“You know feel free to leave me out of this okay?” the boy said not looking up from his pad. A cup of coffee and some pills were sitting on the table next to him.

“Come on Takeya, I’m not asking for too much,” Kana whined.

“Even as Chief Weapons officer I still can’t give you what you need,” he sighed, “I don’t get senior officer’s access until I’m 17, which is in a month. You would have an easier time having access to the database than I would.”

“I’m only communications, we don’t get ANY access. But as weapons officer you do have access to the ship’s computer and databases.”

“Because I need to be able to tell the difference between an incoming missile and friendly fighter and to be able to know which gun on the ship I’m using and what I’m pointing it at. And there goes Meridian.”

A scream followed by a crashing sound was heard.

“Uh, when did you last go to sleep?”

“Um…” Takeya looked at the pills next to his coffee.

‘MODAFINIL STIMULI. For advanced sensory awareness and functionality.’

“Five days. Yup, I’ve been up for the past five days.”

“FIVE DAYS?! That was like three attacks ago!”

“Yes well I have not been able to get any sleep since we’ve been assaulted periodically every 21 hours. And since the last guy is still in sickbay recovering from flash freezing I’d say I’m the only weapons officer on the ship. So yeah, I haven’t had much time to get sleep. Filing reports etc, etc- HEY! BE CAREFUL WITH THAT!”

“You mean you’d been awake when we had dinner the other night?”

“Yes.”

“Why didn’t you just tell me that? We could have rescheduled.”

“Well I’d already been awake for three days so why not?”

“There haven’t been any side effects to using this stuff?” she asked holding up the pills.

“Doc said there’d be some but I haven’t noticed them- I TOLD YOU TO BE CAREFUL WITH THAT!”

Two technicians holding a large coil like device were passing through the mess hall looked up.

“YES YOU! IF THAT’S THE REPLACEMENT COIL FOR MY STERN BATTERY YOU BETTER BE CAFEFUL WITH IT!”

“Yes sir,” one of them sighed and the two continued.

“Honestly why are they cutting through here anyway? The tubes are there for a reason.”

“Unfortunately sections 45-67 are all open space so I don’t think they can use them even if they wanted to.”

“Humph.”

“So…?”

He sighed, “Fine. Next time I file my report I’ll talk to the captain about it. Then you can analyze your mystery signal.”

Kana smiled, “Thank you Takeya.”

“Yeah yeah, just let me finish my report.”

“Alright, I’ll get out of your hair.”

Kana stood up and left the mess hall.

Takeya looked at his pad.

DAMAGE REPORT.

“I hate this part of the job. ROGERS! Get over here!”

A girl no older than 18 ran over, wearing a space suit trotted over, “Yes sir?”

“Don’t call me that.”

“You are a higher rank than me.”

“And you’re two years older than me. Makes me feel all weird. Prep air lock 5, we’re going for a walk.”

***

Kana walked down the hallways of the ship. People had been shuffling about all day working on everything from repairs to refits.

A voice on the intercom got her attention, “Kana Misaki please report to the bridge.”

She turned, “Well that’s convenient.”

She stepped through the doors. The Captain wasn’t there but the XO was.

“Yes sir?”

The Commander turned, “We’ve just been contacted by AJAX. Admiral Halsey would like to see you. There’s a shuttle waiting in hanger 3. Get there.”

“Yes sir.”

***

Jett clawed his way up the cliff face. Behind him, if one looked close enough, a series of holes all clustered in groups of five ever few feet led straight to him.

He reached up and gripped a railing and pulled himself up and onto the terrace. The garden was a familiar place. He’d always visited it but now at night no one was around.

He walked over to a bench hidden under a willow tree and sat down.

The environment was peaceful. No noise from the city reached him as the plant life muffled the majority of it.

He frowned, “Stupid white haired little… what the hell is he?!”

“The question is not what but who.” A voice said.

“What the…” Jett looked up.

A woman in a suit was sitting on a tree branch. Her hair was orange and vaguely familiar but it fell down in front of her forehead and behind her in a sloppy mop. She grinned.

“Who the hell are you?”

“The question is not who we are but what.” Another voice said.

Jett blinked and turned. Behind him hanging from a tree branch was a man wearing a black suit. But that’s when things started getting creepy. The man had spiky Jet black hair and piercing sapphire blue eyes.

He hopped down from the tree.

“Hello.”

“W-what the hell are you?!” Jett asked.

“Hmm, that’s an interesting question. I am you, and you are me. It’s complicated.”

“And I am her and she is me,” the woman said hopping down.

“We are you, or rather what you should be,” they said in unison.

“Okay, what the fuck is going on here? I have no idea who you are,” Jett said pointing at the woman, “But you look like a 30 year old version of me!”

Jett pointed at the man who blinked, “In that regards you would be correct. However,” he raised his left arm, “This however is real.”

“Wow, way to rub it in ass- hey wait a minute! ACC!”

The woman smiled, “She won’t answer. At least, not this time. And don’t worry; you’re not going crazy again. We are real as you would put it.”

“Then just what the hell do you people want?”

“Ah, on to that I suppose. Yes well let’s see here,” the man pulled out a large role of paper and unrolled it, “Yes here it is. In the beginning, approximately 13.82 billion years ago the universe was created in what you call the big bang. And many have come think that was a very bad idea but hey, the choice wasn’t theirs to make.”

The woman cut in, “But suffice it to say, the universe was born and all sorts of crazy things have happened to bring us here.”

“Just what are you exactly?”

“We? Didn’t we explain it already? Ah whatever, by your standards we’re gods. But sadly we are of the universe just as you are. But fear not. Not everything goes according to plan.”

“Wait, what are you talking about?”

“Ah, well you have caused quite a bit of trouble for us recently and due to a series of events beyond even our control things in your plan went wrong. And when a plan grows wrong, improvisation has to occur.”

The man sighed, “Unfortunately it wasn’t us who did the improvising, it was you. And you threw everything out of line. Again.”

“What do you mean again?”

“Oh, well let me explain a little. This experiment of ours has been going on for hundreds of your years and yet every single time you just happen to screw things up for us. At first your outright rejection of our imposed conditions and treatments was just an inconvenience but as the cycles continued we started to notice that no matter what we did we couldn’t change anything.”

“So this time we tried something different.”

“And?” Jett said, “I think I’m getting this all… sort of.”

“But unfortunately we are all still at the mercy of the universe and it does not like it when things don’t go as it has lain out.”

“So we’ve come to correct our mistake.”

“What mistake? What did you do?”

“Oh nothing you need to worry about. However things must go back on track and they must stay there. So things are going to start getting a whole lot complicated.”

“Wait what?”

“Oh, and I would go home if I were you. We’re going to fix things but it may get a little painful,” The man smiled, “Say cheese.”

He held up a camera and in a flash they were gone.

And so was everything else.

Jett blinked, the world not returning, “What the fuck?!”

***

“You made him go blind?” The woman asked.

“Yes, yes I did. And it’s only temporary. There’s a safety limit on all their vision to prevent a burn out.”

“So what intensity was that?”

“The intensity of your average gamma ray burst.”

***

Jett sighed, “Stupid fucking weird… whatever the fucks they were.”

He checked his systems.

INTERNAL DIAGNOSTIC.

EMERGENCY SHUTDOWN OF OPTICAL PROCESSORS.

DO NOT ATTEMPT TO ACCESS YOUR OPTICAL SUBROUTINES FOR AT LEAST 26 HOURS. YOU WILL BE LOCKED.

“Fucking great,” he sighed.

ACTIVATING REPAIR SYSTEMS. REPLACING DAMAGED LIGHT RECEPTORS.

“Any damage to the lenses?”

MILD BURN DAMAGE.

“Alright, get on it.”

He sighed, “Now what am I supposed to do?”

ACTIVATING INTERNAL SONAR SYSTEMS.

“Oh there’s that.”

He stood up and navigated his way out of the garden.

“I hate my life. Now where am I?”

He could barely make out streets and people and buildings but signs; he was hopeless.

“Great.”

He turned 90 degrees and started walking. Soon he started hearing voices whispering.

“… Oh my goddesses, what happened to him?”

“… What happened to his eyes?”

“Why are they bleeding?”

“Is he blind?”

“Young man, you need to get to a hospital. Something is wrong with your eyes.”

Jett blinked, “What?”

***

Dane sighed, “This is fucking useless.”

“What?” Spitfire sighed.

Dane, Gin, Spitfire, and the rest of the team were out looking for the black haired android. So far they hadn’t had much luck with it.

“He behaves like a child sometimes and runs off like a lost dog. He always comes back though, just give him some time.”

“When he first got the arm he wanted nothing to do with people in general,” Gin said, “And even went off an anti-humanity tirade. He’s probably just blowing off some steam.”

“Still, I worry about him.”

“He’s probably fine. It would take a god to do any real damage to him.”

***

“Stupid fucking…” Jett grumbled, “Would you stop following me?!”

The nurse behind him turned and headed back to the hospital.

Jett now had two bandages over his eyes held in place by several sheets of medical tape. Small blood stains could be seen through the bandages.

He continued walking down the street.

“How the hell am I supposed to get back like this?”

He continued before sighing, “Trial and error.”

***

“Spitfire it’s almost midnight,” Dane sighed, “There’s no sign of him.”

“If he doesn’t want to be found he won’t be,” Gin said, “We’ve already learned this lesson. The bastard can become invisible if he wants to.”

Spitfire sighed, “So what? You want to just go home?”

“If need be yes. He’ll come back when he wants to.”

She let out a loud sigh before rubbing her hair, “Fine, I’ll recall the team.”

***

Starry Skies sighed, “For the last time: IT’S NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS!”

“I think I have the right to know where you have been going day after day,” Charger said.

“For the last time: NO YOU DON’T! Mind your own fucking business,” She said before sauntering off.

She hated it when they did this. Her teammates had the annoying habit of sticking their heads into her business. She was her own person. Still…

Stratus walked over, “This whole disappearing thing with her is something new.”

“Yes. And I want to figure out why.”

“You better keep better track of your girl man. Else some other flyboy hotshot may just snatch her up.”

“Like fuck.”

***

A loud bang followed by a crumbling sound echoed through the Wonderbolt Compound.

Spitfire yawned and sat up in her bed, “The hell?”

She sauntered up to the living area. Dane and Gin her other teammates were all doing the same thing.

“What the fuck?” Dane asked more as a statement.

Another loud bang followed by a crumbling noise was heard.

“Is it a monster? Maybe a manticore?” Soarin’ asked.

Spitfire looked out and squinted. Even in the dark there was a significant pile of crushed rocks and dust kicked up. Not the entire path in was blocked but it was noticeable. A figure in the dust could be made out.

“Is that-”

“Jett?”

The android sauntered onto the compound. But something was wrong. His head was wrapped up in white bandages.

Spitfire ran out towards him, “Jett!”

Jett turned. Spitfire could make out blood stains coming through where his eyes were covered and gasped.

“What happened to you?!”

“It’s a long story,” he sighed.

Dane ran up, “Hey buddy, what happened?”

Instantly Jett was on his feet with an energy weapon pointed in Dane’s direction. By now the other Wonderbolts were out of the compound.

“The fuck?” Soarin’ said.

“I may be blind but I can still hear you,” Jett directed at Dane. Dane raised his hands.

“Whoa now buddy. Now I know you may be a little bit pissed off about that fight but you need to calm down.”

“Calm down?” Jett said, “You tried kidnapping me! And then you stab me in the back, literally, with an electrical cable? And who was the fucking Genius who decided to handcuff me to the hospital bed?!”

Spitfire shrunk down just a small bit.

“Dude, you got hurt. I need you to calm down so I can help you.”

“Why would I let you do that?!”

“Because I want you to,” Spitfire said.

“What?!” Dane and Jett both said turning to face her.

“He’s part of the team now as a mechanic to a degree. So I can make it an order. Jett, stand down and let him fix your eyes. That’s an order.”

“Spitfire he-”

“Nope, get your ass inside right now,” she said.

“But he-”

“No.”

“But I-”

“No.”

“But what if-”

“That’s an order Halsey!”

Jett sighed, “I hate you.”

“I don’t care. Now get in there. That’s an order.”

“Fuck you, sir,” he said as his weapon retracted itself.

“I can’t hear you!”

“FUCK YOU, SIR!”

“That’s better.”

He lowered his arms and allowed himself to be guided back into the facility. Soon he was lying down on a couch.

“What the fuck happened?” Rapidfire asked.

“Well on the way in here I tripped every now and again so I punched the wall out of frustration.”

…

“Oh.”

Dane walked over, “Alright let’s take a look at these bandages.”

“Here,” Spitfire said handing him some scissors.

“Thanks.”

Dane slowly cut away the medical tape before peeling it off leaving the two white, blood covered patches, over the android’s eyes.

“Okay would you like to tell me what happened?” Dane asked.

“No.”

Spitfire sighed, “Do you want to tell ME what happened?”

“No. But I get the feeling you’re going to make it an order.”

“Correct.”

He sighed, “I had my picture taken by two weird people wearing suits.”

“What kind of camera did they use?” Dane asked.

“Fuck should I know? They just took my picture and I went blind.”

“Well it had to have been something big because it would take something like you looking into a supernova to even activated the safety protocols let alone even do some real damage.”

“And how would you know this?”

“Because unlike you I have all my memories. We’re both military prototypes. Two of Sixteen created. Designed to be the perfect sleeper agent, the perfect soldier, the perfect everything. There are 8 models. We’re number 4.”

“Then why did you try to kidnap me the other night?”

“Long story, suffice it to say you’d gone missing, and apparently lost your memories, and we found you. This isn’t the first time it had happened so I tried something to get you to safety. I didn’t know you were on a date or had been here for a few weeks already.”

Jett frowned, “I get the feeling things would make more sense to me if I could remember everything.”

“Yes they would. Now hold still,” Dane said pulling the blood caked bandages off his eyes. Spitfire gasped. His eyes were burned black in color. Not even the whites were visible.

Dane frowned, “Oh. Don’t worry, I can fix this.”

“Heh,” Soarin’ laughed, “He looks like a demon.”

Though Jett couldn’t see it he heard a loud smacking sound followed by an, “OW! What was that for?”

“Dude, I’m gonna need that case of yours.”

Jett sat up, head-butting Dane, “How do you know about that case?”

“Please, at school you kept all your shit in there. There’s a medical unit in there that I can use to fix this. Now where is it?”

Jett sighed, “The lower hanger area. On the couch.”

“Okay, now how do I get there?”

“I’ll show you,” Spitfire said.

The pair got up and walked out of the living area, leaving the rest of the team to tend to a blind android.

Soarin’ raised a finger.

“Don’t even think about it,” Jett said.

Meanwhile Spitfire had led Dane to the stairs leading down to the hanger.

Dane laughed, “You know, it’s kinda ironic.”

“What’s ironic?” Spitfire asked with a frown.

“He’s now as blind physically as he is emotionally.”

Spitfire smiled sadly, “Yeah, I guess he is…”

***

“So you’re the Communications officer on the Pegasus correct?”

Kana gulped, “Yessir.”

Halsey smiled, “Good, then you’re just the girl I’m looking for. I understand you’re good with multivariable Ansible algorithms that can keep track of large numbers of objects at the same time correct?”

“If you’re referring to a Pegasus Cross Web then yes, I can do that. It was one of the few things I got to learn in my classes before this all happened.”

“Good,” Halsey grinned, “Ajax, get in here.”

A woman in a casual naval uniform appeared. A hologram. She spoke with a soft British accent.

“Hello.”

“This here is Kana. Kana, Ajax. You’re going to be working with her on a new project I’m assigning to you. She’ll fill you in.”

“… Okay…”

“Any questions?”

“Uh… permission to speak freely Admiral.”

“Granted.”

“Okay, uh, Admiral, this is highly irregular. Can I just know what I am doing this for? I mean, this isn’t an easy program to make and it will take several days just to get the base code down for it. And out of curiosity, why don’t you already use one?”

“I’m sorry but I can’t tell you. This mission is classified for now but you’ll find out sooner or later considering Ajax has a big mouth and will tell you no matter what I order her to do. And as for your second question, we do already use one. However none of them were designed to handle the numbers I’m going to be throwing at you. The exact specifications of it will be given to you by Ajax once you’re back aboard the Pegasus.”

She sighed, “Even out here protocol still holds.”

“Actually,” the Admiral smiled sadly, “If you can keep a secret, I threw out the old rule book six months ago.”

“What?!”

“There aren’t any protocols for this kind of situation so I just took the old book and spaced it and built it up from scratch.”

“I guess that makes sense…”

Ajax frowned, “Sir you never said you tossed the old rule book.”

“Well since you were elevated from ship’s AI to Fleet Control AI there were a lot of distractions.”

“Highly Irregular. Also, would you care to tell Chief O’Brien that my coolant hasn’t been cycled recently? It’s getting a little warm in here.”

“Sure.”

Kana stood up, “Well if I’m not needed anymore I’ll get back to my ship now, Sir.”

“That’s fine. Oh and Misaki,” he removed a small box from his desk, “You’re being promoted. Congratulations Ensign.”

He tossed it over to her. She wore a stunned look on her face.

“Oh and your computer access has been granted. Ensign Authorization of course but still access to the fleet network.”

“I, uh, sir, uh…”

“Don’t you have a shuttle to catch, Ensign?”

“Uh, Sir! Yes Sir. Thank you Sir.”

She stepped out and headed down to the Eternity’s hanger decks.

Once the doors closed, Ajax turned, “So you really want to do this?”

“She’s the only one left standing with experience. So if you want to go get any of the others who are in medical and wake them up or get them off their pain medication then by all means. But I know you’ve always been a moral stickler so I figured you wouldn’t.”

“I hate you sometimes.”

“Get over it.”

She sighed, “Yes Sir.”

***

“Okay, so you’re gonna have to where this over your eyes for a few days still while the Nanites finishes installing your replacement lenses and repairing the damaged photoreceptors.”

Jett blinked, “And where did you get new lenses from?”

“The replicator on that ship we have. We have the same specifications for the most part so replicating new lenses from your old ones and mine was pretty easy. But the Nanites were from that case of yours and I needed the specs to make those. Now if you touch your eyes you’ll irritate everything so don’t take this off.”

“Just what exactly is this?”

“This.”

Though Jett couldn’t see it, it was a large round almost cross between a helmet, sleeping mask, and sunglasses. It was rather bulbous around the front where the eyes were and slipped over one’s head like a mask but only covered the eyes.

Jett reached over and grabbed it, “Again, what is it?”

“You’re an android, use sonar and check it out.”

He pointed his head in the object’s general direction and opened his mouth in a whistle. A low, just barely audible sound echoed through the room.

“Oh, I got it. Medical Ocular Mask Type 3. High Intensity Burn treatment.”

“Uh, how did you do that?” Spitfire asked.

“In the event of ocular overload I have the sonar capability that is 100 times more sensitive than that of a bottlenose dolphin.”

“Uh…”

“Lady, we’re battle robots. Hell I don’t even know what I’m capable of,” Dane sighed.

“I guess it makes sense.”

Dane sighed, “Now keep this on,” he slipped it over the android’s head, “And don’t activate your eyes either for at least 4 days.”

“Yes sir,” he grumbled, “Were you always like this?”

“Ironically if you had your memories it would probably be you fixing me up. But here you are,” he laughed.

“Shut up asshole!”

Spitfire gasped and looked up as well as Gin. Jett had his trademark growl on his face as he ‘stared’ at Dane.

“There he is!” Dane said, “Oh dude, I knew you were in there somewhere!”

He pulled him into a hug.

“Ah! Get off me you dick!” Jett screeched.

“Aw, dude you’re back!” Dane laughed.

“Shut the fuck up! I don’t remember anything!”

“That doesn’t matter. You’re still my brother; my family and we’re all together. And that’s all that matters.”

Spitfire put a hand to her mouth and stifled a giggle. Tears streamed down her face. For a moment, things seemed normal again.

“Spitfire! Get him off of me!”

“Sorry Jett no can do,” she laughed.

“I’m going to kill all of you.”

“While I don’t doubt you have the means I doubt you really will,” Gin laughed.

“I hate girls.”

***

Kana sighed and stared at the file on her screen.

With new access to the fleet network she was able to pull more and more of the audio out of the file but still.

She looked down on her keyboard and tapped a button.

“So yeah, tonight when we reach Earth I’m gonna meet up with my family. Take advantage of some leave you know?”

“Yeah I hear you Admiral.”

“So what are you planning?”

“Well I was going to-”

A loud explosion came through the speakers.

“My god… All Decks this is the Captain speaking, evacuate the ship immediately. We have lost atmospheric stabilization and we’re venting fuel into space. Get to your designated escape pods and shuttle craft. All personnel on Deck 2 you’re atmosphere has been compromised. You have two minutes before automatic atmospheric venting. Evacuate your deck immediately.”

“What the hell hit us?!”

“A radiological reading looks like a small nuclear device of about a kiloton inside the number five cargo bay on Deck 2. The explosion has ruptured the fuel tanks and we’re in an uncontrolled counter clockwise spin.”

“Emergency thrusters, aft starboard. Get us under control.”

“Trying Sir.”

“Emergency escape pods have begun launch. Open hanger bay doors.”

“Open Hanger bay Doors.”

Static.

Kana sighed, “I need more processing power.”

A voice behind her spoke up, “If you would like I could lend some of my core logic to help.”

Kana spun around in her chair. A young woman with a casual naval garb and long brown hair was standing before her. Her image flickered. A hologram.

“Oh, Ajax. Hello. What are you doing here?”

“Well we don’t start until tomorrow so I figured I’d stop by and visit my new working partner,” she peered over, “Looks like you’re working on cleaning up an audio file.”

“Yeah, a subspace echo that I picked up. Kinda just curious about what’s in it so I guess it’s become a kind of hobby.”

“I see. Well have you tried a subspace buffering program?”

“No, not yet. Why?”

Ajax smiled, “Give it a try. And see what else you can get out of it.”

“Oh, uh, okay.”

“And while you’re at it, try a delayering protocol.”

Kana smiled, “So you’re an AI huh?”

“Yes.”

“Hmm, you and the Admiral seem to have a nice relationship.”

“I act as his therapist of a sorts. Plus I’m one of his few surviving friends.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, I’ve been with him pretty much from the beginning. I actually started off as his family’s personal secretary AI but wherever he went he kinda just took me with him until I got upgraded to a Ship’s AI when he moved his flag to the Midnight Eternity.”

“Wow. Oh, the program is almost done running…”

***

“Morally, I am incorruptible. Mentally, I am sharpened, but Emotionally, I am impulsive; my mood subject to change at the slightest whim, quick to anger, impossible to forgive. Anger is my favorite. And that is my weakness.”

Author's Notes:

I had some free time.