Daphne Halacourt watched, glaring through her new glasses.

How had everything gone so wrong? First the Instructor's idiotic test, then the encounter with Pierrot, and now the Supremacy ship had just blown the fuck up?! Was she cursed or just genuinely that unlucky?

Well, not that unlucky -- she'd managed to run into Niles just as she was dying, after all. There would never have been a better time to grab her Aether Armament. If nothing else, the world seemed keen to give her a chance to escape all this. It had necessitated stealing from the dying, outrunning poison gas and now stealing a ship, but the opportunity was there all the same.

She stared through the walls of the sleek ship -- the only one in the impound hangar not locked in via the clamps. The presence of a few Aether-users was notable: one in the cockpit, a shroud of purple Aether coating them -- and the other a little further back, surrounded by a flare of flickering red Aether.

The purple one in the front was in near-top condition, but the red one in the back seemed tired. If Daphne played her cards right and executed a proper sneak attack, there was a good chance she could dispatch both of them and get her hands on that ship, that she could get out of here -- if she managed to survive when even the Instructor was probably dead, surely the Commission would have no choice but to make her a Special Officer.

Killing Jaime Pierrot had been a fool's errand from the start -- Daphne had understood that the moment she'd laid eyes on him in person. She'd hid among some corpses as he strode down a hallway, waiting for her opportunity to strike -- only to realize what she was dealing with as soon as she properly looked at him. Her Cogitant senses had instinctually seemed to scream 'no, bad, wrong' as she observed his movements, and a feeling of distinct nausea had risen up in her throat.

There was something profoundly wrong about that man. She didn't know what, and to tell the truth she had absolutely no desire to find out.

Still, that was in the past. Daphne adjusted the dagger in her hands as she stepped out from behind the packing crates, getting ready to begin making her way towards the ship -- only to hop back behind cover as the hangar doors opened.

Stupid, stupid! She'd been so focused on the ship that she'd forgotten to keep an eye on the rest of her surroundings. Two more clouds of Aether were moving towards the ship, now -- one blue and one green, but both sickly and weak. It seemed exposure to the gas had done a number on them.

Unwelcome variables, but not impossible to outmaneuver. Daphne ran through the factors in her mind:

The purple Aether in the cockpit. If she waited until the right time, circumstances would keep them out of any fight that occurred. The red Aether in the back of the ship. They would be the main enemy in any combat. As such, a sneak attack on them would be the best opening move. The blue Aether approaching the ship. Flickering, but by no means fully weakened. Their presence wasn't necessarily a disadvantage, either -- a weak person that needed protecting would be an effective handicap for Daphne's main opponent. The green Aether -- it was about to dissipate completely. No matter the condition the user was in, they wouldn't be able to fight on Daphne's level.

As the two wisps of Aether entered the ship, Daphne took a deep breath. This would be difficult. Difficult, but doable -- but possible.

And possible was all Daphne Halacourt needed.

She began her approach.

"You are mega-sure it okay to let these guys go?" North's accomplice said, watching Skipper's new ship zoom out of the hangar. "The point is for survivors to be zero guys, I think." Their fingers brushed over the controls for the vessel's guns.

North glared at the other person. "Cut the bullshit. We had a deal -- Skipper and the rest get out unharmed. I'm taking half pay for that shit, you know? Don't fuck with me."

"Oho?" the person in the pilot's chair glanced up eagerly. "And what is happening if I am fucking with you?"

North allowed a crackle of translucent Aether to run over his arm. "Things'll get ugly."

The pilot chuckled again, leaning in further so that his lumpy, bizarre face was illuminated by the glow of the on-board lighting. "Well, maybe Mazma wants things to go ugly!"

They were in Mazma's ship, which had stuck around and attached itself to the outside of the hull after flying out of the hangar. They had to make sure only the right survivors made it out, after all.

"You try and fight me, buddy," North said, crossing his arms. "And I'll make sure to smash those controls of yours in the second before you kill me. Floatin' in space with a useless ship sound like fun to you?"

For a second, 'Mazma' genuinely mulled it over, working his jaw left and right -- then, he relented with a wave of his hand and turned back to the controls. "Don't be worried, fake guy. Your friends are Mazma's friends too, now. Mazma never kills a friend in way that is not fair. And Mazma already made deal with you, right? Mazma is angelic guy. Mazma does not go back on word, or make a lie happen. You got it?"

North rubbed the bridge of his nose. "I got it," he muttered. "And they ain't my friends -- you can consider keeping them alive a professional obligation, okay? Going around killing my former employers don't look good on a résumé."

"Okay!" 'Mazma' said cheerfully. "You are believed, my guy!"

Half pay for a job like this was an obscene amount of money, but it still wasn't enough to deal with this kind of bullshit.

North glanced behind himself, at the open panel in the ship's floor, at the computer unit embedded there, green light running through its circuits. The parasitic auto-brain they'd brought along had done well in piggybacking off of the ship's processes -- they'd been able to pull up information and control evacuation procedures easily. It wasn't the kind of trick that would work on the UAP twice, of course, but they didn't need it to work twice.

It was a surprise that his employer had been able to get this kind of hardware together on such short notice anyway, to be frank. Apparently, the Instructor who'd brought Special Officer hopefuls here had been part of a hard-line faction intent on open war with the UAP. His employer hadn't been able to act openly against the Special Officer's Commission -- officially, they were independent from the whims of the Body -- so they'd hired North to ensure the Instructor's mission failed and to eliminate any evidence on either side.

It had been such a simple job, and yet...

North's eyes flicked back to 'Mazma'. Needless to say, North's collaborator had invited himself to this little escapade -- he certainly had the rank to do those kinds of things, and there were very few people in the galaxy with the guts to say 'no' to him.

To be frank, North had half-expected the whole thing to turn into a disaster with this guy around -- but he'd stuck to his half of the deal. He'd gotten Skipper and the crew out safe and cleared the way for North to do his job.

Still, he was kind of an eyesore…

"You really going to stick with that dumbass disguise?" North said -- he recognised it was a little hypocritical for him to be calling someone else out for wearing a mask, but he simply couldn't stand looking at this one any further.

'Mazma' didn't look back. "What disguise? Mazma is always this guy."

North let a little more of his annoyance slip into his tone. "Stop it."

'Mazma' gave in surprisingly easily. He chuckled and shrugged, his body language loosening into a kind of assured cockiness as he leaned back in his chair. When he spoke next, his voice was completely different -- the bizarre omni-accent replaced by a deep, velvety voice like melting chocolate.

"Can't blame me," he said, running a hand over the side of his face -- brushing against his stitched-together scar. "Great artists can't help but admire their craft."

His fingers slipped through the stitches, sliding underneath his face in a grotesque display -- and then the man started pulling something out. Bundles of once-white string, stained red by blood, being pulled out of the scar seemingly without end.

As he pulled out the string, the shape of his face began to change, the lumps -- actually bundles of string -- shrinking and softening out until his face looked smooth and sleek as a videograph star. At the same time, his hair darkened from it's vivid red to midnight-black, flopping down from its sticky-up position and falling to his shoulders.

There was one last thing: the man's fingers worked deeper into his wound, adjusting their angle so they were reaching up towards his eyes. Then, they pulled out two last segments of string -- and the moment they were free of his body, the colour of his sclera shifted from white to Umbrant black. Satisfied, the man cracked his neck.

"Ah, that's much better," said Wu Ming, the Fourth Contender, the Clown of the Supremacy, the Man With A Thousand Powers. "In terms of comfort, I'd give this disguise method a… six? A six out of ten?" His eyes flicked up to look at North. "What do you think?"

When faced with a predator, prey can instinctively feel the difference in strength -- and North could feel it here, a sudden sense of fragility in his bones, like his body was about to collapse in on itself. This man was one of only four people who'd tried to kill the Supreme and survived -- one of only four people who stood almost at the apex of the Supremacy. In comparison, North was little more than a gnat.

Still, he had an appearance to maintain.

"I'm thinkin' I wanna get paid," North rolled his eyes. "You wanna keep sucking your own dick, or you wanna get out of here?"

"So vulgar!" Wu Ming laughed genuinely, turning back to the controls. "Still, I don't dislike that about your personality. In terms of personal enjoyment, I'd give you an eight out of ten."

"Never asked for a rating, pal."

"And yet you've got one," Wu Ming wagged a finger. "Such is the way of the world -- no matter who you are, you are constantly being assessed in the eyes of others. Don't take it too badly, North: you're an eight in my eyes, but in the eyes of someone else you could be a ten. The difference between an angel and a demon is merely the viewing angle." He held his fingers out in front of him as a frame, as if he were looking at a screen.

"Profound," North rolled his eyes again. "Now -- we goin' or what?"

"Ah, the impatience of youth," Wu Ming sighed, tapping a few buttons on the console to chart their flight path. The ship began to move, preparing to begin the series of jumps that would take them to the nearest friendly lightpoint.

At the same time, he waved a hand near his open scar -- and as a spark of rainbow Aether jumped between his hand and his face, the scar began to close again, this time leaving no trace of any injury. North didn't have the eyes to observe the phenomenon directly, but he'd heard secondhand how this worked -- nanoscopic lengths of string binding the wound together at the molecular level.

For most people, a power like that would be the culmination of their training. For a one-in-a-billion freak like Wu Ming, however, it was treated as just another party trick.

"Still," Wu Ming said, leaning back in his seat, putting his feet up on the console. "This was an enjoyable mission -- your friends are interesting people, my boy."

"I told you -- they ain't my friends. They're former professional associates."

Wu Ming chuckled. "You dance around words like nothing else, kid, but I've been doing this longer than you. You've caught a case of the feelings, I'm afraid. Unfortunate condition, no known cure. I've had it myself."

"Can you just fly?"

"Your professional associates, then," Wu Ming ignored him, staring up at the ceiling. "They've caught my notice. I like them. Good, interesting people. Strong -- especially the man who leads them: I can see why Avaman is so obsessed. In terms of how much I wanna fight them, I think…"

Wu Ming's smile spread into a toothy, feral grin.

"Ten outta ten."

"What happened?!" Ruth shouted, doing her best to hold the unconscious Skipper up as she staggered backwards into the ship.

"I don't know," Dragan wheezed, leaning onto the wall for support as he massaged his throat. "I don't -- the gas maybe, I think -- but he said he had a countermeasure -- ah, crap, I -- I dunno."

Ruth winced. Dragan clearly wasn't in his best condition either. He'd said he hadn't breathed in any of the gas, but maybe he just hadn't noticed -- or there very well could have been other ways for it to enter the body. In all likelihood, they probably didn't have long before Dragan fell unconscious too.

"Bruno!" she cried out as she dragged Skipper into the Slipstream's main room, throwing him down on a couch. "Need a hand here -- Skipper's in a bad way!"

Bruno had a little bit of expertise with medical matters, she knew -- hell, with the kind of training he'd had, he probably had a little bit of expertise in everything. Technically, Serena should have received the same training, but Ruth really doubted she would have paid enough attention.

It only took a few seconds for Bruno to report -- dragging Dragan over to a chair as he made his way to Skipper. His eyes scanned over the unconscious man.

"What happened?" he asked, voice sharp.

"Some kind of gas," Dragan mumbled, looking terribly small in the armchair he'd been deposited in. "He breathed some in, p-probably."

"Shit," Bruno hissed -- before leaning in and placing his ear against Skipper's chest, listening to the ragged sound of his breathing. His eyes flicked to Ruth. "This is beyond me -- this ship has a stasis unit, right?"

Ruth nodded. She'd noticed it when they'd first stolen the ship -- a unit to keep injured crewmembers stable en route to medical facilities.

"Right," Bruno nodded. "We'll get him on ice and find a doctor at the nearest lightpoint. Help me carry him."

Ruth nodded and went to pick Skipper up by the shoulders -- only to freeze when she saw the sudden intense expression on Bruno's face. He was staring past her, over her shoulder, and as she looked at him she could see a reflexive strand of purple Aether crackle through his hair.

Hesitantly, Ruth looked back over her shoulder.

Dragan had moved -- had been moved -- from his chair, now standing in the middle of the room. Behind him, holding him in a headlock and pressing a pistol against his temple, was a woman with pale green hair and bright blue eyes -- wearing a white Supremacy uniform.

"I'm sure you can guess," the woman said, keeping both Bruno and Ruth in her sight. "But I have some demands."