MEGATOKYO, JAPAN - APRIL, 2033

     He felt the Immortal approach long before he saw him, of course.  He
ducked into the nearest alleyway, took his sword out from beneath his coat,
and crouched into a combat-ready stance.  He could hear the sound of several
footsteps, coming his way, but thought nothing of it.  He thought of nothing
else but the coming battle. 
     His opponent entered the alleyway.  Behind him were four large
human-shaped forms, though he couldn't tell if they were humans or boomers
in the pre-dawn dimness.
     "Frederic Rillio?" his opponent said.
     "Yes."
     "Good.  Just checking."  He then turned to his companions and nodded.
It was then that he made out their red eyes.  They _were_ boomers, with
synthetic skin to make them appear human, and each carried an automatic
weapon.  Rillio lunged at the nearest one and sliced with his sword, cutting
synthetic skin from the side of its face.  The boomer caught Rillio by the
arm and threw him against the wall.  Rillio stood, ready to attack again
when the other Immortal signaled.  They each aimed their weapons at Rillio
and opened fire.  He felt his body get riddled with bullets, and collapsed
in a bloody heap on the ground.  His opponent signaled for the boomers to
stop, then walked over to him, his sword out from beneath his coat. 
     "You can't... _do_ this!" he said weakly.  "The Rules..."
     "The Rules say that we can't be aided by mortals or other Immortals.
They don't say anything about boomers."
     "Why..?  Why... do... this..?"
     "I guess because there can be only One."  He swung his sword and
beheaded the other Immortal.

     Daybreak.
     Even with her new hardsuit, Priss had taken a _lot_ of damage from
Largo.  For the first time since the Knight Sabers had begun their
activities,  Sylia honestly doubted that Priss would survive.  She helped
her onto the Knight Sabers' Sky Carrier aircraft, and was ushering her
towards one of the benches.  
     "Will you stop it, Sylia!" Priss said.  "I'm not helpless you know, and
I'm not gonna lie down like some damned invalid!" 
     "Priss..." Sylia said.  "Just do me a favor and for once don't argue."
She removed her helmet and took over flying the KnightWing from her brother,
Mackie.  "Get her hardsuit off, Mackie.  I don't have time to take my own
suit off and examine her."
     "OK, Sis."

     Several minutes later, as they were approaching the Lady's633 building,
the site of the Knight Sabers secret headquarters, Mackie came into the
cockpit and said, "Doesn't look good, Sis.  She's lost a lot of blood."
     Sylia said nothing, choosing instead to concentrate on landing the
aircraft.
     "Nene and Linna are keeping her company and said they'd stay but..." 
     "I understand."  The Sky Carrier touched down.  Sylia powered down the
engines saying, "The most we can do for her now is make her as comfortable
as possible."  She went back into the main compartment and joined the other
Knight Sabers, Linna and Nene.  And for the first time she saw the extent of
Priss' injuries.  She _almost_ inhaled sharply.  Priss' abdomen had a huge
knife wound that still bled.  Her arm looked like it was broken in at least
three places.  Her collarbone was broken, and from the looks of her head,
she must have a concussion.  Priss had said something about Largo hurling
her against a wall and down several stories, and she could only imagine what
her back looked like.  
     "Sylia..?" Linna said.
     "Come on, let's get her inside," Sylia said.
     "I'm... not.. a damned... invalid," Priss said.
     "Priss," Nene said teary-eyed, "just this once can you accept someone's
help and be spoiled for a change?"
     Despite Priss' protestations, they strapped her onto a stretcher and
carried her off the Sky Carrier and into the base.  Sylia's infirmary was
woefully inadequate for the kind of injuries Priss had sustained.  They had
never faced an enemy like Largo before, and frankly, she hoped they never
would again.  GENOM's boomers were tough enough.  But Largo, a super-boomer
with a direct link to the particle beam satellites weapons a mad
messiah-like ambition and three superboomers of his own, was something
nearly beyond anything they were equipped to deal with.  If not for the
hardsuit upgrades and a quick rescue by Mackie, they all would be in Priss'
condition.
     Carefully, they lay her on the bed in the center of the infirmary.
"Priss," Sylia said, "if there's anything you need..."
     "Just... I don't want you... to see me like this.  Please... let me be
alone."
     "Priss..." Nene said.
     "Come on," Sylia said.  "We must honor her request."  She ushered the
other three out of the room and closed the door.  Then she led them into the
suit-up room and began taking her hardsuit off.  Glumly, the other two
followed.  "This will probably not make it hurt any less," she said, "but we
all knew this day would come.  Priss has always taken too many unnecessary
risks, no matter how many times we tell her.  And I can't help feeling that
this is how she wanted it."
     "I can't believe that even _you_ would be that cold!" Linna said.
     "What's there to be cold about?  I'm stating a fact that we all knew."
     "But... _Sylia_!  This is _Priss_ we're talking about!  Someone we've
all fought beside!  My friend!"
     "She's my friend too, Linna, but let's face facts.  She's dying.  She
may already be dead.  And in any war there's always casualties.  Friends
die, civilians die, enemies die.  Would Priss want us to stop because she
died?  The only thing we can do to honor her is continue, and that means
finding another..."
     "_Replace_ Priss?" Nene said, teary-eyed.
     "Priss could never be replaced," Sylia said, "but tonight's battles
told me something.  We need four of us, we need someone to succeed her.  The
three of us alone are outnumbered against GENOM's boomers.  And if another
Largo should appear...  No, we cannot go on as three."
     Linna had finished getting into her street clothes.  She looked Sylia
squarely in the eye and said, "You could at _least_ wait until her corpse is
cold!"  She stormed out of the room.
     Nene, also dressed, watched Linna leave.  She looked at Sylia, then
turned and ran out the same door that Linna used, her sobs barely contained.
Sylia knew that Nene would most likely be back, but she had her doubts about
Linna.  She honestly thought that she had lost two friends tonight.  Sylia
hadn't dressed herself, she still had her softsuit, a combination
undergarment and hardsuit interface, on.  She left the dressing room and
entered the infirmary.  Mackie stood on the opposite end in the shadows,
staring at the
now-still bed.
     "She stopped breathing almost immediately after she was left alone," he
said.  "She's gone."
     Sylia nodded and approached the bed.
     "I can't help thinking that she's happy, meeting death head-on in the
line of battle.  Sis?"
     "Mackie..." her voice nearly broke.
     Mackie nodded and left the room.
     Sylia hated showing emotion.  Hated herself even more when she did.  In
order to do the job, avenge her father and keep GENOM in check, she had to
maintain a tight, stoic, sometimes cold, control over herself.  But staring
at her friend's lifeless body on the slab, every emotion that she had ever
kept inside, ever one she had repressed, came pouring out.
     She collapsed to her knees and wept.
     Linna was absolutely right.  She should at least give them time to
mourn.  Sylia kept herself detached from the other three, but she knew that
Linna, Nene, and Priss spent a lot of their free time together.  She should
give them some time.
     And herself, too.
     She was closer to Priss than she had ever been to anyone other than
Mackie and her late father.  She knew that had either of their upbringings
been slightly different, she and Priss would be more alike than either of
them would have admitted, and it would have been Sylia, not Priss, lying
there dead.  Priss was, quite simply, her other self.  Whether or not she
was her darker or lighter self was a mystery that Sylia thought was best
left unsolved.
     And now she was gone.
     Feeling as if she had been torn in half, Sylia stood, and looked once
more into Priss' lifeless face.  "Goodbye, my friend," she said.  She turned
to walk away, to prepare to send her body to its final resting place, when
she heard a sharp intake of breath.  She stopped, frozen, actually
frightened.  She dared not turn back towards the direction she heard the
breath come from.
     "God damn that was a bad one."
     "Priss..?" Sylia finally turned and saw Priss sitting up, one hand
against her forehead.
     "Shit, what a headache!" Priss turned to Sylia and said, "What's up
with you?  You look like you've just seen a ghost."
     Sylia looked at the diagnostic instruments and said, "Maybe I have.
Priss, you've been dead for six minutes."
     "Yeah, right."
     "Let me check your injuries."  Sylia took the covers off and looked...
     There were no wounds, not even scars.
     Priss looked at her own abdomen, where the knife wound had been.  "What
the..."  Then she looked at Sylia's face, which was not even flinching and
said, "You know what's going on here, don't you?" 
     "I've seen something similar before, yes." 
     "Care to share it?"
     "I have to be sure, and it would help if you heard it from him first." 
     "Who?  Sylia, stop being so mysterious."
     "Priss, stay here, or get dressed and come up to the penthouse.  But
please, don't leave this building."  With that, Sylia left the infirmary.  
     Priss got out of the bed.  Her arm, collarbone, back, abdomen,
everything had healed.  In those six minutes, something had happened to her.
Priss had stopped believing in miracles a long time ago, but this came
awfully close.  Too close for comfort.  Almost enough to scare her into
going back to church.  She walked over to the suit-up room and saw that Nene
and Linna had already gone.  She found her street clothes, but couldn't put
them on.  She could only stare at her body in the mirror, where the injuries
weren't.  Sylia had mentioned that someone knew what had happened.  She
supposed she'd wait until she got a hold of him.  There was nothing to do
but get dressed and head upstairs.

     "Sis?  You OK?"
     "Not now, Mackie."  Sylia headed over to the vid-phone.
     "Sis, what's going on?"
     Sylia sighed.  Mackie deserved an explanation before Priss came
upstairs, big as life and alive.  She said, "Remember a few years ago when
we were in the United States?"
     "Uh huh."
     "Remember Boston?  The man who we saw die and revive?"
     "And he told us he was immortal."
     "I think Priss is like him, but she doesn't know it."
     "You mean, Priss is _alive_?"

     "I'm exhausted," AD Police detective Leon McNichol said.
     "Is something keeping you up at night that I should know about?" his
partner, Daily Wong said.  "Come over to my place and I'll keep you awake."
     "No thanks," Leon groaned.  "My trick knee is acting up again."
     "You're trick knee is _always_ acting up."
     "What've we got?"
     Daily put his glasses on and ruffled through his notes.  He said,
"About the same time all that commotion was going on up on the GENOM tower
last night, this poor bastard was getting his chest blasted out and his head
cut off."
     "Identity?"
     "Frederic Rillio.  American national here in Megatokyo on business.
Worked for the Schwartz and Arnaman securities firm in New York."
     "What about witnesses?"
     "What do you think?"
     "Right.  That's Megatokyo for ya, no one saw a God damned thing."  
     "This makes three, by the way."
     "Three?"
     Daily nodded.
     Leon groaned and stretched.  "This looks like a serial killer.  Why
call us in?  Isn't this the jurisdiction of the regular police?"
     "Until yesterday it was.  Today it became our baby 'cause of this."
Daily handed Leon a sealed transparent evidence pouch.  
     Leon took it and studied the contents.  "Synthetic skin.  Boomers."
     "You've got it."
     "Now what about the head?"  Leon signaled to where Rillio's head lay,
several feet away from the body.  "Why would boomers chop a guys head off?"
     "Beats me.  Why would _anyone_ chop someone's head off after they're down?"
     "If it were a human serial killer at least it'd make a sick bit of
sense from an insanity standpoint.  But _boomers_?  What type of weapon was
used?  A vibro-blade?"
     "That's just it.  The ME left just before you got here and said that
the cut _wasn't_ done with a vibro-blade.  Judging from the type of cut, the
wound produced, and the metal fragments found in the wound, the ME is
certain that it was a sword."
     "A _sword_?"  Leon looked at Daily, surprised.
     "Specifically, an _old_ sword."
     "Boomers with _swords_?"
     "That's what it looks like."
     But Leon shook his head and said, "No, that's just too screwed up, even
for this town.  I think there was a human with them.  Boomers just don't go
around chopping people's heads off, much less carry swords."

BOSTON, MASS, UNITED STATES - APRIL, 2033

     "Hello?" Rebecca said.
     "Rebecca, you look well."
     "Sylia!" Rebecca said.  "Long time no see.  What have you been up to?"
     "Rebecca, I'm sorry but I don't have time for small talk.  Is Patrick
there?"
     "Hang on and I'll get him."
     A few seconds later, a man appeared on the vid-phone.  He had red hair,
a long face, and penetrating green eyes.  He said, "Sylia?  How are you?" 
     "As well as could be expected when someone finds out that one of their
friends is like you, and especially when this friend doesn't even know it yet."
     Patrick O'Brien sat back in his chair and stared at Sylia's face on the
phone monitor.  As usual her expression was unreadable.  "How did it happen?"
     "That is a long story."
     "Sylia..."
     "I don't want to talk about this over the phone lines.  Can you come to
Japan?"
     "I suppose.  It's kind of last minute, but OK."
     "Thank you, Patrick.  Now I owe you a favor.  Call me when you get your
flight reservations and I'll meet you at the airport."
     "Sure thing.  I'll see you in a day or so.  Is your friend there with
you now?"
     "Yes she is."
     Patrick nodded.  "Keep her there.  Don't let her out of your sight for
both your safety and her's. Did anyone else see it happen?"
     "Actually, yes."
     "Friends?"
     Sylia nodded.  "Something else I'd rather talk about when I see you."
     "That could be problematic.  Keep her out of sight."
     "I'll try, but that may prove to be difficult, knowing her.  Thank you
again, Patrick."  Sylia closed off the connection.
     Patrick hung up the vid-phone and looked across the room at his wife
Rebecca, who he had known for most of his eight hundred and seventy-seven
years.  "Sylia's found a new Immortal," he said.
     "I heard.  Are you going to Japan?"
     Patrick nodded.  "I know you're busy these days..."
     "As soon as my schedule is cleared up, I'll join you."
     Patrick nodded.  Finding a new Immortal wasn't something to take
lightly.  Patrick and Rebecca had both taken in many young "cubs," training
them in the art of sword combat, becoming both their Teacher and a kind of
parental figure, helping to guide them through their transition from
mortality.  This was the most critical time for this new Immortal.  If
Patrick didn't get there in time, it was possible that she could loose her
head to an unscrupulous Immortal who specifically hunts young ones before
they really know or accept what's happened.  Also, who her first Teacher was
would have lasting effects upon her for the rest of her life.  Both Patrick,
Rebecca, and Patrick's closest Immortal friend Connor MacLeod, had been
found by one of the most noble of their kind, Juan Sanchez Villa-Lobos
Ramirez.  Patrick's arch-enemy, the thankfully late Kurdt VonHoffer had been
found by a man named Grayson, one of the most evil.  And while it was true
that a good Immortal could "turn bad," and a bad Immortal reform, it was
better to catch young ones early, before an evil one had a chance to find them. 
     Patrick knew that this new Immortal would go through several stages.
Initial euphoria knowing that they won't age and die and will be young
forever, depression once the knowledge of the Game sets in, rebellion
against what they perceive as being 'babied,' and final acceptance of both
their status and the Teacher's guidance.  There were, of course, exceptions.
One of Patrick's most recent students, Nancy Peters, had never rebelled, and
Kagero, a female ninja Patrick had found in feudal Japan, had skipped the
euphoria, instead becoming depressed immediately after she found out about
her Immortality.  It would be interesting to see just how this new cub
reacted to the news.

MEGATOKYO, JAPAN - APRIL, 2033

     "I can't tell you how much I appreciate this," Sylia said as she
stepped onto the accelerator and headed out of the airport.
     "Sylia," Patrick said, "_I_ should be thanking _you_."
     "Why?"
     "For calling me.  This is the most critical time for her.  Not to sound
like a priest or something, but _now_ is when she'll be making the choices
about her destiny, about weather she'll be good or evil.  What can you tell
me about her?  Anything to do with what you couldn't tell me over the phone?"
     Sylia nodded.  "Her name is Priss.  Priscilla Asagiri.  She's one of
the Knight Sabers."
     "Knight Sabers?" Patrick had heard of them.  A lot of people had heard
of them by now.  Four mysterious individuals who oppose GENOM and their
boomer "experimentation," take on jobs to dirty or too political for the AD
Police to handle, charge huge amounts of money for their services, and come
out looking like heroes.  Most of the time. 
     "And you're one of them?" Patrick said.
     Sylia nodded.  "I started the team three years ago, actually.  Priss
died two nights ago after a particularly difficult battle and revived after
the other two Knight Sabers left our headquarters."
     "This _is_ problematic," Patrick reiterated his thoughts on the phone.
"The life of a Knight Saber is rather public..."
     "Not really.  No one aside from a few trusted friends know who we are,
and of those, very few of them only know who one or two of us are.  You
trusted me with your secret.  I think I can trust you with mine."  
     Patrick thought of what Sylia had and hadn't told him, mostly the
"hadn't" part.  The names of the other two Knight Sabers.  He of all people
could understand. 
     The fact of the matter was, that though he and Sylia knew each other,
they really didn't know each other.  And had it not been for this Priss,
Patrick may never have known about the identity of even two of the Knight
Sabers.  He shook his head to clear his thoughts.  He could fence with
himself about this all day, but the fact remained that they each had one up
on the other.  If Patrick let what he knew about the Knight Sabers slip,
he'd suddenly find his own less-than perfectly covered tracks public
property.  By the same token, talk about an almost nine-hundred-year-old
Irishman, an Irelander, to use the old term, would be fair game for the
names of two Knight Sabers to suddenly become news. 
     They were in the heart of downtown now.  "Do you want me to take you to
your hotel first?"
     "Actually I've got a condo in town, and I've arranged to have a car
delivered, but that can wait.  Right now I need to meet Priss."

     Priss clutched her temples.  "AAHH!!  Damnit, what the hell is that?"
It felt as if someone tugged on her soul and pinched it to get her
attention.  Moments later, Sylia and a tall red-haired European carrying a
sword case entered the apartment.  
     "Is something wrong, Priss?"  Sylia looked from Priss to the man, who's
expression stated that he expected this.
     "Just a headache, I think," Priss said.  "Who's he?"
     "Priss, this is Patrick O'Brien.  He's a trusted friend."
     Dispite the fact that Sylia said she trusted him, Priss took an instant
dislike to him.  "You army or AD Police?"
     "Neither," Patrick said.
     "You _look_ it," Priss said with mild disgust.
     Patrick decided to let that go.  He had been told he had the "look" of
the military so many times that he had lost count.  The truth of the matter
was that he had served in many militaries, but not since World War II,
nearly a century ago.  He ignored Priss's unhidden contempt.  "Sylia told me
what happened the other night."
     Sylia left the room unnoticed, leaving the two alone.
     "Why?"
     "Because I can help you.  I know what happened to you."
     "What?  Dying and coming back to life?  It was disappointing, actually.
I expected to see the tunnel and the light and hear a voice telling me that
it wasn't my turn, mend my ways, that kinda stuff.  Instead I didn't see
anything.  It was like I had just blacked out.  I closed my eyes once
second, and the next I opened them, except it was six minutes later.
Afterwards, everything went back to normal except..."
     "What?"
     "I don't know why I'm telling you this, but Sylia trusts you, I guess.
None of the injuries I got left scars.  And they were all healed by the time
I woke up.  I should at _least_ have a scar in my abdomen."
     "Actually," Patrick said, getting up and walking towards where he had
deposited the sword case, "no you shouldn't."  He took out a samurai katana
and held it up against his arm, samurai-style.  Then he handed the hilt to
Priss.  "Run me through."
     She unconsciously took it.  "Are you _nuts_?"
     He put his abdomen against the tip and placed his hand over hers.
"Come on, run me through."
     "You've _gotta_ be crazy!  I'm not gonna..."
     But Patrick had cut her off when he leaned hard against the sword,
impaling himself.  He groaned, slid off the sword, and collapsed at Priss's
feet.  "God damn!  What the hell?"  Priss placed the sword down on the
floor.  "Crazy son of a bitch, I'll get Sylia and..." she was cut off by the
feel of a hand grabbing her ankle and the sound of a sharp intake of air.
Patrick first knelt, then stood.
     "What the hell are you?" Priss whispered.
     "I'm like you."  He lifted up his shirt to reveal the wound, nearly
healed.  As Priss watched, the wound knitted itself into scar tissue which
faded and disappeared in a matter or seconds.  The only evidence the wound
had left behind was the blood on his shirt and on the sword.  "I was born in
County Cork, Ireland in the year 1157, and I cannot die.  I'm Immortal.  And
so are you." 
     "Holy shit."
     "Yeah," Patrick said, sitting back down.  "Holy shit was about what I
said when I first found out."
     "So I won't die?  Not ever?"
     "If you're very careful, you'll look the same a thousand years from now."
     "What do you mean, careful?"
     "Do you know how to fight with a sword?"
     "Not really, why?"
     "Because..." Patrick hated this next part, revealing the purpose the
Immortals had, but experience had told him that the sooner he revealed it,
the easier it was, and the sooner the cub would accept it.  "Because the
only way you can die is if your head comes away from your neck." 
     "So, I'll just avoid guillotines and crazy samurais.  What does that
have to do with swords?  And what about this connection I feel with you?
This... I don't know..."
     "Buzz?"
     "Yeah, buzz."
     "That's how we sense each other and prepare for combat.  Our destiny is
to fight each other to the death until only one remains.  That last one will
have all the power of all the Immortals who have ever lived, enough power to
rule this planet forever.  If you fight and loose that's the end of you.
You die forever."
     "This is a load of crap.  GENOM already rules the world."
     "Maybe now they do.  But have you ever thought of what the world would
be like if someone like Chairman Quincy not only would live forever, but
have enough power to keep mankind in slavery?  Mankind would suffer an
eternity of darkness from which it would never recover." 
     It was the first time Patrick had ever gotten quite that reaction from
a new Immortal.
     Priss laughed in his face.

     Eventually Priss calmed down.  "And you seriously think that this Prize
exists?"
     Patrick shrugged.  "I don't know.  The only way I'll find out is if I'm
the last one, and to tell you the truth, I'd rather not be.  But to prevent
that darkness from happening, I have to do my damnedest to keep the Prize
from an evil Immortal."  He leaned over, picked up his katana and began
wiping the blood off. 
     "Good, evil, get off of it, man.  This is the darkness.  GENOM has
already enslaved the human race with boomers and money." 
     "But GENOM will eventually die.  Chairman Quincy _won't_ live forever,
and when he dies so does GENOM as we know it, or at least its stranglehold
on the world."  He placed his blade on top of his coat where it rested on
the couch. 
     Priss shook her head.  "This is all bullshit.  Why are you here?  Why
do you want to help me?"
     "Because I want to teach you how to fight.  Give you a chance to learn
how to defend yourself before you get slaughtered.  It's not like fighting
boomers."
     Priss looked up at that.  She had no idea that Patrick knew about the
Knight Sabers until that moment.  Looking at his face, she knew that he not
only knew, but at least didn't disapprove.  But why should his approval
matter to her?
     She looked away.  "When I put a vibro-blade in my hardsuit it will be
like fighting boomers."
     Patrick sighed.  "That's against the Rules." 
     "Ha!  Rules are meant to be broken."  Priss turned to leave.  Before
she knew what exactly had happened, Patrick's blade, until then on the couch
and out of reach, was at her neck, biting into her jugular vein.  She could
feel the sharpness of the blade each time her heart pulsed.  She no longer
had any doubt that Patrick could kill her any time he wished.  
     "Rule number one," he said, his sword still against her neck.  "We
fight with swords because it gives us each an even playing field.  Why
bother fighting if someone can blast your chest out and take your head
without you resisting?  I'm sure that Sylia didn't intend for your body
armor to be used to hunt Immortals.  And unless you intend on wearing your
armor twenty-four hours a day, you must learn how to use a _sword_.  Not a
vibro-blade, a _sword_.  Rule number two.  We cannot fight two-on-one.
Again, that is an uneven playing field, and why should you be rewarded for
cheating?  Rule number three, mortals can't be used to assist a fight, for
the same reasons as rule number one and two.  And finally, the most
important rule, you cannot fight on Holy Ground." 
     "Why?"
     "Because it is the only sanctuary we have.  If you break any of these
rules, your punishment will be swift and severe.  I can guarantee you that
most of the good, and even a few of the evil Immortals will come after you
if you break any of the first three."
     "And the fourth?  Holy Ground?"
     "Let's just say your punishment will fit the crime."  Patrick placed
his sword back at his side and Priss relaxed.  "I'm sorry I had to do that,
but I had to get you to listen.  The Rules aren't there to be broken, Priss."
     "How did you..?"
     "What?"
     "Get over here so fast?"
     "I've been studying various Martial Arts forms for centuries.  I
learned them from a samurai, who was one of us.  You'd be surprised how five
hundred years of study can be put to use."
     "Why _do_ you want to teach me? If there can be only one, why are _you_
helping _me_?"
     "Because I want to give you a fighting chance.  Because I was granted
that same chance by another, who was granted that chance by another.
Tradition, I guess.  But mostly because I remember what it's like for this
to be new, and no one should have to go through it alone.  And in spite of
all I've just told you, there's a _hell_ of a lot more to eternal life than
the game.  It would be a _real_ lonely existence if we could never make
friends with other Immortals.  I'm married to an Immortal, and my best
friend in history who's like the brother I never had, is an Immortal."
     "I see.  But what about my life?  Can't I just be myself?"
     "Absolutely.  If Sylia decides that you can remain in the Knight
Sabers, your life will continue _almost_ as it always has.  But if not, you
can pick up and go somewhere else, come up with a new identity and start
again, which you'd have to do eventually anyway once people begin to notice
you're not getting any older.  And that's not _so_ bad."
     Priss didn't like the sound of that, but it seemed as if she had damned
little choice in the matter.  The least she could do was wait around and see
what Sylia decided to do with her, and see what this Irelander guy had to
offer her.  "So... when do we start, Teach?"

(continued...)
(c)1997 Mabnesswords