Avatar is the property of people who aren't me. This work of fiction is not authorized by those people.

A/N – My apologies, guys. I moved to a new place; and on top of all the fun that entails, it took forever to get the Internet/cable hooked up.

"Do you know why I like taking your contracts?" she asked.

"Why?"

"You put me up in the nicest hotels." Jude pulled back the curtains to look out over the bay. The North Tower of the long-ago collapsed Golden Gate Bridge stood illuminated in the night, ostensibly a monument to the hundreds of thousands who died in the earthquakes. In truth, as they planned the new San Francisco, engineers and city planners found that it was cheaper to build a new bridge the west of the original than to reconstruct it.

"It was a stipulation of your contract," Franklin replied, not apparently the least bit amused by her quip. "Full suite, nothing below four diamonds," he added. "Your reputation from New York was good enough to have us accommodate the demand, but we're expecting to get full value on the contract."

"You will," she replied flatly as she let the curtain fall back into place. Jude walked to her bags, which she had left on the bed, and began to assemble her equipment bedside. "I need a more thorough briefing first."

"To be honest, I'm not convinced you're the person I hired," he replied. "I spoke with a man…"

"Named Jude," she interrupted. "That was my avatar. We went over this at the train station."

"But now I want proof."

She set aside the rest of her equipment and withdrew her tablet from its case. After taking time to reset the machine's security protocols to account for the hotel's defenseless wireless network, she pulled up her avatar program. Jude handed him the tablet and asked, "Does he look familiar?"

Franklin frowned and handed the tablet back to her. "Fair enough." He took a camera from his pocket and withdrew the media storage device.

Jude took the chip from him and inserted it in one of her tablet's ports. At first, images of butterflies appeared on her screen – she asked herself if she had ever seen a butterfly outside of a zoo – but her background security program quickly identified the embedded data. Another program activated automatically to reconstruct the information into her briefing.

She scanned through the pages of information, and she was not impressed. "There's a lot of biographical information here," she said, "but you aren't telling me anything about what you're after."

"The target was in charge of restarting our Pandora operations. However, and for whatever reason, he sabotaged them. We need to know why."

"Do you need to know, or do you want it to go away?" she asked. "Because, Mister Ashworth, any two-bit, Scientologist-hired investigator could probably figure out why. People don't bring me in on cases where they don't have a handle on the problem, but only if they're having problems packing it up."

"The problem is that one of our former, high-performing, senior executives has had a crisis of loyalty," he replied. "Yes, we need him to go away, but we also need to figure out what made him go rogue on us – and then we need that to go away."

"Then I suggest you conduct an internal investigation. It will be cheaper for you."

Franklin stepped towards her and said, "This suite aside, we paid you a very substantial advance for this contract. If you're going to back out, I…"

"I'm not backing out," she interrupted. "I'm telling you that I've taken enough RDA contracts to have a pretty good idea how one of your people could have had a crisis of conscience. He was your predecessor, right?"

"Correct."

"Then for starters, I'd suggest the possibility that he got tired of us 'contractors.'" Jude held a hand up before he could respond. "I'm going to help you take care of your problem, but frankly, Franklin, I don't think you want a person like me digging deep into RDA's affairs to find out what created this problem in the first place."

"We have a confidentiality agreement."

"I'm sure you did with the target, too," she said with a grin. "But if one person stared into the abyss and didn't like what he saw, what makes you think that another person wouldn't react the same way?"

"It's a good thing you came with a solid recommendation and track record," Franklin replied, "because you're not doing a lot to inspire me with confidence right now."

She just shrugged. "So what kind of message are you looking to send with this package?"

"None," he replied. "Find him, identify any loose ends, and then bury the package. The sooner you can do this, the better."

Jude shook her head and said, "He arrived two days ago, and you're only just briefing me. I can't give you that time back. I'm going to do what needs to get done, but don't expect me to rush through it. Keep in mind that if I mess up, it could come back to you."

Franklin took a breath before he said, "See that it doesn't," and then made a quick exit from the suite.

Within thirty minutes, Jude had her equipment operational. Shortly afterwards, Jude launched an array of programs to scan for information on her target and his known contacts. By the time she turned in for the night, she had her plan of action underway.

"You know you really should go talk to Natalie," Tom said, sitting alone with Abe at the long-since cleared dinner table. "She may not like to hear what you have to say, but she ought to hear it anyway."

Abe shook his head and said, "Krysta and I didn't want her to find out what it was that we did for a living until we were ready to put it behind us. We certainly didn't ever think it would come out like this."

"Careful, Abe," Tom replied with a grin. "You sound like you're having regrets."

Abe chuckled. "I don't know that I'd call them regrets. Perspective, maybe, but I couldn't tell you that I'd do anything differently."

"You'd still go to Pandora?"

"That I regret," Abe said, "but not because of what went on there." Tom nodded, likely aware of what he was going to say next. Abe continued anyway, "I missed everything. Ever since she was a little girl, from that first hospital stay, I told her that I would be there when she needed me. Then I was gone for so long that I've just become some guy, and I wasn't there for her."

Tom scoffed. "C'mon, Abe, don't go there. She's mad at you now, but you're still her father. It won't last forever."

Abe raised an eyebrow and asked, "Have you spoken with your son lately?"

"Hell no!" he replied with a laugh. "But he's a money-grubbing, worthless sack who doesn't know how to stand on his own legs." Tom shook his head and continued, "I gave him every possible opportunity to be a man, and he squandered it all. Natalie, on the other hand, is a bright, determined young woman with a future. You should be proud of her."

"I am," Abe said. "I just wish I had been around to see it happen."

"Well, who knows, Abe," Tom said with a sigh. "It's just as likely that your presence might have screwed her up." Abe went wide-eyed and slack-jawed, to which Tom just shrugged and said, "It's possible. We'll never know what did or didn't happen in the alternate universe of, 'What if?'"

After a moment of uncomfortable silence, Abe laughed, shook his head, and said, "Christ, Tom, if that's your idea of a silver lining, I'd rather just have the hurricane."

"Just as soon as you stop moping, I'll stop introducing you to worst-case scenarios." Tom sighed and continued, "Speaking of worst-case scenarios, Abe, this plan you've come up with…"

"I know it's crazy," Abe interrupted. "I've had no shortage of people tell me that."

"At least hear it from one of the ten smartest men on Earth," Tom said. "You're crazy."

"I didn't sabotage the Pandora operation," Abe replied. "They were going to hang me out for Parker's stupidity. You should know me better than to think I'd take that lying down."

"Maybe you didn't set out to be a saboteur, but the fact is that things went wrong – again – and you were in charge." Tom took a breath and said, "Put yourself back in your AMIS shoes, and conduct an after action review of your operation. What would you identify as the points of failure?"

Abe grinned and asked, "Have you opened a wormhole to the alternate universe of, 'What if?'"

"No," Tom replied. "But I'll cut to the chase. Right now you are, at best, a fugitive with a couple of felony charges. You're too high profile to be made to disappear, but RDA could arrange for an expeditious trial."

"At which point I'll die in prison."

Tom continued without acknowledging his comment. "If your plan is successful – successful, Abe – you might, at best, be the man responsible for the collapse of civilized society. You're going to lay bare the greatest corporate conspiracy in the history of mankind – in which senior members of the governments of the civilized world were complicit, I'll add – and then follow that up with an intensified energy crisis. At worst, and certainly in the event of failure, you'll be a terrorist." Tom sighed and said, "In all cases, you're asking your family to assume a lot of risks that are, in my opinion, unfair to ask of them."

"So what should I do, Tom? Walk into a police station, turn myself in for something or another, and then hope for the best?"

"You should do what you're best at doing and leverage your position to your advantage, rather than go for the climactic showdown," Tom replied. "You still have time to do it."

Abe shook his head. "If the chairman had left Krysta and Natalie alone, I probably would. Unfortunately for him, that's now part of the history of our alternate universe."

"Not just for him, Abe. You're playing with more people's lives than either of us could account for – on two worlds, no less."

Abe nodded and asked, "Do you want to play along?"

"No," he replied flatly. "I have no interest in this business. This is your job, not mine."

"Except it crosses over with your job," Abe said. "This is about your life's work, Tom. The entirety of your pursuits has been to make Earth a better place to live, but instead you've had your work usurped as a plaything for the man who already has everything."

"But he still lets me work," Tom replied. "Where everybody else would have put me out to pasture, he's kept me in business. I still get published."

"What's the point of getting published if all of your discoveries get locked up as corporate, intellectual property for nobody else to act on?"

"Versus being a has-been academic?" Tom asked with a snort. "By the way, the research that Doctor Patel has with him: If he really thinks RDA will sit by while he distributes it en masse to all corners of academia…"

"He does really think it, because it's going to happen," Abe replied, interrupting him. "On that particular point, I'm shoulder-to-shoulder with him and Norm. Too many people have been sacrificed to obtain that knowledge for it to get locked up in RDA's archives."

Tom shook his head. "They're not going to know what to do with it. That information is just as likely to be wasted by the masses as it would be by RDA."

"We'll take our chances."

He chuckled and said, "I have no doubt about that. You've taken plenty of chances already."

"And relative to those risks, I'm asking you to take a fairly minor one. Besides, once this all goes down – and it will – I doubt the chairman will be lenient on you a second time."

"Respectfully, Abe, I'm more important to RDA than you ever were," Tom replied flatly. "If I go, RDA's research program will seize up. The chairman will more than likely force me to sell some of my stake in the company, and then he'll let me go on doing what I'm doing now."

Abe sighed. "You're really not going to help me, are you?"

Tom shook his head. "I won't stand in your way, but I can't in good conscience participate, either."

"All right," Abe replied with a slow nod. "Well, if you won't help me, are you still willing to be there for Krysta and Natalie?"

"Of course."

Abe reached into his pocket and withdrew a portable storage device. "This contains all of my emergency accounts and contacts. I've checked on them since coming home, and they're still active. If anything goes wrong, move the money, activate my contacts, and get my family to safety." He handed Tom the drive and added, "Download the information and destroy the chip as soon as possible."

Tom reluctantly took the device and, storing it away, said, "You still have time to make sure it doesn't come to that, Abe." He pleaded, "Be sensible about this."

"I owe my family security, and they aren't going to have that as long as Savage is able to punish them for an offense I didn't commit." He took a breath and said, "The sensible thing, Doctor, is to knock the bastard back on his ass."

Natalie had lost track of the time, had tried several times to wash the sting of her tears from her eyes, when someone tried to turn the locked knob on her door. "Go away, please," she said from her bed, her face half buried in her pillow. "Just let me sleep it off."

"Nä-tey-lee?" Tseyo said from the other side of the door. "May I speak with you?"

She hesitated, but then gathered herself together and unlocked her door. When she opened it, Tseyo was sitting in front of her with a slight smile. He had taken off his mask. "My father wouldn't come down?"

His smile faded. "He should have," Tseyo replied. "But he started talking with the older one."

Natalie just shook her head. Doctor Walsh had practically been a surrogate father to her in her dad's absence, but she was even looking at him in a different light, now. What research projects had he ordered at the Na'vi's expense? Was he being honest about her father, or just protecting the extent of his own involvement?

Tseyo asked, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," she replied with a sniffle. "It was just a lot to learn." She took a deep breath and added, "I'm sorry about your sister. I would never have thought my father could be involved in something like that."

He looked down and nodded slowly. "It was very painful for me to lose her," he said. Then he took a deep breath and continued, "However, now she is one with Eywa, and part of the energy which sustains life. That makes it hard to stay sad." He took another breath and looked up at her. "There is more, though, that you should know."

She nodded, quietly asking him to continue.

"I was very angry because of her death – all the people were. When we knew it was the one your father had sent who was responsible, we wanted all of them to be brought to account for the crime." He paused, turned, and crawled to his hammock. He took a long knife from a sheath that had been hanging from the rope near one of the anchor points, and then came back to the door. He held it flat in his open palms and said, "I used this knife to kill the one who killed Mehi'a." He looked in her eyes and added, "I wanted to use it to kill your father, too."

Natalie looked at the blade, and immediately had an image of it impaled in her father's chest. She closed her eyes and shook her head, trying to get rid of the sight. She was not completely successful, but she opened her eyes to look back at Tseyo. "Why are you telling me this?"

"Your father said I should, and I think he's right." He let out a short laugh and said, "I don't know how you Sky People live with each other, because it seems to me that you hide so much from your friends. My people don't – good or bad, we don't hide from each other."

Rather than be impressed, she decided to test the extent of his honesty. "Do you still want to kill my father?"

He shook his head. "I'm not angry anymore. I don't like him, but the kind of anger I felt is destructive. You cannot balance your energy with it."

"Are you going to kill other people?"

Tseyo paused for a moment, and then replied, "I don't want to, but I came here to protect my people from more harm. I'm ready to do what I need to do to keep that promise to them."

"Those people are going to be other people's brothers," she replied. "Or children's fathers."

"I know," he said quietly. "I hope I don't have to hurt them, but…"

"…If you have to," she finished for him. He nodded. "Norm said you came here to be a witness, not to be a fighter."

"I can't tell my people's story if I let your people kill me, can I?"

Natalie sighed and shook her head. "This is all so crazy." She felt the same emotions from earlier begin to dominate her, and she did her best to fight them back. "Somehow, I knew that there was more going on in your world than we were being told here, but I wouldn't let myself believe it was so bad."

"Sometimes it's easier to think about what's going to happen than about what's happened," he replied. "I could either keep thinking about how sad and angry I was when Mehi'a was taken away, or I can think about how happy the people will be when I can tell them that our home is safe again." He returned the sword to its cover, and then came back to her. "I think the future is better."

Natalie nodded. "I think the same thing here a lot. I know you've seen how bad our world has become, and there are a lot of people who are too focused on what's happened. However, I like to think about what I could do to help it, how I can help bring it back to life." She allowed herself a few moments to get lost in those thoughts, to envision a brighter future, and she could not help but smile. Natalie looked back at Tseyo and said, "Thank you for talking with me."

"You spoke with me last night when I was sad," he replied with a smile. "It was the right thing to do." Tseyo paused, looked down, and said, "You know, one thing I remember fondly about Mehi'a is that she was one of our people's best dancers."

He looked at her with a smile and expectant eyes, and she let out a short laugh. "Once everyone else is asleep," she said, "we'll go to the dream world to watch dancers."

The house fell quiet more quickly than she had expected; and, to her particular disappointment, neither her father, mother, nor Doctor Walsh came down to check in on her. Perhaps they figured she had gone to sleep, or they assumed that, as an adult, she ought to be able to handle herself. Whatever their logic, their actions – or lack thereof – stung her.

Norm did come down to the basement, but less to check in on her than to make sure Tseyo was squared away for the night. First he took care to see that Tseyo was not suffering from the dizziness and headaches that overcame him earlier in the day. After he was satisfied with Tseyo's health, he informed Tseyo that they would be leaving the house tomorrow, news to which Tseyo reacted positively, and then Norm was gone for the night.

Natalie made a final inspection of the house before she roused Tseyo from the light sleep he had fallen to in the intervening period, and then she brought the tablet and two virtual network headsets from her room. First Natalie turned on the tablet to ensure that their headsets were linked, and then she fitted Tseyo with a headset.

It took a little while to secure his headset properly – she found getting the faceplate to cover his full field of vision was the most difficult part – but she managed it. Once he was fitted, Natalie instructed him to lay back into his hammock. She donned her own headset, only bringing down the microphone and earpieces in order to communicate with him, and then she turned on his headset.

"Do you see anything?" she asked.

"It's all white," he replied, his voice muted in the room but clear in her earpieces. "Am I supposed to see something?"

"Not yet," Natalie said. She turned back to the tablet, and she began the configuration sequence for Tseyo to be able to control his avatar. She accepted the prompt, and her tablet revealed the white nothingness that Tseyo had commented on. "You'll see a red spot shortly. Let me know when you do."

Natalie touched the center of the screen, and Tseyo said, "I see it."

"Stay still, and follow it with your eyes." She moved her finger around the tablet until a dialogue box appeared to confirm that the headset had a lock on the brain patterns associated with his vision. The configuration continued for the better part of the next hour, until finally she was able to link Tseyo with his avatar body.

While he adjusted, she pulled down the faceplate of her headset and called up the command to enter her avatar. She felt lightheaded for an instant, and then as though she were rising out of her body. Before Natalie felt too detached, however, she found herself standing in the empty, grey-walled anteroom of the virtual network.

Natalie felt her avatar's hair falling around her shoulders, and she took a moment to shift her weight from one leg to the next, encouraged to feel no pain. Natalie could not help but smile.

She looked behind her and saw Tseyo looking over his virtual body. Although he was more animated in his expressions of surprise, taking particular interest in his five-digited hands, she was struck by how much his avatar body had managed to mirror his Na'vi form. Although the preview screen they had used on the tablet had made a good faith replication, particularly in the gaunt features of his face, it had also done a fair job at mimicking his musculature – even though the default clothes he wore did their best to detract from it.

Natalie realized she was staring too long at his body, and she asked, "Are you okay?"

Tseyo appeared startled to see her, but then he replied, "It feels a little confined."

"You'll get used to it," she replied. "Everybody feels that at first."

He rubbed the small of his back and said, "I can still feel my tail, but there's nothing here."

She nodded. "Your mind hasn't yet grown accustomed to this world, so it's still letting you feel parts of your real body. Once you immerse yourself here, it should go away."

Tseyo took a couple of steps towards her, and then reached out to brush her cheek. "This all feels very real," he said. "It's like having a communion with the spirits."

Natalie nodded and put her hand over his. "Yes it does," she said. "That's what this world is designed to be – as close to real as possible."

He grinned and said, "It's strange, too, that I don't have to be sitting to be level with you."

She smiled and replied, "I think it's better this way."

He nodded, and then looked around. "I know we just got here," he said, "but how will we get out? I don't see any way to leave. Will we wake up on our own?"

She stepped away from him and made a rectangle with her thumbs and index fingers, nodding at him to do likewise. Natalie then moved her hands apart, and a translucent, light blue prompt screen appeared before her with a range of buttons and options. He did the same, with the intended result – although she was not able to suppress a giggle as Tseyo inspected his hands, apparently curious where the prompt came from.

"If you touch your finger to the red area at the bottom right of that," she said once he abandoned the investigation, "you will leave this world. Right now, though, touch the black area at the top left to make this disappear." Natalie again followed by example.

"Now, where do we go to see the dancers?"

Natalie restored the prompt screen, and quickly navigated the options until so that she could transport them from the empty staging room into a virtual opera house. She stayed a few steps behind Tseyo as he walked about the floor, alternately looking up at the vaulted ceiling, from which hung an ornate chandelier, and across the rows of seats. When they approached the stage, Tseyo leapt up and looked out over the hall.

"Do you like it?" she asked, although the awestruck expression he had maintained since entering the hall was enough of an answer for her.

He nodded and replied, "It's strange, but this feels a little like home."

"How so?"

"Whenever there is a ceremony, all the people sit around the altar mound – from the ground up to the branches and exposed roots – to watch the dances. I can almost see them in this place."

She nodded slowly and looked around the auditorium. Natalie tried to picture the inside of Tseyo's hometree – and the hundreds of Na'vi participating in a ceremony – but was frustrated that her imagination did not seem up to the task. Natalie took a breath and said, "Well, if you'll follow me to our seats, we can bring the dancers out."

They sat in the first tier box seats at stage right. Natalie called up the prompt and, recalling Tseyo's fondness for drumming, requested a corps of taiko drummers. Seven drummers appeared on the stage, and they began their performance at her command. When their performance was over, she followed their act with a dance troupe accompanied by bodhráns. Thereafter, she found a troupe whose principal percussion instruments were trash cans and barrels.

Tseyo was enraptured throughout the demonstrations. He leaned forward, hands on the railing, eyes darting around to follow the drummers' and dancers' motions. As the dances went on, Natalie watched as his hand bounced on the railing in synch with the music, keeping almost perfect time. In watching him, she also noted that his eyes were closed, and his lips moving. She strained to hear the song he was singing above the din of the music coming from the stage, but it was to no avail.

At the conclusion of the industrial-themed performance, Natalie was preparing to call up a drum battery when Tseyo said abruptly, "I want to dance."

"What?"

He looked at her with a broad smile and said, "Your music is so intoxicating, I can't just sit here. Can we dance?"

"Not here," she replied. "But, yes, there is a place we can go." Natalie took notice of the fact that Tseyo was still dressed in the default outfit that the program provided – a white t-shirt and faded jeans. She let out a short laugh and said, "They won't let us in if you're wearing that, though."

Tseyo appeared relieved and immediately proceeded to discard his shirt – by way of tearing it off. "These are not appropriate for dancing, anyway."

Natalie stopped him before he could slide out of his pants and said, "You have to be wearing something, or else we definitely won't be allowed to go." Before he could make a case for abandoning the restrictive clothes, Natalie took them out of the opera house and back to the empty room, where she called up a wardrobe.

As most of her wardrobe purchases were for her avatar, she did not have a wide selection of men's clothes beyond the default options. However, he zeroed on in dark khaki slacks and a rawhide vest with beaded necklace. It was not an outfit she would have put together, nor would she have gone shoeless, but he explained it simply for her. "These feel familiar – like hides."

Natalie hoped it would be outlandish enough that the bouncers of the club she had in mind would let it pass on the basis of uniqueness.

She called up the public rooms and scrolled through her bookmarks until she found the dance clubs. Although one club could accommodate thousands of people, there were so many users that the most popular clubs – even those with access criteria – had to be replicated several times over to accommodate the demand. Natalie chose one such club, and soon they were standing in a queue to gain access.

The bouncers were being particularly choosy tonight, and Natalie witnessed more people being ejected than admitted. When it was their turn to be evaluated, Natalie offered a quiet prayer.

The bouncer managing their queue – the avatar was a tall, bald, muscular black man whose user Natalie was sure had to be a lanky, pimple-faced twenty-something – quickly pulled out their profiles. He looked at hers and said, "You're good, he's not."

"Why not?" she dared to ask, knowing full well the simple challenge could be grounds for her ejection as well.

"Are you kidding? He's barely got three hours of log time. Newbies don't get in here."

"Yeah, well I'm a regular, and he's my guest."

He snorted. "The admins will terminate me if I let a newb in."

"So then maybe he's not a newb," she replied as she prepared to transfer in-world currency to the bouncer's account. "Maybe his primary profile got corrupted, so he's building up another one."

The bouncer looked at the open transfer connection, crossed his arms, and said, "It's going to take a lot of convincing for me to pass that one off."

Natalie offered five-thousand credits. He shook his head, so she raised it to seventy-five-hundred.

"Fine," he said, accepting the transaction. "But he's not protected. If he breaks the rules, you're both getting permabanned."

"Fair enough."

The bouncer transferred a keycard to their profiles, allowing them to open the club's doors.

They walked to the mezzanine railing to look out over the expansive dance floor. Colored, laser lights came down from a ceiling too high up to be seen, such was the capability of virtual architecture, while the floor itself alternated colors. As hundreds of people bounced and danced to the bass-heavy electronica that blared through the space – some carrying glow sticks, some glowing with fluorescent paints, most in their casual attire – Natalie was reminded of ripples moving through a pond.

Once more, Tseyo's eyes darted about the room, grinning from one ear to the next. Still, Natalie felt compelled to ask, "Are you comfortable here?"

He nodded. "I'm trying to find the instruments. They're so loud, they must be very large."

Natalie pointed towards the disc jockey – nomenclature which managed to survive long past the deaths of the stylus and of optic-based music storage – on an elevated platform near the back of the club. "He's controlling the music, but the instruments aren't real," she explained to the extent that his language would let her.

Whether or not he understood, chances being that he did not, Tseyo nodded and said, "Take me down there."

They pushed through the crowd until they were situated on the dance floor, a process that was delayed several times when Tseyo would become captivated either by a particularly gifted dancer or somebody making creative use of glow sticks. By the time they were in a place where they could have some semblance of space to move, the disc jockey's set had shifted to a more authentic drum and bass, his chosen tracks sampling from high energy live performances with minimal electronica woven in.

Though she felt settled, Natalie watched him turn his head about, surveying the scene. She asked, "Are you okay?"

Tseyo smiled and replied, "I'm much more than okay."

She smiled. "Well, you wanted to dance, so—," her voice trailed off and she nodded at him.

Natalie had tried to sound pleasant, but he must have cued in on her word choice. He raised his brow and asked, "You didn't want to come here?"

She took a moment to think about her response. "I wasn't expecting to, but now that we're here—," her voice trailed off again. She rubbed the back of her neck and, with a short, nervous laugh, said, "I can't dance."

He laughed and replied, "I won't believe it."

"It's true!" she protested. "I've tried – believe me – but I can't dance."

"You have the same problem all Sky People do," he said. He poked her forehead and explained, "You're trying to think about it, instead of letting your energy guide you."

Natalie smirked at him and asked, "All right, how do I let my energy guide me?"

"You have to become aware of your environment." Tseyo knelt down and, over her protests, removed her shoes, which disappeared into her avatar's inventory once discarded – something which seemed to catch him off guard for a second.

He shook off his surprise, stood back up and asked, "Can you feel the rhythm coming up through you, now?"

Natalie took a deep breath and tried to think about how to phrase her response. She wanted to explain how a virtual construct could not perfectly mimic a sound's pressure waves, other than the occasional pulse that would create an artificial bump for her avatar. However, as she was about to speak, she stopped herself – to her surprise, the floor did seem to pulse beneath her feet. "A bit, yeah," she finally admitted. "But I could…"

"Ah!" he interrupted, holding up a finger. "I know you could already feel it pulsing against your body, but you have to welcome it inside your body." She was about to say something else when he put his hands on her cheeks and said, "Close your eyes, and concentrate on the sound coming up through the ground and into you."

She closed her eyes as instructed. At first, she felt ridiculous. She imagined the people around them taking sideways glances at the unusual couple who were standing still on a dance floor. However, after a few moments passed, Natalie's mind began to focus only on the music, and her breathing became more even – relaxed.

Natalie felt him move his hands to her shoulders and lean in close to her. He whispered into her ear, "Move your feet." Natalie hesitated. "Don't think about it," he said. "Let yourself feel it, and then move your feet."

Natalie's feet began to move, although it was a far cry that someone with a lifetime of experience might display. She was uncoordinated, but doing her best to keep pace with the music. Tseyo kept her body locked for a while, up until it seemed he was satisfied with how she was moving her legs. At that moment, he lifted his hands from her shoulders and said, "Now move with the music as you feel it against your body."

Once again, she knew she was not going to be stealing the spotlight tonight – not unless the club was preparing a blooper video to upload. But as the music continued, she became less and less concerned about her appearance, which had the unexpected effect of making her feel more confident. It did occur to her, though, that she had not heard Tseyo, and so she opened her eyes to see if she had lost him.

Though he was still on the floor and in front of her, Natalie had indeed lost Tseyo. He appeared as thought he had transport himself home, that his avatar was only mirroring the motions of his living body as he danced about a fire. His feet moved perfectly in time with the music, no easy feat given its speed, and the rest of his body seemed to move fluidly along with the footwork – and even then he seemed restrained.

Tseyo had no problem keeping up with the track as it transitioned to a more frenetic beat. In doing so, he caught the attention of the people immediately around them, and they paused to form a small circle around him; and Natalie was caught up with them. Whether or not he was aware of their reverence, Tseyo continued on as though he might have been the only person in the club – or in the exclusive company of his kin.

The circle grew as others took notice of his impassioned dancing, and people began cheering him on. Then a siren sounded, and an array of lights that had been randomly circling about the club focused in on him. Tseyo had gotten the attention of the club's administrators, which caused Natalie to have a moment of dread. She worried that they were preparing to boot him for being out of place; or, worse, promote him to a more exclusive room, isolating him from her.

While she worried about the administrators' intentions, giant screens appeared where the ceiling might have been, and Tseyo was featured from multiple angles captured by unseen cameras. Although most of the patrons carried on with minimal reaction, enough took notice that a cheer from the crowd managed, however briefly, to drown out the music. Tseyo, wherever he had gone in his mind, registered the cheer as encouragement, and he let out something akin to a war cry in response.

When the track ended some minutes later, Tseyo stopped his dance and opened his eyes. He came back from wherever he had gone, and he appeared shocked that not only was he being watched by so many people, but that they were enthusiastically cheering for him. He offered them a humble smile, and then looked to be scanning the crowd – she assumed for her.

Natalie stepped from the circle at the moment that he got sight of her and took his hands in hers. "What was that?" she asked with a wide smile.

"That was my energy," he replied, mirroring her smile.

"It was amazing."

The next song was slower, had fewer samples of authentic instruments, and was light-spirited. The club's administrators' also lost interest in Tseyo at the same time as the song had; and so as the next track picked up, the screens vanished, the lights moved on, and the observers' circle collapsed back into an amorphous crowd. A few patrons took a moment to give kudos to Tseyo for his performance – to which Tseyo only smiled and nodded in response, to Natalie's amusement – but then carried on as though he had never interrupted them.

"You have to be tired," Natalie eventually said. "Do you want to go?"

"I'm okay," he replied. "I don't know if I could do that again, though."

"I don't think it would be appropriate for this song, anyway."

Tseyo nodded, and then asked, "Is there a particular dance for this music?"

"No," Natalie said as she stepped closer to him. "Just whatever you feel comfortable with."

He stayed within the confines that the crowd had locked him into, his rhythm more casual than a few moments earlier, and she did her best to keep up with him – clumsy though it was in comparison. They drew nearer to each other as the music continued, as much due to the increasing encroachments of the crowd as by any other factor.

Without thinking, she reached out and placed her hands on his hips; and she felt relieved when he reciprocated, drawing her close. What little space there had been left between them vanished, and she let herself be taken by his lead. His hand moved up her back; hers followed up his. He took a deep breath, causing his chest to press against hers; she sighed and held him close. He brought his brow to rest on hers; she turned her head so that their cheeks might brush against each other.

Natalie closed her eyes and took a deep breath through her nose, hoping to become intoxicated on his musk; but she was disappointed. For all that virtual reality had managed to accomplish, its designers had never managed to crack the complexity of the senses for taste and smell. Rumors abounded that they were suppressing such research for fears that people would become totally addicted to the virtual realm – more than already were, anyway – if they perceived that they could taste real food. Enough people died on a yearly basis for letting their bodies atrophy into nothingness as they spend unbroken days hooked up to virtual worlds; more people might let it happen inadvertently if they became convinced that they were consuming nutritional food.

The result for Natalie at this moment was an acute awareness of the artificial nature of the experience. Controlling the avatar she was holding so close was not someone with whom she could carry on in the real world. As soon as she left this place, she would see Tseyo again in his natural, alien body; and he would continue to see her through the prism of his culture. It was not that they would be star-crossed lovers; their respective stars were distinct and distant.

She let go of him and stepped away. He dropped his hands from her and looked at her confused. "Natalie?" She could not think of anything to say. Natalie formed a box with her fingers, brought up the master command prompt, and pressed the button to be ejected from the virtual realm.

After a flash of light, Natalie became keenly aware that she was lying on the floor of her basement. Her hair was gone, her legs were stiff, and her heart was racing. She took off her headset and got to her feet just as Tseyo began to move in his hammock.

He took off his headset about the same time that she had made it to her bedroom's door. "Natalie," he said. "Did I do something wrong?"

"No," she replied, turning to look at him. "I – It was—," she paused to find the right words. Natalie smiled weakly and could only offer a simple, "I'm sorry."

"For what?"

She stared at Tseyo for a moment, as though seeing him for the first time all over again, fixated on his alien features. The lights on his skin were glowing brightly, his tail idly flipped about behind him, and his large, yellow eyes conveyed confusion. Natalie took another breath and said, "I'm sorry for keeping you awake too long. Tomorrow is going to be a very long day for you." Tseyo was obviously not persuaded by her answer, but he seemed to resist saying so.

She walked to his hammock and gently took the headset from his hand, and once she had it, Tseyo took the opportunity to take hold of her wrist. Their eyes met, and he asked, "Please, Natalie, did I…"

"Sleep well, Tseyo," she replied with a smile, gently twisting her hand in the hopes that he would let go of her – which he did.

Tseyo sighed and looked down, and then he took a deep breath and said, "I enjoyed our time tonight, Natalie." He looked back into her eyes and added, "Thank you for taking me to your dream world."

"I'm glad you could see it," she replied. "Whatever else you see of our world, I hope you'll at least remember that part of it." He nodded, and she returned to her room to have a restless night.