"Being alone in deep space is one of the most horrible things in this universe."

Anonymous space traveler, Grand Year 2011

Helen stood on an exterior ledge peering out at the stars rushing past. She leaned against a railing, looking at the unfocused scenery as it flashed across her vision

Someone walked onto the ledge she was on, approached her. She did not bother to look, radiating supreme disinterest, keeping up her sharp, haughty demeanor. The person stopped right next to her, leaned on the railing as well, looked out.

"Sure is awesome, isn't it?"

She recognized that voice: John, chief of the GPD or so she had been told.

"Big space," John said, awed. "Biiiig space. A lot of people haven't thought about how big space really is..."

"What do you want," Helen snapped.

"Nothin', nothin'. Just... standing outside." Helen turned her head to look at John. John's dark brown hair was unkempt, his white dress shirt wrinkled. He looked back at her, and a small smile came unto his lips.

"If you want to talk to someone," she hissed, "go to the club. I'm not available." She turned her head back.

"Aw." John shifted slightly. "I just wanna talk and stuff."

"Go talk to a computer, you'll get more out of them than me."

She folder her arms.

"Well, someone's grumpy," John remarked.

"You've no idea," she quipped back.

"What's wrong?" John asked.

"Shut up," she growled.

"Seriously," John said. "It might help. I was a junior psychologist before I was a policeman. Trust me on this."

"You probably weren't very good," Helen retorted.

"No seriously, it helps if you talk," John insisted. "Really. I feel a lot of things you're keeping to yourself, and they're hurting you. You're brittle, quick to anger, irritable. Soon you'll burst because you're keeping all this... this stuff inside you and you don't want to release it."

"I don't know why I listen to you," she said. "You're... not helping!"

"Please," John said, softly, placing a larger hand on her small thin one. "Please. Just say it. I hate to see you suffer this way."

Helen bit her tongue. John's delivery had struck something inside her, and now she had to fight back her words. She gritted her teeth. Then she gave in to the words.

"I am in mourning," she said in a brittle voice. "My father. He - he... he was taken from me." She fought back tears. No tears, she reminded herself, sticking to her self-imposed image of toughness. No tears. Do not show your sorrow.

"Ah." John patted her hand. "Who... what took him?"

"I... don't know," she said. "It was in the middle of the night. My father was... in the fields... and then he was gone."

"Was he your only family?"

"My mother died only that last year," she confirmed. "In the Second Robloxian War. A shelling by FEAR's forces. She was part of the peace envoy on Rokan."

"And your dad, I guess, provided for you?"

"Yes. After he died, I left my town to find some... new life. And I gave myself... psychological shielding, to preserve my grief. I was naturally good at... you know, small mechanical jobs, and eventually I was hired by Armacham, which was now a legitimate company and allied with the new friendly FEAR. I rose up the ranks... and now I'm here." Helen shrugged.

"So you have a tragic backstory, and you rose from humble beginnings to... well, this," John summarized. "Do you want to find whoever captured your father?"

"Yes." Helen spat over the edge of the railing. "And when I find my father's captor, I will kill him. No questions asked. The blood of my enemies will seal my revenge."

"Revenge is a funny thing," John said. "It tears lives and worlds apart, or so people say."

"So people say," Helen echoed.

"Well, I advise you think about what you're doing." John released her hand. "Honestly, I'd hate to see your life ruined. It'd be sad."

"I won't," Helen said. She turned away, and on her way back into the ship looked back and said: "I'll have cleansed the universe when I'm through." Then she was gone.

-OOO-

Jack sat in his room, near the left stabilizer wing of the Great Justice. He was staring at a screen unfolded from a wall, on which was a display of a circle alternating between red and blue, which was a loading bar of sorts. This screen was a communications patch to New Robloxia, right to one of the many FaceTime booths around the city. The communication was delayed until a connection was established between the two machines, which during low-res flight was a long time due to relative speeds and resolution.

The loading bar faded away, and a grainy picture faded onto the screen in its place. It was Angelica's face, set against the white inside wall of the booth. She smiled when she saw him.

"Hey honey," he said.

"Hey," she replied.

They exchanged virtual hugs, and then stared at each other for a few seconds. Angelica, Jack noticed, was looking slightly harrowed; there were beads of sweat on her forehead, and her hair was unkempt.

"How was your day?" Jack asked.

"Day? It's been twenty-six of 'em." Angelica laughed. "Just a time delay."

"I haven't heard about that," Jack said. "Anyways, my day was... okay. Boarded, saw the Low-Res Gate, fought off some space pirates, had a party - and someone's aching to murder me."

"Murder you? Why?"

"Dunno," Jack said, shrugging. "John's given me a security cam. It's on another monitor right now." He gestured to his right, where there was another screen folded out of the wall, showing an empty corridor.

"Well, I hope you pull through," she replied. "My days were pretty odd. Just a week ago, there were these huge ships in the sky. Right now they're somewhere over Tripfall, or so I've heard. Builderman's declared a period of caution, because those ships are allegedly Vaktovian Badanovs."

Jack froze. Badanovs! The Vaktovians had long stayed away from Robloxia, but everyone knew of their terror. Everyone, at one point in their lives had seen the archived footage of the last Vaktovian war. It changed them. Jack remembered that day in his school when his class had to do a report on the footage. In the middle of the montage, one boy started crying and had to be dragged out of the room.

"Only allegedly, right?" Jack felt very worried. "Allegedly Vaktovians, right? They don't look like Badanovs?"

"I don't know, Jack," Angelica replied. "Look, if they attack, I'll go to one of the safe centers below ground level, okay? If our baby is born in a bunker, so be it, as long as the baby is born at all."

"Yeah," Jack agreed. "The baby is everything."

"Listen, I have to go. The air raid siren just went off. Love you!"

"Love you too," Jack whispered.

The feed turned off, and Jack switched the screen off and folded it back into its crevice. Then he stood up from his bed, which he had been sitting on during the conversation, and walked over to the small adjoining washroom next to him. There he opened a cabinet, and found a small can of shaving cream and a rack of razors. Slathering the cream on his jaw, he began to scrape at the stubble that had built up over a period of two days, ever since he had captured Arthur Ipecac.

A flickering movement caught his eye.

He stopped shaving, and listened closely. Reflected in the top left corner of the mirror was a tiny, tiny sliver of blue plastic, hovering around like an insect. It emitted a faint static noise, almost too low for the ear to detect.

He knew this device. It was called a Slice. It was a remote-controlled killing machine with a small industrial-strength heat beam built into it, able to be guided around corners and through tight spaces with pinpoint accuracy, and move about a crowded room with such stealth as to be undetectable. Jack stayed still, did not move a muscle as the Slice probed the room with a small crystal-glass eye. Not moving was key to surviving a Slice attack. The Slice came closer and closer to his ear, making that annoying subsonic whine it was so iconic for.

The Slice slowly passed in front of his eyes, and it took great effort not to track it. If he had tracked it, the Slice would seize upon the movement and kill him with one well-placed blast of the heat beam. Blue plastic inched past, gleaming. Jack saw the eye at the front rolling around, scanning, scanning, scanning for him but not finding him because it was designed for moving targets.

The Slice exited the room, and Jack could now follow it with his eyes, see it move silently into the bedroom.

When had he first seen a Slice? Ahh, yes, it was five months ago. A wealthy banker he was protecting had almost been assassinated. Luckily, Jack had Hamburg with him at the time, and Hamburg had guided him as the Slice was bearing down on the sleeping banker. And then... what had Hamburg done? He had pulled out his gun slowly so as not to trip off the Slice's periphery sensors, and then took aim and shot it down.

Now he waited until the Slice was rooting within the bedclothes, before bringing a hand down to the shiny gun in its holster. He wrapped two fingers around the grip, began to slowly jerk it out of the holster. The Slice was now entombed deep within the sheets, a bulge pressing against the covers and making a cloth wake behind it. Jack began to move stealthily out of the bathroom, and into the darkness beyond. He was gambling that the Slice wouldn't see him in the gloom, and with its predicament what it was. Fully unsheathing the shiny gun and draping it in a fold of his sleeve, he waited until he could clearly see the Slice and took aim. At that moment, the Slice emerged from the edge of the bed and resumed its nosing about the room. Jack froze again, because the Slice was facing his direction. He did not want to give his presence away, definitely did not, not so close to his goal. The Slice was perusing a light fixture, and turned away slightly.

Jack, while the Slice's vision was not on him, whirled, aimed again, and fired. The bullet whistled through the air and bisected the Slice clean in two. Sparks erupted from the tiny laser emitter within, and soon the little body was burning on the floor.

Just to be sure, he scooped up the two smoldering pieces, and hurriedly doused them in tap water. Then he placed them in the bottom of the sink and covered them in shaving cream, just to be doubly sure. He walked out of the bathroom, and snuck over to the room's door; with a swift motion he pulled it open and peered out into the hallway. Bringing the shiny gun out in front of him, he began to walk steadily down the hall.

Helen and John rounded the corner at that moment. Jack lowered the weapon and made for them. John looked over at him, and surprise darkened his features.

"What happened?" he asked.

"Someone," Jack replied, "tried to assassinate me with a Slice."