"So the city's dying." Mims frowned, scratching his head. "Is that what knocked out our tech? Some kind of death throes?"

"Uh..." Yvian was tempted to lie. There was a person in there. Sad and lonely and defiant and afraid. After touching her mind, Yvian felt connected. Protective. The human didn't like things that attacked him. He'd let City 43 die if he knew the truth. "Not exactly," she hedged.

Mims focused in on her, suspicious. "Then what, exactly?"

Yvian shifted uncomfortably. Mims had been with her through a lot. Been there for her. "I think..." she said, slowly. Crunch. She couldn't lie to the Captain. "I think knocking out our equipment is what's killing her."

The Captain's frown deepened. "How so?"

"It's..." How to explain? Yvian took a moment to think, then started again. "She... the city, the energy field that stops computers, she was using that. I think she decided it wasn't enough. She, uh, I think she used a stronger version. Like a pulse instead of a field." The human's expression darkened. Yvian quickly continued. "The pulse used too much energy. She doesn't have enough to keep herself alive."

Lissa scowled. "So you're saying it's dying because it tried to kill us."

"Basically?" Yvian raised her shoulders in a slow shrug, hands held slightly out. "She's getting a little power from the starlight, but it's not enough. I don't think she'll make it another hour."

Lissa harrumphed. "Sounds like a problem that's solving itself."

"No!" Yvian had expected the human to be against her, but Lissa? That might be worth panicking over. She'd been counting on her sister to win over the Captain. "You don't understand. We can't let her die!"

"Why not?"

"She's a person," Yvian explained. "There's a person in there!"

"So? We kill people all the time." The engineer gestured at her sister. "I mean, look what she did to you."

"Yvian's right," the Captain stepped in. The pixens both turned in shock. Neither expected the human to care about a giant crystal that had tried to kill him. He continued, "If there's a person in there, she might be the only one who can tell us what's going on with these cities. Hell, she might be able to tell us what happened to the Lucendians. Maybe help us get our hands on some of their tech. It's too big an opportunity to let go."

"And what if she tries to kill us again?" Lissa argued. The flare she was holding started to gutter out. She dropped it and pulled out a new one.

"With what?" Mims scoffed. "If she had weapons or those crystal guardians she'd have used them by now. I doubt she'd risk killing herself if she had other options." He turned to Yvian. "You said she's a person."

"Yeah." Yvian nodded.

"So you can communicate?"

"Sort of." Yvian scratched her head. "We can feel each other's feelings. I heard a bunch of things that were probably thoughts, but I couldn't make sense of it. I don't think she understood me, either. We don't speak the same language."

"Ok." Mims thought for a moment. "Lissa," he ordered. "Go through the duffel, see if anything we brought's still got a power source. The crystal ships eat heat, light, plasma, and electricity. Give her whatever you can find and buy us some time."

Lissa frowned. "I don't think-"

"Just do it," Mims cut her off. "Yvian, I want you to talk to the city. Do whatever you can to keep her calm and get her on our side. Do not," he pointed at her. "Let her hold on to you if you feel her start to go. For all we know she could take her with you."

"I got it." Yvian swallowed. As much as she wanted to comfort the crystal person, she wasn't looking forward to feeling her fear and pain a second time. "What are you going to do?"

The human picked a flare out of the duffel, looked at it, and grimaced. "I'm going outside." He put the flare back and started down the stairs. "There might be one more card we can play."

"Shouldn't you take this?" Lissa picked the unused flare back up and waved at him.

"You need it more than I do," the Captain called back. He hit the bottom of the stairs and broke into a run, disappearing into the darkness. "Buy as much time as you can."

"Fucking Crunch." Lissa started rummaging through the duffel with one hand, the other holding the lit flare for light.

Yvian eyed the crystal Node, bracing herself. Could she really die in there? Yes, she decided. Probably. If the city died while she was inside it. The pixen took a breath. It didn't matter. There was a person in there. A person Yvian wanted to save. She would do whatever she could.

She touched the Node. Her mind flowed into the crystal. Fear. Cold. The person in the crystal was quieter, now. Weaker. Yvian tried to send soothing thoughts.

It'll be alright. We'll help you. Just hold on. It'll be alright. We're going to get you some energy. Just stay with me. Stay with me...

The woman in the crystal heard her. The mind clutched at Yvian, clinging. She was so afraid. Yvian felt such... hate? Yes. Hate. The woman hated her. Why? A torrent of vitriol poured into the pixen. High pitched, lilting whistles that Yvian could not understand. Yvian tried to be soothing, but the touching of minds didn't allow her to dissemble. The woman could feel her fear and confusion. She whistled defiance even as she grasped at the desperate hope that the pixen would save her.

Yvian could feel the city. A vast stretch, drinking in the weak light of stars. Growing colder and colder as its life faded. The voice in the crystal ranted, almost gibbering. Yvian kept trying to talk to it. She didn't know what else to do.

A sudden trickle of warmth. Yvian didn't notice at first, but the woman did. A burst of hope, followed by bitter disappointment. It was not enough. She was still going to die. A confused Yvian pulled back. The city didn't want to let her go. Yvian tried to explain that she needed to know what was happening. She needed to pull out if she was going to help the woman. The woman didn't care. She seized Yvian's spirit. If the city was going to die, she would take the pixen with her. One final act of defiance.

Yvian fought. She wrenched and wriggled, trying to pry her mind out of the crystal. The city clawed her back, clamping down. Fury and hate crashed into her, gleeful at the pixen's confused panic. Slowly, painfully, Yvian struggled to loosen it's grip on her. Why? Why did the woman in the crystal hate her so? Why wouldn't she let Yvian help?

Heat. Light. Energy far beyond the meager light of stars crashed into City 43. Yvian felt it strike the spire, felt the crystal greedily drink it down. Shock and hope jolted the woman in the crystal. For an instant, she let go of Yvian. The pixen didn't waste her chance, yanking her thoughts back into her body.

Her eyes opened. The red light of a flare showed her sister's concerned face.

"Are you alright, sis?" Lissa looked concerned.

Yvian nodded. She needed a few seconds to compose herself. When she was done, she asked, "What happened?"

Lissa nudged a metal box with her foot. It was humming. It was small generator, half a meter by half a meter. A few dials and buttons were visible, and a thick cable extended out of it down the stairs. The end of the cable had been stripped, the exposed wires touching the floor. "Everything with batteries or an active power system is dead, but the generator still works. Also, that." She pointed.

In the distance was the archway they had used to enter the spire. It wasn't far, maybe half a kilometer, but the dim starlight had been too weak to make it visible at a distance. Now it was easy to see. Searing yellow light poured through the archway.

The floor was vibrating. It was slight, but Yvian could feel it shake the litter she rested on. Crunch, she was tired of laying on that thing. She tried to sit up, but the movement shifted the litter from it's resting place against the pedestal and dropped her. A yelp and a jolt of searing pain shot through her as she slammed into the floor.

"Yvian!" Lissa was at her side in an instant. After being assured that Yvian was ok, she tried to lift the litter back into place. She wasn't strong enough. Yvian argued that she could probably stand up now, but her sister wouldn't hear it. They were still arguing when Mims made his way up the staircase.

"You only think you're ok because of the painkillers," The human pointed out. "You stay on the litter. How's the city?"

"I don't know," Yvian admitted. "She wouldn't let me go, and then something happened and I pulled out. What did you do?"

"I called the Peacekeepers."

"How?" Lissa asked.

"Hand signs." The sisters stared at him. Seeing their confusion, he elaborated. "Sign language." He moved his hands in strange patterns as he talked. "Humans have a language you speak with your hands. It was originally designed for talking to deaf people, but communicating without making noise is useful, so everyone in the military had to learn it, too." The Captain rubbed the back of his neck. "Sensors can't see through the crystals, but they can see us as long as we're outside. I stood out there and used sign language until they got the message."

"What did you tell them?"

"I told them to fire energy weapons at the center of the city." Mims glanced back at the lit archway. "The ships are too far out for anything but beam weapons, but that'll change." He gestured at Lissa, and together they propped Yvian's litter back up against the pedestal. "I need you to check in with the city real quick. Tell her we're here to help and try to convince her not to shut down whatever ship comes down to pick us up. And make it fast. That much plasma flying around is gonna heat up the air. We need to clear the area."

Yvian touched the Node again. The other mind reached out, but didn't grab her like last time. The crystal woman whistled a question the pixen couldn't understand. Yvian didn't try to respond with words. She let the woman see her feelings, and imagined the ships above raining plasma down to feed the city. She imagined a ship coming down to pick her up, and gave it a questioning feel.

The woman sent her an image back. Xill. Xill killing Lucendians. The image shifted, showing Peacekeeper units moving through the city. A question.

Those aren't Xill, Yvian thought at her. They're refugees. The other mind couldn't understand her words. She sent an image of Peacekeepers hiding from a Xill ship*. Not Xill,* she repeated.

The woman was suspicious, but the rage and hate she'd sent before seemed to be absent. A lonely feeling came with an image of Yvian reaching for the Node. She wanted to know if the pixen would come back.

I'll come see you again, Yvian told her. I have to go, now, but I'll come back. She sent an image of herself reaching for the Node. The woman seemed to understand. Slowly, regretfully, she pulled back. Yvian sent one last image before she went back into her body. An image of herself, waving. Yvian, she thought. My name is Yvian. The crystal responded with a series of whistles. Yvian suspected it was her name.

She came back to herself in the dark. Her confused grunt drew the Captain's attention. He asked, "How'd it go?"

"Good, I think?" Yvian tried not to make the next part sound like a question. "She's a little paranoid, but she agreed to let us go. She wants me to come back and see her."

There was a pause. Yvian realized the human was nodding. "Good. That's good. Lissa, fire up another flare." A burst of red light illuminated the Captain's grimace. He took the light from the engineer and handed it to Yvian. "Hold this." He rested a hand on one of the handles to her litter. "I don't really feel like dragging this down stairs in the dark."

"I can walk-" Yvian started.

"Shut up."

"I can hold the light," Lissa offered.

"No you can't," the Captain informed her. "You're helping carry."

"What about the stuff?" She gestured at the duffel and the generator.

"Leave it." Mims gestured at the litter. "Let's get out of here. It's been a long night."