Dr Naskia Bass sat in a seat at the front of a lecture hall, she was flicking through various different research fellowships open to her at the University. Having been valedictorian for as long as she could remember and shining in her PHD projects and assessments Naskia had the pick of the litter of positions. She was leaning towards a project on increasing the efficiency and reliability of long range data transmissions. She was also offered a fellowship working on the miniaturisation of antimatter reactors, but given her Father and Niall had cracked that already and shown her the equation, it would be a bit redundant.

She looked up as she thought about what she really wanted to do, chewing on the end of a data stylus as she did. She smiled as she watched Niall surrounded by a group of four of his first year students who were entrenched in a heated discussion with him. They had projected a holo-image of the cross section of a torodial fusion reactor in front of the table. Occasionally one of the students would point at something and Niall would shake his head. The reactor looked like it was a homemade torodial fusion reactor which were exceptionally outdated pieces of equipment and it was likely a pet project the group were working on. Naskia could see from the cross section it wasn’t going to work and she knew Niall had spotted that already.

Naskia puzzled for a second as she did spot one thing that didn’t make sense. A girl who Naskia recognised as another of Niall’s first year students. She was rocking back and forth on the balls of her feet, her books and pad hugged tightly into her chest. She was standing off to the side of the group of male students. She was roughly the same height as Naskia but she was quite thin, almost scrawny with long, tangled blonde hair. She dressed in a similar style to Naskia; cardigan buttoned up to ward off the cold, short skirt with some leggings underneath and a plain pair of shoes. Naskia thought she looked quite pretty in her mismatched outfit. She also recognised the look; it was one of a tired, lonely, struggling first year girl. She knew the look because she had been there before.

Naskia got up out of her seat and stowed her pad in her bag; she ironed out the creases in her skirt with her hand, wanting to look perfect as usual. She walked over to the girl and stood beside her, a few paces in between them and watched the boys’ discussion. Naskia caught the girl make eye contact with her briefly as she approached before darting her head away and biting her lip nervously. Naskia felt herself smirk slightly, she never thought she’d be able to make anyone that nervous.

“It has to be the magnetic containment field!” Nouss yelled with some frustration. He pointed to a set of magnets dotted around the tokamak. “If we boost the output of these electromagnets, that should stabilize the field.”

“Hmmm….yes it would.” Niall said without elaborating. The group looked happy for a second before the grin disappeared from one of their faces.

“How much energy would we need to put through the electromagnets to stabilise the reaction exactly?” Lessard asked his colleagues.

Rynok tapped at his pad. “2.16Mw….”

“Damn…that would make the reactor uneconomical…” Sassmal cursed.

Niall smiled happy his students hadn’t wasted too much time on that particular dead end. “Torodial fusion reactors are difficult pieces of kit, it’s why The Empire moved on to more efficient forms of fusion that produce better results…”

“Yes! But this is a point of pride! If Humans can do it then the four of us should be able to do it as well.” Nouss shot in, somewhat rashly, drawing looks of horror from his classmates. Niall simply raised an eyebrow at the wayward insult and allowed them to descend into debate again.

“Kymie, isn’t it?” Naskia said edging herself closer to the now reddening girl.

The girl looked petrified for a second that Naskia was talking to her and nearly dropped her books, shocked that Naskia knew her name. “Y…y…yes Mis….I mean Dr Bass…”

Kymie looked like she was about ready to pass out from the sheer terror of just standing near Naskia. “It’s alright!” Naskia smiled reassuringly at her nervous companion. “I’m not gonna hurt you or anything!”

The nervous girl shifted on her feet thinking she’d upset Naskia. “Sorry…I’m just nervous…”

“Why?” Naskia asked keeping her reassuring smile.

“Because you’re Naskia Bass! Hussel Bass’ daughter…” Kymie said causing a little sting in Naskia, even as a Doctor in her field she was still in her father’s shadow. “…you got the top mark in every class you ever took! You out performed your father in nearly all of your classes and he’s famous. You’re like…a legend!” Kymie was moving quite a bit and looked somewhat excited.

Naskia gasped and grinned, focusing on Kymie’s face. “Really?! I beat my Dad? I never knew that…I’ve never beaten my Dad at anything before…”

“I bet you’ll be more famous than your father one day, Dr Bass.” Kymie added causing Naskia to blush slightly.

The two girls paused as some raised voices came from the group of men. Mild insults were exchanged before Niall intervened. Kymie glanced at Naskia nervously.

“So why are you standing here just watching, why don’t you get in there?” Naskia asked after the group settled.

Kymie didn’t respond, she just bit her lip and looked around nervously. Naskia placed her hand on Kymie’s shoulder and smiled at her reassuringly. “Kymie, you can tell me.”

“It’s ok Dr Bass…I’m fine.” Kymie replied looking down at the floor.

“Please, call me Naskia, Nas if you like. That’s what my friends call me.”

“Ok….Naskia…” Kymie rocked back and forth on her feet again, happy this time that one of her idols said she could use a familiar name.

“So c’mon, why don’t you go over there?” Naskia pushed.

“Cuz I can’t! Those guys are really clever! They’re the smartest in the class! Look how they yell at each other and insult each other. They’d just laugh at me and call me a ‘silly girl’!” She seemed less nervous now, more frustrated.

Naskia smiled seeing some of her younger self in Kymie. “What did you score in your entrance assessment?”

“One hundred and forty two…” Kymie said sounding a bit more nervous. She was worried what Naskia would make of her score.

Naskia’s smile didn’t break. “Hmmm, the same as me then.”

“Really?!” Kymie shot out, shocked to be on par with one of her idols. “I thought you wouldn’t have dropped a single mark!”

Dr Bass laughed. “Of course not, I know I’m clever but I’m not that clever…”

Kymie didn’t know what to say. She could feel her stomach churning with the nerves of maintaining conversation with someone she saw as infallible and intimidating. Her mind went blank and she couldn’t think of a response.

“What’s your opinion then?” Naskia asked.

“My opinion?” Kymie stammered.

Naskia gestured to the tokomak cross section. “Yeah, why do you think it’s not working?”

“Ehhh…I dunno…” Kymie said turning slightly red with embarrassment.

Naskia studied the blonde girl for a few seconds. She reminded her so much of herself when she was in her first year; shy, nervous and unsure of herself, feeling out of place in what seemed like a male dominated field. It was clear that Kymie was very clever. Naskia had helped Niall mark test papers and course work and Kymie’s work was always very impressive. But still Kymie looked like she felt out of her depth. Naskia recognised the signs; messy hair, bloodshot eyes and bags under her eyes, just how Naskia looked when she was stressing over her work.

“Humour me…please.” Naskia pressed.

Kymie studied the image for a few seconds. She already had an idea of what she thought was wrong but she was worried about blurting out something stupid. “Well…this projection is the exact size of the actual reactor…”

“Go on…” Naskia pushed softly.

“Ehh…..I think it’s fatally flawed…it’s too small…” Kymie forced out nervously.

“What’s your reasoning?” Naskia continued to gently coax the answer from her nervous admirer.

“The walls are too close to the plasma stream, the heat shielding isn’t up to the job. They could keep adding heat shielding but it would only interfere with the magnetic containment field and collapse the reaction. It needs to be 15 to 20% bigger…” Kymie said making fleeting eye contact with Naskia.

“Join in, tell them that.” Naskia encouraged her.

Kymie looked terrified, caught between wanting to impress Naskia and the worry of being pilloried by her colleagues. “But…it’s stupid…they’ve probably thought of that already. They’ll just laugh at me and call me horrible things…”

“If they do Niall will put them in their place!” Naskia said firmly.

“He won’t…this is how these smart guys get on…” Kymie shifted on her feet.

Naskia sighed knowing all too well what she meant. She locked eyes with Kymie. “If he doesn’t then I’ll put them in their place. And then Dr Freeman will spend the night in my sock drawer, ok?”

Kymie giggled at the thought of her fearsome lecturer spending a night sulking amongst his girlfriend’s socks and nodded. Naskia gently guided her forward towards the group until they were standing just outside. Kymie just stood there nervous, unsure how to butt into the turbulent conversation. Naskia slowly lowered her hand down and pinched Kymie’s bottom, causing her to jump forward, dropping her books and squeak. The group were silenced immediately and stared at the terrified girl.

“You have something to add Miss….miss…” Niall said not one hundred percent sure of her name.

“Kymie” Naskia reminded him as she gathered up Kymie’s things.

“Yes…Kymie…what do you think?” Niall asked his eyes moved from the stern look of Naskia to Kymie. Naskia’s look was one that said “Tread carefully if you want to get any for the next while.”

“It’s too small…the heat from the…” Kymie said before she was cut off.

“Oh don’t be stupid! I did the calculations myself! The chamber is the optimum size. Go home and sort your hair out blondie, you’re clearly not cut out for this!” Nouss cut across her, his tone drenched in arrogance.

Kymie looked like she was about to run away and hide after the tongue lashing she had just received, Niall could see she was visibly upset. Nouss didn’t seem to care.

“Nouss…” Niall said quietly. “If you EVER speak to Kymie that way again I will boot you from this class. Am I understood?”

“Yes….” Nouss said through gritted teeth.

“Good, you’re lucky I don’t send you off to the holosuite with her to try out one of my Human holosuite programs.” Niall said referring to his ‘Human Experience’ program. “Kymie, please continue.”

Kymie looked around nervously before Naskia gestured for her to carry on. “Ehhh….It looks like the heat from the plasma stream is interfering with electromagnets, disrupting the containment field and collapsing the reaction. More shielding will only make the reaction more unstable so I think they need to start over…scrap the whole thing and start again, make it about 20% bigger.”

Kymie finished and bit the inside of her cheek and waited to be told she was wrong.

“Gentlemen, you have your answer.” Niall said. “Very well done Kymie, you clearly have an eye for design.”

Kymie beamed and rocked back and forth on her heels.

“See! Just speak up a bit, you’d be surprised sometimes how much it helps.” Naskia said.

“That was very entertaining but I’m afraid I’m now late for an appointment. Nas, shall we?” Niall picked up his jacket and pulled it on.

“Two seconds, sweetie…I mean Dr Freeman.” Naskia and Kymie giggled. “If you ever need anything you just say to me, here’s my direct contact details.”

“Thank you! You are too nice.” Kymie looked down at the card Naskia had given her, holding it like a prized possession.

“Nah…I just know how it feels to be surrounded by arrogant men.” Naskia handed Kymie her books back.

Naskia set her hand down and Niall clambered on.

“Well then…I look forward to hearing your progress in a few days.” Niall said as the students said goodbye.

Naskia collected her bag and looked over her shoulder at the group of students before leaving the lecture hall, she smiled happy to see Lessard asking Kymie to help them redesign their reactor.

“So what appointment are we off to?” Naskia asked the man sitting in her palm.

“I got a message asking if we could both go to biology lab 4C after this class.” Niall said.

Naskia sighed. “That’s all you’re gonna tell me isn’t it?”

“Yup…” Niall smiled.

“Whatever happened to no secrets between us eh?” Naskia said gently dropping Niall into her now padded, more comfortable cardigan pocket and heading towards the biology building.

Naskia climbed the stairs to the 4th floor of the biology building and turned right into the corridor where the labs were. She was somewhat curious about the rather tall, imposing woman standing beside the door to lab C. She was instantly noticeable from a distance. Very tall, taller than Niall in the holosuite even, with tanned skin and shoulder length brown hair. She was staring intently at Naskia as she walked along the corridor towards the laboratory. It was quite unsettling.

Naskia swallowed subconsciously as she got closer to the woman. She forced herself to look straight ahead rather than making eye contact with her. As she approached the door she reached out her arm to touch the access panel but the tall woman grabbed her by the wrist firmly.

“Your name Miss?” She asked bluntly.

Naskia looked up, forcing herself to meet the woman’s gaze and not to seem intimidated. The woman was very pretty considering how imposing she was, with grey eyes and braids in her hair. Naskia smiled gently and withdrew her arm, its captor releasing it. “Dr Naskia Bass…and you might be?”

The tall woman pressed the access button and the door opened. “You may enter Dr Bass, she’s been waiting for you.”

Naskia didn’t want to wait around and ask some of the many questions she had but decided it would be better to go straight inside where she could get the answers she wanted from Niall. She hurried through and looked around the lab noting several unknown people in lab coats setting up equipment and one other person she recognised but did not expect.

“Naskia darling! It’s so good to finally meet you in the flesh. And such pretty flesh it is too.” Pryvani flashed her charming smile and rushed over to Naskia wrapping her arms around her and pulling herself towards the surprised woman for a hug. Naskia instinctively pushed her arms up to block the embrace, she didn’t want her boyfriend getting crushed in her pocket not to mention she was also uncomfortable with the encroachment on her personal space.

“Is something wrong?” The confident heiress asked sensing Naskia’s disposition easily.

“Oh nothing!” Naskia lied. She reached into her pocket and fished out Niall. “I just didn’t want my man getting squished.”

Pryvani’s face lit up with excitement as she laid her eyes on Niall for the first time. Niall performed his ritualistic blink as he readjusted to the increased light level. He was greeted by a somewhat familiar face intruding on his personal space.

“Miss Tarsuss…” Niall stood up in Naskia’s expansive hand and extended his arm. He wanted to ensure the respect she had shown him in their written correspondence would carry on now that they were no longer on even terms.

Pryvani extended her pinkie finger, being careful to keep her long, brightly coloured nails from scratching Niall’s arm and shook his hand.

“Dr Freeman please, I’ve told you before, call me Pryvani…” the heiress performed a half curtsey as she had been trained to do as a child.

“And yet you persist with calling me Dr Freeman?” Niall shot back with his well-worn tone of arrogance.

Pryvani took a step back allowing Niall a view of her entire outfit rather than just her face. She seemed to be dressing down compared to some of the images of her he’d seen but she still wasn’t entirely blending in. She wore a black, formal blazer with matching skirt, both were covered in sparkling sequins. Underneath she wore an extravagant ruffled shirt. She had on her feet a pair of exceptionally tall stiletto heels that made her much taller than Naskia. He suspected Naskia would be taller if they were both in flats. Niall wasn’t particularly interested in fashion but quickly decided he preferred Naskia’s modest cardigan and skirt combination that she usually wore. He also preferred her simple, yet luscious dark hair as opposed to Pryvani’s multi-shaded green cut.

“Ahh yes Dr Freeman, but you have fought hard to have your title recognised. It would be a disservice to you not to use it.” Pryvani smiled.

Naskia was getting slightly frustrated with the situation. First the tall woman grabbing her am, now Pryvani’s surprise appearance and most of all; being left out of the loop. Not to mention she felt somewhat irked by Pryvani addressing her as Naskia but continuing to refer to Niall as “Dr Freeman”.

“Now we’ve got the formalities out of the way.” Naskia cut across the pair before they could continue their banter. “Would anyone care to tell me what’s going on?”

“That’s a surprise.” Niall beamed quite pleased with Naskia’s frustration.

Naskia sighed and gave him a look that only he could read. “You know how much I dislike surprises…dear.”

Niall’s pleased expression faded away as he realised now would be a good time to fill her in on his recent correspondence with Pryvani. She only ever called him “dear” when she was starting to get annoyed with him.

“Pryvani, would you?” Niall asked.

Pryvani turned around and called out to the small group wearing lab coats. “Dr Selil, could you join us please?”

A red headed woman in a lab coat appeared from a tangle of fibre optic looking cables in a large piece of apparatus and walked over to the group. She looked mildly annoyed to have been torn away from her work. She stopped just outside the group and folded her arms across her chest, it was clear from her body language she would have rather be back in her mess of cables.

“Dr Kharee Selil, allow me to introduce Dr Naskia Bass and Dr Niall Freeman.” Pryvani extended her arm towards the new comer.

Dr Selil was the same height as Naskia with shoulder length red hair. She wore a green turtle neck under her lab coat and black pencil skirt with tights. Niall also noticed her glasses, hardly any other Titan wore them. These glasses seemed to have mechanical lenses that focused as she looked around. Niall thought she was quite pretty, though she would have been prettier if she smiled.

“Hi, nice to meet you.” Naskia smiled and extended her hand toward Dr Selil.

Dr Selil returned the handshake quickly but didn’t say anything to Naskia, she turned to Pryvani instead. “Is this going to take long? I’m very busy.”

“Dr Freeman is to be your research subject, Dr Bass is his girlfriend. Would you mind explaining to Dr Bass your research proposal please?” Pryvani asked.

A sly smile drew across Dr Selil’s face. She was always more than happy to talk about her work. The only thing she loved more than her work was explaining it and sharing her discoveries with others. She rushed over to the wall at the side of the lab, activated a large wall display and started to tap on the screen. Two pictures of scrolling DNA strands appeared on the screen, both identical as far as Naskia could tell.

“This is a Titan DNA strand.” Kharee started pointed to the strand on the left. “And this is a Human DNA strand…spot the difference?” She moved to the right hand strand.

“Ehhh…they look identical.” Naskia said somewhat surprised.

“97.2381% identical in fact. Truly remarkable!” Dr Selil smiled to herself and shook her head. She tapped the screen again and two very different DNA strands appeared.

“These are DNA samples taken from insectoids. Most people very rarely see any insectoid apart from those from the gatherer caste. They’re really the only ones who interact outside of their own species…well apart from the solider caste but they haven’t ventured into Titan space in centuries. The strange thing about the solider caste is that….” Kharee spoke quickly, she was excited.

“Dr Selil…?” Pryvani interrupted the ramble.

“Ahem…sorry.” Kharee paused to refocus her mind. “This DNA sample on the left is from a gatherer caste, the one of the right is from a scout caste. The differences are immediately apparent, even a child could tell that these two samples are completely different. They only share 86.5934% of their DNA. Most castes have a similar level of genetic difference.”

Kharee tapped the screen again and it changed to time lapse footage of a familiar gatherer insectoid encasing itself in a chrysalis and then re-emerging much bigger and stronger looking, with enlarged mandibles and claws.

“In times of need members of the insectoid species can change their caste, in this instance we see a member of the gatherer caste transforming into a soldier. The entire process takes months but in the end the individual goes through change on virtually every level, including at a genetic level.”

“Fascinating…” Naskia muttered totally focused on the time lapse footage. Insectoids gave her the creeps but the transformation process truly was remarkable.

“My team and I have spent the last five years working to unravel the secrets of this process. At first we believed it was designed by the insectoids to give them greater flexibility but the deeper we looked the more we ruled it out. This is a natural process triggered by a gland in the individual’s body. How it is triggered and how it chooses the target caste we don’t know.” Kharee was getting excited now.

She tapped the screen once more revealing a long spiral of what could be misidentified as DNA but was in fact RNA. “This is the RNA sequence responsible for the transformation. Compared to standard viral RNA it is remarkably complex, we have a rudimentary understanding of how it works and we hope to be able to replicate the results fully.”

Naskia followed the science, she had a good understanding of biology but there was one detail that eluded her. “So how exactly does Niall fit into all this?”

Kharee grinned, her eyes shone with excitement at the prospect of all the discoveries to be made. She tapped frantically on the screen again bringing up some data that was not part of the presentation she had put together. On the screen appeared a spinning double helix of Human DNA.

“This is Human DNA….” Kharee said and then tapped the screen again.

A strand of RNA appeared and blended with the double helix strand and started to alter it.

“We introduce a specially designed string of RNA based on the insectoid RNA matrix to the Human DNA and let it work its magic…” Kharee said pausing for dramatic effect. “Now the Human DNA is Titan DNA.”

Kharee beamed looking very pleased with herself as Naskia looked on completely agog. Niall stood in her hand. He had seen this before but it never ceased to amaze him and to fill him with hope. He had lied before to Kiri in the holosuite about making himself into a Titan but now it looked as if it would actually be possible. He could lead a normal life again, lie in his bed at home with Naskia in his arms, walk to work himself and finally be recognised as a Titan citizen.

“You mean…you could make Niall into a Titan…?” Naskia finally managed to ask. Her eyes dropped from the screen to focus on Niall standing in her palm.

“I believe we can. We’ve had some success already.” Kharee said sounding just as arrogant as Niall did when he was taking about his own achievements. She rushed off over the room and buried herself in the mess of cables she had been in earlier before rushing back over to the group. She raised her hand between Naskia and Pryvani and held up a Human wearing his own miniature lab coat.

Dhanyle sat in Kharee’s hand, looking around somewhat lost. He was used to other Titans, but mostly the ones who came in and out of the lab. He had worked hard to earn the respect of those who he interacted with, but always felt reserved when meeting new people. Most people instantly assumed he was some sort of mascot rather than a fully-fledged member of the research team.

He opened his mouth to speak when one of the new Titans leant in close to examine him. She had thick brown hair and a cute face. She hummed a bit and looked to a human she was holding in her own hand, he was about the same age but a bit taller.

Dhanyle shimmied back at the sudden encroachment on his personal space, looking more embarrassed than afraid. His face was dirty from his recent work inside the lab equipment.

“Oh..um…hey.” he blinked as Naskia looked him over, looking up to Kharee for reassurance.

“This is Dhanyle, my assistant. His small hands can be very useful setting up some of the more delicate equipment and experiments. How old do you think he is?”

Naskia studied the Human. He was a bit smaller than Niall. He had short brown hair that looked reasonably well kept and his face had a day’s worth of beard growth. This Human also didn’t look like the well exercised, athletic pets that she saw everywhere else. He was stocky and looked to have spent more time exercising his mind than his body. He seemed to be roughly the same age as Niall.

“Hi Dhanyle, nice to meet you.” Naskia said. She was somewhat concerned for the Human in Kharee’s hand. He didn’t seem comfortable being presented to the group of massive women. “I’d say he’s about four…”

Kharee smiled happy with the answer. “He’s actually over seven years old. I used an RNA template to reverse and slow his aging. I hope with more treatments we should be able to eventually slow his aging to Titan levels and now we have funds and resources from Miss Tarsuss we want to look into growing Humans to Titan size.”

Naskia lifted Niall to her face. Her smile was bigger than he was and her beautiful, blue eyes were welling with tears. “This is what you’ve been keeping from me?”

“It is…I didn’t want to get your hopes up…” Niall said.

“And this is definitely what you want? I thought you were proud of being Human?” Naskia quizzed her smiling fading into a confused pout.

Niall shifted on his feet, scuffing his shoes on her skin. It was an uncomfortable question. “Nas…I love you…I want to be with you for as long as I can…that’s the most important thing to me. I know you’ve given up a lot by committing to me, the fact you’ll outlive me by…well centuries from a Human perspective makes me feel sick, thinking of you alone and heartbroken. I want to grow old with you and just be normal. I’ll always be me, Human or Titan but that’s not as important as knowing you’ll be happy for the rest of your life.”

Naskia’s eyes overflowed and tears ran down her cheeks, Niall never talked like this and his words made her heart swell. Niall sucked in his lips and blinked his eyes as Naskia stared down at him, her face was so loving and kind she could have been Aphrodite herself. His own words had prompted a surge of emotion in him he didn’t know was there and he choked down a lump in his throat. He didn’t want to cry in a room full of strangers.

Pryvani guided Dr Selil away from the couple to give them some privacy. “Do you have everything you need?”

“I think we what we have should be sufficient.” Kharee thought for several seconds. “I imagine this research will take time and our funds will require topping up at some point in the future but your generosity already has been extraordinary.”

“Think nothing of it.” Pryvani smiled.

“Actually I do still need to procure a female test subject. Two males will not make for definitive results.” Kharee realised.

Naskia sniffled as she overheard Kharee speak. “I know where we can get a girl who would love to be part of this…”