Resolution

There was nothing to breathe. Only darkness and liquid cold stars. Her lungs were sluggish wings of molten lead. A searing pain scorched her throat. She tried once more to draw breath, back arched with the effort and surfaced… 

Elenor sat up with a gasp filling her grateful lungs. Then the world beyond the nightmare fell into focus with the hateful clarity of memory. The station… Aeryn Sun’s deception. She opened her eyes and took in the room. 

What ship is this? 

It was familiar, yet odd in color and form. The air carried the signature pulse of a leviathan, something she would know anywhere. But this one was different. Whereas Moya's very presence was permeated with vaguely mothering warmth, this one held none of that. It was cold and austere, a roomful of sharp angles and baleful reds. 

Elenor rolled off the edge of the bed, daring her weak legs to fail. They held firm. She took staggering steps to the doorway. It came open easily. She paused, puzzled. Biomech but inscribed with Peacekeeper characters… 

A hall of red-scaled spines extended in two directions. A DRD scampered by, oblivious to her presence. She stood in the middle of the floor and staring after the oddly shaped piece of mech. 

She considered following it. At that moment the floor gave a tremendous lurch. Her feet tangled and the deck rushed up to meet her. A school of DRDs glided past. She pushed herself up on her hands and knees to find herself face to face with one of the servicers. 

"Where is Officer Sun?" She gasped, a portion of her feeling slightly ridiculous. 

Its eyestalks seemed to regard her with guarded skepticism. One of the pinchers moved in thoughtful debate. Then, abruptly, it tucked its eyes low against its frame and raced off down the corridor. 

Elenor climbed to her feet and moved in labored pursuit. 

# 

“This is the right way?” John called after the dim shape of Asher Korbyn. Emergency lighting had kicked in giving everything a surreal greenish glow. He sensed more than saw a down slope in the grating of the access conduit. The station shifted once more. His balance left him and his forehead met with the unyielding metal. It brought a stellar explosion of white pain. 

“Trust me.” Korbyn returned. 

“I don’t.” He rubbed dolefully at this injured skull. 

“Funny. Elle said the same thing…” 

The boastfulness in his voice that made John’s hands curl into fists. Reflex action. Redneck style. He drew in a calming breath. Stay cool. Think of Ellie. Think of Aeryn. Moya. 

“Go to your happy place, John.” He muttered to himself. “You can start wailing on him the moment you meet up with Talyn.” 

More sounds of metal on metal up ahead. A grunt of exertion. Sudden brilliance filled the small space. Asher smirked at him from the opening to a corridor. They were mere footsteps away from the abandoned pod, hopefully still clinging to the skin of the dying station. 

# 

"Talyn… maintain position!" The command thundered out into the corridor on a masculine voice. Sebacean accent. Self-assured and arrogant. An officer, no doubt. “Target the remaining marauders and fire at will!” 

Cautiously, Elenor leaned around the doorway to glimpse the scene inside. The man’s back was to her. Dark clothes, but not a uniform. Hair pulled back into a tightly wrapped tallus, a lasting symbol of his regimental alliances. Aeryn Sun raced into view to take a post near what appeared to be a tactical station. Neither had noticed Elenor’s entrance. 

The floor and very walls erupted with sound and light as she stepped across the threshold into the hectic room. Ellie startled, blinking owlishly. 

“Talyn, stand down. This is not an intruder.” Aeryn addressed the air. Her attention swiveled back to Elenor. “Return to the infirmary." 

A new, insistent sound demanded Sun’s attention. She called to the officer. "The remaining targets have been neutralized. But their last volley hit the lateral defensive grid. The DRDs have been dispatched." 

"Where is Crichton?" He demanded, whirling. His expression faltered as he noticed Elenor. His face changed from angered impatience to something akin to recognition. Then hardness settled back into place. 

Elenor felt her heart crystallize. The memory was murky from childhood, but there was no mistake here. This man was Bialar Crais. She hissed. "Traitor." 

"We will give them as much time as we can." Aeryn was oblivious to the quiet seething between the two. Her face folded with confusion as she sensed the tension. “Elenor… do as I say. Return to the infirmary.” 

"Why is he here? What is this ship?" Elenor slipped closer, eyes fixed on Crais. He watched her with a distracted irritation. 

Aeryn stepped in her path, steering her away. "Crais has returned with Talyn to extract Crichton and the others--" 

"Talyn… what is…" Elenor stammered. She looked around as if seeing the strange mix of biomech and Peacekeeper for the first time. 

"This… is Talyn.” Crais extended his hands in a grandiose gesture to indicate the room, the ship. His voice became condescending. “A leviathan hybrid. A most unique ship whose very existence has been threatened by your folly.” 

"Moya's offspring died." Ellie muttered. Her eyes moved away, lost. She avoided Aeryn’s reach, wary of her earlier treachery. "That can't be. He died…" 

"These histrionics are at best a distraction." Crais looked at Aeryn. His lip curled with distain. It only refreshed the surge of vinegar around her heart. “Remove her.” 

Elenor made murderous strides toward him but was cut off once again by her mother. "You betrayed my father to the Peacekeepers… told them how to find Moya--"

He jabbed an angry finger at Elenor as he turned his glare onto Aeryn. “This… fantasy of Crichton’s…” He indicated Elenor with a dismissive wave of a gloved hand. “I hope it is well worth our lives, Officer Sun. Certainly you do not believe this. Tell me you do not.” 

But Aeryn remained silent, staring to the middle distance. Eyes front. Parade rest. Emotions tucked carefully away. 

Crais stepped between them, his back to Elenor. His fury was centered on Aeryn as he extended his seething glare. “Look upon this… weak, genetically inferior misstep and tell me that you lay claim to it. This creature that the Peacekeepers would have mercifully slain at birth.” 

Aeryn’s mouth pulled into a defiant line. Her chin pulled up. And for once she looked away from that middle distance, weathering the venomous assault. She glanced at Elenor, her expression inscrutable. 

“Even if by some fantastic whim of misfortune her story is true, you cannot tell me you would call that creature your flesh and blood… fathered by some deficient alien.” 

Aeryn snapped her head around, meeting his stare unflinching. "You will not speak of my daughter this way. Am I understood, Crais?” 

He snorted in disgust. It was an animal’s grunt. Crais spat the curse in their native tongue. “Telmach defoisto mi dela ro.” 

“You may get your wish after all, Crais.” Aeryn returned. “Death may indeed find us this day.” 

# 

The adrenalin did little to take the edge off the loathsome ache in his leg. His heart threatened to slip the confines of his ribcage. However, DK found the means to sprint the remaining thirty feet of the hangar to the Farscape Three. Rachel, a life-long athlete had easily overtaken him in the race to the module. She was strapping herself into the navigator’s stations well before he had started to scale the vessel’s side. 

“Give me a break.” He looked down at her expectant expression and nearly succeeded in not groaning at the exertion of lowering himself into the seat. “While you were running out marathons, some of us had computers to put together in the garage.” 

“Geek.” Rachel returned, activating the module’s internal power. Her face was immediately lit by the ghostly glow of the flight status board. “But I promise not to hold that against you if our sorry asses live through this.” 

“Gee, thanks.” 

“This is gonna be rough.” A frown filled her voice as she plotted an appropriate trajectory to escape the dying station. “You sure about this, David?” 

“No.” He shrugged, turning a crazed grin at her. 

# 

"The carrier is on an intercept." Elenor recognized the ident-signal immediately: Ravstar regiment. Forced to squint by the relative brightness of the gas giant, she looked up at the view provided by the ship’s clearplaz. 

The sight was no less fearful. It was not the approaching carrier, but the certain death of the station. The giant metal beast had taken a hideous arc into the outermost levels of the mammoth planet. Even now the considerable stresses of the giant clenched its fist around the delicate hull of the immense complex. There were eruptions of fire, quickly quieted along her sides as seams played out beyond their designed tolerances. 

Please do not let them be there still. I could not bear it. She squelched the thought, seeking the firmer footing of her hated training against the swift tide of her anguish. 

"Has it detected us?" Aeryn asked. She did not look up, her attention focused on scanning the faint signatures of the escaping craft, looking for the familiar and welcome in the chaos. 

"The planet will not be able to hide our presence." Crais spat. He muscled Ellie away to glower at the screen. "We can wait no longer.” He swiveled away, and addressed the air, fists at his sides. “Talyn, prepare for immediate starburst." 

"No! You can't do that!" Ellie grabbed his arm, but he shoved her away roughly. 

"It's useless." Crais frowned clasping the device at the base of his neck. He hissed with pain, eyelids snapping open. "Several of Talyn's calorics ducts have been fused. He is unable to gather the energy to starburst." 

"Hey! Crais! Aeryn! Anybody home?"  

John Crichton's voice filled the seething stillness of the tier. All three fell silent, frozen in place as a composite of secret relief and anger. 

Aeryn closed her eyes. A faint smile curled her mouth. "Yes. Crichton, we're here." 

#

“The leviathan hybrid is maintaining its position, sir.” Braca announced. “EES suggests that it has been damaged severely and is unable to StarBurst.” 

“Hardly surprising.” Scorpius did not turn away from the view of the stars ahead, as if he alone could see into the depths what their instruments could not. He squinted rheumy eyes and was silent for a long moment. His second bobbed from foot to foot, deliberating. 

“Braca… have your technicians scan the escape vessels from the NeuTech facility for all non-Sebacean life forms.” 

“Sir, again. It is highly unlikely that Crichton—“ 

“Do it!” 

The Scarran growl was unmistakable. Several of the bridge-staff flinched, but they knew better than to turn around. 

# 

"You..." 

Asher looked up at the voice. And for the moment he forgot. Forgot Crichton hovering at his back, seething with destructive protectiveness over his daughter. Forgot Sun, her face hard and eyes cold stones. Let them stare. Let Crichton make his threats. 

“Ya. Me…” A foolish grin spread across his features. Asher crossed the threshold into the corridor of this exotic vessel. A little over a cycle ago he would have immediately begun judging the wealth such a rare ship would bring him on the markets, and how to make that happen. But what was a cycle, if not an eternity? 

Ellie wavered on her feet. A purple bruise decorated the line of her jaw. Dark circles worried her eyes. The mane of hair was a wretched tangle, framing her pale features. The ferocity that powered her every move had abandoned her. A siege had ended, but there was no resistance left. 

She crumpled against him, weary and surrendering. For a moment he was dumbstruck, arms pulled around her in more of a reflex than for affection. He sank to the floor with her, both kneeling. Her frame shuddered with her soundless sobbing. 

“No. Leave them.” He heard Sun mutter the quiet command to Crichton. But Asher did not turn to watch them pass. Instead he buried his face in the soft mass of Ellie’s dark hair. 

Earn her? How can I earn what I don’t deserve? 

# 

“Lucy! I’m hooooome!” John trilled as he bounded into the command tier. 

“Where have you been?” Crais rasped. 

John staggered back, hand clutching his chest as he feigned surprise. “I didn’t know you cared…” 

The remainder of the reply evaporated as he took in the room. He immediately registered the taint of smoke… floor panels hastily removed… haphazard repairs done in desperation. 

“Whoa. You had a party and I wasn’t invited?” He jerked his chin at Aeryn. “How bad?” 

Her face with fixed with the familiar deadpan mask that always betrayed grim news. She granted him a humorless grin. “Bad. Talyn’s defensive grid is down. Several of the caloric bladders have been damaged. DRDs have been dispatched, but it gets worse--” 

“Let me guess… the Peacekeepers are sending the SS Minnow after us?” 

“A command carrier to be precise, Crichton.” Crais snarled. He leaned heavily against the bulkhead, breath coming in labored gasps. John realized for whatever pain Talyn experienced, however muted; it must be delivered onto his Sebacean navigator. Crais jabbed a finger at his own chest, his loose hair falling in disarray around his face. “My… our… ability to StarBurst is compromised… the cannon is inoperable.” 

“And your folks never got you a puppy… I get it.” He held up his palm to Crais’s continued litany and looked once more at Aeryn. “How long to restore StarBurst?” 

“Unknown. The damage is severe.” Again she looked away, hiding the unvoiced blame. “The work would go faster with us to assist the DRDs—“ 

“I have to know if DK and Northway made it out.” John shook his head. 

He turned to the comms post. The uncertain flickering to the tell tales there did not instill him with hope. “Grab Captain Caveman off my daughter and get him to help you. Make sure Ellie stays in the infirmary. Tie her down if you have to…” 

“John…” 

“Aeryn, just… don’t.” He kept his back to her. It would have been too hard to see his fear confirmed in her expression. 

# 

"Holy shit. What the hell is that?" DK whispered in breathless appreciation. 

Rachel looked up from the flight computer. The ship was hideous and glorious at once. Etched with the damning glow of the gas giant, floating in position like a misshaped insect was a creation of mammoth proportions. Its sleek form was too graceful to be made by mortal hands. A ladle shaped forward graced by three protrusions bent back, suggesting unimaginable sleek power and speed. And to beat it all… it was sports car red. 

Fantastic sight or not, it made the hairs stand up on the back Rachel’s neck en masse. 

“It almost looks organic…. Grown” DK murmured, entranced. 

She said, becoming more frustrated with the haphazard integration of back-assward Earth tech and Peacekeeper. “Whatever it is… those are Peacekeeper insignia--” 

“Well it’s about friggin’ time!” John Crichton’s voice erupted in their headsets. 

They exchanged a glance over the space that divided their two stations. Rachel reached forward, hand grasping his shoulder. DK erupted into relieved laughter. “John! How! What!” 

Rachel did not wait for a response. “John, is Ellie there with you?” 

There was an awkward pause. “She’s here, doc. Little worse for wear… but ok.”  

Rachel settled back into the seat, shutting her eyes. A watershed of relief seeped through her. The release of tears threatened and she fought it. No more playing hero. I’m retired now from this Buck Rogers crap. Let’s make a deal, God. No more of this for me. Because this was a life that was meant for someone else. Not me. Not a frail human. Not some black woman that was only three generations removed from a poor sharecropper, baking under the merciless Louisiana sun. 

She listened to the ensuing conversation, detached. 

“…red and black ship. Funny looking mud flaps. Can’t miss it.” 

“That’s you? It’s Peacekeeper—“ 

“Ya. But we repossessed it.” A frantic tone seeped into Crichton’s voice. “Long story. Just get a move on. We’re ready to park you in the Hammond…er… starboard side bay… got it?” 

A newer, more insistent bleat of signals roused Rachel’s attention. She suddenly understood Crichton’s barely concealed anxiety. If the red ship hovering outside of their portals was mammoth, then the ship on approach staggered the imagination. She confirmed the telemetry. The Peacekeeper tech returned with hatefully detailed information on the approaching doom: Command Carrier. 

“David, we’ve got company.” Rachel said. 

“It wouldn’t happen to be the 86^th Airborne would it?” The dread in DK’s tone betrayed the humor. 

“John, we’re receiving telem on a large… friggin huge craft heading for intercept. Can you confirm?” DK asked. 

“Oh ya. We can confirm.” 

DK and Rachel exchanged a glance in the darkened reflection of the portal glass. She stumbled through basic commands. Finally the board of barely familiar symbols shifted to a satisfying blue. Terra cognito. 

“Energy patterns are erratic. Some sort of systemic collapse…” Rachel’s voice trailed off as she read the litany of complaints voiced by the Peacekeeper scanning devices trained on the strange red and black vessel. Inwardly she felt the war of wonder over such a fantastic creature and the crush of watching its potential demise. She regarded the telem on the approaching carrier, a graceless behemoth by comparison. 

Her heart seemed to collect a layer of ice. “John’s ship isn’t going anywhere, DK. The carrier is going to be on top of them… of us… in a matter of minutes.” 

DK craned his neck to peer over the partition at her. She shook her head, mournfully as she read the question in his eyes. He needn’t voice it. Distantly she realized that she felt her head bob up and down, agreeing. A strange surety filled her, as if all the pieces were fitting together with sullen little clicks. 

Wordlessly, she opened the comms channel. DK cleared his throat. “Say, John… hold on we’ve got a change of plan here.” 

Crichton’s answer was swift: “DK, man… This better not be the stupid stunt I think it is….” 

“Come on, John. You know me.” 

“That’s exactly what I mean.” 

“We know you’re not going anywhere and you’re no match for the carrier.” 

There was a tense pause. The edge of frustration was evident in Crichton’s voice. “Listen to me. You have no idea what you’d be doing…” 

Reflected in the darkened scrim of the portal she watched DK shut his eyes. He fell quiet for a long moment. When he spoke again his voice was tremulous. “Rach, alter flight nav to intercept the carrier.” 

“Already laid in, David.” She heard herself answer. Again, an impostor far more brave than she had invaded her body, was using her voice. “ETA on the carrier is seven minutes. 

“Don’t do this, you bone head. Don’t play hero…” 

A new warning lit up the panel. Rachel frowned. The Peacekeeper tech fought her commands. It was doing its job: ensure survival. The computer flipped through escape scenarios in rapid succession, vectors drawing on a myriad of possibilities. Each of them ended in slimmer probabilities of success. “The body’s massive enough to sustain a proportionate anomaly, but the range is gonna be tight.” 

“Every man gets to be his own kind of hero.” DK was not listening to her. “My turn to save the day, John.” 

“Damnit, DK.” Crichton’s voice cracked. “Don’t use that on me. Northway talk some sense into him.” 

“He is making sense.” Her throat narrowed to a pin-hole. “Please tell Ellie… that I’m sorry, but I know she understands.” 

“Goddamnit, DK! You can’t—“ Rachel cut the coms. Tears threatened. She blinked them away, releasing a sigh. 

“Phase stabilizer is coming on line.” She said quietly. 

DK extended his hand over the partition. He maneuvered around to face her. For a moment she saw him, the DK that had left them so long ago, smile bordering on infectious, as if he were about to impart some incredible secret. She smiled in turn, taking his hand into both of her own. 

“Let’s roll.” 

# 

“Answer!” Ellie demanded. 

Her heartbeat thrummed in her ears. Strained lungs tried to keep up with the demand for air. Aching, bruised muscles protested the all out sprint. Was she too late? Had they already started their suicide run? The comms unit in the infirmary had relayed their entire misconceived plan. By the time Ellie could override the security lockout, it was too late. The Farscape module had severed its laserlink. 

She took the corner too quickly, lost her balance and careened off the red spine of the wall. The thick sharp edge of a scale dug deeply into her skin, bringing blood. But she did not notice. 

Ellie paused long enough to catch her breath. "You can't let them! Father, make her stop!" 

But there was no response from John Crichton. She fell back into a shambling stride for the damaged command tier. The air was thick with the sweet cloying smells of cooking amnexus fluids and the occasional spark of circuits played out well past their duties. 

“Make her stop!” She shouted. 

Crais turned a savage scowl at her outburst. She ignored him, side stepping his approach. Her gaze was fixed on the only motionless form in the chaotic room. John Crichton’s back was to her as he stared out facing the clearplaz and the scene of destruction beyond. His splayed fingers wove this his closely cropped hair, seeking to anchor the real within the surreal. 

"Do something... you have to make them stop!" Ellie stumbled into him. Her fingers hooked into his shoulder. He turned to regard her like a man stirring from a horrid dream. The lost blue gaze fell on her, seeing, but blind. 

It was a childlike plea. “Please. They can’t… not like this.” 

Slowly, like moving in thick liquid, he moved to touch her face. He stopped. John looked once more to the clearplaz. His hand flatted on her shoulder, guiding her out of the way. He stepped toward the portal, head lowered like a man at prayer. Without looking up, he tapped the channel open. 

“DK… listen to me, man. Don’t do this.” 

A dull crackle of static was his response. 

#

“Time to intercept.” Scorpius prodded. 

“Less than twenty microts, sir.” Braca answered. “The gunship has not changed position.” 

There was a flutter of activity. A huddle of techs communed in harsh calls. “Reading gravimetric disruption dead ahead sir.” 

As if on cue, a burst of blue light erupted on the view screen, filling the space with its awesome glow. The protowormhole twisted its toothless maw to face the carrier. 

“Evasive maneuvers!”

# 

The universe was rippling blue, wrought with white light. The air possessed an electric hum. Once more Rachel felt the familiar buffet of the wormhole’s tides against the craft. Her safety harness dug into her shoulders, her waist. 

Vision telescoping, she regarded the carrier’s signal. Its mass was directly on top of them. 

Soon now… 

She lowered her head and shut her eyes. This was where you made your deals with God. She tried to think of something, some sort of saving grace that could surmount the bleak, dead surety that filled her. It was an unlikely vision, but welcomed just the same. 

A Saturday morning in her grandmother’s kitchen. Nina Simone crooned softly in the quiet, hot air. Rachel was eight years old watching her grandmother’s stooped little body sway in time with the music, shoulders rolling as she kneaded bread against the battered old butcher-block table. Soon Daddy would be downstairs to sip coffee and read the paper with her. Outside, summer extended forever under the faded denim sky... 

#

The red pillars of Talyn’s command were drenched with the azure glow. John felt the familiar tug. Home. The wormhole undulated in its graceful, hypnotic dance, promising and divulging none of its secrets. The carrier was nearly lost in the sea of light and warring forces.

“DK, you son of a bitch.” He said under his breath. It was a curse and praise. 

Around him their voices were insignificant, puny. The meaningless words rippled like the light. Crais engaged in pointless argument with Ellie. Aeryn’s insistent call through the coms. StarBurst is restored? He found it did not matter. 

Limbs cold and numb, mouth gone dry, he watched. He stared, unblinking until his eyes watered. Like a lumbering fish the carrier was caught in the net of the wormhole. But it fought its capture. He watched as it pulled a graceless arc, nearing the event horizon. Even at this distance, unaided by Talyn’s sensors, he could make out the tell-tale orange flickers of explosions along her rings. She skidded, an escape in slow motion. The ship pushed past the edge and away from the anomaly’s mouth. The orchestra of physics and math played out to incredible completion as the carrier performed its own awkward, inadvertent slingshot maneuver, rapidly receding. 

Then, as quickly as it appeared, the wormhole collapsed into itself with a fluttering shimmer. Serenity filled the space once more like an incoming tide. And the room was still. Only Talyn’s awe filled murmur and the continued drone of static from the open laser-link. 

John did not remember reaching for the comms. The words were obligatory, pantomime, for he knew there would be no answer. “DK?” 

The crackling staccato of the random stars was his only answer. 

“Farscape Two. Come in.” 

Nothing. 

# 

Had he even moved? John had been at the same spot, leaning against the chest-high portal as he peered into blackness when Aeryn had left him arns before. She allowed the door to the chamber to close before she spoke. The room’s illumination was deactivated, the only light coming from the stars beyond. 

Her brow winkled. Darkness. Since Zhaan’s death, he sought it too quickly and often. And now this. The loss of his comrades. For whatever icy exterior, John increasingly presented, she could sense the faults forming beneath it. Like any break, it was only a matter of time before the pressures became too great, splitting the whole. How much more of this before John Crichton shattered? 

Her voice was quiet with concern, but those were not the words she chose. “Talyn’s better. We should rendezvous with Moya in a solar day or so.” 

“Good.” His voice was so low. 

She stepped further into the darkness. Quiet stretched between them broken only by the warm breath of Talyn’s atmospheric vents. 

“You should try to rest, John.” 

"How is she?" John asked, turning his head. She could see him only in profile, features picked out by the pale light of the stars. The rest was darkened shape, the suggestion of him. 

Elenor. Aeryn suppressed a weary sigh. There was the other problem. It was as if father and daughter conspired to do this: commune in silence and darkness, each blaming and guilt-ridden at once. 

"Fine.” She answered, innocent of his true meaning. In all honesty Elenor was as much a mystery as Crichton. She strode the remaining distance to stand by his side, staring out the portal as well. “I don't think there's a great deal of physical damage." 

"No. I mean… is she ok?" He lowered his head, resting his forehead against his folded arms. 

"I don't know, John."  She looked at him. "What about you?" 

"I don't know, either." And he was silent once more. 

# 

Elenor leaned against the high ledge of the portal, staring into the blurred stars beyond. She was aware of a movement out of the corner of her eye. Resting her head on her forearm, she looked to the side. She dabbed at her eyes with the back of her hand. It was one of the oddly formed, red-cast DRDs that belonged to Talyn. 

The antennae of the small mech twisted on their stalks. She wiggled her fingers slightly, part greeting, partly in experiment. How much of this little creature was the traitor Crais, and how much was Talyn? 

"Hello, Talyn." 

The stalks did not move. The lights unblinking. 

"You and me… we're alike." She was beginning to feel foolish. But there was no one here to witness this, except Talyn. "Both parts of two different things. There's no one place you or I belong… is there?" 

The stalks wavered slightly. The DRD maneuvered closer. 

"For a long time I hated myself for what I was. I was ashamed. Until one day I met this person that taught me that there's another way to be… that it's not all hatred. She taught me a lot, even if I didn't always listen." 

At this the DRD seemed to lose interest. Its antennae tucked in closer to its sleek frame and it trundled off. 

"Talking to DRDs? You sure you're alright?" Asher’s voice interrupted her quiet brooding. 

Ellie felt his warm hands on her shoulders. She did not turn around when she answered. "Don't worry about me. I'll be fine."

End Resolution. This story continues with the Epilogue.

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