Demon

This time Robin flicked him, quite hard.

"That's it!" Snitch stormed, pacing angrily around the dashboard. "I gotta take that crap from you, douche-bag, but not from her. Nothing more, not word one, that's all I'm go

Cirocco picked him up and shoved a match down his throat, end-first. It left a little of the shaft and the matchead sticking out of the demon's mouth. His eyes bulged as she upended him and struck the match on the dashboard. Then she held him erect, arms pi

"I think these matches would burn practically down to your tail," she said, calmly. "What I'm wondering, do you think we'll be able to see it? You think you'd glow like a lantern? What was that? You'll have to speak a little louder, I can't hear you." She waited, as Snitch struggled vainly. "Sorry, Snitch, I can't understand a word you're saying. What's that? Oh, all right." She wet her fingertips and pinched the match-head, which sizzled and went out. She pulled the match out of him and he collapsed, wheezing.

"The trouble with you," he said, "is you can't take a joke. My lord, you're a mean one, Cirocco Jones."

"I'll take that as a professional compliment. Now, she asked you a question. And you will address her as 'Ms. Robin,' with suitable deference, and you will keep your filthy thoughts to yourself."

"Okay, okay." He lifted a weary eye toward Robin. "Would you please repeat the question, Ms. Robin?"

"I just asked why Gaea is doing all this? Why is she going to all this trouble to steal Adam?"

"No trouble at all, Ms. Robin. See, she wins whichever way it comes out. If she gets the kid, and Cirocco don't come, why that's fine. But she figures, if she does get the kid, well then, Cirocco is sure to come." He turned his head and leered at Cirocco. "And Cirocco knows why she has to come, too."

Cirocco picked him up and popped him back in his bottle. Chris could hear him screaming his protests-mostly having to do with the promised alcohol-as she twisted the lid tight. No one said anything for a while. The look on Cirocco's face precluded idle conversation. At last she relaxed a little, and looked at Robin, then Chris.

"You'll want to know what he was talking about. I don't know if I need to say it, but I will. I would be going after him with everything I've got, no matter what. If Gaea got him, I would not rest until we had him back."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Robin confessed, "but I never thought anything different."

"I do know," Chris said, "and I never thought it would have made any difference, either."

"Thanks. To both of you. Robin, I have a reason other than friendship for doing my best to see that he doesn't get into Gaea's hands, and if he does, to get him away from her." She punched numbers on her keypad. "Rocky, how many eggs did you find in that room?"

"Fifteen, Captain," came the voice over the radio. Cirocco turned to Chris.

"Does that sound right?"

"No. I'm sure I had a rack of sixteen in that room. It was full."

"Conal," Cirocco said, "what can you tell me about the rack of Titanide eggs you let Adam play with?"

"It was the standard keepsake rack, Captain. Two rows, eight above and eight below. It was full." Cirocco hit the keypad again.

"Rocky, it seems-"

"I've found the rack, Captain," Rocky said. "It held sixteen. I've been searching diligently, according to your orders."

"Rocky, so help me, if you-"

"Captain, permit me to interrupt before you say something that might insult me. I have the fifteen eggs here before me. I have not waited to find them all before destroying them. To be exact, I have split them in half, so you may count the pieces upon your return-as I anticipated the embarrassing situation which seems to have arisen. Now, I may still find the missing egg, or it could be that Adam was holding it when he was taken. But if it is not found, it would be rather incriminating if I were shortly to be pregnant, wouldn't you think?"

"I'm sorry, Rocky," Cirocco said. "It's just that I've seen the lengths a desperate Titanide will go to if-"

"No offense taken, Captain."

"Jesus." Conal's voice was awed. "I didn't see that, Cirocco."

"What are you talking about?" Robin asked.

"It's Adam," Cirocco said. "Suddenly he's more than just personally important to all of us."

"He's capable of fertilizing Titanide eggs," Chris told Robin. "The ones he chewed on turned transparent-they're activated."

"Yes," Cirocco said. "He can do the thing that only I could do for almost a century. So we have to get him back. We can't let Gaea have him, because if she has him the Titanides become her slaves. And if we can keep him free..." She looked up, out the windshield into nothing, and seemed surprised. "... then I can die."

"Settle down, settle down," Conal said. "She didn't mean it like that."

"How the hell else could she mean it?" Nova demanded.

"She didn't say she was going to kill herself, did she?" He let her think about that for a while. The truth was, Cirocco's words had rocked him, too, but he had soon been able to understand the meaning behind them.

"Then what did she mean? Explain it to me."

"First you have to understand what Gaea did to her," Conal said. "It was a long time ago, back when Cirocco and the rest of the original crew had just got here. Gaea offered her the job of Wizard. She took it. Part of it-and Gaea didn't mention this-was that the race of Titanides was changed. Gaea took out the built-in hatred of angels and stopped the war that had been going on for so long. She also changed them so ... do you know how Titanides reproduce?"

"Only vaguely."

"Okay. They have frontal intercourse first. The female produces a semi-fertilized egg. You saw some of them in Adam's room. They have to be implanted in a rear vagina and fertilized again by a rear penis."

Nova's lips thi

"The step I left out is Cirocco. The egg will never be fully fertilized unless it's activated by Cirocco's saliva. Gaea pla

Conal saw compassion in Nova's eyes, and it touched him.

"It must be very hard," Nova said.

"Extremely. And in some ways you might not think of. Gaea has never given any sign that Cirocco would ever be let off the hook. What I mean is, if Cirocco died, then the Titanides would die, too. Her own survival had to take first place over everything. It meant that she had to do some things she wasn't proud of. Like with me, she had to... " He stopped himself just in time, and swallowed a bitter taste. There were some things Nova wasn't entitled to know.

"I know of two times in the last seven years when she has had to let a Titanide friend of hers go into a sticky situation where Cirocco knew he couldn't survive, because she couldn't risk her own life. One of those times... I know she feels she betrayed him. One day she might have to betray me so she can survive. I know that, and I accept it.

"That's not an easy way to live. You become the ultimate survivor, but you can't take any pride in it, because you know the lengths you'll go to. It doesn't leave much room for honor. And Cirocco laughs at honor, but I know it's important to her-not the way somebody else defines it, but the way she does."

Nova was giving him an entirely new look. It made him uncomfortable. None of the things he had said had come easy to him. It had taken him a long, painful time to work them out.