Earth-bound Shuttle on Approach from Lagrange Point Three
Catherine Bloom gazed out of her viewport. The approaching blue globe of Earth filled her view. She had last been on Earth many, many years before, when her whole family was killed as they were fleeing a battle between the Earth Alliance forces and Eastern European rebels. She has lost her parents and her little two-year old brother Triton in the firefight. She had been only four years old at the time and she was taken in by the traveling circus troupe that her parents had been part of. She grew misty- eyed as she remembered the hardships that she went through. Catherine glanced over to the seat next to her. Trowa was sitting in his seat, perfectly still, his long brown bangs, obscuring part of his face as he sat, sleeping lightly. He had been to Earth a fair few times in his life, though he had never told her of any of his exploits while he was there. Not that she was one to ask, but her curiosity had been piqued ever since the appearance of the two fiery-headed strangers who were sitting in the aisle across from them. Mariemaia Khushrenada was chatting animatedly with her guardian, Preventer Agent Aeron Mackenzie. Catherine shook her head, trying to imagine this lively, outgoing teenager as the head of a huge military operation bent on the subjugation of mankind. Looking at her surrogate little brother again and remembering the trials he went through, she paused in her thoughts. "I suppose anyone is capable of terrible things," she murmured softly.
Feeling a twinge in her back and legs caused by sitting so long, she stood up and carefully made her way around Trowa so as not to wake him. Aeron saw her get up and turned to Catherine as she was in the aisle. "Catherine, do you need anything?" she asked helpfully in her strange but pleasant accent.
"Oh, yes. I was just wondering if there was anywhere I could get something to drink," she replied. Her throat had be slightly sore ever since she'd set foot on the shuttle.
Aeron pointed down the aisle towards the rear of the craft. "There should be a bar in the galley back there. You should be able to find something to suit your tastes there. Don't linger too long though. We may be starting descent soon, probably in about an hour or so, and that can get kind of bumpy."
Catherine smiled. "Thank you." The redhead returned the smile and turned back to Mariemaia. Catherine made her way down the aisle, observing the small number of other passengers on the shuttle, who all seemed to be dozing off. "Curious," she mumbled under her breath. Pushing open the door to the galley, she did indeed find a bar there, situated on the right side of the room, away from the tables and chairs that occupied the room. It was a rather large room for a shuttlecraft, and she wondered how exactly her little party came about commanding such luxurious amenities. Mariemaia must still hold quite a position of importance to able to afford all this, she decided.
The brunette maneuvered herself to the bar, deftly slipping between tables and chairs and plopping herself into a cushioned barstool. There were only two other people at the bar, both rather large burly men, and neither of them seemed interested in anything other than their glasses filled with an amber substance that was unmistakably liquor. That was perfectly fine with Catherine. A young woman of no more than seventeen or eighteen years of age came up to Catherine. She had dark hair and a rich, light mocha complexion. She also wore a bartender's uniform suit.
"Hi there!" she greeted the older woman brightly. "My name is Rynna and I'm your bartender for this flight. What would you like to drink, ma'am?"
Catherine pondered. "Do you have anything hot? My throat has been bothering me a bit."
Rynna's eyebrows lifted ever so slightly. "Oh? Is it dry, sore or aching?" she asked, her brown eyes focusing on Catherine's throat as if she could see right through flesh and tissue.
"More of the last two, not so much the first," Catherine replied.
Rynna nodded. "I know just the thing to make that all better," she declared and reached under the bar, pulling up a plastic bottle of honey, a small pot of sugar, a teaspoon, a small plate and a teacup. She placed these on the bar, then turned around and walked to the right end of the bar and came back carrying a silver teapot. She poured the hot, steaming tea into the teacup carefully and placed the teapot on the counter behind her. Reaching for the pot of sugar, she measured out a small amount of it with the teaspoon and dumped it into the tea. Taking the bottle of honey, she held it upside down over the teacup and squeezed a fair amount of the sticky and sweet substance into the tea. Stirring it carefully, she handed the cup to Catherine, who accepted it gratefully. "Give that a whirl," Rynna said.
Inhaling the wisps of steam that rose from the cup, Catherine could have sworn she felt her aches and pains lessen. "Thank you," she said with warm sincerity to Rynna and took a sip from the cup. The hot liquid made its way down her throat, soothing the soreness she had felt. Lifting her cup in a small salute, she told Rynna, "This is really good!"
Rynna grinned. "You think so?" She pointed to the bottle of honey. "This is what does the trick. It's not just honey in here. I've added a few other things as well, like ginger and lemon extracts. It really helps with sore throats."
"As I've discovered," Catherine said as she sipped more tea. "I'll have to try making something like this when I return home."
"Oh it's easy," Rynna said. "It's all a matter of putting the right amount in. You need to heat the honey first though. Not too much, just a little bit so it's warm. Then you add the lemon and ginger in and mix it, and you let it cool. I picked this all up from my grandmother." Just then, a phone rang from behind the counter to the right. "Excuse me," Rynna said. "Duty calls."
Catherine nodded and Rynna went off to answer the phone. Catherine held the warm cup in her hands, letting the pleasant heat soothe her. After a few minutes' time, Rynna returned. "Hi again," Catherine greeted her. "Are we going to descend soon?"
"Pretty soon, but there's still about forty-five minutes or so before you need to return to your seat. Unless of course you'd like to." Something in Rynna's eyes told Catherine that this last statement was said more out of duty and courtesy than what she actually felt.
"No, I think I'll stay and chat a bit," she said, winking at Rynna. "Perhaps have more of this wonderful tea. My name's Catherine," she said, extending her hand to the girl.
Rynna smiled and shook the offered hand. "Pleased to make your acquaintance, Catherine."
"You seem awfully young to be bartending on a shuttle, Rynna," Catherine said, leaving the end of her statement open for explanation.
"Well, this isn't exactly what I planned to be doing, no," Rynna answered truthfully. "But it's only a part-time thing, or at least I hope it will be."
"What would you like to do?"
The younger woman paused and appeared thoughtful. "Well, I'd certainly like to go to flight school and be able to learn how to fly, like my brother."
Catherine's eyes widened. "Really?" she asked, not so much a question as an expression of surprise. "That's pretty ambitious. I must admit, I'm a bit surprised as to why you'd like to do that."
Rynna gave Catherine a wry grin. "Is it because I'm a girl?"
"Well, partly, I guess," Catherine replied. "It's not something I'd expect a young woman such as yourself to aspire to be."
"Well, I have my reasons. Like I said, my brother is a pilot. In fact, he's piloting this very shuttle right now," Rynna said, a hint of sisterly pride in her voice.
Catherine remembered seeing a sullen-faced young man of twenty or so climb into the cockpit at the start of their flight. From what she could recall, he had dark, blonde hair and a pasty white complexion. In other words, he looked nothing like Rynna. His copilot, a short, squat Asian man, looked even less like Rynna. "He is?" she asked, a little uncertain of whom she was talking about.
Rynna nodded. "He's the only family I have left. Ever since our parents were killed eight years ago, he's taken care of me. He's an excellent pilot, and that's how he's been able to support us all these years."
"And you'd like to follow in his footsteps. That's pretty admirable. I hope you'll be able to do so," Catherine said sincerely.
"I know I'll be able to do so, soon," Rynna said, almost distractedly. Catherine was about to ask her what she meant by that when the ship suddenly gave a mighty lurch forward, unseating Catherine and throwing her to the carpeted floor. Picking herself up, she grabbed the bar and regained her balance.
Rynna looked at Catherine with concern as she grabbed the various things on the bar to keep them from falling and breaking. "Are you all right?"
Catherine nodded. "And you?"
"I've had worse," Rynna replied, rubbing her elbow. "You'd better get back to your seat before it gets any rougher. We're apparently coming in a little bit early."
"See you on the ground, then," Catherine said, smiling as she turned to follow the rest of the passengers returning to their seats. Making her way back down the aisle, she slipped in past Trowa, (who was now awake), sat down and buckled her seatbelt.
"Where did you go?" Trowa asked as he buckled his own seatbelt.
"To the back to get something to drink," Catherine replied. "Funny we're descending so early. Aeron said that we had at least an hour before the actual descent." They both looked over the aisle at the Preventer agent who was leaning over Mariemaia, peering out the viewport. To their surprise, Aeron rose and came over to them.
"I'm not entirely sure what's going on. I don't think we're descending quite yet, and if we are, we're doing it over the wrong area of the world." Aeron looked slightly concerned. "I'm going to go to the cockpit and check with the pilot." With that, she padded down towards the front of the spacecraft towards the cockpit.
Trowa frowned slightly and looked outside the viewport. Something didn't sit right with him. Catherine caught his look and was able to tell from years of knowing him that something was troubling him. "What is it, Trowa?"
"We're on the correct flightpath for descent, but like Aeron said, we're not over the right portion of Earth."
"Yes, that's why she's going forward to find out exactly why," Catherine said.
"I know, but still..." It wasn't like Trowa to be indecisive or inconclusive about something, and that troubled Catherine. She didn't know what to do to assuage his feelings of unrest, so she sat there with him as he brooded silently.
A few minutes passed, then there was a loud sound like a gunshot from the forward compartment. Trowa shot out of his seat, ready to move forward when a large object came down from behind him and slammed him across the head. He was thrown into the aisle, bleeding from a large gash on his head. Catherine screamed, and tried to get out into the aisle, but an arm came around from behind her and wrapped around her neck, crushing her windpipe. She choked and sputtered as she was dragged out into the aisle by the rather large man in a black suit that had been sitting in the seat behind her. He held her upright while digging a gun into the small of her back. "Be quiet and don't make a noise," he ordered in a rough voice.
Catherine had no intention of disobeying his commands as she could barely breathe. She looked around the cabin and surveyed the scene and the disaster that it had become. Trowa was on the floor, still bleeding onto the carpet, unconscious. His breathing was shallow and Catherine feared he might be seriously hurt. Another large, black-suited man was holding Mariemaia in a fashion similar to the one that was holding Catherine and she could see that the man had a gun to the child's back as well. Just then, the door to the cockpit burst open and Aeron ran out into the aisle. She was bleeding from her mouth and shoulder and she appeared to be limping as well. She tried to dash to Catherine and Mariemaia but yet another black suit jumped her from an aisle seat and tackled her right into the cabin wall. He manhandled the redheaded woman and brought her arms behind her back and managed to slap on a pair of handcuffs before she could do anything in retaliation. He pushed her to the ground and grabbed her flailing feet and put a pair of cuffs around her ankle. He then dragged her towards the middle of the cabin where the other two men were holding Catherine and Mariemaia.
"Aeron, are you all right?!" Mariemaia called out, her voice strained because of the grip the man had on her. Her eyes, fixed on the Preventer agent on the floor, were wide with terror and concern.
"Just stay calm, Marie," Aeron answered. "Don't make any movements."
"Wise advice, Madam Preventer," a deep resonating voice said from the front of the cabin. "Too bad you didn't follow your own wisdom." A tall man came into view from the cockpit door. He had wavy black hair, dark brown eyes and a very familiar light mocha complexion. Catherine strained against her captor for a better view. The new speaker walked right down the aisle and stopped in front of Aeron's prone form on the floor. "You're probably wondering what in hell is going on right now," he said, his rich voice easily filling the room. "First, let me assure you that no further harm will come to you should you choose to cooperate. As you have probably guessed, my colleagues and I have taken over this ship." He paused. "Well, I shouldn't say taken over, as it has already been under our control for some time now."
Catherine looked around as much as her captor would let her. Indeed, it seemed that everyone else in the ship was standing at attention, apparently waiting for this person's next command. It finally dawned on Catherine that she and her party were the only people on the shuttle not allied with this man. The man with a very familiar skin tone...The realization struck her like a bolt of lightning. She gaped at the man and said, "You're Rynna's brother?"
The man looked surprised for a moment, but composed himself quickly. "Ah, I see you've met my baby sister." He pulled out a walkie-talkie and held it to his face. "Rynna, would you please come to the cabin section."
A few moments later, Rynna appeared in the aisle, stopping at Trowa's unconscious form on the floor. "Yes, Vance?" she asked genially.
"I see you've met Miss Catherine Bloom already," her brother stated, motioning to the pinioned woman who showed surprise at her name being mentioned.
"Oh yes, we had a wonderful time talking before over tea. She really is quite a lovely person, Vance." Rynna smiled brightly at Catherine, who could only look bewildered back at her.
Mariemaia's voice cut through the cabin. "If we're done with the introductions and formalities," she said, her voice cold as ice, "I would really like to know why you have taken us hostage and what it is you want."
The man called Vance turned to look at the young redhead. "Ah, Mariemaia Khushrenada. You still insist on using your late father's surname, even after all this time." He bent forward so his face was level with Mariemaia's. "I can see Lady Une has taught you well throughout the years."
"Well enough to know that you lot are nothing but common terrorists," the defiant girl spat back at Vance, who merely chuckled.
"You will find we are much more than that in due time, my dear. Your beloved Lady Une already has."
Mariemaia's eyes grew very big. "What have you done to her, you monster?!" she screamed at him.
"Something that should have been done a long time ago," he replied nonchalantly, as if he was discussing the riddance of a pesky bug. "But there will be more time for getting to know each other once we make landfall. Adams, Cardigan," he nodded to the two men holding Catherine and Mariemaia. "See to it that your charges are properly accommodated for the landing." He turned to the man who was standing over Aeron. "Drago, if you would be so kind as to secure Miss Mackenzie for the landing as well." The men set to work carrying out their orders, strapping Mariemaia, Catherine and Aeron into their seats again, only this time, using handcuffs and rope as well as their own seatbelts to keep them in their seats. Rynna skipped gaily to her brother's side and accompanied him back towards the cockpit. Then the man called Drago picked Trowa up off the floor and unceremoniously dumped him back into his seat. He then handcuffed and tied the unconscious Trowa as well as buckling him in. Then, almost as an afterthought, he pulled out a large green handkerchief out of his pants pocket and tied it around Trowa's head to staunch the bleeding somewhat. After he was done, he and his fellow kidnappers resumed their own seats and strapped themselves in.
The intercom crackled. "I hope all of you are buckled in tight, because it's going to be a bumpy ride down," Vance's voice announced. "Next stop, Earth."
Catherine's throat burned anew as she wept, staring out at the oncoming planet from her viewport.
Catherine Bloom gazed out of her viewport. The approaching blue globe of Earth filled her view. She had last been on Earth many, many years before, when her whole family was killed as they were fleeing a battle between the Earth Alliance forces and Eastern European rebels. She has lost her parents and her little two-year old brother Triton in the firefight. She had been only four years old at the time and she was taken in by the traveling circus troupe that her parents had been part of. She grew misty- eyed as she remembered the hardships that she went through. Catherine glanced over to the seat next to her. Trowa was sitting in his seat, perfectly still, his long brown bangs, obscuring part of his face as he sat, sleeping lightly. He had been to Earth a fair few times in his life, though he had never told her of any of his exploits while he was there. Not that she was one to ask, but her curiosity had been piqued ever since the appearance of the two fiery-headed strangers who were sitting in the aisle across from them. Mariemaia Khushrenada was chatting animatedly with her guardian, Preventer Agent Aeron Mackenzie. Catherine shook her head, trying to imagine this lively, outgoing teenager as the head of a huge military operation bent on the subjugation of mankind. Looking at her surrogate little brother again and remembering the trials he went through, she paused in her thoughts. "I suppose anyone is capable of terrible things," she murmured softly.
Feeling a twinge in her back and legs caused by sitting so long, she stood up and carefully made her way around Trowa so as not to wake him. Aeron saw her get up and turned to Catherine as she was in the aisle. "Catherine, do you need anything?" she asked helpfully in her strange but pleasant accent.
"Oh, yes. I was just wondering if there was anywhere I could get something to drink," she replied. Her throat had be slightly sore ever since she'd set foot on the shuttle.
Aeron pointed down the aisle towards the rear of the craft. "There should be a bar in the galley back there. You should be able to find something to suit your tastes there. Don't linger too long though. We may be starting descent soon, probably in about an hour or so, and that can get kind of bumpy."
Catherine smiled. "Thank you." The redhead returned the smile and turned back to Mariemaia. Catherine made her way down the aisle, observing the small number of other passengers on the shuttle, who all seemed to be dozing off. "Curious," she mumbled under her breath. Pushing open the door to the galley, she did indeed find a bar there, situated on the right side of the room, away from the tables and chairs that occupied the room. It was a rather large room for a shuttlecraft, and she wondered how exactly her little party came about commanding such luxurious amenities. Mariemaia must still hold quite a position of importance to able to afford all this, she decided.
The brunette maneuvered herself to the bar, deftly slipping between tables and chairs and plopping herself into a cushioned barstool. There were only two other people at the bar, both rather large burly men, and neither of them seemed interested in anything other than their glasses filled with an amber substance that was unmistakably liquor. That was perfectly fine with Catherine. A young woman of no more than seventeen or eighteen years of age came up to Catherine. She had dark hair and a rich, light mocha complexion. She also wore a bartender's uniform suit.
"Hi there!" she greeted the older woman brightly. "My name is Rynna and I'm your bartender for this flight. What would you like to drink, ma'am?"
Catherine pondered. "Do you have anything hot? My throat has been bothering me a bit."
Rynna's eyebrows lifted ever so slightly. "Oh? Is it dry, sore or aching?" she asked, her brown eyes focusing on Catherine's throat as if she could see right through flesh and tissue.
"More of the last two, not so much the first," Catherine replied.
Rynna nodded. "I know just the thing to make that all better," she declared and reached under the bar, pulling up a plastic bottle of honey, a small pot of sugar, a teaspoon, a small plate and a teacup. She placed these on the bar, then turned around and walked to the right end of the bar and came back carrying a silver teapot. She poured the hot, steaming tea into the teacup carefully and placed the teapot on the counter behind her. Reaching for the pot of sugar, she measured out a small amount of it with the teaspoon and dumped it into the tea. Taking the bottle of honey, she held it upside down over the teacup and squeezed a fair amount of the sticky and sweet substance into the tea. Stirring it carefully, she handed the cup to Catherine, who accepted it gratefully. "Give that a whirl," Rynna said.
Inhaling the wisps of steam that rose from the cup, Catherine could have sworn she felt her aches and pains lessen. "Thank you," she said with warm sincerity to Rynna and took a sip from the cup. The hot liquid made its way down her throat, soothing the soreness she had felt. Lifting her cup in a small salute, she told Rynna, "This is really good!"
Rynna grinned. "You think so?" She pointed to the bottle of honey. "This is what does the trick. It's not just honey in here. I've added a few other things as well, like ginger and lemon extracts. It really helps with sore throats."
"As I've discovered," Catherine said as she sipped more tea. "I'll have to try making something like this when I return home."
"Oh it's easy," Rynna said. "It's all a matter of putting the right amount in. You need to heat the honey first though. Not too much, just a little bit so it's warm. Then you add the lemon and ginger in and mix it, and you let it cool. I picked this all up from my grandmother." Just then, a phone rang from behind the counter to the right. "Excuse me," Rynna said. "Duty calls."
Catherine nodded and Rynna went off to answer the phone. Catherine held the warm cup in her hands, letting the pleasant heat soothe her. After a few minutes' time, Rynna returned. "Hi again," Catherine greeted her. "Are we going to descend soon?"
"Pretty soon, but there's still about forty-five minutes or so before you need to return to your seat. Unless of course you'd like to." Something in Rynna's eyes told Catherine that this last statement was said more out of duty and courtesy than what she actually felt.
"No, I think I'll stay and chat a bit," she said, winking at Rynna. "Perhaps have more of this wonderful tea. My name's Catherine," she said, extending her hand to the girl.
Rynna smiled and shook the offered hand. "Pleased to make your acquaintance, Catherine."
"You seem awfully young to be bartending on a shuttle, Rynna," Catherine said, leaving the end of her statement open for explanation.
"Well, this isn't exactly what I planned to be doing, no," Rynna answered truthfully. "But it's only a part-time thing, or at least I hope it will be."
"What would you like to do?"
The younger woman paused and appeared thoughtful. "Well, I'd certainly like to go to flight school and be able to learn how to fly, like my brother."
Catherine's eyes widened. "Really?" she asked, not so much a question as an expression of surprise. "That's pretty ambitious. I must admit, I'm a bit surprised as to why you'd like to do that."
Rynna gave Catherine a wry grin. "Is it because I'm a girl?"
"Well, partly, I guess," Catherine replied. "It's not something I'd expect a young woman such as yourself to aspire to be."
"Well, I have my reasons. Like I said, my brother is a pilot. In fact, he's piloting this very shuttle right now," Rynna said, a hint of sisterly pride in her voice.
Catherine remembered seeing a sullen-faced young man of twenty or so climb into the cockpit at the start of their flight. From what she could recall, he had dark, blonde hair and a pasty white complexion. In other words, he looked nothing like Rynna. His copilot, a short, squat Asian man, looked even less like Rynna. "He is?" she asked, a little uncertain of whom she was talking about.
Rynna nodded. "He's the only family I have left. Ever since our parents were killed eight years ago, he's taken care of me. He's an excellent pilot, and that's how he's been able to support us all these years."
"And you'd like to follow in his footsteps. That's pretty admirable. I hope you'll be able to do so," Catherine said sincerely.
"I know I'll be able to do so, soon," Rynna said, almost distractedly. Catherine was about to ask her what she meant by that when the ship suddenly gave a mighty lurch forward, unseating Catherine and throwing her to the carpeted floor. Picking herself up, she grabbed the bar and regained her balance.
Rynna looked at Catherine with concern as she grabbed the various things on the bar to keep them from falling and breaking. "Are you all right?"
Catherine nodded. "And you?"
"I've had worse," Rynna replied, rubbing her elbow. "You'd better get back to your seat before it gets any rougher. We're apparently coming in a little bit early."
"See you on the ground, then," Catherine said, smiling as she turned to follow the rest of the passengers returning to their seats. Making her way back down the aisle, she slipped in past Trowa, (who was now awake), sat down and buckled her seatbelt.
"Where did you go?" Trowa asked as he buckled his own seatbelt.
"To the back to get something to drink," Catherine replied. "Funny we're descending so early. Aeron said that we had at least an hour before the actual descent." They both looked over the aisle at the Preventer agent who was leaning over Mariemaia, peering out the viewport. To their surprise, Aeron rose and came over to them.
"I'm not entirely sure what's going on. I don't think we're descending quite yet, and if we are, we're doing it over the wrong area of the world." Aeron looked slightly concerned. "I'm going to go to the cockpit and check with the pilot." With that, she padded down towards the front of the spacecraft towards the cockpit.
Trowa frowned slightly and looked outside the viewport. Something didn't sit right with him. Catherine caught his look and was able to tell from years of knowing him that something was troubling him. "What is it, Trowa?"
"We're on the correct flightpath for descent, but like Aeron said, we're not over the right portion of Earth."
"Yes, that's why she's going forward to find out exactly why," Catherine said.
"I know, but still..." It wasn't like Trowa to be indecisive or inconclusive about something, and that troubled Catherine. She didn't know what to do to assuage his feelings of unrest, so she sat there with him as he brooded silently.
A few minutes passed, then there was a loud sound like a gunshot from the forward compartment. Trowa shot out of his seat, ready to move forward when a large object came down from behind him and slammed him across the head. He was thrown into the aisle, bleeding from a large gash on his head. Catherine screamed, and tried to get out into the aisle, but an arm came around from behind her and wrapped around her neck, crushing her windpipe. She choked and sputtered as she was dragged out into the aisle by the rather large man in a black suit that had been sitting in the seat behind her. He held her upright while digging a gun into the small of her back. "Be quiet and don't make a noise," he ordered in a rough voice.
Catherine had no intention of disobeying his commands as she could barely breathe. She looked around the cabin and surveyed the scene and the disaster that it had become. Trowa was on the floor, still bleeding onto the carpet, unconscious. His breathing was shallow and Catherine feared he might be seriously hurt. Another large, black-suited man was holding Mariemaia in a fashion similar to the one that was holding Catherine and she could see that the man had a gun to the child's back as well. Just then, the door to the cockpit burst open and Aeron ran out into the aisle. She was bleeding from her mouth and shoulder and she appeared to be limping as well. She tried to dash to Catherine and Mariemaia but yet another black suit jumped her from an aisle seat and tackled her right into the cabin wall. He manhandled the redheaded woman and brought her arms behind her back and managed to slap on a pair of handcuffs before she could do anything in retaliation. He pushed her to the ground and grabbed her flailing feet and put a pair of cuffs around her ankle. He then dragged her towards the middle of the cabin where the other two men were holding Catherine and Mariemaia.
"Aeron, are you all right?!" Mariemaia called out, her voice strained because of the grip the man had on her. Her eyes, fixed on the Preventer agent on the floor, were wide with terror and concern.
"Just stay calm, Marie," Aeron answered. "Don't make any movements."
"Wise advice, Madam Preventer," a deep resonating voice said from the front of the cabin. "Too bad you didn't follow your own wisdom." A tall man came into view from the cockpit door. He had wavy black hair, dark brown eyes and a very familiar light mocha complexion. Catherine strained against her captor for a better view. The new speaker walked right down the aisle and stopped in front of Aeron's prone form on the floor. "You're probably wondering what in hell is going on right now," he said, his rich voice easily filling the room. "First, let me assure you that no further harm will come to you should you choose to cooperate. As you have probably guessed, my colleagues and I have taken over this ship." He paused. "Well, I shouldn't say taken over, as it has already been under our control for some time now."
Catherine looked around as much as her captor would let her. Indeed, it seemed that everyone else in the ship was standing at attention, apparently waiting for this person's next command. It finally dawned on Catherine that she and her party were the only people on the shuttle not allied with this man. The man with a very familiar skin tone...The realization struck her like a bolt of lightning. She gaped at the man and said, "You're Rynna's brother?"
The man looked surprised for a moment, but composed himself quickly. "Ah, I see you've met my baby sister." He pulled out a walkie-talkie and held it to his face. "Rynna, would you please come to the cabin section."
A few moments later, Rynna appeared in the aisle, stopping at Trowa's unconscious form on the floor. "Yes, Vance?" she asked genially.
"I see you've met Miss Catherine Bloom already," her brother stated, motioning to the pinioned woman who showed surprise at her name being mentioned.
"Oh yes, we had a wonderful time talking before over tea. She really is quite a lovely person, Vance." Rynna smiled brightly at Catherine, who could only look bewildered back at her.
Mariemaia's voice cut through the cabin. "If we're done with the introductions and formalities," she said, her voice cold as ice, "I would really like to know why you have taken us hostage and what it is you want."
The man called Vance turned to look at the young redhead. "Ah, Mariemaia Khushrenada. You still insist on using your late father's surname, even after all this time." He bent forward so his face was level with Mariemaia's. "I can see Lady Une has taught you well throughout the years."
"Well enough to know that you lot are nothing but common terrorists," the defiant girl spat back at Vance, who merely chuckled.
"You will find we are much more than that in due time, my dear. Your beloved Lady Une already has."
Mariemaia's eyes grew very big. "What have you done to her, you monster?!" she screamed at him.
"Something that should have been done a long time ago," he replied nonchalantly, as if he was discussing the riddance of a pesky bug. "But there will be more time for getting to know each other once we make landfall. Adams, Cardigan," he nodded to the two men holding Catherine and Mariemaia. "See to it that your charges are properly accommodated for the landing." He turned to the man who was standing over Aeron. "Drago, if you would be so kind as to secure Miss Mackenzie for the landing as well." The men set to work carrying out their orders, strapping Mariemaia, Catherine and Aeron into their seats again, only this time, using handcuffs and rope as well as their own seatbelts to keep them in their seats. Rynna skipped gaily to her brother's side and accompanied him back towards the cockpit. Then the man called Drago picked Trowa up off the floor and unceremoniously dumped him back into his seat. He then handcuffed and tied the unconscious Trowa as well as buckling him in. Then, almost as an afterthought, he pulled out a large green handkerchief out of his pants pocket and tied it around Trowa's head to staunch the bleeding somewhat. After he was done, he and his fellow kidnappers resumed their own seats and strapped themselves in.
The intercom crackled. "I hope all of you are buckled in tight, because it's going to be a bumpy ride down," Vance's voice announced. "Next stop, Earth."
Catherine's throat burned anew as she wept, staring out at the oncoming planet from her viewport.