“-That leads me to us getting on the boat and coming over here. I persuaded some dock hands to let us on and I thought that would be the end of it.” Andromeda said.

“And this persuasion you speak of is?” Gram prompted.

“Yes, more of what I’ll explain in a minute.” Andromeda said.

“Alright, despite a few rough smooth runs here and there, it sounds like this has been nothing but trouble.” Gram said.

“Trouble is an understatement. Anyway, Once we got on the boat, that’s when things started getting complicated.” Andromeda said, Gram gave her an incredibly overexaggerated look of are you being serious right now?

“I know, I know, but I’m being serious. It started out peaceful, we met this man. By his words, he called himself Aldir Algoer.” Andromeda said.

“Why does that name sound familiar?” Gram asked.

“I don’t know if you’ve head of someone named Entai Algoer, but this Aldir claimed to be his son.” Andromeda said.

“That… Well… Yeah, I don’t know much about the man myself besides that he opened his, whatever it is, up on the hill. I assume there's a reason you said claim?” Gram asked.

“Yeah, it took some stressful argument with Eli, but once that was eased somewhat we had him go and talk with Aldir. He would pretend that he was just my bodyguard with no allegiance. If Aldir was plotting something, then he would just at the opportunity to get him on his side.” Andromeda said.

“Did you not consider that if Aldir was a threat, he wouldn’t just be putting Eli in danger. He could have just as easily thought you two were close and thought to take out your ally.” Gram said.

“No, you see, uh… Wait, hold on.” Andromeda said.

Alright, in retrospect, we were banking on having Whisper to not have our plan be throwing Eli to the wolves. He has a point.

>Way to make me sound to sound like the bad guy here guys.<

“Whisper.” Andromeda said.

>What the hell?<

“What about her?” Gram asked.

“She’s the reason it wasn’t what you might be thinking, but it wasn’t her really her fault either.” Andromeda said.

>THANK YOU, geez.<

“Will you explain that later?” Gram asked.

“Yes.” Andromeda said. Gram reached over behind his desk and the sound of a latch coming undone could be heard. He sat back up and raised a flask to his mouth for a swig.

“Continue.”

Rude.

“It was after this that everything went to shit. Whisper came back to me suddenly and said something had kicked her out of Eli’s mind. The last thing she heard was an explosion, then she was back with me and shaken up.”

“Kicked out?”

“Iwanted to go see what had happened, but when I tried to open the door to the room It was locked. I heard someone say on the other side that I was under lock down.”

-----

“What are you talking about?” Andromeda said, she pounded on the metal door with all her might.

“You are to remain in your cabin until we arrive at Aeroae. We have been ordered to bring you to The Perimeter. We will be arriving in a few hours, so stay put.” The man behind the door said. Andromeda heard his footsteps fade off into the distance and she sunk to her knees.

Whisper, what the hell happened?

>I don’t know! Eli and Aldir were talking, then I was back here!<

“What were they talking about?” Andromeda asked.

>Uhh, uhh, I… I don’t know, Eli was talking and…<

Andromeda could feel an overwhelming wave of distress wash over her as Whispers words were lost into her emotions. “It’s fine, don’t worry about that. We just need to focus on what’s happening right now.” Whisper calmed down enough to not give Andromeda a heart attack from mental anguish alone.

She tried as hard as she could, but the bulkhead door wouldn’t give no matter how hard she tried. It was locked down tightly from the other side. She tried to find some other way out of the room, but the only other possible means of escape was to go through the window into the surf below.

“WHY!?” Andromeda screamed. She couldn’t help but feel like this somehow involved Aldir. She already knew that this whole trip was one large trap, Entai was ostensibly the one who “invited” her here so if Aldir was a part of that then he was definitely tricking her. It didn’t change much because she was already working under that assumption. She didn’t like the idea of sitting quietly waiting for whatever was prepared for her once they reached the other side of the bay, so she gathered her things and put on her mask.

Andromed walked to the bulkhead door and put her hand to it. While she had extensive experience with Refutei mending by this point, something this complex and heavy might be an issue.

“Alright guys, once we go through this door, we’re on high alert until further notice. Does everyone agree?” Andromeda said.

I don’t see a better way, so yes.

>I just hope we make it out of this intact.<

“Me too.” Andromeda said, she applied Refutei mending to the door. It was difficult and for the first time in a while she didn’t just destroy her target in moments. There were so many hidden and unseen surfaces inside the doors and walls that getting the read on all of them took some effort. Even then, it only took enough time to breath.

The solid metal door started to creek under its own weight, the stainless surface grew pocked and rusted at her touch, spreading through the door. Heavier and more vital parts of the mechanism broke inside until finally, the door cracked with great force. It broke off it’s overengineered hinges and fell into the hallway.

To no one’s surprise, the loud, clattering crash of the door drew everyone’s attention. Before they could surround the door, she burst out into the hallway to see three men, two armed with clubs, and a third wielding a spear.

“Call the captain, the prisoner has escaped!” The man taking point with the spear said. One of the men behind him peeled off and took off down the hall.

“Let me through, I don’t want to hurt you.” Andromeda said, she looked at her surroundings, despite the walls and ceiling being sheet metal, the floor was made of wooden boards. She needed to move quick before the whole ship was on her.

“We are under strict orders to detain you. There is no room for negotiation.” The spearman said, then he rushed her.

Andromeda narrowly dodged the spear just before it pierced her side, she grabbed a hold of it and broke it down into wood pulp. He lost his balance with his weapon now gone and Andromeda grabbed him by the shoulders. She threw him against the wall beside them and bounced his off it. He stumbled back in a daze, Andromeda took a step forward and punched him square in the stomach, knocking the air out of his lungs and dropping him to the ground. Confident that he wasn’t going anywhere quick, she stepped over him and approached the man with a club.

“Let me go, and I won’t hurt you.” She said. Instead of answering, the man rushed forward. Andromeda internally groaned and used Refutei mending on the boards of the floor where his foot intended to land. When his foot didn’t find purchase on the ground, he fell forward. This put him in the perfect place to bring her knee up into his jaw as he fell. That was all it took to knock him out completely.

Andromeda went back to the first man and dragged him back to the room. He could barely find the strength to lift his hand against her so he went just fine. Ironically, the unconscious man was harder to drag because he was entirely dead weight.

Once they were both inside her room, she put her hand against the remains of the door and focused on using regular Mending. The door reassembled itself in no time and now they were both locked inside. Andromeda walked quickly down the hall until she made it to the outer bulkhead, this door led outside and was the only thing between her and getting to a more open space. It was locked as well, and much to her great fear she heard boots stomping down the hall.

The other man with a club and a few more men ran up behind her. “There!” One man screamed. There were too many to fight at once, and the hall was wide enough to for more than one to get through to her.

“Seriously, I will actually leave you alone if you just leave alone. You have my word on that.” Andromeda said.

“We have our orders.” One man said.

Andromeda turned to her side and tapped the metal wall beside her, it was thin and sounded hollow. When the men rushed her, she leaned into the thin wall and broke it down with her weight and Refutei Mending.

She stumbled into the room next door which was some kind of hardware closet just as the men had reached the whole she made, she just barely managed to restore it as one man was reaching in. The metal sheet wrapped around his forearm and trapped it in the wall.

“Hurry, she’s in the toolroom!” One man yelled to the rest, while the man with his arm in the wall tried his hardest to get it out. Andromeda looked around the room and saw barely anything besides a few buckets, mops, some metal tools, and the only door to the room at the far end.

As she panicked at what to do, she smacked her hands on the floor. The hollow ring of the floor under her. Without a better idea, she gritted her teeth, closed her eyes, and broke the floor under her. Andromeda felt weightless for a single moment, then her body fell through the floor onto something metal and hard. She didn’t delay for a second when she rolled over and restored the floor that she passed through, only to hear several footsteps rumble over head.

She took a deep breath, the immediate danger to her safety had passed, but she wasn’t out of the woods yet. Not least of which because where ever she was, it was pitch black.

-----

“So you break out of a locked room on a ship in the middle of the bay, knock out two of the ship hands, both armed. Then you break through a wall and a floor to avoid getting cornered. Only to get stuck in what I assume is the ship’s cargo hold.”

“Just about.” Andromeda said.

“Look, don’t misunderstand me. It’s not that I don’t believe you, but you aren’t more than, what, 20-something? Who taught you how to fight, or think on your feet like that. You don’t strike me as the kind to grow up on the street and pick that up naturally.” Gram asked.

“Well, to tell the truth. I joined the military right out of school at 18, did a year in training, then just shy of three more until a ceasefire was called. It had only been a few weeks at most before I was brought…” Andromeda looked around the room absentmindedly, not focusing on any one thing.

“Here…” She said.

“Right, you’re not from… here, and you don’t seem interested in talking about what that means. So if my math is right, you’re about 23-ish?” Gram said.

“Something like that, I’ve been here for almost half a year now, so I could be 24 by now. I haven’t exactly been counting the days, and the calendars are all different from what I’m used to.” Andromeda said.

“Fair point, it must have been some impressive outfit to turn a kid like you into what you say you are.” Gram said.

“Not impressive, we just weren’t interested in dying. Fear is a good motivator.” Andromreda said. Gram nodded in approval. “You won’t find a single guard in the city who wouldn’t agree with you on that.”

“As I was saying, I was stuck in complete darkness.

-----

Andromeda waited for a few minutes to let her eyes adjust to the dark, but no matter how hard she squinted, nothing more than absolute darkness filled her eyes. Considering that this was a cargo ship, and not a terribly large one at that, she realized that she stumbled her way into the hold of the ship. That meant what she was currently sitting on was a shipping container of some kind.

It was truly dark, the kind of dark you don’t even get when you close your eyes in a dark room. There was no light here.

What do we do? We can’t just wait here until they undock, there could be an army down there by then.

>I’m at a loss too, I can sense the people around us, but that doesn’t tell us how to get around down here.<

Andromeda felt a pain in her back, likely from the rough landing on this container. She reached around to her back and mend it. It would hurt a lot to do this right now, but that was preferable to having a disk slip in the middle of a fight.

She clenched in pain as she mended her back and felt relief as the pain faded, but even through the pain, she noticed something incredible. When brought her hand back, there was a faint glow between her fingers. The glow dissipated after a few seconds, but it was bright enough that she could make her fingers out. It was something, but if she didn’t have anything to mend, then it wouldn’t glow.

Andromeda, do you remember what you learned about Arcanism?”

“It’s about moving mana around, but It’s been a while. What about it?” Andromeda thought.

It glowed too, didn’t it?

Andromeda’s eyes shot wide. She put her hands together and called back on her memory of how to perform it. Her eyes were already shrouded in darkness so she didn’t really need to close her eyes, this brought her immediate confirmation that she was doing it correctly. A rope like length of rope made from pure light fell on top of her, it did enough to light up her immediate surroundings, tough it was still faint enough that anything farther than her reach was still in darkness.

Andromeda used the faint light to get a read on where she was. True to her suspicion she was sitting on a crate, bad news was that she seemed to be sitting on either the third or fourth container in a stack, she discovered this by dropping the rope of light over the edge and watching it not reach the ground for about that distance. There might be some way of repelling down with the Arcanistic rope, but in complete darkness a slip could send her falling.

I have an idea, we can try to use one of the other reflexes.

“This is not the time for experimenting White.” Andromeda thought.

Hear me out, we all basically came to the same conclusion about the hot and cold being separate from fast and slow as hard to understand. But does that matter?

>What?<

“You’re not making sense, of course it matters. I can’t imagine something I can’t understand.” Andromeda thought.

No, I’m being serious. Sure, ice being hot, or fire being cold is impossible, but so is creating something from nothing. In this space, we can create anything we can imagine, so creating those things in here should be the same as imagining it.

“I can see the logic, but I don’t know how we can make that work.”

Just… Just trust me. I wouldn’t mention this if I didn’t think there was a chance it could work. Trust me. Just let me do the creating, you just need to focus on the flow.

…

Andromeda?

“Alright, if you think we can do it. Then we can” Andromeda said.

She closed her eyes and cleared her mind.

There was no thought in her mind, just the blackness that one finds behind their closed eyes. She dedicated every ounce of her will was dedicated to the flow between her fingers. Even though there was not a single thought that passed through her conscience, in her minds eye she could see something.

In the way that a thought often is, it was nebulas and hard to understand. But deep inside her heart, she knew what it was. It was a river. A river in her mind, but the water was frozen inside it. She could feel the warmth in her soul seeing it. A frozen river burning ice.

Then she felt something. Andromeda opened here eyes to see that pure white light in liquid form fell from her hands.