See Part One for Disclaimers

He sat transfixed by her words -- human!

"Human?" he finally managed to ask out loud.

"Yes.  Now I don't know your genetic makeup Galen, but I could take a guess."

The terrible ache that had existed within him receded slowly as enlightenment finally dawned.  His child!  It explained so much of what had occurred those weeks before he had left on his mission for the Circle.  Dureena's mood swings and the arguments that left him unsure of their relationship.  A child.  He savoured the thought, let it take root as he recalled the touch of its unformed intelligence as he had entered Dureena's mind.  He felt again the kick of its foot against his hand and cringed inwardly at his reaction.  What must Dureena have thought at that rebuttal?  Of course he knew what she felt, he had only to think of her and he could tap into that unique link.  Her anger and hurt reached him even now.  For now he must close that connection.  Soon, when he had dealt with this current situation, then he would explain his thoughts to her, make his apologies.

Another shock wave hit the tunnel and the transport shuddered to a halt, thankfully by an exit point.  "I must go to the bridge and sort out this contretemps, but I will return to the medical facility as soon as I can.  Explain to Dureena --Apologise for -- No matter, I will be there as soon as I may."

He left in a swirl of black and as Sarah watched the rapidly moving Mage she thought she could see his shoulders relax as tension drained from him.

His long stride took him rapidly from the transport to the bridge; there all was controlled chaos.  Captain Gideon was leaning forward in his chair, directing fire from the main guns.  As yet, he had not released the fighters that even now waited in the vast hangers.

"Matthew."

Gideon nodded, acknowledging his arrival.  "Can I finish this yet, Galen?  My paint job is getting damaged.  I'd like to get this over with."

"Would you open a channel for me?"

A nod to the communications officer and the signal was sent.  The reply swifter than anyone had expected.

Galen stood, tall and imposing, his features schooled into a mask that revealed nothing of his thoughts.  As soon as a face appeared on the viewer he pushed forward, making his presence felt even at that distance.  His words dropped icily into the sudden quiet.

"Cease this attack Elysian.  Until now, this ship has held back its true destructive capabilities.  On my order they will blow you from the sky.  You will never see your home again, never have the cure you so desperately seek.  You are nothing but an annoyance, a bug to be squashed.  Humans have a weakness however; they do not take lives lightly.  I do not have that problem.  This ship is under my control and if you do not break off your attack now, you will all die."  He pulled back and his voice lightened.  "Oh, and do stop sending your minions to try and apprehend me; it is extremely annoying, and detrimental to their health."

The Elysian Captain's eyes were wide with anger, he spluttered, tried to speak and then Galen cut off the transmission.

"Was that wise?"

"I'm sorry, Matthew.  I needed a signal from his ship and to misdirect his attention for a moment.  I think he has something else to think about now."  The accompanying smile smacked of macabre humour.

"What have you done?" Matheson got his question in first, and both men waited for Galen's reply.

"Why don't you join me and see for yourselves?"

"Okay, Galen," Gideon replied.  "John, take command here.  Keep the Elysian off our backs; do what you have to do."

Galen felt the smile tug at the corners of his mouth.  "Really, Matthew, you are quite safe with me.  Are you ready?"



Crew passed the two men as they made their way to Galen's flyer.  Avoiding the damaged transports it took them a good while to traverse the many levels down to the hangar.  Gideon left him alone for the first half of the journey, as though gathering his thoughts, but he knew it would not be long before the Captain would require answers.  Meanwhile a bubble of joy seemed to be working its way through him, he had the absurd desire to grin like a Cheshire cat, to shout his news to everyone that he met.  Instead, he kept it bottled up inside, where it tickled delightfully at his senses.

"Is there a cure for the Elysians?  You told them that they could lose the answer to the plague -- is there an answer then?"

"Oh yes.  Dr Chambers half recognised the DNA sequencing and when we ran it through my own medical records we got a result.  Do you remember about fifty years ago, on Firna Prime, they had that terrible accident in the atmosphere?  Two cargo vessels collided, each carrying vital elements for the mining concern.  The resultant mix caused a massive precipitation over the whole planet.  Some weeks later the Firnanian began to die out.  Research discovered that it was due to the chemicals getting into the water supply.  Each element on its own was perfectly harmless, together they were deadly.  Krycek's Syndrome, that was the name of the scientist who discovered the cure, can not only be eradicated but the resultant damage to the planet was also reversed.  The test results from the Elysian we first caught matched almost exactly to the data I had."

"So they really did need a Mage?"

"Yes.  But although I hold the cure they still owe me for what was done to Dureena.  Someone has to pay for that crime, Matthew."

The bubble had burst within him; evaporating in the heat of his anger, like rain on a hot summer day, as the torment his love had endured swamped him.  Happiness that had seemed only a touch away fled from him.  He had sworn revenge and he would have it.

Silver walls reflected their passage in the soft lighting.  Moving like shadows, they walked swiftly from the hangar where Galen had set down his flyer.  Ahead of them they could hear the sounds of a fight in progress.  His arm held back the Captain from his headlong rush toward the commotion.

"No need to hurry, the holo-demons are good for another fifteen minutes yet."

"Holo-demons?  Galen --"

"A little something I borrowed from a friend.  They work quite well in situations like this.  Just don't get separated from me, I would hate to find you in little pieces somewhere."

They turned a corner and came across the first casualty.  Pale blue blood seeped across the silver floor, spreading slowly from the torn and battered Elysian guard.  Galen took the weapon, handing it to his companion, set a binding spell and walked on.  "We can send someone to pick them up later.  Don't worry about him, he is unconscious not dead -- yet.  Come along."

Victims became more prevalent as they drew closer to the hub of the ship.  By the time they reached the bridge Matthew's collection had grown considerably.  Inside the carnage seemed horrific.  Bodies lay scattered over every surface, only a small handful of Elysian still remained standing.  In front of them were two holo-demons; all that were left of the army Galen had sent down the open link.  With his arrival they too blinked out of existence.

Gideon called for backup as they faced the few remaining aliens.  Four sturdy looking individuals had taken up a protective stance around a small faded Elysian, obviously their captain.

"Put down your weapons and you won't be harmed," Gideon ordered, aiming his own weapon at the guards.

"A rash promise, Matthew," Galen murmured, his attention centred on the being they were trying so hard to protect.  He moved forward, ignoring the minions and let his intent gaze capture that of the Elysian Captain.  "Move aside," he ordered the Elysian guards, "you have done all that you can.  Judgement is now mine."

One hasty guard raised his weapon but Galen was swifter, blue tendrils encircled him and he went down, unconscious.  "Anyone else?"

"Put down you weapons, do as he says.  We are doomed anyway."  Finally the captain decided to enter the fray.  His eyes were as faded as his skin, pale and watery in the semi-gloom.  And yet Galen saw a hint of cunning buried deep within and did not relax his watchfulness.

"So, Mage, have you come to gloat, to lord it over us now that you have consigned my world to death?"

"No.  I am here to meet person to person with the monster that ordered the kidnapping and torture of my companion.  To see for myself the face of a killer."

"Well here I am.  And much good it did us too."  His tone held no guilt for his actions, only regret that they had not worked.

Galen could feel the power moving in him, searching for a weakness in his control, begging for an outlet.

"She is alive, did you know?  Do you even care that she has her memories back, that she will tell me everything that you did to her -- everything?"

"Impossible!" The word gasped between bleached lips.  "No-one can survive the mind probe!"

"No, not impossible.  You chose your victim unwisely.  Dureena is strong, very strong.  Her will is greater than your torments.  She will survive this, and you will not."

"So, that's her name," Mareen murmured, then turned his eyes to Galen.  His tone turned vicious as he spat out his next words.  "The bitch wouldn't even tell us that much.  She was just like you, willing to let us die, afraid to share your secrets!"

It took all his fading willpower to keep from reaching out and taking that scrawny neck between his strong fingers and crushing the life from the Elysian Captain.

With lips thinned in anger Galen moved closer.  "She did not have the secret to tell, but you didn't give a damn did you?  You were willing to take, and take until there was nothing left of her to give.  Had it ever crossed your mind to ask for help?  The galaxy has changed since you were forced out, though maybe they were right to banish you from our midst.  Exile a race that was so caught up in its own survival that any other life was yours to forfeit."

"We are dying!" Mareen exclaimed.

"Not good enough!"

A squad of security officers entered behind him, distracting him for the briefest moment.  Even as he turned his head Mareen brought up the weapon he had concealed behind his back, his intent obvious.

Maybe it was a sixth sense, or just his instinctive mistrust of all around him, but Galen turned with a speed that stunned the Elysian.  And this time he could not hold back his anger, it poured from him in a brilliant stream of energy that wrapped itself tightly around the pallid figure before him.  Mareen's weapon discharged itself harmlessly into the ceiling as the white tendrils crushed him, his mouth opened in a silent scream as life faded from his already dying body.  But it did not end there.  As the body lay inert on the floor, all life extinguished, the power that surrounded it continued to engulf and consume the Elysian until nothing but ashes remained.

Galen became aware of Gideon's proximity even as he watched his handiwork reach completion.  There were no words of recrimination, no outrage as he had expected.  He just stood at his side, eyes on the remains that were even now scattering across the floor.

***

Sarah returned to the Med Lab feeling more hopeful than she had left it.  A quick glance to Dureena's section and she noted the lights had been turned down, hopefully she slept, she certainly needed it.  Earlier she had removed all the monitors, leaving only a single drip to feed the antibiotics and fluids Dureena still needed.  She would leave her for a while longer before trying to tempt her to some nourishment.

Turning to her computer she set about engineering a workable cure for the Elysian.  For, although she abhorred what had been done to Dureena, their desperate plight had, in some way, touched the healer within her.

***

The need for sleep was almost overwhelming, and as he stepped out into the Excalibur's hangar it was with the utmost reluctance.  Right now, all he wanted to do was lay down in the darkness of his flyer and drift into a healing sleep.  But, he had yet to make his peace with Dureena, something that could not wait.

Matheson waited for them, his normally impassive face bearing the unmistakable signs of concern.

"Captain, Galen, we have a situation."

"Another one?" Gideon sighed.  "I am getting too old for this.  What now?"

"First up, the Elysian you were interrogating earlier was found dead in his cell about ten minutes ago."

"Foul play, John?"

"Undetermined.  Dr Chambers is performing the autopsy now.  And -- Dureena is missing."

"What!" Gideon and Galen exploded in unison.

"What happened?  Quickly."  This anxiety, on top of all that had gone before sent waves of emotion through his bone weary body and Galen took a hasty step forward.

"Dr Chambers thought she was resting.  The lights had been switched off in the cubicle.  When she went to check on her a few minutes ago, Dureena was gone.  Security are searching the ship now but there is a lot of space to cover."

Galen turned toward the transport system.  "Is this repaired yet?"

"Yes but --"

He almost ran toward the exit, hurling himself into the opening and calling out his destination.  He knew where she would have gone; at least he hoped he understood her well enough to gauge her movements.



The door to the observation room stood open.  Ahead the room lay in darkness save for the faint illumination from the planet's small moon.  He stepped carefully into the gloom, his dark coat merging with the shadows.

She stood by the large observation port, her head leaning against the clear material.  Even in the semi-dark he could see the defeated set of her shoulders and almost taste her inner pain.

"Dureena," he called his voice low and unsure.  For what he had done he should be on his knees for her forgiveness, but it was not his way.  He had to explain to her why and how they had come to this point.

Taking another step toward her he saw her pose change, tense now as she heard his approach.

"Leave me alone, Galen."

The husky voice that he had come to love so much stirred every atom of his being.

"Let me explain.  Allow me that."

Her silence encouraged him to continue.

"At first when I returned to our home and found the house empty I thought that you were still angry with me.  But something felt wrong.  I searched the valley until I found Cat, by the waterfall.  She was still alive, barely."  He could see the giant animal in his mind's eye still; the once beautiful creature reduced to a dying wretch.  "I couldn't save her."

She flinched under his suddenly arctic tone but his eyes had moved away to the empty vista outside the room.

"I saw the signs of struggle, but there was no clue left for me to find.  When I checked the computer logs I found your message.  I had never received it.  I would have returned had I known there was any danger to you."

Crossing to the window he leaned against it, trying now to see her face still wreathed in shadow, wanting to gauge her reactions but denied even that by the deep gloom within the room.

"I made the first of many mistakes then.  I thought it had to have been a Mage that had defiled my home, taken that which I hold most dear to me.  Thane was missing, his hatred of me had festered over the decades and I thought, wrongly, that he had finally taken the opportunity to hurt me in the worst possible way.  I spent weeks chasing him, weeks when I should have been following the Elysian --"  He pushed away from the wall and began to pace out his agitation, not helped by the icy silence surrounding Dureena.

"Thane is dead, in case you are wondering.  Not by my hand, but it was my interference that proved the catalyst in his demise.  I had to return to our home and start again.  Alwyn gave me the clue, put me on the trail of the Elysian.  I didn't know why they might have taken you, only that they would pay for their crime.  I called in all the favours I could, and imposed on tentative friendships and we began this hunt."

Passing a weary hand over his aching eyes he turned again to face her inflexible back.  Letting his eyes travel over her slight form, the short hair that now clustered tightly to her fine skull -- the shapeless blues that covered her growing stomach.  She did not give him any encouragement.

"I know now what they wanted from you and what they did to try and obtain it.  Dureena, I would have given anything for this not to have happened.  The price you paid for the secrets that we keep is too much for me to contemplate.  Her silence now only encouraged him to continue; to try and make amends for all that she had suffered.

"When we found you and I saw that you were pregnant, every part of me wanted to kill the bastard that had done that to you.  I thought that you had been raped, or they had used you for some terrible experiment.  It never occurred to me that you carried our child.  I was so sure that you had been violated that no other explanation even entered my thoughts.  When the child kicked against my hand I had to leave before my anger took me beyond my capacity to control it.  It took me years to master the passions that had threatened to overwhelm me and with your loss I have become swamped by them again."

She turned now and in the faint moon glow he could see the heavy circles that darkened her eyes, the bruised flesh on her arm where drips had been pulled out in her anxiety to leave the Med Lab.

"And now, Galen?  Now that you know the child is yours, what now?"

He closed the gap between them, afraid still to touch her, afraid to break the fragile hold he could see was all that stood between her and complete breakdown.

"Now we await the arrival of our child, here on the Excalibur where Sarah can look after you.  Will you let me stay with you?  I don't think I could bear to be parted from you again."

She shivered and he was immediately concerned.  Unbuttoning the heavy coat he wrapped it around her now shaking body as reaction set in.  It swamped her small form, the dark material hanging against the floor.  Leaving himself vulnerable by removing the links, he wrapped his arms around her, pulling her back against him.  For a moment she resisted his touch then let her head fall back against his shoulder, the fresh shampooed smell of her auburn curls tickling at his senses.

He revelled in the feel of her slight body resting against him.  Just her presence, here in his arms, began the healing that his soul so desperately craved.  She seeped into him, stealing softly through his senses and he felt whole again.

They stood not speaking, until she removed one hand from the coat's enveloping folds to find one of his.  Pulling it down to the swelling of her body until his palm lay flat against the burgeoning mound.  The child within kicked hard against him, and he felt a surge of emotion that threatened to swamp him with its intensity.

Finally she spoke, her voice soft and undemanding in the quiet that had surrounded them.

"And the Elysian, what of them; will they be punished, Galen?  Do I get my revenge?" Those last words relieved him of the anxiety he had suffered; she had not killed Shima.

"The two Elysian responsible for the pain you suffered are both dead.  The captain by my hand, the other escaped by dying first of the plague that was the driving force behind their foray."

"And a cure, Galen.  Is there one, and will you give it to them after all that they have done?" She turned in his embrace; her eyes had locked onto his now, unreadable.

"There is a cure, and yes we will give it to them.  I can't exterminate a whole civilisation, Dureena.  My wrath only takes me so far."

Her eyes were steady on his face as she answered softly, "Good."

The generous answer stopped his breath for a moment, she had come so far from the angry woman he had fallen in love with and he loved her all the more for it.

" I took so long to find you, Dureena, you suffered so much because of me.  Can you forgive me?"

He leaned down until his lips could reach her cheek and he pressed a light kiss against the soft skin.

"I love you," he said softly, his arms pulling her closer into his embrace.

Gently, fingers traced a pathway along his cheek, across the fine bone structure until they came to rest on his parted lips.  Standing on tiptoe she pulled him down to her mouth, giving him absolution as it met with his.

***

The whole ship was humming with expectation.  Crew would smile at one another as they passed in the corridors, bets had been laid, wagers made.  On the bridge Captain Gideon and Matheson cast anxious glances at the secure line they had left open for medical use only.

"How long does it take for crying out loud!" After twenty hours nerves, on the bridge at least, were beginning to fray.

"Med Lab to Captain Gideon."

He stabbed quickly at the com.  "Here.  News, doctor?"

"It's a boy.  Mother and child doing well though Galen is a little the worse for wear," the smile in her voice was echoed by Matthew.

"Thank you doctor.  I'll let the crew know."

In Med Lab Dureena sat with the tiny child cradled closely in her arms.  Galen stood beside her, a glowing look on his face that echoed the pride and love he felt for them both.

He had a decision to make, one that for now at least, he would put off making.  Should he, as his father had done, abandon the Mage way of life to give his son the chance of a normal life or make the child live in isolation with Dureena and himself raised as a Mage?

That was a thought for another day.

the end

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