The release of emotion is what keeps us healthy. Emotionally healthy."
"That may be, Doctor. However, I have noted that the healthy release of emotion is frequently unhealthy for those closest to you."
-- McCoy and Spock, "Plato's Stepchildren", stardate 5784.3
**************
For Jeffords, time had slowed down. The Courtier charged, the Marines' hands moved towards their sidearms. A dozen curses flashed through Jeffords mind and then Moldiver was there, her hand closing around the courtier's wrist, jerking him off his feet as time returned to normal. The courtier, unprepared for the sudden stop, lost his grip, his sword flying out of his hand and bouncing and sliding across the platform.
"How dare you?" The Courtier demanded, drawing himself up in self-important righteousness and then staggering as Moldiver pushed him backwards several steps. "Honor demands that I avenge the insult to my Lord!"
As one of the Marines raised his sidearm, Jeffords grabbed the man's arm. "No."
"Sir?"
"I want to see how she handles this."
Collal assumed a fighting stance while Moldiver stood there. "YAAAAHHHHH!" he shouted, charging forward.
Moldiver stuck out her hand, palm forward, which Collal ran into. Moving with his momentum, she moved her hand back until he stopped and then shoved forward, sending him stumbling backwards and into the lake.
Turning back to the dais, Jeffords saw that the Emperor was descending the steps, and crossing the creek, his wives behind him. His attention distracted by Tsunami's greeting, Jeffords renewed his observations. The emperor was roughly six feet in height. Long tied back black hair and dark eyes. He wore no visible ornamentation of his rank save a sword hilt fastened to his belt. Unlike the others, who had a slightly alien air about them, the Emperor came across as regular guy. The sort who would give you the shirt off his back if it meant helping you out.
Three feet away from the Terrans, the Emperor stopped and looked at Tsunami.
"Captain Jeffords, His Royal Highness, Lord of the Stars, Chief Protector of the Most Holy Trees of Jurai and Ruler of the Juraian Empire, Emperor Tenchi Masaki," Tsunami said.
The Emperor bowed to Jeffords as Jeffords had bowed to him. The courtiers gasped and muttered discussions sprang up among them.
"The Emperor greets the Ambassador as an equal," the old man said. "The Ambassador and his party are invited to join his Highness for dinner."
"The Ambassador accepts on behalf of his party," Tsunami responded.
Turning, the Emperor made his way back up the steps and towards the right hand waterfall. When the two guards had followed, and the dais was empty, Tsunami gestured and they followed her up the stairs across the dais, behind the right hand waterfall, through a small doorway and into a long, wide hallway. Waiting for them was the Emperor, his wives, Tsunami's twin, and Misaki.
"I'm sorry to make you go through all that, Captain Jeffords," the Emperor said holding out his hand, which Jeffords, after a moment, took. The Emperor, he noted, had a good, firm handshake. "The formalities of the imperial court require that I can't speak and that the Master of Court," he indicated the white-haired man, "must speak for me. It seems a bit silly I know but-"
"But we do it anyway," the purple haired Empress said, grabbing her husband's arm. "As will succeeding generations. The formalities are what keep Jurai at the top of the-"
"Aw, c'mon, Ayeka," the green haired Empress said, giving the other woman a knowing grin as she grabbed his other arm. "You know you make us follow those rules cause you get off on it. Remember when we worked the carrot fields?"
"Um girls?" The Emperor asked.
"Why-I never-" Aykea sputtered, but she had a grin on her face. "I don't know why Tenchi married you in the first place, you horrible beast!"
"Um," the Emperor looked back and forth between the women. "You girls didn't really leave me a choice in the matter."
"Oh yeah," the green haired one said, staring thoughtfully at the ceiling. Her counterpart took the opportunity to kiss their husband.
"Captain," the Emperor said, "may I present the loves of my life." He indicated the purple-haired woman. "Ayeka."
Ayeka half-bowed. "A pleasure." She smiled in a friendly fashion. "I sincerely hope that your visit to our empire is the first of many and that those succeeding visits come under the auspices of peace and friendship, rather then this horrible war."
"And," the emperor indicated the other woman. "Ryoko."
Ryoko, Ryoko...
The room was filled to practically bursting, scientists from virtually every country on earth and their security details.
Ryoko gave a half-wave with two fingers. "Yo."
Before them, a clear barrier looking into a small, furnished room. It's sole occupant, a tall, dark-haired woman dressed in some sort of odd Japanese kimono-robe hybrid. Only the Americans seemed to know anything about her and what little they had provided raised many questions and very few answers.
"You're a very lucky man, Your Highness," Jeffords said.
The woman smiled as she stood on the other side of the clear barrier, swaying slowly from side to side as she sang in a child's voice. "Ryoko, Ryoko, greatest crook ever known, catching her would bring much reknown. Mighty Warrior, left he did, took me and his ship when he made the trip." She pressed herself against the barrier. "The ship did crash, frozen I was, Ryoko caught and frozen too. The warrior stayed, retired he did, no more fighting ever again. Became a priest, ruled the shrine, forgot about me, but I won't whine. Grandson left, became a king, married the princess, wed the crook, putting the warrior off the hook." Her eyes rolled back in her head and she collapsed, dissappating into motes of fading light, laughing the entire time.
"...is, isn't he?" Ryoko was saying as the last echos of laughter faded back into Jefford's memory. She kissed the Emperor.
The Emperor cleared his throat and indicated the man Jeffords and his crew had traveled hundreds of light years to see. "I believe you already know Lord Misaki."
"'Lord' Misaki?" Moldiver repeated.
Misaki turned red. "It turns out that my Grandfather Tarou is His Highness's cousin on his Father's side."
"And it would not do for a relative of the Emperor to have an inferior rank," Ayeka said.
The Emperor indicated the old man, who was removing some kind of device from his ear. "My Grandfather and Master of Court, Yosho, and my sister in law, Sasami, who serves as my chief advisor." He indicated the blue haired woman standing face to face with Tsunami and both women patently ignoring all others.
"Hello, Tsunami," Sasami said.
"Hello, Sasami," Tsunami replied.
"It's been a while, hasn't it?"
"Yes, it has."
"Shall we?"
"I see no reason why not." With that, the pair joined hands. Almost instantly, a near-blinding golden light sprang up around them and Jeffords found himself half-expecting to hear a heavenly chorus singing. As it was, he could have sworn the golden sparkles briefly formed the image of a tree.
The light grew brighter and then faded. Where there had been two women, there was now one. She was tall, her blue and scarlet kimono/robe hinting at an almost amazonian physique under the cloth. Her blue hair was tied back into twin ponytails and three bangs hung over her forehead, the almost childish style constrasting sharply to the rest of her. Her posture was rigid, the word soldier written all over her, figuratively speaking.
"Sanumi," Ayeka said. "It is good to see you."
"As it is to see thee, your Highness," Sanumi replied. "My Lord," she bowed to the Emperor, hands inside her sleeves.
Ayeka turned to the Terrans. "Captain Jeffords, may I introduce the Battleship Tsunami, or as she is more commonly known, Sanumi."
"Hey, if the reunion's over, can we get on with the grub? I'm starving!" Ryoko said.
"Of course, My Lady," Sanumi said, turning and leading the way down the hall.
"Merged personalities, political fanatics, Aliens who speak accentless English," Tarn said softly as they started walking. Tarn was a fellow member of the Eurasian Defense Force. "I'm starting to wonder how much of what we learned from Eve was in fact insane ravings."
"Eve?" Jeffords stared at him. "You were at-" he broke off as they turned a corner and entered a dining hall. Before them a vertiable feast was set out for them to enjoy.
"Have a seat, Captain, there will be time enough to talk after the meal."
**************
With a final flourish, the last of the meal was set aside. Though delicious, Juraian food seemed to be heavily vegetarian, with very little meat. On the other hand, no one joined the Royal Navy looking for same old boring things.
"Captain Jeffords," Ayeka said, setting her hands on the table, "as I'm sure you've been told, a ship full of Terran Soldiers was not what Tsunami expected to find when she arrived in Sol. The garbled message is, as Tsunami explained, to blame, and while we are grateful for the offer of help, your craft is obviously not a warship, despite the extensive refitting. Exactly what sort of aid are you here to provide?"
"Whatever you need," Jeffords replied. "My orders are to assist you in whatever capacity we can. Military or otherwise. My holds are filled with everything from medical supplies to farming equipment to tactical nukes."
"The nuclear warheads would provide a much needed assist. While able to shrug off the radiation and heat in their ship form, they be greatly vulnerable while in their alternate form," Sanumi said. "Killithain are drawn to planets when requiring rest. Detonating the warheads in the asmotsphere could weaken them during initial exposure enough that our battleships could best them. If the Tsunami or large numbers of craft need not be present at each encounter, we perchance might win this war. Our choices be limited."
"And render the planets inhospitable," the Emperor said distantly. "I don't care what Dad said. Nuclear is not the future."
"I must agree with Sanumi," Ayeka said. "We do not have very many alternative options. This system is among the last bastions of civilization in the galaxy and more of those fall each day. If we do not act fast, the Thaniens and their Killithain slaves will soon have the numbers to overwhelm even the Maru's considerable defenses." Her eyes began to blaze with anger. "Look how easily they broke Jurai and we fled like scared dogs." She rose to her feet. "The galaxy is laughing at us. Us! We who-"
"Oh sit down," Ryoko said, grabbing the other Empress by the sleeve and yanking her down. "Have some Sake and lay off the melodrama."
"Killithain?" Tarn asked. The science officer leaned forward with intense interest. "What, exactly, are these Killithain?"
"Killithain is what we call the prisoners of the Thaniens," Yosho said. "Killithain are mindless beasts, driven to do their masters bidding. They have no real independent will and linked by some sort of subspace telepathy. They are, in effect, living weapons." He gave them a sardonic smile. "An interesting life, no? The energies wielded in their ship form let them match all but the Tsunami blow for blow. To destroy even one requires a blitz of all weapons from at least ten dreadnoughts or equivalent. As they tend to attack in groups of six, it makes fighting them difficult and why we have been forced back into one system. It's all we can hold. Washu has seeded the system with some rather...specialized defenses which for now has held them back as it costs them in numbers. But soon they will have enough Killithains that they can attack without worrying about such...mere trifles."
Mirai stared at the table. In her career as Moldiver, Mirai had developed a sort of sixth sense that let her know when something was off. And it was blaring right now.
"Lady Moldiver? Lady Moldiver!" Mirai looked up to see Sanumi looking at her.
"Huh?" she asked and then swore silently. 'Nice one, hero," she thought. 'Real superheroic sounding.' She shifted her mental train of thought to full Moldiver mode, which she hadn't really been in for the past month.
"You seem distant, and have not touched thy food. Is something wrong?" Sanumi asked.
"No...no. Just tired I suppose," Moldiver replied. "I've been living in this suit since we left Sol." It was close enough to the truth. When wearing the suit, Mirai had discovered that she needed no food or sleep. She had just as much energy when she took the suit off as she did when it she put it on.
"And you have no wish to risk compromise of thy true identity either," Sanumi said with a smile. "Lord Misaki, wilt thou allow her to use thy quarters to rest?"
"Me?" Misaki asked.
"I cannot leave this meeting and thou are the only other one besides myself in whose presence she may remove her guise without fear of discovery."
"You know who I am?" Moldiver asked.
Jeffords grimaced as he remembered Tsunami's near slip when they had met her for the first time. Finding out who Moldiver was and where she got her powers was high on the list of last minute orders that he had received as the Christopher had left Martian orbit.
"Aye," Sanumi said, replying to Moldiver's question. "It is long been a custom to avoid open contact with planets who have not yet developed the ability to travel between the stars. The Sakigake is a step, and little more as your own people have admitted. But our need was great, and Misaki did entrust me with your true name ere I left for Sol. That name, Lady Moldiver, I promise you, will never pass my lips without thy leave."
"Er..." Moldiver said. She too, was remembering Tsunami's near slip.
"You do not have to worry, Ms Moldiver," Ayeka said with a smile. "To be entrusted with a secret is considered an honor of the highest caliber among Juraians. You may rest assured that it is safe with her."
Tarn looked interested. "Does it matter what the secret is?"
"No," Ayeka replied. "It is said among Juraians that the measure of a person can be gauged by how many secrets they have been entrusted with."
"But how did such a custom come about?" Tarn asked. "Placing so much value on secrets could eventually tear the society apart."
"It has to do with the origins of the Juraian Empire," Yosho said. "Our earliest records tell us that before the Empire, we Jurai were pirates, dividing space into territories and warring viciously with each other. How that came to be has been lost to time. Anything beyond some thirty-thousand years ago is legends, stories, hints, myths and half-truths. However, as some of those myths and stories bear strong coincidence to each other and to the legends, stories and myths of other races, historians believe that some great cataclysm struck the galaxy some thirty-five thousand years ago, plunging it into what's we refer to as the Great Blackout." Yosho moved his head. causing the lights reflecting off his glasses. "For five thousand years, the races of the Galaxy struggled to survive this terrible event, record keeping forgotten. We may never know what caused this terrible event, but it's agreed that it must never be allowed to happen again. In this, we are united...albeit barely. But that will change once this war is over, I promise you."
"Indeed it will," Ayeka said. "When the Thaniens first struck, there was much bickering about what to do, procedures distracting from taking action, racial ego causing stonewalling, and all the while, the Thaniens were using the Killithain to chip away at our defenses and we didn't realize it until it was to late. Now look at us." Ayeka's hand tightened around her glass, threatening to shatter it until Ryoko leaned across the Emperor and grabbed her wrist, squeezing until Ayeka relaxed her grip.
"Interesting," Tarn mused. "And there is no clue as to what this Cataclysm was?"
"None," Yosho said. "There are stories of a deep-space exploration ship in whose data banks and holds lie records of the Cataclysm, what it was, and life before it. For some reason, the crew set its computers to endlessly jump the ship between stars, never getting close to any star, always jumping away whenever anyone gets near it. Then they all committed suicide. All but one, a scientist who fled the ship while the others were killing themselves, taking an escape pod and ending up on the Homeworld of the Mari, where the story of this ship was first heard. No one knows what race built the ship, and bizzarely, the Mari have no stories of strangers from the stars."
To this day, traders and explorers have claimed to see this ghost ship here and there along the edges of civilization, always vanishing into hyperspace before they can get close enough to confirm their sighting or have any more evidence of it's existence outside of sensor ghosts."
"A Flying Dutchman," Jeffords said.
"The ship is irrelevant," Sanumi said. "We have no time to be chasing stories. The Thaniens and their slaves are real and a course of action must be decided. I stand by mine proposal of using the Terran weapons to contaminate asmotspheres and weaken the Killithain."
"And why stop there?" the Emperor said. "Why don't we take it one step further and contaminate some of the other holdouts, just to keep them 'safe'?"
"A small price to pay," Sanumi said. "Perhaps, My Lord, if you would set aside such sentimentality-"
"How dare you speak to your Emperor like that!" Ayeka demanded, surging to her feet. "Show some respect!"
"I have," Sanumi said coldly. "But let us be clear, Your Highness. My allegiance is to the Empire, not the Royal Family. So long as the Empire survives, I will take any course of action I see fit."
"Tenchi is the Empire!" Ayeka shouted, slamming her hands down on the table. "It is well within his rights to decide the course of action to take and I have every confidence in him to make the right choice. And furthermore, since he is the Empire, you, like the rest of us, will comply with his decision and do so without question!"
Sanumi raised an eyebrow. "But what if," she said with a smirk. "That decision was to leave you and Ryoko?"
"Why you-" Ayeka leaned forward only to stop as a glowing beam sprang forth from Ryoko's palm to bar the way.
"That would be his problem," Ryoko said. "Arguing isn't going to solve anything, ladies," she continued, eyes narrowing slightly. "Why don't we call it a day?"
"I agree," Yosho said. "Let us adjourn for the evening and resume tomorrow when we are fresh. Is that acceptable, Captain?"
"Of course," Jeffords replied. "Mol-" He broke off. Misaki and Moldiver were gone, and the door to the room was sliding shut.
"Jeez," said one of the Marines.
**************
Imperial Quarters
By almost any standard, the temperature in the Imperial Quarters was nearly unbearably warm. For the two women who lived there, it had taken some getting used to. Tenchi Masaki, however, found the heat comforting and a shield against things he didn't want to think about as he stared out the window at the blackness of space. In the distance, the single star that the Maru orbited. From here, it was distant light, like the windows of the shrine temple as seen from the house back home.
Home...
Had it really been fifty years since he had ventured into that cave? Fifty years since a decision made in a moment of bravado had led him into forbidden territory, the first steps on a journey that had...
Had gotten him killed.
A shudder ran through him. Though he had been ressurected, when it was cold, and he was alone, he could still feel Kagato's sword in his guts as the space pirate had cleaved him in two. He shivered, fighting the urge to order the computer to raise the temperature.
Had it all been worth it? The aches, the pains, the frustration and the terror? Was the final result worth all that? He turned from the window and looked at Ayeka, who sat at the vanity brushing her hair and Ryoko, who was floating in mid-air over the bed, her thumbs dancing over the controls of a video game.
"Yes," he said softly. "Every second."
Ayeka turned her head. "Did you say something, Tenchi?"
"Just thinking about the past." The ruler of half the galaxy sat in a chair facing the bed. "Captain Jeffords...what's your opinion of him?"
"He's no ordinary captain," Ryoko said. "He recognized my name."
"Are you sure?" Ayeka asked. Ryoko nodded. "But how? There's no way he could have known it beforehand and it's a very rare name."
"You're forgetting that he's human, Princess," Ryoko replied.
"Ah yes," Ayeka said, frowning. "I keep forgetting humans can't pick up on the nonverbal portions of Gesterano."
Gesterano, which was used by the Galactic Community at large as a common language was a simplified version of Juraian but nevertheless had the same array of subvocalized sounds and subtle nuances of body language. Curiously, with the subvocalization and body language taken out, Gesterono became extremely similar to many Terran languages, names and all.
"But that could merely mean he has spent some time in Japan," Ayeka said. "In Japanese, Ryoko is a fairly common name."
The reformed space pirate shook her head. "No. It was more then that. He's got a poker face, but I could see it in his eyes. Somehow, he recognized my name as one connected to some event. Not a personel one, just...an event."
"But what sort of event?" Ayeka wondered.
Ryoko shrugged, a gesture whose results did not go unnoticed by either Tenchi or Ayeka. "Beats the hell out of me," she said, tossing the video game onto the bedside table. "I'm not telepathic."
"But you could tell he recognized your name," Ayeka said with heavy sarcasam. "And that it wasn't the name of someone he had been close to."
"It's called 'tells', Princess," Ryoko said with a smirk. "It's how you can tell how good someone's poker hand is. All it is is body language and a little logic. Everyone has tells, even full body borgs, if you know what to look for." She ticked them off on her fingers. "His eyes went a bit blank, means it was a memory, but not a romantic one. His heart rate stayed the same, so it wasn't a bad memory or a scary one, or any one that could've involved adrenaline or any extreme emotion. His eyes narrowed, so he was thinking, putting pieces into place and such. Since it happened right after you said my name, he obviously recognized my name in connection with some event." She spread her hands. "You just have to know what to look for."
Ayeka sprang off her chair and grabbed Ryoko, pulling her down to the bed, elicting a surprised sqauwk from Ryoko. "And did my 'tells' say I would do that?"
"No," Ryoko said, and rolled, straddling Ayeka. "Did mine say I would do that?" Ayeka's response was to tickle Ryoko, who ticked back. Fairly soon, both women were rolling around on the bed, giggling and emitting the occasional moan as questing fingertips crossed spots that were less ticklish and more sensitive.
Tenchi watched with some amusement until the struggle brought them near him, at which point, two arms grabbed him and pulled him between the combatats, where it became quickly apparent that things other then tickling were on their minds.
**************
Amagi sighed to himself as he signed his name on the plate and dumped the report into the queue where it would be e-mailed to the officers of Amagicorp.
There were many pluses to being the billionaire owner of a company, but administration wasn't one of them. However, most billionaires didn't have Isabelle. The android could quickly and efficiently sort through the data and deal with the day to day, leaving him free to work on that which needed to be worked on.
However, even with Isabelle filtering the wheat from the chaff, it still took up the better part of his morning to clear his desk of the day's tasks. Pulling the keyboard in front of him, he composed a short memo to Amagicorp's employees commending them for their hard work for the current fiscal quarter. He could've had Isabelle do it, that's what assistants were for, but Amagi found that the occasional "personal touch" worked wonders.
With the sheep fed, Amagi turned his attention to the buyout of a small upstart robotics firm. It's idea of a giant, armed, and armored robot, a "buma", that could compress itself down to human proportions seemed ludicrous, but Stingray, their head scientist insisted it could be done. Amagi decided to put the matter before the stockholders and let them decide. Now, what next? Asteroid mining or the Amagicorp worker's strike in Africa?
The com beeped. "Yes?" he said absently.
"Doctor Jun Ozora to see you, Professor," Isabelle's voice said.
Amagi brightened. "Send her in, of course."
Not a moment later, his office door slid open and Jun Oroza stepped in. Immediately, Amagi could tell something was wrong. Her eyes were red-rimmed, her normally confident walk unsteady, and her hands were visibly trembling.
"I'm sorry to bother you, Hiroshi," Jun said, "but I didn't know who else to turn to."
"That's what friends are for," Amagi said. "Please, sit." Jun sat. Though there was a time when they had been more then friends, that had been more then a decade ago. A great deal had changed since then. For both of them. "Before I forget," Amagi said, passing her a cred card, the number two hundred and fifty thousand on it's readout. "For Nozomu."
"Hiroshi, you don't-"
Amagi held up his hand. "Now, now, Jun, I would feel remiss if I didn't do at least something to help you raise the lad." He folded his hands on the desk. "Though I admit I'm a little surprised that Ken hasn't said anything. One would think he'd notice a quarter million appearing in your bank account every month."
"I can't say. It's so hard to read the man sometimes. I don't think he notices, but..."
"You can never tell with Ken," Amagi finished. "But enough of him. What's wrong?"
"I...it...this is so embarrassing..."
"I promise I shall never tell another living soul," Amagi said grandly, hand on his heart.
"It's...It's Mirai. She's Moldiver!"
Amagi's jaw dropped.
**************
Karou Misaki sat on the bed in his quarters, listening to the sound of the shower and Mirai softly singing. Had it really been three years?
His last words to Mirai before the Jump had been that he loved her. At the time, he had said it only to keep her from going into the sun. And then the moment in the Sakigake, where she had given him the mol-unit. Then he had Jumped, arriving in the Juraian's home system, some seven thousand light years away. Ironic, considering he was supposed to have gone to Sirius B, Polaris, and finally Alpha Centauri before coming home.
At first, he had been overwhelmed at being on an extra solar planet, talking with real aliens. Then the Killithain had attacked a few months later, and he had gotten caught up in trying to stay alive. But once they had settled in Altais, about a year ago, he had found himself remembering her, the way she smiled, and laughed. Despite many offers, he had not sought other women, and his one try with a VR program had left him feeling dirty and used.
The door hissed open and he turned to see her exiting the bathing area dressed in a thin robe that clung to her body, still damp from the shower. She was taller then he remembered, and her eyes had lost some of their shine to replaced by something dark and cold.
"Growth spurt," she said, almost embarrassed as she sat next to him on the bed. "And I've been working out, training and stuff." Misaki found his eyes drawn to her legs. They were long and muscular, but still slender. Hurriedly, he jerked his eyes back up to her face, a part of him noticing the flat stomach, trim waist and full breasts hinted at by the robe. She was watching him, smiling slightly.
"You look...fine...and..." he trailed off and his eyes moved back down to the slight hint of cleavage revealed by the robe. "Um," he jerked his eyes back up, to find that she had moved her head closer to his.
"Karou," she said softly, touching his cheek with her hand. A lightning jolt surged through him as with simply a touch, she pulled him closer. "Where's the kitchen?"
Misaki fell off the bed in what an anime fan would call a "full face fault". "There," he said, his voice partially muffled by the carpet and pointing at a rectangular hole in the wall, ringed with buttons. "Just tell it what you want."
"Thanks." He watched her get up and cross the room, triggering a discussion between the two voices that live in the head of every male since the dawn of time.
(Oh yeah, look at that, will you?)
(Don't be so crude. Granted, she is attractive, but it's been three years since you two last saw each other.)
(Years, shmears, baby, yeah!)
(Now just one minute-)
Mirai bent over slightly to read the buttons on the bottom of the kitchen.
(Whoowhee!. Mm-mm-mmm. My friend, the train is in the station, and you have a VIP pass. Hop on and get ready to ride!)
(Don't be so crude. You can't even be sure the she still possesses an ardor for you. For all you know, she has another paramour.)
(Trust me, man, she wants you, she wants you bad. Yeah, Baby, yeah.)
As though his body had a mind of it's own, he stood, walked over to the kitchen. Mirai, seeing his shadow on the wall, turned to face him. "Karou?"
"Mirai," he said softly. "Mirai, you need to go...if you don't, I...I won't be able to stop myself from...from..."
The rest of his sentence hung unsaid between them.
She smiled and untied her robe, letting it fall to the floor. "Who said I wanted you to stop?" she asked softly.
And Misaki did not stop...Not for several hours, anyway.
**************
For Jeffords, time had slowed down. The Courtier charged, the Marines' hands moved towards their sidearms. A dozen curses flashed through Jeffords mind and then Moldiver was there, her hand closing around the courtier's wrist, jerking him off his feet as time returned to normal. The courtier, unprepared for the sudden stop, lost his grip, his sword flying out of his hand and bouncing and sliding across the platform.
"How dare you?" The Courtier demanded, drawing himself up in self-important righteousness and then staggering as Moldiver pushed him backwards several steps. "Honor demands that I avenge the insult to my Lord!"
As one of the Marines raised his sidearm, Jeffords grabbed the man's arm. "No."
"Sir?"
"I want to see how she handles this."
Collal assumed a fighting stance while Moldiver stood there. "YAAAAHHHHH!" he shouted, charging forward.
Moldiver stuck out her hand, palm forward, which Collal ran into. Moving with his momentum, she moved her hand back until he stopped and then shoved forward, sending him stumbling backwards and into the lake.
Turning back to the dais, Jeffords saw that the Emperor was descending the steps, and crossing the creek, his wives behind him. His attention distracted by Tsunami's greeting, Jeffords renewed his observations. The emperor was roughly six feet in height. Long tied back black hair and dark eyes. He wore no visible ornamentation of his rank save a sword hilt fastened to his belt. Unlike the others, who had a slightly alien air about them, the Emperor came across as regular guy. The sort who would give you the shirt off his back if it meant helping you out.
Three feet away from the Terrans, the Emperor stopped and looked at Tsunami.
"Captain Jeffords, His Royal Highness, Lord of the Stars, Chief Protector of the Most Holy Trees of Jurai and Ruler of the Juraian Empire, Emperor Tenchi Masaki," Tsunami said.
The Emperor bowed to Jeffords as Jeffords had bowed to him. The courtiers gasped and muttered discussions sprang up among them.
"The Emperor greets the Ambassador as an equal," the old man said. "The Ambassador and his party are invited to join his Highness for dinner."
"The Ambassador accepts on behalf of his party," Tsunami responded.
Turning, the Emperor made his way back up the steps and towards the right hand waterfall. When the two guards had followed, and the dais was empty, Tsunami gestured and they followed her up the stairs across the dais, behind the right hand waterfall, through a small doorway and into a long, wide hallway. Waiting for them was the Emperor, his wives, Tsunami's twin, and Misaki.
"I'm sorry to make you go through all that, Captain Jeffords," the Emperor said holding out his hand, which Jeffords, after a moment, took. The Emperor, he noted, had a good, firm handshake. "The formalities of the imperial court require that I can't speak and that the Master of Court," he indicated the white-haired man, "must speak for me. It seems a bit silly I know but-"
"But we do it anyway," the purple haired Empress said, grabbing her husband's arm. "As will succeeding generations. The formalities are what keep Jurai at the top of the-"
"Aw, c'mon, Ayeka," the green haired Empress said, giving the other woman a knowing grin as she grabbed his other arm. "You know you make us follow those rules cause you get off on it. Remember when we worked the carrot fields?"
"Um girls?" The Emperor asked.
"Why-I never-" Aykea sputtered, but she had a grin on her face. "I don't know why Tenchi married you in the first place, you horrible beast!"
"Um," the Emperor looked back and forth between the women. "You girls didn't really leave me a choice in the matter."
"Oh yeah," the green haired one said, staring thoughtfully at the ceiling. Her counterpart took the opportunity to kiss their husband.
"Captain," the Emperor said, "may I present the loves of my life." He indicated the purple-haired woman. "Ayeka."
Ayeka half-bowed. "A pleasure." She smiled in a friendly fashion. "I sincerely hope that your visit to our empire is the first of many and that those succeeding visits come under the auspices of peace and friendship, rather then this horrible war."
"And," the emperor indicated the other woman. "Ryoko."
Ryoko, Ryoko...
The room was filled to practically bursting, scientists from virtually every country on earth and their security details.
Ryoko gave a half-wave with two fingers. "Yo."
Before them, a clear barrier looking into a small, furnished room. It's sole occupant, a tall, dark-haired woman dressed in some sort of odd Japanese kimono-robe hybrid. Only the Americans seemed to know anything about her and what little they had provided raised many questions and very few answers.
"You're a very lucky man, Your Highness," Jeffords said.
The woman smiled as she stood on the other side of the clear barrier, swaying slowly from side to side as she sang in a child's voice. "Ryoko, Ryoko, greatest crook ever known, catching her would bring much reknown. Mighty Warrior, left he did, took me and his ship when he made the trip." She pressed herself against the barrier. "The ship did crash, frozen I was, Ryoko caught and frozen too. The warrior stayed, retired he did, no more fighting ever again. Became a priest, ruled the shrine, forgot about me, but I won't whine. Grandson left, became a king, married the princess, wed the crook, putting the warrior off the hook." Her eyes rolled back in her head and she collapsed, dissappating into motes of fading light, laughing the entire time.
"...is, isn't he?" Ryoko was saying as the last echos of laughter faded back into Jefford's memory. She kissed the Emperor.
The Emperor cleared his throat and indicated the man Jeffords and his crew had traveled hundreds of light years to see. "I believe you already know Lord Misaki."
"'Lord' Misaki?" Moldiver repeated.
Misaki turned red. "It turns out that my Grandfather Tarou is His Highness's cousin on his Father's side."
"And it would not do for a relative of the Emperor to have an inferior rank," Ayeka said.
The Emperor indicated the old man, who was removing some kind of device from his ear. "My Grandfather and Master of Court, Yosho, and my sister in law, Sasami, who serves as my chief advisor." He indicated the blue haired woman standing face to face with Tsunami and both women patently ignoring all others.
"Hello, Tsunami," Sasami said.
"Hello, Sasami," Tsunami replied.
"It's been a while, hasn't it?"
"Yes, it has."
"Shall we?"
"I see no reason why not." With that, the pair joined hands. Almost instantly, a near-blinding golden light sprang up around them and Jeffords found himself half-expecting to hear a heavenly chorus singing. As it was, he could have sworn the golden sparkles briefly formed the image of a tree.
The light grew brighter and then faded. Where there had been two women, there was now one. She was tall, her blue and scarlet kimono/robe hinting at an almost amazonian physique under the cloth. Her blue hair was tied back into twin ponytails and three bangs hung over her forehead, the almost childish style constrasting sharply to the rest of her. Her posture was rigid, the word soldier written all over her, figuratively speaking.
"Sanumi," Ayeka said. "It is good to see you."
"As it is to see thee, your Highness," Sanumi replied. "My Lord," she bowed to the Emperor, hands inside her sleeves.
Ayeka turned to the Terrans. "Captain Jeffords, may I introduce the Battleship Tsunami, or as she is more commonly known, Sanumi."
"Hey, if the reunion's over, can we get on with the grub? I'm starving!" Ryoko said.
"Of course, My Lady," Sanumi said, turning and leading the way down the hall.
"Merged personalities, political fanatics, Aliens who speak accentless English," Tarn said softly as they started walking. Tarn was a fellow member of the Eurasian Defense Force. "I'm starting to wonder how much of what we learned from Eve was in fact insane ravings."
"Eve?" Jeffords stared at him. "You were at-" he broke off as they turned a corner and entered a dining hall. Before them a vertiable feast was set out for them to enjoy.
"Have a seat, Captain, there will be time enough to talk after the meal."
**************
With a final flourish, the last of the meal was set aside. Though delicious, Juraian food seemed to be heavily vegetarian, with very little meat. On the other hand, no one joined the Royal Navy looking for same old boring things.
"Captain Jeffords," Ayeka said, setting her hands on the table, "as I'm sure you've been told, a ship full of Terran Soldiers was not what Tsunami expected to find when she arrived in Sol. The garbled message is, as Tsunami explained, to blame, and while we are grateful for the offer of help, your craft is obviously not a warship, despite the extensive refitting. Exactly what sort of aid are you here to provide?"
"Whatever you need," Jeffords replied. "My orders are to assist you in whatever capacity we can. Military or otherwise. My holds are filled with everything from medical supplies to farming equipment to tactical nukes."
"The nuclear warheads would provide a much needed assist. While able to shrug off the radiation and heat in their ship form, they be greatly vulnerable while in their alternate form," Sanumi said. "Killithain are drawn to planets when requiring rest. Detonating the warheads in the asmotsphere could weaken them during initial exposure enough that our battleships could best them. If the Tsunami or large numbers of craft need not be present at each encounter, we perchance might win this war. Our choices be limited."
"And render the planets inhospitable," the Emperor said distantly. "I don't care what Dad said. Nuclear is not the future."
"I must agree with Sanumi," Ayeka said. "We do not have very many alternative options. This system is among the last bastions of civilization in the galaxy and more of those fall each day. If we do not act fast, the Thaniens and their Killithain slaves will soon have the numbers to overwhelm even the Maru's considerable defenses." Her eyes began to blaze with anger. "Look how easily they broke Jurai and we fled like scared dogs." She rose to her feet. "The galaxy is laughing at us. Us! We who-"
"Oh sit down," Ryoko said, grabbing the other Empress by the sleeve and yanking her down. "Have some Sake and lay off the melodrama."
"Killithain?" Tarn asked. The science officer leaned forward with intense interest. "What, exactly, are these Killithain?"
"Killithain is what we call the prisoners of the Thaniens," Yosho said. "Killithain are mindless beasts, driven to do their masters bidding. They have no real independent will and linked by some sort of subspace telepathy. They are, in effect, living weapons." He gave them a sardonic smile. "An interesting life, no? The energies wielded in their ship form let them match all but the Tsunami blow for blow. To destroy even one requires a blitz of all weapons from at least ten dreadnoughts or equivalent. As they tend to attack in groups of six, it makes fighting them difficult and why we have been forced back into one system. It's all we can hold. Washu has seeded the system with some rather...specialized defenses which for now has held them back as it costs them in numbers. But soon they will have enough Killithains that they can attack without worrying about such...mere trifles."
Mirai stared at the table. In her career as Moldiver, Mirai had developed a sort of sixth sense that let her know when something was off. And it was blaring right now.
"Lady Moldiver? Lady Moldiver!" Mirai looked up to see Sanumi looking at her.
"Huh?" she asked and then swore silently. 'Nice one, hero," she thought. 'Real superheroic sounding.' She shifted her mental train of thought to full Moldiver mode, which she hadn't really been in for the past month.
"You seem distant, and have not touched thy food. Is something wrong?" Sanumi asked.
"No...no. Just tired I suppose," Moldiver replied. "I've been living in this suit since we left Sol." It was close enough to the truth. When wearing the suit, Mirai had discovered that she needed no food or sleep. She had just as much energy when she took the suit off as she did when it she put it on.
"And you have no wish to risk compromise of thy true identity either," Sanumi said with a smile. "Lord Misaki, wilt thou allow her to use thy quarters to rest?"
"Me?" Misaki asked.
"I cannot leave this meeting and thou are the only other one besides myself in whose presence she may remove her guise without fear of discovery."
"You know who I am?" Moldiver asked.
Jeffords grimaced as he remembered Tsunami's near slip when they had met her for the first time. Finding out who Moldiver was and where she got her powers was high on the list of last minute orders that he had received as the Christopher had left Martian orbit.
"Aye," Sanumi said, replying to Moldiver's question. "It is long been a custom to avoid open contact with planets who have not yet developed the ability to travel between the stars. The Sakigake is a step, and little more as your own people have admitted. But our need was great, and Misaki did entrust me with your true name ere I left for Sol. That name, Lady Moldiver, I promise you, will never pass my lips without thy leave."
"Er..." Moldiver said. She too, was remembering Tsunami's near slip.
"You do not have to worry, Ms Moldiver," Ayeka said with a smile. "To be entrusted with a secret is considered an honor of the highest caliber among Juraians. You may rest assured that it is safe with her."
Tarn looked interested. "Does it matter what the secret is?"
"No," Ayeka replied. "It is said among Juraians that the measure of a person can be gauged by how many secrets they have been entrusted with."
"But how did such a custom come about?" Tarn asked. "Placing so much value on secrets could eventually tear the society apart."
"It has to do with the origins of the Juraian Empire," Yosho said. "Our earliest records tell us that before the Empire, we Jurai were pirates, dividing space into territories and warring viciously with each other. How that came to be has been lost to time. Anything beyond some thirty-thousand years ago is legends, stories, hints, myths and half-truths. However, as some of those myths and stories bear strong coincidence to each other and to the legends, stories and myths of other races, historians believe that some great cataclysm struck the galaxy some thirty-five thousand years ago, plunging it into what's we refer to as the Great Blackout." Yosho moved his head. causing the lights reflecting off his glasses. "For five thousand years, the races of the Galaxy struggled to survive this terrible event, record keeping forgotten. We may never know what caused this terrible event, but it's agreed that it must never be allowed to happen again. In this, we are united...albeit barely. But that will change once this war is over, I promise you."
"Indeed it will," Ayeka said. "When the Thaniens first struck, there was much bickering about what to do, procedures distracting from taking action, racial ego causing stonewalling, and all the while, the Thaniens were using the Killithain to chip away at our defenses and we didn't realize it until it was to late. Now look at us." Ayeka's hand tightened around her glass, threatening to shatter it until Ryoko leaned across the Emperor and grabbed her wrist, squeezing until Ayeka relaxed her grip.
"Interesting," Tarn mused. "And there is no clue as to what this Cataclysm was?"
"None," Yosho said. "There are stories of a deep-space exploration ship in whose data banks and holds lie records of the Cataclysm, what it was, and life before it. For some reason, the crew set its computers to endlessly jump the ship between stars, never getting close to any star, always jumping away whenever anyone gets near it. Then they all committed suicide. All but one, a scientist who fled the ship while the others were killing themselves, taking an escape pod and ending up on the Homeworld of the Mari, where the story of this ship was first heard. No one knows what race built the ship, and bizzarely, the Mari have no stories of strangers from the stars."
To this day, traders and explorers have claimed to see this ghost ship here and there along the edges of civilization, always vanishing into hyperspace before they can get close enough to confirm their sighting or have any more evidence of it's existence outside of sensor ghosts."
"A Flying Dutchman," Jeffords said.
"The ship is irrelevant," Sanumi said. "We have no time to be chasing stories. The Thaniens and their slaves are real and a course of action must be decided. I stand by mine proposal of using the Terran weapons to contaminate asmotspheres and weaken the Killithain."
"And why stop there?" the Emperor said. "Why don't we take it one step further and contaminate some of the other holdouts, just to keep them 'safe'?"
"A small price to pay," Sanumi said. "Perhaps, My Lord, if you would set aside such sentimentality-"
"How dare you speak to your Emperor like that!" Ayeka demanded, surging to her feet. "Show some respect!"
"I have," Sanumi said coldly. "But let us be clear, Your Highness. My allegiance is to the Empire, not the Royal Family. So long as the Empire survives, I will take any course of action I see fit."
"Tenchi is the Empire!" Ayeka shouted, slamming her hands down on the table. "It is well within his rights to decide the course of action to take and I have every confidence in him to make the right choice. And furthermore, since he is the Empire, you, like the rest of us, will comply with his decision and do so without question!"
Sanumi raised an eyebrow. "But what if," she said with a smirk. "That decision was to leave you and Ryoko?"
"Why you-" Ayeka leaned forward only to stop as a glowing beam sprang forth from Ryoko's palm to bar the way.
"That would be his problem," Ryoko said. "Arguing isn't going to solve anything, ladies," she continued, eyes narrowing slightly. "Why don't we call it a day?"
"I agree," Yosho said. "Let us adjourn for the evening and resume tomorrow when we are fresh. Is that acceptable, Captain?"
"Of course," Jeffords replied. "Mol-" He broke off. Misaki and Moldiver were gone, and the door to the room was sliding shut.
"Jeez," said one of the Marines.
**************
Imperial Quarters
By almost any standard, the temperature in the Imperial Quarters was nearly unbearably warm. For the two women who lived there, it had taken some getting used to. Tenchi Masaki, however, found the heat comforting and a shield against things he didn't want to think about as he stared out the window at the blackness of space. In the distance, the single star that the Maru orbited. From here, it was distant light, like the windows of the shrine temple as seen from the house back home.
Home...
Had it really been fifty years since he had ventured into that cave? Fifty years since a decision made in a moment of bravado had led him into forbidden territory, the first steps on a journey that had...
Had gotten him killed.
A shudder ran through him. Though he had been ressurected, when it was cold, and he was alone, he could still feel Kagato's sword in his guts as the space pirate had cleaved him in two. He shivered, fighting the urge to order the computer to raise the temperature.
Had it all been worth it? The aches, the pains, the frustration and the terror? Was the final result worth all that? He turned from the window and looked at Ayeka, who sat at the vanity brushing her hair and Ryoko, who was floating in mid-air over the bed, her thumbs dancing over the controls of a video game.
"Yes," he said softly. "Every second."
Ayeka turned her head. "Did you say something, Tenchi?"
"Just thinking about the past." The ruler of half the galaxy sat in a chair facing the bed. "Captain Jeffords...what's your opinion of him?"
"He's no ordinary captain," Ryoko said. "He recognized my name."
"Are you sure?" Ayeka asked. Ryoko nodded. "But how? There's no way he could have known it beforehand and it's a very rare name."
"You're forgetting that he's human, Princess," Ryoko replied.
"Ah yes," Ayeka said, frowning. "I keep forgetting humans can't pick up on the nonverbal portions of Gesterano."
Gesterano, which was used by the Galactic Community at large as a common language was a simplified version of Juraian but nevertheless had the same array of subvocalized sounds and subtle nuances of body language. Curiously, with the subvocalization and body language taken out, Gesterono became extremely similar to many Terran languages, names and all.
"But that could merely mean he has spent some time in Japan," Ayeka said. "In Japanese, Ryoko is a fairly common name."
The reformed space pirate shook her head. "No. It was more then that. He's got a poker face, but I could see it in his eyes. Somehow, he recognized my name as one connected to some event. Not a personel one, just...an event."
"But what sort of event?" Ayeka wondered.
Ryoko shrugged, a gesture whose results did not go unnoticed by either Tenchi or Ayeka. "Beats the hell out of me," she said, tossing the video game onto the bedside table. "I'm not telepathic."
"But you could tell he recognized your name," Ayeka said with heavy sarcasam. "And that it wasn't the name of someone he had been close to."
"It's called 'tells', Princess," Ryoko said with a smirk. "It's how you can tell how good someone's poker hand is. All it is is body language and a little logic. Everyone has tells, even full body borgs, if you know what to look for." She ticked them off on her fingers. "His eyes went a bit blank, means it was a memory, but not a romantic one. His heart rate stayed the same, so it wasn't a bad memory or a scary one, or any one that could've involved adrenaline or any extreme emotion. His eyes narrowed, so he was thinking, putting pieces into place and such. Since it happened right after you said my name, he obviously recognized my name in connection with some event." She spread her hands. "You just have to know what to look for."
Ayeka sprang off her chair and grabbed Ryoko, pulling her down to the bed, elicting a surprised sqauwk from Ryoko. "And did my 'tells' say I would do that?"
"No," Ryoko said, and rolled, straddling Ayeka. "Did mine say I would do that?" Ayeka's response was to tickle Ryoko, who ticked back. Fairly soon, both women were rolling around on the bed, giggling and emitting the occasional moan as questing fingertips crossed spots that were less ticklish and more sensitive.
Tenchi watched with some amusement until the struggle brought them near him, at which point, two arms grabbed him and pulled him between the combatats, where it became quickly apparent that things other then tickling were on their minds.
**************
Amagi sighed to himself as he signed his name on the plate and dumped the report into the queue where it would be e-mailed to the officers of Amagicorp.
There were many pluses to being the billionaire owner of a company, but administration wasn't one of them. However, most billionaires didn't have Isabelle. The android could quickly and efficiently sort through the data and deal with the day to day, leaving him free to work on that which needed to be worked on.
However, even with Isabelle filtering the wheat from the chaff, it still took up the better part of his morning to clear his desk of the day's tasks. Pulling the keyboard in front of him, he composed a short memo to Amagicorp's employees commending them for their hard work for the current fiscal quarter. He could've had Isabelle do it, that's what assistants were for, but Amagi found that the occasional "personal touch" worked wonders.
With the sheep fed, Amagi turned his attention to the buyout of a small upstart robotics firm. It's idea of a giant, armed, and armored robot, a "buma", that could compress itself down to human proportions seemed ludicrous, but Stingray, their head scientist insisted it could be done. Amagi decided to put the matter before the stockholders and let them decide. Now, what next? Asteroid mining or the Amagicorp worker's strike in Africa?
The com beeped. "Yes?" he said absently.
"Doctor Jun Ozora to see you, Professor," Isabelle's voice said.
Amagi brightened. "Send her in, of course."
Not a moment later, his office door slid open and Jun Oroza stepped in. Immediately, Amagi could tell something was wrong. Her eyes were red-rimmed, her normally confident walk unsteady, and her hands were visibly trembling.
"I'm sorry to bother you, Hiroshi," Jun said, "but I didn't know who else to turn to."
"That's what friends are for," Amagi said. "Please, sit." Jun sat. Though there was a time when they had been more then friends, that had been more then a decade ago. A great deal had changed since then. For both of them. "Before I forget," Amagi said, passing her a cred card, the number two hundred and fifty thousand on it's readout. "For Nozomu."
"Hiroshi, you don't-"
Amagi held up his hand. "Now, now, Jun, I would feel remiss if I didn't do at least something to help you raise the lad." He folded his hands on the desk. "Though I admit I'm a little surprised that Ken hasn't said anything. One would think he'd notice a quarter million appearing in your bank account every month."
"I can't say. It's so hard to read the man sometimes. I don't think he notices, but..."
"You can never tell with Ken," Amagi finished. "But enough of him. What's wrong?"
"I...it...this is so embarrassing..."
"I promise I shall never tell another living soul," Amagi said grandly, hand on his heart.
"It's...It's Mirai. She's Moldiver!"
Amagi's jaw dropped.
**************
Karou Misaki sat on the bed in his quarters, listening to the sound of the shower and Mirai softly singing. Had it really been three years?
His last words to Mirai before the Jump had been that he loved her. At the time, he had said it only to keep her from going into the sun. And then the moment in the Sakigake, where she had given him the mol-unit. Then he had Jumped, arriving in the Juraian's home system, some seven thousand light years away. Ironic, considering he was supposed to have gone to Sirius B, Polaris, and finally Alpha Centauri before coming home.
At first, he had been overwhelmed at being on an extra solar planet, talking with real aliens. Then the Killithain had attacked a few months later, and he had gotten caught up in trying to stay alive. But once they had settled in Altais, about a year ago, he had found himself remembering her, the way she smiled, and laughed. Despite many offers, he had not sought other women, and his one try with a VR program had left him feeling dirty and used.
The door hissed open and he turned to see her exiting the bathing area dressed in a thin robe that clung to her body, still damp from the shower. She was taller then he remembered, and her eyes had lost some of their shine to replaced by something dark and cold.
"Growth spurt," she said, almost embarrassed as she sat next to him on the bed. "And I've been working out, training and stuff." Misaki found his eyes drawn to her legs. They were long and muscular, but still slender. Hurriedly, he jerked his eyes back up to her face, a part of him noticing the flat stomach, trim waist and full breasts hinted at by the robe. She was watching him, smiling slightly.
"You look...fine...and..." he trailed off and his eyes moved back down to the slight hint of cleavage revealed by the robe. "Um," he jerked his eyes back up, to find that she had moved her head closer to his.
"Karou," she said softly, touching his cheek with her hand. A lightning jolt surged through him as with simply a touch, she pulled him closer. "Where's the kitchen?"
Misaki fell off the bed in what an anime fan would call a "full face fault". "There," he said, his voice partially muffled by the carpet and pointing at a rectangular hole in the wall, ringed with buttons. "Just tell it what you want."
"Thanks." He watched her get up and cross the room, triggering a discussion between the two voices that live in the head of every male since the dawn of time.
(Oh yeah, look at that, will you?)
(Don't be so crude. Granted, she is attractive, but it's been three years since you two last saw each other.)
(Years, shmears, baby, yeah!)
(Now just one minute-)
Mirai bent over slightly to read the buttons on the bottom of the kitchen.
(Whoowhee!. Mm-mm-mmm. My friend, the train is in the station, and you have a VIP pass. Hop on and get ready to ride!)
(Don't be so crude. You can't even be sure the she still possesses an ardor for you. For all you know, she has another paramour.)
(Trust me, man, she wants you, she wants you bad. Yeah, Baby, yeah.)
As though his body had a mind of it's own, he stood, walked over to the kitchen. Mirai, seeing his shadow on the wall, turned to face him. "Karou?"
"Mirai," he said softly. "Mirai, you need to go...if you don't, I...I won't be able to stop myself from...from..."
The rest of his sentence hung unsaid between them.
She smiled and untied her robe, letting it fall to the floor. "Who said I wanted you to stop?" she asked softly.
And Misaki did not stop...Not for several hours, anyway.