Okaiyama, Japan
Spring, 1986
The sun rose over the lush Japanese countryside, turning the sky from pale gray to lavender to azure. From a simple looking house along the dirt road, a lone figure emerged, walking down the dusty path to the Shinto shrine hidden in the forest. The young man was not going there to worship; he did not put much stock in his family's religion. He was going to the shrine only to clean it of dust and ensure it was in good condition. After all, he did not share his grandfather's beliefs, but he was careful to respect them.
He was not an unusually handsome boy. He was medium of stature and build, and possessed the dark eyes and skin typical of his people. But Tenchi Masaki's life was by no means devoid of occasional glances from the young ladies at his school. Tenchi couldn't imagine what the girls saw in him; when he had asked one of his closer female friends about it, she had just laughed
and explained it as a combination of his total lack of arrogance and the air of quiet confidence that he exuded.
Tenchi had a great respect for women, and often found that he enjoyed their company more than that of his male friends. Nevertheless, the fact was that, among other reasons, he simply did not have room in his life for a relationship. With the vast majority of his time taken up by chores, he hardly had a moment for leisure of any kind, let alone dating.
Once again, he pulled the wicker brush from his small rucksack and began the daily task of dusting the shrine. Suddenly, he stopped and sat down on the ground near a cedar tree. He closed his eyes and let the breeze rustle his hair. It was these moments, in which he got to simply sit back and enjoy the beauty of nature, that Tenchi considered his leisure time. His grandfather, Katsuhito, would be upset to know that he spent the least bit of time this way. Grandpa was a good man, and fun to be around, but he could be a real nitpicker at times. He would swear that the chores, the sword practice, and the thousand other things he made Tenchi do were all part of the training.
Training for what? Swordsmanship? Tenchi didn't like to fight, and tried to avoid it when it came his way. But if it came down to a brawl, he was quite capable of defending himself with his bare hands; he had no need for a weapon.
What else, then? Surely Grandpa didn't expect him to follow in his ancestor's footsteps and become a priest. He could only imagine the guilt he would live with as a practitioner of a religion he did not believe in.
Who knows, he thought, drifting in and out of sleep. Maybe it was just Grandpa's way of raising him, teaching him to be the kind of man Katsuhito's father had raised.
Zzzzip.
Tenchi opened one eye, somewhat startled, and a little curious. What was that noise? He listened carefully, but did not hear the noise again. Perhaps he had imagined it, he thought, closing his eyes once again.
He had nearly dozed off when a thunderclap shook him to his feet, followed by a deafening roar. Now thoroughly scared out of his wits, Tenchi looked toward the south, where the sound of the explosion had come from. There, an orange glow formed the base of a tower of smoke at least a hundred feet high, judging by the distance.
Was it a meteor? he wondered. A plane crash, perhaps? Whatever it was, Tenchi certainly had no intention of finding out. He tore off through the woods, toward home.
Katsuhito Masaki gently slid the spatula under the omlet-like concoction in the frying pan, and lifted it onto a plate. He smiled to himself as he poured the teriyaki sauce over it. Okonomiyaki was Tenchi's favorite; Katsu-san was not a big fan of it himself, but tried to indulge his grandson whenever it was practical to do so.
The door opened with a bang, and Tenchi came barreling through it. The startled priest lost his grip on the teriyaki bottle, splattering the floor with sauce and broken glass.
"Tenchi, what's the matter?" he asked with concern as he slipped on his sandals and began to clean up the mess. "You look as if you've seen a ghost."
"Something..." Tenchi began, breathing as if he had been running the thousand meter dash, which was not a totally inaccurate description, "something crashed in the woods. It woke me up; I can't imagine what it was!"
Katsuhito considered scolding the boy for falling asleep on the job, but thought better of it. That would wait until things were calmer. "How far away do you think it was?" he asked, his mind calmly sorting through the possibilities.
"I, uh, I don't know," Tenchi said. "Maybe a mile or two?"
"Hmmm," Katsuhito mumbled, looking thoughtful as he stood. "Sounds like a plane crash. Come along," he called over his shoulder as he walked out the door. "We'll check it out. Someone may be hurt."
Tenchi didn't bother saying that "may be hurt" was the understatement of the century. He would already be in enough trouble for sleeping during his chores; a smart mouth wouldn't help things.
The crash site was perhaps two or three kilometers from the house. When they arrived, the fire had burned down considerably; only a few trees were damaged. The craft itself was a total loss. Tenchi could not make out what the smoldering wreckage had been, but whatever it was, it was fast, judging by the size of the crater in which it lay.
Katsuhito picked up a large tree limb and began moving the hot metal. He thought it very unlikely that anyone had survived such an impact. That made his discovery all the more surprising.
Tenchi was examining what appeared to be the pilot's seat, when his grandfather shouted to him to come quickly.
He was bent over a prone form, obviously female, wearing some rather outlandish clothing. "She's alive," Katsuhito assessed, "but unconcious."
"What should we do?" Tenchi asked, looking down at the girl. He thought she looked maybe eighteen or so. She was slight of frame, and had messy red hair. Her face was rather pretty, but marred by a bloody gash on her forehead.
Katsuhito looked up at Tenchi. "I don't want to move her," he said. "She may have internal injuries. But the nearest hospital is in Nerima, nearly a hundred kilometers from here. Against my better judgement, we'll have to take her home and care for her until she awakens."
They walked home in silence, taking turns carrying the injured girl.
Later that day, the girl awoke to find herself lying on a couch in a neat and clean, if somewhat spartan, living room. The afternoon sunlight sparkled through the trees, causing shadows to play across a high, wood-beam ceiling. She looked down at herself, and was surprised find her uniform gone, relpaced by a thick white robe. Where was this place? The last thing she remembered was wrestling like mad with the control column, as the ground raced toward her face. And now, suddenly she was here, in this strange house.
She looked around and, seeing no one about to greet her, tried to sit up. She found enough energy to lift herself about ten centimeters, before collapsing back on the couch, full of blazing pain.
"Ahh, you're awake," a deep, gentle male voice said. She looked toward the door to see a bespectacled gray-haired man with a thick mustache smiling down at her.
"Where am I?" she asked, her green eyes roaming the room.
"You are among friends," he replied, examining her face carefully. "We found you in the forest, not long after your plane crashed. You are at the Masaki residence. I am Katsuhito Masaki, and this is my grandson, Tenchi." He gestured to a dark-haired boy of about sixteen, who was just entering the room."
"Miss?" the boy inquired, "are you okay?"
"My name is Washu," she replied, "and I've been better." She felt something strange above her left eye, and touched it gingerly.
"I bound your wounds," Katsuhito said. "That one took only a few sutures; I'm afraid the broken rib is much more serious."
So that's why I can barely move, Washu thought.
"Where are my clothes?"
"In the laundry," Tenchi said brightly. "Sorry about that, but we had to get you into something less constricting, so Grandpa could put a bandage on you."
"So I guess you guys got a good look, huh?" she grunted, upset at the thought of their eyes on her body as they changed her.
Tenchi's smile disappeared, replaced by a look of indignation. He opened his mouth, but Kastuhito held up a hand, and Tenchi simmered down.
"I can assure you, it was an awkward moment for both of us," Katsuhito laughed, "but if it's any encouragement, I turned you over on your stomach while I put the binding on."
Washu let out a harsh laugh, then winced as her rib cage took the strain. "Well then," she said weakly, "you got to see my butt, so I guess it wasn't a total loss."
Tenchi was rapidly getting irritated with his smart-mouthed guest. The truth was, he had found it difficult to look away from her rather impressive derriere. He felt himself blushing.
Katsuhito was more patient. "I promise you, Miss Washu, my grandson and I have no untoward intentions with you. You may leave as soon as you are well, or you can stay here if you wish. In any case, until you have healed, I suggest you get some rest. Come along, Tenchi." He motioned to his grandson, then turned and left the room.
At sundown, Washu joined her hosts at the table for dinner, limping along on a sprained ankle which had gone undetected until she tried to stand on it. The two men found that she was much more friendly when there was food available, though she had apparently never tried Asian cuisine before. She seemed to prefer the shrimp, bread, and other finger foods rather than deal-
ing with the unwieldy chopsticks.
She had an amazing intellect; though Katsuhito seemed rather uninterested in her descriptions of various physical priciples, Tenchi listened with rapt fascination. This was stuff he had never heard in his science classes.
"So," Katsu-san said when she seemed finished, "where do you live?"
Washu hesitated before answering, then cocked a wry grin. "Let's just say I'm not from around here."
"What happened to your plane?" Tenchi asked.
"It wasn't a plane, but to answer your question, it was engine failure," she stated matter-of-factly. "I was shot down."
"What!? Shot down?" Tenchi blurted. "You mean by the military?"
"No."
"Then who was it? I can't think of anybody else who can shoot an airplane down."
"You weren't paying attention," Washu said, smiling and waving a reproving finger at Tenchi. "I said it wasn't a plane. It was my ship, the Dragon."
Tenchi looked at his guest as if she were quite insane.
Washu just shook her head and smiled. "Looks like I'll have to tell you guys the whole story."
It was a thoroughly astounded Tenchi and a grim Katsuhito that followed Washu outside to look up at the night sky. From one horizon to the other, a million stars lit up the heavens.
Good grief, Tenchi mused as he considered her story. Terrorists and princesses and horribly destructive weapons and who knew what else?
"Which one is it?" Katsuhito asked.
"That one." Washu pointed out a bright blue star in the constellation Leo.
"Regulus," Katsu-san muttered, "about eighty-five light years from here."
"It must have taken centuries for you to get here," Tenchi said, his voice full of awe. "How did you do it? Hyperspace? Deep-freeze hybernation?"
Washu laughed. "None of the above. The Dragon is--was--pretty fast. She could make about eight-c when I put the petal to the metal."
"But in science class, they told us it's impossible to go faster than the speed of light," Tenchi pointed out.
Washu shrugged. "Well, that's what you get for listening to human scientists. Not that I blame you; I mean, all you have to go on is your own experience."
"So how did you do it?" Tenchi asked again.
"Well, technically I didn't. See, your guy Einstein was only half right. You can actually go as fast as you want, but only from your own point of view."
Tenchi scratched his head. "I don't get it."
"Okay, look," Washu said turning toward him and holding up two hands, turned palm to palm. "Time dilates," she began, spreading her hands outward as she spoke, "as you approach the speed of light, right?"
Tenchi nodded, feeling as if he were in Mister Takagi's class again.
"All right," she went on, "But you don't notice, because your brain slows down, too. All you notice is that you're now covering several lightyears every few minutes. So you think you're leaving light in the dust. But if I clock you from here on Earth, my instruments would tell me you're only doing about ninety or so percent of light speed."
"Right," Tenchi said, fascinated by this subject. "But shouldn't Grandpa and I be long since dead when you got here?"
"Heh heh," Washu laughed, a michievious glint in her eye. "I'm an alien, remember? For all you know, I might be twenty thousand years old. But no, it's a little trick called temporal distortion..."
"Umm, excuse me," Katsuhito interrupted. He shook his head gravely. "I'm afraid there's a bigger issue here."
"Grandpa, wait..." Tenchi said. He had a feeling he knew what was coming.
"I'm sorry, Tenchi," Katsu-san said, an edge of sympathy in his voice, "but you know she can't stay here. If we continue to harbor her, we would be just as guilty of her crimes as she is. I am afraid we'll have to turn her over to the authorties as soon as possible."
Tenchi looked at Washu apologetically.
"It's alright, Tenchi," she said. "He's right, you know. You guys nursed me back to health. Some friend I would be if I dragged you down with me." She smiled fondly. "Why don't you two head back inside, and get some sleep. I promise I won't go anywhere. I just need to be alone for a while; I've got a lot on my mind."
Late that night, Washu still sat on the step of the Masaki home, gazing up at the stars, in particular the bright blue one she called home. Around that little point of light circled the planet Jurai, her home for the last twenty years. The home that she had felt forced to betray.
The Darius Movement had not started out as a terrorist group, but rather a legitimate political party whose agenda, while deeply conservative, was by no means violent or even particularly threatening. Many of the Jurian people had shared the Darian party's concerns over the practices of government officials, but the party was small and had too few votes to excercise any influence in parliment. With their controversial proposals and solid, non-negotiable, and unpopular stance on key issues, the parliament simply would not take the Darians seriously.
Then came the discovey of a new planet in the Mizar system. With its lush, tropical climate and vast mineral resources, Jurians flocked to the new world, and its population soon became big enough for official admittance to the Jurian empire. This privilidge brought with it many perqs, including a rather large amount of representation in Parliament.
That was where the trouble started. With critical resources in their possession, The Mizar-Jurians had a lot of votes to begin with. Then Parliment played their trump-card against the bothersome Darius party; it brought in fifty brand new representatives from the world of Mizar II.
Now the Jurian Constitution was clear on the way Parliament had to be operated: no more then one-hundred eighty representatives could occupy parliamentary seats at one time. With a hundred and fifty of those seats already taken up by the ruling Imperial Party, and only thirty for the Darians, there was no room for the new voters. Therefore, rather than risk angering his influential Mizarian partners, the Jurian Regent (who had come to power in the absence of Emperor Yosho) decided that the Darius Movement didn't technically constitute a real political party, and not only gave their remaining seats to the Mizarians, but flagrantly disregarded his own Constitution by adding twenty more!
The Darius Party's top officals were livid. They immediately brought before the Senate a bill of no confidence against Duke Anaximander, the Regent. Two days later, as scorching hot debates raged back and forth accross the Hall of Parliament, a popular head official of the Darians was walking up the steps of the old building, when a fountain of blood exploded from the side of his head, and his lifeless body dropped to the alabaster stairs.
The police found the sniper bullet lodged in the trunk of a bush on the other side of the stairway. The assassination caused a cry of outrage amoong all the citizens of Jurai, but it was never officially determined who was behind it.
But the Darians knew. They knew that a government-hired assassin had destroyed thier last hope of gaining some voice in politics. However, rather then raising an outcry and pointing their collective fingers at the Regent, they began quietly withdrawing from the political arena. A series of covert deals with local mercinary groups and private arms dealers slowly converted the Darius Party from a political entity into an armed rebel group.
Vehicle bombings, assassinations, and the frequent taking of hostages marked the rise of a new and very different Darius Movement. When Washu, sympathetic to the group's cause, decided to join their fight, she raised many eyebrows with her amazing computer skills. The rebels quickly found a way to get her an enlistment in the Fleet, where she became one of their most valuable spies.
But her luck had run out on her last assignment. The rebels wanted the blueprints for a new ship-based weapon the Fleet was developing. Washu had gladly obliged, totally unaware that the Jurian Empire had been monitoring her activities for quite some time. When six gun-toting Imperial Security agents had burst into Lieutenant Washu Wanatabe's quarters and found her uploading the classified data to a foriegn network over her laptop computer, it had taken the timely attack of an unknown ally to save her skin. Between the two of them, Washu and her mysterious friend had been able to distract the agents long enough to kick, pummel, and beat them into submission, after which the unconcious men were locked into Washu's room. "Go! Run!" the other woman had shouted. Washu had been in no mood to argue, and laptop in hand, she had torn through the corridors of the ship and into the shuttle bay. Five minutes later, she was at a rebel-held space station, boarding her personal liner, the Dragon.
It was on the fifth day of her fugitive journey across space that Washu discovered she was being pursued, not by Imperial Security, or the Fleet, but by her Majesty the Princess Ayeka, heir to the Jurian throne.
Princess Ayeka's ship was fast, but Washu had managed to outwit her time and again, until she found a planet on the charts that looked reasonably safe. She had contacted the rebels, and told them what happened. The rebel leader, a nineteen-year-old boy with long blond hair, had told her to proceed to the nearest safe planet, and that they would do what they could to bring her back home.
And so here she was, on this back water planet in the middle of nowhere, wondering what fate awaited her. Either the rebels would show up first, in which case she would be taken to a safehouse on some godforsaken world, to live the rest of her life in hiding, or the Empire would catch her here, in which case she could look forward to a speedy kangaroo trial and a public execution. Either way, she was out of the spy business for good.
Washu suddenly awoke, and was shocked to discover she had been asleep for hours! She looked at the horizon to see the first golden sliver of sun making its way into the sky. She shook her head and smiled as she made her way back into the house and to the couch: her hosts might be worried if they knew she had spent the night outside in her condition.
Spring, 1986
The sun rose over the lush Japanese countryside, turning the sky from pale gray to lavender to azure. From a simple looking house along the dirt road, a lone figure emerged, walking down the dusty path to the Shinto shrine hidden in the forest. The young man was not going there to worship; he did not put much stock in his family's religion. He was going to the shrine only to clean it of dust and ensure it was in good condition. After all, he did not share his grandfather's beliefs, but he was careful to respect them.
He was not an unusually handsome boy. He was medium of stature and build, and possessed the dark eyes and skin typical of his people. But Tenchi Masaki's life was by no means devoid of occasional glances from the young ladies at his school. Tenchi couldn't imagine what the girls saw in him; when he had asked one of his closer female friends about it, she had just laughed
and explained it as a combination of his total lack of arrogance and the air of quiet confidence that he exuded.
Tenchi had a great respect for women, and often found that he enjoyed their company more than that of his male friends. Nevertheless, the fact was that, among other reasons, he simply did not have room in his life for a relationship. With the vast majority of his time taken up by chores, he hardly had a moment for leisure of any kind, let alone dating.
Once again, he pulled the wicker brush from his small rucksack and began the daily task of dusting the shrine. Suddenly, he stopped and sat down on the ground near a cedar tree. He closed his eyes and let the breeze rustle his hair. It was these moments, in which he got to simply sit back and enjoy the beauty of nature, that Tenchi considered his leisure time. His grandfather, Katsuhito, would be upset to know that he spent the least bit of time this way. Grandpa was a good man, and fun to be around, but he could be a real nitpicker at times. He would swear that the chores, the sword practice, and the thousand other things he made Tenchi do were all part of the training.
Training for what? Swordsmanship? Tenchi didn't like to fight, and tried to avoid it when it came his way. But if it came down to a brawl, he was quite capable of defending himself with his bare hands; he had no need for a weapon.
What else, then? Surely Grandpa didn't expect him to follow in his ancestor's footsteps and become a priest. He could only imagine the guilt he would live with as a practitioner of a religion he did not believe in.
Who knows, he thought, drifting in and out of sleep. Maybe it was just Grandpa's way of raising him, teaching him to be the kind of man Katsuhito's father had raised.
Zzzzip.
Tenchi opened one eye, somewhat startled, and a little curious. What was that noise? He listened carefully, but did not hear the noise again. Perhaps he had imagined it, he thought, closing his eyes once again.
He had nearly dozed off when a thunderclap shook him to his feet, followed by a deafening roar. Now thoroughly scared out of his wits, Tenchi looked toward the south, where the sound of the explosion had come from. There, an orange glow formed the base of a tower of smoke at least a hundred feet high, judging by the distance.
Was it a meteor? he wondered. A plane crash, perhaps? Whatever it was, Tenchi certainly had no intention of finding out. He tore off through the woods, toward home.
Katsuhito Masaki gently slid the spatula under the omlet-like concoction in the frying pan, and lifted it onto a plate. He smiled to himself as he poured the teriyaki sauce over it. Okonomiyaki was Tenchi's favorite; Katsu-san was not a big fan of it himself, but tried to indulge his grandson whenever it was practical to do so.
The door opened with a bang, and Tenchi came barreling through it. The startled priest lost his grip on the teriyaki bottle, splattering the floor with sauce and broken glass.
"Tenchi, what's the matter?" he asked with concern as he slipped on his sandals and began to clean up the mess. "You look as if you've seen a ghost."
"Something..." Tenchi began, breathing as if he had been running the thousand meter dash, which was not a totally inaccurate description, "something crashed in the woods. It woke me up; I can't imagine what it was!"
Katsuhito considered scolding the boy for falling asleep on the job, but thought better of it. That would wait until things were calmer. "How far away do you think it was?" he asked, his mind calmly sorting through the possibilities.
"I, uh, I don't know," Tenchi said. "Maybe a mile or two?"
"Hmmm," Katsuhito mumbled, looking thoughtful as he stood. "Sounds like a plane crash. Come along," he called over his shoulder as he walked out the door. "We'll check it out. Someone may be hurt."
Tenchi didn't bother saying that "may be hurt" was the understatement of the century. He would already be in enough trouble for sleeping during his chores; a smart mouth wouldn't help things.
The crash site was perhaps two or three kilometers from the house. When they arrived, the fire had burned down considerably; only a few trees were damaged. The craft itself was a total loss. Tenchi could not make out what the smoldering wreckage had been, but whatever it was, it was fast, judging by the size of the crater in which it lay.
Katsuhito picked up a large tree limb and began moving the hot metal. He thought it very unlikely that anyone had survived such an impact. That made his discovery all the more surprising.
Tenchi was examining what appeared to be the pilot's seat, when his grandfather shouted to him to come quickly.
He was bent over a prone form, obviously female, wearing some rather outlandish clothing. "She's alive," Katsuhito assessed, "but unconcious."
"What should we do?" Tenchi asked, looking down at the girl. He thought she looked maybe eighteen or so. She was slight of frame, and had messy red hair. Her face was rather pretty, but marred by a bloody gash on her forehead.
Katsuhito looked up at Tenchi. "I don't want to move her," he said. "She may have internal injuries. But the nearest hospital is in Nerima, nearly a hundred kilometers from here. Against my better judgement, we'll have to take her home and care for her until she awakens."
They walked home in silence, taking turns carrying the injured girl.
Later that day, the girl awoke to find herself lying on a couch in a neat and clean, if somewhat spartan, living room. The afternoon sunlight sparkled through the trees, causing shadows to play across a high, wood-beam ceiling. She looked down at herself, and was surprised find her uniform gone, relpaced by a thick white robe. Where was this place? The last thing she remembered was wrestling like mad with the control column, as the ground raced toward her face. And now, suddenly she was here, in this strange house.
She looked around and, seeing no one about to greet her, tried to sit up. She found enough energy to lift herself about ten centimeters, before collapsing back on the couch, full of blazing pain.
"Ahh, you're awake," a deep, gentle male voice said. She looked toward the door to see a bespectacled gray-haired man with a thick mustache smiling down at her.
"Where am I?" she asked, her green eyes roaming the room.
"You are among friends," he replied, examining her face carefully. "We found you in the forest, not long after your plane crashed. You are at the Masaki residence. I am Katsuhito Masaki, and this is my grandson, Tenchi." He gestured to a dark-haired boy of about sixteen, who was just entering the room."
"Miss?" the boy inquired, "are you okay?"
"My name is Washu," she replied, "and I've been better." She felt something strange above her left eye, and touched it gingerly.
"I bound your wounds," Katsuhito said. "That one took only a few sutures; I'm afraid the broken rib is much more serious."
So that's why I can barely move, Washu thought.
"Where are my clothes?"
"In the laundry," Tenchi said brightly. "Sorry about that, but we had to get you into something less constricting, so Grandpa could put a bandage on you."
"So I guess you guys got a good look, huh?" she grunted, upset at the thought of their eyes on her body as they changed her.
Tenchi's smile disappeared, replaced by a look of indignation. He opened his mouth, but Kastuhito held up a hand, and Tenchi simmered down.
"I can assure you, it was an awkward moment for both of us," Katsuhito laughed, "but if it's any encouragement, I turned you over on your stomach while I put the binding on."
Washu let out a harsh laugh, then winced as her rib cage took the strain. "Well then," she said weakly, "you got to see my butt, so I guess it wasn't a total loss."
Tenchi was rapidly getting irritated with his smart-mouthed guest. The truth was, he had found it difficult to look away from her rather impressive derriere. He felt himself blushing.
Katsuhito was more patient. "I promise you, Miss Washu, my grandson and I have no untoward intentions with you. You may leave as soon as you are well, or you can stay here if you wish. In any case, until you have healed, I suggest you get some rest. Come along, Tenchi." He motioned to his grandson, then turned and left the room.
At sundown, Washu joined her hosts at the table for dinner, limping along on a sprained ankle which had gone undetected until she tried to stand on it. The two men found that she was much more friendly when there was food available, though she had apparently never tried Asian cuisine before. She seemed to prefer the shrimp, bread, and other finger foods rather than deal-
ing with the unwieldy chopsticks.
She had an amazing intellect; though Katsuhito seemed rather uninterested in her descriptions of various physical priciples, Tenchi listened with rapt fascination. This was stuff he had never heard in his science classes.
"So," Katsu-san said when she seemed finished, "where do you live?"
Washu hesitated before answering, then cocked a wry grin. "Let's just say I'm not from around here."
"What happened to your plane?" Tenchi asked.
"It wasn't a plane, but to answer your question, it was engine failure," she stated matter-of-factly. "I was shot down."
"What!? Shot down?" Tenchi blurted. "You mean by the military?"
"No."
"Then who was it? I can't think of anybody else who can shoot an airplane down."
"You weren't paying attention," Washu said, smiling and waving a reproving finger at Tenchi. "I said it wasn't a plane. It was my ship, the Dragon."
Tenchi looked at his guest as if she were quite insane.
Washu just shook her head and smiled. "Looks like I'll have to tell you guys the whole story."
It was a thoroughly astounded Tenchi and a grim Katsuhito that followed Washu outside to look up at the night sky. From one horizon to the other, a million stars lit up the heavens.
Good grief, Tenchi mused as he considered her story. Terrorists and princesses and horribly destructive weapons and who knew what else?
"Which one is it?" Katsuhito asked.
"That one." Washu pointed out a bright blue star in the constellation Leo.
"Regulus," Katsu-san muttered, "about eighty-five light years from here."
"It must have taken centuries for you to get here," Tenchi said, his voice full of awe. "How did you do it? Hyperspace? Deep-freeze hybernation?"
Washu laughed. "None of the above. The Dragon is--was--pretty fast. She could make about eight-c when I put the petal to the metal."
"But in science class, they told us it's impossible to go faster than the speed of light," Tenchi pointed out.
Washu shrugged. "Well, that's what you get for listening to human scientists. Not that I blame you; I mean, all you have to go on is your own experience."
"So how did you do it?" Tenchi asked again.
"Well, technically I didn't. See, your guy Einstein was only half right. You can actually go as fast as you want, but only from your own point of view."
Tenchi scratched his head. "I don't get it."
"Okay, look," Washu said turning toward him and holding up two hands, turned palm to palm. "Time dilates," she began, spreading her hands outward as she spoke, "as you approach the speed of light, right?"
Tenchi nodded, feeling as if he were in Mister Takagi's class again.
"All right," she went on, "But you don't notice, because your brain slows down, too. All you notice is that you're now covering several lightyears every few minutes. So you think you're leaving light in the dust. But if I clock you from here on Earth, my instruments would tell me you're only doing about ninety or so percent of light speed."
"Right," Tenchi said, fascinated by this subject. "But shouldn't Grandpa and I be long since dead when you got here?"
"Heh heh," Washu laughed, a michievious glint in her eye. "I'm an alien, remember? For all you know, I might be twenty thousand years old. But no, it's a little trick called temporal distortion..."
"Umm, excuse me," Katsuhito interrupted. He shook his head gravely. "I'm afraid there's a bigger issue here."
"Grandpa, wait..." Tenchi said. He had a feeling he knew what was coming.
"I'm sorry, Tenchi," Katsu-san said, an edge of sympathy in his voice, "but you know she can't stay here. If we continue to harbor her, we would be just as guilty of her crimes as she is. I am afraid we'll have to turn her over to the authorties as soon as possible."
Tenchi looked at Washu apologetically.
"It's alright, Tenchi," she said. "He's right, you know. You guys nursed me back to health. Some friend I would be if I dragged you down with me." She smiled fondly. "Why don't you two head back inside, and get some sleep. I promise I won't go anywhere. I just need to be alone for a while; I've got a lot on my mind."
Late that night, Washu still sat on the step of the Masaki home, gazing up at the stars, in particular the bright blue one she called home. Around that little point of light circled the planet Jurai, her home for the last twenty years. The home that she had felt forced to betray.
The Darius Movement had not started out as a terrorist group, but rather a legitimate political party whose agenda, while deeply conservative, was by no means violent or even particularly threatening. Many of the Jurian people had shared the Darian party's concerns over the practices of government officials, but the party was small and had too few votes to excercise any influence in parliment. With their controversial proposals and solid, non-negotiable, and unpopular stance on key issues, the parliament simply would not take the Darians seriously.
Then came the discovey of a new planet in the Mizar system. With its lush, tropical climate and vast mineral resources, Jurians flocked to the new world, and its population soon became big enough for official admittance to the Jurian empire. This privilidge brought with it many perqs, including a rather large amount of representation in Parliament.
That was where the trouble started. With critical resources in their possession, The Mizar-Jurians had a lot of votes to begin with. Then Parliment played their trump-card against the bothersome Darius party; it brought in fifty brand new representatives from the world of Mizar II.
Now the Jurian Constitution was clear on the way Parliament had to be operated: no more then one-hundred eighty representatives could occupy parliamentary seats at one time. With a hundred and fifty of those seats already taken up by the ruling Imperial Party, and only thirty for the Darians, there was no room for the new voters. Therefore, rather than risk angering his influential Mizarian partners, the Jurian Regent (who had come to power in the absence of Emperor Yosho) decided that the Darius Movement didn't technically constitute a real political party, and not only gave their remaining seats to the Mizarians, but flagrantly disregarded his own Constitution by adding twenty more!
The Darius Party's top officals were livid. They immediately brought before the Senate a bill of no confidence against Duke Anaximander, the Regent. Two days later, as scorching hot debates raged back and forth accross the Hall of Parliament, a popular head official of the Darians was walking up the steps of the old building, when a fountain of blood exploded from the side of his head, and his lifeless body dropped to the alabaster stairs.
The police found the sniper bullet lodged in the trunk of a bush on the other side of the stairway. The assassination caused a cry of outrage amoong all the citizens of Jurai, but it was never officially determined who was behind it.
But the Darians knew. They knew that a government-hired assassin had destroyed thier last hope of gaining some voice in politics. However, rather then raising an outcry and pointing their collective fingers at the Regent, they began quietly withdrawing from the political arena. A series of covert deals with local mercinary groups and private arms dealers slowly converted the Darius Party from a political entity into an armed rebel group.
Vehicle bombings, assassinations, and the frequent taking of hostages marked the rise of a new and very different Darius Movement. When Washu, sympathetic to the group's cause, decided to join their fight, she raised many eyebrows with her amazing computer skills. The rebels quickly found a way to get her an enlistment in the Fleet, where she became one of their most valuable spies.
But her luck had run out on her last assignment. The rebels wanted the blueprints for a new ship-based weapon the Fleet was developing. Washu had gladly obliged, totally unaware that the Jurian Empire had been monitoring her activities for quite some time. When six gun-toting Imperial Security agents had burst into Lieutenant Washu Wanatabe's quarters and found her uploading the classified data to a foriegn network over her laptop computer, it had taken the timely attack of an unknown ally to save her skin. Between the two of them, Washu and her mysterious friend had been able to distract the agents long enough to kick, pummel, and beat them into submission, after which the unconcious men were locked into Washu's room. "Go! Run!" the other woman had shouted. Washu had been in no mood to argue, and laptop in hand, she had torn through the corridors of the ship and into the shuttle bay. Five minutes later, she was at a rebel-held space station, boarding her personal liner, the Dragon.
It was on the fifth day of her fugitive journey across space that Washu discovered she was being pursued, not by Imperial Security, or the Fleet, but by her Majesty the Princess Ayeka, heir to the Jurian throne.
Princess Ayeka's ship was fast, but Washu had managed to outwit her time and again, until she found a planet on the charts that looked reasonably safe. She had contacted the rebels, and told them what happened. The rebel leader, a nineteen-year-old boy with long blond hair, had told her to proceed to the nearest safe planet, and that they would do what they could to bring her back home.
And so here she was, on this back water planet in the middle of nowhere, wondering what fate awaited her. Either the rebels would show up first, in which case she would be taken to a safehouse on some godforsaken world, to live the rest of her life in hiding, or the Empire would catch her here, in which case she could look forward to a speedy kangaroo trial and a public execution. Either way, she was out of the spy business for good.
Washu suddenly awoke, and was shocked to discover she had been asleep for hours! She looked at the horizon to see the first golden sliver of sun making its way into the sky. She shook her head and smiled as she made her way back into the house and to the couch: her hosts might be worried if they knew she had spent the night outside in her condition.