Academia: Year One

--

Once we had been so informed by the monolith dressed in scarlet that he was not the captain at all and that the captain was in the rigging above our heads, Jim and I both glanced up, perhaps in a mix of reflex and curiosity. A lithe blue figure all but flew overhead, snagging fingers briefly on cords and ropes before, with a simple flip and a casual straightening of her uniform, Captain Amelia landed quite gracefully on the deck and proceeded to address the first mate (a fellow by the name of Mister Arrow). With this done, having presented herself as an odd amalgam of serious lecture and light sarcasm, she turned to me, the plate on my accursed metal suit smashed shut, and said in a voice I discovered I did not like, "Doctor Doppler, I presume?"

As Jim looked on with some amusement I admit was rather founded, I found myself, over the course of the ensuing twenty-so minutes, being insulted in a most roundabout way, daggering words that she quickly covered with a twisting apology that was nearly as confusing as her insults. She was beautiful, razor-tongued, intelligent, and had what seemed to be some form of a sadistic streak, and I believe it was around noon the next day that I found myself suffering the first horrible stings of something akin to love. I hardly think I have ever experienced anything quite as unpleasant, and as I write this, I daresay I will find myself in a great deal of trouble with her.

Doctor Delbert Doppler

On Solar Wings: The Revival of Flint

Ra'liton Publishing (renewed OL 350)

--

Amelia touched the stretch of velvet fur where her ribs ended in a smooth curve, coat unbuttoned and white shirt pushed up so she could prod with gentle fingers the area still sore. Over the past month or so she had grown accustomed to the constant ache in her side, as she had to many uncomfortable changes in her body, some natural and others of a kind that had to be forced onto an individual. A humorless smile touched her painted lips, the small corners of her mouth twitching up as she held her gloved palm to her torso, claws nipping the edges of some unsightly scars that formed ridges of bare caramel skin where the fur would not grow over again. She felt no regret for the complete lack of femininity each jagged rip and each reminder of pain showed her, and she cared little to what others might think, but she was not pleased to welcome a new addition to her maladies. It was still rather sensitive when touched, organs and tissue stitched neatly up beneath the skin and soft hair shorn close by medical examiners, and would undoubtedly be so for months, even as she continued with her usual style of life.

She sighed and tugged her shirt firmly down, coolly buttoning with a swift chain of her wrists flicking the sturdy blue cotton of her coat before she used her palms to easily smooth back her sleek red hair, tucking the auburn strands into their usual position close to her scalp. Clicking her carefully maintained claws to the desk's honey smooth surface, she turned to gaze out the clean panes of the bay window, an eyebrow raising as she studied the dark of nighttime etherium. Checking almost unconsciously for any suspicious galleons was a habit engrained deeply into her persona and she took it in stride, relaxing tense cords in her thin shoulders after a moment's perusal revealed no threats.

Stepping quickly and efficiently over the floor in a swift cascade of tiny clicks and a smooth rustle of cloth, the coat's tailored hem brushing along her grey breeches, Amelia adopted the same amused, severe expression that had served well to confuse many a questionable person. It had irritated and bemused the kind Doctor, as well, and she frowned at the complications of their odd relationship, too friendly to be professional and too stiff to be romantic. A great deal of the stiffness was most likely on her part, as she was unused to any men taking any form of interest in her outside of the damn fine captain, that Amelia variety or the damn captain, shoot her, you scurvy idiots opposing that first standpoint.

In any case, she had no time to consider any of it, twisting the large gears holding the tumbled lock into place and shoving gracefully open the heavy wooden door of her stateroom.

She loved the smell of the etherium, a cavalcade of subtle scents that twisted into one another to birth a wondrous tang that could be easily lost by those with less sensitive noses, though it often emerged by way of etherium sickness and could be combated with a bad cold or specific medicines. The medicines, though, tended to have the same effect as a cold, stopping the nose up so that the smell could not irritate the body into nausea and other unpleasant illnesses. When she was younger, she had thought it humorous, that beings with advanced olfactories would be unaffected, whereas those without fared much worse. Too many spacers working below her falling ill to the sickness had rid her of that amusement and instead given her a lack of sympathy for those not smart enough to simply shut up and take their damned pills.

Whatever the fragrance, she loved it: smooth and quiet, rather like tea, which she enjoyed quite dearly, and it often soothed her when she had little else to turn to. No matter what hardships or pains she might take to her body and mind, the etherium would eternally exist for her, and God knew she would let nothing keep her from the environment she loved most.

Thusly, she stepped with ease and grace down the hewn steps trailing from her stateroom and the small deck there to the main deck waiting under flickering starlight for the coming morn, absently tucking her gloves a little tighter around her elbows as the stiff cloth flared slightly as it was supposed to. She was a picture of elegance and professionalism, feline strength incarnate, and a satisfactory smile pressed her lips to see that everything was perfectly maintained. The rigging was tight, the deck was cared for, and she could hear in the galley voices raised in argument pitch, broken by a surprisingly loud, scolding remark from Sarah that successfully stopped the debate before it could turn to swords and blood. Amelia wondered how well Silver might have brought about his mutiny had the startlingly formidable Missus Hawkins been on board; the woman was an excellent diplomat, respectful, soft, and strong tones helping her as she insisted on whatever it was she believed, and the captain thought it quite possible she might have turned the mutiny against the cyborg.

Jim thought the world of Silver, heaven explain it all and hell to decipher the explanation later, but Amelia had little for him but a grudging respect and an intense dislike. She remembered Mister Arrow, a strong figure that had been with her for so many years, and she paused at the foot of the stairs, near the galley, closing her eyes and collecting together the still sharp edges of a mournful memory. Breathing out, she clenched her fists, feeling her claws tickle the skin beneath her gloves, and then relaxed her grip, pushing back the aging sadness before she thought to open her eyes once more upon the glorious landscape. What was done was done, and there was naught she, nor anyone, could do to change it.

There remained a necessity, waiting this voyage out at least running the duties of first mate herself, and she would need to find a capable person to fill the empty space left professionally by her dedicated friend and ally, though the tiny nick in her essence by the loss of a friend might take longer. She frowned into the night, feeling beneath her feet the faint, almost imperceptible rock of the ship aiding the etherium sickness some might experience, and allowed an uncharacteristic sigh, a brief lowering of her strength. She was without her hat, having left it in her stateroom, but she doubted anyone other than the unfortunate spacer appointed guard would be on deck, so it was not wholly important.

Crossing the deck, she studied the yawning skies, glancing up the masts to see the softly muttering flaps of the canvas glittering with the sheen of pale yellow as they waited patiently for the brighter lights to collect once more. The clouds, airy shades of dark violet and swallowing blues, were puffy and thick, almost swollen, and she saw in the distance the flickering pale blue and dark red of the cosmic storms they had bypassed earlier, smiling with a hint of triumph in her lips at having avoided the possible chaos. She brushed an errant strand of hair behind the sharp angle of her ear, sweeping over the strong wood of the deck and around the strong mast, sharp feline eyes catching the figure hunched near the guard post.

"Doctor," she called, smiling almost kindly as she picked an easy way to the Canine fumbling with a stylus and several clumsily stacked sheaths of paper. He glanced at her, his dark brown eyes startled behind the crooked shelter of his spectacles, and then tried to shuffle his loose papers together with an uneven collection of books beside him sorted in a way that made very little sense whatsoever. "Doctor, are you aware that your spectacles are close to falling from your snout?" she commented vaguely, standing elegantly beside him, though politely refraining from pinning any of the mess under her stiletto heels. "Tough it is somehow disarming, it is also rather foolish looking. I find it advisable that you possibly rectify it before you manage to lose them, which would be something of a pity as you do seem rather astute at what you do."

He quickly moved to push the glasses into a more respectable position, a marginally insulted look on his face, which she smugly acknowledged, having had that in mind when she had spoken. "Foolish," she heard him mutter. "Foolish? Ha! Not me, certainly, I don't believe." An uncertain note had entered at the end and she considered why it was he would take her words mildly personal, arching her eyebrows skyward as if to plead for an explanation as to why nothing could be half as simple as she wished often. "Captain," he started, nearly indignant as he turned to face her again, stilling the stylus from his careful scribbling of illegible notes, "I don't think – wait, astute?" He blinked, his offense sputtering and dying sadly at the realization that she had once again presented a double-edged sword composed of insult and compliment. "But," he floundered and then he switched his gaze back to his paper, slapping a hand to his forehead as though it might help.

"Indeed," Amelia replied dryly much to Doppler's continued mortification before her mischievous tone returned. "Have you by any chance seen if Mister Diggins has managed to piece his act together?" she began in a cheekily blithe voice, her curious twice-sided nature appearing. "He seemed so very incompetent it is a wonder he has grown past his childhood. I dare say I might need to restrain him in the brig for his own safety as well as the continued welfare of my vessel, before I am forced to do something drastic such as remove his hands from his body." She twitched her lips up in a tiny smile when Doppler looked at her, an odd, comprehending expression on his face.

"Are you joking?" he asked slowly, as if to test a theory he had stumble upon, trying to judge her serious expression and the subtle, teasing lilt in her voice.

"I never joke, Doctor Doppler," she fired back, hands folding serenely at the base of her spine, reed-slender body stiff with the delicate, but deadly, poise she was naturally predisposed to. "On occasion I have been known to jest, and perhaps once every few years when I have imbibed a bit too much wine at those regal events the hierarchy insists upon I might allow myself a mock or two, but I have yet to joke." She smiled, a thin upward rictus that was as bemusing as her nature, and she continued lightly, in a bantering tone, "I find it a foolish waste of time and have also found there are many things I can accomplish during such times a-wasted. Have you any tea with you, by chance?" Her gaze turned piercing, a thoughtful note trickling into her polished voice, and he looked about his person, seeing papers, inkpots, a few un-inked pens, and many things that were quite obviously not a thermos or any drink at all. "There is a rather chill wind up here on deck. What is this thing you seem to be doing, by the way, as it is cluttering up my deck quite messily."

"It is somewhat cold," he agreed, and paused, studying her straight face in quest of any form of jest in it to deny her last sentence. "Are you really interested?" Doppler then asked, unable to fully stifle the eager tone in his voice, not being used to anyone showing interest in his work. "I mean, you aren't joking, or trying to fool me, or," he was efficiently cut off.

"I though I informed you I do not joke, Doctor," she snapped in a peculiarly friendly manner. "Now, do you wish to show me what it is you are doing or am I to restrain you to your quarters for the duration of the voyage and force you to work alongside Mister Diggins as punishment for daring to argue with the captain?" The curl at the edges of her mouth was somehow warmer than usual, an unexpected change in her usually lightly stern exterior.

"I think I'd rather be shot than trust my life in his hands," he muttered.

"If you entrusted him with your life, you just might be shot anyway," she remarked in cool reply, leaning forward just so out of her stiff-backed posture in a nonverbal beckon for him to get on with it.

"Erm, well," he started eloquently, a nervous, almost bashful tone to his words, in place of the usual nearly puppy excitement, "that is to say, I'm doing a thesis on military strategy in the Trans-Tujin War. I received a notice from my alma mater," he straightened his back proudly, intoning with great depths of sincere pride, "the University de Conocimiento, about having a post as a professor. They want me to write a few different papers to send in for analysis before they try to see if I can begin teaching."

The mere thought seemed to light him up, a glowing achievement that she could easily pinpoint as having been his goal for many years, and though she felt an unexplained displeasure at the idea, she simply granted him a soft, approving smile. It was a remarkable accomplishment, and she supposed she was to feel a sort of – what word would be appropriate, she thought to herself, and she finished it neatly with, a sort of sympathetic happiness for him.

"What have you written?" she questioned and he flipped through the papers, taking care that they did not flutter away into the gloriously beautiful void that was the etherium. "While you try to fix your continued ineptitude with organization skills," Amelia stated in an airy tone, threaded with her wry amusement, "I have a favor I must ask you: check that Missus Hawkins' quarters have a stiff lock. I will not stand for her to have a lock that might break under any sort of pressure, and it might do you well to check that your own lock works well." At his querying reply, one she sliced through after only the first syllable, she persisted with a serious voice, quietly deadly, "There are pirates along the route, Doctor, and it would not pay to stray from our course as that could very well be even more dangerous. We are not dealing with a threat like that of a simple mutiny, nor are we dealing with the likes of Barry Robin. The Flail of Procyon is said to be wandering a trail near to ours."

"Him?" Doppler choked, eyes widening with deep-rooted apprehension and an acknowledgeable, as well as explainable, fear. "But he was--"

"Incarcerated?" she suggested. "I fear he escaped as he always seems to do, Doctor. Francho Ololois seems quite adept at doing so. Kindly give me your notes, as from what little I can tell, you have little knowledge of military strategy whatsoever."

---

Sarah flipped aside the hemmed cloth of her bed, running a hand down the inside of the sturdy cotton, and smiled to herself, completely happy for the first time in – she couldn't even remember how many years since it was she had last felt as though she could just close her eyes and not wake crying or worrying. They would draw into the port in a few days, and if B.E.N. could manage it without doing something potentially harmful, she would have a small apartment to live in for a few months to find a contractor and make sure Jim was doing well. Montressor was small and she knew the best construction teams would be found elsewhere, and nearly all the work on buildings down along the dusty surface of her home planet was done by imported work teams.

Sighing, she tilted her head back to study the angled ceiling in her tiny room, the walking space but a few steps and the height of the room required her to bend her knees and waist slightly to move, but it was hers for the voyage. She closed her eyes and breathed, taking in the delicate scent of polished wood and making a brief face at an uncomfortable blossom of faint nausea in her stomach, feeling below her feet the soft rocking the ship was drifting with. A moment was all it took to pick out the tiny white pills she had packed in one of her two bags, carefully setting one on her tongue and swallowing the etherium sickness med with a wrinkle of her nose at the unpleasant, bitter herbal aftertaste. It would take a few minutes before it could begin to work and she felt her thick brown hair, seating herself briefly on the edge of her perfectly made cot as she began weaving her hair into a loose braid with quick, practiced flicks of her fingertips.

"I might as well see if I can find something to eat," she murmured, tying a swift knot at the end of her braided locks and proceeding to twist it up into an idyllic bun at the fairy soft back of her head. She used a trio of pins taken from the same bag to stick the bun into place and she stood, keeping her back bent in hopes of avoiding smacking her head painfully along the ceiling. Reaching for her modesty cap, she clasped it over the elegant bun, knotting with a gentle grip the double strings under her smooth chin and tugging firmly at the strings to draw the cap into a ruffled shield obscuring her hidden hair completely and securely.

She checked her attire, the skirt flowing in a flattened bell shape from the daintily sewn waist and the bosom of it at a modestly proper height on her chest, the faint dip of her collarbone only just visible, the puffing white sleeves of her undershirt fitted from under the straps of her pale pink dress. Satisfied that she was perfectly outfitted in the polite, conservative style that she had been raised to believe in, she then moved to the door, twisting the knob and stepping into the lamp-lit hallway flickering with a pale yellow glow. The thin, fragile hoops supporting her skirt knocked momentarily along her stocking-covered legs and she paused to orient her mind, trying to remember which way to go. Recollection served her well and reminded her kindly that the stairwell was a few feet at her back, and Sarah turned, lightly walking to the stairs and, bunching her skirt in one hand to keep from tripping on the hem, stepping hurriedly up them.

She was greeted by the night skies of the etherium, shaded by purple and rich colors of deep texture and welcoming beauty, and she had to grip the slender brass rail, her head lolling gently back as she peered into the gorgeous, consuming depths swirling overhead. Her breath caught in her throat, hitching while a wonderment took tender hold of her soul, and she could suddenly, fully understand why it was Jim had fallen so in love with the etherium, speaking at great lengths about it. It made a lovely sense now, understanding why it was he had such difficulty trying to put into words why he had been so convinced he wanted to attend the academy, why it was that he needed to earn the right, the privilege, the honor to be a captain.

"If I were ten years younger," she admitted quietly to herself, loathing that to speak she would break the comely silence, "I would've done the same."

Trailing her hand up the rail affixed to the wall, parallel to the few steps left before her, she blinked and slowly moved her hand back to the front, focusing on the mast and plucking her mind free of the wonderful fingers of etherium epiphany. Sarah shook her head slightly, a short motion of her head from one side to the other, and she quickly ascended the remaining steps, hesitating once on the deck to see the beauty once more before she rounded the jutting wall and stepped quietly down the next set of steps that led to the massive galley.

The explosion of noise was unsettling, a sudden change from the genteel delicacy above into a raucous collection of men and the occasional woman chewing dedicatedly at food, arguing and speaking in noisy tones around the room, seated at the long-tables set up. In the back she could see the cook, an alien with countless arms and appendages, a froth of tentacles sprouting from his mouth and swirling around his sickly green face, and she hesitated, not trusting the man entirely when she saw the condition of his skin; as a cook herself, she knew better than to eat anything cooked by someone who looked as if they had not bathed in a few months, and she tried to decide if she really wanted to eat the questionable stew he was preparing. Someone made a grotesque sound to the side, commenting rudely and in an obscene manner on how much they appreciated the dirt found drifting in the thick, pasty broth, and that angered the mother in her.

"Excuse me, sir, can I help you?" she called, hoisting her skirt up past her ankles and carefully lifting her feet over bottles, discarded boots, food stuffs, and whatnot scattered over the floor, and she saw several startled looks given her by the men. The smoke in the galley, billowing in a quiet manner from the wood-stoked stove, gave her no pause, as she was used to the unpleasant parts of running her own inn, and she came to a stop next to the cook. He granted her an odd, strangled rumbling sound in a language that consisted of burbles and sharp consonants. "Oh, don't be rude," she scolded, kindly placing her hands on his lumpy shoulder and pushing him away from the stove. "Sit down and I'll work the kitchen, if you don't mind." She said it in such a fashion that she allowed no response whatsoever, having spoken it in a tone suggesting she was presenting an order and not a request, and the cook, unused to being told to refrain from his job, backed away, wandering with a lost expression to the closet free spot on the benches.

"This is disgusting," she muttered, raising the pot from the stove and studying it with an appearance of stupefied disgust, and she strode quickly to the deep washbasin, tilting the sludgy contents out. A stream of water was sparked to flow over the trails slowly moving to the drain, and then she directed the water to splurge through the pot, sticking her hand into it and wiping with the side of her palm to rid the metal of the stew's rancid insides. "All right, then, I just need to wash my hands," and she did so, "and then I can cook something that's actually edible."

Several of the men glanced down at their stained bowls, chewing thoughtfully at the tasteless lumps in their mouths, and, with apologetic looks sent to the effectively discarded cook, began to move to the basin, shuffling behind her after she had cleaned her hands to dump their portions into the sink.

"Sit down, all of you," she ordered, laughing and smiling in a way that put the grizzled spacers in a surprised state of ease. "I'll try to cook as fast as I can, if you'll all just sit down and wait patiently." She shook her head again, in a gentler manner, and began flipping open the deep cupboards by her shins, peeking into the shadowed, stuffed places for anything she could prepare a stew with. Several armfuls of vegetables tied up in preserving mesh bags were pulled free, followed by a haunch of dried, salted meat, and she slid the doors shut, flipping through the drawers at level with her torso and claiming a few knives of varying sizes. "If you have beer," she called, using one of the knives' dull side to tear open the mouth of a mesh bag and collecting several of the thick, wobbly pink carrots, hailing from the Shani'n Coral Reef if she remembered correctly, "then you should finish your drink quickly and get some water. Water works best with this kind of stew, and the flavor gets dulled if you're drunk."

The women in the galley shrugged and downed their mugs of alcohol, leading a much smaller movement back to the washbasin, tugging on the thin rope to let the clear liquid flow into their froth-sticky mugs.

"Could someone find some purps for me?" Sarah continued, looking briefly through a cupboard over her head, standing on the tips of her feet in an attempt to see better into the higher cupboards. This was one of the times she regretted her shorter height, a feminine height that had counterbalanced her square face, which though pretty, was never what might be considered classically beautiful. "This won't work," she murmured, closing the cupboard and lifting a knife to slice quickly through the length of one of the shani'n carrots.

As she set the knife aside and scooped the dark pink carrot bits into her cupped hands, hastily plopping them into the shallow water in the pot, a pair of large, muscular hands offered several of the purple fruits native to Montressor and several other planets. "Oh, thanks," she said, taking them two in each hand before she looked her benefactor in the face.

A long, defined face with a nose that had the ridge in the middle that served as testimony that it had been broken once smiled jaggedly at her, and she recognized it as the hapless one of Mister Diggins. "Oh!" she repeated, smiling as she felt a bit of pity and warmth for the clumsy man. "Mister Diggins! Thank-you, really. I looked in the cupboards and they weren't in any of them."

"They're kept in the barrels on the left side of the galley," he informed her in an oddly soft voice for his tall, strong frame. "Fruits are perishables, so they can't be kept in the cupboards." He nodded his head in response to her thanks and carefully sat on a squat stool next to the counter, and she rolled her eyes in wry amusement at herself.

"You'd think I would remember that," she laughed, finishing the carrots and dropping them in a cascade of popping bubbles as well as thin splashes into the pot's withheld water. "I've had my own inn for the past seventeen years, and I really should remember things like that. I suppose I haven't had enough sleep lately." She gave him a charming smile, the worn motherly one she had frequently given to Jim, and he smiled in reply, a bashful expression on a face that was surprisingly innocent for the roughness of his features. "What are you doing here, Mister Diggins? On the Legacy, I mean."

"Alfred, ma'am," he replied in that soft whispering voice of his, "and I want to see things I haven't seen before. I'm a rigger, ma'am, and I'm not usually as bad at it as I was today. It's just – I'm used to working on smaller ships." He glanced down at his meaty palms, shafts of black hair moving around his face, and she had the sudden impression that it was not so much that he was incapable or handicapped, but unsure of himself.

"Oh, don't worry," she disagreed, "I'm sure you'll get the hang of it." She smiled at him, quietly gentle but with an undercurrent of strength that was always present in her face, and she added in a playfully sharp tone, "And I'm not ma'am, Alfred. My name is Sarah Hawkins."

Alfred Diggins looked up, a jagged smile on his face like an awkward, asymmetrical picture, and he said wholeheartedly, "Thanks for cooking, Miss Sarah." He glanced at the alien that had been assigned as cook, who seemed to be sulking and possibly attempting to drink his oblivious neighbor's mug of beer empty with one of his nasty tentacles, and then pointedly at the pot she was stirring. "Not to put Mister Grogarn down," he remarked mildly, "but he isn't the best of cooks. Or smells."

"Have you traveled together before?" Sarah asked, leaning over the pot and sniffing delicately at the more pleasant scent now wafting in gentle waves up from the pot. Judging it ready, she encircled it with arms and heaved up, staggering backwards a fraction at the combined weight and size of it, finding the pot a little more difficult to manage when it was actually full. Alfred moved to help and she stayed him with a piercing, if friendly, glare as well as a firm shake of her head otherwise, and she gritted out, squaring her feet carefully backwards, "Please don't try to help me, Alfred. It'll be easier for me if I do it on my own without people buzzing around me trying to help." Her tone was kind, though, so it took some of the possible sting from her words, and he subsided quietly, the stringy black fringe of his hair passing over watchful, anxious eyes.

She moved to the large stove-slash-boiler in the center of the kitchen, fitting the pot with some infinite care onto the post-raised metal circle under the stretching light, and scanned the sides of the boiler for any dials or buttons she could push to bring about the heat. "We've worked on the same ships a few times," he called behind her and she made an agreeing noise, one that encouraged him to speak, but informed him she would not be replying for the moment. "He's a fine cook and all, but only when you're really hungry. Otherwise it's just kind of," he paused to grope for the best word in his mind as she found the heat panel and prodded the small lever up into the slot marked as simmer-and-steam. "Gross," he said ineloquently and helplessly blunt.

"Well," Sarah said with an almost haughty, smug tone of voice, as though she begged to differ vastly, "I think I'll be cooking for this trip, so don't worry about anything, Alfred. If I can run my own inn, raise my own ill-tempered son, and weather floods every year on Montressor, I'm confident I can take care of the galley." She glanced back at the soup preparing itself rather quickly on the stove and then spared a peep at the bare, unused tin plates next to grimy bowls that each of the spacers had, and muttered, "Bread, bread, I need a loaf. Where's the bread?" She looked at Alfred and made a dismissive gesture.

"Oh, never mind. I'll find it." Sarah turned to the cupboards once more, trying to see into the lifted depths and finding it just a bit difficult with her height, but she refused to admit it. "Could you check the soup, please?" she asked, voice muffled by the cupboard door next to her head, and Alfred clambered clumsily to his feet, moving across the floor to stare at the mildly bubbling soup, which had begun to make threatening hissing sounds. "And if it's hissing at you, don't worry: it's supposed to do tha--oof!"

She fell backwards from the cupboard, clutching a dried and quite possibly rock hard loaf of mesh-covered bread in her hands, and landed with one arm casting over part of the boiler, wincing at the needles that attacked her legs quickly. "Ow," she sighed, slowly getting back on her feet.

---

Notes: Real quick! This is a set-up chapter (much like the past few have been), in that it's establishing a setting, that of the RLS Legacy. I know my chapters have been rather short, but once I've settled into a rhythm, I'm sure they'll get longer and will accomplish much more than they have been. :]

I have two mentions in this chapter of pirates, the names of which are actually derived from real pirates (from back in the day before being a pirate required the Internet and mp3s). Barry Robin was taken from Bartholomew Roberts, who was a pirate famous for his kindness and his gentlemanly nature (he treated all prisoners with respect and was noted for forbidding many vices on his ship); Francho Ololois came from Francis L'ollonois, the Flail of Spain, who, on the other hand, was one of the worst pirates to roam the seas, a vicious cutthroat who was a sadist, merciless, and – in my opinion – the most frightening pirate who lived. The university Doppler mentioned was the University de Conocimiento, or (translating the second two words from Spanish) the University of Knowledge. The Tujin is actually a species I mentioned once before in the previous chapter, and is the race of Himu, another original character to finally be introduced next chapter.

I have several thanks to give this chapter, happiness of happiness! nameless shadow, I really enjoyed your story, by the way, and it's true – the only thing that says friendship better than mud is…I'm sure there's something, right? ^-^ And I love writing the intros – it's a way for me to write something that can establish the mood or whatnot, things I probably won't be able to actually put into the story. Tmyres77, I did e-mail you (and you got it! Yay!…^-^), and I liked your story, too! A great deal, and I think it inspired me to start working on an A/D one-shot to be posted someday soon. Characterization seems to be my strong suit…western-pegasus, I /love/ your story! Is the title Latin or Italian? I want to say Italian, but I'm not entirely sure – you write in a way that everything flows (I'm not sure I can describe it). I've finished about four pages (about one-third) of the first part of 'Happenstance,' and I'm relieved to know at least one person likes the idea. ;] Nix Entente, I feel marginally guilty now. And I did write the intro on my own (it was just supposed to be the first three paragraphs, but I kept writing…). I wish I was older than I am…I can't even hold a job, which means I need to bug my mum for cash. Five more months and I can earn my own money! *victory!*

General consensus seems to like Rubin. *double victory!* Yes! Good, 'cause she's going to be around for a while.

Side note, here: I'm leaving this coming Sunday with my family to go to Egypt (to visit my dad, who is I the USAF), so I'll try to post the next chapter this Friday before we leave. I'll still be able to write and post while I'm there, but I'm not sure how fast it will be and I'm almost certain I won't be able to post for about a week after Sunday. I know I'll be writing, definitely! Just don't worry if I'm not able to post for a bit, okay? ^-^

-Palla.

royalnavyacademy.blogspot.com (it gets weirder and more incomprehensible each day….)