Episode Four: Farscape Loose Ends: Corners

by Errationatus2

Crichton is on the hunt for the real Furlow, and has recruited a new crew to help him. To live this new life, however, is going to require a few new changes...

Previously, on Farscape:

Crichton has left Moya. Acquiring the Ashkelon Warlord D'Strand'm'tah's Stealth-class Vigilante from Miriya Breannados, Crichton has begun a hunt for the devious mechanic Furlow. After visiting the pirate Reihna Karadandidos, Crichton thought he had finally caught up to Furlow – only to discover it was not her but a bioloid. Now, with his new crew – consisting of an enigmatic 'Blade Maiden' who invited herself aboard, a manic ex-Peacekeeper computer hacker, and an exiled Scarran gladiator both 'found' in a mental hospital, Crichton heads for Dambada, not entirely sure what he's got himself into…

AND NOW, ON FARSCAPE: FREEBOOTER:

LOOSE ENDS

CORNERS

---

History may not repeat itself, but it does rhyme a lot.

Mark Twain

---

IT LOOKED THE WAY HE'D LEFT IT, FROM THE LAST TIME.

Still a burnt-out wreck, orange-dusty, too hot, a garbage heap.

Furlow's garage looked as if no one had been back since it had been blown to hell a cycle ago. He'd learned, however, not to take anything for granted. That was why, behind him, the Vengeance was running widescans and her weapons were tracking anything that moved.

"Spectacular." He heard Haxer say from behind him, saw the man kicking dirt. "Not exactly resort material, is it?" He had been going over the wreckage of the vehicles left behind. They'd all been stripped to their frames, if not simply stolen outright. Crichton even knew where the one vehicle had been that his counterpart had flipped in the pursuit of Furlow and his Displacement Engine. Whether it had been perverse pleasure or just simple pique – he'd blown it into very little pieces on his second – amend that – first trip here. Those pieces were still there.

At least they didn't have to wear those stupid-looking goggles. Any more flare activity was cycles away. Chak'sa was looking over one of Furlow's wrecked auto-cannons. Shiv, as was becoming usual, by his side. She was holding a scanner in her hand, watching it carefully.

"No activity." She reported finally. "No active energy sources. No lifeforms other than ourselves."

"Can you scan under this crap?" He asked, squinting in the harsh white light, wishing for the thousandth time he had a pair of sunglasses. It wasn't that the concept in this part of the universe had never been heard of, it was just that he simply couldn't find a style he liked.

Shiv tried, reported a negative. He thought about it.

"Interesting." Chak'sa came over to them. She'd been investigating the auto-cannon. "That cannon has been recently cannibalized." She reported. "And it is very …clean."

"'Clean'?" He asked, adjusting the filter over his face. He didn't feel like coughing up the fine dust that was everywhere here for the next three days.

"Yes. The only components taken were mostly in the fire control subsystem."

"Okay, that's strange." Haxer said.

"I checked one or two others, and they have been wrecked, and completely stripped."

Crichton turned, pointed at the one she had just vacated.

"So just that one?" A nod. "It's been cleaned." Another short nod. "Specifically cleaned?"

"It would appear so." She thought about for a moment. "I would say that it appears to me to have been forensically cleaned. There was a definite pattern to it."

"Yeah, that jibes." Crichton turned back to Shiv. "Take a stroll around the complex. Run that ground scan again."

"For what am I looking?" She asked, activating the pad again.

"Irregularities. Something that doesn't quite fit. Anything a bit… off."

"Could you be a bit more vague, please?" Haxer quipped as he drew up beside them.

"It's just a hunch. Furlow's a little too sly."

Shiv bent about her task, wandered away, walked around the perimeter. Chak'sa seemed content to stand and wait, but Haxer fidgeted.

"Y'know, I'm glad I signed on. This endless action really gets your heart racing."

"Would you prefer yet another day of endless insincerity and useless medication?" Chak'sa asked him. "I find this infinitely preferable."

"You would, my little Scarran delight. Heat, sand, dust, the aftermath of carnage. Like a fellip garden to you lot."

Chak'sa allowed a small smile to ghost across her face.

"And you are like every other Sebacean in the cosmos – the one species most adept at being an irritant."

Crichton suppressed a smile at that.

"One thing I've been curious about," He directed casually at Chak'sa. "Did you ever find any help at Ushen Nevaar?"

"For him," she clicked in her throat. "Nothing seems to work – and anything that might is far beyond our – his – means." Haxer nodded behind her.

"That figures."

"Yup." Haxer answered for himself. "I was enjoying the peace and quiet, though."

Chak'sa rolled her eyes.

"You did not sleep next to the wall with the Dragiga Throat-Singer who believed that if he did not sing he would die."

"For which I'm grateful, Cha – as always." He looked over at Crichton, smiled. "She does looks after me."

They both said it, at precisely the same time: "Though I don't know why."

Crichton smiled. Odd to think of a Scarran with a sense of humor. But then, Chak'sa was hardly just any Scarran. None of them were 'just' anything, he mused. Quite the crew he had acquired, all scarred up, twisted in some way, all a little driven and grim in their ways. He could trust them, he had decided, as far as he would trust anyone. It wasn't much, but it would do. He had thought it would take more time, but some instinct had told him that he could. They were, in many ways, all freaks, belonging nowhere. So why not? Do what freaks everywhere had done since time immemorial: come together. They would never be 'normal', not even to each other, but they could trust one another. Each other was all they'd ever have. A Scarran could trust a Peacekeeper, and they could trust a Human analogue. They could all trust Shiv, simply by the dint of the knowledge that she was exactly what she appeared to be – she had no guile, no hidden seams. From her birth she had been taught to have no pretensions, to be direct, to be pure, to perform the one perfect kill and then extinguish herself, an example of her art for others to follow.

Shiv was a freak only in that she had refused to be extinguished.

Crichton watched her make a methodical circuit around the wreck of Furlow's garage, glanced at the arguing Haxer, the stoically patient Chak'sa, wondered again if he'd made the right choice, decided that he had. The worst that could happen was getting killed, and he no longer feared that. If he were dead, he'd be beyond caring. Betrayal he expected, thus it would not surprise him when it came. These three, like all the rest that had come before, and all who would come after, were temporary. Stay or leave, he did not care. Love him, hate him, be indifferent to him, that didn't matter either. He trusted only himself and nothing else.

Shiv completed her turn, came back.

"Anything?" He asked her.

"Density changes." She replied simply, holding up the scanner. "Here, here and here. A small energy reading."

"Compositional analysis?" He asked after a moment of studying it.

"Plasticrete." She told him. "Standard construction material. It appears, however, to be reinforced with some kind of energy layer."

He crooked a smile at her, looked it over again.

"Scattering field over hatches? Furlow mentioned a sewer at one point. But you don't need five entrances to a sewer…. Scattering field as camouflage." He told them to fan out, gave them each a hatch to find. After a few moments, Haxer had found his, had pried it open, and then immediately slammed it shut.

"Thanks!" He called over. "You can eliminate the sewer!" He dusted his hands and went for the next.

Shiv's was buried under tons of rubble, and Chak'sa's had been filled in by debris from the explosion that had leveled the place. Crichton's led down, but only to a storage room, empty. Haxer's next choice yielded better results, however. He was heaving piles of rubble away.

"Hey! I think I've found something." They came over, to find him pointing to a heavy hatch. Shiv scanned it.

"The energy is strongest here." Crichton reached down and tried to pull the hatch up, which was heavier than it looked. It barely moved. Chak'sa grabbed it and yanked it open with little effort, snapping the lock. She was easily the strongest physically, even if she didn't look it. The door made little noise opening. It obviously had regular maintenance.

The hatch opened down into shaft with stairs – dusty stairs with clear footprints going in both directions.

"Nice one." Crichton dug out a light, pulled a pistol, started down. The stairs didn't go too deep, only a few motras. They ended in a large metal door. Crichton pressed his ear against it. Nothing. He waved Shiv forward – she had the best hearing of all of them.

She listened, shook her head. Crichton tried the latch – locked. He stepped back, aimed a boot at it, kicked. The door rattled, but didn't budge. Another couple of kicks had it open.

"Well, well…" he muttered as they stepped in. Along the walls were computers, all active, in standby. Any sign of occupancy was not too recent, however.

"Haxer." Crichton turned to him. "You can handle these?"

Haxer sniffed.

"Don't be insulting."

Crichton made a sweeping motion with his hand – an invitation. Haxer dusted his hands, walked forward.

"Anything specific?" Crichton shook his head.

"Get all of it. I'll need you to sort it later." He pondered the size charge he'd need to blow this area. He was going to finish what Sun had missed.

"Furlow, undoubtedly." Shiv observed. "I would estimate that she had been here only a few solar days ago."

"That figures." Crichton told her. "How's it looking?" Directed at Haxer.

"She's got a lot of data on this thing. Odd that she'd leave it here, though."

"No worries," Crichton told him. "She's a pirate's hostage, right? Who would think to go rooting around underneath a big pile of burnt-out rubble?"

"Well, you." Haxer said, slapping a portable data node into the computer's port, began downloading.

"Other than me."

Shiv came up to him.

"There is something I do not understand." She said. He looked at her, raised an eyebrow. "If Furlow has indeed been using this room, why did she clean the cannon outside – and so meticulously? Why only that one?"

Crichton had been thinking about that.

"She didn't. I think that was a separate event. It doesn't jibe. If it had anything really to do with her it did only coincidently. It was too deliberate." He stepped back. "Remember I had told you that Crichton had been here before – then he and the others had blown this place up?"

"Yes…"

"That cannon was the one the Hynerian was using to hold off the Charrids."

"Why forensically clean the cannon? All one would find would be Hynerian DNA, at best."

"Why make a bioloid of Furlow?" Crichton countered. He had his suspicions. Haxer signaled his completion of his task and Crichton led them out. He made a decision, led the way back to the ship.

"I'm late into this game, Shiv." He told her as they walked back to the Vengeance. "Somebody's more than a few steps ahead of me, and I've gotta catch up – and it's definitely a game."

One piece of this little mystery was now in his hands, possibly an important piece, but certainly not the only one. They climbed back aboard the Vengeance and Crichton armed a heavy charge, dropped it as the ship climbed back into the sky. There was a blinding blue flash and what was left of Furlow's garage and surrounding area disappeared. Anyone who followed would find only a hundred motra-wide smooth glass-bottomed crater.

"Is this even about this Furlow any longer?" Shiv asked him when they were underway.

"Peripherally. She's no longer the focus. Something else is going on here, Shiv. It's bigger than Furlow, and I think I need to find out what it is." She nodded, went forward. Chak'sa would be piloting today. Crichton followed Haxer back to the Vengeance's main computer bay. He was uploading Furlow's data.

"Much encryption?" Crichton asked.

"A bit. Nothing that I couldn't get through. I disabled a few viral codes too. You're right, she's tricky. Wouldn't want any of them in the ship."

"Agreed. How long do you think it'd take you to sift all of it?"

"Depends on what you want."

Crichton stowed his gear.

"That's just it – I'm not sure. I doubt we're going to get itineraries and detailed plans of where she's going."

"But you want anything that might suggest it?"

"Yeah. And what she's working on, and why."

"I'll see what I can do." Haxer sat, started sifting. Crichton slapped him on the back, went forward.

"Destination?" Chak'sa asked him. They were hanging in orbit, waiting for him to decide.

"Somewhere with a decent comm network, I think. Preferably a Peacekeeper network."

Shiv ran a few commands through the Navicomp.

"The closest with a civilian connection is Avarsham." She informed him. "However, the Corporate Judiciary has apparently barred visitors for a weeken." She tried again. "There is a Peacekeeper Iila-class Listening Post in the Y'ashool Expanse."

"Which is special why?"

"Iila-class is a secure facility that processes all Outer Perimeter Subvertor and Disruptor networks and activities. We may not get names per se, but at times locations can be more telling. As for defences, they are minimal. A few Marauder crews, perhaps a Prowler detachment - nothing significant. It is technically not supposed to be there, if you follow me."

"Ah. Yeah, outstanding. That's perfect." He nodded to Chak'sa, who put them on course. He looked out of the forward portal for a moment, sighed and then vanished into the back.

Shiv watched him go, then turned her attention back to the Navicomp. Chak'sa shifted beside her. She had all the air of someone wanting to ask a question, but wasn't sure how to ask. After a short while, she ventured,

"What do you know of him, Shivi'na?" She was clearly talking about Crichton. "Is he who he says he is?"

"I first met him several monens ago while in Reihna's service. The Crichton I met then was not like this one, I will admit. He was more… haphazard… in his approach. His control is far more mature now, in my opinion."

"Experience changes one." Chak'sa told her. "Did that influence your decision to enter his service?" Shiv thought a moment, then nodded. She told Chak'sa what he had told Reihna about there being a duplicate. Chak'sa seemed intrigued but not surprised.

"His reputation would not bar such a possibility. He feels he is not the 'original' Crichton, is that it?"

"From all indications, an original and duplicate – if it is true - if they are completely identical in every way, would be a moot point to make. He would be John Crichton – whether he believes it or not. I suspect, however, that his agenda would be better served by the fiction he is attempting to propagate."

Chak'sa thought it over, nodded to herself.

"What are your impressions of him, Shivi'na?"

"I do not think it is possible to sum him up succinctly, Chak'sa." Shiv said, after a moment of thought. She also thought that an understatement. Crichton was nothing but a mass of contradictions.

"I've heard the stories, of course. I admit I scarcely believed any of them."

"He destroyed a Se'em'aari Triad," Shiv mused, her tone still one of vague disbelief. Yet the intact First Quills could not be faked, and only from a Se'em'aari corpse could they be extracted at all. "No easy feat, even for Thantados." That too was an understatement. If any Prey gave Shiv pause – and it had to be admitted there were some – not many, but some – Se'em'aari were in the top five.

"Or a Scarran." Chak'sa observed. "I fought one in Lost Fortune. She nearly ended my career. 'Haxer' – it shall be odd to call him that - does confirm Crichton's time in the Aurora Chair. He was there. Crichton did destroy the base."

"Considering how badly the Peacekeepers want him, I think it is safe to assume that his reputation is deserved. Reihna certainly believed it to be."

Chak'sa watched the stars go by for a while, then asked, "Do you trust him, Shivi'na?"

"When I first encountered him, I did not," Shiv replied in her usual candid way. "I admit, he is …unusual in my experience. He is very inexplicable – yet completely open with his emotions. It is a combination I cannot fathom."

"He intrigues you." Chak'sa said, with the faintest hint of amusement. Shiv gazed at her for a long moment.

"Yes."

Chak'sa cocked her head at that, allowed a small smile to appear on her face. "Your intrigue is intellectual."

"Of course it is."

"Yeah," came from the back. Both turned in their seats to see Haxer standing in the doorway. "What is your scam, anyway, Shiv?" He asked. "Why'd you dump Reihna and sign up with him? What are we waiting for? It'd be like old times – with this amazing beast – he's worth at least 60 million by now. We could all retire and live comfortable for the rest of our lives – even if he is some rogue tech trying to pass himself off."

"My reasons are my own concern – and these are not old times," Shiv said, ice frosting her tone. "Nor will you suggest such a thing again."

Haxer smiled a wide smile of his own, made a point of looking at Chak'sa.

"Yeah, it's personal, all right." He shook his head. "Who would'a thought that?" He mock-sighed. "Our little girl is growing…" a blade thwocked into the bulkhead next to his head, and hair slowly fluttered to the floor. It didn't faze him in the slightest.

"I rest my case." He laughed, retreated. Shiv glared after him, stood, retrieved her blade.

"I see your sense of humor remains intact," Chak'sa told her, dryly, watching her snap it back into its place on her 'cuirass'.

"My reasons are personal, yes." Shiv said after a moment, remembering her oath to Crichton. "But not that personal, if I follow your train of thought correctly. It is not some 'female sexual whim'. Thantados do not breed, nor do we engage in emotional interpersonal fixations. We are incapable of it. We are never expected to live long enough to do so and thus are not given the capacity."

Chak'sa clucked her tongue in that thoughtful Scarran way, checked her course.

"Well, it is true that you weren't expected to form friendships, or learn to enjoy the finer things that living has to offer, either. Yet you have done these things." She glanced over at Shiv, amended her statement. "In your own way, of course. Why not explore physical pleasure as well?"

"I would not know how." Shiv said frankly. "I do not have the faculties to know arousal, desire, or pleasure. I do not have the capabilities for measuring physical attractiveness. When he was with Reihna, I noted many females looked on Crichton with some favour, although he did not reciprocate. I assume he is considered attractive – at least by Sebacean standards."

"Not only Sebaceans," she added, but Shiv shook her head.

"It is irrelevant. I was created for other matters."

"For which you are justly famed. But, if your makers did not intend you to be attractive, and you certainly are – why did they make you so? If you are not meant to know physical pleasure, why equip you with female anatomy? For example, what possible use are breasts to one such as you?"

Shiv blinked. She found herself involuntarily glancing down. It was not something she'd ever pondered – it had never come up. Shiv had simply assumed it was just another method of distraction, if necessary – a psychological edge. Part of her arsenal, as it were, and she said as much.

"That's certainly possible." Chak'sa conceded. She'd not thought along those lines before. Interesting.

"It might be more accurate to say I am not …psychologically… equipped for such things." Shiv speculated. "Regardless, I am unmoved. It serves no useful purpose, nor do I require emotional attachments."

Chak'sa just shook her head, finding it hard to believe. Shiv thought about it. She was one of those people who were honest almost to the point of brutality – she simply didn't care about the 'feelings' of others. The truth was the truth – she was not made for lying. She could be cunning, sly, deceptive if the situation required it, but she could not lie. Simply omitting relevant facts or keeping the truth to herself was not the same thing.

She thought some more, and understood what Chak'sa was 'getting at', as Crichton might have said – she had simply, for no reason Chak'sa could discern, switched alliances from Reihna to Crichton, and there had to be a reason. Chak'sa assumed it was a feminine reason, intrigue about a famous male, possibly something physical. In her head, Shiv almost laughed. She had not lied when she'd told the Scarran that she had no context for arousal, or desire, or physical pleasure. She didn't. She had all the physical requirements to have sex, of course, but sex required emotional contexts Shiv could not provide.

In the past, Shiv had encountered people involved in such relationships, she'd even witnessed the physical aspects of such a one – pirates were notorious for engaging in it wherever and whenever it was possible to do so – and out of sheer curiosity, she had – once - selected a male to copulate with – merely as an intellectual exercise. Nothing had come of it, however. After half-an-arn of his fumbling about, and nothing at all stirring within her, she had dismissed him. When he had refused to end the encounter, she had been forced to severely injure him. She could not see what others found so worthy of such great pursuit and thus never bothered again.

The idea was frankly ridiculous. Crichton intrigued her, certainly. He was a being of contradictions. He was unpredictable, and Shiv was used to being able to predict actions. Very rarely had she been wrong, but with Crichton, she was very rarely right, and that puzzled her immensely.

That was all.

Chak'sa, for her part, had different ideas about it, but kept them to herself. She had known Shiv for many cycles off and on, and knew that - despite her proficiency and knowledge - she was in many ways a child, a young woman who may have understood combat and the art of killing, but knew next to nothing about what it was to be female. Even if Shiv did not understand it herself, female she was, and engineered or not, instincts would rouse themselves, whether she was ready or not. It was only a matter of circumstance and time, although she couldn't imagine a context.

"Hey…" came from the back. "Check this out!" Chak'sa rose, hit the auto-pilot, nodded at Shiv, who followed her.

Haxer was sitting at the edge of his seat, staring intently into a monitor. He looked both excited and bewildered.

"What is it?" Chak'sa asked him. He pointed to the screen.

"I think I've found another piece of the mystery Crichton was alluding to," he replied, tracing a line of data with his finger. "See this code? It's Peacekeeper – and it's Special Services level encryption."

Shiv leaned in, looked it over.

"You are certain?"

"I'm crazy, girl, not incompetent. I'm certain."

"What is it protecting?" Chak'sa asked him.

"That's the funny bit – it's just …there." He stroked a few keys, bringing up another screen. "There's this data block – which is some seriously esoteric mathematics, way up there in the trancendentals and virtuals – the syntax is psychotic though… and then the encryption and then the block continues on, same crazy numbers. Lots of duplication, but subtle shifts in the grammar of it."

Shiv eyed the numbers.

"Mathematics are simply another language. What do the equations describe?"

He turned a rueful grin to her.

"I think I'm officially frightened now, Shiv. This stuff isn't your typical math. It's… beyond that." He blew out a puff of breath. "I don't know."

"You don't know?" Chak'sa blinked.

"Well, I should say I don't believe it. What these equations are describing should be… well, impossible."

"Wormholes." Came from behind them. Crichton stepped out of the passageway.

"These are wormholes?" Haxer pointed at a few lines of calculations. Crichton glanced at the equations, went aft toward the galley.

"Well, no, not exactly. Those are transcendental calculations – specifically on pocket gravi-magnetical densities of the wave-curve of a wormhole's event horizon. What it might do, as opposed to what it could do." He came back with a packet of food cubes, bent, looked it over for a few moments, then suddenly whistled. "I'll be damned. Static electromagnetic shock calculations and quantum transverse-harmonic flux densities, too." He smiled. "The universe, my friends, is not based on math – it's based on music." Seeing that he was quickly losing his crew, Crichton pointed to a series of what looked like elemental compounds.

"Not important. What's this?"

"Analysis of metal compounds, crystallization factors, alloy ratios." Haxer told him. "That's the hull composition of a Prowler." He pointed to another. "This one I've never seen before, although it's the same thing, different ship. I think."

Crichton found another seat, sat, cracked open his ration pack. Three faces with varying looks of "explanation, please" on them turned to him. He thought about it, wondered what he should tell them, decided it didn't matter. What could they do with the information? Sell it? To who – the Scarrans, Scorpius? Unlikely. Nothing they'd learn from this data – not even Haxer, would be of any practical use to them.

"Furlow was apparently studying wormhole effects on ship hulls." He told them at last. "Comparing a Prowler's hull to Farscape's. Crichton's ship."

"Why?" Shiv asked him.

He shrugged.

"I have no idea."

Haxer accepted that, asked, "Well, why the high-level Special Services encryption smack in the middle of it then?"

Crichton shrugged again. "Does it repeat?"

Haxer ran the data forward, found more instances, seemingly at random locations throughout the code.

"Yeah – a few times. Looks random."

Crichton finished off his food, tossed the box into the reclaimator, got up, came over.

"Yeah. It's junk. I think Furlow left it in after she cracked it to confuse anyone who might get their hands on it. All it does is split the calculations into fragments – that's why it wasn't making any sense to you. The calculations aren't in any particular order, either. That's on purpose. You have to know the order of the calculations beforehand for them to make any kind of sequential sense. Not that these are all that useful. She got them from Crichton a long time ago. Amateur stuff, just funky gravity effects."

"You know the order of the calculations?" Haxer looked skeptical.

"I'm getting there." Another look of disbelief. "Hey, don't let the devastatingly handsome looks fool you." And it didn't hurt that somewhere in his head they all sat neat and tidy, in the proper order. Eventually he'd sieve them all out.

"I would never have thought it." Chak'sa said frankly, with some surprise, reassessing him. If Haxer thought those numbers amazing, then they were amazing.

"It works."

From the cockpit, there came a pinging alert, and wormholes were quickly forgotten.

They all raced forward. Crichton threw himself into the pilot's chair, Haxer taking the co-pilot's.

"What's this now?" He asked, looking over his controls, bringing the Vengeance back under manual control. From behind him, at the navigational array, Shiv answered.

"Burst transmission - distress beacon. Cannot get much… it appears to be a Hok'sla Pleasure Liner. They say …they're under attack."

"Do they say by whom?"

"Transmission is too fragmented. It is likely being jammed."

"Got coordinates?" Crichton asked. Haxer looked at him dubiously.

"May I point out that we are technically a pirate vessel – and not a rescue ship?"

Crichton grinned at him, but his one blue eye was frosty.

"May I point out that I'm the boss here, and I say what we are at any particular moment?" He held Haxer's gaze, asked back to Shiv. "Those coordinates?"

"Relva five, Decca two-nine-nine, five sectors off the ecliptic."

Crichton kept looking at Haxer, who finally relented, entered the coordinates.

"You're the boss." He said, with a grin of his own.

The Vengeance swung a hard right, accelerated.

"I've got enough enemies," Crichton said to no one in particular. "Wouldn't hurt to make a few friends – pirates or not."

---

THE VENGEANCE WAS IN FULL STEALTH WHEN THEY CAME UPON THE LINER.

"What the frell is that thing?" Crichton muttered when they came upon the scene.

The liner wasn't hard to spot. Like pleasure liners anywhere, it was huge, ostentatious, overdone, and lit up like a psychotic Christmas tree. The even-bigger ship latched to its side looked like a colossal ugly tumor growing from the side of some exotic tropical fish.

Both Shiv and Chak'sa shook their heads, but Haxer knew.

"Frelling Havasti." He spat. He'd run into those scum before, and the encounter had been far from pleasant – for them. Haxer had a rather substantial price on his head from the Havasti. Something about diverting a large shipment of potential merchandise and costing them a rather astronomical amount of money.

"Frelling slavers." He intoned.

Crichton smiled a savage smile. He glanced over at Shiv. "Standby to prime the cannon – and the Lancers." He looked over at Chak'sa. "Target all their generators – and engines. Full attack." She nodded. Haxer just sighed.

"This is crazy – and I know crazy. That's a Clan ship – there's easily a thousand slavers on it – every single one armed to the hairline."

"Any locks yet?" Crichton asked. Shiv shook her head. No one knew they were there.

"Target and fire." He said back to Haxer, "The odds are good there aren't that many on the liner yet. We nail the power and engines, and there won't be any more."

The Vengeance arced gracefully over the Slaver ship, rolled, came back around with her Lancers dead on target with the ship's engines. One shot from the Lancers tore through the huge engine core like a hot poker through tissue paper. Crichton shook his head as he watched the engines disintegrate. Gotta hand it to the Nebari – they knew their weapons. Secondary explosions began to crawl up the colossal ship, and Shiv pointed out that the entire ship could explode. Banking the Vengeance around to where the two ships were joined, he pulled the ship into position.

"Cut those umbilicals and boarding tubes, then target the nose of that thing – let's try and give it a nudge away from the Liner." A nod, and with her usual precision, Shiv neatly severed the connections between the two ships, and then employed the Main cannon to add some spin to the Slaver vessel, which had begun to heel from the explosions racing up its side. The punch from the Main managed to impart more spin to it, which the explosions already happening within added to – the Slaver ship rolled away – not quickly but it was moving.

Crichton pulled the Vengeance into a steep climb and came down over the Liner on the other side as the Slaver ship blew. The Liner rolled from the shockwave.

"Weapon up," Crichton told them with a fierce grin. "Stand by to board. Time to earn your pay." Nods, and a flurry of activity. "Haxer – Havasti."

Haxer grinned, knowing what he was asking.

"They're distinctive, Boss. You'll know 'em when you see 'em. They won't look like anyone else on that cruiser – you can count on that."

"Good. Shiv – auto-docking procedures. Use one of the tubes the Slavers cut." Another nod, and Shiv set the controls, and the Vengeance maneuvered herself into position as Crichton and his crew got themselves into position at the hatchway.

The crew of the Grastrella Numbana, the liner so recently under siege, had not been trained to deal with either pirates, slavers or boarders or any kind. Terrorists, yes. Passengers gone mad, certainly. Even a catastrophic mishap to the liner itself. The only officer left – that hadn't been either killed or already captured by the Slavers - was one Nubai Hadri, and he was a minor officer, usually assigned to deck-watch, which consisted, most days, of making sure the pampered and preening wealthy folks had the proper temperature Raslak or Frestia water, and that the artificial sun generators were set to the proper frequency for individual physiologies.

Not really what he had spent three cycles training for, but it was all on the way to the top, he'd told himself.

Well, here he was leading what was left of the crew – armed with whatever they could find, in what was surely a suicidal attempt to repel boarders that had hit and invaded with such ferocity and swiftness that they already had the majority of the passengers ready for transfer to their own ship, and anyone who had resisted already dead.

He and his 'squad' had managed to make it to the large open terrace that ran the length of the ship, with its ornate cathedral-like windows that looked out onto space, and which had, until recently he noted with some surprise, been completely obscured by the huge bulk of the Slaver ship… which was now on fire and starting to drift. The Havasti he could see appeared as surprised as he – which led to outright alarm when the Slaver vessel blew up.

Hadri got only a brief glimpse of another ship taking its place before the Slavers went mad – which changed to alarm again when through another hatchway, figures suddenly appeared, weapons blazing – and all Hezmana broke loose. Havasti began to drop, and Hadri could do nothing but watch.

It wasn't a lot – two Sebaceans – one who looked like a Peacekeeper, a Scarran-looking female and a small female with hands like lightning. But – everywhere they turned, Havasti died.

He saw the small female look directly at him, and her hand seemed to move – frell, I'm going to die! - and then a gurgle from beside him and a heavy thump. He managed to control his hearts-beats long enough to see a Havasti crash down with a small, very sharp blade in his throat. Yellow Havasti blood splashed the wall and his legs and he felt faintly nauseated. Better him than me, he consoled himself.

"Who by Nekka are they, Hadri?" Dromin asked from behind him. She was from Engineering, armed with a laser primer for the engines. It'd do some damage.

"I have no idea, but they're taking out the right ones. Let's go – we have to help – it is our ship." He swallowed, and they all yelled and ran out – Hadri killed his first person, but it was almost entirely by accident, he just swung wildly and a Havasti had the misfortune to reel back just as his weapon – a jagged piece of bulkhead splintered from the initial attack charge - connected the spot his head suddenly occupied. Hadri stood in surprise and gazed down on the dead Havasti, unbelieving he'd done it. Dromin found out what a laser primer would do to flesh when she fired it at a Havasti who charged her and turned him into a burbling mass of boiling flesh that thudded to the deck and slid to her feet.

Dromin was violently ill almost immediately afterward. Hadri looked up from contemplating his now-deceased opponent to see the Scarran, a very different-looking-from-the-norm Scarran female he saw now, tag a Slaver on the end of her long staff, fling him easily into his compatriots, knocking them down and out. The smaller female leapt nimbly over their unconscious bodies and killed several more with unbelievably fast motions. It looked as if all she did was wave her hands, but Havasti fell. The tall, dark-haired Sebacean shot a Slaver off an overhead tier, sending him crashing to the deck with a sickening crack!, hit another that took his place, flinging him back. He killed half-a-dozen more, firing with two pistols, two Havasti without even looking in their direction. One shot sizzled past Enki, a porter, singeing his hair and leaving him standing shocked. The Havasti behind him about to crush Enki's skull dropped like a sack of stones. The Peacekeeper-in-grey executed a fancy scissor-kick and blasted one Slaver in the face, knocking him cold, then started pulling equipment off the guy.

"Coordinating circuitry," he told the tall one in black leather. "Keeps them all in reach."

The tall one nodded, and the battle began again, rolled through the ship. Thanks to the control box, the Havasti were easy to find. Hadri and his small crew followed, did what they could, opened doors and removed security barriers. The sweep eventually ended up back where it had began. Their one-eyed leader contemplated what he'd wrought, and ordered the females into the upper tiers. The small female stalked gracefully by him, looked at him briefly, to receive another nod. The Scarran followed her, long staff in her hands, one going right, one going left. They disappeared into the tiers and Hadri could hear more shouting, a few screams and then silence – save for the babble of the frightened and bewildered passengers.

"Hey, you!" Hadri looked up to see the tall Sebacean in black leather pointing a black-silver pistol at him. "You have a uniform. You in charge?"

Hadri stuttered for a moment, still a bit stunned.

"I suppose I am," he managed at last. "Unless the Captain's still alive."

"You'll do." The tall one said. "You've got control of this boat, yes?"

Hadri blinked. He hadn't thought they'd known he'd been doing it.

"If you've got any communications left, I suggest you use them, tell your people to clear out and lay low, or find a way here. My girls are hunting, and we wouldn't want any accidents."

Dromin stepped up, coughed, said, "Uh – thank you for your help."

The tall man shook his head.

"We were passing by." He looked back to the other Sebacean. "Heard your distress call."

"We got lucky, Boss," he said, holding up the control node he had taken off the Slaver he had kicked. "Only the initial Raid and Collection Teams – about a hundred."

"Many left?"

"Counting these?" He checked. "Twenty, twenty-four, tops. Track indicators say those still moving are all up with Cha and Shiv - upper tiers."

"Ah," the tall one said. "They'll be dealt with shortly then." He glanced around at the frightened faces of the passengers. "We lose any passengers when we blew the ship?"

"A couple. Unavoidable. They were more or less still in the Collection stage. We were mostly on time, I'd say. Havasti raid, collect, assess, then move their slaves-to-be to their ships."

"Good." He looked back at Hadri. "What's your name?"

"Nubai Hadri. I'm the Officer of The Deck."

"Okay, Hadri - take your people and calm the passengers, find your officers and bring them to me."

"Bring them to you?"

One long-fingered hand stroked a holstered pistol.

"Yeah," he said with a feral grin. "At the moment, I'm running this boat." He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder. "Any time."

Hadri took a few steps, not about to argue. Dromin followed him. Out of earshot, she nudged him.

"Hadri – that's… I think t-that's …Crichton!"

Hadri glanced back, while at the same time trying to both assure and calm passengers as he went.

"You're so full of dren – Crichton travels in a Leviathan, not a Peacekeeper ship – where's his Luxan? Crichton always travels with a Luxan. Did you see a Luxan in that group?"

"Well, no…"

"You're frezziked – although after today, I don't blame you. Let's find the Captain."

The passengers were giving both Crichton and Haxer a wide berth.

"Okay… so we've rescued the Liner, killed a few hundred Slavers, and so…?"

Crichton was eying the signs, trying to see if his rudimentary language skills would allow him to decipher them. No luck.

"So… what?"

"So… what do we get out of it? Money? Loot? What?"

Crichton looked at him with a crooked smile.

"Reputation."

Haxer just rolled his eyes, grumbled "I've got plenty of that," good-naturedly, glanced at the control node. On the little screen had been small red dots to indicate where all the Slavers had been. One by one they had been going out, and as he watched, the last one died – all save for the few at his feet.

"The girls are done." Even as he said it, Shiv appeared by a balcony on an upper tier, glanced down at them and then disappeared. Chak'sa appeared at the top of a staircase and gracefully made her way down. She appeared rather elegant, Crichton thought. She walked with a grace that made all the so-called 'chic' wealthy females around her look rather cheap. A glance at Haxer saw him transfixed by her.

What's this now?

Milling passengers scrambled to get out of her way.

"We have prisoners, if you would like to question any," Chak'sa told him as she drew near, stopping and planting her staff, referring to the group Shiv and she had only wounded or rendered unconscious.

"What could they tell us?" Haxer asked, with a contempt of all things Havasti.

"One never knows. Knowledge can come from the unlikeliest of sources."

"…and a philosopher…" Haxer said snidely, with a grin.

"The day will come when you will choke to death on that smugness. I ask only to be there when it happens." Chak'sa countered. He smiled at her. Shiv had reappeared at Crichton's side.

"Havasti are terrible prey." She said quietly, orange eyes cold. "They have nothing to recommend them as worthy adversaries."

Crichton was eying his pile of prisoners.

"Well, they don't have to possess expertise, Shiv – they rely on numbers and firepower – and the intimidation that comes from being big and ugly." Haxer told her, looking to Crichton.

"Shiv – intelligence value of any of these guys?" The few who were awake were looking nervous. They were a ragtag bunch, all wearing a mishmash of different styles of clothing, interspersed with odds-and-ends of armor pieces from various races. Their faces were coated with intricate clan tattoos.

"Little to none." She replied coldly, which brought another feral grin to Crichton's face, and prompted one of the Slavers to blurt:

"W-wait! You… you are Crichton, right?" He was the scrawniest of the lot, which wasn't saying much. The average Havasti was easily Chak'sa's height and ten kilos heavier. Fortunately, they wore little armor and were not particularly individually smart.

Crichton took a few steps, pistol drawn, and Chak'sa planted her staff in the guy's chest, pinned him.

"Now how would you know me? This is my first time playing with Havasti."

Behind them unseen, Dromin pinched Hadri hard and pointed. Who'd been right? Hadri nodded in exasperation and made a note to remember it all for any journavoyants they encountered – which would be plenty when Central Ship Dispatch heard of this incident.

"On R'skol… there was this woman…" The Slaver was saying.

"Shut up, Sa'al!" Another yelled at him, still clutching the blades embedded in both his wrists. A wave of another blade by Shiv quieted the second man.

"No, go on Sa'al…" Crichton asked Sa'al, crouching down and planting 'Betty' firmly between the Slaver's eyes.

"A woman… she was trying to sell what she claimed was your DNA."

"What?" 'Betty' was jammed slightly harder. "What did she look like?"

"I don't know! Sebaceanoid, heavy… dirty…"

Crichton stood up.

"Furlow. Has to be. Where's this R'skol?" He asked Haxer.

Haxer thought a moment. He shrugged. None of the others knew, either. Hadri knew, and interrupted with a tentative;

"That's not that far off – a few arns at the most. It's a medical/commerce planet, one of the Ashkelon Warlords' worlds. E'tron'tahl's, I think."

"You – " Crichton whirled back to the Slaver. "When was she there?"

"A w-weeken ago. Maybe a little less."

The ship's crew was gathering, now rounded up, communications restored, the Captain dead, but the First Officer still alive. Crichton waited, told them to deal with the remaining slavers as they saw fit, slapped Hadri on the shoulder in thanks, bade him a "helluva job, kid", much to the admiration of his comrades - and ordered his crew back to the Vengeance. A few minutes later, they were pointed at R'skol.

"This is probably futile," Haxer was saying, even as the ship was powering away from the Liner.

"I'm the Boss," Crichton reminded him, and left it at that.

---

INTERLUDE

IT BEGAN INNOCENTLY ENOUGH.

Simply a minor fault in an energy redirection conduit. The computer-controlled repair station glitched and failed to perform. No one noticed until a secondary system caught the fault, but by then it was too late. A cascading effect began rippling through the load-sharing conduits and the particle shunts. As the charge built, it reversed the energy flow back into the engine core, where sub-atomic reactions started converting the heliox-2 core into an unstable quantum plasma state.

Earth's first human-built Hetch-drive began - in layman's terms - to self-destruct.

Crichton's teams tried to contain it. Built into the facility was the "deep core drop", a thick shaft covered with heavy cobalt/titanium infused alloy doors beneath the drive assembly into which – in an emergency – the entire assembly could be dropped – to fall into a pool of near-pure heavy water some fifty metres below the facility.

John and Aeryn directed the crews as best they could. Having come for the tour of the "nearly-completed" prototype, they were the only real ranking officers present.

Almost all got out, but the runaway overload was building beyond levels the facility couldn't safely contain if not immediately dropped. John's chief crew stayed behind, but it was not going well.

"Sarah!" he yelled at his right hand. "What's the tonnage gonna be on that explosion if we can't control it?"

"We can't control it, John!" she shouted back, fear writ plain on every feature. "It's hit the cascade plateau – it's wildly out of control!" She did some quick calculations, and the color drained from her face. Everything in close proximity to the engine was vibrating madly. "If this thing detonates, most of Nevada goes with it – and that's no exaggeration!"

"Hit the auto-drop!"

"The engine's giving out too much EM radiation!" Sarah yelled over the banshee wail of the overload. "All the auto-drop control computers – fried!"

"Where's the manual release?" Sarah pointed – to the other side of the room. John didn't hesitate. He grabbed Sarah and spun her toward the elevators. "Get out! I'll deal with it!" There was a loud snap! and a blue bolt of lightning tore from the side of the engine, flinging a shielding panel across the bay. Eye-blinding arcs of light started dancing across any metal surface they could find. The banshee wail grew to a crystalline shriek.

"Go with her, Aeryn! Get out! There's a hi-speed escape lift just around the corner from the auto-drop!" When Aeryn started to protest, John grabbed her, pulled her into a fierce embrace, a bruising kiss and screamed directly into her face, "Get out!", then shoved her after Sarah. He leapt from the platform and ran like a bat-out-of-hell for the manual release. Almost to it, another large snap! blew a side panel from the radiation driver and spilled deadly blue light across his path, pulsing like a malevolent heartbeat. He skidded to a hasty stop. On the other side of that shaft of death, he could see the large red emergency button.

Millions of lives waited.

A quick glance showed Sarah and Aeryn running for the elevator. At the door, Aeryn shoved Sarah in and closed the door, and turned back. John cursed, counted and leapt, prayed he'd be fast enough…

…he shoved a fist into the button and the welcome booms of heavy bolts slamming open clanged around the engine and the huge door below it sliced open like a great maw to swallow the snarling, spasming drive. It dropped into darkness and the door slammed shut. John stumbled to the hi-speed lift and hit the controls just as Aeryn reached him.

"We've got to get out." He told her, pulling her into the elevator. Moments later they were blasting surface-ward.

Below them, the engine detonated, and the elevator rocked, pulsing blue light spilling through every crack and crevice in the elevator car and shaft, then the power cut out and they knew nothing else.

INTERLUDE ENDS

---

R'SKOL WAS A PLANET THAT HAD SEEN BETTER DAYS.

The planet's surface had been strip-mined at some point in its not-too-distant past, and the rotting hulks of immense mining machines – whose owners were long since forgotten - had been left to decay, scattered over the scarred and pitted landscape. The hulks had been there for millennia, long since stripped to skeletons, and few were interested in them. There was only one city worth the name, R'hes'sheliam, but no offworlder was allowed to set foot in it. It was a Warlord city, and the massive Constables they all seemed to employ guarded every entrance. The commerce/medical part was to be found in the huge metra-wide pits, wherein had been filled with buildings and warrens and avenues where virtually everything could be bought and sold – if the price could be met. Each pit – and there were dozens – had a boss of its own, and each boss answered to the local V'rahn. R'skol was where people came to escape – in more ways than one. As Haxer explained as they entered the system, it was an anomaly – as it boasted some of the most sophisticated medical facilities in the Uncharted Territories.

"You can change anything you want here," he told them as the Vengeance passed an outer checkpoint. "Face, body, species. You can even get a new mind, if you like."

"Oh, yeah?" Crichton asked, sounding skeptical. "How's that done?"

"Neurarepathy."

"Neura-what-athy?"

"Neurarepathy. Neural re-pathing. Brain, tissue and DNA re-sequencing. You can literally have your memories rewritten, replaced, or removed. They can make you an entirely new you – after all, the best way to hide is to become someone else entirely."

Crichton had to agree. The idea had merit. He could see Haxer looking wistful.

"I've often thought about trying for this place," Haxer told him at the questioning look on his face. "To see if I could undo some of the damage that frelling Aurora Chair did." He tapped his temple as he said it.

"What stopped you?"

Haxer laughed.

"Can't afford it."

Crichton shrugged, went back to piloting.

He activated the Ward Of Passage, and they were not challenged as they entered the system. There were no questions asked. If you had a Ward, you'd earned it. Each had a unique signature and they could not be faked.

They found a berth, and were given a wide one by the local denizens of the port. Stealth Vigilantes were few and far between and either madmen, Peacekeeper Special Commandos or pirates would bring one here. They locked the ship down, and set its auto-defences.

Crichton looked over his crew, decided they were presentable. Shiv was in her black suit and blade 'cuirass', Haxer in his old-style PK uniform, grey, not the customary black. Chak'sa wore a dark-red bodysuit, over which were black and gold pieces of Scarran plate. She had her Dra'ak'ka on her hip and a round, wicked-looking blade on her back – the D'braic, he was informed. It was the Scarran equivalent to a battle-axe. It had no wooden haft, however, and could employ 'energy enhancement'. Like the Dra'ak'ka it was one of those weapons only professionals used, for it was as dangerous to the novice as to an enemy. She wore a high metal collar when in public – as she always did. The neck was a notorious Scarran weak spot. He was in his usual - black vest, black leather pants, double holsters, black longcoat with the red-gold piping. He pulled on his black gloves and looked back at Haxer. Haxer didn't carry, as a rule, but that didn't mean he couldn't cause trouble. Haxer was – apparently - an expert in several kinds of rather lethal Peacekeeper martial arts. He had also spent - according to Chak'sa - several monen under the tutelage of someone called Katoya, whom Crichton had never heard of, but had been reputed as a master. It was ostensibly for the "mental discipline", but while there, he'd taken advantage of the other courses offered. If he was actually adept, Crichton would see it eventually, he decided, and if not, well…

"Where would Furlow go to sell DNA?"

"Legit gene brokers are probably on the Plaza. I doubt this Furlow would go there. They wouldn't touch anything she had to sell. The less-legit are most likely on a need-to-know basis, if you follow me."

Crichton nodded, pointed in a general direction and bade them follow.

"We'll just shop around."

"It's not likely anyone would buy your DNA anyway," Haxer said. Crichton let it pass. "First off, no one's gonna believe it was yours – and they'd have nothing with which to compare it."

"There is always one," Chak'sa informed him and Haxer nodded. "who will believe and buy anything."

"Yeah," Crichton agreed. "That's the one we need to find."

They wandered through the shops and streets, and again, they were given a respectful distance. They were an unusual crew, and it wasn't exactly easy to blend in with a Scarran Royal Caste female and a Thantados Blade Maiden as companions. Crichton tried to ask a few vendors, but they weren't very forthcoming. He discovered rather quickly, however, that information flowed more freely with orange eyes glaring balefully from his elbow. His initial misgivings about Shiv were rapidly dissipating. Finally, after two arns or so, they were directed to rather non-descript building with no outward indicators as to its purpose – entirely by design they'd been told, wrapped in grime and piping and steam, and they entered.

Inside was a pristinely clean, well-lit area, with the aspect of a very posh, very expensive private clinic on Earth. A female with huge eyes, emerald-green hair and pale turquoise skin smiled up at them nervously.

"Who's in charge of the buying and selling?" Crichton asked her, and her smile widened, and she quavered,

"That would be Medican Arnesstillantillisan." She told him, hitting a key on her desk. There was a hiss from the other side of the room and a round door irised open to admit "Medican Arnesstillantillisan". He/she/it was rather large, a dark red serpentine being easily ten motras long and several around. An armored, snake-like head with an ear-to-ear mouth and large dark eyes rose above them. Several arms waved below the head. Various pieces of plate jewelry was on its head and around its neck. The large mouth split in a wide, very sharp-toothed grin and Crichton's companions – save Shiv - took an instinctual step back.

Crichton held his ground without a blink, and the Medican noted it.

"Greetings. My apologies for the reaction I often invoke. I fear I have little control over it. I am an Odrêe." The voice was surprisingly melodious, and male. "You, however, do not find my appearance unusual? That is unusual."

The Medican was easily two heads taller than Crichton, talking down to him. Crichton shrugged, suddenly poked a gloved finger into the Medican's throat scales, eliciting a shudder and a quick 'step' back.

"Everything has a weakness." He told him as the Medican coiled lower, more eye-to eye. The smile was wider, if that were possible.

"Indeed. Well-said." He slid back. "How may I be of service to you, worthy sir?"

Crichton described Furlow, and didn't mention names, merely called it 'outlaw DNA.' The Medican looked at him suspiciously for a moment.

"Do I look like law enforcement? This is just straight information."

"I believe I know of who you speak," the Medican said after a few long moments. "This person sought to sell a most famous sample of DNA – for any purpose I desired. She did not, however, say how it was acquired. I do have, as you can see – standards." Arnesstillantillisan coiled up, got comfortable, thought. "I did purchase and test a small amount – for verification purposes."

"And?" Crichton asked.

"It was of a strain I had never seen, I must admit. Most unusual."

"In what way?"

"Firstly, it was Sebaceanoid, but not; it appeared to be, I would say – a much… older strain of the main sequence Sebacean genotype. Many strands appeared to do nothing at all."

"Junk DNA." Crichton said, to a large nod.

"So it had appeared. On closer examination, however, such 'junk' as you call it, well, I could see that a healthy sample would have contained enormous potential for mutations and re-sequencing possibilities. It was easily one of the most adaptable genotypes I have ever encountered."

"So you bought it all then?" Crichton asked.

"I had wished to, but her samples were rather badly contaminated, incomplete, not viable at all, I'm afraid."

"That's very likely." It was doubtful she got close enough to him to get anything complete - yeah, he could see her wallowing in her sewer's catch basins for John's urine – and whatever else he flushed.

The Odrêe sighed.

"As I said, I would have very much liked to purchase a clean sample. Such diversity in it!"

"Well, now," Haxer said from behind them. "Can't have you cloning armies of this outlaw, can we?"

"Oh, I would not have done that. I would not take DNA that would allow me to reproduce this being. I would not need it, for one thing." Arnesstillantillisan told him. "Besides, there would be very little profit in it." It looked at Crichton with a sly look and smiled at Haxer. "I don't have the facilities."

Crichton cracked a slight smile.

"What would you have done with it?"

"Oh – vaccines, DNA patches, molecular repairs. It's potential benefit to Sebacean physicians would be enormous. I could retire – quite wealthy - on such DNA."

"And the seller of the bad DNA? Any idea where she went?"

"She did not indicate an itinerary to me. I know that she did leave the planet. Her Colartas companions insisted on it."

"I see." Crichton glanced back at Haxer. That figured. I'm still behind here. "What are your specialties?" He asked, and Haxer blinked.

"I am a Charva-level Neurapather."

"That's good?" Crichton asked. He didn't have a clue what that meant.

"That's exceptional," Haxer said. "If it's true."

Arnesstillantillisan hissed at him, bent his head down.

"One does not forge the Mark." Haxer saw the slash-burn in the shape of a lightning bolt on that large head. Haxer bowed his head.

"No. Apologies." Another slow hiss and a nod.

"Can you recover memories? Fix damaged pathways, that sort of thing?"

"I can - depending, of course, on the damage. The liability, however, is very high. My fee, I fear, is likewise." He quoted an astronomical price.

Crichton looked back at his manic translator.

"Hax?"

"No offence, Boss – you don't pay me anywhere near enough." A lop-sided grin came at him.

"Well, he's right." Crichton said to Arnesstillantillisan. "We're not paying that."

Arnesstillantillisan started to bow and back away. Haxer looked disappointed.

"However…" Crichton stopped him. "…I could make your retirement happen sooner than you think."

Both Haxer and Arnesstillantillisan looked at him with surprise then.

---

THE MACHINE ON HAXER'S HEAD, with the shape of a glowing, slightly demented octopus, slowly dimmed and the sibilant hum it had emitted died. Haxer blinked after a few moments and looked around. He'd had to sit still for almost two solid arns – not something he did well.

"I don't feel any different." He sounded thwarted.

"You will not for quite some time, I fear – although I assure you I have repaired much damage, it will take time for it to heal and settle into pathways you may follow."

"'Much damage'? How much damage?"

"Your pathways were very badly scarred, worthy sir. I repaired all that could be repaired, and saved all that could be saved. But – every brain is different. Some may heal quickly, some not-so quickly. Some… never. Such is the nature of this science. But you have good prospects. Do not imbibe intoxicants of any kind for several monen."

Haxer bounded from the chair, stretched, and with a broad smile, said,

"I'm not the intoxicant kind. On the bright side – if nothing ever happens, I know who to kill about it." He chuckled, shook his head, and walked out of the surgical bay.

Chak'sa rolled her eyes and followed him. "I shall watch him." She said, to Crichton's nod. Crichton looked at Arnesstillantillisan.

"I suggest you be very careful where you use that payment, Doc." He told him. "Haxer isn't that far off."

"Threats are unnecessary, Sir. Do not judge the character of a being from the surroundings he finds himself in. I will use it as I indicated – and will retire, I assure you."

"In that case… you mentioned that you can recover memories."

"Yes…"

"Can you …erase them?"

"No." The Medican's voice was hard. "To do so would damage a being's mind most perniciously. They can be repressed most efficaciously, but not erased. I will not do that."

"How about emotions?"

"That depends. I would have to scan your brain."

Crichton grimaced. He had a thing about brainscans of any kind.

"It would be only to identify the source memories for the emotional contexts you wish suppressed – to create an emplate. I would then program a portable module that you could use to suppress these emotions whenever needed. I should warn you, however, that this is an extremely imprecise procedure. Due to the nature of how emotional states are generated in one's cerebral matter, it is less a matter of electricity and more a matter of chemistry. I will be giving you the ability to physically change your brain chemistry at your will." The Medican hesitated, then shook his great head slightly. "This is not something I can guarantee."

Crichton thought about it, then slowly nodded. It was done with due dispatch, with Shiv watching the Medican's every move. He was instructed to remember everything he could about whatever it was he wanted the emotional contexts excised from – they need not to be in any particular order. He did, felt a cool wave roll through his head as he sifted certain memories. It took only half-an-arn to finish.

He was gratified neither the Medican nor Shiv asked him why he might want to do such a thing.

The Odrêe took a small circular metal disk, about the size of a Euro coin. He pressed it and several web-like filaments shot out, with smaller discs on their ends. He pressed it again and they retracted.

"This is the neural inhibitor/redirector."

He inserted it into the device he'd used to scan Crichton and hit a few controls. A few moments later, he handed it to Crichton who looked at it dubiously.

Arnesstillantillisan shook a finger at him, like some headmaster at a posh school. "Its use is quite simple, but care and great caution must be taken! This device redirects neurons and their charges. In essence, it changes your feelings on certain subjects by either repressing the sections of your brain that activate upon certain memories or instances - or by redirecting the electrochemical flow in your brain from one section to another. You will simply not 'feel' a specific emotional context because you will basically retrain your brain not to associate a particular emotion with a particular event, person or circumstance."

The Medican also passed over a small box in which to put the device. Crichton tucked it into the box.

"Place the dark side against your head behind your auditory organ and press it hard. It will deploy. If you press it hard twice, it will hide itself – under your skin. The material from which it is constructed has the same chemical property as Sebaceanoid bone, so it will confound most kinds of sensor detection. It will hurt to deploy it thus, but it cannot be avoided." He pursed his lips, stared at Crichton as if trying to decide something. "I… would recommend that you leave it on once you employ it. It can be removed, of course, but you may be better served. The device draws power from you yourself – the 'drain' as it were is exceedingly negligible. However, since it is always 'on', its inhibitory properties are also always on."

"Which means I have what – some kind of telepathic blocking device? Something that can stop mind-probes, that sort of thing?"

"It could be used in that manner, yes – were one to employ it as I have suggested. Although my memory for having suggested such a thing will prove… unreliable."

Crichton smirked, nodded and put it in an armored pocket – where all his valuables went when travelling. He turned, collected Shiv and headed to the door.

"Thanks, Doc. Enjoy the retirement." The Medican executed a slight bow.

"Oh, I will, I can assure you."

---

IT WAS DARK WHEN THEY LEFT THE NEURAPATHER'S.

A gritty wind carried the smell of rust and flint past them, the wet garbage-stink of a lousy neighbourhood. Haxer looked exceedingly thoughtful and half-frustrated, which made sense. Shiv was watching Crichton.

"She had companions," he said to no one in particular.

"Frelling Colartas." Haxer growled. He paused. "Wait – what would she be doing with Colartas? They're mercs, but they're expensive mercs. They eat people who default."

"Who says she hired them?" Chak'sa asked, as Crichton stepped into the street.

"Well, why else would they be there?" Haxer asked as they followed him.

"That's the question now, isn't it?" Crichton paused, said casually, "The last Colartas I remember were members of a PK Retrieval Squad." Talyn had been pretty thorough with his memories.

"Curious," Shiv commented at his side.

"Isn't it though." He pointed them back toward the Vengeance. "The sooner we get to Y'ashool, the better, I think."

They wasted little time in returning to space. The Vengeance was soon on her way to Y'ashool, and Chak'sa was quizzing Haxer about his treatment. Shiv had yet to comment on Crichton's acquisition, and he doubted she would, unless he did it directly in front of her. If she was curious, she kept it to herself. Crichton wished others would follow her example.

"Fascinating," Harvey said, once Crichton was alone in his cabin.

"You think so?"

"You had a perfect opportunity. That Neurapather had the requisite skill."

"'So why, John'," Crichton mimicked. "'Did you not erase my sorry ass?'"

"I wouldn't have put it quite that way, but that is essentially it, yes."

Crichton was bouncing the disc acquired from the Odrêe in his hand, sat down, put his feet up.

"You're right – that is absolutely fascinating. Perhaps it's something you should file away for future reference."

Harve sighed, was grateful nonetheless that Crichton had passed on the opportunity, even if he had just reminded him that it was indeed possible. He tried a different tack.

"You did not find out anything significantly new about Furlow." Harve sniffed. Then he said, "Colartas." His attitude was one of contemptuous dismissal. Crichton nodded, still contemplating the disc in his hand.

"I'm still seriously wondering if she's worth pursuing," he mused. "A bioloid of her works for monens for Reihna, who's raiding Charrid outposts – most likely at the bioloid's insistence, for frell knows why - but in the meantime she's on R'skol trying to sell Johnny's incomplete DNA and she's being 'escorted' by Colartas whilst doing it." He cracked his neck, tucked the disc back into his pocket. "How much sense does that make?"

"Colartas do not work exclusively for Peacekeepers." Harve reassessed.

"No doubt. But they were working for somebody. If Furlow was selling incomplete DNA on that dren-hole, the odds are equally good that they weren't working for her."

"Then whom?" Harvey knew they were missing too many pieces, although he had suspicions of his own.

"Not sure yet. I have hunch that the same person or people who paid and then poisoned Vittiga on Abbanerex would probably know."

Harve nodded. He could feel Crichton's suspicions on that matter. He pulled the disc back out of his pocket, looked it over again.

"I should tell you that will not work on me, John." Harve told him. Crichton shrugged.

"Don't go makin' assumptions, Harve. It's not for you, anyway." He closed his eye, and he looked reluctant. "Need you to do something for me."

"Certainly."

Crichton sighed deeply.

"Go into those memories that Talyn gave me from John's time aboard – find me anything you think might be even remotely useful about Furlow. I need Scorpius-level discernment here – and you're the closest thing I have to that."

"I understand. I shall try to be quick." He was thinking of emotional erasure, and didn't want to be caught in that – just in case.

"Just get it. You have time." Crichton waved a hand dismissively, still staring at the inhibitor. It was deceptively simple looking, thinner than a dime. Harve nodded, vanished.

Crichton studied it for a while longer, and with a disgusted sigh, shoved the inhibitor against his head, behind his right ear, pushed hard – twice.

The tendrils climbed through his hair, seeking preprogrammed specific points on his head, settled against his scalp. There was a sudden intense heat, sharp, teeth-grinding pain which slowly dissipated, followed by several small pinpricks and then nothing. His vision blacked out momentarily, then returned. He felt along the back and top of his head and his fingers could find the monofilament of the web as only the slightest ridge. He inspected it as best he could in his mirror. The main part of the device left a red circle where it had burned itself in, but a bit of medi-gel from the Auto-doc would fix that. There would only be a small bump where the main body of the device nestled behind his ear, faint pink lines where it had gone through the skin to the bone. Once completely healed, it would escape casual - even relatively close - inspection. He washed the small amount of blood left behind from head and fingers.

Nice. It hid itself very well. He had a feeling the inhibitor had a dubious legal status – hence the Medican's reluctance to explain all of its features. Any further attempts to brainscan him without his permission should result either in frustration or failure.

What had Iskijji said to him? Oh, yes: "to survive, we must rid ourselves of those things which make us weak – even if in the doing we break our own hearts."

He stared into his mirror for a long time, then cursed and methodically went through how he felt about Her, went through those memories of John's that were particularly intense and wiped them clean of emotional meaning. The feelings didn't vanish, but they felt… distant. So far away they had no connection to himself. It was as if he watched another feel those things – and that other was not someone he liked all that well.

Crichton nodded to himself. So much for that particular ex-Peacekeeper Achilles' Heel. He felt a pang over doing it and then suppressed that – just for the hell of it.

To survive, sacrifices had to be made.

---

HAXER SAT IN FRONT OF HIS CONSOLE, PUZZLED.

Chak'sa saw it. She saw all of his moods.

"What?" She asked, with that air of one who knew someone too well and expected a silly or non-committal answer in return.

"Why'd he do it?" Haxer's dark eyes turned to her, troubled.

"Why did whom do what?" She sat next to him.

"Crichton. Fix my head."

"We do not know that he did." Chak'sa shook her head. Anything could happen yet. There were no guarantees of anything ever. She had the feeling that it was done to make Hax – and by extension herself - beholden to Crichton. Of course, that could be her own hard-won cynicism.

"No… I can feel things changing in here." He tapped his temple. "What if I turn into some demented fezzik?" He shook his head. "What if I'm some fanatic Peacekeeper?" He looked away, looked back. "What if I hate Scarrans?"

"Do not feel too badly. I hate Scarrans."

He looked back at his screen, watched the jumble of the esoteric Furlow-stolen number codes of Crichton's wormhole calculations scroll by.

"Not what I mean." Chak'sa gazed at him a few moments longer, shook her head, stood. She stroked a hand through his sandy hair, rested it on his shoulder.

"If it comes to that," she said as he looked back at her. "I will simply snap your neck, and relieve you of your misery. Acceptable?"

Haxer's face broke into a broad grin. He patted the hand on his shoulder, which gripped him harder for a moment, let go.

"Perfect."

---

THE Y'ASHOOL EXPANSE WAS A TENDRIL OF DUST CLOUD JUTTING INTO "CLEAR SPACE".

The end-point of a great finger of darkness that comprised one of the huge walls of dust that bisected the galaxy, the Y'ashool Expanse was rarely travelled and seldom-visited. It did, however, border on several Scarran outer territorial base locations and staging areas, and was occupied by a rather sophisticated Peacekeeper Listening and Information Retrieval and Storage facility. Most of the facility was automated. The Vengeance, running in full stealth, simply sidled up and had a look. Around it was a massive wall of black. It's mere presence evoked a kind of oppressive heaviness. Crichton refused to be intimidated by it. Stars were being born in this blackness. The dust was heavy with organic molecules, contained the 'stuff of life', as Carl Sagan had termed it. It was no abyss and certainly nothing to fear. He wasn't afraid of the dark.

"Any way to run a tap from here, have a listen, loot some data?" Crichton asked as they watched the complex, which looked like a large series of dark tubes held together with equally-dark rods. He could see the familiar shapes of a few Marauders in an open hanger.

"There's only about two dozen people on board," Haxer told him, pointing to lifeform readings. "Why don't we just storm it and take it and help ourselves?"

"Not a bad idea." Crichton told him. "But I only want some information. Not in the mood to be killing anyone this afternoon."

"I can suit up and patch a direct link to their core." Haxer told him. "Take me a few hundred microts." He stood. "I have a few tricks of my own."

"All right." Crichton nodded. "Nothing too fancy."

Haxer got suited up, was strapping his tools on when Crichton came back to check on his progress.

"Specifics?" Haxer asked, checking the suit's seals. Chak'sa hoisted him in the air, slapped him down on his feet to settle him in the suit. He nodded at her. Good. Comfy. She handed him his helmet, which he pulled onto his head.

"I want a few specialist depot locations – we need some supplies. Grab anything you can get on any PK activity at Abbanerex, R'skol, any Disruptor or Subvertor networks anywhere near anywhere I find relevant. You know where those places are. Make it the last couple of cycles."

"Tricky."

"We can still storm it. Which is trickier?"

"Right." He sucked in a deep breath, squared his shoulders, locked his helmet down, said, "I hate EVA," then stepped into the airlock. It cycled, and moments later, Hax was looking into the seemingly-endless stretch of abyss-dark before him and the stars behind him. For a moment – a moment only – he felt the weight of that dark, felt atavistic terror scrabbling deep down below. With a crooked, slightly demented smile, he shook it off. He knew worse terrors.

He kicked off the side of the Vengeance, floated in total silence toward the Infovault. He wasn't worried about being scanned. An Infovault was designed to be silent and hidden – active scans tended to alert anyone passing to its presence – and he was shielded from passive scans. The Vengeance was a stealth ship built for the elite of Elite Special Commandos, after all. His suit was 'Jump' armor – ship-to-ship combat. The original purpose of the Vengeance would have had the crew in these suits; the ship would, under stealth, steal up on another vessel and the crew would 'jump' from it to the other – taking it by surprise.

Perfect ship for a pirate.

He was a few motras from the Post when he heard a faint crackle on his comm, listened hard. He waited, but it didn't repeat, and he shrugged to himself, discounting it as noise from the surrounding space. That was one thing about the great dust lanes in the galaxy – they may have looked dark, foreboding and empty, but they were surprisingly noisy. Deep inside them, stars were forming and the snap of radio noise was like a newborn's cry.

When he first heard the woman's voice, he dismissed it as misheard radio crackle. He could make out no distinct words. It was if someone far away had shouted something just on the cusp of his hearing. He'd attached himself to the station and had crawled up the side, found an umbilical port – where ships would be attached to receive computer hookups – and was in the process of tapping into it when he heard the woman's voice again – quite distinctly – say the word:

"Elisaha."

The word froze parts of his brain momentarily, for it felt very familiar. He waited for it to repeat, or for something to follow, but nothing came. He shook his head, irritated. He patched in, worked his way through the databases of the station unseen, ran his data catchers.

He got as much as he dared, detached from the Vault and kicked himself back to the Vengeance.

Inside, he unloaded his data and began to sort it. The name "Elisaha" kept flitting through the back of his brain and it suddenly dawned on him that he had just recently had neural repair. He tried to snag the word and couldn't. He changed tacks and just let it flit – it might just knock something else loose. Don't rush it, he admonished himself, although he was and had been almost frantically eager for cycles for anything that pointed to what and whom he truly was – but he sensed at this point that exhortation to speed would accomplish nothing. Let it unfold. What could be repaired has been repaired. It has to be at its own speed.

Frell!

His data-mining program chirped at him and brought him back to the real world. It had uncovered one of many of the code names for Scorpius. He kept it searching for anything connected to it – and then he set about decrypting. The more he worked, the harder he frowned.

Crichton entered the area after a while.

"Well?"

"You're not going to like it."

"What is it?"

"You're really not going to like it."

"Just tell me."

Haxer sighed, looked over the data and then sighed again.

"As far as I can tell, Furlow is currently in the 'custody' ….of Scorpius."

Crichton just shook his head.

"Why am I not surprised?" He paused. "Assuming, of course, that this Furlow also isn't a bioloid."

But Haxer was shaking his head.

"Med report right next to it. She's the real deal."

A headache popped up behind his missing eye. Of course she was, and of course Scorpius would have her. "Anything else?"

"The only slice of good news is that she is not being held in the usual PK pens. She's somewhere called 'PH1999'. The only reference I can get as to its location is somewhere called 'Solatja' – whatever the frell that is."

"Nothing on this 'Solatja'?"

A head shake.

"Nothing. Not a vector, not a number anywhere."

"Figures. Anything else?"

"Moya's name keeps popping up, linked to vector coordinates."

"What? They're tracking her?"

A nod.

"Looks like it." He checked. "Special Services again. There's a "special distance' clause on it, however. At the moment, it's just monitoring." Crichton nodded. No need to rush around looking for her just yet then. Good. What were they watching Moya for though – to see where she'd go obviously. But the only reason to follow Moya would be to follow him – right?

"Anything else? Any good news?"

"Well, we now know where Scorpius is – sort of. The last several tracking reports on him and his own filed progress reports show him to be stationary and has been for the last two weekens. According to his own reports, he expects to stay that way for at least another monen, perhaps slightly more, maybe a little less."

"Spectacular. Then we have time." Crichton slapped Haxer on the back, pleased. "Anything else?"

"A report on a flotilla of Charrid scouts seen outside the Peacekeeper Shipyards near Voti'iTor. That's not necessarily a big deal, since the Shipyards border their territory, but Voti'iTor is a Spekta-class star."

Crichton nodded. "Spekta-class" was Sebacean terminology meaning a red supergiant star - which meant a huge gravity well. Slingshots and gravity wells meant wormholes. Depending. He'd uncovered through a few more pried-loose calculations that that kind of wormhole-summoning brought only the dangerous, unstable kind. It likely meant a lot of dead Charrids. It also meant that they were still working from the idiot end of wormhole formation and wouldn't get anywhere significant – for quite some time - if ever – and they wouldn't be killing anyone but themselves. For a change.

"Thanks. Good job."

"One question." Haxer asked him, dead-seriously.

"What?"

"Why my head?" Crichton told him, as serious.

"Because I know what it means to wonder who the frell you really are." He smiled then. "And if I can screw Scorpius, even indirectly, it's a bonus. You have problems with that?"

Hax replied with a smile of his own. That kind of reasoning he understood perfectly well.

"No problems." Haxer yawned a mighty yawn, and it gave Crichton an idea.

"I think we can factor in a day or two for some relaxation. Where's good for some R&R?" he inquired. Haxer's dulling eyes brightened.

"I know one spot – serious fun - if you don't mind open ports, pirates, criminals, fanatics and easy females."

"Send the cords for'ard." Crichton sent him a wry grin and walked off. On the Command Deck, he arrived to see Chak'sa shaking her head.

"Are you certain you wish to go here, Crichton?" she asked, pointed at the coordinates Haxer had wasted no time in sending. He must have known them by heart.

"Why not? We could use a rest."

"That is Nebudhi Lair – the 'Terminus'." Shiv raised an eyebrow at that.

"Sounds perfect." He smiled at their dubious looks.

---

A PEACEKEEPER COMMAND CARRIER WAS MORE THAN JUST A WARSHIP.

Over five kilometers long, nearly a kilometer thick, armed with city-shattering Frag Cannon, only a Scarran Dreadnought took one on with confidence. With a crew of fifty thousand - pilots, infantry, specialists, commandos, religious and political subvertors, propaganda experts, tech-soldiers and cyber-soldiers, a Command Carrier was basically an entire city, armed and dangerous, completely mobile, available at a moment's notice.

The dockyard had no name, just a number and it was brand new. The space around it was dense with odd, writhing nebula and strange gravities. It had taken seven now-crushed and fragmented probes to find a safe route and a quiet area. One could literally see gravity pulse through the nebulas, twisting and scattering them into new configurations.

The Carrier that hung serenely in the colossal dock, in that rare safe area was an anomaly. It had, up to now, been crewed almost entirely by techs. At the moment, it had no engines, and hardly any skin. It would, upon its completion, if all calculations and theories were proven correct, give Peacekeepers access to wormholes.

There were no guarantees, of course, but all available data said this was possible, and thus High Command had ordered it done. Spies and deep-range probes showed the Scarrans assembling a fleet unlike any ever seen. Everything that could be done to slow it, to sabotage or delay it was being done. High Command was making diplomatic concessions they would never have dreamed of in the past – all being done simply to buy time. Granted, this experiment – Scorpius' experiment – wasn't the only stratagem they were trying, of course not – but if this worked, the others could quite possibly be rendered redundant.

Scorpius sat in a large observation pod in the adjacent station, looked over the activity and at last felt some measure of satisfaction. It was not precisely what he'd wanted, but it was definitely the best tool to achieve that aim. He knew all he needed to know to begin. He had found the keys in this tortured space. Even as he thought about it, in the distance a blue-silver funnel sparked into existence and hung for a moment – then vanished. The perfect place to be, leading to a perfect opportunity.

Scorpius caught Braca approaching from the corner of his eye, did not turn around.

"Sir," Braca began. Scorpius nodded. "Shipyard Master Avjaka states that the refit will be shortened by two solar days."

"Shortened?"

"Yes, sir. Apparently the redoubling couplers she thought would be late have arrived on time."

"Excellent, Braca. And what of that other matter?"

Braca smiled.

"In hand, Sir. Our operatives report success on all fronts."

Scorpius stood.

"Again, excellent! Today is turning into a good day after all. Efficiency and precision are two hallmarks of success and advancement, Braca." He paused, looked out again at the Carrier. "And we will be successful."

Braca eyed the ship that at last appeared in the distance. They'd been expecting it. Another Carrier – this one called the Last Avenger – the name earned in the Battle of Hannimallhai against the so-called Scarran Exploratory Fleet – a test of Peacekeeper might – one hundred-fifty cycles ago.

"And our new …guest?" Braca asked, not happy to see the ship at all.

"Treat her with all courtesy and respect that is her due, Braca – of course."

"Sir, she's been openly advocating your censure and the discontinuance of all your projects. Frankly - she's a bit of a …viper, sir."

Scorpius turned a sly smile on Braca as he moved to go meet the Carrier.

"Even vipers can be handled safely, if one uses necessary caution. She must not be allowed to undo what we have begun, Braca – even if she is a Commandant."

No, indeed. He was too close to success.

---

END OF PART ONE