Akira was hallucinating. Maybe she partook in some wild psychedelics with the locals and was just tripping out. For all she knew, there was no island in the first place, and she was in her apartment on Base having a crazy dream. Or maybe she was captured by Concordians, and they were trying to extract secrets from her.

At that moment, she would probably take the Concordians scenario; at least it made sense.

What made no sense was how a small young woman, looking like death incarnate, had broken out of a tomb of solid rock on an island that had no contact with the outside world for a thousand years. It was impossible. It was illogical. It was madness.

And the goddess looked very mad as she fixed her piercing gaze on Akira.

"Where is Verus Rex?" Hania repeated, the promise of pain laced within her voice.

It took Akira a moment to realize she was being addressed; it took her several more moments to round up her remaining sanity to answer. And when she finally did, what she meant to say was "I don't know."

What she said instead was, "Why the hell would I know?"

If even Izzy let out a hum of skepticism at her answer, it was definitely bad.

Hania stared at Akira, her bloodshot eyes wide, before taking a slow step closer.

Akira gulped.

Another step.

The thought of running crossed Akira's mind, but she couldn't seem to make her muscles listen. How could she escape the wrath of a vengeful goddess?

Another step—

A loud crack echoed through the silence. It was immediately followed by a torturous howl, and Hania crumpled to the ground in a heap of rags and hair.

Akira whipped her head around towards the forest to locate the source of the goddess's agony, but the villagers and pilots were still hiding in the trees, just as timid as before. She turned to Izzy, but he was staring at the goddess in speechless awe.

Whatever happened, their best bet was to bolt. Senses regained, Akira jumped to her feet before she heaved Izzy up and began dragging him back to the others.

"Get back here!" the goddess shrieked.

But Akira wasn't dumb enough to comply. In fact, she wasn't even planning on looking back until the villagers' eyes widened at whatever they saw behind her.

As soon as Akira glanced back and saw the goddess reaching for a rock the size of her head, she dropped to the ground, dragging Izzy roughly down with her.

But no boulder crashed into them. Instead, all Akira heard was another series of cracks and another pained cry. When Akira lifted her head and turned, she saw a grotesque image akin to a scene on the battlefield.

The petite young woman was splayed across the ground, a tattered cloth stained with dirt and old blood draped over her frail frame. Grime covered her parched skin, and what little hair remained on her head was tangled and matted. On her gaunt face, her expression was twisted in agony, made bolder by the dark shadows that were cast on her pale skin.

And then there was her hand, resting on top of the rock she had reached for earlier, her cracked yellow nails caked with dirt. Except its shape had transformed, with each of her fingers pointing in different directions and bent in places where no joints existed.

The sound of cracking...

Akira glanced at the goddess's feet. Each appendage looked more like a chunk of white, wet clay that seemed to be hanging off the rest of her leg by her skin alone. The bottom hem of her clothes shifted to reveal an ivory bone, its jagged end piercing out of one of her calves and streaked with blood.

"I hate to interrupt," Izzy's chipper voice sliced through the silence with one swift stroke, "but I believe your bones are a bit brittle. Ma'am."

The silence returned once Izzy voiced his observation. And then, in a span of a second, Hania's expression went from pain to shock, then fury, then...nothing.

Hania had fallen unconscious.

***

The villagers wanted to bury her.

"She may be our goddess, but she is dangerous!" the elder insisted for the hundredth time; during the first ninety-nine instances, the visitors had avoided reacquiring the translator from Hania's limp body. "We have to contain her before she destroys us all!"

"Can I get a blood sample first?" Izzy asked.

"We need her!" Akira said, waving off Izzy's incessant tapping at her shoulder. "This Verus Rex is dangerous, and she might know how to stop him!"

"Or bone marrow since, you know, it's already out in the open," Izzy said.

"Our legend warns that she must be kept sealed!" the elder said firmly. "We were blessed by Oelu that she did not do more damage this time, but we might not be as lucky when she wakes up."

"You know what, I'll just help myself..." Izzy said, slinking out of the conversation.

Akira bit back a sigh. This entire night was completely illogical. But maybe that was the only way to get through it.

"Oelu went to find a cure, right?" Akira asked. "So what if we looked for it too? He didn't say anyone else couldn't try, right?"

The elder contemplated her argument while the other locals held subdued sidebars.

"We have...other divine objects to help us, back home," Akira continued, raising her wrist with her phone's docking station. "We can do it. We'll take her with us so she can't hurt you or your village."

"And if she wakes up again?" the elder asked. "The only thing that could restrain her was the tomb."

"Whoops..." Izzy mumbled from outside the debate.

Such a sound was especially concerning considering the source, and Akira couldn't help but look. Fortunately, Hania was still unconscious and bound by the ropes the villagers had quickly secured around her. The only difference was that Izzy was kneeling beside her, holding up the jagged bone that had pierced her leg.

"My...hand slipped?" Izzy said, wagging the bone with his fingers.

"You'll be next on her list after Verus Rex," Akira muttered before turning back to the elder. "Well, she can't do much harm with a leg missing, can she?"

The elder still looked doubtful, but she eventually shook her head in defeat.

"I still have my doubts...but perhaps you came to us for a reason," she said. "Perhaps Oelu sent you here to retrieve her for him. If that is the case, we simply must trust that he will guide you safely home."

***

Hania was still unconscious by the time the visitors were packed and ready to depart the next morning. While Izzy determined her bones were still "like the crumbs at the bottom of a bag of chips," the patch of skin that had been pierced by bone had already healed. With an erratic and allegedly superpowered goddess as their cargo, time was of the essence, and they only carried so many sedatives onboard to keep her in check.

So after a collection of hurried farewells from the locals, and Akira dutifully gave each of the children a hug of their own, they were off, the two pilots in the front row and Akira and Izzy squeezed in on either side of the unconscious goddess. While Akira hated the idea of having an unstable superhuman between her and her charge, they had already spent too much time arguing over it to delay the decision any longer. The best they could do was drape a thick blanket over her to keep the sunlight away from her, which, according to the locals, was the source of her power. Akira had seen too many impossibilities in the last twelve hours to argue.

The pilot didn't need much convincing to fly them at top speeds, and as soon as they were within range of secure communications, the co-pilot radioed a request for a runner. Within an hour of their departure from Pali Uli, they were met by a cruiser, the UNS Crusader.

"We need to move this one to a secure room," Akira said as soon as she jumped out of the plane, belatedly verifying that the sailors that met them on the flight deck were all of lower rank. "Red lights only. Watch the restraints. And keep that blanket on her."

Once a group of new recruits rushed to comply, Akira thanked the pilots and dragged Izzy below decks.

"No need to be so rough," Izzy said, thankfully only resorting to verbal resistance. "I'm not a child, you know."

"Oh, really?" Akira said, not loosening her grip on his upper arm as she pulled him through the maze of passageways. "So you weren't thinking about running off before our debrief to get some alone time with that bone you stole?"

Izzy was silent for a moment too long.

"You know I don't run," he finally replied, his last word laced with disgust.

"Captain Dunn," an unfortunately familiar voice said from behind them. "When your team left, I didn't think you'd be bringing back a prisoner."

Akira halted, then braced herself for what was to come before turning. Smirking behind her was Lieutenant Makana Li, dressed in the Navy's navy blue coveralls that still looked as impossibly good on them as they did the first time they met. Which was crazy—coveralls shouldn't look good on anyone.

But Makana was blessed with naturally good looks that could pull off even the most unsightly outfits, and Akira knew that very well. Sure, their loose, long-sleeved uniform hid most of their figure, but their toned muscles were still slightly visible under the thick fabric. While most of their body was covered, their exposed face made their bronze skin glow even more to compensate, accentuated by the light freckles that dotted their defined cheekbones. Even though a navy blue ball cap covered their dark, buzzed hair, it couldn't hide the fact that their head was somehow shaped perfectly, however that was possible.

Or perhaps Akira was just biased.

Regardless, the sight of their familiar face made Akira tense; her right shoulder twinged in discomfort.

"I'm...going to run," Izzy muttered, now physically resisting Akira's hold.

But Akira stood fast, ignoring how Izzy's struggle made her shoulder throb even more.

"She's not a prisoner," Akira said, then amended, "yet."

Makana's sneer widened, this time accompanied by eyebrows raised with intrigue.

"I'd love to hear the debrief on this one," they said chipperly, then sighed. "Unfortunately, it'll have to wait. Base command is in a meeting that seems very important and very confidential. Your little excursion is the least of their concerns."

That was never good, but Akira did her best to keep her expression neutral.

"Is that why you're here?" she asked. "To relay the news?"

"No, of course not," Makana said innocently. "I just wanted to see if you'd all make the trip back in...one piece. Well, there's always next time."

And with one last smirk they were gone, leaving behind an air of swagger that made Akira regret a plethora of her past actions. At the same time, seeing Makana after a long night irritated Akira, and her exhausted facial muscles couldn't hold the emotion back.

"Look on the bright side," Izzy said, probably noticing Akira's frustration. "At least nobody got shot this time."

With that comment, and news of the postponed debrief, Akira waved Izzy out of her sight. As she watched him scamper away without another word, clutching tightly on the satchel that held a goddess's fibula, Akira realized she needed a distraction, and she knew exactly where to get it from.

A few minutes later, after making an unintentional detour at the mess, she found herself in one of the lower levels of the cruiser, standing outside a containment cell with two sugar cookies in hand. According to the guards monitoring the room, the goddess's vitals showed she was still unconscious, but Akira wasn't sure if she could trust that. After all, the woman spent an unknown amount of time buried alive and healed a serious injury overnight; they were clearly in uncharted territory.

Still, nothing was going to get accomplished by doing nothing, so Akira squared her shoulders and marched inside.

The room was a bleak gray turned scarlet by the illumination of a single red light shining dimly from the middle of the ceiling. Directly below it was a solid steel table with two chairs on opposite sides, all of their legs welded firmly to the deck. Seated in one was the goddess, her disfigured figure hunched over onto the table with her wild hair splayed across the metal. She was unmoving, but that didn't mean she was unconscious.

Akira moved closer to the table, adamantly hiding her hesitation from her footsteps that echoed off the walls.

"Hungry?" she asked, holding up one of the cookies.

As expected, she received no response.

Regardless, Akira placed a napkin-wrapped cookie on the table next to the woman's head, then strolled over towards the opposite wall. While she waited, Akira slowly munched on her own cookie as she paced. Five minutes later, her snack was gone, as was her only method of entertainment.

So she began working out, starting with squats.

She was in the middle of her third set of twenty when something finally happened.

"You couldn't even get one with some damn chocolate chips?" a bitter, raspy voice suddenly asked.

Akira, fully lowered in a squat, almost fell over in surprise. The goddess's slumped figure hadn't moved, but the voice was clearly coming from her.

"There wasn't any," Akira said, still not sure if she had hallucinated the question.

"That's pathetic."

Before Akira could protest, the goddess dragged herself upright, her expression pinched in what could've been irritation, discomfort, or both. Under the dreary red lighting, her gaunt face now gave off a foreboding air—or perhaps that was the glare she shot at Akira.

After an uncomfortable staring contest, the goddess turned to the cookie on the table, then glanced at the rope snaked tightly around her arms and torso.

"You sure as hell better not expect me to eat this without hands," she snapped.

"You better not expect me to trust you after you looked like you wanted to kill us," Akira said, unphased. "Besides, last I checked, your hands didn't work."

Akira's last claim was a gamble since she wasn't sure if the goddess had somehow managed to heal her bones by then. But if the sharp glare she received was any indication, her guess was spot on.

Her brief moment of smugness was quickly shattered when the goddess turned back towards the cookie and slammed her head into it.

Akira wasn't prepared to keep from flinching at the sound. The table reverberated from the impact, sending an echo bouncing back and forth within the small room. Belatedly, Akira worried that the goddess with a calcium deficiency had caved in her own head in a moment of insanity, and her wild mop of hair was sparing Akira from the gory truth for a moment longer.

That concern quickly passed when the woman sat upright again, leaving behind a massive crater in the table and the sugar cookie smashed into nibble-sized fragments. Most importantly, her head was still intact—from the outside, at least.

As the goddess leaned over the table to eat the crumbs hands-free, Akira forced herself to continue as if she saw people voluntarily bashing their heads into steel on a daily basis.

"Who, or what, are you?" Akira asked. "How long were you buried in that thing? And how are you even still alive?"

"Me first," the goddess said instead, her voice directed towards the pulverized cookie. She paused to finish swallowing some crumbs, then glared suspiciously at Akira. "Who the hell took my leg?"

Akira schooled her face into a deadpan. Even though she wasn't that close to Izzy, she didn't want him dead either.

"I mean...it looks like your leg's still there," Akira said.

The goddess's frown deepened. "I meant the bone."

"Oh, that thing," Akira said, knowing full well that her casual tone was far off the mark. "It...uh...it fell out."

The goddess narrowed her eyes; Akira resisted from fidgeting under her scrutiny.

"The giraffe kid with the afro took it, didn't he?" the goddess finally said.

"You can't kill him," Akira said without missing a beat.

But the goddess made no such promise. Instead, she went back to her cookie.

"Your name's Hania, right?" Akira asked after the goddess took a few more bites. "How did you end up on that island in the first place? How do you know Verus Rex?"

At the mention of Verus Rex, the goddess froze, then slowly leaned back in her chair with a blank face. A beat later, her expression twitched, and her jaw shifted ever so slightly.

"Please, Hania," Akira said when it seemed like the goddess wouldn't explain. "You've clearly had a rough time, and I want to help. But to do that, we need information. What do you know about Verus Rex?"

Hania kept her focus on the wall opposite of her, deep in thought, before flicking her gaze to Akira.

"First off," the goddess began, her voice low and solemn. "My name's not Hania; it's Danya. The locals altered my name to match their language."

The goddess, Danya, leaned forward. "And the one they call Oelu? That's Orel. But that wasn't always his name. Before that, he went by Verus Rex, king of Concordia."