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Alley fell into open sky and immediately focused her mind. She was falling into her adversary's mind and this was an incredibly dangerous place even discounting Lizbeth's demonstrated power. Anyone's mind was-

"Hey!" A young voice sounded nearby and Alley stared as a small winged horse appeared flying beside her. "You are not supposed to be here." The horse was gold and a white mane and tail. Was this a palomino? She had heard of that, but never seen one. The pegasus' wings had golden feathers that matched the coat.

"No?" Alley inquired as she flared her body as best she could to slow her headlong plummet. "I am not even sure where 'here' is."

She kept her tone mild and calm as the pegagus eyed her. She looked around, but there were not any landmarks. Nothing but clear sky all around her. She had to be falling towards something but there was nothing that she could see.

"Really?" The pegasus put a ton of derision into that one word. "You are Alley. The alien." Her tone was odd. Hate, to be sure. Fear. Regret mixed with longing and just a tiny touch of hope.

"And you are Lizbeth, the crazy bitch." Alley retorted, still calm. She angled her body to alter her fall and slid away from the horse. Far from insulted, the pegasus looked sad.

"Yeah." The wings flapped once, twice, to stay with Alley. "Yeah, I am. I… I didn't mean this to happen, you know?" She sounded so lost and alone for a moment that Alley felt her heart start to break. The Viper stepped on that, hard.

"Whether you meant it to happen or not, it did." Alley said firmly. "You have suffered and I am sorry for that, but I cannot allow you to kill children. A number of human children are going to die if that pilot launches."

"I know." Lizbeth said weakly. "But I can't stop it."

"Sure you can." Alley retorted. "You just don't want to." Alley did not react as the horse hissed at her. "Don't even try girl, I know some of what you went through and I met the Warlock. I can guess the rest." The horse looked thunderous, but Alley was unmoved. "If you know nothing else about me, then you know what the Elders did to me and my nest."

Her own hot glare was just as fervent as Lizbeth's and the pegasus was the first to look away.

The sheer horror of what had been done to Alley's nest was hard to fathom. The taking of injured children and brainwashing them to serve the Elders who had killed their parents and injured them had been bad enough. Implanting each human with a biological weapon of mass destruction had been worse, far worse. Then the fact that the weapon wasn't perfect and killed them every so often. So, they had been in pain their entire lives and watching their numbers slowly dwindle with no understanding of why or any way to stop it. Only the tough love of the Muton who had reluctantly taken the role of their Mother and their shared bond of pain had kept any of them sane.

"I… I do." Lizbeth allowed. "For what is worth, I am sorry for that. The Elders were evil."

"That they were." Alley agreed. "But so are you."

"NO I AM NOT!" Lizbeth screamed. "You think I had a choice? He had me! He knew what I was and he had me! He tortured me for weeks! He nearly killed me dozens of times and I woke up from that each time to see his gloating face, to have him to do it again!"

"There are always choices, girl." Alley replied, still angling away from the pegasus. She would likely only get one shot at this, she had to make it count. "There are always alternatives. You are not entirely lost to your evil and I do know what it is like to be tortured, so you have my sympathy. However, I need you so, I choose a different alternative."

"What?" Lizbeth's form seemed to hesitate in mid-air and Alley struck.

Lizbeth screamed as Alley's tongue wrapped around her form, binding her wings to her sides. The Viper pulled the struggling horse close and unhinged her jaw. She opened her mouth wide and Lizbeth screamed again and again as Alley swallowed her whole.

The world shifted and Alley sat up straight beside a bed where Lizbeth lay writhing. The hospital room was bright and airy, but felt closed in and almost claustrophobic. The girl, she was maybe fifteen, wore a patient gown and was strapped to the bed. Her blonde hair was cut very close to her scalp, the better to keep it clean and allow access to her head.

"No no no nononononononono!" Lizbeth moaned as Alley reached out and laid her hands against the girl's temples. "Don't!"

"I have few choices now, girl." Alley said sadly. "I swear to you, I will not kill you. I will not torture you. I will not hurt you unless you earn it. I will do what I can to help you but right now? I need your help and you will not give it willingly. So I have to take it. This is wrong." Alley admitted. "But what you plan to do is worse. The Avatar is destroyed. If I can, I will free you from the horror he did to you."

"He... It is destroyed?" Lizbeth asked, stunned. "That is not possible!"

"Nothing is impossible, girl." Alley said kindly as her hands warmed. "Nothing at all."

Then Lizbeth's screams drowned out everything as Alley reached into her mind and twisted hard. She felt a set of psychic chains shatter and was ready when Lizbeth recoiled. Her own chains snapped into place and Lizbeth's eyes were huge as Alley retracted her hands.

"You..." The girl's voice was stunned. "What have you done?" Alley just looked at her and Lizbeth growled, a feral sound of rage. She hawked and spat at Alley and her aim was true. The globule hit the snake in the face. "Do you really think this will stop me?"

"Wrong question." Alley did not react, did not punish the girl. Instead, she started to release the straps that held Lizbeth. Power flared from Lizbeth's hands as soon as they were free. It lashed out at Alley, but could not touch her. Lizbeth screamed in rage and shock and the power faded

"What have you done?" Lizbeth demanded, staring at the snake woman as Alley released her completely. "I..." She gathered power again and threw it at Alley, who stood silent as it rebounded and struck Lizbeth! She screamed and the power faded. Then she stared at her hand.

"Did you really think I would be that stupid?" Alley inquired, her tone cold. "To let you loose with no restraint whatsoever? I will not be as brutal as the Warlock was but I have many lives riding on my decisions now. Not just yours." She wiped her face with a slow hand. "I know this is a shock, but I do not have time to do this gently and less desire to after the pain you have caused me. Kneel."

"No." Lizbeth started to sneer and then gasped as her knees folded and she was on the floor kneeling in front of Alley! "What? No! NO!" She screamed and struggled, but Alley's will held her firm. A wave from Alley and Lizbeth's mouth shut. From the look on her face, she was screaming, but no sound would come until Alley wished it. Alley laid her hands on the kneeling woman's head, solidifying her hold despite Lizbeth's frantic struggles that were in no way physical.

"I find the whole concept of owning others utterly repugnant after what my nest went through." Alley said with a growl. "A cursory glance at human history shows that it was a normal state of affairs until the dawn of the nineteenth century and even then? It took over a hundred years for most European countries to have any semblance of Civil Rights for many of their inhabitants and even then? It varied from place to place and was never all of said inhabitants. Most other regions outside of Europe couldn't have cared less. Even in the most forward thinking places, there were pockets of hate. That is what racism is, at its core. Hate and fear. It is also apparently the way humans are wired to think." The snake shook her head. "'Us' and 'them'. 'We' are better than 'them' because 'we' are. Little things like morals, ethics or even facts are irrelevant when we are better than everyone else. The Germans got the worst press about that and yes, it was deserved after what was done during World War II, but everyone did it. No one's hands were clean. Every single country on Earth had its 'undesirables', its 'unclean', its 'ghetto children'. No one was above such evil. No one. Some were just better at hiding the body counts under layers of statistics. After all, why bother educating people, teaching them right from wrong, when you know that they are not as good as you are? Who cares if the whole reason they are not good is that you will not let them be? If they are not of you, then it is not only accepted practice to put them down or just kill them, but encouraged!" She shook her head. "What the Elders did in coming here and conquering this planet was wrong. But they did a few things right. Making all humans the same no matter what ancestry, gender, skin color or sexual preference was actually a good thing. Kidnapping into prostitution didn't happen! Hate crimes didn't happen. School shootings didn't happen! Theft didn't happen!" Alley fought to pass her rage and managed, kept from hurting the now slack jawed girl by sheer force of will.

"Because no one was free!" Lizbeth managed to croak that out.

"Bingo." Alley looked away from the girl and Lizbeth stared at her. "Freedom is no blessing sometimes. On our last mission for the Elders, the nest found a girl who was not much older than you appear to be. She was suffering from extreme pneumonia. Terminal." Lizbeth opened her mouth, but Alley waved and it shut again, clearly without her consent. "She was dying and there was nothing any of us could do. She was free, yes. She was free to die and take her unborn child with her!" The last had Lizbeth freezing. "We wanted to save her. We tried to save them both. We failed. Life is not fair, Lizbeth! If it was, that girl and her baby would still be alive. The Elders never would have come to this planet. I never would have been made, never..." She choked for a moment and then continued. "...never would have met and loved Mark." Pain sang in Alley's tone and Lizbeth stared at her, wide eyed. "What happened to you was horrible, Lizbeth, I am not discounting that. I am truly sorry and someday, maybe, I will be able to help you. For now? We have to deal with the now." Her tone hardened. "We will deal with the now."

"I won't serve you!" Lizbeth snarled. "I won't!"

"Yes, you will." Alley finished what she was doing and sat back, her rage now spent and only sorrow showing. "You now belong to me."

Reality

Lizbeth woke up with a scream but a look from Alley had her freezing.

"You can't do this to me." Lizbeth said weakly as Alley released her mind, but only partway. Alley did not deign to respond and Lizbeth snarled at her. "You can't do this to me!"

"I think she can." Came a subdued voice from the vat. "She has the power and the moral responsibility to do what is right, not just what is needed."

"I command you to stop her! Kill her!" Lizbeth shouted and then screamed as feedback flared across the link Alley had forged in her mind. A fairly gentle push. Alley didn't have to be gentle. "What?"

"You were never in command here." The voice of the slain X-Com operative was cold now. "He was." Lizbeth looked confused and Alley waved towards the puddle that still graced the floor. The puddle that had been a damaged Avatar. Lizbeth stared at it and then at Alley. Jenni's voice turned snide. "He thought to control her with fear. That was dumb. She knows fear and pain on a level that few do. You might, but few others."

"You… know... nothing!" Lizbeth snarled and tried to sit up, but a glance from Alley and she lay back down. "What? NO!"

"Don't fight it." Alley warned as Lizbeth's face contorted in a rictus of rage. "It will hurt."

"You are just a filthy X-Ray! You don't-" Lizbeth broke off with a scream as she tried to sit up again and then fell over, clutching her head.

"I warned you." Alley said mildly as Lizbeth moaned. "I didn't need to. If I were a human slave-owner, I am sure I would be getting a whip or something out right now. I am not human. I will not be cruel simply for the sake of being cruel, but I will not tolerate disobedience either." She laid a hand on Lizbeth's head and shook her head as Lizbeth tried to twist and bite her hand. "Idiot girl."

A pulse of power shocked Lizbeth and she slammed back to the bunk, her face slack. "I… What?"

"I stimulated the pleasure center of your brain. Same as your master did. You desire the feeling." Alley said quietly. "You are in withdrawal from other things. I have no time and less inclination to coddle you." Steel would have bent under her calm words. "I know people who can help you, but that is for later. Right now, you will stop the pilot."

"I can't." Lizbeth said softly and Alley stared at her. "Once he is launched, he is autonomous. He comes back when his mission is done." Alley growled and Lizbeth shook her head savagely. "That is the truth!"

It was. There was literally no way for Lizbeth to lie to Alley now as tightly as the Viper had the woman bound. What she had said was the truth, but not the whole truth, Alley realized as Lizbeth stared at her.

"You have a means to bring him back." Alley said very softly as Lizbeth's face turned pale. "The Warlock or X-Com, neither of them were so ignorant as to make such a weapon and allow no means of stopping it. That ship's weapons are intended to kill psis, so the Warlock had to have a means of stopping him." Lizbeth's face shut down and Alley shook her head. "How?"

"Wouldn't you love to- Urk!" Lizbeth's snide words cut out as Alley's controls pushed past her resistance with hardly any effort at all and dove deep into her mind. She writhed, tried to fight and Alley took complete control of her, silencing her and stilling her with a thought.

"Huh." Alley mused as she rummaged through Lizbeth's mind. "The Avatar couldn't access the machinery here. He needed you." She glanced at the vat and then back at Lizbeth whose face was strained with fruitless effort. She was no psi. There was no way she was getting loose from Alley. "Jenni? Can you access Hangar Three?"

"There are only two." Jenni said weakly. "The fighter hangar and a shuttle hangar."

"There is a third." Alley corrected her grimly. "But the ship in there is nothing like I have seen before." She tilted her head at Lizbeth. "What is a Veritech?"

"Get out of my head!" Lizbeth tried to scream that but Alley only let her grate the words out.

"My commanders had secrets within secrets." Jenni sounded upset, and who could blame her? "But even if there is another ship, I cannot fly it. Can you?"

"No." Alley replied. "But Lizbeth can. She brought it here."

"I won't!" Lizbeth snarled.

"Yes, you will." Alley replied as Lizbeth's face suddenly went slack again. "We do not have time to argue or for another pilot to train in it. You are going to fly it and you will bring that pilot back."

The sound of gunfire in the hall had Alley recoiling. She spun towards the door as it slammed open and Jane ran in, followed by four forms in blue armor. All four of the other women were huffing and puffing, clearly from trying to keep up with the furious ranger. Jane wore her usual combat load, Warden armor with Storm Gun and fusion blade. From the look of her? She had seen action. Lots of it. She stopped short, staring at Alley.

"Commander! Slow down!" One of them managed as Alley gawked at the quartet. All of them had a red snake emblazoned on the front of their armor. None of them were happy with Jane. "This area is not secure!"

All four of them stopped just as short as Jane had on seeing Alley. Were they about to salute? A pulse to Jenni said warned the ghost woman to remain silent. If Jane heard that voice, all hell would break loose. They did not have time for such now. Later. If there was a later.

"Alley?" Jane took in the scene at a glance and then aimed at Lizbeth. "You!"

"We need her, Jane." Alley said slowly. "She can stop the ship that just launched."

"Damn! Was hoping to catch him on the ground." Jane looked at where the pilot lay beside Maya, his form still encased in energy. "And… huh?" She asked intelligently.

"Maya's body is alive." Alley reassured her partner. "Her mind isn't in it." Jane shook her head. "Long story I bet." At that, Jane nodded, a faint smile creasing her features. "I do not know what Lizbeth and the Avatar did to this guy. He is acting like Maya's brother. He isn't though."

"Too old and Sam's body just died." Jane was angry again. She aimed at Lizbeth. "Let me shoot her!"

"No." Alley replied. "Jane, she wants death. She is insane. I refuse to give her what she wants." Lizbeth opened her mouth and Alley backhanded her without looking. "Be! Silent!"

"Alley?" Jane asked, her tone suddenly worried. "What happened?"

"We need her." Alley said sadly. "I… I took her, Jane. I took control of her." She slumped as Jane gawked at her. "I… I feel so wrong, but it was needed."

"Oh, Alley." Jane sighed deeply and lowered her weapon. She gave herself a shake. "What do you need?" Alley smiled at Jane but when she smiled at Lizbeth, it was savage.

"Me? A big charge of explosives to put under the seat of her Veritech."

Most people probably won't know what a Veritech is- wiki/VF-1_Valkyrie