How?

Even when laying on her bed, the room around Satya still spun at a million miles an hour and her body still twitched uncontrollably. Though the kaleidoscope of colour and sound that had fueled her waking nightmare seeming to finally disappear, what was and wasn't real, what her senses and sensibilities could and couldn't put order to even in the dark quiet of what was supposed to be somewhere safe still felt impossible to discern, pushed beyond recovery in the same swift, cruel stroke that had destroyed everything she held dear.

How, she thought again, the only word that could be pulled out of her mind through chattering teeth and tearful sobs as despair curled her up into the fetal position and rocked her back and forth. Though making sense of the question seemed as forever lost as her dignity, what it stood for still flickered in amongst the chaos so deeply and destructively embedded in every corner of her mind. What made it come to this? How did it happen?

How?

How?!

Earlier that night...

Somehow, a return to form felt... Difficult.

The events of the party itself went as Satya expected for the most part: Idle chit-chat and the politics of modern wealth were what she had prepared for in the first place, and what came saw her able to use them to full effect. The hours that ticked by as the moment of truth drew ever closer, she soon found, were divided threefold, the first section of which was spent in a constant rotation of conversation. Prompted by changes of music, welcomes wearing out, a new arrival, or simply no particular reason at all, groups of socialites, oligarchs, tycoons, and politicians alike formed, dispersed, and formed again in a swirling, pattern-less form, Satya following suit with each new step taken. The plunges she took into each newly manifested collection and the moves she made when inside were calculated and cautious, chiming in on conversations, listening intently where opportunity and context allowed, and participating in whatever actions were offered within reason, each time playing the subtle games she knew well - and that she hoped everyone else was blinder to than the mad scientist and Omnic financier she purposefully kept her distance from - in hopes of unearthing some key, finding some clue that would uncover the truth.

If only the process hadn't been so taxing.

With her return to the party from her encounter, Satya found herself soon enough gravitating towards where shell throughout the party's duration music played, floating off the instruments of a small group of musicians in one corner of the room and onto the feet of the guests who took to the open area in the middle of the room to try their hand at dancing. Satya's first steps in joining them had brought about the ease in her chest and muscles that only it could, taking to the waltzes and various other tunes played with graceful ease. More than once, even, her and the partner she had chosen for that particular song had found themselves in the centre of the room, all eyes fixed on the motions she deftly put the two of them through until its conclusion had her standing to receive their applause, heart pounding and a smile beaming across her face.

And yet, in the midst of it all, even where fleet-footedness and the adulation of a crowd brought joy, Satya found herself wishing for something that could really take her breath away.

With each new song that the musicians played and each set of steps she underwent to them, the more Satya found herself dwelling on it, able to through so much practice at dancing that she could practically do it in her sleep. What she found herself facing in these moments was a wish - nay, a craving - for something more; the company she kept was good, but not thrilling; the dances close, but not close enough; the music well-played, but she wanted it louder; the dance floor well-attended, but not full to the point where the only place in which there was space enough to move freely was the one she occupied and used to its fullest extent, even if that extent ended up revealing nothing about Project Legion. It was ultimately a distraction, she knew, but one she welcomed.

And when dancing had gone far enough for one night, so she began another aspect that would hopefully yield better results.

A small, confident smile crossed Satya's lips as she switched from pleasure to business; from the first day of training at the Academy, it had been drilled into Satya's head that a proper Vishkar employee was a representative of the company at all times in public, and was to conduct themselves with nothing short of absolute decorum as a result. Congeniality and etiquette, they had said, was just as powerful a tool and just as strong a trademark of their work as hard-light itself, and to be versed in it was to ensure that order would always prevail.

It was a philosophy that Satya, even after taking such pleasure in dancing, could still take just as closely to heart and put into as much practice as any.

The trains of thought that stopped on it as the night's social processes continued once again provoked a strange internal mixture of feelings. On one hand, she knew that much like the dance floor had, it served a cathartic, reassuring purpose; Chaos had shocked and offended these principles during the prison break in Paris, strained them under the weight of fear and doubt in Lijiang and the mountain complex, and bent it near to the breaking point under the unpredicted pressure of Monaco, but every time upon its relent Satya had been able to take silent pride in looking at herself in the mirror, knowing that she had only fully shed her self-discipline around people she trusted and that she could justify every action she'd taken while on the job. The gathering on this night was one she'd surmised from the start to be no different, a meeting of professionals to discuss a topic and do business in the traditional Vishkar fashion. In Satya's opinion, if someone was going to call themselves a professional they had to act like one, and it set her at ease to know that she was in a situation where such beliefs could be applied.

Which was why it was in equal measure frustrating that she seemed the only person there who believed this.

Though each new social circle she entered showed new faces, the conversations held felt to Satya like they either couldn't or wouldn't change: One after the other the topics discussed were almost entirely drawn from a shallow pool of superficiality, greed, and vain self-aggrandizing, each one daring to aspire to further heights of incredulity than their predecessors. In one group she listened for twenty minutes to a trio of investment brokers obsessively trade near-identical business cards and misogyny-laced barbs before finally pulling herself away; another saw a collection of bubble-headed so-called housewives surrounded by camera drones - and an Omnic who appeared to be directing them - down glass after glass of every kind of alcohol being served, let loose head-rattling screeches while dancing wildly, and get into overdramatic fights that the camera drones swarmed around, seemingly intent on not missing a single outrageous second of. Other groups still, meanwhile, preferred to revel in sharing tales of acts of such cruelty and depravity, or beliefs based in such horrific prejudice that Satya was almost certain people had been historically been killed in order to keep them from the public eye. If it wasn't that, instead they chose to speak of debauchery and excess to such a degree that she would've thought it had been dreamed up for a movie, were it not being spoken about right in front of her.

And the more Satya heard and saw it, the more it made her feel thoroughly fed up.

Each moment where she left a group to its own devices, having learned that Project Legion was going to be the last thing on their minds until the time actually came, was accompanied by an eye-roll and a selection of choice words that she kept behind her teeth as she turned her back to them, and each time it was followed by a stop in her tracks to silently question where it was coming from. It wasn't as though she'd never dealt with people quite so unbelievable as them, she knew; They'd been amongst the delegates at every function she'd ever attended for Vishkar, an unfortunate but avoidable byproduct of the nature of social gatherings that she'd learned to easily make a non-issue. They could be chaotic, but through straightforward, professional conduct and an orderly mindset they could be put into a place where they didn't harm her sensibilities.

And yet even so, no matter how much Satya reminded herself of the past and the facts, all it took was one look back over her shoulder at the bankers, the divas, the stockbrokers, tech moguls, politicians, and industrialists to churn a bitter feeling in her stomach that she'd never had for them prior, something... Contemptful.

A contempt that could be reasoned with familiar words from others who'd felt it...

But, she reminded herself as she turned back forward again and dismissed them with an unnoticed scoff, that could wait for another time. For now, she still had a job to do and the means to do it, and until such time as both could not be said the self-obligation to carry it out was undeniable. Another group, another conversation, another social obligation and all its associations would have to continue onward and be tolerated to that end.

Even if its unfamiliarity unnerved her.

Finally, after the tours of a social butterfly and the graceful maneuvers of the ballroom, the next portion of the night Satya dedicated was spent being abruptly pulled from one collection to another by Sanjay, always eager to introduce his 'best and brightest protégé' to what felt like both an endless stream of new faces spawned from gods-knew-where and the same dozen people she'd exhausted her social abilities with hours prior. With each congregation he would extoll the virtues of her skills and convictions as though she herself were being presented as Project Legion; each time Satya, in turn, played her part as she always had when her old handler had wanted to impress those he believed could raise his station, even though this time his mere presence, let alone his obvious mewling, soured a growing frustration within her that proved impossible to shake and nearly the same to suppress, boiling to the point where the voice in her head begging for everyone else to please be quiet and leave her alone effectively drowned out whatever was being said. It was one thing, she knew, to deal with this feeling, a lifelong struggle that she could best with dignity and without issue; it was another entirely to listen to the Ashes share grumblings about their estranged daughter's escapades as a bandit queen with every other sentence, or to hear Sanjay's "old friend" Señor Portero flaunt his supposedly hard-earned success in spite of the so-called insects in Dorado and Castillo over and over and over again without reprieve until she finally took a chance presented to slip away unnoticed, far enough out that the music and general din of speech were low enough that they could be accepted as mere background noise.

And where both her body and mind could wander back down old paths.

At a glacial pace reflecting her fatigue Satya made her way back over towards the window, a flurry of questions etching themselves across her thoughts on top of her disdain as she looked out at the cloud bank above the dome, stretching endlessly across the sky it darkened as it came closer and closer. Were they all part of the Conspiracy? she wondered. If Sanjay had been able to get in touch with them, how might they know him?

And since Maximilien and Moira are both here too, how much deeper does it go?

Satya shook her head, placing two fingers on her temple and her thumb on her cheek as she looked down and perished the thought. No. Don't go there, she told herself. Don't let chaos come back.

She closed her eyes as she took in a breath, pushing away the paranoia of intrigue so that calm rationality might prevail again with each recitation of her mantra. As the noise of her thoughts died down a chilling whip of a sound lashed from outside the building, drawing her attention upwards with fresh curiosity to hear the wind breaking against the dome with growing force. Hearing it, a faint smile curled up one side of Satya's face as she considered herself grateful that Higher New York, in all its perfection, wouldn't have to bear the brunt of what was to come.

A smile that flipped the other way around as the thought of who would became clear.

Again Satya shook her head, exhaling with a frustrated vigor at the process of having to perish yet another errant thought, one only magnified by its familiarity. She was an entire hemisphere and two years removed from Rio, she knew, and yet it felt as though her life and work were caught in an immense loop; Vishkar would come to a city, do what they always did, and be met with nothing but backlash from the locals. She would be sent to do something there, be confronted with a situation outside of her comfort zone, and from there the spiral towards-

There! she realized, the pinpoint striking its mark in her thoughts.

It made perfect sense: Staying outside her comfort zone for as long as she had had taken its toll, she quietly surmised, so coming back in from the cold to its familiar embrace seemed the perfect solution to getting back on track and staving off chaos, and her return to the crowd at large to put her preparation to good use after the scene that had played out seemed the best place to start. It only made sense that if change was what had brought things into disarray, a return to the fundamentals that her world had revolved around would settle it back into its normal, familiar, ordered place.

And, perhaps at the same time, finally let her find what she was looking for.

"I always seem to find you like this, don't I?"

The sudden words from out of the blue lifted Satya's head ever so slightly as she peered over her shoulder to who had said them, to which she saw Sanjay walking up beside her, arms folded behind his back and his own gaze pointed rigidly forward.

Satya eased into a smile as she continued to look out the window. "I suppose so," she said. "but not without reason. The city looks so beautiful from up here."

"From anywhere, I would think," Sanjay replied, returning the expression. "Except for from below, of course."

As quickly as it had come Satya's smile faded away. "Yes," she added, her voice low. "Of course."

The reflection in the window caught Sanjay's eyes making contact with hers, "There's more to this than a pretty image, isn't there?" he said, a raised eyebrow accentuating his tone.

A silent exhale escaped out the tiniest slit between Satya's lips, briefly fogging the window to the point where it covered her vision. "I've never been especially fond of parties," she said, keeping her voice and expression neutral. "I find that removing myself from one every so often helps me to process it. When I'm able to do that, sometimes it helps me find something that I'm looking for."

"And just what, pray tell, might you be looking for right now?"

Satya's chest tightened with a growing sense of uneasiness as the fog of her breath disappeared; Has he always sounded so demeaning? Did I just not notice it before?

Still, she was quick to remember, his question was nothing new, and getting back to the fundamentals meant getting used to Sanjay's methodologies again.

Even if they had never sat well in the first place.

"Perspective," she answered, direct and formal. "If that makes any sense."

Sanjay sniffed in as he looked out. "I thought I gave you perspective when you first arrived here," he said, accusation marking his words. "You haven't forgotten it, have you?"

Satya's own words hardened in response. "Of course not. I'm simply comparing what you said then to what I've learned since."

"In what way?"

At her side Satya straightened out her palms, bringing them down in a slow motion that enabled her to collect her thoughts and find the right things to say and the right way to say them. "In a way that makes me believe that it isn't a coincidence that all the city lights are off tonight," she explained. "I was under the impression this was just supposed to be an unveiling."

Sanjay smirked as his eyes flicked over towards her. "It is. The city being blacked out is a mere precaution, nothing more. They only allowed me to conduct the test if we did it; you likely know by now that there are those among us tonight who don't entirely trust me."

Again, keeping her expression and voice neutral allowed Satya to mask her thoughts. "I can't imagine why."

"Neither can I. In any case, we'll soon show them the path, just as you and I always did."

Gradually, Satya folded one hand behind herself, letting out an inaudible sigh before a question she'd hoped to avoid asking finally became unavoidable. "Have you ever wished that things could return to how they used to be?" she said, curiosity in her words and elegant formality in her voice hiding her true feelings.

"What makes you ask that?" Sanjay replied, peering over at Satya with eyes behind which thoughts stirred. "Still having second thoughts?"

"As I said, I'm simply looking for perspective." She looked away from his reflection, trying to gaze forward past the edge of the city if she could. "A lot has changed since you brought me here. I believe I can best follow the path, but it hasn't always been clear."

The smile on Sanjay's face tightened into pursed lips before loosening into something more unreadable as he raised a hand to cup his chin. "I think about it often," he answered. "but sometimes there is just no going back. All you can do then is move forwards." His hand scraped along his chin as it lowered while the tension in his lips loosened. "If that makes any sense."

"It does," Satya replied, pausing as she made a slow blink of her eyes. "Thank you."

The silence between the two that followed carried through to a point in time that Satya found well past the point of awkwardness, only punctuated by the occasional howl of wind overhead or the sudden sting in her ears of a rise in laughter among the crowd behind her. Through their reflections both watched as their gazes switched between the city and each other, at times almost in perfect unison. Seeing Sanjay's neutral, unreadable face in front of her showed the same thing in the same way she knew he could see from her: There was more to know than what had been told, and neither was willing to divulge it.

Finally, off the window's reflection Satya watched as Sanjay turned to leave, the tightness in her chest growing as he took the first few steps away until she couldn't take it any longer, letting the words on her mind turn her around and jump off her tongue before he was gone. "What did you mean by 'the test?'" she asked.

While Sanjay had stopped in his tracks, he didn't turn to face the question, instead only peering over his shoulder at Satya, as he brought his arms around in front of himself. "All you need to know," he said, giving a sly smile that Satya recognized all too well. "is that Project Legion will bring order to chaos in this city. Now if you'll excuse me, there's business to get back to." He turned his head forwards again. "Business that I would love to see the company's best and brightest involved in as well. Like it or not, no one would ever guess just by looking that you don't enjoy this sort of thing."

Satya watched as he made to leave before turning back towards the window, only to stop halfway through the process as a second guess suddenly pulled her the other way around and left her stuck somewhere in between, her eyes panning from the window to the party and back again. On one hand, the bad taste in her mouth from Sanjay hiding something from her again was a feeling her patience for had long since worn thin, and staying out of the party, she knew, would wear it any further.

And yet, on the other hand, if she was going to return to old form, being patient with Sanjay needed to be a part of that just as it had been before.

On the other hand, even blacked out the city looked so beautiful, so orderly, so peaceful, so perfect, that there couldn't be anything to worry about.

On the other hand, seeing the storm about to break likewise renewed concerns that had become exceedingly difficult to ignore.

On the other hand, order had been promised to assuage those concerns.

But even then, she knew, it was Sanjay that had promised it.

And yet, on the other hand, Vishkar was going to be bringing order to chaos, just as it always had.

On the other hand...

On the other hand...

An exasperated seethe pushed out through Satya's teeth as she shook her head. Very well then, she concluded. You have made a fair point.

If only it didn't feel like he knew how to play her with it...

With another deep breath, she mentally recited her mantra once more before turning foot back towards the party, leaving the whistling wind and billowing clouds to grow steadily, yet slowly, especially with how time felt as though it passed slower and slower with each repeat of the cycle. With each time that Satya peered over at the clock on the wall as one of Sanjay's associates continued shallow musings and haughty tirades that revealed nothing, as she slipped away to steal an hors d'oeuvre she'd had her eye on, as she made another graceful step on the dance floor, her disappointment grew from blinks to sighs to shoulder droops to pursed lips as the hours refused to tick by. The sudden appearance of the memory of an old saying she'd taken embarrassingly long to understand, about how time was supposed to fly when she was having fun, brought with it a scoff and an uneasy laugh at the irony of it all.

If such was the case, she figured, she'd stopped having fun at the party a long time ago.

Removing herself yet again from what had to be the thousandth rotation between no more than a hundred guests, this time Satya made to take a seat in a lounge area in one corner of the room, letting the fatigue unwind and sink into the sofa as she did so before re-adopting a proper posture. Looking out at the crowd, though, only made her sigh and look down as she reached a hand up from her lap to run it over her hair; there was still a long ways to go to get what she wanted, and precious little ability left by which to get it. There wasn't any uncertainty that she could still mask her exhaustion and find out what Project Legion was, but tight lips and bad company made the prospect of stomaching the whole process again something she definitely didn't want to do.

And definitely not alone...

The sudden arrival of a familiar smell, one that wafted its way towards her and left its rich aftertaste lingering in her throat, perked Satya out of her relaxation enough to look up at the coffee table in front of her, where a small tray of drinks sat for the enjoyment of whoever might have come across them. Knowing what she had encountered led Satya's focus to one particular item that drew a faint smile in response: A glass of tequila with a pair of ice cubes floating in it, just like what Sombra had downed like Tic-Tacs in the wonderful memories of their adventures and that had bolstered her confidence in Monaco, its existence now offering its hand in getting her back in stride and giving the push she needed.

A push she accepted without knowing just how far over the edge it would take her.

Within a few moments she'd picked up and downed a welcome sip from the glass, and within a few moments more the feeling of something stronger than the aftertaste began to take hold. Bit by bit as she slumped back on the sofa Satya felt as though she was beginning to slip out of her body, a sensation taken further when she craned her neck down towards her body, looking at herself through what seemed to be someone else's eyes.

The amazed laugh Satya let out felt as though it pushed her further into whatever reality she now occupied, sending her floating through the air as if she were on a gust of wind. What is this, she asked herself, barely having time to consider an answer before a terrific wave of euphoria washed over her, sending her consciousness into loops and emptying any thoughts beyond the simple pleasures of the moment. It feels strange, yet... Good.

Almost as quickly as it began her laughter settled down as the euphoria deepened, stretching a wide, open-mouthed smile of wonder across her face. VERY good.

At the same time, even if she was out of body her senses seemed to have kicked into overdrive; even while lolling across the room and floating around the chandelier she could smell her drink sitting in front of her body, taste the hors d'oeuvres she'd eaten an hour ago like it was new, feel the slightest draft of air tickle against her cheek and nudge her further up into the air, hear the conversations of a dozen different groups of guests from every corner of the room, and see so closely, so deeply into open space that... Colours? In the air? And they are making... shapes?

Satya took another look down at her limp body below before looping up to stare towards the ceiling, feeling her limbs dangle underneath her and her back and neck arch. Her eyes widened as each sense, each feeling grew stronger. Colours brightened; voices grew louder; stimulations of the nose, fingers, and tongue sparked through her like lightning; and the patterns of everything she could see turned so infinite in quality, vivid in detail, and beautiful in their design that the only thing she could figure was that this was what God, or whatever a given religion might have called them, looked like.

Her smile widened as she reached out, overcome by the thrill rush, wishing for a feeling more incredible than the last. This... this is incredible, she thought, letting herself float up farther and farther.

It's beautiful, it's remarkable, it's...

…loud. So, so loud...

It's… everywhere - by gods, EVERYWHERE…

…

… stop.

That's too much.

Too much, too close - take it away.

Get it away from me! Please, no!

No, no, no! Make it stop, MAKE IT STOP!

HELP! PLEASE!

STOP!

In a sudden violent instant Satya found her mind trapped back inside her body, unable to move, look away as the feelings and images intensified from stimulation to domination. Colours flashed in an overpowering rainbow that blurred her vision and jabbed needles in through her forehead, while an infinite array of patternless shapes pulsated in her view from all angles, closing in so tightly around her that she couldn't breathe. In her ears, stomach, and pounding heart a destructive symphony of noise throbbed and reverberated, leaving all with the churning, terrifying feeling as though they were set to rupture. What horrors her eyes and ears didn't pick up were taken in in their full might through a thick, heavy coating against her skin that stung like a swarm of bees and a million different smells and tastes dancing on her tongue. Together, sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch all spun in an endless, inescapable tempest over and around her, blending together into a great sensory mass.

Raw instinct pumped into her veins through Satya's racing heart as she shivered on the sofa, screaming for her to leave this instant. Sinking into the fetal position, the writhing swarm of sensation moved with a mind of its own, pinning her down each time she tried in vain to get up or drowning out every thought before it could coalesce. She rocked back and forth, eyes wide with terror and streaming tears and her hair falling over her face, thick and heavy with sweat, as the room swirled around her with no sense of up and down or concept of time and space; the only thing to do - the only thing she could do - was scream, scream and cry and rock back and forth as the terror, the Chaos all around her bore down.

But even so, the worst was yet to come.

The sudden chatter that manifested twitched Satya's haunted look directly forward as the faces of every assembled guest all stared down at her with beady eyes and twisted, devilish faces that seemed to close in just like everything else as they spoke, their words shooting off tongues and psyche alike and piercing deep into raw, exposed emotion and unmasked thought, not relenting until any hope of an end with some semblance of dignity intact was gone forever.

"What was that sound? Was it a scream? Pathetic-"

"-So unsightly, how embarrassing-"

"-Aw, the special little Vishkar girl can't handle a simple party?-"

"-What a weird person. She shouldn't be here-"

"-Can't even see she's being used, can she?-"

"-I guess some people just can't follow the right path in life-"

"-Order, chaos; that's her thing, right? Big whoop-"

"-Nice and expendable. Told everything, but knows nothing-"

"-A weak-minded, naïve fool if I ever saw one-"

"-Almost as worthless as the peasants down below-"

"-Your whole life wasted, Satya. You lose; chaos wins..."