[ Watashi ]

[ Tomodachi ]

[ Saint Seiya ]

[ Clamp ]

[ Fanfiction ]

There was a faint shuffling sound as the body on my left shifted its position on the wide bed. Blindly I reached out and brought its owner close, struggling to keep the movement a gentle one when I felt the other wince, almost imperceptibly, and when I remembered it had been a rough, rough ride for the unlucky souls who had been either brave or foolish enough to seek out my company during this particular shore leave. Leaning toward my companion, I laid a light kiss in the crook of his right shoulder and smiled when a soft sigh brushed against my ear. On my right, a hand slid over my stomach. Tensing, I refused the overwhelming urge to reach out to the third occupant of the bed.

"No. Enough," I hissed, strain seeping into the tone of my voice, and I rolled over on the bed sheets to find a pair of deep brown eyes watching me--glazed over. Shit. "Hey," I whispered, stretching myself and feeling for that small sail that I had allowed to slip away from y grasp. "Stay," I ordered gently, even as I dispersed the lazy currents that had formed in the room during Achernar station's night shift. The barrier separating this place from the Deep was a tenuous one--too weak, and that was because of me.

"I--what...?" The drowsy mumble cut through the silence, and I released air from my lungs in a shaking breath.

"Shh," I kissed his lips. "Nothing. Rest." He did so, there was nothing else he could do now that that Deep's flow had left him, and that his body could feel the full force of an exhaustion that had been masked away until now.

I had to get up from this bed, and to leave the room. I had to, or I'd end up hurting the two young men lying beside me, and I didn't want that. They belonged to the Takeda clan; distant cousins who enjoyed sharing lovers during night shifts, they had wondered what it felt to make love with a jumpship pilot. Now they knew--well they knew how intense and rough it could get when you stumbled upon a pilot who had just Out Fallen from far too long a Dive, and whose spirit clang to the Deep. I would have drawn them in and drowned their souls in the glistening waves of darkness, had I not stopped myself in time--as I had for the ones who had shared this bed with me before the two cousins.

"Thank you," I breathed in the ear of the one on my left, sitting up. There was no protest, but then these were the sons of an old space-faring clan in the Outer Colonies, and they knew how encounters with jumpship pilots always ended--abruptly and without fuss. Thanks were expressed, thanks for the sharing of self and strength and intimacy--thanks for the anchor in this universe without which we could never leave the Deep.

As I put some clothes on, I denied the deep-seated hunger that haunted the dusty corners of my mind. There had been no real satisfaction, no true relief this time, on the contrary: all I had gained was a sharp, acute feeling of incompleteness, of something nameless lacking, a hole inside my heart--painful, like an arrow piercing through my soul. It was the insane Dive from N-ay-si to Achernar, a single Dive from a point deep into Nyah space to another section of space in the Outer Colonies, crossing over two galactic arms without pausing. Yes, certainly that was the cause of it. Mine had been a fool's decision, made in a moment of utter confusion and icy terror--refusal of a thing that didn't--couldn't happen.

Shaking, I leaned my back against the door I had just closed shut--giddy with weariness and sleeplessness and worry and hunger.

Need.

Longing.

"Fuck!" I focused on the furious sounds of the snarl that had escaped through my clenched jaws, and willed the weirdness away. Now wasn't the time for it. Pushing away from the door, I started down the stairs to rejoin Fi.

She was setting an empty glass down on the table she was sitting at when I entered the Kallokeri's main room. At once, she lifted up her head, and her hazel eyes met mine. Troubled. "Hey," she smiled as I sat down beside her, a trembling smile, and she clasped the hand I laid on the table, hard.

"Hey," I repeated, passing an arm around her shoulders and drawing her against me. "That bad?" I asked her in a gentle whisper.

"For the both of us," she replied, shooting me a knowing glance.

"Yeah, well," I shrugged. Then I bowed my head and leaned against Fi. "They're okay," I said quickly, feeling her warmth and solidity envelop me--her strain and exhaustion as well. "Both of them, and the others as well. Thank the gods and goddesses of the Deep, because for a moment there, I though I'd--" I bit my lower lip. "I thought I'd lose myself and them."

Fi held me tight. "It was too long and too harsh, even for you," she ruffled my hair and repeated, "even for you, my obnoxious, pain in the ass lead pilot. You kept most of it to yourself," she added, something like anger tainting her voice. "Don't think you can hide it from me, Loki. You didn't let me help and share the strain, you moronic fool. Never," she touched her brow to mine, "never do that again, understand?"

"Aye." In spite of everything, I smiled. "I love you, Fi."

She chuckled at that. "Of course you do, stupid, as do I. We're both halves of the same pair, Loki." Then she went silent, and we held each other like this for a long while. The Kallokeri's main room was empty but for us. It was the end of the night shift, and Griffin and Pegasus were the only jumpships currently docked at Achernar.

"Where are they?" Fi suddenly sighed beside me. "Where are Arion and Achilles? They should've docked two day shifts ago."

"I don't know, Fi," I closed my eyes and willed ghosts and nightmares away. "But they'll be here." I nodded. "They'll be here soon, I promise you." Empty, hollow words.

I could touch the Deep.

I could swim the currents.

I could bridge the infinite void between stars.

But I couldn't master Fate.

Nobody could, but in times like these, one reached out nonetheless and murmured senseless songs, hoping to cajole the never-ending, never-beginning flow. "I hear you," Fi said softly, and strength had come back to her voice somewhat, as if she believed my words and trusted they could come true.

And so, in times like these, one plunged one's hands into the currents' heart, deep, much deeper than was safe when one was docked at a station where the Curtain of Reality distorted the feeling of the flow--and wished.

Ripples went through the endless dark, then the ghost of a light shimmered in the void, sending echoes through night so thick it looked like velvet. Quickly the small fire sparked into being, and soon others joined it--many, many others.

Brennan watched the now well-known images, and a smile twisted his lips, as it had every time he had watched this particular spectacle. It was beautiful, he had to admit, beautiful beyond anything a normal eye could see. Before his eyes, tiny flames winked into existence and grew, even as the commentator's voice started quavering with hysteria. They knew their craft and they knew how to show off, did Azure Traverse's pilots, but this wasn't one of their stupid pranks.

Oh no.

This fantastic display of fireworks was them making their first big mistake and starting down the road Brennan had prepared for them. With rapt attention, he watched as what must happen sooner or later took place in the crowded space around Vega station. The camera zoomed to show one of the great jumpships ripple into being uncomfortably close to a slow, sluggish Mining ship that was making its painstaking way toward Vega's docks.

The smaller ship panicked. Spooked, or crazed, or simply ignorant, its pilot tried to veer off-course in a steep maneuver his ship wasn't built to whistand. Brennan sensed something like a distant shiver run down his spine, feeling in his bones how the small ship's structure must start tearing itself apart under the strain its foolish pilot was putting it through. The sleek, arrow-like jumpship seemed to waver for a few seconds, as if it was suspended between hyperspace and Vega, then it swept upon the doomed Mining ship and winked out of existence with its prey--to wink in again, this time right next to the station's docks, the Mining ship safely tucked in the space between the jumpship's two flank cargo holds, right below its powerful engines.

That had been a masterfully executed rescue; the Miners aboard the small ship owed their lives to the Azure Traverse pilot, but being Vega-registered and thus Inner Colonies, it was likely they didn't know that. It was also likely they'd sue the jumpship and demand compensation for the cargo they had jettisoned before attempting their ridiculous escape maneuver. Laughter, short and joyless, spilled from Brennan's lips.

As soon as the news had been released and had reached the various colonies, jumpships had flocked to the Vega system so they could feel the tragedy for themselves and seek the two they had lost. They had come in pairs as they always did, and they had swarmed the star system without a care for the search teams already dispatched by station authorities, or for the Miners who had kept at their business, free from having to heed a ban on all outbound traffic. Using the laws their predecessors had swindled the house of representatives into voting centuries before, Azure Traverse's pilots had changed their announced courses and dived down hyperspace to come to Vega without warning. Operating under emergency procedures to try and rescue their own, they had argued when Vegan authorities had protested in an uproar over the chaos invading their star system.

Fools.

Vega station wasn't Outer Colonies, it was run by Graad Foundation affiliates, and the Merchants and Miners registered there had no love lost for Azure Traverse jumpships and their privileges which delayed their own docking and undocking procedures, and sometimes even caused a temporary shutdown of the local jumpgate. The people of Vega were wary of jumpships, and when the great ships had swept upon the small, usually quiet star system, flooding space like hordes of locusts, accidents had happened.

No life had been lost, but cargo and profit, and sometimes valuable trade agreements. The images of the jumpships invading the Vega system had made the news in all the Inner Colonies' worlds, all the way to Earth itself. Everywhere, reactions had gone the same way: the apparently chaotic behavior of Azure Traverse's pilots had spooked people who already regarded them as aliens--irrational and unreliable. Some independent, or more romantic-minded journalists had tried to lead stories toward how moving and noble were the pilots who threw away trade and profit to rush to the rescue of their own without a thought for the problems their actions might cause them. Those articles had been found, bought and stifled; the Zines the journalists were attached to had been made to see the wisdom in keeping a tight rein on inconvenient stories that could only lower their sales. Instead, debates about the wisdom of allowing jumpships to come and go as they pleased had appeared on several networks. And some had started raising the very interesting question of how and why two jumpships could be lost upon leaving a system where there were absolutely no navigational traps--where pilots could fly on their first week of training.

There was a light tap on the door on Brennan's right. "Come in," he nodded, switching off the screen in the same time.

"It's done," came a female voice, quickly followed by its owner.

"And?" Brennan asked, fully aware of the reluctance marring the young woman's aura, but unwilling to be distracted.

Aquila Irene stared at the stone floor between them for the time of a heartbeat, then looked up at Brennan, her mouth drawn in a taut line. "Sedating them wasn't enough. We had to resort to artificial coma. One, we put in cryo-stasis; the other--" a haunted light shone in the deep blue eyes, and then was gone. "The other, we couldn't save. Nothing we did or tried could shake the madness that came upon him." The young Silver Saint struggled to keep her voice steady. "He was like fire, a torch that nothing could quell, and he would have destroyed us all. He never knew, never felt--" the young woman faltered.

"I'm sure you did all you could," Brennan said, willing gentleness to come to his voice and not quite managing it.

"Yes, we did," Aquila Irene blinked back the wavering light in her gaze, "but it wasn't enough. Lord Brennan," she added, coming toward him, "they're not like us. They don't know, they're not warriors. Elias and I would have felt it."

No. Brennan considered the Aquila Saint's words. No, Azure Traverse's pilots weren't warriors--yet. Shamira Goldstein could turn her fleet of jumpships into a terrible armada quickly enough though, should she decide to take upon the Sanctuary.

To take upon Earth and have revenge for what had happened seventeen years ago.

That possibility kept Brennan awake late at night, and lied at the core of the nightmares that hounded him mercilessly. "I'm sure they're not," he told Aquila Irene, stopping himself just short of reaching out to her--of reaching out to Aquila like a blind man famished with need. It was Irene standing next to him. Irene, not Eleni, even though they had both been born in Greece.

The land of the Gods.

"Lord?" she reached out to him, and he shied away from the hand that almost touched his. Stay away, child, he wanted to tell her.

Stay away, please.

It hurt to see Aquila live on, generation after generation. Aquila, who chose a new wielder each time one died. The Cloth mourned each and every one of them, Brennan knew. He talked to the Cloths sometimes, he shared memories with them in the dim light of dusk, and it soothed his bleeding heart--for a little while.

"You and Elias were enough, then," Brennan said, standing up and turning his back on the young woman.

"We were," she answered at once. "I reckon we can take on a single team, but no more."

It was fine. It meant that Brennan wouldn't have to bring the other Gold Saints into this--that he wouldn't have to waste precious time convincing them it was the right path. The thought of having to again confront the likes of Siel made Brennan grimace in disgust. It was easier with the Bronze and Silver Saints, who looked up to him with awe and reverence.

"Then carry on according to the plan," Brennan gave an absentminded nod. He heard Aquila Irene head back toward the office's door, and froze when he caught a whiff of distress in the air, that she couldn't master. And, because she was one of his Saints and under his protection and guidance, because he couldn't allow the uncontrolled emotion to fester into questions or doubts, he said gently even as he reached out and steadied her with ethereal hands, "There's nothing else we can do, Irene. Nothing else," he sighed, "and I'm sorry to have to ask this of you and Elias." Brennan pivoted, in time to see the Aquila Saint pause, her hand clasping the door handle.

"We know, Lord," she replied, strain still present in her voice, but much less so now. Then she gave him a slight bow, and was gone.

For a while, Brennan just stood there, contemplating the void inside his heart and distantly wondering why he didn't feel even the slightest ounce of satisfaction at watching the winds of Fate follow the direction he had foreseen. Eventually he moved away and went out of the office.

Brennan's aimless wandering at last brought him to the parvis of Athena's temple--the place his steps invariably led him to. On his left was the not-so distant sparkle of the sea, but he didn't look in that direction. On his right were the high peaks of Star Hill, but his gaze shied away from that dreadful place also. He could remember his master, the previous Aries Saint, explaining to him how the representative of the Goddess could seek council there, and find comfort in the advice of the stars. But there was nothing to gain there--Star Hill was the home of ghosts and portents of doom, of a madness that had assaulted Brennan's mind every time he had attempted to go there.

Barred from left and right, Brennan's gaze settled upon the Sanctuary below him, on the Great Stairs and the Twelve Houses they went through--on the third of them, where imperceptible ripples like irised currents in the night disturbed the air--the muffled cries of someone or something locked away.

Banned from the world.

A snarl distorted the lines of Brennan's face, and he jerked away from *that* contemplation. There was life in the Sacred Domain, Brennan could feel it pulsing through rocks and stones and temples of marble. There were echoes of youthful voices, rising up in the evening sky. There might even be songs later, if the apprentices weren't too tired after the day's numerous chores and harsh training. Brennan focused on that, focused the whole of him on the lower levels of the Sanctuary. That way, he wouldn't have to feel the emptiness behind him. For a time, he would be allowed to forget that the temple of Athena was lifeless--had been lifeless for over two hundred years. For a time, he would no longer know that the Goddess Athena had abandoned them.

"There you are!" The bright flames of Shane's cosmo abruptly enflamed the air around Brennan, even as his apprentice materialized next to him.

"Shane." Brennan glanced at him, and then refocused on the lower levels of the Sanctuary. There was no lecturing the hot-tempered young man on respecting Brennan's few moments of rest and solitude, no more than there was sinking into his head the need to heed the ancient laws of the Sacred Domain and walk up the Stairs to get to this place, to walk, and not to teleport oneself--even though the Veil of Athena no longer enveloped the Twelve Houses or the path leading to the great temple and the Goddess' altar. Shane did as Shane wanted, and Brennan had quickly come to the conclusion that the best way of getting something out of the slim, red-haired youth was to give him as much free rein as possible, and to let him figure out things for himself.

"Yeah, I know this is a bad time," Shane snorted, blue eyes set on Brennan, unafraid. It was because they were so much alike, Brennan mused inwardly, yes, because Shane and that Azure Traverse pilot looked and felt so much alike that he had allowed himself to be thrown off-balance during the council session on Carré. Damn Shamira Goldstein to the darkest pit of hell! "But then, it's always a bad time," Shane sighed beside him. A smile was hovering on the lips of Brennan's apprentice, and the light in his eyes had softened somewhat.

Fool, Brennan would have told him in another life, two centuries ago, fool for letting your heart open to the likes of me. But Shane was his, and it was the way of things between the Aries Gold Saint and his apprentice--always had been. How could it be otherwise when two people touched minds as easily and instinctively as others breathed? "When a brat like you disturbs the brief moments of respite I can get, yes," Brennan summoned a smile to his lips.

"Well," Shane retorted in a calm voice, not fooled in the least by his master's attempt at small talk, "this brat has come to tell you that you should take better care of your jumpgates' logistics."

"What?" The question had escaped Brennan's lips before he could stifle it.

"The prices of grain and uranium have shot up in the markets of Sirius and Epsilon Eridanis. I'm told that Proxima will follow suit. It can't be more than a week before it reaches Titan and then Mars." Had it come from any other than Shane, that sentence would have been ludicrous--absurd, in the mouth of a Saint of the Sanctuary. But Shane, curse his relentless curiosity and thirst for knowledge, Shane walked the mundane world and shamelessly used his powers to get from place to place and study the flow of human life like a cat would a nest of mice. Perhaps it was Brennan's own fault for not spending enough time with his apprentice and heir--but better that than risking that Brennan's own darkness and inner demons touch Shane and poison him as well.

"You should tell the Bronze Saints wielding the jumpgates to use their brains when they assign priority levels to the ships wanting through," Shane was saying, oblivious to Brennan's inward ramblings. "No grain transport has come through the Beta Carenis gate, and no shipment of uranium has come from the Hyades Cluster in over a week."

Brennan laughed then, because the Azure Traverse pilots were making their second mistake, ensnaring themselves even further into the trap. "There's no fault with the Saints taking care of the gates," Brennan shook his head. "Think, Shane. Beta Carenis and the Hyades Cluster are mere stops along the trade routes."

"The Vega accident," Shane whistled between his teeth.

Indeed. It had been almost two weeks since the loss of the jumpships had been announced. Less than one since Azure Traverse had given up hope of ever finding even the bodies of its two pilots. The jumpships had vanished from the Inner Colonies ever since. They had rippled out of reality as suddenly as they had come, and never shown up in the various places they had been supposed to get to in the first place. Rumors had glided over Inner Colonies stations, that the jumpships had disappeared altogether, dissolved into the chaos of hyperspace, but Brennan knew better.

The jumpships had retreated to where their home was: in the Outer colonies where the old space-faring clans thought of them and their pilots as their own. Azure Traverse's pilots had withdrawn themselves to mourn their loss. This meant that the flow of goods from the vast majority of Outer Colonies who dealt exclusively through Azure Traverse jumpships for transport had come to a stand still. Transport activity would resume soon enough, but in the meantime, stocks would dwindle, and market prices would go through the ceiling. Soon, rumors among Merchanters in the Inner Colonies would fester with fury and resentment at the jumpships' deliberate absence. The traders would draw mistaken conclusions, prejudiced against Azure Traverse as they already were.

"I see," Shane abruptly said. Unable to help himself, Brennan looked at his apprentice. There had been no anger in Shane's voice. The deep blue gaze was distant. "I can see the pattern that you weave. It's darkness and poison, and it may well destroy all of us--destroy you," he finished in a whisper. Brennan didn't reply. Shane wouldn't say more now, but he'd come back to the subject later. Brennan would have no words of reassurance for him in that moment either. What Shane saw was a true possibility, but Brennan was beyond caring about that.

Beyond caring about anything at all.

"Nah," I muttered while revolving a very nice specimen of banillies around and around in the palm of my left hand. "Too expensive, really."

"Not so!" the shopkeeper protested at once, adamant, hovering above the fruits like some huge protective bat. "See here, Sa' Morgenstern," the man added, using the old form of address that only the old, ancient clans of the Outer Colonies knew and remembered from the first day of interstellar travel, "the winter down on Abeli was particularly harsh this cycle, and the harvest was poor."

"The fruits look of excellent quality, though," I mused, enjoying the haggling game.

"Of course!" the seller exclaimed, indignant. "I'd never insult my customers by proposing them less than the very best products! It wounds me that you'd think otherwise, Sa' Morgenstern."

"Sa'" came from a deformation of "sailor" which had been adopted by the Azure Traverse pilots long ago, a fitting name for men and women who led their jumpships through the Deep's currents. "So," I smiled at the man, "I suppose these prices are nothing more than the repercussion of a rise at the source?"

"Absolutely!" the enthusiasm in the man's nod was a trifle overdone. "The Kostas family couldn't do anything else after losing almost a half of their harvest to rain and hailstorms that lasted till late in the Spring," he beamed at me, and I burst out laughing.

"You're a swindler, but I'll take a score of them anyway." This delicious kind of plum was too tempting to resist, and besides I might perhaps charm Fi into making a compote that would last me through a run or two. Now, that prospect alone--

Eddy tearing at time and space.

Sudden flow of the Deep showering all over Achernar station.

Warmth flooded me and I blinked, even as a joyful cry resounded through the market. "Jumpships!" I whirled around, all thoughts of banillies and compote evaporated from my mind, just in time to see the gigantic news panel hanging above the market's center place flash with names. "The jumpships are coming!"

"Loki!" Fi flung herself at me from the left and hugged me tight, half laughing, half sobbing. "Do you see?"

Yes, I did indeed see. Lifting my right hand up, I clasped Fi's arm that she had wrapped around me, and blinked again when new names flashed upon the huge board as more jumpships Out Fell from the Deep and contacted Achernar station to warn ops of their coming to dock. Arion and Achilles, Unicorn and Draco, Fenrir and Nidhogg, Rheingold and Freyr, Teutates and Belenos--I exhaled a long, shaking breath. So many of them. There were so many names on the list! This gathering of jumpships would be the greatest in three generations of humankind.

"They're in final approach," I told Fi. "Arion and Achilles have initiated docking maneuvers. They're coming in at berths Psi and Omega. Let's go, we'll be there right when they come on station!" With that, I flung myself forward, but Fi held me back. Leaning to her right, she snatched something from the shopkeeper and dumped a bag full of banillies in my hands.

"And I suppose I'll have to do some cooking and make a compote out of those," she grinned at me, her eyes glinting--alight with joy. "Put it on Griffin's tab!" she called to the merchant. Then she ran, finding her way unerringly through the market's crowd. For Muir was docking Arion at Achernar station, and nothing in the universe could stop Fi from going to him.

It took us a bit less than half an hour to reach berths Psi and Omega, set at the other end of the vast space station. Bending down, I clasped my hands upon my thighs, completely winded. Eyes closed, I struggled to regain my breath while the metallic echo of our racing steps dwindled into nothingness, absorbed by the constant hum of Achernar station's engines.

"Muir!" Even as Fi's voice rang in the air, the telltale hiss and creak of an airlock door being released reached my ears. I looked up just in time to see Fi fling herself in the arms of a middle-sized man whose lithe frame seemed too fragile to resist Fi's assault--deceptive appearance, as I had found when I had first met Muir some six years ago.

"Fi," he breathed in her hair, holding her close and pressing her against him as if he hoped to merge their two bodies into a single one. "Fi," he repeated in a husky whisper. Something constricted my throat then, when I saw the Deep's currents enfold the two lovers and shelter them, insubstantial--a cold, painful thing that coiled around my spine and crushed it ever so slowly, before spreading to my rib cage and crush that also. For a moment, my vision wavered and I ached to look away--unable to do so and take my eyes off Fi and Muir--from two soul mates embracing and stopping almighty Time from ticking around them, cloaked as they were in a delicate mantle of the Deep's immaterial flow.

Eventually the Deep's spell lost its hold on normal space, and Muir looked up. His dark grey eyes set upon me, and a crooked smile twisted the corners of his mouth. "Loki," he bowed his head, and sighed. "We searched for days, all of us. We searched every single grain of space dust, every current and fold and eddy in the Deep," he bit his lower lip, adding, "but we couldn't find them. They're lost to us, as if they never existed." Ghosts were haunting Muir's usually clear gaze, and a grief he hadn't truly come to grips with yet. I gave him a silent nod, acknowledging the words and the harsh truth they heralded. On my right, the other airlock hissed open to let through the pilot of Achilles, Muir's team mate.

Shin was even smaller than Muir, but there was no mistaking the strength exuding from his lean frame. He kept his jet black hair cut short and simple, without any of the eccentricities most of us liked to indulge in. The sole concession Shin had always made to his nature of jumpship pilot was the small earring and its tiny sapphire hanging from his left ear, and that was because all Azure Traverse pilots wore the jewel as a way to be recognized wherever they went.

"Shin", I smiled at him, "be welcome. Be very welcome indeed. We've been waiting for you for almost a week." Fretting, sinking into irrationality and struggling against hysteria, but I didn't say that. There was no need to: they knew.

"It couldn't be helped," Shin replied, calm, composed--on the outside. Glancing at the still embracing Fi and Muir, he added, "We should go and give them some privacy. Come," stepping toward me, he reached out and drew me along with him, "I'll tell you on the way to the Kallokeri."

That was fine with me, but, "What about you?" I asked softly.

He snorted, a rather unusual display of emotions in well-behaved, always in control, polite and patient Shin. "I'll be okay," he shrugged. "Muir took most of the strain and kept it to himself, stupid fool that he is." The ghost of a smile hovered on Shin's lips. "You lead pilots are all the same, even though I'm told you're the worst."

"Fi has been badmouthing me during our last shore leave, I see. Again. Shin," I laid a hand upon his left shoulder, lightly, for the smaller pilot wasn't one for overt gestures of closeness or affection. Gently, quietly I asked, "Tell me. What happened at Vega station? And why are so many of us here at Achernar, away from their normal routes?"

Beneath my fingers, he tensed. Then he looked up at me, the expression on his face an unreadable one, but I knew what was lurking behind the mask he wore. The Deep was clinging to him, as it had been for me when Fi and I had docked here. The undercurrents were small enough, weak even, but they were in total disarray, their flow no longer a harmonious one.

Chaotic.

I ached to reach out and help, but it would have been wrong to do so. I wasn't Muir, I wasn't Shin's other half, and chances were I'd do more harm than good. Still, I hummed softly at the Deep's shadows, bidding them be gentle and hush. For the time of a heartbeat, a shiver ran through Shin's body, and then was gone. "I don't know how you did that," he said in a bemused whisper, "but thank you."

"No charge," I shrugged, concentrating on indifference. I didn't want to get involved with another pilot. Not now, not ever. That one mistake in Carré had been enough blunder for a whole lifetime. "Not that I did anything either," I went on, a grin splitting my face as I got a mental image of Shin sending me flying, being the heir to a family whose roots lay in ancient martial arts fighting and all, and then mocking me for being a witless idiot who ought to know better and allow his brains to remind his groin that the man walking beside me wasn't exactly keen on winning male attention. Had I been one of the Takeda's daughters, on the other hand--

"We don't know what happened at Vega," Shin said all of a sudden, his gaze distant. "Station authorities claim that nothing was wrong with either Basilisk or Chimaera. Docking crews reported no problem with the jumpships, and neither Nico nor Yong complained of anything. There wasn't much traffic in the system--passing of year holidays," Shin smiled, a cold twist of his lips. "Undocking went smoothly, and Nico and Yong even put a bit of distance between them and station before In Diving. Then they disappeared. Station didn't pick up any signal, no distress call, no mayday. Nothing." Shin paused for a few seconds, tome to avoid running into a little girl who was running recklessly down the market's alleys.

"Aldebaran never got Chimaera's confirmation of imminent Out Fall, so we figured that whatever happened took place in the Vegan system, or in the inner ripples of Vega's eddy in the Deep." Shin heaved out a sigh. "But we found nothing. All those who could came to assist in the search. Muir and I left dock at Procyon, our holds empty, and we plunged down the Deep as soon as we heard--to no avail." With a single shake of his head, Shin reached out to a small wind chime hanging from a toy store's door. "Muir said that you might have perhaps have felt things we couldn't, but Fi and you were deep in Nyah space, and out of reach."

"Yeah," I replied somberly. "The Nyah told us, but they requested we skip Vega. They were real anxious about their cargo not being delayed, and we were too far away anyway."

"So you In Dived all the way to here," Shin cut me off with a derisive smirk. "One hell of a stupid risk to take, but," he dragged in a shuddering breath, "one Muir and I would have taken as well."

We kept crossing through Achernar station's great market in silence for a while. Shin stopped once, to buy sweet potatoes from a small shop, and proceeded to eat them after having offered me one that I had adamantly refused. "There were accidents," Shin muttered between two bites of the sweets, "but only small ones, thank God. Cargo lost and Miner ships frightened out of their wits. Fools," he hissed, "who should know their place and know better than to change their course when a jumpship Out Falls in their immediate vicinity."

I whistled between my teeth. "Shamira will not be happy." Shin scoffed at that, but didn't reply. The miners would sue Azure Traverse and demand outrageous compensation for their lost cargo, even though the fault lied with them. But Vega being Inner Colonies and close to Earth, the law courts would rule against us.

"As to why so many of us have come to Achernar," Shin let out another sigh, heavy with grief and weariness, "we needed to get back to places where we belonged, to rest and to mourn once we abandoned all hope of ever finding Nico and Yong. Some came with us to Achernar, others went all the way to Rigel or Deneb." As far away from Vega and the feeling of loss, of death lingering there as they could. "We warned Shamira, and she wished us God speed."

Of course she had. Shamira had had no other alternative. Nobody in their right mind wanted distraught pilots to get lost in the Deep, their perceptions of the currents distorted by the unbalance born of loss and strain--Out Falling in the heart of a star, a planet, or even a space station. No, nobody who understood who and what the pilots of Azure Traverse were would have considered the thought of telling them to carry on their business as if nothing had happened, not even for a moment.

Shin and I went the rest of the way in silence, navigating through a crowd which parted to give way to the two jumpship pilots that we were out of respect for our grief and need to reach the shelter of the Kallokeri quickly. The people here understood the terrible meaning of our loss. Achernar was Outer Colonies, and as close to a home as we'd ever know or have.

Someone was waiting for us next to the Kallokeri's door. A heavy weight settled upon my heart when I recognized the thin, long-haired silhouette of Nakamura Tomoko, head of the Takamura clan, close allies of the Takeda and the current, powerful stationmaster of Achernar. On my right, Shin's shoulders almost imperceptibly slumped. As we reached her side, Nakamura Tomoko bowed--bowed low, and my heart sank even further while I bowed back to her.

"Sa' Morgenstern, Sa' Yin," she greeted us, her voice a delicate mixture of regrets and respect.

"Nakamura-sama," I nodded at her, and because she was the head of an old, old clan and master of a station that had been home to Azure Traverse for generations, I asked her, "Is there anything we can do for you?" She wouldn't have showed up here otherwise. She wasn't one of the Takeda or Nakamura's sons and daughters who came to the Kallokeri to touch us, be touched and share a dance between the sheets.

She bowed even lower, and then looked right at us, brown eyes troubled but determined. "Forgive me, Sa's, for intruding on a very private and painful reunion, but I must tell you..." she drew in a deep breath. "Achernar's storage facilities are filled with uranium that was supposed to have reached Sirius and Epsilon Eridanis eight days ago. Ships coming through the jumpgate here tell us of prices sky-rocketing at markets there and even at Proxima Centauri. The companies we sell to have sent ceaseless requests for the goods, that we have ignored, but we are told by those stations' and worlds' authorities that the situation is deteriorating. They're pressing us to use any means at our disposal to deliver the uranium they need, they--" she stared down at her feet, and her voice dropped to a barely audible whisper, "insist that the Pilots' Guild understands the way things are, and will give our shipments top priority to go through the jumpgates."

"Fuck the bastards!" I snarled, even as Shin froze beside me, his body rigid as if to brace for blows. Damn the Inner colonies and the Graad Foundation, couldn't they let us grieve in peace?

"Is there no limit to how low they're willing to stoop?" Shin hissed softly on my right. Nakamura Tomoko didn't respond, but there was no need for her to. Had Achernar been Inner Colonies, her words would have meant disgusting blackmail, but Achernar was a star far, far away from the Earth's sun. Achernar was ours, and Nakamura Tomoko's coming to us was the gesture of a friend warning us that the Graad Foundation had decided to use current events to push their despicable commercial war even further. "We only just came at dock--" I closed my eyes tightly shut when I heard the shock and distress in Shin's voice.

"Tell the lockgate people that you already started loading Pegasus and Griffin," I said at last, willing the black fury overwhelming me *back* where it wouldn't impair my vision or cloud my reasoning. Currents were troubling the air around us, and I had focused on Nakamura Tomoko alone, unseeing but for her, unaware of anything but her and the filthy game of the Graad Foundation.

"No!" Shin grasped my arm in a futile attempt to jerk me away. "No, not you! The shipment was our--"

"You're not Griffin's pilot, Shin," I said in a deadly quiet voice, turning to face him and meeting his gaze. "You do not wear emerald at your ear," I continued, merciless. No, there were too many ghosts haunting Shin's eyes, too much exhaustion, and the wildness of the Deep was upon him, a breath away from clamping its jaws shut upon him. No, I wouldn't let him and Muir risk sailing the Deep in the state they were in.

"You will tell the lockgate people so," I refocused on Nakamura Tomoko, "and you will start loading our ships. Slowly," I murmured, "as slowly as you can. I need a full shift, night and day."

"Sa' Morgenstern," she bowed at me, "we will give you two full shifts. You have the Nakamura's word, and profoundest thanks. We are in your debt." Because I had allowed Achernar to remain true to alliances and covenants sealed by her forefathers. Because I had given her a way out, and because faith, loyalty and honor were everything to the Takeda and Nakamura clans. Fi and I would be the ones to pay the price for that, but there were no others who could plunge down the Deep now--none. All I had been able to do had been to give Fi and Muir two full shifts--small, insignificant tidbits of time during which they could be together. Too short, but Fi would understand and forgive me.

That was what hurt the most, I thought with a bitter smile as I turned away from Nakamura Tomoko and went inside the Kallokeri, pausing just for a moment to raise my right hand and press its palm against a spot on my brow, right above my right eye. There was a headache hatching there; already it was trickling its slow, pain-ridden way to the back of my skull, a throbbing ache that would soon grow and grow until I yielded and fed my body with some painkiller or other. I had no time for this--none. With a sigh, I made a curt gesture of the left hand, wishing I could somehow wave the maddening pain away, just like that. But of course, such futile wishes were never granted.

Darkness flowing.

Tiny beads of light cascading nadir-ward.

Echoes of bright stars, insignificant as dust taken away by the Deep's flow.

Eddies troubling the currents, sending ripples coursing through Griffin's hull and tickling the synthetic fabric of my jumpsuit.

There. I paused, reaching out to the flow and tasting the currents.

"Loki? What do you think you're doing?" Fi's rods dripped down the waves traversing Griffin's deck and I held out my hands to catch them before the Deep could take them away.

"Switching to swifter currents so we can reach Sirius quicker," I breathed, blowing the words on the flow and willing them to drift over to Pegasus. "I want us out of there and bound for Phecda so we can catch Muir and Shin when they get there."

"What if there's no cargo bound for Phecda waiting for us on Sirius?"

I laughed, bubbles that disturbed the weaker undercurrents circling Griffin. "Then we let them rot with their fucking cargo and we run to Phecda with empty holds!"

"Of course." Fi's sarcasm ran down in rivulets against the walls of Griffin's piloting deck, and I sat back in my seat, focusing on our two jumpships and on the Deep flowing around us.

Always in motion.

Always changing.

Cold.

I shivered as I encountered the smallest of disturbances in the currents. It was far away, and dark, and sharp. A shark's fin that was cleaving the Deep's flow unnoticed--a presence like the Dwellers and unlike them.

Colder than ice.

Emptier than the void between stars.

Darker than the Deep's dark flow.

It could be one of the great storms being born, it could be the eddy caused by a black hole--it could be anything. Alien, a dissonance in the Deep's perfect harmony, it beckoned. It didn't belong. It was a blade, a sword poised in the currents' heart, so craftily dissembled that nobody would feel its presence.

Waiting.

A shadow, perhaps the ghost of a Dweller ship, if they had any. "Fi," I called softly, turning my mind away from the thing slowly, slowly lest it sensed our presences. "Reach out to me, we're diving down the central currents, now.

No protest, no argument came from Pegasus. Instead, I felt Fi's gentle, steadying touch and I let out a relieved sigh. Eyes closed, I gave a delicate push and Griffin veered away from its course, tumbling down the stronger currents to go where I willed it to, Pegasus on our tail--linked.

Far, far away upstream, the cold, black blade didn't move from its spot in the heart of the flow--unmoving, immobile in an environment that was nothing but motion. Fighting to ignore the gooseflesh rising the hair on my arms and the clawing thing churning my stomach, I willed myself to feel only Griffin and Pegasus cascading down the currents, plunging down and fleeing a thing that had no name.

Moments of eternity later, I reached out to the small control pad on my right, and took the small tin box I had used to store some of Fi's banillies compote. Dipping a finger into the smooth texture of the compote, I brought it to my mouth and licked it, wishing I had a cat's tongue, which could have scraped off the last bit of it. Through half-lidded eyes, I hummed in contentment. The sugar was making for a nice, natural release of Tyrosine, and that was very much welcome during a Dive down the Deep. It took me another eternity to finish the compote--eternity or an instant or a mix of both, as the unreconciable paradox went. As I licked the last bit of the sweet from my right forefinger, Griffin trembled under me.

Eddies, I grimaced. A lot of them, so deep in human space. Gently I corrected Griffin's trajectory, keeping the jumpship safely away and aligned nadir-ward with the currents. If I turned my attention on the eddies and let my mind brush against them, I would know them, the names of the stars they were the shadowy reflection of, but I had no time for them or for mapping out this piece of the Deep. It was what the Pilots' Guild did--futile though it was, for when a storm rose and the currents switched directions, the eddies were swallowed up by the flow, and then they were reformed elsewhere--or nowhere, if one were to go along with the Dwellers' crazy way of thinking.

At last. Sirius was a very bright star, and the pull it made upon the Deep was a very noticeable one. The eddy it shaped tugged at the currents, attracting all but the strongest ones and diverting them from their course--though not for long. They left the flow's nadir-ward rush to spiral around Sirius' shadow like curious passers-by puzzled by a splash of color in the dark, and then they went back to where they belonged.

"Fi," I called while gliding over toward the eddy, "forty heartbeats to Out Fall."

"You bastard!" she chuckled. "You did it, you brought us to Sirius well ahead of schedule!"

But of course. "Had you had any doubt?" I asked her, laughter plain in the tone of my voice. Then we dived down the spiral that would lead us right next to the station orbiting Sirius' remotest planet. Unstoppable, laughter spilled away from me. The wild ride through an eddy's disturbance was always a giddying, intoxicating experience. Plunging down the chaotic currents, colliding with them and tearing through the fabric of the Deep itself to come ashore on the other side--it was wondrous and terrible. We were falling, falling faster than the human mind could ever hope to apprehend, through curtains of glistening black that could trap a soul in their midst and never release it--falling.

Out Falling.

Now.

Arrow.

I gasped. Red, it cut through Griffin's hull. Crimson, it tore through the jumpsuit I was wearing and pierced through my heart. Darkening, it filled my bloodstream and my mind, eclipsing the Tyrosine boost griffin's bio-monitoring control had been programmed to deliver into my body in the moment of Out Fall.

A howl of pain.

Absolute terror.

Two voices, two souls intertwined crying out in the Deep.

Fading.

Dying.

Thoughts gliding down the currents faster than jumpships could dream--raw, raw pain that struck at me and tore a desperate cry from my lips.

"LOKI!" Fi shrieked from the other end of the universe. "LOKI!" Something touched me, gentle and soothing. Terrified. Somehow, the red arrow started to dissolve, and the haze of pain and mad fear choking my mind lifted--just a bit.

"I'm here," I whispered through clenched teeth. Griffin and Pegasus were tumbling down, out of control and rocked by the eddy's savage currents, torn by them. Fi was here, with me. Falling as well. She was shaking, I could feel her hanging on to sanity through sheer strength of will--reaching out to me.

Steadying me.

Sharing strength she was in dire need of herself.

"Shit!" I bit my tongue until I felt the metallic taste of blood fill my mouth, and I pushed at Griffin, crying out as I found a difficult, pain-filled path through the wild currents. "I've got us!" I shouted at Fi, hoping she'd hear it--hoping she's hold on to me and Griffin. "I've got us!"

"Picking up station chatter from beyond the Curtain," came Fi's rushed voice. "It's drifting up from the eddy's core--Loki!" She was frantic. "They're saying--" I heard her sob on Pegasus' bridge. "They're saying Azure Traverse jumpships disappeared upon In Dive at Tau Ceti!"

Something icy and viscous coiled up to my spine and bit, freezing everything. Stopping my heart. Yes. Yes, it was true. It was--a howl of mad grief clawed at my throat, but no sound could pass through my lips. It was what I had felt. They had called out for help, they had cried out in the Deep, where no one but the Dwellers could hear--and another lead pilot, if the currents' whims led the cry just the right way.

"Not lost, Fi," I said in a rasp whisper.

"Are we In Diving upon Out Fall?" she asked, mustering a semblance of calm. She hadn't felt it, I suddenly realized. She had only felt me fall and sink, prey to the insane pain and terror that had overwhelmed me. And now, she was doing the only thing she could: discarding her own feelings and supporting me, offering me an anchor, a stable point so we wouldn't get tapped in the eddy and come hurtling upon Sirius station.

"No," I managed. No, the jumpships hadn't been lost. That wasn't what the cries of agony had carried. The pain that had traversed the Deep was that of violation and torn hulls, of jumpships gutted and hurled down one of the Deep's many storms.

No, we couldn't In Dive as soon as we reached the Deep's shore. It was too late to do anything. Time lost all meaning in the Deep, and what I had perceived could have happened just now, or aeons ago. The fact that Sirius station was relaying the information meant that it was fairly recent, but it changed nothing. I knew. We had cargo to deliver, to protect ancient covenants and alliances--to protect people who had trusted us and cast their lot with us long ago. It was a thing I could do, could find the strength to carry to its end, but In Diving again--no.

Not when it meant being struck by the echo of the jumpships' agony and death, trapped in the eddy's swirls.

Not with the thing poised at the heart of the Deep's flow.

No.

The air that hissed through the unsealing airlock was cool, unpleasantly so, and the light that rushed in to flood Griffin's passageway was stark--too white and blinding. Raising a hand to my brow in order to shield my eyes from the painful glare, I grimaced and stepped out on the station's docks. It was because Sirius was such a bright, white star. The people who had settled here were used to its harsh radiance, and reproduced it even in the artificial lights of a station floating in the forever night of space. It was more than inconvenient for travelers who were more used to basking in the gentler hues of suns like Achernar, delicately shaded with the faintest traces of red.

"What a delightful surprise to see jumpships dock at Sirius!" In a sharp motion, I looked up to see a station official standing before me. The man must have been waiting for Fi and I to come out so he could organize the unloading and delivering of the cargo we were carrying. "When we heard the news of Azure Traverse pilots again going mad and losing their jumpships in hyperspace, we thought your lot would once more freak out and disappear on the spot!"

I stared up at the man in silence, stared at him truly, and saw that the sarcasm and contempt there had been in his words were mirrored in his gaze. He was young, perhaps a year or two out of whatever academy there was on the world below the station--and he had an air of self-importance about him, as if he thought of himself as powerful and impressive. Well, I smiled at him, I would show him powerful.

Tapping on the earfeed I was wearing, I reached down for the comm-unit set at my belt and opened a channel to Pegasus, touching the outphonic mode switch so my nice welcoming party wouldn't miss anything. "Fi," I said in a quiet, unconcerned voice, "how long to leave dock? The stench in this station's air is an affront to my senses."

There was laughter in Fi's eyes, in spite of everything, and that was good. "Half an hour," she replied in mock earnest. "They haven't started unloading, and our mooring isn't yet complete." She paused for a second, then added with feigned innocence, "less than five minutes if we switch to emergency procedures."

"All right," I nodded. "Seal your airlock, we're leaving."

"Wait!" The young station official reached out to me, stopping just short of touching me, which would have been most unwise to do. "Wait! I--"

"And, Fi," I continued, ignoring the man whose mouth was now hanging open like that of a fish out of the waters, "patch me through to ops, please. I'm warning the stationmaster of our departure." In silence, she rolled her eyes heavenward, then after a small delay the diminutive screen's image changed to show me Sirius station's very busy center of operations. At once, a woman turned toward me.

"Captain Morgenstern," she began, which told me that Fi had talked to her, anticipating my wish.

"Stationmaster." I gave her a polite bow.

"Please," she said, bowing as well, and deeper than I had--significantly deeper, "accept our apologies for the stupid misbehavior of one of our junior crew." The light in her blue eyes was a hard one, and the lines of her mouth taut. On her shoulders, half-hidden by the blonde hair cascading down her chest and back, were the insignia of a stationmaster. So, I mused to myself, she was the real thing. Sirius station had decided to take this small matter seriously. Silently I chuckled, while the woman was saying, "And please accept the expression of our sorrow for your recent loss."

"Sorrow and grief won't part the Deep's currents or make it release Kraken and Hydra," I told her softly, "but thank you nonetheless. Oh, Stationmaster," I added in an afterthought, "do you have cargo bound for Phecda on your departure schedule?"

She blinked. "Yes. Herbs and medical supplies. Can I--"

"Then," I gave her another bow and flashed a smile her way, "can you please warn the owners that we'll be happy to take care of the delivery of their goods?"

She took a moment to absorb my words, then gave me a reluctant nod of her head. "Of course. May I assume that you will be staying at dock long enough to unload the contents of your holds, then?"

"Yes, stationmaster, you may indeed," I grinned at her and ended the communication. My, but the poor woman was unhappy--and with good reason! Trapped by a mightily stupid blunder of a member of her junior crew, she had found her back into a corner, forced to grant my outrageous request and allow me to snatch away what had most likely been cargo owned by a Graad Foundation affiliate and bound for travel through the Pilots' Guild's lockgate. Forced to grant--or so she thought.

On my right, Pegasus' airlock slid open and Fi strode out of her own ship, coming to my side without sparing a glance for the young station officer who scampered away, likely anxious to find some small dark hole to hide into--where his stationmaster wouldn't be able to find him and flail his worthless hide.

"How little they know us," Fi sighed while drawing me toward the station's market section. Indeed. How ignorant of us they were, these Inner Colonies people, to think that we'd leave dock on a mere whim without at least unloading the cargo entrusted with us--cargo belonging to clans whose roots in space far away from Earth were as deep as our own. The ancient families who led the Outer Colonies were like kin--ours to protect, and we'd never betray their trust.

People stopped and turned as we walked down the market's alleys. Kids stared, wide-eyed, and sometimes they pointed in our direction and started speaking in hushed whispers, as if we were some kind of monsters springing from myth into their everyday reality. There was awe in the crowd, but it was dark and full of misgivings--the opposite of Achernar. Fi and I stepped through the alleys in quick strides, and didn't take the time to stroll or stop by a shop. There were wonders to find in a station so close to Earth, riches like real wooden furniture or perfumes of true, live flowers, but the attraction of those magical items was eclipsed by the dark currents disturbing the crowd's flow.

"Where are we going?" Fi asked in a breath. "I shouldn't have taken us here. There's nothing for us on this station. No place for us here. None." She took a swift glance around us, and shivered. "We should go back to Pegasus and Griffin."

"Yes," I nodded, "but I want to drop by an interstellar communications center first. It won't be long." Fi was right: we should go back, and leave as soon as unloading and reloading of cargo were complete. We weren't welcome in stations so close to Earth. In truth, we never had been, but the mistrust and dislike festering in people's hearts had grown, all of a sudden. We were tolerated, because they needed the goods we brought them from the Outer Colonies they dare not reach out to, but that was all.

"You'll contact Shamira?" Fi's voice had reduced to a very quiet whisper. I gave her a silent nod in response, and abruptly pulled at her, having caught sight of the telltale sign of an Aeolus communications center.

The store's owner watched us enter his establishment with wary suspicion, but there was little he could do about our presence here. Customers were customers after all, and money was welcome no matter its source. Choosing an empty booth, I made my way toward it and sat down, plugging my comm-unit in. Aeolus Communications' logo flashed upon the screen, together with an authorization request to withdraw the communication's cost from Azure Traverse's account. I granted that with a touch of my left thumb on the screen, and requested a subspace channel to Earth--Greece, the island of Lefkada, where Shamira lived.

"Yes." Shamira looked tired as I watched her turn toward her own communications screen. "Loki?" she frowned.

"Shamira." I hissed air through my lips. "We need to talk. About Kraken and Hydra. It was no loss. There's a thing--"

"Not on this kind of channel, Loki," she cut me off, her expression unreadable and her voice flat, toneless. "Not on any channel. Understand?"

No. I searched her face. No, I didn't understand. She was saying that she refused to discuss the matter, as if--as if there was nothing to discuss, or as if she knew all there was to know about this. Shit! I clenched my hands into fists, a heartbeat away from telling her to go to hell with her stupid secrecy, but instead I nodded. "All right. There's another thing. The waves are withdrawing, and we're coming to low tide. I'm sending the word now."

Shamira Goldstein stared at me long and hard. "You're set on this," she finally hissed between clenched teeth.

"Yeah." I told her with a joyless smile. "You gave me this emerald, remember?" I tapped the nail of my left forefinger against the jewel hanging from my small braid. "When you took me upon Griffin's bridge for the first time, you said I'd be a beacon, the lead pilot of Azure Traverse, and that the other jumpships would look to me for guidance and support me if the need arose. Well," I sustained the charcoal eyes' stormy gaze, and went on, "the time has come for me to guide. The tide is growing low. Word will be spreading from here, and I'll need you to help pass it along. Please," I added, which might have been a mistake when one was trying to assert authority--all right, was a mistake, but Shamira had been the one who had raised me.

Snatched me away from the unending dark.

Freed me from a blackness that had smothered me.

Crushed me.

Hurt me.

Killed--killed!

"So be it." Shamira's heavy, loud sigh cut through the old, icy nightmare that had sprung from the shadows of my soul to come over me again. Just as I managed to win free of the black, vicious ghost's grip upon my heart and to refocus on the screen, it went dead.

Shamira had ended the communication.

A hand settled on my right shoulder, and I jumped. "We're leaving these shores, then." It was Fi. Just Fi, I told myself as I willed the frantic rhythm of my heartbeats to steady. At last, her quiet whisper registered in my brain, and I regained enough self-control to nod.

"Yes." I closed my eyes and focused on her, on Giuseppina Baldini who was my other half and my anchor to the world when shadows or the Deep's storms tried to claim me. Releasing air from my lungs in a shaking breath, I went on, "Both times, it happened when In Diving from an Inner Colonies station. It's that thing in the Deep, Fi," I said, struggling to keep my voice calm. "It's that thing I felt, and it's aiming for us, I'm sure of it. Somehow, it must drift close to the greater concentration of strong eddies that mark the Inner Colonies. I don't know why, but I sensed it, Fi. I swear."

"So we're withdrawing to the Outer Colonies," she nodded at me.

"We'll still ship cargo to the Mid Range Worlds, to Nyah space, to Edge and Threshold, and of course to Shore. Nobody else could talk to the Dwellers," I smiled despite myself.

Fi's hand pressed my shoulder. "I think you're right," she said softly. "I think you're doing what you must to protect us all. You follow your instincts. You're Griffin's pilot," she squatted before me, her hazel eyes level with mine. "It's what you do--what she set you out to do when she gave you Griffin. If she has forgotten, and cares more about Azure Traverse's weight in the transport market, well she's a fool," Fi snorted, scorn plain in her tone. "The jumpships will follow you, Loki. We'll follow you wherever you go."

I looked at her, silent for a long minute. Then I reached out to her and brushed the back of my left hand against her cheek. "I don't deserve you," I murmured. Then I let her go and refocused on my comm-unit. Azure Traverse was abandoning the Inner Colonies and returning home, to distant stars, so distant that the clans and families living there had no longer any ties to Earth. The trade market would be in chaos, at least until new ways were found to transport goods, new stops and new trade routes were established. It was none of my concern.

We were going home.

End of Chapter 3.

Notes

Kallokeri: Summer, in Greek. Built from "kallo keri", litterally "fair weather".

Banillies: Greek for a kind of plum you find in Greece. Absolutely delicious when used to make a compote. I can vouch for that one ^^

Abeli: Greek for vineyard.

Aeolus: slight deformation of the name of the Greek god who rules over the winds.

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