Author's Note:

Wow… thirtieth chapter. The big three-o!

Chapter 30: Going on a Treasure Hunt

"BEN…" Ariah collected the necessary items required to bandage both her and Jim's injuries from one of the many first aid kits located around the RLS Legacy. "Can I ask you for a favour, please?" She enquired.

"Why certainly, Ariah." BEN smiled cheerfully. "What's your request?"

"Um…" Ariah rubbed the back of her neck. "I need you to guard the longboat with Morph, and make sure that we still have time to get back to your home before dawn."

"Why can't we go now?" BEN raised an eyebrow.

Ariah sighed. "Jim and I, we…" She looked away for a moment, trying to figure out how to explain their injuries to the short android without alarming him.

"Right, right…" BEN chuckled nervously with a surprising amount of understanding and he walked towards the dock house. "You and Jimmy need to talk, so you wanna be alone." He stated with a salute. "Don't worry, Ariah, I'll guard our longboat and keep a weathered eye on the horizon."

Ariah smiled faintly. "Thanks, BEN."

"Oh…" The android thought for a moment. "I'll shout if we've got to leave the ship to get back in time."

Ariah nodded in agreement. The young woman turned around and made her way towards the main control room, in which she and Jim planned on healing their injuries and fixing the controls for the RLS Legacy simultaneously.

"Okay, I'll do you first." Jim stated bluntly.

"Might I ask… why?" Ariah raised an eyebrow as she sat across from Jim on a stool in the main control room.

"Because…" Jim started. "One: you are the better programmer of the two of us, so you can program the Legacy while I fix you up." He raised a finger to indicate that he was not yet done his explanation. "And Two: You fell on your back more times than I did, so you probably have more injuries than me… which means you need to be healed first."

"Yeah." Ariah rolled her copper-brown eyes. "It was more getting thrown on my back rather than falling." She shrugged and pulled out the jar of mint-smelling cream. "But fine, we need to hurry up anyways or Doctor Doppler and the captain might have a situation on their hands if the pirates notice we've taken their longboat."

Jim nodded curtly; preparing the bandages while Ariah spun around in her stool to remove her ivory shirt and red vest with her back to him. She tossed the garments at her feet and reached behind her to begin untying the knot to her older torso bandages.

"One question." Jim cleared his throat as he opened the jar to the healing ointment. "Who was the person who healed you for these?" He tapped the older bandages.

Ariah quickly thought of something off the top of her head that seemed plausible. "They were from before this voyage." She stated. "I got into a bar fight at one of the spaceports and was sent to an infirmary." Ariah sighed as she pulled off the last of the bandages and dropped them to her feet. "Must've been a nurse who did it." She lied.

"Oh." Jim dipped his fingers into the ointment. "I guess I didn't notice them until that day in the brig." He coated his hands with the mint-scented cream.

"Yeah." Ariah looked forwards, trying to figure out the components of the circuit board in front of her. "It was a pretty bad fight." She grasped the wires and began plugging each colour-coated wire into its appropriate space in the control panel's circuit board.

Ariah tried to focus on her work, but a feeling of regret lingered within her body while Jim smoothed his hands over her back. The story had been true for another part of her past, but she knew that the unbound bandages at her feet certainly weren't from that incident. The reason the young woman had lied was because she didn't feel like bringing up the subject of Scroop so shortly after his death; especially when that particular incident might have a heavy weight on the balance of her and Jim's bond.

Jim's fingers glided gently over Ariah's pale back, covering her with the soothing healing ointment. There were more bruises along her back than there were cuts, but what Jim was really surprised at the amount of faded scars that were along Ariah's back. It was evident that Ariah had had a rough life, much more than he had ever assumed.

While Ariah silently worked on plugging in the main control panels wires, she became conscious that Jim's hands were giving her quite a different sensation than she was used to. Rather than the smooth surface of two pincers circulating across her back, Jim's hands were noticeably different. Though the two healers had the same skilled and gentle touch to avoid discomfort, Jim's hands had a strange texture to them. They were calloused at some points, developed from all of his hard work as a cabin boy; and the crevasses along his palms, they same ones that palm-readers used, were noticeable.

The skin across Ariah's back prickled with gooseflesh as she paused in her work to try and regain her concentration. Yet Jim's hands continued spreading their strange sensation through her, while the young man massaged the soothing formula into her skin.

Ariah was finally able to refocus on her work when Jim had finished spreading the ointment and he switched over to wrapping her bandages. The moment Ariah finished plugging the last of the wires into the main control panel was the exact time when Jim bandaged her torso up to her chest.

Jim simply handed Ariah the end of the bandage so she could modestly cover her breasts.

Ariah smiled faintly… 'Maybe Scroop and Jim aren't so different after all.'

Jim tied off the bandage and spun Ariah around in the stool so she could face him. He smiled. "You done with the control panel?"

Ariah nodded and looked at Jim. "What do you want done first; the front or the back?"

"Might as well do the back first." Jim shrugged.

Ariah sighed. "Okay." She scooted her stool closer to Jim's. Jim turned his back to Ariah and smoothly peeled off his loose shirt, wincing noticeably as it passed over his injuries.

The young woman looked at Jim with concern, then dipped her hands into the mint-scented cream and spread it evenly across her palms. Ariah looked over Jim's athletically built back, noticing that most of the bruises bunched closely across his broad shoulders.

Slowly, Ariah set down her hands onto Jim's back and began spreading the medicine across his bruises. She could tell from the development of gooseflesh across Jim's back that she was giving him a similar sensation as he had given her and could stop her smirk.

Jim clasped his hands together in front of him, trying to focus on something that wouldn't draw his attention to how amazing the feeling Ariah was giving him. He knew that they had to be off the RLS Legacy soon -though it couldn't have been more than half an hour past midnight- because Doctor Doppler and Captain Amelia's lives were at stake if any of the pirates noticed their missing longboat.

After a few barely self-controlled minutes, the medicine application was finished and Ariah began wrapping Jim's back in bandages. Thankfully, mainly because Jim was male, the bandage wrapping took less time and soon Ariah had spun Jim around to face her, so she could start healing the bruises around his neck.

Ariah dipped the tips of her fingers into the cream and gently smoothed them along the tender bruises. She monitored her every move closely, so she wouldn't inflict more pain to Jim; so close that there was hardly any distance between their two faces as she worked.

The urge was nearly impossible for Jim to resist. His fingernails dug into his palms as he tried to focus on the folds in Ariah's red bandana. This urge was equally shared by Ariah, who had to breath deeply in order to focus on her work.

The young woman finished applying the medicine and looked up into Jim's pale blue eyes. There she saw undeniable passion burning bright, and she knew that Jim could see the exact same fire in her eyes.

The two teenagers came together instantaneously; lips against lips, they held onto each other tightly. They both knew that they weren't going to consummate their relationship all the way tonight, due to the little time they had... And they needed to be careful of each others injuries, now knowing were each was.

The control room seemed to heat up from the intense heat coming off of the couple's bodies. Ariah flushed up, feeling Jim's torso pressed against her own with only a layer of bandages on each to separate them.

Jim's hands brushed along Ariah's chest, causing the female teenager to squeak with surprise, but none the less share similar passions. Ariah ran her fingers through Jim's bangs tugging playfully at the end of his rattail while hugging him closely.

Never in her life had she such feelings… and she'd never been this close to someone.

"Ariah! Jim!" BEN's voice yelled feverishly down the corridor. "We need to go now!"

The two teenagers separated immediately; realizing the amount of time they had consumed. They looked up longingly at each other and allowed one last tender kiss.

The astrophysicist had gotten a few moments of sleep, once he saw that Captain Amelia's condition was improving. But the dog-man's short period of peace was just that.

The stealthy pirates -that had managed to sneak up the mountainside unheard- soon invaded the small cavern-like hovel like a pack of ravenous vermin. The crew of barbaric pirates bound both Doctor Delbert Doppler and Captain Amelia in thick ropes and gagged them with bandannas before either of the hostages could dish out a decent fight.

The darkness of the lengthy night soon began to fade as the morning suns began to rise, colouring the skies above the planet's horizon in bands of soft hues. Dawn was slowly approaching, and the group waited for their prey to fall right into their grasps.

Jim, Ariah, BEN and Morph quietly landed the longboat back in its original position outside the jungle's clearing. They made the mistake of thinking that the pirates were still in camp because of the skilfully disguised bundles of clothing that wrapped fern leaves and other rude materials that resembled the pirates' slumbering forms.

Ariah strapped her solar glider back into place and looked around. The quartet secured the longboat and took their new shortcut back to BEN's cave before the suns' light could fully embrace the planet's surface.

Had they taken their normal route back to the first hatch, perhaps they would've noticed the pirates' true absence and avoided falling into the crew's clutches.

Jim was the first to climb out of the elliptical hatch at the back of BEN's cave. Ariah followed Jim and then helped BEN out of the hatch after her. Morph floated at Jim's shoulder obediently, chirping as he surveyed the shadowy cavern.

"Doc! Doc, wake up!" Jim shouted; approaching a shadowed figure, of whom he thought was Doctor Delbert Doppler. "I got the map." He pulled the sphere out of his trousers' pocket and offered it to the shadow. "Just look…"

Out from the seclusion of the shadows came a mechanical hand, glinting in the light from the rising suns. The hand daintily plucked the map from Jim's palm.

"Fine work, Jimbo." John Silver's voice stated as he stepped into the morning light with a leer on his face. "Fine work indeed…"

Ariah and Jim's jaws dropped simultaneously. They were absolutely stunned that the pirate captain was even in the cavern. They soon came to realize that he wasn't the only pirate who was present. The muffled yelling from the gagged Captain Amelia and Doctor Delbert, and the horrendous chuckles, indicated that the entire pirate crew was in the cave and had already gotten their grimy grasps on the two hybrids.

"Thanks for showin' us the way, boy." Silver smirked.

BEN yelped as Birdbrain Mary pounced on him, pinning him to the ground. "What's this sorry stack of metal?" The two-legged alien shrieked loudly, looking BEN in the eyes.

"Not the face!" BEN wailed fearfully, trying zealously to defend himself.

"Yer just like me, Jimbo." Silver stated plainly. "Yeh hates teh lose." The cyborg chuckled sinisterly as he tapped at the map's buttons.

After a few futile tries with his human fingers, Silver examined the map thoroughly with the pincers of his cyborg hand to no avail.

"What the devil's the..." He attempted to compress the map, similarly to what he had done to Scroop's pincer only months before. The cyborg glared at Jim, who smirked lightly. "Open it." Silver ordered as he tossed the bright orb back into Jim's waiting hand.

The brunette teenager gave the cyborg a flat, challenging glare and made no move to activate the small sphere.

"I'd get busy." Silver shifted his mechanical hand into a laser pistol and pointed it –rather than at Jim- at Captain Amelia and Doctor Doppler's heads.

The gagged feline shook her head in disagreement, while the gagged canine nodded his head in agreement. After noticing his companion's dissimilarity of the situation, Doctor Doppler shook his head against Silver's order. John Silver cocked the pistol, prepared to blow the two hybrids' brains out.

Jim kept glaring at the cyborg and tapped the treasure map's buttons, spinning sections of it coherently and unlocking the tiny mechanism.

From the moment he had learned how to open the legendary map, Jim had practiced the combination over and over again until he could do it blindfolded, in the dark; or in this case, staring down an enemy.

With one last click the map opened and a green light flowed from it. The pirate crew murmured in astonishment at the marvellous map. The light soon formed into a pathway, which flew out of the cavern's entrance and wove through the planet's dense jungle, as if leading them to something.

"Oh, the powers that be... Would yeh look?" Silver laughed aloud at the sight. He turned towards his crew. "Tie him up an' leave him with the others 'til we- what?" The green light retreated back into the core of the fist-sized map and all eyes were on its holder.

"You want the map... you're taking me, too." Jim stated bluntly.

"And by the way." Ariah fished out Silver's keepsake from around her neck and dangled it into the morning's light. "I believe you dropped something earlier, Mister Silver." The pendant's smooth surface glared in the light of the early morn, reflecting a single beam at the cyborg. "Lest I should release its contents to these fine gentlemen I'd suggest that you'd take me along as well…" Ariah cocked an eyebrow slyly at the cyborg.

Silver pondered profusely of the dilemma. If Ariah knew the contents of that particular pendant then she knew exactly what to release to his crew. She knew to reveal how soft to the core he truly was... which wouldn't bode well.

"Hmm." Silver chuckled at the two teenagers' identical mischievousness and he smoothed his human palm over his stubble-covered chin. "We'll take 'em all." He stated.

Ariah curtly tossed the pendant into Silver's waiting hand and kept to Jim's side. She could barely meet anyone else's eyes as she brooded over the recent events.

The pirate crew loaded into the last longboat from the RLS Legacy, keeping each of the six hostages on a short leash, so to speak. They then began the heated pursuit down the pathway emitting from the map.

Jim and Ariah took turns dozing on each other's shoulders while the other held the map securely. The night had been doubtlessly exhausting and they hadn't obtained enough sleep since early the previous day.

They followed the heading produced by the map as far as they could by longboat until the jungle became too dense to fly through. The pirates then unloaded themselves from the longboat, armed with shovels and proton rifles. Ariah, Jim, BEN and Morph were allowed to join the pack of buccaneers while one of the more lazy pirates –Meltdown- guarded the tied-up hybrids.

Morph chattered nervously at Jim's shoulder while the aforementioned teenager held out the treasure map to Flint's Trove.

"It's OK, Morph… It's OK." Jim reassured the tiny shape-shifter.

"Jimmy, I-I don't know about you..." The skittish robot tugged nervously at the bottom of Jim's shirt. "But I'm starting to see my life pass in front of my eyes. At least," He grasped his head. "I think it's my life." BEN concentrated furiously. "Was I ever dancing with an android named Lupe?" He hollered.

"BEN, sh." Jim hushed the robot. He looked forwards at the cyborg captain, who carved a path through the thick foliage with his cutlass. "This isn't over yet…" He wiped away a trickle of sweat from his forehead. The dual-suns surrounding the legendary planet had already heated up the exotic jungle to its unbearable warmth.

"We're gettin' close... lads." Silver seethed in anticipation. "I smell treasure a-waitin'." He laughed loudly and cut aside the last veil of vines from their pathway. "Huh?" Silver's eyes widened, as did the eyes of rest of his crewmembers. "Where is it?" He exclaimed.

The green light from the map ended right at the edge of an immense cliff, which dropped off into a deep jungle-filled valley.

"I see nothing!" Onus yelled. "One great, big stinking hunk of nothing!" His accented voice echoed off from the chasm-like cliff side as they stood by the jungle's edge.

The green light was sucked back into the map, which became virtually immovable.

"What's going on, Jimbo?" Silver asked Jim who was fumbling with the spherical map.

"I don't know." The brunette teenager strained against the buttons and mechanics of the map with his strength. "I can't get it open." He attempted once more, failing miserably.

"We should've never followed this boy!" Birdbrain Mary kicked Jim to the ground.

Jim let out a small grunt of pain as he landed against the metal ground; the thick moss that was covering the ground did little to cushion his landing.

"I'd suggest yeh get that gizmo goin' again, an' fast!" Silver whispered feverishly, trying to keep the crew at bay without having to fight them.

"Let's rip his gizzard right out, right now!" A rebellious pirate hollered.

"Throw him off the cliff!" Another buccaneer jeered loudly.

"No!" Ariah yelled. "You'll have to kill me first before you lay a finger on him." The young woman stated defiantly, standing in the line of fire with her arms out and blocking Jim's body from the barrels of a dozen proton rifles.

"Me too!" BEN stood beside Ariah in the same manner. "Is this really the right way to be going?" The robot whispered to the black-haired teenager.

Ariah smirked playfully but remained statuesque. Morph quickly shifted into a shield and three defenders glared at the mass of pirates.

"Three brats and a bucket of bolts…" Birdbrain Mary cackled sinisterly, motioning to charge against the poorly defended group. "No contest!" The crew jeered in agreement and began advancing upon the hostages, their proton rifles buzzing in anticipation.

"Jim…" Ariah whispered to the other teenager. "Do something or run." She stated.

Jim pushed aside some of the mossy grass over a nick in the ground and he discovered a trench with markings similar to the ones on the map. He pushed the sphere into the hole, where it fit perfectly. A beam of light emitted from the sphere, moments before the pirates' fingers could graze the triggers of their proton rifles.

The crew awed at the light, stopping in their steps. The three defending friends turned around, watching rivers of bright green light form under their feet. The plateau rumbled underneath them until the beams of light shot up into the air, revealing a triangular doorway that looked to be able to host an entire fleet of ships.

"Oh, have mercy." Silver exhaled.

"The Lagoon Nebula?" Jim and Ariah looked at the astrological sight right before them.

"But, that's 'alfway across the galaxy." Silver interjected, stepping forwards.

Jim looked down at the spherical hologram -that had appeared above the location of the map- intently. "A big door…" The young man prodded at a few of the locations to test the mechanism. "Opening and closing." He pondered a moment, stroking his chin. "Let's see..." Jim pointed at a planet situated at the far right of the hologram. "Kinapis." He smirked. "Montressor spaceport." Jim pressed the crescent moon-shaped icon and the triangular door revealed the familiar spaceport in which they had begun the voyage. "So that's how Flint did it." Jim realized. "He used this portal to roam the universe…" The young man pressed more planets along the hologram. "Stealing treasure."

"But where'd he stash it all?" Silver pushed aside Jim and began poking at random icons in the hologram. "Where's that blasted treasure?" He demanded. A few doors opened and closed, some revealing monsters from far off places, and others revealing the flaming asteroids of a recent supernova. "Treasure!" Silver childishly demanded. "Treasure!"

"It's buried in the-" Jim recalled BEN's earlier rambling. "Buried in the centroid of the mechanism." He thought for a moment. "What if the whole planet is the mechanism... and the treasure is buried in the centre of this planet?"

The pirate crew shouted excitedly, retrieving their shovels and zealously trying to dig through the solid metal surface of the planet. Their digging utensils soon became brittle and the heads of the shovels crumbled.

"An' how in blue blazes are we supposed teh get there?" Silver demanded.

"Just…" Jim nudged past the cyborg and pressed the core of the legendary planet's hologram. "Open the right door."

Author's Note:

Thanks to Whisperwings for editing, you're fantastic!

Hey, I just realized something that's kind of humorous. If I were using Roman numerals for each chapter then chapter 30 would be "chapter XXX"! Muhahahaha.

MG#6