Serenity. That was the only word she could use to describe how it felt. In the very back of her mind, she was cognizant of some of the events that had just unfolded. They driftied in and out of her stream and consciousness and did indeed trouble her. Yet if felt like she was wrapped up tightly in a thick cotton blanket. So warm and serene.


Aisha wiggled her fingers and her toes, still unable to discern if this was a dream or reality. Flexing her digits didn't do much to solve that particular enigma, but the energetic Ctarl Ctarl detested inertia. Sitting perfectly still never suited her. Colors and shapes began to better define themselves in her field of vision. She looked around her and took in her surroundings. Clad in her Academy uniform, Aisha realized she was lounging on the sturdy limb of one of the Keeuor trees on her family's estate. As she inhaled, she could smell the sweet blossoms of the tree's fruit in bloom. She was surrounded by thousands of brilliant lime-green petals from the blossoms, although it would be quite awhile before the fruit itself would ripen and be harvested. In her hands was a snapshot of her close friend. He was holding onto a wrench in one hand and his face was streaked with grease and motor oil. It was a good picture of him, but Aisha was filled with a sense of loss upon seeing the image. She didn't remember in any great detail his ill-fated encounter with Xin Chu, just that something terrible had happened to the boy despite her efforts to keep him out of harm's way. Even in this idyllic setting, she feared the worst for him.


"Oh Jimmy...." she said with tears starting to fill her eyes. "I thought that I did all I could to protect you, but it still wasn't good enough....".


Before her eyes, the picture she was holding onto turned into dust and scattered in the wind.


"NO!" she gasped in shock "this can't be happening". Jim was gone and now she was being denied even a small memento of her young friend. It just wasn't fair. The proud, arrogant creature found herself up against powers that she couldn't control.....


"Penny for your thoughts." a familiar voice spoke up from some distance beneath her.


Aisha looked down and saw Jim, clad in his usual ensemble of cargo pants and grey jacket standing at the base of the tree she had made herself comfortable in.


"JIM?!"


The Ctarl Ctarl hastily jumped out of the tree and made a near perfect landing in front of him after falling from a height of about 20 feet.


For a moment, they stood there in an awkward silence. Jim was apparently caught off-guard by the cat-girl's enthusiastic welcome. He nervously began rubbing the back of his neck before he chuckled and spoke up again.


"I'd have to give that landing a perfect 10, but only a 9.2 from the Corbonite judge....." he began saying before the Ctarl Ctarl threw her arms around the boy and began tightly squeezing him.


"It really is you, isn't it?". Her voice was beginning to waver when she asked that.


"I'm......glad....to.....see....you.....too." Jim wheezed breathlessly.


Aisha suddenly realized she was applying way too much pressure and released Jim from her tight embrace.


"You oughta be ashamed of yourself, making me worry like that!" she scolded him as she gently tousled his hair. "I thought I lost you forever". Her generally happy-go-lucky demeanor changed noticeably when she said that.


"What is this place?" he asked her.


"It's a grove on my family's estate." Aisha explained, although she had no idea how either she or Jim had arrived here. "At least I think it's where we are....Do you want me to show you around?" she offered the boy.


"Sure!" he eagerly nodded. With hardly any warning, Aisha grabbed him by the hand and the two of them almost sprinted to the tallest tree in the grove. She effortlessly lifted him up so that his arms were wrapped around her shoulders and he was riding piggyback.


"Hang on tight" she smiled. "I wouldn't want to lose you."


With those words, she began effortlessly scaling the tree. She used her claws for the first few meters before she began climbing from limb to limb. Even with Jim clinging onto her back, Aisha's speed and dexterity was impressive. His presence hardly slowed her down. Curious about their progress, Jim began to look down. Aisha felt him hold onto her even tighter when he realized exactly how high they had climbed and that he was afraid of heights.


"We're almost there." she reassured him as she climbed up two more limbs.


She announced that they had arrived and Jim began to cautiously step off of her back and onto the tree limb. Despite his fear of heights, Jim was glad Aisha took him up here. The two of them took a seat on the thickest part of the limb as they began to take in the panorama. There was enough of a gap between the leaves and blossoms that they both were treated to a spectacular view, and so long as he didn't look straight down, he was fine. Off in the distance to their west was a grand-looking building that appeared to made from some sort of crimson marble. Further off and to the east was a beautiful forested river valley with a shallow blue-green river lazily drifting through the lush trees.


"I used to come up here when I wanted a place to just sit and think. It was my little place in the sun...I remember I'd used to spend hours just swimming around in the river right before the Harvest season..." she said nostalgically as she gazed at river.


Jim was looking at the impressive structure. "Is that your home?" He asked.


Aisha nodded, although much of her enthusiasm was now gone. A few moments of absolute silence passed between them.

"Jim- when you look back on all the things you were able to do, do you have any regrets?" Aisha asked.


"No, not really." he said after only a slight pause. It seemed like an odd question, but he continued. "I mean, I'm just a kid. You said so yourself. But I got to see all kinds of things I never thought I'd see. Aniki took good care of me, and I got to know you and Mel....I don't regret a thing."


"You're no ordinary kid- you can take care of yourself....." Aisha remarked as she absently held his hand.


"I know that....What about you? Do you have any regrets?"


"Sometimes..." she said earnestly as she continued looking at the manor off in the distance. She then turned to face him, the distant and melancholy look in her eyes now gone. "But it's nice to know I'm in good company" Aisha gently squeezed the boy's hand.


"Don't look so sad, Aisha. It isn't over. In fact, it's hardly begun...."

"Wh-what do you mean?"


"You know what I'm talking about. I'm not as fragile as I look!" he said as he pounded his knuckles against this chest with mock bravado. He was aware that he sounded a little too much like Gene just now and chuckled nervously. "But it's kinda nice having someone like you to worry about me, Aisha....."


"Aisha?"


"Aisha?" Jim was gone, and she was no longer in the grove. Everything had dissolved to black and she heard somebody else calling out her name.


"Aisha. Wake up!"


Gene, Mel and Suzuka were in Aisha's quarters, standing over the semiconscious Ctarl Ctarl. For modesty's sake, Suzuka was able to find a grimy and oversized pair of coveralls and had managed to put them on Aisha. However, the cat-girl was tossing and turning while murmuring incoherently. Each of them though she was having a bad dream. Perhaps she was replaying her battle with the pirate or possibly even the moments when Jim was slipping away in her arms. The three of them were quietly beginning to worry, since they didn't know how long it normally took her to regain consciousness after changing back from her beast form. Suzuka was thinking a sedative might be in order, but injecting Aisha could prove problematic. The assassin was the first to see that the Ctarl Ctarl was regaining consciousness.


Her eyes slowly opened. "Where am........?" she began to groggily ask. Now that she was awake and beginning to talk, Suzuka, Gene and Melfina were standing over her. She recognized that the four of them were in her quarters.


"Aisha? How do you feel?" Melfina asked.


"Jim! Where's Jim?" Aisha asked suddenly. "Is he OK?"

"Gillium is in the sick bay doing a diagnostic as we speak- we should know soon." Suzuka explained.


For the cat-girl, that was far from reassuring. Aisha's ears twitched and she clenched her teeth as she gingerly sat up on the cot and started to put two rather wobbly legs on the floor. "I demand to see him!" she seethed.


"Try to remain calm, Aisha. You were in your beast form and should rest." Suzuka said.


"Yeah, you don't need to worry about Jim- he's tougher than he looks....." Gene tried reassuring the cat-girl. However, it turned out to be the wrong thing to say.


"That's easy for you to say!" Aisha snapped.


"Huh? What are you talking about.....?"


"How long have you been exploiting him Gene? It's been going on since before we ever met." Aisha screeched angrily. "He's just a kid, but that doesn't bother you. You won't stop until he's dead, WILL YOU!?"


"It's not like that, Aisha...." Gene said defensively.

"Really? Then how come you didn't take Mel with us tonight!? It was because you didn't want her to get hurt!". She saw the hurt look on Mel's face and was aware that it was too late to take her statement back. Sparing her ship-mates feeling wasn't Aisha's top priority at the moment.


Suzuka quietly spoke up on Gene's behalf. "Aisha- losing your temper with Gene accomplishes nothing. Despite his relatively young age, Jim has been aware of the consequences behind his decisions for quite some time. He knew that there was an inherent risk in this particular pursuit.....just as we all did."


She knew that Suzuka was right, but she didn't want to hear it.


"Please....leave. All of you." the Ctarl Ctarl said abruptly. "I want to be alone right now."

Gene and Suzuka quietly took their leave. Instead of joining them right away, Melfina stood next to Aisha's cot and put a hand on her shoulder. Mel wasn't so sure the C'tarl C'tarl should be left alone in her present state. There was an awkward silence before she spoke up.

"I know that you really care for Jim, Aisha, but he can't be a child only when it's convenient for you." Melfina said.

She was a mess but Aisha knew she had to compose herself. "I don't know what Terrans Jim's age normally do, but I'm sure it doesn't involve getting their skulls split open night after night. How can Gene look at himself in the mirror, using Jimmy like that?" she seethed. The memory of Jim holding his hand to her face and telling her everything was had gone dark was still vivid in Aisha's mind- it was one of her last before waking up. She was on the brink of tears again, and didn't want anyone to see her like this. Yet Melfina wouldn't leave.

"Aisha- I never asked for any special treatment." Mel said. Part of her was steeling herself for the cat-girl's wrath for what she was about to say. "Gene would never admit it, but he thinks I'd only get in the way. That's why he didn't want me to come.....But Jim and Gene have been partners since before I met them. The last thing he'd want was for anything to happen to Jim."

Aisha only looked down quietly at the floor. It was irrational, but she felt she still needed to be angry at someone. Since the pirate who attacked Jim could now only be removed from the junkyard in several plastic bags, Gene seemed like the next logical choice. But she was mad at herself, too. She should've done something to protect Jim.

"The important thing is that Jim's still with us." Melfina reassured her.

"But I let him down."

"I don't think he'll see it that way. And please stop referring to him in the past tense."

Mel's last statement didn't quite sink in yet. Already, she missed the kid. Aisha wasn't sure why Jim's opinion meant that much to her. It just did. He was a smart kid and she trusted his judgement. Although it sounded vain, she also liked it when he paid attention to her. It made the cat-girl feel appreciated, which had been something of a rarity since her expulsion.

"Forgive the interruption, ladies." Gillium said. "I thought you might be interested in knowing that Jim has...."

Aisha's ears twitched. "Yes?" she asked expectantly. Melfina also seemed very interested in what Gillium had to say.

"......Jim has just regained consciousness."



A.N. Uh....*nervous chuckle* hope the first part of the chapter wasn't too maudlin or sappy. For those of you who are wondering about my use of the word "immortal" in the summary, that wasn't meant to imply that Aisha and her kind never age or die. That was just a moniker given to the C'tarl C'tarl in the show itself. However, I think that they'd be much harder to kill and age slower than humans or other species- which could make them "immortal" by comparison.