The story arc Aurora of Rainbow Fire is part two of an ongoing series called The Odd Man Out. All current parts can be found at https://members.tripod.com/fanservicelimited/index.html
Aurora of Rainbow Fire chapter seven: Learning to Fly part a.
A Tenchi Muyo TV series lemon comedy by Nugar. Email the author at nugarthebarbarian@yahoo.com with any comments. All Tenchi Muyo characters and situations copyright their creators, Hiroki Hayashi and Masaki Kajishima, and AiC and Pioneer and are used without permission. All other characters and situations are owned by a whole lot of various people. This is a nonprofit work only.
"Well, that's it, then," Kiyone said, looking around the apartment and slinging one final bag over her shoulders.
"We're finished here?" Mihoshi asked, also carrying several bags.
"Yes. Let us go."
"Wow, I've never been to the Galaxy Police Headquarters," Sasami enthused, looking all around. "It's so much different from Jurian stations."
The Galaxy Police Headquarters was a huge space station roughly the size of the Earth's moon, but built entirely from gleaming metals. Huge rings had been stacked on top of each other, each connected to the rest in a seemingly haphazard manner. The top and bottom were also connected to each other by a long bridge that bowed out into space away from the main body, resembling nothing so much as a giant cup handle. The gargantuan station housed tens of millions of people at any given point, and devoted much of its huge surface area to ship construction, maintenance, and storage. The rest was devoted to its massive communications equipment, personnel training and housing, defense, and its own set of massive star drives. Even as its ships patrolled this galaxy and one neighboring one, so did it, albeit at a slower, less methodical pace with frequent extended stops. The Galaxy Police enforced the peace, violently if need be, and was the single most powerful organization within the surrounding ten galaxies. If circumstances demanded it, it could call upon the armadas of any of the empires within its jurisdiction to put another wayward empire back in its place. Even the powerful empire of Jurai would hesitate to go against the official policies of the GP.
On a local level, however, the GP had far less influence, and generally enforced whatever laws were present in a given region of space. The political intricacies involved when the GP had to request assistance from another empire, or vice versa, were so complex that they took up the full time of many of the greatest minds of the galaxy, which was probably a good thing given how easy it would actually be to blow up the universe. The last thing anyone needed was for geniuses like that to have time on their hands.
Washu would have sneezed, but, well, she was somewhat unable.
The thing that made Sasami coo in awe was the nature of the construction, because it was assembled. Jurians grew their ships and stations from the giant Jurian space trees, making minimal use of gleaming steel and plastic. Indeed, many Jurians had a phobia of being in such stark confines, but it wasn't a problem for Sasami.
"Ah, I haven't been back in ever so long," Mihoshi enthused, waving happily to everyone she saw despite the fact that she had no idea who any of them were.
"Well, you've been stuck on Earth for about five or six months," Kiyone reminded her. "Be thankful we got this assignment. Escorting Sasami around is way better than busting small time crooks out in the middle of nowhere."
"I forget, why did we come back?" Mihoshi wondered aloud. "I thought we were just going to go on to Jurai."
"Maintenance, Mihoshi, maintenance. Yagami needs a refit and restock, not to mention fuel." Inwardly, Kiyone exulted. (I get to escort a Jurian princess around! And Detective-Sergeant asked to see me! I just know there's going to be some sort of political intrigue going on, maybe a kidnapping threat! If I can do this job properly, my promotion is in the bag!)
"Ano, Kiyone? Why are you laughing like that?" Mihoshi asked innocently.
"Yeah, Kiyone, you're starting to creep me out," Sasami agreed.
Blushing in embarrassment, Kiyone assured them that it was nothing. "Hey, is anyone else hungry?" she asked, attempting to change the subject.
Predictably enough, Mihoshi exclaimed, "Ooh, I am!"
"Well then, let's get over to the cafeteria. You two can eat while I go meet with the boss-man."
Both Sasami and Mihoshi nodded happily, and they trekked off.
After getting them settled down with some food, Kiyone hastened to her appointment with her superior. Not for the first time, she was extremely happy to be back in civilization. Not only did both she and Mihoshi have real money, and plenty of it thanks to their accumulated pay while on Earth assignment, their meals were free. While Sasami didn't eat enough to keep a Jurian space tree alive, Mihoshi could inhale enough for a squad and contributed heavily to their tight budget on Earth. Here, it just didn't matter.
Kiyone looked around happily, scanning the crowds for people she knew. She was just passing by a coffee bar when a young woman about her age stood up.
"Mitzuki," Kiyone exclaimed. "Is that you?" she asked, examining her old classmate. She had changed her hair, going with a fixed style that kept her hair wound tight against her head, indicating that she had probably spent a fair amount of time in zero-g lately. But the rest was pure Mitzuki: narrow face, slender hands, and lithe body.
"Kiyone! Long time no see! How are things going?" chirped the other girl brightly, clutching her cup of steaming brew in one hand and giving Kiyone a one armed hug.
"Oh, pretty well," Kiyone replied happily. "Just glad to be back. How is everyone?" Knowing that it was likely to be a lengthy report, she glanced at her watch to see how much time she had before her appointment. "Tell you what, I've got a meeting with the Detective-Sergeant in about fifteen minutes. Care to walk with me and bring me up to speed?"
"Sure!"
They walked along for a while, winding their way through the three dimensional maze that made up the central plaza. Kiyone found herself getting more and more depressed as Mitzuki rambled on about this or that classmate who had received, in Mitzuki's words, 'yet another promotion.' Mitzuki was doing quite well herself, having just jumped in rank and was expecting a post in the Special Investigation Unit quite soon.
Then, as things do, talk turned to Kiyone's career.
"And how about you and Mihoshi, Kiyone?" Mitzuki asked. "I heard about your assignment to that little backwater planet, what's it called?" She looked over, a smug little smile on her lips.
"Earth," Kiyone supplied glumly.
"Anyway, that's too bad. But you seem to be doing pretty good, I mean, we all thought that they were either going to fire you or leave you out there until you retired. You really must have pissed off one of the higher ups, didn't you?"
Kiyone just tightened her expression and shrugged noncommittally.
"So, what brings you back to headquarters? That general ship refit they put out?"
Kiyone bit her tongue to keep from lashing out at the snide little bitch, then abruptly relaxed. She had an Idea with a capital I. "Oh, the same thing that caused us to be assigned to Earth in the first place," she said casually.
Mitzuki took the bait. "So, what was that?"
(Heh. Best to approach this in a roundabout way,) Kiyone thought smugly. "Tell me, do you still read those _awful_ cheap tabloids in your time off?"
Mitzuki blushed and nodded, having hoped that everyone had forgotten about her vice. It was just one more strike against Kiyone that she had the bad taste and manners to bring it up.
"Well, you know how you used to always read those 'articles', and I use the term loosely, about the Jurian royalty?" Kiyone asked pointedly, enjoying the other woman's discomfort.
"Yeah. So," she replied curtly. "What's this got to do with your assignment? You gonna be a tabloid detective now, Kiyone?" (Haha! Take that, bitch!)
Kiyone's eye twitched, once, but she rallied back. "Well, what two members of the Jurian royalty haven't they been talking about lately?" She already knew this because Mihoshi had an account forward them to Yagami, and was always talking about it, even to the point of wondering aloud what those two missing princesses were up to after a single story had raised the question and implied an orgy of sex, violence, and drugs with the locals of some backwater planet. Apparently, she hadn't made the connection.
Mitzuki shrugged.
"Think about it. Even the Emperor shows up at least once a month, with yet another story claiming 'proof' of his sexual preference, one way or the other." She paused, then decided to answer her own question. "The two crown princesses, that's who, silly," she said in the same tone one would use to address a moronic child. "And did you ever wonder why that is? Well, maybe it was because no one could find them, being on a little backwater world no one has ever heard of." She grinned in triumph.
Mitzuki gasped. "_You_ got assigned to protect the princesses?! So what are you doing back here?"
Kiyone glanced around, then leaned close with one finger on her lips and placed one finger on Mitzuki's lips. "Well, this is strictly hush hush, you know, but the two princesses are going home for a counsel session with her parents. Princess Ayeka can take care of herself, and has her new, ah, escort," she said, winking twice and nudging the other woman in the ribs. "But Princess Sasami wished to remain on Earth for a little while longer for reasons of her own. We have _earned_ the honor of being her escort back to Jurai. Both of the princesses asked for us personally." (Hah! Hah!)
Mitzuki's mouth gaped as Kiyone wrapped an arm around her shoulders, dragging her along forcefully. "Y-y-y-you? But why the Galaxy Police at all?"
"Shhh, that's _very_ hush hush." Kiyone winked and pointed one finger upwards in an easily understood gesture that meant the higher ups. In other words, it's political, little girl, you're in over your head. Why don't you go scrape that gum off your shoe and bust a few jaywalkers?
Kiyone patted her on the head condescendingly, and gave her one last insincere hug. "It's been good to see you again, and be sure to say hi to everyone for me. Now, I'd best hurry or I'll be late for my Important Meeting." She turned and walked away, the air of important dignity hanging in the air around her like cigar smoke.
And both, as they parted ways, had the exact same opinion of each other.
(Stuck-up bitch!)
Before entering the Detective-Sergeant's office Kiyone took a small detour to the restroom to 'freshen up'. In actuality, she wanted to splash her face and climb down off her high horse. She knew the Detective-Sergeant, and the last thing she, a lowly first class detective recently back from assignment to some backwater planet no one had ever heard of, wanted to do was act like she was better than anyone else.
Mitzuki was an exception because she really was better than that brown-nosing bureaucrat.
The extra time she took was worth it, as it allowed her to present an honest, respectful face on when she actually met with her superior.
"Ah, come in. Have a seat Detective... Kiyone," he said, looking up from where he had just requested her name from the database.
"Thank you, Sir." She bowed and took a seat in front of his desk, hiding her disappointment over having had her name looked up. She wasn't even important enough to remember when he had a meeting scheduled with her.
"Now, Kiyone, I understand that both Princess Ayeka and her younger sister Princess Sasami asked you to accompany Princess Sasami from Earth to her parent's estate on planet Jurai."
"That is correct, sir." She nodded.
"Good. And that is exactly what you will do. Ordinarily we don't assign detectives as chauffeurs for little girls, but we are certainly prepared to make an exception this time."
"I had hoped so, sir. Neither my partner or I wish to disappoint the Princesses of Jurai."
"Quite right. Quite right. I understand that they speak highly of you two, the Princess Sasami in particular."
Kiyone dropped her eyes and studied her hands. "I am honored by their praise, Sir."
"Yes," he replied dryly, bringing up a report. "As it says here in Princess Sasami's own words," and here he dropped his voice into a passable imitation of a little girl's voice, "'They're _sooo_ funny, I love to watch them try to catch the bad guys. Even Ryoko,' that's the dread space pirate Ryoko who has yet to be captured, as you well know, 'says that they're more fun to watch than 'Galaxy Police in Black'.'," he said, referring to a popular and long running show that portrayed the Galaxy Police as bumbling, incompetent idiots who nevertheless managed to save the day, at least until the next episode.
Kiyone blushed and studied her hands. "Princess Sasami has such a gifted way with words, Sir."
"Indeed." He paused and looked intently at her, giving her time to squirm as only an experienced commanding officer could. "Anyway, relations with Jurai have been touchy of late; we currently owe them more favors than they owe us. Jurai being the most powerful single empire under our jurisdiction, and the first to come when we request assistance, it has been deemed prudent that we accommodate the two princesses' wishes. Who are we do deny Princess Sasami her entertainment?"
"Who are we, indeed," Kiyone agreed weakly.
"It goes without saying that if anything should happen to the young princess while she is in your care..." He let the sentence trail off.
"Nosir, no need to say anything. I understand perfectly."
"Good." His expression softened and he projected a more relaxed attitude. "However, as two of the most important members of the Jurai royal family are leaving Earth, there probably won't be any pressing need to put two fine, capable officers on that remote post. We'll see about a transfer, pending a good review, of course."
Kiyone brightened. "Of course, Sir, you can count on us, Sir. And Sir, um, could you maybe review my request for a new partner?"
"I will certainly look into it. Any questions?"
"Um, yes, Sir. Are there any other circumstances I should be aware of?" she asked hopefully.
"Circumstances? What sort of circumstances?" her superior asked pointedly, sitting up and leaning forward, bearing down on the hapless detective in front of him.
"Oh, you know, kidnapping threats, civil unrest, troubles with another empire?" (Come on, there's got to be _something_,) she thought.
"No..." he replied, clearly uncomfortable with such a line of questioning. "Just what are you getting at, Detective?"
"Ah, nothing, Sir. Just wanting to know if there is any indication of a problem my partner and I might face in our mission."
"Detective, this isn't a gritty police drama. Concentrate on your duty, not your aspirations as a hero."
"Yessir, I will, Sir."
"Good. Dismissed."
"The Princess Sasami?!" the man hissed into the audio only communications gear. "Here? Now?" He paused, listening carefully to the rest of the information. "Yes. The agreed on price? Excellent. I'll get right on it."
"Hey, there's Kiyone!" Mihoshi said brightly, waving as high as she could to be seen.
"I see her!" Sasami replied, jumping and waving as well. She was rewarded when the dark-haired detective noticed them and started their way. Sasami, ever observant of other's emotional conditions, remarked on her dour expression. "Kiyone looks down, don't you think, Mihoshi?"
"Huh?" Mihoshi asked, lowering her hand and looking at her charge. She looked back up at her partner, then clasped her hands together. "Oh, I think you're right. She does look sad."
When asked, Kiyone shook her head dismissively. "I'm fine, don't worry about it. How was lunch?"
"Good," Sasami replied.
"Are you hungry, Kiyone?" Mihoshi asked.
Kiyone shook her head. "No, I'm fine. I'll get a cup of coffee, though. Hey, why don't we show Sasami around headquarters? We've got some time."
"That sounds like fun, I've never been here before. It's very big, for a made place." Sasami toed the hard metal floor.
Mihoshi nodded at her, following Kiyone as she led the way to the nearest coffee bar. "Headquarters is the biggest artificial planetoid in this galaxy. It's so big, in fact, that we don't even really need the gravity generators to stay on the ground."
"There was that synthetic solar system the Syanellians had up until about eight centuries ago," Kiyone mentioned as she signaled an employee. "That was bigger, although I guess you're right about this being the biggest planetoid. Their system was just a bunch of planets and a sun held together."
"Syanellians? Who were they?" Sasami asked.
Kiyone glanced back as she was paying for her coffee. "You mean you've never heard about them? That's strange. But I guess you would later on in school."
"The Syanellians were a race of powerful humanoids from another galaxy who built a big, mobile solar system," Mihoshi explained. "They traveled around and raided other species empires for supplies. They showed up on the other side of our galaxy about eleven-hundred and thirty-two years ago, and started attacking everyone in sight. It was the second to last major war, and the Galaxy Police fought most of it. It lasted three hundred years until they were wiped out by Empress Raikori."
Kiyone took a long drink of her fragrant coffee and sighed before nodding. "Yes, like I said, up until about eight hundred years ago." Once again, she took the lead and guided them all over to a clear elevator, taking another long drink as she did so. She hadn't had Jamariquoian Blue since well before her trip to Earth. "Let's go up north and work our way down from there."
"Ooh!" Mihoshi exclaimed as they entered the clear tube and stood on a glowing disk of energy. "Can we stop by the rec-park? They're due to be finished with the new Twista-Hurl ride!"
Kiyone winced. "Uh, we'll go through, but if we want to have time to see the sights we can't stay for the rides." She gave Sasami a pleading look.
Sasami smiled knowingly. "Yeah, let's hurry! I don't want to miss anything!"
"Aww-" Mihoshi's reply was cut off as the disk disappeared, taking them with it.
Two hours later, they had toured the northern residential levels and were well on their way south, toward what might be considered the bottom of the giant installation if top and bottom had any real meaning in space. It was towards the engines, power plants, and ship docks, and since everything had been built in a linear fashion to take advantage of the acceleration supplied by the engines, the word 'bottom' was as good as any.
The upper middle levels were where most of the GP desk jobs took place, as well as a large central level devoted to one of several GP Academies. Their tour didn't tarry long there, as most of it was off-limits without permission and Sasami didn't want to raise a fuss.
The real delight of the day, at least for Kiyone, was when they finally got to stop by the shipyard and see her beloved Yagami.
They stopped in front of a large armor-glass window running the length of the corridor. The other side was mostly vacuum, though there was a bit of escaped atmosphere from the ships that lined the inside of the incredibly huge cavern that served as the shipyard. On the opposite wall and a few degrees up, the Yagami sat motionless, gleaming in the bright light that filled the inside. Although crew and robots crawled over other ships in the hangar, none were attending to Yagami, indicating that the refit was complete.
"They repainted it!" Kiyone exclaimed delightedly, staring at her now gleaming red ship.
"And the equipment restocked, the combat suits replaced, supplies replenished, air recyclers upgraded, the engines replaced..." Mihoshi added, glancing up from where she was leafing through a report they had picked up at the dock office.
"They repainted it!" Kiyone exclaimed, grabbing Sasami and pointing at the ship in case she had missed it.
"...the airlock fixed, the decking refurbished..."
"You don't understand!" Kiyone insisted, lightly shaking the little princess. "They _repainted_ it! They _never_ repaint on a general refit!"
"The library updated, the memory expanded, and oh, look!" she cried, jabbing her finger at one line and turning it towards the others. "We've been selected to beta test one of those new Sirus Cybernetics Advanced Personality Substitute AI modules!"
"The paint! Oh, how it gleams!"
Sasami gently tugged a now forgotten and nearly empty Ocean o' Coffee cup out of Kiyone's shaking hand and threw it in a nearby waste receptacle. "I know," she said, patting her chaperone's hand. "It's very pretty."
"Oh, I've never met one of those," Mihoshi added. "I can't wait to meet it! I wonder if it'll like us?"
A huge ball of fire and flying debris exploded out from where the newly installed engines were a second previous.
"MY BABY!" Kiyone screeched.
Mihoshi's head jumped up and she stared in shock with the other two as alarms and lights went off, containment crews rushing to attend the wounded ship. "Oh, no!" she cried suddenly, glancing worriedly at her partner. "The new paint job!"
Kiyone gave her a look of startled disbelief edging toward righteous fury. "To hell with the paint job! What about my ship?!"
A second, smaller explosion lit the hangar, sending work robots spinning backwards before containment fields enveloped both them and the pieces of Yagami. One hyperdrive engine floated motionless several lengths from the ship it had become separated from.
It was like watching the death of a puppy.
The next hour passed in a blur for Sasami, as they checked in with the dock office and patiently listened to several explanations, mostly involving improper couplings and crossed wires, but which really amounted to 'We won't know why your ship committed suicide until we salvage the brain module and send it to the Sirus service psychiatrist, who is heavily backlogged right now and it could be a while.'
What really disturbed the Juraian princess was Kiyone's reaction to the incident. Although she seemed shocked at first, soon she started to grin unaccountably as she badgered and threatened the harassed dock master for the details.
"So, what do we do now?" Mihoshi asked. They all sat at a table in one of the better cafeterias they liked to frequent in the lowest residential level. She nibbled idly at a plate of unidentifiable bits of meat and vegetables covered in brown sauce.
Kiyone ate heartily, having skipped lunch. She was nearly finished with a bowl of rice and fish soup, and had already taken several bites of a kind of pot pie served with slices of bread. She poked the back of her chopsticks at a tasteful sign across the causeway advertising transient lodgings. "We'll stay the night here, and see about another ship in the morning. Repairs on Yagami are going to take weeks, especially since we just got moved to last in line and they practically have to rebuild the entire aft section from scratch. We can probably requisition another patrol ship."
Sasami nodded silently, eating her own beefbowl.
"Does this mean we have time to ride the Twista-Hurl?" Mihoshi asked brightly.
Kiyone turned faintly green at the thought. "If you wish, I guess. I, umm, I'll go requisition a ship while you two are at the park."
"Yay!" Mihoshi cheered. "You'll like this," she assured Sasami. "They give each person that rides a blanket meal ticket good anywhere in the station for anything and all you can eat, as long as you use it within an hour of the ride. It's their way of refunding the meal you just lost on the ride."
"I don't suppose they spend much money buying meals for their customers in that time, do they?" Sasami asked, frowning when Mihoshi shook her head brightly. She dubiously pushed her bowl toward the center of the table. "I guess I'm done, then," she added reluctantly.
"Let's get a room first, and I'll meet you back there when I get back, okay?" Kiyone asked.
They nodded.
She finished a last bite of pie and set her chopsticks down, wiping her lips with a napkin. "Well, let's go, then."
Kiyone woke up grinning like a madwoman. Her suspicions had been correct.
Oh, sure, it was entirely possible that the timing between her ship spontaneously developing suicidal tendencies and her assignment to escort the youngest Juraian Princess was coincidental, but not very likely. This was intragalactic politics, where one being's decision not to have coffee one morning was the result of an action on the part of some super- secret organization controlled by a government halfway across the spiral arm.
Any way she looked at it, all the facts pointed to one simple conclusion.
Some agency had an unwholesome interest in Sasami.
Who, though?
Her commander hadn't given her any indication that some agency or agencies might have an agenda involving the princess. While she generally accepted statements from on high at face value, she knew that they had their own games of power politics to play. More likely, they simply didn't know, but you could never really tell.
Kiyone shrugged, happily contemplating the possibilities. She would be every inch the detective when she went for the meeting her superior had requested earlier.
"Detective Mabiki, no, don't have a seat," instructed the man known simply as Detective-Sergeant. Presumably he had a regular name as well, but equally presumably he occasionally left his office. Kiyone had never heard of either, but it wasn't polite, nor advisable, to pry.
"Sir!" she replied, standing at attention.
He noticed that and waved his hand irritably. "No, relax, relax. This won't take long. As your ship has been disabled in the accident in the docks, you will, of course, be forced to find other transportation."
Was it Kiyone's imagination or did she hear single quotes around the word 'accident'?
"This isn't official Galaxy Police business, so I'm afraid I can't provide you with another ship as per your request," he said, although his tone didn't sound very regretful. "However, and I think you'll find this much more, ah, suitable, for the young princess, you will be provided with an ample expense account and given a pass for one of the civilian transport ships currently shuttling between headquarters and the planet Waldow." He paused and slid a fat plastic envelop across the desk. "I checked the dock listings there and found a Juraian treeship currently taking on passengers. It's a cruise starliner making the rounds, and is quite suitable for our purposes. If you hurry you can make the departure date."
He couldn't have spelled it out any clearer if he'd actually spoken plainly.
"Sir! I will, Sir!" she replied stiffly, eyes alight with joy.
"Yes, yes, very good. It's bound for the Ring, but you should have no trouble making it to Jurai from there."
Of course not. The Forest Ring was Jurai's oldest, closest, and most important colony world. And for some reason, which she'd have to figure out herself, it was of vital importance that she go there.
But why?
"Any questions, Detective?"
"No, Sir! I'll leave at once, Sir!"
He sighed, her eagerness was so blindingly obvious. "And Detective?"
"Yes, Sir?"
"When you leave at once,"
"Sir?"
"Be sure you take the Princess with you."
"Sir!" Now what did he mean by that?
"Dismissed."
"Come on, we've got a ship to catch!" Kiyone insisted, frantically stuffing a wad of clothes into her partner's suitcase before running back for more. For some strange reason, Mihoshi had unpacked her entire wardrobe into the room's tiny lockers.
"Ano, Kiyone?" Mihoshi asked hesitantly from where she had rudely been shoved to the side on the grounds that she wasn't doing it fast enough. "I didn't have _everything_ in there..."
"Huh?" the dark haired girl replied distractedly between grunts, jumping up and down on the hard-shelled suitcase to make it close.
Finally, it make a loud *snick* as the latches caught, then groaned a little as the sides strained.
"Ah, nevermind." Mihoshi knew her partner would calm down eventually. And the truth was, she was impressed. To think, she'd always just blindly believed in the old saying that you couldn't put five pounds of rice into a three pound sack. Just one more piece of evidence that showed that her partner was a miracle worker.
Kiyone panted heavily, still standing on the suitcase. Then, gingerly, with the same deliberate carefulness of someone holding a cup full of ammonium triodide, she stepped off of the suitcase, to the bed, and to the floor.
The suitcase held.
She dusted her hands off and made a mental note to direct Mihoshi to the nearest laundromat later. "Now, Sasami?" she asked, scanning the room.
"Uh, right here! And I'm all packed, too!" Sasami assured her hastily.
"Good! We've got a transport to catch!"
Their trip to Waldow proved uneventful. Kiyone was as nervous as a man standing in a suspiciously grand piano-shaped shadow, and not all of it was due to the (to her) inordinately lengthy time they had spent getting ready for departure. Her eyes never stayed still, and she watched everything and everyone around her as ardently as she had when she was lost in the jungle and danger seemed to come from every angle.
They landed in the lone spaceport on the main continent of planet Waldow. In fact, it was the sole spaceport the planet had, period. As such, it was a large one, as it had to serve the needs of the many cargo ships that came and went, many of which were going right back to the Galaxy Police headquarters.
None of this brought comment or more than passive notice from the three travelers, although Kiyone did briefly wonder if the Waldowian government was out to get Sasami for some reason. She didn't dismiss it, but rated it unlikely. For whatever reason, it wasn't the planet that was important. They had to board that ship!
"Slow down, Kiyone, please!" Sasami huffed, having been run ragged trying to keep up with the speeding woman. She had been running flat out, trying to match Kiyone's longer strides, although Kiyone had at least been considerate enough to carry two of Sasami's large suitcases in addition to her own. Mihoshi carried the other big one and a satchel, leaving Sasami with only a backpack.
"Oh, sorry, Sasami," she apologized, genuinely contrite. "I'm being awfully inconsiderate of you. We'll stop at the next refreshment fountain for a break."
"Good," Mihoshi said simply.
As it turned out, there was one right around the corner, its cheerful primary colors advertising the presence of free water, pure ethanol, and hydrochloric acid from fountains. They checked carefully before they drank. Sometimes practical jokers were known to switch the signs around.
The air filled with an awful groaning that seemed to come from the depths of some great hell, perhaps from the Great Sleeping One himself. Passerbys stopped and turned slow circles, seeking the source of the unholy moan. Sasami and both of her two chaperones looked around intently, self-consciously aware that the sound was coming from near them. It was punctuated by a staccato series of sharp pops that made everyone jump and hold their breath, anxiously awaiting the next one.
All eyes turned as one, unerringly focusing on the battered, tan hide of the bulging suitcase held in Mihoshi's now trembling hand. Little blisters appeared on its naugahyde skin, the hinges warped and squealed, and the seams strained ominously. As much as everyone present would have liked to turn and run like hell, no one was willing to risk vibrations that might set the overstuffed time bomb off.
"We're all going to die," ventured one pessimistic soul. Everyone's hearts sank.
"Don't. Move." Kiyone hissed in a whisper at her friend. "Don't talk, don't nod, and if you have to breath, for our sakes do it slowly!"
"Okay!" Mihoshi replied quickly, nodding.
The air filled with the hiss of indrawn breath... But the moment passed.
Something inside the suitcase shifted, causing a three- second harsh mechanical buzz which cut off abruptly. A few seconds later, it started again, and shut off just as quickly. With many fits and starts, as if a switch was right on the cusp between on and off, something in Mihoshi's suitcase finally managed to get turned on fully, setting up a grinding vibration that resonated through the entire suitcase, through the handle, and into Mihoshi's hand.
Kiyone and Mihoshi exchanged a glance, and Kiyone made a vague pumping motion with her right hand. Mihoshi responded with an embarrassed nod, and Kiyone put her hand over her face.
The words "Bomb! It's a bomb!" filtered in and out of the crowd, along with various speculations about the afterlife, death, and the probabilities of everyone's immediate demise. Everyone stared at Mihoshi balefully.
"It's not my fault!" she whined in a dreadful, low whisper, not even wiping at the tears coursing down her cheek for fear she would move the suitcase slightly. "I didn't pack it!"
Kiyone took one slow, sliding step away from her partner and whistled innocently.
"Kiyone!" Mihoshi whimpered.
A large bulge of stretched naugahyde appeared on the lid, indicating that a major internal structure had weakened. Another appeared on the side, and the hinges rattled loudly.
One woman screeched and fainted as the locks screamed again, and the suitcase started to lose its suitcasey look. Now it looked more like a balloon. A trembling, buzzing balloon that was about to pop.
The tension mounted quickly. Something had to give, and soon.
*POW*-*TINK* went the rightmost hinge pop-rivet as it broke loose and bounced off the hard floor at nearly supersonic speeds.
"MY EYE!" screeched some random person.
The luggage was quieter, now, with only a low, muffled buzz of some unknown device to fill the silence. The tension released, the groans silenced, and the pressure subsided.
Everyone gave a collective sigh of relief.
"Whew!" Mihoshi said loudly, wiping a hand across her forehead. "What a relief!"
The already-twisted-beyond-hope-of-repair latches chose that moment to let go, allowing the lid to fall open and disgorge a small mountain of frilly pink things, fluffy white things, lacy red things, and one long, battery-operated naughty purple thing which fell out squirming and vibrating across the floor. Mihoshi hastily turned it off and shoved it underneath the bottom of the pile, blushing furiously.
Several people in the crowd laughed cruelly, and she blushed even more.
"Oh, great," Kiyone groaned. "More delays."
Try as they might, they couldn't get the suitcase to stay shut again, even with most of the clothes removed. Other than a few bored travelers, their audience dissipated quickly, leaving them to their own devices.
Sasami piped up optimistically. "We're in a spaceport, right? We don't have much farther to go, and there's got to be a duty-free shop around here somewhere. Why don't you go get a big bag or something?"
Kiyone hugged her. "That's a great idea, Sasami! I'll do that! You stay here, I'll be right back."
True to her word, Kiyone was only gone a few minutes before she returned with a cheap blue duffle bag trimmed in grey. At two and a half feet long and a foot tall, it easily held all of Mihoshi's clothes and very, very personal items. Unfortunately, it was of such low quality the zippers stuck twice, and the stitching on a bit of grey trim had came loose, letting it flap.
Mihoshi grabbed the strap and they were off once more. Another wild run later, they arrived at the check-in station. Kiyone flashed a card emblazoned with the GP logo and paid their way on board. They were directed to a line of people waiting entrance to the departure gate, there to wait patiently for the next thirty minutes.
Both Sasami and Mihoshi gave Kiyone a series of baleful glances.
"Hey, how was _I_ supposed to know that our flight would be delayed?" Kiyone replied defensively.
Nearby, two young aliens strolled casually towards their next assignment. This wasn't an undercover assignment, nor did it involve assassination, razzle-dazzle, or political intrigue. Frankly, even the most desperate black-ops commander wouldn't hire them for anything complicated, and they'd be the last choice even for the simple stuff. They just weren't smart enough.
"I'm tellin' ya, Ura, this is our big break!" continued a young guy with short red hair highlighted with a wide blond streak. He had a punk rocker look to him, mostly because of his piercings, a nosering and three earrings in his left ear, his large, gaudy necklace, and his loose black pseudoleather clothes. He shifted a large duffle bag, the pair's only luggage, from one hand to the other.
The other, a blue-haired girl about the same age, shook her head in disbelief as they walked. "Oh, come off it, Amaraba. I don't care how fancy this ship is, we're not going to run into any royalty trying to travel incognito, even if we are going to the Forest Ring, first. Nobles have their own ships, you moron."
"Either way, this ship is gotta have hundreds of rich people on it. I mean, who else could afford it? I'm tellin' ya, all we gotta do is bow and scrape like they _was_ royalty and we'll be gettin' big, fat tips." He made a mock-bow in her direction. "We'll have enough money to BUY our own ship in no time," Amaraba replied confidently.
Ura wavered. "You really think so?"
He gave her his best suave smile, which wasn't very. "Trust me, babe. We're gonna hang with people of quality from now on. Nobles, gangsters, you name it."
"All-right!" his girlfriend enthused. "You go, boy. Unh huh, unh huh."
"Hey," he replied. "It's gotta beat washing dishes at that crappy restaurant."
On this, Ura was in full agreement.
Amaraba paused to flourish their newly issued crewmember cards at the gate. He loved playing the high roller, and Ura seemed to appreciate it, too.
They moved through to the waiting line, ending up in position just behind two women and a young girl who were talking. The hall was wide enough for people to stand in line side by side, and they ended up standing on the left side of a man in nice casual clothes with a blue duffle bag at his feet.
Ura glanced to her right at Amaraba and gestured to the two women ahead in line with the young girl between them. "Daughter?" she mouthed with a grin.
He shrugged and dropped their bag on the floor, but as she watched he made a V with each hand using the index and middle fingers. Then he glanced at the two women and subtly placed his hands together, interlocking the fingers so that the skin between them on both hands ground together in a series of twists.
Ura broke up laughing and punched him in the arm. "Amarabaaa," she drawled between giggles, "knock it off."
"Hey, you thought of it first," he said, laughing and rubbing his shoulder.
"That's just gross," Ura replied indignantly, then laughed again herself. They ignored the annoyed looks they were getting from all the other people in the area.
Ura looked up when she noticed a light above the departure gate blink on. It was a cool amber color, indicating that it wasn't quite ready, but would be soon. "Hey, grab the bag, we're about to move out."
Amaraba looked ahead at the wide line of people stirring in anticipation of the impending gate activation, then crouched and grabbed the handles of their duffle bag. It was no coincidence that it put the rear ends of both the girls in front of him right at eye level. Both of the lesbians were hot, and he used his time on the floor to get a good look of their nice, firm asses. The dark haired girl was wearing a skirt which showed off her legs nicely, but the blonde's tight slacks gave him a better show. When she moved, he could see the panty line through the thin brown material, and it was apparently a very revealing thong.
Then Ura, who was more aware of her boyfriend's habits than she let on, backhanded him across the back of his head and knocked him over into the man standing beside them.
He jumped back up with a hasty series of apologies, and not all of them were to the man he had just fell into. He quickly grabbed his duffle bag and moved over to stand close to Ura, who was giving him one of her better glare-of-death's, but not nearly as good as the one he was getting from the man. Anger had seeped into the man's eyes, promising pain for the indignity put upon him. Amaraba paled and stepped a little closer to his girlfriend.
"Bastard," she hissed into his ear. "If you're going to stare at some girl's ass, it had better be mine!"
Reflexively, his eyes dropped and shifted to her own rear, which wasn't bad in the look's department either.
"Just for that, you're cut off," she continued in a whisper.
Amaraba wilted accordingly. "Aww, I'm sorry, babe, it won't happen again..." he whined.
"Hmph," she replied, crossing her arms and turning away. "You're still cut off."
"You mean... No more fun?"
"Nope."
"No blowjobs?" he asked, the realization sinking in.
"Absolutely not."
"No sex?"
"Unh unh."
"No _hand_jobs?" he guessed.
"Hardly." She sniffed.
"But, but..."
"Butts got you into this mess," Ura replied coolly.
"I'll be good," he said in a dejected little boy voice.
"You'd better. I think that man wants to kick your ass."
Amaraba glanced over to find the man didn't seem to be willing to let bygones be bygones, at least from the way he was still glaring. "Shit, um, let's see if we can't squeeze by the lesbians, alright?" he asked.
"So long as you don't try to feel a cop," she replied nastily.
"Um, Ura, I think you mean 'cop a feel'," he hazarded.
"Whatever," she snapped. "You're not helping your case by making fun of my sayings, you know."
"Right, right..."
With several apologies, they managed to squeeze between the laden threesome and the wall, but found their advance blocked by a solid wall of passengers. The amber light had been on several minutes now, and they figured they only had a few more minutes to wait, so they simply pressed in.
After five minutes, Ura commented on the delay. Amaraba agreed.
After ten minutes, Amaraba sat the duffle bag down. The girls beside them also sat much of their luggage down. Everyone exchanged looks and shrugged.
Another five minutes passed, and the light blinked green.
"Finally!" someone in the crowd exclaimed, and there was much murmured agreement.
Amaraba turned and bent over to grab their bag, and accidentally bumped heads with the blonde girl who had mirrored his actions exactly. "Ouch," he complained.
"Owwie," Mihoshi parroted. "Sorry about that, I should watch what I'm doing," she said, amusement entering her voice.
"It's okay, I wasn't looking either," he replied without thinking as he grabbed the handle of the duffle bag.
"'It's okay, I wasn't looking either'?" Ura asked in disbelief.
Amaraba blinked. "Uhh, yeah, uh, watch what you're doing next time, ya clums-*cough* *cough*" He trailed off, embarrassed at having been polite to someone.
The line inched forward as two, then three, then five people disappeared through the gate, just enough to give the rest a little breathing room.
Then the light changed back to amber.
The crowd gave a great collective sigh of disappointment. Those who had picked up their bags sat them down on the ground again, including Mihoshi and Amaraba.
"Y'know," Ura commented quietly, "if this was really as high class a ship as you keep saying it is, they'd have 'porters out here taking our luggage."
"We're crew, babe," Amaraba said patiently, as if that explained everything. "They don't send 'porters to pick up the crew's own luggage. We have to get it ourselves."
"Oh." Ura accepted that easily enough. She knew there was a flaw in that logic somewhere, but she just couldn't put her finger on it.
Somewhere behind them, Sungi, the man Amaraba had fell into, shifted impatiently and amused himself with private thoughts of removing the clumsy little punk's privates. He wasn't the type to forgive easily, and made a decision that if he ever got a chance, the kid was going see a world of hurt. Even if it was just an accident.
Caught up in his fantasizing, he missed seeing the kid and the cute blonde bump heads. Even so, his eyes never left the young pair, and he did see it when they sat their bags beside down beside each other. He noticed this mainly because the bags were exactly alike: blue with grey trim around the edges.
He glanced up as the light turned green again, then back to the kid and the blonde. They both looked down and noticed that their bags looked exactly alike. They said something, but he was too far away to hear. Then, as he watched, they agreed to swap bags. Sungi chuckled quietly to himself. He had been watching, and knew full well which bag each had sat down, and they had just gotten it confused and gave their own bag to the other.
A brief thought of telling them that they had switched flitted through his mind, only to be squashed. Let them discover the unhappy fact on their own. The kid deserved it, at the least.
The line started moving forward again, so he picked up his own duffle bag and moved along with it.
He didn't think about the fact that he, too, had a blue duffle bag with grey trim.
"You know, I think I'm glad that this bag was made so shoddily," Mihoshi said idly as she sat it down on one of the room's twin beds. She would have liked a suite, but they barely managed to get a berth at all, so it would be just like their vacation on Earth.
"Why's that?" Kiyone asked as she sat her own load down on the other bed and helped Sasami put hers there as well.
"This torn place," Mihoshi replied, tugging lightly on it before she opened it in search of a shirt she wanted. "When we were standing in line, a guy sat one down just like it and we got confused, but I recognized this torn spot and knew which one was mine."
"Is it?" Kiyone asked, ever practical.
"Unh huh," Mihoshi replied, pulling out the shirt she had been looking for. "Unless he has a wild side I didn't see in public," she continued, holding up a pair of red panties purchased on Earth.
Kiyone chuckled and Sasami giggled. "Maybe so." Abruptly she turned serious. "Well, I'm going to go look around the ship. Keep an eye on Sasami, Mihoshi. And be careful, Sasami. This isn't Earth, you know.
"I know," Sasami said, and nodded.
A loud bong, like that from a gong, filled the ship, indicating that lunch was served in the banquet hall, a common Juraian custom.
"Good. I'll see you two in a few hours." Kiyone left the room, the door dematerializing to a flat grey screen and rematerializing after her.
"Man, I wish we had time to kick back and relax before we had to start work," Ura complained as Amaraba flashed his crewmember card in front of the reader on their door. They both walked in through the holographic screen as the wood obligingly disappeared.
"Yeah, no foolin'," he agreed, tossing their duffle bag on the tiny bed. They got extra pay if they shared one of the tiny little rooms with a fellow crewmember, and they would have done that anyway. "I heard this ship's got some nice bits. Maybe we can use some of them when we get off duty."
Ura bobbed her head, making her large left earring dance and sparkle. "Cool."
"The onsen, maybe, or the bar... Hey!" Amaraba exclaimed as a happy thought occurred to him. "I think they've got one of those new antigrav tingle-sense rooms! Those are supposed to be really cool!"
"Wow, really? I always wanted to try one of those!"
He smiled. He knew she'd forget to be mad at him. She always did. "Cool," he replied as they left for their assignments.
Sungi sighed as he carefully placed his own duffle bag on the far side of his large, plush bed. Standard operating proceedures would have him immediately leave for the recreation hall and flirt with anything that moved, but his heart just wasn't in it. So, for the moment, he sat slumped on the edge of the bed, breathing deeply.
He always got nervous at the start of a mission, but it had been getting worse these past few years. It wasn't that he was having moral issues with his line of work, he didn't have morals. It just seemed kind of pointless after a while. Once you complete one job, another one would be waiting, thanks to the ever-changing dynamics of the galaxy, and eventually his luck was going to run out.
On a long enough time line, everyone's chances of survival drops to zero.
Giving one more great sigh, he stood up and walked out the door. As much as he'd like to spend the trip locked in his cabin, people tended to get suspicious if you didn't try to blend in.
"This is a really pretty ship," Sasami commented as they walked through the cavernous wooden hallways leading from section to section. "It's a lot bigger than mine was."
Mihoshi nodded in agreement, peering around at the exits leading to bathrooms, cabins, and other hallways. "This is a Class L Jurai civilian transport, or, as my old professor used to call them, a really big free-fall tree. It's even bigger than Yagami."
"I don't know what the Yagami was," replied a woman's voice behind them, "but you are correct. The Dinu-oh is one point five kilometers long and three-quarters of a kilometer in diameter."
They both turned quickly to see the newcomer. She was tall, dressed in a formal but very low-cut cocktail dress slit high up the side. She bowed very low in Sasami's direction.
"It is a pleasure to meet you, Princess Sasami. I am Kodachi Seru, and this is my ship."
Sasami bowed in return. "How do you do," she replied politely.
Seru was a minor house of nobles, not very popular in the empire. They weren't disliked, but they never did anything controversial, so most people, royalty and commoners alike, dismissed them as boring. In the meantime, the members of the house of Seru quietly made a large fortune in the private sector. For Kodachi to call this her ship meant that she both owned it, Juraian ships never being leased, financed, or mortgaged, and performed the duties of a captain and pilot. A Juraian space tree only answered to one mistress.
Mihoshi blinked, remembering something Kiyone had said about traveling secretly.
"Very well, thank you," the captain replied in cultured tones. "I trust that all is well? Is there anything, anything I can do at all for my princess?"
Sasami shook her head quickly, sending her long ponytails flying. "No, I'm fine, thank you."
The captain clapped her hands together happily, a smile forming on her face. "How lovely! We don't often see other royalty on board, much less a princess. I hope you'll allow me to throw a banquet in your honor? We can get a few pictures made, perhaps you would consent to bless Dinu-oh..." she trailed off, enthusiastically listing activities she wanted Sasami to perform.
As she talked, Sasami's mood grew darker and darker, as did her expression. This was how it was all over the empire. She wasn't a princess, she was trained seal, expected to perform on demand. A feeling of hopelessness washed over her. She had a duty to the empire, though, didn't she? She couldn't very well refuse.
Mihoshi, who had been rudely dismissed as someone not important enough to notice, saw Sasami's deepening frown. Although she didn't understand why her charge was unhappy, she quickly realized who was causing it. "Excuse me," she began in her most authoritative voice, "but Princess Sasami will not be taking part in any public ceremonies."
"blu nuhg...What?" Kodachi said as her tongue stumbled to a halt. She tried to get a grip on this unpleasant new concept.
"Sasami is under my protection," Mihoshi stated firmly. "And I have been given orders to deliver her to her family estates on Jurai, quietly. We are traveling incogkneetoe."
The captain blinked. "Incognito? But, but WHY?"
Mihoshi's brain stumbled. "Uh, uh..."
"Because I've been called back by my mommy and she said not to cause a spectacle on the way home," Sasami supplied helpfully, with a glance at Mihoshi.
Mihoshi nodded, then ahhed as something occurred to her. Completely ignoring the matter at hand, she began digging in her pocket.
"But, but, but you're the _PRINCESS_!" the captain wailed piteously, raw need in her voice. Several passengers stopped and stared at the sight. "I can't let a princess travel on my ship without getting some kind of recognition out of it! I've got a business to run here! I need all the advertising I can get!" she whined, kneading her hands.
Mihoshi finally found what she was looking for, then looked around at the gathering crowd. "Umm, Sasami? This is a spectacle, isn't it?"
Sasami looked around at the crowd. "Oh, no, you're right, Mihoshi, it is." She glared her tiny fury at the captain, who wilted instantly. "There, you see what you've caused? You made me disobey my mommy! That always makes her angry, and trust me, you wouldn't like my mommy when she's angry."
Kodachi blanched and looked around at the dozen or so people who were standing around, listening to them talk. "I'm very sorry, Puh... Little girl," she finished lamely. "Listen up everyone!" she announced loudly, turning to the crowd. "It's officially Nirvana hour down at the bar! Follow me and you all get free drinks!"
The crowd broke into a cheer and happily trailed behind as she marched off to the ship's bar, intending to get very very intoxicated. Hopefully she could forget the mental image that popped into her mind when the princess warned that her mother might get mad if she caused a scene. That was a thought no sober mind could deal with.
"Thank you, Mihoshi," Sasami said gratefully.
"Oh... Right... Anyway," Mihoshi replied, getting back to her question, "this _is_ a spectacle, isn't it?"
Sasami took one good look at the pair of Katsuhito's glasses Mihoshi held in her hand and hit the floor with a groan. "Yes, Mihoshi," she replied with a kind of resigned tolerance as she climbed to her feet. "Those are Grandfather Masaki's spectacles, glasses, whatever you call them."
"Silica-based head-mounted optical magnification lenses?" Mihoshi supplied brightly.
"And that," Sasami replied.
"Here, you take them. I found them on the beach, but forgot about them until now. You'll see Grandfather before I will, so you give them back to him."
Sasami shrugged and put them in the pocket of her blouse. "Okay. Hey, wow! Is that the new Dead Men Walking game?!" she cried, looking through the nearby arched doorway at an arcade center.
Mihoshi looked around until she spotted it, and noticed that Sasami was making a beeline for it. "Sasami, wait!" she called.
The princess slowed and turned around, still walking, though backward. "It's okay! I don't need someone around all the time, you go go on ahead. Have fun, see things, I'll be right here, bye!" she waved. Then she turned around and streaked for the complicated looking machine, which reminded Mihoshi of a voting booth as designed by Washu-chan.
Mihoshi wavered in indecision. On one hand, she was Sasami's guardian, and couldn't very well guard her if she wasn't around. On the other, Sasami clearly didn't want her around, and the average crime rate on ships was incredibly low. She frowned, trying to decide what to do.
A few minutes later, it occurred to her that she was thirsty, so she wandered off in search of the cantina.
The refreshment center, when she found it, was a nice, cozy bubble in the middle of the ship. It would only seat about three dozen people, but given the relatively small number of passengers, it wasn't likely that more than a quarter of them would suddenly have a craving for a double-scoop chocolate-and- strawberry rootbeer float with amnyal nitrate sprinkles at the same time.
Actually, that rarely happened at all. Never before, in fact, and the soda jerk checked his memory thoroughly for a similar order when Mihoshi requested it of him, pulling his large, funnel-shaped audio receptors down with his hands so that they sproinged back into position when he let go, a nervous subroutine he had been trying to uninstall for months with no success.
"You want a what?" the android, for all intents and purposes a he, asked.
Mihoshi patiently repeated her order.
The robot blinked, the little round lights of its eyes going black momentarily. A row of lights danced and blinked in a flat line, suggesting more than simulating a mouth as it replied. "Well, okay, if you insist." Rather than turn around, the robot's metallic grey head simply spun a 180 on the slender, straight tube that served as a neck so that it could watch as its sole pair of arms pulled rapidly on levers, grabbed for cups, and operated an ice cream scoop.
Mihoshi watched, mesmerized as the robot worked with astonishing speed and surety. She leaned over the counter, standing on one leg with the knee of the other on her stool, a classic perky-and-interested pose that looked right at home in the simulated drugstore surroundings. In a few brief moments a tall crystal glass brimming with foamy brown liquid was deposited in front of her and the robot's metal hand made a quick pass over the top, carpet-bombing the top scoop of pink ice-cream with neon blue sprinkles.
"There you go, Miss," the robot announced, its optical sensors suddenly focused on the way Mihoshi's shirt strained to keep her natural bounty in check as she leaned over the counter and breathed deeply of the scent of root beer and ice cream. "You, uh, need anything else?"
Mihoshi looked up, her carbon-based photoreceptors meeting his own of hydrogenated phosphor. She smiled. "A spoon would be nice."
The robot, consistently referred to as Robot, even by his friends, slapped one hand to his forehead in dismay, producing a hollow bonging sound. "Oi! A spoon! I forgot the spoon!" he exclaimed aloud, running to and fro as he frantically searched for a spoon.
Mihoshi giggled at his antics, and a few moments later, spoon produced, he handed it to her with an apologetic bow. "Terribly sorry, Miss, I'd forget my own head if it wasn't bolted to my body."
Mihoshi giggled again, although she already had a spoonful of ice cream and rootbeer in her mouth, with another on the way. "You're really funny, Mr. Robot," she said, wiping her mouth with a napkin he thoughtfully handed her.
"Please, just call me Robot, all my friends do."
"I'm Mihoshi!" she declared between bites.
"Of course you are," he replied politely. "So, ever traveled on a Seru ship before?"
Mihoshi shook her head, making her blonde curls bounce. "Nope, never. I used to have my own ship, but it kind of got destroyed in a fight."
"What kind of fight?" Robot asked, interested.
"Well, you see, I was in hot pursuit of the dread space pirate, Ryoko!"
She paused to swallow a few more scoops, and the robot used the time to make a logic jump that told him there was a 87 +/-14% chance that she was a Galaxy Police detective.
"We flew all over the place, and we finally ended up at this little pre-contact planet a few light-years from here. Well, to make a long story short, we both crashed there. And then I was stuck," she paused to take a drink, then continued, "for eleven months! But it was okay, the people were really nice, even Ryoko after I got to know her, and other people kept arriving, except for the scientist Washu, who had really been there the whole time," she inhaled a portion of rootbeer and crunched a few sprinkles, "and we all made friends, and then there was all this sex with Tenchi, oh, no, that makes it seem like I had sex with him-doesn't it sound like I had sex with him to you? Well I didn't, I just watched, his family owned the place some of the others stayed at, and Kiyone and I, Kiyone's my partner and best friend," she ate six large spoonfuls of ice cream as she took a breath, "stayed in town and visited sometimes, but then everyone left and Kiyone and I were assigned t-ahhh!" she cried, dropping the spoon on the counter as she clutched her head in pain.
"Ice cream headache," the robot commented blankly, his circuits momentarily overloaded. "I see them all the time."
"Gahhhh!" Mihoshi replied cleverly.
"Yeah, me, too," he replied.
"Man, that was a long, boring job," Amaraba complained as he and his girlfriend re-entered the tiny cabin they shared.
"Unh huh. This job blows." Ura flopped back on the bed, still in uniform, flinging her arms wide. Her left hand ended up on top of their blue and grey duffle bag. She soon sat up, however, when she noticed Amaraba taking off his shirt and dropping his pants to the floor.
He looked up as she whistled, then laughed and held a pose.
Ura clapped appreciatively. "A ten, a full ten."
He glanced down, then grinned stupidly. "I've always thought so, but no one would believe me." He laughed uproariously at his own joke.
"Hmph, you wish," she replied, suddenly catty. "In that case, make it a five."
"Hey!"
"Y'know," she said thoughtfully, tapping her chin. "I really wish you'd get one of those 'Prince Arberts'."
His hands flew to his bare groin, covering it protectively. "No way! There ain't no way I'm going let some freak doctor cut my dick off and replace it with one grown in a vat!"
Ura laughed hard and beat her hands against the bed. "Stupid, a Prince Arbert ain't a vat grown cock, it's a kind of piercing!"
"Oh." He felt stupid, and was uncomfortably aware he was blushing.
"Yeah, it's where they take one of the big hoops and jam it through the end of your dick," she explained.
He cowered back, once again covering his privates. "Like that's any better! Count me out!"
"You pansy," she taunted, but let the matter drop. "Anyway, let's get dressed and hit the bar, alright?"
"What about the tingle-sense room?" he asked hopefully.
"And there!"
"Cool." He walked over and unzipped the bag. He had some black pseudoleather pants and a vest that would be perfect.
A moment later, he looked up in confusion. "Ura? Did you leave all our clothes back on Waldow?"
She frowned. "No, everything we had fit in the bag. Why?"
He pulled out a small wad of strange clothes, obviously none of theirs. The clothes only came in three shades, white, grey, and yellow. It was all cloth, too, not pseudoleather.
"Huh, that's pretty weird." She sat up to look.
"Oh, I get it," he said loudly, walking in a tight circle. "I must have gotten the bag switched up at the airport with that lesbian chick. She seemed so sure she got it right, though." He laughed. "I guess she was wrong."
"That was pretty stupid," Ura replied. "What else is in there?"
"That was it," Amaraba confessed, laying the clothes to the side. "That's kind weird, I thought the bag had way more than that in it..." He poked around at the bottom of the bag, only a few inches below the rim. A pull-tab caught his attention. "What's this?" he asked as he pulled it.
A snowfield of white powder greeted their eyes as the false bottom peeled back.
"What's all this white shit?" Ura demanded.
Amaraba shrugged. "I dunno, it looks like flour. Maybe she's a traveling baker?"
Ura shook her head. "No, no, I swear, you can be such a dimwit sometimes, Amaraba. This is like that powder makeup stuff."
Amaraba shook his head. "No freaking way. Who in the hell would carry around fifty pounds of it?"
Ura conceded that he had a point. "Well... It ain't flour."
"I guess not. Hmm, what could it be?" They thought in silence for a few moments, then Amaraba snapped his fingers. "I know! It's drugs!"
Understanding dawned in Ura's eyes.
"Yeah, it makes sense! White powder hidden under a false bottom, carried by someone you wouldn't suspect as a drugrunner, a cute blonde lesbian, it HAS to be drugs." He stared at the heavy white powder in awe. "Holy shit! There must be a hundred million notes worth of it in that bag! Baby, we're rich!"
"Yay!" she cheered, hopping off the bed so she could dance around the room with her naked boyfriend.
Amaraba abruptly stopped, causing Ura to knock him down and fall on top. She ended up sitting on his stomach, looking down at him with a cutely puzzled expression.
"I just thought of something," he replied to her unspoken question as he gingerly rubbed the back of his head.
"Huh? Whuzzat?"
"That weird lesbian chick must have been a drugrunner! And we've got her shit!"
Ura paled. The people who transported drugs across the galaxy were widely known to be badasses. When most companies wanted to ship an incredibly valuable artifact, they hired a team of crack security guards to make sure it didn't get stolen. Drug cartels didn't have that option, so they hired one man to do the work of twelve. When carrying around a few hundred million in drugs, a runner could NOT allow himself to be robbed, detected, or arrested. They were trained to evade, outwit, and kill, quickly, efficiently, and above all silently.
"We're dead, ain't we?"
Amaraba gulped and nodded. "I'd say we pack it and haul ass, but..."
She nodded, and a single tear crept out of the corner of her eye to roll down her cheek. "I'm too young to die," she said fearfully.
"And I ain't?" he asked incredulously.
"I'm too beautiful to die!" she bawled.
"Hey, hey, calm down." He struggled to sit up and wrap his arms around her. "We're smart, we can figure out somethin' to get outta this," he said consolingly.
Ura's response was to burst into tears once more. "We're gonna die!"
Amaraba privately agreed, and that was his salvation. It's amazing how the fear of pain and death can focus the mind. In this case, Amaraba's adrenaline inspired mind actually managed to have a fairly good idea.
"Why don't we switch back?" he offered. "I mean, if we didn't notice that we got the wrong bag until now, what are the odds the lesbian did? Most of the passengers just threw their stuff in their cabins and hit the casino, anyway."
Ura sniffled and wiped her nose across his bare chest, leaving a cool trail of mucus.
"Hey, we didn't leave anything in our bag that has our names or pictures or anything, so even if she did look in it, she's not going to know who switched."
"But she probably remembers talking with you in line," she pointed out as she wiped at her eyes.
"Maybe, maybe not, but if her drugs suddenly show back up and we take our bag back, maybe she won't hunt us down. I mean, it ain't like _we're_ gonna say anything to the cops."
Ura nodded, feeling a faint twinge of hope.
Amaraba started really getting into the idea. "We're both crewmembers, right? And one of our duties is cleaning the cabins, right?"
She nodded.
"We just use our cards to get in the room, like we're gonna clean it, and then we swap the bags. No sweat."
Ura thought about it for a moment. "That's your plan?"
He nodded.
"Well, I like it!" she agreed. "Now... Wait, we're not supposed to clean the cabins until around 12 tomorrow. Aren't they going to ask questions if we stumble in when they're asleep tonight and try to switch?"
Amaraba opened his mouth to reply, then shut it again. He didn't know.
"But if we wait too long, she's gonna _definitely_ find out that she got the wrong bag. Then she's gonna hunt us down and pull our spleens out through our asses."
"I know, I know!" he replied in a rising tone of voice. "But what can we do? I say we go for it right now. It's only ten, they probably ain't made it back to their cabin yet. If we hurry, we can make it."
Ura jumped off his chest. "Well, hot stuff, you better put your uniform back on. This ain't the Luv Boat, you know, we're expected to wear clothes at least MOST of the time."
He nodded eagerly and jumped up.
Another thought occurred to Ura as she watched him dress. "Umm, not to be all bitchy and stuff, but I've got another question..."
He glanced at her, annoyed. "What, another one? Do you always have to pick at my ideas apart?"
"Sorry, geeze. Anyway, what cabin is she staying in? Do you know?"
Amaraba looked her square in the eye. "Shit."
To be continued in part b...