Chapter Nine
"It doesn't matter how many times you come here, it doesn't get any less creepy."
Washu sighed, glancing out across the cluttered Sargasso space as Ken Ohki drifted neatly between the rusting hulls of the dead spacecrafts. "Nagi, I appreciate you doing this. I know Ken Ohki's still a bit beaten about - but the sooner I can figure out what's going on, the better it will be for Ryoko."
"Ken Ohki isn't a weak ship. He's flown with worse injuries." Nagi said frankly, running her fingers absently over the ship's controls and drawing a yowl from her craft. "Besides, all he's done since we've been on the earth is fret and bother me about Ryo Ohki. It's good to get him back in space again - it means I can leave that hell hole planet and get back to doing what I do best - hunting down creeps like Tarant Shank."
"Do you think he'll still be in Sargasso?" Tenchi asked hesitantly. "After all, his craft was damaged too, right?"
"He's not here." Nagi sent him a long-suffering look. "Although if you could read a radar screen, Prince of Jurai, you'd know that already. Unfortunately we probably won't be seeing him today. He'll be long gone from here by now - thanks to us wasting so much time."
"Do you care even a little bit about Ryoko's life?" Tenchi demanded. Nagi looked amused.
"It's not my problem." She said simply.
"Well, whyever you're here, we appreciate it." Washu said frankly. "Just a little further on should do it, Nagi - if you don't mind. It was somewhere around here - I recognise the outline of a couple of these vessels from our last trip and that looks like some debris from the craft Shank blew up."
Ken Ohki mewed at this point, and Nagi glanced upwards, a frown touching her lips.
"It's here all right. He can pick up the Daidalos's emissions." She said quietly, clenching her fists. "And Ryo Ohki's, too. We're in the right area. And like I thought, Shank has gone. Damn him. Damn Daluma! It's not often I get a chance to snare a criminal like him."
"Nagi, you have my word that if I can build anything to help you catch Shank, I'll put my skills entirely at your disposal." Washu promised. "Just so long as you stay here right now and let me grab the samples I need. I know you want to go chasing off after him, and Ken Ohki's picked up his trail, but we really do need your help. And even if you've resigned your interest in Ryoko's life, Tenchi and I haven't given up on it yet."
"All right. I accept your offer." Nagi nodded. "Although the longer I leave it, the more likely Daidalos is to be fixed and back to it's worst."
"Well, I'm familiar with the structure of the cabbit ship. I'm sure I can find a way to enhance Ken Ohki's shields, if need be." Washu said absently, as she carefully prepared her equipment, checking all the switches and levers as she keyed in a set of instructions. "The problem with the last attack was that he hit us unawares. We weren't expecting pirate company. Careless of us, perhaps...but if I'd had advance warning, Ryo Ohki wouldn't have been so badly damaged as she was."
She stood back from her computer system, eying it approvingly. "There. That should do it. Although I really need to get my sensor out into open space. I don't suppose you'd open Ken Ohki's hatch for me, just for a second?"
"Not a chance." Nagi held up her hands. "I'm not an idiot - we'd all be sucked out into that mess of debris before you could say pirate raid."
"I had a feeling you might feel that way." Washu sighed. "Oh well."
"Isn't there any other way around it, Washu?" Tenchi asked. "Can we link Ken Ohki to one of the dead ships somehow, and do it that way?"
"No...Ken Ohki isn't built with a passageway, and I already told you, it's too dangerous to randomly go walking around dead spacecraft, in case there's no air." Washu shook her head. "I could do it, but I don't want to leave my equipment abandoned. I need to see the readings. Nagi has to pilot, and you're just too vulnerable. So it's not an option."
"Washu, I've been in open space before and I haven't died."
"Yes, but that was because of the Light Hawk Wings, and we both know you can't control them yet." Washu shook her head. "I won't risk it."
"So what are we going to do?"
"Hope and pray that I can get it through Ken Ohki's dome without getting my hand stuck." Washu grimaced. "I'm making no promises, but it seems like the only answer."
"Hand...stuck?" Nagi stared at her as if she'd lost her mind.
"Yes. I'm going to try and phase it through."
"I thought you lost your magic, when Kihaku exploded." Tenchi frowned. "How are you going to do that, if you don't have your Kii powers any more?"
"I have flickers of them." Washu admitted. "Over the last month or so, they've been there - deep inside of me. But they're only very faint. I think it's like the Jurai power - that gets passed on through the family just as it gets handed over directly by Tsunami's grace. I inherited some of that magic when I was born, which is why I always had it outside of Kihaku's blessing. Now it's only a shadow of what it once was, but it's the only option we have, so I'm going to do it."
"A Kii, huh?" Nagi looked interested. "I thought they'd all died out."
"Not this one." Washu said grimly. "But we're what you might call an endangered species."
"That explains a lot about Ryoko, then, doesn't it." Nagi said thoughtfully. "I always thought her magic was unnatural."
Washu frowned, but did not respond. Instead she moved across to the side of the ship, closing her eyes for a moment as her grip tightened on the sensor in her hand. Then, focusing all her energy through her body to the ends of her fingers, she pushed her fist up against the crystal dome, willing it to go through with all her heart.
To begin with, nothing happened. Then, very slightly, she felt her atoms shift and she pushed harder, determined to get the sensor through before her strength ran out. At length she managed it, withdrawing her hand hurriedly as she felt her cells reassemble themselves into their usual order. She winced, glancing at the red tips of her fingers.
"That was not comfortable." She said ruefully. "I'm really not the witch I once was."
"Are you all right?" Tenchi sounded anxious. "You've gone white, Washu. Are you sure you should've done that?"
"I'll be fine." Washu nodded. "Now to find out exactly what we're dealing with. The spectral readings are already off the chart - so I think I must be right in my suggestion that this is the root cause of the problem. If Ryoko is anywhere, I think we'll find her here."
"And then we can bring her back?"
"One step at a time, Tenchi." Washu shrugged. "Let's see what we're up against first."
Tenchi moved across the drive room of the ship, gazing out across space at the dead craft with a frown.
"They don't look like anything much. Just empty shells, most of them." He remarked absently. "It's almost sad, that they just get dumped here when they're no longer serviceable."
"Not all spaceships are sentient." Nagi said frankly. "They probably don't care, so there's no reason why you should. Besides, a lot of them are pirate vessels. And the pirates are too dead to care what happens to their ship, so I'm not going to waste any time worrying about them."
"What would you do, then, if it was Ken Ohki?" Tenchi asked. Nagi shook her head.
"Ken Ohki regenerates. It's not an issue." She said with a shrug. "And if something happens to me, he knows what to do...who to go to. Contrary to popular belief, I'm not completely alone in this universe, Tenchi. Just because you consider me nothing more than a cold blooded pirate killer doesn't mean I don't have connections."
"I never said..."
"You don't have to." Nagi offered him a humourless smile. "I'm not stupid."
"Well, you've always been Ryoko's enemy, and well..."
"And you made her fall in love with you, thus ruining my fun for the rest of eternity." Nagi shook her head disapprovingly. "I didn't know she was that weak, but then most pirates are, when you get down to it. I had thought she was different - her continued evasions of my attacks gave me hope that I'd at last found a challenge worthy of my skills. For a long time, it did seem like I had. But I don't want to fight her now. Even if she was fit, she's not the pirate she was - nor is she the fighter. It's just not worth it. You ruined her, and it's a one way trip."
"I didn't ruin her - and Ryoko fights just as fiercely as she ever did." Tenchi protested. Nagi raised an eyebrow.
"And that's why she's lying in a coma, on the Earth?" She asked softly. "My mistake."
"Did you come to help or to gloat?"
"Stop it, both of you. Please. I need to concentrate." Washu grimaced at them. "Save it for later. These readings are crazy...I'm trying to make sense of them but it's all jumbled up. I just think I get a hint of something that might resemble Ryoko - but there are other forces that are stronger, and I'm not even sure I'm right. In fact, this is reminding me more and more of Sasami's trip through the mirror. I had the same problem pin-pointing her then, too - only with Sasami, it was her physical form that travelled through the glass. Not her psychic one."
"Travelling through mirrors now?" Nagi snorted. "You people are far too weird for ordinary conversation."
"It was a ghost ship on our way to Jurai." Tenchi remembered. "Sasami disappeared one night, when we were stuck in Sargasso. And we never did find out exactly what went on...where she'd been. She wouldn't tell us. But Washu picked up spectral energy that night too."
"Ions." Washu agreed absently. "And the readings I'm getting now look very similar to those, if I'm truthful."
"Are you saying ghosts have Ryoko?" Tenchi stared. Washu shrugged.
"A ghost." She said cautiously. "Possibly. It's just occured to me, Tenchi - we're not far from the ship that Sasami disappeared into, all those years back. The Nagatabi. I can't believe I didn't make that connection sooner. Maybe there aren't ghosts here as a rule - but there was definite energy aboard that one. Strong psychic and ethereal readings...enough to form at least one independant entity."
"Ghosts don't exist." Nagi said firmly.
"If we're dealing with ghosts." Washu sighed. "I'm not sure we are. Not exactly, anyhow. What people consider to be ghosts often aren't ghosts at all - but the result of seperation, like what's happened to Ryoko. If a soul is seperated from the body for too long, it loses its way back. That's when it becomes trapped...and those were the readings I got when we boarded the Nagatabi the last time. Psychic readings but without physical form to back it up. At the time there were a lot of things that didn't make sense - including why Sasami was involved - but I didn't know then that Sasami was Tsunami's chosen one. Now I do, it makes a lot more sense. Tsunami has tremendous psychic energy and somehow that attracted this...well, for want of a better term, this spirit to her."
"So whatever took Sasami was probably like Ryoko - astrally projecting but without being able to find a way back?" Tenchi asked. Washu shrugged.
"More likely, there was no way back." She said quietly. "I told you, Tenchi, these projections don't last very long. The body can't sustain itself for great periods of time without the presence of the mind. Eventually the divide is too far to breach and it breaks. That's when the person dies. Whatever took Sasami that day was the severed soul of someone who had died and who wasn't prepared for it to happen. Sudden and violent death is the usual precursor to this kind of activity. This being tried to keep hold of Sasami, and now it looks like he or she has done the same to Ryoko."
"But Ryoko isn't Tsunami." Tenchi objected.
"No, but she is a lot stronger than she was, thanks to the gems she assimilated with during the fight with Kagato." Washu rubbed her temples. "And she has telepathic and psychic potential. Her bond with Ryo Ohki was increased threefold by the gems. It's not surprising that she should be vulnerable now when she wasn't before. And this time she was directly hurt...directly unmeshed. Last time she wasn't either."
"So how do we get her back?"
"That's what I'm trying to work out." Washu admitted. "I'm debating whether boarding the Nagatabi would even help, this time. We're not looking for a person, after all. We're basically looking for a ghost, and even if we find her, there's no guarantee we can communicate with her or send her back to where she belongs. We're stuck in physical form - and she's not. The last time, we couldn't communicate with the spirit because she was on a different plane to us. Sasami only could because of her overwhelming natural magic. We don't have Sasami this time."
"So that ship is the Nagatabi, huh?"
Nagi's voice made both of them jump, so intent had they been on their conversation. "That's interesting...that it should be that ship you're talking about."
"You know something about the Nagatabi, Nagi?" Washu eyed the bounty hunter curiously, and Nagi inclined her head.
"Yes." She agreed. "You could say that I've heard stories."
"Well, anything you can tell us would help." Washu sighed. "They didn't involve spectral sightings, did they? These stories of yours?"
"I don't listen to ghost stories." Nagi said scathingly. "No. I know about it because everyone knew about it, at the time."
She shrugged, leaning up against Ken Ohki's control panel as she did so.
"The Nagatabi was an Arian vessel." She said at length. "Far as I know, it belonged to some rich Arian family - a Lord or a Daimyo or some kind of pretentious title. Anyhow, he and his daughter made a trip on it through space one time - a trip they'd obviously done so many times he became complacent and careless about his security. The craft was attacked by pirates, and the little girl was killed."
"Killed?" Tenchi stared. "But...how?"
"Use your imagination." Nagi said acidly. "Whatever Ryoko has led you to believe, very few pirates care much about spilling blood, even the blood of a child."
"Do we think that's the entity that has Ryoko?" Tenchi glanced at Washu, who shrugged.
"Possible." She admitted. "Although when we were aboard, I did think I detected another entity - an incomplete being, true, but a spectral life form all the same. Tenchi, don't you remember? I think you yelled at me for having my priorities off-kilter."
"Vaguely." Tenchi acknowledged. "But it was just a glowing light...not even vaguely a person. The one that dragged Sasami into the mirror was almost a person - a person made of light. And I'd say it was a child...it wasn't bigger than Sasami, certainly."
"Then it sounds like you have your mystery solved. Glad to be of service." Nagi bowed mockingly towards him. Tenchi grimaced.
"Nagi. Stop it. Please."
"No, there has to be something more." Washu glanced at the readings. "I'm not picking up any half-formed entities. Not this time. And whatever it was that took Sasami, it didn't hurt her. Sasami was fine - in fact, she seemed to enjoy her little adventure. Not to mention the fact she was returned to us within a few hours. This is different on all levels. Firstly, Ryoko's only been pulled into something astrally. Not physically. Secondly, she's not been returned to us in any form. Thirdly...something just isn't right. Nagi, do you know anything more about the Nagatabi? The raid? What happened to the girl's father?"
"He returned to his planet to stand trial." Nagi said with a shrug. "Although of course he was acquitted. Powerful people usually are, as you'll know. And the ship was relegated to Sargasso - if memory serves me correctly, Arians are a damn hard species to kill properly, and if there's a death aboard one of their ships, that ship is usually decomissioned. They're funny about things like that. Probably they thought it was haunted, just like you do. Waste of a perfectly good spaceship - but there's no accounting for taste."
"Hang on. He went on trial for what?" Tenchi frowned. "You just said pirates killed his daughter. Didn't you?"
"Yes." Nagi inclined her head slightly. "Or so the story goes. But the father had blood on his hands too. He killed the pirate...didn't I tell you that?"
"No, you didn't." Washu's eyes narrowed. "But I'm starting to see a tenuous connection. Nagi, what about this pirate? Was he aligned with Haki or the Daluma? They seem to have a hate at Ryoko and she did say that Shank's family had ships moored here."
"On the contrary." Nagi looked amused. "The pirate in question was a former Balta - and a friend of Ryoko's."
"A friend?" Tenchi blanched. "Nagi, you don't think Ryoko was aboard Nagatabi when this happened?"
"The night Nagatabi was raided, Ryoko was witnessed attacking two prestigious banks off Shitori's orbit." Nagi dismissed this with a careless flick of her hand. "Even she isn't stupid enough to get involved in a messy business like a bungled kidnap. It's thought that was the motive - though with the pirate slain, they never found out for sure. Either way, the girl - I think her name was Mirei - was killed and so was her would be abductor. His ship floats here just as surely as hers does. In fact, you can see it from here. Look. Across the other side of that gutted patrol bug."
"I see." Washu squinted through space at the deserted craft. "What happened to the pirate's body, after he was killed?"
"Claimed by the Galaxy Police as 'evidence'." Nagi shrugged. "That's why his ship wound up here. They interred him somewhere in a convict graveyard - I wouldn't like to guess where they plant those suckers. I only deal with them when they're alive, not after they've cooled. But that would be my guess. He was condemned as this Mirei's murderer, and laid to rest in a regulation convict's grave. Dead pirates don't generally get hearings - it's too much work and there's not much point. Their guilt is pretty much a certainty."
"How did he know Ryoko, Nagi?" Tenchi asked softly. Nagi smiled, a flicker of malice in her red eyes.
"Difficult to say. Perhaps they were lovers. Certainly they were blood-bonded, because I saw the scar across her hand myself." She said frankly. "I always regretted that I never had the chance to take him down. He intervened once, when I was fighting Ryoko, and provided her getaway. If I had known he was involved, I would have got them both. But they were sneaky and I didn't ever get the chance to redress the balance. Hotsuma was killed before I could lay paws on him, and Ryoko...well, thanks to you people, I never did quite manage to bring her in."
"Hotsuma, huh?" Washu pursed her lips. "I never heard the name before. Tenchi, you know Ryoko better than I do. Has she ever mentioned him to you?"
"No." Tenchi shook his head, and Washu could see the mixture of emotions cross his face. "I guess she didn't think that mentioning former lovers to me would go down very well."
"But he's dead." Nagi said matter-of-factly. "What's wrong, Prince of Jurai? Are you jealous of a ghost?"
"If that ghost has my girlfriend, then I'm not overly pleased with him, no." Tenchi snapped back. "Washu, do you think that's possible? Could it be Hotsuma who has Ryoko, not this Mirei girl at all?"
"I'm working on the same thought process myself." Washu admitted grimly. "If Nagi is right - and they were blood-bonded - it would explain a whole lot more about the readings I've had, and why it was Ryoko who was targeted. If he was the malformed spirit that we encountered that day aboard the ship, then he must be feeding off Ryoko's memories and emotions to even exist, through that pirate bond. That's why he won't let her go. He has no existance without her."
"Can they still be bonded, even after death?" Tenchi wondered. Nagi shrugged.
"Pirates would say so." She agreed. "Superstitious idiots, the lot of them."
"Then we have to go to the Nagatabi. We have to get her back!"
"Tenchi..." Washu placed a gentle hand on his arm. "I told you...one step at a time. I know you want to pull her back - so do I. But we have to be careful, too. If any of these things are right, Ryoko's thoughts and memories are all open season. Going in rashly could hurt her and even sever the bond between her and her real life completely. We don't want to kill her because we're badly prepared."
"So what are we going to do?"
"Right now, we're going back to the Earth." Washu sighed. "Nagi, if you don't mind...I think we're done here for now. I'll begin work this evening on enhancing Ken Ohki's defences - because I have a feeling I might need to call on more favours from you in the next day or so, and I'd prefer it if you didn't choose to leave just yet."
Nagi frowned, her lips thinning at this.
"I don't like the Earth." She said at length. "But I suppose that I will stand a better chance against Shank if you can increase Ken Ohki's potential. So all right. For now, we'll go back."
--------
He was dreaming again.
Mirei darted through the darkened ship, passing through the walls as she moved closer and closer to the dark, fear-ridden thoughts that punctuated every space. As she reached the chamber which he had claimed for his own, the sensation became overwhelming and for a moment it was everything she could do to keep her thoughts seperate from his. At length she succeeded, pushing through the divide into the chamber and pausing by his bed.
He tossed and turned in his sleep, occasionally crying out against some invisible force, and despite herself, Mirei felt a sense of compassion touch her senses.
"Don't be scared." She murmured. "It will be all right."
She hovered her hand above his shoulder, but then she hesitated, unwilling to disturb him. His angry words towards her the night Ryoko had appeared on the ship had alarmed her and that memory was still too fresh in her thoughts for her to fight against it. Instead she just stood there, watching him for a moment as he struggled against invisible forces. Snippets of his nightmare still teased at her, as if threatening to wake ideas that had long since lain dormant, but she wasn't able to make sense of them and at length she frowned, shaking her head.
"I can't help you." She realised. "I don't know how."
"Ryoko..." Hotsuma's words were barely coherent, but at the sound of the woman's name Mirei froze, staring at him with new resolve.
"Ryoko." She echoed. "Of course. Ryoko. It's her - I knew it was. I have to find her. She'll know...she can tell me and then everything will be all right. I'm sure she will. She saw the photograph and she seemed to recognise...I need to speak to Ryoko. She can help...I know she can help. That's why she's here."
To think was to act and she flitted into the crystal of the mirror, focusing her thoughts on the ship's other inhabitant. Ryoko was not sleeping, that much she knew, and as she surged upwards she became aware that her missing pirate was on the bridge alone, staring sightlessly out at the stars that seemed to drift past the window. For a moment Mirei faltered, unsure as to the reception she would get. Then she steeled herself, grasping a tight hold of her resolve as she hovered forwards, resting a spectral hand on the woman's shoulder.
Ryoko started, springing back at the sight of her and energy crackled between her fingers as she stared at the phantom with a mixture of fear and confusion.
"Who are you!" She demanded. "I knew you were real...I knew I hadn't hallucinated you! What do you want? Because I...I don't believe in ghosts and I'm not scared of you!"
"I want you to tell me." Mirei said confusingly, and Ryoko blinked.
"Pardon me?"
"You had the picture." Mirei explained softly. "You must know...will you tell me? Please?"
"I don't have a clue what you're talking about." Slowly Ryoko lowered her hands, eying her companion in wary distrust. "Who are you and what do you mean? What picture? What must I know?"
"The picture of me. And the girl."
"The picture of Sasami?" Comprehension flitted into the bright amber eyes and Mirei's expression became hopeful.
"Sasami." She repeated. "That's her name?"
"If you mean the picture I found, then yes. Sasami." Ryoko frowned. "But you're in the picture too. Aren't you? Why don't you know who she is?"
"I don't know a lot of things any more." Mirei became sad, and spectral tears glistened on her lashes. "I forget things. It's so hard to hang onto anything. I thought...I thought you might know. That you could tell me...what I don't know."
"How would I know anything about it?" Ryoko demanded. "I never saw you before. And Sasami might have met you - but I sure as hell haven't before Hotsuma brought me aboard the Nagatabi. So what you think I can tell you I don't know. Is that why you're haunting me? Because you think I knew you?"
She faltered, then,
"I mean...you are...dead, aren't you? You are a ghost?"
"Dead?" Mirei looked surprised, glancing down at her hands. "I don't know. Do you think so? Maybe that's why I don't remember things any more."
Ryoko eyed her for a moment, as if trying to ascertain if her companion was sincere. Then she sighed, dropping her hands to her sides and sinking down onto a steel bench.
"All right." She said resignedly. "Lets say that for a mad moment I believe you and I take it as read you don't know who you are or why you're here. You must know something. I mean, why else would you settle on me? Just because of Sasami's picture? I don't get it."
"Sasami...she was special." Mirei frowned, closing her eyes as she struggled to remember. "I can almost see her...she laughed a lot, and she played with me. We played...we played in her world, and her memories and thoughts were so bright and happy. I wanted to stay there forever, but she couldn't...I couldn't. She had to go home, and then...I don't know what happened after that."
She held out a hand and hesitantly Ryoko touched it. Immediately a flood of pictures washed over Mirei's senses and the spirit gasped, pulling her hand back.
"I remember Sasami." She whispered. "It is you. You are the reason I'm here."
"That doesn't make any sense." Ryoko looked impatient. "If you are dead, then you were here a long time before I was. And you were here when Sasami...but that ship was...in Sargasso."
Her brows drew together, and Mirei could see she was processing this information carefully. Gently the spirit settled herself at her companion's side.
"Sargasso is where the dead ships go." She murmured. "And you were there because you hid from pirates, Ryoko-san. But you're sad...I know you're sad. And you think he's dead. Don't you? The one you love."
"What did you say?" Ryoko started. "What do you know about me? If you don't know who you are, how can you know who I am?"
"I touched you. I can feel your thoughts and memories, just like I can feel the man's." Mirei frowned. "The one you call Hot...Hotsuma. But I can't find my own. It's lost somewhere, and noone seems to remember. I think, sometimes, that he does - but he won't speak to me. He's not like you. He won't listen...but I want to help."
"You want to help Hotsuma? Do what?" Ryoko looked confused. "He stole your ship - right out of a graveyard, if this really is the ship Sasami got herself lost aboard. Why would you want to do anything for him? More likely he woke you, not me. He disturbed you when he took Nagatabi out of Sargasso and made it a raiding ship."
"Nagatabi." Mirei repeated the word thoughtfully. "That's my ship? This ship?"
"That's what Hotsuma told me." Ryoko nodded. Mirei glanced across the bridge, staring out thoughtfully at the stars.
"None of it is real any more." She admitted sadly. "I can't make sense of it all. I just want to go back...but I don't know how to. I just wanted to play...I wish I could remember. I know it matters. But I can't. I can't."
The ghostly tears slid down her cheeks and she dashed them away, struggling to contain her emotions. "You make me sad, Ryoko-san. You make me want to cry because you're crying, too. You just won't show it, that's all."
"I'm not crying." Ryoko snapped. "You don't know a thing about me, so don't make assumptions that you do."
"Your spaceship died." Mirei said sadly. "And you loved her very much. Someone loved this ship too, once. I know that...I remember that. But I can't remember who, or why. I don't know how I got here, or why I'm still here."
"You said you wanted to help Hotsuma." Ryoko said quietly. "Why does he need help? Aside from the fact he's bagged himself a haunted ship, what else has he done?"
"I don't know." Mirei frowned, screwing up her face as she struggled to remember. "He has dreams...they scare him. Bad dreams. Sometimes they wash over me, and they scare me, too. They're powerful thoughts, and I don't know how to stop them. He knows I'm here, even if he lies and tells you he doesn't. He's afraid of me - I think he thinks I want to hurt him. But I don't. Really. I just want to help him. Somehow I know it's why I'm here, even though nobody else comes to this ship any more."
"What kind of dreams?"
"Bad dreams." Mirei repeated decidedly. She held out her hand once more. "Will you come with me? I'll take you there. You can talk to him - he likes you."
"That's always been a matter of opinion." Ryoko said darkly. "He wanted to control me once, that's closer to the truth. Whatever his motives for bringing me here, I really don't know what he expects me to do. And I don't understand what you want me to do. I don't even know your name, and apparently, nor do you."
"It...might be Mirei." Mirei said hesitantly. "I...I think."
"You think?"
"When he dreams, sometimes he says that name. And your name." Mirei nodded. "And there's noone else here. I know you're Ryoko. So I...I must be Mirei. Mustn't I?"
"I suppose that makes sense." Ryoko rubbed her temples. "As much as any of this makes sense. All right...Mirei. Where are you going to take me?"
"I won't hurt you." Mirei promised. "Through the mirrors, to Hotsuma-san's room."
"I don't need to go through mirrors to get there. I can teleport." Ryoko shook her head. "And I'd rather not trust the word of someone who doesn't even know if they're dead or not. If you don't mind."
Mirei bit her lip, hurt flickering in her brown eyes, but she nodded.
"Then will you go to him on your own?" She begged. "He suffers a lot when he sleeps and it makes the ship so unhappy."
Ryoko sighed.
"All right." She agreed reluctantly. "I'll go. But bear this in mind, all right? Whether you're dead or not, or a ghost or whatever you are - I don't appreciate being haunted. So no more sneaking up on me from behind, okay? Else we'll find out how much electric energy can hurt spirits from the beyond."
Mirei faltered, then spread her hands.
"You won't hurt me, Ryoko-san." She said with a smile. "You're not a very good liar...and I know you won't."
Ryoko glared at her for a moment, but didn't respond. Then she flickered and blurred out of view, and Mirei faded back into the mirror, a sense of satisfaction building up inside her as she made the short trip across the ship to the sleeping pirate's chamber. As she approached, she could hear the sound of low voices, and she smiled again.
"Mirei." She murmured softly, nodding her head decidedly. "That's who I am. And Sasami...she was my friend. And...and Ryoko is the reason...Ryoko is the strong one. She can help him, I know she can. And maybe then everything will make sense again...and I'll know all the things I can't remember!"