Absyllea, Predator-Class Cyborg, Soldier of Enlar, War Scout Prime and Scourge of Chardis, methodically made her way to the computer core at the heart of the Justice Patrol headquarters. Tri-steel doors tore like tissue paper in her mighty hands. She tossed aside duranium struts like balsa wood. Finally, with a grunt, she wrenched open the last hatchway and strode into the data center.

The room teemed with a strange array of jerry-rigged equipment. Most of the machines appeared to be of Earth manufacture. Others had obviously originated in Consortium space. And some, intriguingly, were unidentifiable. She duly recorded it all with her enhanced eyes.

In the center of the room, a human youth stared at her. She sprawled in an oversized chair with a personal entertainment device in one hand and some confection in the other hand, suspended halfway on its journey to a gaping mouth.

"Who are you?" Absyllea interrogated. "You are not in my mission parameters."

"I - I - I have clearance to be here!" the Earthling squeaked. "I'm the, uh, intern. Sort of. Uh, who are you?"

Absyllea's personal datanet was already penetrating the Justice Patrol databases. Her eyes flickered as she accessed relevant information.

"You are called Kelly Mooney," she said. "You have a minor psychic gift. You are a...charity case." She hesitated over the unfamiliar phrase charity case; her translator only conveyed a loose correlation of weakness. To be considered weak by human standards, one must be weak indeed. But intern correlated to slave. And slaves only wanted orders.

"You will assist me," she instructed the human. "My mission is to download all data from Justice Patrol computers and transmit to the fleet. The next satellite window is in eight minutes. To facilitate this, you will open the emergency seals on the main entrance."

The human gawked. "I...I don't understand..."

Absyllea smiled comfortingly. She was good with slaves. This intern was probably the curious type that always asked why.

"Our projections are that your planet will be drawn into the galactic war," Absyllea informed the slave, with as much sympathy as a scourge of worlds could muster. "I am gathering intelligence on your military capabilities. I have overwhelmed this installation and taken command. Thus, you will follow my orders."

The human gasped, and the strange objects it held fell to the floor. "What..."she stammered. "What about the Justice Patrol?"

"They have been subdued with minimum possible force," Absyllea reassured her. "Their prognosis for full recovery is excellent. Excepting one of the elder males, who suffered some sort of cardiac incident."

Kell Mooney stood up. Her legs trembled. She stared at the ground. "Was it Augur?" she whispered.  "You hurt Augur?"

The cyborg waved a hand airily and turned her attention inwards, back to her personal datanet. Despite the latest in espionage enhancements, it was having trouble breaking the bizarre Earth encryption. "You may tend to him after I leave," Absyllea said, inspecting a computer terminal.

"No," Kelly whispered. She savagely wiped tears from her eyes and said, with greater force, "No. I don't think I can let you leave."

Absyllea turned back to face the human. "I am Absyllea," she announced coldly. "Predator-Class Cyborg, Soldier of Enlar, War Scout Prime and Scourge of Chardis.

"You are Kelly, the charity case. How could you possibly impede me?"

Kelly's gaze was still directed down. "Like this," she whispered. Sweat broke out on her forehead as she used her telekinesis to lift Absyllea into the air. The cyborg slowly wobbled towards the center of the chamber.

"You are so weak," Absyllea sneered. "What manner of attack is this?"

"Not. Attack." Kelly grunted. "Stalemate."

As a matter of routine, Abysllea had used her sonar to map the contours of the computer core when she entered. But she hadn't really noticed how high the ceiling was. Or that there were no beams, or pipes, or anything at all up here to grasp. She could bend metal with ease. She could kick concrete into powder. But with nothing to grab or hit or kick or throw, her prodigious strength was useless. She hung in the air, completely helpless.

"Stalemate," Absyllea grumbled. "And how will you break this stalemate? If your concentration wavers, I will kill you. If you go to tend to your Justice Patrol, your concentration will waver. If you do not tend to them, this Augur may well expire." She folded her arms and smiled. Sometimes war was psychological.

"All I have to do is wait," Kelly said. Her voice was strained but her face was composed. "Hey, " she suddenly asked, "do cyborgs have stomachs?"

"Your master is dying."

"You may be a cyborg," Kelly replied, "but you're not the only one good with computers." Her scalp was slick with sweat. She brushed a limp tendril of hair out of her face and picked up the device she had dropped. "According to the J-Sat, three Darts are on the way. Ooh, look, another one just launched!

"I just have to keep you tied up for a couple minutes until the cavalry gets here."

Absyllea vibrated with fury as she struggled to maneuver towards the damnable intern. But she could get no traction in mere air.

"So." Kelly said. "Stomach. Got one?"

"Of course. What is the relevance?

"We have a few minutes to kill, so I thought..."

Kelly looked Absyllea, Predator-Class Cyborg, Soldier of Enlar, War Scout Prime and Scourge of Chardis in the eyes and smiled.

"Let's see how fast I can spin you."