Tony slowly slipped to the new Sky Runner's floor. He opened his mouth, and kept it open for a few seconds, then exhaled deeply. He wondered if anything could have been averted if he hadn't made that painting.
He lifted himself up. There was no need to think about what had happened, he reasoned; after all, it wasn't what had happened that mattered any more: it was what could happen as a result of the robbery. Then again, the robbery wouldn't have happened if he hadn't painted.
Paula came up to him and hunched down. "What are you thinking about, Tony?" she inquired.
"Oh, nothing major," revealed Tony. Silently, however, he added: except my fault in this situation.
"I know what you're thinking," Paula admitted. "You think it's your fault that we're in this predicament, right?"
Tony looked up at her, shocked. "How... how did you know?"
"I'm psychic," she answered. "I can read your mind." She blushed, and continued, "But I don't use my mind-reading powers often. I prefer psychic communication and PSI above mind-reading."
"What the?" Ness suddenly blurted. "Jeff, can you tell me what's happening?"
Jeff had been reading a book written in Greek by Ptolemy. "Hmm?" he asked, putting the book down.
"The Sky Runner was running perfectly; it was scanning for the special mix of paints that Tony had used in the paint; and it was heading south/south-west, at a bearing of about 230°. Then, suddenly, the compass went crazy, and the Sky Runner's now turning around."
Jeff shot up suddenly, shocked. He ran over to where Ness was. "What in the world are you talking about?" he demanded angrily.
"Look for yourself," Ness murmured.
"That's not good. Not good at all," Jeff observed. "It's heading towards some strange singularity. It's like the magnetosphere has completely disappeared."
"Maybe the singularity is throwing off the scanners and making it think that the paints are that way," Paula offered consolingly.
"Impossible," retorted the blond genius. "I designed the scanners myself. They've been specially constructed to ignore magnetic interference."
Tony stood up and looked out the window. He felt air sickness coming on, and wondered why he was looking outside. His eyes opened wide. "Um, Jeff," he stuttered, "you may want to look at this. And Paula, I think this may support your belief that the scanners malfunctioned."
"If I've told you once, I've told you a thousand times," Jeff muttered, all the while walking towards Tony. "The scanner could not have malfunctioned due to a fault when I made it. I tested it under all possible conditions, and made sure it still worked properly. And guess what? It did."
Tony groaned; Jeff was impossible to argue with. He would take what you said and re-interpret it to fit his views. He grabbed Jeff by the shoulders and steered him around to the window. "Look," he ordered sternly. "Look."
Jeff gasped, seeing the black disc that the Sky Runner was flying towards. Jeff realised that it was likely flat, given that there seemed to be no growth from the round sides of the disc. He observed that the disc seemed only to be growing in size through an increase in radius.
"I can't believe that," he said, his heart pounding harder with each passing second. "It's unbelievable. It's defying the laws of physics. Laws that should not, could not, must not, cannot be defied."
Ness came over to the three other people he had been brought together with in the Sky Runner. "This isn't any more dangerous than anything else we've gotten into before. We didn't know what we were heading into when we were thrown into Moonside, Jeff, but that didn't make us give up the fight; Paula, we let our souls be implanted into robots, we didn't know if we would survive, but we didn't let that worry us, right? The point is this, people: we can survive this. All we have to do is believe in ourselves."

Jonathan Falken yawned. The other workers were rebelling. They wanted to go home; it was quite late now, and they wanted to get some sleep.
He wanted to sleep, too, but he felt he had an obligation to remain. After all, he was head of the AVMO, and somehow he felt that role required performance above and beyond the typical work required of the lesser members of the AVMO.
"Come on, Jonathan," Ken Tremblay pleaded, "my wife is pregnant. She could go into labour at any moment, and I want to be there when my first child is born. Please."
"I'd love to let you leave, Ken..." Jonathan said.
"Thank you!" Tremblay exclaimed, running towards his coathook.
"...but for now, my duties do not include dismissing members of the AVMO." Ken Tremblay sighed, turned around, and returned to his computer.
I didn't want to do that, Jonathan thought, but I couldn't do anything but that. I just hope these constellations stop V-fluxing soon. It's not fair that I, a student, am the one who has to tell married men and women like Ken and Linda to put their work ahead of their family life. It's depressing... should I resign my position?
He sighed. There would be no chance of that. But no constellations had underwent V-flux since Cygnus had a few hours ago. He walked over to Mr. Cornwell.
"Mr. Cornwell," he began, "can I talk to you for a second?"
"What for, Jonathan?" queried Donald Cornwell.
"It's about the others. They really want to go home. I understand why you want to keep them here, but they have a life beyond their work; and I do, too. I'm not sure about your relationship with your wife, but my mother arranged a special surprised for me today. It'll be in a few hours, and I want to be able to leave to get that surprise. Ken Tremblay's wife is pregnant, and he wants to be with her when she goes into labour. Does that mean nothing to you?"
Mr. Cornwell listened to Jonathan's heartfelt plea with an open mind. "I'd love to grant you that, Jonathan, really, I would. It would be a great pleasure; I understand what Ken's going through, and I understand what you're facing. But you have to understand that this V-fluxing may not be as trivial as it seems to be."
"I know it's more than the trivial stature most people would give it," Jonathan insisted, "and maybe that's the problem. Maybe you're making it more serious than it is."
"Perhaps," Mr. Cornwell said. "You may be right." He walked off, to see how Patricia Fitzroy was doing, his eyes narrowing pensively. "And perhaps you may be wrong."

"Did you see what just happened?" one of the four figures that had previously appeared said. "The Sky Runner just disappeared into nothing."
Another of those figures pressed a button on the vehicle's dashboard. "The remote monitoring system to which my Chevy is connected is indicating that there was something that they disappeared into, but somehow we couldn't see it."
"We have to get up there and help them," a third of the four figures insisted.
"Be practical. I know it's like you're letting them down or something, but you have to trust the orders we've been given," the fourth argued. He turned to the first figure. "Do you have any tricks that can get us up there?"
The first figure thought about that query for a second. "No. They're primarily attack, and whatever assisting tricks I have don't give this effect."
"We're running out of time," the second figure observed. "The relay is indicating that the anomaly is receding. I'm guessing we've got a few hours before it's completely gone."
"What a relief, Simon," the third figure muttered. "Could you maybe put a bit more pressure on us?"
"You're not helping either, Cyan," SimonBob retorted.
"Aah! I dropped my medallion somewhere," the fourth suddenly exclaimed.
"Simon, can this old Chevy go up?" the first figure offered.

"I can't believe it!" the Master yelled. "She's still interfering! She should have left me alone long ago!"
"Who should have left you alone long ago?" the Thief asked eagerly.
"You have no need to know who she is," the Master answered. "All I have to tell you is this: we cannot wait for the Hibernos Portal to naturally close. She has introduced four more chesspieces. Those four that just went into the Hibernos Portal are her Pawns; she has four more pieces: Knights. So close the Portal now, before they can get in."
"Yes, Master," the Thief mused. He walked over to the jewels. He twisted the yellow gem, as his Master had ordered.
"Perfect," the Master said. "She may have outwitted me before, but I have outwitted her now. This will teach her for not doing as she ought to have done."