Disclaimer: I do not own "Lilo & Stitch" or any of the characters therein.

CHAPTER FORTY:
A RAY OF HOPE, HOWEVER FAINT

Trapped and terrified, ZaiLeia watched helplessly as Le'Kruune and his two men approached her. Pinned down by Mackayl's lifeless body, she trembled; one of the very few times in her life she had ever let her fear show. Grinning smugly, Le'Kruune kicked the body aside like a tin can and pointed his weapon in her face.

"I could end you right now, but I won't, and you wanna know why?" he hissed.

When she didn't respond, he continued. "Because I still love you, Zai."

This statement hit her ears like a physical assault. She glared up at him in disbelief.

"Love me?!" she demanded, but her breathing was shallow and labored, and her words came out in a rasp.

"Yes, Zai," Le'Kruune whispered back. "Even though you chose to screw around with this parasitical little bastard, I forgive you."

"What?!!"

"But as long as he was alive, I knew I had no hope of winning you back. That's why I had to do it. You'll soon realize that it was for the best, and that stupid little son of a she-trog is where he belongs." He leaned toward her, lowering his voice. "Rotting. In hell."

Pain and rage darkened her features at these words. She propped herself up on one elbow and spat in his face. Le'Kruune's head flew back as though he had been slapped, and he cursed hideously in his native Kaizaxx as he wiped his face off and then back-handed one of the guards. He then turned and shouted a command to the other guard, and both men hurried down the corridor and out of sight. His attention diverted, ZaiLeia seized the opportunity to place as much distance as possible between herself and Le'Kruune. She rolled over onto her stomach and dragged herself toward Mackayl. Her heart wrenched painfully at the sight of the purplish blood pooling beneath him, even as her own blood made its dark trail across the stainless steel floor. Looking at her slain hero, she had forgotten herself entirely. The physical pain was nothing now compared to the emotional pain of seeing him like that.

"Mackayl…"

When she reached him, she laid her head down on his chest and sobbed. When the guards had gone, Le'Kruune turned back to ZaiLeia, and what he saw made his disfigured face darken with rage and disgust.

"Why, you filthy little khaash'taga!" he hissed, using the foulest word in the Kaizaxx and Turian languages to add insult to her injuries. The grand councilwoman was accustomed to being cursed and degraded - such a thing is inevitable in politics - but what Le'Kruune had just called her was beyond forgiveness. Under the jurisdictions of certain alien governments (most of which residing outside of the Federation) using that particular word to describe someone was punishable by various forms of public torture. Never had she been called such a horrible thing until now, and she was still reeling from that verbal punch in the face when Le'Kruune stormed over to her and kicked her in the flank, further opening her wound. The grand councilwoman cringed in pain and held her arms up to shield herself from further assault, but Le'Kruune did not kick her again. Instead, he glared harshly at her for a moment, then returned her earlier sentiment by spitting on her. A large glob of saliva and phlegm splattered the side of her face. ZaiLeia shuddered, but did not move to wipe it away. She remained perfectly still as Le'Kruune knelt down beside her. She did not even look at him until he hooked a gnarled finger under her chin and forced her head up sharply so that they were eye-to-eye, his face little more than an inch from her own.

"I will leave you here to rot alongside of Mackayl, and only when the stench of your fetid flesh fills my ship will I be truly satisfied."

ZaiLeia said nothing in return. She couldn't. She was weak, afraid and in pain, and it was all she could do just to keep her composure. Tears pushed madly at the back of her eyes, but she would not let them escape. She would not give Le'Kruune the ultimate satisfaction of seeing her cry. For a moment, however, something in her stone-like façade faltered, and her own anguish was reflected back to her from Le'Kruune's ravaged face. For just a brief moment, something had passed between them: all that they had once meant to each other, and all that they had shared, was somehow still there, and they both saw it, and for one split second, Taisiya was looking back at both of them from each other's eyes. Terrified by this, and terrified by himself, Le'Kruune withdrew even further from sanity. He stood up slowly, his one good eye emptying of emotion as he turned and walked, shuffling at first and then faster, until he was sprinting down the corridor toward his suite, bounding away as though he were running for dear life. Just as he reached his suite - just as he entered it - just as the door came down behind him, the curtain of insanity also came down - and he was incarcerated once again as a prisoner in his own mind.

All alone now, the grand councilwoman finally let herself go, sobbing openly over the still-warm body beneath her, her head still resting on Mackayl's chest. A faint sound within caught her attention and she hushed, straining her ears for the impossible thud of a heartbeat. She heard it again and looked up. He was still alive, but barely. She leaned toward his face. He wasn't breathing. Without a moment's delay, she began mouth-to-mouth resuscitation on him. After more than a minute of this, Mackayl began to stir. Suddenly he was conscious and gasping to breathe on his own. ZaiLeia let out a huge sigh of relief as he looked up at her with bleary eyes. The corners of his mouth curled upward into a smile, and ZaiLeia returned it tenfold. He lifted a trembling hand toward her face, and she caught it in her own and held it affectionately against her cheek. Overcome with fatigue, she collapsed on the floor beside him, one arm draped comfortingly around her newfound friend.

Words were not needed at that moment, for that one faint ray of hope had been rekindled, and they eagerly accepted its warmth, and embraced it, and by doing so they were embracing each other. With her last bit of strength, ZaiLeia pulled Mackayl closer. In the frigid atmosphere of the corridor, he melted into her, gratitude overwhelming him. Past, present and future meant nothing to them now, and the ugly reality surrounding them faded away as she continued to hold him. Absorbed in the moment, she leaned into him, and pressed her mouth to his for the second time that night, and for a completely different reason altogether.