Author's Note:

Ah, chapter fourteen… apparently that's a good luck number to some. Not some much for Scroop as we continue his day of slavery.

Chapter 14: The Adversity of Mister Scroop

Ariah rubbed her aching back as she sat down on her cloth hammock. She ignored the muted scuffling from the upper deck, hoping that Captain Amelia and Mister Arrow's hearing wouldn't end up caging her slave.

She kicked off her dark leather boots, removed her solar glider and her harness –placed them in her duffel bag- and she slowly lay down in her hammock.

The young sailor sighed with relief and she feel asleep from fatigue, despite the muffled fighting above deck and the bright rays of starlight pouring through the portholes into the dusty air of the crew's sleeping quarters.

Scroop left the crowd of sailors after knocking out the fat, orange-skinned alien that dared to launch him out of a laser cannon.

The crimson slave located the lift used to access the bottom of the ship, adjusted it appropriately and began carefully scraping off the barnacles with the tips of his pincers at the bow's port side. He needed to get the job done, and it was nearly midday already.

Jim found himself always being followed about by Morph. Though the blob could be annoying at times, he figured it was better company than most on this ship, now that Ariah was taking a nap. He and the transformer were currently sitting out on the bow's netting. They were staring at the thousands of galaxies expanding outwards from the ship.

The brunette teenager sighed and lay down across the netting. He let his thoughts flow freely through his mind as the afternoon starlight cast its warming rays upon the Legacy.

Morph copied Jim, resting a miniature form of Jim against the original Jim's shoulder and mimicking Jim's sigh in a high-pitched voice. Jim snorted at the transformer antics and kept thinking.

Ariah awoke to a very painful spasm in her back. She only just stopped herself from yelling out in pain by clapping her hands over her mouth. Her copper-brown eyes watered momentarily as the sharp sting passed.

The young woman let out a shuddering sigh as she got to her feet. Her legs trembled from aftershock of the sudden jolt. Ariah half-heartedly pulled on her boots and lifted herself from her hammock.

She thought to herself of possible ailments that could be overcoming her body.

'No, it's not that time of month…' she ruled out quickly. She pushed back her red bandanna and wiped her sweating forehead with the back of her hand.

'Maybe its some sort of bug or something…' she pondered. 'Bug. That's right…' Ariah sighed and feebly climbed up to the upper deck to check on Scroop.

Scroop scraped off the last sticky barnacle from the bottom of the RLS Legacy and tossed it outwards into the depths of outer space. He sighed from exhaustion and pulled the lift up, so he could get to the main deck. He met Ariah once he reached the main deck.

"Yes?" Scroop asked bluntly.

"Do you know where Jim is?" She asked tiredly. Her normally pale skin was sicklier colourless than usual and she swayed a little on the spot.

"Cabin Boy is at the bow." Scroop stated gruffly. He climbed back onto the main deck and secured the lift. The crimson arachnid narrowed his golden eyes curiously. "You sick or something?"

"No… it's nothing, thanks." Ariah cleared her throat and shook off the dizziness. "You go help Silver with lunch." She smiled weakly. "Try not to boil your pincer… again."

Scroop rolled his golden eyes and walked across the deck. When he was at the top of the stairwell into the mess hall, Scroop couldn't help but glance back at Ariah suspiciously before entering the stuffy confines of the galley.

Ariah dragged herself to the ship's bow, leaned over its outer railing and smiled softly at the sight she saw in the bow's netting.

Of all of the places to take an afternoon nap, the front netting in the glaring starlight was an odd one. Ariah chuckled lightly and allowed Jim and Morph to rest, 'no doubt they're exhausted from this morning's sailing activities…' she thought sarcastically. She rubbed the back of her head and walked towards the galley.

Ariah walked down the steps into the galley and mess hall of the RLS Legacy. She was exhausted from the strange illness affecting her.

"Can't stay away from me too long can yeh, darling?" John Silver chuckled warmly through the thick steam of the galley.

"Hmm." Ariah smiled weakly and sat down at one of the benches closest to the galley section of the mess hall. "I'm just tired, I guess…" She yawned.

"I believe that's what the crew's quarters are for." Silver raised an eyebrow.

Ariah pressed her chin against the back of her hands and sighed tiredly. "It's much darker in here." She stated. "Plus Zoff decided to take an afternoon nap too." She raised her eyebrows frankly. "And you know how he sleeps."

"Hmm…" Silver nodded in agreement.

"So what are you two cooking up for lunch?" Ariah asked, spotting Scroop's familiar silhouette through the cloud of steam in the galley.

"Purpaya Sashimi." Scroop stated bluntly. He was frying up a long rack of fish and cubed purps between the stoves in the galley.

"Mmm…" Ariah smiled. "Wake me when it's ready." She yawned, rested her cheek against the cool wooden surface of the table and fell asleep in her arms.

The two male sailors shook their heads knowingly at the black-haired teenager and then continued cooking the crew's lunch.

Ariah was woken up to a gentle prodding in her shoulder. She grumbled incoherently and then gradually opened her copper-brown eyes. A delicious aroma of fried food filled her nose and she smiled softly.

Scroop placed a plate of Purpaya Sashimi in front of her and then went to eat his own portion in the galley as well as started to wash the pots, pans and cooking utensils.

Ariah sat up and rolled her shoulders. The ache from her back had now spread to her shoulder blades and was quite a nuisance. She ignored the ache for the time being and began eating the food presented before her.

A long while passed, the rest of the crew loudly entered the mess hall, hungrily gobbling up their quantities of Purpaya Sashimi.

Ariah sluggishly took her time eating her own lunch; fading in and out of listening to the buzz of conversations around her.

"Ariah… are you alright?" A voice asked her directly.

"Hmm?" Ariah snapped back to reality and looked across the table from her. It was Jim.

"You look kind of…" Jim tilted his head. "Sick."

Ariah sighed. "Don't worry about it, Jim." She shrugged. "It'll likely pass."

The afternoon on the RLS Legacy dragged on longer than expected. Twice, Ariah had tried to take a nap in the crew's quarters, only to be awoken by the same painful spasm in her back after a few minutes of slumber.

Scroop had finished washing, drying and putting away all of the tableware from lunch, then he was sent out to polish the mainmast by Ariah along with more monotonous tasks.

Finally the hot and humid day drew into the dark and cool evening. Scroop and Silver began preparing dinner for the crew, a combination stew of breakfast and lunch's leftover ingredients.

Jim, Ariah and Morph spent most of the time out in the netting of the bow. Jim told Ariah stories about his boring and repetitive life on his home planet -Montressor- while Ariah admired them. To her, Jim's stories were basically telling her how something of a normal person would live their life on a daily basis at her age.

Before long, Silver clanged the dinner bell and the crew swarmed into the mess hall to get their share of food.

Ariah didn't have much of an appetite during dinner, but she enjoyed watching Silver tell another of his adventurous stories about him and a past best friend of his. His mechanical arm was used expertly to display shadow puppets of key elements in his story.

Then -while Scroop was beginning his round of washing dishes and starting to peel vegetables and thick-skinned fruit for storage purposes- Ariah and Jim went back out to the bow's netting, where they counted constellations and shooting stars.

After a few hours of lying beside Ariah in the bow's netting, Jim sat up. We should probably be getting to bed." He stated. "It's getting pretty late." Jim rubbed his neck.

"Hmm." Ariah nodded in agreement. "You go ahead, Jim. I'm going to stay out for a little while longer."

"Oh." Jim sighed. "Okay." He shrugged. "Good Night, Ariah."

"Good Night, Jim." Ariah smiled faintly.

Jim stuffed his hands into the pockets of his jacket and walked towards the crew's quarters. Morph hugged Ariah's face 'good night' before following the cabin boy.

Ariah sighed, enjoying the night air under a blanket of billions of stars.

Sooner than later, the familiar ache in her back forced her to leave the bow's netting, but this time, she wasn't going to ignore it.

"Hey Scroop…" Ariah called cool-headedly into the galley, where Scroop was still peeling vegetables and thick-skinned fruits.

There was an unusual frailty to her as she walked down the steps into the galley, now pleasantly cooled by the night's air. Silver had already retired to bed, leaving the two sailors alone in the galley.

"What do I have to do now?" Scroop asked.

"Oh…" Ariah gently sat down at a bench. "Just one last thing as my personal slave." She folded her arms in front of her.

Scroop placed the last peeled vegetable into the storage barrel. "And that would be?"

Ariah strained a smile. "I, um, was wondering if you could help me." She grimaced as she moved. "Put some healing ointment on my back." She sighed unsteadily. "And then bandage me."

Scroop could spot all of the subtle signs of pain that Ariah was trying to hide and his facial expression softened minutely. It was a rare and nearly impossible thing, to see genuine concern in Scroop's golden eyes.

It truly aggrieved him to see Ariah in such a great deal of pain.

"I think…" Ariah paused as she winced in soreness. "That those wolf-aliens, back in Gyrogga, pounded me pretty badly." She cringed a bit. "This morning's little hassle seemed to add up." She sighed finally, pulled out a large jar of healing ointment and a roll of bandages, and placed them on the table in front of her. "And all of my crashes from testing my solar glider -with Jim- didn't help much for the pain." She shrugged.

Scroop growled at the mere mention of Jim's actual name and his golden eyes narrowed in irritation. "Why don't you get Cabin Boy to do it?" He snapped. "I'm sure he'd be thrilled to see you, topless." The crimson alien turned away angrily.

Ariah raised an eyebrow, surprised at Scroop's reaction. She detected a subtle hint of what could only be jealousy… but that was impossible.

Ariah snapped from her thoughts and cleared her throat. "Because Jim's asleep now, and you're still my slave for two more hours." She recoiled a bit from another spasm in her back and hissed through her teeth. "Besides, I trust you…" Ariah added.

Scroop sighed. "Fine." He quickly wiped the sticky fruit and vegetable juices from his pincers with a dishtowel and kept his back to Ariah.

"Thanks… Scroop." Ariah said gratefully.

She untied the front lacing of her red vest, gently slipped it off and slowly pulled off her ivory peasant top. The sensitivity in her back made movement a little confined.

Ariah opened the lid to the healing ointment and unrolled most of the bandages. Then she turned her back to Scroop, with her bundle of removed clothing covering her breasts.

"You can start now…" Ariah stated plainly.

Scroop promptly turned around to observe what he was working with. His golden eyes nearly bulged completely out of their sockets and he was speechless what he saw.

Ariah's back was so darkly bruised that the crimson alien could hardly see any signs of her naturally pale skin; besides some tiny little ribbons between patches of bruising.

Among the horrendous amount of bruises were scars of previous wounds, but there were a few fresh slices -barely scabbed over- running across the width of her back.

"Is it bad?" Ariah asked timidly. She cleared her throat. "Because it feels pretty painful from having it, but…" She paused. "I may just be exaggerating."

"I don't think you're exaggerating enough." Scroop stated gruffly.

"It's that bad?" Ariah enquired with a small groan.

Scroop clicked over to the bench and dipped the smooth side of his right pincer into the wide-mouthed jar of healing ointment. He exhaled softly at the relief the mint-scented ointment gave to his previously boiled pincer. Then he lifted his ointment-coated pincer from the jar.

Slowly and carefully, Scroop smoothed his pincer over Ariah's heavily bruised back. The injured sailor sighed out calmly, feeling the relief of the ointment progress into her body.

The crimson alien paused when Ariah let out a small pained yelp; the ointment seemed to be stinging her opened wounds. He waited a moment as Ariah felt the nipping surpass and she nodded. Scroop then was extra careful when handling the fresher cuts.

Ariah observed that Scroop was very gentle as he tended to her. Most of the crew, she was guessing, would've just plopped the ointment on, tied the bandages around her and then send her back to work.

But Scroop was different… Was it, knowing him for four years as a sailor -and as a friend- that gave him that strange characteristic? Was it something else that Scroop felt about her? Or was it simply the fact that since Scroop's slavery proceeded until midnight, he was taking his time to both properly attain to Ariah's wounds and to make sure he didn't have to do any other strange tasks?

The young woman assessed her thoughts as Scroop spread the soothing ointment over her uncovered back. She had wondered exactly what the crimson alien had meant after he had taken out all of the mobsters in Gyrogga.

'You should take better care of the ones you care for…' He had said and then he had left.

Exactly whom was he referring to and of whom? Was he telling Jim to take better care of her, or Silver to take care of her? Was he telling her to take care of either or both of the males, or vice versa? Or was Scroop telling them that he was setting the example of taking better care of one of them? Thoughts like these pried at and confused Ariah's exhausted mind and she gently set her chin against the cool wood of the galley's table.

Finally, Scroop closed the jar of ointment, washed his mint-scented pincer and began preparing the lengthy torso bandage. He speared the end of the torso bandage on the tip of his right pincer and gently held it in place on the small of Ariah's back.

Then -carefully guiding around Ariah's torso- Scroop wrapped the lengthy bandage to the young woman's healing back. He cautiously monitored how tightly he bound the torso bandage; making sure that it was tight enough to avoid unravelling, but loose enough so it wouldn't constrict Ariah's ability to breathe.

The widest part of the bandage was expertly placed at the exact spot where Ariah's breasts were, which is what the torso bandage was designed for. Scroop cleared his throat, Ariah looked up from the table, and he gave her the end of the bandage.

Ariah smiled softly and Scroop turned away. She placed her clothes on the table beside the jar of ointment and wrapped the thick part of the bandage twice across her breasts, so they were modestly concealed.

The healing sailor cleared her throat in the same manner and then handed Scroop back the end of the bandage.

The crimson arachnid wrapped the last few feet of the bandage around her torso and finished off the bandage with a small knot. Scroop pulled the other end of the bandage from his right pincer's tip and tenderly tucked it under the rest of the binding.

"Done." Scroop stated.

Ariah looked up and smiled weakly to the crimson alien. "Scroop..." She sighed and stood from the bench. "You're free from being my slave." Her natural smirk returned to her face. "At least until you lose another challenge." She added smoothly.

Scroop snorted and turned away, preparing to leave the galley.

"Wait."

Scroop faced the young woman with a curious expression.

Ariah walked up to her best friend and gently hugged him around the middle.

"Thank you." She said warmly. "I really, really, appreciate it…"

Scroop wrapped his pincers lightly around Ariah and hugged her back.

"Well." He shrugged. "An order's an order."

Ariah separated the hug and looked up at the red sailor. "I'm going to bed." She turned away and grasped her clothes. "Fresh day tomorrow…" She yawned loudly.

She casually slipped her ivory shirt over her bandaged torso, carrying her red vest and the jar of ointment in a bundle under her arm.

"Good night, Mister Scroop." Ariah smiled and left the galley.

A silent, hopeless reply slipped from Scroop's fangs. "Good night… Ariah."

Author's Note:

And so ends Scroop's day of slavery… (Sigh)

Well, thanks a bunch to Whisperwings for editing this chapter.

MG#6