* * * * *

"What do you think he's talking to them about in there?" Penny fidgeted a little on the couch, playing with a wayward strand of hair.

Tristian had been crouched on the other side of the room, inspecting the juryrigged lamp. He didn't even look up when Penny spoke. "Who, Joe? Knowing him he's probably instructing them on the . . . finer points of the game, so they stay in character, or, ah, explaining how the next scenario is going to go."

"He seems to take it very seriously," Penny noted with a frown. She folded her legs on the couch so that she seemed even smaller than she was, watching Tristian almost primly.

Tristian shrugged, standing up and turning toward her at the same time. It was the motion of a waterspout dancing across the surface, the sword's light wrapping against him and sliding away. "He's been doing this for a long time, so he tends to get very focused in these types of situations." Slipping over to an outlet, he tapped the wall over it, listening as if he could hear the electricity sloughing inside the wires. "He wants to get the best out of people."

"Oh come on, it's just a game," Penny protested. "There's no reason to get so worked up over it."

"Maybe," Tristian agreed. He made his way over to the kitchen, the sword leaving an afterimaged slime trail in his wake. Penny couldn't take her eyes off it, it was a comet streaking across a dull landscape, far brighter and sharper than any toy should be. "But if you're not going to play the game right, why even bother playing at all? That's probably what he's trying to get across to them."

Penny smiled knowingly. "Oh, the boys take their games very seriously."

"I've been getting that impression," Tristian commented, casting another look around the apartment. "Some of this stuff I didn't know was even out yet." He laid the sword down very carefully on the counter, making sure that it balanced on the hilt and that the shaft didn't touch any surfaces. "Don't get me wrong, he's not like this all the time. He's one of the funniest people I know, honestly. But there are times when you get a lot of . . . responsibility and you have to know when to switch it off so things can get done. This is one of those times." He started going through some of the cabinets, opening one and scanning the contents before shutting it and moving onto the next. "You'll see when this is over, he's almost like a different person."

Penny rolled her eyes. "I hope so. Because after five minutes I'm ready to punch him in the face." Tristian didn't respond and she hoped that she hadn't insulted him by saying bad things about his friend. He seemed fairly nice, all things told, if touched with the same bit of eccentricity that Brown had. But she was getting used to people having a few quirks. Starting to like it, some days. Even if she'd probably never admit that outloud. Idly, she scratched at her forearm, almost hugging herself.

"Good luck." Tristian closed another cabinet door, then stepped back as if trying to decide which door might hold the prize. "He's taken his fair share of punches over the years, another one really isn't going to bother him." The lightness in his voice hid a flatness, and it wasn't clear which was the serious undercurrent and which was the joke.

Penny watched him for another few seconds before impulsively leaping off the couch, crossing the room quietly and stopping inches from the other side of the counter. Tristian had his back to her, one hand halfway to another cabinet. The sword was pointed toward her, a red sun squeezed into a tube and stretched out into solid dough. What the hell was it made out of? She had seen a similar one that Leonard had won off the auction, when she caught him dancing around the apartment making those strange vroom noises while swinging it. When he caught her looking he had stumbled and tried to look natural, but had only fallen over the chair. She had laughed at the time, and apologized for laughing but a little later she even regretted walking in on him. In those few seconds before he noticed there was a lightness to him, an ease that he never had with her, a playful whimsy that seemed utterly private. And part of her wanted to capture that for herself, because there were times when she felt like she was losing it. Maybe that was why she stuck around.

That toy had been one thing but this one seemed . . . heavier? If that was possible. What could it possibly be-

"Don't," Tristian said, as soft as snow and as implacable as a wave.

Penny pulled her back with a flinch, not even aware that she had been reaching out toward the sword. Tristian was facing her now but she was almost sure he hadn't been when he said the word. The hard abruptness in his voice had been surprising, a complete change from his so far understated quiet.

Yet it was that quiet that had returned when he spoke again. "I'm sorry . . . I didn't mean to come off like that. It's . . . it's very delicate, that's all." He was already taking it away, off the counter and holding it with a practiced ease at his side. "And it's the only one I have."

A little confused, both at his and her own actions, Penny stammered a little. "I just . . . it's really bright." For effect she shielded her eyes, even though the sword was safely behind the counter, although its glow kept creeping up around the edge, a puddle attempting to escape its own gravity. "It's like being outside, looking at it. I was . . . I was wondering if there was some way to turn it off or, or dim it somehow."

"There was once." He turned back to the cabinets and for a second she thought he wasn't going to elaborate. But he kept talking. "But it broke and I'm not sure how to fix it. So now it's stuck on." His shrug was more a ripple from the rear view. "I don't mind, it helps me get used to it. Sometimes you need the reminder."

What an odd thing to say about a toy. Penny frowned. "And you can't just like take the batteries out or something?"

Tristian laughed at that, and she was startled by how natural it sounded, how different from his normal voice. Like he was keeping himself tightly under control and her comment had caught him off guard. "I only wish. But I lost the instruction manual a long time ago and the people who made it told me I've got to figure it out on my own." He whipped it up so that it was inches from his face, engaging in a brief staring contest before snapping the blade back down. "I think I'm doing all right, most days." Another cabinet was opened as he continued methodically down the line.

Penny had been leaning on the counter with both forearms when she seemed to come to a decision. "Maybe you are," she said, pushing herself off and curving around it lithely. "So maybe you can tell me this." He still wasn't looking at her, engaged in his own task.

At least he wasn't until she slammed the cabinet door shut, nearly closing it on his hand. Tristian turned toward her, the sword swinging away until it was nearly touching the back of his calf. The twin uplift of his eyebrows was the only hint of a question.

Penny tilted her head a little to the side and smiled up at him, one hand still flat on the door. "Why do you play the game?" she whispered.

* * * * *

Brown sat up on the bed, pulling his knees up to his chin and then dropping into a crosslegged stance with military precision. "Okay, couple things, boys." He started to tick off points on his fingers. "First, its hard for me to convey how much I really didn't want to get you involved in any of this. Don't get me wrong, you seem nice and all, but things are rapidly getting complicated and I don't have the mental capacity or the patience to pay attention to six things going on at once. Five is my limit, frankly." He might have been kidding but then again, his face offered no revelation either way. Instead his gaze kept going from Sheldon to Leonard and back again, as regular as a clock, or a worn down heartbeat. He folded his hands together and leaned forward, the bed creaking under his movement. "As far as our crises usually go, this one is fairly benign." His gaze sharpened, running on a laserline. "For the moment. Whatever the hell the hive is doing, I don't think they're out to hurt anyone. But they're quite willing to put up a fight."

"Just tell us what to do," Sheldon said, with an intensity that even Brown blinked against. "Since you deputized us, we've become soldiers for the duration of this mission." He struck a stance that seemed both barbed and ungainly at the same time, his eyes nearly popping. "I've studied Venusian karate in nearly all its aspects . . . that is not a skill you want to turn down, Commander."

"That's . . . nice," Brown commented neutrally. "But there's, ah, no one on Venus."

"Oh." Sheldon still held the posture, oddly poised, like an atomic model that had suddenly gone limp. "What about Jupiter?"

"Big floating gasbags," Brown responded instantly, almost automatically. "But they'd probably prefer to sell you a bottle of solar wind before-" He halted in mid-word and shook himself, muttering, "Why the hell do I keep letting you people sidetrack me?"

Leonard thought this was a good time to jump in. He had seen Sheldon try to demonstrate his fighting prowess before and the local gym still had his picture up on the door. "But you don't understand . . ." he added quickly, praying that Brown wouldn't look at him. "We can help you, now that we know what's going on, you can use that to your advantage. You don't have to worry about keeping us in the dark. You . . . you have complete freedom of movement." Hey, that sounded pretty compelling.

And then the man glared at him again, and it was like being drowned by a glacier. It was slow and you knew it was coming but there was still no hope of getting out of the way in time. It was just waiting.

When Brown spoke again, his voice had taken on the quality of a low-flying aircraft. "Which brings me to my second point." He pointed toward the door, and the world sealed away outside. "Why did we need to bring her here?"

"I told you, her name is Penny and she's our-" But Brown cut him off so abruptly that the blow felt physical.

"I heard the speech earlier," he snapped, rolling into a crouch and carefully balancing on the balls of his feet. He almost expected Sheldon to go behind him and start smoothing out the groove he was leaving behind. "And while it was very lovely, it doesn't answer my question."

"The aliens were in her apartment." Leonard's throat could have absorbed an ocean. "What did you expect me to do?"

"My original plan would have been to have Tristian secure the room and then put the forcefield up there, so she would be safe from any further invasions." The coldness in his voice was withering. "This way the only place they could come was here, where we were. And I could have taken care of them." He sighed, pressing his knuckles against his chin. "But now we've tipped our hand, and they're probably working on getting around the forcefield now. Or just doing whatever the hell they want, because we're in here. Because I'm dealing with you and her . . ." his voice was rising but he bit it off before it went any louder.

"I'm sorry," Leonard said, and the words had an escape velocity so daunting that a nuclear engine could barely launch them.

"It's not completely his fault," Sheldon interjected, having letting his former combat stance collapse. "He comes from a society that values romantic social interactions between people of differing genders as the only form of measuring one's success or failure in that society. Thus all his other accomplishments, which while insignificant compared to mine, are meaningless because he has not managed to have intercourse with any female he has yet encountered."

"I have too!" Leonard shot back immediately. "And way more than you!" The long silence that followed this suggested that it wasn't really the most appropriate topic at the moment. "Well, uh, not that I'm, ah, keeping score or anything. I really don't go bragging about my conquests, not that I have a lot of them to speak of and . . ." he added quickly, doing his best to shrink against the door. Another silence. Then, in an even quieter voice: "Please don't judge me."

"See?" Sheldon pointed out. "This is what our decadent pleasure-driven society has driven and reduced him to. Unsuccessful in science and in love." He shook his head, tsking as he did. "It's a sad situation, really. But I've been trying to help him as best I can."

"I can tell," Brown replied dryly. "And one day I'm sure it will make a wonderful romantic comedy. But I really don't have time to play psychologist for you two, as career defining as that might be." He swung his feet off the bed, with the rest of his body following, landing with a mild thump. "But we are going to have to discuss what to do with your little friend in the other room."

"Do?" Just from the tone of his voice Leonard knew he wasn't going to like where this was going. "What do you mean . . . do?"

"It's bad enough that you're tagging along, but I'm dealing with it because I've come to the conclusion that beyond launching you into orbit for the duration of this, you're going to follow me around until this is over." He sat down on the edge of the bed, leaning forward and bracing himself with his arms. "She's a different story, however."

"Just don't tell her anything," Leonard said, hoping that sounded like a reasonable argument. "We've got her convinced it's all a stupid game. Right? That's how you people are, right? All secretive and stuff?"

"Leonard is phrasing it all wrong," Sheldon said, giving his friend a pitying look. "Once again he fails to understand the context of the world that you live in and keeps trying to apply his own experiences to something that he knows nothing about." He smiled a little. "Fortunately, I'm capable of translating his attempt to relate to you into an example that may be a bit closer to home." He crept near Brown, leaning in as if telling him a deep secret. "You're just like a branch of the Syndicate. Except, you know, you're the good guys."

A frown was Brown's only response.

"He means The X-Files," Leonard prompted, shooting his friend a sarcastic smile. "In case you can't relate to it."

Brown bit his lip and looked down at his knees for a second, clasping his hands together tighter. "Look. Okay. Listen, you're right, we do generally operate in secret. But part of it is force of habit. It's just easier to make things happen when you don't have people who aren't involved looking over your shoulder." If the comment was meant to include them, his expression didn't indicate it. "But what you're not getting is that we can't do this in half-measures." He met their quizzical looks with a steady one of his own. "You two know what's going on and hey, that's fine, whatever. It really doesn't bother me. Tell the local newspaper for all I care. Oh no, aliens in the apartment . . . I'm sure that will get lots of press."

"We can't tell her," Leonard insisted. "She won't understand. She's not-"

"That isn't my problem," Brown answered firmly. "I can't juggle taking care of this while making sure that everyone in this building is safe and play along with some ridiculous charade that you've concocted because you don't think your girlfriend across the hall can handle the fact that aliens are replacing electricity in the wires."

"You have to admit, it does sound pretty weird when you put it that way," Leonard ventured weakly.

Brown stood up from the bed and without even seeming to move he was suddenly in front of Leonard. Sheldon was hanging back slightly, his arms bent but stiffened and at his sides. The way he always looked when someone would question him at a conference, in that second before he would blister the room with an answer. The rare times when he appeared to believe something was worth defending, even if he felt it was self-evident. But Leonard saw none of that, the only horizon in his view was Brown's drab and dark uniform, and the curl of his displeasure.

"Clearly I'm going to have to put this a different way, because I'm not getting through to you," he said with a soft frustration. Leaning in a few inches, he said plainly, "One of us is going to have to come clean and tell her what's going on." Lightly, he tapped at Leonard's shoulder, tiny bullets striking the skin with cannonball flair. "I'll let you go first, but if you can't, then I'm going to tell her."

* * * * *

"The game?" Tristian asked, letting the word dangle evasively at the end of his sentence.

"Come on, don't do this to me," Penny said with some exasperation, banging her hand on the cabinet with a peeved expression. "Don't go all into character on me now like we're still in some silly science-fiction scene. It's bad enough that I have to watch them do it, you struck me as having a chance at being somewhat normal." She stepped away, leaning against the counter and folding her arms across her chest. "Can we just drop the Jedi crap for a second?"

Tristian studied her, turning away slightly but still regarding her in a sidelong fashion. Finally, his stance suddenly relaxed and he put one hand on the edge of the sink, opening his stance up somewhat. "Fine," he replied, his face utterly serious. "But I'm not turning the sword off."

Penny, who had been staring at the kitchen island, glanced back at him warily, unsure. When he finally couldn't keep his expression still any longer and broke into a sly smile, she grinned back at him, shaking her head and running a hand through her hair. "Okay, fine. Fine. You can keep your little light-up toy on. But if you're not careful you're going to let it define you."

Instead of responding he glanced out the kitchen window. The disintegrating light of the dimming day touched the curve of his eyes and slipped right off the edges. "I'm trying to avoid that," he said eventually, carefully. "But it's not like there's any other characters I can really play."

"Oh, I'm sure there are," Penny assured him, watching him curiously, as if expecting different words out of him. "But why play at all?"

"Why?" He tucked his chin into his chest briefly, considering the question. When he did look up it was slightly askew of Penny but she could still see the marginal humor in his eyes. "If you want the honest reason, it was kind of sprung on me."

Penny gave him a disbelieving look. "Like you just walked into a room one day and someone was like, 'Congratulations, you're a Jedi now?' I think that's a new one."

"And yet here you are, playing a princess," Tristian pointed out. "Unless that really was part of your plans for the day."

"Right." She blew out a puff of air so that her bangs flared upwards briefly. "All right, so I guess we're both suckers." She raised herself up on the balls of her feet. "Though I like to think that my role was inside me the whole time."

Tristian laughed. "That's pretty much what they told me. Good to see that you fell for it, too." Penny made a face at him, which he weathered with equanimity, brushing it aside as he continued. "No, it turned out that the person who was playing my role was, um, they dropped out and they needed an extra person in order to go into the game."

"So Joe suggested you?"

"Actually, no, he didn't." Penny shot him an odd look at that he didn't seem to notice. "It was some other . . . I can't quite call them friends, but they're not just acquaintances, it's . . . did you ever have a weird uncle that only visited once in a while and did some things that were kind of astounding but was sort of frustrating at the same time?"

"My Uncle Barry," Penny said, chewing on a fingernail. "He was a . . . minstrel? The only one in Nebraska, he used to tell me, because nobody else had the guts for it. I don't know if guts was the right word for walking for days down roads with cornstalks on either side and singing for anyone who would listen . . . but that's what he called it." She let her arm drop and tracing an idle line on her shirt. "He'd show up without warning, which always drove my parents nuts and he'd insist on singing for his supper, he'd go out and make us all watch while he serenaded the corn." She laughed without sound, rubbing her elbow while her gaze refused to focus. "Uncle Barry would always tell my father that it would help the corn grow, he'd get a bigger yield. My father would just humor him and roll his eyes and pour another shot of brandy into his coffee as my mother would ask him again when he was leaving. All that singing all the time, a capella, with a guitar, a tambourine, for a little while a ukulele before my father accidentally left it near a plow. He drove us nuts."

Her frown was wistful and present and close all at the same time. "But there were times . . . late at night he'd wake me up and we'd go out to the barn. And we'd sit on bales of hay and . . ." she stopped, glancing at Tristian. "This sounds silly, right?"

"You're talking to a man holding a giant glowing toy sword," Tristian answered with quiet humor. "I really don't think I'm in any position to judge."

"Right," she said, giggling a little, running her hands down her pants and then clasping them together, as if nervous. "So we'd . . . we'd sit there and he'd teach me these songs he knew. Not like the silly ones that he'd sing at bars or out on the road, but really old ones, or ones that he had made up . . . they were like little stories, some were love songs and some were sad." Her hand was tapping against her thigh, perhaps trying to find the old rhythm. But it goes and it slips and you've got to let the step skip before it can come around again. "And I'd watch him sing and it would be . . . he'd vanish. Like, not literally but his face, his posture, it would all change. Even if it was just some song about a frontier maiden pining for her woodsman lover to come home, he'd close his eyes and look up at the sky . . . and sing. For those few minutes it would feel like he really was waiting, like he'd been waiting forever but the promise was worth it. So he'd wait just a little while longer. Then he'd stop and he'd open his eyes to give me that goofy grin of his and he'd be my strange Uncle Barry again." Penny closed her own eyes briefly, a certain tightness lingering as a memory bobbed too close to the skin, threatening to puncture every layer. "He told me . . . he said the one reason he loved singing was that if the song was right, you could become someone else. You could stop being who you were for a little bit and learn what it was like to be another person. And if you were really good, convince other people that they were that person as well, just by listening to you. He said I was his favorite audience, because I always went wherever his song was going." Her sigh wasn't a letting go so much as a clinging, allowing the air to seep from you so that someone can hug you that much tighter. "He drove us nuts." It was the official story. "I haven't seen him in years, not since I left home to come here. I wonder sometimes if he still visits, and if he does, if he goes out to the barn at night and sings a song that convinces him that I'm there. That someone is listening." She took a strand of hair and brought it under her nose, as if trying to inhale a small part of home still attached to her. "He couldn't teach me how to sing, of course, my voice just sucks. It's a lost cause. But sometimes I think about how it wouldn't be so bad if I could do that, become another person. Just for a little while."

Tristian studied her, drumming his fingers along the sink. "One thing I've learned about this game is that you can become something else, but it won't change who you are."

"Sometimes I wonder . . ." she murmured, letting the words trail off into something insubstantial without attempting to reel them back. Snapping herself back into the conversation, she asked, "So that's how you met Joe?"

"Basically. We kind of knew each other already, but had never really talked to each other." His free hand rubbed the opposite shoulder, like finding an old wound. "When I first started, ah, playing, they thought they'd be able to . . . ease me into the game. But it turned out we timed it poorly and something big happened right when I started." There was memory in the phrasing, the way that rocks held the river in place even as the water kept wearing them down. The view was the same above as below, until you found the line that separated. "And the guys who got me into it were called away, because they were playing special forces types and this big war was going on. So I was in the middle of this huge mess, people running around who I didn't know all doing things I didn't understand and I had to figure out the rules on the fly."

Penny smirked. "Oh, I've been there. Ever play Halo 3?"

Tristian laughed again, shaking his head while mouthing the word "no." Penny noticed that he was very careful not to let the sword touch the ground, no matter how much he seemed to forget that he was holding it. That's some dedication, she marveled silently, not sure if she was supposed to be impressed or not. "I faked my way through it by some miracle, to this day I'm still not sure how. I met Joe some time after that, it turned out we were playing for the same team. And he was a big help, explaining to me exactly how things worked and what to expect. It's what I needed, because to be honest I was feeling really lost." The sigh that graced the edges of his voice wasn't an addition but a component, a puzzle piece that couldn't be removed even as it smeared the corner of the picture. "Since then it's been interesting. Don't get me wrong, there's a lot of days when none of this makes any sense at all to me. I've been in places where everybody seems to be speaking a different language, where all the rules that we thought we had down got tossed out, and done things that I've never expected to."

"And now you're a pro at it," Penny said. "Teaching other Jedi your ways." She was surprised to hear a little admiration in her own voice when she said that. But there was something about him that even if she was playing a game and someone gave her a ridiculous sword, she would listen to what he had to say. And he'd be able to say it in a way that didn't seem silly. Like the time when the boys tried to explain particle physics to her with a longwinded metaphor that included the cast of Lost and the various hosts of Who Wants to be a Millionaire. Leonard actually got Sheldon to draw her a chart connecting it all together, and they gave a little speech that started with "Now, let's imagine Regis Philbin as . . . charm."

"Not quite." It wasn't certain at first whether he was commenting on the pro label or the notion of teaching other people. "It . . . that's what I thought would happen at first, too. That I'd run into other Jedi and we could trade off stories and ideas, people who had been doing it longer than me who could give me some clue as to how to proceed. That's not the case, as it turns out. It didn't hit me at first, not running into other people who were like . . . who were playing the same kind of character as me. Then they finally confirmed it, after I pressed them on it." The sword was lifted, the shadow of it neatly bisecting his face. A crimson splatter that hit the wall behind him might have been his face, distorted into the boundaries of this too small space. "It was just me."

"Oh." The way he said it, with a brief weariness, like watching autumn leaves fall and not realize until later it was the last time, made her forget for a second that they were just talking about some silly game. "But you could always find a rulebook or something, right? Go online and download some manual?"

He let the sword drop again. "Nobody ever writes this stuff down. And what I do isn't the same thing as what Joe does, so he can't really help me beyond keeping me sane when things start to spiral out of control. I've got to figure it out on my own, and nobody is going to tell me if I'm right or wrong."

"That's a terrible game," she breathed, without realizing right away what she had said. She instantly wanted to take it back, not wanting to insult him. Which surprised her, a year or so ago she would have thought nothing of dismissing a nerdy activity, not even considering it worth talking about. Yet here she was, feeling bad because this stupid little game was seemingly stacked against him. What are you two doing to me? But there was no malice in her question, and maybe even a little affection. It never occurred to ask him why he didn't just quit. It didn't seem like an option.

"At first that's what I thought, too," he agreed. "But, when you think about it . . . isn't that the kind of game we've always wanted to play? Where we could make up our own rules and decide for ourselves how it was going to go? This way if things went wrong, we had no one to blame but ourselves . . . but if it went perfectly, if it worked out, it really meant something. It wouldn't be due to luck or dice rolls or because you were able to bend the rules to suit you . . . that's what makes the difference."

"I don't know," Penny said warily. "I'd need structure. I'd need some kind of script, or I'd feel like I wouldn't know what I was doing. I'm no good at improvising."

"You learn. You have to. Because people are counting on you." She had a quick mental image of a bunch of people in ragged alien costumes all standing in a cafeteria with little signs on the table indicating which alien world it was. And all of them cheering when Tristian walked into the room. It was absurd and yet felt sort of right. "Standing around waiting for someone to tell you what to do just doesn't work. Not here. You make guesses and adapt as best you can and do what you think is right at the time. If you try hard enough, most of the time it winds up working out. At least that's what I believe." He sucked at his upper lip, creating a small "mm" sound. "It's like life, in that sense. I think that's why I've come to enjoy it, most days. Even if I am more Luke Skywalker than Obi-Wan." That last bit was said with an offhand shrug and twist of the mouth.

Penny smiled. "Yeah, but Luke is the one that saves the day. Obi-Wan gets killed."

Tristian raised an eyebrow in exaggerated surprise. "Not bad. I wouldn't think that's in your usual genre."

Blushing a little, she said, "Oh, wow, I didn't think that was right. Blame the guys. I think they're rubbing off on me." She craned her neck to stare around Tristian. "They've been in there for a long time."

"It's a complicated little game we play," Tristian said evenly, also eyeing the bedroom doors. The lights skipped into a brief flicker, causing his eyes to dart to the nearest bulb. But then they flared back to normal, with barely a second in between. Penny didn't even seem to notice.

"Yet you keep playing it." Penny crossed over to the counter island and hopped up on it, swinging her legs idly. "Doesn't it ever strike you as weird? I mean, you're standing here in some strangers' apartment, running around a building for no real reason while pretending to be some kind of space-knight . . . for fun? This is fun for you? Honestly?"

"It's a bit unorthodox, I'll admit. But there's benefits to it." Tristian crossed his legs at the ankles and shifted his weight against the counter, angling himself so that he could talk to her and still keep an eye on the rest of the room. "After all, you do meet all kinds of interesting people." He nodded his head toward her.

Penny laughed. "Flatterer."

Tristian only gave a small mocking bow as his acknowledgment.

"But . . . you really do enjoy all this?" Tristian looked up to give her another humorous response but stopped when he saw the sudden serious look on her face. There was a grayness in her eyes that hadn't been there a second earlier, the sky itself parting to reveal nothing but clouds. "It all makes sense to you?"

"I do. It does. In its way." He shifted again, as if trying to make himself recede. "But that isn't your question."

"Can I ask you something? A favor?" Those weren't the questions either, they cam out too quickly to even be considered properly imperative. Tristian didn't answer, merely waited. His silence almost scared her off from asking but then she pushed the heels of her hands against the counter as if bracing herself.

"When this . . . whatever it is, this game is done . . . can you teach me how to play?" The extra snap in her speech to indicate she was kidding wasn't present. The only action Tristian took was to not move, perhaps preparing to find out which direction this was going to fall into. Her eyes had every part of him. Her boots thumped an insistent rhythm into the counter, a pulse gone erratic. "Please? Because . . . because I think it's time I learned. Will you show me?" Outside, background radiation creates ambient symphonies. Outside, hydrogen atoms careen in the dark spaces and a million miles apart is being as close as lovers. "Please?" In the gaps there's nothing but talk and tapestries, outside.

While inside, all there is are questions.

"Can you show me what it takes to be exactly what you are?"