Emblems Saga: Call of the Emblems

The Katti's Chosen

"It's not just about living forever, Jackie. The trick is still living with yourself forever."

Planet Veran, Kathleet Colony System Phron, Lycian Space

The Jiorg Spaceport was a busy place. Not surprising, considering it was the main spaceport for the capital city of the colony. This unfortunately meant that one sad, frazzled man was left to wait and search for another just inside the main lobby, in a crowd of thousands.

"This is ridiculous," the man said, pushing his deep purple bangs away from his eyes. "Even if I knew what she looked like… I hate this job."

He looked down at the printout of his assignment.

Being freelance hardly meant things were free. In fact, it was quite the opposite. That his training as a Mage Pilot required doing this kind of work, working for near pittance and dealing with… people, had nearly made him quit. The only reason he, Erk Flogherty, a self described hermit/isolationist, even continued was because his teacher was deceivingly good at weaving words.

Erk shook his head and glanced again at the printout. 'Lone Cleric of frail disposition and marvelous personality requires escort to Ostia. Reward of Five Thousand Credits upon arrival.' Of all the postings on the local 'Net, this one sounded the easiest. Taking into account his skill and the relative safety of travel to and from Ostian Space from within Lycia, this was clearly wasting his skills. All the better.

Besides, aside from finding the client, how hard could escorting a lone Cleric be?

Imperium Outpost 4438, Imperium Space side of Imperium-Elibean Neutral Zone

The hallways of the three deck space station were quiet. Normally, only the standard thirty man crew was stationed there. Yet, for the past three standard weeks, a sleek, orb shaped ship sent from Section 4, the Central Intelligence Corps, had been parked just outside the station. The two occupants of the ship had remained onboard the outpost, the elder monitoring communications being intercepted from Elibean space, while the younger kept all prying eyes away from their work.

The eldest agent, a tall woman wielding her long light-blue hair like a wall with which she isolated herself, currently aimed her piercing red eyes at the monitor screen inside of a recently emptied monitoring room. Behind her, the much younger agent stood, facing the other way, ensuring the evicted station crew didn't attempt to return. They were ordered to avoid unneeded deaths, so the normal procedure of dumping them out the air lock was out of the question. His short hair matched in color to the woman, as did his eyes, red as crimson. To any observer, the hair, eyes, and facial lines made them obvious siblings. But the black armored body suit the boy wore compared to the white jumpsuit clearly set them apart.

"Any time now, Ninian," the boy said. "The crew is getting antsy. Don't forget to erase the search algorithms. Quantum doesn't like it when no name military grunts learn our secrets."

"Nils," Ninian said, slowly letting her eyes take in the data scrolling across the screen, "I only agreed to take you on this trip because it was low priority and you promised, promised, to behave. I know you want to go blow them out the airlock, but that is not behaving."

Nils' mouth scrunched up as he repressed a sneer. "Yes, sis."

"Good boy," Ninian said. Without taking her eyes away from the screen, she reached back and patted her brother on the head, ruffling his hair. "Don't worry, we're almost done."

Nils grumbled something under his breath, his eyes never leaving the entrance. He was positive that the crew was on the other side, trying to eavesdrop on them. It was beyond irritating to withstand his agent training. No witnesses usually meant no witnesses, unless it meant witnesses who didn't witness what they thought they witnessed.

The more he thought about it, the more he thought the old man spouting poetry while he was being trained had lost touch with reality. How the hell does anyone witness something without witnessing it? No matter, he wasn't one to question orders as explicit as the ones given for this mission, especially when his sister was right behind him.

"And…. Done." Ninian stood, turned, and walked away from the console. She left the room, Nils on her heels, just moments before the door swiftly slid shut. Then a dull thump rippled through the station.

Nils cocked his head as he watched several of the stations crew open the door only to let billowing smoke fly into their faces. Shouts of fire and commands for order filled the air as the fire sirens started going off.

"I thought you were going to refrain from using explosives, Ninian?" Nils asked. He still had his arms crossed, his unhappiness with being left out of the fun written across his face like the child he was.

"Orders are orders," Ninian said with a shrug. "Erase all evidence of existence, without killing anyone."

The two stopped next to a round hatch. Ninian passed her hand over the security panel and watched lazily as the iris opened. Revealed was a stretched out umbilical tube connecting to their Sphere. The siblings ignored the red lights flashing and sirens blaring in the station as they left to board their ship. By the time the umbilical had retracted and the fire was under control, the Sphere was long gone.

"So, where are we headed?" Nils asked. He leaned back in the copilot's chair with his hands cupped behind his head. "Are we finally done with this border mission? These space rations are starting to give me indigestion."

Ninian shook her head and smiled as she focused on piloting the ship and handling the controls. "Nope, we're headed to Elibe." The space around the Sphere seemed to be a mass of writhing blues and greens, the telltale signs of warped space-time.

Nils yawned and nodded, his eyes halfway closed already, the low hum of the engines putting him to sleep. "Oh really, fun-WHAT?" Ninian stifled a small laugh as Nils bolted up right into a wide-eyed upright position. "We're heading into Human Space? For real! I thought this was just an information run! This is awesome!"

"Calm down Nils," Ninian said. She shot her brother a look but couldn't hide her smile. "This is a big opportunity for you. If you pull this mission off right, you'll probably get Rank."

Nils' wide grin threatened to split his face open. "I can't wait! I'm going to finish this mission so good they won't have… I just thought of something."

"Oh?"

"Yeah… who convinced Mother to let me do this, and Quantum to allow it?" Nils watched his sister closely. Though she didn't give anything away with her body language, he knew she was the only one who could have pulled this off, to his knowledge. Quantum, that self-righteous piece of analytical technology, was too uptight to allow it and Mother was too worried. That was unless someone convinced them to let him go for a price. "You vouched for me and you're my controller," he said, as the notion dawned on him, "aren't you?"

"Yes." Ninian remained silent for but a moment before she continued. "Is that going to be a problem?"

Nils frowned into his lap for a moment. A controller was responsible for making sure a potential agent knew what the assignment was, and if the worst came to pass, that they were silenced before they were a threat to the Imperium. Failure meant death. There was no practice run. This meant that he either succeeded in this mission, or his own sister would kill him, likely without any hesitation.

"No," he said, shaking his head. Now he had to succeed. He didn't want to die, but he really didn't want to force Ninian to go through something like that. "But why! Why would you do this to yourself? If it were Jahn, it'd be easier for him, but… Are you sure you can do this?"

"Of course," Ninian said. She looked over at him and smiled warmly. "I know you Nils. You're more than capable of completing this mission. I have complete faith in your abilities."

Nils swallowed the lump that had formed in his throat. Part of him was extremely happy. His sister was that confident in him. She believed in him. It wasn't like he didn't know that before, but it felt good to hear it. The other part of him was terrified. His sister had just smiled like when he'd come in the door after playing in the mud when he was very young. The fact that it was his life, or death, was perfectly clear by this point.

It also clarified some things to him. Now that he knew what the next mission was, his test mission, he sat in his seat contemplating his thus far short life. Illuminated was how his sister had risen through the ranks so quickly and where the 'Ice Bitch' nickname came from. If she could kill her own brother without shedding a tear, then what couldn't she do?

Planet Caelin, Capital of Caelin State, Lycian Space

Far from the bustling center of the Caelin Stock Market or the other centers of regional power, on the perimeter of the city, stood a relatively old mansion. A high fence of bars and wire surrounded the building and its grounds, with teams of men patrolling the perimeter. Inside the house, on the second floor, in the master bedroom stood one Ludgren Blitzkrieger.

He stared out the tall window of the mansion, watching the night pass by, as if he were searching for something out there. He received no answer but his own reflection and the occasional lightning bug blinking at him. It was quite peaceful, at least on the surface.

Behind Ludgren lay his brother, Hausen Blitzkrieger. He lay on the bed, his face gaunt and boney, like the life had been sapped from his body. This was to be expected, but Ludgren put on a face to make it look like he was also suffering, if only for his brother's sake.

"Has there been any news," rasped Hausen. "Any… news from the detectives."

"No, dear brother," Ludgren said, his voice dripping with false concern. "Please, be done with this foolish desire. Rest now. You know the doctor said you might recover now that the fever has passed."

In truth the Governor's body had grown used to the original poison and was metabolizing it too fast. A new serum had been devised though, one with different symptoms, but the same result. Ludgren smiled inwardly as he contemplated his future.

"No," Hausen said, more forcefully than he appeared capable of. "I must know, before I die, what happened to my daughter. I will not die, until she and her family is found."

Ludgren turned away to hide his grimace. 'Why won't he just DIE?'

There was a knock at the door. Ludgren put on a smile and went to the door. The servant handed him a note, bowed, and left. Closing the door, Ludgren opened the note and walked slowly back toward his brother.

"What does it say, Ludgren?"

"Nothing important," Ludgren said, making sure to keep the note away from Hausen's view. "Just a notice that the legislature is trying to pass that silly tax bill again. It's likely to fail, once more, pay it no mind."

"As long as that's all…" Hausen said. His voice, already soft, trailed off as he appeared to doze off.

"Sleep well, brother," Ludgren said, a cruel smile appearing on his face. Silently, he crossed the room, quietly opened the door, and slipped from the room. Once in the hall way, Ludgren made his way down to the main floor and stepped into his office.

Once inside, he made sure to lock the door and activate a small round device that looked like a large stone paperweight with a push of his thumb onto its top. The stone paper weight hummed for a few seconds in a frequency that was almost too low to hear, before it beeped once.

Two beeps meant the room was insecure. One meant he was free from prying eyes. There's never been more than one beep since he'd come into possession of this device.

Pulling out the note again, Ludgren opened the folded piece of paper and read it aloud. "Master pleased with your work. Wishes to make another deal. You're wealth will increase one hundred fold. Speak: Enus Eoah Teius Finum"

As soon as he'd finished speaking the fourth word, there was a loud snapping noise and the paper burst to flames in his hands. The first time this happened, he'd dropped the paper in fright. The flames reached out and consumed him and he fell to the floor, moaning in despair as he thought he was about to die.

This time, he let the flames consume him and when his vision cleared, he stood in darkness. Just as before, he'd been transported to someplace else. He had tried to find out where, but all his inquiries had returned was superstitious nonsense.

"I take it, that's a yes, my lord Ludgren?" asked a deep voice, which to his ears sounded strained. As if the speaker wasn't fully in control of his own speaking.

"The new poison is working better than expected," Ludgren said. He looked around as he tried to get his bearings, but nothing was visible. "I know you're a man of your word."

"Indeed," the voice said. It almost sounded pleased. "I wish to start a rebellion in Lycia. The end result will be a single Kingdom, like Bern was before the popular uprising a hundred years ago."

"History said the old King of Bern was the richest man in the galaxy," Ludgren said, his voice breaking as he realized how rich he could be if he allied again with this stranger. "But why me? Surely, there are others who would be more capable of assisting in this… endeavor? Not that I'm saying no. I do wish to participate."

"Ah, ever the politician. Take the deal or… well, let's just say you'll die before your brother does if you say no."

Ludgren swallowed as a lump formed in his throat. "O-of course, I say y-yes! Yes!"

"Good man. Master will be pleased. Let me tell you your assignments then."

Ludgren nodded and listened as the man began speaking of conspiracies to start, rumors to spread, plans to start building, and other things this 'master' wanted done. Internally, his mind was reeling, seething. Did they really think they could use him? As soon as he got what he wanted from these bastards, he'd cut them off. Or better yet, he'd hold them hostage and tell them what to do. No one used Ludgren Blitzkrieger and got away with it.

Deep Space, Sacean Expanse

Batta the Beast grinned, a foul sight if ever there was one, as he stepped from the cockpit of his mech. After taking a look around the hangar of the little Sacean ship, he found himself standing over the power relay that allowed the hangar bay door to open and close. With a snort, he activated his vibro-axe and dropped it onto the cables, severing them in a shower of sparks.

"Oh my," Batta said with faux concern, "look at what I have done. How clumsy of me?" The beastly pirate snorted and pulled his axe from the dent in the floor. "Next, I'll just go to the bridge and kill anyone in my way. I bet the Taliver or Ganelon Gang would love to get their hands on this ship. Hehehe, pay day for Batta the Beast."

On his way to the bridge, Batta jumped out into hallways, leaped into unoccupied rooms, and destroyed doorways into empty closets. Nothing and no one appeared before him. When he got to the bridge, and also found it empty, an unsettling hunger filled his gut.

"Ahhhh!" Batta shouted. He swung his axe and totally demolished the defensless seat in front of him. "Where is everyone! Where's the mayhem, the pillaging? Don't tell me that one little girl is the only one living on this hulking piece of space junk?"

"You are trespassing, pirate. Leave now. Security teams have been notified. This is your last warning."

Batta looked up at the speaker embedded in the ceiling and sneered. "An AI, huh? We'll just see about that." He de-activated his axe and moved over to a console and pulled a small cube with glowing red lights forming the pattern of a skull and cross on it. After placing the cube on the console, he watched as the red light filtered down into the blue backlit console, turning the blue to red as the cube began executing an auto-hack program. "Let's see how you like that, you snarky little artificial bitch," Batta said and grinned.

"Warning! Hacking cube detected. Hacking program attempting to penetrate system. Firewalls being breached. Electronic Engineers, please attend."

A sudden noise from in the hall way caught Batta's attention. He whirled about and ran out, gleefully activating his axe and laughing as he went. Once in the hall, he barely saw the tail end of a furry tail disappearing down the hallway into a hatch.

"So there is someone in here!" Batta crowed. "Come out, come out, wherever you are! Hahahaha!" Batta's laugh grew demented as he moved his large bulk down the hallway. Left forgotton, the red cube continued its attack on the now completely red console. Slowly but surely, the red over took blue.

Outside the ship…

"Work," Lyn muttered. She reached out with her hand and grabbed at thin air, but her attention was beyond the canopy where she was watching the mech hand attempting to grab a small lever on the side of the hull. "Work, please work!"

Unfortunately, the fingers of the mech's hand were too large. The forefinger and thumb couldn't get a hold of the lever, no matter how hard they tried. To add insult to injury, the power decided to run out at that very moment, shutting down the mech.

"No! Damnit! Crap!" Lyn took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Okay. This is bad. But not as bad as it could be. I'm still alive. And that means I can still do things. Okay. I need to get my helmet on. Yeah… and stop talking to myself. That too."

Lyn took another long breath and reached for the helmet in a box to the left of her seat and at the same time activated her EV Suit's re-breather system. The pockets of air sewed into the different areas of her suit began their job of releasing oxygen and taking in carbon dioxide from inside the suit. She'd have about ten minutes before she would need to stop moving so the system could recycle enough oxygen for her to act again.

The suit was good for short term repairs on the ship's hull, but beyond that, it was in the hands of a higher power. It used to have a larger tank that went with the get up, but she traded that for a week's worth of food several years ago. In retrospect, that wasn't the greatest idea.

Then again, she didn't ever expect to be in a situation like this. As she attached the helmet and made sure the seals were air tight, she wondered if she had been deluding herself thinking she'd never ever have to fight in space. It certainly seemed like a foolish notion now.

Everything was in place. All she needed to do was hit the eject button and she'd be vaulted toward the hull of her home. She placed her hand over the eject button and paused. Her heart was racing and she could feel a bead of sweat trickling down the back of her neck. She closed her eyes, squeezed them shut, and let all the emotions surrounding her come into their full. Her head swayed for but a moment before she pushed them all down again with a firm force of her willpower.

Her nerves calmed, Lyn opened her eyes and smashed her hand onto the button. The ejection process was quick, there was a small pop and a loud hiss that quickly vanished into the vacuum of space. Then she was free flying through weightless nothingness.

Just before she smashed into the hull, she kicked her foot forward. The gesture added a spin to her course for half a second. Then her feet clamped onto the metal surface of the hull and stopped her forward motion with a soft jerk.

Lyn let out a strained breath that she hadn't realized she was holding. "That was… easier than I thought it would be. First time for everything, I guess. Now, to the hatch…" She lifted her left foot from the hull and used her right as leverage to push her body forward. Then she placed her left foot back down onto the hull. When that foot was attached to the hull again, she did the same with her right foot.

"Right… Left… Right… Left…" she said with each step. "Right… Le-ugh. Talking… to myself… again. I can't believe I miss talking to that stupid computer." Lyn shook her head and continued her slow, but steady march. Around her, the vastness of space was alive with starlight, a view enviable by anyone who was stuck planetside. It did little to suppress her growing anxiety, which was making her gut get all wobbly as she walked. "I have to hurry," she said, "I can't… stop."

Inside the ship…

"You stupid animal!" Batta screamed at the door. "Get out here now! I promise… I won't hurt you. Much."

"You've convinced me," came a voice muffled voice from the other side. Batta frowned as he waited for the door to open. Instead, the voice said, "You've convinced me you're as stupid as you are ugly. Honestly, asking a poor little kitty like me to open a door to a brute like you. Do you get laughed at by all your ugly pirate buddies when you're together for how stupid you are? I know I'd laugh. Hahahaha, see, I'm laughing too."

A vein had, by this time, popped out from Batta's forehead as a snarl continued to make his face even uglier than it had been before. He activated his axe and raised it to slash at the door, but just as the blade was about to hit, the door suddenly slid open. Momentum carried him forward and into the room several feet.

"And now you've won the Idiot of the Week Award," the cat man said. "Congratulations! Bu-bye!" With that, he was out the door. Batta roared as the turned around and chased after him.

The chase continued for several minutes, the cat man always one hallway ahead. Yet it always seemed that fuzzy little tail was there to show him the way. After a while, this got old, and Batta got bored. But he wasn't going to give up. He knew what to do with rats you couldn't catch. Better to make them come to him instead.

"Fine!" Batta shouted down the hallway. "I'll kill you later. I got better things to do." He turned and went back down the way he'd come. Randomly choosing a door, he opened it and slipped in quickly. Then he closed the door and waited. Pushing his head against the door, he listened for sounds outside.

Several minutes passed. He was beginning to think that the cat man wasn't going to show. Then he heard it, the soft padding sounds of the blasted beastman. Batta grinned, revealing his nasty rotten teeth, as he waited for the foot steps to stop. That grin only grew when they stopped directly in front of the door he'd hidden in.

Taking a quick silent step backwards, Batta gathered up his energy and smashed open the door with a single slash of his axe. The momentum of his attack blasted the fragments of the door into the hallway, and the cat man. The door remnants and the cat man crashed into the opposite wall.

"Hehehe," chuckled Batta. "Look at what the cat dragged in." The cat man groaned as Batta bashed aside the remnants of the door with his axe. With one hand, Batta grabbed the cat man and lifted him into the air, choking him. The feeling of the soft flesh squishing in his large hand sent a wave of ecstasy.

The sudden loss of air and the increasing pressure on his throat woke the cat man from his daze. He struggled to pull Batta's oversized fist off his throat as he choked on his own tongue. Batta sneered.

"Pathetic animal," he snarled. "Did you really think you could take on Batta the Beast? I'll show you a real fight." Batta whipped his arm around and tossed the cat man into the room that he'd been hiding in. There was a loud crash as the cat man hit the other side of the room.

The lights flickered to life when Batta hit the activation switch next to the door, revealing a room full of swords and training dummies. The cat man had hit a rack full of katanas and caused them all to fall to the floor when he hit it. Breathing raggedly, the cat man had already pushed himself to his feet and a naked katana was in his hands.

"Oh ho ho!" Batta chortled. "Thinking about fighting back are you, pathetic little kitty? Well then," Batta raised his axe in front of him, "let's do this."

The two dashed at each other, the cat man with surprising speed. In the seconds it took for the two to attack, the Batta's axe cleared the distance and smashed into the blade of the katana. When the vibro-axe knocked the blade from the cat man's hands, Batta grinned.

"So much for that," Batta snorted. The cat man, knocked back from the collision of attacks, growled. "Is da wittle kitty mad?" Batta said, taunting the cat man. The cat man's eyes narrowed and he fell onto all fours. "Oh I don't think so," Batta said. He rushed forward and smacked the cat man between the eyes with the blunt side of his vibro-axe. The cat man slumped the rest of the way to the floor.

"Hehehe," chuckled Batta, "You'll fetch a good price, alive or dead, on the black market. Don't know what you're doing way out here, but who cares."

Batta de-activated his axe and lifted the cat man onto his shoulder. Then he turned and was about to leave when he saw someone standing in the doorway. It took him a moment to recognize it as the girl from the fighter. She was still dressed in her flight suit, so she must have rushed straight here.

Lyn was breathing hard as she gripped the sword that she'd found lying on the floor. If she had to guess, it looked like the cat man had tried to defend himself, to no avail. But it looked like he was still alive, so not everything was lost.

"Let him go, monster," Lyn snarled. Her eyes narrowed when the hulking pirate grinned.

"What luck," chuckled Batta. "I'll get loads of creds for you and this beastman. I'm just full of luck today."

"Rot in hell," Lyn growled. "Drop him or I'll drop you."

"Not with that sword," Batta said confidently. "My axe took a bite out of it when this fool tried to stop a Vibro-axe with it. Idiot."

Lyn shifted her stance and lifted the katana into an offensive stance from her former neutral stance. "I'll take that as a no, then," she said. She sprinted forward, bringing the sword up for a high slash.

Batta grinned and activated his axe. The green hue of the vibrating molecules that formed the blade hummed to life as Lyn approached. At the same moment, the cat man was dumped onto the floor.

Batta swung at Lyn first, missing her as she ducked under the green blade. Lyn took the opening and got in close to Batta. She brought the katana down in a horizontal slash before she kept going, ducking into a roll using the last of her momentum.

She popped up again several feet away and spun around just in time to hop to the side as Batta brought his axe down. She'd gotten him though, clearly shown by the long red gash on his front, but it appeared to have only served to anger him. The fact that he still wasn't dead yet inflamed her ire.

"I've had enough of this shit! Just DIE!" Batta screamed, spinning around with his axe, attempting to just lop Lyn's head off. Lyn snarled and dropped into a backwards roll. Instead of popping back up, she sprang forward off of her heels when they hit the floor. This extra burst of speed proved too much for Batta, who was still in the midst of his last attack. Unable to stop Lyn, she brought her katana down on his unprotected arm.

The force of the attack was so savage that the blade, though it snapped at the gouged out point, it took his entire arm off just under his elbow. Batta cried out in pain and grabbed his arm with his only remaining hand. Lyn didn't waste a moment though, and spun around, swinging horizontally. Batta's cry turned to a wet gurgle as his throat was ripped open and a fountain of blood shot into the air.

"But… I can't…" Batta rasped, as he fell back like a slab of stone, "Gahhh…." And then the great beast of a man's chest stopped rising and Lyn knew he was dead and her ordeal was over. Gasping for breath, she dropped her broken blade and stared down at the man who'd died in front of her.

"I can't… believe I did… that." It took several minutes for her to realize she'd fallen to her knees. Everything was spinning. As darkness swallowed her vision, her body slumped to the side.

Some time later…

Waking to find herself in her bed when all she remembered was blood spurting like an over pressurized fountain from a soon to be dead man's neck, was the last thing Lyn expected. She immediately stood and, just as quickly fell back onto her bed as her head swam. This wasn't supposed to happen. She was supposed to kill one, and then the next, and then the next until her family's blood debt had been paid. Why was she reacting this way to just killing one. The pirate scum deserved no better.

Lifting a hand to her head and felt something sticky and wet. Slowly getting to her feet, she moved to her mirror and tapped the button next to it to activate the backlighting. She nearly gasped when she saw herself. She looked like a demon straight out of hell, covered in wet blood, her hair thick with the substance. Her image brought unwanted memories to her mind. She looked like one of them! The stench of the blood made her vision blur.

And then he was standing behind her, covered in blood just like she remembered him. The blood of her parents. She stood there, frozen in terror, as the ugly face of the pirate cracked open and grinned.

"Now you're just like me," the man murmured, amusement hidden in the deep trembling notes of his bass voice.

"No!" she cried. Still, she was unable move. It was like some foreign power held her feet to the ground. "Noooo!"

"Yes!" the pirate boomed. "Just like me! A murdererrrrr!"

Lyn looked from the man's sly little grin and back at herself in the mirror. Slowly, her face grew covered in more and more blood, as if she were sweating the damning evidence of her foul deed. And then, her reflection's expression changed. She was looking at herself smiling, enjoying the blood flowing over her, as the pirate behind her laughed harder and harder.

"No!" she cried. "No! I'm not a murderer!" The laughter got louder and louder, echoing in her ears as the mirror got larger, and her grinning, bloody face with it. "Nooooooooooooooo!"

Lyn's eyes popped open and she snapped awake and out of her bed faster than she ever remembered having done. Her heart was racing as she tried to catch her breath. Her mind wouldn't stop running laps as it tried to come to grips with where it was now.

Was that a dream? Did it really happen? Was any of it real? She reached up to her head, but gone was the sticky remnants of the man she'd killed in the training room. And there wasn't anyone else in here with her.

"That was… it is… I'm… okay. Yeah." Lyn nodded to herself. Moving to the mirror she reached to turn the back light on, but paused for a moment. Doubts began to filter into the back of her mind as she remembered herself smiling, reveling in the bloodshed. She shook her head and turned the light on.

The image revealed was her own face, clean, for the most part, but it wasn't smiling at all, much to her relief. There was some grease on her cheek, but that wasn't out of the ordinary. Her fears abated, she turned the back-light off and made her way out of her room.

What she found outside was a mess. There were gouges everywhere along the hallways and several doors were lying in pieces inside the rooms they used to guard. As she made her way to the bridge, she passed by that room.

The training room was surprisingly empty, aside from the large red stain on the far side. Relief flooded her system when she realized that she didn't have to see his body. The fact that the first thing she felt was relief, or any apprehension at all, was confusing.

"Why am I so riled up about this?" she asked herself. "All of this because of some silly dream? Besides, I've known this day would come eventually." She looked down at her hands and pursed her lips. "Though… I suppose no amount of training can prepare you for what actually happens. But it's too late to worry about this now. I've got to get to the bridge."

Along the way to the bridge, she found more gouges in the walls and floors. One wall even had a hole large enough for her to fit her head through. Since this was right next to the bridge, she was wondering what could have caused that kind of damage as she walked in to find the cat man attempting to type something at one of the control consoles.

"Hey!" she shouted, going on the defensive. This was her home, after all. Letting some stranger access her home was like asking them to come in so she could expose herself to them. "Get away from there!" She crossed the bridge as quick as a flash and was immediately attempting to stop her guest from doing whatever it was he was doing.

"Gh… Halt!" He shouted in his broken Sacean. "Com… broken. Pirate dishonorable backstab!"

"What?" she asked. "What about the pirates? They're all dead! Now get up already!"

"No!" the he shouted. He stopped fighting her and pointed at the console's screen. "Hail! Hacking pirate backstab!"

Lyn froze at the word 'hacking'. She turned to the screen and read what amounted to a error notice that the ship's computer was now dead. Immediately, she let go of the cat man and let her shoulder's slump.

"Great," she said, "just great. Now we're stuck in the middle of nowhere, with no computer and no mechs to defend ourselves. We're probably lucky to even have life support and lights." The lights took that opportune moment to dim until they were gone, leaving the computer console's the only source of illumination.

Nodding, Lyn slumped into the captain's chair and groaned into her hands. The cat man looked back and forth between the console and the Sacean girl, then he stood. After moving to the other side of the bridge, he pointed at a large stack of data processing nodes piled up in the corner and pointed at it.

"AI heart?" he asked. "If no honorable… uh, guiding light, then use torch?"

Lyn looked up from her lap at the cat man, her eyes half lidded as she looked at him. "I'm sorry, but I haven't a clue how to help you. I'm a Sacean on a ship, her own ship, and I can't even fix it anymore. Saceans are supposed to be the best Techs in the galaxy, but no, not me, I'm just one screw up after another." Lyn sighed in defeat and put her head back into her hands. "I can't even kill a pirate without turning into a wobbly mess. I'm a disgrace to my parents, my tribe, and my people."

A hand fell onto her shoulder. It was warm, and firm. She looked up and into the eyes of the cat man.

"All life is sacred," he said, "but to protect the sheep, buzzards… uh… birds… ugh… Wolves! Wolves must be slain. Take heart, in the honorable protection from wolves." The cat man smiled, apparently happy with his increasing vocabulary and in an attempt to encourage her. "Also," he added, "Persevere and live free." He thought for a moment more and then nodded, satisfied with what he'd said.

Lyn sighed again and nodded. "Thanks. I think."

"Hail!" The cat man shouted. "Com broken. Apply healing herbs, yes?"

She nodded. "Yes, apply healing herbs. I suppose I can't just give up. If I'm going to get strong enough to avenge my tribe, my parents, then I'm going to have to get stronger. I can't do that sitting here, in the dark."

Though the words sounded right to her ear, they felt hollow even as she said them. Despite that, she stood and forced her legs to hold her up. Once on her feet, she moved to sit in front of the computer console and studied the display screen.

After closing the notification window that an error had occurred, it continued to pop back up, repeating the message. Notable was that the response time for the pop up window was less than a second, since it came back almost immediately. This, she concluded, meant one of two things. The message was a ruse, meant to cause discord in the crew too blinded by panic to dig any deeper. Or, the pirate had successfully locked the system down so nothing was going to happen no matter what, in which case panic was well within her rights.

"The only way to know for sure is a hard reset," she said, thinking aloud. "If it's an executable, then when Bee reboots, it will run a scan and delete any infected or corrupted files, and everything will be restored. If not… then we better hope some miracle occurs and a transport flies by us."

"Faith in the Great One," the cat man said, "you succeed with honor."

Picking up her step as she moved quickly out of the bridge. "It better work," she muttered, "his Sacean is getting worse."

"With honor!" the cat man shouted again.

A/N: The ending of this chapter was completely different three times. I wanted Lyn to have issues with actually killing, since this is her first time, because she's not some homicidal maniac on a revenge bender after the deaths of her clan. That was ten years previous and while the pain is constant, in some ways, she's coped with the loss. So I guess my imagination decided to experiment with different ways of having Lyn deal with this first kill, or rather, second kill. She did take care of the one guy in the mech back in chapter three, but that wasn't as close and personal as actually cutting his neck open and watching him die.

War is a gruesome thing, and I wanted Lyn's reaction to that to be more realistic than "Oh, I killed one of them nasty evil pirates, let's go save grandpa!" I hope the result is believable and not too wangsty.

On a more positive note, most of the important cast members for this leg of the story have been introduced, so I should be able to keep the character jumping to a minimum now. Thus leads me to this:

Next Chapter: Planet Bulgar, largest Sacean planet by population. It is here where the real adventure starts, or so a sad little tactician thinks.

Constructive criticism and comment welcome. Thanks for reading.