Down in the arena, Harlequin was looking to Yoji for a possible counter bid as Aya got painfully to his feet, ready to face the coming threat, already well aware that Yoji was out of options. Five *million*. Fuck. The brat must have known he’d be able to beat Yoji out with a single mill, even less – the platinum card was fully legit, therefore no threat to undercover missions but also no bottomless pool of cash – but he’d jumped right to a bid that defied challenge by most of the crowd. An impulse buyer in no mood to haggle, Yoji decided, even with this largely disinterested crowd.

Harlequin went cheerfully through his once, twice and thrice routine as Yoji stood mute by his seat. No one challenged the standing bid; few if any of them were probably in a position to do so. Mister Business Suit and Miss Dominatrix had already abandoned their fledgling merger and returned to their seats.

Aya still wouldn’t look in Yoji’s direction, keeping his eyes on the dirt as he struggled to stay upright. It was hard to tell with his arms bound together, but it looked like one of his shoulders might be dislocated. Yoji braced himself for the cry of “sold!” as he might have for an expected physical blow, but it didn’t come.

It was soon clear the going price was as high as it was going to get. A comedy-masked jester, dressed in green, responded to Harlequin’s signal by vaulting the low wall of the arena and scrambling up the stairs to the high bidder’s seat. One of the many, many guards in the place also approached from the top of the stairs, carrying not a gun for a change but some sort of electronic device, probably a card reader.

“Just a formality,” Harlequin said apologetically. “Any bid over one million has to be verified in advance, you understand. Nothing personal.”

The kid nodded his understanding, gesturing that he had no problem with it at all, and fished a bit of plastic all but covered in verifying holograms and sparkling logos out of his wallet; a debit card from some Bank of the Ungodly Wealthy. While the guard and the jester busied themselves with the financial details, Harlequin turned to Kalen’s part of the stands again. Catching the blond’s eye, he gestured his approval, a forgive and forget sort of motion in the face of five million quite compelling reasons for clemency. Whatever the controversy had been concerning Aya, it was over now.

Kalen didn’t look relieved or even particularly happy that his catch had fared so well. In fact, he looked distinctly disappointed, almost crushed with it. He scowled back at the Harlequin’s offer of support. Again displaying that driving belief that “the show must go on,” the Harlequin shrugged and turned away.

Something very solid thumped into the back of Yoji’s head with enough force to make his ears ring and his vision dim for an uncomfortable instant. He sat down with a little less grace than he might otherwise have, holding a hand out even as he flopped down to keep Ken safely in his own seat. He knew Ken well enough to understand that defending his friends now and thinking it through later was the normal order of things for him. The guard that had hit Yoji with his gun glared a silent challenge at Ken but, though the dark-haired assassin was absolutely seething with hard repressed rage, he obeyed Yoji’s silent command to be still.

“You lost. Keep to your seats,” the guard growled, waiting for Yoji and Ken to both nod agreement before heading back to his post.

Yoji rubbed sourly at the lump growing on the back of his head as the high bidder finally finished with the formalities and followed the jester in green down into the arena. Ken was trying to get his attention again, probably to reiterate his desire to charge in and get both of them blown away. Yoji ignored him.

When he reached the center of the stage, Harlequin swept the kid into his arms like a long lost friend. “Jacin!” he crowed happily. “We’ve missed you! You haven’t attended the last four games. I was beginning to wonder if I’d said something to chase you off.”

He had exactly the whiny, entitled, spoiled little rich kid voice that Yoji had expected. “Oh, nah. Just had some family business to deal with, unavoidable shit, you know.”

“Welcome back anyway, my boy, welcome back.” He actually patted the kid on the head, ruffling his hair like a fond uncle. “You already know the rules, of course, but let me go over them just for the sake of any new gamers we have in the crowd tonight, shall I?”

Jacin nodded magnanimously. “Sure. Whatever.”

“All right, then! There aren’t many . . .”

Yoji already knew the “rules” himself from their intell, if they could really be called that; high bidders were permitted to do pretty much anything they wanted. The closest thing to a condition that was forced on them was that they had to play with and then kill their purchases *on stage*. The audience was to be allowed to watch everything and to make suggestions, though the winners weren’t required to take them. In exchange, Masquerade agreed to dispose of the bodies along with any incriminating evidence. They were very efficient at this: practice, it would seem, makes perfect.

The winners could do whatever their twisted little hearts contented, and with nary a care about prosecution or consequences. No one ever testified against Masquerade. The few who had done so in the early years of the organization had been offered up as prizes in subsequent games. That had shut the rest up quite effectively.

Harlequin went through all of this in detail, dressing it up with his polished banter and frequent calls on the audience for response. He was a showman, you had to give him that. In his practiced hands, the audience kept interest even during the “slow” parts.

Yoji keyed his comm. “Bombay?”

There was a staticky pause and then the click of a connection. “Go ahead.”

“You’ve seen what happened?”

“Yes. What do we . . .”

“Give me some good news,” Yoji interrupted.

“Um, well, I *have* found the main lighting panel . . .”

Yoji sighed heavily. “I’m sensing the approach of a ‘but,’ here . . .”

“Yeah, kind of. The switches aren’t really connected to the lights. They’re being controlled electronically from somewhere. I’ve been trying to hack the building systems but they’re *heavily* encrypted, failsafes and tracers everywhere. We’re talking military level security. It looks like Tashi-San’s been in business with Masquerade a lot longer than we thought.”

“Great,” Yoji said, rubbing at his stinging eyes. “Just fucking great.”

After several seconds of dead air, Omi cleared his throat timidly. “Um, Balinese? I’m still . . . there’s still a chance I can hack this but maybe, um . . . we might want to have a back-up plan?”

:: I’m afraid this *was* the back-up plan, kiddo:: Yoji thought to himself. “Look, I *need* that distraction. Get them down the instant you can, all right?”

“Working on it.”

The pause went on for a little while without the telltale click of a sign off. Yoji waited. If Omi had more to say, he would.

“We *are* going to get him back safe,” Omi finally queried, the depth of his worry clear in the quaver of his voice, “aren’t we?”

“Of course,” Yoji replied with as much confidence as he could. “Just get those lights down for me, OK?”

“OK. Bombay out.”

Harlequin was still busy in the arena, talking up the glories of Masquerade. Jacin was still slouching next to him, looking vaguely bored with the whole concept of having just spent five million dollars on the purchase of another human being. Aya was still on his feet behind them, but just barely. Judging by the way he swayed and shivered on his unsteady legs, he wasn’t going to be for much longer, no matter what happened next. He kept worrying at the collar and the mask, as if they were choking him, then his hands would fall again when he ran out of strength to hold them up.

A flash of white-blond hair in the aisleway caught Yoji’s eye and he glanced over. Kalen was coming their way again. Oh, goody. The look on his face said clearly that, even though he wasn’t pleased with the way the bidding had gone for whatever reason, at least now he had the time to come play with them. Yoji gave Ken the heads up and a signal to stay cool, which Ken returned with just a touch of sour irony. The two coolest heads in their little group – usually, at least – were currently unavailable for comment, and neither of them could afford to let their shorter fuses make a bad situation worse.

Yoji looked back expectantly as Kalen crouched behind his and Ken’s seats, his face carefully set in an expression of disappointment with “good sport” overtones. At this point, Kalen probably knew better, but the few guards who had watched the blond’s approach quickly lost interest and that was better than nothing. Kalen didn’t say a word, just rested a familiar elbow on their inside shoulders as he leaned forward for a better view of the arena. Smiling softly, he pointed to the stage, directing their attention back to the Harlequin just as he finished his lecture on the rules of the game.

“Now then, Jacin. You know the rules and you’ve become intimately acquainted with the available ‘arsenal’ during the months you’ve spent with us. Where do you want to begin?”

Grinning now, Jacin cracked his knuckles like a workman ready to get down to business, advancing on Aya with his head cocked as he considered his options. If he was hoping to frighten his new property into some kind of motion with this intense study, he was disappointed. Aya stayed exactly where he was, studying him right back through the shadowed plum eyes behind his mask, patiently waiting for him to come within range if he was stupid enough to do so. Unfortunately, he wasn’t.

“I’m feeling kind of like a traditionalist today, at least for starters . . . give me the bullwhip.”

Several of the jesters were already holding assorted implements of pain, retrieved from backstage during Harlequin’s commentary on the rules. One of them – dressed in deep crimson and wearing a mask of tragedy – stepped forward at Jacin’s command, bearing a simple, black leather whip in one hand and a heavily ornamented dagger in the other. Jacin, perhaps wisely, took them both, tucking the dagger into the top of one of his heavy-soled boots. The bullwhip he held in both hands behind his back, dragging it along like a serpent’s tail as he walked a large circle around Aya, just outside the reach of the redhead’s leash.

The crowd was all but silent, murmuring, expectant.

“Not a scrap of imagination,” Kalen suddenly groused. “That boy’s a complete waste of any feature, much less as fine a one as this. They should have banned him ages ago.”

“For what,” Ken inquired tightly, “insufficient cruelty?”

Kalen ignored him. “I mean, there’s something to be said for the classics when it comes to working the crowd up, but that doesn’t mean he has to do the same bloody thing every time. They’re already desperate for it. A starving dog will take any rancid piece of meat you toss at it but, if you want to keep him around once the edge has gone off his hunger . . . well, you’re going to need something more, aren’t you?”

The bullwhip literally ripped the air apart, the tip of it cracking its miniature sonic boom less than an inch from Aya’s face: a warning shot of sorts, first taste of things to come. Aya barely flinched and, for the first time, Jacin began to look less jaded and more intrigued, even a touch nervous. He was obviously used to Masquerade’s standard issue playthings, the squalling, shaking, submissive creatures tied to the edges of the arena. He’d never dealt with someone who simply wasn’t afraid to die.

“High quality meat . . . well, that’s the note we met on, isn’t it?” Kalen inquired of Yoji sweetly. “You shouldn’t feel too badly about losing, really. Just imagine how the boy would feel if he found out that somebody had already taken a bite of the dish he paid five million dollars for. You’ll have to be sure to tell him later.”

The second serpentine arc of the whip struck malleable flesh, opening a shallow wound on Aya’s thigh that snaked up over his hip to the small of his back. The audience let out a collective, almost orgasmic gasp, savoring the slow, sensuous flow of the thin ribbon of blood that twined down his leg. Aya didn’t make a sound, even as that leg gave out under him and dropped him to the arena floor, but his mouth twisted in a grimace of pain that made Yoji wince in sympathy. He wanted to call Omi about the lights again. He wanted to launch himself into the arena and break Jacin’s scrawny neck over his knee like a piece of dry wood, even if it was his last act on this God forsaken cesspool of a planet.

He stayed in his seat. God help him, he stayed in his seat.

“Or maybe it’s been more than a bite, hm?” The blond studied Yoji intently for several more cracks of Jacin’s whip, noting the white knuckles clutching a crease in his jacket, the subtle winces before every score, as if he were feeling the sting on his own flesh. “There’s something in your eyes, you know,” he stated evenly, “something I’ve seen from the very beginning, that makes me wonder if that bit of flesh hasn’t been on your plate for a while now . . .”

Yoji didn’t bother denying it. What was the point? Whatever he knew, he knew, and how could Yoji not react when the whip came down on already raw flesh and Aya finally made a sound, a thin groan of agony that sent the crowd into hysterics of delight. They were howling again, mad with the blood and the pain and the power. A single traitorous tear slithered down his cheek, pattering down on Kalen’s hand before Yoji could wipe it away.

“God . . .” he whispered, not knowing if it was a prayer or a curse.

Jacin was playing Aya on the end of the chain like a psychotic lion tamer, yanking it to pull him off balance and whipping him when he showed any sign of defiance. The defiance was slowly fading, replaced by the dull haze of shock, but Aya wasn’t giving up easily. He’d gotten back to his feet again but the ground around him was painted with smears and spatters of blood.

“Call me a conspiracy theorist,” Kalen murmured, turning to Ken as he fished in his pocket for something, “but I do sincerely wonder . . .” When Yoji looked over, he deposited that mysterious something in Ken’s lap and sat back on his heels, waiting for the reaction.

The light of reason blinked out of Ken’s eyes with an almost audible click the instant they lighted on Omi’s blood-spattered goggles.

If Ken had been wearing his bugnuks, Kalen would have died right then with his guts in his hands, followed immediately by Yoji and Ken when the guards avenged their own in a storm of bullets. As it was, the malignant blond fell on his ass in the cross aisle behind their seats and Yoji kept Ken from completing his tackle with a grab and tumble that landed the two of them in the leg space in front of their seats. Kalen must have signaled to the other guards that he was in no trouble, because even the guard posted *under* the vaguely bleacher-like stands – directly beneath them – ignored them after a moment of startled study. The goggles had landed by his feet with a little clink, but he left them where they lay, continuing his patrol.

“Let me go!” Ken screamed, trying to jerk his way out of Yoji’s grasp, “Let me go right *fucking* now!”

There were people on either side of them, legs into which they were jostling and bumping with considerable force. No one seemed to notice. Whatever they thought was happening, apparently they found the struggle going on in the arena more fascinating than the one at their feet.

Yoji held on to the front of Ken’s jacket, holding the lapels together so that Ken couldn’t squirm his way out and into deeper trouble. “They *don’t* have him, Ken! They can’t! The last time I talked to Omi on the comm Kalen was already out here! He already had those somehow!”

Ken was beyond reason, in full panic mode. Whether he even heard a word Yoji said or not was anybody’s guess, but it was obvious that just the thought of Omi going through what Aya was now hit even closer to home than seeing it happen, too close for inaction. He’d been willing to obey the informal chain of command the four of them observed up until now, but no more. Unable to break free, Ken took one swing at Yoji that went wild and a second that drove his lower lip into his teeth, bloodying it.

Desperate to shut him up before the guards decided to investigate in spite of Kalen’s nonchalance, Yoji took advantage of the extra height and weight he had on the younger assassin and pushed him to the ground, laying on him with a forearm over his throat. He would have put his hand over Ken’s mouth if he hadn’t been worried about losing fingers. Ken’s deep brown eyes were black with rage and hatred and stark terror. Much as he could relate, Yoji kept his pressure on Ken’s throat firm.

“Listen to me. They don’t . . .”

He had to pause for a second to catch his breath after Ken demonstrated his talent as an escape artist by nailing Yoji in the crotch – just a few inches east of home base – with a forceful knee. Ken didn’t get away, but it was a close thing. Fighting anger, Yoji pressed into Ken’s throat hard enough to hurt, taking some of the fight out of him. Not all, though; far from all.

“We can’t move yet, Ken,” he said, enunciating very slowly and carefully. “There are too many guards with too many God damn guns. We’ll just get ourselves killed and we’re the only . . .”

“When, then?” Ken snarled savagely. “You tell me when! After Aya’s dead? After they’re both dead, Yoji?”

“No . . . we have to . . .” Yoji swallowed hard, trying to work out answers that would make sense in his own mind. “I understand how you feel. I know how much you love Omi and hurt for him because I feel the same way about Aya, but . . .”

“Right,” Ken growled, “and we all know how long your lovers live . . .”

It was a nonsensical accusation made by a man half out of his mind with fear and grief, the same man who’d once let Yoji cry on his shoulder in the aftermath of Asuka’s “second” death at Yoji’s hand, but the blind rage that Yoji almost completely succumbed to was very, very real. Ken’s eyes went wide when Yoji suddenly bore down on his throat with all of his weight, cutting his airway off completely. He very nearly passed out from asphyxiation, his eyes starting to roll back into his head before Yoji came to his senses and released him, scrambling backward until he ran into the pair of legs behind him and could go no further. Ken didn’t move for quite a while, just lay there with his eyes closed, panting.

“It doesn’t matter,” Ken finally offered hoarsely. “He already knows. We’re next to die in the ring but if we move *now* maybe we can die to let them live. Maybe . . .”

“Omi’s been shot, you know.”

“What? How do you . . .” He trailed off, finally remembering the comm conversation he’d only heard half of. “How bad?”

Wiping a trickle of blood from the corner of his mouth, Yoji cursed himself for his cruelty even as he spoke. “He said it was minor but you know him. He could be bleeding out and he wouldn’t tell me. Not if he thought we’d take a stupid risk trying to get to him.”

“Where is he?”

“In the rafters, with every guard in this place on the look out for him. How far do you think he’d get alone, Ken? Even healthy his chances are zero without *real* help. Or maybe he won’t even try. Maybe he’ll just see us go down and try the same kamikaze bullshit you’re talking!”

Ken just sort of looked at him for a moment, head cocked to the side, digesting. “You want to wait because of Omi, then?”

“Yes, he’s part of the reason. I don’t really want to watch you die either.”

“Even if it means waiting until Aya’s dead?”

It wasn’t a malicious question, not really, but it hurt just as deeply as if it were. He had no answer, no answer he could vocalize. They just stared at each other for a while, trying to come to terms with the situation and with each other. Not that there were any acceptable terms available.

Finally, Ken got to his knees, reaching out a hand for Yoji to grasp. Squeezing, Ken nodded, and Yoji returned both gestures. Leaning casually over their seats again, Kalen applauded softly until the two assassins looked over at him.

“Why haven’t they put us in the arena,” Ken asked him, quietly matter-of-fact, “or in the pits waiting for the next game?”

Kalen chuckled, motioning the two of them back into their seats and waiting until they obeyed. “Right to the point; I do like that. Why haven’t they taken you? Because they don’t know who you are.” All solicitous kindness, Kalen pulled a handkerchief from his pocket to dab at the blood still trickling from the edge of Yoji’s mouth. “Only I’ve seen you four in all the right combinations to put things together. Well, Tolith also, but he’s no longer an issue . . .”

“Why?” Yoji grabbed Kalen’s wrist when he didn’t answer. “Why not?”

“Because your lovely redheaded friend killed him, of course. Don’t worry, though. I don’t hold it against him. There were perhaps others I’d have rather seen buy the proverbial farm at his hands, but Kalen was far from my friend. Harlequin assigned him to me three years ago to see if they couldn’t dig up – or truck in – enough dirt to get me kicked out of Masquerade for good. It was getting very old, I can assure you.”

“So what about all the brownie points you could earn by turning us in?”

“Tell me his name first.”

Yoji glared at him, incredulous. “What?”

“I find him . . . fascinating, and I’d like to know his name. Tell me.”

Unable to think of anything it would hurt, Yoji told him. “Aya.”

“Aya. Lovely. It suits him somehow. Anyway, I’m not turning you in because I feel that I owe . . . Aya something for ridding me of that filthy little straightjacket. Call it a posthumous reward, if you like.”

“Why posthumous? Why not get him out of there?”

“If I hadn’t put him in the arena I’d already have a shiny new straightjacket to contend with, or maybe even a shiny new mask. Not an option, I’m afraid.”

“What about Omi?” Ken suddenly broke in, before Yoji could stop him.

“Omi? Who . . . oh! Yes, that one. I’m afraid he sealed his fate when he let Harlequin see his face. They’ll put him in the game tonight, I’m sure, if they find him soon enough.” Kalen shrugged, offering as casual an apology as if he had just let a child know that he couldn’t have an ice cream cone before dinner. “Shame. He’s a brave little soul. He’d have made a smashing feature . . .”

Before Ken could react, a sudden commotion in the ring attracted the attention of all three of them. Somehow, Aya had managed to grab hold of the end of Jacin’s whip, which was now wrapped around the bound and bleeding hands held over his head. As they stared, he yanked the thing out of Jacin’s one-handed grip, bringing it around in an arc so that, on the next pass, it struck the little rich brat square in the face.

The crowd went silent for a shocked instant, then exploded into the loudest uproar of the night. There were a few scattered boos and hisses but most of them were cheering like madmen. Whether it was because they liked a little spirit in their victims or simply that they disliked Jacin was unclear, but at least it drowned out the involuntary cry of relieved encouragement that Yoji voiced. Aya was a fighter, even in the worst of times, *especially* in the worst of times. One would do well to remember that.

Jacin stood still after the first blow, absolutely dumbfounded that his property had actually attacked him. The next swing caught him on the cheekbone, laying open a split there that leaked crimson. It seemed to be the taste of his own blood that finally sparked the rage that followed.

He ducked under the next swing, reaching down to retrieve the dagger in his boot as he yanked on Aya’s leash hard enough to pull him forward into the dirt on his face. Aya got up to his knees before Jacin’s charge was complete – probably working on adrenaline more than anything else, at this point – but he couldn’t do anything to stop the dagger as it carved a deep slash across his chest. The next flash of the knife came at him hilt first, taking him on the back of the head and dropping him dazed into the dirt. Fury twisting his features, Jacin knelt behind him, yanking his head up by the hair to lay the blood-stained blade of the dagger against his throat.

“Wait!”

Of all people, it was Harlequin whose words stopped Jacin from slitting Aya’s throat on the spot. He stepped into the spotlight he had been avoiding, awarding all the attention to the high bidder, with his arms crossed behind his back. He strolled over as casually as if he were walking through the park on his daily constitutional.

“If that’s what you really want to do, Jacin, my boy, it isn’t my place to stop you. The rules clearly state that this is your property and you may use it at your discretion, *but* . . .” He knelt in front of Jacin, catching the boy’s eye; a thin trickle of blood was running down Jacin’s hand from the shallow cut already in Aya’s neck. “Five million is an awful lot to pay for a straight kill.”

“Smart,” Kalen nodded sagely. “The audience would never stand for it.”

Nodding, Jacin took the knife away from Aya’s throat and released him. Hurting and barely conscious, the redhead crumpled into a boneless pile in the dirt. Jacin just stared at him, eyes tracing the muscular lines of his bloodied body. Yoji had a very bad feeling he knew where this was going.

Glancing over at Kalen – his eyes were focused intently on the arena – Yoji keyed his comm. He couldn’t speak; if he did, Kalen would stop him and take the comm away, maybe even use it to track Omi down. Instead, he gazed up into the rafters. The lights up there kept him from seeing Omi, even if he’d known where he was, but he knew from past conversation that Omi could see him.

“Balinese?” Omi asked after a moment, having heard the carrier signal buzz in his ear but no message. “Are you there?”

Yoji disguised a questioning shrug as a simple stretch, causing Kalen to glance over but apparently not to suspect anything. Omi may or may not have seen the shrug. It didn’t matter. He already knew what the question was.

“I can’t get the lights down, not yet. This place is almost hack proof.”

Jacin had his pants unzipped and down around his ankles. He was having a very difficult time getting Aya in a position where he could do anything with the erection he’d exposed when the redhead just didn’t have the strength to stay on his knees. There were already several shallow cuts on Aya’s back from Jacin trying to threaten him into cooperating.

Yoji stared imploringly into the rafters. “Find a way,” he mouthed.

Bracing Aya against his lap, Jacin grabbed the collar and yanked him upright, tracing little circles over his chest with the dagger. The circles slowly spun lower and lower across his belly, occasionally dipping in to slice his flesh. Aya was trying to fight a little now, ineffectually, seeming to accomplish nothing more than arousing Jacin further. He pulled Aya back against him, leaned forward to whisper something in his ear, his dagger arm clasped around Aya’s stomach.

Scored by the dagger, the collar suddenly gave way.

Aya fell forward, twisting just enough that the dagger only scored his side instead of puncturing his belly. Taken off balance, Jacin landed on top of and to the side of him, the dagger sliding neatly up into his body instead. He made no sound that could be heard over this latest shocked hush of the crowd. Judging from the angle, the blade probably took him right in the heart: instant, painless death. Lucky bastard.

“I say,” Kalen murmured, laughing a little. “The gods are looking out for that one this evening, aren’t they?”

The crowd was far from sympathetic this time. Spirit was fine but slave was not allowed to slay master. It simply wasn’t done that way, even if it had been the fault of the bidder’s own stupidity. Several of the jesters scrambled forward to retrieve Jacin’s body, confirming with their shaking heads that nothing could be done to save him.

“Now,” Yoji murmured, just loud enough for the comm to pick up.

“Working . . .”

Harlequin stalked toward Aya, who had either passed out or given up on trying to keep his head up. There was a gun in his hand. He trained it on the still form.

“Now!”

“I’m trying!”

“How dare you defy Masquerade,” Harlequin screeched, cocking the pistol.

The lights went down with an electric hum, plunging the theater into chaotic darkness. Taking back every bad thing he had said today about God and Fate and anyone else he could think of, Yoji leapt to his feet. He couldn’t see in the dark any better than anyone else here but he didn’t really need to in order to cause some serious mayhem. He was reaching for his concealed wire, could hear Ken already rummaging the big jacket pocket where he kept his bugnuk gloves, when Omi suddenly broke in over the comm.

“You better wait a second, guys. I don’t think that was me . . .”

When the darkness he drifted in grew suddenly deeper, Aya thought at first that he was simply passing out again, escaping from the pain . . . but the pain stayed with him. The one who had bought him was dead, he was fairly sure. If he was lucky, they’d kill him quickly for that, sparing him the experience of a second torturer. He wasn’t feeling terribly lucky, though.

Then the light was back again, even brighter, more direct: a spotlight. He rolled over onto his back, opening his eyes to see what the delay was in putting him out of his misery. It took quite a while for his eyes to adjust to the harshness of the light.

A masked figure stood about twenty feet away from him, upside down in Aya’s field of vision. He stood quiet and patient with his hands at his sides, waiting, it would seem, for Aya to acknowledge his presence. It wasn’t Harlequin, nor was it one of the jesters, but the mask looked very familiar: white and blue and silver in the shape of a weeping wolf . . .

The Prime.

He drug himself to his feet one last painful time, facing the target they’d searched out for so long. All around them, the once irreverent jesters lay flat on their faces in postures of abject worship. Harlequin wasn’t quite so awed but he was on his knees beside his master, head bowed, gun forgotten at his side, a candidate knight awaiting his lord’s approval.

Silent, the Prime approached Aya, walking a tight circle around the newly unleashed redhead. Aya stood still despite his relative freedom, shivering with pain but not with fear, too numb for fear, eyes on the dirt. He didn’t move when he felt hands ruffling the hair at the back of his head, deftly disconnecting the buckles that held the suffocating mask to his face. It fell to the ground at his feet, glaring back up at him with its empty, ruby-rimmed eyes.

When the Prime stood in front of him once more, reaching out to cup his cheek in one amazingly gentle hand and draw his face up, Aya could see his eyes behind the mask. They were silver; pure, sparkling silver with rims of deepest, midnight indigo. They caught Aya’s spirit like a physical force, squeezing his heart, locking his strengthless legs under him so that he couldn’t have dropped even if he tried.

“Beautiful,” the Prime murmured. “I can see why they put you in the black mask. That face is already like porcelain. So white and so lovely.”

Aya didn’t know how to respond to that. He kept his silence.

“If I free your hands,” the Prime asked, almost kindly, “can I trust you not to try to attack me?”

“No.” He couldn’t force himself to lie, not to those eyes. There wasn’t enough craft in the universe to fool those soul-piercing eyes.

“I see,” was the vaguely amused response; the bonds stayed where they were.

“Sir,” Harlequin asked timidly. “I would say nothing to give you the impression that your visit to my arena is not an honor of the highest degree to myself and to all your servants, but . . .”

“What the Hell am I doing here?”

Harlequin fell into tensely panicked silence, trying to figure out if it would be more disrespectful to ignore the question or to answer it. The Prime took obvious pleasure from letting him agonize over it for several seconds. Eventually, he grew tired of the host’s quivering terror and answered.

“This one is different. A challenge. I will Hunt this one tonight, I think.”

Leaping to their feet, the jesters retrieved tiny bugles from somewhere in their floppy costumes and blew a quick hunting call with them. At their signal, a massive four-screened monitor descended from the ceiling, each face displaying a spinning graphic of the Prime’s wolf mask. These images faded to black, and then the screens were filled with the output of the many cameras over the arena, changing from view to view at whatever invisible cameraman’s discretion.

Giving Aya one more quick look over, the Prime turned his back on his prey and walked a few steps away, laying his hands over his eyes in some bizarre mockery of hide and seek. The only thing missing was him counting aloud. Aya took a confused step in his direction, not really sure what he intended by it, but the Harlequin neatly interposed himself between predator and prey.

“Now, now, you only have ten minutes. You’d better start running.”

The door on one end of the arena was being opened. The hallway outside was lined with heavily armed guards. Beyond them, he could see the door to the outside, also open onto the October night.

“Hide if you want. Arm yourself if you can. Make it enough of a challenge and he may let you live. It’s never happened yet but, well . . . there’s always a first time, ne? Now go!”

Harlequin gave Aya a push that sent him to his knees, almost sent him tumbling, then laughed when he proved unable to get up right away. There was little doubt that the Prime would kill him right here if he didn’t escape but his legs refused to work. He looked up into the jeering crowd, searching for a familiar face that he knew was . . . there.

Yoji looked terrified – he had good reason – but he actually offered Aya a small, comforting smile, a promise that he would get them all out of this, safe and sound. Aya had every possible confidence in his abilities to complete the mission and get Omi and Ken out safe but he was inclined to believe that he wasn’t going to be part of that bargain, no matter how desperately Yoji wished it so. Naked, bleeding and disoriented, he wasn’t going to last more than a few minutes in the bleak October night without a substantial amount of luck.

Struggling to his feet, he locked eyes with Yoji for what he thought might be the last time on this world. “Mission first,” he mouthed to his lover. “Me last.”

Gathering together what little strength he had left for one final battle, Aya ran out the door and into the frozen midnight landscape of Dream Land.

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