Twelve pairs of eyes were boring into Major Clarke. They seemed to cut through the air, stale after hours of being confined into this room, and tense with anticipation.

Finally, they were willing to listen to him. One blurry, pixelated picture had made all the difference. Part of him felt offended that his word alone seemed to be worth so little. After all, that image could have been tampered with too. The council had no way of telling if he was lying when he claimed that this woman was the culprit.

Beads of sweat began to form on his forehead, and he curled his shaking hands into tight fists. He could see the frustration on their faces, as well as a hint of lingering doubt. It mirrored his own. Maybe he had been lying. Maybe he had forgotten something, due to the hypoxia. Maybe he was not a witness – was he the culprit?

He didn't know.

All he knew was that this woman had taken control of the ship. But he didn't know how. He remembered her grin, her uncanny two-colored gaze, and that look in her eyes. She had said something to him, something important. But he couldn't remember.

He could remember how he had woken up after the woman had knocked him out. He closed his eyes and tried to recall what had happened after that.

He remembered getting to his feet, legs shaking and head spinning, and there had been this loud, drumming noise assaulting his ear drums. But it had not been the blood rushing through his veins. The hum of the vibration had not matched his own heart bit. It had been the ship. The Aphelion had been moving.

He had turned around to look out of the nearest window. Outside, he had not been greeted by the glowing guiding lights of the space port of Essandrie. There had only been the light of the stars, sparkling against the dark canopy of space, pitch black like the augmented eye of the woman who had captured the Aphelion.

~ ~ ~

Heisenberg made his way up to the bridge with quick strides.

He had no trouble finding his way. He had once served aboard a ship like this one – a Leviathan class vessel. He couldn't recall its name now, like so many other things from the time before the Purge. But that mattered little. A lot had changed since then. Most notably, his allegiance. Heisenberg had little to give other than his loyalty, and it bound him to the person who had paid for the repairs to his body. But as he walked along the corridors of the military vessel, he found a strange thought process occur somewhere within his circuits.

He wouldn't want to be anywhere else in the universe right now. And he realized, strange enough, that he had rarely before pondered about what he wanted at all.

Coming around another corner, he found Ensign Darwin sitting in the middle of the hallway, licking his paw without a worry in the world. The cat was still carrying that small harness with miscellaneous hardware strapped to it. It looked very odd to Heisenberg's sensors. Almost funny.

"I see you made it back aboard in time, Ensign," Heisenberg addressed the cat. "Very well done. The Pontifex will be pleased."

The cat looked up at him with his mismatched eyes as Heisenberg picked him up to bring him along on his way. His silent contemplation was accompanied by the cat's purr, the low hum of the ship's engines and the occasional quite clicking of a Legion droid, hidden in the nooks and crannies of the ship all around them.

As the door to the bridge slid open, he realized that something was wrong right away.

He spotted a black-and-white figure, huddled against one of the control panels, with her head hanging down and her face covered by her hair. Ensign Darwin struggled free from his grip and jumped down to run over to her, nudging her with his head. But she didn't respond to the cat's presence, or his agitated yowls like she usually did. Darwin looked back at Heisenberg and let out a meow that even in absence of any words sounded like a question.

An image popped up in Heisenberg's head, of that day on Hestia Station, when he had found her not unlike this. With her body limp and unmoving, and a hand crammed so deep into the circuit board of a door control that it was covered in bleeding cuts. The memory had a strange quality to it. It caused a tingling sensation in some of his circuits that were usually tasked with warning him of an impending danger.

Dread, he realized. He was feeling dread.

Crouching down next to the Captain, he turned her over, only to find her completely lifeless and with her eyes closed. Her left hand was connected to the ship's terminal through a web of cables this time, so at least her skin was intact. He also noted that her chest was still rising and falling like it was supposed to. But she didn't open her eyes, even when he shook her softly.

"What should we do, Ensign?" Heisenberg mumbled.

The cat meowed, and Heisenberg agreed.

Rutherford, Heisenberg opened the comm link to the Blackstar.

Hello Heisenberg, the other AI replied. I see you're on your way to the meeting point. It seems like all went well, congratulations!

I told you it would work! Higgs chimed in, sounding smug.

Rutherford, Higgs, there is a problem, Heisenberg interrupted the two. It's the Captain. She does not respond.

...who? Higgs asked, sounding confused.

The Captain, Heisenberg reiterated.

Who are you talking – wait, you actually mean the Captain?

Of course, Heisenberg huffed. What kind of question is this?

Higgs' didn't answer, but Heisenberg could sense that he was processing some thought involving the term 'wrecked up bullet brain' somewhere in the back of his artificial mind. But it wasn't meant as an insult.

What do you mean she doesn't respond? Rutherford asked.

She doesn't move and her eyes are closed, he described the sight before him.

Have you checked if she is breathing? Rutherford suggested. Perhaps she is just asleep?

She is breathing, Heisenberg confirmed. But I do not believe that this is sleep. I have been shaking her, and she does not wake up. Darwin seems upset as well.

The cat had begun to pace semi-circles around the Captain and Heisenberg like a watchdog.

Let me check my databases, Rutherford said. The correct term for this state seems to be "unconsciousness".

Thank you, Rutherford, very helpful, Heisenberg noted, and for some reason Higgs chuckled at his words.

Now what should I do about it?

According to my databases, there seems to be nothing that can be done. She should wake up on her own soon, Rutherford explained.

As if your database would know anything about any ailment that can't be cured by a cup of black tea or patched up with a band aid, Higgs scoffed.

And if she does not wake up? Heisenberg asked, feeling that strange tingling in his circuits again.

He looked down at the lifeless human in his arms. She looked small and vulnerable in her current state, with that tiny organic body and no proper armor. Sure, Higgs had woven the Sharksin material into that black-and-white suit of hers, but she needed to be conscious to activate that. He had suggest she should bring the black combat armor for this mission, but she had refused, claiming it would be too bulky. Then again, whatever was wrong with her did not seem like the kind of problem that an armor could have prevented.

Heisenberg, Higgs' voice ripped him out of his thought process, What has gotten into you?

I... am worried, he admitted.

Silence descended over the comm link at his words.

Congratulations, Rutherford said again. Seems like you are on your way to full autonomy.

I don't think-

Heisenberg was cut short when the Captain began to shift in his arms. She moaned quietly and her eyelids began to flutter. Another sensation was tugging at some remote circuit.

Relief, he found the right word for it. He was feeling relief.

It was very odd.

He focused his sensors on the Captain now. She seemed groggy but fine, and from his limited understanding of human facial expressions, she did not seem to be in pain. She looked up at him and opened her mouth to say something, but then her gaze darted past him and her eyes widened.

In a movement so fluid and quick that it strained his sensors' processing speed, she bolted upright and leaned over his shoulder. Grabbing a gun from the magnetic coils on his back with the hand that wasn't bound to the terminal behind her, she fired a single shot. It rang out blaringly through the empty bridge.

Except that the bridge wasn't actually empty any longer.

He had been so distracted that he hadn't noted it, but somebody had snuck up behind him. Now all of his sensors and combat protocols screamed their alarms at him in a clamorous cacophony. But all he could focus on was the Captain as she threw him a wide grin and patted his shoulder.

"Quid pro quo, Heisenberg," she said. "I think that makes us even again."

~ ~ ~

Clarke sucked in a breath of air through clenched teeth as he felt the bullet bite into his flesh and bone, and he dropped his gun, but he didn't scream.

Making his way to the bridge, he hadn't exactly known what to expect. Perhaps that a group of pirates or raiders had taken control of the ship. Instead, he had found the doors ajar, and nobody in the room except for the white android. He hadn't even seen the woman covered by its hulking body at first.

He had snuck up close enough to land a precise shot at the unit's weakest spot – a small crevice between the armor plating of the back and the backside of the head. But the surprise when he had spotted the woman had caused him to hesitate. And now his weapon was lying somewhere on the floor behind him, and there was a bullet lodged in his shoulder instead of the Reaper unit's head.

Now the white android got up to its feet, towering over the frame of the petite woman, the weapons strapped to its back giving the impression of folded wings. But the Angel of Death did not seem half as intimidating right now as the woman whose service it seemed to be in.

"Ah crap," the woman cursed as she took Clarke in with her mismatched eyes, "I knew I had forgotten about something."

She lowered her gun, probably thinking that with his profusely bleeding wound and the weapon out of his reach, he really wasn't a threat any longer.

Eyeing him up and down, her gaze lingered on the stripes of his uniform that indicated his rank, and then came to rest on his face. There was something about the look she gave him that made him feel like a mouse before a snake. At the same time, he felt oddly detached from the whole situation, and he wondered whether she would shoot him now, or just watch him bleed out. He probably should have been scared to death in this situation, but all he could feel was profound confusion at the sight before him.

Perhaps this was nothing but an odd dream, and he was still unconscious on the floor in that corridor in sector seven. Then again, why had he been unconscious in the first place?

As he thought of the redhead mechanic, he recognized the woman before him now. But he didn't understand what the hell was going on. None of it made any sense. There was only one thing he was certain of: she was not supposed to be here.

He could feel the blood gush out from the wound at his shoulder, seeping into his uniform and tinging the grey fabric dark red, but his pain felt unreal. The searing pain in his shoulder and the impossible actuality of the whole situation filled him with a weird mixture of light-headedness and reckless determination. He felt like a passenger who got to watch the events before him unfold, completely out of his control, and way beyond his comprehension.

Years of military training had honed his body into a tool that came as close to a machine as an organic being possibly could. He was trained to obey and function – not to think. And so the part of his brain that had tried to make sense of what was happening shut off completely.

Adrenaline surged through his body, drowning out everything else. He moved quickly, diving to the side and reaching for the gun to bring it up and shoot her before she or the Reaper unit would be able to react. Or so he had thought. The woman was quicker.

She became a black-and-white blur in the corner of his eye as she moved forward. Inches before his fingers made contact with the gun on the floor, she stepped on his hand so hard that he could feel the bones shatter like dry twigs. His scream of pain echoed through the room, but the force of the adrenaline compelled him to keep on fighting. Grabbing hold of her ankle with his other hand, he wanted to yank on her leg to get her to fall. But she was faster once more.

She shifted her full weight onto the foot on his hand, sending a new wave of pain through his body, and drove the knee of her other leg against the side of his head. He could hear a nasty cracking sound coming from within, and saw nothing but white stars dancing before black for a moment.

But he wasn't done yet. He turned his body, in a last, desperate attempt to smash it against her, but she danced out of his reach. He didn't see her, but he felt another hit against his rib cage that drove the air from his lungs, and a sharp pain like a needle prick at the back of his neck.

Then, the last of the stars went out and only black remained.

~ ~ ~

When he came to again, Clarke found himself lying flat on the ground and tied up tightly with what seemed to be cable cords. The Reaper unit was towering over him, face lights blinking in an erratic pattern. It had just finished making the last knots on his restraints. The adrenaline had ebbed away now, but he still didn't quite feel the pain the way he probably should have. His limbs just felt dull and heavy like lead underneath the restraints.

With a labored groan, Clarke turned his head to the side, and saw those strange, high-heeled boots before him again.

"Look at what a mess you've made," he heard the woman speak with irritation, followed by a weary sight.

Somehow he was fairly certain she was not referring to the pool of blood that had formed underneath him.

The Reaper unit pulled him up, so he came to face her now. She bent down to a crouch before him, meeting his gaze on eye level. He stared back at her, his head spinning and his unsteady gaze drawing dancing black and white shapes around her head.

"What the hell is going on?" he whispered hoarsely.

"You didn't hear the radiation alert, did you?" she asked him, ignoring his question.

"Radiation alert...? No, I... I came to the bridge, and..."

"What's your name?" she cut him off.

"Jason," he answered before thinking. "Jason Clarke."

"Tell me, are you always that rough with your subordinates, Jason?" she asked him.

He recalled how he had barked his orders at her before. The way she was looking at him now, with a face as impassive as a mask, but those uncanny, mismatched eyes, he was glad that his voice came out as anything more than a hoarse whisper.

"I-I'm sorry about that."

"Nah, you're not," she said and waved her hand dismissively, "You're scared shitless, not sorry. There's a difference."

"I'm... not... scared" he protested.

"Hm. Are you sure about that?" she asked, casting him a wicked grin.

His eyes were not focusing properly on her face, and among the dancing images before him, she seemed to have a halo of impossible shapes. Or perhaps they were demonic horns? He could feel the color drain from his face at the fantastic and terrifying sight. For a moment, he almost thought that her teeth might turn into fangs and she would dig them into his neck to suck his blood.

She seemed pleased as she saw the expression on his face change. "Good. Remember that feeling well. It's not nice, is it? Wouldn't you rather have authority through respect rather than through instilling fear?"

"Remember...?" He mumbled, trying to make sense of her words, "Wait... so... you're not going to kill me?"

She snorted with suppressed laughter.

"And why would I do that? Oh no. You've made enough of a mess already. You're a stowaway. Do you know what pirates do with stowaways?"

She leaned forward until her face was only inches from his, and cracked that evil grin again, causing a shiver to run down his spine.

"They're sent to walk the plank."

"You're gonna throw me off the ship?" he asked, feeling a sense of panic well up inside of him as he attempted to struggle in his restraints. But his limbs felt heavy and numb, as if all blood flow had been cut off from the for too long. The restraints were not that tight though, he realized. She must have done something to him – a narcotic of sorts, or perhaps poison. Probably so he wouldn't struggle.

"Don't worry," she said, "I'll send you back where you came from in one piece. Let the sharks back at home take care of you."

Commanded by her gesture, the Reaper unit picked him up from the floor. His battered body sagged limply against the armor plates of the android as it put him over its shoulder like a sack of wet clothes. Within his restraints, all that Clarke could do was bring up his head to look at the woman, who followed them as the Reaper carried him off the bridge.

"Oh, you get such an interesting choice here today," she chirped cheerfully as they walked, "Let's see... When you get back to the station, you can either tell a little lie – that you have no idea what happened here, and how the ship was stolen. If you've got a good poker face, they might actually believe you."

"I'm no liar," he hissed at her through clenched teeth. "So what's the alternative? What the fuck is going on?"

She looked at him with a deadpan face. "Alternatively, you get to tell them that Amy Larsson just stole the Aphelion."

He blinked at her in surprise.

"You are..."

"Why of course. You hadn't figured it out yet?" she scowled at him, almost pouting, "I thought that was the whole point of having a signature look, but it seems like my reputation still does not proceed me enough..."

The angry look she threw him now caused the blood in his veins to chill.

"Oh no, no, it does!" he quickly said to assuage her, "It's just... I kinda imagined you'd be..."

He eyed her up and down, looking for the right word, until his gaze came to rest on her face and her mismatched eyes. She looked perfectly impassive again, and only raised one eye brow expectantly.

"Taller," he whispered sheepishly.

An amused smile flickered over her face for a moment.

"Maybe I should have been less subtle about this," the woman continued, furrowing her brow, "I mean, I thought it would be pretty clear that it's me. After Symoa, Aenara and Astraphos, I thought people would start to catch up at some point. But maybe I need to make my point clearer..."

Clarke continued to stare at her as she rambled on. She would have been quite pretty if it hadn't been for the mismatched hair and that horrific eye. It was extremely distracting, the way the rings within were clicking and shifting as she looked around. Her other eye was organic, and grey. When she turned her head to the right, she looked almost normal. Watching her like that, he noted that just like the two sides to her face, there were two sides to her smile. One moment, it could be charming with angelic sweetness, the next, it could be harrowing, betraying the wickedness of a demon.

Clarke felt like he was caught up in a dream.

Everything seemed surreal to him. The swaying motion of the android as it carried him along a seemingly endless seeming corridor. The rhythmic sound of its steps on the metal-paned floor over the dull hum of the machines somewhere in the belly of the ship. The figure of the black-and-white woman who watched him closely with a curious look on her face as they walked. The fact that when he turned his head to the side to look out of the windows, he could see the vast expanse of space beyond it, instead of the shipyard of Essandrie.

Suddenly the android shifted his body on his shoulder, and a flash of white, hot pain stabbed through his shoulder. Perhaps this wasn't a dream after all. But the mere idea just seemed insane. Absolutely lunatic. Impossible.

And yet her words seemed to be true. Amy Larsson had apparently stolen the Aphelion.

"Where is your crew?" he asked hoarsely as they made their way through deserted corridors.

They had passed several major control nodes on the way already, and none of them were manned.

"Sorry, what?" she asked, returning her attention to him.

"Your crew. Where are they?"

"Oh, technically, they're all over the ship... all around us," she explained, waving her hands.

He looked around, and back at her. That woman made no sense whatsoever. Perhaps she was lying. Perhaps she was playing a trick on him. Or perhaps he was dreaming. Nothing made any sense.

"Are they...", he started, his voice a low whisper, "Are they ghosts?"

Now it was her turn to blink at him in surprise. Then she burst out into loud laughter at his words.

"Holy shit, you're one of those Essandriens, aren't you?," she giggled, wiping a tear from her organic eye.

He clenched his teeth together at the notion, and felt the blood rush to his cheeks. He certainly wasn't one of those superstitious ship-worshippers. Far from it. But the longer he found himself trapped in this nightmare, the more confused he became.

"No, Major," she snorted, barely containing another bout of laughter. "I can assure you that they're not ghosts."

"Where are they, then?" he asked. "How are you doing it? How do you control the ship?"

"Trade secrets," she just said. "You don't need to know the details."

Clarke heaved a frustrated sigh. Nothing made sense in this strange dream.

The android stopped next to a row of circular hatches in the wall, which led to emergency escape pods. He put Clarke down on the floor and began to work on one of the hatches. Clarke couldn't deny that he felt a sense of relief wash over him that she seemed to be true to her word. She was sending him back, alive. So perhaps she had spoken the truth before, too?

"All things considered, I think it's not so bad that you ended up here," she said and grinned at him.

He couldn't quite find it in himself to agree with her.

"You know who I am, and you know what I did. So there is just one last thing – if you go back and decide to tell the truth, I want you to bring your superiors a message," she said.

He licked his dry, cracked lips and thought about his options. He wondered how his superiors would react if he told them that this strange patchwork pirate had apparently hijacked the Aphelion all on her own, and let him live just so he could tell this insane tale.

It made no sense, not even to him, who had seen it with his own eyes.

"And what if I decide to tell them the lie?" he asked her.

"Oh, I trust that you will make the right decision when the time comes," she said sweetly and patted his cheek. He shuddered at the touch of her icy hand.

"Now listen well, Major Clarke," she said, and fixed her mismatched gaze on his eyes. "This is a warning."

~ ~ ~

Clarke raked through the memories in his brain, frantically trying to remember.

His head was pounding, it felt like his brain was too big for his skull, filled with too many thoughts than there was space for. And yet he couldn't hold on to the one thought he needed to have now. Ever since Amy Larsson's reaper unit had thrown him, gagged and bound, into an escape pod and sent back to Essandrie, he had these terrible migraines. In the chaos after she had seized the Aphelion, the station personnel had not noticed the lone pod on its way, and it had taken them a while to find him, locked up in there, with barely any breathable air left.

He looked up and found the Security Council still staring at him expectantly. There was something very important that he needed to tell them. But he couldn't remember.

From the corner of his eyes, he could see the door open, and somebody snuck into the room. Without disturbing much of the silence that had descended, the young soldier handed data specialist Benson a data pad and then left again.

"Seems like we have some additional reconstructed footage from the bridge now, before all communications were cut," Benson explained and brought up an image on the large screen in the room.

Clarke felt his breath catch as he saw the oversized image of Amy Larson, in all her terrifying glory. The image was of much better quality than the last, showing her face in sharp detail, right down to the fine lines that distinguished the different adjustable rings in her black eye augment. Her lips were slightly crooked in the strangely sweet and angelic smile of a deceitful devil in disguise.

And then his gaze fell on her organic eye. With one look, it betrayed all of the terrifying tides that were held back behind the mask that was her porcelain face.

Clarke stared at the image with widened eyes. This wasn't a snapshot from a surveillance camera, he realized, it was a message. She was facing the camera straight on, posing for the picture on purpose. And it seemed to him like her gaze was boring straight into him once more. He saw it all within her eye, just like when she had given him one long, hard look before she had kicked him off the ship. And he remembered everything again. Twelve heads whirled around to look at him again as he began to speak.

"A storm is coming."

~ ~ ~

Do you think it was a good idea to let our face be seen like that? Lars

When they had arrived back on the bridge, the comm lines had been buzzing with hailing signals from the station. They had cut all ties to the systems back on Essandrie, knowing that Nova would take care of scrambling any remaining signals of automated surveillance systems that had made it through. There was only one image she had sent over separately, hoping that Nova would catch its meaning and allow them to decrypt it eventually. It showed Amy Larsson on the Bridge of the Aphelion, to make it clear once and for all who she was, what she looked like, and just what she was capable of. She didn't even need to flip the bird to make it drive the purpose and meaning of that image home.

There is a time for disguise and subterfuge, and there is a time for the unmasked truth, Null said. The time for hiding in the shadows is over.

There was no organic indecisiveness left within her, Lars realized. That rallying speech she had given to the Major, about how she would come back and rain hell on their world, had done its job to intimidate the man. But as she had spoken, it had also filled her with a sense of purpose and confidence that he had rarely seen in her. It was delightful.

Lars could only imagine the kind of happiness it would bring her to see the expression on Mad Jack's face when they delivered the flagship of Neo-Tokyo to his doorstep.

Maybe he should have been more concerned about that loose end. Maybe they would come to regret the decision of revealing their face like that later. But that was what life was about. Sometimes, they would make mistakes. But right now, it seemed like they had done everything right, and all was working out in their favor.

They had plugged back into the Aphelion's systems, and moved her through the infinite black. Once they had been brought under their control, the Legion was working mostly on its own now. They didn't need to fully dive into the cyberspace any longer to steer the Aphelion toward the rendezvous point with the Blackstar. And Lars found himself simply reveling in the elating feeling of piloting a ship of this size again, even though it felt very different from the way he had done it in the past.

Hey Lars, Null started.

Yes?

Sorry that it took so long to fulfill my promise, she said and grinned.

Well, a year and a half is not too bad to plan and execute the biggest heist of the galaxy, he chuckled. It's pretty impressive, actually.

True, she noted. It could have been worse. It took me over forty years to bring back that piece of a star that I promised my father.

Lars noted something tugging at their heart at the thought. It still pained her to think about what had happened back on Europa, but the memory did not lash out and tear through their mind like it used to. This kind of recollection was different - a bittersweet feeling that would probably never fully leave her - but that was a part of being human.

These memories and this pain, it all was a part of her, and it made her who she was.

And she was very different from when he had first awoken with her, he realized now. She was harder, in many ways, but also softer, in many others. Her anger was deeper, fueled by the hypocrisy of the elites, but her laughter in those precious moments of respite was more carefree. Her determination was stronger, but her conviction had changed. She didn't fight to regain herself a soul, but to bring justice.

She had become a force of nature, ready to tear worlds apart. She had started with Symoa, Aenara and Astraphos, and Lars knew that she wouldn't rest until she had carved a blazing trail all the way to Neo-Tokyo.

She would probably never know what it meant to him that she had let him be a part of all this – all these experiences, and these sensations. Even the anger, the sadness and the pain. Because that was also part of being human. And it had been necessary, for him to understand the one emotion she had not taught him, but evoked in him: his love.

Hey look, it's the Blackstar! She pointed out, ripping him out of his thoughts.

Up ahead through the window, Rutherford had brought the black vessel close enough to the Aphelion for them to see her through the large window on the bridge. From the outside, the Blackstar would have looked like a tiny insect, buzzing around the hulking behemoth of a Leviathan class ship. As they approached now, Rutherford dipped her nose down and the ship dove out of view again.

"Rutherford, please be careful not to get any scratches on her!" Higgs voice resounded through the bridge via the open comm link that connected the two ships. He sounded panicked.

"Everything is under control," Rutherford commented, with a slight strain to his voice.

"Proceed to docking port fifty-four," Heisenberg, who had manned some of the Aphelion's controls, instructed them.

"Oh dear gods of man and machine, we're doomed!" Higgs suddenly screamed. "He's trying to dock in reverse! Heisenberg! Do something!"

"Stop at the entrance port," Heisenberg instructed and rose to his feet. "I'm coming down to direct you into your designated parking space."

Null looked after him as he rushed out of the bridge, her lip twitching with suppressed laughter.

Do you think they'll make it in one piece? Lars asked worriedly.

I don't know, she admitted.

A few moments of silence passed between them, as they waited for news from the docking bay.

So, what do you think, should we just paint her black and rename her Blackstar II? Null asked suddenly.

The Aphelion?! Lars asked back.

"Potentate, the Blackstar has successfully docked," Heisenberg's voice informed them before she could answer.

They both let out a relieved breath they had been holding way too long.

"Thank you, Heisenberg," Null said, "Everyone, come to the bridge, you really need to see this view, it's gorgeous."

"Aye-aye, Captain," the three androids replied.

I was kidding, of course, Null thought, picking up on their previous internal conversation.

Of course... Lars remarked drily. Why would you ever doubt Rutherford's parking abilities...?

Well, that, and... it's pretty far-fetched. I mean, we can pull of the impossible but I don't know if even we could steal that much black paint.

Alone on the bridge, Amy Larsson laughed out loud. The sound echoed strangely through the empty room, and startled the cat who was sleeping on a nearby pilot's seat. Ensign Darwin's ear twitched and he opened an eye lazily. That moment, the rest of the crew came through the door.

She disconnected from the ships interface and rubbed her wrist, where the two cables slipped back under her skin. Walking over to the pilot's seat, she picked up the cat and cradled him against her chest, scratching behind the ears.

"You've all done a fantastic job today," she lauded the crew.

She moved to the Captain's seat in the center of the room and sank down with a heavy sigh, placing the cat on her lap. She stretched her legs with a sigh and a content smile appeared on her lips.

"Your orders, Captain?" Higgs asked her.

"Sit back and enjoy the view," she said with a shrug, "The Legion will take care of maintaining the course for now. Oh, and Rutherford, send a message to new Elysium."

Her smile turned into a mischievous grin.

"Tell them we're coming home. And we're bringing a gift."

_____
A.N.
We did it! THEY did it!
I can't believe it.... it took me about three months longer than expected to get here, back then even I didn't know 75% of the shit that went down between stealing that chip on Symoa Station and the actual heist.... and as things go, every single side story I came up with in between then and now somehow connected to the great plan in the end... It's actually really pretty insane :'D
Thanks for sticking with me through all this madness!!