Oscar thought the newcomer might not even be human. There wasn’t the slightest timbre of emotion to be found anywhere.

“Go FTL,” Tomansio told Troblum. The big man had a scared look on his face; he was trembling. Catriona rematerialized in the cabin and hugged him tightly.

The gifting expanded as Cheriton’s eyes opened. He was staring up at a dark gray ceiling. A head appeared above him, badly blurred. Focus was gradual as his sluggish eyes responded to the pale oval shape. It was a woman’s face, framed by short dark hair, smiling benevolently.

“Oh, bollocks,” Oscar groaned.

“Hello, boys and girls,” said the Cat. “I can feel you out there. How lovely that you care so much about your friend.”

“I can’t move,” Cheriton reported. His self-control was starting to crack. Little bursts of fear were interrupting the gift as if it were conveying electric shocks.

“Sorry about that,” the Cat said. One hand lifted up into view; it was drenched with blood. Drops splashed down off each fingertip. “But I couldn’t have you running away, now, could I?”

“Cheriton,” Tomansio said very calmly. “You have to trigger your biononic overload. I’m so sorry. We’ll hold the ceremony of renewal when we return home. I swear it.”

“I can’t,” Cheriton’s wretched thought came back. “I can’t.”

“We have your secure store. You will lose nothing.”

“I can’t.”

A sleep cubicle door expanded. Corrie-Lyn ran out and clung to Inigo. She was fighting back tears.

“Cheriton,” Tomansio continued, his thoughts becoming stern. “You have to do this. She’ll infiltrate. The mission will be compromised.”

“Help me.”

“Oh, my dears.” The Cat’s smile hung above them, exuding an icy presence into the cabin even though she was nowhere close. Her lips widened into a mournful smile. “The poor boy is telling the truth. He can’t suicide. That’s a weakness, and we all know what I think about being strong, now, don’t we? So I’m helping him. I took a nice big pair of scissors to his biononic connections.” She looked at her glistening scarlet hand, as if puzzled by the color. “I seem to have accidentally cut through a few nerves, too. Well, when I say cut, I mean hacked. But on the positive side, nothing will hurt now, so that was kind of me, wasn’t it?”

“Devil whore,” Tomansio sent. “When this is over, I will find you.”

The Cat laughed. “Better than you have tried. But I’m curious. Exactly what is ‘this’? It’s all very exciting, this gathering of yours. I’d like to be a part of it.”

“Go FTL,” Aaron said sharply. “We have to get a head start. She will find out.”

“Yes,” the Cat agreed. “Leave him. Leave him with me. All alone. We’ll have such a party together.”

“Go,” Cheriton said. “Just go. It will be over quickly. I won’t survive what she’s done to me.”

“Oh, now, my dear, that’s just a big bad lie. I have a medical capsule, and I’m not afraid to use it. The two of us will spend what seems like an eternity together. I might even make you Aaron’s replacement. How lucky can you get?”

“Never.”

“How lovely. You believe you are strong.”

The gifting was suddenly flooded by a sharply defined image surging up out of Cheriton’s memories. A startled Cheriton found himself seven years old and sitting at the table eating a meal with his parents and two sisters. It was a pleasant time, with his mother and father talking to their children, interested in their day, encouraging questions. A delightful period of his life, suffused by happiness.

Then his father stood up. “Come here,” he beckoned to Cheriton. As the young boy got to his feet, his father activated several weapons enrichments.

“No!” Cheriton’s frantic thoughts pleaded. “No, no, this is me, this is my life.”

“It was boring, my dear. It makes you weak, and that’s no use to me. I’m going to make it so much more interesting and a little bit dirtier.”

“Stop this,” Aaron said.

“Or what?” the Cat asked over the sound of young Cheriton’s distraught sobbing. The sizzle of weapons fire was deafening, blotting out the screams of his sisters. The stench made Oscar want to throw up.

“Now they don’t exist anymore, so let’s edit them out of the rest of your life, shall we,” the Cat said. “And while I’m doing that, I’ll have a think about what I can replace them all with. Something yummy, I feel. Something that is going to make you love me.”

“They are real,” Tomansio sent with a surge of conviction. “Believe it, Cheriton. Know the truth. They did not die like that.”

The gifting degenerated into a chaotic swirl of images and sounds and sensations. Flashes of Cheriton’s family slipped past them, draining to gray nothingness.

“Bring them back!” Cheriton wailed.

“Troblum,” Tomansio said. “Get us out of here.”

Troblum only tightened his hold around Catriona. “It’s me she wants. She’ll never stop, not ever. She never does. I know her. I studied what she is. Ask him.” He pointed at Aaron.

“I don’t know,” Aaron said. “This is what was done to me.”

“Bring who back?” the Cat asked lightly, her mind radiating gentle concern. “Who, my dear?”

“What?” Cheriton’s thoughts were confused.

“If she does want you, there’s only one place you can go to be safe,” Oscar said urgently to Troblum, worried by how distraught the big man seemed to be. He clearly wasn’t thinking logically. “Take us there,” he urged.

“Oh, look,” the Cat said enthusiastically.

Another memory was jerked out of Cheriton’s brain. This time Oscar found himself on a picnic by a small stream; now Cheriton was the father. His wife and small son were with him.

A deep disquiet bubbled up into Cheriton’s thoughts. This was a lovely time, yet he instinctively knew something was wrong.

“Stop this,” Tomansio said. “You can extract what you need easily enough.”

“But this way I get to play first,” the Cat said. “If my Cheriton is to belong to me, he can’t have affections for anyone else, now, can he?”

“Don’t!”

“Troblum,” Aaron said with a menacing insistence. “Get us out of here.”

“Please,” Araminta-two whispered. Her emotional output was rising to a fearsome level as she responded to Cheriton’s terrible degradation. Oscar found the tears welling up in his own eyes at her distress.

“Like father, like son,” the Cat said.

Cheriton looked down to find himself holding a pump-action shotgun. “No!” he screamed. “No no no no. Stop her; in Ozzie’s name, don’t let her do this.”

“We can’t leave him,” Corrie-Lyn sobbed. “Not with her. Nobody can face this alone. It’s inhuman.”

A ruby targeting laser stabbed out of Aaron’s fist. It splashed on the solido projector. “Now!” he hissed.

“Troblum!” Catriona wailed.

Cheriton’s finger pulled the shotgun’s safety off. It produced a nasty snick that echoed around the starship’s cabin.

“It’s not real,” Inigo vowed. “Know this, Cheriton, and remember.”

“Oh, dear Jesus,” Oscar moaned.

“Do it, you motherfucker,” Aaron yelled.

The Mellanie’s Redemption flashed into hyperspace.