Head pounding, Piper groaned and tried to open her eyes. A glaring light made her turn away, but something held her still, and she fought the rising tide of panic in her chest as she felt the restraints around her limbs. Blinking away tears as she opened her eyes, the iron shackles around her wrists came into focus.

"W-where…what…"

It was a dirty, bare room that might have been any one of a thousand in Atmos. It was certainly a cell, and her chair faced a heavy door with a tiny, barred window. There was nothing to tell her where she was or how she'd got there.

Some time later, she couldn't tell how long, there was the sound of boots on stone. The window on the cell door slid open, then snapped shut a moment later. Piper heard the echo of boot recede. Silence again. Time passed. Now, it was a dozen boots sounding a march towards her cell.

"Hello, Piper."

Cyclonis' voice grabbed Piper's attention in a vice. She stepped into the cell alone, circling Piper and taking her time to examine her captive.

"Where am I? Where are my friends?"

"Oh, I didn't bother bringing any of them along. I only wanted to spend a little time with my favorite sky knight. Alone."

Fingers brushed Piper's shoulder, but the wide back of the chair prevented her from looking back at Cyclonis. Piper shifted as much as the bonds allowed her to push the hand away, and when Cyclonis stepped back into view, her expression was edged with anger.

"I already told you that I won't join Cyclonia!"

"Oh, you really don't have a choice, Piper."

"There is nothing you can do that will ch-"

"You have no idea THE THINGS I CAN DO TO YOU!"

Cyclonis' nails dug into Piper's shoulders. The sky knight hadn't even seen the girl move before her face was inches away from her own.

"But fortunately for you, most of them would leave you unable to do what I require. Or be able to do much of anything really, and I want you…intact."

Cyclonis wore a wicked grin, and there was nothing to take Piper's mind away from the reality she faced. Alone. Helpless. At the mercy of someone…that had none.

"…What do you want?"

"That's more like it…"

Piper had to admit, for a psychopath bent on world domination, Cyclonis knew how to make an awesome crystal lab. The multi-level structure was stocked with some of the most advanced devices on Atmos, half of which were likely invented by Cyclonis herself.

And the crystals…oh sweet Atmos the crystals…

Every kind, every cut, strange artificial designs and half-formed seeds floating in nutrient baths filled every centimeter of free space. It was a treasure trove that she had free reign to play in.

Almost.

"When you're done giggling, we have work to do."

"I was not giggling!"

Cyclonis' smirk said otherwise, and the sky knight backed away from the crystal vat she'd been caressing. Cyclonis placed a knot of scrolls on a workbench and unraveled one, beckoning Piper forwards.

Piper had never seen anything like it. The scroll described the degradation of a crystal's structure. But the crystal was a type she'd never seen before, and the…rot…wasn't something that should even be possible, as far as she could tell.

Piper lost herself in the contents of the rest of the scrolls. Some of the information was incomplete, such as how the unique crystals had been made, or what their intended purpose was. Cyclonis had made notes in the margins in her own spidery script, but there was still a great deal missing.

"This is why I brought you here. You are going to find a way to stop the crystal's degradation and repair the damage."

"But…I've never seen anything like this! Anywhere! And the conditions your notes describe…you want to work on the crystal's energy pathways while the crystals are still active?!"

"That's right."

"But that's impossible!"

Cyclonis advanced on her, and Piper backed away, trying to put the table between them. The girl's outline flickered with crystal energy and Cyclonis was again close enough to touch, her arms gripping the table edge and trapping Piper between them.

"Failure is unacceptable. I'll give you three days to solve this little mystery, or…let's say that everyone on Cyclonia will die."

"You...you'd kill all those people, if I don't help you build your little doomsday weapon?"

"Oh, that's beside the point. And I never said it was a weapon…"

"Then what is it?"

Cyclonis sighed, tilting her body forwards, coming close enough for Piper to feel hot breath on her face.

"You're a smart girl, Piper. Figure it out. That's why I brought you here."

Cyclonis pulled away, slowly, and turned to leave. Piper slumped against the table, trying to get her breathing under control. What did Cyclonis really want with her? Piper had been handed an impossible puzzle, she was certain of that. No one, even Cyclonis herself, could possibly…

"You need my help."

Halfway out the door, Cyclonis stopped.

"Somehow, this…crystal rot is putting Cyclonia in danger, and you…you couldn't figure it out, so you kidnapped me, hoping I'd know what to do."

"Clever girl…"

When she turned around, Cyclonis was smiling in an almost halfway pleasant manner.

"You really should have accepted my earlier offer, Piper. The things we could do together…"

Perhaps it was just Piper's imagination, but there was less of the usual spite in Cyclonis' voice as she said those words.

"So this rot…what is it, exactly? What caused it? And how is it a danger to Cyclonia?"

"I don't know when or how it started, but a chain reaction is spreading throughout the crystal veins in Cyclonia's foundation. Crystals are being converted into this new structure, causing earthquakes in the process that are growing in intensity. I estimate that unless the changes are stopped and reversed that Terra Cyclonia will break apart and fall into the wasteland in as little as a week's time."

"A week? That's…you expect me to stop this conversion and perform a re-crystallization procedure across the crystal fundament of an entire terra in a week? And you expect me to do it alone?"

"There is no other option! Nothing I tried had the slightest effect! Why do you think I had you brought here?!"

"But it would take days just to internalize all this information, and that's time Cyclonia doesn't have to spare! I'll lose even more time chasing solutions you've already attempted!"

Cyclonis snarled, and a crystal sewn into her sleeve began to glow. Piper refused to back down, striding forwards until they were face-to-face…and then she leaned closer, trying her best to act relaxed despite the danger.

"C'mon…you and me, working together. You know you want to."

The crystal flared…and then fell silent. Cyclonis' eyes widened, her expression ecstatic for a split second before her eyes hardened and she lead Piper back to the workstation in an iron grip. A wave of her hand levitated a scroll into the air for easy reading, and she began expounding on the shorthand notes in the margin in the voice of an irate teacher to an incompetent student. Piper listened carefully, only interrupting to ask for clarification on various point as Cyclonis went through what she had done so far to stop the rot, explaining her thought processes and the reasoning behind each theory.

While I otherwise liked the series, I really felt there was a lot missing to the setting.

This Fic is (mostly) canon, but I've tried to fill in some of the blanks and expand upon the terrible lack of background fluff with some of my own theories and ideas.

Most chapters will have little infodumps at the end to explain the things I add, hopefully the fic will be more enjoyable and make a little more sense as a result.