Brooks watched as the Leviathan consumed the shuttle. It had become engulfed in the Reality Break Shadow much earlier, and all connection had been cut off. For some time there had been no visible change to the shuttle - the RBS was only a threshold, and crossing it did not cause immediate effects. Had there been crew on the shuttle, though, they would have felt it, and soon after their minds would no longer be their own.

Two minutes later, the ship had visibly rippled as it had begun to alter, soon becoming something else. Its shape had blurred, its parts rearranging. It was deep within the Shadow now, and there was no coming back.

It was like watching a mad engineer retool a device into something that made sense only to him. After this point, it would not have functioned outside of the Shadow of the Leviathan, grim experience had taught Brooks that. Things altered beyond a certain point, if they left the Shadow they could no longer hold themselves together as matter. The resulting event was known as a matter failure, as the object broke down almost entirely into a burst of elementary particles and massive amounts of energy.

This time, he did not have to see that. This time, he got to see something worse, as the bulk of the Leviathan came more and more into their reality. No longer was its eye simply a vague outline, but it had become something almost corporeal, and once it engulfed the thing-that-had-been-a-shuttle, it ceased to be.

"It is a part of the Leviathan now," Kell commented.

Urle looked at him, but said nothing.

"Launch all escape pods and craft as soon as they're ready," Brooks ordered. "Yaepanaya, do we have firing solutions for the Magnetic Accelerators?"

The woman looked up from her desk - she had been actively scribbling. "The system can't get firing solutions through the Reality Break Shadow - we've calculated by hand down to the 20th decimal. In theory it should be hard to miss something that big, but . . ." she gestured. "Nothing about them makes sense. But we're going to need to let it be closer before I can give you good odds on a hit. At most, ten seconds before contact with the Shadow."

It was a matter of defiance, they all knew. Tens of thousands of ships had fired upon Leviathans in the past, and few, if any, projectiles even reached their target before they ceased to exist.

And those that hit did little. How could they, against something so vast?

Brooks accepted Yaepanaya's words all the same, then looked to Urle. "Evacuation status?"

"The last shuttle is launching in twenty seconds," he stated. "We've got at least 80% of the civilian population and 15% of personnel off. The rest of the civilians . . . voluntarily gave up their seats."

Brooks looked at the stats - out of 14,892 civilians, 11,943 were evacuated. Out of the ship's complement of 19,955, only 2,973 were evacuated. All were in non-combat roles. Every ship had evacuated full.

Almost 20,000 left behind. Their lives were in his hands. All of them had moved to the furthest point in the ship from the Leviathan, if they could. He and his bridge crew would be closest to it, taking the fullest extent of its reality-defying presence.

They had more escape craft, but they were running out of time. They would have to buy time for those escape craft and hope that the Leviathan did not notice them.

And most importantly, they would have to call for help.

"Last ship launched, sir," Urle said.

Brooks leaned forward, his voice quiet. "You're certain your daughters are out?"

Urle hesitated in answering, and when he did, the emotion bled through his mechanical voice. "Yes, sir. They are safe."

Brooks spoke louder. "Then we had better make sure we do our duty." He clicked on a channel to address the entire ship.

"To all souls aboard the Craton - to battle stations. We are going to engage the Leviathan. It is not a desirable outcome, but we do it to give those who have escaped time. Thank you all."

He closed the channel.

"Send the emergency signal," he ordered.

"As ordered, Captain," Cutter said.

There was no bang, no dramatic sound as the engines overloaded. Not even a vibration - they simply did not work in that way. But they all felt it; it was an electric feeling, like static, but moreso. It built until it seemed almost unbearable - and then it was gone.

Kell staggered. Brooks looked at him, and stood to help steady the being.

Touching him, he was not just cold, his body felt like rock, both in its unyielding nature, and also its solidity. He could not right the man with any exertion.

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"Ambassador, are you-?"

"I am fine," Kell said, standing upright. His body moved like a marionette on strings, simply moving vertically.

"Are you sure?"

"You have more important things to do, I am certain," Kell replied. There was a bite in his voice that Brooks had not heard before.

Brooks' skin was too thick to be bothered by angry words, but the Shoggoth was right. He looked to Cutter.

"Message has been sent, Captain. And our engines are disabled - we have momentum, but that is all."

"Time until we enter the Shadow?"

"Two minutes and seven seconds, Captain," Cenz reported.

"Ready the Mag Cannons. Prepare to fire on my mark."

"Sir!" Eboh, the communications officer, said. "We've got contact from the Hev ship - it's the Response Team, they've got the ship working!"

Brooks breathed a sigh of relief. "Communicate to them the trajectories of the escape ships - ask if they can recover them if possible, if the Leviathan leaves after we're gone."

"Sending now, sir. Lieutenant Commander Caraval is asking to speak with you as well."

"Put him through," Brooks replied. "Put them on channel for the command bridge."

Caraval's voice came through - there was a strange pitch to it that he knew came from the signal bending under the gravity of the Leviathan. The computer could not clean it up perfectly.

"Caraval reporting," he said. "The Hev ship is fully functional. Had to jettison one section that we believe came too close to the Leviathan - lost a portion of its crew, but still operational."

"Like the shuttle, that section is now a part of the being," Kell mused.

"Had a near-problem with one of our number, but all is well." His tone changed. "I . . . we . . . would sure like to know why you're moving to engage, sir."

"The Leviathan is going to catch us no matter what," Brooks said. "We have to buy time."

The reply was hesitant in coming. ". . . Ah."

"Your families are among those evacuated," Brooks told him. "Thank you for your service. You have my commendations, Lieutenant Commander."

"Thank you, sir." There was relief in his voice. Caraval's son lived with him on the ship.

"Sir," Cutter suddenly said. "Ambassador," addressing Kell. "When you say shuttle and Hev ship section are now 'part of' Leviathan - is this literal?"

Kell nodded. "Yes. They are simply parts of it - as it split in two to follow us and the shuttle both, they are addendums to its body."

Cutter's mandibles clicked rapidly. "Sir, if we target the Hev component - it is physical. It is not surrounded by Reality Break Shadow. We can hit it, sir. We might . . . actually be able to hurt it."

Surprise went over Kell's face. "I agree. Captain, target it - target it immediately."

The idea made Brooks feel a surge of excitement, until he saw the angle. He struggled to keep the frustration from his voice. "We can't - the Leviathan is between us and it. We're not even sure of its edges."

"We can!" Cutter said excitedly. "Signal from Hev ship shows us exact gravity curve - we follow trajectory of signal for shot - we can bend it around the Leviathan!"

"Even better," Urle said. "This Hev ship has its own zerodrive, yes? If they can extend their field and launch the piece into zerospace just as it explodes, it will . . . well, I don't think the Leviathan will like that."

"Yes!" Kell snapped. A fury was in his voice - the most emotion they had ever seen from the being. "Captain, I swear to you, if you do this, you will hurt it, and it shall regret this moment for all its time."

"We have twenty seconds!" Yaepanaya noted loudly. "If we're going to do it, say so quickly!"

"Calculate it," Brooks ordered. "Get firing solution - Caraval, are you tracking this?"

"Yes, sir! The Hev Captain is - he's delighted by this idea."

"If you can synch their zerodrive with our shot, we can make this perfect," Brooks added.

"Already doing so - they can hold the charge for a ten-second window!"

"Five seconds until Shadow Break!" Yaepanaya yelled.

"Firing solutions, now! Orient the ship! We have to-"

Reality broke around them.

They heard it, a sound as the air itself around them shuddered, twisted and altered.

Brooks felt like he had been turned inside out, and he knew it had only just begun.

He could barely see, everything appeared distorted - an effect upon the synapses in his mind. Others around him staggered, even Urle. It did not matter that he was more machine than man, he was still just a being, and there was no resisting such a thing as a Leviathan.

Save for Kell.

Somehow, the being was not blurred in his mind. He saw him as clearly as he had only moments before.

No, he saw him even more. More clearly - every inch of the form of man he had taken on, and in moments he saw yet more.

He saw in ways he did not know he could see. He saw beyond the charade of a human form, to something, something else more alien than anything he had encountered in all his years in space. Something huge, something primordial, something that was innately like the Leviathan.

And yet, he realized for the first time, something that was contained. While the Leviathan viewed them as nothing and would walk over them with the anger of a being stepping on ants, Kell moved carefully. Restrained.

And he could sense something, a feeling - sorrow.

Kell was looking at him, not in his human form, but his presence.

"I am sorry," he felt, more than heard, Kell say. They were not words, but merely an idea, conveyed to him through something other than sound.

Brooks wanted to reply, to say to Kell to finish what they had started. He could see the button on the console, near Yaepanaya, and he only had to press it. The computer could not do it - the AI of their system was experiencing what they were, in its own way.

All he had to do was press it. But he could not make himself move.