Bad omen - A sign, either real or imagined, of ill fortune or catastrophe in the future.


They could call him what they liked; a nostalgic, or a wistful sap, but Stanford was sure there was something euphoric about feeling the comforting warmth of the sun's rays on his skin. Especially after spending time on a planet that harboured nothing but scorching darkness, where looking out onto the lonely horizon yielded only crimson fold mountains and a black sky that was crowded with blazing moons.

A little too insecure to admit it out loud, adapting to unwelcome change had always been a struggle for Stanford.

Maybe in another life, where he was slightly less of a pessimist, he'd be able to find a silver lining before his insecurities conjured up a worse-case-scenario. But in his defence, the multiverse had thrown enough bullshit his way recently. He had every reason to be pessimistic. He had every reason to be watching his back, expecting persecution to be waiting for him around every corner.

When he had first been marooned on the planet that he and Agura were cohabitating, the sun had been his worst adversary. The powerful heat had scorched his pasty complexion and sapped what depleted energy reserves he had left. The real kicker? After spending so long in crimson red where his eyes had only seen the darkest shades of black known to man - when the sunlight came, his brain was deceived by his new field of view, which was half bright colour spectrum and half vague grey shapes that danced across his line of vision. Then, he had to finally accept that there was no restoring what the red sentients had robbed him of.

If he had to compare it to something mundane, Stanford would liken it to a broken screen. Split right down the middle, one half of the screen worked correctly and the other was full of slow-moving static that buzzed and twitched, almost like radiation was seeping into his head. If he had let it, the static would have slowly but surely eaten into what was left of his sanity by now because his brain was convinced both eyes should be functioning the same and couldn't comprehend why they weren't. This discomfort was so overpowering at times that Stanford couldn't help but reach up and press his palm against the socket, just to quickly check that an eye was still there, and not just empty space.

The first time Agura had seen him doing it she'd scolded him. In fact, she'd ripped into him, shut down every futile retort he made and then she'd proceeded to lecture him about the dangers of getting foreign bacteria in his wounds.

Sometimes, she felt more like his mother than his friend.

She softened slightly when he explained the reason behind it, and after a bit of deliberating, she told him what the feeling was. Phantom pains, apparently.

"Sometimes, when people lose a limb, they feel pain from where the missing limb would have been. It's supposedly a response to mixed signals from the brain. Or, the sensation originates from damaged nerve endings or scar tissue, which might be the case here. I know that's not the same as what you're feeling, Stanford, but it could be a similar phenomenon."

That's how Agura had explained it to him, and it did make sense. So, for both of their sakes, he struggled hard with the itching urge to touch it. However, sometimes, away from Agura's watchful eye, he couldn't resist hovering his fingers over the charred skin of his eyelid. Just to check that there was indeed still an eye underneath. Or he would sheepishly approach the water's edge and peer over the side, greeted by the ghostly stranger staring back at him from below. He'd fight against the burning sensation and his weakened facial muscles to crack his eyelid open, just so he could stare impassively back at the silvery orb at the centre of his wound.

After Agura became his substitute doctor, the pains had lessened. Sitting out in the heat was less unbearable and the scar tissue on his face was less taut.

He'd never have the courage to admit out loud just how grateful he was for her help. Though, whenever he tried to return the favour, she was insistent that she didn't need help. Agura was more self-sufficient than he would ever be, but he had a sneaking suspicion that she didn't confess her own issues because she didn't want him to worry. He couldn't help but feel slightly guilty that, as resourceful and smart as Agura was; she was potentially neglecting her own needs to take care of him. Even now, he was sitting on a boulder between the junction of two caves, waiting for her to come back from a scavenging trip. It was easier for him to stay behind rather than dealing with Agura refusing to admit that he was a dead weight, but he couldn't help but feel like he was dead weight. He leant back with a sigh, rested his hands behind his head and stared aimlessly at the patterns in the rocks, swinging his legs back and forth in boredom. He cautiously scratched the side of his face, mindful of the delicate, patchy scabs. It only took catching himself or moving too quickly for the hardened wounds to crack and bleed, creating even deeper craters in the damaged skin.

He flinched as he accidentally clipped one of the scabs on his chin, feeling a sliver of blood travel sluggishly down his jaw. He swiped his finger through it, momentarily entranced.

"Stanford?"

"Stanford!"

He sat up suddenly, almost cricking his neck from the speed of his reaction to the urgency in Agura's nearby voice. There was the sound of stones becoming dislodged underfoot as Agura almost tumbled out of the cavern mouth to his right.

The intense worry in her eyes sent alarm bells ringing in his head. His heart sank deep into the pit of his stomach.

"What's wrong? I thought you were looking for supplies?"

"I-." Words seemed to desert her. She was at his side in seconds, forcefully grabbing him by the wrist and tugging her along with him, back into the shadows.

"Agura! What-."

She turned around and shushed him rather harshly. He spluttered, slightly offended, but she didn't seem to notice. His heart was left knocking against his ribs from the shaken look on her face. Once they had both been enveloped by the darkness of the cave, their voices concealed by the babbling of the cavern water, she turned to him.

"Agura, seriously, you're starting to freak me out."

"Be quiet, Stanford. You have no idea how much danger we're in." The hairs on the back of his neck stood up. Agura's grip on his wrist only strengthened until she was practically dragging him through the cave. Her dread was infectious, and his apprehension only grew as they drew closer to the light at the other side of the passage. The grip on his wrist had almost become painful as they stood just under the cropped overhang, hiding from the reach of the midday sun.

"Now are you going to tell me what's going on?" Stanford fumbled over his words. He was barely even able to compose the question.

"Sure, just take one look out there."

Agura stood in front of him, almost like a living barrier. He managed to peer over her shoulder, scanning the landscape for any signs of life. The horizon was shuddering in the heat, the dry winds sweeping up loose grains of sand and swirling them across the plains. Nothing abnormal.

"You'll have to forgive me, Agura, but I can't see anything unusual," he whispered.

"Keep looking," she said flatly.

He squinted, eyes scanning both the ground and the sky. Through the dust, something skimmed through the sky. There was a flash of gold, caught in the sunlight before the blip raced past his field of vision and he almost bumped heads with Agura trying to keep track of it. Another brief reflection of sunlight gave away the second hovering spectre, travelling in the opposite direction. The third hovered more slowly along the ground, scanning for signs of life but travelling slow enough for Stanford to figure out what he was looking at.

He let out the breath he had been holding and his shoulders slumped, seemingly in relief. Agura picked up on his body language and turned on him with an incredulous look on her face. "Stanford, do you know what this means?"

He brought his hands up in defence. "Agura, it's fine. This...this has happened before."

Her eyes widened even more. "What do you mean 'this has happened before'!?" she asked in disbelief.

"I mean, I've seen drones passing through before. Agura, as long as we stay hidden, they won't know that we're here."

She begrudgingly seemed to accept his words. "Makes sense. The Reds will be expanding their empire, looking for any colonies to conquer until they control the whole multiverse. And this world is completely barren. There is nothing left here for them to burn to the ground. But-."

Stanford's unease grew with her sudden pause. "But?" He repeated, almost sadly as he realised that their relief was short lived.

"The drones only have to look a little bit harder and they'll find evidence that we've been here. If that happens, it's likely that whoever's monitoring them will be making an appearance."

Stanford dropped into a ponder, chewing his lip in thought. He couldn't argue with her reasoning. The drones would be reporting any abnormal activity back to a command post, either of red sark, or the sentients themselves. "What do we do?"

"We need to get to the ATV and move it to somewhere where the drones can't see the contents of it. There's a tunnel branching off here to get to the watchtower. I can get there and get it hidden. If worst comes to worst, I'll come back to you and we can travel off-world-." He stopped her there as he fought down the feelings of slight resentment starting to brew inside him.

"Agura, you do realise that if you get seen and something comes after you, we might not see each other again."

The sheen of boldness never left Agura's eyes. "I'm aware. If by any chance I did get seen and then get caught by scouts - they wouldn't have us both. One of us would still be free to find the others and return to earth." Stanford was deeply uncomfortable with where her plan was heading. "Here, take this. Use it to get off-world if you absolutely have to." She extended her shaking fist towards him and deposited a bypass crystal in his palm. When he didn't move for a good few seconds, staring at the pale crystal in his palm - Agura gently folded his fingers over it and then squeezed his fist.

He swallowed the lump in his throat. He really didn't want to do this. Everything she was saying was logical and sensible, almost painfully so. He could feel his palm shaking in her grip so surely Agura could feel it too?

The last thing he wanted was to be left alone again. He was a poor decision-maker. He was a poor survivalist. He was a poor fighter. Despite feeling like he had grown up virtually by himself; a world without other people was horribly daunting to be suddenly dropped into and Stanford knew it would only shatter his confidence into more pieces the second time. He knew he lacked the skills that Agura used so well to survive alone. Stinging tears began to well up at the corner of his eye. She couldn't just leave the tatters of their mission to him, he was hopeless. He couldn't even protect his friends; how could he protect everyone else relying on them to stop the red sentients?

He wasn't ashamed of the fact that in these short few weeks, Agura had come to know him better than almost anyone else ever had. She picked up on his unease quickly, pulling him into a hug without a second thought.

"I'll be as careful as I can, I promise. It won't come to that" Likewise, he was sure he now understood more about her than anyone on the team had before. She had always been strong, impossibly stubborn and would hunt down anyone who labelled her as helpless. However, he had come to the conclusion that her strong fa?ade was an intricately woven front and what scared him the most was that beneath it; Agura was as frightened as he was.

They swiftly detangled like this was a regular occurrence within their lives.

"Keep an eye on those sentries for me, don't get seen."

"And make sure you come back in one piece."

She scoffed at his comment, holding his gaze for a moment before retreating into one of the side passages. He listened to the sound of her footsteps fading away before slinking down behind a rock and releasing the breath he had been holding.

His mind was starting to overflow with anxiety. The dire thoughts thrashed and twisted through his head in an almost feral way, impossible to cage or pin down. Agura would come back or die trying, he had no doubt about that. With every close brush with death they'd dealt with; Stanford found that his thirst to live was only getting stronger.

Stanford was a shell of the man who once fought for multiversal freedom in the battle force 5 alongside his friends, he knew there was no denying that. However, he wasn't the same man that had been incarcerated by the red sentients either. That Stanford Isaac Rhodes had been hounded by a nagging itch that made him indifferent to death and made him see it as a welcome reprieve from the cruelty he'd endured.

However, Agura's iron will to survive was contagious, and it had weighed heavy on his shoulders rather swiftly. He didn't want her knowing that if they were caught, it was very likely that they would be passed to the highest bidder, and each would be more callous and savage than the last.

A sharp tingle spread up his neck and he pressed his shaking palm against the lumpy scar tissue on his face. Better to steer himself away from those thoughts.

He turned, leaning upwards and peering over the rock shielding him to look for any signs of life in the desert. Nothing.

Seeing nothing was unnerving. And hearing nothing was even more unnerving. Any more failing senses could be the end of him. He watched the horizon with growing unease until a droning mechanic sound snared his attention. Taking a moment to completely focus on it, he knew it wasn't Agura because the sound of her jury-rigged vehicle was more of a wavering ungodly spluttering roar than a constant whirring sound.

He saw the bottom half of the sentry hover down into the maw of the cave seconds later and he barely had enough time to drop down behind the rock before it was hovering at the entrance. At least, that was what he assumed it was doing. The sound neither got louder nor quieter, it just kept wavering at that same threatening pitch and there was an ominous red light beaming into the cave. The light grew in ferocity as the sentry hovered deeper into the cave, closer to his position.

He curled up into a ball, trying to make himself as small as possible without making a sound. He had his hand clamped over his face to dull the sound of his rapid breathing - an action that was quickly making him feel nauseous. If its audio enhancers were anything like his reverb's, it could probably pick up the sound of his heart as it hammered against his chest, almost trying to escape his body. It whizzed straight past him, moving deeper into the cave, and expertly weaving between the stalactites and precariously placed boulders. His gaze followed the mesmerising crimson light further into the darkness as it methodically scanned the walls.

He remembered what Agura had said. She had been forced out her last battle zone by sentry drone that had been programmed to torch the entire ecosystem. There was nothing but ruins left to shelter them here, which made it easier to flush them out of hiding. The red sentients sent their machines out to search the far corners of the multiverse to find and enslave any colonies not already under their tyranny. The red sentients were ruthless hunters and they would know just how many humans had escaped their wrath and they would be actively trying to hunt them down and terminate them.

He tensed up at the sound of another sentry entering the cave, this one moving past him and speeding off to the left. Then he could hear one more, which seemed to be moving much slower, almost to the point where it had to have been hovering directly above him. He screwed his eyes shut in dread, carefully pulling his cloak down over his face as far as he could. It drifted over him, following the same path that the others had taken.

Stanford held his breath for as long as he possibly could, listening to the sark travel further into the cave and out of sight. Here he was, cowering from enemies that he once would have been able to blast out of the sky without a second thought. He highly doubted Agura would be hiding in fear like this. She would be in the thick of the action, pushing herself to her physical limits to support those around her. During their last disagreement, Agura had called him sheltered and spoon-fed. She had quickly taken those statements back and assured him that there was no animosity between them. He knew she was right though. If he were even half as self-sufficient as she was, she wouldn't have to keep picking up his slack. At times, he even caught himself feeling envious of her resourcefulness.

He wasn't about to keep sitting there safe and sound whilst she was risking her life to save them both.

Limbs shaking so hard that he could barely stand, Stanford scrambled onto his feet, clumsily clambering his way across the rocks and into the side passage that Agura had disappeared down earlier, wincing at the sound of the stones he had dislodged underfoot. This passage was much more claustrophobic - Stanford had his hands stretched out in front of him, blindly fumbling around for the precarious, jagged edges of the walls ahead. A sentry drone could traverse it, but it would have to travel much slower than a human.

"Blast," he snarled under his breath as his right foot slipped, sending pebbles cascading down the passage and creating a barrage of echoes as he fell flat on his back. He winced. Seconds later; the ominous mechanical humming sound re-emerged from deeper in the abyss. His stomach started tying itself in knots again as he saw the red light in the distance, dull at first but growing brighter. With legs that felt virtually gelatinous, Stanford scrambled backwards as the drone wavered towards him. The overpowering luminosity of the crimson spotlight in the dark forced him to squint. His mind was screaming for him to get up and run. Adrenaline was coursing through his system, but with fear shackling his body to the ground, there was no outlet for his anxieties to escape and he was left paralysed, staring into the empty red lens hovering in front of him.

Entranced, Agura's shout didn't even register with him until she had slammed a sizable rock down onto the sentry. He shielded himself from the flying sparks with his arm, and then he was met by Agura's unimpressed glower.

"You never listen to me, do you?"

Stanford let out a strangled sigh, shakily testing his balance and dusting himself off. Self-loathing began to stir inside him, but he forced it back, settling for a quick retort in defence of his actions. "Hey, in my defence, this place is crawling with them."

"And you're not the only one who's been seen. I'm pretty sure the two I took out on my way back got a good look at me. In other words, we need to get out of here."

"You don't have to tell me twice."

"Come on, it's parked just outside."

True to her words, the hodgepodge of Vandalian and sentient parts was parked in the sand at the bottom of the ledge. This was the only time Stanford would swear that ungodly engine roar had ever been welcomed by his ears. He could almost feel the sense of urgency radiating from Agura as she stamped the gas pedal to the floor. They began weaving between canyons and rock monoliths at a nauseating pace - Stanford was barely able to differentiate between sky and sand, he had no clue how Agura was managing to navigate properly.

The plains that the gorge opened onto reminded him a little too much of Handler Corners. Vast, sweltering, and devoid of everything aside from sands and alien tumbleweed.

They were empty.

Well, until they weren't.

The sound of the warning thunderclap was barely audible over the sound of the whining engine, but the swirling crimson portal that opened in front of them was unmistakable.

Agura saw it and yanked the steering instruments as far to the right as she could. They ground to a screeching halt, showered by sand and gravel from as the two tires that had been airborne landed back on the ground with a clunk.

"What now?" Stanford breathed, staring motionlessly at the churning antimatter abyss, waiting for something hostile to emerge.

"I... don't know." Agura muttered it low, but Stanford could easily hear the lingering fear in her voice.

The pair shared a short but deafening silence and Stanford sent up a prayer that Krytus himself wouldn't come tearing out of the portal towards them. Agura inhaled sharply in front of him, rolling the ATV back through the sand.

The wall of red was broken and five red sark streamed through, surging towards them, head-on. Stanford braced himself as Agura spun them around and put her foot to the floor.

"Where are we going?!" He tried to yell to her over the excessive noise of the engine.

"Anywhere we can lose them!"

He looked back from his position, only to see one of the sark dangerously close to the rear fender. "Agura, I don't want to alarm you, but you need to drive faster!" She suddenly pulled a hard left down a side passage, and Stanford found himself clinging on for dear life to avoid being thrown into the path of the zetners. Agura took them under one of the factory plants, expertly weaving in and out of the iron legs holding its weak, rusted skeleton upright. As they cleared it, Stanford glanced back, expecting them to be almost surrounded.

He was surprised to see that they had drawn back into a condensed group under the factory foundations.

"Agura, wait, they're slowing down!"

They skidded to a halt, facing the crowd of sark. The robots didn't advance.

"I don't get it," he admitted, incredulous.

"This doesn't add up," she growled simultaneously.

Had the glare of the sun on metal always been that bright? The light continued expanding outwards into a dome shape from the zetners, enveloping them and travelling up towards the metal structure they were encompassing. Stanford felt like the spark of dread in his stomach had just been doused in gasoline, because when the energy beam touched the metal of the structure, it started to crumple inwards, imploding and crushing into a cluster.

"What-."

They were hit by a wave of heat as the sparking dome erupted. The crumpled metal was forced apart, flying in all directions as chunks of shrapnel pelted down on them from above. Agura was barely able to pull them out of the way of a steel divider that speared the ground inches away.

Stanford's jaw dropped, "since when could sark do that?!"

Agura's face mirrored his shock. "Since never. The reds must have upgraded them with some cutting-edge sentient tech since our last battle."

"Well if they keep hitting us with that, we're done for!" He noticed Agura, glowering in their direction. "What, what are you thinking?"

"We need weapons to have any kind of chance against that power. This vehicle has a few. Take the wheel for me."

He swallowed the lump in his throat. "Agura, are you sure that's a good idea?"

"Just do it, Stanford!" she snapped.

He slipped into the driver's seat, taking a brief moment to familiarise himself with the controls. It had been months since he had operated anything with wheels, after all. The lead zetner whizzed past them, clipping the rear wheel and startling Stanford into gunning it forwards.

"Line up with them, we've got crossbow bolts we can fire from the front!"

The irony of the situation was slightly distasteful. Agura was usually the all-terrain navigating huntress and he was their artillery marksmen. Though, he was sure any shot at the enemy he could have fired while Agura was driving would have missed; his miserable field of vision would have impeded his precision. Agura fired, the crossbow bolts jamming themselves into the front wheels of a zetner and causing it to career out of control and plough into the one flanking it. Even with shiny new weapons, Stanford supposed that their artificial intelligence hadn't changed much.

He winced, barely able to stop his head slamming into the controls from the force of being sideswiped by another zetner.

Agura precariously leaned over him and struggled to pull down a lever on his right. The ATV gave a jolt that nearly unseated him as the blades on the front began spiralling. Stanford rammed one of the sark trying to sandwich them in from the front. The back of its zetner erupted in sparks and then smoke as it peeled off from the chase. The remaining two were close on their heels, trying to sandwich them in from the sides and run them into a wall.

"There are too many on us at once - I'm going to draw their attention so you've got a chance to hit them!"

With that, Agura leapt off to the side, softening her drop with a roll into the dust before Stanford could scream about how reckless it was at her. Turning himself so that she was in his field of view, he could see one of the two remaining zetners heading towards her. His heart leapt up into his mouth. He hit one focusing on her from the side. The Vandalian frame of Agura's vehicle was heavier, meaning that when the zetner flipped onto its side, Stanford was still able to drive it up against a rock face, smashing through the cab and crumpling the robot at the controls into spare parts.

"Agura!"

She had barely jumped out of the way of the one remaining adversary for it to turn and power straight towards her. Sark were definitely less formidable when he and Agura had sentient chip-powered vehicles full of weapons to thin their numbers. But as long as they didn't pull another new trick on them, Stanford was confident that he and Agura could handle them.

Handle a small group at least. He didn't know how they would fare if the sentients sent a whole army of sark after them in retaliation.

He sped past Agura, slamming head-on into the zetner that was about to knock her down before it could reach her. Slowing it right down allowed Agura to catch up to them and jump on the zetner, kicking in the glass and dragging the robot out. By the time Stanford had managed to cut out the spluttering, struggling engine - Agura had driven her knife through its head, frying its circuits.

He slumped down in the seat with the loudest sigh he could muster. Agura mimicked his behaviour, collapsing on her back in the sand. "If that had been red sentients…" she trailed off, "we would have been dead."

He pushed that thought as far to the back of his mind as he could. The ATV had clearly seen better days. Overheated with the front bashed in, the engine was hissing and gushing steam.

"Sorry," he said sheepishly."

"Don't be-," she cut off his worries at the root. "But we're not out of the woods yet, Stanford. Leaving this planet without a vehicle would be a death sentence. We'll need to collect supplies and make repairs-."

"And hope that nothing else comes after us in the meantime, which is highly likely," Stanford finished for her. If there was any time to loathe that Agura was always correct, it would be now.


Thanks to my wonderful beta reader, Ashlyn for helping me get this chapter up to scratch. As well as scrawly_times/weregreatatcrime for the amazing feedback on the other chapters which has motivated me to keep going! The next few chapters are where the plot really kicks off and I'm pumped to start writing those. There are a few hints dropped about past and future events in this chapter, I wonder if you can find them. As always, I hope you enjoyed the chapter! And apologies for the extra delay because I always upload this to AO3 and forget to upload it to FFN for a month lol