"All it takes is one person calling you beautiful to turn you into a complete idiot."

- Miriya Breannados

IT WAS AN ARN LATER when Shiv arrived at the wing fighter. She was still wearing the revealing gear, still spattered with blood and carrying a large bag with Mhal's insignia on it. She halted by the fighter's hatchway. Nexus waited in it, the bruise on her face mottling, her eye slitted open now.

"Crichton?" Shiv asked, her voice flat.

"Inside. I've done the best I could under the circumstances." She glanced into the ship and then back at Shiv. "I'm Nexus. I know who I look like. It's complicated."

Shiv eyed her for a moment.

"Yes."

Of course it was. This one was a mystery for later.

"The so-called Warlord?" Nexus asked.

"Alive is worse," Shiv echoed, as she took two more steps and drew even with the other woman, curious as Nexus touched her lips briefly.

"He kissed me."

Shiv arched a single eyebrow at her. Those piercing raptor eyes had softened.

"You will be all right."

Shiv proceeded in with nothing further, passed her and went aft. Nexus didn't follow. This part was not for her.

Shiv hesitated in the corridor, the smells and air and textures - not the Vengeance, but of it, those things the same or similar and it soothed her. She didn't really understand much of it yet, still many gaps in her memory, too many unanswered questions.

All she knew for certain was that she had been terribly hurt, then spirited away, enslaved and abused and unknowing herself and yet - as if it were a solemn inevitability, Crichton had come for her and risked everything to release her from that bondage.

She halted there in that short corridor.

I am not what I was, Shiv suddenly realized, some faded half-remembered memory leeching into her consciousness.

She would not be spared. Had not been spared.

Nothing was over, she was now certain, as certain as death was inevitable.

It had barely begun.

CRICHTON WAS RECLINING on a crash couch, grunting with every movement, pale and pained, his torso exposed, swathed in a thick sheath that yet seeped blood through, pinkish and darkening. His breathing was laboured.

Shiv stopped in the doorway. She had been silent as was her wont, yet he had heard her. His artificial hand came up and indicated that he had seen her as well.

She came on, dropped the large bag near him.

"Your things," she said, the words tumbling out, "weapons and coat and…"

"Grädian yet." He said harshly.

She nodded.

"No. He is done." Her eyes went to his bandage sheath. "Crichton," she began, unsure of what to say, "I am…"

"Home," he cut her off gently, though his voice was ragged and she blinked at him, "where you belong."

Shiv took a last step, took his hand and gazed over at him. His face was lined with his pain, the concentration of holding it in check. Her eyes roiled with many new emotions. She looked at the bandage sheath around his bare torso and then laid her other hand softly on it.

"Will you for…" she began again but once more he cut her off.

"No." He said firmly with a shake of his head. "No need. Wasn't you."

He felt her fingers grip his hand tighter.

This understanding - that too was inevitable.

"What is next?" Seemed right to ask that, correct to enquire, she was the SIC of the Vengeance. She was home.

The vessel's motto was 'First Things First', after all.

"Make yourself decent," he ordered with a pained grin, "and take us home."

SHIV ALL BUT CARRIED HIM INTO THE VENGEANCE'S MEDBAY.

"Thanks." He nodded in approval at her new outfit, the rusty-coloured leather and longcoat with the Vigilante's insignia on it, clean of blood, of all traces of her subjugation. The Shiv that appeared correct. He knew that her head wasn't; her mind was in turmoil, she a hater of mysteries, most especially when they concerned herself. Caught in the same madness as he was, his own mind still process-reeling down in its depths.

He knew more now, though, and she would know all he did.

"She says she is not Officer Sun," Shiv said shortly as she moved the diagnostic and knitter assembly over him and set it to working.

"So she says. She calls herself Nexus. Long story. I'll explain her as we go."

Shiv nodded, accepting it as he knew she would. She was tapping scanner pads on him - fussing really and it amused him to see. Un-Shiv-like behaviour. Well, he supposed she had cause.

"You …okay?" He asked. "That bastard do anything?"

"No." Shiv searched inside herself. There had been no real physical violation. He had touched her only as a demonstration to others. She had killed any who tried anything further, her instincts yet overriding any coercion. "No."

"Have I…," he hesitated and she studied him as he sought the words, "have I ever used you poorly?"

A twisting of her lips smile, a quizzical spark in her eye at the question, a gentle hand on his arm.

"No." Assuring, confident in it. "You would have been in no doubt."

He nodded and she could see relief in his eyes.

She did not and would not again ever doubt him.

"Your Bladeship's on the Vengeance," he changed tacks, pain relief seeping through him, the wound knitter exploring his wounds in preparation for their repair, "just you onboard, apparently." He explained briefly both what had happened and where he'd found it.

Shiv closed her eyes, tried to remember, could not. The last thing she did remember with any real clarity was Thadon's voice, though she could not remember what he said - then a great and heavy blackness had descended without warning, someone reaching for her, the crushing power of a world falling on her... the 'vacation', yes. She and Thadon had made 'progress' - at least according to him and Shiv had almost felt her guard lowering. They had been on their way from Merirhisteum to… some planet, some planet for 'recreation' - Leridis, she remembered abruptly, a 'planet of sensuality', he'd laughed. 'You could use a lesson or two in it,' he laughed harder at her look of disdain and she'd found herself almost smiling…

…something had slammed into their Bladeships - linked together to share resources for the long trip back - and stopped them dead. A great rolling mass of shadows had fallen and...

She breathed.

I am a weapon that wields weapons. Be and not be. Most look and do not see, most listen and do not hear. There is nothing, there is only myself. I will be the nothing, then be myself in the nothing, then leave the nothing behind. In that nothing, nothing but myself, cleansed.

"As to No'Halladan himself," he continued, "not a scrap. Like his ship."

"I remember…" did she though? - "…fighting. A nothing, yet with weight and an immeasurable strength…"

"…Like a damn god had slammed his thumb down on you, yeah." The assassin looked up sharply. "Same thing hit me." He frowned at her. "Part of that long story… it killed me. Again, Nexus. I was dead then… wasn't."

She stood there and her eyes turned inward with many conflicting emotions swirling chaotically. He wondered at them. His affection for her was great, the surge of love he felt in the arena muted, subsumed properly into his immense respect for her.

"It felt like death itself. The 'Sharp Night' the Fabricators called it." A faint respiration, perhaps a sigh. "I can see it from here," she told him plainly.

"You know we call this sort of thing a 'Tuesday' on this ship."

Shiv returned to her gaze to him, that ghost of a smile on her lips.

"Yes. I suppose we do." She tapped a slender finger to her lips, thinking. "He would not have fled." She was certain of that. "Destroyed…?" She shook her head. "Thadon and I… alone he was not what I expected."

"More gentlemanly, was he?" Crichton asked, curious. "Less aggressive?"

"Yes." She thought about it. "This… is, was… new for us both. We were… I believe I liked it."

She liked it. That explained the new softness in her, a new perspective. Too bad, he thought. He could only hope it didn't ruin that fine edge of hers. Still, he refused to begrudge her some feeling of pleasure, as it were, the invigoration a legit relationship could bring.

He almost envied her.

"I don't think we can write him off just yet," Crichton told her, offering her a slice of hope, because it was her, "again, part of that long story. When you're done here, go ask Nexus about it."

"You kissed her, she said," Shiv cocked her head at him, still mildly amused, "she seemed …concerned."

"I did?" Crichton frowned at that, 'concerned' - great, all he needed. She was difficult enough to work with as it was. "I don't remember doing that." A small smile. "You kissed me," he reminded her, "then you killed thirteen guards."

"I do not remember doing that," she said, eyes amused, then Shiv drew in a breath. "Crichton…" she began, "I am not good at…"

"Shivi'na - you don't owe me anything." He said plainly. "You know that." He waved her away with a mock officiousness. "Go take some time, find your centre again, get drunk or something."

That twisting of her lips, her only genuine smile, came then. She lay a gentle hand on his chest.

"When I am asked why I chose this ship, this captain, this life - I will tell them of this day," she said softly. "I will not forget."

She walked away and as she stepped through the door, stopped, then said with great solemnity,

"I have said it: I am not perfect. Will you accept me anyway?"

"In a heartbeat," he returned with equal gravity with absolutely no hesitation.

She took a step and he stopped her again with:

"Hey," he jibed, "don't get a swelled head. I didn't do it strictly for you. I get jealous."

Shiv sent him an steady look over her shoulder, a curl on her lip, and he was glad to see it.

"Perhaps you would survive the consummation," she said lightly.

"You are a very frightening woman," he said with a smile and a good slice of affection.

Shiv simply nodded and left, her step lighter.

First things first.