Asherah's knock was greeted by an outburst of giggles. "Come in!" called Rain, who sounded as though she'd been responsible for some of them. Asherah stared.
They were all sitting in a circle on the floor, in their pajamas. The sight of Nastasha wearing a pastel violet pair with her glasses and an extremely discomfited expression made her feel a bit better. She wasn't the only one having second thoughts about coming.
Rain interrupted her musing. "The bathroom's right there."
Asherah shut the hotel room's door behind her, smiled at them, and went to change.
"I'm surprised she consented to come." Marie- Louise opined, shooting a very surreptitious look in Nastasha's direction which thankfully went unnoticed, as Nastasha was occupied trying to suppress her desire to run out the door.
"Well, it certainly wasn't easy." Rain said, supremely self- satisfied.
"I'm glad she's here." said Shirley. "We've never really gotten to talk to her that much before. She was always with Chibodee."
"And she's always kept anything personal to herself." Cath observed.
Bunny looked surprised. "I never noticed that before, but- you're right!"
"Ssh," Janet cautioned, "the door's opening!"
Asherah exited the bathroom to encounter eight silent stares. She looked down at her green plaid pajamas. "What?"
"Nothing." the girls hastily disclaimed in unison. Rain and Allenby scooted over for her.
"Okay, who brought sweets?" Rain asked, pulling out a modest shoebox.
Marie- Louise, Asherah, Allenby, and Chibodee's girls revealed their own boxes. Nastasha blinked.
"That's okay," Allenby smiled at her, "that just means you get to sample everyone else's."
They opened their stashes; Rain had candy of every kind, Allenby brought enough Cooler Coffee (A/N: a Frappuchino- like drink) to keep an army wired for a week, Marie- Louise revealed a beautiful silver box full of chocolates (A/N: the Russell- Stover sort of thing. No Hershey's Kisses for France's princess!), and Asherah had chocolate chip cookie dough, chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream, and chocolate. (A/N: Think Dove brand.) Shirley, Janet, Cath, and Bunny opened their boxes to reveal a treasure trove of snack cakes, candy, and some cookie bars they'd baked themselves for the occasion.
Rain started popping sweets. "Want some, Nastasha?" she inquired, offering a handful.
"No, thanks." the Neo- Russian replied, looking to bite back a more caustic answer.
"How about mine?" Asherah held out a round stick of dough.
Nastasha wrinkled her nose. "No, thanks." she repeated.
"So, when's your next match, Allenby?" Shirley asked.
"Three days from now. I'm fighting Neo- Hungary."
"Who's their fighter?"
"Uladay Weilen." Asherah answered before Allenby could. She looked at the blue- haired Gundam pilot. "He's pretty good, but he doesn't cheat. And if he can't see you, he drops his guard just enough."
"Just enough for what?" Bunny asked.
"Just enough to create an opening." Allenby supplied, still looking at Asherah.
"I noticed you said, 'but', he doesn't cheat." Rain noted aloud.
Asherah ate a chunk of cookie dough.
Rain rolled her hand , cocked her head and raised her eyebrows, inviting an explanation.
Asherah swallowed, snagged one of Allenby's Coffee Coolers, and only answered after a long swig. "I was taught that following the rules… limits you."
The other women immediately protested, and Asherah made a downward, quieting motion with her hand. "I was raised to be an agent. There are no rules in that profession, and if you try to follow any you'll get killed." She shrugged.
"That sounds horrible." Marie- Louise shivered.
"It could be, but I enjoyed it." Asherah told them frankly. "I was good at it."
"I get the feeling that wasn't the only reason you enjoyed it." Rain tossed out, watching Asherah's face shrewdly.
Asherah snapped her face toward the other woman. There was a long, tense moment where she stared at Rain with cold eyes and an implacable expression, but then she relaxed. "No." she replied shortly.
"What exactly did you do?" Nastasha wanted to know.
"A lot of bad things." Asherah cryptically answered, giving Nastasha a look warning her to leave it at that. "Cookie dough." she flatly offered.
"No thanks." Nastasha demurred, taking a Coffee Cooler instead. Shirley leaned over and pushed a blondie into her hand. (A/N: Like a brownie, but blonde. They're good.) Nastasha looked at it doubtfully for a moment; then, visibly deciding What the hell, she took a bite.
*
An hour later, they were all grouped in an elevator, sniggering. "Okay, okay, shut up!" Asherah urged. The elevator reached the lobby and they exited, accompanied by several hastily- suppressed snorts of laughter.
Asherah and Allenby in the lead, the girls walked boldly down the street, wearing cute slippers and their pretty pajamas. Wolf whistles and indecent shouts followed them.
Chibodee, leaving a bar, stopped cold and rubbed his eyes five times before he convinced himself he wasn't hallucinating.
"Oh, Chibodee! Hey!" Asherah ran over to him.
He looked around at them in bewilderment, and the girls laughed at his expression. "Wha-?"
"Nothing." Asherah told him, and they went on their way.
Chibodee stood in the middle of the sidewalk, staring after them. Of all the things he'd never thought he'd see…
One man got too close and pinched Marie- Louise's rear. The girl whirled around, her floaty white nightgown swirling around her heels. "Excuse me, monsieur?"
He made a very rude suggestion.
Asherah and Allenby exchanged glances and leapt over the others' heads, landing on either side of the French princess. "Is there a problem here?"
"No." the man replied, looking them up and down and adding several more comments.
At his last one, Allenby cocked her head at Asherah. "Is that even possible?"
Asherah hemmed and hawed. "Uh, yeah." Looking at the drunk, Asherah politely put a question to him that left him stunned, staring after them in much the way Chibodee had, and Marie- Louise looking both scandalized and traumatized.
They set on their way again, with Marie- Louise in the middle this time. "So, what do you want to do?" Asherah asked conversationally.
"Let's go shopping." Shirley suggested.
"I didn't bring any money!" Rain told them, disappointed.
"I did." Asherah said, pulling some out of the pocket of her top. "Or we could go to a strip club, I'm sure you'd make enough to buy pretty much whatever you wanted."
Rain punched her in the shoulder as the others laughed.
The first shop they came across that appealed to all of them sold hats. When they emerged, Asherah was wearing a fedora, Allenby a reggae- style cap with attached locks, Rain had a bowler hat, Marie- Louise a Dr. Seuss Cat in the Hat- hat, and Nastasha by this time had so much sugar running through her veins and was so drunk off laughter that she was actually quite fond of her Mickey Mouse ears. Shirley had a unicorn atop her head, Janet a football helmet, Cath had gotten her hands on a sombrero, and Bunny was sporting a do rag.
The jeers on their way back to the hotel gave way, for the most part, to perplexed stares.
*
"I'm tired. I don't know about all of you, but I'm going to sleep." Rain yawned, after the girls had all brushed their teeth- somehow managing in the process to get Rain's favorite red dress and blue jacket stuck in the toilet. Asherah didn't know how she'd wound up being the one to extricate the unfortunate clothes.
"Yeah, me too." Allenby agreed, and the others added their acquiescence and made for their various sleeping bags. Allenby had been lucky enough to be the first one there, so she and Rain had the bed.
The lights were off and everyone had been silent for a few minutes when Rain spoke. "Asherah? You awake?"
"Yeah. I'm an insomniac." Asherah said.
"Really? How late do you usually stay up?" Bunny asked interestedly.
"If there are other people around, but I don't have to get up early, I'll usually sleep from one or two in the morning to anywhere from eight to ten. If I'm left to my natural inclinations, I'll go to sleep around four or five in the morning and wake up at one or two in the afternoon, but if I have to get up I can." (A/N: Asherah's showing her Mary- Sue colors. (Anyone know what they are?) These are my sleeping habits.)
There were "Hmms." from the other occupants of Rain's room.
"Hey, Asherah?" Rain tried again. "What was it like, being an agent?"
The sweets, late hour, female bonding time and darkness of the room conspired to make Asherah much more generous with personal information than she usually was. (A/N: That happens to me every single time. It gets dark, and you want to talk. About personal things that you don't feel comfortable talking about in the light.) "I was raised that way." she finally answered. "I was brought up knowing about all sorts of things- how and when to kill, about technology, how to gather information, how to fight… the aim was to make me very well- rounded, and send me out for whatever was needed. I- and the others like me- was sort of like the Swiss Army Knife of Neo- America's Department of Defense."
"How horrible." Marie- Louise again opined.
"It wasn't, really." Asherah told her again. Their voices floated disembodied in the air; the sense of camaraderie she was feeling, and the safety of not being able to see the others, prompted her to answer more fully. "Like I said, I was brought up that way- I never experienced a normal life. I was good at it, and I enjoyed it. And… there was Jonas."
"The man that wants to pit the colony nations, and the colonies and their home nations on Earth, against one another?" Shirley asked.
"Yes." Asherah answered softly. "Jonas Harrington. He was another agent around my age; very handsome- tall, well- built, brown hair, green eyes. Jonas was the only other one good enough to take me. Sparring with him was wonderful; he could match almost every move I made."
"I know what that's like." Allenby said softly.
"Who?"
"Domon." the Gundam fighter answered.
"Well, I fell in love with mine." Asherah told them, prompting startled gasps from her fellow Neo- Americans and Marie- Louise. Rain gave Allenby's shoulder a sympathetic squeeze. "We got married… and then last year I found some documents I shouldn't have. He was selling weapons to the people on Earth. He told me the rest of it- about why he was doing it. I refused to join him. We started fighting- we almost killed each other. He got away.
"After that, I went to the government and told them about what Jonas was up to, but since it's in their best interest that the other nations weaken each other, they told me to keep quiet." Asherah's voice broke. "I couldn't. So I took everything of value I could with me- and left. For the past year I've been working to stop Jonas.
"I'm starting to think I- won't be able to." she admitted painfully. "Shirley, Cath, Bunny, Janet- that's why I started training Chibodee. I know that there's going to be a showdown. Jonas and I are going to clash, and only one of us is going to come out of it alive. Jonas is just as good as I am- he's the one that taught me that vanishing trick that all of you like so much. If I die, someone else is going to have to make sure that Jonas doesn't succeed. The Shuffle Alliance was a natural choice, but Chibodee- he's so hotheaded, and he had so much potential that he wasn't really using. He would have died.
"That's why I pushed him so hard. I don't want him to die. I'd watched all of you during the Thirteenth Tournament, and I really didn't want any of you to die. That's the whole reason I can't agree with Jonas- it would only lead to death."
"That's a downer." Marie- Louise muttered.
At the same time, Shirley spoke. "You certainly have helped Chibodee, Asherah, and thank you for it. But we could help you now. There's no reason for you to do this alone."
"I have to." Asherah argued. "This is just something- I have to do. Thank you for offering to help- it means the world to me, but I have to face Jonas. I only want you involved if there's no choice. If I fail."
"Friends help each other, Asherah. They're there for you, and part of being a friend is letting them." Rain told her.
"There are also things that you can only do alone, and your friends have to let you do them." Asherah came back at her. "And your friends can only offer you their support- but that's enough."
Rain had to concede the point, but added, "Asherah… we're here for you, if and when you need us, for whatever."
"Us too." Shirley said, and Cath, Bunny, and Janet added their agreement.
"And I." Nastasha finally spoke up.
"Don't forget me." Marie- Louise told Asherah firmly.
"Count me in." Allenby added.
Asherah was overwhelmed. "Thank you." she said softly. "It means more to me than you could know."
"I wouldn't be so sure." Rain muttered, quietly enough that even Asherah's impressive hearing couldn't pick her up. Allenby made a small noise of agreement.
With that comforting thought, all nine women drifted off to sleep.
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