Summary: Lesson 2: In which Gintoki and Hijikata are kidnapped by a kinky alien who turns Hijikata into the ultimate sex toy, and Gintoki offers to help Hijikata lose his virginity. Subsequently, energy cannons are fired and Gintoki botches an ejection.

The Kuroneko-Chan & the Shiroyasha Arc

Lesson 2: Remember to Carry Your Passport, Just in Case You Wake Up As Another Species.

Gintoki's skull felt like one of Zura's bombs had gone off inside of it. He swore again and rubbed the bump on the back of his head. Waking up in a western bed after being ambushed in an alley wasn't the way he'd wanted to end his day. At least he wasn't alone: a bizarrely dressed Hijikata was asleep and drooling on the pillow next to him.

Not that his own outfit wasn't bizarre. Gintoki had pulled off the stupid little gold crown with the veil and had stripped off the bamboo chest armor, but he'd left the rest of the outfit on because it was cold in the room. Besides, the damned arm length black gloves that ended for no apparent reason at the ring around each middle finger felt sort of good against his skin, as did the clingy high-necked black silk shirt and the robes. And the weird thing that hung across his shoulders… was it toilet paper? Did monks carry their own toilet paper? Did they drape it across their shoulders and carry it around in public? Was it holy toilet paper? Would the gods be pissed at him for carrying holy toilet paper around his neck when he wasn't a monk? What would happen if he used holy toilet paper to wipe his ass after he'd taken a shit? Would he go to Hell?

It's Hijikata's fault. Somehow he's got me all caught up in some kind of Shinsengumi revenge plot or something. Gintoki shot Hijikata a look that he was pretty sure would slice the balls off the bastard if he'd been awake to see it.

In fact, there was no reason that Gintoki needed to be the only miserable person in the room. From the looks of it, he was pretty certain that Hijikata would be even more miserable than Gintoki was once he was awake, which would make his own misery a little brighter, if only in comparison.

"Your breath smells like sour mayonnaise," Gintoki muttered. He shook Hijikata's shoulder. "Oi! Neko-chan! Wake up!"

Hijikata made a sleepy noise. "Fuck off, Sougo."

An image of the sadistic Okita and Hijikata together in bed flitted through Gintoki's mind. He shivered. Hijikata was either an idiot or a masochist. "Wake up already! Hey! Neko-chan!"

"It's not Neko-chan, it's Katsu—Fuck." Hijikata rubbed his eyes. "It's catching. Wait a minute!" He bolted upright. "Where the hell are we? And why the hell are you in my bed?"

"Unless Shinsengumi get paid a whole hell of a lot more than I think they do, I don't think this is your bed. Oh, and yeah, by the way, you have cat ears."

"Cat ears!" Hijikata blinked and patted his head, all color receding from his face. "Holy shit!"

"They're cute," Gintoki admitted grudgingly, watching the soft, pointed ears twitch. "You've got a tail, too. I hear black goes with everything."

"A tail—" Hijikata whispered faintly.

A long, slim bump rose under the covers, but it wasn't anchored at the right place, so Gintoki didn't suffer any envy. Well, not much, anyway. He shook his head philosophically. "If a man lives long enough, there will be days like this."

Hijikata grabbed his collar. "THERE IS NO FUCKING DAY LIKE THIS IN A MAN'S LIFE!" he bawled into Gintoki's face.

"Don't go crazy on me, Neko-chan," Gintoki protested, his hands up.

"YOU'RE THE ONE SPOUTING INANE COMMENTS!" Hijikata let go of Gintoki's collar and looked around the room with a stunned expression. "Fuck. I never should have got out of bed this morning. I knew it was going to be a shit day as soon as I walked in on Kondo-san taking a dump before breakfast."

Gintoki pulled away.

"Not like that, idiot! He didn't lock the stall door, that's all."

Gintoki relaxed a little and scratched his stomach. "It looks like the door is the only way to get out." He got off the bed and started to walk towards it when he found himself sprawled on the floor under 150 pounds of angry cat-boy.

"STOP, YOU MORON!"

"I'm stopped!" Gintoki wheezed.

"The door is wired."

"Huh?"

"Just look at it, you idiot. It's wired. It's probably live." Hijikata squirmed on top of Gintoki. "Watch."

A pillow landed on the metal plate that covered the floor between Gintoki's nose and the door. It immediately began to quiver and dance, while Gintoki could feel the floor underneath him tremble in time to its gyrations.

The pillow exploded. Feathers floated down and the cycle began again.

"It's a giant vibrator," Gintoki said, awestruck.

"It's a giant vibrator that makes things explode!" Hijikata snapped.

"Just the feeling I'm getting from the floor is making my big guy happy," Gintoki said. He ground experimentally against the floor. Nice Things Happened, so he did it some more.

"Fucking pervert!" Hijikata abruptly got off him. "Fine. Kill yourself by giant machine sex if you want to. I'll let everyone know you were an idiot to the end." He stalked back to the bed and sat down, arms crossed.

Sighing regretfully, Gintoki got up and sat down beside him. "Maybe later. Oi. What's the last thing you remember?"

Hijikata didn't bother to ask what he meant. "I was heading back to headquarters after my shift," Hijikata muttered. "Someone jumped me."

Gintoki nodded. "Me too. Damn, I could use some chocolate right about now."

"Your teeth are going to rot out."

"Shut up, jerk." Gintoki looked around the room. "You sure this isn't your bedroom?"

"Do you want to die?"

"Someone really perverted sleeps here."

The bed was huge, with a frame that would probably make Okita come in his trousers, given all of the manacles, chains and straps dangling ready for use. Mirrors lined the walls, harnesses dangled from the ceiling, and there were several pieces of furniture that Gintoki suspected had nothing to do with comfort and everything to do with pain. A large cabinet stretched to either side of the bed. Gintoki didn't think he'd ever seen so many varied and brightly colored sex toys in his life.

"As if we didn't know that already, idiot. So what the hell happened after that?"

Gintoki stuck a finger in his ear. "I woke up dressed like this and lying next to a freak." He grimaced, then took his finger out of his ear and examined it for a second before flicking it.

"At least I don't look like some S/M monk with toilet paper around his neck," Hijikata said, dark satisfaction in his voice. "I'm still in black. Damn, I could use a cigarette." He began absently patting himself for a pack, and suddenly froze, flushing a deep crimson.

"A black Cheongsam," Gintoki felt justified in pointing out. "Slit up to your navel. And the heels on those stilettos are at least six inches high. They look nice with those new boobs."

"Boobs! I've got boobs! What the fuck?" Hijikata groped his chest again, flushed an even deeper crimson and scrambled under the bed cover, pulling it up to his neck. "Don't look, you pervert!"

"It's not like you're naked. Though, if you want to be, that's okay, too." Gintoki wouldn't mind seeing Hijikata's boobs, actually. Though they were on the small side, they looked perky.

"Unless we find other clothes, I'm fine with what I'm wearing," Hijikata forced through clenched teeth.

"You're a man! With boobs! Wearing a sexy dress and stilettos! Gah!" Gintoki pulled his hair. "The first time in weeks I've woken up in bed with someone with breasts, and it's some kind of mutant policeman!"

"Years, more like."

"Oi! Catboy!"

"Pervy permed priest!"

"Bastard!"

"I'll kill you!"

"Bring it on!" Gintoki paused. "Wait, that's your line."

"Bring it on!"

Gintoki shook his head and sighed. "Our time slot is going to be bumped again. But it's no use crying over spilled milk, I suppose."

"Oi! Enough with the cat jokes!"

"If you say so, Neko-chan." Gintoki dodged Hijikata's punch. "Oi, time for fun and games later. We need to figure out if you've got any other little surprises waiting for you."

"Like what?" Hijikata glowered in an embarrassed way.

"Are the ears and tail and boobs the only things that they've changed?"

Hijikata got a panicked look on his face. His hand disappeared under the sheets. "Shit," he whispered, turning green. "I think I'm gonna be sick." He threw back the sheet and yanked his dress up. "Tell me that isn't what I think it is! Please! Tell me. Now!"

Gintoki stared. "Whoa. It's like a strip mall of sex," he breathed.

Hijikata dangled, limp yet pretty impressive for a guy who just found out he was a cat with girl boobs, but it wasn't Hijikata's joystick that drew Gintoki's eyes.

"Neko-chan, you've got a pussy."

Hijikata passed out.

"Oi!" Gintoki glanced at the door and decided it was better to have Hijikata around to face whatever it was that had done whatever it had done to Hijikata's body. He shook him. "Wake up!"

Hijikata blinked, his eyes dazed. "Kondo?"

"The gorilla isn't here. Are you going to be all right?"

"Fuck. I need a cigarette." Hijikata slowly sat up.

His tail hit Gintoki in the back of his head.

"Ouch! Watch it with that thing, jerk!"

A considering look crossed Hijikata's face and he turned to Gintoki. "Have you checked to see if you've still only got one set of plumbing?"

Gintoki's heart stopped. "Augh! Damn!" He hitched up his robes and felt his crotch. "Thank the gods of he-men everywhere," he breathed in relief, and slumped back on the bed.

"Natural old-man silver," Hijikata observed. "Or do you bleach?"

"Old man, my ass! I'm only a couple of years older than you!"

"Bullshit."

"I don't have an old man's ass!" Gintoki insisted. "Though if I did, it would still be a hell of a fine old man's ass. But I don't. Look! Virile young man's ass!"

"Get that fucking thing out of my face!"

"Hey," Gintoki said, dropping his robes back into place and settling in next to Hijikata again. "Looks like we're sex slaves, doesn't it? You know. The priest and the prostitute?"

"Someone tries to have sex with me, I'll rip him a new one," Hijikata muttered. "This is so damned clichéd." He closed his eyes; his color was starting to come back, Gintoki noticed.

He was actually kind of pretty, in a hard-assed Shinsengumi way. If he weren't Hijikata, Gintoki would have put the moves on him when they first woke up. Though…

Maybe they could help each other out. Little Gintoki was feeling frisky, despite their situation, probably because of the boobs and vibrator stuff he'd been exposed to. Judging by Hijikata's pointed nipples, he was feeling the heat, too.

"You're not trying very hard to escape," Gintoki pointed out.

"You aren't, either."

"But that's because I'm perverted. I've always wondered what it would be like to be a sex slave."

"You're nuts."

Gintoki shrugged. "So. Escape?"

"The door is the only way out of this room. We'd be vibro-splattered in little pieces before we got halfway to it."

Hijikata was right. Gintoki examined the heavy electrical cables that blossomed into a fine mesh of delicate wires across the burnished metal of the door. They seemed to make a design.

"Whoever kidnapped us sure has a thing for guys with cat ears," he observed.

"Shut up."

"No, really. If you tilt your head to the side, you can make out at least five Amanto doing it to a neko-guy—" Pain exploded through his jaw as a stiletto heel connected. Gintoki landed on his ass on the floor.

"I said, shut the fuck up!"

Gintoki waited for the stars to fade a bit. "Cranky without your nicotine, aren't you?"

"I'm not the one with the shakes from sugar-withdrawal."

Damn. He'd hoped that Hijikata wouldn't notice. "Maybe we need something to take our minds off of just sitting around and waiting to be violated."

"Like what?"

"I don't know," Gintoki shrugged casually and watched Hijikata's feet like a hawk. "Maybe we should start the party without the hosts?"

Hijikata slowly turned towards Gintoki, death radiating from every pore.

"Look at it this way," Gintoki said reasonably, still keeping his eyes on Hijikata's stilettos of pain. "Would you rather lose your virginity to me, or to a bunch of horny aliens with S/M fetishes?"

"I'm not a virgin."

"Shit!" Gintoki stared. "I'm sorry. Was it while I was unconscious or something?"

"Fuck." Hijikata took a deep breath. "No, you moron. I haven't been raped."

"Whoa! Then you did it voluntarily? Kinky! How are those guys built, anyway?"

"Bastard!" Gintoki ducked, but Hijikata's attack was half-hearted at best. Ha! So he was feeling it, too. Gintoki let Hijikata pin him to the bed.

"Shut up." Hijikata dropped his head to Gintoki's chest and muttered something.

"What?"

"I said, I'm not a virgin, but—"

"But what?"

"Technically, my – you know – is." Hijikata's ears were blazing red.

"Your euphemism for a cat?"

"Enough with the fucking cat jokes!" Hijikata kneed Gintoki in the groin and stood. "You're a fucking horny, perverted, manipulative son of a bitch, aren't you, Sakata?"

"Why, does that bother you or something?" Gintoki managed to gasp. Damn, his private bits were getting a workout, and not the good kind, either.

Hijikata snorted. "You remind me of Sougo."

"Bastard."

They both fell silent, Gintoki nursing his bruised jewels and Hijikata seemingly just being his normal sulky self. Gintoki groaned. They were so screwed, and the sex torture hadn't even started yet.

"We're screwed," Hijikata said.

"Wait! I was just thinking that!"

"Liar."

"No. Really. I was thinking, 'we're so screwed—'"

"—And the sex torture hasn't even started yet," Hijikata chorused with him.

"I hate that I'm thinking like you."

"I hate it more." Hijikata squirmed. "This damned tail itches."

"Where?"

"What do you mean, where?"

"At the tip? Along the whole length? Where it meets your ass?"

"The last one."

"Oh."

"Look away for a minute."

"You're paranoid, you know that? We're guys. You're just going to scratch your ass, aren't you?"

"Look, you jerk, just – look at the dirty mural on the door or something."

"I've been trying my best to ignore it."

"Then close your eyes."

"For a minute?"

"A long minute."

Gintoki sighed and closed his eyes.

"You're not looking, right?"

"I'm not looking. I bet you wear a towel in hot springs, don't you?"

"That's rude."

"So's scratching your ass."

"You said you weren't going to look!"

"I'm not, I'm not." Gintoki squinted, trying to make his eyes look like they were closed. He watched as Hijikata jacked up his skirt around his hips and looked at himself in the mirror. Damn. That was really hot. And when Hijikata's hand moved to the base of his sleek, black tail…

"Oi!" Gintoki said hoarsely. He cleared his throat. "Ass scratched yet?"

Hijikata dropped his dress. "You can open your eyes now."

"I don't even know why the hell I had to close them in the first place," Gintoki muttered. "Look. There aren't many options open, are there? We can try to escape and get vibrated to death, we can kill each other and conserve electricity, we can lay here on the bed and talk about boring shit like the fact that I didn't get my Shonen Jump today, since I'm stuck here with cat-boy—"

"Oi!"

"Or we could have sex."

"You're the last person I'd ever want to have sex with."

"You're not my first choice, either, but I might be the last person you could ever choose to have sex with," Gintoki pointed out.

"Fuck."

"We can do that."

"I didn't mean—fuck."

"Make up your mind, would you?"

"…"

Gintoki yawned and rolled over. "Then there's the last option. We can just go to sleep."

"…If we do this…"

"Do what?"

"…You know."

"Sleep?"

"HAVE SEX, YOU BASTARD!"

"Sounds good to me." Gintoki rolled and twisted, and an instant later, he was lying on top of Hijikata. "It's been a while. Do you mind if we do it the old-fashioned way, with the guy on top?"

"Get the fuck off me!" Hijikata heaved under Gintoki, and both men gasped as their hard lengths came into contact.

Gintoki was pleased to discover that Hijikata was just as turned on as he was. "Feels like you like me just where I am." Gintoki buried his face in Hijikata's neck. "Mm. You don't smell bad for a guy."

Hijikata shoved him away. "Strip. I'm not having sex with a fucking priest."

Gintoki took the toilet paper from around his neck and put it on the bedside table so they could grab it easily when it was time to clean up, then obligingly stripped. As he started to peel the black gloves down his arms, Hijikata cleared his throat. "You can leave those on," he said gruffly.

Gintoki narrowed his eyes. "You're stripping, too. And if I leave the gloves on, you leave the stilettos on."

Hijikata glowered, but he reached for the buttons at his throat and slipped the first one through the loop that secured his dress closed. Gintoki sat back and watched with admiration as Hijikata finished unbuttoning his dress and pulled it over his head. Garters. No bra. No panties. Gintoki approved entirely. As soon as Hijikata's head emerged from the cloth, Gintoki pushed him down and straddled him again.

"Those are damned perky," Gintoki observed, staring at Hijikata's boobs. "You're almost as sexy as an ice cream parfait."

"Shut up!" Gintoki erpped in surprise as Hijikata grabbed him by the back of his neck and yanked him down into a savage kiss. Hijikata's breath might smell like sour mayonnaise, but his tongue tasted smoky and hot and moved with a wicked sinuousness that Gintoki really, really wished he'd known about before, because Hijikata was definitely worth kissing and it was a shame that they hadn't started doing it years ago.

Hijikata's tail thumped Gintoki's ear.

"Ouch! Shit! You made me bite my tongue!"

"Grab it," Hijikata ordered, pressing forward.

The tail thumped Gintoki again. "That thing should be registered as a deadly weapon!" Gintoki snapped, rubbing his streaming eye and hoping it wouldn't swell up like a monkey's ass.

"I said 'grab it,'" Hijikata hissed. "I can't control the damned thing."

"Right." Gintoki grabbed.

Hijikata gasped. "I meant that you should grab the fucking tail!"

Gintoki moved his thumb a bit.

"I guess it's all right," Hijikata muttered when he could speak again.

Emboldened, Gintoki slid his hand lower. An instant later, he was lying on his back on the floor, rubbing his jaw and staring at the ceiling. "The writers are really getting a kick out of the whole 'hit Gintoki with the tail' thing, aren't they?"

"Shit. I told you I can't control it."

"Do me a favor. Kill the aliens with it, not me." He struggled to his elbows and looked up at Hijikata's glowering face. "I don't think I'm in the mood any more."

"You'd damn well better be, because that hand of yours isn't done yet." Hijikata grabbed Gintoki's hair and yanked him off the floor.

"Owowowowowowowo – Oh, shit!"

Hijikata Did Something Really Sexy.

"Okay, I'm in the mood again," Gintoki panted. "Oh hot damn, am I in the mood!"

Hijikata hesitated. "You have any protection?"

"What?"

"Rubbers. Sheaths. Condoms."

"Why?"

Hijikata just stared at him. An image of little Hijikatas running around with swords and diapers full of mayonnaise flitted through Gintoki's mind.

"Oh." Gintoki could almost feel sorry for Hijikata, if he weren't such a bastard that he deserved to be made into a mutant. But sex. The first sex he'd had in a long, long, long time. Hijikata was almost a girl, and 'almost' counted pretty big when you hadn't had any in a while. "Don't worry. I got great marks in sex education. I know what I'm doing."

"Condom or nothing. I'm not getting pregnant with a bunch of naturally-permed white-haired brats on sugar highs rolling around inside me!"

Whoa. Suddenly little Gintokis were running around with the little Hijikatas, and, cute as they were, Gintoki drew the line at litter births. He dove into the cupboard next to the bed and started pulling out drawers. He hit pay dirt in the third one: inside were dozens of varieties of condoms and flavoured lubes. "Ooo! Chocolate-flavored extra-large ultra-thin-manly-ribbed!" He ripped the packet open.

"Don't eat them, you idiot!"

Gintoki took the condom out of his mouth. "I just needed a taste, that's all."

"Put it on or choke on it!"

"Right, right. Oof!" Gintoki found himself suddenly on his back, a very determined-looking Hijikata leaning over him. "Hey, wait! Wasn't I supposed to be on top?"

Hijikata straddled him. "You think I'm gonna get pinned down by your heavy-ass body?"

"Gosh, you're pretty testy. Time of the month is it?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Moon madness? Crimson tide? The unwelcome visitor—"

"I'm not on the fucking rag! Now shut up and do something constructive for a change."

"All right," Gintoki said. He grabbed Hijikata by the hips. "Slide onto the glory stick, Neko-chan."

He didn't see Hijikata's fist, but his jaw exploded with pain. By the time the stars stopped flashing in his eyes, Gintoki's lower body had settled into a healthy rhythm, however, probably proving something about the unnecessary nature of his higher functions, which he would cheerfully throw away if he could do what they were doing forever, or at least for a hell of a long time.

Hijikata was disturbingly gorgeous. Way too much man for any woman, or any other guy… Gintoki's eyes glazed over at the thought of watching Hijikata getting it on with some chick, preferably in a threesome involving Gintoki. "You're too sexy," he muttered, clutching Hijikata's waist.

Hijikata moaned and clutched his knees tight around Gintoki's waist, arching as a girl-bits climax seemed to hit him. A moment later, his boy-bits gave an encore performance. Gintoki lost his rhythm and simply plunged in as deep as he could, reaching his own heights of ecstasy.

Hijikata collapsed on top of him.

Gintoki caught his breath, waiting for Hijikata to punch him out, or at least get off him, but Hijikata didn't move. "Hijikata?" Getting no response, he lightly slapped Hijikata's face. "Hijikata?" Damn. Had Hijikata died of sex? He slapped him harder. "Hijikata! You son of a bitch! Don't you dare die on me! I don't want ears and a tail!"

Once again he didn't see the fist aimed at his jaw, but when he finally picked himself off the floor – this was getting to be a pattern that he wasn't entirely happy with – Hijikata was propped up in the bed, pale and panting, frantically trying to hide himself with his hands, which didn't seem to know which area of the body to block from Gintoki's sight.

"Get away from me, you sex-crazed maniac!" Hijikata snapped.

"I'm not the one who had multiple orgasms," Gintoki pointed out. "What's it like, anyway?"

"Yes. What's it like?"

Gintoki rolled off the bed and whirled, his hand going automatically to his waist and meeting nothing but air. Beside him, Hijikata had also sprung into an offensive stance. Naked, vulnerable and still panting, they glared at the Amanto ambassador from the restaurant.

The Amanto smirked. "I say. That was very pretty. I'm quite pleased with my new possessions."

"Possessions my ass!" Hijikata snapped.

"And it's a nice one," Gintoki murmured, stroking Hijikata's bum.

Hijikata struck his hand away. "I'm the Vice-Commander of the Shinsengumi, you bastard," he snarled at the Amanto. "You're under arrest."

"I'm afraid that you have no jurisdiction on this ship, Vice-Commander," the Amanto replied. "Besides, I'm an ambassador. I have diplomatic immunity."

"Were you the guy that made him into a cat-boy?" Gintoki demanded.

"Oi!"

"Not me, personally," the Amanto leered, "though he was altered per my specifications. He's quite gorgeous, don't you think?"

"Just because you made him pretty doesn't mean it's right," Gintoki snapped.

"I can talk for myself, asshole," Hijikata snapped in turn, still glaring at the Amanto. "Turn me back or I'll kill you!"

"Hmm." The Amanto didn't appear to move, but he was suddenly surrounded by several huge, hulking Amanto who looked like bulls. "You samurai are fiercer than I had expected. I'd hate to have to use drugs, but perhaps it's best..."

Before the last words left his mouth, Hijikata leapt. Gintoki watched in amazement as he punched the Amanto in the jaw, sending him flying. His tail blurred as he spun lightly, and Gintoki heard the solid thunk of tail meeting flesh.

The guards were down. Hijikata quickly stooped and then disappeared through the door.

"Shit!" Gintoki grabbed whatever clothing he could lay his hands on and draped the holy toilet paper around his neck before springing after him, running roughshod over the Amanto guards laying on the floor. "How can he run in those damned stilettos?"

As he emerged from the room, he caught a glimpse of a naked ass and black tail disappearing around a corner and sprinted after. "Wait! You bastard!" He skidded around the corner and abruptly stopped.

Hijikata was waving an energy cannon menacingly at a platoon of Amanto soldiers, his tail lashing psychotically. "I'll blow a hole in this fucking ship if you get any closer," he was snarling at the Amanto.

Gintoki reconsidered his original idea to escape with Hijikata. He turned to head away from the crazy neko-chan and his energy cannon, only to be confronted by the soldiers they'd just escaped, looking battered and more than a bit pissed off. "It was him, not me!" he yelled, pointing at Hijikata. "He's the one with the killer tail!"

"Shut the fuck up and blast them!"

"With what?"

Hijikata turned to him, a stunned look on his face. "Didn't you grab a weapon on the way out of the room?"

"I grabbed the clothes!" Gintoki said defensively. "And the toilet paper!"

"You fucking moron!"

"At least I'll be a fucking moron with clothes and a clean ass," Gintoki snapped.

"You'll be a dead fucking moron if I get my hands on you."

"Fight naked if you want to then, neko-chan."

"Don't fucking call me NEKO-CHAN!" An energy blast took out the wall next to Gintoki's head. Hijikata whirled to confront the platoon. "You bastards die, too!" He pulled the trigger.

Since none of the Amanto seemed to carry swords, and since Gintoki wasn't too sure about the dynamics between energy cannons and the hulls of spaceships, he dropped the clothes and leapt into the fray unarmed. The huge bull Amanto couldn't move as quickly as he could, and in seconds, the way was clear.

He ran like hell for an exit.

"Wait, you son of a bitch!" he heard Hijikata yell, but an escape was an escape and Gintoki wasn't about to be caught because of some damned naked police-neko wearing stiletto heels.

Unfortunately, Hijikata caught up when Gintoki had to pause to fight his way past another half-dozen guards.

"Lazy ass! Where were you? You could have at least got here quick enough to help me!" Gintoki snapped, trying to catch his breath as the last of the guards slumped unconscious at his feet.

"You were going to leave me behind!"

"It's not my fault," Gintoki protested. "You were the one having fun shooting things up!"

"Asshole," Hijikata muttered. "Fine. Give me my dress."

Gintoki looked away and scratched his head.

"After all that, you left the clothes behind?"

"The wind runs naked," Gintoki pointed out. "And we've got toilet paper."

"Don't give me that bullshit, you just cut out and left them behind! You're a moron! Nobody escapes with no weapons and no clothes!"

"What?" Gintoki demanded. "Are you the Escape Nazi or something? Is there some kind of 'How to Escape' Shinsengumi instruction manual? Was I supposed to read it before I got kidnapped by aliens?"

"Everybody knows you always grab a weapon and clothes when you try to escape!"

"I don't see you carrying around any boxers, neko-boy!"

Hijikata's tail decked him. By the time Gintoki climbed to his feet, still dazed, Hijikata had vanished.

Gintoki finally caught up to him several corridors later, and only because Hijikata had stopped and was trying to open some sort of hatch.

"You were going to leave me behind!"

"It's not my fault that you have the reflexes of a turtle." Hijikata grimaced. "Fuck! Help me here, would you?"

"What are you doing?" Gintoki asked as he started tugging on the hatch wheel, too.

"Emergency escape pod. Now, pull!"

Gintoki put all of his strength into turning the wheel. With a protesting shriek, it finally began to rotate. There was a burst of compressed air, and then the hatch shifted inwards and up, leaving a dark, black hole just as an army of Amanto thundered into the corridor.

"Get in there and get the pod going!" Hijikata lifted the energy cannon to his shoulder. He looked so amazingly sexy in his stilettos, with the big-ass gun propped over his cute little boobs, his ears and tail twitching and his boy-bits half-awake from adrenaline, that Gintoki was pretty sure he had fantasy material enough for a lifetime. "I said get in there! And wipe the fucking drool off your mouth while you're at it, pervert."

An energy blast punched a huge hole in the wall next to Gintoki, and he dove through the hatch. Hijikata landed on top of him.

"Ow ow ow ow ow!"

"Stop being a wimp," Hijikata demanded. "Launch the pod!" Hijikata took a position guarding the opening. Gintoki heard the whine of the energy cannon warming up, then the strange, muffled buzz-shriek of its blast. "Hurry!"

"Shit, shit, shit, shit, SHIT!" The control panel in front of Gintoki was covered with dials and levers and brightly colored buttons. "It's the red button you're never supposed to push, right? The red one? Right? Right?"

"JUST FUCKING LAUNCH THE SHIP!" Hijikata screamed, blasting energy beams out the hatch.

"Right. Just like driving a scooter. Now's where's the fucking key?" Gintoki closed his eyes, took a deep breath and patted the console. Feeling a button, he pressed it.

The engine coughed and sputtered awake. There was a flash and an explosion in the cockpit as one of the soldiers managed a lucky hit.

"GET US OUT OF HERE YOU FUCKING MORON!"

"SHIT!" Gintoki started punching buttons and yanking levers as fast as he could. The engines began to sound like something that could fly a ship through space instead of something that his scooter could outrun, and there was the groan of metal rapidly straining beyond its ability to remain intact. Alarms shrilled, but the hatch door suddenly closed, nearly catching Hijikata and cleaving the cannon on his shoulder in two.

"You're gonna kill us, you idiot!" Hijikata bawled. Something snapped, sounding pretty damned serious to Gintoki, and the ship jolted in its moorings.

"You fly it then!"

"I can't fly it!"

"You're a total nerd! You should know all about this stuff, otaku-boy!"

"Fuck off!"

"What about Shinsengumi training?"

"They train us how to shoot people and slice people and beat up people, not how to fly spaceships, moron!"

"It's not my fault if we die!"

"I'll fucking kill you if you fucking kill us, shitty perm-head!"

Gintoki viciously stabbed a button. There was a loud rumbling sound, then another jolt. The monitor suddenly showed a disturbingly naïve universe stretched out before them, the Amanto ship getting smaller by the second.

"We're clear of the ship!"

Gintoki breathed a sigh of relief and pushed another button.

Alarm bells started shrieking. A nearby planet that had looked relatively small and harmless before suddenly seemed to be getting a whole hell of a lot bigger and more threatening. It also seemed to have an alarming tendency to spin so fast in the huge display screen that Gintoki felt like lace underwear in a heavy-duty industrial dryer.

"You're crashing us! You're making us crash!" Hijikata started punching buttons, but the ship just fell faster.

Suddenly, the cabin was filled with the unnerving hiss of escaping air.

"I'm going to die naked, next to a naked catboy," Gintoki gasped just before the air was sucked out of his lungs. His last vision was of Hijikata giving him the finger as they both grabbed at their throats and slipped into unconsciousness.