Moraga Vasquez, Walkabout Prep

"He's not adjusting very well," Cybil said, still pacing slowly across the room. Others knew that she meant business when she paced, she tended to remain still - sometimes eerily so - if she wasn't worried. So she was worried about Moraga, and with good reason. "He hasn't forgotten his past, and that's an issue."

"I haven't forgotten mine," Van said, "I mean, I tried to forget."

"You did forget," Cybil said, and gave a scowl when he tried to claim otherwise. "If you hadn't, you'd still be in the same mess that he is."

"I think forgetting is a bit strong a word," Gabe said, softly, from across the room. "Van's... pacification about his past life was neither easy nor quick. His detachment would be better."

"Either way, I got over it," Van suggested. "So that kind of leaves us with him and these issues he's got."

"You lot are talking about me like I'm not here," Moraga said; his voice was grim, like the lines of his eyebrows and mouth. But he wasn't looking at any of the others in the room, preferring instead to stand with his back to them, while on the balcony. The apartment where Gabe and Van lived was quite nice, in his opinion. The balcony offered a good view of the entire campus at Carramba High: an expansive place with plenty of different types of buildings and landscaping.

The apartment reminded him of his own home, the Outpost, a sanctuary for weary folk. Where he and his family put their lives in order and had taken in strays here and there. Where he... apparently... was still with them, only... he was here too . A twist of some kind of magic, or science, or whatever. He didn't care. He didn't want to be here.

He didn't hear an apology from anyone behind him, so Moraga just continued to stare out at the evening sky and wait for them to determine what else they could do to his life. They'd fucked it up already, well past what he could consider on the friendly side. He could forgive an accidental nudge. He had forgiven most of his friends at the Outpost, at one point or another, for the stupid but well-meant things they managed to do. But this... This was too much, and he let everyone know that.

Moraga felt something weird, that same flittering around his thoughts that always came when someone was trying to read his mind. Given how some of the Sirens could do it, and possibly that strange woman that tried leading him (and how many others) to their doom at the Vault, Moraga had his share of experience with the sensation. But since he was nowhere near any Sirens, the Vault, or even his home planet, he knew it was either Mirage or Darkhanis. Neither of them was welcome just at that moment so he let them have a brain-full of his frustration and bitterness. They backed off. Or more accurately: Mirage extended a soft apology, Darkhanis dug deeper and with more stealth.

What he found was a mire, no other word could describe Moraga's thoughts. Everything in his mind circled a drain of depression. Nothing led upwards, nothing looked brightly on to the next event. What Moraga wanted - what he truly wanted - was completely out of his grasp, possibly forever, and certainly not through any of his own doing. Darkhanis tried to find any 'in', a direction that he could nudge the man's thoughts, and failed once more. Not because of any estimable resistance to his powers, but because there was nothing to find. Darkhanis was adept at many forms of psychology, he'd helped Vanya and numerous others escape such dire threats to their sanity. Was Moraga going to be the one he couldn't fix?

The thin man on the balcony was nearly invisible against the night skyline, hardly seemed wider than the railing itself. As usual his rust-red hair was pulled into a narrow tail that went to the middle of his shoulder blades. He was wearing his 'Pandoran' outfit which, any of those looking at him knew, meant he was thinking too hard on that place, and those people he missed. Wraps of dirty cloth, mixed liberally with pieces of metal and plastic, formed armor around his chest, over his midnight-colored tank top; gauze twined around his arms terminating under well-worn leather gloves. His pants showed signs of having been repaired on numerous occasions - possibly since before he'd ever worn them. His leather and metal boots seemed to be the bulkiest thing about him, everything else was narrow and long, lean. He wore no obvious weapons, not even his hunting rifle. At least he'd had the sense in his head to leave them back at his own small dorm. The people here didn't want him accidentally using them. On himself, or them.

He wondered what they saw, when they looked at him. He knew it wasn't what he saw in himself. They had told him on numerous occasions that they felt he belonged here, he would do well here. They kept badgering him to 'get along' and 'be happy with the situation'.

Moraga appraised his current situation with a dark scowl. It was just too high to jump and land comfortably - four stories was a bit much even for him. On a good day hunting on Pandora, he could easily survive a ten meter drop. But twice that? Not likely.

So here he was stuck, on a balcony with a bunch of supposedly-concerned people watching his every move. Van and Gabe looked the most at ease in their own apartment, obviously. Sanger had his bare feet propped on the coffee table from the one end of their white leather couch, Gabe sat in his own chair at the end of that table occasionally trying to push his friend's feet off. Mirage sat close to Van, though every once in a while she looked at him so oddly - she had to remind herself that this was not her Vanya. Her friend Darkhanis seemed to want to stand, but occasionally put his bulk into the other single leather chair opposite Gabe's. Cybil would have taken the spot on the other end of the couch from Van, but she didn't seem to be capable of sitting.

It had actually been dean Luger who had brought Moraga up to the apartment where the others were waiting, but he declined to enter. Maybe he had his own reasons for not wanting to participate, Moraga had sensed in the older gentleman that they had all too much in common. Maybe Moraga needed to concentrate on that aspect of his elder: was he where he wanted to be? Was he happy? It looked as though he was, to the tan-skinned Pandoran. But how had he gotten to that point? That was what had eluded Moraga since he arrived.

His memories threw themselves past his mind's eye, a clean line of events from his youth to this moment. That wasn't what he wanted, or needed, to be thinking. He'd been told that on several visits from these people. Now that he had been dragged up to this apartment and faced further 'intervention' (interrogation, how he felt it went) he'd already spoken every word he needed to. He'd already related every one of those memories - painful and joyous - to these very individuals. So why was he thinking on those things now? Oh yes. Only one solution to that question.

Moraga knew that the burly Zekiran was still digging around his mind, but he had no way of really getting rid of the intrusion. So he gripped the balcony's railing and growled verbally instead: "Atasenne Mirage, would you kindly get your friend's mind out of mine? Nothing's changed in it, he should know that by now."

Mirage gasped a bit, and threw a concerned, caustic glare at her friend and Breeder. "Darkhanis, do as he says. You know better than that."

The others in the room also took nervous glances at one another, everyone knew that Darkhanis was a bit bold with his own mind-reading even if he was one of the "Using Telepathy Politely" instructors. Apparently his instruction never quite led to his own use of the power with permission. With his level of ability, it seemed that he knew no bounds of tact unless he was called on it. Moraga felt the grey-skinned man's mind retreat from his own, but wasn't relieved.

"Moraga," Darkhanis addressed him with his most certifiably 'I know better than you' voice, "if you aren't willing to let us help you, what exactly do you think will happen?"

"I don't know!" He shouted, spun, and leaned forward - gripped at the railing behind him with his long hands clenched in anger. "I used to know what my life would lead to, but I don't any more! You people took that from me!" He didn't wait long enough for anyone to try to respond, before adding, "and I'm right to be angry, I'm right to be afraid! Not one of you can tell me otherwise!"

Once more the group sat in nervous, guilty silence. He was correct: they had taken him from his element, and thrust him into things as though he would hardly notice the changes. But like Van Sanger had observed on his first year in his role as an instructor at Carramba, Moraga woke up every morning expecting to be at home. He was not at home any longer. He was here, in this foreign place.

Moraga's thoughts went by very quickly, Darkhanis observed them passively and was impressed by their clarity. Though Moraga was, for all intents and purposes, a savage from a terrifying world, a man that survived by doing brutal acts of violence on a daily basis, he was no fool. He was often far more objective in his thoughts than a real savage could be. He knew his own mind, his own limits. He knew, Darkhanis let the thought tighten in his throat, that he was well past those limits now. It was entirely possible that he could become violent - hence his weapons were left in his dorm. But no one doubted that he might be a fierce opponent, even without guns or knives. There was a very strong, and growing, portion of Moraga's mentality that wanted to become a dervish of bloodlust. That he considered it was frightening; that he considered it was commendable - he thought on it, rather than merely acting upon his base urges.

But he could not be treated as a savage, Luger had been adamant that this group help him, rather than merely subdue him. Darkhanis wondered if even his own considerable psionic power would be able to put a dent in Moraga's will. But then what? Darkhanis tried another tactic, he hoped it would have the desired effect, but doubted at the same time. Moraga was a keenly intelligent man, able to put into words all the things that his frantic emotions conveyed.

"I realize that it would be an imposition," he said carefully, "but... In the past, when I have had to deal with individuals having breakdowns..." Moraga didn't flinch at that: he knew that was what was happening. "I've found that simply clamping down on that portion of their mind worked to at least temporarily clear things up. I can safely... bind that part of your mind, until it's more easily controlled by you."

It was Van that narrowed his peacock-blue eyes at that idea. "Putting a choke-chain on him isn't going to-"

"It might..." Moraga admitted. There was an edge to his voice, the same edge that was in his eyes. "It might help." He unclenched his hands from the balcony's rail, straightened up and took two steps bringing him into the carpeted living room. "I can understand why you'd say that," he looked at Sanger, "but... My life hasn't been nearly as messed up as yours in that way. I was never a captive, this is all just... So hard." He gazed at the ceiling, saw in the edge of his vision Cybil move to finally sit next to Mirage. "If that's what it takes... I mean, I know I need to calm the fuck down, I know that I need to get..." He couldn't bring himself to say 'get over my family not being with me'. But they all knew what would have been said.

Gabe had moved his own hand over Van's shoulder, knowing that bitterness would be rising. As a captive, as a slave to his master, Van wasn't allowed the luxury of volunteering to have the chains put on. He was told to volunteer. Thankfully, among the group, Van was the smartest in the bunch. He knew better than to argue against this course of action. He just wondered, as did everyone else, if it would work.

"Detachment from emotions isn't a difficult thing to achieve," Darkhanis said. "Though doing it yourself... at this stage? Is unlikely." He paused, looked at Moraga with a calm but serious expression. "I would like to do this now, rather than later."

"Don't give me the chance to change my mind, Breedlord," Moraga said, nearly a whisper. With that said, Darkhanis rose from the chair, and approached the much thinner man. Though they were of comperable heights - Zekirans being notably taller than most Humans - Moraga might have fit in the bulk of his leg.

Darkhanis felt through Moraga's mind, moving into it easily but undisguised now. That clarity that Moraga had could work against him. He'd been able to logically undermine many of their arguments - he really did understand his situation, he just really did hate it. And he had every reason. The Zekiran had to find the right ways to best pin down Moraga's emotive side, and that was more difficult than he expected. Moraga was quite a passionate man, even if he had been sedate or looked distant. He hadn't let his emotions rule his actions, a complex task for anyone.

His actions could have been triggered by this, Darkhanis knew. They could have inadvertently brought a murderer into their midst, again. Darkhanis looked at Van, briefly, and then back to Moraga. The tan-skinned man's eyes were closed, eyebrows knitting into a worried clump. He wasn't trying to resist, but he didn't know how he could help.

"Just relax," Mirage suggested, and the sound of her voice did the trick.

Moraga and she had been introduced by Darkhanis not long after his arrival. Because like several others that had come to Carramba through this nexus of time and space, he might be of considerable use genetically on Zekira... If he wished it. Bart had gone for it, hell, nearly everyone who met Mirage wanted to participate in that breeding program. It didn't hurt that like his own line Moraga had just the right amount of facial hair, was just the right height to blend in... Physically it was hard to imagine him not being appropriate in a Zekiran breeding project.

But as he worked, Darkhanis realized the importance of Moraga's mind to this project of his. Focused, capable and complicated. Mixed with Mirage's mental abilities, they might have another generation even stronger than Engel's.

Darkhanis fished around a bit more. There could be no mistakes here, and no placebo effect. Of anyone there, Moraga would have been able to tell if nothing had been done. He needed effects, he needed to not feel. As he worked, and having already considered the option, Darkhanis muttered, "if only Ten were around, he'd probably be better with this on a day to day maintenance basis..."

"Ten would enjoy it too much," Mirage countered. It was true, though his interference with Vanya's mind was voluntary, Ten's nature - or perhaps his ancestry - caused him to delight in it. "But... if there will be need for upkeep? Who will be available?"

"Talking like I'm not here again," Moraga reminded her, but it was with a half-hearted smirk. He didn't see the sweet smile she put on, his eyes were still closed. Mirage looked at Moraga with more than a helpful-healer's eye. Like Bart, he was quite tall, and like the Paveh line, he had extremely attractive facial hair. If Moraga had been privy to her thoughts just then, he might have asked everyone else to leave while they took care of her issues...

It wasn't easy, but after half an hour of concerted effort, Darkhanis announced he was done in as much as he could be. "You are a stubborn man, Moraga," Darkhanis said. Mentally he added you need distractions, son. Let Cybil help you with that.

Cybil had already distracted Moraga more than once since his early-summer arrival. Moraga licked his lips, "well, yeah, that." He raised his brown eyes to meet Darkhanis', "but now I won't care, so maybe something other than hot sex?"

"There's something other than hot sex?" Van blurted out, "not on my watch!" Mirage slapped his head, waiting a moment until after Gabe had done the same.

It broke the tension in the room, though truth be told Moraga was still hesitant to laugh, managing a chuckle unlike his typical throaty one.

"Obviously, there are down sides to this action," Darkhanis said, and Moraga nodded. "But hopefully it will help put you in a position that allows you to adjust."

"I've got until the semester starts," Moraga asserted, "so... we'll see. Work with me on this," he said.

"That's all we ever wanted to do," Gabe said.

Cybil got back up, stood tip-toed and gave Moraga a kiss on his cheek, and went back to her own apartment. Mirage and Darkhanis followed suit, leaving Moraga to stand facing the two men he blamed the most for having caused his whole life to be torn apart. "You know I don't lie," Moraga said. They nodded almost in unison. "Then you know that this is going to be hard. I know it. And you know that... I can't forgive you for this, Gabriel, it's... I'm not sure that I ever will."

The angel looked away, down, anywhere but back at Moraga. "Some day, perhaps I'll deserve to be forgiven."

Moraga felt a strange sensation in his gut: it was anger trying to rise, and failing. So Darkhanis' trick had worked, good. That logically meant that desperation and fear wouldn't get a grip on his mind either. At least, he hoped so. Moraga nodded toward the pair, and quietly found his way back to his dorm on the other side of campus.

***

"I hate seeing him like this," a woman's voice came to Moraga's ears, "he's so frail."

Groggily, Moraga realized the source of the voice was the weaponsmith and combat mage Gresilla Hagen. He liked her, she was gorgeous and tall and enjoyed hunting and combat as much as he did. But what did she mean, frail? He was skinny, but that didn't mean he was --

He tried to sit up, failed, and realized that it was possible that every bone in his body was broken. He gasped out a breath of bloody mist, felt it lingering on his already-bloodied face. He could feel, bonus. He could feel. Crap.

"There's nothing for it," the man's voice was also familiar to Moraga, it was Collins, the other weaponsmith. "Get him over to the triage tent and let's hope someone can stabilize him."

Whatever had happened, Moraga wasn't too clear on. He couldn't move any longer, there was just too much pain. But he did feel as Gresilla's strong hands moved under his shoulders and knees... She was a goddess incarnate - though she didn't like it when anyone called her that. Right now, however, she was causing Moraga so much pain that he passed out again.

When he came back to wakefulness, it was in a hospital room, not a triage tent. The fact that he recalled Collins' words was a miracle, but he had yet to open his eyes or try to move again. He suspected it would be a disaster if he did. Slowly his senses crawled back to him: he heard a quiet beeping beside him, the monitors for his vital signs. He smelled something - antiseptic, bandages, clean-room cloth probably. That taste in his mouth, he'd had many times before: it was less iron-filled blood and more bacteria-covered teeth. He knew he was breathing on his own, there was no tube stuck down his throat. The steady sound of the monitor in the room gave him confidence. His heart rate was okay.

But that stood to reason. He'd already been told he couldn't die here. Gabriel's gift, supposedly. However, whether he repaired his own body in a rapid fashion - that was obviously a no. Moraga realized someone was in the room, and on forcing his eyes to open and cast around unfocused, he knew it was Gresilla once more. That big white on white blob, and the rich green color below: her hair, face, and her gorgeous outfit. Blinking a few times, Moraga got his eyes to behave, and Gresilla noted his actions with a broad smile. More white on white: her skin was as pale as her teeth.

"You're finally awake," she stated the obvious. "We thought you would be..." She trailed off, he was pretty certain she was going to say a vegetable.

Wincing more from the bad taste in his mouth than any amount of pain (which he wasn't detecting, healed up already or just drugged out of his skull it made no difference to him), Moraga muttered, "what happened?"

"You fell," Gresilla said simply. But that didn't make any sense.

"I don't... remember?"

"You fell a long way." She said, as though that cleared everything up. Even though there was a bandage still covering the top of his head, his eyebrows could easily be seen shifting around. Good, he still had that going for him: puppydog eyebrows were his last resort. "There was an earthquake, and you fell... Along with a lot of other people. Many of them didn't make it, we... were out--"

"No, no no," Moraga chanted suddenly, "we were - my class was out there!" He tried sitting up, failed but only because there were lines of equipment and a snug velcro attachment keeping the brace over his shoulders stable. "Tell me they're... oh god, no. Not again."

Gresilla's jaw tightened. Why would he say that? To her knowledge it had been the first time he and the class went out to the Plateau camping grounds. "There were a lot of other people out there at the time, Moraga, it wasn't just your kids. There were campers and tour groups, Collins and I were out there for the historical society's weapons display." She checked for his response, his intense stare into the middle distance worried her. He and the class he was frantic about had been doing their semester finals, the Geocaching society had arranged it for that Saturday morning. Lots of people enjoyed the Red-River camp grounds. "I guess your group had made it to the top," Gresilla quietly said, "we'd just started a demonstration in the Historic faire. The... the ground just started shaking, it was totally unexpected."

"Did... any of my--" He couldn't pull those words out, but they didn't need to be said. Gresilla looked away, her fine white eyebrows knit together.

"There were two that... didn't make it." She sighed, noting the increase in the heart monitor's frequent beeps, and turning its volume to zero. "It wasn't your fault." As he lay there with a strange shudder going through his narrow form, Gresilla dared to ask: "what happened, before?"

With that, she saw his stomach tighten, the light blanket that had been covering him had fallen when he jolted upwards. He had so many scars, mostly those on his hands and forearms, but there were tell-tale signs that he had been in more than his share of shootouts, knife fights and hunting accidents. He pulled in as deep a breath as he could, discovered that the shoulder brace was there because his collar bones were still knitting up. "Before... on Pandora," he sighed, "there was this girl, Jennifer. We were... maybe fifteen. I had gone through her dad's stuff and she caught me, and we kind of just... hooked up. We clicked." His eyes bunched shut, "and she died in an earthquake. I mean, random like that, when we were exploring the Rust Commons, everything just came down on her, like it was just..." Just not meant to be, he recalled his own thoughts on the matter.

Moraga realized that he was crying, not because of the pain, or because of the distant memories of a girl he'd barely gotten to know. "I ... broke a lot, didn't I?"

"Pretty much everything, yes," Gresilla said. "Your legs were pinned, but maybe that was a blessing in disguise, neither of them had more than a couple cuts."

Moraga tried to assess things calmly, and realized he was failing: the heart monitor, though silent, showed a jagged and rapid burst of activity. "I broke something else, too, I think. You need to tell Darkhanis that I broke his... um, conditioning. I'm sorry."

"Why are you sorry?" Gresilla said, softly moving her hand over his bruised face. "It's all right. It's been more than a year, I don't think he expected it to last even half that long. You've... come a long way."

It wasn't any kind of secret among the instructors or staff at Carramba, but still to hear her say something as intimate as that surprised him. He decided not to take it the wrong way. Still, there was something deeply wrong. Far deeper than the pieces of rib that had lodged themselves in his lungs, than the clots from his crushed legs that had threatened his brain. What he wanted to say was thank you, but what came out was a sob.

Gresilla remained by his side, though Moraga lapsed back into silence broken only with more shuddering sobs.

His body recovered within a week, which surprised almost everyone but him. Moraga assured the doctors that on Pandora, before he had removed his genetic profile from the system, the New-U devices reassembled him within seconds of sure death. Even though he was able to demonstrate that he was essentially good as 'new', they kept him in the hospital, a nice private room with a single wide window, under observation for a few days longer than he really wanted to be there. Truth be told, they wanted to make sure he didn't try anything that would undo their hard work.

Moraga had surprised some of the staff when they brought his meals: he practically inhaled them, even things that other patients claimed they disliked. Of course, one of the nurses made a note that he also had neither gained nor lost any weight during his stay. And though a psychologist was called in to make sure that the 'survivor's guilt' syndrome didn't set in, she went away from his room practically in tears herself after listening to Moraga's 'standard rant' regarding why he shouldn't even be there at all. They had seriously considered a more extensive psych evaluation, but a few comments from his employers put a stop to that.

In that time, too, it hadn't just been the white-haired Gresilla visiting with him. As he expected, reporters and investigators came with questions about what had happened - none of which he could answer, and none which anyone else in the room would have allowed him to try answering. Darkhanis and Mirage independently shooed those people away; Luger didn't even have to speak to the intruders, he just gave them a steely-eyed glare and they shut the door without even entering.

It was while dean Luger visited, that Moraga decided to get some 'quality time' in with his elder. Though Moraga had grown up on his own, and never knew anyone well enough that he wanted to call them a 'father figure', Luger certainly came closest. Moraga suspected that Darkhanis wanted to claim that spot, but with a wry smile Moraga had relegated him to 'weird uncle' status. Darkhanis had gently fiddled with Moraga's mind once more, but they both knew it was less necessary now than it had been a year before. Even though he was under tremendous stress, and having undergone near-death and more losses that he couldn't have avoided, Moraga's mind-set was in a slightly better place than it had been.

Perhaps that was why Luger spent that hour listening to Moraga's occasionally-broken voice. Sometimes Moraga was telling his life story, other minutes were spent in a quiet lamentation of things that he'd never be able to do. What was clear was that while Moraga understood his situation, he just resented it now, more than outright hating it.

"They kept telling me to just be that guy," he said, referring to Sanger's claims that he could go back to being that Moraga of his youth - the one who drifted from outpost to rural village, who never stopped picking up as many gun clips as he did women. The one who lost his first girlfriend in a freak accident, his second to a violent Psycho's attack, his third to a pack of Skags. The one who gave up on girlfriends and went for those one night stands and transitory homes out of desperation rather than desire.

"I grew up," Moraga asserted passionately. "I mean, I don't want to be that guy. I hate that guy. That guy's... that guy is an asshole, self-centered and callous and shallow as fuck." He drew in a sad sigh. "And then I met Clover, and I changed for her." To Luger's slightly lifted eyebrow, he added, "it took some time. I mean I spent three years agonizing about it. I walked away from her and told her not to expect me to come back but... I did go back."

Moraga leaned his head against the pillow (he figured if he was getting a nice bed, he might as well get some use out of it, even if he hadn't been relegated to it for days) and pushed out a long breath. "A friend of mine hooked up with me on a mission, and told me that Clover had a daughter, and she'd named her just like I asked. Morgan," he said quietly. "But... it took until she was almost three before I had enough of my shit together to even ask them to come into my life. I'd staked a claim, the Outpost was fixed up, and... Well, my friend Jude decided to retire from things, and he offered to help her out for a while." He gave a distant chuckle, "and I told him thank goodness, because she needed someone who could fucking cook. My god that woman worked at a diner and never learned a thing about how to cook..."

Luger just continued to watch, passively, as Moraga spoke. Obviously, the younger man needed to get all of this off his chest, but that didn't mean Luger tuned him out. Far from it. He'd seen Cybil's appraisal of the situation, he'd listened to Gabe and Van's discussions about it, so now it was more than time enough to hear it from the subject of such debate. And Moraga himself would have pointed that out: he didn't much care for it when people acted like he couldn't hear them or - even worse - expected him not to understand what they were discussing. Just because he was rough around the edges didn't mean he wasn't smart.

Having come from a world like Pandora, however, meant that a lot of people estimated him for his physical abilities and appearance, long before they'd consider his mind or emotions. They expected him to be tough as nails, dangerous, shallow, and perhaps they had reasons to think that based on others that looked like him or came from similar places.

Moraga was hardly alone in the fact that he was 'rescued' from a world of pain and difficulty. Van was proof of that, anyway. They were quite similar, but there were many ways that Luger knew better than to say he was 'one of them'. No, there were more similarities, he knew, between this man and a certain blue-skinned spine-armed dragon rider... One who had so much more underneath that taut, girded exterior.

They'd had their share of violent encounters. Moraga was relaying one such instance: his feigned death in order to prevent certain bounties from being collected. It was quite clever, Luger thought. They had access to numerous biological reconstruction devices - the 'New-U' function on the planet had advanced sciences behind it. But with some innovative uses of electronic virtual reality, they sent a remote-controlled 'fauxMoraga' to meet with a dangerous boss or two, and allowed it to die at their hands - sans New-U replacement. That had left Moraga in a bit of a sticky spot: he himself had to be erased from that very system, in order to make sure that he was 'permanently dead' in the eyes of those who sought his head on a pike. That system also encompassed a fast-travel network (presumably rebuilding a person in their new location, while destroying the old one), so any travel he had to do was on foot or by vehicle. He went on for a few minutes about that Scooter person and the transportation he supplied. It was almost painfully obvious that Moraga also shared Shard's love of blue cars, and of children.

Moraga tearfully recounted his first sight of his daughter, giving that smile he had always put on when thinking on it. A blessing: "Clover hadn't run me off with a shotgun, she welcomed me back, she didn't have to do that. So I took her and Morgan, along with Jude, back to the Outpost." It was such a radical departure from his prior life, but Moraga freely admitted he enjoyed every moment. The birth of his son Cliff, as told with closed eyes, almost caused Luger to summon Darkhanis once more. He shouldn't have been remembering so much, but Luger needn't have worried.

"I don't want to go back to being the dick that strolled in to New Haven that one day," Moraga said, evenly. "I mean, I'm never going to turn a woman down," he laughed, "I'm not stupid." Moraga drew in a long breath and let it out slowly. "But I don't want to be that guy. I want to be the guy that... someone depends on, you know? I want more than just... drifting. I did that. It's over, I don't need that any more."

"I can see why you have yet to take the Breed Lord up on his contracts," Luger said, of the breedings that Darkhanis wanted to arrange on Zekira.

"I want to know my family, thanks," Moraga said, glumly. "Already lost one family, I... don't think I can bear the thought of having a bunch of children on another world that I don't get to raise myself."

"You may want to speak with Bart Wheeler about that," Luger commented. "The two of you have much in common, as well. He... adjusted a little more quickly than you did, though."

"That's because he was already immortal," Moraga muttered. He'd spoken in passing to the inventor, they did have a lot in common, but when they'd spoken before, it was while Moraga's emotions were stifled and off limits. "I think he already knew how to... I don't know, how to let things be."

"That is true; it's why I didn't need so much time to fit in, either," Luger said. "I was already an old man, I'd already seen enough disagreeable garbage in my life. Trust me when I say," he leveled his gaze on Moraga carefully, "that of all the locations that you will, eventually, enjoy settling down in, this place will be the best."

Moraga took that as well as he could, to heart.

***

"Are you absolutely sure this is the best... um," Moraga lifted his arm again, and the tiny green-skinned girl darted below, taking more measurements. "I... um..."

"The Atasenne was quite clear on the instructions, Master... mister? I can never get that right... Mister Moraga." The girl was so cute, bright yellow bowl-cut hair, over that rich green skin and leafy colored eyes. "If you're to be at the party, she wants to make sure that you give off the right impression."

Apparently that meant 'by not wearing his armor, hunting gear, or jeans and sweatsocks'. So she intended to dress him up, that was... nice? Interesting? Different? Annoying? A host of terms went through Moraga's mind while the little servant girl was jotting all the numbers down and making notes to herself in a cheerful if quiet voice. All his life, clothing was the very least of his concerns. He wore whatever it was that he could scrape together and if it didn't fit, make it fit.

Thankfully he had friends like Gresilla and Bart and Mirage to make sure that he could look presentable in almost any situation. Bart suggested that he 'cleaned up well', as they compared notes about the woman whose party they would both be attending the next night. By the time Taiji had finished with the measurements, someone else had come around to make annoyed sounds and suggest that perhaps they ought to cut his hair and trim that stuff off of his chin. Moraga had to assert himself at that point, holding up two long fingers and balling his other hand into a fist.

"You touch my hair, or my beard, and I swear on Lucky's grave I will bury you with him."

The man with the ridiculously coiffed hair sputtered a bit, but retreated and managed to merely wash that hair and gently trim that beard. Aside from the fact that everyone wanted him to be something he wasn't, or look a way he absolutely hated, Moraga had to admit that he did enjoy being pampered like that. The little green girls, he only knew the one's name but recognized that there were at least half a dozen of them scurrying around, got his fingernails and toenails trimmed and buffed. A couple of the male versions - darker green all around, but still little and young looking - brought him dinner and some kind of information packets about... well he wasn't sure what it was about, because it was written in that hyperactive jaggedy script of theirs. The magazine had a ton of images, and at the very least Moraga could tell an advertistement from an article without much trouble.

Maybe he could get Darkhanis to imprint their script into his brain, so he didn't have to learn to read all over again...

The next day, the impending party caused the huge mansion Mirage owned to bustle with even more activity than the night before. Apparently there were plenty of people there to see some sort of race, a horse race, Moraga gathered. Flying horses. Well that was no surprise, Bart claimed he had a few of those on his nearby ranch. Maybe Moraga might get to take a look at them, he was far more interested in seeing a Steed race than being gawked at by Mirage's rich friends.

The nervousness in his gut didn't leave, and got worse, as the morning turned to afternoon. So not only were there going to be hotshots from the racing community there, but politicians, bigwigs in companies that supplied those horses... The green girls and their tailor buddies had hooked Moraga up with a perfectly fitting - if a bit plain - midnight blue and steel-grey suit. Bart had shown up wearing something a bit more showy, but then he'd had practice, he was a king after all, and here he seemed to fit right in with those people. He was charming as fuck, Moraga wondered if he could get some lessons. Mirage swept through the hall and paused at his door. She smiled brilliantly, then noticed he wasn't returning the expression.

"I'd feel a lot more comfortable if I could, you know, have my-"

"Weapons?" Mirage curtly addressed him, "absolutely not." Her pursed lips softened into a more accommodating smile, and she added, "I don't even allow Darkhanis to bring weapons to my parties, my dear, even though he is one of the finest swordsmen in the world. Weapons on display always result in fights and bloodshed," she looked away with a distantly worried expression. "So I won't have them in my home."

Moraga let his eyebrows do their thing, but she wasn't looking. "Okay, I just... um, you know," he reached up to scratch at the back of his head absently, and one of the little green girls all but exploded trying to get him to stop fiddling with the tie in his hair. "I don't want to seem... stupid and rude..."

"You're neither," Mirage grinned. "You're merely nervous. Not afraid, so stop telling yourself you need to run away."

"It's my nature," Moraga muttered, but he knew she was right. It just felt so unnatural to him, as she pulled on his scarred hand and got him out of the guest room. One of the guest rooms. Moraga had gotten lost several times in the massive mansion, he just had to remember which of the many rooms up on the second floor was 'his' for the duration. He also didn't know how long he'd be staying, and that made him feel a little uncomfortable. He was at their whim, and due to the nature of their travel arrangements, he knew that no matter how long he remained here on Zekira, he'd still be arriving back to Carramba two days after he'd left.

They wanted to keep him busy. His friends had seen how he responded to their tactics after the earthquake, and done their darndest to get him rolling once more. And he was; Moraga wasn't dwelling so much on the past, and was even creeping toward looking ahead to the next semester or a gathering here and there. They'd grabbed him and taken him to Zekira, ostensibly to check out the wildlife and hunting, for one of his courses.

But what it actually was about? Darkhanis really, really wanted him to sign those breeding contracts. Bart suggested he do it just to be done, and the look in his eye said he'd enjoy it a lot, but... There was just something wrong, still, in Moraga's mind, about littering the dimensions with offspring and having nothing more to do with them than giving them a name. The thought of any children made his gut tighten and his head cloud with memories of his family.

His memories were interrupted as Mirage escorted him down the Long Stair (it was pronounced that way, too, it was a very extensive stairway) and he got a look at the rest of the already-swinging party below. A dance floor was dotted with people, and Moraga leaned down to whisper, "you are not going to try getting me to dance, Atasenne, because I do not dance, and you do not want me to dance."

"That's fine," she whispered back. "Oh look the racers are arriving." Even though he knew the others down there hadn't heard her, they clearly also saw this event - and most of them broke off from whatever they were doing, to stand by the massive fluted-glass windows. A group of ... flying horses, they really did have flying horses, swept over the cliff side. Some of them cleared the roof of the mansion by inches, their wide wings stretched with feathers trembling from their descent.

They all vanished below the cliff side: apparently the beach was where the race would start, so there were people waiting there. Mirage gently shut Moraga's mouth, it was dangling open. The Steeds really were magnificent, and for this particular race they were always the best of the best.

"I want one of those," he said with a bright gleam in his eyes. They did have an active hunting community here, there was a lot of unexplored territory around this planet. And the bonus was that aside from the huge desert just south of this Telva mansion of hers, almost all of that unexplored land was lush and fertile, filled with green - green that Moraga in all his life had never even imagined.

Of course he hadn't imagined the little green girls now serving wine and snacks to the varied guests at the party, either.

When one of them swung by him, with only two glasses left on her tray, Moraga cleared his throat and asked, "if you wouldn't mind... Um, there are enough of you to go around, do you think you could... stick around and maybe keep me from doing something stupid or saying things to the wrong person?"

"Of course Mister Moraga," she said, it wasn't Taiji, her voice sounded a little huskier than his only-known-named-companion. "Atasenne Mirage suggested that someone might help you out today. I can do that. Let me find a place to put this, I'll be back."

"Good," Moraga whispered to the air. This many people around had started to make him more nervous, not jumpy but tense. He'd always preferred the company of a couple friends, his family, or just a vehicle and his guns. Groups like this made him think of gladiator rounds and his last days before his 'death'. Best not to dwell on that, he realized, because some of these people had the same airs as the Bosses he'd avoided by staging his own demise. A few of the people at this party, Moraga wasn't sure why Mirage even wanted them here. They were noisy, snooty, argumentative. Exactly the opposite of the beautiful woman hosting the party.

The green girl came back shortly, made sure that Moraga was holding his wine glass correctly. "The vintner is here," she commented, "so if he asks whether his wine is up to your expectations, say it exceeds them. Because he'll get pretty snotty if you don't."

"Looks like he's already pretty snotty," Moraga said with a grin. Said vintner was indeed making the rounds and having verbal sparring matches with a few of the well-dressed attendees. Maybe they didn't care for it, it had a bit of a tang to it - but it was by far sweeter than anything Moraga had had while living on Pandora. If 'wine' was even possible there. He was pretty sure it wasn't. "Who are they?" Moraga nodded toward a clump of people: they were as over-dressed as most others, but they had a strange way of casting their gazes at people. Like they were evaluating everyone in the room against some invisible standard.

"Those are Darkhanis Paveh's students," the girl, whose name was Teff, said. "Not his Carramba students," she added momentarily - she knew where they spent half their time after all. "His Peridian staff, learning his trade."

"Terrific," Moraga slumped and wanted to find a place to curl up and die. The moment they spotted him, it would all be over. He watched as they descended on Bart - but that man was thrilled to meet them. And - oh no he didn't - yes, he did. Moraga closed his eyes and let out a carefully measured breath. They were coming this way, thanks to that skag's ass. Moraga, from across the room, locked eyes on the other non-Zekiran attending, made sure Bart was watching closely, and mouthed the words I will kill you slowly for this you son of a bitch.

Bart laughed and pretended it was because of a joke someone nearby had told.

"Well I can see why Mirage likes him," said one of the trio, the woman.

"We know it isn't your style, Vaharna," her dark-blue companion said, "but he does have all the aspects of a good Pelatih." He looked Moraga up and down without even bothering to announce his name. "A saving grace, I suppose."

Before Moraga could get in a word, however, their third, a brightly yellow-skinned man with what appeared to be a cockatiel's feather crest, got right up close. His eyes were large, round, glassy; bird's eyes. Moraga's gut did a strange flip: birds were kind of a specialty of his, even though he'd had to move on to different species after Bloodwing was left with his other self. The tan-skinned man could almost sense the thoughts of this bird-crested Breeder.

Moraga almost said something, but realized that anything he could possibly say or do would be ignored. So as with a number of his other encounters, Moraga simply let them poke and prod - they didn't ask him any questions, they were so absorbed in looking at the color of his eyes, hair and skin - how did they compare to a true Zekiran's? And that hair he had, it was a bit like the Paveh line's but could it be worked in with a splice or two?

They had their conversation and Moraga gave a couple glances down at the small green girl Teff, who shrugged, rolled her eyes and handed him a small chunk of cheese on a dainty napkin. They did keep going back to that word though, Pelatih, with confidence that whatever it meant could have profound impact on their work with his genetics and most surely his offspring.

As the team of Breeders finally detatched themselves from Moraga and moved on to their next victim, Moraga ground his jaw a bit. "I should probably know this already, but... what's a Pelatih?"

Without missing a beat, Teff explained, "animal masters, not just those who ride the Steeds, or breed them, but those who work with their feed, lands, and things. They sell pets and tend to their medical needs, there are a good number of them here today.."

"And they think I'm --" Moraga said, interrupted by the gentlest of whispers in his other ear.

"Of course you are," Mirage said, her sparkling periwinkle colored eyes flickering from his to his chest and back. "I already told you what I saw in you."

"Well, yeah, Bloodwing was... I trained the bird and he responded to me pretty well I suppose. But... Look I'm not staying here on Zekira, Mirage."

"Not while you're working at Carramba," she replied, "but what about during break?"

When the crowd gathered at the windows gave a collective gasp, and half a dozen winged Steeds erupted from the beach hidden below, Moraga wasn't watching. Instead he was looking at Mirage with a serious line to his lips. "You really want this, don't you."

"We can set you up, I'm sure you would actually like it here..." She twisted part of his tailed hair around her finger.

It was Teff that gave off a little noise, one which her Mistress recognized and instantly responded to. "Oh. Oh Moraga I am... so ..."

He shook his head, chuckled, "gorgeous? Available? Rich?" He had admitted that he'd never turn a woman down, it was a running joke back at the school - less of a joke at his prior home with his adorable wife and her ready hand with the frying pan. It was not a joke now either, now that the single most beautiful woman ever assembled (and she had been, by Darkhanis, in his lab, genetically) was expressing interest in him of all people.

So while the Steeds were competing and they were missing out on the treat of seeing a three-Steed neck-and-neck race over the cliffside finish line, Moraga and Mirage were working some kinks out of their professional relationship.

***

"But everyone loves her," Bart asserted. "She's used to it. I'm fairly sure she'll get over you and your beard soon enough."

"Bart, you are the biggest skag's ass this side of Pandora," Moraga muttered. But he wasn't growling, wasn't grimacing, snarling, or any other nasty critter-invoked expression. He was far too busy grinning ear to ear at his infant daughter. The girl was chubby faced, he hadn't expected her to be so... buoyant? Considering his own build, Mirage's curves, and the fact that even the most rotund Zekiran he knew was Darkhanis (and that wasn't fat, it was muscle, he'd made the mistake of sparring with the guy once or twice), he had expected the babies to be more or less skinny. She was not.

She stuffed her little fist into the air, it encountered his nose, then his beard, and she gave a delighted giggle and smacked at Moraga's face as he laughed.

Miracle was her name, appropriately. Her hair, what she had of it, was not quite black: reddish in the same way that Mirage's was violet-tinted. Her eyes were a stunning shade of red-violet as well; her skin was a rosy tan. Moraga had made note of a single small teardrop-shaped marking on her scalp - something that her mother had always hinted she'd had as well; though she also led people to believe that her own birthmark was situated somewhere entirely off limits to most people's eyes. Miracle's hair would cover hers within days, as it grew in. She would be beautiful, Moraga was positive that his newest daughter would follow in her mother's footsteps on that account - she'd be a heartbreaker. Of course, so was he.

Moraga's discussion with Bart was mostly over: Bart had recognized the signs of a man smitten with his newborn, it was one he'd seen in the mirror many times himself. However, the contents of their discussion still rolled around in both men's minds. Moraga wasn't going to remain on Zekira full time, by any stretch of the imagination. Mirage had born him this gorgeous child; he'd signed on for other 'donations' with Darkhanis in the year that he'd spent watching and nervously waiting, and while there were still two of those contractual 'donations' outstanding, two more were already showing the fruits of those unions.

But Moraga wasn't Zekiran, he wasn't yet entirely comfortable there. And more than that, as Mirage had come to her senses and tamed her fertility event, Moraga knew that 'love' wasn't really what he had with the pale beauty. As Bart had pointed out: everyone loved Mirage. He - and Bart, and numerous other men in their circle - had merely gotten much closer to her than most who shared that emotion.

Moraga would be heading back to Carramba - that two-day delay would be getting a workout, who knew how they'd arranged this kind of time travel anyway? - and teaching as normal. Mirage would obviously be needed to tend to her newest child, and had to reassure Moraga that she did know how to do that. She'd done it numerous times.

Every time she said that, he took a look at her (even while she was quite pregnant) and steadfastly refused to believe she'd ever popped out a child let alone two dozen of them over the years. She'd even led him into the beautiful photography hall where her own images, along with those of some of her older children, were on display. Sure enough, at least a score of images showed Mirage in her various stages of pregnancy - three separate pregnancies, by the dates on the plaques below each image. Plus Moraga knew from having spoken to a variety of her children - Mirage was an excellent parent, even if she was often called away for work or business. Those in her employ or belonging to her stock roster were carefully chosen to take care of those children if she wasn't there herself. Long lived Zekirans like her had to maintain a practical outlook, she would raise those children to be completely functional and self-sufficient, playing to their talents which she could immediately 'read' through the use of her own psionic power.

So Moraga felt reasonably more at ease than he had before. He was fairly sure that Darkhanis would alert him to any new births, or to introduce him to his latest projects. And also, that they would visit him regularly with little Miracle. Even if he wasn't going to be on Zekira most of the time, he had insisted on having his contracts written specifically to allow him as much access as they could. Darkhanis was sure that most of Moraga's children would take after him - strong, smart, and keenly psionic toward avians. Over time, that would be proven correct.

Over time, though, Moraga got back down to the nitty-gritty of life as a professor at Carramba High School. In earnest this time, without any psionic blocks or even much in the way of drinking or medicinals. Moraga felt good. He had not forgotten his old home, his old life. But like the scars on his arms, they'd become part of him in a way that no longer interfered with his current activities.

That was good. Because those activities were about to get a whole lot more interesting.

***

It was the way she looked at the child that caught Moraga's eye, but as usual he didn't respond at the time because, well, Miracle was sort of priority-one. When the now-three-year-old girl went back to her Telva home with Mirage, and took with her the other two younger half-siblings he'd sired so far (a boy and a girl, Maroon and Realm), Moraga thought it was about time to actually ask.

"Gres, you're staring again," he said. The tall woman blinked twice, her red eyes seeming to be a bit distant. "Everything okay?"

The arms-mistress looked away, noticed that there were no other instructors or visitors left over from the busy visit. "I ... I suppose so?"

Moraga's eyebrow crept upward, and didn't have to say another word before Gresilla drew in a long breath, pushed it out, and glanced away again.

"You really love children, don't you?" She asked, as though it had been less than obvious. "Yours, other people's, the kids at school. You really care about what happens to them."

He absently scratched the back of his head. "Yeah? Yeah, I guess so. I mean, teaching's not the easiest thing in the world, but... I figure I can do it better than the folks that asked me before." To Gresilla's own upturned eyebrow, he added, "I almost got recruited by the Crimson Lance once. They figured on getting me to pass my training on weapons to their ranks."

"And did you?"

"I killed the recruiter, and the rest of the squad that followed me out of the armory... I mean when I say recruiter, I mean they kidnapped me, you know?" Moraga idly scratched his beard while Gresilla gave a chuckle, "of course that meant they were busy printing dead-or-alive posters with my handsome mug on em for a while..." He leaned against the door frame, they were in the Magic Department - Moraga wasn't too sure why they were there, but it was apparently easiest on those who transported people. "Kind of turned me off the idea of teaching, honestly, maybe that's why I was such a dick about it earlier."

"You had plenty of reasons to be angry," Gresilla muttered, "no one blamed you."

Moraga had to give her that much: she was good at dodging in more ways than physically. He, however, was good at adjusting his aim for things that dodged. Therefore, "that's not what's on your mind," he said. He saw the way her smooth shoulders dipped a little: he'd hit with those words. "Can we get back to the regular campus? I've got a pizza order to pick up. Come up to the loft with me. I'm not allowed to eat a whole pizza alone."

Gresilla looked at him - he was just as skinny as ever, and she'd seen him eat two whole pizzas by himself at one party. But the offer wasn't meant to break him of any eating habits, and she knew it perfectly well. She opened the gateway to the school's 'normal' campus (it was hardly normal by any means, but it wasn't the magic department) and preceded him into it. Moraga watched her pass, watched the world in the edges of his vision change from the eternal hazy unreality of the magic school, to the safe and sound park situated near the Java Cup.

Flying horses, magical dimension travel, kids that had psionic powers... It was all in a day's work over here. Moraga had gotten used to the routine, and put his past to rest for the most part. It came in handy when he had to change diapers, that was for sure. But something else in his past made Moraga the faintest bit wary. He couldn't treat Gresilla the same way he would Mirage - though they could almost be sisters by their height and lovely white skin. Something was bothering her, and it most likely revolved around him and his children.

His 'loft' was the top floor of one of the campus class structures, the Humanities building. It actually surprised Gresilla that he'd chosen a spot that wasn't the highest rooftop of the campus, after all right beside it was another with taller sections. But it was 'home' for the time being - until they managed to convince him to move into one of the apartments, or find his own place in the nearby area. Moraga had to be reminded on several occasions that he wasn't supposed to just move into occupied buildings, like apartments or rental homes... Even when they weren't currently occupied. He'd made an attempt to keep his loft reasonably clean and quiet, though the local pigeons and a flock of ravens competed for his attention there.

They were getting no attention from him when the pair arrived, even though the showy pigeons puffed up and cooed at him. Moraga distractedly scratched at one of their extended necks, moved on to the bird's disappointment. The ravens gave off their distinct four-caw alarm when the door behind the pair slid shut, but aside from that they merely maintained an eery black-eyed lookout. Moraga always felt like they weren't the only ones watching through those glassy black eyes.

Moraga had flipped open his phone and gruffly ordered a typical meal for himself and then glanced at Gresilla to see whether she had anything else to add. Since she wasn't looking at him, and all but ignoring his gentle throat-clearing, he decided to order a salad and some drinks to fill it out. She wasn't going to be tasting any of it anyway, by the looks of it.

Normally, Gresilla seemed to be all kinds of calm, cool and collected. Sure, he'd seen her be fierce when using the weaponry she was justly famous for carrying. He'd seen her a bit angry now and again, even made her blush - but that, he now pondered, was probably the root of the issue. How had that even happened? Making a woman who was by all rights older than the planet they were on, turn beet red with a mention of... what had it even been?

It was probably about babies. Not sex, not even that - they'd been a bit of an item for some time and it could easily be said they were a good match both physically and emotionally. Moraga considered the woman who was weakly attempting to distract herself by reading the titles of some of the textbooks stuffed onto the shelving near her. Considered, and wondered.