Bandits Amid The Festival [11.9]

This chapter contains graphic sexual content.

In one of the few meeting rooms on the Brigand not yet torn into by sailors, an automatic kettle filled with coffee had been set on a table, along with creamer, sweeteners, and some sweet-glazed biscuits. Only two people occupied this meeting room today. On one side of the table, Lieutenant Murati Nakara sat with her back up straight, her hands on her lap, and a somewhat tense and serious look on her face. Her eyes wandered frequently.

Across the table, Premier Erika Kairos sat casually back, sipping coffee from a plastic mug.

“I’m glad I was able to catch you today, Lieutenant. You’ve been quite busy!”

“My apologies! There’s been a lot of work to do. I was planning an outing too.”

“Ah! Then I won’t keep you long, don’t worry.”

“No! It’s perfectly fine. I have a lot of time still– and I’d make more time for you!”

Erika put her cup of coffee down for a moment and leaned forward with a friendly smile.

“I’ve been informed of your indefatigable work ethic, but this is not that sort of meeting.”

“Oh! I thought you wanted to go over procedures and such, maybe talk about the pilots–”

“Not today! Right now, I just want to get to know you personally, Murati Nakara.”

Murati felt her heart accelerate in her chest.

Due to the circumstances, she had not yet been able to have a one-on-one meeting with the Brigand’s new political leader, Erika Kairos of the Nationale Volksarmee. Of course, she was well informed of the situation, she was there to listen to Erika’s speech. But they had not gotten to actually talk to one another. Murati’s duties as first officer intensified recently due to the messiness with the Brigand’s refit, and the Captain’s participation in United Front discussions. While the Captain and Commissar were occupied, Murati had tapped into that ‘indefatigable work ethic’ to cover every second that they were gone. She had signed off on workgroup tasks, rejected dozens of foolish inquiries and requests from the sailors with an iron fist demanding strict adherence to code, and maintained operational security.

Then, Murati was swamped with additional shore leave preparations.

So she had been denied the time to meet Erika again and again. Even as Erika made the rounds and visited the engineers, sailors and other pilots, Murati had been absent.

While she was busy, she hadn’t thought about it as much, but in her presence–

Murati felt almost desperate across from this woman. She was completely struck by her.

That speech– it had shaken through Murati and filled with her burning determination!

Erika’s words bore the weight of history; every sentence swept through Murati like a hurricane. She was left wondering if this is what the original revolutionaries felt listening to Daksha Kansal declare the Union upon the First United Front’s liberation of Mount Raja. Ever since hearing that speech, in the back of her mind, she thought about what she would say, what she would ask, how she would make a first impression on Erika–

“Lieutenant, you haven’t touched your coffee. Is everything okay?” Erika asked.

“Yes! Ma’am! May I ask something about you?” Murati said.

“Of course! This is a conversation. No need to be so stiff, Murati!”

“Ma’am–” Murati’s eyes brightened. “May I ask about– your bibliography!”

Erika blinked her eyes, in the middle of lifting her cup for a drink of her coffee.

“My bibliography?” Erika asked, cracking a little grin.

“Yes! I mean– I want to know about your theoretical grounding! I’m– I’m not questioning you of course. I am someone who greatly admires the Katarran people and sympathizes with their history and plight; and to see a scholar such as yourself who is fighting for their dignity and that of others, it gives me such wild hope for the future! In so few and yet carefully chosen words you demonstrated such a vast and strong grounding in the status of internal nationalities in the social order of the Imbrian Empire, but not just in theory, but with concrete experiences gleaned from local insight! Through your speech, I glimpsed the rich history of the Shimii in Eisental and the economic advantage Imbrians glean from the direct exploitation of Katarrans even as they try to drive them to the margins of society! My eyes were opened– I am deeply, poorly read on the specifics of regional cultures in the Imbrium. I must update my theories too! I would read any number of books that you suggested!”

Murati’s wild hand gestures and sudden eagerness seemed to surprise Erika.

Who still had her cup of coffee hovering near her face while she stared at Murati.

“I’m afraid I don’t have an exact book list.” She said gently. “I’ve read the elemental works, like Mordecai, von Haar, Kansal’s early work, Jayasankar’s treatises on inter-ethnic alliances in the Union’s struggle, such things. I’m afraid there’s not really anything that’s written with a critical eye about Eisental’s history. I was actually thinking of writing about it once–”

Upon the mere suggestion that Erika might write a book, Murati’s entire soul quaked.

“Ma’am if you wrote a book, I’d love to read your manuscript! Maybe I could help edit! It would be my honor to do anything I can to bring your insights into the broader academic discussion on communist governance and nationalities policy! You are definitely worthier of being read in Union scholarship than some of the doggerel that passes for socialist education at the Academy!!”

Murati spoke breathlessly and had started to lean closer across the table.

Erika blinked and finally sipped her coffee again after several minutes.

“My, my– it looks like it’s not just your work ethic that is impressive!”

She started giggling. Murati started to wonder if she had misspoken somehow.

“I am flattered Murati.” Erika continued. “Perhaps in the future, we can do so.”

“Yes, of course.” Murati said. She thought she inferred the Premier’s intent.

Right now wasn’t the time to be thinking about theory-craft.

Erika looked upon Murati with a fondness and softness in her eyes.

“Captain Korabiskaya spoke glowingly of you. She told me you are not only skilled in combat and in tactical planning, but are also exactingly responsible towards your duties, and the most ardent communist of the crew’s officers. Even in this short span of time, I can already feel your– unique– passion and energy, Murati. I may just concur with the Captain.”

She set down her coffee on the table and reached a hand across.

Murati reflexively saluted, realized she had done so, and immediately reached out herself.

They shook hands, with casual courtesy.

“I am not much older than you; I am hoping that both of us can have bright and long futures ahead. For now, Murati, let us do this. You live your theory with that passion you possess and speak your mind candidly to advise me and our course of action. And I in turn will live my theory and impart on you what I’ve learned from my years here in Eisental. I think this will be more instructive to both of us for now than writing my seminal work of theory.”

“Yes, of course, Premier. Thank you kindly.” Murati replied.

When Erika spoke seriously, she had a decided charm Murati could not avoid.

She had an easy, unremarked charisma; something Murati felt she herself must have lacked.

Maybe if it was Erika, all her petitions for captainship would have borne fruit.

But when they talked just like this, she also seemed approachable and easygoing too.

It made Murati feel a bit less mature than she once believed herself to be.

Erika was someone, like the Captain, who had demonstrated enormous merit in the field.

Murati hoped she would have an opportunity to prove her own convictions as well.

“But like I said,” Erika continued, “I wanted to talk about you personally.”

“Of course! You can ask me anything, ma’am!”

She hoped her enthusiasm wasn’t too annoying– but Erika was just so cool.

Almost like speaking to a real Katarran warlord– but a communist!

“What are your ambitions for the future, Murati?” Erika asked. “One thing I’ve always been curious about, is what children of a real socialist nation grow up wanting to become. Here in the Imbrium, no Katarran child can dream of anything; and the Imbrians are pushed to think of themselves as money earning machines who need waged labor. If I might be allowed an assumption, it seems like you are on track to be a wonderful scholar. Am I wrong?”

Murati smiled. “Actually, ma’am, I want to be Captain of a ship in the Union Navy. Of course, you can’t do that forever– someday I may become a Kommandant and perhaps even a Rear Admiral, I’m sure. But I feel that a Captainship is a reasonable goal within a few years.”

Erika looked surprised for a few moments and then smiled again.

“A career soldier? How interesting. I shall evaluate your merits over time then.”

“Ma’am!” Murati stiffened again. “I would welcome any criticism you have!”

“Oh dear, I’ve made her go solid as steel again.” Erika said, giggling.

“Ma’am?”

“Nothing, nothing~ Murati, please don’t be so formal.”

“Alright.”

Murati let out a long-held breath and tried to loosen up at least a little bit.

She finally reached for her coffee and took a sip.

It was still warm, thanks to the design of the mug. She hoped dearly she was not looking like a fool in front of Erika– she was committed to impressing her new ally. Erika was not only a Katarran, whom Murati was fascinated by; nor just a successful leader of insurgents; she was a communist, excellently read, eloquent, and with easy confidence. It felt like Erika had achieved so much of what Murati strove for, and Murati wished to earn her respect as a peer.

But she couldn’t hurry to that goal. She just had to do her best, over the course of things–

–those things, being, war. Murati then felt the totality of her foolishness hit all at once.

Probably, she looked like a monumental idiot being so excited about going to war.

“How has life been for you aboard the ship?” Erika asked. “Do you have any hobbies?”

Murati blinked. Erika’s casual inquiry brought her out of her dark, spiraling mindset.

“Um. It’s been more than acceptable. The Brigand is very comfortable and full featured. As for hobbies, I– I like music. Electronic music. And I like to read of course. I have been reading about local establishments– I have my fiancée aboard and I am planning a date.”

“She is quite a lucky woman! I hope you have a fantastic evening.”

Erika sipped her coffee again and Murati tried to think of what else to say.

“Um– yes– hobbies– let’s see–”

Hobbies were not a particular strong suit of Murati’s– being asked that question by Erika made her realize how much her work and her ambition had become her entire life. Having to furnish an answer to someone she wanted to respect and desired esteem from made her wrack her brain and realize she didn’t do much ‘for fun’ around here, or even back at Thassal. She had always been doing work for Naval HQ or fighting them about getting more work or a Captainship, and she only ever went out to have fun if it was with Karuniya. In her room, she mainly read history books and treatises on war, logistics reports, strategic reviews of forces. She rarely watched films, and was only familiar with video games through her advocacy for combat simulators. In fact, she only really liked music because it could provide ambiance while she was reading or working– she didn’t have any hands-on sort of hobbies.

“We could listen to some music sometime. I could show you my favorites.” Murati said.

“That would be lovely. We shall make a time of it at the next opportunity.” Erika said.

“Ma’am– Should I have a real hobby?” Murati felt compelled to ask all of a sudden.

Mainly out of reaching a peak of nervousness about whether she looked too foolish.

Erika gave her a gentle smile, reached across the table, and patted Murati’s hands.

“No, Murati; you should be yourself, and I think you are very good at that.” She said softly.

Murati smiled back. She felt a shot in the arm of confidence.

For the rest of their conversation, her wild gesticulation and verbal energy fully returned.


“My girlfriend is the absolute coolest! She’s the coolest of the cool!”

Maryam clung closer to Shalikova’s arm, rubbing her cheek up against the shoulder.

“Ah– Thanks– Maryam–”

“I told you! You look amazing on the street like this! I’m so happy you wore the outfit!”

“Yeah–? Well– As long as you like it–”

They’re the worst. They’re the worst. Those two– they’ll be the death of me–!

Everyone was staring.

Literally everyone on the street was staring directly at the two of them. Right? They must have been. Shalikova was almost scared to try to catch the direction of anyone’s gaze in the crowd. Maybe they weren’t looking– but she felt so exposed. She was so red. Not just her face, but her suit was so red and gaudy– and the sunglasses— it was insane to be wearing it, she felt like an ambulant semaphore. No– she was more like a living Yule decoration!

It was insane. And it was all their fault.

“It’s been a long walk, but I’m really looking forward to the carnival!”

“Ah– yeah, definitely–”

“We’re gonna eat junk food and play games all day! The perfect station date!”

“Oh– totally–”

“And we look like such a power couple, don’t we? It’s everything I dreamed of!”

“Uh huh? Well– I’m happy if you are–”

THEY’RE THE WORST!

Several hours before she set out on her date with Maryam, Shalikova had gone to Illya and Valeriya’s room. They had insinuated they had something to give her, and she wanted to get whatever filial nonsense they thought they had to do for her sake, over with as soon as possible and then get on with forgetting it. She figured it was some ill-considered thing relating to her date, like cologne or erection pills. She paused in front of their door, wondering if she might be able to make out a sound. Neither one of them had told Shalikova what their schedule was like, so she looked for them as soon as she woke up.

She thought that she could hear a vague whiny noise through the door.

“Ugh. What if I walk in on them? Damn it.”

Shalikova stood frozen in front of their door for three or four minutes before knocking.

“Forget it, it’s not my fault if I inconvenience them–”

“Come in.”

Mere seconds after Shalikova’s fist raised off the steel door, it unceremoniously slid open.

Though Shalikova immediately feared a dramatic unveiling, Illya and Valeriya’s room was nothing out of the ordinary. Two bunks, a pull-out desk, bare metal walls and floor, like the rest. Unlike most of the officers, who lived alone until circumstances starting shrinking the number of available accommodations, Illya and Valeriya were roomed together. Valeriya was lying in bed, whether sleeping or not, Shalikova did not know. From the glimpse of a pale shoulder, she was naked in bed, her back turned, barely wrapped in blankets.

Illya was seated in the middle of the back wall, with a portable computer laid on the pull-out desk surface. She was wearing a tanktop and shorts and looked bored scrolling through pages. It seemed the two of them had their fun before Shalikova stood at their door.

She felt a sense of relief lifting the tension in her chest.

“Sonya.” Illya said, by way of greeting. “Anything I can help with?”

“You wanted me to come get something.” Shalikova said, barely above a whisper.

“You can raise your voice. She’s awake. She just doesn’t want to look at you.” Illya said.

From the bed, Valeriya raised a hand, waved half-heartedly, and then put it back down.

Shalikova noticed as her hand came down, she gestured like lifting a mask over her face.

Which she was not wearing to bed– Valeriya was really a prisoner of her habits.

“Fine.” Shalikova said. “Look, you said you had something for me if my date got approved. Well, you saw it from your monitors, I did give the form to Murati, and she did approve it.”

“Ah, yeah. I have something that’ll upgrade you from ‘our little sonya’ to a real playboy.”

“Yeah? I don’t want to do anything like that. But I’ll take it just so you’ll shut up.”

“You’re so cold to me. But you’ll be hot as fire if you wear this to your date.”

From under the room’s second bunk, Illya withdrew two plastic gift boxes.

“Back before we learned about this mission, we got you a gift and tried to make plans to see you again. We thought bringing you something fancy might break the ice after a long time apart– but you know, circumstances conspired against us, and we broke the ice in much shittier ways, on this boat, instead of in the Union. Regardless, it’s yours. We got you an outfit and some accesories. Mount Raja chic stuff– not the easiest shit to get without the sort of connections we have. You can wear it or not, but you really ought to.”

She deposited the boxes on Shalikova’s awaiting arms with a self-assured grin.

Shalikova was not even going to bother to open the boxes much less wear the contents.

Maryam was just going to wear a uniform, and so was she.

“Thanks. Are you and Valeriya doing anything special?” She asked out of courtesy.

Illya cracked a grin and cracked her knuckles too. “Every night is special for us.”

Shalikova crooked an eyebrow. “Okay. Well. Whatever. Have fun I guess.”

She turned sharply around and marched back to her room and put all of that behind herself.

Back in her room, she threw the box on her bed and stripped her clothes.

On the opposite side of the room, a strobing purple marshmallow indicated that her girlfriend was still solidly asleep and Shalikova had no intention to wake her. She had an idea of how she wanted everything to go. She would go catch a shower, come back, dress up, and if Maryam was still asleep, she would go pick up food for the both of them.

They would eat in their room, and then set off together.

Maryam slept like a boulder most of the time, so she didn’t have to fear waking her.

She left the room in her vinyl bathrobe, marched to the bathroom, ignored Geninov and Santapena-De La Rosa being there together while washing up, marched out of the bathroom. With her hair wet and dressed only in her vinyl robe, Shalikova still felt, for once, bold enough to go to grab a breakfast box from the under-reconstruction cafeteria.

Appearances be damned– this was her big day.

Raising her head, straightening her back, smiling to herself like she owned the ship.

Even if it was a little cold to be out and about like that, the fire in her heart was enough.

Shalikova grabbed some breakfast and took it back to her room.

In her mind, she would stride through the door to the adoring eyes of her girlfriend.

Looking oh-so considerate, responsible, and put together, for bringing her breakfast in bed.

She stood at the door. In her mind– it was going to be a perfect start to a perfect day.

Reality punched her square in the sternum just a moment later.

“Sonya! Take a look at this! It’s so cool!”

“Huh?”

Shalikova found Maryam was awake and sitting on her bed instead; holding up some bright red thing at her with an enormous beaming smile like a little girl with a birthday gift. Illya’s boxes and their wrappings lay discarded behind her. Maryam had helped herself to whatever Illya had gotten for Shalikova– which was mortifying enough to think about.

But the actual contents–

“I bet you would look really cool in this! And now I can wear my nice dress too!”

–inspired even greater fear.

Unable to bear the disappointment it might cause her girlfriend, she went along with it.

And now, they were walking down the street, in public– and Shalikova looked–

“Who gave you that dress anyway?” She said, trying to deflect.

“It was McKennedy! She said she wanted to make up for ‘the inconveniences.’”

“She must have realized how racist she sounded with you.”

“Well, it’s quite cuttlevenient for me, whatever the intention.” Maryam smiled proudly.

Illya’s gift for Shalikova was a set of track clothes.

There was a bright red zip-up jacket with gold stripes, emblazoned with the word “ACE” on the back in gold-bordered black, which Shalikova wore half-unzipped over a plain white tanktop and sports bra for lack of anything else to pair with that. Along with the jacket she received matching red pants with a gold stripe. They were exceptionally tight in the back– a place where Shalikova was a bit lean anyway. She got new black and white sneakers too, with actual laces and layered material that must have been a boutique synthestitch job.

And then, she had the sunglasses.

Big light-blue lenses that perched heavily on her nose and barely concealed her eyes, on a thin frame from translucent blue and black materials. These were typically known as “pilot” style glasses despite the fact that Diver pilots didn’t wear things like this— or at least Shalikova did not. They were extremely showy and so they went with the rest of the showy outfit, which made Shalikova feel like she must have come off monumentally insecure.

Does Illya think I’m a delinquent?! Is she just fucking with me?!

There was a bright side, keeping the situation from being completely intolerable.

While Shalikova looked, in her mind, ridiculous, at her side, Maryam was jaw-droppingly, stunningly beautiful. McKennedy, as rude as she was, definitely had an eye for fashion.

Maryam had been gifted a long-sleeved dark blue dress that flattered her figure, with a high collar and white seams and accents. The sleeves flared into little ruffled cones at the wrist, and the skirt had a similar ornate, ruffled design. White leggings and black shoes added a bit of contrast. By far the cutest touch, however, was a floppy beret perched atop her head.

“You look stunning too, Maryam. Forget about me– you’re incredible. You’re beautiful.”

“Ah! Sonya, thank you so much! But don’t sell yourself short! You don’t let me talk down about myself, so I’m not going to let you either! You’re my super cool girlfriend, so chin up!”

“You’re right. I’ll try– but you really are very beautiful Maryam. I wanted to say that.”

There was one small note of sadness in Shalikova’s heart– because Maryam was not her entire self that day. Her skin was a creamier color, and her hair was still long and silky and dark– but it was not purple. And her eyes were no longer the cute little W’s that Shalikova had come to love either. Maryam was hiding her identity as a Katarran.

Her tentacles and fins shrank and hid within her hair, she wore lenses provided by Cecilia Foss that covered up the shape of her irises. She was pretending to be a black-haired, fair-skinned, blue eyed Imbrian. Of course, no matter what Maryam looked like, Shalikova would still love her– but she wished that Maryam could have been the crayon-pink skinned, purple haired, W-eyed, tentacled and finned purple marshmallow that she knew.

Regardless, she was beautiful, and she was right. This was her special, promised day.

Shalikova had bowed to make it perfect. Illya’s stupid tracksuit was now just part of that.

If Maryam thought she looked cool, Shalikova could try to silence her anxiety for now.

Arm in arm, the lovers strolled through one of C-block’s lower modules.

Ordinarily the purpose of this module was commercial space. Sans accoutrements it was essentially a box wider and taller than a typical “indoors” module in Kreuzung. It played host to conventions and exhibitions, athletic events, and festivals and fairgrounds. For the lovers’ visit, it had become the latter. Now playing host to various rides and mechanisms that had been erected for the festivities, surrounded by a deep cluster of kiosks, tents and plastic buildings, easy to put up and take down. Fairy lights strung up around every structure and overhead pulsed with itinerant colors. There was a sizeable but not overwhelming crowd. And the walls and ceiling of the module had taken on a wine-red and orange-pink color and lighting that stirred something in the most ancient recesses of Shalikova’s brain.

Dreams of the sunsets that their world now only saw in fiction, briefly crossed her mind.

She pulled Maryam in closer, her soft face lit in those dark and evocative colors.

“Whatever you want to do. I’m all yours. Just like I promised.” Shalikova said.

Maryam laughed.

“Back then, did you think we would be this close when I received my reward?”

They had agreed to go on a station date weeks ago, after Shalikova lost a game to Maryam.

Back then, Shalikova heard the word ‘station date’ and imagined several romantic cliches.

Now– they had different cliches entirely. But they were better ones, by far.

“Some part of me was hoping for it.” Shalikova said, with a bashful smile.

Maryam beamed back at her, and pushed herself onto Shalikova, rubbing cheeks with her.

“Let’s go play some carnival games! Then we’ll get some food and get on the rides!”

“Maybe we shouldn’t ride anything with full stomachs–”

Shalikova often forgot about Maryam’s monstrous strength, so she was taken completely by surprise when her pouty girlfriend easily silenced her protests by pulling her helpless along by the arm to wherever she wanted to go. It became funnier than it was distressing very quickly; the two of them entered the crowd winding its way through the festivities.

The clamor of dozens of chatting festival-goers drowning out the chords and brasses of the streetside bands; the smell of frying oil and sweet caramel and cheese predominant among the snack shops; the colored lights playing about their faces and bodies from the shopfronts around them and the struts above them; soon, Shalikova could hardly tell she was wearing her gaudy red tracksuit amid all of the gaudiness and cheer around them.

There was so much energy around her that Shalikova started to feel more comfortable.

Nobody could possibly look at her in the middle of all this–

Except the girl whose eyes she did want.

“Sonya, look over there! You can win me a prize!”

Maryam pointed at a tent playing host to a shooting gallery.

On the front counter, there were a few air guns, carbine-length with a simple stock. Behind the counter, there were several targets of different sizes and at different ranges.

Some targets were platters, others were small cylinders, and the very smallest target was the width of a finger standing on a pedestal. Targets had scores depending on how close or far they were and what size they were, and there was a wall of prizes you could pick if you had the corresponding amount of points. Among the valuable items there was a neon techwear cap, a set of cat-eared headphones, and a large plush cuttlefish.

As they approached the tent, the operator clapped his hands.

“Step right up! Ten marks for three shots! It’s easier than it looks!”

Slightly nervous as the man began appraising her, Shalikova reached into the wrong pocket. She had put her money in her jacket pocket to have it closer in reach and to make it harder for anyone to see the bundle; but she actually reached into her pants pocket out of habit, because the TBT uniform half-jackets usually had no pockets on them.

Her fingers mindlessly closed around something round that was wrapped in a plastic foil.

Briefly speechless, she retracted her hand and took the money from her jacket.

Was that a condom?! Illya?!

“I’ll try it. I want the plush.” Shalikova said, hiding her surprise.

“Well, if you get the points little lady.” Replied the man behind the counter.

He handed her a rifle and stepped aside to allow her to shoot.

At her side, Maryam smiled wide, her shining eyes awaiting Shalikova’s next move.

Shalikova hefted the rifle, feeling the weight. She looked down the sights.

Feeling around the body of the rifle. No safety. Semi-automatic. A small box magazine on the underside. Probably packed with pellets. Had to be more than the three she was allowed to shoot per round. Like Union training guns, it used an electric gear to fire– she realized the man in the tent was staring at her as she examined the gun, and she might have looked briefly suspicious for having insepcted the gun before shooting it.

Without further delay, Shalikova aimed the rifle at the smallest target.

She fired her first shot, falling short.

Fired a second, going wide.

And quickly let loose the third, overshooting the tiny ceramic target.

“Hey, you missed, pal.” Said the operator, a tad bit too cheerful.

Shalikova put another ten marks bill on the counter and looked at him.

There was fiery determination in her eyes which put him to pause.

Perhaps, he was deliberating on whether to allow her another go at all.

From what he saw before, he might have suspected she was familiar with weapons.

At her side, everything had happened so fast, Maryam was still processing.

She looked between the targets, all still standing; and the confident Shalikova, cracking a grin, rifle still in hand, money on the table. Shalikova was sure of herself now. This booth was a scam for civilians, but she knew the exact errant behavior of her rifle now.

Staring down the operator, with the rifle still in hand, finally caused him to relent, take her money and allow her to shoot again with the same rifle. This was his mistake.

Had he made her swap, he would have gotten another ten marks for free.

Wordlessly, Shalikova lined up the small target in her sights.

Under the watchful eyes of the operator, she shifted her aim a few degrees up and left.

He knew immediately, and she heard a low groan escape him.

Trigger pull; the fwip noise of a shot.

Immediately, the shattering crack of the finger’s-width plate worth the most points.

Knocked off its distant pedestal and smashed to pieces on the floor of the tent.

“Alright miss. You wanted the cuttlefish plush right? You earned it.”

From behind the counter, the operator picked up the round, fat fluffy cuttlefish toy.

He put it in a bag, and with a nervous smile, reached the bag out to Shalikova.

As if to say, ‘put the gun down and leave with this.’

Shalikova grinned even wider and cockier than before.

With the rifle she had in hand, she could have taken every high points target.

That would have given her more winnings than the plush– but the operator had to cut her off to cut his losses. He was trying to weasel out of the rest of the shots Shalikova had already paid for, which was rather dirty of him. Shalikova had thought about demanding to play the rest of her round, with its two remaining shots. But Maryam was watching with stunned elation, and they didn’t want to rock the boat anyway.

Graciously, she put down the gun to accept the plushie.

“Sonya! You’re the absolute coolest! A stone cold killer!” Maryam cheered.

“Thanks, but uh,” she started to whisper, “tone it down a little!”

Shalikova pulled Maryam away from the tent and back into the path.

“Look Sonya, it’s me!”

Maryam half-unbagged the cuttlefish plushie. She pointed at it, and back at herself.

Shalikova looked at the plush. It bore little resemblance, due to the Imbrian disguise.

It was basically a blue blob with a suggestion of tentacles, but it had the silly little head fins.

“I can see it.” Shalikova replied.

Maryam smiled.

“Thank you Sonya! This is already the best day ever!”

“I’m glad.”

“I told you, you’re so strong. You’re like a Katarran warlord!”

“Let’s– let’s not push it– okay?”

“No! We’re gonna push it! Let’s play more games!”

“Okay– That’s not what I–?”

Maryam grabbed Shalikova again and rushed to the next attraction that caught her eye.

There was another tent game nearby that had a long board that sloped against a backing board. On the peak of the board there were several holes that were worth points. Along the length of it, there were obstacles that served to funnel a ball thrown by the player toward the backing board. Each of the obstacles and holes was marked with the points, with the objective being to slide the ball into the center-most of the holes for the most points.

Just like before, there were prizes up on a wall. There were novelty glasses with swirly colored lenses, a very intricate toy Marder-class, a replica vibrocutlass, and a bag of novelty game dice, with a twenty-sided dice out of the bag to demonstrate the contents.

Judging by the prizes, this game was for a younger set than the last one they played.

“Maryam, do you really want any of this stuff?” Sonya asked.

“I want the game dice!” Maryam said. “Good dice are invaluable, Sonya!”

“These don’t look good to me, but I’m not an expert.” Shalikova said.

“You can run all kinds of scams with dice, they’re an amazing survival tool.”

Shalikova blinked. “Um. But you don’t need to run scams anymore. You know?”

“Oh. I suppose that’s true! But I still want them!”

She puffed up her cheeks just a little– couldn’t do it too much without attracting attention.

At Maryam’s petulant insistence, Shalikova walked up to the operator–

“Oh no Sonya! You misunderstood! I want to play this one! I just need some money.”

Shalikova reached into her jacket for the spending money the Captain had given them.

Then she had a sudden and worrying thought.

This game did not look particularly sturdy. It was a bunch of plastic boards and small parts slotted together. For the average carnival-goer that wouldn’t be a problem, but she began to think of what would happen when Maryam’s abnormal strength acted on that ball. Could she just punch through the backing board? Would she send all the obstacles flying?

She stood for a second with her hand picking through a bundle of bills.

Staring at Maryam’s smiling face the entire time without an expression to match.

“Maryam, I think– I should play–”

“Sonya, you shouldn’t get to have all the fun you know.” Maryam said gently.

This is her special day. You just have to deal with the broken plates Sonya Shalikova.

With a sense of looming dread, a defeated Shalikova handed the bills over to Maryam.

Cheering, the not-so-purple marshmallow danced over to the ball game with great vigor.

“How much for a game?”

She put a bill on the counter, and the operator handed her three balls.

Maryam’s face lit up.

Shalikova’s face darkened.

She partially averted her eyes.

“Here I go! Cuttle-shoot!”

From the shadow at the edge of her eyes, Shalikova could tell Maryam had reared up to throw the ball– but the motion that resulted was much less aggressive-sounding than she imagined. In place of the raucous crash she was expecting, Shalikova heard rubber sliding on textured plastic. There was a soft thud and a chunky noise–

–and then the game board made a happy, chirpy noise.

Shalikova turned to look and saw nothing had been destroyed.

Maryam had simply put a ball into the center-most hole on her first try.

“Lucky girl eh? Pick a prize and give me those back.”

Like the other proprietor, the vendor for this game moved to quickly cut Maryam off.

He quickly handed her the bag of dice she wanted with an awkward grimace.

Maryam pocketed them with a smile and prompted Shalikova to walk away with her.

“Sonya, I can already spot my next target!” She declared happily.

Across the bend from the ball-throwing booth there was a test of strength game set up on a cleared patch of festival ground. It constituted a gaudily decorated pressure plate attached to an LED tower that would light up when the player struck the plate with a mallet in order to measure the strength of the player. Shalikova had little to fear with this one.

Everything was digital, the mallet head looked like rubber rather than metal, the pressure plate was a thick and pretty solid-looking object, and there did not seem to be any moving parts. It seemed unlikely Maryam’s strength could physically destroy the equipment.

Next to the play space, there was a set of plastic shelves with prizes.

Maryam quickly honed in on a pair of sunglasses with big blue lenses and a sleek frame.

“After I win those, we’ll match, Sonya!” She declared happily.

Shalikova stepped aside, simply relieved that there wasn’t an obvious problem for now.

Seemingly amused at a slight-looking girl trying her luck with the game, the proprietor took Maryam’s money and watched attentively from the side, chuckling as Maryam bent down, picked up the mallet and raised it. He must have thought it would be easy money.

Then the magic that was Maryam came into play. Shalikova felt the air rush as Maryam threw everything she had into a titanic swing, smashing the pressure plate such that it made a sound like a gong, and sent a vibration into the earth that stirred up Shalikova’s feet. The proprietor must have felt it too because he reacted like he wanted to jump away.

On the LED tower, the display lit up with a red NaN at the very top.

From Shalikova’s vantage, there was a hairline crack on the side of the pressure plate.

Thankfully, the proprietor was standing opposite them, so he didn’t see it at first.

Having borne witness to Maryam’s brutal power, he rushed to get the prize she wanted.

“Take it and go.” He said sternly.

Shalikova urged Maryam not to complain.

She put the sunglasses on Maryam’s nose and pushed her away into the crowd.

Putting as much walking distance between herself and that proprietor as she could.

Meanwhile, Maryam’s cheeks puffed up to a somewhat reasonable extent for an Imbrian.

Wearing the sunglasses, her consternation looked even more silly.

“Hmph! Hmph! Sonya, it’s not fair! We could have won a lot more prizes!” She whined.

“Maryam, that’s the point.” Shalikova sighed. “We weren’t supposed to win anything.”

“But that’s unfair!” Maryam cried out, crossing her arms as she walked.

“Uh huh. All the games are rigged Maryam. We won because we’re not normal. Normal people just pay to lose. By the way, weren’t you just saying you were a scammer too?”

“Hmph! I’m different from them. I won money with games of chance. It’s– it’s totally different if you get scammed by that. Games of skill are supposed to be fair. It’s not the same!”

“I’m sympathetic because you’re my girlfriend, but the rational part of me is yelling.”

“Sonya–”

Maryam stopped Shalikova in the middle of the street.

Her eyes narrowed, her gaze hard.

“Sonya. What if the food is also a scam?” She said, in a grim tone of voice.

“I don’t know how it could be.” Shalikova said. “It’s not like you can rig food.”

Soon the two of them would discover how it was possible to scam people with food.

Their eyes widening and their faces paling at the tremendous prices on display.

Across a long aisle full of different vendors, there was nothing worth less than 10 marks.

One sausage? 10 marks. A carton of popped corn? 10 marks. One cheese bread? 10 marks.

Aside from the limited selection that Shalikova could eat, the prices were out of control.

“Sonya. Let me handle this.” Maryam said. A mischievous little grin on her face.

“Um.”

Over Shalikova’s monosyllabic and nebulous objection, Maryam skipped toward the little kiosk selling cheese bread for ten marks a piece. With an enormous smile she waited for her turn in a small line of people. The vendor was already prepared with a piece of cheese bread in a wrapper when Maryam’s turn came up, and was already holding their hand out to collect the ten marks. Maryam, however, had her hands behind her back. Casting glances about herself. There was no one behind her in line except for Shalikova who had followed her.

“How about you give a discount for Kreuzung station’s biggest cutie?” Maryam asked.

Shalikova felt a shiver running down her back and across the lengths of her limbs.

In an instant, her eyes glowed with the power of psionics.

She heard a voice whisper in her mind; or perhaps, she just knew something was happening.

Molecular Control.

From Maryam, a colored cloud seemed to waft toward the vendor, like a visible breeze.

Green and blue in equal amounts, at first, but the blue quickly overwhelmed.

And the vendor’s own blue, green and slightly yellow aura completely shifted as well.

Maryam and the vendor held gazes for a few seconds, before the vendor’s apathetic expression became a smile almost as comically pleasant as Maryam’s. They leaned over to hand Maryam the cheese bread they were already holding and retracted the hand with which they meant to collect payment. Instead, they reached for a second cheese bread in the oven in which they were cooked. With seemingly great pleasure, they wrapped the bread, and handed it to Maryam as well. All the while, their aura looked shiny and serene.

“Of course, miss! Cute couples gets free bread around here! Have a wonderful outing!”

Shalikova blinked with confusion as the vendor reached out to hand her a cheese bread.

Maryam made a cutesy gesture, making a V with her fingers, and turned around.

“Alright Sonya! Let’s eat and go somewhere!” Maryam cheered.

Shalikova glanced at the vendor and back at Maryam.

“Right.” She said. “Maryam. Follow me.”

“Oh– Okay Sonya.”

Her voice trembled. She definitely noticed the shift in Shalikova’s attitude.

But she wasn’t angry.

It wasn’t helpful to be angry about it. Shalikova felt something else.

On the edges of the module space, red plastic fences had been set up to prevent anyone from accessing the wall panels, which were projecting the same colorful horizon and sky as the rest of the module and looked like invisible walls surrounding the carnival space. There were no vendors here, just plain floor with false turf, and there were a few perfunctory tables stood up so people leaving the crowd could sit around in the empty space.

There were a few people there, but it was the emptiest place in the module nonetheless. Shalikova took Maryam there and stood a few dozen meters from the nearest visitors. They had eaten their ill-gotten cheese breads on the way. Shalikova’s heart pounded.

“Maryam.”

Shalikova reached out and grabbed hold of Maryam’s two hands.

Maryam’s face turned slowly redder. She averted her gaze a little.

“Sonya–?”

Shalikova bent forward and put her forehead gently on Maryam’s own.

Truly hoping Maryam would understand her. She could not hold back her words any longer.

“You don’t have to do that kind of stuff anymore.” She said, whispering close to Maryam, brow to brow and nose to nose. “You don’t have to use your powers or the skills you picked up on the street to steal from people. Even if they’re being unreasonable– it doesn’t matter. Please rely on me, Maryam. Don’t take advantage of people anymore like you did to that vendor. I don’t like it– and you don’t need to do it. I don’t blame you– but please stop.”

“Sonya– I– I’m sorry– I thought you must have hated me now.” Maryam whimpered.

“I don’t hate you.” Shalikova said. “I’d never hate you at the drop of a hat like that.”

Maryam sniffled. “I’m sorry. I’ve been hiding things from you– like that power–”

Shalikova could feel the contrition in Maryam’s voice, but it was not contrition she sought.

“Maryam, I don’t need to know everything. People can’t know everything about each other. I am not asking you to come clean with anything or to explain everything. I trust you, I want to trust your judgment. I trust that you will understand me now and understand what I want. Please don’t use your powers to manipulate innocent people. You have a support network now– and you have me. You have me, and you have your dreams. I will help you realize your dream, Maryam, but as part of that, you have to stop abusing your gifts.”

She lifted her forehead from Maryam’s and looked her in the eyes.

Not with sternness or conviction, but gently, with love. She loved Maryam so much.

Maryam was a sweet girl who had a hurt in her that had yet to heal. She wanted to help her.

She squeezed Maryam’s hands more firmly. “No more ‘scams’ okay? Promise?”

Maryam smiled, weeping, and nodded her head. “Yes, Sonya. Thank you.”

Shalikova leaned forward again, and lifted one hand from Maryam’s.

With those fingers, she tipped Maryam’s chin up just a bit. She kissed her.

Gently but without hesitation. Communicating her feelings and convictions.

“I love you, Maryam!” Shalikova said, raising her voice right in Maryam’s face, much to the latter’s surprise. “I know we’ve only been together for a bit now, but I’m really serious!”

“Sonya– you don’t have to shout.” Maryam said, chuckling at Shalikova’s passion.

“I know! But I feel like if I don’t say it loud enough, it’ll sound unserious!”

“Oh trust me, Sonya, it’s very obvious when you are being serious!” Maryam said.

Shalikova started to feel a little silly again. But Maryam’s laughter was worth it.

The two of them stood off to the side of the carnival for a bit, holding hands and hovering in each other’s space. Leaning their heads into each other, sighing together. It was just a little bit awkward, but Shalikova could feel the warmth of Maryam’s gentle affection throughout. Maryam was scared Shalikova would hate her; but Shalikova was also scared Maryam would react badly to being essentially scolded by her girlfriend.

Their love weathered the stiff breeze, however.

“I guess you do have that ‘King’s Gaze’ gift after all, don’t you?” Shalikova said.

“No, I actually don’t. What you saw is a special trick.” Maryam said.

“Maybe I’ll ask you to teach it to me someday. I need to get stronger.” Shalikova said.

“Ah– that one can’t be taught. But I’ll teach you everything else– I promise!”

“Yeah. I’ll need it if I’m going to help you reveal the truth of psionics to the world.”

Shalikova said it off-handedly, but the words made Maryam cling even closer to her.

“Thank you, Sonya. I’m lucky to have you.” Maryam said.

“I’ve never been so lucky with my life as when I met you.” Shalikova replied.

It felt corny to say, but it was also how she felt, and there would be no better time to say it.

Hand in loving hand, they made their way back to the carnival.

Because of that love, Shalikova would not stand letting Maryam’s special day end so early.

“We can do anything you want. Play more games, eat more food. I’ve got the marks.”

Maryam smiled and squeezed Shalikova’s hand.

“It’s already been a perfect day, because I’ve been with you, Sonya.” Maryam said.

Shalikova smiled and averted her gaze, just a bit embarrassed.

“But– There is something I’d like to do. Let’s ride those spinny cups!”

With a bright and innocent smile, she pointed at a ride at the end of the street.

Cup-shaped couples’ vehicles attached to a broad spinning base, with each cup also spun on its own axis, for twice as much intimidatingly kinetic spinning action on its occupants.

It was a stunning chimeric blur of a machine.

Shalikova felt her stomach churn.

“Of course, Maryam. Anything for you.”

Though she would come to regret the consequences, today, everything was for Maryam.


Commence Operation “Bottled Ship.”

Murati grinned a little to herself with unflagging confidence.

Meticulous plans had been laid; now it was time to pay them off with flawless execution.

“After you, madam.” Murati said, holding a door open for her vibrantly-dressed companion.

“Oh ho! Look at you– in full hubby mode tonight. I’m a lucky gal!”

“You’ll see just how lucky, Karuniya.”

Everything had been accounted for. Everything was in her total operational control.

Karuniya would dance upon the tips of Murati’s fingers until she was sick of the pleasure.

For this date, the most crucial factor to begin was to choose the venue.

In this case, Murati had searched high and low to find something to Karuniya’s taste.

Her face lit up with a radiant smile as she realized where she was.

“Oh! It’s an aquarium? I’m so surprised– I had no idea this station had one!”

Walking through the doors, they found themselves in the middle of an atrium connecting many seemingly massive containment chambers to a series of a walkways astride thick glass, by which visitors could behold the exhibits. Vast recreated ocean vistas teemed with life well-lit enough for the visitors to enjoy, with carefully considered biomes and species pairings. However those exhibits themselves were quite special– certainly, Kreuzung itself did not have the space to host all of the entities in these grand spaces by itself.

Murati led Karuniya straight ahead and demonstrated the illusion on the glass.

When her hand touched it, the exhibit was revealed to be an LCD display, and a menu appeared that allowed for the perspective of the glass to be shifted in a small window just for her and Karuniya– so that it would not disturb the broader view that all of the guests received. Upon seeing the trick play out, Karuniya laughed to herself.

“Of course they wouldn’t have the animals here, there’s no space. This is pretty clever though. But where are they broadcasting these animals from?” She asked.

“Thuringia Research Complex.” Murati said. “It’s apparently a big deal.”

“Well, let us judge the scope of their collection then.” Karuniya said.

“Anything you want to see first?” Murati asked.

“As a matter of fact, I’d love to see what kinds of jellyfish they have.” Karuniya replied.

“Jellyfish, huh? Well, you’ll be pleased by the variety, judging by the ads I saw.”

Murati reached out her arm, so that Karuniya could hook around it.

“My, my, you’re so gentlemanly today.” Karuniya said, taking ‘hubby’s’ arm with a grin.

“Just for tonight, I’m making every possible effort.” Murati said, grinning herself.

Both of them had donned their best set of clothes for the date.

It was the same pair of outfits they had worn once before; their ‘date’ back in Thassal. Owing to events best left unremembered, the two of them had not gotten to debut these outfits in public back then– though they had certainly made an impression on each other.

Now, however, they lit up the halls of the digital aquarium.

Murati wore a slick button-down shirt with bronze cuffs and a fit so flattering to Murati’s lean body it must have looked as if it was tailored for her, and not picked out of a rack at a station plaza in the Union. She wore it just how Karuniya had once advised her, tucked in and with a few of the top buttons undone. Because the shirt was white, there was a tantalizing impression of Murati’s black brassiere beneath. Besides the shirt, she had put on a tight pair of pants that had also once caught Karuniya’s eye, along with black shoes. To finish her look she took an extra effort in grooming herself, washing and styling her short, dark hair and applying a hint of borrowed lip gloss and skin toner to make her face look more special.

Karuniya had once called her tall, dark and handsome when she first tried out this look.

That affirmation accounted for a significant boost to Murati’s confidence on this date.

Another force multiplier, however, was the absolute desire Karuniya’s look inspired in her.

With a woman like this on her arm, Murati could have never let herself fall short.

Under the bright white lights of the aquarium’s atrium and in the connecting halls of the exhibits, Karuniya was like a techwear runway model. Most striking was the off-shoulder crop top with translucent sleeves, effectively bearing Karuniya’s shoulders and some of her neck and collarbone, because the leotard she wore beneath cut at the upper chest.

High-leg stockings and a short skirt with intricate hip cutouts and leg slits, of the same material as the top, finished off the look, showing off several spots of Karuniya’s perfect, honey-colored skin. Both the top and skirt clung to her figure perfectly, highlighting the smooth and plentiful curve of her hips and chest. Her hair was collected into a ponytail and had a glittery sheen like tiny constellations playing about the rich dark strands.

Her face was always beautiful– but with a touch of glossy, dark red lipstick and eyeshadow she looked remarkably glamorous and mature. Both her and Karuniya had their selves they wore around the ship, playing around and hurling good-natured teases at one another– one hurling far more than the other. But arm in arm like this, they looked like the married power couple they had not yet been able to be, serious, sexy and clearly into each other.

Seeing her like this made Murati’s heart soar, but she had grown just enough over the few months of their relationship, to be able to wear a conceited grin on her face and play it cool.

No longer would her mind ask the question, ‘do I deserve her’? ‘Can’t she do better’?

Murati didn’t just deserve Karuniya; she desired her with all the little greed she had.

And she would more than make up for the interruptions and miscalculations of the past.

“Have I ever told you your ass looks amazing in those pants?” Karuniya winked.

“I could stand to hear it more often.” Murati said, playing coy.

In silent response, Karuniya grabbed a handful of her hubby’s rear.

Holding hands and clinging close, the pair stopped in front of the screen for the jellyfish exhibit. Unlike some of the other halls, the lights were very dim, only bright enough to keep the visitors from bumping into a few benches laid opposite the screen. In the dark, the only light was provided by the screen and by the wide variety of colored jellies. Hundreds of deep-sea jellyfish streaked across the screen like a storm, their bioluminescence exaggerated by a post-processing effect just enough so that they would provide alternating colors across the faces of the visitors gazing at the great swarm arrayed before them.

“Pop quiz Murati, are jellyfish community organisms or single organisms?”

Karuniya looked at Murati after delivering the question and smiled one of her characteristic little grins. The way the lights played about her face, cast her glossy lips and slightly glittery cheeks in contrast– it was arresting enough to delay Murati’s answer for a moment.

“Single organisms.” Murati said.

“Correct. I thought I could trick you. For your basic biology knowledge, you win a prize.”

Karuniya began to tiptoe and planted a quick little kiss on Murati’s lips.

“Now though, tell me this: how do Jellyfish mate?”

She leaned forward again with a self-satisfied cutesy little look, hands behind her back.

“Sorry Karu, I can’t even imagine them having genitals.” Murati replied with a laugh.

Her fiance’s lips curled into a perverse little expression, and she waved one index finger from side to side in a teasing fashion. “Male jellyfish release clouds of sperm and females release unfertilized eggs, and babies happen from the mess– but in some kinkier species, the sperm will actually travel directly inside the female through her mouth to fertilize her.”

Karuniya licked her lips after delivering her explanation, locking eyes with Murati.

“So, had I gotten it right, would I have won more than a kiss?” Murati asked.

“May~be~” Karuniya replied, in a little sing-song voice.

She gave Murati a smoldering gaze before turning and walking away down the hall.

“I can barely keep up with her sometimes.” Murati muttered to herself, smiling.

From the jellyfish exhibit, Murati imagined Karuniya might want to see some of the more grandiose animals of the collection. She had looked at the catalog and memorized the locations of the exhibits and was ready at a moment’s notice to make suggestions– but Karuniya continued to surprise her with what she was interested in.

It shouldn’t have been a surprise, due to Karuniya’s character and what interested her about the sea in her own profession– but Murati couldn’t help but feel a bit blindsided to be holding her fiance’s hand while looking at manicured algae through a fancy LCD.

Painstakingly recreated in a controlled environment, the “marine forest” exhibition hosted a vast forest of tall yellow-green macro-algae and an underbrush of moss overgrown on the rocky artificial seafloor. Animals lurked the vegetation, like shrimps and small fish.

“Look at that. So much primary production!” Karuniya declared cheerfully.

“Primary production?” Murati asked.

“Algaea are able to capture chemical energy from the environment.” Karuniya replied. “In essence, they create the prerequisites for a food chain. All they need is whatever amount of sunlight can penetrate the surface of the water, and the right chemical balance. But smaller animals can feed on them, and those animals feed larger predators, and so on.”

She spread out her arms as if she wanted to embrace the algae in the tanks.

“You’re looking at life itself, Murati! An environment that has primary production is one that is still sustaining life. Our world is not so dead after all, is it? Maybe it’s not in the best shape for us to live in, but as long as algae grows in the photic zone, life will go on.”

Rather than say something sarcastic or contrarian in return, Murati simply looked at the algae and tried to quietly imagine that chain of living. Algaea begot as if from nothing, feeding the bottom dwellers that would be eaten by free floating fish. Fish eaten by whales, sharks, and even leviathans. Insuring that something with a nervous system continued to roam the world, even as humans killed each other hundreds of meters farther below.

She smiled at Karuniya’s girlish enthusiasm and her optimism.

Even if she didn’t quite share it– to Murati, there was no point if humans didn’t live too.

To Murati, humans were life. However wrong it may have been– she put humans first.

“Did I successfully troll you by placing animal life over human life?” Karuniya asked.

“Complete failure. Not mad at all.” Murati said, smiling placidly.

“Darn. You’ve actually bettered as a person. That sucks.”

“Actually, you were just so cute delivering your speech.”

Both of them laughed in unison before moving on from the macroalgal forest.

“Alright, you must be going nuts from all this oceanography crap, let’s see a big shark!”

“I’ll never get tired of your ‘oceanography crap’ Karu, I mean it.”

“Ah hah, then let’s go see some dolphins! They’re awful little guys!”

“Unfortunately, there is no dolphin exhibit.”

“Aww. That’s too bad! I could’ve told you all kinds of horror stories.”

“Really? Horror stories about dolphins?”

“Oh ho! You have no idea!”

Karuniya raised a hand to cover her laughing mouth, narrowing her eyes in a sly expression.

Murati remained ignorant of whatever Karuniya was mugging at, however.

Despite Karuniya’s disappointment at the lack of dolphins, she was enthusiastic during their visits to several other exhibits. Thuringia had built quite a collection of habitats, including an abyssal exhibit in a fully dark hall where eerie bioluminescent fish roamed, a bit too close to home; a school of colorful tropical fish in a well-lit habitat without predators; a tank that was home to a vast blue whale, though Karuniya noted it was cruel for the whale to be alone, even if it was for the scientific observation of humans; and a tank of various crustaceans with gleaming shells; and a small sunken vessel overgrown with barnacles and other creatures.

“Crustaceans are like nature’s Diver mecha.” Karuniya declared confidently.

“What? Really?” Murati asked, swayed and drawn in by her tone. “How so?”

Karuniya cracked her same grin once again.

“I was just jerking your chain. Totally meaningless and random thing.”

“Maybe I could stand to be more frigid to you.”

“But I love this Murati who is trying sooooo hard!”

Karuniya squeezed close against Murati’s chest as if trying to nuzzle her.

Murati averted her gaze, slightly embarrassed. Was it that obvious?

But she really wanted to succeed.

Throughout, Murati carefully studied Karuniya’s responses and expressions.

Everything seemed to be going well. Her fiancé was still seemingly engaged and happy.

Murati neared the end of the first phase of the operation.

“Let me lead the way now. There’s something I want to show you.” Murati said.

“Oh? Exciting~ is it your favorite fish, Murati?”

“You’ll see.”

It was only tangentially related to fish, but Murati was counting on the spectacle of it.

And also on Karu having built up some appetite over the course of the night.

Rather than a food court or vending machines or any other sort of cheap and quick meal, the Kreuzung Aquarium had a bespoke high concept restaurant inside its premises and offered a ‘dining experience’ for two. During planning, Murati had feared that finding a nice place to take Karuniya to eat would be difficult because of their diet, but the Aquarium was a step ahead. They offered a ‘special nature-friendly set’ for that did not have meat or seafood and instead promised a plant-based four course menu.

It had been a bit pricey, but Murati managed to scratch together the additional budget needed in Imperial marks because Valya Lebedova was disinterested in going out and spending their shore leave funds; and because Aiden Ahwalia was serving a punishment and would not be allowed to spend his own.

With Valya’s blessing, Murati made reservations.

“After you, madam.” Murati said, leading Karuniya into the dining venue.

There was a very small lobby, only large enough for a front desk, that led into a hallway full of doors. Everything was dimly lit. At the desk, a hostess confirmed their names and reservation and led them into a room in the hall. Inside the room there was a small table and two chairs, surrounded by undecorated walls that were very close and a rather low ceiling– everything was exceptionally tight. Karuniya looked amused by the whole thing, it must have seemed ridiculous to her. When they sat down, her eyes began to scan around the room for any sign of what the gimmick was. She did not seem to find it at first glance.

“Since you ordered a set dinner menu, we will bring you the courses, starting with aperitifs. What kind of environment would you like to enjoy today?” asked the hostess.

“Whichever you think would suit the evening.” Murati replied.

Smiling, the hostess left the room, and the door shut.

Karuniya chuckled again. “Is this a joke? A reservation for eating in a dim metal box?”

“Just wait.” Murati said.

Outside, the hostess must have been inputting something for the room.

About a minute after she left, the walls of the room slowly brightened.

First they took on a variety of dark blues and greens.

Streams of bubbles played about the walls and ceiling. As if rising out of the depths, the projections on the floor, ceiling and roof all began to lighten. Beneath the couple, a bank of sand came into view. Above them, rays of sunlight penetrated the bright blue foaming surface of the water. Around them, on the walls, schools of fish in all colors and sizes flitted from wall to wall like a storm of bodies. Karuniya smiled and covered her mouth, as if embarrassed at how surprised and delighted she was by the illusion of the room.

Their table was now suspended in the middle of a simulated ocean.

Certainly no camera could safely capture a near-shore sandbank and all the shallow water life that existed there, but something like a predictive imager could be programmed to display a complex illusion like this one. Every fish had its own organic and variable routine, and because the graphics were not being rendered in real time from acoustic data, there was not the sort of dramatic visual noise one would get from a ship’s predictive view. Everything was rendered convincingly enough for the perspective of the diners. Seagrass and kelp dotted the landscape, there were little crabs in the sand below, and larger animals occasionally swept through the landscape as well, disturbing the many schools of fish.

“Murati I was skeptical, but this is so amazing! I don’t even know what to focus on!”

“Right? The hostess really picked an amazing environment for us.”

“It’s almost like being in a Diver, but you know, in much nicer waters.”

“And with far better cameras.” Murati added, laughing a little at the idea.

Murati knew what she was focusing her eyes on.

Not on any fish, but the woman across from her, face glowing gently as the light alternated across her features, smiling ear to ear, a girlish joy overtaking her as her eyes tracked the simulated fish and scanned the blue near-shore horizon. She was staggeringly beautiful. Being with her– more than anything, it gave Murati hope for life.

If the world really was dying, she could have withstood the end of it at this woman’s side.

But it made her fight for the remainder of the world they had, with all of her strength.

For a world where Karuniya’s dreams and ambitions could be realized.

Murati reached across the table and took one of Karuniya’s hands in both of hers.

Karuniya looked down from the fish she had been tracking.

“Murati, thank you. You didn’t have to go to these lengths, but I truly appreciate it.”

She lifted her other hand from the table and stroked Murati’s hands as well.

“You deserve to indulge every so often. We don’t know when we’ll get a chance again.”

“This reminds me of our first date.” Karuniya said. “That restaurant, back home.”

She spoke euphemistically, she couldn’t say ‘Mt. Raja’ but Murati remembered perfectly.

“That’s precisely why I wanted to have a bougie dinner date.” Murati replied.

She lifted the hand she had taken closer and kissed the back of it.

Karuniya looked, for once, to have a bit of a girlish blush on her cheeks.

After the spectacle, the food began to come in.

It was no longer the highlight of the evening having been shown up quite thoroughly by the ingenuity of the venue, but it was still pleasant. Cucumber and seaweed salad with puffed rice “coral” crackers, wheat gluten “scallops” in a savory butter sauce, heart of palm and chickpea “crab cakes,” and a “sea foam” ice cream dessert. It was all quite cute, the portions were decent, and the tastes were well considered. It helped that there was a bottle of red wine with the dinner set that complimented the meal and the evening well.

Eating their imitation seafood courses in the middle of imitation sea life.

“To simulation!” Karuniya cheered, wine glass in hand.

Murati laughed and lifted her glass to Karuniya’s own.

And with that, the merry-making portion of the operation was fulfilled.

Just as they had entered the Aquarium arm in arm, with Murati dutifully opening the doors for her fiancé, they finished their dinner course, saw all they desired to see, and as it was getting late in the evening, bid farewell, with Murati now holding the doors for a tired Karuniya. Arm in arm again, they left the Atrium and waited at the elevator bank for a ride back to their floor. It was time to retire back to the ship until their next journey.

“I had a fantastic time, Murati.” Karuniya said, settling against her hubby on a bench.

“Ah, but there’s still evening to go, mademoiselle.” Murati said, putting on airs.

“Yes, but I could use a good lie-down.” Karuniya said gently.

You’ll lie down, don’t worry. Murati laughed internally. It was time for the finale.

Some might have thought it uncharacteristic of her– but Murati could be rather lascivious.

Like any woman, she had desires, fantasies; she could be aggressive. She liked to top!

When the mood was just right, when she had Karuniya right where she wanted her–

Well.

Tonight, she had expertly crafted the mood; and Karuniya was clearly asking for it.

They made their way quietly back to Alcor Steelworks.

That night, Kreuzung was just a bit chilly, for reasons known only to the temperature control authority, but it made Karuniya cling closer to Murati as they walked. Murati hooked an arm around her and smiled. She led her fiancé, who though not drunk was clearly a little bit drowsy from the food and drink, up into the Brigand. Off to one side of the hangar, Murati could see the pair of security officers Zhu Lian and Klara Van Der Smidse playing cards to pass the time. They cast a glance at the couple climbing a ladder through the deployment chutes, and then returned to their game. Murati led Karuniya to the lifts.

At the door to their room, Karuniya yawned. She opened the door and stepped in.

Murati glanced about herself.

The hallway down the officer’s quarters was completely empty.

Every door was shut, and nobody was making a sound. Only the hum of the ventilation.

Recalling how the night of their first date had gone, Murati stepped in behind Karuniya.

She walked close to her fiancé, who was about to sit down on the bed–

And struck the wall with her palm, her arm crossing over Karuniya’s shoulder.

Murati leaning into her with a grin on her face and savoring her fiancé’s surprise.

“Oh! You startled–” Karuniya’s eyes met Murati’s own. Realization dawned on her face.

“I told you the night wasn’t over yet, didn’t I?” Murati said, with a grin.

“Ah ha, I see. You’re feeling frisky. Did you manage to hold an erection?” Karuniya whispered.

She raised a hand to stroke Murati’s cheek.

Murati took it into her own and pulled it down gently.

“Let me show you.” Murati said.

Her words came out of her lips almost like a demand.

“Yes. I’m in your hands.” Karuniya said, sounding a little surprised.

Without another word–

Murati suddenly and brusquely pushed herself onto the bed on top of Karuniya.

Never once breaking eye contact as she pushed her down with one hand to the shoulder.

While the other lifted Karuniya’s skirt–

“Murati–!”

A delectably surprised little expression appeared on Karuniya’s face.

With expert precision, Murati pulled her in by the hips until she was closer to her crotch.

Looming over with Karuniya’s legs spread around her, Murati lowered her head and blew a warm breath directly behind Karuniya’s ear that made her flinch. She was sensitive here. Murati bit on Karuniya’s ear lobe, kissed the side of her neck, nuzzled her shoulder. All the while pulling up her dress and sliding her fingers beneath the leotard she had worn under it. Those fingers lingered on her skin but did not try to slip off her clothes, not yet.

As if to demonstrate; this is what will become of you.

Murati did not even pull down her own pants yet.

She wanted her fiancé to squirm a bit first. For all the teasing she always did.

“You’re already so–!”

An excited little murmur escaped Karuniya’s quivering lips.

“Keep your peace until there’s a reason to yell.” Murati whispered in her ear.

Her fingers traced the soft, pliable skin just below Karuniya’s belly and above her groin, kneading and grazing, gliding further down, peering between her thighs and back up close to her belly. Sliding under the sides and the front of her thin bodysuit and easily lifting the fabric wherever needed. Crucially, never approaching where Karuniya’s needy clit would get an ounce of satisfaction. It was not time for that yet. Murati savored the shuddering flesh, the gentle reactive pushback of Karu subtly pressing her hips back as Murati teased her soft spots, all her favorite places gleaned from past experiences. She could see Karuniya’s flushed expression, her shut eyes; she could feel her little fits and starts of breath.

“Don’t lose your head yet, Karu. I’m not even inside you.”

Soon as a finger glided over her pussy, her body immediately quivered, head to curled toes.

Her hands which had lain at her sides now squeezed the bed. Her chest lifted involuntarily.

Transferring her emotions like a wave into Murati’s own body, pressed atop hers.

Murati’s fingers toying with her like a device. Flick the switch and feel the heat build.

Being in control was intoxicating for Murati.

Her head rushed with the feeling of Karuniya seized in pleasure, being only hers.

She felt it from the tips of her fingers to the stirring length of her dick.

That catharsis which only came with a successful encirclement, with a grand plan.

They had already negotiated before, already explored, already stumbled.

Theirs was a matured love now; and Murati savored the ripe fruit.

They weren’t in Mt. Raja, they weren’t in Thassal; they had come a ways now.

“I’ll give you what you need. I know you inside and out now.”

For a few moments, Murati lifted the hand that was moving between Karuniya’s legs.

Her reach and position emphasized her taller size.

All of her fiancé’s body lay within her lustful grasp. Tracing the leotard, across Karuniya’s belly and up to her ample, perfectly shaped breasts, squeezed beneath her crop top. Hooking her fingers between fabric and flesh, pulling down the leotard slowly to reveal more of her chest, outlined by glistening sweat in the room’s dim light.

Karuniya lifted her back just a bit to assist as Murati pulled the leotard off her hips and down her legs. Finally the underwear came off, lovingly peeled and then carelessly discarded.

“Now, the rest.” Murati ordered.

With a blissful look on her face, Karuniya lifted her top off and cast to the floor beside the bed. She hooked a finger between her skirt and hip and Murati helped her pull it off the rest of the way. Joining her crop top and underwear on the floor. A glistening honey-amber jewel, a treasure of flesh, Karuniya laid sweaty, flushed, quivering gently under the press of Murati’s clothed body. Every fold, every rise and fall in the contours of her– all laid bare.

“Are you ready?” She whispered.

Karuniya shut her eyes and held a little smile, lips quivering with the rest of her.

Murati raised herself just enough to behold her fiancé’s body in its lusty majesty.

Quickly, hungrily, she descended on her once more.

Murati’s lips moved from Karuniya’s ear, neck and jaw, down to her chest.

Feeling Karuniya’s heartbeat through the teeth gently biting down on one supple breast–

“Murati! Oh! Jeez–!”

–while her free hand pushed a trimmed fingertip over a soaked, throbbing clit.

“O-o-ohh–!”

Her tone of voice changed completely– she sounded like she was melting.

Eyes shut, legs trying to tighten and failing with Murati in the way, kicking aimlessly.

Hands ripping into the bedsheets. Chest pounding amid the heat.

Murati’s lips kneaded the tips of her breasts; her fingers glided between her legs.

“Mmm–! Ugh–!”

She was so noisy, and her squirming ever more violent, but under control.

Using her weight and position, Murati kept her pinned and she loved every second.

Karuniya was a screamer, a kicker, bucking hips and jerking arms and Murati loved it.

Her intensity increased to match. Strumming Karu’s clit, sucking on her neck, pushing her.

When Karu threw her hips up at Murati, she felt it directly on her bulging dick.

“Murati–! Mura–! Mu–!”

An explosion of wimpering and moaning, a feast for the ears.

Then–

A sudden, surprising calm before the expected climax.

Karuniya opened her eyes slowly, lifted her head to look, eyes clearly hazy.

Breathing heavy, sweating hard. Barely able to move with intention.

Murati slowly pulled back, until her body was half off the bed.

There was a sly smile on her face as she met her fiancé’s confused expression.

She knew exactly what she was doing.

Stopping every so often to kiss Karuniya’s body, on her breasts, on her navel–

–working her way down, laying a sucking nip of a bite on her mons to presage.

Spreading her legs, holding her by one hip and leg, kissing the inner thigh.

Waiting to be acknowledged–

“Murati– don’t– don’t make me wait–” Karuniya mumbled, trembling where she lay.

“Of course. Anything for you.”

With eyes full of lust that Karuniya could no longer see, Murati fulfilled her wish.

Done with the teasing, she lifted her lips off Karuniya’s thighs and kissed between her legs.

Lips closing, spreading, her tongue pressing–

Karuniya started thrashing the second Murati’s tongue slowly and gently worked her clit.

Maintaining a precise rhythm, keeping control of Karuniya’s hips and legs.

Karuniya bucked against her face, and Murati pressed further as if in challenge.

In her throes Karuniya raised up against the wall and Murati followed her back to bed.

“Ahh– ohh–”

Murati closed her lips again, and Karuniya’s hips bucked gentler, her voice dying.

Her fingers curled and stretched in rhythm, and her breathing began to steady.

Murati could feel the shift, and slowly withdrew her tongue from Karuniya’s pussy.

She lifted herself up and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

“You’re– so cocky–” Karuniya said, smiling, clearly wiped out.

“I think I have good reason to be.” Murati said, with a confident little shrug.

“Ugh. Fuck. You’re awful. You’ve gotten so good.” Karuniya replied, her breath returning.

Murati bent down nearer to Karuniya again and kissed her, holding her shoulders at first.

Karuniya kissed back with vigor, her tongue drawing out Murati’s own.

She still had a bit of fire in her– good.

In the middle of this passion, Murati started to unzip her pants.

For her, it was difficult to work up to an erection naturally. She wouldn’t let it go to waste.

While they kissed, she pulled her pants down, and started to push Karuniya down again.

“Another go?” Karuniya asked, her barely recovered breath leaving her again.

“You wanted me to have fun also, right?” Murati said.

“I do. Condom?”

“I told you, I prepared everything.”

Murati flashed the little packet from the pockets of her pants before she discarded them.

‘How– should I be facing–”

Without another word, Murati took Karuniya by the hips and guided her around.

Karuniya clumsily followed along, Murati savoring every brush of her throbbing dick on Karuniya’s sweaty, silken skin as they maneuvered around each other. In seconds she had her fiancé face down on the bed. One hand holding her lower belly, just above her still shivering clit; and the other on her hip, gripping tight, by which she again pulled her closer, her ass farther up to Murati’s waist, her head and back just barely straight.

“I don’t know how long I can hold this.” Karuniya replied, weakly supporting herself.

“The pillow princess doth protest too much.” Murati said, adjusting how she held Karuniya.

“Gah– You’re really getting me back for all my cheek, huh?”

“I’m just having fun.”

“Me too.” Karuniya said, with an exasperated little gasp.

Murati lifted Karuniya again, pulled her even closer, and clicked her tongue.

Pushing in, shifting her weight and position so that she could thrust into her.

“Ahh–” Karuniya put her head down against the pillow, her hands scrabbling on the sheets.

Clumsy at first, Murati finally felt like she had the balance, and began to thrust with rhythm.

Delighting in the look of Karu’s hair getting messy, her sweaty back, the way each thrust caused her rear to shake. The way Murati could hold her body so easily and use her so thoroughly, bending over her and lifting up her hips and pulling her in deeper.

Her own vision grew hazy with pleasure, and she could feel the rushing in her groin, the thrill shaking her muscles. She restrained a cry, her heart pounding, bent against Karuniya’s back. Almost falling on top of her, losing her rhythm to short, desperate, hungry strokes.

Murati barely lasted, but by the end, Karuniya looked like she could take no more.

As her dick softened and the wet rubber started to slip off, Murati felt euphoric, satisfied.

“Karu– I love you–”

“I love you– Murati–”

Out of breath, spent, and smiling.

Murati curled up behind Karuniya, crammed side to side in bed, and held her close.

Gently kissing her shoulder and the nape of her neck while they fell asleep together.

Having reached a new peak in their journey together.


Winfreda Kappel had struggled mightily against having her clinic torn up by the sailors in their frenzy to unnecessarily reimagine everything in the ship.

One thing that Alcor Steelworks could not promise them was confidential medical work– because they didn’t even have that for their own employees on their executive campus. She was finally able to impress upon the Captain the need to take care of “Treasure Box Transports’” “employees” in the “Pandora’s Box” and that to do otherwise was to potentially compromise operational security. Her clinic remained open.

She had even seen a few sailors and treated injuries incurred in the process of their frenzied renovations, which she felt vindicated her resistance. However, as usual, she did not see a lot of traffic to the medbay and to her clinic. Syracuse, the security team medic, took it upon herself to deliver medication allotments, in order to have something to do every so often.

A ship was not a place that usually saw frequent health problems.

Soldiering was dangerous work, but it was the chance of death that made it dangerous. Pilots, officers, and sailors were more likely to be killed outright by anything that could routinely injure them in a dangerous situation; or would otherwise go uninjured.

That meant Winfreda had more time to kick back and savor the ship’s ‘medical brandy.’

The Brigand’s doctor may have looked at first glance atypical for her station.

A vibrant woman in the midst of a second bloom; the edges of her eyes and lips just scarcely beginning to attain the majesty of age; with brightly dyed hair in three shades of alternating blue, precise with her makeup; a healthy figure beneath conservative dress, sweater and coat and long skirt and tights. Neither the tidiness and discipline associated with soldiery, nor the warm matronly stereotypes of women in medicine suited her at all.

Upon winning her rights in the Union’s revolution, she immediately underwent hormone therapy, dyed her hair, put on loud music and prescribed liberation every day.

Somehow, she drew the eyes of Parvati Nagavanshi one fateful day.

“My mission needs a doctor who has been through hell and back, and still looks in the mirror and wants to live her life each day. It is too easy for someone in your profession to be ground down, broken to merely fulfilling their duties. Such people will collapse under what I am asking. But I know you won’t. Because you lived the Revolution; and now look at you.”

She still remembered Nagavanshi’s conceited, cruel grin in that dreadful black uniform.

Winfreda couldn’t deny any of that. Begrudgingly.

One curious thing about Nagavanshi is it always felt like she assessed the people around her even better than those people assessed themselves, or maybe even could assess themselves. That made her deadly effective at her job, frightening to hear from, and odious to speak to.

Despite that, Winfreda was not exactly thrilled and tried to assert her right not to–

“Let it be noted I tried, and wanted, to be nice. I can be difficult.” Nagavanshi had said.

It was resoundingly unfair, but ultimately, to avoid the resurfacing of certain problems that Winfreda had made for herself in her youthful, liberated social life in the young Union, she took Nagavanshi’s offer. Now she was sailing the high seas, was frequently endangered, and had to double as counselor to a bunch of hot-shots and fools nearly half her age.

At least she enjoyed running a clinic again.

Maybe when she came back– she would actually be ready to settle down. Big maybe.

“My, my, everyone’s going to be having fun, huh?” Winfreda said, grinning to herself.

She noticed one of the “No Judgment Dispensers” she had set up so the crew could self-serve condoms, had gone from full to nearly empty almost overnight. She realized a ton of shore leave dates must have been approved by the Captain. Dutifully, she refilled the dispenser when nobody was paying attention to it.

She saluted in spirit all the folks soon to be getting lucky.

“Hmm. I wonder if Minardo or Lebedova might be down.” Winfreda said, giggling.

Her, Lebedova and Minardo, and sometimes Marina, were called “the elder stateswomen” of the Brigand by a cadre of chirpy girls who also somehow concocted the idea that Shalikova, Nakara, Geninov and Al-Shahouh Raisanen-Morningsun were the “Four Princes.” Korabiskaya was spared the gossip largely because the girls were afraid of a reprimand; and Winfreda believed the only thing keeping al-Shajara from the gossip was that her flamboyance precluded any mystery. She was simply too well-known a flirt for those girls’ imagination.

But there was some truth to it in Minardo and Lebedova’s case, in Winfreda’s opinion.

Those two were both quite suited to her taste and seemed like they would be mature about casual sex. Certainly more so than any younger women. They were both flirty and passionate about their work, and had great bodies– she could see why the sailor girls wanted some of that. As for herself, of course, she needed no explanation. Despite her many charms, however, it had been a while since Winfreda had gotten to have sex herself. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to ask and see if her fellow “stateswomen” were equally pent up as she. At worst they would say no, and at best, maybe she could rope the both of them at once.

Now that would be quite a sight and a sound indeed.

However, where the little faction intersected with Marina–

She was still turning that one over in her head.

Mind filling with a slew of colorful delusions, Winfreda cheerfully ambled back to her clinic to find someone waiting for her in the middle of the room.

A patient; and a most uncommon visitor as well. She was a squirrely one even for regular health checkups. Her figure and stature on the petite side; a completely deadpan expression on a pretty young face; tawny brown hair spun into a distinctive spiraling ponytail; and her characteristic antennae, the size of a human hand and installed where her ears should be, grey and solid with a series of LEDs to indicate statuses.

Braya Zachikova.

“Oh, Zachikova! Have you finally decided to stop running away from a blood draw?”

“Funny you mention blood. Mine’s getting a bit thin. I want a scrip for blood pills.”

“Huh?”

Winfreda stared at Zachikova, who made no expression in response.

“Your blood is thin? How did you come to this conclusion? What are your symptoms?”

“I’m tired and grumpy. If you’ll just hand me some pills real quick I’ll be on my way.”

Winfreda put her hands on her hips and stood her ground.

Putting on a surly face, Zachikova averted her eyes.

“Zachikova, I’m sorry, but this isn’t a dispensary. I won’t give you any drugs without first knowing what effect they may have on you! If you’re feeling ill, I insist on running tests. You’ve ducked out of having even a single health checkup, and I’ve been worried this would be the result. We will get you help, the proper help, I promise– once we can pinpoint your actual condition.”

“Isn’t this supposed to be an informed consent clinic?” Zachikova grumbled.

Winfreda sighed loudly.

“Informed consent doesn’t mean you can come here asking for erythropoietin or any other thing entirely on your own whim. Some medicines can be harmful and must be administered after testing. I don’t understand why you are so against it. If you don’t want me to do it, I can get Syracuse to run the tests if it would be more comfortable– hey!”

In the middle of her talking, Zachikova simply turned around and left the room.

“What am I going to do with you?” Winfreda cried out.

She had limited avenues for problems like this.

If it got too serious she would have to tell the Commissar, but that just wasn’t her style. Winfreda hoped that any patient who was reticent about treatment could be sat down and talked to and reasoned with, in the privacy of the clinic, with no one the wiser. But Zachikova was the first time a patient was so vehement about avoiding any formal diagnostic tests, and who was aggressively against any discussion of the matter.

“I hate to say it, but it’ll have to be the Commissar then. I’ll write it down.”

Commissar Aaliyah and Captain Korabiskaya had been busier than ever, and always busy together, but it wasn’t like they were joined at the hip.

She just had to pull the Commissar aside.

While jotting down a note on her digital clipboard, there was a knock on the door.

“Come in! Seat’s open!” Winfreda said.

“Ah, not actually here for my health doc, but thanks.”

Once the door slid open, Winfreda smiled at the sight of Marina McKennedy.

“You know, I was just thinking about you.” Winfreda said, smiling.

“Me too.” Marina replied. She showed a bottle that she was carrying.

“I see where this is going. Are you sure you’re okay with it?” Winfreda asked.

“I’m positive. Aren’t you annoying seeing all the kids running off?”

“Hmm. Ah well– you only live once. That stuff better be nicer than my brandy.”

Marina winked, with a handsome smile. With a fond little sigh, the doctor locked the door.

Perhaps unfortunately, Marina was a woman quite to Winfreda’s taste also.


“Well, ultimately, it wasn’t a lot of trouble huh?”

“There were some low points, but nobody has shot at us, so I consider it a win.”

Captain Korabiskaya and Commissar Bashara glanced at each other, smiled and laughed.

Since their arrival at Kreuzung, the Brigand had been moored at Alcor Steelworks, subject to an extensive and necessary repair and maintenance program (along with the installation of a few new ‘toys’.) In a week and change, the project was essentially completed, thanks to the gargantuan efforts of the sailors, the Brigand’s friends at Solarflare LLC, and Amelia Winn’s under-the-table assistance in macro-stitching entire sections and systems using military blueprints. Most of the exterior was brand new plate, the interior was fully repaired, maintained, and rewired, and they even added a new chair for Erika in the bridge.

“They even made the armor a nicer shade of beige than before!” Ulyana cheered.

“I’d even say it’s more of an olive than a beige now.” Aaliyah replied.

Both of them stood proudly about fifty meters from the work site, beholding the ship.

In a little over three months, this idiosyncratic rustbucket had been through a lot.

Now it awaited its next adventure.

A sword and shield in the duel for the heart of Imbria. Surely it would have months, maybe even years of beatings ahead of it, but it had never been as prepared for them as it was now. Ulyana almost wanted to shed a tear for what it had come to represent for herself. She felt like it was only yesterday when they were still a motley assortment who barely knew each other’s names. Her crew had come together, pulled through when needed, and the Brigand was now not only their redoubt, their weapon– it had also become their home.

“Ah, Captain, Adjutant. I see you are taking in the sight of a job well done?”

Behind Ulyana and Aaliyah approached Euphrates, dressed as always in her blue blazer, waistcoat and pants, her short and messy blue hair combed back like always; at her side, always to be found, was Tigris, in red overalls and a white button-down shirt, her red hair in a ponytail. These were not her lab clothes nor her business clothes– and farther back, Ulyana spotted two containers being hauled by truck from the freight elevator.

“Euphemia?” Ulyana said. They were outside, so she observed Protocol Tokarev.

“Ah, yes.” Euphrates said, waving. “Our business in Kreuzung is also concluded.”

“We’ll be hitching a ride again if that’s okay.” Tigris said. “As payment, I have a bunch of spare parts and additional equipment for the Agni. Murati will love the stuff, I’m sure.”

“You are always welcome aboard.” Aaliyah said. “Your assistance has been crucial.”

“Likewise. We may well have been dead or abducted without you.” Euphrates replied.

“Yeah, the feeling’s mutual. I’ve been missing that bucket of bolts over there anyway.”

Tigris pointed at the Brigand with a grin on her face. Ulyana smiled back.

“Is your destination the same as ours, then?” Ulyana asked.

Euphrates nodded. “Aachen. Just like you, I need to talk to Ganges, about many things.”

“She’s going to be pretty in demand.” Ulyana said.

“For better or worse, Ganges’ ambitions led her to many places.” Euphrates said. “Far be it for me to criticize her for this, I’ll leave that up to you. I’d just like to get a sense of where she intends to go, and whether she has anything to do with our wayward Sovereign. And whether she might assist me in putting things right in one of the places she abandoned.”

“There’s no point speculating.” Tigris said. “We just need to storm into the same room with her and wring her neck for being too cavalier with the people she was responsible for.”

“Nobody is wringing anybody’s neck.” Euphrates declared. “We are just going to talk.”

“After Qote’s disgraceful circus, I almost want to wring Kansal’s neck.” Aaliyah said.

Despite Euphrates’ misgivings, Tigris and Ulyana were prompted to laugh.

For a moment, Tigris and Euphrates joined them in taking in the sight of the Brigand.

“Time feels like it’s moving again.” Euphrates said gently.

Ulyana did not really understand the remark’s significance, nor did Aaliyah.

They simply allowed everyone their own quiet contemplation.

Once they were back on the ship, there was work again in every direction.

Some sailors were lobbying to have a ‘goodbye Kreuzung’ shore leave party, which Ulyana argued against because she didn’t want to have to drag sailors back at the eleventh hour, and because Kreuzung was a racist hellhole not worth remembering whatsoever. There were arguments over where to put Tigris’ spare parts, since the supply pod was meticulously arranged to maximize storage and SF-type cargo crates like Tigris’ did not fit. Ulyana heard all the arguments and then decided to just leave it in a corner of the hangar, secured by magnetic anchors, since the Agni needed access to it. On the bridge, Erika Kairos wanted to talk about meeting with the Rostock and Olga Athanasiou wanted to talk about Divers.

It was not easy being in charge of this home away from home.

But finally, the evening was starting to fall, and they had only hours left of their visit.

Final checks and preparations could wait until the next morning.

Ulyana ordered everyone to rest, no night shifts.

She joined Aaliyah back at their quarters and they had a little celebration of their own.

“This time, exactly and only one drink.” Aaliyah said softly.

“Right.” She recalled the last time, with fondness, but also embarrassment.

Nevertheless, Ulyana poured out their glasses, and they toasted and cheered to each other.

Exchanging gentle gazes. Knowing hearts aware that their own next adventure grew near.

Little did they know that Kreuzung was about to stage a grand festival for them soon.


Arbitrator I turned and looked over her shoulder.

Framed in the dim white light of the Brigand’s corridors through the threshold of the door.

Slender and white-skinned, small horns on her forehead parting her long, white-and-red hair.

Rather than her uniform, she wore her robe of leviathan skin once again.

Behind her, Braya sat on the bed, working on something on her computer.

“Braya, I’m going for a stroll.” Arbitrator I said.

“Okay. Bring me back a coffee from the machine whenever you’re done.” Braya said.

She trusted her enough to let her leave unsupervised.

Assuming perhaps that she would only be confined to the halls of the ship.

This was not a new development– ever since she had taken Braya’s blood, and told her of her ambitions and desires, the surly computer girl she was so fond of had grown to trust her. They were intimate now. Arbitrator I could have hardly imagined it when she first saw Braya’s emotions reverberating within the metal shell she had used to contact her. When she herself was cavorting about the ocean as a beautiful and ignorant Leviathan, running away.

Despite her outward appearance, that aura bore the truth of a scared, hurt, desperate girl.

Yearning to be touched.

Now, Arbitrator I was going to hurt her again, wasn’t she?

“Of course. I’ll even make you my special coffee.” Arbitrator I teased.

“Absolutely no. Just go get a normal coffee from the machine.” Braya grumbled.

With a girlish giggle, Arbitrator I left the room.

As soon as the door closed behind her, that smiling expression on her face darkened.

Melting away into inexpression, with the weight of what she had to do.

Through the nearly empty halls of the Brigand, she walked down to the hangar.

Troubled– until she met another soul, and then she smiled, however briefly.

“Fancying a stroll?”

As always, the Chief of Security was patrolling the halls. Evgenya Akulantova lifted her hat to Arbitrator I, and the Omenseer performed a little curtsy in response. Thankfully, the chief was on her way quickly. She, too, had come to trust their new navigator.

Everyone had come to trust her– and she was about to betray all of their trust.

But it had to be done– or else Braya would not be safe.

None of them would be safe unless she took matters into her own hands.

Her and only her alone. It was her responsibility.

Down in the hangar, Arbitrator I found a vent that she had been spying.

Low to the ground, it allowed water that collected on the hangar to be drained out.

And in this case, it allowed Arbitrator I to soften her body and ooze through.

Like the soft things of jelly that once dwelled deep, deep underground–

Falling from one of the Brigand’s exhausts out onto the concrete floor of Alcor Steelworks.

Recovering her form on the ground, and breaking into a run.

She rushed out from under the ship, and looked straight up into the dark, false sky.

Far, far up above them, she knew she would find Enforcer I and Enforcer III of the Syzygy.

Her eyes turned briefly feral with the thought of them– and then softened.

Filled with tears.

Ripping her eyes from the ship and from the image of Braya in her mind.

She flexed fingers that became black and sharp like knives. Setting off on her grim duty.

For everything she was responsible for; for everything she did not do.

Her kin’s ravenous vengeance could not be allowed to continue.

“For the hominin to be safe– I must kill these monsters. I’m sorry Braya– goodbye.”

Her eyes became lit not with red rings but lined by a purple hexagon.

Feeling the weight of everything she wished she could have kept–

She ascended.

For everything she buried and recovered and could not deny any longer.


Previous ~ Next

Bandits Amid The Festival [11.8]

“Now, listen up, and listen well. I’m only doing this to give you a chance to repay me.”

“Of course. I have no illusions otherwise, my fair lady.”

“Okay. I am going to take your arm now. Don’t mistake it for anything serious.”

“Absolutely. I am all yours– in a non-serious, purely transactional way of course.”

“Hmph.”

Dominika clung close to Sameera’s arm while they walked.

“And I’ll have you know, I truly won’t accept being taken somewhere corny.”

“What about somewhere trendy?”

“Trendy is acceptable.”

“Phew! I almost had to turn us right back around.”

“That’s– don’t be silly. I’m just saying– after all the trouble, I expect to be treated nicely.”

Sameera al-Shahouh Raisanen-Morningsun was all smiles, while her date Dominika Rybolovskaya had a mix of disgruntled expression and needy body language that must have confused onlookers. In fact, to everyone else, they must have looked like a strange couple.

Sameera was tall and gallant with dexterous limbs, a solid trunk and an ample bosom, a pretty face with sharp eyes and a sleek jaw, long silky brown hair tied into a ponytail; but she was difficult to place, always ambiguous. Clearly a woman, but with a style and swagger that seemed more solidly masculine; her ears and tail marking her as a Shimii or perhaps a Loup– yet never more than ‘perhaps’ either; with a city-girl style and yet a rural easiness.

Meanwhile, Dominika was clearly a Katarran, and yet shorter and more waifish than her companion. Her long, voluminous red hair had brown streaks, both colors dyed, and interspersed inside it were black-striped red strands that were actually long, thin fins coming down the sides and back of her head, rather than hair. Her skin was a flat pink color, and visible on exposed parts of her body were bumps that looked slightly inflamed — but which were actually photophores, bioluminescent structures on her skin. Her eyes were also quite striking, bright pink irises with a blue limbal ring, falling sharply upon any target of her gaze.

A Katarran was an uncommon sight, but a Katarran being so openly Katarran?

Clinging to a Shimii/Loup of some kind like lovers?

“So, what’s the big surprise?” Dominika asked.

“You’ll see soon.” Sameera said, smiling gently. “Don’t worry, it’s nothing extravagant.”

“It wouldn’t make a difference. We’ll stick out like albino fish in the school regardless.”

“Well then. I promise it won’t be corny.”

“Oh enough. I’m just trying to make you aware. I’m not so easily pleased.”

“I know that for a fact, milady. And yet, I can’t run away from a challenge.”

Both of them were wearing clothes they had brought in from the Union.

Their fits were not especially fancy and were generic enough to betray nothing of their origin, while still communicating their styles. Sameera wore a simple black tanktop that exposed a bit of her well-defined midriff, along with workout pants and a green jacket. Dominika wore a backless, sleeveless dark red dress that was rendered a bit less revealing by a long blue jacket. Her jacket had diamond cutouts on the sides and sleeves that unveiled several photophores on her skin. It was too bright in C-block for them to glow, however.

“I can almost feel the staring. If any of them linger for too long and cause a problem–”

“It’s fine. We have our IDs– and you look stunning. Anyone would look.” Sameera said.

“You’re a bit more of a showoff than I took you for.” Dominika said. “Proud of your abs?”

“What’s the point in working so hard if I can’t show off every once in a while?”

Sameera winked, and Dominika averted her gaze, a bit redder in the face than before.

“You look– worthy of my company.” She said. “I’m not embarrassed to be seen with you.”

Sameera wagged her tail and acknowledged the compliment silently.

She was a bit surprised that her invitation wasn’t turned down entirely.

An invitation to a date at a mystery location, so that the crux of the afternoon would be a pleasant surprise. To find herself with Dominika clinging to her arm and playing the needy femme, walking together flanked by two-story plastic buildings along a fake cobblestone road, under the sunlamps and grey steel sky of Kreuzung. It had been a longshot.

Thankfully, Dominika accepted the framing that it was a gift, to repay her for all the worry.

Sameera was elated. She really wanted to go out with Dominika; the hard-to-get act only made her more curious and excited about the soft underbelly of her squadmate.

Some part of her suspected, however, that Dominika really wanted to be spoiled a bit.

So she had the perfect idea of where to take the acerbic Katarran on a date.

“What do you think of this district? Oddly quaint isn’t it?” Sameera asked.

“It’s all too fake. I see the defects too clearly to appreciate the effort.” Dominika replied.

Sameera was trying to immerse herself in the little fantasy of the place– but she guessed Dominika was simply less of a romantic than she was. Not that she would ever begrudge her the difficulty. Those plastic buildings all around them were gussied up with fake brick textures and false slanted ceilings of curved tiles, the cobblestone beneath them too smooth to be real, the sky above too unconvincing with its flat and even LED cluster placements. It was trying to cultivate an old-world appeal, but the artifice was too evident.

She wondered if perhaps, a version of this that was closer to the truth existed in a more affluent place. After all, this was still only C-block, the second-largest block in the core station in terms of space, but still a middling place in terms of wealth and exclusivity. Perhaps up in A-block there was real brick, real cobblestone, a real blue sky– maybe even a captive sun, performing an ancient dance in the sky for the rich inhabitants. Who knew?

Someone like her was born inexorably barred from such sights.

“Hey, prince charming? You okay? What’s got you grimacing?”

Sameera looked down at Dominika clinging even tighter to her side. She smiled.

“Ah, I was just thinking that I prefer the kitschy fakeness of all of this.”

“Really?”

Sameera glanced up at briefly at the ceiling, shading her eyes.

Up above them, far above, was the affluent A-block of Kreuzung. She nodded towards it.      

“I think it’d be too absurd to see the real thing. I’d question why it’s even there.” She said.

Dominika blinked, in her eyes a gently dawning realization. “Huh. You’ve got a point.”

“But hey. Less socially conscious talk. We’re greedy mercs after all.”

“I’m not a greedy merc.” Dominika said. “I’m a ravishing young beauty out on the town.”

Sameera got a sense of whiplash from how quickly Dominika’s moods seemed to shift.

But that only excited her even more.

“Then I will play the part of your gentleman without fail.”

After twenty or thirty minutes of walking from the elevator that dropped them off on the block, Sameera and Dominika rounded a corner into a circular street in which there were several shops with colorful signs. All the fake old world brick gave away to trendy, minimalist storefronts with geometric color patterns and simple facades. Unlike the sparsely populated outer street, these cafes and shops were well-traveled, with their outdoor tables beginning to fill up with brunch guests as the pair arrived. While some of the pedestrians were casually dressed like Sameera and Dominika, most of the guests wore uniforms of various sorts, either the grey business suits that constituted the corporate uniform, or the coats of police, nurses, the fireproof jackets of guild unionized maintenance workers, and so forth.

Teeming with middle class clientele, the street cast a stronger contrast against them.

“Here we are, what shop do you want to go to? I was thinking the Patisserie there.”

For a moment, Dominika looked taken aback by all the people, and the cutesy vibes.

“Wow. Can we afford this? I thought we were going to a park or something.”

“I checked the prices, everything is reasonably within my Marks stipend.”

“Hmm. Well, if it’s your treat, let’s start with the Patisserie then.” Dominika said.

“Anything that my ravishing young beauty desires.” Sameera cooed.

“Hmph.”

All of the little café tables with their green umbrellas were taken up, so the young couple navigated past them and into the shop itself to take up a booth seat, turning heads all throughout. Whether it was their beauty or their ethnicities, Sameera wasn’t about to question. As long as their attention remained confined to gazing from afar, Sameera could enjoy the obvious curiosity of the Imbrians around them. They sat amid the simple and warm salmon pink interior of the shop, their booth across from several long counters with ritzy gold and glass displays filled with a rainbow of sweets, cakes, cookies and breads.

Sameera thought they would sit across from each other, but Dominika surprised her yet again by following her into the same half of the booth. She continued to cling close to her, a piece of arm candy more delectable than any of the sweets the shop had on display.

Inside the windowless shop, the lights were dimmer than outside. Pressed together in their booth seat, Sameera could see the little charming bumps on Dominika’s body glowing a gentle green. The design of her dress played well with these features, her halter plunging into a deep vee that exposed a humble bit of cleavage, and a line of evenly spaced photophores like a little arrow between her collarbones and breasts. Her jacket was starting to fall from her shoulders and did very little now to cover her bioluminescence.

Or the captivating softness of her round shoulders; the striking curve of her collarbones–

“What are you so keen on, Miss Gentleman?” Dominika met Sameera’s wandering eyes.

Her voice was a tiny bit teasing, but her expression was as surly as ever.

What kind of signals are you sending to me, milady? Much to consider, there…

Sameera laughed it off. “I’ve just never seen you glow like this. It’s appealing.”

Dominika averted her gaze, not with a sharp huff, but slowly, with a little grin.

Was she softening up, or just a different kind of harsh? Either way, it was titillating.

On their table, there were little pink and gold plastic booklets that had the menu items with pictures, and ordering was done on a touchscreen through a very spartan graphical interface that conflicted with the cheery pink aura of the shop. There were several dozen menu items.

Up front and with the largest picture in the booklet, was the shop’s special Baumkuchen, a cake composed of three circular, stacked layers of dough completely drowned in chocolate that was then allowed to set. Various colorful syrup drizzles could be ordered, and patterns could be designed around the cake to make it showier and more picturesque. There was also an entire section of the menu devoted to Bossches, large dough balls covered in chocolate that had different sweet, creamy fillings. On the simpler side, they had baked or fried dough items like Franzbrots, which were simply dusted with powdered sugar or cinnamon.

Ultimately, what caught Sameera’s attention the most was a section titled Exotic Delights.

In this section, the booklet had a layout with colorful geometric patterns that Sameera thought she recognized as Shimii in origin, or at least inspired by the Shimii’s art. She thought she saw similar patterns on the colors of the shop buildings too. At the top of a two-page spread a note let the reader know these were featured in a trendy Imbrian TV show.

Central within the spread was a multicolored array of flavored Halwas, a soft dessert with a base of sesame paste, mixed with sweeteners, fruits, other nuts and set. Rashidun halwas were often simple shapes, like crumbly squares that were topped simply. However, the shop’s centerpiece halwa, bright orange, looser in consistency, heavily garnished and spread in the shape of a crescent, was much more Mahdist in nature. There were also numerous Sahlab on offer, a creamy pudding that could also be colorfully decorated. It seemed that the colors and decorations were part of the draw of these Shimii-inspired desserts.

And part of the business plan.

These exotic desserts carried the highest prices on the menu by far.

Dubbed “Parsa’s Delight” by the shop, the Mahdist Halwa was 30 marks a serving.

Her fingers gripped the booklet tighter as she ran down the offerings and their prices.

She grit her teeth and her muscles tensed up. Her heartbeat hammered in her chest.

“So we’re not wanted here, but our food is a trendy treat.”

Looking at them made Sameera furious. She shot a nasty sidelong glance at the counter.

“Hmm? Are you looking? What are you thinking of getting?”

From her side, Sameera noticed Dominika looking at her again.

Her expression was soft and nonchalant. She looked a bit less standoffish than before.

Sameera’s muscles loosened up, her fists unclenched.

She restrained her tone of voice.

This is her day. Don’t fuck it up, gentleman.

“Still looking.” Sameera said. “They have a lot of weird little variations of fried dough.”

It was pointless to get too angry. She wanted Dominika to make some good memories.

Eyes on the prize. Let the revolutionary fervor out some other day.

“Honestly, I’m tempted to be boring and just get a coffee.” Dominika said.

“Ah, yeah, they do beverages too, don’t they?” Sameera replied.

“Coffee, milkshakes with syrups– they have these pudding things in mugs too.”

“Hmm. That alters the calculus a little bit.”

“The calculus?”

“It makes the dryer desserts more appealing if you can get a nice beverage.”

“How strategic. I thought you were a meathead that just rushed into things?”

Dominika cracked a little grin. Sameera laughed.

“You’re right! What was I thinking? Baumkuchen it is.”

“That’s a lot of cake! I’m not going to help you eat it, you know.”

“Oh you’re eating the cake, milady.”

“Huh?”

“You need to treat yourself! I demand to spoil you! We’re getting two Baumkuchens!”

“Sameera!”

“Two Baumkuchens with all kinds of syrup, and I’m spoon-feeding you too.”

“Don’t push your luck!”

“I’m going to push a slice of delicious cake past your pouty lips until you smile.”

“Hmph!”

In the end, after Sameera had satisfied herself making sport of Dominika, to the point that Dominika even ended up giggling just a tiny bit herself from the absurdity of it all.

Together, they decided on smaller but more indulgent patisserie orders than getting a giant chocolate cake. Dominika had been correct that Sameera preferred the straightforward solutions, and so she got something easy from the very first page: a simple Bismarcken donut ball filled half with chocolate and half with cream, along with a hot mug of cinnamon milk.

Dominika meanwhile ordered a bright plate of macarons in a variety of flavors, arrayed in rainbow-hued little pyramid that almost rivaled the color combinations of the booklet’s halwa spreads. Along with the macarons, she did get her coffee, and she got it Vienna-style, covered in whipped cream and with the espresso mixed with a bit of whipped cream as well.

“Here. Have a taste. There’s too many.”

Dominika lifted a little pink and red macaron from the plate and raised it to Sameera’s face.

Sameera briefly stared at the macaron before realizing it was she who was being fed.

Then, without warning, she took the entire dessert into her mouth in one bite.

Her lips briefly brushed the tips of Dominika’s fingers, who then jerked them back.

“Tasty. Really cute colors too. Almost like taking a bite out of you.”

“Hey–”

Sameera could complete the intended ‘don’t push your luck’ left in Dominika’s lips.

Accompanied by the low background noise of romantic Imbrian soft rock coming from the shop’s audio system, the two of them slowly enjoyed their treats. Sameera’s donut was soft and chewy and sweet, and because of the two-tone filling it was quite moist, even without the creamy milk. Every so often she pilfered a macaron from Dominika’s plate, which her Katarran beauty did not dispute. They were quiet at first, but gradually got to talking.

Surprisingly, Dominika brought opened conversation first.

“Sameera– you said you were a Leviathan hunter.”

Dominika leaned much closer than before and whispered.

“Where were you stationed?”

Sameera enjoyed the brief brush of their bodies together.

She whispered back. “Haryana.”

Haryana was an agri-complex in Lyser. Not a name that should be said aloud in the Empire.

“How many did you see?” Dominika asked.

She was neither whispering nor speaking aloud.

That private tone would continue throughout the rest of their conversation.

“I killed a few, but nothing that impressive.”

“But was it dangerous? I have no idea how often is too often with Leviathan sightings.”

“It wasn’t like we saw Leviathans every day. It’s just that Agrispheres are really important so they get their own hunter guard. Nothing gets left up to chance and no expense is spared to keep them safe. So most of the time I would just sortie for patrols or for training, or if a buoy picked up some life signs. I was really eager to prove myself, so I’d take like, every mission.”

“Did you get to cook your own fresh food in a big plaza surrounded by trees?”

Dominika referenced a quite old Union propaganda poster about Agri-sphere living.

“Nope. My accommodations were decidedly military.” Sameera said with a chuckle.

“Did you meet a lot of bright-eyed young farmer’s girls looking innocent of the world?”

Another old propaganda poster about Lyser. Promoting starting a family in an Agri-sphere.

Sameera responded a bit awkwardly. “That’s classified information.”

“Mm-hmm.”

Dominika grinned a little, as if satisfied at successfully poking at Sameera.

“Okay, my turn to ask about you. What was the ice frontier like?” Sameera asked.

“Cold.” Dominika said dismissively.

“Milady.” Sameera smiled dangerously. “I’m going to steal your macarons.”

“Hey! Stop! I was just kidding. Anyway. I mainly have bad memories of it, honestly.” Dominika shut her eyes and shuddered, perhaps remembering what it was like. “We were always doing maintenance and repairs, everyone was on edge, food shipments got delayed all the time so our rations kept changing. Climate control could barely keep up with the cold–”

“Ah, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to dig up bad memories.” Sameera interrupted.

“It’s fine. Nobody ever asks me about it. There’s a lot I could say, I guess.”

“If I can poke you for one more thing– why did you decide to go to the ice frontier?”

“Why did you decide to become a Leviathan Hunter?” Dominika shot back.

She sounded suddenly annoyed. That was the last thing Sameera wanted.

Sameera replied in a gentle, patient voice.

“I just kinda wanted to get out in the world and fill up an unwanted job. Do the dirty work nobody else did. I wanted to feel like I was important somewhere.” She said.

Dominika looked contrite about the turn in her attitude.

Perhaps Sameera’s honesty and earnestness had gotten through to her.

She averted her gaze, but she responded.

“I wanted to be alone. Nobody wants to work on the ice frontier. So I thought I would have a lot of space to myself, and be more self-directed. I was right; but I regretted it pretty fast.”

“Well. If you ever need a friend. You’re not alone anymore.”

From observing Dominika, Sameera thought she might draw a rebuke if she volunteered.

But she got the gist of what she wanted to say across. It was implied.

“Thanks.” Dominika whispered simply.

She reached out for a macaron and shoved it whole into her mouth.

Sameera lifted her cup of milk to her lips. That was the end of that conversation.

She liked the small talk, but it was also nice just to be able to sit beside Dominika.

Back when she had first seen her in the hangar– She was cute, and she was a little withdrawn– maybe she could use a friend? Maybe she was up for some fun? Katarrans were always less stuck up than others, or so Sameera had thought at the time. It was silly to admit it to herself, but she had a crush. If Dominika ended up hating her, at least she wanted to have some fun along the way. She was even cuter when she was all flustered. Maybe Sameera had a chance? For all her swagger– it felt like she always ended up cast aside.

Always outside the worlds of others.

But maybe this time– maybe she wouldn’t be overlooked–

maybe she would be needed

“Sameera. I have something to tell you. It’s important.”

Dominika spoke up after a long silence, and her lupine, feline prince glanced to her side.

“I’m all ears.” Sameera said. She playfully folded then raised her ears.

She was so curious. What would Dominika say?

Dominika gathered her breath after a brief pause. Shutting her eyes.

“Look–”

“Yeah?”

Dominika withered under Sameera’s gaze. She looked like she would break a sweat.

“I– I wouldn’t be here without you. I don’t know– I don’t get what compelled you to risk your life for me. It’s hard to accept that you decided to take such risks for my sake. I think– it was reckless, and stupid of you. But– I’m alive now. I’m here, thanks to you. I can’t deny that– Ugh. God damn it. I’ve been trying to think of what to say for weeks. So there you go.”

She stared down at the plate of macarons in front of her, hands balled into fists at her sides.

Elated to hear those anxious words, her prince responded with a rapturous smile.           

Sameera leaned a bit closer to Dominika and quickly laid an indulgent kiss on her cheek.

Dominika’s entire body quivered, her hair fins standing suddenly up and shining brighter.

“That’s all I needed in return. Non-seriously and transactionally, of course.”

Dominika’s hand absently reached up to rub her own cheek, her photophores strobing.

Once she regained her composure, she sighed and stuffed her mouth with another macaron.

Sameera, meanwhile, tried to hide her giddy, girlish exuberance and finish her donut.

That taste of Dominika’s cheek had been sweeter even than the offerings of the Patisserie.

“I need to tell you one more thing.” Dominika said, still rubbing her cheek.

“Always listening, milady.” Sameera replied.

“This is serious. Back then, when you collapsed in the hangar, and then when we were almost attacked by that demonic Diver, I was terrified for you. I– I really don’t want you to be so reckless again. I mean it. You can’t just– I don’t want– you to throw your life away.”

However she worded it, all Sameera heard, was that Dominika cared about her living.

For once she felt like she did not have perfectly recited words to say in response.

Her heart was hot and pounding hard in response.

“I’ll try. I guess I’ve never been too good at taking care of myself.” Sameera said.

“Well–” Dominika looked down at her plate, searching for the words–

She then leaned again, laying her head on Sameera’s shoulder. “You’re not alone either.”


In a part of C-block a few streets away from Dominika and Sameera’s sweet shop, the road curved around a small park, and there was a library building and a public school. In the park, library, school and the streets connecting them, a variety of kiosks, tents and other pop-up shops had gone up overnight. It was the seasonal market, a one-week open air festival of small batch textiles and handcrafts; rare collectibles like real, bound books; and fresh food made right on-site; and much more. It was a truly a focal point of station culture.

“Ahead lies our destiny, gamer–! I mean, Alex! Feast your eyes upon the sum of human endeavor! Treasures heretofore unseen arrayed for us to covet, and if our coin prove sufficient, we may yet lay claim to a king’s ransom of rare finery and culture goods–”

“–Thanks for calling me Alex every once in a while.”

Alexandra Geninov couldn’t help but feel blessed by this turn of events, however.

Her companion, Fernanda Santapena-De-La-Rosa, looked so excited to be here.

Even if she wasn’t necessarily excited to be with Alex, she hadn’t refused the offer.

This was clear sign of progress. Alex only wished she could make a save file.

Out on the town, the two perennial night-shifters of the Pandora’s Box had dressed up in their best, and only, personal outfits for shore leave. Their styles clashed quite sharply.

Fernanda had dolled herself up, the shiny purple streaks going through her long, blond hair even more pronounced than before, and the purple lipstick and eyeshadow on her delicate face sparkling with a hint of glitter. Her light figure was wrapped in a black and dark purple synthetic dress, skin-tight from the neck to its long sleeves and filigreed bodice. Diamond-shaped sheer sections on the upper chest and belly whose tips met just under the breasts, added a tasteful amount of risqué flair. Those sheer sections composed of two diamonds of tight mesh fabric, meeting end to end, were also mirrored on Fernanda’s back, on her arms, as well as in the leggings that went with the dress. On the sections of the dress that were not partially see-through, silver faux-occult patterns had been laid over the fabric. These were also present in the dress’ short, flared skirt, worn over as a bottom piece.

Simply put– she was so fucking hot that it was driving Alex low-key insane.

Alex was nowhere near the level of Fernanda’s gothic chic. Nevertheless, as she walked the streets, she started to put on a bit of swagger. She liked to think she must have looked handsome, with her tall and gallant figure, wide-shouldered, long-limbed, slender; easily a head over Fernanda; as well as her mysteriously, exotically mixed race skin tone and silky brown hair, messily stuck up in the back of her head with a single claw hair clip.

Her fashion was near completely thrown together– just things that felt comfortable if she ever had to wear something other than a uniform. She had a pair of tight blue pants with a few rips on the knees and thighs, and a blue zip-up hoodie with a little 16-bit pixel art model of a ship on the back. She wore her hoodie half-unzipped and well off-shoulder; showing off some cleavage in addition by wearing an over-size, deeply plunging white v-neck underneath the hoodie, also falling off her nice shoulders and exposing tantalizing black bra straps.

“Is there anything specific you’d like to see?”

“I shall strategize once I have laid closer look to the goods. What about thine own interest?”

“Just browsing. But honestly, I just thought you’d like a place like this.”

“Oh ho! Perhaps a dew-drop of high culture has fallen upon the brows of this gamer?”

Fernanda made a smug little face and a dramatic little gesture with her hands.

At first Alex was a little repelled by Fern. She wasn’t going to lie to herself and think she always liked her. When she first saw her she thought she was a weirdo, and their first few shifts were tense. But the more she got to know her, working those long nights on the bridge, she started to think, Fern is kinda cute. Then, they started to live together, saw more of each other outside the bridge, and Alex thought, Fern is kinda hot.

Truly, Alex’s imagination had been very limited those few weeks ago.

Fernanda, as she stood on this day, was like, geothermal event levels hot.

Alex was hitting herself for fantasizing about everyone but her!

On the way to the market, in addition to trying to work up a bit of confidence in her own body language, Alex’s eyes examined the way Fern’s dress clung to her every contour and she felt like she had to say something. Everyone loved compliments, right?

And damn– Fernada was earning every second of Alex’s lascivious gaze.

As far as Alex was concerned, today her life was not a shoot-em-up or simulator, it was a storytelling game– clearly, she was locked into the “Fern” route. This event was her chance to make some moves and score some points with the roomie to turn things romantic.

She had to nut up and take the initiative. No coward strats— big dick moves only.

“Hey, Fern,”

“Uh huh?”

“You look h– I like your dress.”

Afraid of the commit, Alex cancelled into a much safer move, like a huge coward.

Fernanda looked her up and down with a neutral but appraising expression on her face.

Was it just Alex’s imagination or did Fern’s eyes just linger on her tits?

“Much appreciated– you have–” Fernanda paused. “You possess a rather easy presence.”

With twice as many words she said about as much of a compliment as Alex had.

Not much of one at all. They averted their gazes and got to walking.

Despite the awkwardness, the two of them headed into the market with smiling faces.

Fake stone paths dotted with a few synthetic trees made up the park, the turf grass easily exposed by the lack of quality lighting to maintain the illusions. None of the architecture was very impressive, despite its attempts to put on airs. False stucco on the library façade and the false colonnades fading into the walls of the school building, it all failed to impress.

It was the streets around these landmarks that now brimmed with life.

Hundreds of sellers had arrayed themselves in every open spot along the streets. Some had large tents filled with goods, others were selling out of the trunks of small electric vehicles, yet more had carts or simple plastic table-stands with their goods on offer.

There were all kinds of people selling, young and old, men and women.

All of them were Imbrian though– nobody had even as much skin tone on them as Alex.

“Gamer– I mean, Alex, prithee, accompany me first to the purveyors of textiles.”

“None of these strike me as erotic novel type stuff.” Alex said teasingly.

“I shall prove your insolence wrong in due time! But I wish to see everything on offer!”

Rather than ignore Alex’s lagging behind, Fernanda grabbed her suddenly by the arm and pulled her toward several stands and tents were shirts, carpets, sheets, and other such goods were on sale. Alex wasn’t just being surly for the sake of it: she had noticed common themes among the textiles on sale that clashed heavily with both her own sense of fashion and quite definitely with Fernanda’s fashion. It seemed the order of the day was geometric patterns, like diamond-shaped waves and squares within circles, or even fractal patterns.

All of which had either bright flat colors, or psychedelic arrays of many colors at once.

Upon looking at these tie-dye explosions up close, Fernanda barely restrained a grimace.

“Looking for a new welcome mat to lighten up your hallway? Or maybe a cute scarf or a drape to add flair to a new look?” A seller called out to them. “Our textiles all have super chic Shimii-inspired patterns! Teen girls love these nowadays! You would be on the cutting edge of the hip new styles no matter how old you are now! C’mon, take a closer look for yourself!”

Alex wasn’t sure she’d ever seen Shimii textiles with such garish colors before.

Fernanda and her both ignored the seller and continued walking.

“Dunno about you, but I’m not that interested in what teens are doing here.” Alex said.

“Concurred.” Fernanda said with a small sigh.

There was a decent amount of foot traffic along the streets and into and out of the school and library; a variety of food vendors around the street market were taking advantage of this. Alex kept an eye out for them, as she had begun to feel slightly peckish.

However, almost all of them were selling some kind of processed meat.

Hamburg steaks, chicken wings, candied bacon; there was meat to eat everywhere she turned, but nothing like Minardo’s cooking. Strictly speaking, they weren’t forbidden from eating meat, but they had been raised to find it wasteful, so it felt odd to do so.

Both of them stopped in front of a cart with a few things for sale they had never heard of.

“Pray tell, what form of comestible is ceg kofta?” Fernanda asked.

From behind the cart, the young woman scooped up a mass of red paste flecked with white and green bits and showed it to the two of them. It smelled strong and herbal, but upon seeing it, there was no denying that it was just meat. “This is raw lamb mashed with onion, garlic, green leek and spices. It’s a Shimii specialty, it’s becoming super popular. Ten marks per, want some? I’ll throw in some rose petal lemonade on the side for free!”

“Huh? It’s raw?” Alex frowned. “Won’t that just make us sick?”

The young kofta seller narrowed her eyes. “Of course not! Shimii eat this every day!”

“Then it shall be left with them, or your impression of them. Let’s depart, gam– Alex.”

Fernanda tugged Alex’s arm and led her away from the cart quickly.

She had a grossed-out look on her face.

Alex was beginning to fear the date venue had been a miscalculation on their part, but it started to turn around when she pointed out the jewelry vendors to Fernanda. Her eyes finally twinkled with delight. There were finally goods that came in purple and black and were much more her style. Hairpins shaped like raven’s feathers, necklaces with star-shaped purple gemstones of both ferristitched and slightly more authentic varieties, brooches and wristlets and earrings in sharp and wicked shapes and designs.

It was a bit more romantic than rainbow scarves and raw meat.

Fernanda drifted from seller to seller, smiling exuberantly at the pieces on display.

She looked so exceptionally beautiful when she was happy.

Alex had a corny, stupid, gay thought– she wanted to make Fern happier more often.

Maybe it’d do everyone some good to see that smile on the regular.

If I could save right here and just come back to this moment whenever I wanted.

It was time– Alex had been too passive. She needed to make a gamer move.

There was an opportunity, and she wasn’t about to let it pass unanswered.

“Hey, Fern, come look. I found something; try this on. I think it’ll suit you.”

Working up her courage, Alex picked up a little something from the table of a compliant vendor– a choker, with a lacy, partially see-through black band and a purple decoration in front that was the shape of a broken heart. As soon as she saw the piece, Alex knew she had to grab it. When Fernanda turned to look, she paused and stared, transfixed, at the object.

Alex thought she saw a bit of a blush on Fernanda’s cheek, and quietly undid the clip in the back of the choker, and presented it, as if to say, ‘want me to put it on you?’

“I’m surprised,” Fernanda said, after some hesitation. “You– You get it, gamer.”

“Hmm? I get it?” Alex grinned.

“I– I mean to suggest, you have demonstrated a refinement in taste hitherto unseen.”

A few moments’ hesitation, and she lifted her blond hair, shut her eyes and moved closer.

Alex’s heart began to thrash.

She had never seen Fernanda make herself so– vulnerable?

Basking in the unforeseen triumph, Alex neared, leaned forward, and slowly and gently wound the choker around Fernanda’s slim neck with the utmost care and tenderness and respect. She clipped the choker on the back and adjusted it. Her hands brushed against the soft skin of Fern’s shoulders and neck, felt the silky texture of her hair, and she was close enough to smell the darkly sensuous perfume that her witch had applied for the occasion.

She could have pounced on her– oh god. Dangerous thoughts. Reel them back in.

“Oh yeah. I’m buying it.” Alex said to the vendor. She handed them a few bills.

Fernanda looked she was going to scoff out of habit at this unasked for favor–

–but she caught sight of herself in the vendor’s mirror and paused to take it in.

“It– it does look– it flatters my countenance to an acceptable degree. I will wear it.”

“It’s amazing on you. You’re amazing, Fern.”

Without thinking, she had found herself saying something far more blatant than before.

For a moment Alex expected Fern to flinch and kick her shin in disgust, or something.

“Hah. Never was it in doubt. My nymph-like beauty is without equal among mortals.”

Instead, Fernanda turned a conceited smile on Alex and walked away with a haughty air.

There was a second where Alex felt kind of stupid. Like she had been tricked somehow.

Then her heart felt lighter. She was happy; she was satisfied.

She loved seeing Fern like this. It wasn’t a contest– it wasn’t a competitive game.

Fernanda was smiling. She was smiling too. It was nice– it wasn’t perfect, but it was nice.

They were having a good time, all things considered.

Three months ago, this would have been unthinkable. But they had been through a lot.

And now, Alex really felt like– she wanted Fernanda to like her– she felt that–

there was no one else she wanted to take those night shifts with than Fernanda.

Even if all they did was argue about dumb, pointless stuff. It was fine; if it was with her.

But does she like me back? She’s been acting pretty flirty if I think about it.

Maybe Alex just had to be the sexy biracial gamer chick of her dreams!

Maybe it was that easy!

Alex waved goodbye to the vendor out of sheer personal exuberance and followed along behind Fernanda with a renewed energy. She had never felt this way about anyone, and she thought she liked it. Whatever status ailment she had been inflicted with, she hoped it wouldn’t go away soon. Everything felt so easy now, and she was no longer so anxious about displeasing Fernanda. She thought a successful date was essentially already locked in.

“Do you think they have any video games here?” Alex asked, with a big, cheery smile.

Fernanda glanced over her shoulder at her. “Mayhaps you’ll find the rare handicrafted memory card of a departed old matron, boasting bespoke digital entertainments heretofore unseen, lovingly stitched pixel by pixel over a centenary of teacups and porridge bowls.”

Her voice was thick with sarcasm, and Alex loved it too. Berate me more, princess!

And what was that she saw? Was that a little smile playing on Fernada’s purple lips?

There you go! You’re winning, Alexandra Geninov! You’re finally winning!

Closer to the school and library, there were bigger tents with exactly what Fernanda was looking for. Shelves upon shelves of books– of course, none of them were real hardcover books. Instead, they had very thin screens within a smooth plastic shell containing a microcomputer wafer smaller than an ID card and similar in weight.

All it could do was display the book in its attached memory card. Single purpose reader devices were uncommon in the Union; almost all books in the Union were just library files that the station computer served to portables or room computers. In the Imbrium, however, books were bought and sold as limited, physical goods, hence the hardware.

Alex and Fernanda walked into a big tent, big enough to have a dozen shelves inside.

Each shelf was marked with the genre of books it contained, and in no time, Fernanda had shuffled over to the “Dark Romance” shelf. Because the books were so thin, there were hundreds and hundreds of them in each shelf. They were poorly labeled on the shelf itself, most of them unmarked, requiring that the book be picked up and booted up with the tiny buttons on the case, to determine what it was. Fernanda began looking through them.

“So, any steamy lesbian sex?” Alex asked, peering over Fernanda’s shoulder.

No immediate response.

And there she went– Fernanda’s eyes scanned across the lines of text one after another.

Her slender fingers swiped across the screen, turning page after page.

After a few moments, a slightly hoarse laugh escaped her lips.

Alex smiled and stood by, eventually picking up a random book herself.

Perhaps seeing her disengaging, Fernanda’s gaze lifted from her book for a brief moment.

“Gamer– Alex. You cannot reduce this literary juggernaut to such simplicity. Dark romance works are obsessed with the sadomasochistic relationships that can develop between the same sex. They are characterized by brooding protagonists, dark acts of sexuality, and bitter endings. Indeed, there is the unveiling of the sapphic flesh, but this is hardly the only appeal of these works. In the Union, these works are still largely the domain of enthusiast writing, but they appear to have been broadcast more widely in the Empire.” Fernanda said.

Indeed, after a few pages into the book Alex had picked up, there was already lesbian sex. A special agent who was infiltrating a Solceanos convent into order to sneak out the woman that she loved, who had been forced to hide there due to her political rivals; and she just couldn’t help but pause and get knuckle deep inside her girl before their escape–

Fernanda peered at Alex’s book, shut off her own reader and picked up a second sheet.

“You have come into possession of a future volume of ‘The Death of The Umbran Lilly’.” Fernanda said. “If you desire to assist me, help me collect the rest. I desire to obtain as many volumes as they have available. You’ll be pleased to hear I will allow you to carry them.”

“Uh huh. Or I guess I should say ‘as thou wisheth, o dark mistress’.”

“Hmph.”

Alex shut off the reader in her hands and started flipping through others.

Due to the lack of good labeling the two of them kept taking and putting back volumes as they looked. It was easy for Alex to think of this as some kind of mission and put her whole head into it. From what Fernanda gathered there were fifteen volumes.

“So lesbians aside, what kind of stuff do you look for in a series? Why this one?”

“Hah! To ask such a simplistic question of me. Of course, what else could I desire but to peer into the deepest depths of human desire and community? To explore the darkest and most enshadowed recesses of the spirit and expose the most turbulent angst contained therein?”

“I’m sorry but all that still sounds like you just want lesbians in it.”

“Hmph. Pray tell, what do you seek from your little video games, gamer?”

“Well, first priority is good gamefeel, like slick controls and mechanics.”

“Pah! Gamefeel. And you pretend my words mean nothing?”

Fernanda broke out into laughter. For a second Alex felt rebuked again.

But Fernanda seemed to be smiling still.

Alex started to become invested in finding all twenty-something volumes of ‘The Death of the Umbran Lilly’ in order to appease Fernanda, and quickly became absorbed in the task.

She would only tear her eyes from a book or shelf if she found one.

To the point that she did not notice a third individual making their way into the shelf.

And while being particularly dramatic with snatching a book from the shelf, elbowed them somewhere, and knocked the book they were reading right out of their hands. It felt like the noise of that book hitting ground was louder than any other sound in the entire station, overwhelmingly loud, drowning out Alex’s breathing, heartbeat, thoughts. She was immediately, completely embarrassed to have hit someone else, and crouched to pick up the book without a second to spare. Thankfully, the portable readers had padded corners.

“Agh! Oh, I’m such an oaf, I’ll get it for you–”

Crouching on the ground, picking up the portable that had fallen–

In front of a pair of thick, black boots, out of which long black tights emerged.

Alex’s eyes followed the tights up a pair of long and well-defined legs.

To black skirt and coat, worn over a black shirt. Long sleeves with red armbands.

One emblazoned with a stylized black sun, another with an eagle-like dragon.

Dark brown eyes looked down at her on the floor.

A bushy tail swung leisurely behind the figure.

Peeking out from around a beret were two tall, furry ears.

“Ah. Thank you. I was surprised too.”

She reached down a hand. Black gloves with a cuff bearing that same strange sun motif.

Alex recognized the symbols. The Commissar had made sure everyone knew them.

The Sonnenrad, a symbol of esoteric fascism; and the Reichsadler, imperial heraldry.

Judging by the armband, this woman–

–was an officer of the Volkisch Movement!

Alex had stricken a fascist officer!

I fucked up! I fucked everything up! You did it again you fucking loser Alex Geninov!

Shocked stupid, not knowing what to do, Alex took her gloved hand.

That woman easily pulled Alex back up to a stand, her grip confident and strong.

She was a Loup, Alex thought– shorter than her, with long, brown hair with neat, blunt bangs, fluffy ears and a bushy, bristly tail that wagged easily behind her. Her eyes were a dark, deep blue. She had an affable expression, but her gaze was so intense–

“I’m– I’m really sorry about all this! Really! It won’t happen again!” Alex said.

She stared straight into that cutting gaze, feeling eviscerated by its depth.

This woman, whose hand she was holding, could finish everything Alex cared about.

Her life; the mission; and– the love of her life–

“Please forgive us.” Alex mumbled.

At her side, Fernanda froze up, staring wide-eyed with her hands clutching a book.

“Oh, it’s nothing. Fellow enthusiasts of taboo literature, right?”

The Volkisch officer smiled and reached out a hand again, this time for a shake.

Alex, still dumbstruck and anxious, shook it, perhaps a bit too vigorously.

“Um. Alex.” She said, by way of introduction.

“My name is Aatto Jarvi-Stormyweather. Pleased to make your acquaintance.”

Alex handed her back the book that had been dropped.

It visibly shook in her nervous grip.

Aatto caught on and wagged a finger.

“Oh I’m so sorry. I understand– please don’t worry. I’m just a paper pusher, I’m not here for the ‘zeal and glory of the National Proletariat.’” She said the slogan in a deeper, mocking voice. “Just pretend like I’m anyone else here. You’ve got a bunch of ‘Umbran Lilly’ right? I can recommend it. Though I prefer stories that have kingdom-building elements.”

She reached across from Alex and picked up another book from the shelf.

It was the last volume they were looking for.

Aatto handed it to a demure Fernanda.

“Of course, there’s not much to spoil, the name of the series says it all. Nevertheless, it is a truly intriguing little tale.” Aatto says. “I think the imagination on display can excite both dabbler and connoisseur alike with its audacity. Even though our heroine must die for the sake of the morality laws– her journey takes some incredible turns. I only wish that women such as these were allowed to live out their conquests to the fullest. Anyway. Enjoy it.”

Alex and Fernanda speechlessly took the books.

Aatto meanwhile turned back to the shelf and picked up a different book to peruse.

While periodically staring at Aatto as if she would pounce if they ignored her for too long, they grabbed one of the bags left in the aisles for prospective customers, put all their books in it, and bid silent leave from the Volkisch officer. The entire time Alex was around her, she waited for the other shoe to drop. Would there be someone in one of the shelves closer to the front of the tent, ready to tackle them to the ground? Would there be a tactical team outside that would immediately fill them with lead for buying perverted books?

Outside the tent, the pair found themselves unmolested in the middle of the street.

Except by the amount of money it cost to buy 20 volumes of lesbian erotica.

They both looked back over their shoulders into the tent, to see if Aatto was watching.

Nothing. She must have still been perusing the dirty books in the back.

Fernanda and Alex heaved a sigh of relief, leaning into each other.

“We should seize the march.” Fernanda said. “Before we bequeath opportunities to fate.”

She thrust the bag of books into Alex’s chest, urging her to carry it.

They left the open air market, Alex’s breathing still troubled by the fright in the book tent. After stealing away into the wide open streets of C-block, putting several corners between them and the open-air market, the two of them slowly began to take lighter steps.

There were no snipers or barricades or armored cars.

Alex was the first one to laugh, but Fernanda soon joined her.

“She was just a paper pusher– dressed like that? What kind of department has a ‘judge, jury and executioner’ style dress code?” Alex said. “And she’s into gay porn? I can’t deal with it.”

“Envision joining a sapphic reading group only to find that in your meetings.” Fern said.

Both of them guffawed openly on the street for a moment.

“God. I’m starving. We should find a place we can actually eat at.” Alex finally said.

“I’m afraid I must concur. Without replenishment, you’ll soon have to carry me too.”

Fernanda glanced at Alex as if looking for a response– and smiled when Alex laughed.

Farther down the street, they found about the only place where they were guaranteed to get something vegetarian– a fruit bar, serving a variety of smoothies and drinks. Rather than actual fresh fruit, which would have been prohibitively expensive, the venue was dominated by several rows displaying different cartridges of stitcher material to mix together.

Fruits were processed toward the creation of flavor bases, syrups, creams, and fibers, contained in small transparent cylinders that would be fed into the smoothie machine. Guests could choose any combination, for different flavors, colors and textures.

This was a shop after Alex’s own heart.

In the Union, fresh fruit was exceedingly hard to get. Fresh food was so precious it was the main perk of farming– getting to have any fresh fruit and veggies at all was a highly desirable perk. Every unit of food grown in the Union that was bound for cafeterias, schools, workplaces and community pantries, was immediately processed into a product that would last longer and be transportable. Everything was dried, milled, pulped or pickled; only a few whole fruits were frozen for consumption in near-original form, and these were rare goods often bound for the navy or as some kind of prize or bonus for outstanding citizens.

Alex was quite used to eating stuff like this– smoothies made by stitcher machines.

It was easy to eat, pretty tasty, and it conferred a hit of sugar for a late night gaming boost.

There were some unfamiliar fruits on offer, however. One of the perks of Empire.

“What are you getting?” Alex asked Fern.

Fern grinned to herself. “I aspire to compose a drink that evokes the midnight shadow.”

“You’re getting purple stuff. Got it.”

“Hmph.”

Alex was throwing stones from a glass house, as her drink was essentially “green stuff.”

Because of all the shelves, there was no indoor seating in the fruit bar, but the establishment had put up a few tables and chairs in an adjacent alleyway for customers to leave the street. The pair sat down under a white umbrella and sipped their smoothies in disposable plastic mugs, taking in the somewhat stale air of the district and catching their breath.

Fern’s drink did look surprisingly tempting with its deep purple hue and swirl of a brighter purple syrup. Alex’s was monotonously green and somewhat fibrous, but the strongest flavor was a sweet berry syrup that had been run through the drink along with cream.

Fernanda extended her hand toward Alex, the smoothie cup in her thin fingers.

“Perchance a sip, gamer? You’ve been eyeing it constantly.”

Alex leaned forward and took a sip from the plastic straw.

This prompted an explosion of sweetness onto her tongue she was not really prepared for.

She could vaguely taste something starchy, maybe beet? And something like grapes?

“Wow.” She said. “It’s really purple.” She cocked a grin.

Fernanda retracted her hand. She looked down at her drink.

There was a brief moment of hesitation before she put her lips on the straw and continued to drink as she had been. Alex thought nothing whatsoever of this moment.

She did think, seated across from Fernanda, that they hadn’t really gotten a chance to really sit down and talk about things that were not work related. She felt really curious–

she knew all these things that Fernanda liked and did–

–but how much did she know about Fernanda herself?

“Hey, Fern, where are you from?” Alex asked. “I don’t think you’ve ever said.”

Fernanda narrowed her eyes at Alex and sipped more from her drink.

“Is it security stuff? You can answer a bit quiet can’t you? No one’s listening.” Alex said.

“It’s not that.” Fernanda put down her drink. “It is simply neither pertinent nor interesting.”

“I’m interested.” Alex said. “I mean, if you wanna talk boring, I’m just from Mt. Raja.”

Fernanda’s eyes drifted away from Alex. Her body language noticeably softened.

“Sevastopol.” She said simply. “I was raised in Sevastopol. Then I joined the navy.”

“Couldn’t find a way to make that sound fancy?” Alex said in jest.

“My life simply wasn’t fancy.” Fernanda replied seriously.

Alex noticed the shift in her behavior and tone and felt slightly alarmed by it.

It was uncharacteristic– she felt like she was fumbling the run at the last second and needed to recover to post a good score. Like before, she thought she needed to appease Fern again.

“Oh. Sorry. I mean– I don’t think you need to be self-conscious. I’m just a huge loser, you know? I wasn’t the smartest kid, my parents didn’t like me, like– if we compare childhoods, I’m probably way more embarrassing. But– I think anything you say is probably really interesting! So you don’t have to worry! I’m just a gamer after all, I won’t judge you!”

She smiled and shrugged and tried to look like she was sounding funny when she wasn’t.

She was just motor mouthing without aim and sounding pathetic. And yet she continued.

“Sevastopol is a big shipbuilding station isn’t it? Did that make you want to go Navy?”

Fernanda’s averted gaze slowly drifted back toward Alex– and softened slightly.

“I just wanted an adventure.” Fernanda said. “Sevastopol was too straightforward.”

“Yeah. I kinda wanted that too.” Alex said. “I guess more like. An escape, maybe.”

“Yes. Life could use more adventure, don’t you think? More romance; more mystery.”

“Oh, for sure, for sure. You know, you got that mysterious girl stuff down real good.”

“You think so? Well– I’m not displeased to hear it, I suppose.”

Fernanda averted her gaze again, resting her chin on the back of her hand.

Alex started drinking from her smoothie again to keep herself from talking any more.

Shit did I fumble everything like this? At the finish line?!

Both of them were silent for several minutes while their cups started to drain.

“Alex. Um.”

Fernanda broke the silence. Twiddling her fingers. Eyes avoiding contact.

She cleared her throat.

When she began speaking again, she had returned to her previous tone of voice. “You were a most amusing traveling companion on this excursion. It would not trouble me if, perhaps, were we to trod upon a new shore– if we could reprise this kind of event.”

Alex couldn’t help but beam brilliantly in response. “Of course, my mistress of the dark.”

“However, I must insist upon one oath from you.” She said.

“Um, sure,” Alex blinked, confused.

Fernanda put down her cup and looked at Alex in the eyes.

“Self-effacing ill becomes you. Making sport of you is my exclusive domain.” She said.

Alex stared, momentarily dumbfounded.

Once she understood the meaning of Fernanda’s words– she almost wanted to cry.

“Ah, yeah.” She replied, feeling bashful and stupid and elated. Everything was mixed up.

I’m being such an idiot, but– God she’s so fucking cute.

Alex thought, there was no sugar-coating it anymore.

She really was in love with Fernanda, huh?

No changing routes now, gamer– she really was seeing this one through to the end.

As anxiety-inducing and weird and kinda cringey as everything felt to her–

–it also felt amazing.


“We’re going to drink. They have plenty of beers here. Order some. I’ll cover it.”

Khadija explained the situation serious and unsmiling in their private booth.

Sieglinde Castille stared at her from across the table. She blinked several times.

“Miss– Ma’am–”

“It’s Khadija. Don’t ma’am me. And don’t dare call me the Lion of Cascabel.”

“I wasn’t going to–”

“I’m not drinking alone. I’ve drank alone enough. If I’m drinking, you’re drinking.”

“We were just going to play Mahjong?”

Khadija leaned in closer, a smile playing across her glossy, fuchsia-colored lips.

“It’s a game bar. We’re playing a game, and drinking. Order up.”

Her diction was slow and threatening, her expression belabored in spelling each word.

“One of us should remain sober.” Sieglinde said. Her voice trembled.

“I’m not letting you be more sober than me.”

“This is ridiculous.”

“You’re ridiculous. Everything about you is ridiculous. You want to talk to me? Drink.”

“Isn’t it against your religion?”

“I’m good over here. I won’t be having wine. Neither will you. Now pick a drink.”

“I’ve– I’ve been trying to remain sober.” Sieglinde said. She averted her eyes.

Khadija put on a sadistic smile. “Whatever streak you had going, it’s broken. Drink.”

Sieglinde Castille looked finally defeated.

How could she object?

How dare she even think, ‘What have I done to deserve this?’

She knew full well what she had done to deserve it. In her own mind, Khadija was sure she could heap any kind of abuse upon Sieglinde and it would be justified in the final calculus of their lives. Making her drink didn’t even rank among the punishments Khadija thought to subject the former Red Baron to for the terrors she had caused. Condemning her to be less morose for one night? Giving her a bit of liquid courage to help her discuss her sins? Hell– God forbid, maybe they might even get so fucked up as to have some fun.

Woe be upon her– she could endure this much.

“Fine. Fine.” Sieglinde sighed. “I’ll have a Katzbalger. Or– a few, I suppose.”

“What a proletarian choice! I think I’ll start with some rum punch.” Khadija said.

Ever since Sieglinde’s defection, Khadija had not known what to do with herself.

There was something deeply perverse about her old enemy switching sides.

She didn’t blame captain Korabiskaya for being merciful. If Khadija had wanted Sieglinde dead, she had her chance, and she did not take it. In the middle of battle, Khadija had decided that she did not deserve to die. On some level, that had to mean burying her grudge, but she was not able to do so. She continued to nurse an animosity toward her.

It was easy to keep carrying on as she had been.

Things that were easy to carry on doing weren’t always right, however.

There was no avoiding it forever. She wasn’t a little kid with a playground rivalry. There was no teacher who was going to sit them down and make them hash things out. Khadija needed to confront what kind of woman Sieglinde Castille had become in A.D. 979. Not twenty years ago, but now, when they were both old and Khadija had settled their affair. Sieglinde had defected, and even given opportunity, she was not using it as a pretext to escape.

She was demure and compliant. She was abundantly courteous. She seemed sincere.

Khadija had won their brawl out at sea, and she was being graceful in victory.

She would give Sieglinde something of a chance. To determine how they would live.

So– what better way to break the ice than to have a drink and play some Mahjong?

Whether in the Empire or Union, it was not hard to find bars like the one they were in.

As soon as they walked through the door, it was a long hall with individual rooms, and somewhere in the back there was a kitchen. Each room had plush booth seats and a convertible table. This particular bar encouraged guests to play games while they drank and ate light snacks– but it also probably didn’t mind them doing other things too. An inexorable part of living in a station was that most people had a very small amount of personal space, and it was difficult to be private with someone without inviting them into that personal space. Venues where two persons could be private without necessarily being personal were a necessary middle place for people like Khadija. Access to alcohol didn’t hurt either.

Aside from the red upholstery of the seats, the room was pretty spartan and sparsely decorated. Grey walls, white lights, a table with multiple folding ends. There was a touchpad on the wall that could change the color of the lights, the climate of the room, and play music. Khadija chose to play a channel of gentle acoustic guitar tracks, though every so often the computer threw in some other similar music unasked for. Under the booth seats, there were boxes that contained cards and game pieces for a variety of games.

Khadija withdrew the boxed set of pieces for mahjong, a rather deep game of colorful tiles.

“How much do you know about mahjong?” Khadija said.

“I’ve played it before. It’s from the Far East, isn’t it?” Sieglinde replied.

“Right. In the Imbrium, the game made its way to us from Hanwa, after the border wars.” Khadija said. She showed Sieglinde the pieces, which, in this Imbrian set, all had alphanumeric characters, rather than High Hanwan. “It’s an old game with many variants. Hanwa may have got it when they conquered Yu. It’s something that has been transferred, regrettably, through the violence of conquest, assimilation, and rivalry between empires.”

An uncanny prop for their dispute– but Khadija only chose it because she was bored of cards.

Khadija began to look through the tiles, checking to see if the set was actually complete.

“I learned about it in the army. I guess that figures.” Sieglinde said in a glum voice.

“Are you good at it?” Khadija asked.

Sieglinde shook her head. “Not at all.”

“Hah! Well. Of myself, I would say, I’m good enough for how I like to play.”

Low stakes gambling among drunk acquaintances, was the piece left unspoken.

While Khadija was going through the tiles, someone rapped on the door.

Through a slot, they had brought the first round of drinks. Sieglinde’s Katzbalger was a lightly decorated can of cheap beer with a cartoon of a dead cat on it, advertised as a low brow drink for salt of the earth Imbrian men. Khadija had been a little surprised that Sieglinde would order it. Meanwhile, her own can of rum punch was as bright and fruity as the contents were, garishly blue with a smiling, possibly drunk strawberry mascot.

Neither of them had dressed up for the occasion. They both wore the same teal half-jacket, and sleeveless button-down white shirt that characterized Treasure Box Transports. Sieglinde wore the uniform pants, while Khadija had a skirt and black tights. Wearing the same thing heightened the contrasts between them. Sieglinde was taller, broad-shouldered, her long mane of golden hair falling over her shoulders and back, almost down below the waist. Her sleek cheekbones and soft, slightly rounded nose gave her a slightly more traditional beauty. Khadija meanwhile was smaller, leaner, wiry, and her facial features were slightly sharper. She was perfectly manicured, lips wine-red, eyes perfectly shadowed the same color, lashes done, toner on her skin, where Sieglinde was unadorned. Khadija’s long hair was a shade of gold as well, but still different in texture and darker in tone.

And of course, Khadija’s fluffy ears, as perfectly manicured as the rest of her appearance.

Her bushy tail gently waved behind her, a sign of how calm she was.

“Here, this sheet has all the scoring rules and the hands on it.” Khadija said.

She set the sheet down off to the side of their play area, where both could reference it.

Then, she cracked open her can of rum punch, and stared expectantly at Sieglinde.

Looking glumly down at her can, Sieglinde popped the top as well. She took it in hand.

“A toast?” She proposed.

Khadija grinned. “Oh? I’d love to! You read my mind!”

They tapped their cans together, and then sipped from them.

Sieglinde took a much longer drink than Khadija, surprising the older Shimii.

When she put down her can again, the former noblewoman shut her eyes and groaned.

“What did we toast to?” Khadija asked.

Sieglinde lifted her can from the table again. “To peace.”

“Bah, childish and wishy-washy.” Khadija lifted her own can. “To struggle!”

She leaned across the table and tapped her can against Sieglinde’s a second time.

Then she downed the rest, as if to show Sieglinde how to really crush a can of liquor.

Meeting the silent challenge, the ex-baron downed the rest of her can on her next draught.

“There we go! That’s the spirit! Khoroshego!” Khadija laughed, raising her empty can.

Soon, the second round arrived, but this one was not so immediately thrown down.

“I thought Shimii were all very reserved and sober. Especially the women.” Sieglinde said.

“I’m a communist and communists can drink.” Khadija said. She watched Sieglinde’s dumbfounded expression and laughed out loud. “Look, there are many things I am supposed to avoid. But I’m not an ascetic. I’m a soldier with my vices. I still pray, I still fast. I do the things I grew up doing. And I fight like hell for others– if my soul ends up in the abyss for some drinking, I hope the many more souls I saved can live less broken lives than I.”

“I apologize for my impudent questioning. Yours a noble outlook.” Sieglinde said.

“No it isn’t. It’s not about ‘being noble.’ I’m fighting for my convictions.” Khadija said.

She felt immediately annoyed at Sieglinde’s reaction and started to shuffle tiles.

“To say you are ‘good’ or you are ‘noble’,” Khadija began, “it’s facile. You aren’t fighting for your soul. Your soul doesn’t matter to the world. Identify your enemy, call them for what they are, and fight what they do. Fascists, imperialists, they take the homes of people, starve them, and enrich themselves off their endless toil. I don’t fight them because it is ‘noble.’”

Sieglinde averted her gaze as if scolded and took another long sip of beer.

Khadija turned away from her again and started arranging the tile walls to begin.

“I don’t know what to say.” Sieglinde said. “I know what I did was evil.”

“You can start by not moralizing it.” Khadija grunted. “I don’t think you’re ‘evil’. Don’t make me stand up for you, for fuck’s sake.” She knew more than she let on. She had spied on Sieglinde weeping in the brig and knew exactly why she had been forced to fight in the war. But she couldn’t say that. “You were not evil, you were probably just young and ignorant.”

“I can’t excuse it anymore by saying I was just young and ignorant.” Sieglinde said. “I want to be better than that, Khadija. There were many times where I thought of running away, of refusing to serve, of doing anything– I never took them. I can’t see that as anything but evil. I willfully inflicted pain and furthered injustice, because it was easier than rebelling.”

“You want to be better? Why?” Khadija asked. “To save your immortal soul?”

“No!” Sieglinde cried out. “I just– I know I was doing wrong. I can’t carry on like that.”

“So it’s that simple? You realized you were ‘doing wrong,’ so now you must ‘do right’?”

“No. It’s– It’s more than that.” Sieglinde looked helpless to put it into words, however.

Khadija sighed, trying to reel back her own frustration. She was being too aggressive.

“Forget it. I’m done setting up the game. Take a sip and draw. Snacks will be here soon.”

Along with their drinks, a tray with a spartan assortment of snacks slid into the room through the same slot on the door. There was tough black bread, mixed pickled veggies and some hard cheeses. A final section had a dollop of coarse mustard and a dollop of sour cream, along with some empty space where perhaps sausages or other meat was supposed to be.

Khadija drew her hand of tiles. There was very little to work with. She was unlucky.

A mishmash of stuff. Maybe I get lucky and make a few sequences.

Neither of them spoke much as the game progressed.

Both of them were keeping dutifully closed hands, and discarding many tiles.

Khadija looked at Sieglinde between every play, but Sieglinde seemed to avoid her gaze.

Almost without interacting with each other, they came close to finishing their first hands.

“Taking it really seriously aren’t you? Relax. We haven’t even put down any bets.”

Sieglinde nodded her head with a wan expression. “Alright.”

“Poor start.” Khadija replied.

The former noblewoman reached for her latest beer and took a long drink.

She then set the can on the table with a bit of a strike.

“Khadija, what do you want from me? What can I do?” Sieglinde said, raising her voice.

“Play out this round.” Khadija replied simply, looking down at her concealed tiles.

Grunting, Sieglinde picked up her final tile and laid down her hand.

She had collected an entire hand of oak tree suit tiles, numbering one through nine.

Khadija revealed her own hand: still a mishmash of tiles that didn’t come together.

“You let me win?” Sieglinde asked.

“No. Don’t be so full of yourself. I got unlucky. It happens.” Khadija said.

Sieglinde Castille was a stupid and earnest girl with a lot of hurt in her heart. Khadija knew that already and it was evident to see, right in front of her tired old eyes. She knew Sieglinde was a 36 year old woman who had been shackled by a cruel and corrupting duty, in an evil place that never allowed her to learn otherwise, or to feel like she could possibly rebel.

But now she recognized it. There was no point in brutalizing her or punishing her.

Nothing Khadija did to Sieglinde would bring back the people she killed.

And she was already being crushed by that exact same idea herself.

In their fated clash at Goryk’s Gorge, Khadija killed Sieglinde von Castille, the Red Baron. Sieglinde Castille, the gloomy woman in front of her, was a shadow of that grand villain. She had the fight snuffed out of her, and now belonged to nowhere in the world, lost, broken and isolated. Maybe she didn’t know what she wanted; she certainly didn’t know what to do.

Khadija picked up the fifth bottle of rum punch and took a short sip.

She set it down on the table as hard as Sieglinde had set down her beer before.

“You want to know what I want from you? I’ll tell you then, but only this once! I want you to actually think about the kind of woman you want to be from now on! Not about whether you are ‘good’ or ‘evil’, whether you are doing ‘right’ or ‘wrong’! Think, concretely, about what you will do, what actions you will take, what kind of world you believe in. Believe in something and work towards that!” Khadija’s voice rose to a shout. “Stop living in the past! Neither of us can turn back the pages of what we’ve done! Start writing your story from today! If you become someone I detest, I promise I’ll strike you stone dead! But if you become someone worthy of praise, I will equally yield to it! That is what I want from you!”

Sieglinde’s eyes drew wide in front of Khadija, struck dumb by her shouted words.

Tears started to collect in those sad eyes.

Khadija grunted.

Stupid woman; act your age for once.

That was the cruel thought in her head because it was too odious to accept her simpering demands that Khadija lead her by the nose to redemption. Absolutely not, no way; make something of yourself first and impress those around you with those deeds. Impress me— that’s what Khadija wanted. Show me, how you have changed, show me that you can create a new legend for yourself. As someone who will fight rather than protect the oppressor.

Khadija wanted so strongly to believe that was possible.

She wanted to believe she had killed that Red Baron and freed Sieglinde from her.

But the directionless woman in front of her, begging for salvation– was not promising.

After a minute of silence, Khadija lifted her can of rum punch to her lips and emptied it.

She then started to shuffle the tiles again.

“Ya allah! Collect yourself. I won’t stand you winning one round and then leaving.”

Her gut was starting to burn from the booze, but she did not want things to stop just yet.

Sieglinde nodded her head and started to help with the shuffling.

“Are there any other games you know? Backgammon? Go? Poker?”

“I know a little bit of each. I’m not very good at any.” Sieglinde whimpered in reply.

“Ugh. You’re so boring. We must endeavor to change that.” Khadija replied, smiling a bit.

A shy little smile worked its way to Sieglinde’s face too.


“You’ve been scaring my customers all day. Got any good news to make up for it?”

“Heh. Yes. That last package has come and gone without incident. Off the grid.”

“Okay. Thank heavens. Past few months have been brutal. I’m glad she’s okay.”

In that same tent that Alex and Fernanda purchased a queen’s ransom of erotic lesbian literature, the nondescript older man who owned the same tent made to look at his remaining stock at the end of the first day of the market. In the back shelves, away from prying eyes, awaited Aatto Jarvi Stormyweather, a Rottenfuhrer of the Sicherheitsdienst, Volkisch Intelligence. Odd was the Loup that sat behind a desk, and did not fight on the frontlines, but odd also was the Loup that did not flee to the Royal Alliance instead of remaining with Rhinea. Aatto was willing to remain behind that desk in a new uniform.

And so, Aatto stayed behind the same desk as when she was a part of the liberal Rhinean Navy, and nobody had yet to dispute this. The Volkisch needed all the specialists they could get to keep the state running, whether or not they were part of the Imbrian privileged class.

“What do the Liberals plan to do now?” Aatto asked. “Are they gearing up to fight?”

“You don’t need to know that. Thank you for your work, but– you don’t need to know.”

Even this man was terrified of her.

An informant who had helped smuggle out liberal politicians in danger of being purged by the Volkisch, and whom Aatto had assisted greatly in this endeavor. She had forged documents, faked dispatches, leaked communiques and staff orders, contacted mercenaries and faked ship inspections– but she was still despised for the uniform of a Rottenfuhrer.

She didn’t care one whit about that. She didn’t care what anyone thought of her.

But she needed to know. Was someone finally going to challenge the Volkisch?

Was the fated battle to resolve the contradictions of Rhinea finally at hand?

“If they will fight, I will gladly assist. In any capacity. Please let me know.” Aatto said.

All she wanted to know was whether the Liberals could light the Flame of History.

Whether they were strong enough to fully seize power on the pyre of their enemy’s bodies.

For a moment the man stared at her quizzically. He then turned his entire head away.

“Are you crazy? No. They can’t challenge the Volkisch. They’re just gonna lay low.”

Aatto’s eyes narrowed, her tail straightened, her ears folded, with great displeasure.

It was as if a trance, a delusion she had been under, suddenly shattered in front of her.

As if the entire weight of reality was forcing itself back through her head.

Unworthy. All of them are unworthy. The liberals, the Volkisch, the Imbrian Empire. All of them will recede into the shadow of history with nary a cry. Disgusting. Worthless. Pathetic. Where is the grand trial in which we will finally determine the course of history? Must we continue to limp along in fruitless detente? Feckless cowards watching the clock freeze from afar–

The shopkeeper caught a glimpse of the sheer hatred on her face from the side of his eyes–

But clearly, when he turned to look, she had the same little grin that she always did.

Utterly collected and calm, her expression betraying little emotion.

“Then I’m afraid that will be the end of my services. I see no point in risking my life for others any further if the opportunity will lead to nothing. We must part ways now.” She said.

“What? I mean– fine. I can’t begrudge you that. Thank you. You saved many lives, Aatto.”

Aatto grunted and shoved past him and out of the tent, gritting her teeth.

Saving lives? I couldn’t care less. I thought all of you had some god damn spine.

Where was it now? Her grand spark, her glorious conflagration? Her end of history?

Where can I find someone with the potential to create a new world?

Or even– someone who could even see the possibility of a new world before their eyes.

Her true and worthy King to set the world on its rightful course.

Would the currents lead her to the one she desired to serve?


Previous ~ Next

Knight In The Ruins of the End [S1.5]

In the middle of the endless white forest, there was a tree with a trunk that reflected light like glass.

Images upon its length began as static, but cohered into something as the tree awaited a visitor.

Raised over an ankle-deep puddle, surrounded by its rising and falling roots that were like gnarled bodies half-interred and half-dug back up. She saw it in the distance, and she ambled toward it like an animal in an endlessly dark cave, as if her senses only allowed her to perceive and follow its light. Step by slow, plodding step, her mind a fog, while the trees sang around her, their colors drifting in the air like a sky full of ribbons. Cheering for her, encouraging her, warming her, lavishing her with their endless affection.

She stepped into that puddle and looked up at the reflection on the trunk of the tree.

There was a familiar environment. A window into a world of metal.

There was a woman, hair tied up in a brown ponytail, wearing a long shirt and pencil skirt and tights, and a long lab coat. She had a pin on her lapel, depicting a globe beneath a rainbow of falling stars, and a second pin beside it, at times clutched in her shaking hand, with a logotype: “Shooting Stars.” These tokens looked almost childish, and the way she was clutching them nervously even more so. It made her look too young, too new, particularly in the indistinct violence of her surroundings. Metal, dark and jagged and industrial, pipes and mechanisms, tubes, fluid, fuels, gases. She stood on a platform deep in the midst of a gargantuan mechanism, staring helplessly as it unfolded before her, loomed over her.

Staring as it seemed to menace her; as it seemed like it grew endlessly outside of her grasp.

And up above, emblazoned in the center of everything, a flag.

Linked purple hexagons around a tiny blue globe, accompanied by a logotype: “Aer Federation.”

That mystery woman in the reflection contemplated the flag, then turned her head over shoulder–

–and smiled, an expression so tragic that blood should have come out of her eyes as tears.

As if staring out of the picture in the tree; as if she could see the lost soul in the endless forest.

Across time, maybe even across dimensions–

Filled with an agony and mourning of incomprehensible proportion.

“I’m sorry. I know that this will trouble you greatly, but I have made my decision.” She said. She was not speaking into the forest, not speaking to the woman in the puddle, but to the owner of the memory. “I’ve failed Nobilis, I’ve failed Nocht, I’ve failed Ayvarta; I’ve failed all of humankind, every hand that gave me third and fourth and fifth chances.” Tears drew from her eyes and though she continued to smile it was clear that her heart was broken. “If there’s anyone left to remember me, it will only be as a dismal failure; but the thing I regret most is how I failed you. We’re the only two left; and I can’t make this decision for you. But I made it for myself. I– You’ll probably think I’m such a coward. But I can’t– I can’t keep–“

Suddenly, at the side of the woman in the puddle, who had been watching the memory–

–there was a second one.

Red-haired, horned– lavish white robe– a disdainful look in her yellow on black eyes.

“Interesting finding. Somehow, this graveyard keeps opening its holes for you subhuman scum. I wonder– who is she talking to? Maybe I will let you explore and see if you turn up more.”

She raised her hand, and the colors collected around it like tendrils–

“But not for this; not right now.”

–and the tendrils lashed out at Gertrude Lichtenberg and tore her entirely to pieces–

“There’s nothing I want to be reminded of less– than of that spineless bitch Polaris.”


Depth Gauge: 3503 m
Aetherometry: Blue (DISTORTED)

Gertrude Lichtenberg awoke with a start and ran her hands over her body in a panic.

Breathing heavy, checking that she had arms, legs, a torso, shoulders, breasts–

With the source of her panic rapidly fading, unable to piece together what she had experienced, Gertrude was overcome with exhaustion once again. She threw herself back on her back, kicked her legs, sighed.

Despite the nap Gertrude felt very little relief from her previous exhaustion. It felt like lying down in her bed only caused time to move forward and did nothing for her body otherwise. There was a thought that swam vaguely in her mind and started to drift farther and farther away in wakefulness and it infuriated her. Something she had to do? Something she had to be worried about? She grunted with anger.

“This is really starting to get to me. I’ll– I’ll talk to Nile again. After I come back.”

They should already be at the same depth as the suspected habitat in the rock wall.

She could not stop now. She had to see this thing through to the end– or to its next step.

Gertrude slipped out of bed, fixed her clothes and left the room.

She took with her the gadget that Nile had given her, lying on her bed, stowing it in a pocket.

She did not look at it.

Since she did not understand it anyway, she was not curious whether anything had changed.

She made her way to the Iron Lady’s bridge. At the door, she was immediately met by Karen Schicksal, who handed her a vitamin jelly pouch without saying anything. She looked more disarranged than ever before, with her hair uncombed and dark bags under her glassy eyes. As soon as Gertrude accepted the vitamin drink, Karen withdrew another such drink from her jacket and began to drink it. They were starting to go through these quicker than Gertrude could have imagined– everyone looked exhausted.

In addition to Karen, Nile was standing with her back a corner of the room, and Victoria was standing beside Dreschner near the central throne. Gertrude sucked her vitamin jelly while making her way to her own chair, nodding her head at Nile and Victoria along the way, both of whom nodded back. They both appeared about as haggard as everyone else, but standing a little more alert than some of the crew.

“High Inquisitor,” Dreschner said, by way of acknowledgment. He yawned, pointing at the main screen.

On the main screen, their next destination loomed in front of them, enormous in its scale.

Its size easily outmatched the enormity of the Iron Lady herself.

“What is this supposed to be?” Victoria mumbled to herself.

In front of them, the structure that had been partially embedded into the rock wall appeared like an enormous, metallic stack of four plates where each pair was stacked well to well, so there was a thinner “neck” between the two main structures. It was absolutely massive, at least 300 meters tall. Some of the outer armor showed signs of damage, like shearing and gaps in the plates, but miraculously, there was no wear from the saltwater. Certainly this structure could not have been new as it was the size of a larger substation and nobody could have built it in such a precipitous location, so one would have expected an array of creatures to have accumulated over it over time, and for the elements to have worn its surface.

“It fits much too snugly into the rock wall.” Nile said. “I’m no engineer, but this looks deliberate.”

She appeared beside Dreschner’s seat, standing in conference with the rest of them.

“Not one of yours, I take it?” Victoria asked, her voice exhibiting a hint of derision.

“I would have ditched all of you and gotten myself a nice can of espresso if it was my lab.” Nile said.

“Don’t get started, you two.” Gertrude grumbled.

“I have something of an idea regarding its provenance.”

Dreschner raised his voice to match the women beginning to argue. Everyone looked his way.

“Lady Lichtenberg,” he continued, “do you remember your father well?”

Gertrude shook her head. This was a topic on which she had no strong feelings.

She remembered Dreschner from her childhood more than she remembered her own father.

“He was a very busy man, and the years of my childhood which are still clear in my memory did not feature him prominently. Not to sound callous– that’s just how it is.” Gertrude replied.

Dreschner nodded. “I would never accuse you of being anything less than filial. At any rate: the reason your father was first employed by Leda Lettiere was not as a guard, much less as guard captain. He secured those positions due to his bravery in a clandestine effort. He participated in an abyssal expedition to recover an ancient technology. A surface-era technology. I never learned what it was, but your father told me of the existence of such ruins. There are allegedly even some under Heitzing. It’s not well known.”

Gertrude was not aware of this history, but in her somewhat addled state, she simply could not muster a lot of emotion about her father. However, there was one tantalizing bit of information there–

“Wait a minute– surface era? As in, over a thousand years ago, before– the Ocean?” Gertrude asked.

Dreschner nodded his head solemnly.

“Maybe even before the corruption.” Nile said suddenly. “He’s not wrong– such things exist.”

Gertrude and Dreschner’s eyes turned sharply to stare at Nile, who crossed her arms.

She looked as tired as everyone else there.

“They do– I bet your organization has unjustly pilfered many of them.” Victoria hissed.

“No more than you biofascist brutes have destroyed unknowingly in your pointless wars.” Nile snapped.

“Stop it already!” Gertrude shouted. “Don’t speak another word to each other. Dreschner– how do you know this structure is related to the surface? What did my father tell you about such structures?”

“That they did not decay, and they never lost power.” Dreschner said. “We have confirmed both. While this station has received seemingly random acts of violence, there are undamaged plates that look brand new. No wear, not even saltwater corrosion. Furthermore, we probed around the area with a spy tentacle and found that there is a lower intake which is still sucking in water. This structure has electric power.”

“Can we signal it with the laser? Do we get anything back?” Gertrude asked.

Karen raised her voice, having stood in the periphery of the discussion. “We attempted to connect to the exposed laser array near the top of the structure, but we kept receiving incompatible protocol errors. I even had the computer attempt a Free Interface Generation process just to see if we got something, but the Iron Lady’s learning computer could not figure out how to communicate with this system at all.”

“It might be designed not to respond even when passive.” Victoria said.

“It’s unsafe to make a system like that! If the human operators were all incapacitated, there would be no way to determine the status of the station and respond to emergencies!” Karen said, sounding helpless.

“That’s our safety standard, but not necessarily theirs.” Gertrude said. “Nile, how much do you know?”

“I’m afraid it isn’t much.” Nile said. “Our resident deep-divers were a pair of ladies by the names Euphrates and Tigris. I was not as much a woman of action. I preferred to stay behind and work in lab or clinic settings, not run around. That being said, we had friendly chatter about it. So I can confirm that the most peculiar characteristics of old era structures are their continuing access to power, pristine condition, and the difficulty in extracting anything from them. Euphrates never successfully recovered old era data from any of the structures she uncovered. I doubt we will be able to do any better ourselves.”

“We may want to consider turning back, Gertrude.” Victoria said, her ears folding slightly.

Gertrude wasn’t about that to heed that advise. She wasn’t about to let anyone tell her or even insinuate that this had been fruitless. In fact, if this was a Surface Era facility, then Gertrude’s journey may even have become more important than ever before. She felt a sudden attack of grandiosity– Norn wanted her to see this thing. Norn wanted her to discover it. That meant there was a way inside, or there was something to see inside. There was something she had to uncover, something that she had to understand.

There was no force on Aer that would have made her turn back now.

That inferno, raging where her heart should have been, dispelled some of the exhaustion she felt.

“We’re not ascending.” She told Victoria. “And you’re coming with me. We’re going into that thing and we’re going to see what we find in it.” She then told Nile bluntly. Nile did not seem surprised, and simply hid her hands in her coat pockets. “Have we found an entry? Can we connect a chute anywhere?”

She was raising her voice. She did not intend to sound so angry, but she was– impassioned.

“I know we’re all exhausted and we’ve been working nonstop. We’ll have a break as soon as I return from that structure. But I don’t want to hear talk of turning back. We are not returning to Konstantinople empty-handed. I am grateful for your continuing effort. Now, remain alert!” Gertrude declared.

This time loud enough for the entire bridge to hear.

Dreschner averted his gaze. Karen shrank back.

Across the bridge, there were a few half-hearted nods and salutes.

“Let’s start working on a way in there. The boarding party is already decided.” Gertrude said.

Everyone on the bridge resumed their duties, and so, with a sigh, the expedition continued.


The Iron Lady neared the structure and extended its boarding chute, holding onto the surface around the suspected entryway via its magnetic clamps. A similar process to the entry into the Cutter was undertaken, but ultimately found to be unnecessary. The engineers brought a wheeled scanning array to attempt to predict the structure of the door, which would have subsequently told the engineers where to drill. However, as soon as the first few seconds of laser and sonar scanning commenced, the door simply opened, as if it detected the sound and light waves and responded solely to that level of activity.

Behind the door was a brightly lit corridor at the end of which there was another door.

This one, the engineers did not probe. They tested the environment for habitability and turned back.

There was oxygen, everything was lit up and temperate. They had power, heating– and a big door.

“The door seems to have an LCD panel for interaction. We figured you would want to look at it first.”

The engineers were clearly tired, and anxious about the structure, but holding back any criticism.

While Gertrude found the situation unnerving, it was not nearly enough to get her to back down.

At this point, nothing would be– perhaps not even certain death.

She tried to keep her crew in mind– but they slowly fell by the wayside of her obsession.

“As long as there’s breathable air, I’m going. I can delve inside on my own if that’s what it takes.”

Victoria sighed openly at Gertrude’s behavior– or maybe out of personal exhaustion too.

“I swore that I would protect you. Quit being so pig-headed. I’ll follow you in.” She said.

With the help of some of the girls from the security team, Gertrude and Victoria once again donned their armor and flip-up bulletproof glass visors. Gertrude had her club and vibroknife and pistol, but in addition, she had a trio of portable door-breaching charges clipped to her belt. These would do nothing to a bulkhead, but could punch through an interior sliding door’s locking mechanism and thereby force the door to slide open. She even convinced Victoria to carry an additional two on her own person.

Victoria and Gertrude were a given, but there was a third member of this particular sortie.

Her face was again covered by her special muzzle, but that and her collar, glowing green, were the only pieces of apparel that Nile had in common with her previous appearance. She had been forced to leave behind her turtleneck and coat in favor of a durable, long-sleeved blue shirt like Gertrude’s– along with a suit of K9 skirmishing armor. This resembled Imbrian composite riot armor, but it was lighter, and made up of more individual plate segments that could bend together with the natural curve of her body to allow greater flexibility and freedom of movement. K9 armor units also included a tail and ear section, as well as Loup-scale vibroclaws retractable into the gauntlets. It suited her height and physique perfectly.

Like Gertrude, her long hair was tied up to keep it out of the way. That detail, the long pants and boots, and her distant eyes, gave Nile a very rugged look in the armor. Gertrude thought it was quite attractive.

She was the picture of K9 excellence, armored, deadly, swift on her feet, and proud-looking.

And as a nod to Nile’s particular status, her armor had the badge of a K9 medic, and a medicine bag.

“You look handsome, doctor.” Gertrude said. “How do you feel? How’s the fitting?”

Nile shut her eyes and sighed. “Never in my life did I imagine myself wearing this kind of thing again.”

“Again?” Victoria asked, narrowing her eyes. Nile ignored her completely.

Gertrude chose to let the remark go.

“Might as well use stuff we have that we know fits and works. Gets around the issue Victoria had.”

“I’m not objecting. It’s just surreal. If you’re expecting me to sic on command, you’re delusional.”

Gertrude grumbled. “I’m protecting you! I outfitted you so you won’t die if you get shot or stabbed. I have no expectations of you as a fighter. You’re here because I need your brain, and I need it safe.”

“Here’s hoping there’s nobody around in there to shoot or stab me.” Nile said.

She made to put her hands in her coat pockets, and found herself wearing no coat.

Sighing again, she hid them behind her back, interlocking the fingers.

Meanwhile, near a Jagdkaiser with its cockpit open, Ingrid stood with her arms crossed, staring from afar.

Before setting off, Gertrude drew nearer to her, drawing her lover’s full attention.

“Ingrid, I really want to thank you for doing your job so diligently.” She said.

Ingrid raised a hand to hover in front of her mouth while she yawned loudly.

Her tail started wagging, just a bit.

“When don’t I, huh? I’ve always been your loyal dog that gets shit done.”

“I promise, after all this, I’ll make some time specifically for you again, okay?” Gertrude said.

Ingrid averted her gaze and grunted.

“I’m not a puppy, I don’t need you to placate me. I’m fine over here. I have nothing against what’s going on and I completely trust and believe in you. So just go, so that this whole mess can be over.”

Her tone was not agitated in the slightest, even though she looked slightly annoyed.

She was being so much more mature about all of this than Gertrude previously imagined.

“Thank you, Ingrid.” Gertrude said again.

She was so strong. If only Gertrude could have a quarter of her strength– or loyalty.

God damn it. It’s not like I’m cheating– I haven’t done anything.

And the two of us aren’t even– god damn it. God damn it, Gertrude Lichtenberg.

You’re a real bastard.

Her inner voice berated her terribly.

She closed her hands into fists and walked away. Feeling terribly guilty for a moment.

Personal issues had to be set far aside, however.

She had to make ready to tackle the supposed old era structure.

For everyone’s sakes. It wouldn’t matter what she and Ingrid were or felt, if she was still powerless.

That prospect of “old era technology” that might grant her an advantage was far too tempting.

Without some kind of forward progress, Gertrude was convinced she would lose everything again.

So she took her resolute and desperate and half-mad steps, one foot in front of the other.

Crossing the bridge suspended in the middle of the ocean, into the walls encasing the unknown.

Past the threshold from the Iron Lady’s boarding chute, the interior of the structure was exactly as simple as the engineers described. Plain steel walls that were nonetheless polished and unblemished, a wide lobby bereft of anything save for a single shut door with an LCD panel beside it. As soon as they crossed the the threshold, Nile turned around and looked at the ceiling over the door-frame.

“There are vents up there. If there’s vents, there’s potentially pumps. That might explain why this room is barren and has nothing but another bulkhead.” Nile said. “This room opens to the exterior, possibly when it detects radiation, admitting people inside. It’s not necessarily meant to be a secure bulkhead.”

“Why would anyone design it like that?” Victoria asked.

“It might be their safety regulations.” Gertrude said.

“Is that euphemism meant to mean ancient surface humans? Because I’m not convinced.” Victoria said.

“Skepticism is healthy.” Nile said. “Fearless leader, go interact with that door, and we can confirm.”

“I know. It’s not like there’s anything else to do.” Gertrude replied, grumpy at the teasing.

Gertrude approached the door with Victoria at her side and Nile following a few steps behind.

Up close, the door looked remarkably thick and solid. It almost appeared seamless with the surrounding walls, with only the thick doorframe belying its true nature. The LCD panel was crisp and almost clear enough to be a mirror, completely unblemished. It was about the size of a human head. Gertrude approached and laid her hand on the panel, because its size reminded her of a palm scanner.

Blue light filled the screen and began to display a picture in response.

White text on a blue background, a bit difficult to see.

“What is this? It’s all in High Imbrian?” Victoria said. “Then we can safely say it’s from this era, no?”

Nile shook her head. “It isn’t exactly the same grammar as High Imbrian.”

Gertrude stared at the letters, speechless.

Across the Imbrian Empire, the common language was “Low Imbrian.” Low Imbrian was a somewhat universal language in the Imbrium and its surroundings. Cogitan captives understood Low Imbrian to an extent; and their Imbrian captors, following another pointless battle for the Ayre Reach, could mostly understand their common tongue, Republic Common Speech. The Union spoke and wrote Low Imbrian as “Union Communication Standard.” Katarrans called it “Street Talk.” Hanwans understood it and spoke a frighteningly similar language they called “the Public Tongue.” This language must have had an ancestor that was common to all races and cultures of Aer, and its inter-legibility survived stalwartly to this day.

High Imbrian was not like this. High Imbrian was a highly rigid and formal language with a completely different structure to Low Imbrian (though Low Imbrian was littered with High Imbrian loanwords). High Imbrian was not spoken in conversation, but was often learned and used as an academic status symbol. Doctors like Nile would know quite a bit of High Imbrian; an Inquisitor like Gertrude was supposed to learn it rigorously because large parts of the legal code were written in it. There were other prestigious languages of this sort. The Shimii boasted a dying tongue called “Fusha” that their surviving religious scripture was written in. The Union used a lot of High Volgian and High Bosporan in the same way Imbrians employed High Imbrian. Hanwans spoke a tongue that Imbrians called “High Altaic.”

These were niche languages that had largely died in their cultures save for loanwords in whatever dialect of the common tongue was actually spoken by the masses. It was widely believed that the High languages belonged to specific ethnic groups from the surface and slowly faded, while the common tongue was evidence of a global network of cultural exchange that necessitated a lingua franca.

It was in this context that Gertrude experienced shock when she only somewhat understood what she was seeing on the screen, but understood enough to tell it was High Imbrian. She could not hold a very vivid conversation in High Imbrian, but she should have been able to read it. And she could, mostly, but there were some grammar stumbles, it was just different enough that it read stilted and wrong in her mind.

“My High Imbrian is deeply rusty.” Nile said. “But I think it is asking for a ‘signal’?”

“No, it’s asking for a ‘Token’.” Gertrude corrected. In her own mind, making some best guesses, it said:

Welcome! We’re sorry for the inconvenience. Only authorized personnel can access the Island-3 crown spire. If you are here by mistake, assistance has been dispatched for. If you possess a valid authorization token, please lay the flesh of your hand on the panel and we will scan for evidence of STEM activity.

More or less that was what Gertrude understood. It was just a little bit off, but probably not too much.

Gertrude took off her glove. Victoria shot her a sharp glare.

“What are you doing?” Victoria asked. “You don’t know what will happen.”

“It just wants to scan my hand.”

Gertrude laid her hand on the screen once more, the bare flesh of her hand against the cold panel.

In the next instant, she felt a burning pain and jerked her hand back on pure, naked instinct.

Crying out in pain, shaking it, as if trying to cool it off. But the pain was localized too.

It was not “burning” but something like thousands of hot needles pricking her hand.

Her heart raced as she held her palm up in front of her eyes, looking for blood.

“What happened?” Victoria shouted. “Gertrude!” She snapped toward Nile. “Take a look at her!”

Nile had been staring with surprise at the panel, and Victoria jolted her back to reality.

“Gertrude! Let me tend to it! Stop shaking it!” Nile stepped forward.

“It stings, god damn it!” Gertrude cried out.

But there was no blood, there were no wounds, not even the needle pricks she felt.

Nile gently took Gertrude’s wrist and looked over her hand. Her eyes narrowed, she was puzzled.

From her belt pouch, she withdrew a plastic pack inside of which was a soaked cloth.

“This has an analgesic and mild sedative solution. It will relieve the pain and clean– the area.”

She could not say wound– there was no visible wound, no blood, no damage to the skin.

Gertrude grabbed hold of the little cloth in her affected hand, squeezing all the healing moisture from it with a sudden desperation. Soothing cool sensations flooded over the hot needles that had once invisibly scored her flesh, leading to relief, both from the pain and the sense of panic. She grit her teeth, breathed deeply but in a controlled rhythm, slowly regaining her center under Nile’s comforting ministration.

On the door panel, the text had updated to read:

INVALID. TOKEN NOT FOUND.

INSTALL STEM AND A VALID AUTHORIZATION TOKEN AND TRY AGAIN.

“HURENSOHN!” Gertrude screamed at it in High Imbrian, as if the panel understood–

Please refrain from vulgar language or verbal commands will be disabled.

“Huh, it accepts speech? That said speech, right?” Nile said.

She was gently stroking the back of Gertrude’s “wounded” hand to try to soothe the Inquisitor.

Gertrude, meanwhile, was growing ever more irritated as the pain in her hand lessened.

“It said ‘verbal commands’.” Gertrude grumbled.

“Interesting. Was that option previously available?” Nile asked.

“We haven’t been talking in High Imbrian until Gertrude called it a son of a horse or whatever it was– so maybe that activated it.” Victoria said. “Can one of you two talk to it about how to get in?”

“We know how to get in!” Gertrude replied brusquely. “We need some fucking, token or whatever.”

Nile sighed through her respirator. “Calm down, Gertrude.”

She turned her sight on the panel.

“Well, lets hope it understands me through my mask.”

Nile called out to the panel in somewhat tormented High Imbrian, inquiring about “STEM.”

Almost instantly, before Nile was even done talking, the text on the panel updated once more.

STEM stands for System for Token Execution and Management.

STEM is the ground-breaking technology back-end supporting the advanced endurance, comfort and security that have made the Island-series a leader in colonization solutions for extreme environments.

“What the hell? Say more than that! Elaborate!” That last word Gertrude shouted in High Imbrian.

On command, the panel spat out a longer and more complicated explanation.

STEM is a zero-trust secmodel installed at a mechanical root operating layer or in a neurological subject cortex that allows the reading and execution of “rich data blocks” or the storing of permissions and contracts into “tokens”. A STEM token or block can be tied to biological identity with strict permissions, a model that insures only authorized personnel are able to employ the access and execute the code associated with that token or block. STEM and tokens bridge the gap between analog and digital by imprinting cutting-edge smart contract tokens and encrypted data-rich blocks onto both electronics and the personnel that use them.

“What the hell does this gibberish even mean?” Gertrude shouted. She just barely understood it.

“I’m having a truly difficult time parsing it. What is– what is a Sicherheistmodelle?” Nile asked.

“You’re supposed to be the genius scientist!” Gertrude continued shouting.

Nile stared at her dead in the eyes. Her ears erect, her tail straightened out.

Gertrude felt a chill from the directness of that gaze, the tightness of that body language.

Her fingers, which had been stroking the furious Gertrude’s hand, stopped moving over her flesh.

They pressed down, without causing pain, but the grip became firmer, less comforting and warm.

“This childish conduct ill befits you.” Nile said. “I am a doctor, and I am a doctor who talks to patients and reads books and writes papers in a language people actually speak.” Despite the muzzle, Gertrude could tell that Nile was setting her jaw. She was agitated. “I am doing my best. I will continue to do so. Now, if the two of you want to get through the door, you will ask it where you can get a ‘STEM’. From what I can parse, a STEM is necessary to be able to hold the “signal” or “token” to open the door. Clear?”

“Yes.” Gertrude said simply and promptly as a scolded schoolchild. “Sorry.”

Victoria grunted, averted her gaze and said nothing.

Nile’s fingers began to move over Gertrude’s afflicted hand once more, as gently as before.

“I know you’re upset.” Nile said, her voice returning to its soft register. “But from what I’m seeing, it’s unlikely the door meant you harm, and it is even less likely that any lasting harm will result. Your hand will be fine. I’m here to support you, Inquisitor. Keep your wits about you, or the little lady here will worry.”

“Hmph. I’m not going to worry over her.” Victoria replied. “But you’re right. Gertrude, please calm down.”

“You could stand to be at least a little bit gentler with me.” Gertrude mumbled.

“What was that? You need to speak up for the door to hear you. It’s not updating.” Victoria replied.

Did she really not hear, or was she just being a bitch?!

Gertrude sighed. They were right– she was being stupid and losing her temper at a computer.

But they had essentially confirmed it now. This place, Island-3, was not built by Imbrians.

While the door recognized a variant of High Imbrian, Gertrude had never heard of a “STEM.”

Whatever cybernetic system this was, it was used to delegate access controls.

Imbrians used biometrics like fingerprints and eye-scanners, but they didn’t call that “STEM.”

They also didn’t describe those systems in the same way, even factoring translation errors.

Gertrude caught enough strange words in the description of “STEM” to think it must have been quite different from standard biometrics. It wasn’t just making a key based on Gertrude’s retina or fingerprint. Maybe it was storing the key itself onto her. That might have been why it fried her hand– it needed to sample her skin or blood or something else, biological, to know Gertrude had a STEM inside her.

This was equal parts surreal, arresting, but also, exciting.

Had Norn explored this structure? If so, how had she gotten past the door?

And what was behind this barrier that was worth such a complicated security system?

“How to install STEM in myself?” Gertrude asked the computer in High Imbrian as she knew it.

Parsing request.

“Don’t get mad at it.” Nile said. She must have noticed the tension in Gertrude’s arm.

A few minutes later, the text updated again.

A STEM architectural administration location has been found near you!

Suddenly a garbled, glitchy-looking and unreadable map appeared along with a series of coordinates.

“That map is bunk, but the coordinates may be correct. That Z axis is 5000 meters deeper than we are right now. It might somehow know that there’s another ancient installation in the abyss.” Nile said.

“Five thousand meters?” Gertrude cried out. “So, what, we leave with nothing and dive deeper?”

In another fit of passion, Gertrude lost control of herself and kicked her steel-lined boot against the wall.

“Gertrude!” Nile scolded again.

Gertrude grit her teeth, ignored her doctor’s reprimand and readied to kick the wall again–

“Huh?” Victoria’s ears stood up, and her tail curled. “Over there. Something shook.”

Everyone turned to face the wall running alongside the door.

At the edge, the seam between the corner and the wall was beginning to widen.

“That panel might be loose.”

The trio gathered at the corner and found that the seem between the panels was indeed widening.

“This wall can’t be that thin?” Gertrude said.

“There might be electronics hidden behind this panel.” Nile said. “I don’t know why it would be so flimsy.”

“Gertrude, you believed Norn was hiding something in here, didn’t you?” Victoria said, crossing her arms. “If so, a brute like her probably has no idea what that STEM thing is either, but she may have forced her way in violently. We need to move this panel and see if there’s a crawl space or a gap behind it.”

Don’t insult Norn.” Gertrude said with a sudden sharpness. “But yes, we should try to move this.”

Victoria looked surprised by the sudden scolding.

Gertrude made to leave to get equipment, but stopped when Nile touched her shoulder.

“Leave it to me. I want to limit how many people we involve in this.” She said.

“Why?” Gertrude replied.

“Just be quiet, trust me, and get back from the wall.” Nile said.

Victoria stared at her with narrowed eyes, but took a few steps back.

Gertrude almost feared she would reach for her sword. She stepped back from Nile as well.

Nile turned to the wall. She let her arms hang at her sides, loosened up, moved her fingers.

“It’s been a while since I did this. I would beg Allah for forgiveness– but I’m beyond forgiving anyway.”

In the next instant, Gertrude saw Nile’s eyes acquire red rings around the irises.

She drew in a breath, and delivered a punch to the wall–

–that Gertrude realized stopped just short of striking.

Victoria’s eyes turned red as well– she must have been seeing it.

There was a brief flash of green across the panel, and it shook and fell loose from the wall entirely.

Nile casually reached out her hand and caught the panel before it collapsed on top of her.

“Help me move this aside.” She said calmly.

Victoria stood in place, wary, while Gertrude stepped forward with a troubled look on her face.

She had felt it, that hair-raising invisible pressure; this was the power Norn possessed.

When she beat Gertrude back on the Antenora, when she attacked so quickly it was as if time slowed.

That beating was replete with the colors and presence that Gertrude now felt again.

Wary, she helped Nile to move the panel aside.

Revealing, behind it, several electronics that had been rearranged away from a very narrow path.

At the end of which Gertrude could see a distant metal wall– was that the interior?

“We found our entryway. And perhaps also Cocytus’, if what you believe is actually true.” Nile said.

She looked at Gertrude, and found herself holding a narrow and serious gaze from the Inquisitor.

“Nile, explain what you just did. I want to trust you, but I need to know.” Gertrude said.

From a few meters away, Victoria lifted her hand from the butt of her sword and sighed.

Nile shrugged and began to recite in a professor-like voice:

“Loup call it Volshebstvo and its practitioners Zirnitra. They have a belief that these are knacks which can be obtained by feats of strength or the whimsy of spirits. Khedivate Loup and Shimii hold these arts to be forbidden by God, calling them Sihr. Practitioners are called Majus, which is a highly pejorative term for Shimiists of all sorts as it implies godlessness and idolatry. To them, these abilities are provided by Jinn, evil spirits or demons that bend light to create illusions that deceive and lure people away from God. Khanate Vekans believe that Bayatars attain these powers from taking in the blood of their monarch’s horse, or having sex with the monarch– they call it Id Shid and call its practitioners the Mergid.”

She cast a glance at Victoria as she spoke the last sentence, and Gertrude cast a glance over to her too.

“What are you trying to say?” Gertrude replied. “That you’re some kind of folkloric legend?”

“No. I am saying you have nothing to fear. People with this ability have always existed.” Nile replied. “It’s neither unattainable nor inherently evil. In fact, I could show you how to do it– provided we had time.”

“She’s correct.” Victoria said. “And, Gertrude, if she wanted to kill us, she had many chances to do it.”

It was surprising to see Victoria agreeing with Nile on anything, and that surprised lent additional tension.

“Taking her side now?” Gertrude snapped. She realized, immediately, how stupid that sounded.

Nevertheless, she had said it, and let it hang in the air, awaiting the crash–

“I’m on the side of being logical and not lashing out at people for no reason. Unlike you.” Victoria said.

Gertrude felt pure shame down to her bones with the way Victoria and Nile were both looking at her.

Nevertheless, there was also a rebellious little part of her that didn’t want to have to apologize.

“Whatever.” She mumbled. “Let’s just carry on. I’ll go through the opening first.”

Nile and Victoria stared briefly at each other, then at Gertrude, with defeated looks on their faces.


Gertrude, Victoria and Nile ventured deeper into the facility.

Crawling through the narrow gap in the wall that had been concealed behind the loose panel, they found themselves in a hall behind the STEM-locked door. Following that hall, the space opened up into a lounge that was two stories tall. A pair of staircases along the sides of the space led to a narrow walkway connecting a few doors, but most of the space was taken up by untouched furniture that looked like it was made of glass, but must have been some kind of carbon or plastic. There were tables, chairs, what seemed like a couch lacking any kind of soft padding, completely empty vending machines. A bar with a counter, housing machines for preparing food that were also too clean to have seen any recent use.

The entire room had a hyper-modern style, featuring many abstract shapes, swirls, curves, everything from the railings on the staircases to the hanging LED lamps, the handles on the doors and the armrests and legs on the chairs, it all seemed like an objet d’art more than a functional set of furnishings. Gertrude was silent and serious as she looked over the pieces. The trio tried a few of the doors; several were locked via STEM tokens, while the ones that weren’t appeared to be empty storage rooms or backrooms.

That the supposed people of the ancient era lived so much like the people now, did not once enter into Gertrude’s mind. Her archeological curiosity was purely self-centered and power-driven. She had no interest in this time capsule, even though she was now sure that it was such a thing. Rather, what mattered was the treasure at the end; and therefore, finding the road that led to the end.

“Someone picked this place to the bones.” Victoria said. “No food, no drinks, not even napkins or hand soap. The bar has nothing, the vending machines have nothing, even the furnishing looks like it should have padding or cushions but no longer does. But they also left it superbly clean. It’s surreal.”

“It doesn’t matter. There must be a way through here. I’m going to blow one of these doors.”

Gertrude reached for one of her breaching charges, but Nile bid her to calm down.

“Those panels are probably just blocking off executive offices.” Nile said. “This place looks like a corporate lobby. Those offices probably just have devices and computers with STEM interfaces. Let’s check upstairs and try to find a connection to a different area. We may have more luck if we can get farther up.”

“We should also keep an eye out for more damage.” Victoria said. “Our mysterious infiltrator may have made their own functional path through the structure. I’m positive they did not have a STEM.”

“That gap they made in the first room was meticulous. None of the electronics were damaged.” Nile said.

Gertrude did not have as much of a low opinion as Victoria did of Norn– but she was beginning to think it may not have been Norn who first discovered this place. It had to have some connection to her, or else Norn would not bother sending her to Kesar. Either Norn visited this place, or perhaps she was taken here, or found it in a classified file or something like that– but she might not have been responsible for it. That move with the hidden panel was not Norn’s style. She would have blown a hole through.

Norn was not surreptitious. She was direct. She had no motivation to lie; she had the power not to.

So this place had to mean something or she would not have sent Gertrude there.

But, perhaps she also didn’t make the paths herself either. She was not meticulous.

“Ugh. What a situation– fine, let’s check upstairs.” Gertrude brusquely replied.

Climbing the staircases, they found more locked doors, with panels as verbose as the one before all asking for STEM tokens– but of a slightly different type. These doors asked for “verification” tokens rather than “authorization” tokens. Gertrude knew enough about machines to know such a distinction was significant, but it didn’t matter. She wasn’t about to let the door sting her again, she knew she did not have a STEM and therefore, it was fruitless to play around with the panels for too long.

There was a plant pot in each corner of the upstairs hall, next to one of the locked doors.

They had short, thick green trunks and long fronds, like “tropical-style” plant decorations.

Gertrude, on a whim, rubbed her fingers on one of the fronds and nearly jumped.

“This– this doesn’t feel like plastic!” She called out.

Victoria dipped a finger into the soil in the pot. She withdrew it and shook it, with wide-eyed surprise.

“It’s moist.” She said simply.

Nile crossed her arms. “Someone has been here recently, and they’re taking care of this place.”

“How the hell?” Gertrude said. “They won’t communicate with anyone, but they’ll water the plants?”

“Maybe they can’t actually operate the main computer; they’re not able to pay attention to a security system or acknowledge intrusion remotely.” Nile said. “They have no administrative ability, but can get around somehow and are trying to keep the spaces inhabitable as much as they can. So they are unable to respond to contacts from outside and can’t operate these locked STEM doors but they keep what they can reach clean, and have wound their way through the facility over time without causing damage.”

Gertrude couldn’t imagine this scenario, it was too farfetched.

“That’s insane, they would still need food and water. For what end would they stay trapped here?”

Nile shrugged. “I’m just guessing. I have no idea. But these are real plants, and someone watered them.”

“Whoever it is, they are fastidious. Everything is impeccably clean, it looks brand new, and it can’t just be because the materials are durable. It does fit a potential profile of our mystery infiltrator.” Victoria said. “There may be sources of food and water deeper in. I hate to say it, but it’s not so implausible.”

“Fine. That gets me no closer to anything.” Gertrude complained. “We need to find another path.”

Nile and Victoria stared at her again, but this time Gertrude did not stay put long enough to see it.

Though she felt their gazes in the back of her head. They simply vanished in the flame of her passion.

They looked over the lounge and bar area, as well as the upper story, a second time.

“Wait, I know.”

Gertrude had an idea. The front door panel had called this placed the “Island 3 Crown Spire.”

That did suggest verticality was important– it was like Nile said. They had to find a way further up.

Going up–

Maybe one of these doors had an elevator or a staircase but everything was locked by STEM and it was impossible to tell which doors were important and which weren’t. They couldn’t blow up everything for fear of damaging something important. It was likely the person or persons who infiltrated the front door ran into the same obstacle. They were on a landing though– so they must have tried going up.

Gertrude had been checking the doors and walls and the floor, on both the first and second stories–

“Nile, can you use your ability to try to disturb the ceiling panels?” Gertrude asked.

Higher up the spire from this “lobby”– to get higher up, maybe–

Nile nodded her head. She glanced at the roof.

Her eyes briefly lit up and red, and suddenly there was a series of loud knocks, dozens of them.

“Ugh! Be careful!” Victoria shouted, folding her ears down against her head with her hands.

Reverberating across the ceiling, Gertrude thought she could almost see the strikes on each panel.

Like waves of vague color rippling out from a center point in each panel.

Nile had not moved a muscle other than to give the ceiling a look.

Was her power even more impressive than Norn’s? That simply couldn’t be–

In the midst of her awe, however, Gertrude saw one of the panels shake and drop.

Along with a carbon-fiber rope ladder that stretched into the ceiling.

“There! God damn, we finally found it!” Gertrude cried out with joy. “Nile, you’re amazing.”

Nile shut her eyes and looked down at the floor but was clearly smiling behind her mask.

Victoria huffed. “I’m choosing to trust you for now, criminal, but I’m watching you. Every thing I learn about you makes you seem more dangerous, and Gertrude doesn’t understand it at all.”

“At least you’re choosing to trust me, that’s all I care about.” Nile replied.

“Hey. I understand perfectly what I’m doing. Quit your bickering. We can go up! Onward!”

Gertrude called out to the two, and ran to the ladder, which had come down in front of a second story doorway. She began to climb up into a crawlspace that separated the lobby from whatever was above. It was, like the interior of the wall hidden behind that loose panel, full of cables and vents and pipes, that had been carefully rerouted away from a tight path, at the end of which was a light coming down. It was another loose panel that had been completely pulled away, allowing exit up into a new hallway.

As before, the space was fastidiously clean. But it also answered a lot of questions.

After Victoria and Nile had made their way up to the new hall, which was a pristine blue steel like the other ones, they wound their way through several habitations and habitation-supporting facilities. Here, there was noticeable damage. STEM panels had been messily removed, and doors hung open with their sliding locks sticking out like limbs half-amputated. Aside from the door damage, everything was pristine, without a speck of dust. There was an area with bunks, dozens of them; a bathroom with showers; another lounge, with empty and open offices that also had their STEM locks disgorged; and an algae and mushroom cultivation room that was overgrown but tended, still producing food that must have been regularly consumed. There was a wall full of crates of material for both the algaea and the mushrooms.

Gertrude was amazed at the the size of the grow operation and the sheer amount of supplies in it.

“There’s decades worth of food in here. There must be a hundred crates of preserved material.”

“Some of these crates have Imbrian and Katarran national symbols.” Victoria said. “But there’s one in the corner that’s just blocking off a vent that has an entirely different symbol. I’ve never seen this one.”

That last crate was made of plastic slightly yellowed and had seen a lot of use. That symbol on its lid was barely legible, but appeared to be six hexagons, arrayed in a hexagon pattern, around a globe.

“Is that an old Republic symbol or something? What polity is that?” Gertrude asked.

Nile’s eyes were shut. She took in a deep breath. “I’m afraid it’s much older than that.”

“You know something, so just come out with it. We’ll believe any crazy thing at this point.” Victoria said.

Nile nodded. “It’s an ancient polity that spanned the surface. The Aer Federation.”

“Aer like the planet?” Gertrude asked, in mild disbelief despite Victoria’s assertion.

“Yes. In the Sunlight Foundation’s research on abyssal locations and recoverable old era technology, which has borne little fruit, I must add–” Nile sighed. “This symbol came up a bit. It’s on broken pieces of ancient vehicles that Yangtze and Euphrates studied. On old cargo crates, ancient debris, shipwrecks.”

“I thought you said old era things were untouched by time.” Gertrude replied.

“Structures, yes. They are made of an extremely dense and high quality form of agarthic alloy that we have no capability to reproduce. The amount of heat, material and time that must have taken to produce a structure like this Island-3 would be mind boggling to us, infinitely too expensive and we simply don’t have the facilities and logistics to do it. But even the surface dwellers could not make everything out of this material, so they left behind debris. Things like ancient shuttles or transport ships, maybe even cargo pods and escape craft, that were ultimately destroyed long before our time and lost in the depths.”

“And your people just happened to turn up their bits and pieces in your expeditions.” Gertrude said.

“Why is that the part you’re skeptical about? You just don’t understand the time scale the Sunlight Foundation operates on.” Nile replied. Her eyes looked suddenly wistful. “For us, it’s as if time stops, and we have infinity itself to accomplish our goals. With that outlook, scouring every centimeter of a deep ocean trench or a gorge or overturning every grain of sand in a Reach is not daunting at all.”

She looked at Gertrude in the eyes. “It’s only recently, that I’ve felt like my time is moving again.”

Despite her ardor and desperation– Gertrude recognized the humanity in those eyes, in that look.

She stopped questioning Nile. She began to feel like she just wanted to embrace her.

And she had to choke down some of that unneeded empathy. To keep going; to keep the fire.

“Let’s keep looking around then. We might be able to find someone– or readable records.”

Nile nodded her head in response. Victoria put down the box back where she found it.

If there were Katarran and Imbrian supplies stockpiled here, then there had been an intruder.

It was just as they thought– someone had gotten to this old era structure before them.

Norn? Perhaps with assistance?

What do you want me to see here? What do you want me to experience?

Gertrude’s obsession with the purpose of coming here– made her lose sight of other things.

She barely acknowledged the magnificence of what she had found– what she had learned.

Knowledge and experience in itself was useless to her. Unless it was actionable as power.

So she kept wandering through this grave of an unknown ambition.

With a weary mind and a hungry, reckless heart–

Please help me.

“Hmm?”

Gertrude looked around.

She thought she heard a voice.

They were just walking down another corridor with more empty rooms–

Please. I’m trapped. Please help me.

“Do you hear anything?”

That voice had such pathos to it– it really sounded like somebody was hurt or distressed.

There was a growing alarm in Gertrude’s heart at the voice. Nile and Victoria stared at her.

“Hear what? There’s just a bit of whirring, probably the vents.” Victoria said.

I can’t get out. I need to leave. I’m trapped in here. Please. You have to save me.

“How can you not hear it?” Gertrude asked.

Nile looked at the Inquisitor, quizzical at first, but then her eyes drew wide with alarm.

“Victoria, grab her–!”

Victoria had been far too late to realize and then to respond–

Gertrude had already taken off running down the corridor. She was convinced that there was somebody deeper inside the facility that was desperately crying for help and it awakened every bound-up and coiled tense muscle in her body to sudden action. That voice, which was filled with so much emotion, it reminded her of something that she felt suddenly responsible for, and it made her despondent and desperate. She ran and her eyes teared up and her chest hurt and everything began to change–

rippling mirrored images of emotional colors
walls warped into half-remembered vistas of dreams
moaning forests full of silver trees
puddles reflected ribbons of flying sensation
sky as crowns of world-spanning white branches
reflecting past present future roots digging through–

a woman surrounded by evil machines–

and the one whom she had been truly speaking to–

and what she had left behind–


There was loud slamming sound as an automatic bulkhead shut itself behind Gertrude.

When she came to her senses, she was in a dark, cavernous place with a damp floor.

No longer surrounded by metal walls, Gertrude panicked and clutched her chest and neck–

but she could breathe.

Her breathing was ragged, moaning, exhausted, but she could breathe.

She was outside Island-3. When she looked back, she saw a closed bulkhead, but everything around her, in front of her, over her, was rock that had been carved into some kind of tunnel. It was dark, but there were a few LED strips on the walls glowing dimly and intermittently on failing batteries. There was air in this tunnel– she even thought she could still hear the whirring of a pump somewhere. She was not cast out at sea and the pressure was not going to tear her apart. She was inside the gorge wall somehow.

Looking back over her shoulder.

How far had she gone?

Where were Nile and Victoria?

And where was the voice that had led her to run so desperately?

She was so shocked, she felt numb, utterly confused, so she walked forward, there was nowhere else.

“What happened to me?”

Soon as she stepped farther into the tunnel ahead, that pathetic whimpering returned–

Please help me. Please anyone help me.

Gertrude was also hearing something else– a static-filled and broken, horrifying voice–

WARNING, STEM CRITICAL FAILURE, STEM REFORMATTING INITIATED–

REFORMATTING FAILED.

There was buzzing noise inside Gertrude’s head like she was a radio for some dismal frequency–

WARNING, STEM CRITICAL FAILURE, STEM REFORMATTING INITIATED–

REFORMATTING FAILED.

“I don’t have a STEM. That computer said it.” Gertrude mumbled to herself.

It couldn’t be her STEM that was breaking down– she had none–

These weren’t her thoughts– they couldn’t be– they didn’t have her–

–texture.

Gertrude was certain she was hearing someone else’s internal voice, but inside herself.

“It doesn’t feel like Nile, or like Victoria, or like Norn–“

It wasn’t like any of those powerful presences she had felt in the past, but it had the same–

–texture.

Every time she heard it, booming inside her skull, it made her panic ever worse.

Please help me– Please, I’m trapped– I can’t take it anymore–

WARNING, STEM CRITICAL FAILURE, STEM REFORMATTING INITIATED–

REFORMATTING FAILED.

Gertrude grit her teeth, going from a brisk walk back to a headlong run.

Her own ragged breathing began to overpower the voices in her head as she sprinted into the darkness.

In front of her the shadows parted to reveal ever more and deeper shadows.

She ran and ran in the mounting and encroaching dark, her chest muscles tightening, her legs burning.

Indistinct rock sliding past her, the same flat shadow in front of her tears-warped vision.

She felt the walls enclose, the world tighten around her like black shackles, why couldn’t she advance?

Her chest tightened and expanded and every action was pain.

But she kept running, kept tearing at the indistinct shadow in front of her–

Until something broke up the once-changing sights.

Gertrude brought herself to a sudden halt, gasping with surprise.

In the middle of a circular room littered with debris. Ripped plastic and cardboard, wrappers, fish bones.

All surrounding a woman in a long, black dress, standing with her head bowed, arms hugging herself.

She twitched; a convulsion wracked through her body–

WARNING, STEM CRITICAL FAILURE, STEM REFORMATTING INITIATED–

REFORMATTING FAILED.

Her lips spread gently and she whispered. “Please help me. Please, anyone.”

Gertrude stepped forward. That voice was so soft, gentle, needful–

She reached out a trembling hand and touched the woman on the shoulder–

and felt a jolt of something hot and quickly-spreading, like electricity through her veins.

Her eyes immediately began to weep, blistering hot like they were melting.

Around her everything broke down and blurred away in copious tears.

In between blinking eyes, flitting in and out of focus before her she saw–

Oceans. Mountains. Skies. Trees (not silver, but reaching high). Roads. Buildings.

(A purple glow that flashed and burned.)

Metal hallways. Depth. Darkness. Pale bodies by their hundreds.

(A clicking sound like thrown dice. A feeling like an equation resolved.)

Duty. Order. Repetition. The same halls, the same tasks.

(A rising pillar, ambition, an eagle on a flag.)

A monstrous metal landscape that glowed and throbbed with sinew and bone as if alive.

“I’m sorry.”

Polaris.

“I made my decision.”

How could you abandon everything?

WARNING, STEM CRITICAL FAILURE, STEM REFORMATTING INITIATED–

REFORMATTING–

SUCCESS!

Welcome to STEM R12.2. Isolating corrupted blocks until bad block check resolves–

BAD BLOCK CHECK CANCELLED– WILL NOT RETRY.

Eyes with glowing blue hexagons around orange irises deep and bright as pools of fire,

swallowed Gertrude whole.

She was right in front of her–

grinning.

And when her fingers touched Gertrude’s head, it felt like her skull split open.


Her body was in a different position and there was now a dim light in her eyes.

Directly in front of her– no, she was supine, so it was the ceiling above–

It was all dark brown and black rock.

She was not lying on the rock. Her head was lifted a little bit, and rested on something soft.

Her vision was still swimming. Something slowly started to come into focus.

On the periphery of her vision; black, a long black sleeveless dress, a black cape; slim pale arms;

A pale woman with a soft and beautiful countenance, a mature and gentle expression, regal even;

long silver-gray hair; an ample, gently rising bosom; two tall, fluffy, black ears;

silk-sleek hands stroking Gertrude’s hair and shoulder, around her neck;

Fingers crawling into her shirt and massaging her neck and collarbone in a sensual way.

Her head was resting on this woman’s thighs.

Bright eyes colored a deep orange locked onto Gertrude’s own.

She felt comfort. She felt rest for the first time in a while. She felt, strangely, safe.

“Are you awake now, master?” The woman asked. She shut her eyes and smiled gently.

Her voice was very attractive– deep, sonorous, worldly.

“Where am I?” Gertrude asked.

“You are in the Island-3 Crown Spire, the VIP module of the Island-3 colonization project.”

“What does that mean? Island-3?” Gertrude mumbled, still recovering her senses.

“Island-3 was a project to explore the deep ocean trenches and expand humanity’s reach into the place known as ‘Agartha’ in search of energy sources. I’m afraid that’s all I’ve uncovered. Most importantly, master, what you are now is safe. Your body is so worn, and you are full of anxiety. Let me help.”

Her lips were painted a very slight violet. With her every word, they moved so tantalizingly.

“Who are you?” Gertrude asked. Her tense body started to loosen up.

“I am a humble caretaker of humans– of people. You can call me–”

She paused and looked up for a moment as if in deep thought.

“–it looks like you can call me Azazil An-Nur. I am Azazil An-Nur. I am here to serve, master.”

The woman looked around the room. She seemed puzzled by her own surroundings.

“Well– I suppose it cannot be said that you are in Island-3 anymore. Years and years ago, someone carved this tunnel, and trapped a girl here in the dark. They loved her because they had been born to love her– but their hearts resented her and wanted her shut away from sight. They were both ashamed and disdainful, grateful and proud; such is the dual nature of Duty. Those powerful feelings still linger in this place. They have become more important than Island-3’s original purpose. Do you feel it, master?”

Gertrude felt it. She could feel the entire room, beating, like it had a pulse, a pulse of long-lost voices.

There was a familiar texture that once felt so distant, but was now so plain, so obvious.

She could feel it so strongly that it was as if the colors in the room brought the woman to them–

Norn.

Norn had been here before. This entire room felt like her– abandoned, confused, angry.

So, extremely, horrifically, angry–

“Master, are you curious what happened here? I can show you– if you open your mind to it.”

Gertrude’s head still felt hazy, and there were a million alarms buzzing in back of her mind.

Despite this it only took her a few seconds to respond.

“Show me.”

Azazil An-Nur smiled gently again.

“It shall be done, master. Hold on tightly to your sense of self– I’ll hold on to it too.”

Around Gertrude, the colors that were previously dancing in their dimmest hues exploded with brilliance.

Azazil’s eyes glowed with red rings, and a whirlwind of emotion swept Gertrude away.

To the time of Mehmed’s Jihad– and before.

Depth Gauge: 3603 m
Aetherometry: Blue (ABERRANT)


Previous ~ Next

Surviving An Evil Time [10.6]

This chapter contains a torture sequence with a brief moment of heightened violence.


In the context of a station, the overarching structure providing power was referred to as a Core Pylon. To further understand the Pylon, its layout could be broken down into a massive superstructure housing two critical pieces of machinery: the reactor core ring and the agarthic energy array. Agarthicite “fuel rods” were contained in the energy array with complex Osmium shields. This array was submerged within the reactor core as part of normal operation and cooling. Energy was generated in several synergistic ways.

Agarthicite as a material boasted surreal properties that were observed but understood only in a very shallow fashion in the After Descent era. Most visibly, it was known that any solid matter that agitated Agarthicite too much would be annihilated entirely by a fatal discharge from the crystal. This property was not witnessed in particulate agarthicite known as “agarthic salt” but only in cubiform agarthicite “ore.”

No form of Agarthicite “annihilated” water or gas, but it was known that in annihilation of human bodies, the water would be vaporized by the heat of the reaction. Therefore, controlled annihilation of carbons submerged in water could generate heat. While any type of solid matter could be annihilated, Carbon was common, easier to process, and its reaction was well understood. Any material could suffice, however.

Osmium was the great exception. It was the only known case of a material being antagonistic to Agarthicite, both resisting annihilation and even reducing the scope of the reaction and thus allowing some control over annihilations by subjecting the reacting agarthicite to the presence of Osmium.

Osmium tools and devices could be used to mine, shape and manipulate Agarthicite– very carefully.

An eerie and less understood property was that Agarthicite would rotate in bizarre patterns when subject to controlled electrical and magnetic charges and would generate more kinetic energy than was spent agitating them. It was this property that resulted in collapsed ship reactors physically twisting the matter of the ship before annihilating it. Thus, when the energy array was physically hooked into the core ring, the array was also connected to motors that generated additional power by allowing the array to spin in the water. This generated enough power for the operations of the Core Pylon to self-sustain.

Agarthicite could become “spent.” Spent agarthicite would lose its otherworldly purple sheen and become dull and ductile, able to be spun into alloys. In this decayed state, Agarthicite was extremely useful as a metal. Together with Osmium, it was found in all kinds of technology in the After Descent era. For example, decaying Agarthicite alloys led to the electric oscillators used in monomolecular vibroblades.

Both the eldritch rotation and the heat generation could create significant usable energy.

Reactor cores, known as “Core Rings,” were designed both to house and stabilize the energy array and to employ its eldritch properties in the generation of energy. Agarthicite reactors could power the generation of their own magnetic and electrical charges while also generating enough surplus energy to power the massive stations housing underwater inhabitants. Station reactors built in 979 A.D. would be expected to run for multiple decades before needing a replacement Energy Array. Some reactors had been running since the Age of Strife and nobody had touched their Arrays since then. It was unknown by what process their ancient agarthicite was refined to such a degree as to permanently sustain reactions.

Ultimately, very little was understood, truly understood, about Agarthicite. It was only observed.

There were people who believed Agarthicite held powers beyond the mortal ability to “observe” and “deduce.” Agarthicite study was referred to as “pseudophysics.” It had both the academic social credibility of a science and the raving mad reverence of a religion. Most “normal” people beheld Agarthicite this way, no matter how much philosophers and theoretical scientists tried to dispel its myth through logic.

To the people of the After Descent Civilization, Agarthicite reactors and the Stations they lived in had an unspoken near-sacred status. Agarthicite was the true, material God of Imbria and Cogita both, a God capable of both sustaining and destroying life. It was unthinkable to tinker with these systems, innovation in the field of Core Pylons and their constituent parts was glacial wherever it was not outright outlawed. It was known that Agarthicite powered the collapsed Surface Civilization also– but the history of the Reactors for the After Descent civilization began after the Age of Strife with the first reactors created wholly underwater, their designs drawn from studying the Origin Core Pylons of the first stations.

However, it was for this reason that a fleet of Cogitan men and women could convince themselves to attack the Core Pylon of an Imbrian station. Agarthicite was their God, but this was not their land. Imbrians were lesser people, barbarous, evil, enemies of all that was right. Cogitan racism allowed them to see the Imbrians, their stations, and their Core Pylon, as violable, or even worthy of violation.

Their God wasn’t our God. Just as they were the lesser. Anything could be done to them.


Homa left some lonac in the pot in case Leija wanted to eat before she left.

It was simple food, but then again, pulao rice was her favorite meal. She might like it.

After cursing Radu and Imani, Leija said nothing more and finally fell asleep. Since then, she had been resting peacefully on Homa’s bed. Homa had eaten, showered, and laid down on the floor to play with her phone. Leija’s words joined the massive amount of things troubling her during these dark days in which she lived. She had no reason to disbelieve what Leija said: Radu had come to visit her. Since then, she had felt apologetic toward Homa but kept it close to the chest. Did Radu visiting come before or after Imani approached Leija, trying to get connected to a Shimii helper at a dockyard for her schemes?

She mentioned both of them. Why? Why would they be connected in her drunk head?

Could it be that Radu the Marzban was helping Imani? One of the Volkisch Movement?

Imani was a Shimii– but it still made no sense to her that Radu would help her.

Homa was not an authority of what the Marzban’s agenda was.

But he was a wanderer, who lived by his own justice and hid his face from the public.

Could a bandit like that really have ties to a person like Imani Hadžić?

This was something she couldn’t reason out by herself in her room. That was the most frustrating thing– talking to herself about Radu was like ruminating on the agendas of angels or djinn. There was no way to find him, there was no way to even prove his existence anywhere outside the vessel of her own memories. She couldn’t influence him. But she still worried! She couldn’t stop thinking about it.

Because if Radu was helping Imani, the world was a little bit bleaker than she thought.

Heroes and villains would make even less sense than ever before.

She had been sure that Radu was supposed to be a hero. And Imani Hadžić was a villain.

Now, even in the fantasy that supported her life, such things began to lose their meaning.

And it bothered her– because she viewed herself as someone connected to Radu.

Even if they had not seen each other in years.

She couldn’t help it. She was not connected to very many other people.

It was just him and Leija.

If you had no one, no blood– then kin were the people who occupied one’s memories.

Shimii valued kin above all else– and maybe Homa valued Leija and him as kin.

Despite everything they had done–

Homa grit her teeth. Her emotions were so twisted up. It hurt, deep in her chest and brain.

“Maybe when Leija feels better I’ll ask her about it.” Homa said.

Her hands reflexively stroked the necklace, fingers rubbing on the rough bit of silica.

Staring up at the steel ceiling in the dark. Leija’s light snoring the only sound.

Homa stroked the necklace, slowly drifting off, the fog of sleep slowly seeping in.

Peaceful Place.

She shut her eyes and saw the colored lights bouncing behind her eyelids.

Her mind went dark, her body falling gently.

To a world of great open skies, conquered by the crowns of massive trees.

Iridescent foliage casting many-colored shadows the world beneath.

Great silver-white trunks stretched down from heaven to thick, jagged roots prism-purple.

Over soft blue dirt, she sat, her back nestled against the monumental body.

A breeze swept by billowing red algae and weepy fungi and stirred the muddy puddles.

As far as she could see to the horizon and beyond, from the ground to the heaven, it was all the trunks of trees, their crowns making up the sky, their branches making up the clouds and below them the canopy of the forest, low alginic shrubbery under and around their roots, liquid dribbling down their trunks forming channels like erosion on mountainsides, and she was alone, and her mind was mile a minute and slug-like slow– and she felt greatly at peace. Amid whispering families of trees all connected among whom the colors traveled expressing pale blue and white.

Then, amid the trees–

A pale traveler, red-haired with a black horn, white robe and tail dragging on the mud.

Looking over her shoulder, her yellow amid black eyes dilating with hatred as she saw.

Between the sonorously singing trees the colors around her became painted a deep black.

WHY THE HELL ARE YOU HERE?

Colors became tendrils that rushed toward Homa with murderous slashing violence–

“Agh!”

Homa opened her eyes. A tiny sliver of yellow light from the hall shone in her face.

She was on the floor. A metal floor in a metal place.

Holding herself, curling up in her bed. For a moment she was in the grip of something.

A vast forest; whispering trees; the surface? She had dreamed of the surface?

As the scriptures read. A surface with a vast sky and dry ground and breathable air.

There was a monster too. It was a nightmare. Fear shook its way through her body.

It took a few minutes for her wits to fully return to her. For her to realize and admit that it was only a dream and could not hurt her. But she felt something primal before that– a need to make herself small and hidden as if some enormous presence was watching her closely. Was this how ‘mice’ once felt about ‘cats’? She knew both animals and had heard this metaphor used in educational contexts.

But such depredation no longer had many places where it could happen.

Except perhaps in dreams. Dreams, like ancestral visions of what humanity had lost.

“Ugh. What kind of stupid shit is that, Homa Baumann?”

Homa chided herself for her weakness and childishness.

Anxiety must have been getting the better of her. Her mind must have been in shambles.

No wonder she had no control over her life when dreams affected her so strongly.

Gritting her teeth, she finally made herself get up and face reality again.

It was early in the morning.

Homa reached for the wall, turned on a dim light in order to see.

Leija was still asleep. Homa was almost worried, but she was breathing regularly.

Her face was eerily peaceful. Her makeup had run just a bit, lipstick lightly streaked, eyeshadow lightly smeared. Slight lines of aging showed around her eyes and at the edges of her mouth as she rested, more visible than ever, but Leija looked so content, Homa thought she looked more beautiful than ever. When she saw her at peace like this, Homa could overcome that staggering tension she otherwise felt in her presence. There were no glaring eyes and scowling lips, no striking claws. Her prone body, escaped from the world of violence from where she came and imbued with the gentleness of sleep– Homa felt a sudden heart-shudder of sympathy for her.

“I hope you’ll be okay in here.” Homa said.

It didn’t feel right.

Some part of Homa wanted to take care of Leija, but she had no choice.

She would have to go to work and leave Leija behind.

Homa sighed to herself.

Majida had said, there was no place where Shimii could have a storybook life.

Thinking about it, Homa finally put together what she wanted to say–

“I can’t forgive you for everything. I am not the only person you hurt. You hurt people every day in so many ways I can’t even describe. But I still– I do still love you, Leija. Because I know it’s this place, and the way that being here warps people– if we’d lived anywhere else, if we’d lived peacefully, maybe you could have been good to me. You wouldn’t have neglected me– and I wouldn’t have to resent you.”

In her sleep, Leija’s eyes shut a little harder, the fingers on her hands closed and opened.

This wasn’t any kind of closure, nor was it the culmination of anything significant.

It wasn’t a big moment– just Homa coping to herself, functionally alone, in her room.

That’s all it could be and that was all she could do. But she still felt like she had to say it.

Maybe it could serve as a rehearsal for when Leija woke up and they had to confront this.

Homa dressed herself, ate a bit of lonac in a cup and left for work.

Her head felt a bit heavy and foggy. As if she was fighting back tears the whole time.

She expected her day to go by as mindlessly as ever. She hoped for it to be so. She hoped for a day she could run on autopilot. Home, to the checkpoint, to the tram, to the pavilion, to B.S.W. and back home again. Once she got back home in the afternoon, she would have to deal with what happened with Leija, but the rest of the day should have been exactly the same as always.

Leaving home–

Checkpoint–

Tram–

Pavillion–

Two elevators down to her little lost corner of the world, Bertrand Shore Works.

“Homa,”

On the corridor leading to the semi-circular bulkhead into B.S.W, a blond woman awaited her. Wearing a grandiose coat over a ruffled red shirt and a long, tight black pencil skirt and ribbed tights. She smiled and waved in front of the closed bulkhead into B.S.W. Kitty McRoosevelt could not let herself in– Homa had been leaving the bulkhead unlocked for her after she came in, since Kitty was supposed to come later in the day, after Homa already clocked in. This was part of the instructions Bertrand gave clients, so they wouldn’t waste their time while the employees set up. Only employees could work the doors.

“As-Salamu Alaykum!” Kitty said cheerfully.

“You don’t have to do it in Fusha.” Homa said. She sighed internally.

This woman–! Homa had been saying that about a lot of people lately…

“Usually the bulkhead door is unlocked when I come in.” Kitty said.

“Yeah, that’s me who does that. Only employees can open stuff here, so you have to wait.”

Homa walked past Kitty and held her keycards to the door’s reader. After the keycard swipe, she stepped in front of the card reader’s touchscreen for camera authentication. There was a metallic rolling sound shortly thereafter– the Bulkhead door unlocked and could open now.

“Ahh, I see.” Kitty replied. “It has a camera, too? That’s a lot of security.”

“It’s like I told you, only an employee can open it. So don’t come here early.” Homa said.

She walked through the bulkhead door, automatically opened, and thought nothing of this.

Kitty stood off to the side and watched while Homa put on her gloves, mask, goggles and put protective sleeves over her tail and ears and returned to work on her yacht. She had stripped, repainted, and detailed the exterior, so now she had to recoat it with poison and waterproof gel. She big Kitty stand farther back than she had been the past few days and got to work as usual.

Though she was here way too early with nothing to do, Kitty had no complaints.

In fact, the blond hardly spoke to Homa at all that day.

She would have said ‘suit yourself’ to that, but Imani was counting on her.

So she tried to poke Kitty and see if there would be anything to report to Imani today.

“So, any big plans for the yacht?” Homa asked Kitty.

“Nothing special.”

It was as if she was turning the tables on Homa now. She had become the terse one.

“How has your stay in Kreuzung been so far?”

“Amenable.”

“Been to any neat places?”

“Perhaps.”

Perhaps?!

Homa felt so stupid shouting small talk over the sound of her spray gun.

Especially when she got back next to nothing.

What was going on?

“To hell with her then.” Homa sighed. There was always tomorrow.

If Kitty was grumpy today it didn’t matter at all.

Homa hardly knew what use Imani was getting out of her information anyway.

As the afternoon went on, she focused on her work and did not bother with Kitty.

And Kitty seemed quite content to just stand around in silence this time.

It irritated Homa just a bit– what a stupid turn from how chummy she was earlier!

By the end of the day, she had wandered off out of the dockyard altogether.

Homa clocked out and put it out of her mind. She had to worry about Leija and about whether there to try her luck at the shops again today. She might try to buy something for Leija in the Imbrian shops– if the dynamic pricing wasn’t too bad, a gift might help the Madame’s mood. Perhaps a cake or a sweet?

She put away her tools and walked out of B.S.W, through the bulkhead door and then up the old cargo ramp to the elevator. She tuned out her surroundings, just like she wanted to do. Her auto-pilot took her step by step, steps farther from B.S.W. and steps closer to home, mindlessly. Looking down at the grimy green steel floor of the ramp as she climbed the makeshift steps down the side of it up to the elevator shaft, she wondered how she would approach Leija after all of this.

What would she even say?

All kinds of things floated in her head, but it was such an awkward situation.

“I found you drunk wandering the halls–”

No, not, found you. Leija might twist that to mean Homa specifically grabbed her–

But if she laid the blame on Leija herself too thick that’d piss her off too.

There was no winning–!

Suddenly, Homa hit something soft and firm.

In front of her was supposed to be the elevator, but her mind had wandered off.

When she looked up, there was something in front of the elevator door.

It was like–

A case– a huge white case, with a synthetic felt covering and a steel frame.

For a tool or maybe even a musical instrument? Homa had seen things like this, but–

Someone had left it in front of the elevator door–? Why? It was taller than Homa herself.

She made to move it, more of a reflex than anything, feeling the weight of it as she tried.

Then–

Dull tap-tapping on the floor– heels?

Danger! Cried an unheeded voice in her mind–

Homa looked aside in time to see a black-gloved hand strike her with something.

She felt a brief burning sensation, her muscles seizing up, horrible nausea.

And the hands seizing her– something pricking her– burning in her veins–

Homa struggled on sheer instinct, but her strength faded extraordinarily quickly.

She tripped over her own feet and would have fallen had it not been for the black gloves.

Gripping her by her jumpsuit, unzipping the case blocking the elevator–

Her vision went dark as she caught a flash of waving blond hair in a thickening fog.

Inside the closed case, limbs going limp, Homa’s world and mind went pitch black.


“–Oh look, she’s coming to. I guess we won’t get to see my tenth straight winning hand in a row. Get the synthestitcher ready. I’ll make her smile for the camera. Then we can really get to work.”

Footsteps on water. A voice. A familiar voice.

She quivered, from the back of her neck down to her tail.

Her stomach felt hot, her nose was running. For a moment, the world was spinning.

Slowly spreading eyelids unveiled a world of intermittent, dim red light.

She felt water. Her feet splashed as she tried to move her limbs.

Homa could move her feet just a little, but not her torso, or her arms.

Mental fog cleared up just enough to begin to understand her predicament.

B.S.W, her workplace, was where her body expected to have been.

Instead, she awakened in the middle of an empty place, three times as wide and long as a room, with a bar at one end and shuttered windowpanes on the other. Judging by the bar shelves it may have once been stocked up, but there only scattered old bottles and broken shards left. There was an entrance door and a door out to the back, the former broken open and the latter barricaded with junk drawn from the rest of the venue. There were plastic restaurant chairs whole or in pieces scattered around the room.

Because the lights were malfunctioning, there was only intermittent flashes of white light, coming on with different periods of seconds in between each flash in a way that was maddening. The only consistent light came from the red emergency alarm light, and because this light was revolving, from the high center of the wall, it cast eerie shadows over the other occupants. Taken together it was like a vision from out of nightmare, nearly panic inducing, Homa wanted to keep her eyes shut and go back to sleep.

And indeed, keeping them open was difficult, they teared up.

Struggling to breathe as more of her senses returned to her; enough to realize her arms were bound behind her back, her feet were bound. Involuntarily she started to struggle, forcing her feet apart, forcing her arms, shifting her weight forward and back on the seat. Moaning with frustration when she realized how tight her bonds were, and that they were chafing skin– skin that was out and exposed, because Homa was stripped completely naked. Her entire body shivered with sudden fear. She was bound to a chair with her arms stretched and behind her back, her legs tied apart and to the chair and naked.

“H-h-elp.” She whimpered, as her voice started to return to her. “He-He-HELP!”

“Nobody will hear you. Be quiet.”

Homa heard a voice, and she heard something, like a mechanical switch being flipped.

In front of her, a figure coming into focus threw something on the ground.

She stepped on it, her heels easily crunching it under the water.

Then she closed toward Homa, heels splashing then tapping in succession on the floor.

“Are you awake now? Can you see my hand?”

Waving her black-gloved fingers in front of Homa was Kitty McRoosevelt. She bent in.

Narrowed eyes, messy blond hair, mere centimeters from Homa’s own face. She smiled softly.

“Help me–” Homa whimpered, “Kitty– Help–”

“I brought you here, Homa.”

As if to punctuate this, she ran one of her fingers down the inside of Homa’s thigh.

Homa clenched her teeth, wracked with another full-body shudder. It was so cold here!

And Kitty’s finger was pressing hard on her skin. Near somewhere sensitive–

Homa cried out. “Please let me go! Please don’t kill me!”

“Relax. I’m not going to kill you. And you’ll be freed once everything is over.”

“Everything?”

“It doesn’t concern you. Just be quiet, put your eyes forward, and smile for me.”

Homa realized Kitty wasn’t alone.

When her vision came back in full, the blurry figures farther in the distance came into focus, shifting something on wheels towards her. It reminded Homa of the cameras in the photo booth at Ballad’s Paradise, except that they were on top of a large, enclosed metal box that was itself on a wheeled stand. It was operated by a woman in a black bodysuit with intermittent black or blue plates across the surface, like armor and she looked–

slim and slightly muscular with bright fruity orange skin,

her eyes were green and w-shaped– her hair was long and red and purple, and–

and some of her hair, was positioning the camera, while her arms and legs pushed the cart,

“She needs to look straight at the camera until the datasheet compiles.”

When the Katarran noticed Homa staring at her, she winked with a mischievous smile.

“But she’s preoccupied with other things.”

“I’ll set her straight. How long does she have to stare?”

“We’ve never done this on a Shimii. It might take longer. Maybe twenty seconds?”

At the knocked-down front door, there was a burly blue man without hair, an eel-like tail coming out of his armor. There was a third person, a similar man, who was standing by near the windowpanes. All of them were armed and lightly armored, they had guns, Homa did not know the exact models but the form factor suggested assault rifles, which she knew from studying Diver models and gear.

She felt a light smack on her cheek and shut her eyes reflexively from the touch.

“Homa, stare at the camera for me for thirty seconds with a neutral expression.”

Kitty wanted her to stare at the camera– she would not! She’d avoid it at any cost!

In response Homa shut her eyes and stared straight at the ground, gritting her teeth.

“Don’t be stupid.” Kitty said. “Do this for me and you will get to go to sleep and wake up tomorrow and go about your business like none of this happened. Just open your eyes and look natural for the camera.”

”N-n-no. Let me go. Stop this and let me go.” Homa whimpered.

”I’m doing this to keep you safe, you brat. I could drag you with me back to B.S.W, force your face into every authentication camera like you’re a piece of equipment. There are ways to make that work– cruel ways. I’m being humane here, Homa. Look at the camera, now. Or I will have to make you do it.”

She needed Homa’s face to open all of Bertrand’s doors. To get into B.S.W. illegally.

There were cameras with facial recognition. Only Bertrand and his employees, who were registered with the station, could open them. They needed their work permits and to be physically present for security purposes. For the front bulkhead, but also for the cargo elevator access and for the berth authentications– it had to be a B.S.W employee holding the authentication keys and the only way for the computer to know was using imaging cameras. That was what all this was about,

and in the morning, too, when Kitty asked–!

Homa had been so stupid! Imani warned her to be careful! Kitty really was dangerous!

“Where are my clothes? Let me have my clothes and let me go!” Homa begged.

“I’ve found people are more compliant when they can’t hide. Open your eyes, Homa.”

“Fuck you! You’re not using me! You pervert!”

Homa’s insults came out choked, quivering with the rest of her body.

She heard Kitty sigh audibly. Behind her, the Katarran cuttlefish woman laughed.

“Feisty!” She said in jest.

“You know, I had a hunch you’d be difficult. This sucks. You, hold the chair.” Kitty said.

Footsteps splashed over and someone grabbed hold of the back of the chair–

In the next instant, Homa felt her stomach almost push into her spine as something struck.

She was hit in the gut, by something fast, both blunt and sharp, with brutal strength.

Vomit rose to her throat. She choked, she wanted to double over but could not.

Her gagging and gasping for breath turned to pained screams.

There was an immense pain focused upon a point in her upper abdomen.

Kitty had kicked her! She had kicked her with those heels!

Homa was in so much pain, she thought she would die.

Her eyes forced open from the shock, spinning with panic, was that blood–?

No it was just– the water and the red light–

“Next time I’m stomping on your dick.” Kitty shouted. “Stare at the fucking camera.”

Homa gasped for breath, openly sobbing. She couldn’t believe this was happening.

Her surroundings were nightmarish, and she felt the most brutal pain in her life.

Not even the worst of Leija’s beatings had been this terrifying.

Kitty was really going to any lengths. She would mutilate her. She would kill her.

Any thought of resistance had left her body instantly. She was hurt, her mind swimming, she felt so pathetic, so weak, and helpless and useless. Acid-tasting spit dribbling from her open mouth, her stomach a tight knot of unbearable pain. Shivering from the cold that transferred from the water her feet were in and the moist air collecting on her sweating bare skin. Burning tears pouring from her eyes, fluids from her nose, tasting hot bitterness rising at the back of her throat. She couldn’t fight back!

“Please–” Homa whimpered. “Please don’t kill me.”

Click.

Homa felt something cold sliding down from her lower abdomen and stopping at her groin.

Kitty with the long, suppressed barrel of a black pistol pointed at Homa’s–

“Jeez. This is brutal. And I thought it’d be cuttle-quick.” Remarked the cuttlefish woman.

“Shut up. I didn’t pay for your opinions.” Kitty said. “Homa, I’m going to wipe your face with my other hand. Stare at the camera with a neutral expression for thirty seconds and this bullshit is over. I’m on a fucking clock. I’m doing it this way for you. I don’t have to do this. You or your corpse can suffice with a little preparation– I’m trying to be kind to you. I’m trying to put you out of harms way. Stop being so fucking difficult and look at the camera. Thirty seconds. And you never have to see me again.”

As she promised, Kitty’s fingers rolled over Homa’s eyes and nose with a stiff nylon wipe.

Homa’s mind was a blank. There was no way she could resist anymore.

One kick. One kick was all it took.

Her mind was filled with admonishments. You’re so weak, so pathetic, so useless.

Nowhere near close to a hero. Just a sad little sack of tears and blood so easily broken.

Homa looked straight at the camera, keeping as composed as she could.

A thin strip of light glowed across her features. It was a laser scanner, mapping her face.

After twenty-five seconds it stopped. “That wasn’t so bad, was it?” Said the cuttlefish.

After the camera captured her appearance, the attached box whirred to life. Instruments inside it slid and grinded for a minute, Homa staring at it as if in a trance. Then, from the box, the Katarran extracted what looked like a partial mask, with crosshatched colors blended into its plastic exterior. It was not her entire face, it was parts of the bridge of her nose, her lips, cheekbone, ears.

“Are you sure this is correct?” Kitty asked the cuttlefish woman, staring at the mask.

“Of course. The purpose of this mask is to trick the facial recognition. So the computer scans her face and prints out what it saw. Computers like this don’t recognize your entire face, they are not humans, they don’t see like we do. They see specific unique features that distinguish faces from each other. This mask is a perfect representation of what an authentication camera computer sees when it sees this Shimii.”

With a confident smile, the cuttlefish woman lifted the mask over her own face.

“Want a demo?” She asked.

“No.”

Homa felt the barrel of Kitty’s pistol lift from her groin.

“I’m satisfied.” She said.

”So, mind telling this humble technician what happens now?”

“You stay here. I’m going out with the rest of the team to prepare. We need to be in place for my first package. We have to dock them immediately when they arrive, and we preferably want to move after B.S.W’s work hours. Thanks to sleeping beauty here, our window is tight. Speaking of which,”

Kitty turned to the dazed Homa and looked into her eyes again.

She lifted something to Homa’s sight. It was her black slate portable.

“Unlock this for me, would you?”

Mindlessly, Homa put her thumb on the on/off button when Kitty brought the portable near.

Kitty then scrolled through, making no expression as she rifled through Homa’s messages.

Her coldly inexpressive face lit by the white screen.

After a few minutes, she held the portable away from her, and put a bullet through it.

Homa had been bracing for a booming shot, but it was a sharp thwick instead.

Nevertheless, the discharge of energy was close enough to her naked body to rattle her.

“Here you go, my little snitch.” Kitty dismissively threw the phone at Homa’s lap.

“Does that alter our plan any?” asked the cuttlefish woman, raising a skeptical eyebrow.

“Nope. Imani Hadžić has no idea where we are or what we’re doing.” Kitty said.

She then engaged the safety with a quick click of a finger and stowed the gun in her coat.

“You three keep an eye on her. Don’t do anything. You should only be under contract for like thirteen hours more, so just kick back and relax. If shit breaks bad, just retreat, and leave her here. Someone will find her eventually. We’re hitting up Bertrand’s tonight to avoid unnecessary issues with the staff. It’ll be tight, but we’ll make it before the packages. I’ll call you when the deed is done and you’re free to go.”

“Sounds good to me.”

“Goodbye forever, Homa Baumann. I’m sorry we had to leave on such bad terms.”

Kitty waved her fingers at Homa and promptly left the bar through the front door.

Leaving Homa naked, cold, and alone with the two burly guards and the cuttlefish woman.

As soon as Kitty left, the cuttlefish woman wandered over to the bar and looked behind it.

“It’s dry here. It’s lifted above the flood level. I’m gonna move her chair over here.”

“Whatever you say.”

None of the burly men seemed particularly interested in the cuttlefish woman’s doings.

She grabbed Homa’s chair, seemingly without minding her weight, and moved the hurting and miserably cold Shimii from the flooded floor over behind the bar before setting her down. Homa’s feet touched dry ground, and she felt just a bit of relief. It felt far better when the woman cut open a bag and withdrew Homa’s jumpsuit and tanktop from it, laying the suit over Homa’s body like a blanket, and the rest of the clothes on her lap. She smiled at Homa, seemingly satisfied with the state of things.

Homa felt a brief distress, looking down at her belongings.

Her ID was still there, but her work permit keycard was gone. Kitty must have taken it.

Without it, Homa would not be able to get through the checkpoints!

That Katarran woman did not notice the shift in Homa’s expression back to a brief panic.

“There, it’s better now, isn’t it? Don’t worry– I only do what the client pays for. Wasting time hurting or killing you is just wasting my energy, and for a Katarran, time and stamina are money.”

She returned to the bar floor and pulled up one of the knocked-over chairs and sat on it.

It really did not matter that Kitty had not shot her dick off– Homa was effectively dead.

Without her papers– her mind started spiraling at the thought. All her work was undone.

Kitty had robbed her of everything she had worked so horribly hard for.

“Now we wait. Oh, you know what? Kitty left a few of these behind. These are useful.”

On the bar, the cuttlefish-woman picked up a small black plastic bag. Tearing it open, she withdrew a little black cylinder with three needles and a trigger on the back– a punch-injector.

“Here. This will make it more peaceful for you. I’m truly sorry for all the trouble.”

Reaching over the bar, the cuttlefish woman put the cylinder to Homa’s throat.

Immediately Homa recalled the sensation of the jab as if it was burned into her memory.

Homa struggled reflexively but had nowhere to move. Her tearful eyes soon shut again.

Once more, she fell unconscious, just like when Kitty had attacked her before.


Homa’s mind went black. Falling and falling incorporeally through a void of– colors.

Be At Peace. Sleep Well. Peaceful Place.

Homa’s world of pitch black became replaced with one of stark white.

Her body felt like it was suspended in mid-air, but she was not falling, she was not flying.

She realized she was lying down and staring at a sky of silver-white and gray tree crowns. Laying down in a puddle of lukewarm water, floating just above its surface. She was surrounded by enormous tree trunks. Far in the sky, the branches at the tops of the trees made up the sky, like clouds made of rocky bark. Between the trees, the colors swirled and traveled like floating rivers.

Peaceful Place. Safe Place. We’re Sorry.

That voice reverberated across the clearing in the forest, across Homa’s puddle.

It was so kind–

Homa wanted to cry. It was the kindest, gentlest voice that had ever spoken to her.

It was their voice– all of them were speaking. To each other. To her. To everything.

We’re Sorry.

“Don’t be sorry. Thank you. I can feel how much you care.”

In the next instant, Homa lost all buoyancy.

Her body sank right into the water. It was suddenly so deep, so crushingly heavy.

She sank farther and farther until the trees were impossible to view.

No matter how much she struggled, the pull of the water was inescapable.

Until the light completely vanished in front of her eyes.

Thrown from paradise down into the black depths of the Imbrium Ocean.

Awakening came like a hammer blow to her face.

Her eyes tearful, assaulted by the repugnant colors of the bar. Her sweat-soaked body, cold under the makeshift sheet of her jumpsuit, shivered as soon as sensation returned to it. Her empty lungs demanded choppy, sucking breaths that hurt her chest. She bent forward, caught between heaving from her dry, itching throat and sucking for air for her pounding chest, shaking all over.

Danger!

For the first time, Homa noticed Kitty hadn’t taken her necklace–

“Huh? You two, the door–!”

Light flashed from outside the door, briefly illuminating the room.

Thick smoke poured into the bar. The cuttlefish Katarran yelled for her companions.

Homa could see the silhouette of one of the men running to the side of the door. Putting his back to it, assault rifle in hand. He dropped a small device that he had perhaps intended to use to spy through the door, but it was useless, the smoke was thickest there. Grunting with frustration he reached the barrel of his rifle through the door and began to open fire indiscriminately–

At which point, something slipped into the room right under the gunfire.

There was a bright glint, an arcing flash like swinging a glowstick in a dark room.

In an instant the Katarran’s arm severed at the joint.

His assault rifle fell into the water. Homa heard the blood dribbling onto the floodwaters.

The assailant kicked the weapon away and in one fluid motion leaped the second burly Katarran, moving extremely quickly despite the flooded room. Homa did not even hear a splash, it was as if the figure glided over the surface, leaped in one bound. Heedless of the status of his companion, the second Katarran gunman opened fire toward the entrance of the bar. His wounded companion was cut down by the haphazard hail of bullets, a flashing muzzle in the dark, the sound of shell casings hitting water–

Immediately after, Homa saw that same glint as before, the flash of electricity–

Vibroblade– it was a vibroblade!

Having somehow avoided the gunfire, the assailant thrust the blade through the man.

Engaged to cut, it entered the Katarran’s chest, the light dimming inside him.

Flashing again, when the assailant cut free of his ribcage, spilling his flank onto the floor.

“I surrender! I surrender! I’m just a technician!”

That cuttlefish woman raised her arms and moved away from the Katarran’s gear in the corner of the room. At this point the smoke had begun to settle. Even the damaged air circulators in this disused bar could still sense smoke intermittently and began to suck it out. Once enough of the smoke had gone Homa saw more of the gory scene on the opposite side of the bar. At the door one of the Katarrans was riddled with bullets and his arm was a bloody stump. His blood streaked the water, flowing out of the bar due to the circulators struggling to dry up the floor. Farther along the windowed front wall, the second Katarran– Homa couldn’t even look. It was– it was all coming out of him. Everything inside him.

She didn’t want to think about it or see it.

Brandishing the edge of a vibroblade along the neck of the cuttlefish woman, it was–

Orderly dark blue hair, rounded, neatly manicured cat ears, a long, thick tail–

Glasses– a beautiful, coldly inexpressive, blood-spattered face–

Wearing a black uniform, cape hanging off her shoulders with clips, arms out of the sleeves.

“Imani! Imani, you came to rescue me!”

Homa screamed at the top of her lungs. Tears burst out of her eyes.

Imani Hadžić glanced her way. Her eyes briefly lingered. “I’m sorry it took me this long.”

She glanced down at the woman begging for her mercy.

“Homa, was it Kitty McRoosevelt who abducted you? These Katarrans work for her?”

At her feet, the Katarran woman clapped her hands together as if in prayer.

“Yes! It was her, and everyone here was working for her!” She cried out.

“Homa?” Imani asked again for confirmation.

“Y-Yes. It’s like she said.” Homa said. Imani had such a focused expression it was mildly frightening.

Once Homa’s mind began connecting the dots, her body started shaking again.

She had been focusing on the familiar face, reaching out for comfort.

But this wasn’t just the troubled girl she had a sweet date with, the girl she had her first kiss with. Imani Hadžić, in that uniform, was a deadly agent of the Volkisch Movement. On the sleeves of her jacket were the black sun armband and the sword and moon armband that Homa could not place, but she was still part of the Volkisch even without their common symbols. And what the Volkisch Movement did, as far as Homa knew and understood, was killing people. Imani Hadžić had come here to kill people.

Imani had killed two armed men like it was nothing. Using a personnel-size vibroblade.

None of them could even touch a hair on her head.

And now she had her sword to the throat of a third victim.

“Did Kitty tell you what she intended to do?” Imani asked the cuttlefish woman.

“We spoke in confidential language. We are just helping her deliver packages to B.S.W.”

“I see.”

Imani lifted the blade from the woman’s neck.

Her arm pulled back– Homa could already see the swing coming and held her breath–

Then their eyes met, across the room. Imani glanced at her with a troubled expression.

She swung the blade over the head of the cuttlefish woman.

Slicing the very tips of the diaphanous fins flapping up from the woman’s head.

“Think carefully about your choice of employer next time.”

Imani lifted her foot and kicked the woman in the face and into the nearby wall.

Where she came to rest, nose broken, eyes bruised and shut, lying limply in the water.

But with her chest rising and falling. She was breathing. She wasn’t dead.

Homa let out the air she had been sucking in. Accompanied by a tiny, helpless sob.

Imani sheathed her vibroblade and glanced about the room.

“Ya Allah…” She sighed. “What a mess. Let’s get you out of those bonds.”

Nonchalantly she walked behind the bar. Once she got to see Homa up close, her eyes drew a bit wide. Homa had her shoulders up, her head down, the jumpsuit falling off her and exposing her breasts. Her face was deeply flushed and felt hot. Not just from all the crying, screaming, and near-vomiting which she had suffered. She was acutely aware that she was bound and completely naked in front of Imani.

Imani pulled the jumpsuit off her and withdrew from her uniform a small vibroknife.

She crawled around close to the bar cut Homa’s hands free, and then her feet.

Homa thought she would die of embarrassment from having Imani all over her like this.

Far more material and readily present was all the pain that she felt.

Her wrists had red marks, as did her ankles. Her belly had an awful bruise. Her whole body ached from struggling against the bonds, from being stricken by Kitty, from the punctures by the drug injectors, and from the stressful position in which she had been bound to the chair. She felt like she had not eaten in a day and her limbs were like jelly when Imani helped her stand off the chair. Unfortunately, she was not so light-headed that anything felt dream-like. Homa was cursed by a sharpness of her faculties.

“Thank you, thank you, Imani,”

Homa embraced Imani tightly, and Imani gently embraced her back.

“How did you find me?” Homa asked.

Imani briefly knelt down, causing Homa’s heart to jump anew from embarrassment.

From the floor, she grabbed Homa’s portable. It had a bullet-hole right through it.

“This was designed to track you if you failed to answer my messages within a certain time.”

She handed the broken portable to Homa, along with, surprisingly, a fresh one.

“That one’s storage is still good. Copy everything over to this one when you can.”

“Imani–”

“Don’t mention it, okay? I want to stay in touch. Money is no object for my little Ho~ma~.”

Imani walked out from behind the bar with a smile.  

Homa put her clothes back on as quickly as she could and put both portables away.

She got the hang of walking again and rushed over to the Katarran woman on the wall.

Rifling through her suit, she found a communicator.

“Here, Imani! You can use this to track Kitty!”

Homa threw the communicator at Imani, who caught it.

Her own hands lingered a bit longer on the Katarran woman’s gear–

Because– a dark series of thoughts filled her mind as she noticed how calm Imani was.

“Imani, is Kitty really going to destroy the station? You don’t seem to be in a rush.”

All of this time, Imani had been content to sit passively and let Homa report on Kitty’s goings-on. At no point had Imani stopped Kitty despite knowing where she was and suspecting her of plotting some wrongdoing. She put Homa in danger, in fact, which Homa was easily willing to forgive because Imani’s face in the chaotic light of the bar looked too beautiful to hold accountable. She had been tracking Homa, so she was prepared, to some degree, for Homa to be abducted or endangered.

It looked to Homa like Imani knew everything that was going to happen.

And that she was letting it happen. She wasn’t even going to try the communicator.

This was the final tell– how calm Imani was standing in the center of the flooded bar.

Even now that Kitty’s plan was in motion. Imani did not see it as urgent.

“I’m grateful you came to my rescue. I was so scared. They even hurt me, Imani. But you have to tell me the truth now. You are not going to stop Kitty, are you? It’s like– you just wanted to use me to find out when Kitty’s plot got underway. But you aren’t going to stop it at all? I deserve to know.”

Imani averted her gaze.

“I– I wasn’t just using you. I had fun– I’d like to have a different relationship to you.”

“Imani, we can’t have a different relationship right now.” Homa said. “Right now– please tell me the truth. You owe it to me. Is Kitty going to destroy the station? If she is, then you must be completely insane. But she is not going to right? She’s doing something else. And you’re going to sit back and watch.”

Imani smiled gently. She laughed, just a little. It was a bitter laugh.

“Will Kitty McRoosevelt destroy the station? You know, I’m actually not certain, little Ho~ma~. It depends on how she feels. Hers will be the final judgment. Will her hatred toward us allow her to kill us so easily and readily? Will we deserve the fury of her broken heart? At first, I was certain she would not. But recently, Homa, I’ve been feeling like, I wish I could allow myself to destroy everything and remake it to serve my own little heart. Perhaps Kitty will indeed kill us all, profiting nobody in the process.”

She could not meet Homa’s gaze as she spoke. She arranged some hair behind her ear.

Homa silently watched her fidget. She drew nearer as if demanding a real answer that way.

“Kitty McRoosevelt is going to engineer a Core Separation to put the station complex out of live power and into on emergency backup power. Kreuzung is not well prepared for this kind of scenario. Kitty’s aim is to bring down the automated missile and gun defenses of the station complex. This will allow her to infiltrate combat troops and commence a coup. Kitty is a foreign agent, from the Cogitum.”

Speaking those words, Imani finally met Homa’s face with an eerie smile.

“Kitty doesn’t know that the 7th Fleet of the Stabswache is secretly underway to intervene. Her forces will be utterly destroyed, and the station will come under the command of my superior. Her name is Vesna Nasser. Daughter of the late Shimii revolutionary Osir Nasser. I am a member of the Volkisch because of her, Homa. I pledged myself to her cause, to fight to create a new future for the Shimii.”

Tears drew from Imani’s eyes. Smiling and weeping as she laid herself bare.

“Knowing all this, Homa– do you hate me? I don’t care if you find it unacceptable, but–”

Homa took a step in and without thinking or warning, pulled Imani into a kiss.

She threw her reluctance aside, brought her passion forward, seizing upon Imani.

Imani complied readily. Their tear-stained eyes met until hers closed.

Letting herself be taken in by Homa’s ardor, her capturing lips and the snare of her tongue.

One hand brushing Imani’s soft hair aside between kisses, stroking her cheek.

And the second, rising suddenly–

Sticking a punch injector of Kitty’s knockout drug into Imani’s neck.

She expected Imani to fight back then, to be roaring mad, to draw her blade–

Instead, both of them were weeping gently, eyes fixed again as Imani’s senses clouded.

Imani made no move to resist. As if, perhaps, she knew, and allowed it to happen.

Staring deep into her eyes, after tasting her lips– Homa could not help but cry.

“I don’t hate you.” Homa said. “I hate the things that happened to you.”

“Was that kiss real?” Imani asked. Her words slurring. Her face starting to numb.

“Yes. It was real. It wasn’t like the theater.” Homa said. “Imani I– I–”

She couldn’t say ‘I love you’ to Imani. Even though she did– painfully, she really did.

In that moment, Homa wanted to love Imani more than anything.

She wished they could keep texting and go on dates to stupid kitschy places.

But as long as Imani wore the evil skin of that uniform, Homa could not be with her.

That damned uniform, in that moment, Homa hated nothing more than the people behind it.

“Imani– I am going to make that Vesna Nasser regret putting all this in your head!”

Smiling, Imani drifted off to sleep in Homa’s arms.

Homa set her down in the corner with the remainder of the Katarran’s gear.

She quickly applied the last punch injector to the cuttlefish woman’s neck, making sure to prolong her unconsciousness so she wouldn’t wake up first and take revenge on Imani while she slept. Then, rummaging through Imani’s own gear, she took the small vibroknife– and a small pistol. Homa did not know the caliber or model, but it was suppressed, just like Kitty’s. It might come in handy. She had never fired a gun in anger, but she knew the principles behind it. Leija had shown her how to do it once.

Leija–

Swallowing hard, Homa realized what she was embroiled in and stifled a sob.

Crying hard over the sleeping body of Imani Hadžić. She took Kitty’s communicator back.

Looking at the objects in her hands. Weapons and tactical gear– it was war.

War had really come to Kreuzung Station once again. Everything was happening too fast.

All of Homa’s senses told her it was time to knuckle down and run away from this.

She was no hero, Imani would never be her princess to save, none of this was within her power.

Homa thought she was a useless girl who was unlucky enough to be dragged into a mess.

Everything attached to her spine hurt in some way.

She had never been in a real fight. Everyone in this bar could kick her ass.

And she was completely in over her head.

Just a helpless girl crying over the wreckage of everything she ever loved.

“But I can’t just sit here. I have to do something! I can’t just watch! I’d hate myself for it!”

Reflexively, Homa grabbed hold her necklace and squeezed the little rock tight.

Somewhere in the recesses of her mind, she felt a warm, encouraging thought.

We Believe In You.

You Are Courageous.

Taken by a sudden impetus, Homa grit her teeth, put away the gear in her jumpsuit and took off running, splashing through the floor of the flooded bar, out into an unfamiliar and even more flooded street. She saw an elevator shaft in the distance and ran for it, knowing she would at least find the current block and tier on that elevator. She ran as fast as her legs could carry her through the part-flooded streets.

“I have to stop her. I have to stop her–”

Suddenly, for a second or two, everything went dark.

Darker than it had ever been. Pitch black. Every light, every monitor, everything.

Then the lights came back on. Homa stopped in her tracks.

Revolving red alarm lights flashed from every wall and the ceiling.

On every touch-capable surface, the screens began to display the same thing.

Large red letters and a symbolic image of a pillar being lifted from within a ring.

In every direction, from every surface, as total as the darkness before.

Homa stood, her shadow spinning around her with the red lights and flashing warnings.

Transfixed with eyes drawn wide and lips quivering, in water above her ankles.

WARNING.

WARNING.

WARNING.

WARNING. CORE SEPARATION.


“Do you have a purpose for Tristitia?”

Deep beneath the baseplate of Kreuzung’s Core Station tower were the nearly-abandoned maintenance tunnels for some of the lower-class blocks. Several had flooded, but there were just enough operable passages for the interests of its current occupants, and the flooding in the rest was pretty convenient on the whole. In a long square room, heavily ventilated but with rather poor air circulation due to mechanical failures, the smell of iron from coagulating blood and decaying flesh lingered. Maimed corpses had been lined up against the walls. Someone had put their hands together as if in macabre prayer.

Between the dead worshipers stood two figures.

One entirely pale androgynous body, short-haired, lean, in a white robe.

Another a pale, dark-haired woman in a long black dress, long-limbed, yellow-eyed.

Her face was stark white, with beautiful but vacant features like an exquisite doll.

Over her head, orbited a halo like a circle of blood, semi-solid and spinning.

“Do you have a purpose for Tristitia? Tristitia fulfilled her previous purpose.”

Her hands were stained with the blood of the room’s most recent occupant.

“I keep telling you, these are only orders or tasks. A purpose shouldn’t be something as minor as killing people and collecting their bodies! Your purpose should be grand, Enforcer VIII!”

The White-Robed Figure laid their hands on the shoulders of their companion.

“What should be Tristitia’s purpose?”

“Of course, your purpose should be to worship! To become closer to God!”

“Tristitia does not understand. How would Tristitia carry out ‘worship’?”

“Oh but that is a fraught subject! Even with our vast potential, such questions elude us!”

“Tristitia does not understand. Please try to explain Tristitia’s new purpose.”

“It is fine! A fine question! I have not come unprepared! I have been thinking about this, in fact. What should be the form of worship? Why, worship should be closeness to God. But what is God? To know God we must appreciate the form of God. But then what is the form of God? God is the greatest beauty, the greatest strength, the greatest perception– but then, what is the form of greatness? Greatness is indefatigable, unstoppable, uncontrollable, uncollapsible! Therefore–”

“Tristitia does not understand.”

Tristitia’s words were no longer being heeded. Her companion was now lost in rhetoric.

“Of course, a God can only be worshiped by sentient, living beings, and as such, a God must be perceptible to them. There is only one power that can be called greatest and unstoppable, while being perceptible to sentient beings– the power of our Lord and Savior Arbitrator II, Titan of Aether! It is the Aether that is the attainable form of God to which the living must aspire!”

They threw their hands up and smiled with vibrating, sharp teeth at the steel roof.

“Endless stillness adrift! Thought flowing downstream! Without space, time, or form, only the purity of the mind released from the impetus of flesh! This is the true form of God– so why worship through hard work and dedication? When God is peace itself? No, no, no– one can only approximate the form of God through Sloth! Sloth so unmoving and grand it reverses creation! That is true worship! That is true Sloth! Our God is only reachable through the ultimate stillness! Be it death or enlightenment!”

After their screaming tirade, the creature turned to their companion with expectant eyes.

“Well? Well?” They demanded.

“Do you have an actionable purpose for Tristitia?” She replied in a dry tone of voice.

“Actionable?”

“Do you have a purpose for Tristitia, that Tristitia can actually understand.”

One deadpan voice, belonging to Syzygy’s Enforcer VIII, “The Despair”– or Tristitia.

And one hysterical, impassioned voice belonging to Syzygy’s Enforcer VI, “The Sloth.”

These were the only sounds reverberating from these old maintenance tunnels.

Until–

A series of alarms began to ring out from the upper floors.

When they finally made it to the maintenance tunnels, the warnings lit up the cracked screens on the walls behind the corners, creating and eerie scene dominated by the color red rather than the dim yellow-white of tunnel’s LEDs. The appearance of these warnings seemed to cheer up Enforcer VI once again, to the degree that they started cackling almost in tandem with them.

“A signal from God! Oh purposeless doll, it appears it is time for a task after all!”

Enforcer VI turned nonchalantly toward Enforcer VIII, and from the interior of their robe, procured a round lump of meat wrapped in a silvery skin. Enforcer VIII stood blankly staring while Enforce VI shoved two fingers into her mouth, forced it open, and tipped the morsel inside before shutting Enforcer VIII’s jaw forcefully, as if demonstrating to her how she should chew the blob.

“Create a combat form and depart! The Imbrians have begun the festivities!”

Enforcer VIII began to chew the fleshy fruit herself. Her eyes glowed with red circles.

Omenseeing.”

Around the room, the corpses began to stir, to soften, to melt down and slide away.

Coalescing around the blank-faced, angelic doll as a powerful shell of bone, blood, muscle.

“Your purpose is to stalk through this chaos and kill the heretics! Let the festival begin!”            

A choked voice sounded from within the roiling flesh.

“Tristitia will fulfill this purpose.”


Previous ~ Next

Knight In The Ruins Of The End [S1.1]

Depth gauge: 600m

Rain poured from the artificial sky in Schwerin Island, coming down in sheets that pooled over the synthetic earth around the palace in the center of the habitat. Gray clouds in the unmoving firmament and fields of bright red and yellow flowers surrounding the palace, joined by the great crystalline threads of the water. So much was coming down that it ran gentle rivers down the stone steps into the palace. Gate closed, windows shut but not shuttered. Inside, the residents enjoyed the scheduled spectacle.

On the stone steps into the palace, stood a girl.

Beside the stones, out of sight of the door or the windows.

Fists closed at her side. Teeth grit to keep from chattering. Soaking in the rain. Cold and quivering.

Dressed in a white shirt, a little bow tie, and dark brown overalls. No protection from the water.

Her skin, variously referred to as “swarthy” or “olive-colored” or “leather-tan,” was becoming grayer.

Dark, long, slightly tough hair, tied up into a braided ponytail that fell behind her back.

Tall for her age. A little tomboy out in the wilderness. Enduring the rain like a statue.

As much as she wanted to stand still as a stone she could not. She was too cold and vulnerable.

Her feet turned in place, shifted. She couldn’t help it.

But in the rain, she could not tell apart her tears from the water roaring over her body.

She wanted to scream, but not in pain. She wanted to scream with anger, with the power of violence.

Because she could not, she did not scream. She kept her voice trapped deep in herself.

Standing at the foot of the steps into the palace, in the pouring rain. Eyes shut. Teeth grit.

“Corporal punishment of this sort for a kid is rather cruel.”

Gertrude Lichtenberg opened her eyes and looked up.

In front of her was a tall man, grey uniformed, with a stiff posture and a grave face.

He was holding a small umbrella. With the grimness of his uniform and face, it almost looked silly over him. His brown eyes scanned across the stone steps and then fall back upon her. Deadly serious. This was a soldier, little Gertrude knew. A man of great gravity and dignity, peaked cap and thick boots, insignias on his coat. Gertrude knew the patches very well. He was a Lieutenant. Her own father was a Captain.

Gertrude tried to stiffen herself up also.

In return, the man knelt down in front of her, so he could look her eye to eye.

He lifted his umbrella to cover her too, just a little bit.

“My name is Einz. Einz Dreschner. What is your name?”

“Gertrude– Lichtenberg.”

Between name and surname her teeth chattered.

“Did you cause mischief?”

“I hurt someone.”

“Did the Captain send you out here?”

Gertrude could barely contain her tears thinking about it. They felt warm in her eyes and cheeks.

“No. I sent myself sir.”

Dreschner looked, very briefly, taken aback.

“This won’t make amends. You’re only hurting yourself. Come with me. I’m sure it can be sorted out.”

He extended a hand but Gertrude did not take it.

“No sir. She’s not talking to me.”

“Who isn’t?”

Gertrude sniffed hard. Fighting back sobs.

“Elena.”

Dreschner nodded. He made a serious face again. Like he grimly and fully understood.

“She’s not talking to me sir. I hurt her. So I just want to stand here and become a statue now.”

“I understand. But at least– you shouldn’t be sad and alone. Let me stand here with you.”

He closed his umbrella. Gertrude felt a shock– he must have been someone’s guest from the palace.

Dreschner took his place next to Gertrude in the pouring rain.

He did not explain. And she could not argue with him. He simply did it.

“My–” His own teeth chattered. “It is mighty cold, little soldier.”

He laughed.

Gertrude looked up at him, his smile flashing against the sheets of rain and the gray sky.

They stood, side by side in the rain like that, for a good while longer.

Perhaps Dreschner knew that in due time, the Captain would come looking for him.

And bring them both in.

And ultimately, help solve Gertrude’s little problem.

So that, then, nobody would have to stand in the rain.

Elena and Gertrude did talk again after that.

That very day even– and so soon, that Gertrude still felt soaked, even with a change of clothes.

Elena’s return to her side made her feel very warm, however.


Depth gauge: 1800m

Slowly, the rain-dewed pastures of her youth faded to the metal walls of her adulthood.

It was the year 979 After Descent.

Human life was relegated to deep beneath the surface of the Oceans on the planet Aer.

One such Ocean was the main Ocean of the western hemisphere: the Imbrium.

In this body of water, a woman once called a Knight had lost everything.

She could only dream now, of what she could have had. And what she did to let it slip from her.

Painful and unwanted dreams.

Gertrude turned in bed and almost reflexively wrapped her arms around the dark-skinned woman laying beside her. Feeling her muscled back against Gertrude’s bare breasts, holding her lean arms, burying her head in her long, slightly coarse dark hair. Her companion was still asleep. Her tail gently lifted and dropped beneath the sheets. Dog-like ears atop her head gently folded and lifted in rhythm with it.

Ingrid Järveläinen Kindlysong.

Even her name sounded so beautiful to Gertrude.

“Mmm. You really don’t want to let me go?”

She began to mumble. Her voice pleasantly rough.

“I’m sorry to wake you. I couldn’t help myself.” Gertrude said.

“I’m flattered. You can tug on my leash anytime, Gertrude. You and only you.” Ingrid said.

She backed into Gertrude. She was shorter than her and nestled into her chest so well.

Gertrude truly never wanted to let her go.

Now that she had known loss, such loss as she had never imagined she would ever suffer–

It had taught her that she needed to keep close, jealously close, anything that mattered to her.

Ingrid was hers to hold. Hers and hers only. No matter what happened.

Gertrude wanted to squeeze her close, to taste her, devour her–

Then a pale green light glowed over the lovers. There was an accompanying sound, radio-static.

A voice-only message from the bridge of this ship– the Irmingard-class dreadnought Iron Lady.

“M-M-ma’am!”

That squeal could have only come from the Irmingard’s mousy communications officer, Karin Schicksal. Despite her auspicious surname, she was a small and skittish woman whose voice was cracking from anxiety. After a too-long pause she continued. “Y-You did say to alert you when we got closer!” There was a nervous little laugh. “We’re approaching Kesar’s Gorge. Um. Let us know if you have any orders!”

Gertrude lifted her hand from Ingrid’s chest placed it on the wall to respond to the voice-only message.

“I’ll be in the Bridge shortly.”

Ingrid grunted a little– but not enough that Schicksal would hear her.

She always made sure to toe certain lines for Gertrude’s sake.

“Dismissed.” Gertrude said, with an exasperated sigh.

“Oh! Sorry, I forgot to cut the line! Very sorry! See you soon!”

Finally the light green glow from the wall disappeared as Schicksal’s message window closed.

“Might not get many chances to fool around for the next bit.” Gertrude said.

“I’ll live. I survived a multiple-year drought in our sex lives after all.” Ingrid laughed.

Gertrude wondered but never asked how long Ingrid had felt this strongly about her.

Her own feelings were still muddled. She loved her, but–

But she had to set these doubts aside for now.

Standing up from bed, her room closet automatically extended a hanger with her uniform.

A black coat with gold and red accents, black pants, and the tall hat of the High Inquisitor.

In a lot of ways, Gertrude was still the little tomboy from Schwerin Island.

Except she was not so little at all. She had grown very tall for an Imbrian woman, though not as tall as some. And now in addition to a swarthy tomboy, she was at times called gallant, handsome. At least physically, she fit the uniform which she had been given. Its strength, its unwavering steadfastness.

Its brutality too– perhaps her mind and spirit also, regrettably, befitted the legacy of this uniform.

“Hey,”

Gertrude felt a pat on the back as she started to dress. Behind her, Ingrid smiled.

Standing with her shirt half-open, tapping her palms on Gertrude’s back and rubbing.

“Don’t look so down. Everyone wants to have faith in you. Including me. Show us some confidence.”

Seeing her acting so supportive, Gertrude could not help but smile back.

“There’s my handsome tyrant.” Ingrid said.

“Hopefully everyone else will be as charmed about it as you.”

“Hah! Hopefully not that much!”

The pair laughed at the implication.

Though this bubble of peace which they had seized for themselves could not last, they still cherished it.

Soon both women donned their uniforms and the duties that came with them, and set out into the day.


Depth gauge: 2000m

An adult bluntnose sixgill shark descended from the surface waters, looking for the ocean floor.

Struggling briefly against the titanic wake of some massive creature it could not possibly fathom.

Avoiding the current, the sixgill shark had its reckoning of its own course briefly disturbed.

Try as it might, the sixgill had chosen its dive location poorly, and the ocean floor eluded it for a while.

Instead, beneath the sixgill’s sleek body there was only darkness and further descent.

And so, in order to avoid the gigantic being in whose wake it had been traveling, the sixgill ascended.

An uncommon encounter between humans and nature, in the reality of the After Descent era.

But one that reminded these separate worlds of each other’s presence.

Between the rocky and uneven seafloors of the southern Imperial territory of Sverland and the vast, rich silt plains of the eastern Imperial territory of Veka, there was an enormous trench known as Kesar’s Abyss or Gorge. It was a connecting point between the Khaybar mountains dividing the Empire and the Narodnaya range separating the territories of the Union from Veka and Sverland both. When viewed from the Imbrium above, the Kesar trench was nearly a kilometer across and many more long, a gaping black maw screaming at the heavens. Torn open, split jagged as if by the strength of some titantic monster.

Kesar– the place where Norn the Praetorian’s journey began. Could there be an answer here?

Approaching Kesar was Gertrude’s Inquisitorial flagship. Irmingard-class dreadnoughts all shared many traits. Most distinctive was the thick, “spoon-shaped” prow, like its namesake upside down with a beautiful curved surface above and the tapering point jutting at the fore. Between the prow and the larger main body was a “neck” containing sensor equipment. All quarters in which work and daily living were contained had been spaced into the massive main hull, a semi-cylindrical, flat-topped, beautifully curved monument, bedecked with cannon pods, sensors, and winged fins and control surfaces. Flared armor “wings” around the circumference of the ship’s stern protected enormous hydrojets fed through intakes on the sidepods and below the stern. The most powerful Agarthicite reactors ever fielded on Imbrian ships powered massive turbines that drove this beast, as well as its massive main coilgun turrets.

The Irmingard class was not only the largest and most well-armored and well-armed ships designed and fielded by the Imbrians, the sheer power of their reactors and engines made them the fastest and most enduring vessels in the world in terms of speed over long distances. While they were not necessarily sprinters, the Irmingard class could chase any vessel to the ends of the earth, indefatigably hunting its prey, creeping nearer and nearer to pressure smaller and lighter ships and never allowing escape.

Per the wishes of its commander, the Iron Lady sailed without a livery, wearing only flat gunmetal gray.

But even this behemoth found itself dwarfed by the sheer size of Kesar’s Gorge.

From the circular bridge of the Irmingard, Gertrude Lichtenberg watched the yawning abyss through the picture of the main screen, taking up most of the wall at the very front of the bridge. She approached the island in the center, surrounded by the various battlestations. At this central post was the Captain, Einz Dreschner. He was the man responsible for the direct, day to day leadership of ship operations, even though Gertrude was in charge of the vessel as a whole. She counted on him to enforce her commands.

An older man with a heavily lined and severe face, hairless in head and chin both, never without his cap.

Nevertheless, that grim expression became as much of a smile as it could when Gertrude appeared.

“Inquisitor.” He said warmly, by way of greeting.

“Captain.” Gertrude said, taking his side. “So that’s Kesar.”

“Indeed it is. Just as Norn the Praetorian described it. Vast and seemingly empty.” Dreschner said.

“Seemingly. But it was here, Captain, that the Praetorian’s legend began.” Gertrude said.

Dreschner nodded. He spoke in a lower voice. “I am a very material sort of man, Gertrude.”

Only for her ears. “Do you trust me, Einz?” She asked, whispering back.

Dreschner crossed his arms. He spoke in a measured voice, like a wise man giving oratory.

“I believe that I should support you in this adventure even if I don’t fully understand it. To me, the benefit to be gained is for your confidence to be restored, and for you to be able to make clear decisions about your future. However, a part of me believes this ship should head for Konstantinople, rather than here, trying to unearth some treasure or discover some mythical secret to the Praetorian’s rise to power.”

“Do you think the crew feels the same way?”

“No.”

Drescher reached out and surreptitiously, he patted Gertrude once, in the side of the arm.

Such that nobody noticed, but she knew he was offering reassurance.

“Sailors sail. Their compact with their ship is that they are the ones who have to worry about pipes and pressures and nuts and bolts, and leave the worrying about direction and missions to the officers. And your officers, Gertrude, have nowhere to go in the world except where you tell them. In their minds, I believe they are still trying to excel to secure their livelihoods. Ultimately, all we want is to sail, as well.”

“Let’s hope you’ve read them correctly. I wonder if any of them are getting homesick.” Gertrude said.

“Like you, Gertrude, I don’t believe they have homes to return to that are any better or brighter than the bowels of this ship.” Dreschner said. He sat back farther into his seat. “For now, this ship is their home, and it is their home because they have faith in their leader. They trust your path is the correct one.”

“Thank you, Captain. I’ll make sure to walk my path confidently then.”

Gertrude stood up on the front of the island. Putting on her most stern and confident expression, and briefly preparing her voice. She face the massive abyss on the main screen and laid out her plan, which was heard not only on the bridge, but broadcast to the sailors working in the lower tiers of the vessel.

“Look sharp, soldiers! Before you lies the Kesar Gorge. Before we return to Konstantinople, we must carry out a thorough investigation of this pit. Our objective is to fully reconnoiter this area before we attempt to rejoin the Inquisition. Kesar’s Gorge contains a buried secret of the aristocrats and warlords currently vying for the throne and we cannot rest until it has been brought to light. Uncovering the truth is the justice of the Inquisition, whether the deceit comes from royal or peasant lips! This mission is the Inquisition’s first step toward ending this era of strife and setting right the current of Imbria’s history!”

It did not matter how much of that was improvised. It was a motivation they could understand.

She surprised herself with how convincing it sounded– in reality, what Gertrude was hoping for was only to find the source of Norn’s power. Perhaps even to gain such power herself, and learn to wield it.

Her officers proudly stood at attention, saluted, and followed her words closely.

With a flourish of the hand, Gertrude pointed at the main screen as if pointing a saber at it.

“We will tackle this task in stages! First, I want an imaging buoy to be lowered into the abyss to a depth of three kilometers. Once we have a clearer idea of the geography below, we will judge a course to descend into the gorge, and reconnoiter the path using a drone. Finally, the Iron Lady will descend. While we are tackling the imaging and analysis work, I want the ship to receive a quick maintenance. Check all filters, make sure nothing is leaking, and make sure all repairs to the exterior have held firmly. We will be descending into extreme depths through Katov mass. We need to be prepared and in top condition!”

“Yes ma’am!”

As one the officers on the bridge responded.

Gertrude looked down at them, all of their faces, their cleanly gray uniforms, well manicured haircuts, perfect postures. Service on a dreadnought’s bridge crew was a huge privilege, and everyone who accepted such a competitive position had to look and act the part day in and out. She saw determination on their countenances, a steel edge in their eyes. They were ready. Gertrude did not think these were the faces of people who had given up on her at all. So she felt a weight being lifted from her shoulders.

“Sonar and LADAR crews and Electronic Warfare officers will have to split their attention between the imaging and drone work and maintaining alertness! We are on the border between Veka and Sverland, and could reasonably expect responses from either the Vekan Empire or the Union, now that it has exerted control in this region. Be aware of all possible threats! Our Diver pilots will run routine patrols, but it’s up to us be their eyes and ears to threats in the far distance. We are an Irmingard class crew! We are the Inquisition! We will bring all crimes to the fore and dispense justice! Commence the mission!”

“YES MA’AM!”

All of the bridge officers shouted in chorus, offered a final salute, and returned to their stations, conferring with one another to begin the work ahead of them. Gertrude breathed in deep and sat down beside Dreschner. He gave her a quick look filled with his approval, the tiniest bit of a smile, before he joined the chorus of chattering voices, restating orders, calling officers by name to delegate tasks.

“Captain, I will recover my breath for a moment, but then I need to inspect the hangar.”

“Of course, Inquisitor. If I may comment, it does appear you are back to your old self.”

Gertrude wished that she could truly believe that was the case.

Too much had happened, however. She could never be the same again. Not completely.

That woman who fought unflinchingly, with a single-minded focus and devotion to one purpose.

If she was a monument to order and justice, she was one with deep cracks across its surface.

That purpose was gone. If not gone completely, it was shaken, warped.

She was still hurting, still vulnerable, in some soft and sad little part of herself, buried deep.

Like stepping on a tiny nail and continuing to tread upon it.

While wearing a confident smile and speaking in a proud voice to everyone who could see her.

But there was nothing to do but to keep going forward. Not just for herself.

All of these people were entrusted to her. She owed it to them as well to do more than doubt herself.

So even if it hurt, she had to walk the path laid out before her as Gertrude Lichtenberg.

To wherever it led her. To whatever end. For them.


Gertrude sighed deeply upon entering the hangar.

She had been so caught up in herself, and between Ingrid’s legs, that she forgot the state they were in.

With Sieglinde von Castille gone, so was her Grenadier— and in its place there was now a pile of scrap that was once called a “Magellan.” They were not able to do much with this machine. They had extracted data from its computer, but there was very little diagnostic information included, likely so the machine would be harder to replicate or repair outside its origin. Without spare parts, and without data on how to service it, they would have to kitbash Jagd parts into it and then pray that it could run that way.

Looking at the remains of the machine, Gertrude could almost recall, as if a sensation on the tips of her fingers and the bottom of her feet, the ease with which that machine moved. The power that it conferred to her. She almost defeated the Pandora’s Box with that Magellan. She was certain that had she fought with greater clarity and more reliable allies she could have ripped Elena from the Pandora’s Box. Now, however, it was vaguely propped up on a gantry, kept together with steel cable and thick ribbed tape.

Norn had managed to recruit and supply more pilots, but Gertrude had gotten too complacent.

She wished she had been more conservative with the Serrano patrol fleet.

To think she lost all those lives in the fighting–

–and still didn’t get her back,

“Don’t look at it so much! I’m embarrassed with it! Stop looking at it, Commander!”

From behind Gertrude came a whiny little voice.

She turned in time to watch a short, dark-blond woman hopping up and down.

Her tail wagging furiously. Her ears lightly twitching.

Dressed in a white coat over a green and black bodysuit. Spectacles perched on her nose.

“Chief?” Gertrude replied.

“Commander. If only you could see the visions I have– you wouldn’t look at the scrap so disdainfully.”

Dreadnought crews attracted two types of officers: prim and proper careerists, and unique eccentrics.

The intense hopping, paired with the warped smile on Chief Engineer Monika Erke Tendercloud’s face as she stared at the pile of Magellan parts barely retaining a shape– put her squarely in the latter category. She was a woman barely 154 cm tall, her blond hair divided in two long tails. Her small stature besides, she had a full, rounded, mature figure, and Gertrude knew for a fact she was the more senior of the two of them. Within those wide-draw orange eyes there was an intellect of inscrutable fathoms.

“Stop staring at it as it is now– stop staring at my shame. I will inform you when it is dignified again.”

She rubbed her hands together in front of herself. Gertrude crooked an eyebrow.

“Monika, this is the first I’m hearing that you have any plans for that thing.” Gertrude said.

Monika crooked her head to one side. “Of course I’m not going to just let it take up space! Now that we lost the Grenadier, I was thinking of using the Grenadier’s spare parts and some Jagd parts and making something exciting. I just need a bit more time to perfect my vision. Until then, don’t judge it.”

Gertrude acquiesced and ceased staring at the pile of junk.

“I’m– I’m sorry about losing the Grenadier.”

“Ehhh, it’s fine!” Monika put on that strange smile again. “Wasn’t my idea anyway. Maybe I’m happy it’s gone. Maybe I think it wasn’t made right and deserved to be destroyed. Maybe I’m good with it being someone else’s problem.” She turned her crooked head back right-side-up once again, shrugging. “It’s not like I have anyone to answer to about it. Rescholdt-Kolt isn’t going to call me up anymore.”

She crossed her arms and shut her eyes. Gertrude nodded her acknowledgment.

Suppressing the urge to apologize for how she had been treated, a habit which Ingrid so disdained.

Loup scientists were pretty rare. Owing to the prevailing military culture of the Northern and Southern hosts, most Loup valued spirituality and warfighting over scientific pursuits. Of course, Gertrude knew that these norms were encouraged by the Empire. It was convenient to have the Loup as an Imperial “guest culture” that produced seasoned warriors unflinchingly obedient to the Imperial officer class.

As an outlier in this arrangement, Monika would ordinarily have few opportunities. But Gertrude accepted Monika into her ranks and even convinced the R-K industrial firm to work with her on R&D. In the Empire many scientific careers began as these partnerships between military personnel and industrial firms.

Now Rescholdt-Kolt Heavy Industries and Monika stood on opposing sides of this civil war.

Thankfully, this did not seem to be slowing Monika down one bit.

“My vision will be sweeping and grand– I will make an armor worthy of a knight like you!”

Monika raised her hands with a big smile.

Gertrude suppressed the urge to say something like ‘Knights do not exist anymore.’

That, too, was a habit people like Ingrid found distasteful.

“I look forward to taking it out then. I wasn’t aware you wanted to make a personal craft for me.”

“I got a front row seat to your last battle from the data we extracted from the Magellan.” Monika said. “You are an amazing pilot. And since we’re low on pilots, it makes sense anyway, doesn’t it? Clostermann was never going to extract the full potential of my machine– and Ingrid has her own mecha now too.”

Ingrid’s mecha–

Opposite the pile of scrap that had become of the Magellan was a symbol of Gertrude’s folly.

Standing up on the gantry, looking almost brand new–

Was the Sunlight Foundation’s Jagdkaiser Type I. Where the Magellan was beveled and beautiful, the Jagdkaiser was angled and jagged and evil-looking. Its namesake was the second-generation Jagd type, a light and sleek and fast machine designed for close quarters attack. Over-long arms, big shoulders, a compact body. The intention with the Jagd was to have a lot of thrust with a tight center mass and fully integrated weaponry that was ready to go with very little setup on the hangar’s part. The Jagdkaiser shared many of these traits with it, but its built-in weapons were far more terrifying than any Jagd.

Particularly its left arm, which was a special agarthic weapon unique to the machine.

Because of the damage it had received, even with the spare parts they had been given, it could not be fully reassembled. One of its arms once belonged to a Volker, it was repainted and kitbashed, and allowed the machine to use standard assault rifles and vibroswords, as well as to manipulate objects. The Sunlight Foundation’s wake-jet integrated propulsion was too difficult to reproduce and service, so until Monika figured it out, they had affixed an ordinary suite of thrusters, with solid fuel verniers and backpack, shoulder and foot jets, routing the water intakes and turbines wherever they could around the chassis.

While this increased the weight and bulk, it made the machine far more usable for them.

Now–

Now it was Ingrid’s machine–

At first, Gertrude had come to believe Norn delivered the machine to them as a cruel joke.

Gertrude lost Elena by commanding this machine to attack against Norn’s orders.

A moment of great shame and evil impulse that she wanted to forget.

But–

This was Ingrid’s machine now. So Norn had said; and so Ingrid greedily accepted.

For the power to fulfill Gertrude’s wishes.

“Monika, since you’re here already, tell me about that one.” Gertrude said.

“Heh.”

Monika put on her most perverse smile yet.

“That Sunlight Foundation is a strange group of folks huh? Scary scary scary.”

She crossed her arms as if beholding a master’s work of art at a gallery.

“So this is all conjecture from me, based on what we could extract from the machine’s computer, and going over the parts we were given as well as the spares that came with the damaged chassis.”

Then she began to lay out her interpretation of the art to the awaiting student.

First by pointing out the most obviously worrying feature.

“That arm is a miniature Agarthicite reactor. Except, rather than trying to capture the energy of the annihilation reaction and converting it in order to put it to good human use, all that arm needs to do is vent the annihilating force out onto a target. So it’s bulky for weapon, but significantly more compact than ordinary reactor infrastructure. Even within that use case, I’m baffled how they miniaturized a core ring to that degree while maintaining its structural integrity– but anyway. That higher chamber in the arm catalyzes the munition cartridge, which contains agarthicite and a sheet of material to trigger a reaction when certain conditions are met in the chamber. It’s like a reactor and a gun slapped together. After the reaction is triggered and the cartridge is consumed, at that point the reaction is directed by powerful magnetic fields and osmium shields out of the claw toward the target. This happens in a flash.”

She made a gesture with her hands, closing the fingers, then spreading them, moving her hands apart.

As if, between the gesturing hands, there was an expanding circle.

An Agarthicite sphere of annihilation, consuming all in its theoretical path. Gertrude understood.

“Frankly, I am not sure about the pseudophysics behind the reaction actually being able to travel to a target and smack it. It feels like it shouldn’t be possible once the reaction exits the claw and escapes the magnetic fields. Maybe it’s because of the trace amounts of matter in the water– but anyway.”

She clapped her hands together, shut her eyes, and resumed lecturing.

“Annihilation reactions depend on the amount of agarthicite used, its quality, the type of catalyzation and the resistance of the material being annihilated. So if I put a die-sized cube of very high grade agarthicite in a football size orb of Osmium and slam the whole thing into the ground, I’m inflicting violence on the agarthicite, which generates a strong reaction. But it’s got so much osmium to eat through, I’ll never see even a hint of purple. However, Agarthicite needs material to annihilate, or it will never react and yield its true power. Now, Gertrude, pop quiz time! What material can generate a reaction while offering the least possible resistance? Can you think of anything? Agarthicite only annihilates solid matter, you know.”

Gertrude was taken aback by the sudden audience participation.

“I think reactors use special nanocarbons? They’re part of the core ring fuel assembly.” She said.

“True! But, that’s a compromise for ease of manufacture and portability. There’s other possibilities.”

“I can’t imagine what. Stitcher carbon tubes are everywhere. You just have to process it.”

Monika grinned at Gertrude with a twisted delight and a dark glint in her eyes.

“Tissue. Human tissue for the most salient example.”

Gertrude was speechless, staring with a mixture of horror and disgust.

“What? That’s a pretty macabre joke Monika.”

Monika pointed over her shoulder at the rack next to the Jagdkaiser, containing a single cartridge.

“No way.” Gertrude said. “You can’t be serious.”

“Human sacrifice is indeed always an option.” Monika said. “Not only do our bodies have a good amount of carbon, they have tons of water. That water superheats during the annihilation reaction, it isn’t annihilated specifically, but it vaporizes, creating steam, heat. Energy that can actually be put to work.”

Monika gesticulated further, but this time the Inquisitor was hardly paying attention to interpreting it.

Gertrude tried to maintain her composure, but it was a titanic task in the face of what she was hearing.

“What is in the cartridge? Tell me now. I can’t believe you didn’t report this immediately.” She demanded.

Monika shrugged, unconcerned.

“After disassembling and putting it back together, I believe it contains human bio-carbon.”

“How the hell?” Gertrude said. “And why? Why would they do this?”

Monika bobbed her head to one side and stood on one leg. Her tail fiercely wagging.

“Carbons in particular are Agarthicite’s favorite meal. In reactors, carbon-based catalysts are introduced to an energy array to trigger a controlled reaction. It’s a good trade-off between the energy generated, the volatility of the reaction, and the cost in materials and processing. Agarthicite can ‘burn’ carbon cleanly and keep an entire civilization alive and warm almost perpetually. Human tissues are cheap and renewable however. They have just the right amount of carbon to make a violent but controllable reaction, without needing any processing. Simply put, humans burn good. It’s certainly an alternative!”

Gertrude had heard horrible legends about how, during the Age of Strife, superstitious and insane warlords fed people to reactors to try to keep them going after the collapse of civilization. She thought it must have been sensationalism– as if to say, look how ignorant and barbaric these people were, and how enlightened we are today. Look at how much progress we have made, and how much better we have it.

Now, she was staring right in the face of the most unconscionable barbarism–

“Whoever made this machine doesn’t give a wit about taboos. They’ll inflict any horror for science.”

“So– Inside that cartridge–“

Gertrude was nearly speechless at the thought. She had ordered this weapon to be fired!

And it contained–

Monika put both legs down on the ground again and stopped hopping.

“Human bio-carbon. I don’t know how they got it. It’s probably tissue cultures. That’d be the path of least resistance, and you could control the amount of carbon versus water. But it would also take a long time to grow the needed amount per cartridge. So who knows? Maybe the material was extracted from a willing donor or maybe it’s a human sacrifice. We can’t know. But that’s what we’re dealing with.”

Could Gertrude really let Ingrid pilot this evil machine?

Even if viewed only as a weapon, without moral constraints, it was exceedingly dangerous anyway.

“That machine also has a weird interface that assists in piloting it.” Monika continued her assessment. “Ingrid is not going to be able to use it completely, but it looks like it can work by pulse alongside a bio-port, like a prosthetic. I don’t know what it does and I’m hesitant to take it apart because we don’t have any spares for it. It might help Ingrid though. I talked with her and she agreed to hook herself up to the pulse-collector when piloting. It’s just little pads that attach to her wrists and temples, it should be fine.”

Selene Anahid, the previous pilot, was clearly unwell when she piloted the Jagdkaiser. She had been operating under the influence of drugs and psychological conditioning in order to enhance her synergy with the machine. Gertrude did not know all the details, only brief and vague explanations given by Norn. While Norn and Selene accepted this state of affairs, Gertrude didn’t want to subject Ingrid to that.

After what happened, and knowing what she did now, Gertrude was terrified of this machine.

Could it even be piloted safely at all?

Or did someone’s brain need to be as cooked as Selene’s to do so?

And each time that weapon fired– was it really consuming human material?

It was a weapon, it would kill people with every cartridge nonetheless, but this was still disturbing.

“Monika, will Ingrid be safe piloting this thing?” Gertrude said.

For once, Monika put on a serious face.

“Is she ever safe piloting a Diver, Commander?” She asked.

Gertrude wanted to shout at her for this brazen sophistry, but she held herself back.

Monika was just a blunt and unrestrained sort of person– and she was not wrong.

Ingrid risked her life every sortie. She was a soldier. Kill or be killed was the law that governed her duties.

“What if I put the question this way: will this machine traumatize or hurt her irreversibly?”

Gertrude sounded, for the first time, openly a bit desperate. Monika frowned at her.

“Commander, again, I have to say. Ingrid is a soldier. She is irreversibly traumatized already.”

This time Gertrude reflexively grabbed hold of Monika’s coat as if to shake her.

Her hands moved before she could stop herself, towering over the Engineer.

That sight of the smaller woman, her surprised face, and Gertrude’s powerful hand near her neck.

Once she realized what she had done, Gertrude’s expression softened, her eyes drew wide.

“I– I’m so sorry.” She whimpered.

She let go of Monika and took a step back, distraught. Her mind started spiraling.

It was barely seconds of aggression, but it caused her a staggering amount of sudden mental anguish.

Monika looked at her with a sad but understanding expression. “It’s fine, I get it. I’m sorry too.”

There wasn’t anything to get. Gertrude was an absolute, uncontrollable, evil monster–

–she had no right to judge the maker of that machine.

Not after everything she had done. And all that she was about to set out to do from here.

After all the people she hurt and was still hurting–

“I– I need to return to my quarters. Thank you, Monika. I leave the hangar to you.”

“Hey, Gertrude, please don’t–“

Without listening to Monika’s pleading, Gertrude turned and walked quickly to the elevator.

Keeping a stone face that finally broke when the elevator doors shut.


“You look glum again. C’mon, cheer up. We’ve got Pastete! If you’d let us have booze, we’d have a party!”

“We’re not having booze.”

“Okay, just for you, I’m going to throw a two-woman sober party. It’ll be lame as fuck, but it’ll be ours.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“You cracked a smile, you bitch, don’t pretend!”

Gertrude had indeed smiled. She couldn’t help it with Ingrid.

The Irmingard’s mess was its own little food court, with both cooks and vending machines. Long row tables in the center of the mess held the most people, but there were tables for four up against the walls of the mess, and Gertrude and Ingrid had taken one in a corner. For the day’s dinner, they had Bavarian Stew, broth-boiled pieces of dried beef with potatoes, pickled carrot and a touch of sweet cream. Ingrid’s eye had been caught by the side-dish, however, which consisted of margarine-buttered biscuits and pastete, a paste of boiled liver ground up with sweet onion and garnished with pickled garlic shreds.

At Ingrid’s behest, Gertrude mindlessly smeared some of the pastete on her biscuit and bit down.

To her surprise, it had a rather sweet and earthy flavor, with only a slight hint of the iron-like taste she associated with offal. Dry biscuit should have done the pastete no favors, but somehow the textural contrast worked to the point Gertrude could not imagine eating it with a softer bread or cracker. The rich, fatty paste complimented the salty, crumbly cracker-like biscuit and kept everything balanced. She understood Ingrid’s excitement, and the delight in her face as she tasted the pastete with spoon alone.

Her tail wagged so hard it was making noises. It was as if she was eating with her entire body.

“It’s better than I thought.” Gertrude said. Unable to muster that level of emotion.

Thump thump, went Ingrid’s tail. “You Imbrians don’t know how to eat. Offal is the taste of a hunt!”

She spooned more of the pastete into her mouth like a kid enjoying an ice cream or a sherbet.

“Liver gives you vigor! It makes you want to fight! It makes you want to fuck!” Ingrid cheered.

Gertrude smiled. “You could stand to have just a little less vigor, I think.”

“And an anemia patient like you should be eating this every day!” Ingrid said through a full mouth.

Both of them laughed. Gertrude tried the stew. It was a hearty blend of flavors, slightly sweet, slightly tangy, savory and rich. It had good mouthfeel, with the potatoes and carrots easily picked apart, just soft enough without becoming indistinct mush. Clearly the cooks had thought of how to try to bring some of the unctuousness that real stewing beef had, and which the dried-up beef could never possess. Sweet cream was an interesting idea, and the broth used as the base had a decent body to compliment.

Despite the disadvantages it faced, it still managed to taste like home.

Home–

Was that still Schwerin Island?

Not that she could ever go back there. Useless to even consider.

“Ingrid,”

Gertrude looked directly into Ingrid’s eyes. Her companion looked back, in the middle of eating.

“Hmm?”

“Are you really going to pilot the Jagdkaiser?”

Ingrid stared at her, while swallowing all the food she had stuffed in her cheeks.

She washed it down with some vitamin drink, and wiped her mouth.

She sighed.

“Is that what’s got you down now? You’re so fucking fragile.”

“I– What–?”

Gertrude did not imagine that particular response.

“Do you trust me?” Ingrid asked, arms crossed, pouting.

“Of course I do!” Gertrude protested.

“No you don’t, because if you did, you wouldn’t be spiraling out over this.”

“I’m not spiraling out.” Gertrude asserted. “I’m concerned. That thing is dangerous.”

“Everything we’re doing is dangerous.”

Not that type of rhetoric again. Was this just how Loup approached everything?

“I’m afraid of this machine warping you– making you not yourself.” Gertrude said.

It took a lot for her to reach into herself and pull out and expose that anxiety.

For a moment Ingrid paused. Her expression softened. Her words became less sharp.

“‘Trude, I don’t know what you went through with Norn, but you’ve known me for how many years now? Nothing is going to happen to me. Piloting a different machine won’t change me or how I feel. I promise you I will be careful. Like, fuck, I’m doing this for you. I want to be able to protect you. I saw the data, the stuff this machine can do is crazy. Even if I think Norn can go fuck herself, the Jagdkaiser is too useful.”

An impulse took over Gertrude in that moment, and she said the first thing she thought of.

“What if you didn’t have to fight? What if you could just stay here for me?”

Ingrid’s eyes drew wide. Even Gertrude, after she was done speaking, realized how scandalous it was.

It did represent her honest feelings.

She could not bear losing Ingrid.

“What the hell? That’s so cute.” Ingrid recomposed herself and grinned at her.

“I– I might’ve gone too far–“

“Nah, you’re finally being honest. Look, being the homefront housewife is not my style.”

It really wasn’t– and Gertrude knew that part of what she loved about Ingrid was her gallantry.

Ingrid was a warrior. In her own way, she really was an old-school Loup hunter.

She was determined to fight to prove her strength and gain respect, status and accolades.

Somehow the Iron Lady had ended up the village that bore witness to her deeds.

If Gertrude tried to smother that wildness out of her– then Ingrid would really not be herself.

“Sorry.” Gertrude said. “I’ve been really stupid. You’re right.”

“Talking about it is how we get it fixed. So I’m glad you finally let me know your feelings.”

She reached out and patted Gertrude’s shoulder.

“I’m going to get so strong, Gertrude, you won’t have to worry about me ever.” Ingrid said.

War wasn’t about any one person’s strength.

That meant, to protect Ingrid, Gertrude also had to become stronger. All of them did.

She would not say that to Ingrid however. It would have ruined the mood.

“I believe in you.” Gertrude said instead.

Ingrid had no snappy comeback. She smiled gently and girlishly and accepted Gertrude’s words.


Depth Gauge: 2100m

Gertrude slept alone that night.

She and Ingrid both knew they had been too boisterous lately and people were talking.

No more midnight rendezvous for a while. It would only distract from the operation.

Laying in an empty bed again, Gertrude immediately missed the feeling of a warm body beside her.

“When did I become so needy?”

Her brain responded, ever so helpfully–

Since–

Vogelheim.

When she took Elena’s virginity.

Gertrude raised her hands to her face, gritting her teeth, cringing.

“God damn it.”

She was not about to stay up all night with these thoughts. She would drive herself crazier than she was.

Reaching out to her nightstand, she withdrew a bottle of sleeping aid pills.

She took one with a cup of water she kept on her nightstand as well, and dropped back in her lavish bed.

Spreading her arms only punctuated how alone she was. So she curled up tight under the sheets.

With the help of the drugs and her environment, Gertrude’s mind went quickly dark.

Drifting into nothingness as if falling and falling, a comfortable lack of gravity, suspension.

Freed from reality, freed in the truest sense. Floating without care for course, without need of agency.

Behind her shut eyelids she saw a road of colors upon which her consciousness drifted along.

Ferried as if by a million soft little hands, downriver to a great waterfall of colors.

Splashes of light in a great welcoming dark where she was bare and free. Free in every way.

Slowly, the colors dimmed, just a little, and the shadows faded into a stark white sky.

That sky became solid– it was not sky at all but the great white crowns of hundreds of trees interlinked, their branches and leaves making up the visible firmament. Absolutely titanic trunks of white and silver stone grooved as if through erosion brought hundreds of tiny rivulets of water from the heavens to a muddy, dark earth below. Down to this forest, she drifted, upon the oft-bending streams of color that ran in the air visible like expressions of the breeze. Thick roots that glowed gently purple tore into the earth between the trees and made up most of the geography of the forest floor in grand size and complexity.

Like cave echoes, cheerful waves reverberated between the trees, their whispering, their conversation.

They were a community, and they were happy to have a visitor.

Peaceful Place. Restful Place. Sweet Dreams.

They cheered, welcomed, in their own way. Their voices spoke directly into the senses.

But they were not alone–

In the distance, in a rare clearing between all of the trees, amid tiny red algae and scuttling crabs–

Two figures stood across from each other. One figure was gray and silver-haired, while the other was starkly white, with flowing red hair and a single horn jutting out of the side of her head. Clad in an ornate white robe, in contrast with the grey and black dress on her counterpart. The yellow over black eyes of the white figure dilated with hatred for the grey one, she grit her teeth, and inky, roiling black color expanded out from her. All other colors began to gather around her feet like snakes about to bite the grey figure.

“What are you doing here? You foul, corrupted thing! Don’t pretend as if you are worthy of this place!”

Castigating words reverberated from the white figure, silencing the happy whispering of the trees.

Without word, the grey figure withdrew and brandished a blade at the white one in response.

A blade upon which the colors gathered, as if to meet the tendrils forming around the white being.

Gertrude stood in the middle of this scene, in the middle of both sides, gathered there–

Acknowledged–

And when she was seen and when she saw herself for what was–

She bolted awake.

Gasping for breath inside the metal walls of her bedroom–

“ALERT KONRAD! ALERT KONRAD!”

Red lights began to flash in her room. Karin Schicksal’s voice sounded in the room.

Alert Konrad was–

Combat.

In the next instant, as she leaped from bed to hastily don her uniform, a message from the bridge came through. Gertrude quickly acknowledged it and scanned the contents in glances while dressing.

Once she grasped the entire meaning of the message, she paused for a moment.

Warships from the Empire of Veka were approaching Kesar’s Gorge at combat speed.

One particular ship had been detected from a previous All-Navy profile: the cruiser Aranjagaan.

Flagship of Veka’s security division– a ship that Gertrude knew.

She had intelligence on a particular person for whom this ship had become her flag during this Civil War.

“No fucking way.”

Gertrude was briefly staggered by the circumstances. Her luck– and that of a certain sad little group of strays who once shared their most precious days together at the Luxembourg School For Girls–

–their luck was rotten to the very core.


“Approach at combat speed. Target only with light guns. Fire for effect, avoid direct hits. We want to take them alive. We need to determine if they know more about this facility than the mercenaries do.”

Three vessels detached from the task force to pursue the fleeing criminal, whose escape craft had risen suddenly from a secret hangar about a kilometer from the site of the operation. Led by the cruiser Aranjagaan, with two Frigates for support, the flotilla began to give chase. In the background, the Task Force’s remaining twenty ships loomed over a depression in the silt plains where an illegal bio-laboratory had been operating. Wreckage from several Divers and some Katarran mercenary ships littered the plains.

Instruments predicted the path of the escapee– that it may attempt to lose them in Kesar’s Gorge.

“We won’t allow these cretins to do what they want in Vekan territory! Go after them!”

On the bridge of the Aranjagaan, the order to pursue was reaffirmed by a chief Vekan enforcer.

This woman was a young, chestnut brown-haired Shimii named Victoria van Veka.

Little did she know that this Vekan security operation was about to get mightily more complicated for her.

Both professionally and personally.


A woman with an infernal passion burning in her chest–

A secret a million years kept, and another kept a mere thousand–

What will be discovered in the extreme, forgotten depths of the world?

We can only descend further, enduring the deepening weight of history

Even if the truth of our pain is buried ten thousand meters below.

KNIGHT IN THE RUINS OF THE END


Previous ~ Next

Surviving An Evil Time [10.5]

For a few minutes, Homa drifted in reverent silence through the open ocean.

Outside her cockpit, through the cameras, she could see the bubbles from her exhaust trailing up, she could see the water rushing as she descended, and the bodies of the towers growing larger and farther around her. So she knew she was falling. She had a smile on her face, she could not help but be happy. Encased in metal armor, out in the water, free from the station’s confines.

When the feet of her stripped-down Volker mech touched ground, she pressed down the pedals to engage the hydrojets and accelerated toward the base of Tower 7, where her target was.

Homa’s every muscle brimmed with excitement.

When she was in the Diver, she felt bigger, stronger, freer than ever.

Everything was quieter, too. But she wasn’t just alone with her thoughts. Controlling the machine with the sticks, the pedals, the switches, and triggers, glancing across her monitors and the instrument panels, switching cameras. She was engaged the whole time, working as if with her whole body in rapid succession, but the task was peaceful, almost relaxing, as it frequently occupied all of her faculties.

“Homa– you– hear me?”

Emma’s voice was scratchy, cutting in and out, but Homa could technically still hear her.

The headphones slotted into the fluff of her cat-like ears were connected to the Volker’s acoustic and laser-channel digital communications system. Depending on which could provide the most fidelity, the computer would switch between them automatically. The audio quality going to hell meant that Homa was far enough away now from the laser router at B.S.W to switch to acoustic data transmission. This was basically decoding long-distance soundwaves as a digital signal, from sound to bits and bytes.

Transfer rates over acoustic data protocol were atrocious.

“Barely.” Homa replied.

“Oh–”

Homa knew Emma well enough to fill in her characteristic ‘oh dear’.

She was Bertrand’s secretary, but she was a licensed sonar, radio, and laser/acoustic router operator, so when Homa went out on the Diver to work in the water, Emma was always the voice in her ears. For worker safety, Emma was supposed to fill in Homa on any weather updates from the station, or on any traffic that might be headed her way. But Bertrand cheaped out on his laser router, so most of the time, Homa could barely hear Emma unless the job was at base of the Kreuzung core tower.

Today, Homa was headed out to pry open a stuck runoff gate at the base of Tower 7.

Dockyards got jobs like these from time to time, dockworkers called them ‘gigs.’

Money was money. Getting a gig like this was more marks in her pocket.

Her rent was paid, but her conviction to leave Kreuzung was still as sharp as ever.

For that, she needed money and a lot of it. No two ways about it.

“Don’t sweat the small stuff! I’ll finish this and be back soon!” Homa said.

She was sure only every other word of that got through to Bertrand’s.

Between the towers Homa traveled over slushy dirt, made up of the same raining marine biomass that made up the marine fog swirling around her. There were many animals, pale or transparent, soft-bodied, abyssal fish and crustaceans and worms, congregating on the remains of larger animals from brighter waters that had drifted from above and made it into the Kreuzung sea floor.

There was no way to move in her great machine without disturbing these natural sites. Clouds of fish and krill felt water displace around the area and leaped defensively away, before returning to the carcasses in which they made their livelihoods once Homa moved far enough way from them. Out in the water, there was so much more life than anyone would ever see just staring out the sea viewing windows in the Kreuzung complex. It was easy to think the world outside was entirely dead. Walking through the Kreuzung seafloor, Homa got a firsthand view at everything they shared the crater with.

Somehow, while the people were all trapped in ships and stations, life teemed out here.

And up above, from where all the food for these beings fell continuously from the sky.

Homa peered toward heaven, and all her floodlights illuminated was more marine fog.

Brown dust suspended in dark water, and the distant, looming shadows of towers and their bridges. Allah and the promise of heaven. It was far out of her sight, infinitely beyond her reach. At the bottom of the Kreuzung crater she was 2500 meters from the surface. To think, even then, that there were human beings even deeper. Some parts of the complex, deeper underground, went as far as 4000 meters.

Nothing habitable– just old maintenance tunnels and mining shafts, Homa had heard.

Sometimes, when she piloted, she marveled at the enormity of what surrounded her.

But she also felt strangely powerful. She felt a thrill in the center of her chest.

Because she was out here, walking this forbidden land in her suit of armor.

As bad as she sometimes felt for the fish– she felt better than ever about herself.

Closer to each tower, the muddy, biomass-heavy earth was replaced with the steel base plate for the tower. Some of these rings contained massive entrances into underground spaces, but others were just there to provide anchor points and power supply inputs for heavy equipment. There were slots on the floor in places, contact points where construction modules could be attached to power huge cranes or massive underwater welding gear which could be used to repair or replace exterior plates on the tower. There were ships that could repair station towers too, truly massive ones that plugged into the baseplates, Homa had learned about them in school. That was neither here nor there though.

For Homa, at that moment, it only meant she was gliding over steel, rather than soil.

Slowly, the marine fog lifted as she closed in on the structure and she could see the varied man-made geometry of the exterior of Tower 7’s base. The runoff gate she was commissioned to pry open was dead ahead, its indentation in the tower wall visible once Homa got close enough with her Diver.

There were four handholds on the exterior of the gate in case it needed to be forced open, but it was otherwise a door that slid out when enough water was pumped through the connecting chute to force it open. This particular gate, Homa was told, was one of the places water was periodically pumped out to in order to empty the station’s desalination pipelines so they could be cleaned or replaced. When it became stuck, the pipes and tanks couldn’t be fully emptied. It was a quick and dirty job to go out in the water and get it open, so it was contracted out to any company with a Diver. That way the maintenance crews in Kreuzung would not have to keep, train, or assume liability for any Diver pilots and their gear.

“I’m at the site. I’ll just get this cracked open and be back shortly.”

Fuzzy gibberish came through in response. Homa slowed and stopped before the gate.

Technically it would have been possible for Homa to connect to Tower 7 itself and route back to Bertrand’s that way. She could have talked to Emma and had any guidance whatsoever from her; but B.S.W would have assumed the cost of the data transfers and she would have gotten yelled at for it. So instead Homa just assumed nobody would hear her if she died screaming in the open waters.

Not that anything would happen at this point.

She pushed her sticks forward, engaging the finger switches to spread and close the digits on the Diver’s hand. She grabbed hold of two of the handholds on the gate door and pulled back her control sticks to pull with just the mechanical force of the arms. This had no immediate effect, the runoff gate remained shut. Homa angled her hydrojets away and slowly ramped up the thrust, pulled up and back, feet leaving the ground as the current cycling through the machine lifted her completely off the base plate.

Despite the amount of force being applied, the gate remained firmly shut.

“Ugh, this is really stuck!”

Bertrand didn’t want her to use the solid fuel boosters if at all possible. Solid fuel was a misnomer — it was just what people came to call power generation other than agarthic batteries. In this case, the “solid fuel” was actually liquid– they could burn anything that burned, depending on the kind of boosters equipped. Bertrand filled theirs with diesel because it was cheap, but cheap wasn’t free. With a few licks of solid fuel boosting she could have had this open in an instant. She was starting to think she had no other choice, however. She had not come with any tools, just the vibromachete on the magnetic strip.

Cutting through the runoff gate was of course not an option.

“Well! I don’t have a choice! Hey, Emma, if you can hear, I’m hitting a booster.”

Her left hand moved instinctually toward a button panel in front of her, in order to flip open a plastic cap enclosing the trigger that unlocked the solid fuel boosters. On normal Divers the boosters were immediately accessible from buttons on the stick or pedals, but Bertrand installed a mechanism to lock those controls and then put a plastic box over it to really make Homa think about using fuel.

As soon as she unlocked the booster, however, she was alerted to sudden movement–

On her monitors there was a flashing red box placed by the computer over the runoff gate–

Which burst suddenly open, ejecting a cloud of salt residue and water stuck inside.

Unveiling flashing red eyes and a long, eerie shadow–

Homa rapped the buttons on her sticks that engaged solid fuel boost and thrust upward.

She felt her cockpit rattle as something lunged past and slammed into one of the feet.

This threw her off but not enough to completely lose control. She tried to get her bearings.

Glancing at one of her secondary monitors showed her one of the underside cameras. On the feed, there was the long, dark form of a creature about twice the height of her Diver in length, but slightly thinner. A bulbous main body like a huge four-part jaw that attached to a sack for the eyes and brain, tapering into a tail with yellow biological lights glowing across it. Two structures on the rear end of the sack-like portion of the body ejected water and dirt– bio-hydrojets, fed water from the enormous mouth and from four sets of gills on the sides and top of the sack. That meant this eel-like being was a Leviathan.

Twisting around, its jaws and four malicious eyes atop its sack-body suddenly faced her.

“Leviathan! Emma! Leviathan!” Homa cried out.

Jerking her control sticks, Homa faced down the creature, trying to gauge its next move.

A red targeting box drawn around it by the predictive computer, labeled the creature.

Gulp-class, a “lifeboat” level Leviathan. Fourteen meters long.

Had it been hiding in the runoff gate? For how long? How did it get in there?

It must have been holding it shut until Homa disturbed it.

Now it was clearly aggravated.

Engaging its hydrojets and the muscles on its tail, the Gulp-class lunged at Homa.

Rows and rows of vibrating silver teeth gleamed inside its enormous, distending maw.

Monomolecular edges, each one, just like her machete.

They would shred the unarmored Volker. Homa once more launched herself aside.

“Emma! Emergency! Leviathan!”

Homa repeated words, rather than phrases, hoping something would get through.

But there was nothing but static on the acoustic network or laser messaging.

The Gulp-class lunged past her, but this time it slammed its tail at her as it went.

Her entire cockpit rattled and shook, Homa clinging to her controls with a deathly grip.

Gritting her teeth, eyes racing between monitors, heart pounding.

She could connect to Tower 7, but she needed her hands and concentration on avoiding the attacks, she could not work on the computer to swap connections and ask for help. After sweeping past her, the Gulp-class seemed to have learned something from its short-ranged and sudden leaps, and instead gathered momentum by swimming away into the marine fog and doubling back.

“No, no– this is– this can’t be–”

Homa’s vision swam, her undershirt clung to her cold sweating chest.

Her limbs tensed and shook, her feet shook hard enough to tap her pedals.

Shrill screeching roars sounded the violence hurtling her away.

As the monster threw itself forward, Homa shrank away from it with her whole body.

Forward boosters threw her aside the charging, snapping jaw.

Three vibrating teeth grazed the exterior forearm of her Volker, scratching the metal.

And the body disappeared again into the fog, twisting to resume attack.

Had those teeth caught on a pushrod she would have been without an arm.

“No no no no no!”

Was this how she was going to die? All alone out in the ocean, torn out of a Diver by a screeching monster, screaming her heart out without a soul to hear? Every centimeter of her skin was brimming with anxiety, she felt her heart like bass echoing through her pores, into her roiling gut. She could not unclench her jaw and her fingers shook wildly enough on her controls to make up a drumbeat. Flooding tears stung her eyes and clouded her vision. She could not feel her tail.

If even one of those teeth dug deep enough her entire body would be extruded–

Teeth–

–dug,

“I’m– I’m not going to die here! I’m going to escape this place! I’ll escape! Damn you!”

Homa shouted herself hoarse and drew her vibromachete from the magnetic strip.

It was just large enough to hold in both hands like a short sword.

On her monitors a red box indicated the resurgence of the Gulp-class and its heading.

Homa engaged all thrust, throwing itself into the Gulp-class’ charge.

Holding her sword from the shoulder and thrusting with all her might and momentum.

Crashing into the Leviathan’s fat snout and driving the sword between its four eyes.

Its distended jaw slackened from the attack and could not close around her Volker.

Hysterical, Homa pounded her feet on her pedals, tugged her sticks. “Die! Fucking die!”

Furiously tearing across the soft palate and nostril, Homa drove her sword back out. In the wake of her cutting edge issued a geyser of red biomass. The mildly buzzing vibration of the monster’s teeth died out, its jets sputtered and clogged with gore, the mutilated body sank slowly away from the Diver. Coming to fall upon the tower base plate, where curious, wandering krill and shrimp convened.

Homa watched, heaving breath, eyes incredulous, as all the tiny creatures invisibly lost upon the surface of the tower base plate showed themselves. Visible in contrast with the dark body of the Leviathan, they started picking apart the corpse. To them, it did not matter whether it fell to the brown earth or to the metallic plate surface. It was a needed injection of life-sustaining biomass.

Something about the sight of the creature that had brought her so much fear, being so easily colonized by the bottom feeders, left Homa speechless. That feeding frenzy of dozens of creatures the size of one of her fingers, playing about below. Her tears continued to flow, but she fell back upon her chair, releasing her sticks, her feet slack on the pedals. Catching her breath, holding her necklace reflexively. She had fallen back into the habit of doing that, from when she was a kid.

This Is Life.

Homa– did not think that.

It felt like it came from the place of her thoughts but–

It was as if– she heard a voice–?

A very gentle– very soothing voice–?

“Homa! Come in! We bought laser access! Are you okay? Did you say Leviathan? Homa!”

Emma’s voice. Homa was snapped out of her reverie by a crisp call from B.S.W.

She almost wanted to shout back for Emma and Bertrand to go fuck themselves.

But she valued her job– she needed the money.

Homa needed the money to get out of this hellish place. Before it killed her.

So despite the swelling emotion rushing over her body like a shower of stress–

She politely explained what happened.

“Solceanos defend you Homa! Oh gosh! We’re so glad you’re okay!”

Homa practically heard the next words said before they were spoken and braced for them.

“We’ll talk about the fuel and all that when you get back. Be safe, okay?”

Mildly different than what she thought, but still. She grit her teeth.

With the runoff gate forced open and the Leviathan killed, the job was done.

“Bertrand should try to wring some more money out of them for the Leviathan.” She said.

“Oh he will! Don’t you worry!” Emma replied cheerfully.

Homa engaged her hydrojets again, gliding just off of the sea floor. She could have moved faster now that Emma was paying to talk to her, since she would know if there was any traffic. But out of force of habit, she took her time getting back to Bertrand’s to have a stern, frustrating chat about her use of fuel to save her own life from a violent death. Another day at the office.


After Homa left Bertrand’s office and finally found a moment’s peace, she pulled out her phone and found a few messages from Imani Hadžić. She stared at the mails in disbelief for a few minutes. Because she could see the previews in the notification bubbles, she knew only two messages, the first and last, contained nothing but black hearts. However, the other mails had actual content to them, so Homa took a bathroom break in order to read them in private and respond.

“Ho~ma~” began the most substantial message, “During your work, please keep an eye on Kitty McRoosevelt for me. Make idle conversation and try to get her to speak on current events or local politics if you can. Let her run her mouth. If she asks you for any favors, such as hiding or moving things from her yacht, comply promptly and let her use you. Report to me any such events, as well as any names, places, or times she mentions, for example, if she talks about going on dates or being indisposed on certain times. Earn her trust, be compliant to her requests, but take care of yourself. She cannot be allowed to suspect you. If she tries to harm you, do anything that you can to contact me.”

That message, too, ended with a little black heart.

Homa typed up a quick response from the bathroom.

“Will do. Are you okay?”

By the time she was back outside, she would find that this message had been responded to:

“You’re sweet.”

Homa took that to mean Imani was indeed okay.

And despite her complicated feelings toward Imani, she felt relief, nonetheless.

All of the rest of Imani’s messages were just her being needy or sending black hearts.

For all that she said she wouldn’t demand immediate answers, Imani harassed her anyway.

Her slate would have been buzzing nonstop had Homa not been out in the Diver.

Despite having that near-death experience, she still had half the workday to go.

Bertrand’s profits stopped for no one.

“Homa! Our little hero!”

On the dockyard, seated atop barrels of ship coating gel and fluid next to Kitty’s yacht, Becker and Aicher cheered Homa’s return. Becker had one of Bertrand’s portables in hand and showed Homa the footage they extracted from the Diver. Homa felt her stomach turn for a moment at the sight of herself shouting ‘Die! Fucking die!’ while butchering the Leviathan. It was too surreal.

“Crazy piloting out there Homa! Schecter could have never done this!” Becker said.

“I’m glad he didn’t go out then.” Homa sighed. Imagining an even more tragic scene.

“My time on patrol didn’t coincide with a lot of Diver stuff.” Becker said. “But even I can tell Homa, your reflexes are amazing! And that charge? You’re made of stern stuff little lady.”

“I was just freaking out. I’d have really rather not had to fight for my life at all.”

“Well, look at this way. Yes, you cost old Bertrand a little bit money short term for all the fuel, but long term, you’ve proven you’ve got skills Homa! Bertrand won’t have to worry about sending you out anymore. I bet once his fuel cost is covered up, you’ll have a promotion coming!”

Becker’s continued gushing caused Homa’s ears and tail to droop in embarrassment.

“Hell, Homa should just take off of here and join the navy. Better money there!”

Aicher was joking, but Becker quickly shot him a glare.

“No, Homa shouldn’t go near the navy, Aicher! It’s not managed right these days.”

“Didn’t think I’d ever hear that out of you old Beck. I thought you loved the navy.”

Becker’s expression darkened. “Not these days. It’s not– it’s not run right anymore.”

Homa knew what he meant. She recalled their earlier conversation.

The Volkisch Movement was in charge of the Navy now.

But Homa didn’t know that she could agree that the Navy was ever “run right.”

After talking with Imani, she didn’t know whether any part of the world was “run right.”

And after today, she knew she didn’t want to be anywhere near a fight again.

Thankfully, Becker and Aicher ran themselves out of steam on this topic pretty soon.

Soon Homa was left to begin the work on the yacht.

First she was tasked with the exterior, which would take a few days. She had to remove any old coating in order to insure that any new coating was applied evenly. That meant dousing the exterior with a thinner chemical, using a plastic wiper to peel off all the coating; shining, polishing and painting the bare metal and filling any dents or scratches; and then applying the new coating in layers, waiting for each layer to set. Each layer would take, by Emma and Bertrand’s calculations, about eight hours to set. So that meant it took half as much time in reality– but it did extend the work schedule by several more days.

Staring at the massive yacht in front of her, Homa recalled Imani’s message.

If she was supposed to be snitching on Kitty, that meant Kitty was also alive and around.

So Imani and her had not killed each other on that night in Ballad’s Paradise.

Homa internally berated herself for having such a stupid idea in the first place.

Of course these spy games were a lot more complicated than shootouts in public places.

Donning a plastic mask and putting a pair of plastic sheets over her ears, Homa popped a cap off one of the barrels and firmly affixed a hose to it. That hose she connected to her chemical sprayer, and set herself to work, hosing down the stock livery of Kitty’s yacht and with it, the old layers of coating. With a 40 meter long and 13 meter tall yacht there was a lot of hull to hose down.

Her sprayer could launch a jet of chemical as high up as the yacht’s bridge and even higher, but to do things safely and smartly, Homa had the nozzle set very tight, and instead used a personal elevator to get up higher. Standing close to the hull, she lifted her platform to the section she was working on and sprayed a cone of chemicals at a low speed, to get a thin film over the hull, enough to wear away at the old coating without wasting product or spraying it everywhere. This method also took more time, which was probably the actual reason that the company did it this way.

When she was done with most of the port-side prow section, she elevated herself almost on top of the deck, and saw over it, in time to spot the bulkhead door into B.S.W opening and admitting a woman into the path toward the main dockyard. Heels clacked on the steel floor, and the approaching woman threw her blond hair and waved at Homa when she saw her over the yacht. On that day she was dressed in a blue blouse with a deep v-neck, and a tight, ruffled yellow skirt, but still wore her distinctive coat.

Kitty McRoosevelt, all smiles, had come to pay them a visit again.

“It’s fine if I look over your shoulder, isn’t it?” She asked, shouting up at Homa.

Comply promptly.

“It’s fine! It’s your money!” Homa replied. “But put on a disposable face mask!”

Safety first. Homa was spraying chemicals everywhere after all.

And she supposed it would be bad if Kitty McRoosevelt had to go to the hospital.

For Homa at least, if not for Imani Hadžić.

Now that Kitty was physically around and watching her from below with her back to a barrel of coating thinners with a little face mask on, fully integrated into the surroundings– Homa had to think about how she was going to get her to talk. Clearly Imani was not just going to come down here and cuff her. So there must have been something Imani wanted Homa to learn from Kitty before arresting her, or something that she wanted Kitty to do. But Homa had no idea, and she was not the biggest social butterfly in the world, so she had no idea how to extract it from her.

And of course, far be it for Imani not to be frustratingly cryptic and actually tell Homa anything.

“Have you ever thought of just blasting the side of the hull from down here?” Kitty asked.

“Huh? Uh, no, that’d be super dangerous. This stuff is really toxic.” Homa said.

She pointed a finger at her chemical sprayer, and Kitty nodded her head.

“Well, I’m glad they’re thinking about your safety around here.” Kitty said.

“I mean, yours too. You should back off a bit more. You don’t have a zip-up suit like me.”

Kitty heeded Homa’s warning and backed up from the yacht– but only a few steps more.

“It’s really impressive how you’re the only woman here. It’s such a male-dominated field.”

“Ah, it’s not really that hard. My co-workers are all super old guys. They can still do it.”

Despite trying not to feel flattered, Homa’s little tail began fluttering in its protective bag.

While Homa worked, Kitty remained near the site, often asking questions about the process or about the equipment Homa was using. These would be interspersed with questions about Homa personally, every so often. “So how old are you kid?” “How long have you worked here?” “How was vocational school?” “Do you guys get lunch breaks? You’ve been at it for a while!”

Homa had curt answers. She was engaged in work, and it was a little bit annoying.

However, she did feel a bit flattered. Even though it must have been part of Kitty’s scheme.

Few people ever took so much interest in what she was doing.

By the end of her shift, she had spent hours with Kitty, and she felt exhausted as she waved the crew goodbye and shambled up the ramp toward the elevator and the journey home. It was like she had done twice as much work today as normal. She almost forgot to account for the fact that she had survived being eaten by a monster. It had been an eventful day and the first many, as Kitty would start visiting the dockworkers every single day, punctuating Homa’s blurry days of eating, sleeping, and working with an intrusive but not always unpleasant or unwelcome burst of color.

Kitty was not alone in disrupting Homa’s life, however.

That afternoon, as Homa exited into the pavilion, she saw new digital signage up on every shop window, and the coming-and-going crowds of busy people began to pool in front of shops, some with their portables out, others asking strangers if they knew or had heard anything about this. On the shops, the signs read ‘Dynamic pricing in effect’. When Homa approached a shop that had sweaters for sale on the front window, she saw, for the first time, a price tag’s number fluctuate before settling on a slightly higher price than before. That sweater’s price rose by 26 Imperial Mark right before her eyes.

It was not a big change, and it did not happen often– Homa kept looking for a few minutes but did not personally see another price change that night, but she thought, it must be happening all over the shopping center, probably with more dramatic effects.

What did it mean?

On the tram, Homa sent Imani a mail. She was part of the government, wasn’t she?

“Imani, the shops in Kreuzung have ‘Dynamic Pricing’ now. Did something happen?”

She received an answer as soon as she got off the tram.

“Yeah, something happened.”

This woman–!

Gritting her teeth by herself on the elevator, Homa sent another message.

“Can you tell me what happened, Imani?”

This one did not receive an answer. Not right away, anyway.

Homa looked around the Shimii market, but there was no ‘Dynamic Pricing’ there– yet.

She stopped by Hasim’s for some more marrow bones and another bag of cabbage.

Paying careful attention to the condition of his wares– everything looked normal.

Those beef cubes must have really been selling out a lot.

“Hasim, has it been tough to source beef lately?” Homa asked.

“Ah, looking to pry into my business secrets, miss Baumann?” Hasim joked.

That was his good-natured way of suggesting she not ask that question.

Nevertheless, she satisfied her own anxiety. The Shimii shops weren’t out of goods.

Prices hadn’t changed either. Yet.

So what was happening in the core station? Homa felt perplexed.

After she returned home she immediately tapped on the wall twice to bring up the launcher and tapped the icon for the television. She already had the news channel playing. While she took off her jumpsuit a few commercials played advertising for Volwitz Foods’ latest ready-meals, for data plans for portables, Epoch Clothiers’ new line of all-vinyl see-through clothing, and finally, the news anchor reappeared on screen. Homa sat in her underwear, on the edge of her bed, ears twitching and tail swishing freely from the back of her shorts, awaiting any pertinent news.

Finally, after a few local puff pieces and some reminders that a murder happened recently, the anchor introduced a colleague who was at a massive wholesaler warehouse. Three enormous cargo elevators were packed full to bursting, and there were a lot of people buzzing around in the background as the camera panned over. The warehouse itself, for all the people in it, looked pretty empty of actual goods. Homa had never seen a place like this, but she assumed the stuff that got brought into Kreuzung from the agrispheres and factories had to be kept somewhere–

“We’ve never seen anything like this!” the reporter said excitedly, “Volwitz’ wholesalers all over Kreuzung have been posting massive delays in returning stock, and its led to a feeding frenzy of ship suppliers rushing in with their bulk orders. In all my years of covering the shipping biz I’ve never seen a warehouse this empty–” the reporter caught sight of a dark haired woman near one of the elevators, clipboard in hand, coordinating a series of forklifts full of crated-up food. He approached her, using a handheld remote to maneuver his drone camera around the other side of her. A dirty trick to make people feel trapped into an interview. Homa saw this often in this news channel.

“Ma’am looks like you made off good before the warehouse got ransacked! What’s your name? Do you work for a ship in port around here? Did you have any idea it’d be this crazy?”

“Um.” The woman stared awkwardly into the drone camera. She was rather pretty, her lips and eyes lightly reddened with makeup. Her uniform looked familiar too. She had a motherly sort of look to her, Homa thought. “I’m– Minardo. I am a ship victualer. I had no idea it would be this busy. I suppose I got lucky? I’m just trying to do my job here.” The drone camera hovered closer and she shooed it away.

Homa thought her Low Imbrian sounded pretty weird– definitely not from the region.

“Got any wisdom for the viewers at home on what these wholesale shortages might mean?”

Again the drone camera got closer to Minardo’s face– meeting a gaze full of killing intent.

Homa thought it looked like when Madame Arabie got mad–

“Leave me alone already!”

In the next instant the drone camera was on the floor and the reporter was shouting.

“No! I have freedom of the press! I was just trying to get some man-on-the-street–!”

As soon as the video cut away to an embarrassed-looking anchor in the studio, Homa felt a buzzing transfer through her bed, across the sheets. Homa realized the only person it could be and practically dove to the other end of the bed to pick it up. It wasn’t a call, however, but a mail, from Imani Hadžić.

She had responded to Homa’s earlier inquiry in much more detail now.

“Rhineanmetalle’s consumer brands have temporarily formed a cartel with Volwitz Foods and Epoch Clothiers, colluding to reduce output sold specifically to Kreuzung core. The cartel is trying to collectively turn the public against further labor strikes and break the strike in Kreuzung through economic shock. It’s a play by the fuhrer Adam Lehner using his influence over the capitalists. Volwitz and Epoch Clothiers were both majority-owned by liberal stakeholders who have since been targeted by the Volkisch. They are in no position to refuse for now. Supplies won’t run out entirely, one hopes, but prices will go wild.”

Homa read the mail twice, trying to pick apart every word for comprehension. She mostly understood it– a bunch of the big brands were refusing to sell to Kreuzung as revenge for the Rhineanmetalle strikes so that people would be scared off from supporting the strikers. Despite this, she still wrote and sent a mail to Imani, her skin tingling with anxiety, that read– “What does that mean for us Imani?”

Her eyes remained glued to the portable for almost ten minutes.

Fingers quivering over the cold metal.

What does that mean for her? Would she be okay?

Then, finally another mail from Imani arrived.

“Together, the cartel represents 63% of all goods sold in Kreuzung. About the Shimii in Tower Eight: a few people like Leija Kladuša have the authority and ability to import goods produced by Shimii in other stations per certain agreements and will continue to make these available. But doing some quick back of the paw math, 43% of consumption by Shimii in Tower Eight is of cartelized goods. There’ll be shortages, especially in food. Volwitz products account for over half the Shimii’s food consumption. It’s only in local textiles and hygiene products that we begin to see a gap in local goods over cartelized goods.”

Leija– that was Madame Arabie’s name. Leija Kladuša. Few people knew it.

Madame Arabie brought in poppy from outside Kreuzung and refined it into drugs.

Homa knew this was the most lucrative pillar of her criminal Empire.

Rich Imbrians loved the heroin and the even stronger and less cut up opium she produced.

That drug money funded a lot of the Madame’s less pernicious pursuits.

There was another buzz, and a third mail appeared from Imani shortly thereafter.

“Without goods to buy, money is useless. Restaurants will get more expensive soon. While you still can, buy a bag of flour, a thing of vegetable oil and buy zlatla. You know what it is right? Western Shimii love the stuff. Half cup water + zlatla + a cup flour, mix dough in a bowl, oil the dough, and fry. Three a day to stay alive. If you can’t fry, put the bowl near your room heater, add a bit more water, cover with a plate, to steam a dumpling. If you have meat or vegetables, eat a little a time with your cakes to ration it.”

Homa blinked at the instructions. Her tail stood up on end as much as it could in surprise.

Was she expecting some kind of famine? This was starting to become surreal.

“Can’t you do anything about this?” Homa asked. “You’re a big-shot, right?”

“Nope~” came the reply. “I’m just a soldier. It’ll get worse if we lose Kitty. So just focus up, okay?”

Upon mention of that woman again, Homa felt her frustrations with Imani resurface.

“What can she do to this station that’s worse than this?” Homa furiously typed.

Promptly: “Destroy the whole thing. Kill everyone. You and I included.”

Homa froze. That had to be a joke right? Nobody would– nobody could destroy a station.

Her eyes glazed over as she stared at the message. So curt and simple, but– terrifying.

Those were the most terrifying words Homa had ever seen on a screen in her life.

Destroy a station? Kill everyone– including Homa? No– that couldn’t be what Kitty–

Nobody would do that. Nobody would. It was completely insane. Out of this world insane.

Another buzz. Another mail. Homa’s shaking hands, her spiraling vision–

“Trust me and stay on task. Love ya~” it said.

A black heart to punctuate it. Homa’s fingers were shaking too much to form words back.

Imani was done talking to her, Homa knew it right then. There would be no more mails.

She leaped off the bed, turned off the television and rushed to her closet.

Throwing on her one good casual pair of pants and a shirt, along with her jacket, she walked back out to Hasim’s with her hands in her pockets and her gaze turned almost exclusively on her own feet. Focusing on walking and breathing while she could feel the walls warping around her. A bag of flour, a tube of cooking oil, and a can of pickles. She could swing that. And it would feel like doing something– in a moment where Homa otherwise felt like she had no control of her life.

There were a lot of things stewing in her brain. Too many things.

Bubbling up to the surface of her anxieties, however, was one question.

Was Kitty really capable of destroying Kreuzung? Was that even possible?


“Homa, what do you think about how the Shimii live here?”

Kitty’s voice snapped Homa out of a reverie.

She opened her eyes wide, suppressed a gasp. She looked down at her hands. She was done dissolving the coating on Kitty’s yacht, so now she had to repaint it to Kitty’s wishes. Her chemical sprayer, after a thorough cleaning, was performing double duty as a spray paint gun with paint canisters. Hefting the object in her hands, the world around her became clearer. She was at work; she had been painting.

Her head had been heavy, brain swimming in a thick stew of her concerns.

In cases like this, she liked to immerse herself in work and drown out the world around her.

Now, one of those worries that swam in her head was also present beside her.

Because the paint was not toxic, Kitty felt like she could stick closer to Homa.

She had been pretending to be interested in the painting, but she really just wanted to talk.

Homa turned her head and tried not to shoot her a glare.

“What were you saying?” Homa asked. Masking her irritation as best she could.

Whenever she looked at Kitty, Imani’s mail came to mind and upset her more than she was.

For her part, Kitty either did not notice or ignored Homa’s attitude. She was bright as ever.

“The Shimii in Kreuzung seem to have it hard– I just wondered how you felt about that.”

Homa grunted. “I mean– What is there to say? Yeah– it sucks. We just live with it.”

“Is there anything you can do about it?” Kitty said, gesturing with her palm up.

“No? I’m just an ordinary work-a-day girl.”

“Even ordinary people can make a difference! What if you campaigned for office?”

Homa fixed Kitty a look, as if trying to physically scrutinize how she could be so ignorant.

Kitty simply smiled at her. Ignorance must have truly been bliss. She was all smiles.

“I realize it would be difficult– but not impossible.” She said, as if realizing her mistake.

“It is impossible because Shimii can’t even vote in Kreuzung elections.” Homa said.

“I see. I come from Aachen. It’s different there.” Kitty replied. It sounded like it was true.

Homa’s ears twitched with a mild interest. “How much different can it be?”

Aachen was far in the north of Rhinea, on the edges of Eisental. Its waters bordered the Great Ayre Reach to the northwest and the Palatinate to the northeast, and Khaybar’s northern range wasn’t too far. Homa did not know much about it except that there was frequent traffic between Aachen and Kreuzung, both being major cities. When she started working at B.S.W, she would routinely see customers from Aachen, just because it was a major port that issued official papers, so it was a place ships could come from.

“Aachen has a more progressive culture.” Kitty said. “It’s a border station so you have Palatine big shots, Rhinean liberals, Bosporus transplants. It’s a travel hub so all kinds of people go there. There is a big shipyard there with a strong labor culture, and a technology university. And because it’s a border town, it’s a place where there’s been significant cultural exchange across its history. I like to think melting pots breed understanding and sympathy. I guess Aachen has a stronger activist culture than Kreuzung.”

Homa furrowed her brow, skeptical. “Are there Shimii there? Can they even vote there?”

“Interested now?” Kitty chuckled. “There are Shimii. And they can vote in local elections.”

“Do they have good jobs? Can they live anywhere? Do they get to go to the university?”

Kitty’s expression darkened a tiny bit. “They do have their own habitation there–”

“So they live in a ghetto.” Homa said. “Don’t mince words about it. I’m not a dumb kid.”

Words spilled out of her. She almost regretted becoming impassioned. But not completely.

Some part of her thought she should have shouted in Kitty’s face for being so naïve.

No matter what niceties the Imbrians let Shimii have– it was always like this in the end.

“I’m sorry, Homa. I am belying my ignorance, but I do think there is always hope for change. There are places where Shimii have it better– so the Shimii in Kreuzung have models they could follow and hopes that they can have for change in their own lives here. Their struggle isn’t for nothing.” Kitty replied.

“We already live in a ghetto over here.” Homa said. “So what’s there to aspire to?”

This was stupid. She was just trying to gain Homa’s sympathy for her own purposes.

While Homa painted her boat, she was just standing there spouting empty rhetoric.

But it was also the most that an Imbrian had really shown interest in Shimii specifically.

So Homa also felt a bit taken aback, and unable to be fully aggravated with her.

And besides, Imani wanted Kitty to win Homa’s sympathy anyway.

She couldn’t be too mad– but it was still frustrating. Voting? They had bigger problems!

“Why do you care about the Shimii all of a sudden anyway?” Homa asked.

She tried to sound gentle, but it did come off extremely confrontational.

Kitty did not appear offended. She smiled. “Because you are one, maybe.”

She winked. Homa scoffed. Did she think she was being charming?

“How shallow.” (She had to admit she was the tiniest bit charmed.)

“I was joking. You could say I am something of an organizer. Maybe I see an opportunity.”

“Don’t tell Becker that. He hates workplace rabblerousers.” Homa joked.

“Duly noted!” Kitty laughed again. “You know, I wish I could tell you how I really feel.”

“Huh?”

Homa turned off the paint sprayer, pointed it at the ground and looked over her shoulder.

What was this woman about to say–?!

Kitty took a deep breath. Those seconds felt like an eternity to Homa, who had far too many wrong ideas about what Kitty intended to talk about. “There are a lot of people doing a lot of things to try to change Rhinea, and the Empire, to try to do good for its people.” Homa practically deflated like a balloon full of anxiety but tried not to show it. Kitty continued to speak– her voice sounded a tiny bit more passionate than usual. “Not only in Aachen, but across the Imbrium Ocean. I know exactly how hard you have it, Homa. And there are a lot of people who wish it wasn’t so. I can’t say more, I just hope you understand.”

“It’s tough to see it that way from in here. But I’ll keep that in mind.” Homa replied.

What she really wanted to say, was something like ‘their wishes don’t help me any’.

But she thought, Kitty was trying to sound nice. So Homa should accept it for now.

Their conversation did stick in Homa’s brain for a little bit that day.

How did the Shimii live in other places? Was there anywhere that they were truly free?

And in the places where they were discriminated against– who was standing up for them?

In Kreuzung, it did feel like nobody was doing anything to help them.

Madame Arabie’s kind of help ran on favors and debts and commitments. It was crooked.

Imani was a member of the Volkisch. Was she really able to do anything from there?

On the way home, she thought about Radu the Marzban too. He was a hero, a living legend.

There were a lot of tales of him saving people in shipwrecks, delivering supplies during emergencies, killing Imbrians who committed heinous crimes on Shimii. They said that he and his crew of raiders wandered the seas righting wrongs committed upon the Shimii– but with all his strength, then, why did the Shimii still have to live like this? Couldn’t Radu the Marzban take down all the villains exploiting the Shimii? He saved Homa– but he couldn’t save her mother. He was a legend, flitting in the shadows.

But even their myths and legends couldn’t change things for them fundamentally.

“Could Imani do it? With all her money? With her Volkisch clout? But she isn’t–”

“Hey. You look pretty troubled.”

Homa arrived at her room and was about to head in when she noticed someone standing in front of the next room door over. In fact, this person was leaning against the door, with a small cartridge vaporizer in hand– one of the disposable models, not like Madame Arabie’s pipe. A faint smell of cinnamon wafted from her fingers. To Homa’s surprise, it was Madiha al-Nakara, her pale hair wrapped in a little bun, wearing a garish, flowery green shirt of a similar style to the last.

“I– I’m okay– Miss–?”

Madiha blew out a bit of cinnamon smoke. “No, not miss. Just call me Maj– Madiha.”

Homa stared at her for a moment and then stared at the door– the room right next door.

“Huh? You’ve been staying next-door all this time?” Homa asked.

“Since a few days ago.” Madiha said. “Our schedules don’t intersect much I guess.”

Homa blinked hard. “Is that girl with you too? You’re both staying here?”

“Parinita? Yeah? She’s worn out, taking a nap inside.”

Wait a minute–

Recalling that night, where Homa overhead–

impassioned sounds of lovemaking–

through the room walls–

had Madiha– with that petite companion of hers–?

up so late like that, and the yelling–?!

“Why are you making a face? Did Arabie tell you something distasteful about me?”

Madiha scrutinized her, while Homa took back control of her hanging mouth.

“No! Of course not! I have nothing against you. It’s– It’s really not that.”

“You look even more skittish now. Are you really okay?”

“Well–”

“C’mon out with it already. Tell Big Sister Madiha what the matter is.”

Could Homa really ask her to keep it down at night?

Would Madiha not immediately wring Homa’s neck if those words left her mouth?

Madiha openly sighed, discarded her vaporizer in a nearby trash chute, and walked over.

She clapped a hand on Homa’s shoulder– she was trying to be reassuring, but her grip–!

“Look, I’ve seen that troubled urchin look before. I can at least hear you out. Okay?”

Homa nodded. “Um, Madiha– what do you think about how Shimii live here?”

Ultimately it was impossible to ask her to fuck her girlfriend more quietly.

It was the fault of the shoddy construction here anyway.

So instead another topic that had been stewing in Homa’s brain came out in its place.

Madiha nodded sagely. “Ah. You’ve got money on the brain again– can’t blame you.”

Homa wished all she had in her brain was money troubles. It’d be so much simpler.

“Homa was your name?” Madiha asked.

“Um, yeah.” Homa replied. “Homa Baumann. I’m– I’m mixed.“ She added to explain her surname.

Madiha gave her a wistful look for a moment. She looked deep in thought.

“You’re a Shimii, Homa. Your parentage doesn’t matter.“ Madiha took in a breath. Homa had never been accepted so casually and confidently. It took her aback some, until Madiha started talking again. “Homa, no matter how bad it gets for us, there will always be dancing, weddings, big pots of stew and bread. Shimii use whatever we have to try to live through the era. We survived the cataclysm and live here underwater. We’ve been through much worse than this. Our religion was nearly destroyed, our people persecuted, our homes and names stolen, but we live. Our ummah pray for better times and live their lives as best they can. So to answer your question: we all know how things are. But why are they? That’s what I ask myself. Not how people live. I know that. They live as best as they can. So ask why instead.”

Homa was surprised. It was a more in-depth answer than she thought she would get. After throwing that dumb question out, Homa imagined she would talk about the food or about parties.

That was the kind of answer Homa expected out of someone much older than Madiha looked.

She had thought of Madiha as being another gangster like Arabie was.

Maybe she was something different. That look in her eyes, it was almost tender.

Homa could almost feel her sympathy wrapping around her like warm colors–

“So if you ask me what I think about Kreuzung; the Imbrian bastards here sicken me.”

She raised an empty hand to her lips, as if so distracted she forgot discarding her vaporizer.

This seemed to make her momentarily frustrated. She closed the hand into a fist.

“Madiha–”

Homa briefly hesitated. Her head stewing again. Kitty’s words; Imani’s words–

“Madiha, can anything change what’s happening to us here?” Homa asked.

“Fighting.” Madiha responded. Quickly; as if a quietly honed reflex.

She grit her teeth. As if it bothered her to have responded so quickly.

“Fighting?” Homa asked. “But– fighting who?” The Imbrians? All of them? How?

“Bah. I’m sorry. I just said whatever. Pay it no mind.” Madiha sighed.

“I’m not going to tell anyone, Madiha. You can speak your mind.” Homa said.

She really wanted to hear what Madiha had to say. She felt like she needed to hear it.

She was so intriguing. Was there someone around here with an actual answer to things–?

Madiha grunted. “Homa, I’m not going to tell you to fight anyone personally. We’re not all fighters. But just don’t be complacent, and never say thank you for the little crumbs you get here. If someone does resort to violence, do not rush to condemn them on that fact alone.”

Those words dropped like a heavy load of ingredients into the pot boiling Homa’s brain.

“I’m just trying to understand.” Homa said. Her emotions got away with her for a second. She started to weep. “You said fighting– but fighting who? How does living get better for us? For the past few months, everything here has been going to hell. Nothing feels certain anymore. I’ve always wanted to get out of here and go out into the ocean. But lately I’m thinking– what if there’s nothing out in the Ocean for me but more of this? Even if I survived all the trouble and got out? So what am I supposed to do? If I stay here I could struggle and maybe die; and it could be the same anywhere! What do I do then?”

She raised her voice, curled her fingers into fists, turned a red weeping gaze on Madiha.

For that instant, a repressed anger she couldn’t direct at Arabie, Imani, Kitty– leaked out.

And yet, the stranger upon whom this childish injustice was done did not condemn her.

“Homa, my answer to that is pretty bleak. I won’t sugarcoat it for you.” Madiha said.

“Then just say it. Nobody around here tells me the truth.” Homa replied, bitterly.

Madiha grinned at her. She crossed her arms, locked Homa’s eyes with a red glint in hers.

“There is no place in the Imbrium Ocean where you can go and lead a happy storybook life as a Shimii. You will run into the hatred the Imbrians project onto our flesh, their hatred of our marked bodies, their hatred of our worship of Allah. But I hate them in turn, and my hatred is a prayer of fire that will consume all of their works. Allahu ackbar. If you don’t want to fight them, Homa, I will fight for you. For every life the pacifists preserve, I will take ten to assure victory. We will kill as many as it takes.”

Behind Madiha, the door to the apartment opened, and a sleepy-looking girl walked out.

Dressed in a long-sleeved blouse and a long blue skirt, yawning.

Homa and Madiha both turned their smoldering gazes her way. She pointedly stared back.

“Ma– oh, that’s the girl from the other night? Are you troubling her Ma– Madiha?”

Madiha shrugged dismissively. “We were having a lively conversation about life.”

“Elocution is a gift from Allah to our people– and you used it to make her cry.”

“I wasn’t trying to– she just asked for my opinion, and I gave it candidly.”

Homa sighed, wiping her forearm across her face. Her brain steeping in frustration.

“No, it’s okay. I appreciated her candidness. I’m sorry for the trouble, Madiha.”

She turned quickly from them and opened her door, as fast as an escape.

“Hey, listen. If you need any help, you can come to me. But think about what I said–!”

Even if Homa did not want to, she would be thinking about it, even as the door shut Madiha out. Even as the door behind her closed, and her legs gave out, and she sat back against the door weeping. Staring up at the ceiling with hands over her face. She couldn’t stop thinking about it.


As-salamu alaykum.”

“Ah, Homa, welcome, welcome. If you’re looking for the marrow bones again–?”

“Hasim I can see it. You’re all out of them. Not even the smallest bones left?”

For days now the beef bones available had been shrinking, and less in the bag, but still–

There had to be something!

“Afraid so. It’s been tough, you know, I get these specifically from the Agrisphere in Suhar, from my Shimii cousins there, they work so hard, it’s the best quality in the whole country. Homa, when you go for quality like I do, it’s tough sometimes, sometimes you just come up empty-handed if you only get the best, but I promise you, Inshallah we’re going to restock soon, and you’ll be amazed at the quality–”

Homa was barely listening to Hasim’s little speech.

She cast disgruntled looks about the shop, taking stock of the potential soup ingredients. He was out of all the frozen vacuum bag meat he normally carried. His refrigerator and freezer were empty save for the frost. He had not done anything to cover them up, so he must have run out recently. He would probably get bony stockfish and throw them in there to look like he had something on hand. In his pantry section he had cans of stuff– there were cans of shredded chicken and ground beef. There was a can of green beans packed in water and salt. It wasn’t cabbage, but it would do. She couldn’t afford to eat restaurants, so she needed to cook with what she could get.

“Pleasure doing business as always, Homa. May Allah see you to safety.”

For want of anything to polite to say, Homa said nothing at all in response.

She walked out with a can of ground beef, a can of ground chicken and cans of green beans.

None of it was her first choice, but it would fill her belly.

She wasn’t at the level of eating fried flour with zlatla just yet.

The deteriorating quality of her lonac was not lost on her, however. It was depressing.

It was a week now since she last had beef cubes. Normally Hasim’s supply was steady.

Bone marrow lonac wasn’t bad– but Homa really wanted to have a nice meal again.

She had been working so hard! On Kitty’s boat– on snitching to Imani–

Didn’t she deserve a treat? But she couldn’t afford it. Especially with things getting worse.

For someone who had been taking care of herself like an adult for years now, she felt utterly without control of her own life. For days now, she had thought of begging Imani for the money to just eat at a restaurant without it coming out of her own pocket, so she wouldn’t have to be ashamed of doing so– but she was ashamed of asking Imani for any help. (And wary of the consequences.)

Everything felt more burdensome, more intolerable. She couldn’t just keep her head down.

As she walked through town, she looked around at the conditions of the other stores.

Imani had been right.

Epoch Clothiers, Volwitz Foods, Arleiter Tools, even Raylight Beauty–

All of the stores associated with Imbrian brands had closed early that day.

Signs on the window exhorted shoppers to subscribe to stocking alerts in their rooms.

Homa wondered if they had no supplies at all, or if they were still getting anything.

Volwitz Foods shops especially concerned her.

If they didn’t restock, all the “mom & pop” food shops would get hammered with orders.

There was an air of tension on the streets. People lingered in front of shops as if in a trance, as if uncomprehending. There were groups in the middle of the street passing around gossip and information. Homa almost wanted to tell them what Imani knew, but she had no idea whether it was public knowledge, or if it could be traced back to her and cause trouble. There were fewer smiles on people’s faces, fewer women in their best dresses going to dance, fewer lads at the pubs watching the football matches. Homa wondered how the Flowing Scarlet would look today too.

Was Madame Arabie still stocked up?

Homa trudged back home, feeling like she was dragging her own body weight.

At least she had the very last pot of bone marrow lonac to look forward to.

Her tail gave a sad little twitch in anticipation.

As soon as she rounded the corner to her own hall, her heart jumped–

“Homa!”

She hardly had time to react when a woman’s arms wrapped around her.

Pulling Homa tight into her chest.

Brown hair, emerald eyes, a brown blouse with gold-painted lines.

“Madame?” Homa yelled out in shock. “What–?”

“Homa, I’m so happy! I’ve been looking all over for you!” Madame Arabie was giddy.

Her breath– she reeked of alcohol. Her words were slurred, her eyes distant.

She was drunk!

At least she was smart enough not to be using the drugs instead–

But it was still a bad situation! Homa tried to extricate herself from Arabie’s grip.

“Madame! I’m– I’m happy to see you too! Let me go and lets– let’s relocate to my room!”

Arabie was so strong! No wonder everyone was so afraid of her!

Homa had never been trapped in a hug so difficult to get herself loose from!

“Homa~” Madame Arabie’s voice slurred. “You’re such a good little kadaif. So good to me.”

Kadaif? As in the dessert? Her brain was truly going out wasn’t it?

“Allah give me patience!” Homa cried out. “Why me? Just– please get moving this way!”

Homa began pulling Arabie’s weight step by step down the hall, over to her door.

Before any nosy neighbors stuck their heads out to watch– especially one in particular.

“Because–” Madame Arabie tried to answer Homa’s cries, which were not directed at her.

She choked up for a moment, her head leaning into Homa’s shoulder.

Her fingers caressed Homa’s dark hair.

“I don’t– I don’t have anyone else.” She mumbled.

Homa grit her teeth.

She managed to shuffle the drunk Arabie all the way into her room, through the door, which she locked behind her, and then finally cast her down onto her bed. Homa stood, breathing heavily, in front of the bed, with Arabie laying down on it. Arms spread, giggling, her chest rising up and down with steady breathing, legs hanging off the end. What was she supposed to do about this?

“Madame–”

“Call me Leija! I’m too young to be a Madame!”

Madame Arabie– Leija curled up her legs on the bed and shifted over onto her side.

Looking at Homa through cloudy eyes, making herself comfortable.

Her cheeks and eyes were red, and the pale insides of her ears were flushed too.

She was completely off the precipice from the alcohol.

Homa could only imagine the disparaging things the town aunties could concoct about this.

Hopefully not too many people saw Leija in this position. Or would see her with Homa too.

“Leija,” Homa acquiesced with a sigh. “Can you tell me what happened?”

Leija shuddered in response. Her brainlessly cheerful demeanor darkened.

“It was so stressful. So stressful Homa. I just want to hide. Can I hide from them here?”

“Them? Who is them? Is someone after you?”

The only reason Homa wasn’t on the verge of a heart attack was that Leija was so drunk she could have easily been making the whole thing up in her head. Homa had enough problems as it was without having to be caught in the crossfire of Leija’s mafia troubles, but also, nobody ever messed with Leija no matter how bad things got. So she assumed it mustn’t have been anything important.

And finally, Leija herself confirmed: “Problems. Problems are always after me.”

“Fine. It’s not use talking to a drunk. Do whatever you want. I can’t stop you.” Homa said.

“You’re so nice to me, Homa.” Leija mumbled. “So good and nice and lovely. My little kadaif.

Her words began to slur much more and to trail off much more quickly.

“Take it easy and sleep it off.” Homa said, trying to sound reassuring.

Leija did not run her own businesses, it was impossible for her to be at so many places or to make so many decisions by herself. She had managers and a chain of command, Homa knew this well from being part of her organization. Homa knew that Leija was not personally needed anywhere unless there was a dispute. She imagined the scenario in her head: Leija’s various cronies gave her the bad news about the shops and prices in Kreuzung, telling her that she would lose money and that things would be rough unless something changed. Feeling helpless about it, she drank too much to cope with it, and ran away from the Scarlet on some aimless anxiety impulse and went in search of someone familiar.

Now she was here, drunk out of her mind on Homa’s bed.

Things had never gotten this out of hand with her, but Homa never put it past her.

Though, she had once imagined that the day Madame Arabie personally came to her room, it would be to drag her out and shoot her. Not to get drunk and sleep it off on Homa’s bed. Out of those two nightmarish fantasies she did not even know which one she preferred. Once Leija came to her senses, she could still very well lose her temper at Homa over the whole thing anyway.

There was no winning with this woman.

Despite how much trouble Leija was causing, Homa didn’t want to disrupt her sleep.

She withdrew a spare gel pillow and a nylon blanket from beneath the bed and made herself a little nest on the floor to lie down on and stare at the ceiling for a while. She needed to decompress. Her stomach was growling for a bowl of lonac, but she did not want to move just yet. Life kept coming at her like hammer blows one after another. Breathing deep was all she could do to surmount it.

“Homa,”

Leija’s slurred voice sounded far less cheerful all of a sudden.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Homa.”

On the floor, Homa turned her back on the bed. Leija had not moved, but if she did, Homa did not want to look at her spouting this nonsense. She grit her teeth, and her ears folded against her head as much as they could, but of course, she could still hear the woman on her bed moaning.

“I’m sorry Homa. I never took good care of you. I even– when I saw you in the suit– I even thought it would be nice to sleep with you. I’m a rotten woman, Homa. I am destined for the fire. You are a treasure that Allah sent to me. I looked you in the eye and discarded you every time.”

“Shut up. I don’t want this from you.” Homa mumbled.

“Homa. I’ve been wanting to say sorry. Ever since he came back. I’m so sorry.”

He? Radu? What was she saying? Was it still all nonsense? Homa sat up.

On the bed, Leija Kladuša was nearly falling asleep. With the last of her strength–       

“Radu and Imani Hadžić. Those bastards– those bastards–” Her voice trailed off.


“Here you go! Everything went quite professionally, even for me!”

Deep in the Kreuzung Core station, inside a pressurized maintenance tunnel just under the rim of the baseplate. A woman dressed casually in a jacket, skirt, and tights, with orange-mottled gray skin and brown hair, handed Kitty McRoosevelt a small, handheld device, put together from parts.

An analog switch, an antennae, an electric circuit, a tiny system-on-a-chip, and the contacts for a crude little battery. When she said ‘everything went professionally’ she must have been referring to the preceding courier work to set it up, because the device itself had rather crude workmanship.

It was difficult to ascertain whether it was real in the dim, intermittent light in the tunnel.

“When you toggle this device on, you’ll have 12 hours to make sure everything is ready. I would suggest taking out the batteries right afterward– the signal is encrypted, and it will be sent to the drone faster than anyone can notice it, but if it stays on, it will keep transmitting and give you away. So just chuck it and step on it when you’re done. The drone will take an 8 hour journey to your buddies in the abyss of Masud. They are ready and awaiting the signal. Then, at full combat speed, the fleet will make it here in 4 hours. I informed them of the location of the B.S.W. dock– it’s up to you to have it secured.”

“Up to me?” Kitty McRoosevelt said. “You’re not coming?”

“Perimeter defense isn’t my thing. But I got you some big strong boys and girls for that.”

Xenia Laskaris smiled girlishly at Kitty and Marina McKennedy, their other witness.

Her dark-green, exoskeletal antennae rose slightly like arms spread in joy.

“She’s kept her word.” Marina said. “I never asked her to stand and fight with you.”

“I wouldn’t have gone this far for you if it’d ultimately lead to that. It’s just not my style.” Xenia said. “Marina will take you to meet the rest of the team. I need to start limiting my involvement because the local crews are skittish about outsider Katarrans. Apparently there’s a whole fleet from the Mycenean Military Commission stuck in Eisental, demanding mercenaries join them– it’s a whole thing.”

“But they won’t object to working for ‘Imbrians’. That is apolitical to them.” Marina said.

“Exactly. Don’t tell them you’re actually Cogitans by the way.” Xenia said.

“I never intended to. Well, I suppose if this thing doesn’t work, I’ll know who to curse.”

Kitty spoke gravely. Xenia seemed more amused by it than anything.

“Trust me, I want you to succeed. I live for this kinda shit. It’s job security for me!”

Chaos, she meant. War: destruction, killings, and upheaval.

Twelve hours away as soon as Kitty hit the button. The G.I.A.’s operation would begin.

Her fingers hovered over the switch. She did not flip it, not yet.

But now, the power to kill had been placed in her hands. Her empty heart unwavering.

She only needed one more day. Kitty would get what she needed from the Shimii girl.

“Kitty.“

Marina spoke up as they left the maintenance tunnel and Xenia Laskaris behind them.

“Think before you press that button. That’s all I ask.“ She said. With an air of grave finality.

Kitty scoffed.

“Marina. I’ve done a lot more thinking than you want to admit.“

There was a current driving Kitty McRoosevelt. The weight of ages, history itself given voice to haunt her.

Through her, through her grief, pain, ignorance and bigotry, it would conclude the inevitable tragedy.


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