Solar and Daron finally reached the interrogation room.
When they entered, they immediately spotted Serion and Sephra. Both of them were sitting on the floor, heads lowered, with hair falling into their faces. Solar quickly placed Hira at the control panel to disable the cells, and then rushed to their two companions.
“Look up! It’s me!”
“It’s about time. We were starting to get bored,” Serion raised his head. The man’s eyes had dark circles underneath, his face was strained and tired, and his hair was disheveled, but he didn’t seem broken. For a split second, he did something that the girl didn’t expect. He smiled.
However, when he noticed there were only two of them, the smile vanished.
“Where is Angron?”
Solar bit her lip and looked to Daron for help.
“He… He got left behind,” the boy hesitated to say, and Serion fixed him with a stern gaze. “He transformed and nearly killed us.”
“What?!”
Sephra jumped up so suddenly from her seated position that the two young ones hopped back. Her condition was no better than the man’s, but it seemed the news had immediately roused her.
“How could you leave him behind?! Do you know what you’ve done?!”
Solar muttered. “I’m sorry. But we really didn’t have a choice. He would have killed us.”
“Admiral…” Serion spoke softly.
The woman looked at her and then turned back to Daron and the others.
“What exactly happened? I need a report.”
“He didn’t have his calming substance thing with him, and he attacked us,” Daron explained.
“I see. That’s a problem. We can’t leave him down there.”
At this point, Hira had finished its task, and the energy barrier had disappeared. Serion stood up, and Sephra was already outside, pacing nervously.
“How long does it take to reach the spaceship from here?” Sephra asked.
“The hangar isn’t far,” Daron replied confidently. “We can find it quickly, and now there are four of us. It won’t be difficult.”
“Three,” the woman corrected. “I will get Angron out. Go ahead without me.”
“Wait a minute,” Solar interjected, irritated. “We came this far to rescue you! After all this, if they catch you again, we’ve achieved nothing!”
Sephra almost smiled.
“Don’t worry. The first time I had no choice, but I won’t let it happen again. Give me that.”
She pointed at the communication bracelet on Solar’s wrist. The girl hesitated but eventually removed it and handed it to the admiral.
“Thank you. I’ll notify you through this when you can come for us. If you’ve managed to get here so easily, Quilen probably won’t notice we’re gone for a while. If he does, he’ll be tearing his hair out in frustration for underestimating us so much.”
“That’s great, but where is this place where we can go?” Daron asked in confusion.
“There’s a back exit at the rear of the prison. It’s used for disposing of corpses. It’s not particularly well-guarded, as it leads to the void, so I’ll reach it. You’ll find it, connect the ship to it, and we’ll be good.”
Sephra looked at Serion.
“You can fly the ship there, right?”
“Yes.”
“How do you know there’s an exit?”
“Because I have an identical spaceship. Where do you think the rebels got their fleet from? They stole it from us.”
“One more thing,” Solar added, and Sephra looked at her. “The sight probably won’t be pretty. The other boy remaied still there.”
The woman remained silent. Her three companions couldn’t guess what she might be thinking.
Finally, she nodded, turned on her heel, and left.
Serion, Solar, and Daron watched her for a brief moment before turning to each other, just as Hira settled on Solar’s shoulder once again.
“This is my blaster as a robot,” Solar replied, answering the unspoken question from the man. “We would have had a harder time getting here without it. I’m sure it can get us out almost unnoticed as well. We hardly encountered anyone on our way here.”
“If not before, they’ll surely notice we’re escaping once we’re in the hangar,” Daron pointed out.
Serion picked up his knife from the nearby desk, and a moment later, he had it at Daron’s throat.
“Why should I trust you?” he demanded.
“Wait! I swear I don’t mean any harm! I only obeyed him because he promised to let me go! Please, believe me!”
Serion stared at Daron with a serious expression, and Solar would have bet anything that he was contemplating whether to slice him horizontally or vertically. She was surprised when the man look at her with his black eyes and a question seemed to appear in his gaze.
“It seems like you really don’t mean any harm. I had my doubts, too, but I didn’t see any intent in him to betray us.”
As Solar made a move to raise her arm, she felt a stabbing pain. She reached for it and retrieved the greenish shard from underneath her clothes.
“By the way, we found this… They had it locked away, but I managed to steal it.”
Serion stared at the shard for a moment, then shook his head and lowered the knife, much to Daron’s relief.
“We’ll deal with this thing on the ship. Right now, it’s enough to get all of us out of here!”
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