"Thirty even years," Montmorency finally spoke as she and Louise entered into the room at the Starfinder Society they had been using while being questioned. She walked over to her bed and sat down on it, her face devoid of emotion until Louise sat down across from her, when her emotions welled up in an instant. "I, I'd be older than my mother is now, by then."
"Montmorency, they didn't say it was the only time," Louise said carefully. " it could be one of the longer times it took."
"But what if it isn't!?" Montmorency screamed as tears began sliding down her face while her breathing started to become heavy. "What if, what if it could take our entire lives to get home, and, and by that time everything is different and everyone we knew has passed on without us? What if we never find our home again and are just stuck wandering these empty places alongside all these creatures!?"
"We won't be stuck here forever, we will find our way back," Louise said as she rood up and placed her hands on Montmorency's shoulders, hoping her firm tone would help calm her down.
It did not.
"But what if we do and, and, what if it doesn't matter? What if takes so long that even if we get back, things have changed to much? What if all of our problems, our families, what if they don't recognize us, assume we died, and forgot about us!? Even if it only takes a few years, we, all of our classmates will be ,elsewhere and married, our families will have thought us dead and, and what if we're the ones who change and they don't recognize us?!"
Louise found herself unable to speak up. Montmorency's worries were perfectly right. Everything she was worried about could come to pass. It could take them so long the people they knew disappeared, the entirety of Halkeginia could change in some way like through a war or crusade, and if they had to learn about these places and creatures, these aliens and their technology, they could change in some ways probably. And if they did, would their families recognize them? Would they still have a place to go back to if they took too long to return?
"Montmo, . . . .Momo!" Louise said awkwardly. It had been years since they had been friends, and even if their captivity had brought out a bit more familiarity it still felt very strange to use Montmorency's nickname after so long even if she had said it while they were captive. It did what she hoped though, making Montmorency's head whip up to stare at her with bloodshot and tear filled eyes. "I don't know, how we will get home. I don't know how, or when, or what will be waiting for us there, or here, or any of that. But I'm going to get you home, and I'm going to be here with you the whole time!"
Montmorency stared at Louie for a solid minute before suddenly lunging forward and hugging her before falling to her knee's sobbing into Louise's stomach. Louise leaned backwards against her bed and sat, allowing Montmorency to simply cry into her.
What else could she do after all?
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
"How long has this been going on for?" Musashi demanded from Alexandria.
" . . . .We've been noticing the trend for the last half year now, and this exact problem has been happening for the last two months."
"Two months? And you only thought to mention that now?"
"All the disappearances have been happening at small hospitals and the like. And we have increased our security just in case," Alexandria stated seriously. "It will not happen her, or to those two girls while they are here. But that Is why I want them to get marked as citizens and your crew members. It would add more protection to them."
"Telling us the whole situation right away would have given them more protection as well!" Musashi yelled in anger. "Is nothing known about these disappearances? No trail?"
"No. all that is known is that every time they have been primitives, or the homeless or non citizens. The primitives have only started recently."
"That is even more of an issue then!" Musashi slammed on the desk as he stood up. "What security measures are in place?"
"We have all of our hall cameras, as well as magnetic locks on all of the doors in and out of the building as well as the building security. As well as the locks on all doors that you have already seen."
"Fine," Musashi said as he stood up and took a step away from the desk. "But I want you to tell them the whole situation."
"That will only make them more tense and anxious."
"They deserve to know that-"Musashi stopped as the lights in the room very suddenly shut off, bathing him and Alexandria in darkness. "What the hell is going on?"
" I, I am not sure. the stations power should never fail, but if it somehow did our emergency power will kick on in a second," Alexandria said just before the rooms lights lit to a dim, but barely usable red in color. "See?"
"That is still concerning. Hopefully Jarskat can," Musashi stopped before he looked at Alexandria with his dark vision capable eyes. "What are the locks on individual rooms programmed to do in the event of a power outage?"
"Well, they would disengage so people can leave and . . . oh no."
Musashi turned toward the door out of the room, and when it did not open automatically he grabbed it and threw the door into its inner hall space with enough force that it sparked ferociously at him. It was probably broke. "Jarskat, do you read me?" He immediately called over his inbuilt comms. Only to receive nothing in reply. " Shit. Emden, Marila, we've got possible break in to the building, converge on the girls room to protect them from possible primitive slavers. Weapons free!"
"This unit understands mission parameters, moving now with Designate Marila as vanguard," Came Emdens tone in his head.
"Good," Musashi stated as he strode down the dark halls and pulled a pistol out of his upper leg from a compartment for it. "Don't worry girls, you wont be taken on my watch!"
Xxxxxxxxxx
It had only been a minute or so since Montmorency began sobbing into Louise's stomach, but as she did, and just as she seemed to slowly be calming down, the rooms lights went out, leaving the both of them in darkness.
Which in itself was sudden but would hot have been concerning, if there was the sound of yelling coming from outside of the room, albeit distantly.
"Wuh, whab ish-" Montmorency tried to ask, only for her words to not really make sense due to how she was still sobbing.
"I, don't know," Louise muttered as a thump sound could be heard from outside the door. "Momo, get behind me," she then said as she helped Montmorency off th4 floor and onto the bed behind her.
Not a second later the door to the room was slid open, and the girls found the dark silhouette of a human standing there. A human they did not recognize. "Oh good your safe," the man said with a chuckle as he stepped into the room and held out a hand with a smile on his face. "C'cmon, there's a power outage, so we need to get you to the safe room. Its protocol you see."
"I was never told about anything like that," Louise stated instantly, feeling that something was wrong about the situation.
"Well, there's a lot of procedure's, no need to tell every kidnapped primitive them when they wont be around for most to occur, right?" The man said with a smile as he took another step forward while still holding a hand out towards the girls. "So, come along now."
"What is your name?" Louise asked as she leaned backwards, hoping Montmorency would understand and move further back into the room, allowing her to slide back as well.
"Jerry."
"You have no family name?"
"Course I do its, doe. My name is Jerry doe."
"You had to think abouit that," Louise said as she noticed that the man was standing at a slight angle, his other hand and arm not visible in the dark red light that now barely filled the room and the hall behind him.
"I don't get asked my last name lots, that's all. Now come along, we need you two someplace safe,"
"No," Louise said as she slid a bit further back as the man took another step forward. "I haven't seen you before, you are not dressed like the other people in this building. I have no reason to trust you. Leave."
The mans noticeable smile faltered and dissipated as he let out a long sigh. His outstretched arm hanging down to his side before pulling something out of a pocket. With a flick of that wrist the object extended into a baton that then began crackling with electricity. "Of course I get the primitives with a modicum of sense. Oh well. I'll make this simple you primitive pigs, I can either knock you out with this," He held up the crackling baton, while lifting his other hand and showing a pair of ring like objects in it. "Or you can surrender and put these collars on. It should be obvious which will be less painful, no?"
"What are they?" Louise demanded to now as she tried to shift back, only to feel Montmorency press against her back, making it silently clear she could not back up any further.
"Well," the man said as the rings seemed to split and open up. "These are just some simple little collars to make you less likely to cause a scene. They will make you a bit drowsy, and things will be easier for all of us," He said as he took a step forward. "So, what will it be?"
Louise felt her body go cold at the situation. If she had a weapon she could maybe attack him. If she had her wand she could, probably just explode and nothing else. Her options were to resist and likely be hurt, or surrender and have whatever that collar was slapped around her neck. And she didn't need that much of an imagination to imagine where that would lead.
There was only one answer to give. "No."
The man chuckled as he took a step forward ad raised the baton up into the air. "Well, looks like I'll need to rough you up and start your training a bit early then. Don't scream to loud now."
"I should say that to you."
The man froze at Musashi's voice, and while it was difficult Louise could see Musashi standing in the doorway of the room, pointing what looked like a pistol of some kind at the man. He then slowly tuned his head until he could see Musashi. "Hey hey, you're not about to shoot me. That would scar these girls for life to be suddenly covered in my blood when I haven't done anything yet. Put down that gun and we can deal with this like real men. What do you say?"
"No," Musashi said simply, as he pulled the trigger. But instead of a loud bang, there was the sound of electricity as the man began to spasm before he fell limp to the ground.
"Musashi!" Louise exclaimed in happiness.
"Sorry, Alexandria only just earlier decided to divulge some rather important information," Musashi said as he pointed his gun at the man at the ground and pulled the trigger again, an arc of electricity striking the mans body and making it flail about for a second. "It wont happen again."
"he, was trying to . . . . . ." Montmorency shook her head, unable to say the word.
"Alexandria knew this could happen?" Louise asked.
"not precisely this, but that something like it cold happen in the future," Musashi said with a sigh as he stepped to the side, allowing Emden to step into the room, grab the mans legs, and drag him out of the room without a word. "That is why she was pushing for you to be part of my crew, because she believed staying here longer would be more dangerous."
"We were just about kidnapped and likely to be enslaved," Louise said seriously.
"I'm aware. As I said, I was not told the whole situation until just a few minutes ago." Musashi said as he turned towards the door. "I have to deal with that scumbag and Jarskat, but Emden will be right outside the door until the power comes back on."
"Wait!" Montmorency suddenly spoke up. " Wait I . . . . our only options, are to join you, or stay here, right?"
"There are some other options technically, but they are based off those two options, yes."
"If, if we joined your crew, hunting for our home wouldn't be forgotten about, right?"
Musashi looked at the two girls, specifically Montmorency's tear stained face, perfectly visible with his low light vision, and sighed. "It would be a secondary objective, as we could not constantly look for it at all times and still have the means to keep using the ship, feeding ourselves and the like. I promise it would always be something that we would be looking into."
"Then," Montmorency paused and seemed to be preparing herself for what she was saying. "Then I'll do it. I'll join your crew and do whatever it takes. Cleaning, washing dishes, I don't care what it is or how much I have to debase myself. I just want to go home."
"I will as well," Louise spoke up as she glanced to see the fear, and certainty, in Montmorency's face. "Since it does seem like it will be safer there than here."
"It won't-" Musashi began to say, only to stop as he realized that no matter what he said, the girls had made up their minds. " Alright. I'll have it set up for you to get the information load once the power is back. I'd suggest resting up for then."