From black nothingness, my senses return to a small lighted space with average, modern furniture. I blink, mental wheels spinning as I try to remember what I was just doing and where I am. When a quiet ding fills the air, I realize I’m back in my hab. Even in stasis, my head hurts, which is not a normal thing, and my skin crawls like I’m cold. Investigating the sound, I check my logs and see a recent message.

April Conway: Hey. How are you feeling?

Aiden Rockwell: Got a headache, but all right. What happened?

April Conway: I’m sorry, but it looks like you had an episode of some kind. You fell unconscious and started having seizures. Your heart rate was over 200 BPM. We had no choice but to sedate you and put you back in stasis.

I swallow hard, fingers shaking as I type a reply. My head is in way too much pain to focus enough to type mentally.

Aiden Rockwell: Jeeze… Do you think it was caused by another panic attack? Something mental? Or is it related to my new condition?

April Conway: Only you can answer to the panic attack, but it’s certain that an increased heart rate will elevate your condition. Just like I said before, when you're awake, your heart beats faster and that spreads the parasites in your blood faster. Your brain could have been going into some kind of shock, hence the seizures, from the increased parasite presence.

Aiden Rockwell: I see…

April Conway: So, I know you were fine with it before, but I want to give you one last chance to change your mind. Do you still want to go forward with the experimental procedure? You’ve been out for about six hours, so the team is already good to start.

Aiden Rockwell: Something came up… How much time do you think I will have if we delay the procedure? How long do you think it will take?

April Conway: It’s hard to say… In stasis, we’ve bought you a day. Maybe more, maybe less. When you were awake and having that episode, things were looking pretty grim. Like an avalanche started tumbling, and now we’ve only slowed it down with some chainlink fencing. I’m afraid that if you were to wake up in this state you’d immediately resume the same issues. I’d give you minutes to live. The procedure… That will probably take us four hours.

Aiden Rockwell: That’s not what I was hoping to hear… I guess ahead and do it.

April Conway: Sounds good, Aiden. We will start right away. There’s a possibility that you won’t feel right, even if you’re asleep or in the game. So, stay vigilant and don’t log out until you are given the all clear. Understand?

Aiden Rockwell: Don’t log out. Got it. And April, go fast.

April Conway: We’ll try.

Only a few moments pass before I know what I have to do next. Swiping away the keyboard and message system, I navigate my HUD until I can select “LOAD LIBERTAS ONLINE”. In a matter of moments, I’m gone from my virtual space and appearing just outside the tavern in Starlight. To my surprise, the sky is dark and brooding. A massive cloud formation rumbles above me as the pattering sound of rain on shingles begins to grow louder. I take cover underneath the wooden patio of the tavern, when I come to realize that none of the buildings in Starlight have been named yet. I’ll have to get to that sometime, but right now I have more pressing matters. An issue to get to the bottom of.

Aiden Rockwell: Hey.

Rin Akari: Hey, hope everything is going all right. You kinda bounced unexpectedly and didn’t come back all afternoon.

Aiden Rockwell: Yeah, I’m fine for now. I need to talk to you and Felix about something serious. In person.

Rin Akari: Ok… But I’m not sure where Felix went. He just logged out to meet with someone.

An audible groan escapes me. Dread and anger clutches my chest as the pieces of this puzzle look more and more like they are coming together.

Aiden Rockwell: I’m in Starlight. You here?

Rin Akari: Off farming drops. I can head back.

Aiden Rockwell: Meet me in front of the tavern as soon as you can.

I pace around the wooden deck for a few minutes, staying dry and nervous, until I remind myself to focus on the present and do the best I can here and now. Worrying over a future that hasn’t happened yet is pointless. Begrudgingly, I open my HUD to see that my Spy has completed his recruitment and training. With a single poke, I bring up that troop categories’ settings and give it the commands it needs to begin its work.

Spies (LV. 5): 1

Status: Idle

Keywords to search for: captain, key, ship, earth, fabrication

Target Settlements: Cutter’s Cry, Bandit’s Pinch, Gormsay, Birch Castle, Tiengen

Spies dispatched. First report will be in 12 hours.

Most of those keywords make me cringe. I know it’s going to pull a whole bunch of false positives considering the fantasy nature of Libertas, but it’s all I can do. Is it going to be worth it? Who knows.

In time, a rain-soaked Rin comes jogging up from the palisade gate, an umbrella made of grey feathers held above her head. When she makes it up the stairs and smirks at me, it’s hard to not smirk back. I admit I’m feeling cautious and a touch of resent. Normally, I would question how it was looting monsters in the rain, but I don’t want to waste the time.

Placing my hands on her shoulders to be absolutely certain I have all of her attention, I ask, “I need to know everything.”

She raises her brows, amused. “About what?”

“Both Felix and Alloy. You used to run with them in the River Raiders and I need to know everything about them. And don’t hide anything from me, I’ll know.”

Rin looks shocked. Her cheeks are red. Maybe from the running, maybe not. She asks, “I’m not sure I’m following you, Aiden. About what? What do you want to know?”

I let my hands slide to my side with a groan. Secretly, I was hoping I didn’t have to be direct, that she would understand what I was after, but now I have to be blunt. “I figured it out, Rin. I know they’re both on the Shield. And I remember the first day we met, we headed to Cutter’s Cry so you could meet up with a friend. I never saw this friend of yours, and Cutter’s Cry is also, coincidentally, the place where I heard about the mutiny. I know at least one of them is in on it, it’s too much of a coincidence. So spill it. Tell me I’m wrong. Please.”

Something in her beautiful violet eyes snaps. Tears begin to well in her eyes and her posture slumps. “Fine. You deserve to know. Felix and Alloy both have been thinking about commandeering the Shield and flying it to the Dream—to my ship—so we can be together. Alloy’s just in it because he wants try to find a way to take Earth back from the Culicidae. For the longest time, I thought it was just wishful thinking or a bad joke. But over these last two weeks… I can’t tell you how many times we argued about it. Even now I doubt they’ll go through with it.”

I stand there, betrayed and incredulous. Clenching my fists, I shake my head. “This whole time… Building up to form the Starlight Roses… It was all a lie. Felix, that conniving… I thought he was acting weird in Sunshine Mines. That’s why he ‘forgot’ to heal me. He only wanted me to be a part of this so he could keep his eyes on me and going back to level one would buy him more time to finish fabricating whatever it is they need. Alloy was in that room with him in Cutter’s Cry. Kidnapping me to the Five Roses Keep was a distraction, a waste of my time. That’s why Alloy’s been my constant enemy, to hold me back from advancing too quickly and figuring out that the mutineers were right in front of me the whole time! So why didn’t you tell me, Rin? How could you hide this from me? I thought… I thought you were a better friend than this.”

Rin doesn’t say anything, she wipes at the tears, or maybe raindrops, that are rolling under her eyes. Frankly, I don’t care if they are tears.

“What about Rubble? Is he involved in this too?”

She shakes her head, speaking between ragged breaths. “Rubble’s not a part of the mutiny. B-But it’s like I said, Aiden. I don’t think they will really go through with it.”

I cross my arms. “Take off those rose-colored glasses, Rin. It seems pretty clear to me that they fully intend to do it. I just don’t understand. How could you do this to me Rin?”

“At first I thought it was a joke. I told him it was a good idea, thought it was just a romantic dream of being together again. I didn’t think it was possible. I thought they were just talking to talk.”

I throw my hands in the air. “How do you even start thinking it’s a good idea? All of our ships flew off in separate directions to protect each and every one of us. By doubling back, going past Earth to rendezvous, do you really think that the Culicidae won’t notice? They would just follow the Shield until it reached the Dream and they’d have two ships to suck dry.”

Rin wipes at her eyes again and sniffs her nose. “I know, Aiden. I know. I didn’t take them seriously and now it’s too late. Why do you think I’m telling you this?”

“I don’t know,” I say, “I’m honestly surprised you are, considering it turns out you’re not much of a friend.”

“We are friends, Aiden. I’m sorry. It was Felix’s idea, I swear. When we first met you just seemed like a greeny with nothing going for you, and you were so determined to learn Libertas and find this mutiny you swore was going to happen that I started to respect your resolve. Then I got see the real you, the worried, shaken you. But still, you wanted to push on no matter what blocked your path. And things happened… And I tried to tell Felix it was wrong. I really did. But now he just won’t listen. I’m sorry.”

I hadn’t realized before, but my head is really starting hurt something fierce. A dull throbbing ache grows worse every time my heart beats, adding to my frustrated mood. It must mean that they’ve started my experimental operation. Venom in my voice, I tell Rin, “I don’t care. Shove off. We don’t have time for you to work through your regrets. Something tells me Felix and Alloy are getting ready to pull their stunt as we speak. So just tell me how they plan on taking over the Shield so I can stop them.”

Rin’s gaze falls to her feet, and she’s quiet in thought. I begin to doubt that she even knows any details to their plan when she finally speaks. “I don’t know all the details or how he plans on pulling it off, but Felix is more than just a 3d modeler. He’s an engineer on the Shield. He knows all the ins and the outs on that ship. How it runs, where certain service hatches are, ways to override doors, he also knows the captain, the pilot, and a lot of the other staff on the ship. He is really skilled in 3d printing, so whenever something breaks he’s the one they ask to model and print a new part. That’s why he has to log off every now and then, usually because he gets called to fix something. All I know is that he’s planning on threatening the captain.”

“Jesus!” I curse, spinning around to look the other way because I’m too angry to even look at Rin. I gnash my teeth, hoping it will help me push through this growing headache. “He’s a borderline terrorist. No, he is a terrorist, putting everyone’s lives on the line. I’m going to stop him. Even if it costs me my own life.”

With a slash of my hand, I open my HUD, select April Conway and send her a message:

Aiden Rockwell: You’ll be done with my surgery within the hour. I’m logging out.