The Spider Queen

(Unova Syndicate -Frontier Region)

(Sun's Glory Starship- Command Deck)

Sophie stared silently out of the window and absentmindedly gazed at the numerous stars that passed by.

It was only when travelling through the universe that one could fully grasp just how insignificant and small they truly were.

Space was nothing more than vast hollow emptiness with flickers of life that easily faded and blinked out of existence.

Sophie let out a small sigh as she felt her already low mood get even worse.

The two prisoners were dutifully piloting the starship while her clones kept a close eye on the situation.

The next assignment from the Unovan military had come a lot sooner than Sophie had initially anticipated.

Apparently the Imperial Army was launching a series of attacks on an important transit point that was vital to the supply link of the Unovan forces.

All available mercenary teams were to immediately head to the outpost and defend the warp gate with their lives.

This should be good news in ideal circumstances.

Sophie had just made contact with a scout of the Imperial Army and arriving close to the fighting zone would make the rescue operation proceed far more easily.

The problem was…

It was a trap.

Sophie's golden eyes darkened as she reminisced about the vision she had seen after activating her foresight ability.

It was not a pretty scene. She saw herself ripping apart a heavily armoured team of qi tide cultivators before instantly getting knocked out by a void stage cultivator hidden in the darkness.

As what happened next, Sophie had no idea since she had to withdraw from the black and white world in order not to rouse Finch's suspicion.

However, it was probably safe to assume that the end result would be either her capture or death by those assassins.

The real issue was that Sophie had no way of knowing who was responsible for the ambush.

Whether it was done by her father's enemies or an unknown group.

Either way it was clear that relying on the Imperial Army was no longer an option. Sophie massaged her temples slowly and tried to think of possible solutions.

Finch was still in her custody onboard the starship and was currently being entertained by one of her clones whose purpose was to monitor the dangerous Servie.

Of course, he was under the impression that he was talking to the original Sophie and the mirror copies were the ones flying the starship.

Sophie had already exposed her copy summoning ability while chasing down the Servie on planet T'ramran so it didn't make sense to hide it.

Right now, Sophie could only think about two possible courses of action that she could take.

The first would be to take an immense risk and flee the battlefield once the Imperial Army attacked the outpost and try to reach Federation controlled territory before the starship blew up.

The other option would be to use the attack on the outpost to connect to the virtual net and check to see if there were any messages from her father.

Hopefully he had seen her first message for help and had already assembled a team to come to her position.

Sophie hated this feeling of helplessness. She grabbed the armrest of the captain's chair and slowly crushed the metalloid exterior.

Despite all of the dangerous and life-threatening situations that she had been thrust into over the last few months, it was this final hurdle that was the most frustrating.

Outside the window, Sophie could spot a field of asteroids coming up ahead. These massive rocks floated merrily along without a care in the world.

Lt. Shirren pressed a series of buttons on her monitor and redirected extra power to the shields surrounding the space vessel.

The starship easily passed through the field with minimum damage since the enhanced shields could easily withstand the collisions.

"Maybe I should go talk to Lily," Sophie muttered quietly.

It would take a few more hours before they arrived at the transit point so this would be the last opportunity for some peace and quiet.

The hybrid girl lazily got up from the captain's chair and strolled towards the exit. She nodded twice at the clones standing at attention and then left the room.

Sophie didn't know that once she left, one of her clones immediately sat down on the captain's chair and mimicked her pensive expression to the amusement of the others.

The stolen spacecraft was a decently sized vessel so it took Sophie around twenty minutes to reach the floor with the living quarters.

Sophie made several turns through the winding labyrinth of side passages and corridors until she arrived at an unmarked door.

She could already hear the sounds of laughter coming from inside as Lily joyfully interacted with one of her copies.

Sophie smiled gently and reached her hand out to input the command to open the door when a familiar sounding voice entered her mind.

[Hey original. Finch has important news that he just shared with me. Apparently he got a message from the Imperial Army with more details about the rescue mission]

[I'm pretty sure that sneaky bastard used his open connection to the virtual net to accurately grasp the coordinates of our new assignment. I have to say that all things considered….]

[We should just kill him.]

Sophie hurriedly withdrew her outstretched palm from the door and walked away to a concealed corner.

She took a few deep breaths before closing her eyes and connecting to the mental network.

It was once difficult to share her senses with her clones using the mental link but now Sophie could do it was ease.

The mental network could be vaguely described as a miniature galaxy with planets revolving around a central star. Each celestial body was connected via golden thread-like links.

Sophie entered the mind of the clone who had just sent the message and absorbed her recent memories.

A tidal wave of information crashed into Sophie's head as she instantly absorbed thirty minutes worth of conversation.

Sophie opened her eyes and there was a slight frown on her lips as she recalled what she had just seen.

Apparently the rescue team had already been assembled and would secretly search for their spaceship once the official battle begun at the transit point.

The contents of the report sent to Finch's wrist communicator detailed a rough outline of the plan.

The Imperial Army would only send out probing attacks over the next two days and then the real assault would begin on the third.

Finch informed Sophie's clone that the rescue team would be sent out during that time.

A full visual description of their starship had already been provided to the rescue team by Finch who had snapped several pictures of the outer exterior of the vessel.

This had been done from a gap in the handbag when Sophie was carrying him back to the starship from planet T'ramran.

Sophie's clone had suggested killing the scout but Sophie knew that wasn't the answer.

There would be significant backlash if it was ever discovered that she had killed a member of the Imperial Army without cause.

Seeing a vision of the future wasn't exactly a legal defense that stood the test of an impartial jury.

Besides there would be no point since the description of their starship was already in the hands of the so-called rescue team.

Wait…

A smile flashed across Sophie's face as she realised that the answer had been staring her in the face this whole time.

Finch knew about her cloning ability but didn't know that she could transform her mirror copies into Lily's image as well.

This was the perfect opportunity to trick her ambushers!

The only problem was where could the real versions of themselves go?

Sophie tapped her fingers against the sides of her hips for a few minutes before a brilliant idea entered her mind.

She pulled out the metalloid tablet given to the mercenary teams by the Unovan military and connected to the public forums.

There was a familiar profile that caught Sophie's eye and she sent out a private message to her recent acquaintance.

Perhaps there was a way to discreetly leave the starship without drawing Finch's attention.

[Sophie: Hey Perspherene, are you also going to the transit point?]

[Perspherene: Sophie! I didn't see you at the tavern in awhile… and yeah… my greedy captain seems determined to lead us all to our inevitable deaths :( …]

[Perspherene: Do you want to meet up? I'm always down to spend some more time with my drinking buddy!]

[Sophie: Of course! But let me ask you something… is your captain in need of more warriors? I'm thinking of leaving my current crew]

[Perspherene: I can put in a word for you since we are pretty short staffed at the moment but I'll give you a fair warning… the pay is pretty shit.]