Disclaimer
First things first I own nothing here because I borrowed the characters from sunrise and some of the key points of the story from a book I read as a teen lol so I hope you like this swash buckling adventure
Hey readers after you read and review please check out the poll I set up I would like to know which of my stories to update first
Lady Rouge
Natsuki Kruger stood in the icy mist, silently watching a sheer veil of fog float through forest ringing the bay. The chill and the sent on the breeze teasing her senses with memories of her childhood. Born and raised in Aries, she loved the rain and sea with a passion that nothing and no one has ever inspired. Drenched to the skin and shivering she felt at peace with her self as she did no where else in the universe. Her bond with this land ran deeper than national ties, however, for she was part of the people who first settled this wild land and the spirits that whispered across the vast forest sang in her veins.
A descendant of the first rulers of Aries, Natsuki's grandmother had filled rainy days with the magic of stories of old. Natsuki closed her eyes briefly; she heard echoes of the old woman's voice. Natsuki had loved the tale of the first settlers landing, she envied the sense of wonder they must have felt when they explored their new world, for at twenty six she had lived through so many harrowing adventures she no longer found any thing intriguing or unique.
At Natsuki's elbow Marshiro glowered impatiently, seeing no trace of beauty in the wretched day, spoke in a whine.
"You're already overdue at the base, and while they will hold the shuttle indefinitely, I think you'd have some consideration for the crew even if you have none for me."
Five feet five, Natsuki glared down at her diminutive superior.
"I will be gone for months, possibly years. What difference does a few more minutes make?"
Exasperated, Marshiro glanced up toward the sky and was rewarded with an eye full of stinging rain. She coughed and sputtered.
"This operation has been coordinated to the last second. If you are not at Viper Viola's outpost when Yamada arrives to start the brawl, you won't be able to infiltrate Viper's operation."
Not intimidated, Natsuki discounted Marshiro's warning.
"Yamada is far to bright a man to start a brawl without me."
"That may well be true, but he's already in route and we can't change his orders without sending a message Viper might intercept and decode. That would endanger your life as well as Yamada's. Must I remind you that you volunteered for this mission? Viper is supplying arms to colonies that were charted for peaceful settlement of the universe. All it would take is one fanatic to begin seizing territory by force and the whole concept of peaceful development will fail. War is a plague more virulent than any disease, and with Viper encouraging the acquisition of arms, it's only a matter of time before a colonial chief makes the mistake of using them. He must be stopped now, Natsuki, and I am confident you can do it. Now let's get out of this accursed rain and began."
"That was a most inspiring speech. You've missed your calling. You ought to have been a politician, or an evangelist."
Disgusted by her protégé's sarcasm, Marshiro turned and gingerly tiptoed around puddles dotting the sand to reach the sleek hovercraft lying in wait at the shore.
Emblazoned as with Garderobe's crest, the ship served as Marshiro's personal vehicle on the rare occasions she deigned to leave Garderobe's glass walled headquarters in Aries capital.
To the casual observer the impressive office building was the center from which most of the vast Garderobe corporation's operations where directed.
It also held the firm's highly trained intelligence unit that was secretly known only to its elite corps, and Garderobe's columns also known as the board of directors.
To others who worked in the building, Marshiro was merely the head of an obscure research team whose annual reports made for dull reading they were seldom opened, let alone studied. A spymaster of extraordinary skill, Marshiro basked in her carefully cultivated anonymity. At times like this when one of her operatives behaved with the very same independence that was crucial in the field, she was thoroughly annoyed. Once inside the hovercraft she took off her heavy red overcoat and tossed it aside then sat down in the main cabin to sip a steaming cup of hot chocolate while she waited for Natsuki to join her.
Meditation was a practice she frequently recommended, but never relied on it herself and was far from calm by the time Natsuki finally appeared.
Marshiro waited for her to cast off her wet coat, and towel the rain from her long blue black hair. She passed Natsuki a mug of hot chocolate and a packet of photographs.
"Viper Viola's an elusive bastard, but easily recognized. He comes from Kyoto stock so does Tomoe his second in command, and Miya, who is Tomoe's sidekick for all intents and purposes. The Arab woman is Summer Moon, Viper's lover; the last is his daughter Shizuru. Be careful of her. Viper has raised her as a son and she's undoubtedly even more ruthless than he is. Ghastly bunch of pirates is all they are, and once you have enough information to close down their entire enterprise, they will live out the rest of their lives in a maximum security prison."
Natsuki would have liked something stronger than cocoa, but Marshiro did not imbibe spirits of any kind and did not provide them to her operatives. In the winter she urged hot chocolate or teas. She was rumored to have a wife, but neither Natsuki or anyone she knew has never met her. Natsuki could not help but wonder if when Marshiro and her wife got in a wildly passionate mood, they might smear each other with foamy whipped cream that Marshiro heaped on top of her cocoa.
Erasing the bad image, Natsuki set her cocoa aside on the low table between their padded seats.
"Aren't you forgetting they have to be tried first?"
"No certainly not. If we didn't need evidence for a trial, we would be sending assassins rather than you. Garderobe won't stoop to murder, however, no matter how just our cause."
Natsuki opened the packet and began to shuffle through the candid photographs taken at the Viola Mine, Viper Viola's frontier outpost, taken by another of Marshiro's minions. While the pictures were of excellent quality, the poses left a great deal to be desired. Viper had been standing at an angle, looking down and other than unshaved cheeks and dark honey colored hair, Natsuki couldn't make out much.
"Who took these?" She asked.
"Chie Hallard a wiry girl who runs with one of the punk gangs. She is a nearly invisible sort who can come and go without attracting any notice where ever she is sent. It's a valuable quality you would do well to cultivate."
Natsuki scoffed at that bit of advice.
"You are not paying me to be invisible, Marshiro, but to match wits with the galaxy's master criminals, and live to through it."
Marshiro conceded the point with a faint nod.
"Chie has her place however. After all, you couldn't pass as a punk at Viper's outpost."
"I wouldn't even try."
Punks were youthful bands who amuse themselves by boarding privet star ships and briefly terrorizing the owners. They diverted the craft for joyrides, but were pranksters, who soon released their captives and went on their way, unlike the far more evil and ambitious pirates who seized star ships and made slaves of their owners and crews. It was pirates' careers that Natsuki was sent out to end, and like the once famous otome she always got her man or woman, as was the case sometimes.
The second photo was of Tomoe. She wore her green hair long on one side and shorter on the other. Chie caught her in the midst of an argument very intense, her mouth open and the tendons in her neck taut. Next came Miya, she wasn't as vivid as Viper and Tomoe were but had the look of a follower.
Natsuki flipped to the fourth picture and found that Summer Moon was a lovely little thing, her long black hair braided in a single plait. She thought it was a pity she had such bad taste in lovers.
Even among a gang of pirates, the last photo proved shocking. Shizuru Viola was a slender beauty with a wild tawny mane and the most amazingly vivid eyes she had ever seen they were the color of garnets and seemed to see through everything. Chie had caught her in the midst of a fluid, undulating stride, but rather than her extraordinary grace, it was the deadly looking polearm clutched in her left hand that brought a gasp to Natsuki's lips.
"How did Viper get an element? I didn't realize they had even gone into production."
"They haven't."
"Then what is she holding?"
"It's an element, all right, but its one Viper manufactured himself. We found the leak in the new otome division and ended it, but there is a possibility the element isn't the only prototype Viper has. That's one of the reasons this mission is so urgent. Armed colonist are dangerous, but armed with elements and who knows what else, they will be invincible. As you know, the weapon was developed with the sole and unlikely event that the events on earth repeat themselves. It's not like the red star has been seen.
The new weapons were to be stock piled and never used at least that was Garderobe's intent. It obviously isn't Viper Viola's."
Natsuki studied Shizuru's clear crimson eyes, framed with a thick fringe of long dark lashes. She had a remarkable beauty even when cosmetic surgery was commonplace. The static quality of a still photograph didn't disguise the smoothness of her gait. She might have been a talented dancer rather than a pirate's daughter, but to hear Marshiro tell it, she was more dangerous than her father. Hers was the best photo of the lot.
Natsuki could easily imagine Chie eyeing her with a lascivious gaze while she drank a volcano, the fuming brew illegal in the colonies but favored by the lawless drifters who frequented the outpost on the frontier.
Transported by her vivid imagination, Natsuki let her mind wonder freely and it soon carried her into the photo she held. She heard the loud clang of the games lining the walls of the crowded tavern. Smoke from a dozen-banned substances stung her eyes and blended with the pungent smell of grease and sweat soaked leather.
Shizuru was no longer looking toward a hidden camera, but right at her.
She was easily as tall as Natsuki if not a bit taller. They easily met each other's gaze. Shizuru was so beautiful, and, unable to resist the impulse, Natsuki reached out to tip her face toward hers. Without bothering to introduce herself, she kissed Shizuru long and hard, Natsuki's mouth dominating hers with a lazy insistence Natsuki didn't end it until she was satisfied that Shizuru understood she intended to have more from her than the scorching kiss. Natsuki smiled at her then, with a self-satisfied grin that froze on her lips as Shizuru raised the polearm ready to strike. Natsuki raised her hands, but before she could utter the first word of an apology, she brought down the blade. Natsuki could feel it slash through her chest. Her blood sprayed over the crimson eyed beauty but it still didn't touch her defiant stare.
Natsuki owed a lot to her ability to imagine her adventures before she lived them. Her day dreams were normally enjoyable, but dying even in her imagination wasn't. She winced and swore under her breath.
"I agree," Marshiro said. "They are a disgusting lot, but no worse than some of the others you have dealt with successfully. You will introduce yourself as Natsuki Kuga, a commercial pilot who's lost not only her license for carrying contraband, but all sence of honor."
Marshiro handed over a closely spaced print out.
"Memorize the background information and destroy it. Should Viper wish to access Garderobe's computer files, he'll find ready documentation of Natsuki Kuga's shady past. You fled Aries to avoid prosecution, and can't visit any of our colonies for fear of arrest."
"That's plausible, if not very exciting."
"If your story were any more exciting, then others would be expected to know it. You needn't worry you'll run into anyone who ever knew Kuga.
She is one of my creations, so there's no one who can contradict your story, provided you go with what is on the page and nothing more. Please don't embroider it that will only make Viper suspicious."
"I understand the rules."
A veteran operative who has assumed more than a few hundred identities since she was sixteen, Natsuki was well acquainted with Marshiro's rules.
In her opinion, many of those rules lacked imagination, but she couldn't argue they worked.
Meticulous about her appearance, Marshiro squirmed unhappily in her damp clothes. Her sharp doll like features had a bluish cast, and despite the warmth of the hovercraft's cabin, she was still cold.
"As has happened when you've gone undercover in the past, Viper Viola will probably demand you prove your loyalty by successfully completing a challenge. Whatever it is, do it. As always you will have complete immunity from prosecution once the operation ends with Viper's arrest."
Natsuki re-sorted the photos, this time placing Shizuru's on top. Marshiro had already warned Natsuki about her, but Natsuki sensed she was even more dangerous than Marshiro believed. Beauty and evil were a lethal mix, and she knew this mission might prove to be her most difficult. She hoped it would not also be her last.
"If any thing goes wrong my insurance money goes to my little sisters."
"There's still no spouse in your life?"
Natsuki's laugh was her first of the day.
"There are plenty of lovers in my life but none I'd care to reward with that kind of money."
Marshiro raised her mug of cocoa. "To the success of your mission," she proposed "And to Natsuki Kuga."
Natsuki was happy to drink to that. She just wished she had something stronger to swallow.