Chapter 36: A Serpent on the Beach

The first thing they did aboard Eden was look for a doctor. Adora had asked why Kal had set off the security scanners in the hangar, but all Kal said was that people "didn't want to understand things that scared them," and, instead of pointing out that answer only made her more confused, Adora decided to just follow him and enjoy her surroundings.

Together, they pushed through the massive superstructure of the spaceport terminal, weaving in and out of aliens of all shapes and sizes pushing carts and cargo, all while Kal continued to mutter darkly to himself; her question must have really set him off.

Adora, for her part, tried her best not to stare at those in the crowd, or fall too far behind when something new and exotic inevitably caught her eye. She was doing a good job, all things considered, until the moment they left the spaceport itself and stepped into the megabuilding adjacent it.

"Try and keep up," Kal said as he made his way through the extra-wide central corridor of the main level. "And don't lose your jaw on the floor."

It was harder to do than Adora imagined. If the spaceport seemed exotic and interesting, the megabuilding was on a different plane of existence, novelty-wise. It seemed like every third step, an especially enticing store would draw her interest, or a particularly bizarre looking alien would cross their path, twice as freaky as anything she'd glimpsed back at the landing port. She almost lost track of Kal completely when she saw one particularly chunky alien, holding two of what she assumed to be an insect skewers, feasting on one skewer before lowering the second to its belly, where another mouth that unexpectedly appeared from the fat rolls there opened up and gorged.

"Did…did that just happen?" Adora asked, stopping in the middle of the walkway and staring. "Is that thing two people or one?" Kal hadn't noticed her stop, and she ran to catch up to him when she came back to her senses enough to notice she was falling behind.

Eventually they found their way off the main path to a small clinic, built into a corner of a secluded alleyway. Adora would have protested being pulled away from what practically was a feast of novelty out in the main concourse, but as soon as they entered and she saw that nearly every member of the staff looked like a cross between a praying mantis and housefly, she let out a squeal that fell somewhere between delight and disgust. With all interest in exploring outside gone for the time being, she slammed her butt down in the nearest waiting room chair while Kal checked them in.

"Funny, I thought for sure you would freak out seeing all these Gorm in here," Kal said, taking the open seat next to her after speaking to the attendant at the front desk.

"Is that what they're called?" Adora asked, watching them buzz and hum at each other while they worked, their compound eyes never blinking. The aliens waiting in the lobby with them were of a comparable diversity to the mish mash of oddities she saw out on the concourse, but the Gorm were so intriguing she barely noticed the others.

"Why are we here anyways?" she asked. "We've been traveling for a while now, and even though I don't exactly feel completely healed, I don't feel half as bad as before." She picked at the set of bandages wound around her chest to make her point. "If anything, I feel hungry, actually. Those instant sand pouches only do so much for you."

"Okay first of all, the fact you can eat so many of them in one sitting and still be hungry is insane," Kal said. "And second of all, we're here to do a little more than just get your injuries checked out."

Adora flushed. She was hungry a lot. So what? It took a lot to maintain her training and level of fitness. "What else are we here to do?" she asked, choosing not to address his first point. She had a feeling he'd tease her even worse if she tried to defend herself.

He didn't answer, and she pulled her eyes away from the Gorm to look at him. He was watching someone discreetly, tracking them with his eyes without moving his head. When she followed his line of sight, she saw a tall, freakishly muscled man coming out of the examination rooms at the back, walking toward them. He must have stood about the same height as She Ra, and likely weighed the equivalent of three of her, by Adora's estimations.

Kal stilled when he got close. Adora was about to look away and pretend she hadn't been staring when he suddenly looked down at them and their gazes met. She averted her eyes anyways and held her breath.

Long seconds ticked by, but he eventually passed them. It took several more seconds longer for her to calm down, for her heart to slow is frantic pounding in her chest.

"Who was that?" Adora asked. She had seen large, intimidating people before and hadn't blinked, so why was this time different? Maybe it was because she reacted off Kal. Seeing him turn stock still like he was tensing for a fight might have tipped her off that something wasn't right.

"No idea," Kal said. "Trouble."

"How do you know?"

Kal shrugged. "Just do. You get a feel for these things after a while." He relaxed and glanced sidelong at her. "We need to get you immunized."

"Excuse me?"

Kal turned to face her fully and grinned. "You know, vaccines? The Enclave gave you all a battery of immunizations when they arrived, but places like Eden are even more of a melting pot than most places in the Empire. You'll find all kinds of nasty strains of bacteria and viruses floating around you wouldn't find elsewhere. Wouldn't want you to get a case of Greyscale or Red Death while you're out here, would we?"

Adora swallowed and Kal laughed. He really was getting a kick out of seeing her inexperience being off Etheria, although that was leagues better than fighting opposite him, she figured. Still, she folded her arms and pouted in the chair, sneaking glances at the Gorm and the other aliens in the waiting room until they were called into the back.


"So, what exactly are we doing here?" Adora asked, spearing another hunk of meat from the communal platter with her fork and popping it into her mouth. They had gotten her immunized and the Gorm doctor (so cool) confirmed she'd be able to take off the chest bandages after another day or so. Most of her other wounds had closed up nicely, giving Adora a much needed boost of confidence that maybe her healing factor from She Ra wasn't totally out of commission. Now they were deep inside some sit-down place closer to the main walkway, eating something that Adora couldn't pronounce but tasted fantastic.

Kal placed his fork down on the table and looked at her. "Okay, I get you asking that about the clinic, but we've been eating here for an hour and you're still not sure what we're doing?"

"No, I mean—" Adora cut off and narrowed her eyes when Kal smirked at her. "You're just being annoying on purpose, aren't you? I mean what are we doing here on Eden? What is this place? Who is Ly and why are we going to see her?"

"Eden," Kal said, drumming his fingers on the table, "is a scoundrel's paradise. It's one of the few places people can go to keep clear of the emperor's prying eyes." He took a long pull from his flagon of bubbling whatever it was he was drinking and called for a refill. "Ly is an old friend of mine, same as Vasher. We all worked together during the waning years of the Beast war."

"It sure sounds like she's not going to be very happy to see you from the way Vasher put it," Adora said.

"No, I imagine I'll be lucky to survive that confrontation at all," Kal said with a wry smile. "Working for the Vestamid hadn't been very pleasant for either of them, and it's likely just grown worse with me gone. We need to see her though. She's the only one that can help us fix Pip."

"And then Pip will help you read whatever's on the crystal, and that should help with the current war effort?"

"If my hunch is correct."

"If your hunch is correct," Adora said, nodding. "So, who is she then? What kind of person can fix an AI that is way more complicated than anything even the Enclave has come across? I'm totally imagining her to be like Entrapta, but maybe ten times…y'know." She made a tangled, jerky gesture with her hands and Kal laughed. "Entrapta struggled with Light Hope, so I'm super curious about who you think can fix the AI that woke her up in the end."

"Actually, I think you'll be quite surprised when you meet her. She's not at all like how you expect, but she is brilliant. She was part of the original team that discovered ignominite and researched the Barrier. Ly didn't build Pip, but she did put her in me, so I'm hoping she'll be able to work something out."

Adora almost choked on her food at hearing that. Kal caught the look in her eyes, and the question that was implicit in them.

"Yes," he said. "Ly was a member of Evelyn's science team." He glanced about calmly after he spoke and then lowered his voice even further. "Although I wouldn't get in the habit of saying her name still. As out of place as Eden is, it's still not safe."

A million questions flashed across Adora's mind, but she only asked one: "You knew her?"

Kal's eyes drifted to his flagon as he tapped a pensive beat on the table once more. He shook his head. "No one knew her. Corynth thoughthe knew her. Ly and Vasher like to think they did too, since they worked together for years. I don't even pretend to have known her."

Adora opened her mouth, but stopped short of saying the first thing that came to mind. Something about the way Kal spoke—about the tone of his voice and the slump in his body. It told her he was answering more than just her question on the surface.

He mentioned working with Ly and Vasher during the waning years of the war. He mentioned Corynth. Was Evelyn no longer around when Kal came along? But Evelyn and Corynth had died at the conclusion of the war—they were the conclusion of the war, as far as she knew. It was hard to not ask for clarity, but now that she was off Etheria, Salas' warning about keeping that woman's name out of her mouth came back to her. Even if this place was beyond the emperor's reach, Kal too had still warned her to be careful, so careful she would be.

"You mentioned something just now that came up back on the landing bay," Adora said instead. "The Vestamid. I've heard some things about them back home, but nothing much. Who are they?"

"An extremely dangerous and reclusive sect of cultists," Kal said, "who also happen to hold a monopoly on production and distribution of ignominite throughout the empire."

"You mean to tell me the very thing aside from the Barrier that's helping hold the Beast back is entirely in the hands of a single group of fanatics? How does that even happen?"

"Do you know how we get the stuff in the first place?" Kal asked.

"I know we mine for it, but not much more than that."

"It's incredibly hard to mine," he said after getting his refill from the waitress and thanking her. "That's why it's monopolized. It only comes from worlds the Beast had engulfed during the first war, since ignominite is technically the calcified remains of the Beast itself. The problem is, when you travel to one of those dead worlds to mine ignominite, you experience…side effects."

"What kind of side effects are we talking about here? Doesn't sound like just a stomach ache."

Kal shook his head. "Some people have gone insane from just looking at planets like that from orbit, let alone landing on them for extended periods of time for a mining expedition. I'm talking about psychosis and permanent internments in a psyche ward. Some people succumb in a matter of hours, others take a few days, but no one will go mine for the stuff. It doesn't matter how lucrative the contract, everyone steers clear."

"Except the Vestamid," Adora said. "How do they do it? Are all of them already crazy or something?"

"Essentially, yes."

Adora blinked at him in surprise. She had meant it as a joke, but seriously?

"They're religious zealots," Kal said, seeing the disbelief on her face. "Extremely unorthodox theists who believe they are 'vested' so to speak with the authority of the late Daiamid Shapers. Hence the name 'Vestamid.' They worship the Beast as their God, and believe that the Shapers like Corynth were messiahs who communed with their deity." He rolled his eyes while he laughed through his nose. "They think they are 'doing God's work' so to speak by mining the Beast's remains. All of the issues a normal person might experience on a dead planet, they just see as a divine experience—them communing with their God as the Shapers once did."

"That's…all sorts of screwed up," Adora said, placing her fork down on the table too. Her appetite had suddenly vanished.

"Agreed," Kal said, spearing a vegetable before chewing on it. "You think the galaxy at large idolize Corynth? Wait until you find out how fanatical the Vestamid are about him. Or about Taline." He shuddered, and Adora frowned, thinking on that.

"One thing that doesn't make sense to me," Adora said, "is why would they help enable us to fight the Beast if they revere it as a god? They mine its remains, and the empire uses it in weapons to fight its thralls on a more equal footing. Wouldn't that be like, I don't know…heresy to them, or something?"

Kal shrugged. "Don't ask me to explain their motivations or rationale," he said. "I don't understand them. No one is privy to their dogma, since they're so protective about it, but there are some rumors floating around saying they view fighting against the Beast as a means of purging sin—that by giving their lives at the zenith of the last war to lock it away, the Shapers convinced it to let the people of the galaxy prove their sanctity in battle against it when it inevitably seeped out of its cage again."

"They really spun being saved from total annihilation at the last minute into an allegory for purgatory?"

Kal shrugged again and Adora fought to keep from gaping at him. She shouldn't be surprised, she reasoned; there were as many coping mechanisms for trauma as there were varieties of people, and she more than most should understand that. Still though, it was…hard to wrap her head around it, the beliefs of a fringe group such as the Vestamid.

"Ly and Vasher are working for these people?" she asked. "And you did too, sometime in the past?"

"In a sense," he said.

"I don't understand," Adora forced herself to eat another bite of food. "Everyone back at the hangar except Vasher seemed uncomfortable when their name was brought up—like they were surprised and afraid to hear the name mentioned. I get that the Vestamid are weird, but why would they act as if they were surprised to hear the name if they're working for them?"

"They don't work for them directly, per se," Kal said. "Nobody here is, technically, and certainly nobody here shares in their beliefs. On the surface, this Eden is run much like any other planetary settlement. They even had those warbirds come out to us and pretend to be Imperial Navy." He took another swig from his drink. "But this place is far from normal, remember? It's a hideout for criminals, like I said, sitting on the sunward side of a tiny planet that should have fallen into the star's gravitational field long ago already. No one is supposed to know about it or find it unless they're supposed to. Do you think the Vestamid would openly flaunt the fact they have a presence on a place like this?"

"You're saying this is a front?" Adora asked. "They supply the empire and help the war in public, and then have connections to a hidden outlaw settlement in private?"

"Not just that," Kal said. "No singular entity aside from the empire could afford the technology and the upkeep on a place like this. It's being prevented from falling into the sun, for crying out loud. But the empire wouldn't fund a location the emperor wouldn't have eyes on. The Vestamid don't just have a presence here, they own this planetoid outright, and no one is allowed to acknowledge it. Couple that with the fact this isn't the only 'Eden' that exists, and you have the makings of a grand conspiracy."

"How does Horde Prime not crack down on something like that?" Adora asked. "Isn't he paranoid a group as powerful as them will cause problems? I have a hard time believing he has no idea about these underground sites, but even if he didn't, why wouldn't he at least move to take their monopoly away from them?"

"That," Kal said, gesturing with his fork, "is a very good question. People on this station? They've already asked themselves all the questions you just did, and no one knows any answers for sure. Some suspect the emperor is actually working hand in hand with the Vestamid in secret. What the heck is the point to all these stations they maintain, aside from the fact its lucrative for them? What are they planning? Or is Horde Prime working with them behind the scenes for his own reasons? It's shady as hell, which is why everyone reacts the way they do when their name is brought up."

Adora paused before her mind ran away with the conspiracies, and thought back to what originally got them into that conversation to begin with.

"If they're as powerful as some people think they are," she said, "then it makes sense why Vasher and Ly would be hiding out here. I heard that Prime conscripted or killed everyone from that old science team."

Kal nodded. "There are some still hiding out, and no one knows about it. Well, aside from me, and now you." He grimaced all of a sudden and dropped his fork. It clattered to the table and he yanked his hand back, holding it in his other hand, close to his chest. He hissed in pain, and Adora could see his fingers shaking.

"Are you okay?" Adora asked. "What's wrong?"

"I'm fine." Kal forced the words out between gritted teeth and pulled away when she reached forward to touch him. The look he gave her wasn't friendly. It reminded Adora that this was someone who, up until recently, she had thought of as an enemy.

"I saw the same thing happen to you back on the ship," she said, remembering how his fingers shook when she first accused him of being a spy. She thought him just enraged then, but now she suspected differently. "What's going on?"

"I'm fine," Kal said again, squeezing his eyes shut as he took deep breaths. The tremors ceased and the tension in his shoulders abated. When he next spoke, his voice sounded tired. "It's just blowback from using magic. Even after all this time, what I did on top of your castle to save your life is still affecting me."

"I've heard of people getting tired from using too much magic," Adora said. "Glimmer could barely use her powers for a while after Shadow Weaver got her hands on her, but it's been days for you, Kal."

"Turns out, coming into contact with the Beast as often as I did in the past has detrimental effects on a person," Kal said, forcing a smile. "Who knew?"

Adora didn't laugh with him, but to her surprise, he actually gave her more of an explanation this time.

"By all rights I should be dead," he said. "Instead, I have these spells of pain every time I use…well, my spells." He gave a little chuckle at his joke and it only made Adora worry more. It was scary almost, how he could look so feral for one moment then perfectly at ease the next.

"That first war must have been awful," she said. "I know that's probably putting it lightly, but just hearing and learning about what happened…it's tough to even think about. I can't imagine living through it, and I especially can't imagine what fighting through it like you did was like."

Kal didn't say anything back, immediately. He sat there, flexing the hand that had trembled earlier as if to exercise it, and Adora chanced another question.

"Does that have anything to do with why you tripped the alarm back at the hangar?"

"Yes," Kal said. "Those things are designed specifically to pick up concentrations of the Beast inside a person."

"You knew that was going to happen, didn't you? You already contacted Vasher by the time we landed."

"I did," Kal said, nodding. "Things would have turned out ugly if he hadn't come. I'm…grateful he did."

"They called you an Abomination," Adora said. "I've heard that term used before too. But you don't look or act like one, at least not from what I've been told about them."

"I'm not an Abomination," Kal said, glancing about when he said the room as if he were making sure no one overheard them. He sighed and leaned back into the seat, making it creak. "Abominations are intelligent, yes, but they're malicious, and their only goal is to spread another infection. Not only that, but they don't retain the memories of their host from before they were turned. You'd certainly not find an Abomination hanging around people like Ly and Vasher for eight years, or sneaking around Etheria for three."

"You've been exposed to the Beast enough times that it hurts you to do magic, but it hasn't actually turned you? I didn't know there was that distinction."

"Neither does most anyone else," Kal said. "That's what I meant when I said people don't understand and don't want to understand. All those security officers in the hangar saw was a scanner beeping at them saying I was tainted. They don't care enough to distinguish between someone exposed and someone turned, they were afraid." He blinked, looking morose. "Can't say I blame them, though. It's rare for someone to survive exposure at all, let alone enough to trip a scanner and still look relatively put together."

A kindred feeling bloomed in Adora's chest upon hearing that, and it took her completely by surprise. That feeling of isolation, of being rare and misunderstood and not by choice, she understood that. "How much can someone take before they turn, then?" she asked.

"It depends," Kal said. "Remember how I said some people go crazy just looking at a planet covered by the dead remains of the Beast from space? The number of people with no tolerance is so high, it might as well be the be-all-end-all statistic. Some 'lucky' few actually have a tolerance." He sighed. "Even still, the Beast doesn't just leave you, given time. Your body can't filter it out like other toxins. Even if only a small amount touches you, it will have a degrading effect that accumulates over the years. For me, it's been over a decade of living with it, and every year gets harder to do magic without feeling the consequences."

They lapsed into silence after that, neither speaking for a long time while they ate. It wasn't lost on Adora how forthcoming Kal had been, and she appreciated it. "Thank you," she said after some time had passed. "Thank you for telling me."

Kal nodded.


Adora made him pay for a new wardrobe after they finished eating, only answering him with a raised eyebrow and a cocked hip when he asked what was wrong with the clothes he had loaned her. When she picked out something that fit better and didn't have a ridiculous logo on the front of the top, they found an elevator and rode it down a few stories underground. Immediately, Adora felt how much cooler the air was. It was even cooler than the hangar, and she tried to stave off the chill as she followed Kal all the way to the hotel room Vasher had promised to set them up with.

To her pleasant surprise, it was spacious and well-kept. They had a separate bedroom each, connected by a shared living space and bathroom. Low ceilings, warm lights, and a beige and black color scheme made the whole place feel cozy. Adora tested out the padding on the couch before heading to one of the rooms, saying she felt tired and was going to take a nap. Kal said nothing, so she clicked the door shut behind her and went to sit on the bed.

Truthfully, she wasn't tired at all. What she wanted was a bit of privacy so she could finally do something she had wanted to since finding out she had left Etheria: contact Glimmer.

Out of habit, she ran her left hand along the embossed patterns on her gauntlet, fingering the runestone there before turning to her PDA on her other wrist, tapping it awake. It was cracked and busted from the fight atop the Crystal Castle, but still functional, so she navigated to Glimmer's contact card and tried to send her a quick message.

It failed when the device couldn't get a signal.

Adora grit her teeth and looked at all the connections the PDA could detect. Nothing showed up, which was weird because she knew there must be at least something on this rock.

You're on a secret settlement that's supposed to be a way stop for thugs and mercenaries, she thought to herself. What did you expect?

Still, the idea of not being able to contact anyone at all out there perturbed her. Despite their shaky alliance, Adora was under no impression that Kal was actually her friend. Even if she could admit she thought they were starting to warm up to each other, she had already learned first-hand what happened when you trusted people too easily.

Catra was her biggest lesson—someone she had grown up with and had considered her closest friend…maybe even something more than a friend. And despite that, Adora still got burned. No, she trusted to easily, and couldn't make that mistake again, ever. She wouldn't. Kal was right when he said trust wasn't something to give out easily; she was just heeding his advice.

Adora tried again to find a connection and gave up in a huff when still nothing came.

"I'm gonna go out for a bit," she said, stepping back out into the living area and announcing her plans to the open room without looking first to see if anyone was there to receive them.

Kal glanced up at her from his perch on the couch; he was hunched over the coffee table, tinkering again at the sprawling, cascading symbols and designs of Pips source code on the portable computer he had set up there. "You okay?"

Adora averted her gaze and kicked her toe into the carpeted floor. "I need to get out and just…I don't know. Explore. For a bit."

Kal nodded. "You should take some money with you then." He fished around inside the bag next to him before pulling out the wad of cash Adora had seen him use to pay for everything so far. When he peeled off a few bills and placed them on the coffee table, he said, "just in case you see something you want to buy, y'know?" before turning back to focus on his work.

Adora stood there for a moment, dumbfounded. She had expected him to refuse her, or at least balk at the idea of her going out alone. Encouraging her and giving her spending change was literally the last reaction she was expecting to get. She padded over and grabbed the money, fingering it restlessly with both hands.

"Just like that?" she asked, finally pocketing the cash. "I can go?"

"Yeah?" He sounded confused, although he still didn't look up from his work. "You know how I asked you if you were carrying any weapons before we got off? Yeah, no one else except for security and people the Vestamid consider 'extra valuable' are allowed to carry weapons. It's still dangerous out there, of course, but you won't get into any serious trouble unless you go looking, and I know you can take care of yourself if you do."

"It's really okay? You're not going to try and convince me to stay or something?"

Kal furrowed his brow and finally looked up at her. "Did you want me to? I was under the impression you'd probably not give a damn what I'd say and leave anyway if I tried to stop you."

Adora laughed at that. "You aren't wrong. I'm just…surprised is all."

Kal turned back to the code, and Adora couldn't help but feel slighted. Was her desire to go wandering around on a supposedly dangerous settlement, alone and without any weapons really that inconsequential of a topic? Nothing she had done or chosen not to do had been inconsequential before.

"This is the first time you've ever left Etheria," Kal said, filling the silence that had grown between them again. "And there's plenty of interesting things to do here. Go have fun."

Now Adora felt guilty for fighting the urge to trust him, although she pushed the thought aside as she headed for the exit. She turned back to look at him one more time before closing the door behind her. He was still leaned over, plugging away at the computer, not even sparing her a second look. She shut the door and heard the lock click, still feeling just as conflicted about what to think of him as ever.

As time went on and she wandered, that general feeling of unease and confusion still didn't leave, as had hoped. She explored every section of the surrounding floors she could get to, heading back up to the main concourse on the ground level and exploring the dozens upon dozens of the shops that had caught her attention earlier. Giant department stores with magnificent cuts of clothes and exotic perfumes were lined up on either side as if waiting to be explored, but it was the tiny outlets in secluded alleyways, with their assortment of knick-knacks and baubles, that really piqued her interest.

One of them had a section selling figurines and paraphernalia about the Shaper, Corynth, and Adora suppressed a laugh and an eyeroll at seeing it. Glimmer had complained to her more than once in the past of how Catra would stop and scrutinize every one she'd come across when they went shopping together on their off time. Adora had no idea why Catra might have taken to him like most others in the galaxy had, and the notion seemed especially ridiculous after seeing how flippantly Kal had spoken of him back at the restaurant.

He might have saved the galaxy, sure, Adora thought, but he's just a person at the end of the day. Is everyone going to make me look like a messiah if I save people this time?

She frowned and leaned closer, studying the mask on the closest figurine, before shuddering and pointedly turning away when it reminded her a little too much of Shadow Weaver. Maybe that was what had pulled Catra's interest to begin with.

Before long, she found the food.

Stands and outlets bursting with snacks and sweets seemed to pop out at her on every third corner after she noticed the first one. Before long, she had to fight to stop buying every little thing just to get a taste, because she'd surely get sick otherwise. Most of the stuff she wasn't even sure she could digest.

There was an arcade she explored, loud and obnoxious and flashy with games. She passed by someone up on the third floor playing an instrument she didn't recognize. It sounded like a dying, wailing animal, and although a fair amount of people had gathered who seemed to actually like the music, she couldn't get away from it fast enough. Despite her best effort to actually enjoy herself as Kal insisted, that uneasy feeling from before still followed her, clinging like a shadow no matter what she did to try and shake it.

Adora wandered through a less busy part of the megabuilding, dragging her feet, when she rounded the corner and came across a sight that actually managed to pull her out of her slump: a massive LCD screen stretched from one end of the wall to the other, as tall as she was, showing a beautiful view of trees and beaches and an ocean that stretched to the horizon. Come see Eden's beautiful beachfront, read the caption at the top. The only beachfront this secluded in the entire galaxy.

She knew it was an advertisement, just like she knew there was no way that beach was natural, either. Likely it was another artificial construction. maintained by the Vestamid. for the sole purpose of entertaining whichever guests had come to funnel money into their pockets and further their schemes. But still, despite how obvious the pandering was, it managed to lull Adora for a moment, pulling her somewhere full of water and beaches and forests and nature, despite being so far from home.

She sighed and stared at it a moment longer, letting herself pretend for a moment she was there instead of on some sterile compound. Then she checked her PDA, hoping that maybe being out of the hotel room would afford her a connection, or at least a way to pay to get one. There was still nothing—no way to get in touch with Glimmer, or anyone else.

Adora sighed and tried to concentrate on the advertisement again, trying to squash that lonely feeling in her chest. If even a sliver of that positivity she had felt from the billboard moments earlier came back, she'd consider it a win. She was so lost in herself trying to relax that, when the voice behind her spoke, she startled.

"Well, well, well," came the voice, low and gravelly. "I thought I might have recognized you from earlier."

Adora yelped and spun around, putting easily ten feet of distance between her and whoever was there. She recognized him immediately, mostly because he was impossible to forget: it was the hulking mass of flesh and muscle she had locked eyes with back at the clinic. She should have heard him coming long before he got this close…how had she not picked up on it?

"No need to be so jumpy," the man said. "It's just a friendly hello."

"Little close and sudden for a friendly hello if you ask me," she said, stepping back to put even more distance between them.

"And she's got a sense of humor too," he said, taking a step forward and smiling wide enough to show all his teeth.

"What is it you want?"

"Oh, nothing much," the man said. "I just couldn't help noticing that little number you have on your arm there."

Adora furrowed her brow and held up her PDA.

The man shook his head. "The other one."

A stone felt like it dropped in Adora's stomach at that. She had hoped he was talking about the PDA, even though she knew he wasn't. Without thinking about it, she grabbed her runestone bracer with her other hand and angled herself away in an effort to hide it.

"That's it," the man said, taking another step forward and smiling wider. "I can feel something coming from it. It's calling me. Hand it over and I'll let you go."

"This isn't yours," Adora said, tensing her body to run.

"Oh, but it will be soon," the man said. "I can just take the whole arm, if you'd prefer."

If Adora had ready and reliable access to She Ra, she might have challenged him, but the guy was a literal mountain and she couldn't risk it. Not out here, alone, with no backup or any way to contact someone.

Adora took another step back and felt something cold and hard press up against her back. She glanced quickly behind her and felt the floor in her stomach open up, dropping the stone there even further: the man had somehow maneuvered her against the billboard. How could she be so stupid? She had trained for years to handle scenarios exactly like this, and still had somehow been cornered so easily? Had she really let her guard down so much?

She bunched her hands into fists, preparing to fight just long enough to get away, when a voice off to the side drew both of their attentions.

"That's enough."

Vasher rounded the corner, striding toward them with a calm expression. "This one's with me. I don't know who you are and frankly I don't care, but you better get out of here."

Adora flicked her eyes from Vasher to the stranger and back. For a moment, she feared a fight would break out, especially when Vasher calmly but firmly rested his hand on the sidearm at his hip.

That's right! she thought. Vasher was part of security, so he'd be allowed to carry.

Even if the stranger were twenty times stronger than either of them, he'd likely not survive a bullet. He seemed to think the same, because he harrumphed and stomped off and away without another word.

"Are you okay?" Vasher asked, turning to her. The thick accent Adora had heard back at the hangar somehow worked miracles to calm her nerves.

"I am now," she said. "Thank you for coming to help me. I was right about to try and deck him in the nose and make a break for it."

Vasher looked her up and down with one eyebrow quirked. "I know you can fight, but that man would have snapped you in two." He made a 'breaking' gesture with both hands. "Like a twig."

Adora shrunk into herself watching him make the same gesture a second and then third time. "I don't doubt it," she said. "How did you even find me anyway?"

"Kal asked me to watch out for you as a favor," Vasher said. "I said okay, but he asks for too many favors."

Adora gave a nervous laugh and rubbed the back of her neck. She wasn't sure whether to feel relieved or incensed about being essentially spied on. "Either way, thank you for scaring him off."

"It's no problem," Vasher said, turning and beginning to stump off. When she didn't follow him, he stopped and glanced at her over his shoulder. "We need to go now."

"Go where?"

"The Garden." He glanced quickly at his own PDA at his wrist. "It's almost time for Ly's show. I'll take you."

It was time to see her already? Adora hadn't even realized how much time had passed while she was exploring. Maybe she had been having a good time after all? Or maybe she was so lost in her thoughts she hadn't realized how fast time was passing her by. The fact she couldn't tell one from the other concerned her.

Uncertain of the correct answer, and uncertain about what and where exactly 'The Garden' was, Adora hurried to follow in Vasher's wake, scanning her surroundings the entire time to make sure that massive stranger didn't sneak up on them a second time.