Standing in the middle of the room was Julia, the eldest daughter and official representative of Livia.The humans were, theoretically, second in command only, but in practice much of what had been the responsibility of the Thundercats had fallen upon the hands of the Amazonians.She was running through a list of security items to an attentive Phaeton, who, as always, remained in shadow.

“Over the past several months,” the well-shielded woman said, “we have been detecting minor instances of clandestine activity among the throwbacks.”

“We had an execution today.Would you call that minor?”

“Those three were, of course, the extreme.They must have acted on their own, apart from the other movement we’ve detected -- we found none of the usual papers on them.”

“Are you sure they weren’t agents or part of a rouse to distract our attention?”

“The plans they did have were far more sophisticated.It must have taken them the better part of a year to produce them.What we usually find -- when we find anything among the conspirators -- are scraps, tissues, drawn erratically with ash or blood sometimes.Those three had a different style all together.”

“Hmmm,” he leaned back and seemed to rub his chin.“Well, we don’t often ever see such determined, conceited efforts from them, anyway.What does it matter?The truth will out.Anything else?”

Just as she was about to answer, a sudden and unexpected disturbance came from the world outside.Acting on instinct Phaeton crawled up out of his chair into the darkness.Julia, on the other hand, spun around to confront the doors -- that had hen opened.

“Kara?” she asked, a little confused.Her meetings with Lord Phaeton were always private and with the highest level of security.That and she had never seen the cub so hysterical.

“Father?” he asked.Once completely in the chamber his eyes scanned the interior from side to side.“Father,” he said, in tears.

“Kara, what’s the matter?”She wrapped an arm around his back and with her free hand pushed back his mane to wipe his cheek.

An out-of-breath Marsala stammered into the office, closing the doors behind him.He looked around but not to find Kara -- indeed, he had only taken partial notice of Julia.It was a shape within the shadows that alerted him and told him where to go.

“Oh, um, Julia,” he said, stopping to look at her for a moment.“Forgive the intrusion.Sir, I tried to stop him.”

“That’s all right,” Phaeton reassured his Master of Activities.“My son can meet me when ever he wishes,” he said, adding sternly: “perhaps next time he’ll knock first.”

Julia had petted the youngster into a state of calm.She looked at the recess of the chamber where now two shadows, side-by-side, stood at watch.“My lord, I have little else to add to my report.If you’d dismiss me --”

“Yes, you are dismissed, Lady Julia.”He nodded from the darkness.

She gave the cub a slight peck on the cheek -- a light gesture and no more.She often acted like a mother to the boy.“Take care,” she whispered then vanished out of the doors.

He watched her leave then stood there, in the slant of light from the only open window.The room was quiet and tense.“Father,” he said as two silhouetted forms made their way to him. “Let me hold you,” he reached out but Marsala stepped into view to hold him back.

“What’s going on here?” The old lion growled.

“It’s my fault.He wanted to see a part of the underworld, so I showed him a dynamo.”

“Is that so?You brought my son down there?”

“He was adamant.Something happened earlier today that sparked his interest.”

“I wanted to see my brothers,” Kara said, trying desperately to touch even the hem of his father’s robe.

“Did he see their faces, Marsala?”

“I saw them, everything.”

“And you were not afraid?”

“No -- they’re beautiful faces, father.”

Phaeton and Marsala seemed to look at each other for a moment in that weak ambiance.The lord’s expression was masked by the darkness.The man acted only more apologetically.He whispered something that made the Thundercat leader draw back.

It was at that time that Kara began to relate the story, starting from the events of the afternoon.He had just come back from his appointment with his doctors and wanted to relax in the Imperial Garden -- notice that he said nothing about meeting with friends in the garden.After playing a game of tag he was startled by the screams of the other youngsters.He ran to the scene and saw the malformed children -- notice that he made no mention of Caesar.That had been the incident Marsala had hinted of.It had caused an old memory to resurface and a curiosity that like all cat curiosity had to be satisfied.He told his father that he had forced the human to take him down there.And then, at the end, he related the experience of what he saw at the power station.The explosions, the hellish fires.In the minutest detail he recalled what had unfolded before his eyes.He ended with the picture of how the men were falling into the red-orange flames.

On a chair he sobbed into his paws.He felt a strange, furry warmth on his shoulder that was not completely familiar.He turned to see but by then it was too late.

“Such things are to be expected.They are inevitable,” the grown-up lion said to the man-cub.

“And that’s it?Father, you are the Lord of the Thundercats.Don’t you care?”

No answer.

“It’s our job to help people who can’t help themselves.And they are people, under the smog and dirt, they are beautiful people, like what the ancient Thunderians must have been like.”

Silence.

“Theirs were the hands that built this city.But where are the hands in your plan?”

“Where they belong -- in the depths.”

Kara looked at Marsala.His stone face was expressionless.“How can you be so cruel?I don’t understand -- Code of Thundera!”

“Kara, be reasonable!This isn’t as simple as you think --”

“No!I won’t hear it!”He stood and wrapped his arms around his ears.His face was painted in a newfound terror more horrific than his fiery visions of the underworld gone awry.A new kind of horror he thought -- now hoped -- was impossible.

Marsala tried to approach him but that only shocked the young lion who then turned tail and stormed out of the room.

“Don’t --” Phaeton said.“Let him go.Let him work this out on his own.He’s young, that’s all.He’ll grow up, we all did.”

The man returned to his master’s side and helped him stagger onto his favorite chair -- the one before the circular desk.

“I’m sorry I took him down there.”

Phaeton reached up and rubbed the stubble under his advisor’s chin.“Don’t be, you know him better than I do, old friend.Once he gets his mind on something, nothing can stop his --”

“Much like someone else I know.”

The cat purred -- then something, some stray thought brought him back out of that lulled trance.“The doctors say he’s reverting.”

The news caught Marsala’s tongue for a moment.“What are you going to do?”

“We have to mate him -- fast.Look over his schoolmates, find an appropriate lioness.All the top noble families are a part of his class.Anyone of them will do.”

Marsala stood and nodded in compliance.“Will you tell him?Everything?”

“What he needs to know only,” the lion answered, turning his head to that small, side chamber.“For the rest he’ll have a whole lifetime to get used to.”