Paranoia momentarily sets in.

  Hiau, despite being the highest ranking officer and in position of leading everyone on her ship, found herself with a raised eyebrow. Her two hearts thumped as she found her four eyes scanning the room across every minute detail, partly expecting that perhaps there might be an eavesdropper or bug somewhere.

  But of course, her quarters remain exactly as they are.

  With a raised eyebrow, she turns back to her holodisplay. There was no visual of Admiral Gahn, and the only confirmation that he was still on the other end is the ongoing call’s ever ticking clock with each passing second. Given her tools, she was able to trace the source to a different continent of World Amrita, and in passing thought, realized that she was correct in her initial assumptions when arriving here. Quietly, she wondered if Admiral Gahn knew of her presence here as well.

  “What is the meaning of this?” she responds.

  “Forgive me; allow me to clear myself up,” Gahn replies.

  “Go ahead.”

  “Firstly, allow me to apologize for our recurring misunderstandings in our encounters. I understand that we have served as each others’ first point of contact for this matter at hand, but it has thus far been handled…less than ideally. I would like to take time to make some clarifications before I move forward with my proposition.”

  “...Go on.”

  “We both understand that Zviedal is a dangerous terrorist with extremist ideology, and that he has been working with Subject-000002 to further his motives. Although our conversation was cut short previously in World Pliua, I want to emphasize the truth now that I and my fellow Ulminhan cohorts are not colluders or collaborators in any capacity with Zviedal and the Subject. We in fact hoped for the process to have been more diplomatic and peaceful in nature, and I apologize on behalf of them if it has ever appeared otherwise.”

  “I understand.”

  “Thank you for understanding. Despite our best intentions, I and my cohort have been held hostage to Zviedal’s demands. He is clever in that he hijacked our mission to make it his own. As you can see, he wields great influence, in possession of such a weapon. This is where I will make my proposition. May I continue?”

  Hiau’s mind raced to absorb all of this. So, now Gahn is claiming that they were in fact hostage to Zviedal the entire time. Was it rigged for them since the beginning? Or was this a more recent change? A fallout between the two, perhaps?

  “You may continue,” she responds.

  “Excellent. I am calling you on this secured line to avoid detection by his means. I have details of his plans, motives, and intentions, and as such can directly lead you to him, guaranteeing his capture. We will be departing for Gateyard Olmona within the next few hours, with the intention to negotiate or otherwise coerce the facilities there into providing means to access travel to the Subject’s homeworld. I would highly suggest moving forwards with capture once they are out of Olmona’s atmosphere in order to minimize any possible casualties or collateral damage.”

  General Hiau considers the thought for a moment. This makes sense. Gateways are typically placed in orbit far from the actual planet. Perhaps their final transit between the two would be the only sensible time to attempt a strike.

  “And what do you ask in return?”

  “I only ask that the safety of my troops, crew, and my family be secured and guaranteed,” replies Gahn. “I request that the matter finally be removed from our hands, and our names cleaned.”

  Another moment of tense silence.

  “Very well,” responds Hiau. “You have my assistance. Forward me the necessary details of your plan, and I will act accordingly. Most likely you can expect my arrival with additional Coalition backups and escorts during their final transit to their desired gateway above Gateyard Olmona. I will recommend pulling back to avoid casualties for your sake.”

  “Much appreciated; thank you for this conversation,” replies Gahn. “I will forward the details to you shortly. Keep in touch.”

  With that, the call ends, and Hiau is left back alone with herself in the silence of her quarters to absorb what had just transpired.

  Between this and overhearing the Senators’ and Ministers’ conversations prior, it felt like the trajectory of her life had been irreversibly altered in the span of a few hours.

  The words that she had been so long conditioned to believe began to ring hollow, now. The only “demons” posing enough of a danger to take down turned out to be those old men at the top. How many countless, including her, have been sacrificed for their delusions of grandeur?

  And now, suddenly, she is presented with something that would in fact make that entire agenda even easier to carry out. If it’s true of the existence of that world, then the Subject would most likely intend to inform her people of what she’s witnessed out here, thereby possibly bringing the conflict to a close.

  No. Not Subject-000002.

  Lym.

  She has a name.

  Thus, should this operation be carried out successfully, then a captured Lym would not be able to meaningfully inform anyone of anything. She would be repeatedly dissected until the Happian genome is finally replicated and refined for safe and reliable use for the elites.

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  The elites with their newfound powers would finally eliminate any speck of resistance, competition, or other threat standing in their way, having cheated the system to no longer be reliant on the masses. The Happian people, if they are real, will be completely eradicated.

  General Hiau, only ever to be a prototype testbed, will likewise be culled to make way for the new order.

  So clearly, she is suddenly stuck with a mission she no longer wants to carry out after such disillusionment.

  But what can she meaningfully do? Hiau found herself anxiously trying to find a solution with great fervor. She did put herself in a corner with this one. Given the already outbound communications, she will have to rendezvous with the supplemental Coalition escorts for the mission, and coordinate with Gahn upon Zviedal and Lym’s final capture.

  What can she reliably do?

  Perhaps, one step can be taken at a time.

  Knowing her ship’s crew and troops, they are already unflinchingly loyal to her. Perhaps it wouldn’t be too much work to reinforce it into them that they are to follow all of her orders to the letter. With a mission this important, perhaps she can even threaten something such as summary execution for defiance, defection or other forms of resistance to her. They know not to dare to directly engage with her physically anyhow. Perhaps this would make things easier for her.

  This would have been easier if they went about this alone, but of course, there will be the additional escorts. The rest of the Coalition is expecting this operation to go about swimmingly. What can be done about them?

  If the entire goal of the system is for it to prevent Lym’s transit to her homeworld, then her goal in taking vengeance against the system should be to ensure she succeeds in it.

  Therefore, how can Hiau make sure that Lym makes it through that gateway?

  That was the tricky part, and can get very messy. Heavy casualties will likely be incurred amongst confusion and chaos. If they are expecting to capture Zviedal and Lym during transit towards the gateway, perhaps then Hiau and her warship can preemptively strike against the other Coalition forces in betrayal, perhaps even giving time for Lym to retaliate in some capacity. The finer details of this consist of wild cards, however.

  Would that basically be it, then? To turn her back on everything she knew at the last minute to ensure the success and survival of these two people she had been chasing up until just now?

  Don’t be silly and foolish. She never truly knew anything.

  Even just now, she knows that she and Gahn were lying to each other to get what they want.

  *****

  “Gahn, everything alright?” asks Vertan. “I was going to ask if everything is all fine with the ships, but your face seems kind of long.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Gahn replies flatly. Other things were on his mind at the moment. “We can get moving shortly.”

  “Well, alright,” says Vertan unsurely. “That’s good then, everything looks too dangerous down there. It’s best we get out before any trouble finds us.”

  “Indeed,” agrees Gahn. Trouble always seems to find Zviedal, he further thought.

  There was rather an utter lack of nervousness or care behind Gahn’s current words, actions, and the way he carried himself. Rather, he found himself with an embittered sentiment that he is forced to carry out what was truly necessary. Truly, he felt betrayed by Vertan that he had let it get to this point, and Gahn quietly forced himself to make peace with the fact that sometimes, the right and necessary decision is not always the most desirable.

  But what else can he do? At the very least, doing what he did will guarantee the safety of what few hundred troops and crew he still had left under his leadership. His name and his family will be cleared of rumor and suspicion.

  And more importantly, the wider populace will no longer be at such risk or endangerment with Zviedal and the Subject contained and handled properly.

  Vertan couldn’t quite grasp just yet what was off about Gahn. In fact, he was the only one who could pick it up, having known the other man for so long. There was a certain subtlety to the change in his tone and voice when he spoke to Vertan just now. He understood that the two have been at odds with the other lately, but just now, he no longer felt the presence of his childhood friend. Only a cold stranger, carrying things out either out of his own interests or obligations. As it occupied his mind, he completely ignored the sting of the slightly acidic raindrops of Amrita’s polluted skies. Surrounding him, the various surviving Ulminhans of Gahn’s troops and crew bustled about to make final preparations while they were still at the skyborne station, completely oblivious to how he felt.

  “Hey, Vertan!” one of them calls out as he passes.

  Vertan looks up to him from out of his stupor.

  “Hm?” he started.

  “Saw you had a long face,” the man replies as he pats Vertan on the shoulder. “Don’t let it get you down! We’re almost there, we can do this! A lot of us have been waiting for you to succeed.”

  Vertan blinks for a moment.

  “You have been?” he finally asks.

  “Yeah!” the man replies. “We’re just quieter about it than the other side. Don’t worry, man, it’s big but we believe in it. I gotta run—”

  And with that, the man rushes off to rejoin his comrades as the engines of the ships rumble to life amidst the ever-growing storm.

  Vertan stood there for a moment. Just for a little bit standing under the roof of that skyborne platform alone, he felt a glimmer of hope against the backdrop of such dreariness.

  So, the revolution is not always loud and obvious. Sometimes, it hides quietly amongst the many.

  Out of nothingness in midair, a window into a certain vessel’s innards suddenly open up. Lym had arrived with her gunship, still otherwise invisible to the eye, to pick him up. She stood waiting inside.

  “You didn’t get too wet out here, did you?” she asks with a tired smile.

  Vertan chuckled as he stepped into the gunship, its door closing behind him. From the outside, the view into the vehicle’s interior slides back out of existence.

  “Can’t you tell I stayed as dry as I could?” Vertan says with a wry smile, his hair wet in some parts.

  As the five vessels of the Ulminhans ascended back out of the now stormy Amritan atmosphere, so too did Lym’s gunship trail behind as their escort. This time, there was no need for the Ulminhans’ vessels to fade into invisibility; their fabricated flight plans and transponders communicated that they were all commercial vehicles en route to Gateyard Olmona, and there was no issue in being granted access to the massive gateway above the world.

  Ascending from a different part of the world, General Hiau’s warship follows in pursuit, being joined by a new fleet.