Gavin looked over the group, clearly assessing how to break them into proper roles, but Katsi had already made up her mind. "I'm going to go find Srava. I'll join up with you after." She activated her transformation device, the golden armor of nanites forming around her, the lenses over her eyes already feeding her information about the target from her connection to Dean. She lifted his coin, the nanites moving it to the center of her chest, like a medallion. The information from the rest of them would probably come later. She tried to have the nanites work on a way to reverse the process that had made Dean into what he was, but apparently that would take time. Before anyone had time to try and stop her, she had begun to fly away on her dragonfly wings, her mind set on finding her prey. All she could think was that this time would be different. She wasn't going to lose him. She wasn't going to lose anyone ever again.
Gavin held up his hand as she flew away. Once she couldn't hear he looked at Zwei and Pine. "You two, follow her flight path. Cover her and keep it quiet. She is clearly working through something and... I can relate. So just..." Before he could finish, Pine had already begun to pursue. Zwei shrugged and ran with him. Gavin sighed, "Let... her do that. Why does no one understand we are entering hostile territory? Would it kill them to have an ounce of-" He paused when he began to hear crashes from near where his captain had gone. He went pale but had a reassured gulp when he saw what he could only assume was the wave of darkness from the Tak'Nasi situation that had erased so many things. He closed his eyes, hoping he could trust in his captain to get the job done. Focusing on Tai and Narine, he said firmly, "Alright, so Sai went AWOL so this will be your first field mission Tai. My suggestion? Play support for now. If that was built to match Sai's capabilities, you should be able to collect and send info on all the living things in our vacinity rather easily with minimal risk. If you are seen, run. Doesn't matter if it is a Falos Knight, one of their Mannequin killdroids, or a survivor. If you are seen, you run. We will do the rest."
Tai asked cautiously, "Are you sure? I have Father's-"
"You have a manual on how to do it. You've personally never done it. Even Sai practiced in the simulations before he tried them on us. Trust me for now." Tai hesitated at Gavin's words but eventually relented and left to do his patrol before sending the live data to the communicators in their transformation devices. Gavin began to look it over before he reached into his coat, producing two small devices, "I snagged these out of Katsi's pocket before I reassured Anisa that I had this. I saw her and Doug working on them." He tossed one to Narine that had a red glow about it. "It looks compatible with our transformation devices. I don't know if our younger crystals can take the strain... and these stones in particular have a tendency to take liberties with the DNA of the user. So, keep this for emergencies and try not to use it."
Narine looked it over, trying to figure out what it was. "It looks... a lot like the Ziegfried's tech."
Gavin nodded, "Yeah. And I know what it does. That's why I gave you that one and why I took these two. I can't be sure that they aren't universal but I know for sure it will work as intended this way." She looked at him with curiosity and he explained, "I'm the man who built our ship to specs. With nothing but spare parts and a dream. I know exactly what they just did and my opinion as a former arms dealer is the less you know the better." Before she could ask further, he adjusted his hat and began running through the streets, refusing transform just yet. There was a lot more work before the situation would call for Alabaster.
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Sai sat in the chair opposite Shawn, eyes tired and annoyed, “I’m sure they could use my help.”
Shawn nodded, “But you are too deep in and can’t bring yourself to truly leave the table. Not when you know you are so close to proper answers. So, like a puppet, you dance on the strings of your own habits.” He locked eyes with Sai, “You know I’ve had that conversation before.”
Sai growled, “Yeah! With Equinox! The villain!” As Shawn slowly nodded he waited for Sai to say the obvious. “But that doesn’t mean he is wrong.” Shawn motioned to the cards face down on the table. Thinking he could expect what he would find, he froze as he looked at the hand, “This… this isn’t the same game.”
Shawn chuckled, “Oh, it is. Life is just like this. The rules are a bit more complex but the win conditions are the same. Have the better matched hand.”
Sai looked at it, seeing his various crew mates on the Ziegfried, his eyes resting on Narine in particular. And among the cards was Shawn himself. Sai asked, “Metaphysical as this is… what’s the point of this exercise?”
Shawn stated again, “You can’t play the game if you don’t know what cards you are holding.” Discarding cards that had Douglas, Dean, and the Ziegfried on them, Shawn drew three new cards from the deck. “See, if you know what someone’s throwing away, you can guess what cards they have.”
Sai looked it over and took a deep breath, stating, “But how often are their discards a bluff? Throwing away a better hand to mislead?” Shawn laughed quietly before Sai continued, “Why not be honest? There has to be a reason Shawn and Equinox wouldn’t come out and state who they are.”
Shawn shrugged, “If it is Equinox, he already has. But if he is helping, why not explain why? And how he remembers…” Shawn stated firmly, “If it was me, it’s likely to avoid the woman I made a deal with. I don’t trust bureaucrats and she definitely is one.”
Sai froze it dawning on him that they hadn’t thought twice about her. What was her goal? Why had she offered him that? He had been so used to the absurdity of being a hero that…
“So, loophole. If ‘Shawn Masters’ isn’t effecting time then his memory is still gone. That would make him able to act freely without reprisal. Alternatively, Equinox having been robbed of his memories of Shawn might have been told or gotten wind of a great hero being gone and is trying to bring him back.” Sai thought about it and asked, “Would Leithan really be heroic if he never went down the road of being a Pirate? If he had never had his crew massacred by… Shawn?” Sai almost took responsibility for Shawn’s actions again. Almost blamed himself for the deaths that day. Sai was blameless, just holding the memory, but the guilt clung to him all the same.
Shawn smirked and said mirthfully, “We can figure this out if we just keep playing the game…”