Aetheral Space

It was hard to believe the place had been a hangar half an hour ago.

Atoy Muzazi strode through the field of burning rubble, maneuvering around the huge shards of scrap metal that had lodged themselves into the ground like stakes. More than once, he was forced to look away as he stepped over a melted chunk of armour or a discarded limb. The rebreather he was wearing made the smoke a non-issue to his lungs, but it still stung at his eyes.

The whole left side of the building had been destroyed by the explosion, a colossal concussive force blasting it into devastation. The ship the hangar had been holding was a flaming wreck too - at the very least, the criminals wouldn't be able to attempt an escape with it now.

Not that they'd be going anywhere without their leader.

They'd found the one called Skipper underneath a pile of corpses, apparently - the brave soldiers who'd been apprehending him when he attacked. The man's Aether must have been magnificent to allow him to not only survive the original blast, but the period of burial too. It hadn't been perfect, though.

The only thing attached below his left shoulder was a bloody, smoking stump, the wound already half-cauterized by the attack that had caused it. Foolishness; Skipper had exercised more force than his body could sustain, and he'd lost an arm for it. He hadn't even managed to escape with the attack - all he'd accomplished was the murder of innocent Supremacy personnel.

Skipper still grinned impertinently from the ground as Muzazi approached, flanked by two guards. His arm and legs had been bound with Neverwire, their dull red glow impeding any use of Aether.

Muzazi narrowed his eyes. "Was it worth it? All these lives?"

Skipper cocked his head, still smirking even as he winced in pain from his missing arm. "You, ah, you tell me, champ. We aren't the ones who started this little fight, after all."

The lack of morality was obvious. He'd have no luck appealing to this man's sense of shame.

Muzazi’s finger tapped against the hilt of his sword. "Where are your comrades - Ruth Blaine and the other one? Did they escape? Where is Dragan Hadrien?"

"So you didn't get 'em, then," nodded Skipper, clutching his stump. "Good news, that's good news. I dunno where the kid is, champ - but I wager that wherever he is, it's safer than your little game."

The sword came out in an instant, the blade tickling against Skipper's throat. The man only rolled his eyes.

Muzazi spoke quietly, dangerously: "Don't play games with me, dissident. Where is Hadrien? What did you do to him?"

Skipper gave him a strange look, brow furrowed. "You … you really don't know, huh?"

"Tell me."

Skipper's eyes flicked to the left, then to the right, taking in the guards flanking Muzazi and the other soldiers arriving on the scene.

"Nah," he said, after a moment. "I don't feel like I've got an appreciative audience here."

Muzazi grunted in frustration, sheathing his sword in a single smooth motion. As much as he might like, he couldn't simply have the man executed yet.

"Take him for interrogation," he said, turning on his heel and striding away. "I want locations by sundown!"

"Sir," said one of his guards - Prescott, he thought - as they walked. His voice was mild, calm, every word just a gentle suggestion. "If I may offer an opinion - if his associates escaped from the scene of the crime, I'm not sure how likely it is that he'll know their locations."

Muzazi bit his lip. "There may have been a pre-arranged rendezvous point, just in case this kind of scenario occurred."

Prescott nodded, smiled, stepped back. "Of course, sir."

The second person Muzazi had come to see was damaged as well, only much more lethally. The corpse of the huge Pugnant lay on an automatic floating stretcher, the fabric buckling under his considerable weight. His eyes were open, along with his mouth, full to the brim with dried blood.

"Not the most enviable way to leave this world," mused Prescott, rubbing his chin.

"To die fighting," said Muzazi softly, hand tightening around Luminescence. "I suppose that couldn't be so bad."

"If you say so, Mr. Muzazi," Prescott smiled. The man was always smiling.

"Do we know who he was?"

"A local thug, we think. Works for an individual called the Hyena."

The second guard shot Prescott a surprised look, but he took no notice. Muzazi furrowed his brow; he didn't quite understand that strange interaction.

"The Hyena?" he said, turning. "Is there a way I can get in contact with this gentleman?"

As he spoke, he could see the one called Skipper being taken away in the distance. Silver capture gel had hardened around his arm and legs, preventing movement, and he was being carried into a transport by an automatic stretcher much like the one holding the Pugnant's corpse.

Prescott's smile spread just a tad. "Well, now that you mention it, sir…"

-

Ruth Blaine had never been good at laying low, so she usually just didn't bother. Which made situations like this one especially troublesome.

She'd managed to snag a hoodie from a washing line outside a shack on her way out of the district - and so she was now walking with the hood up, concealing her face as much as possible. It was a different kind of camouflage from the kind they'd used back home - blending into crowds rather than forests - but the principle was the same. Her hands, stuffed into the pockets of the hoodie, fidgeted nervously.

She had to stay calm. That was the most important thing. As long as she stayed calm, she could fix everything. So - what was the situation?

They'd arrested Skipper. Maybe Bruno and Serena, too, but she couldn't be sure. They were important prisoners, so they'd be taken to somewhere well-guarded.

Or shot in the street.

Ruth shook her head as if to dislodge the intrusive thought. No, she shouldn't think like that. If she assumed the worst, then everything she could do was pointless.

The most well-guarded place on Caelus Breck was probably the tower in the centre of the city. From what Skipper had told her when they were coming in, that was where the security forces operated out of, as well as the planetary government.

Wait, if the planetary government operated out of the tower, didn't that make it less likely they'd keep Skipper there? Since he was so dangerous? Or - or did that make it more likely?

Ruth bit her lip anxiously, face locked into an expression of intense concentration. Planning like this wasn't her strong suit. She much preferred following orders than giving them.

Even if Skipper - and maybe Bruno and Serena - were being kept in the tower, could Ruth really do anything to free them? The operation to grab the Cogitant had been tough enough, and that had been on a much smaller ship. At any rate, that Special Officer would be lurking around somewhere. She had barely managed to escape him last time, but defeating him was out of the question.

Shit.

Ruth stopped walking, stepping back into an alcove as she bit down on the nail of her thumb. She'd forgotten about the Cogitant, the one this whole operation had been about. Where had he run off to?!

A chill ran down her spine. She wasn't sure how far it went, but Cogitants were supposed to be really smart - or at least very observant. Could security use Hadrien to track her down, now that he'd had time to observe her?

How long did she have, then? Minutes? Seconds? Were they coming for her now?

She squeezed her eyes shut. No, no, no, no. What was she supposed to do?!

"Hey."

Skipper's words from that day came back to her, blasting away the fog of indecision that had been wrapping around her. His gently smiling face lit by a burning red sun, his hand extended to lift her up from the ground. Her gun pointed at this stranger.

He hadn't even glanced at the weapon.

"It's okay," he'd said, still smiling. "You're okay. Calm down."

Ruth opened her eyes, her heavy breathing growing steadier, calmer. It was okay. She was okay.

If they were keeping her friends in the tower, then a frontal assault would be suicidal. Her head would be cut off by that swordsman before she got through the front gates. Sneaking in would be the only way.

Break the big task down into manageable chunks. Right.

So - she needed a way in, a disguise, and the location where her comrades were being held.

A way in: if she had a good enough disguise, she could presumably just walk in, but she couldn't rely on that. Could she bribe someone to let her in? Probably not - most people liked to be bribed with money, which she didn't have.

A disguise: it would be no trouble to beat up a guard and take his uniform, but would that be enough? Wouldn't some kind of genetic scan be required as well? Argh. This would have been no trouble for North, if he were still around.

The location: anyone important enough to have that information would presumably be spending most of their time in the tower. So she couldn't get that information until the infiltration was already underway. But, now that she thought of it, grabbing that information would mean blowing her disguise, which would mean the infiltration failing anyway.

Right. Failure, failure, failure. She was calmer, now, but she was still screwed.

All this damn planning. This wasn't her role in the team: Skipper was the one who took care of it. Even Bruno and Serena could do better, given their experience. She was a fist that punched faces, and that was a role she was more than happy with.

If she couldn't do this by herself, could she find allies? Hire local mercenaries? No, no, she just ran into the money problem again there.

It was like she was stuck inside a maze - and every time she tried to take a path, a new wall rose up to block her way.

The barrel of a gun settled against the back of her head. The metal was cold against her body, ruthless. She took in a sharp breath.

Security?

"Can I talk to you for a quick second?" asked Dragan Hadrien.

Ruth's heart beat like a jackhammer. With her Aether, she could probably withstand even a few point-blank shots, but her body was still under the impression it was about to have its eyes melt out of its sockets. She gulped, doing her best to keep still.

"Sure," she said, as evenly as she could. "Right here, or…?"

"No," said Hadrien. There was a bit of shakiness to his voice. Was he nervous about threatening her? "Security patrols will start coming through here in four minutes or so. There's a car down this alley - we'll talk there."

Ruth's brow furrowed. Why was he trying to avoid security? She'd have thought he'd be eager for them to find him.

Still, she wouldn't argue with a nervous pistol. "Okay," she said slowly. "I'll just turn around and walk down the alley, yeah?"

"Yeah. Yeah."

It was a bit of an awkward maneuver - turning around in the cramped alley while keeping the gun against her head. Hadrien was determined to stay directly behind her, it seemed. She couldn't blame him; the first time they'd been in such close proximity, he'd earned a kick to the ribs.

She walked, Hadrien following behind her, gun still pressed against her head. The barrel was angled upwards slightly, given the height difference between them, but the fact that the pistol wasn't aimed directly at her brain didn't make her feel any better. A lucky shot would still leave her horrifically injured.

The car Hadrien had mentioned was a rusted-out wreck in a small parking space between three buildings. From the looks of it, there was no way it was achieving flight for more than a second. At a prod from Hadrien's weapon, Ruth clambered into the vehicle's passenger seat.

The inside was just as bad as the outside, the instruments coated with dust and rust. Clearly nonfunctional.

Still pointing his gun at her, Hadrien climbed into the driver's seat. Ruth's eyes followed the gun as it moved.

"You know," she said, testing the waters a little. "A shot from that probably wouldn't do a thing to me."

The Cogitant raised a doubting eyebrow. "Not even with Aether?"

"Not even with Aether." She'd seen what he was capable of back when they'd first met - the Aether he was capable of using could barely reinforce a punch, let alone a shot she knew was coming.

Hadrien sniffed, nodded. "Okay," he said, more to himself than her. "Thought this might be an issue - luckily, I've come prepared." He plunged his free hand into his pocket and pulled out a script - a full-blown, chunky model he had to have scavenged from somewhere.

"What's that?" Ruth said warily. "Have someone to call?"

Hadrien didn't break eye contact. "It's connected to the engine of this vehicle. You do something I don't like, I can blow both of us to kingdom come."

Ruth's blood ran cold. "Both of us? You'd take yourself out too?"

"Better than being dragged along with you for the rest of my days. Believe me, I'd rather not die either. Do we understand each other?"

Was he bluffing? It was hard to tell. If he was, he had one hell of a poker face.

"Blaine," he repeated, voice firmer. "Do we understand each other?"

Quietly, she nodded. "What did you want to talk about?"

Come to think of it, why hadn't he run for the hills? Where was security? If he'd just escaped, he'd come after her much too quickly for him to have been brought in by the Supremacy. It didn't make sense.

Hadrien's hand - the one holding the script - moved, and Ruth instinctively flinched, but all the Cogitant did was turn the device around so that she could see the screen. It was the front page from a local news site, an image of Dragan Hadrien's face filling the frame. The story had only just come through? It had taken a while for them to report the kidnapping.

"It's you," she said cautiously, glancing up at him. "What about it?"

Hadrien rolled his eyes. "The headline, Blaine."

She read further, mouth moving silently as she read the words to herself.

MISSING ADMINCORPS CLERK REPORTED AS DEFECTOR - GOVERNMENT OFFERS SUBSTANTIAL REWARD

"Oh."