1

A momentary silence fell over the crowd as Rian entered the bar. In this place a new face, especially such a beautiful one, always attracted attention, but within a few seconds the buzzing returned as the patrons resumed their conversations. Rian moved through the milling customers and made her way up to the bar. "I'm looking for Xenara Li," she announced to the barman, "I was told she might be here."
"Over there" he said, jerking his chin towards a darkened corner, where a lone figure sat staring out at the city lights.

Rian was small but far from fragile and was perfectly able to give as good as she got as she was joslted by the crowd on her way over to the pilot's table. "Captain Li?" she asked, frowning when she recieved no response from the dark woman at the table and asking a little louder "Are you Captain Xenara Li?"
"Of course I am," replied the woman, without looking up, and took another sip from her jug before adding, "Tam wouldn't have sent you over here otherwise, now would he?"

Rian smiled and sat down opposite the captain. "I'm Rian" she said, holding out her hand, but the dark woman merely looked at her and took another swig of beer. Undaunted by this rudeness the younger woman tried again by adding, "Dr. Rian Lokion. I'm pleased to meet you."
"Really?" asked the other, clearly not interested in talking, but the doctor persisted.
"Yes, really," she answered with a nod, "I wouldn't have said so otherwise, now would I?" Xenara scowled at the dig and sat back in her chair, demanding "what do you want?" before polishing off the rest of her beer and motioning to Tam to bring her another.
"I hear you're heading for the Kanarios System," the young doctor said, "I need to get there and..."
"I don't carry passengers" interrupted the other woman as she took up her full jug and brought it to her lips.
"I heard that too, but I was hoping you might make an exception."
"And why would I want to do that?"
"Because it's important."
"Not to me" countered the pilot, with a shrug.

Rian took a breath to calm herself. She had been warned about Li and would have preferred to find another way to reach her destination, but the Kanarios System was remote and uninviting and few people bothered to make the trip. Xenara was only going there to collect some artifacts for a private buyer and Rian had not been able to find any other pilot willing to make the journey for the small price she could pay. "The people there are dying" she said softly, hoping to appeal to Li's compassionate side, but looking at the woman's implaccable features, she wasn't sure that she had a compassionate side. "I can help them, I have a treatment for the plague that's blighted them for the last 20 years."
"As I said," came the cold reply, "it's not important to me."

Rian was a little shocked by such a total lack of pity, but she swallowed the rebuff that almost escaped her lips and leant forward slowly. "I don't have much money," she said, "but I'll give you all I have if you'll take me with you."
The captain sneered and replied calmly "it's not the money."
"Then what is it?"
Startlingly deep, crystal blue eyes rose over the top of the beer jug and the captain informed her, "I just prefer to travel alone."
"Captain," Rian sighed, "please, I promise I'll stay out of your way, you won't even know I'm there."
"I SAID NO!" yelled Xenara suddenly, thumping her jug down on the table so that beer was sloshed onto its smoothe surface. She leapt to her feet, causing her chair to fall backwards with a clatter, and spun on her heel, stalking out of the bar with her hand clutching at the handle of the phaser strapped to her thigh.
"We'll see" mumbled the young doctor and, after a few seconds, she got up and followed the woman out onto the street.

Before they had gone more than two blocks a scream pierced the night air and both Xenara and her persuer stopped dead in their tracks, Rian managing to duck behind a kiosk just before the captain turned around. Further down the street a distraught woman was just about to run into the road to retrieve her toddler, who was standing right in the path of an oncoming hover-transport. In a flash Xenara ran and grabbed the woman, pulling her back from the road and then charged into the road, snatching the child and flinging herself to the other side just as the transport screached past. Rian collapsed with relief as the tension of the situation flowed out of her and sagged against the kiosk. The frantic mother ran across the now empty road and grabbed the errant child from Xenara's arms, hugging him close to her and bathing him in her tears. "Thank you so much!" she sobbed, looking up at the captain. The boy started wailing and struggling against his mother's nearly suffocating grip, blissfully unaware of his brush with death. She loosened her hold slightly and held out a hand to Xenara, taking the reluctant woman's hand in her own. "How can I ever repay you?"
"Don't worry about it" replied the slightly embarassed woman, turning to leave.
"Please," the mother called after her, "at least tell me your name" but Li was half way down the street and didn't turn around. Rian had to run to catch up with her.

* * * * * *

The Argon was an impressive ship, it didn't look like a cargo rig at all. Rian didn't know much about ships in general, but she recognised that this was something out of the ordinary. 'Well, well' she thought, watching from across the hold as Xenara walked around the gleaming vessel, running her hand almost lovingly over its surface, 'maybe she does care about some things after all!' Rian had flirted with the young man that was on duty in the hold and slipped him a few credits to divulge the time of the captain's departure. Now, as she crouched behind a small runabout, she tried to work out how she was going to get aboard without anyone realising. She had been expecting the captain to leave the hold after completing her systems checks and go to a hotel for the night as the other pilots did, but her faith in her ability to get aboard unseen was severely dented by the realisation that Li was intending to spend the night on the Argon. 'I guess I should've known' she thought, settling down to lean against the runabout.

Suddenly she froze as cold metal pressed against the back of her head and a throaty voice said "don't move." Rian swallowed hard and, as the captain moved around to stand staring down at her, her face fell, her eyes closed and the breath she had been holding came out in a sigh of frustration. The captain's eyes were like ice as she held her phaser pointed at Rian's head. She was silent for a few seconds and then asked "what was your plan, Doctor? Were you going to sneak aboard my ship in the middle of the night and stow away?"
"Yes" admitted the blonde, with a sad little nod.
"And you really think you could have got away with that?"
"I don't know, but I had to try."
"No you didn't!" snapped Li, squatting down in front of the doctor and shoving the weapon against her neck, "you know I could have you locked up for this?"
Rian nodded slowly and kept her voice much calmer than she felt as she replied "I know.... but I don't think you will."
The captain was taken aback by the woman's unexpected reponse to her threat and sneered, asking in a snide tone "and how do you know that?"
Rian merely smiled, her eyes softening as she gazed on the dark, angry, beautiful face before her. "Because I've been following you and watching you for the last two hours and I've discovered something about you.......You're a fraud, Xenara Li. You're not half as unfeeling and cold as you pretend to be."

After a split second of confusion, the anger that Rian had been expecting flared on Li's face. "How dare you!?" she yelled, rising in agitation and starting to pace like a caged animal, "How dare you think you know me?! You have no right...."
"I'm trying to save thousands of lives!" countered Rian, springing to her feet and grabbing the restless woman by the shoulders in an attempt to calm her, "possibly millions! Maybe I don't have the right but I'm taking it anyway."
"GET YOUR HANDS OFF ME!" screamed the pilot, shoving violently at the little woman and sending her crashing to the floor. In a second Rian found the phaser in her face once more and decided that, in Li's current unstable state, it would be safer for her to stay still. They remained frozen in that position for what seemed like hours, Rian sprawled on the floor, with the dark pilot crouching over her, holding the phaser in her face, trembling with rage. Rian was terrified, although she somehow managed to keep that fact from showing in her face. The captain's eyes were burning with anger but Rian's training and natural empathy enabled her to see something else in them, something Xenara never allowed anyone to see, not even herself....Fear. It was clear to Rian that Xenara was right on the edge and probably had been for some time. At this moment she was barely managing to keep enough control to prevent herself from shooting the infuriating doctor and Rian knew she was perilously close to dying; yet the fact that the woman was fighting to keep control indicated that at least she wasn't psychotic as Rian had begun to suspect. That had to be encouraging.

2

Xenara leapt up to avoid the flash of the laser at her feet and twisted in mid-air as another tried to spear her side. She landed in a crouch, rolling over as a third lightjet sizzled through the air behind her. When she had first given up her life as a pirate and mercenary she had been riddled with guilt at her past actions and, in an an attempt to drown her self-reproach in physical suffering, she had spent hours in this very chamber, undergoing Kilirian torture programmes. Although it was only a simulation, the agony had been real enough, and she had endured hours, sometimes days of it, frequently pushing herself to the limit of her endurance and beyond into unconsciousness in an attempt to assuage her guilt and somehow pay for her past evil deeds. It had not worked and in the end she had adopted a more constructive, though potentially no less painful activity. The file now running was a Rotek training programme, designed to keep trainees alert and suple. The Rotek, however, had much more elastic bones and muscles than humans, enabling them to twist into all sorts of positions that would be nigh on impossible for most species, and she had not adapted the programme to accomodate her human physiology. Though Xenara was extremely quick and agile, she was not always fast enough to avoid every one of the laser beams that flashed from the central array in random busts and would regularly get hit by them. She had decided, however, that this was nothing to do with the fact that she had stuck to the Rotek version of the programme, thus making it impossible for herself, but rather that it indicated her difficiencies, or her lack of concentration, or her lack of general fitness. Any right-minded person watching her, however, would've known that was rubbish. Xenara Li was one of the fittest, fastest, strongest human beings alive, with combat skills second to none, and no one except Li herself was in any doubt as to her abilites.

One such right-minded person watched her now from the open door of the chamber, mesmerised by her magnificent body and her athletic grace. Rian's eyes followed the leaping, rolling, running woman as she flung herself around, twisting, leaping, ducking and diving to avoid the vicious lasers. She stifled a gasp as the captain was caught in the ribs, the laser burning right through her sweaty tank top and searing into her flesh. With a groan Li twisted out of the way and sprang up over another blast. She had been at this for hours, running the programme four times in succession without a break and she was clearly exhausted. Her black hair and her clothes were soaked with sweat and plastered to her glistening body and she had several burns and deep cuts as well as the bruises that she had got from slamming herself into the wall to avoid some of the blasts. Rian had wanted so much to intervene, to stop the programme, but the last time she had interfered, by suggesting that the captain worked too hard and needed a rest, she had been in real fear that Li would throw her out of an airlock and it was only some fancy talking and some promises that had saved her. She was not anxious to repeat the experience but when Xenara was caught once more in her back by the last flash of the programme and dropped to her knees panting and gasping and clutching at her side, and then dragged herself up and ordered "computer, reset programme and run," the young woman was unable to keep quiet any longer. She ran from her hiding place and into the chamber crying out, "computer, shut down programme!"

"What are you doing!" yelled the exhausted captain angrily.
"The question is, Captain, what the hell are you doing?" Rian corrected her as she strode up to support the reeling woman.
"That's none of your business" snapped Li.
"It is if you're trying to kill yourself?" the doctor answered clamly, "are you?"
"No!"
"Then what is this, Xenara?"
"I told you, this is none of.....hngh!" Xenara was stopped mid-sentance as pain stabbed through her back and she dropped to her knees, panting and wincing. Examining her quickly, the doctor found that the last shot had done some damage to her kidney and she said calmly "we'll talk about this later, Captain, for now I have to treat you, okay?"
Deep, defiant eyes bored into her as the captain spat "you have no right to interfere with..."
"Yes I do, Captain," Lokion informed her, maintaining her veneer of confidence and calmness, "I think you'll find that in medical matters I outrank you, according to interplanetary space law. So, if you make me, I'll relieve you of duty and take over your ship."
Li roared like a frustrated lion and sprang at the startled young doctor in rage, pinning her to the wall, her hand around the pale throat. Rian gasped in surprise but kept her cool, meeting the pilot's manic stare apparantly without any fear. "I'd kill you first!" menaced the captain, flicking her head to try to get the sweat out of her eyes.
"I'm sure you'd try, Captain," she said cooly, "but I am trained in self-defense and in your current state....." she left the thought unfinished but gently pushed against the woman's injured side, making her cry out in pain and lose her grip on Rian's neck.
"Please, Xenara," the doctor crooned softly, laying her hand gently on the captain's shoulder, "let me help you, that's all I want to do."

After a little more gentle cudjoling Rian managed to get the captain's co-operation and led her to the small treatment room at the back of the ship. It was now compulsory for any kind of ship to have some type of medical facilities, but Xenara had only paid lip service to the rule, tucking the tiny room away in a redundant corner of the Argon and stocking it with the absoloute minimum supplies required. It was almost undisturbed and looked as if it had never been used at all. Lokion helped the sullen captain onto the table and removed her tattered tank top, her eyes darting over the lean, athletic torso beneath. The woman's skin was decorated with numerous scars, some faded and old, others clearly newer, but the doctor filed the observation away at the back of her mind and resolved to speak to the beligerant Li about it later, whether she wanted to or not. "Please turn on your side, Captain" she requested gently and the woman grudgingly obeyed.

Rian passed a hand-held scanner over the purple bruising that now covered a large area at the small of the captain's back and frowned privately at the results. "I'll have to perform minor surgery, Captain," she informed Li, "it shouldn't take too long but you'll need to rest for a few hours afterwards."
"I don't have time for this" scowled the captain, trying to raise herself off the bed, but she was restrained by a gentle hand and Rian's soft voice saying "Xenara, if I don't take care of this now it's going to get much worse and more complicated, then it'll take longer to put right and the recovery period will be days instead of hours." She looked steadfastly into the brooding face and added "do you have time for that?"

The captain lay back down, a sulky look on her face, and tried to relax into the stabbing throb in her side. She new she deserved this suffering, but if she wasn't able to make her pick-up she wouldn't get paid, and then she wouldn't be able to afford the Argon's refit. The idea focussed her mind and she told herself that for the sake of her ship she could let it go just this once. Rian pulled an anaesthetic injection from her bag and prepared to administer it to her patient but, as the injector rested on her bicep the captain jerked away and grabbed Rian's wrist. "No" she almost growled, "I can't afford to be unconscious, what if something goes wrong with the ship?"
"I'm sure I could deal with it until you're recovered. I may not have your expertise but I have piloted a ship before."
"No way am I leaving you in charge of my ship!"
Rian smiled and admitted "I knew you'd say that." She laughed lightly and acquiesed "alright, I'll use a local."
"No" came the terse reply.
"What?!" Rian asked incredulously.
"I said no, Doctor. Just do what you have to do."
Lokion took a deep, calming breath and explained "Xenara, this is an invasive proceedure and I'm not going to do it to you without some kind of anaesthetic."
"Fine, then don't" said the captain matter-of-factly as she wearily got up off the bed.

Rian was before her in a second, genlty forcing her to sit down again with two hands placed on her shoulders. "What's this all about?" she asked softly, "do you like being in pain?"
"No!" denied the captain, her eyes flashing up at the young woman.
"Then why?" asked Rian, "Talk to me, Xenara. Please. I'm here to help."
"I never asked for your help!" the woman spat, trying to stand up, but the doctor was stronger than she looked and her grip, though gentle, was solid as a rock. "Didn't you?" she enquired softly. "You agreed to my coming aboard your ship when you easily could have thrown me out of that cargo bay, or even killed me, with no one being any the wiser. You ran your training programme with the door to the ISEC wide open, knowing I could come by at any minute, knowing I wouldn't let it continue." She removed her hands from the captain's shoulders and hooked a finger under her chin to make her look up and meet her own gaze. "I think you are asking me for help, consciously or not, and I want to help you. You can rant and rave and threaten me all you like, but it won't change the fact that you're in a lot of pain, Xenara, and not just physically, or that I can help you if you'll let me, if you'll trust me."

Li wanted to react in her usual way, she wanted to yell and shout and throw things around the room, including the maddening young doctor, but the tuth of Rian's words had hit home and left her shaking not with rage but with intense sadness. She jerked her head out of the soft grip, flicking it to shove back the tears, and croaked "I....I don't trust easily, Doctor."
"Perhaps no one has ever given you reason to before, but I hope I have."
"Why do you care, anyway?" she asked, the exhaustion evident in her voice.
Rian had always cared. She had never been able to stand seeing beings suffer and that was what had led her into a medical career. Something told her,however, that this answer would not satisfy the woman that was now her patient and so she raised the dark head once more, looked deep into the tormented eyes and said simply and with genuine sincerity that not even Li could fail to recognise, "I care." A few moments of penetrating silence later the captain agreed to a local anaesthetic and the doctor set to work.

* * * * * *

The surgery only took half an hour but it left Xenara weak, if a good deal more comfortable. Rian placed a stasis bandage around the woman's middle, which would effectively keep her imobile while she recovered, and then she injected her with anti-biotics, anti-inflamataries and anti-pyrrhetics. "Why can't I move?" the captain asked her groggily, and she explained about the stasis bandage and the fact that she had to keep still for the next few hours, adding "don't worry, Captain, I promise I'll release you if there's an emergency, but for now I want you to sleep, okay?"
"Hmm" was the only reply.

While Xenara slept the doctor ran a scanning programme on her entire body and winced at the shocking results. The list of old injuries that the computer screen displayed went on and on and on, most of them untreated. Some of them had been treated by only the most rudimentay methods but very few had recieved proper attention. 'Gods!' she thought, 'she's dammed lucky to be alive!'

When Xenara woke a couple of hours later, the doctor sat by her bed and stroked the matted hair from her forehead. "Xenara," she said quietly, "now that I've got you here, at my mercy so to speak, we have to talk." There was no reply but the woman seemed to reluctantly agree so Rian asked "I want to know where all these old, untreated injuries came from. Are they all from your 'training programme'? I know you were a soldier but you're too good to have sustained all this damage in the line of duty."
Xenara snorted "I've never done anything in the line of duty, Doctor." The self-loathing rang in her tone as she explained "I did it for money. I was a mercenary and a pirate."
"But not any longer?"
"No, now I just mind my own business, unlike some people, but that doesn't change the fact that I've done some terrible, horrible things in my life."
"I see," acknowledged Lokion, beginning to understand what was going on here, "and this is your way of punishing yourself."
"Something like that."
"You do know you're killing yourself, don't you?"
"That's not my intention, Doctor, but if it happens I can't complain."
Rian frowned and stifled a sigh of frustration, not wanting her patient to feel judged in any way. "It might have been more efficient just to blow your brains out" she suggested.
"Probably, but that would have been too easy."
"You prefer a slow, painful death."
"It's no worse than I deserve" was the mumbled reply.
Rian leaned forward and stroked the woman's brow, "Xenara," she crooned, "no one deserves this. Every civilized society in the known universe outlawed torture centuries ago."
"Well, maybe the Kilirians have it right" replied the cpatain.
"The Kilirians? What....!?" Comprehension settled over the young doctor and she sighed deeply "Ah, of course!"

The Kilirians were one of the handful of societies that had refused to give up torture as a form of punishment and for that refusal they had been ostracized by the rest of the universe for over a century. There was, however, a thriving black market in Kilirian devices and programmes, mainly bought at huge expense by adrenaline junkies, pain addicts, self-harmers and thrill seekers who had no idea what they were getting themselves into. It was not all that common, but Rian had treated a small number of the victims of these illegal programmes, and now that the connection had been made, she recognised Xenara's injuries. "Have you still got the programme?" she asked softly as compassion for Li flooded through her.
"Yes...but I don't use it anymore, I haven't for months."
"But you haven't got rid of it. Why?" she asked, keeping her voice calm and soothing.
"I was very expensive."
"Is that the only reason?"
"I guess I thought I....I might need it again...sometime" admitted the captain, closing her eyes against the expected condemnation of the doctor.

Rian, however, was not about to condemn or judge her. She had already realised that the captain was ill and even if she had been in her right mind, how could she condemn the woman for trying to pay for her mistakes, no matter how misguided her methods might be? "Has it occurred to you that there may be a more constructive way to make things right?" she asked tenderly.
"What do you mean?"
"Well, instead of hiding away and taking every opportunity to hurt yourself, you could devote your energies to helping others. Giving back what you took."
"You mean with good works?" asked Li disparagingly.
"If you like."
The captain laughed mirthlessly at the image of herself doing charitable deeds, "that's not my style, Doctor. I'm not the genrous, gregarious type and I don't do charity. As you may have realised, I'm not a nice person and I try not to inflict my company on too many innocent beings. I wouldn't even have inflicted it on you if you hadn't been so damm stubborn!"
"I have to disagree, Captain," said the doctor with a wry smile, "you're full of anger, for reasons I don't understand yet, but last month I saw you risk your life to save that mother and child and I think underneath it all you have a good heart, however deep you try to bury it. Besides, I'm sure a starving child on Antaros V wouldn't care how gregarious you were if you could feed him. There are a lot of innocent beings suffering needlessly in this universe, Xenara, and you have so much to offer them. You're strong and hard-working, you have expertise and experience in many practical fields, you have a ship and you fly it better than any pilot I've ever seen. Some would say you're just compounding your crimes by not using your skills to help others. Do you really think you can make things right by adding your own suffering to theirs?"
Xenara seemed to think about it but then answered wearily, "It's too late for me, Doc."
"No, it's never too late. Not for them and not for you. You even have a place to start right now, a real chance to change your life and others' lives for the better."
"What?"
"Kanarios. Stay there with me and help. I can cure them but that won't be the end of the job. Their whole society has been decimated by this plague and they'll need help to rebuild it. You can help them, Xenara, help them reclaim their lives, help them build a future for their children."
"It won't bring back the lives I've destroyed, will it?"
"No, it won't, nothing can do that, but that's no reason to walk away from those that still have a chance, is it?

Suddenly the captain gasped as pain flashed in her back and involuntarily grabbed Rian's hand. "Hold on, Xenara," Lokion said, "the anaesthetic's wearing off, I'll get you a pain-killer."
"No" came the habitual, shuddering reply, and the captain's hand tightened around the doctor's.
"Xenara, you're my patient now and I'm not going to let you do this to yourself any more. I understand why you did it but it stops right here, do you understand? You've suffered enough. Please let me go." The sincerity in the words were gently persuassive and the captain's grip eased enough for Rian to pull free. As the relief-giving drug flooded through Li's veins and her breathing became even again, she gave herself up to the drowsiness the analgesic had produced, but as she sank into sleep the doctor heard her mumble "too...late..."

* * * * * *

The captain came round with a jolt to find her ship rocking around her. "What the....!
"Xenara, we're under attack!" called the doctor as she released the stasis bandage and helped her patient to her feet. A sharp intake of breath from the captain as she pulled on a clean top, warned Rian that she was not yet fully recovered, but there was nothing to be done right now. As she helped the captain lower herself into her flight seat, Rian noted the sweat breaking out on her patient's forehead but said nothing.

The ship attacking them was large, fast and bristling with weapons. Even so, the captain was confident that they were no match for the Argon. They exchanged fire for a few minutes, dancing around eachother in a lethal ballet, before the face of a rough-looking man appeared on the communications screen. "Davick!" the captain exclaimed, "What do you want?!"
"Your cargo" growled the man.
"I don't have a cargo yet."
"Well then you must have money to pay for one, I'll take that instead."
"Go to Hell!" sneered Li.
"Oh, I expect I will, Li, but not today." His eyes drifted over to where Rian sat and he added "I'll take your little friend, too."
Anger flared in the captain and she warned "you keep your hands off her, Davick, or you'll wake up without them!"
"Oh, I see! It's like that, is it? Well in that case maybe you'd be willing to pay a ransom for her. I'd heard you'd gone soft, Xenara, it's no wonder. A woman like that would be enough to break through even your hard shell."
"Are you done?" asked the captain with forced calm.
"Oh no!" came the giggling reply, "I'm just getting started. So, you gonna hand them over or not?"
"Not."
The man shrugged and flashed a cold, toothy grin at the captain, "alright. See you in Hell, Xenara" and with that the screen flicked to black and the vessel began firing once more.

Xenara's piloting and combat skills were indeed prodigious. Whether it was youthful bravado that had made Davick think he could beat her, or just plain stupidity, Rian couldn't tell, but within ten minutes the battle was over and his ship was dead in the water. "Enemy ship's weapons systems have been disabled" announced the computer and a smile crept over the captain's face. "Load neutron torpedo and lock on to their core" she ordered cooly. Rian gasped, attracting the captain's attention to her shocked face. "But they're disabled" she protested, "they're no threat to us now."
"They're a threat to everyone," Li countered, "if I don't destroy them now they'll just keep on doing this and maybe their next target will be someone that can't defend themselves."
"But there must be a hundred people on that ship, Xenara, and right now they can't defend themselves. You....you can't do this.....please."
Li took a deep breath and stared cooly at the image of the ship on her screen. She sighed and shook her head in frustration, but when the computer announced "target acquired" she commanded "unacquire target, stand down and resume course." She sank back in her seat wincing with the pain that she had kept at bay until now and letting her head fall back against the support. As the doctor leaned over her to check her condition, she grumbled "you know, Doc, one of these days your dammed compassion is going to get you killed."
"Oh, I expect it will, Li," she smiled, "but not today."

* * * * * *

The child screamed in terror as the man slashed her mother's throat and strode towards her. She ran as fast as she could, tears of pain and fear pouring down her face as she stumbled along. She was small and was able to lose herself in the milling, panicked crowd that ran around the burning settlement in confusion. She found her father lying in a ditch, his eyes staring sightlessly at the starry sky and she threw herself on top of him and tried to suggle into his familiar warmth. But he was not warm now, his skin felt like ice as she embraced him desperately and when she realised that he was gone too and she was all alone she began to scream.

The captain awoke to find herself shivering in the embrace of a pair of soft, warm arms and lying against a soft, warm chest. She tried to spring up, but the stasis bandage held her firm and all she could do was stare wildly around the room. "It's alright, Xenara," came the doctor's voice, "you were having a nightmare, it's over now." She held the trembling body a little tighter and let her warmth flow into her patient as she calmed down.

When Xenara had begun to show signs of distress Rian had debated whether to wake her, but the dream seemed to be so intense that she'd thought it might be dangerous and so she decided just to hold the woman and let her wake in her own time. "Do you want to tell me about it?" she asked when the captain was calm and she had slipped out from under her to fetch a glass of water.
"I thought you were telepathic" came the slightly sarcastic reply.
"No, empathic," the doctor corrected her, "I felt your terror, but I don't know what caused it."
The captain tried to sit up but once more the bandage prevented it and she tutted in irritation and snapped "how long do I have to wear this damm thing?"
"Another couple of hours, that's all," the young woman assured her, "in the meantime, try to relax, okay?" She moved away to complete her latest scan but offered "I'll be right over here, if you want to talk."

For five minutes or so there was utter silence, but then the captain suddenly said in a far away tone "they destroyed everything."
Rian looked up and moved back to the captain's bed. Sitting on the edge and gazing down tenderly, she asked "who?"
"I don't know. Soldiers. I couldn't stop them, I was too little."
"You were a child?"
"Yes. Four....or five years old. They killed my parents and left me all alone. After that I had to bring myself up."
"Was this just in your dream, or did it really happen?"
"It really happened......sometimes I...I..."
Rian touched the woman lightly, comfortingly and urged gently "go on, Xenara, sometimes you what?"
"Sometimes I wish they'd killed me too."

* * * * * *

Over the next few weeks, Rian managed to gently prize out the story of Xenara's life. How, orphaned and displaced by an attack on her settlement at the age of five, she had become a thief in order to feed herself. By the age of nine she was an expert pick-pocket, but not quite expert enough to escape the eagle eye of a visiting pirate whose pocket she tried to pick. Instead of turning her in he had adopted her and, craving someone to care about her as she did, she had willingly gone with him to join his team. And that's where she'd stayed, enduring humiliation and degredation for years until her 'father' was killed in a raid when she was fifteen and she was once more on her own. By that time, though, she was a highly trained and proficient fighter and had become a mercenary soldier, hiring herself out to anyone that would pay her, no matter how appalling the job she was asked to do. None of it touched her, she made sure of that. She made an excellent living, building up enough savings to buy the Argon in just a few years as a mercenary, and then she had followed in her foster father's footsteps and taken up piracy. She had been alone for most of her life, even aboard the pirate's ship she had ultimately been alone, so her solitude did not bother her now, in fact she craved it. She was a rock, an island, she needed no one.

"What made you give it up?" asked Rian softly.
"I...I don't really know," she admitted, "I guess I took stock of my life and realised what I'd been doing was wrong, but I'm not really sure what prompted it. Maybe it was a gradual thing, maybe it's something to do with turning thirty!....I don't know. I only know I'll never go back to that life, not if I can help it. I hate the way I was."
"And you hate yourself for being like that."
"Yes."
"But what about the way you are now, Xenara? Isn't that just as much you?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, this 'new Xenara', if nothing concrete happened to create her then she must have been in you from the start, musn't she?"
"I guess, but I don't think I've changed that much. You must have realised by now that I'm still no saint. I still kill people when I have to. I would have killed Davick if you hadn't stopped me."
"Yeah, but do you remember your reasoning for that? You weren't going to kill him just for the hell of it, or for revenge, or for kicks, were you? You said it was to protect others who couldn't defend themselves. Remember? Now, unless you were lying, I'd say that's a pretty big change in your outlook." The doctor settled herself in a nearby chair and picked up her coffee mug before admitting "You know, I kind of like this 'new Xenara', I think I could easily be her friend, if she'd let me."

...to be continued...

SW
01/02/03