Dengaron P.E. (Personal edition)

Sabotage

"Let me just put this away; I can't let anything happen to this information," Charlie said, his hands still shaking from creating his blueprints.

"Yeah, okay, that's fair," he said and left with Adam.

They exited into the hallway, which connected all four bedrooms on this side of the ship, and began to walk towards the bridge.

"I don't think I ever asked, what's your power?" Alex queried Adam.

"Some people like to call me King Dice, since whenever I try to use my powers, something entirely random happens."

"What do you mean?" Alex pressed, his curiosity piqued as they walked past the Jayden robot nicknamed 'Hella'.

"Well, I could set wherever I'm targeting on fire, or I could cause an earthquake. Perhaps my own arm will fall off," he said, pointing to his four-fingered hand. "It's happened before. I'm sure it'll happen again."

"Wait, so you're technically just a hat with a bunch of strips of paper with powers inside?"

"Pretty much. You fight me, you have no idea what you're going to get. I have no idea what I'm going to get until I've done it. I have this for more sneaky powers though," he said, showing Alex a large smartwatch on his right wrist.

"What's that for? Isn't that a smartwatch from thirty years ago?"

"Yeah, Jayden gave it to me. It somehow reads and tells me my powers after I've used them. Look."

The watch read 'broken legs'.

"Notice how it doesn't say 'target: broken legs'."

"Oh," Alex muttered. "Oh no." He realized what it actually meant; Adam had his legs broken by his own power. "When did this happen?"

"Three months ago. Countraverse helped fix me up."

"Ah," Alex said, feeling fortunate he didn't have a power that could harm him. He was walking just far enough behind Adam that when the emergency door came crashing down like an anvil, it separated them, with Alex on the side with the bedrooms. He turned and saw Hella briefly outside Charlie's room before it exploded, taking parts of the ship with it, including himself.

As fast as he could react, Alex shifted forms, watching his clothes get sucked out through the elephant-sized hole. Shutters came down to the left and right of him, sealing off the outside and him from the rest of the ship. He saw the same had happened to Charlie's bedroom and knew he'd have enough oxygen to hopefully find the emergency suit hidden in the wall. He wanted to rush after him but knew there wasn't much he could do against an airtight shutter in his current form. Instead, he saw Rose and Jay come running from under the shutters, which had closed off the hallway. They both had suits on and were carrying a spare, presumably for him.

He phased through the helmet's seal and reformed himself, knowing well that under the suit he was naked. Not wasting a second, he thought out the easiest way to get to Charlie; the room was floating away, mostly intact, with a shutter door covering the most likely imploded door. How long did he have? Had Charlie even survived? Was the room actually airtight? Of course, it was, he told himself; Charlie had designed the system himself.

"Okay, I need a tether, a thrust pack—"

"You're not going anywhere!" Jay's voice sparked from Alex's helmet.

"The hell I'm not," he responded. "My best friend is out there."

"Exactly, I've run a life scan and he, well..."

"Well?" Worst case scenarios invaded his next thoughts.

"He's gone," Jay said quietly, yet those words hit like a train. Moments passed, no one moved. "Look for yourself."