Titans of Chaos

Colin tightened his grip around me. Suddenly, impossibly, my extra wings and limbs and tendrilswere no longer here, and hence no longer in pain. He stroked my face and hair, and brushed theblood away. He stroked my arms and legs, belly, breasts, and thighs, and wherever his handpassed, the blood passed away, too, and the pain was gone. I had had a hole in my lungs with ahypervolume larger than the volume of my whole 3-D body, but that was gone, too, wished awayby Colin.

As swift as waking from a dream, and with as little sense or reason to it, the pain was gone. I washale and whole again.

Victor closed up Vanity. A black fluid, like a swift amoeba, wriggled over her flesh, knitting cell tocell. The wounds closed with no suture and no scar.

Victor picked up his eye in his hand. A blue spark flashed from the iris and struck Vanity's skull.

Victor said, "I return bodily controls to you. Wake."

Vanity sat up, stretched, yawned, looked around with her huge green eyes. "What's going on? I'vehad a bad dream___Quentin... ?"

Quentin said, "I am afraid it was real."

I had been lying here for several seconds, while Colin continued to caress my naked breasts andrun his hands along my inner thigh.

"Hey!" I shouted, slapping him hard across the cheek.

"Ow!" He shouted back, "Wounded man here!"

"Get your filthy hands-"

"Part of the medical procedure. I am summoning inspiration."

"I'll inspire you, you sick jerk-"

"Madam, I am a trained professional. Now then, for the next part of the process, you are requiredto start pulling down my zipper with your teeth."

The impending murder of Colin Iblis mac FirBolg was interrupted by a loud noise.

Crash. The first steel door, high above us, had just given way.

Crunch. The second one, too.

Something very fast was coming down the shaft after us.

The Shield of Lady Wisdom

Deck after deck whizzed past us as the platform fell. Some of the decks were crowded with boxesand crates, warehouses. Others held corridors lined with small oval doors and hatches.

Then we started passing decks filled with museum displays, library shelves, rows of obsidiancoffins. One deck was a greenhouse, set with water fountains, stretching back as far as the eyecould see. Another that flashed past was an observatory, with scores of complex telescopespointed out a score of portholes and crystal domes, each window opening on a different twilightseascape. We were entering strange territory.

"What is this ship?" I said aloud, my voice hushed with wonder.

"Phaeacia," said Colin.