Despite the relatively small size of the room, Eliza found enough space to ponder around in a circle. Though it made her dizzy, she preferred it to just sitting. “Kazuki… where are you… can’t you just pick up the uplink…” she muttered to herself.
Anxiety seeped through her expressions; did Kazuki get himself into something again?! Was he alright?! She kept worrying to herself.
The worry and stress kept reminding Eliza of her past. She could see glimpses of herself in the mirror, throughout the ages...
She’s tried contacting him so many times. Pressing her uplink for the dozenth time, it connected to the comms channel.
Then, a voice spoke into her ear. ‘ELIZA, do you copy?’
Kaz. She replied immediately, ‘Kazuki? What’s going on? Where are you? It's a lockdown… Just… What's going on?’ She blurted out all at once.
‘Terrorists are trying to hijack the vessel and kill the occupants. Stay where you are. They’re coming to you right now. WHATEVER YOU DO: DO NOT OPEN THE DOOR,’ Kazuki replied in a calm voice. Though none of his words matched his soothing voice, filling Eliza’s heart to the brim with anxiety and nerve.
Her pacing increased, her heart beated a thousand times. Wait… the door? Her head turned to it, pausing… Nothing. It was closed. She heaved a sigh of relief. ‘What? Wait… what?!’
‘Keep your voice down. I’m running back right now. Hide. Now.’
As she was just about to reply, a slam came at the door. Her heart sank in fear… Then, her eyes pierced around the room. Hide. Hide. WHERE?! The closet? NO. THAT WAS TOO OBVIOUS. THE BATHROOM?! NO. NO… She started to panic, as the knocking came again. She knelt beside the bunk bed, seeing that there was a small gap underneath it. Barely large enough to fit a person… Given her stature, it might be hard.
The knocking became violent, smashing against the door. “PLEASE LET ME IN!” a voice shouted at her. “PLEASE!!!”
She slowly gasped at each violent smash, gulping down her worries.
It wasn’t a voice she recognised. But for a second, she almost considered it. ‘Kaz… what… do I do?’ Eliza asked. She knew what she had to do… She started to crawl beneath the bunk bed, feeling the rough carpet below and the soft mattress above.
‘Hide. Make no noise. I’m coming,’ Kazuki reported. She remained silent as ordered, placing both hands on her mouth…
Still, the shouting outside kept coming. “PLEASE! I BEG YOU!” It slowly went down to a startled cry…
That’s no friend, Eliza…. She told herself.
Synthia spoke up, ‘Let’s not be hasty… let’s stay here…’
Eliza nodded. ‘I know. It’s no friend,’ she repeated out loud.
Her mind shot into action, thinking of possible solutions. Though none boded well. Was she going to die? No… no, not here. She refused to believe that this will be her grave, but her thoughts quickly faded away as the door came open with a crash of fired circuits.
“Stupid fucking phase doors…” She heard footsteps entered into the room.
Synthia placed a finger to her lips, easing Eliza’s mind through her presence alone.
She talked to Kazuki silently, ‘Kazuki! Someone’s here!’ Her hands remained firmly planted on top of her mouth, stopping her from audibly gasping for air.
’Hold. On. I’m coming. Stay silent, do not move.’
Silently staying put, she saw a pair of boots trod against the floor. She heard the closet doors get flung open. Dear fuck… By the Eclipse, she was thankful she wasn’t in there. She heard whoever it was searching around the place, before entering the bathroom… The doors slid closed…
‘Don’t worry Miss Elizabeth,’ Synthia whispered silently to Eliza, a holographic visage in front of her, patting her cheek. ‘Mr. GemRy will arrive shortly, there’s nothing to fear.’
She nodded, agreeing with Synthia as she AI continued to pat her on the cheek. Despite the feeling barely being noted by her physically, Eliza cherished each stroke.
Her heart was bleeding. Eliza couldn’t take it… Her composure was lost, as she started to hyperventilate… She has to stay strong here… Eliza hijacked her own breathing, using everything beyond her willpower to keep it closed… to keep her racing heart from screaming out in agony.
She steeled herself, even biting into her own tongue. She hoped the pain would ward away her stress - but it did not. It intensified, as the figure returned back into the main quarters… And then, it knelt.
It placed a hand against the floor… Eliza could see it clearly with the white lights shining down.
A muzzle came into view, as a hand grabbed onto the underside of the bunk bed. Eliza closed her eyes. And then, a gunshot rang out…
“Huh…” Eliza muttered to herself… Was she dead? She slowly opened her eyes. A second gunshot, then another! A whole fusillade.
Bolt casing dropped onto the floor as the figure fired towards the door.
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There was fighting! Bolts flew up, smacking into flesh, steel and energy. Then, she heard a splash. The figure fell down to the floor.
They were still breathing. She saw the gun slowly slide towards her… Does she take it? Does she take the shot? Eliza couldn’t tell exactly what was going on, but she had a choice… use the gun, or not…
Then, she saw a second pair of shoes enter… They looked familiar, along with a metallic breathing she knew all too well. They knelt down, a mechanical noise soothing Eliza’s mind… But it didn’t look underneath the bunk bed. Instead, the person was directly on top of the figure…
“P…please… I’ll—”
BANG.
Eliza covered her head with her hands. She moved them to her ears… covering them. BANG. BANG. BANG. BANG. The loud noises continued… And then, silence… She looked forward, as a head popped down to look at her.
“KAZ!” She shouted, looking at a familiar face… It was the face she knew of for so long, though Kazuki was missing his aug-glasses. He was breathing heavily, a small amount of steam exiting his mouth. The hand he held on the ground shook slightly…
He nodded at her, extending a hand underneath. She grabbed onto it, as he pulled her out. “You hurt?” he asked.
Eliza shook her head, not daring to look at the dead corpse in their presence. Kazuki kept holding her hand, as he led her out into the hall. Though he was the first to hold her hand, Eliza gripped harder.
‘Captain, is the ship secure?’
She heard muffles of something on the uplink channels, but couldn’t hear into it. And then, the red lights turned off - blinking. And the normal lights ran back online.
‘ALL PASSENGERS ARE TO REMAIN IN THEIR QUARTERS UNTIL GIVEN DIRECTIONS BY THE INTERCOM.’ “Where are we going, Kaz?” asked Eliza. She pressed her fingers down further, not wishing to let Kazuki, the key to it all, go.
He turned back to her. “The captain owes me for saving him and the crew. He’ll have us relocated to one of the First Class Suites. Let’s go…”
∗ ∗ ∗
Eliza rolled around on her double bed. “At least the rest of the ride was comfy…” she said.
A mere grumble was all Kazuki gave to that notion.
It was nice and fluffy… as she expected. “I still feel like I owe you, Synthia,” Eliza shouted across at the holographic figure of Synthia, sitting on the table and recharging. The AI tutor was small, as always. “Kazuki isn’t too find of what happened, though.”
‘If anything, compensation is good, wouldn’t you agree, Mr. GemRy?’ Synthia asked as she tilted towards Kazuki. She did the same. His bed was empty and nicely kept… In fact, she thinks he didn’t even bother sleeping for the week’s journey - only maintaining his guard.
The thought dismayed Eliza slightly.
Kazuki, for his part, was standing at the window, staring off into the abyss of warped voidway. The room was large and spacious, like a large hotel room on the move. The décor, the holographic portraits and neatly neon lighted carpet…. The hovering lights: everything screamed pure luxury to Eliza.
“I cannot overlook this,” Kazuki stated, ignoring all the splendours around him. He took a moment to manually reclock his exospine. Eliza instinctively threw over a new priming pin amongst a jar of them. Kazuki snatched it out of the air, readjusting some parts along the power converters. "Thanks."
“Wait… what are you talking about?” Eliza mused.
Kazuki paused for a few seconds, still staring off into space. “We’re nearly there,” he said. He popped a pill of Halolazil into his mouth… holding one hand with the other.
‘How do you know?’ Synthia asked, before falling to an offended voice. ‘Have you been checking me without my knowledge?! I’ve been keeping track of the voidcraft’s trajectories ever since we left Lautrasia.
‘I’ve been counting,’ Kazuki answered… What? Counting? Wait? Has he been counting the whole time?
Whilst she was sleeping and resting and lounging around, he’s just been counting… “Kaz… can’t you relax?”
“Absolutely not!” Kazuki raised his voice, to Eliza’s surprise. She shook slightly, as she sat up on the bed, wearing her pyjamas. He turned around to her, his face unmoving. Despite the monotone voice, it betrayed Kazuki’s thoughts . “You nearly died under my protection. Again.”
His unmoving eyes stared at her, giving no remorse or affection.
“Kaz… I know… but… can’t you relax for a while? For my sake?” she asked. “It’ll help me feel at ease knowing you’re at ease.”
Kazuki paused. His head twisted back around towards the abyss. And then back towards her. He sighed, eyes and muscles still unmoving. “Fine… But we won’t have long because—”
An intercom interjected, cutting Kazuki off, ‘We have arrived at our final destination, the Grandé Ball Palace. Thank you all for your patronage with the Gran-Mercutio,’ it said. It had a soft, faint voice that was still audible.
‘Well, the two of you can still have some fun at the Ball Palace,’ commented Synthia, before giggling slightly. Eliza’s face turned bright red as she grabbed an empty plastic mug from the side table, lobbing it at her. It phased directly through Synthia.
She hoped Kazuki didn’t take into consideration what the AI had just said…
“Uh…” Eliza turned towards him, as she started to do her hair up in a half-up style. A patterned hair ornament held it in place.
He remained silent, watching the warp field shut off, the cruise re-entering normal space.
Bright stars littered the astral winds once more, as a large structure peered out from the distance. It was a structure Eliza’s been to only once in her life… And that one time changed everything… But this time will be different, she thought. Kaz kept his head forward, eyes staring at the large space station… Though calling it a space station would never fully capture its beauty. It was a marvel of architecture, a bright marbled space station with pillars, appendages, and a large dome for its ‘roof’. It fulfilled what everyone thought of when the think of the Ball Palace: a noble vestige of a bygone era.
Though to Eliza, this place has only ever brought one thing: and that was blood. “Things will be different this time around,” she tried to assure herself, muttering. She then raised her voice for Kazuki to hear. "Right?"
Kazuki spoke up, “It will. I blundered last time. Try fooling the database twice. It will not work. Be it the Marquis or Obadiah, we will not falter.” He extended a hand.
Eliza looked at him, as he turned around to her. Slowly, she walked over, getting up and shaking. “Don't be so serious, Kazuki, we're here to enjoy life as well, you know? The Dassant has changing rooms past customs. Some tradition about surprising others with fashion… We can get changed there.”
She prayed, hoped, begged that thing will be different. Kazuki's eyes merely stared deep within her red soul, before blinking solemnly, he then nodded. This has to be different. This time round, they have potential friends and allies awaiting for their arrival. Kazuki is not bound by the Directors of his past. They’ll find a lead, they’ll most definitely find answers…
Piece by piece, Eliza knows that her, Kazuki and Archius from afar will bring all the deaths the peace they deserve, hidden knives beneath the backs of those that seek to flush their lights away with a darkness over this Republic.