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The slowing of the ship did nothing to give Zenia the force to remove herself from the wall where she was firmly rooted in place. She struggled a bit more, managing to pull herself out up to her knees, her body un-forming and reforming rapidly.

She tilted her torso around to see outside the windows of Tomorrow's Treasure as the message came over the ship's intercom. Not only was she in unfamiliar space, now there were Iridiites right outside! A Series-II and who knows who else! They never travel alone, not after the order, that is. There could even be a Series-1 or an Uppercase NEOS in the vicinity.

Rotten luck! Rotten Iridiites! Rotten Captain! Rot, rot, rot!!

"Now you've done it!" Zenia groaned. "Should you have let me adjust the course uninterrupted, we wouldn't BE in this situation! We're off by several light-years, and now THEY'RE after us!"

Zenia's body twitched violently, her arms displacing themselves as they strained to pull her from the wall. "I hope they scatter your pieces across the multiverse! After all, they've got the capacity to! The minute they figure out I'm here, they're going to wipe this ship from existence!"

Zenia's one eye glared at the captain, her body contorting around it like a hazy, feverish dream. "So if you want to stay alive I suggest you listen to me this time. Keep your mouth SHUT. Got it?" She snarled, returning to her task of freeing herself. She hated being so small. She hated this body with every fiber of her existence. Had she been inside Z, she wouldn't be having any of these problems. This captain would fear her, the Iridiites outside would fear her, the galaxy would fear her, and yet currently, she was trapped outside... and well, inside a wall.

"And if you don't keep quiet about me..." Zenia added to the captain, "I'll make sure that they kill you."

The Captain pivoted quickly to face the girl.
"Wh- Are you running from them or something? Don't tell me that you expect any sort of refuge after you practically hijacked our ship! I'm a proud researcher, not a smugger for intergalactic crooks!"

Mara tread lightly and slowly to where Zenia was lodged in the wall, avoiding the light of the viewport and repeatedly checking over her shoulder to make sure that the gigantic block didn't start firing at them.

"Even if they aren't after you, they seem like a safe bet for getting you off of my ship, you little... freaky... whatever you are. What's stopping me from turning you in?"

Zenia's head shook and split several times as frustration sought outlet. Clamping her hands down on her temples, she stabilized herself in order to speak clearly to this nobody-of-a-captain.

"You're such a coward." She growled. "First you shoot at a child and now slinking away from two enemies, planning to barter one off to the other. If you knew half of what they were doing, you'd be on MY side! You would, you WOULD!"

Zenia finally freed one of her legs from the wall, falling forward as her other leg was still snagged. She hit her face against the hard metal surface, her nose breaking, yet without a single drop of blood from her body. Her small, child-like hands slowly reached up and re-adjusted her nose back into place, carefully resisting glitching as they trembled.

"I'll tell you why you shouldn't turn me in, if you're so insistent on being a goody-goody. They are going to rule the multiverse if they capture me. I'm a piece in their massive, twisted puzzle of complete and total domination of everyone and everything. They get their hands on me and it's all over. Dimensions upon dimensions soon to be conquered by a horde of barbaric Iridiite robots, and you'll only have yourself to blame."

Her body quivered, then with a forceful and sudden twist of all her ingredients, Zenia dislodged herself from the wall, distancing herself from the captain and crouching down on the opposite side of the room in the shadow of a large control panel. Huddled-in, brooding, looking exactly like a kindergartener in time-out.

"Is that a good enough reason not to turn me in? Do it my way and I might just respect you enough to let you live."

"Maybe it's abandoned" one of the two Lowercase-N units suggested.

"But to warp from hyperspace with nobody aboard? Fishy." Responded the other.

IRIS was unmoving in her assertion and from her position. Loudly, she overcame the nearby communication systems.

"I repeat, you have entered Iridiite controlled space. Failure to comply with our requests will result in your immediate termination. This is your last invitation to respond."

Her eye scoured the intruder as she loomed ever closer, the still and near lifeless ship inviting for a prying open or prying into.

"You're afraid, aren't you?" She grumbled. They most likely had never seen an Iridiite ever in their limited lifespan, either that, or they had something to hide and were avoiding her. Most anyone else would have complied or become confident in their ill-conceived ability to take her on. Perhaps they had an irrational fear of the color orange. It could be any number of variables.

"Hey, so, just curious, what happens if we do find something on the ship?" The second Lowercase-N unit piped up from the silence of space.

The first unit was quick to respond. "Well, assuming it's whatever killed Lowercase-L, one of us dies and the other captures the villain. Assuming it's Z-001, one of us dies and the other captures the villain. Assuming it's like, I dunno, a Dimensional Lord? I think in that scenario we would try and bargain, but it doesn't work, then one of us dies, and the other captures the villain..."

"Stop talking." IRIS commanded. "Unless you're willing to try and strike up a conversation with whoever is on that ship, I don't want to hear another peep out of you two."

There was a long, awkward pause. Though they were much more "advanced" than the blocky spacefarer IRIS, they didn't dare risk fighting with the very vessel that carried them.

After what felt like an eternity, one of them quietly piped up on the communication channels.

"Ah, yes, hello? Iridiite Unit Lowercase-N NEOS reporting. Our ship has tried to communicate with you multiple times to no response. Is, uh, anyone on board? I mean, if not, we'll totally blast you still, but like, you know! Common courtesy, we won't do it until we're sure you're there- I mean, not there. Haha! Uhm, so, yeah! If yoooou're on-board, hey, we'd like to say hello before we come knocking! Was that right? Did I do it right?"

Eyeing the huddled whatever-she-was in the corner, Mara slowly and reluctantly received and answered the transmission.

"Mara Moruya, expedition leader and captain of Tomorrow's Treasure speaking."

She glanced out of the ship's viewport. The orange, eyed block and it's contents were getting closer. It almost seemed angry, but was it even possible for a space station to feel... anger? And why just one eye?

Mara quietly turned to look at the girl again, fumbling words to appear as though she was still attentive.

"Our ship malfunctioned and we warped here without knowledge that it was currently being monitored..." She bluffed with scholarly poise, "We're just barely recovering from the sudden jump, a few of us were unprepared and we're assessing the damage..."

Mara focused in on Zenia's darkened face as best she could. The child's left eye was visible, with the right side of her face covered with her red hair. She could feel Zenia's piercing eye from across the room.

Look out the viewport. The space-station and it's singular eye were steadily approaching, it's eye on the left side of what she assumed could be called a "face", and on the right, a series of letters, "IRIS".

"... Uh, what are your requests? Awaiting reply." Mara hastily asked, turning off the microphone on her end of the transmission. She turned to face Zenia, who still didn't look as though she approved any of the captain.

"Alright, I just need to confirm something with you if I'm sure you're not trying to trick me. You say they're after you, that there going to take over the universe or something if they capture you... so prove to me that you're connected, that you're not just on the run from what you rightfully have coming for you. What are you hiding underneath that hair of yours, on the right side of your face?"

Zenia scoffed at the captain's request.

"Of course, you scientists are always asking for proof. Is faith dead? And here I thought humans would believe what comes from a higher power."

She writhed in the darkened corner. Writhing in the dark confines of the control room... a higher power indeed, just not in her current condition. She despised this vulnerability, because she never had to answer to anyone before this, she had only needed to blast her opposition to miniscule pieces and be over with the ordeal. For once, she was actually at someone's mercy, though it wasn't the captain she feared.

The blasted, stubborn, and crass IRIS unit, along with her dopey Lowercase-N lackeys... pitiful excuses for Iridiites, and yet they were the ones threatening her with capture. The captain was the only barrier between her and a return to the Iridiites.

"Fine then." She said after finishing her inner-confrontation. "Here's the proof you seek, if you want to see it so badly."

With a hand, she pushed back the strands of hair that covered nearly half of her face, revealing an uncanny asymmetry. She lacked her right eye, she lacked a socket for it too, and where could have been a hole was simply a spot of continuous skin. No blemishes, no scars, no cavities or crevices, no evidence of an eye ever being where it should have.

"In the manner of all the Iridiites, I too have a letter. However, this... skin... does a poor job of holding it in."

Zenia made a quiet motion, pointing with a solitary hand out of the window and into the decreasing space. "That primitive block is labeled 'S'. She wasn't the first, nor will she be the last, and I say 'she' because she isn't just a useless, floating brick, she was a useless person as well. Her only redeeming quality was that she could be compressed and become that brick. I, however, am unique. I am much more than a compressed soul. There was only one of me, and they had their chance."

Her hand twitched, bending like uncomfortable rubber, and becoming a letter, which she placed over the eyeless skin.

"I am letter Z. The most powerful of all. Should they capture me, you will die. Everyone will."

"So there is somebody on board at least." Grumbled IRIS. "Captain, possibly a crew, it's a medium ship after all. Ask them to declare the number of crew members and any objects aboard being transported, including firearms."

Trying it's best to sound tough, a Lowercase-N unit promptly made the demands. "If you are to pass through Iridiite space," She boomed, trying to gather some sense of authority, "you must declare each passenger aboard your craft, as well as any weapons you are currently in possession of. We are searching for two enemies that stand against the greater good of the reformed Iridiite nation, and as such-"

"N." IRIS huffed. "You've said ENOUGH."

"Ah, uh, yes. Declare your uh, contents please. Oh! and uh, requesting permission to board, that too. Thank you!"

IRIS's systems made a collective sigh. These two, it seemed, were simply uncut for being rigid and strict. She loved her fellow Series-II, but seeing them abandon their charm for advancement into NEOS didn't change the fact that many of them had been wayside scrap for thousands of years.
She groaned, knowing full well they were EQUIPPED for this field of work, having more humanoid forms allowed for greater mobility and potential over blocky bodies, yet an exterior couldn't change their internal core. Deep inside they were formed from fear, fear of an impending doom that would eventually leave them without people.

She was convinced she would have to pick up the slack. Quietly in the background, IRIS pinged the systems of Tomorrow's Treasure to gain insight into the make and model, place of production, and any registered information within the console.

For a human, that data would have to be decoded or asked for by a crewmember, but between ships, this data was often interchanged many times. Tracking systems and waypoints throughout the galaxy also often pried into the silent information guarded within a ship's data logs. Each craft had a unique number, code, sometimes even names. IRIS wasn't a human, though she wasn't fully computer either, giving her the upper hand in an almost predatory relationship. Tomorrow's Treasure would receive nothing but Iridiite propaganda while IRIS decoded the ships every movement within the past week.

It's last stop before warp had been Helinime-IV, registered number of crew on board, six.

Mara's found her attention ripped from Zenia's half-face to the pressing demands of the outside Iridiites. Permission to board?! What kind of regulated space was this?! Not even in a warzone would she dream of a space-station pressuring her into allowing someone to board!

"Boarding won't be necessary, we're an exploration and research team." Mara contested. "We don't have any weaponry on the ship itself besides a few plasma-blasters under the wings, and each crew member is armed with a single, medium-range energy blaster. They're standard issue and not prohibited in any system. No modifications have been made. We aren't transporting weaponry either and-"

There was a pounding on the door leading into the control room. Mara nearly jumped into the ceiling as the sudden noise rippled through the silence.

Dunnovan's muffled voice dimly passed through the door. "Mara?! Mara are you in there? The hell was up with that warp?! If we hadn't been in our pods we would have been rattled to death! Can you hear me, Mara?"

"Our... Our number of crew is... six, can you give me a minute? I have to open the dooooor to the control rooooom-" She babbled, turning off communications abruptly and shakily moving away from the viewport. The eye of the orange block seemed intent on staring her down. The figures in the yellow viewport seemed to exchange confused glances. Avoiding looking directly at them, Mara gently opened the door as Dunnovan practically was about to bust it down.

"Mara! Are you alright?! I felt the warp activate and then the loud voice as we came to a stop, I went looking for you in the mess hall and you weren't there, so I came here and-"

"Dunnovan!" Mara shushed. "Keep it down, we're in some THICK danger! There's a space-station with an eye on it, and it's crew is forcibly requesting permission to board. We've randomly entered their zone of control and we're in a hot mess if they get on this ship. They're looking for escapees."

"So let them board?" Dunnovan whispered. "We've got nothing to hide, Mara. If anything they could give us directions out of here."

"We DO have something to hide, Dunnovan."

"What in the heavens are we hiding from a space station with an eye?!" Dunnovan questioned abrasively.

Unmoving, Mara pointed Dunnovan to the darkened corner using just her eyes. He leaned to the side, perplexed, yet catching sight of a small girl who he had never seen before staring back at him with an unforgiving eye. Her form wobbled and twisted before snapping back to "normal". Dunnovan's eyes widened.

"who is that??" he gasped. "how did she get in here???"

"They're after her." Mara warned. "She's some sort of catalyst in a universal domination plan or something. It's crazy, Dunnovan, you have to believe me on this one. I swear that I'm not making this up."

"Mara what the HELL is going on?!?"

"Dunnovan, trust me. You have to play it cool. I'm trying to convince them that we mean them no harm and that this is an accident. Okay?"

"And if we don't?!"

"We either get blasted by the space-station or the girl rips our insides out. Dunnovan I need you to stay calm. I'm finishing up giving inventory of the ship's passengers, alright?" Casually, she turned away from Dunnovan and went back to the communications system.

Dunnovan looked at her, looked out at the approaching space-station, and then at the girl in the corner, whose gaze was like a searing knife cutting through lukewarm jelly.

"Mara." He whispered. "I was having second thoughts, but after this? I'm definitely retiring."

Mara chimed in on the communications again with the Iridiites on the other end. "Pardon the absence, my crew is reorienting after the sudden warp, we're a Captain and Expedition Leader, Survivalist, Cartographer, two excavation experts, and one scholar of galactic artifacts. Inventory as requested. Awaiting reply."

Ending communications she breathed a sigh of relief, then took it back in, along with the tension she had expelled. She peered out the viewport and at the giant block which loomed nearby.

The two Lowercase-N units looked at each other. "If they're telling lies, they're doing a fine job at it." One suggested.

"I'm inclined to believe them, they could just be down on their luck, the rag-tag group." The other muttered. "But you know, we can never be too safe. I don't want to be remembered as the N unit that let some psycho with a murder-weapon pass us by."

Hesitating slightly, the first rang in over communications again, quietly beaming their words to the Captain. "We're pleased with your inventory! Yes, yes, you sound like good company, however in order to complete inventory under orders, we need to give a quick headcount. Requesting permission to board!"

Dunnovan looked at Mara from across the room. Mara looked back at him. They exchanged confused and worrisome glances, almost telepathically asking the other what to do yet unable to receive an adequate response.

Mara slowly opened the communications channel again.

"Permission denied." She replied, tension thickening in the air around her lips. "We're in no condition to allow passengers after a sudden warp and we are unaware of the state of our entire crew."

"Requesting permission to board." Snapped IRIS, her voice thundering over both the Captain and the Lowercase N units. Her single eye scrutinized the interior of the control room of Tomorrow's Treasure.

"P-Permission denied!" Mara responded hastily. "We need to check for injuries first!"

"PERMISSION TO BOARD OR WE OPEN FIRE." Threatened IRIS. She moved closer to the white ship, her photon-cannons lighting up as they charged with energy.

The two Lowercase-N units were startled by the sudden fierceness of their host. "IRIS!" They both exclaimed. "What's gotten into you? Is it that urgent?"

"Idiots!" IRIS scoffed. "Their ship's registry is detecting SEVEN bodies on the craft, and ONE of them isn't using any OXYGEN!"