When the nightmares board the Jelly ship, full battle ensues. A Jelly, Itari, is assigned to protect Kira and leads her and Falconi, who is carrying Trig, deeper into the ship. Kira is separated from Falconi but ends up carrying Trig, and the Jellies direct her to a place where the Wallfish can pick them up. When a group of nightmares pass without seeing her, Kira realizes that the Soft Blade has rendered her essentially invisible. She kills three, but the fourth stuns her. Kira has a vision from three different perspectives of the battle on the Extenuating Circumstances. The three perspectives meld into one being, the Maw, and fly out into space. They feed on material they find, growing larger, until they attack and take over two ships. They find a planet to feed on, and then they receive the message Kira sent out from the Jelly ship. The Maw sends its servants, the nightmares, to find and destroy Kira and the xeno.

Kira wakes up, and each time she fights the nightmare it absorbs some of the xeno, leaving it thinner each time. To save her life, she forms a blade with the xeno and cuts off her right arm, then cuts through the nightmare.