Chapter Text
Harlock didn’t even consider it before answering. “No.” He was lounging on his throne with Miime flanking him, and Kei had hoped to catch him in a good mood.
“But Captain, he’s been unhappy since we left Earth,” she insisted. “And there’s ample scientific proof that it would do him good.”
“I don’t doubt that. But as my substitute, Yama has many duties to attend to.”
“He’s of no use in such a state. He withdraws and eats poorly, don’t say you haven’t noticed.” She was sure he had. Such things didn’t escape Harlock’s attention.
“It will pass.” … Or perhaps they did. What a stubborn bastard.
“It’s also good for morale,” she offered.
“Kei, we are not getting Yama a pet.”
“I’m not talking about a pet. It would be an ESA, an emotional support animal.” That sounded far more impressive.
“As far as I know, these require the same amount of care,” Harlock countered. He spoke calmly and dispassionately, all the while holding her gaze.
“But you do have one”, Kei insisted, clutching the last straw. “Two, one might even say.”
“Tori does not qualify as an emotional support animal.”
“Neither do I,” Miime added matter-of-factly.
“Oh, fine,” Kei huffed. “Just promise that if Yama happens to find one somehow, you won’t kick it out the airlock.”
The captain scrutinised her, her closed-up posture, her crossed arms. She knew he could read her quite well and had probably a very clear idea of what she was up to. A few seconds of silence passed.
“I think I would not,” Harlock said at last, “if there was any obvious benefit.”
“Guaranteed,” she said, her relief all too audible, saluting languidly and turning on her heel. “I’ll be at my post.”
“Kei, that wasn’t a Yes. I assume you can tell a Yes from a No.”
“Yes, sir, indeed I can.”
She hid her disappointment as best she could. Opposing the captain was a thing she hated to do, but he left her no choice. This should have gone better; she had been completely honest with them both, she did believe Yama needed another purpose in life, at least currently, aside from being eligible for the captain’s post. He was a carer by nature; he needed something to look after. It nurtured his self-esteem. With his mission abandoned, his past life lost and all his loved ones gone, Yama was well on his way to becoming depressed, whether or not he was aspiring captaincy in some distant future. It was impossible for Harlock not to see his misery. Why wouldn’t he allow Yama some minor distraction from the daily routine in the infinite blackness of space if it might help him cope with his obvious mental issues?
But oh, she had no intention to give up yet. If Yama came across some living thing by accident and decided to take care of it, no one would take it away from him. Harlock was a man of his word. Kei, in turn, was good at laying out what she had agreed to a little more generously.
The next stop on their route was the trading planet Tizmah. There they would exchange useless loot for supplies and things of use, and it was her turn to oversee the barter transactions. Plenty of opportunity to look out for something that met the requirements.
On the bridge, at the helm, Yama stood holding the freshly polished steering wheel, its wood reflecting the cold glimmer of the stars surrounding him in the quiet. Dead things whose light had travelled so far it told of a reality long gone, none of those stars still existed while he gazed at their glistening beauty.
A sigh heaved his chest.
He had done what he wanted; freed himself from his crushing guilt, only to end up entangled in another. Their deaths were still on him. He had made Isora what he was, what he had died as – an embittered, spiteful man. Sometimes, back when Yama was struggling with the rigours of his late military training, he had allowed himself to wonder if his gnawing guilt, constantly eating away at his sense of self-esteem, would go away if Isora and Nami simply disappeared. Not that he ever wished for that to happen, ever, but … If they were gone, so would be his past, or not? All he had done to them were forgotten; no one would be left to remember the terrible mistake he had made. No one but Yama himself. If only … If only he could erase all of it without harming anyone again.
There was a time when Yama would have clung to an idea like restarting the entire universe. Even if no one could explain to him how it should all work out in detail, the prospect of starting over and undoing his mistakes had been too tempting. But now … There was so much to lose. So many things he couldn’t sacrifice. He had no right to do it, not when the people he cared about most had died for it.
So he knew the answer now. Losing the last two people he called family did nothing to ease his pain. On the contrary, it made it even worse. He would never escape his past.
“Yama?” He raised his head and turned to see Kei. Strange, he hadn’t even heard her footsteps.
“Late shift’s over, I’m taking your post. Get some sleep, you look like shit.”
He probably did. Kei had a heartwarming way of expressing her concern for others. With a tired nod, he stepped away from the wheel to make room for her. “It’s been quiet,” he said, unnecessarily. It usually was.
Kei stopped to turn to him and nudge his shoulder in a half-hug, giving him that encouraging smile that had often been reserved for him lately. The fact that she was worried about him shamed him; he certainly didn’t deserve that kind of attention.
“Take care,” she said as he walked away.
“You too.” He hoped that this time, he would be tired enough to sleep.
The encounter with Yama at the relief had been enough for Kei to convince herself once again of his condition. The way he avoided eye contact and moved away from her with his shoulders slumped had slain her guilty conscience with hard facts. She even had to defy Harlock’s order.
You’ll have to suffer through this, Captain, she thought as she set the timer for the shift. After Tizmah, a few things will change. Only small, fluffy things, of course.
Tizmah was coming – the same old shithole it had always been, but there was simply nothing you could not get rid of on Tizmah in a good trade. Kei wound up the transactions to the end, but made sure to keep some grain back, as unprocessed food was a good that could be traded for literally anything. The problem, however, was that she had not yet decided what kind of animal would suit Yama. There was a whole series of requirements that had to be met: It could not be demanding, it had to be affectionate, easy to care for, as small as possible and, above all, friendly. The more of Yama’s time it would take up, the more unhappy the captain would become. As sure as she was that he wouldn’t go against the pet – certainly not if Yama liked it (because Harlock liked Yama a lot, even if he would never admit it) – she had no intention of testing his patience and making life difficult for everyone.
In summary, what she was looking for was not to be found on the market. There were plenty of animals, oh yes, from basic livestock to exotic pets, and some were quite adorable; but they all meant work, and filth, and noise, and most of the small and cute ones were only happy when in groups. Something old-fashioned like a puppy did not turn up, sadly; but then, a dog required too much attention anyway, and if it started bothering Tori, Harlock would probably throw himself out the airlock at some point.
Kei was close to giving up and returning to the Arcadia without having achieved anything, when suddenly, in one of the darker alleys leading away from the market, a well-dressed man walked up to her with a broad smile on his face.
“Young miss, may I have your attention? Pardon me for spying on you earlier, but I assume you are looking for a pet, yes?”
Kei, who hated nothing more than being addressed as ‘young miss’ but couldn’t help feeling a twinge of hope, met his eyes. He didn’t look like a gangster, even if he had approached her like one. “Just tell me what you want.”
“Since you left empty-handed, you obviously haven’t found a suitable companion. As luck would have it, I have a very lovable little animal with me. It is friendly, cute, quiet, house-trained and eats very little. What’s more, it fits in any handbag. I’m certain it will look wonderful on a beauty like you.”
That sounded like crap. And a trap. No creature in the universe could be that perfect. Probably a new scam to kidnap naïve girls and sell them off as sex slaves. How tiresome.
“All right, show me this thing,” she demanded. “But I warn you, don’t bullshit me.”
“Of course not,” he promised, his smile still wide as he reached into the beltbag around his hips. “See for yourself, missy.”
A soft little cooing sound emerged from the bag; and then, Kei caught sight of something utterly unexpected.
Fortunately for him, the guy proved to be right. The animal did indeed fit into a handbag, or rather into Kei’s pouch. It squirmed once or twice, then calmed down and remained still. It did, in fact, to such an extent that Kei worried whether it was even still alive when she got back to the ship. But when she opened the pouch in the cargo hold after the taskforce for stowage had left, it stirred lively and began to purr.
What a weird thing. Did it even have eyes? Or a nose? Or sensory organs at all? She couldn’t discover any when she held the small furry body up to her eyes.
Well, never mind. She placed the thing in an empty cardboard box next to where the supplies where stacked. It wouldn’t be able to climb out by itself, no limbs and all.
“There, little fellow. Let’s see you do your job. Let Yama find you, and cheer him up.”
Would it work? Would Yama even look twice at a crawling hairball? What if he didn’t even bat an eye? … But those sounds. ‘Its cooing has a calming and stabilising effect on the human mind, which is why it has long been used as a therapy animal,’ the vendor had told her. ‘People tend to instantly fall in love with it.’ Well, Kei, wasn’t in love with the animal, but she wasn’t in love with anything, so that didn’t count. Everyone knew that men were more susceptible to certain stimuli. After all, this thing looked like a tit with fur.
She gave the animal a few last strokes, eliciting some more purring from it, then left it alone.
In the early morning, she would send Yama to the cargo hold to investigate a report of strange noises. He would hate it. With a bit of luck, everything would go according to plan.