The whiteness impedes once more. They are both stuck. For how long Walker doesn't know, everything is messed up. Situation: trapped in the heart of the vessel.

Walker contemplates the rest of them, 'Chee off on some monk type trip, Dobrovowski injured; plus a criminal, Irons is not one hundred percent in his head, Wheeler…not known, and Reed seems the only one left to stick (or attempt to) things together.

'Situation stinks. Time in here…three quarters of an hour now, Dexter growing worse and worse. Exit blocked every time.''
*
"Are you telling me that there is no possible way for them to get themselves out of there?" Reed addresses the computer.

Chee sits silently observing the proceedings, it has been what seems like a lifetime since he was snatched from Saf El. His order gone, his duty now to balance his misdemeanor, in whatever way.

"Well compute?" Reed thinks the vessel's main brain is deliberately putting in long pauses to piss him off.

"Well computer?" Irons imitates his colleague.

The annoyed bloke looks down at Irons who sits with only a T-shirt on at lower end of the bridge, "get some fucking pants on soldier! You are not in the nuthouse now!!"

He takes no notice of him but sticks his tongue out at Reed.

Dobrovowski listens to him asking the computer the same question. They are all going round in circles. The scar on his wrist is perfectly formed. The criminal is still amazed at how quickly his body heals. He's also astounded at Sgt. Reed not emptying a cartridge from a 67. into the blasted computer. The large blue rectangle sits there, dormant.

'How does he think he's going to get Walker out of the forbidden zone? Not that way pal!' Dobrovowski slumps into a chair, moaning a thought of boredom to himself, 'what came over Al'? Cutter? Why bother getting the bitch? This Dexter...whoever the fuck she is, well it's her own tough shit. Should have just let her rot there. Thanks to her we're all in the shit.'

"I still can't change the course Andy," Wheeler has been trying for the last hour to bypass main command centres for controls to the bridge on level five; his face small on monitor.

"Okay Rich', get back up here. We'll try the main centre from the bridge."

"With all due..save it, it won't do any good. The vessel simply re-wires itself so that I can't get to it. Shit..it doesn't even have to stun me out anymore it's got that smart."

"How are the 'droids doing on the lock of the...you know what?"

"Useless man. The vessel keeps blocking down their internal power supplies and you've got heaps of robots stacked everywhere."

"Okay Rich'. I'll find out where we are going," Reed punches off the monitor with his finger. He looks up to the large blue, above all their heads, on a wall of the bridge. It has been too dormant to their needs. Whatever it is up to, Reed only hopes that their mystery destination will somehow involve Walker.
*

The planet spins before the vessel. It orbits the barren looking world. Wheeler, Dobrovowski, Reed, Chee all look at the screen. All are puzzled why the vessel has brought then to this deserted planet. Restricted first by the United Forces, then by the Allies and now under Universal Council law. Nobody has ever entered the orbit of the planet. A few fools, passing themselves off as explorers have tried to breach it but most have been captured before being allowed to get near it. An Xryyum vessel did try to land on the planet- they were never heard of again. A United Forces scout ship found the Xryyum craft ten years later, over the other end of the sector. Nobody was found on board and all logs, records had been erased. No indication of anything living at all.

Irons gets up from the floor and presses his nose against the surface of the main viewer. He cries into it, muttering something. Wheeler grabs the wretched soldier, throwing him backwards, squealing, from the screen.

"What the hell has eight four seven got to do with this shit?" Reed sneers.

"Death's Gate isn't the kind of place I thought we'd find any answers," Wheeler comments.

"The Devil himself wouldn't come within light years of this irredeemable place," Chee adds to his colleague's words, it is the first time he's engaged in proper constructive conversation since they hurtled through space (via R.S.T.C).

"YOU WILL ALL REMAIN ON THE BRIDGE."

Irons gets up from the floor. He is so surprised that the vessel's computer speaks, his insanity mask slips, "there is obviously some purpose here and to do with..." his words waft off as the others look at him.

Wheeler gets hold of him, raising Irons off his feet. The bonkers bloke is frightened for a moment, then relaxes as he sees the big man smile at him, a friendly gesture, rather than the annoyance expressed through kicks and punches.

"Yet again my friends, are esteemed leader has landed us in the shite..once....more," Irons adds awkwardly to his first rational outburst.

"Yeah," Reed sighs, "but it looks as though this time he'll be going solo."

Dobrovowski crosses over to a control panel, noticing some expenditure of energy on the vessel's behalf. He shakes his head. In blunt condemnation, "well you can kiss goodbye to that esteemed leader of ours. "Reed slides up beside him. "This great vessel has just beamed him directly down to the planet' s surface."

"Damn it!!" Reed utters.

Dobrovowski brings more bad news, "and it looks as though the bay doors are sealed. All levels toward light cruisers shut down and teleport now inoperative."
*
'The planet's heat feels familiar,' Walker thinks to himself, 'I have been here….before. I recognize this place but where from? Long ago. The experiment...or what I term as experiment. Maybe just some sequence of events. Can never tell. Can never tell.'

He clambers up mountainside. The peak is high above him but the gradient he is on and below, isn't too steep. From higher up perhaps he'll get a bearing.

'Situation? Transported here from vessel. Definitely not an illusion, the heat is real; uncomfortable burn of desert sun on my skin. The arid temperature makes my throat dry.' Luckily the Univarians gave him just the right amount of sense to know inhospitable conditions but also that immortal slant where he needs no sustenance and can go for long periods of time in conditions which would kill a human within the hour or minutes(in this case).

'Must establish where I am. Dexter must still be aboard. If she isn't and is here she is dead. Reed cannot have taken command of the vessel. Who could override my instruction? Univarians. They built it and gave the craft to me. They are somewhat far away to do that. And would they?'
*
Valleys stretch out below. Once fertile (probably some lost time ago) now mainly reflecting dust, rock, uninhabited but for specialized wildlife. Walker has now covered up most of exposed skin, all terrain uniform with which he and Reed were originally going to rescue Wheeler, has come in more than handy.

He checks through viewers: no sentient life but for creatures which inhabit planet. He spots a long distance relative of an Earth scorpion. He attempts to home in identification of beastie that sits motionless on a rock- thirteen hundred metres away. He is in luck, the animal is indigenous only to the planet: Devil's Gate.

He switches off scanners. Walker hears something behind him. He goes to withdraw staser but finds nothing. He shifts forward to engage in karate (empty hand) then stops, dead. The figure, which appears out-of-the-blue, is a young woman, one he recognizes... the Univarian.
*
They walk through the valley, which he has just been looking down upon. She is unaffected by the heat. He sweats in long slow dribs but ignores the discomfort, knowing he cannot die from over-exposure. She has not spoken at all.

Cutter attempts to assimilate the situation and possible outcome- he finds that his theories and thoughts strike a large stone wall of improbabilities; frustrating, unwanted, solutions. He must follow her, he has no choice.

A sand demon runs across their path and stops to the left of them. Walker eyes it with amused indifference as it rears its sting. The creature is considerable in size, half a metre in length and with one large claw, used for holding prey (usually mammals). The woman looks to it. The sand demon backs away.
*
They come to a half submerged temple, Walker wonders whether he is seeing things. It rises up like a mountain in itself. A lost civilization. But maybe not so lost, she turns to him. They have come to a stop before it. Suddenly the sand from it starts to fall away in a huge avalanche of rocks, disturbed by the great moving of structure.

Walker runs back from it, not wishing to be caught in a sudden onslaught of the moving mass. The woman laughs as he speeds at the best he can manage but to no avail, it is obvious that he will be taken away with the destruction. For the second time he is teleported somewhere else, against his will.
*
Chee has listened to the fractured, insubstantial arguments of the soldiers trapped on the bridge. The computer will simply not allow any of them to leave. It will not communicate with them. Data is restricted to the scenic and useless view of eight four seven. He decides it is time to do something. They seem to have forgotten an important factor. Chee believes that he can find it for them.

"Gentlemen..maybe it is time to accept this position and therefore focus our energies elsewhere?" He hopes that his years of monastic life have not separated him greatly from the throng of human or immortal communicative skill.

"And?" Reed questions.

"What of Dexter? She didn't get transported down there," Chee issues his theory, knowing the computer is studying them.

"What of her?" Wheeler storms.

"I shall get her," he proclaims.

Dobrovowski has been sat back in a chair behind them all riding it out. He sits up slightly, moves his head upright, instead of being slouched.

Wheeler laughs. He goes over to one of the sealed doors and thumps it with his false arm. It clangs loudly. He shakes his head at Chee.

The monk, once soldier, goes up to the door that Wheeler has just tried to get through by force. He places both hands lightly upon it. Kneeling, as though in some respectful gesture to the vessel, he closes his eyes like in meditation.

Within moments the door opens for him. Wheeler is taken aback, so much so that he fails to respond in time. Reed dives after Chee but is blocked by the vessel. Only the monk goes through and Reed is left with aching body as the vessel shocks him backwards. "What the fuck? Have you got something against the rest of us?" He blurts out but the computer doesn't reply.

The vessel is still trying to figure it out. For some reason one of the being's which was on the bridge has left but still remains there? lts banks of biomorphic intelligence are racing to conclude and find the one answer of a simple physical property, duped by Chee's mind trick.
*
Dexter's brain is messed. Not irretrievable. Luckily the vessel has not scanned them. It'll take a good hour or two for its advanced yet unspiritual grey matter.

Chee guides the craft through the atmosphere of Death's Gate, having teleported Dexter from her ordeal, deciding to escape from the vessel and search for Cutter.

'Such nonsense' he contemplates the planet's ominous sounding nickname, 'Death's Gate or Devil's Gate...a mystic load of twaddle.'

The monk knows exactly why the governments have never allowed any on this world. He first discovered the transcript by accident, going through some geological files at the monastery. It was a planet which held some unforeseen force or race rather like Holodern IV, except this time, the race or whatever were intelligent and not some disorganized stream of locusts. The race could calculate and move within their parameters as well as human forces. The United Forces never wanted to oppose an enemy such as that. Seera herself had the prudence to keep well away, especially after what happened on Holodern IV.

Great expanses of desert roll out before the light craft. The sheer heat bellows out below as they dive, a great landscape belching heat from the very sight of it. Chee watches the temperature rise as he brings the craft into a steadier descent. He has disengaged all connections with the vessel. Everything operates on manual. Distantly he picks up a great energy surge, then it quietens as though never there. He plays back the monitoring disk. A definite surge is shown. Chee scratches his chin, pondering.

Dexter is coming out of her slumber. He had gently put her to sleep with a touch on a pressure point. She will wake a tad fuzzy but nothing too dramatic.

"Jesus...?"

"Here, take this," Chee hands her an aspirin tablet.

"What is it?"

"Something for your headache," she eyes him suspiciously as he says this, holding it there patiently, "come on, I'm a good guy."

"That's what Lee said," she says acidly.

"By my order I am only allowed to defend myself with my skills. Not attack."

"And if you do you won't reach heaven right?" The reporter is full of negative tones in her words, she grabs and takes the pill.

"Something like that," he laughs warmly.

"What was that weird place?"

"Just some built in defense mechanism for the vessel. In case it ever got boarded by enemy forces," Chee brings the craft to a thousand feet.

"Whose enemy?"

"The vessel's I guess. An elaborate booby trap, all its passageways can be directed there. The Univarians don't do things by halves."

"Where are we going?"

"To save a soul."

"Whose soul?" The reporter asks.

"A mutual friend."
*
The vessel looks exactly the same as one he has just left. Yet everything is empty here. Walker checks teleport implant in his wrist. The two millimetre by two millimetre square underneath his skin still seems to function well enough. Without the device he would suffer the symptoms that all of them suffered that first time, when fighting the U.F. He stands in a great cavern type place but the walls are too stylized in their rough cragginess and fissures. A huge light source comes from above and even Walker's breath echoes in great drawn exhalations.

The woman floats down to him smiling. He feels fear. Here he may die. This makes him glad, it is time, ironic when he should regain his emotions, all which mix against each other.

"Welcome to you Walker."

"Welcome to you....lady," he answers.

She is standing before him in a desert robe get up that she had on before. Cutter wishes to know what death they have deemed for him. Why? How? Other such answers which he deserves to learn of before his impending demise.

"Are you going to dispense with the cloak and dagger and talk sense or are am I and your race going to be forever thrown into this divide of circumspect illusion..?"

"You," the woman disappears from the main brace of light.

Walker is left alone, with no answers to his cynical questions. He laughs to himself. It is plain to see that this is some other vessel yet seemingly larger, even than his.

The soldier sits upon the floor basking himself in the warm light. Its brightness could be attributed to the presence of many of their race. It matters not. All that matters is that Walker returns to the vessel and continues his mission.

She appears again. He looks at her as she draws close. She is waiting for him to speak. He obliges, "so?"

"You must regain," she says.

"Recover what?"

"Yourself."

Alan closes his eyes, "whatever you wish to call yourself...I have no idea why I am here...why the vessel put me within your clutches. If death is here..huh..as I sense it is, then do so."

The woman looks at him confused and hurt by his suggestion that her/its race may wish to finish with the human that they nurtured for so long- on his time scale. To it/her the years have only seemed a few hours of universal mean time, to him it must have been quite a tortuous experience.

"Death is never here. We have no death and can never inflict it upon one of our own. You must join your friends in good time, then you can be free," Walker listens to the woman's words of comfort, they pour over him with quiet assurance, "I can free you Alan Walker. The trap you have entwined yourself in is unnecessary.

"Life is to be cherished. To live within freedom that holds all of us dear, even in this universe; even with us, it cannot be sneered at. I/my elders have joined through you to give you an insight to beyond what is common within evolution.

"Long ago on your planet they had the divides of poverty from the rich, to name one example; money occupied the lives of all. And now it is the same, the pursuit of wealth still holding your race and others within a backlog. No future can be held positive with that thing that binds you, your race. A wise man told of the evil that it brings. This is one thing. It is a conflict, even in good men's hearts.

"This may detract from what you may see as your purpose. A richness of solitude can only be found where your spirit lies in peace. Spirit can triumph. It will bear it upon yourself and open your mind for there truth lies of what may become."

Walker believes the woman is preaching to him, half of him can find a murmur within something long and hollow...that which may have been once where his soul lay or lingered. His mind thinks of some deeper reason, he wishes to pull away from it and soldier on. Alan Walker blocks it. The darkness within returns and gives the soldier comfort. The woman looks as though she may continue.

She carries on, "flying through the many different solar systems, galaxies can free the mind; to be one within a dreamland that may exist. This is all hypothetical I admit but until you are free, you will forever be flying against yourself. That is where the key lies..within what you lost..your soul.

"What is it that frees one? Is it ignorance? Is it the knowledge that one can never find the answer? Is it...finding.....the answer?"

Walker had never thought about it. Ever. And now she is confronting him with it, in her last words. He found himself growing uneasy. But why should he? All that death. The destruction could never hold him down. He was, after all, no longer a human, something else.

"I suppose you may think of me as some pathetic human. How many races have you interfered with? What manner of beings have you toyed with? Split their personalities? Broken down? For what purpose? For what reason? Idle curiosity? Alien boredom?

"The vessel is still an amazing work of technology, in fact it alters and adapts itself with each passing moment of time. I have been in contact with it for more than two hundred years now and I am still in awe.

Am I some Neanderthal man; questing for basic survival- primeval desires growing, trying to change? Is this what it's about hanging one's frontiers beyond expectation?"

The woman bows her head, her foot playing in the light, fine dust spread on the surface of the floor. From above she receives a thousand differing views which stream into her mind telepathically, so as not to alarm the subject.

He doesn't notice. His brain only registers a slight lapse of concentration. Alan Walker for some reason feels a rush of introspection that delights him in a long lost emotion, a taste of joy. It could be linked with joy; in a fraction of sexual release it could be so slight, it is cooled down by his black darkened depths. Walker doesn't mind being there. It's all a distraction from the problem of Ball and everything that follows therein. All those years of killing with the team. Lives they have saved. Lives they have taken. Lives judged by them.

Nothing can distract him now. After Ball, or whoever, he would then return to his private planet. Walker knows there is no place for him in the universe or anywhere. Times have changed from the need for good warfare exponents. Maybe in remote parts of the galaxy but not with current human history, with the Universal Council.

"Your questions still show that you function as a human being Pr. Walker," the woman stands in front of him looking directly into his eyes.

Cutter avoids her eye contact. He turns from her. It shows weakness. They know who is infinitely superior. It is no matter of a battle of the sexes that rages on as ever, it is that she is one of them.

'Time to throw in a little distraction,' thinks Walker.

"Do you have a name? We have met occasionally but I have never known your name. Not that it matters, if you must pose as a human we may as well continue the pretence," he adds an air of belligerence at the end of the line.

The woman gives him a look of disappreciation.

He storms up to her. Grabbing the woman by the neck he pushes her away frustrated then...falls. Falling to the floor, emotions going off in him like some unchecked volcano, "did you do this?"

"Yes, I would like you to answer so that you may know yourself," she cradles him for a moment, absorbing his emotional surges.

"What..is your problem?" Walker gets up, shrugging her off and regaining his composure, "what is all this 'yourself', continually cropping up? You made me! Must it go on like this? Kill me. Refrain from this second guessing.

"Am I to be tested throughout my life? I am like every other man that exists or was, until you came...leave me. Leave.

"Hope is nowhere to be found. Do you and your race think you hold it all?"

"We hold nothing but know everything that will happen," she stands perfectly calm.

"How can you live with yourself? That is utter nonsense! It tires me. I see you have no answers, I didn't expect any answers. I desire...I desire no answers sweet alien, your appearance is most beguiling. I find all of this..too much."

Opening his eyes he finds himself alone. If they are going to kill him then they are making it very comfortable for him. 'Odd that'. The alien's words bug him.

"Hello?" His voice echoes for a time like a murmur that seems to have gone but so inaudible that the ear thinks it's finished- then catches a slash of sound.

He sits down. He closes his eyes thinking. The echoes seem to play on around him.
*
Walker stands up. In the light there is comfort.

He walks through the blackness, which goes on, and on. Time has lost meaning.

'Why must this extraordinary ambience of some other place go on? My destiny is not here,' Walker philosophizes, 'where did the word 'Cutter' come from? I didn't even create it.'

Something moves down his spine. Alan spins around. Nothing there. Even with his sight he sees nothing, just black.

"Is this?"

No answer, no echo.

Something moves to the left of him. Walker illuminates the surrounding area with a pen-sized torch. He briefly catches a peek of what he thinks is a United Forces uniform.

He extends beam to its fullest. There is mere black in a three hundred and sixty degree turn. He cannot even sense anything else. Murmurs click on and off in the dark.

An alien grabs his shoulder and throws him several feet into more black. It speaks in a foreign tongue to him issuing insults, then ceases. Its presence has gone.

Walker thinks fast. He recognizes the alien's language. He even is familiar with the voice. It is an alien he killed once. Ghosts. 'Is this a dead zone?'

As if on cue to his questioning thought, the dead make themselves appear before Cutter as he is trapped in the darkness. Hundreds upon hundreds surge toward him as the lone man runs. He flees to where he knows not.

"GO AWAY!"
*
"Why have you brought us here?" Dexter can' t understand why Chee has been steadily guiding them through a hard route, through mountains, instead of opting for the flat plain desert.

The light cruiser has come to a halt and is now lowering. Chee checks controls, with a mark of concern.

Dexter is naturally curious, "what is it?"

He holds his hand up to hush her.

The reporter tries to see the radar but can only see a slight glitch on the monitor. There appears to be nothing, just the usual thermals, especially common for a planet such as this.

"So what is it?" Mary cannot hide her concern.

"I apologize Ms. Dexter, I didn't mean to be rude. It is a bit unnerving that another vessel is here or...should I say another one has arrived. Until I'm sure of what is going on I think it would be wise for us to stay incognito," Chee switches power from engines into cloaking device, boosting power of shield.

"What do you mean another one?"

Chee is more than concerned.

"There is a vessel south-east and fully cloaked but that has only moved a few metres. It's now hidden from my scanners, I should imagine it is not letting itself get settled. The other vessel that has just arrived is going to where life forms are present- Walker."

"Maybe the others have regained control of the vessel?"

He gives her an amused but disconcerting look, "I don't think so Ms. Dexter..once the vessel follows a path or order it will remain along that until the very end. It is probably still orbiting this delightful planet."

"Who's in the vessel, the one that's just got here?"

"I have no idea. I only hope that Walker is tucked away and his suit cloak doesn't pack in."
*
The heat of Devil's Gate hits Cutter as he aimlessly wanders the dunes. The mess of desert has settled, aided by the vessel which hovers a hundred metres above, its large presence having impressed a force field onto land below; cooling the ground and air about him.

From high above, to the rear of craft, a tiny hatch opens slowly. A figure the size (because of distance) of a centimetre stands on hovering platform. As it draws closer to the bow, the figure looks human. The platform lowers further down.

His newly reformed emotions are in turmoil, his mind filled with the hope that his vessel has come to rescue him. Walker recognizes the woman, who is drawing nearer. He mouths the word..Seera..without letting out sound, his heart sinking.

She passes him, twenty feet above and to the right. Finally she lowers into a crater that has grown considerably larger due to her vessel. The tall woman, slender, looks exactly as she did when she kidnapped him in Phase Four. Running a scanner slowly around rim of crater, to surrounding area.

The Univarian appears, then pushes Walker from behind, shielding him. Memory flashes spark, making him lose concentration. The alien whispers something with eyes closed, communicating with fellow aliens.

Seera tilts her head for a second then looks directly at the alien, as if she can see him. Pointing her scanner at the alien, before she can get an exact reading, the Univarian throws energy out from itself and zips over her head, making itself visible.

Seera ducks dropping scanner.

Walker watches the scene disappear to blackness. The woman stands before him, waiting in the light, the place from before.

He collapses to the ground, struggling to stand up. She tries to help him.

"Leave me."

"I only wish to help you Alan," she steps back from him, watching his struggle.

"You can help me by telling me what the hell is going on."

"You will know our ways soon enough."
*
The Univarian stands behind Seera. It quickly changes its form to that of Alan Walker, an exact copy in every detail. The woman withdraws a pistol and now holds it at him. She unholsters another, two ancient weapons.

"We meet again once more Seera," the Univarian speaks with the exact voice of Cutter.

"Is that some new trick you have learnt?" Seera queries walking up the slope, finding her steps hard in the soft sand, "should I applaud or jeer?"

The ground is difficult but she moves with stealth, homing two .38s at the alien's chest. Seera finds it odd that Walker doesn't move, it is still an unpleasant experience for immortals such as they to be shot.

"I have learnt a thing or two from our benefactors."

"Save it," Seera cuts in.

"Is this where I go?" The Univarian asks calmly.

"Yes. Do you wish an explanation from me? Perhaps to learn of my wicked plans!" Laughing demonically, like a pantomime.

"Not really," the Univarian resigns, "but I doubt that your weapons will have any effect..I'm surprised you came so ill-equipped."

Seera raises one of the guns to the disguised Univarian's face, "that was always one thing about you wasn't it private?"

"Really Seera..you shouldn't hold onto the past like that, it is bad for you."

"What's that?"

"I am not a private in the United Forces. I haven't been for some time but I don't expect you to keep abreast of current events, living in the past through a deluded sense of nostalgia of what you once had," the Univarian knows that fundamentally Seera is just another megalomaniac, it doesn't take her long to come to the boil, if you stir and simmer her gently to the point where you degrade her past.

"Whatever you son-of-a-bitch but-"

The Univarian raises its hands in mock submission, also to interrupt her, another goading stab, "please Seera..don't swear in such a manner. It's not becoming of one who, although mad as a brush, has some grain of intelligence, albeit used ineffectually."

"Goodbye private."

She lets off both guns sending the imitation of Walker flying over the crest of the crater and down the other side, sand erupting around it.

Seera follows and fires off both rounds into the form.

The noise and sand settle. She looks cautiously at the messed up figure of what used to be Cutter.

Seera slowly approaches what she thinks is victory. There is no movement.

"That was quite a blast, most invigorating," the Univarian says turning its half-blown away face up to her, words gurgled.

She quickly reloads her weapons but the alien grabs both weapons out of her hands before she can blink, throwing them over its shoulders, dramatically. Changing back into its true form.

"I am quite surprised at your ingenuity...that would have certainly killed the real Walker. Is that a pair of .38s? What am I asking for?" It chuckles to itself, "I already know the answer?

"Also you know that if your and his vessel were joined- which is permissible; especially since I/we built it- then your plans for universal domination would again be succinctly attained and nothing could stop you. Nice, peaceful, worlds under your belt. The quiet peace of the galaxies being your playground once more. Before the races of the Universal Council would know what would hit them..KERPOW! They wouldn't stand a chance."

Seera is taken aback. Looking up, as if for some signal, "and I suppose alien that you knew this is was about to happen?"

The Univarian looks up also, into the approaching heat of anti-matter focused into the size of a tiny ball, which will blow it, apart.

"Absolutely," it whispers before exploding, leaving nothing.
*
The woman cries out loud, crouching. Walker catches her as she falls, surprised at how solid she feels. He is used to getting injured men and women, children away, but nothing to do with comforting, just getting injured to R.C vehicles; out of the way.

"What is it?" He asks softly.

"Gone," the woman says gradually, pulling back some form of composure.

"What has gone?"

"A fellow being of mine. The one whom distracted Seera from you, before we teleported you back here," she gets her strength back.

"Dead? But couldn't it have been avoided..?"

"It was his destiny to serve you and learn."
*
Chee studies radar. The vessel that arrived half an hour ago, gently moves from its stationary position. He is bothered by the fact that it has released a missile, although small, it seems that the life form that was there, has been killed, no longer visible on screen or scanners. The computer on board the small craft will not identify the being.

The monk codes in the configuration of Walker. The computer comes up with: "NOT KNOWN".

Dexter looks through a small window, out across the desert. She sees a vessel rise in the distance. Chee has brought the craft up slightly to have an external visual with the ship that now prepares to leave Death's Gate. If it were to discover them and decide to attack it, they would be dead in a very short time.

The woman thinks of home, how long ago she was there on Earth. A lot must have changed. For these men, or at least a few of them, Earth must be as alien as the Univarians.

The vessel shifts for a moment being blurred, then disappears in a blast, the noise echoing around the mountains. Chee moves power back on line but keeps a weaker cloaked shield.

"Well if they did see us, they certainly don't seem bothered our being here," he begins to set course for further exploration.

Chee disappears from her sight. His expression of astonishment is like hers. The light craft suddenly plummets down, with no one at the controls.

Within a second Dexter is attempting to gain control. She doesn't have time to scream. She is teleported.

The craft ambles out of control. From above it several anti-matter energy forms of light break through the sky. They connect with craft. Before the human eye can see or hear, the ship explodes.
*
"What the hell is going on down there?" Reed watches on the scanning system.

Chee's craft has been erased from the screen. Underneath it Wheeler fiddles around with circuitry.

"We're like sitting.." Dobrovowski doesn't finish his sentence.

"Ducks? " Irons offers.

"Fucking ducks!!" The lanky man adds.

Inside Irons head his hallucinatory and mentally disturbed mind conjures up voices. They encourage him to make friends again with his old friends, because it will surely be a most splendid venture to take part, even Death agrees. Irons thinks that Mr. Death has selfish reasons for going along with it.

Reed addresses the computer- he doesn't know why, it'll pass the time. Another vessel leaves Death's Gate. It has just fired a small burst of missiles down the planet at Chee's craft. He naturally knows that it will attack them. Its gun ports are forming, opening in preparation. "So computer are you going to respond or are we all at the mercy of the Univarian masters?"

The large blue rectangle doesn't answer. The other hostile vessel is setting itself up.

"WELL?!!" He bellows.

"CRAFT HOSTILE. NO UNIVARIAN LIFE FORMS OR OTHER CAN BE SCANNED WITHIN AS IT HAS BLOCKED SENSORS. HOSTILE CRAFT PREPARING TO FIRE MISSILES, E.T.A. IN 3 SECS. TAKING EVASIVE MANOEUVRE."

All the men instantaneously lurch back as the vessel screams from stand still to R. S.T. C. Tearing across the bows of looming ship. The missiles from Seera's ship project out into nothing, where Walker's vessel leaves only a trace image.

Seera cannot believe it. For the last few hours she has recorded Walker's crew struggling to get control of their damn ship, it then decides to break across her of its own free will.

An alarm sounds, before her computer can tell her that she should raise shields, to evade and that her missiles have done a U-turn, the warheads sink into Seera's craft.

A huge explosion knocks the vessel sideways. She is thrown back with great force. Fifty-eight percent of her vessel's decks erupt. The vessel attempts to compensate by directing all power to main lines shutting down vast unused decks.

The craft is ripped to shreds internally. Chain reactions knock on. The damage goes to seventy-two percent. The computer focuses on the bridge. It takes gravity field off bridge and guides Seera to a survival cone. Once in it, the computer switches off all life support. It shuts down all systems, once sure its one occupant is safe. The damage factor stops at eighty-six percent. It activates droids to start repairs before finally closing itself down to a dormant state.
*
Reed gets up checking his head, only a few cuts and bruises. Rest of men seem okay. He addresses the computer, hoping its next action will not be so unannounced.

The vessel doesn't respond but throws them again into Relative Space Time Compression.
*
Dexter regains consciousness. She is in a dark place. A single light comes from above causing a strange triangle of luminescence. She gets half up with a start. Looking like little, frightened animal, she wonders where she is.

"Welcome Dexter."

The woman's voice startles Dexter more. She stands up, trying to find the location of where the person is speaking from but can only see black, light shadowing her face in downward breaks.

"Who's there?"

"Do not be alarmed Ms. Mary Dexter. We will not harm you," the woman-come alien, who was plying through Walker' s mind, stands right next to the reporter, from nowhere.

Dexter leaps back from the Univarian.

On close-up, the reporter can see this is the woman from her dream in the ship. What has this woman got to do with anything? This must be the one that Cutter has told her about. The first reporter to make contact with a Univarian that changed Walker and co. And now she is the first to meet the controllers of Cutter.

"What have you done with....?"

"With Alan Walker Ms. Dexter?"

Mary nods slowly.

"Why should it bother you?" The alien walks from her into blackness.

Dexter calls out into the black running after her. The alien reappears behind Dexter smiling.

"It does bother me..I..I wish to know. Is there a way out of this mess? Why am I here?" Dexter is getting lost now, in herself, not fully appreciating what has happened.

"Why is anyone here?" The woman is not as complex as Walker, a thought that the Univarian toys with as she asks Dexter the question, walking past the human, sitting on floor, eyeing the reporter mistrustingly.

"Don't get philosophical on me. Where's Samo Chee?"

The alien doesn't answer. She is thinking that Dexter's simplicity will aid her.

"Well don't just sit there! What have you done? Where is this?" The reporter isn't sure whether she wants to know the answer.

The Univarian is ignoring her. It appears to be talking to someone else. The alien is perplexed, it is as though some great catastrophe has occurred. Dexter moans on in the background. Usually the alien can deal with several things at once, her mind is being overflowed with information demanding action, possible alternatives, routes to a goal, new data assimilated, changing plains of thought that switch themselves through other dimensions.

Dexter has finally shut up. She notices her alien host is troubled. From above the light begins to flicker like some storm that is getting ready to rumble. Without warning her surroundings are gradually becoming more and more clearer. The black is giving way to white cleanness. The echoes in her breathing are becoming less and less.

She finds herself in a small room like that on board Walker's vessel. The strangeness has disappeared. A door is open to the left. She walks through it into a corridor. She can hear crying.

Walking a few feet she finds another doorway, the crying is louder. It is in great sobs and wails. A man, in pain.

She enters a great hall with light bright. There is Walker on the floor clutching his stomach in angst.

"Cutter?" Dexter is more distressed at this sight than any other she has been subjected to in the last few hours, everything turns on its head.

She cannot believe the rush of emotion that flows from him. It is uncalled for. It is like some corny release from men she has known in the past; more often due to over indulging in booze.

"I am not Cutter..." his voice trails off in sobbing, he attempts to hide himself; trying to put a brave face on but the sheer extent of his burden is too much.

Dexter goes up to him. She reaches out to him- he pulls away.

"Go away.." Walker turns his face from the young woman.

"No I won't Alan. What's the matter? What have they done to you?" Mary is right by him now.

"I don't know...I can't think straight...I.." he looks up at her, huddled on floor, looking pathetic, "I..I..I've failed."

"Failed what Alan?"

"Being...being," he falls back onto the floor seeming to have trouble standing up or coordinating himself.

Dexter crouches down and takes hold of him, hugging the man close, trying to understand, "quiet..whatever it is, it isn't worth all this now is it?"

The soldier feels ashamed and disgraced. To show such weakness, when the Univarians left him, a sudden wave of past caught up with him. It went beyond words, his soul returned. The events that occurred since he was taken into the Univarians craft, drifting from Holodern IV, all of it makes no sense, enough to drive a man insane.

"What are you thinking Alan?" Dexter realizes she must reach this recluse.

"What is there to think?" He is gathering his composure, his eyes are reddened, swollen from crying for so long.

"Don't back off from me Walker...come on Alan..what did they do to you?"

He doesn't hug her so close now, physically and mentally he is beginning to distance himself. Dexter knows that he shouldn't do this, not yet, after all there is only her and him in the hall.

"Are you okay now?" She watches the man as he stands, shaking himself like a dog that has just been thrown into a stagnant pond.

"Fine," Walker answers embarrassed by what she has just seen, but moving on, composing himself, he turns his thoughts to getting back to his ship.

"You seem different, "Dexter offers.

"In what way?" Alan asks.

"Better?"

"Maybe," Walker scratches his head, he checks the kit on his suit, even though he doesn't have to.