The world always seemed so peaceful far below the kirins’ study. The room was unique as it was a section of the station that was almost purely clear. The ceiling, floor, and walls were all massive displays that had merged the views of cameras on the station to make the room appear as if one was floating in space. Near the door was a bit of a landing of sorts that held his book cases, and supplies for his writing. But there, as if hanging free in space was his desk at the far end of the room.

At his desk the kirin set, reading the latest reports on the desk’s built-in display. He got to study the findings of the new sample now in his lab, reading all the data the teams had uncovered and cataloged for him. “I see my sister. You died long before the scourged masses came. Naturally it seems. Rare that one of us falls simply to illness. What else had befallen you to make you die there of all places.” He remarked looking at the genetic information that scrolled like water across his desk.

He leaned back and took a breath, as he locked eyes with one of those random stars in the sky around him. “Why must so much be so unknowable. Is it so wrong to want to know everything... Just as she is too far out of my grasp in time. So is this star that I see every day. Its light wavers, and I know that it is actually dead by now just like her. The light arriving now from its final eons of life. That star is so vastly far away that it has gone nova by now. And all I can do is simply wait to see it bloom.” He sighed, shaking his head, eyes still transfixed on that twinkling star that seemed to shimmer and fade in and out slowly. He looked down once more to the information at  his desk.

“Had I known you. I could have likely saved you, my sister.” There came now a noise breaking the Kirin’s considerations and ruminations. “L-lord! Kezag here, We have an urgent issue in Airlock A - 3! Azara is in there! He is trying to space himself!” The kirin sighed deeply, and closed his eyes before he poked his desk’s surface, the display shutting off as he casually stood up/ He grabbed his coat from the back of the chair he’d been sitting at, and slipped it on calmly, casually. “Very good job calling me, Kezag. Calm yourself and know I am on my way.” 


Within moments the kirin would arrive at the airlock, walking casually towards the red flashing lights. A mild alarm going off signified the airlock had been attempted to be overridden with some on inside, and was now on full lock down. It could no longer be operated at all for just such safety reasons. Each airlock required at least 2 people to agree to open, one inside, and one outside. Any attempt to bypass this sounded alarms and locked the system down.

The kirin stood in front of the glass doors to the airlock, beside Kezag, one of his greater slaves who tended to the ‘new-borns’. Kezag was a chimera himself, one of the Kirin’s earlier prototypes. He was a simple amalgam of a lion headed stallion, and wore simple clothing, denoting his status was high enough to be out of silks, and ment that he was deeply trusted.

On the other side of the glass door though, stood Azara. A newly made chimera of many parts. Most of which draconic in nature. He was large, almost the same size as the Kirin, with the head of a wolf, and the rest looking like a mix of various dragon species. Azara was hunched over a smashed control panel frantically trying to get it to work, though in his rage he’d put his fist through it.


“Initiate the airlock override sequence Kezag. Then I want you to go away. I can see he is angry, and I do not want to risk him lashing out at you.” The kirin  adjusted himself a bit, straightening his coat and simply putting his hands behind his back, one talenous paw in the other as he waited patiently. The chimera at his side worked as quickly as he could, tapping at the panel by the door before the alarms changed tone, then silenced, the red lights starting to flash in sequence of yellow, then white.

The airlock hissed, and groaned, and the lights shifted tone, and Azara knew now he’d been caught. The trapped chimera turned and saw the kirin standing at the door, and readied himself for the coming fight. The large imposing figure hunched, claws out, fangs bared.  Azara lowered himself ready to pounce the second the door was open. Even with Azara’s intentions clear as day, the kirin stood there as that door slid open quickly, and the savagely enraged slave lunged himself at the lord with all the ferocity his body could muster.

The kirin was not here to fight. He never fought a slave outside of the sparring rooms on the station, or the arenas planet side. No; he was here to quell the beast’s rage, and as such would do his best to not lift a finger against him if at all possible. With the beat lunging towards him, the kirin simply stepped aside, and would allow the dragonoid chimera to crash into the hall’s wall behind where the kirin had stood.

“Calm yourself Azara; you are in no trouble, and have done no wrong boy. Please, speak with me.” The kirin’s words flowed as calmly and eloquently as ever, unphased by the brutality of the attack against him. But just as unmoved was Azara, lost in a battle lust that the kirin knew well was from his draconic merging. That powerful body’s instincts, overriding the mind of the loyal and sturdy canine head.


Once more Azara threw himself towards the kirin, this time much closer and ready to swipe at him instead of lunge. A furious flurry of slashing claws being thrown at the kirin, who expertly dodged or otherwise deflected each attack. He had no intention of hurting the slave, but he also had no intention of letting the slave hurt him or anyone else either.

The kirin trained himself hard in the martial arts of the world, he knew that some one as big, and as angry as Azara could do so much damage to him if he ever landed a blow. And in such a rage, even if the kirin had fought back, it would only serve to anger him more, increasing that ferocity and rage. 

Rage is an emotion born of passion or fear. As such it is a roaring living fire. And rage expected to be met with more fire, more anger. But the kirin knew well, a fire that burns is only ever grown when coming into contact with more fire. Adding fuel, or heat, is no way to combat flames, be they real, or in one’s heart, or mind. And so the lord let that fire burn, and took from him the wind that fanned the flames, pulling away more of Azara’s fuel with each failed attack, each attempt to harm the kirin tha failed, draining Azara little by little. The growls, snarls, and roars, with each subsequent attack slowly fade, and before long, with the kirin untouched, the chimera was left panting, and the fight was already decided.

“Ease yourself Azara. I am here to care for you now.” Said the kirin with only a light panting from having had to evade the dragons fury. While the hulking chimera pant hard, and tremble, hardly able to stand any longer. “You don't understand! I want to go... I NEED TO GO!” He roared and lunged once more at the Kirin. And for the first time, the kirin struck him as he passed. As the kirin dodged this lunge, he used the palm of his hand to strike between the beast’s shoulder blades, pushing him down, and causing the large beast to fall to the floor in a heap. Now shaking, quivering as his muscles burned, Azara’s mind slowly faded from a roaring tempest  into a rolling sea once more, and the pain flowed from him.

Pain, not from the fighting, but from his existence, from memories of his past.

“She needs me! I... I can’t stay here! I won't stay here!” Cried the wolf-headed dragon as he sobbed on the floor. He was clearly delusional at this point, as there was no one out there, and no one he should know anywhere but here on the station.


The kirin moved to stand over him, kneeling down and with his large talonous hand, simply stroked over the head of the wolf. “You have memories of her still don't you? You wonder why we call you Azara. Why you look like you do now.” To which the chimera looked up at him in astonishment. “Y-you know? You know what’s going on? Who I really am?” The kirin nodded and used the back of his hand to stroke the cheek of that wolf, his thumb wiping away a tear. “I do. And you should not. You already killed yourself once. The old you is already dead. She is not waiting for you now. She already has her lover with her.”


The wolf was more confused than before now. “I... What? Then why am I here!? Why do I remember her!? What are you talking about!? I’m not dead!” He shouted in defiance, throwing his arm up to swipe the kirin’s paw from his cheek. But this caused the kirin to claw under the chimera’s eye by mistake as he did so, his tears now mixing with blood that trickled down the cheek of the wolf.

The kirin stood, Sighing and wiping the blood from his claw with a handkerchief, before kneeling back down and dabbing it against the cut lightly. 

“You think you are Mister Setari, A kind old wolf who worked his whole life in a processing plant. Who had a wife and six pups, one grown, and five who lived with you still.” The kirin said removing his hand and simply resting that paw between those ears lightly.

“But one day, you came home only to find some one had bombed the floor of you living complex, from just next door to your home. It broke you.” A flood of emotion filled the mind of that wolf, eyes wide in abject horror, as the events played out as if they where going on right that second. The trauma, the pain, the permanent mark upon his mind opening up like a roiling, festering wound. “I..... I saw them... Th-.... their bodies,... n-nothing but... a smeared stain, filled with red, a-and pink, and... white bits... M-my family....” Whimpered the wolf as he was held, and caressed by the kirin tenderly.

The kirin kept petting him soothingly there in that vacant hall as he carried on the story. “Three days later. Entirely consumed with grief, you walked into a facility, and signed an agreement that in exchange for ending your life, and the donation of your body, your one living son would be granted employment at one of the most prestigious corporations and have his debts entirely erased.”

The kirin moved his hand to the wolf’s chin, lifting up that face so he could look into his eyes. The kirin’s own eyes, filled with empathetic pain and sympathy now. “Your son is doing well Mr.Setari. He misses you all, but he knows how important carrying on the family name and blood line was to you. And while he was angry with you at first, he understood now that you did what you did to make sure your bloodline survived.” The kirin wiped away another tear with  his other hand, and smiled down to that hybrid with a genuinely caring smile, so much like a father’s own smile. “And Mr.Setari, your bloodline is thriving. I am taking very good care of your son. ”


The chimera was stunned. So much came back to him all at once. He remembered it all now. But the word that his son was well perked up  his ears, and locked his gaze to the kirin’s now. He leaned up, the hulking dragon body still quivering a bit from having expended so much strength;  “M-My son! Keji! Where is he? Can I see him!?” The wolf-headed chimera gripped the kirin’s shoulders strongly as he looked him in those deep compassionate eyes. The kirin nodded and pointed down one of the halls. “Come, I will show you your son. He works planet side, so we only have camera feed. But it is the best we can do.”


The kirin would have taken his coat off now, and thrown it over the back of the chimera, who’d been only dressed in simply slave silks. The chimera greedily wraped that coat around himself, and soon followed the kirin through the station to a room filled with monitors and panels, each one having a slave jacked into a controller chair in front of it. 

Each station managed an entire facility from this remote control room high in orbit. All of the facilities the Kirin owned or ran for others, and were extensively monitored at all hours of the day. The kirin led the chimera up to what looked like one of the only pure-blooded, unaltered people on the station, who set in that controller chair that linked them into the monitors before he spoke slowly and politely to the slave.

“Show us Seno Valley’s plant. Asset requisitions and management department, Third floor, cubical D.” As he placed a hand on the shoulder of the data-diver they didn't respond in person, but soon the feed on the monitor showed just what was asked. And now, It showed in crisp clear detail a young wolf that looked so much like the head on the chimera.

The kirin turned to the chimera keeping a hand on his back as he spoke calmly and quietly as if not to disturb the others in this silent room. “He works for me now. He is adjusting very well to it, and we have scheduled him to meet other eligible females of his species through our company’s bloodline management resource center. He has dates every Thursday with eligible females who will see your bloodline is kept pure.” The chimera studied the screen for a moment, his face contorting in pain as he trembled, looking first at his son’s face, but more and more at that hand and then to his own body, tears rolling down his cheeks. 

“Wh-what happens now?” He asked looking once more to the kirin, who’s paw was patting him tenderly. The kirin simply smiled and looked at him and said “You can choose to keep these memories. So long as you serve me, and do your duties well you can stay here as you are. We will let you see your son any time you want through these feeds. We will even record his dates for you. And we can stream his home as he lives in company housing.”

The offer sounded so good, the next best thing to seeing his son. But, then he’d see him like he is now. And along those thoughts. there was one thing that seared its way across the chimera’s mind at this point. “But...  It means living with this pain. These.... Memories. I... I can’t stop seeing it. It wont leave my head... My... Family.”

The kirin sighed moving to hold the chimera tight to his chest. “Even these memories fade with time. But we can't undo what has been done to your body now. You can't leave this station. I’m sorry your memory wipe didn't hold the first time.” The kirin sighed deeply and patted along the chimera’s back, closing his eyes as he tightly held the now lightly sobbing creature.

“You never should have remembered this pain that drove you to suicide. You should never have suffered like this. You do not deserve it. You are a good man, and you were a fantastic father. Kiji himself has said so many times.” Those words struck the chimera like a bolt of lightning to his heart. But one word, ‘were’, made the chimera realize that to his son... he was already dead. He’d died providing his son with a future and means to carry on in the face of this all. He’d died a martyr to the sake of family, name, and blood. 


And now, he once more wished he was dead. These horrible images plagued his mind endlessly, playing on loop. The sight of him being held back by the investigation team, and the image of what was once family, now a fine paste. So mangled he could never have known who it was, or even if it was just one of them.

The chimera pulled away a bit, sobbing. I can't keep these memories... And seeing someone you love through a screen and living with the fact that you are dead to them, to the world. I can't....”

The kirin looked to  him with a sternness, a solemnness that betrayed the gravity of it all. His face like that of stone as he spoke pure straight fact; “We can take the pains away. We can erase your memories again. But we can do it right this time, using different methods sure to work with your new body.“


The chimera looked to the floor, seeing this body of his in simple slave silks under that coat, so diffrent from who he was before. He looked once more to the screen, holding a hand out and petting the boy’s cheek on it. The hand on his son’s cheek, no longer his own. “I.... I’ve seen enough.” Said the chimera. Looking back at the floor and closing his eyes. “I want to die again. I can do so happy, knowing my boy is doing well, getting on with his life and succeeding. That's all I can ask for now, nothing else matters to me.” He looked up to the kirin, the one he only knew as ‘master’ and said simply;

“Please,... Master. Take the pain away. Take from me these horrors I live with.“ 

And so it was, that for now, Mr.Setari was put to rest again. And in his place, within that mind freed of the pains of the past; the loyal, willing, and happy slave Azara was given home. Within that head, and within that body. A new spirit was able to take hold. 


From death, new life.