As the bright red sunlight broke through the cells’ windows, prying open Ludo’s eyes and causing a yawn to spread across his face, a guard approaches the cell and knocks on the stiff metal bars. 

“Hey 12210415,” he announces, “You have a visitor.”

He sits up slowly and stares at the guard silently.

“Yeah you, get up. You only got half an hour

…

Ludo sat at the same booth he was before, but now with two guards stationed around the booth with batons. From the ceiling pops out a small drone that hovered above him, scanning him top to bottom with green and red lasers. Cairo hobbled up to the booth with a crick in his leg and a small brown paper bag in his hand. When he sees Ludo sitting compliantly, he smiles and releases his breath. 

They both pick up their phones, Cairo making the first words.

“So, how was the past week?” 

Ludo shrugs. “Fine I guess.”

“Good, good. W-”

“Before you say anything-” Ludo interrupts. Cairo nods silently and purses his lips. “Can you explain exactly what I would be doing with your friend?”

“Oh, of course!” Cairo sighs in relief. “Your job would be to help upgrade and repair Dante’s ship as need be. You would get free board and food, and be a Planet-Hopper yourself! O-oh wait, you don’t know what that is…”

“No it’s fine,” Ludo assures, “I’ve learned.”

“Oh good,” he smiles.

Ludo leans in and places his elbows on the counter. “I’ll help.”

Cairo stares up at him. 

Ludo stares back.

“Wait, really?”

“Yep.”

“J-just like that?”

“Mhm.”

“O-oh. Oh! That’s great!”

“I just have two conditions,” he starts, holding two fingers up.

“Of course!” Cairo complies, “What are they?”

“First, I don’t want a big bounty. Bounties seem like too much hassle for me, plus I was already wanted before. Didn’t like the feeling.”

He nods.

“Second, I want you to teach me how to control my Shine.”

Cairo’s eyes shoot open. “You know what that is?” He whispers.

Ludo nods.

“Civilians aren’t supposed to know what it is. How did you find out?”

Ludo chuckles, “You must’ve not read my case file. I’m no civilian, I was a member of the Emerald Tribe.”

Cairo stares at him blankly.

“Y’know, the Emerald Tribe? Worst gang in Sunport? Run by Eckart and Esmalt the bormen?”

“Sorry, I’ve only been on Bor for a few weeks myself.”

Ludo sighs. “Forget it, it’s not important. My point is that I know what it is, but I can’t control it myself. I need help from an experienced user.

Cairo blushes and grins, rubbing the back of his head. “Heh, no one has complimented me on my shine usage before. That’s very… Hey wait… how do you know I can use it?”

Ludo peers around him. The guards are standing still without a twitch and the drone overhead has locked back into the ceiling. Slowly he reaches into his shirt and pulls out the beetle shaped pendant and places it on the counter. “In truth, I’m not entirely sure. All I know is that you’re really good at it. You must have been using it passively, even if you’re able to hide it.”

Cairo stares at him for a while before breaking into a small chuckle, then staring down at his feet. “It must have been obvious.” A fine sheet of light had emerged from his body, creating a soft blue glow that brightened his eyes. “I didn’t want to introduce myself with my Shine out, just in case it was taken the wrong way.”

“Understandable,” Ludo responds, “If a normal person saw you glowing blue, they’d probably shit themselves.”

They both laugh, the blue glow surrounding Cairo flickering like a flame. He slowly raises his head and stares at Ludo intently.

“Is that all it’ll take for you to come with us?” 

Ludo looks at him determined, eyes glowing brightly with a light he had not seen before.

“Yes.”

He smiles. “Then I have one thing to say before we go.”

Ludo stares down at him. “Before we go? What do you mean?”

Cairo ignores him. “Meilin told me conclusively, she is happy.” He reaches into the paper bag and pulls out a couple small photographs, which he slides under the glass. As he picks them up, Ludo’s eyes begin to well. In them stands a much smaller statured borman, head and body shaped hexagonally with smoothed brown edges. Her smile was bright and clear in each photo, the long quills that lay on her head loosely hanging on top of her shoulders, softer than Ludo had ever seen them before. Her clothes were new and clean, long skirts with baggy shirts and no scratches or holes to speak of. She looked like a young sun, excitedly sitting in the center of attention.

Ludo wipes his face and slides the photos back to Cairo, nodding silently. 

“You ready to go?” he asks.

Ludo looks back at him, squinting harder than before. “What do you mean? I can’t just leave.”

Cairo smiles, “Oh, can’t you?” Leaning forward, he places his hand on the divider that stood between them. Without warning the several layers of glass transformed into a thick layer of snow, which Cairo quickly scooped away with his bare hands. Ludo stumbles back quickly as Cairo reaches his hand forward, gesturing for Ludo to take it. 

“C’mon!” He insists. Ludo nods and jumps through the snow, which melts on his skin.

“What’s your plan here?” Ludo asks him. 

Cairo winks. “Don’t worry, no plan is the best plan.”

“What?!”

Cairo reaches into his pocket and pulls out several small chunks of ice, shaped like hockey pucks. Clasping one between his hands, he sends his blue energy to his hands, causing them to glow tremendously. Within seconds he releases them as the puck becomes suspended in midair, its shape changing and growing into that of a person. What stands is a small devil, a species of people who are small with red skin, with horns and tails and sharply shaped features. 

This devil wore long, frizzy hair that extended down her head and covered one eye. Her skin was a pale red, nearly a pinkish tone with bright green bruises lining her face and a small bandage across the bridge of her nose. She wore a red letterman jacket and a thin white undershirt, both with the english character “P” displayed proudly and prominently on the back and front respectively. She had straight, mostly flat horns that crooked at a 50 degree angle on the top of her skull and resembled kitchen knives more than horns. Her hands looked like they could cover the entirety of her face, with each of her fingers thick like hot dogs poking out of her palms.

As she stood there, her teeth chattered loudly as she held her arms close to her chest. “C-cold!”

“Hey Pop,” Cairo asks, “get us outta here please.”

The devil, apparently named Pop, gives a shaky thumbs up before blowing on her hands to give them warmth. The guards that were stationed at Ludo’s side had realized what had been going on and began to charge through the hole in the wall at them. Pop looked at them and in a blur smacked both of them against the wall, her arm constricting and expanding like a balloon with a yellow sheen glowing from it.

Ludo’s jaw hit the floor. “What was that?” 

Pop looked back and smirked, raising her thumb. “Smash!” She bends down to the ground and pushes off, running straight at the wall opposite from them with her fist raised, which begins to expand, nearly touching the walls and ceiling. Releasing her fist into the wall, the bricks and metal collapse under her weight, sending waves of dust and tremors through the room. The new hole in the wall pours the warm dawn light in like a water pitcher pouring the sun. Pop leaps out of the new window into the courtyard below, cushioning her fall with inflated limbs.

“Wait!” Ludo calls.

Cairo looks back at him, ready to leap out the window himself. “What is it?”

Ludo stammers, thoughts leaving his ears like smoke through like a chimney. 

“Were actually getting out…” he mutters to himself. With a quick smile he says, “If we’re escaping, there is someone else I’d like to take with us.”

Cairo nods, reaching for another puck of ice. “Hey Pop!”

“Uh!” She responds.

“You mind waiting here? Ludo’s gotta grab something.”

She nods and gives a big thumbs up. 

…

Rezuk sat in the cafeteria as the alarms went off, their piercing tone causing his ear lobes to shrivel and his nose to pop out of place. Several sheets of metal slide across the exits as guards rush stand watch in heavy armor with riot shields. Several concerned prisoners question the guards as to what’s going on, but are rejected and in some cases smacked down by their batons, whose tips glow a bright blue with the crackle of electricity. In the distance, beyond the sirens blare, Rezuk can hear the loud sproinging of a spring, like a big slinky or a Salmn, a kelkish fidget device for kids with doodads and springs that make unique sounds.

A door to the cafeteria, the one leading to the cells, groans loudly as it dents. Guards stand in silence as the source of the springy noise batters through the thick layers of metal, bouncing over and over, crumpling the barriers like tin foil. The last hit blew the entire line of guards away, thrown into the crowds of prisoners who were all but enjoying their morning oats and milk. In the doors wake stood a large earthman whose muscles stood large, nearly popping off of the person they were attached to. He wore a striped green and white leotard with no other clothes aside from some black deep brown loafers. His bald head shone into the eyes of everyone in the room and his black twirly mustache grinned for him. Quickly he trots over to Rezuk, who stares at him with wider eyes than an owl. 

“Are you Monsieur Rezuk?” he asks, extending his hand forward. His quiet and reserved tone sent pleasant chills down Rezuk’s spine as he nodded. 

“Mon name is Edward,” he grinned, “but you can call me Ed. Monsieur Ludo asked me to get you.” 

Rezuk stares up at him awestruck and flushed, slowly extending his hand forward where Ed takes it and lobs him over his shoulder, quickly trotting out of the room where Ludo and Cairo stood panting, surrounded by the incapacitated bodies of several well armed guards.

“J-jeez,” Ludo pants, “Y-you… are so f-fast… for your size.”

Cairo wipes the sweat from his brow and chuckles. “Yeah, that’s our Ed.”

“What’s going on, Ludo?” Rezuk asks.

“We’re-” He gulps. “We’re escaping.”

Rezuk’s eyes widen as big as they can go. He attempts to stammer out some response but fails. “Oh.”

They all quickly hurry back to the window Pop had made. Peering below they could see her punching and kicking guards that were beginning to surround her, pressuring her with their electric sticks but failing to hit her as she shrunk and expanded seemingly at will. Ed places Rezuk firmly on the ground and leaps in after her. 

His muscles expanded further, similarly to how Pop inflates her body, but Ed appears to do it in a much more controlled and restricted manor. Where Pop expanded her limbs far beyond their normal confines, all of Ed’s muscles seemed to simply pump up like a tire rather than a balloon. They grew larger and their veins pronounced themselves upon his arms, legs and chest, but never to the extreme levels Pop had experienced. They stood back to back, each striking the guards as they descended upon them. They each took down dozens of guards, delivering quick blows to their helmets and expensive high tech chest pieces which pushed them back into the people behind them and knocked them over like dominoes. Pop and Ed each worked around each other, moving with the grace of dancers and helping each other as they could.

From a door came one rather large guard, at least 10 feet tall and wearing a special type of armor surrounded in electricity, as if he wore an electric fence on his chest, holding a large sword that crackled as well. The rest of the guards stumbled backwards as he approached the duo, who stood their ground and began to glow their respective colors of yellow and red. As the guard swung the sword to them, Ed lunged forward followed by Pop who leapt on his back. Gripping his shoulders tightly, her energy began to fuse with his, creating a bright flash of green light that blinded the large guard.

As he looked back down, the two were gone- not a trace of their existence left. Bewildered, he stumbled around, swinging his sword wildly at the air in hopes of swatting them like flies if they were still around. It proved fruitless, however, as behind his shield of electricity both Ed and Pop’s fists emerged, quickly denting and nearly blowing entirely through the armor. The electricity faded as they reappeared hands first, slowly expanding back into existence. 

Pop yells triumphantly, the hair on her head frizzing up as if she’d been touched by a static balloon. Hopping off Ed’s shoulder, she inflates her hands again, cupping them at the bottom of the hole, gesturing for the rest to follow suit. Cairo quickly complies, rubbing another puck in his hands. 

Rezuk stood at the edge of the hole, legs trembling and jaw pried open wide. Ludo steps up and pats him on the back.

“Let's go.”

Rezuk peers up at him and nods, leaping down onto the soft pillow-like cushion of her hands with Ludo following suit. As soon as he lands, Pop’s muscles twitch and she lets out a small yelp.

“Ah! Sharp and hev-vey!” She retracts her hands and licks her wounds. 

“Oh, sorry,” Ludo apologizes. 

The puck Cairo had rubbed inflated back into a new person, this time a Kelk with a bushy black bull cut and a long-nosed ivory mask that extended a foot from his face, intricately detailed with red paint and large sobbing eyes. He wore a contrasting pair of dirty denim overalls and knee-high rubber boots with a clean blue short sleeved undershirt that presented the bright green scars on his forearms. 

“Whutchuh need, Cairo?” he asks. His voice was low and gruff, with the sound of an unknown accent. 

“Kernel,” Cairo replies, “We need you to tunnel under the building to the launch site.”

Kernel salutes, taking a handful of seeds out of his pockets and gripping them tightly in his fists, which now begin to glow a bright green. With a quiet mutter he throws the seeds to the ground where they expand exponentially- nearly to the size of a person- before burrowing underground quickly like dozens of drills. Kernel gestures to the ground where jumps in after the seeds, followed by Ed and Pop.

“What’s even going on…” Rezuk murmurs.

Cairo manages to overhear him and laughs heartily. “Sorry you got roped into it. Welcome to the world of the Planet-Hoppers, kid!”

He leaps into the hole and Ludo follows close behind. Rezuk trembles for a moment before looking back and seeing a storm of guards pushing their way into the courtyard. With a small yelp he leaps down the hole behind them, murmuring as he tumbled down into the vast darkness of the underground.