The pirates all rushed past her and Medusa, screaming and shouting with savage glee. They flung themselves forward and entered the chamber. Maka and Medusa followed.
It was a large, cavernous space; the ceiling was so high above their heads and shrouded in shadow that it was impossible to make out. The floor was also invisible, but that was because it was completely covered in treasure.
Gold. Coins upon coins upon coins of gold. It was a vast sea of shimmering yellow, undulated gently in dunes. Scattered among the pieces were glittering jewels, flashes of color against the tawny ocean. The pirates fell to their knees and began shoveling the treasure into their pockets. Medusa turned and waved the ship in through the wide doorway. It steered carefully into the room, which was large enough to house even a ship comfortably.
"Fill the ship!" shouted Medusa, but her crew seemed to ignore her. She snorted, but called up to the deck. "Fly towards the center of the room," she instructed. "Once people screw their heads on straight again, we'll begin to move what we can towards the ship."
A shout answered her, and the ship floated off.
Medusa sank to her knees as well and picked up a coin with the mouth of each snake. "Extraordinary," she breathed, turning each over. "Absolutely incredible."
Maka wandered off, drinking in the sight of all the loot buried beneath the surface of the planet. There were some coins she recognized, but thousands of others must have originated from worlds she had never seen. There were also solid gold statues scattered among the smaller pieces, and a few ancient pieces of tech that while their function was indiscernible, their value was apparent.
There was a small boat off in a corner of the room, and Maka made her way over to it. No one paid her any mind; they were all far too occupied with the vast amounts of wealth in front of them. Maka guessed, based on the way the gold coins were shifting below her feet, that the boat might have originally been in the center of the room where her ship now hovered, but over the millennia it had slid away to be hidden in the shadows.
When she approached, she noticed that despite its age, it was in relatively good condition. She was able to make her way around to the other side and found a small set of ladder rungs built directly into the side. Carefully, so as not to be surprised by any rotten wood, Maka climbed and hoisted herself onto the deck of the small ship.
There was no gold up here, but there were dozens and dozens of pieces of tech. Maka eagerly began to sift through them piece by piece. A few she recognized as prototypes of things she used today, but most were entirely foreign to her. They were carefully crafted, beautifully constructed, and she felt a feeling of awe wash over her with every item she examined.
Something caught her eye in the pile and she shifted things until she was able to pull it out. Maka gasped audibly as she pulled it out. It was a set of beautiful wings, like the ones she used at home but a thousand times better, jagged yet graceful and made of smooth white chrome. It reminded her of the pictures of angels from her storybooks as a child.
Running a delicate hand over it, Maka admired the craftsmanship, the ingenuity. She set it to the side, determined to look at it more once she explored the rest of the ship. She turned to the other side of the boat.
A skeletal hand pointed directly at her.
Her heart leapt to her throat, and Maka flung herself backwards. The hand didn't move, and she gathered her wits again to see that it was indeed a skeleton pointing at her. Slowly getting to her feet, Maka studied the thing.
Whoever it had been in life - and she could hazard a guess at who - had been large, larger than a human man, thick chested and tall. A large black hat still sat upon the horned head, eyes now just empty sockets and teeth yellowed and faded. The clothes apart from that had largely disintegrated, leaving ivory behind. The feet still disappeared into shabby boots however, and the hands each had six skeletal fingers, one set of which was wrapped around an enormous ruby.
Maka moved forward, and as she dodged around the pointing hand, she saw that it was gripping a small scrap of paper in its clasp. For a moment, she hesitated, caught between knowledge and wealth. She felt a little funny making the decision, but stepped closer to the body to pry the ruby out of the bones and shove it onto her pocket.
The place between her shoulder blades itched.
She turned again to the pointing hand and slipped the paper carefully from between the fingers. This was trickier, as she didn't want to rip it, but finally she managed to extricate it. Unraveling it, Maka was amazed to see the Common Tongue.
It will never be yours.
Before she could even begin to parse out what that meant exactly, a huge sound rang out like a gong, like a bell, like a death knell.
Maka looked around frantically, but at first she couldn't see what was happening. The pirates were standing up, their heads and arms adorned with the treasure they had looted, appearing just as confused as she was, but then a rending, roaring sound shot forth, and the floor lurched. Maka felt herself slam against the small railing of the ship and the wind was knocked out of her. Shouts and screams came from the ground and she steadied herself to look out over the chaos.
The floor had opened up like the giant jaws of a sea creature, and all the treasure was tipping towards the empty space. The pirates were all desperately trying to keep their footing, but they were overbalanced from the weight of all the treasure on them. Maka watched as they flailed helplessly, clawing at the gold that was slowly dragging them to their deaths.
A thump behind her caused her to turn away from the horror. Giriko stood behind her, a mad glint in his eye.
"Looks like we're all gonna die," he said in a voice that sounded nothing like a human's, "so we might as well have a bit a fun before we go." He grabbed one of his large gloves and pulled it off his hand to reveal an oversized meaty fist covered in oscillating blades. They began to spin and whir, droning like a hornet's nest.
He raised his arm and brought it down in a large arc. Maka dodged out of the way just in time, feeling the wind of his strike brush past her, and the blades splintered the wood of the deck, a horrible wrenching sound filling the air.
Maka grabbed one of the closest inventions and threw it at him. He swung his arm again and the contraption shattered into pieces. Maka flung item after item at him he swatted each away, a mad cackle bubbling forth from his as he did so.
"Enjoying yourself, bitch?" he crowed.
Fumbling in her pocket, Maka tried to free one of the pistols still in it, but she couldn't fit it out around the ruby. She slide between his legs just as he charged at her and tried to get to the ladder, but she heard the whirring of his blades and she had to duck and roll.
"I don't think so!" he screamed, looming over her. Maka felt her heart stop; there was no escape.
Just as he raised his arm again, Giriko froze like a statue. His blades stopped and his eye bulged. He fell to the side, twitching and gasped for air to reveal Medusa behind him, a single snake head pulled away from his neck again.
"But that poison will kill you," she said softly. His body spasmed a few more times before becoming still. Medusa stepped over his tangled legs as if it were nothing. "Are you hurt?"
"Can you get this boat working?" Maka yelled, ignoring the question. The floor groaned under them again and both women held their arms out for balance.
"Yes, but that will do us no good. We'll never be able to clear the planet's gravitational pull in time to escape the explosion. The main ship is already heading towards the door, but it's not fast or powerful enough either."
Maka turned to watch as the larger ship moved towards the opening. She stared hopelessly at it, gazing out to where Brew still sat in the ground, projecting the tiny planets.
Brew.
"We need to get back there!" she screamed, pointing at the door. "If we open the door to another planet, we'll be transported there instead!"
"How do you know?" cried Medusa.
"I don't! But it's our only chance!"
Medusa glared at her for a beat, then leapt to the prow of the boat where the controls sat covered in dust. "Let's get this thing in the air."
But Maka was already slipping her arms into the beautiful wings she had found earlier. There was a pinch between her shoulder blades as the needles injected into her spinal cord (they were long and sharp enough to get through the fabric of her jacket and shirt, though Maka normally wore shirts with small holes cut out when she wore them at home) and she felt the connection course through her. She concentrated on stretching them, and they unfurled behind her.
"What are you doing?" Medusa yelled over the noise of the dying planet.
"Opening the door," Maka said, testing her wings with a flap. They felt powerful. "Someone needs to control it. You need to get on the other side of it and then turn around to go through the other way."
"But-!"
"Just get there! I'll make sure it's open."
And she took off.
Nothing, nothing, could compare to the exhilaration of flying through the air of her own accord. The wings were perfect, better than any she had ever made, and they adjusted flawlessly to every turn she implemented. Maka wove between the falling towers of treasure, gold coins raining down like hail around her. She saw the main ship ahead of her, slowly picking up steam and approaching the gate. An engine roared to life behind her, and she knew Medusa must have gotten the small boat working. Desperate, Maka flapped harder and harder.
She made it to the deck of the ship where a terrified young alien was steering. "Get out and then turn around!" Maka screamed at her. "I'll open a new door!" The girl only turned to look at her, but Marie appeared from behind her, bandaged and unchained and shouted back, "Roger that!"
Maka flew the last few yards and burst out onto the surface of the planet. The rumbles were quieter, but she could see even there the rolling plains start to buckle and collapse, the jungle trees falling like Jikilian dominoes. She dropped below the outcropping of rock just as the larger ship passed overhead. Counting the seconds, Maka waited with bated breath.
Medusa's smaller ship finally shot by, and Maka flew up again. The main ship was making a wide turn, and Medusa was trying to maneuver the ancient aircraft into a tight enough about-face.
"C'mon, c'mon," Maka muttered, hovering near the holographic projections. Behind her, the treasure room collapsed in on itself, echoes of gold piece after gold piece tinkling off of each other as they were swallowed up by the open, pulsing core.
Both ships straightened towards her at the same time. They began to pick up speed, two giants barreling towards her. Maka looked through the tiny model of her galaxy, trying to find something she recognized.
The world broke apart. Fire engulfed everything. Maka tapped whatever planet she could and turned towards the gate, flapping desperately. The ships roared by her.
Everything was white, and then everything was black.
She was lying face down on a cloud.
No, not a cloud - a bed.
It was soft and gentle, like a mother's touch. Something she had not known in so long.
She couldn't breathe.
She was suffocating!
"Stop struggling!" someone called out. "Hey, someone help!"
Hands were on her shoulders, which felt weird, and Maka tried to move, tried to get the pillow out of her face. She tried to make words but nothing came out, everything was muffled, and there were voices trying to shush her-
"Maka, Maka! Please, you have to stop moving. You're going to hurt yourself."
Stein's voice cut through the haze in her mind. She tried to lean up to look at him, but there was something heavy weighing down her back.
"Maka," he said gently, and she turned to look.
The wings were still there. They were as graceful and pure as ever, but they were sprouting from the gnarled mess of her back. Her skin was red and raw, mangled like some sort animal had clawed her. She flexed one of the wings very gently, and it moved. Her skin burned as she did.
She couldn't see where her flesh ended and the metal began.
"Maka," Stein said quietly. "You were hit in the back with the explosion. I think… I think it grafted the wings in place. We won't be able to remove them."
Maka had a feeling she should go for a walk tonight.
It had been a few weeks since the explosion, and a few days since she'd been able to leave the hospital area of the ship. Eruka, an alien with oversized eyes and mouth and an oversized heart, had become the nurse, tending to both Maka and Marie (who had taken control of her ship again as soon as she'd stepped foot on it) as the weeks went on. Free, the other pirate sent back with the ship, seemed to have become the honorary first mate. The five identical aliens all worked the deck, indistinguishable and mousy.
Medusa had been tied up and locked in the brig.
Or at least, she had been.
"Going somewhere?" Maka asked lightly as she approached the lifeboat. Medusa turned to watch her. Maka winced a little as one of her new wings hit the door frame - she was still getting used to taking their size into account - but otherwise stepped lightly up to the woman who was untying the lead lines.
"I am," she said calmly. "I have no intention of being taken to prison once we reach Kaly Fornya. I will be leaving with this boat."
"You will?" Maka tried to keep the amusement out of her voice.
"I will."
"What if I try to stop you?"
Medusa cocked her head as she studied Maka carefully. "You're still too weak to fight me," she said plainly. "And I am far more familiar with my tech than you." A snake hissed.
"We can tell the authorities what you did, how you helped," Maka said quietly. "Your sentence will be shorter. And then you can be around."
The unspoken for me hung in the air as Medusa pursed her lips. "No," she said quietly. "I have no interest in that."
"You'd make a terrible mother," said Maka, with only a faint trace of bitterness.
Medusa opened her mouth to respond, but before she could a chirping interrupted her, and Crona shot out from her pocket to nuzzle against Maka's neck. "Yes, I supposed I would," replied Medusa, her eyes glittering. "Which is why you should care for Crona from now on. They were quite loyal while you were in the hospital, and a life on the run has never been in their best interest."
Maka smiled, a tired, resigned, hopeful smile. "So there's no convincing you?"
"None," she said brusquely, turning back to the boat. "But I wish you all the best in your future endeavors."
"What do you mean?"
Medusa threw the last rope into the lifeboat and opened the hatch in the hull that allowed it to get out. The wind whistled through the opening. Medusa had to shout a little to be heard over it.
"Didn't she tell you? I overheard the captain telling her dear doctor about it. It's a real honor. She's going to recommend you to the Solar Cadet Academy."
Maka scratched at Crona's head thoughtfully. "Sounds like a good deal."
Medusa jumped into the lifeboat. She turned to look at Maka for the last time. "It is. You'd be a fool not to take it. The headmaster is a smart man, if a little eccentric, and the school is bankrolled by the wealthy Evans family; they sent both their sons there."
"Oh yeah?"
The lifeboat hummed to life. "Yes. Quite a famous family." Medusa pressed buttons rapidly on the control panel, and the engines of the small boat. Over her shoulder she called, "But watch out for the younger one. I heard he's a piece of work."