He had met with resistance, at first. The man had not wanted to tell him anything. He could not afford to waste more time, so he’d had to answer his questions...

Xian could understand the confusion, but he had more pressing matters to take care of. If he had to answer all the questions the humans had, he’d be at it for the next hundred years, if not more.

So he had said what he could to appease Paul and make him understand the urgency of the matter.

“There are three others like me,” he had explained. “They would have destroyed this world had I not imprisoned them. They have been sleeping for thousands of years. The mask was what maintained them bound. By removing it, the process was reversed. And they were awoken, as was I. Now they have broken free from their prison and, soon, they will start on their path of destruction again. I must lock them back in their cell. But I’ll need the mask to achieve this.”

Paul had listened with intent and some traces of incredulity. He could not blame him. It would be a difficult story to swallow for any human.

“Why would they want to destroy our world?”

“That is for a longer conversation,” Xian had said. “Suffice to say they are fanatics, much like those on this world who adore the Zendaar. And because of their beliefs, they would destroy Qojja, and many other planets as well.”

“You can’t just destroy a planet like that, though, that doesn’t make sense...”

“Under normal circumstances, you would be correct. But these are not normal circumstances. There are ways they can achieve this. They already have, elsewhere.”

It had taken some convincing, but Paul had finally relented. He’d admitted to taking the mask himself.

“But I gave it to Jack.” His expression had hinted at regret and longing.

“How did you even manage to pull it off?” had asked Xian. “That should not have been possible.”

“I don’t know. It spoke to me.”

Xian had frowned. That made little sense to him. But he could not waste more time. Not now. He’d have to look into it later, after the runaways were recaptured and contained.

“Do you know where Arnett is? The news says he’s disappeared.”

“He has. He didn’t even leave a note.” Paul had sounded upset. “I don’t understand why he would do that. Even Will was caught by surprise. You’d think Jack would have told him something, at least.”

So Jack was gone. With the mask. And nobody knew where he was.

Great.

After that conversation, Xian returned to his ship.

He ran scans now, trying to pick up on any activity that could give him a hint as to the device’s location.

As he searched, an alarm went off.

He honed in on the report and the circular wall became a view of the mining town. With a few quick strokes on the floating panel before him, his ship darted out of the water and sped toward Naleq.

The damage was already done, but he could at least stop it from spreading further.

As soon as he landed, he crouched and set both his hands against the shaking earth. Closing his eyes, he poured healing energy into the soil. He felt the dirt and rocks spinning wildly in every direction. He appeased them, coaxed them into calmness.

The quakes abated.

He rose and stared at the half-sunken village.

This was what he had feared...

And it was only the beginning.

***

The business was located in a mall. According to the map, it had a fairly large surface at its disposal. Which was to be expected for a workshop that trained in the arts of magic. It was supposed to be accessible to even children and the elderly. They even bragged about it in their name: Magic For All.

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The woman who received Susan was in her fifties and looked like she might be on drugs.

“Oh, I don’t know,” she said with glazed eyes. “I wasn’t here at the time. I joined two years ago...”

“Is there someone else I could talk to, who might remember my mother?”

The woman smiled airily. “There is no one else. But that’s alright.”

“No, actually,” said Susan, somewhat irritated, “it’s not alright. This is important.”

“Nothing is as important as peace, my dear, believe me. I’ve been where you are—”

“I doubt it.”

“—and it’s not worth it. The more you worry about something, the more it will eat you up.”

She had not come here for a lecture, but for answers.

“Well, if you can’t help—”

“I did not say that,” giggled the woman.

Susan frowned. “I thought you said you weren’t here at the time...”

“You forget where we are, silly thing! There are other ways I can help.”

She did not particularly like being called a ‘thing’—let alone a silly one—but if this airhead could get her answers...

“Alright,” she said hesitantly. “So what can you tell me?”

“A moment, please,” said the woman as she fluttered her eyes and looked around into empty space. “Wilma, was it?”

“Yes,” said Susan uneasily. “Caine.”

The woman grasped at the air in quick, jerky gestures. There was nothing there, yet she held her fist closed tight each time, at least for a few seconds, before releasing her fingers and giggling.

“Oh, the silly little woman. Tsk.”

“What’s that now?”

“Your mother. She was quite the awkward one.”

That was not the image Susan had of her mother—quite the opposite. She had been strong-tempered, resolved, smart... What was with this crazy person? She started to wonder if she shouldn’t just leave.

“Ah yes,” said the woman. “I see the incident now. One of many. She was to make a globe of clay and draw Vuulthur’s continents across the surface—all without using her hands. Midway through, she lost control. The clay globe fell to the desk and paint splattered all over her. After this, she gave up. Tsk. As if she was the only one to fail an experiment. Tsk tsk. No patience at all. And very little confidence in herself.”

“Spare me the comments,” said Susan, who was losing patience herself. “Could this incident explain my mother’s curse?”

“Oh no, silly thing!” The woman giggled again, and Susan felt like if she heard that high-pitched laughter one more time she might try to choke it out of her. “Nothing we do here could provoke a curse. Never! That would get us into way too much trouble. We only teach the basics. And that certainly was one of them. Very mild, if you ask me. Oh no, no curse at all!”

Susan sighed. “Alright. Thank you.”

She didn’t give the woman a chance to say anything more. She needed to get out of there. She couldn’t stand that obnoxious lady one minute longer.

As she walked out of the workshop and into the crowded mall, someone bumped into her.

“Sorry,” she heard a man call out without looking back.

She cursed about what an awful world this was, with horrible people, and how much she just wanted to leave...

Outside, it had started raining again.

***

He had parked his glider across the street from the Moonrise headquarters and ordered the AI to obscure the windows so no one could see him inside.

This wasn’t his first stakeout, so he had brought everything he knew he’d need—food, drinks, literature... He’d indulged himself with an ancient printed copy of Hamlet. He couldn’t get those names out of his head—Rosenkrantz and Gyldenstierne—so it had felt appropriate. He still had trouble accepting such an incredible coincidence.

Goodrich had called him back with more bad news. The Zendaar had no interest in meeting him. They did not even pretend to be too busy... why bother? They just didn’t care.

That was even more infuriating.

How could such attitude be tolerated?

He had visited the local police precinct and had been all but laughed out of the room. The Zendaar were untouchable. They ran the planet.

Well, not directly, but he could tell they had their hands in everything and pulled many strings.

That so many thought of them as gods did not help.

He saw signs of this among many of the officers. It was obvious from the looks of blissful worship at the mere mention of the Zendaar—or the angry frowns when Ward said anything slightly critical about them...

Very infuriating indeed.

He wasn’t sure what he was expecting to accomplish. The Zendaar were supposed to look like everyone else—how convenient—so how would he recognize one if they walked in or out of the building? As for the witnesses on his list, he had their pictures, but he doubted they would just happen to come by. It was more likely they’d been sent on leave until things settled.

Running their names at the precinct had not brought up anything useful. Access to those files was restricted. He’d tried asking for a warrant and authorization to go seek those people out... All attempts had been turned down with a stern warning: when the Zendaar say no, it means no. End of story.

Maybe he could follow Goodrich when he got off work.

And then what?

Was he hoping for some secret meeting with these mysterious creatures? If they controlled everything as completely as he suspected they did, they would have no reason to hide.

And yet, were they not hiding from him?

No, he realized, they were not. They just did not consider him significant enough to spend any amount of time in his presence.

Arrogant bastards.

That’s what they were.

He sipped from his drink, then grabbed his book.

The AI would warn him if anyone came in or out of the building. It was also set up to film all comings and goings, so he wouldn’t miss anything important.

He was ten pages in when the voice rang out:

“Intruder alert!”

What? Intruder? Where?

He sat up and turned around.

The back door was wide open and a dark figure swiftly struck him before he could say or do anything.