It was too late. Red light sizzled in front of them, the explosion shuddering the entire craft. The reactive shields had activated just in time, but the interaction was enough to throw Kazzy to the side.

The Captain growled. "Shit, they're not playing around. To hell with diplomacy."

She sprayed a trio of Aetheric bolts to the far end of the Hangar. None of them reached the end, two impacting on the ground and one on a cloaked craft. The impacted craft shifted on the ground but maintained its balance on its landing gear. Roughly half of it was now visible.

"Looks like they can't shield and cloak at the same time," Domrik observed, hastily removing his right gauntlet and popping a crystal from the store in the back of his armor. "But we can."

"We can?" the Captain wondered, confused, as she swayed Kazzy from side-to-side, avoiding most of the incoming fire while returning her own. A handful of damaged Jets had been unveiled, more popping into existence with each volley Kazzy threw at them.

"Sort of," Domrik admitted, remembering that the soldiers he encountered during the heist were able to partially penetrate his illusion. "If they know about illusions, they probably have a way of detecting them, too."

"Team Eight has joined us," the Captain reported. "Hold off on the cloaking, Specialist. They can't see us. And we can't take much more of this. The reactive shields are overheating."

"Land there," Domrik said, indicating the spot on the floor. "You'll have partial cover from that cloaked craft."

"Squad Three, inform all craft to land as soon upon entry to the facility. An aerial fight in here is too dangerous."

The landing was rough, and everyone was out of their seats before the shuddering ceased. The Captain barked her orders. "We need to get to the nearest hangar wall, ASAP. We can take cover behind the pillar. Specialist, target as many hidden craft as you can. We need to know where everything is."

"I can keep us cloaked from the attackers while still visible to the other Teams," Domrik said as he jogged after them through the cargo bay and down the ramp.

"Do it," she said, levelling her rifle toward the direction of incoming fire. She ran sideways as she covered for the rest of her team. They crossed the ten meter distance to the wall without taking a hit, thanks to Domrik's illusion. Kazzy's reactive shields flared a few times until all fire was drawn to Teams Seven and Eight."

Using his arm blasters, Domrik marked all of the cloaked craft in rapid succession, damaging each one enough to unveil part of its hull to the others. He extended their cloak a dozen meters out, so that their bolts were invisible to their attackers for at least part of their quick journey. Marking their attackers wasn't so easy, as they were in constant motion moving along the opposite wall, using the landing gear of adjacent Jets for partial cover. At the far end, another craft lifted away.

"They're migrating and spreading out, Captain," Domrik said, firing a couple bolts to indicate the general area of their new location. Team Seven was also spread out, partially protected by Domrik's cloak, while Team eight used the cargo ramp of their own Jet as cover. The pilot still remained in the cockpit, firing the cannons at a regular interval. The cooldown between each usage was several seconds. It was too slow. Their reactive shields were overworked. Before one minute had passed since landing, the craft took several bolts to the windshield. The front end exploded, causing the remaining hull to collapse forward. Team Eight retreated, scrambling to the nearest wall pillars for the scant cover they offered. More Guard Jets arrived at that moment, but they hovered clumsily around the expanse of the hangar as they tried to find a safe landing spot. Each took substantial damage from the growing number of cloaked soldiers before finally touching down.

"We need more reinforcements!" the Captain demanded. "We're outnumbered three-to-one. We need to keep moving. Specialist, keep us hidden!"

Domrik refocused, realizing the distraction of the other Jets' arrival had been enough to drop the illusion. Each soldier of Team Seven was having to dodge and deflect incoming fire. Lieutenant Sparn was already limping due to an impact on her shin. Domrik had landed a few hits, twice more than the rest of Team Seven combined, but none of the other soldiers had been taken out yet. His eyes darted to Kazzy. It sat there huddling next to a darker-colored twin, watching the battle in silence.

Then he knew. It was now or never. "Do you trust me, Captain?"

"I trust you to follow orders, Specialist!" she replied as she manually activated an arm shield and stormed out from behind the pillar. "Team Seven, move out! We can't let them surround us!"

They responded immediately, pushing away from the wall and wandering closer to the newest arrivals, away from Team Eight's collapsed Jet and away from Kazzy.

"Captain, keep moving!" Domrik insisted, breaking from the group in a wild sprint toward Kazzy. Her cargo ramp was still lowered.

"SPECIALIST!"

"You're still cloaked!" he argued as he grabbed the edge of the ramp to redirect his momentum. It was true. He could still feel the illusion active, the crystal still tingling in his slippery hand. It wouldn't last for much longer, however. "On my mark, you will be visible."

"GET BACK HERE NOW!"

In three long bounds, he was behind the pilots seats. He triggered his armor's dismount function. It released him in one solid jerk, and toppled back to clang on the floor. "Mark!"

He ripped open the compartment and tore through his travel bag. There was no time to put on the shield pads. His survival mind was already reeling at having ditched his armor, but it hadn't been a conscious decision. It seemed now like none of his movements were conscious decisions. Everything seemed to be happening automatically. Suddenly, he had the Augmentor Bow in his hands. The moment the silky metal graced his skin, he was already moving down the corridor, energy surging through his body. He moved just as quickly without the aid of his armor, and with no more effort. He cleared the cargo ramp entirely, then rolled to a stop and stood.

That's when he knew things were different. Here he stood, no armor, no Aetherite, no illusion, no defense. He didn't need any of that. The battle raged around him, but instead of anger or fear, he encountered an overwhelming sense of tragedy. His eyes pooled with tears. Everyone here was innocent. He'd already believed that intellectually, but now he was catching his first true glimpse of it. He knew, deep within, that the coming moments were inevitable, that there would be a perceived victor and perceived defeated. There would be pain echoing through time and space. Perhaps it was that echo that amplified his inspiration to acquire the Augmentor Bow in the first place. He knew his purpose now. It was the same, he realized, as the Bow's.

It was to accelerate the suffering, to prolong it no longer than necessary. There was no greater compassion than that.

What he saw with his own two eyes was now only the surface of perception. The Aetheric field interpenetrated each entity before him with ever-shifting iridescent threads of light. It was an enigmatic dance of energy, powerful in its creative and destructive abilities. This moment of perception contained no time at all for him. He couldn't tell if his moment of physical pause lasted for one second or one year. It was all the same to him.

And so, he joined the spontaneous dance of death.

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His feet seemed to glide above the metal as he leapt to action. Aetheric bolts coursed in his direction, but avoiding them was a matter of perception. Those he saw would not harm him, could not touch him, for he knew that the path he followed was the correct path. Even though he could not predict its next twist or turn, and he didn't want to. It was something else entirely animating his movements, and yet it was not something separate from himself.

His fingers hooked around the bowstring, and there ceased to be a bow or a hand. The infinitely soft metal thrummed with blue light as he pulled it back. A vortex of blue energy coalesced into a shimmering beam spanning the length between his hand on the grip and his fingers on the bowstring.

There. That soldier there was a split second away from taking a kill shot to Lieutenant Avosta. The Bow was already aimed in his direction, all it took was a minute adjustment. The soldier's helmet became Domrik's entire world, the worn and rusted metal becoming a detailed painting of war and hatred.

Then he let go.

Energy surged extatically through him. Blue light flared, overpowering all other light sources. The Aetheric arrow didn't so much travel as instantly punch into a line connecting the Bow to its target. There was no chance for the soldier's reactive shields. His death was instant and explosive.

The next target was revealed behind the collapsing headless body in slow motion. Domrik, still in a full sprint, had yet to take another step before he drew the bowstring back again. Energy formed into a line once more. His fingers released. The line traveled viciously, instantaneously, into its doomed target. Another body fell, even before that soldier had time to comprehend what had happened to his late ally.

Domrik took another step and felt himself diving to the floor. Three bolts, travelling from three independent locations, passed through the space he would have occupied standing up. The stinging friction between the metal and his arm was but a pinprick as he twisted and fired a quick headshot at a soldier readying an Aetheric cannon in his direction. He flicked out his elbow, and he was up to his feet again.

Only three seconds had passed since the beginning of this mad dash, and yet most of the fire was already redirecting toward him. He found himself travelling toward one of the partially-cloaked Jets, and what he did next surprised even him.

Energy shot through his legs, snapping them straight and propelling him several meters into the air. The instant burning of his thighs was background noise to the intensity of his narrowing focus. Four more streaks of blue death reached the opposing soldiers before his feet landed softly on top of the craft. With this added bit of cover, he twisted and bent in an exotic dance for the next few seconds. During that time, a thought occurred. He had ample opportunity to get off more shots. What was he waiting for?

He felt the answer. His body was burning from the sudden exertion. An image appeared in his mind of an electrical wire glowing red-orange, not from channeling an Aetheric current, but from channeling too much energy for its present capacity to handle. Any more, and he ran the risk of melting. Time was required to let the heat dissipate. He was not invincible in this state. The Bow had to work within his limits, as high as they were.

He let himself drop off the craft into a graceful roll on the floor. When the assault began again, it wasn't to end more lives, but to preserve them for later. He started taking out shoulders and knees, striking out at just the right points to incapacitate them temporarily. The teams on his side were now pulling more of their weight, now that he was systematically disabling the opponents illusions. It seemed that with each blue lance, the surrounding soldiers' armor and weapons went offline for a fraction of a second, and in battle, that was everything. Their reactive shields were sluggish, if not completely disabled. Within the span of thirty seconds, nearly every opposing soldier had some sort of injury.

Domrik was able to take another breather when his side ramped up their assault. The beautiful play of transcendent light had faded a bit, and his normal vision had gone blurry. His eyes burned. It wasn't from the tears, he realized, but the sweat pouring from his forehead. His chest burned with each breath. His heartbeat was an earthquake. He really was overheating.

But he had done all he needed to do. The battle was finishing itself. The rest of the Guard platoon had arrived and surrounded the remaining opposition. A few craft remained in the air, filling the hangar with the echoing roar of their Aetheric thrusters. The mutual assault made communication impossible anyway, so it took several minutes before the remaining opposition started to trigger some sort of process that ended their lives instantly. It started slowly at first, and when it became clear what was happening, the Guards got up close and apprehended as many as they could. Some of them surrendered without resistance, but those looked to be soldiers whose armor wasn't working properly. The Bow's projectiles had messed with the circuitry somehow.

Domrik caught motion in his peripheral vision and turned. Another craft was lifting off. That was odd. That ship was completely cloaked, now, and it had been one of the first Kazzy had targeted. He tore his attention away. It didn't matter.

Then he sensed it. It was hardly a whiff, but with the running down energy of the Augmentor Bow still boosting is Aetheric body, he felt it. Jase was on that ship. The realization didn't boost his mood, because he'd somehow already known it would happen. Jase must have been in control somehow, as the cloak was far more robust than the others. The Jet was more than halfway transparent. None of the others had presented that way. He trusted Jase would find a safe place to land.

He made his way back to Kazzy, the exertion really hammering hard on him as he climbed the cargo ramp. He wiped sweat from his brow, completely soaking the sleeve of his undersuit. Thirst drove him to the water compartment, where he drained an entire bottle. Once standing in the cockpit, his attention turned to the artifact in his hands. It was a thing of such raw beauty and power, it almost scared him. What was a godlike object like this doing in such a mundane world? He tried pulling on the bowstring. It didn't budge. He tried thinking back over the past ten minutes, yet all of it was like a dream fading away. He'd used it, but he still didn't know how it worked. He knew his Aetheric body had merged with the Bow's. He'd guessed correctly there. But what triggered that process? He was no closer to the answer. If anything, he was more clueless now than before. He thought there might be some sort of activation phrase or motion, something that could trigger it on-demand. Nothing special had happened in the moments before his use of it.

Unsettled, he shoved it back into his travel bag and remounted his armor. Relieved from the armor's support, he strode back out to meet with the platoon. They were in the process of bringing in the surviving soldiers. The Guards now outnumbered them two-to-one. They left the rest of the bodies where they lie. He spotted the Captain already striding over to him. He decided to start things off smoothly. "Orders, Captain?"

"Get back to Kazzy, now. They just told us this place is rigged to blow. They had turned off the alarm in the hangar in the hopes of trapping us here. Guess some of them aren't as brave as they think. I was eager to go exploring." She went quiet until she was in the pilot's seat, checking on Kazzy's status. "I gotta admit, Specialist, you have me in a bind."

"How so?" he asked as he locked himself into the copilot seat restraints.

"You disobeyed a direct order," she said with mild frustration, "then proceeded to save all our asses using some god-knows-what magic shit you conveniently neglected to inform us about until the last minute. I don't know whether to submit you for court martial or nominate you for an award."

"How about neither?" he suggested. "I just sacrificed a couple decades of my life at least. Now you all know who stole the Augmentor Bow."

"The what?" Lieutenant Avosta asked as he entered behind them, supporting Lieutenant Sparn to her seat. "You owe us all an explanation, Specialist. Foreknowledge of that secret weapon of yours would have been useful."

"I didn't know if it would work," Domrik admitted to the team as they filed into their seats. The Captain got Kazzy off the ground and ascending through the hexagonal port through which they'd entered.

"Bullshit," Avosta countered. "You used that thing like it was a part of you."

"Do your suits record everything that happens?" Domrik asked.

"Affirmative," the Captain answered. "All recordings get analyzed and archived."

His head slumped against the headrest. Relief swept through his body as he finally lay the truth bare. "Then that will be the first and last time you see the Sacred Bow in action. Everyone knows someone stole the Bow from the museum. That was me. Your analysts will see it, then call in the police." He realized he would be willing to turn himself in just to get the process over with.

Silence held the group for the next minute. Avosta decided to break it. "Where is it?"

"Bottom of my travel bag." There was no use lying. They would find out soon enough.

The Lieutenant raised his restraints and rummaged through the bag, mumbling to himself as he removed the artifact. Domrik watched his subdued reaction with fascination. The others were transfixed by the object as well. They each took turns holding it during the trip back.

Domrik watched the suburban lights scroll below them again, a sense of heavy nostalgia growing in his chest. This might be the last time in decades he saw a mundane view. He was about to become very good friends with three concrete walls.

"This is Captain Faekin of Guard Team Seven," she announced over coms. "Mission update. We have left the facility with a handful of casualties. The place blew just after evac, but we have detained soldiers for questioning. We also acquired a lead for additional recon missions. We will review full details during the debrief. Over."

The Commander's neutral voice came through. "Acknowledged Captain. I will inform the other Commanders to call off the support. Way to turn it around."

"Don't give me the credit, sir," she said. "The Specialist is full of surprises."