Sailor Moon Fan Fiction ❯ Third Labor (Forward to the past) ❯ Silver Tidings/Golden Dreams ( Chapter 2 )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

THIRD LABOR: chapter two (prologue) Silver tidings/Golden dreams

various universes/characters by other people.
other stuff the fault of gregg sharp

Silver light glowed into being, resolving as four bodies briefly appeared, then the darkness was
held back by the glowing flames that marked the tail of one of the four.

"Hang on, we'll switch the reactor back on and be set to go in a half hour or so." Grey turned on a
lantern, which made a bit more light than Akane's tail.

"Aka ne ne." Akane voiced her disapproval. All she could smell was metal and plastic, and that
damn Irish Spring that Grey had been using lately. Oh, and some lavender stuff that Sasami and
Ami had started using, but it wasn't as VILE as the soap Grey was using. Ick.

"Where exactly are we?" Ami looked around at the metal room, noting the patches and discolored
sections of metal, the tubes and hoses lining the corners, the odd boxes with their yellow and
black markings.

"Repair Bay One. It's used for speeders, hovercraft, just about any kind of personal vehicle. Or
did you mean the ship. It's the last one i had when i visited this timeline, the 'Dewclaw' - a Lu class
repairship that goes out to various ships in space and repairs them, does a bit of salvage,
occasionally ferries passengers."

"It's a spaceship?" Sasami looked around. "It's kinda..."

"You're used to Juraian treeships and a higher class of living, Princess Sasami. This is a working
vessel used in an entirely different timeline using technology that's a bit grittier than you're used
to." Grey patted a wall affectionately before leading them out into the corridor.

"That's actually, uhm, what I meant," Ami spoke quietly, noting the oppressive stillness was
making her a bit nervous. It reminded her of *way* too many SF Horror movies. Not that she
watched them.

Grey shone his lantern about, peering into the darkness."Since i've been here before, i'm using my
old identity. i'm Grey, owner/operator of the 'Dewclaw' - like i said, this is essentially a mobile
drydock/repair bay. The Death Star was destroyed six months ago and the Emperor is dead."

"So this goes after 'Return of the Jedi'," remarked Ami, briefly surprising Grey. "I *do* get away
from my studies occasionally."

"Right," Grey nodded and smiled an apology. "So the Empire is without a single head right now,
more a lot of little governors each of whom claim to be the 'rightful successor' to the throne and
each is trying to claim as much space as they can. Tensions are actually higher, and pirates and the
like are taking advantage of the confusion. Many of the Rebellion have bailed, as the Emperor is
dead, though the Empire's bureaucracy is still trying to run."

"Something like Japan's 'Warring States' period then," commented Ami, still nervously trying to
look in all directions. She couldn't even see her companions clearly still.

"You got it," Grey jerked his thumb towards a side corridor in which large plastic barrels could be
seen. "Technology's a polyglot. Ancient vanished civilizations, the Makers for one, have some
really advanced tech contributed. There's also a number of civilizations which developed their
own tech, so not everything's compatible. And then there's the Force. My record here indicates i'm
a minor league force-sensitive though a heckuva long way from being a Jedi. Sasami's chi levels
will have her recognized as a *major* force sensitive. Though neither of you have any records as
of yet. When we get to a starport, i've got a databurster guaranteed by Celeste that'll register you
two with whatever identities you want."

Ami continued to get progressively more nervous as shadows shifted with each movement of
Akane's tail.

Akane glanced up at the girl. "Ne Ne. Aka NE." (You're making *me* nervous NOW!)

Grey tapped a touchplate, putting in a long series of numbers. A door opened with a loud crunk.

"AAAHHHH!" Ami jumped at the sudden noise, her hair sticking up.

"AAAHHHH!" Akane sent a burst of flame at what had startled her. Unfortunately this was Ami.
Sasami jumped, ending up 12 feet up and clinging to the ceiling. Grey, ready for the door but not
a pair of screams, had turned and was looking for whatever was attacking.

Grey holstered his blaster, grumbled, and went into the room. A moment later lights began
flickering on in the hallway.

"What a piece of junk," summed up Sasami, being unusually blunt as she landed on the floor.

"It's supposed to be," answered Grey from inside the room. "This vehicle is for anyone out of the
RRO or similar Celestial agencies. If it looked *nice* it would be targetted by thieves."

An odd vibration started going through the deck, and Ami noted with relief that the air began
moving.

"Okay, life support and power are back on. Systems will come fully online in another fifteen or
twenty. If you'll come this way... Something wrong?" Grey stopped when it was obvious that the
three others were stuck staring at each other.

"AMI-CHAN?!" Sasami squeaked.

"Welcome to a non-anime universe," said Grey. "Both of you look like humans of Asian ancestry.
Perfectly normal."

"B-bu-but..." Ami dove for a compact and squeaked on seeing the difference in herself.

"Don't worry about it, you look fine. Quite cute, in fact." Grey was being quite honest, walking
along the corridor so that the two had to follow. "Black hair and dark brown eyes are normal for
a Japanese girl, though you're still a bit pale."

"But my eyes are so..." Ami tried to quantify the overall changes. She looked so *alien* but still
like herself somehow. Her eyes weren't round, they didn't quite sparkle the same way, and they
weren't blue. These were brown eyes, almost almond shaped, and not nearly as big as she was
used to.

"They're perfectly normal Japanese eyes. Hmmm. Actually this might make good training before
we get to the mission in that regard. That *also* is not an anime universe."

"Hmmm," Sasami said, examining herself. "My hair's shorter and I'm thinner, but I don't feel any
different."

"You look like a young Asian girl. Though here in Empire space, that means you come from
Cathin, Wu, or Setooine. i'd recommend Wu for both of you. Wu is a bit isolationist, mainly
composed of farms and very provincial villages. It's a rough and tumble world, known for all sorts
of nasty carnivorous beasties which tend to rip the weak and unwary apart at an early age.
Particularly as the local leaders only allow their own servitors to own weapons more advanced
than simple knives. Not a planet anyone will regard as a threat, but anyone who survived living on
that world and that managed to escape is going to be thought of as either having connections or
being fairly dangerous themselves."

"Oh my," Sasami commented, catching a look at herself in a mirrored panel as they passed it.

"These ladders lead to the gun blisters, standard on a lot of vessels that had to run blockades or
operate in dangerous areas." Grey pointed at the two ladders, the righthand one leading up, the
left leading down. "Top hardpoint is a pulse laser. i'd really like you two to use a simulator
program and make yourselves familiar with its operation. This ship isn't terribly fast as things go
and so we may end up in a running battle. Bottom hardpoint is a high energy blaster. Don't use the
blaster if we're being observed by any authorities, it's something i cobbled together and packs a bit
more punch than is strictly legal."

Ami and Sasami looked down the tube to the bottom hardpoint before realizing that Grey was
continuing on.

"This corridor has five bunkrooms. Choose the one you want, they're all the same. Over here is
the galley and kitchen. This corridor leads to the main hatch and docking controls. An extensible
web forms a sort of drydock partition that can be used to moor and protect a ship while repairs
commence." Grey continued on. "Bridge is this way. Lifepods are down these chutes. You'll
notice there are five. Each pod can take three people. Normally, though, the ship has a crew of
five. One can run it, but not as well as five."

"I see." Ami wondered if there was some point to all this. "We're just going in after Minako and
then back out again, right? So we won't need any of this, right?"

"Ami, when has anything in my life gone as planned?"

-----------

A week later, Ami had reason to regret her earlier statement. "I picked up some protein-wafers at
the..." Her voice trailed off as Sasami made a shushing gesture.

Holding his hands over a palm computer, Grey was casting 'Augury' again as he had once a day
since entering this universe.
"Spirits of light and servants of good,
Spirits of metal and plastic and wood,
Advise me now on my simple task,
Truth that lies 'neath confusion's mask,
In this starport controlled by Hutt,
Is there where Minako's shut?"

Ami blinked as the display on the palm computer altered to green. "We found her?!"

Grey continued concentrating. In *this* universe, he'd learned he could ask up to four questions.
And as it had to be a yes/no question, he had to be careful of the wording.

"So that we may our friend soon see,
I ask the second: is she free?"

Ami suppressed a groan as the palm computer's display went to red.

"My third question, i seek to know,
Is fourth level where i must go?"

Sasami gasped as the display turned green again. The fourth level was a rather unsavory
marketplace, overseen by the Hutt. As the Hutt were a race of interstellar gangsters whose culture
emphasized ruthlessness and profit over all, this was not a good thing.

Ami clicked on a display of the fourth level, noting aloud that there was one major place to
purchase slaves, and four which served a lesser clientele.

"Fourth question is now the thing,
Minako's jailers, on outer ring?"

The display remained green. Ami noted that the outer ring, cheaper because the traffic wasn't as
great, had two of the shops. 'Luftwig's Exotica' carried darn near anything. 'Dzz'kk's Sundries' was
cheap and disreputable. "Should I carry the lightsaber?"

"No, just blasters." Grey took a deep breath. "Sasami, do you want to stay here? It's not exactly a
nice neighborhood."

Sasami smirked and formed a ball of chi over her hand. "I can take care of myself, and you still
have that weapon restriction, remember?"

Ami frowned, not liking having to have a gun, but here it was a required item of dress.

"Why don't you stay here, Ami?" Grey offered. She'd gotten ill during their first check of the
station's less savory levels. The first level was relatively tame. Further in, the influence of the
Hutts became more obvious. At least with the first level there was a veneer of civilization. "That
way if we need to launch immediately, you can have the engines primed."

Ami nodded, grateful she wouldn't have to go down there again, though it shamed her a bit that
Sasami could handle the atmosphere down there better than she could. Of course, since Sasami
had made that wish that gave her a power level equivelant to a Sailorjin, Sasami wasn't exactly a
helpless kid either.

-------

Eyecatch #5:

A framed picture of Usagi Tsukino, wearing her school uniform. The picture turns over with a
click, revealing a picture of Son Usagi - the Sailorjin princess. Click/flip: Sailor Moon. Click/flip:
Usagi as a playboy bunny. Click/flip: the five year old from Skysaber's Choice. Click/flip: Usagi
panicking in the cockpit of a Gundam unit. Click/flip: Usagi as an angel (tripping over a cloud).

Eyecatch #6:

A framed picture of Kiyone in her Galaxy Police uniform. The picture turns over with a click,
revealing a picture of Kiyone in jeans and workshirt, with a Pikachu on one shoulder that is giving
a "V" sign. Click/flip: Kiyone in a gi, Ed (Pikachu) in a matching gi at her feet, both of them in
identical martial arts poses. Click/flip: Kiyone's dressed as a Southern belle, with a very
diminuitive Rhett Butler at her feet. Click/flip: Kiyone's sitting on a cloud, while Ed's holding a
fake halo by a wire over her head.

------

"Yes, we have just such thing," said the odd lumpy being behind the counter. "We get shipment in
just few day ago." It flicked a switch.

Sasami gave an involuntary gasp.

Grey winced. "I see. Not much meat on them. Any useful skills?"

The lump considered what little he knew of human facial expressions, also human aesthetics. Not
much in either case, though some things were nearly universal. The little one (a larva?) was
showing distress. The big human was sneering, which was an expression shared by 127 different
races. "They hotwire spacecraft. Big bad. Now on auction block. You buy, I sell? Or you want
different group, more skill? I got that too!"

"Well, they're..." Grey checked out the proprietor, realized that it was one of those species that
gave birth to hundreds of young and then had a feeding frenzy. Children were not considered
valuable. "They're just kids, but I might be able to train them to something useful. How much?"

"How much you got?" The lump twitched, sensing a sale.

Sasami frowned as the dickering got underway. Grey making a vast number of statements
showing his contempt for the six figures, as well as how much money he'd spend clothing,
feeding, and training the "raw material". The odd collection of lumps and hairy warts was arguing
back that they were worth more than that as meat animals, that they didn't take that much room,
and they were thin - so how much food could they intake? Besides, he had an interested buyer
from another spaceport that could use waitresses.

Finally the deal was concluded, though both sides argued about how the other was robbing them
blind, and Grey waited for the girls to be brought in.

"Do we have enough money for this?" Sasami whispered.

"Barely," confided Grey. "We'll have to sell the speeder to make the docking fees, and we'll be
eating nutripaste for the foreseeable future."

"Yechhhh," summed up Sasami.

"Here is, we do deal?" The warty being brought the girls, hustling them forward.

"What are those collars?" Sasami asked innocently, trying not to look at a number of otherwise
naked teenagers. This was embarassing.

"Slave collars," said Grey absently, trying not to react in any obvious way to the girls, "if they go
too far from the control it zaps 'em. If a button on the controller is pressed, it zaps 'em, if a wearer
moves too fast, it zaps 'em. Painful electrical jolt. Unfortunately fairly common."

"You look? These meet standards?" The slaver indicated the girls.

Grey didn't want to create any ripples, so inspected the girls' teeth and eyes, checked under the
collars and tsked about the amount of burns, and finally went back to (apparently) grudgingly
admit that these were suitable.

One of them stared at him briefly, then finally spoke. "You... I know you.".

The slaver held a hand out, stopping the transfer of credits. "Is relative yours human?"

"Is this some kind of trick to up the price!" Grey growled at the lumpy being. "Are the credits
good or NOT!"

"Hi, I'm Sasami!" Sasami immediately tried to distract the blonde. The rest was spoken much
quieter. "You really don't want to do this now."

"...but...I know HIM...." Life began flooding into the girl's face.

The lump looked back and forth momentarily, then pressed a button which summoned several
wardroids from their alcoves. "Oh, I forget to add extra amount for..."

Grey snarled, this time for real. He pointed at the nearest wardroid.
"Metal born in fiery burn,
Now to that state return!"

Glowing hot, the wardroid came apart as internal circuits fried and then the batteries exploded.

"You... you're not a Jedi..." the lump attempted to move away from this crazy fellow. After all, if
the wardroids opened fire now he'd be hit himself. "A Jedi would never buy slaves and they'd
never use the Force to destroy things like that..."

"i never said i was," agreed Grey, letting the other fill the blanks.

The lump flattened slightly. "A Sith?!"

Grey never agreed. He didn't disagree either. "Sasami, the droid that's aiming on me from the
right. Do it."

"Okay!" Sasami chirped, drew chi, and reduced the wardroid to metal shards. Also putting a
basketball sized hole through the wall.

"i've heard, that with the Sith, there are always two," darkly hinted Grey. "And if a Sith Lord
found out about certain individuals spreading news of his identity..."

"No, My Lord. Your credits are *quite* good here!" The lump was quick to restart the
transaction, and he actually turned a pitying gaze towards the females. Fully aware of how much
damage a Sith Lord and his apprentice could do to him personally, and his shop, the slaver
immediately made the wardroids stand down and finished the transaction without further delay.

The lump waited until the Sith and his apprentice were gone before sending a report off about the
new powers in town.

---------

Akane sat on the ramp to the 'Dewclaw' and watched the worlds go by. There was a boskun, and
there a protocol droid, and there a kaolinite, and there a (sniff sniff) kaibur who'd had too much to
drink.

This was fascinating to her, someone who had once thought of Nerima Japan as an odd place and
for whom that had pretty much been her world. Now her ears flicked about as she listened to the
buzz of alien conversations, her nostrils flared as strange otherworldly scents were brought to her
on the errant breezes generated by foot and vehicular traffic. Her eyes, less color sensitive but
better at seeing things in low light levels, were particularly good at picking up movement.

So the ebb and flow of traffic on Loading Bay 5, Outer Ring, was endlessly fascinating to the
former girl. Her senses gave her information a human would have overlooked. So she knew full
well that it was Ami coming up behind her.

"Aka neeee."

Ami checked her palm-sized computer and read the display. "Explosions? Are you sure?"

"Aka ne ne A." (That and blaster fire and, if I don't miss my guess, ki blasts.)

"Oh dear, I'd better start the engines up then." Ami looked out across the docking area. "I thought
they were going to stay out of trouble."

"Akane ne. NE." (The operative term, my dear Ami, was TRY.)

Ami looked up from her translator. "Oh, I suppose you're right."

Akane looked back at the girl as she re-entered the ship. ~Nice girl, though she tends to overthink
situations.~ Akane's ears flickered at a closer set of explosions. ~Dang! Sounds like a major battle
going on!~

Grey was the first to round the corner, running as if his life depended on it. With him came six
naked young girls. ~Pervert~ Akane started, then realized she recognized the crew. ~Hmmmph.
I'll bet THIS is an interesting story.~

Sasami became obvious a moment later, flying literally around the corner, then stopping in midair
to begin building a chi blast in between her hands.

Then one of the warehouses came apart as a huge Mobile Suit kind of thing crashed through and
started reaching for Sasami who darted and dodged and threw the chi blast at the Suit.
Unfortunately she missed, the blast shot through the remains of the warehouse, and a bunch of
approaching sirens abruptly stopped blaring.

"Pfeh," said Akane, knowing full well that the cops here were literally owned by the gangsters.

As Grey approached he managed to gasp out a request and motion the girls forward. "Akane,
please help Sasami. Burning torpedo."

Akane grinned and moved from lying down to a full run in a single sinuous movement, flames
forming an aura around her as she ran. The flames increased in intensity as she leapt and Akane
briefly formed a comet that flew over startled aliens and exploded against the hard armored plates
of the robot vehicle.

Grey continued into the ship. "All of you, over there." He gestured towards the dining area with
one hand, touching a comm-panel with the other. "Ami, why aren't the engines up?"

Sasami flitted into the airlock, followed by a bruised looking (but satisfied) Akane. Sasami keyed
the door closure as energy blasts could be heard taking apart pieces of the 'Dewclaw'.

Another shudder indicated the engines at last coming on-line and the ship lurched as someone
threw it into first gear. Another series of explosions on the outside of the ship was followed by
what sounded like pieces of ship falling off and breaking glass.

In the cockpit, Grey was doing something he frequently did. Panicking. "What do you mean you
didn't read the manuals! You're always reading!"

"Well...." Ami managed to look embarassed. "The physics in these things are completely wrong,
there's no way they could work! I just..."

Grey gear-shifted to second, putting the autopilot to the setting of 'get the heck out of here' that
he'd programmed for just such an emergency. Since the 'Dewclaw' handled like a heavily loaded
eighteen-wheeler under the best of circumstances, they wallowed but were slowly picking up
speed. "Never mind, get up to the top turret and start firing. That Mobile Suit is coming after us
and it's a *lot* faster than we are."

Ami winced. "Well, I..."

Grey's face went flat. "You never ran any of the simulators, did you?"

"...no..."

Grey sighed. "We're doomed. Okay, *try* to use the top turret, *please* Ami. And don't let your
duplicate come into physical contact with you."

"Duplicate?"

"Duplicate, Doppelganger, native Analogue," Grey pointed a thumb back to the rest of the ship.
"We picked up the native versions of not only Minako, but you, Makoto, Rei, Usagi and Hotaru.
I'll explain later as we need to..." A light began blinking on the console. "Who's using the *rear*
turret?!"

----------

Minako/Vena rotated the turret with its odd weapon towards the pursuing ship and small cloud of
snubfighters just beginning to launch. Fingers danced over the control surface, bringing power up
and noting that she only had six shots with this thing. It showed an external capacitor that was fed
by the main reactor and recharged slowly. How odd.

Minako drew upon her native self's skills and targetted the looming giant robot vehicle, pulling the
trigger.

The blast slammed into armor plate that had been weakened by Sasami's earlier fight and
shattered. The 'chest' of the robot was neatly holed, and the blast continued onwards, striking the
spaceport behind it. A fairly sizable explosion resulted. The Vena part of Minako deduced that
someone had figured out a way to put a planetary defense blast cannon on a starship, and that the
capacitor was to keep gun's firing from burning out the engines or stalling the vehicle as all its
energy was transferred to a single weapon system.

Minako sent three more discharges towards the cloud of snubfighters, taking out three vehicles
that had probably seen service in the Clone Wars. The remainder continued forward, scattering
around the ungainly repairship and raking it with lasers.

----------

"Ami..." Grey bit his lip, trying not to say anything that would further upset the girl who was
wincing at explosions and fire alarms.

"I... can't." Ami stared at the console. "There are people in those things... I..."

"We can't take the whole group with us," Grey felt obliged to point out. "You didn't have this
problem in China, did you?"

"But they could have gotten away," Ami said in a low voice, "these people are in space. Some
may be slaves themselves."

The ship shuddered again. Grey reminded himself that Ami was just a sixteen year old girl. Maybe
she'd been through a lot during the China campaign, and maybe she was a genius juku student, but
she was only sixteen. "Okay, just pilot. It's on autopilot, but when THIS light turns green, you
flick THIS switch. Okay?" Grey pointed out the hyperdrive enable light and activation switch.
"The computer's running through the necessary data and will signal when we're ready."

Ami nodded, hating the feeling of helplessness. "What are you going to do?"

Grey shrugged. "i'm a cleric. i'm going to pray, i'm also going to try to keep the ship together long
enough for the jump."

----------

In another world, she might have been known as Makoto or Lita. In another world she would
have grown up to become Sailor Jupiter. She didn't know this, she didn't care. She was simply
Julie, an asteroid miner's unwanted child. She and her childhood friends had decided (at Uria's
suggestion) that they were going to get OFF that rock and never come back. So they'd stolen the
fastest ship that had been available, the boss's jump-shuttle and tried to run. They hadn't gotten
far.

She and her childhood friends had been caught. Uria, the tough tomboy, had been carried off and
they'd never seen her again. Nessa still broke into tears about it. The slaver might have been lying
when he told them she'd been fed to the Hutt.

Slave collars had been put on them and they'd been slowly but surely broken under the neuro-lash.
Then, when everything had been as bleak as it could get, they'd been summoned to be sold off to
some guy. How Vena recognized this guy was a weirdness - she was pretty sure she'd never seen
the little girl OR the guy on the Asteroid and all their tormentors and slave handlers hadn't been
human since they left home.

Julie brought the weapons systems up in the turret and sent pulsing laser blasts towards a few of
the snubships. It was payback time. Their current 'Master' was, according to Vena, a friend who
had just rescued them. Julie wasn't too sure about that, but being here was certainly better than
being back THERE. And since the little one-man fighters were definitely the bad guys, she had no
trouble centering the crosshairs on one fighter after another and blasting away with glee.

--------

The bottom turret gave a series of booms before going silent. The top turret was being used
enthusiastically if not very accurately.

Ami fretted over moral issues, the impossibility of hearing laser blasts going past the ship, and the
general weirdness quotient of what she was surrounded by. (ie: she was having an anxiety attack
and getting cold feet about a relationship with this Grey fellow, especially as he had frustratingly
been a perfect gentleman since coming to this timeline.)

Several girls recently rescued from becoming an Unhappy Meal were being nervous wrecks and
had not found anything to wear (though this last was less a consideration for them than for the
guy who had bought them and was still trying to avoid looking at them.)

A certain individual known as Grey (silver dragon male, C5?) was praying and trying not to look
at the young girls shivering in the corner while running around with a fire extinguisher putting out
fires.

At a point where large pieces of the ship were about to become free-floating debris, a light came
on and Ami flicked a switch. The 'Dewclaw' sped into hyperspace, trailing a little cloud of smoke
and debris in the best tradition of 'Star Blazers' and other space series. Which got further
complaints from Ami, predictably.

---------

Ami eventually got over her snit, her ability to fit everything in a rational world having only been
temporarily overwhelmed by a dragon-cleric in human form piloting a ship through hyperspace to
rescue a merged dimensional analogue of her friend Minako due to Usagi trying to spend quality
time with her husband who was actually Ami's husband too even if they'd never...

Ami shied away from the realization that THAT was the reason she was feeling both defensive
and irritated at the whole situation.

"That was all i had for clothing," apologized Grey, "leftovers from other adventures and
companions, as well as other operatives who also used the 'Dewclaw'."

Vena/Minako shrugged inside her too-large flight suit and remarked that it was warmer than not
wearing anything at all.

Meria, the native Ami, kept staring at the twin she'd never had before and didn't comment on her
own skintight latex spacesuit. It hadn't even been made for humans, and it literally hugged every
square inch as if it had been spray-painted on everything from the neck down. If she *had*
commented, she would only have noted that it was rather toasty.

Mareya, a shorthaired version of Rei whose left arm ended at the elbow, had gotten the worst of
the lot. A tanktop two sizes too big and a pair of Dragonball Z boxer shorts. (Grey had been
rather surprised to find those as he hadn't even known that those existed.)

Julie had followed Grey to his cabin, found a man's workshirt, pair of jeans, and old tennis shoes,
and had the best fitting set of clothing among all of them. Grey had stated he could heal the scar
marring her face, but Julie had brushed it off stating that she had had it since childhood and it was
of little concern.

Moom was the near-Usagi, though with less than a 1/4 inch of hair on her scalp. She had found a
Chinese dress that was merely a size too small and had eagerly put that on. She otherwise seemed
largely to be in shock.

The Hotaru-clone was Sally. A young looking girl, related to Mareya apparently. Sasami's
clothing was too small, and so she was wearing a set of pajamas that Ami had gotten for wearing
during the Labor.

"So, what do we do now?" Sasami asked, looking over the crowd. "I mean we were just
supposed to get Minako, weren't we?"

"Well..." Grey said with a wince, "it's not like i could just leave them..."

"So what happens to the me that *was* here when *I* leave?" Vena/Minako wondered, still
trying to adjust a flight suit that would fit Chewbacca so that it didn't look quite so...
overwhelming.

"Unless we use *this*," Grey held up what looked like a solid soap bubble, "this universe will be
minus 'Vena' - you two will remain merged. If it's worded right, we can use this Limited Wish to
seperate the two of you when we leave this plane of existance."

"What about the rest of us?" Julie asked, looking about. "I mean, we literally have nowhere to go.
Uria was the one to come up with all the plans, well her and Nessa."

Sally moaned, the two had been almost like her parents.

"Well, what happened to them?" Ami asked, realizing that this were the Michiru and Haruka
locals.

"Nessa got sold last week. Uria was taken away fairly early," Julie responded. "All we really know
is asteroid mining and that's no future at all."

"The 'Dewclaw' is a repairship operating in this timeline, and you can continue to stay on board,
though there will come other Captains. You're going to have to learn ship repair and the operating
budget was skunked by purchasing you. Though we'll have to drop back into normal space for me
to see if the purchase went through." Grey sighed. "i should have realized this wouldn't be easy.
The laws of this universe tend to produce epic adventures regularly and this looks like the
beginning of one."

"Huh?!" The number of girls asked in unison, except for Moom who was still lost in her own
private daze.

"Look at the elements present," Grey explained, "an old beat up ship on the run from gangsters,
though if you get out of the fringes you can avoid most of THAT. Crewed by young and
attractive girls who are escaping their past. It is *so* in genre that i expect you to run into a fuzzy
mascot at nearly any point (just so long as it isn't an Ewok- i've heard they're a lot like kender)
and romantic lead. Probably Usa... Moom's."

"But we don't know HOW to fix spaceships or any of that stuff," Julie pointed out, wondering if
there was a way that they could get this guy to stay.

Meria frowned and considered her other self. *She* got to leave, so maybe if she arranged to take
her double's place...

"Well, THAT i can't do much about," Grey admitted. "We'll exit hyperspace in an out-of-the-way
system called Dantooine. The Rebellion had a base there, then they abandoned it, then the Empire
converted it to support for their Death Star, then THEY abandoned it. It should still have a lot of
supplies that the Empire left there. Then on to Tatooine. There's still a power vaccuum there with
the death of Jabba the Hutt, and there's a hermit who knows a bit about the Force hanging around
over there. Don't know what he's calling himself nowadays, but he used to go by the name of
Luke...

"i've programmed both sets of coordinates into the navcomp. As for me, Sasami, Ami, and Akane,
we've got to get going." Grey held up the soap bubble. "i wish that Minako, Ami, Akane, Sasami
and myself were now before the archways of Mimir's Well, and that Minako and Vena were
seperated with Vena remaining in her native timeline."

---------

"You took quite awhile," said Celeste, checking an enormous pocketwatch.

"Extenuating circumstances," replied Grey as he and the others appeared. "Was the split
successful?"

"Yes, you managed to abandon a bunch of untrained panicked girls on a falling-apart spaceship
heading for a former Imperial base off in the fringes, without any clue as to how to operate that
starship." Celeste was annoyed.

"Like i had a choice?! What was i supposed to do, MARRY them?" Grey was grateful that
Celeste didn't answer that question. "i did the best i could! Dantooine doesn't have any native life
that is particularly threatening, sort of like pre-colonial Georgia without the bears. i *did* do
some research you know!"

"Not to mention the damage done to the 'Dewclaw'," Celeste continued. "The drydock webbing is
spread through five systems. The blast shielding is gone in six places, the cargo bay is open to
hard vaccuum, the fire control will break down at any moment, and the tractor beam is at less than
50% power..."

"The 'Dewclaw' isn't in a combat zone, the girls don't know how to use the drydock anyway, i
couldn't do a dang thing about the shielding or tractor beam without replacement parts, and the
computer's locked access to that bay. Fire control *might* be a problem, but can you come up
with one thing that would have worked better at this?"

Ami actually spoke. "Yes, actually. You could have headed instead for the nearest colony and
dropped them off at a spaceport. It was their own universe, their own time. They could have
handled it."

Minako considered her dear friend for a moment. "Sorry, Ami, but you're wrong. I was part of
Vena for awhile. Think 'Coal Miner's Daughter' or something like that. They've darn little in the
way of education, were looking at a bleak existence on a barren rock, working twelve hour days
digging ore without even a blade of grass for them to look at that wasn't a hologram. They
wanted OUT of that life and I can't blame them. The reason they made a break for it was that
Uria's arranged marriage was coming up, at which point she'd have been stuck as a baby factory
and her dreams of being a pod racer would have been over."

Ami wasn't the only one taken aback by the bitterness in Minako's voice. "But... I..."

"No buts, Ami-chan," Minako tried smiling to take the sting out. "Grey-chan didn't do that badly."

"Well, just to be safe, maybe i should go into the next world alone, is the portal set, Celeste?"

Celeste finished glaring. She'd have to arrange a suitable hero to run across the girls on that ship,
though fortunately heroes weren't that uncommon in a Star Wars universe. "Arch four. It should
use your connection to Makoto to take you directly to her."

--------

Grey stepped through, feeling the automatic adaptations take place. In a universe where there
were dragons, he would be a dragon - so any world like Oerth or Toril or RIFTS Earth - he'd
become a silver dragon or the local equivelant. That was now his primary form. In a world where
there were no dragons but the gods or goddesses of Yggdrasil or a similar system normally held
sway, he became the 'sexangel' form with or without wings -which had been the case in the Star
Wars universe. Without either of those influences, or if the environment was deemed hostile
enough by what was left of the Binding, he ended up in cyborg form - that modified Triax
VX-500 housing. Lastly was a purely human form, though he'd gotten a magic tattoo and some
esper talent that was supposed to be useful if he ever figured out how to access it.

This world, for all its appearances, had no dragons or angels roaming its streets in disguise. The
technology might have allowed for cyborgs, but clearly nothing near the full conversion type. That
meant... human.

It felt diminished. Crippled. Small. He could fly (though the angelform was the only one where
landing didn't end up in a crash) in all his other forms, but the human form was... weak.
Defenseless. Soft. Grey was amazed how easy it was to get used to being big and powerful. Being
a psuedo-angel had been glorious, being a silver dragon- bordered on joyful, being a hulking
cyborg had been inconvenient and a large set of its own problems - but it had been comfortable in
a way.

Stepping out into a rainshower and feeling the sudden ache of old tired joints, Grey realized that
something was even more wrong with this. There was a burning sharp pain in his chest, and he felt
the wet cold penetrating him far more than he remembered it.

Looking at his arm confirmed the worst. Wrinkled pale skin spotted with age and old scars. Not
only human again. But his old human body. He'd been close to forty when he'd been remade into a
demon. He hadn't kept track of time since then, time travel and dimensional jaunts had invented
terms like 'subjective time vs objective time', but at least another forty years had passed on various
jobs and missions. Judging from this pain-wracked, trembling, withered shell - another twenty
years or more had been tacked on. This body was literally crumbling inside, and Grey could feel it.

Struggling for every step, Grey tried to make it towards the odd barely-seen buildings
surrounding him. The Binding was still weakened or confused. Celeste hadn't immediately recalled
him, which meant he was out of touch with them too. He was glad of one thing at least. That he
had to go through this indignity and have his Final Death be of old age out in the rain of some
alien timeline, at least Ami and Minako and the others weren't here to see this...

And somehow he'd always known, that even though he'd always done the best he could, and he'd
always cared, that he would die cold and alone and unloved. It was just that sort of life...

So cold, so dark...

So alone...

------------

heh heh. cliffhanger, eh?