As Nina loaded her last spare magazine into her pistol, she ignored the discomfort while her thoughts drifted elsewhere. While only a few days ago she was enjoying the warm afternoon breeze from the hammock which overlooked the ocean at their accommodation on the Fire Fountain, her current situation might as well have been from a different life. It wasn’t just a second one either – the sudden changes in just about everything around her besides Reina and the crew were beginning to read like something akin to a flip book.

You couldn’t have high points in life without low points, she got that. The problem was that the low points were more often than not a little too close to bedrock for her liking.

Not to mention how frequent the dips seemed to be becoming. It wasn’t like a series of rolling hills that eased upwards before letting her down softly, instead playing out like a rollercoaster which had been designed to terrify her. While it was doing a good job of it too, it was a more exhausting experience than she could deal with right now and the only thing she was left with was a wish for the ride to end. Considering that her life on Caecus had been so steady that it might as well have been drawn out using a spirit level, frequently losing control over aspects of her new life was strenuous. For the umpteenth time she reminded herself that she wasn’t cut out for this, but there was no getting off until the ride had reached the station and it certainly wasn’t just smooth sailing from here on.

Land on a new plate, enjoy the fresh take on life, and sample a slice of the life that was on offer. Check. Have a close encounter with someone out to turn her into a tool to further their own careers while chasing after her in a potentially deadly encounter, also check. Once was nerve-wracking, while twice was concerning. Three times she had been through this now, however, and she was seriously re-evaluating her employment options. The debt that Reina held over her was the least of her worries right now, and if she got back to Luem she would really have to think about quitting or taking a permanent office role. If Euris could do it, so could she, right? Rinse and repeat was supposed to accustom her to the process, but the only thing that Nina felt was an increasing concern that each dip would be her last.

The fact that their escapes had been escalating in difficulty was also something that alarmed her. While the first time had been somewhat casual as Ormain thought that he held all the cards, the second time had been downright horrifying. Even if she had been unconscious for what had apparently been the real escape, her time with Rucille was more than enough to leave her with mental scars that would take years to heal. At least the physical wounds which lingered would fade with time, but she would be naïve to roll with the assumption that Reina’s new plan couldn’t leave her with any new ones. It wouldn’t surprise her, as terrible as the thought was. Suffering through her second escape hadn’t been enough, apparently, because this time she also got to dish some out herself.

For now, she would just conveniently forget that there were more plates to come.

“Don’t hang around,” Reina said to Zhannah for the third time. Being told once would have been enough as nobody wanted to wait around in the line of fire, but Reina was practically repeating it like a mantra. It was obvious to everyone that she was concerned about what the results of her decision would be, but nobody was going to fault her for whatever came to pass. Could Nina have placed a team that she was responsible for in clear danger with a roll of the dice? Even if she could have, she was glad that she wasn’t the person who had to make the call. She agreed that if they were going to gamble then now was the time to do it, but at least she wouldn’t be the one losing sleep at night if something went wrong because she wasn’t the one who had called it.

“Yeah, yeah,” Zhannah replied, seemingly at ease as she stared forward. From her place at the side of the boat Nina could finally see what she was looking at in the distance, the open ocean which served as the exit to the passage stretching away from them. How Zhannah was supposed to slow and then turn at exactly the right place was a mystery to her, but then again, she had no idea exactly how experienced she was. A common occurrence, when she thought about it. She didn’t even have a great handle on how much experience the people in her own team had. Learning about your co-workers on the job might have sounded practical, but it was difficult to pay attention when your attention was instead focused on saving your own skin.

A shoulder bumped into her own which shook her from thought, looking up to find that Saela had appeared beside her. The girl had a stern expression on her face, while her usual hoodie had been replaced by a slick black raincoat. It hadn’t kept the rain from soaking her fringe despite how well she usually managed to hide herself under a hood, and Nina didn’t need to look hard to see the look of distaste as Saela glanced at her pistol either. So what if she couldn’t fire an assault rifle, there wasn’t even a spare one for her to use anyway. She was trying her hardest to help protect everyone aboard including Saela herself, so why was there the need for snark? It was true that she had no idea if her shots had even landed anywhere near the target, but she wasn’t a soldier and so she was just doing what she could. It wasn’t a quest for praise or an attempt to prove herself indispensable, so why couldn’t her efforts just be accepted in earnest instead of snubbed?

“Slowing in five,” Zhannah said before counting down, cutting off any chance to vocalise her thoughts. Nina was thankful for the instruction as it enabled herself to brace for the sudden deceleration, and instead of being sent tumbling when it came she would be saved from the embarrassment. She couldn’t exactly shoot at someone else if she was busy flailing around with her legs in the air, and so after gripping the cold steel rail before her she hunkered down to wait. Breathe in, breathe out. They were only going to have a moment to make something stick, and if they didn’t then it would be boat chase round three which was something that she simply didn’t have the energy for.

“Three,” Zhannah said as Nina felt a slap on her other shoulder. Turning to see that Reina was smiling at her with an almost apologetic look was enough to make her heart twitch, but the dice had been rolled and all that was left was to see what the results were. She thought about telling Reina that there was no need to be sorry, but it could wait. She’d done the right thing, as terrible as it sounded, and the fact that it gnawed at her was more than enough. It would be fine anyway, right?

“One,” Zhannah finally said, and before she knew it Nina was gripping the railing as tightly as she could. Almost thrown off her feet even though she had braced for it, she winced as Saela’s shoulder smacked into hers before the boat swayed out to the right. There wasn’t much room to manoeuvre, but apparently Zhannah was going to use every centimetre available to swing Alan’s craft around. It was a good thing that she did too, because only halfway through the turn Nina saw a pulse round sail over their heads, an unwelcome reminder that there was still a boat full of angry mercenaries behind them with a rather large bone to pick.

A smaller boat was not something that she had ever thought would be preferable, but tonight had decisively changed her mind.

“Up,” Reina said, galvanizing Nina’s unsteady hands as she rose to look back down the dark stretch of water that was appearing before her. In the distance she could make out Ormain’s second boat with little difficulty, the white water which was being split by the bow acting as a makeshift target in the dark. She didn’t know if Reina said anything after that, because before she could see the muzzle flash of a rifle in the distance she grimaced before pulling the trigger, the gunshot punctuating the roar of the engine before it was joined by the three rifles to her left. Twice and then three times she fired, but before she could fire a fourth she was sent sideways before barging into Saela as the boat leapt out of the water once more.

Ignoring the hiss that escaped from Saela’s lips, Nina dropped her pistol to balance herself before looking around the boat to see if everyone had made it through in one piece. Svanda and Rop still sat off to the side with stony expressions on their faces, while Trim and Aline looked at each other as though confused. Jade was still in one piece although she had been using the light machine gun as an impromptu shield, while the three sitting at the controls were just as silent. Zhannah hadn’t even turned to check on them, although the lack of screaming by now probably told her all that she needed to know. They were fine, and it was time to put as much distance between them and Ormain as possible.

“They didn’t shoot back?” Alan asked to break the silence. Considering that he had been huddled in cover with his arms over his head he wouldn’t have known, although to be honest neither did Nina. She didn’t even know if she had come close to hitting the target, let alone if they had fired back. It had been nothing but a blur for her, and it was probably a good thing. If things had been any different, she didn’t know if her already thumping heart would have survived.

“They jumped as soon as they saw us,” Svanda chuckled as she kept watch behind them to see if the chase would continue. “I don’t blame them either. It was the smart thing to do.”

“At that speed?” Aline asked. “Wouldn’t that hurt?”

“Depends on how they landed,” Rop shrugged. “Probably better than being shot though.”

Nina saw Reina breathe a sigh of relief out of the corner of her eye before she straightened herself up and smiled at the group. Easy to smile now that they had come through without even a hitch so far, although her expression was soon replaced by a thin frown as she glanced over to Zhannah.

“Get us out of here before Ormain picks them up, he isn’t going to take this lying down and his patience has probably run out too.”