Ringed Victory

Chapter 1 - "Paid Vacation"

Cody Bransford was a trust fund baby. That usually refers to a rich kid - typically spoiled - whose parents arranged a trust fund to avoid taxes. The stereotypical trust was large enough that the child could live a rich kid's life on the interest or dividends alone so it didn't matter that he (or she) couldn't get at the principal. Cody was not that sort of trust fund baby. His trust fund had been set up by the courts to control the settlement from a lawsuit. No amount of money could make up for the loss of his parents - killed by an over-tired long-haul truck driver - and even if he could get at the principal he'd never qualify as rich by 'old money' standards. However, the trust fund was large enough to pay for his education in any field he chose. The administrator of the trust only required that Cody present evidence of approved course work from an accredited college. That, plus modest living expenses, would have to do until he reached age 25.

His colleague and best friend, Dylan Jamieson, was not an orphan . . . but he might as well have been. He was the product of the marriage of two up-and-coming professionals. As their careers developed, their marriage waned and after the divorce they had moved on to new lives and new families. Dylan was a leftover reminder of the closest thing to failure his parents had ever experienced, so they were just as happy to have him out of sight and out of mind except for the occasional bill for his own education or education-related expenses.

Both young men were 23. Both had completed their bachelor's degrees in something largely irrelevant to the job market. Both had decided going for advanced degrees in name only - so that the checks kept coming in - was better than actual study in a real professional field. They hunted around until they found tiny, but reputable, Briaroak College. The college was only too happy - for a fee, of course - to approve a research plan in the politically popular "Alternative Energy Sources" area as part of a nominal Master's program in Earth Sciences.

What the pair of young men had in mind was a paid, continuing vacation. They were exploring the potential for obtaining useful energy from geothermal vents in the ocean. A dive boat - actually a pretty nice trawler-style yacht named "Isolde" - was an obvious necessity. It was, of course, a coincidence that the vents they were after just happened to be located not too far from some of the best diving sites in the Caribbean, reachable from the US Virgin Islands. If some weeks they didn't happen to make the full 200-mile trip out to the actual geothermal vent site, but instead only made it to some crystal-clear dive waters on coral reefs, well, they were still diving nearly every day so they were working, right?




And some weeks they actually did travel out beyond the local area. The Mid-Atlantic ridge was a bit too far away but there were guyots (flat-topped, underwater mountains) within Isolde's range and not too deep for ordinary SCUBA diving. Once a month or so they'd go to one of them to provide source data for their official research. These results were dutifully emailed (Isolde had a satellite link) back to Briaroak College to sustain the scholarly research cover. In fact, it was becoming possible that their research would actually be fruitful.

"Today's dive," Cody dictated into his smart-phone recorder, "is in Grid Alpha 67-Lambda 12. The depth is less than 60 feet and It's about a mile and half from the geyser field we've designated Number 18. That is a reasonable hot-pipe distance so that geothermal steam could be conveyed to turbines here with acceptable losses. If this site provides a suitable foundation for a power station, we could avoid the risks of floating platforms or flexible pipes, and also keep the turbines and other equipment above the water level for easy maintenance. If all this comes together, then the Bransford/Jamieson power cycle of geothermal steam to electricity to electrolysis-generated hydrogen could be economically viable. The hydrogen could then be transported anywhere at reasonable cost with no loss in net energy value."

"Our goal for today's dive is to explore the sea floor at this location. We intend to gather rock samples and do a few test drills to see how deep the silt is. The site looks surprisingly flat on sonar, except for a few of what look like rock piles though they seem to be unusually long and straight. If they are loose rock that can be easily removed, then a good foundation for any number of platform legs should be available."

He stopped the recorder and called out to Dylan. "Hey, dude, anything else I should record?"

"Not unless you want to describe what you did with that stripper in Cinnamon Bay," Dylan prompted hopefully.

"She wasn't a stripper," Cody protested. "She was just doing, ah, exotic dances for little extra money while she studied for her degree."

"Yeah, right," Dylan said. "How many hours in her course load this semester?"

"We didn't discuss that," Cody admitted.

"Not polite to talk with your mouth full, hmm?" Dylan teased. "Or hers?"

"You're just jealous," Cody countered. "The skank you were with had needle tracks all up her arms."

"Those were tattoos," Dylan claimed.

"Which are made with inked needles, are they not?" Cody pounced victoriously.

Dylan grinned, and said, "So, okay, neither of them were rocket scientists, but we weren't particularly focused on their minds."

Now Cody grinned and nodded. "Guilty, as charged." He paused for a moment, then said, "But I don't think we'll go back to Cinnamon Bay for a while."

Dylan nodded in turn, neither young man realizing how prophetic that statement would be.

After sending their message over the satellite link, they prepared for their dive with due care - they were fun seekers, not death wishers and due care was quite a bit of care indeed - but in moments they were at the bottom. The water was clear enough that they could see even without lights - not brightly enough for details, but enough to allow them to maneuver around and keep track of each other. Nonetheless, both lights came on simultaneously as soon as they saw the rock piles.

Each diver grabbed for his noteboard and wax pencil, something they could use underwater, and started scratching away. It was only when they tried to show their message to each other that they realized both had the same message.

"Not natural," said the boards.

The rocks they had found were clearly dressed stones. Some were broken and some were covered with various types of growth, but enough were clear to indicate man-made artifacts. Nature abhors straight lines, so stones with straight edges were enough to show the work of man, even aside from some carvings that were typical of Greek columns.

Dylan rubbed off his board and wrote a series of question marks and exclamation points. Cody just shrugged, but he started moving closer to the pile. They poked around a bit, gathering up football-sized samples. One looked like a small jar or amphora and was surprisingly free of obstructing marine growth. They found a large knife or small sword, with whatever had wrapped the hilt completely missing but most of the blade metal left. Scratched into the blade were unmistakable letters, but not in any modern font. Rounding a corner of the pile, they saw a tumble of additional jars, some broken and most covered in growth.

Cody swam over to a flat spot between the rock piles and started digging into the silt with his knife. He quickly found much harder material, followed a few moments later by the discovery of a seam between fitted stones.

"Paved?" he wrote on his board. Dylan shrugged in response, but nodded.

Even through the mask Cody's frown showed, and he pointed up.

Together, they swam to the surface.

"What is this place?" Dylan asked as soon as they could talk.

"Damned if I know," Cody said. "Let's get this stuff cleaned up."

Among the classes Cody had taken in his aimless academic wandering were a few on marine archeology and he knew enough not to let artifacts that had been in salt water for a long time dry out too quickly. They put their finds in a tank filled with sea water and headed back to their private cove on Halcyon Island. The privacy was from isolation, not from right of possession - Halcyon Island was uninhabited, and if there were an owner it certainly wasn't them - but there was a bay just big enough for Isolde though sometimes in a crosswind they had to put out an extra anchor at the stern.

It was typical for a trawler yacht to have a powered tender - Isolde's was a 12 foot RIB sometimes called a Zodiac - and a couple of kayaks were not unusual. But Isolde had an extra dinghy - a fully-inflatable 8-foot rowed raft that they used when it was just the two of them, but stowed away in the lazarette if they didn't need it. It was small enough to manhandle into the water without using Isolde's davit so that made it convenient. More than that, they used it when they needed a lot of fresh water. While paddling around in a kayak for fun one afternoon, Dylan had found a mostly hidden stream coming into the little bay. It was too small for a normal tender, but they could get through the brush in the smaller dinghy and paddle as much as row to a nice little fresh-water pool below a six-foot waterfall. So they packed their treasures in a few towels to keep them damp during the short journey and paddled up the creek.

"Okay, let's see what we have," Cody said, pulling out the first chunk of rock.

"That looks like marble," Dylan observed. "I don't think there's any natural marble in these islands."

"I don't know of any, either," Cody said. Under the water he brushed at it, then picked at some of the growth. "That sort of rules out some local tribe, and look at this."

Under his patient probing, a few carved letters had appeared. "Does this look like Greek to you?"

"Yeah, dude, it's all Greek to me," Dylan said, laughing. But he looked more closely and nodded.

The next rock was a piece from a more conventional limestone block, though neither explorer was aware of any local indigenous structures using that material either. The open vases and broken amphorae held nothing of interest, though once again they could discern some carvings in the cast items that did not look indigenous. All that was just prelude, though. Both of them felt the real prize - if any - would be in the unbroken jar.

"Do you think we should open that?" Dylan asked. "I mean, maybe we should wait for real experts or something. And, y'now dude, I heard about someone opening a grave in Africa somewhere and getting smallpox."

"Your choice, dude," Cody said. "I'm going to open it, but if you want to back off . . ."

"Nah," Dylan said. "Everyone knows I'm even more stupid than you are. How could I ever explain it if you got a plague and I didn't?"

"Here goes," Cody said, then used his knife to crack at a seal of some sort - maybe wax. He held the jar under the clear water so the first indication of anything happening was when bubbles started to slip out from the crack.

"Whoa, dude, still holding air after all that time? Maybe there is something bad in there."

"Could be," Cody said distractedly. He had stopped his work when the bubbles started, but when they continued at a very slow pace, he pulled the jar out of the water and took another whack at the seal.

"If it was dry, then we don't want to get it all wet now," he explained. In a few minutes, he had the stopper out of the amphora and looked inside. "Get the mesh bag," he ordered, too focused to make it a request of his nominally equal partner.

Dylan complied without question, holding a fine mesh bag so that Cody could pour the contents of the jar into it. Then he pulled it back just before Cody tilted the amphora.

"Do you think we should pour this over the water?"

"Oh, duh," Cody said, blushing at the near mistake. "I'm so used to leaning over the tank doing this, for the other things we've found, that I didn't even think."

"So, it *is* a good thing that I came along, huh?" Dylan prodded, nudging his friend with an elbow.

"Sometimes, dude, just sometimes," Cody said, but he grinned and moved over to the dinghy. The bottom of the inflatable raft was as secure a place as they had handy to catch anything that came out of the jar. After they were ready, he started pouring again. At first, nothing came out. Then they heard a thunky rattle as something hard touched the sides of the clay pot. The rattle stopped when an object dropped into the soft bag.

"Man, that looks like a ring," observed Dylan.

"Yeah," Cody agreed. "And it looks to be in good shape . . . . except, I haven't seen anything that color before."

"Me, neither," Dylan agreed. The ring was a fairly ordinary design, with a large jewel in a fairly simple setting. The jewel was a dark purple color with surprising depth. The setting itself was equally strange. It appeared almost black, with deep violet hints that seemed to come from within the metal, not on the surface.

"What do you think it is?" Dylan asked. "What sorts of crystals are black?"

"Well, obsidian is black, except that's not really a crystal. And besides, this is purple."

"So what sorts of crystals are purple?" Dylan asked with deliberate repetition in his tone.

"Amethyst . . . but that's a fairly light purple. Spinel comes in black to red, but that's definitely a purple. Corundum makes rubies and sapphires depending on what is in the mix, so maybe this is some combination . . , but it's really dark."

"You're more expert at that stuff than I am," Dylan admitted, then grinned. "Along with most other stuff. Dude, just what courses *did* you take?"

"A little of everything," Cody said, "but I didn't get that from a college course. I had this girlfriend who . . ."

"Oh, hell, no," Dylan interrupted. "I'm not listening to another tale of conquest. Let's get back to this thing."

"Oh, right," Cody said. "Well, anyway, I think this is what's called an 'emerald' cut. There are facets, and the thing is sort of a rounded rectangle overall. That could be just about anything, though. I mean, just about any clear stone can be cut that way."

"If you say so, dude," Dylan said. "What about the metal?"

"Now that has me totally stumped," Cody admitted. "I don't even know of any metal that looks like that in our modern world, and this . . ."

"So you think it's old?"

"Yeah, man, don't you?"

"Yeah," Dylan agreed. "But how . . . I mean, how did it get there?"

"Beats the hell out of me," Cody said, but he was distracted again. He had been using a small dental pick that was part of their cleaning equipment. Carefully, he cleaned up some engraving on the perimeter of the ring surrounding the jewel. "Does this look like Greek to you? And don't give me any smartass bullshit."

Dylan leaned closer. After a moment, he nodded. "Looks like a block Alpha, and . . . let see . . . that looks like a Lambda . . ."

In a couple of minutes they had it clean enough to be confident. Cody said, "'Alayla, in block Greek. Ever heard of it . . . or of him?"

"Doesn't an 'a' ending usually indicate a female word?"

"That's in Latin," Cody said. "At least, I think so. Wasn't there some movie about Zorba the Greek? That was a guy."

"Oh, yeah. Well, no clue. Like you said, it could be a thing. Probably is. I mean, my class ring has the name of the school, not my own name."

"Right," Cody agreed. He was continuing to study the ring when a sound intruded into their isolation.

The roar of powerful, high-speed engines grew quickly in volume and they looked at each other in stupefied surprise. Then they moved to the side of the little pool and climbed a brushy ridge that separated it from the main cove. Dylan reached the top first - he was a few inches taller than Cody - but his reaction was not what his friend expected. Dylan dropped to the ground, pulling Cody down with him, and hissed at him to be quiet.

They crept up more slowly, keeping behind a brush screen, to look at what had prompted Dylan to hide. In the little bay were two over-powered RIB launches, each full of men bristling with weapons. Behind them, just outside the bay, was some sort of drug-runner boat. Or at least, one that could be used for that. It was big enough to hold the launches, but it looked fast enough to launch itself into space if needed. There weren't any markings on the bigger boat or on the RIBs, but the dark BDUs, automatic weapons, multitude of antennae, and total number of men made it clear this wasn't a peaceful outing, even for someone rich enough to have the racing boat as a toy.

"Pirates? Seriously?" Cody breathed.

In the next moment, that identification became suspect. The launches surrounded Isolde and a loud-hailer squawked. "Federal Agents! Come out with your hands up!"

"It's the Feds!" Dylan said, starting to rise. "It's gonna be okay."

"Hssh!" Cody whispered frantically as he pulled his friend back down. "Anyone can say they're feds. And even if they are . . ."

"What are you trying to say?" Dylan asked, but he did drop his voice to a soft whisper.

"Look, man, I don't trust the Feds," Cody whispered. "Just because someone works for the government doesn't make him an angel. And there's no way we've done anything that justifies sending an army against us so even if they all think what they're doing is on the level, whoever ordered this is screwed up. Let's watch for a bit."

As thought Cody's quiet comment had been a signal, one of the launches approached Isolde and boarded her. The other launch started a slow pass down the beach. With one launch shut down and the other at idle, they could hear comments coming from the radio on the searching RIB.

"They're not here," a voice said. "No sign of where they went. The tender and kayaks are still on board. Their research and samples are still here."

"Gather it all up," another voice said. "Then sink the boat."

"Sink the boat!" Dylan repeated in a whisper.

"Shhh," Cody hissed, listening.

The radio speaker crackled again - it sounded to Cody like the first voice, the one that had boarded Isolde. "Sink her? But these guys have to be ashore somewhere. We can't just strand them."

"I'll arrange a pickup later. We don't have time for this now," the other voice commanded. That caused the men in the nearby launch, still idling just off the beach, to look at each other.

"You think he's really gonna do that?" one asked.

"Not our concern," the one at the helm said. "If these guys are terrorists, let their god take care of them."

"Terrorists?" Dylan repeated again. "What are they talking about?"

"No idea," Cody replied. "But I'm glad now we didn't show ourselves."

"That's gotta be a mistake," Dylan insisted.

"Or an excuse," Cody countered. "Look, I just have a bad vibe about this. You remember what I said in our report today? That we were close to showing how this whole thing could work? Lots of low-cost energy, renewable and with no carbon content. There are lots of people who wouldn't want that."

"Yeah, Big Oil," Dylan sneered.

By this time the man at the helm of the nearby launch had spun the wheel and added power. As they moved to the opening of the cove, the other boat joined them. Isolde was already visibly low in the water, though the student-adventurers had not heard any explosions. It was almost as though they had planned a deliberate frustrating torture for anyone who might be watching from the little island. If the attackers had left rapidly, the two young men might have been able to save Isolde. She sank slowly, on a level keel. The most likely explanation was that the attackers had opened some of the sea cocks. A quick dive into the engine room could have closed them, and as long as the Isolde was floating, they could have saved her. Or at least, they might have been able to. But the two stranded men could only watch as the launches returned to the mother ship and were hoisted aboard. It was done professionally and efficiently, but it still took half an hour before the big, fast boat started moving away. By that time Isolde was obviously on the bottom with only a bit of the flybridge bimini showing above the water.

"Let's get the tender," Dylan said.

Cody just shook his head. "They punctured the inflation tubes. Didn't you see?"

Dylan asked, "So what are we gonna do?"

"I don't know," Cody replied. He looked back at the little inflatable raft. In it were their discoveries, two oars that could be used as paddles, a couple of life preservers, and a few zip-loc bags that they had used to hold the samples.

He slumped down on the hidden side of the little ridge, still not wanting to take the chance that someone on the boat was looking their way with binoculars, and frowned.

"What do you think that place we found was?" he asked suddenly.

"I don't really care," Dylan said. "We're stranded on an island with no food, no communications, and no way home. Why do you care?"

"I think it was Atlantis," Cody said flatly. "Maybe not the Atlantis of Plato, but some sort of Greek outpost in the Atlantic. We can't just dump this stuff. It's too important."

"Yeah, well, you can do what you want with it. I'm more concerned about survival!" Dylan said, standing up and brushing off the seat of his shorts. "Why the hell do you care?"

"What, oh, I was just thinking about the bags," Cody said, pointing at the raft. If we empty out the stuff we found, we can probably get four or five gallons of fresh water. We can dive the Isolde and get some more things to hold water. And some canned food that doesn't have to be cooked."

"Then what?" Dylan snapped. "Row?"

"You got a better idea?" Cody challenged. "The weather is supposed to be good for a few days. We can get the charts from Isolde, drying out the ones we need well enough. We have our dive compasses."

"We're fifteen or twenty miles from any other islands, maybe thirty from one we're sure has people on it. How fast can we row that thing?"

"Fast enough," Cody said firmly.

"Maybe they'll send somebody to rescue us," Dylan said.

"I’m not going to bet my life on it," Cody said. "Look, dude, I'm going. You can come along, or you can wait for rescue."

Dylan sighed, but nodded. "Okay, but I'm not gonna cart along 50 pounds of rocks. We leave the stuff we picked up here."

"Okay," Cody agreed. "Except for this ring. I'm taking it."

"Fine," Dylan said. "Hell, for all I care you can wear the thing. It looks big enough."

"Fine," Cody said. He rinsed the ring off in the fresh water pool, got the sand off his hands, and looked at the size. "It looks pretty big. I think it will go on my first finger."

"Whatever," Dylan said. He was piling the artifacts they had found on the beach.

Cody shrugged and put the ring on the pointer finger of his right hand. As it reached the base of his finger, he felt a tingle, then a buzz, then a building shock.

"Dylan . . ," he gasped, before he started to twitch.

His friend looked at him to see that he was in distress and seemed almost to be glowing. Dylan reached for his friend, but as his fingers neared Cody's arm, there was a bright flash, a sharp crackle, and then - for both of them - nothing.

Chapter 2 - "No Way!"

Cody's first sight, on recovering, was of a strangely Sphinx-like mound of sand. It had the proportions of a sleeping lion, with worn edges that blurred the form without quite blending it completely into the surrounding beach.

Then it moved.

It stood up, and as it did so the details became more distinct. Eyes and ears and nose were more than ridges in the sand, and the texture lost the grainy look in favor or a smooth, furry pelt. Only the color remained a perfect match for the nearly sugar-white sand. Cody's impression was now more of a cougar than a lion - leaner, and without the heavy, zebra-thighbone-crushing jaw. Now that it mattered much. Being four feet away from a mountain lion wasn't materially different from being four feet away from a savanna lion. So Cody screamed.

It would have been better if the sound could be characterized as a shout, or a roar, or a yell, but the higher, purer tones were unmistakably a woman's scream. Even as the sound was reverberating in their tortured ears, Cody's left arm came up, the palm 'pushed' forward, and a bolt of shimmer blasted at the cougar.

::NO, wait . . !::

It was too late for that. The cougar slumped back to the sand, once again blurring into something that was noticeable only for a shape that was unusual on the wave-smoothed beach.

That was, unfortunately, not the only unusual shape on the beach. Cody looked down at his arm, the one that had somehow blasted the cougar . . . and it wasn't *his* arm. It was a woman's arm - a well-developed arm just the right side of too-muscular. But it was still much less bulky than the arm he had had that morning. And less hairy. And just more . . . graceful than the arm he had worn since puberty. It also had a metal covering, a bracer of some nearly black metal that had a strange depth from which a deep, violet color seemed almost to glow; the same metal as the ring they had discovered. The other arm was much the same, and from that inspection Cody took in the rest of . . . well, it was no longer *his* body, even if it were the one in which his mind dwelled. No one could mistake that body for a man's body.

He . . . she . . . looked at abundant curves in all the right places - for a woman. There were two shapes in particular that hid most of the lower contours from immediate inspection and they were . . . more than abundant. If the armored breastplate covered real mounds that were anything like true to the hyper-realistic detailing, then the woman inside the armor would have no trouble getting dates. Continuing perceptions flooded in . . . a heavy helmet with a stylized "Y"-shaped opening for eyes and nose that nonetheless fit so well that it didn't shift when she moved her head, an even heavier tug from a mass of ink-dark hair that did drag lightly on an armored back plate when she moved her head, a shifting skirt of overlapping metal and leather panels, and - once she swayed her hips enough to see - greaves over knee-high boots. All the metal parts were in that dark, deep violet color, with black leather gloves and boots. All the armored pieces held weapons, too. Or at least, there were hilts protruding from the greaves and the bracers, four blades in all.




"Oh, hell no," she finally growled - though the sound had a throaty purr that made it anything but fearsome. "No friggin' way."

Her self-inventory was interrupted when the sand pile moved again. She stepped back quickly and was trying to remember what she had done the previous time, when the cougar made its own groaning growl.

::Don't do that again.::

She heard the words in her head, but realized there hadn't actually been any sound. Casting her memory back, she realized the earlier words had also been without external sound.

"Who . . . what the hell is going on?"

::How the hell should I know? Who are you? What happened to me?::

"Who are you?" she demanded instead of answered.

::My name is Dylan Jamieson. Who're you?::

"I'm Cody," she claimed.

::Bullshit,:: the cougar snapped, this time accompanied by an audible snarl. His tail started to snap back and forth and she could see his talons starting to feel for a grip in the sand.

"No, really," she insisted. "Look, what do you remember?"

::I remember Cody putting on that ring, and starting to shake like he was getting zapped by something. I reached out to him and . . . then, I was . . .:: Without finishing his thought he slumped to the sand. ::Oh, God, what has happened to me?::

"I don't know," the armored woman claimed. "Except, I remember the same thing you did. Only when I woke up . . . well, you can see what happened."

The cougar forced his eyes open and looked at the statuesque woman. ::Damn, this is either the worst dream in history, or the worst torture ever invented. Waking up on the beach with a woman like you should be a fantasy come to life, but . . . are you really Cody? Seriously?::

"Yeah, dude, and if you think waking up as a mountain lion is strange, try waking up as a woman. In armor, even. What the hell happened?"

::Damn if I know,:: the cougar replied. ::Only if you're a hot woman and I'm a damn *cat,* man, that's just not fair.::

"Get real, dude. I may be in a woman's body, but there's no way I'm doing anything with a guy - human or feline."

::Damn shame,:: the cougar said. Then his face twisted and his ears laid back along his head. ::Hey, how can I be talking to you? I mean, cats don't have mouths that can make speech.::

"I think it must be some sort of telepathy," she replied. "I mean, I can obviously hear you, but there's no real sound."

::Yeah, right,:: the cat said, accompanied by a short, sharp cough. Then he shook his head and said, ::On the other hand, that's not the strangest thing that happened. None of this makes sense. Maybe we're still out of it.::

"I don't think so," the woman replied. "I don't know why, but I think this is real."

::Gotta be the ring. Take it off.::

"Oh, yeah. Duh!"

She pulled at the ring, now showing on the outside of her tight glove though the dark metal and jewel nearly blended into the black leather.

"It won't come off. It won't move at all. I can't even twist it."

::Try harder.::

"Man, any harder and I'll be pulling off my finger with it."

::Deal,:: the cat said. He pulled back his lips to show gleaming teeth that could easily separate a finger from the anchoring hand.

"Get real," she said, pulling her hand back. "There has to be another way."

::Maybe there's a catch, or something. Squeeze it, or push at the stone.::

The woman combined those and felt a click on the stone. As she released the pressure, the stone followed her finger and now sat just above the setting. She ran through a quick set of experiments, starting with trying to slide the ring off her finger. That didn't work. The stone wouldn't slide in any direction. Pushing it back down merely reset it into place. Another push let it pop up again. It was only when she tried to twist the stone that she had any success. While the mountain lion watched anxiously, she twisted the stone around. It moved through 180 degrees, then stopped. That led to an obvious next step, and she pushed it back down into the setting.

There was another tingle/buzz/shock but it wasn't as bad as the first one. It did cause her to close her eyes almost reflexively, and when they were open again she looked around. Unfortunately, it was still a 'she' that was looking around.

"Whoa, dude," a voice said, this time a real voice - a deep, resonant voice that seemed to echo within her almost as though it were still telepathic. Standing in front of her was big, buff man wearing cutoff jeans and a t-shirt. With a huge grin on his face.

"Cool," he said, looking down at his massively muscular body.

"Not cool," the woman countered. "I assume that's you, Dylan."

"Yeah," Dylan replied. "You still Cody?"

"On the inside, anyway," she sighed.

"Not bad outsides, babe," Dylan smirked.

She slapped him. It was a reflex so quick that even she didn't realize what she had done until it was over, and Dylan didn't even have a chance to dodge.

"Sorry," he said, raising his hands to block any further attacks.

"I don't need you going all Neanderthal on me," she snarled - unfortunately her musical voice took a lot of the threat out of that growl. "And my name is definitely not, 'babe.'"

Taking stock, she realized that she as now a more normal woman. Without a scale, she didn't know if she were as tall at the armored woman had been but she seemed to have the same bounteous curves. At least now she had on shorts and a tank top instead of armor, and an errant breeze showed her that her hair was a bright, glowing blonde that seemed almost as pale as the sandy cougar’s pelt.

She tried to pull the ring off with no more success than before. "This sucks, man," she complained.

"I don't know," Dylan said. "It's kinda cool. I mean, look at you. You're so gorgeous it hurts, and . . . well, look at me!"

"Yeah, well, you be the girl then."

"Listen, dude . . . ette, I'm just sayin'. It could be worse."

"You're not listening, asshole. I'm a girl!"

"Yeah," Dylan agreed with another smirk, "and you could be a lot, lot worse."

"If you keep letchin' at me, next time I'm gonna take out your 'nads," she threatened. She started to prod at her ring again.

"Hey, don't do that!" Dylan said.

"I'm a girl, dude. That has to change. No way I'm staying a girl."

"Look, at least let's think about it for a minute. I mean, it's a lot better for me to be human than a damn mountain lion."

The girl's spectacular face lifted to an even higher level of beauty when she smiled for the first time. "I'm not so sure, you bastard. At least when you were a cat you weren't leering at me like some dirty old man."

"Hey, I'm not old," Dylan countered, but his self-deprecating smile helped to keep her smiling as well.

She looked at her slender hands, her long, sleek legs, and pulled a handful of brightly golden hair around her face. Despite her distress, she couldn't help enjoy the silky texture, and in her inner heart she knew she was feeling some pride at being so beautiful. Then she shrugged as though to shake off those thoughts. "Look, dude, we gotta fix this. I mean like, we don't even have any ID, no money, no nothing. What are we gonna do if we can't change back?"

At that comment, Dylan twitched and one hand patted at his hip. "Actually . . ."

He pulled out a wallet, and started flipping through the contents. "Looks like I *do* have an ID. Let's see . . . Troy Hammer, age 25 . . . yada, yada, hey, it says here that I'm a private detective for Sylvan Investigations. Cool!"

"No way," she repeated. "That is *sssoo* unfair. You get a cool new identity, and I get squat."

"Maybe not," Dylan counter. The little raft was behind the brunette, but in his line of sight. He could see something that she couldn't. "Look in the boat."

There was a trendy leather handbag in the raft, seemingly undamaged by any exposure to water in the always wet interior. The girl made her own inspection and found a similar support package along with passports for both of them. "I guess you work for me," she said. "I'm . . . I mean, this body and ID, are apparently Savanna Sylvan, and I'm the CEO of Sylvan Investigations."

"No way," Dylan said, but he moved over to where he could look over her shoulder. All of the sudden they both realized how close they were standing, and they both twitched away.

"Sorry, man . . . I mean, um, what did you say your name was?"

"Savanna, apparently," she replied. "I assume the photo matches my face?" she asked. "The hair color is right. Are my eyes really, um, 'violet?'"

She looked at him, and he moved a step closer. His own blue eyes stared into hers for a long moment, then he shook himself. "Um, yeah. Violet. Dark, almost like the color of your armor, but there is violet in there." Savanna saw the snarky grin on his face again. "That photo does *not* do you justice."

"Oh, grow up," she snapped, but she felt a flush of heat fill her cheeks. And that deep, resonant feeling of pride.

Savanna distracted herself by fiddling with the ring. She arched an eyebrow at Dylan . . . or Troy, but this time he just sighed and shrugged. "I still think it's better to work the problem in these bodies, but . . . well, I was gonna say that I can understand how you feel, but I expect that's not really true."

"You got that right," she said. "Man, I'm a girl!"

"Yeah, I think we covered that," Troy said. "Go ahead. Maybe another turn will make us back into ourselves."

"Oh, God, I hope so," she sighed. It was not to be.

Pressing on the stone made it pop up just enough to be turned again, but it wouldn't turn any further in a clockwise direction. It would turn back, and after another look at Troy she shrugged and pushed it back into the original position.

There was another barely tolerable buzz/shock, and when her eyes opened she was again dressed in armor. And her companion was again a pale, yellow-white cougar. More experiments showed that she could change at will between the armored woman and the blonde - in each case with appropriate companion - but nothing else.

One of the times when she was the armored woman and starting to manipulate the ring to change back, the cougar interrupted her.

::Hey, man . . . I mean . . . oh, hell, whatever. Don't do that.::

"Why not?"

::Just, at least, give it a rest for a minute. I’m getting a headache from all those shocks.::

"But I just can't stay this way," she insisted.

::Maybe not, but this isn't getting us anywhere. Maybe there's something else on all that armor you're wearing.::

"Oh, yeah," she said hopefully. The first thing she did was take off her helmet.

::Holy . . . sshhuugar,:: Dylan breathed.

"What?"

::If anyone told me that there was a prettier girl than, um, Savanna anywhere in the world I'd have called them a liar, but . . . you are just . . . incredible. It's . . . supernatural, like some sort of more-than-human goddess. Aside from the eyes - which are just gorgeous on both of you - everything is just . . . better. Even more impossibly beautiful.::

"Yeah, right," she snorted, but she really, really wished he had a mirror. In a coincidence she was finding less and less likely to be random, a glint off the water caught a sparkle in the stone of her ring. She looked at it again, and remembered the Greek letters.

"I wonder . . . was there a Greek goddess called Alayla?"

::Beats me,:: the cougar replied. ::But I'm beginning to think this really is supernatural. If you have the ring of a Greek warrior goddess, then . . . I mean, crazy or not, it's an explanation.::

"Crazy is right," she said, but she was distracted as she studied the ring. Finally she shrugged and put down her helmet.

Alayla, if that's who she was portraying, took a better look at the martial array she was wearing. Aside from the color it could have been bronze age Greek armor. The back-and-breast were fitted to her shape, emphasizing an abundant bosom and almost fragile little waist. And the armored plates of the skirt were curved enough to drape after flowing from that tiny waist to her powerful hips. But other than that the items could have been from a museum. If there had actually been Greek warrior women - the Amazon legend was just a myth - the armor would have been perfect.

With one other exception. Instead of the normal short sword that was part of the Greek hoplite armament, there were several blades. Each of the greaves of her lower legs held an 18-inch short sword or long dagger that, when drawn, was strangely hard to look at. There was a depth to the dark-violet blades, drawing in her eyes with almost hypnotic power. Part of that was the edge, which seemed to shimmer with a sharpness that made it unclear just how fine the edge really was - as though light itself were not precise enough to show it. At first she thought they were both the same, but on looking closer she saw a white symbol in each hilt.

"Oh my god," she whispered. "No way."

::What?::

"Did you ever read the Saberhagen Swords books?"

::You're the reader, dude . . . ette.::

"Well, a guy named Fred Saberhagen wrote a series of books on magical swords forged by Vulcan. Each had a special power, indicated by the symbols on the hilts."

::You think these are those swords?::

"No. For one thing, those were supposed to be at least three feet long. But the black hilts, the little symbols. Those are the same. I wonder . . ."

She put one away in her right greave, and took the other to an outcropping of rock. As she approached it, she first felt and then heard a slow, methodical beat from the sword. When she reached the rock, she let the edge rest lightly on the face of the outcrop. The sound picked up in volume until it was a slow, drumming hammer and the sword started to flow through the rock as though it were a hot knife in warm butter. Its own weight was enough to make it slice through the stone, but when she put a little force behind it, the hammering picked up and it moved more quickly through the rock.

"This is Stonecutter," she said. "See the symbol is a block with a wedge cutting through it."

::So what's the one you put away?::

"If I'm right, that's Shieldbreaker."

::Hey, that reminds me. You're the reader, but I did a paper on classical warfare and your armor is incomplete. Where's your shield? The reason there isn't any armor on the legs, other than that flippin' skirt thing, is because that would be protected by a shield. That whole armor concept won't work without a shield.::

"This is my shield," she said, putting Stonecutter away and drawing the other long blade. "It'll move on its own, if need be, to stop any weapon. I'll bet it could deflect bullets."

::Cool.::

"Maybe. In the stories, Shieldbreaker's weakness was that it wouldn't defend against unarmed attackers. In fact, it sucks all your strength into it, but there's no place for that strength to go if there aren't any weapons incoming. Even one of the gods was defeated by a bunch of ordinary, unarmed humans when he couldn't let go of Shieldbreaker."

::Strange story.::

"Yeah, but it would solve the problem of a shield," she said. Putting it away again, she pulled out the blade in her right bracer. This dagger only had a six or seven inch blade, and on the hilt was a small white arrow. "This would be Wayfinder, if the symbol is correct. You decide what you want, and it will point at it. I suppose that's why it's short. It's not primarily about fighting."

::If you say so. What's the other one?::

She swapped blades and looked at the symbol on the one from her right forearm. "I don't recognize this one. It doesn't look like any of the ones in the stories."

The symbol was a twisted, flattened stick; somewhat like an "L" but more open.

::That looks like a boomerang,:: the cougar observed.

"It does, sort of," she agreed. "Well, here goes."

She didn't change her grip to throw it by the blade. She just pulled it back and let fly at a nearby tree. It seemed almost to accelerate after it left her hand then hit the tree with a sharp crack. They could see that it was buried to the hilt in what looked like a fairly hard wood. While Alayla was looking at the protruding handle, wondering if she were going to have to go dig it out of the wood, the hilt started to vibrate almost ultrasonically, then it ripped itself from the tree and flew back to her hand. She almost didn't get her hand up in time . . . in fact, she wouldn't have gotten her hand up in time if something hadn't moved her hand for her.

"Well, I guess that makes Boomerang a good name for this one."

::What did you hit me with? When we were first changed? I remember you pointing something . . . your palm? . . . at me, and then I passed out.::

"Oh, yeah," she agreed. Looking at her left forearm, she saw yet another white symbol against a black part of the armor. This one was on the back of her wrist, where she could just touch the end of the bracer if her hand were pulled back so that the palm was forward. When she tried this, she saw a shimmer pulse forward through the air. Luckily, the cougar was not in line with it this time.

"The little symbol is like a head, with a frown, and with rings around it, like it's . . . ringing or something."

::Well, my head was sure ringing after you used that thing on me. Call that one 'Headache.'::

"That fits," she agreed, finding another smile on her lips. "I doubt if Saberhagen would agree - all of his were action names, like Wayfinder or Woundhealer, but I'll take Headache for this one."

Her other wrist had an explosion symbol, which begged for a test. When she tilted her palm forward, another shimmer sped through the air. This one hit the rock outcrop that Stonecutter had sliced to easily. The result was a booming explosion, a cloud of dust, and several near misses from rock fragments.

::Call that one 'Grenade,':: the cougar suggested.

Alayla nodded, then motioned her friend to walk over to where they could look at the damage. That showed another unexpected effect. As soon as the cougar stepped from the bright sand to a shaded, green area, his fur mottled into a matching color. In fact, she realized there was a moment when his hindquarters were still pale yellow and his shoulders were already dark green.




"Whoa, dude," she said. "I guess your name should be 'Chameleon.'"

::Ain't no friggin' way I'm gonna be named after a lizard,:: he said - or at least, thought - firmly.

Alayla laughed - a sound entirely too much like a giggle to her sensitive ears, but nodded. "Okay, I guess that would be, um, already taken." She waved her arms in a sort of flourishing benediction and said, "I hereby dub you . . . . Furrtive."

::Like hell,:: Furrtive's mind snarled, but she just turned and looked at a rock outcropping further down the beach. She sent another pulse that way, but even as the explosion was echoing in their ears, she was yelping and waving her hand.

"Oww, oh, damn, that's hot. This damn bracer got hot when I shot that pulse."

::Must be some sort of range effect,:: observed Furrtive.

"Must be," she agreed. She looked thoughtful for a moment, and then snapped her fingers - well, almost. There wasn't much of a snap sound through the gloves. In any event, she quickly drew the Wayfinder equivalent and concentrated on the blade. In a moment, she started to turn in a circle. Like a compass needle finding north, the blade ended up pointing directly at the little raft.

"Oh, hell," she sighed.

::What's wrong?::

"I asked Wayfinder to, y'know, find us a way off the island. I was hoping there was a better answer, but all it shows is the raft."

After a moment, the cougar walked over to nudge at her hand. ::Well, switch us back and I guess I'll start rowing.::

"You? Why not me. I'm not some 'little woman' for you to patronize."

::Hell, we can take turns for all I care,:: he replied. ::But I can't take a turn at all as a damn cat.::

"Oh, yeah, sorry," she said. She moved the stone around in the ring again, and after a flash that was no less unpleasant because it was becoming commonplace, Savanna was again regarding Troy Hammer.

"All aboard," the big man said. "I'll push off . . . and before you start again, I probably weigh twice what you do. If I sat in that thing you wouldn't even be able to get it into the water."

Savanna didn't say anything, but she did comply.

Chapter 3 - "Move Over"

An hour later found them on their way. Unfortunately, the only reason that looked like any progress at all was because they knew what they had done. In fact, they were just pulling out of the little cove where Isolde had been sunk. Their tasks had included a quick dive to pick up various survival or navigation items from the sunken ship. With foresight due more to experience with wind and wave-driven salt spray than worries about actually sinking, they had kept charts and crackers and a few related items in zip-lock bags. Plus there were canned goods that didn't require cooking to eat. Then Savanna refused to sit in the raft for what might be a couple of days in sticky, salt-laden clothes so they took another side trip back to the fresh water pool to rinse and on the same diversion to fill jugs with drinking water.

Only after all that could Troy start pulling strongly on the oars toward civilization. Thankfully, the weather was good and forecast to be that way for a few days. With thirty miles to go, and not much more than one or two miles per hour, it would be a long haul. Troy set up a pace he felt he could sustain, but after an hour of steady work, he just had to take a break.

"Man, this may be harder than I thought," he panted.

"Let me take a turn," Savanna offered.

"I'm good for a while more," Troy insisted, returning to his labor. But it was only another half hour and he just had to stop.

"I guess you better do this for a while. I'm beat," he admitted.

They carefully switched places and Savanna took up the task. She was a trim, healthy young woman, but hard physical labor - especially with a major upper-body component - was not something her new body was ever going to be good at. She managed about half an hour of effective rowing, but didn't argue when Troy pointed out that her strokes were getting shorter and slower.

"Move over," he said, and they swapped places again.

He had recovered from the initial weariness, but there was a limit to how much high-energy-output work he could sustain even if there were no oxygen debt or fatigue poisons in his system. They were still in sight of Halcyon Island and not yet in sight of the next landmark toward which they were headed, when he had to rest again.

"This is . . . hard," he said. Looking over his shoulder at nothing but water. "It's going to take a long time."

"Yeah," Savanna agreed. She fiddled with her ring for a moment, and looked at Troy.

"No way," he said quickly. "First off, all that armor will probably poke a hole in the raft, and it if doesn't all those blades will. And I do *not* like the idea of being a cat in a small raft in the middle of the ocean."

"This isn't working," Savanna said. "It's been two hours, and we're only a mile or so off the island. If nothing else, Alayla will have to take a turn at the oars along with the two of us."

"But what if, like I said, all that metal . . ?"

"Then we'll have another problem to solve. But we're not solving this one now," she said, then repeated Troy's earlier command. "Move over."

They swapped again. Troy took a moment to make sure there was enough clear space for his feline body, and nodded. Savanna rotated the ring stone, but just before she pressed it down, Troy said, "Oh, one more thing. If the shock when we switch burns a hole in the raft, I'm going to say, 'I told you so.'"

"Not as Furrtive you won't, even if you think it," Savanna said, then pressed the stone home.

The good news was that the shock didn't cause any damage. The better news was that neither did any of Alayla's armor. Or Furrtive's claws, which he was careful to keep sheathed. His fur was now a strange combination of raft gray and sea-green, but still very effective - particularly when he was not moving.

The even better news was that Alayla was strong. Really strong. They hadn't thought to check that when they were on the beach, but she was soon pulling the oars strongly enough to have the little raft skimming across the water several times as fast as Troy had managed.

And the best news of all was that she didn't get tired. After an hour, she was feeling as strong as when she started, and after two she was doing even better as she found the right combination of stroke length and pace.

::Damn, if I'd have known you were that inhuman, I'd have let you start clear back at the island,:: Furrtive said. ::But I think you need to take a break. I can't work the compass in this form and I think we need to make sure we're headed where we want to go. We're out of sight of land.::

"Hmm, probably a good idea," Alayla said, "but let me try something."

Instead of getting out the compass - or switching them to their other bodies - Alayla drew Wayfinder from its sheath. After a moment's concentration, her arm moved to allow the knife to point more or less in the direction they'd been heading. There wasn't any good way to check while she was rowing since Furrtive couldn't use the knife, but she felt confident that they were headed where they needed to go to reach some help.

The thirty-mile trip that could have taken two days ended up continuing well into the night, but only the first night. Alaya brought the raft in to a small, isolated beach on Crimson Key, a swanky semi-private island owned by a single resort hotel.

::Now what?:: Furrtive asked.

In response, Alayla shrugged, though there wasn't really a lot of choice on the next step. She manipulated her ring and soon Savanna and Troy stood on the tiny strip of sand. Troy took a reflexive look at his wristwatch, followed by an equally reflexive - and much more appreciative - look at his companion. She scowled at him . . . well, it was intended to be a scowl, though it ended up looking a bit more like a charming pout . . . then looked over a ridge of higher ground at the sky glow from the main resort area. "I guess I think we need to get back into the boat," she said. "If you'll row us around the point there, we can just pull up to the dinghy dock and act like we're from one of the boats in the harbor or something. We can still use the Isolde information if we're challenged on where we came from. Oh, that reminds me . . ."

She checked in the purse that came with that identity and smiled the most genuine smile she'd showed since the pirate attack. "Look! Credit cards!"

"Oh, god, a girl for only a day and the first thing you want to do now that we're back in civilization is go shopping," Troy moaned, but the twinkle in his eyes showed that he was only teasing. "It's a bit after 10:00, so we might have trouble finding a room . . ."

"Rooms, jerk," she interrupted.

"Right, whatever," he continued. "And I doubt there will be that many shops open at this time of night."

"Well, we'll see," she said, motioning him back into the raft. Once again he insisted she board first, but it wasn't long before he was rowing them through anchored boats on the way to the dinghy dock. Getting a room . . . rooms . . . didn't turn out to be a big deal. The clerk accepted Savanna's credit card with no problem and if there were a few smirks at a handsome couple without luggage getting a room late at night, they were discreet enough not to be obnoxious.

Savanna didn't realize until the next morning how well-stocked her new handbag was. They both expected a nice hotel would have complementary shampoo and she was smart enough to use the conditioner as well. But when the time came to control all that mass of hair, she really needed the brush she found in the purse. There were other things she found in there, too . . . things of the, "Oh my god - kill me now" variety. Thankfully, she didn't need to experience those. Yet.

All she tried to do with her hair was keep it more or less straight with the brush while she waved the room hair dryer over it, but in the end it was enough. Her hair still had volume and a nice flow. It was only when she was getting ready to leave that she realized she'd left something out.

She called her colleague over the phone from her room. "Dyl . . . Troy, we have a problem."

"What? A new one?" he said wryly - a bit of teasing that she didn't really appreciate.

"I need, I mean, I don't know how to use, um, makeup."

"So?" he asked.

"So I can't go out without, y'know, looking like a real girl," she said.

"Trust me, Beautiful, you look like a real girl," Troy said with a laugh.

"I'm serious, asshole," she snapped. "If we're going to find the guys who did this to us, I mean, y'know, *us*, we need to blend in."

"Sorry, Beautiful, and this time I'm not joking. You won't blend in unless the crowd is movie starlets . . . or Playboy bunnies."

"I won't even blend in with them if I look like a castaway. And yeah, I know that's what we were. But no one cared on a late night check in. During the day . . . well, we need to blend in."

She gave her own laugh - more bitter than humorous - and added, "Besides, this is meat market central. This resort is where the beautiful people come to see and be seen. I need . . . oh, god, this is so hard . . . I think I need to go to a salon."

"Oh, man, you *have* gone over to the dark side," he said, no longer teasing. "Are you gonna be okay."

"No, man, I'm a friggin' *girl!* I won't be okay until we get things back to normal. But in the meantime, I need to know how to . . . to function in society."

"That suggests you have some sort of a plan . . . other than going to a salon, that is."

Savanna sighed into the phone, then said, "Maybe. I guess I was thinking last night after we were finally safe. I can't shake the feeling that this is not all a coincidence."

Troy confirmed what he thought he heard. "You mean you think we were *meant* to find that ring?"

"Yeah," she said. "I don't know why, but I really think we're supposed to like, 'fix' something - something connected with the reason we were attacked."

"Look, Co . . . um, Savanna, are you sure that's not, um, wishful thinking? Because it implies that once we fix whatever we've been sent to do, we'll change back?"

"Yeah, I thought about that, too," she said. "But I still can't shake the feeling. Whether it's real or just, like you said, wishful thinking, I think we need to try."

"Okay. It's not like we have another real life anymore. So, what's the plan?"

"Well, I'm going to go to a salon. You go get us something to wear other than cutoffs and t-shirts."

"What's your size?" he asked.

"How the hell should I know?" she retorted. "Guess, or pick a salesgirl that looks like me - don't say it, I know what you're thinking - and get something. I'm telling you now, though, if it's too trampy, I'll make you wear it!"

"Right. Hot young woman, but not trampy. Should be no trouble. I'm obviously an expert in girls' clothes."

"Find a girl who is. There are a lot around," she said dismissively. "And, um, figure out a way for us to get off the island."

"You want another boat? I don't think we'll be able to rent one around here."

"No, I guess not. Just get us back to the mainland. We'll find another boat if Wayfinder sends us back out here."

"Who's going to pay these credit card bills?"

Savanna snorted into the phone. "How the hell should I know?" she repeated. "But until the cards get rejected, it's our only choice."

"Right . . . boss," Troy said.

"Oh, that's right," Savanna said, finding enough humor to laugh again. "Don't you forget it."

They went their separate ways after agreeing on a rendezvous time. Savanna missed it. By three hours.

Troy didn't complain. At least, not about the delay. He did squawk after he dropped his drink in his lap when he saw her. At that he was better than the waiter who walked into the pool, and the guys (plural) who were slapped by their dates just for staring. Her thick, soft hair flowed smoothly in tumbling waves, but its primary purpose was to provide a frame for huge, soft eyes and full, bright lips.

Oh, and she must have found a boutique near the salon, because she had changed from her cutoff shorts and tank top into . . . well, technically it was still a shorts-and-top outfit. But the shorts were even shorter, and tighter, and much brighter than the jeans had been, in a pale blue that seemed to capture the sky in the bright sun. The top was a blinding white – reminding Troy of the castaway top except for being a lot tighter as well.




Or at least it did, once he got past staring at the shapes that the top pretended to hide.

"Whoa, dude, that's a . . . good look for you," he said as Savanna approached.

"Yeah," she admitted, blushing. "I don't know why, but I just saw it in the window, and . . . well, I couldn't pass it up."

"Nice shoes, too," he mentioned as he helped her to her seat.

She looked down the unending length of her sleek leg at the tiny sandals - high-heeled sandals - that matched the blinding white of her top.

"They went with the outfit," she claimed, but she didn't meet Troy's eyes when she said it.

"Is there something you want to tell me?" Troy prodded. "I mean, this is the girl who couldn't wait to get back to being a guy. And now, look at you!"

She ducked her head again, then looked up with a frown marring her artfully-accented features. "Yeah, like I said. I don't know what's happening. At one level this all seems so wrong. Yet at another, it seems wrong not to do what a girl would do."

Savanna sat back in her chair and looked into the distance. "You know, I felt that when I was Alayla too, only different. As Alayla, I felt strong, confident, and aggressive. I was going to - am going to - get those bastards that sunk the Isolde. But as Savanna, while I still want to get them, I feel more . . . careful, I guess. Like I need to make sure I get all the details right so that I don't make any mistakes. And I seem to be able to tell what those details need to be, even if I don't always know how to, um, 'do' what is required. Like I knew I couldn't blend in around here without makeup and at least some attention to my hair even though I didn't know how to, y'know, do it. The same goes with the clothes. I knew I needed to wear heels, but the first few steps were worthy of America's Funniest Home Videos."

Then she looked thoughtful again, and added, "Though after only a few steps it was easy. Just like now I feel confident I can maintain my hair and makeup. It's like I'm programmed to be this woman, and I just have to . . . activate the right programs."

Troy had leaned back in his own chair while she told him of her feelings. By the time she was done, he was frowning himself, but it wasn't in disagreement.

"Y'know, I may have had something similar," he said. "When we were rowing out of the little cove, I really wanted to do the guy thing. Do the muscular stuff, and a part of that was to protect you. But there was something else as the cat . . ."

"What?" she prompted.

"I don't know, exactly," he said. "But I think it's a good idea there weren't any wild pigs on Halcyon. I remember thinking about how much I'd like to kill something. And eat it. Raw. I pretty much ignored it with all the rest that was going on, but I remember it now."

He sat up straighter and looked at Savanna. "Oh, and I remember something else now. When I was the cat and you were Alayla, I didn't feel like I needed to protect you, but I did feel a fierce loyalty. At the time I thought it was just the friendship that we already had, but now that it's the two of us and things are more settled, I can tell that it was different."

"So there is a mental aspect to these transformations as well," Savanna summarized. "I wonder how far that goes."

"Me, too," Troy agreed. "I'm not particularly happy with the idea that we're being turned into some sort of robots."

"I don't think it's that," Savanna said. "It's not - at least, my feelings are not - a 'compulsion' that I can't overcome. It's more like a sense of . . . rightness. It's like, when we were back in school I wouldn't go to classes all stinky from the gym. I'd make sure that I had a shower and that my clothes were reasonably clean. It's just that 'reasonably clean' means something different for a girl - there's a stylish element as well. It just feels wrong not to look reasonably nice."

"Then you're way wrong," Troy said. "You are unreasonably beautiful, and way too hot to look 'nice' in any context I can imagine."

"Down, dude, or a slap is the least of your worries," she said sharply.

"Lighten up, um, dudette," Troy countered. "I'm not going to like, attack you or anything. Like you said, I don't feel a 'compulsion' to act a certain way, but this body is still guy enough to appreciate a pretty girl - and you are *way* beyond mere pretty. It just seems right to acknowledge your beauty. I'm not going to worship you or anything but you better expect some appreciation. If not from me, you'll get it from any other guys with a pulse anyway. Probably most of the girls as well."

"Geez, dude, lighten up," Savanna said. "It's just a . . . like a disguise or something."

"You sure?" Troy challenged. "It seems way too natural to be a role you're playing. It's real, for all that there is some of you that's still Cody, too. It's like, you're a natural girl who remembers Cody's experiences - not that you're a guy stuck in the wrong type of body."

Savanna frowned at his comment, but she didn't say anything for a long moment.

Finally Troy broke the silence. "I did some research while you were, um, busy. I looked up Alayla."

"Really?" Savanna said, eyes losing their introspective blankness in favor of piercing attention.

Troy began in a lecturing tone, but he smiled to show it wasn't going to be a long lecture. "Alayla was not so much a single person as a type. It's Greek for war goddess."

"War goddess? Not 'warrior' goddess?" asked Savanna.

"All the listings I saw were for war goddess," Troy confirmed. "Does it matter?"

"Maybe," she replied. "A warrior is about fighting. But war is about justice."

Troy laughed. "War? Justice? Those hardly seem to go together."

"War and justice *always* go together," Savanna said. "At least in the minds of the warring parties. That doesn't mean we'd agree, but the participants always think so. That's how they get hundreds or thousands or millions of people to participate. Even Hitler thought it was 'justice' that the master Aryan race had 'Lebensraum' and that it was unjust that the inferior races were occupying it. The rationale can be very self-serving, but there always is one."

"Okkaayy," he said slowly. "And that matters . . . how?"

"Because if Alayla is just a warrior, then she's just looking for a fight. But if she represents war itself, she's looking for justice - and is willing to use force to obtain it."

"So if she finds her justice . . . she may be satisfied?"

"Maybe," Savanna said thoughtfully.

Troy shrugged and after a moment when it was clear she didn't have any further thoughts, changed the subject. "I have reservations on the afternoon flight back to Miami. All they had was first class. I hope you don't mind."

"Not as long as the cards keep getting accepted," she said with a smile.

Troy continued, "I also got you some clothes. I picked fairly casual things - warm ups and t-shirts - that should work in your size. But I flat refused to pick up any underwear. You gotta get your own panties and bras. And shoes. I didn't think I could guess your size well enough."

"Oh, good," she said, a new blush painting her flawless cheeks. "I, um, already picked up some underwear. And at least now I know my shoe size."

For one of them, shopping for shoes was still a fate worth than death so they arranged another rendezvous, this time at the airport gate for their flight. Savanna was early, which turned out to be a problem of another sort. While she was waiting, she was doing some research. As a scientist, research was a typical pastime. The fact the research was on makeup tips in Glamour magazine was merely expedient considering her current situation. At least, that's what she told herself when she bought the magazine.

"Is this seat taken?" she heard a voice ask.

Without looking up, she shook her head. "No, it's open."

Then she did look up, and look around. Only about 20% of the seats in the waiting area were taken and there were plenty that were separate enough that no intrusion on another's space would have been needed. The guy who sat down next to her had clearly not made his choice at random.

"It's unusual to see such a beautiful woman travelling alone," he said, intruding into her attention once more.

"I'm waiting for a friend," Savanna said.

"Well, it's obvious she can't be as pretty as you. That's just not possible. Are you meeting her plane, or are you heading out?"

[He just won't take a hint,] she decided. [Or maybe he thinks it's *me* that's not picking up on *his* hints. Like that's ever gonna happen.]

"*He* is meeting me here, and *we* are travelling out together," she said, making sure the emphasis was clear without being too blunt. Well, maybe not too blunt. Better to err on the side of making the message clear.

Not that it did any good.

"Obviously your, ah, escort is falling down on the job," he said. "Allow me to fill that job until he decides you're important enough for him. I'm Nate Williamson."

Williamson was on the wrong side of forty, she decided, and trying to deny it. To his credit, he was trim and either still had his hair or was a member of the infamous club. But the sunglasses he only took off when he introduced himself had been hiding too many lines, and his nose was starting to show the fleshy bulk of aging. Not that she really cared.

"As it happens," she said coolly, "he works for me and he is doing what I told him to do."

"Even better," Williamson said, showing an obviously practiced grin on his face even as he put the sunglasses back on. "That - and the ring you're not wearing - means that you have the freedom to make new acquaintances."

"Yes, I do," she said. "But it also means I have some privacy - which I treasure."

"Ah, if it's privacy you want, I am a member of this airport's executive club. We could get out of this crowd and get a drink or something."

Savanna was running out of ideas on how to tell him to get lost with at least a modicum of manners when the problem was resolved for her.

"Hi," Troy said blandly as he walked up, yet his face had a tightness that was just short of a scowl.

"Hello, Troy," Savanna said quickly. "I'm glad you made it on time."

She stood and to the big man's surprise, kissed him quickly. To her surprise as well, followed by a flaring blush that her long hair hid from the intruder but not from Troy. To cover his own confusion, Troy tried to get some sort of conversation going.

"And who is this?" Troy asked, looking down at the seated intruder.

"This is . . . I'm sorry, what was your name?" she asked. She remembered, but she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of making it seem like she cared.

"Nathan Williamson," the man repeated, standing to shake hands with Troy. He started the little dominance game with his grip, but he quickly regretted it without any apparent effort from Troy.

"Well, I guess I need to be on my way," he said quickly once Troy released his hand. Savanna had to stifle a snicker when he started flexing his fingers as soon as he thought they weren't looking.

"That wasn't nice," she said. "But thank you."

"What was that all about?"

She sighed. "He tried to pick me up. And I foolishly told him the truth; that you worked for me. That meant I was available - at least to him."

"Was that why you kissed me?"

"I guess," she replied. "It just seemed like the right thing to do."

"Another 'right thing to do?' Like doing the salon thing? And wearing heels?"

"I guess," she repeated. "I don't feel like something is forcing me to act all girly, but I guess there isn't any reason *not* to act . . . like I look. Once we finish this, it'll be different."

Troy nodded, but it was more a sign that he understood her statement than that he agreed with her claim. Or maybe he just didn't want to agree.

"So you don't think there will be any lingering effects if we act like we look, now?"

"Lingering effects? You mean, like I'd feel embarrassed about giving you a quick, no-passion kiss to get rid of a jerk?" Savanna laughed, and added, "On the scale of all the things that have happened to me - Dude, I'm wearing a damn *bra* - that doesn't seem like a big deal. And anyway, back to that jerk . . . I guess I wanted him to know that we were more than just colleagues, and do it in a way that didn't seem like a simple lie. I didn't think he'd take a plain claim that we were together unless I showed him it was true."

"Are we? More than just colleagues?"

"Well, sure," she said. "You've been my best friend for years. That hasn’t changed."

"Friends. Right," he muttered, but she heard him.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

"What? Oh, sure," he said, but he wouldn't meet her eyes.

They sat and each spent a few minutes with their own thoughts. Then they both tried to say something together.

"You first," she said with a smile.

"No. Ladies first," he disagreed.

"I may be a woman - at least for a while - but I'm not really a lady," she countered.

"Actually, you are," he countered in turn. "I mean, you still behave with good manners, and you have the sort of quiet confidence that ladies display."

"Hell, guys do that, too," she said.

"Yes, we do," he said, and if he emphasized the 'we' a bit, it was little enough that she could let it pass. "But when a girl does it, that makes her a lady. A part of that is, like I said, being quiet. You won't - a lady won't - get loud enough to demand that she be heard, so the polite thing is to allow her to go first. So, ladies first."

"Man, that sounds sort of circular," Savanna said, "but I'm not going to debate it right now. Anyway, what I was thinking was that we may need to put together some sort of cover story for our relationship."

He nodded, and to anyone else it would seem that he was politely listening. She could see the twinkle in his eyes, though.

"You jerk," she said, but she had to laugh. "You can see where this is headed - but I promise you now it's not going as far down that trail as you're thinking."

"Oh, my, however will I survive?" he said mournfully. Then he smiled again - this time not limited to the depths of his eyes. "Look, ah, Savanna, I know this is not easy for you. But all those protective instincts stood up on their hind feet and howled when I saw you with that other guy. I honestly don't know what I'd do if someone . . . did something to you. For both our sakes, I think we better make it clear that we're off the market to anyone else. Okay?"

"Right," she concurred. "Officially, we're business colleagues. Unofficially, we're, um, dating, I guess we'll call it. But actually - meaning in private, especially - we're 'just friends' . . . friends *without* benefits."

"Right," he agreed in turn, and it would have been silly to deny the tinge of regret in his eyes. Which did not make Savanna any less determined to deny an all-too-similar feeling that rumbled deep in her own heart. [Just the programming, like knowing how to walk in heels,] she told herself. Several times.

Chapter 4 - "Shieldbreaker"

"Come up to my room after you get settled in," Savanna told Troy after they arrived in Miami. He gave her a smug little grin that she wanted to slap off his face, but she knew he was just playing his part. Well, at least she knew it would have been the right thing to do if he *were* just playing his part. That better have been his reason.

When he knocked on the door, she was just brushing the travel twists out of her hair. She opened the door with one hand while she continued to pull her brush through her pale tresses with the other.

"My, don't you look domestic," he teased. "Girl through and through. By the way, you look gorgeous - as always."

"Thanks," she said, looking at the brush in her hand like she wasn't entirely sure how it had gotten there. She shrugged and pointed toward an open area of her room. "I need to be Alayla for a little bit and didn't want you to become Furrtive while you were walking down the hallway or something."

"Oh, right," he said, and a very conflicted set of emotions showed on his face.

She didn't say anything, though. She just manipulated the ring and after an always-unpleasant buzz/shock, Alayla returned. Furrtive faded into a complex set of colors and textures to match the carpet, the bedspread, and a corner of the dresser all at once. It was surprisingly effective in that complicated background - as though a corner of the bedspread had dragged on the ground, and a drawer were slightly open on the dresser.

"That's pretty impressive," Alayla said. At first Furrtive didn't understand, but when he looked at his own legs, he nodded.

Without further distraction, Alayla pulled Wayfinder from its sheath. She concentrated for a moment, then let her arm be pulled to point toward one wall.

::So, what does it mean?::

"I wish I knew," she said thoughtfully. "All it does is give a direction and . . ," she waved the knife around some more, " . . . maybe a bit of a sense of how far."

::What did you tell it to find?::

"The guys who attacked the Isolde," she replied. She continued to move the knife around, then reported, "I think they're here in Miami. Or anyway, somewhere in this area. I don't think they're in this hotel, but I also don't think they're a long way away. And Wayfinder is not pointing inland. It's more down the coast."

::So, what's the plan?::

Obviously deep in thought, Alayla let her fingers put Wayfinder away before she started to explain. After a moment, she sighed. "This is pretty frustrating. I can use Wayfinder when we're private, but we can't go out in public like this. I think we'll need to do this in steps. Get a bearing, go toward it a ways, find some privacy, and then take another bearing."

::Makes sense,:: Furrtive replied. ::I think we need to get started, though. We don't know how long they'll stay in south Florida.::

"Right," Alayla said decisively. She prodded at her ring and in a moment Savanna was again looking at Troy. "Get a rental car . . . or better yet, a small van. We might find ourselves changing in the back of it or something. Oh, damn, I don't want to compromise these identities if we have to abandon the van."

"Gotcha covered," Troy said. It just so happens that I know a guy here in Miami who can do fake IDs. Well, I should say that Dylan knew a guy, but I can use him - that is, me - for a reference."

"Oh, good," Savanna said, then she smiled coyly. "Why Troy/Dylan/Furrtive, you're a bit naughtier than I thought."

"Quite a bit," Troy said huskily, then he shook a little, prompting a similar movement from Savanna.

"Oh, crap, where did *that* come from?" she said, shoulders - and other parts - moving in a sigh that didn't really defuse the sudden sexual tension between them.

"I'm, um, going to put it down to, ah, residual influence from the ring," Troy said carefully.

"Yeah, right. 'Residual influence," she repeated. "Well, it's as good an explanation as any." [And a lot better than the obvious alternative - that I'm taking on a feminine mindset for real. Why did Dylan have to turn into such a hottie? Ohmigod, did I really just think that? Please, God, don't let me have said that out loud.]

Her blush was very evident from the inside, but she hoped that pulling her hair quickly in front of her face might have kept it from being too obvious from the outside. Troy picked up on the movement, of course, but he either didn't recognize the underlying reason or chose to pretend that he did not.

"And while I'm doing that, will madam be visiting the salon again?"

"Very funny," she said. Then despite herself she had to laugh. "Actually, no, but you're closer than you deserve. I need to go shopping."

"Again?" he asked. "What for?"

"For a dress," she said, blushing. "I need something nice enough we can go inside a club or a good restaurant, or something like that . . . just in case that's where the trail leads."

"Right," he said dryly. "Just in case that's where the trail leads."

"It's true!" she insisted, but her expression did not have the firm certainty always displayed by Alayla.

It actually turned out to be surprisingly easy. After a couple of hours - and a lot of cash, but their supply seemed to replenish itself somehow - they were on their way in an innocuous white van, and in four they had homed in on their target. Alayla looked at Furrtive in the back of their van, showing him that Wayfinder was pointing at the villa between where they were parked and the broad Atlantic. "Well, either they're back on a boat, or they're in there."

::Looks like,:: Furrtive agreed. ::So, hard and fast, or sneaky?::

"A little of both, I think," Alayla said. "We should sneak in as far as we can, but when the time comes . . ."

::Right,:: Furrtive agreed, and his tongue slowly wiped over sharp, shiny teeth.

"No eating what you kill," Alayla said firmly. "In fact, no killing unless we have to. I can't believe that crew was at the top of this. We need information."

::Right,:: Furrtive agreed again - but he repeated the show of teeth.

A 'sneaky' approach required first of all the cover of darkness. So despite homing in on their target while it was still early afternoon, they had a few hours to wait. They took advantage of that time to reconnoiter around the grounds, finding a higher hill where they could look down into the compound. After they had about as much of that as they could stand, they went to dinner.

"Would madame prefer a fine dining experience - so I can see you in that new dress you just had to get - or is something casual acceptable?" Troy teased.

"Jerk," she replied, but she had to laugh. "I'm fine with casual. In fact, let's find some place we can eat outside. This outfit is not made for over-air-conditioned meat lockers."

"As madame wishes," he replied, sweeping into a flourishing bow. They found a non-chain burger place with a nice view of the ocean from some outside tables. It turned out the best thing about the burgers was the view, but that was enough.

"You know, there's a, um, 'reset' thing when we do our changes," Troy observed as they ate.

Savanna didn't feel she should talk with her mouth full, so she just raised an eyebrow to get him to continue.

"When you're, um, you - meaning Savanna - for a few hours you get the normal sort of . . . impacts. I mean, your hair gets a bit windblown and if we get something to eat I can see that there's less shine on your lips. And if we sweat, well, there are several, um, signs."

Savanna guiltily looked at her top to see if there were stains from the heat and only just managed to stop herself from taking a quick sniff of her armpits.

"On me, too," Troy quickly continued. "But here's the thing: Whenever we change back from our other forms, you're just as fresh and impossibly beautiful as when you just stepped from the salon. Clothes, too."

"Oh, yeah," she said. "Now that you mention it, when we've been, y'know, like this for a while I've had to run a brush through all this hair a few times, but right after we switch, that hasn't been necessary."

"Right," he said. He smiled and said, "I'm obviously not an expert in this, but I think your makeup, um, deteriorates a little more than you might be aware of also. But after a switch everything is perfect again."

She snorted in a not-very-ladylike way at the claim that she was perfect, but she was thoughtful as well. "I'm obviously not changing back into the cutoffs and tank top I started in, so it's not all the way back to square one."

"Right," Troy agreed again. "I think there is a . . . reference condition - whatever clothes we were wearing when we changed *from* these forms and whatever grooming goes with that. And each time we switch back we return to that condition."

"Cool," Savanna said. "That means I don't really have to waste half my life doing makeup like all the other girls. Or, oh yeah, I won't have to shave my legs and all that stuff."

"Finally found something you like about this new life?" Troy asked.

Savanna didn't reply - at least, not verbally. She blushed and ducked her head. After a moment when Troy did not offer any alternative topics, she finally looked up. "Okay, so I like looking good. Savanna is a lot better looking than Cody ever was."

"You can say that again," Troy agreed enthusiastically. Very enthusiastically.

"Jerk," she said again, but she smiled.

He added some good news of his own. "That means I won't have to shave, and probably won't have to get haircuts and things. Hell, it means we won't even have to shower if we don't want to. Just 'poof' with the ring, and then back, and we're fresh as daisies."

"You aren't a daisy even right after we change," Savanna said, but she blushed and dropped her head again. [God help me, but I noticed he has a musky, athletic scent that is so masculine it could be bottled and sold.]

"I wonder if you could . . . anticipate a need or something," he said. "Like, could you, um, pick an outfit you wanted to *be* wearing, even if it wasn't what you had *been* wearing, and have that be what you change into after being Alayla?"

"I guess we can find out," she said. They picked up the detritus of their meals and went back to the van. A series of experiments showed that 'anticipation' didn't work - she always reverted to the fresh form of whatever she had last been wearing as Savanna. She tried a more evening look with more dramatic makeup and nice dress - inviting Troy in no uncertain terms to leave the van while she was changing clothes - and if that were her 'reference' outfit then that was how Savanna would reappear. But she could neither 'upgrade' nor 'downgrade' the outfit she had been wearing.

"Okay, that's enough," Troy said after what he felt were too many experiments. "I'm getting a real headache again. I think we know what we need to know."

Savanna looked like she was going to complain, but she knew he was right. In part, she had been playing around with different looks as much as checking the effect of the ring, and she knew it. However, their experiments had wasted - that is, 'consumed' - enough time that they could proceed with their real mission. They drove to their starting point; a tree-screened driveway to a house with signs of being unoccupied - and changed back to their combat forms one more time.

The first obstacle was a high stone wall surrounding the villa, complete with outward-curving spikes in the top. However, this obstacle was not a real impediment to Alayla. She drew Stonecutter and held it against the wall. It started a muffled, rhythmic thud that stayed quiet when Alayla kept the rate of movement slow. Apparently, Stonecutter worked as well on rebar as on concrete because it was only a few moments before there was a hole large enough they could step through.

The next task was for Furrtive. In the dark, he faded into an amalgam of dark green and flat black before flowing silently across the yard. Even though Alayla knew where he was, she had a hard time keeping track of him until he reached the corner of the main building and couldn’t pick him up at all after that.

Not until two guards fell over a balcony into the flowerbed. She figured that was his handiwork.

::Come ahead,:: Furrtive sent. She moved quickly and just as silently across the open space before meeting her companion on the balcony from which the men had been dropped.

"Could you get a count?" she asked.

::These two, plus at least two more guards that I could see. We counted a total of 12 on the zodiac boats, plus however many stayed on the ocean racer. Four guards on 3 shifts would be about right, with a few bosses who don't pull guard duty.::

"Do you recognize these two?"

::Not really,:: Furrtive replied. ::This guy might have been on the boat that came close to us, but he was wearing a ball cap and I'm just not sure.::

"Me, neither," she admitted. "Where do you think the bosses are?"

::Well, it's nearly midnight, right? I expect they're either in a conference inside or already in bed.::

Alayla nodded agreement at his analysis. "Those are the ones we want. Let's go find them."

Alayla pulled out Wayfinder to get a bearing, then looked at it thoughtfully. Instead of keeping it out, she put it away in her right-hand bracer and drew Shieldbreaker. She didn't quite pull her left wrist back enough to trigger Headache, but she kept it arched. With one palm mostly forward and Shieldbreaker in her other hand, she nodded.

Like most battle plans, this one fell apart almost at once. The 'almost' was that she was able to knock out one guard with Headache, but in falling his weapon hit the floor which was almost as good as an alarm. The fourth and final active guard called out to his partner, but was trained well enough not to run blindly to the source of the sound. When he received no response, he did sound an alarm - with his voice.

It turned out there were fifteen people in the compound. There were three down when the alarm was sounded. The fourth fell to Headache just moments after he yelled, but that was the end of the 'easy' ones. However, they definitely recognized that fourth guard as the one who had been in charge of the zodiac that came closest to their location on Halcyon Island so they knew they were in the right place.

They heard, "Freeze. Federal agents" from multiple sources, but that had been the prelude to an unwarranted attack before, so it didn't stop them.

Actually, as far as the self-proclaimed agents were concerned, it didn't stop *her.* Furrtive was as good as invisible in the gloom and all they saw was a tall dark-haired woman in black armor with a very long knife. That prompted a fusillade of bullets.

Which in turn changed Shieldbreaker from a length of dark steel to a whirling disk of protection. With a howl that made further conversation impractical, the weapon pulled itself from one position to another - there was no way that Alayla's arm could move that fast, even without the weight of the blade - and intercepted the incoming bullets.

Well, intercepted most of them. The value of Alayla's armor was shown as well when several bullets made it ring like a pure, clear bell. Alayla should have been staggered by the impacts even if the bullets didn't penetrate, but it seemed to provide protection against that as well. Even her head was not jerked around when a bullet hit the helmet. Between Shieldbreaker and the armor, Alayla was essentially invulnerable.

Or was for at least a few minutes. It wouldn't be long before the attackers realized they would have to shoot for the exposed skin, and from multiple sides at once. Thankfully, they didn't have that long. The agents were shooting from cover or concealment for the most part, and Alayla only managed to drop two more with Headache. She was thinking about switching to the Grenade effect when the fire started to slack off. Soon there was only one person firing, and in not much more time even that stopped.

::You're welcome,:: Furrtive's thought came, complete with a definite gloating tenor.

"I was the one who provided the distraction," Alayla claimed, checking her armor for any actual damage. She couldn't even find bullet traces, let alone any dents or penetrations. "How many was that?"

::I make it ten,:: Furrtive said.

Alayla nodded and drew Wayfinder again. She kept it out - with Shieldbreaker in the other hand - until they were led to a closed door that looked suspiciously heavy.

::Time for Grenade,:: Furrtive suggested.

"Maybe," Alayla replied, but she looked thoughtfully at the array of weapons about her. "Y'know, we haven't actually hurt anyone yet. They're all going to have real headaches and it's possible that one of the ones you dropped off the balcony will have a broken ankle or something. But if we raise the stakes to explosives . . ."

::Um, Boss, they were *shooting* at us!::

"Yeah . . ," she agreed, but she was thinking back on both attacks. "But it's just possible that they were following orders - valid, lawful orders as best they could tell. I don’t want to kill anyone for being a good agent."

::Okay. So what do we do?::

"First, we need to check some of these guys for ID," she said.

::Kind of a problem for me,:: Furrtive observed, briefing showing several inches of vicious claw - but no fingers.

"You watch in case any come out of that room. Or from anywhere else," Alayla ordered. It only took a few minutes to determine that none of the unconscious attackers had any ID at all, but that was almost as good as ID.

"I still don't think these are really federal agents," she said as she returned to Furrtive. "If they were - and weren't on some sort of deep cover mission, in which case they wouldn't have military-style weapons and tactics - then they'd have had ID even if it were hidden inside their vests and things."

::So why were they yelling that they were federal agents?::

"Probably because that usually works," she said. "If I'm a crook who is already assaulting someone with illegal weapons, I'm not going to worry about adding an 'impersonating a federal officer' charge to the list."

::Oh, yeah. Duh. So does that mean they're really crooks?::

"I don't know," Alayla admitted. "I'll bet they're not federal agents, and they did sink Isolde so they're not fully on the side of the angels. But I can't shake this feeling that they're more tools than actively evil."

::Is that your 'war goddess' sense of justice?::

Alayla stopped and looked at him for a moment. "Maybe," she said. "I didn't think of that. I wonder if there's more to this persona than armor and blades."

::Oh, yeah,:: Furrtive confirmed, and his golden eyes danced with a message that didn't have anything to do with a sense of justice.

"Pervert," she accused. "I'm not even from your *species.*" But she couldn't help smiling at his appreciation.

***************

While the transformed pair were considering their options, the men inside the room were doing the same thing.

"Who are those guys?" asked Ray Cole, who happened to be both the youngest and the lowest-ranking guy on the inside.

"What did you see?" asked Brett Renfro, who happened to be both the oldest and the highest-ranking guy on the inside. He was by no means old, though. He had the "rode hard and put up wet" signs of a hard life in a face creased with deep wrinkles accented by a nose that had signs of several 'readjustments'. But he had the hard, lean look of a man for whom high-order physical fitness was as much a part of life as breathing. Physically, he was giving nothing away to any of the other men in the room.

The five men were all dressed in dark utilities with the pants bloused into combat boots. All had sidearms and there were several rifles laid around the room ready to hand, but they knew the door to their inner 'safe room' was protection against anything except heavy weapons or explosives. While they would go down fighting if it came to that, all but the youngest two thought they were expert enough with pistol to counter anything less than a major assault. Cole and one other younger man held his rifle at the ready. One senior operative beside Renfro was listening to the discussion, and yet another senior operative was busily typing at a laptop.

"Close that down," Renfro ordered the man at the laptop. "No communication when we're under attack. If we win, then we can report later. But we don't want to take the chance that they're monitoring our comms."

"Yeah, I know," the seated man said, but he continued to type. "I'm just setting the encryption."

Renfro nodded at that exception, then turned back to Cole.

Cole answered the question thoughtfully, closing his eyes so that his mind could recreate what he had seen before retreating to his assigned position of last-ditch defense. It didn't make any sense, and he looked at his younger partner for support. The other man, Juan Hermanez, just shrugged.

Cole shrugged in turn, then looked at Renfro. "Okay, Boss, but you're not gonna believe it."

"Try me," Renfro ordered curtly.

"It was a woman. A six-foot brunette wearing black armor - ancient, real metal armor, like Greek or Roman or something. Not just a ballistic vest."

Renfro scowled, but he didn't contradict the report. In fact, he nodded. "I saw her myself. How many others were there?"

"None," Cole reported, again looking at Hermanez. This time the other man nodded in support.

Cole continued. "And all she had for a weapon was a sword - or maybe a long knife. Whatever. She just flicked that thing around and deflected the bullets. Except, I think I hit her at least once. Maybe a couple of times."

"Me, too," Hermanez interjected. "It must have hit her armor. In fact, I think I got her once in the helmet. She didn't even twitch."

By this time the seated man, John Gleason, had finished and shut down his laptop. He rose and joined the conversation, looking skeptical. "How much have you had to drink?"

"None," Cole said firmly. "I'm on - was on - standby. You know that."

"Yeah, and you young punks think that a beer or two won't make any difference. And that can lead to a six-pack."

"Not me," Cole insisted.

"Me, neither," Hermanez added.

"So how did she take down the team? Did she stab them with her sword?"

"No," Cole replied. "She has some sort of . . . knockout thing. She just pointed her palm at someone and they dropped. I didn't see everyone go down and I swear she must be able to send that pulse around corners or something, but everyone I saw go down just sort of dropped when she wasn't even that close to them. When it was obvious the guys weren't going to stop her, I came here per SOP."

Gleason looked at Renfro again, expecting him to challenge the report, but the senior man just nodded thoughtfully. Finally he spoke. "Okay, I saw at least a couple of guys drop, and I saw that woman before I ducked in here. I still doubt that she was alone, but nothing you said contradicts what I saw."

He sighed and looked again at the reinforced door. "It contradicts the hell out of reality, but I saw the same things."

"So what are we gonna do?" asked Gleason.

"You got the alert out?" Renfro asked. At Gleason's nod, Renfro continued. "Then we sit tight. The support team will be here in a couple of hours. If this woman - and whoever she's with - have heavy weapons and are willing to use them, then we're toast. But they haven't used any yet. I don't have an explanation for how she was doing that stun thing, nor how she was able to get a sword to move fast enough to block bullets. It's data. We'll cover it in our report and let the higher-ups worry about it . . . if we survive to make a report.

*******************

Alayla looked at the heavy door again, then her grin returned and she walked over to it and simply knocked.

No one answered, so she knocked again then called out. "We can do this the easy way, or the hard way. I recommend easy."

Still no answer from inside. She drew Stonecutter again and let it start its thrumming beat against the heavy door. Stone, metal, or wood didn't seem to matter much to the blade. The pulse rose until it was more like a saw's whine than a hammer beat, but it slid through the material with steady progress. Alayla had started her cut near the top and she pulled it slowly toward the bottom in a line about six inches from the opening side.

A hail of bullets attacked the exposed part of the blade - Alayla could feel the impacts even above the thrumming vibration from Stonecutter itself. But none penetrated and the lead storm didn't seem to harm the short sword as it continued until the door started to twist away from the cut - helped by the continuing impact of bullets.

"Come lean on this thing," she ordered. Furrtive flowed forward and made sure the door was stable until the cut was complete. When she was done, she put Stonecutter away and drew Shieldbreaker again. When she was ready, she nodded at Furrtive.

Wicked talons sunk themselves into the newly opened crack and he ripped the door wide. At the first sign of light from the interior, Alayla vaulted through the opening, Shieldbreaker screaming defiance in her hand.

Chapter 5 - "Wayfinder"

Brett Renfro held back in order to observe when the woman entered the room. The others were shooting and anything he could add to that wouldn't make much difference. There was a bit of distortion near her that he noted as something to consider when he had the time, but the first priority was defeating his obvious attacker. She was apparently invulnerable to bullets. In some cases they were deflected with the flat of the short sword. In others he could see the edge of the blade split a bullet in two - once so sharply that the two pieces actually glanced off the helmet as they continued past her head - not that she seemed inconvenienced by that. After an observation that took only a few seconds, he decided on a different tactic and picked up a chair to throw at her. The sword in her hand didn't seem to care what sort of projectile was inbound. The chair was deflected as easily as the bullets.

By this time three of his four colleagues were down. He confirmed that she seemed to be able to send a stun pulse from her palm, and more importantly that she didn't seem to want to hurt anyone.

"Cease fire!" he shouted. His remaining men heard him - though it only helped one of them. Gleason went down to a final stun blast, leaving only Cole standing.

The woman stopped as soon as the others did. She stood for a moment looking at her opponents, then lowered her sword. "I told you easy would be better," she said.

Renfro took his first really good look at the woman and what he saw was more amazing than her ability to deflect bullets. The woman was tall, but not inordinately so. He estimated her height without the modest heels on her boots to be right about six feet. It would have been a lot harder to estimate her weight. At first she seemed almost slender, aside from a dramatic bust. Certainly her waist was very slim. That would have put her in the buck-thirty range perhaps. But a second appraisal showed she was amazingly fit, with the perfect balance of muscularity and sleek smoothness that showed a woman who was honestly strong and not artificially sculpted like a body builder. Renfro felt she had a lot more muscle - and denser muscles - than any woman he had ever met. That took her weight into the unknown category. But even those features were not the most amazing thing about her.

In the suddenly quiet room, the tall, dark-haired woman had a presence that seemed to fill the room - as though there were energy crackling around her in a hypercharged aura. It showed in the fierce gaze that peered from the slit in her helmet, but it also showed in the regally erect posture and the poised - almost coiled - stance. This was more than a trained fighter. This was 'warrior' as an archetype. Maybe even something more.

"Who are you? What do you want?" Renfro asked.

"Who I am is my business, and I'm after information, of course," she said.

When it was clear he was not going to resume hostilities, she removed her helmet to show a beauty that was even more supernal than her warrior virtues. Renfro noted that her dark, almond eyes took a quick glance at the space between him and Cole and for a moment the distortion he had seen earlier took on a more solid form - or at least, the boundaries of the distortion seemed a little easier to identify. Whatever it was stood between Renfro and Cole and there was an implied threat should either reach for a weapon.




"On what topic?" Renfro asked.

"On you, for a start," she said. "Who are you, and who do you work for?"

"I'm not at liberty to say," he replied.

"Your people were shouting that you are federal agents. Do you have any proof of that?"

He declined to answer, which was of course an answer.

Cole started to edge to the side, but before Renfro could tell him to stop the woman had drawn a dagger from her forearm armor and thrown it at him. The dagger penetrated first the sling on his AR and then the wall, taking his rifle with it. She seemed almost amused by the distraction and showed no further surprise when the dagger started to vibrate. In a flash too fast to see clearly, it was back in her hand.

"Naughty, naughty," she chided the man.

Despite his normal self control, Renfro felt his eyes flick to the clock on the wall. The woman noticed, and smiled again.

"Expecting reinforcements?" she asked, but was apparently unsurprised that Renfro again declined to answer. "Well, that's not good news for either of us, I suppose. It means you get a headache, and we get to try something else."

Her left palm flashed almost negligently, for all that it was as quick as a bolt of lightning. A shimmer in the air pulsed toward Cole who collapsed bonelessly to the floor. Renfro had the satisfaction of knowing he had not surrendered any useful information when the palm swung to him - though as he felt the pulse he realized he had gained very little in return, and most of that so incredible that his superiors would not credit him with success in this encounter.

When he came to, he saw that the rest of his team was already up and moving around. Other than a few minor injuries from falls - and headaches all around - his team was unharmed. A few had head bruises that showed their own knockouts had been caused by something more conventional than a stun blast, but none of them had anything to add to the overall report.

None but Gleason, who was looking at the table where his laptop had resided.

"What did they get?" Renfro asked.

"Everything, and nothing," Gleason said unhelpfully. "Our mission orders, order of battle, protocols, and contact information were all on the laptop. On the other hand, the encryption on that is so tough that even NSA couldn't break it with a month of supercomputer time, and if they're not really, really careful they'll just cause it to lock up. Permanently. As in, hard flush of all the data with an overwrite to prevent reconstruction. It's not a problem. I guarantee it."

With the encounter entirely over, the cavalry finally arrived. It was going to be a long night, Renfro knew, but apparently it was not as much of a disaster as it had seemed.

Well, except for the fact they were going to have to convince anyone of their story of a warrior woman who took down the entire team. They'd be lucky if their next assignment was merely shoveling sludge out of Calcutta sewers for a month. Rats and all.

He would have been a lot less sanguine about the laptop if he had known about Wayfinder.

Once they were safely away, Alayla manipulated the ring so that they could drive without anyone finding them remarkable. There wasn't any reason their credit cards would be less supportive than before, but for some reason Savanna felt they should pay cash and provide false identities to the hotel clerk. If, somehow, they were tracked to this point, they didn't want to compromise their 'real' identities of Savanna and Troy. It was nearing dawn so they paid for two nights in advance - the one they were on and the next one as well - and told the clerk not to send housekeeping by until requested. Despite the fact she was always 'fresh' after a transformation, Savanna decided a shower would feel good before going to sleep. Later, she roused from her slumber when Troy knocked on the door at a time the clock said was almost noon.

"You up in there?" his voice called.

"I am now - but don't come in yet," she answered. She changed from a nightgown that was pretty enough to trigger guilty feelings - both because of her pleasure at the silky material and because of her pleasure at how she looked in it. Neither were things she wanted to share with Troy. And she had to do her hair and makeup unless she wanted her 'reference' shape to include 'bed hair' and a bare face. For a woman with her bounty the designer jeans and slightly-too-tight top were hardly 'neutral' clothing, but they weren't stridently feminine aside from the shapes they covered, and she couldn’t do anything about them. She knocked in turn on Troy's door a while later and had brought the laptop with her.

"What are we going to do with that?" he asked. "You, I mean, Cody was always better with computers than I was but I didn't think you were really that much of a hacker."

"Not at all," she admitted. "But we have another choice."

She pointed at the open part of the room for Troy and started the appropriate movements of the stone in her ring. In moments Alayla stood there with an almost-seen Furrtive.

::Do you think Alayla is better with computers than Savanna?::

"Yes and no," she answered unhelpfully. "Alayla can cheat."

She pulled out Wayfinder and regarded it for a moment. "I don't think this thing is as capable as the one in the books. There, you could have some unformed idea like, 'find something to make me happy' and it would lead you to something you hadn't even imagined. I think this one needs a fairly tight image of *what* you want to find so that you really only need to know *where* it is. I think if I wanted to 'get rich' it might point at a bank, with no help on how to get the money out of it. But if I asked for the location of a gold nugget, it would lead me right to one."

::Okay,:: Furrtive said. ::I'm not sure how that helps here.::

"I expect this laptop is encrypted, but all I need to break it is to 'find' the right sequence of keys for the password. I'm hoping that is specific enough for Wayfinder."

She focused her mind, then waved Wayfinder over the keyboard. It immediately quivered in her hand, but it didn't point clearly at a key. Instead, it seemed to bounce back and forth. It took Alayla a moment to figure out what was needed.

"Duh," she said wryly. "Shift and . . . let's see . . . G."

With the first key down, and knowing what Wayfinder's motion would be for two keys that had to be pressed simultaneously, it still took several minutes to discern the long string of characters, numbers, and special symbols in the password. Still, it was done and the computer seemed happy. Once it was clearly booting up, Alayla put Wayfinder away. She glanced at Furrtive to warn him, then switched them back into the more-normal forms.

"If there's another level of passwords, I'll switch us back," she said. "But I don't like typing while I'm wearing gloves."

They found out the first answer almost immediately. The team was definitely sent to stop their energy research. The attack was specific to Cody Bransford and Dylan Jamieson, and to Isolde. And it was clear that success was defined not by intimidating a couple of grad students, but by making sure they could not continue their research at all. The second tier of data showed that the attack team worked for a company called Fafnir Special Services and that they had what amounted to a get-out-of-jail free card from the US as long as all they violated were weapons laws. There was an implication that even more would be readily forgiven.

With that to start from, they used the laptop and the motel wi/fi to get some background on Fafnir. After they got past the mythological dragon and the German precision machine tool company, they found what they were looking for. Fafnir was apparently one of those shadowy paramilitary companies that various governments and large corporations found convenient to assign deniable missions. The information they found online included the identity of the Fafnir CEO - Edward Garrison - who was, like most of the company, ex-military. The services they provided were not well defined. Supposedly they consisted primarily of training other forces, but the pictures showed armed men in various settings, one of which included zodiac boats like those that had attacked Isolde.

"That tells us at least two things," Savanna said. "One is that the guys we took down are not actually pirates. They pseudo-military operatives with a mission other than simple larceny. The second is that they were operating under orders from someone higher up."

"Big Oil?" Troy asked.

"I don't really care," Savanna said, "at least not as the next step. If this Garrison knows who contracted for a mission that involved marooning a couple of grad students on a deserted island, then he's the guy we want to talk to. If not, then he's still responsible. If one of his subordinates interpreted a mission in an unauthorized way then he'll want to get to the bottom of it almost as much as we do. But willing or not, he's going to tell us who decided to screw with us."

It was apparently lucky that she finished her thought just when she did. In the brief moment of silence, they heard the crunch of tires on the small pebbles in the motel parking lot. It started the hair up on the back of her neck (figuratively, because the heavy mass didn't show that from the outside). Without a word of explanation, she rotated the stone in her ring and Alayla appeared. In another second, Alayla had Stonecutter out and was carving a new exit in the back wall of their motel room.

Furrtive didn't argue. By the time he realized what she was doing, he had caught the scent of gun oil and bore cleaner, and had heard multiple footsteps with the artificially soft tread of stealth. They were out the back of the building within seconds of that first unexpected sound, and deep into the shadows of an adjacent parking building in not much more time than that.

::Why did you run?:: Furrtive asked.

"Why did you follow so readily?" Alayla countered.

::Because I smelled guns,:: he replied. ::And they weren't walking like normal motel guests.::

"Your reasons are better than mine," she admitted. "I just knew they were after us. I don't know how or why, but I was sure of it."

::More of your Alayla abilities? Some sort of carry-over?::

"How should I know?" she asked in turn. "I just knew we had to get out of there. I didn't analyze it at the time; just reacted."

Without any warning or offer of an opportunity to surrender, the door to their room was broken in followed by a now-standard demand to 'Freeze, federal agents.' From their concealing shadows, Alayla and Furrtive could see through the hole they had carved in the back wall enough to identify the same black utilities and automatic weapons that Fafnir had used previously. Furrtive thought he recognized the voice of the man who had been in charge at the villa, and Alayla didn't feel the need to argue. The clearest voice was one they had not heard before, and it was clear because of very unstealthy volume.

"Goddamn it, that's not possible!" the voice yelled.

The response was too quiet to hear over the sounds of too many men in a too-small space, but the shouter's next comment was clear enough. "I'm telling you, there's no way they broke that encryption - especially not this fast. And even more because anyone good enough to break my encryption would be smart enough not to use this same laptop to surf the goddamn web, for chrissake!"

"Oops," Alayla said quietly. "I guess that's how they found us so quickly."

The voice continued to declare the impossibility of any hacker attack on his system, demanding that whoever was in charge officially declare that someone on the inside was a spy. Apparently he didn't get the response he wanted because his angry and increasingly profane voice continued to cover any further sounds from the room. Alayla shrugged and looked at her companion, then fiddled with the ring again. She breathed a sigh of relief when her purse materialized on her shoulder, along with the jeans and top she had been wearing.

"Damn," she said softly. "Now I won't get a chance to wear that dress."

"Geez, girl, you have lost it," Troy said, but he was smiling. "We had to cut our way out of our room, and we just missed getting kidnapped or shot, or probably something worse. And you're worried about a damn dress?"

"It was a nice dress," she said obstinately, and if she had seen the pout on her full lips, she'd have been embarrassed at the ultra-feminine expression.

They had their ring-provided IDs, credit cards, and a replenished supply of cash so they just started walking through the parking building until they reached the opposite side. Then they found a bus stop and rode the bus for a while, switching with real randomness because it took three changes before they found out which route ran where. Once they were satisfied their backtrail was untraceable - they couldn't have retraced their own steps if they wanted to - they found a rental car place and got another vehicle.

And Savanna went shopping.

When she returned, she found a note that said Troy had gone to the pool. They had arranged a temporary respite at a medium-level hotel twenty miles from both the villa and the rapidly departed motel. It was populated by the not-quite-elite who couldn't afford the luxury of the Miami gold coast, yet wanted Florida sunshine and beaches. Savanna looked down from the window of their room, which overlooked the pool, to see that the hotel had little touches of luxury like poolside drink service so it made a very inviting place to wait. She also noticed that Troy had found some swim trunks . . . and an audience.

[Two can play at that game,] she decided. One of her purchases had been a swim suit of her own . . . . or at least, something that pretended to be one.

When she walked into the pool area she was gratified to hear a collective intake of breath, followed by absolute silence except for the steady tapping of her heels. She smiled at Troy and took a lounge chair next to his.

"Close your mouth, moose," she said softly. "We're supposed to be dating, remember. You should have seen me in a swimsuit before this."

"No, I'd have remembered," he said, keeping his voice low enough that his contradiction couldn't be heard by anyone else. "The last time we went swimming together, you had a different suit and you didn't, um, fill it out quite so well."

"This little thing?" she said, snickering. "It's just something I threw on. Do you like it?"

"Damn, girl, you are *not* nice. Fishing for compliments?"

The bikini she wore claimed to be one size fits all. It said so on the label. However, it must have been misplaced from the juniors area, because it was only through courage and determination that that the brave little triangles of scarlet shimmer covered enough to be legal in public . . . and the sharply-disapproving women who had watched her entrance thought it shouldn't have been.




However, when they started their own conversation the stasis was released on the rest of the pool area. Movement and conversation returned, though the topic of the other conversations was revealed in the glances - and some cases, daggered looks - sent Savanna's way from those nearby. The pool attendant came by and Savanna gave him credit for not staring at her boobs when he took her drink order. Then she started giggling hysterically.

"What's wrong?" Troy asked.

It took her a moment to get herself back together. She had to start over when she tried to tell Troy about her observation, interrupting herself with renewed laughter. Finally she managed to calm down enough to speak, though when she finished Troy did not find the same amusement.

"That pool guy, who came over? I was noticing that he was *not* staring at my . . . I mean . . ," her voice dropped to a whisper, ". . . at my boobs. I was giving him credit - in my mind - when I realized what he *was* staring at."

"So. . . ?" prompted Troy.

"Troy, 'darling,'" Savanna said, voice dripping with husky intimacy, "if you need anything, like, oh, some sun tan lotion . . . applied to all the, um, hard-to-reach places . . ."

At what seemed like an offer from the beautiful brunette, Troy started to shift uncomfortably on his lounge. Savanna's eyes made her own visual inspection of the probable cause of Troy's discomfort, then she dropped her bomb. "I'm sure our little pool attendant would be happy to oblige."

"What? You mean . . .? Oh my god," Troy said, looking over at the bar area.

Savanna noticed that his semaphore of interest lost . . . interest. Rapidly.

A wicked little smile played on her bright lips as she teased her friend. "Why Troy, you blush quite prettily for such a big man."

He grimaced at her comment, then sighed. Putting his sunglasses on, he leaned back in his lounge chair. He didn't say anything when the attendant brought Savanna's drink. After a moment, she felt the silence become uncomfortable.

"What's wrong, Troy?" she asked. "I was just teasing."

"I know," he said, still leaning back in his chair.

Savanna was afraid she had really offended him when he took off his sunglasses and looked at her. He didn't make any attempt to hide a slow, appreciative inspection from her deep, violet eyes to her delicate, painted toes. Then he let his eyes rise to meet hers again.

"Do you still feel like Cody? On the inside, I mean?"

"Sure. Don't you feel like Dylan?"

"Yes," he said. "Do you think I act like Dylan?"

"Mostly," Savanna said. "I mean, you're bigger now, and better looking. Some of that is attitude - not arrogance, but realistic acceptance that you're a babe magnet. That changes the way you look at things."

"Do you really think I'm a 'babe magnet?'" he asked.

"Dude, look at yourself," she said, laughing. "Or just look at those girls in the pool trying so hard to get your attention."

Troy smiled at her comment, but a thoughtful expression soon returned to his face. "I feel like Dylan, but I don't, also. I feel bigger, and stronger - which is obvious - but I also feel more confident. And I move like I've always been this size. How much of that confidence comes with being bigger and stronger . . . and as you mentioned, better looking than old Dylan was ever going to be? So, am I Dylan with some . . . evolution, or are the differences more than that?"

"I don't know," Savanna said. "Are you trying to say that something similar applies to me?"

"Yes," he said. "You move like a confident, graceful, very feminine woman. Your expressions, the little smiles, the pouts, the way you toss your hair when you want to be noticed - all of those are perfect for a beautiful woman. Yet they are not just things that would show in a photograph. So, at some level, you are 'directing' those motions. Did Cody know how to move like that? Is there something you never told me?"

"Geez, no, dude. No way," Savanna said sharply, but then her own eyes became thoughtful. "I told you that there seem to be some sort of 'programs' ready to go - when I trigger them, I have new abilities."

"Yes," Troy agreed. "So, do you still feel like Cody?"

"Yes," she repeated, but this time her voice was more thoughtful. "The other things . . . I guess I don't think about them. I just do them."

Troy nodded. "It's the same for me. I don't have to think about my size, but I do think I move better than Dylan did. More balanced, as though more than just my strength is better. I think I could fight now. As Troy, I mean, not just as Furrtive."

Savanna nodded, allowing him to continue.

"Obviously, the differences for you are greater . . ," he interrupted himself to lighten the mood with a snarky grin, ". . . really great. But you seem to have feminine attitudes as well as feminine, um, skills. All the shopping, for example, and . . . well, that's an awesome bikini. Do you think if someone had told Cody he'd be transformed into a beautiful woman that he'd ever have accepted the need to wear such a . . . flattering bikini?"

"What's your point?" Savanna asked, but it wasn't a challenge of disagreement.

"I guess my point is that you seem to be very comfortable in *your* new skin as well."

She nodded. "I guess so. I mean, I'm not curled up in a ball somewhere, rejecting this reality."

Troy wouldn't accept mere non-rejection as her attitude. "It's more than that. Are you 'comfortable' as Savanna?"

After a moment, she nodded. "I still want to get all this resolved and go back to being Cody again," she claimed. "But until we do, I guess I can live with this body."

"And its attitudes?"

"'Its attitudes'? You act like you think this body has a mind of its own."

Troy shrugged. He looked over at the pool attendant again, and said, "I don't think anyone knows how much of sexual orientation is 'nature' versus 'nurture.' Frankly, I think human sexuality is complex enough that it's likely to be some of both. Seeing you adapt to your new form . . . doing things that are not just learning to use makeup, but actively embracing feminine attitudes about shopping and skimpy bikinis . . . for that matter, seeing you *choose* to wear spike heels with a tiny bikini when you go to lounge by a pool . . . how much does your new body - which would be the 'nature' part of your attitudes - drive all of that?"

"I don't know," she replied.

"I don't either, of course," Troy said. He put his sunglasses on and leaned back again. "I don't think we'll solve it sitting here, but . . . well, Savanna or Cody, I want you to be happy. If you feel, um, urges to do things as Savanna that you wouldn't have done as Cody, then I just wanted you to know that I'm okay with it."
"Look, dude, I'm not going to jump into bed with you just because I put on a skimpy swimsuit."

He just nodded, accepting without argument.

"No, really," she persisted, now fully into pout mode. "I’m sorry I put this thing on."

"I'm not," Troy said, letting another snarky grin show. "You're so beautiful it hurts . . . literally, in my case . . . and showing it off makes the whole world a better place to be."

"Oh, you . . . pig," she said, but her pout had softened into a smile. "But I'm still not going to bed with you."

"Too bad," Troy replied, and this time his smile was much broader. "I think we'd be awesome together . . . and you do keep bringing it up."

"I'll show you how to 'bring it down,'" she offered, then demonstrated by dumping her drink in his lap. She leaned back in her own lounge chair and said, "Maybe your little pool attendant will offer to clean that up for you."

Troy barely heard her comment as he jumped up, hooting and spluttering. His eyes glanced over to where the attendant stood at the bar and his strong face showed another dose of embarrassed heat. He didn't say anything, though. He just looked at his shapely partner - letting another slow inspection make a point that didn't need words - then walked over to jump in the pool.

While he was gone, Savanna was thinking about his comments. Was she still Cody where it mattered? Not the outside. She was still grounded enough in reality to recognize she truly was beautiful; recognize it even without giving in to a vanity that she was trying to control. But the inside? How much of an ancient mythological goddess was still part of her - part of her inner soul - when she was Savanna? Even without any proof she felt - in a way that was a real as her faith in the next morning's sunrise - that Alayla existed to bring about justice. Alayla was a 'war' goddess, not just a warrior who happened to have some oversized boobs molded into her breastplate. Cody had been a reasonably honorable guy. He'd want justice, too - especially when it was justice for a wrong done to him personally like sinking the Isolde and destroying all their research. But in Savanna's heart, she knew that her desire for justice was more than just personal revenge. She shared that with Alayla in a way that was not a carryover from Cody.

But what about the rest? What about her desire to have nice clothes . . . and to show off her new body in a ridiculous little bikini? What about, like Troy had said, *choosing* to wear spike-heeled sandals to the pool area? Cody would not have done that - not just because guys didn't wear heels, but because he was never that much of an exhibitionist. That attitude was not just compensation for a new body shape, like wearing an all-too-necessary bra. That was a . . . celebration of her new form. Of her new identity.

And if that happiness in her new body *shape* was real, then would there be a time when she would be happy with the way her new body *functioned?* Would they be as 'awesome' in bed as Troy suggested? Despite her denial with Troy, in her private, internal consultation, Savanna knew she was at least curious about that.

A flame of curiosity that sparked brightly when Troy heaved himself from the pool, his washboard abs glinting in the sun and his swim trunks plastered to buns of steel . . . and another shape as well.

"Are you getting too much sun?" he asked. "Your face is getting kinda red."

"I'll be okay," she said.

After Troy settled back on his lounge seat, the pool attendant came over to see if they wanted anything more to drink. Savanna noted with a silent smirk that he hadn't come over when she was lying there alone. But it gave her a moment to think about their joint endeavor as well as her own internal feelings.

"I've been thinking about what you said," she began, and then lied by omission when she didn't tell him what she her thoughts had really focused on. "I think some part of Alayla carries over when I'm Savanna. There have been a couple of times when I didn't want to risk the Savanna and Troy IDs, so we used fake IDs and paid cash. Both times we ended up abandoning something that could have been used to compromise us - the van and the motel room."

"You were also really quick to pick up on the attack at the motel," Troy said. "You were Alayla and carving on the back wall before I had a clue what was going on."

"Some sort of, um, precognition?" she asked.

"Maybe," Troy said. "Or some instinct that didn't actually need a glimpse of the future - just good tradecraft."

"'Tradecraft?'" she repeated. "You make us sound like spies."

"Well, agents anyway," Troy said. "Agents of justice, maybe, instead of a government, but we are on a covert mission."

"We weren't too covert when we attacked the villa," Savanna pointed out.

"Okay, then call it a secret identity, and enough instinct to know how to protect it," he offered. "Anyway, I'm not sure you need the ability to see into the future to know how to protect these identities. Unless there's something else . . ?"

"Maybe," she said. "Not directly, like visions, but what bugs me is that we found that ring several hours before they attacked."

"Oh, yeah," Troy said. "That can't be a coincidence."

"Right," Savanna said, then she sighed. "I don't suppose that it matters. Whether we're getting some sort of precognition from Alayla or it's just good tradecraft, as you said, we need to keep these identities protected."

"Maybe," Troy said, surprising her with only partial agreement. "How are we going to proceed from here?"

"You mean, against Fafnir?"

"Yes, and whoever is behind them."

Savanna shrugged. "I'm not sure. We could use Wayfinder to find Garrison."

"What do we do then?" Troy asked. "Suppose we kidnap him and 'make him talk.' He might be an innocent pawn - perhaps a bad manager with a rogue unit in his organization, but not actively involved himself."

"Yeah. Like I said, maybe he'll want to find out what is going on as much as we do," Savanna offered.

"We can't count on that," Troy said. "So we can't just approach him on the street and tell him about Isolde, either."

"It sounds like you have an idea," prompted Savanna.

"Maybe," Troy said. "Look, we're supposed to be private investigators. Maybe we can get a job with Fafnir. I'll bet they're looking for operatives."

Savanna looked skeptical. "For all we know, our IDs are only as deep as our wallets. If they do a background check, we're toast."

"So we don't let them," Troy said. "Part of our appeal will be that we're 'off the grid.'"

This time Savanna nodded, adding a bit to the plan. "We need to have *them* offer a job to *us.* Somehow we need to make their acquaintance, let them discover that we're operatives and available for contract work - not direct employment - and once we're inside, we can look for the source of the contract on our research."

"Sounds like a plan," Troy said. Then he smiled and said, "Since you've only had one drink - seeing as how the first one got spilled - do you want another before we go back to the room?"

"That's 'rooms,' pig," she said, but she didn't feel the need to suppress a light-hearted giggle. "And sure, since you're offering. It'll give your bartender friend a chance to spend more time basking in your presence."

"I'll bask your ass if you keep it up," Troy threatened, but he was happy to see her happy again, so he waved at the attendant.

Chapter 6 - "Skills"

In the modern age, the internet was almost as good at finding things as Wayfinder; at least, if the 'thing' to be found was information. And public libraries have internet access that is basically untraceable as long as you don't want to go to naughty sites. There was little public data on Edward Garrison beyond his appearance on the Fafnir webpage. However, it did mention that his wife's name was Naomi and a search on that revealed that a Naomi Garrison was an officer of the Pink Mist Ladies Shotgun Club. In turn, the website for that club showed that the members were about to embark on a Caribbean cruise on which a special sporting clays tournament would be held as the ship sailed between ports.

"We need to get on that ship, and in that tournament," Troy said.

"Do you think you can shoot a shotgun?" asked Savanna.

"You know, I think I can," he said. "It's part of that feeling of greater . . . capability, I guess, but I think I can fight, and shoot pistol and shotgun and, hell, I can probably throw a knife almost as well as Alayla."

"Did you ever shoot one before? As Dylan?"

"A few times. I was okay for a beginner - didn't close my eyes or anything. And I had the most important part right - swinging smoothly through the target. The only problem I had - well, the biggest problem I had - was getting the lead right."

"I never shot a shotgun before," Savanna said. "But I had a pistol and we'd go plinking sometimes. However, if we're going to interest Garrison and Fafnir, we need to be better than beginners."

"I guess there's only one way to find out," Troy said.

So they bought a couple of shotguns - nice Browning Citoris. They weren't in the Weatherby class, let alone Perazzis, but they were about right for a couple of successful private investigators. And they found a range that would let them try them out.

Troy was pretty good. He was into the 20's on his first rounds of trap and skeet, and managed to shoot in the high teens even at sporting clays. They both felt that with a little practice he'd be able to run a full set of targets.

Savanna didn't need the practice. From the first clay bird, she just dusted them - one after the other. At first it was fun to do so well, but it actually stopped being fun before they had finished the sporting clays. There was no challenge and it didn't even take much concentration.

She whispered to Troy as they walked between the last couple of stations on the sporting clays range. "Makes you wonder what ancient Greek war goddesses did for fun. It certainly wouldn't be anything that involved warrior skills."

Troy didn't answer right away, and when she looked at him she saw a flush of heat in his cheeks. At her frown, he sighed. "Okay, so I was thinking that looking like you do, 'fun' wouldn't have to involve warrior skills."

"Geez, dude, keep it under control."

"Geez, dudette, take a look in a mirror. If there is any of Cody left in you at all, you won't blame me for thinking about your . . . skills."

She sighed, but couldn't keep a smile from tugging at her lips.

"Gotcha," Troy said triumphantly - just loud enough that the attendant heard.

"What?" he asked. Troy twitched and his face showed some heat again, but he brazened it out with a discussion on the setup for the next station. Savanna followed a step behind, trying not to notice her own response to Troy's implied source of 'fun.'

Distracted or not, she ran the targets at the next station as well.

The next step was getting on the right cruise, plus making sure they would be invited to shoot in the tournament. Both were straightforward. Money talks. So a week later they were checking in to a high-end suite on a mid-size - but almost ostentatiously luxurious - cruise ship. The Haven Aurora catered to clientele who didn't like crowds. Her total passenger capacity was in the low hundreds in a ship that would pack over a thousand in typical Caribbean cattle-car configuration. Yet her staff was apparently the same size as those denser occupancy ships - certainly there were stewards everywhere they looked.

Getting away from the dock and out of the harbor took a couple of hours. In the strange way that bureaucrats have of keeping the masses under control, it was acceptable for the ship to have several hundred shotguns onboard as long as the passengers couldn't have access to them. As soon as they were outside the 12-mile limit, the wealthy clientele would again be considered responsible enough to touch their own firearms. The first stage of the sporting clays tournament would start the next morning.

Troy and Savanna wandered about the ship while it made its sedate way out of port. Like most of the others onboard, they circulated among the firing stations to see what sort of setup they would be facing. It was, of course, a coincidence that they happened to reach one of the stations just as the Garrisons did the same.

"Oh, look, Troy," Savanna gushed, "this one uses minis, too. I love shooting at minis."

"Shooting at is right," he said. "I might as well just *throw* my shells at those damn things."

Edward Garrison smiled and nodded at them. "You don't like minis?"

Troy looked at him and smiled back. "Actually, I like minis. I like the challenge." He held out his hand and said, "Troy Hammer."

"Ed Garrison," the other man replied. "This is my wife, Naomi."

Savanna decided he must stand about 6'1" or so, since he was just about as tall as she was in her heels. That made him 5 or 6 inches shorter than Troy. He had a lean, tight look as opposed to Troy's massive bulk, but he was clearly fit at something just the far side of 40. Naomi was in her 30's and if she'd have been just a few years younger she would have looked like a second-time-around trophy wife. She was blonde, elegantly stylish even in her casual clothes, and her bosom was just a bit too firm for a natural endowment. Savanna decided that the other woman was determined to keep her man from straying by keeping his attention on her, which was a good strategy as far as the even-more-statuesque blonde was concerned.

"This is my boss, Savanna Sylvan," Troy countered, pulling her attention back to the conversation. He smiled in a way that showed he wasn't embarrassed at the apparent subordinate position.

Naomi Garrison smiled at Savanna. "So, you like minis?"

"Oh, sure," Savanna said enthusiastically, then her expression became thoughtful. "Didn't I see your name on the list of club officers? We haven't joined yet, but they allowed us to come on the cruise anyway."

"Yes, I'm the president," Naomi responded with a smile. "So I guess if you don't like minis - or do - I'm the one to talk to."

She turned back to look appreciatively at the towering Hammer for a moment, and turned back to Savanna and said, "I haven't really reviewed the contestant data - at least, not for the ones who just came to shoot on the cruise. It's one of our bigger recruiting events, though. I hope you'll consider joining our club. We have plenty of events where the men are allowed as well."

"I might," Savanna said, then snickered. "Well, I'll certainly *consider* it. I meant I might join up. I love shooting."

The club president turned back to Troy. "So, Mr. Hammer, you said that, um, Savanna was your boss. Were you speaking figuratively?"

Troy chuckled and sent a companionable grin at Ed Garrison before focusing on Naomi. "Meaning, is she my boss in some more explicit way than just the fact that she's pretty enough to have men falling at her feet? Yes. We both work for Sylvan Investigations and as the name implies, it's her company."

Savanna dutifully blushed at the compliment, then shrugged. "I guess here on the cruise, since we're not 'on duty' we can admit that we're, um, dating as well." She looked up at her big escort and leaned into him a little. "Since there's only the two of us in the company, it's not like there's anyone to complain about favoritism. But I try to maintain professionalism when we're on the job."

"Ah, good for you," Garrison said. "As it happens, I'm the CEO of a security firm myself . . ."

"No business on the cruise," Savanna interrupted, and she let just enough strength show to make it clear to the Garrisons that she really was the boss of her little company. "Let's just enjoy the cruise, and the competition."

"Of course," Garrison said graciously. They stayed together while they toured the stations, commenting on each other on techniques that might be effective for each stand. It was nearing dinner time when they finished the rounds.

"Do you have dinner plans?" Naomi asked politely.

"Not really," Savanna said. "We don't really know anyone on the cruise yet - except for you, of course."

"Then you should join us," Naomi said. "You can consider it part of my recruitment drive. Oh, we do like to dress up a bit for dinner. Is that a problem?"

"No," Savanna said. "What sort of dress will you wear?"

Naomi pulled her to the side a little so that the men could talk about whatever interested them. "I intend to keep Ed's attention from straying too far, so I have an LBD that's probably just a bit too short. But I have enough tan that I don't look too pale in it and my legs are pretty good for an old broad."

"Naomi!" Savanna said with a gasp, then a giggle. "You look fabulous. I was afraid I was going to have to stick Troy with a pin or something to get his attention back on me."

Naomi laughed, but she shook her head. "I don't think you have anything to worry about. But I'm giving you fair warning - hands off my Ed."

"Oh, Troy keeps me satisfied, thank you very much," Savanna said with a smirk, and a coy glance over at her partner. Then she looked back at Naomi. "Seriously, when I first saw you I have to admit that I thought you might be Ed's trophy wife - I'm not kidding. You're gorgeous and I love your sense of style! But now that we've gotten to know each other a little, I can see you two are wonderfully compatible."

"Thank you, dear. I try. And I'm happy to say that it seems to be working . . . even if Ed can't keep his eyes off you."

"Only if I'm standing near you," Savanna assured her.

They completed their obligatory mutual admiration session and the two couples parted ways to dress for dinner. When they rendezvoused again, Naomi was in a tight little black dress with a sequined bodice that showed off her (possibly augmented) assets almost dangerously. And as promised, it showed a lot of tanned, toned legs.

Not that it provided all that much competition for Savanna. The blonde had chosen a dark red dress that didn't look as tight - except for a built-in corset effect at the waist - but still made it clear that she had an abundance of feminine bounty. It was a bit longer than Naomi's, but Savanna's greater height meant she had at least as much leg showing, accented by heels that were both delicate and towering. And Savanna had used her newly-awakened talent with cosmetics to produce a masterpiece of dramatic shadings to accent impossibly perfect features. Even her long, sun-bright hair seemed to be too good to be true - too soft and too lively for something that should have needed a bottle of gel to produce such volume.

What Savanna and Troy had not known was that the Garrison's were seated at the captain's table - apparently it had not been a problem to get the younger couple seats - and while Ed Garrison seemed to be truly enchanted with his pretty wife, the five other men and four other women in their dinner party focused their attention sharply on the newcomers.

Despite her admonition not to talk business on the cruise, the men's conversation quickly drifted that way. Savanna realized she shouldn't have been surprised. Men define themselves by their professions. She kept one ear open to Troy's stories so that she could remember what he had claimed in case it came up later. He kept it appropriately vague beyond the basics of being private investigators, using client privilege as a shield from deeper revelations. Savanna was both surprised at his wry inventiveness for 'war stories' of investigation gone wrong, and flattered at his invented reports on how effective she was in her own right.

She was afraid that the women's conversations would focus on fashions and catty one-upmanship. All were attractive in a way that did not give up just because they were ten (or so) years past what others might consider the optimized prettiness of younger women like Savanna. All were successful in the social/business world - at least through the reflected success of their husbands - and Savanna couldn't match that. They had redefined their pride in a deeper way than surface beauty, reflected in careful grooming, stylish clothes, and continuing fitness. Though Savanna was far and away the prettiest woman there, they were not intimidated, nor even challenged by that one dimension of womanhood. Instead, the gushing mutual flattery moved quickly on to quite technical discussion on shooting shotguns. It was clear that these women were not members of a social club that used the excuse of sporting clays to avoid the cliché of a knitting circle. They were shooters, and highly competitive.

"What's your handicap, dear?" one of them asked Savanna. The woman was another shapely, 30-something beauty that showed a bit more attention - or at least, more obvious attention - from fashion experts than Naomi. Savanna was thankful that there were placecards at the table and she had worked to memorize them all during the lags in conversation when the wait staff were placing dishes in front of them.

"I don't really have one, Heather," Savanna replied. "I'm afraid I've been too busy for anything so formal. I just like to shoot when I get a chance."

"That's fine, dear," Heather cooed, but Savanna could see a sense of triumph in the other woman's eyes.

[She thinks I'm a newbie,] Savanna decided. [I hope we get paired together in the first round.]

A few of the husbands had a hard time keeping their eyes off of Savanna, but most were well trained and managed to be discreet about it. Only the captain, Brett Andersen, was openly staring. He was far enough down the table that it wasn't uncomfortable - in fact, given the lack of envy she was receiving from the other women, Savanna found it almost reassuring - but she noticed his eyes meeting hers too often for it to be completely ignored.

"You have a beautiful ship, Captain," Savanna said into one of the minor lulls in conversation.

"Thank you, Miss Sylvan," he replied.

"Oh, please, call me Savanna," she answered, dropping her eyes with at least the outward trappings of modesty.

"Thank you, Savanna," he replied, but she noticed that he did not make the counteroffer to use his given name. He was still, and always, captain when he was on his ship. Which Savanna actually found to be comforting.

It did give him an excuse to spend a few minutes talking about his ship; technical details that were actually more interesting to Savanna than she felt she could let on. Cody had been the principal shiphandler on Isolde, with Dylan functioning more often as deck crew. She asked a few relevant questions to show she did know something of ships, but let a host of others go unasked. When the conversation moved on, she lost herself in her own thoughts for a while.

[Who am I, really? Is Savanna a flighty, social butterfly who pretends at being a detective? No, not if we want to get inside Fafnir. Yet if I seem too . . . masculine in my interests, will that seem so strange to Garrison that it puts him off? This body looks so intensely feminine - *is* so intensely feminine, in the little ways that seem no natural, like wearing heels and keeping all this hair looking good. Will my interest in the ship seem artificial - which is to say, false, and therefore make Garrison look for the truth beneath the lie . . ?]

Her thoughts were interrupted by another question, this time from one of the men - Heather's husband, John Davis. "Savanna?"

"What? Oh, sorry. I guess I was woolgathering for a moment."

"No problem. I was just asking you what choke you use for trap. I think Heather needs a tighter choke."

"I use modified, for 16-yard trap," Savanna said, glad she had at least a few rounds of experience with that. "In fact, one of the other shooters suggested I might want to open up to improved cylinder, because he said I have very fast reflexes and get on the birds quickly. I haven't tried that. Oh, and I haven't shot any handicap trap, yet - just watched a few rounds."

"There, see?" Heather said. "He wanted me to go to improved modified, or even light full - which is what he shoots."

"Well, I suppose that depends on how fast you get on the birds," Savanna repeated. "So far, modified has worked pretty well for me."

Heather smiled in agreement, but her eyes were thoughtful as well.

[Not so much of a newbie after all, am I?] Savanna thought. [Oh, well, it will all come out in the tournament tomorrow.]

And so it did. After the first day of the tournament - which Troy and Savanna carefully did *not* win, but placed very well - all of the women who had pigeonholed Savanna as beautiful but an intellectual lightweight had to rethink their opinion. She was trying very hard not to be smug when she found Troy taking some money from one of their prior night's tablemates.

"What was that all about?" she asked when they were alone.

"Just a side bet," he said with a smirk. "It won't be so easy tomorrow."

"You shot well," she said, nodding at his arrangement.

"Yes," he said, but his eyes twinkled.

In a moment, that meaning of that subtle sign became clear to her. "You bet on me!"

"Of course," he said blandly. She blushed at his flattering confidence, then she frowned. "We can't make them look too bad, or it will be an insult."

"Of course," he repeated blandly, but at her continued frown he grinned sheepishly. "Okay, so I won't make any side bets tomorrow." After a moment, he continued, "Do you think we're getting their attention?"

"Yes," Savanna said. "Now we just have to make the sale. I think you should do something . . . like . . . oh, I know. Weight lifting. The ship has a gym. Set up some impressive weights. The word will get around."

"Okay," Troy said thoughtfully, unconsciously flexing his biceps as he walked. Savanna's breath caught at the great boulders that showed beneath the sleeves of his shirt but she tried to pretend she hadn't noticed. It didn't work. He noticed when she started breathing again. Despite his promise to keep their private lives at the 'just friends' level, he noticed her breathing a lot. In order to generate an excuse for his own attention on her, he said, "But you need to do something, too. Something besides shoot."

"Like what?"

"Hmm, how are you at diving? I mean, off a board. The ship has a fair sized pool. Cody could dive, couldn't he?"

"Yes, but not since high school," she answered.

"Well, beautiful, if you don't bellyflop, you'll get their attention."

"I think I can do better than that," she said. Then she giggled. "You know, this means I need to buy another swimsuit. I don't think I have a one-piece suit."

"Dive in a bikini - that will get their attention," he suggested, eyebrows working in a comic leer.

"You'll pay for that," she promised darkly, but she had to grin as well.

After the morning sporting clays tournament, the Haven Aurora put into one of the little tourist-trap ports that fill the Caribbean. Savanna and Troy declined to go ashore, saying truthfully that they had been there before (though they didn't mention it had been as Cody and Dylan). There was enough time in port for people to come and go so at any given time that afternoon about half the passengers were onboard and half ashore.

Half was plenty to provide the attention they were after. After she got the required one-piece suit, Savanna started out easily but like so many things with her new body, it wasn't long before her motions were as natural as one who had been born that way. Savanna found she was stronger than Cody, at least relative to her weight. She knew that Alayla was much stronger yet, but even her own legs were able to provide the impetus for a lot of air time on her dives. She also found as a probable skill inherited from Alayla that she didn't lose orientation no matter how she twisted and tumbled on her dives.

But it was her newfound supple agility that was the most pleasing surprise. It wasn't long before she was twisting and tumbling off the one-meter springboard at a level that would be competitive in the Olympics.

Well, except for two things. Her hair was three times too long for Olympic competition. Even wet, it flew everywhere when she twisted around - half of the time covering her face - and it was so thick the mass of it was a distraction from her presentation. The second problem was that - no matter how perfectly she entered the water and despite the compression of her tight swimsuit - the cross-section of her body changed too abruptly for a smooth entry. She always got a pretty good splash.

Still, despite those minor flaws - or perhaps because of them - she had quite an audience by the time she finished. As she rose from the water the last time, gathering up her towel rather than moving once again to the board, a small smattering of applause swelled into an ovation. Savanna blushed, and started to bow. As she started to dip, she remembered to change it into something that was a bit more like a curtsey, blushing even more strongly at her confusion. When she made her way to a lounge chair she had to fend off congratulations and thanks from several well-wishers, along with a few questions she had to dodge. She certainly couldn't explain that her only experience with competitive dives had been as a guy. In fact, to one really persistent woman she finally ended up pointing at her full bosom as a reason for not competing. The woman's eyes widened as she understood the message in Savanna's gesture, then she gave an embarrassed nod and hurried away.

"I think you made your point," Troy's voice said from behind as she tried to escape the last group of curious passengers.

"What? What point?"

He smiled and led her to a long-desired lounge chair. "I heard about the 'incredibly beautiful blonde giving the diving exhibition' even down in the gym. I'm sure that everyone on the ship has heard of you now - probably with embellishment." He grinned wryly, gave her one of his insulting - and flattering - long, slow looks, and added, "Though I don't think anything they could say would be much embellishment. The reality was awesome."

"Thank you," Savanna said with artificial smugness - her blush showing she was not as blandly sure of praise as her tone implied. Then her eyes narrowed and she asked, "What about your exhibition. Did you get noticed?"

"Oh, yeah," he said, with more than a hint of smugness in his own tone. "I am . . . this body is really strong. I was benching as much as their weight machine could be set for, and in squats I nearly bent the bar." He looked thoughtful for a moment, then said, "Y'know, I can't imagine how strong Alayla is. I'm way stronger than I was before, and she made me look like a wimp on that little raft."

"Yeah," Savanna replied, then blushed. "I'm sorry, I meant I don't know how strong she really is either, not that she made you look like a wimp. I mean, you managed to row strongly for a couple of hours, and I don't think I made even half an hour."

"Well, whatever, it was impressive. However," he grinned, "I think we can say that I was at least somewhat impressive as well. When I was banging out reps at the max of the machine, Ed Garrison wandered in. I think he wanted to talk to me but he left before I finished."

"Good," Savanna said. "Of course, we need to talk business before the end of the cruise, but we can't seem too eager."

With that she stood and picked up her towel.

"Leaving so soon?" Troy asked.

"I think I better," she said. "I don't want tan lines from this suit."

"Oh, well, if you want to avoid tan lines, our cabin has a balcony. It's pretty much shielded from any others, and I promise not to look . . . much."

"Pig," she sniffed, but she smiled as she walked away.

Chapter 7 - "Competition"

The second day of the tournament found Troy and Savanna paired with the Garrisons. Troy's only deference to stylish shooting was a stiff bag he wore at his waist to hold shells. There was a divider so he could pour in a box of shells in one side, then store the empties on the other side so that he wouldn't clutter up the desk with spent hulls. On the same belt he hung a small case that held the various choke tubes he would use throughout the course of fire. However, he clearly felt he needed no padding on his shoulder to spread out the recoil from 12-gauge shotgun loads. Savanna, on the other hand, had found a tailored shooting vest with pockets that accomplished the purposes of Troy's belt equipment, and had a quilted shoulder pad. It was, in fact, specially tailored because her waist was too small for her bust and hips . . . or at least, smaller than an off-the-rack vest could accommodate.




Naomi Garrison had a similar vest, though hers had bright pink pockets and several equally bright patches from prior Pink Mist Ladies Shotgun Club events. Ed Garrison, on the other hand, looked like he was ready to hunt wild turkeys. His vest was camouflaged, as was his shirt and BDU-style pants tucked into also-camouflaged hunting boots.

Troy smiled good-naturedly at his new friend's outfit. "So, you sneak up on a lot of clay pigeons in that?"

Garrison just shook his head, but he didn't seem offended. "I do wear it to get turkeys and quail, but mostly I wear it in tournaments so that I can have a consistent hold. Don't you find a bit of variation in your hold when you just wear a knit shirt?"

"Not really," Troy said. "Though maybe I could improve if I were more consistent. Did you hear that, beautiful?"

Savanna looked up at his voice, then blushed at his words. After a moment, she managed a smile and raised a warning hand.

"If you want to spend more money on your guns, then I see a jewelry store in my future," she warned.

"Me?" Troy said, showing a cartoon character's wide-eyed shock. "Do you want to add up the total cost of your outfit over mine?"

"Now, now," Naomi said, chuckling. "None of that." She looked at her husband to receive a nod that implied they had discussed something earlier. "Tell you what. If we beat you on this round, you and I will go shopping in the next port and we'll find some retail therapy for you. Troy and Ed can figure out a good set of clothes for their next safari."

"And if we win?" Savanna asked, smiling to keep it from being a challenge.

"Well, then we'll do the same thing, of course," Naomi said with a laugh, except I'll make Ed pay for Troy's vest."

[She wants to get the two of us apart,] Savanna realized. [I expect Ed is about ready to make his sales pitch to get us to join his company.]

It was what they had wanted, of course, so Savanna wasn't going to turn them down. However, just to be contrary she decided they should win their little bet. It was not an easy win - mostly because they had to make it seem like it was harder than it was. As they approached the last stand of the ten-station course they were only two birds ahead of the Garrisons. In fact, Savanna had needed to run the previous two stations to make up for a few misses by Troy.

The last station was unusual for sporting clays and took advantage of the ship's architecture. The shooting stand was on the fantail, but the clays were actually launched from a little platform nearer the waterline. They would have to shoot down, and get on the birds fairly quickly before they hit the water which would count as a miss.

"I think you're up," Ed told Savanna. "You're high score at this point."

"Would one of you mind going first?" she asked. "I think I want a different choke."

"No problem," Troy said, stepping up. He called for a pair to see the flight path, but he missed the first two actual shots because it turned out the launcher was like a trap house and the path varied back and forth randomly.

"That's not fair," he said ruefully. He ran the rest of them, but he was down two for the station.

"You wanted me to miss a couple, didn't you," Savanna said.

"What? Us?" Naomi asked innocently. She stepped up to the shooting stand and called for her first pair. Unfortunately - for her, at least - she was a bit slow and one of her birds hit the water before she could shoot it. "Nine," she said sourly a few minutes later.

"Better than I did," Troy offered as consolation, but his smile reminded her that he had faced an additional challenge.

"Let's see . . ," Ed mused. "I think that means we are down one overall against you at this point, right?"

"Yes, I think so," Savanna said easily. But her eyes held a challenge. She had played the light-hearted young woman all day, concentrating on her shooting well enough to show that she respected the integrity of the sport, but smiling wryly rather than being upset when she did miss a bird. It was similar to the persona she had worn at their shared dinner. However, her deep, violet eyes were much more focused now, and she let Ed see the confident intensity of her unleashed competitiveness.

"Okay, how about a side bet?" Ed challenged. "If I beat you on this round, you have to listen to a proposition I want to make to you."

"A proposition?" Savanna repeated. "I'm not that sort of girl, Ed."

"Not that kind of proposition," Ed said quickly, first flustered and then good-naturedly accepting the tease in her tone.

"And what do I get if I win?" Savanna asked, openly challenging him with her eyes.

Their world had shrunk to include just the two of them, despite the nearby presence of both Naomi and Troy. This was a challenge between the leader of each pair, and Garrison was a bit surprised to realize how sharply Savanna had risen to that position. She was such a beautiful young woman - a classic blonde bombshell, in fact - that it was hard not to think of her as merely that. It had seemed much more likely that the huge, self-confident Troy was the actual boss of their partnership so Garrison had arranged for Naomi to get Savanna away to give time for Ed to approach him with an offer. He had decided to take the opportunity for a little side bet to ensure their attention, but he felt he would still be making his pitch primarily to Troy. Now that turned out not to be the correct assumption.

He bowed his head a little to show respect, smiled a little ruefully to acknowledge his mistake, and said quietly, "I won't underestimate you again."

"Oh yes you will," she promised, but she still smiled.

"If you win, then I'll refund the cost of this cruise to you," Ed said bluntly. "But I'll still ask you to let me make an offer - to both of you, of course."

"Now that just sounds kinky," Savanna said, laughing to make it clear she was still teasing. Her eyes didn't lose their competitive intensity, though. "You're on."

Garrison was pretty good, but once again he was just a bit too slow - or perhaps one of the waves was just a bit too high - and one of his birds hit the water. Savanna decided it was time to make a point and ran hers almost casually, hitting most of the birds before they were ten feet from the launcher with blindingly fast double taps that didn't seem to have enough time to twitch from one target track to the other. But all of the birds vanished into puffs of dust that left no doubt at all that they had been destroyed.

"Now I really want to talk to you," Garrison said.

"Let me guess," Savanna said as she handed her shotgun to the attendant. On this cruise, none of the upper-crust shooters would have to clean their own weapons. "You want to offer us a job."

She walked over to stand beside Troy, which pulled Naomi back into the conversation as well. Looking at the blonde, she said, "We can still go shopping, Naomi, if you want to. I know Ed put you up to that so that he could have some time alone with Troy."

"Guilty," Garrison admitted. "Though it's obvious now that would not have been the right conversation."

"Oh, not so wrong as all that," Savanna said. "I agree with Troy on nearly everything. But we have already agreed that we're not going to work for anyone else."

She put her arm through Troy's and started an easy stroll down the deck. The Garrisons walked along as well - they were all going to take showers to get rid of the smell of gunsmoke anyway, so after the round they always went back to their staterooms. Looking at Garrison she said, "If you'd like, we'll still listen to your offer, but not right now. And I have to warn you that I can't imagine the circumstance where we would be joining your company."

"At dinner then," Garrison suggested. "We'll get our own table so we can talk privately."

"If you'd like," Savanna said. She waved cheerfully as they parted, then called back to the older couple with a laugh. "Oh, and you still owe us for the cost of the cruise."

When they reached their stateroom, Troy took Savanna by the waist and lifted her up into the air. "Oh, god, Savvy, you were awesome. I haven't seen that much energy crackling in the air since . . ."

He paused and put her down, suddenly sober. "Since the battle with Alayla and the goons in that villa," he said. "I just realized how much you were like Alayla when you were challenging him."

"Savvy?" Savanna repeated.

"What? Did I call you that?" Troy asked.

Savanna nodded, smiling at him despite waving a warning finger in his face. "Let me tell you right now, if you start into some sort of Kemo Savvy thing, I'm throwing you right over the side. Even if I have to change to Alayla to do it."

"Ugh, me no say that. Me promise," Troy grunted.

"Pig," she countered, but she smiled.

That was the last night on their short, tournament-centered cruise; the next day they would be back in the ship's home port. So, as was traditional, it was a dressy event. Troy dug out the tuxedo that they had brought for him - tailored, of course, since nothing off-the-rack would fit at his size. They were sharing a stateroom and had - for the most part - been casual with their privacy, accepting a towel or even underwear as adequate covering. Nonetheless, for some reason she didn't understand herself, Savanna decided she wanted to do her final dressing alone. While she was still in her robe, she sent Troy out to find something to do. Predictably, he wanted to find a bar. She compromised by telling him she would meet him in the piano bar, not one of the more nightclub-oriented opportunities on the Haven Aurora.

When she walked into the bar, even the piano player fell silent. She wore a deep, violet dress that matched her eyes - including an inner glow that seemed to create highlights from within. It flowed like deep sea water on a moonless night from a halter neck to the floor - an oval opening below the neckline revealing that the woman within was blessed indeed. The fabric obviously had some stretch because it was tight enough to create an eye-magnet dimple over her navel, yet she seemed to move without restriction. Sparkles at ears and wrist were mimicked with constellations of crystal on the upper bodice that faded away to sleek oblivion on the long, long sweep to the floor. Matching crystal combs held her hair up away from her neck, though the length of it couldn't really be held up completely. The remainder fell in thick tumbles to the small of her back, hiding yet accenting the backless gown's design.




And she was just flat out, eye-watering, breath-stealing beautiful. Her cosmetic artistry walked a fine line between glamour and innocence, making her look like a princess at her first ball when she smiled, then transforming her to succubus of carnal delight when she let a cool challenge curl her lips.

Troy was out of his seat while the faint echoes of the interrupted piano rendition were still fading away - staking his claim before challengers could contest it.

"Dear, sweet lord you are beautiful," he whispered softly.

"Thanks," Savanna replied, cheeks flushing at his reverence.

"I mean it," he said. "There is something about Alayla that is truly supernatural - like she really is some sort of goddess - but tonight I can see that same sort of impossible glory in you. Surely no mortal woman could be as incredible as you."

"Wow, that's over the top," she said, trying for a casual smile but dimpling with real pleasure. "You're not so bad yourself. You look good in a tux."

"I look like a penguin," he countered, "but it doesn't matter. No one will remember what I look like as long as you're in the same room."

"Down boy. I mean, I appreciate your . . . appreciation, but it's just me. You can save your gushing for when we have an audience to impress."

"No," he countered, not to be denied. "I can't. Anyone who could let a woman who looks like you - and has the poise and strength you show - go without complimenting her is either blind or gay. I'm neither. So get used to it. I'm going to keep on 'appreciating' you from now on."

"Even when I'm back to cutoffs and a tank top, with windblown hair and no makeup?" she challenged, but there was a light of happiness in her eyes that he determined to keep turned on.

"In any outfit you choose to wear - as long as you wear a smile with it."

"Oh, that's too much, but thank you," she said quietly. And smiled.

Their entrance into the main dining room was accompanied by a wave of silence, followed by a wave of soft susurrus as comments trailed in their wake. They met the Garrisons at the appointed table and Savanna could not help feeling a bit of pride when for the first time the successful older blonde's face showed envy of the younger woman. Ed Garrison, to his credit, allowed himself one slow, appreciative look before turning back to his wife and paying her some minor compliment that was only important for the underlying message; that he was happy to be with his own wife - or at least, wanted her to think so.

"You look incredible," Naomi managed to say to Savanna as they neared the table.

"So do you," Savanna said brightly. "I love that color on you!"

Naomi's dress was a rich, cobalt blue that caught some of the darker tones in her eyes, and it did look nice . . . though they both knew at least for that night, Savanna was in a different class.

They took care of the basics of the dining experience fairly quickly. As is typically the case, the ship's menu had a choice of either a fish or a meat course for the main entrée. They had all chosen the fish, so the selection of wine was fairly straightforward. While they waited for the meal to be delivered, Garrison started on the main purpose for their shared dinner. However, he did it a bit obliquely.

"You shot very well today," he began, looking at Savanna.

"Thank you. So did you and Naomi. I think in the end we only won by one or two clays out of what? . . . a hundred shots each."

Garrison smiled at Savanna, but asked bluntly, "So, how many did you miss deliberately today?"

"What makes you think that I missed any on purpose?" she turned it back on him.

"I told you I wasn't going to underestimate you again," he reminded her. "So of course, I did immediately by assuming I could challenge you with a shotgun. Are you as skilled with other weapons?"

"I have many skills," Savanna said blandly.

Naomi Garrison interrupted. "Dear," she said to her husband, "don't interrogate her. Let's have a nice dinner."

"Of course," he said readily, but his eyes said the questions were far from over.

Naomi actually took up the overall questioning, though hers were intended to be friendly conversation. Turning to Troy, she said, "So, Troy, tell us about your background. Where did you grow up?"

"That assumes I've actually *managed* to grow up," he said with a laugh. "I think of it more as a work in progress."

"Aren't we all," Garrison agreed. "But from your accent, I get the impression that you grew up in the Midwest."

"Guilty as charged," Troy agreed easily. "Do you study regional accents?"

"It's part of the job," Garrison said. "Some of our most important projects have involved both finding someone based on an accent, or going undercover as someone with a particular regional accent."

"That's as much word choice as the way that words are pronounced, isn't it?" Savanna asked.
"Yes, it is," he agreed. "And both of you are doing everything you can to avoid answering any questions about yourselves."

"Oh, are we?" Savanna asked with wide-eyed innocence. Then, just for a moment she let the sharpness back into her eyes so that Garrison could see it. After that moment, she turned to Naomi. "I’m sorry, Naomi, but I think the time has come to work some things out. I hope we'll be able to return to a nice conversation in a few moments."

Turning back to Garrison, she said, "Look, Ed, we work for ourselves. We're not interested in putting on power suits and filling out time cards. When you said we were, ah, competitors we looked you up, and we know at least the public face of Fafnir Special Services. We're not interested."

"Good," he said, surprising her. Savanna wanted him to make an offer - needed him to make an offer if they were to find out why Isolde was attacked. She was afraid that she had blown the deal, but then Garrison smiled.

"If you wanted a corporate type job, you wouldn't be the people we want," he said. He leaned back in his chair and continued, "Okay, so we don't know much about your background. We looked you up, too, and all we can find out started a week or so ago. You have passports and drivers' licenses - South Florida, but I don't think that's where you grew up. You have bank accounts and credit cards. Some of them - like the passports and drivers' licenses - show issue dates at some time in the past and those are confirmed in the official data bases. But somehow I don't think they were issued years ago. And all your financial actions started . . . let's see . . . ten days ago. Your identities are fake."

If he expected some sort of protest or denial from Savanna, he was disappointed. She just sat there quietly, waiting for him to continue. Garrison smiled at her calm demeanor and continued. "That's actually a good thing. We have a need for . . . untraceable operatives. If you're good enough at faking a backtrail to get into the US passport system, then you're the sort of people we want."

He looked at Savanna with that slow, appreciative appraisal again, and smiled. "That is in addition to your obvious physical abilities. Your diving display was quite impressive, and I've got some people who will have a hard time believing how much Troy was lifting just for a daily workout."

Now it was his time to let a sharp look into his eyes. "So, let's recap. You come out of nowhere to get on this ship and in our tournament. You shoot well enough to win, yet let us keep close enough to keep us engaged. You show off your agility and Troy's strength, where we're sure to notice. Now you tell us that you're not interested in working for us. If you weren't showing off for us, why are you here?"

"I like to shoot," Savanna said easily, taking a sip of her wine. "And to dive. And Troy wasn't really showing off. There isn't enough weight on those machines for him to do that."

"Right," Garrison said dryly. "Okay, so no more games. You accomplished your purpose - you got me intrigued. Now, why do that if you don't want to work for me?"

[Think fast, girl,] Savanna told herself. [He's smarter than you thought.]

She sighed, and nodded. "Okay, we were trying to interest you. But we truly don't want 9-to-5 jobs. What we had in mind was more some sort of independent contractors."

Savanna looked at Troy and smiled. "You wouldn't believe what it takes to feed him. But frankly, we're not interested in being Peeping Toms for divorce cases. Business could be better. But here's the thing . . . we're not going to give you our background. If you can't find it out on your own, then you'll just have to trust us. And we won't work on your teams. You give us assignments - you can consider them tests if you want - and if we perform, then you take us as we are. If we don't perform, then you don't want us anyway. But we work alone."

Garrison looked at her for a moment, then smiled. "When I tell some of the guys back at the office about you two, no one will believe me. You're too good to be true." He looked at his wife and patted her hand. "You're too pretty to be real, and Troy is too strong. I'll be frank as well, I wouldn't want you as regular employees. I *don't* trust you. Fafnir provides an honorable service to select customers and I don't want people who won't trust us enough to be honest with us."

He paused to see if that would distress Savanna, but she was as serene as a goddess. At that point, he decided he'd never play poker with her for real money, but it was another point in her favor for what he really wanted.

"But there are times when there can be an advantage to have . . . deniable assets. I'm confident we can overcome any money issues, so tell me, how do you see this operating?"

Savanna smiled, and if there was relief in her eyes it was only to be expected. "Well, there are two obvious logistical issues, and one issue that might still be a problem. We'll need an authenticated way to communicate. I assume you have a way to pass orders to your operatives and that we can be brought into that loop to an appropriate degree. And we'll need some resources - not weapons, but your data resources are greater than ours. There is an obvious problem in that we won't always know in advance what data we need, so the most efficient way to handle that is to give us access to your data sources, but I can understand if you don't trust us enough for that right away."

She sighed, and her face showed a frown that had no trace of artificially seductive pout. "There is one problem that may be a show-stopper. We won't work for 'bad guys' - as we define bad guys. In other words, we're going to want to know who the ultimate customer is, and what the real objectives of our assignments are. We won't . . . I don't know . . . turn into pirates or something, robbing people and sinking their ships or marooning them. We won't run drugs. We won't murder anyone, which does not mean we won't defend ourselves, of course. We won't take any assignments from you that we wouldn't take on our own. And that includes knowing who the customer is."

Savanna had inserted the apparently random example of what had happened to Isolde to see Garrison's reaction. He was either a pretty good actor or he didn't realize that his own people had done what Savanna found unacceptable. He had looked blandly uninterested in the piracy example, and grimly satisfied in the drug example, but neither had sparked any sense of guilt that Savanna could detect.

Garrison smiled and they could all feel the tension level drop. "Actually, that sounds very good. I was sitting here thinking what my own conditions would be if I were in your position, and I'd like to think they would be pretty much the same. 'Just following orders' doesn't work for me, either."

He sat thoughtfully for a few more minutes, then looked at them again. "Okay. We'll work something out. Show up at the Fafnir office in Crystal City . . . one week from today. Set up something - a burner phone for all I care - that you'll allow us to contact you on. We'll have a, ah, test assignment for you. Maybe a couple. If you can perform, we'll work out some compensation. You won't be disappointed, if you don't disappoint me."

"Deal," Savanna said, rising to shake hands with him.

They finished their meal, but in honor of their new arrangement, they decided to go to one of the nightclub bars for a small celebration. The one they chose tended toward slower songs at a volume compatible with conversation, so they conversed. Troy once again supplied creatively original - and totally fictional - recounts of assignments gone wrong in ways that were funny, at least after the fact. It turned out that Naomi had a few tales of her own, though hers were wickedly catty renditions of club politics that she told with appropriate voices and expressions. They were laughing so continually that Garrison finally had to call a halt.

"I am going to pass out from lack of breath before long," he claimed. "C'mon, Gorgeous, let's move around a little."

He pulled Naomi to her feet and led her to a dance floor.

"That looks like a good idea," Troy said, standing and extending his hand to Savanna.

"Oh, I can't dance," she said.

"Oh, I don't care," he replied. Tugging on her fingers, he made it clear that he wasn't going to take no for an answer. Savanna blushed, but instead of snatching her hand back, she let herself be pulled to her feet.

In moments they were swaying together to the music. It wasn't anything like ballroom dancing. Neither could have told what the primary beat of the music was, let alone whether that would call for a waltz or a foxtrot, but it didn't really matter. Troy was a strong, confident lead and his smooth motion pulled her along.

It turned out that the dance floor had an extension out onto a verandah deck. It wasn't long before they were out under the stars, with a three-quarter moon providing a shimmering highway over the water. They transitioned through a couple of songs, but after one faded to a momentary quiet, Troy looked at his partner without letting her out of his arms.

"You are so beautiful," he said softly. Then he leaned down and kissed her. It wasn't a quick peck like she had given him in the airport. It wasn't an assault that demanded surrender. It was a joining, a sharing of breath, a sharing of warmth, a sharing of all that makes a person alive.

Though Troy's kiss did not demand surrender, Savanna found herself surrendering to it. Her body seemed to merge with his, every curve finding a corresponding strength to melt formlessly against into one combined flesh. Her knees felt week, yet at the same time her body sang with energy, almost vibrating with a harmonic much higher than her rapidly beating heart. When Troy finally leaned back from their kiss, she realized her eyes were closed only when they started to flutter open again.

"Wha . . . why . . . did you . . . do that?" she asked.

"Why did you kiss me back?" he asked.

"I . . . don't know," she said.

"I told you why I did it," Troy said, grinning at her. "You are so beautiful that any man who would let you go unkissed in the moonlight should be shot, then hung, then drawn and quartered. I wouldn't want that to happen to me."

"What . . . what are you talking about?"

"Kissing you," he said blandly. "If you don't remember, I'll be glad to do it again."

He leaned down to her lips, but she pulled her head back. "Wait. We said that we were, y'know, just friends. Without benefits."

"No," he said. "We said that in private we would be just friends. In public, we're dating. Any big, red-blooded, testosterone-fueled man out in the moonlight with a woman as exciting as you - that he was 'dating' - would kiss her. I guarantee it. I'm just maintaining our cover, of course."

This time when he leaned to kiss her, she didn't pull back. When he let her up for air, her eyes were closed again, and opened very slowly. "Oh my God," she whispered breathlessly.

"Not really," he said with a renewed grin. "You're the goddess. I'm just a guy - a lucky guy - who happens to be 'dating' you."

"But . . . inside . . . I mean . . . I'm still Cody," she said softly.

"Are you?" he asked. "I don't mean to diminish the part of you that is still Cody. I can see that in your intelligence, in your strength of will, and in your sense of humor. But I think you're more than Cody now. Inside or out, you're not just Cody any more."

"But what about if . . . when, we turn back?"

"We'll deal with it," he said, and parodied her self-correction, "if . . . when we turn back. We've managed to deal with the change into these persons. Hell, half of the time I'm a cat! We'll deal with whatever happens."

"But . . . if we, I mean, you and I . . . what will that mean for Cody and Dylan later?"

"Nothing we can't handle," Troy insisted. "Look, I know you liked kissing me. Do you think Cody would like to kiss Dylan?"

"Oh, god no," she said quickly.

"I agree. But like I said, you're not just Cody any more. If we go back to those people, then our reactions will be different. And that's just the way it is." Troy looked thoughtful for a moment, then said, "I can't pretend to understand what it's like from your side. On my side I'm reacting to an incredibly beautiful woman, which is what Dylan would have done if he could get away with it. But I do remember being Furrtive as well. I know that there are feelings that come with these bodies - feelings that are not just the result of a change in shape. If we go back, then we'll be different people. That doesn't mean we shouldn't be *these* people now."

Savanna shivered despite the warm evening. "I'm not ready to . . . I mean . . . oh, god, I don't know what I mean."

Troy put his arms around her again and she found herself welcoming the warm shelter. After a moment, he murmured into her hair, "I'm not going to say I'm sorry for kissing you because I'm not. But I won't push you to do anything you don't want."

"Thanks," she whispered back.

Chapter 8 - "Missions"

Savanna was honest enough with herself to admit that she had enjoyed kissing Troy. Regardless of the future, that was a fact for the present. Still, she found that being on the 'other side of the fence' made her afraid she'd lose control and let things go too far. Her new sensations were confusing . . . and compelling. It wasn't the narrow focus that her sex drive had been as a guy. In comparison anyway, she could see how guys would get a reputation for being willing to stick their little head in a knothole in a fence. There was a single, clear, and urgent objective. The details were secondary.

But now, it seemed like the details were everything. She found herself imagining the setting from the earliest preparation; selecting an outfit and a hairstyle, doing her makeup and deciding on a perfume. The date, and it would definitely include a date, with dinner and maybe a movie or maybe even dancing like they had done on the ship. Then there would be a softly intimate time where they kissed and caressed and just . . . shared their private space. When they finally went to bed it would be another step in an all-consuming, life-changing moment they could cherish forever, not just animals coupling.

And yes, she knew that was hopelessly romantic, but it was that big a deal. It was surrendering in a way that a guy never has to do, and she wasn't going to give up her . . . self just because her new . . . features got a little achy sometimes. And maybe itchy, so much so that she sometimes wanted to find a private place to scratch . . . or at least, rub . . . or . . .

Okay, so they ached a lot, but it was a delicious ache that she didn't really mind.

Even if she did think about it. A lot. That was the problem. As Cody, the challenge had always been to get a girl to say yes, like that was something the girl didn't really want to do unless talked into it. But that wasn't the case at all. As Savanna, she really *did* want to say yes. She just wasn't sure it was the *right* thing to do, but it was certainly what she found herself *wanting* to do. Wanted so badly that she couldn't really say no, either. At least, not entirely.

So, she let Troy kiss her sometimes - sometimes just a little almost-married peck of welcome. Sometimes more. And they held hands. And they laughed together, and shared secret little conversations about whatever caught their eye. But every time he indicated a willingness to take it to a higher level, she made him stop. Well, almost. One night after they left the ship, she did let him caress her breast in a movie theater, just like high-school kids. Like teen-agers, it was almost a rite of passage at least for her because, well, she'd only been a girl for a short while. It really *was* her first time in a movie with a guy. It seemed so perfectly trite that she couldn't go without having that experience at least once. Darkened theater. "Naughty" touching. Kissing.

She didn't even realize her own fingers were being "naughty" as well until an explosion on the screen pulled her back to the real world. She used the loud noise as an excuse to cover her twitch, but she pulled back and kept her hands in her own lap after that.

[How in the world does *any* high school girl keep from getting pregnant by age 16?] she wondered. Of course, the answer was that they were all on the pill. Which raised another question she wasn't ready to deal with just then.

On the other hand, within her self-imposed limits she was even more aware of their times in private. In particular, she was very, very aware of Troy's massive shoulders and rock-hard abs when he was going to or from the shower. What she should have done was get very careful, even prudish during their times when they shared a room. Maybe she should have insisted that one or the other of them leave whenever it came time for things like showers or getting dressed.

But she didn't.

She never really let him 'see' anything that wouldn't have been revealed - hadn't already been revealed - in her tiny little bikini. And she never really looked - not really - when he was wearing only a towel. But she found her lips twitching in a coy smile when she *almost* let something show. And she knew as only someone who had grown up as a teenage boy can know that a glimpse of bra and panties was much more erotic than even a very revealing bikini.

In the perverse way that only humans seem to be able to do, she was teasing both Troy and herself, yet only teasing. It would have been so easy just to go with the urges she felt - and she couldn’t deny that she felt them. Troy didn't bother to try to hide that he felt them, even aside from the evidence his towel failed to hide. But despite the way her breath caught when his muscles rippled under his taut skin, despite the way the sight of his not-very-well-hidden bulge caused her own little tattle-tales to get achingly hard . . . and caused a more intimate ache as well . . . she just couldn’t accept the idea of doing anything more, really, than kiss. And look. And wish, though she wasn't entirely sure what she was even wishing for.

So for the week after they left the ship until they reported to Fafnir headquarters, they continued to get two rooms when they could. Though she was not sure that Troy was always honest when he said a chosen hotel only had a single room open. She didn't argue as long as it had two beds. In part this was because she couldn’t deny, even to herself, that she *liked* the way Troy looked wearing only a towel.

And because she knew she *liked* the way his eyes tracked her when she was wearing little more herself.

Even if it caused her to ache so, so badly in places she didn't even used to have.

It was, therefore, almost a relief when the checked in at the Fafnir offices in Crystal City near the Pentagon. Despite their earlier claims to hate the idea, they were both dressed in very professional, sharply tailored power suits. If Savanna's skirt was just a bit too short, well, it was not the most stridently feminine part of her appearance. With her more-than-ample figure and her thick mass of tumbling sun-gold hair, pretending to be some sort of gender-neutral, just-treat-me-as-one-of-the-guys, businesswoman wasn't going to work regardless of how much leg she showed.




"Welcome to Fafnir," Ed Garrison said as his secretary ushered them into his office. "This is Cesare Velasquez. He's my head of Operations."

Velasquez had a round face that showed his Latin American - probably Mexican - heritage rather than Castilian Spanish. His stocky body had the sort of enduring solidity that had gained itinerant Hispanic workers a reputation for being willing and able to perform long hours of work in the hot sun. His motions as he rose to meet them were controlled and deliberate, adding to an impression of stolid perseverance rather than flashy brilliance, but that might make him even more dangerous if they let slip any insights into their dual nature. Velasquez would worry at an inconsistency like a bulldog on a bone - never giving up until it was rendered into meaningful context.

"Mr. Velasquez," Savanna said politely as she shook his hand. It hadn't been something they had preplanned, but Troy held back so naturally to let Savanna take the lead that it was more effective than a deliberate ploy. She was the boss in more than name only and this new challenge needed to understand that immediately. Nonetheless, as soon as that point was made he was shaking hands with Troy as well. To his credit, and to the comfort of his hand, he didn't try any masculine dominance games with a man who probably outweighed him by nearly a hundred pounds, yet who also almost certainly had a lower body fat percentage than even the compact operations specialist.

"We just have a few background details to take care of, then we can get you integrated into our team," Velasquez said breezily.

Savanna merely stood up and started walking toward the door. She wasn't entirely sure what response she expected, but a bark of laughter from Garrison was not at the top of her list.

"I told you she wouldn't go for that," Garrison said, looking at Velasquez.

"But we can't just send unknowns on, um, special missions," Velasquez said.

"Why not?" Garrison asked. He pointed at the seats that Savanna and Troy had vacated, then sent a smile around the room. "Look, I know it's not something we have done before. And it might not work. But these two are good enough that even with a full week to try, you can't find any background on them except for the obvious fakes they've set up. Well, obvious only in that identities with absolutely no existence before a few weeks ago have to be fake. If *we* can't find out who they are, then anyone we send them up against won't either. That's a good option to have in our bag."

"Yes, but . . ," Velasquez interrupted himself to look at the prospective operatives, "no offense, but . . . how can *we* trust them? If we assign them something requiring, um, discretion, how can we be sure they won't run straight to the press or something like that?"

"You can't," Savanna said easily. "Except for our promise not to do so. We don't want to be famous. That's the point of establishing these identities. Trust me when I say that our, ah, previous identities will not come up."

She looked at Garrison and said, "Okay, let's lay a few things out. Your website and public activities deal with training special operatives in a host of missions. Some training is for foreign governments, but at least the ones you admit to must be blessed by the US government. However, we know that you conduct missions as well as train others for them. We know that you have . . . agreements with federal agencies to allow you to use weapons and tactics, even on US soil, that are not available to the general public. And we don't care. As I've already said, we will be selective in what assignments we will accept, which will include as a minimum knowing who the customer is. But that is so we do not violate our own sense of right and wrong. And we insist on working alone. As a result, the only 'proof' we could provide of wrongdoing by some other standard than our own, would necessarily incriminate ourselves as well. Your opportunity is to firewall us off in some way that allows us to work with you - not for you, though we'll expect to get paid - without compromising any aspect of your operations that does not include us. If you can't see a way to do that, then we won't be working together."

Once again she gathered up her purse in a way that indicated she was ready to walk out of the room. But this time Garrison interrupted her before she even swayed to her towering heels.

"Sounds like exactly what I had in mind," he said.

Velasquez was still not sure. "How did you . . . I mean, what makes you think that we conduct operations on US soil?"

Savanna blandly ignored his question, focusing her deep violet eyes on Garrison instead.

After a moment, Garrison shrugged. "Cesare, pick a mission, or a couple of missions, to test them. Make it a test of us as well. Can you work out mission orders that allow them to be, as she said, firewalled off from the rest of our operations? I expect you can. And if they complete a test mission or two, we'll try them on real - but independent, per her conditions - operations as well. It will either work or it won't. Now, what sort of missions would you use for tests?"

Velasquez didn't look happy at the direction, but he nodded dutifully. "Okay, well, I'm assuming you want to see if they can cover the usual spectrum. That would mean one covert op, and one force-on-force op."

"Force on force, as a going-in plan, is a sign of poor planning," Savanna declared. "I'm okay with use of force. For example, give us something to blow up. But if we can do that without anyone knowing who was involved - even after the fact - then we're all better off."

"Okay," Garrison confirmed. "One covert surveillance op, and one sabotage op where it will be acceptable to have a force-on-force encounter but not required. These will be training exercises for other Fafnir teams who will try to stop you. We'll use the standard Airsoft ammunition. Do you have the required equipment?"

"We have what we need," Troy said, finally entering the conversation.

"Do you have some way for us to contact you?" Velasquez asked. Troy gave him the number to a burner cell, and in a few minutes they were being escorted out of the building.

"Well, that could have gone better," he said once they were well away from the building, "but it could have gone worse."

"Yes," Savanna agreed. "It's about like we expected. I'd like to be able to get access to their data to find out who sent the teams after us - I mean, after Isolde. But we couldn’t provide credible security backgrounds anyway, so this is about as good as we could get."

As though in response to her comment, the burner phone chirped with an incoming text message. "Between 2200 tonight and 0400 tomorrow there will be a series of cards at the following locations: (GPS coordinates). Identify the images on the cards."

"Well, we asked for it," Troy said. "Y'know, Furrtive is pretty stealthy but I'm not so sure about Alayla. Should we try it as ourselves?"

Savanna shook her head. "I don't know why - call it feminine intuition if you want - but I think we need to do this as our alter egos." She looked thoughtful for a moment, then grinned. Pointing at the ring on her finger, she said, "I wonder what the range is on this thing."

It turned out to be about a hundred yards. It wasn't that she could change only herself if Troy were farther away than that. It was that if he were farther away than that, the stone wouldn't pop up out of the ring no matter how she pushed and prodded on it.

So that evening found Troy and Savanna dressed in black outfits, faces darkened (and Savanna's blonde hair covered by a knit cap), and sneaking toward the first checkpoint.

"Stay in here," Troy suggested, pointing at the exposed roots under an old, half-tumbled tree. The hide only had one virtue, it would conceal her completely. At least, conceal her from the sentries they had already spotted, though not from the stinky creepy-crawlies that she just knew were in there.

"This better work," she muttered. Once she was out of sight, she twisted the ring and felt herself transform - and become instantly locked into position when the protrusions on her armor, and even the hilts of her knives, entangled themselves in the roots of her sheltering tree. "If we can't change back, you're going to have to come dig me out of here," she told Furrtive.

::If we can't change back, that's going to be the least of our problems,:: he countered.

A few minutes later he sent her another mental message. Or at least, she received one. It wasn't clear that it was meant for her as much as just a thought so intense it projected. ::Oh, hell.::

"What's wrong?"

::This card is in color, or at least I think it is.::

"So? What's the problem?"

::So the colors must be set so that you have to be able to *see* color to see the message. And it's dark in here. There are half a dozen guys moving around outside, but I got by them easily enough. I'm in a little hut now, and I can see well enough to move around but cats don't really see color. And it might not work anyway. Even human eyes need more light to see color than to see black-and-white."

"Well, that's why I got so close," Alayla pointed out. "I can change you and you can use the light."

::Yeah, but it means we have to change to Troy, and while I'm Troy we can't communicate like this. Besides, I'd really rather not show a light.::

"Well, unless you have another idea . . ."

::Yeah, I know. Just a second . . . okay, I checked. There's no one in sight. Make the switch, then give me, oh, 30 seconds.::

After he felt the shock/buzz of transition, Troy looked at the card. He could just make out that there was something on the card, but he couldn't see it clearly enough to describe it. In his human form, he had a flashlight with him but it had a red filter over the lens and he figured the colors had been chosen precisely in order to make that useless. It took him a few seconds to get the filter off, then he shielded the light and turned it on. He almost dropped the flashlight when he saw what the image was.

::Someone has a sense of humor.:: he thought after he completed yet another transition.

"What?"

::I said, or thought, that someone has a sense of humor. The image on this card is that buxom girl that you see in shiny plate on trucker's mud flaps. You know, the one facing to the side, leaning back on her arm?::

"Oh, yeah, so what makes that so funny?"

::Gorgeous, if there was ever a woman with a figure as good as that decal, it's you.::

"Yeah, right. Get back here. We have two more places to get and less than four hours to get there."

::Yes, Goddess.::

"And don't you forget it," she said sharply, but he could hear the smile in her tone.

She didn't hear Furrtive approaching, but somehow she knew he was there just the same. "Ready to change back?"

::Ready if you are,:: he replied. After the change he continued, "They were pretty cute with those colors. They were red and green, but so close in tone that you couldn't tell the difference in any black-and-white image, or green-and-white. If we'd have used one of those low-light night-vision scopes, we wouldn't have been able to see it."

"I wonder what they'll have at the next one," Savanna mused.

"Probably have this one inside a locked box or something," Troy offered.

It wasn't inside a locked box. In fact, it was more out in the open than the first one. It was hanging in a tree, in fact. Well up a towering oak that had been pruned so that there weren't any branches within fifteen feet of the ground. There were two rings of guards, too - not shoulder-to-shoulder since it was allowable to use non-lethal force and they didn't want a single simulated grenade to take them all out. But alert and moving randomly in the vicinity of the tree. In fact, that's part of how they identified the correct location for the card. The guards and the 15-foot leap to the lowest branches didn't slow Furrtive down a bit, though he had to make sure he had a secure cradle that would hold Troy when he had Alayla change him back to human form.

When he was Furrtive again, he reported, ::This one is the Playboy party joke girl, the one with thigh-high black boots, shoulder-high black gloves . . . and a smile. She's, um, reclining in a champagne glass.::

"Goody for her," Alayla said dryly.

::Y'know,:: Furrtive said while he was loping back to her position, ::we could really, really make an impression on our new boss if you posed for similar pictures. Think of what they'd say if we took in that sort of, um, proof that we had seen the cards.::

"Think of what it's going to feel like when I plant my boot up your . . ," Alayla snorted, interrupted herself.

They didn't need a flashlight to make out the third image. In fact, it was brightly lit. And surrounded by four armed men facing outward. A bit of careful reconnaissance revealed another circle of men, this time in a ring hidden in shadows fifty yards from the lights.

It was also a more complicated image - he could see it was some sort of cartoon figure, but from outside the outer ring of men he couldn't make it out well enough to describe it reliably.

"Can you get inside them, but stay in the dark?" Alayla asked.

::Yes,:: Furrtive answered confidently. ::But if I have to change back to Troy in order to make it out, they may see me.::

"Well, give it a shot," she ordered, though he was already moving to do that very thing.

A few minutes later Alayla heard a funny sound - or "sensed" a funny sound, since it wasn't really audible. It was obviously coming from Furrtive, but it took her a moment to realize he was laughing - or at least, doing some mental equivalent of laughing.

"What's going on?" she asked.

::Our boy has a sense of humor all right. And I think you impressed him more than he let on.::

"Me? What did *I* do?"

::I think all it took was looking so gorgeous, well, and based on this image, showing some strength of personality. I really, really think you should pose for our own picture of this one.::

"What are you talking about?" she demanded.

::I can see this one even as Furrtive. Do you remember the Wicked Wanda comic strip, from Penthouse? It was . . . oh, hell, I don't know . . . years ago, but we saw some reruns or whatever they call it.::

"Yes," she said tersely. "And I assume this is relevant?"

::Oh, yeah,:: Furrtive replied. ::If I'm not wrong, this was the Wicked Wanda cover image or something. Thigh-high spike-heeled boots, shoulder-length gloves . . . great body. That remind you of anyone we know?"

"Get serious," she snorted.

::I *am* serious,:: he insisted. ::We could get you the boots and the gloves, and at least Wanda has this, um, strategically placed buckle on her belt . . .::

"Get your ass back here, you pig," Alayla said, but he could hear the laughter in her voice, showing that there was some of Savanna in Alayla as well as the other way around.

::I'll just be another minute . . . or a few . . . I want to make sure that I can remember this image so that I can describe it.::

"In about one more minute, I'm going to do the switch and see if Troy can get out of there as well as Furrtive," she warned.

::Okay, okay, I'm on my way,:: Furrtive promised.

The internet is a very useful tool, especially when images are involved. Once upon a time most books were simple text, aside from a cover illustration perhaps. And libraries seldom allowed copies of any magazines - particularly adult magazines - they happened to have in their collections. But on the internet you can find just about any 'famous' image and the three images used as tests were all available. So the next day when they reported to Fafnir with the results of their operation, instead of verbal descriptions, they presented Garrison and Velasquez with copies of the images that had been on the cards - not the neutral red/green sketches that made the first two impossible to make out in black-and-white or night-vision optics, but the same poses. Since Troy had done the real work, Savanna let him be the one to flop the copies they had found onto Garrison's desk.

He laughed and congratulated them. However, Savanna had been watching Velasquez and she caught him giving her a guilty glance - then flushed when he realized she had caught him.

[Troy was right. I think Velasquez has a more-than-professional interest in me. Well, screw him. Oops, cancel that. Not ever, ever gonna happen. He's a pig for real, not just a macho jerk like Troy.]

She knew Troy wasn't really that bad. At least, if he were that bad then Cody had been worse. Savanna's memory flashed back to a certain exotic dancer from Cinnamon Bay. A small, ironic smile tugged at her lips as she realized that memory was impossibly out of place for Savanna, for all that she knew it - like Cody - was still part of her in some way. In any event, Cody had made as many suggestive comments as Dylan ever did, and Troy was probably nicer than either of them.

[Not Velasquez, though. He's the real thing - a true macho pig.]

Now her disdain showed as her introspective smile turned into a sneer when her eyes cleared from her internal thoughts. She realized that she was pointing that sneer in Velasquez's direction, which didn't really bother her.

"Okay, what's next?" she asked.

"Tonight's mission is a simple demolition job - blow up three piles of rock," Velasquez said. "The problem is that you need to get all three to blow within 30 seconds of each other, and that you can't use a radio trigger. We're going to be monitoring and jamming everything we can cover - which is more than you know."

"Okay," Savanna said easily. "I presume we'll have some coordinates again?"

"They're being sent to your phone now," Velasquez said. "And, as before, we'll have people watching. If you get caught, you fail the test."

"Understood," she said tersely.

It actually turned out to be easier than the mission to identify the cards, though it would not have been without Alayla's new abilities. After an appropriate night sneak - again as Troy and Savanna, and in black clothes with darkened faces - she identified a location where she could see all three piles of rock at the same time.

"Sneaky," she whispered to Troy, pointing at the third pile. It was on a small, artificial island in the middle of a pond. There were, of course, guards on all sides of the water. Anyone attempting to sneak into the water would be seen for sure. She noticed that they had mortar tubes in several positions and pointed them out to Troy.

"What are those for?"

He thought for a minute, then smiled. "I think they're for counter-battery fire. I'll bet the only way they think we could get all three within 30 seconds without a radio detonator - or wires they'd see us place if we went into the water - is with some sort of rocket-propelled grenade. I expect they're primed to send paint splatter to cover wherever we shoot from. In fact, it looks like there are only three or four places where you could hit all three piles from one launch point, and they're probably already pre-targeted on those. They just have to track back the grenade trail to see which one we're at and bingo - we're dead."

"Good thing we're not using RPGs, then, isn't it?" she said with a snicker.

In the end, it didn't turn out to be as easy as they had thought. The best location was actually up a tree. That would be good for avoiding paint spatter if they did draw some counterbattery fire, and it was actually closer than any other place that could give them line of sight to all three locations. Well, except for a couple of totally exposed places that were obviously not usable. Those exposed locations already had mortars and crews sitting on them.

Firing an RPG from a tree would not be a good idea. The backblast would probably set fire to the thing, and if not it would certainly cause enough damage to give away their position. Since the trees were essentially unusable as a place to shoot from, the mortars were not really targeted in their direction. If the Fafnir crews were sharp they might get retargeted in time to be awarded a paint-based 'kill' on the intruders, but only if they knew where to look.

Alayla's obvious weapon was the palm blast they had named, 'Grenade.' Velasquez had not specified how big the blast needed to be, and Grenade would be very noticeable. She selected her sequence of fire from closest to most distant, which would be around 40 yards for the first two, and almost 150 yard for the last - all good RPG distances. When she was ready, she looked at Furrtive for concurrence, then aimed along her arm and bent her hand back. They could just detect a shimmer pulsing from her palm, but no one else would notice it.

The first pile of rocks exploded with a most satisfying blast but Alayla was already aiming at the second pile. She didn't even bother to aim down her arm. Somehow the pulse knew where she *wanted* it to go, which was more accurate than sighting on her arm anyway. [Use the Force, Luke,] she thought, trying not to giggle.

Then she launched a pulse at the third rubble pile. It was almost their undoing.

"Oh, god," she grunted in pain, biting on her own hand to keep from screaming.

::What's wrong?:: Furrtive asked.

"My arm," she gasped. "It's on fire."

Furrtive felt so helpless seeing his goddess hurting and unable to do anything about it. He considered biting at the bracer in the hope of finding a way to take it off, but Alayla already had that in work. She seemed to know how to remove the metal plate, flicking at latches and pulling on leather ties. In only seconds it was off - though it seemed like longer than that to her. She peeled the underlying glove off as well and they both gasped to see an ugly array of blisters already growing on her forearm.

::Change to Savanna,:: Furrtive said.

"We're up in the middle of a tree," she replied.

::Yeah, and we can climb down. It's easier than climbing up, and I'll be able to help you. I mean, Troy will.::

She nodded, eyes squeezed in pain, but managed to fumble at the stone in the ring until it was placed in the opposite position. Pushing down on the stone, they prepared for the shock of transformation.

Once the change was complete, the news was better than they might have feared and worse than they might have hoped. Savanna's arm was not blistered. In fact, other than a redness that looked like a bad sunburn, it didn't seem injured at all. She gasped in relief, though her arm was still very tender.

"I can handle this," she said tightly. "Can we get down yet?"

While she was tending to her arm, the mortars had indeed been launched to each of the likely RPG launch locations. None, however, were targeted anywhere near their tree. The guards were running around searching for the attackers, including some that had been concealed so well that neither Alayla nor Furrtive have even known they were there. However, the war goddess and chameleon cougar were even more stealthy and had managed to pass right by the hidden men without detection. They waited quietly until the men completed their search, calls back and forth revealing that they were giving up. They did find that it was not paint, but dye that had filled the mortar shells, so if they had been tagged they were likely to show the results the next day.

As it was, the only result that might have showed was a still-angry red tone to Savanna's right arm, but that was concealed within the sleeve of her soft blouse and trim jacket. They reported to Garrison the next day on schedule, though they were much less smug than they had been after the card identification mission.

Chapter 9 - "Good Guys, or Bad Guys?"

Garrison welcomed them again the next morning, and in contrast to the first day Velasquez was almost welcoming as well. In fact, as soon as the mutual greetings were completed the operations chief asked, "How did you do that? That test is obviously set for RPGs, or maybe mortars with a laser designator - which we would have detected, by the way. And we used radar for counterbattery fire direction but we never saw any incoming rounds. How did you blow those targets?"

"I guess that's just going to have to be one of our secrets," Savanna said lightly.

"But, if there's a technology there that we don't understand, we need to get on top of it," Velasquez insisted.

"No, you don't," Savanna said, this time flatly, with no room for discussion.

"But . . ."

Garrison interrupted, "You heard the lady, Cesare. Drop it."

Velasquez subsided with poor grace. It was apparent his initial welcome was more about his hope to get some new technological edge than an actual appreciation for the new operatives. But he did nod and take his seat.

Savanna and Troy took their own seats and Savanna tried very hard to suppress a wince as her sleeve pulled on her arm. The sunburn-like tenderness was still there. She had - reluctantly - tried changing back to Alayla once they returned to their hotel rooms. The burn was nearly as bad as it had been. And as painful, so she switched quickly back to Savanna. Still, she forced herself to make the change again in the morning and found that Alayla healed much faster than normal humans. Her burns would probably have been reduced to the moderate sunburn stage in a couple of days, but those would have been very unpleasant days. As a result, she was going to be Savanna for at least the next little while. Unfortunately, Savanna seemed to heal only at normal rates. Her sunburn-equivalent was still quite tender the next morning. She was determined not to show it, though.

Garrison gave them a friendly smile and slid an envelope in front of them. "Let's take care of the fun part first - at least, I think you'll find this amusing."

Savanna pushed the envelope to Troy. [Message: I'm a boss, too. I'm not concerned with whatever is in the envelope. And I 'have people' to take care of administrative details.]

Troy, on the other hand, was impressed. The envelope was thick with cash, and at least the bill that showed on top was a hundred.

Savanna noted what it was without looking directly at it. "So, is that for services rendered - training your troops is what I think you called it - or is this for services yet to be performed?"

"Some of both," Garrison said. "If you walk away, then it's for services rendered." He looked at Velasquez and grinned. "Cesare here was more than a bit disappointed in his men for not stopping you. For not even getting a description of you after the fact. And anything that tweaks Cesare that well is worth quite a bit to this organization. We seem to have been getting complacent."

Velasquez's face clouded over, but other than an obvious tightening of his jaw he made no response.

"And the rest is that we have another assignment for you. The money will amount to an advance for expenses you might incur in the execution of the assignment. Since I don't think you're interested in submitting expense reports, I think we'll just work on the basis that it comes out of your pay. I don't think you'll feel cheated."

Savanna just nodded. [I have to keep playing it uber-cool. He needs to see me as a peer, not a minion.]

After a moment, she looked at Velasquez. "Will you be providing the particulars of the assignment?"

"Yes," Velasquez agreed. He slid another envelope across the desk.

"Who is the customer?" Savanna asked.

"It's in there," Velasquez replied. "And I think you'll agree this is for the 'good guys.' A Mrs. Donnelson has been kidnapped. Your job is to get her back."

"That's a job for the authorities," Savanna replied.

"Whose?" Velasquez asked. "The woman is the wife of a Caribbean businessman who didn't pay the right government officials for protection. If you're not aware of how rampant corruption is in the area, then you're not the right people for us."

He sighed and sat back in his chair. "The good news is that kidnapping is a business in the area. There is no 'ticking clock' that requires a rush job, and if you screw it up they'll just up the ransom a bit. They know any rescue attempt will be from a private organization so they'll just kill all the rescuers and send another ransom demand. Or try to, in any event."

"Wonderful," Troy said dryly, but he picked up the other envelope.

"I assume the delivery point is in here as well?" Savanna asked.

Velasquez nodded, then looked at Garrison. The head of Fafnir stood up, obviously bringing the meeting to an end. The others rose too and if Savanna felt the heat of Velasquez' stare on her derriere as they walked out, it was less than the heat of tenderness in her arm.

The mission itself was almost an anti-climax. Fafnir's briefing package had the location where the woman was being held and the longest task was arranging the charter of a support boat that could reach the indicated Caribbean island. The actual execution was a weakened echo of their villa strike against the Fafnir team. The guards were neither as structured nor as alert at the Fafnir operatives and between Furrtive's paws and the Headache pulse, all fell within a few minutes of when the pair rose from the waters near the island hideout. No real battle was required and none of them saw either Furrtive or Alayla. In fact, right up until they reached the victim, Furrtive could have handled it himself.

Alayla was afraid she would have to stun the victim as well as the kidnappers in order to keep their identities secret. Having anyone, including Mrs. Donnelson, tell a tale of a tall dark-haired warrior woman in black armor would pretty much establish the linkage between Savanna and the attacker at the villa, yet changing to Savanna while there might still be kidnappers around - including in the woman's room - was an even more serious risk. She didn't dare change from Alayla until she had cleared the captive's room. Her plan was to stun Mrs. Donnelson with the first pulse from Headache, then search the room before releasing her.

Apparently the kidnappers were also concerned about being identified by their victim. It was an ironic sign of their professionalism - at least by the standards of kidnappers - that they had used something more comfortable then a smelly bag over her head to keep their victim from seeing them. The kidnappers had put the poor woman in a locking bondage helmet that kept her blind and nearly deaf, with her hands locked into softly-padded cuffs suitable for long-term wear. Alayla saw that as soon as she saw the woman herself, and with that assurance that her own identity would be protected, proceeded to clear the room including an attached bathroom and closet. When Alayla was sure there were no more threats in the area, she changed back to Savanna and approached the victim.

"Be calm, Mrs. Donnelson," Savanna said. "We're here to rescue you."

"Rescue?" the woman repeated. "The men who captured me? Did you get them all?"

"Yes, we did. I'm sure of it," Savanna said. "However, we have a slight problem. I didn't bring any way to take that . . . thing off your head right away. I’m afraid you'll have to let us guide you away from here first."

"Just . . . get me out of here," Mrs. Donnelson said, blindly looking around.

With the change back to human form, Troy had swum out to where they anchored the support boat and started it up. He was waiting at the dock by the time Savanna had led the hooded woman away from the hideout. For him the small lock holding the helmet on might as well have been made out of string. He broke it quickly and helped the woman out of the helmet.

"Oh, god, thank you, thank you," she said. She told them that her name was Ellen Donnelson, which they already knew, and they quickly tuned out her grateful babble on how thankful she was, and how terrifying it had been, and how lonely she had been, and how grateful she was . . .

Troy found some tools in the chartered boat's engine room that would cut the cuffs holding Mrs. Donnelson's hands together and took care of that on the way to the rendezvous. The boat Troy had chartered was much faster than Isolde, but it had less depth of keel and tended to drift downwind faster. However, it was apparent that none of Cody's shiphandling skills had been lost in the transition to Savanna as she pulled smoothly alongside the rich man's yacht. A comic relief moment occurred when Mrs. Donnelson asked for the bondage helmet before she left the boat. She blushed, but her flush was accompanied with signs more of arousal than simple embarrassment.

"So, do you think she's going to be the one wearing that thing, or is she going to put it on him?" Troy asked as they motored away.

"Oh, god, I don't even want to think about that," Savanna moaned. "Those guys have to be like, 50!"

"Well, they say 50 is the new 40," Troy replied.

"Yeah, if the *they* doing the saying are already 60," Savanna said, but she giggled at the image of the so-proper woman offering that hood to her husband.

"You know, Alayla could have cut the locks on the helmet and on the cuffs," Troy said.

"Of course," Savanna agreed. "But I couldn't let her know that Alayla rescued her."

"So you left that poor woman blind and nearly helpless for, oh, an hour longer than necessary," Troy pointed out.

"Yes. Do you think that's terrible?"

He laughed. "Well, I might have if she had panicked or something. But she was remarkably calm. And she did keep the helmet."

Apparently the Donnelson's were quite pleased with the way things had turned out - even if she did have to wear that helmet a bit after she was 'officially' rescued. Garrison met them again at Fafnir headquarters, this time with a larger envelope. "There's a bonus in there from our clients."

"Good. I'm glad we could help her," Savanna said.

"Yes," Garrison agreed. "Less than 48 hours after we gave you the assignment, you're pulling up to Donnelson's yacht with his wife. So far as we can tell, no one was hurt - or at least, no one was injured including the kidnappers according to the official reports . . . which we can believe or not as we choose. Most of them seem to have been clubbed into unconsciousness - silently, and in the dark. Care to tell us how you managed that?"

"With great care, of course," Troy answered easily. He said nothing more, and after a moment Garrison sighed.

"Well, I can't argue with results like that. I'll let you know when we have another assignment. In the meantime, enjoy your bonus. It's substantial."

After they left the Fafnir offices, Savanna turned to Troy and said, "I don't think this is going to work out."

"Why?"

"I just didn't think it through, I guess," she said. "They're not going to let us gain access to their internal records, and we can't keep doing missions for them."

"Why not? We can handle whatever they might assign us."

"Yes, but it's only a matter of time - likely a short time - before someone sees us in our alternate identities. And if Alayla shows up on a mission assigned to Savanna . . ."

"Yeah, you said something about that," Troy said. "And I don't disagree, but with your knockout power and my camouflage, we can stay hidden."

"Not guaranteed," Savanna said. "We need another plan. I wish I had one."

"Okay," Troy said. "But while you're, um, 'cooking' something up, you owe me dinner."

"What? What makes you say that?"

"It's a celebration of a successful mission where we saved a nice woman from a very bad situation. It's the sort of thing that makes me feel good, and good about us. We owe it to ourselves. Besides, every time we've gone out to dinner since the cruise ship, it's just . . . eating. Mission Objective: Feed the furnace. Dress: Casual. Location: Not significant. We just got a ton of cash and I think we need to spend a little of it."

"With a date?" Savanna asked, eyes wide at the thought, but a not-well-hidden smile showing in those same deep, violet eyes.

"Absolutely," Troy said. "I am hereby volunteering to go someplace nice enough that I need to wear a suit. Which means that you need to wear one of those dresses that you love shopping for so much."

"Oh it does, does it?" she asked, arching a brow in skepticism . . . but they both knew it was a poor attempt to disguise her interest.

"Absolutely," Troy repeated. "I haven't seen you in all your awesome glory since the ship, and that's just too long."

She started to arch a skeptical brow at him again, but gave it up even before the motion was started. After a moment, she said, "Yes, it has been too long. Even though, you know we don't really need the money. Whatever magic backs up our credit cards is still working, and our cash never runs out."

"Yeah, ain't it great?" Troy said. "But I still think we should go out for a nice dinner."

Savanna shrugged . . . then she grinned as some nicely naughty thought came to her. "Okay, but that means I need the room to myself for a while."

"You sure you won't need any help getting your dress zipped up or something?" he offered.

"I'll manage," she said.

A few hours later when she entered the hotel bar to join Troy again, he tried to keep his attention focused on Savanna's eyes. But he just couldn't. This dress was about as different from the one she had worn on the ship as possible, except that it also fit very, very well. This one was brilliant white and though it had long sleeves, it was short enough to show off the very nice tan on her long, long legs. And it was cut so low that her . . . charms were a cause for celebration in their own right, even aside from the cash bonus that was supposed to be the reason for their date.

And the really, really interesting thing was that when she saw his interest, her body responded with two little - well, not so little - points of acknowledgment. When he saw that he decided he wasn't going to apologize for staring.

"Y'know, it's not fair," he said as he stood to hold her chair for her.

"What's not fair?" she asked.

"All of the sudden, I can't remember what Alayla looks like, yet she's a real, no-kidding goddess. You'd think I would remember what a goddess looks like, but tonight you have driven every other woman in the world right . . . well, out of the world. Tonight, there is only you."

"Thank you," she said, blushing but smiling at the compliment.

Troy went into the 'guy' mode. "Would you like a drink before we leave? We have time before our reservations."

"Geez, I thought I took so long you'd be passed out from hunger," Savanna teased.

"You did, except I had a few pretzels and whatever. Plus, I allowed extra time. There was no way I was gonna rush you tonight, and I definitely made the right choice there."

She dimpled with another smile, but she shook her head at the same time. "I don't think I need a drink. Not yet, at least. I guess I've gotten used to dressing like a girl in public."

"Allow me to disagree, pretty lady," Troy said. "There is nothing girlish about you - except maybe that tiny waist. But if you take a deep breath everyone in here is going to see some very womanly attributes."

"Is that a complaint?" she asked archly. "Should I go put on something else?"

"Oh, god no!" he said. "The only complaint will be if you start acting all giggly and girlish. You're much too perfect to pretend to be a silly little airhead."

"Maybe it wouldn't like, be y'know, pretend," she said, flipping her hair around and giggling. "All your flattery might like, go to my head or y'know . . . whatever."

"Don't even try," Troy said, laughing in a way that was *not* an answering snicker of agreement. "The perfect woman is as pretty as a goddess, and as smart as . . . well, you."

He dropped his voice to a whisper, "Or as Cody. That's one of the things that makes this all seem so real despite the basic impossibility of it. You're as smart as Cody, which is saying something, yet as beautiful as . . . well, as Alayla."

Troy continued to look thoughtful for a moment, then continued, "You know, there's something to that. You do some things differently than Cody, but there really is something of him in you as well. I don't know exactly what, but I can tell it's there. And that's a good thing. I'd hate to lose that part of him - he was my best friend and I'm glad you kept that."

Then he grinned at her and let his eyes drift down again, "While adding some very special . . . features of your own."

"Pig," she said, but she smiled. Then just to be mean she took a deep breath and arched her back a little.

"Oh, that's just cruel," he complained, wincing as though he were in physical pain. Of course, that might have been true.

He took a moment to finish off his drink, then left some cash on the table. Savanna gathered up her purse and gave Troy a smile when he helped her to her stilt heels. Somehow, he never got around to letting go of her hand and she never got around to complaining about it.

Since their rented vehicle was a van, Troy decided to use taxis for transportation. The driver let them off at the door to a building with a suspiciously small parking lot and Savanna started wondering just how much this 'date' was going to cost them. Her concern wasn't diminished when the menus were presented without prices - or at least, hers was. On the other hand, that was kind of romantic, too. Certainly the setting was. Snowy tablecloths. Candles on each table, yet with the tables far enough apart that each seemed like a private island of light in a sea of darkness.

Savanna was surprised and at first a bit put off when Troy ordered for both of them, but just like the night in the darkened theater, this was part of being a girl - a woman - too. And she decided she didn't really mind. It made her feel like a pampered princess to have such a huge, strong man clearly devoted to 'taking care' of her. Her balance on her heels was fine - but they were still very high heels and they restricted her movement. So did the short skirt on her dress - at least, if she didn't want to flash everyone in the place. She found that focusing on what modesty was still available to her made things like what she ate seem like distractions.

Then Troy was done with the waiter and looking at her again. Looking at her eyes, with pride and wonder . . . and desire.

"Stop," she said. "You're making me blush."

"Good" Troy answered. "It makes you even more beautiful."

"Look, Troy, we need . . . I mean, yeah, this is a date and all, but . . . I'm not . . ."

"You're not going to be pressured into anything you don't want to do," he assured her. "But I'm going to enjoy this date with the appreciation it - and you - deserve. If you don't like it, close your eyes."

"Pig," she whispered, but it was becoming a term of endearment. She shook herself and tried again. "Look, Troy, we need to be . . . I mean, . . ," she interrupted herself and did close her eyes. When she opened them again, she said softly, "You need to help me, because I'm not entirely sure I can . . . help myself. I may . . . do something we'll regret - at least, that I'll regret - later. It would be so incredibly easy to give in."

Troy's eyes widened in surprise and he sat back a little. "Whoa, dude, are you serious? I mean, I really would like to take this further, but I figured you were just, y'know, teasing. Just doing an awesome job of being a woman. A little flirting, a bit of tease, a lot of sensual heat, but I didn't think it was any more than a surface act - like, oh, wearing a dress. It's real for that body, but it's on the surface. Hell, I guess I figured you were just a really good actress."

"It's not an act," Savanna whispered. "I feel every bit like a woman tonight. Inside and out. But . . . what about tomorrow? Or anyway, some day down the road when this is over? What will I - what will *we* - feel like then?"

"I don't know," Troy admitted. "I'm not even sure that the 'we' that we are today is the same 'we' that found that ring. And if we change back, that 'we' might be someone else, too. I just don't know."

"Exactly," Savanna said. "I just don't know. But I think we need to be very careful."

"If you say so," he agreed - more or less. He sighed and added, "Look, Savanna, I'm sorry. I won't say I was just teasing because I was more than ready to go as far as you want to go, but I guess I just let the whole self-control thing fall on you. I figured . . . I mean, from my perspective you're an incredibly beautiful, sensuous woman. But I figured Cody would control things from your side."

"Not entirely," she said. "In my head, I know I am - or was - Cody. But there's a lot more to this body than the brain. And those other parts are . . . shouting at me. A lot of the time. I think it's a good thing that you're a nice guy, because I'm not entirely sure that I'm a nice girl."

"Oh, god, that's just not fair," Troy said, smiling to try to lighten the mood.

It worked, at least a little. Savanna found a smile of her own and reached out to touch his hand. "Think about it from my side."

Troy actually blushed at that. Savanna noticed, but she just arched a tapered brow a little higher - giving him the choice to take or ignore the opening.

"I guess . . . I have been, um, thinking about it from your side. I mean, aren't you curious? You have the chance to, y'know, experience things from both sides. If you - I don't know - if you weren't so personally involved . . . If you just considered this as a thought experiment or something . . . wouldn't you think the, um, guy involved might be curious about what it's like for . . . the other side?" His square-jawed cheeks blushed again and he added. "I know I have."

"You want to be a woman?"

"No," he said quickly. "Not now, and I never even thought about it back before I learned it was somehow, magically, possible. But now that it's happened - to you, I mean - aren't you even curious?"

Savanna was literally saved by the bell - or ringtone - when the burner phone went off.

"Yes," Troy said, a bit abruptly.

"This is Velasquez. I have a mission for you."

"Okay, when do we meet?"

"Are you free tonight?"

"We're at dinner now. We could come by later, I suppose."

"No, that's all right. I'll bring the mission data to you."

Troy provided the location and then sat back, looking at Savanna.

"That's strange," Troy said. "Two changes at once. No Garrison, and not in the Fafnir offices."

"Yeah," Savanna said. "Is the back of your neck itching?"

"No, but there's something . . . a feeling that this is significant."

"Yeah, and I wonder if the ring has something to do with it," Savanna said. "We needed a new approach and now - coincidentally - things are different. I don't believe in coincidences like that . . . at least, not when this damn ring is involved."

She looked thoughtful for a minute. "Y'know, this is sort of like Wayfinder. If you just ask for something vague, like 'find justice,' Wayfinder doesn't help. But if you ask for something specific, like 'find the next key for this password,' it points to it immediately. Now, when we need a new approach, things happen."

"You think the ring has that sort of power?"

"I think the ring has so much power we don't know *what* it can do. After all," she said, arching her back for a moment and grinning at Troy's wince, "it made impossible changes in us. Why not do impossible things like arrange a new path forward? Like you said, this is the first time we've met Velasquez when Garrison is not present, and outside of the Fafnir offices. I think that is . . . or those are significant data."

Troy asked, "Did you ever get a strange vibe from Velasquez?"

"Yeah, all the time," Savanna said. "His eyes burn a hole in my butt every time we walk out of the office. And I'll bet the only reason he could tell you the color of my eyes is because he read it in one of his files."

"Really?" Troy's deep voice rumbled. "I didn't notice, but maybe I should have."

"Down boy," Savanna said, smiling at his protectiveness. "I can handle it. Anyway, when you asked if I had a bad vibe from him, the answer is yes. But I just figured it was his lust radiating at me. Did you get something, too?"

"Maybe," Troy said. "Maybe it's just the contrast. Garrison was really welcoming and even back on the cruise I guess the vibe I was getting was positive. I think he's a 'good guy' even if his company has been involved in the seedy side of life. I don't think I'd call him a 'nice' guy, meaning if he had to get rough on a mission, I think he could do it. But I think he is a 'good guy' in that he truly tries to work for what's right."

"Okay, and . . ," she prompted.

"I never got that from Velasquez. I guess he just seemed ruthless to me. No conscience. Limited only by what society will let him get away with."

"I could see that," Savanna agreed. "Obviously, I 'm biased. I don't like the way he looks at me. But if you're getting something similar . . ."

"So what do we do?" Troy asked.

"I guess we see what the mission is," she said.

Chapter 10 - "Haven't We Met Before?"

When Velasquez showed up, he had a companion. The companion showed Savanna how close they had come to being discovered in their alternate identities because the companion was the man from the room in the villa; the leader who had refused to tell them anything.

Troy stood up as the men approached, but Savanna remained seated. It was one of the unconscious feminine mannerisms that seemed to come to her once she found the need. Staying still also gave her a chance to get her racing heart back into order. [Uber-cool,] she ordered herself. [We don't know this guy.]

Troy was massive enough that any surprise on his rugged features looked like nothing more than polite attention. He reached out his hand to Velasquez, which triggered a round of introductions.

"This is Brett Renfro," Velasquez supplied, allowing him first to shake Troy's hand, and then to touch fingers with Savanna. "He's one of our senior operatives. He has some background on the next assignment."

"Haven't we met before?" Renfro asked Savanna.

"I don't think so," she said. "But we get around a bit. Perhaps we have. Where do you generally spend time?"

"Oh, here and there," Renfro replied unhelpfully. Of course, Savanna's answer had been just as empty of content.

After Velasquez completed the introductions, he looked pointedly at the empty seats at their table.

"Please. Sit down," Savanna offered, grateful that Troy had deferred to her. On the one hand, being the only one seated had a power element. On the other hand, needing to look up at all the others took too much of that away - only to have some of it returned when Troy made it clear she was the head of their little partnership.

[Too many games,] she sighed. [This will be tricky.]

Once they were arranged, she looked at Velasquez with an inquiring arch to her sculpted brow, letting silence add to her power.

Velasquez nodded and began the briefing. "This is actually the second phase of a mission. The first phase was to seize plans for a terrorist act from some right-wing extremists."

"Terrorist?" she repeated.

"Yes, it had something to do with corrupting our energy supplies," Renfro supplied. "We found the terrorist's base of operations - a boat - and seized their data, but they seem to have disappeared. We were hoping that you could find them."

"That sort of investigation is more appropriate for a large group. We're more of an . . . action team," Savanna said. "I'm assuming you have a starting point, but there is a lot of time involved in just running down leads. It takes manpower."

"Yes, normally," Velasquez said. "But this is a bit different. We've done the normal background things and come up dry. They seem to have disappeared from the island where we left them. What we would like you to do is go to the island and start from there. Figure out how they got off the island, and from there where they might have gone."

"They?" This time Troy repeated the key word.

"Two men," Renfro said. "The names on the records - for the lease of their boat and things like that - were Cody Bransford and Dylan Jamieson. Their cover story was college students doing research into alternate forms of energy, but they seem to have done very little actual research. What we found in their papers was obviously a cover story as well."

Savanna was lucky in that she had chosen the moment when the provided the names to take a swallow from her wine glass. And even luckier that the names came out just before she had swallowed any wine. She paused for a moment with the glass to her lips as though savoring the aroma and by the time she took an actual swallow she had her surprise under control. It helped that any time Savanna moved, all male eyes were on her so if Troy gave any sign that he recognized the names, no one noticed.

[Chasing ourselves down - as terrorists, no less - is not an assignment I expected,] she thought. [And it is not the sort of mission that should be assigned to us. This is all bogus, but there might be a way to get something out of it anyway.]

"Who is the customer?" she asked.

"The US Government," Velasquez replied. "We often do jobs for them."

"I imagine you do," she said, "but this one seems strange. If anyone has the sort of manpower resources it would take to track down a couple of - did you say, college guys? - it would be them."

"Not this time," Velasquez said dismissively.

"Actually, that's not good enough," Savanna said. "The US Government is too big, and not monolithic enough to be the only identification we have for 'the customer.' You'll have to be more specific."

"Why? You won't work for your own government?"

"Oh, we might," she said. "But all we have so far is your claim that it's someone in the government. No offense, but that's not enough. Even if he - or she - is with the government, this might not be a valid mission. Maybe the guy is misinformed. Or it wouldn't be the first time that some mid-level bureaucrat was bribed by a competitor to use the government against someone innocent. He might even think he's doing the right thing - even if it's not exactly the 'legal' thing."

She shrugged, then waited for their eyes to return to her face from where her motion had drawn their attention. "If you want us to work this problem, we need to meet the person who is really behind the assignment."

Velasquez frowned, sitting for a moment. Finally he said, "That might be arranged. I'll get back to you."

He stood up to leave, offering no more than perfunctory handshakes and nods of good-bye. Renfro left with equal abruptness.

Velasquez turned to Renfro once they were out of sight and asked, "Well?"

"No way," Renfro said firmly. "The woman who attacked us was six feet tall, and while that woman - Savanna, was it? - was seated, I don't think she's that tall. And she certainly doesn't have the shoulders and muscles of the woman warrior we saw. The blonde hair could have been a wig, but that warrior woman took her helmet off and her face was . . . firmer. She was amazingly beautiful, but she didn't have the delicate bone structure of that blonde. The only thing they have in common - besides being beautiful - is the same color eyes. That is unusual, of course, but it doesn't make them the same woman."

"Damn," Velasquez said. "After they took down the kidnappers by knocking them all out, I thought this might have been the pair that took out your team."

"So did I," Renfro agreed. "But there's no way that's the same woman and unless that guy has some sort of stealth suit, he's not the . . . distortion I saw with the warrior woman. Though there is something . . ."

"Yes?" prompted Velasquez.

"I'm just trying to remember . . . I wonder if that warrior woman had a ring like the Sylvan woman. It's fairly unusual, but it's so dark, and the brunette wore black gloves. With black armor. I just don't remember if she had a dark ring as well. It could have been lost in all that black."

"But you think the warrior woman might have had a ring like that?"

Renfro shrugged. "I suppose that's a fair way to put it. She *might* have had a ring like that, but all I can say for sure is that I can't be sure. It wouldn't have stood out, and I certainly don't have a clear memory that she had a ring. It's just . . . unusual, I guess - the ring on Sylvan - and I guess I'm looking for anything unusual."

"But you're sure they're not the same woman?" Velasquez prompted again.

"Of that I am sure," Renfro said firmly. "If there is a connection - and if the ring has anything to do with it - then the best I can guess is something like a sorority. They may know each other . . . but I guess that's possible even without some sort of ring they both have. If the brunette even had a ring like that. Sorry, now that I've rolled it around in my mind a little, it's nothing."

"I guess," Velasquez said, obviously disappointed.

They went through the business of getting into their car. When Velasquez had it running and was pulling from the lot, Renfro asked, "So, are you really going to get them to look into the disappearance of those two guys?"

"Of course not," Velasquez said. "That was just an excuse to get you a chance to look at her, and to see how they would react to the names. Hell, the only reason we think your team's attack on their boat and the attack on your team are related is because one followed the other so quickly. We don't even know if that dark-haired warrior woman knows those students exist."

Renfro nodded. "Well, these two didn't seem to know them. I have to admit, I was looking at her more than the big guy when you dropped the names but I didn't really see any response."

Velasquez nodded his head. "I'll just . . . not get back to them on this one. Garrison doesn't know anything about it, of course. He'll come up with some other mission for them soon enough. And if he doesn’t . . . well, I'd be just as happy if they move on to something else. They make me uneasy. They're too good for someone I've never heard of, and they've hidden their real background and identities too well. I don't like people that mysterious."

"Yeah, right," Renfro laughed. "Like my team is any different."

"Yeah, but your team works for me. These two work for Garrison."

Renfro nodded in agreement, thinking the encounter was a dead end.

Savanna and Troy thought otherwise. They remained at their table after the two men left.

"Well, if there was any doubt about the relationship between - what was his name? - Renfro's team and the attack on us . . . the Bransford and Jamieson us . . . it's gone now," Troy said.

"Yes," Savanna agreed. "But it's not clear what the responsibility chain is above that. I'm not even sure that Garrison is in the loop."

"I'm not either," Troy agreed. "So, what do we do now?"

Savanna looked thoughtful for a moment. "What do you think the relationship is between Velasquez and Renfro?"

"Velasquez is the boss of those two, at least," Troy said.

"I agree. That means the link we need to follow from here goes through Velasquez."

She grinned and asked, "I wonder if we can figure out where he lives. Can you say, 'Wayfinder?'"

"Not while I'm Furrtive," Troy said with a smile. Then his smile changed. It was still humorous, but there were something deeper there, too. "There are a lot of things I can't do as Furrtive."

They continued with their meal, relaxing in the knowledge that - whether enabled by the ring or not - they had a path forward.

And then just relaxing. Their feed-the-furnace meals had not included wine or cocktails, both of which seemed appropriate for their 'celebration' date. It was a strange meal that combined the familiarity of old friends who had many shared experiences - leading to lots of inside-joke humor as they remembered their times together - with the newness of a first "dinner date." She was flattered by his attention in a way that provided a new perspective; a mirror image of Cody's 'conquests.' Not that it felt like surrender to have a large, handsome man focus on her so sharply.

Eventually Troy signaled for the check and Savanna took advantage of that business to visit the powder room. For some reason, she wanted to make sure she looked nice. Really nice.

Troy's eyes widened in pleasure when she returned, though all she had done was blend a few edges, and touch up her mascara and lipstick. But she *felt* pretty. Maybe it was looking in the mirror at herself, but she was reminded of how good she really looked and she liked it. That pleasure seemed to show because Troy's enjoyment of her return was greater than the small changes should have caused.

"You truly are beautiful," he said softly as she approached.

"Thank you, kind sir," she said lightly, driven by unconscious reflex to dip in a quick, yet graceful curtsey. "You're not so bad yourself."

Savanna said it more out of politeness than anything else, but the words made her consider her date with a little more concentration. At first Troy had just seemed 'big' and 'masculine' in a solid, powerful way. But what she realized now was that Troy really did *look* good. The suit he wore sent a message of sophisticated success, yet it did not hide the trim bulk of his muscular frame. What she had not really paid attention to was that he was actually very handsome as well. His face had clean, symmetric lines that were both strong and animated. His pleasure at her appearance showed without making him seem childish, and the combination of honest emotion and rugged strength was very . . . the word was 'appealing.' To her. Behind her eyes she had a flash vision of what it could be like to be with Troy, and it made her tingle in a way that was frighteningly desirable - an itch she wanted to scratch . . . or have someone scratch for her.

Without any conscious control, her hand reached out to cup the solid planes of his cheek, feeling the rasp of a barely-emerging beard in the soft palm of a hand that seemed so delicate next to his power.

"You're . . . not so bad . . . yourself," she repeated slowly, in a breathless whisper. Where had all her breath gone? She was feeling lightheaded, yet even that was frighteningly desirable. A drug that created a craving for more.

Somehow her hand moved from his cheek to his neck and she felt it pull him toward her. Somewhere in there her eyes closed. Somewhere in there, her lips opened.

"Oh, god, I can't handle this," she whispered, shivering as she pulled back. "I need you to take me home. Please."

"Of course," Troy said. His tone had no apparent disappointment, but she carefully avoided looking at his eyes to see if there was any hurt there.

Or letting him see the pain in her own eyes.

That happened to be one of the nights when they each had their own room. There was another moment at the door to Savanna's room. Troy took the key card from her trembling hands and opened the door for her.

"Are you gonna be okay?" he asked.

"Kiss me again," she said, surprising him. Not that he hesitated to comply.

He kissed her with passion and tenderness, but this time he broke it off before she leaned back. "Are you gonna be okay?" he asked again.

"Oh, god, I don't know," she moaned. "This is not supposed to be happening to me."

"Hard to argue with that," he said wryly. "This is all impossible anyway."

"Tell me about it," she sighed. Finally she managed a rueful smile of her own and said. "I'm sorry, Troy. Really. I’m not trying to be a tease. I'm just . . . confused."

"It's okay," he said. "I'm sure this hotel has plenty of cold water."

"Cold water?" she repeated, then snickered. "Yeah, well, they better."

With that she reached out once again to touch his cheek with her slender hand, then sighed as she stepped into her room.

Savanna had not answered Troy's question about whether she was 'curious' about sex from the female side. She was. Intensely. And her curiosity wasn't lessened by the fact she had been . . . experimenting some of the nights when they had separate rooms. With breath-destroying, brain-fracturing, universe-disintegrating results. This wasn't the first night when she had been highly aware of her new body. And of its needs. And of its limitations - or at least, *her* limitations.

Her experiments had discovered that for women - or at least, for one specific woman - sexual pleasure was not a destination; it was a journey. A journey that could continue and continue. But the downside is that it seemed like a never-ending journey that could never reach its destination. Her experiments had shown that despite whatever she tried, and even when it left her limp as a wet rag (very wet, in fact), all she could do for herself was to take the edge off. There was still a feeling of unmet need, of . . . unfulfilled need. She knew in a way that she couldn't deny even to herself that she wanted very much to be 'filled' in a way that only . . . that only . . . what she had felt in Troy's jeans, that night in the darkened theater, could do.

All of the sudden, in her imagination, she saw Troy in the next room taking care of *his* unmet needs . . . of that huge tool - she was sure it would be monstrous based on the hints through his towel when they *had* shared a room - rampant and demanding . . . of Troy taking care of the "problem" in his own way.

That made her even hotter. She stripped out of her clothes with the bare minimum of care to prevent damage. She remembered - had been thinking of little else for the last hour, it seemed - that her room's shower had a detachable spray head. That had been one of the better experiments.

Her mind flashed on a hundred different images while she was taking care of her "problem" in her own way. Troy was in her fantasy images, only he wasn't wearing a towel. For one moment she even flashed on being Alayla, and having Furrtive . . . Now *that* was kinky, but it was enough to send her rocketing into the sky over and over.

When she finally calmed down, limp but once again not really satisfied, she tried to decide why she didn't just *do* it with Troy. They both wanted it. They were both adults. It had been about a month since she had been transformed and she hadn't had a menstrual cycle (thank God . . . or Goddess), though she had been changing back and forth from Savanna to Alayla every few days and that might have had something to do with that. In any event, she didn't expect to get pregnant. And she was sure, somehow, that neither of them had to worry about STDs. Why not just do it?

Deep down inside, the part of her that was still Cody was shouting with the answer. Cody was afraid that if she took this last step, then she would lose him. That if she 'went all the way' as a woman, then she would really have gone all the way to being a woman, and that Cody would never return.

And the greatest problem of all was another question that followed from that thought: Would it be so bad to be Savanna/Alayla . . . permanently?

Her doubts or concerns or whatever they were - questions, at least, - were gone the next morning. Well, she acted that way anyway. They went through their well-practiced routine of changing in the back of the van into Alayla and Furrtive, getting a line of bearing with Wayfinder, changing back and driving to another spot. It happened to be a Saturday, which didn't mean much for Velasquez. He was one of those relentless types who seldom took a day off, even weekends. But Wayfinder did not lead them to the Fafnir offices. Nor did it lead them to any residence. In fact, it didn't lead them to any single spot at all. Velasquez was on the move. That made it really tough because they couldn't follow at the same time they took a bearing.

Or at least, they shouldn't have. Savanna had a feeling that this was more than a casual drive for their target so she really didn't want to lose him, yet she couldn’t switch to get a new bearing while Troy was driving. On the other hand . . .

"Pull over and switch," she ordered. Troy found a place in a nearly deserted parking lot and moved to the back of the van. However, instead of moving back there with him, Savanna moved into the driver's seat and started up again.

"What's going on?" he asked.

"We need to try something," she said. While she drove, she manipulated the ring and just before pushing the stone home in the transform position, she said, "Hold on."

What, exactly, Troy was to hold on to was not clear, but the pulse of transform shock followed her words. If the van wobbled a little, neither noticed it. Now Alayla was driving.

::How does an ancient Greek goddess know how to drive?::

"Oh, that could have been bad," Alayla replied with a frown, but she didn't stop. "Hell, how does *any* of this work?" She pulled off her helmet and leaned back a bit to put her shoulder by the door post. Hopefully, from the outside, she would just look like an ordinary woman driver. "Too bad shoulder pads are out of style for women," she mused. "These pauldrons are a bit . . . dramatic."

::Let me think . . ," Furrtive mused as she drove, :: . . . magical transformations, following a dangerous operative, and all you can think about is fashions?::

The big cougar coughed with a sound that did for a laugh. ::On the other hand, how many women would know that shoulder armor pieces are called pauldrons?::

While he had been talking - or telepathing, or whatever it was - Alayla had pulled Wayfinder from its sheath. She managed to get a bearing on Velasquez with the blade. "I think this will work."

::Yeah, as long as we don't get stopped,:: observed Furrtive. ::Even a goddess would have trouble explaining the armor and blades, plus no license . . . and oh, yeah, a cougar in the back of the van.::

"Oh, go . . . chase a mouse or something," Alayla said, but she couldn't hide a smile.

They managed to track Velasquez as he headed west on Highway 50. With a bit of faster-than-legal pursuit - thankfully not interrupted by sirens and flashing lights - they caught up enough to get a lock on their target's actual vehicle; a showy Batmobile-black Camaro. That helped because it allowed them to track him through the merge and then split with Highway 29, which Velasquez followed next. Eventually he led them to the Manassas area, and then to Henry Hill where the first battle of Manassas (or Bull Run, to the Federals) had been fought. After Velasquez parked his car, he started walking toward the statue of General Jackson that identified the center of the Confederate line. This was the battle where Stonewall Jackson got his nickname for 'standing like a stone wall' while the battle swirled around him. There was someone waiting for him there.

Furrtive's shimmer slid through the morning shadows after their quarry. He merged with the rolling grass and crept close enough to hear the exchange.

The other man challenged Velasquez as soon as they were within normal voice range, without any sort of greeting. "So, are they the ones?" The challenger was a middle-aged man well into middle-aged spread. He wore an expensive suit even on a weekend, and fiddled with a not-very-convincing comb-over whenever the wind moved the longish hairs around.

"Renfro says no," Velasquez reported.

"Any information on that pair of students?"

Velasquez shook his head at that, too.

"Did you send someone back to check on them? They're not still on that island, are they?"

"Of course I checked," Velasquez said. "They're gone."

"How do you know that?"

"I know they're gone from the island because we checked. I don't know where they went, but I'll lay money they're dead."

"How?"

"Drowning, most likely," Velasquez supplied. "Or died of exposure at sea. I expect they made some sort of raft; the wreck of that boat would have had some tools and things. But the current wouldn't take them anywhere they could get help. Hell, they may be - or their bodies, anyway - half way to Europe by now if their raft didn't dump them into the water to drown. But they didn't swim 30 miles to get help, and they didn't build a yacht to sail to Miami. They're dead."

The other man frowned, but he nodded slowly. "That's not an entirely satisfactory outcome, but it will probably be sufficient."

Velasquez shrugged, more to show lack of concern than disagreement. "What's next?"

"I'll let you know," the unknown man said. "I've been reviewing grant requests for any other potential alternate energy solutions. Speaking of which, even if they're not the ones who attacked your team, are these Sylvan people going to be a problem?"

"No," Velasquez said firmly. "I'll let Garrison keep them busy on legitimate Fafnir business. If *you* need anything more, I'll use the regular team."

"Very well," the man replied. "I'll be in touch."

With that, he walked off in a different direction than where Velasquez had parked his car. Furrtive flowed back to the van, itself parked well away from either of the two conspirators, but his expectation to be changed immediately back into Troy was not met.

::What's the matter?::

"I'm trying to see if Wayfinder can keep track of that new guy," Alayla said. "We don't know his name or much about him. In fact, I didn't even a get a good look at his face. But that's apparently not going to be a problem."

::It's not?::

"No. I 'asked' Wayfinder to point at him and it's working fine. As soon as they separated, the knife stayed with the new guy."

::So now we track him?::

"Yes," she confirmed. All of the sudden her arm - holding Wayfinder - moved quickly in an arc. "Well, I guess he got in his car." A few more minutes of tracking and they had a bearing that had steadied out enough to follow.

It didn't work. Every time they found a tactic that made a little progress something got in the way. In this case: traffic. By the time they got around to the north side of the Manassas battlefield where the actual Bull Run flows, traffic was bad enough that even with Wayfinder pointing the way, their new target was well out of sight. To the extent that Alayla could sense distance as well as direction, it was clear he was getting farther away as well.

Finally she gave up and found a place for another transformation. After they were back to Savanna and Troy, she let him get back in the driver's seat.

"I think we need a better plan than just following him anyway," she said. "What was your impression of their little talk?"

"If the new guy is not the top boss, he certainly higher up than Velasquez," Troy said.

"As you reported their conversation, I agree," Savanna said. "What's your impression of the man himself?"

"Some sort of bureaucrat," Troy replied. "He gave off this officious vibe - someone who has power without real accountability. That silly comb-over wouldn't work for an elected politician, but he's not a businessman. He wasn't . . . confident enough to be a major corporate player. He has to work in the shadows."

"Hmm, good insight," Savanna said. She smiled and looked at her rugged companion. "So, how about another dinner? This time I'll treat."

"Since I have all our hard-earned money, how much do you want me to give you so that you can 'treat' us to dinner?" Troy asked with a chuckle.

"Just for that, I'll make you wait an extra half hour while I change," she threatened.

"See that it's worth it," he countered - taking the time for a full-body leer at his gorgeous partner. He didn't do that often . . . which made it all the more effective on the times when he allowed himself that little pleasure.

Savanna blushed, but she couldn't hide a smile of pleasure at his appreciation. And if she hadn't had enough incentive already, sparking that appreciation in his eyes again was a good reason to take a little extra time. For that evening, she chose red; dark red that shimmered alternately into glowing highlights and infinite depths with every motion. The design of the dress was a simple wrap-around and it wasn't even that short.

Except for the slit where the wrap pretended to overlap. The first time Troy caught just a hint of a dark welt on her smoky stockings his eyes locked in with irresistible power. After a couple of more he finally managed to reboot his whirling thoughts and look back at Savanna's face, to find a smirk of teasing amusement.

"You're not nice," he said.

"Nice of you to notice," she replied smugly.

Chapter 11 - "A Different Tack"

Savanna expected a typical wry smile from Troy; one which acknowledged her little 'victory' in their teasing games as a prelude to a tease of his own. Instead, she saw a genuine frown on Troy's rugged features. She asked a question with her eyes, but he just shook his head and helped her toward the car. He remained silent during the short drive to the upscale restaurant he had selected, but it wasn't the silence of anger. He was thinking so intensely that Savanna could almost see steam rising from his ears and she decided to let him have the time to get his thoughts in order.

Once they had taken care of the details of getting seated and placing a drink order, she raised an elegantly shaped brow at him again. This time he nodded . . . though he didn't say anything immediately.

When he finally did, he started with a softly spoken compliment. "You really are amazingly beautiful."

"Thank you," Savanna replied quietly. "But I don't think that's kept you speechless for the last half hour."

Now she got the wry smile she had expected earlier, though it had a different flavor.

"Actually, it is," Troy said. "You seem to have . . . embraced being a woman. You're pretty in the sense that would show in a still photo, but you move with grace, your gestures are confident yet feminine, your style is impeccable and sophisticated. You're everything a woman could hope to be . . ."

"But?" she prompted. "There's obviously a contradiction dangling out there."

He smiled again, but this had a less-than-happy undercurrent. "But you're still conflicted. And I'm worried about you."

"Why? Because I won't go to bed with you?" she asked tightly.

Troy's smile was meant to be disarming, and in a way it worked. It showed he wasn't going to be defensive enough to let her change the topic to something about *him*, yet it showed also that he truly wasn't speaking from anger or frustration.

"Actually, it is," he repeated, letting his smile take any challenge from his repetition. "Or at least, that you won't go to bed with someone. Your whole being celebrates joyous, sensuous femininity, but every time you try to accept that you're a woman - fully, with all that offers - something rebels. It's going to tear you up if you can't come to some sort of resolution."

"Like going to bed with you, you mean," she snapped.

"Well, that would be one way," he said easily, still showing a sad, disarming smile that made it clear he wasn't going to let his own desires be the focus of the discussion. After a moment, he sat more upright in his chair, looking at her directly. "I'm worried about you, Savvy. Look, you're brilliant. You always were smarter than me. So use those smarts to look at this . . . analytically, I guess. If it weren't *you*, what would you think of a woman who dresses in such feminine clothes, who moves with such sensual grace, who smiles with a look that is hot enough to cause a core meltdown in the sun . . ."

He leaned forward and took one of her hands in his much-larger one. " . . . who kisses with enough heat to meet the promise in that smile and then, when it comes time to do anything more . . . pulls back? Wouldn't you say that is a conflict? A deep, unhealthy one?"

"Maybe I'm just . . . maybe I just have good morals. Maybe I'm just a nice girl who is saving herself for like . . . marriage," she said.

"Maybe," Troy replied easily, still not letting their discussion become an argument. "If you can tell me, honestly, that you're just holding back because you want to 'save yourself' for your wedding night, then I'll accept that. But I want you to look me in the eyes and say it like you really, really mean it."

She couldn't. She couldn't even meet his eyes for long enough to try out a lie - which pretty much showed it would have been a lie.

She was saved from having to resolve the issue by the arrival of their dinners. Troy showed his sensitivity by not pushing while they went about the mechanics of confirming their selections. And then he sat quietly when they could have resumed their discussion, at least for a while. Finally, he reached out again to touch her hand.

"Savvy, I don't want to push you into anything you don't want. Honestly. I like you too much as a friend and colleague - just as I felt about Cody - to let this come between us. I just . . . I guess I feel your conflict, and it worries me. I want you to be happy. And I don't think you are."

Savanna nodded, accepting both his friendship and the correctness of his assessment. Her free hand moved to slide from the swell of her bosom to her trim waist, then pulled a heavy lock of thick, blonde hair behind her ear. She touched the dangling earring for a moment, then let her finger trace along the line of a neatly arched brow. Her eyes were distant, seeing thoughts that had no physical location yet were close to her soul.

"What if . . . what if I didn't want to be Cody again?" she asked.

"Would that be so bad?" Troy asked in return.

"What does it say about . . . me . . . about Cody . . . if I *want* to remain a woman? Does it mean that he - that I - was never really a man? Not deep down on the inside?"

Her eyes sharpened and she looked at Troy. "What if things had been reversed? What if you had been the one to put on the ring? Would you be willing to go to bed - as a woman - with a man?"

"I don't know," Troy said, but it didn't change his relaxed, non-confrontational tone. "If I were - somehow - just dropped in a female form with no other changes, I don't think I could have sex as a woman. But that's not what happened is it?"

"No," Savanna admitted. "There's a lot more than just a change in shape."

Troy nodded, and said, "In fact, I don't think - if all that happened was a change in shape - that I could even kiss a guy. I mean, if you think about it, the physical responses are . . . well, physical. But the pleasure of kissing someone comes from the mind, and heart."

This time is was Savanna's turn to nod in acceptance of his observation. Troy shrugged and said, "But I can't really answer your question, because I'm *not* the one who put on the ring. I don't know what sort of changes it caused. They're obviously more than physical, though. And that's the problem."

"Yes, it is," Savanna agreed.

"Hence, the conflict," Troy summed up. "Look, I'm not trying to get you to go to bed with me . . ."

He broke the serious mood with an embarrassed little half grin. "Well, not that I'd turn you down if you offered. But I'm honestly worried that you're tearing yourself up inside over this."

Troy leaned back in his chair and pushed some of his food around with his fork. "I'll play Cody-the-smart-one for a minute and analyze things . . ."

Savanna smiled at the compliment to her erstwhile self, but she didn't interrupt.

"First, this change - at least, the change to Savanna and Alayla may be permanent. In which case you have two choices: You can continue to be an incredibly hot woman who is - ultimately - just a tease. You can stay celibate. I have to admit I think that would be a terrible waste, but it's an option."

"Ugh," Savanna grunted. "I never had much luck with that as Cody, and this body . . ."

"Moving right along," Troy interrupted her. "Or if you stay as a woman forever, you can just . . . *be* a woman. Do whatever you would have done if you had been born as a beautiful girl who grew up to be a gorgeous woman. Never look back at Cody and things that just . . . don't exist anymore."

An unconscious smile tugged at the corners of Savanna's lips at that thought. Troy noted it, but decided to save that observation for later.

"On the other hand," he continued, "maybe someday we'll change back. In that case there are two options as well, though not necessarily choices. The change back might undo whatever the ring has done and there still won't be a conflict in your, um, drives. You'll just be the same guy you always were - horny and chasing girls on any day of the week ending in a 'Y'."

Savanna stuck her tongue out at him, but she didn't otherwise interrupt.

Troy's face grew more serious. "Or, we could change back, and you'd feel guilty for what you'd done as Savanna. I won't pretend that's not a possibility. I guess the question is: would that conflict be any worse than what you're feeling now?"

"So, what do I do?" she asked, not answering his final question. Except by not denying it immediately and firmly, she admitted her current conflict might be as bad as anything that could arise if she changed back to Cody.

"I don't know," Troy replied with surprising firmness. "I'm not living the life you have now. But I don't think what you're doing - denying that part of you that wants more than flirting - is working for you."

"No, it's not," she agreed.

They finished their dinner with a mood that was a lot more somber than their earlier 'dates.' They both fell into their own thoughts several times, looking up periodically with the guilty feeling that they had been neglecting their companion, to find the other lost in thoughts of his or her own.

When they returned to their hotel rooms, Savanna fumbled in her purse for her key card. Troy took it from her hands and opened the door for her.

She turned to him and - without a word - pulled his head down to where she could kiss him. After a long, delicious moment she leaned back and turned on a playful, heavy-lidded smolder that set a new standard for heat.

"Come in," she said quietly.

"Not tonight," he said, and the wry grin she had expected at the beginning of the evening showed. "I know I said I wouldn't turn you down if you offered, but tonight there's too much chance that you're just, um, offering because I pushed you into it."

"That's not it," she said softly. "And I'll prove it to you."

Pulling him into the room with her, she let the door close behind them.

When Troy woke up the next morning - or perhaps 'regained consciousness' would be more accurate - he was alone in Savanna's bed. A quick glance around and a slightly more extended listen revealed no clues to her location, so he picked up his clothes and went to his own room. While he was trying to decide what to do - and what Savanna's mood might be - he looked out his room's window onto the deck surrounding the hotel pool.

Savanna was down there in a lounge chair, wearing an especially daring white bikini and presenting the sort of glamor that made blondes famously sensuous for generations. Not surprisingly, she was surrounded by half a dozen would-be suitors.

"Now, that's just not right," he muttered to himself before quickly putting on a pair of trunks and a safari shirt.

He was reassured when Savanna rose as she saw him approach, tapping quickly toward him in her delicate heels. As soon as she was within reach she grabbed his shirt and pulled him into a scorching kiss that had nearby witnesses fanning themselves.

"I was afraid you had, um, second thoughts," Troy said.

"Oh, I did. And third, and fourth thoughts. I've been remembering last night all morning," she said happily. Then she smirked and leaned close to whisper to him. "Did it look like I was walking bowlegged when I came to you? It feels like it to me."

"Oh, god, you are ssoo not nice," Troy said. "And no, it did not. You moved like water flowing over smooth stones. But I may make you walk close in front of me for a while . . . though after last night I would have thought it would be a week before I had to worry about that."

"How about you just let me 'worry' about that?" she teased. "I'll consider it my responsibility to make sure you're ready."

"Oh, god, you are *not* nice," Troy repeated, an artificial groan in his voice. Well, Savanna assumed it was artificial.

They moved to the lounge chair she had vacated. Another was open nearby since her suitors had recognized their quest was futile. Savanna seemed to float to her seat, so full of joy that gravity had no hold on her. Troy smiled at her happiness, but the strong planes of his face creased in a frown as soon as they could talk together in semi-private.

"I was afraid, when you weren't there this morning, that you had . . . well, I already said something about second thoughts. I mean, we went from an uncomfortable discussion to silence, to . . ."

"To magic," she filled in for him. "Actually, I had already been spending a lot of time thinking about us lately. About . . . sex. And the only thing holding me back was concern about Cody. But you laid that out all nice and logical - typical guy thing - and all of the sudden, when we were at the hotel room . . . I guess I just knew."

"I’m glad," Troy said. Then he smirked and said, "Really, really glad, but happy for you as well. As long as you're happy."

"Oh, I am," she said with a languid sigh. "Though . . . are you sure I didn't look bowlegged?"

"Now that's just cruel," he said with an artificial frown. The light in his eyes made it clear he wasn't really unhappy.

Savanna let him bask in her appreciation for a few moments, enjoying the power that came from flattering his ego - though it was actually more truth than flattery. Savana knew that Cody had never been that accomplished. Nonetheless, despite her own joy she decided she needed to bring them both down to earth.

"I think we need to find out who that bureaucrat is, and where," she announced.

"What? Oh, um, yeah. I guess so," Troy agreed, with pain in his eyes at the change in subject that nearly made her giggle.

"Now that you're - finally - awake, I think I'll go get changed," she said.

"Don't change much, beautiful. You're perfect," Troy replied gallantly.

"Oooh, you're going to get paid for that remark," she said, unable to stop a giggle this time.

"Oh, god, you are not nice," he repeated yet again, this time with a robotic monotone that made it seem like an automated response.

"And you'll pay for that one," Savanna said as she walked away. "I'll meet you in the lobby in an hour."

"In the lobby?" Troy whined.

She just grinned, too far away for a private comment but her eyes danced with joy at his unhidden desire.

Of course, finding their bureaucrat wasn't as easy as they had hoped. They started their search on a Sunday and while Wayfinder showed them a direction every time they used it, they didn't feel Alayla could just drive around while wearing black armor and several long to very-long knives. If nothing else, driving while she had her head down looking at Wayfinder was asking for trouble - as bad as texting on a smart phone. Actually, using Wayfinder just for an occasional bearing worked fine for a while anyway. It was far enough from their hotel to the bureaucrat's apparent location that the bearing didn't change much between checks. But about the time they were getting close, it was obvious that their target had started to move. Even a quick transition to Alayla followed by ongoing bearings didn't get them close enough to see their target before they got to an airport. It wasn't much consolation to see Wayfinder tracking a private Challenger bizjet as it made a fast departure.

"Damn," Alayla said.

::You can say that again,:: agreed Furrtive. ::What do we do now?::

Alayla didn't answer immediately. She just looked at Wayfinder for a while until the bearing settled down as the bizjet left the DC area.

"Headed south, it looks like," she reported. Fortunately, they had their baggage with them - not so much because they figured they would be leaving the area entirely as because they didn't think they'd actually go back to the same hotel after they found their quarry. Even with Savanna's periodic shopping sprees, she only had a couple of bags - full-sized ones that required checking, but not oversized. And since she had to check at least one bag anyway, Troy's had a bag large enough to keep his suit in good condition. Alayla found a place to transition again, then let Troy drive them to the airport.

The good news was that while Troy was taking care of turning in the rental van, Savanna found out there were plenty of airline flights headed south. The bad news was that there wasn't really any way to get a bearing while they were underway. At least, not any reasonable way.

Savanna giggled and rubbed her hip against Troy. "So, big boy, you wanna try for your mile-high-club pin?"

"What?"

"Well, I can't very well change to Alayla in the lavatory with you out in your seat," she said. "So I guess we'll both have to crowd in together. And a man and a woman who crowd into an airliner lavatory in flight . . . well, what else would they want to do?"

He grinned at her but countered with logic. "Since we can't really change direction in flight anyway, there's no reason to check a bearing while we're still in the air. So why do you *really* want to get me in a lav?"

"Well, I don't have my mile-high-pin either . . . at least, not as Savanna," she said.

"Meaning that Cody did? When? You never told me about that," he said.

"And I'm not going to tell you now," she said. "But . . . it was fun."

"Oh, god, you are *not* a nice woman," he groaned. "Now the whole time I'm going to be thinking about the mechanics of it. Tell me, how did you arrange it?"

"That's for me to know and you to find out," she taunted, letting her soon-to-be-patented smolder raise the temperature a few - actually a few dozen . . . maybe hundred - degrees.

They didn't do the mile-high thing, of course. They actually had to make several short legs and there wouldn't have been time . . . or at least, that's what she told him in giggly little whispers whenever he nudged her and looked pointedly at the airliner lavs. They hopscotched from DC's Reagan to Charleston, South Carolina, to Miami before they finally got a bearing that wasn't still further south. At each stop they'd find some private place on the airport - not easy, and sometimes only accomplished by going into adjacent rest rooms, with cellphone coordination to make sure each had found a closed stall before she manipulated the ring. Apparently it worked because no alarms were raised.

After changing back and rendezvousing with Troy in the concourse, Savanna said, "Well, I guess what goes around, comes around."

Troy didn't have enough information to get the point, so she explained the bearing. "We're going to need another boat."

"You don't think he just headed to Europe or something?" Troy asked.

"All those courses head north out of DC," Savanna said. "Great circle routes."

"Oh, duh," Troy said. "So, if we didn't get an easterly bearing before this, he must be south of Charleston, yet east of here. What's out that way?"

"Only about a thousand islands in the Bahamas," Savanna said.

"Hmm, Bahamas," Troy said. "So, are you up for an island cruise? I'm thinking a sailboat. And . . . oh . . . clothing optional once we're past the 12-mile limit."

"In your dreams, pig," Savanna replied, but she couldn't hide a couple of signs of interest.

It had taken long enough that they decided to get a hotel room for the night - a single room with a very large bed - and arrange the charter of a sailboat the next day. Troy found a Catalina 445 - named, appropriately, "Magical" - that would be large enough to be safe at sea in reasonable weather yet small enough for the two of them to handle easily.

And Savanna went shopping for some additional bikinis. As a happy, vivacious couple sailing the Bahamas, it would be expected that she'd be wearing a bikini a lot, and having only one or two wouldn't do - wouldn't do at all.

Once they were out of sight of land, Savanna did change out of her bikini. But not by taking it off. She made sure the autopilot was engaged, then used the ring to become Alayla.

"Well, we're headed more or less in the right direction," she reported.




::I wonder if all that armor would weigh you down enough to sink,:: Furrtive mused. Then a moment later she heard a mental cat cough of laughter. ::No, now that I think of it, you have enough flotation for half a dozen suits of armor.::

"Pig," she replied, but she smiled, then she smirked. Instead of changing back to Savanna, she started to take off all that armor. "Since you declared we'd be clothing optional - and of course since you're not wearing any clothes - I think I'll just take mine off."

::Hey, that's not fair. I can't even wear clothes when I'm like this,:: he complained.

"That's not all you can't do," Alayla said. It turned out that the realistic - but ample - shapes formed into the breastplate of her armor were accurate. And unlike Savanna who felt she needed the support of her bikini top or a bra at all times, Alayla's magnificent endowment rode high and proud without any support at all. It also turned out that the hadn't needed any sort of corset help from her armor because her waist was just as tiny, and her hips as sleekly curved as when she was in full combat gear.

::Oh. My. God,:: Furrtive sighed. ::Change me back . . oh, wait, that wouldn’t do any good.::

Alayla preened proudly, but she frowned. "I'm afraid not. Though if you're saying that Savanna is not good enough for you . . ."

::Savanna is no help to me at all,:: Furrtive whined. ::Though she's much *too* good for Troy.::

"Good comment," Alayla said, snickering. Magical's autopilot was guiding them easily on a broad starboard tack, heeled over a bit but not pounding on the gentle swell. She moved to the foredeck with a catlike grace that Furrtive easily matched, then just stood in the sun and enjoyed the sense of oneness with nature.

::Which do you like better, Savanna or Alayla?::

"I don't know," Alayla said. "Sometimes it's more like wearing a different outfit than being a different person."

::Really? I would have thought that you'd have a feeling of power with Alayla. After all, she's . . . you're an actual goddess.::

"Yes," the tall brunette replied. "But Savanna is more real. Being like this is . . . larger than life. When I'm Alayla, I feel consumed with a sense of purpose. Standing here, open to the sun and the sea breeze and enjoying them, I still feel incredible power flowing through me. It's almost as though I could . . . reach out and call a storm or something. I know that I'm impossibly strong, and fast, and even without the magic of Shieldbreaker I could destroy any man in single combat. But I also feel guilty. Like we should have gotten a faster boat, or found another flight headed this way. I'm too driven to relax."

::So you like being Savanna better?::

Alayla shook her head and leaned against the mast, seemingly unaware of her nude state. "No. The feeling of power is addictive. And I remember the feeling of satisfaction when we completed an honorable mission."

The brunette's classic features showed an unusual blush and she ducked her head for a moment, then looked at Furrtive. "It was completely different - I mean, it wasn't something that came from my . . . physical, um, features at all. But in a way, it was as good as sex. When Renfro surrendered in that villa, the sense of triumph was like a drug. Every time I change back to Alayla I feel a craving for it."

She shook herself - and if Furrtive had still been Troy he might have had to jump in the water to cool off as all the secondary motions diverged and recombined - then she moved back to her armor. "In fact," she said, "I better change back. That craving is getting worse. I guess - I hope - that means we're getting closer to our final task. To justice."

Chapter 12 - "Ambush"

Sailing is inherently more leisurely than driving a motor yacht. Or at least the pace of it is, whether the sailors feel leisurely or not. But Savanna was able to enjoy the relaxed existence even if Alayla would have been driven by her need for justice. Troy enjoyed it too, though Savanna never indulged in an au naturel enjoyment of the cruise like Alayla. At least, Savanna never indulged while on deck. Well, except for once at night when they made love under the stars. And one other time when . . . In any event, Savanna was not often nude on deck. Not that Troy complained. He didn't have Savanna's unique perspective on both sides of the sexual universe, but consciously or not, he was as captured by a bit of tease as any man. The tiny bits of material that pretended to be clothes did more to entice than conceal, which made the last bit of hidden mystery something to be treasured indeed.

And it wasn't as though he didn't get to sample that treasure in private. Frequently.

They checked in with Bahamas customs, their magically generated passports as easily accepted as always. Then they worked their way through the islands to find the one that held their prey. When they had it identified, Troy flipped the pages of a guidebook and found the applicable data. "This says it's a private island, and the rumor is that it's owned by Dmitri Sordid."

"The business guy? Makes his money in some sort of money trading?" she asked.

"That's what it says, but it emphasizes that it's only a rumor. Apparently no one knows, from which we can infer that means except for whatever government agents he has in his pocket. Somebody must know, but they're not telling."

Savanna looked at the distant island through the binoculars. "Another rumor is that Sordid gives a lot of money to - and gets a lot of favors in return from - governments around the world. Including the US."

Troy laughed bitterly. "Isn't it funny that the ones who fund the 'liberal' causes all want big government - and the favors it bestows - rather than free markets? Once upon a time the very definition of 'liberal' was about limits on government."

Savanna shrugged, "Yeah, well, Big Business or Big Labor either one; neither want free markets . . . and the responsibilities to compete that go with them."

"Meanwhile . . ," Troy said, "what's the plan?"

"I hate to be so one-trick-pony, but I guess we do it like the villa. Sneak until we can't sneak any more, then get physical."

"I love it when you talk dirty," Troy said with a smirk.

"Pig," she countered, sticking out her tongue at him. But then she ran the tip of it over her full lips with a slow suggestion.

"Oh, god, you are *so* gonna pay for that," he moaned.

"Promises, promises," she replied.

They waited for night, of course. The Magical had a diesel auxiliary so they motored up until they reached a distance they felt they could swim, anchored, then made their way quietly ashore. Once they were on the beach, Savanna prodded at her ring for a few moments and they endured the transition shock once again.

"At least we seem to have shed all the salt residue along with our other bodies," Alayla observed.

Furrtive satisfied himself with a coughing grunt, then moved silently and nearly invisibly toward the main buildings.

::Guns,:: he reported. ::Looks like AK-74s, but I can't tell if it's the full-auto or semi-auto version.::

"Does it matter?" Alayla thought to him.

::Not really,:: Furrtive replied. ::Except isn't this Sordid dude big on gun control?::

"Of course . . .," she replied, "for others. Not for the 'special' people like him, though."

::Yeah, well, it's not going to do them much good. They're not very alert.::

"Good for us," Alayla sent.

It was actually going better than the other intrusions. The guards really weren't very alert. Between Furrtive's stealth and Alayla's silent Headache blast, half a dozen guards dropped without a sound, with none even seeing a glimpse of Alayla. Furrtive, of course, was the next best thing to invisible. That took care of those on the grounds.

::I don't see any additional guards on the verandahs or patios,:: Furrtive reported.

"Me, neither," Alayla concurred. "And I don't like it. Wait up. We'll go together."

She had Shieldbreaker in her right hand, with her left wrist cocked back to send a Headache pulse at anything that moved as they slipped over the low rail surrounding a verandah on the seaward side of the main house. Then they heard a click.

The next sound was Shieldbreaker's scream of rage as it spun a nearly solid wall in front of Alayla. A hailstorm pounded the whirling blade, but the only projectiles that got through bounced harmlessly off her armor - almost as though Shieldbreaker could predict which ones were not a real threat. In just an instant, the storm passed and Shieldbreaker's screech ratcheted rapidly down to a wary, repetitious tapping as it went back into waiting mode.

"That must have been a Claymore, or something equivalent," Alayla said, eyes searching the source of the attack for any follow-up. "Good thing we had Shieldbreaker."

::Yeah, pretty much,:: came Furrtive's reply, but it was accompanied by a liquid cough.

"Are you okay?" Alayla asked, turning to look at her companion. The answer did not require a response from Furrtive. The big cougar lay on the stones of the verandah, surrounded by a spreading pool of blood.

Alayla didn't waste time with cries of dismay. Instantly, she was by his side applying pressure to stop the bleeding. It was not enough. Furrtive's head was down and he was unresponsive to her prodding. The flow continued from at least half a dozen wounds and the only result of Alayla's attempt to staunch the outpouring was that her gloves and bracers became covered in sticky blood.

One splash of blood covered over the Grenade symbol on her right wrist - or at least, mostly covered it. Or actually . . . the symbol itself was essentially clear. The blood surrounded the white symbol on the black metal almost like a frame.

Alayla's mind raced back to the time she had overused Grenade and received second degree burns on her wrist for her mistake. And then she had . . .

Without hesitation, Alayla reached over to the stone on her ring and popped it up from its setting. She quickly reversed the oval shape and pushed it home just as she heard footsteps behind her. The shock of transition passed quickly, over before words arrived from that same direction.

"Freeze! Let me see your hands!"

Savanna put her hands up carefully, well away from her sides. But her eyes were on Troy, whose own eyes opened to meet hers. "You shouldn't have done that," he whispered.

"How are you?" she demanded quietly as the footfalls approached behind her.

"I've been better," he said. "But I've been worse. I expect I'll have some monumental bruises, and I think I've got at least a couple of broken ribs, but I could tell as soon as we changed that I was going to survive. Now we're both caught."

True to his assessment, hands roughly grabbed Savanna's arms and pulled them behind her, then someone introduced the butt of a rifle to her head.

When she came to, she was tied spread-eagled on a bed. And she was naked.

The bureaucrat they'd been chasing was slapping at her face - not hard, just enough to wake her up. When he saw her eyes open, he leaned back.

"Who are you?" he demanded.

"Who are *you*?" she demanded in return.

That earned her another slap - this one harder and intended to punish.

"I'll ask the questions," the man said. "Who are you?"

"My name is Savanna Sylvan," she replied.

"Damn," he said, mostly to himself. Then he looked back at her. "How did you find me here?"

"I used a magic dagger that pointed the way," she said. That earned her another slap. Perhaps it had been her tone of voice, which was not very respectful.

"*Why* did you follow me here?" he asked now.

"Why did you attack those two college students?" she asked in return. Before he could hit her again, she added. "We're here on their behalf. Someone wants to know what happened to them. We followed the trail back through Velasquez to you."

"Velasquez," the man muttered tightly. He started pacing around the room in deep thought, then he stopped and laughed.

"I don't know why I'm worried about that," he said. "You and your associate are not going to be a problem any longer. No one can touch me."

His shoulders squared and he became more erect. His worried pacing became more of a strut, or perhaps a march back and forth. "Since it won't make any difference, I'll tell you . . ."

[Oh, god, here comes the monologue,] she thought. [Well, keep him talking as long as possible.] Not that she had to do anything. His eyes had been lingering with lascivious interest on the revealed curves and hollows of her nude form, but when he started his rant they became more inward focused.

"I am the real power in the world," he said. "I am Franklin Chambers, Deputy Undersecretary for Alternative Energy in the Department of Energy. It's a permanent position, not one that changes with each administration, and I've been controlling the world's energy supply for the last twenty years."

"Indeed?" she prompted.

"Yes, indeed," he asserted. "Energy is power. Not just the power that comes from a wall socket. It's power over everything. For most of human history, the challenge has been to get enough food. He who controlled the food supply - or some critical element in the food supply, like land, or tools, or water - controlled everything. Now, that central element is energy."

Chambers started pacing faster, gesturing as he warmed up to his topic. "Energy is freedom! It provides choices to those who have it, and takes them away from those who do not. And for the last twenty years I have controlled energy itself."

"Not the actual electricity or gasoline, of course," he said dismissively. "That's for engineers and other servants. I've controlled energy policy! I've made energy as hard to get as possible. I've created bogus studies that promised affordable alternatives to fossil fuel to keep the US from using our own resources. Did you know that the US has the largest known fossil fuel reserves of any nation in the world? More than Saudi Arabia. More than Russia. More than anyone! But I gave the politicians an excuse not to use it."

Savanna prompted him with more questions. "But what about the environment? Global warming?"

"Hah!" Chambers responded. "Let me give you a little rule of thumb. Whenever anyone who claims to be a scientist says that 'the science is settled', there's another agenda. No real scientist would *ever* say that! And the agenda is control! Power over others. I mean, really, can you imagine letting the government tell you what sort of light bulbs you can buy? Or forcing you to get remote thermostats so that they can set the temperature in your own house? Unless there is some sort of world-changing threat, who would allow that? And *I* am the one who hands out *billions* of dollars each year for 'global climate change' studies. Do you think that I'm going to fund studies that say we do *not* need draconian controls over every aspect of each individual citizen's life? *Everything* that anyone does produces carbon dioxide. *Breathing* creates carbon dioxide. It's the greatest control lever possible. Hell, we chose carbon controls first! Only after we decided on that did we pick a rationale. Global warming was just a convenient excuse."

"So those students? Bransford and Jamieson?" she asked.

"Those idiots had actually found a way to get around it all. We put too many eggs in the carbon-dioxide basket. They found a way to make practical, transportable, no-carbon footprint fuel. We couldn't allow that."

"We?" Savanna repeated.

Chambers pulled himself up and looked around guiltily, like he had revealed something he shouldn't have.

"I did that," he said. "I meant to say that *I* wouldn't allow that."

"So what is Sordid's role in all this?"

His eyes narrowed to slits and he looked around the room again. "Nothing. He's just a . . . a supporter. He's just a friend who has contacts. And campaign money."

"I thought you said you were in a permanent position. Why do you care who wins elections?"

"Because I need to have enough statist fools in office who also want greater government control. Hell, the party affiliation doesn't really matter. Politicians from both sides want bigger and bigger government. Sordid's campaign contributions come back a thousand times over in taxpayer funded studies to 'prove' that we should have more control over people's choices. God, the people are so *stupid!*. You'd think even American voters would be smart enough to see that switching from 'the next ice age' and 'nuclear winter' in the 70's to 'global warming' in the 90's as the global catastrophe that needed to be headed off means it's not really about weather. Colder or warmer, climate is an excuse. The issue is control!"

His rant was interrupted by a knock on the door. Chambers took a moment to reach down and pinch tightly on each of Savanna's nipples, eliciting of yelp of pain and leaving them swollen and red. Only then did he turn and fling the door open.

The man in the doorway was carrying an AK-74, held at port arms, but his eyes went immediately to the beautiful - naked - blonde spread out on the bed. Chambers smugly allowed him a moment to see the tableau, smirking at the man's immediate lust.

"You'll get your turn," Chambers promised. "Now, why did you interrupt me?"

"There's a call from Mr. Sordid, sir," the man said.

Chambers immediately looked guilty, glancing again around the room in a search for listening devices. His guilt gave way to fear, but also resolution. Without another word, he moved away, leaving the man with the gun in the doorway. That man looked around guiltily himself, including a glance down the hallway to make sure that Chambers had moved away, then his features twisted into a cruel smirk and he moved into the room.

"Mr. High-and-Mighty Chambers is about to get his ass chewed for talking too much," the guard said. "We may get you first after all." He used the barrel of the rifle to poke at Savanna's swollen buds, then trailed it down to prod first her navel, and then the exposed treasure at the cleft of her legs, but his pressures were light and his movements careful.

"Don't worry, gorgeous," he said. "No damage to the merchandise. At least, not yet." With that he turned away and left, closing the door behind him.

As soon as the door closed, Savanna yanked on the restraints holding her to the bed. They were solid, which was not really a surprise. As soon as she had awakened Savanna realized they were not simple rope, nor even handcuffs forming a convenient way to keep her immobilized. She was held by fetish bondage restraints - wide leather straps anchored to heavy chains. It was clear she was not the first woman to be fastened to that bed. [If I can help it, I'll be the last,] she promised herself.

Apparently Chambers liked his captives to be pretty, or at least decorated. She still had her ring, plus a couple of others she wore to make that critical one seem less noticeable. She could feel the weight of her casually stylish loops in her ears as well. [If I'd have been wearing a garter belt and stockings, he'd probably have left them on, too,]

[I hope Troy is okay,] she thought. [When I hurt my arm, changing from Alayla to Savanna changed a second degree burn to a moderate sunburn. Based on what I saw right after we transitioned, he should be in no real danger as long as he's Troy.]

[As long as he's Troy . . .] she repeated to herself. [I wonder how long it's been.]

The room had large, floor-to-ceiling windows and though there were drapes they weren't heavy enough to block out all the light. In fact, the angle where the outside light hit the carpet implied the sun was fairly high. [So, more or less noon. That means . . . about 15 hours since he was hurt. Based on what happened to my arm . . .]

The obvious opportunity was if she could somehow change to Alayla. Alayla would have no trouble escaping from the restraints. But if she changed, then so would Troy. And would Furrtive be healed enough even to survive? Furrtive's wounds were clearly mortal when she had changed him back to human form. How fast would Furrtive's wounds heal while he was Troy?

And the alternative? It was pretty clear what Chambers had in mind for her. Would avoiding that 'fate worse than death' be worth the literal death of Troy?

No. Definitely, and simply, no. If the only way to keep Troy alive was to allow herself to be gang-raped, then so be it. The thought frightened her so much that even thinking about it caused her insides to feel watery and for a moment she was afraid she had messed the bed. But in her heart she knew that anything - even including her own death - would not be too high a price to pay to keep Troy alive. Nonetheless, she needed the option to change to Alayla, so she started the motions required to manipulate the ring.

By then she had accomplished the change enough times that doing so without being able to see the stone was no issue. However, she had always used both hands. The ring wouldn't rotate on her finger and getting the thumb to reach far enough to manipulate the stone - especially when she was stretched uncomfortably taut - turned out to be harder than she thought. In fact, it was harder than she could manage. She could push on it, but only from the side. However, she found out that she could get direct pressure on the stone by pushing it against the chain holding her cuffs. She had just managed to get the stone popped up when Chambers returned. Savanna made a quick twist of her wrist to hide the protruding stone, making it look like a frustrated attempt to break free.

"I'm glad to see you waited for me," he said with a smirk. That fell immediately into a frown of worry, though, and she could tell his joke was a deliberate taunt, not real humor.

"How is my partner?" she asked. That earned her another slap, but also an answer.

"He's . . . okay," Chambers replied, then a snarky, malevolent grin lifted his lips again. "At least for now." He started pacing around the room again, pausing at various - but random and unpredictable - points to reach out and twist a nipple, or flick his nails at another sensitive spot, or merely be annoying by lightly running his fingers along her arms. His voice took on a musing tone, as though he were just lightly playing with ideas. "You know, it's interesting what today's tolerant attitudes toward homosexuals have revealed - by the way, I don't see why anyone calls them 'gay.' As a rule, they're the most bitter, unhappy group of people I've ever seen. Anyway, there are apparently a lot more people out there who have homosexual desires than ever admitted it before. So, your partner may end up, oh . . . with all his teeth knocked out, for example, but I'm sure he'll be alive for a long time."

"Myself, on the other hand," he said, "am exclusively heterosexual. I like women . . . whether they like me or not."

"But you like me, don't you?" he said, twisting viciously at both of her nipples simultaneously. He moved back to strip off his clothing, then moved into position above her. "I'd advise you to try and enjoy this. If you get wet, it'll be a lot more fun for both of us."

[I guess the good news in this is that his dick is so tiny that I can hardly feel it,] she decided as he moved into her. [But if they're going to assault Troy, too, I'm going to have to take a chance that his wounds will be healed well enough.]

After a few of what she presumed were supposed to be sexy descriptions of what he was doing, followed by some random grunts, he stopped moving, apparently finished. Savanna had just laid there passively, thinking that perhaps her lack of interest would frustrate him. But Chambers was so focused on his own interest that he didn't even care what she did. He grinned and moved back from her. "First of many," he said. "And when I'm done the men will line up to take my place."

"Where is Troy?" she asked. That was perhaps a mistake. She received the standard slap for daring to ask a question, but this time he had more force behind it and she saw stars for a moment. Apparently, thinking of another man while he was raping her was not sufficiently respectful of his masculinity.

"Keep asking questions if you want. I like hitting women. To that end, I'll even answer a few. He's two floors directly below you. His accommodations are not quite as nice as this, I'm afraid, but they are adequate for his needs."

With that he finished dressing and turned to the door. The guard with the AK was still outside, and still leering at her naked form when the door was open. But he didn't keep it from closing and Savanna could hear the click of a lock being set. Like the restraints set into the bed, having a lock on the *outside* of the bedroom door made it clear she was not the first woman to be held captive there.

But it also meant she was not likely to be looked in on, at least, not without some sort of key or lock sounds. Savanna pulled and twisted her hand around again until she could reach the stone. The room was hot enough and her hips were painful enough - not to mention another newer and more intimate source of pain - that she was sweating and for a moment she was afraid that she wouldn't be able to twist the stone into position.

But then it clicked and Alayla in full armor was now the one restrained. That didn't last long. She broke the chains holding her with contemptuous ease, popping them so hard that several links broke in each to go zinging around the room. The locks holding the cuffs on her wrists took only another second. Then she was moving toward the door.




"I'm coming," she sent to Furrtive.

::No hurry,:: he replied. ::I'm not going anywhere, even though I got out of my chains as soon as I changed to cougar form. On the other hand, no one is going to find me now - even if they come back into this cell.::

"How are you?"

::I'm . . . okay,:: he replied slowly.

She could hear the ambiguity in that appraisal. Without sending a pseudo-verbal communication, her concern conveyed to him through their link.

::Okay, so I'm feeling pretty rocky,:: Furrtive said. ::But I'm a lot better than I was right after that Claymore hit me. I don't think there is any more internal bleeding, but I expect I've got at least a couple of broken ribs, and some . . . ::

He paused, and Alayla said, "What's wrong?"

::I just realized that the camouflage effect isn't working in the bruised places.::

"I'll be right there and get you out," Alayla said.

::Don't do that,:: Furrtive said. ::Go get that bastard first. I'm okay. There are plenty of places to hide in here. But I won't be able to move fast enough to get away . . . and I won't be able to help you. Just get him, and then come back for me.::

If she had still been in the Savanna form, she would probably have rushed to his side regardless of any other mission. But she was Alayla now, and the mission - Justice - was her highest priority. Another non-verbal message through the link let Furrtive know she agreed to his sense of priorities - since it was now her own.

Chapter 13 - "Justice Carries A Sword"

Even though she wasn't going to rescue Furrtive immediately, Alayla could still 'talk' with him. She started out with an observation.

"I don't think I've been using my strength and my armor effectively," she said. "When I broke the chains that held me to the bed . . ."

::You were chained to the bed? What did they do to you?:: Furrtive interrupted.

"We'll discuss that later," she said. "The point is that when I pulled on the chains - as Alayla - they just shattered. As Savanna there wasn't any give at all when she pulled at them. I must be many times stronger than she is."

::Okay, sure,:: Furrtive said. ::But I want to know about . . .::

"Later," she said, interrupting him in turn. "The other thing is that - even when my armor gets hit with a bullet - there's really no impact, or shock, or whatever at all. It's like the armor sheds the impact rather than transmitting it to me - even spread out."

::Okay,:: Furrtive replied. "What's your point?::

"The point is that I'm about to hit this door with my shoulder - on the armor - instead of taking the time to, um, carve it like I did at the other villa."

::Oh. Are you sure that's a good idea? I mean, they always tell you to break a door in with your foot - not your shoulder.::

"That's true, but I just think this will work," she sent back. While she had been thinking this over with Furrtive, she had been listening at the door. There were quiet sounds of shuffling outside and she interpreted this as the sounds of her guard's restless footsteps.

[Part of this is probably because I want an excuse to hit that bastard, after what he did with that gun barrel,] she thought. [So be it.]

With that, she stepped back a few paces, lowered her shoulder, and charged at the door.

It exploded outward, ripping itself from the frame so fast it didn't have time to splinter. The panel caught the guard from his own shoulders - where he had been leaning on it - to his hips and sent him into the wall across the hallway. Actually, sent him through the wall. Part way, anyway. Alayla didn't check to see if he was still alive after his head passed through the wall - it looked like stucco - but she didn't really care. Her shoulder didn't hurt, either.

She retained Shieldbreaker in one hand, but instead of leaving her other hand free to use Headache, she drew Wayfinder from its sheath. Using that as a guide, she framed a careful question in her own mind on the path to Chambers - not just where he was at that moment - and the knife led her to a set of stairs. In moments, she was outside a door at the end of an upper hallway.

"I wonder if they're all asleep or something. No one came from the noise of that door breaking," she sent to Furrtive.

::I hope that's true, but don't count on it,:: he replied. ::My ears are really sensitive and I didn't hear anything when you broke out, though. Maybe it wasn't all that loud.::

"Maybe," she agreed. "Chambers told me you were two floors down from the room I was in so you might not have heard anything anyway. On the other hand, if the other guards are also on other floors or outside or whatever, then maybe they didn't either."

Alayla realized that in part she was chattering as a way to keep from feeling so vulnerable as she moved through the mansion alone. Hopefully, they wouldn't set up any of the claymore-style booby traps inside the actual building, but she expected at any moment to round a corner and find an army of angry men.

That didn't happen. Instead, she followed Wayfinder's guidance until she arrived before a door at the end of an upper hallway. It was clearly on the top floor (aside from any attics or storage spaces) so she presumed that led to Chambers. Alayla put Wayfinder away and drew Boomerang from its sheath, then tried yet a third approach on the door she presumed led to Chambers. Instead of carving the door or breaking it down, she just twisted the knob - very hard. She could feel the lock mechanism break, then the door swung open as though it had been unlocked.

"Who are you?" Chambers demanded as soon as she entered the room.

"I am Justice, and have come for you," she replied with slow, relentless drama.

Chambers was seated behind an ostentatiously massive desk. He reached for an obvious button near the phone, but Alayla sent Boomerang at his hand. It caught the sleeve of his jacket and pinned it to the desk for a moment. Then the knife vibrated and extracted itself, returning to her hand.

"Don't bother," she said curtly. She moved closer to him and as she approached Shieldbreaker's steady pulse ratcheted up just a bit. It wasn't so much louder or faster as more . . . distinct, as though each pulse had more pressure behind it.

[Weapons in the room, and probably in the desk,] she decided.

Whether she interpreted it correctly or not didn't really matter. She might have been alertly on guard or half napping and it wouldn't have changed what happened next. Chambers dropped his left hand into what was apparently an already-open drawer and came out with a handgun. Unfortunately for him, Alayla was only on the other side of the desk, and though it was a big desk, it wasn't too far for her to reach across with Shieldbreaker, especially since the sword pulled her forward with enough force to lift her from her feet.

The impossibly sharp blade slipped through Chambers' wrist without perceptible drag - all the way through. In a moment, his hand lay on the rapidly staining carpet, fingers still wrapped around the gun. The shock was too great for him even to scream. He just stared at the stump of his wrist, watching the blood spurt out. Alayla sheathed both Boomerang and Shieldbreaker with reflexive speed, then ripped one of the phone cords out of the complex instrument on the desk and formed a quick tourniquet.

"That was stupid," she said.

Chambers was still too shocked to speak with any voice, but his whispered gasp showed the typical bully's tendency to blame someone else. "Why did you do that? I'll kill you for that!"

"You did it to yourself," she said. "You're the one that drew the gun."

Before she could get any farther with the conversation, she heard footsteps on the stairway behind her. Turning quickly, Alayla moved a heavy couch to block the door, then once again drew Shieldbreaker.

"Now, before this gets any uglier, you're going to answer some questions," she said - moving once again to stand on the other side of the desk.

"Go to hell, bitch," Chamber gasped, but he didn't look at her. His eyes seemed to be locked on the gory member lying on the carpet. In a moment, however, it was clear that the pain of his wound was starting to grow and it distracted him from the ruin of his hand. He winced and looked back at Alayla.

"I'll kill you," he promised, finally getting just a bit of tone in his straining voice. "I'll kill you by pieces. I'll . . ."

Alayla interrupted him without the faintest trace of sympathy. "Who is in this, ah, energy-limiting conspiracy with you? Is it the oil companies?"

"Of course," he snapped. "Not directly . . . at least, not most of them. But they benefit from needlessly high oil prices. And I get support from the Arab oil sheiks, from so-called environmental groups who have no clue what their 'back to nature' silliness would do to their own lifestyle, from . . . well, lots of organizations and individuals."

"Who controls it all?"

"I do," he said smugly - well, he tried to be smug, but the building pain in his wrist still twisted his face into too much of a wince to be effective. "You just don't get it, do you? It's not about energy. It's about control. It's about political power. Everyone who wants bigger government is behind me, whether they know it or not. No one tells me what to do."

Alayla was distracted even as he spoke because with his words she felt the ring on her hand tingle almost as sharply as it did when she transitioned between Alayla and Savanna. It might have been her imagination because there were no other changes - certainly she didn't become Savanna again - but somehow she had the feeling it was looser on her finger as well.

Her distraction turned out to be bad luck for Chambers. When he noticed her eyes move down to look at her own hand, he reached for a letter-opener on the desk and raised it to stab at her.

Shieldbreaker was not distracted. It screeched once with an angry pulse almost too high to be heard and lashed out at Chambers' arm. This time, the cut was not at the wrist - Shieldbreaker took his arm off at the shoulder. This time, the blood that pulsed from the open hole was not going to be stopped with a tourniquet - there wasn't any place to tie one.

Alayla stepped back as the would-be shadow-king-of-everything looked once at his own missing arm, then collapsed to the floor as he lost most of his remaining blood.

"Stupid fool," she said softly. "If you wouldn't have tried to use that silly letter-opener, Shieldbreaker might have let you live."

Alayla realized that there were pounding sounds on the door to the room, though for the moment the couch was keeping it from opening. Shieldbreaker's blade looked pristine with no trace of blood stain so she sheathed it and moved to French doors leading to a balcony.

"Well, let's see how strong I am," she thought. Vaulting over the balcony rail, she let herself fall past two other floors to the ground level, landing easily despite the fact her boots drove several inches into the manicured lawn. There was another set of French doors at that level. They yielded easily to a casual push - casual to her, at least, though pieces of the lock mechanism zinged around the room.

She sent a thought deliberately to Furrtive. "It's done. I'm coming for you."

::Take your time. Everyone around here seems to have run off to somewhere more interesting.::

Wayfinder was as effective as ever and in a few moments Alayla was at the door to a basement store room. In another moment the door was open and she was looking around for Furrtive. She only saw him when he moved, noting at that time that he had been lying so that large discolored areas that did not match the background were hidden.

"Oh my god, that looks bad," she said.

::I've been better,:: Furrtive admitted. ::But I'm good enough to walk. I think you should stay as Alayla until we get clear of this place.::

"I’m afraid you're probably right," she said. Since Alayla had just come in from the outside, she didn't need Wayfinder to point to an exit and went back to her Shieldbreaker/Headache combination. She only needed Headache, and that only once when someone who was apparently just a maid - no weapon, and wearing an apron - met them at a corner. Alayla was glad she had a non-lethal means to take that person out of the picture, though even as she was passing the crumpled body she realized the woman would be able to report that a tall, armored woman had been involved. That meant the linkage between Alayla and Savanna would be known.

[Too bad,] Alayla thought. [But I'm not killing someone just for that.]

It turned out not to be the only person who saw her anyway. They were away from the building when they heard the sound of rapid-fire shots. Shieldbreaker twisted her around so that it could whirl its screen of protection behind them, which was as effective as usual in keeping the bullets away. In moments they were sheltered in heavy, tropical forest and the firing ceased.

"So much for our secret," she said. When her comment didn't get a response from Furrtive she looked at the hard-to-see cougar for some sign of why. Other than the bruised areas he didn't look any different . . . well, actually, he looked very different, now matching the jungle growth instead of the stonework in his underground cell . . . but there wasn't any obvious sign of a problem. In a moment, though, she could hear his breath and it didn't sound good.

::I guess I'm not quite as healed as I thought I was,:: he gasped.

Without a word, Alayla reached for her ring and changed them back into the 'normal' human forms. Troy stood straight after a moment, then smiled. "Much better," he reported.

"We better move on," Savanna said.

In his human form Troy still had a couple of broken ribs, but there weren't any worse injuries. Unfortunately, he couldn't easily lift his arm so that she could help support him. Actually, that wasn't the real problem because his shoulder was so much higher than hers that his arm didn't really need to elevate to rest on her shoulder. However, it did pull his chest a little to the side and it turned out to be easier just to walk with his arms down. So, despite the potential for following threats, they their walk through the jungle growth was a casual stroll, made doubly strange as Savanna reported on Chambers' bloody end with almost no emotion. Apparently no one was that interested in following them anyway. As far as they knew, the warrior woman had murdered Chambers in a gruesome way and was impervious to any weapons they possessed.

"I'll bet they work for Sordid," Troy observed, smiling when it was clear from Savanna's reaction that she had been thinking about the same thing.

When they were reasonably confident they weren't being followed, Troy stopped and pulled Savanna to a halt as well. "Okay, no more delays. Tell me what happened in that room."

"I told you," Savanna said. "Chambers first tried to use a gun on me, then something that looked like a knife, and Shieldbreaker . . . took care of the threats."

"I don't mean that room," Troy said. "And you know it. Tell me what happened when he had you chained down."

"No," she said flatly. "It's over. I will say that the only one involved was Chambers, and he's been . . . dealt with. It's over."

"You can't get 'over' something like that just by declaring it," Troy said.

"Actually, I can . . . pretty much," she said. Then she sighed, and shrugged. "Okay, so he raped me. But it was . . . distant. It was like I was watching it instead of . . . y'know . . . involved. Don't get me wrong, I hated him and I don't regret that he's dead. Not a bit. But it doesn't really matter.

She smiled at Troy and deliberately let her glance drop down to a spot below his belt buckle. "Hell, lover, next to you he was so tiny that I hardly felt it. And as far as humiliation or whatever - some sense of helplessness or vulnerability or something that means I'll always be looking over my shoulder? Not gonna happen. Even while he was grunting away, I was planning on how to get back at him. I have to admit, it didn't turn out quite the way I expected but the end result was close enough. He paid for what he did."

"I guess he did," Troy said. "Remind me never to get you really, really mad at me."

"Yeah, remember that," she said, smiling again.

By now they had reached the beach. Savanna made Troy wait while she swam out to the "Magical" alone and retrieved the small inflatable raft that the sailboat used as a tender. It was a sign of how badly his ribs were hurting that Troy didn't even argue, and then didn't argue again when she insisted on doing the rowing back to the boat.

Once they were back on board, with the little raft turned upside down on the foredeck to drain, Troy moved to the cockpit to start the engine and she retrieved the anchor. They motored out of the lee of the island toward Rock Sound, which was large enough they could lose themselves in a small crowd of transients, yet small enough that they wouldn't immediately get a lot of official attention.

Savanna decided to change into almost unisex cutoff jeans and a t-shirt once they were away from the island. She smiled at Troy's obvious disappointment that she wasn't wearing a tiny bikini, but she just moved to sit at one of the cockpit benches near where he stood at the wheel but not quite within reach.




"Is something wrong?" he asked.

"Maybe," she replied.

Without saying anything else, she started to poke at the dark ring that was apparently welded to her finger.

"Wait," Troy said. "If you're going to change us, shouldn't you be the one at the wheel? At least let me get it on autopilot."

"That's not what I had in mind," she said. Savanna held up her hand and slowly moved the ring toward the tip of her finger, moving it clearly past the knuckle to a point from which it could easily be removed.

As soon as Troy realized what she was doing, he gasped, then winced as his ribs hurt from the sudden intake of breath.

"How long have you been able to do that?" he asked.

"Since Chambers . . . confessed, I guess, that he had been the one behind the attack on . . . well, on us. As Cody and Dylan."

"Was he really the boss of all that?" Troy said. "I didn't actually meet him, but I didn't think he had the . . . the strength, I guess, to be a real crime lord."

"I don't think he was," Savanna reported. "Or at least, I don't think he was nearly as powerful as he felt he was. I think that others, like Sordid, pulled his strings without Chambers admitting it even to himself. But I also don't think anyone else specifically ordered him to go after us."

She sighed and leaned back against the bench. "I don't think there's some vast evil conspiracy. I think it's more that there are a lot of people who think the world would be a better place if there were a more powerful central government - run by like-minded, 'enlightened' people of course. They work together only because they share mutual goals and that sometimes means they support each other. Bureaucrats like Chambers use taxpayer money to fund studies showing the need for ever-larger government. Fat cats like Sordid fund campaigns and causes that want the same because he thinks he'll be able to influence those he supports - which is probably true. Politicians like the power and so they go along with the centralization of authority."

"What about Big Oil? Are you saying they had nothing to do with suppressing alternate energy research?"

"No, I'm not saying that," she replied. "But it's not because of some big, secret conspiracy. It's because their corporate ends are served by our continuing use of fossil fuels. Instead of saying 'Big Oil' we should be talking about Exxon-Mobil or BPC - specific corporations with specific financial interests. With all the government funding on climate studies, 'Big Green' is just as self-interested. Oh, and the so-called progressives have managed to redefine compassion as giving away someone else's money so all the rich guys like that: big media moguls, Wall Street, whatever."

She shrugged and looked again at the ring that was partially off her finger. "Anyway, once Chambers made it clear there wasn't anyone higher up the made the decision to attack us, I felt the ring loosen."

"So you can take it off now?"

"I *can*," she said, emphasizing that word. "Should I?"

"It's what you want, isn't it?"

"Is it?" she replied with another question.

Troy smiled. "Look, Gorgeous, if you think I'm going to try to talk you into changing us back to Cody and Dylan, think again. I love our lives as super-cool detectives with a little magical super-power on the side. And . . ."

He stopped, showing surprise himself at what he was about to say. But as soon as he realized what the impulse had been, he realized it was valid. "And I love you."

"Are you sure?" Savanna challenged.

"Yes, I am," he said flatly, then he sighed. "I'll understand if you want to change back to Cody. He was a cool dude and a lot of fun, and he was way more successful than I ever was with the ladies. And he'd have been decently rich in a few years when he could control his trust fund."

He looked off into the distance for a long moment. When he spoke again, he was still looking away and his voice was noticeably tighter. "And I can understand if you can't love a . . . well, a man."

Savanna stood and moved over to the wheel. She held up her hand and slowly, deliberately, pushed the ring back to the base of her finger, then used that finger to push on the autopilot.

"I can love the right man," she said softly.

*****************

Troy woke up in a tangle of sheets and stretched languidly - a long, slow ripple that seemed to extend his spine by six inches. As sometimes happened when he was sleeping very deeply, he was disoriented for a moment. One hotel room looks much like another and he had to think to remember the specifics of this particular situation.

Then his orientation took another hit when he realized he wasn't Troy at all. He was Furrtive.




::What's up?:: he thought to Alayla.

The war goddess answered both telepathically and verbally, with the sound coming from the other room of their mini-suite. "I felt a pulse in my ring this morning."

Furrtive flowed from the bed to join his partner. He found her in full armor, with one of her knives out. In a moment it was clear that the knife was Wayfinder and she was casting about for guidance.

::A, um, 'pulse' you said?::

"Yes," she confirmed. "I was asleep when I felt a tingle/buzz/shock thing about like I felt when we completed our last mission. Now the ring is tight on my finger again."

::Ah, well, I guess that makes one thing clear. We're still in business.::

"It would appear so," she agreed.

They had sailed the Magical back to 'civilization' in South Florida and returned her to the charter company. Then they had taken an unhurried road trip back up to the DC area to see what - if any - repercussions arose from their unacknowledged mission.

There were surprisingly few. Franklin Chambers had disappeared, apparently without a trace. But he was only a middle-level bureaucrat and besides, there were immediate whispers that he had . . . secret interests that might have gotten him into trouble. Even Cesare Velasquez went on as though nothing had happened, though without his hidden patron his lifestyle might take a hit.

There had not been any public news on what happened at Sordid's Caribbean estate. Nonetheless, they were sure that the maid they had only stunned would report that she had seen a six-foot woman in black armor. That would link Alayla (even if they didn't know her name) and a beautiful blonde who was accompanied by a big man. Savanna had given her name when she was tied to the bed and they had to expect that this had been reported to Sordid. That made it all too likely that "person or persons unknown" would make the link if they continued with Fafnir. The world of covert security forces was too small to avoid it.

Once their check of the DC impact of their mission was complete, they left for flyover territory to keep under the radar of anyone looking for payback, ending up in the DFW metroplex. They had ditched the burner phone even before they returned to the DC area.

Alayla's concentration finally ended in a direction from Wayfinder. What it pointed to she didn't know, but her mental question had been on where they needed to go to respond to the signal from the ring and that was apparently clear enough to get a response.

"I'm getting the impression that the distance isn't too far. Imagine that," she said dryly.

::You mean our random choice to come to Fort Worth wasn't so random after all?:: Furrtive asked.

"Either that or there are missions for a war goddess everywhere we might go," she said.

When she manipulated the ring to become Savanna again, she reverted to what she was wearing when she had last been in that persona. So did Troy.

The immediate effect of that was a delay before they got on with their mission. A gorgeous, sensual, nude woman, a handsome, virile nude man, and a hotel room is too combustible a mixture for mundane activities like dressing . . . though a shower was part of the delay - a long one that threatened the hotel's hot water supply.

Eventually, they moved on to tasks more compatible with a mission of justice. Savanna sent Troy off to the hotel's breakfast bar while she took care of the myriad details of hair and makeup. When she finally joined him to eat, she was wearing simple jeans and a tank top, but on her that was more than simple. Her jeans loved her curves and the tank was cut low enough to prove her bounty was natural. When Troy saw her he dropped a plate - thankfully onto the buffet table and it didn't break - and then gave her a comic-opera leer of appreciation.

"Pig," she whispered, sticking her tongue out at him. But her cheeks dimpled with pleasure at his flattery.

"Guess what?" he challenged her.

"I'm sure I have no idea," she said, but her eyes got a bit heavy-lidded with . . . if not a guess, then perhaps a suggestion.

"Oh, god, you are not nice," he said, interrupting whatever he might have been thinking about.

"Don't you forget it, either," she said. "So, what is the mystery I'm supposed to guess?"

He blinked for a moment, then recovered enough to answer her question. "I'm not Troy Hammer anymore. Allow me to introduce myself: Troy Shield, at your service."

With that revelation, Savanna checked the ID in her purse. "I guess I'm Savanna Dryad now," she reported. "And I have passports in the new IDs as well, but no Sylvan Investigations cards. I wonder what we do for a living now? Not that it matters. We still have our cash and credit cards."

"At least the first names are the same," he said. "Maybe I can remember that."

"You better," Savanna said archly. "The first time you call me by some other girl's name . . . will be the last."

"Oh, no, whatever would you do to me?" he asked, cringing in apparent fear.

"Trust me. You don't want to know," she informed him, but the sparkle in her eyes took away any real threat.

A few minutes later, Troy asked, "Did you say that the ring is tight on your finger again?"

"Yes," Savanna confirmed. "Is that okay with you?"

"I think the more relevant question is: Is that okay with you?" he countered.

"Oh, yeah," she sighed happily. Then she smirked and whispered in his ear, "Though if you keep making me walk bowlegged, we may have to give up sex while we're, um, 'working.'"

"Oh, god, no!" Troy said in horror. "Anything but that!" Then he smirked and whispered to her, "Besides, it wasn't me that woke us up in the middle of the night for another round . . . or three."

"No, it wasn't," she said smugly. "We'll have to work on your endurance."

"Well, they say practice makes perfect," he observed earnestly. Then he grinned and said, "Of course, you're perfect already."

"Nice of you to notice," she said, primping her thick hair. Then she giggled and held up her ring. "But I think we better get to work."

A few minutes later they had their luggage in the rented van and were headed off in the direction Wayfinder had indicated. Neither of them knew what the mission would entail, but it didn't really matter. The pair of permanent students, orphaned or the next thing to it, had found a purpose. For them, the journey of life had become vibrant in itself - much more important than any single destination.

Finis