I think I’m mentally prepared for the alt-tech flash-bang, but I’m really not. Even shielded by a half-closed door, I feel like a three-day psychedelic music festival is being stuffed down my ears over the course of a millisecond. Fluorescent jellyfish dance in my eyes. I have just enough presence of mind to stagger out of the way as Gem pushes past me and bursts into the dining room, his guns blazing.

I stumble in after him, my Leyden pistol raised, but there’s no one left to shoot at.

Our friends are still alive, though they’ve looked better. They’re curled on their sides now, groaning and squinting. Luca has a black eye. Ophelia has a busted lip. Blood trickles from Tia’s left ear. Franklin has just finished throwing up.

All four hostiles are out cold, spread-eagled on the floor, goofy grins frozen on their faces like they really enjoyed that millisecond concert before Gem shot them in the heads with rubber bullets. Their Leyden harpoon guns are all burning and smoking.

“Well, that worked,” I note.

“WHAT?” Gem asks.

I point at his ears, reminding him about the cotton. Then I rush to untie our friends.

“Hello, there,” Ophelia grumbles. “Lovely to see you again. Thank you so much for the grenades.”

“Sorry about that.” I pull my dive knife and saw through her zip tie.

“Quite all right,” she assures me. “The Nautilus? The crew?”

I give them the brief version: The Aronnax has been destroyed, the Nautilus is banged up but okay, and the base has been cleared (for now), thanks to our robot dragonfly freedom fighters.

Luca giggles, his tone slightly hysterical. “Oh. Chiudete gli occhi! Now I get it! I think I may be blind!”

“It should pass,” I tell him, hoping I’m right.

Franklin retches. “I can taste the color turquoise. Is that normal?”

“Ana, are you okay?” Tia asks. “Your bandages are soaked with blood.”

“You should see the other guy.” I don’t mention that Tia, Franklin, Luca, and Ophelia also look like they’ve been worked over by the local gang of dolphins. “I’m sorry we couldn’t get here sooner.”

“You kidding?” Tia winces as I snap her restraints. “We were prepared to hold out for at least a month.”

“Well, we could come back later….”

“Now is good. Thanks, Captain.”

“We need to get to the Varuna,” Gem says, clipping Franklin’s zip tie.

“Yeah.” Franklin smacks his lips, probably trying to clear the taste of bile and turquoise. “They took Dr. Hewett. He was responding well to treatment, but he’s in no shape to be moved.”

“They’ve also taken our best research and tech,” Ophelia adds. Without her steel-framed glasses, she looks a bit like a mole dragged blinking and disoriented from a nice dark tunnel. “They must be stopped. Go!”

“None of you are in any shape to fight,” I fret. “And Dev could be coming in from the lagoon any minute.”

“Are your Leyden guns still functional?” Ophelia asks. “Leave us some of those.”