Editing User:Taln Fan/Summary:Cytonic

Spensa is shocked and grieved at the loss of her pin, and tells Chet, believing him when he says he didn’t take it. Spensa picks up Chet, who suggests heading for the Cannonade border. M-Bot informs them that they’d be intercepted before making it to the border. Spensa suggests going straight up. She starts flying upwards, and gets a radio communication from Peg. Peg shouts that she didn’t know Spensa was a pilot, and is very impressed with her flying. Peg warns her however, that flying up too high will make her lose her memories and sense of self. Peg offers that if Spensa returns, she’ll get Peg’s best ship. In exchange, Spensa will defeat the pirate champion for her. Peg says that if she wins and she gets the other factions on her side, they’ll assault the Superiority base of [[Surehold]] and take it back. Chet agrees that they should head back down, and Spensa flies down. Spensa joins the other pirates, who don’t shoot her down, and is determined to continue the Path of Elders.

As they approach the ruins, Peg figures out that they are both cytonics. Spensa tells Peg that she’ll join in on the attack of the Superiority base. Peg tells them more about the other pirate factions, two led by her sons Gremm and Semm. M-Bot, Chet, and Spensa discuss what they learned from the portals. Spensa mentions Jason Write, who M-Bot identifies as the first human to initiate contact with the greater galaxy. He indirectly caused the First Human War. Peg asks about wha they saw, and Spensa relays the information to them. They talk about the delvers’ ability to possess people, and Peg says that large groups repel them, and they prefer people who are isolated and alone. As they fly towards base, they get an alert that a group of enemy pirates are flying towards the Broadsider base.

They arrive back at base in the midst of a full firefight, and M-Bot highlights enemy ships on Spensa’s display. The enemy pirates are from the [[Jolly Roger Faction]], led by Gremm. Spensa goes for the weaker fighters first to prevent her flight from being overwhelmed. Spensa deals with the enemy ships with relative ease, surpassing the enemies in skill greatly. She shoots down three enemy ships in under five minutes. She uses her IMP to giver Cutlass Flight easy targets. Gremm chases after her, and they engage in a fierce duel in the air. Gremm prevails, scoring several hits on Spensa’s ship and locking it up. Spensa laughs, excited by the thrill of the fight. Chet wakes up, having lost consciousness during the dogfight. By the end of the battle, Spensa has four kills and three assists, astounding Peg. With the Jolly Rogers still soundly defeated and Gremm impressed with Spensa’s flying, Gremm agrees to officially duel Spensa the next day.

* [[Brade Shimabukuro]]

* [[Ohz Burtim Winzik]]

* [[Alanik]] (mentioned only)

While Spensa sleeps, she tries to cytonically reach out to Jorgen as she did before. She senses something blocking her however, and instead finds Winzik sitting on a throne, and Brade speaks to her. Brade says she’s been blocking Spensa from reaching out cytonically during her dreams. Winzik orders Brade to trap Spensa’s mind, but Brade says she doubts she can do it. Brade attacks Spensa with her mind, and Spensa fights back. Jorgen’s mind joins her, and together force Brade away. Spensa talks to Jorgen, again catching each other up on the past weeks’ events. Jorgen leaves, and Winzik speaks to the delvers through Brade. He tells them that cytonics like Spensa are out of countrol and loud. Spensa realizes that Brade had provoked her to make a lot of cytonic noise that would anger the delvers. The delvers say they can deal with the cytonics on their own, but Winzik convinces them otherwise. The delvers agree to Winzik’s deal.

* [[Chet]]

* [[Cutlass Flight]]

* [[Gremm]]

About twelve hours after the pirate attack, Spensa and the entirety of the Broadsider Faction head to the arena, which is in the Jolly Rogers’ territory. Along the way, Spensa reads a trashy romance novel and is slightly confused by its purpose. M-Bot talks to Spensa about his feelings, saying he is getting a happy feeling as they fly over the oceanic fragment that they had sailed across. M-Bot tells Spensa that Peg has received an encrypted direct call from a pirate in the Jolly Rogers. M-Bot cannot hack into the pirate call since he is no longer in a surveillance and espionage ship. M-Bot tells her that she is talking with her son, Gremm. They arrive at the arena, which is a large open-air region, with pieces of fragments floating at varying elevations. Spensa sees patches of glowing white light on some chunks of rock, which make her uncomfortable as she approaches the arena.

* [[Chet]]

* [[Vlep]]

* [[Gremm]]

* [[Hesho|Darkshadow]]

* [[Peg]]

* [[Cutlass Flight]]

Ships from all of the pirate factions are assembled in the arena, around a hundred ships. Gremm announces that he is no longer the champion, and has been defeated by a new member of the Cannonade Faction. He calls himself [[Darkshadow]], and Spensa thinks it’s an awesome callsign. A small ship flies forward, a third of the normal ship size. Spensa wonders if it might be a figment. Peg uploads arena boundaries onto Spensa’s proximity display, and tells her that if either of them strays outside of the boundary, the other pirates are allowed to shoot at them. Spensa boosts into the arena proper as the duel begins.

* [[Hesho]]

* [[Cutlass Flight]]

* [[Gremm]]

* [[Semm]]

* [[Gward]]

* [[Ido]]

* [[Alanik]] (mentioned only)

;Plot Summary

Peg speaks to the other pirates, saying that they are now strong and skilled. She urges them to join together and assault Surehold. Peg manages to sway both of her sons, and the other factions agree. Vlep and the Cannonade Faction however, declare that they won’t come. Spensa talks to Peg in private, and realizes that she had secretly been arranging things with her sons, who pretended to initially disagree with her. That way, when they agreed, the other factions would be persuaded. Spensa admires Peg’s brilliance, and wishes she had her in the DDF. Peg declares that they will go back to base and celebrate their major victory.

* [[Chet]]

* [[Cutlass Flight]]

* [[RayZed]]

* [[Becca Nightshade]] (mentioned only)

;Plot Summary

Spensa tells a story to the gathered crowd of Broadsiders back at the base. She tells them the story of the exiled lion prince Simba, who returns and kills his uncle for the murder of his father. Simba kills his uncle and gains his revenge. The Broadsiders love the story, and feast. After the story, Chet talks to Spensa and says he doesn’t feel very useful among the pirates. Maksim compliments Spensa on the story, and says he doesn’t think lions can actually talk. Spensa eats some corn, but finds it disgusting. However, eating the corn reminds her of eating heritage foods back on Detritus with members of her flight. As Spensa starts to tell another story, the base’s scanner alarm starts going crazy.

;Characters

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* [[Spensa Nightshade]]

* [[Jorgen Weight]]

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;Plot Summary

Spensa tries to speak to Jorgen again, but feels something blocking her, like a prison. She feels lost. She can hear Jorgen, but can’t speak. Jorgen tells her that things are tough for him right now, and wishes he could talk to her. Spensa tries to speak again, but is too tired. She drifts off into true sleep.