Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Hope focused on her salad with something close to desperation. It wasn't fair to the uninspired pile of cucumbers and lettuce to expect it to solve her growing tension headache, but it at least gave her the slimmest means of ignoring the other people at her table.

She'd felt the twinge of pain at breakfast, a slight tightness behind her forehead, and her hours of work in the park hadn't relieved it. If she had expected the fresh air and sunshine to drive it away, she had been disappointed. She decided that instead of a lunchtime consisting of a few stolen moments with a ration bar, she would treat herself to a proper sit-down meal, with fork and plate and everything. She smiled gently at herself. Taking a lunch break wasn't a treat; it was a deserved rest. The habits of too many weeks of constant battle to save New Los Angeles weren't going to be unlearned quickly. She would take her earned lunch hour and she would return to duty refreshed.

Only it didn't work as she planned. A quick glance at her credit limit made her decide against even a minimal meal at the Sunshine Café. This wasn't self-denial, she protested internally. This was staying true to her goals. She had placed a pre-order for a limited edition Orphe weapon set, and she was very close to paying the balance. Besides, the barracks canteen remained free for active service members, even Mediators. She would simply have her lunch there. The shared tables were always convivial, or perhaps she could find a quiet corner.

As she walked along the residential streets, past the shadow of the cathedral, she reflected that perhaps the latter was a bad idea. If she sat alone, someone was sure to join her and share their troubles. She'd end up working through her lunch. She didn't mind, usually. That kind of unscheduled conversation could be just what a person needed. Hope was glad to help.

Usually.

Today her temples were throbbing, politely and with a lack of conviction, but definitely indicating that she needed a break. She would get a tray, find a half-full table, and let light conversation sooth the tension away. If she could laugh, all the better.

The noise from the mess hall rang down the corridor before she reached the line. She would have retreated to the park and a dried block of carbohydrates except that her stomach growled sharply. Her pride growled as well. The line moved briskly, and she stood a moment later, salad plate balanced in a hand that clutched a napkin, the other hand holding a fork and crumbling roll.

She scanned the room. It was full to capacity, people barely hanging on to the edges of benches. One couple was sharing a chair, giggling and flirting. Hope didn't think she could manage sitting in someone's lap. The salad plate wobbled as someone pushed past her. To her relief, she spotted a free chair at a table near the door. Hope placed her plate on the table and smiled at her new neighbors.

"We're not really looking for company," said one woman. Her tone was without apology or regret.

Hope wished she could say she hadn't hesitated at the rebuff, but she sat down all the same. "I've never seen the mess this busy either," she said kindly. Then she applied herself to her salad. She focused her gaze at the vegetables with the intensity she hoped her new psycho launchers would provide in battle.

The cucumbers never had a chance at helping her headache. If she had been alone, she would have tried to shake her mood through mindfulness. Concentrate on the crunch, savor the textures, consider the work and sunshine (or miranium powered Integrated Production Plant) that provided exactly this pale watery dish at precisely this uncomfortable crowded place. Or she might try to be silly, nibbling at a carrot sliver in continuous tiny bites and wriggling her nose. Even the least interesting salad could be improved using the bunny method.

Today she wanted only to be finished and gone. She had tuned out the conversation around her, easy enough since the unwelcoming pair closest to her were strangers gossiping unkindly about other strangers. She hoped neither of them ever became her clients, and not primarily because she wished everyone uncomplicated tranquil mental health.

"You should get your eyes fixed." A sentence broke through her determined salad session.

"Excuse me?"

"That heterochromia. So overdone. Every BLADE and their sister has tried it, and you just aren't pulling it off. Yardley would fix it fairly cheap." The woman sneered delicately at Hope's meal. "He even has installment plans now."

Uncalled for, thought Hope, considering they were also eating free food. "They've been like this all my life," Hope said mildly. The only inheritance from her birth parents, she liked her mismatched eyes. The padré that had raised her had always reminded her that her eyes meant that she came from deep roots, even if she didn't know them. They were proof of a history that had not forgotten her, and a promise of unlimited choices for her future. The padré was like that, always giving her new sources of encouragement. She didn't share this memory with today's neighbors.

"No, really," said the other woman at the table. "You just don't have the oomph to pull it off. The violet looks so wrong somehow."

"Totally," agreed the first woman. "Brown is about all you're up to. Trust me, Yardley is your best friend." As if her unkindness wasn't clear enough, she snickered rudely. "Maybe he can offer you a bundle. Do something about your face while he's at it."

Hope looked sweetly at the pair, soft and timid like the tiniest forest bunny. She even added an extra nibble to the current piece of lettuce on her fork. "Yardley, did you say?" she repeated. She speared the last cucumber and snapped down on it with determined teeth. "You know, we Mediators have been working to identify underground modification businesses. Security reasons, you understand. You must have more information besides a name."

She stood up, gathering her plate. The padré had also told her that her eyes were a reminder that she could be two things at the same time. Kind and strong. Sweet and fierce. Polite and decidedly not. "I'll let Lara Nara know. You can expect a call from him shortly. I hope you'll be as forthcoming with him as you were with me."

Chapter Text

"Hold still," Irina said, as the Wrothian ducked her head away from the bandage spray for the third time. After several hours of repeated battles, the sharp beak of an auravis had finally hit its target. Irina had managed to shoot down the bird before it could strike Ge Jewhe a second time, but the younger fighter was initially a little stunned from the impact. Irina had insisted on a pause before continuing their mission.

"I don't need your help," the feline alien hissed.

"Your request on the missons board says differently," Irina replied. She turned her own head and quietly spat out some errant fuzz. "Look, I won't yank on your fur..."

"I would kill you!"

"I said I wouldn't," Irina retorted, "but you have to stop moving for the spray to work. You've got a lot of fluff up here."

"Psst," Ge Jewhe scoffed, but she finally sat as still as a statue, allowing Irina to target what Irina hoped was the center of the Wrothian's wound. "Human medicine probably won't work on us," said Ge Jewhe.

Irina was silent. She wasn't concentrating on the first aid so much as mentally counting to ten to control her own temper. "We developed it with your medical team," Irina said finally.

"Oh." No sign of contrition. Irina counted a little higher.

When the treatment was over and the medi-pac stowed away, Irina reviewed their situation. "All that fluff did a good job of protecting your skull, so I think you're good to go. But we've cleared five auravis already. Please tell me you're satisfied."

"No! Not until we find ..." Ga Jewhe broke off. She reached towards the blond fur at the top of her head, then stopped herself again. "I hired you for a full day. I'll let you go when I'm satisfied," she growled.

Irina looked at the fearsome warrior with the face of an American shorthair. Must not pet our allies, Irina reminded herself. "Look, you've clearly got a plan, and I can help you better if you let me know what it is. Communication works like that."

Ge Jewhe growled so low that it was barely audible. "Fine, since you insist. We are looking for an item."

"Details. I need details."

"It's a bracelet, if you must know."

"Your bracelet?" Irina said with shock. She had been on an earlier mission to retrieve both that trinket and its owner.

"NO! I keep it safe, always!" Ge Jewhe's hand flew to her wrist, touching a heavy gold band. She shrugged after reassuring herself. "It's for Vi Sezha. I mean, it's just a bracelet," she corrected herself.

"For your friend," said Irina slowly.

"She didn't want it," muttered Ge. "So I tossed it aside somewhere near here. But then an auravis snatched it."

"Of for heaven's sake," muttered Irina. This didn't sound right. On the earlier mission, Irina had seen for herself how worried Vi Sezha had been when Ge Jewhe went missing. She had seen the tears filling the Wrothian's eyes when she'd begged a human team to help, and she had seen the renewed tears when Vi Sezha had wrapped her arms around her friend during their reunion. "Just out of curiosity, how did you offer her the bracelet?"

"We were on patrol. She didn't want it."

"How exactly did you phrase it?"

"I asked if she wanted a bracelet I had found, because otherwise I would throw it away."

"Did you say bracelet or did you say something else?"

"I may have called it old."

"And?"

"Old junk that I had found."

"Mm hm." Irina indicated she was unconvinced.

"It is old!" Ge Jewhe said defensively. "From my grandmother. And it is junk, because if Vi Sezha doesn't want it, it will never be valuable to me."

Irina got to her feet, hoisting her assault rifle a little higher. "Come on, we've got auravis to snipe. Maybe we could even set out something sparkly as a lure." She glanced at Ge Jewhe sharply. "Not your bracelet. And once we get Vi's bracelet back, we're going to practice how you're gonna give it to her properly."

Chapter Text

Later, they all privately agreed that Frye was to blame, although they never mentioned in on the official report. Phog analyzed the sequence of events and had determined that Frye wasn't properly checking the corners of their temporary base on his guard rounds. Frye hadn't argued; in his long experience he knew he was to blame for any and all fuck-ups. Maybe he took a little pride in that fact. And Gwin? Gwin was just sore about the whole thing.

The morning sky had not begun to change from dark and flaming to grey and flaming. Small round creatures flew past, eyeless and harmless unless provoked. Phog was up early, or maybe hadn't gone to sleep at all, focused on huge sampling of varied crystals collected the day before. Frye had taken over guard duty at midnight and was contemplating how soon he could make coffee.

"AHHHHHHHHH! Get them off! Get them off!" Gwin nearly took the entire temporary tent with him in his haste to exit the shelter. The canvas bowed and stretched as he flailed his way through the door.

Frye, sketchy as his patrol path might be, was there before Gwin was fully free. "Don't shoot me!" yelled Gwin.

Frye lowered his weapon. "I wasn't going to," Frye said tightly. He switched to his long sword and poked at Gwin. His skill allowed him to catch a foreign lump on Gwin's armor even as the younger man danced and yelled. Something dark and inky squirted back at him. "Phog!" he called, calm but loud, "dial up the MMC. We got a medical thing going on."

"It's not medical," snapped Gwin, still hopping around. He left purple-black splatters on the ground as he went, as well as on the walls of the tent and the hem of Frye's pants. "I woke up and these things were swarming me." He pulled at one bulbous lump on his arm. It stretched and squirched, tiny fat tendrils popping free at the end, each dribbling more dark liquid. He finally pulled it free and threw it across the compound. It sank into the ground, leaving only an inky shadow. Then it popped up and started slithering towards Gwin again.

"Shoot it!" yelled Gwin, now tugging on a different blob.

Frye walked over to it and started to prod it with the toe of his boot. The thing rose up eagerly, going from blob to tentacle-tipped cylinder. Frye reconsidered and used his sword instead. The thing popped with a splatter of ink, coating Frye's blade half-way with its final fluids.

"They look like baby filiavents," Frye said cheerfully. "But they're inkpot sized, instead of big like BLADE tower. Wonder if they're poisonous. Venomous. Toxic."

"Oh god, get them off me," Gwin yelled with renewed vigor, flinging another tiny terror blob away from himself.

"I got you covered," Frye consoled him. "I have a stock of the best anti-poison augments, all ready to go. It's the good stuff, guaranteed not to cause a reaction. A guy can't be too careful."

Gwin tossed an inkpot directly at Frye, but Frye sliced it in two with a fresh splash of color.

This went on for a while, Gwin screaming and pulling himself free of his new pets while Frye played round after round of the devil's Fruit Ninja. Phog finally surfaced from the depths of his research and helped pull off exactly one blob.

"Filiavent," Phog confirmed. "Freshly developed from a larval state, still fairly mobile. They're probably seeking a good soft place to take root." Gwin wailed loudly, while Phog considered the tiny indigen. "It could be a good resource for medical imaging."

"Or finger painting," offered Frye. "You got a little something on your cheek." Frye's own face was splattered and the front of his hair had gone from ice white to crow wing black. Gwin really couldn't be described, although he was finally lump free.

"Ughhhh," Gwin said, sinking to his knees.

"Right, next on the agenda we have anti-poison augments for the crowd and a trip to the sulfur hot springs," declared Frye. "And maybe some coffee in between. But first, let me sign my work." He dragged the tip of his sword in the ground, cutting this way and that. The dark Cauldros soil shimmered even more deeply.

"'OSTRICH WUZ HERE'," he read. "Nice. The pen is mightier than the sword, but in this case the sword makes a mighty fine pen."

Chapter Text

"Your armor is slipping," Ga Jiarg said pointedly.

"Whoops! Let me fix that." The young BLADE unceremoniously dropped the load of materials she was carrying. The sand dampened the sound when they fell, but a soft clatter still echoed down the narrow canyon. Ga Jiarg waited for any response from a curious indigen, but the crash must have gone unnoticed. He flicked his whiskers slightly but otherwise remained impassive.

"You know," said Mia chattily as she fumbled with the elaborate fasteners that secured the Six Stars regal gear, "I love what you guys have developed for us, really I do. Worth the price and then some." A cord escaped from her fingers, giving her a temporary tail as it swung behind her. "Remind me to repay Cross for buying me this set."

Ga Jiarg's patience was not superhuman, especially after Mia's hip guard joined the cargo in the sand. "Hold still and I will help you," he growled, putting a hand on her shoulder to enforce his request. "You are as inexperienced as one of our kits, at least with this gear."

"You can tell that I just got it yesterday?" Mia asked undaunted.

He had her armor sorted out quickly. "Let us begin with your first lesson. The armor must sit firm but not tight. The knots you have used ..." Words failed him, so he merely untied the childish tangles and retied them using the proper method.

"Wow, you're like ten times as fast as me. It lays smooth now," Mia said, patting the chest piece with admiration. "Thank you!"

"A well-prepared knot will hold firm in adversity," Ga Jiarg recited. "Which means that teammates must work together from start to finish."

"You sound like my dads," Mia said with a laugh. "They were big on proper knots and stuff. It wasn't metaphorical though. They were mountain climbers, you know." She laughed again, but with a wistfulness had crept into her voice.

"They were not on your ship?" Ga Jiarg asked gently.

"Oh no, they disappeared when I was still in school. Usually I went with them, but they wanted me to focus on my education when I hit my teens. I miss them sometimes."

Ga Jiarg had finished arranging her armor to his satisfaction. "There. Do that little dance you do when things go well," he commanded. "But quietly. We don't want to draw indigen, not yet."

Mia grinned and did a silent cheer. Her face fell. "It's slipping again. Not as bad as before, but I think it's still too loose."

Ga Jiarg looked Mia up and down with a fierce frown. His ears flattened with dismay. "I think our designers failed to consider that you humans are ... are ..."

"Bouncy? Wriggly? Totally awesome?"

"Hairless. The fit works best with a soft underlayer."

It was Mia's turn to frown. "That bites, because I don't think I can convince Cross to sponsor me to a fursuit."

Chapter Text

Lila Brown, manager of the West Gate Skell Refueling Station, had been quick to agree to a meeting with H.B. to discuss a private request. For one thing, she wouldn't mind a chance to get off her feet. More honestly, she knew H.B. had been her loyal customer through thick and thin, good times and bad, celebratory BBQs and literal explosions. She owed him the special treatment. He might be infuriating, exacting, and contrary, as well as too full of himself and downright persnickety at times. But he had good qualities, if she could remember them. For example, he had agreed multiple times to test experimental fuel mixes. She wasn't sure how he had pushed his skell to the limits indicated in the logs, but the data had been crucial to developing better products. She might have an uneven history with NLA's most superior Pathfinder, but it was a long one. So when he'd demanded, more than asked, for a moment of her time, she had handed her clipboard to her co-manager and headed into the station office.

She had not offered coffee. A moment later she was doubly glad there were no beverages involved.

"You want me to what?!"

"I'll take you there myself. A moment of your time and someone will fly you back. It will take an hour at the most."

"I don't leave New Los Angeles. I can't," she replied, her lungs betraying her with a little choking noise.

"Thirty seconds in the fresh air won't kill you," H.B. continued.

Lila tightened the muscles in her legs, her shoulders, her jaw, anything to stop the shaking. Then she relaxed and continued the conversation. "H.B., I can't. My mim responds to open spaces like yours responds to lava when you forget your anti-thermal underwear. I shut down faster than I can take a step."

"We just need you to open a door. 10 seconds."

"Great. You can toss my limp, dead body against it and see where that gets you."

H.B. crossed his arms and looked dismissive. He was good at doing that. He didn't even need to slide his wire-rimmed glassed up his perfect nose. "I've seen you walking in the Commercial District."

"Running as fast as I can, my body on auto-pilot. I come to a minute after I reach my destination. After I get inside," she emphasized.

"Then you'll have to teach me how to unlock the panel." H.B. frowned severely. "We both know you managed to get unauthorized access to most parts of engineering during the voyage here. I never caught you, but I know."

"Not just engineering," she said smugly. She sighed, wishing that the Whale was still her home, that they had never been attacked, had never crashed on this planet. But regret was pointless. "Tell me exactly what kind of door you're trying to open."

"An intact section of the Whale was recently found by Reclaimers. This is strictly confidential." His green eyes flashed behind the clear lenses.

"Of course." Lila thought about crossing her fingers but let it be.

"It includes a corridor with a door. We can't risk brute forcing it open. The entry pad won't respond."

"Typical in emergencies for non-critical areas," murmured Lila. "Anyone have the code still on their comm device?"

"No one from that section survived." They both paused a moment, letting the shared grief rise and fall. H.B. continued briskly. "Without codes, cards, or personnel, we have to resort to more illegitimate solutions."

Lila laughed gently. "So you want me to come as your personal key fob. Call me Kagi-chan."

"I will not," snapped H.B.

Lila was still smiling. "I'll let you in on a secret. I usually reconfigured locks from the inside after I got into a room through a vent." Lila watched as H.B. tried not to show his disappointment. "However," she continued, "I think I can still be helpful."

H.B. perked up.

"Just to clarify, we aren't talking the bridge or the Lifehold? Or the armory?"

"None of those. Mixed-use section."

"Good. The mechanisms there aren't all that hardened. You said no damage, but would it be okay to cut a small hole in the outer wall? Gently?"

"We can consider it."

"Cut into the wall below the panel, enough to feed in a wire or two, reroute a little electricity, reset the codes, and you've got VIP access to anywhere you want. I'll send you a diagram, maybe a training video. You could even give me a call once you're on site and I can walk you though it."

"A diagram should suffice." H.B. had reverted to his starchiest, most superior form.

Lila looked at him, her face deeply serious. "Most doors in NLA are original to the Whale. I'm sharing a great and terrible power with you."

"I think I can be trusted."

"You better be." She grinned at him again. "And if all else fails, just wack the panel with a fire extinguisher a few times."

Chapter Text

They had always understood each other without words. It had been obvious from the moment they had met, back before they had words in common. He had looked into her eyes and known answers to questions he had never considered. Nothing had changed. Her eyes were enough to make conversation unnecessary, even a distraction. It wasn't just a silent way to communicate while on missions. He could consider the quality of today's blue, electric or spectral or dreaming, and understand things that weren't to be found on heaven or Earth. Or on Mira. He'd blink and return to himself, and then he'd go back for more.

That had been long ago, and she hadn't changed. In a way, neither had he, although all their shared history had been erased in the crash. The few months since he awoke, you could even count the time in weeks, had created a different history, one that had required even more trust in each other. They had felt the wrongness without speaking about it, and had let it slip away because the unspoken connection was just as steady. He didn't really want to ask what he had missed. He respected her decisions and sacrifices, all the more for knowing how much had been achieved while he'd slept.

How could he not? This was the moment that proved it. They were standing in the heart of an alien fortress, light years from where Earth had been, moments away from reclaiming the key to the survival of the human species. It was such a small thing, smaller than a human heart, a data drive that would give them the coordinates to the Lifehold. Together they could awaken all the stranded refugees, and in doing so rescue themselves.

It was within their grasp, but now bitter words of accusation swirled around them. Pointless and consuming. He stepped in to stop the flow. If it broke him, if she decided that he was disposable, so be it. He didn't have the time for it, but for a second he still turned to her and drifted into her gaze. Some thrumming of his mimesome fluid mimicked a heartbeat, measuring enough space to admire the world of possibilities that lived in that beautiful crystalline gaze. She was absolutely fantastic, in every measurable way, and he hoped she understood what his rebellion meant.

Then the muzzle of her gun eclipsed his view as she raised her aim. Or maybe it was emotion that made their bond dim. "You too?"

He'd try to find the words later, something to ask her forgiveness for this moment of treason. Provided she decided not to shoot. Either way, this picnic was coming to an end.

Chapter Text

Frye's story began as most of his stories did, with him standing in the parking lot of the Repenta Diner. He wasn't banned this week, at least he didn't think he was, but the air outside was nice and he found the traffic noises soothing. He had just enough tension in the back of his neck that he thought he might start a fight if he went inside the bar, so all in all the parking lot was just fine. He supposed he could have stayed home, relaxing in a leather chair, with a pipe and an old book or two. He laughed at the image, adding a fire place and a snifter of amber delight to the daydream. Hell, he could wear a velvet robe and a little red fez while he was at it. He took another swig from his mystery flask and the sting brought him back to reality. His supplier had been inventive recently, but it definitely was not well-aged brandy.

He wasn't so deep into his meditions to take offense when his comm device shrilled. "YO!" he shouted into it. Maybe he took a little offense. If someone called him off-duty, they had better be willing to get yelled at.

"FRYE!" shouted the caller, louder than the initial greeting. "HAVE YOU SEEN IRINA?"

Frye toggled the volume down so that it wasn't at all-caps levels and tried to make out the caller. Damn caller ID was too small on these damn phones. The video was bumping around, not like it was the caller was riding in a vehicle, but like they were multi-tasking too many things and the call was not their priority. There was a glipse of an eye, a shock of wayward brown hair, a lot of sandy wall, someone in the background in full armor and with weapons engaged. "Gwin?" guessed Frye. "Are you calling me from a mission?"

"Just a Curator thing," said Gwin a little breathlessly. Something metallic snapped which Frye would have sworn was a magazine being locked. "But it's running long and I can't reach Irina. We were supposed to meet. Have you seen her?"

Frye was still fixated on Gwin breaking all the rules by making a personal call while he was out in the field. Usually Frye was all for that kind of bad behavior, but this felt a little sloppy, even for Gwin. "Is that gunfire in the background?"

Another face popped into the screen. "HI FRYE! Hey, Gwin, can I borrow your assault rifle? Mine jammed."

"Hand it over and I'll clean it," said Gwin. The rookie's face disappeared and the video wobbled wildly again. Then Gwin reappeared, solidly framed. "I gotta go soon. Have you seen Irina?"

Frye had questions, so many questions, but he recognized a pointless fight. Didn't always stop him, but this time it felt like maybe the faster Gwin got his head in the game, the better things would go for their side somewhere in (he would guess) Oblivia. "I saw her walk into the diner a while ago." Frye weighed the flask in his hand, calculated ounces per minute and clarified, "Probably two hours ago."

"Shit," Gwin said. There was an anguished scream in the background.

Frye was done with the conversation. "My man, hang up! You're taking casualties!"

Gwin looked over his shoulder. "He'll be fine."

"THEY HIT A SAMPLE JAR!" wailed the voice off-screen. Frye recognized it as coming from Gwin's Curator friend, Matt something or other, and his concerns shrunk.

"Look," Gwin continued, speaking rapidly, "we were supposed to go to dinner."

"OOooooooooOOoooh," Frye leered.

"Just dinner," Gwin emphasized. "Elma had her at lunch and I think Murderess was taking her shopping afterwards. Obviously I am going to miss dinner and I don't want her to be alone."

Suspicion bloomed in Frye's gut. "Special day?" he asked quietly.

"Her brother's birthday," said Gwin. "She..." The link cut out.

"I'm on it," said Frye, to nothing and no one.

Chapter Text

Frye had to pause at the entrance. He nodded at the Prone bouncer, a blue alien big enough that he needed to duck his head when tossing customers out the door. The alien hesitated, considered Frye, then nodded his head in return. It wasn't his eyes that needed to adjust so much as his mind. The darkness inside the Repenta felt different than the NLA night. Outside the gentle light from the five moons kept the world illuminated, full of mysteries but still welcoming to anyone with the urge to explore. The interior of the diner had a closed secrecy to its dimness, mixed with a strictly performative brilliance that gave nothing away. Track lighting pinpointed a few tables, while a disco ball twirled sluggishly over the handkerchief-sized dance floor. The shelves behind the bar were the steadiest light in the room, flaring with suggestions and offers. The rest of the space sank into murkiness.

Frye looked around, failing to spot Irina. Her slim shape wasn't leaning against the bar, her ash-blonde head didn't peek from a booth. He didn't spot any clusters of Interceptros to ask. He didn't hear her voice, sharp and dry as the honed knife she wielded. Unless she had snuck out the back door, she was not spending her time here convivially.

He drifted over to the bar, reaching it exactly as the manager's path crossed over his. She didn't bother to let him order. "If you're here for one of your people, make it quick. I'm about to throw her out."

"An Interceptor?" Frye asked, mostly to buy enough time to flag down a bartender. The bartender looked straight through Frye.

"The thing is, I don't want to start a riot." The Repenta's manager pressed a finger to her lips, stopping just short of chewing on her nail.

"Let me guess. Blondish, silver eyes, best damn BLADE in town, and with a loyal fan base?" Undaunted, Frye took a moment to smile brightly at the bartender. The man turned his back on Frye.

"She's one drink away from taking offense at thin air. I don't want your whole division jumping in, or possibly having to defend themselves." The manager finally pointed at a booth at the very back of the bar.

"Let me buy her a beer and then we'll clear out."

The manager put her fists on her hips. "No. I cut her off already."

"Two beers," wheedled Frye. "I promise she won't drink much of hers. She hasn't caused any actual trouble, right?"

"No trouble yet," the manager said, not in agreement. "I know the signs. She needs to move on."

"Don't we all," muttered Frye and headed for the table.

The booth was submerged in shadows, but the mirrored ball cast flecks of light on an empty wine bottle and wine glass and small fleet of shot glasses. Irina had them circled protectively around herself, leaving the other side clear for Frye to sit and plant his elbows.

"Hey, Irina," he drawled.

"Fuck off, Frye," she said crisply.

"Not until I buy you a beer and see if I can beg a favor. Speak of the devil," he said as the server brought his order. One beer and two small glasses. The manager was not joking around tonight, he thought. He poured one glass and took a healthy test swig before passing it to Irina. "Gotta check for poison."

"I'm not in the mood," Irina said proudly.

"Come on, let me pitch my idea first. Here's the situation. I'm a few points short of maintaining my good standing as an Interceptor, and I thought you might help me out."

"Too much time bending your elbow," snapped Irina.

Frye drained his glass and reached for hers again. She didn't defend it, so he took another small sip before returning it to her side of the table. "I wish. Mostly I've been paying off favors I owe with the Harriers and so on. I've been working my ass off, but it wasn't going towards our division rankings."

"Good luck with your new division."

"But Irina," protested Frye. "You know me. I might get lost, but I'll never stray. Interceptors is my home. But this week I got word that I need to hit an officially marked mission or I'll slip into probationary status."

"Like I said, good luck."

"Actually," Frye said, twirling the base of his glass in spirals and avoiding her eyes, "the deadline is kinda soon. Like end of the day." He flicked a look at Irina. She looked back dully, but Frye was pretty sure she was following along. He made a more elaborate curl on the table. "So I thought, if we could bang out a mission right now, I'll owe you big time. Plus the Interceptors won't have a bad mark at the next Division meeting for having one less member."

"No big loss," said Irina.

Frye smiled as if he'd been expecting that response, which indeed he had. "You know it and I know it, but the anonymous number will still look bad." He pushed his glass away and reached for hers. "If you won't do it for me, do it for the division."

Irina swatted Frye's hand away. "Fine, fine, stop looking so pathetic," she said. She finished the almost empty glass. "Do you have a mission in mind?"

"Absolutely," said Frye, piling one more lie to every other falsehood he'd said since he sat down.

Chapter Text

Irina exited the Repenta with the grace of an empress wearing full hoop skirts and with the care of a new recruit trying to pass a field sobriety test. Which is to say, she bumped into only two tables on her way out, giving the startled occupants a gracious wave as she continued onward. Frye darted around her like a hundred kilo humming bird, doing his best to block the server with the laden drinks tray, the bar babes taking a group selfie, and above all the manager. If no one said anything out loud, this night never officially happened. The bouncer behaved perfectly, opening the door promptly but without a hint of eagerness.

And they were out.

The night air had the opposite of a bracing effect on Irina. She sagged against Frye. "I know what you're doing," she hissed. "You're fooling nobody."

"I'm just grateful for the favor. Big time," said Frye, starting to sweat as he propped her up. If she figured things out, realized that his whole story was based on whatever he could pull from thin air (or elsewhere), then she might take offense. If he was lucky she'd use a sharp knife when she chopped him into tiny pieces.

"I bet you're making it up, all of it," she pronounced.

He swerved the pair of them towards the transport plane. He couldn't risk the long walk back to the Administration Alley giving her more time to think. "I'm on the level," he swore. "Gotta get those credits, save my hide, win for the team. Interceptor pride, right?"

"Nuh uh," she said, hanging onto his neck. "Prospectors," she whispered in the direction of his ear. "It's about the Prospectors."

Frye didn't correct her. What could he say? She had spotted the lie that Frye had forgotten he was telling.

Chapter Text

Irina took Frye's silence for agreement, which wasn't wrong. "I know that area around your mission," she said. "I've been there with the Colonel and her rookie. The rocks make the passage even more narrow. Only a careful pilot in a fast skell is going to avoid tripping over angry indigen."

"Making it a very normal, very Interceptor mission," replied Frye. "We clear swarms like that to let people get on with their lives. 100% pure Interceptor." The transport pane hadn't arrive yet, and there was nothing to do but pray to the gods of public transportation to speed it towards their stop.

"That area leads to caves. And caves mean Prospectors. Stop lying to me."

"What it means is we can get it done by midnight. A nice short mission in a nice compact area, and we get home to our own little beds by midnight." A shudder in the air above them proved that some small deity loved Frye. A second later the propellers of the transport copter drowned out any further conversation. "Mind your head as you get in."

Frye hated that Irina was so close to being right. He'd chosen a mission along that stretch because there was always a ticket for it on the mission board. He should know: he picked that same mission every week, most recently the day before yesterday. It was familiar and nothing beyond what he could manage even with the slight drag of a teammate equal parts capable and inebriated. Of course he had lied about being in danger of probation. He was as safe in his ranking as Irina herself. It was easier to get away with the other stuff he pulled when at least part of his record remained pristine. He'd stopped thinking why his preferred maintenance missions featured caves and not beaches, mineral deposits instead of scenic view points. It was just a habit by now, and he'd forgotten the origin. He didn't want Irina to remind him that it was anything but chance.

They got into their seats for the short flight. Irina slumped against the window as Frye fussed over her seat belt. "I hate people like you," she said. "You're a waste."

"Sure," agreed Frye easily. Again. she wasn't wrong, but this wasn't something he was desperate to hide.

Her breath misted the widow as they flew across the city. "He wouldn't have been a waste," she said to the lights below them. "Kids like Gwin are all about chasing the next big explosion, but Leon would have understood it all. He'd have understood how we got here, what it meant, where we need to go." She sagged a little lower. "I wish he had worked with Elma. He'd have given that Rook some real competition."

"Elma's rookie is okay," Frye said.

"Never got a chance," Irina muttered. She was starting to slur a little.

Frye knew it had to be said. "I'm sorry about your brother."

"That's why I hate guys like you. What a waste," she said, flaring up one last second before putting her forehead against the glass. Her eyes glittered silver in the reflection.

Once again Frye couldn't argue.

Chapter Text

By the middle of their flight, Frye was half hopeful that the evening would end early. Irina had blown up at him with good effect, releasing her pent-up anger and sorrow. He hadn't enjoyed being her target, but he could take the hit for a good cause. She was nodding beside him when they landed in the Administrative Sector. Maybe he could get someone to take her to her rooms, get her settled for the night. He could hoist her most of the way if that helped. Her hangover would be spectacular in the morning, wine mixed with beer mixed with whatever else she'd had, but it would no longer be today. The date attached to today was the worst part of what she was going through.

However, the deity that had guided the transport to them also sped it quickly to their destination, and Irina roused upon landing and lurched off the 'copter. "This way," she announced. "We'll take my skell."

"I was thinking we'd just hitch a ride," said Frye. "There's an away station right by the area and teams go there on the regular."

"Wish I had parked at the Repenta," said Irina, not stopping. "We could've gone directly there."

"The route to the away station works fine," protested Frye weakly. She wasn't listening.

"My skell," Irina said, weaving through an empty shopping alley. "I need my gear."

"Oh right," Frye muttered, trailing behind. He hadn't even thought of that. He'd gone on missions with BLADEs wearing much less practical gear than Irina's current outfit. Her soft sweater and casual trousers were practical compared to flip flops, swim trunks, and a tuxedo jacket. But that would never do for Irina Akulov. She was by the books, her armor well chosen, her weaponry even better. So the off duty look was never going to be acceptable for her. Frye tugged at his flak jacket. He should talk. He couldn't relax unless he was in full armor. "You get your gear and I'll check in with mission board."

"See you in the garage," she said.

When he caught up to her, she had her hand on the knee of a navy blue Verus, as sharp and fast and balanced as her normal self. He'd ducked into the barracks lounge, but unfortunately it was empty. No comic relief from Lin and Tatsu that Frye could use to distract Irina, no mustachioed voice of reason to bellow that they had better put a halt to this deeply stupid idea. He had resigned himself to Adventures with Akulov. But there was one more thing he had to do.

"Get in the skell," she said.

"No."

"You're the one that's hot for this mission."

"Hot or not, you're not driving."

"Excuse me?" she flared at him, silver fire and sharp nose. "This is my skell. I'm the pilot."

If she had whined or looked hurt, it would have been harder. Frye had a soft spot for disappointed soldiers. But she had snapped at him, and Frye was used to looking authority square in the eye and saying, "Nuts." He stood tall, then slouched in a crooked way. "You're drunk and I'm your driver. You can take a nap until we get there."

"I am not." She mimicked his pose and tilted, exactly as he expected. She grabbed onto the skell tighter. "You're drunk too."

"I'm barely damp," said Frye. He shoved a small red packet at her. "Sobriety augments. Take two and you'll be fine when we arrive."

"Bet you buy it in bulk," she snapped.

Frye didn't mind one last insult, since she also accepted the packet. "By the crate load," he said. "Now you hop into the jumpseat while I grab a thermos of coffee for later."

Chapter Text

It wasn't ten minutes before Frye was glad Irina had insisted that they take her skell. The steering on the Versus was touchy, leaping to respond, but at a settled speed it cut through the Miran landscape obediently. Irina was sound asleep, not muttering or stirring. Yet her face still had the same worried look, the same sorrow that Frye had seen mirrored in the transport window. He swung a large arc through the shallow lake between NLA and the entrance to Noctilum, curling inward so that Irina's head bumped gently against his shoulder. She sighed and relaxed, and her brow smoothed.

She was a good person, reflected Frye. She could have told him to stuff it, to take the demotion he deserved and never bother her again. She could have insisted they bang out a nearby mission, without thinking why Frye preferred clearing paths to distant caves. She was good that way, too good for her own safety. She was ready to protect her team and anyone her team cared about, no matter what her personal opinions were. She deserved rest and comfort, even if it was only a short skell ride and his mangy shoulder.

Noctilum's foliage should have made the pilot's capsule grow dark, the way the huge leaves blocked the light from the five moons. But the Night Glow Forest didn't work that way. The bioluminescence of the vines and leaves and animals filled their capsule with colored flickers and slants. Frye picked up a little speed, partly to avoid curious indigen, partly to settle Irina more firmly into the jump seat when her head started to nod.

He almost woke her when they cleared the densest part of the jungle. A rare energy mist filled the atmosphere with drifts of tiny white flickers, a world of intangible fireflies. The silvery trails condensed around their path, and Frye let the skell skid slightly to enjoy the effect. He checked Irina's face, pale from the pure soft light. She hadn't moved, but the pucker of worry was back. He smoothed the course of the skell and kept driving.

He finally ended the drive at an away station just outside their target area, but not without a flourish. He turned a nice tight circle some distance from the cluster of tents and crates. The turn pushed Irina solidly against the side window, so she wasn't jostled when Frye unbuckled his restraints. They were far enough away that no one stationed there would come to greet them or shout questions about their visit. People at remote stations always did that, pestering you before you had even turned off the engine. Frye didn't blame them; some of these spots were dead boring. He paused before hopping out, considering his sleeping teammate. He shrugged off his plated jacket and tucked it around Irina. Then he popped open the capsule.

He was glad he had done it. Noctilum nights were warm, but this area was exposed enough to catch some fresh ocean breezes. He didn't want anything to disturb Irina, not before it was absolutely necessary.

He didn't think about a little kid wearing an oversized jacket. A kid with twice as much blonde hair as Irina's neat bob. It had been Frye's jacket, four sizes too big, but it had worked fine on a cold autumn nights. That had been another planet ago. It wasn't a thing Frye thought about anymore.

Chapter Text

The away station was inexplicably full of Mediators. That fact surprised Frye for a moment. He'd initially considered grabbing one or two randos, hell, maybe filling the entire team so Irina could keep on sleeping. But not with these guys, not them. The Mediators' main task was keeping the peace in New Los Angeles, mostly consisting of traffic control and listening to everyone's problems. They were not designed for combat, by training or personality. They crowded around Frye, happy to see him, wanting to know if he needed first aid, coffee, a snack. Wanting to know if he needed to, you know, talk about something.

It was probably just as well. If he had left Irina behind, she would have killed him when she woke up.

Frye shook them off gently, declining the first aid and accepting two paper cups of hot chocolate and a packet of cookies. He resolutely dodged the questions of "how are you, really?" He told himself the presence of Mediators was a good sign. The area couldn't be too much of a problem if the weakest division was minding the store.

Irina met him when he got halfway back to the skell. "Forget something?" she asked, holding out his jacket with understandable disgust.

"Come to papa," he said, passing her the warm drinks and cookies in return. He shrugged it on easily. Irina was already wearing her own set of medium Sakuraba armor, he noted.

"You weren't going to ditch me for the Nice Nice Squad, right?" said Irina. She must have seen the Mediator's logo, a pair of embracing half circles.

"I would never," swore Frye easily. "Besides, they're too busy, listening to imaginary xeno activity. Somebody's cousin's neighbor thought they saw some Ganglion soldiers nearby." He sniffed his drink. "Does this cocoa taste weird to you?"

"Normal people don't fortify it with vodka."

Frye couldn't look innocent, not when she was glaring at him with a milk mustache on her lip. "Knew I had forgotten something," he laughed.

They sipped in silence broken by the chirr of unseen insects. "I need to apologize," said Irina suddenly. "Laying into you like that. It wasn't right."

"It's fine," said Frye, hiding his discomfort. He had his suspicions about what came next.

"No, I was in the wrong," repeated Irina. And sure enough, she kept on talking. "It's just that you have family, and I hate watching people pretend like that's not worth everything. You have a chance that I'd give anything to have myself."

"It's not really your problem," said Frye, doing his best not to growl. God, he wished she hadn't bothered to apologize. Shallow and faintly hostile he could handle; Irina sharing her heart was nothing he felt safe to touch.

"No, but I've teamed with your brother. He's an okay guy. Not the world's greatest soldier, but he's trying and he's honest. He's a good kid. He mentions you and I think he misses you."

"Leave me out of it."

"Frye," said Irina. She stopped. Frye tipped his head up and stared at the smallest moon. "It's none of my business," Irina said quietly, "but you could have what the rest of us dream of."

The night sky was ordinary. The energy mist hadn't lasted long, and even five moons couldn't erase the darkness. "I dream of my dad," said Frye. "He could have been here, and god knows we could use someone like him. But he decided to give up his slot. I happened not to be cool with that, but no one wanted to hear my opinion. So now we don't talk."

"I shouldn't have said anything," said Irina.

The Mediators must have put truth serum in their cocoa, decided Frye. Whatever was going on, he was sick of it. Time to reclaim his status as baddest bad boy of New Los Angeles. He'd start with littering. He drained his cup, crumpled it, and tossed it into the bushes. That made him feel better, strong enough to shrug off the memories. "You lost Leon, I lost my dad, everyone in NLA has lost someone," he said. "So maybe give us all a break. That includes yourself. We all know what you're going through, at least a little, so let's skip the apologies and go shoot things."

Chapter Text

They proceeded on foot. The Mediators had asked ever so nicely for Frye to leave any team skells parked at the away station. The Mediators had seeded the area with listening devices and pressure sensors and what ever else they had to sniff out the elusive, probably imaginary, xenos. All of the recordings would be drowned by the movement of a single skell, and the equipment would most likely be outright destroyed.

Frye and Irina had no complaint, being used to ground combat. Interceptors fought hard, but their usual targets weren't any bigger than a human bus, and this mission was no different. The target creatures were called Insidia, and resembled armless versions of T rexes. Only a little taller than a skell, they had nothing special about their attacks besides huge jaws of sharp teet. It would be an easy mission but because they were working as a half-team, Frye and Irina needed to be more careful in their roles. Frye could shoot the indigens to get their attention, but he had to restrain himself. No spraying the area with his Gatling gun, carelessly attracting more vicious chomps than the two of them could handle at once. Being able to draw a crowd might be a useful technique, but not tonight. Irina, meanwhile, was the only one with any support skills in her set, and as a result she had to hold herself back. She could have blistered a target with her melee or ranged attacks, as respectable as anything Frye's oversized weapons could provide, but instead she gritted her teeth and waited for his requests. Timed correctly, her special moves could enhance the team or weaken enemies or most importantly boost the nanos busily repairing any injuries to their mims. They both would be mindful and demure if it killed them, but it was doing nothing for their tempers.

"I'm not one to complain," Irina said after their fourth clear, "but this mission bites."

"Being a paragon sucks," agreed Frye. "How do you manage to stay sane up on that pedestal of yours normally?"

"A good team goes a long way," said Irina. She slanted a moonlit gaze at Frye. "A full team is even better."

"We could go back and kidnap a Mediator," offered Frye. He was pretty sure he had just received one of the better compliments in his life, but he wasn't sure. Irina ignored his suggestion and the mission continued.

Their seventh target proved unlucky. For a moment, Frye was positioned all wrong and the creature focused on Irina. Fighting from the back had its advantages but those were erased by a surprise swing of the creature's tail. Frye was sent flying. He thudded against a boulder and the air was knocked out of his lungs. His gun made a small metallic noise of dismay, but worse was the fact that his whole body went numb. While he was struggling to recover, nothing was stopping the monster as it bore down on Irina. Frye forced himself to grab his sword in weak hands and pushed himself back into the fight, knowing he wouldn't have regained his strength by the time he was close enough to hit the creature. Still, he had to do something.

One shot. The animal plowed into the ground, conquered. Irina stared at Frye across the empty battlefield.

"Sweet mother of miranium," barked Frye. "We have got to do some target practice together, because that was beyond awesome."

"Yeah, yeah," said Irina. Her assault rifle dipped wildly and she started to drop to her knees. "I think I need to sit down for a bit."

Chapter Text

Frye briefly shared his boulder with Irina while they both caught their breath. He probably should have rested at least as long as she did, maybe longer, but he was impatient to have this night be over.

"We cleared enough to get the bounty and mark the mission as complete," he said, standing up and shaking each leg experimentally. "We don't have to stay." It wasn't like he wouldn't be back in a few days, clearing the area again.

"Not on your life, buster," replied Irina, taking a sip from her canteen. A canteen filled with water, Frye thought with dismay.

"You've done me enough of a solid," he said, starting to pace.

"We don't quit until we smooth the path for the Prospectors, whoever they might be." She struggled to her feet.

Frye was stomping in a circle, getting the feeling back into all his limbs. Once he had his larger muscles behaving, he'd try to relax his hands out of the fists they were locked into. He'd wiggle his fingers and maybe make a rude gesture or two. That reminded him of the weird noise his gun had made. Better check that out, he thought, before anything else tried to eat them. Better check that out before Irina ordered him to return to the mission. She was already muttering commands, although her voice was too low for him to hear her. Maybe she was talking to herself.

He didn't get a chance to mention the gun or the noise or the pointlessness of sticking around. As soon as she knew she had his attention, she repeated her command, low and even and still almost too quiet to hear. "Turn around easy, and don't shoot."

Naturally, Frye whirled around with his Gatling gun ready in his hands. A Prone soldier was creeping behind Irina, ready to grab her.

"Behind you!" he shouted.

Irina made disgruntled noise bu did not turn or duck or do anything to escape the threat he had just warned her about. Which, Frye reflected, she had actually been the first to warn him about. Instead, she reached up and behind her, caught the Prone's arm and in one fluid movement flipped him over her shoulder. The big grey alien lay stunned on his back, sprawled on the dirt between them.

"You'd have shot me as well as him," shouted Irina.

"Jeez, add hand-to-hand to the target practice you have got to do with me, I am begging you," said Frye, planting a heavy boot on the enemy's chest and placing the tip of his sword on the guy's throat. "Is it just me, or is he as wrong as the Mediator's cocoa?"

The Prone growled desperately up at him but didn't try to escape. Then he started to howl.

"Is he crying?" asked Frye.

"I think he's just a kid," said Irina with surprise. "Help him stand up."

"No. You, sit up and stop yelling." Frye backed off enough to let the guy struggle into a sort of crouching position. Irina might be right. The Prone soldiers, at least the guys, were about half again as tall as humans, with chests and arms to match. Big and beefy and way too many eyes was a good description. This guy seemed about Irina's size, in every direction. Not a woman, because the armor wasn't hiding any of the curves that Prone gals featured. The armor he wore was Ganglion made, grey and solid, not the fancy stuff that the allied faction of Prone favored, and he wore the blank helmet that barely gave space for his tentacles. But it was slipping over his upper row of eyes, and the jacket was hanging loose around his torso. Frye could see where plating had been cut so the sleeves and pants could be shortened.

"I didn't know they had kids," said Frye, not lowering his sword.

"The Prone we rescued have families, so it makes sense the Ganglion ones do too. Come on, kid," encouraged Irina, "pull yourself together. We won't hurt you."

"Says you."

"Don't listen to this idiot," said Irina. She pulled out one of the foil packets that the Mediators had insisted they take. "Hey, kid, would you like a cookie?"

Chapter Text

"We can't let him go," said Frye, waving his weapon menacingly. "He's our enemy."

"He's just a kid." Irina glared up at him. She was still bent close to the snuffling alien.

"He would have killed you."

Irina hesitated. When she spoke, it felt as if she was trying to convince herself as well as Frye. "He's unarmed and half my weight." She shook her head and continued with more confidence. "We can't hurt him."

Frye couldn't find a good argument against her, not one he could rely on. His head, sure, it was full of loud and clear instructions from every briefing at HQ. He knew what they were supposed to do: no captives, no release. The Ganglion had killed the humans they had captured, killed or worse, and New Los Angeles didn't have the extra capacity for mercy. His head was clear, and that was a bad sign, because his brain was usually wrong about, well, everything. If his gut was siding with Irina, then that's how he would probably decide.

The real problem was that she wasn't having an easy time coming up with a plan either. "We could take him back to the Mediators," she considered.

"Best result would be a life in prison, if they let him get that far. They have their orders too," Frye pointed out.

"I don't think he'll survive if we just let him go," Irina said.

Frye furrowed his brow. "He was doing okay so far."

Irina pointed to the kid's elbow. Frye hadn't noticed that the sleeve was stained with something that wasn't mud, and the plating was torn rather than neatly cut. The kid put a protective hand over his bent arm. "I didn't do that to him," she said.

"Me neither."

"We could give him to the Tree Prone and ask them to take care of him," suggested Irina. The Tree faction had recently joined as an ally of New Los Angeles, after being released from a Ganglion prison camp.

"Oh sure, they'll be so glad to take care of someone that was beating them last week and shooting anyone that didn't work hard enough. They'd be happy to have him in their family." Frye itched behind one ear but kept his sword ready. He had his own suggestion. "It's starting to feel like the best idea is to give him a ten second head start and then run in the opposite direction."

Irina didn't say anything, but her frown of agreement matched Frye's. "We can see if we can patch him up first," she said. "I wonder if our medi-kits do any good on Prone physiology."

"Direct pressure is direct pressure. Give it a try," encouraged Frye, glad that a tolerable decision had been reached. He'd argue with his brain later, but for now his gut was happy.

The kid wasn't a very willing patient, and in the end Irina bundled a messy wreath of bandages around where she thought his wound was. He hadn't eaten any of the cookie either; Irina finally tucked the packet into a pocket on the kid's armor. Frye gestured for Irina to back away and addressed the kid. "Look, the planet helps translate for us, so I know you get what I'm saying. You head that way [he gestured with his sword deeper into the ravine] and we'll backtrack. Lots of BLADEs back that way, so don't even think of following us. Pew pew boom, get it?"

The kid stared sulkily at Frye and scooted a little further away from his deadly sword. Frye took this as agreement. "Okay, you head out first, Irina, and I'll follow. Don't look back."

"Don't even think of doing what you're planning," warned Irina.

"I'm not doing anything unless he starts something. I promise." Irina snorted and remained by his side. Trust Irina to start disbelieving him the minute he started telling the unadulterated truth. Frye took a deep breath and nudged Irina with his shoulder. "Okay. Everyone take a step on the count of three. Away from each other, to be clear. One. Two. Three." Irina took a step. The kid took a step. Frye took half a step.

The jungle exploded around them.

Chapter Text

Irina shoved the kid against the boulder, planting herself between him an a storm of lunging insidia. The remaining carnivores in the area had returned in a pack and were invading the glade from three separate directions. Frye considered that he would make a beefier meat shield than Irina, but what was done was done. He couldn't swap places with her eany more than he could take a minute to fix his Gatling gun. There was no time to wast, not when he had to distract the attackers using only his longsword and his sparkling personality.

He swung against the back of the closest beast, shaving off the row of fur along its spine. It was a blow intended to annoy rather than to harm, fast and easy. Harm would come later. He ran past another, kicking it behind its knee (ankle, rather, the thing was tall). Two enemies were now trained on him. He'd normally blast them with his ranged weapon, get a little distance while keeping their attention, but that wasn't an option. He windmilled his sword and swooped into a lunge. He hit his mark, some teeth went flying, and the first insidia reared back. This was lovely, except it opened more space for the second monster to make an attack on him.

Frye knew this area, knew its mud patches and its walls, knew where there were boulders hidden under oversized ferns. He should know, having run this exact same mission weekly and more than weekly. He dodged away, a sideways leap that morphed into a slide, and the insidia went face first into a rocky barrier concealed by the vegetation. The space between those boulders was narrow, a tight squeeze Frye himself could barely fit through, and as he hoped the beast jammed its skull into the wedge and was momentarily stuck. Nice, thought Frye. It would work itself free in a moment, but Frye had the opportunity to fully attack its partner. He hoped Irina was doing okay against her target.

"Incendiary Edge," he shouted. These jungle critters tended to handle thermal attacks badly. The move also boosted a team's strength and he trusted Irina would use it well. He'd heard a smattering of gunfire, but not her voice. She wasn't waiting him to call for moves, was she?

He stopped worrying about Irina and started worrying about his own situation. He might be getting too good at drawing attention, because the third monster had whirled away from Irina and was advancing towards him. Frye gripped his sword and raised it but froze when Irina shouted at him. "Hold up! It's under control."

For a moment he wanted to shout back that things were very much not under control. Then the newcomer took a bite out of the side of the free insidia. Well glory be, thought Frye. Irina had gone and used brainjack without him hearing her call. He hadn't seen that move done often. She was focusing her knife's innate power into this third insidia and was persuading it to attack its own kind. It was a short effect, and draining to the BLADE. People tended to keep it as a last resort. Frye was glad Irina thought he merited the assist.

Frye used those precious seconds to attack the no-longer trapped insidia. It felt a little too easy. Frye could have sworn it looked a little concussed from slamming into the rock. He planned to make it a lot concussed.

Unfortunately, Frye had counted on the one-on-one lasting a little longer. He heard Irina yell another attack command; it was unclear but the result made it obvious. The controlled animal stopped fighting its fellow and turned angry eyes toward Frye. It made sense that Irina would release her controlled target early as a way of recovering her own strength. He didn't hold it against her, but he really could have used one more chance to hit his opponent before he had to juggle two more. It wasn't much, but he could throw one more move out, maybe enough to finish Old Dizzy. "Rising Blade," he shouted. He wasn't proud of pulling out a move every rookie knew, but he followed protocol to let Irina know. He'd leave her to build something out of such a weak combo.

Old Dizzy slumped to the ground. Maybe he shouldn't be so ashamed of basic efforts. He turned his attention to the other insidia. Two left, now both focused on Irina but also much weaker than at the start of battle. "Yo, over here," he said, whacking a tail. This time he remembered to duck when it flicked back at him.

Irina was pumping out bullets faster than was possible, mixing in extra moves to exceed the base output. The insidia seemed fascinated by her performance. Frye landed another blow on one insidia, he'd forgotten which one it was, and on the other side Irina got a fierce blow into a soft spot on its neck. It shook itself loose, pulling Irina along with it for a few steps before it collapsed to the ground.

One enemy left. Two fighters. It was going to be fine.

One kid, temporarily exposed. One target, small and unarmed. It was not going to be fine.

Chapter Text

The kid was on his feet, fists up, ready to fight the insidia. The little idiot is just making himself easier to snatch, thought Frye. Frye's own idiotic plan was to stab down on the insidia's tail, maybe pin it to the ground. That was how Frye learned that the lower tip of their tails was mostly stiff fur, flashy and acting as a false target for fools like Frye.

He heard Irina scream, not from pain but from frustration. Her knife was still caught in the downed enemy. She wasn't going to use her rifle, he knew that, not one-handed and with the kid being very much in the line of fire. She was good but the risk was too great. Frye swung his sword higher along the creature's tail. It wouldn't do noticeable damage, but it might knock the monster a little off balance. He ignored the fact that all the creature had to do was stretch its neck a little further and pluck up its prey.

There was a muffled rumble from the far end of the ravine, the side that lead directly to the entrance to the caves. It was a roaring sound, more like water than falling rock, but it was deep. There was a quality beyond sound that felt like the planet itself was protesting tonight's events. Irina's and Frye's confused cries of despair and fury were nothing in comparison. It didn't stop Frye from taking another swing but he turned his head toward the noise, hoping for a miracle.

A boulder twice as big as Frye's sturdy frame plunged down from the sky, flying directly at the insidia's skull. It smashed the beast's face into the ground, then ricocheted off another rock to return at almost the same force to smash into its jaw. The monster staggered back, sweeping Frye with it. When it tossed its head toward the moons, the rock remained firmly jammed into its toothy maw.

After that, the fight didn't last much longer. Now that the kid was in the clear, Irina abandoned her knife and blasted the body of the insidia. Frye practically climbed up the spine of the creature, taking a slash with every step. The monster shook itself, mouth still blocked, unable to fight its attackers. It twisted and sank to its knees. It was grinding away at the offending boulder, unable to spit it out. All that was needed was for Frye to swing at the neck and the indigen toppled onto its side and lay still.

The boulder rolled out of the limp jaws, and in doing so flung open its arms and legs. Boulders shouldn't flop, thought Frye, and they definitely shouldn't bleed.

"Pa!" yelled the kid, launching himself at the motionless body of a large male Prone, as grey as his son.

Oh shit, thought Frye, oh shit oh shit oh shit.

Chapter Text

Frye scattered the contents of the medipack in his rush to open it. Irina was holding the kid far enough off of his dad's chest that Frye could get a good view of the adult Prone's injuries. Frye was going to need more than a batch of bandages and cooling packs, but this was what he had. There were a lot of rips in the armor and Frye had no idea which area was most critical. Around the heart, he thought, or the lungs, assuming Prone were built roughly the same as humans used to be. Any place was as good as another because the mimeosome kit probably didn't have squat that was useful for organics.

"Pa!" bleated the boy. Irina wrapped her arms more securely around him.

The Prone male stretched out an arm towards his son. "Get back to your mother," he wheezed.

"We'll make sure he does," said Irina. The elder Prone's major eyes drifted shut and his minor eyes flickered.

"No one's going anywhere," said Frye, slapping his patient in the face. "You're staying right here with us." Add another lie to my tab tonight, he thought. He had piled bandages on the larger wounds, the ones he could spot, but that wasn't going to help with blood loss or anything internal.

"In the caves," whispered the Prone. "A few of us shelter there." His breath hissed away.

"No," declared Frye. He ripped open a precious package of tensifer booster, worth twice the credits this job could earn him, and pressed the spray into the man's chest.

"That won't work on xenos," said Irina.

"Got a better idea?" snapped Frye, pumping the stimulant into the limp body.

"Pa!" sobbed the boy over and over. "Pa!"

Either the child's plea or the alien chemicals were enough for the Prone to rally for a moment. "Don't return him to the Ganglion," he begged weakly. "Only to his mother. They begrudge us our children."

"I'm telling you, you're not going anywhere," insisted Frye. He punched down on the biggest wound, as if enough pressure would undo the harm of vicious teeth and crushing jaws. His hand sunk into the damage, covering only half of the area. He plastered his other hand next to it. "No one asked you to do this."

"For my son..." The Prone's lips moved but there was barely a sound. "For my child... anything ..."

"Not. This." Inside Frye was as frantic as the child weeping and clawing in Irina's grasp. He now had both hands flat against the Prone's barrel chest, fingers wide to cover more territory. Fluid oozed and squirmed in between. Frye wasn't calling it blood, he wasn't calling it anything, he wasn't thinking at all. He was pressing so hard with elbows locked that his arms were starting to tingle. Moonlight glittered wetly where human and Prone touched.

Irina leaned forward. "Don't move," she said carefully.

"I'm not planning to," Frye growled back. "I'm not close to giving up."

"I mean it. Don't move," she said, still examining his pointless first aide. "But take a look at your hands and tell me what you see. How are you feeling?"

"What do you mean, how am I feeling? What does it matter how ... wait..."

"There. Something's happening. You see it, don't you?"

"I don't see anything. Wait. No. Hang on," said Frye. He still didn't see what Irina was talking about, mostly because he wasn't going to relax and crawl up as close to the Prone as Irina now was, her nose almost to the big guy's chest. But he could feel it happening, a crawling sensation along his arms, across the backs of his hands, through the tips of his fingers.

"Your nanos," said Irina. "Do you think they could be trying to transfer themselves to the Prone?"

The microscopic repair systems for mimeosomes were enhanced by armor, boosted by weapon output, and as far as Frye was concerned powered by the light of the fucking moons. They weren't supposed to transfer, and they shouldn't know the first thing about Prone anatomy, but something was shifting from Frye to the wounded alien. Something that moved like a breeze on the hairs of his arms, something as warm as a whisper along his wrist. Frye pressed his fingers more firmly against the tattered uniform.

Irina positioned the kid close enough to hold his dad's hand but not to interfere. She pulled out her comm device and scanned the situation. "It's real," she said. "Your armor's acting like he's the one wearing it and redirecting the healing protocols."

"Great, I've got a new roommate. Two guys, one pair of pants," said Frye. He leaned a fraction harder against the Prone. The heartbeat he had only felt as a weak flutter was starting to pulse regularly under his palms.

The Prone opened his major eyes again and looked up at Frye. "I do not want to leave my son," he rasped softly.

"Good choice," said Frye. "Shut up and let stuff happen. I think we're going to be okay."

Chapter Text

Irina drove them home. Frey didn't argue the point. He didn't tell her directly, but he felt off, dehydrated from the inside out, crystalized like a mimeosome geode. He jammed himself into the jumpseat, trying to twist his suddenly too-long legs out of her way, bending his brittle elbows so she could pilot the mech easily.

They had escorted Cookie and his father to the entrance to the cave system. Irina had repeatedly assured the Ganglion fighter that all of his group would be welcomed in New Los Angeles. No one else in the party looked convinced, not even Frye. The next time they met, Frye thought, they would probably do their best to kill each other. This wasn't a new thought to a veteran like Frye, but it didn't make it less bitter. Maybe the little family would come to New Los Angeles after all. Why not? Why not ask for a second miracle after what happened tonight?

"Watch out for our guys," blurted Frye. "They've got a hint someone's here." Irina had hissed his name in warning, but he had ignored her. "They're already starting to look for you. Plus the Prospectors are always clowning around in caverns. I'm surprised you haven't clashed already."

"We keep ourselves secluded. For the children," said the Prone father gravely. "We have managed to escape unfriendly eyes from all directions, but we were planning to move. We know of an area nearby that has a provisional outpost. It is too insignificant for the Ganglion to check on us there."

"In the toxic forest? Yeah, even BLADE doesn't bother to engage that group much. Too big a hassle for a dead end area."

"Consider what I said," emphasized Irina. "New Los Angeles could be a fresh start for you."

The Prone father had nodded and then the pair had slipped into the cave entrance. Frye and Irina waited until the sound of their footsteps vanished, then carefully made their way back to the skell. Frye had let Irina do most of the navigation back to the skell. He was on his feet, but the loss of nanos had left him wiped out. It was up to her to keep them out of the way of enemies. If the Ganglion Prone decided to ambush them, she would have to protect them both. Frye couldn't relax until they had swung wide around the Mediator camp and Irina's skell responded to her signal, sliding the capsule open for them both.

They wouldn't include most of tonight's events in the mission report. As far as BLADE was concerned, they had cleared their quota, end of story. It hadn't taken many words to come to this agreement and they didn't talk after that. Frye could have relaxed in the back passenger capsule all by himself, but he didn't want to be alone. Irina's quiet huff as she took a sharp turn comforted him. Frye stared out the small side window as the glowing night-time forest flashed past, then as the silvered prairie grass swallowed them like a sea. Irina pushed the Verus to speeds Frye would never have risked himself.

"Drop me off at the mission board," he said as they rolled through the city gate.

"Are you sure you shouldn't go to the Mim Maintenance Center? You look like you could use a check-up."

"You worry too much," Frye chuckled easily. "I'm fine! Ten fingers, nine toes, perfectly normal." This would be the last lie he told her, he promised himself.

When she dropped him off, he paused and put a hand on the edge of the pilot's capsule. "Hey," he asked quickly, "do you want me to leave your name off the mission report?"

"Trying to stiff me out of the credits?" She didn't sound angry, merely curious.

"I can shoot you your half privately. Hell, the whole amount. You did me a solid tonight. I just thought that you might not want to connect your name with mine."

Irina tilted her head down at him, considering Frye with steely eyes. She flexed her hands on the skell's controls, improving their position infinitesimally. "We did a good job. I would never be ashamed of letting people know that." She nodded at him, he fluttered a wave that approached a salute, and they parted.

The story ended, as most of Frye's stories did, with a return to the Repenta parking lot. His fellow lushes hadn't cared about his absence, but they were more than happy to greet him loudly and imprecisely. He unearthed his neglected flask from its lonely exile in a vest pocket, shared a quick toast, and then gave a longer greeting to the vague brightness over the rim of the city walls. It was only the promise of morning, nothing that could be called dawn.

Vodka couldn't go stale, not in a few hours, but it went down wrong, slithering into his gut and curling like a snake. He put the flask away and breathed in the city air. A mix of skell fumes and construction crane oil, with a redolent hint of dumpster. He wasn't revived but at least it grounded him. He had a sudden thought.

His comm device refused to acknowledge his first swipe, or his second. His dry fingers moved pointlessly against the surface. He breathed on his hands to no effect, finally stooping to giving the tip of his index finger a quick lick. That was enough. He swiped up the contact for a good friend, or at least a guy that owed him a few credits.

/if any rockheads go to fn 219 let me know
/take me along
/just want to check st
/k?

Frye tapped green to send. His friend's icon waved back at him automatically. Frye stared at the curling blue logo for the Prospector division next to the recipient's name. A quick tap pulled up a thread of names, but the one he wanted was early in the alphabet. It wouldn't hurt anyone if he tapped it.

The comm device balked again. He tapped one more time, then growled and switched to voice commands. "Message to Christoph, P. Prospector." The text window opened expectantly.

He didn't look at the screen, swinging his gaze to the edge of dawn. "It wasn't about you. I heard people talking and they're wrong. You got on the Whale because you're a fucking genius, so ignore them. It wasn't you. That's not why I'm angry. Was angry. I just wish I could be okay with his decision."

The light in the sky hadn't changed. Time couldn't have passed, but the comm device blipped encouragingly, asking if he was done. Frye fixed his eyes on the heavens. "I miss you," he whispered.

A beam of sunshine broke over the city wall, blinding him. "Stupid. Delete the message, wait, no, save to drafts." The comm device chirped obediently and he squinted down to see if the message was safe. He flexed his tired fingers. "Change that. Schedule to send in a month. No. Schedule it for ..." Frye swallowed. "Schedule it for his birthday." The device obeyed and shut down, the screen reflecting the dark outline of a man against the radiant sky.

Chapter Text

Case rounded the corner to the Repenta, the city twinkling behind her, then skittered a few steps in confusion. Her smile brightened in a moment and she rushed forward. "Gwin!" she said with delight. "I wasn't expecting to find you here. Where's Frye?"

"Inside," Gwin said shortly. He tried not to frown. This wasn't the first time he'd been asked that exact question. At least Case had greeted him. He wasn't enjoying how people didn't even say hello.

He changed his mind about that in a second. "Baby doll!" shrieked an inebriated woman in a blue party dress. She toddled across the parking lot and wrapped an arm around his shoulder. Her lips smeared bright lipstick on his cheek. "My widdle bitty extra fry. We loooove youuuuuu!" She plastered another kiss on face.

"Thanks, Donna," said Gwin. "Much appreciated." He untangled himself carefully, holding on to her arm so that she didn't wobble.

"Let's toast!" blared Donna, waving a bottle. Gwin pulled out a flask and took a pull in solidarity. Donna cheered and lurched back to a small group of parking lot revelers.

"It's water," said Gwin before Case could open her mouth. She had been watching with a mix of amusement and concern.

"Okay, I need an explanation, please," said Case. When Gwin hesitated, she smiled shyly and shrugged. "Or not. Can I do anything for you?"

Gwin grimaced for a moment, considering his situation. Then he sighed. "No, it's okay. I promised to babysit Frye's ... er, acquaintances while he has a break inside the Repenta. He's fine!" Gwin quickly assured her. Case was one of Frye's real friends, and he didn't want to worry her. "He wanted a break, mostly to sit inside and do nothing. I dunno, maybe he wanted to have a meal or play some pool. He did me a favor last night, so I promised to act as a stand-in for him."

She nodded, hiding the worry still lurking in her glass green eyes, and pulled out a tissue. She started to rub his cheek. "I think they're too old to be classified as children," said Case. Over by the patio, the woman in the blue dress was managing to simultaneously dance and share her beer with a BLADE.

"Yeah, but they start missing him and then they go into the Repenta to drag him out. I kind of act as a surrogate."

"The extra Frye. I get it now." Case had finished cleaning his face. She kicked a loose asphalt pebble. "I guess Frye's not interested in missions right now. I won't bother him."

"Please!" Gwin grabbed both her hands. "Take me. This city's not doing me any good tonight."

"Won't Frye get mad?"

"Frye would understand if I have to go on a mission with Elma's rookie."

"Okay," she laughed, "but no complaining if you end up having to pick dilus teeth out of your glutes."

Chapter Text

The idea was to challenge the humans in art class by bringing in xeno models. That's how Lin Lee Koo volunteered Tatsu to sit as a model for six sessions.

"Tatsu not show all his fur, right," he had quivered before the first session.

"What? Ew! No!" said Lin. She rushed him onto the small raised platform before he could shed so much as his lobed hood. "Keep it all on, round boy. I gave up jokes about peeling you months ago. Ew."

It seemed fairly silly to Tasu, but he supposed it was good for the class to start with such a fine figure of a Pon. The instructor did gently request that the young Nopon remove some of his gear, the hat, the oversized pack, and finally his thick glasses. As a result, the activity in the room was vague to him, but Lin assured him that the students were learning a lot.

The instructor had Tatsu pose in a variety of natural ways. Most were graceful and easy to hold. The best day was when he was asked to pretend to sleep. This he did with such fervor that his face was damp with drool when Lin poked him at the end of the session.

The last session was another easy pose. He was asked to stand in a sagacious pose with his wing arms wrapped around his belly. He contemplated Life, the meaning of art, and the prospect of lunch. He felt like quite the wise oldiepon. He could only vaguely see the students, who sounded excessively lively today. He asked Lin why his deep expressions had made them behave so irreverently.

"Probably because we were trying new media," said Lin. "Didn't you notice?"

"Tatsu keeping eyes firmly turned to the All."

"At least you didn't snore this time. I'm surprised you didn't notice the change. Usually we have easels and paper. Today people were making clay models and wire frames. I was using papier-mâché."

"Sounds tasty."

"No. Anyway, everyone made a sculpture but mine's the best. It'll be life-sized when it's finished."

The instructor came over to thank Tatsu for his efforts. "We plan on having a gallery exhibit at the end of the month. I hope you'll attend."

The exhibit was held in the Outfitter's hangar. Tatsu wasn't convinced that every student had understood the assignment. Was he really nothing more than a flappy circle to them? Not that it mattered. He didn't really care about the other students. He was here to support his bestest, most beloved friend, Linly. He was dying to know how she had immortalized him.

His feeling were mixed. He thought her pencil sketches were tentative, almost as cartoonish as her fellow students' works, but a few of her studies of his wing arms showed a true understanding of Nopon grace and power. He didn't care for the still life where she had added a cornucopia behind his resting form. He preferred the colorful pastel where he stood with one wing raised in a triumphant display.

"Dance of victory!" crowed Tatsu.

Lin put firm hands on his shoulders. "Do not demonstrate in the gallery."

The instructor's voice came over the sound system, drawing everyone to a small open space. He thanked the visitors and praised the diligence of the artists. Then he announced a special presentation. "Miss Koo wanted to introduce her final piece as an interactive experience."

"Hi!" Lin spoke without hesitation into the mic. "We've been drawing and sculpting my friend Tatsu for weeks now, but I know in my heart that no one else understands him as well as I do. I don't believe anyone else has captured his true essence. I won't believe it." She turned and shouted over her shoulder. "Hit it, Alexa!"

The lights dimmed to a soft spot light. It illuminated a radiant version of Tatsu as the artwork was slowly lowered from the ceiling on a nylon rope. The sculpture was lovingly and imaginatively crafted. His fluff was recreated in crinkly gold paper fringe, while his vest and hat glowed fluorescent green. Swirls of peach and mango decorated his graceful wings. Flutters of streamers in a rainbow selection whirled gently as the sculpture approached the floor. It stopped at the level of Lin's head, bobbing and turning slowly. "No one else," said Lin, "knows his over-the-top enthusiasm and his all-encompassing curiosity. No one knows his generosity and vivid imagination. And no one else knows how sweet he is, right to the core."

The crowd gave a pleased round of applause at this lovely memorial. Tatsu felt prickly with suspicion.

"So please enjoy this piece. I'm calling it Candygore." Lin pulled a brightly decorated stick from behind her back. "Who wants the first wack at it?"

Chapter Text

Mia looked at the food, then turned pleading eyes up to her team leader. "Please tell me this isn't lunch."

"Okay. This isn't lunch." Lucky had distributed the rations out to his crew, making sure they had enough water and were sitting in the shade. One thing he was known for (besides his mellow voice and lean good looks) was his insistence on regular work breaks. He was strict on this point, enough to make a Nopon cheer and a union rep weep with joy.

All of which made Mia's complaint surprising. However, she had a point in light of the sorry state of the meal. Two folded starch disks that might technically be called tortillas if one was willing to allow them a lifespan of over a decade. The filling was warmish and had flecks of bright colors in a dull grey base, and it was guaranteed to contain nothing natural. The two semi-circles lay forlorn on a cardboard tray.

"Really?" asked Mia. "This is it?"

"This is it, mija. Don't forget your salt tablet."

"This stinks," said Mia. "I don't mean the company, of course." When Lucky nodded, she continued to pester him chattily. "I don't even get a drink?"

"You have water," said Diego. He was also ignoring his meal, gazing vaguely in the direction of NLA with a look of resignation.

"I hate choking down pills, and I hate choking down sodium pills the most. I'll do it," she reassured him, "but I'm going to need to complain first."

"Whatever you need to get it down somehow. Our mims need the water and the minerals, both. There's more than salt in there."

"I want some of that good stuff, like that strawlenny fresca or even a little horchata. Those used to come with the taco platter MREs, at least in powder form."

"You know the shortages we're suffering right now," Lucky explained tiredly. "They're getting the Integrated Production Plant back on-line as fast as they can. Until then, we make do with limited lunches, water, and salt pills."

"Boo!" said Mia ungraciously. She sniffed her meal but at least she didn't grimace. "Okay, I'm almost done complaining. You're being really nice about it, by the way. But also, boo! This bites."

Lucky leaned over without replying, rooting around under a nearby bush. He pulled out a grey rock and grinned at Mia. "Let me teach you something. You're probably too young to know this trick." He sliced the rock easily into four sections and passed her a wedge. "You need one of these to do it and you gotta balance everything, but you'll get the hang of it. Open your water bottle." Mia followed along.

"Good. Now lick your hand. Just the thumb and finger." Mia wrinkled her nose and did so. "Perfect. Crush your salt pill and sprinkle it on your hand. Careful now, don't want to lose any of it," warned Lucky. "It's okay if it's a little gritty."

When she was done and both their hands were suitably dusted, Lucky grinned at her. "The sequence is lick, shoot, suck. Lick the salt, drink the water, then suck on the rock-orange. Okay? One, two, three."

"Santé," said Mia when they were done. "Does this count as corrupting me?"

"I doubt it. I just tricked you into the equivalent of eating your vegetables."

Chapter Text

"I've created a monster," said Lin, flopping onto the couch. From the kitchen came the sound of cheerful Nopon singing.

Elma and Douglas had heard this complaint several times tonight, whenever Lin could escape the haze of baking and frosting. Elma lifted her eyes from their paperwork without comment, while Doug tutt-tutted without sparing her a glance.

"No, I mean it. This is the fourth cake I've had to bake in as many days. One more and I'll need to call in the Reclaimers to deal with the leftovers."

"I'm pretty sure Commander Vandham will help you out," said Doug, sorting a stack of completed forms. He passed a tablet screen with map locations to Elma.

"He helped me the last two times," Lin informed him. "He was slowing down by the end. No one is invincible."

"Then call the Interceptors."

"I'd rather call locusts. They have better manners."

Elma had rapidly annotated the list and passed the tablet back to Doug. She turned serious eyes to Lin. "I would expect you to be happy to share your culinary interest in a constructive way," she said pointedly.

Lin had the grace to blush. "It was for art! The sculpture of Tatsu was legitimate art. I was making a transformative piece!"

"And then you filled your sculpture of your loyal friend with candy and encouraged the viewers to break it into pieces."

Doug coughed quickly, then matched Elma's serious tone. "It was memorable," said Doug, stretching his arms. He was willing to take a break from cross-referencing squad tasks. "Making realistic bones and organs out of sugar and jelly was a mark of talent."

"Thank you! And I didn't force anyone to help me make a dozen initial models!" huffed Lin.

Elma and Doug kept silent. Lin sunk lower. "Okay, I know this is probably my just desserts. Literally. But I am ready for Tatsu to knock it off."

"He wants to contribute a special treat to the Littlepon Haunted House next week. He only has a few more days to get it right," said Elma gently.

Lin sat silently, considering her sins and the hope for release. Then she sat up, her chin raised high. "He's not going to stop until he thinks the cake, including the gory but delicious internal organs, is perfect. Which means I have to help him make it better than perfect."

"That's our kiddo," said Doug. "But do me a favor: no explosions."

"Ohmagah, that's brilliant!" She bounced off the couch, making a beeline into the kitchen. "Hey Tatsu! Have we considered triggering a small burst of carbon dioxide to push out the licorice rope intestines when the cake is sliced?"

Chapter Text

Izzy had a friend on the Whale. They liked to go out to eat together. Izzy was the driving force. He was the one who had all the contacts and knew when there was a unregulated restaurant opening in any part of the crew area, and he arrived at every first night with a crowd. Izzy loved inviting lots of friends, a real squeeze as too many people crowded around a flimsy table in an unguarded storeroom. Izzy said it was for the company, for the chance to try ALL the appetizers.

And to be smooshed up against Jimmy. Izzy's hand on Jimmy's leg, hip to hip, he only had to turn his head to plant a kiss on his ear, no leaning required.

Both Jimmy and Izzy made it to Mira, but Harriers lost a lot of people that first month.

After that Izzy still went out whenever he could round up a group, but he kept his hands on top of the table.

He knew it was important to keep doing the things that you love, even when your heart is broken. He reminded himself that it was just temporary, that Jimmy would be restored when they got the Lifehold, and that Jimmy was a good enough soldier that they'd restore him right away. They'd need good soldiers for a while. Izzy worried that the longer it took, the further back Jimmy would get on the list; you'd want soldiers that are most up to date first, naturally, but maybe Izzy could put in a special request?

Like the ECP would be sentimental and care about a geologist's broken heart.

Meanwhile, Izzy hit the restaurants, taking his whole team. Grabbing anyone else at the division HQ. He fed a lot of Prospectors. Even better was when he had been attached to a mixed team. Those nights he could clear out several hangouts, get a real crowd around the table, all talking different shit. He'd done a little matchmaking too, professionally, for hobbies and special interests, maybe a little romance but that's not as interesting. He wasn't above it, mind you, but that kind of thing doesn't get you more conversation.

Never for himself. He wasn't that desperate for comfort.

He always picked up the check. Let other people shoot him some credits or not. Preferably not. This was why he was chronically short on credits, but that's what running missions was for, right? He wasn't trying to buy friendship, absolutely not. He was not buying his way out of loneliness. He wasn't spending his way into respect or a mentor role or whatnot. He was just a guy that preferred not to worry about how the meal ended. He paid, end of story.

(He was forgetting what Jimmy looked like. Too many mims around the city with about the same face, about the same eyes. He remembered only pieces, mostly how it felt. Jimmy's regrettable five o'clock shadow. The way his voice fluttered just below Izzy's shoulder blades. They way he'd lean into Izzy as he reached out to pay the check. Izzy couldn't bear to see someone else stretch out their arm, dip their hand for the tablet, make that gesture, and for it not to be Jimmy. So Izzy paid.)

Early on Mira, but not that early, Izzy and Frye washed up in the Interceptors' division tent at the same time. Izzy was queasy from too much pizza, too late at night, too much conversation. He'd be fine for a mission, but he knew it should be nothing too challenging for body or mind. He needed the fast credits, because he planned to do it all over again, the food, the crowd, the wall against going back to his empty room.

Easy, brainless, fast. Hence, jumping on an Interceptor heavy mission. Prospector missions gave Izzy too much time to think, when he could think.

Frye was, well, Frye.

Frye was queasy in the way that only Frye can manage. A mephite had died to provide his latest hangover. Several mephites. The pay had been good, converted to a whole lot of vodka in one easy transaction, but somehow the stench had lingered. Or so it seemed, judging by the film coating his mouth.

He was sucking on an anti-hangover augment. He insisted to his fellow drinkers that this was the best way to get relief. "Fast release, my ass," he always said. "At least take a few licks, to make sure you haven't gotten your hands on a bad one." Not all augments were legit, especially at the start, when resources were scraped thin all across NLA. Some of them came from questionable sources, with questionable results. Sugar augments were one thing, dangerous enough in the sense that a guy could go out unimproved and still under the weather. There were worse versions, ones that could result in a quick trip to the mim center. He'd seen it with another guy.

Izzy and Frye knew each other in passing (the Repenta had food as well as alcohol). At least Izzy knew of Frye, and he recognized the dangers involved in getting to know him better. It was hard to miss the brassy laugh on the edge of the parking lot, the icy crew cut as Frye plowed past the Prospectors' Hangout without a glance. Izzy had also heard the almost imperceptible sigh of a teammate as tall and blonde as Frye but washed out from teary regret. Izzy knew why Frye wasn't welcome in the Repenta. Izzy had decided to keep a defensible space between himself and a man that was so obviously a liability to the people around him.

That gap was narrowing today. They were both in a hurry to get out of NLA for their own reasons, but only on easy missions that wouldn't end in disaster for sub-optimal mimeosomes.

Izzy was prepared enough. He had good gear, he was a heavy enough hitter that Harriers sometimes tapped him, and he had a good memory for environmental advantages. More importantly, he had his special brew. He stood there, thermos in hand, full of a bitter tea that turned spicy just before you swallowed. He poured himself a mug, sipped, swallowed, nodded at Frye.

Frye nodded in return, reconsidered, groaned and held his head very carefully. He crunched the augment. Today he could use all the help.

"Want some?" asked Izzy. He could relax the rules enough to share a drink, especially if it meant a teammate was in better shape to handle a mission. Izzy refilled his mug and offered it, clean rim facing towards Frye.

Frye reached out, but his hand was inaccurate. Izzy grasped Frye's hand and guided his fingers around the mug. He followed Frye's hand, stepping closer so the tea wouldn't spill. Izzy released the pressure gradually, slowly, making sure that Frye was able to take the slight weight, then hovered in case more help was needed.

Frye sipped, then drained the mug. He winced as his head tipped back, but he didn't stop until the mug was empty. He didn't return the mug immediately, holding it close to his chest to absorb the last bit of warmth. "Thanks. My head should clear in half a minute."

Izzy never ever fell for Frye, but in that moment he felt it was a very very close miss.

Chapter Text

"Today, we're asking people on the street: what is happiness?" The interviewer waved a bulbous microphone at a passing pair of BLADEs.

The lanky older man was the first to answer. His eyes crinkled in a way that suggested smiling came easily to him. He lifted the frozen drink in his hand. "A nice coldberry coffee frappe is a good start." He demonstrated his happiness with a rattling suck on the straw.

The woman was more serious. Her pale green eyes flashed huge on her pale face. "Belonging," she said earnestly. "That always seemed like happiness to me. If I could belong somewhere, I could be happy."

"So belonging to BLADE makes you happy?" asked the reporter. Very nice, very uplifting, he thought.

She bit her lip softly. "It's supposed to," she said.

"Coffee has never let me down, as long as there was enough ice," insisted her companion. "Some of our work stinks, admit it. Ganglion. Humans. Paperwork."

"Not all humans," she replied quickly.

"Not all Ganglion, to be honest," he said. "I could stand to hate them a lot less if they'd let me. But coffee never gets that complicated. It's there to be enjoyed."

The young woman considered this and her eyes grew fierce. "I'm changing my choice," she said. "Cookies."

"You're saying that happiness is cookies?" asked the reporter. The soundbite was shifting into something less than he hoped.

"Cookies," she repeated firmly. "Specifically, peanut butter ones."

Chapter Text

"I'm not even sure where I can put this," said the female soldier. She was walking along the night time sidewalks of NLA with a bulky object carried in both arms.

"Put it on a table, obviously. Make it a statement piece for your apartment," advised the woman walking beside her.

"I live in the barracks. We don't have a table."

"An end table then."

"Our room is four bunk beds and twice as many lockers. We don't have end tables."

"Then set it on your desk at work. It'll make you look sophisticated. Worldly." Her friend giggled.

"Shared space. No one wants a globe taking up half the work area." The globe's owner stopped suddenly by a cafe table to set it down. It was multicolored and tilted on a brass support. She spun the sphere experimentally. It wobbled, with only a third of the surface decorated with continents in low relief. The majority of it was flat blue water with imaginative illustrations of Nopon sea monsters. "I'm not even sure how accurate it is. No one's ever mentioned a sixth continent at the pole."

"Maybe the Nopon know something we don't."

"I think thy were just getting rid of worthless junk as prizes."

"It still makes you a winner," said her friend, trying to cheer her up.

"My crowning achievement," the winner muttered, "will be knowing the Nopon name for the Yawning Gap in Oblivia. I only know that because I pitched a skell in there, and some Nopon were watching me as I climbed out."

"Ooof. My condolences."

"Thank goodness for skell insurance," agreed the globe's owner.

A cafe staff had come outside and was pointedly wiping down empty tables. The friends gathered up their trophy and moved on.

"Do you think they have to deal with abandoned crap regularly?" giggled the friend, casting a glance backwards.

"That gives me an idea. I can leave it on the cathedral steps with a note. 'Please take care of this child.'" She rocked the globe maternally.

The unencumbered friend clapped her hands. "I have my own idea. You could give it to Hope."

"No way. She doesn't want junk in her life. I wouldn't do that to her."

"It's her job," argued the friend. "Finding uses for the useless and so on."

"Don't be mean."

"We're talking Mediators."

"No, for real. She's been going through some stuff. Like stuff." They both walked quietly for a bit. If it was notable on Mira, then Hope's "stuff" must be severe.

The friend wasn't giving up. "I heard her talking about starting a Nopon school," she continued. "Schools need globes, right? It's their natural environment."

"Okay, but if she so much as starts to sniffle, I am leaving it wrapped in a blanket on your doorstep."

Chapter Text

Lin didn't set Tatsu on the sofa so much as she flung him into the cushions. Lurid green and pink candies scattered around him to create a blast zone of sugar.

"I can't believe you did that!" she shouted.

"Good test for Linly's design. Very Outfitter of Tatsu." Another wave of lollipops pumped from the gaping wound in the abdomen of the bear costume he was wearing.

"The Candygore Suit was for the Haunted House later this week, not to have you parade around the streets of NLA today. Plus you modified my design!"

"Sunshine Café offer credits for dancing mascot work. Manager Coco promise good salary," explained Tatsu. "Kill two evello with one stone."

"Like how? You scare the living bejeebus out of Coco as well as ruining my surprise? Because I wasn't the first person she called when her customers started screaming. The news is gonna be all over NLA by dinner."

Tatsu didn't answer at once, mostly because the head wound between the fake furry ears was releasing bright purple gummie brains. Once they stopped bouncing off his face he tried to excuse himself. "Nopon not drink coffee much and littlepon especially not. The audience for the Haunted House won't know. And Tatsu will give all the credits to Linly to pay for project."

Lin was still frowning at him when a blast of cotton candy lungs blew into her face. She swatted and swore, but she was laughing by the end. "Okay, I can't stay mad when the roundest version of Sunny the Sunshine Bear is bleeding treats all over me. Can you turn it off now?"

"Button on back," said Tatsu, spinning himself into a sugar cocoon.

Lin flipped the candy replicator off and the excitement stopped. She cleared a spot on the sofa next to Tatsu, who was contentedly sampling a salt water taffy kidney. "I'm going to try to look on the bright side. We know the radius for candy emission is a reliable 0.98 meters, and the directionality is good. Even getting a red-hot to the face didn't hurt me, so safety concerns are settled." Lin scanned the suit with her comm device. "The Ma-non candy creation mechanism is just as fantastic as promised: good range of shapes, colors and content. The energy level is holding steady. Do you feel the batteries getting warm?"

"Tatsu toasty due to triple layer of fur, clothes, and more fur."

"We aren't putting you naked into the final suit, Nature Boy. But maybe you can ditch your hat."

"No hat is worse than naked," vowed Tatsu.

"Then we'll build in a cooling break every hour. Maybe between every scheduled group of littlepon."

"Tatsu always glad for ice cream break."

"Agreed. Good review session, team. Let's see what's in the freezer." She stood up. Something cracked under her foot. She revised her plan. "Ice cream comes after we clean up this mess, or we will really be in trouble."

Chapter Text

He found Mia sobbing behind some orange storage crates at the back of the skell hangar. She was crumpled on her knees, weeping so hard her ribs were heaving.

Alarmed, he dropped to the ground in a tangle of folded legs and bony ankles with all the grace of a broken umbrella. It was enough to knock his trademark hair ornament loose. The purple hibiscus slithered down an errant strand of grey hair before plopping onto the ground. He ignored it as something unimportant. What mattered was his friend, lost to her grief.

Then he froze. He wasn't sure if he should touch her, lay a hand on her shoulder or squeeze her hand or something. She hadn't answered when he'd called out her name in the garage, and she hadn't acknowledged him now that he had found her. She might be crying even harder, if such a thing were possible. Maybe he should leave.

No, that wasn't right. Elma hadn't left Lin when she had cried, he remembered that. People had gathered together as a group to cheer up Hope. So he was right to stay. Probably. The people in NLA needed even more support when they were sad. This was probably true on any planet, although not everyone remembered that. He wasn't naming any names, mind you, but he suspected that leaving people alone to deal with their grief pretty much always ended with disaster.

He might as well get comfortable, since he had decided to stay. He pulled a toolbox closer, so he could lean an elbow on it, and also screen them from curious eyes better. You don't have to be alone when you're sad, but you don't have to put on a show either. He wasn't sure if Elma had taught him that, but it felt accurate. He had to rely on feelings so much that sometimes he was tired of emotions generally. But that didn't apply to Mia and whatever she was dealing with.

With the box in place and his limbs rearranged, he was still no closer to knowing what he should do. "Hey," he drawled. Good start, solid start. "Mia." Excellent followup, he was actually quite good at this. "I..." He faltered, still short of a clue on what she might want to hear. "Hey." That completed his repertoire, so he left things as they were.

Mia kept crying, but she seemed to be muttering to herself. He certainly couldn't understand the broken words she was saying. She scrubbed her face, paused to hiccup, then burst into a fresh wave of tears.

"No rush," he said, and meant it.

She finally stopped, without him having to do or say anything. He sat there, wondering if now was the time to pat her on the back. Would she want an awkward hug? He was bad at those. Mia sat beside him, head tilted up to the ceiling, a hand over her eyes.

"I bet I look like a mess," she said thickly.

"Don't know. You're covering your face," he pointed out.

She dropped her hand and turned to look at him. She'd chewed off the lip gloss she wore and her eyes were grey from all the tears. Her hair was still fluffy as a Nopon's. "Looks different but okay," he decided. "Still you."

"Well, I am a mess," she declared. "Inside. What kind of a person falls apart when she gets the best news of her entire life?"

"You heard about your dads?" said Cross with surprise.

Mia laughed, then started to cry again, then stopped herself with a wet giggle. "That would be beyond good news. Thanks, Chief. You always bring me down to Earth."

"Down to Mira, and I would blame gravity for that."

She snorted. It sounded like a cheerful gurgle. "No, I mean I trust you to tell me what's important. And this isn't important. Not like that."

"So what's the news?"

"I got my skell license."

"I heard. That's huge news. I wanted to be one of the first to congratulate you but you were busy .. you know. That is great news," he repeated.

She sat up straight, and the smile on her face was bright. "I've been working my butt off to get that license. I earned it!" She slumped back against the crate. "And now I'm bawling my head off. Go figure."

"I don't get it. I'm sorry. But it must make sense, a little, at least to you." Something else that Elma had said flashed in his brain. "Tears are good for emotions that are too big for words. Or something like that."

Mia leaned more comfortably on the crate, her shoulder finally bumping his. Shoulder bumps were great, he was excellent at those. "All that work. And now I have a whole new future. I don't know if I'll like it. I don't know if I'm good enough."

"Hey now. You're plenty good," he interrupted. "You promised to stop lying to me."

"I never lied. I just left stuff out," she said. She bumped him again. "I got everything I promised myself I would and it seems like there's no one I can tell. At least not enough to match what I should be feeling."

This kind of absence was familiar to Cross, although he didn't have a name or a face for it. "Your family," he said quietly.

Mia didn't answer.

They sat for a bit longer, until something clanged in the distance and reminded them that BLADEs didn't lurk in the back corner of the barracks' garage. Cross got up first, then reached down to pull Mia to her feet.

"I'm not family, not close, but if you tell me about your news twenty times, maybe it will feel okay. I'll buy us some iced coffee. I can sip, you can tell me the details, and I won't mind if you repeat yourself."

"You've had your skell for a long time," she protested.

"Feels like almost a decade some days." He stretched with spine cracking results. "I still have to pinch myself every Tuesday to know it's real. Come on. New Los Angeles awaits its newest skell piolot."

Chapter Text

Yelv was never great at stealth, he'd be the first to admit. Go in loud and hard was more his style. But someone in BLADE thought he needed some skills, so they had paired him with the smoothest guy in New Los Angeles. Yelv had teamed with H.B. in the past and it had gone pretty well. He had simply kept his mouth shut, stuck to H.B. like glue, and only pulled out his weapon after the first explosion.

This time he wasn't allowed a weapon. "We're infiltrating a civilian facility, which requires fitting in. We can't risk people noticing that we're armed," H.B. had told him.

"Guys and gals park their skells in front of the ice cream shop," Yelv pointed out.

H.B. ignored him. "Casual clothes. No weapons. 1200 sharp."

And so Yelv met him at the Ma-non transport pad at noon, looking very sharp indeed. He was wearing his nicest suit, the plaid one with the shiny lapels and the bow tie. H.B. made a strangled noise and stripped Yelv down to an undershirt. At least it was a clean one, and Yelv got to keep the pants.

Someone in the ECP had heard that the anarchist aliens that floated over the city were up to something. The Ma-non lived in a sparkly golden ship that shaded a quarter of the city and were known for their love of pizza, anime, and good times. They were also capable of defending their ship in ways that wasn't fully clear to humanity. Now they were doing something new and the ECP wanted to know more. The Ma-non had been making structural changes to the port side wing of the ship, usually home of the aliens they loved to have as guests. There were reports of galleries or closed labs or processing rooms, but the details were in short supply. The lighting had been dimmed from cozy to secretive, and the Ma-non had been stockpiling strange ration in unheard of levels. Their normal pizza requirements guaranteed Army Pizzeria stayed in the black, but now they wanted raw materials, a shopping list of carbohydrates and lipids, edible but not actual food. The Ma-non weren't bringing in BLADE for resource missions, turning to the Nopon Commerce Guild, which was primarily an arms dealer. This was unprecedented, secretive, and worrisome.

Yelv stayed close to H.B., who sailed nonchalantly into the section of the ship reserved for guests. Today the non-native aliens were bunched together in the entry corridor, speaking in low voices and shushing each other when H.B. and Yelv passed. One insectoid Orphe perked up as they approached and buzzed at them. The Orphe stretched out a slender arm clad in glowing rings, offering a deal. Yelv wanted a bangle like that, kind of, maybe the hot pink one or the green that really popped. H.B., however, moved on before Yelv could haggle for a price.

"Am I supposed to not talk to people?" asked Yelv.

"We need to investigate without wasting time," H.B. lectured.

The guy could probably order a beer and make it sound like he was teaching you something, thought Yelv. "But what about acting normal? You said we needed to do that to, and it's normal to shoot the breeze."

"It may be too late," murmured H.B. He slid his glasses up his splendid nose (Yelv wondered what it was like to have a nose that straight) and smiled with grim charm at the Nopon bustling towards them.

"Friends have clearances?" The pink Nopon circled around their knees, adjusting the lace on her dress and fluttering her lashes up at H.B.

"I'm afraid I left them in my other pants," said H.B., squeezing out a little more animal magnetism. "I'd be deeply grateful if you could let us pass for now."

The Nopon was examining H.B. from every direction. "Understandable how friend not have space to spare with those pants. Warawa looking respectfully and seems very reasonable."

"I promise to bring our passes later today. You can take all the time you want to check them out then."

Warawa giggled and Yelv felt invisible and unnecessary. Warawa gazed a moment longer up at H.B. with deep, dark eyes, then cooed when H.B. dropped another smile in her direction. Finally she pattered away, toward a door to what looked like a connected row of shipping containers. "Warawa forgive this time and open door. Have funsies!" She waved a lollypop-shaped comm device at the lock and the door slid open.

H.B. walked through the entrance with only the faintest repressed shudder. Yelv was right on his heels, glad that the Nopon had asked absolutely nothing from him.

The door slid shut behind them and the light dropped from dim to almost midnight black. Yelv really wished he had picked up one of those bracelets. Even a yellow one would have been better.

"We're in," said H.B. softly, "but from this point out, I have no way of predicting what will happen."

"Groovy, pard," said Yelv, pretending to be calm. "I'm used to being in the dark, like, existentially, so this is normal for me."

Chapter Text

Yelv could just make out where things were in the dim room. Several tables or perhaps stacks of crates stood in the center, while loops of cables dangled from above. He hoped it was a cable that brushed his forehead, although cables weren't usually warm and damp and they definitely didn't normally hiss.

H.B. cursed under his breath. "I've found the exit, but we need three key cards. They must be here somewhere. Look around."

"Excuse me?" said Yelv, not wanting to say the obvious.

"Feel around. Check that table near you."

Yelv groped his way to the table as instructed. It was cluttered with shallow trays and dishes. The first one he put his whole hand into by accident. Round wet balls squirmed away from his touch. "Ew, gross," he yelped, pulling his hand away.

"What is it?"

"I think I found a bowl of eyeballs," Yelv rasped.

"Was there a card in there?"

"Pard, I am not checking."

"Don't be a baby." H.B. joined him by the bowls. Something squished. "Got one. Now keep searching."

Yelv found the second card in a tray of what he hoped wasn't chopped up alien guts but he was glad it was too dark to be sure. H.B. was fuming and Yelv was about to offer to Reclaimer their way through the door via a solid kick when his hand brushed something square and flat deep in a gelatinous mass.

Yelv was still wiping his hands on his good pants as they entered the next room. This was blazing with light from dozens of floating video screens. Every screen showed something different and cruel. Yelv tried to make sense of what he was seeing. These weren't security camera feeds, and they weren't showing scenes of Mira. On one screen, a woman in a pretty dress was covered in red paint and screaming. Another showed a shabby man fighting waves of thorny vines; they had backed him into a corner and he wasn't doing great. Something very toothy and slimy was menacing a woman who looked strong enough to be a BLADE but was frozen in terror.

"Don't look at them," warned H.B.

"A little late to warn me, pard." The screens were starting to cluster around Yelv. If he turned away from a particularly gruesome video, that screen would dart repeatedly into his field of vision. The one with the man with knives for fingers was particularly persistent. Even when he spun around, it trailed after him. Soon, he was surrounded by a cloud of unpleasantness.

"You can close your eyes," suggested H.B. when Yelv wasn't able to stifle a groan.

"I'm good," said Yelv, very much not good. One screen showed a pack of dogs. "Aw, no, they aren't going to hurt dogs, are they?" The soft golden creatures were small enough to be puppies. To Yelv's relief, nothing else in that video seemed ready to slime or slither or slash. The puppies were clustered around a brown and white pup that had been turned to stone, their heads tilted adorably in confusion. "Yeah," asked Yelv, unconsciously mimicking their posture, "what's up with him?"

His attention was riveted to the scene, and initially he didn't notice H.B. tugging at his sleeve. "I found the door," announced H.B.

"Just a minute. I wanna see what comes next," begged Yelv.

"No. We are on a mission," H.B. reminded him. "Move."

Yelv didn't like the next room, or the one after that. He hadn't liked the stacks of fleshless alien and human skeletons. He really hadn't liked the room with stacks of limbs that still had flesh, although they had only spent a few seconds in that one. The room with the giant vials of mutated indigen was creepy but okay, except for the shattered tube with a slimy trail that led to a vent. Yelv was glad when H.B. decided not to investigate that.

The next room wasn't too bad. It was well lit and organized with nothing gross. Instead, it looked almost like a store, with stacks of pizza boxes on several tables, as well as sealed packages of cookies and snacks. H.B. opened on box and sniffed. "Empty."

Yelv opened one himself, and then three more, just for good measure. All were empty. "Should I try a box of cookies?"

H.B., now facing a table of open and perfectly empty pizza boxes, replied, "If you must."

The plastic package was heavy, but nothing shifted inside. Yelv opened the box. "No surprises. Do you think any of them are full?"

"No," snapped H.B. "I think I see the point, but it isn't effective. Different sensibilities for different species." He gave no other explanation.

They passed through more rooms, each increasingly hideous. Giant plants with ruby lips tried to bite them. Hairy monsters with more legs than Scirpo but mercifully only the size of Yelv's head tried to ensnare them. Something may have struggled in a silken prison in the corner of the ceiling, but H.B. hurried them onward.

"I think we're nearing the end," whispered H.B. He opening the next door and pushed Yelv through it.

Yelv didn't immediately spot what was going on in the last room. Too many machines around the edges of the laboratory emitting sparks and smoke. It was the cackling that drew his attention. Behind a glowing curtain of green energy he saw a hunched figure, draped in a stained white lab coat and wearing a gas mask and oversized gloves. The mad scientist was bending over a Nopon lying on a gurney.

"Hey, is that you, Tatsu?" Yelv didn't wait for H.B. to follow but bolted forward.

The mysterious scientist laughed evilly and slashed at Tatsu with an oversized knife. Tatsu wailed as his innards gushed out in a rainbow spray of ooze.

Yelv had to do something. He had no weapons, and punching the force field probably wouldn't do much. He panicked and used the only skill available him. "Essence Exchange!" he shouted. He felt his health energy transfer into his weapon expertise, and vice-versa. Just before he passed out, he remembered that they hadn't fought anything yet, so the latter was at zero.

He woke up on the floor. H.B. was glaring down at him, and Yelv suspected that he had just slapped him awake. Certainly his cheeks felt less numb than the rest of his body. "Tatsu..." he asked groggily.

"Friend very brave, very stupid. Tatsu can relate," said the young Nopon. He had left the gurney and was standing close to Yelv's head. The wound in his chest was still spilling pink and green lumps.

"Man, I'm glad we made sure he had no weapons. He'd have blasted us for sure otherwise," laughed the mad scientist. It sounded a lot like Lin. Yelv noticed a red hairpin peeking from under the mask.

"I think we've done a satisfactory test of your Haunted House," said H.B. He didn't help Yelv to his feet.

"Haunted House?" asked Yelv, struggling upright. "That was all fake?"

"Yessirree," said Lin. "You don't look so good. Is your face tattoo supposed to stand out so clear?"

"Have some Tatsu bits," said Tatsu, handing him a sunshine yellow wedge. "Glucose kidneys help stabilize body and mind."

Yelv sucked on the candy and tried not to think what it was supposed to be shaped like. The sugar did indeed make him feel better. "What was the point of dragging me through all that?"

"We needed a naive subject," said H.B., "the better to measure human reactions."

"And brother, you were it," added Lin.

"That's all? No super secret mission to save New Los Angeles?"

"No," said H.B. "You can go home now."

Lin looked at little guilty under her mask. "You can take some extra candy with you," she offered.

Yelv sighed. "Thanks, I guess." He perked up suddenly. "Hey, can I watch more of that video with the five puppies?"