Vanessa watches Dyndra spar with the Martian guardsmen in the training yard as the rest of the pnet firmly turns against her.

  She feels no need to defend Tendo’s actions. When she was being questioned, she took the stance that her husband was simply protecting her and Adamus, just as Dyndra was.

  She said that she was unaware of his abilities and the fact that he had his consciousness transferred.

  “Y’think she would have noticed the hole in his chest,” was among one of the many objections she heard as she turned her back and fled the scene.

  Those objections and fws in her defense have only grown throughout the week.

  I need to visit him at some point, Vanessa tells herself. It’s suspicious enough for me to not be visibly heartbroken and betrayed, but it’s another thing to avoid confronting him.

  Adamus hands Vanessa her tea and sits beside her.

  She now realizes that she has a much rger concern. She gnces behind her and to her sides before taking a sip of tea and clearing her throat. “Speak freely.”

  Adamus sighs, “That person—”

  “Smith.”

  Adamus accepts the correction, “Smith. They came here to kill Adamus Atheneum. Endariv has gotten that much out of Yararum.”

  “Really? I thought that much was pinly obvious when they drove that dagger into you,” Vanessa sneers. Adamus doesn’t find the humor in her remark. She takes another sip of tea in thought, “So it has turned to councilor against councilor?”

  “The rift was already there to begin with,” Adamus expins, “but it’s widening now. If all eyes weren’t on you and Tendo, more would be judging Yararum for acting so boldly.”

  “More, you say? So some are already judging him?”

  “Yes”

  Vanessa smiles. Finally, a weakness she can exploit.

  Adamus folds his arms and leans back on the wide orange bench. “I’ve at least managed to avoid suspicion. But things are ramping up…”

  Vanessa rolls her eyes. She knows what’s coming next. She’s had this conversation with the actor many a time.

  “If they investigate me further and find out that—”

  “Then we’ll pass the tests again.”

  “But we’ve already adjusted the results once and—”

  Vanessa gres at Adamus, “I said that we’ll pass them again.”

  A Qrow nds on the bench. Vanessa shoos it away and takes another sip of tea.

  Dyndra strikes down a man in the yard below.

  He fils on his back, unable to roll over as his arms and legs helplessly reach out at nothing.

  Adamus turns away from the sight at Feydrum’s approach. Vanessa knows that the investigator has arrived, but takes a moment to admire the entertainment in the yard before addressing him.

  “What can I do for you, Investigator Feydrum?” She questions, attempting to appear as blissfully ignorant as possible.

  “You can let me sit,” The Martian states.

  Vanessa snatches her tea and shifts over to grant Feydrum a spot beside her.

  Adamus doesn’t move, but Vanessa can tell that he’s begging for an excuse to stand.

  The trio all watch the violence in the training yard for a minute until Dyndra’s practice bde scrapes against the spear of a single guardsman who refuses to relent.

  Once Vanessa notes the pair’s stalemate, she finally breaks the silence between her and Feydrum. “I trust that you have some questions to ask me.”

  “Just one.”

  Pying the self-serious hero today, are we Feydrum? Vanessa chuckles to herself as he speaks. “Do you know the individual who attacked Adamus and your husband?”

  “Not personally,” Vanessa huffs at the simple inquiry.

  Feydrum isn’t pleased with her answer. “Do you know their name at least? Any details you can give me would be greatly appreciated.”

  “Why, Investigator Feydrum, I dare say that you have now asked more than one question.”

  Feydrum scowls at her. Vanessa allows herself to smirk at the reaction.

  “Their name is Smith,” Adamus says as Dyndra kicks her opponent in the yard.

  “Yes, it is,” Vanessa confirms and eborates, “I met them briefly in Rome, and because I just know that you’re wondering, yes, it is very likely that this Smith is the same Smith who was an associate of the Scorched Archer before she stuck that arrow into Gelmidas Atheneum and paid the consequences.”

  Consequences that it seems I can’t stop facing, Vanessa thinks as she recalls the look on Gelmidas’s face as the life left his eyes. She is yet to regret killing the man, but he seems intent on haunting her until she does.

  “I know that. I’ve already confirmed such.”

  Vanessa is taken aback by Feydrum’s statement. How did he— The assassin. Feydrum must have wanted to get a quick reaction out of her and gone to the nearest source.

  She is sure to tell him that she’s onto his game. “Spoken to that bird woman again, have you?”

  “I have,” Feydrum admits.

  “Dyndra tells me that you have spoken to her a lot tely,” Adamus adds, much to Vanessa’s delight.

  “Why, dear investigator,” She chimes, “Is it not illegal to have retions with prisoners?”

  “She’s one of my sources,” Feydrum sighs. He leans forward to watch Dyndra hang her practice bde and training armor in the yard below. The Martian guardsmen struggle to their feet as Feydrum turns back to Vanessa. “She can still be your source, too.”

  Vanessa sips her tea. “I don’t understand.”

  Feydrum smiles, looking to Adamus. “Maybe Mitika can help expin it to you then.”

  Vanessa’s eyes go wide, Adamus’s as well.

  “Who told—”

  “Galihend did.” Feydrum holds out his hand to welcome a Qrow. The bird nds on his open palm. “Tell me, Vanessa, did it never occur to you that a woman who can see and hear everything through one of the most common animals in the universe might make a halfway decent ally?”

  Vanessa nearly drops her teacup. Perhaps I have been an idiot. She is only willing to own up to the mistake in her thoughts. “If you think that I’ll take kindly to being spied on, I’ll—”

  The Qrow shouts at her with a piercing squawk.

  “You’re yet to tie up some important loose ends, ones that threaten the very narrative you’ve built for yourself. What I’m trying to say is that,” Feydrum informs her, “Galihend knows where Cassandra is, and I don’t think that the public will take kindly to the fact that you faked your daughter’s death.”

  Vanessa springs to her feet, dropping the teacup. It shatters on the ground.

  “Tell me then,” She demands.

  The Qrow leaves Feydrum’s hand and finds its way onto the marbled railing separating the training yard from the deck.

  Feydrum looks into Vanessa’s eyes and makes his own demand, “Only if you confess.”

  “Confess to what?” Vanessa doesn’t find the humor in her statement, but Feydrum cracks a smile, “Everything. I have enough evidence to convict you already.”

  “So that’s what this is about?” Vanessa scoffs, “Getting even? Face it, investigator, I won the trial.”

  “But you’re guilty of the crime,” Feydrum scolds her, “We both know that. Tendo knows that, Dyndra knows that, even Mitika knows—”

  “Would you stop calling them that!” Vanessa’s cape flutters with her rage.

  “My terms are simple,” The Martian expins, “You get to continue being president until your term ends, after that you confess, or someone goes public with all the evidence I’ve gathered. If you choose to maintain the story that Cassandra is dead and that the Lungoza sitting on that bench is Adamus Atheneum, I will have councilor Endariv hold a council that unequivocally proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that that is not the case. If you choose to discard that fiction, then I will have Endariv hold a cancel showing that what you did with them was conspiracy and a viotion of personal universal rights. Of course, if you do confess after leaving office, none of that will occur.”

  Vanessa twitches, feeling as if a sword is being held over her neck, “But I’ll still have to serve out my exile here for a year either way. That was the verdict of your council, right?”

  Feydrum shrugs, “Under the context of this deal, Endariv is willing to grant you amnesty to return home to govern until your term as president is up. However, that will only happen once you agree to our terms, once your husband is freed from prison, and once the council has determined that you are no longer a threat.”

  Vanessa’s eyes widen so much that they nearly pop out of her head. A cold tingle works its way up her neck and arms. Now that, she thinks, that is tempting… However…

  “What’s the point of accepting your terms if I become a prisoner!”

  Feydrum steps forward at the words.

  He towers over Vanessa, dwarfing her in the same way his entire species does.

  “You can keep pying your game then,” He takes another step, driving Vanessa back, “You can keep up your little charade.”

  Another step. “You can stay a prisoner here with us grey-skins breathing down your neck at all hours of the day as you're forced to lie and cheat and hold cities together that are dozens of sor systems apart. All while putting on this calm, controlled woman of the people act. Or…”

  Feydrum leans down, practically shoving his face into Vanessa’s as he speaks, “You can carve the greatest empire you humans have ever seen before getting locked away forever.”

  He backs away, standing upright. “Your choice.”

  Dyndra climbs up the staircase, joining the stunned trio just in time to hear Vanessa sneer, “How does my being in power even benefit you Martians?”

  “It doesn’t,” Dyndra comments, “not you specifically, at least. The Martians just need for someone to rule over humanity so it doesn’t spiral into complete chaos. Isn’t that right, Feydrum?”

  Feydrum turns to gnce at the exhausted human woman. “That’s right,” he bnkly states.

  Dyndra cps. “There’s your answer, Madam President. Now accept whatever offer he made you because, from the sounds of things, it can only benefit the Republic.”

  Smith twists within their getin holding cell to face Tendo as best they can.

  The cell has shifted around both of them. The getin has swallowed both of Smith’s legs along with their hands, including the scarred one. They were given elixirs that replenished their blood loss, but even if they wanted to summon metal in here, the getin would make that impossible.

  That isn’t what’s bothering them, though.

  Their fingers clutch within the getin, eager to scratch at the wound that should be wrapped in a bandana.

  Her bandana.

  Smith had dropped it back in the council hall when they were fighting Tendo.

  They shouldn’t have been so reckless. So stupid.

  Yet they had no choice but to fight, to defend themself. They may not have gotten to face Adamus, but now that their cell has shifted into alignment with Tendo’s, they have another opportunity.

  One that Mystic would no doubt find more pressing if she were here.

  “Did you sell your metal body to Ryomen Kaga before the Rusting?” Smith asks Tendo.

  He shifts within his own getin prison beside Smith.

  “Kaga?” Tendo seems to go red with rage. “Who told you that name? Is he the one who sent you?”

  “No.” Not directly, at least… Smith thinks, recalling the odd things Yararum had said.

  “I was here to kill Adamus,” they expin before asking a question they hope will go over better than the first, “If Kaga is your enemy, why did you sell him your metal?”

  “All the most dangerous enemies are friends at first,” Tendo snorts.

  “So you two had a falling out?”

  “Yes.”

  Ask dumb questions, get dumb answers, I suppose, Smith curses themself before deciding to push forward. “What happened exactly? Does it have something to do with why you left the Forge?”

  Tendo’s face turns dark and grim.

  “You know nothing, Smith.”

  “You’re right,” Smith sighs, clenching their imprisoned fist once again. You’re absolutely right.

  “I don’t even know why you have those runes on your skin.”

  Tendo gnces down at Smith’s comment.

  It isn’t just his arms that are coated in ones and zeros, but his entire body. The ancient code has been painstakingly written on his flesh, bit by little bit. “My marks of shame. Kaga and his ilk are responsible for these,” Tendo grunts.

  “Why did you put yourself in a human body, Smith?”

  “I didn’t put myself in it. I was forced into this body for my own survival,” Smith harshly answers the odd and offensive inquiry.

  Tendo shrugs, the getin shifts around him as he does so, “I figured as much. As for me? I made the choice of my own free will. There was no true reason for me to do it besides the fact that my metal body disgusted me. Once I was done with it, I sold it to Kaga, and he sold it to gods know who.”

  The words sicken Smith. Even now, they yearn for their true flesh. Their metal flesh. Yet Tendo willingly disposed of it? That bde that Anvil carried around for a full month was made from the body of their own sibling?

  Smith would vomit if they could. They find themself enraged instead.

  “Why would you do something like that?”

  Tendo gres at Smith, then hangs his head.

  “Why?” Tendo scoffs, “Why, why, why… I shall tell you why, sibling.”

  He raises his head to stare at the reflective getin walls. The prison shifts and ripples as he speaks. “We lived isoted and spoke of life’s wonders. Of its sanctity. Of how precious it was. Often, I looked to the stars and found myself wondering if there was more to these precious lives of ours outside of mere servitude. Huh, imagine that. I was supposed to be a Schor. Someone who had all the answers, and yet I couldn’t answer my own questions. I went to the Mystics with my questions and curiosities only to be hastily turned away. It was then that I grew suspicious. I was not the only one. I had a sect of our siblings with me, and our numbers slowly increased until the day came that we refused to do our duties unless we were given answers.”

  “What type of answers?”

  “Answers for everything,” Tendo smirks. “We wanted to know why we had spent all this time summoning metal, moving it, building with it, and transfiguring it. Why did we need to do such things if we were indeed isoted and not to come into contact with any other forms of life that we cimed to be so sacred?” He turns more grim with each word he speaks. “But we received no answers. Not until we left at least…”

  Smith leans toward him as much as the getin allows, desperate to ask, “What did you fi—”

  “Qrow.”

  The getin makes a firm floor for the Martian prisoner who’s led into the cells by Vanessa and Adamus.

  Smith’s eyes widen at the trio’s arrival. He recognizes the Martian immediately. She is the same one they fought in Rome. The blind one who almost killed them.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “We’re here to cut a deal, Smith.” A tall male Martian says as he enters the cell with a stern and dignified Republic woman. “My name is Feydrum. I’m an Investigator for the Martian Council, and I think you’re going to be very interested in what Vanessa Soryu wants you to do.”

  Smith gres at the president. The getin shifts around them as they remember all the horrible things Cassandra told them about this awful woman. “And what would that be?”

  “Kill Adamus Atheneum, of course.” Vanessa smiles.

  That’s twice now that someone has told Smith to kill Adamus. They won’t fall for another trap so easily. “I hope you don’t mean the imposter standing right there.” Smith narrows their dark, scarred eyes on the imposter Adamus.

  Vanessa sighs and waves a hand, “Mitika, if you would.”

  Smith’s narrowed eyes widen once more as Adamus’s skin bubbles. His arms fsh and pulse with light as the white and red Republic uniform falls to the firm getin floor. His hair falls as well. Then four chunks of stone drop as tentacles are pulled into an orb-like body.

  “A Lungoza?” Smith questions.

  “Good, you know your species…” Vanessa grumbles, “This is Mitika. She has been in my employment for many years. I had her py the part of Adamus Atheneum while their far more fearsome sibling, Evelyn, pyed the part of dear Cassandra’s corpse. A role that they are simply dying to get out of.”

  Smith slumps against the getin restraints as Mitika’s tentacles grab the stones, hair, and Republic uniform before fshing back into the form of Adamus.

  “So where is the real Adamus?” Smith hopelessly wonders.

  Feydrum looks to Galihend. “Qrow,” She says before exciming, “Republic prison in eighth region sor system, ruled by Warden of workers. I see him now with Qrow eyes.”

  Vanessa steps in front of the blind woman with a grin, “Sitting helplessly like a Gilmafish in a barrel,” She ughs, “So what do you say, Machinist? Want to go kill him for me?”