Disclaimer: I don't own it.

A/N: Well, folks, here it is. I know I should have spent a bit more time editing, and I'm currently beta-less, so if you see any mistakes than please tell me. Otherwise, enjoy.

(And many, many thanks to my lovely reviewers.)

Chapter 4

(Same scene. Fala pulls away from the kiss first, one hand on Moira's shoulder, biting her lip because she is afraid if Jager's reaction if she should smile. No one says anything for a long moment)

Jager: Fala.

(He has a way about him, to say just one word and make it a comeback, a command, a warning and a question all in one.)

Fala (defiant): This is Moira.

(Her words don't have the power of his; she is younger, less experienced, and, in a tangled way that has nothing to do with Moira, very much in love with him.

Moira takes a few tentative steps forward, toward Jager, not at all sure of what she is doing, and he copies the action. He moves to the left, and she to the right, until they are circling, tighter and tighter, with Fala in the center, as everyone around them backs quickly away. It seems a twisted cross between hunters rounding up their quarry, and a sort of timeless, ancient dance. Beautiful, in its own way. A beam of tension so clear and hard it is almost physically visible keeps them locked in this perverse dance, around and around. Fala is the sun, and they are two planets - each wanting to be just a bit closer to her light.

Watching the fight build around her, Fala feels helpless - a great defenselessness and exposure that she has not felt since she left Egypt. She left Egypt - and the helpless feeling of being nothing more than prey - all behind, with nothing more than a few brown scars across her wrists, from a failed attempt at running away, and she uses vampiric power to hide those. Not because she particularly cares if anyone sees, but because she can. It means, to her: I am powerful, I create my future, I can abandon my past.

Now Moira is her future.

She runs her tongue nervously across her fangs, and fidgets, because she knows that Moira will loose the fight, and die, and she will have to watch.

Then, all at once, Moira stops circling. Giggles.

Fala winces.)

Moira: We shouldn't do this.

Jager: Because I'll win.

(Its is a statement, not at all a question, and they both know it.

He doesn't like to pick fights unless he must; but this is a threat to his pride, a thief of his love, and he's not afraid to throw away the few morals he has left for such a cause.)

Moira: Fala loves me. Kill me. Fly off into the sunset with her.

(Her words flutter out of her mouth before she has time to consider them, immature and raw. She has no idea what she's saying, but knows she has to stall.)

Moira: It won't help.

(Maybe she's goading him. Maybe she's convincing him to back off. Maybe she's convincing herself that Fala is someone worth dying for. She remembers the girl in her cell, whose cold she had burrowed into instinctively, and thinks - no, not worth dying for; worth living for.

Her words are so inappropriate, so awkward that he just stands there for a few moments, not letting his guard down, but no longer searching for a fight.)

Moira: We're all quite powerless here, aren't we?

(She's making everything more uncomfortable by the second. None of them want to seem weak.

But Jager cannot control who loves him; Moira doesn't have the strength or integrity to win a physical fight; and Fala, Fala is trapped in the center, a victim again, a little girl in a dangerous world who's put such large pieces into motion that they've spun away from her control.

Yes, they admit, though never to each other: powerless.)

Jager: Fala?

(This time, it is a question, which she answers by backing up a few feet, so that her toes brush against Mordra's. The other girl takes her hand.)

Jager (to Moira): You hurt her -

(His words are more those of Fala's father than lover; in a way, he has played both roles, and more, at different times.)

Moira: I know.

Jager (to Fala): If you're sure -

Fala: I am.

(She leans over and whispers something into Moira's ear.

Within a few moments, they have said their polite goodbyes, and two seagulls are flying away again, across a clouded sunrise.)