  He had never been so humiliated in his life and he would make Crichton pay for it the next time they met.  Opening his eyes, Braca saw his left sleeve was missing and sighed.  Thinking that he would make Crichton pay for desecrating the Peacekeeper uniform as well, he said, "That frelling human."

With a groan, Braca slowly sat up, unhooked the clasps on his jacket, and threw it off to the side wondering why Crichton would disgrace him in such a manner.  He looked around the pleasure bar and, as he assumed, Crichton and the Nebari were gone.

Unexpectedly, a soft groan rang out and Braca turned to see who it was.  He saw Crais lying on the floor with a burnt and bloodied back and remembered that the Captain had been electrocuted.  Braca slowly stood up and stumbled over to his captain, knelt down at his side, and checked his pulse to make sure he was still alive.  Crais' pulse was weak, but he had one nonetheless.  There wasn't a medical kit in the bar, Braca was sure of it, and in order to elude tracking neither he nor Crais had brought a comm unit.  There wasn't much he could do but try to wake Crais up.

"Captain?" he asked, placing his hand on his commanding officer's arm.  "Captain Crais?"

Groaning again, Crais slowly regained consciousness and tried to get up, but fell back onto the floor.  After a few microts, Crais, with a coarse voice, asked, "What happened?  I can't remember anything after finding Crichton here."

"You were electrocuted, sir.  When I got here you had already been injured and Crichton had knocked out the Nebari…"

"Crichton?  Where is he?  Did you capture him?" Crais asked as he stood up.

"No, sir," Braca responded, ashamed, but quickly covered it up.  "He incapacitated me and escaped.  The Nebari has escaped as well."

"How could you let him escape?" Crais asked as he started to walk towards the exit with Braca at his side.

"Crichton incapacitated me before I could take the Nebari into custody, sir."

Crais stopped abruptly, turned to Braca, and yelled, "I don't mean the Nebari.  I meant Crichton.  How could you let him, an inferior species, get away?"

"Sir, he incapacitated me in some way.  He must have had a weapon," Braca lied, hiding his nervousness.  "That had to have been the only way it could have happened."

"Very well," Crais growled.  "Access the station's comms channels and call in the command carrier.  I want our commandos to land and search for Crichton.  Tell them to tear this station apart if they have to."

"I'm afraid I can't do that, Captain," Braca replied, defiantly.  "Our orders state that we are to retrieve the data crystal.  Under no circumstances are we to deviate from our mission."

Braca watched as Crais visibly twitched at his words, almost as if his words had inflicted pain.

"Yes," Crais calmly said, straightening up.  "You are correct, Lieutenant.  But nonetheless, call in the command carrier.  Have our forces come aboard and seal the station.  Also, I want all outgoing ships stopped and searched.  We are going to find the Nebari and we are going recover the data crystal."

----------------------------------------------------

Stumbling into the transport hangar, John looked first to his right and immediately saw a Marauder with two dead Peacekeepers lying beneath it.  He turned to investigate, but suddenly heard Aeryn say Stark's name from behind him.  Turning around, John saw that the bulkheads of the hanger and the ships lined up against them were covered in blood.  He then saw Stark lying unconscious on the floor with a pulse wound in his gut.  Aeryn and Natalie were kneeling by his side, bandaging his wound and trying to awaken him while D'Argo looked on.

John stepped closer to the person who in a short time had grown to be a good friend and whispered, "Oh, my God."

Aeryn looked up from Stark, knowing John was there.  But she hadn't expected to see John in the condition he was in.  In shock she inspected his body with her eyes:  his pale complexion, bruised and bloodied face, a tourniquet wrapped around his right arm over a stab wound, and his right hand holding a bloody rag in place over his left side.

Natalie glanced at Aeryn and, seeing the look on the Sebacean's face, she turned around to see John standing there.  In surprise, she mumbled, "Oh, shit."

D'Argo heard Natalie and turned to look at her.  Seeing that she and Aeryn were looking behind him, he turned to see John.

"What the hezmana happened to you?" D'Argo asked.

"How is he?" John asked, ignoring D'Argo.

"We don't know," Aeryn answered, still in shock at John's condition, as she stood up and walked over to John.  "He's breathing, but he doesn't have a pulse."

"He doesn't have a pulse?" John asked incredulously.

"No, he doesn't.  What happened to you?"

"I ran into Crais and Braca.  After that, Dalek decided to use me as a punching bag.  I don't know what the hell he did, but one microt he's normal, the next he's like Superman and was throwing me around like a rag doll.  So where is he?  Did you get him?"

"We should get you back to Talyn," Aeryn said, concerned, as she reached up to touch John's face.  "You may have other serious injuries that need to be taken care of immediately."

"Aeryn, I'll be fine," he said taking Aeryn's hand.  "But where's Dalek?"

"John, forget Dalek," she sternly said, looking John right in the eye.  "You're injured, severely.  We have to make sure that you're okay."

Unexpectedly, Stark let out a groan attracting everyone's attention.  His eye fluttered open then immediately snapped shut, his pupil still dilated.

"Stark, open your eye," D'Argo gently persuaded.  Stark did as D'Argo requested, and the Luxan asked, "Are you all right?"

"I don't know.  Am I?"

"You tell us," Natalie said.  "For a while there you didn't have a pulse but you were still breathing and you've got a hole in your stomach the size of a grapefruit."

"Yes," Stark started as he slowly sat up with D'Argo's help, neither of them knowing what a grapefruit was.  "This body is but a shell…"

Without warning, the engines on the Marauder powered up, interrupting Stark and drawing everyone's attention toward it.

"Dalek," John yelled, knowing that the Nebari was piloting the craft as it lifted off the ground.

"Dren," Aeryn yelled, knowing the kind of firepower Dalek now had at his disposal with the Marauder's weapon systems and the weapons stored in the ship's cargo hold.

It slowly pulled out onto the runway as John and Aeryn ran back to the others and took cover behind the closest transport in the hangar.  They watched as the Peacekeeper vessel slowly taxied on the runway making it's way towards the closed hangar doors.

Hearing the craft's main cannons powering up and knowing that they wouldn't be able to make it to the transport pod, or out of the hangar, or into another ship in time, Aeryn yelled, "Hang onto something."

"And exhale," John added, using what he learned from space flight training.  "Make sure there isn't any air in your lungs."

As they tightly held onto landing struts, exposed conduits, and anything else they could find on the transport, Dalek fired the Marauder's cannons.  The shots hit their mark, disintegrating the hangar doors with the ensuing fireball dissipating in the cold vacuum of space as the dead Peacekeepers lying in the hangar were sucked out.  The crew held on for dear life as the vacuum tried to suck them out into space, but Stark, in his weakened state, was yanked off the strut he was clutching to.  D'Argo quickly reached out and grabbed Stark's arm.  As strong as he was, D'Argo still couldn't pull Stark in and was losing his grip.  The others, as far away from D'Argo as they were, could do nothing but watch as D'Argo desperately tried to hold onto the Banik.  Stark was pulled from D'Argo's grasp and was sucked across the hangar while Dalek made his way in the Marauder towards the massive hole he had created.  Suddenly, a translucent purplish energy shield went up just microts before Stark was completely sucked out and he fell to the floor gasping for air while the hangar repressurized.

"Frell," Dalek yelled as he hit the navigation console, cracking it with his enhanced strength.  He slid over to the weapon's console in his seat and targeted the force field, punching in the commands with such force that he nearly cracked it as well, certain that the weapons on the Marauder would be more than enough to take down the field.

"Hang on to your ass," Natalie yelled as she heard the Marauder's weapons powering up again and watched Stark as he scrambled towards one of the fighters in the hangar to clutch a landing strut.  She gripped the power conduit she had hung onto before and exhaled as the others did the same.

Dalek hit the command to fire and the weapons' energy discharges left their barrels, streaking towards the field to destroy it.  As the weapons fire hit their target, the field unexpectedly absorbed the discharges and expelled them into space.

"No," Dalek yelled as he watched his shots harmlessly dissipate into space and nearly punched the weapons console in rage, but stopped himself as the stimulant began to wear off, realizing that not only was punching the console futile, but stupid as well.

Standing up after nothing happened, John, Aeryn, and the others looked at the force field, realizing that it was still intact and that the Marauder wasn't going anywhere.

"So what do we do now?" Natalie asked, drawing everyone's attention.  Seeing their incredulous expressions, she added, "C'mon, it's not like he's just going to give up."

"We know that, Natalie," John responded.

"Then you could've at least said something instead of making me look like a moron, you dumb ass."

John just sighed and turned back to look at the Marauder.

Thinking for a few microts, Dalek looked out into the hangar from his position at the weapons console and watched John standing there looking at him.  With a small grin growing on his face, Dalek transferred weapons control to the navigation console, slid over, and turned the bulky craft around one hundred eighty degrees on its axis to face the rear wall of the hangar.  He immediately charged the Marauder's cannons and fired at the rear wall, disintegrating it and revealing a massive conduit running perpendicular to the hangar which contained pipes, smaller conduits, and level riser shafts.

"Frell," D'Argo exclaimed as he watched the Marauder fly into the exposed conduit and disappear.

"Natalie, contact Chiana and have her bring in Talyn.  I want the four of you to get back to him now," John yelled, and turned to run toward his Prowler, but ended up stumbling towards it.

With a sigh, Aeryn ran to catch up with John and helped him to the Prowler.

"Aeryn, what the hell are you doing?" he asked as she helped him.

"I know I can't stop you from going after him, so I'm going with you to make sure you don't get yourself killed," she stated as they reached the fighter.  "And get in the back.  I'm flying."

----------------------------------------------------

"Chiana, pick up," the Nebari heard through the comms as she stood on Talyn's bridge

"I'm here, Natalie," she responded.  "What's happening?  Talyn saw an explosion in the hangar."

"That was Dalek.  He stole a Marauder and shot out the hangar doors while we were in the hangar," Natalie yelled.  "I'd love to stick him in a vacuum and see how he likes it.  Look, just forget that.  John and Aeryn went after him in the Prowler, but Stark's hurt so we need you and Talyn to dock with the station and come pick us up."

"We'll be there in a few microts."  Chiana cut the transmission and said, "All right, Talyn, let's go."

Talyn just sat there not doing anything.

Chiana turned to look back at Talyn's beta channel, walked over to stand under it, and said, "C'mon, Talyn, let's go.  What are you waiting for?"

Talyn didn't respond.

"Talyn?  What the frell's wrong with you?  C'mon, let's go."

Talyn activated his tactical functions and holographic imager on the main console, showing Chiana why he wasn't moving.

"Frell," she whispered.  She slowly walked to the console as she watched the holographic image of a Peacekeeper command carrier slowly revolving above the main console.  "Talyn," she soberly addressed.  "If the Peacekeepers are here, then we have to get them now.  So let's go."

Talyn responded in the negative and left on the image of the command carrier.

"Look, Talyn, if the Peacekeepers are here then the others need us.  Natalie needs us, now.  Are you just going to let her and the others get captured?"

In response, Talyn activated main propulsion and sped towards the commerce station on a stealth trajectory.

----------------------------------------------------

"Where the frell is he?" John mumbled as he looked through the canopy at the pipes and shafts passing by them inside the narrow conduit, trying to find the Marauder.

"I don't know," Aeryn answered.  "But he couldn't have gotten this far.  The Marauder is too large to travel through here."

Watching as a cross junction about half a metra ahead of her slowly came up on them with the conduit narrowing even further, Aeryn pulled back on the throttle to slow down and allow more time to maneuver inside the narrow conduit.

She felt John nod off slightly behind her and turned to look at him.  She knew that if he had trouble maintaining consciousness, his condition had worsened, but she was still shocked to see how bad he was.  She saw that his complexion was even paler and looked down to see that blood was seeping through the rag in his side.

"Frell, John, we have to get you out of here now," she stated as she glanced back out into the conduit to make sure there weren't any obstructions she hadn't seen before as they came up on the junction.

Without warning, two frag discharges passed across their bow as they passed the T-junction and, with the scanners, Aeryn saw the Marauder go through the junction behind them.

"Crap," John yelled as the Prowler shook from the turbulence of passing through the discharges' wake.  "We need to get turned around," he mumbled tiredly.

"Frell Dalek, all right?  You need help," she yelled.

"We're going after Dalek, Aeryn.  If you're not going to help, I'm going to get out and go after him myself."

"Frell," she sighed, knowing he would do it no matter what she did or said.  She turned to glare at him and added, "But if you die…"

John flashed a small knowing smile at her and replied, "I don't doubt that you would, baby."

Going into a T-junction, Aeryn swung the prowler around in a small arc and headed back down the conduit at full speed.  Slowing, Aeryn banked the Prowler into the conduit that Dalek had tried to escape down and pushed the throttle to full power, pushing the Prowler to its limits.  The Prowler sped dangerously down the conduit to catch up with the bulky and sluggish Marauder.  Unexpectedly, Aeryn pulled back on the throttle throwing John forward into her.  She then pulled back on the 'stick' to dive under a pipe and threw John back into the cockpit's rear bulkhead.  As Aeryn pulled back up to avoid another pipe, John was pressed back into the rear bulkhead by the artificial gravity of the station and nearly blacked out, weakened as he was by blood loss.

John shook his head to stay conscious and asked, "What the hell was that for?"

"What?"  Aeryn responded, not turning back to look at him.  "You didn't see those pipes with your blue eyes and twenty/twenty vision?"

"Very..."

"Frell," she immediately said, interrupting him.

"What?"

"The conduit splits into two up ahead."  She turned to look at him and added, "You can't see that?"

"No, I can't," he answered, his vision blurred.  "But, of course, my eyesight isn't as good as yours."

With an annoyed sigh, Aeryn shook her head and turned to look back out through the canopy.  "So which way do you want to go?  Left or right?"

After a microt, they simultaneously said, "Right."

Turning the 'stick' slightly, Aeryn eased the Prowler into the right conduit and, as the conduit narrowed, she rolled onto her left side.  John looked above him through the canopy and saw the other conduit through the spaces between the pipes and shafts.

"There," Aeryn said, looking up and slightly ahead.  "Ahead of us in the other conduit."

John looked ahead in the next conduit over and said, "I see him."

"He's trying to get a weapons lock," Aeryn said, the Prowler's sensors alerting her to what Dalek was doing.

"Can he get one at this angle?"

"No, but he could manually fire and get lucky."

"Then let's hope he's broken a mirror lately."

"He's firing," she exclaimed.

John watched as the energy discharges from the Marauder's rear weapons headed straight for them but, instead, hit a fuel conduit.  The explosion rocked the station and sent a massive fireball in all directions.

"Hold on," Aeryn said, tightly gripping the 'stick' as she tried to keep the Prowler steady while the explosion rocked the tiny craft, then quickly dissipated from lack of oxygen.

"It's diverging," John exclaimed as he watched the Marauder turn left following the curve of the conduit.

"I see it," Aeryn said calmly, nodding at the end of the conduit opening into space.  Speeding out of the conduit, Aeryn pulled up to avoid crashing into one of the outer conduits connecting two of the pods.

"Oh, dren!" John yelled as he saw another Prowler in front of them, barreling toward them and about to collide with them.

=================================

"I'm here, Natalie," Chiana responded.  "What's happening?  Talyn saw an explosion in the hangar."

"That was Dalek," Natalie answered as she looked at the gaping hole in the rear of the hangar.  "He stole a Marauder and shot out the hangar doors while we were in the hangar.  I'd love to stick him in a vacuum and see how he likes it."  She sighed softly and looked at Stark being supported by D'Argo.  "Look, just forget that.  John and Aeryn went after him in the Prowler, but Stark's hurt so we need you and Talyn to dock with the station and come pick us up."

"We'll be there in a few microts," Chiana responded before Natalie cut the transmission.

Turning to Stark, Natalie asked, "Can you walk?"

"Yes," the Banik replied.

"Without D'Argo's help, I mean."

Stark looked despondently at her and reached behind him to grab a pulse pistol.  Offering it to her grip first, he said, "You'll need this."

Remembering the Peacekeeper she had been forced to kill, Natalie put her hands up and backed off slightly.  "Uh, thanks…but uh, no thanks," she stammered.  "Guns and me are like beer and booze; we just don't mix."

"Natalie, you have to take it.  You need a weapon to help protect yourself," D'Argo pressed.  "I'm not going to be able to protect Stark and you while I'm helping him.  That's unless you want to help him?"

"Uh, no.  I think I'll pass on that," she answered, not wanting to be anywhere near the bizarre Stykari.  She glanced hesitantly at D'Argo and Stark and looked down at the pulse pistol.  She sighed and said, "Fine."

As she took the pistol Stark said, "The power level is already set.  All you have to do is pull the trigger."

"Right," she responded dejectedly.

"We have to go - now," D'Argo announced.  "Station security will be here any microt."

"Then let's go," she said.

As D'Argo held up Stark, they turned around and walked towards the exit with Natalie bringing up the rear while throngs of people ran into the hangar trying to get to their ships.  The trio shoved their way past various aliens of both familiar and unfamiliar species and, fortunately, the aliens were so intent on getting off the station that they didn't care or even notice that D'Argo was shoving them out of the way left and right.

Suddenly, station security showed up to help with crowd control and, unbeknownst to the trio, to stop all outgoing ships as per the Peacekeepers' orders. They began pushing their way through the massive crowd of people, all trying to get out at the same time.  Seeing the security guards, D'Argo ducked down slightly to avoid being seen and guided Stark toward the wall and behind a large vertical waste pipe, with Natalie following.

"What is it with cops always showing up after everything's said and done?" Natalie mumbled.

The three watched and listened as security tried to calm the frightened crowd that was quickly becoming a panicked mob on the brink of killing anyone just to get off the station.  They were yelling and screaming at the overwhelmed, underpaid, and understaffed station security who were on the brink of giving up and letting whatever was going to happen, happen.

"Uh, guys?" Natalie yelled.  "Maybe we should get out of here?"

"I was just thinking the same thing," D'Argo answered.

As they stood up Natalie's blood rushed to her head and she stumbled slightly, bumping into someone.  "Oh, I'm sorry.  I got dizzy there for a mic…"  She stopped as she realized that the person she had bumped into was Barig, wearing a brace on his broken nose.

"You!" he yelled, as he realized who it was, and reached for his knife.

Natalie, seeing him going for his weapon, quickly struck him in the face with the barrel of her pulse pistol, knocking him down to his hands and knees, and kicked him in the face for good measure, flipping him onto his back.

"You bitch!" he yelled as he covered his bloody nose, attracting the attention of Rallin.

Rallin turned and saw his friend lying on the floor with the female Peacekeeper they had tried to take earlier standing over him.  He charged at Natalie, wanting to take revenge for what she had done to Barig, but D'Argo stepped in front of him and swung a left cross, hitting him across the jaw and knocking him to the floor.

As Natalie watched D'Argo take out Rallin, Barig kicked her feet out from under her, sending her crashing to the floor.  Barig saw the pistol drop from her hand and quickly seized it before she had a chance to recover it.

With a sinister laugh, Barig stood up and aimed the pistol at Natalie and said, "I told you I was going to free you.  But this isn't exactly what I had in mind.  Too bad.  Rallin and I could've had a lot of fun with you."

"Oh yeah?" she responded incredulously.  "Well, have fun with this."

She immediately kicked him in the back of the knees, dropping him onto all fours.  Then she kicked him in the nose causing him to drop the pistol.  He cried out and brought his hands up to protectively cover his nose as Natalie reached over to grab the pistol.  Seeing Natalie's situation, D'Argo picked up a dazed Rallin by his arm and threw him at Barig, giving Natalie a chance to get away.

Hearing someone yell, the security guards finally noticed the fight that was occurring in the middle of the hall and one of them yelled, "Stop right there!"

"Hell," Natalie said and stood up.  She glanced back at D'Argo and turned to watch the approaching guards.  Instinctively reacting, she raised her pulse pistol, aiming it above the guards, and fired.  The pulse blasts hit the ceiling and the small bulkhead above the hatch to the hangar, sending the guards and the other people standing in the hall diving to the ground.

"If you were going to fire at them, then why didn't you kill them?" D'Argo asked as he pulled out his qualta blade, converted it to a rifle, and helped Stark up.

"Think about it, D'Argo," she answered as he and Stark ran down the corridor with her covering their retreat.  Once they were all out of the corridor and into another one, D'Argo shut the hatch and locked it.  As they ran down the corridor to get to the level riser, Natalie continued.  "If I killed them, then their friends would make sure we never got off this station alive.  But even if their friends didn't come after us, I still wouldn't have killed them."

"Wait," Stark exclaimed weakly as he stumbled out of D'Argo's grasp and braced himself against the wall.

"What's the matter?" D'Argo asked.

"I need to rest."

"Oh, of course you need to rest," Natalie said, mockingly.  "You were dead just a little while ago."

"No, I was not dead," Stark responded.  "Merely adjusting."

"Adjusting?  To what?"

"When I was shot, I was not prepared and some of my energy was let loose.  I needed to adjust to that, but I still need to rest to replenish what I have lost."

"Huh?"  She turned to D'Argo and asked, "Do you know what the hell he's talking about?"  She put her hands up and added, "No, wait.  I'm not sure I even want to know."

"No, I will explain," Stark said.  "This body is a vessel for my true incorporeal self.  It is but a shell that allows me to exist in your realm.  Without it, I would die."

"Uh, huh," she said and looked at D'Argo in skepticism, but he only shrugged.   She looked back at Stark and added, "So, that's it?  You just need to 'replenish'?"

"Yes," he responded, impatient with Natalie's doubt.

Without warning, Rallin tackled the trio, knocking them all to the floor and causing D'Argo to lose his qualta rifle and Natalie to lose her pistol.  Dazed, Stark tried to get up, but Barig walked over to him and punched him in the jaw, knocking him back to the ground.  Stark once again tried to get up, getting on all fours, but Barig stomped down on his head, knocking him back down, and viciously stomped down on his temple for extra measure, knocking him out.

Simultaneously, D'Argo and Natalie tried to get up, but Rallin immediately stood up and kicked Natalie in the face, flipping her onto her back and knocking her out.  Without delay, but not in time to help Natalie, D'Argo swung his leg around and kicked Rallin's legs out from under him.  As D'Argo tried to get up, Barig walked over to him and tried to kick him, but D'Argo caught his leg and twisted it around flipping him over onto the floor.

Getting up, Rallin ran towards D'Argo as he got to his feet and tried to punch the Luxan in the gut, but D'Argo caught the punch, grabbed Rallin by his torso, and threw him up against the bulkhead, putting a dent in it.  He dropped a dazed Rallin to the deck and was about turn to deal with Barig, but the Sebacean-esque man jumped onto D'Argo's back, wrapping his arm around the Luxan's neck to choke him.  D'Argo immediately backed into the wall, trying to dislodge Barig, but the man didn't lose his grip.  Instead, he grabbed one of D'Argo's tenkas and dug his fingernails into it, causing D'Argo to bellow in pain.  On the verge of hyper-rage, D'Argo swiftly reached back to grab Barig by his head and flip him over, but instead, he dug his thumb into Barig's eye, popping it, and used that as leverage to flip the Sebacean over him and off his back.  Barig fell to the floor, screaming in pain and calling out to Rallin to help him.

The loud piercing screams brought Rallin out of his daze and he looked over to find Barig on the floor with his bloodied and shaking hands covering his left eye.  Seeing D'Argo standing over him, Rallin pulled out a knife and charged with a battle cry.  D'Argo heard Rallin yell from behind him and turned to see the Sebacean coming at him.  At the last minute D'Argo spun out of the way, but not before Rallin was able to slash at his arm.  He checked his wound and saw that the slash barely broke his skin, but there were a few drops of black blood mixed in with the clear.  He reached up to apply pressure to his wound and quickly looked back up at an approaching Rallin, causing the Sebacean to stop dead in his tracks.

As the two began to circle, Rallin said, "I'm going to kill you, savage, for what you have done."

"Don't count on it," D'Argo calmly responded as he lowered his hand and saw that his blood was completely clear.

"Why shouldn't I?  You are a Luxan, aren't you?  Luxans are universally known to be incompetent warriors, and I have killed three Luxans to prove it."

Blinded by his rage, D'Argo charged at Rallin as he patiently waited, watching as the Luxan did as expected.  D'Argo grabbed him by the collar and shoved him up against the wall, hoping to break his back, but Rallin stabbed D'Argo in his side.  Feeling a searing pain in his left side, D'Argo threw the man off to the side and checked his wound.  The knife had deeply pierced him and his blood was running an extremely dark red.  The effects of the toxins were immediate and D'Argo collapsed against the wall and slid down to the floor.

Rallin shook his head to help regain his bearings and saw D'Argo's qualta rifle lying next to him.  He sat up as he grabbed the rifle, stood up, and walked towards the wounded Luxan.  He glanced to his left and saw Barig lying on the floor, unconscious, but continued towards the Luxan instead of stopping to help his friend.

Standing over him, Rallin aimed the rifle down at D'Argo and said, "How ironic.  To be killed by the very weapon that you Luxans hold so dear.  It'll make a good prize, don't you think?"

D'Argo braced himself as he watched Rallin pull the trigger but, unexpectedly, two shots rang out and hit Rallin, knocking him to the floor.  D'Argo watched Rallin's eyes as his body slowly shut down, and once he was certain the Sebacean was dead, he looked to his left to find Natalie standing there with a pulse pistol aimed down at Rallin and a shocked and distracted expression on her bruised and bloodied face.

"Natalie," he yelled weakly, trying to gain her attention.

"Yeah," she whispered, still staring at Rallin's lifeless body.

"Natalie," he repeated, slightly stronger, with a cough.

"Oh," she said and looked away from Rallin.  She finally noticed D'Argo's condition and ran up to kneel by his side.  "Jesus, D'Argo.  What do you need me to do?"

"You need to cleanse the wound," he said weakly and nearly passed out.

"Hey," she yelled and slapped him, keeping him conscious.  "I need you to stay with me, all right?"

"All right."

"All right," she mumbled.  "But how do you expect me to clean to it?  There aren't any first-aid kits around here and I'm not about to ask station security for help.  Speaking of station security, they should be here any microt so we need to think of something, fast."

"You don't need anything," he replied, trying to calm her.  "You just need to apply direct pressure to the would until the blood runs clear."

"That's it?  Just apply direct pressure?"

"Yes.  You need to keep hitting the wound as hard as you can until the blood runs clear."

"If you say so," she said as she clasped her hands together, raised them up over her head, and slammed them down onto D'Argo's wound.

----------------------------------------------------

"It's diverging," John exclaimed as he watched the Marauder turn left following the curve of the conduit.

"I see it," Aeryn said calmly, nodding at the end of the conduit opening into space.  Speeding out of the conduit, Aeryn pulled up to avoid crashing into one of the outer conduits connecting two of the pods.

"Oh, dren!" John yelled as he saw another Prowler in front of them, barreling toward them and about to collide with them.

Aeryn anticipated how the other pilot would maneuver out of the way and dove as the other Prowler pulled up.  The immense thrust from the engines on Aeryn's Prowler hit the tail of the other Prowler, sending it tumbling end over end.  The skilled Prowler pilot brought his craft out of the tumble just as another Prowler pulled up along side him.  The two sped after Aeryn to join her, seeing that she didn't have a wingman, and to find out who she was.

"Prowler, identify yourself," the male Prowler pilot said over the comms.

Aeryn glanced back at John with a look that said, Why not?

"Yeah, we could use them," he answered.

Aeryn activated 'send' and said, "This is Officer Sirian Tal of Omicron Regiment."

"Omicron Regiment?  What are you doing out here?" the pilot suspiciously asked.

"My attack wing was ordered to follow and capture a Nebari Resistance member named Dalek alive.  He has stolen valuable Peacekeeper information and has just stolen a Marauder, killed its crew, and killed the rest of my wing.  Now are you going to help me capture him or not?"

"We're with you."

"Good.  Now who are you?"

"I am Officer Markir Calin.  My wingman is Officer Jenden Ladic."

"Very well.  I am in command.  You will take your orders from me.  Is that understood?"

"Yes, sir."

Calin and Ladic formed up behind Aeryn in a delta formation as Aeryn closed the comms channel and banked left around the pod, hoping to find another conduit opening large enough for them to travel into or even the very conduit that Dalek was in.

"Do you know them?" John asked.

Aeryn seamlessly pulled up to fly over an external shaft as they rounded the pod, leveled off with the other two Prowlers right behind her, and answered, "No.  They probably joined the regiment at Scorpius' new Gammak Base."

Looking ahead at the pod, John weakly pointed at it and said, "There."

"I see it," Aeryn said.  Addressing Calin and Ladic, she added, "There's an opening a quarter metra ahead.  We're going in."

Aeryn banked left into the dark and cavernous conduit with the other two Prowlers following her while skillfully staying in formation when, all of a sudden, she noticed a horizontal shaft splitting the conduit.  "Dren," she yelled and dove under the pipe.  Calin saw the pipe in time and pulled up over it, but Ladic didn't and crashed into it.  She was dead on impact.

"Frell," Calin yelled.

"What?" Aeryn asked, not knowing Ladic's fate.

"We just lost Ladic.  She was a damn fine Peacekeeper."

"I'll put her in for a commendation once we have completed our mission, but until then we go on, understood?" Aeryn coldly ordered, masking her sorrow over the death of a fellow Sebacean.

"Yes, sir."

After Aeryn cut the channel, John coldly said, "Well, that's just one less Peacekeeper we have to worry about."

Aeryn sadly glanced back at John and immediately turned back to pilot her ship with a sigh.

John looked ahead into a tunnel, noticing two bright spots in the distance, and asked, "What's that?"

"Those…are Marauder flood lamps.  It's him."  She activated a comms channel to Calin and stated, "That's Dalek, directly ahead.  Remember, we want him alive."

"Yes, sir."

Aeryn held the Prowler steady and focused on the conduit, keeping her eyes open for any other obstructions as she increased her speed, knowing that Dalek could see her and Calin.

Noticing the increasing G-forces, John asked, "Aeryn, what are you doing?"

"What was that game you once told me about that humans sometimes played?  Playing chicken, was it?"

"Yeah, that's it, baby," he answered.  "But what do we do if he fires?"

"I doubt he'll take that chance.  If he wants to live, he won't open fire on us since he doesn't know what's in these pipes."

"So we can't fire, either."

"Exactly.  So we have to force him down somehow without firing at him.  The best way to do that is here inside the station."

"Does Calin know all this?"

"Of course he does.  He's a Peacekeeper, remember?"

"Oh, how stupid of me to have forgotten something like that."

She glanced back at him with a glare and increased her speed.  Activating a comms channel to Calin as she allowed her Prowler to drift slightly right, she ordered, "Form up on my wing."

Calin throttled up, almost to dangerous levels, and formed up on Aeryn, flying side-by-side with her to block Dalek.

Seeing the two Prowlers charging at him, Dalek thought for a microt about firing at them, but knowing that one stray shot could hit a coolant pipe or a fuel line and ignite the highly explosive liquids inside, he decided against it.  Frell, he thought.  He pulled back on the throttle, carefully turned the Marauder around one hundred eighty degrees, and throttled up, speeding back down the conduit.  Dalek was coming up on the end of the conduit, fast, and knowing that he couldn't go back the way he came, he turned right, hoping to find a means of escape.

He checked his sensors and saw that the two Prowlers were still following him.  He fought the urge to fire his rear weapons at them.  In the end, his self-preservation won and he mumbled, "Dren."

Without warning, the sensors lit up, alerting Dalek that the conduit was a dead end.  "No, no, no," he exclaimed.  He thought for a microt then brought up an external image on the screen in front of him.  Seeing that the pipes and shafts went through the wall, he activated the targeting scanners, aimed for the center of the wall, and said, "I hope this works."  Coming up on the wall at full speed, he hit 'fire'.  The two pulse blasts hit their mark, disintegrating the wall.  He flew through the opening and found himself inside the station, flying over one of the parks and thousands of surprised and scared shoppers.

"We're going in," Aeryn stated to Calin over the comms as she flew through the opening into the station with Calin by her side.

Seeing a walkway with an accompanying horizontal level riser shaft underneath it, Dalek waited until the last possible microt before he dove under it and leveled off.

Catching a glimpse of the of the walkway before Dalek pulled up, John yelled, "Pull up!"

Aeryn pulled up almost immediately after Dalek dove and barely missed the walkway, but Calin didn't see it in time and crashed into it at full speed.  He was killed on impact.  Fifteen others were killed as Calin's Prowler slammed into the walkway and level riser shaft.  The mangled debris fell to the floor four levels down as the panicked crowd scattered for their lives.

Seeing that Dalek didn't have enough room to pull up, John and Aeryn watched as he dove down to the deck and flew only a few hentas above the floor.  As he flew into one of the large, curving conduits that was lined with shops and connected the pod they were in to one of the outer pods, Aeryn quickly rolled and dove under another walkway and into the conduit.  She quickly leveled off to stay far enough off the floor to avoid hurting anyone, but not so far that she couldn't pull up without crashing into the ceiling.

"We have to get him outta here, Aeryn.  We can't risk anyone else getting hurt," John said weakly.

"I know."

The Prowler's threat sensors immediately came to life, alerting Aeryn to the weapons lock Dalek was trying acquire.

Dalek acquired a lock and fired a single burst at the Prowler.

=================================

"Talyn," Chiana addressed as she ran to the airlock.  "Open the airlock doors."  She ran down the corridor and watched as Natalie and an injured D'Argo helped Stark inside.

"Where the hezmana have you been?" D'Argo asked weakly as he collapsed onto the floor.

"D'Argo?" Chiana exclaimed as she ran to his side.  "What the frell happened to you?"

"We got into a fight," Natalie answered as she helped Stark down onto the floor.  "He was stabbed.  I managed to get his blood to run clear, but he's lost a lot of it."

"He was stabbed?  Then where the frell where you?"

"I was a little busy being unconscious at the time."  She stood up and reached up to wipe off the blood that was trickling out of her nose, flicked it off her fingers to the floor, and added,  "Oh, and thank you for your concern."

Ashamed, Chiana looked down at D'Argo's wound, avoiding Natalie's stare.

With a sigh, Natalie walked over to D'Argo's side, knelt down on the floor, and softly said, "Look, why don't you help Stark get to sickbay?  I'll help D'Argo."

"All right," Chiana answered, got up, and walked over to Stark.

As Natalie stood D'Argo up, with his help, she asked, "Just where the hell have you been, anyway?"

----------------------------------------------------

"Aeryn, if you're going to do something, then you'd better do it now," John said as they watched as the pulse blast hurdled towards them.

"I'd tighten your restraints if I were you," Aeryn replied and waited until the very last microt to roll to her right, out of the way of the pulse blast.  It impacted on the inner hull, opening up a massive hole into the vacuum of space.  As the air rushed out of the conduit, the terrified crowds held tightly onto anything that was bolted down and waited for the energy shield to come to life and the conduit to repressurize.

"John?  Aeryn?" the two heard Natalie ask over the comms.  "Where are you two?"

"We're doing a little shopping," John responded.

"Where are you, Natalie?" Aeryn asked.

"I'm on Talyn with D'Argo and Stark," she answered.  "We're orbiting the station, staying out of the command carrier's sensors, and we're trying to avoid the Marauder and Prowler sweeps.  But we can't hide from them forever.  Look, I know how much you ladies like shopping, but hurry up."

Dalek reached the end of the conduit and flew into the next pod.  He saw a bridge a few hentas ahead.  There wasn't enough time to pull up, but there was barely enough room to fly under it.  He didn't have a choice, and as he dove even further down he scraped the deck, throwing sparks everywhere and demolishing the kiosks that were in his way.  As he came out from under the walkway, the Marauder rocked from the impact of exploding grenades and pulse blasts on the hull and on the deck around him.  He activated the rear cameras and saw at least two-dozen security guards armed with pulse cannons and grenade launchers standing on the bridge with the Prowler diving for the deck under the it.

"Dammit," John exclaimed as he watched the explosions and pulse blasts rock the Marauder.  "How will the Prowler hold up against that?"

"I don't know.  No one's ever fired grenades at me before," Aeryn coolly answered.

"That's not the kind of answer I was looking for from you."

Aeryn glanced back at him with an annoyed glare and said, "Hang on."

The pulse blasts rocked the Prowler but did little damage as Aeryn swerved and rolled to avoid being hit by the grenades and the explosions going off around her.

"Don't those idiots know that killing your customers is a bad thing?" John asked as he tightly gripped Aeryn's waist to keep from being thrown around the tiny cockpit.

Pulling up, Aeryn flew towards the ceiling to try to stay out of range of the grenade launchers as she followed Dalek who was stuck on the deck.  They watched as grenades went off around him as he came up on the next bridge.

"Oh, frell," John mumbled as he saw on the sensors that Dalek was trying to get a weapons lock on the next bridge.  All John and Aeryn could do, while avoiding being hit, was watch Dalek fire on the bridge, destroying it and killing the dozen guards who were on it.

The threat sensors suddenly came to life alerting John and Aeryn to the weapons lock someone was trying to get on them.  "Who the hell's targeting us?" John asked.

"I have no frelling idea."

Without warning two small missiles were launched from the deck - one heading for the Marauder, the other heading for the Prowler.  Dalek watched as the missile streaked towards him and regretted hitting the navigation console, knowing he had inadvertently cut his connection with the ship's threat sensors.  He patiently waited for the missile to get close enough and pulled up just barely before the missile struck the hull.  Instead, the missile streaked under him and went into one of the stores lining his right side, exploding when it hit the rear wall and destroying the shop along with the stores above it and beside it.

As the missile streaked towards them, Aeryn rolled out of the way mere microts before it hit, but the missile kept its lock on them and swung around, speeding towards them.

"John?" Aeryn worriedly asked after not hearing the human's expected glib remark about the situation.  She turned slightly to glance at him and saw that he had passed out.  "Frell!"  She pushed the Prowler's engines into the 'red' and sped past Dalek as she flew towards one of the windows lining the sloped ceiling.

Seeing the Prowler shoot past him, Dalek pushed the strained engines of the Marauder as hard as he could, knowing by instinct that the pilot was going to try to use the missile to get out from inside the station.  He pulled up and tried to keep up with the Prowler, but stayed far enough behind to keep the missile from turning on him.

Speeding towards the window, Aeryn hoped that she would be able to get out before the energy shield went up, but she also hoped that the shield went up before anyone else inside the pod was hurt.  Aeryn opened a comms channel to Talyn and said, "Natalie, get another table in sickbay ready.  John's unconscious.  And meet me on the hammond side of upper pod three.  That's where we'll be coming out."

"We'll be there," Natalie responded.

Coming up fast on the window, Aeryn suddenly pulled back on the throttle and pulled up slightly.  The missile sped underneath her and hit the window destroying it in a substantial explosion as Aeryn leveled off.  Throttling up to full power, Aeryn sped out of the station with the Marauder right behind her mere microts before the energy shield went up.

Dalek followed the Prowler as it banked left around the outer hull of the pod and tried to get a weapons lock.  Without warning, Talyn came around the pod with his weapons at the ready as the Prowler sped towards him.  "Frell," he shouted and dove under the pod for cover.

As Aeryn landed inside one of Talyn's docking bays, she yelled, "Talyn, get us out of here!"

Talyn did as instructed and sped away from the station on a stealth trajectory, avoiding detection from the command carrier and the Marauder and Prowler sweeps.

----------------------------------------------------

Natalie stumbled out of the galley with an empty bottle of raslac in hand.  She started to walk down the corridor towards her quarters, but she tripped and dropped the bottle on the floor, shattering it, as she grabbed the wall to steady herself.  She looked down at the shattered bottle and mumbled, "Shit."

Natalie never had been a heavy drinker.  She sometimes had a drink or two at a bar in Houston with her crew or during a meal on Talyn, but she had never been full blown drunk until now.  After Talyn escaped from the Peacekeepers at the commerce station, she had helped Aeryn in getting John stabilized, but during the entire time she was distracted by the image of Rallin's eyes.  Of all the people she had been forced to kill, she had never seen their eyes before, and Rallin's lifeless gaze haunted her.  His eyes forced her to leave John, Aeryn, and the others in the sickbay.  She ran down Talyn's maze of corridors until she found herself outside the galley.  She remembered that they still had one bottle of raslac left, so she took it knowing that talking about what she had done wouldn't help.  She drank every last drop of the drink to try to forget Rallin's eyes and the disgust she felt for herself.  When she couldn't forget, she tried to rationalize what she had done.  She had saved D'Argo's life.  But in the end, she still saw herself as a murderer.

"Next time we're at a commerce planet, we're getting some stronger stuff," she slurred as she remembered John telling her that his body processed the intoxicants in raslac in just a little over an arn and that it should be the same with her.  As she felt herself beginning to sober up, she pushed herself off the wall and stumbled down the corridor towards her quarters.  Once there, she palmed open the door and slowly walked into the nearly pitch black room.

Looking for a small lamp Chiana had somehow procured for their quarters, Natalie put her hands out in front of her and felt her way towards the table the lamp was bolted to.  She unintentionally kicked the table and sighed as she palmed on the lamp.  She saw Chiana glaring up at her, annoyed, lying naked in the bed they were forced to share with the sheets wrapped around her body as usual.

"Sorry I woke you," Natalie slurred.

Chiana watched Natalie for a few microts as she slowly walked around the bed to her side and collapsed on top of the sheets on her back.  With a sigh she asked, "You're drunk, aren't you?"

"How'd you guess?"

Chiana turned onto her side, facing Natalie, and with a conspiratory grin, she asked, "Why didn't you comm me?  We could've had ourselves a little party."

"I wasn't in a party mood," she answered as she brought her hands up to rub her eyes.  "Besides, there was only one bottle of raslac left."

Seeing that her efforts to cheer up her human friend weren't going to work, she said, "C'mon, Natalie.  Talk to me."

"I don't feel like talking."

"All right," Chiana mumbled as she turned onto her other side.  "If you want to kill your brain cells, fine.  But you're not getting into this bed with those drenny boots on."

"Don't worry," Natalie quietly said as she closed her eyes.  "I don't feel like sleeping anymore."  She slowly stood up, trying to keep her balance, and walked out of her quarters with Chiana worriedly gazing after her.

Closing her eyes just made things worse.  When she closed her eyes, Natalie relived everything that had happened when she killed Rallin.  It all seemed to have happened in slow motion; from when she had picked up the pistol, to when she pulled the trigger and watched as the discharge left the barrel and hit Rallin, to when she watched Rallin's eyes as he fell over and died.

Knowing that there was hardly anything in the galley, Natalie slowly made her way to the bridge hoping to talk to someone who, unlike Talyn, would talk back.  It would certainly make things easier if someone could tell her what to do, what she needed to do to forget or to get over it, but she knew better than that.  So she wanted another drink.  She knew it wouldn't take away the pain, but she hoped that a good, strong drink would be able to help her forget for at least a little while.  But there weren't any more intoxicants onboard.  So the next best thing was to talk to someone, even if that someone couldn't or wouldn't talk back.

She slowly walked up to the door to the bridge and palmed it open.  Once the door opened, she saw D'Argo standing there in the middle of the bridge looking out through the forward portals with his arms crossed over his chest.

"Hey," she said to get his attention as she slowly strolled in.  "Why aren't you in sickbay?"

He turned back to look out at the star field and said, "I didn't feel like staying."

"So…" she paused as she took a seat on her stool.  "How's your side?"

"Sore."  He turned his head slightly to look at her through the corner of his eye and asked, "How's your cheek?"

She sighed and slumped forward, resting her elbows on her knees, as she looked in front of her, unseeing.  With another sigh and a shake of the head, she answered, "I don't know."

D'Argo let out a soft sigh knowing that she had been drinking before and was sobering up.

"Go ahead and laugh.  Let it all out.  I'm always here for a good laugh."

D'Argo turned to her and softly said, "Natalie, you're drunk because you're in pain.  That's nothing to laugh about."

"Tell that to the people of Earth."

"I doubt that will happen."

The two remained silent for a short time that seemed like arns while they both looked out at the star field.  Then a confused Natalie asked, "Why are you up here again?"

D'Argo looked at her, then, as the Leviathan let out a single chirp, looked back at Talyn's beta channel.

After thinking for a few microts, Natalie let out a frustrated sigh and looked at D'Argo, annoyed.  She asked, "It's Talyn?  You're here to watch Talyn?"

D'Argo didn't answer and stared out through the forward portals.

"I'll take that as a yes.  So what's the problem?  You don't trust him?  Is that it?  Look, D'Argo, I can understand why you didn't trust him after we got him back from Crais.  But you got over that.  So what the hell's the problem now?"

"Chiana told me what he had done while we were waiting for him to dock."

"What he had done?  So what the hell did he do?"

"He hadn't followed Chiana's orders.  She told me that he saw the command carrier and wouldn't move because of it."

"Your point being?"

He turned to pointedly look at her and said, "He wasn't willing to fight if we needed to.  He was not willing to engage the command carrier."

"So let me get this straight," she said as she planted her elbows on her knees, leaned forward on them, and looked up at him incredulously.  "You don't trust him because he was afraid of taking on a command carrier?"

"No, he wasn't afraid," D'Argo confidently stated.  "He didn't want to fire on another Peacekeeper."

"You know, D'Argo," she started as she closed her eyes in frustration, sat up, and planted her hands on her knees, leaning forward on them.  "I'm just going to stop trying to figure out what goes on in that head of yours.  I know I'm going to end up giving myself an ulcer if I don't."

----------------------------------------------------

Sitting in a chair at John's side, Aeryn watched as he slept on an examination table, recovering from his wounds.  After they had docked with Talyn, Aeryn, with Chiana's help, got John to sickbay where Natalie was already tending to D'Argo and Stark.  Using their scavenged medical equipment, Aeryn tried to stabilize John's condition while a distracted Natalie looked on and handed her instruments and bandages every now and then.  Aeryn had worked feverishly for nearly a quarter arn when Natalie suddenly sprinted out of sickbay.  She had called out to the troubled human, but to no avail, and called to Chiana to help.  Two arns later, Aeryn watched over John as the medicines and instruments worked to speed up his recovery to the point where he would be able to function.  From then on, his body would have to heal itself, as the machines they were using weren't reliable enough to complete the job.

Hearing John unexpectedly groan, Aeryn watched as he slowly regained consciousness and asked, "How are you feeling?"

"Do you really have to ask?" John replied as he brought his hands up to rub his eyes.

"No, I don't.  But I'm asking anyway."

John looked at her through one open eye and, with a sigh, he said, "I feel like dren.  But I guess I deserve to feel this way, don't I?"

"Yes, you do.  Especially for making us all worry the way you did while you were lying on that examination table on the brink of death while I tried to save you by myself."

"By yourself?" he asked as he sat up, leaning back against his elbows.  "What about Natalie?  I thought that she was studying up on medicine."

"She ran off.  Chiana commed me about half an arn ago to tell me that she showed up at their quarters drunk."

"Wait a sec…  She was drunk?  What the hell?  Why was she drunk?"

"I don't know.  Neither did Chiana.  All she knew was that Grant showed up at their quarters depressed and drunk."

"I'm gonna have a talk with her," he said as he tried to get up.

Aeryn jumped up first, pushing John back down onto the table, and said, "You're not going anywhere.  Not until you've fully healed."

"And how long do you think that'll be?"

"Oh, about a weeken.  Two at the most."

"Two weekens?" John exclaimed as he sat up again.  "Are you kidding me?  By that time Dalek will have already sold the crystal to the Peacekeepers, and we can't let that happen."

"John, no," she said while gently pushing John back onto the table, being sure not to reopen his wounds.  "We will find Dalek and get the data crystal back before he sells it.  You are going to lie here and heal.  Do you understand?"

"Aeryn, I'm not just going to lie here and do nothing while that bastard is out there."

Aeryn looked at John in disbelief and said, "Why is this so important to you?  Why is this so important that you're willing to get yourself killed?"

John gazed deeply into Aeryn's eyes and quietly said, "Revenge, Aeryn.  It's all I have left."

"What are you talking about?  That is not all you have left."

"After what Scorpius did to us…yes it is.  But since I can't get back at that son-of-a-bitch yet…"  He closed his eyes with a sigh and continued, "Dalek betrayed us.  He kicked my ass, nearly killed me, he killed Sylla, and stole the crystal.  He's going to pay."

"This isn't like you.  I know I'm partly responsible but, John, revenge isn't all that you have left.  And in the end, it will only get you killed."  Seeing that John wasn't paying attention, she forcefully said, "Look at me.  I'm trying to tell you that you have more than revenge."

"Like what?" he asked with rage building from within.

"Like me, John.  I love you and I know somewhere inside you that you still love me.  And I know that should be enough for you.  You don't need to rely on revenge to keep going."

Taken aback, John was left speechless, his rage dissipating.

"You didn't think I still loved you, did you?"

John didn't say anything, but his eyes told Aeryn everything she needed to know.

"Well, I do," she quietly said.  "Before, I was just so angry at Scorpius for what he had done and I was so angry at you for putting me in that position.  But then I realized what I was doing to you.  I realized what I was doing to us."

John remained quiet for a few microts, looking down at the floor and taking in all that Aeryn had told him, then said, "I know.  At least I do now."  He looked up into Aeryn's eyes, took her hand, giving it a squeeze, and added, "But I'm still going after Dalek with you.  It's my responsibility."

"I know," she quietly said.  "But I couldn't sit here and do nothing."

"No, I didn't think you could," he said with a genuine smile on his face.

Seeing John's infectious smile, a radiant smile grew on Aeryn's face.

"You know, we still have a little problem," John said after a few microts, getting back to business.

"Yes," Aeryn replied, becoming serious.  "How do we find Dalek?"

"I believe I know someone who may be able to help," Stark said all of a sudden as he sat up on his examination table, watching them.

=================================

"We should've gone down with him," Natalie stated and immediately closed her eyes in pain from her hangover.  She slowly opened her eyes and looked down at the planet below again through the forward portals on the bridge.

"He told us to wait, Grant," Aeryn said as John, nearly fully recovered and wearing a new black t-shirt and jacket, stood at her side under Talyn's beta channel.  She turned to look at Natalie and added, "So we're going to wait."

"No," John started as he looked at Aeryn.  "Natalie's right.  It's been two arns since he left and we haven't heard a word from him.  We should've gone down with him just in case he ran into trouble."

"John, this is a farming colony; a farming colony which he's been to before.  Just how could he get into trouble?"

John looked at her incredulously with a small grin on his face, his eyes conveying his thoughts.

Turning to look at the planet through the portals with a sigh, she said, "We should've gone down with him."

"Then why don't we go down?" Chiana piped in from the front of the bridge.  She glanced at Natalie, then D'Argo who was standing at the back of the bridge, then turned her attention to John and Aeryn.  "I mean, there's no reason why we can't."

John looked at Aeryn and they gave each other a discreet nod.  Moving to walk off the bridge with Aeryn, John said, "You three stay here.  We'll see what's going on."

"Hey!" Chiana exclaimed at their retreating backs.  "What about your promise?"

----------------------------------------------------

Aeryn, with John seated behind her, flew down to the planet in her Prowler following Stark's trajectory.  She glanced back at John and saw a faraway look in his eyes.  She turned back around to the controls and, knowing what he was thinking about, she asked, "This planet reminds you of Earth?"

"Yeah," he quietly answered.  "It looks a little like Iowa and some other states."

"Maybe you'll see them again someday," she stated.

"Maybe.  But not without you."

She glanced back at him again, flashed him a small grin, and said, "I know."

As a small grin grew on his face, out of the corner of his eye he saw the Marauder on the ground in front of a large villa.  He looked at it and, drawing Aeryn's attention to it, said, "There it is.  Maybe now we'll get some answers."

Immediately after Aeryn set the Prowler down next to the Marauder, she opened the canopy and jumped out with John instantly at her side.  The two walked towards the villa as a cold breeze washed over them, chilling them through their leather clothing.  Climbing the short flight of steps to the front porch, they came to the front door and stopped.

"Ladies first," John drawled with a small grin, motioning with his hand.

"No," Aeryn said with a slight shake of her head.  "Why don't you go first this time?"

"No, please, I insist."

"You're the one with the guns, remember?" she pointed out.

"Why don't I go first?" he asked as he rested his thumb against the clamp holding the pistol to his thigh holster.

"Please, be my guest," Aeryn said as she moved out of John's way.

John moved to open the door, but the door opened from the inside and revealed an elderly Ilanic with a wooden cane.  John stepped back slightly in surprise with Aeryn, drew his pistol from his thigh holster without delay, and aimed it at the Ilanic.

"Ah," the Ilanic started.  "I thought I heard someone."

"Crichton, Aeryn," Stark said in surprise from inside the villa as he stood up from his seat on a couch.  He walked up to them and asked, "What are you doing here?  I thought I told you to stay on Talyn?"

"We got tired of waiting," Aeryn said.

John lowered his pistol, but didn't holster it, and said, "It's been two arns since you left and we haven't heard from you since.  We got worried, so Aeryn and I came down to see if you're all right."

Not noticing the strange look on his old Ilanic friend's face, Stark said, "Worried?  Why were you worried?  I did tell you that I had been here before and knew the inhabitants."

"Stark, look at our track record," John stated.

After thinking for a microt, Stark replied, "Yes, you're right.  You should've been worried, but…"

"Aeryn?" the Ilanic interrupted.  "Aeryn Sun?"

"Who are you and why do you want to know?" Aeryn answered suspiciously.

"I am Serall, and…"

"And," Stark interrupted.  "He just wanted to meet you Aeryn.  I've told him much about you; about all of you."

John and Aeryn looked at each other, curiosity written all over their faces.  "Stark," John drawled suspiciously, as he fingered the trigger on his pistol.

"Yes?" the Banik answered, trying to look appeasing.

"Let the man finish what he was about to say."

Serall turned to Stark and asked, "She doesn't know, does she?"

"No."

Serall let out a sad sigh, moved out of the way, and said, "You'd better come inside."

John cautiously entered the villa with Aeryn right behind him and his pulse pistol at the ready.  As the two slowly walked down the two steps into the large room, their eyes never left Stark and Serall.

As Serall, with Stark, walked down to join John and Aeryn, he motioned with his hand to the couch and said, "Please sit."  While Stark took a seat in a chair to the left and opposite Aeryn and John who were still standing, Serall walked up to them and asked, "Would you like anything to eat or drink?"

"No," Aeryn stated immediately and slowly sat down with John, who kept his pistol trained in the direction of Stark and Serall.

"I didn't think you would," Serall said as he slowly and painfully sat down on the couch directly opposite Aeryn and John, resting his elbows on his knees and leaning on them, his old age showing.

"So why did you ask about Aeryn?" John asked, staring directly at the Ilanic.

Serall sighed sadly and said, "I just wanted to know if she truly is Aeryn Sun."

"I am," Aeryn stated.  "Why do you want to know?"

"There is something I must tell you, Aeryn Sun."

"Wait," Stark interrupted.  "Serall, this is not the right time to tell her."

"Tell me what?" Aeryn exclaimed.

"Stark, she is here.  We must tell her.  If what you tell me transpires, we may never get another chance," Serall said.

"Yes, you're right.  We may never get another chance," Stark solemnly replied.

"Tell me what?" Aeryn exclaimed.  "Will someone tell me what the frell is going on?"

"Calm yourself, Aeryn," Stark said as he got up, put his hands up, and slowly walked towards Aeryn.  "You must calm yourself.  I know a chant that can help."

"Stark, no," Aeryn said pointedly, staring daggers at the Banik, and shot up off the couch.  "I don't want or need a frelling chant.  Now, tell me what the frell is going on."

"Aeryn Sun, please, sit down.  I will tell you," Serall said softly.

Aeryn sat back down as she stared at Stark, watching him skulk back down into his seat.  She turned to look at Serall and waited for him to begin.

With a sad sigh, Serall looked down at the floor and said softly, "I knew Talyn Lyczak, your father, Aeryn Sun."

"My father is a high-ranking Peacekeeper.  How could you possibly know him?" she asked suspiciously.

"Your father was a high-ranking Peacekeeper.  There is no easy way to put this, Aeryn Sun, but your father is dead."

Aeryn sat in silent surprise, not entirely trusting the Ilanic, but willing to hear him out.

"And it pains me to say this as well, but your mother, Xhalax, was the one who killed him."

"You expect us to believe that?" John asked.

"Yes, I do."

"Why?"

"Because I was there when she killed him."

****************************************

"Stop right there," Talyn and Serall heard from behind as they tried to escape from the retrieval squad in the crop fields and did as ordered.  They saw a Peacekeeper commando in full armor standing there with a pulse rifle trained on them.

"Throw your weapons to the ground," the commando ordered.

Recognizing the voice, Talyn said, "Xhalax, what the frell are you doing?"

Keeping her rifle trained on Talyn and Serall with one hand, she used her other to pull off her helmet and let it fall to the ground.  She calmly said, "I am following orders which is exactly what you should have done, sir.  Now, throw your weapons to the ground."

"Following orders?" Talyn asked.  "Those orders were unjust.  I was not going to kill my own child just to satisfy their sadistic laws."  He stared at her for a few microts as she remained silent, pain showing in her eyes.  As realization dawned on him he said, "That's why you're here isn't it?  It was either Aeryn or me, wasn't it?"

"Yes," she calmly answered, trying to hide her pain.

"Xhalax, come with me," Talyn unexpectedly pleaded.  "Serall will be able to help us.  He knows many people who will protect us from the Peacekeepers."

"I can't," she mumbled in fear.

"You must come with me, Xhalax.  You cannot possibly live under High Command's oppressive and hypocritical rule.  We cannot allow them to win.  Come with me…"

"No, I…I can't…"

"Xhalax, please.  I love you…"

"I love you, too," she whispered as a small tear rolled down her cheek.  She pulled the trigger on her rifle, sending the pulse blast hurtling towards Talyn, and hit him square in the chest, killing him instantly.  She watched as his lifeless body fell to the ground and tried to fight back the tears that were welling up in her eyes.

Serall tried to take advantage of Xhalax's momentary distraction and quickly turned around to run into the field.

With her quick reflexes, Xhalax aimed her rifle at the Ilanic and shot him in the back.

****************************************

"They took his body with them and left me for dead," Serall solemnly said.  "But that's when I met a young Banik.  Apparently he had been hiding in my crops, living off them, to hide from his masters.  He saw everything.  He approached me and tried to help me to the "other side" because he believed me to be dying.  Fortunately, it was just a flesh wound and I was able to instruct him on how to help treat my wound.  This Banik sits before you now."  He sat back against the couch with a wince and continued, "Talyn…  He hoped that someday he would be able to find you and take you from the Peacekeepers, Aeryn Sun.  He no longer wanted to be a Peacekeeper and he wanted to raise you as far away from their grasp as possible…"

"We're supposed to believe that?" John asked.

"Of course.  It's the truth; why shouldn't you believe it?"

John turned to Stark and asked, "Is it the truth?"

"Yes," Stark answered.  "It happened exactly the way Serall described."

"So you knew?" Aeryn quietly asked as she stood up and slowly walked towards Stark.  "You knew that Xhalax had killed my father the whole time?"

"Yes, I did," he answered as he watched Aeryn stalk up to him.

"You frelling knew and you never told me?" Aeryn shouted.  She ran up to him and gave him a Pantak jab to the forehead, knocking him and the chair backward to the floor.

"Aeryn," John exclaimed as he shot up from his seat and ran over to her, as did Serall, albeit slower and with a limp.  He grabbed her arm, turning her to face him.  "What the hell are you doing?"

Aeryn unpredictably grabbed John's pulse pistol out of his hand, pushed him away, and aimed the pistol at Stark's head.  She yelled, "Why the frell didn't you tell me?  You've had plenty of time to tell me, so why the frell didn't you?"

"I didn't think you were ready, Aeryn," Stark frantically said.  "I was only trying to help - just wanted to help - just trying to help."

She stared down at Stark, rage burning in her eyes.  "Frell," she yelled and pulled the trigger.  The pulse blast grazed Stark's ear, lightly singeing it and putting a hole in the wooden floor.  She walked up the steps to the door, kicked it open, and stormed out of the villa.

"Aeryn," John called out and started to run after her, but Serall grabbed him by the arm, stopping him.

Turning John around to face him, Serall said, "Let her go.  If what Stark tells me is true, then you of all people know that what she needs right now is some time alone."  He let go of John and hobbled over to Stark to help him up.  "In the mean time," he said as he helped Stark up (with Stark doing most of the work).  "I'll contact some people I know to find the command carrier.  It will take a few arns, but my contacts will find them."

"The command carrier?" John asked in surprise.

"Yes.  You did say that Dalek, I think his name was, was trying to make a deal with the Peacekeepers for a large sum of currency.  I don't think he's going to want to give up that "reward".  So where the Peacekeepers are, he and the data crystals are bound to be."

----------------------------------------------------

Walking out of the villa, John found Aeryn sitting on the steps to the porch, bathed in moonlight, staring down at the pulse pistol in her hand.  He slowly walked up to her, sat down at her side, and said, "Hey."

Aeryn didn't answer.  She didn't even look up and continued to stare at the pulse pistol.

John sighed and said, "Serall's found the command carrier.  It's in orbit around an uninhabited planet.  Well, it's uninhabited now.  At least that's what he told me.  There's an old monastery there.  That's where the deal is going down."

She turned to look at him with a determined expression and said, "Then what are we waiting for?"

"You.  We're not going to leave you behind."

"I wouldn't want you to because I'm going with you.  I want to get those bastards for what they did."

"What did 'they' do?"

"They hurt you…and killed my father."

John sighed and turned to look out at the stars.  "I thought you said you weren't a warrior."

"I'm not.  I'm a murderer."

=================================

"Well, there it is," D'Argo stated.  He and the others were scattered around the bridge looking out of the forward portals at the planet Dalek and the Peacekeepers were supposedly on.

"Thank you, Captain Obvious," Natalie drawled while she checked a sensor readout on her console that Talyn had indicated.

Chiana let out a snort and dipped her head to hide the smirk on her face as D'Argo turned to glare at her and Natalie.

An awkward silence washed over the crew, but to bring everyone back to the task at hand John asked, "Is there any sign of the command carrier?"

"Uh," Natalie muttered and checked Talyn's tactical sensors.  "No.  No sign of 'em…yet."

"Well, there's no time like the present," John said and unholstered one of his pulse pistols to check the power level.  "So, let's go."

"Wait, how do we know he's down there?" Chiana asked, standing under Talyn's beta channel.  "I mean, any smart thief would know that you don't go through with a deal if it's already failed once."

"Who else is he going to sell to?" Aeryn asked.  "He wants to make as much money as possible off this and there are only three places he can go.  He obviously can't go to the Nebari; he's not going to go to the Scarrans - they'll just kill him for it; so the only option he has is going with the Peacekeepers.  And with them, I think he thinks he has a chance."

"All right," Chiana said.  "But I still don't think he's down there."

As John and Aeryn turned to walk off the bridge with D'Argo, Chiana, and Stark following, Natalie yelled, "Hey, be careful on the way down.  Talyn sees a pretty bad storm heading towards the monastery and it should hit within a half arn."

"We will," John yelled over his shoulder.  "And be careful yourself."

Natalie watched as the hatch shut and turned to look out of the portals with a sigh.  Unexpectedly, Talyn beeped, his humming increasing in volume, and drew her attention back to his beta channel.  She watched in curiosity as one of the red panels on the deck opened up revealing a snake-like arm with a device attached at the end.  "What the hell is that?" she asked, watching it slowly extend from the opening.

"It's the hand of friendship.  It's the greatest honor it can bestow," Natalie heard from behind her.  She turned around to find a holo-recording playing at the front of the bridge.  It was of Aeryn and someone who, from the descriptions she had been given, was Crais on Talyn's bridge.

She watched Aeryn and Crais look down at the deck, watching the very device that was behind her now rise up out of the deck.

"Talyn," Crais started and brought his gloved hand up to rub his lip.  "Who's it for?"

Talyn beeped and shone a beam of light down on Crais causing the two to look up at his beta channel.

"Thank you," Crais said.  He turned around and added, "I humbly accept."

Natalie watched as Crais tore his coat open, dropped it down off his shoulders, and pulled up his queue as the 'hand of friendship' rose up to neck level.

"No, Talyn," Aeryn said.  "Talyn?"

Natalie jumped at Crais' cry after Talyn jabbed the 'hand of friendship' into the back of his neck.  She watched in horror as the arm pulled back into the deck and Crais fell to the floor.

"Talyn, what's happening?" Aeryn yelled.  "What have you done?"  Aeryn ran to Crais' side as he lay on the deck and asked, "What is that?"

"A neural transponder," Crais answered and slowly stood up.  "A direct interface with Talyn.  His senses, his propulsors, his weaponry…I command them all."

"You command him?" she asked in disbelief, her eyes locked on him while he walked around the bridge.

"Every system.  It's indescribable.  It's a pity you can't experience it."

"Crais, we were going to share command."

"Talyn, chose otherwise," Crais said, and the recording immediately shut off.

"Okay…" Natalie said as she turned back around to look at the transponder.  "Now, why is it that I'm always the last person to know about these things?"  She immediately raised her hand and said, "Never mind, forget it.  So…"  She looked up at Talyn's beta channel and added, "You're choosing me?"

Talyn replied in the positive.

"Uh, okay.  But why me, why now?"

Talyn brought up a holo-diagram of the command carrier over the right main console and beeped frantically.

Worried, Natalie walked over to the console and checked the tactical sensors.  Seeing the command carrier heading towards them at full speed with their defense screen up and their frag cannons at the ready, she dryly said, "Oh, that's just great."  She turned to look at the transponder and in her mind she weighed the pros and cons of accepting it.  After a few microts she said, "Oh, what the hell, why not?"  She walked over to the transponder and turned around, lifting up her hair to expose her neck, and said, "But be gentle, okay?  This is my first time."

Talyn pulled back his arm and jabbed her in the back of the neck.  She immediately fell to the deck in unbearable pain and passed out.

----------------------------------------------------

"So, where is he?" Braca asked from his position in front of the entranceway as he looked around the old, massive, roofless stone chapel of the monastery.  The wood rafters were still completely intact, with vines hanging from them to nearly touch the floor.  The storm was growing stronger overhead.  Braca looked back down and through the three rows of stone columns a few hentas in front of him and watched as his troops moved into position.  He also observed six columns and ten rows of stone benches arranged in a semi circle around the central pulpit at the back of the building and thought them to be good defilade.  He looked around the interior trying to find any other covered positions that Dalek could be hidden in.  He noticed to his right two rows of support columns - some still standing, others in various stages of decay – with a row of stairs behind them attached to the side wall, leading up to the second tier.  This was supported by a single stone column and was hollowed out underneath.  He looked to the other side of the chapel and took in the same arrangement of columns and stairs.

"Patience, Lieutenant," Scorpius said as he strode up the steps into the chapel, his hands behind his back.  "He will show himself when he believes it is safe to do so."  He walked up to Braca, who was now standing at attention, and slowly circled him.  "Are our forces in position?"

"Yes, sir."  He received a message through his headset and added, "They are also taking care of our little problem as we speak."

"Excellent."

"Scorpius," Dalek exclaimed as he slowly emerged from the shadows with his hands behind his back and walked in front of the pulpit.  As Scorpius slowly turned around, Dalek added, "I didn't think you'd come in person this time.  I thought you would send that idiot Captain of yours again."

"Ah, Dalek.  How nice of you to finally join us," Scorpius declared and began walking towards Dalek with Braca at his side.  "As for Captain Crais…  After the incident at the commerce station, I did not believe it to be prudent for him to come down.  So I came myself while he remained on the command carrier."

"Well, I would have preferred it if you had sent down Crais.  At least I know he's stupid enough to not succeed in double-crossing me.  But I thought that, just in case you came down yourself…" he said and brought his hands out to his sides, revealing a remote trigger in his right hand.  "I should be prepared."

"Dalek, I'm hurt."

"Too frelling bad.  Now," he said and brought his right hand up.  "If I take my thumb off this trigger, the self-tracking pulse cannons will activate and they will fire on anything that frelling moves."

"A wise precaution, however unnecessary."

"Frell you.  It's very necessary.  Oh, and I'd like to thank you for stocking your Marauders with those weapons.  If it weren't for you, then we wouldn't be here now.  Now where's my money?"

"You're welcome.  But where's the data crystal?"

Dalek reached into his inner jacket pocket with his free hand and pulled out the crystal.  "It's right here."

Scorpius turned his head to look back at Braca who said, "Our problem has been taken care of sir."

"Very well," Scorpius stated and looked back at Dalek.  "Braca, pay the man."

"Yes, sir," Braca happily said.  He immediately unholstered his pulse pistol, aimed it at a shocked Dalek, and pulled the trigger.  The pulse blast went straight between Dalek's eyes, killing him instantly.  Dalek fell to the ground in a lifeless heap.

Scorpius strolled up to Dalek's lifeless body, bent down, and pulled the blood covered data crystal from his hand.  As he stood up he saw his fifteen armor-clad commando escort run into the chapel.  One of them approached Braca with two self-tracking pulse cannons and asked, "What shall we do with these, sir?"

"Take them and their pass keys back to the ship, Corporal, and recover the stolen Marauder," Braca ordered.

"Yes, sir."

As the Corporal turned and ran out of the chapel with two other soldiers – each carrying two pulse cannons each - Scorpius walked up to Braca and held the crystal in front of him.  Looking at it, he said, "Braca, prepare our forces for departure and contact the command carrier."  He placed the bloodstained crystal in his belt next to another data crystal and added, "Have them set course for the Gammak Base.  I want to be underway as soon as we come aboard."

"Yes, sir."

"Lieutenant," Braca heard someone yell from behind him.  Both he and Scorpius turned to see the Corporal he had just spoken with barreling up the stairs into the chapel.  Without warning, a pulse blast rang out and the Corporal fell forward onto his face with smoke billowing out of the pulse wound in his back.  They looked up to find Aeryn Sun in her leather coat standing in front of the chapel with pulse cannon in hand.  She suddenly reached for a grenade strapped to her belt next to her second pulse pistol, which was stuffed into the front of her belt, while pulling the pin with her thumb and hurled it into the chapel.

"Get down," Braca yelled and, with Scorpius, he ran for cover as the grenade landed in the middle of the chapel and exploded, destroying the pulpit and the two center columns of benches, creating a small impact crater in the floor, and sent stone chunks flying everywhere.

Using the smoke and flying debris as cover, Aeryn and John ran into the chapel and took cover behind two support columns, just as the Peacekeepers started to fire in their direction.  D'Argo, Chiana, and Stark tried to join them, but were forced to take cover outside the chapel because of the weapons fire.

"I hope you realize that you could've brought down the entire building and destroyed the data crystal with that," John yelled as he checked the power level on his pulse rifle with an extended barrel.

"I just wanted to get their attention," Aeryn yelled back.

"Well, I think you got it," John yelled and turned to find the Peacekeepers' positions.  One of the two commandos on the second tier to the right shot at John, but hit the column instead as John spun around for cover.  The pulse blast sent small stone chunks flying at him, but they harmlessly bounced off his black jacket.  John spun back around to fire at the Peacekeeper who shot at him.  He hit the kneeling commando in the faceplate, shattering it and only stunning her, but she lost her balance and fell off the second tier.  Landing on the ground on a massive stone which had been a part of a support column, she hit her head hard and was knocked unconscious.

"Cover me," Aeryn yelled and ran out from behind the column.  John spun back around to the left while he pulled his pulse pistol out from behind his back.  He fired at the back and left side of the chapel, pinning down the commandos while Aeryn ran to the next row of columns and took cover behind one that was still fully intact.

D'Argo saw John spin around to cover Aeryn and ran into the chapel while firing at the center, taking cover behind the column Aeryn had been using.

Once he was sure Aeryn was safe, John spun back around and looked over at D'Argo.  He yelled, "Nice of you to finally join us."

"I would've been here sooner if it wasn't for Aeryn," D'Argo yelled back and popped out to fire at the Peacekeepers under the second tier to the right.

"Yeah, well, that's Aeryn for ya."  He aimed his pistol at the commandos in the crater, fired, and added, "You gotta love her.  Cover me."

D'Argo spun around the column, raising his qualta rifle to his shoulder while John spun around and raced towards the second inner row of columns.  D'Argo fired at the soldiers to the right, but was overwhelmed by the pulse fire coming at him from all sides.  He was forced to take cover behind the support, leaving John out in the open.

Aeryn was watching John dodge the pulse fire as he ran when, suddenly, a pulse blast hit him in the abdomen.  She couldn't tell where exactly - his pulse rifle was blocking her view.  She could only watch through the rain of pulse fire as he fell to the ground.  "John?" she yelled worriedly.  She didn't get a response and yelled, "Damn you, answer me."

"Yeah," John yelled in response.  "I'm all right."  Sitting up, he scooted back against the support, looked down at his weapon, and added, "But my pulse rifle's had it."  He threw the damaged pulse rifle away, stood up, and yelled, "How many do you think there are?"

"I'd say about nine."

"Do you have any more grenades?"

Looking right at him, she yelled, "You do realize you can bring down the entire building if you use it?"

"I only want to get their attention."

With an amused look, Aeryn pulled out her last grenade and tossed it to John.  John caught it, immediately pulled the pin, and tossed it into the impact crater.  It exploded a microt later, killing the two Peacekeepers using the crater for cover.  Pulling out his pulse pistols, he yelled, "Go, get those bastards.  I'll cover you."

"Right."  She looked over at D'Argo and yelled, "Get ready."

The impending storm loomed closer with the thunder growing louder and the lightning flashes becoming more intense.

"Chiana, Stark," John yelled through the chapel entrance.  "Get in here when I give the word."  John brought his pistols up and yelled, "Go."  He spun around firing both pistols at anyone in Peacekeeper armor, while D'Argo ran to join Aeryn and the pair ran along the support columns to get into a better firing position.

Stark ran into the chapel with Chiana right behind him.  Unexpectedly, someone grabbed her from behind, putting a hand over her mouth to keep her from calling out, and pulled her out of sight.  A Peacekeeper using a bench for cover saw Stark run into the chapel and fired at him.  The pulse blast hit Stark in the shoulder, sending him crashing to the floor.  He crawled over to the nearest support column and sat up, leaning back against it for cover.

"Are you okay?" John yelled

"Yes, I'm fine," Stark answered.

Looking around the surrounding area, John asked, "Where's Chiana?"

Stark looked around and said, "I don't know.  She was right behind me…"

"Frell," John mumbled and spun back around to fire at the commandos using the benches for cover to help protect Aeryn and D'Argo as they ran.

Running between the first and second rows of supports, Aeryn and D'Argo dodged pulse blasts and jumped over large stones lying in their path while the Peacekeepers ran into the center and turned the benches onto their sides, using them for cover.  As she ran, Aeryn looked over at the commandos and pulled out her second pulse pistol, firing it at the soldiers as they ran for cover.  She managed to hit three of the commandos, but could only confirm one kill.  She saw one of her pulse blasts hit a soldier's faceplate, destroying it and half the soldier's face.

D'Argo kept his eyes on both Aeryn and the Peacekeepers as he ran.  Suddenly, the volume of pulse fire increased and a pulse blast hit Aeryn in the leg, knocking her to the ground.  D'Argo quickly took cover behind a support, knowing that he couldn't get to Aeryn without getting himself killed.  He watched Aeryn crawl over to another column for cover and yelled, "Are you all right?"

"Yes," she yelled back as she put down her pistol and applied pressure to her wounded thigh.  "The frelling pulse blast only grazed me."  She turned slightly, revealing just enough of her head to look into the center for a clear shot, but was forced to turn back.  "I can't get a shot.  They're using all the frelling weapons they have."

D'Argo tried to poke his head out, but quickly pulled back and shouted, "I can't get a shot either."  He looked at her while she grabbed her pistol and stood up.  "Do you have any more grenades?"

"I gave my last one to John."  She stuffed her pistol into her belt and looked down at her pulse cannon, then quickly looked at D'Argo.

Seeing in her eyes that she had a plan, D'Argo asked, "What?"

Aeryn pulled the strap off her shoulder and turned over her cannon to access the power controls.  "When they start running, shoot them."  She increased the power level on the cannon, putting it on overload.  Spinning around the column, she threw the cannon at the commandos in the center.  It landed in the midst of the overturned benches causing three commandos to run while the other caught his armor on one of the benches and was stuck.  D'Argo spun around to pick them off but, as thunder loudly rang in the distance with lightning flashing in the sky, the cannon exploded, severely injuring the soldiers and forcing D'Argo to spin back behind the column for protection.

Aeryn pulled out her pistols and yelled, "Cover me."

"Aeryn, wait," D'Argo yelled in response, but to no avail.  He watched her spin around the support and run towards the newly-formed impact crater.  He immediately spun around to the right, raised his rifle, and began firing at the three soldiers, killing them, then fired at the soldiers using the columns and the second tier as protection.

Crossing her arms, wrist over wrist, Aeryn fired at the commandos using the columns to her right as she ran toward the impact crater she had created.  The commandos fired back at her as she ran.  The pulse blasts whizzed past her and hit the ground at her feet, kicking up dirt and small chunks of stone that were formerly the benches.  She flipped over a bench that was still intact and landed inside the impact crater, staying low to avoid the pulse fire.  Directly in front of her was the fourth soldier.  Both of his legs were gone and he had been severely burned, but he was still alive.  Aeryn also noticed the pulse pistol lying at his side.

"Aeryn Sun," the soldier panted, out of breath and in pain.  He slowly pulled his helmet off and added, "I never thought I'd see you again."

"Taerin," Aeryn said, hiding her surprise.  "I thought all the Pleisars were doing grot work."

"I was promoted," Taerin replied.

Aeryn looked down at his severed limbs and said, "I'm sorry."

"I'm not."  Taerin went for his pistol, but Aeryn raised both of hers first and simultaneously fired a single shot at his head with each pistol.

Aeryn jumped up facing D'Argo, with her arms out stretched to either side and aiming at both sides of the chapel.  Her first shots hit three of the commandos – two on the right behind the supports, the other on the left on the second tier – and killed them.  She crossed her arms over her chest for more support and continued firing.  Seeing that John and D'Argo had things covered on the left, but not noticing that one of the Peacekeepers was slowly making his way towards John, she spun around and fired volley after volley at the two remaining Peacekeepers to the right.  Aeryn pulled the triggers, firing at the soldiers – one on the second tier and the other underneath it - when suddenly, she ran out of chakan oil.  "Frell," she yelled and dove down into the crater.

The two Peacekeepers popped out and fired at Aeryn as she dove for cover, hitting the bench she was taking cover behind and sending small chunks of stone into the side of her face and neck.

"That's frelling it," she yelled and reached for Taerin's pulse pistol.  She turned the power setting to overload, sprang up, and threw it under the second tier.  The pistol exploded almost instantly, killing the Peacekeeper under the tier in the blast. The tier and the wall adjacent to it to collapsed, killing the second soldier under tons of stone.  Just then the sky opened and it began to rain – a fierce, drenching downpour.

Turning around, Aeryn smoothed her wet hair back out of her eyes and looked for John.  Seeing a Peacekeeper sneaking up behind him, she yelled, "John, behind you."

Hearing Aeryn, John immediately turned around, but was knocked to the ground as the Peacekeeper kicked him in the gut.

Aeryn was raising her pistols to fire at the commando, when she heard someone sneaking up behind her and immediately tried to turn around.  She didn't turn in time and was stabbed in the back.

D'Argo had turned to help John, but saw the helmet-less Peacekeeper who John had knocked out earlier standing where Aeryn had been with a knife in hand.  Knowing that John could take care of himself, D'Argo charged at the commando and yelled, "Aeryn."  Without warning a bolt of lightning came down and struck the soldier, electrocuting her.  Running towards the impact crater, which was starting to fill with water, D'Argo jumped over one of the still intact benches surrounding it and landed in the crater.

"D'Argo," Aeryn said, in pain and lying back against the crater wall.  "How nice of you to join me."

"Are you all right?" D'Argo asked.

"Of course I'm not all right, I've been stabbed.  But nothing major was pierced, so I'll live."  She shut her eyes and laid her head back against the crater wall with the rain streaming down her face and asked, "How's John?"

D'Argo inched up to see John, but was forced to immediately duck down as the remaining commandos focused their pulse fire on him.  "Frell," he yelled.  "I can't get to him without getting the dren shot out of me."  D'Argo lifted his qualta rifle just over the top of the crater, popped his head out just enough to see the three Peacekeepers on the other side of the chapel, and fired at them.

Poking her head out just enough to get an obscured look at John through the first row of columns, Aeryn watched as he fought.  She ducked down, pulling out two chakan oil cartridges, grabbed her pulse pistols, and ejected the empty cartridges to replace them.  She crept up and raised her pistol, hoping to get a clean shot through the obscuring support columns and rain.

----------------------------------------------------

Hearing Aeryn's warning, John turned around to defend himself, but instead was on the receiving end of a kick to the gut that reopened the wound in his left side and caused him to lose both of his pistols.  He yelled and fell to the muddy ground, protectively wrapping his arms around his abdomen and trying to catch his breath.  The Peacekeeper reared back and tried to kick John again, but John sat up slightly, caught his leg and twisted it, spinning the soldier onto the ground.  As the Peacekeeper fell, he swung his other leg around and kicked John in the side of his head causing him to roll back.

Seeing a flash of light, John looked over to where he last saw Aeryn and watched as a bolt of lightning electrocuted a Peacekeeper while D'Argo ran towards her.  He immediately turned to look at the Peacekeeper who was getting up and stood up himself, his arm still wrapped around his midsection.

The commando and John circled each other for a few microts.  As John came to stand in front of a column, the Peacekeeper charged him, shoving John back into the column.  As John hit, he pulled off the Peacekeeper's helmet, revealing the man's scarred face.  The commando immediately straightened up, kneeing John in the gut.  John swung his arm out, trying to punch him, but the commando caught it and spun around, dragging John around.  He swung John around into the column again, kicked him in the abdomen, causing him to bend over, and punched John in the temple, knocking him to the ground again.

The Peacekeeper reached down to pick John up by his collar, but John grabbed a handful of mud and small chunks of jagged stone and as the soldier stood him up, John threw the muck and stones into his face.  The man reached up and yelled as the small stones embedded themselves into his face and in his left eye.

Grabbing the wounded Peacekeeper by the arm, John swung him around into the column.  As the commando hit, John kneed him in the gut causing him to fall to his knees.  John immediately punched him across the temple, knocking him to the ground.  Seeing that he was still conscious, John picked him up and slammed him against the column again.  Grabbing the soldier's forehead in a blind rage, John slammed his head against the column with an accompanying resounding blast of thunder, killing him.

Running over to where his pistols lay, John scooped them up and ran to the right, behind the first row of columns.  He saw a blue pulse blast from D'Argo's qualta rifle whiz past the Peacekeeper using the massive columns for cover.  John aimed at the Peacekeeper while rounding a column and ran towards the stairs to the remains of the second tier.  As he ran, he fired at the second Peacekeeper, killing him.  Reaching the stairs, he ran up them and looked down, seeing the pulse fire from the last remaining commando taking cover under the second tier.  He reached the top of the stairs and fired down at the solder through the thin, time worn bricks with both pistols.  The pulse blasts cut through the bricks and cut through the commando's head and back, killing him.  As the bricks John shot through crumbled, the surrounding bricks collapsed onto the Peacekeeper, burying him.  John ran back down the slippery stairs without delay to avoid being caught in the collapse himself and dove for the ground as the stairs gave way.

D'Argo stood up and yelled, "John?  Are you all right?"

John rolled over onto his back, letting the cool rain fall on his face, and sighed.  He yelled, "Yeah, I'm fine."  He rolled over onto his hands and knees, slowly standing up, and holstered his pistols.  Walking towards D'Argo, he asked "How are you and Aeryn?"

"I'm fine, but Aeryn's hurt."

"Oh, dren," John worriedly whispered and ran towards the crater.  He jumped into it and landed next to Aeryn, splashing water everywhere.  Seeing Aeryn leaning against the crater wall on her side, he looked at her back and saw the stab wound.  "Frell, Aeryn," he said.  Looking up at D'Argo, John said, "Why don't you go help Stark?"

"Right," D'Argo answered.  Wanting to give the two some privacy, he climbed out of the crater, relieved to finally be out of ankle deep water.

John turned to look into Aeryn's eyes, as she turned to look at him, and said, "How bad is it?"

"It's not too deep," Aeryn replied.  "I'll be fine."

"Are you sure?" he asked skeptically.  "The last time you were stabbed, you lied about dying."

"I didn't lie," she said matter-of-factly.  "But this time I'll be all right."

"I'm glad to hear it."  He sat up against the crater wall, looked around the chapel, taking in all the destruction, and saw D'Argo tending to Stark's wounds.  Coming to a realization, he exclaimed, "Where's Chiana?"

A sudden movement near the entrance of the chapel caught John's eye and he turned to see what it was.  It was Scorpius.  John immediately drew his pistols and fired.  Unfortunately, Scorpius made it out of the chapel before the pulse blasts could hit.  Blinded by rage, John jumped out of the crater and ran after Scorpius.  "D'Argo, stay here," he yelled as he ran past the Luxan.

Chasing after Scorpius into the atrium of the monastery, John raised the pistol in his right hand, shot at the half-breed, and yelled, "Scorpy, you better stop right there."

Seeing that there was no place to run, Scorpius complied with John's order.  As the rain began to fall harder, he turned around to face the human.  With his arms outstretched at his sides, he said, "John, how nice to see you again."

"Shut up, Scorpy," John ordered as he walked up to the hybrid, his pulse pistol aimed right at Scorpius' head.  With rage burning in his eyes, John glared at Scorpius and slowly squeezed the trigger.

Without warning, someone from behind said, "Put it down, Crichton."

John turned his head and said, "Braca.  How's the leg?"

Braca slowly circled around John's left side, his pulse pistol aimed at John's head, and stopped a few hentas away across from him, next to Scorpius.  "Crichton, put it down," he repeated.

"Why don't you put it down," D'Argo ordered as he came to stand at John's side, his qualta rifle aimed at the self-serving Lieutenant.

"Shut the frell up, Luxan," a commando stated as he came up behind D'Argo, circling around him to come to stand next to him.  He aimed his pulse rifle at D'Argo's head at point blank range and ordered, "Now, put down the rifle."

No one moved a muscle and stayed silent for several microts, aiming their weapons at each other.  Scorpius finally broke the silence and said, "This is quite the predicament."  Looking straight down the barrel of John's pulse pistol, water streaming off it, he added, "Isn't it?"

=================================

With a groan, Natalie slowly regained consciousness with a splitting headache.  She rolled over onto her back and brought her hands up to rub her eyes.  "I'm never doing that again," she said.

Are you okay, Natalie? she heard over Talyn's beeping.

"Uh, yeah…" she paused and looked around the bridge, feeling sensations that she could not describe.  "I think."  Looking up at the hybrid's beta channel, she asked, "Talyn?"

Yes?

"I don't believe it," she said, a smile full of wonder growing on her face.  "I can't believe it."  She began to stroll around the bridge, reaching back to touch the transponder attached to the back of her neck as she felt all of Talyn's systems through the device.  "This is…this is so incredible."

Yes, it's incredible, he said impatiently through the transponder.  Now what are we going to do about the command carrier?

"How the hell should I know?"  She sighed, walked to the command console, and said, "Look, I'll figure something out.  How far away is it?"

Two thousand metras and closing.

"So…"  She turned to look at Talyn's beta channel and asked, "What are they going to do when they get to us?"

They are going to dock with us and board me.

"And they're going to have to take down their defense screen…" she said, turning to look out of the forward portals at the command carrier.  "Talyn," she started and sighed.  She closed her eyes, letting her head fall, and said, "I hate giving these orders.  As soon as they take down their defense screen, I want you to get a lock on their bridge and blow it straight to hell.  That should put 'em into chaos for a while and give us and the others a chance."

Their bridge? Talyn asked.

"Yeah, why not?  It can't hurt to try…or at least it can't hurt us to try…"

But what if it does?  They could fire back…  I think we should try something else, Natalie…

"Yeah, they could fire back, but we don't have much choice, now do we?"

No, we don't.

"All right.  So just play dead and let them come to us," she said nervously.  "Is there an asteroid field in this system?"

Yes, but it's behind the command carrier.

"Well, if we take out their bridge, then we shouldn't have a problem getting to it.  We'll hide from the Prowler and Marauder patrols there until the others are ready to get out of here," she ordered.

The command carrier loomed larger and larger in Talyn's forward portals as it approached.  Its crew was highly confident that they would capture the hybrid leviathan and the escaped prisoners.

Straightening herself up, Natalie crossed her arms and said, "I didn't realize how big one of those things was until just now."

The two silently watched the command carrier approach for a few microts, then Talyn suddenly asked, What are you feeling?

"Fear."

You don't look like you're afraid.

"Maybe not.  But trust me, I'm quakin' in my knickers."  She turned to look back at his beta channel and asked, "Why do you ask?  Are you afraid?"

Captain Crais said that Peacekeepers don't have fear.  He said that emotions only hinder our abilities in battle.

"Well, Crais is a moron."  Turning back around, Natalie looked out at the command carrier.  "First of all, you're not a Peacekeeper, Talyn.  You never were.  Second of all, what Crais told you was nonsense.  Complete and utter nonsense.  If you want proof, just look at Aeryn.  She used to be a Peacekeeper, but now…  Now she, as John said, is more.  And third of all, Crais wasn't a Captain.  If he was a Captain, he would've still been in charge of that command carrier instead of being here giving you orders and teaching you nonsense."

Talyn remained silent for a number of microts, then said, The command carrier is almost on us.

"All right, get your main cannon ready, but don't charge it and don't target the bridge yet."

The command carrier slowed as it came up on Talyn and stopped with its bridge just above him.  They scanned Talyn for any life forms and to ensure that his weapons systems were down.  Seeing that were and that there was only one life form aboard, the commanding officer of the carrier ordered the deactivation of the defense screen and ordered the boarding parties to ready themselves to take control of the Leviathan.

"Now, Talyn," Natalie yelled as she braced herself against the command console.

Immediately activating his main cannon, Talyn targeted the command carrier's bridge and fired.  With a single shot, the bridge of the carrier was obliterated, killing the twenty Peacekeepers inside.  The emergency hatches immediately sealed the rest of the ship off from the eradicated area, but not before another ten Peacekeepers were sucked out into the cold vacuum of space.

Natalie instantly powered up Talyn's engines using her link with him without realizing it.  She allowed Talyn to speed away faster that he would have if he had powered up his engines on his own.  Speeding along the belly of the massive Peacekeepers vessel, Talyn activated the secondary cannons on his stern and fired at the Peacekeepers with all weapons, inflicting the maximum amount of damage before flying into the asteroid belt.

As expected, two squadrons of Prowlers and one squadron of Marauders swarmed out of the carrier's docking bays and pursued Talyn.  The smaller crafts tried to engulf Talyn using their greater agility, but Talyn destroyed any ship that got in his way.  With Natalie trying to target some Peacekeeper ships with the main cannon, Talyn was free to target several others with his secondary cannons.  However, Talyn waited to fire the cannon until after Natalie achieved a good lock; she hadn't yet to learn how to fire, nor did she want to learn.  In all, Talyn had destroyed one whole squad of Prowlers and half a squadron of Marauders.

Talyn pushed himself as hard as he could, escalating his power levels and speed.  He increased the distance between him and the Peacekeepers as he raced toward the belt, obscuring the view of the pilots behind him.

"Uh, Talyn?" Natalie said, gaining the gunship's attention.  "Are you sure that's a good idea?  I mean you don't want to blow your engine, do you?"

Trust me, Natalie.  I know what I'm doing.

"You know what you're doing, huh?" she asked incredulously, looking back at his beta channel.

Yes.

"All right.  Just making sure," she said calmly, turning to look back out of the forward portals and to brace herself against the console in front of her.

The lead three Prowler pilots watched the Leviathan heighten his speed dramatically, increasing the distance between them.  Trying to catch up with the hybrid, the pilots pushed their ships' engines to dangerous levels to catch up with him.  Then, without warning, Talyn pulled up to reveal a small asteroid - but was still larger than a leviathan.  The pilots tried to turn in time, but their momentum carried them right into the asteroid.  They were dead upon impact.

Pulling up, Talyn entered the asteroid field and immediately banked to his right to avoid an asteroid hurtling toward him.  A Marauder and two Prowlers had followed him into the asteroid field under the first asteroid, but from their position they weren't able to see the other asteroid careening toward them.  They ran into it head on and were killed instantly.

The remaining nine Prowlers and four Marauders flew over the asteroid and formed up behind Talyn as he pulled up in front of them.  Talyn and Natalie tried to target the Peacekeeper ships, but the surrounding free-flying asteroids blocked the crafts, keeping them from acquiring a target lock.  Not seeing any other alternatives, Talyn began firing with all his weapons at anything that moved.  Several shots missed their marks, but Talyn did manage to hit several asteroids.  The explosions from the impacts knocked a few asteroids out of position and straight into the path of the Peacekeeper ships.  Most of the ships managed to avoid being hit, but two Prowlers didn't turn in time.  They ran into the asteroids head on and were destroyed in fiery explosions as the cesium fuel in both ships ignited.

Spinning around one hundred eighty degrees, Talyn targeted one of the larger asteroids with his powerful main cannon as his momentum propelled him backwards, away from the targeted area.  As the Marauders and Prowlers came up on the asteroid to pass it, Talyn fired a single shot at the asteroid, shattering it.  The smaller meteorites scattered and impacted on the hulls of the Peacekeeper ships, but didn't cause much damage.  The larger meteorites, however, slammed into two Marauders and four Prowlers, destroying them.

Subconsciously accessing Talyn's senses, Natalie scanned the surrounding area, helping Talyn see the smaller meteors and asteroids and looking for any other Peacekeeper ships.  Having found a massive asteroid about the size of Colorado at least one hundred metras ahead via the gunship's senses, Natalie said, "Hey, you mind if you turned around?  I want to get a better look at that asteroid.  And I'd like to actually see where we're going."

Complying with Natalie's request, Talyn spun back around to give Natalie an unobstructed view through the forward portals of the asteroid she had seen with his senses.

"Talyn, do you see that opening in the upper left quadrant of that asteroid?"

Yes, he replied apprehensively.

"Just how big is it?"

It's large enough for a full-grown Leviathan to travel through.

"Does it go all the way through?"

Yes.  Why? he asked despite knowing what Natalie's answer would be.

"Well, you're not going to like my answer…"

Talyn remained silent for a few microts, and said, Changing course now.  Banking slightly right, Talyn flew toward the opening in the asteroid with one of the Marauders and two of the Prowlers following.  The other Peacekeepers increased their speed and flew around the asteroid to take up positions at the opening on the other side of it, lying in wait for the gunship.

As Talyn entered the cavern, Natalie mumbled, "There better not be a giant space worm in here."

What? Talyn exclaimed worriedly.

"Oh, nothing you need to worry about."

Yeah, right, Talyn said, having picked up on Natalie's expressions over the past eight monens.  He kept his sensors focused on the cavern and banked right, following the curve of the cavern and cautiously decreased his speed.  Suddenly, a large spike became visible as Talyn came off the turn.

"Shit," Natalie yelled, and subconsciously took control of Talyn's propulsors, diving under the spike.  However, the two Prowler pilots chasing Talyn didn't see it and slammed into it.  Seeing the massive fireballs that had been two Prowlers in front of him, the Marauder pilot dove for the deck of the cavern, clearing the explosions and the remains of the spike.

Thank you, Natalie, Talyn said shamefully.  If you hadn't taken control, we would've been killed.  I never even saw it…

Natalie saw a flash of one of Talyn's memories of Crais admonishing him after he had made a mistake.  Trying to keep the Leviathan's confidence up, she soothingly said, "Don't worry about it, Talyn.  If I had been looking at something else, I never would've seen it either.  Hell, I don't even know how I took control."  Turning to look back at his beta channel, she encouragingly added, "But next time, I might not be here, so keep your eyes out, okay?"

Okay, Talyn replied confidently.

Both Talyn and Natalie remained silent from then on as Talyn maneuvered in the cavern.  Seeing the opening at the end of the cavern, Natalie said, "There it is."

I see it.

"All right, we gotta get that Marauder off our ass, so as soon as we clear the opening and as soon as that ship is close enough, cave it in…"

With my secondary cannons so I can use my main gun to take out the other ships in front of us, Talyn interrupted, completing Natalie's train of thought.

"Exactly," she said, feeling sorry for the Peacekeepers who were about to lose their lives.

Coming out of the cavern with the Marauder following, Talyn targeted the roof to the entrance of the tunnel.  He fired and destroyed the roof, causing part of it to collapse on the Marauder, burying it under lenarts of rock while the rest scattered in every direction.  As he fired, Talyn saw the three Prowlers and single Marauder in front of him in a delta formation, the three prowlers in formation as a spearhead in front of the Marauder.  Targeting them with his main cannon, he fired.  Seeing that there was nothing they could do, two of the Prowler pilots ejected from the their ships as the weapons blasts hit the Prowlers, turning them into fireballs as the other Prowler and Marauder turned away and took cover behind a nearby asteroid mere nanomoments before the weapons blasts hit them.

As Talyn passed by the flaming debris of what used to be the Prowlers, the remaining Prowler and Marauder formed up behind him and the shipless pilots used the directional thrusters on their ejection seats to land on the gunship.  One landed on his tail, immediately anchored himself to Talyn's elastic skin using a pair of knives he had strapped to his hands, and unbuckled his safety harness letting the ejection seat float away.  The other, however, landed directly on Talyn's forward portals.

Looking directly at the Peacekeeper, Natalie folded her arms across her chest and said, "I really wish you had some windshield wipers, Talyn."

What?

"Nothing," she said as she watched the Peacekeeper go for his pulse pistol.  As he put the barrel up against the portals, Natalie, with a pitiful expression, lifted one of her hands and pointed out behind him.

The Peacekeeper turned to see an asteroid directly behind him and softly said, "Aw, frell."

Talyn reversed his engines, nearly coming to a stop and sent the pilot flying helplessly into the asteroid.  He floated dead in space, all the bones in his body broken and all his internal organs crushed.  Caught off guard, the other pilot was thrown forward as Talyn slowed, flipping over the Leviathan's back, holding onto his knives as tightly as he could.  He slowly turned around to continue his trek across the gunship's back, but instead he came face to face with one of Talyn's secondary cannons.  The last thing he saw was a flash of green light.

Both the Prowler and the Marauder banked to avoid ramming Talyn as he slowed.  The pilots immediately turned around to pursue him again.  They saw an energy discharge coming from one of the secondary cannons on his stern, but couldn't see the target.

Seeing the Peacekeeper ships approaching at full speed, Talyn turned around one hundred eighty degrees on his axis and sped off, gaining speed with every passing microt.  Dodging asteroids left and right, Talyn banked, rolled, dove, and pulled up, trying to lose the Peacekeeper ships.  But the pilots were extremely skilled and stayed with him, matching him maneuver for maneuver.  As Talyn banked around an asteroid, he saw another massive asteroid directly in front of him, filling his sensor field.

"Dive," Natalie yelled and braced herself against the console.

Talyn immediately dove under the asteroid, his tail nearly scraping the jagged rock, and was forced to pull up from the asteroid's massive gravity field.  Coming out from under the asteroid, Talyn unexpectedly saw the command carrier's main engines directly in front of him.  He increased his speed and allowed the gravity field to pull him towards the asteroid, barely avoiding ramming the command carrier.  Their maneuvering control offline, the carrier drifted aimlessly into the asteroid field, its crew working frantically to restore control before they hit something.

The Peacekeeper pilots had followed Talyn under the asteroid to avoid colliding with it, but they didn't see the command carrier in time.  The Prowler and Marauder rammed the command carrier's main engines, their cesium fuel and chakan oil igniting from the extreme temperatures.  The explosions rocked the carrier and caused a rupture in its fuel lines.  The leaking fuel ignited instantly and caused a massive explosion.  The explosion ignited the fuel and other gasses in the pipes and conduits in the stern of the carrier, causing secondary explosions all throughout the ship.

Talyn and Natalie both sensed the explosions in the carrier and sped away to a safe distance.  Turning around to allow Natalie a better view, they both watched in a mix of awe and horror as the explosions destroyed the giant vessel a piece at a time.

"C'mon guys, get to the life pods," Natalie mumbled.  "They do have life pods, don't they?" she yelled.

Yes, of course they do.  But, why would you want them to live?  They're the enemy…

"Yeah, they're the enemy, but they don't have to…"  Natalie immediately stopped as she watched the command carrier disappear in a colossal explosion that quickly dissipated in the cold vacuum of space.  She was thrown to the deck as the resulting shockwave hit Talyn and knocked him back, sending him tumbling end over end.  Quickly regaining control, Talyn straightened himself and tried to come to a complete halt.

Slowly pushing herself off the floor, Natalie sat up and scooted up to the forward pylon, leaning back against it.  She smoothed her hair back, looked at his beta channel, and asked, "Are you okay?"

All systems are normal.

"I know that, but are you okay?"

Talyn remained silent for a few microts and said, Yes, I'm fine.  Are you?

Closing her eyes in sorrow, Natalie let her head fall back against the pylon.  She said, "Ask me again later."

Not fully understanding her, Talyn didn't say a word and let a weary silence descend upon them.  After several microts, Talyn asked, What do we do now?

Natalie sighed and looked out of the forward portals for a few microts.  She finally said, "We go back to the planet.  And when we get there, we wait.  We wait and hope for the best.  And I'm going to get a drink."

=================================

"This is quite the predicament.  Isn't it?" Scorpius calmly said.

Out of the corner of his eye and through the rain dripping off his eyelashes, John saw the commando aiming at D'Argo gently squeezing the trigger on his pulse rifle.  Acting instantaneously, John brought up his other pistol as lightning flashed with an accompanying crack of thunder, laying his left wrist over his right, and aimed at the commando.  "I wouldn't do that if I were you, son.  Because if you kill D'Argo, then I kill you."

"That won't do me any good if I'm dead, John," D'Argo stated.

"It won't do you any good either, Crichton," Braca said, gaining John's attention.  "Because if you kill the Corporal, then I'll kill you."

"But if you kill Crichton, then I'll kill both you and Scorpius," Crais said as he pressed the wet barrel of his pulse pistol against Braca's head.

"Crais," Scorpius said in utter surprise at Crais' sudden appearance.  "What are you doing?"

"It is fairly obvious, Scorpius.  I am here to kill you."

"What the frell is going on?" John asked.

"As much as it pains me, Crichton, I am here to give you my thanks," Crais stated.  "If you hadn't been there, I never would've come into contact with the exposed circuit breaker."

"The chip absorbed most of the power and shorted out, didn't it?"

"Yes," Crais answered.  "And I also have to thank you, Braca, for not reporting my initial insubordination.  That should've been your first sign that something was wrong."

"Braca, you're an idiot," Scorpius mumbled.

"And, Scorpius, I thought you should know that Talyn has destroyed your command carrier."

"How?" John asked suspiciously, knowing that Talyn wasn't powerful enough to destroy a command carrier without help.

"He allowed himself to be pursued by a Marauder and a Prowler and led them right into the carrier's main drive," Crais said.  "Talyn pulled up before he hit, but the Marauder and Prowler were not so fortunate.  The impacts caused the destruction.  I witnessed this firsthand as I left the carrier in my Prowler."

"You believe him?" D'Argo asked.

Oddly enough John did and, in reluctant acceptance, he said, "There's a first time for everything."  He noticed Braca flinch and shift his weight off his still healing left leg.  With a smirk, he said, "Still hurts?"

Braca looked directly at John, indignation in his eyes, and squeezed the trigger.

D'Argo saw Braca's eyes and mumbled, "Oh, frell."

Seeing Braca readying to fire at him, John swung his left arm around to aim at Braca.  Crais saw John move and knew that Braca was going to fire.  Beating John to the punch, he fired at Braca's head killing him instantly, while John repeatedly fired at his torso.  Thunder and lightning rocked the entire area.  As he fell dead into the mud, Braca's finger depressed the trigger on the pistol in an involuntary muscle reaction and fired one round at John's left side.  Braca lay on the ground with steam rising out of his wounds in the cold rain.  After being hit, John fell back into the mud as he aimed and fired at Scorpius, who was trying to dive for cover.  The pulse blast hit Scorpius in his abdomen, his regulation suit partially protecting him.  Scorpius laid still in the muck, feigning unconsciousness.

----------------------------------------------------

D'Argo saw John move to fire at Braca and leaned back slightly to avoid the shot from the corporal that he knew was coming.  The Corporal saw D'Argo move and pulled the trigger on his pulse rifle as another thunder crack rang out.  The pulse blast whizzed past D'Argo's face as he brought his qualta rifle around.  Aiming again at the Luxan, the Peacekeeper fired, hitting D'Argo in the shoulder.  D'Argo roared in pain and brought his rifle up to fire into the Peacekeeper's midsection.  As the weapon's fire hit him, the commando fired again, hitting the Luxan in the side.  In his rage, D'Argo fired again, hitting the Peacekeeper in the gut again, but the soldier returned fire, hitting D'Argo in the chest.  In retaliation, D'Argo ignored the pain from the shots and drove the twin blades of his qualta rifle through the commando's abdomen right up to the barrel.  A lightning bolt hit nearby with a deafening thunderclap and D'Argo pulled the trigger once, forcing a pulse blast into the commando and throwing him off the qualta rifle.  The Peacekeeper landed nearly six hentas away.  D'Argo watched the commando land and fell back onto the muddy ground in a bloody mess, his blood flowing completely black.  With D'Argo falling to the ground, Crais was the last man standing.

They all remained silent as the rain softly pounded them, while thunder rang out and lightning flashed.  The rainwater washed the blood off their bodies and thinned it, forming large red pools around them in the mud.  In D'Argo's case, it was a large black pool of blood.

"John," D'Argo weakly called out.  "Are you dead?"

John let go of the pistol in his right hand and, with a groan, he brought his hand across his body to apply pressure to his left side.  "How the hell can a guy get shot in the same damn side three frelling times?" he weakly yelled.  He sighed, looked at D'Argo, and said,  "Other than that, I'll be all right.  How 'bout you?"

"I'm not dead yet," D'Argo said, closing his eyes from the pain.

"Glad to hear it."  Straightening his head, John closed his eyes and asked, "Crais?"

"I'm fine, Crichton," Crais replied.

"Damn," he mumbled

"I am not surprised that you're disappointed, Crichton," Crais said as he walked up to John and stood over him.

"Well, how could that be?  It's not like I try to make it obvious," John responded.  Sitting up, John leaned back on his left arm as he held his side and scanned the carnage before him.  He worriedly said, "Where's Scorpius?"

Turning around, Crais scanned the old monastery with his eyes.  To his right was the crumbling perimeter wall with rainwater filling in the ditches surrounding it and under it.  Less than a tenth of a metra in front of him was another perimeter wall with water cascading down it, feeding the hungry vines growing on it.  To his left was a large stone structure, possibly the monastery's quarters.  Along the front of the building were windows and in the center was the main entrance.  In front of the main wall were support columns holding up the balcony with the doors to it directly above the main entrance.  Seeing a small movement in the shadows behind the balcony supports, Crais raised his pulse pistol.

Seeing the direction in which Crais was aiming, John slowly sat up onto his knees, grabbed the nearest pulse pistol with his left hand, and aimed it at the shadows, waiting for anything to move.

With the help of the lightning, they both saw a flash of glossy black leather in the shadows and fired.  Scorpius immediately ran for cover as pulse blasts impacted the stone walls all around him, shattering them.  Running through a hail of stone chunks, he jumped through a window on the left side of the quarters.

Ejecting the empty chakan oil cartridge from his pulse pistol, John lifted his bloodied right hand from his wounded left side, reached for another cartridge, and slid it into his pistol.  He stood up and swiftly grabbed Crais' pulse pistol with his blood-covered hand before the former captain could react.  Removing the chakan oil cartridge and tossing the pulse pistol away, John looked down at D'Argo and said, "I'm going to get Scorpy, so watch Crais.  If he does anything you don't like…"  John looked right into Crais' eyes and continued, "Shoot him."

D'Argo lifted his head to look at John.  "Right," he said weakly, then let his head fall back onto the ground.

John slowly jogged to the entrance of the quarters, his pounding feet splashing muddied water all around him.  With his right arm wrapped tightly around his abdomen to clutch his left side, he continued to try to stop the bleeding from his wound, but to no avail.  He stumbled twice from the dizziness of blood loss as he ran, but recovered quickly each time.  He reached the pillars and leaned against the one to the left of the entrance.  Closing his eyes, he bit his lips to keep from groaning as he fought back the pain.  Opening his eyes, he raised his pistol and aimed it at the entrance.  He pushed himself off the column and slowly approached the entrance while thunder and lightning crashed all around him as storm intensified.  Knowing that Scorpius was in the building, he was more cautious than he had ever been before.

His heart was pounding in his chest as he slowly entered the building.  He listened to the rain beating down on the roof of the building and the water streaming down the walls through an infinite number of cracks as he listened to his own heavy, but steady breathing.  He couldn't see anything in the dark interior of the building and he knew he didn't have time to allow his eyes to adjust if he wanted to stay alive.  He knew he had to keep moving, so he pressed forward inch by inch, 'seeing' with his ears.  But his own heartbeat and breathing were so loud in his ears that they drowned out all other sounds.

A bolt of lightning suddenly flashed with an immediate accompanying thunderclap, illuminating the interior of the building for a nanomoment.  Within that nanomoment, John saw everything that was in his field of view.  He saw that he was in the foyer of the building and that the stone stairs that led to the second floor were directly in front of him.  He noticed that vegetation, small and large, from plants to vines to grass was growing in between the cracks of the stone masonry of the walls, ceiling, and floor.  He also saw that there were two pairs of adjacent hallways, one pair on each side of the foyer.

Remembering seeing Scorpius dive into one of the windows on the left side of the building, John made his way to the first hall on his right with his pulse pistol straight out in front of him.  Lightning flashes helped to illuminate the entire area, allowing him to actually see it.  John walked up to the entrance of the hallway and stumbled slightly.  He reached for the wall to steady himself, and spun around to lean against it to rest for a few microts.  Shutting his eyes, he tried to slow his breathing, calming himself and tried to ignore the stabbing pain he felt in his left side.  Opening his eyes, he had trouble focusing.  He stuffed his pistol under his right arm and brought his hand up to rub the bridge of his nose.  With a sigh, he took his hand away and tried again to focus.

All of a sudden, John heard the sound of collapsing masonry coming from his left and instantaneously snapped his head up and grabbed his pistol, aiming it down the long hall.  Pushing himself off the wall, John slowly stalked towards the first door he remembered seeing, his arm outstretched in front of him with pulse pistol in hand.  Reaching the first entryway on his right, John turned into it, ready to fire at anything that moved, but the only thing that was moving was the rainwater that was streaming down the walls and dripping from the ceiling.  He stalked down the hall, checking every single room except for the last five – two on the left and three on the right.  He didn't find anything in each of the rooms he had checked.

Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse, John thought hysterically as he came up on the first of the three rooms on the right.  Waiting for a bolt of lightning, John leaned up against the wall next to the doorway as he had done with the other fifteen rooms he had checked.  As the lightning he had been waiting for flashed, he spun into the room and quickly scanned it through the sight on his pulse pistol.  The only thing he saw in the room was a large pile of stone rubble close to the rear right corner, possibly from the cave-in he had heard before.  If Scorpy had been hiding behind it, then he would get away.  John didn't have time to check it out.  He had to check the other rooms in case Scorpius was in one of them.

"Let's see what's behind door number one," he mumbled as he came up on the second entrance.  Leaning back against the wall, John waited for his lightning bolt.  All the while he was still bleeding.  He wasn't bleeding as badly as before, but he was still losing blood, which slightly impaired his judgment.  With the flash of lightning, John spun around to scan the room once more, but when the accompanying thunder rang out, he thought he heard a pulse blast coming from outside.  It was possible he was only hearing things, but he wasn't too sure about that.

Distracted, John didn't see Scorpius' leg swinging out from inside the room as another bolt of lightning hit outside.  The kick connected with John's chest, causing him to lose his pistol and sent him tumbling back onto the floor.  Despite the pain he felt as the wound in his left side reopened, John quickly recovered, tightly clutching his left side with his right hand to try to stop the bleeding.  He grabbed his pistol off the floor next to him and fired volley after volley at Scorpius.  Seeing that John was going for his pistol, Scorpius ran down the hall and dodged the pulse fire that impacted the masonry all around him, sending small chunks of stone into his regulation suit.

"Why won't you die?" John yelled as he fired at Scorpy.  As the half-breed ran out of view, John chased after him.  Running towards the end of the hall, John couldn't see Scorpy waiting for him there in the darkness.

As John ran out of the hall, Scorpius grabbed his left arm, swinging him around into the wall next to entrance of the hall and caused him to lose his pulse pistol.  A bolt of lightning suddenly struck the ground right outside of the quarters with a deafening roar of thunder, but Scorpius ignored it.  With John's arm in hand, he twisted it around behind the human's back, immobilizing him.  Pressing his body against John's, Scorpius crushed John into the jagged masonry of the wall, trapping him as he pressed his thumb against Human's temple to try to completely put him out.

Pulling his right arm out from between his body and the wall, John elbowed Scorpius in the side of the head.  Dazed, Scorpius stumbled back slightly, giving John enough room to spin out from between the half-breed and the wall.  Spinning around, John shoved Scorpy face-first into the wall and wrapped his arms around the Peacekeeper's neck in a chokehold.

Scorpius wrapped his legs around John's and, using his Scarran augmented strength, pulled John's legs out from under him, sending them crashing to the floor.  With Scorpius falling on top of him, John had his breath knocked out of him and coughed uncontrollably while Scorpy rolled off him.  Quickly standing up as multiple bolts of lightning struck the surrounding area, Scorpius repeatedly kicked John in his abdomen, not giving the human a chance to recover and defend himself.  John threw his arms out, catching Scorpius' foot before the next kick could connect with his abdomen.  John pushed his foot and threw him back onto the ground away from the wall.  Rolling over in pain, John slowly stood up as Scorpius did the same.

"What the hell are you doing here, Scorpy?" John asked, tightly wrapping his right arm around his midsection.

"I'm here for the same reason you are, Crichton," Scorpius calmly said.

"The data crystal.  So just what the hell is on there that would bring you all the way out here from your precious Gammak Base?"

"I know you're smarter than that, John."

John thought for a microt as lightning suddenly flashed.  He waited for the thunder to die down and stated, "Wormhole information."

"Precisely."

Surprising Scorpius, John suddenly charged him, hoping to take him out.  Ramming his shoulder into Scorpy's gut, John picked up the half-breed by his legs and threw him down to the floor.  Using John's momentum against him, Scorpius planted his foot in John's abdomen, pushed him up, and flipped him over.  As Scorpius tried to rise, John spun around on his butt and kicked the Peacekeeper's legs out from under him, sending him crashing to the floor.  Immediately after Scorpius hit the floor, John tried to plant the heel of his boot against Scorpius' head.  But Scorpius saw John's move and rolled away and stood up.

Getting up immediately after Scorpius, John asked, "So what about the information you got from my brain?"

"Worthless."

"Worthless?"

"Yes.  The information was protected.  I could not access it."

"Oh, c'mon.  I figured you and that bitch of yours would've figured out a way to at least get around that little block the Ancients put in," John said sarcastically.  "Speaking of that bitch, why isn't she here?" John asked, hoping to learn of Lenara's fate as he slowly strolled towards Scorpius, stopping a few hentas away.

"Lenara, I'm afraid, is no longer a Peacekeeper."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"She was executed for treason, Crichton.  Executed for helping you and Talyn escape."

Lightning highlighted the pain in John's face as he shut his eyes and dipped his head momentarily in pain.  He knew Lenara had been taking a massive risk by helping him and Talyn, but one that both he and Lenara thought she was capable of handling.  All she wanted was to avenge the death of her sister.

Opening his eyes, he looked to his side at the wall and noticed a loose stone.  "Tell me, Scorpy…" John said and looked up into the Scarran half-breed's eyes.  "Did you know why she helped us?"

"We never did find out," Scorpius answered suspiciously.  "We placed her in the Aurora Chair, but she was unusually resistant.  She was placed in the living death before we found out."

"And do you remember the blonde tech who helped me escape from your first Gammak Base?" John asked menacingly, rage burning in his eyes.

"Yes.  Why?"

"Her name was Gilina," John said, momentarily ignoring Scorpius' question.  "She was Lenara's sister."

Scorpius turned his eyes away from John in thought.  Realizing Lenara's need for vengence, he turned back to look at John, but John quickly grabbed the loose brick from the wall with his bloodied right hand as lightning flashed and swung it around, hitting Scorpius in the left side of the head and cracking the outer casing of the coolant rod housing in his headpiece.  Scorpius stumbled to his right, away from the wall, just as John had planned, giving him more room to move.

Grabbing Scorpius' collar, John repeatedly punched him in the face as hard as he could, giving him a bloody nose, then let go of his collar.  As Scorpius stumbled back, John elbowed him hard across the jaw and brought his arm back around to backhand him across the opposite side of his jaw.  Ignoring the pain he felt and the massive heat increase which was weakening him, Scorpius swung out his arm to punch Crichton, but John blocked the hybrid's swing and countered with a punch to the gut.  As Scorpy bent over from the force of the impact, John kneed him in the face, sending him crashing to the floor onto his back.

John jogged up to Scorpius, ignoring the pain he felt in his side, and tried to kick the Scarran half-breed, but Scorpius caught his foot and threw him back onto the ground.  Rolling out of it, John shot back up as Scorpius stood up.  But with a jumping back-spin kick, John sent him crashing back down to the floor.  As John landed, he silently thanked McDaniel for using the kick on Natalie, inadvertently showing him how to do it.

With a growl, Scorpius shot up off the floor, ignoring the waves of heat he felt coursing through his body, and grabbed John by the collar.  Spinning around, he threw John back against the wall.  John hit the wall in midair on his back with a grunt and collapsed onto the floor on his stomach.  With a soft groan, John lifted his head to see where Scorpy was, but instead saw his pulse pistol lying on the floor in front of him.  He slowly turned his head to see Scorpius in the flashes of lightning, leisurely strolling towards him.

He could only hear his own heartbeat and breathing as he grabbed the pulse pistol and stood up, keeping it out of the view of the Peacekeeper scientist.  Once Scorpius was in point blank range, John raised his arm, aiming at the hybrid.  With his unique sight, Scorpius saw John raising his pulse pistol in the darkness, but the human pulled the trigger before he could move.  The pulse blast hit Scorpius in the chest, ramming him back onto the floor, and caused even more damage to his already severely compromised thermal suit.

John kept his pulse pistol trained on Scorpius as he slowly strolled up to him.  Scorpius started to weakly crawl backwards among several plants growing through the cracks, the rise in his body temperature showing on his exposed, now red face.  Without warning, one of the plants turned, opened its large mouth, and bit Scorpius' calf, causing him to holler in excruciating pain.  John aimed for the carnivorous plant and shot it, protecting himself as he walked up to Scorpy.  As the plant fell over and died, John saw that it had bitten nearly all of the flesh off Scorpius' calf down to the bone.

John came to stand next to Scorpius, who was writhing in pain from his still rising body temperature and his wounded leg.  Seeing Scorpius' condition in a flash of lightning, John waited for the thunder to die down and asked, "What's the matter Scorpy?  Feeling a little hot under the collar?"

"Crichton, you cannot kill me.  If you kill me, then you will be killing yourself," Scorpius croaked with a gulp, his breathing labored.  For emphasis, he repeated, "You will kill yourself, Crichton."

"Then I'll see you in hell," John calmly said and pulled the trigger, firing a single pulse blast at Scorpy's head.  The shot killed the half-breed instantly.  To make sure that Scorpius would stay dead, John fired repeatedly into his head until his pistol was out of chakan oil.  Once he was out, John reholstered his pistol behind his back with a relieved sigh and clutched his left side with both his hands, applying even more pressure to it to stop the bleeding.

"Didn't think so," John said and stiffly knelt down with a groan to search Scorpius for the data crystal.  Checking Scorpy's belt, he found two, one of which was stained with blue Nebari blood.  John thought that he could safely access the other mysterious crystal with Moya's help and put it in his left hand with the data crystal he had come for.  He wrapped his right arm around his abdomen to clutch his left side again and slowly stood up.  He aimed a last contemptuous kick at Scorpius' ribs and turned to leave.  He stopped dead in his tracks as another bolt of lightning flashed, revealing an alien who resembled B'Soog standing in front of him.  He had a pulse pistol strapped to his thigh and a knife stuffed in his belt and was aiming a pulse rifle at John.

"I'll be taking that data crystal, if you don't mind," the alien said in his distinct accent.

=================================

"Who are you?" John asked, staring down the alien.  He slowly slid his left hand behind his back and stuffed the two data crystals behind his holster, hoping that the alien wouldn't see his movements in the darkness.

"I'm one of the people you frelled when you destroyed half my mining colony a solar day ago.  But you can call me D'Saal," he said calmly.

"Yeah, I remember that," John said in response.  "So, what the hell are you doing here?"

"I followed you.  I guess I should thank you for not starbursting.  That made my job much easier.  And I guess I should also thank you for killing my partners.  They were cheating me out of my share."

"What?  Is that all you wanted to do?  Is that why you followed us, to say 'thank you'?  Do you expect me to say 'you're welcome', or something?"

"No, I expect you to give me that data crystal," he answered.  "I thought that if you were willing to take on a Peacekeeper command carrier for it, then it must be very valuable.  It's something that will help me undo the damage you did to my colony."

Lightning flashed and John waited for the thunder to die down.  "If you want it," he said as he planted his feet on the floor, bending his knees slightly.  "Come and get it."

In a flash of lightning John saw D'Saal squeeze the trigger on his rifle.  He jumped out of the way, barely avoiding the pulse blast.  Landing on the floor, John rolled out of the dive and ran for cover with D'Saal firing round after round at him, lighting up the entire room like a strobe light.  He stopped firing to exchange power cells and the room was once again engulfed in darkness, only to be illuminated by the frequent bursts of lightning.  However, John was still able to hide from D'Saal's view, moving only in the darkness and staying absolutely silent, not even removing his pulse pistol from its holster to exchange the chakan oil cartridge.

Slowly circling the same spot, D'Saal painstakingly scanned the foyer.  With the flashes of lightning, all he saw was Scorpius' body being devoured by several carnivorous plants.  He couldn't even find Crichton's shadow.

While D'Saal had his back turned, John jumped from out of the cover of the hall he had searched earlier and charged him.  Grabbing D'Saal, John rammed him into the stone stairs face-first, causing him to lose his pulse rifle.  D'Saal was slightly dazed, but recovered quickly and elbowed John in the temple, knocking him to the floor.  Seeing one of the 'man-eating' plants right next to him, John rolled to his right towards the stairs, narrowly avoiding having his head bitten off.  D'Saal walked up to John to pick him up, but John suddenly kicked him in the head, then in the gut, causing him to stagger back slightly.

Getting up, John kneed D'Saal in the face, but he staggered back slightly and remained standing.  Seeing the knife stuffed in D'Saal's belt as the alien righted himself, John grabbed him by the collar and spun him around, throwing him against the wall of the stairway.  He quickly grabbed the knife and drew it from D'Saal's belt, slashing his chest as he raised it overhead.  Then he immediately drove it down through D'Saal's skull into his brain, killing him.  He stood there lifeless against the wall with his eyes wide open.  Standing aside, John let D'Saal fall to the floor right in front of the man-eaters.  Standing back against the stairs while clutching his left side, John watched in a mix of horror and disgust as the carnivorous plants tore at flesh and ripped the limbs from the body.

He slowly walked away from the carnage and kept his eyes open, using the flashes of lightning to make sure that none of the plants were following him or were in his way.  Backing out of the quarters into the rain, he turned to find D'Argo and Crais to his left, positioned just as they were before he went after Scorpius, except Crais had his back turned to D'Argo.

"Hey, D'Argo," John yelled as he ran to them, the rain pounding down on his body.  "Looks like we won't have to worry about Scorpius anymore."  Running up to his Luxan friend, John saw that he was unconscious and had blood streaming out of his mouth.  "Frell," he said and knelt by D'Argo, splashing muck everywhere.  "It's still black."

John raised his hands to slam them onto D'Argo's wounds and cleanse them, but Crais suddenly interrupted him and said, "Don't waste your time, Crichton.  He's dead."

"Very funny, Crais," John said sarcastically and raised his hands again.

"If you don't believe me, then check his pulse and you will see for yourself."

John checked D'Argo's pulse to prove Crais wrong.  But he couldn't find a pulse.  Putting his ear to D'Argo's chest, he tried to listen for a heartbeat.  But he couldn't hear one.  "Oh, dren," he mumbled as he pulled away from D'Argo's chest.  Pressing his hands one on top of the other against the Luxan's chest while ignoring the stabbing pain from the wound in his side, John weakly tried to perform CPR.

Turning around, Crais saw Crichton doing something to the Luxan and assumed that the human was trying to revive D'Argo.  He said coldly, "Crichton, it is useless.  He is dead.  His wounds were too severe.  There is nothing you can do."

Ignoring Crais and the rainwater streaming down his face, John continued to pump D'Argo's chest with two breaths after every fifteen compressions and checked his pulse after every four sets of compressions.

Crais walked up to John and grabbed his arm, pulling him away from D'Argo's lifeless body, and turned him around.  Looking John in the eye, Crais sternly said, "Leave him be, Crichton."

"I can save him," John replied over the thunder that boomed in the distance and frantically tried to pull his arm away from Crais' grasp.

"No, you cannot.  There is nothing you or anyone else can do.  Not even Zhaan can help him.  He is dead.  You have to accept this."

Yanking his arm from Crais' grip, John looked down at D'Argo.  Glaring back at Crais through the downpour, he yelled, "You were here, you could've done something."

"Yes, I was here, but there was nothing I could have done.  He would not let me near him."

"Bullshit," John yelled.  He suddenly remembered the pulse blast he had heard under the thunder while he was inside the nun's quarters.  Lightning flashed in the distance with an accompanying roar of thunder.  John waited for the thunder to die down and added, "You killed him."

"No," Crais yelled back.  "You killed him, Crichton.  You were the one who left him for dead.  If you had stayed, he might have lived."

John stared at Crais in shock.  He knew Crais was right.  If he had stayed instead of going after Scorpius to satisfy his hunger for vengeance, D'Argo might have lived long enough to get some medical treatment.

"But before he died," Crais said, gaining John's attention.  "He told me that he wants you to continue the search for his son.  And he wants you to pass his qualta blade on to Jothee."

"Why the frell would he tell you that?"

"I, obviously, was the only person present at the time."  Crais opened his mouth to say more, but was interrupted.

"Crichton," John and Crais both heard Chiana yell.  They turned to see five Nebari walking out from beside the chapel through the mud with Chiana.  Seeing that Chiana's hands were restrained behind her back and that she was wearing a control collar, John reached for the pulse pistol behind his back, but remembered it was out of chakan oil.

Walking up to John and Crais with guards all around her, Chiana saw D'Argo lying in the mud covered in black blood.  Once she saw his wounds she knew he was dead.  She stared blankly at him as tears streamed down her face.  She wanted to scream and tear the limbs from the Nebari surrounding her.  But she knew if she tried, all the official would have to do to subdue her was to push the button implanted on his forehead.  All she could do was stand there and stare at D'Argo's body.

The Nebari came to stand in front John and Crais with their pulse weapons trained on the Sebacean and the Human, rainwater dripping from their barrels.  The lead official calmly said, "You have something which belongs to us.  We have come to claim it."

"Let me guess," John said, emotionless.  "The data crystal."

"Yes," the official answered.

"So, how did you know we were here?" John asked as the effects of his adrenaline ebbed.  He tried to hide how weak he was from his blood loss and added, "Oh, wait.  Let me guess again.  You were able to follow us because we didn't starburst, right?"

"No," the official answered, not seeing any reason in not letting who he thought was a Sebacean know.  "We had a tracking device implanted in Dalek."

Thinking back to when Dalek gave him the line about being tired, John said, "He was working for you, wasn't he?  He told me he was tired, but I knew it was just a line."

"Yes," the Nebari answered.  "He was working for us.  But he didn't know it."

"What do you mean?" Crais asked suspiciously.

Turning to Crais, he said, "We had captured him, 'reprogrammed' him, and sent him to the Resistance.  He gathered information for us.  When we learned of the data crystal, we instructed him to bring it to us."  Turning back to John, the official asked, "Now, where is the data crystal?"

"It's safe.  And you're not getting it," John said, trying to seem defiant.

"That is unfortunate," the official calmly stated.  Turning to his men, he ordered, "You may fire when ready."

As John stood there trying to maintain his balance, he saw the Nebari pulling their triggers.  Suddenly, pulse blasts rang out from nowhere, cutting through the Nebari with brutal ease as John, Chiana, and Crais dove to the ground to avoid being hit.  The pulse blasts died off and the trio looked up.  They saw some more Nebari standing around them with various pulse weapons in hand.  The first group of five lay dead on the ground.

Looking around, John saw Meelak and roughly said, "Jesus, you've got some great timing, you know that?"

"When we saw that you had been out of contact with Talyn for quite some time," Meelak started as he walked up to John and offered the Human his hand, as other Nebari helped Crais and Chiana up and released her from her restraints.  "We thought you could use our help."

"You've been following us, too?"

"Yes."

John took Meelak's hand and allowed the Nebari to pull him up.  As John stood, wobbling slightly, he said, "If you've been following us, then why haven't you helped?"

"We couldn't risk it," he answered.  "Our numbers are very small and we couldn't risk losing anyone."

"I can understand that."

"Good."  Looking right into John's eyes, Meelak asked, "Do you have the data crystal?"

"Yeah," John said.  "But first, Moya and Zhaan."

"Of course.  Moya has been released.  She is now flying free in orbit around this planet with Talyn."

"I'm glad to hear it," John said.  "Now, what about Zhaan?"

"She is cured," Meelak answered.

"She's what?" John said in shock.  "I thought you said that you didn't have the resources to do it?"

Meelak remained silent for several microts as he looked at John, then calmly said, "Yes, I did."

John stared at Meelak in surprised realization and quietly said, "You lied.  You had the resources to cure her all along, but you didn't.  You wanted to make sure that we would do this for you, so you didn't give her the cure, did you?"

"Yes.  Now where is the data crystal?"

John stared at Meelak in contempt.  He slowly turned around on shaky legs in incredulity, remembering his last visit with Zhaan.

****************************************

"She will kill you," the Nebari said.

"She's my friend."

Meelak paused for a microt then continued.  "When one of my men tried to bring her some soup, she tried to kill him with the spoon."

John stared at Meelak then turned to look at Zhaan who was still standing naked beside her bed with her hands folded in front of her, patiently waiting.  "I'll take my chances."

"Very well," Meelak said as he moved out of the way.  "But first…" he paused as he reached behind his back, pulled out a pulse pistol, and held it to John grip first.  "You should take this."

John looked down at the pistol suspiciously, then back up at Meelak.

"You and I still have business to discuss, and we can't talk if you're dead."

Looking back down at the pistol, John was trying to decide if he could trust Meelak.  After a few microts, he figured Meelak was right; it was better to be safe than sorry.  He took the pulse pistol and looked down at it, still wondering if he could trust the Nebari.  He looked back up to Meelak as he pointed the pistol at the floor to his side and fired.

"Satisfied?"  Meelak asked.

As he reached for the door sensor, John just gave him a look that said, What do you think?

Once John was inside Zhaan's quarters, Meelak shut the door and locked it as he watched John walk towards the nude Delvian.

As John circled Zhaan, he kept his pulse pistol down at his side, but he had his finger on the trigger.  He noticed a tray of untouched food cubes and a cup of water sitting on the table next to her Delvian urn, but he had other more important things to worry about than whether or not she was eating.  He looked back up into Zhaan's red eyes as he stood to the side of the room and stayed close to the door with Zhaan between him and her bed.

She looked down at John's pistol then looked back up into his eyes and said, "I thought you said we were friends."

"We are."

"Then, why that?" she asked as she glanced at the pulse pistol John was holding at his side.

"It's for your sake, not mine."

"My sake?" she asked as she slowly walked towards John.  "Is that because of the madness?  Are you going to kill me to put me out of my misery?"

John raised his pulse pistol at her head as she walked towards him, and said "Zhaan, stop right there.  I don't want to hurt you, but I..."

Zhaan suddenly charged at John and pushed him up against the wall, causing him to drop his pistol as she pressed up against him, her face mere centimeters from his. 

She whispered, "You'll what?  You'll hurt me?"  She let out a small laugh, and continued.  "I don't think so.  Not when I need your help…"

She reached up with one hand to grab John's ear and gave him a Delvian Kiss as she whispered to him, "They did this to me John.  I need your help to get out of here and to get revenge for what they did to me.  If you do this for me, I will be very…" she paused as she slid her other hand down to John's crotch and gave him a squeeze.  "Very grateful."

"Oh, yeah," John shakily said through gritted teeth with his eyes closed as he shuddered from the sensations.  "I have no doubt about that."

****************************************

Slowly turning his head to get a look at Meelak out of the corner of his eye, John said, "You know, when I last saw Zhaan, she hadn't touched her food.  I didn't think too much about it at the time."  Slowly turning around, John looked right at Meelak.  "Then she told me, 'They did this to me, John.'"

"Yes, whatever," Meelak interrupted.  "So where's the data crystal?"

Ignoring Meelak's question, John continued, "I thought she was talking about Varla and didn't know that your people were with the Resistance.  But now that I've had time to think…"  John paused as he walked up to Meelak, standing nose-to-nose with the Nebari, and added, "She was talking about you wasn't she?"

Meelak remained silent as lightning flashed in the distance and thunder boomed overhead, but his silence only confirmed John's suspicions.

"You son of a bitch.  You used her to get to us, then you used us to get the crystal…"

"Yes, I used her and you," Meelak yelled, frustrated with John's noncompliance.  "I used you to get the data crystal and to get him," he added, looking down at the dead Nebari official.

John, Chiana, and Crais stared at Meelak in stunned silence from his unintentional outburst as a sequence of lightning bolts struck off in the distance.  Realizing his mistake, Meelak turned away from John.

With tears still streaming down her cheeks, mixing with the rain dripping from her matted hair, Chiana walked up to Meelak and softly said, "So, we went through all this…  D'Argo died after all this, just so you could kill him?"  She glanced at the official, nodding her head at him.

Turning to Chiana, Meelak said, "It's more complicated than that."

Rearing back, Chiana punched Meelak in the nose and broke it, knocking him down to the muddy ground and splashing muck everywhere as his blue blood streamed out of his nose.  "Frell you," she yelled and repeatedly kicked him in the gut as hard as she could.

Grabbing Chiana by the arm, John pulled her away from Meelak and into a tight embrace.  As Chiana cried against his jacket, John looked down at Meelak and said, "Just how the frell is it more complicated than that?"

Reaching up, Meelak wiped the blood away from under his nose and stood up, looking right at Crichton and Chiana as she turned in his arms to glare back.  "It's more complicated because that official is the premiere weapons scientist for the Establishment.  If he got the data crystal then the Establishment would have a technology that would change the balance of power.  We had to take him out.  And we also knew one of my people was working for the Establishment.  We were positive it was either Sylla or Dalek…"

"Which was why you sent them with us," Crichton interrupted.  "You knew one of them would try to steal the crystal and get it to him," he stated, looking down at the dead official over Chiana's head.

"Yes.  Now you have what you want.  So give me what I want."

Reaching behind his holster, John felt for and pulled out the dry data crystal he found on Scorpius and threw it to Meelak.  "It's all yours, buddy."

"Thank you," Meelak responded.  Looking at his men, he ordered, "Let's go."

As Meelak and his entourage marched through the mud, exiting through the hole in the perimeter wall to the ship they had brought down from Moya, Stark and Aeryn helped each other slowly walk out of the chapel toward John and Chiana.  "John, are you okay?" Aeryn asked as she walked up to him, seeing his extremely pale complexion accented by the rain streaming down his face.  Letting go of Chiana, John stepped to the side revealing D'Argo's dead body.  Shocked, Aeryn quietly said, "Oh, frell."

Opening his mouth, John tried to say something, but was interrupted as the Resistance's expresser lifted off.  As he watched the ship speed away into space, John opened up his jacket and activated his comms.  "Hey, Natalie, ya there?"

"It's about damn time you contacted me," Natalie yelled.  "I've been going out of my mind up here."

"Yeah, I'm sorry about that, but we've got a big problem."

"What?"

"There's a Nebari ship leaving the planet."

Knowing what John was thinking, Aeryn asked, "John, what the frell are you doing?"

"They've got a copy of the data crystal," John continued, ignoring Aeryn's question.  "So you're going to have to take them out, Natalie."

"Why?  What's on the crystal?"

"Wormhole information."

"I'll be back in a sec," Natalie responded after a few microts and closed the comms channel.

"John, what the frell have you done?" Aeryn asked, still using Stark as support.

"They used us, Aeryn," John answered with rage burning in his eyes.  "They used us and got D'Argo killed.  I'm not going to let them get away with that."

"Then what the frell are you going to tell Natalie when she finds out that she just killed members of the Resistance?" Chiana asked.

John stared at Chiana with heavy eyes through the rain and remained silent, waiting for Natalie.

They waited in silence for over half an arn, then heard a comms channel open.

"It's done, John," they heard Natalie say through the comms.  "Talyn took 'em out."

"Good," John mumbled and passed out, falling back into the mud.

=================================

With Aeryn at his side to help him stand, John stood with her as far back from the others as possible.  He blankly stared at D'Argo's corpse.  It was completely wrapped in one of Moya's blankets and was lying on a bench that had remained unscathed and was placed on the dais.  His eyes shifted to Zhaan as she slowly walked around D'Argo while performing a Delvian death ritual.

After he had passed out from blood loss and exhaustion, Chiana had piloted the Marauder they had come down to the planet in up to Moya while Crais informed Aeryn and Stark of the events that had transpired.  Once on Moya, Chiana freed Zhaan and, along with Rygel, she helped the Delvian gather the necessary medical supplies to help John, Aeryn, and Stark.  In that time she tearfully let Zhaan, Rygel, and Natalie know about D'Argo's death, but she didn't tell what Crichton did to Meelak and his men.  Chiana also had a private conversation with Natalie about a decision she had come to.  As Chiana brought Zhaan and Rygel down to the planet, Natalie was taking care of things with Pilot's help in regards to Chiana's decision and was going to join her friends shortly.

By the time they had returned to the planet, day had turned to night and the storm had passed.  Zhaan treated John's, Aeryn's, and Stark's wounds with no complications. She also gave D'Argo an autopsy before preparing his body for a death ritual.  Because D'Argo hadn't let any of them know about Luxan death rituals, it was decided that Zhaan would perform a ritual that they thought D'Argo would want.  So there they stood - Stark up front supporting Zhaan, Chiana and Rygel standing behind him and off to the side, Crais standing several hentas off to the other side, with John and Aeryn standing in the back, side-by-side – watching Zhaan.  They watched and listed to Zhaan.  Except for John.

All John could do was look at D'Argo's corpse in shame, recriminating himself over what he had done and thinking of what he should have done.

Turning to gaze at John, Aeryn saw the look in his eye.  Trying to help him, she said, "There was nothing you could've done, you know?  Even Zhaan said that his wounds were too severe for any of us to do anything to help him."

John turned to Aeryn, gazing into her eyes for a few microts, and said, "Maybe not, but I could've at least stayed with him and let Crais go."  Turning back to look at D'Argo's body, he added, "I know he didn't want Crais to be there to watch him die."

The two remained silent for a number of microts as they watched Zhaan perform the death ritual.  Suddenly, Aeryn quietly asked, "So what do you want to do with Crais?"

John sighed and shifted his gaze to Crais, watching the ex-Captain as he thought.  "I say we leave him here," John finally said, turning to Aeryn.  "And take the Peacekeeper ships so he can't leave."

"We could do that," Aeryn said, turning to look at John.  "Or we could take him with us."

"Take him with us?"

"Yes, we could take him with us."

"Why would we want to do that?"

"We want to do that because we need him.  Now that D'Argo's gone, there's only you and me.  The others can fight, yes, but they're not warriors, John.  We need Crais."

Turning to look at Crais, John said, "You've got a point.  But we're not going to let him anywhere near Talyn."

"No, we're not," Aeryn said, determined to keep Crais from taking Talyn again.

The two descended into silence once again.  Several microts later, Aeryn suddenly asked, "So what are you going to tell Natalie?"

"I don't know," John quietly answered.

A few microts later, Natalie walked up to John and Aeryn with her hair down, concealing her transponder.  "Hey," she softly said.

"Hey," John replied.  Turning to her, he thought he smelled raslac on her, but he ignored it and asked, "Where were you, anyway?"

"I was taking care of something on Moya with Pilot."

"Taking care of something?" Aeryn asked.

"Yeah, I was moving my stuff over to Talyn."

"Couldn't that have waited?" John asked.

With a sigh, Natalie closed her eyes and let her head fall.  Looking back up at John, she said, "Talyn and I are leaving as soon as I get back on board."

"What?" John and Aeryn simultaneously asked in shock.

"Yeah, Talyn and I leaving.  And Chiana's coming with us.  I was moving her stuff over to Talyn, too."

"What do you mean you and Talyn are leaving?" Crais asked as he walked up to Natalie, attracting her attention.  "And who are you?"

"Crais," she said, sizing up the ex-Captain.  "I didn't think you'd be here, at the funeral of one of the men you tried to hunt down."

"Yes, I tracked Ka D'Argo.  But I was only doing my duty as a Peacekeeper.  Now, who are you, and why are you taking my ship?"

Natalie broke out into laughter, mocking Crais.  This caused Zhaan to stop her chanting and drew her attention along with that of Chiana and Rygel.  "Your ship?" Natalie mockingly asked.  "Okay," she started, sobering up.  "First off, he's not your ship.  Second, we're leaving because the Peacekeepers are after Talyn, and we don't want to put Moya and the other in harm's way.  And third, I'm Dr. Natalie Grant."

"Well, Dr. Grant," Crais said menacingly, walking up to Natalie and stood nose-to-nose with her to try to intimidate her.  "Talyn is my ship.  I am his captain.  He is leaving with me."

"Well," Natalie started and reached behind her neck, pushing her hair off to the side.  She pulled out her transponder, held it in front of her for all to see, and said, "This says otherwise."

"Jesus, Natalie," John stated as he and the other looked on in stunned silence.

"Where did you get that?" Crais asked simultaneously.

"Talyn gave it to me and he is not leaving with you.  He doesn't want you anywhere near him," Natalie said in a low menacing voice, replacing the transponder behind her neck.  "I will not let you get anywhere near him, let alone let you take him."

"You will remove that transponder at once," Crais ordered.  "Talyn needs a captain.  He needs someone to train him to be a warrior.  He needs me."

"Look, you arrogant son of a bitch, Talyn doesn't need you.  And he certainly doesn't need any more of that Peacekeeper bullshit you've been filling his 'head' with."

"You will remove that transponder at once," Crais yelled.

Quickly pulling out the pulse pistol she had stuffed in her belt, Natalie pistol-whipped Crais on the top of the head, knocking him to the ground.  Straddling Crais, Natalie got down on one knee and aimed her pistol at Crais' head.  What Crais and the others didn't know was that the pistol wasn't armed.

"Crais, if I catch you anywhere near Talyn, I will kill you.  If Talyn sees you anywhere near him, he will shoot you down.  Do you understand?"

Crais remained silent as he glared at Natalie and, in grudging acceptance, he said, "Yes."

"All right," she said and stood up, stuffing her pulse pistol in her belt behind her back.  Looking up, she saw that everyone's eyes were on her.  Locking her eyes with Zhaan, she softly said, "I'm sorry."

"It's okay, child," the Delvian calmly said with a small smile.  Standing aside, Zhaan motioned for a tearful Chiana to join her on the dais.

The others watched as Chiana joined Zhaan, walking up to D'Argo's corpse.  She pulled out a small vial of powder and poured it out onto the blanket, setting it on fire instantaneously.  Walking off the dais, Chiana and Zhaan joined the others on the muddy floor of the chapel and watched as D'Argo's body was consumed in flames that reached up into the night sky.

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The End