Night 48: Kitchen
[from here]The kitchen was pitch-dark save for their flashlights; no lingering light from the Sun Room's windows made it in here. Taura did a quick swing, and headed for the sink. The water turned on, clean and fresh, so she rinsed off her claws and went looking for a towel
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"I bet the medics have some in their kitchen," Taura called through the open doorway. Some things never changed. "They haven't bothered to give us any." She ignored the warning, but kept up a running monologue, one that he could hear was still calm and even. "If I had to get trapped in a prison, at least it's one that doesn't subscribe to -- hah, found it!"
Her head, quickly followed by the rest of her, popped back into sight.
"Frozen dessert. Guaranteed cure for combat nerves, if you can keep it down." Or unless he was still chilled? Tylor was still twitching, though his voice had picked an octave and was sticking with it. Good sign, maybe? Had she ever been that green?
Not a question that needed exploring. "We take what we can get, as often as we can get it, right?"
She set milk and ice cream down on the counter, and went to pull the lid off with her right hand. Four wicked little points did not retract with a twitch of a tendon, and she stared at the blades for a second. Then she sliced through the paper carton in one swift motion and peeled back the paper. It was a bit of a permanent solution, but it made a nice effect. "Spoons?"
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When Yomi stepped into the kitchen, the first thing she noticed were the two standing by the counter. They were the only two in the room and doing nothing to hide from her light.
And what did she know, one of the errant History members, just as promised. “Taura,” she exclaimed with pleasure. With someone else, not the Himura Yomi thought was supposed to be leading the group.
She left the pipe slip through the fingers of her other hand until she was gripping it by one end; tipping it up against her shoulder, Yomi stepped away from the door and toward the counter. Was that actually a snack? Well, well. What was this, had she interrupted some midnight binge eating?
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At least his chances for coming out of the night happy had increased, especially when Taura came back with ice cream. Tylor grinned, and opened a drawer to pull out some spoons. "If I'd thought about it back in that room, I'd have said no way... but when a pretty girl asks me to eat with her, how can I turn her down? And we might need more energy to run again, too." Or for him to run and her to fight. She seemed really good with those blades, if it weren't for the fact that she kept double-taking at them. Tylor decided not to ask about that, instead asking, "Are you from Earth? I can't figure out your accent."
The idle question was interrupted by someone coming into the kitchen. Tylor turned, surprised, but it was another pretty face and she looked happy to see Taura. "Hi there! Do you like ice cream?" He offer a wave with a spoonless hand.
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"You?" But before he could answer, the first of her squad arrived. "Howdy. Tylor, this is Yomi. Yomi, Tylor. Hope you made it through the sun room unscathed. We had a little trouble." Tylor had a little trouble, but Taura was nice enough not to point that out. "We're the first ones here."
When the squad had assembled, what was she going to do with Tylor? The idea of sending him back across the sun room solo seemed both impractical and unkind, but she couldn't take him along. Could she? Picking up strays wasn't in her job description, but she couldn't just leave him, either. Well, wait and see wasn't the worst plan in the world, was it? It seemed to have an almost mystical quality of working out all right with the Dendarii, so she hopped up to sit on the counter near Tylor and waved at the ice cream and spoons. "Go ahead, if you want."
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‘A little trouble’ was a relative enough way of putting it, she was sure. Yomi made an acknowledging sound, whether to the introduction, Taura’s unspoken question, her comment, or all three.
“Who doesn’t like ice cream?” was what she said. As for why the she-giant was there with ice cream in the first place, Yomi didn’t bother asking. She posed a different question once she’d come to a stop a few steps from the two. “So who’s this?”
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Standing up straight, ice cream spoon and flashlight in his right hand while he saluted with the left at both women in general, "Lieutenant Commander Justy Ueki Tylor, age 20, United Planets Space Force!" After a pause, he slumped out of the salute and added, "I'm glad you're friendly. I would have gotten eaten by that thing for sure if it hadn't been for Taura! I still don't know how I'm supposed to get back to my room now... is it still waiting in the Sun Room?"
Maybe he could just hide in here, eating ice cream with pretty girls until dawn. He'd spent nights doing much less productive things.
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"And it's Sergeant Taura, if we're being formal. Dendarii Free Mercenaries." She glanced at Tylor -- some people had funny ideas about mercenaries, and she couldn't say she blamed them.
Don't trust anyone who wants to be a soldier. The planet- or system-based groups relied on fanaticism, and mercenaries on money. Very few traded in honor; even among the Dendarii it was rare. Taura wasn't sure where she stood; she had chosen the life of a soldier. Better to be good at something than to go off and be a terrible gardener or clerk or something on one little planet for the rest of her days. It wasn't about the money, or the missions. It was about being Taura against the backdrop of the universe.
Clarity snapped into place like the autofocus kicking in on a long-distance lens. "I'll make sure you get out of here, Lieutenant Commander, before duty calls. But...if anything happens, go out the doors in the cafeteria and over the wall. It's not hard to climb." Wall-climbing seemed to figure strongly in soldier training, even when training space marines. Military traditions outlived their trainees; it was a necessity. Some of them outlived their own utility, too.
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But so many higher-ups were like that, as Yomi already knew.
At any rate, it seemed this Tylor fellow was merely looking for a safe corner to wait the nightly horrors out in. Even Yomi could understand that desire. ‘Friendly’ was also relative once the lights went out. But Taura was acting like the real deal, volunteering to coddle someone who wasn’t involved with their plans to challenge the basement. All of the club members weren’t like this, were they?
No, so far they just seemed to enjoy being late. And yet with the guy, that made a group of three…
Yomi spoke up once Taura had finished, lightening her tone in the same fashion as Tylor. “Uh huh, still there,” she said lightly, as though they weren’t talking about a jealous spectre that could do much worse than just eat a person. “Who knows what’s outside, either.” Stepping closer, she picked up a spoon and scooped it into the ice cream. Then she held it aloft between them like one would a glass. “Anyway, I think this night deserves a toast. Cheers!”
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Unless Yomi was bursting with the secret information that she was the youngest Admiral of her home, wherever that was. Tylor smiled around at them, taking some more of the pink-colored segment of ice cream (he was no sexist, all ice creams were equal) and nodding at the toast. "To not getting horribly killed! Cheers!"
After eating the bite, Tylor added in a grieving tone completely devoid of subtlety, "I wish they'd let us have alcohol!" He wasn't an alcoholic, but he did like it an awful lot. And it might be easier to sleep in this creepy, dark place if he could drink first. Most of all, you didn't take your dates out for ice cream unless you were 12 or they had some kind of extreme love for the stuff. In a more normal tone, he added to Taura, "I don't want to be formal if you don't. But I felt guilty, it's rude not to introduce yourself properly where I'm from, and I'd hate for you to think I was hiding something from you. If you ladies would still call me Tylor, I'd be happiest!"
Then, to Yomi, whose name had been given by Taura and who hadn't volunteered much since, including the state of the Sun Room until Tylor asked about it, "What's your favorite flavor?" She had at least said she liked ice cream, after all, so that meant they had something in common. If she didn't want to talk more about herself personally, Tylor wasn't going to try to make her.
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Then she went back to trying different combinations of flavors. She didn't know much about Yomi either, and she was curious to see what Tylor could turn up. The woman clearly shared her impatience with the way this mission was proceeding, but two out of two full investigation squads and no command staff didn't strike her as enough to start getting creative.
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What exactly would her toast be, now that they were making them? The others’, they were all well and good for the ones that had made them, but they didn’t apply to her. And the spirit of cheering no longer came to her, not unless it was from the sesshouseki--a hot rush, something like contentment the as she watched light fade from human eyes.
But Yomi had started it, and she knew how she would end it. She smiled at her spoon.
To the future that just left my sight.
As the man began talking once more, Yomi lowered her arm, and after awhile put the spoon in her mouth. The ice cream went down tasteless. At Tylor’s so-called guilt over secret-keeping, a smile grew around the utensil before she pulled it out. "Fine by me," Yomi said, who didn’t care either way. Space exploration and the like were better left to movies, and so were the people who claimed to do it.
She was ready to put aside the fun and games and suggest heading down to the basement herself, if not with them, but then they were both looking at her, waiting for her to answer a question. Well, well, well. Offhandedly, Yomi played along, pretending to think about it with such a drawn-out sound of contemplation it seemed as though she were trying to puzzle out a koan. "Ahhh, that’s too hard! How can a person be expected to decide that."
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"Having a pleasant time, I take it?"
Homura had moved away from his group, and now approached the three standing around with a purposeful gait. When he came close enough, he could hear their toasts more clearly, and could catch the faint scent of their sweets, and each new piece that make the picture clearer only sharpened his anger. They had struggled so hard to make use of what time they had. They had risked their lives for weapons, supplies, each tiny piece of information that might bring them closer to freedom. And just earlier that very day, Homura watched his closest friend hunched over, subjected to a disease that would eat away at his life, his strength, and his pride--
And then he came across this. Perhaps they had meant nothing by it, this innocent encounter. But Homura could feel a rage that he hadn't experienced in centuries at the sight of it.
"Himura and Kamiya aren't here. Is one of you Hayashi?" Homura moved his eyes from the man's face to the other woman's. It didn't matter. He turned his gaze toward Taura then, mismatched eyes narrowing in the dark. "I'd like to know just what you're doing here. I've never rejected requests for nights off, but when you sign up for an assignment, I expect you to work for that goal!"
Homura didn't wait for an answer. He didn't want an answer yet; what could possibly give reason to this madness? "How long have you stood here just waiting? Tonight is an experimentation night, in case you haven't considered that. Do you know if they were taken? Did they leave you a message saying to expect them to be delayed? Are you so sure that any room in this prison is safe enough for you to let down your guard so completely? Because if you are looking to simply stagnate and die, then I don't need to waste my resources on either of you."
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As Homura launched into his lecture, Taura hopped down from the counter into parade rest. If there had been a way for her posture to become more correct as he continued, she would have taken it; as it was, the only motion she made was the occasional sweep of the room for incoming. Because she hadn't dropped her guard -- she didn't need to prowl a room to watch it.
"Where I come from, there's a difference between showing initiative and deliberately deserting an assigned post. Sir. Two people, neither in command and neither briefed," she said, hoping that was an accurate description of Yomi's status, "did not, in my estimation, make critical mass to proceed with the mission. If you believe three does, I am ready to proceed."
She thought about adding that they hadn't been in the kitchen very long, by their own internal perception. Or that there were several rescue squads, if the day's messages were to be believed, and anyone missing the assignment would be out of commission for the night. It was a ruthless arithmetic, but it was the one that counted.
No, she'd leave it there. One reason is justification. Two are excuses. She Except there was one explanation that seemed necessary. "Sir, this is Tylor. He ran into a...little trouble in the Sun Room, and I couldn't just leave him there." She turned to Tylor, a deliberate, open smile on your face. "But he's all right now, aren't you?" She wasn't at all sure of Tylor's capabilities to do anything other than panic and look helpless, but she didn't need to let him know that. Confidence could do remarkable things, and maybe a little propping up would do the trick. She cocked her head, as if appraising him, and added, "He can take care of himself. Just go back the long way around if you need to, yeah?" She ended it with the sort of smile that appealed to certain deep human instincts -- a gender-specific impulse that she'd never completely understood the root of. Maybe they'd clipped it out of her, taking it away to make room for a few extra percentages of muscle mass. But she'd use the hand she'd been dealt, and if masculine pride would see Tylor home, that was for the best.
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Tylor blinked, still holding a spoon in his free hand, glancing nervously between Taura, the newcomer and Yomi. He didn't know what most of the man's words meant, although it wasn't very hard to put together with context that they were part of a group and had some mission that was on hold. As Taura explained what had happened, Tylor squinted at Homura's figure in the dark, not recognizing him. All parties wound up coming to an end, anyway.
This was heading disconcertingly quickly to a situation where he'd be alone in the dark again, even though the look Taura gave him was nice. More than nice, alluring. Asking for help again might be pushing it. So Tylor stood up next to Taura, only to bow at the waist with emphatic force but without much rigid dignity, lowering his head.
"I'm sorry! This is all my fault. I'm new here, and I got attacked by some sort of monster ghost demon thing in the Sun Room. Taura rescued me, and was trying to help me calm down. Then her friend arrived just now, so we were all sort of saying hello and I guess I was flirting a little." Tylor stood up in a position that was a little too grovelling to be straight, gesturing at both women while giving Homura a hapless, guilty expression. "I didn't know they had an important mission. If you're angry at anybody, it should be me."
After all, unlike Taura, he didn't know who the man was or care about his opinion. It didn't seem as if he'd get to keep his bodyguard at this rate, but at least he'd gotten directions back to his quarters and some ice cream.
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But in that moment she wasn’t struck by a sense of the celestial when he opened his mouth and his reprimand began to border on a tirade in its emotionality. Of course good leaders couldn’t be expected to tolerate feeble behavior in the ones under them-that wasn’t how masters molded tools of fate like Yomi, like Kagura-yet in this instance the dressing-down didn’t match the circumstances. It came from elsewhere. Perhaps, by the physics of Landel’s, a god’s form could be modified to take on more human qualities. Because this was a human delivery.
Expression blanking out of her mien, she accepted the rake of his gaze and said, "That’s me," when the question came, remaining silent in between the rest of the talking, gaze lowered just enough to seem compliant.
Someone who appeared to do little vetting for competency and experience didn’t have room to chide his members for a lack of them later. It might have been a different story for Taura, had she been an old enough member to have known or worked with Homura before as he seemed to imply, but her response made Yomi think otherwise. Since Yomi herself was neither guilty of the unspoken charges nor a beneficiary of any ‘resources’, she couldn’t be included in most of what he was telling them off for-the spirit of it, though, that she would acknowledge. God or not, the possibility of resources still sounded good enough to her that she was encouraged to show contriteness.
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The notion of Taura's altruism also didn't impress Homura. Perhaps she'd missed those notes that said the History Club was one focused on their own interests, and Homura's agreement. He addressed Tyler briefly, his tone clipped and dismissive. "You're responsible for your own weakness, but not for her choices." Someone that had needed to be rescued, that hadn't learned enough from the day to prepare himself for the horrors of the night wasn't likely to be of value in the long run. As for Hayashi, she had identified herself, but said nothing, and offered nothing in explanation for her own actions. So in turn, Homura ignored her, and instead committed her reaction to memory for use in making decisions later. "Taura, if you want to be a hero who blindly follows orders--who uses those orders as an excuse? Then there are other organizations here you should join. But relying on the wisdom and strength of others in place of your own is foolishness. If you can't think for yourself, then I don't need you."
It might seem strange, considering how weak they'd all become in this prison. But Homura's philosophy remained unchanged. He'd long learned that relying on others in place of acting yourself truly was madness. Altruism, the mercy of the gods, fate? A fool's methods that would never earn Homura's approval, much less his respect. That sort of mindlessness put the course of a person's life in the hands of another, for their pleasure, and Homura had seen firsthand just where that led.
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