Diwan scowled at the communications point, as if the man on the other end could somehow see her. “Do you think I’m playing a game here?”

“No, I know you’re not,” Wayan replied. “But I’m not either. I can’t give you the bridge, no matter what you do…”

“No matter what I do? Well, what about if I did do something…” Diwan spun around, locating Mila and Cortes. She’d show him she meant business.

Cortes was now looking at her again, his eyes angry. But he still appeared unable to stop her. “What’s wrong, don’t have the heart to stop me?” she snarled. He was mad at her already, that Diwan could tell. If she hurt him more, maybe he’d stop trying to care about whether she would ‘change’ or not. She was sure she’d nearly convinced him.

Diwan saw the gun Cortes had dropped on the ground, and bent to pick it up. Her Seijin powers could knock someone down just as easily, but the crude weapon would probably hurt more. “Now,” she said, loud enough for the communication equipment to pick up, “which one of you wants to go first? Might have to be you, Cortes; I don’t think she is going to be very responsive. Unless, you want to tell your man to give up the bridge? I’m sure he can hear you.”

“No…” Cortes growled.

“Really? I don’t have to make it a question. I can make you do it.”

“And before you do, I can tell Wayan not to listen to anything I say from this point on.”

Diwan snarled, and pointed the gun at the centre of Cortes’ chest. Her lip twitched slightly, and she moved it over to his leg. “I’ll ask one more time…”

It was at that moment that Mila seemed to fly awake. Her eyes sprung open, and before Diwan knew it she had a ball of energy in her hands. That energy sprang from them and hit Diwan in the centre of her chest, flinging her backwards.

It wasn’t as powerful as Diwan has expected, and only left her slightly dazed. But then Mila had gotten up, and stood up over her, another blast of energy forming in her hands.

Diwan rolled out of the way as the energy slammed into the floor where she had been a second before. Then she formed her own ball of energy in her hands, and flung it at Mila.

Mila wasn’t fast enough to move out of the way, and was flung back, slamming again into the wall.

Cortes grabbed her as she tried to sit back up. She was too weak to keep on fighting. “I’m alright…” she said, though her eyes wandered.

“But you won’t be for long…” Diwan had picked the gun back up, and pointed it dead straight at Mila.

“Diwan, stop…” Cortes growled. He let Mila drop back to the floor, and then stood in front of her. “You’re mad at me, not her…”

“I’m not angry at anyone!” Diwan snapped. “I’m simply doing my job!”

“Yes, you’re angry!” Cortes shouted back. “What are you, emotionless?! You were angry before, but at the Sphere…”

“Oh not this again!”

“Don’t tell me everything that happened when you’d lost your memory meant nothing. Everything you saw…”

“Everything when I lost my memory? Or everything when I was with you!? Which is it really, Cortes?”

“I thought you could change…”

“You were wrong. Now, get out of the way. That isn’t a suggestion; it’s an order.”

Cortes gritted his teeth, feeling the drug pull at him. “No…”

“You have to, and you know it…”

Cortes felt his body tense, and the blood pound through his head. He wanted to move, so badly it hurt. But he knew that would mean Mila’s death or at least her getting seriously injured. “I said… no…”

Diwan pushed the gun so the muzzle was right in his chest. “Move!” she shouted. He was supposed to listen to her!

“You want to hurt someone…” Cortes choked out, “then shoot me instead.”

Diwan tensed, her finger moved closer to the trigger. This close, the gun would kill Cortes. Why don’t I want him to die!?

Cortes wasn’t looking straight at her, perhaps just waiting for the trigger to be pulled. When it didn’t come, he looked back up at her, and then reached a hand up to grab the gun. For a moment, they both held the weapon together.

Then suddenly the gun was snatched from Diwan’s grip. Cortes held it up, right in her face. “Get back…”

Diwan took a single step backwards. She wasn’t frightened; she could tell him to drop it. He had only not listened to her about stepping aside because he really didn’t want Mila to die. Either that or the drug was wearing off…

“Well, what are you waiting for? Just…”

“Don’t!” Cortes shouted cutting her off. “Unless you really want me to kill you.”

Diwan started. That had nearly been a costly mistake. She smiled, ever so slightly. “Alright. How about you give me the coordinates to Puerto Angel instead?”

Cortes blinked, and his expression said he feared he might actually do it. He drew in a sharp breath, closed his eyes and gritted his teeth. “No…” he snarled out, though doing so almost seemed to cause him great pain.

“Fine,” said Diwan. She should have known. He hadn’t moved for Mila – her death was something he definitely didn’t want to happen. How much more wouldn’t he give her the coordinates to Puerto Angel? He knew the Sphere would kill every pirate they found there. “It doesn’t matter anyway. I know you bloc’s name, at the very least.” She leaned in close to Cortes. “…Puerto Angel.”

Cortes almost shuddered as she said the name.

“Let’s try this one then. Let me go.”

Cortes drew in a breath. Gritted his teeth. He tried to fight it again.

But Diwan knew he couldn’t. She had the slightest feeling that the smallest part of him might not want to kill her either.

The muzzle of the gun dropped lower. Cortes tried to keep it up, his breath chugging in as he struggled to think clearly. He lost. The gun was now pointed at the ground, and Cortes stared blankly at it. “Looks like you get a second chance Diwan… but now you don’t know if I really wanted to give you one…”

Diwan scowled. She leaned in close so Cortes had no choice but to look at her. “I don’t. Care,” she snapped. Then she turned around and walked out of the cell area. She didn’t need to hurry; Cortes wasn’t going to stop her.

Cortes watched the Guardian’s retreating back, then just growled and slumped back against the wall next to Mila. Diwan would leave. They were both safe.

“Cortes!?” the communication system blared. “Mila? What’s going on; are you guys alright?”

Cortes sighed, and stood back up.

Mila stood, a bit more tentatively, behind him. She still felt dizzy.

“Wayan? It’s alright, we’re both fine…” Cortes pressed his hand against he communication point.

“Good! What happened to Diwan?”

Cortes paused, his hand pausing over the button that would enable Wayan to hear his voice. Finally, he pressed down upon it. “She’s gone…” he said simply. “I guess to get away in an S22.”

----

Mahad and Lena dashed down in to the Sphere water carrier’s docking bay, just in time to see Diwan and the Guardian both board one of the S22’s stored in the larger ship.

“Diwan!” Lena shouted after her. “Stop!”

The other Guardian looked startled, and dashed into the patroller with a quick: “Come on!” directed at Diwan.

Diwan paused, glaring down at the younger girl.

“I don’t think she has Cortes or Mum…” said Mahad, grabbing his little sister by the shoulder.

“But…”

“Maybe we should just leave them…” Mahad didn’t want his little sister getting hurt. Diwan had tricked them all. What if she was somehow more powerful than she was before? He knew he was being almost paranoid, but this was his little sister he was thinking about.

Diwan seemed to realise she wasn’t going to get attacked. She seemed to think for a moment herself, and then took a step back towards the open hatch of the ship. “I’ll get you next time, Lena. I may not be exactly sure where you’re bloc is… but at least I know which bloc to ask for!” With that, she turned on her heel and ran into the S22.

Barely seconds later, the docking clamps disengaged and the small ship slid out of the open belly of the water carrier.

“Well…” Mahad muttered, watching the ship leave. “I guess now we know you can’t trust a Guardian…”

----

Diwan let the other woman pilot the S22. She knew she should have reprimanded her for her failure to bring the Seijin children all the way to the Guardian school. But she knew her own failure was much worse.

“We’re clear…” the Guardian muttered, sweating. She didn’t seem to want to hang around too much longer than necessary. However, the relatively safe confines of the Sphere patroller were giving her extra confidence. She positioned the S22 so the water carrier was between their ship and the Saint Nazaire. Then, she powered up the weapons.

“What are you doing?” Diwan snapped.

“If I can hit the power relays, I can seriously damage the water carrier, perhaps even destroy it…”

Diwan knew that much already.

“If they won’t let us take those children to the Guardian school, where they belong, then they shouldn’t be able to have them either. The last thing the rebellion needs is more Seijins…”

Diwan tensed, and for a moment almost didn’t know why. Before her memory had returned, she had thought that the Sphere taking the Seijin children was completely wrong. When she’d remembered again, she’d realised that was simplistic and foolish, and simply wrong. The rebellion didn’t need more Seijins, and the children themselves deserved a far better upbringing than that they would receive among the common people. But to destroy them just because they couldn’t bring them all the way to the Guardian school….? Had she even felt this way before!? Before she’d lost her memory? Diwan couldn’t remember. Suddenly, all she could see was that expression on Cortes’ face as he’d told her about how the Sphere split up families… She shook her head, clearing the image from her mind. What she did now was because of her own opinions, and had nothing to do with what she’d thought these last few months. Or with Cortes.

“No!” she snapped, putting a hand on the Guardian’s shoulder and physically pulling her back from the controls. “The… pirate ship. You know how angry destroying the crew they have on the water carrier will make them? Them against our single patroller; you know we wouldn’t survive!”

“I… I’m sorry, I didn’t think of that…”

“Just get us out of here,” Diwan snapped.

The S22 shot away into the sky, a few blasts of energy following from the Saint Nazaire. The large ship itself, however, did not follow.

----

The Saint Nazaire was home. They’d taken the Seijin children back to their bloc, without incident, and returned them to their families.

As far as could be told, there had been no retaliation from the Sphere. It didn’t seem they’d come a second time, they hadn’t realised the pirates had intended to take the children home.

As Cortes walked the dirt path up to the lighthouse, he wondered whether Diwan had neglected to tell the Sphere they’d attacked for the purpose of returning the children intentionally, or if she’d simply gotten mixed up with the return of her memory and forgotten. He dismissed the thought with a shake of his head. He shouldn’t still be thinking like that. He’d put Puerto Angel in enough danger as it was.

He sharply rapped on the Vector’s door, and then walked in without waiting for a reply. He found the older man at the top of the lighthouse, doing something on Puerto Angel’s computer system.

“Cortes, I’m very busy at the moment,” said the Vector, without even looking up.

Cortes didn’t reply, and just waited.

The Vector eventually looked up, and saw neither anger nor frustration on the Captain’s face; the emotions the man would normally display if he thought the Vector was needlessly wasting his time. He sighed, and pushed back the computer. “You’re not still worried about Diwan, are you?”

Cortes sighed, and stepped away from the desk.

“Cortes,” the Vector got up, following him. “It’s been almost a week. Now, don’t you think if she were going to give some piece of information that would enable them to find Puerto Angel, we’d know already? The Sphere wouldn’t waste any time.”

“I know that,” said Cortes. “I know I wasn’t foolish enough to give her the coordinates, though… I know I came close…”

“That wasn’t your fault…”

“It was my fault for trusting her in the first place…”

“For all you know you may have been right then. Her attitude may have simply changed when her memory returned.”

Cortes huffed. “That doesn’t put Puerto Angel in any less danger…”

“How do you expect her to find us?”

“She knows the bloc’s name! That means she can ask!” Cortes snapped.

The Vector sighed, and came and stood behind Cortes. “We’re fine Cortes, I promise you.”

Cortes let out another huff of air. He could have pointed out that the Vector couldn’t possibly know that; but he wanted to believe him. “I… I did trust her Vector. But now I don’t know if that was because of that drug she gave me. And I don’t know if I was right to trust her; if that just changed because of her memory. Or whether that should make any difference at all. The truth is…” here, he paused. “I think I was starting to… I wanted to trust her… I was…”

Cortes hadn’t shared this with the Vector before, but it didn’t take him long to catch on. It was obviously difficult for the Captain to get out. “You wanted her to come to our side, didn’t you?”

Cortes nodded.

“You started to fall…”

Cortes drew in a sharp breath. “Don’t… I shouldn’t have brought it up. It doesn’t matter now.”

The Vector let his hand rest on Cortes shoulder. “It isn’t a fault to care, Cortes. No matter who she was.”