Part 6 : The Fine Print
January 2003 – The Compound

1 : Dave

"Ray, are you sure you've got them this time?" Dave asked over the phone, anxiously looking at the alien device that was sitting on his desk. The communicator would come alive any moment now, and Van's questions were never easy. Especially when Max was still running for his life somewhere in the Rocky Mountains.

"Positive," Ray answered, confident this time. He'd been tracking the kids for over seven months now, a low blow for his pride if there ever was one. "They've just checked in to a motel. My men are scouting the area as we speak. If everything's fine, we'll get them by midnight tonight. And—shit! The Unit is moving in this direction!"

Dave's heart seemed to stop for a second. Three days ago the kids had barely escaped the Unit, and that was news he did not want to give to Van, but would have to anyway. Van always had a way to finding things out, and it would do Dave's plan no good if the rebel leader didn't trust him.

Not to say Van trusted Dave at all. That man didn't trust his own shadow.

"Ray?" he anxiously asked when a full minute had gone by.

"I'm not sure, Dave… I think… I think they are going to start the search tomorrow."

"You have to move now," Dave said, trying to sound calm and composed. If Ray noticed he was not, he didn't say. He had problems of his own.

"We will. I'm gonna make sure the Unit stays way off track while my men take care of the operation. If things go according to plan, you'll have them there before the sun rises tomorrow."

Ray hung up at the exact moment Van's communicator came to life. Dave had thought at some point it would be fun taking the little device apart and putting it back together, but one stern warning from Langley had made his wandering hands wander away.

It wasn't Van's voice that came through. No, this time the voice belonged to Luke, Van's second in command. Where Van was guided by loyalty and a sense of duty, Luke was guided by a practical view of things. Khivar was not the right man for the throne, and Zan had been. Or at least, Zan had been better, and that made him the choice Luke wanted.

"Seven months is a long time to have our king missing," Luke's rough voice not so subtly accused.

"We found him, and he should be safely here in about ten hours," Dave said. No greetings, just straight to the point. He couldn't blame them, really. Being in the middle of a civil war always made it a priority be quick and efficient.

"Make sure he is. But Day-ve," Luke paused, Dave's name slightly mispronounced, "Zan's will must be followed. If he does not agree to stay under your protection, you'll arrange for his safety conditions to be met. We will not tolerate our king running for his life any longer."

"I will certainly give him the option to leave once I make sure he's safe and healthy," Dave said, deciding the particulars of his plans were his own business. It was a risky move to withhold information from the Antarians, but damn if Dave trusted some 19-year-old's instincts to hold the future of the entire planet in his hands.

"There is another matter we wish to discuss," Van's voice took Luke's place, younger, vibrant, and with hardly any accent at all. He sounded slightly out of breath. Although Kal had told Dave that the communicators were very capable of holographic imaging, it also made it riskier for their talks to remain private. Van hardly ever called him, and when he did it was always as a package deal: he would call Langley first, and Langley would give Dave the heads up. It was in both men's best interest to be prepared.

"Yes?" Dave cautiously asked. There never was any other matter to discuss but where Zan was, and what was being done to ensure his safety. Ever. This change of subject did not bode well to Dave's strategist mind.

"I want those humans dead." The coldness in Van's voice made a perfect match with the bitter winter outside the compound's walls. There were only a handful of humans Van knew about, one of them Dave himself. That Van wanted him dead was not an unexpected feeling, but telling Dave straight out would not seem the best way to go.

"I beg your pardon?" Dave asked, in a perfect imitation of his father's British accent.

"Every single one who hunted him, or is hunting him now. I want their names, and I want them dead."

Dave's eyes looked at the communicator in stunned silence. Those men were following orders, was not going to cut it. The only reason why Van didn't want the entire United States wiped out was because he couldn't afford it. Yet.

"I'm—I'm not sure I can… find them all," Dave said, trying to think fast. That Van wanted some sort of retribution for crimes against his king was understandable. That Dave had to hand over an execution list was not.

"You will," Van stated, no arguments there. "And we will see to their demise. That is our right."

Van wouldn't be able to spare any of his men for some time, so as long as he was out there and not right here, those agents would be safe.

For now.

2 : Ray
January 2003 – The compound
Six hours later

"You want me to get their names?" Ray asked, confused. He had barely finished the delivery of six unconscious teens to Jake's capable hands not even two hours before. "We already have their names."

"I know we have the current list of agents. I need every single agent involved when Max was captured by the Unit."

"The mighty Dave couldn't hack into it?" Ray teased, but lost the smile when Dave didn't look amused.

"The records have been deleted. When Agent Pierce disbanded the Unit two years ago, he was very thorough in his work of erasing it from existence. There must be a printed copy somewhere. Archived files. A list on a napkin."

"Most of them must have returned when the Unit re-formed a year ago."

"That's probably true, but not enough. We need to make sure the list is complete."

"It may take a while…" Ray cautioned. Dave nodded somberly. "Is there something else I should know about these kids?" Ray asked at length. There were very few uses Ray could think for a list of this type, and none of them were good.

"Just that they have powerful enemies out there. I just need to make sure I know all of them."

"You always find the weirdest people. With the weirdest problems attached, if I may add," Ray said sincerely. In his years of work with Dave, he'd been asked to do many, many things; it didn't mean he didn't find them strange half of the time, and stranger the other half. Danielle, their French cook, was probably the strangest of them all, up until last night, when he'd kidnapped honest-to-God aliens. Was that technically abduction?

"Jake says I have a knack for it," Dave murmured, his mood not improved in the slightest.

Ray placed a hand on the desk to catch Dave's attention. "Hey. It took us too long, true, but we finally have them. In ten years, these kids are going to look back on this day and think this was the best thing that ever happened to them."

For a moment there, Dave's eyes clouded with shadows of fear. But the next, he finally smiled. "You didn't seem all that happy when I approached you, if I remember correctly," Dave pointed out.

"What can I say? I was young, naïve and you had way too much information about my personal life. Aren't you used to it by now when people go running in the other direction when you appear from the shadows with a box full of surprises?"

"It always seems like a good idea when I'm doing it," Dave said thoughtfully. "I don't know. I guess I always imagined someone picking us up when we were kids, with a box full of surprises and no secret agendas…" Dave said wistfully. Ray stared at him. It was incredibly rare for Jake or Dave to talk about their past, that this was a rare insight into it.

"What would you offer yourself? I mean, if you could do it right now, what would you say to your younger self?"

The day Dave had come with his offer, Ray had been a desperate father in need. He'd been dishonorably discharged, but he'd happily gone to the mother of his child. Only to find the child and not the mother. Stranded in a foreign country, without friends, money or contacts, life had become hell.

"Am I rich?" Dave asked, his head slightly cocking to the right.

"No, you're a poor devil in need of something fast. You know—think of me, when you found me."

Imagining Dave as a poor devil was actually hard. Dave and Jake had the same brains, but where Jake was soft, Dave was practical. Where Jake liked things nice and easy, Dave was cunning and resourceful. Dave probably thought Jake's life was boring, while Jake thought Dave's way was too risky. How two people as different as these two had become life-long friends was a total mystery.

"I would ask for a computer with internet access," Dave said, leaning on his leather chair. "I would make a counteroffer, see how far this Dave person would dare to go. I would just start from scratch."

And build this life back, Ray finished. That was what he liked about Dave: he knew exactly where he wanted to be, and how to get there. He smiled at the man's honest answer.

"I'll get you your list," he said, turning around and leaving Dave's office, completely missing the guilt ridden look those words instilled in his boss.

3 : Ash
January, 2004 – New York City

The strangest aspect of their new home planet was picking a name. Not only were their true names barely pronounceable here, but they lacked ethnicity. It was not the same to be called John Smith, than John Schmidt, or Juan Vasquez or Hareharekrishna. One's skin color, speech and traditions had to match with one's name, because getting it mixed up raised all kinds of alarms and questions, and totally defeated their main purpose of being invisible.

Kal Langley had explained it all the week before when they had just arrived, all tight bundles of energy and excitement and wonderment. Now, seven days later, things were starting to get less star-struck and more practical.

They were so eager to get outside and guard their king, that their headquarters felt more like a cage than their new command center. Yet a routine had to be established, rules to be approved and followed. Adjusting to this new life, on this new planet, living among 7 billion aliens, could be scary some times, but none of them were backing down from their duties as Guards. None of them ever would.

And their duty this morning was picking a name.

Hundreds of pictures were scattered over the dark blue rug, each one with a brief info that made little sense out of context. Being a female or male, young or old, white or black, was dependent on their mission, but they had to choose a base human form, one to fall back on in moments where they had a quiet time to themselves or when things were so hectic or dangerous that choosing that form would be an automatic reflex.

Shifters were neither "girl" or "boy". Or rather, they could be both. Because men had more appeal as soldiers when it came to perception, shifters were, as a general rule, all male in form, but their minds could be either gender, some days feeling more female than male. There were few that were locked on a specific gender, like Luke, and they had no problem with sticking to it. Most of them, though, picked two forms, because one never knew what the day would bring.

Antarians had no gender issues. They had genetic ones, but this world was barely contemplating getting out of the former to know what was awaiting them with the latter.

He wanted a small form. He was more of the mind that innocent looking creatures were the best disguise, the one his enemies would approach without their defenses on high. The main problem on Earth, though, was that no human could know they were here, and that ruled out shifting in public. If he chose a form that was not practical in as many scenarios as possible, it would be a disadvantage to himself and a disservice to his king.

"So, not too young," he murmured, practicing his English out loud.

The one grateful thing about his first mission was that all his targets where in the same country. And the great thing about the United States of America was that any ethnicity was allowed. He could be black, white, yellow and all the shades in between, with hardly anyone batting an eye.

"Not too big," he said, placing face down the images that he was rapidly discarding. His eyes kept changing color as he subconsciously matched the ones in the photos. Blue, brown, green, his irises adjusting without a second thought.

Within two minutes, he was staring at 21 candidates to be his next face.

Van said he could not tell a human and an Antarian apart, and all shifters smiled at that. The differences were so obvious to them, it was painful, but to the untrained eye—one that didn't have to disguise itself every day as someone else—he guessed he could see why.

As he stared at the face of a mid-twenties male, Ash was unable to not see them: humans' faces were more rounded, where Antarians' were sharper, longer. Noses were slightly too small in humans, along with the size of the irises and eyelashes. Their bones were heavier, and their muscles not as flexible. Human hair grew at an alarming rate, and they lacked the skin patterns on their backs that Antarians had.

When Zan came back, his alien-ness would be easy to hide, but it wouldn't pass a close inspection. Everyone knew in Antar that Zan had been genetically modified to survive on Earth, but most didn't know that, physically, Zan was about 90% human. Yet ironically, that was what gave Ash the certainty that Zan's reign would be the best thing that could happen to shifters: their very own king would be as much a product of genetic manipulation as they were. It was almost as good as having a shifter on the throne.

Khivar was using that rhetoric to induce fear in the population. Claiming that bringing someone from the dead was not just a crime against nature, but against their very own selves. Immortality, Khivar had said the last time Ash had heard him address his subjects, is the worst form of selfishness. Those who are gone have made room for those who will come, the new ideas, the new blood that has to replace the old. To live again is to take away the rightful place of those who had not yet lived.

"Well, here's a little replacement for you, Mr. Usurper. We are going to replace you with the newer version of Zan."

"Talking to yourself out loud is never a good sign, you know?" Violet said, the only one of the Invisible Guard who preferred a female gender at all times. She'd picked Asian for her form, long, straight black hair cascading at her back, an impressive feat. Hair was difficult to maintain consistently between shifts, for one, and long hair was reserved for royalty. Yet another difference between our worlds.

"Just trying this language out while picking a form. You picked yours rather fast," Ash said with approval, wondering if having long hair would be a big deal.

"I asked Kal what kind of woman looked both smart and athletic, and out of his suggestions…" she trailed off, striking a pose to show her form. "The eyes take a little getting used to, though," she said, blinking a couple of times, her thin eyebrows arching, giving her a comical look.

"All the differences are annoying," Ash said, picking five photos. "I still haven't decided myself. God, but the human body has way too many muscles!" he added, studying the body of a chocolate-skin man. Antarian bodies would never bulk the way this guy's had. It was physically impossible to augment their muscle mass that much. Shifters, on the other hand, would have no problem, but keeping that form would take practice. A lot of it.

"Maybe you should do it backwards, like Jade and I did," she suggested, getting a closer look from her place behind him. "Pick up the name and then go see what looks like it. Or use a form from your own name, something Earth-sounding."

He looked at her with a skeptic face. "There are so many variables, really…" he murmured, breaking his own name in bits, trying to see if something stuck. Ash doesn't sound half bad, except that it didn't match the faces that were looking back at him from his printed copies.

Violet sat down beside him, taking the five photos out of his hands. She promptly discarded three, and left two. One man, one woman.

"He's rather tall," he said, slightly narrowing his eyes while he contemplated the pros and cons about this form. Yellow hair reached to this man's shoulders, crystal blue eyes looking a little dazed. He was from some place called Australia, and the information card warned that there was a different speech pattern to learn.

"Then just be a girl," she said, shrugging.

He took her form, appreciating the slim figure. She laughed out loud. Taking the same form was usually considered taboo among shifters, except when they were picking forms.

"You're right, the eyes feel odd," he commented, playing with a few different adjustments until he fell back to his Antarian form. "I don't think I can decide today," he said with a frustrated sigh. He started to pick the photographs that were turned down, piling them into a stack, and Violet started to help. Soon, she picked one that he had set aside: Zan's photo.

She changed into Zan, her eyes glued to his image. For one second, it felt as if she were truly Zan, and Ash was Guarding him, all this training left behind, his mission over, finally fulfilling his destiny.

"You think he'd… talk to us?" she whispered, losing Zan's form and taking her own. It was against the law to impersonate the king except on duty.

"Zan was the most vocal proponent in equal liberties for us, even letting us out of the military life if we chose to. You've seen the archives. He saw us as people. He never feared us."

"He had a Seal to protect him," she said, fearful eyes turning to look at Ash, knowing her words could be interpreted as treason.

He placed a hand on her forearm, looking her straight in the eye. "Van wouldn't have chosen wrong. And he talks to us, all the time… at all times," he added, eliciting a smile from her. Being a rebel did not keep office hours. "But I think… I think we'll Guard him from the shadows long enough to get to know him, you know? By the time he comes home, we can decide to stay here. Earth is far enough, and diverse enough, for us to get lost in."

"Like Kal thought he was doing?" she pointed out in a somewhat troubled manner, her eyes going back to the photos, her hands sorting them out in stacks.

"I guess… I thought you liked Kal," he said as an afterthought. Kal was the only shifter who'd served Zan long before Zan had taken the throne. And the only surviving shifter from the original mission.

"I do, I do… It's just… Why did he wait so long? If Van hadn't made contact, Kal wouldn't have bothered, that much is clear. Don't you see? Kal doesn't think Zan is there, or is ready, or whatever. Kal is willing to forget about Antar's life and soul, letting our former leader grow old on an alien world, in an alien body… What if we change our minds, too? What if we betray Van by not believing in his dream?" she barely whispered, her eyes still looking at the now empty rug, her hands in fists.

"Hey," he said, getting her attention back. "We'll learn, we'll watch, we'll Guard. By the time this is over, we'll make a decision. If we stand by Zan, or if we stand by ourselves. We're not fighting to remain slaves. We're not even fighting for Van, when it comes down to it. If this Zan is not the man we want, nothing, and I mean nothing can hold us down to this war."

He would be haunted by those words for the next seven years.