Chapter 1: And so it begins...

Segment 1: Arrival

Chloe was nervous. This would be the second time that she would go beyond the known planes into a universe completely different from those she was used to. But if the information was correct and there were indeed others using Solenoid technology besides Cy and those sworn to him . . . if they chose to repent then they would live. Perhaps she could also bring a little of Cy's wisdom to that place, and take back some more improvements for her own people as well. They had barely gotten the steam engines to work, and fusion power still looked a long way off.

She looked around in anticipation of adventure, something that she had not had for a few years. Running the country took so much time. She prepared herself and went into a combat stance; You never knew where you would appear with this spell. She readied a knife in each hand, but keeping them hidden inside her cloak. Each of her senses was trying to experience everything all at once. The cavern was dim, and a human would have had a hard time even seeing the huge dragon behind her, but her sight was unimpeded. She saw the rough wall at the edge of this cavern where she had departed last time. It brought back memories. She could hear the huff of the dragon's breath as he chanted the words of power . . . She could feel the thump of his heart . . . She could smell the spell book he was using even over the remains of his last meal . . . The smell of mystdale spice wine so thick that she could almost taste it . . . She could sense the magical power around her building.

Then it was released in a mighty torrent that tunneled and ripped through time and space. She felt the magic of The Dragon Mage seize her, an almost euphoric flow of power filling her. The world disappeared, her senses could not detect anything but the vast magic enveloping her. The world returned after a moment - a moment that could have been an instant or a year for all she knew in the spell's grip - but it certainly wasn't the one she'd left. She recognized the steady drone that only came from machines, the sickly sweet smell of oil, and all the other markers of a technological civilization. She smelled and heard the man before she whirled around to face him, still keeping the knives concealed but ready to defend herself. She tried to appear nonthreatening, in hopes of avoiding a fight before she knew where she was.

***

Jack turned the corner and saw a small girl probably around nine years old with purple hair and a chocolate brown skin, wearing an eyewrenchingly black cloak. He almost reached for his gun in surprise, but stopped himself just in time. He reasoned that she wasn't a threat and probably just the result of some fun one of the guys had a few years back. Jack figured that the father probably wouldn't like it if his daughter got shot, and considering how such conflicts were invariably resolved among the Dragonfang pirates . . .

"Hey you, who's your daddy?" He asked her, in what he thought of as a friendly tone.

"None of your business," came the bitter reply from Chloe, who didn't care for his leering tone or the reminder of Laucilol.

"Why you . . . ! You'd better answer me, or I'll take you to the captain! The feared Laucilol the Marauder, he's even feared by the Iron Bitch!" Jack shot back while gesturing wildly with his hands. Who did this brat think she was? The threat was empty of course he had no desire to be face to face with Laucilol ever if he could help it, but he was sure that the threat would work. Laucilol was(1) the most feared pirate in the Taiidani Sector. At the moment they were heading through AAnn territory, to reach the Humanx Commonwealth since the heat was getting a bit too much in Taiidani space.

To his surprise and fear she smiled and turned her head to the side, the wild mass of hair shifting to reveal a pointed ear. "Laucilol?" She said, almost as if she was tasting the word. She laughed gently. "I think I would like to see him right now."

Jack felt a cold finger of fear trail down his back. He knew of only one person with pointed ears and dark skin . . . Laucilol. Oh $#it. Snapping to attention, while trying to salute and bow at the same time, he said: "Of course mistress, right this way," cursing himself mentaly for attempting to threaten Laucilol's daughter. But she seemed amused, so he might survive . . . or so he hoped.

***

#I should really have paid more attention when that demon was threatening Dad, what was it, forty years ago?# Reminisced Chloe silently, #Something like that at least, I was next in line for sacrifice. Too bad I'll have to make this quick and won't be able to use all those wonderful suggestions, after all I'm probably surrounded by hostiles loyal to Laucilol.# Through those thoughts' Chloe's face, which she had kept pleasant so far, twisted at these thoughts.

Her smile turned vicious, hate and vengeance flashed in her violet eyes. At K'val's whispered advice Chloe tried not to think about how much she hated Laucilol, restoring the cheerful and happy mask she had at first. K'val reminded her that this could not possibly be the same person. He had died more than fifteen years ago in another universe far away. This Laucilol had committed no Crimes that she knew of - she needed to know more before acting.

Jack was just silently marching ahead of her, his footsteps almost painfully loud to her ears. The others she saw were much like Jack, dirty, unshaven, and most of their clothes where in need of replacement. No jewelry or rank insignias she recognized as such on any of them. Most of the corridors were similarly bare and dirty.

"What is your name?" Asked Chloe.

"Huh?" Asked a confused Jack jolted from his thoughts of impending doom before realizing that she was talking to him. "It's Jack. Just Jack - I have no last name."

"Talk."

The command was simple direct and completely caught Jack by surprise. "Uhm, about what?"

"Tell me a story," came the short and to Jack's mind not very helpful reply.

"What kind of story?"

"Your pick. Maybe something you did, or a legend among the crew, or an exciting battle you were in. Whatever."

And Chloe listened, with occasional prompting when he stopped. She learned much about the world she was in. Many people had FTL here, not at all like the last time. Telepaths where appallingly common here too, and magic was know. There where also similarities to other tech-worlds she visited, but all in all this was too different to base anything off those assumptions.

Then they stopped. They stood in front of a plain grey door, and Jack was shivering. Chloe could smell his fear. The corridor was empty except for them - this part of the ship was much better looking than the rest, and there where even fewer people than in the rest of the ship.

"Uhm, Laucilol is behind this door. He'll not be pleased if you interrupt his playtime with the slaves," explained Jack.

"I understand. You may go now." Growled Chloe.

Jack happily obeyed the dismissal. #Disturbing family,# thought Jack. #I wonder who the mother is. And if she's still alive. Probably not. I wonder why I haven't ever heard of her before?#

***

Chloe waited for Jack to leave before entering. The scene in the large room was what many would have described as a scene from hell; Generous amounts of blood littered the area, and quite a few corpses. The faces, of the dead and the living, if they still had them in a recognizable form, where locked into grimaces of pain. Some people were still alive, attached to the walls in various painful looking ways. Some of the slaves were still in cages - unharmed. Future victims, thought Chloe familiar with the procedure, letting the quarry see what will happen to them.

"What!? Who are you?!?! How dare you interrupt my play time?!?!" Snarled a furious Laucilol looking up from his current 'toy'. He was dressed in an odd form of armor, consisting of a chest plate that didn't cover his lower torso, a pair of bracers, and a pair of shin guards. The armor was colored blood red, and below it he wore a deep blue jumpsuit. The entire outfit was decorated with silver and gold designs giving it a more ceremonial look than functional. Laucilol himself was very dark-skinned, much darker than Chloe, piercing blue eyes, his long white hair drawn back into a ponytail, and two pointed ears that revealed his race as something else than human: a Drow. He also had a sword hanging at his left hip, and a humongous gun of some sort on the other.

He put down the scalpel he was using to entertain himself with the boy. #A pity that he won't last much longer. I will have to move on to the next one soon . . . his mother will do fine.# Thought Laucilol with a grin of anticipation at the beautiful screams he was going to hear, before pulling himself back to the situation at hand.

"I'm Chloe. How do you do?" Asked Chloe with her best British accent, then her voice turned hard and threatening. "Cease and repent and Cy may still forgive you. Being a slaver is a Crime." You could almost hear the capital on that word.

Chloe was visually examining the boy on the table, from what she knew of humans this one could be barely five. He would not live much longer without help. In each hand, two more knives joined the one already there.

"Heh, cocky aren't you? Well I'll have fun playing with you." Responded Laucilol, though there was something that was nagging him about the girl. There was something about the way she moved...

"So be it. May thou experience eternal pain and suffering." Even before Chloe finished her pronouncement six knifes went flying, They were grouped tightly with about 10cm between each blade the pattern was designed to be almost impossible to dodge.

But Laucilol was fast, and various enchantments boosted it sufficiently that he was able to jump to the side, only a single knife grazing him, and that lightly. He had to immediately jump up as two more knives thunked into the place where he was a moment ago. He realized his mistake too late and while he was in the air, unable to dodge, two knives hit him in his chest and bit deep - cutting through armor, flesh, and bone with equal ease.

Laucilol cried out in pain, but he was relatively unharmed, and he finally got his sword out of its scabbard. He immediately tumbled away from his landing place looking at the place where Chloe had been a moment ago. She had disappeared, and Laucilol cautiously approached the place, checking if she's hiding behind one of the corpses. He was wary because he now knew he was dealing with one of his own kind. Suddenly he jumped to the right on instinct, a mere moment before high explosive armor piercing bullets ripped the area apart, some shrapnel burrowing into his left leg.

***

A few rooms away.

"Did you hear those explosions? Should we check on Laucilol?"

"Are you crazy?! Do you know what he'll do if it's a false alarm? He's probably just stuffed some explosives in one of those wretches again just to see the reactions of the others. Do you remember what happened when someone interrupted his play session that time?"

"You're probably right." Answered the other guard shuddering at the memory of that.

***

Laucilol frantically turned and faced the area where the bullets came from, and just in time as Chloe was almost upon him with another one of those knives. Chloe barely dodged the first swing, dived between his legs and then tumbled away just before Laucilol's sword passed through the area where her head had been a moment before. Using the brief respite of the missed swing Chloe drew her own sword. This time both combatants were a little more wary of the other.

Chloe barely managed to parry Laucilol's swing, and her eyes widened as her own sword - which had managed to pierce gundanium without problems and which had proven sharper than a dragon claws - was nicked by Laucilol's sword. It was only a small nick to be sure, and a human would not have been able to see it, but she had thought Sting unbreakable. Her hesitation almost proved to be her doom, as Laucilol swung his sword down from an overhead blow. Chloe just managed to lean aside and the sword hit her shoulder instead, driving her to her knees, luckily the armor held. Chloe blocked the followup blow but hissed in pain as the impact form Laucilol's sword went through her arm to her bruised shoulder. Swinging with her own sword in retaliation Chloe almost got a good hit in, but Laucilol managed to block part of the strength behind the strike and his armor did the rest. However, it did give Chloe enough time to get back on her feet. They clashed a few more times neither really getting any advantage until Chloe tried to cast a spell.

Chloe felt within her as she drew upon the power that was hers by birthright, and mumbled the ancient words that shaped the spell. Laucilol recognized what she was trying to do and attacked her in hopes of disrupting the disaster that would otherwise surly occur. Something was stopping Chloe form the power, but Chloe was undeterred exerted her will and punched through the barrier only to scream in agony as the wild energies filled her. There was more power here than she had ever felt, but it's chaotic surges made it almost impossible to control. Chloe barely managed to block Laucilol's sword, lightening flashed around them as Chloe lost complete control of the shocking grasp spell.

Chloe was still disoriented from the failed spell when Laucilol got back up and attacked again. Chloe managed to block the first few strikes but Laucilol was slowly backing her into a corner. Then Chloe's grip slipped and her sword fell from her grasp as Laucilol struck it full force. However in knocking away Chloe's sword he had overextended himself and Chloe tumbled away from the corner to the middle of the room. Chloe still felt nauseated form the failed spell, but she was regaining her wits, and the half second before Laucilol reached her where enough to go into a basic combat stance.

On his next thrust Laucilol overextended himself again, certain that she was still disoriented and powerless without her sword. Chloe grabbed his hand and applied a twist and pulled. Suddenly Laucilol was on the other side of Chloe, looking up at the ceiling his broken wrist was still grasped firmly in her hand. For the first time in a long time Laucilol knew fear. Chloe just swung one of her knives and slit his throat.

Chloe turned and started walking away thinking Laucilol safely disposed of, but something was worrying her. There it was again, just barely heard over the wails of the prisoners. Laucilol's heartbeat. Chloe threw herself to the side and whirled around as a bolt of energy flew through the mane of hair following her.

"I can't be killed, foolish girl! Not even by one of my own kind!"

Chloe gripped one of her 'Earth-shaker' revolvers, after having retrieved it from wherever the cloak stored it, and tried to bring it to bear on Laucilol. But she couldn't aim properly with all her concentration on dodging the shots. One of the massive 30mm high explosive shells landed near Laucilol anyway, tearing the area apart, doing a little damage to him, but already it was visibly regenerating. Chloe fell and slid backwards from the recoil of the gun. She hit the wall hard feet first, Laucilol's next shot hit next to her and the wall turned into shrapnel. Most of it bounced of her cloak but one piece made a nasty gash on her forehead. Laucilol had somehow found the time to gather up his sword again and charged Chloe, who still didn't have her sword back. Still disoriented from the recoil Chloe was an easy target as his powerful slash hit her in her chest and threw her across the room. Her cloak prevented the sword from actually cutting Chloe, but it did little to stop it from transferring its kinetic energy.

Chloe however appreciated the distance this gave her, and did a somersault, landed with her feet on the wall, gripped the mighty gun in both hands, and shot. There was a deafening BOOM as the high explosive bullet ripped forth from the barrel in Laucilol's direction. Chloe crouched against the wall, letting her legs absorb the majority of the recoil. Laucilol almost dodged the shot, but this time it wasn't enough to escape the high explosive 30mm round.Before she could fall from the wall, Chloe jumped off in the direction of her sword. Looking for any remains of Laucilol she was shocked when she saw most of him still intact and regenerating rapidly, most of his armor (and his ribcage for that matter) was torn apart. Chloe charged Laucilol, intent on finishing this battle and though Laucilol parried her first few strikes, he didn't have enough time to regenerate completely before his head was severed. Then Chloe cut his still beating heart out of now almost completely regenerated body and crushed it. Then she broke his arms and legs in at least three different places. After that she sagged onto one knee, holding her side, and finally acknowledging the injuries her body had sustained during the battle.

#Broken rib,# she thought while prodding at where Laucilol had hit her with the sword. The pain in her shoulder had already gone down to a dull throb and would be fine in a half hour or so. #Only one. I was lucky, and stupid. I have definitely gotten rusty. First the others, then I'll take care of myself, maybe this will serve as a useful reminder.#

When Chloe approached the barely living boy that Laucilol was torturing a woman in one of the cages cried out in fear for her son, which is understandable as Chloe started to gather a ball of green energy in her hands while she mumbled and gestured ancient words and symbols of power. The huge gash on her face that coated half her face in sticky red didn't help either, or the grimace of pain she had on her face as she struggled to control the power that was surging through her body.

"Please stop," pleaded the mother of the boy. "He's my only remaining child. If you must take a life take mine."

Chloe seemed to completely ignore her, then the ball concentrated into her hands and she laid them on top of the kid. His condition stabilized and he finally fell into a restful slumber. Chloe then retrieved the knives she threw, cleaning them on whatever was handy where they stuck in something. Finally she went around the chamber freeing the remaining slaves, applying bandages where necessary and keeping a wary eye on the door.

"Stay here, I'll try to come back for you. You are not safe until this ship has been pacified."

Most of the former slaves were still too shocked to respond to all that had been happening, but one elderly man with an odd ridge on his head (A Klingon) nodded, and said, "I'll do as you say, and I will make sure these . . . pugaI' (kids, also used to denote nonwariors) do so too. You saved us all, and took vengeance on Laucilol. My life and honor are yours. My name is Ukir, I was the chief engineer of the former chuQun ghargh."

"Thank you," answered Chloe while nodding to the man. And with that Chloe headed out to the rest of the ship. She had confirmed that the pirates had committed Crimes, and now their time to face judgement had come.

(1) Not quite true, this is one of his crew so there are bound to have overinflated opinion of him which reflects on themselves. And it's not wise to question someone like Laucilol.

Segment 2: Getting a job

Chloe peered down the corridor, two guards in light power armor guarding an open door. Probably something important. She took out her assault rifle and prayed to Cy, she didn't dare use her power to cast spells. She took out a pair of magical earplugs and plugged her ears. She didn't like doing this at all, but the guns where just too loud to do otherwise, her ears where still ringing from her encounter with Laucilol.

Chloe leaned around the corner and sprayed the area with APHE bullets, quickly killing both guards, she ran over to the entrance hoping to reach it before they closed the door.

Chloe didn't hear the cry of 'intruder' within the bubble of Silence, but the guns pointed at her through the doorway made the point very clear. She dodged most of the shots by jumping up and reinforcing her momentum to move sideways past the fast closing door. One shots did hit, it was dampened by the cloak and armor, but even a dampened blaster shot hurts. Chloe took her earplugs out, and as soon as she did a loud and painful whine started filling the air along with the repetitive words "Intruder Alert, Intruder Alert, last seen in front of the bridge, shoot to kill."

Chloe had a most unladylike reply to that. The door to the bridge had been closed and presumably locked. Seeing no one around, no scrying, and no cameras Chloe prayed to Cy while mouthing the words to cast Invisibility on herself. Chloe was astounded when she did feel magic power flowing, and a quick check did reveal that she was invisible. Thanking Cy (1) she started inspecting her now unseen leg.

#So much for the quiet takedown. Ouch.# This last was added to her stream of thought when she touched the charred and bruised flesh that used to be her right thigh. It was bleeding, but not too badly. #Those blasts are dangerous, they destroyed my armor in a single shot. Slow rate of fire though,# though Chloe, while she reached for bandages to apply to her leg and a healing potion to speed up the recovery so that she could still fight.

#I shouldn't have gone after Laucilol unprepared for what he and his minions can do,# thought Chloe, while heading away from the spot where she had rested. Sitting still was dangerous when the enemy was hunting her. Of course moving presented its own dangers.

***

Suddenly the ship gave a sickening lurch and Chloe felt as if something was trieng to drain her entire mana pool. The sirens started up again in a different pitch and now they where blaring something about an AAnn attack and a emergency realspace transition. Chloe had no clue who or what the AAnn where, but judging from the expressions of the crew members that passed her invisible form it was not a good thing.

Suddenly a voice rang out over the clamor of crew members going in seemingly random directions, "Pierson! Pierson! You are with me on the secondary bridge, Takumi is at your post on the primary!"

"I thought we had a treaty with the AAnn," said Pierson.

"We had. You know how the AAnn are."

#Might as well follow them,# thought Chloe, #At least I'll get into a bridge.#

***

#This will never do,# thought Chloe, as she watched the secondary bridge crew running around in panic. She didn't know exactly what an AAnn cruiser and four destroyers where, but from the main screen she was drawing the assumption that they were large, blocky, ungraceful, and ugly but carried a lot of weapons. The five ships were advancing in a X-formation with the biggest ship in the middle and one of the smaller ships in each corner. Even as she was watching the battle on the monitor a large group of tuning fork shaped fighters left one of the three pirate ships and headed for the cruiser, releasing a truly impressive amount of what Chloe assumed to be missiles at the largest ship.

The cruiser's point defenses took care of most of the torpedoes but those that got through blew apart weapon emplacements and knocked large gaps in the armor. The Y-Wings - now out of torpedoes - split their efforts between the damaged cruiser that was slowly falling back and the destroyers which where still gaining on the pirates. The pilots of the Y-wings where either very good or insane.

As they bobbed and wove towards whatever ship they where targeting, taking potshots whenever their sights lined up with the ship, before leveling out at a distance of less than a meter, shooting at whatever stuck out enough from the ship to come in their sights. Before quite running out of ship to fly over the pilots then resumed their attack run on another ship, keeping between the two ships to discourage enemy fire. It was quite successful except for two things: the AAnn didn't seem to care if they hit their own ships too, and the pilots frequently crashed into one of the AAnn ships.

As the AAnn kept gaining the lead pirate ship released their best fighters - five new Kaark Attack Bombers and seven X-wings - to assist the remaining Y-Wings. The new fighters initially concentrated on the 'upper left' ship which exploded into a quite impressive fireball, taking an X-Wing and two Kaarks with it.

At that point the AAnn ships came within range to use their main guns on the fleeing pirates, and the smallest pirate ship, the one that released the Y-Wings, went up in an impressive blue ball of fire that was easily twice the size of the ship as 3 heavy beam cannons focused on it.

The second pirate ship signaled its surrender, but the AAnn's didn't care and it was heavily damaged as two beam cannons focused on it next, the third destroyer being too heavily damaged by the remaining fighters.

The crippled pirate ship tried to at least do something and directed the ship on a collision course with one of the AAnn destroyers, but the AAnn reduced it to flying slag before they finished the maneuver, and then went on to the main pirate ship.

Chloe stood her ground in the secondary bridge, dodging the occasional flying technician as the AAnn fired on the last remaining pirate ship. Red lights where flashing, the normal lights where flickering, sirens blaring, and above it all shouts from the crew.

"Damage report!"

"Shields down! Hull breaches on decks 1 through 4! Sir the primary bridge is . . . gone."

"Uhm, I think we have a problem," said Pierson from the sensor station.

"Yeah I'd say so," came the sarcastic reply.

"Uhm, that's not what I meant. Uhm, you see we passed into Humanx space. And well uh, we seem to have found one of their, uhm, border patrols." Stammered Pierson. "Uhm they are hailing us and the AAnn. They demand our immediate surrender."

"We can't do that Laucilol would kill us!"

"Laucilol is dead," advised the still invisible Chloe. "I killed him. Signal your surrender and say you where captured by the bounty hunter Chloe Redienh's Nei."

"Who said that!?!" Asked several crew members, but the one who was apparently in command replied, "Never!"

After he was neatly bisected the rest of the bridge crew proved far more responsive to their invisible captor's demands.

***

(1) Cy has nothing to do with this, Chloe is just not piercing the hyperwall for power and instead accessing both QI and a manawell she is carrying (Neither she nor its creator know that it is a manawell though)

***

Segment 3: Guinea Pig

***

Chloe sat in a corner of a cargo bay of one of the Humanx ships. The former slaves, or at least those not in sickbay for dealing with their rather grievous injuries or an inspection of their overall health, where there too. The cargo bay was bare, with just a few empty boxes serving as benches, the walls had a dull grey finish, and the floor had a classic metal no-slip surface. Chloe had talked with various of the freed slaves about this world and archived a pretty good idea of what she should do. So she requested an audience with the commander of the border patrol, and got it scheduled for right after her medical examination. All there was left to do now was wait, and meditate in hopes of regaining some of the mana she spend on the pirate ship. After a few minutes she also gave up and that idea as the normally turbulent flows where incredibly wild here for some reason, and several times Chloe almost lost control.

A Humanx soldier strode into the room with Ukir, the Klingon who had sworn his life to Chloe. Now the question was wether to adopt him into her 'house' and give him her family name, or wether that pledge meant that he pledged himself to the Empire. The Soldier interrupted Chloe's musings when he cried out, "Bounty Hunter Kgloehe Readienes Neii! Come with me please."

It took Chloe a moment to realize that her name was called so badly was it butchered.

"That is Chloe Redienh's Nei." She said as she rose and headed towards the door.

"My apologies Miss Redienh's Nei." Apologized the soldier as they headed down the corridor.

***

Just before they enter sickbay.

"Please leave your weapons here."

"All of them?" Asked Chloe.

"Yes."

"Very well," said Chloe, but inwardly she thought, #Like hell.#

Chloe started removing a few of the weapons she wore, starting with the knives strapped to both arms and legs, counting as she went.

A few minutes later: "... One hundred and twenty three. Which knives did I miss? Oh of course silly me." So saying she reached down and removed six more from the inside of her boots and one out of her hair.

"Is that all?" Asks the somewhat shaken guard.

"But of course not silly, here is my gun." Chloe replies as she hands over one of her earth-shakers. "That should be all unless I miss counted," lied Chloe, "except for these knuckle guards." She held one hand up for inspection.

"I guess you can keep those." Said the soldier as he looked at the tiny pointed knuckle coverings made out of some silvery metals. They were mounted on a black fingerless glove with many decorative tracings in silver. They looked more decorative than functional and they wouldn't be much use against someone using a gun anyway. Then he looked at the pile of approximately 130 throwing knives and wondered again how she concealed them all on her small body. He took out a scanner and did a search for metals but didn't find anything beyond some jewelry.

***

The doctor that examined her was a young Thranx, named Xor, not that much taller than Chloe.

"Your records could not be found, so we will have to do a full examination." Stated Xor.

"What should I do?" Asked Chloe.

"Answer some basic questions first, such as name, race, place of birth, and date of birth?"

"Chloe Redienh's Nei, Drow, and I'm not sure about either of the others." Answered Chloe truthfully.

"The computer lists no such race as the Drow. We'll do a blood and genetic analysis, if that doesn't turn up anything we would like to test your physiology more completely. Do you know your approximate age?"

"I'm a little over 60 winters for sure, and I believe I'm below 70 winters."

"Well then before we move onto the physical part of this examination are you feeling ill or strange in anyway?"

"Yes. Mild headache, mild manaburn, mild dehydration, cramps in my forearms, mild hyperventilation, I'm extremely nervous, my eyes are highly irritated, and part of my hair was burned."

"What is the source for this nervousness?"

"My weapons are not within easy reach, it's also quickening my breath and giving me cramps. I feel weak and vulnerable." Told Chloe with a straight face, quite a feat considering she still had most of her weapons.

"Well I can't do much about that," said Xor, "But I can do something about the dehydration. I assume normal water is fine? Anyway this manaburn you mentioned what's that?"

"Yes water is fine, and you could return my weapons to me. Manaburn tolerances vary, but the usual symptoms include tiredness, internal bleeding, especially in the lungs, headaches, weakness, weak pulse, unconsciousness or even death. It's a perfectly normal for a Drow to have after being in a stressful or dangerous situation. And before you ask the eye irritation is caused by overexposure to light, Drow generally prefer the dark. The headache comes from the environmental changes I have been undergoing in the last few hours and the manaburn."

"I see, I will turn down the lights a bit. I would like a more detailed explanation of what manaburn is later, but for now let's move on. I need a bloodsample if you don't mind."

"Very well, and I would be delighted to discuss more Drow physiology and to learn about Thranx physiology in return."

***

"This is a test of your strength, how much can you lift?"

"Roughly 20 stones," lied Chloe, who was much stronger than a normal human could be as long as she wore her belt. In fact she could carry roughly 275 Kg for an 12 hour march that some people would have trouble matching carrying nothing but the clothes they are wearing. But it wouldn't do for these people to treat her as dangerous even if she was.

"Never heard of that unit of measurement, do you know what it is in kilograms?"

"About 100 I think."

Xor looked down at the lithe form of Chloe and seriously doubted that claim, but set the machine for a 100kg weight. She was astounded when Chloe did lift the bar up without expending too much apparent effort, and that was mostly theatrics by Chloe.

***

"Ah we have the results from the blood tests back. There is now known race matching your genetic data. Seems like we will have to run more complete tests later. For now we'll just measure your weight and height, after that the commander will see you. Uhm, if you could please remove those boots?"

"No."

Xor was slightly taken aback by the flatout refusal since Chloe had been very helpful and cooperative so far, except for the constant nagging about her weapons, but just assumed it was some cultural taboo.

"I assume you'll also want to keep the armor on while being weighed?"

"Yes."

"Well then weighing you is meaningless. What is your best guess for your weight?"

"Around 40 kg," answered Chloe, which Xor jotted down next to a height of 1.2m.

***

"Commander, here is the bounty hunter." Announced the soldier that escorted Chloe to the commander's ready room.

"Very well, you are dismissed, you wanted to see me about something?"

"Yes, about several things in fact. Lets start with the trivial and work our way up. The bounty for the various pirates and Laucilol was issued in Taiidani space, instead of here. Will you honor it, or will you set the pirates free? Or, will you pay me half of the original bounty and make your own deal with the Taiidani?"

"That is not my decision to make, but I suspect it might be the last one or something close to it."

"Very well, next item, the captured ship."

"We can't let you keep that, it has military hardware." Interrupted the Commander.

"That was not my intention either, I wanted to exchange it for a hyperspace capable freighter."

"Again not my decision, but you will probably be awarded part of the capture money for the ship, minus our share as determined by the international salvage courts."

"Acceptable, now for the truly important part . . . The former slaves can't afford passage back to where they came from, and in many cases they don't want to. I want you to give Commonwealth citizenship to any of them interested in that, and the support they need to get a job and start their lives again."

"Again not my decision, but that is something I'll add to my recommendations when I send in my report. If that is all?"

"It is indeed, oh and I would like to have my weapons returned to me."

"Protocol is somewhat unclear over that, they should have been removed when you came aboard, unless you are a foreign dignitary visiting, the weapons have a great cultural importance to your people, or there is some good reason why you should be armed."

"It is against my religion to be unarmed, and I'm part of the clergy (2). It is said that those who go into the afterlife will be chased by the Tannari and the Baatezu, and that those who do not escape them will live in eternal suffering. As a member of the clergy it is part of my duty to be well armed when I die so that I might protect the others going to wherever they go in the afterlife, and to fight through those who would bar our way. Also how can one protect the weak if one does not have weapons? Also it has been more than a decade since I didn't have any weapons within immediate reach, and my experiences then were . . . unpleasant." Said Chloe even being mostly truthful, only changing details about the fate after death so that the weapons where a tad more important. For what she had to face after death any of her weapons would not even be nuisances.

"I'll have the knives returned to you while the gun remains in the armory until you leave the ship. Is that agreeable?"

"Certainly, thank you very much. May Akon smile upon you and your ship."

***

"Welcome back," greeted Xor as Chloe returned to sickbay to complete her examination.

"What do we do now?" Asked Chloe is a decidedly more cheerful tone than before.

"You seem happier than before," commented Xor, "any particular reason?"

Chloe took out a few of her knives and twirled the around her fingers before returning them to wherever they came from so fast that if Xor had blinked she would have missed it.

"I got my knives back!" Exclaimed Chloe.

"Good for you I suppose," said Xor, "I was just about to go to lunch, do you want to join me?"

"Certainly, it's been a while since I last ate."

***

"That manaburn that you where talking about before, you said it was common among the Drow. What exactly is it? The mana part makes me think it has a magical origin, which happens to be my speciality." Asked Xor hopping to start a conversation now that Chloe had demolished her four plates with surprising speed and archaic table manners, and seemed to be slowing down for the fruits.

"Manaburn is a condition occurring when a mage of the tradition I, and indeed almost all Drow, belong to casts magic. There hasn't been much research done in this condition although it is know to depend more on number and level of the spells than the actual mana used. Casting a single spell doesn't cause any significant manaburn in a trained mage, with the exception of some odd spells that don't follow the normal rules. By practicing magic you can expand your mana pool just like you can train a muscle, and the same can be done for manaburn, the more you practice the less affect you are by it, like building up calluses."

"So you are some sort of mage? I never heard of a magic tradition with that kind of drawback. What is it called?"

"Yes, I am a mage, although it's more of a hobby for me, unlike most mages of my kind. But it is a very useful hobby. No-one has ever bothered to give this style of magic any name to the best of my knowledge. So tell me about the Thranx, I heard that you had some kind of unification with the humans, but details have been sparse."

[Leave this for someone else to fill in, Prefferably someone who knows something about the unification]

***

Somewhat later in the sickbay.

"So do all Drow eat as much?"

"No, and I normally also don't, but I haven't eaten in a while and eat more meals a day than a human, mostly because we sleep less. Magic also burns a lot of calories, and so does running around fighting pirates, so I do eat a little more than normal."

"I see. How can your digestive system handle so much food at once?"

"I don't know."

"Well then over to the medical scanner."

A moment later Chloe is lying on a flat bed while a large ring travels over her.

"The medical scanner seems unable to penetrate the cloak."

Wordlessly Chloe rolls it up and uses it as a pillow while still wearing it. She seems very uneasy about something. Xor presumed that the cloak had some defensive function, since so far Chloe had seemed agitated whenever she as without weapons or her defense compromised.

"Ok, you can get up now. Interesting, your entire body and everything you are wearing is radiating quite a bit of magic. Strong enough for the scanner to detect it even though it normally can't. Although the cloak seems to have a different sort of magic in some way. The food you have just eaten is being processed at an incredible rate. There seems to be a small bruise and burn on your leg healing quite a bit faster than normal. Humanoid normals that is, I'm not quite sure if they apply to Drow, or if it is the result of all he magic that surrounds you."

"The healing is the result of magic, in the course of a day I can regrow limbs if I eat enough, so I would assume the enhanced digestion is part of that. And as for the cloak, that was not made by a mage from my tradition unlike the other items so I assume that is what you are detecting."

***

A few hours later Chloe finally gets back to the cargo bay.

"Ukir, we need to talk, preferably in private." Whispered Chloe when she reached the Klingon.

"Very well, but I doubt that they will let us out of the cargo bay."

"No need for that. Follow me." Said Chloe as she went over to a corner where there were only a few people. "Excuse me may I borrow this corner?" The slaves just shuffled over a bit. "Thank you very much." And then Chloe put a headband on Ukir's head, and took out a small pebble from her cloak and magical darkness sprang up around them. Some people cried out in alarm, but Chloe's voice soon reassured them from inside the black sphere.

"Now then, with that out of the way." Chloe said in the chaotic and guttural tongue of the demons, "When you pledged your life and honor to me, did you pledge it to my clan or my empire."

"I pledged myself to you." responded the Klingon in Abyssal.

"Very well. From what I have heard Klingons take their honor seriously. I was wondering whether you wanted to join my clan. And if not then why you took that particular oath."

"I am without a clan," answered Ukir, in as close to a deferential tone as Abyssal could manage, "but you destroyed my enemy anyway in honorable combat. Honor demands that I return the favor and I have nothing to offer besides my honor or my life. I would be honored if you think me worthy of joining your clan."

"It is not easy to join the clan of Redienh's Nei. You will be tested and you will be trained. Very few have ever managed to join my clan."

One of the soldiers assigned to guard the cargo bay had started making his way over to the black sphere when it first appeared, but was in no hurry. Apparently the rumor that the bounty hunter was a mage was true, and now he owed Swen 2-G-. From the sounds coming from the bubble she was talking to the Klingon in some odd guttural language. He supposed it must be Klingon, they did not sound happy but that might very well have been his own interpretation of than language. He did speed up a bit when he heard that thump fearing for the little girl, but it was slow going with all the people in the way. When he finally reached the bubble the soldier was at a loss for what to do, but he decided to take his chance and reach into the bubble.

"No need to trouble yourself, we are coming out." Said Chloe from within the sphere as she gathered the pebble and put it in a pouch. The darkness immediately disappeared leaving behind a Klingon and a little girl.

***

Back in the cargo bay the next day, the commander comes down to personally inform the now free slaves what the Commonwealth government had decided.

"[The part of the humanx that determines this] has decided to grant citizenship to those of you who want that and we will help you adjust to your new lives if you choose to accept this offer. As for Chloe you will get half of the Taiidani reward and your share of the prize money for capturing the pirates and their ship."

"Give a years worth of laborers wages to each of the former slaves that accept commonwealth citizenship, the rest I would like as either credit chit or cash."

(1): Redienh's Nei is Solenoid for Little Death, and Chloe's last name. Little Death is a mythical figure in the Solenoid pantheon, if we had something like the Grim Reaper's Shield Maiden it would probably be very similar. Akon is also from the Solenoid Pantheon, one of their war gods.

(2) Chloe's position is somewhat like the pope's, if the pope was also Jesus, Quincy (from GENOM, if it had a larger market share), Absolute ruler for life of the USA, as well as a hero. Of course that's not the case in the spiral.