Zimthose gulped with a nod, and gestured to Lance to come close. Reluctantly, he leaned in to listen to his whispers.

“Look, I messed up. I know that. I only have enough to pay for one of the weapons, but I can’t just choose one! Can you help me out?”

“Hmmm,” Lance thought for a moment, glancing at Vise. “I’d take the sword.”

“I just told you I can’t just take one!”

“No, you said you couldn’t choose.”

“You know what I mean!”

“And you know I’m not footing the bill for you.”

“Why do you have to be so difficult?”

“Why do you have to be so irresponsible? Just use some gear the armory provides!"

"We both know that standard gear isn't gonna cut it. It may not be garbage, and better than nothing. But you know what's better than that?" Zimthose turned back around to face Vise, not answering his own question, and put on a straight face. He held out the pouch of crowns he’d brought with him and asked, “This should cover at least one of the weapons, yeah?” Vise took the pouch and opened it, eyeing the various coins. After a moment he shook his head.

“Maybe for a normal case, but these are special made-to-order weapons. Besides, I want you to pay for both, or neither. It’s what we agreed to.”

“I can pay for one now, and the rest after our mission today.”

“Oh really? And risk you not making it back?” Vise asked. “I may have faith in you lads, and I work in good faith with all you Spiral Knights. You've proven yourselves time and again, for sure. But your mission is your own. I know what it's like, not being able to go home. Your Isora, my Great Colony. Both out of our reach, for a number of reasons.” He paused, propping his massive wrench against the workbench and gesturing to the workshop. “But now, I have a business to maintain, and a livelihood that costs a hefty investment. If I could do any more favors for yous, I would. But at that point I’d be putting myself in a hole with no way out, and before you know it, everything comes crashing down.”

All three were silent for a moment. Lance looked between Zimthose and Vise, neither of whom seemed willing to budge.

“What about collateral, then?” Zimthose asked. “I can’t imagine you’d actually want to buy it, Vise, but this has gotta be worth something if you hold onto it.” He pulled the Striker blade from his belt and offered it to the Gremlin. He stayed quiet, but with his expression hidden behind his mask, neither knight could tell what Vise might be thinking. A tense minute passed by, and Lance finally let out a sigh.

"Oh for the love of– I'll pay the difference for him," Lance said, stepping forward with his own pouch of crowns. "Assuming this will be enough?" Zimthose looked at him, eyes wide, while Vise reached for pouch.

"You sure?" Zimthose asked.

"About paying for this? Not really," Lance replied, shaking his head. "I’d much prefer to keep this to pay for what I want for our mission. But I am sure that you'll need to be at full strength if we're gonna find out and stop whatever 'Project R' is."

Zimthose's expression was serious as he nodded. Vise paused for a second, glancing at Lance, then pocketed the pouches. "No refunds."

"Yes, yes, we know the drill," Lance said with a grin. "Honestly, while I was hoping to use that to pay for my own new gear, but I don’t know if we even have time for–"

Suddenly, a beep rang out from both Lance's and Zimthose's back pockets. They looked at each other, then reached for their communications devices. The rectangular screens  both had the same message displayed in bright purple.

"Huh," Lance muttered, "speak of the Devilite. Guess we've got time after all."

* * *

“Oh right, all this started from asking a favor.” I’d totally forgotten Rhendon’s reason for visiting us in the first place, with all the talk of Magma Squad and then Nether’s past. "I take it it has something to do with all of them, then? Not just Nether?"

"That'd be correct. I'll cut to the chase. I need you to delay your departure time by a couple hours." Balldrick and I glanced at each other, more than a bit confused by this request.

"You're gonna have to explain that one, because even I don't follow," Balldrick said. I nodded in agreement.

"Same here."

"That's understandable." Rhendon paused, and contemplated for a minute. "Please understand, you two. You're not alone, dealing with Project R," he said finally. "As I said before, my Scarlet Scouts in particular were asked to help, and that includes me. I'm being sent out today for a solo op, to shut down a Gremlin logging operation. Then, in a couple days' time, I'm to lead a squad to investigate a potential weapons cache that Gremlins are likely using to test for their project." He fiddled with his data pad again, and a new screen popped up. "That's why I can't go in to save Magma Squad myself. I pleaded with HQ to let me go in, but they ultimately decided they wanted me elsewhere.”

“Save Magma Squad?” I asked, still not following.

“Oh…great.” Balldrick slowly shook his head. I glanced his way and his shoulders dropped. “The deconstruction operation. We have to rescue some knights after securing data on Project R. Them.”

“...Oh.”

Oh no.

“I’m afraid so,” Rhendon said solemnly. Pointing to the data pad, he explained the timeline it displayed. “This is when they left for the operation, two and a half days ago. Shouldn’t have taken them more than half a day to reach the area, and they should have been done scouting a little over half a day later. Not that long of an operation, compared to some stakeouts and elimination missions Magma Squad in particular has undergone,” Rhendon said. “But we didn’t receive images regarding the operation until almost twenty hours after they should have arrived. What’s more, there was no communication or updates, no added context, nothing. Just the images. And then, for the following day, radio silence.”

Rhendon brought up the images we had already seen from our briefing earlier. So it really is Magma Squad down there…

“So, after hearing you guys would be the ones to head the rescue op, I crunched the numbers, more or less, and this was what I came up with." Fiddling with the data pad once more, Rhendon brought up another display. The data pad had a list of the four gates currently in rotation at the Arcade, each with four timers counting down. “As you know, each gate and their stratums alternate, completing a full cycle every four days. Today, you’re going to the Jade Gate, right?”

“Why ask when you already know?” Balldrick asked, rather accusingly. 

“How do you know?” I followed up.

“I have my sources,” Rhendon said, leveling his gaze at me. His straight face lasted three seconds before breaking into a smile. “It’s me. I’m my source. I mean, hello? Leader of the Scarlet Scouts? It’s what I do!” 

“Alright, alright, fair enough.” I conceded with a roll of my eyes. “But why go to such lengths to research this? You already know we’ve been assigned to rescue them. And while knowing about their backgrounds has been… enlightening, one much more so than the others, was it really necessary?”

“Tell me, Blast, with the limited information about Magma Squad that I’ve given you, how impressive do you find them?”

“How impressive? I mean, they’ve got to all be at least Defender Elites, right? If not Champions?”

“And you, Balldrick?”

“I can’t comment on what their achievements are, but from the sounds of things I can definitely say they’re more seasoned than Wolver Squad is, by far. Individually, at least. How long have they been a squad?”

“Just over two Cradle years. So you boys have almost two more Cradle years up on them in that regard. But, and I mean no offense, they’ve dealt with a more constant stream of greater nightmares than what you and most other guilds have had to put up with. Honestly…” Rhendon took a deep breath and held it, not meeting our gazes. Finally, closing his eyes, he sighed and continued. “Honestly, they’re better than you. Than most knights. I won’t say what you all have done has been a cakewalk, and you’re all distinguished knights. But you’ve still got a long ways to go before you’re on Magma Squad’s level. And that’s why I’m scared.”

I felt a pang in my chest hearing Rhendon explain this, but his final comment was a bucket of cold water splashing over it. Scared of what?

The look on my face must have been asking for an explanation, as Balldrick spoke up.

“Blast, we just got done talking about, morals aside, rather incredible feats Nether accomplished back on Isora. Rhendon says Magma Squad, led by him, has gone missing. From our briefing, we can guess they’ve been detained and are being held in those cells from the images provided. The question is: how did Rhendon’s best squad get captured? What could have possibly achieved that?”

A moment of silence passed over us.

They’re right. How? How did these knights of such a high caliber, better than us–

“Wait.” Putting the pieces together, I realized something rather foreboding. “How are we supposed to save them? You said it yourself Rhendon. I’ll be the first to admit we are far from the best, but Magma Squad sure sounds close to it. So how and why are we the ones tasked with saving them?”

Rhendon shook his head and shrugged.

“I wish I could tell you. A part of me worries that HQ is overestimating your squad. Another part tells me they’re worried you’re all growing too fast, and need to be put on a leash before you get too many accolades to boast about. Heh, as if you haven’t done that already.”

“I’m sorry, a leash? We’re a guild!” I said, astonished at the notion. “Not only that, we’re the guild that shut down the other guilds conspiring with Devilites and Gremlins using the Coliseum!”

“That might just be the problem.” Balldrick spoke up, glancing around. I followed his gaze, but couldn’t see anyone around who might overhear us. “We solved that situation a little too easily. For all they know, we were bought and created a cover to allow the conspiring guilds to find other ways to continue operations.”

Since arriving at Haven, the Guilds had provided Spiral Knights a way to find a semblance of calm and somewhere to collect themselves amidst the turmoil of being stranded on a hostile planet. While Guilds were mandated to provide a squad to aid in exploring the Clockworks, and these were always made up of Spiral Knights, that didn’t mean Guilds were forbidden from accepting others into their ranks, like Strangers or even Gremlins. This was because each Guild had their own designated hall including sleeping quarters, sparring grounds, and communication facilities, provided by Haven itself.

But they also provided large groups of individuals, particularly those unhappy with the status quo, a way of organizing outside of the Spiral Order’s watchful eye. They were in Haven after all, and while the Stranger’s Council agreed to let the Order operate within their territory, that didn’t mean giving them control and supervision of everything that transpired in the city. When word got out that some Guilds had decided that they would be better off without the Order and sided with the residents of the Clockworks, the Wolver Masters had gotten involved with other Guilds in squashing these ‘rebellions’ before any real harm could be done.

“You think they don’t trust the Wolver Masters? Or Wolver Squad? Us?” I asked, still in disbelief. Balldrick couldn’t answer.

“I think there’s a non-zero chance this could be a test,” Rhendon said. “This Project R is a do or die moment, for both the Wolver Masters guild and Haven as a whole.”

Silence returned.

“No. It’s too unreal,” I said, shaking my head. Kora’s prideful gaze from this morning flashed in my mind. “There’s no way they doubt us and are setting us up to fail. Nether, maybe, given what you’ve told us, Rhendon. But not Wolver Squad.”

“I just said the chance was greater than zero. But I’d have to agree with you, on both accounts,” Rhendon said. “At the same time, there’s no way they could have set up Nether to fall like this. I’m the one who dished out the missions to my squads. And unless something was really wrong with the data, each squad was given their optimal mission, based on my research as Leader of the Scarlet Scouts.”

“Why’d you give Magma Squad this mission, then? Just curious,” I asked.

“Fire.”

“Fire?”

“Fire. Lots and lots of fire.” Rhendon brought back up the first image of Magma Squad he had shown us on his data pad. “As you can see, they all like the color red. Whatever the shade, didn’t matter. Had nothing to do with being ‘Scarlet’ Scouts, sadly. They all really enjoy fire for some reason too, and that’s why they decided on the name ‘Magma’,” Rhendon explained. “They’ve never had any problems with heat on their missions, and given that we knew Gremlins were burning down a whole forest to make room to gather resources, I figured they’d be the best fit.”

“Sounds right up their alley, yeah,” I agreed.

“So then,” Balldrick stepped in, raising a finger, “why did they get caught?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t the slightest clue, honestly,” Rhendon replied. “But if someone or something was able to take them on in a fight and win, then you must be extremely cautious. At the same time, going back to that favor, I need you to delay your departure.”

“Ah, right. Still haven’t explained the ‘why’ bit, though,” I said, still skeptical.

“Because I need you to go after them right away.” He went back to the screen with all the gates in the Arcade. “If you wait just a couple more hours, when you depart to gather more info on Project R, you can head immediately to the next stratum to find Magma Squad. The Clockworks will have shifted so you have no need to come back and redeploy. You can just go from one zone to the next.”

“A back to back mission, huh?” Balldrick nodded, finally understanding. “That won’t be easy. Being that deep in enemy territory with no chance for respite could be a disaster waiting to happen. Just like with Magma Squad.” I nodded, finally understanding as well.

“I’ll be honest,” Rhendon said, standing up, “this is more than a favor. This is a desperate plea.” He kneeled, bowing his head. “Please, save Magma Squad as soon as you can. I’m sure if you can rescue them sooner, they’ll be able to help us solve the Project R problem as well!”

“Woah, stop!” I told him, pulling him to his feet. “I am not someone you should be kneeling to for a request. Please! I mean it!”

“But…I need you to do this, since I can’t…”

Rhendon looked pained as he begged us to help him.

He must really want to see his knights again. I turned to look at Balldrick, who gave a quick nod. Zim probably wouldn’t have any objections. And Lance won’t want to be outdone by Zim. So in that case…

“So long as we can get the data on Project R and get out without any complications, we can do that,” I said. “Just let me send a message first.”