"Why is it that people hate each other?" said Sait, tired eyes gazing impassively at the traffic below. "Why do you think that is?"

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Serena put a finger to her chin, considering the question - and considering why she was being asked the question. Nearly everyday this weird old guy had showed up and asked her and Bruno these kinds of questions. Bruno just ignored him, but Serena wasn’t rude like that.

They were on one of the massive balconies that lined the outside of the hospital, this one made up to look like a dock overlooking a holographic ocean. Sait sat at the end of it in his wheelchair, peering through the hologram to glare at the city beyond.

She blinked. "Do people have to hate each other?"

He didn’t look at her as he replied. "There must be someone that you hate."

Cott’s smug grin floated to her mind, and a growl almost escaped her throat. She hated him, true. She’d rip him to pieces if she ever saw him again. But he wasn’t people - he was Cott.

"I hate a person," she admitted, frowning. "But I don’t hate people. That’s different, I think."

Again, Sait didn’t even look at her. "Mistaken," he grunted.

"How’s that?"

"Humans loathe all other humans," Sait said, as if explaining something exceedingly simple. "Without exception. But that’s not acceptable - not socially - so they lie. To themselves. Take the hate they feel for everyone and put it in just a few people. But it’s a cheap trick. Wears away given time."

Sait really was kind of a downer. It was as if he lived solely to look grumpy and give pessimistic lectures. That might have even been the case - Serena had never seen him do anything else, despite supposedly being in charge of this hospital.

"Do you hate everyone?" she asked, cocking her head.

"Of course." Sait’s eyes tracked a holographic eel as it swam through the false ocean below.

"Including me?"

"Yes," Sait didn’t even hesitate. "My hate for you is lesser, though. I haven’t yet discovered what I loathe about you."

He said it matter-of-factly, as if this was simply the way the world worked. Serena couldn’t imagine living like that - constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop, for every person you met to reveal themselves worthy of scorn. It sounded lonely.

"What about yourself?" she pressed on, eager to punch a hole in this depressing balloon.

Sait’s voice was quieter, but no less certain: "Yes. Exceedingly."

"Because you’re old?"

That got a reaction out of him - it was just an annoyed glance backwards, but it was a reaction all the same. Then, he sighed and began speaking:

"Do you think it’s possible for people to be redeemed for their actions?"

Serena nodded - the thought of Cott made that nod a bit reluctant, but still. "Yeah, of course. If they really feel bad about what they did."

Sait scoffed. "It needs more than that, idiot. For a person to be redeemed, they must take steps to rectify their errors. They must not reap the benefits of their atrocities."

Those were a lot of big words, but Serena didn’t exactly disagree. Saying you wanted to be redeemed without actually doing anything was just lip service.

"So," Sait spat. "What do you call someone who hates what they have done, but cannot bring themselves to stop? Not even because of the loss it would bring them, or the fear of retribution - simply because they cannot expend the effort? Wretch. Wretched." The last two words were delivered with such a low growl that the bitterness was almost leaking from his mouth.

Serena frowned. "Are you talking about yourself?"

"I wasn’t exactly being subtle, fool." Sait turned his wheelchair to face Serena, ignoring the artificial sand kicked up by the movement.

"But you’re a doctor, right? You help people, like with this hospital."

For a second, Sait’s face shifted with those words - changing from his usual grumpy countenance to an expression of utmost horror. It was as if Serena had cut her own throat in front of him. After that second, though, the moment passed - and Sait’s face went back to that usual scowl.

"This hospital," he said, almost spitting the word. "Has never helped anyone. Not one person. Ever. This is a place for hurting people. It’s a bad joke."

"But you helped me," said Serena sadly. "I was all hurt after the fight, but your doctor’s made me better. Nobody hurt me."

Sait laughed, a hollow humourless sound. "Helped you," he croaked. "That’s funny. See what happens if you try to leave, girl. You’ll see what this place is for. Even the name is for hurting people."

The name? Anna Sait Memorial Hospital. Skipper or Dragan would probably have been able to make some easy deduction from that, but Serena didn’t get it.

"Anna Sait?" she asked. "Who’s that? Family?"

Sait’s mouth spread into a yellowing, uneven grin. "Anna Sait is the one who makes me unforgivable. No matter what I do."

-

"Now," said the Sponsor of War, retracting the projection of the presidential assassination back into itself. "I’m sure you would agree this is a quite serious offense, my friends. I’d forget thirty years forced labour - it’s a firing squad for a sin such as this."

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Ruth’s eyebrows were still knitted into a confused wobble as she looked from the bull to Skipper. "Skipper?" she asked. "Why wouldn’t you tell us about that?"

Skipper opened his mouth to say something, but just closed it again with a grunt.

To tell the truth, Dragan didn’t understand either. The fact that Skipper had assassinated the President was shocking, sure, but Dragan didn’t actually find himself caring that much. He’d never known the man, after all, and most politicians were assholes anyway.

The fact that Skipper had hidden it, though, that showed that he definitely cared.

"Your friend seems quite distraught, Skipper," said the bull, an unmistakable smugness slithering in its voice. "Should I elaborate?"

Skipper hissed out the words, so quiet Dragan could barely hear: "I’ll do as you say."

"Sorry, I didn’t quite catch that."

Skipper looked up, spoke louder with a glare of fire and a voice of ice. "I said I’ll do as you say."

The bull seemed satisfied with that, and was seemingly about to finally shut up - when Ruth stepped forward.

"Tell me," she said, voice resolute.

Skipper looked up warily, still in the corner of the room as if trying to hide from events. "Ruth," he said slowly, and there was more than a hint of warning in his voice. Don’t go there, he was really saying. Don’t ask.

Dragan opened his mouth to say something, too - but promptly snapped it shut when Skipper’s gaze swung over to him. Anything he said here wouldn’t help the situation.

The bull leaned forward to face Ruth directly. "Have you ever heard of the Vantablack Squad?"

Ruth shook her head. "No."

"I’m not surprised," the bull chuckled. "They’re not the sort of group many people have heard of. The Vantablack Squad were the people the UAP central government turned to when they wanted something done quietly. Something done invisibly, even, with no way to trace the crimes back to them. Theft, sabotage, assassinations - they were quite prolific back in the day. Until the death of dear President Saon, of course. That wasn’t so quiet."

As the bull spoke, Dragan unfolded his Archive - the thing had been gathering mental dust, really - and inspected his memory of the image the bull had projected. The young Skipper - in his early twenties at the very most - blasting a hole in this President Saon with what had to be a Heartbeat Shotgun. In the background of the image, Dragan could see the blurry and indistinct mass of a crowd. The bull was right: that didn’t seem very inconspicuous at all.

"After the assassination," the bull went on. "The Vantablack Squad was disbanded - its members going their separate ways, save for one who was executed for prior crimes. But the scars of their … escapades are still felt. Especially here on Taldan."

The bull was full of fittingly named shit, no doubt. He didn’t actually care about what this Vantablack Squad had done - even without seeing his face, his voice made it obvious. If anything, this guy and those like him had probably benefited from the chaos this assassination had brought about.

All this was, to him, was something to exploit. Just like everything else, no doubt.

Ruth didn’t say anything - her mouth was a thin expressionless line, and her eyes were full of confusion. Her fists were balled at her sides as she stood there, staring forward in deep thought.

"Well," chuckled the bull, cutting through the silence. "I’ll leave you all to it."

And then it was gone.

Dir cleared his throat awkwardly behind his desk, adjusted his tie in an effort to occupy his hands. Clearly, he hadn’t expected that sudden infodump either - the awkwardness was palatable.

Skipper came back from the corner. "So, uh," he said, expression returning to his easy grin. "I’m betting you’ve got some kind of job for us then -"

"When were you going to tell us about this?" Ruth snapped.

The grin died near-instantly. Skipper’s eyes flicked over to Ruth, but the rest of him didn’t move. "We’ve all got secrets, kid," he said, as if the whole thing was really no big deal. "You can’t expect people to just share their whole life story for you, yeah?"

Dragan stepped forward. "Yeah," he said, frustration creeping into his voice. "No. I’d be okay with you not telling us everything about you - believe me, I don’t want to know - but not when we’ve been press ganged into being these assholes’ attack dogs because of it. You should have told us."

Ruth nodded as well. Clearly, he’d managed to voice her own frustrations too.

Skipper turned towards the pair of them, sucked in air through his teeth. "Listen," he said. "You already knew I was in a little trouble here, and that was why we were in this mess. What does knowing the trouble change? Situation’s still the same, yeah?"

"A little trouble?" Ruth said incredulously, eyes wide.

"You assassinated the President!" Dragan spread his arms wide as he spoke. "That’s a big fucking deal!"

Skipper raised his arms too, but then lowered them again in futility, making it look like the desperate flapping of some unfortunate bird. "Well, you know," he said quietly, glancing towards Ruth. "We’ve all got stuff."

Again, Dir cleared his throat. "I’ve, ah," he said, that awkwardness the conversation had brought about still there. "I’ve got assignments for you all from my superiors. They’d like you to begin immediately."

Dragan glared at Skipper for a second longer, before sighing and breaking his gaze. "This isn’t over," he said, marching towards Dir.

Skipper sighed, quietly. "Yeah," he said. "I getcha."

-

A sword was the pen with which you wrote your will onto the world.

That was something Atoy Muzazi had always believed. It had been drilled into him. So long as he had his sword - so long as he had Luminescence - he could break free of any situation. Power was his ink, and Luminescence his quill. With both of them together, he could make events go any way he wanted.

But now he was powerless. Now he was without Luminescence. The torture was unpleasant, but knowing those two facts was somehow even worse.

He kept his eyes closed, trying to snatch what little sleep he could between interrogation sessions, but he knew that to be futile. When he closed his eyes, all he saw was Hadrien’s smug face. All he saw was that humiliation, the shock of the stun-bolt not so different from the methods his interrogators were using.

I will get out of here, Hadrien, he promised. I will find you.

But he had already done that, hadn’t he? He had embarked upon his revenge - and failed miserably. He’d allowed his rage to guide his sword, and paid the price for it. If he went after Hadrien as he was now, what would change?

He would simply fall deeper into this spiral.

Muzazi wondered if Marie had made it out alright. More than once his interrogators had inquired as to the identity of his partner, so they clearly hadn’t captured her, but that didn’t mean she had left the battle unscathed. There were many people on the streets of Taldan that night, after all.

The answers would not present themselves. He would have to find them.

Escape, then. He’d known that to be the only option from the start. His interrogators would never willingly release him, after all - even if he confessed what he knew, which he never would, he’d be shipped off to a UAP holding facility as an enemy combatant. He couldn’t rely on others to break him out, either - there was no guarantee that they were willing or able to do so.

If he wanted to leave this place, it would have to be under his own power.

He had no Aether.

He had no sword.

He had no strength.

These were the trials that defined a Special Officer. He would make do.

As he heard the door to the interrogation room slide open, Muzazi opened his eyes to look - and they widened into saucers of fury. The calm that he’d dutifully forced into himself shattered like glass. A growl escaped his throat.

"You," he snarled.

Dragan Hadrien stood there, leaning against the doorframe with a displeased expression on his face. He held a script in one of his hands, and he clicked his tongue as his eyes met Muzazi’s.

"Yeah," he sighed. "I’m not thrilled about it either."