The war was over... sort of.
They had a peace accord. Treaties. Various and sundry economic-enhancing projects. Whatever.
It all felt as durable as cotton candy fresh out of the machine, frankly.
Talia Gladys sighed, thinking about her life recently.
She was back with Gilbert. With Gilbert. What the hell.
Well, it's not like she was married any more, hard to be that when your spouse was dead - Johmmy, Johmmy, her poor kind smiling laughing Johmmy, spinning her around and around when she knew she was pregnant...
And Gilbert had never been married to begin with, not legally anyway (never mind that he was in mourning anyway, or would be if he was actually, well, sane), so it wasn't even if they were cheating on their Significiant Others, since you weren't supposed to be able to cheat on dead people.
Or so the theory went, anyway.
And now she was going down. To Earth.
It felt weird. Oh, she'd been born Earthside, but her family had emigrated to PLANT when she was still a toddler, and the gravity -
Ahh, well.
Take a shuttle, take another. She was going to get to a certain Trade Mission in Orb next week, at this rate -
And shuttleports were so boring. You'd think they could design them so the passengers could have a bit more fun, but noo...
And that was when she saw the weird grey-haired man. Damn weird. As in, didn't even feel like a Natural type weird. With three big men in dark suits that had "security goon" written all over them. Plus two administrative assistant types who carried briefcases.
And a chain. A long chain. Somehow furry and shiny at the same time.
That coiled. And flexed. And...
Meowed?
Talia stared, then. She couldn't help it.
The chain flexed around, with the pointy tip turning towards her, and hissed.
Aaaaaahhhhhhh?
The grey-haired man looked at her, then, eyes narrowing, and then almost bugging out.
Coordinator!" Yes, yes, you got it right, and I can't really hear you through the din here but I could sure as hell read your lips, you know...
And then the man turned away... And tucked the pointy tip of the chain under his overcoat. He was...making petting motions, yes. Don't mind the scary Coordinator, chain...
The chain waved and flowed, coiling around it's - owner? - lovingly. Nobody else seemed to mind. Or even notice anything strange was happening, really.
Even when the man opened a can and started to feed it. Or that's what she thought she as doing, anyway...
Talia boggled. She'd never seen a love-me-chain do that before...
But -
"Fire! Murrue Ramires!"
The 'cats had killed each other, which meant "Artemis" was dead, and -
Well. This version of Venus didn't really look like he was any too stable to begin with, anyway.
...Whatever that meant.
Talia looked back at her newsieviewer.
She wished her brain would stop doing that to her. Words that had little meaning (except that they did, somehow, deep inside) and images that made no sense (she wished) and - Her annual psych evaluations were coming up, and she'd never get command of a ship again at this rate, damnit -
Thirty minutes later, Talia managed to catch a shuttle to Orb at long last. No grey-haired man with goons and assistants here, thank goodness.
She slept, and dreamt. Of Crystal Towers, and a Queen and a King.
And a Venus Love-me-chain that coiled and coiled, pretending very hard to be a cat...
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(Posted Sat, 29 Jul 2006 18:11)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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