Petra Duus folded her arms with a smirk, though Ali could sense some surprise that she was recognised. "You know, not many people would be stupid enough to blag their way into an event dedicated to neutering their kind."

"Bet that sounded wittier in your head," Ali teased as she fought against the feelings she could feel this woman invoked in Spud. It was rare that either Ali or Spud had to fight against the other one because they both respected each other's privacy, therefore usually any information flow was minimal and intentional. Now, however, Ali could feel the emotions rolling off Spud at the revelation that her ex-wife was standing in front of one of her best friends in a rally to spread hate-speech. It was proving hard for Ali to control herself as she tried to shut the tetnar down as much as she could.

For a moment both women turned from the other as Touchard took to the podium amidst much fanfare. Ali cursed as she heard Wood and Rila advising her to make a break for it - in vastly different ways - and she realised she was no longer on form. "What are you doing here, Turner?"

A brief flicker of confusion passed over Ali's face. "Just how deep are you? Your friends knew I planned on scouting this out if they didn't give me a heads up they were going to do their damn jobs."

"You know damn well where the boundaries are," Petra hissed back. Ali raised an eyebrow, that had struck a nerve. Especially if all Petra had was to remind her where the boundaries were between USEP and Security Core and that Ali technically had no business encroaching on the latter.

"Yeah, allowing mass killings."

Petra narrowed her eyes at Ali, who held her stare whilst setting her jaw. Wishing she could get someone to tranquillise Spud for the next five minutes. What are you waiting for? Get the hell out of there! She heard Wood order - or was he scolding? - her as she refused to back down under the glare. She had waited a few seconds too long, however, as Petra's arm snapped out and she snagged Ali's arm with a firm grip. "I've got one!" She shouted loudly.

"Shit," Ali had no idea if that was her thought or someone's voice in her ear as she twisted to slam her elbow into Petra's head. However, Petra was a highly trained Security Core operative who had spent years undercover. She saw the move coming and gracefully stepped to the side and controlled Ali's movements with the hand on her arm. Once safe she twisted her hands to be able to yank Ali's right arm behind her back, abandoning her left, to secure it in a back hammer lock. Ali struggled just enough to test Petra's grip and judged it far too secure to bludgeon her way out of, even with a free arm.

As Petra walked her toward the podium Ali chose to glare at her surroundings as her mind ticked away. In the grand scheme of things she had definitely been in worse scrapes than this. Hell, she'd deliberately flown her ship set to self-destruct into an armada. She could get out of this… right? Yeah, she had to think she could otherwise she didn't even have a chance. She focused on her breathing for a moment to push past the double feeling of betrayal and the rest of the tornado of conflicting emotions emanating from Spud.

They came to a stop just shy of the podium where Touchard stood, he looked down on them with a mix of confusion. "I remember you."

Ali pretended to bow, waving her free hand in a grandiose submissive gesture. "I'm honoured."

"Cut the crap," Petra warned and Ali rolled her eyes, "she's a hybrid, sir."

It suddenly occurred to Ali that she had no idea how Petra knew that. She nodded to herself, that was good, that meant that she was getting her focus back. "Why would a hybrid come to such an event?"

"Scan her if you don't believe me." Petra suggested, "she's a USEP officer here to spy on us."

"Isn't that normally S-Core's role?" Touchard asked.

"Turner isn't known for playing by the rules."

Ali did her best to shrug innocently despite her arm still being locked behind her back. "I mean, that is how we met," she reminded Touchard. Touchard nodded and Ali felt a spike of confusion from Petra as she was off-footed.

Ali half watched as Zychene handed Touchard a scanner and she tried to keep her breathing even as she quickly calculated odds and scenarios in her head. Did she put all her faith in the chip Etsile had planted or did she make a break for it? Was Petra still on their side or had she been undercover so long that the lines had completely blurred? Did she risk her crew's lives for her own?

She held her head high as the scanner was pointed in her direction. Confidence was half the battle. It felt like an eternity before Touchard looked at the results before tossing it onto the podium. "It reads human," he announced.

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Ali couldn't see how good Petra was at keeping face - given that she was an undercover operative she was assuming very - but she felt the desperately confused anger at how that failed. "My intel was wrong about that, but she's definitely still USEP," she decided, "and why would any USEP officer be at such event? Even one who dabbles in the underground?"

"That is an excellent point."

"You use my weapons, am I not allowed to take an interest in how or why?"

"Bit late to have a change of heart."

"Bit odd for a merc group to tie themselves so fully to a cause," Ali countered. Touchard gave her a little knowing smile at that, as if there was some hidden meaning that she should know.

There was another too long pause - or at least from Ali's perspective - before Touchard nodded to himself. "Well, if your intel said she was a hybrid then there'll be enough rumours. I think we've got a nice little example to make to USEP about their pandering to hybrids," he said with a sinister smirk.

Ali knew when her opponent only had to make another move to get her in a checkmate. Time to change the rules, or smash the board. As they were so close to the podium there were a number of armed Cosmos' Champions members near them. She reached out with her free hand and grabbed an energy pistol. It's owner reacted and forced the weapon away from aiming at Touchard, but that suited her just fine as she let off a shot at the electronic systems instead. Once she'd fired she abandoned the gun and threw herself backwards, shoulder first towards the floor to land on Petra, jerking her head back into the other woman's as she hoped to stun her.

The gambit paid off in that Petra's grip slackened enough for Ali to launch herself forwards again and lose herself in the crowd. The crowd that were now somewhere between furious and panicked due to the newfound darkness and weapons fire. "Anyone got eyes on Touchard?" Ali asked as she did her best to sidestep everyone in her way.

"Not since the lights went down," Rila replied, "there's too many to scan for him."

"We have a plan!" Pixie cut in quickly, briefly followed by an exclamation of pain. "You said something about a back exit?"

As Ali ducked under a general punch - she was pretty certain they weren't aiming for her specifically - there was a pause over the comm in which she presumed Pixie's brother was saying something. "Okay, we've got our way out," Wood confirmed, "are you two okay?"

"Oh, just peachy - go get him." Ali ordered.

"You got a plan, boss?" Rila asked.

"Stay alive?"

"You know, just once, I'd like you to have a plan to get out of the life or death situation before you get into them."

Ali laughed as she blocked a punch that was definitely deliberately for her, snapping her elbow out to the side and into their head before ducking under their arm only to push their back and kick their knees before she attempted to run towards the door.

It was like an obstacle course that fought back. Ali was blocking, dodging, weaving and punching her way through. She lost track of the amount of people she slammed into walls or railings. She lost track of how many punches or kicks she didn't quite dodge. She lost track of how many weapons she stole to turn on their owners and anyone else who came at her before she was forced to drop them again. Her focus was purely on making it to the exit. She heard a scream over the comm but no one answered her when she demanded what it was, she couldn't afford to spend too much time on it if she wanted to get out alive, so pushed it to one side for now.

Their familiarity and telepathy came in handy when Ali and Rila met up not too far from the door. They recognised each other instantly despite the room only being lit by the flashes of weapons fire and they fluidly shifted to fighting as a team rather than individually.

Finally, with one last tag team effort that ended with Rila kicking the doorman into the warehouse and Ali locking the door behind him, they were finally out and semi-safe. They shared a look as they took a breath. "We're out, what the hell was that scream?"Ali asked.

"Get to Pixie!" Wood snapped but no further information was forthcoming from either him or Pixie.

Ali instantly grabbed her scanner to locate Pixie's biometric as Rila raised the weapons she'd stolen in the fight and quickly secured their surroundings. "Got it," Ali called a moment later and pointed Rila in the right direction and followed the jetran as they hurried down side streets. They found Pixie slumped against an alley wall, hand dropped to her side and still loosely wrapped around a pistol even though she had lost consciousness. A pool of dark red blood was slowly growing around her, and they quickly traced the source back to the leg that was thrown out at an odd angle. Ali clamped a hand down on the wound to try and stem the bleeding as she tapped her comm open with her other. "Faraday, we need a med-evac!"

The few seconds delay in which Ali knew Etsile was pulling up the data feeds felt like a lifetime as she tried to stop one of her crew - one of her friends - bleeding out under her own hands. "Have you got anything to tie around the leg? Just enough to slow the bleeding, then we can beam her directly here."

Ali and Rila glanced around at what they had until Rila nudged Ali out of the way and simply tore up the already punctured trouser leg from Pixie. As the two women quickly worked they heard footsteps joining them. Rila dropped what she was doing and spun around with a pistol raised. "How many of his bones am I breaking?" Wood asked as he arrived back with a younger man in tow.

"Ask me again in half an hour," Ali retorted as she finished tying up the fabric around Pixie's leg, as tightly as she could. "Okay, Ets, we're moving back so you can get her."

Within seconds Pixie's body disappeared in front of them as the beamer pulled her from the planet and she would materialise in the medical bay under Etsile's care. Ali stared at the spot for a moment to try and regain some control, she was covered in blood and she was tired and bruised beyond belief. When she looked over the small group she decided that she wasn't doing this here and called for them to be beamed out.