Not really important, but:

-----

The stars moved slightly in the viewport as the ship continued onwards, away from the gravity wells and towards a relatively safe hyper entry point. To the four figures sitting at the table of the after (and indeed - only) lounge aboard the heavy cruiser "Mordred" were in a subdued mood. The task they'd set themselves was over, done with and completed, though in a way none of them would have expected it to have gone.

"You know," Raven said, sipping his drink with a solemn look on his face. "I can't help but get this stupid feeling of utter uselessness."

"... ditto." Griever remarked, nodding before going back to his nutra-sweet double latte. It always helped him get out of a funk.

"Oh, come off it already." the sole female at the table commented. "We got paid, that counts as having done good in my book."

"Quite, Raja. Quite." Stork said. "Still, we spent ... how much time on it? Almost a year and a half. And when we got there we find she'd already gotten herself a reasonable facsimile of a battle squadron."

"Ah, well. Look at it this way. All the intel from our snooping around the Republic and looking for any clue on the place fattened our accounts by a fair bit. No?" Griever shrugged.

"Okay, true." amended Raven. "Fact is, I wasn't really as surprised as I should have been when we got there. That's one more on the list of people I'd come to expect the impossible from."

"There is that." Stork smirked. "Well then, a toast. To Harrington, as likely as she is to put us out of a job ..."

They looked at each other, Stork with a poker face, Raven with a faint smirk, Griever with an eyebrow raised, and Raja ... well, she stuck out her tongue.

"Naaaah," they chorused, and shared a laugh.

"So, what's your destination after we get back to Khatovar?" the "Mordred's" captain asked the only person at the table who wasn't on a regular Company payroll.

"Hmm? Oh, I'll head to Edo, I guess." replied Griever. "A month or so downtime, maybe more. Think I'm going back to playing yojimbo for the forseeable future. Maybe have a hop back to Manticore, just for the heck of it."

"Uh-huh." said Raven. "Right, just for the heck of it?"

Griever looked at him, and shrugged. "What else is there?"

The pigtailed Tactical Officer and Chief of Security chuckled, and withdrew a datachit from his uniform jacket's pocket.

"Here. It's the medical we got off of her during one of the shuttle ferries. I figured I'd save you the trouble of having Kasumi break into the "Dred's" database." Raven smirked again.

"I'm that transparent?" Griever asked, pocketing the chit.

"Nah, we just know you too well." was the reply.

Outside, the stars shifted, blurred, and the vista was replaced by the blurring white and blue of hyperspace. The "Mordred" sped on, back towards its home port, leaving Yeltsin behind once again.

-----

Time-wise, it'd be about halfway through Ashes of Victory, before Honor went back to Manticore. I figured I may as well write down what my mind was throwing at me for a short epilogue. Start at the end, proceed through the middle, and finish up with the beginning ... it's not the weirdest mode of writing I've practiced over the years.

And, as you can probably tell, I'm planning on leaving the most important things as they were. No 'miracle arrival' of a fleet to save them, no 'ace in the hole' ... just the "Dred" and the "Fey", and a sneak-and-peek through the Peep held systems, some creative interrogation, and finally getting irritated after a few months of almost no progress at all, and raiding a StateSec ship to get the location data straight from their mainframe.

And even with all that, they're too late to do anything but mightily confuse the forces amassed by Admiral Harrington with their presence, and add a few broadsides in the decisive battle. Is it a wonder they keep asking themselves 'Was this trip really neccessary?'


-Griever
now if I could only get back to actually writing instead of scribbling down random ideas.

- Well, if you are running it like the origin, it isn't so much broadsides added as gaping, hungry *potential* broadsides.

- If you're not running it like the origin, it would be nice if their contribution was somehow obviously (to the reader) meaningful. Being in the right place at the right time to save an allied ship from serious damage/destruction (and the fatalities that implies) would work well. Whether or not the characters accept it, I think it would do good things to the feel of the story.

- What is Greiver going to do with the medical info?

- You know, in a galaxy with a lot of people who do brave and dangerous things all the time because they just don't die, or they have magical powers with which to save themselves or whatever, Harrington, who doesn't even have the full scope of modern medicine available to her, gets just a touch more lustre by comparison.

(forgive me if I'm mischaracterizing, but...)

Griever: Yeah, I do that sort of thing all the time too, but that's because I don't die.

Fibula

"It's what I do. Any time there's something so ridiculously dangerous that no rational human being would even consider trying it, they send for me."
- Belgarion (King of the Murgos, book 2 of The Mallorian)

> Griever: Yeah, I do that sort of thing all the time
> too, but that's because I don't die.

Drake: yaright. I AVOID that sort of thing 'cause if I get shot I WON'T die. I get to spend the next half-decade in a freakin' hospital bed treading the fine line of painkiller addiction.

drakensis

"I believe that forgiving the enemy is God's function. Ours is simply to arrange the meeting." - General H Norman Schwarzkopf

Well since we are all giving quotes for our chars:

>Drake: yaright. I AVOID that sort of thing 'cause if I
>get shot I WON'T die. I get to spend the next
>half-decade in a freakin' hospital bed treading the
>fine line of painkiller addiction.

Chloe: It's Cy's will, that it be done and that I don't die. So I must do both.


Or to put it as a (incomplete and unchecked) story fragment.

Sometime in the middle of ten years:

Konoko: Why do you do it?
Chloe: Do what?
Konoko: The war against the Taiidani, those near suicidal attempts to assasinate Guild officials and noblemen, and those hundereds of smaller wars you keep picking.
Chloe: Slavery, Mindrape, and other Crimes are against Cy's command. What goes against Cy's command must be thaught the error of it's ways. But they are not suicidal, for it's also Cy's will that I should live.
Konoko: Uhuh, so you think this high and mighty God is looking over you and protecting you?
Chloe: Of course not, I would not be worthy of Cy's help if I needed it.

> Griever: Yeah, I do that sort of thing all the time too, but that's because I don't die. <

Frighteningly accurate, though he'd probably say something along the lines of being as hard to kill as a cockroach.

Manji's attitude, or that part of it at least, rubbed off on him some two or so years after they met. Truth be told, Manji was in the process of chasing Yakobikuni around the globe, had been doing that for a good fifty years by then, because of the fact that the Kessen-chu weren't going away even after he'd attained his self-imposed goal. Griever was chasing her as well, but more for the sheer heck of it than anything else - and to find out more about his 'condition' because at the time he though it was simply some sort of healing boost.

Exactly why they became traveling companions for the next thirty years is a story for another day, and the reason wasn't merely that they were chasing the same person.

The fact is, Griev pestered Manji to learn how to fight ... well, he got his wish. The training was a little more ... brutal, than most. Their 'sparring matches' would be 'no means barred' and usually ended at incapacitation or submission of one of them ... and the surrounding are would need a new coat of paint to cover the bloodstains. For a somewhat accurate example on how those matches looked, you can read the "Song of the Bloodworm" (at least I think it was called that) arc, and see the fight between Manji and the other Kessen-chu infected.

By the end of that time he would win two times out of six, on a good day. And found himself profoundly thankful for the lessons many, many a time over the course of the following centuries. The attitude came from the fact that often a line of thought somewhat resembling 'okay, if I take that sword through my ribs it'll hurt me like hell, but it'll take it out of the equation and opens up his right side for my sickle ... let's do it!' would emerge as a course of that training.

Then again, it was sort of like the first combat lesson for a proper 'Wu' - getting the person in question to drop the fear of being injured or dying in a fight.

Still, he at least tries not to get too injured if he has to fight. Mostly because, as was once accurately stated, 'The fact that it doesn't kill me doesn't mean that it doesn't _hurt_! Owie. Gimme back my arm!'

Right, as for the other things ... I'm taking the second option of those above. It _would_ do good things to the feel of the story to have them do something meaningful like that, yeah.

And as to the medical info ... well, Neo-Edo has, arguably, the best in prosthetics Spiral-wide. Dynamically adapting biomass-cybermatrix on ceramic 'bone', adaptation aided by medical nanotech, etc. All the experience they had with synthoids and their expertise with plain cyber has good points. And that's just the arm. If anyone deserves it, it'd be her.

-Griever