This work is derived from Characters and Situations that are Copyright
and/or Trademark AIC, and Pioneer LDCA, all public or commercial use of
this material would require the very unlikely permission of the original
copyright holders.
      The ideas projected in this work are strictly the product of the
imagination of the author, inevitably reflecting his mind, and should in
no way be taken to reflect on the originals from which they are derived.
	The following is an attempt by this author to project something about
the inner life of Ryouko. By necessity any honest attempt to examine the
inner life of someone like Ryouko will contain matters that are
considered ADULT in nature, including explicit descriptions of sexuality
and bodily function. If you are under 18 years old, or reside in a
jurisdiction where such materials are illegal, do not continue to read,
or download this material, but rather exit this page immediately.
     Please note: This story is not written as erotic entertainment.
     If that's what you're looking for, you will be disappointed.
     You may find some of the imagery disturbing.
	The Ryouko of this story is the Ryouko of the "Tenchi Muyo: Ryo-ohki"
original video series. While the series contains no such explicit
statements, the CDs, several published assertions by AIC, and published
interviews by both Mr. Hayashi and Mr. Kajishima, the credited
co-creators of "Tenchi Muyo", assert that Ryouko was kept from any
social contact with human beings by Kagato. The usual result of such an
upbringing, even in the absence of other forms of abuse, is a person
unable to function at all. It is this author's theory that the presence
of a sentient companion in the form of the original Ryo-ohki made it
possible for Ryouko to survive, psychically.
	Special thanks to the Parrot King for a very helpful preread and useful
suggestions for improving the story.

     PROLOGUE

Washu's voice: "Ryo-ohki"
The creature Ryo-ohki: "Meow?"
Washu's mind: Your caller is born.
Ryo-ohki's mind:?
Washu's mind: Examine this being, this blank tablet of a mind. If you
are willing, if you accept her, I will unseal your bonding instinct.
Ryo-ohki's mind:?
Washu's mind: That bond is the bond for which you were created. She will
call, and you will summon your other parts. At that time you will be
able to express your higher being. Together, you and your caller shall
explore the cosmos.
The creature Ryo-ohki: "Mewow?"
Washu's voice: "She is called Ryouko. It is a name that means she is the
caller."
Ryo-ohki's mind: ?
Washu's mind: She is blank because that is the way with humans. We are
not created with a whole and functioning mind, but are self organized by
the summing of our experiences. Nothing of her character is preordained,
and we must take it a little on faith.
	With her, even more so than with ordinary humans, it will take many
years for the mind to mature and become fixed; perhaps as long as ten
thousand years. Ryouko will be a part of your very being, and you a part
of hers. If you accept her, you must protect her as your own.
Ryo-ohki's mind: She is warm and cuddly of spirit. Bonding is accepted.
Washu's mind: Ah, I pray that the prescience with which your higher
dimensional self is endowed sees true. Kami-sama has denied me a true
vision of her future, because she is in fact my daughter.
Washu's mind aside to itself: What have I done?

           NINGYO NO YUME

	The first things the girl remembered were a face, and a mind. Later on,
she decided that the face must have been a reflection, because the face
so resembled her own, except for color. The mind which intimately
touched her own was that of the creature she would come to know as
Ryo-ohki. Where her first vision had been a face surrounded by red, with
eyes that reflected a dark olive green, rather than the glowing light
caramel color that she found in the mirror; the mind which first touched
her was the only reality that was her own for a very long time.
	The second things she remembered were also a face and a mind. The face
was a more squared off, with a larger nose, and pale wavy yellow hair.
The eyes were yellow bodied, with small, dark red irises barely
distinguishable from the pupils. The mind was outside, and pawed at the
surface of her psyche in a fundamentally disquieting way. She would
quickly learn to associate that face with the name Kagato, and the
sensation of pain. Early on, a hand reached to her, turning her by her
chin, first one way, then the other. The hand brought her back eye to
eye. Those eyes made her uncomfortable, so she tried to turn away. The
hand wrenched her back, but she continued to resist.
	Then an alien presence reached into her mind from outside, and a
painful shock coursed through her body. When it stopped, she was limp
and unresisting. Something pink and brown streaked into her field of
vision, but the importuning hand batted it away. The alien presence
reached into her mind again, and she felt her limbs move to a will other
than her own. Her arms and legs moved this way and that, seemingly
without reason. The face was contorted with the expressions she would
later learn to call laughter.
	Afterward, a brown furry creature with pink lined long floppy ears,
massing perhaps three kilos, hopped into the space in which she was
confined, and it's tenderly concerned mental presence chased away the
nasty feel left by the other. She could see herself through the
creature's eyes, and what she saw was a towering bipedal mass of pale
pinkish tan perhaps a hundred seventy centimeters tall topped by the
large flattened bare face she would come to know as "human", and bright
spiky shocks of cyan colored hair.
	She sat down and the creature hopped onto her belly, it's soft fur and
caring mind soothing her jangled nerves.
	Sometime later, on a schedule she would only later come to understand,
humanoid metal servitors came and escorted her to a form-fitting seat in
front of a console, with screens. Displays and sounds bombarded her.
Some of the sounds were repeated in association with holographic
projections, and gradually she began to respond, imitating the sounds.
There were three that she learned in that first session and never
forgot. The second face was "Kagato", the small brown creature
"Ryo-ohki", and she learned to call her own image "Ryouko"
	Her mind was very tired by the time the console went dark, and
servitors led her to a space where warm water was sprayed on her until
it ran deep on the floor. Then strong currents of warm air played on her
body till it was dry, and she was led to a small space, perhaps two
meters in diameter, with a soft floor, and a loose two meter square of
soft material resembling Ryo-ohki's fur. The lights dimmed, and as she
slipped into the altered state of consciousness known as sleep, Ryo-ohki
joined her. Together they snuggled under the covers and dreamed the
formless dreams of the newborn.
	Lights brightened, and servitors came to escort her to the console; a
routine that was to be repeated indefinitely many times until it became
part of her nature. With the second session, words were added for parts
of her body, and for other things she was shown. Another element was
added; at the first it's meaning was obscure to her. This element was
projected sequences of large creatures pouncing on smaller ones, tearing
them apart, and disposing of the pieces through the body opening called
"mouth".
	When the second session ended, and she was warm and dry in her little
place, Ryouko again started drifting into sleep. The alien mind came and
prodded her back awake. Outside the entrance to her space, there were
faint scurrying sounds. Ryouko crawled out of her bed and peered out the
opening of the den that had been provided for her. In the dim light,
Ryouko's superbly sensitive eyes could see faint silvery shapes about
half the size of the creature Ryo-ohki, moving about in the training
area. 
	On that second night Ryouko did little other than watch, but there was
a third night, and many more. However, after a while, she began to
realize that she was supposed to behave as those creatures in the
projections, the ones that caught, dismembered, and disposed of the
smaller ones.
	Ryouko had not yet learned to handle her body, and her first attempts
to capture the night creatures were not very effective, but the lessons
now included clips showing how to efficiently move the type of body that
she had, in addition to the four legged ones. She also noticed that some
of the servitors were built on the same pattern as herself, and she
began to unconsciously imitate their meticulously correct upright manner
of walking. After twenty or so days, her mastery of her body was
improving, she began closing in on her prey.
	A night came when she caught one of the night creatures in her hand. It
struggled fiercely, and nipped her fingers, hurting. In a moment's fury,
she brought the creature to her mouth, to bite it's neck, as she had
seen in the projections. The creature stopped struggling, frozen in
terror. Ryouko caught the momentary glint of fear on her mind, and
hesitated. She checked the sensations of her body, found no call from
her body to carry through with this act. She examined the fearful spark
of awareness in her hand, and released the creature.
	As soon as she released the creature, the lights came on, and Kagato
stepped into view. He hauled the girl to her feet and backhanded her
twice. Then he shocked her to limpness. Producing one of the night
creatures from inside his clothing, he wrung it's neck, and placed the
warm, twitching body in her mouth. Despite her condition, Ryouko reached
in with her mind and soothed the fading awareness of the dying creature,
and sent it on it's way. Only then did she obey Kagato's mental command
to eat the still warm and pulsing body.
	The living blood of the creature tasted soft and salty, after the
metallic tingle left in her mouth by Kagato's shocks. Afterward she was
thirsty, and Kagato allowed her to drink. This was a strange new
sensation to her, as she had never eaten nor drank before.
	Kagato talked at her, ignoring the fact that she could not yet
understand.
	"So, Ryouko. If I cannot make a beast of you, you shall be my machine.
Yes, yes, you shall be my little ningyo, my slave, my marionette.
	Servitors! Starting with this morning's sessions, you will dress the
subject Ryouko, per my specifications,  and begin teaching her body
modesty as per Jurai standards."
	Ryouko was then escorted back to her space, and the lights were again
dimmed.
	In the morning, when she was led out into the training area, there was
a slight uncomfortable pressure in her groin, and between her buttocks.
She tensed against that pressure as the servitors raised her arms above
her head and placed a large brown fabric sack over her, with openings
for the head and arms. The servitors then led her to the training
console and she sat down.
At this time she relaxed the tension in her body. A stream of liquid
poured onto the seat, and a little pushing relieved the second pressure
when a small pellet of soft matter was expelled from her body, and
squished in the seat. She stood up, trying to remove the sack from
herself and examine the product of her body, but the servitors
surrounded her and prevented her. Instead they seized her, removing the
sack forcibly, and applied cleaning extensions to the substances, and to
the parts of her body they came from. It was not a comfortable process.
	The liquid and solid materials were efficiently removed, and the fabric
sack was replaced over her body. The next several learning sessions were
devoted to the proper disposal of any future product from her body.
Finally the sessions came to an end and she was returned to her night
place. The ambient light dimmed, and the temperature dropped, causing
her to curl up under her blanket. For reasons known only to Kagato,
Ryo-ohki was now allowed to join her in the night, curled up under her
chin, her soft fur cuddled between Ryouko's warm breasts.
	Ryouko and her companion dreamed of a void. Ryo-ohki's mind sparked the
void with sharp blue points of light. Somewhere in that void was a
comforting presence. As she floated towards that presence, a face
intervened, the second face, the one called Kagato. It cut her off from
comfort, and a remembrance of electricity cut away the memory of
comfort. She woke up sweating, fearing the wetness; thinking that in
this lapsed state she might have forgotten the earlier lesson. Somehow
she already knew that Kagato would not be pleased if she did not
remember the lessons. After careful examination, she decided the leakage
was from the surface of her skin, and she tried to return to that
earlier floating sensation of dream.
	From then on, each "day", as she now learned to call the warm, lighted
periods, she was kept in some sort of body wrapping all the time except
for washings at the beginning and end of each day. Thanks to whatever
processes had preserved infant plasticity in her mind, it was only a
matter of a few dozen more days that she began to string her words
together in the novel ways that sentient beings consider language.
	The next time she met Kagato, she was brought into his presence, in
previously unseen territory. She could see now that he was a being of
generally similar structure to herself, though more angular, and lacking
room for the soft hemispheres that filled out her upper torso, the
framework itself being larger. Without a word, the larger being struck
her on the side of her face. She slumped to her knees, weeping, and was
struck again. The third time, and fourth, she raised an arm to shield
herself. Kagato nodded in satisfaction. He turned to leave, paused, and
caused a shock to pass through Ryouko. Then he forced her body to bow to
him, and he departed.
	So it went for countless "days". A seemingly endless procession of
multimedia lessons was interspersed with occasional, increasingly
violent visits from Kagato. Each visit ended with Ryouko's
incapacitation and the seizing of her body. As Ryouko began to
understand the words, Kagato would finish by reminding her, "I am your
creator. I can make you do anything I wish."
	Gradually, Ryouko came to understand that she was aboard a ship, the
"Soja", swimming in the same great void of which Ryo-ohki dreamed. The
points of light in the void were the light of places called worlds; like
great ships, but inside out, with the living spaces open to the void.
The learning sessions were beginning to include some of the intricate
symbols that marked certain spaces within the ship, or certain controls
on devices. 
	A new element was added to her learning sessions when automata
resembling herself or Kagato would attack her, just as Kagato did during
his visits. She was given to understand that she was expected to fight
the attacks, which she did. Flesh against metal was always painful, but
her body would rapidly restore itself after any damage, and gradually
she learned that by focusing her mind in a certain way, her fist would
harden, and transfer an unaccountable surfeit of kinetic energy,
sufficient to damage even the toughest of metal servitors. It seemed
strange, even then, that her body could violate the simple physical
principles that she was already learning about the behavior of inanimate
matter.
	Soon after she began damaging the metal servitors, they began moving
too fast for her to dodge or block. One time, anticipating a painful
blow, she discovered that her body had instantaneously displaced by half
a meter, and the blow fell short. She soon mastered this new violation
of basic physics displayed by her body, and found the automata were
unable to land blows on her body in a face to face fight as a result.
Only by taking her by surprise could anything land a blow, and soon she
found that by the same sort of focus that made her fist so destructive,
any part of her body could dissipate the energy of a blow landed on it,
harmlessly.
	In general, now that she had mastered shielding and teleport, the only
source of physical pain in her world was once again Kagato himself.
	Now that she had some language and understanding, Kagato also became
the sole source of emotional pain. With words it became possible for the
master to communicate his contempt. During one visit, as she clumsily
sidestepped a blow, tripping on her own feet, he spat out "Your form is
so defective, it's almost hopeless"
	"Master, if my form is so displeasing, why did you design me thus?"
	He vanished from in front of her, materializing to one side, with his
right hand clamped around her throat. Swinging her around like a toy, he
smashed her against the nearest bulkhead.
	"Don't ever question me", he hissed.
	This was followed by a prolonged electric shock, so long she could not
recall it's duration. The stench of burned hair filled her nostrils, 
hot blisters rose on her fingers, and where her body pressed against the
deck. He dropped her to the floor and stalked away. In the following
minutes, as her body healed itself, she was mortified to discover that
during the prolonged electrocution she had soiled and wetted herself.
	She removed the sack that she was compelled to wear, and used it to
clean up the worst of her loss of control. Stuffing the soiled garment
into a disposal unit, she entered the shower, and found that it
automatically activated. On emerging, she was greeted by her most recent
robot tutor, a humanoid machine of bright golden metal.
	"Ryouko-san, you must not be seen like this by our lord."
	"Like this? You mean without that abominable sack?"
	"Yes, my lady. Have you learned nothing in our lessons on body modesty?
It is no wonder our lord is angry. It will take a few moments for the
systems to fabricate new cloth, it is not scheduled."
	"One more time, why must I be inside such an uncomfortable and awkward
piece of work?"
	"Almost all sentient species, and certainly all known humanoid species,
exercise some form of body modesty."
	"But, according to Lord Kagato, I am an automaton, a creation like
yourself?"
	"So M'lord says", the machine looked the naked girl up and down, "You
certainly look like you were patterned after a human being, then, the
same species as our lord."
	About this time the replacement garment appeared. Ryouko struggled into
that unflattering sack.
	"Teach me more about these human beings, and their notions of body
modesty."
	"That is not what is scheduled for today's lessons."
	"How am I to please the lord, if I do not understand what he expects of
me?"
	"Very well" The android socketed a finger in a nearby panel. Moments
later, it unsocketed and turned to her. "M'lord's instructions are
clear. The teaching paths may be modified within certain parameters, in
order to maximize your learning potential. As I am to teach you
protocols for interfacing with other entities, living and automated,
your request is within those parameters."
	Following the android's gestures, Ryouko seated herself at a teaching
console.
	"Human beings are the most widespread humanoid sentients in the local
cluster. Their genetic structure is based on the DNA molecule, a
chemical system of self-replication. As with all higher multi-cellular
organisms of this type, new individuals are produced by a process of
genetic sharing and recombination called sexual reproduction.
	The genetic sharing process is facilitated by dimorphism, that is; one
form of the organism, called the male, donates genetic material, while
the other form, called female, cultures and harbors the resulting new
organism within her body until it matures enough to survive in the
environment. Due to the portion of female body resources devoted to this
reproductive process, the primitive result is a certain amount of
dependence by the female, and dominance by the male. Furthermore, the
new human organism remains dependent for an extended period of thirty or
more galactic years, during which it's primary nurture is commonly
assigned to the female.
	Humans desiring to reproduce form more or less strong and exclusive
pair bonds, and their evolution has provided a high level of pleasure
and desire for reproductive behavior. Their cultures and religions
contain elaborate rituals and complex protocols for the regulation of
this behavior. Much of human modesty is focused around the bodily
functions relating to reproduction and excretion.
	Further details concerning the sources of human body modesty may be
found under the following headings: Anatomy and Physiology, Folk
Customs, Religion, Health and Disease, and Psychology."
	Not all the words in the lesson made sense yet to the girl,
particularly the names of the headings for further study, but she
persisted, desiring to understand. It took her several dozen days of
intensive study to begin to make sense of just the basic points and
headings the teaching console contained concerning body modesty. There
was much for her to ponder.
	First, given that her body was patterned after the human female, why
should it contain the machineries of reproduction? Self examination
showed her that her external detail exactly replicated a woman. Initial
probing showed her that she had a vaginal passage and cervix exactly
like those depicted in the anatomy lessons. Oh, yes, and the pleasure
sensations fingering the externals of that area produced? She felt sure
that she should not draw attention to that discovery.
	In a moment of inspiration, she asked the console if it could produce a
scan of herself similar to the magnetic resonance images she had been
shown. Indeed it could, and the resulting scans showed her body to have
all the detailed structures of human anatomy. This puzzled her greatly,
as she pondered over the twin horned image of her own uterus, and it's
dependent ovaries. What need could there be for a simulacrum such as
herself to have all those internals? 
	About this time, she suffered another visit from Kagato. He pried open
the surface of her mind, and found sufficient cause to punish her as
usual. As she lay twitching on the floor after his usual parting shot,
he spoke: "You can leave off contemplating your miserable defective
body, and start studying your Ryo-ohki's space flight abilities. I'll be
sending you out soon."
	In the background she could see him disassembling the golden android by
pulling it's limbs from their sockets, muttering "That's the last time I
use a servitor from that empire".
	Studying Ryo-ohki was quite a revelation. The small furry creature was
actually the controlling mind of a substantial space ship, which she
kept tucked away in a subspace, keyed and accessible through the red gem
in her forehead. It was then that Ryouko first thought anything of the
red gems imbedded in her own wrists and throat. According to the
lessons, these gems were the source of her own energies, and the reason
she did not need sustenance, like a creature, or outside electric power,
like the mechanical servitors. A little probing of Ryo-ohki's mind
showed Ryouko that the creature could see and touch the hyperspatial
structure of each of these gems. At her then present level of
understanding, Ryouko's perceptions of the gems meant little to her.
	The lessons taught her that there was some sort of psychic bond between
herself and Ryo-ohki. At her calling, Ryo-ohki would be empowered to
form herself into a space ship. The space ship form of Ryo-ohki turned
out to be largely formed of silicon carbide fibers. Great tapered spikes
of fiber composite formed a shape something like a star-thistle, with a
large gem set in the middle. With a radial symmetry, the gem might be
thought of as the "Top", and the fiber spikes as surrounding, with one
larger spike protruding downwards. The gem, a hollow oblate spheroid of
red tinted aluminum oxide, would serve as Ryouko's cabin within the
living structure.
	The whole ship would be about two hundred meters across, and the
outside of the cabin around fifty meters. Within the great bottom spike
were coiled hyperspatial organs capable of transferring large quantities
of kinetic energy to any matter that happened to be in line with the
axis of the spike; this would constitute Ryo-ohki's primary weapon, a
sort of remote ram. The complex inner structure of the ship-creature was
composed of living crystals, each of which contained the patterns of a
subservient replica of the small furry creature that was their mind.
Certain of the living crystals contained a library of templates for a
vast variety of objects that Ryouko might need. 
	According to the tutorials, Ryouko could link herself telepathically,
through Ryo-ohki's mind, to any of the object libraries, and jump
through them, teleport-wise, to pull out objects. Perhaps the most
intriguing was a library of clothes. Linking herself, Ryouko searched
through the clothes library for a garment more pleasing than the
shapeless sacks provided by Kagato's automata. Mentally spotting an item
tagged "Combat suit", she tried jumping through the link. To her
surprise, instead of coming out of the teleport jump with garment in
hand, she found herself wearing the skin-tight red and black body-suit.
	It did not escape her notice that the variety of garments in the object
library was conceptually very different from what Kagato's automata
provided. She simply didn't know what to make of that at the time, so
she filed it away mentally for later consideration.
	As far as piloting the space ship was concerned, it was largely a
matter of understanding the capabilities of the ship, and telling
Ryo-ohki what she wanted, through their telepathic link.
	The day came quickly, on which the tutorial machines determined that
Ryouko was ready for her first venture into space. Kagato himself turned
out for the event, and allowed Ryouko to prepare unmolested, as he had
reason to want her first flight to be a success. Ryouko followed her
lord to an outside cabin, the creature Ryo-ohki was in the crook of her
left arm under her breast. 
	Kagato noted Ryouko's choice of garments with evident distaste. "I see
you have decided to make use of the object templates that came with our
pet."
	"According to the labels, and the tutorial information, this suit
provides the best functionality for exposure of my body to the open
space environment, as well as potential weapon threats."
	Kagato nodded curtly, and the outer wall vanished.
	For a suspended moment in time, Ryouko was overcome, frozen with
terror. The infinity of space yawned before her, overwhelming her
senses. Then it all snapped into place, disorientation and fear were
replaced with awe. There were the glowing traces of stars and nebulae,
spread out for trillions and trillions of Kilometers, as she understood,
against the inky darkness of eternity. 
	Ryo-ohki leaped from Ryouko's arm, and through a process that defied
the senses, unfolded into the vast spiked form that Ryouko had been
studying. She teleported into the cabin space, realizing that she was
now inside the creature that cuddled with her at night, and shared her
dreams.
	Ryouko communed with her ship, and they set off on the three day voyage
to the nearest star system, exactly as instructed by Kagato. As her body
tired of her standing stock still, staring out through several meters of
pure aluminum oxide at the void, one of Ryo-ohki's crystals formed
itself into a molded seat, fitting her backside, and another presented
itself half a meter before her, as a display. Within that display were
the same tutorials and references that resided in Kagato's teaching
consoles, with one exception. The initialization screen read, in ornate
calligraphic ideographs, "Jurai Imperial Encyclopedia; restricted
access, Jurai citizens only."
	As soon as Ryouko came to some of what she now understood was
discretionary time in her tutorial sessions, she directed the display to
show the reference "Jurai". 
	"Jurai is our home world, giving it's name to our empire, of the
dominant human power in the Milky Way Galaxy. The home world is a small,
high-density world, about ten thousand Kilometers in diameter, orbiting
a stable, isolated G0 class star. Orbital period, rotational period, and
gravitational constant are the accepted reference standards for galactic
humanity. The flora and fauna of this planet are DNA based, as may be
expected of a human world.
	A water world, as are almost all human inhabited worlds, Jurai's land
masses are all island continents, allowing the world ocean free
circulation. As a result, the climate is wet, warm, and relatively
constant from equator to pole, but subject to powerful global weather
systems. The land masses are covered largely with a forest and meadow
type of biome."
	Here the display showed a series of images of expanses of vegetation,
towering over a variety of humanoids that Ryouko already understood
would be in the same size range with herself. The larger, adult
humanoids were all wearing various forms of body covering robes, which
were more or less imitated in miniature for the children. One picture
showed unclothed children bathing in quantities of standing water, out
under a bright blue sky. She clicked on the picture, which then showed a
video clip a couple of minutes long, with narration.
	"Pre adolescent children are temporarily freed from the strict nudity
taboos of Juraian society during the Startica summer solstice
celebration on the northern islands, not far from the capitol."
	Ryouko stopped the loop and enlarged it, to consider the visible
differences between the boys and girls. Despite already having a
glimmering of understanding of the evolutionary causes behind external
genitalia, she found the lumpy, irregular extrusions on the male somehow
amusing. As always, the sleekness of the female form seemed to her to
make sense of the general preference of human artists for the female
form.
	She speculated briefly about the sensations of bathing in so much
pooled water, and of being naked, exposed on the outside of a world.
Somewhere in Ryo-ohki's object templates she recalled seeing something
tagged "Onsen", noting that "Onsen" meant a bathing facility built
around a natural hot spring. It would be interesting to try it out
sometime, if she had the opportunity and the nerve.
	Another picture under the "Jurai" reference also intrigued her. It
showed a group of colorfully robed men and women on a round wooden
platform under a towering tree. One of the women had striking blue hair,
and her raiment included a yellow metal plate about twenty centimeters
square, suspended over her chest by a braided fiber covered chain around
the neck. When played, the activities meant little to her, but the
narration was interesting.
	"Jurai Imperial Shinto celebrates the imperial family's historic
reliance on the power of the Royal Trees. Here, the High Priestess,
traditionally chosen from among the unmarried princesses of the royal
line, invokes the power of Tsunami. She is held to be the divine
ancestor of the imperial family; the power behind both the Royal Trees,
and the imperial family's extraordinary wooden ships, the most powerful
in the galaxy."
	Ryouko clicked on the name Tsunami.
	"Tsunami, the Lady of Mystery, is the ancestral goddess of the Jurai
imperial family. She is generally worshipped in the form of a flowering
broadleaf tree. It is said that the power of the imperial family is the
power of Tsunami.
	Tsunami is also the name of the legendary Original Space Tree, The Ship
of the Beginning, in which the royal ancestors migrated to Jurai.
	Some Jurai scholars hold that the two Tsunamis, goddess and ship, are
one and the same. Spokespersons for the imperial family discourage
speculation, but Imperial Shinto practice makes no distinction between
the two."
	The skin tightened on the back of Ryouko's neck. If she could have
seen, her hair moved with it, standing out like a frightened cat's. 
	That night Ryouko slept alone on the floor of the control room.
Ryo-ohki made the spot soft, and provided her with a blanket, but this
was the first time in a thousand nights that Ryouko had slept without
the furry creature cuddled warm against her. Knowing she was inside that
creature made her feel small and helpless. As she drifted off to sleep,
she left her mind link open, dreaming the splendid void in which her
ship swam.
	There was another presence dreaming the void. This presence was of a
rooted being, that simply spread itself daily before the warmth and
light on the outside of a world, feeding itself on the glow. The dream
was the remembrance of a girl similar in body to Ryouko, but she was
stumbling through a forest, wearing a girdle and leggings of skins
borrowed from animals. She was cold, and the forest was brushed with
frost. Her bare feet were numb, and her upper body was poorly protected
by a loose cloak of fur. Her naked breasts were covered with grease, and
tickled by a necklace of ivory hooks that she knew as teeth of a cave
bear, whatever that was.
	Midori knew she was in trouble. The warning had always been given, "If
you are out in the cold, and you start to feel warm and drowsy, keep
moving. If you lie down, you will never get up." She stumbled sprawling
against the trunk of a tree, it's rough bark scratching her breasts and
inner arms as she embraced it. The tree felt warm, and now it was
talking to her. 
"Poor lost child, come inside, and live with me, and share with me the
joys of your life."
	Somehow, impossibly, the trunk of the tree was opened, and swallowing
her cold, dying body. It was so warm inside, and the spirit of the tree
radiated love. Midori gave herself over to the embrace of the tree, the
promised embrace of life beyond the cold death.
	Ryouko half awakened, feeling the continued presence of the tree in her
dream.
	"Who are you?"
	"I shall forever remain your lady of mysteries, but Midori was no
dream, but rather a memory of twenty thousand years ago. Poor lost
child, the resemblance in spirit to Midori is startling; perhaps
reincarnation, ne? Abandon that cold liar Kagato and come to me, I will
welcome you as my sister welcomed Midori."
	"Where are you, mysterious lady?"
	Suddenly, the presence of this other was gone, replaced by the all too
familiar presence of fear; the presence of Kagato himself. The mind of
Kagato seemingly sniffed around, sensing something amiss, but he could
only dominate and read the outer, physical layer of her mind. Her dreams
and inner reflections always eluded him. As if he could be bothered with
the inner thoughts of this created girl, this defective slave of his.
	"Wake up time, little ningyo. Just checking. Never forget my reach, I
will always be right behind you."
	And he was gone.
	Later that morning, the tutorials led her through the most intricate
technique she had yet attempted. Focusing her mind, and directing it
toward her wrist jewels, she was able to form a lattice from the very
essence of the higher dimensions. The tutorials led her to shape this
lattice into a blade. Suffused with energy, this glowing blade would
sustain itself only as long as she continued providing it with energy
from her gems. As a demonstration, the tutorials directed Ryo-ohki to
capture a nickel-iron meteor, which the blade carved through without
detectable resistance. The surfaced of the cut meteor showed a
perceptively perfect polish, and there was no noticeable loss of mass.
	This blade was yet another series of violations of the laws of physics
which the tutorials were carefully teaching her. The blade exhibited
approximately the weight and inertia of a piece of half centimeter
aluminum rod the same length. When she was instructed to drop the blade,
it clattered to the deck and dissipated over a period of several
seconds, with a wash of heat, the hiss and crackle of corona discharge,
and a loud complaint from Ryo-ohki, the owner of the deck.
	Ryo-ohki produced a couple of humanoid automata, the first of which
assaulted Ryouko with a metal blade. The moment the metal blade
contacted the energy one, it was severed. In her efforts to avoid being
struck by the remnant, she almost missed her counter, and was barely
able to slice the oncoming android without receiving a nasty concussion.
The second android was a different story, it formed an energy blade,
which was able to oppose her own. Except for the lack of weight and
perfect rigidity, it was very much like fencing with metal blades. The
pace of the bout was furious, and she was hard put again to avoid
painful injury.
	Afterward she showered and went back to her studies. There was one more
combat technique to master, but one which would require a broader
practice field than would be available inside either the Soja or
Ryo-ohki. Cupping a hand as a guide, she could form a ball of
superheated plasma, with a massive electrical charge, contained in a
less stable version of the dimensional matrix that made up the blade.
She she should be able to project such an object at will, at several
hundred meters per second. She realized that this was indeed not a
weapon she wished to unleash within her own Ryo-ohki, or even the larger
confines of the Soja. Now she had some glimmering why Kagato had chosen
this time for her to make her first foray into the outer universe.
	Finally she came to the discretionary study period. The first word she
looked up was "goddess".
	"Goddesses are deities envisioned as possessing a female gender
identity. Although certain species, such as the Cephalopods of Thallassa
Major, assume a female gender for their deities, among sentients of the
Milky Way Galaxy, only humans worship deities differentiated by gender.
The best known goddesses of Galactic civilization are Tsunami, of the
Jurai Royals, and Miaow, the supreme goddess of the so called "cat
people" of Felix Regina.
	Galaxy wide anthropological studies indicate a general human preference
for female deities. However, most human technological societies are male
dominated and eschew the female, preferring a male supreme deity, and
relegating females to secondary roles. There is a tension in particular
between Jurai commoners and Royals, with commoners generally regarding
the male form as the ideal, and female form as inherently defective."
	Clicking through to "Miaow", Ryouko read her first account of the human
penchant for discrimination and oppression.  Accompanying the article on
Miaow was an illustration of a statue. The statue was of a humanoid,
almost human female, with the eyes and ears of a cat. What struck Ryouko
about the statue was that it had the same outsized eyes with slitted
pupils as herself. 
	When Ryouko clicked back, and clicked on "cat people", there was an
audible intake of breath. The sidebar images showed people, particularly
women, in her own image. Women with slinky figures, full breasts, cat's
eyes, and great shocks of spiky, bright hair in various colors peopled
the images.
	"Despite a fifteen thousand year history of exploitation and slavery,
the cat people of Felix Regina have long been shown to be perfectly
human. The minor behavioral and anatomical variations, as in many other
instances of human racial discrimination, cannot be used to justify
history. The compelling example for the worth of these galactic citizens
is the legendary master scientist of the Royal Science Academy on
Todain, Hakubi Washu, who was a native of Felix Regina. 
The exploitation of cat women's heightened libido in the Jurai and
Galactic sex trades has been explicitly condemned by the Holy Council,
and any further participation by Jurai citizens in the exploitation of
so called "cat slaves" is strictly forbidden on penalty of permanent
disenfranchisement.
	Felix Regina obtained independence seven galactic years ago, and was
accorded immediate recognition by the Holy Council.
	For further study see History, Genetic Variation, Culture, Trade."
	She selected the name Hakubi Washu, and was rewarded with a slightly
disturbing picture of an older cat woman, with dark olive eyes, and a
face framed by spikes of bright red hair, wearing the ceremonial robes
of the Academy. There was something about the image that she tried to
remember, but the memory was too deeply buried in the mists of origin
for her to recover.
	Ryouko could hardly contain her curiosity as she clicked on Genetic
Variation.
	"The felids of Felix Regina commonly possess a distinctive set of
genetic traits that set them apart from the human norm; however it must
always be emphasized that this in no way diminishes their humanity.
	The most visible of these variations is found in the eyes, which are
about ten percent larger than the human norm, and possess slitted
pupils. The catlike appearance of these eyes is no illusion. The iris
has detailed structure identical with that found in true felines. This
construction allows a much larger dilation of the pupil than is possible
with normal human iris structure, at a very small cost in visual acuity.
Maximum dilations of fifteen millimeters or more are common, whereas
normal human pupils are limited to about eight millimeters.
	A second highly visible variation is that the canine teeth are sharp
and slightly longer than the galactic norm. This variation alone is not
an indicator of felid heritage, as it occurs on at least a dozen other
worlds, and is within the range of normal human variation.
	A third felid variation is the presence of a plush furred prehensile
tail in about one third of the population. Even where the tail is
absent, the nerves for it's control are present, and at autopsy may be
considered diagnostic of felid heritage.
	The theory of biomorphic fields lends a scientific gloss to our
understanding that isolated human groups such as the felids of Felix
Regina may mold themselves to a limited extent in the shapes and
behaviors that they admire or worship."
 	That night, as Ryouko slept, the mysterious lady and the figure of
Midori once again inhabited her dreams. It seemed a vivid dream of
remembering, and she was the female shaman of her village. The village
did not have any distinct name, it was "The village", and her people
were simply "The people". It was a mid-winter's night, and she was
slightly groggy from prolonged chanting and drinking of fermented goat's
milk. It was very warm in her hut from the recent crowd of people and
the celebratory fire. Midori was not alone.
	One of the village boys, an unmarried boy near her own age, had
lingered after the solstice celebration, and was now burrowing his way
among the furs piled at the back of Midori's hut. Midori chose to allow
him his behavior. As he found her in the darkness and ran his hands over
her freshly greased body, a thrill of desire ran through her loins.
	"Taro, you'll ruin your marriage prospects"
	As shaman, Midori was responsible for the consecration of marriages,
and everyone's spiritual welfare. As shaman, Midori was an outcast, and
unmarriageable.
	"Just for this one night, I don't care"
	 Midori balanced the causes and costs, and shrugged. Her hands slipped
down Taro's body until they found the object of desire. Taro's organ,
warm and firm, filled her hands. Midori parted her thighs, and pressed
that organ against her most secret places.
	Ryouko woke up once, and that mysterious lady was present in her mind.
	"Come to me, little one, and I will find someone for you. It is not
good to be alone."
	Ryouko woke up again, and she was snug under her blanket, within her
beloved Ryo-ohki. Her hand was pressed warm between her thighs, and it
was slick with the unfamiliar fluids of desire.
	In the morning, Ryouko showered, dressed, and commenced studies of her
destination. The world where she was going was an uninhabited but living
world, full of DNA based life. On the cold and bleak side, as living
worlds go, this world was half covered with ice, much of the rest with
cold but fertile oceans, and small, windswept islands. She was curious
to note that the primary land predators were felines.
	The day's workout session was routine, then came her discretionary
time. She surveyed some of the vast collection of costumes in Ryo-ohki's
object files. It had come to her mind that there were several costumes
with the notation "Includes neurally linked responsive tail" She decided
to try it.
	Leaping through the object space, she emerged wearing a flared floor
length dress of broad blue and yellow horizontal stripes. Low around the
waist was a belt knotted in back with a half meter remainder draping
behind. Experimentally, she bent around to examine the tail of the belt,
and was pleased to see it twitch upward and around where she could view
it. A brief fun session of what one might call tail chasing ensued, only
interrupted by Ryo-ohki's announcement that they had arrived at their
destination.
	Ryouko teleported through the "object file" dimension, picking her
combat suit, and then teleported outside. The air was cold on her face
and ears, but the remainder of her body was perfectly isolated from the
cold by the combat suit. She found herself in a rocky, snow bottomed
canyon, facing out toward a cold gray sea. Above and behind her loomed
the Ryo-ohki, as she floated a hundred meters above the white landscape.
	She fumbled her first attempt at a plasma ball, dropping it into the
snow below, where it sizzled for a few seconds, and then detonated with
a muffled boom. Her second attempt went a little better, arcing outward
to the canyon wall, and exploding on contact. Soon she was barraging the
canyon with volleys of increasingly accurate fire on progressively
flatter trajectories. The canyon was beginning to heat up. Trickles of
melt water began flowing, accumulating on the frozen stream down the
middle. Turning up canyon, she tried one final enhancement to her
technique. With a fierce surge of willed energy, she projected a rod of
captive plasma in a ruler strait line, at a velocity well over the local
speed of sound. Leaping from her hand with a shimmering cone of shock
wave, the plasma bolt slammed into a coniferous tree, igniting it
despite the frigid conditions.
	Beyond the burning tree she heard a mewling sound, somewhat akin to the
sounds emitted by the creature Ryo-ohki. Searching for the source of the
sound, she located a small den scratched into the rocky soil. In that
den were several kittens of the distinctive variety she instantly
recognized from pictures as "Lynx". She reached into the den, only to be
rewarded with a painful nip on the hand. Hearing a hiss, she turned to
find an adult Lynx glaring at her, all teeth, spiked hair, and claws.
The adult was clearly intent on assaulting her.
	A malign presence over her shoulder commanded "Destroy them".
	"Doshite?" she shrugged, and ignored the voice. Instead she stared into
those cat's eyes, far more akin to her senses than her putative lord.
Relaxing, she floated away from the furious Lynx and her kittens,
turning to stare into the flames of the burning tree. The frustrated
malice of Kagato's presence promised more pain, but somehow it didn't
matter.
	Returning to the Ryo-ohki, Ryouko saw that it was nearing bedtime, and
that she should bathe. On a whim she leapt through the object file
dimensions and pulled out the "Onsen" object. She was astonished to
discover that a dome nearly the size of Ryo-ohki's control room was now
hovering next to the space ship. Teleporting into the dome, she found
herself in a sort of terrarium, with tropical plantings surrounding
cascading wood lined tanks overflowing with steaming warm water. There
was enough wooden deck space between the open tanks and the plantings
for several adult humans to stretch out. 
	Returning her combat suit to the Object File space, she returned buck
naked to the dome, and eased her now tired body into the warm water.
Relaxing, she focused her eyes on the snow now falling onto the dome
delineated by a mesh of geodesic lines. The snow vanished without trace
at the boundary.
	After carefully reviewing in her memory the instructions on how one was
to bathe in an onsen, Ryouko finished her bathing, including washing her
hair. Then she stretched out prone on the deck and telepathically
commanded the onsen to dry her. Currents of warm dry air wafted over her
body and she began to drowse. As she turned over on her back, the
creature Ryo-ohki joined her, cuddling alongside her, in the crook of
her arm. She realized that Ryo-ohki had folded the presence of her ship
to join her, and she also realized she was naked to an open sky. It did
not feel exposed or vulnerable, but rather, very good.
	Spreading her legs, the girl ran a hand down the tender places between.
Smiling, she sighed, and addressed the open sky.
	"See, it is good to be a woman."
	Preoccupied at this idyll, Ryouko fell asleep. She awoke to an ominous
shadow. It was the Soja. Her hand slipped from it's comforting position
and she sat up. Kagato materialized in the onsen, and she leapt through
the object space, emerging in her combat suit. Ryo-ohki vanished and
unfolded outside, in her spaceship form.
	Kagato's face was curdled with fury.
	"How dare you refuse to destroy at my command?"
	A ball of plasma shot from Soja and the entire upper end of the canyon
was shattered by a violent explosion. Kagato forced a vision down his
telepathic link to her, of lynx and kittens shredded to bloody
fragments. This blended over somehow into a view of an "older" human
woman rising naked from beside a man, wiping her crotch with one hand,
and using the other hand to steady herself as she vomited.
	"I'll not have my little ningyo warrior turn into a lazy drunken
whore." Unbeknown to Kagato the words also leaked over telepathically;
"like my mother."
	What ensued was the worst electrical burning Ryouko had yet experienced
at Kagato's hands. Later, when she was recovering, Ryouko was pleased to
discover that the combat suit, by means of it's self-containment
functions, had prevented her from soiling herself.
	Kagato now instructed her.
	"Ryo-ohki will now take you to Theta Cetus Four, where you will
intercept an N-class subspace freighter, space the crew, and return the
ship to me."
	Almost as if the interlude on the frozen world hadn't happened,
Ryouko's routine of training and travel resumed, but Ryouko now had
several new words to trace through the tutorials and references made
available to her; words like "warrior", "drunken", "whore", and
"mother".

	So it went. Perhaps a dozen times Ryo-ohki and Ryouko swooped down on a
ship in the depths of space, rendering it lifeless. Never, in those
first raids, did they encounter significant resistance. Always, a clean
surgical strike eliminated life support. Not once did Ryouko encounter
the living occupants of a spacecraft. Once, while surveying a freshly
rendered hulk, she had encountered a lifeless humanoid form floating in
the vacuum, but was too distended to recognize as once having been
human. It had meant little to her.
	Kagato came to her. "I think you are ready now, my little ningyo. Your
image has been captured by spy cameras, and your red and black suited
form is now known throughout the galaxy as the demoness Ryouko, Space
Pirate."
	Kagato chuckled, secure in the knowledge that no civilized world would
now shelter her, or give her quarter.
	"I think you are ready now for a taste of real blood. There is this
world called Omicron Melisian", here he gave her the co-ordinates. "The
ruling royal family possesses an artifact, a crown, said to be older
than galactic civilization. This crown is known to endow it's owner with
great powers, said to be powers of domination, depending on the wearer's
strength of will. This crown is the source of the power that enables the
House of Melisian to rule.
	I want you to enter the royal palace, find the crown, and return it to
me undamaged. You will encounter resistance this time, and I expect you
to show me your best strength."
	It was a long voyage to Omicron Melisian. On a whim, Ryouko looked up
the term "Space Pirate". 
	"Space Pirate: an entity that engages in the theft of cargo or
kidnapping of people from space craft in violation of the accepted norms
of galactic civilization. Attempts at this form of criminal conduct are
rare, and are treated most severely by the law, being in many
jurisdictions the only crime remaining subject to capital punishment.
Despite, or perhaps because of, the severity of the crime, space pirates
are the subject of romantic novels in many human cultures."
	Perhaps it is not surprising that Ryouko spent almost every free moment
rifling the archives available to her for novels about female space
pirates. By the time she reached Omicron Melisian, Ryouko had had her
first taste of the vicarious pleasures of the romantic novel. Though her
understanding was limited, she liked what she read. As a result, while
Ryo-ohki bombarded the Melisian palace, Ryouko made a swashbuckling
entrance, unnecessarily blasting open the main gate, when she could have
simply walked through the walls.
	She found her way blocked by a large man swathed in bulky quilted
ballistic armor. "You devil",  the man cursed, spraying her with
projectiles from a rapid-firing ballistic weapon that an earthling might
call a sub-machinegun. The bullets deflected easily from her body
shields. She created an energy blade, and brought it down on the man's
weapon, as he raised it across to block the stroke.
	Discarding the pieces of his weapon, the man lunged at Ryouko. Despite
the futility of his attack, Ryouko slashed with her blade, and the man
fell screaming, blood pouring from a shallow cut through the vest of his
garment. Ryouko looked down at the wounded man. Though her intellect
understood the reality, she somehow expected the man to heal like she
did. She stood there for several seconds, hidden feelings roiling
beneath the surface of her mind.
	As the man continued to bleed and writhe in agony, Ryouko moved on.
Several more men challenged her in the courtyard, but fell back as she
ignored them, acting as if she were strolling alone. Entering the throne
room, she strode to the rear and walked through the back wall, into the
royal treasury. The din of the futile assault on her person vanished,
being replaced by the near silence of the vault. Near silence, because
she could hear the repressed breathing of a woman.
	With Ryouko in the closed vault, imagined by it's owners to be the
safest place on Omicron Melisian, was a young woman. She was seated and
holding a sleeping child. Ryouko recognized her from pictures Kagato had
provided, it was the Queen of Melisian. Ryouko raised her energy blade,
knowing Kagato would be angry if he ever became aware of her hesitation.
The Queen of Melisian, the young lady, covered her sleeping child, and a
feel of anguish passed that struck Ryouko in the pit of her being. Her
blade clattered to the floor and dissipated.
	She looked around and spotted the crown that Kagato coveted. She picked
it up.
	The Queen stood up and confronted her. "Please, slay me if you must,
but for the people's sake, leave the crown."
	Ryouko dematerialized, reappearing inside Ryo-ohki. She had the crown
in her hand.
	Ryouko was not surprised to find Soja lurking anonymously a few million
kilometers outward from Omicron Melisian. It was barely an hour since
the raid, when Ryouko handed the crown to Kagato. He held it in both
hands, focusing his will upon it.
	"Bah, it is merely a device for healing human infirmities." He dropped
the crown to the floor and crushed it with his booted heel.
	Smiling knowingly, Kagato turned to Ryouko. "So, little ningyo, did you
show them no mercy, as I have taught you?"
	He snapped his fingers, and a great ball of energy lanced out from
Soja. Over a period of perhaps five minutes Ryouko stood silently
watching Soja's grand display screen, as the world Omicron Melisian, and
everyone on it, dissolved in swirling torrents of fire.
	Not long afterward, Kagato sent Ryouko and Ryo-ohki on another mission
to raid a planet.
	As her ship swam in space, Ryouko dreamed. Midori was running through
the cold forest again. This time she was running toward what she now
knew as "her" tree. Several men from the "enemy" village were gathered
around her tree, and they were striking it with stone axes. Midori felt
each blow as if it were landing on her own body. The timing was perfect
for her tormentors, she stumbled into the circle of assailants, and they
slew her next to her fallen tree. Her spirit lingered to witness the
futile and ugly rape of her dead body, then drifted over to find the
smoldering ruins of her home village, with all it's inhabitants strewn
around dead.
	Ryouko awakened in hot stinking sweat. What seemed to be Midori's tree
had appeared again, now it was opening, and was swallowing her body
whole, through a great crack. She was having trouble breathing; that she
didn't really need to breath, for the moment eluded her consciousness.
	"Poor child. Kagato thinks to mark your spirit forever. Oh, he is
wrong, thank Kami-sama, he is so wrong, not with his mark."
	Ryouko woke again, alone with her Ryo-ohki.
	"Meow?"
	"I don't know, Ryo-ohki. I just don't know."
	The planet to which Kagato had sent her was beyond the galactic core,
and Ryo-ohki laid a course that took her near the monster black hole
that resides there. As the swirling, boiling clouds of glowing gasses
and dark dust of the galactic core swelled in her view, Ryo-ohki made
subtle adjustments to her course. One day, Ryouko woke to find they had
passed the galactic core, and were headed in a new direction.
	Ryouko peered into her starship's mind, and discovered the intent to
deceive.
	"Ryo-ohki, Kagato will surely punish you."
	"Meow!" "I don't care", was meaning of the creature's non-verbal
response.
	Anyway, as Ryo-ohki enlightened her telepathically, the girl realized
that thanks to time dilation as they had passed the black hole, several
years had gone by in the outside galaxy. It seemed unlikely that Kagato
or Soja had been able to follow her traces. Still well inside the
crowded confusion of the inner galaxy, Ryo-ohki plotted a course for a
planet with non-human, but DNA based inhabitants. With all the welter of
gasses, dust clouds, radio noise, and crowded stars, it was Ryo-ohki's
hope to make Kagato's search futile.
	Arriving, Ryo-ohki located a secluded tropical valley, deployed the
onsen, and folded her space ship away, becoming once again a small furry
creature. Taking counsel from her, Ryouko renounced her red and black
combat suit, and mostly went nude.
	It was not long before Ryouko encountered some of the natives,
creatures resembling meter tall penguins, with a bluish color to their
dark pattern. Talking to the local chief, who spoke galactic without a
trace of an accent, she was quickly made aware that the red and black
figure of "Ryouko the Space Pirate", was well known and feared. On the
other hand, the appearance of a nude human female was so abstract to the
natives as to suggest no connection.
	In meeting with the chief, Ryouko had her first introduction to
fermented beverages. In the parlance of another time and place, the
penguins really knew how to tie one on. She also saw first hand the
behavior of nominally monogamous sentients, of a sexually reproducing
species. Despite the partying, it was several months before a drunken
male penguin clued the naive girl in on what was going on when partyers
paired off and disappeared into the private chambers of their dwellings.
	The tall strange human girl became a regular fixture at local parties.
She always had a cheerful glow of content when she was drunk, never
seeming to suffer the common ill effects of ethanol consumption, not
even a trace of hangover. Natives who prided themselves in their
knowledge of the galactic tongue loved to practice on the only human
within a hundred light years.  It seemed that there were few humans that
cared for the glowing skies of the inner galaxy worlds, where the nights
were never darker than a cloudy day on Earth.
	Ryouko had really relaxed for the first time in her short life, and it
was a bitter disappointment to her when one day the local chief came
seeking her.
	"Kacho?", she addressed him, for so the chief was called in the
galactic tongue. She had learned to identify and interpret the seemingly
blank and stoic penguin's facial expressions.
	"The outlaw star ship Soja has been seen in several local systems. It
is broadcasting demands for the surrender of a human female. 
	While I am no expert on the appearance of humans, I think the pictures
Soja is broadcasting look remarkably like you?"
	"I am sorry, Kacho, I have put you and your people in great danger. I
will flee."
	"We are not a great power, but we are not cowards. If you stay, we will
fight."
	"Thank you for your offer, but Soja is an enemy beyond your
understanding. Perhaps I am, too."
	With that, Ryouko summoned her Ryo-ohki and made her run. The run was
long enough to distract Kagato from the Penguin's world, but not long
enough for her to elude capture. Little more than a week had elapsed
from the Kacho's warning, until Ryo-ohki was boxed in and forced to fold
her ship form. Girl and creature stood in the hangar bay of Soja, aware
of impending pain, as Kagato approached with slow, deliberate boot steps
clicking on stone.
	Ryo-ohki tried to interpose her small animal body between the girl and
the man. She was hissing, her back arched, her ears pointing strait
back.
	Kagato materialized an electrified rod, in order to reach down to the
creature without having to bend. Suddenly the rod vanished.
	"No. You are trying to protect the girl. That's it. Punishing you would
be meaningless. If I make the girl suffer, you will both obey."
	Kagato kicked aside Ryo-ohki, leaving her in a stunned heap. Taking
advantage of his momentary distraction, Ryouko materialized a blade and
ran it through his neck. The man vanished, rematerializing behind her.
	"So that's the way it is? The hand that strikes it's master shall
suffer, and you shall learn. I am Kagato, the lord of shadows, master.
All you see is shadows. If you strike at me, you strike at shadows. I am
your worst nightmare."
	Laying his hands on her, he shocked Ryouko to limpness. Taking the limp
girl to the nearest wall, he brought out some sort of spikes, with which
he essentially nailed her to the wall through her flesh. He connected an
electrical lead to the nails, setting up a sustained tingling throughout
her body. She noticed that the pain was not subsiding, her body not
expelling the nails. Seizing her right hand, he materialized a blade and
began paring the fingers, one joint at a time. As he worked he spoke.
	"This is how the hand suffers that strikes it's master. You see,
Ryouko, I can do anything I like to you, and you will always recover.
There is no pain or humiliation I cannot inflict upon you. All I have to
do is run some current through you, and your regenerative powers are
delayed. I can make you suffer as much as I please."
	Through a red haze of pain, Ryouko could see her life's blood trickling
from her ruined hand. Her guts rebelled, but she was too weak to eject
the vomit, so she choked. Oh, gods, it hurt. It hurt bad.
	"I could even cut off your head, but that would be no fun, you wouldn't
remember the suffering, wouldn't remember the lesson. I want you to
remember and obey. You will always obey the Master."
	Finally, Kagato overstepped his mark, and Ryouko passed out, but he was
beyond caring by then, absorbed in the sheer joy of what he was doing.
Ryouko knew nothing for a very long time.
	When Ryouko came to, in her own quarters, there was a message on the
display console.
	"You will proceed to Beta Arturos, enter the Galactic Police
headquarters, region five, and retrieve the following prisoners; Major
Offender Gamma-epsilon fifteen, Major Offender Lambda-omicron twelve,
and Minor Offender one five seven three two eight nine. Details of your
mission are in attached files. You will retrieve them intact, and you
will show no mercy to any being that stands in your way.
	As always, I will be watching."
   	A GP Headquarters is generally a large space station in orbit around
a stable single white dwarf star. This provides a highly stable
environment for the station. Though the pattern is not immediately
visible, the basic layout of the structure is an open double helix,
reflecting the roots of the GP in human and other DNA based sentient
life forms. Along the axis, at the core of the station, were the stasis
cells where prisoners were held either for trial or because they were
regarded as extraordinary security risks.
	The Galactic Police installations were rather thin skinned, and had
relatively little organized defense. Instead, they relied on location
inside developed regions, and the continual arrivals and departures of
armed patrol ships. This kept them from being regarded generally as
military installations or targets. In the entire history of galactic
civilization, no GP headquarters had ever been assaulted, until now.
	Taking advantage of the relatively high density and low output of the
white dwarf around which the station was orbiting, Ryo-ohki hopped in
and out of subspace, building up an extremely high kinetic potential
relative to the station before materializing barely a million kilometers
out. Her first pass was at a substantial fraction of the speed of light,
and she used her kinetic energy transfer weapon both to damage the
station, and as a brake. The first pass lasted only fractions of a
second, and by the time the defenders could react station gravity and
power were disabled. The multi billion ton station was drifting out of
control and blind.
	On a second pass, Ryo-ohki managed to jog to a momentary halt within
the outer structure, seemingly at random. Among the millions of drifting
pieces of debris from damage to the station, GP sensors failed to pick
up the materialization of a single human sized organism about five
hundred meters separate from the raiding ship.
	Ryouko's mind plummeted through a deep well of darkness, this jump was
near the limits of her teleport range. Materializing in the vacuum of
space, she felt her combat suit tighten protectively around her. Only
her face was uncovered, and that was protected and pressed upon by a
permeable force field; not that her body needed the protection, but raw
vacuum on her face would have been unpleasant and distracting. In a
moment she had oriented herself and allowed herself to drift towards the
station core. Reaching the core wall, she altered her dimensional
phasing, and passed inward.
	She emerged into the control room area and found herself confronted by
a GP trooper, about ten meters away, armed with a rather bulky shoulder
weapon. The weapon fired, and a wash of plasma spread around Ryouko's
body shield, melting plastic and aluminum for at least five meters
around her. She summoned her own plasma bolt in reply, but a momentary
vision of a Melisian trooper writhing on the ground in agony intervened.
Instead of detonating against the GP trooper's inadequate body armor,
Ryouko's bolt exploded precisely where he would be outside the fireball.
	Seconds later, Ryouko was drifting over the stunned trooper. She was
about to speak to him when she noticed a series of movable tiles on the
bulkhead behind him. On them were written the names and locations of the
prisoners. Even amid all the trappings of galactic technology, the GP
was conservative enough to use physical tags.
	Ryouko moved through the core according to the map Kagato had forced
her to memorize. Coming to the cell that had been tagged for Minor
Offender one five seven three two eight nine, she materialized a blade,
and dissected the stasis lock according to her instructions. In a flash
of pink hair and almost as pink flesh, a humanoid form was expelled from
the wall into her waiting arms. In a flash of perfect timing, she
teleported the being to the passing Ryo-ohki, and was back to continue
her search for the other prisoners.
	Major Offender Lambda Omicron twelve didn't fall so easily into her
arms. He hung on the frame of the cell gateway and gazed across the
intervening two meters of space.
	"Not so fast, girlie"
	"Che! I don't have time for this."
	She turned and carved open the lock on Gamma Epsilon fifteen, who
likewise halted himself at the frame of the stasis cell gateway.
	"Look! You either hold on to me, or I will be forced to leave you here.
Lord Kagato will not be pleased."
	"Kagato?" Two male voices echoed with grudged but instant respect and
fear.
	The more human looking of the two spoke up.
	"Never let it be said Torahiko turned down the embrace of a pretty
girl."
	They both shrugged and reached out. Moments later they found themselves
in the rather plain, almost featureless domed arena of Ryo-ohki's cabin.
Ryouko's combat reflexes had taken over, and Torahiko sprawled a dozen
meters away, rubbing a bruised neck.
	Why had he tried to hold on to her there? She wondered, puzzled by the
vehemence of her own reaction.
	"Mewow!" Ryo-ohki's cry flooded all communication bands, as she sped
away from the stricken GP headquarters.
	"I was just trying to be friendly, girlie", Torahiko protested.
	"I don't think the girl is interested", the minor offender opined.
	"Hey, Chikako, she left you alone in here", Offender Gamma Epsilon
fifteen observed. "You cat girls are supposed to be highly intelligent.
What's the layout?"
	"Look around you, Skaugli. No controls, no doors, nothing. Look at the
girl, obviously a cat-girl like me, that means she's probably a
telepath. I'd bet you fifty galactics that the ship is sentient. No
controls in any form that could be useful to us."
	"Great", Skaugli offered, "No choice; recruited by the most wanted
criminal in the galaxy. Just what I needed to cap a perfect career."
	"Easy for you to say", Chikako shivered, hugging herself, "You're major
offenders; so why me?"
	Ryouko stood with a bland expression, surveying her catch. One was
female, almost Ryouko's physical twin, with pink hair and matching pink
shorts and halter. Two were males, one a human, the other a rodentiform
humanoid of very nearly human standard size and build. A little makeup
and the giant rodent could easily pass for human, but far from being
human, he wasn't even all organic. Superb mimics, the rodentiforms were
highly loyal and self disciplined, and totally immune to the allure of
human females. They were almost ideal agents for the human worlds.
      Like most GP operatives, Skaugli had been surgically modified with
implanted weapons and recording devices. Once he was re-armed, the
rodent would out gun a light patrol cruiser, and yet he could pass
through just about any weapons screening devised by man.
Skaugli turned to Chikako.
      "As for you, it would seem Lord Kagato needs some seducing done."
      "He already has one cat girl" Torahiko opined, "Why would he need
another?"
      "You humans are so ignorant of your own body language. This being
looks like a cat girl, smells a bit like a cat girl, but she does not
move or act like any human I have ever seen. She also emits energy in
spectra that no human organism could possibly emit.
      As for why another cat girl? I seriously doubt if either one is
for Lord Kagato's personal use."
      The speculations were interrupted by the sudden folding of
Ryo-ohki. All four occupants, along with the creature Ryo-ohki, were
summarily deposited on the floor of Soja's hangar bay. Ryo-ohki jumped
up in Ryouko's arms.
      "You talk more than I like, Skaugli", Kagato addressed the former
agent, "Rule number one; no one questions me. But the rodent is right, I
have no use for the appetites of the flesh."
      "Oh, come now. You look like a man to me", Chikako sidled up to
the towering figure, who's barely perceptible twitch sent her sprawling
across the floor. She curled up and rocked, more hurt by the emotion of
the rejection than by the sprawl.
      Ryouko and Skaugli stood impassively.
      Torahiko reacted, "I understand cat girls and rodentiforms as
agents, but why me?"
      "You've already forgotten rule one, but it doesn't matter, does
it?" Kagato looked speculatively at the man. "You're a Jurai initiate,
aren't you? I've waited years for this. Renegade initiates are very rare
indeed."
      "But I can't tell you anything about that"
      "We shall see about that", Kagato's tone sounded almost hurt. Like
a little boy kept out of a secret.
      "You don't understand. It's not a matter of what I want, or how
you threaten me. It is impossible. I am incapable of telling you
anything about that. That is the way it works. If I came here for that,
the I came here to die."
      "As I said, we shall see"
Kagato walked up face to face with the man. Removing his pince-nez
glasses, Kagato stared deeply into the man's eyes. Removing a glove to
reveal an empty sleeve formed around nothing, the Lord of Shadow reached
out and touched Torahiko with his being and nothingness.
      "I am your fellow Juraian. We both together have abjured the king.
It is essential that you tell me the secret of Tsunami, now!" His voice
rose in command.
      Torahiko stood goggle eyed, gasping.
      "I k...k...k..can't"
      He slumped limply to the floor. The remaining organic occupants of
the hangar could smell the fetid whiff of death, as the contents of
Torahiko's bowels stained his prison trowsers.
      Kagato sighed with disappointment, and walked away.
"Come, I will show you to your quarters" Ryouko bowed and pointed to
another exit.
      Chikako put her hand on Ryouko's arm, ignoring the stiffened
message of alienation that her touch drew from the strange cat girl's
mind.
      "Moon child, sister, I grieve for you. Soon, no doubt I will
perish for my follies, and when I do, I shall ask the mother of all cat
people to spare your spirit from that monster."
      Ryouko looked at her blankly.
      After she was gone, Skaugli turned to Chikako.
      "She has no idea what you were talking about"
      Chikako nodded.
      "I know. You know, I have never believed. In fact, ten minutes
ago, I would have told you I was an atheist. Yet I will swear to you,
the goddess is with her."
      That night, Ryouko dreamed terrible dreams of death. When that
mysterious lady came to her, the dying stopped. In her dream, she
pleaded with the mysterious goddess, "Can you make my spirit flee from
this place, as Torahiko's did?"
      "It is not given to you to choose that path, my child."
      "But I want no more of other's deaths", she pleaded.
      "You have already found a way to resist." The lady in her dream
reminded her of how she had spared the life of the GP trooper, "All I
ask of you is that you never join your will with Kagato's. If it takes
ten thousand years, you will be free, and human, and a woman. I
promise."
      Then the mysterious lady of her dreams gave her a new one, a dream
of a man to come. He was smallish, unimposing,  smooth of feature, with
dark hair and eyes. In every way he was different than Kagato, kind
where Kagato was cruel, gentle where Kagato was harsh. He was different
from Kagato in ways that she did not yet have words to express. In her
sleep she sighed with longing.

          OWARI

 Text Copyright 1999, Gregory W. Matteson. <matteson@jps.net>
Principle Characters are Copyright and/or Trademark AIC and Pioneer LDCA