This takes place over a few hours, and the next bit will be the next morning, still in days five through twelve. I could count them up, but I'm fairly sure that will be day ten. Enjoy, mes amis!

Erm, and I seem to be portraying people intoxicated an awful lot. Erm… don't drink and drive! Or pilot! Especially if it's the Maru.

Oh yeah, and I remember someone telling me I'd get into a will if I wrote Trance drunk. Whoever you are, I'm holding that as a legally binding contract

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That night, they faced off. Greek and Troy, Hatfield and McCoy, Harper and the entire Nietzschean race… Captain Rebecca Valentine and the destined-to-be-a-Kodiak-Alpha (but alas for fate!) Tyr Anasazi. The game: air hockey. The place: Albuquerque Drift. The wager: twenty thrones… and the final victory in the battle for superiority between homo sapiens sapiens and homo sapiens invictus.


Beka wore her ten identical finger rings, reflecting the neon light overhead like tiny disco balls. The game had changed very little over the centuries since since its humble beginnings on a blue-green gem (at the time) of a planet few thought of anymore. Many considered air hockey one of humankind's single greatest contribution to the intergalactical gaming and gambling industry—almost enough to make up for the Nietzscheans.


She gripped her paddle, shaped like a miniature iron (one of the game's few changes) with a round bottom and waited for the flat puck to shoot out of the side of the machine onto the table's cool, airily buoyant surface. Her eyes flickered to Tyr's, and her lips curved into an anticipatory grin.


A rattle, a whoosh, and the puck was in play. Tyr tore his eyes from Beka's, and his arm flashed across the table. Beka flicked her wrist, and the disc disappeared into Tyr's goal. He blinked.


It was on.


His mind didn't wander from its laser-like focus on that plain circle of plastic {{yes, they still have plastic in the future}}. He had wondered at her assurance and had felt a tiny surge of triumph when the machine expelled the puck and she didn't react instantaneously. His eyes had been on the disc, but his mind had doubted that she was truly as skilled at the game as she believed when he realized that the disc had just vanished. It registered in a twinkling of her silver rings that he had seen it fly toward him and that his reflexes, for once, hadn't quite proved fast enough. Now he concentrated all of his faculties on the game, none on his fellow gamer.


Beka laughed silently. Ahh, the reassuring routine that inevitably played out when competing against anyone who believed him or herself inherently superior to her. They assumed this would naturally allow them them to triumph. Beka made them work for that triumph, and, in the end, they rarely experienced it. She thought of it as a public service and even as something they would one day thank her for. Someone had to remind them superiority was never simply granted by nature.


But she wasn't philosophizing at the moment. Now, she was playing air hockey and slowly defeating her latest contester. Both of them determined to win this as if their lives depended on the victory, ability would ultimately decide the outcome. Tyr had on his side generally enhanced senses, reflexes, and a better idea of the physics that sent the little circle on its unpredictable vectors. Beka possessed vast experience and reflexes engineered just for this sort of hand-eye coordination and rapid response to changes. Tyr had taken it for granted that he would emerge the winner, but Beka's sense of confidence came from countless past games from which she'd walked out with a few more thrones and a very satisfied air.


Tyr was definitely among the best players she'd ever beaten, and the finale wasn't yet sure. As she remained ahead, always by a meager point or two, adrenaline rushed through Tyr's bloodstream, speeding up his arm and sharpening his eyes and ears. His neurons were firing at almost inconceivable speeds, tracing the disc's path before it traveled the route. But Beka managed to disrupt those precise, mathematical lines often enough to keep herself in the lead. She glanced at the digital score-keeper. "To twenty?"


"Twenty."


By this time, people had gathered and were cheering the players in their battle. It must be said that most cheered for Beka, for even those who harbor a disdain and even contempt for humans usually prefer them to their more highly engineered cousins, whom they view with fear and loathing. Only appropriate for the beings who many believed had single-handedly destroyed what had required thousands of years to build, what spanned three galaxies, and what no one had ever dreamed could fall.


The excitement was so great that it had drawn Harper from the tables he and Trance (mostly Trance) certainly were cleaning out. He informed the crowd of his captain's name, and, to be fair, Trance told them Tyr's and refused to boo him. She cheered them both on, and Beka smiled to hear that high, piping voice careful to shout exactly equal encouragement for her and her opponent.


Albuquerque's staff became highly incensed by all this business the pair was drawing away from the gambling tables, but when they began hearing the cries surrounding them, the idea occurred to one to broker impromptu bets on the game. Soon, uniformed men and women hovered around the edges of the crowd, taking bets and smiling widely, not caring in the least whether the blonde human or the imposing Nietzschean won.


Nineteen to eighteen.


If Beka could convince the puck to slip once more into the goal on Tyr's side, she would win. Her rings dug into her knuckles, keeping her fully aware of their every twitch. People sometimes asked her if they didn't distract her, and she answered them that yes, they did. They reminded her of the 'hand' element in hand-eye coordination.


The puck bounced off her right corner and back to Tyr before she could divert it. He positioned his arm for a shot that would send the puck on a dizzying side-to-side course, but somehow, he sent a clean, straight shot down the center that ended inside Beka's goal. Oh, this was when she loved the game most, just like she loved piloting the most when slipping routes that too closely skirted black holes and dense nebulas.

Nineteen to nineteen.


Rattle, whoosh, and CLACK, her paddle collided with the disc. She hit it at a very shallow angle and returned it to Tyr in the middle of its sideways flight. Almost she could see him mentally redrawing the puck's expected trajectory. He executed a very unexpected move, actually buffeting the disc in his own direction so hard that it bounced of his side and streaked toward Beka. She was calculating how much longer this game would continue when it hit her like a falling boulder. An opening. An angle he wasn't counting on. She readied herself for a defensive shot, and then aimed the puck just a little to the right of Tyr's goal, seemingly a mistaken computation. But as her paddle met the puck, she spun it so slightly that Tyr didn't notice a deviation from where it should have gone until it ended up where it shouldn't have.


Twenty to nineteen.


Any words between combatants were lost in the roar of alternately pleased and angry spectators. Beka smiled at Tyr and tried not to smirk. Now that they were finished playing, their audience barely noticed their existence. They pushed through the gathering, and out of the corners of her eyes, Beka saw incredible amounts of money exchanging hands. She wondered if Tyr caught that too.


When they had safely fled the increasingly loud betters, Tyr murmured that she really should have wagered quite a bit more on their game. Beka laughed. "You made me work for that one, Tyr. If I had bet too much, the universe would've chosen this game as the first one I lost in years."

Tyr dug out a couple of thrones from his full-length leather duster but didn't hand them to Beka. She widened her eyes in mild surprise. "If you desire it, I will give you your winnings now, or perhaps we might find the nearest tavern, and I will purchase all the non-alcoholic beverages you wish."


"All?"


"All."


"Baby, you got yourself a deal."


Half an hour later, the pair had found their tavern. They sat at the bar, and Beka explained her modified version of the classic drinking game, toss-back-shots-till-someone-dies-of-alcohol-poisoning. "Now, I'm sure you can toss 'em back till the cows come home, Tyr," not that she'd ever seen a cow or really wanted to, "but can you hold your sugar?" At his expression of frank disbelief, she continued. "I'm serious. Harper and I do this sometimes, and we almost always get a group going, and I swear to you, he can hold more than anyone except the occasional Than. It must be all that Sparky he ingests." She chuckled. "Instead of falling-on-their-asses drunk, people leave literally bouncing off the walls. Well, and a little sick to their stomachs. What do ya say?"


Clearly, he still had a few reservations about this idea, but he agreed. "If I'm to preserve my dignity at all tonight, I must be victorious in some fashion."


This amused Beka to no end. "And you can't even blame that on 'your people'. That is such a typical male ego thing." Just then, she noticed Harper and Trance at the other end of the bar. Trance looked back at her and waved unsteadily, a tall glass with several tiny umbrellas in her unmoving hand. She slid off her barstool and tottered over to her captain and newest crewmate. Beka gaped. Was Trance drunk??


"Hi Beka!" She stumbled and very narrowly kept herself from the floor. "Oopsie!" She regained her feet and smiled sunnily. "Whatcha two doin'?"


Beka bit her lip. "Um, Trance, I think Harper is becoming really a terrible influence on you. Are you all right?"


Trance giggled. "Oh, alcohol doesn't affect me that same way it does you, don't worry!"


"Right, Trance, I, uh, can definitely see that. So, it looks like you and Harper are having a good time. Nothing like good old-fashioned bonding over drunken revelry, huh?"


Trance giggled, "Beka, alcohol doesn't affect me in the least teeny bit, remember?" and tripped. "Ow, my tail!" She looked crestfallen for a moment. "Don't worry, I'll keep an eye on Harper, though." To emphasize her point, she pointed to her right eye, but misjudged and poked it square on. She blinked and looked very confused. "Beka, something just got into my eye."


"Yeah, Trance, it sure did. Are you sure you're fine?"


Trance beamed. "Why, I'm doing just great! Are you fine?" She looked from Beka to Tyr. "I think it's so cute when different kinds of people can get along." Then she adopted a serious expression, eyes wide, and she shook a finger at them. "But I want you two to… to…" She paused and appeared to count something on her fingers, then curled them up again and continued pointing at Tyr and Beka accusingly. "I want you two to be careful." She turned her scolding onto Tyr. "You better not hurt her, Mr. Big and Spiky… Big Guy."


Miraculously, Tyr kept a straight face and responded respectfully that he wouldn't dream of it. He even said her name.

Trance nodded solemnly. "Good. Cos if you don't… if you do… well, if you're not good, something very big will happen, Mr. Bad Guy." She stopped and considered her words. "Or is it something bad will…" With a shrug, she returned her attention to Tyr and Beka. "Well, have fun you guys!" Smiling, she nodded to herself but didn't seem to be planning to move anytime soon.


Beka raised an eyebrow. "Thanks, Trance. Uh, I promise we'll be good."


"Okie-dokie!" Trance spun and only her hold on the bar kept her and her thoroughly umbrella-ed drink from decorating the carpet.


Bemused, Beka watched the intoxicated girl skip uncertainly back to Harper. She shook her head.


"How old did you say she was."


She twirled around on her stool. "I didn't because I have no idea. Don't know how old she is, what she is, where she's from, why she's purple. You know, I couldn't even tell you her real name. She just told us we could call her Trance, Trance Gemini. Whenever Harper asks her about it, she just smiles and says he couldn't pronounce it. That's really nothing in itself; I mean, the Than have freakin' poems for names."


Tyr smiled, a rarity that seemed to be becoming less rare. "Why am I receiving the distinct impression that you are trying very hard to resist adding a quip on Nietzschean family names. Something along the lines of… people who feel an irrepressible need to include the names of half their ancestors since Drago Museveni in their own."


Beka tried--and failed miserably--to look innocent. "Who, me? Tyr Anasazi, of the Kodiak Pride… um…"


"Out of Victoria, by Barbarossa."


"… out of Victoria by Barbarossa, I am hurt and insulted. The only possible way I can think of healing the pain might be for you to start buying me my infinite supply of teeth-rotting, intestine-destroying beverages."


Tyr hailed a bartender. "For the lady and I, rounds of…"


"Mm… Lancers on the Job."


"Lancers on the Job until one of us falls over or is sick on your bar."


Confusion became evident on the Umbrite's broken visage. "Until you… you do know that is a non-alcoholic drink?"


Beka laughed. "Yeah, hence the name. You ever drink a dozen of those in half an hour? Two dozen?"


The Umbrite turned a very interested shade of blue. Beka guessed it was the equivalent of her suddenly looking green around the gills. "I'll get that right away."