TITLE: Carpe Diem (Seize the Day)

AUTHOR: ArcherofDarkness

SUMMARY:

RATING: PG-13

WHY: language, violence, and cuz I want it to be!

DISCLAIMERS: I own all of the vocabulary words and Xyra

Remember Short passages in between breaks in italics are dreams; 'italics in apostrophes are thoughts'

Tons of cookies and milk to my reviewers! TPGurl, Aurora-Yoru, and Callie!

(Now remember, Jim had just entered Xyra's cabin...)

Jim looked a little surprised…I think it's a landlubber thing; after you learn to be on a ship, everything becomes a routine so that when worst comes to worst, you haven't wasted all your energy on pointless things. His eyes searched my cozy little cabin and I stared blankly back at him.

"Yes?"

He shuffled and looked at his feet, "Uh…I just wanted to…you know. Thanks for keepin' me outta harms way and stuff."

I shook my head. "Boy, I feel sorry for you! So guess what? I'm gonna be nice and give you a tip about living on a ship…hey, rhymes! BE TOUGH. It doesn't matter if you're puny or weak or anything, just act tough. BUT! There is a catch, if you are clearly threatened, don't make a smartass remark to someone clearly stronger and clearly not afraid to use his power to hurt you!"

Jim nodded slightly, he'd heard what I'd said, but as to if it got all the way to his brain…nope. I swear, kids these days! Never listening to their elders or anything! He just looked at me.

"You look really familiar, do I-"

I interrupted him with a yell, "NO, AND DON'T ASK FOR ANY MORE FAVORS BECAUSE YOU ARENT GETTING ANY!"

He dashed out the door with his tail between his legs; I snickered and opened my book and returned to reading.

There were five dragons. One red, another blue, the third yellow, the fourth opalescent, and the last was as black as the night of the Etherium. They each put one of their great paws together and from them rose a purple flame, engulfing all that existed.
I woke in a sweat to the gentle tapping of space dust hitting the hull; I rubbed my eyes and glanced at my watch, which told me the day, hour, and temperature. I sighed, there was still about three hours until my shift started.

I climbed from my bunk and switched on an artificial light before pulling out the bruised solar surfer and all my supplies. There was a stray pair of scissors in my bag, so I carefully measured out the right lengths for the torn part of my sail and cut out the shapes. I threaded a piece of copper thread (it would connect the electrical flows from different sails), tied a knot in the end, and began to sew.

Before I knew it, an hour had passed and I had successfully gotten all of the sails patched; it looked a little tacky, but with a nice coat of black electrical paint! …Oh wait; I don't have any of that, do I? I sighed and heard a pair of boots thumping on the deck above me. Quickly I stored all of my stuff away and got dressed in my uniform, put on my funny hat, and darted upstairs to go see who was already awake.

By now, I should've known that the captain would be up at this time, she was just walking around, checking for any stray ends that might have come loose, looking for any blackened places on the bases of the masts, which could be a dead circuit. I snuck up to her and put my hands over her eyes.

"Guess who?"

She swiftly jarred me in the appendix and threw me over her head, there was a sword at my throat before she saw who I was and sheathed it to help me up.

"Well somebody's a little paranoid today," I muttered.

"Deeply sorry!" The captain cried, brushing off my shoulders politely. "I had a rather odd dream you see…care to join me for a morning coffee? Or tea, do you like tea?"

I stared back puzzled, "Sure, coffee's fine."

She smiled and I followed her to her cabin.

"Sugar or cream?"

"Both please." I took the pitcher of cream and poured a little in my cup, followed by a heaping spoon of sugar, which was stirred up into a delicious cup of coffee. I sighed as I breathed in the steamy aroma.

Captain Amelia sighed too, but not with bliss. It was a rather defeated sigh with a hint of misery mixed in. "I'm afraid I didn't invite you here just for tea Ms. Robethian."

I grinned, "I kind of suspected it, go on."

She gave me a weak smile, "Well you see, Arrow, he's a great chap, but he can't hold his alchohol at all. He never drinks, and the crew's rum is proportioned so that just enough can be given out a day. They would never give up a drop of it!"

"Yes. Men and drinks are hard to separate!"

Amelia looked away, "He was drunk last night, not a drop of alcohol and he's drunk!" She flew into a rage of passionate words, "The crew must be behind this! I never should have taken this mission, but to go to find the loot of a-"

I shook my head and took a sip of my coffee, but my mind was brimming with thoughts. 'The loot of a Thousand Worlds, that's what you meant Captain.' I tried to look tired. "I didn't get a good sleep last night Ma'am, might I be excused?"

She nodded bluntly.

I smiled and touched my hat, taking the coffee with me to the silent morning deck.

The door banged as I let it fall out of my hands, then I smiled and looked up at the stars. "Finally."

I sipped my coffee until the sounds of the crew walking about on the deck were loud and prominent, then I took a little walk to the galley to visit my friend Mr. Silver. I walked in, made sure no one but the cook was in the room, then closed and locked the door.

"Good morning Mr. Silver."

"Morning miss," he touched the ragged red bandana on his head and began stirring what looked like a giant pot of oatmeal. I kept a close eye on him and began tapping my fingers.

"You're good Long John, too good, but I'm on to you. So it would be in your best interest to listen to what I have to say."

He eyed me with suspicion, "So say it then."

I lowered my voice so that only the cook could hear me, even if someone had been eavesdropping from above or at the door. "If youvalue your life,don't anyone of your crew do anything like whatScroop did to Mr. Arrow again or I will kill you, do you understand." There was no question in my voice; he would obey.

I watched his eyes narrow in anger, but there was no way he would spring the mutiny so early on, my hand slipped to the large blade at my hip. "Lassie, yer clever, but I would guess yer after the same thing, so it'd be best fer us both to pretend this never happened."

"Don't mess with them," I hissed, "they're mine to deal with, and they owe me something that I justly deserve. Screw up my plans and you will pay." I took a step back and raised my voice again, "By the way, since that young Jim Hawkins is your charge, I'd suggest getting him a little discipline."

I glared at him, a death glare that I could see made his eye flicker with fear for a second before he remembered that I was just a young woman, oh how wrong he was.

I leaned against a post and sighed, hoarse from yelling at the blundering crew, that was when Jim and Silver came up from the hull. I laughed at the sweaty landlubber, his whole shirt was soaked through after but one hour. Silver and I exchanged glances, mine was a warning and his seemed to be blank, but I sensed something more.

The captain was always on alert, so I never tried the whole sneaking-up-behind-her-thing again. Walking around, I saw lots of slackers and had to use my already sore throat to get them back to work. Silver was explaining a pretzel knot to Jim, so at the one time that he glanced up, our gazes met in a glaring contest, that was only interrupted by the captain.

The sailors were working and therefore didn't salute, but I tipped my hat to her. "Ca va mes Capitan?"

She shot me an odd glance and I hurridly corrected myself, "How are you today Captain? Please excuse my French."

She was about to speak when Arrow's loud voice boomed over the deck, "NO SLACKING MEN!"

"Would you care to join me for tea Ms Robethian?"

I sat in a small, padded chair, with my tea lying on the saucer in front of me, "So Captain, I've hard a lot about you from my teachers and such at school, but what was your greatest mission?"

Amelia smiled, "Probably the mission against the Granex Navy on the Planet Tonthar IX."

"And what about that cook? I swear, that Hawkins boy might come out of this mission with enough experience to go to Academy! Not to mention straighten out if Silver keeps working him the way he has today."

Amelia got out two cups and put a bag of tea in each, "I remember when I was that naive, Academy really teaches you to only trust yourself. I severed with a Captain like that, it was the absolute worst mission I've ever been on. Actually, I come from a line descended from the Commodore Lancer, so my siblings and I were expected to become captains in the least. Was anything like that expected of you?"

I fingered a band on my index finger, "No, I was rebel. I wanted to get away to I ran to the stars, you might say I was lucky to get here."

"How would you be lucky?" My mind raced for a second and then recovered the carefully planned lie, "I come from a primitive planet, from Urdal, you've not doubt heard of it. A capsule landed on my planet and I got a ride to Tinerii Space port."

Amelia stared, "You're about seventeen I'd guess, and yet you're about to be promoted to Lieutenant and come from a primitive planet…?"

I laughed, "They say I'm bright! Plus I was obsessed with ships, on Urdal, an older method of transportation was sailing."

She smiled but I could tell Amelia was studying my face, but I quickly finsished the tea and politely excused myself as my stomach began to rumble.

I headed to the galley to find something to eat, hopefully it would be hot and gooey. But there, on the floor sat Silver and Hawkins, both were peeling potatoes, but Jim was staring at the ceiling and had only gotten through three. I shot a look at Silver and he quickly had Jim back at work.

Potatoes, cooking, man, those brought memories. I dreamed of a juicy, yellow, mango. Now, purp, purp, purp, purp. Blah, too many of the things. I grabbed a dreaded purp and headed back to the deck.

When Arrow saw me, he explained what was going on and was left to begin shouting orders to furl the sails since were passing on the dark side of a planet. Having the sails out would actually slow us down, we would be running on reserve power only, the crew would sleep and then when we got back into the light, the sails would be let out again and we would continue.

At the end of my shift, I retired to my quarters to do some research. I pulled out my com-pad, a laptop like device only much more advanced, and pulled up my last report.

"And the last thing to remember about visiting Montressor and Montressor Spaceport is to beware of pirates, although they are less common here than Octril III and Locus, they are everywhere."

I saved the document and then posted it onto my Galac-page, something similar to Earth's web page, but available throughout the Galaxy. It was entitled "The Wonder Montressor", posted onto ges.jessequest.rex. It was a famous site and had been for some time, I posted a report every time I visited a new planet or port, which was why I had been waiting to post the one about Montressor, I had never visited the Port for more than one day and wanted to make the report as detailed as possible.

Seeing that that was done, I shut down the Galaxy Extensive System and pulled up my navigation program. We were headed in the direction of the Horse-Head nebula and I quickly added in our current coordinates. The computer chartered out our course and mapped out the predicted amount of time left, about twelve more Galactic days, or week days for Earthlings.

With a sigh I slouched back and put the com-pad away; I had waited long enough, I could wait another week.

Alright, I would like for a couple reviews, and the next two chapters after this should be posted pretty quickly, because they're done! That's right, while I was failing at transferring these from com to com to com, juggling three honors classes, and trying to fix the internet, I managed to type up TWO more chapters, aren't you happy! I am.

And if you've got enough time on this Labor Day Weekend, I would appreciate maybe a review about what you, the reviewer, thinks about Xyra, pros, cons, whatever. Just trying to improve Character development. And thanks as always for reading!