She sat in the chair in the little room the waiter led her to. The chair was bolted to the floor, as were the bed against one wall and the low dresser that ran the length of the other. She supposed that when people got involved with their games and their whores they didn't want the furniture shifting around or falling over on them. She snorted softly, folding her arms across her chest. It was not something she'd ever been in a position to contemplate before.

The door opened suddenly and a man stormed into the room, sweeping the door shut behind him as he glided towards her. He was dressed as he had been on stage, except that he was not wearing a hat.

He was also not the man in white.

She was halfway to her feet when the black-clad man reached her, but his hands gripped the back of the chair on either side of her head and forced her back into her seat. Heat radiated from his body as, without pausing, he leaned down and covered her mouth with a bruising kiss.

When he broke the kiss, she could only stare at him, frozen in shock and horror. With barely a pause, he scooped her up with one arm and carried her to the low bed. He dropped her onto the mattress and smoothly crawled on top of her. He attacked her lips again, his hands opening the buttons on her blouse, and that at last freed Titania from her stupor. She screamed into his mouth, fists pummeling his back, but he merely captured her hands with one of his and pulled them above her head. She squeezed her eyes shut and turned her head aside.

"Why do you protest, sweet one?" His voice was deep and rough as he nuzzled her neck. "Isn't this what you wanted? What you paid for?" His free hand lifted her skirt, caressing the lace on her thighs where the stockings ended. He ground his hips against her, only the smallest bits of leather and lace separating their flesh.

Titania gasped, "Shao Kahn!"

Quicker than a snake, he recoiled from her, drawing back until he was kneeling over her. His eyes glittered with the promise of violence. "How do you know…that…name?" he snarled.

She wriggled out from under him, pulled herself up onto her elbows and, summoning the powerful birthright she wished she'd remembered earlier, smacked him across the face with all the strength of a goddess.

The blow whipped Shao Kahn's head around and knocked him clear off the bed. He landed on the hard floor like a ton of bricks and lay still, unconscious. Titania stared down at him, heart thundering from the unexpected assault, and her mind finally began to process what had nearly happened.

"He…he couldn't…to me…to me…" she murmured. Her trembling fingers played across her bruised lips and the room seemed to tilt around her. She fell back onto the mattress in a dead faint.


Rayden stared at himself in the full length mirror. He hated this costume, hated the charade he was forced to play by the Elder Gods. Most of all, he hated who he was forced to play it with.

There was a knock at the door. A thin, nervous man he recognized as one of the club's part-time employees barged in without waiting for an answer. He was babbling something almost incoherently and gesturing behind him, down the hall towards the guest rooms. Rayden sighed. He gathered that there had been some kind of incident; it happened surprisingly frequently with these rich, high-strung women. He followed the little man obligingly to the designated room, then made a shooing motion. The man hovered uncertainly for a minute before fleeing, clearly glad that someone else would deal with the problem.

Rayden opened the door, and stopped. Nothing could have prepared him for the sight of his brother, face down on the floor and unconscious, and the love of his life, sprawled on the bed and also unconscious. As he jumped to the most logical conclusion fury exploded through his mind, then melted into satisfaction when he saw the purpling bruise on Shao Kahn's face. However Titania had come to be in this room alone with his brother, she had clearly not appreciated the room's usual purpose, or Shao Kahn's actions towards that end.

He called the man back to haul Shao Kahn's dead weight from the room, affecting amusement and calmly assuring him that he was more than capable of charming the lady out of her current state of distress, and closed the door firmly in his gawking face. Then, when they were finally alone, he seated himself gently beside Titania.

He adroitly straightened her clothes and brushed a lock of disheveled hair back from her cheek. His hand lingered on her cheek, caressing. It had been centuries since she'd left Earthrealm to return to her home, the barriers between worlds separating him from her forever. He'd spent lifetimes pining for this woman.

He noticed his hand was trembling and drew back from her, turning away.