Strife watched Drok'ti cloak and walk off. She sighed and crawled back in the window. She closed it and flopped onto her bed and stared at the knife. Here she was with it again. She ran her hand down the side of it and sighed again. She put it under her mattress and tromped out of her room to find her cat. She went into the living room. Her father was sitting on the couch opening the mail.

"Daddy, have you seen Zaz?"

He totally ignored her.

"Um. . .hello? Father!"

He looked up at her.

"What?"

"Have you seen Zaz?"

"Nope."

Strife clenched her fists and her teeth.

"Thank you, you are such a big help."

She went into the kitchen to resume her search for her lost kitty. She was looking under the table when her mother walked in the kitchen.

"Hi mother."

"Oh Strife, where did you get those silly glasses?"

"They aren't glasses, they are goggles and they aren't silly. They are highly fashionable."

"Whatever."

Her mother opened the fridge and took out a bottle of wine. She poured herself a glass.

"I see you didn't burn the house down while we were gone."

"Nope. So where were you anyway?"

"We were visiting some friends in Finland."

"Oh, how nice. I bet I would like it there."

"I don't know."

Strife tightened her grip on the back of the chair she was leaning against.

"So have you seen Zaz?"

"I think I saw him in the laundry room."

"Of course!"

Strife straightened up and extended her arms and frolicked into the laundry room. She twirled in the door and turned the light on. She looked in a basket of towels and spotted the fat feline.

"Oh my baby! There you are!"

She picked up her cat and started kissing his forehead.

"My sweet kitty. I haven't seen you for so long!"

Her mother was standing in the doorway watching them.

"Where have you been? Zanzibar?"

"No, I was in space."

"Of course you were. When you get done talking to him you should run to the store and get some more hot sauce we're going to make hot wings tonight."

"Yuck."

"I didn't ask your opinion."

"I need moolah in order to purchase said hot sauce."

Her mother handed Strife her wallet.

"Maybe you could pick up some other things if we need them."

"Of course."

Strife situated her cat on her shoulders and went into her room. She was going to take a shower before she went anywhere. She hadn't changed her clothes in a long time. She put Zaz down on her bed and grabbed some clean clothes out of her drawers.

"Yay! My favorite shirt!"

Her favorite shirt happened to be a tank top with psychotic, evil, red-eyed, squirrel saying 'don't touch my nuts!'. She giggled to herself as she read it. She grabbed a random pair of black baggy pants and trotted into the shower. She got thoroughly clean then got out of the shower. She looked at her wounds in the mirror. Her shoulder was healing up nicely and the scratch on her back from falling out of the vent was looking better. She used some liquid stitches to close it up. She got dressed and brushed out her hair. She hadn't noticed when it got so long. It was nearly to her butt. She felt the ends.

"Eesh, split ends."

She gathered her hair into one hand and cut about an inch off the bottom. She tossed the hair in the trash can and felt the ends.

"Ahh, much better."

She went back into her room and put on her gauntlet. She wasn't going to leave this at home. She put her baggiest hoody on to hide the gauntlet from view. Once she got her shoes on she grabbed her mother's wallet and put it in one of her 13 pockets in these pants. She smacked her forehead.

"Duh!"

She went back into her room to get her backpack. She walked into the living room and looked at her mother.

"I'm going to the store now."

"Here's the list."

Strife took the list and looked at it. Hot sauce, pickles, green olives, condoms. Strife shuddered and gagged. These are the times when she likes to think of that room in her mind maze that her mother is in. She turned and walked out the door. She started whistling as she walked towards the store. It was only a few blocks away, but sometimes a few blocks was too far. She got there unscathed and went about the aisles grabbing things and putting them in the cart she had grabbed on her way in. She got more koolaid because she knew she was out and some more Nesquick because it was really good. She went to the register and the woman working at it scanned the items. Strife hadn't gotten any condoms, she refused to do that no matter what. The lady looked at Strife uneasily. This woman must know Strife by reputation. Strife sighed and crossed her arms over her chest.

"24.85."

Strife handed the woman a 50 and got her change. She put it in her pocket. Her mother wouldn't notice. Strife gathered the things and put them in her backpack outside of the store. She started walking back home. On her way she thought she felt eyes on her. She looked around to try and find the source of her discomfort. She saw a couple older boys leaning against the wall of an old building that had been condemned for as long as Strife could remember. They were staring at her. She decided they weren't any threat. They were just a couple. . .what did Drok'ti call them? Oomans.

"Hah hah, oomans."

Strife now felt like she was being followed. She looked over her shoulder and saw the boys walking a few yards behind her. She smiled to herself and kept walking. They are in for a big surprise if they mess with her. The kind of surprise that Alvorus got. Strife turned onto her street and the boys were still behind her. She looked down and noticed that her shoelace was untied.

"Oh shit."

She knelt down and started to carefully retie her shoelace. It had to look right or else she wasn't happy with it. She heard the boys stop right behind her. She finished tying her shoelace and jumped up, swung around and roared in their faces. They both went sprawling backwards and landed on their asses. Strife lunged towards them and they got up and took off running. Strife smiled to herself.

"That was easy."

She went inside her house and put the perishable items into the fridge. She put her mother's wallet on the counter and took her Nesquick into her room. She laid down on her bed and stared at the ceiling for a while.

She decided to get on her computer to see if there was anything new and exciting on the internet. She took a drink of her nesquick as her computer connected. She decided to check to see if she had any exciting email.

"538 emails! Oh my shit!"

She went through them quickly scanning just the names. Most of them were junk. Strife sighed wearily as she got to the last page of all the junk. Nothing exciting . . .wait a minute. She clicked on one of the emails and opened it. It was an email from someone named Dash.

"Ok."

She started reading it. At first she thought maybe it was just an incognito junk email until she read the next paragraph.

-I know that you've seen it, you've been there. What do you think about it Strife? Is it wondrous? Are we in danger? I must know. I will know. Strife, you will give me the answers I want and you will give them to me soon. You'll know the truth and so shall I. I can't wait until I meet you and see your fear.-

Strife wrinkled her nose and stuck her tongue out.

"Fear? Fuck that."

She closed the email and turned away from her computer. She glanced at it sideways for a second and then averted her eyes.

"Know the truth? What truth? About Cinnamon Toast Crunch? I don't know about that. Grr. What the fuck?"

She turned her computer off and started messing around with the electronic notepad. She started pushing random buttons. That always works for her in the end. There was a beep and the characters changed into English. Strife jumped up and stared down at it.

"I'm a genius!"

She flopped onto her stomach and started reading through the notes. There was a team of mercenaries sent from the colony the day before Strife had gotten there to rescue Drok'ti. They would be arriving on Lau'thalus three days after rendezvousing with some other ass holes two days from now.

"That's not good."

They would arrive on the planet and use the plasma cannons on the ships to wipe out most of the population, then the mercenaries would go in and capture the survivors. Strife growled at that and closed the notepad.

"I have to tell Drok'ti. He has to know."

Strife jumped up and paced around her room tapping her fingers on her forehead.

"Ok, so how am I supposed to get this valuable information to Drok'ti in time to save him and his planet?"

Strife's shoulders slumped and her head dropped down. She fell to her knees and then onto her side. She focused on Drok'ti. She saw him on the ship. She focused in on wrist computer and got an idea. She jumped up and grabbed the notepad. A device fell out of a small panel that opened up. She looked at it for a second. It was a microphone and earpiece. She hooked it to the notepad. To anyone, even her it would seem she was just pushing in random buttons in a random order, but it was not so.