For the first time in his life, he felt as if he were on his own. Dr. Litong would not help him, would not save them... and he couldn't talk to Donovan. He couldn't. His brother had trusted him, Dominic, with his life, and he had just thrown that faith away. Donovan would hate him. Without his keeper for guidance, and without his brother for support, he had nowhere to go.

He wandered the hallways for hours, trying to calm himself and find a way to reconcile for what he'd done. He could find nothing. Pain threatened to overtake him every time he thought of Donovan, every time he thought of Rox, and it took an enormous effort not to sit down and burst into tears. He wanted to hurt someone and cry and beg and die all at the same time.

I tried! I tried, for you both, and I failed. I've killed my twin and I've killed my lover, and all I ever wanted to do was help them.

He remembered the fear and longing and anguish on Donovan's face when they had been told they would taken from Command School and back to the Creche. He remembered Rox's tears falling on his skin as she clung tightly to him in the infirmary and begged him not to leave. He remembered the ice in Dante's eyes when she flung herself over Donovan's prone form and called for Angel. Dominic remembered it all, and he wished he didn't, because it was nearly too much to bear.

Bereft, exhausted, and afraid, he was on his way to find Dr. Litong again-- to tell him he was mistaken, and beg not to be turned in-- when a figure, flanked by a few IF guards, stepped into view. The air left his lungs in a gasp, and Dominic stood frozen in the corridor as Nathan Terrence walked past. He could not breath.

Mode. Here. Alive and... and here.

The other man wasn't even restrained. The guards were nearly following him, and Dom could not believe it. Mode was dressed in a plain black uniform; no sigils, no patches, no cuffs or nylettes or chains around him as there should have been.

He was lost in thought, but it was far from peaceful contemplation, and a frown furrowed his brow and darkened his features. It almost couldn't be called walking, this stride he was keeping. More like pacing. He was worried, which made him angry, and that made him think of his daughter and become worried all over again, and so it continued as he made his way toward her quarters.

All his carefully constructed plans were not playing out as they should have. Avrey, in exchange for a disgraceful sum of money and a few pulled strings, had gotten him all the information on Terrence as he was able to find. What he read on the boy did not please him. Robert wanted his daughter's new Jax gone; forever, dead, in Charybdis, it did not matter. As long as it was nowhere near her. That hope had quickly been shattered when Avrey reported Terrence at the command post, under the wing of the Internal Alliance's director. Vaisou was well-known. So was he, Captain Robert Quistin, in his own right. He'd made the attempt to speak civily, to request a favor, an agreement, officer to officer, but to no avail. Terrence would stay. Katera would arrive soon. And Robert was left searching for a solution to rid himself of the threat to his dreams of a life somewhere far away, with only the little girl who looked so much like his lost wife, and security enough to keep her from harm.

It was simply not to be.

The transfer request he had put in for when he'd first been notified of Katera's graduation had been placed on hold, and another payment had exchanged hands before he learned that it was Terrence who had done such. Just the thought of the boy made Robert's blood boil, and his steps were louder in response, as if by stomping around he could release some of his anger. How dare Terrence counterman his orders? The audacity of that little IA tool was enough to drive Robert into a rage, and he clicked impatiently at the clip to his holster, as he had done once in waiting, years ago. The sound melded with his boots, a thump and a click, a stomp and a snap, and his eyes were cold serpentine as he glanced up and blinked at the figure that approached from down the hallway.

A moment passed before he recognized the pale hair, the cold eyes, and a moment longer before he realized where it was the apparition must have been coming from. Nothing lay in that direction but the rooms for the new recruits, nothing in that direction of any importance but one room; Katera's. Robert drew up and stopped in the corridor, squaring his shoulders and projecting as much icy authority as he could manage, but still the fury bled through his pose, and he could barely keep from launching himself forward.

He glared furiously, with all the obsessive protectiveness of a father, with all the murderous rage of the cruel bastard that he was, and his eyes narrowed as they swept over the boy who had dared defy him. He saw no difference between Terrence and Narita. Jaxen had broken his daughter, stabbed her, scarred her. Robert had seen the slash upon Kat's wrist, had been witness to her terrifying withdrawal and miserable despair, and it was all the same to him. Terrence was no better than Narita, and where Robert had held little influence over the death of one, he would not allow the same to be said for the second.

Quistin's entire manner changed as soon as recognition hit, and Mode watched the bound anger in the man grow nearly to the breaking point. He came to a halt perhaps five feet away from the furious captain, and watched him from behind a cold stare. He wasn't in the same position he'd been in four years ago. If Quistin thought he could cow him, he was sorely mistaken.

"I thought I gave you an order, boy. You had better not be coming from where I think you've been."

The captain's voice was little more than a growl, and Nathan narrowed his eyes at his tone, but his lips curved into a faint, mean smile. He had seen this man strike Katera, seen him shake and threaten her. Quistin had threatened him, ordered him to stay away from Katera, and then tried to steal her away from him when she had arrived at the Command Post. Now it was Quistin's turn to suffer.

What I wouldn't give to kill this one...

Sulphuric yellow glowed with hate in his gaze, and he held his ground, surveying the object of his rage as Terrence stood so close to the death that he wanted to deliver.

"At least you still know your rank, Lieutenant," he spat venomously. He outranked Terrence. It wasn't much, but he also had considerable influence through the station, and no IA upstart was going to upset the twenty-year undisputed reign of Robert Quistin. What he wanted, he got, and right now he wanted his transfer request and his daughter with him and this thing as far away as possible. Lightyears away almost wouldn't be enough.

Robert raised an eyebrow in a gesture that belied his nearly uncontainable fury.

"I've had us transferred. It's too bad she won't have the opportunity to kill you before we leave. But then again, it didn't help Jax. Relocate yourself, Terrence, someplace out of my sight."

Not this time, Quistin. Not ever again.

The last time he had seen the captain, he'd been a prisoner. He had been unable to fight back, unable to contradict or to dictate terms. Did Quistin really think he'd been frightened of him? Is that why Quistin thought he'd put up so little fight before, because he was afraid for his life.

He hoped so.

Once, it had been a little five-year-old pup trying to defy him, and in the name of whatever passed as honor, he had not killed the boy. It had been his greatest mistake. Threats came in all forms, be they a child or a man, but nothing, nothing, was going to stand in his way this time. Jaxen was long dead and his harm to Katera long repaid. Terrence, on the other hand...

Forgive me, Kitten, but this is for your own good.

He caught the man's arm in a solid grip and yanked him to face him. Robert Quistin was surprisingly agile for his size, and Nathan actually had to block a punch before he buried a fist in the captain's midsection. Quistin grunted, more from anger than discomfort, and Nathan connected under his jaw, into his stomach again, and then smashed his elbow into the older man's face, splitting his lip. Any guilt he might have felt for injuring an older, weaker opponent faded as the memory of this man backhanding Katera returned to him, and he made himself stop and take a step back before he did serious damage.

Quistin hissed, spit blood and came at him again, and Nathan met him a little too eagerly for his own taste. Not too much. The camera. The words rang in his head and he only used his fists, pulled his punches, just bruising the man, not breaking him. Quistin was strong and tough, but Nathan was younger, much faster and far less clouded by his emotion, and the captain was wavering when he wrapped a hand around his throat and slammed him against the wall, held him up so he could meet the dazed and angry gaze that was so disturbingly similar to Katera's.

I raised her so she could kill you all someday, and yet, she lets you live. She can't really love you enough to keep you. She must be waiting, like she waited for Jax. That's it. I know it. My Katera would no more love you than she would love me, and perhaps I won't be the one to finish this.

Robert straightened his uniform with a jerk, and made a valiant attempt at a smirk, but nothing could keep the hate from his gaze and the bitterness from his voice. All he'd done, to lose his daughter to this boy. He hoped it wasn't true.

"I hope you enjoy it while you can, boy." He turned to leave. "Because if she won't do it, I will."

He walked away with as much authority as he could muster, but nothing could hide the expression in his eyes. Disbelief.

Disclaimer: After reading this post, what a reader will probably say is "Yeah freaking right." Well, I don't blame you. it's a hell of a stretch, that's for certain. It's almost certain that exposure that brief wouldn't kill them, but it wouldn't be comfortable either. Yes, I know, there are lots of arguments to be made about its unrealism. To be perfectly frank, I just couldn't figure out any other realistic scenario in which they could get off the station, even for the briefest moment, and so I ended up going with this. Please try and be forgiving.

Gabe was moving toward Conference Room B. He didn't know what would be waiting for him when he got there. He didn't know what was going on. He knew only that there was danger, and that things were not going to plan, but most importantly, that Sol was there.

Perhaps it was a trap. Perhaps Hale had finally found a way to rig the game beyond all hope of success; if security had been given instructions to apprehend them, then their cover -- the only real asset they had in this place -- was blown before they even arrived. And in staying in character, they would willingly walk into the awaiting hands of security. And at the same time, not reporting to the conference room would only postpone the inevitable. Where was there to hide, on a space station?

And Gabe had no doubt that this little IA security review came from Hale. Whether they were already known as spies to security, he wasn't sure, but he was certain that if they didn't already, they soon would. Hale would have arranged it so.

Either way, going to Conference Room B was a bad idea. The final was pass or fail, but Gabe wasn't terribly concerned with that right now. It wasn't passing they needed to worry about now; it was getting the hell off the station before they found themselves sedated in a transport ship's medbay, bound for an off-world maximum security prison.

Assuming they weren't simply shot.

So Conference Room B was an extremely bad idea. Except that that was where Sol's last known whereabouts pointed, and if they had her, Gabe was not leaving without her. Better bound for the same prison than headed in separate directions.

So Gabe was running through the corridors, trying to formulate some plan and coming up blank. The enemy held all the cards right now; Gabe had no idea of their numbers, their knowledge, their hardware, or their orders. He had no backup, no intel, no weapons, and most importantly, no idea if they had Sol or not.

He was so absorbed in trying to formulate something resembling a plan that he didn't even notice the footsteps from around the corner. As he rounded it, he ran right into the person coming the other way, and had to fight to keep his balance in the sudden tangle of arms and legs.

The other person gripped his uniform to keep steady also, and met his eyes. And that sense of proximity found its way through the tangled thoughts running through his mind.

"Sol," he whispered, and hugged her tightly. She hugged back, but they quickly disentangled themselves, and she took his hand and pulled him along as she started running again. "We need to get out of here," she said.

Gabe assented wordlessly and changed their course, heading down an adjoining corridor. As they ran, she related the story to him. The interview had been carried out by Nathan Terrence. Asmodeus. Sol's assailant. Kat's lover. The fallen angel.

He didn't for a moment, count on any gratitude for their aid in getting word to Kat that he'd lived. They had, after all, shot him first; it wasn't hard to see how one might consider them square. No, they had to assume that Mode had already informed security. They needed out now.

Sol then told him of her accelerated computer work, and that she'd already delivered the goods to Icarus electronically. Gabe would have been astounded, if he'd not been so intent on forming a new plan in his mind. Hacking a system like the CCP's in that short an amount of time was very impressive, even having known of Sol's abilities for so long.

Gabe led them to Launch Bay 4, and punched in the code that Denton had used. The inspection was still underway, and the officer with the clipboard, from earlier, spotted him immediately, and strode toward them.

"Hey! You were told-"

And that was as far as he got before Sol decked him, kicked him in the face, and sent him sprawling on the floor.

There were shouts in the bay; some ran to alert security, and others started toward Gabe and Sol, fists clenched and faces set. Gabe led the way to the line of MMVs, and punched the button to open the canopy. "Hold them," he said to Sol as he leapt in.

The controls were differed from the IF norm, but not too much. It was, after all, a specialized maintenance craft, and had to be designed as such. But the basic maneuvering controls were just like those of any small IF craft; uniformity made things easier on the pilots, but also on the hijackers.

He hit the main power control switches, and attempted to access the automated liftoff program. The VDU to Gabe's left, however, went red, and the words ACCESS DENIED appeared across the screen. At the bottom, a line of text read: MMV controls locked down by Flight Control override.

Gabe glanced quickly toward the control room, opposite the pilots' lounge, looking down at the bay. Officers inside were scrambling about.

"Son of a bitch," Gabe hissed, working at the controls. Only a few attempts convinced him that all the MMV's controls were locked out. He climbed back out, and didn't bother trying any others.

Sol was holding off three technicians. They weren't trained in combat like Gabe and Sol, but they had numbers and they had raw physical power, and though Sol's attacks were certainly effective -- as indicated by the two prone techs already at her feet -- the weaving and dodging necessary to keep herself out of the path of their fists was taxing.

Gabe's eyes were drawn to the other craft in the room, but he knew that they too would be locked down. He was at Sol's side, stance defensive; he blocked the attacks of one of the techs, and swept him off his feet, but toward the entrance to the bay, he could see more coming their way, having alerted security.

Gabe turned his head right and left, looking for something, anything to get them out of this. He'd planned on having more time to prepare.

And now, it seemed, his lack of foresight was going to cost them both.

But as he was looking around, his eyes passed over the winch attached to the front of the MMV, and his mind sparked.

Shoot through the glass...

Gabe grabbed the hook, and flipped the control to free feed. He then reached out and grabbed Sol's hand, and pulled her along with his as he sprinted away from the techs, toward the open bay doors, toward the faint shimmer of the air shield. "Exhale!" he shouted, but he could already hear Sol forcing the air from her lungs even as he did.

They leapt, and were both suddenly, numbingly cold.

The line went taut at 20 meters, only few steps beyond the threshold, and Gabe's arm was jerked violently. Releasing his grip was not an option. The recoil sent them falling back through the bay doors and crumpling to the metal floor.

Gabe gasped as he sucked air back into his lungs. The impossible cold outside, and then the relative searing heat inside, made his body numb and his muscles completely useless. He could not even push himself up off the floor, much less defend himself. Apart from the violent shivers running through his body, he lay motionless on the floor.

Security arrived momentarily, and a medic crew shortly after, and Gabe and Sol, hands and feet secured and sedated on site, were taken to the infirmary.

Gabe didn't stay conscious all the way there. He knew, at the intellectual level, that they would be okay; their exposure to the freezing cold of space had been extremely brief. And he was not worried about the consequences of being caught, either. They had assumed their identities. They had made contact with Icarus. They had stolen the schematics and delivered them to Icarus. They had, technically speaking, escaped the station, if only for half a second.

They had shot through the glass.

That mission being a relatively amusing one; to find Wick, wherever she might be. Unable to persuade Rox to aid him in his task, Dom did a little basic searching himself, and managed to come up with her schedule. It told him that at 1100 hours, she'd just be leaving one of her demolitions labs, and Dom had arrived with plenty of time to spare. Situating himself outside the door of the lab, he leaned against the wall, crossed his arms over his chest, and painted on an appropriately pleased smirk.

Five years. Do you know that I'm here, Wick? Do you know that our friend Mode is, too? I wonder what kinds of plans you have now. I wonder what kinds of games you'd like to play.

He didn't have to wait long. Right on time, the doors slammed open, and soldiers began walking out. He almost didn't recognize her. She was in the center of the pack, holding a manual and engrossed in reading one of its pages, and it took him more than a moment of staring before he decided that it was really her.

Dom had, over time, become accustomed to the ways of change, but he still found it difficult to understand it sometimes. He never really noticed how he himself had changed, because Donovan changed right along with him, and he rarely had the opportunity to compare past and present. As he stared at Wick, it was hard to correlate how the tiny fifteen-year-old he'd beat before had grown into this woman. The thought made him smile, but that was exactly what she'd become, and it seemed as if his familiarity with her and what they'd done before was now gone.

So, maybe I can become familiar again?

Wick. No one but Jor and Kat call me that now.

Irritated at her own reaction, she looked up and blinked. He stopped walking when she did, looking down at her with a self-satisfied smile, and she stared up at him in undisguised surprise for several seconds before her eyes narrowed and her mouth set. The last time she'd been this close to him she'd been fifteen - smaller, weaker, and unaware of how out-classed she was. He was still much bigger than she was; he'd grown older, too, but she'd learned from their last encounter and what had followed it. Nothing like that would ever happen again.

Why do my hands hurt?

At least play along, Wick.

It didn't occur to him that she might hate him, or not wish to speak with him, or anything of that sort. She was a schemer, a player, a manipulator, just like him, and certainly this was a meeting worthy of an effort. Angry, Dom followed her closely and responded with a knowing smile, a hand to his throat, and deliberate misunderstanding.

The rest of the traffic in the hallway passed them up, and she turned on him with a cold glare and shoved him into a side passage. It was a controlled shove, and he outmassed her by a lot, but he went. He was humoring her, but Wick was too furious at the open taunt to be annoyed at the concession.

Just a little deeper, Katera, and you could have solved all of my problems. I would have done it for you. If he had done to you what he did to me, I would have done it for you.

"Come now, Wick, you know we both had fun." He ran his eyes over her slowly, as if she were an object he was entitled to view at leisure. "In fact, I recall you playing just as much." Now his gaze hardened to match hers, and his smile gained an edge, sharp and malicious and hungry for conflict.

I'm surprised at you, Wick. You're losing your edge. It was only a game. It didn't mean anything. You could at least be polite.

And I hate him more than anyone I've ever known. There's a lesson in that.

Either he'd expected a different initial response from her or he thought she wasn't serious, because he was now firmly in her path. His persistence was inexplicable until she matched it against his comment about Jor. He'd been trying to needle her, of course...but under that there was some confusion. He didn't understand her response. He didn't understand why she wouldn't want him, and that gave her the upper hand. Wick liked to feel in control. It was something they had in common.

You won't get away that easy. I won before, Wick, I beat you in your little schemes, and don't presume to think you might be luckier the next time.

"You're so confident, love." There was a dangerous note to his voice, but he otherwise masked his anger behind a complacent expression. "It's rather endearing. Just don't let it get to your head."

He moved aside, not to let her pass, but to leave himself, and gave her a grin that was miles from reaching his eyes. "All these people you've tried to kill will be so happy to see you. Maybe one of these days, we'll pay a visit."

"See you around, spark." A wave over his shoulder, and Dom was gone. The lies settled over him like a shield as he swaggered away, and already thoughts of battle and engineering bays flickered through his mind. He left, to find his brother and their girl, and later that night Rox paid for Wick's taunts.