Stephen began regaining consciousness, extremely reluctantly, again late in the afternoon to find Thea sitting with him. She rose from the seat that Tabitha had occupied earlier and lightly touched his wrist. Satisfied with her evaluation of his condition she allowed him some water. After she laid him back down she said, "I am ordered to make sure you don't do yourself further injury as soon as you wake up trying to right the world."

Stephen, who was sure he felt worse now than he had earlier had no interest in righting the world. "I need to see Baz and Tommy. He struggled to think past the pain beginning register in his arm and back. "Also Cal."

"Tabitha said you'd want Baz and Tommy, after you had some water. She didn't mention Cal."

"He tried to smile and suspected he was making a mess of it. "She missed one.

Thea placed her fingertips on his wrist again and considered what her gifts were telling her about his condition. He was extremely weak, in pain and liable to lose consciousness again shortly. He might not make it to Cal. "Alright, you are allowed five minutes with each of them. Do you want them together or separate?"

"Cal separate. Baz and Tommy together." He stopped, then "But first, some more water?"

She obliged. "I'm not surprised, considering how much blood you lost." When he seemed done with the straw for the moment she eased him back down on the pillow. "I'll send `em in."

As good as her word she left and Baz and Tommy, who had apparently been waiting for this moment, came in.

Stephen, whose only desire was to say what he knew had to be said and then pass out again, motioned for them to shut the door and come over to the bed.

"Get Liam here. Baz you understand?

"You want him to go Home, to make sure nothing happens, that there is no reaction to the news someone has tried to kill you."

Stephen nodded. "Make sure he understands it all. Him and Cal."

He waited until they nodded. "Where's Reno?"

"Don't know, with Marc maybe." Tommy said.

"He was outside…last night?"

"Yes." Baz's eyes narrowed as he grasped the point. "I will take care of it."

"Tommy, as soon as you can, Baz will tell you…tell him I need to see Marc. 'Til then nothing to anyone. Use the locks and someone at my house."

"Got it, Boss."

"Laszlo?"

Baz shook his head, "No word yet."

Stephen closed his eyes for a moment, trying to fight back the exhaustion and the throbbing pain.

"My friend, you are not ready for this." Baz said.

"No. Almost done. Tell me your news."

"None yet."

"Tommy?"

"Cal has things under control, things have been quiet. Nothing else."

"Thanks. Now Cal. Please."

"Thea went to get him." Tommy said as he went to let him in.

Baz, lingering, said "Rest my friend. That is the most important thing you can do for now. We will be here when you wake up."

"Find Laszlo."

"I will. Trust me."

He nodded and waited while Cal took his place at the bed and Baz left, closing the door behind him.

"Send Adam to Dinah's immediately. Tell him to go to the desk, ask for Mabel, tell her I sent him."

"But…"

"Too long to explain. You made copies?"

"A couple. Baz has one and I have two others just like always."

"Give them to me. Now, then Adam. After you don't know where."

"Man, whatever you want. Is that all."

"The Ops Center…"

"Under control. Me and Michael can handle it."

Stephen nodded at him. "Thanks. All I need are those disks before I pass out again."

"Right away."

Stephen just closed his eyes again. Thea, checking on him a moment later, thought he'd lost consciousness again. Instead, feeling her fingertips on his wrist again, he startled her by saying, "Cal's coming back for only a minute, please…if you give me some water…"

Thea, who didn't think he'd make it long enough, said nothing, just gave him the water.

But he did and Thea left them alone again, "Sixty seconds, that's all. Then I'm back and he's gone."

"Here you go Stephen. I'll get Adam out of here right away. What do I tell him?"

"Nothing, just I said so."

"Got it." He gave Stephen a mock salute and left.

Stephen closed his eyes again and gathered all the energy he had and sent the disks to his house, among about a hundred others just like them. Then he gave himself back over to the blackness that was waiting to swallow him up, grateful for its return.

 Reno had already briefed Marc face to face and was now hurrying home.  There was a concert tonight he'd badly wanted to attend, since he was Home anyway, so he made a quick stop at his place to pick up some much needed items. Clean underwear, some books, and he'd even decided to take back a picture or two of his.  He got them ready to go, showered and changed into a tuxedo, and rushed over to the concert hall.

Surprisingly, or maybe not, Home provided a lot of cultural events throughout the year. Quite a few Awakened took up music and had the time to perfect their art. So there were quite often quartets and symphonies and bands and whatever performing. Of course the best of them only got to perform in the better locations. And this particular quartet was probably the most talented of all of them, at least to Reno's ears.  So he'd hoped he'd manage to hear them perform, especially as they were playing some of his favorite pieces. Not particularly well-known pieces, but ones he understood were difficult to play and beautiful at the same time.

He arrived at the Hall barely in time to take his seat before the concert began.  He sat back, letting the music wipe away his fears, his doubts, his guilt, his hopes.  He just wanted to live in the moment, moved by the beauty of the sound as it washed over him.

When the intermission arrived it took him a moment to catch his breath. He thought about just staying in his seat, but then decided he really needed a drink. A glass of wine, to further relax so he'd be fully attuned to the second, and better half, he hoped, of the program.

He joined the mob around the small bar in the lobby and waited not quite so patiently for his turn.  When it finally came he opened his mouth to order a glass of wine and suddenly someone else was in front of him.  She smelled nice. She had a thick mass of mahogany curls that had to be hotter than hell falling down her back almost to her ass. She stepped back a step and inserted a dangerously thin stiletto heel into Reno's fairly unprotected foot.

"Christ," he cried out.

That startled her especially when his hands came up to rest on her shoulders since she'd started to turn which ground the sharp point even more into his foot.

"My foot!" he yelped.

"Oh!" she said, as she realized why she was so off balance. She moved her foot and whirled around. "Oh, I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I don't often wear these things." Presumably she was talking about the high heels and not the round wire-rim glasses she was suddenly reaching for with one hand, presumably to save them in case he slugged her.

"I'm... I need to sit down," he muttered feeling the pain radiating upward from his foot. He was feeling a bit faint too.  Not exactly cool to keel over in public. He limped over to a bench and several people who'd seen what was going on actually moved to give him a seat.

The girl followed him over and knelt down in front of him, looking down at his foot. Reno wanted desperately to get his shoe off but if he did, he wasn't sure he could get it back on.

"Here," the girl said, handing him her glass of wine.

He chugged it down without thinking.

"I'm sorry," she said in a very small voice. "Is it, do you think its broken?  Surely there's a healer around here somewhere."  She rose to her feet and began waving at someone.

"Wait," he finally grunted. "I'm fine, really. It only hurts when my heart beats."By then the bell announcing the second half of the program was ringing and the overhead lights were flickering. People began streaming back into the orchestra section to take their seats.

Reno began to get up but the girl shoved him back down. "Stay!"

He seriously thought about answering 'arf' but his foot hurt too much.

Then a guy, presumably a friend of the girl's, was kneeling down in front of him, and removing his shoe.

"Hey wait a damn minute," Reno said.  "Christ that hurts!"  He tried to get up again, but the girl shoved him back down.

And then her friend, obviously a healer, was doing his thing to Reno's foot. Reno sat there ruefully looking at his unshod foot.

"I don't want to miss the ..."

"You won't if you sit still," the guy said heartlessly.

Reno sank back and noticed that now his foot only hurt on every second beat.  Okay, and it wasn't quite so bad that he felt nauseous either.  Okay... He might live...

"There!" the guy said.  "That should do it. Melly, those shoes are dangerous!"

"Tell me about it," Reno muttered.

The guy and gal began a heated conversation about the wisdom of women's fashion as Reno struggled to get his shoe back on.  The guys seemed to think it had to do with birds and plumage or something weird like that, and she was arguing that humans, from the time of the cave men, painted themselves up and tried to appear more appealing to prospective mates.

Reno thought they were both nuts.

He got to his feet and was halfway back to the entrance to the orchestra when suddenly the girl ran toward him and caught his arm.

"Wait!  I haven't apologized!  I'm sorry!"

"S'ok.  No worries."

"I'm Melly, by the way.  Hullo."

Reno was looking longingly back toward the darkened theatre where music was beginning.

"Listen, Danny and I are going out for supper after the performance. Will you let me buy you supper? It's the least I can do," Melly was saying.

"Nah, no thanks."

"Please?" and she smiled, opening those big blue-violet eyes impossibly wide at him so what could he say but, "Oh, okay."

They began to separate headed to their respective seats when she whispered loudly to him, "What's your name?"

"Uh, Reno, I'm Reno."

"Oh," she said her smile fading.

Reno's mind was, he was disgusted to note, not on the music the second half. He was thinking about the look in Melly's eye and the sound of disappointment in her voice.

And just where the hell had he seen her before....

As the music ended and everyone gave the quartet an enthusiastically appreciative round of applause, Reno was of two minds. He'd remembered where he'd seen Melly before. In the conference room at the Refuge. He was supposed to be finding out who was there but did he really want to risk going beyond that?  She'd suddenly remembered him, he was sure, from that look on her face when she'd heard his name.

Well, with luck, She and her buddy, Danny?, would get tired of waiting for him.  So Reno dawdled, still in his seat, until nearly the entire orchestra section had emptied out. And then when one of the musicians came out on stage he walked up to say hello and shake hands and generally chit chat.

There, he thought, that ought to ensure she isn't around. So when he turned around and started up the inclined aisle toward the exit he nearly jumped when he saw Melly and her friend standing in the doorway, clearly determined to wait for him.

Damn.  Now she'd really think he was trying to just be nice to her to get info out of her; and was that why she'd waited for him?  Thinking the same thing?  Best know your enemy?  Crap.

He forced a smile as he walked up to them.

"Do you know the musicians?" Melly asked.

"I've played with Fayd before. Once or twice. Just nodding acquaintances really," he added.

"How's your foot?" she asked.

"A dull ache. Nothing much really," he replied

Danny nodded. "Good. Walking will help it then. Sitting still after an injury is never a good idea. So let's walk to the restaurant."

It was a perfect night for a walk. Too bad Reno couldn't think of a damn thing to say. But Danny seemed to have no diffiulties filling the silence. He and Melly got into yet another friendly argument  regarding the history of music.

"What do you think?" Melly suddenly asked him.  Reno had no earthly idea where the conversation had gone. He felt like a total fool when forced to say, "Uhm. No idea, really."

Then they were at the restaurant and being shown to a table. They'd had reservations and it was no big thing to change it from two to three.

"Look," Reno finally said to Danny when Melly was otherwise occupied, "I don't mean to cut in on your date. I should just go home."

Danny grinned. "Don't be silly. Melly and I are just colleagues who both enjoy music. Sit."  He sat, now worrying whether he shouldn't have headed back down to the Refuge as soon as the recital was over. That had been his plan. For all he knew, there was outright warfare going on in light of Stephen's condition. And Marc, what was he up to?  Reno had to get a handle on things for when he would arrive in the morning.

Reno's rather confused thoughts were interrupted when Melly said, "A Euro?"

"Huh?"  Man, didn't he always sound so cool.

"I offered a penny for your thoughts, then a sou."

"Oh, oh right. I was kind of... Never mind."

"No, what, really? I'm a good listener."

"Is that with a capital L?" he asked.

Melly smiled. "No. I have worked with the teams, but I'm a scientist by training."

"Ah.  Well, I really should be getting back cuz I'm thinking things are really a mess and maybe … Well, I need to get back to work, really."

"Well," Melly said with a frown. "If you think so. But dinner would help don't you think?"

"Yeah, normally it would, but I'm kind of..." his voice died away as the easy feeling of the room began to change. Melly and Danny began looking around, and people were whispering to each other across tables and a lot of them were looking at Reno.

"Uhm, yeah I really do need to go."

"What's going on?" Melly asked.

"I.. Stephen was hurt today. He was okay when I left. Looks like word is out though. And, well, I'm thinking maybe it would be best if you not be seen with me."

Melly, who'd been about to take a drink set her glass down very carefully.  "Define hurt."

"He was stabbed. In Malta I think. They got him back to the Refuge. I think a lot of people believe the Council was behind it. And, well, I work for Marc Rogatien so..."

"I already know that, I'd be an idiot if I didn't.   You're going back to the Refuge?"

"Yes."

"Good. I'm going with you."  When he said nothing as she stood up, digging in her purse for money, she paused long enough to say, "Well, are you ready to go?"

"Uhm, well, yeah, okay. But ... You knew Stephen was hurt?"

"No," she said, frowning at him. "Not until you told me. But I knew you worked for Marc."

"Oh. Yeah. I guess you would."

Danny was sitting there at the table looking from one to the other with a frown.

Reno threw some money on the table.  "Come on, let's go then," he said holding out his hand to her.

"Danny, I'll talk to you tomorrow.  Sorry about dinner."  Then she took Reno's hand and waited.

Reno hesitated only a moment then they walked out into the evening, and as soon as they were in the open air they popped off to the Refuge, only afterwards Reno remembering his clean underwear.  A fading "Shit," left behind.  They arrived....into managed mayhem.

Melly glanced around and then looked Reno in the eye, "It would appear we can still get dinner if you're interested.  The people I need to check with are obviously busy right now."

"Sounds like a plan," Reno said and the two of them headed off to the dining room. "I guess Tommy's pretty busy too.”