The force of the shot jerked Don's arm to the side. He grimaced, lowering the weapon slowly. A vague doomed notion fell over him. He waited with no breath, watching the ship as it got closer to him, seeing the shattered glass of the cockpit ...

"Move it, you idiot!" A strong hand grabbed his shoulder and yanked him off balanced. As he toppled to the ground, the ship flew past, crashing to the ground with a massive crunch. Don stared at it from the ground. Flames licked off the ship, adding to the smoke and fire from all around them.

Finally, he looked at his savior and his jaw dropped. "Veerna?!"

The Voldinian was battered and bruised, but it was definitely her. She blew a strand of white hair out of her eyes. "In the flesh," she answered. "That was a nice shot, Don."

A compliment was the last thing he'd been expecting from her. He had to stammer out a response. "Oh ... uh ... thanks."

Veerna blinked at him, looking—strangely enough—as awkward as he felt. "No problem," she said after a long moment. Yulia was behind her, obviously trying to appear as small as possible. For a long time, the two just looked at each other.

Finally, an explosion nearby shook them out of their reverie. It wasn't near enough to injure them, but it was certainly enough to give them a start. "I guess we'd better keep going," Don said finally.

"Probably," Veerna agreed.

Yulia stared at them. "Are you two okay?" she asked after another second of silence.

"Fine," they both said at the same time.

Veerna then turned and started walking purposefully back down the street. Don and Yulia hurried to keep up with her, trailing after her long strides and making themselves feel as if they had half the stride length she did. The Voldinian paid them little mind, as if her single compliment to Don had thrown her completely off-balance.

The streets were still in chaos, but Veerna now seemed to be better prepared to lead them around it. Maybe it was because she was paying more attention, but she was able to bring them around trouble, making sure she never left them in the dust again. She had yet to reclaim her gun from Don.

Ships buzzed overhead, but Veerna had determined that hiding among the corpses on the ground was a handy way of surviving, considering both she and Don looked like they'd been dragged through a war and back again. Still, they mostly walked in silence, occasionally sprinting to avoid explosions or gunfire.

At long last, after what felt like eons, Veerna seemed to bring them where they were supposed to go. She said nothing as she led them towards a tiny building, little more than a shed in the street. So far, it had been left practically untouched by the explosions and destruction of the rest of the city. Don frowned. "What is this place?"

"It's the security room," Veerna replied. "Well-hidden, isn't it? Nobody'd ever think to look here."

"It's ... not much, is it?" Don asked.

Veerna snorted. "It's underground, you nincompoop," she told him. "Safer that way. C'mon you two, we need to keep going." She grabbed Don's arm, dragging him along behind her. Yulia trailed along after them, pulling her indigo hair over her shoulder and running her fingers through it absently.

Veerna broke open the lock on the door with a single kick. Don's eyebrows shot up, but he made no comment. Yulia huddled close to him, not near enough that they were touching, though. He could only watch curiously as the Voldinian forced the door open and turned to them both with a smirk. "Door's open, if anybody's interested," she told him.

"Cool," Don said. "Ladies first."

"Ever the gentleman, eh, Donny?" Veerna asked, raising her eyebrows at him. Before he could think up any kind of response to that, she had shouldered her way past him and down into the dark shed-thing. For a brief moment, Don dared to think about a flashlight, but none of them had one. Heaving a disappointed sigh, Don plunged into the inky darkness with Yulia only a pace in front of him.

It was suffocating. Don banged his head on all three of the walls and tumbled down one flight of stairs, narrowly avoiding taking Yulia down with him. The Atonian's peculiar ivory eyes stared at him from above. "Are you okay?" she asked.

From the bottom of the stairs, Don groaned. "Good enough, I guess," he mumbled. "Watch your step."

"Donny, instead of falling down the stairs like a ton of bricks, could you try to be a little stealthy?" Veerna's aggrieved tone came from somewhere above Don. He blinked into the darkness and caught sight of a white hand that reached down and hauled him to his feet. "We don't know who it was that turned off the shields."

"Sorry," Don said, feeling the side of his head. There was a small amount of something sticky there. "I think I tore open my head."

"Next time you want to do that, could you do it quietly?" Veerna said. "Come on down, Yulia. We've got a long walk ahead of us. This place goes down three miles."

Yulia was down in seconds, moving gracefully to the bottom of the metal steps. Don gave her a jocular frown that he figured would be lost on her. However, Yulia surprised him when he heard her voice come out of the darkness. "I'm sorry ... I didn't intend to be a show-off ..."

"Yulia," Don said. "Can you see in the dark?"

"It's never dark. There's always some light," Yulia answered. "But it wasn't always that way."

"Lead us," Veerna said. "Please."

"O-okay," Yulia stammered. She gingerly took hold of Don's sleeve and probably Veerna's as well and started tugging them along.

"When could you not see in the dark?" Don asked curiously as they walked. He'd picked up on a strange tone in the little girl's voice and it continued to pique his curiosity.

"Oh ... when there were people who loved me," Yulia replied quietly.

Something pinched Don's arm. "Shut it, Collego," Veerna snapped, suddenly hostile.

Utterly confused now, Don blinked. "I don't ..."

"It's okay," Yulia said. "He deserves to know. I couldn't see in the dark until everyone on my planet was killed by the plague."

It was the first time Don had heard Yulia speak about the plague that had devastated her family. Veerna fell silent, but judging by her disgruntled silence, she'd been hoping to spare Yulia the pain of speaking about it. "You don't have to—" Don began.

"I want to," Yulia insisted. "I woke up one day. People were dying all around me. My parents, my brothers, everyone I'd ever known. They just stood there and then fell over. Their faces were grey, they didn't make any noise. I didn't know what to do, I didn't know how to save them. I couldn't. The world was crumbling beneath my feet. Then the slavers arrived. I thought they'd help me, I thought they'd help my family, but they just grabbed me, started to pull me away."

Although Don, in his many years as a psychologist, had heard many people pour out their problems to him, none of them seemed quite as sad or horror-struck as Yulia. Perhaps it was because he'd never had a patient as young as Yulia before. "When they touched my skin, it felt like the contact was burning me," the girl went on in a whisper. Somehow, she was finding the strength to continue putting one foot down, lifting the other ... finding the strength to keep going. "I killed one of them. By then they knew not to touch me. I was unconscious. They wrapped me in a blanket completely and dragged me away. I've been bounced in and out of imprisonment ever since."

"I don't get it," Don said with a frown. "How did the two of you meet and become such great friends?"

"Veerna saved me," Yulia responded. "I attacked someone to stop them from beating me, and they were going to kill me. She pulled me out and she's been trying to keep me safe ever since."

"That's how Rulon found you," Don guessed.

Veerna nodded with a scowl. "Yeah. Spineless cur wanted to kill Yulia. I sacrificed myself to get her out and managed to get myself arrested by the Federation to escape Rulon's grasp. Unfortunately, that didn't turn out so well for me either."

It was astonishing to Don how much the two alien women had gone through. Even Veerna had her reasons for being so ... odd. He began to wonder if he'd sided with the right cousin. After all, Sareen shooting Xander and trying to shoot Suzan demonstrated her true colors. She was willing to do anything she could to get her hands on Veerna and end her life. On the flip side, Veerna fought to protect them and save lives. It was utterly peculiar.

However, he didn't voice any of his thoughts. Instead, he just kept walking with the other two.

. . . . . . . . . .

A quick examination of the hospital revealed that there was no one left alive. Flint and Chris had gone through the entire place to make sure there was no one to threaten Melody while she did her work with Xander, but the place was eerily quiet. "Am I the only one who feels like this is something out of a horror movie?" Chris asked as she and Flint made their way back to the emergency surgery room they'd left Melody, Suzan, and Xander in.

Flint chuckled mirthlessly. "You mean, the presence of hundreds of corpses does creep you out?" he questioned.

Chris snorted. "It's the flickering emergency lights and the weird shadows in the corner that do that for me," she replied. "Why are you helping us, anyway?"

Flint looked at her suspiciously. "Veerna is my partner in smuggling runs," he said. "Losing her would mean losing much of my profits."

"Do I detect another reason behind your concern?" Chris said, grinning a little. "Veerna seems to be perfect for a smuggler."

Flint was quiet for a minute. "She seems to be rebelling against that."

"Hm?" Chris said.

"Two words." There was now an unreadable expression on Flint's face, one that didn't look particularly happy. "Don Collego."

The abrupt change in Flint's demeanor was unnerving to Chris. She eyed him carefully, trying not to really look at him. "What about him?" she said.

"I've seen him with Veerna," Flint said, and disgust filled his normally-impassive voice. "Their relationship is disgusting."

"Listen, buddy, unless you're getting massively different readings on them than I am, I can't see any sort of romantic inclinations between either of them," Chris said. "Honestly. He's her psychologist and she hates him. If you can make a romance out of that, then you should be a romance novelist."

"You don't get it, do you?" Flint snapped. Chris's eyes widened, and she was pretty sure there was smoke rising from his shoulders. "You must be blind, Captain. Can you not see what is immediately in front of your eyes? Collego and Veerna must not become more than a doctor and a patient."

There was something about the way he was speaking that made Chris's hand fall to her hip, where her pistol usually sat. However, although her hand was resting on the holster ... there was no gun sitting inside of it. "What—" Her voice died in her throat. The weapon was nestled firmly in Flint's hand and aimed directly at her heart.

"My apologies, Captain, but I have business to attend to. Don't you wonder how everyone in this hospital has dropped dead?"

Chris took a step backwards, but his whitening knuckles on the gun convinced her not to move further. "You?" she asked.

Flint laughed, but it failed to reach his eyes. "Not me, you silly girl," he said. "The plague. The same plague that decimated Atoni. And do you know what happens, once it runs out of millions of lives to feed on?"

"What are you saying?" Chris's voice came out harsher than she'd intended. Fear was tightening her vocal chords.

"The planet will combust. All of its civilians are dead. At the moment, the only people who are alive are in this hospital and in the security booth." Flint smirked.

Chris forced her fear back. "And how did you survive? Isn't this your home?"

"I've been on a smuggling run for the past four months," Flint replied. "Missed the whole thing."

How could he act so casual? "Don't you have any family here, that you lost?" Chris exclaimed.

"This plague is profit, Chris. Of everyone in the galaxy who has been struck by the plague, only one person survived," Flint told her. "And I think you know who that one person is."

Slowly, Chris raised her gaze to him. "Yulia."

"The very indigo-haired girl that you've brought here," Flint said, seeming to relish the sound of his words. "Do you know how much money she's worth? There are a number of people in the galaxy who would be willing to get their hands on her. The ones who want to stop the plague ... and the ones who want it to continue." He laughed. "Don't turn that horrified look on me, Christine. I know that you know the galaxy is a cutthroat place. Eliminating the competition is just one way to do it. I believe this disease is man-made, and I want it to continue."

Chris's gaze fell to her weapon. "You're mad," she snapped. "Why would you help us get here? You had the perfect opportunity to grab Yulia when we were nearly arrested at the landing bay."

"Too many people. Too many opponents. Why do you think I brought you here, alone? I can handle the scientist and the doctor by just leaving them to their surgery. I know that you'll try to help Veerna when I confront her, so I had to take you out separately."

"Go on, then," Chris said, facing the gun calmly. "Shoot me. I'm ready to die."

Flint's eyes moved past her, to the doors on either side of the hallway. "I have a much more entertaining idea," he said. "Through that door."

Briefly, she considered refusing, but the knowledge that a gunshot would bring Melody running stopped her. Flint wouldn't hesitate to shoot her sister if she came to try and help. Silently, Chris went through the door, and Flint was right behind her.

She stopped short when she realized what room they were in. "You wouldn't dare," she said, whirling on him. The gun pressed to her forehead forced her to remain where she was.

"Wouldn't I?" Flint said. "The cryogenic chamber. Suspended animation. And the bonus is that your case will preserve you, even when the planet explodes. Too bad no one was able to get here to save themselves here."

"No, no, no," Chris protested, backing away, shaking her head. "You can't do this. Please."

"I'm sorry, Captain. I can't have you following me to the passage that'll lead me to Veerna," he said. "In."

The capsule, made to fit even the tallest person, would shrink to fit Chris. She stared at it, her breath coming in ragged gasps. "I can't. Please don't make me!"

Flint dealt her a stunning blow to the head. It wasn't hard enough to make her lose consciousness, but enough to make her unable to move as he dragged her to the capsule—the only furnishing in the pure-steel room. She could do nothing as he pushed her inside, fitting her arms and legs to the correct areas.

The capsule shrank accordingly, fitting snugly to her body, keeping her standing upright and rendering her unable to even twitch. "Please, Flint," she begged, terrified. Cryogenics were used only as a last-resort. There was so much that could go wrong with them. It could malfunction and freeze her too much, stopping her heart permanently instead of temporarily.

Whatever the case, it would mean she'd never see Melody again.

"I think one hundred years should do it," Flint said, setting the proper year. He held the door, smiling vindictively. "This is no more than a Federation fool deserves."

Chris closed her eyes briefly, unable to prevent the tears from spilling down her cheeks. "I'm sorry, Mel. Stay safe," she whispered.

Flint slammed the door and sealed the bolt. Chris's breath started to come faster. It felt like she'd been sealed in her own tomb. It wouldn't open, not for another hundred years. And by that time, everyone outside of it that she'd ever known and cared about would be gone. Melody ... Suzan and Xander ... Don ... Yulia, and even Veerna. They would all be dead and gone.

A cold feeling started to creep over Chris. Gazing out the small window, she saw frost encroaching on the glass, caking over it like a new snow. It was beautiful, she thought.

The ice crawled up her face, and she felt her heart stop as her eyes closed.