Selim sat in the pilot's chair, dwarfed by its huge size. His arms could barely reached up to the armrests. They were going somewhere else on his mother's planet now, some kind of big place full of humans. He was very excited, he'd never seen a…a city. His mother and his father had both told him about them, though both of their accounts had sounded very different and very strange. In his head he saw a big jungle made out of stone, with humans peering round every corner and out of dark caves. There were hundreds of humans there his mother had said. He tried to imagine being around that many people, the thought made him feel a bit weird. He'd never even met anyone apart from his parents.

Now they were disagreeing about something again. Not fighting though, not yet anyway.

"You really trust this … 'friend' not to give you away?" Mei'Savir said, in disbelieving tones "Even after what you have told me about the reward on your head? Do you think he does not know?"

Selim looked at his mother, puzzled. He couldn't see anything on her head.

"He is not exactly the biggest ally of the… the 'Federal Government'." She said.

"Yes, you mentioned this." He could tell his father was still not convinced "You think being a criminal who does not follow societal norms makes him more trustworthy?"

"Look at who is speaking!"

"Yes. So I have intimate knowledge of such matters. I would not trust me either!"

Selim didn't really understand that either, his father did not even trust his own self? It did not make any sense.

"Not only that!" His mother countered "I saved his life, he is indebted to me."

That shut his father up for a moment "So… it is a compulsion of yours; to save the lives of doomed males?" He made an odd face.

"Only the most pathetic specimens." She replied and he laughed "Anyway, I will be careful." She continued "I have not even told him where I shall meet him yet."

Selim spoke up finally "What is it you've got on your head Mei'Varsi?"

"It's just a figure of speech sweetheart," She said softly, stroking his forehead "I don't have anything on my head; it's just something people say."

"But what does it mean?" He persisted.

She patted his shoulder "Nothing you need to worry about."

He was just going to ask her about this other human when his father spoke again "I am going to follow you this time," He glanced over at Selim "In case you meet with… unexpected problems."

"No. You have to stay with Selim."

"But Mother, I want to come," Selim said. This was too good an opportunity to miss as far as he was concerned "I always wanted to see other humans like you told me about and see a big sit-tee. You said one day I could. I promise I will not get in the way!"

"Honey I would love to take you," She looked sad, "But not this time, it's too… I mean, I'll be too busy to look after you."

"But Mei'Savir can look after me because he is coming as well."

"He can't come either."

"Why not?"

"Because the other humans would be scared if they saw him," She was giving him the look she usually used when she was talking about eating plants "And if they got frightened they might try and hurt you both."

"But why would they do that if they were scared of him?" Selim laughed "And even if they tried, they could not hurt him! He could fight them off easily," He said "Is that not right, Mei'Savir?" He looked over at his father, who was grinning broadly, looking pleased with him now "So there is no reason we cannot all go!" Selim concluded happily.

"I said no!" She snapped. She looked really angry too, not just play angry. Selim was taken aback, he had often heard her get angry with his father but she hardly ever was with him.

"It is not fair," He said in a small, sulky voice "You never let me see anyone or go anywhere. I will have to spend my whole life on this spaceship."

His parents looked at each other; the look that he knew meant they weren't telling him things "Because they still think I am an infant and a coward." He thought miserably. His head was throbbing faintly, making him feel crabbier than usual. It was his mother's fault, because she wouldn't let him go to see the big, stone jungle.

"I'm sorry sweetheart," She held out her arms to him, looking sad now "I promise we will take you sometime soon, you just have to please trust me until then."

He didn't answer. Instead he turned away from her and hid his face against his father's side like the little child they thought he was "Mei'Savir, my head really hurts!"

"Hrmmmm…" For once, his father didn't tell him to stop snivelling. Instead he lifted Selim's chin up and studied his face intently, making a clicking noise in the back of his throat "Do you feel nauseated?"

"Maybe." He said in a small voice, wanting to milk this unexpected burst of paternal concern for all it was worth. His father lifted him up so that Selim could rest his head on one huge shoulder.

"Selim – " His mother started to say something to him.

"Lexssss," Selim could feel the vibration of his voice through the side of his face that was pressed against his father's chest "If you are not going to listen to me just go! He will be safe."

He didn't see his mother leave but he heard the door hiss shut behind her.


In her brief phone conversation with Fil, Lex had established that he now lived in San Francisco, that he was willing to meet her and to help her, if he could. He didn't betray any hint that he knew she was a fugitive from justice. She told him the stuff she hadn't wanted to write in the message. She told him she needed to find someone, gave him Iversson's name and what little she knew about her.

"I'll do my best Angel," He said dubiously "I'll start looking. Are you going to come here to meet me?"

"Yes I'll call you half an hour before and tell you where." She told him

They had landed the Chameleon in the relatively deserted San Bruno Mountain State Park just outside the city limits. It was a long way into town but it would've been too risky to land the shuttle anywhere nearer, even with the cloaking technology someone would probably notice a little thing like a spaceship landing on their building.

She felt miserable and angry on the hike down to the city. "God knows I don't want to take risks," She told herself "But we need to find Iversson. Selim's only going to get worse the longer this goes on. We need to find her soon!"

What haunted her most was Selim's parting shot "You never let me see anyone or go anywhere …I will have to spend my whole life on this spaceship." His words sent a shock of scalding guilt all through her. What he said was true; he never saw anyone new. He had no friends. He'd never met any other children. He had only the two of them.

Suddenly she wondered if Scar had been right, right for the wrong reasons. She hadn't done anything physically to stop herself getting pregnant (whatever he might think she had no methods available apart from saying "no" and she rarely did that, for all sorts of reasons) but in her heart of hearts she was afraid. Iversson's words had echoed in her brain throughout pregnancy and her son's babyhood. They'd made her feel she had gambled against ridiculous odds and won. Now, she couldn't help wondering (no doubt Scar must be wondering too) if this thing Selim had in his brain was a result of his hybrid nature. It was like all the terrible curses thrown at them had finally come home to roost.

"No sense thinking like that!" She told herself "I have to keep it together, for Selim's sake. He needs me. He needs both of us to be sane right now. I have to keep things low key which means keeping Scar away from Fil. I know him; he thinks he can just carve pieces off people until they give us the information we need and he's got a jealous streak a mile wide. He makes the green eyed monster look like a goddamn amateur!"

It had been early evening already when they left Reno and now it was dark. She hadn't wanted to prearrange a time and place to meet him, partly because she hadn't known what time she'd be able to get there. She hated to admit it, but there was also a part of her that didn't want Fil or anyone else to know where she was going to be and when, because then it would be much easier to spring an ambush. "I can't decide if I'm being really smart or really fucking paranoid." She thought.

She was in the city now, tarmac under her feet and streetlights overhead. It was a fine evening, dry and clear. A digital clock in the window of a nearby pharmacy read 23.25. If she wanted to see Fil tonight she would have to get moving. For all she knew he might be asleep by now or have turned his phone off – although she hoped that he'd be waiting for her to call. She realised she didn't even know if he had a partner or any children to disturb if she called him very late. Somehow she didn't think there would be.

He had told her he lived in the SoMa District, South of Market Avenue. It was filled with nightclubs, bars, museums, trendy loft living apartments, and techie and internet companies. She had visited the city before many times so she knew where that was. It was going to take her a couple of hours to walk all the way there. She started to look around for a cab.


Scar waited until Selim started to get drowsy before he put him into the medipod.

"Why do I have to sleep in here Mei'Savir?" He asked, half dozing already.

"To make your… head less painful."He said, keeping his voice low. He could see that the child would be unconscious at any moment.

"Don' care 'bout th' pain," His son mumbled indistinctly "…M'no go…be …"

His voice tailed off. Scar watched him until his breathing became deep and regular. Then he started attaching the sensors to his body, carefully so as not to wake him. Selim didn't even stir. As the lid of the medipod slid closed he strapped his dah'kte onto his wrists and put on his mask.

Of course he wasn't actually going to obey Lex's instructions not to go after her. "She might believe that this human male can be trusted," He thought "But I know better. She wants to hang onto connexions from her old life here but I do not have the same sentiments clouding my judgement."

Scar had learned a lot about humans in the past six years. He'd actually listened to what she told him and something that came through in much of her talk about their society was the overriding importance of 'money'.

It was an odd concept to him. Yautja society was not founded on the principles of commerce. When he'd lived on board the Shadow of Death, as he had done for most of his existence, the clan had provided everything; clothes, armour, weapons, water, food, heat, light. In return he owed them his life – so the theory went – although of course he'd turned his back on all of that.

Human society, from what he could tell, did not work this way. Instead all was mediated through the worship of this 'money'. They would do anything for it, according to Lex; kill for it, die for it (stupidly, what use was it to the dead?), waste their lives pursuing it by various futile means; betray their allies and their blood for it.

"I saw the look on her face when she told me the amount they are offering as a reward for her capture; it must be a large sum. Very large." He thought "And that means, whatever allegiance this human male has to her will weigh very little in comparison. He has not even seen her for almost six human years, how much loyalty can he retain? She may not be able to see it, but I can. He will betray her, unless his attachment to her is very strong in which case…" He flexed his arms and cracked his knuckle joints "In which case I may have other matters to discuss with him."


Lex sat in the taxi and watched the cityscape roll past, velvety and dark, studded with twinkling lights. She didn't like to waste the money – Selim's gold money – but she'd figured that it was wiser to risk being recognised by one person in the darkened interior of a cab than by large numbers of people on a brightly lit train or a bus.

As they slid through the city, she suddenly realised that this was the one night of the year when Scar and Selim probably could have accompanied her in public and nobody would have batted an eye. She'd been too distracted with worry to notice before but tonight must be Halloween. Groups of people in fancy dress walked the streets. Some of them had clearly spent a lot of time and trouble on their outfits.

As they passed a late-night convenience store a thought struck her. They were near enough now to Jonas's apartment. She got the cab driver to let her out and ducked inside, pulling the baseball cap low over her eyes and arranging the fringe of the wig to avoid being caught on the store's CCTV cameras. A few minutes later she came out clutching a cheap Halloween mask, one of the last ones left on the shelves. The rest had obviously been snapped up by clubbers wanting to give a last minute nod to the holiday.

Dodging around a corner into the shadows she pulled off the baseball cap and stowed it in the rucksack and pulled on the leering plastic skull that covered the top half of her face. She felt much more confident now her most distinguishing mark was no longer visible and luckily this was the one time of year when wearing a mask would not make her stand out.

She pulled the mobile out of her pocket and dialled Fil's number. She'd been expecting him not to pick up as it was nearly midnight now, but he answered on the third ring.

"Angel?" His voice sounded a little bit croaky, she wondered if she'd woken him.

"Fil." She smiled a little to hear a familiar human voice "Did I wake you?"

"Nah, party never stops at my place!" He said, sounding like he was stifling a yawn "You gonna come over?"

"I can't do that right now." She didn't want to go to Fil's apartment, even though she told herself it was probably just being nuts and overly suspicious, the stakes were too high for her to completely trust him "How about you come and meet me for a drink?" She said.

"As always Angel, you know the way to my heart."


Scar stepped off the gangway and breathed in deeply, relieved to escape the cramped confines of the shuttle at last. He'd briefly considered taking Selim with him to see the city "He is right, it is not fair that he is kept so isolated." He thought "He needs to go out and see some of real life. I should just take him, as he wants to go so much!"

In the end, he'd had to concede that on this occasion, Lex was right. He was going to need to be able to track and run and fight if the need arose, so it wasn't a good idea for him to be looking out for Selim as well. He could probably do both but he wouldn't be able to do it as fast or as well as he could on his own. Also the boy had seemed exhausted, probably this thing inside his skull was making its presence felt.

"He is better off where he is." He thought "He is hidden, the shuttle's camouflage will protect him and the pod will alert me if there is any change in his condition or if he wakes up."

He didn't feel happy about leaving Selim on his own, but it was either that or let his mother go off to face dangers that she didn't even see. As he moved silently through silent woodlands, he reflected again on what his son had said.

"He needs to have other juveniles around him." He thought "How else is he to learn to fight and to assert himself?"

His brow drew down, no matter how much he turned the problem over in his head, as always there was only one answer to this problem that he could see "I must impregnate her again." He told himself "I do not care what any human scientist says; it is what I want so I will make it happen. I just have to be … persistent." His mood lightened considerably at this prospect.

As he entered the city, armed and invisible to its inhabitants, he couldn't help but feel a rush of excitement. This was what he craved, what he'd missed. This was not piracy against sitting targets or tracking dumb beasts. This the Hunt. A real contest against enemies who might present a real challenge… and he had no doubt of there being enemies here somewhere.

He crouched on the corner of a rooftop and deactivated the cloak so he could look at the wristcom. At least Lex was wearing hers. She was travelling away from their current location quite rapidly now, moving away up towards the coast. Even using the rooftops to move around, even if he ran, it'd take him several units to catch her. He grimaced to himself "Much too long!"

He looked down at the busy main road below him, human vehicles flowed along it – small ones rather like the one Lex had stolen in the desert but also much larger ones. As he watched a huge transport thundered by, he could even feel the vibrations of its passing faintly through the rooftop – judging by its size it must be some sort of cargo vessel. Not far away from his position, he could also see a bridge stretching over the freeway. The glittering lights of the road curved away into the half-dark ahead. From what he could tell it seemed to be heading in the direction he wanted to go. He nodded to himself and reactivated his cloaking device.

In minutes he'd climbed down and was balanced effortlessly on the rail of the bridge, staring down at the traffic flashing past underneath him. "It needs to be a vehicle big enough that it will not be noticeable when I hit it..."

It wasn't very long before he saw the lights of another giant getting nearer. He tensed, waiting for just the right moment; then he dropped, landing on the back of the lorry trailer with a scarcely perceptible thud. He stayed low, talons splayed to keep his balance on the shuddering, metal surface.