The citadel shifted. Victoria only noticed because the sunlight streaming in the port windows now crawled along the floor. She checked in her mind. The citadel was slowly turning toward the ocean, and it was already accelerating. She looked in the bridge, only to find the blind spot had moved there from Alex's office. So Alex was there then. There was only one reason why the citadel would start moving before it was facing in the right direction. There was no destination. It was just getting away from where it currently was: city of Porto Maná.

Her plan had been to keep impersonating a marine until Alex was satisfied she was dead. He'd had the marines check each other's shield, something Victoria had managed to dodge, but it seemed Alex had decided on more extreme precautionary measures. Of course Alex would do something like this.

She headed to the stairwell.

At the door, a marine stopped her. "We're not allowed to leave."

"A porthole has been pried open," Victoria said. "I think someone might have jumped out. We need to tell the captain."

"We'll radio it in then. We can't leave."

"I'm not leaving the spire," Victoria said. "Just going to tell the captain downstairs."

"No." The marine noticed the gash in Victoria's armor. "What happened here?"

"Someone stabbed me."

"Did it damage your shield stone?"

"No."

"Are you sure? That looks like exactly where it would be."

"It's not." Victoria pointed above the gash. "My shield is here. Isn't yours?"

"No. Mine is right here." The marine pointed on his own chest.

"Right there?" Victoria stabbed him with knife. The shield glyph within popped when it ruptured.

The marine yelped, but he immediately forgot why.

Downstairs, all the marines looked up. Everyone sensed an aura appear. Victora had to act quickly.

"They're keeping us in here because they're going to kill us just as they made us kill them," Victoria gestured at the dead. "And now they're coming for you. Get to the roof. Shoot anyone who comes after you. Now go."

The marine ran into the stairwell and bolted up the stairs. Two marines in the lobby took after him. Another two stayed behind. Victoria waited for the men to pass, then slipped down two flights to the lobby floor. She took aim at the two remaining marines through the door and kicked it open.

She was emptying the rifle's clip before the door even hit the wall. The rifle's recoil had flechettes flying all over the lobby, but both the guarding marine and the captain collapsed.

Victoria swapped her rifle for one of theirs and escaped to the Deck floors.

The bridge spire wasn't far. Of it's two stairwells, one was ablaze, the other was still rigged with a bomb. However, Alex was not in his office anymore. She could see the detonator on his unattended desk.

Victoria halted.

He wasn't in the bridge anymore either. No one was, because the bridge crew was dead. Officers lay sprawled over bridge steps. The strike room was just as gruesome.

Victoria scanned the citadel for the blindspot. It was moving toward the flight bay in the citadel's portside aft, where a single military shuttle awaited.

She sprinted down corridors. The bay was ahead, the blindspot was nearly there.

Turning the corner, she saw them—Alex and Sibyl, in the bodies of Helena and Winnie, were dragging Naema along. Alex aimed a gun at Victoria. She stumbled. A flechette narrowly missed her as she fell behind a stack of plastic-wrapped supplies.

She scurried closer to her cover. It seemed Tan's power had tripped her up, saving her life from walking into a flechette. That power had proved far more useful than she had anticipated. She raised her rifle over the crate and fired blindly toward Alex, trusting in Tan's power to guide her shot.

She glanced around the corner. Nothing. Alex and Sibyl had taken cover behind a shipping crate. There had been no targets to hit. The flechettes could not penetrate the crates.

"I knew it!" Alex yelled. "I knew you were still alive."

Victoria could see the crate they were hiding behind, but that's it. She hadn't realized how dependent she'd become of Winnie's power. It was like being blind.

"I guess since you're here," Alex said, "you've probably guessed why I'm stepping out. So we get to play a game. How much time do you think I set that bomb for? I'll give you a hint. It's about forty seconds before the really big one is supposed to go off. Do you remember what that timer was at?"

Another bomb. What was it with this man and bombs?

"You've also got to remember to subtract however long it takes for this hopper to get clear," Alex continued. "I forgot to ask Quentin how large the blast would be, so your guess is as good as mine."

"You're not getting on that hopper," Victoria yelled. "Go back and disarm the bomb."

"Nah. You can do that. It's in my office. I'll even tell you the code. It's... 18060513. I know you're not supposed to use your birthday as a password, but I did. So go ahead, but you'll only be letting the bigger bomb go off then."

"Then we die together, Alexander."

"You'd do that? I don't think so. You might not like me very much, but you won't sacrifice yourself just to get rid of me."

"Why not? You told the world what I did. I might never rule again."

"Sure you could, Katherine. The world is filled with idiots. Make up a story. Tell them I was lying. Make them forget. You love doing that! Better yet. Just find another poor girl to steal a body from and start all over. Let this bomb go off and the world will be in such chaos, it'll be ripe for the taking. With all your new powers, it'll be child's play."

Victoria glanced around the supplies crates. She glimpsed Alexander pointing a repulse pistol at her and ducked away just as a flechette punched into the crate by her head.

"What you lack is determination," Alex said. "You had such a good start. You were taking over minds. Replacing your enemies. You blew up half the world, and it worked like a charm. But then what? Six years of shit: taking over countries one at a time, diplomacy, Humanitarian Projects. I thought you must have had an attack of nerves, as if you suddenly forgot you're the monster, but no. You actually cared about what people think about you. You actually wanted to help them." He scoffed. "You have no idea how to rule."

"And you know better? You couldn't rule without warping the minds of every last person in the world."

"Because it works, Katherine. I brought China together in three days. Three days. No wars. No struggle. It's the rational way. You, on the other hand, destroyed the world. Then, before you could do any good at all, a teenage girl had a hissy fit, and you lost everything. That's pathetic. Just give up. All you've ever caused is pain and suffering, because that's all you know. It's time for the little girls to go home. Let Daddy tuck them in."

Victoria fired a few shots toward Alex. No hits. He was still locked down behind the same crates.

"Sooner or later," she said. "You'll have to turn around and go back."

"With you just around the corner waiting for the all clear? No thank you."

"Then we wait."

"Then we do." Alex agreed.

For a long while, they did. Each sat behind their respective covers.

Eventually, Alex broke the silence. "So, again, not wanting to spoil this for you, but we're getting very close to zero hour."

"Then go disarm the bomb."

"That's not going to happen, Katherine, but I'll tell you what. I'm going to leave my wrist monitor right here. Then I'm going to get on that ship and leave. After I'm gone, you can disarm both bombs, and we'll take a raincheck on this fight of ours."

"No."

"Now you're just being stubborn. Neither of us wants to die today."

"Once you're on the shuttle, you'll have no reason to leave that monitor."

"Okay. Fine. Look."

Something slid across the floor. Victoria spared a glance. Alex's wrist monitor now lay in open view. It was in the opposite direction from the ship for him. "There you go. You can get it once I'm gone. Remember. 18060513. Now I'm going."

They shuffled around behind their protection. Footsteps moved cautiously toward the escape ship. Alex was clearly hoping Victoria wouldn't hurt him in Helena's body. He was wrong. Victoria ducked out and aimed.

Naema's wide eyes stared at Victoria from inside her helmet. Alex was hiding behind her with the gun aimed over Naema's shoulder, and Sibyl right behind him. Victoria aimed.

...But she couldn't bring herself to pull the trigger. Did she really need to kill him? Alexander had done a lot of awful things in the world, and awful things to her. But he was the only telepath flair that existed.

Alex fired at her. A flechette punched into her shoulder. She fell back.

Scurrying behind her cover, she realized her shield had dropped. She hadn't even felt it. Whatever glyph it was Alex had been using for Sympathy, he'd just used it on her.

Of course he would. Why not? She was here to kill him. He was just defending himself.

No. Those aren't her thoughts. Alexander murdered her father. He murdered her.

...But still.

NO! No "but still". She had to act now.

She lunged around the crate and fired wildly, aiming low. Flechettes punched into Naema. Her leg. Her neck. Her helmet. She collapsed. Alex dove for the escape ship, firing back. Victoria's gut erupted in pain. She crumpled.

In the ship now, Alex had left Sibyl and Naema behind, The hatch was closing. He was safe. No weapons could reach him.

But that didn't matter anymore.