He almost wanted to laugh; that was what Cain would have done, what Saber would have done. Just laugh, and laugh, until he started crying, screaming, or choking. He didn't particularly care which at this point. The sound of the infirmary doors sliding open once again, bringing Slade's attention back to the present before the hysterical laughter bubbling up in the back of his throat could become anything more than a momentary discomfort, was both a welcome thing for him, and kind of annoying at once.

Still, he supposed that hysterical, nigh-maniacal laughter wasn't really the best thing for someone's peace of mind.

"My complete transformation didn't take; I'll end up just like Dad."

He heard Saber's sharp intake of breath, then his younger twin sighing. Digging the fingernails of his right hand into his lower-thigh, just above his knee, Slade tried all the harder to swallow the hysterical laughter bubbling up at the back of his throat. He knew that it wouldn't do anyone any good if he broke down now, of all times. When the doors opened and the rest of the Space Knights came in, Slade tried to breathe more deeply in an effort to calm himself down.

It was much easier to think of than to do; it still felt like there was something stuck in his throat.

"What's going on in here?" Ringo asked. "Saber? Slade?"

"Fate is a cold-blooded, sadistic bitch; and I think she has my number," he said, his voice quavering with the effort of swallowing back the mad laughter bubbling up at the back of his throat.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Mac asked.

None of them really had anything to say to that; not him, not Shara, and not even Saber.

"We don't want to intrude, but we're like a family here," the Commander said; Slade would have smiled if he hadn't still felt like his throat had been filled with broken glass. "And, if something is bothering you, then we'd like to help. Shara? Saber? Slade?"

"You see, the reason that I came is to tell you all about the trees that Darkon has sent to the Earth: they're his secret weapon." Shara said, bringing his attention – and probably Saber's, too – back to the here and now.

He hated the here and now, but it wasn't as if hating it would do any good.

"We've been studying them; they seem harmless, given everything we know," the Commander said, as calmly as he ever had.

"Yes; that's what he wants you to think."

Shara seemed to be trying to turn so she could sit on the edge of the bed, or else she wanted to stand up, so Slade moved to help his and Saber's sister get comfortable again, even as he saw Saber doing the same from the other side. He almost asked Shara if she was doing all right, but that would have been a stupid question for any number of reasons; all of them completely obvious.

"Shara, is there anything we can do for you? Anything at all."

0101001010

"Thank you, Commander Jamison, but I'm afraid I don't have much time left." She was grateful that Ness and Cain had managed to find such kind people to take them in; with everything that had happened to them in the past – and given everything that was going to happen to them in the future – they deserved all the kindness they could find. "That's why I must tell you about Darkon's master plan: if those plants are allowed to keep growing, the Earth will be overrun by the Radam."

"Can you tell us exactly what the trees are designed to do? They don't seem to affect anything." The Space Knights' Commander said; he seemed like such a calm, reasonable person.

It was an almost painful reminder of their father. "They will, after the flowers start to bloom."

"Flowers?" the blond Space Knight, standing at the front of the group with their Commander, asked.

She knew that it was a strange thing to consider, that flowers could be dangerous to anyone; but she knew better than anyone just how badly appearances could deceive someone who hadn't been forced to face the full horrors of the Radam for themselves. She just hoped that she could stop this horror, even if she wouldn't live to see the end of it. "That's right; and, when they bloom, it'll be all over. And the same nightmare that happened to me, Slade, Saber, and our family will happen to all of you; one by one." She could almost see it happening, in her mind's eye; the nightmare image that had haunted her ever since she had recovered her own mind inside the teknopod that had all but devoured her: "They will cover the entire Earth; and when the flowers bloom, the pods from the trees will envelop every living human, and transform them into Radam slaves. They will use the people of this planet to invade other worlds, and enslave other lifeforms." It had happened before: the Nandorians and the Shir'ana were only two of the peoples who had been entirely enslaved by the Radam, though they were admittedly the ones most often used to make Teknomen. "They won't stop until they've conquered the entire galaxy."

Darkon himself was a Nandorian; and, though she knew that not many people would have understood why she felt the way she did, Shara found that she felt sorry for him. Not Darkon himself, of course, but the host: the innocent Nandorian whose body Darkon had stolen. She didn't even know his name, but she knew that he had to have been suffering just as much as any one of them.

Maybe even more: Nandorians were creatures of open grasslands; they spent their days hunting their next meal, or farming the foods that they had once traded for passage on space ships, or working the metals that some of them had once mined. Of course, all of that had changed once the Radam had discovered them. Just like things had changed for Earth, now that the Radam had discovered them.

Still, Shara knew that Ness and Cain – they would never really be Slade or Saber to her; just like she would never be Teknoman Dagger – were as determined as she was to make sure that humanity didn't share the fates of the Nandorians or the Shir'ana; and she knew that her older brothers had a much better chance than her of making sure that nothing like that happened.

Still, she at least had to make sure that the Space Knights truly understood the creatures that they were facing: "The Earth, and life as we know it, will be forgotten."

"We're not going to allow that to happen," the blond Space Knight said.

"You're going to have a tough battle ahead of you: Darkon has already hatched four new evil Teknomen."

(Three guesses who those are,) Cain's mental tone was almost as bitter as his laugh; it almost sounded like a dog barking.

"Looks like we're about to have more trouble," the blond Space Knight said. "Darkon's just cooked up four more super-fiends."

Ordinarily, she wouldn't have liked to hear her eldest brother described like that; but Spear wasn't her brother. "The four new Teknomen are Axe, Rapier, Lance, and Sword. They're about ready to head toward Earth."

"Where are they currently?" the Space Knights' Commander asked.

"Close; very close," she said, shuddering again at the thought of just how close Darkon and all of his forces actually were.

"How close is close Shara?" Cain asked, clearly trying to be kind; it was still obvious that he and Ness wanted to know the answer to that question just as much as any of the Space Knights that they worked with.

"They're inside Darkon's moon base." She breathed deeply once, gathering her remaining strength for what she was going to have to say next. "After Father was certain that you and Cain had escaped, he self-destructed the Argos. The explosion damaged Darkon's vessel, and it was forced to make an emergency landing on the moon's surface. Darkon's ship, like any of the Radam's ships, is more than just a machine: it's a biomechanical organism that is programmed for self-repair. In the mean time, he's using the ship as a command center for the invasion of Earth."

"I never knew what happened to the ship," Ness muttered, sounding as if he was angry with himself for not finding out more; he really did tend to take too much on himself. She was glad that Cain was still with him; the two of them had always acted to balance each other out so well. "And, all this time it's been Darkon's secret base on the dark side of the moon."

"That would explain why no one ever managed to find it," Cain said, sounding thoughtful. (I guess it also explains why Slade and I were so… obsessed with the moon back then. Bastard was calling to us.)

Wrapping her right arm around Cain's neck, and her left arm around Ness', Shara tried to comfort them as best she could; she didn't like to think of that, the fact that Darkon had still been calling out to her older brothers even after they had managed to escape him, but it seemed like something he would do. Darkon wasn't the type of creature who could ever allow something that he considered his to be outside of his control.

None of the Radam were, really.

011001010

It had been so long since he'd been aware of his body, that Axe had almost forgotten that he'd had a body to be aware of in the first place. Now, however, with the chamber he'd been confined in for so long that he'd almost forgotten himself bursting open, Axe found that he was both relieved and rather curious about what was going to happen next. After all, there was little chance of them being awakened in full armor like this without a very good reason.

When he stood up on his own feet again, armored as they were at the moment, Axe found himself taking stock of his current situation: there were three others standing to the left of him; and, after a few moments of contemplation, Axe found that he could recall just who it was that he was looking at. Just to his left, tall and lithe, with pale-colored armor and a prominent spine on his chest, was Lance; next to him, almost as tall, but with smoother lines to her armored form, was Sword.

He couldn't quite see the last member of their little group – he was at the wrong angle for that, and their fourth was too short to see over Lance's and Sword's heads in any case – but Axe knew that he was there: Rapier, the youngest of them; the little rabbit he'd trained so well.

Feeling the subtle, not-quite-telepathic pressure on his mind, Axe turned with the rest of their new group. Standing just before them, his red eyes glowing through his dark visor as he regarded them all, was Lord Darkon himself.

(Axe, Lance, Sword, Rapier.)

(We hear your commands, Lord Darkon,) he said, bowing his head respectfully.

(We await your orders, mighty Darkon,) Lance answered in his turn.

(We exist to serve you, Lord Darkon,) Sword said, her tone as respectful as any of theirs.

(We live to carry our your will, Lord Darkon,) Rapier said; Axe smiled slightly.

The little rabbit had clearly learned his lessons well.

(It is good to know that all of you are awake; however, as you may have already realized, this is not an occasion for idle chatter. Slade and his traitorous twin brother are still alive, and they continue to hinder our efforts to expand our territory. I wish for you four to meet up with Spear so that you may handle this problem. Permanently.)

(Yes, sir,) he answered quickly.

(We obey!) Lance answered quickly.

(We will not fail you!) Sword called back.

(As you command!) Rapier answered.

As the four of them made their way deeper into the ship, toward the sense that he had of where Spear was, Axe reflected on their current circumstances. He wasn't exactly pleased to know that two of his students had not only attacked one of their own family members – not to mention one of his own students – but were even now attempting to defy the very being that had granted them both new lives and greater power than any human that had ever lived.

Axe couldn't understand why anyone would reject that kind of power; the glory that Lord Darkon had offered them all, but he knew very well just how loyal Slade and Saber were to each other: where one of them went, the other was never far behind. They were going to have to deal with that – going to have to deal with them – now that Slade and Saber had clearly chosen what side they were going to take in this war. And, knowing that Spear – that Conrad – had been so badly injured in his efforts to bring the twins back to their family and the only people who would ever truly care about them…

Well, that changed just about everything.

1101010001

As Shara pulled the two of them closer, Saber wrapped his left arm around her, and felt Slade doing pretty much the same on her other side. This wasn't easy for any of them, so they were all doing their best to give each other strength. Didn't mean he hated the situation any less; damn the Radam for doing this to them, anyway.

"Darkon is physically unable to leave his base on the moon," Shara said. "You must attack soon; to destroy his ship, before the repairs are completed."

"There might be some issues with that; particularly considering the four new Teknomen he's going to have to throw at us, and all the trouble we've already had with Spear." He didn't particularly like being a killjoy, but well… there you had it.

"That's correct, Saber," the Commander said, nodding slightly to him. "If any of us go into this half-cocked, we'll be no match for them. We'll need to make some plans. Tina? We'll need those charts."

(I know you always want to plan everything out, so there's less chance of things blowing up in your face, but… I just don't feel right about this.)

(Yeah; I know. Still, the last time we tried to take Spear on without working on a plan, he pretty much rammed it down our throats. And that was before he had four more of… the others to call on. So, yeah; I don't feel much better about giving him any more time than we have to, but if we go off without a plan, then he's probably going to kill us.) And that's if we're lucky, he added, silently in his own mind.

Slade laughed softly, once; it wasn't a happy laugh. (Well, you always were smarter than me.)

(Just because you're impulsive doesn't mean you're stupid,) he answered, leaning his left cheek against Shara's head; none of them were quite at their best right now.

"Shara, do you have any other information that you think would be helpful to us, with regards to Darkon?" the Commander asked, looking down at the three of them with an expression that seemed kinder than the stoic one that he usually wore.

Saber was grateful for that; god knew they could all use a little kindness right now.

"I'm sorry, Commander Jamison, but I'm afraid I don't know anything else," Shara said; Saber wrapped his arm more tightly around her.

When he felt Shara tensing, Saber shifted slightly to let her lean more completely against his left side, and wished that he could do something more for her, somehow. Still, even if this was all he could do – just sit beside his and Slade's sister and try to give her at least some of his strength – he'd give it his all just like he did with all of the important things in his life.

010100100

She could almost feel them; the four of them were awake now, under the command of Darkon. All of them: Mr. Goddard, Katherine, Shinji, and even Sam… they were all his slaves now, just like Conrad had become. She hated it; and she hated it all the more for the fact that she couldn't do anything about it.

(This is probably a stupid question,) Cain said, his telepathic voice as soft and kind as anyone could ask for. (But, are you not feeling well, Shara?)

(I can feel them,) she said; she wouldn't have wanted to worry the only remaining family she truly had, but there wasn't really any way to avoid that. Not with everything that was happening. (The four of them are all awake, now.)

(I guess that explains the tensing,) Cain said, letting her lean her head against him; Shara sighed.

She could feel the weakness induced by her condition dragging her down almost like a physical weight; a stone around her neck.

"Shara, is there something bothering you?" the Space Knights' Commander asked kindly; Shara sighed again.

"It's nothing you can really do anything about, Commander Jamison," she said, leaning more heavily on Cain as she felt the sheer fatigue that she had been trying harder and harder to push away with every passing moment. "Thank you, though, for your concern."

"Do you want to lay back down, Shara?" Cain asked, the worry in his tone something that she hadn't wanted to hear from any of the little family that she had left. "You seem tired."

"Thank you, Cain," she said, feeling her previous tiredness pressing down all the harder on her once more.

"C'mon," Ness said kindly, standing back up. "We'll help you get tucked back in."

"Thank you," she said, not liking the way she was forced to lean heavily on both him and Cain as she struggled to stand back on her own, two feet. "Both of you. I'm glad… that I could have at least one more day with the two of you."

"We're glad about that, too, Shara," Cain said, though the smile on his face was more wistful than she had ever wanted to see on her cheerful older brother.

She tried to smile, just to see if she could help her older brothers – the last of her brothers – feel better; they smiled back, but she could still tell that neither of them were particularly happy about the situation. She wasn't, either, but she knew better than anyone here that nothing could be done about that. The only thing that any of them could do was to adapt.

1101001001

As he and the others finally made their way through Lord Darkon's ship, Axe took a moment to orient himself with Spear's mental signature once more. He knew in general where the four of them were going, but the sheer sameness of the vessel could sometimes be rather disorienting. Of course, he could perhaps be excused for his lack of familiarity with the vessel they were all staying aboard, given the fact that he had just been released into the vessel itself merely and hour or so ago.

When his mental sense of where Spear was in relation to the rest of them grew strong enough that he could track on the actual direction that his oldest student could be found down, Axe smiled slightly under his helmet. Yes, there might have been a more dire purpose behind their release from confinement at this stage – and yes, one of his own students had been grievously injured by two of those who should have rightfully been on their side – but having the chance to move again, unconfined by the artificial womb that nourished him for so long…

He might not have known precisely what any of the others were thinking, but Axe would have been rather surprised if they had felt any differently about the matter.

110101001

When she and the Commander had both settled themselves down in front of the workstations that the Commander had used when he'd worked on the virus that had got Ringo and Star into the AEM's base so that they could help rescue Slade and Saber, Tina had wondered just what would happen next.

"It doesn't look good, sir," Dr. Fraun reported, bringing Tina's attention back to the present from where she had gotten a bit lost in the simulations that she had been constructing.

"I see," the Commander said; Tina squared her shoulders and tried to focus her attention firmly on what she was doing.

"Here lass, why don't you drink some coffee?" Mac suggested, setting down a cup – creamed and sugared just the way he knew she liked it – by her left elbow. "You've been at this for quite awhile," he continued, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw him setting a cup down near the Commander, too. "Take a break, or you'll go walleyed."

"Thanks, Mac," she said, glancing over at him.

"I had a talk with the doctors," Mac said, she could see him standing just behind the Commander's chair on his left-hand side.

"What did they say?"

Mac sighed. "I'm afraid Shara doesn't have much time left."

The Commander himself sighed, then. "What a shame; so young." Tina felt the silence between the three of them stretching out, but she didn't really know what someone could say to something like that. "It has something to do with the fact that her body rejected the Tekno-system."

"Blasted plants," Mac snarled.

"Yes, indeed," the Commander said calmly.

"Do Slade and Saber know what's happening to her?" Tina asked; she kind of suspected that she already knew the answer to that, but hearing it from someone with the Commander's authority had always seemed to make things like that more real, somehow.

Of course, sometimes that was a very good reason not to ask questions like that.

"I'm afraid so," the Commander said. "The medical staff says there's not much they can do."

"That's awful; they must feel so helpless," she said, turning back to her computer screen and trying to focus on it; these simulations that she and the Commander were working on together were probably their best chance of stopping Darkon before he and his forces could do any more damage to Earth.

"I get it," Mac said. "You wouldn't have let either of those lads go out there even if Saber hadn't been all for staying here and planning things out. You knew that his sister's condition was too unstable to trust to luck, so you didn't want either of those lads to be too far away when the worst started happening. I'm sure they'd have been happy to know you'd been thinking about them, sir."

She was pretty sure about that, too; still, Tina knew that the Commander wasn't one to take any credit for things like that. Just like when he hadn't said anything about why he'd developed the new weapons system for Pegas that had allowed Slade and Saber to finally beat Spear after all he'd done to them.

110101001

Sighing softly, the aches and pains in her body dragging her attention back to the nightmare reality she was being forced to endure, Shara opened her eyes. Her vision cleared almost immediately – yet another reminder that she wasn't really human anymore – but the sight of her older brothers' gentle faces helped to banish what little misgivings she had. At least, the ones that weren't related to the facts of her condition.

"Hey, Shara," Cain greeted; his smile as gentle as it had ever been, but with an undertone of sadness that Shara would have given almost anything to be able to erase.

"Are you feeling a bit better now?" Ness asked; her eldest still-human brother's expression was just the same mix of worry and kindness that she had seen on Cain.

"Not really," she said, feeling her body slowly shutting down even as she continued to speak with the last of her brothers.

"Hi, Shara," Star said, smiling gently. "Is there anything we can do for you?"

She only had to think about that offer for a moment. "I want to go to the ocean."

"Oh? Why there?" Star asked.

"Because, the ocean was where we all played together as children."

For just a moment, with the three of them gathered together like this, Shara could allow herself the luxury of remembering how things had once been. She could even see, in her mind's eye, the way her older brothers had looked when they were both ten; long before any of the horrible things that had happened to all of them were even a distant premonition. It was kind of painful sometimes, thinking about the times that they would never have again, but she often felt that someone should remember those times.

The times when they had been happy; when their family had been whole.

"Let's go, then," Ness said, smiling a softer smile than she had seen from him since the two of them had met up with each other; Ness had been impulsive when the mood struck him, and she was glad to see that at least that hadn't changed about him. "We can go right now, if you feel well enough. What do you say?"

She loved the fact that the eldest of her remaining older brothers hadn't changed so much that she couldn't recognize him, but… "I think I'm well enough to go, Ness. But, I don't want to go until it's morning."

"Why's that?"

"Because, I don't want to look at the moon," she said, turning to lay on her side.

She heard Cain's soft sigh, just before the younger of her two older brothers reached out and gently took her right hand in both of his. "That makes sense, I guess."

"I'm tired," she admitted, feeling the familiar and so very unwelcome lethargy beginning to steal over her once again. "I need to sleep."

"We'll stay," she heard Cain say, his voice as soft and gentle as anyone could have asked for.

She wanted to say something in return, to at least thank Ness and Cain for the kindness that they and their friends had shown to her, but her failing body wouldn't even let her do that. The only thing that Shara found that she was capable of doing, to let her older brothers and their friends know how grateful she was for the kindness that they were all showing to her, the only thing that her failing body would allow her to do, was to smile at her older brothers and the women that they clearly wanted to share the rest of their lives with, up until the point when she lost consciousness entirely.

1010010001

As the four of them continued to make their way deeper into the ship, Axe himself in the lead, he at last began to sense Spear's presence. It had grown stronger, both from the steadily decreasing distance that remained between their group and the place where Spear had been sent to recuperate after the clash with his traitorous younger twin brothers, and because Spear had clearly regained consciousness by this point.

(It's good to have all of you here, even though I do wish the circumstances could be different,) he heard Spear's telepathic voice, suffused with a weariness that he'd never thought to hear from one of his own students.

Particularly Conrad, who was the eldest of them; still, he'd have been the first to admit that the circumstances they were all being forced to deal with weren't exactly easy on any of them. And, considering how seriously Conrad had taken his duties as the eldest sibling – particularly the part about guiding and protecting his younger siblings – it was bound to be harder on him than the rest of them. Axe would do what he could to ease the burden on the eldest of his students, but in the end he knew that nothing short of Slade and Saber being brought back to their side would truly help Spear's overcome his depression.

So, that was what Axe was going to focus on.

When the four of them reached the teknopod that Spear had been convalescing in, arraying themselves in a neat semi-circle around the pod as it continued to pulse gently, Axe smiled. Sure, the coming events weren't likely to be particularly easy on any of them, but with the five of them to Slade and Saber's mere pair of Teknomen, the odds would be stacked a great deal higher in their favor.

In the end, that was really the best that one could hope for under these circumstances.

(How are you feeling, Spear? Well enough to leave?) he asked; while it was true that Lord Darkon would want them to handle this situation with all the speed they could manage, Axe thought that he could at least offer Spear a bit more respite before they were forced to engage the traitors.

Not so much that Lord Darkon would take notice and be displeased by the action, of course, but enough so that Spear would have time to gather his resolve.

(I think that would be best, yes,) Spear said, not sounding entirely happy about that, but also resigned to leaving; as they all were going to have to do soon.

The teknopod shuddered and burst, releasing Spear back onto the floor of the ship, where he quickly reversed his transformation. He stood there for only a few moments, a melancholy look on his face, before Sword all but threw herself forward – armor vanishing in a flash of red – to wrap her arms around Spear's waist and kiss him deeply. He didn't hear what the two of them were saying to each other, their telepathic conversation clearly closed to anyone else, but the signs of such a conversation were obvious to anyone who knew where to look for them.

(Not that I really want to interrupt you two lovebirds, but I think we should really be preparing to leave soon,) he said, smiling wryly under his helmet.

(Yes, I guess you're right,) Spear said, still stroking Sword's hair gently as he continued to hold her. Kissing her forehead for a long moment, Spear forced himself away from Sword with obvious reluctance. "We should get going now. We have a lot to do."

"Well put, Conrad," he said, making his way over to the young man so he could clap an armored hand on his left shoulder; Spear smiled in response, though he still didn't seem entirely happy.

Axe didn't need to waste time guessing why.

"Come on," he said, turning his attention to Lance and Rapier. "Let's get going; the sooner we get dressed, the sooner we can move."

There were no words exchanged between the three of them, but the sound of armored footsteps on the hull of Lord Darkon's ship let Axe know that he was indeed being followed. That was good; it was good to know that at least some of those who had formerly been a part of the Argos' crew understood discipline. Disobedience annoyed him; and really, what else was this little rebellion that Ness and Cain had staged but disobedience on a grand scale?

As he, Lance, and Rapier made their way to what remained of the Argos – preserved not only for posterity but for far more practical reasons – Axe resolved that he would give Conrad all the help that he needed in order to bring Ness and Cain back to where they belonged. It was past time that those two acknowledged the responsibility that came with the incredible power that they had been granted.

He would see to it that they did so, and not only that, but also that the two of them made reparations for what they had done to Conrad; what they had done wasn't something that anyone was supposed to do to their own family.

1101010001

Even now, she could smell the gasses that the teknopods were releasing into the air; the way they were making things more comfortable – more suitable – for the Radam Teknomen that they thought they were going to be breeding here. She hated that smell; it only served to remind her all the more of just how much the world had changed; just how much damage the Radam were doing to their home.

Still, even in the midst of all the changes – all the damage that the Radam's invasion had done and continued to do – there were still some things that remained.

"I remember how we used to love to play in that old lighthouse," she said, looking up through the mist at the lighthouse atop the cliff. "It sure doesn't look the way I remember it, though."

"It's changed a lot; everything has," Ness said, his sigh ruffling her hair in passing.

"I know a lot of things have changed," she said; she couldn't help but know, given what she had seen, and what she was smelling even now as they stood just on the edge of the beach. The scent of the teknopods was at least being blown away by the clean breeze off of the ocean, but with… what she was now, she could still smell the scent of the teknopods. "But it still feels good to be out here; it reminds me of the good times we had together."

The times when the three of them had still been part of a larger family; times that would never come again. No matter how much she wished that things could have been different.

"Come on," she said, wrapping her arms around Ness' left and Cain's right. "Let's go take a walk."

"Of course, Shara," Cain said, smiling. "Whatever you want."

As the three of them made their way down the beach – the farther they could be from both the sight and the scent of those horrible teknopods, the happier Shara would be – Shara tried not to wonder just how close Conrad and the others were to making planetfall again. They would come when they came; it was really best not to worry about that before it happened.

Worrying never helped anyone, she knew.

101010010

Sitting before the banks of computers, scenario after scenario playing out in the virtual space before him, Hamilton Jamison could not help but think back on what he had learned. Not only about the two young men who had come to the aid of the people of Earth when they had most needed it – though the price that they and their family had paid was not one that he would have ever wished on another living person – but what Shara had told him about the Radam. More specifically, the location of the leader of the invasion.

There had not yet been an expedition to the dark side of the moon; the Space Knights would be the first there, if he and Tina could make this work. When he allowed himself to think in that direction, Jamison felt that it was a rather sad thing that the first human landing made on that for-the-most-part-untouched surface would be an act of war rather than one of discovery.

Still, needs must; in the end that of all things still held true.

"Running contingency program for lunar assault: base-to-target retaliation; lunar ground assault; air-to-land missile assault."

"All right, Tina," he said, pleased with her diligence but wanting to explore other options all the same. "Now run the covert-ops simulation, and compare it with the other programs."

Before he could say anything more, however, the comm. unit that had been placed in this room – so that he would not be out of contact with his people even when he was hard at work with simulations such as this – activated. However, it was not one of his own Space Knights displayed on the screen.

"Well Commander, hard at work?"

"I'm in the middle of battle-simulations, General," he said, not particularly interested in whatever Gault might have wanted to say to him. "I'll need to get back to you."

Just as the fingers of his right hand were poised over the button that would deactivate this room's comm. unit, Gault spoke again: "Oh, you'll want to talk to me, when you hear why I've called. I have the Thunderhawk."

"You have the Thunderhawk?" he echoed; he didn't want to believe that even Xercese, with all of his arrogant pretensions, would be willing to use a weapon so terrifyingly powerful as that monstrosity.

"That's right, Jamison," Gault said, his smile letting Hamilton know that – more than likely – the General wasn't bluffing in this instance; would that he were.

0001010001

Feeling the sand squishing between her toes, over and over again as the surf she was standing in washed up above her ankles, Shara laughed happily as – for just a moment – she imagined that the rest of her family, even beyond Ness and Cain, was relaxing on the beach just behind her. It was a nice, happy fantasy; the kind that could only be truly sustained by willfully ignoring reality.

Still, reality was the only thing that she could actually change; so, even as hard and cruel as it was being to them all right now, reality was what she was going to concentrate on.

"Oh my, it's so cold; but it feels good," she said, the sound of her own voice bringing her attention fully back to the present. "Ness, are you and Cain having a good time?"

"Yeah," Cain said; the fond, nostalgic smiles on both of her older brothers' faces let her know that – even though Ness seemed not to want to break the mood that had settled over them by talking – the two of them felt the same way she did.

"The two of you seem to like spending time with those women I saw in the infirmary," she said, thinking back to see if she could remember their names without prompting. "Star and Maggie, right?"

"That's right," Ness said. "Cain and Maggie are getting pretty close." Ness paused for a moment, seeming like he was thinking hard about something. "Star and I, though… we're jus- ow!"

Turning at the sound of Ness' exclamation, she found Cain smiling in that way he did when someone had annoyed him; then he kicked Ness in the shin again.

"Ness, are you in denial again?" she asked, laughing softly.

"No." Ness said, at the same time as Cain said "Yes."

She laughed, and then again as Cain shifted, folding his left calf under his body, and began to write something in the sand. Ness didn't seem to notice what Cain was doing, having fallen silent to stare out at the ocean the way he had been doing before the three of them had started talking. It was also something he did when he was embarrassed, so Shara was fairly sure that she knew just what he was thinking.

Or, what he was trying not to think about.

When she turned to look back at Cain, Shara giggled softly as she saw what he'd written in the sand. There was an arrow pointing to Ness, and under it the word "doofus" was neatly spelled out. Ness looked confused for a moment, before he looked down at the sand next to him.

"You're not funny, Cain," Ness said, in that deadpan way he did when Cain had gotten one-up on him, but he didn't want to admit it.

"If you say so, big brother," Cain said, his tone and his smile both telling anyone who knew him that he was humoring Ness.

It was clear that Ness knew it as well, since he gave Cain a stink-eye.

She laughed softly. "Well, I hope everything works out for the four of you. I hope you and Maggie get to travel around the world together, Cain, just like you always wanted to. And Ness, I hope that you and Star get married and have lots of children."

Ness looked away for a long moment, and Shara wondered what he could be thinking; the expression on Ness' face was as blank as he could manage to make it. When Cain leaned against him, wrapping his left arm around both of Ness' shoulders and letting Ness lean against him in turn, Shara knew that she had said something that would have been better left unsaid. She wished for a moment that she could take the words back, but that wasn't the way the world really worked.

In the end, all she could do was sit down behind her two remaining brothers, put her hands on both of their shoulders, and try to think of a way to help them feel better.

Of course, there were still a few things she could do right now. "Let's not talk about those kinds of things right now, okay? Let's just have fun." She cast back for a happy memory, even shadowed as they all were by what had happened; what was still happening. "We had a picnic, right here. Remember? All our food was out, and that big dog ate it up!" she laughed softly. "And then, Cain, you threw the pitcher of lemonade on it."

"Yeah. And then I chased it off, remember?" Cain said, smiling so that his bright blue eyes crinkled up at the edges. It was so strange, seeing the younger of her older brothers with blue eyes. Still, she knew that things could have been worse; they could have easily been so much worse. "I was all 'you darn dog'!" Cain laughed lightly. "Remember that?"

"Yeah," Ness said, chuckling. "Funniest thing I'd seen in awhile."

1101010011

Standing in the shadow of the Blue Earth, Star looked out toward the beach where Slade, Saber, and Shara were all sitting together.

"What do you think they're talking about?" she heard Ringo ask. "Can you hear anything?"

"No," she said. For one thing, the three of them were too far away from where she and Ringo were standing. But, more importantly, she didn't really want to intrude on their conversation. It was a rare thing; something just for the three of them, and Slade and Saber had already been forced to give up so much. "But they are laughing, so they're probably having a good time."

"Yeah, you're probably right about that."

She could tell that he was still curious about just what Slade, Saber, and Shara might have been talking about, but Star also knew that Ringo wasn't about to try disturbing them to find out. Really, that was all she could ask for considering the circumstances. She was curious, herself.

101010010

Standing in what had once been the main room of the Argos, Spear found himself confronted by an odd feeling as he watched his youngest brother – little Sammy, hatched at last – carefully tucking the gray three-quarter sleeve shirt that he had picked out of the limited selection that he had brought for himself when they had provisioned the Argos for their journey into the dark blue slacks that he had chosen to offset it. He could not place it, not at first, but when he found himself almost unconsciously moving to stand sentinel over the youngest of his brothers, Spear began to recognize just what it was that he was feeling.

He felt… hatred. A deep, slow-building feeling that seethed inside him even as Spear clamped down on his telepathy so that he wouldn't end up inadvertently projecting that horrible feeling to any of the other of his friends or the little remaining family he still had.

Examining the feeling for a moment, knowing that he could not fully regain his mental footing without knowing just what it was that had unbalanced him in the first place, Spear found that it was not his youngest brother that he felt such a disconcerting thing for. Of course not; he could have never harbored such a feeling even for Cain and Ness, not even now that his younger brothers had gone so astray. And certainly not for Sam, who was still here and at his side where he belonged.

Finding his eyes drawn to the back of his youngest brother's neck, below where Sam's spine linked to the base of his skull, Spear beheld the fitfully moving form of the small Radam creature that acted as a link for all of them. His hands were resting on Sam's shoulders, and for a moment Spear wondered just when he'd moved them, but then he found his gaze drawn back, once more, to the form of the creature firmly attached to the back of his youngest brother's back.

It was wrong; everything about this situation was wrong. Nothing like this should have happened in the first place, but… now that it had, there was really only one thing he could-

"How much time are you planning to spend thinking?" Axe asked.

Spear blinked harshly; had he been thinking about something? He couldn't quite remember. It was disconcerting, but before he could begin to think too much about that, Axe had spoken again.

"I know it's kind of a problem, but it's not something you need to agonize over," the eldest of their group – the man who had trained every one of the members of his family into the fighters that they were now – said, smiling.

"Really?" he asked, smiling softly as he raised an eyebrow; really, whatever he'd been thinking, it couldn't have been all that important.

"Really." Spear allowed himself to be gently edged aside, as Axe took his place standing behind Sam. "You still remember how much Sam enjoyed collecting scarves, don't you, Conrad?"

Spear laughed softly. "You know, after all that's happened, I actually had managed to forget about that."

Axe 'hmm'ed softly, a mildly disapproving expression on his face. "I suppose you have been under more than your fair share of stress, lately."

"Yes," he muttered; thinking of Earth, and the twins, and all of the troubles he'd faced concerning the two.

Still, with the extra forces that he now had on his side, Spear knew that – one way or another – dealing with his and Sam's wayward brothers would be a great deal easier from now on.

110101001

He almost asked Gault to repeat what he just said; almost unable to believe that even he was willing to go so far for the sake of his ambitions. But he was not one to deny the reality before him; just as General Gault, it was clear now, was not a man to listen to reason. Or even to heed the voice of experience when it was presented to him.

"General, you must know that to release a bomb of that magnitude is insanity! Reconsider!"

"I'm going ahead with it," Gault said, the light of his own, dangerous brand of certainty in his eyes. "My scientists have informed me that, if we fire the Thunderhawk into the Space Ring, the entire structure will be destroyed by the reaction. It's our hope that, when the structure of the Ring collapses, all of the aliens will be destroyed with it. Understand? Now, here's where you come in: I want you and your Space Knights to distract the aliens just long enough to give us time to fire the missile."

He turned away; this was just like Gault, jumping on the first, most obvious opportunity to solve a problem that he had been presented with. "General, I can't go along with your decision. If the Space Ring is destroyed, it'll fall to Earth and millions will die."

"Are you certain?" Tina asked.

"I've never been so certain of anything in my life: the Space Ring is held in place by a delicate balance of forces; if they fire the Thunderhawk, the explosion will separate the sections, and the gravity of our planet will pull them down upon us like giant bombs."

"This is the only way we can defeat these aliens," Gault said, sounding as purely callous as he ever had. "This is war; there are always casualties. A few people getting hurt aren't going to stop us from saving our race."

"That's horrible," Tina snapped, speaking for only the second time since Gault had contacted them with this mad plan of his. "How can you be so heartless?! These are people you're talking about! Whose side are you on?! You heard what the Commander said: when it hits, it'll be worse than anythingthe Radam have done to us! You can't risk the lives of-"

"Stop this insolence!"

"Please, General; you can't do this! All life is precious!" Tina said; swiftly growing as passionate as he had ever heard her become. "These people are counting on you to save them, not hurt them! Don't you have any family? Don't you know what it would feel like to lose someone close to you?"

As Tina lost the last of his composure, collapsing to the computer console weeping, Jamison felt that he could easily guess the true cause – one of them, because like all of those who had joined up with his Space Knights, Tina was not one to stand for injustice – of her vehemence in this matter. Shara's condition weighed heavily on them all.

"Enough!" Gault snapped, unmoved as Jamison had expected him to be. "I don't have time to debate strategy! Especially with underlings. We're firing at the Ring, and that's final."

"General, what can you possibly hope to accomplish?" he demanded.

"Destroy the aliens, of course!"

"You'll do nothing of the sort! I have information, some new information concerning the location of-"

The ringing of the attack-alarms, and a report from one of Gault's own underlings drew the General's attention then, and Jamison knew that there was nothing more that he could say to dissuade Gault from his mad plan.

"Well, Commander, it appears my plan has been put into motion, just remember to hold up your end of the deal."

"General, the aliens aren't on the Ring-!" he said, trying to catch the attention of someone levelheaded within Gault's forces. Someone who might have been able to stop that mad plan of the General's before he could carry it out.

"He's cut off the transmission!" Tina exclaimed; Jamison found his fists almost involuntarily clenching, Gault's constant search for self-aggrandizement at all costs had finally gone too far. "Commander, we have to stop him."

"I know, Tina," he said, once he had managed to regain what composure he could manage under the circumstances.

However, he was fully aware that, as things stood now, the Space Knights would need all of their forces to deal with him. And, with the Radam attacking once more, Slade and Saber were going to be unavoidably delayed.

0100100100

Back aboard the Blue Earth, Slade seethed quietly in his seat. Just one afternoon; just a single afternoon, that they could spend with Shara. Apparently even that was too much to ask. Looking back at Saber, not truly wanting to interrupt his younger twin's remaining time with their younger sister but knowing that he had to all the same, Slade saw Saber kissing Shara on her right temple.

"Sorry we couldn't have spent more time together today, but I don't think Darkon's particularly happy about you escaping from him."

"I know, Cain," Shara said, and he could tell that she was trying to smile more for the two of them than for herself; there wasn't much he could do about that as things stood now, but Slade hated it all the same. "Good luck out there."

"Thanks," he said; he still wished that the three of them had been able to stay together longer, but all the wishes in the world wouldn't change what had really happened on this day of all days.

"Well, let's get going," Saber said, with an easy smirk that Slade knew wasn't nearly as lighthearted as his younger twin was trying to make it look. "Those Spider-crabs aren't going to go killing themselves."

"Be nice if they did, though," he muttered.

"Well, it'd certainly make things easier for us," Saber said, as the two of them quickly made for the Blue Earth's air lock.

Once they had made it into the air lock, with the doors sealing behind them the way they always did, Slade called on Pegas even as he felt Saber invoking his own transformation. Breathing more easily once he could feel his and Saber's combat partner being launched out of the ship. And, even more, when he could feel that the transformation had completed itself.

Flying free from Pegas at last, he quickly joined up with Saber as the two of them backflipped onto the mech and rode it against the Spider-crabs coming down from the sky. Calling his lancer, Slade saw Saber doing the same. Tearing their way through the Spider-crabs that were swarming over the Command Center, Slade turned slightly to watch as Saber leaped off of Pegas with a burst from his thrusters.

(Good luck out there.)

(Yeah, you, too. Don't work too hard,) Saber said, his younger twin becoming enveloped in the bright blue light of his thrusters as he dove for the largest knot of Spider-crabs on the ground.

(I'll keep that in mind,) he said, looking out over the vast swarm of Spider-crabs still descending on them from the air.

Just then, the sense of someone else – four someones in particular – slammed into him with a force that Slade hadn't had time to prepare himself for even subconsciously. Whip-turning, even as he mentally called out to Saber that they had company, Slade confronted the one person he would have been perfectly happy to never see again: foremost of the Radam's brainwashed soldiers, Spear.

Only, Spear wasn't alone this time; and the people that backed him only served to remind Slade of just how much he'd lost during the course of this war. Shinji Mabashi stood on the far left, his hair somehow looking freshly-dyed; Katherine stood next to him, dressed in the outfit that she had chosen to wear at her wedding reception; Sensei Goddard stood on the middle-right of the group. And there, standing at the far right of the four evil Teknomen that had come to the Command Center to help Spear destroy it, was Sam.

Sam, the youngest of his and Saber's siblings. He'd been hoping that Sam had died sometime during the transformation process, if only because Slade hadn't known if he'd have been strong enough to face down the youngest member of their family in mortal combat. He didn't know what that would say about him if he did, either.

"Hello, Ness," Spear said softly; there was a new hardness to the evil Teknoman's eyes, a new firmness to his tone, that Slade was sure wasn't going to lead to anything good. "It's been a long time since we all saw each other." Spear's eyes tracked Saber as his younger twin landed, but the icy expression on his face as the five evil Teknomen closed with him and Saber didn't change one bit. "I'm feeling generous, so I'll give you two a last chance to come along peacefully." Spear folded his arms, the expression on his face the same as the one Conrad wore when he had reached the end of his – not inconsiderable – patience. "Whether you choose to make me regret my generosity is entirely up to you."

Well, really; under the circumstances there was only one way that they could answer that kind of a challenge.