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Lanessa always tried to let her hardest troubles slip away. Fighting with her brother again?
Ignore it.
Dad had passed out on the couch after 19 hours overtime to keep the lights on and water running?
Give him a blanket and ignore it.
Get kicked out of Garrison Middle for fighting some chick which fucking decimated her chances of ever joining a Space Exploration Program with the ever-expanding Galra integration?
Sweep it under the rug. Out of sight, out of mind.
Lanessa was now in college on a scholarship. Paladin University- a place that prided itself on their Space Exploration Program that would give her a boost she couldn't have after her expulsion of The Garrison. Including their highschool.
They took their discipline disgustingly seriously when she wasn't allowed to go to any of their highschools after she had finished sixth through ninth grade in whatever public school was closest.
Those places usually ended up being shitholes. One didn't even serve lunch, you had to bring your own. But hey, she never got into another fight and the tuition was free. Who was she to look too closely at a gifthorse when the gifthorse was just a giant, rotting box on wheels that was engulfed in flames.
She was also barred from Garrison's subsidiaries, which was nearly any school with a Space Exploration Program worth more than fifty bucks and a shitty diorama of the Milky Way. Sometimes Lanessa saw Pluto in a diorama or two.
She was determined now more than ever to make an impact at this college; Paladin University. It was touted as number one in the US because it didn't have the messy military-corperate chain the Garrison did.
---
"As we know, in 2012, the Galran Empire had touched Earth Soil and declared it as a place of peace and refuge! A safe haven. They had only recently recovered because their tyrannical ruler had been assassinated alongside his wife and son. Without direction, the Galra released any colonized planets and assumed a democracy."
The professor emphasized and drew a large variety of scribbles with a blue dry-erase marker. No one bothered telling her that she probably didn't need to do that because a slideshow was lit on a projector beside her.
She drew cat-like creatures, a smiling globe, an angry cat-like creature with a broad jawline, and an American flag.
"Amongst the colonized planets was Altea- home of Alteans, which is what I am!"She said and faced the class, tugging on a long orange strand of hair that was seemingly always draped over her face.
"After freeing them and assuming rule, an unnamed human acted as a leader to guide them to Earth, promising freedom and acceptance. She became a diplomat for the Galra until she died in faulty space-time travel when she went to invite the Alteans."
She said somberly, drawing a crude woman and quickly added wrinkles and a cane in her outstretched stick-figure hand. Lanessa tried not to laugh and grimace at the same time.
"But! We've come a long way from barely-legal education for aliens to a fully integrated, private university for Galrans and Alteans and everyone inbetween to learn about space!"
She cheered happily and in walked a long line of aliens. Most looked fairly humanoid, with the exception of the occasional mammal-bug hybrid. Or even literal, sentient, beings built like a popsicle stick.
The room of about twenty humans quickly filled with seemingly hundreds of extraterrestrials. But some just looked big.
Lanessa sighed in relief, glad she didn't accidentally join a dead class.
Gazing over the forty or so aliens, Lanessa caught the eyes of boy with snowy hair and blue markings under his eyes that looked like the teacher's.
He caught her glance and he walked over to her with another boy in tow.
"Hi! Greetings! Oh, it's so exciting here, hello!" He said with bubbly exuberance. He was holding the hand of a blonde boy, but pink was under his eyes instead of blue, which matched more closely with the teacher's.
"Hello, fair sir! To what do I, a meager human, owe the pleasure of meeting two hot alien dudes?" Lanessa gleamed back at the guys, and leaned forward just a bit, holding out her hand with blue-painted nails she agonized over earlier.
The man giggled and spread open his hand, palms up, before briefly correcting it and moved his hand with the palm facing inwards to grab hers.
"I'm Allore, this is my confidante and close pal, Romielle. Just like Ms. Korin, we're from Altea." He said and moved his elbow instead of his hand, his whole arm flopped around.
"Call me Lancie! Born and raised on planet Earth! I hope we'll be seeing each other more often." She said warmly and scooted over so the two could sit.
---
It was only the first day, so Lanessa tried to be ready for whatever bullshit they could throw at her. She saw it coming, but no amount of preparation could have readied her for the three-inch stack of papers she carried.
It was nothing but consent forms, syllabuses, legal documents, and medical records (What the hell is Altean Thrubligy and why does she need eight shots in her thighs for it?)
As she sat on a bench by the student parking lot- surprisingly lacking of any alien tech vehicles- she pulled out her phone to look it up.
It's a fungus that doesn't hurt Alteans but sticks in their hair and travels to literally any other species. Thrubligy seems to cause temporary lockjaw and... month-long paralysis of the legs.
She groaned. So now there's a whole other flavor of lice; but instead of an itchy scalp you lose all ability to talk or move.
Great.
With a little more searching, she realized it was coined as Altean Mycotetanplegiasis. Cool. Thrubligy was obviously a more popular use. Which was good, because if you can pronounce Mycotetanplegiasis, you've probably got too bright of a future to be wasting it with no talking or moving.
Before she could learn about how much a single vaccine cost versus a whole set of eight or two sets of four, a motorcycle revved past her at breakneck speed, scattering her papers.
"SERIOUSLY? ASSHOLE!"
Before she could yell any more choice words, the bike did a hairpin turn and stopped- right next to her.
Because the motorbike parking...
Was right by the bench...
That she was sitting at.
Lanessa decided she would not back down and eat her words because the aforementioned asshole was actually stopping, and the engine was too loud for the driver to have heard how she had cursed them out. So she got off the bench, walked up to the bike and she stood bravely with both hands on her hips as the biker turned off the ignition.
She was going to serve justice pie, with a side of cruelty. Or vanilla ice-cream. But it's A La Mode. Or A La Carte. Or Carte Blanche. Hell if she knew. Wait- it was probably À Lá Carté.
"Well as I live and breathe, if it isn't Lanessa McClain." The voice said with muffled awe as the tinted shade obscured the identity of the biker.
But judging by the easy soprano of the voice and the tight leather jacket... Bikerette.
She tried not to stare as the mysterious woman made no effort to reveal her identity.
"Uh. Yes. You're living- probably breathing. I'm Lanessa McClain. Nice introductions- who the hell are you?" She asked agitatedly, bouncing a bit on her toes.
"Come on, Laney, how could you not remember me? Fifth grade? The Garrison?" She asked and straightened her back as she kicked out a stand for her motorcycle to rest.
Lanessa tried to wrack her brain but was mostly distracted by the long laced boots that stuck out elegantly. They cuffed at the top and met her knee, where she wore black jeans.
The boot scuffed the pavement when she leaned back- now stabilized by the stand. Her (tight) leather jacket was black with a purple decal of... a knife... probably. Lanessa couldn't help but stare at the totally foreign language below the decal. If she stared too long, she'd swear she saw a tail flick mischievously.
"That was a big year for me. Besides, I doubt I'd forget seeing an alien way back then." She said pointedly and stepped on a fluttering paper to stop it from blowing away.
"Well, I wasn't always like this, you know." She explained cryptically as if she were transformed into an alien like a vampire. One bite and you'll change to an entirely different species. But she remained smug- and it seemed like she would stay that way until Lanessa could guess her identity.
"Yeah, sure Anne Rice. Hey- can you help me with all these papers you fucked up?" She snapped at the most annoying piece of Thrubligy she's ever had the misfortune of talking to. And she gestured at the many papers that had skittered across the concrete.
The mystery girl shrugged and hooked one tall, elegant leg over the bike. Both her shoes hit the ground with a thud and she shimmied off the seat. Swift (bouncing) movements of the hips.
With her dumbfucking helmet still on, she at least had the decency to help Lanessa pick up the papers.
"You haven't changed, Laney. Still such a pain in the ass. Shame, you were quite charismatic for an eleven year-old." She said through the helmet that she apparently kept on for whatever psychological warfare she enjoyed enacting.
"Stop calling me that, it pisses me off." Lanessa growled as she hefted the stack that didn't blow away.
"Aw, is Little Laney gonna cry? Gonna kick a locker? Gonna punch a kid?" The woman teased and handed her Lanessa's discipline record in faded ink with cheap paper.
"If your name is Yurak, then sure, I'd gladly do so. But... not the first two." She said, passively tense.
"So you do remember me?" She asked with such an unidentifiabley thick emotion that Lanessa tried not to flinch at. Then she really flinched when the woman slipped off her helmet.
Lanessa paused.
She had yellow sclera, broad and pointed ears, sharp fangs and dustings of purple instead of pink on her tan skin.
It was then that Lanessa also noticed her sweeping tail and her claws, the only (exposed) parts of her that were fully purple.
Lanessa would've laughed, would've said "Oh! Totally! Yeah, I absolutely remember you, you're definitely Yurak. The human."
But she saw her offset smile and. The. Same. Fucking. Haircut. Girl-mullet with two red and spherical plastic beads poking out of her hair tie. It fluffed up her hair in the front giving the illusion of short and puffy hair, but the back was straightened and long.
She wanted to punch her in the face.
Again.
"How-"
"Come on! My name was Yurak! You really thought I was human? All it took was puberty- and wow! Tits and teeth." The biker said with muted anger.
There was an awkward pause as Lanessa pondered what this could mean. What Yurak meant to her- after all these years.
Was it worth it?
Probably not.
Punching a girl in the face and missing out on learning about her lifelong passion because of her own impulsive choices?
"I am sorry for what I said back then." Yurak said with sudden sheepishness as her previous expression of disbelief slipped right off her face.
Then, Lanessa felt lighter. She could trample down her past and let it pass like water under the bridge.
"What did you say? 'Hey, you left your shoe untied?' or was it that 'my kind' shouldn't be on Earth?" Lanessa asked coldly as her heart raced. Don't give away your forgiveness just yet.
"In my defense, I didn't even know race was a thing. Just... like... different shades of the same human?" Yurak explained through winced teeth.
Lanessa stared at her, gaping. It made sense.
The lunches featuring bugs and raw meat, the constant loose tooth without any adult teeth seeming to grow in, the eversion to anything about her heritage. It all seemed to click... just how alien she was.
"I never meant to go all the way across the galaxy illegally with my mother only to end up hurting everyone around me. I'm really sorry. And I didn't mean what I said back then, I was a dumb kid. At the time all I ever knew was Galra and how I had to slave to an empire just because I looked different." She said with a strained voice that lost it's deprecatory edge and found a vulnerable lining.
"Well... I guess I didn't need to punch you. In the face. Three times." Lanessa sighed, staring at her scruffy, brown jacket.
"I'm sorry, too. Kind of. But most of all, I do forgive you now, Yurak."
"Kara."
"What?"
"I go by Kara Kogane, now. It was what my father wanted to name me before he went missing. It's some homage to humans because he thought I would look more Galra than human. So now I'm Kara. And now I want to help you. "