Chapter 16: Circe's Dream
                        -------------------------

"Where am I?" Circe muttered as she looked around.  All around her she
was surrounded by a thick mist.

"Cirrrceee," a voice echoed out of the mist.

"Who are you?" Circe asked as she spun around looking for the owner of
the voice.

"It's time, Circe." The voice was closer now.  Some where off to her left.

"Time for what?" Circe asked as she spun in the direction of the voice.

"It's time for Tzen's secrets to be known."  The voice was right behind
her now and the sound of it caused her to jump in spite of her self.
Turning, she saw a hovering Orb.  "Follow me," it said.  Obediently, Circe
followed the Orb.

******************

"Wake up," Hao heard a voice commanding him out of the darkness.  Slowly,
he came awake.  Circe was standing beside him.  "Come on," she said.
"It's important."

"What about Maru?" Hao asked as he turned towards the other bed.

"This doesn't concern her," Circe said as she lead Hao from the room.
Seconds later they had left the house and were walking towards the north
side of town.  As they left town it occured to Hao that he hadn't even
thought to bring a weapon with him.  But something seemed to tell him
that he would be okay as he neared the mountain.

As they approached the solid wall of the mountain, it suddenly seemed to
shift its shape, revealing a path winding up it.  Without pausing Circe
headed up the path, and after a moment's hesitation Hao followed.

"Where are we going?" Hao asked.

"To see the secrets of Tzen," Circe answered in a flat voice.

An hour later, when they reached the summit of the mountain, the sun had
just begin to rise in the east.  Down in Tzen it had been cold, but up
here it was freezing.  Even as he stood shivering, he was amazed that
Circe seem to be unaffected by the cold, even though she was wearing
scarcily more than Hao.

Suddenly, Circe began chanting.  So loud that Hao thought she would wake
the dead.  And just as suddenly, she stopped.  Then, the surrounding
seemed to go fuzzy, and with a bright flash of light, Hao and Circe
vanished from the mountain.

***************************

"Where are we?" Hao asked.

"You are in the Chamber of the Tzen Orbs," a voice answered before Circe
could.  "He have summoned you here, Hao."

"But why?" Hao asked as he looked at the orbs curisously.

*****************************************************

"Have you seen Hao?" Maru asked the old lady, Lucy, as she walked into
the kitchen.

"Not this morning," Lucy answered.  "Perhaps he went to look around town."

"Yeah, that's probably what he did," Maru answered.  "Probably thought I
needed to rest.  But I feel much better this morning, and I can hardly
tell that my hand was burnt."

"Really?" Lucy asked.  "With a burn as bad as that one was, I wasn't sure
the lotion would work."

"Well, lucky for me it did," Maru replied.  With that she sat down at the
table and began rummaging through there supplies.  Picking up Hao's
pistol, and taking a small screwdriver from her pouch, she began to work.

"This one's shot too," she mumbled to herself as she looked at the
circuitry of Hao's pistol.  "Hmm, I wonder."  Then she picked up the gate
device and began to examine it closely.  With a smile she went back to
pistol, and after removing its power supply, began to disassemble it.

Thirty minutes later she dumped the pouches carrying Hao's pistol and the
used up energy cells into Lucy's trash, and went back to wait for Hao.