Rhea was furious. Why was Brisingr yelling at her? She didn’t do anything wrong. She only wanted to live a normal life filled with pranking people, but she wasn’t crazy enough to shatter somebody's arm! Rhea did what she could do under the circumstances, and she wasn’t going to sit by and let somebody who hadn’t even been here scream at her for that.

“Excuse me?” Brisingr asked, her voice chilly. “I left because of your incompetence!”

Rhea growled. “My incompetence? I had a game plan! It would have worked if you didn’t leave!”

“And how many more people would have been hurt? Killed!?” Brisingr demanded back.

Rhea’s blood boiled. “Because you left, do you know how many people died?” she asked. “Let me tell you; it wasn’t pretty!”

Brisingr flinched and Rhea received a sick satisfaction because of it. Before long, Brisingr collected herself again. “I admit, my absence may have caused a lot of problems. But whose fault was it that the whole situation got to that point in the first place? Whose fault was it that it took us months before we could deploy?”

Rhea’s fingers curled around her armrest. She didn’t like what Brisingr was implying, not one bit. “Brisingr, if you’re trying to say it’s everybody else’s fault as well, that’s going too far.” Murmurs were audible as Rhea’s coworkers talked.

Brisingr faltered. “No! I don’t think it’s their fault, I think it’s yours! Maybe if you hadn’t been fooling around, we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now!”

Rhea drawled, “We can go at it with ‘What if’s' all day but it’s not going to change anything. The way I see it? It was both of our faults. I admit I could have handled the situation better and maybe you got disenchanted and flew off. That might be on me as well, but you can’t go scot-free.”

Brisingr glowered at her and Rhea, not for the first time, mourned Brisingr was the one who worked for Yggdrasil. She and the Precept Prime were the only people she couldn’t figure out by look alone.

Brisingr opened her mouth - whether to yell or agree, Rhea’d never know - when a series of shaking coughs hit her. Brisingr dropped to a knee, hacking wildly into her hand.

“Medic! Medic!” somebody called.

Rhea waved them off and crouched next to Brisingr. Wincing at the gray mass falling from her mouth, she soothingly rubbed her back. “You idiot,” she whispered, clicking a button on her seat. A slot opened and Rhea retrieved a small bottle out. Opening it, she palmed a pill and shoved it down Brisingr’s throat.

Amidst the retching, Brisingr managed to force it down her throat and she gasped for air, massaging her neck. Too late, Rhea remembered the water. Rhea decided not to look at Brisingr’s tears and opted to glare at her coworkers, all of whom were viewing them as if they were in a zoo or something.

“Scoot! Scram! Before you wake up the next day and find some unpleasant surprise!” Rhea threatened. Everybody hastily went back into professional mode, almost all of them reliving Rhea’s epic pranks.

Rhea noticed Brisingr wasn’t shaking anymore and took her hand off. Helping Brisingr rise to her feet, she scolded her gently. “Prat. You know you need the medicine, why didn’t you take some?”

Brisingr murmured dully, “Too busy.”

Rhea shook her head. Brisingr was always going to be like that. Guess it’s up to her to make sure Brisingr doesn’t kill herself. As it is her job to watch over everybody else.

Rhea was knocked out of her musing by the way Brisingr was looking at her. She cracked a smile. “What? I’m not going to bite.”

Brisingr didn’t smile back but she didn’t reprimand Rhea either. Not much of a sign but a sign nonetheless. Rhea inwardly sighed. Was this all over now? Could she focus on the more important things again, like finding out where she hid Luna’s lunch before getting shot at?

“Commander.” Ah, speak of the devil.

Praying Luna didn’t know, Rhea tiptoed her way to her second in command. “What is it, Luna?” she asked, fighting hard to keep the quiver out of her voice.

“Look at that, Commander. It’s not normal readings.” Luna told her.

Rhea had started to relax when she realized it wasn’t about the lunch, only to stiffen once more as Luna went on. Smashing her face against Luna unnecessarily (there was still plenty of space), she scanned Luna’s finding.

The energy signature...... was similar to that night. Rhea frowned. That was impossible, right? But how many times had the things she deemed impossible become possible and come back to bite her in the butt?

“Okay, Luna, thanks for telling me. I’ll take care of it-“

Rhea’s hesitation and shock had drawn Brisingr over and she read the information. Rhea cursed. She didn’t want her of all people! She supposed she should be grateful it wasn’t her. She would flip.

Rhea spotted Brisingr flinching before composing herself. “What are you going to do with this information?”

“I’m going to deploy our-“

“I’m afraid you can’t do that. Take a look at the coordinates. Ring a bell?” Luna pointed out the numbers, 51.709759, -10.082816.

Rhea blinked. “Does anybody know where that is?”