SunTzu was out straight for ten hours and awoke when someone was banging on his door.
He opened the door ajar and lensed out, still trying to wake up fully.
"Good Morning and Good evening TopGun. Do you have any idea how long I was banging on this door already? I'm in a hurry."
"Rei, what's up?" He asked, eyes still half closed. She sighed.
"I'm sorry that I had to wake you up. I just wanted to let you know that I'll be gone for a day or two also. The Queen requested me on Coruscant. As far as I know Usagi, I'll probably have to safe the Sol System from complete destruction because she put her foot in it with the wrong person." She put on a smile. Artemis showed up in the hallway and walked up to her.
"Rei, please hurry, the shuttle is waiting for you." The Admiral said as he came near.
That made Rei briefly glance over to Artemis and then back to SunTzu.
"I'll see you around, okay?" She said as Artemis walked up next to her and motioned her to the hangar.
As she was a few meters away she stopped briefly and turned around.
"Nice boxers." She laughed and continued to walk away. Artemis turned around and gave him a dark glare.
He stood there for a moment, looking down on him. He was just wearing boxershorts when he had opened the door.
SunTzu's stomach announced loudly that he was hungry, when he stepped out of shower a few minutes later so he got into some clothes and got to the cafeteria.
The ship was pretty empty, while he was on the Queen Zenobia most of the ground forces were flown to a maneuver on a nearby planet, just a platoon of Troopers and Team 3 remained on board. Now with Rei gone and everybody that was still onboard busy it would probably get boring for the next few days. Although he didn't think that he wouldn't be busy either.
As he sat there and spooned a tasty stew, a blonde haired creature, vaguely resembling Minako, entered the dinning hall. She was wearing a baggy grey sweatsuit and looked exactly as SunTzu looked this morning, maybe just a bit more pale even. The only thing that gave away that it really was Minako was the red bow in her hair.
She got to the food counter and took a triple espresso and some sandwiches as well as some candy, everything to go. Even he figured that something was not right.
She didn't even see him, when she walked past him.
"Mina?"
"Huh?" As she finally noticed him she jumped a bit. "Don't look at me. I'm not presentable at all."
"What's wrong? Are you not well?"
She sighed and sat down on the small table he was sitting. One of the tables that probably were too small for two people with trays.
"I've been learning for an exam that i have tomorrow the last few days and so far it costed me my beauty sleep, my self confidence and any sort of glamour I ever had. But if I fail it I can forget passing this year."
Poor girl, she really looked like she was done with the galaxy.
"Is it so hard? What about Setsuna? Can't she help you?"
"She does the best she can but it's about fractures and there's some stuff that I just can't get in my head. It's infuriating. And it doesn't help that there's no real medical library on this ship yet, not even digital."
"I see." He nodded. "Where is the next library that has anything you need?"
"Good question. I guess I'd go for earth." She shrugged, pressing her lips together.
"To earth?" He looked at his chrono and then called AICA.
"Darling, this is your Pilot. Can you tell me our position? Or even give me an ETA from here to earth?"
"Good evening. Give me a sec. We're in the Palanhi system. I'd estimate five hours if everything goes smooth and we give full thrust."
"Thanks AICA, I might get back to you." He looked away from his chrono and back to Minako. "How fast can you leave for earth?"
"I, uh, I… Give me thirty minutes. No, give me thirty five to take care of Artemis too."
She took her stuff and vanished. Meanwhile he ended his meal.
Thirty minutes later he arrived in the hangar. He saw Odegana and Ritz, which just got back from patrol and greeted the two. They briefly talked to each other, about news on enemy activity but they didn't found anything either. The most interesting thing that happened was that a Corellian Frigate from GA arrived in System also and reinforced their defenses. Other than that nothing worth telling happened.
A few minutes later Minako appeared, now wearing a flight suit and a medium sized bag over her shoulder as well as a pilot helmet in her hand. Artemis followed her close by.
They walked over to AICA and the Pilots. Artemis was driving in safety measures into Mina.
"And don't forget to be strapped in all the time as well as never take off your helmet, Minako."
"Artemis, it's not the first time I'm flyin with him, I know how to take care. And you know he's going to take care of me. Relax please, the older you get the more worried you become."
She greeted the other pilots as SunTzu took her bag and carefully stored it into one of the freight compartments.
"Lieutenant, I have your promise you'll take care of her?" Artemis asked SunTzu. The Admiral probably wouldn't have looked less worried if it would have been Diana. He seemed to have a very close bond with Minako.
"Yes, Sir! I'll take extra care, Sir." SunTzu said and saluted.
Artemis stood there and looked worried when SunTzu helped Minako into the cockpit. She strapped herself in and then waved at Artemis.
"See you tomorrow, Cat Dad." She smiled and blew him a kiss before the canopy closed.
They left the Far Star and jumped down the Shwuy exchange till the crossing of the CTE.
"Can I learn in here?" Minako asked over the radio in her helmet.
"You can, but I'd rather have you sleep some so you immediately can hit up the library when it opens tomorrow morning. I'll land at the palace, you'll have a room there right?
"I do. But what about you?"
"I can sleep in the Flight Center or even at home. I'll take you to University tomorrow morning."
"This is so nice. Why you're doing all this?"
"I have pity with you, you looked so done in the cafeteria. And also I know how important getting your M.D. is for you."
"You have a good soul SunTzu, i really appreciate it."
"It's all good, it's also better than just to fly straight trough space and hoping for something to shoot at me."
She fell asleep soon and he took care of flying.
At around 3am they landed at the palace. She just woke up when they hit the ground. She yawned and stretched herself, meanwhile SunTzu already opened the canopy and was out, retrieving her bag. A patrol of two guards, weapons under slung, came over to see if everything was okay, the nightly landing wasn't scheduled.
"Guards, please accompany Princess Venus to her quarters." SunTzu said and thrusted the bag into one of the Guards hands. They both nodded and stayed put, waiting for Minako.
Then he helped her out of the cockpit. Minako looked sleepy but smiled pleased.
Before she left she gave him a hug.
"Thank you so much again. You're a life saver."
"No problem. Get some more rest, I'll be here tomorrow morning to take you to the library."
"Alright. I'll be on time. Good night SunTzu."
"Good night Minako."
Her and her escort left then and SunTzu flew AICA over to the AirBase, where he went to sleep in the Flight Center.
The next morning SunTzu was waiting at 07:30 in front of the palace. The day promised to be beautiful and sunny. She came out, looking way better than the night before.
Minako smiled when she saw him.
"Good Morning my savior."
"Good Morning. Breakfast?"
He hold up a paper bag with pastry and a coffee.
"You're an angel right?"
"As far as I know I'm more known as a demon in the Task Force."
She took her breakfast and started eating while they walked off.
"Where did you park?" She asked him, in between bites of a chocolate croissant.
"We're not taking a car. We're heading to the landing spot. Someone will flex on her fellow students when it comes to entrances today."
A few minutes later AICA landed on a plaza in front of the Royal University's Library and SunTzu got out.
A lot of heads turned this morning.
SunTzu helped the blonde student out of the cockpit.
"I'll learn and then directly head to the exam, now that I can write it in the auditorium. I let you know, how things went."
"Good luck, I know you can do it!"
"Thank you so much." She paused a moment. "Okay, let's do that!" She said with confidence and walked off into the library.
He took AICA out for a small morning flight over Tokyo before heading out to the pacific with her. He even took a small tour to space and made a honorary visit to the ESDF Fleet in the orbit before returning to the base.
After landing a round of sport followed. It was awesome, when you had time to actually get shit done. After a shower he went for lunch in the palace, followed by enjoying some time in the courtyard, thinking about the little tour on the botanical garden on the Queen Zenobia he had with Rei, which made him smile.
It hasn't been a whole day yet but he still looked forward to see her again, he concluded.
He spent the rest of the time in the Flight Center getting Intel about what was going on right now in the galaxy. Something told him something was brewing up again, although it didn't feel too bad as last time. This made him think about Marvin also, he was so busy lately that he didn't find much time to think about his friend's demise much lately.
Looking at a holographic map of the galaxy where a gold mark was on Coruscant and a blue one near Palanhi he decided to never let one of his friends die in combat again.
A message snapped him back to reality.
It was Mina, telling him she'd head to the exam now and asked to wish her luck.
He answered that he wished her the best of luck and that she should just contact him afterwards so he could get her.
SunTzu finished making notes, that he wanted to talk about with Ami later on. Maybe he could help her find clues or even a pattern for where attacks would happen next.
He was back in AICA storing the data for safety into her as well, when Rei sent him a holo. What a pleasant surprise.
Good thing he was in AICA, the snub had a miniature holo player on the console, so he could play the message.
It showed Rei, in business attire, including hair in a strict bun, also a key lace with her ID Card was hanging from her neck.
"Hey TopGun, just wanted to let you know that we're going home. We were successful but that was mostly because Darth Vader showed up and told about his support for the plan in his position as Supreme Commander. You cannot imagine the aura of this man. Senators switched their opinions just because he showed up. He didn't even have to talk to intimidate you. Man, I'm glad he's on our side. The Imperial Remnant also supports the cause. That Senator Daala? Damn, she's a bad bitch. Some senator from Fondor tried to talk shit and he ate him verbally in front of the whole Senate! It was amazing. Anyway I hope you are good and could rest a bit more. See you soon on the Far Side and if something comes up please, take care. Bye!"
The message ended. So they were successful which was definitely great. Rei also seemed to have found liking in the big political intergalactic stage the senate was. Who'd knew. And she looked kinda cute with that bun.
SunTzu played the message again.
It was around 4:30 pm when SunTzu left for the university.
He landed in front of the medical faculty, thanks Google Maps for the adress, and waited for the blonde student.
The pilot sat on AICA's front and smoked a cigarette, flight suit pulled down to his hips, revealing a tight black thermo shirt underneath. He sat there, his feet dangling down and smoking a cigarette, while the sun slowly sat down.
Soon more and more people streamed out the building and after a small while he could make out Minako in the crowd of people. She was talking on her mobile phone but waved when she saw him sitting on AICA.
She finished her phone call and walked up to him smiling.
"Hey James Dean. Aren't you a bit too old to hang around the university like this?" She laughed while he started to smile.
"And I thought you'd like the idea of being picked up from school by the bad guy. You know for the street credibility and stuff."
They shared a laugh and Minako pulled out her phone and took a picture of him. That was for her social media accounts this time. Today's Taxi Driver.
"How did it go?"
"Way better than I expected. My topic was radius head fracture, exactly what Setsuna had in the medbay a few days ago and teached me about. I already called her to say thank you. But learning here helped immense too. Thanks for bringing me here."
He smiled, glad that she did good and that everything went alright.
"I'm glad to hear this, congrats."
"How was your day?"
"Awesome. Way better than recon mission after recon mission. By the way, the others are on their way back."
"Setsuna just told me. What do you say, let's go back too?"
He helped her store her stuff and get inside and got into the cockpit himself afterwards.
"Wait a second, I'm not gonna fly without dinner. Hold on."
He left off and at the next convenience store with parking lot he found he landed again.
He rushed inside and came out with various snacks, warm and cold.
"Ever had dinner in a star fighter?" He asked Minako, as he shared the food.
"Lieutenant, you know what a woman wants." She laughed as she unpacked an Onigri.
They left off again and headed to space, while they were enjoying their food.
Mina dozed off short after they reached the Shwuy Exchange and awoke half a hour before they reached the Far Side.
"Good Morning Sunshine. Did you enjoy your nap?" SunTzu asked, looking at her in his rear view.
"It's amazing how comfortable it is in here." She answered and stretched her arms. "I understand why a certain someone always wants to fly around with you. And with certain someone I don't mean your new trainee." She looked into his eyes over the rear mirror and winked.
"I don't have any idea what you mean Minako."
"Oh c'mon, everybody can see that there's something going on between you and Rei. Well, almost everybody. Usagi probably can't. What's the situation right now? What happened on that cruise ship, tell me."
"Nothing happened. I don't know what you mean. Me and Rei are just friends."
"Yeah, right. I mean even if Rei wouldn't be one of my closest friends I could see how you look at her."
He didn't answer and turned his gaze away from the rear view and to the front.
"I really don't know what you mean." He tried to get out of this again.
She leaned forward.
"I'll show you something."
She put her hand over back, and slipped under his life support system, hand resting over his heart now. He could feel a warm, pleasant feeling in his chest.
"What are you doing?" He asked her surprised.
"What if I tell you, that I'm really the incarnation of the goddess of Love and I can feel certain emotions when I touch people?"
"I'd tell you that even you're on university to still go easy on the drugs."
She laughed.
"You think this is so devious in a universe where people can bend space and time or move things with their mind?"
SunTzu turned around to her.
"Okay. And what is my heart telling you then?"
She leaned closer to him so she could whisper in his ears.
"You're head-over-heels in love with a certain someone. But like i said I don't need my powers to see this." She smiled before she continued. "I tell you a secret. Maybe, just maybe this certain someone has feelings for you too. Even though she has problems to show it."
His eyes widened and his jaw dropped for a moment and she laughed when she saw his reactions.
"Sad, that the Goddess of Love has to interfere so that you two finally can get it together." She said with a played annoyed voice and sighed. "She should be happy that I'm such a good soul and dropped out of this competition."
So, I'm a competition now. Sure, just use me and throw me away like a dirty towel. Not that I have feelings or something.
Her eyes lighted up and she had an idea.
"Which doesn't mean I can't provoke her a bit." She let out an evil laugh. "Say, you can transmit music from inside here, right? Did you know I'm a pretty well known idol?"
Some twenty minutes later they dropped out of hyperspace near the Taskforce and the Corellian Frigate.
SunTzu glanced at the chrono, the Royals and their diplomatic mission should've been back already.
Showtime.
He gave AICA the order to transmit over to the Far Side while Minako wrote a message to Artemis
"Good evening Taskforce Sol, this is Lieutenant SunTzu speaking again and tonight we have a very special treat for you. Ladies and Gentlemen, the wonderful, the beautiful, Goddess of Love, Minako Aino. And she's singing a special song for us.
Minako began singing and Artemis opened the channel to be audible on the whole ship.
In the Lounge near their quarters Ami, Hotaru and Setsuna were enjoying a cup of tea after a long day and were soon joined by the Senshi that accompanied the mission to Coruscant, even the Queen joined them.
They all were surprised as the speakers suddenly started to play music.
"Hey, that's really Minako singing." Ami stated and looked up to the speakers.
"She's pretty relieved that the exam is over now. That's probably her way to celebrate."
"Where is she by the way?" Michiru asked.
"Oh. She and SunTzu went to earth yesterday and stayed there till today. She needed something from the library there or so." Ami told her.
Rei, who was sitting next to Ami now, dropped her jaw.
"They did what?"
"They left for earth overnight. I guess with the song they're signaling they're back and that they're good. Like you did with SunTzu last time."
Ami could swear she saw a small cloud of smoke rise up from Rei.
"Ah. Okay. You girls excuse me please." With an austere look she got up and left for her room.
The other girls gazes followed her.
"What was that about?" Usagi asked, with a puzzled look on her face.
Most of the table facepalmed, except for Setsuna, Ami and Hotaru.
"Oh Usagi." Ami sighed.
Rei tore her closet open and yanked out the flight suit she kept around lately. Next she searched for the tightest bra that she had in her cabinet.
If you wanna play girlfriend, we gonna play girlfriend.
She thought that Minako gave up seriously hitting on SunTzu a long time ago but now they had been on earth together, doing whatever together. She even was singing songs in AICA now.
But be aware Goddess of Love, Rei Hino doesn't run away from a fight.
As soon as Minako finished the song SunTzu landed on the Far Side and when he opened the canopy she was already strapped out and stood up.
A cheering crowd moved up to the starfighter and applauded her. She blew kisses, waved and shook hands with and to the mostly male crowd. She was a magnificent singer after all and the crew loved her performance.
A dozen hands offered their help to her to climb down and when she was on the deck she even had to write autographs, partly on arms. Selfies with her were taken, even a group photo where she sat on the shoulders of a particularly big and strong guy.
The blonde enjoyed the interaction with the crowd greatly.
SunTzu followed the spectacle from his pilot seat and shook his head smiling.
After a few minutes of interacting and thanking the attending crewers Minako turned around and gave a wink to SunTzu, forming a Thank You with her mouth which he answered with a sloppy salute and a smile.
Then the singer excused herself from the fans, got her luggage and after telling three fans that she was okay to carry her bag on her own she left, blowing a last kiss to the crowd.
She was almost at her room, when she run into Rei. The fellow Senshi was wearing a flight suit.
"Hey Rei, whatcha doing?"
"Oh, I thought I'd see if I could catch a leisure ride with SunTzu. He usually does that for me, you know. What about you? How was earth?" Rei said in a snarky tone.
"Rei? Are you jealous?" Minako asked, trying not to laugh.
"Me jealous? Oh please. For what? Do you really think I could be jealous because of Topper Harley. We're just friends." She remarked, with crossed arms and a severe look on her face. "Did anything happen between you two." She asked, suddenly not being so harsh anymore
Minako sighed, Rei should know better.
"Rei, listen. He just helped me to pass my exam with bringing me to earth, that's all. And you should know that I wouldn't make the smallest move because I know that you developed feelings for him."
Rei wanted to open her mouth and disagree.
"No Rei. You know who you're talking to." Mina put her arms on Rei's shoulders. "Maybe you guys should think about how long you want to keep up this charade between you two up before you both finally come out with your feelings." She gently squeezed Rei's shoulders and turned away, picking her bag up again and continuing her way to her room.
"He's still in the hangar." Minako told her over her shoulder.
"Mina-Chan?" The blonde girl stopped and turned around. "I'm sorry."
Minako smiled and closed her eyes for a moment before she looked back to Rei.
"It's all good. That was just the temper of Sailor Mars we all know and love. Now do the goddess of love a favor and go." She winked and turned around.
Rei nodded and began walking to the hanger with fast, energetic steps.
Minako was right, time for results.
The crowd soon dispersed back to their various tasks around the ship and SunTzu went on with a after-flight-check, minding his buisness, the hangar almost empty now.
Rei arrived at the door to hangar and stopped for a moment. She fixed her hair and opened the zipper of her flight suit till under her chest, revealing tight pushed up cleavage In her most tight bra available. She fixed everything in place and took a deep breath.
I hope you're ready for the whole fiery package of Sailor Mars my dear little Top Gun.
Then she stepped inside the hangar and headed for the AICA's Landing Spot.
SunTzu was almost finished with his checks. In the corner of his eye he saw that someone was moving towards him so his head turned.
It was Rei. And she wore a half opened flight suit, revealing a great looking pushed up décolleté.
His jaw dropped. What was happening now? Was he hallucinating?
Suddenly the lights went red and an alarm started blaring through the whole ship.
Artemis came over the speakers and declared all hands battle stations.