16: Mihama's Melancholy and Kagura's Cure

With a whisper of repulsors, the Red Spirit drifted from its crater, shaking off its coating of grit. A cheer rose from Kagura and Tomo, who'd been banished from the ship until the repairs were finished. "Great!" Kagura crowed as their ride settled back down, "All we need to do now is find Ms. Sakaki and the runt, and…"

Something growled behind them, making both women whirl and draw their blasters as one. A huge, yellow-white canine sat on his haunches before them, majestic in the milky, predawn light. Chiyo leaned on his great flank, looking rather like a drowned, battered, strung-out rat. "Thank you…" she said softly. The dog licked her face tremendously, almost knocking her off her feet and then, casting a disdainful look at the blasters, padded off into the mist.

"Ch-chiyo-chan?" Kagura holstered her blaster and ran to the girl's side. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah," Tomo added, "You look like crap!"

Chiyo sagged into the soldier's arms without answering. "Shit…" Kagura held her out and shook her gently. "Hey, what about Ms. Sakaki? Where--?" They made eye-contact. "Shit!"

"What? Shit, what?" Tomo asked frantically.

"We're going," the soldier said, scooping Chiyo up and starting towards their ship. She seemed impossibly tiny and fragile. "Come on."

"But… what about…?" the honorable captain looked back into the forest, then at Kagura as she mounted the ramp. "You don't mean—hey! Kagura, what's going on?"


Two vessels met the Red Spirit in orbit, slender blockade runners similar in design to the ill-fated Lightning, but with a more martial, predatory look to them. The stubby pink Spirit was swallowed by one of these sleek black raptors before they vanished into hyperspace.

In the Spirit's main room, Kagura sat across from the Princess, nervous as she never had been before. "I'm sorry it happened like this… I, I shouldn't have let her leave. I'm sorry—"

"Don't." Kaori closed her eyes and leaned back in her chair, blowing out a long, soft sigh as tears tracked down her cheeks. "You couldn't have stopped her."

The ship shook slightly as they set down in the bay.

"Listen, when you get off this ship, they're gonna want you to be Princess Kaori, Light of the Rebellion. If, if you're not up to it, I can tell them…"

"Do you know why I loved her?" Kaori said, cutting her off. "It was because she was so stoic and strong. Ms. Sakaki was invincible… you could have put the galaxy on her back and she wouldn't have bent." Her eyes opened and she gave a small, watery smile. "If I can't live up to her example, what kind of an admirer would I be?" The persona of Princess Kaori, light of the Rebellion and heroine of the galaxy drifted down over her like a sheet as she stood. "They're waiting for us."

And so Kaori descended into the docking bay, every inch the defiant, noble Rebel Princess their hosts were expecting. Kagura and Chiyo flanked her, the former adding to her imposing bearing, the latter vanishing in her shadow.

The blockade runner's captain stood at the base of the ramp, surrounded by soldiers in full ceremonial dress. "It's good to have you back, Princess!" he hailed, "The Katana and the Quicksilver are at your service!"

"Good afternoon, Captain Green," she returned coolly. You'd never guess that she'd just had her heart torn out. "Thank you for your timely arrival."

Green removed an envelope from his pocket and held it out to her. "I was told to give this to you. Orders from the Top." You could hear the capital T in his voice.

"On paper?" Kaori took the envelope and turned it over in her hands.

"It's his trademark, you know."

"Whose?"

"The Professor's. I'll get you a private room to read that in."

"Thank you."

As Green and Kaori started away, Tomo and Yomi mounted the ramp down. There followed a sound like a turnstile from Hell and suddenly they were staring into the barrels of forty blasters. "YEEP!" Tomo leapt behind the First Mate and shrieked, "I'm too cute to die!"

"Um…" Yomi shuffled backwards. "O-okay, we can wait in the—"

"No, Yomi!" Tomo yelled, stepping around her and drawing the lightsaber Sakaki had given her. "Don't give them any ground! I'll protect you with my super rolling defense!"

"Your super rolling--?" Yomi clubbed her before she could ignite the weapon and dragged her back into the ship. "Sorry, everyone, my friend's a little…"

"Oh, for--! Look, they're the, ah, the professionals we hired! Let 'em come!" Kagura barked. The rebel soldiers stood down, and, with much shaking of heads and mutters of "super rolling…?" filtered away to their other duties.

"That's right," Tomo said smugly, swaggering as she descended to the deck. "Captain Takino triumphs again!"

Yomi hit her.


The Katana was a tight ship. Everything that needed doing was being done by the crewers who could do it best. Unfortunately for Kagura, that meant that she wasn't really needed for anything, and was thus reduced to the irritating status of "useless guest" for this trip. Normally she would have just kicked back, but this time she'd found a worthwhile project for herself… Chiyo-chan.

The Tatooinian girl had been wandering the vessel pretty much at random, still dressed in her moisture-farmer's garb. Her silence and despondent gaze made many of the crewmen wonder if their ship hadn't picked up a ghost. Apart from occasional warding sign, she was pretty much ignored.

"The hope of the future, right, Rival?" Kagura said to the air, watching Chiyo drift on by her room, "The last Jedi, huh? Well, this can't stand. Let's get her back on her feet, eh?"

The soldier set out and intercepted her target in a dark corridor along the "bottom" of the ship. "Hey, runt," she said, gruffly but not unkindly, "We're gonna put you to use."

"Huh?" Chiyo's voice was a little gravelly from disuse. Bad sign.

"This ship doesn't need any more ghosts, but it does need is a few good pilots."

"Pilots? But I don't—"

"Don't worry about it! It's not like we're gonna throw you in the cockpit right away. Just give the simulators a try, eh? It'll be better than just pining away, right? Come on, give it a shot."

"I… uh… okay…"

"That's the spirit!"

Kagura led her young charge to the simulator room, which, in spite of the designers' most determined efforts, still had the ambiance of a video arcade. Off-duty pilots gathered to test their skills against each other and heckle trainees. All the place needed was a bar and they'd be set.

"New recruit!" Kagura said to the elderly simulator master, Akagawa. He raised a hand to his ear and replied, "Eh?" The crew affectionately referred to Akagawa as the "Deaf Guy." Many years ago, he'd been a top-flight pilot for the Old Empire, but nowadays all he was good for was to help train the next (or the next three, rather) generation(s).

"NEW… RECRUIT!" Kagura repeated, slowly and loudly. "I NEED A SIMULATOR!"

"Geez, you don't have to shout…" Akagawa squinted through his sunglasses at Chiyo. "Isn't he a little short?" If it were as catchy as Deaf Guy, he might also have been known as the Blind Guy.

"Of course not!" the soldier gave Chiyo a little push towards a vacant simulator. "Can we use that one?"

"Eh?"

"THAT ONE!"

"Oh, go ahead."

The simulator hissed open upon their approach, and Chiyo looked at it in trepidation. "But, but I don't know how to…"

"Did you have a skyhopper back home?"

"Yeah, but—"

"Same thing, but with more guns! Go get 'em!"

"But—!" Chiyo's last protest was cut off as the soldier shoved her in and dogged the hatch shut. Kagura stood back and crossed her arms, looking up to the screens set above it. A few of the pilots had witnessed the 12-year-old being crammed into an advanced simulator and came over for a laugh.

And sure enough, Chiyo's first skirmish was shaky at best. Kagura noticed the girl make almost every rookie mistake she had ever heard of; it was painful to watch, though the pilots seemed to enjoy the show.

But then…

Impossibly, Chiyo-chan got the hang of it. Before her virtual enemies could lay in the final blow, she was suddenly weaving expertly around their shots and returning fire with deadly accuracy. The laughter and jeering of the pilots became whoops and cheers as the faux Imperial fighters burst one-by-one like popcorn. Finally, the Imperials fled ending the simulation.

Chiyo emerged from the simulator to stunned silence. "So… uh, how did I do?" she asked.

"That… was…" one of the pilots stammered.

And then all at once they were surrounding her, full of greetings, congratulations and general good tidings. Chiyo put a hand to the back of her head and giggled a little, still adorably modest.

"That was abso-bloody-lutely incredible!" one crowed, "It took me years to get that good!"

"You were never that good, Mike!" another yelled.

They broke into a good natured argument as the lot of them, a bewildered Chiyo-chan in tow, adjourned for the "Juice Bar." (Pilots weren't allowed alcohol except for special occasions; there was no telling when they might have to scramble.)

"Well, that worked out," Kagura said in their wake. "You made about twenty friends, I'd say… have something to do now…" She walked slowly back to her own room, lost in thought. Kaori had seen to herself, Chiyo would probably be all right now…

Now to address the horrible, gaping, hollow feeling in her own chest. Kagura flopped backwards into her bed and stared at the ceiling. "Didn't even remember me…" she sighed. "Damn. I'll miss you, y'great dark lump."


"Here they are," Mike said with a touch of pride. He led Chiyo into the Katana's hangar bay, past the Red Spirit and a few shuttles to the quick-launch rack. A little more than a dozen fighters hung there, their violent forms eager to leap out into the night. "Most of us have to settle for Valkyries, same as the Imperials," her guide said, gesturing vaguely at the rack, "Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with them, but check this…"

Along the bottom row there was a group of five ships the like of which Chiyo had never seen before. They were longer and more rounded than the Valkyries, their black paint offset by panels of pearly gray. "What are those?"

"Secret contract with Incom, Chiyo-chan." Mike said, "Super Seraphs! I just got cleared to fly one a week ago."

"Wow! That's great!"

"You might get my spot, though, 'cause… hey, are you all right? You look a little pale."

"I'm fine…" Chiyo glanced out into hyperspace. "I just… something's wrong."

"What do you mean? Is it—huh? Did your hair just move?"

"What?" the girl raised a hand to one of her pigtails. "I don't think so. I have an ominous feeling, though…"

"Well, don't worry. The Katana's got stealth gear, so the Imperials'll never be able to find us. We haven't been attacked in—"

And then, with a horrifying lurch, the both blockade runners were ripped from hyperspace and set upon by a hail of green bolts. Bearing down on them was a gunmetal gray monstrosity—the Implacable, back for revenge!

"Well, I'll be," Mike said.