Stark looked around as if startled by the use of his name. He frowned at them each as if wondering what they were doing there. He looked back at Aeryn and looked as if he had forgotten her question.

"Stark?" Aeryn persevered.

"Yes?" A worried expression trickled its way across Stark's healed features. "Wait, no. I mean, yes! Hello."

The voice finally confirmed it to Crichton. Stark had grown an eye and one side of a face, but there was no mistaking his voice, or that dancing cacophony of expressions that seemed to writhe ceaselessly just beneath his face.

"Stark, you crazy bastard – good to see you!" Crichton drawled, "What the hell are you doing here?"

Stark looked around the tiny room, blinking rapidly. "I don't know. Where is this place?"

There was an uncomfortable silence.

"Stark," Aeryn said as gently as she could, "Do you know who we are? Do you know who I am?"

Stark looked at her blankly, then his face burst into a wide smile.

"Mother?"

Aeryn opened her mouth, then closed it again slowly.

"Been overdoing it with the peace pipe again, Stark man?" Crichton said.

Stark leaned towards him conspiratorially. "It's all smoke and mirrors, you know?" he hissed, "All trickery, all deception, all lies. Nothing real, nothing at all."

Crichton looked at Aeryn helplessly. "Really?"

"What happened to you, Stark?" Aeryn said, "When we last saw you after the war, you seemed..." Sane, Crichton supplied silently, "better."

Stark looked around the room, his eyes seeming to focus on some invisible point. "I was looking for something." he said distantly. He laughed a sudden wild laugh that was cut short as quickly as it had began. "What was I looking for, I don't remember. Something old? Yes, no. No, I found something new, but really it was borrowed. I couldn't... can't seem to... lost, all gone now."

Stark giggled and looked at them again. He put his hand over one eye. "I can see you!"

Crichton, Aeryn and Jothee regarded him sadly.

"This is hopeless." Jothee declared. "I don't know what he's doing here, but he can't help us. We need to find our contact and find the resistance -"

"Vive la resistance!" Stark interjected happily.

"Right," Jothee said steadily, "Someone must have tipped ff the authorities. That means our contact is likely -"

"Wait." Crichton held up a hand. He was watching Stark intently. "Stark, what do you know agout the resistance? Do you know where they are?"

Stark's intense eyes locked onto Crichton's for a moment before skittering away.

"Yes."

"Can you take us to them?"

"Yes."

Pause. "Will you take us to them?"

"No."

Crichton turned away, frustrated.

"Please Stark."

Stark examined Aeryn's face. Slowly he reached up one hand until it was inches from her face. He looked puzzled at the appearance of his own hand.

"Can you please take us to the resistance, Stark?"

Stark smiled dreamily, "Yes mother."

Stark turned around and pushed past Jothee. He touched a spot on the wall that looked identical to any other to Crichton's eye. There was a click and a grinding sound. Then there was a jolt and a sense of vertigo.

"Going down." Stark said.

Crichton clung to the wall to steady himself. Elevators, he told himself, were the safest form of travel on earth. Admittedly he wasn't on earth, and this elevator seemed to descend by a series of uncontrolled lurching falls and the mechanism was squealing like a distressed pig, but the principle was still the same.

Crichton felt a weight begin to build up, a sense of dammed up pressure inside his skull. Anger flowed into the reservoirs of his mind as he watched Stark, still twitching unceasingly. The Stark he had known, that Stark's sanity had always been a tenuous thing, dancing high over the windy cliffs of madness. But even after all he had suffered and endured, he had never stepped over, never quite fallen.

Crichton narrowed his eyes. Someone had done this to Stark. Someone had pushed him. Crichton hoped very much that he would get the chance to meet them.

There was a last staggering jolt and a clang. The sense of movement ceased and Stark pushed open the door. They followed him through it.

Crichton's eyes adjusted slowly to the gloom. There was the occasional light that looked like dimly glowing fluorescent tubes hanging from the ceiling. They were in a narow, rocky corridor. The air smelled damp and the walls were running with water. Crichton wondered with the ceaseless rain above that these tunnels were not underground rivers by now. Then he wondered how far down they had come.

They made there way wordlessly along the crude tunnel, splashing through muddy water, ducking frequently when the tunnel became too low. At one point Crichton heard a thump and a string of curses behind him. Luxans had tough skulls, but that didn't mean that they would spurn a hard hat. Then, Stark ducked through a doorway. The rest of them followed him into another room.

This room was a little larger. There were wooden beams covering the floor, and a small table and chairs in the middle of the room. Despite this, the damp had done its work here too. The floorboards felt soft and rotten, they bent and moved constantly underfoot. The table might once have been metal, but was now made out of rust held together with rust. Only one of the chairs still had four legs.

"Hello."

A young woman rose from one of the chairs. The woman was tall and slender, and she had legs, Crichton noted. Although she only had the two of them, she seemed to have an abundance of shapely legs, of which Crichton thoroughly approved. Crichton allowed his inspection to continue upwards, past other features which met with his complete approval, until he reached her face. The young woman was smiling. She had long dark hair which spilled down over her shoulders. She kept her face down-turned so that it overhung her pale, oval face. The rest of Crichton's inspection was cut short as Aeryn surged forwards and caught the woman by the throat.

"Who are you? What have you done to him?" Aeryn snarled.

Crichton caught hold of Stark as he tried to rush forwards. He stared at the woman's face.

"You're not her!" Aeryn said, the words slurring with suppressed anger. "She's dead!"

Crichton's eyes widened as he realised what Aeryn meant by that. The girl had black hair, with blue strands running through it. Her face was a pale blue colour and was also hauntingly familiar. Take away the hair, add a few years and some chloroplasts, the young woman could have passed for a certain Delvian priestess' twin.

The woman gasped. Her face was contorted and turning a deeper shade of blue. She grasped at Aeryn's hand helplessly. She choked out a few desperate words. "Please, wait... I didn't -"

"Aeryn, stop."

Stark shrugged off Crichton's grip. He stepped forwards, his eyes suddenly rational, his bearing still and dignified.

"She is not Zaan. I know that." he said slowly. "Some men, some evil men found her, found me, made her look like Zaan and forced her to deceive me. They made me do things, terrible things and they hurt her if I refused." Stark's eyes were beginning to take on a haunted quality again but his voice was still measured and emotionless. "It doesn't matter now. They can't hurt us any more. Can't hurt anyone any longer."

Aeryn maintained her rip for a long moment, then reluctantly released the blue skinned woman. She staggered, rubbing at her throat, then almost immediately went to Stark's side. She looked into his face, her own expression curiously intent. Aeryn glared at her darkly.

"My name is Cailan. Stark helped me once, so now I do what I may to help him." she paused and dropped her attention down to the floor again. "And the resistance."

"The resistance?" Jothee echoed. "They are here? When do we get to meet them?"

"Now."

A man stepped into the room. He regarded them arrogantly. "I'm sure you have a lot of questions.

Two more men, far larger stepped through to flank the first man, but Crichton barely spared them a glance. He laughed, just a little wildly.

"Looks like the gang's all here – small universe," he mused. "Hello Bracca."