Media Play is one of my favorite places in the world. And on a Jihaddi's salary, it's just a little slice of heaven. I hummed as I happily pulled a couple of Red Dwarf import tapes off the rack and turned down the next aisle. I was being good - I could have afforded more, but I had put myself on a strict allowance of one tape a week. Having missed a few weeks due to the jaunt to Marraketh, I was making the time up slowly. I was in *such* a good mood that I actually didn't notice the Spoungie until he stepped up to me and said straight out, "Want a Healthy Snack?" I stared down my nose at the "man". He was wearing bright purple, an idiodic grin, and nothing more that I wanted to spend time describing. I focused my gaze on the "snack" he was holding. Then I frowned. "That's not a Hellthy Snack," I informed him politely, "That's a Magnum." He frowned at me. Then he looked at the weapon clutched in his hand and brightened. "Oh! Yeah, see, lord Barney told me to look for the scummy Jihadii that were wandering around here and buying Evil British Movies and stuff. Then he told me to kill 'em. You seen any?" I slowly glanced down at my handful of Red Dwarf. Unfortunately, this spoungie was smart enough, or maybe bored enough, to follow my gaze. Also unfortunately, Media Play had decided to stick large "Import: Britian" stickers on the tops of the boxes to make them easier to find. Damn. And the last thing I wanted in this place was a shootout. "Hey!" he squealed, "You're one of THEM!" I paused. "Well, actually..." Talking my way out of situations has never been my strong suit. The spoungie snarled in dementia and pulled the trigger on his gun. The first shot hit my left shoulder, which smarted a bit as it lodged in my Spandex o' Doom body armor. The second time, the gun kicked and he hit the "TV Series" sign, which snapped a chain and swung into the Red Dwarf rack. Damn! "Okay, you asked for it," I muttered, reaching into my backpack awkwardly and pulling out my sword. Not bothering to unsheath the blade, I manhandled the hilt around in my right hand while clamping the Red Dwarf tapes to my side with my useless left arm. Finally getting the hilt in position, I launched a spray of bullets at the spounge. Three of my shots hit a few DVDs of The Matrix, two hit a tape of Never Been Kissed, and the other six caught the spounge more-or-less in the middle of his torso while he was attempting to figure out how to aim. Of course, with my luck, while the spounge died(the words of That Song on his lips) another ten came pouring out of the aisles. Six of them were tugging something that looked like a Large Automatic Bullet Launcher-Type Weapon(painted nagenta, damn my eyes), and one of them grinned maniacally as he took aim. "Here goes my damage budget," I sighed, and let 'er rip. Running across the display floor to avoid the spray, I fired a steady stream of carnage at the spoungies. I managed to see the gun thing blow up(somehow, I think the sponge had loaded something backwards) an instant before I vaulted through the window toward the cashier's desks. Rolling smoothly to my feet, I surveyed the damage. The entire back half of the store was blown up, uncountable dollars of merchandise had been destroyed, and a half-exploded nagenta Weapon was lying in the middle of the wreckage. Civillians were slowly un-duck-and-covering, and eleven dead spongies were littering the ground. I set the Red Dwarf tapes on the cashier's desk, brushed the glass off my clothes, leaned on the tip of my sword and smiled at the rather bemused young man next to me in line. "So, come here often?" I asked as the cashier numbly started ringing up the tapes. He blinked and went "..." for a few moments, before glancing over my shoulder, reaching into his belt and producing a knife. It balanced briefly on his fingertips as he grinned and tossed it where he was looking. A gurk sounded behind me; I looked over my shoulder in time to see the end protruding from a spoungin's eye socket, blood spurting, as he slowly collapsed. "Fethr'ar, des'dre," I said jauntily before turning to the cashier. "Oh, and add the store to my bill," I said, tossing to him the FnordExpress card Mal had suggested I use if in Real Money Trouble. I didn't think he had an entire store in mind, but I was sure the credit limit would cover it. I mean, if you can't trust the [REMOVED-FNORD], who can you trust? The other man, meanwhile, had walked over to the window and checked over the blast damage. At about this time he walked back. "Quite a number on the videos." "Yeah, 's a shame." "Jihaddi, or random terrorist?" I shrugged absently. "Jihaddi. You?" He nodded and offered a hand. "Lieutenant Bos, TRES." I shook it. "Aris Merquoni, VRDET." He seemed to be waiting for something. "Aaah... I can't remember my rank offhand. I'd need to check my DT licence..." He stared at me strangely as I collected my tapes and credit card back from the still-stunned cashier. I pulled a recently-used "closed for remodelling" sign from behind the counter and set it by the door, ignoring the sirens echoing through the mall, then turned back to Bos. "So, what are you doing around here?" "Someone told me there were spongin nearby. I was investigating. I see you found them." "Seems I did. You like Red Dwarf?" The sudden change of subject threw him off balance for a second. "...Well, actually, yes. I haven't had time to watch it recently, though." He stared. "Why?" I shrugged and held up the bag. "I guess I'm going to have to wait a while before getting the next tapes," I said mournfully. "This is the only store I know that carried 'em." He was still staring at me. "You can just tape them, you know." I shrugged. "Yeah, but that channel also carries That Most Annoying Of Lesser Wyrms, and besides, taping 'em isn't any fun." I noticed I was still holding my sword, shrugged my backpack off and unzipped it. I dropped the sword and the tapes in, then put it back on and dug my wallet out of my jeans. "By the way... I seem to be a company commander." His posture straightened suddenly as he blinked at me. I had to giggle. "Oh, knock it off, you look like Rimmer." He managed to blink again and let out another strangled "..." I shrugged. "Never mind. Want to get something to eat? I know my way around here." Another blink. "Sure." He paused, then made a massive effort and got himself back together, looking at his watch. "There are, in all probability, more of them. We'd better move, if he managed to call those..." he left the sentence unfinished. -- She shrugged. "I wouldn't worry about it. We'll be regular citizens in just a few minutes." I blinked. "Sure," I said, looking around at the devastated shop. "Lead the way. But out the back, okay?" I rummaged about in my pockets. "I guess you don't have any cash... oh, nevermind." I fixed the cashier with a gaze. "You didn't see us." She nodded dumbly, mumbling something about putting your purchase in a bag sir, and we ducked out the door quickly. "Over here.." Aris pulled us towards a door in what looked like a construction zone in a neighboring store, and opened it quickly into a corridor with cement floors and pipes running across the walls. "Into the bowels. We're lucky construction's still going on." After avoiding a couple of random service people, we came to a likely looking exit back to the main mall. I reached for the handle. "Wait a second. You've got blood on your clothes." I glanced her way. "So do you. And your shoes are covered in it." She glanced herself over. "Life isn't a James Bond movie. Okay..." She thought a moment, and rummaged around in her pack. "I have a change of clothes.. do you happen to.." "No, just the books I bought." "Right. Turn around." "Sorry?" "Turn around!" She physically spun me around, grumbling something about 'Lord,' 'fools,' and 'mortals.' A short time and some rustling sounds later, she spoke again. "You can't go out like that. Take these," she shoved some stuff in to my hands, "and keep out of sight until I get back with something clean." "But.." "And shut up!" She turned around and quickly exited through the access doorway; the sounds of crowds and people exchanging money filtered through from a fair distance. The door closed with a light click, and I was left in glaring flourescent lights, not quite sure what just happened. I looked around, a bit out of touch with reality. Gathering up what was left of my sanity and cursing spongin for the Nth time, I found an alcove and rummaged in my bag quickly, stuffing the blood-soaked garments in the bottom and mentally cursing myself for wearing light-coloured clothing that day. "Hadda play the tourist, didn't you Rob?" I murmured to myself. A janitor came by with a cart humming a random tune, ignoring me in the alcove across the hall. I had just started to contemplate stirring up some mayhem with VR (after first sneaking the hell out of there) when a brisk knock sounded at the opposite door. Looking around quickly, I skipped across and opened it to my apparent companion. "Right," she hissed. "put these on. And no arguments." I grinned wryly, now a little more in control, "Turn around." "Touche." She smiled ironically and did so while I quickly changed and stuffed the rest of my clothes in my bag, taking books in hand. Wordlessly I nodded and pushed out into the mall, towing Aris behind me. To any random observer.. actually I'd rather not know what a random observer would have thought. Mingling with the crowd, busy getting good and lost while trying to not look like we were trying to get lost, we made our way to the food court, just another couple of people out for a pleasant morning of shopping, honest mum, really. Well, that was the theory anyway. -- "'Lord, what fools these mortals be,'" I quoted for the second time in a row as Lt. Bos dragged me through the corridor. I finally managed to quicken my pace to fall in step with him, then to somehow manage to slow him down and get him to windowshop. Seeing as we were heading in the wrong direction to get to the food court, I stopped off at Electronics Boutique to pick up the new Civ game, then stopped to get a new leather jacket. By the time we reached the food court, Lt. Bos(whose first name, I had finally learned, was Rob,) was seriously annoyed with me. "A leather jacket," he said flatly. For the eighteenth time. This minute. "I like the color," I said, rolling my eyes. "And it's warm. Despite what the rest of the country thinks, this is not the land of sunshine." He shook his head. "That's not the point," he said, finally breaking the monotony. "You're buying..." he gestured, as he seemed to do fairly often, "I mean, a computer game?!" "I've been looking for it forever for my home box." "And a jacket! After-" I rolled my eyes and he stopped and glared. I took a look around the food court. "So, what do you want? Cheap Chinese, cheap Japanese, cheap Indian, cheap pizza, cheap burgers, or cheap shakes?" "Sorry? Oh. What's that?" he asked, pointing at the nearest booth. "That's Cinnabon. That's dessert. So?" "I need sushi, if you don't mind." "Right. I'm getting some pizza. Meet you." Without a word, I pushed through the tables and left my erstwhile companion staring after me. I grabbed cheap pizza(actually not too bad; Sbarro's got my confidence), then found Lt. Bos and guided him to a table close to the Cinnabon. We both ignored attempts at conversation during the meal, and after grabbing a pastry to go, we wandered out to the parking lot. I don't know why we were sticking together. London-dispersion forces, maybe. I turned to the TRES-ie and smiled. "So, how'd you get to Milpitas?" He shrugged. "Public transportation. It was relatively inexpensive, and I'd heard a lot about the Great Mall." I shook my head. "I have a car, if you'd like a ride back to... where were you at? San Jose?" He nodded. "Thank you. One of the hotels in the downtown core near the convention center. I can give directions. You sure it's not a problem?" I smiled charmingly. "Not at all. Can you drive?" He looked strangely at me. "I *can*, but I don't. I'm not legal in this country anyway. Why?" "Just asking." "Are you saying you can't?" He smiled. "Not at all. I just drive like I aim." He just stared at me. -- So I accepted a ride from her, probably unwisely, though I wanted to get as far away from that mall as possible. If she'd survived this long, she couldn't be that bad. I've always been an optimist. "You're drifting across the mediaan!" I reached for my seatbelt and fastened it, suddenly realising that I had neglected to do so earlier. "Oop. Sorry. Now, you were saying about your mission here?" "Um, maybe I should let you concentrate on the road." "Oh, don't worry about it." She rummaged about under her seat and pulled out a cloth-covered book. "Mind if I listen to some music?" "Go ahead." I watched her try and open it with one hand and glance between the road and what she was doing. "Give me that!" I quickly pulled the package from her hands before she could resist; she squawked briefly and sighed while I zipped it open. "All right, flip through until you find the yellow unlabeled one. I just burned that the other day." I flipped through a copious collection of CDs, about half of them labelled with marker. Most of the rest bore obscure labels, though I did recognise a few - the soundtracks from various musicals, for instance. Twenty or thirty in total. Near the end was what looked like a freshly burned yellow CD, unlabelled; I grabbed it and tossed it in her CD player. "Any particular song?" "Mmm.. hit number seventeen." I hit the play button, forwarded to the seventeenth track, and went back to staring out the window. Music filtered through the speakers, and was boosted in volume by several orders of magnitude as Aris reached over and turned up, singing along. -- "o/~ Takeittothebridge / Throwitoverboard / Seeifitcanswim / Backuptotheshore... o/~" I sang as I pulled the car off the freeway and onto Park street. "o/~ Noone'sinthehouse / Everyoneisout / Allthelightsareon / Andtheblindsaredown... o/~" I hummed along with the musical interlude and guided the car to a halt at a stoplight. "So, where are you staying?" I asked. Rob slowly pried his fingers out of the armrests. "Little hotel off Fifth street," he said, a bit shakily. "Okay." I crossed a few lanes and U-turned so we were going in the right direction. "So, what do you think of San Jose?" "Nice," he said shortly. I thought I detected a tinge of mortal terror in there, but let it go. I decided not to attempt any more conversation, and sang along with Yesterday's Hero when it came up. I nearly missed Rob's hotel, but he pointed it out to me in time to stop. Stopping turned out to be a very good thing. Parked precipitously parallel to the hotel was a large Nagenta van with a picture of the Purple Pestilence painted pre-eminently on its postierier. (Alliteration, anyone?) I turned to Rob, whose fear of my driving had evaporated into a kind of calm study of the situation. "Well, this is a surprise," I said. -- "And so it begins," I mumbled to myself, eying Aris, then glancing out the window towards the entrance to my hotel. "They must know I'm staying here." "Obviously." She drew her sword with a feral glint in her eye. "Which room are you in? They'll be in there." "No.. No, they'll have backup on call, probably mechanised. They usually do." "So?!" "So I lost three men in a similar situation just last month. We leave." She looked at me, flabbergasted. "You kid me, boy. Those are SPONGIN." "Feh. You may be a warrior, but you can't take them alone - and I refuse. I won't put myself in situations like that with no real advantage to be gained." "Fe'thra'arr'ilmis," she breathed almost inaudiably. "Damn right. Where is the local TRES base? I can crash there for the night, and deal with this tomorrow morning." I fixed my best cold look at her. "Fine." She produced a sleek silver case from her bag, opened it, and tapped a few keys. "I'll take you to the TRES base here in San Jose. After that you're not my problem." "This wasn't my idea, miss," I smirked. "Keep that up and I'll leave you to the spongin." She kicked the car into gear and looked over her shoulder, backing out of the parking space into traffic. "I think given a choice between that and another hour in this car, I'd prefer it." "You wouldn't last five minutes." I forebore comment, given the probability of not making it even that long. For a while, she carefully avoided high-traffic areas, assuring herself that we weren't being followed before heading onto a main road in silence, letting music drown out any possibility of conversation. Not until were were halfway there did either of us attempt to broach conversation - leaning over to turn Terrence Mann down to a level we could talk over, I asked in a futile attempt to break the ice, "So.. uh, what does a Company Commander do, anyway?" Seeming to have recovered her smile, she shrugged. "So far? Head out on rescue missions and get lost. You?" It was more abrupt than I expected, and I blinked to try and figure out what she'd asked. "Tactical commander.. uh, I stay back in base and integrate all the information from a battle and make suggestions to the commander in the field. Satellite imaging, GPS monitoring, good communications.. when it all works, anyway." I shrugged. "I'm told I'm fairly good at it." "Maybe so, but you've got a hell of a lot to learn. We should have taken on those spongin." "And gain what?" "The knowledge that they'll never ever have a Purple thought again in their miserable lives. And your hotel room, of course." I eyed her obliquely. "But what advantage does that give us? We risk our skins for no purpose at all in a situation like that. They'd have backup three ways from Sunday." She openly glared at me. "You _really_ don't get it, do you? Those spongin are out there, right now, doing the Foul Thing's bidding. Mucking around in your hotel room. They probably got grape jelly on-" "The road!" She looked forward and hit the brakes quickly enough to stop for a red light. After releasing my grip on the dashboard, I continued, "and so what if they are? We can deal with them later. No sense in wasting our own skins when we might be useful later." "Maybe. You're still a wimp." "Just cautious. Where are you from, anyway? I remember you mumbling in a couple of different languages, and I didn't recognise either." "It's... um, a long story. Ah, there we are. The TRES base is just off the next road, five minutes away." She stopped, signaled, turned smoothly, not even coming close to hitting anything. Five minutes later, we stopped in front of a McDonalds' fast food restaurant, bearing the signs of a TRES base - hedges arranged just so, only 42 billion served. Cute touch. She turned my way, and extended a hand. "Fun working with you. Enjoy the rest of the evening." Returning the gesture, I nodded and smiled. "I hope so. Maybe under better circumstances. Have a nice day." Stepping out of the car and collecting my books, I closed the door behind me, waved as she drove off, and went towards the McDonalds to register with my CO. While shaking my head and walking toward the back door of the restaurant, I failed to notice a fairly large man casually stroll out from behind a hedge and approach me from the rear. "Excuse me?" I turned around. "Yes?" -- I dropped Rob off, keeping my grin plastered to my face until he'd turned around. "Tight-assed-sonofa-krevn, I muttered, turning my CD over to some Annie Lennox. The sounds of "No More I Love Yous" filled the car as I drove back to Malikandril's place in the Los Altos hills. "This is an incredibly twisted song," came a voice from the passenger seat. I turned very slightly to see a tall, humanoid black cat wriggle His eyebrows at me. I rolled my eyes. "Rirr'varia, Ir'rah'thrr," I greeted Him semiformally. "I happen to agree. That's why I like it." "I see." He laughed suddenly. "Who was your companion?" I shrugged. "A TRES-ie." "And a tight-assed son of a snake?" "That wasn't all exaggeration." He chuckled again. "Now. What is this I hear about my pupil causing a disturbance in a human market?" I rolled my eyes again, more obviously this time. "They started it." "You need to work on your aim." "I know, I know. I never said I was a *good* Third-Gunner." "Perhaps you should take a vacation and train, mm?" I swerved dangerously, but managed to keep the car under control. "No thanks." "You need driving lessons too," He idly remarked. "Doesn't your organization have training grounds for these sorts of things?" "Next time I'm at home base, I'll check," I said. "Anyway, I need some sleep, and some Red Dwarf, not necessarily in that order." "All right. Have fun." "You too," I said, but He was already gone. I sighed, shook my head, and headed into the hills. -- There are very few things, I noted to myself, more painful than a roundhouse kick to the side of the head, well executed by a professional. In a pinch, however, a crowbar is an expediently close second. I observed first the darkness, as awareness slowly dawned. Yes, crowbars do indeed suck. For that matter, so did getting jarred around and bouncing unpleasantly on a hard surface. My mouth felt like it was full of cotton, but a bit of simple experimentation revealed it to be only a dirty sock tied into my mouth with a length of twine. I snapped into an alert state despite years of training, and identified the bouncing and low hum as indicative of being in what was presumably the back of a car bumping along a fairly rough road at high speed, within which I had been trussed up and roughly placed into. A particularly rough bump in the road and a prolonged turn made me hit the small of my back on the side of the car - after which immediately followed a foot embedding itself into my solar plexus and something warm crunched into my legs. An angry, feminine-sounding series of curses emitted from my travelling companion. "Oh, *no*," I mumbled through my gag as a vaguely familiar scent entered my consciousness. "Not *her*." A series of noises that could have been "feelin's mutual" was heard. -- My head hurt. This wasn't a new sensation. DTs have to deal with headaches; it's part of the job. But waking up with a throbbing headache and a mildly unwashed sock shoved into my mouth was a new experience. It wasn't exactly one I wanted to have, though. I squeezed my eyes shut and wondered if this wasn't some particularly nasty bit of Th-varian humor visited on me by my buddy Firefoot. Doubtful. Firefoot wouldn't stoop to using something that leaves wrench-shaped impressions on one's skull. I shook my head a few times and blinked my eyes clear. Then I murmured a quick prayer for forgiveness into my gag - it isn't good to annoy a God, especially when you might need His help in a few minutes. *Wise.* *What's going on?* I thought hard, while I still had His attention. *Mmm... you can get yourself out of this one, des'dre.* "MMmmmmMMFFRRWH!" I growled, nothing legible or printable getting past the gag. A sudden swerve and a bump in the road sent me crashing into someone. I glanced up and caught sight of a much-too-familiar face. "Oh, no," I heard him whine through his own gag. "Ffflns muchull," I managed to mutter. What had happened? I remembered stopping at Friday's, hoping to get some food. I'd stepped out of the car and down the walk, out of sight of the windows... That's probably when they'd snagged me. I wriggled a bit, causing Rob to let out an agonized squeak which I ignored. I was still wearing my unitard, and it still had the bullet in it. My shoulder still hurt, which bit. All my weapons were gone, and so was my backpack, which bit worse. Well, so be it - I'd find them later, and if they were really gone, I'd send an apology to Tee. I grimaced at the thought and lay back to wait. -- "What, no free phone call?!" Aris yelled sarcastically at the spongin guard, contentedly playing with his plush doll and completely oblivious. I glared at her, and then at the otherwise normal-looking security guard with his vapid smile, bald spot, and truncheon. "Aris, give it a rest." Looking around at what could be better described as a cage than a cell, I debated my chances of making a weapon. No such luck. Stuffed mattress, nothing sharp, metal, or even hard. A mouse looked at me curiously from a crack in the wall. "ARE you kidding?!" The annoyance she had been directing at the guard was immediately focused on me. "Hey, Lieutenant. Any bright ideas?" "Not a one. You?" She rolled her eyes. "Well, I could always turn into a dragon and rip the bars off the door, but I don't think there's enough room." I ignored the sarcasm. "We just need a quick way to get out of here. I have a feeling they want to do something unpleasant to us." "No kidding, cap'n obvious. I just wondered why they didn't just kill us. Not like they didn't try hard enough earlier." I shrugged. "They have been known to take captives. We're probably candidates for interrogation or something." "No.. I really don't think so. They wouldn't have let us talk to each other. We'd be watching videos of It by now, if that's what they wanted. Interrogation isn't a big thing, they'd just try and convert us right away if they wanted information." She was running around the edges of her cell with her fingers, looking for something. "Yeah, I guess you're right. I've read some of the material that TRES hands out on spongification, we'd be unable to do a heck of a lot after a few hours of prolonged spongification. So the question is, why do they want u--" I was interrupted by a loud *click* as the door to the cell block opened. Both of us rivited our attention on the door as a fairly tall man wearing a vaguely military uniform came in and eyed both individually. Black hair, reasonably tall, and with a light of fierce determination in his eyes, he looked the sort of man that enjoyed doing things that would make most people cringe. He kicked our 'guard' viciously in the leg, who jumped and cringed like a whipped puppy. "Mister Slade! I was just going to get off shift and talk to you! These mean Jihaddi are just fine and and--" The black-haired man wordlessly hauled the guard to his feet and shoved him out the door. Grinning pleasantly, Slade nodded to someone outside, handed the key out, and closed the door behind him, turning the smile on us. Aris, holding her arms crossed, simply glared back. I cleared my throat. "Good evening." "Morning, actually. I trust my people didn't manhandle you too badly..?" Aris gave him a glare. "I've had slightly worse headaches in my life." I glanced her way. "No.. bit of a compound skull fracture, some injured pride, but not a heck of a lot more." I was not going to give him the satisfaction of making me ask what was going on, and he obviously wasn't going to give me the satisfaction of making him explain it without being prompted. She rolled her eyes. "Men. Look, , what the do you want with us and why aren't we either dead, or happily babbling every bit of information we have retained from our spongin brains?" Slade chuckled pleasantly, a mildly sinister but oddly soothing sound emanating from the back of his throat. "You are direct. This could be almost fun." He walked over to the side of her cage, and signalled towards a camera. The lock clicked free, and he swung the door open. "Try nothing. You both have automatically tracking lasers on you from three different directions." Entering the cage, he stood in front of Aris, his continuously steady eyes and smile never leaving her for a moment. I noticed that he was actually a good few inches shorter than he had at first seemed, though it wasn't immediately apparent from his bearing. It was my turn to glare. "Don't touch her." Aris turned to look at me oddly. "He'd find that difficult." "Oh, I haven't got anything so .. crude .. planned. No, we're both going on a little trip." He motioned toward the camera again and my lock clicked open, as well. "Both of you move to the door, please." He motioned, simultaneously bowing slightly in her direction. I shrugged, and complied. After a few seconds of headshaking, so did she. -- Well. This was a development. 'Slade' was covered in slime, from his ears to his toes, and I had a feeling the TRES-ie could sense it as well. Wyrm Minions always made me feel like this, ever since I'd been flattened by half a million Lyran mage bolts. I shivered at the memory. Okay, planning was good. Since Lt. Bos was the tactical expert, I should logically defer to him for a plan of escape from this mess. I glanced over at him. *Yeah, right.* What were the odds? Right now, Rob and me against a Wyrm minion and some auto- tracking laser cannons. Not good. However... I frowned. Something was damn peculiar about these corridors. I studied them for a while, and finally came up with an answer - we'd been driving for longer than I'd been awake for. We were back in Milpitas. At the Great Mall. Construction on the back half of the mall as it was, it would be child's play for the Minions to set up something. I cursed softly under my breath. We finally reached what I assumed would be our interrogation room. Slade gestured at a couple of seats, and we took them, warily eyeing the walls and ceiling for nasty surprises. I saw two lasers, one on each corner behind Slade, unidirectional, and a third in the hallway outside the door. Two Spongin were standing guard outside, and at Slade's signal, shut the door on us. Great. We were locked in with two laser cannon and a madman. "Now," Slade said, leaning forward onto a large, stainless-steel desk, "We need to talk about magic." "Magic?" I asked, a little off balance. "Oh, yes," Slade said, his lips stretching in an innocent grin. "How to make people disappear." Rob peered confusedly for a few moments. "I admit I don't quite follow. I don't know any magic." I turned, nearly gaping in astonishment. Had this man been so isolated from Hayuman culture to not know a polite euphemism when he heard one? "It doesn't take very much." "But I can't make people disappear. She might." Slade looked at him obliquely. "What does that have to do with anything?" "If I don't know magic, why would I--" Slade interrupted. "Disappear. Sleep with the fishes. Go bye-bye. Like you two just have." "Oh." "Not yet," I murmured. "Damn right, 'oh,'" Slade said, a trace of amusement creeping into his voice. "Now, you're probably wondering why I've brought you here." "Operation Grand Slam?" I asked sarcastically. He stared at me. "You..." I blinked, then raised both eyebrows and shot him a Look. I'm quite good at that, actually. Rob was staring at me like I was either quite insane or psychic, I'm not sure which. Anyway, Slade swallowed tightly and got to his feet, composure shaken. "I trust you'll stay where you are," he said, crossing to the door. The laser cannons didn't waver, and neither did we. "You realise they're going to be listening to us talk.." Rob murmered to himself, his eyes scanning the room slowly. "Yep. And don't bother, there's no way out." "You don't know that." "Yes, I do." He shrugged and wordlessly looked at the steel desk thoughtfully, glancing at the glass eyes set in the ceiling and walls. "Three of them. That means they can hit any one of us from any of three directions.. and they're presumably automatic systems." "Yeah, so?" "They're not powerful enough." "Yes they are." He motioned impatiently. "The door's locked, too, I suppose." "Just shut up and wait for the man to return." He suddenly grinned. "Good plan. I like your train of thought." "Huh?" At that moment, the door clicked. -- "WHATTHEHELLWEREYOUTHINKING!?" I bolted furiously into the corridor, Aris screaming at me semi-incoherently. Smashing an elbow into the face of the closest guard and embedding a knee in his stomach, I grabbed a knife from his belt and handed it to her, roughly pulling her to her feet. "Get a hold of yourself." She breathed quickly and deeply, regaining her composure. "If you ever pull a stunt like that again, I'll castrate you. I still might. With rusty things. Grok, hon?" She accepted the knife and kicked the door closed behind me, Slade's groans of pain cutting off abruptly. I snickered to myself semi-insanely. "Grok. God, did you see the look on his face?! Let's get out of here. I think we're going to be up to our hips in spongin in a few minutes, and neither of us have any goddamn idea how to get out of here." "Not like we can ask for directions, huh." "Nope. That way." I pointed and started walking. "Not while I outrank you." She yanked me back, absently slicing open the spongin guard who had at this point started to recover. "This way." I shrugged, and followed her lead. "So how do we get out?" The door in front of us opened, three spongin rushing out, tripping over their own feet. I planted a foot through the sternum of one in a smooth ushirogeri (back kick), while cracking the neck of another with my hands - Aris ripped several holes in the other and finished off the one I'd kicked on the counterstroke, red blood spurting on the floor, almost as if happy to be freed of its inane prison. We dashed through the door, me following her after first pulling a sharp instrument off a spongin body. I yelled after her, "All right, so you were right, that's the way out. These ones didn't have real weapons, though!" "Shut up and run." -- We made it to a construction zone in time to hear the alarm klaxons going off. Still cursing Rob for attacking us out of a situation I could have talked us out of, I dived behind a pile of girders and ducked low. Spongin, spongin, everywhere, and not a sec to think. I cursed and cracked my knuckles, focusing on my fingertips. "What the hell are you doing?" Rob hissed at me. "O'Mrrnah'teh," I snapped, narrowing my focus. 'Fisking is Malik's job, not mine, but I had enough Power... Ahh. I relaxed and flexed my fingers, my natural claws coming into focus. "Knives are great," I said, passing the one Rob had obtained back to him, "But they're nothing on the real thing." He was staring at me. I shrugged. "Come on. I think I know where we are now." I jumped out into the fray, using my new claws to tear a hole in a passing sponge's throat. -- Aris and I quickly worked our way through the half-completed addition to the mall, sneaking through hallways while spongin rushed frantically to and fro trying to find us before we managed to get out. Whoever was controlling them knew what they were doing, I noted - the search pattern was almost computationally efficient. After ambushing and decimating another group of spongin, we found an exit - completely blocked off by metal doors. I mumbled to myself, and grumbled openly - not fast enough. We both paused momentarily inside a large piece of artwork fenced off with translucent plastic, shaded so that we could see out but no one could see us inside. "They've probably got all the other doors blocked, too," she said thoughtfully. "And we've been lucky.. no guns." "That is odd. And come to think of it, they haven't been trying to kill us, either.. just capture us." "Why on earth are they going to this kind of effort? We're just going to keep killing people by the truckload until they do manage to nail us." She paused thoughtfully. I shrugged. "We're trapped here, for now." I looked out at the broad avenue that represented the main part of the new mall, and laughed nervously. "You could just turn into a dragon and fly us out of here." "I'd never get through there." "This is no time to kid.." "Well, any other bright ideas?" She gestured impatiently. "You're the tactical type. Figure a way the hell out of here." "Nothing that wouldn't be completely stupid." I happened to glance up at the sculpture, and jumped back in complete disgust. "GOOD HOLY GO--" Aris swiftly clamped a hand over my mouth, as shouts and footsteps echoed in the distance. "Good job, sthondat." We both ran like hell for better cover, in the open across a broad pathway in the mall. Ducking in to a door, we surprised two spongin looking querously through cupboards, presumably looking for us. After shredding one of them to complete ribbons while I snapped the other's head forward and kicked it into an open cupboard, Aris poked me. I turned around. Twelve spongin, three of them holding nasty-looking sliverguns and the others holding various weapons, stood menacingly at the door. Not relishing the prospect of having a rapid-fire stream of tiny slivers of sugar containing high-potency chemicals shot into my bloodstream, I held my hands out and dropped my weapon. "Looks like the game's over." She glared. The spongin shot us anyway. -- I dropped when Rob did, slightly thankful when I could still hear his breathing. Slightly. I concentrated while the spongies chattered amongst themselves on returning my fingers to normal. It wouldn't do for that Wyrm minion to find out what he had captured, if he didn't know already. I had barely finished when a number of spongies picked me up and carried me bodily into another makeshift cell. I frowned and started organizing thoughts. Data: The Beast had taken over the mall renovations, presumably for a dastardly purpose. Data: Rob had seen something he didn't like. Data: B'harnii could easily change the new construction to his liking. I didn't like where this was going, but I couldn't make any more sense out of it, so I lay back and pretended to sleep. -- I blinked sleepily, stretching out semi-contentedly on my warm b-- or what would have been my warm bed, had there been any justice in the world. Instead I was greeted with harsh lights, lying on what appeared to be a cold metal surface. I sat up warily, forcing myself into a fully-awake state and peered around.. back in the cell. Aris was similarly conked out in the cell opposite mine - I grumbled and mentally kicked myself for being incredibly stupid. I stood up, unhopefully tested the bars that made up the door, (I had heard stories about at least two Jihaddi who had gotten free because spongin neglected to lock their cells - I wouldn't have beleived it if Mike, one of my closest friends and confidantes, hadn't been one of those Jihaddi) and finding it locked, settled into stretching, to clear my mind for whatever was coming up. That was a Purple Demon statue. Why. What on earth are they doing in this mall, anyway? This isn't just a base, otherwise they'd have us killed. If they wanted information, they'd have sponged us. They're pulling something really big, here, and they need us alive for it. ... I suppose it'd be too much to expect for them to come right out and tell us. No, this bastard's got to string us along, I thought to myself. I stretched my neck and upper back, attempting to work out a kink I seemed to have acquired, and practiced kicks for a few minutes, loosening up. Noticing I still had dried blood on my clothes, I shrugged and settled into practicing punches, elbow strikes, and kicks to pass the time and work out frustration at being captured. When I'd worked up a good sweat, a voice from the cell opposite spoke; Aris had by the time awoke and was eyeing me bemusedly. "Having fun?" I stopped, drew into ready position, bowed, and sat down on my bed^H^H^Hshelf. "Sure. Loads." "You okay? You took quite a lot of anaesthetic." "A little stiff, but I'm all right. You?" "Been better. Pretending to be asleep isn't one of my strong suits, but I pulled it off." "Ah." "Well, we tried, anyway." "Yeah." We both drew into a somewhat uncomfortable silence for a bit, before I spoke up. "Sorry for blowing our cover back there." "'sokay, we would have ended up getting nailed sooner or later. What were you off about, anyway?" "Big statue of B'harnii, covered in cloth. Right in the middle of the broadway." "In Milpitas?" I shrugged. "Clear as day, back there." "So why do they want us badly enough to kidnap us? All we did was shoot up a few of their hunters." "Does it look like I know?" He snapped unpleasantly. "They're doing something here, and it isn't a just a regular convert-the-masses thing. Something's up." "Yeah. I've been feeling oddly uneasy about this whole place. There's something eerie about it." Aris paused thoughtfully. "I mean, it's evil and disgustingly peurile and all, but... I don't know. Something dank." "Whatever it is, they must want to hide it pretty badly." "Not bad enough to kill us. No, scratch that. Maybe they haven't killed us because they can't afford to..." "Pardon?" "Never mind. If I'm right, you're better off not knowing." -- Brusquely kicking into his spartanly furnished office, Slade sat down and shuffled papers, attempting to deal with the frustrated thoughts going through his mind. Goddamn Jihaddi. Can't get anything done without them popping their bloody heads into your business. Typing frenetically at the computer on his desk, he quickly contacted B'harnate Intel and requested what information he could, based on the obviously fake IDs that they carried around with them. "Lieutenant Bos"... mrm. Canadian military weenie, a nobody working for the Jihad tactical departments. "Aristalarus"... some random running a division, or something. Working quickly, he gave a report to his Lyran superiors, a tersely worded message outlining what had happened and his plans to deal with it. He hit his palm against the desk. Jihaddi, he thought, always getting in the damn way. Who knows how many more of them could be on the way right now. He'd gained time by putting these two out of commission for now, but probably not enough. The rest of the Jihaddi could be here at any time to find out what happened to their covert scouts. No, he thought to himself... can't spongify them, can't kill them.. have to find out exactly what they know, and then get rid of them in the usual way: hit them on the head, pump them with enough drugs to make them unsure of their own names, and drop them in the middle of Arizona with enough witnesses to convince anyone of their ribald activities over the last few days - hopefully even themselves. Or maybe just kill them. Whatever. He mused to himself briefly. The two of them would provide amusing diversions for a little while if that latter option came into effect. Slade glanced up at the spongin signalling for his attention. "Yes?" "Sir! Sir, they're awake, sir! I saw them myself!" The spongin saluted breathlessly, comedically drawing himself short. "I know they're awake." "You said you wanted to know, sir!" "I said I wanted to know. In fact, this is why I had you order workmen to place cameras in the cell block." He indicated the monitor. "Right.. yes.. sir." Slade walked around the edge of his desk. "Lord Barney doesn't like it when you forget about the instructions that his Special Friends give you." The spongin toed the floor wordlessly. "You know what happens when you forget." "Uh huh." Slade smiled. "But Barney loves all his special friends. You know this is for your own good." "Yes, Mr. Slade." "Good. Into the closet; I'll have time for you later." The spongin hesitated, as Slade reached for his belt in a meaningful movement, and then scuttled to the tiny reinforced closet set in the side of the office. "When I come back, I want you to be ready, okay?" Slade kicked the door viciously shut and slipped the latch. A small whimper came from inside. "Kids." He stalked through the door, pulling a piece of paper off the desk and scribbling on it. As he closed the door behind him, an alarm light on the wall started flashing red and a low-volume but highly peircingly pitched siren went off. -- "Sixty-five bottles of beer on the wall, sixty five bottles of beer... take it down, pass it around, sixty-four bottles of beer on the wall... we're all buzzed, our brains a bit fuzzed, sixty-four bottles of beer on the wall. Take one down, pass it around, sixty-three bott--OW!" Rob finally shut up when I smacked him with a pebble. "Okay, okay." I followed the pebble up with a substantial glare. "Not now, please. Besides the fact that you sound worse than Reggie Wilson's Hammond Organ Classics, there's some major unfroodiness building up around here." I stood, stretched for the millionth time, and started pacing again. When Rob didn't answer, I turned to glare at him again. "Don't you feel it?" "It's just your imagination. Calm down." He mocked me, breathing zenlike while making whispery hand motions. "Like that." I snorted. "You're an ass." "Guilty. But you're right. Any ideas?" "Rob, if I had an idea, I'd be implementing it. My lack of implementation indicates a similar lack of ideas. *Anything else, sthondat?*" I finished in Kzintongue. He looked blank for a moment, and I mentally cursed myself in every language I knew, which was a lot. "What?" "Never- shh! Do you hear something?" He froze and listened, and I did the same. As he shook his head, I held up a hand to forestall any comments and closed my eyes to clock out distractions. I *did* hear something, but I felt it as well. It was the steady thu-THRUMP of a heartbeat, amplified by magic and not rabies. It meant, from my skant experience(ha, ha), that someone or something very powerful was grounding and drawing energy. It basically meant that whatever the hell was happining was happening right now. It also meant that we had very little time to stop it, which meant we needed to know what was going on. "Rob," I said, "What do you know about magic?" "Huh?" he replied. I flashed back to the conversation in Slade's office and groaned, realizing I wasn't going to get much. I also realized that things were worse than expected when Slade opened the door. He looked... almost spooked. I figured out why when he started talking. "The Lyrans are here," he said. "You have one last chance to tell me when the Jihad gets here, or I feed you to them." -- My inner ear throbbed as what felt like a sudden staticky atmosphere suddenly pervaded the room; it built up slowly as if to a crescendo. Aris and Slade both started looking very worried. "What is it?" I clapped a hand on my ear a couple times to relieve the pressure, shaking my head of the sudden stuffy feeling. "A summoning." Slade looked nervously upward. "They've started. They'll finish. You'll die. Tell me when the Jihad is coming." Aris stared dumbfounded. "Pentagon. This thricedamned place is a pentagon! That's wh--" she clamped her mouth shut. "You didn't know?! The Jihad isn't coming?" It was Slade's turn to look on, dumbfounded. He paused and gesticulated, his face turning noticeably more livid. "Then you won't stop this thing?" He bobbed on his toes for a moment. "Ah." In a matter of moments, the air around us warped and twisted, colours thrown out of whack and I experienced an intense *stretching* feeling. It hurt. Slade got up, suddenly completely composed and grinning fiercely. "The Jihad isn't coming to destroy the summons." Aris and I both mutely shook our heads. "Very well." He bowed, and produced a knife from his belt, and his grin changed from fierce to a more pleasant, bantering style. "How would you two like to spend your last moments?" I swallowed. Aris glared. Slade smiled, and walked around behind my chair. "Once I was like you two," he mused, "Idealistic, thought I could change the world, make it a happier place where a man could make a living, buy a few people, some influence, and live out his life in happy luxury. Give the cream of the crop the chance to come to the surface and guide the great unwashed masses of humanity to their destiny." "A sick bastard's dream," I countered lamely. "What can I say. B'harne gave me the opportunity to live that life. I do what I can. "But you know, I didn't think they'd ever succeed in this little experiment of theirs... but when they made their breakthrough... y'know, I thought that my little dream might just end. So I figured.. a bit of a strategic rumour to the Jihad, a bit of a chase, get some Jihaddi interested, let them report, and then bring them straight back to the source. This little project could be shut down, I could escape, and could keep on, in my function," he spat, "as a servant of that purple foam fucker, to make the world a better place for people like me. "But no, you two had to take this whole place on by yourselves. And now you're going to die!" He giggled. "And so am I. Now, I'm betting that you'd like to spend your last moments fighting for your life. Here's how I'm spending mine." Slade happily sliced our bonds open. I stood, turning around, but I was too late to stop him. I don't know if I would have. Slade plunged his blade into his stomach; he withdrew it coated in blood, laughed at the sight, and then did it again. Aris and I looked on, I remember, with a mixed reaction of disgust and fascinated horror as the man repeatedly stabbed himself, spilling viscera over the floor. When he couldn't continue, he collapsed in a bleeding, heap at our feet, still quivering slightly from his laughing. I continued staring for a moment until another multihued shock wave ripped through the room. "Ow." I said noncommitally. Aris grabbed my arm and yanked. "There are more pleasant ways to die," she said, "But that's not important right now. We can still stop this thing. Maybe." "Uh, with all.. ow, due respect -- ow -- how the SMEG do you intend to -- ow -- do that?" Aris went past a sponge, and I kicked him in the gut as we went past. "Let go, I can go for myself." She did, and I went with her. Aris pushed through a door into an open space, and went through, and IMMEDIATELY stopped, turned around, and shoved me back into the enclosure. "Look, you're going to have to trust me. Behind that door," she pointed, "is a circle of Lyran mages. They didn't see us, and by now all the spongin have either bought it or gone to a safe distance. I'm willing to bet anything you like that there are exactly seventeen of them." I shrugged. "Okay, okay. So we kill them?" She shook her head. "No. That would be suicide. And normally I haven't got any problems with that, but it would be useless suicide. Killing a mage in this kind of spell just makes the energy involved harder to control." "So what, then?" "Blow up a wall. The centre of this mall is a pentagon. Break it and you break the summoning. QED." "Sounds like a plan. How?" She looked at me, then shrugged. "I was kinda hoping you could help with that part." -- The food court of the mall had originally been missed by the construction, which was good, and we were able to get behind most of the counters, which was even better. The only problem was that the regular chinese food venders didn't carry small explosive devices suitable for leveling a concrete wall on a reglar basis. That was a minor problem that we didn't waste time considering as we ransacked the place for anything remotely useful. It wasn't until I spied the acetylene welding torch beside the Cinnabon shop that I got an idea. It never occured to me to ask what the hell an acetylene welding torch was doing next to a kiosk that served tasty pastry delectables; I assumed a construction worker had left it behind. Anyway. "Rob," I said, pointing at the torch, "Do you have enough 'leet MacGuyver skills to make a bomb out of that?" He hurried over, then grinned. "Yes! Great! Come on - where do we need to set this up?" I pointed in the direction of the more unfinished piece of mall. No sense in glassing Black Market Minerals with no need. As Rob took off, I took a moment to turn around. Was it just me, or were the shadows smiling? I gave a five-point blessing and turned to follow Rob. -- "Okay, that should do it." I placed the tanks down very very gently against the wall in a nook where the blast would be directed upwards and against the wall. "Now we just need to set it off." I paused thoughtfully. "A gunshot wouldn't do it, and I'd rather prefer not to stand here and light a match; we haven't got anything that'll produce a spark, not reliably." I noticed Aris take pains to look casual at that moment. "Of course! You did that shapeshifting thing, you're a magic user! Can you do flame?" "Yeah, I can," she answered reluctantly. "Although.." I turned the valves of the oxygen and acetelyne tanks to full before she had a chance to talk. "Let's go." "But.." she started. We both ran down the hallway leading radially out from the pentagon; one of the main avenues of mall. At a distance of about fifty metres, Aris stopped and turned around, closing her eyes and concentrating for an utterly interminable thirty seconds. Down where we had put the makeshift bomb in the distance, a bright spark flared - and then FLARED. Scant moments later, the roar of collapsing masonry reached our ears; I turned away and continued running like hell. "I GOT IT!" Aris yelled, and ran after me. As we reached the clearly-marked exit, with accompanying sunlight, thrown open presumably by escaping spongin, another magic shock wave passed through us, this time more intense than any of the others - it gave me an intense headache. Aris screamed in agony and fell to her knees holding her head. "Firefoot... No, we broke the spell. It can't be happening! It's..." I picked her up and roughly pulled her to her feet and ran outside. "We've done all we could. The spell must be almost complete." Aris, glared at me through her agony. "Noshit, mm? From the strength of that blast, either we've only got a few minutes, or whatever they're summoning is bigger than I want to think about. I yelled slightly incoherently, "How could they be continuing the spell?" Aris pointed calmly. "It just means we got the wrong symbol. The pentagon was the interior of a pentagram, for double security. Just in case. If you have any ideas, I'd like to hear them. Minute and a half to two minutes." -- Okay, so we have a minute left to live, and Rob decides to go look at the pentagram. Like I thought, it was etched rather than painted or formed into the concrete, a large stream of brightly colored magic sparks floating a few centimeters above the parking lot. That's when the sponge shot me in the back. ... No, I didn't die. Would be a hell of an anticlimax, coughing and leaking blood all over while Ultimate Evil loomed in the background, but the bullet bounced off my body armor like it was supposed to. It also tore a hole through my jacket. My new leather jacket. My brand new, expensive, SHINY leather jacket. Okay, there wasn't much I could do in a minute and a half about a giant alien Force taking over the world. But I could absolutely CRUSH this spoungie that had just made the last few minutes of my life a major annoyance instead of quivering fear. I don't like that. Either one, but this would take my mind off the fear bit. I turned around and there must have been something in my eyes that spooked the spoungie, because he screamed and ran, tripping over all the exposed water piping that was running from - ... exposed water piping? I looked down. There was a whole mess of piping running from the side of the building to the ground, and some of it looked like it could contain water. Water, the universal solvent. Water, if you didn't know, does much of what it does to chemicals to magic. Running water, anyway. And running water... I pulled off the jacket and handed it to Rob. "Turn around." He blinked at me. "We have a minute left to live, and-" "I want to save the damn body armor, and it doesn't 'fisk. Turn around!" He blinked at me, but eventually turned around, allowing me to strip down to close-to-bare-skin unobserved. Well, unobserved by anyone who I cared about. "So what are you going to do about..." He turned around again, but by then it didn't matter. I'd already Changed. "... uh..." I ignored him, which was pretty easy to do, as I was back in the form I was supposed to be. I reached out and hooked a claw under the water pipe, and tore it out of the ground. Plenty of good fresh dihydrogen monoxide spewed into the air, and I held up a forefoot to deflect the water into the wall of the pentagram. It made a lovely, lovely boom. -- I watched, fascinated, as this simply gigantic thing-that-was-Aris enthusiastically ripped into the ground, and with a resounding crack ripped open a water main. Unable to do much more than stare, I watched as she directed the water flow to the ground, and through the door across the boundary of the pentagon. A speedy buildup in the staticky field in the air culminated in a bright flash arising from somewhere above us; it was followed by a strong wind inrush toward the centre of the mall and then a concussion wave pushing outwards over our heads. The world around us twisted and skewed out of proportion for what seemed like an eternity; in total silence, the world bent and warped and folded as the pent-up magic was released from its prison and allowed to flow free, uncontrolled, and raw into the world around it. As the throbbing subsided, and the effects of the magical blast slowed enough to let mere sound waves propagate, the sound of crackling fire from the centre of the mall, distant sirens, and .. well, gunfire penetrated our haze. If either Aris or I had been in any state to notice at the time, we would have seen an intense firefight going on between the remaining spongin and newly- arrived Jihaddi, from TRES and VRDET. When the shock waves, physical and magical, had finally subsided to a bearable level, I picked myself off the ground and regarded the ... foreleg ... beside me. As I watched, the dracoform writhed slightly, rapidly reducing in size. When it had reached an approximate eight metre length and two metre height, it turned its dragon-like head and regarded me coldly. In a surprisingly human, feminine voice, it spoke, "They'd be dead now." The sound of such a relatively monotonous voice shocked me far more than the experience of seeing a gigantic dragon appear out of nowhere. A thought occured to me. "... Aris?" "Yep." Without actually grinning, the dragon, ah, Aris, exhuded an air of smug satisfaction. "You thought I was kidding, didn't you?" -- "I kinda thought you knew," I said as we sat sipping coffee in the middle of the wreckage. Over half the mall had been torn to shreds, and the TV was yapping about terrorist attacks against corporate America. I tuned it out and watched the TRES and VRDET operatives clear out the remaining evidence of B'harnate interference. "I mean, it's not like TRES is completely homogenous in that respect. Hell, J was a kitsune, CyberPyro was a robot, and there's Shad, who's a dragon at least half of the time." "Well, I, uh..." Rob took another sip of coffee, "I mean, you look normal." "What did you expect?" I raised an eyebrow and gestured at my humanform. "Scales? Bat wings? Hell, I don't even have wings in my normal form." "All right, all right." He grinned. "I give up. So you're a magical dragon?" I winced a bit. "Magical might be going a little far." "All right, you two," someone in a TRES uniform said, an Admiral by his glitter and a patch reading "Admiral Keith, Chi" on his pocket, "Pack up. We're leaving." I frowned. "Can I get a replacement for my jacket, first? I think that shop managed to escape getting leveled." The look he sent me was almost as dark as the one Rob had managed. "Sheesh, okay, okay." Rob put down his empty coffee cup, got to his feet, and stretched. "You're quite a character," he said. "So are you," I replied. "Well, I'll see you later. Hopefully your next trip to the Bay will be just as interesting as this one." He winced rather visibly. "Don't *say* that. That's a potent curse." "Yeah, I know." I flashed him a grin. He looked puzzled for a moment, then worried. Finally he shook his head. "I'll never understand women. Dragons. Whatever. Say..." He frowned again. "Something's been bugging me..." "Yeah?" "Back there, when you were lighting off that bomb... why'd you yell 'I got it'?" I laughed. I had to. "Because," I said when I got my breath back, "I aim like I drive." At the look on his face, I had to laugh again. "Come on. I'll drive you back to your hotel, and I'll tell you the story of *why* I never was a good Third-Gunner." And we walked off into the sunset, leaving the scorched and charred remains of the only store I could get Red Dwarf tapes at smouldering in the fading light. I never said this story had a happy ending, did I?