As with any ship preparing for launch, the rest of the week blurred past for the crew of the Nadesico. By Friday a good majority of the crew had arrived, enough so that the venue for the Friday Frag was moved to the ship's gym, one of the largest single rooms on the ship.

As the day wore on, Hari, Saburouta and a good third of the engineering staff found themselves in Christenson's care setting up for the evening's carnage. Despite looking forward to it, Christenson's partner in crime for the event preferred to linger with Omoikane. Earlier in the day McLaren had completed all the setup Omoikane had needed and was now scanning log files to a soundtrack consisting for the most part of music made before he was born. Somehow he managed to lose track of time in the process, as engineers are wont to do. Ruri, on the other hand, spent the day in the midst of the politics of launching the Nadesico, and was acutely aware of the time.

She had received a call halfway through the afternoon from Yurika, who was opting to stay on Earth for now. It was news which she expected but still really didn't want to hear and served to increase the tedium of the afternoon. Prospector was fully aware of the decision, and was equally aware of the impact it had the young captain. By four in the afternoon he gave up and all but shooed the Kanchou off-duty.

Ruri wandered the quiet halls of the ship, knowing there would still be time before the shift ended and even more time before the evening's "LAN party" started. She found that her wandering had brought her near the main computer core, and, guessing that "Omoikane's Minions" were elsewhere on the ship, decided to editate in the presence of her old friend. She rounded the final corner and began to walk the final meters to his door when Omoikane flashed a warning sign before her.

"Nan desu ka, Omoikane?"

A new sign appeared: "Nothing's wrong, Kanchou, but you may wish to enter quietly."

"Nani, Omoikane?" returned Ruri, to which Omoikane replied with a screen Ruri understood the meaning of well enough but had never seen him show before: "^_^".

One of Ruri's eyebrows cocked as Omoikane moved to allow her entry. She reaced for the keypad but found Omoikane was opening the doors for her. She glanced at the empty workstations to the right and left of the door and didn't immediately understand the reason for Omoikane's warning. As she stepped into the office area, she noticed through the plexiglass McLaren leaning against the rail over the core, and realized that she might not be the only one using Omoikane as a meditation chamber.

While the realization was certainly valid, at the current moment it was inaccurate as she soon realized. She had walked in between stanzas. The thick lexan muffled the sound but there was no mistaking what he was doing in the core. She walked over to the door to Omoikane himself and as quietly as necessary entered the core. As she closed the door she leaned back against it and opted to wait until he had finished to announce her presence.

Either the song was short or she had walked in on the end of it, as it wasn't long before he had apparently finished. Not knowing of a better way to announce herself, Ruri simply asked, "Latin, ka?"

Tobias spun, revealing a flourescent red face not caused by the core's air conditioning. "K...Kanchou... um. Close. Italian, actually. Um, I might should go help Mike and make sure he doesn't accidently kill Lieutenant Makibi."

"Hari-kun will be fine," Ruri objected.

Tobias smiled. "Point. Besides, if Mike kills him, I get to kill Mike."

Ruri stepped forward and looked down into Omoikane. "The two of you are very competitive, aren't you?"

The Scotsman shrugged in what was quickly becoming a trademark manner. "I honestly don't care. I don't consider myself naturally competitive; I leave that up to other family members. I guess we are competitive, but he has yet to lock me in a trunk for a job interview."

The stood quietly for a while, both unsure if conversation was necessary. As Ruri looked out across the core she heard the familiar sound of a message window opening despite the mild roar around her. She glanced towards the engineer and saw the window close as quickly as it opened. He didn't see her look towards him as he was still staring dumbfoundedly at the location the screen had resided a moment ago. "Nan desu ka?" she queried.

Tobias shook himself from his reverie and shook his head as well. "Ah, it's nothing, Kanchou," he replied, attempting to assure himself as much as his commanding officer. "Um, there's still a while before the fun's supposed to start," he started, staring at the toes of his boots. "Would you care to join me for the British version of tea?"

He looked up, clearly unsure if he wanted her to respond affirmative or negative. Ruri was about to make her response the latter when she noticed Omoikane open a message just over McLaren's shoulder. Tobias noticed her gaze shift and started follow it when she suddenly answered with a quick "Hai."

Ruri followed Tobias the short distance to his quarters, almost afraid of what lay beyond his door after her first excursion into an engineer's lair several years before on the first Nadesico. She breathed a small sigh of relief when the door opened to reveal quarters kept as spartan as her own. Out of habit she left her shoes by the door and was relieved to see Tobias follow her lead. His empty workstation raised her curiosity enough to ask about it.

"Oh, it's not that i don't use it," Tobias quickly responded, toeing a bag near the entryway. "It's just that it's all in there," he continued. "Keyboards, spare IFS controllers, high memory projectors, the usual gaming paraphenalia. Make yourself at home," he finished as he bagan rummaging for tea's hardware.

Ruri sat down in one of the two sidechairs in the room the surveyed Tobias' domain. A rolled up futon in one corner and a stereo sitting on the dresser, above which hung a rather large sword, were the main changes to the room it appeared he had effected. "McLaren-san, is the sword purely ornamental?"

"The Claymore? More or less. It was carried by one of my clansmen in Wallace's uprising in 1297, but I've no idea how to use it. Hey, I know it's traditional both in England & Japan to serve sweets with tea, but do you want anything more substantial? Prospector's having pizza brought in but I've never had any from there – some place he knows called 'Peaceful Days.'"

Ruri smiled, "Eating light will be fine, I know Peaceful Days' chef."

Tobias nodded and brought the paraphenalia over to where Ruri was sitting. After setting the tray on the small table between the chairs he crossed over to the dresser and rifled through the music disks piled there. "Any preferences?" he asked, loading several into the stereo unit. "Black Album it is," he responded after Ruri shook her head.

Ruri's eyes widened in suprise at the cacophony which emitted from the speakers as her host grabbed the unit's remote and moved to sit in the remaining chair. The look wasn't lost on McLaren, who stumbled out an explanation. "Ah, there's something we should probably discuss, Kanchou. That's the reason for the thrash. I've found that it interferes with Omoikane's ability to interpret speech, which I thought was a problem at the time."

"Then I take it you did not invite me here entirely of your own choice, the same being true of my acceptance. Would I surmise correct that Seiya is part of the conspiracy as well?"

Tobias nodded, "As is Mike of course, and he'd pledged to have Hari in on it by yesterday as well." He switched the music to a more benevolent selection as he finished.

Ruri reclined in the chair and accepted the cup he offered her. "How are the preparations going for Monday's honeypot?"

"Mike has all of the software in place, and hardware will be ready as soon as I get the case back from the Aesti guys." JT read the furrowed brow and responded. "It seems there was a debate among them as to whether it would be, as they put it, 'Subaru Red' or 'Tenkawa Pink.'"

"Making the case unique so that it would not be confused with other units? What is the liklihood of that system becoming totally unusable?"

"Unknown," came the reply. "Every simulation Mike, Omoikane or I could think of to run came up with drastically different results on each iteration."

"I see," Ruri replied, and debated for a moment the next question on her mind. "Tobi-san, the song I heard you sing earlier. What is it called?"

"'Alma del Core,'" Tobias replied, blushing slightly. Ruri's expression indicated that the answer wouldn't suffice, and the blush deepened as he continued. "I took some voice lessons to fill up credits one semester, that was one of the ones I had to learn or at least an abreviated version of it. There's a longer one, but the lyrics to this one are only 'Alma del core, spirto dell alma, sempre costante t'adorero. Saro contento nel mio tormento, se quel bel labbro baciar potrò.' The first part apparently translates two ways, 'fairest adored, spirit of beauty,' and more accurately 'soul of my heart, spirit of my soul.' The rest is 'Always constantly will I adore you. I will be contented in my torment, if only I.. uh... could kiss those beautiful lips," he finished, almost muttering the last part in his embarassment. "I guess I shouldn't have told Omoikane what I know, huh?"

"It's hard to hide anything from Omoikane," Ruri replied, smiling slightly both at the man next to her and her own memories. "So, should we head towards the festivities?"



// \\