Stanley followed Vlad out of the cryochamber, and into another passageway. He didn't trust her enough to walk in front of her, and would much rather be surprised by a nightmare instead of her homemade dagger. Even without her original brace weapon, this woman loved to hunt and kill. She made that obvious, as she checked every side of her, and led him effortlessly into an empty room full of butchered people.

Stan grimaced in repulsion, as he tried to avoid stepping in pools of blood, or on dismembered bodies. "What now?" Stan asked.

"Quite impressive," said Vlad, a smile spreading across her face.

It was amazing to Stan, that even when she smiled, she looked like a cat who had been sprayed with large amounts of water. Usually when most people smiled, it was because either something wonderful happened or if something hysterical happened. Seeing Vlad smile about genocide made Stan want to turn and run, feeling that taking his chances with the nightmares was a smarter thing to do. Of course, he wasn't about to try and attack one full-on. He felt leaving that to her was better, since it didn't matter if she died. In fact, Time Prophet or not, Vlad dying would be one less thing for Prince to follow them for. "This is most definitely the work of a Divine Assassin," said Vlad, stepping carefully around the bodies, admiring how they looked in their final moments of agony. "A tragedy that Kai is troubled by this. I am finding myself envious. However, a Divine Executioner's envy of a Divine Assassin can only last so long,"

"Okay, you're really starting to creep me out," said Stan. "I mean the dead guy...well, used-to-be dead guy creeps me out, but you really creep me out, so come, let's go,"

"You do not want to aid Xev and Kai?" Vlad asked, looking at him with those eerie emotionless eyes.

"We gotta scare them outta this, right?" said Stan, crossing his arms in perturbance. "Well I don't see anything here that'll make Kai wig out, do you? This normal for him, but this just plain gives me the sudden need to throw up, so come on!"

He began gesturing to her for her to leave with him, but his gesture turned into a shriek when the body of a cleric nearest him grabbed him by the ankle, and spoke. "You didn't seem to mind so much as you tore out my throat and eyes," it said.

"What are you talking about, I never-" Stan said.

"Or mind it when you forced me to watch you kill my family...and then let me bleed to death,"

Stan whirled around and saw a girl with part of her bottom lip torn off, and arm missing. As the bodies began to stir and walk about, Stan suddenly snapped back to reality as Vlad grabbed him and yanked him toward her, apparantly using his body as a shield. "They are speaking to you as if you are Kai, fool!" she whispered sharply. "This is his nightmare we are now facing, so do what should be done!"

"Me?!" Stan whined, as Vlad backed him toward an open passageway as the murdered people began closing in on them. "Why me?!"

"You are the most useless mortal I have come to know!" Vlad spat as she took a firm hold on his arms.

She shoved him hard, and sent him slamming into the wall of the empty passageway blocked by Kai's victims, and fled through the cleared path. As Stan rubbed his head and regained his balance, the manifestations were gone. He wasn't sure what Kai was thinking, but of course Vlad was still dangerous! She had shoved him like he was a doll, and just because Kai was still strong enough to handle her, Stan didn't want to be around if Xev and Vlad's PMS days happened to fall on the same day. "What did you do that for?! We could have been killed!" he whined.

"Only mortals fear what their eyes put into their minds," said Vlad. "Dreams cannot end our existence, yet they can end those of your crew. You do not waive opportunities such as the one we have experienced, because it exposes your inability to think logically,"

"That's verbal abuse!" said Stan.

"You refuse to listen to me, and in turn, I refuse to hear your cries of abuse. That is what is," said Vlad. "Had you the ablity to shut your mouth, you would have heard that each manifestation we encounter has an after-effect on the whore or Kai,"

"You mean they are going to die?!" said Stan. "Why didn't you tell me that before, why couldn't you just-"

"As I do not care for either Kai or his ever-loving whore, I did not see the reason to until now," said Vlad. "Seeing you squirm in fear was invigorating for a while, but now I grow jaded of your trepidation and find it infuriating,"

"What reason?!" said Stan.

"I have told you before. It intrigues me, as I have never sought to help anyone in this life. My life as the Time Prophet was erased when I became a Divine Executioner, so I am helping you now. I would not be helping you if I kept that piece of information, and it is obvious that you are incapable of thinking without someone to aid you,"

She turned away from him, and headed in the direction of the crew's sleeping chambers. "Hey, where do you think you're going?!" said Stan.

"To Kai," said Vlad. "In order to effectively exercise this issue, it is best we gather them on the bridge. Collect the whore, and I will meet you,"

Stan jogged to Xev's room, keeping eyes out for any kind of manifestations. In his favor, he found none, and found Xev as she had been before. He sighed, and tried to pick her up and keep her flimsy sheets wrapped around her, finally just tying them about her in order to keep her covered. He knew that if she woke up on the bridge naked, she'd probably kill Vlad first for being there, and eat his brains afterward; Kai always got a get-out-of-jail-free card for some reason. "Ugh, Xev, you need to stop eating," he grunted. "It wouldn't kill you to wear clothing to bed either,"

"Stanley,"

Stan nearly dropped his load as he spun around, to be face to face with Prince. Not taking his eyes off the manifestation, he slowly lowered Xev back to her bed. "I'm not scared of a dream, so you can just drop and dissapear right now, Prince," said Stan, backing away slowly. "Not interested in any deals,"

"I haven't offered you a deal, Stanley," Prince said shortly, stepping around Xev's bed. "And you will find, that even though I am indeed a deity, I am very real, and not one of their petty nightmares,"

"Then what do you want?" said Stan. "We don't have anything that you'd want, and we're kinda busy right now, so just-"

"Holiday," Prince said quickly. " Thought I would check upon Stanley, and Xev, and Kai, and Vlad. How are Xev and Kai by the way? So rude of me not to ask, but I am Prince, and I am a bit rude. Sleeping a lot lately, aren't they?"

"Well...yeah," said Stan. "But they don't need your help, me and Vlad have this, thanks!"

"Poor Xev, and poor Kai," said Prince. "They poked their noses where they didn't belong, and this is what they got. Shame, really is. Perhaps they'll learn that opening others' mail is very inconsiderate,"

"What are you talking about?!" said Stan, picking up Xev again. "You know, you're really starting to annoy me, and Xev is really heavy, so if you excuse me, I have a cluster lizard and an assassin to scare awake,"

"They opened the box, Stanley," said Prince. "They didn't heed the warning, and now they are stuck in this coma, until someone can get them out...I can do that for you,"

"Sorry Prince," said Stan. "After the last time you offered something to one of us, he got blown up, so hope ya have a nice day, so sorry I can't help you, goodbye!"

Vlad stood at the edge of Kai's bed. She frowned, and almost recoiled at the sight of him, as he lay there, trying to do nothing about his humanity. "I don't understand why I am trying to spare you, Brunnen-G," she said coldly. "But I made a promise, and I shall keep it, only because the dead do not break promises,"

She roughly yanked up his arm, and pulled it over her shoulder, but a sudden prescence stopped her actions. She let go of him and looked around the room. "Reveal yourself," she called out. "Or be slaughtered at the hands of the hunter,"

"Such harsh words,"

Vlad turned around to face her sudden companion. "You are the one they call Prince," she said, the time cycle pointing out to her that this was someone to never trust. "You are an enemy to this band of fools,"

Prince touched the side of her face, rubbing it gently. " But not yours. You hate this, don't you Vlad?" he asked. "Having to breathe, and eat, and sleep? And what about your new ability to see into the cycles of time? Surely that puts a cramp in your lifestyle,"

She grabbed his hand and bit it quicky. "Ouch!" said Prince, recoiling. "That really hurt,"

"And so it should have," said Vlad.

"What do you say, Vlad?" Prince asked. "You kill Xev and Stanley right now, we take the box and fly away from here. We'll wake Kai, and you can kill him, just like you want to. In turn, I will give you what you want,"

"The dead do not have wants," Vlad said coldly.

Prince grinned. "That may be so, but the living do. You want to be a Divine Executioner again, don't you?" he said.

"Yes," said Vlad, burying her knife deep in his abdomen without warning

The action even surprised Prince, and being killed was like brushing his teeth; just part of the routine. He looked down in pain, to see that the knife was in fact, sticking out of him, and blood was gushing. "Why? " he asked hoarsely

"I am a destroyer. I destroy," she said, twisting the knife in his chest. "Cheerie bye,"

"Cheerie bye," Prince repeated, as she ripped the blade out of him.

He stumbled backward and landed across Kai, who didn't so much as move. "What did you do that for?!"

Vlad turned to see Stan holding a very limp Xev in the doorway. She looked back to where her latest victim had fallen, and saw that he had vanished "That is Prince?" she asked sardonicly. "That is the one who managed to destroy the Last of the Brunnen-G? He is annoying,"

"You killed him!" said Stan. "And now we don't know where he's gonna pop up, or when, or who's he's gonna pop up as!"

Vlad simply tucked her bloodied dagger into her skirt and dragged Kai off his bed, pulling his arm over her shoulder. "And when he does," said Vlad. "I will kill him again. He is a deity not bound to this existance, yet he insists on acting as if he is. It confounds me,"

As they came to the middle of the bridge, Vlad dumped Kai's limp form onto the floor as if he were a sack of stones. Xev stretched in her sleep, and her hand went flying up, punching Stan hard, while Kai's head made a nasty clunk against the floor "Hey, be careful! He's still alive, you know!" said Stan.

"I brought him here," said Vlad. "What more do you want? The heads of Divine Assassins are meant to be hard. He'll live,"

Stan gently placed Xev next to the assassin, and stood up, slitting his eyes at her as thin as he figured they could go, rubbing his sore nose. The action elicited an arrogant smirk out of Vlad. "Just stick to your part of the bargain, huh?" he said, putting his hands on his hips. "You look out for dream things, I'll try to wake them,"

"Agreed," said Vlad. "But only for now. As I have told you, I would sooner disembowel myself rather than become part of your crew,"

Stan sighed, and rubbed his hands together, looking at the unconcious members of his madhouse of a crew. The impatient look on Vlad's face made him even more uncomfortable, as he walked cautiously around Xev and Kai. "Well?" Stan asked.

"Well what?" Vlad asked shrilly.

"Nothing's happening!" said Stan. "Where are all the creepy dream people?!"

Her nose crinkled again, and Stan was wondering whether or not to head for a moth before she lost interest in this little mission, and decided to amuse herself by mutilating him. "Patience is something mortals seem to lack as well," she said. "Now that they are both in one place, it will be easier to draw them to us. We wait until the opportune time, and then you will wake them,"

"You know something, Vlad," Stan griped. "You're just like Kai, you don't give people enough information, and then you get angry when they don't understand what you're telling them! Okay, so you want me to wake them by scaring them, but you don't tell me how! You-"

Stan found himself diving to the side as Vlad wordlessly tossed her knife in his direction without even turning her body. It landed in the command pedestal, and the Lexx responded as expected with a loud "OWW!"

"Comparing me to him shows your ignorance," she spat. "I could have killed you long ago had I wanted to. You expect instant gratification, and in that-"

"Vlad, move!' said Stan.

One of Xev's would-be rapists grabbed her from behind around the neck. However, she didn't panic; instead she slammed the dream man in the face with her elbow, and the minute she was free, she jumped down to the lower part of the bridge, and yanked her knife free. As the rapist edged closer, both the dead Zev and Xev crept through the opposite passageway. "You awaken the reptile," said Vlad. "I will deal with Kai,"

"Sure, she gives me the hard one," Stan mumbled.

Scrunching up his face in fear, he allowed the group of assailants shove him up against the command pedestal, as he kept repeating in his mind that none of this was real. "Um...let go of me!" he screamed.

"Shut up!" said one of the men, smashing him across the face with his fist. "We don't wanna hear you talk,"

That was it, if he had to wake Xev, he wasn't going to do it this way. Quickly thinking, he slammed the nearest guy in the groin, and pointed to Xev. "Wouldn't you rather have her?!" he pleaded.

The attackers looked at her, and the leader apparantly nodded, and walked over to Xev. Climbing over her, he began kissing her neck, but found himself being kicked off, as Xev's eyes popped open, and she screamed in the cluster lizard language. The rapists were gone, and she was looking around wildly. "Hey, I did it!" he said.

Xev whipped her head around at him, and Stan took this as his cue to recoil slightly. "Hey!" he said. "Just me, it's okay, I promise,"

"Stan?" she asked. "What's happening? I wasn't out-"

"Hold that thought!" said Stan, seeing that Vlad was taking her time with the Zev/Xevs.

Leaving the real Xev to contemplate her odd situation, Stan ran around to the other side of the bridge, nearly tripping over Kai, and watched as Vlad buried her knife in the dream Xev's neck and dropped the ersatz figure to the ground. Stan looked back to Kai to see him twitch slightly. "Vlad, hurry up!" he complained.

Vlad looked at him somewhat dissapointedly. "Oh," she said, as Zev was ready to knock her block off. "If you insist,"

Without even turning around, she reached back and Zev looked down to see the over-used dagger sticking out of her chest. "You did it again," she said, tears pouring from her eyes.

Vlad looked at Stan in disgust as he let guilt wash over him in the fact that he'd let Vlad kill her, and pulled the knife sideways to finish the job. As the body thumped on the ground and dissipated, Vlad's nose crinkled. "Guilt for a spector," she said. "How shallow of you,"

"Stan!" Xev said impatiently. "What's wrong with Kai?! What are we doing out here?! What's Vlad doing here?!"

Stan came around to other side of the bridge again and knelt next to Kai. Xev was sitting with her legs tucked under her, and had one hand pressed to her forehead. "You mean he didn't wake up?" he asked.

"Wake up?" said Xev. "Stan, what are you talking about?"

"Well that's gratitude!" Stan said angrily, standing up. "Because some people have to go opening boxes that spell out danger, this is what you get! I'm sorry, Xev...it's his fault,"

"You mean...Kai's..." Xev started.

They were proven wrong, when cold steel claws took hold on Stan's neck, and started to choke him. "Kai!" he said, trying to pull the brace away. "Kai, you're chokin' me!"

Kai realized what he was doing, retracted the weapon, and flinched from the lights, covering his eyes with one hand, as he slowly sat up. "How did I get on the bridge?" he asked.

"Well, Vlad carried you, and I brought-"

"Shh!" Xev said sharply, clutching her forehead. "Don't yell so much, Stan,"

Kai and Xev slowly both stumbled to their feet and Stan took the hint. "Lexx," he said. "Could you dim the lights please?"

"YES, STAN," the Lexx replied. "I TRY MY BEST TO PLEASE YOU. YOU ARE MY CAPTAIN,"

Both of the newly awakened crewmembers cringed at the sound, as they directed each other toward the passageway. "What's happened to us?" Xev asked. "Light hurts, sound hurts, and my head's gonna explode. I wasn't like this when I went to bed,"

Stan and Vlad followed them down the passageway, making sure that they weren't in worse trouble. "I believe we are suffering from a common human infliction," said Kai. "It is commonly known as a migraine,"

"Well, can you do anything about it?" said Stan. "Having you guys walking around like this isn't any better than your nightmares!"

"Stan!" Xev persisted. "Please,"

"Oh, sorry," he said quietly.

"I'm not!" said Vlad. "Seeing the both of you in agony pleases me greatly. I wish to cause more of it,"

Xev gritted her teeth, and growled deeply in the cluster lizard tongue. She slipped easily out of Kai's grip, and turned toward Vlad. "I might be in pain," Xev hissed. "But I can still take you!"

Vlad smiled smugly as Xev lunged for her throat, and Kai and Stan immediately reacted by grabbed both of Xev's arms. As the cluster lizard in Xev tried to wrench free, Vlad turned away. "If you mustconfront me," said Vlad. "Fight me when you are well. I would barely scratch a fingernail,"

With Vlad back to her normal skulking in the bowels of the Lexx, the rest of the crew found it hard to do anything except sit in the galley, and slump against the lump of a table. Xev and Stan slumped; Kai stood ramrod straight as ever, and even though it was clear he looked as bad as Xev felt, he wasn't going to show any symptoms of it if it killed him. Stan for once didn't think anything of it; after seeing what was in Kai's head, he wasn't sure he ever wanted to question the assassin's habits again. If he did, it would probably give him nightmares "As an answer to your question earlier, Stanley," said Kai. "No, there is nothing I can do. As the protein regenerator only repairs damaged flesh, and a migraine is simply a common human infliction that will pass on its own, we must wait,"

"Great," Xev moaned. "Nightmares and side-effects. Stan, we really are sorry about that,"

"Eh, don't worry about it So," Stan replied sluggishly."Do you guys...remember anything?"

"Remember what?" said Xev.

"You know...the dreams," said Stan.

"No," said Kai. "I believe that as we slept, our dreams were taken from our minds, and they manifested in real time and space,"

"So you mean you don't remember Prince, either?" said Stan, forcing himself to keep his eyes open.

"Prince was here?" Kai asked. "What did he say?"

"Aww, just stuff about how you guys were gonna die, and that he wanted his box back, and that you opened it, so it's useless; you know, regular Prince talk," said Stan. "Vlad killed him,"

Xev picked her head up from the table. "She did?!" she asked, raising her voice a little too much, so both she and Kai winced a little.

"Yeah," said Stan. "Look out,"

Kai turned toward the doorway. "I will...leave you to rest," he said.

"Where are you going?" Xev asked. "You can stay here, it's okay. Prince won't-"

"I will return to the cryochamber, and resume what I was doing before we opened the box," said Kai.

Stan rolled his eyes. More innocent machinery parts were about to be slaughtered. Xev on the other hand looked dissapointed. "Kai," she said. "Do you ever think about other things besides fighting?"

Kai stopped, and Stan marveled at how Xev had the ability to not only control a one-time vicious killer, but could stop someone with a sentence and pour on the guilt. Though Kai probably didn't recognize it, Stan could see the guilt method worked just as well on former corpses as it did on security guards, robot heads, and any one else who crossed the cluster lizard. "As I was dead for thousands of years," said Kai. 'Thinking of other things is...difficult,"

As Kai's footsteps faded, Xev moved to follow him, but Stan caught her. "Let 'im go," he said. "Something's obviously bothering him, so just let 'im work it out on some debris...preferably 790 remains,"

Though slightly lightheaded, feeling that hearing the slightest sound would make his head explode, and swearing solemnly to sleep only at night like everyone else, Kai carefully chose a piece of debris out of the small collection, and took a deep breath. He threw it up in the air, and fired the brace the minute the artificial gravity took hold of the object. It fell back to the floor neatly cut in two. Unaware that he was smiling slightly, he re-holstered his weapon, and went to choose another target. However, he ended up reaching behind him, and turning his attacker in front of him, bending the arm of his enemy behind them. "You will not have me, Vlad," said Kai, mirroring his words to her when she had tried to drain him of his protoblood.

Even though her arm was bent in a painful position, she didn't so much as grimace. "Surprising," she said. "Your humanity is evident, yet your assassin's programming is intact. You were not lying when you said your atypical physical strength, although decreased, is still present,"

He released her, seeing that she hadn't intended in the first place to harm him with her homespun weapon. "We have been over that subject many times," he said coldly. "You know as well as I do, that even though our bodies are alive, our minds are as they were,"

"But they are not," Vlad persisted. "You cannot deny that like me, you are experiencing human emotion. However, unlike me...your weapon was reproduced as your body was. How was that possible that you have a way of defending yourself and I do not?"

"Though I have many memories, I do not posess the needed answer to your question," said Kai, desperately wanting her to leave. "Perhaps you should have asked Prince before you killed him,"

He subconsciously knew that he didn't want Vlad around because she spoke the truth about how emotions were very much becoming a part of both of them, whether they wanted them to or not, but that didn't mean he wasn't going to fight them. Unlike her, he couldn't kill without remorse, and not killing meant sooner or later submitting Stan and Xev's lives to death. "How is that just?!" Vlad asked shrilly. "You find it fair that I am left human, while at least part of your former existence lingers?"

"Yes," said Kai. "While I use my weapon to repent for my actions...you would use yours to repeat your actions. That is something that could not be. Surely the cycles of time have showed you this. I suggest that you come to terms with it,"

She ran her fingers over the lid of the box thoughtfully, intrigued by how she could rouse human anger in him if she tried hard enough, yet disgusted because she knew that they couldn't resume their death match anytime soon if he was going to contiune becoming more and more human.

"If I asked you to, would you release me from this mortality?" Vlad asked quietly. "Being a Divine Executioner, I cannot destroy myself...only other assassins. You are a Divine Assassin, and Divine Assassins have no will of their own,"

"No," said Kai. "I once told you that you deserved to suffer...I still carry that belief. And...even if I were to kill you, the rest of my protoblood, though severely depleated, was destroyed along with the original Lexx. We could not return you to your former self if that is what you are implying,"

She cirlced the room, and the box, and looked down."This brings you comfort?" Vlad asked in a hushed tone, standing with his last unfortunate "victim" at her feet.

Kai looked at his brace. "I do not know," he said. "Comfort is something that I am inexperienced with,"

"Shooting down tiny pieces of dead flesh and broken machines," she said distastefully. "That is not what is. I used to shoot Divine Assassins, and toy with them just to the point where they were frightened. Then I would drain them. I can still feel the way the protoblood snaked its way through my cold flesh, and the taste of it lingered for some time. Now I am here on this ship, trapped as only an echo of what I used to be without my impaler, and speaking with a Divine Assassin,"

"That is correct," said Kai, leaning against the box in the middle of the room. "We are both echoes of what we used to be. Yet I do not have any feeling for it,"

"That is because you are pathetic, assassin," said Vlad, sitting next to him. "You cannot see what I see. I see darkness. It excites me, yet I cannot understand why,"

"I see the faces of all those I have killed," said Kai. "It is a intimidating experience,"

"You admit to being intimidated?" Vlad asked coldly. "Human qualities have made you more pathetic than I surmised. You do not see what I see. As I am cursed to being the Time Prophet, only I can see what is coming,"

Kai turned to look at her. "And what is coming?"

Vlad turned so she was eye to eye with him. "Death," she said. "As we have been resurrected, only one other can be,"

"And that other would be?" said Kai.

"Our master will come back to us, Kai," said Vlad. "I await His Divine Shadow,"

Kai got up off the box and turned his back on her. "I see," he said.

"You see?" Vlad said petulantly. "Does what I have revealed to you affect you in any way?"

Kai slightly looked over his shoulder at her, not trusting her to not attack him if he didn't give her the answer she wanted. "As I have destroyed His Shadow before, the idea of his return does nothing to please me as it does you, yet fear is something that will not eliminate the problem," he said.

Vlad stood and squinted at him, looking more an more as if she'd sucked on a lemon."Yet again, you sound awfully confident for a Divine Assassin,"

"As confidence is something I am also unaware of and inexperienced with, I simply understand that whether I live or die, His Divine Shadow's time in this Dark Universe will not be much time,"