Ina Ymari was the best of the best. Utterly and unquestionably unmatched in her passion, skill, and dedication. A shining star so bright she had long since forgotten what being dim meant, yet still so capable of growth that it could never get boring.

What was Ina so immaculate at, people might ask?

Chess!

…

What? Corvis Base had, like, a city’s worth of people skulking around its underground bird’s nest. There wasn’t a hope in any hell of her being the best at anything else here. Even if she wanted to be that, it was pressure a girl like her wasn’t built to handle.

Butterflies in her stomach. Heart palpitations.

No, no. Ina Ymari was more than content being the best at a game only a dozen people she had ever met could even play.

Thank you very much.

…

Things hadn’t quite shaken up like that for her, though. Much to her dismay, it turned out being an exemplary marksman made you turn into someone to be depended upon.

It also turned out that the two weeks she had spent systematically manipulating the UA into focusing their anti-rescue efforts on Ansa were so devastatingly effective that she was viewed as equal to the effort’s communicative leader, Sasha.

More and more, people were depending on Ina Ymari to save the day.

To lead.

And as she sat in the quiet, dimly lit workshop of her absent lover, practicing chess plays against a high-tech, blue-tinted computer screen that lacked the warmth of a lover or a light source, Ina Ymari only wanted one thing.

To curl up in her bunk and burst into tears.

If she had pushed Sierra to defy command’s inane, moronic scouting formation harder, Ina would have been closer to Liz. Close enough to prevent whatever horrifying beast of steel and wire was able to catch her off guard.

She would be fine.

If she had managed to stave off Liz’s captors, and ensured Lark wasn’t grabbed by their claws either, then this impromptu, multiplanetary rescue op wouldn’t be happening.

Sierra would be here.

Instead, Ina was trying to bandage up an open wound created out of a lack of command’s foresight.

Foresight she had and just… sat on…

Ina wanted to melt into a permanent, invisible puddle of goo...

Aoi wasn’t here, lighting up and occasionally defiling the good name of Ina’s Semi-Weekly Chess Club.

Liz wasn’t here, giving her the mentorship and, secretly, the slight parental influence she had lacked since Saramat’s fall.

Even Bailey wasn’t here, and thanks to Liz and Aoi, she was sort of getting used to having her around.

…

The lack of Sierra, though?

Her heart and soul?

Everything she ever wished for out of romance and… other things that were perhaps related to romance and maybe also chess club?

It made Ina want to shut down.

She missed her girlfriend more than she had ever missed anyone, and with what little she knew about Sierra’s dangerous dash with espionage planned for tomorrow fogging up her mind further, she was terrified of never seeing her again.

Ina just wanted to shut down.

…

But, she couldn’t. She knew that.

This base was counting on her, and she couldn’t let the inevitable implosion could create eat at getting Liz back.

She had to stay focused.

Sasha needed her mind at its sharpest.

Beep!

Ina was broken out of her internal anxiety prison by the high sound of her chess computer finalizing a counter to her last move, but its beep hid something far more important, and amusingly coincidental behind its ear-piercing tone.

Something almost important enough to stop her from moving the computer’s queen where it wanted it to go…

“There ya are!” While Ina didn’t hear the workshop’s door open, she immediately recognized Sasha’s light, calming voice the moment she heard it. Just the presence of her good friend made her head briefly perk up quick enough to make the gold hoops hanging from ears bounce lightly against her cheeks.

It was almost enough to make Ina smile on the spot.

Sasha herself, though, looked how she had been looking since this mess started. Composed, but tired.

Her eyes, oceanic and dark pools of turquoise, were alert, but they couldn’t fully mask the bags under the soft brunette’s augmented peepers.

Said hair was the biggest giveaway of the warmly tanned bombshell’s recent work ethic. Clean, but frizzy and unkempt in a fashion that indicated maintenance beyond quick, cold showers had been pushed out of her rhythm.

Her outfit hadn’t changed in days, to a point where Ina was concerned she had been sleeping in that black tactical vest and red, skintight suit combo she liked so much. Though the clear presence of that gold, Saramat Memorial Rose pin Ina had given her gave Ina hope Sasha was at least snoozing better than her…

Lord, she hadn’t looked this ragged since their planning for Lark’s rescue. At least she was taking care of herself physically, though. Her figure’s light musculature hadn’t gone anywhere.

She wasn’t quite as… meaty… as Sierra, but Sasha was gorgeous even when stressed.

Really gorgeous. Besides, could Ina even comment on these signs of stress? Ina was barely sleeping past her necessary six hours. She was eating what she had to.

There was certainly a bag underneath her right eye at the very least. The one she didn’t let her white bangs cover to the point of hiding its cruel sight from the world.

The one that worked.

Even ignoring her tired… eye… she hadn’t taken off that old olive coat Liz had given her all week. She had even finally put her spare set of patches on it, too.

Had she changed out of her gray cargo pants this week? No, probably not.

Along with all of that, Ina was pale; her tawny-beige skin not quite looking sickly, but certainly looking frazzled by the last two weeks of terrors and potential loss.

She looked tired.

She looked as stressed, scared, and saddened as she was.

“Yoo-hoo? Ya there, Ina? Can come back after your game if it’s a bad time!” Ina had spent so long pondering Sasha’s stress levels that she had neither noticed the steps her leather boot-clad friend had taken, nor that her head had tilted back down to her chess board for an unknown period of time.

How long had she been thinking about all that…?

“A-Ah! No, no, now is fine! Sorry!” Ina corrected her glance and moved it to Sasha’s face, faking a smile so terribly that she knew her friend would find concern in it before it had time to turn to an expression of neutrality.

Sasha’s smile faded the faintest amount upon seeing it. Ina had obviously spooked her.

Curse her poor emotional regulation…

“If you’re sure?” Sasha’s response, while still calm, was phrased like a question. A question thrown with the haste of a mech dispensing emergency jamming flares, and the focus of a woman shuffling paper around in her hands while she walked.

Ina couldn’t blame Sasha for trying to get to business, though; shutting the workshop’s metal doors and clicking the lock button beside them. Given the aforementioned stack of paper in the reformed rebel’s hands, this wasn’t a social call.

Not yet, at least.

Sasha had a habit of making every visit feel like one, sooner or later…

“Mhm…” Ina affirmed her sureness quietly, doing her best to focus on the task likely to be at hand while Sasha stomped over to the table she was sat at.

The table she hadn’t been at with Sierra in two weeks…

That double date with Liz and Bailey felt like an eternity ago…

“Cool!” Sasha beamed upon making it to her table, peeking curiously at the chess puzzle Ina was still glaring at from the corner of her eye like she too was going to get lost in it, before sitting next to her.

How good Sasha was at talking like nothing was wrong. Ina would have found it impressive if she didn’t know exactly where that mentality came from.

And who gave it to her…

“So, I got approval on both of our targets from command, and satellite data came in a few minutes ago courtesy of Aoi. She’s doing good by the way!” Sasha began chiming what could have easily been a pre-written speech, before the trademark, perky distraction popped up momentarily.

It was cute…

“Thinking it’s smarter to hit ‘em one at a time, though. We’ve got good manpower, but, without Aoi here at least, I don’t think we’re equipped to split our focus like that. Right?” Sasha was back to business like she hadn’t grinned ear to ear thinking about their mutual friend, and it took Ina more effort than usual to hone in on what mattered.

She could ask about Aoi when she had gotten home.

If she—

…

No, Ina.

When.

“Agreed.” Ina kept her focus on what mattered at the moment and replied briskly, looking at Sasha’s nose so she could fake eye contact before turning her gaze to the paper spread across her table.

Two targets she had studied ceaselessly these last couple of days.

No.

Three days.

Three days, fourteen hours, twenty-six minutes, and… definitely some seconds in there.

While Ina tried to round up to the second in her mind, Sasha’s left index finger made contact with the page closest to her friend.

“So, we’ve got the arms factory we were scouting out. Northwest of Chalybe City isn’t really somewhere we need to create footholds around. Not until we start having to fight with the corporations more directly, at least…” Sasha mused, scratching her chin while she likely pondered the future of conflict on Ansa.

Honestly, it was almost strange how uninvolved Ansa’s corporate gods were with the shifting war effort. If the rebels were truly close to some kind of victory, any kind at all, wouldn’t they have gotten involved by now?

…

Food for thought that she could eat later.

For now, she stayed alert.

“It’s not as useful to us, but it’s not heavily manned, and should dent the UA’s ability to get weapons to troops in the area for a while, even if it might not divert as much direct attention!” Sasha was right in her upbeat assertions. She would have been giving Ina that cool little smile even if she was wrong, sure, but her calm confidence was well-earned.

It looked so natural on her that Ina could barely remember the confused girl who walked into her chess club barely a year ago now…

Still, task at hand.

Hitting up an ordnance factory was a good, stable idea with decent, short-term, and long-term benefits.

Hitting one so close to Chalybe, though? That risked bringing a hammer down on a rare pocket of resistance that corporate interests had shielded from the UA’s wartime crackdowns.

But even that ignored the greater issue…

“Then we’ve got our second choice! Th—”

“The oil refinery to the east…” Ina cut across Sasha before she could even move her finger to the map she had started staring at.

The second option.

“Yeah, that!” Sasha replied with a bluntness Ina couldn’t help but find adorable even at her lowest, before placing her right index finger at the center of the second target’s map. “I figured you’d want to go with it for the same reason I do… but I’d be a bad co-leader if I didn’t run the first option by the best tactician I know first, eh?” As if to accentuate her cuteness, Sasha followed her second, more detailed reply with a playful elbow nudge to Ina’s shoulder.

It was nice…

All of it was.

The nudge.

The partnership.

She needed that right now.

“R-Right…” It didn’t activate Ina’s nerves any less, of course; her cheeks still flushed a little, and her voice softened for a moment, reverting more to the Persian accent she was trying, and failing, to mask less around Sasha.

It was, of course, only a moment, however.

Back to the task at hand.

“We can pin the first target for later. If we need to buy more time, then striking it might look like we’re planning something big afterwards, but…” Ina paused, taking a slow, steady breath before her airy, light voice returned to confident speech. “They have to think we’re honing in on something, and if the intel we’re getting is right… then it has to be something big to the east…”

Another breath was taken, but this time, Ina gave herself a moment to relax and focus.

Her hand, without even looking at the board, moved one of her bishops to d6 and delicately tapped on the screen of her chess computer a few times.

It needed to be muted, right now.

So she could think about the important part.

Another breath was taken, this one far less steady than the last, but Ina figured there wasn’t time for another.

“If we simply blow up factories without creating a believable plan, they’ll see right through us. It puts her at risk…” Ina took a moment to realize what her slightly shaky voice had said, sweat already starting to beat down her brow as she moved her gaze from the map to a random part of the table. “P-Puts us all at risk, I m-mean…” She knew that wasn’t a good save, but she also knew that Sasha wasn’t the type to make it an issue.

She just-

She-

She was just scared.

“Hey, you’re right! Don’t worry about how ya said it.” Sasha gave Ina a comforting scratch behind the neck for a moment, undoubtedly a strategy she had learned via gossiping with Sierra, and continued with a warm expression in her cool eyes. “Dooo ya feel like talking about it?”

Ah, so that was the other reason Sasha came here now, instead of just calling her to a briefing over the base’s encrypted comms network.

Typical Sasha, always worrying about the people around her even while she wears that big, seldom fake smile.

…

The mission was more important, obviously. Liz’s life, Sierra’s life, and possibly their own lives hinged on two coordinated, vastly different kinds of attack on the UA’s resources.

But Ina really did need to talk… and Sasha was always good at that.

Based on her relationship with Sierra, and what Liz found with Bailey, transformatively so most of the time…

Ah, Bailey. Ina didn’t know her too well, transparent attempts from Liz’s lover to talk her into fooling around in the communal shower aside.

Obvious and frequent but kind of nice flirting aside…

The advances of sleaze, playfulness, and lust’s living form hadn’t been what addled Ina’s mind regarding her, though. The beauty of her maternal comrade’s long lost partner was absent from Ina’s mind even in her rare moments of… stress relief.

…

Mostly.

…

But, no, that wasn't why Bailey occupied the mind.

Bailey was right.

Safe in appearance or not, scattering their mech pilots so far apart in a scouting mission lacking an infantry presence was stupid. Ina knew it. Sierra knew it.

Everyone other than command knew it, yet Ina didn’t push it.

Sure, Sierra didn’t either, but maybe if Ina had, she wouldn’t be so far away.

Maybe Bailey wouldn’t be chasing Liz down in a fury Ina had to be partly responsible for.

Liz probably wouldn’t be dead or worse and—

“Hey, hey. You’re shaking. It’s okay!” Sasha’s dulcet, sweet voice brought Ina back to reality faster than the less than gentle hug which followed could have ever managed. Despite Sierra’s strength, it always felt like Sasha and Aoi were the two who had break her spine one of these days.

Didn’t she deserve to have it broken for all this anyway?

No. No she didn’t.

Ina paused for a moment, letting herself melt into the crushing, yet soothing embrace of her warm friend while remembering the exercise Liz taught her.

In through the nose.

Out through the mouth.

…

“I-I’m fine. Sorry, just…” Ina felt a little calmer, even if her quiet, nervous reply probably gave Sasha the opposite impression. “Let’s talk.” The second part of her response, fortunately, was far more in line with the growing warmth of relaxation her friend’s comfort gave her.

Ina was safe.

It was someone else, far away from here, but likely still on this planet, who wasn’t…

“I get it, Ina. Trust me. I’ve been worried about the girls on the Nightjar ever since they left…” Sasha’s voice was quieter than it had been before, and was joined by her bone jostling hug turning into more of a delicate side hug.

It was nice, but her words weren’t quite addressing Ina’s true, deepest concern.

“I-It’s… not really that.” Ina quietly and politely refuted the attempt Sasha made at relation, once more managing to make direct eye contact with her comforting, smiling friend before continuing.

She was safe.

Sasha had always been there for her.

Let it all out, Ina.

“I’m not as worried about them. Bailey and Aoi are… you know… some of the most capable people I have ever met.” Ina’s tone regained composure lost in her previous, part way spiral, but the nerves began kicking in when she had realized what she might have implied to Sasha. “N-No offence!” She followed up with most of that regained composure slipping away from her again.

Don’t be mad. Don’t be mad. Don’t be mad.

“Nah, I get it!” Sasha responded, speech so calm and casual that no living creature could even begin to view her as upset. Even Ina. “Gods know this place is missing a lot without Aoi alone. Probably would’ve made that thing today a lot easier…” As was typical for Ina’s sometimes distraction prone friend, Sasha’s mind wandered off for a moment or two.

Ina knew that was always a brief little thing, though. Heck, if anything, it was nice to see Sasha’s seconds of mind wandering be so innocent.

Such a far cry from last year. So much torture beneath those Shayatins’ vile hands, and yet Sasha had come around.

A brilliant mind in a fun, upbeat girl.

Even Iblis themself couldn’t destroy someone like her.

…

The elephant in Ina’s thoughts was starting to become harder to ignore…

Guess she had to get this over with.

“We… We’re just… getting close to the end. I can feel it.” Ina was still trying to form a version of this elephant she could put into words in real time, before once more repeating that old Nataliza strategy.

In through the nose.

Out through the mouth.

Ina’s mind was a little clearer again.

“You’re worried about Sierra, right?” Clearly Sasha’s had refocused too, gently throwing Ina a question with a complicated answer in her current context.

Worried? About her girlfriend? The one she only knew was even alive right now because Aoi said so.

Amongst other things, but what Aoi was sharing to Sasha and, by extension, Ina, wasn’t relevant here.

Ina tried hard not to picture it. Those were thoughts for much later tonight.

The thoughts that needed addressing right now, which involved people who were mostly clothed, were that, yes, Ina was desperately worried about her girlfriend, no matter how much Sierra could bench press naked…

Sasha was right.

She was half right.

“Y-Yes, obviously. I’m worried. I’m really worried. But…” Ina sounded as worried as she claimed she was. More so, honestly.

One more time, Ina.

In through the nose.

Out through the mouth.

“Sierra will be fine. I know that. She’s the smartest person I know. And the toughest. And the kindest. And—”

“Don’t have to tell me twice, you know. Your girl’s hot.” Sasha interjected in a fashion that, truthfully, should have felt inappropriate to Ina. It could have come off as dismissive.

Yet, it put a small, almost invisible smile on Ina’s far more visibly reddened face.

“So if it’s not about her…” Sasha paused her next sentence midway through, looking at Ina with a gaze that expressed clear knowledge of her big concern.

Sasha could have continued. She could have just said it.

Yet, as was typical for one of Ina’s first, true friends, she respected Ina’s ability to say it herself.

“We’re so close to the end of all this. I know that. Sierra’s delivery thing tomorrow? That’s going to get us close. Very close. A few days left after that, maybe?” Ina was rambling a little, but she couldn’t really help it. She was frazzled, and speaking without her filter was always a helpful little fix. “We’re going to have Liz back soon, Sasha… and I don’t… know what that means…” Her gaze slid away from Sasha and back to the cold, metal surface of the table, staring at a reflection that didn’t want to stare back.

A reflection that, much like her, could only gaze back helplessly with one eye, while the other remained vacant and dim.

This was okay. She could trust Sasha.

Lord knows Sasha might be the most qualified person on Ansa to help right now…

“I don’t know if she’s going to be okay. Will she be okay, Sasha?” Ina muttered just loud enough to let Sasha know that she wanted an answer, continuing after a moment spent sniffing back a tear. “Is she even going to be alive…?”

It was a tough pill for Ina to swallow these past few weeks. Sure, if that truly was Sasha’s Handler on Lark’s radio, then would they really go through the effort of nabbing Liz, Whitehawk and all, just to silently kill her?

No. They wouldn’t.

But until Ina saw Liz alive, the thought couldn’t leave her mind.

“Well, I know what happens in there better than anyone, eh?” Sasha spoke so nonchalantly about her time within the abyss that it made Ina snort and look up at her in conflicted amusement/concern.

Looking up revealed that the hand not resting on Ina’s left shoulder was firing off a thumbs up right at the tactician.

…

How was she supposed to respond to this?

Luckily, Sasha didn’t give Ina the chance to force a response in the first place.

“Look I… I can’t tell you she’s gonna be alright straight away, right? Getting where I am took a while. Lark’s still a real work in progress. Can’t even imagine what that girl she fought is going through right now, either…” Sasha’s tone shifted from nonchalant, cheerful, and sly to something so closely mimicking one of Liz’s pep talks that Ina wondered if she had gotten lessons from her.

“Well…”

That peppy, assuring smile of hers did wince in the face of a realization, though…

“No, I can imagine it pretty well…”

In a strange turn of events, Ina’s arm had now become the one wrapping itself around Sasha’s shoulder, smiling as well as she could while sliding up and down the escaped bird’s tense back.

That seemed to give Sasha the confidence to continue.

“My Handler was very personal. I can’t pretend to know what she’s doing to Liz… or what she’ll look like when we get her out…”

Sasha paused again, but fascinatingly, the melancholy in her face had dissipated at the flick of an internal switch, reassurance and optimism re-entering her eyes as they locked onto Ina’s half-hidden pair.

“But she will be okay. It probably won’t be right away. I took months and a whole memory… deal.” Sasha sounded as confused as anyone who had their memories as thoroughly stirred around as hers should, batting her expressive right hand like it didn’t make her look more puzzled by her own mind. “Heck, she’s got you, and Bailey, and Sierra in her corner, too. Maybe it won’t be pretty for a bit, but she’ll be okay.” Another pause, and this one seemed final.

More than that, it had seemed like it worked.

Sasha was many things, but she was yet to be proven wrong about her Handler.

She was always right about their strategies and comrades too, while Ina was thinking about it.

Ina could trust that. She knew that already, obviously, but if anyone needed reassurance right now, it was her.

“You’re right…” Ina nodded her head, sitting back up straight after to stare Sasha confidently in the eyes.

One thing on her mind.

“We have to get her back first, though.” Ina asserted, smiling as confidently as she had all day to her friend and co-strategist.

None of this worrying was any good now. They had a mission to accomplish tomorrow, and a rescue to aid after.

Find Liz first.

Get Liz back first.

Then worry about the rest.

“That’s my Ina.” Sasha seemed to be of the same mindset, though the conclusion she came to was, instead of a confident, professional smile, deliver a light boop to Ina’s nose with her finger.

Stop blushing. Stop blushing. Please just stop blushing.

Beep, beep!

“Ah crap.”

Sasha, to Ina’s great fortune, didn’t even have the time to register said blushing before the fancy, holographic wrist communicator broke their minute air of silence.

“Our brief’s in an hour, and I really gotta fit in a shower before it.” Sasha was already stood up from the table before her sentence had even finished, walking halfway across it before turning her head to glance slyly at Ina. “Feel like joining me~?” The brunette’s voice injected itself with a different, cheekier tone Ina had grown… familiar with this past year.

A shower with Sasha, a girl who had a habit of turning a brief exchange of tools with Sierra into a three woman quickie?

Lord, that sounded wonderful right now…

…but Ina had a chess computer to kick the butt of first!

“You can go on ahead. If I have the time I’ll catch up, and we can… uhm… you know…” Ina may have regained over a decade of lost confidence this past year, a lot of it due to Sasha’s influence, but she was never going to be a good flirt.

Unless it was with Sierra, apparently.

Supposedly?

“Relieve some of that stress?” Sasha, on the other hand, may as well have been the art form’s greatest visionary in Ina’s eyes.

Perhaps Bailey was close, but only one of them had gotten Ina’s pants off in the middle of chess club.

For now…

“Y-Yeah, that…” Ina nodded, turning her gaze away from Sasha and taking an embarrassing few seconds to settle it back down onto her chess board.

She had almost forgotten the flow of the game by now… but she supposed all of what she just chatted through with Sasha was worth a longer practice game.

“See ya there, then!” Sasha waved goodbye with a humorously tone-breaking sweetness, that was then flipped on its head by the ace pulling her vest over her head, and unzipping the lightweight, skintight suit underneath it.

Not a hint of shame in that woman, huh?

Her and Ina.

Sierra.

Ina was starting to notice a certain… pattern in the women she slept with…

…

Alas, with Sasha’s lovingly comforting and playfully sleazy attitude removed from her workshop with the quiet thud of a sliding, metal door, Ina’s immediate thoughts of stress relief fell back to the wayside.

They weren’t replaced by anxieties this time, though.

Ina had a mission to focus on, and a less important, enriching practice match to win before she worried about anything or did anything sinful with Sasha in the less than closed off confines of their nearby communal shower.

It would be okay, she had to believe that right now.

Just like she believed she was about to retain her undefeated streak against the best chess program Aoi could source.

But she didn’t need to believe in the last thing eating her mind up tonight.

No, she knew tomorrow would be okay.

Ina Ymari would deal a decisive blow to the UA’s logistics and keep them distracted from the real effort to track Liz down.

Sierra DeSoto would survive the most dangerous mission of her life, come out clean on the other side, and get her, and Liz, home in one piece.

The storm was looming close, but Ina knew they would all make it through.

They had to.