Author’s Note: AAGH! YET ANOTHER AU KIY!! screams I hate me today… well… cough um… I’m thinking about publishing all three of them when I finish ‘em and passing them off as unrelated related stories. (Kiy is a fantasy story involving these seven characters, and Ra’s Fleet is a completely sci-fi story involving these chars…does anybody besides me think I’m obsessed?) Ah, well. Let’s see which one I like best. grin At any rate. Warnings are the same as for ‘Ra’s Fleet’ and ‘Kiy,’ with a couple of additions, but for you newcomers, here they are:

A) Homosexuality. Gayness. Guys lovin’ guys. References to girls loving girls. If any of that squicks you, this story won’t be for you.
B) References to the sexual abuse of a child (no flashbacks, nothing, just references)
C) Mild sadism/masochism, though not for sexual pleasure…
D) Cursing. I do not star everything out, and people do swear here.
E) Sophomoric humor. I find it funny, but then, I’m weird…
F) Things going ‘boom’ or ‘crackle’…very loudly.

Um, I’m getting silly…. better just upload it already!

"Do you know anything about Tarot cards?" a man in a pressed business suit asks a youth sitting across a mahogany desk from him. The youth is perhaps nineteen; he wears khaki slacks and a long-sleeved shirt, and his golden-highlighted honey-colored hair is cut short. The man has dark hair that is greying at the temples, vaguely resembling something sinister, and there is a deck of cards sitting in his hands. He is shuffling them easily as he speaks, with the practiced hands of a dealer, or one who spends a great deal of time playing games like poker.

"No, sir; merely that they are used by mystics for fortune-telling," is the response.

The man laughs. "No need to pretend that you don’t think I’m slightly mad while thinking I am; I don’t personally believe in them."

The youth does not comment.

"There are seventy-eight cards in the Tarot deck; twenty-two of the ‘Major Arcana’ and four different suits, each with fourteen cards, called the ‘Minor Arcana.’"

No answer, so the man continues.

"There are a number of different Tarot decks; the most commonly recognized one is known as the ‘Rider-Waite deck.’ In the Rider-Waite deck, all but one of the twenty-two Major Arcana have human figures on them." As he speaks, the man begins to lay out cards on the table, starting with one labeled "The Magician" and ending with "The World."

"The card that lacks a human figure is the Wheel of Fortune," he states, pointing to said card and removing it from the layout of cards.

"So?" the youth asks, his patience getting ahead of him.

"I’ve always found it interesting that we have twenty different ranks for Talent, that’s all."

"So what does this have to do with cards?"

"Well, you see, the Major Arcana start at zero, and go to twenty-one. That makes for twenty Major Arcana above zero that have human figures on them."

"And…?" the youth asks, apparently becoming bored.

"Card zero is the Fool," the man says, pulling one last card out from the deck and laying it on the table, face down to him, so that the youth may see it face up. Unlike the others, it is not of the Rider-Waite deck; it is slightly holographic, so that the image changes as the light changes. The image is of a young man, dressed in silly clothing, doing something stupid.

The card is turned around, revealing the image on the flip side – that same young man, but this time, holding a miniature version of the galaxy in his hands.

"The Fool in the Tarot can represent both knowing nothing – and knowing everything.

"Card Zero."