"I'm not sure I even know where to start," Grey admitted when Ali stepped into his ready room.

"Glad that I'm not dead?" Ali suggested unsurely.

"I'd have preferred to know that two months ago," Grey retorted, and Ali didn't need to be telepathic to sense the anger he was barely keeping hidden. She couldn't really blame him for that. She also knew not to mention it hadn't quite been two months, that was not the point. "Do you have any idea how worried we've been?"

"How worried you've been?!" Ali snapped. "Krekt, sir, a bomb went off and killed your ground team!" Her arm flicked out behind her as if Yerta was actually behind her to gesture to as if to prove her point. "And you hightail it outta there before help arrives and don't send any messages to let us know what happened or who's safe! I found out who was missing from Witworth when he initially called me in for questioning, and if it weren't for Spud reaching out to me in the aftermath I'd probably still be scared of trying to find her."

"And your own escapades rather prove why we were right to go off grid," Grey replied in kind, and Ali set her jaw. "S-Core tried to arrest you, and rather than going with them you assaulted two of their officers and sent them on a chase through The Forum only to disappear without a trace, for well over a month."

"Technically I only assaulted one of their officers," Ali corrected stubbornly, crossing her arms with grumpy shrug.

Grey pinched the bridge of his nose as he drew a breath. "Ali, part of me thought they'd killed you and covered it up, or you'd got yourself killed or worse trying to escape." Ali looked away as his tone softened a little at the admission. He was right, she shouldn't have gone completely dark, but she knew if she told Spud where she was there was a too big a chance of the Endeavour coming to collect her, and she couldn't have them break cover yet. Not just for her. She'd bounced around the sector nine times before finally meeting them at the coordinates Spud gave her.

"I… I'm sorry, but I had to." It felt lame even to her own ears, but she had nothing more she could offer.

"You can't keep pulling stunts like this, Ali. You're a USEP captain now - again - and you have a responsibility to your crew."

"Yeah, I do," she agreed. "What good does me sitting in a cell do? I told Rila to cooperate fully before I legged it, and if she obeyed that order they have nothing to worry about. S-Core singled me out not the Faraday."

"And if they turned on the Faraday because you ran?"

"What would stop them doing that if I let them arrest me?" Ali asked. "You do believe I'm innocent, right?"

"Of course," Grey dismissed that line of thought before it could ever really get started. "But USEP don't, you've been all but sacked as captain of the Faraday and I'm pretty certain you only still have your rank because they need you to court martial you - again - to remove it."

"Is Rila still in command?"

"For now," Grey said. "The Faraday was released after cooperating with S-Core's investigation into you. They wanted to parachute in a new captain, but Rila was able to persuade them to let her keep command for the time being, and is dutifully following orders to provide Eskaar ongoing support in the aftermath of the Cosmos' Champions attack there."

"Good," Ali decided.

"Good?" Grey demanded. "Ali have you been listening to a word I've been saying? USEP have cast you out, that means you no longer have a ship or crew."

"Yeah, and from their point of view the worst thing they could've done is take my crew from me!" Ali shouted. "That means they're safe and uninvolved and if USEP want to try and hold them over my head they have to admit they're willing to punish people they've declared innocent!"

"So your big plan is to just traipse around the sector in the hope you can take it all on yourself?" Grey demanded.

"If I have to, yes!" Ali assured him. "You want to try and hand me in for the bounty I'll be on Peshtar within the day, you won't find me from there."

Grey sighed, they both knew he wasn't going to hand her over to the authorities. That would require him bringing the Endeavour out of hiding. She was offering to leave and let him keep his crew safe. But he also knew she was right, this couldn't continue. "Do you actually have a plan?"

Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

Ali deflated for a moment. "No," she said, sounding defeated and tired. "Did you get anything in the aftermath of the second bomb on Yerta?"

Grey shook his head sadly. "No, all the comm and ship traffic at Yerta at the time turned out to be dead ends, and there was only so much we could search at Yerta before HQ ordered us back. We stayed as long as we dared before bugging out before any escorts were sent."

Neither one of them vocalised the likelihood of their friends' survival. They'd found no bodies, but Ali knew that it was entirely possible they'd been vaporised in the explosions. Equally the fact that they'd not managed to track any ships meant nothing. They could have been held somewhere on the planet, or indeed held long enough on a ship to be able to wait till the Endeavour left. Or been on one of the earlier ships and get lost in the crowds on Peshtar or another busy port.

"Why did you refuse the order?" Ali asked, curious more than angry now.

"I got the impression they'd drag Lartyne over the coals for simply surviving," he said.

Ali nodded, that fit. "Does Lartyne remember anything about the attack? Did she see anything?"

"You think she was in on it?"

"Of course not," Ali refuted swiftly as she recognised the edge to his voice that suggested he wasn't pleased with the particular line of conversation. "But she was there, she might've seen something, something that at the time didn't stick out but with hindsight…"

Grey waved one arm in a defeated gesture. "We asked her afterwards, but she couldn't think of anything. I doubt she's remembered anything since, she'd have come to us if she had."

Ali nodded to herself, she had to admit that made sense. "Well, we lost access to Touchard once we docked at The Forum, S-Core insisted he was their prisoner," Ali explained, rubbing her head, looking for all intents and purposes like she was thinking rather than trying to wish away another headache. They hadn't got any less persistent over the last month, but then her living conditions hadn't exactly been great so she'd put it down to that.

"Hardly a surprise," Grey said. "Though I assume you talked to him before you handed him over."

"A little, didn't want to step on S-Core's toes too much… He warned us that there'd be some kind of retribution, I guess that was Yerta." Ali sighed as she trailed off in thought. "I guess I need to review everything we know."

Grey scrutinised her for a moment. "Tomorrow," he replied, and she quirked an eyebrow at him. "When was the last time you slept properly?"

"Seven or eight months ago?" Ali retorted, only half joking. If she were honest it felt like she hadn't had a proper nights sleep since before the first bomb went off at one of the embassies on Earth, killing her father. Grey stared her flippant façade down. "Okay, I'll take a day to rest."

~-x-~

Despite the intervening years since she'd lived and served on the Endeavour, Ali still knew her way around the ship as if she'd never left. Even the subtle differences between the Endeavour and Faraday were reassuring and familiar.

She soon arrived at the door she was seeking and she swore the door controls unlocked the second she pressed the chime. The door had barely closed behind her as she spotted Spud's familiar pale face. Something dropped in Ali's chest as the worry, fear and relief solidified at the visible proof her friend was safe and well. She ran the few paces to wrap her arms around Spud, clutching her tightly as she sobbed her heart out into her purple hair.

"It's okay," Spud whispered as she held Ali just as tightly, she could feel Ali's emotions clearly through their tetnar, a telepathic bond that formed due to the kentarian half of Ali's physiology.

"When the bomb went off… I thought I'd lost you too," Ali admitted.

"I know," Spud promised.

They stayed like that until Ali felt sure enough that she could loosen her grip on Spud without the other woman fading into a memory. That she was real and solid and most importantly safe and alive. Even though Spud had initially reached out to promise she was safe after the attack, Ali had still had to talk herself into reaching out across their tetnar just to find out where the Endeavour was, scared that she'd call and find nothing there. The flood of feeling when Spud had replied had been beyond reassuring, but still hadn't been enough to prove it till that physical proof. She hadn't quite dared to believe that her mind wasn't playing tricks on her.

As Ali wiped her face Spud directed her to sit down on the edge of her bed, an arm still slung around her shoulders for solace. Ali appreciated it and squeezed that same hand by way of thanks. But even still, she could feel the barely contained curiosity and hope. "I know what you want to ask," Ali admitted.

Spud looked a little contrite at that, it made Ali smile. "Can you blame me?"

"No," Ali admitted with a watery chuckle. "But… I…" She trailed off with a sigh. "Without a tetnar I don't have a chance of reaching them," was what she finally opted for.

Spud nodded as if that made sense. "I just thought… maybe… You and Ben were pretty close," she said to explain her hope.

Ali couldn't deny that. But how could she explain that she had tried? She had tried so damn hard to reach across a bond that hadn't fully formed in desperate hope. The feeling that answered had just been impressions of pain and she couldn't be sure it wasn't a mirror of how she was feeling herself. The emptiness she'd found there was what made her anxious about what she'd find when trying to reach Spud, even though she knew it was irrational. And even though Spud had noticed how close she and Ben were, how could she explain their kiss without breaking down at the almost immediate loss? She didn't think she could cope with pity or more sympathy right now.

"I guess we'll just have to find out what happened to them the old fashioned way," Ali finally shrugged, and if Spud felt any of her inner turmoil, she didn't say anything.

"Assuming we don't already know."

"I know, but hope is about all we've got left," Ali said. "Unless we go down the revenge path."

"I'd rather not have anymore friends in dangerous situations for a while."

"No promises, have you seen the Emerald Mule?" The two women shared a look before they both chuckled at the familiar, comforting presence of each other.