Teaser

The mercenaries converged on Miko. They took no chances and opened fire at once, mass effect rifles chattering and micro-rockets salvoing from under-barrel launchers. They were attacking Miko like she was a tank, not a random girl practicing in the park. She had a split second to respond, trembling as she spun away and called into herself a wall of fire that detonated the rockets in mid-air.

With the mercs concentrating on Miko, Liara was left alone. She called forth a biotic attack to pin the mysterious woman in the darkness of the trees with a singularity. Her target moved faster than seemed possible, and easily evaded it. Even as she did, pulse fire came from the woman's new position, unerringly accurate. Liara knew how dangerous the game she had been playing was… So the lightweight body armour plate she had been wearing on her torso kept her from being killed instantly as the pulse fire tore into it and flung her off her feet and backwards.

With a smirk, the woman drew a second gun, letting the first fall to a lanyard. She looked sharply for Miko as the woman used her Firebending to drive the Mercs back into cover. They were all the finest veterans, highly equipped, and two of them were biotics who were pushing Miko to the limit. She already had a wound from a gunshot on her arm and it was slowing her bending down.

Julia couldn't do much about anything, because the musician with his blank eyes was moving as fast as the others before him. He had lunged in a blur of motion and flung her backwards across the stone, slamming down into the rocks of the walkway around the lake, and then was on top of her a moment later. All of her skill had just served to keep her from slamming her head into the rocks as she fell and skidded to a stop under the enormous blow. Ugh, I think that was another rib, she thought as the pain flared.

Then she had other problems. The man was over her, pinning her down with a knife in one hand and … Fangs descending from his teeth. Even after all this, Julia felt a moment of incomprehending shock and terror. Vampires. Pretenders are Vampires.

But the dead man hesitated. And in a moment's hope, Julia knew why. The simple silver band necklace of her mother's had been a nice choice for a morning exercising out in the park. Now it symbolically stood between her and death.

As Miko battled the mercenaries, the Pretender woman who had driven Liara out of the fray waited for her chance with the second gun, stepping from the shadows into the dim pre-dawn light and levelling it. In a glimmer of light, Liara, struggling to her feet, saw what the gun was, and gasped in horror.

It was a Romulan disruptor pistol. And Liara had no doubt at all that the calm and cool woman had it set to disintegrate.

Aiming at Miko's back as the woman finally engulfed one of the mercenaries in flames, there was a smirk on that pale face with plump red lips and sunglasses on before dawn. She pulled the trigger like a practiced killer and the green beam lanced out.

Miko spun around just in time to be caught full-on the chest by the beam. Liara felt a scream die in her lips as she charged her biotics for the attack. Too Late, Goddess!

But Miko's eyes were glowing white, and the beam slammed into a whirling wind and rings of fire around her instead of striking her body, being absorbed and refracted by the immense power surging from within Miko. Her attacker's face twisted into a grimace. "Raava." She held down the trigger, and the sheer energies of the horrifying disintegrating weapon pitted themselves against the Avatar State as the Pretender drained the charge trying to burn through.

And then Miko felt it, through the Avatar State. She was the Avatar, she was complete… And through the defences she had raised, she was being attacked again anyway. A mind pressed into her own, dark and corrupted. It commanded her to stillness, it tried to pull a distinction between her and the Avatar, to bleed pure fear into her. You don't know bending, you can't hold this, you are imperfect, behind in your training…

The thoughts crept like corrosion into Miko's mind.

Julia's necklace had lasted long enough for the attacker to claw and battery at her neck with gloved hands until awkwardly ripping it off. She fought back with a pocket knife, lunging up to just break the blade off in his chest to no effect. For all that, this was an unskilled creature, acting almost like an animal, incomprehending in how he handled his hands and body. But Hungry.

And then his head exploded from his body in a whirling motion of a stark silver blade which glinted in the rising light. It rolled across the stone as the headless body toppled back down onto Julia, and she struggled to kick it up, looking up.

A short figure in a barnous stood there with a scarf wrapped over where her eyes should be and long curly black hair descending on her back. She held a silver blade dripping with dark red dead blood and flecked with bits of flesh and bone.

"Rebecca," she called out, sharply. "I'm going to give you the rest you deserved all those years ago!"

The Pretender woman deactivated the disruptor and whipped around, leaving Miko in the Avatar State to regain her strength and turn on the mercs around her. She reached out and flipped up an object which extended into a memory-metal sword, and began to retreat. "Come at me, bitch," she responded with a growl.

The woman in the barnous, no eyes required, ran straight for her. The two swords clashed sharply in the rising sun, and clashed again. Each time that the Pretender struck with her blade, she found it met with silver that bent, chipped, and yielded, but revealed a steel core beneath that held. The little blindfolded woman always knew where her opponent was in time to match the blade against blade.

Freed from the telepathic attack, Miko turned her power on the Eclipse mercenaries. With the Avatar State all of the elements, even those she hadn't trained fully with, were at her command. With a swing of her leg she carved grass and earth from beneath them, throwing them off their feet. The Asari grimaced and kept her footing with a backward jump. She threw a biotic bolt at Miko that was leapt over effortlessly, the air beneath Miko propelling her into the air. Once airborne she twisted and drew the same air with her, projecting it forward in a tightly-packed funnel cloud that slammed into the Asari with all the strength of a miniature tornado. The woman went flying back down the path. A rapid series of hand gestures summoned stone from beneath the lush grass, stone that wrapped around the Asari's limbs and waist to pin her in place.

The Salarians recovered. The red-skinned Salarian gave the order to fire only to be taken from the side by a biotic bolt that sent him spinning skyward. Still in the fight, Liara focused her biotic gifts into an even larger bolt, one that burst into a singularity once it was over the remaining Salarians. The pull of the generated dark matter drew them into the air.

Miko raised her hands, summoning twin funnels of tightly-packed air, with stone and fire mixed within. With a single downward gesture she struck the Salarians with these weapons. Liara's singularity burst at the same time, as she willed the energies to expand outward in a brief explosion of dark matter. The twin strike put both down for the count, leaving them wounded and unconscious.

As Miko swung to assist the mysterious woman, she saw the blades skitter together and the Pretender lean down with her strength into Ms. Blindfold. For a moment it seemed like she would drive the shorter woman into the ground. Then Blindfold released her blade with one hand and let herself be driven to the side, but the bottom dropped out from the Pretender she was fighting; the woman toppled forward as her weight shifted.

With the heavy leather gloves she wore, Ms. Blindfold grabbed the blade of her own weapon and bunted it back up into the torso of her opponent, sliding her hand down to the crossguard. She pulled hard and flicked the blade back across the woman's chest. A horrible screaming erupted across the park as the wound seemed to hiss, and the blindfolded woman rose, twisting the blade in deeper and deeper.

"It was done fairly," she said, 'looking' down as the figure below her toppled into the paving stones, and twitched, and finally did not move any longer as the silvered blade was thrust up into the neck from below. "No Powers, no lightsabre. No eyes," she smirked and then shook her head slowly, and drawing the blade back from the corpse, dropped to her knees-and tenderly kissed the forehead of the rotted, emaciated corpse which was all that was left on the ground. "Rest easy. I have freed your body."

As Julia rose, she realised the universal translator on her omnitool was translating the woman's words for her, and through the pain, she haltingly checked the original language.

Old New Franconian. The language unique to S0T5, the legendary tongue of the Earthreign.

The sun rose over the park, and the woman rose to face it. Julia realised who they were dealing with now. She'd seen the images. The resemblance left her no doubt. "Yellow," Julia said.

"Pleasure to make your acquaintance, Captain Andreys, but we need to go now. They will not stop, and the rest of the Dawn-Bearers need you. My ship is waiting."

"Those things… I remember the one on Noveria, but are they actually—"

"Yes and no," Yellow answered, preempting her. "They're creatures of sapient nightmare. They are formed by feeding on fear. But once they do… They become as real as matters for your comprehension, anyway. You will learn more, but we must go."

"Not without them," Julia insisted, noting the injuries on her comrades. Now that the danger was past Miko was back to normal, her amber-toned eyes showing instead of the solid white of before. She was looking to the gunshot wound on her arm with a grimace, as if just remembering she was hit. Liara looked just as worse for wear.

Instead of the opposition she'd anticipated, Yellow simply nodded. Before Julia could say anything else, the all-too-familiar sensation of a Darglan transporter whisked them away from the battle site.

Alone in the fractally-twisted spaces of the Fracture of Universe S0T5, in spaces that once hailed the Terran Reich, the legendary Earthreign, as their ruler, the Alliance vessel Jayhawk continued its solitary flight at her top speed of Warp 6.

Inside the cockpit the ship's official master, Captain Robert Dale, Paladin of the Alliance, felt like he wanted to vomit. The same could be said for the two present members of his operations team, as Gina Inviere and Lieutenant Talara shared his metaphysical gifts and thus the sensitivity to the wrongness that existed within the Fracture.

The only person in the cockpit who wasn't pale and nauseated was Lieutenant Commander Jarod, Operations Officer from the Aurora, who was the natural choice for pilot for the moment given his relative insensitivity to the wrongness of the Fracture. "We'll be there soon," he said. "How are you feeling?"

"Like I'm going to vomit," Robert answered weakly. He glanced to the systems screen he was technically manning. The warp drives on the Jayhawk were running at their maximum potential, something they weren't meant to do indefinitely. They were starting to push the ship like it'd never been pushed before. He tapped a button on the console. "Engineering. Lucy, looks like the drive's getting a little hot."

"It's the field intensity, I'm trying to compensate but it's not easy." Her voice betrayed she was suffering just as they were. "Why did this damn place have to be in the Fracture? I feel like I'm going to hurl all over the engines."

"If we're right, this was a battle from the height of a war with the Darkness," Robert said. "A war that probably caused the Fracture in the first place. We can't be surprised this place exists inside of it."

"There's still a lot we have to learn about that old war," Jarod said. "The information we have on it is sketchy. We haven't found any Darglan accounts in either of the S4W8 databases, or any databases recovered from Darglan space."

"Maybe the Darglan didn't want to remember the war, as a people," Talara suggested. "It marked the end of their interuniversal civilization."

As she spoke, Robert saw some color return to her bronze-toned face. Her eyes, with their mostly-Human appearance save the lavender dot in the center of her irises, seemed to focus more.

He felt it too. The sense of wrongness was fading.

"I'm picking up a large mass ahead," Jarod said. "Bringing us out of warp in one minute."

As those final seconds passed by, Meridina arrived from the quarters she was sharing with Lucy, looking better than she had before going to rest. Lucy arrived after her just in time for Jarod to bring the ship out of warp.

"Well, that's certainly impressive," Robert remarked.

Through the cockpit's front windows was the sight that fascinated them all. Ahead of their ship was a massive sphere of metal, broken and battered with multiple openings in the shell. Surrounding the sphere was a great cloud of debris, hugging it like an aura, with pieces small enough to fit in a fist and large enough to rival even the Aurora in size. The sphere itself was ninety kilometers in diameter, completely stupendous in size, second only to the colossal Dyson Sphere found in S5T3.

As they approached the larger pieces of debris became recognizable. "Vengeur-class," Jarod noted. "There must have been dozens of them at least. And a whole bunch of other ships we don't recognize."

Lucy set a station for sensor readings. "Jarod, look at this elemental comparison. Is that what I think it is?"

Jarod glanced quickly at the results from one of the scanners. "Its Darglan," he said. More results showed. "And that might actually be a piece of bio-armored hull. The composition suggests Vorlon bio-armor."

"The Vorlons were here?" Robert stared ahead as the debris loomed larger.

"Looks like it. Another of the samples is coming up as a ninety-five percent match to Apexai-made alloys. And there's even more here the sensors don't recognize."

As he spoke the others were already feeling something different. "They were desperate," Gina said softly. "I can feel it here."

Talara nodded. "I'm feeling terror. They knew they would probably die, and they were terrified of what they were fighting."

"But they were still holding." Lucy's expression was grim. "Desperate, terrified, and utterly defiant."

Robert swallowed. "I recognize this feeling," he said, concentrating on an old wrongness surrounding the area. "I've felt this before. On Gamma Piratus."

"I can feel the deaths." Even without the nausea of the Fracture present, Meridina's face was pale. Besides feeling what the others sensed, her telepathic talents felt the mass death-traces of people who'd died in the hulks they were now flying around. Many had been telepaths and left stronger traces. Proud, terrified, desperate, defiant, it all mixed together.

The debris field thickened as they closed on the sphere, forcing greater maneuvering from Jarod. He flew them between the shattered pieces of one of the Vengeur-class dreadnoughts. As they emerged out the other end they were presented with another piece of debris, this in the shape of a tall, red-and-white vertical hammerhead bow with a blown weapon turret on the side. Jarod had to bank the Jayhawk to starboard, hard, to evade it, then come back to his original heading to avoid the burnt silver of a catamaran-shaped hulk.

Around them, they could feel a further unease, it felt like something was lurking in the background around them, a fundamental tension. Nobody could place it, but it left them all on edge.

"We're almost there," Lucy noted, even as a familiar-looking hulk loomed ahead. Everyone felt a little ache in their hearts at the broken ruin of a Darglan Emergency Cruiser, a sister to their own Aurora.

Beyond the feelings of the others, Robert felt like he could see what happened back then. In a corner of his being he imagined the great dark forms, ships that seemed to be made of living shadow, and the vicious onslaught of these vessels as they seemed to eliminate deflectors and crumple armor to dust, destroying and slaughtering the defenders of the sphere by the dozen. He wondered if it was his imagination, or in moments, if it might be a real memory.

The sphere itself loomed ahead of them. Jarod guided them toward its broken exterior while Lucy returned her attention to the sensors. "Most of the station is in vacuum," she said. "I can't tell if it's from battle damage or if someone deliberately decompressed the interior. But I'm picking up a sign of a remnant atmosphere toward the central core. Looks like it's still sealed against vacuum."

"Any sign of a place to land?" Robert asked.

"Nothing. I'm not sure of any way to directly access the intact portion save for beaming in."

A tone filled the cockpit. Gina checked her station. "We're getting a signal from inside the station. It's a message, naming all of us except Talara. 'Welcome to A Famoso. We will meet you in the Garden."

"Nice to get an invitation, like that's not ominous as hell," Jarod remarked. "So we all go?"

"We'll go." Robert stood and nodded once to Talara. "Talara, beam us over and keep watch. Let us know if you pick anything up."

"Yes sir," she answered dutifully.

The Jayhawk's transport capacity meant that the sensitives beamed over first. They took a moment to sense for immediate danger while Lucy verified the atmosphere with her omnitool scanners. "It's fully breathable," she said, removing her breathing mask and returning it to the folds of her robe. The others did the same. Lucy and Gina had the blue robes Gersallians used for field Knights of Swenya while Meridina donned a brown field robe like Robert's own. The ladies had purple armor while Robert's was an azure blue shade.

Another burst of light formed. Jarod appeared, wearing a field action uniform with a pulse pistol in his hip holster. "Well, I can see why it's called a garden," he mused.

The structure they were within teemed with plant life and flowing water, vast enough that the water currents included an active waterfall. "Reminds me of what Scotty said about the Genesis Project cave," Robert said, taking in the sight.

They walked on, following a stone-laid path toward a central piazza in the lush space. The scents were fully natural, wafting down from flower-bearing trees. It was hard to imagine they were in the middle of an ancient space station, not on a planet somewhere. The vast open space stretched on for kilometres all around them.

The piazza itself had four approaches, each a stone-hewn path. There were old benches and chairs present, as well as rose bushes. In the piazza center the floor was carved marble, forming an eagle insignia. Robert recognized it from the briefing materials from the Huascar's discovery in the Cyrannus Cluster: it was the symbol of the Terran Reign, with its Old New Franconian declaration of Mes Werke, damiu que mon Leutle ne soit esklaven sind. "My work, all so that my people shall never again be slaves".

As they approached, he felt something familiar. A trace left long ago, the metaphysical equivalent of a remnant sunbeam from a once-risen sun. I remember this, he thought. I felt it… where? After a moment's consideration he remembered. Umintamil. It was in Umintamil. His eyes widened as he considered what that meant. The old Gersallian monastery where he spent six weeks trying to get stronger control over his expanded powers was known as once being a favored spot for Swenya, in her late years, to meditate and reflect on her life, and mourn those who had passed. If he felt the same remnant light here was he did there…

...then Swenya herself had been to this place, long ago.

But more than that, it was clear that something significant happened in this place. An act that he felt was, in some way, literally awesome, such that it left a mark for sensitives like him to sense.

Meridina looked around at the piazza, her face full of wonder. "I can feel it. She was here." Her voice was barely a breath. "Swenya was here."

"I feel it too," Lucy said. "Something happened here. It's left a… mark of some kind."

Jarod was still scanning quietly. "It's not something that shows up on sensors. Anything else you can—"

The four felt the danger all at once, the dark and malevolent shadow of a threat. A shadow they remembered. Their lightsabers hissed to life in unison.

Then the power came, pure and strong, nearly knocking them off their feet when the wave hit. In the middle of the plaza a single dark form slammed into the ground. They knew who the figure would be even without looking toward her, seeing the ashen gray complexion and the eyes as red as burning coals.

"Tisiphone," Robert hissed.

The Fury of NEUROM sneered at his reaction. "I won't be holding back this time, worms!"

The attack came fast, and it came like a sudden storm. Red lightsaber blades flashed to life, one in each hand, and in the blink of an eye she was in their midst. Her speed was astonishing and her ferocity enough to startle them all. Her lightsabers slashed independent of the raw force that knocked them backward and interrupted their attacks on her.

Jarod watched, nearly struck dumb with awe. He was used to his friends and comrades going through foes with ease, but here they were, with a four to one advantage, and their foe was outfighting them all at once. One by one her strikes burnt armor and robe, even skin. Bursts of sheer will threw them to the ground the moment their guard was down.

As the others were forced away, Gina thought she had an opening and rushed in. The Tisiphone whirled, forcing the blue blade away from her back and bringing her foot up. She kicked Gina in the mouth with enough force to smash bone and break teeth, causing her to spin and hit the ground, blood spurting from her lips. Tisiphone loomed over her as if to strike Gina down before she could recover.

Desperate to help, Jarod went for his pulse pistol and fired. Even with her back turned one of the Tisiphone's blades flashed backward, catching the blast and batting it off into the bushes. She turned on him and snarled. "Ignorant child, you dare to call yourself a 'Pretender'? You would be killed for that on many worlds." She charged at him.

Meridina got back to her feet and lashed out with her mind, relying on her telepathic power to attack their foe. What she encountered was utter, vicious darkness, a deep well of anger and hatred and desire for power that defied reason. Just touching it was agony and she had to break off the attack probe, at which point Tisiphone tossed her back to the ground.

Robert, back on his knees, summoned his strength and sent a wall of force at the Fury. She sensed it coming and met force with force, throwing it back at him and sending him flying into the bushes of the piazza.

This left nobody to stand between the Tisiphone and Jarod, and she went in for the kill. Jarod scrambled backward, firing as he did, just for each bolt to be deflected by the Tisiphone's crimson lightsabers. Instinctive fear filled him at the sight of his charging foe, telling him there was nothing he could do to stop her from slicing him into pieces.

A moment before her lightsabers could come down on him, Lucy appeared between them. Her blue lightsaber met the Tisiphone's weapons and stopped them. Her expression was locked into grim determination to counter the proud sneer that curled the Tisiphone's black lips.

Jarod scrambled away, giving Lucy the ground she needed as the full fury of the Tisiphone came down on her, a living crimson whirlwind battering at Lucy's blue blade. Her foe was the quickest she'd ever fought, with a vicious darkness unlike any she'd encountered before. She felt fear at the power of this adversary and, with effort, pushed it away, relying on her instincts empowered by the Flow of Life. They guided her arms and her blade, moving them inhumanly fast to block the flurry of strikes that came next. The Tisiphone seemed determined to kill her, and she would not let that happen.

After several moments of their duel the Tisiphone's sneer turned into a grin. "Now that's more worthy," she purred. "If only we'd fought on Deep Space Nine, I might have gotten greater satisfaction in my victory."

Lucy didn't react to the taunt. She couldn't let herself react to anything, not to her fear, not to her worry over her comrades, or her anger at this foe for hurting them. She ignored all emotions and centered herself on her connection to the Flow of Life. She let it guide her as the attack resumed, even more ferocious than before. It took everything she had to deflect the storm of blows the Tisiphone rained upon her. Her lightsaber movements had to be quick and had to be exact to resist.

It was almost more than she could manage. Lucy felt pressed to the limits of her speed, her endurance, and her focus, but she found the strength to keep her poise. She turned and backed away, surrendering ground without letting herself be pinned into place. She felt each blow coming before it could land and blocked it as necessary, allowing only glancing blows that singed and stung but did not inflict wounds.

Her fighting only seemed to make the Tisiphone more determined to strike her down. The Tisiphone whirled about Lucy, testing her defense again and again. "I can sense you faltering, girl," she hissed. "You are not my equal."

"I won't let you harm my friends." The remark was made without rancor or even passion. It was a matter of fact statement, a declaration of intent.

Robert and Meridina were recovering again. They tried to go in and help Lucy. The Tisiphone dodged a wave of force from Robert and used one of her blades to stop Meridina's attack. She whirled away from Lucy for a moment and threw Meridina into Robert with a precise wall of force. She turned back as Lucy came for her, weapon raised, and their blades again locked.

The Tisiphone growled and unleashed her will against Lucy to knock her back. She succeeded only partially, as Lucy quickly recovered. Again they rushed to meet each other.

There was a blur of motion. Another figure appeared between them. Twin ruby blades came from the bone-crafted weapon in her hands, a lightsaber that somehow packed two blades into the same space as one, that intercepted the weapons of both. A masked face with a turban to cover the head looked toward Tisiphone and then Lucy. "This battle is over," the figure declared with an electronically distorted voice.

Undiscovered Frontier
"The Closed Circle"

"Stand down, Tisiphone," the voice instructed next, and the mask turned levelly to face Lucy. "Stand down, Lucilla," it added, in scratchy, metallic overtones.

Lucy refused, though she fell back from the strange figure, back toward her friends who held their blades at the ready. Conversely, the Tisiphone retreated as ordered, stepping back and deactivating her lightsabres to stand with a bemused smirk curled on her lips as she flipped her hood back up and gazed at them, looking confident and unconcerned.

Lucy slowly fell in with the others. They could all feel it, except for Jarod: The second being had no presence in the Flow of Life, no connection to it like their own. Not light, not dark. None.

"If you were wise, you would obey," Tisiphone spoke again, "for you face more power than you can possibly imagine: the ultimate weapon."

"That's enough," the figure rejoindered, shooting a sharp, masked glance back to the Tisiphone.

Though he couldn't sense the masked figure, Robert could sense that there was enormous power in the being, that Tisiphone was being perfectly honest. He lowered his weapon and extinguished the blade.

"Who are you?" he challenged. "Why did you let Tisiphone attack us?"

"Attack? If this was an attack, you'd be dead," Tisiphone laughed, only for the figure to whip up a gloved hand, raised in a stop gesture at the palm. Once again the Tisiphone went silent, and the masked figure refused to answer.

"Since she isn't feeling very talkative right now, I thought I'd mention that I always call her 'Neanderthal'," a voice rang out as a small party moved out from some trees and down the path toward the others.

Robert shot a look at the familiar sound. It was Sidney Hank, approaching from the opposite direction, wearing a business suit as if he were on his way to a board meeting. At his side, carrying a case, was the mysterious agent Mr. Black that Meridina recognized from Noveria. Another woman, vaguely white-Hispanic and with a mask with a visible HUD lowered over her upper face, stood at his opposite side, fingering a lightsabre. And Scirocco Montague, the immensely powerful telepath in Sidney's employ who'd once single-handedly killed an Aristo, hung behind her, staring almost entranced at the cowled and masked figure that Sidney had just called the Neanderthal.

Lucy swore she heard a soft snarl from under the mask.

"Impertinent as ever, Sidney," they most definitely heard.

Hank stopped walking. The others halted with him. "Take the mask off. I know exactly what you look like already and I can show all the others if I feel like it."

The left hand of the figure reached over and pulled the right glove from her hand, revealing delicately white-alabaster skin that was flawlessly perfect, with pale nails. Then, ever so methodically, and almost reverently, she unclasped the mask from the turban, and slowly peeled it to the side and down.

It revealed a woman, better described as handsome than beautiful, but still aethereally perfect. Her brow was heavy and sharp, but her eyes vivid and green, her hair red, chin prominent. Pulling the turban off with the mask, her red hair cascaded down her back. "You will call me Alekto," she instructed simply, as she dropped mask and turban to the ground beside her. "And Sidney, you will perhaps reflect on the fact that when the Circle is closed, I may be far less tolerant of your impertinence."

"I suspect we'll both be reconsidering our relationship once the Circle is closed," he replied, not bothering to react directly to the offered threat. "Although let's be honest, we'll still have a common interest." He didn't bother elaborating on it.

Sensing Lucy's own impatience and feeling some of his own, Robert imposed a diplomatic tone to his voice. "Well, now that we're all here, we have questions. About this Circle that keeps getting mentioned, what it has to do with the Brotherhood of Kohbal, and the location of Reshan's Temple." He looked from Sidney to the Alekto and back. "And that's not mentioning the ancient war that was fought here, a war that's still shaping the Multiverse today."

"The Multiverse has long been shaped by the Darkness," the Alekto said. "Countless civilizations have fallen at their hands. Whole universes purged of light and life. That is all you need to know at this time."

"The Circle's the urgent matter," Sidney said in agreement. "Everything depends on keeping it intact."

"And the Circle is?" Lucy asked. "Some kind of object in Reshan's Temple?"

"The Circle is not an object, girl, it is a metaphorical construct." The Alekto gave her an annoyed look. "One that I was not pleased to learn."

"There'll be a day when you learn what the Circle is, but right now, even learning about it would put it at risk," Sidney remarked. "What you need to know now is that Reshan's Temple is necessary to keeping it intact. There is something kept there, something you need to gain access to."

"Holy crap."

The words drew everyone's attention to Jarod. He was staring at the Alekto intently. He swallowed. "That word. 'Alekto'." His eyes faced Robert and then Meridina. "It's Ancient Greek. It's the name of one of the Furies."

"As is Tisiphone," Robert remembered.

"Yes, but the name itself has a meaning," Jarod continued. "Translated from Ancient Greek, it means unending, or endless."

The Alekto shot a sharp look at Jarod, but rather than speak, just smirked.

The word struck a chord in the others, save Gina. "As in 'the Endless'?" Meridina asked him.

Jarod nodded, his mind making it clear that was exactly what he was thinking.

She turned her head to face the Alekto, who met her eyes. Interest and pride shined in them. Meridina searched her own memories and felt where the familiarity she was feeling came from. "You," she said. "You were at the judgement of the Darglan millennia ago." As she spoke those words the memory of the ancient recording came back easily.

"I was," she said. "I always felt their punishment was lax, given the devastation their irresponsibility wrought. You think of the Darglan as innocent explorers; to everyone who actually had to deal with them, they were gullible idiots who got trillions of people killed. But that is irrelevant to the matter at hand." Those green eyes focused intently on Meridina, to the exclusion of the others. "Sidney believes you are the best candidates to complete the Circle, but you are woefully lacking in skill. I require a test if I am to be convinced you are capable of meeting the challenges involved."

"Oh, another test, I love those," Lucy groused sarcastically. "Are you going to have your pet swevyra'kse try to dice us into pieces again?"

Tisiphone's eyes blazed with readiness, but the Alekto shook her head. "Nothing so difficult, child. You will actually have a hope of completing this one." Her expression turned sharp, and she stared directly at Merdinia. "I want to see if you are sapient, or an animal. Come here."

She reached down into the folds of her robe and produced a rectangular box, one side of which seemed a black well of emptiness.

"The rules are simple, Meridinia," The Alekto said with a coldly unflinching face. "Put your hand inside the box. No matter what happens, don't take it out. If you do, you will die."

Meridina's eyes focused on the box. Robert stepped up beside her, frowning. "You're not killing her, not over something like this," he insisted. "That's not necessary."

"The Box only allows you to kill yourself. I must know," The Alekto shot a look at Sidney as if to preemptively quell him.

"She doesn't mean me immediate harm," Meridina said softly. "None that I can sense." She stepped forward. "And our lives are already at risk. If this will lead us to the secrets Mastrash Ledosh died to protect, I will do it."

The box was held up to her. Meridina's senses felt nothing particular about. Her life was not threatened by the box itself. But she did feel unsettled by it. The others were too, severely, and the tension in the piazza was increasing steadily.

With her eyes on the Alekto, Meridina put her right hand into the box.

Her hand caught fire.

At least, that's how it felt. The pain shot through her hand as if she'd dipped it in flaming acid. Her face twisted into a wince and she nearly cried out from the intensity of it.

There was something else to it, something more intense. She knew, she absolutely knew, that her hand was being melted, being destroyed. It was burning in chemical agony, flesh was melting away to reveal muscle and tendon and below it bone. It was being utterly obliterated. Every biophysical instinct in her entire body screamed for her to take it out instantly, to quench the pain.

This is a test. She focused on the light of Swenya that she had felt around her. She felt that light, gently encapsulating her, her existence, her feelings, her determination to do Good and Right by the Code. If the price of this was that The Alekto would take her hand, she was prepared to give it.

The Alekto watched rigidly, betraying no emotion. Her eyes did not flicker, even as Sidney watched her sharply.

Sharply from across the gap between the two groups, the woman named Green and Tisiphone exchanged a glance, the glance leaving little doubt at Green's disgust, or the fact that the two of them knew each other from the past.

Meridina felt her heartbeat and her breathing slow as the unimaginable agony continued, and yet she didn't have the slightest ability to faint even if she wanted to. The impulsive temptation to remove her hand… Slowly began to fade. Her calmness at the Flow of Life settled her. Her hand was gone, and it was gone to a purpose she would understand. Swenya was here, with her, the Light of Life was here, with her.

"Alekto," Green said quietly, "she has passed."

The Alekto started, and nodded. "You are right."

Tisiphone's lips curled into a sneering frown. Her Master ignored her.

The Alekto pulled the box away. From the agony evident on Meridina's face, from what the others could feel of her, Robert and Lucy and Gina had been blanching in horror. But suddenly, as the The Box was pulled back, Meridina's hand was revealed-perfectly intact, without a blemish on it. Meridina herself, so convincing was the device, stared at it in shock.

"She might just be the one," the Alekto said, shaking her head and looking bemused. "She might just be the one. And you all might really be the Dawn Bearers."

"Was that necessary?" Lucy asked at the savage deception and torture, unable to restrain heat in her voice.

"Oh, yes it was, more than you can possibly understand," the Alekto answered. "We cannot afford mistakes about this, the risk is completely incalculable."

A tone from Robert's omnitool ended the conversation. He tapped at the blue light that formed over the back of his left hand. "Dale here."

Talara's voice came through the other end. "Sir, another ship just came through the debris field. Sensors show it's a match for the vessel that the woman Yellow used to flee the Citadel."

The Alekto's expression betrayed pleasure. "She's on time."

Moments passed and four columns of light flashed into existence in the piazza. A sharp buzz filled the air and when it ended, four more people were with them. Robert was stunned to see Julia arriving with Yellow, Miko and Dr. T'Soni beside them. He stopped himself from giving her a hug given the uncertain circumstances.

"It went well, I see." The Alekto observed with a matter-of-fact tone and slight shrug.

"Yes, Master," Yellow answered. She turned her head toward Robert and Lucy, allowing them to see her face and the cloth headwrap covering her eyes. "The Pretenders made an effort at Captain Andreys, as you foresaw. They were planning on converting her into a host."

"Well done, Megaera. The enemy is thwarted, and it seems we have our Dawn-Bearers." The Alekto reached into the folds of her robe. When her hand came back out, it was gripping a familiar lightsaber.

"Swenya's Blade," Meridina gasped. "You've had it."

"So that's why you were at Gersal for the attack," Lucy said, glaring at Tisiphone. "You came to steal it!"

"My Master required control of the weapon to ensure the Circle was not jeopardized," Tisiphone responded, smirking. "Besides, had I not been there, you would have died. Your compassion, Lucilla Lucero, is your greatest weakness."

Sidney rolled his eyes. "Alekto, can you reign in your pet assassin again? Her barbs get old."

"Tisiphone, be polite to company, please. The Circle is not yet closed."

A glare flashed from the woman.

Megaera, for her part, was looking gently to Sidney's companions, as if she were communicating despite the lack of sight.

"Black, Green, please mind your duties," Sidney instructed, though it was gentle.

"I don't get to socialise much," Megaera noted, bitterly.

"I didn't choose your boss," the head of Pan-Empyrean answered. His fingers snapped and Black lifted the case he was carrying. He pulled it open. Inside, nestled in velvet and protective foam, was another lightsaber, this one crafted of dark-surfaced material. "I'm sure Kohbal's people are going to know the time's coming, and you've got to beat them there," he said, taking the weapon from its place. "You'll need this."

Robert approached and accepted it into his hand. He held it to the side and with his thumb felt out the switch. With a sharp snap-hiss the weapon's blade flashed to light, a brilliant purple in color.

Another snap-hiss came to the air. Lucy was testing Swenya's Blade, which blazed with sapphire brilliance.

"Whose weapon was this?" Robert asked.

"It's known as the Closed Circle," Sidney remarked. "I believe the Gersallians would call this Reshankesh."

Robert extinguished the blade and stared at it. "Reshan's Blade?"

"The old man was quite the duelist, among other things. Even Swenya usually lost their practice duels." Sidney grinned as if he'd been there for them. "Well, at first. Anyway, I've been waiting three thousand years to get that thing out of my vaults. You'll be needing it when you get to Reshan's Temple."

"Why?" Gina asked.

"The blades are the keys to the Temple's inner chamber," Sidney replied. "Without them you can't get in and you can't get what you need. And anyone trying to force their way in without them would be in for a nasty surprise."

"You have the book," said the Alekto, a hint of impatience now in her voice. "And you know how to read it. Don't think you can just ask us where to go and it's not another test, either. Reshan would not confide the coordinates with either of us."

"He didn't trust you?" Lucy asked.

"He didn't want to give either of us any temptations," Sidney said. "And he needed someone to keep his weapon safe through the millennia."

"Enough time has been wasted. You still have work to do." The Alekto turned her head toward Yellow a.k.a. Megaera. "You will accompany them, Megaera. See to it that the Circle is kept intact."

Megaera bowed her head. "Yes, Master, of course."

The uncertainty Robert felt from the others was evident. An objection formed and died as he felt the certainty within him that they would need a powerful ally for this fight. "The Brotherhood of Kohbal is dangerous enough that your help will be welcomed," he said. He kept his eyes on Yellow and the Alekto and didn't return the others' bewildered looks.

He could understand why: he felt the darkness that seemed integral to Yellow as a being as easily as they did. Trust wouldn't be easy. But his instincts were certain she'd be necessary.

"Then we are finished here," the Alekto said, and the dismissive tone of her voice was impossible to ignore.

Robert keyed his omnitool. "Talara, we'll be beaming up nine people this time. Tagging them now." He tapped at the omnitool to designate Julia, Miko, Liara, and Yellow.

"Transporting now."

The others beamed out first, leaving Robert for last. The moment the second group was away and Robert was alone, Sidney flashed him a grin. "I see Captain Andreys is hale and hearty," he said, smiling. "I'm glad to see that favor worked out for you in the end."

Robert didn't get a chance to answer before he was whisked away by the Jayhawk transporter.

Once the others were gone, Sidney nodded once toward the Alekto. "Nice to see you again in the flesh, after all of this time. We'll see if we end up making a habit of this."

"If you want, Sidney," the Alekto answered with a shrug. "I'm not going anywhere."

Sidney chuckled and waved a tipped salute. At the signal, the masked woman — the one known as Green — tapped at an omnitool interface. A transporter pulled the quartet away, leaving the Alekto and Tisiphone alone in the heart of A Famoso's garden.

The Alekto leveled a look at her subordinate. "I can sense your interest in the Lucero woman. Surely she was not that skilled a duelist to try your talents?"

"I would have beaten her before long," Tisiphone insisted. Her tone turned wistful. "But it has been so very long since I fought an opponent of such mettle. It was a pleasure I didn't expect to have again so soon."

"You mean that she fights like a Jedi." The Alekto's expression turned thoughtful. "Although she has an impertinence, a passion, that is entirely her own. And yet, it feels familiar."

The tone in her voice prompted a certain look from Tisiphone. "Master, you don't think she's…?"

"Time will tell, my Fury," the Alekto answered. "Go and retrieve Yellow's vessel. I wish to return to Xanadu. Preparations must be made."

The Jayhawk flew back out through the debris field, this time under Lucy's control.

In the back of the ship Robert and Julia exchanged a hug. Liara, Miko, and Megaera watched the unexpected reunion quietly while Robert himself noted the tension in Julia's being. He could tell she'd been in a fight, a bad one.

Considering the exchange back in the Garden, Robert pulled away from the hug and turned to Megaera. "Thank you," he said, and he put sincerity into it. "For saving Julia and the others."

"You are welcome."

"We'll probably be rendezvousing with our main ship shortly…" Robert trailed off and looked to her. "Megaera or Yellow?" he asked, trying to be polite.

"Megaera. Yellow is an old code name," she laughed.

"I wish I could've been there for you all," he added. "Whatever these Pretender things are…"

"Yellow, Megaera, she said they were living sapient nightmares," Julia said. "I'm still wrapping my head around it. It had fangs, Rob. And it was a Human being just a day or two before. A member of one of the street bands."

"When one of their number kills someone, they turn their victim into a vessel for another of their kind," Megaera said. "That was the fate they had in mind for you."

Robert clenched a fist as he pushed away the thought of losing Julia to something like that. She swallowed and nodded. "Thank you again for stopping them."

"Do you want to rest?" he asked. "I mean, going through that…"

"What I want is to make sure Schneider doesn't torpedo my chance to get my ship back," Julia replied hotly. "I get the feeling she'll use any excuse to deny me, and an 'abrupt disappearance' could work for that."

"If she's that biased against you, Maran will make use of it," Robert assured her. "Besides, from what you've said, you were attacked by more than just vampires or whatever they are. There were Eclipse mercs there. Colony Security will find them, word can get out that you were attacked."

"Who were those aliens anyway?" Miko asked. "The ones with the black circle on their armor? I recognized one was an Asari like Liara."

"The others were Salarians," Liara answered. "A squad of mercenaries from the Eclipse organization. They were hired by the Shadow Broker to kill Captain Andreys."

Robert frowned at that. "A reprisal over us saving Shepard's body?"

He could feel Liara's discomfort and grief as she nodded. "Yes. Feron established a data brokerage on Ilium and we got word of the contract, so I came to New Liberty to see about stopping them. The Broker provided clean IDs for your attackers to enter Alliance space. But I had no idea they were for creatures like that 'Pretender'. I figured whoever was coming was working for the Broker."

Megaera outright giggled. "He may have believed them so, or thought of them as clients, but the Shadow Broker has no idea of what he was dealing with. They had an agenda far beyond killing you."

"Why would they want to make me, what was it you said, a host?" Julia shuddered again at the thought.

"To use your body against your friends. To inflict the maximum grief on them. And ultimately, to keep you from completing the Circle."

"And they'd want that because?"

"Because, Captain Dale, if the Circle is broken, the Darkness will win, and that is precisely what the Pretenders want to see happen."

"Why?"

Before she could give him an answer, the ship intercom chimed. Jarod's voice came over the speakers. "The Aurora just jumped in. Captain Varma is ready to hear what you've learned."

"Then bring us in for a landing, and warn her we might want to meet in Conference Room 1. We've got extra guests along."

The senior officers of the Aurora and Koenig quietly listened as the events at A Famoso and New Liberty were shared with them. Most of them kept glancing toward Megaera, seated at the table with Robert's operations team.

Cat let out one of her customary "squees". "There's actually an intact garden inside A Famoso?! Did you get scans of it? What kind of species did they have growing in the garden? How is the atmosphere and the water flow maintained?!"

Before Robert or the others could reply, Megaera spoke up with a stern voice. "Do not, under any circumstances, try to board the station. There are dangers there you are not prepared to face."

"Well, at least we'll have scans?"

"No, we don't." Lucy looked up from her omnitool and glared at Megaera. "You deleted them. How did you delete our scans of the station?"

A sly grin crossed her face. "I have my ways. We are quite familiar with Darglan technology, after all."

"So you have recovered the Swenyakesh and acquired the weapon of Swenya's mentor Reshan." Kaveri spoke in a matter-of-fact tone. "And they will allow you into the Temple's inner chamber."

"That's what they both said," Robert answered. "They didn't know where to find it, though, and they said nothing about what the book's gibberish would mean."

"Then finding the Temple comes next." Kaveri put her hands together on the table. "Your Paladin authority permitted me an opening to depart T7C8, but I expect to receive orders from Command to either return or head to another mission. If you are to go to this Temple, we will need a destination soon."

"That's why I'm about to head back to Science Lab 1, with Meridina, Jarod, Cat, and my team, to figure this code out," Robert said. "I have a feeling we're running short on time to get this done."

"We will linger here for the moment," Kaveri said, "while you work."

"You are sufficient distance from the station to be safe from any troubles," Megaera said. "But I must repeat myself. Do not approach, do not send probes, do nothing to disturb A Famoso. The consequences would be dire."

Kaveri leveled a curious look at the woman with the head-wrap covering her eyes. "I will take that warning under advisement."

"To remove any risk, perhaps we should jump for Gersallian space?" Meridina advised. "While we have no records of its location, Reshan most likely built his temple in our home universe."

Kaveri nodded her approval. "A sound suggestion. Commander Locarno, have us jumped to N2S7 immediately, the nearest jump anchor please. Everyone else, you are dismissed."