[ Author's Note:
I'm going to try to put some more time into this story and hopefully finish it up soon. This definitely took much longer than I expected... ]
Cyclonis let her thoughts drift back over the events of the day.
She had awoken to the pleasant sight of her home terra in ruins after having a quality night's sleep on a rock. After waking up the Dark Ace, who was still recovering from the whole "being dead" thing, and shaking her energy-starved Nightcrawlers awake, she attained the enviable privilege of escorting her bruised and beaten entourage to the Wayside, a fuel station and important link in the region's trade network. More importantly, however – especially to Master Cyclonis – in the right hands, its long-range radio equipment would let her triangulate a signal from the Cyclonian fleet.
"Master Cyclonis," the disoriented palooka in the back of her skimmer called in a tired voice.
"What?" Cyclonis asked flatly. Her violet eyes were fixed forward, studying the gentle contours of the clouds and landmasses far in the distance in order to guide herself to her destination.
"I don't mean to pry, but…" he began quietly.
"If you have a question, then ask. I'll be the judge of whether it's appropriate or not," Cyclonis replied. "I dislike people who preface their questions."
The Dark Ace grunted. "I was wondering what happened between the last battle and… well, now."
Cyclonis glanced to her right, confirming that her Nightcrawlers were still in a V formation around her vehicle.
"Hmm. I already told you what we need to do, but I suppose an explanation would do well to satisfy your curiosity…" Cyclonis paused to glance to her left. "After the battle took a turn for the worst, I fled to the Far Side. I tried to imbue myself with enough crystal power to fight off the Storm Hawks, and managed to freeze myself in a manner similar to your… condition. Unlike you, however, I didn't explode."
"I exploded?" the Dark Ace asked unhappily.
Cyclonis let out a rare chuckle. "In any case, I came back in time to step out of the same portal I'd gone into the Far Side with… but I ended up stranded on a spire in Terra Deep." She paused, taking in a deep breath. "I suppose at that time, the Cyclonian Navy was split up into a few groups, one of which decided to be big goddamn heroes and save me from the pirates when they picked up the Far Side energy signature that doubtlessly sprung up from Terra Deep…"
"I thought you said an imposter took over," came the reply.
"The fractured components of the Cyclonian Navy may not have all been working together… or perhaps, they may have just been sent to capture me rather than rescue me. Either way, friendly forces soon arrived to pick up my half-conscious body, and they were immediately shot out of the sky by Murk Raiders, who decided to bring me aboard after looting their ship."
"How did you get away?" the Dark Ace asked, suddenly attentive.
"They didn't know who I was. Without my cloak, I didn't have any identifiable markings. The only thing they probably noticed was that my clothes were well made, and therefore expensive, but I'm not so sure about that, considering I woke up on their ship without even a clue what my name was."
"Amnesia?"
"Yes…" Cyclonis opened her mouth to say more, but the breath caught in her throat. Her lips closed to form a stern line, and she decided to wait for the Dark Ace to say something else. To his credit, he didn't.
After a time, Cyclonis blinked in recognition at the landmass in the distance. "There's our destination, just over that cloud bank." She raised her voice and directed it at the Nightcrawler commander, who was waiting near her right. "While we're operating the radio, try to see if you can sneak in the back and steal a crate of fuel crystals!"
The head Nightcrawler nodded, and abruptly broke off of the formation. The rest of the Nightcrawlers trailed after him like a small group of locusts behind a layer of clouds, leaving Cyclonis and the Dark Ace to go in the front alone.
"When we land, leave your helmet and chest plate in the skimmer," Cyclonis ordered. "We need to keep as low of a profile as possible."
(._.)
Once she was off of Terra Atmosia, Starling turned the tuning knob on her Slip-Wing's radio until it landed on the correct frequency.
"Hello, Storm Hawks?" she asked. "Is anyone there?"
There was a pause. If they had heard her and were monitoring their usual frequency, it would be a moment before one of them manned the radio. She banked to the right by a few degrees, and then began drifting lazily past a bird that wasn't quite fast enough to keep up.
"Starling?" a familiar voice asked. "Is that you?"
"Piper," Starling acknowledged. "Yes, it's me."
"Great, I wanted to talk to you, actually!" Piper began quickly. "What happened to, uh… Cyclonis? She is going to have a trial, right?"
"Piper…"
"I mean, I'm not saying she's completely harmless, but if she doesn't remember anything… then she's mostly harmless, right?"
"Piper, she regained her memory on the way back, escaped, and now she's… somewhere," Starling said flatly. "I actually called to ask if she had contacted you, but… apparently that's not the case. I don't understand why you have this fixation on helping her. I mean, I was expecting help. After all, the council wants me to bring her in."
There was a lengthy silence.
"I see," Piper replied quietly. "But, no, she hasn't called."
Starling tapped her fingers against the radio, feeling the blood boil in her head somewhat. The scale in her head was teetering back and forth – she wanted to abandon the effort and cut off the conversation, but she also wanted to give Piper a piece of her mind.
The "piece of her mind" option won out.
"You know, I don't understand you at all," Starling began angrily. "You're a Storm Hawk. You're a hero. You and everyone in your squadron fought against the worst aspects of humanity Cyclonia had to offer, and for what? To keep the empress? I certainly hope it wasn't meant to be a trophy."
"'It'?" Piper asked simply.
Starling's eye twitched. "Her, then. It doesn't matter." She rolled her eyes. "I can't believe I'm having this conversation. You should have turned her in… but you just played the, 'Oh, she's harmless; I'm not going to do anything' card until I had to drag her out of there myself. You are lucky I found her when I did and alerted the council; otherwise you'd be getting your head bashed in right now. You should have turned her over as soon as you recovered her, and not a moment after that. I don't understand what your motivation was – did you think she could be some kind of lap dog to have around the ship?"
Starling paused for a moment. The rest of her furious tirade was caught in her throat.
"You don't… you don't fancy her, do you?" she asked quietly.
"No!" Piper said rather loudly from miles and miles away. "And while you're throwing accusations around, look at it from my perspective! I saw Cyclonis for who she was. This might sound absolutely insane, but she wasn't a bad person!"
Starling sighed, and massaged the bridge of her nose. Her head was killing her.
"You're really telling me that Master Cyclonis isn't a bad person," she muttered. "Yes, it sounds insane. Luckily, as of now, it's out of your hands. It's clear that you've fallen prey to her indoctrination one way or another, so I'll take care of this myself. Keep the news of her escape quiet; the council doesn't want her to be common knowledge, since that would incite a panic."
"Starling, I'm not saying she isn't dangerous right now, but-…"
Starling changed the frequency back to the emergency Atmosian council frequency, which she would use to radio in for a transport once she had the raven-haired psychopath in tow. She hoped it wouldn't be too long before then…
(._.)
"So we're taking the direct approach, Master?"
"Yes."
There was a brief chime as the door collided with a set of bells installed just above the doorframe. Cyclonis peered around from under her hood, keeping an eye out for any possible threats. The two old men playing checkers were the only customers inside the diner, and the only employees on duty seemed to be a cashier at the register and a cook, judging by the light sounds of cookware coming from past the door to the kitchen. Her survey of the room complete, Cyclonis looked down at the white and black checkerboard-style tiles on the floor.
"Welcome to the Wayside," the cashier greeted tiredly. "We've got a breakfast special 'til ten, or you can buy some fuel and redeem the receipt with the attendant…" He didn't even bother to look up once through his spiel; he was too busy drying empty coffee cups.
Cyclonis took a step toward the counter. "I would like to use your radio."
The cashier glanced up and raised an eyebrow. He was middle-aged with a brown mustache and glasses, with curious eyes behind them. "Why's that?"
"Well, our radio stopped working yesterday and we really need to radio in to our cargo ship to ask our crew where to deliver the order," Cyclonis explained without hesitation.
The Dark Ace could've sworn she made it up on the spot.
"Order?" the cashier asked, adding another dry coffee cup to the row of cups he'd assembled. He picked up another one out of the drying rack.
"Why, yes, we're escorting a small crystal shipment. So, how about letting us use your radio?"
"Well, I don't know, little lady. Are you paying customers?" he asked with a frown.
Cyclonis narrowed her eyes, but the Dark Ace stepped in with a few coins in his hand.
"I'll take that breakfast special. I'm starving," he said simply, and pressed the coins onto the counter.
"Breakfast special coming right up," the cashier said, swiping away the coins. He gave the Dark Ace a receipt in return. "One breakfast special!" he yelled behind him. Once the chef yelled something incomprehensible back, he turned back around. "Radio's through that back door."
Cyclonis wordlessly strolled off toward the back of the diner, pulled open the door, stepped through, and glanced around. She sealed the door behind her and took a step toward the radio placed on a table in the corner with a chair, and grinned. With the radio tower in place behind the sign outside, she would be able to pick up the fleet's signal.
Taking her seat at the radio console, she adjusted the dial to the Cyclonian Navy general communications frequency, and snatched a pen and piece of paper from a stack on the side of the table. She placed the headset attached to the radio onto her head.
It was static at first, but then there was a short period of distorted speech, but she couldn't quite make out what was being said. After consulting the signal strength on the analog meter, she drew a point on the paper with a set of numbers beside it, and then adjusted the radio to the Atmosian general distress frequency.
"Hello, this is the Wayside. We have a cargo ship in trouble, and we'd like to know whether another station could assist us," Cyclonis said evenly.
"We hear you, Wayside. This is Terra Neon. How can we assist?" a radio operator asked.
After comparing her sheet to the map of the Atmos on the wall, and drawing in a grid with another small point over Terra Neon's rough location, Cyclonis gave him the Cyclonian frequency. "Please tune yourself to that frequency, and tell me the strength of the signal."
After a moment of waiting, the operator returned. "Reading about forty-two percent signal reliability. I can't tell what they're saying."
"Thank you for your cooperation," Cyclonis said, and abruptly switched off the radio.
She drew a line connecting the two points and read over the numbers.
"Hmm… forty-two… law of sines…" she mumbled slowly while scribbling away on the paper.
She dropped her pen with a smirk once finished. She lifted the paper up and admired her handiwork – where the two lines from each station intercepted, there was a third dot in the northwest.
"Excellent," she mused.