Emily wasn't entirely sure what to make of this "Pippi Korax", a "Deputy Commander" who tinkered with vending machines, but there was... something about the seemingly young woman that Mrs Fulcher couldn't quite define; something that made Tony's mother able to relax in this girl's presence. There was also something about Pippi that suggested to Emily that the Deputy Commander was a lot older than she appeared, wiser than she sounded...

Emily was ready to listen, but her husband had always been more suspicious, never more so than now. "Anyone can just come up to you and say they're a high-ranking official", he snorted. "I could tell everyone I'm the United States Ambassador to Australia, but that doesn't make it so."

"True", admitted Pippi. "My rank is, of course, quite irrelevant. You've been thrust into a world you could never have imagined, and that's after suddenly getting your son back under rather alarming circumstances. It's no surprise that you're cautious, unwilling to just calmly accept everything and everyone at face value."

The girl sat down. "What can I do to convince you that I, and this organisation, just want to give your family all the help and support we can?", she said. "There is no better place for your son at this time..."

"And we only have your word for all that", muttered Ryan. "That's the whole problem."

Pippi leaned forward, elbows resting on her knees, fingertips touching. "Indeed...", she sighed. "We could be at this all day..."

"I'm not going anywhere", declared Mr Fulcher. "I can wait."

"As can I - and longer than both of you", answered the Deputy Commander, "but that won't help Tony. Let me put it this way - why did you trust your son's treatment to the staff of Pacific Hospital?"

"They're doctors", offered Emily, hoping her contribution might help pave the way to a peaceful conclusion to the argument - for Tony's sake.

"And who told you that?", asked Pippi.

"They don't just let anyone practice medicine at a hospital", replied Ryan, sounding less confrontational than before, as he struggled to follow the young woman's train of thought.

"And who told you that?"

"I don't know!", exclaimed Ryan. "No-one. You just... know - it's a damn hospital!"

"You trust a hospital to be staffed by responsible medical professionals", observed Pippi, nodding slowly, "but that's not always the case, is it...?"

"No - but more often than not, it is", retorted Mr Fulcher. "At the time, we didn't think about that. Tony needed help, and that's where we went - but what has that got to do with anything?"

"Trust", replied Pippi. "It has to begin somewhere, and you don't always know from where. Years ago, someone trusted someone else to set up a hospital..."

The girl got up. "A man I trust more than any other in all the cosmos once said to me that the best way to measure how trustworthy a person is is to ask them to reveal a secret, and decide for yourself whether or not you believe the answer", she said to Ryan. "Mister Fulcher, the floor is yours."

Ryan rose from his seat, setting his Diet Coke can down on the table that lay between them. "All right", he said. "Any secret? Or something specific?"

"Anything within the last... thousand years, say?", offered Pippi. "I've seen a lot, been through a lot - learned more than many have a right to know..."

"From what we've been told, and that's not much, yours is some kind of non-governmental organisation that's been protecting the Earth for decades", said Ryan. "Protecting us from what? Aliens...?"

"Amongst other things", replied Pippi. "Not from your own stupidity, though - internal problems are nothing to do with us. Usually..."

"Okay then", said Mr Fulcher thoughtfully. "May as well go for the big one - Roswell; UFO or weather balloon?"

"Both", answered the Deputy Commander. "We intercepted, shot down and recovered an alien space-craft, and when the US Air Force got there, they found one of their own experimental balloons that we'd left for them."

"And the weird wreckage, the 'alien bodies'?"

"Creative journalism", explained Pippi. "A very effective defence, if used right."

"Hide the incredible behind something even more incredible", said Mr Fulcher. "Are we Earth-people really that gullible?"

"Not all of you, but enough", replied the young woman. "Anything more? You have a truly golden opportunity to find out answers many would die - or kill - for."

"Bigfoot", continued Ryan. "Is that real, or a hoax?"

"Hoax", the Deputy Commander responded swiftly. "Like Roswell, an exercise in hiding something in plain sight - in this case, something better left well alone. There are lonely, bleak places where people should never go, and whenever there's news of fresh Bigfoot sightings, that's a sure sign that somewhere else, someone got too close."

There was a pause, one side hoping enough had been said, the other readying another question. Emily hoped Ryan had heard all he needed to hear, but she knew him too well to believe that, and soon enough, Ryan showed he wasn't about to change. "Who shot Kennedy?"

"Lee Harvey Oswald."

"Seriously...?"

"Well, that's not entirely correct", admitted Pippi. "The body was his, but it was occupied by the mind of another. The identity and motivation of the occupier has never been determined - even by us."

Ryan seemed to relax. Emily prayed her husband had been convinced by this admission that SCORPION were not entirely infallible, but as he took a deep breath, it became clear that Mr Fulcher was not yet finished with the interrogation. His last question, however, came as a complete surprise to Emily...

"Miss Korax... is there a God?"

After her chirpy introduction, the Deputy Commander had become quite serious in tone in her answers to all of Ryan's questions, but on hearing this, the lively sparkle came back to her eyes. "Well, well", she sighed. "After all this time... I've conversed with kings and emperors, prophets and dreamers, heroes and madmen, but in all thirteen hundred years of my life, I can quite honestly say I have never been asked that question. It's a particularly fascinating question - the answer to which can be viewed as a measure of a race's readiness to venture beyond its home-world, because it's not as straightforward a question as it might appear..."

"What - what do you mean...?", murmured Ryan.

"There are more answers to that question than one would imagine", said Pippi. "'Yes' and 'no', of course... and the one few consider, but which says the most. The same answer that enlightened races give to the question "what is the meaning of life?", and that answer is 'Does it really matter?'"

Emily shuddered, but she couldn't quite work out why. It was almost as though some great cosmic truth had been laid out before her, but her simple, mortal consciousness hadn't quite grasped it. I'm convinced, she told herself. Now, come on Ryan - can't you see it too...?

Ryan Fulcher stepped back, and sat down next to Emily, his head bowed slightly. When he looked up, surrender was written all over his face. "Please, help us", he almost whispered. "Help Tony."

"I can help you to understand", said Pippi, sitting next to Mr Fulcher, "but helping Tony is all up to you. But before we begin, let me say this - thank you for letting me help. I'll tell you now, it's the best part of the job..."

"It's... beautiful..." ...

Metara-Shay of The Dawnshapers had been involved in the investigation of the crystalline substance now ever widely referred to as "Dominium" almost from its discovery, but this was the first time she had had a chance to see for herself the uses to which the mysterious mineral was being put. Some of that crystallised life-energy, the power of the LifeStar filtered through living creatures, then fossilised, had been crafted into jewels for Darkhawk, and several weapons, but the ultimate expression of this new art was the god-like statue she was now employed to observe, and maintain.

Until the beginning of this assignment, she hadn't seen the statue for herself, but she had heard stories of it coming to life, animated by the mind and spirit of a young hero, who served Darkhawk and her people under the title of "Captain Dominion". "He" had first come to the defence of Darkhawk's kingdom during the Faenri incursion, punishing the foul, winged invaders with might born from the very heart of Dominion, and Metara-Shay wondered when it would be her time to witness this particular manifestation of The Great Mother's fury...

Completing one set of scans, the young practitioner of Dominion's own unique form of LifeStar-fuelled magic set down one handheld sensor unit, and turned to pick up another instrument. When she turned back, a tiny squeal of alarm was forced from within her, barely achieving enough energy to be audible - where there had previously been only transparent golden crystal, there was now a flickering point of light inside the statue's chest, pulsing like a small, glowing heart.

"S... Supervisor...?", murmured the startled spell-caster. "Supervisor, come quickly...!"

The statue shifted. At first, Metara-Shay feared it was going to topple over, but as she backed away, she could see the whole golden mass of the sculpture, and see that the statue was stirring, as though waking from a deep sleep - the solid masses of its fists were opening up, separating into individual, articulated fingers; the arms were flexing, at the shoulder, the elbow, the wrist; the head was tilting back and forth, eyelids opening and closing, the "eyes" within becoming pools of brilliant light.

Sections of the legs, arms and torso turned dark, becoming opaque to resemble some kind of uniform, and the statue's head tilted down at the Dawnshaper. The sculpture started to speak, and Metara-Shay quickly realised just why she'd been issued with a personal translator as the device turned the alien language into understandable words, fed directly into the girl's mind...

"Oh, sorry - I didn't expect anyone to be here", said the hero, his voice sounding strangely young for a mighty warrior. "I suppose you'll have to be the one I tell, then - I'm borrowing Captain Dominion for a while. You could say this is a... diplomatic mission, or something like that..."

Metara-Shay almost tripped over herself, stumbling backwards into the broad form of Supervisor Laarkel of The Oris as he came into the chamber, answering the girl's calls for aid, just in time for both of them to see Captain Dominion rise into the air, the LifeLight of Dominion filling every corner, every extremity of his crystal body. "This... this is highly irregular!", spluttered Laarkel. "We received no orders...!"

Captain Dominion did not speak again. The light within him intensified, almost to blinding brightness, then suddenly it was gone, as though the air had just swallowed him up...

"I... I didn't know he was going to...", mumbled Metara-Shay, terrified that she had done something, or not done something, that meant she had utterly failed in her duty. The Supervisor had other things on his mind than her conduct, however, and he remained silent until he was able to open a communications channel to Dominion Space Command, and pass on the news.

"Fleet Command, this is Dominium Research, planet Ta'Aris - Captain Dominion has left the kingdom..."

There was an immediate response; one that made Metara-Shay tremble, down into the very depths of her soul. "Ta'Aris, this is Ravani, on board Dominion Five. We have detected an unauthorised launch and exit vector from Dominion, and acting on your information, we are engaging in pursuit."

Metara-Shay knew Ravani - Iraisu At'Nuan Ravani, Child of Mystalorn - and whilst Ravani's fellow Mystalornan Mane-of-Night inspired cautious awe, Ravani herself was a creature to be feared, presenting herself more as a huntress, a predator. For a few moments, Metara-Shay considered telling the scale-and-leather-clad spell-caster what Captain Dominion had said to her, then the Dawnshaper thought better of it, and kept her mouth shut. She was most likely in more than enough trouble as it was...

...to be continued...