The following is a character study set mostly after the events of "Hand to Hand" (although one chapter will occur during the episode's final scene). It will include spoilers for this episode--of course, as well as for "Adrian's Garden," "Nikita," "Gambit," "Under the Influence," "Beyond the Pale," "Outside the Box," "Cat and Mouse," "Half Life," and "I Remember Paris." I wrote this story before "Three Eyed Turtle" aired, however, so a bit of this story is based on assumptions which that episode proved erroneous; I decided to keep those parts here, though, since a) I didn't have the energy to completely rewrite them and b) there are other observations there which I think are still valid. Hopefully, if you haven't yet seen TET--and want to remain unspoiled--you still won't know what I'm talking about after reading this. :)

This story will refer back to a few of my previous stories--"Anam Cara," "Invisible Chains," and "Heaven and Earth”--as well, although knowledge of those stories isn't really necessary to understand the events here. I'm rating this MA-14, furthermore, for harsh language, as well as for discussions of violence, sex, and sexuality.

I want to add an apology to my sister, here--too, for incorporating her wonderful name into my story. :) What can I say? I think she's the strongest and most intelligent person I've ever met (and, thanks not in small part to these boards, I know many), so I really mean it as a tribute--no matter how odd that statement might seem after reading this. :) Even though, as well, I will use some of the dialogue from the episode here (especially in chapter 5), no infringement of any sort is intended with the following. Please send any comments or requests to: gilbertklfn@cs.com.

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It had been about three hours since she had left now--their savior; they themselves only had about a half hour left before they had to leave, as well. Almost everything had been taken care of, however--the guards and "guests" had either cleared out or were dead; their travel and financial plans were almost in place, and the remaining girls were as ready as they were going to get. . . . Now all they needed was a little more luck, and they were free.

Aurora, as she had been called, was at Anagar's computer, was making the final, necessary bank transfers--was making certain that all of the women who remained would be taken care of in the future. Her eyes barely blinked, as she focused on the screen. She was thankful--for pretty much the first time--for the degree she had obtained in business in her native country. And she was thankful, too--for the *only* real time--that she had been enough her former master's favorite that she knew all his codes.

She sighed slightly, as her determined eyes continued to find all the links they needed to make--found everything she needed to do in order to make their future secure. It had only been a few hours now since she had shot Anagar. . . . It had only been a few hours since she had been reborn. The gun she had taken her new freedom with, in fact, still sat beside her--still comforted her like an old friend. And, while her thankfulness for this second chance still burned within her, part of her mind was well aware that she had yet to even begin to process the shocks she had been through today, . . . hadn't begun to process the ones, in fact, that she had been through for almost a year now.

While part of her, then, was working furiously both to ensure all of their safety and to hide her own, various, lingering traumas from herself, another side of her was analyzing everything--was trying to process it. She had, after all, received a degree in psychology before she had tried business; she could, in fact, speak about 5 languages and was more literate than most of the men who had--until today--been guarding and controlling her.

She looked down at the list of names beside her and opened up yet another new account, as part of her mind continued to hide from her deeper conflicts--grateful that the higher banking world had become completely computerized--and that she understood it enough to manage this. But, where she had come from--unfortunately, none of that knowledge had mattered a damn; none of it had helped her at all when it had come to trying to keep her family alive. Her country had just survived a brutal war--was only just recovering from it. . . . Who the hell, then, could afford a psychologist or hire a businesswoman?

She looked down at the information on another girl, as she continued thinking. Part of her mind, however, was listening to her choice of words. . . . "Girl." That was what Anagar and his clients had called them--"girls." Her eyes burned slightly. No more, she decided as she typed. They weren't girls; most of them hadn't been, indeed, for many years. They were--all of them--women.

She began to trace back through the path which had brought her here, with the part of her mind which was allowing such self-examination. She hadn't wanted to become a model, had had no desire to show off her body and a fake smile just to be able to eat, but she had a father who had lost everything--who was almost useless, when it came to providing, anymore--and three siblings who needed looking after.

Since her mother's death and her father's increasing spiritual incapacity, then, they were her responsibility to look after. The fact that she had had no means with which to provide for them hadn't mattered. . . . She was the oldest; it was her duty.

She opened another woman's account, her mind still pondering this. Well, no more. They would be taken care of now, as would she. She would return home long enough to make certain they were alive--that they were well. Then, she would give them access to the money and leave. With the money, they would be alright without her--and she herself had no intention of looking back; she had paid her dues, had earned her right to live free. She had every intention of taking advantage of it now.

She sighed, her long, self-taught training in hiding her emotions keeping any weariness out of her features. She had survived two wars now: one had been declared; the other . . . well, she suspected no one except its survivors would even know that it had happened.

Memories of her year in bondage tumbled through her mind again, as she blinked determinedly--focusing on keeping back the tears; they were unworthy of her, after all. She was a survivor. . . . And survivors didn't cry.

She took a deep breath, trying to keep back this sign of weakness. She knew that, to many people, emotions were thought to be a woman's realm, but she had always lived in a man's world. She had been fighting a war when she was 14--had used a gun more than once to keep raiders away from her family and her town; one of the older soldiers, in fact--one who had been a scholar in another life, had referred to her then by a name he had known from an old poem from the country her grandmother had been from, Italy: Armida--"the little armed one." She had taken it. . . . It was a name that fit her.

She thought over all this again now and sighed slightly, continuing her work. She had, indeed, grown up and lived in a man's world for many years, but she was beginning to decide that she didn't like the fact that she saw her emotions as a weakness. They weren't, indeed; they had helped her survive. She was as strong as--was stronger than--any of the men she had known; she had survived more than any of them, too. If she wanted to cry, then she had a right to her tears.

Her mind continued jumping from thought to thought--processing randomly, as she worked. Too much had happened too quickly. She was finding it impossible to take it all in.

She had spent the last year as a slave, as a walking corpse. She had, truly, done precisely what her recent savior had accused her of, as well; she had killed other women for the pleasure of perverted men. . . . And she had been good at it.

She swallowed heavily--trying to rid her mind of her self-disgust. She had told herself so often, during those many months, that she was only doing what she had to--that she had no choice. She let out a sigh which had something of a growl in it. But she knew now that that was bullshit. It wasn't that she didn't have a choice; it was that she hadn't had the guts to make it.

She remembered back to the eyes of her savior again--to the deep blue which had told her, even when she had screamed to herself otherwise, that this woman had known *precisely* what her choice had been, had known exactly what it was like to live her life. . . . And, indeed, when she had first met her, she had hated her for that.

She had tried, of course, to tell herself the reverse--that this woman, this "girl," simply didn't understand, that she had never been faced with the decision to kill or be killed. But, even then, she had known the truth. . . . She had known, and she had burned in wrath because of it.

From that very second, then, she had planned to take this girl out--to prove to her in the pit that she would fight for her life--would kill if necessary, . . . and, when the blonde-haired bitch had discovered the truth at last, she would have killed her; she had even hoped that taking out her friend first would make her fear--would make her afraid. . . . But it hadn't--not at all.

No. All of the mental plans she had made had gone completely awry--had done so quickly. Killing the child her savior had befriended, in fact, hadn't given her the sense of power she had thought it would. Instead, for one of the first times, she had felt . . . dirty--had looked up at the crowd watching this spectacle and felt the most incredible sensation of emotional death she had ever experienced. . . . She had hated it.

She continued her work now, sighing slightly. She had, also--though, hated her future savior for it, had transferred her feelings of self-disgust onto her--had blamed her for the emotions her too-insightful observations had awakened in her. But she had told herself that, once she had gotten this woman in the pit--once she had forced her to face the truth and had killed her, she would be free of the emotion once more.

This plan, too, however, hadn't happened as expected. Nikita--as she had only later discovered from the woman's files was her name--had accepted her part in the battle she had been forced to fight, in the battle with a woman who had branded herself as her enemy, with an acceptance which mixed stoicism and vague disgust. And, as a consequence, Aurora--as Anagar had dubbed her--had felt a bloodlust more powerful than any before.

Usually, in fact--she thought back again, she hadn't felt much in the way of a desire to kill; her emotions, instead, were, normally, more of a determined acceptance that this was the only way to keep on living. But, with this new opponent, that had changed--drastically. She had been looking forward to holding her under the water, to feeling her life drain away in her hands; it had practically, indeed, been a frenzy.

What had finally happened, then, had taken her by surprise. It wasn't that Anagar's Aurora had always been the easy victor, of course; she had had very close battles before. What had surprised her, in fact, hadn't even been that she had almost died--that she had been only several seconds away from it, as Nikita had held her under the water; it hadn't been, either, that she had had--as what she had been convinced would be her final living thought--a moment of mental triumph that the woman who had thought herself to be so far above such degradations had now been lowered to them. . . . No. What had surprised--what had shocked her out of her year-long moral coma--was that she hadn't died; Nikita had, with a conscious decision--indeed, let her live.

She closed her eyes for a second, before she remembered her current time constraints and opened them once more to begin putting her final touches on her work. Everything that had come after that--all of the next several minutes--had been a blur for her. The psychologically-trained part of her mind recognized now that she had been in shock; her entire vision of her life, indeed, had crumbled around her, once she had seen Nikita's eyes--had seen her determination to keep from killing her.

This woman had, in the end--to her amazement, been right, then. . . . If she had only had the courage, in fact, she wouldn't have had to become a killer once again at all.

This hadn't been all which had left her dazed, however; something else, indeed, had truly been uppermost in her mind. She had been Anagar's prize for some time now--had been his long-time victor. She had been the "girl" who could vanquish, who could kill, any opponent--any other woman, at her new master's word. She had been the "girl" who had turned on her fellow slaves to save her own life; she had been the "girl" who had understood completely that there were times when Anagar and his clients had wanted her to be savage--when she was with the other women in the pit--and times when she was supposed to accept without complaint the most violent of sexual advances. . . . And, because she had never complained--because she had accepted her new life with as little horror as she could muster, she had gotten the prizes which slaves could win: the chance to, within tight limits, go where she pleased--the opportunity to have better quarters and provisions than her fellow slaves. . . . And she had taken advantage of it all.

In those few moments after Nikita had let her live, however, everything had changed. Instead of Anagar and his minions and customers shouting for her, they were shouting for her death; they were ravenous for it. . . . She was no longer her master's prize.

But Nikita had refused to play into their games, had refused to take part in their bloodthirstiness. . . . And, for that--indeed, they had tried to kill her.

Armida, as she was now thinking of herself again, took a deep breath, remembering. She had felt her heart dying as she had stood in shock and watched her savior being--seemingly--killed. She had felt a bond to this woman's soul, as they had both stood in that water--after she had allowed her to live. But then, she had--she thought--been forced to watch her die.

She had felt no sense of victory then, truly; she had only felt pain. Before her floated the body of the one woman, the one person --other than her mother, who had ever gone out of her way to help her. . . . And she had been able to do nothing to change her death.

She sighed, finishing up the transfers at last. She began to check the various new accounts she had established to make certain they were solid; she was leaving nothing to chance. When Nikita had proved, moments later--though, not only that she wasn't dead but, indeed, that she was more alive than anyone else there, she had brought "Aurora" back to life, as well.

She thought about her savior again now. She wished she could have done something real to thank her. She didn't even know who the woman was, really--had no idea why she had been there in the first place; she obviously, after all, hadn't really been one of them.

It had only been when she had found Meyer's body on the search of the building she had made afterwards, in fact, that she had suspected that her presence had had nothing to do with stopping Anagar. Indeed, she suspected very strongly that this particular bit of help had been Nikita's own agenda. . . . And, to her dying breath, she would never stop being grateful to her.

The next few hours after her savior, and the client who had apparently been working with her, had left had been filled with many different activities. First, she had found the rest of the women, and they had either killed or run off the remaining clients and guards. Then, she had made a thorough sweep of the building--including those areas she had never been allowed into before. She swallowed heavily, thinking back. . . . What she had discovered there, however, had disgusted her unspeakably.

She had, indeed, found, in the basement, a furnace--an on-site crematorium. . . . It had made sense, of course, but it had revolted her, nonetheless.

She had run off the guard who had been working it then--had chased him away from the body of the girl she had only later discovered was named Sondra and had spent several minutes looking at her body, remembering what Anagar had once said of the "girls" who died: "Drowned women are very beautiful." She swallowed back her disgust. . . . That child, as she had obviously been, had deserved better than this.

She had left Kat in charge of removing the women's collars and collecting their names and where they had come from, while she had begun to make plans. Anagar had been delighted to discover--in her early days here--that she had skills with both money and computers, and he had put her to work in his office, on top of her usual work--both in the pit and on her back; she had used her knowledge, therefore, to begin what she was finishing up now--after she had made arrangements with a local funeral home, one which--for the right sum--wouldn't ask too many questions, for the burial of Sondra's body. . . . Even if none of the other poor women who had died here had achieved it, she would give her final innocent victim a Christian burial.

She sighed, her final arrangements beginning. This, however, wasn't all she had done. She had also discovered in Anagar's files what would have been her own fate today, had Nikita not acted when she did: she would, indeed, have been dead.

Anagar, she had found, had been cleaning house this weekend; all the old girls had become both too routine for his regular customers and--possibly--too confident in their own abilities--in themselves. And--as she knew only too well--self-confidence and servitude didn't go together well.

He had planned battles, therefore, for all of them today--with the showdown between herself and Kat slated for the finale. The winner of that would then have faced the fate which Nikita had almost succumbed to, . . . and Anagar's clients would have gotten off on it all.

She swallowed back her disgust heavily. She was glad she had killed Anagar; he, after all, had made her into what "Aurora" had become: a whore and a killer. . . . He had deserved to die.

She tried to change the path of her thoughts, thinking now to her future. Nikita had given her a second chance--a chance to try to make amends. She couldn't, of course, bring back from the dead the poor victims Anagar had taught her to destroy, but she could protect the ones who had survived. And she could also send a little money to the families of those who had died--or, at least, to all those she could find the records of.

She sighed. She hadn't much more time here--didn't have much more time at all in this place which had been her prison for the past 12 months. Nikita had sent her a message almost a half hour ago that they needed to be out at the end of that time. And, while she didn't know what was coming for them, she did have the sense to not be here when it arrived.

Now, there was only the future--a future she would be spending with the one person she still truly cared about, the only one she had ever learned to love: Kat. Her stomach roiled at the thought of Anagar's plans for the two of them today, but those plans no longer mattered. She could look after her friend now--her lover; if she had anything to say about it, indeed, they would never be parted again.

She sighed, her mind focusing on this. No. She wouldn't call her "Kat" anymore; that was what Anagar had called her. She was going to rechristen her with the name she had borne before, one which fit the inner softness which Anagar hadn't allowed--at least, not in the pit: Lilia.

She sighed, remembering the path which had brought the two of them together. Lilia had been brought into Anagar's world about 6 months after she had been, but they had become friends quickly. And they had both, really, been more than a little surprised when that friendship had begun to form itself into other feelings. . . . Neither of them, after all, had ever fallen in love with another woman before.

She sighed, thinking this over. She wondered now whether their attraction to each other was actually the outer sign of the mental repulsion about men that their recent lives had branded into them. It was possible, of course. Maybe in the outside world, indeed, they would find that they were only friends--but that really didn't matter. She needed Lilia's softness, and Lilia needed her strength; they were a good pair--whatever sort of pairing that was.

She sat there for another few seconds, thinking. They had only been allowed to be lovers once, actually. Anagar had watched. To her surprise, however, he had then allowed them to stay together for the rest of the night, while he had gone to grab some other unfortunate woman to take out his arousal on; all of the women, really, had been interchangeable to him--he was only interested in the parts.

That night, though--to what she was sure would have been her former slaver's surprise, had changed everything for both her and her friend. They had talked of their fears, of their dreams; they had both made it known to each other that they wished they could be together all the time, instead of simply existing for the use of others.

They had known--at the time, however--that this hadn't been possible, so they had both tried to forget about it. . . . Neither of them had, though. Neither of them had even begun to.

Today, then, after their freedom had been established, she had given Lilia the shorthand version of her plans--of her desire to move to the West, to some country which, if she had enough money, wouldn't ask any questions about where she had gotten it--of her desire to spend the rest of her life with her chosen one. And, to her joy, Lilia had agreed.

She had, however, done one other thing, as well; she had given her friend's soul the freedom from fear which it had needed. She had taken her to see Meyer's body--had shown her that the man who had taken her as his "favorite," who she had tried to tolerate even through her fear of him, was, indeed, dead; he would never hurt her again.

She had smiled, too, when--after this new thought had completely worked its way into her friend's mind, Lilia had stepped up close to her former captor and spit on him. . . . It had, indeed, been the sign of reawakened will that she had hoped to see in her.

This, of course--the possibility of healing that it suggested, had been wonderful. But then something even more amazing had happened; Lilia had looked up at her and smiled--a smile which had come straight from her soul. . . . And, at that moment, something had been born in her own heart which she knew she would never let go of again.

She looked up suddenly at the clock on the wall. It was time. Lilia came in and leaned against the doorframe, asking her in Russian: "Are you ready, Aurora?"

She focused on her lovingly; her beloved still had a bruise from where their savior had punched her. Lilia, though--Armida knew, had not been bothered by missing out on her night with Meyer; she had only been worried that being displaced might mean a shortened future for her.

She pulled herself from her thoughts and nodded, responding in her chosen one's language. "Almost. Are the rest of the women ready?"

"Yes, we're waiting for you." She smiled at her.

The woman who had once been Aurora smiled back at her and stood up. "Good." She picked up the gun and moved back from the computer. "Stand away," she ordered her friend. She then aimed at it, put her arm in front of her eyes, and shot the computer's insides into tiny fragments; it wouldn't do to leave any more traces than necessary.

Lilia had hidden behind the wall just outside the door. When the noise stopped, she looked back in at the destruction and then smiled up at her friend; her eyes were dancing. "Done?"

Her friend nodded and laughed slightly. "Yes." She looked at the machine and then back to Lilia. "And call me Lucia." Her friend looked at her curiously. "It was my grandmother's name. I'm tired of being named by men."

She walked toward her, as Lilia looked up at her. "Lucia," she said, trying out the name on her tongue.

Her newly-christened friend nodded at her, loving the sound of it from her chosen one. She took a second to gently stroke the side of her face, their eyes meeting.

Lilia leaned up to kiss her new companion tenderly, a kiss which Lucia joined--one which seemed to reawaken their souls. A few seconds later, she looked back at her. "I like it," she smiled.

They both spent one more second looking at each other, before they began their journey. Then, they led their fellow ex-slaves away, leaving forever the prison which, finally--thanks to both their surprise savior and their own determination, was no longer their home.

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

His words kept ringing through her head; she couldn't quite make them stop: "It has nothing to do with Renee." Her eyes were half-burning, her self-disgust rising. She should have listened to it, should have known; he had told her the truth. It had had nothing to do with that woman. . . . It had had everything to do with herself.

Madeline took a deep breath, steadying herself again. She only had about a half hour now before she had to meet her fate, before she had to face up to the results of her recent loss of focus. Paul had set a chess game in motion these past few days, and she had been foolish enough to be distracted by a well-played bluff, . . . had been distracted enough, indeed, to forget she was actually just a pawn.

Her anger was simmering through her now; most of it, however, was aimed at herself. She couldn't believe that she had allowed herself to lose focus so badly--that she had allowed herself to be outmaneuvered by a man who had never understood the game half as well as she had--by a man who, compared to herself, was still a novice.

She looked down at her desk, her self-rage simmering. She should have seen through this, should have seen where it was going. Paul had never been happy that she had severed the sexual side of their relationship; he had never quite forgiven her. She knew this perfectly well. . . . How had she ever allowed herself to forget all of the implications of this, then?

She could see all of his plans and self-rationalizations now--could see them all quite clearly. His whole supposed attraction to Renee had been rather pathetic, really. Yes, they were no doubt sleeping together, but that had never meant anything; Paul had had other lovers before. It was just that--always--they never satisfied him in the way that she did.

She supposed, in many ways--however, that this was her own fault. She was the one who had taught him to desire her over all others; she was the one who--in their earlier years together, when she had still been cementing her future position within Section--had shown him all of the fantasies he had so obviously held, had allowed them to play out entirely. And, while these actions had kept her job secure for many years now, she was also the one who had been foolish enough to underestimate her own powers of persuasion.

She sighed, still disgusted. He had set it all up from the start, had--no doubt--hand-chosen Renee to play her off against. He had used this member of Oversight to try to make her jealous, indeed--but, she suspected, he had known from the beginning that it was in no way his sexual relationship with this woman which had caused this reaction in her. He had ensured this, in fact, by taking her out of Comm.--had made her question whether she were being replaced, whether her future were endangered. . . . And she had somehow fallen for it all.

She shook her head just slightly, as she looked up. This wasn't the first time he had tried this little stunt, in some ways, too; he had also used Ray Leeds to make her fear that she was being displaced. But he had done that, as well--she knew, to protect her. This time, however, there was no intention to protect; everything, indeed, had been maneuvered to force her to obey.

She sighed, pondering this further. She wondered now whether he were truly foolish enough to believe that her feelings about Renee had been brought on by sexual jealousy. Was he still capable of believing--despite all the evidence to the contrary--that she still wanted him? Or had this simply been an excuse to allay his conscience, as he forced her into physical intimacy once again?

She was a bit disgusted. As little as she liked it, she supposed--indeed, that it actually was the former; he truly was that big a fool. It appeared that she had done her job of making him believe in her desire for him a bit too well; his ego, it seemed, was too formidable to allow him to believe the truth--that it had always simply been about herself, her future.

She hated herself for getting trapped into this--hated that she hadn't been insightful enough to see it coming. She supposed, though--too, that she had been foolish enough to expect some loyalty--some gratitude from him. But that delusion had landed her precisely where she was right now.

Her mind made an attempt to switch tracks--an attempt to focus on something other than the revolting fate which awaited her in the tower. It wasn't so much, after all, that she disliked Paul as a lover; it was more that she despised being forced into this path. She may have been a valentine op. for many years, but she always--at those times--had had some sense of control, of decision, whatever had happened. . . . Now, however, Paul had stolen that from her entirely. She set her jaw, forcing her mind onto other things. She wished now that she had been harder on Nikita. The younger woman had ignored direct orders--ones which she was well aware Michael had purposely changed for her protection--and had refused to exit the mission when instructed to; in fact, she had even gone as far as staging her own small revolution, ending Anagar and his establishment--both of which might have come in useful in the future.

Madeline's eyes burned. She hated that she had been too distracted during Nikita's debrief to question her further about disobeying. She could have, indeed, come up with any number of punishments for the young woman in repayment for her decision to act autonomously. . . . It truly was, after all, a habit of which they needed to break her.

This wasn't all that she was angry at the young operative for, however. She also despised the fact that Nikita had refused to kill the opponent she had been given in combat--that she had decided to spare her life; that wasn't, indeed, the way an operative was supposed to act. Had she herself been in the young woman's situation, in fact, she would have killed the woman without a second thought. She shook her head slightly. It was disgusting that Nikita couldn't simply learn to do the same.

She hated, in truth, the sense of "sisterhood" which the young woman looked for in other women--the one she seemed to have felt more than once. She herself had used it, of course, early on in the girl's training, had set herself up as the new recruit's "mother" in order to try to bond with her--but it was a trait which she saw as naive, one she found distasteful; she would have been far happier if they had been able to rid her of it altogether.

This was, indeed, a trait which Madeline was entirely incapable of comprehending; she had never experienced anything like it in her life. Even with her literal sister, in fact, she had felt no bond. She had been happy to rid herself of that girl, as she had been equally happy to rid herself of many other women--as she had, in fact, tried to rid herself of Renee. She didn't have a clue that the whole concept of a "catfight" was both stereotypical and dangerous; she believed in it firmly, when she felt it was necessary. . . . That Nikita would avoid it--would actually search out the sort of bond which Madeline herself had always purposely avoided--was revolting to her.

This wasn't where all of her anger was based, however; she truly hated, indeed, that the young operative had become so adept at creating revolutions, as well. When Housekeeping had gone in, several hours later, in fact, they had found only the traces of the women Anagar had once held. All which had still remained had been the physical building, as well as quite a few bodies--only a couple of which had been accounted for by their own operatives in their egress; even Anagar's accounts had been disbanded--had been scattered into dozens of others, all over the world.

She sighed, thinking over this detail again. She regretted now that she hadn't had Birkoff follow up on it--that she hadn't gotten him to trace and recover the funds; Section did, usually--after all, impound the accounts of anyone they took down in order to help out their own ends.

Her eyes were a bit unfocused, as she pondered this further. She wasn't sure why she hadn't done this, indeed. She supposed, though, her real reasoning had been more practical than anything else. While, emotionally, she absolutely despised the fact that a group of sex slaves had broken free of their restraints and fled, despised that they hadn't simply accepted their servitude--logically, she had realized that they were no threat to Section's interests; they had no idea of where Nikita had come from--had no idea of what Meyer had been. They obviously weren't, either, going to begin using the money they had liberated to start their own revolution--so the waste of man hours it would have taken to search for them would have been very hard to justify.

She looked down at her desk again, her mind changing tracks--going back partly, once more, to the subject which had been preoccupying her for hours. While she hated the feeling of helplessness she had been--she would be--subjected to with Paul, she had no problem with anyone else experiencing the same thing; moral logic had never been her strong suit. So long as she was safe and well-placed, everything was well. . . . It was only when *she* was endangered that she would truly take action.

As much, then, as she wished she could take out her current situation on Nikita and the women she had freed without permission, she also knew that she really didn't have the time. Paul had seen to it that she was severely distracted; she simply didn't have the energy, therefore, to be able to follow through on these desires.

She took a deep breath. Her time to meet him in the tower was drawing close. . . . She had to prepare herself.

She had been a valentine op. for many years, of course, so she understood the entire process well. She would simply have to deaden her body and her mind to what was about to happen; she would survive his touch, as she had forced herself to many times in the past. She would also try to focus on the fact that she would be doing some personal valentine training of one of their more attractive new recruits tomorrow; that, indeed, usually helped.

She would survive this, then, but she wouldn't like it. Paul was a fool, and he was trifling with her a bit more than she was feeling capable of allowing, of late. . . . If he pushed her too much farther, indeed, she would see to it that he felt her wrath.

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

He knew this had been a hard mission for her; he didn't know everything, but he knew enough. Some of the details he had gotten from Birkoff, some from the haunted look Michael hadn't quite been able to repress, and some from her own, distracted air. . . . And he hated every bit of it.

Walter was waiting for Nikita to come turn in her comlink now. She was the last member of the mission left to report in; everyone else had turned in their things and left some time ago--although Michael was still sitting in his office, was distractedly staring at the wall.

He sighed. She had been in a debrief with Madeline for half an hour now, so he suspected that--when she emerged, she was going to look and feel like hell.

All of this disgusted him. He hated what this place did to her--hated the compromises it had forced her to make. He knew, too, that this one had probably just brought back a lot of bad memories--memories, especially, of the mission against the Peruze brothers.

Walter, in truth, still hadn't forgiven Michael for that one yet; he still couldn't believe that he had allowed her to be pimped that way--that he had even done the pimping. All the reasons her former trainer might have for doing it really didn't matter to him, either. He had done it; it was unforgivable, and that was enough for him.

He felt his stomach knotting in anger. He hated watching the people in this place get whored, really--hated it every time it happened. He had watched the process in all of the good ones so often, had seen Section sell them off as though they were just a series of body parts to be used--had seen some of them lose themselves in the process, as well, mostly the women. . . . And, every time he had to witness it, it made him feel sick.

He shook his head a little, as he signed in a gun which had been left for him--his mind still thinking into this. What the hell had become of this place, anyway? How had they all ended up here?

There had been a time, indeed, long ago--he thought back again now, back in the days when Adrian had still been in charge, when they hadn't just acted like pimps and hired killers, when they had looked out for each other. Yes, sometimes, someone had had to play the whore, but they had tended to leave it to those who hadn't minded that role; Madeline, for instance, had taken to it beautifully. . . . They hadn't gone around forcing it on everyone.

He walked back toward his storeroom to put the gun up. As far as he knew, of course, Nikita hadn't actually been pimped during this particular mission, but she had had to play that sort of role anyway. And, even if he also suspected that that wasn't the part of the mission which was plaguing her the most, at the moment, it angered him anyway.

He sighed. He knew from Birkoff--who was suffering pretty badly with his guilt over this one--that Nikita had made a friend early on in this whole scenario, a friend she--in the end--hadn't been able to protect. He knew, too, that this would be the part of the mission which would be plaguing her the most--was the part which she was going to be focusing on for some time to come.

He wished to God he could help her with this, of course. He put the gun in its designated place. Maybe he should try to invite her out for a drink, should try to go somewhere with her--somewhere where he might get her to talk. . . . He suspected, really, that she was going to need it after this one.

He nodded a little, as he began to return to his work station--his plan set, his mind still focusing on the woman he was most fond of in this place. Birkoff had told him, as well, that she had managed to stage her own mini-revolution at Anagar's--that she had even stayed behind specifically for that purpose. He smiled. That was his sugar; that was what he loved about her. The woman just couldn't see an injustice without wanting to right it. . . . That was what this place should still be about.

He sighed, going back to his usual work stool, as he waited for her. In a lot of ways, Nikita was really a throwback to the old days--to the way things used to work around here. She really tried to do things for the greater good; she really believed in protecting the innocent--instead of just following her orders.

It was too bad, really, that things around here didn't happen like that anymore. . . . They would *all* have been a whole lot happier, if they did.

He knew, however, that this wasn't going to happen. He let his mind switch tracks, then--thinking back now to the look in Michael's eyes when he had turned in his equipment today. Birkoff had told him that the Class Five operative had been off his mark by almost two minutes on this one--probably a first for him. He had also told him why.

He sighed, still thinking through it all. He hated what this place did to couples most of all. The young man and Nikita had, as far as he could tell, been getting along a lot better since their supposed escape together several weeks ago; there had seemed, indeed, to have been an unspoken closeness re-forming between the two of them since, one he had been happy to see--for both of their sakes.

He thought back now, though, to the look in Michael's eyes earlier. He had tried to hide it, of course--his blank mask had been readily apparent--but Walter had known him long enough to recognize that hundred-yard stare when he saw it. The younger man had had it a few times with Simone, he remembered--as well, but it had become almost a part of his wardrobe since he had trained Nikita. . . . Every time a mission was rough on them as a couple, indeed, it became evident again.

He wondered now, of course, what its return would mean for his sugar--but he suspected that it wouldn't be anything good. Michael tended to crawl back into himself whenever he was hurt--whenever he was frightened. Nikita, certainly--even more than Simone, had drawn him out, but his strategic withdrawal was a trait which was too well-established, by this point, for him to be able to entirely overcome.

He hoped, of course--still pondering the younger man, that Michael wouldn't pull away from her now--wouldn't strand her again, especially when he suspected that she needed him so deeply. . . . He also suspected, however--as little as he liked it, that his hopes would be in vain; Michael was just too solitary a creature to allow himself to ever emerge for very long.

Walter sighed disgustedly. He hated all this--it made him crazy. There were times, in fact, when he just wanted to duck tape the two of them together and lock them in a room. Even though he hated what Michael did to her a lot of the time, he still knew that they were both happier together; it was just stupid, then, that they kept getting separated.

There had been a time several weeks ago, however--he remembered once more now, when he had hoped that things had changed for the two of them--back when they had supposedly escaped. Even after--especially after--the vicious and entirely unnecessary debriefing Zalman had given him, he had still hoped fervently that the couple really *had* gotten away, had hoped that they were finally free of this place and all of its pain; he knew, after all, that--if anyone could get out of here for good--it was Michael. . . . He still wished to God that it had all been real.

This was part of the reason, really--as well, why he hadn't been angry at his torture at Zalman's hands. For awhile, indeed, it had seemed that they might make it--that they might be free. And, if they had been free, then maybe--*maybe* Michael could stop being such an idiot to her and just love her the way she deserved to be loved. . . . It was about time that happened, anyway.

When he had discovered that the whole thing had been a set up, however, he still hadn't been too angry. By that point, after all, Michael had been captured; if it had all been real, then, the young man would have been dead. . . . Anyway--he had decided, the whole thing had finally rid them all of Zalman, and that had been a plus for *everyone*.

He smiled, continuing to remember. Sugar had tried to apologize to him, after it had all been over, but he hadn't accepted it; he knew it had just been a mission. Besides, he suspected--thinking back on her goodbye to him that day, that she hadn't understood that it wasn't real then, anyway. . . . There had been nothing--in his book, therefore--for her to apologize for.

Walter's train of thought was broken when he looked over and caught sight of her coming toward him finally. He set a smile on his face to welcome her; he figured she would need it, by this point.

He looked around again and saw that Michael was nowhere to be seen. . . . He suspected, sadly, that that trend would continue.

If her ex-trainer wouldn't be there for her to talk with, though, God knows he would be. She walked closer and smiled at him slightly. She really was an angel, after all--and, even if it was just for a little while, he was going to be there for her. . . . If anyone ever had, indeed, she deserved some friendly company.

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

She sighed, as she left Madeline's office. This had really been a shitty few days. There had been too many people she hadn't protected, too many things she had just let go. . . . And she hated it all--hated her own utter incompetence.

It all seemed a bit much, really. Nikita sighed, as she made her slow way toward Walter to return her com. equipment. Just being in Anagar's "establishment"--as Madeline had so euphemistically referred to it--had made her feel dirty, had made her feel used; the place reeked of perversion and death. There had been too many lives being wasted there, as well. . . . She just hadn't been able to save them all.

She closed her eyes for a second, trying to hold back her pain, before refocusing blearily on her path. Sondra's image kept reappearing to her, despite her best efforts to fight it off; she had been such a child--had been *so* innocent. It just seemed so pointless that she was dead.

Nikita shook her head slightly. She had tried, of course; she did realize that. She had tried to save her--had tried to get her to stay away from Anagar altogether, to leave his "talent agency" before she had ever been recruited. She swallowed heavily, thinking back sadly. But it hadn't been enough. . . . It hadn't even been close.

What had eaten away at her, truthfully, after the mission had really begun, as well--after they had been taken to the "establishment," to the whorehouse--had been that she had known that her only good chance to save Sondra had passed. . . . Once you were in a place like that, after all, you were in it for good.

Disgust roiled through her again, as she thought back. She had understood, of course, part of what the place they were in truly was--had realized part of what their new roles would be. But she had never--*never*--imagined the true depths of depravity she was about to be subjected to; her mind just wasn't capable of sinking that low on its own.

She shook her head, still trying to process it all. The psychology of men like Anagar and Meyer baffled her, as much as she could trace some of their sickening paths. They liked the sort of power it gave them to be able to brutally fuck--to dominate--a whore and then watch her beat up another woman; yes, they wanted their bitches cruel, but only when they were with each other. Hell, they were even too chickens--- to try to beat up the women themselves--were too afraid to even try. Anagar had provided his clients, in fact, with nice little torture boxes to make sure they didn't have to really risk themselves in attempting to best the woman they wanted; press one button and she went down in the sort of pain they themselves couldn't take even a fraction of. . . . It was sick.

She sighed disgustedly, as her mind continued to think through all of this. She had watched Meyer, of course, when he had come in. She didn't know precisely what had drawn him to Kat--as the woman had apparently been called--in the beginning, but he had obviously gone back to her again because she was good at killing other women, was good at following her orders. She supposed, really, that--by punching her out, she had saved her one last encounter with the monster. . . . Good.

Meyer, of course, too--she remembered, hadn't wanted Kat after her beauty had been marred. He had opted, instead, for the one woman who wasn't paying any attention to him, who wasn't even acting frightened; she supposed he had probably been thinking that it had served her right for having ignored him. . . . Bastard.

She was gritting her teeth slightly, as she walked. She was glad Meyer was dead. She just hoped that all the other perverts had been taken care of, as well.

She thought back again through the whole, sordid mission. It drove her crazy that Michael had tried to get her to leave it early--that he had attempted to persuade her to abandon the poor women who had needed her so desperately. She knew, too--though, that he hadn't failed to understand that these women needed saving; he hadn't been enjoying their bondage. . . . No. He wasn't one of the men like Meyer or Anagar. It was just his usual trick; he was trying to protect her, no matter who else might get hurt in the process.

She sighed once more. In a way, of course, she appreciated that he didn't want to see her hurt--that he needed to protect her. But she also realized that his protectiveness tended to verge far too close to possession; even after a few weeks of friendship outside of Section, then, he still couldn't just allow her to make the decisions they both knew were the right ones.

She thought back now to their conversation, when he had first come into Anagar's. She knew he hadn't disagreed with her; he hadn't thought she was wrong. In fact, when her logic had proved too effective, he had resorted to an old tactic--had resorted to simply ignoring that she had just scored a point, that she was making sense; he had had to fall back, indeed, on simply repeating how long she had to meet the van, like some demented, blank-faced timepiece. . . . He hadn't even been able to answer her reasonably anymore.

She shook her head slightly again, pondering his actions. She loved him deeply, but this trait of his drove her crazy; she really needed him to respect her opinions--to take her seriously. Her mind paused for a second, thinking through this. . . . No, she realized, that wasn't quite it; to an extent, he did do that. What she needed, desperately--however, was for him to *act* on it.

She supposed that--in a way, though--he had done this, this time. But she also knew that his decision had had little to do with his desire to allow her to take this path and much to do with his knowledge of her stubbornness. If he could have knocked her out and carried her to the van, in fact, he would have; his decision, then, had really come down more to time constraints and logistics than anything else. She sighed. She still wished, however, that it had been about something more.

She continued thinking over all of this--continued analyzing Michael's reactions during the mission. She had noticed, indeed, that he had gone out of his way not to touch her--both when he had "chosen" her and also later, when they had been alone in his room.

She tried to figure out what this meant now. While she would have welcomed his touch once they had been together, she remembered--just a small, reassuring one--she was beginning to understand why he hadn't done this. She suspected, indeed, that he had been trying to tell her something through this slight physical distance; he really seemed to have been saying that he *didn't* see her like this, that he would never see her as a whore--had been trying to remind her that he wasn't like the men who came to this place willingly. . . . She had known all of this without being told, of course, but--in retrospect--she realized that she had appreciated the reminder, nonetheless.

Her heart warmed at these thoughts. She wanted to stay on this path, in fact, wanted to just linger in some more positive place like this one, but her mind began to move on anyway, despite her desires--continued to reflect on the past few, terrible days.

She had, really, wanted to stay on at Anagar's mostly in order to protect Sondra. The rest of the women had been important, too--of course, but this poor girl had caught her heart more strongly than any of the rest; she swallowed heavily, remembering. In the end, though, she hadn't been able to. . . . In the end, indeed, her acquaintance with the girl had only assured her death.

Her mind switched tracks now to focus on the woman who had been Sondra's executioner--the one who had wanted her dead. It had hurt Nikita that she hadn't been able to break through to her fellow captive before they had fought; she had tried to, in fact, had tried to force her to see the sordid truth of the life she was living--but, in the end, it had only been fighting and besting her which had made her understand--it had only been through example that her unintended rival had finally learned.

She shook her head slightly, continuing to think about this lost soul. She hated that it had taken so much--hated that she had needed to go so far to get through to her, but the woman had been deep in her own self-delusions--in the ones she had built to survive.

She sighed once more, trying to pull her mind away from her temporary adversary--her heart clenching slightly. She wished she could say that she didn't understand, but she knew that was a lie. She did understand her--altogether too well; she hadn't lied to Sondra, after all, when she had told her that she came from a place like Anagar's. Section, indeed--in some ways, was just one big whorehouse/snuff show. . . . It seemed to be, really, what their masters got off on.

She hated all this, of course--hated that she hadn't been able to end this place, as well as Anagar's smaller version of it. . . . She supposed, though, that there was only so much she could do in one lifetime; there was only so much she could expect of herself.

She let her mind drift again, therefore. She tried to tell herself, indeed, that she had done the best she could--that she had saved as many lives as she had been able to. . . . But, somehow, that just never did seem to be enough.

She was drawing close to Comm. now, her mind still lost in her thoughts. She hated being forced to watch innocents die--hated that her masters, many times, even expected her to be the executioner; Madeline, indeed, had obviously been displeased by the outcome of the mission, although all their goals had been accomplished in it. . . . She wondered now whether the older woman just hated the idea that anyone got to be free. She half-snorted. Maybe she was jealous.

She looked over to Michael's office, as she came into the main part of Comm.; she wanted to go talk to him--wanted his comfort. She knew he had been concerned for her safety; he had shown it, in fact, in two main ways: both by inquiring, the second they had been alone on the mission, if she were alright--which meant, codedly, "Did they rape you?" and by several looks of longing, love, and regret, as they had returned back to Section after it.

Her heart clenched again slightly, though--aching dully, as she continued to ponder his reactions. Beyond these shows of concern, however, he had been distant, had seemed to be regressing back into himself. She sighed, her heart aching in sadness. The more things change . . .

She looked up to Walter's work station, as she approached it; his smiling, comforting face beamed a welcome home to her. . . . If she had felt capable, she would have smiled.

She sighed once more, though, as she got closer. At least she still had some friends in this place--even if Michael was becoming distant again and Birkoff seemed to be more than capable of selling her out lately; at least Walter was still here. A small smile did finally manage to spread onto her face. She decided to be grateful, indeed, as she walked toward him--decided to count her blessings. . . . In a place like this, after all, one friend was about the most you could expect.

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

Maybe she should have just said "no"; maybe it would have been best if she had just been alone. As wonderful as Walter was, after all, what could he really do--what could he really tell her that she didn't already know? She sighed. . . . She supposed, however, that she would just have to find out. Nikita had been at home--lying on her couch--for about 15 minutes by the time her friend arrived. She wasn't entirely sure, though, why she had agreed to his suggestion that he come over for awhile--just to share a little company, but she supposed that she had, quite simply, needed a friend, had needed someone to talk to. . . . In her heart, however, she also knew who she wished that person had really been.

She opened the door with a slightly forced smile, when he knocked, and gestured inwards, as she let him in silently. He gave her a look which told her not to try so hard. "So, what've you been doing for the last quarter hour?" He watched her evaluatingly, as she shut the door behind him.

She gave him a rueful--and slightly more genuine--smile. "Lying on the couch." She shook her head, knowing her emotions didn't need too much more explaining to him. "Not much else, really."

He shrugged. "Well, don't let me stop you." He pushed her gently back toward the sofa. "I know my way around."

She smiled at his avuncular tone and wandered back to take up her original position; he moved into her kitchen and got out a glass. "So, you wanna tell me about it?"

She shook her head to herself, her hand running back through her hair. "Not really."

He let out a little laugh. "Yeah, right." He was pouring himself a drink. "You invited me over so you could *not* talk." He looked back at her knowingly.

She turned her head toward him, raising her eyebrows slightly. "I thought you invited yourself over."

He shrugged again, replacing the bottle in the refrigerator and moving toward one of her stools. "To-ma-to, to-mah-to," he smiled. The amused look faded a second later, however, as he looked at her deeply--knowing she needed to talk about the mission. "So, how'd it go?"

She decided to give up on her silence, laughing a little. She cocked her head--staring at the ceiling for a moment, thinking, before she looked back at him. "It sucked."

He snorted slightly. "What else is new?" She smiled at him, as he took a drink. "Wanna get specific?"

Her humor faded a little, her eyes reflecting her sadness. "How much do you know?"

"A little," he nodded. "Birkoff told me some of it." She looked back toward the ceiling. "Y'know he feels like shit for not telling you about it all to begin with."

She nodded, not focusing on him. "Yeah," she agreed--only half believing it.

He decided to let Birkoff try to deal with her himself on that one and changed the subject slightly; she needed more help than their little computer genius did, at the moment. "He told me something about a fight."

She nodded again. "Yep. Turns out it wasn't just a whorehouse, after all. It was a snuff show, as well."

He watched her softly, as she closed her eyes for a moment, some of her pain overwhelming her at the memory; her tone was more serious, when she spoke again--almost hauntingly so. "Why would a man want to see that, Walter?" She looked over at him, pleading for answers. "What's the attraction?"

He was both sympathetic and lost. "Ya think *I* know?" He shrugged. "They're perverts. They get off on pain." He shook his head, raising his glass. "Never appealed to me." He took another drink.

Her eyes were sad. She knew he couldn't really answer her questions, knew--fortunately--that he wasn't the sort of man she was angry with, but she was taking this opportunity to question him as a representative of his sex, nonetheless. "Have you ever been to one?"

He was a little confused. "A snuff show?"

She shook her head. "A brothel."

He looked at the floor and cocked his head a little. "Other than on-duty?" He nodded to himself. "Once." He looked back up at her, trying to explain. "I was a kid."

Her eyes were a little hurt. She was shaking her head--needing to understand. "Why? I mean, what's the appeal in having to *pay* someone to be close to you?"

He shook his head back at her, his eyes quiet. "There isn't much." She looked confused. "Some friends of mine took me," he explained. His eyes showed how stupid he now thought he had been. "I didn't want to seem like a wimp and back out."

She looked into him deeply, needing what answers he could provide to her. "What happened?"

He laughed a little. "Nothing." She raised her eyebrows at him. "You want the whole story?"

She smiled slightly. "The expurgated version."

He smiled back. "They--my `friends'--chose her for me." He shook his head, remembering. "They picked her because she looked like a girl I had a crush on."

She smiled at him slightly, as he continued. He was staring now, unfocused, across the room. "I got back in that room and saw this kid," he looked back at her, "and she *was* just a kid." He shook his head again. "I couldn't do it--hell, I couldn't do *anything*."

She laughed a little. "So did you tell your friends?"

He raised a finger at her. "Uh-uh, haven't finished the story yet." She smiled slightly and let him continue; he looked down at the floor, as he went on. "I ended up spending a few hours just talking to her--figuring out how she had ended up there." He shrugged. "Usual sad story."

He refocused on her again, as he finished up. "In the end, I gave her 50 bucks and snuck her out of there--through a back door." He smiled, about to take another drink. "And *then* I lied to my friends about the whole thing."

She laughed with him and looked back at the ceiling again. "Thanks. I think I needed to hear that."

He let the silence between them continue for a few more seconds, as he looked her over--evaluating her. He turned around to place his drink on the counter, before he spoke again. "So, you wanna talk about it now?"

She sighed, shrugging slightly; she was withdrawing into herself. "What's to tell? Another mission as a whore--another bunch of innocents Section didn't give a damn about." She laughed slightly, without any sort of mirth. "What else is new?"

"Well, that was specific," he commented wryly.

She smiled again and looked back at him, but her smile faded almost instantly, as the truth of what was bothering her began to sink in. She sighed, her eyes connecting with his deeply. "Some days, I just don't know how to keep doing this."

He nodded. "Join the club." He paused for a second. "So what was it this time--really?"

She looked down at the floor, biting her lip a little. "There was this girl--Sondra." She shook her head. "She couldn't have been more than in her late teens, maybe early twenties."

Walter nodded. "But she looked like she'd just left mom and dad."

She nodded and looked up at him. "She looked like she'd *never* left them." She sighed. "She was *so* innocent." She shook her head again, her eyes a little amazed. "She'd never even been in a fight before."

He watched her sympathetically, letting her talk. "So what'd you do?"

She laughed slightly--humorlessly. "I hit her."

He smiled, sharing her macabre joke. "You taught her how to fight."

She laughed again, ruefully. "In a couple of hours? Not bloody likely."

He could see it; she was fighting the knowledge that she had tried to help, that she had done something good. He didn't even need to ask what had happened to Sondra; he could tell. . . . She had survivor's guilt.

He tried to get her to see her own efforts; he hated watching her blame herself. "But you *tried*." His eyes probed into her-- tender but determined.

She shrugged and sat up to break eye contact with him, trying to avoid self-knowledge. She rubbed her ankles tiredly.

He shook his head. He hated to see this happen, hated that she could question that she had helped, that she had made an impact. "Sugar, you started your own revolution today. Birkoff told me."

She shrugged, her back to him slightly. "And Sondra was dead before it even began." She continued to rub her ankles.

He sighed and then spoke very quietly. "There are only so many you can save." She didn't respond. "You did more than the profile called for--you even stayed behind when you were supposed to exit, just to help them."

Her voice was very small, as it floated back to him. "I stayed for her."

He sighed heavily again. There wasn't really anything he could say to make it better, he knew, but he couldn't just let her kick herself around.

The silence continued for a few more seconds, while she lay back down on the couch; he tried the only approach he could think of to get through to her--identifying with her trauma. "There was a three-man mission in the Balkans." He sighed once more and shrugged. "A motion detector failed; I got out alive and the other two didn't." He paused. "They were in the 5% I've told you about." He nodded and turned to reach back for his drink.

"Good men," she replied. It was half a question and half a statement; she was only partly taking in his story.

"The best," he emphasized. She looked at him, as he continued-- as he tried to give her some hope for the future, some way to deal with the past. "And it got me interested in the gadgets we use, I mean," he paused, "I designed a few myself." He smiled a little, looking nostalgic. "And then eventually I got into it full-time." He shook his head, coming out of it. "Been there ever since."

She continued to listen to him, as he lifted his glass. He was really just getting to half of his point, though; he stopped himself before he actually tasted the drink. "Mmn," he murmured, as though he had just remembered his next idea. "By the way, you should start thinking about your future, too." He shook his finger at her before draining the rest of his drink.

She had been playing absently with a few strands of her hair, but she dropped them at his words, forgetting them completely. She looked back at the ceiling, her mind wandering, a little unhappily. "My future," she echoed. It wasn't a happy topic for her.

"People don't live forever in the field," he reminded her. She closed her eyes briefly, before staring at the ceiling once again. "You should move into another area."

Nikita was shaking her head, thinking about this. It wouldn't happen; Michael wouldn't let it. As much as he wanted her alive, he also wanted her where he could watch out for her . . . where he could just watch her.

Walter continued, unaware of her thoughts. "Comm., research, profiling," he listed. He got up with his glass and started toward the kitchen, before pointing back at her. "*I* could use an assistant." Nikita laughed a little and rolled her eyes--seeing his plan. "No, c'mon now," he responded to her look, "I'm being serious." He continued on to the kitchen to get a new drink.

Nikita looked over at him lovingly. It was wonderful to have someone care about her like that.

She looked back at the ceiling, though, as she allowed herself to really ponder it for a second, her eyes unfocusing slightly; she knew she couldn't actually do it. "I think I'd feel too guilty knowing there were people out there risking their lives."

He took the top off the bottle he held. "Trust me. You get over it."

Her eyes grew a little red, as she continued to stare blankly upwards; her hand was beneath her neck. She was finally really allowing herself to think into this last mission--and, now that she had, she found that she didn't know how to keep going. "How do you do it? How d'you stay sane?" He was the only sane person she actually knew, after all--or, at least, he was the closest you could get to it in Section. She looked over at him, flopping her hand onto her stomach. "What's the secret?"

He looked back at her honestly, his drink in his hand; this was the other thing he had wanted to tell her to begin with. "Knowing," he sighed a little, "when to lie and when to tell the truth."

She seemed confused. "To them?"

He answered her seriously. "To yourself." She looked back at the ceiling again, as he explained. "At night, you go to bed *knowing*," he paused for emphasis, "that you live in Hell." She looked back at him again--understanding. "That's the truth."

"And the lie?" she wondered.

He smiled, pondering it deeply--daydreaming. "When you wake up in the morning, thinking that this day," he paused--happily, "may change everything. You'll escape; you'll fall in love." He stopped again, looking off into the distance wistfully. "They'll close the place up and send everybody home."

His happiness wasn't transferred to her. She looked back at the ceiling again, her eyes growing red; she was being overwhelmed once more by all the thoughts she had every time she went to bed. "Then that night you have to face the truth again."

He went back to the stool. "Yeah. . . . But in the meantime," he sat down, "you've accomplished something that's truly remarkable." She looked over to him, hoping for guidance; he focused on her sadly. "You've made it through another day."

Her soul seemed to throb slightly with a sense of emptiness; she knew he was right, of course--but that knowledge was brutal. She looked back at the ceiling before closing her eyes for a second--trying to hold in the pain. . . . She wished to God there were some way out of this.

Walter watched her reopen her eyes and decided to give her a minute in silence. He had told her what he could--even if that would *never* be enough.

He took a drink, as the phone rang--reminding them both once again of the painful life they had just been discussing. She reached for it, knowing instinctively where she had last put it; sometimes, it seemed like it was a part of her. "Hello," she answered.

The voice she knew would respond was there as expected. "Josephine," Michael intoned.

She closed her eyes for a second and snapped the phone shut. As much as she had come to hate what that voice represented in her life, she couldn't help but feel warmed by it, anyway-- knowing the human being that that rich sound also hid.

She refocused on the room, her eyes loving. Michael and she had been building a friendship, of late--one she cherished more than any other she had ever been part of. Maybe, indeed--she decided, then, this one aspect of her life was what she should live for--was what she should keep going for. . . . There really was, after all, very little else.

Walter examined the expression on her face. "Do I need to even guess?"

She looked back at him ironically. "Yeah, right. It was Prince Charming calling to invite me to the Ball." She smiled, as she sat up.

He drained his glass once more before he stood up. "Well, I guess we should both get in, then. They'll be wanting me soon, too." She stood as well, grabbing her things, as he was putting his glass in the sink. "They really gave you a lot of downtime today, didn't they?"

She nodded, her look facetious. "Oh yeah. I'm *well* rested."

He smiled, but, as she came toward him--both of them heading for the door, he took hold of her arm gently; his eyes probed hers. "Sugar, you gonna be okay?"

The look in her eyes grew a little more real. She nodded. "I'll be alright." She smiled a little. "Not great, but alright."

His hand rubbed over her arm briefly. "You'll come to me, if you need to talk?"

She smiled more broadly at him, as she opened the door, then leaned in to kiss him on the cheek. "Count on it."

This last move, however, had been seen by her still-unwanted next door neighbor. "Dollface!" he greeted her, as she closed her door behind her. "I see you're expanding your horizons." He looked at Walter slightly enviously.

She shook her head, as she walked by, not even taking the time to focus on this minor annoyance. Verbally, she told him what had become her mantra for her interactions with her new neighbor. "Shut up, Mick."

Walter smiled to himself behind her, oddly encouraged by the witnessed exchange. As little as Nikita may have--understandably --wanted to admit it, he could see that she had found another friend. . . . That was good. No matter how odd they were, after all--in Section, you had to take all the friends you could get.

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

There was a sim. in front of him, but his eyes weren't really focusing on it. He hadn't, in truth, been able to concentrate on too much, for the last several hours; he just felt too guilty. He had--once again, after all--allowed a friend to face off with a danger she hadn't even realized existed. . . . And he had done it all simply because he had been told to.

Birkoff stopped trying to focus on the sim. before him for a second --taking off his glasses to rub his eyes. He knew Nikita had to be coming back in for this next mission--knew Michael would call her. And he knew, as well, that he needed to find some time before it began to talk to her; if he didn't, indeed, he would be distracted during it--and then God only knew what might happen.

He felt a sense of inner disgust. He hated his "life" here--hated his job. He hated everything about this place, in fact, with the exception of a *very* few people. . . . It seemed a shame, therefore, that he was more than capable of continually hurting them.

He put back on his glasses once more and forced himself to refocus on the screen, while his mind traced back. For quite some time, he had been able to look after her, or to try to--at least. But, for the last several months, he had been distracted--had been targeted in a big way by Operations and Madeline; everything in front of him *always* seemed to be some sort of test.

He had, for awhile recently, begun to get seriously paranoid, in fact. It wasn't hard to do, really, when you had your own personally-assigned nemesis keeping watch over you constantly.

Hillinger, thankfully, was off duty tonight, though; that was a blessing, indeed--in a lot of ways. First, he didn't need him around to needle him while he was so unfocused, and--second--he was *damn* glad that the idiot hadn't been there to comment over his shoulder about Nikita's latest mission. That boy, after all, was just the sort of idiot who would get off on the kind of snuff show Anagar had run. He shook his head. Moron.

He thought more now about the "establishment" Nikita had been sent into. He hated that she had had to go into it unprepared, not even knowing the real danger she might face; it seemed kind of stupid to him, really, to send in operatives without telling them all the variables. . . . What if she had had to fight, when he had been cut off from her? What did they think she should have done?

He sighed and punched a few keys to send the sim. he had just finished up off to Michael; he needed it to attach to the latest profile. He knew, unfortunately, though--when he let himself consider it, precisely what they would have expected from Nikita; they would have expected her to simply kill the other woman and not complain about it. . . . They really expected her not to have a soul.

He shook his head. The whole place Anagar had run made him feel sick; he couldn't even *imagine* wanting to watch two women fight to the death, much less getting off on it. . . . What the hell kind of perverts were these men, anyway?

If the truth were told, however, Birkoff really couldn't have understood wanting *any* of the services Anagar provided. The whole concept of a whorehouse didn't appeal to him, although he also knew that he probably would have been unable to keep from eyeing some of the women who worked in them, nonetheless. It was just that he couldn't see why you would want to *pay* someone to have sex with you--couldn't understand the appeal of it.

He sighed quietly, continuing to think into this. Alright, he knew he wasn't exactly Casanova, but he still wanted a woman to really *want* him--not to just be with him because she had to be. . . . Where on earth could anyone find the arousal in *that*?

He had, in fact, come too close to this situation once before. Even though he tried not to, in fact, his mind still went back to his encounter with Abby--with Nikita's body double. Yes, okay, she *had* played off seriously on his fantasies about his friend, but he had gotten so swept away in the whole event, truly, because he had thought that she really wanted him--that his fantasy was finally coming true. . . . His fantasy, however, had *not* been about a valentine op. on a mission. He sighed again. That didn't appeal to him at all.

It wasn't, of course, that he was utterly immune to some of the things he ended up seeing in Section; especially when he had been a few years younger, he suspected that Madeline had been trying to torment him when she had forced him to carry out prolonged valentine surveillance. He had had a hard--God, his mind interrupted, choosing a different word--a *difficult* time trying not to embarrass himself several times, in fact. What had the woman thought he was, anyway? A eunuch?

He shook his head slightly and pulled up another program to run-- mostly to give himself something to do. All of this, however, had been more his early reaction; after awhile, his attitude had changed in a couple of ways. First, he had begun to grow more jaded, more used to such images, and they had, therefore, had less of an effect on him; he thought now--in retrospect--that this had, indeed, perhaps been Madeline's plan.

This hadn't been all, though. Along with this, too, he had started to see the effect some of these missions had had on the ops. involved--had started to take in their true toll. It had begun to be painful for him, in fact, to watch one of these forced encounters and then see the look of torment in the op.'s eyes, whenever their target looked away; it had just begun to seem cruel.

He supposed, then, partly because of all this and also partly simply because he was the man he was, he found the whole concept of using a prostitute rather repulsive, instead of erotic. He wanted a woman who wanted him. He wanted a woman who took pleasure in whatever they might do together. . . . He wanted one he was sure wasn't going to be looking bored or tortured whenever he looked away.

For all these reasons, therefore, he had been glad that Hillinger hadn't been around to witness this last mission. That boy, in fact --he suspected, would never follow the path he himself had--would never come to see these missions as more painful than arousing. Hillinger, indeed, would probably have happily been one of Anagar's customers, given half a chance. . . . He was truly that twisted.

He sighed, pulling his mind back finally--reluctantly--to his part in this last mission. He supposed he was letting himself wander so much because he really didn't want to face the pain he had allowed his friend to be caused in it; he hated, truly, that he had hurt her once again.

He felt some internal sense shriveling; it hurt him that this hadn't been the first time that he had taken part in bringing Nikita pain, but he knew irrefutably that it was true. In many ways, indeed, Birkoff had forced himself to face the fact that he tended to go into a sort of working fugue state during missions--into a state of supposed calm and lethargy which actually hid his anxiety or horror from himself. . . . He didn't like this trait, of course, but he knew that there really was, for him, no other way to survive most of them.

At the same time, however, the repression of emotions which he so often took on only made his reaction after the missions were complete more devastating. He sighed once more. He had, during this last mission, too, been forced to witness both Nikita and Michael undergo several different traumas. Not only had she gone in there, after all, not knowing what the place truly was, but the two of them had been put into the position of prostitute and client, as well; these were roles, he knew, which would never have been appealing to them, but--since the Peruze mission--they had become, no doubt, even more tormenting.

He shook his head very slightly, continuing to think through this latest mission. He hadn't, of course, been able to hear all of what they had said to each other, once Michael had "chosen" her to accompany him to his room. The older op. had, in fact, cut off their surveillance while they talked--or he guessed, at least, that it had been the Class Five operative's decision; most things in the relationship between those two, really, seemed to be.

It had only been several minutes later, then, that Michael had turned his comlink back on and informed him that Nikita wasn't leaving yet--had ordered him to make up a new egress plan for her. And, in truth, Birkoff had rarely heard such muted but obviously intense pain as in those few, short commands.

God, he hated what this place seemed to do to those two. He didn't know exactly what they had said to each other, of course-- didn't know exactly what had happened. He was certain, though, that it hadn't been anything sexual or--probably--even romantic; not only did he suspect that Michael didn't really see anything arousing in the situation, but he also knew that the gap in communication with Section had only been of a few minutes' duration. And, from long years of watching Michael with a variety of targets, he was *certain* that there hadn't been time enough for anything real to have gone on--especially not with Nikita, the only person he obviously cared for.

He sighed, continuing to ponder all of this. He didn't *know* what they had said to each other, indeed, but he could guess. Michael, he suspected, would have tried whatever method he could think of--ordering, bullying, . . . reasoning, probably as a last resort--to get her to take advantage of the early egress he had purposely written into the mission for her, the one which he didn't even care would have made him look like such a wimp to Anagar and his guards. She, on the other hand, would have reasoned, begged, and then--finally--would have simply refused to go. He smiled slightly. And, in the end--as usually happened, unless Michael had simply decided to use brute force--she would have won.

His smile faded a little, however, as he thought about her decision. He didn't know, really, whether he thought that she had been right to stay or not, now. He had guessed that she had done it to protect the one woman she seemed to be talking to the most on the mission--the one who had been *so* nervous but who had eventually died anyway, as far as he could tell--but he was torn about whether he had agreed with her determined plan. On the one hand, her desire to protect the women whom Anagar had trapped was a trait that he--like so many throughout Section-- loved her for, but he also hated that she had decided to risk herself so. . . . He really was afraid that, someday, they were all going to lose her.

This last thought, indeed, seemed to clang loudly through his head; he closed his eyes for a second, remembering the worst part of this mission. He had *hated* having to tell Michael his orders, having to remind him that he couldn't protect Nikita, if the mission had any hope of success. . . . He *had* done it, of course--had put himself into his "I don't care" mode to get the job finished; it was the only way he could give people orders he despised.

Once the mission had ended, though, and he had had to face himself again, he had found that his self-disgust had grown once more. . . . One day, he suspected, it was going to overwhelm him completely.

He sighed again, looking back at his program. It was days like this when he began to feel that he was coming to understand Michael--was coming to understand the man he was. The Class Five operative, too--after all, could blankly order others to their deaths, could take part in missions which he *knew* would leave Nikita hurting, on so many levels. He still tried, of course, to look after her, still changed profiles to try to keep her from additional harm--but a lot of the time that simply didn't work. . . . And--for all this--Birkoff could now understand him; he, indeed, was doing precisely the same thing.

There were still definite differences between them, however. Most importantly, in fact, was that Michael had one, incredibly special, thing which the younger op.--no matter how much he might dream of it--simply didn't have: her love. He swallowed a little. Yes, he cared for Nikita as a friend--always would, but he did still, frequently, wish that there were more--that, just once, the beautiful woman would look at him with even a *fraction* of the devotion he had seen so often in her eyes for Michael. . . . But he knew, just as well, that this probably wasn't ever going to happen.

He sighed, trying to pull himself out of the thought. Who was he kidding, anyway? What guy in Section *didn't* have this reaction to her? He was already luckier than most, really; he was a friend--one who Michael didn't want to kill whenever he was close to her. And, as much as a little part of him thought he should be offended by the older man's reaction to him, or lack thereof, he did appreciate it all still--deeply.

He shook his head slightly again. He still needed, though-- he knew, to tell her all this . . . well, no--he revised internally, not all, but he did need to apologize. Whenever she got here, then, he would.

Just as he was thinking this, however--as though he had somehow summoned her with his thoughts, he saw her round a corner toward him. He saved his program quickly and logged out, trying to catch up to her as unobtrusively as possible; Operations was out of Section, it was true, but he still didn't want to be seen by anyone who might question the action with his superiors later.

"Nikita," he caught her attention. She had been making a beeline toward Michael's office.

She blinked at him, as though he had interrupted her thoughts --as though she were just coming out of them. "Hey, Birkoff."

"Can we talk for a minute?" he asked, trying to lead her over to a small, side hallway.

"Okay," she agreed--slightly reluctantly, giving Michael's office a glance as they passed by it; there were obviously other things on her mind. She refocused on him, though, once they were alone. "What is it?"

He took in a deep breath. "I just wanted to apologize."

"For what?" She still seemed distracted.

He repressed a sigh. He might be her friend, but he would always come in second in her mind--at best--to Michael. "For the mission--for not warning you."

She looked down and shrugged, as her mind finally seemed to start focusing on his words. "You do what you have to do." She looked back up at him.

His eyes looked deep into her. "You believe that about as much as I do." She smiled a little. "Nikita, I'm sorry. I hate it when I have to lie to you." He swallowed. "I just can't always tell you the whole truth."

She sighed a little, nodding--looking at the floor once more; she was still a little distant. "I know." She refocused on him. "I wish you could, but I know you do what you need to." She still seemed like she only half believed it.

He shook his head, his heart sinking. "I hate this." He was a little agitated. "I feel like I'm growing further away from you all the time."

She gave him a sympathetic smile, not quite knowing what to say. He was right, and they both knew it.

"I'm still your friend," he continued. "I still care." He shook his head again. "Is there any way I can prove that?"

She pursed her lips a little and refocused on the floor. She did hate it when he kept her in the dark, but she knew that there was only so much he could do--knew that there was only so much either of them could. She had no desire, either--really, to lose his friendship; there just weren't enough friends in her life to start throwing any of them away.

She sighed and made up her mind, then. "How about if you buy me lunch, during your next day down?" She looked back up at him.

He smiled, incredibly relieved. "Thanks. I'd like that." She smiled in response and was about to turn away, when he realized that there was something else he needed to tell her. "Nikita," he caught her attention again but felt a little unprepared once he had; he didn't really know how to say this. He took a deep breath, deciding to just give her the facts; she would understand them. "Michael missed his mark by almost two minutes on this last mission."

She looked confused. "When?"

His eyes said even more than his voice. "When you were fighting."

She looked at him with deep comprehension and nodded. She wasn't sure she liked the sound of that, but it certainly wasn't Birkoff's fault. She gave him a small smile before she began to turn away again; she really did appreciate his help. "Thanks, Birkoff."

He caught her eye for one final second and smiled tightly. It wasn't much, but it was information she needed--information she could use. . . . Maybe--as little as he liked it--that was about the best he could do for her right now.

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

He felt like he had been in shock for . . . no, he didn't even know for how long. There had been a long procession of events which had tormented him recently, though--and they had all, to a sense of internal, wracking sadness--led him to an epiphany of the most soul-crushing kind. In just a few minutes, too, he would have to pass along this terrible new self-knowledge to the woman he loved. . . . And that, indeed, would be the worst blow of them all.

Michael had been in his office for some time now, had retreated there almost from the instant he had returned from this last mission. He had come out once or twice, it was true, in order to meet with his overlords, but he had--for as much of the time as he had been allowed to--come back here to hide.

He could feel his sorrow in his blood--coursing out of the organ which had once been his heart. He still felt a bit, at the moment, like a wounded animal which had retreated into its den. This past mission had been unspeakably painful, on so many different levels. . . . He just couldn't yet imagine a way to recover from all it had brought with it.

His mind--almost against his will--began to work back once more through the events which had led him here. The first brutal step in the whole process, of course, had been the set up of the operation itself; he hated that Nikita had been forced to play the whore yet again--even if, thankfully, that role had only been symbolic this time. Still, it had been Section's little reminder, yet again, of just what they thought of her--of the true use they saw for her. . . . The fact, too, that they could reduce a woman whose soul was so bright, whose mind so nimble that she seemed to have been touched by angels to a simple matter of sellable parts disgusted him far more than he would ever be able to express.

This, however, hadn't even been all--hadn't even been the whole of the profile's original indignities to her. Their masters hadn't even allowed her to know the entire truth of what she would be facing on this mission. She had, of course, figured out part of the services which Anagar had provided, but she simply wasn't perverse enough to be able to guess them all; she hadn't been soulless enough to even try.

His eyes began to burn now, as he regarded the wall across from him. "Men" like Anagar and Meyer disgusted him. While he had no expectation that every relationship entered into should be about love, he did feel that--in a world populated by the truly human-- the people in these relationships should at least both be there by their own free consent. . . . That, indeed, was really all he expected out of life--however little it was frequently true.

He was not naive, though; he knew all the reasons why whorehouses had been brought into existence, however little he may have agreed with them. But Anagar had taken this particular perversion of natural desire one step further--had added an extra soulless twist to it. . . . And it was this, truly, which made him feel ill just to contemplate.

Again, though, Michael was no innocent; he had met far too many men like Meyer to be unable to break down many of the reasons for their "hobbies." . . . That didn't mean, however, that he would ever truly be able to understand them.

He sighed, his mind continuing to focus on this revolting subject. He hated that any woman, that any person, should have to be subjected to this sort of atrocity--but it made him absolutely burn in rage that it had been his Nikita who had been forced to undergo it. She was, after all, a sacred being; he despised that their masters, instead, insisted on treating her just like any other member of the damned.

He could feel his soul burning within him with these thoughts. He had wanted--had *needed*, then--to be able to get his beloved out of Anagar's as quickly as possible. She was there to tag Meyer, and that was all; there had been no reason why she should have to stay on after that.

His sadness welled within him. This hadn't been his only concern for her, however; he had wanted--had hoped, in fact, to be able to extract her before she had even discovered the truth about Anagar's establishment--the truth of the lives of the women she was among. He had known, indeed, that--if she knew--it would be infinitely harder to convince her to go, to get her to leave without trying to help them--however unlikely it had been that she could make some real change there. He had known, truly, that the low chances of success would make no difference to her at all; angels, after all, were always on the lookout for souls to save, even when their chances of doing so seemed to exist solely in the realm of the miraculous.

His hopes, however, had been for nothing, in the end-- unfortunately. His arrival had been too late; she had already known.

He had tried, though, to get her to leave, anyway--had used all the tactics he could think of to attempt to persuade her. He had tried ordering her, had tried reasoning with her, but none of it had worked; in the end, in fact, he had been reduced to simply repeating himself over and over, while attempting desperately to ignore the things she said. . . . He hadn't wanted to admit, in fact, that she had made too much sense.

He shook his head slightly, remembering. In a way, of course, the fact that she had used his sister to try to make her point had been a low blow on her part, but he also knew that she had only done it once he had refused to listen to anything else. He knew, as well, that she had been right. It had been fears of this sort which had made him so deeply grateful to Rene; without his friend to act as his sister's guardian, indeed, God only knew what might have become of her.

He took a shuddering breath, as he pulled his mind back from this unpleasant path. He didn't want to think about it anymore. . . . It simply frightened him too much.

No--he wouldn't let his mind go there any longer, but this train of thought had made him face one unavoidable truth: Nikita's arguments had been good ones. He had, indeed, understood all of them only too well--had loved her even more for wanting to help these enslaved souls.

None of that, however, could change the fact that this simply wasn't enough for him. *No one*, indeed, would ever be more important to him than her; in the long run, in his mind, no one else would ever matter.

He had *hated*, then, that she had wanted to stay. If he could have, in fact, he would have knocked her out and carried her to the van, would have gotten her to leave--willingly or not. The mission profile, though--sadly, had made that impossible. It would have been too difficult to get out of the building and then back in without being noticed; it would have been a risk which could have jeopardized the entire mission, . . . and he simply would have had no excuse to give his masters for that, no matter how much he had ached to.

He thought back further on this part of the mission now--his heart still throbbing in pain. He knew he had seemed a bit eager in demanding a woman when he had first walked in the door, but the action hadn't been enough off profile to be a particular problem. He had hated, however, having to circle the "lounge," having to take in the faces of all of the women he was going to be convincing Nikita not to save; it was so much easier, truly, if they remained anonymous to him. Seeing their eyes--the fear of the new arrivals, the complete blankness of the ones who had already destroyed their own souls in order to survive--had just made everything that much more difficult.

None of this, however, had dissuaded him from his pre-planned course of action; he had still attempted to convince her to abandon them all. Yes, he had known that they would appear in his future nightmares to torment him, but he had many ghosts who did that already; a few dozen more would make no appreciable difference.

He closed his eyes for a second--his soul aching, as he continued to remember. There had been so many points during this mission when he had felt ill--when he hadn't been certain that he would be able to continue. When Anagar's assistant, for instance, had given him the box with which to control his beloved, it had taken every ounce of control he had ever possessed to keep from breaking the man's neck; he had had no problem, indeed, when Nikita had finally killed him.

He forced open his saddened eyes once more to continue his blank perusal of the wall. There had been so much he had wanted to say to her, once they had been alone, too--had been so much he had needed to tell her. In the end, though, he hadn't been able to say a word--or, at least, none which had truly mattered.

He had turned off his comlink, however--he remembered, had signaled her to do the same; they had both needed the chance to at least speak to each other without surveillance, even if he couldn't bring himself to say any of the things he had wanted to. He had been able to ask her if she was alright, though-- had at least been able to assess that she hadn't been through much more than the simple shock and disgust of the place, but that had been the limits of his courage. . . . It hadn't, truly --he told himself now--been the place to speak from the heart, anyway.

He had tried, therefore, to tell her the things in his soul without words; he had tried to show her that he would *never* see her in the way this mission had forced him to suggest by keeping his distance--by refusing to touch her, even as he had chosen her from the group. She wasn't a whore to him, after all; she *never* would be. And, even if he couldn't help that his eyes had taken in the long sweep of her legs that the slit of her dress had revealed--even if he had wanted to simply be able to hold her close, to tell her without words that he cared--he hadn't wanted her to confuse his desire for her soul with the fruitless desire for power which Anagar's usual customers were seeking. . . . He just prayed, indeed, that she had understood.

His eyes were becoming bloodshot. He hated, truly, that this had all come about after they had been becoming so close, of late--hated that this had had to follow on the friendship they had been able to build for the first time. He wanted her to be able to come to him for help, to be able to trust him with her opinions and ideas. But--despite the fact that she had knelt before him at the end of their few minutes together and had asked him, without words, to honor the friendship which they had so recently forged-- he simply hadn't been able to. . . . He hadn't had the strength.

He sighed tiredly. He wished, truly, that this had been the worst of this mission, as well--that he had had nothing beyond this to remember with horror or sorrow. But, of course, this simply wasn't the truth.

The most tormenting part of the mission, obviously, had come at its end. His heart, truly, had almost stopped when he had seen her emerge--when he had seen her brought to the pit. He had wanted to stop everything, had wanted to begin shooting at the guards and guests until he could rescue her--Meyer and the mission be damned.

This hadn't been the limits of his reaction, however. The fact that their target had finally arrived during her match, too, had become inconsequential to him, truly. . . . All he had cared about was Nikita.

He had, as well, in those moments when he was being forced to watch the horrible spectacle of the woman he loved in the pit--a place which was, he supposed, at least appropriately named--felt as though he were being forced to watch his own life ending. Had Nikita died, had she even come close to it--in fact, he didn't know at all what he would have done. . . . He was just very grateful that he hadn't had to find out.

He had been caught there completely, however--had been horribly spellbound, until he had seen, had known for certain that she was going to win--that she would be the victor. This in itself, of course, hadn't made him entirely happy, but he had decided that whatever came of it he could handle with her in time. She had to be alive--after all--in order to have any problems to deal with.

He had finally moved then--had finally taken up the position he had been supposed to many minutes before. And, he knew very well--too, that he had taken great satisfaction in killing Meyer--in killing the man who had cheered for his angel to murder another woman for his entertainment. That man, indeed, had been a plague on this earth; he would feel no sense of guilt for having dispatched him.

This hadn't, however, been the end of his fear. He had seen, as well, when he had looked up from his work with his target, a spectacle far worse than the one he had witnessed before; he had, in fact, seen what had appeared to be his beloved's death. . . . And he had feared, in that moment, that they were--both of them-- truly, forever lost.

His heart had almost ceased beating then, as well, but he had forced himself to move; the closer he was to her, after all, the easier it would be for him to help. If he got down there quickly enough, indeed, perhaps he would be able to revive her, after killing the guards. . . . It had been all he had had left to hope for, at the time.

It had, therefore, been with the sort of relief which no one should ever be forced to experience that he had seen that she was still alive. And, although he had simply acted mechanically in aiding her in ridding themselves of the rest of the guards, some part of him had realized that he was falling even more deeply in love with her at that very moment--some part of him had discovered that she seemed even more beautiful standing in the middle of her self-made revolution than she ever had been before. . . . How he had managed to not draw her close and hold her forever had been a miracle in itself.

He had only half taken in the woman whom she had helped save, though--the one who, only a few minutes before, had been trying brutally to kill her. That woman had, too--quite obviously, much like himself--been in shock; he had, indeed, shot right past her head in order to kill a guard who had been aiming at Nikita-- and she hadn't even flinched at the move.

He couldn't blame the woman for this, however; Nikita's beauty--her light--could cause temporary blindness at times. . . . He wasn't surprised that the woman she had just saved had been taking a few minutes to adjust to the sight of an angel.

He looked down at his desk, as he thought through some of his more recent actions once more. He knew that Nikita would love it if he had told her what he had done after their egress--knew she would love him even more if she had known, but he still had no intention of telling her. That, he supposed, would just have to be his secret until death.

He had seen the Housekeeping orders, however--he remembered, as they had been returning to Section, had known that the women at Anagar's would still be in danger, if they weren't gone well before the operatives arrived. It was for several reasons, then, that he had sent his anonymous warning to Anagar's computer-- knowing who would be on it, knowing she would misinterpret who had sent it. He had, indeed, done it for himself--to make up for the help he had refused them before; for Nikita, to continue her beautiful revolution; for the women themselves, who had never deserved to be there; and--indeed--for his sister, who, as Nikita had pointed out, could so easily have become one of them. . . . It was, in the end--in fact, the least he could do to help out the cause of his angel.

His mind was caught in these thoughts for a few more seconds, before he saw her--his beloved, his light--as she made her way into Section. He was, though, almost relieved when he saw that she had been sidetracked by Birkoff; what he was about to say to her, truly, was more painful than anything before--both the truth and the lies. . . . He wasn't sure how either of them would ever survive it.

He had spent the entire way back from this mission, indeed, lost in thoughts which had frightened him--in ones he simply couldn't escape. He had been thinking over, constantly, the last several weeks with her--had been thinking over the friendship they had somehow begun to build together--and he had realized, to his *incredible* pain, something which absolutely tormented him: he couldn't allow it to continue.

He swallowed heavily, as his mind forced him to review the reasons for this horrible decision. He had needed, at several different points in this mission, in fact, to have Birkoff remind him of his duty; the idea was almost ridiculous, but it was absolutely true. Michael--Section's golden boy, the most feared of Class Five ops.--had needed to have a tech. op remind him of mission parameters. He shook his head slightly. And it had all been because he had feared too much for her--for his beloved.

He sighed, remembering sadly. He had spent the last few weeks becoming, perhaps, *too* close to her--far closer than was safe for them. And, while he had cherished every magnificent second of their new emotional intimacy, it had had its drawbacks, as well, when it came to his efficiency.

One of these problems, indeed, was that he had continued to dream about her almost nightly--but far more vividly than he had before. He had found himself, as well, at times, thinking about her, fantasizing about her--and while this, too, was not unusual, the times when he had thought these things--and the fantasies he had had--had expanded. He was no longer just sitting in his office imagining making love to her; now, too, he would find himself almost in the middle of a mission, dreaming about being her husband, about holding a small child they had created in their love for one another. . . . It had, truly, grown even more dangerous than usual.

He closed his eyes for a second. He knew he couldn't allow this to go on; he knew this unquestionably. He wanted--almost more than life--to be able to continue becoming her friend, to be able to continue coming to truly know her, allowing her to come to know him--but he also knew that he couldn't; it just wasn't possible.

This mission, indeed, had proven this to him irrefutably. He had, as he had been caught watching her battle in horror, also been thinking back through all of the things he had come to know of her, of late--of all his wonderful new knowledge of his beloved. And all he could keep thinking--over and over again, then--was two words: "Not now . . . Not now." He just could *not* lose her now.

He needed, therefore, even if he *didn't* want it, to be able to pull away from her slightly; he needed some time to himself, outside of Section One. Without it, he didn't know what would happen, but--whatever it was--he couldn't allow it to. It was just too dangerous.

Maybe someday, he told himself, he would be able to be her friend--maybe, his subconscious began to think, he would even be able to be her lover--but that day was not now. Now, he needed a few days--or weeks or maybe even months--alone in order to be able to continue, in order to be able to function, in his life outside her. . . . And, even if he hated all of this, he knew it was inevitable, nonetheless.

He hoped, however, that he would be able to explain this to her without making her pull away from him. He saw her turn and begin to walk toward his office, and his heart started to beat more loudly in fear. Because, if she pulled away, he would die; he just couldn't take it.

His soul seemed to throb with the ache of loss, as his subconscious began to pray that angels would prove to be patient creatures. . . . That, indeed, was his only chance at survival now.

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

Michael's world seemed to have stopped, seemed to be waiting-- holding its breath; he watched his beloved--his Nikita--continue to approach his office. His heart was hammering so loudly, he was afraid that she might hear it when she entered.

She gave her usual, perfunctory half-knock before opening the door. "Is there a briefing?" She hadn't seen any real activity of that sort. She came in, closing the door softly behind her.

He gave a half nod. "In an hour."

She looked at him curiously, as he was reaching over to block his surveillance; he knew that their masters weren't here at the moment, but he wanted to take no chances. "An hour?" she repeated, her uncertainty over what was about to happen here clear in her voice.

His small task done, he looked back up at her, feeling the usual twinge in his heart. . . . She was so beautiful. "Yes," he replied quietly, not able to make himself say what he needed to yet.

She nodded a little. "So what's all this about?" She took in his look--the fear in his eyes; it obviously wasn't going to be something pleasant.

He opened his mouth, trying to force himself to form the right words--whatever those may have been. . . . But they just wouldn't come.

Her heart felt like it was trembling, as she watched his struggle. . . . God, she hated this; her eyes were begging him to be merciful. "Please don't make me guess, Michael," she said very quietly.

He swallowed heavily and finally forced himself to speak; his voice was hoarse, was just audible. "We can't keep seeing each other."

She looked a little confused for a moment--a look brought on by her conscious desire to block out the truth of what he was saying. "I didn't know that we were."

He focused on her deeply--reluctantly forcing her to face what he meant, his eyes very sad. He shook his head.

She closed her eyes, her attempt to keep herself from facing this beginning to fail. "So, you mean we can't be friends anymore."

His voice was a little shaky. "Not outside of Section."

Her eyes were slightly accusing, as she refocused on him. "We were never friends *inside* Section, Michael."

He took a deep breath. "I know." His eyes were filled with a near-despairing acceptance of the truth.

She nodded and looked away again. "So you don't want to be with me, anymore."

"*No*," his quiet voice half-growled in contradiction. She looked back at him. "I want to." He shook his head. "I can't."

She seemed curious--confused. "Did Operations order this?"

He shook his head again. "It has nothing to do with Operations or Madeline." He sighed. "It has nothing to do with Section." His eyes pleaded for her to understand. "It has to do with me."

She wanted desperately to hide the tears in her eyes, but she couldn't; it wasn't possible. "Can I ask why?"

He nodded slightly and paused, not entirely certain how to explain; he didn't fully understand it himself. Finally, though, he took a deep breath and began speaking softly, deciding that he needed to be as honest as possible with her--for both of their sakes. "Becoming your friend has meant more to me than anything before." He took another deep breath. "But I just can't function anymore."

She shook her head, not understanding.

He tried another way to explain it. "I was two minutes off-mark on this last mission, 'Kita; I almost missed it completely. All I could think about was that you were in danger." He shook his head, his eyes still tormented with the memories. "I couldn't even move."

She thought about it, trying to comprehend--still a bit doubtful. "Would you have been able to act more quickly if we hadn't spent a few days off together, recently?"

He shook his head again. "I don't know." He took another, shaky breath--trying to steady himself once more. "It's what I need to find out."

She shook her head as well, closing her eyes; she couldn't believe this was happening again. They had been so close, had actually been happy for once, for brief periods of time. . . . It was too damn cruel.

He knew what she was thinking; he agreed. He decided, therefore, to try to further explain his own, painful, motivations. "I've been dreaming about you every night," he said quietly. She looked back at him, her eyes showing her attempt to comprehend him. "That's not new," he continued, taking a second to sigh, "but the intensity of the dreams is."

He could see she still wasn't following; he shook his head, trying to make her understand. "All I can think about is the week we spent together; every time I'm at home, it's all I can focus on. You exist in every corner, in every space."

He took a second to swallow heavily before he could continue explaining. "For awhile, I could try to keep the memories confined--could attempt to keep them there, so that--when I'm here --I was able to function." He shook his head. "But that's not the case anymore."

He saw the pain and love in her eyes. He sighed once more, his own eyes tormented, as well. "You've become my ghost, Nikita-- you're haunting my soul," his voice was very soft. "There's not a second of my life, anymore, when you aren't there."

She took a deep breath, desperately trying to keep herself from crying. Did he not want her close? Her voice, when she spoke, was shaky. "Is that bad?"

He shook his head at her slowly, his heart throbbing with tenderness and pain. "No. It's beautiful." He took another deep breath. "But it's tormenting." He swallowed heavily again, trying to explain--his voice an incredibly soft whisper. "I don't know how to live like this."

She bit her lip for a few seconds, still trying desperately not to cry; her voice was tear-filled, as she forced herself to admit the truth. "I don't want to lose you, Michael."

He shook his head; his eyes were suddenly much stronger--the determination glittering in them. "You can't." His gaze burned into her. "You will *never* lose me."

She closed her eyes and lowered her head, as a lone tear traveled down her cheek--her heart aching. His promises meant little to her right now; she felt like something inside of her was dying.

His voice was soft; his soul was throbbing in torment at the sight of her in pain. "I don't want this, either, Nikita." He sighed. "I hate it." He paused for a second to try to keep from crying, as well. "Maybe it's still too soon after that week; maybe if we wait, I'll be able to be close to you platonically and not need you so deeply that it eats away at my soul to be separate from you. Maybe that will happen."

She opened her eyes once more; her head was still bowed. "And maybe it won't." She looked back up at him; her eyes held dozens of emotions, all of them tormenting--for them both.

She sighed then, however, accepting this change between them reluctantly; she tried to be practical, therefore. "Should I ask to be reassigned?"

"*No*," he growled softly at her; her words frightened him-- angered him. "I don't want your distance in Section." He shook his head, his voice growing gentle once more. "I won't survive with that."

She sighed, her eyes a little accusing--her anger starting; her acceptance had fled as quickly as it had come. "So once again, you make our rules." It would have been a hell of a lot easier to be distant from him altogether, after all, rather than have to remember each time she saw him what they had been to one another for so short a time. She began to turn to go, sadly.

His voice stopped her. "Nikita, this *isn't* what I want."

She turned back to him reluctantly. "But it's what you're asking for, nonetheless."

He nodded. "I know it's not fair." His eyes were so sad. "I'm sorry. If I could be with you as a friend and still function as an operative, I would." He shook his head, remembering too vividly the pain of this last mission. "But that's not happening."

He sighed, his voice becoming even softer--his gaze holding his memories. "You make me feel too alive, Nikita-- too human." He shook his head once more. "I can't feel like that and still do the job." He swallowed heavily. "Not right now, at least."

Her anger faded somewhat, as she stared into his eyes. She still didn't like this, of course, but she could see that this wasn't a manipulation; it wasn't even something--as he had said--that he wanted. It was, instead, a path that he needed them to take--that he had to have for his own sanity. . . . They both hated it. Both of them ached.

She nodded, then--agreeing, if not liking it. She let out a heavy sigh, as she tested their unhappy agreement's new parameters. "So, should I still come to you, if I need help?"

His eyes were begging her--were so full of love and need. "Yes." He sighed, swallowing heavily again, before he began to plead with her for what they both needed. "Don't pull away, Nikita--please; I won't, either--not here." He sighed once more, trying to gather enough strength to repeat what he needed to tell her. "I just need some distance outside--need to attempt to pull my life," his voice grew softer, "myself into order."

She sighed wearily and looked at the floor once more-- deciding to change the subject; there was nothing more either of them could say about this, anyway. "So, we're going back out in an hour or so?"

"No, you'll be working oversight on this mission."

She looked back up at him, confused. Why would he leave her behind, while he went out? "What will you be doing?"

"Operations is gone for a few hours." He nodded a little. "There's enough for me to do, other than this mission."

She nodded, as well--understanding, her relief flooding through her; she focused on the floor once more. He hated letting her go out in the field without him; it drove him crazy, she knew. Once more, then, he was protecting her. She smiled slightly. . . . Some things, apparently, really weren't going to change.

Her mind, therefore, changed paths. "Do you think there'll ever be a time when we'll be able to be together, Michael?" she asked finally, looking up at him--unable to keep away from the subject which was tormenting them both so.

His eyes were incredibly sad; his heart throbbed with his love and need for her--and with the pain of the horrible distance he himself had requested. "I don't know, Nikita." His voice got even softer. "I wish I did."

She nodded again, looking away; it was an honest answer, of course--which she appreciated, but that didn't make it any easier. "I'm going to miss you, Michael." She sighed and started toward the door.

He swallowed heavily--her words like an arrow to his heart. He knew it had been the truth, but her statement had still hurt like hell; he couldn't answer it aloud. "Go get some rest. I'll have someone wake you when it's time for the briefing."

She nodded and opened the door. She then gave him one final look--her eyes sad and loving--before she left quietly, shutting the symbolic barrier behind her.

He watched through his window, as she walked away from him slowly--watched until he lost sight of her. He hoped, of course, that he could work through this internal conundrum quickly--hoped that he would suddenly find that he was able to be close to her again, that he had matured that far, . . . but he had no idea if or when this might occur.

He closed his eyes, then, and lowered his head, as he tried to cope with the separation he himself had caused. "I'll miss you, too, Nikita," he thought to himself. "My God, how I'll miss you."

[The End]

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