bandombigbang 10: Part VI
Part V - Master Post - Mix - Art
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The starliner appears just off the edge of the cliff. Literally appears. Okay, so it probably did the normal ship hovering thing, but to Matt it seems like it just appeared because he most certainly hadn’t heard it approach.
Granted, he had also been watching Pete do things with a laser torch that just shouldn’t have been possible. Four inch gashes in solid metal do not just melt back together like that, Matt doesn’t care who is wielding the tools.
Matt does wish he had heard the ship approach, because he almost loses a hand when Pete jumps in surprise and almost drops the laser torch. “Shit! Watch it, Wentz!”
“Sorry, sorry!” Pete says, jerking the torch up and away from them both before he turns it off.
“Matt, get your ass in here!” Ryan shouts from the hatch. “You’ve got a wave!”
Matt and Pete share a look before turning and looking at the starliner hovering twenty yards away. It’s about twice the size of the Nirvana, and definitely something close to a smaller version of Fuck City. Meaning, totally an all on its lonesome space faring vessel. From the bridge window, a small dark figure waves at them.
Pete waves back even as he whistles. “That is not a cheap ship.”
Matt nods. “Totally not.” He’d bet it was worth somewhere in the billion credit range.
“Mixon!” Ryan bellows.
Matt rolls his eyes. “Yes, mom! I’m on my way.” He takes another look at the ship, and then slips down from his perch to the open hatch, dropping down into the passenger section easily. “What do you want?”
“There are a couple of Space Pirates that want to talk to you,” Ryan says. “Well, they want to talk to the person in charge, and I’m not done with Andy yet. You’re up.”
Matt blinks, then shrugs. “Okay.” He goes into the cockpit and drops into his chair, where his view screen shows a burly blond man waiting patiently. “I’m Matt Mixon. Would you be the guy in that billion credit ship hovering outside my shuttle?”
The blond guy smirks at him. “That’s a low estimate, Mixon, and yes. I’m Bob Bryar.”
“Space Pirate and general Bob of all trades!” Another man says as he shoves Bob to the side to look into their end of the connection. He’s small and dark and probably the guy who’d waved at him and Pete. “I’m Frank, and how the fuck did you losers blow up three quarters of an armada?”
“I’m not disclosing that information, sorry, Frank,” Matt says. He leans back in his chair and clasps his hands over his stomach. “What can we here on the good old Nirvana do for you boys?”
Bob puts his hand against the side of Frank’s head and shoves him out of range of the view screen. “We’re here to get you and your crew out of the area. There’s a search party from the Toro Family on its way, and you do not want a piece of that.”
“Especially since that bucket of bolts doesn’t look like it can fly in a straight line!” Frank says off screen. He giggles when Bob lobs something at him - something that made a very loud thump when it hit the wall.
“Why should I trust you?”
Bob shrugs. “You don’t really have much of a choice. Also, since you’re definitely not local, you probably don’t know that there’s something of a civil war taking place right now - we’d be part of the rebels trying to overthrow the harsh rule of the Familys and yadda yadda yadda.”
“Dude, Gerard is going to be pissed that you totally trashed his speech,” Frank says. He pops back up on the screen, this time leaning into Bob’s space instead of out and out shoving Bob aside.
Bob shrugs again as Matt blinks. Bob says something back to Frank, but Matt is distracted by the sudden appearance of another grouping of ships on the outer edge of the plains.
“Shit, you’re serious, aren’t you?” Matt asks, sitting up in his chair. The ships are definitely headed in their direction. Even if the Nirvana’s jamming sequence was working, there’s no way it could hide the body heat of eight guys, especially a former Living Ship that was still giving off energy like a ship exiting hyperspace.
“Yes,” Bob says. “You should gather up your crew and whatever belongings you don’t want confiscated by the Toro’s and come aboard Dixie. Your ship should be fine here - it’s well hidden and off radar. I wouldn’t have found it if we hadn’t seen you land. We’ll bring you back once the heat’s off.”
Matt looks Bob in the eye. He doesn’t know why but he’s sure he can trust Bob. Frank is another question entirely, but Bob reminds Matt of Andy - solid and sure. The others are going to kill him. Matt nods. “Okay. Ten minutes safe enough?”
Bob nods. “I’ll land, and we’ll help you load up. Any injuries?”
Matt shakes his head. “No, thankfully. I’ll go warn the peasants.”
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Thirty minutes later, they’re piled a passenger lounge on Dixie just outside of the main bridge. If Matt hadn’t just spent the last ten years of his life on the most advanced, tricked out ship in existence, he’d be drooling over Dixie. She’s all clean lines and open space, compact and airy, intimate, yet enough room to give even the crankiest of crew member’s space. In short, the best type of small space flight vessel in the galaxy.
No one is thrilled that Matt agreed to jump on board without talking to them, but he is completely sure that they didn’t have a choice. He’s sure they don’t actually believe him, especially after they hear Frank call into someone named Brian that he and Bob are, “Totally bringing in fresh meat! You’ll like them, too - they’re cute!”
“Mixon, if anyone dies or is tortured, I am blaming you,” Andy tells him. He jabs a finger against Matt’s shoulder, hard.
Matt scowls as he rubs his shoulder. “Why am I the one always being blamed?”
“Because it usually is your fault?” Stu says. He has had his hands near his hipshooters since Dixie had appeared outside their bolt hole.
“Dudes, not to cut into your friendly comrade banter or anything,” Frank interrupts. He has his head stuck through the opening between the two rooms. He’s grinning and wagging his eyebrows at them. “But we’re about to land. You totally want to see this, Mixon.”
Matt shrugs at the glares everyone else is giving him, and he follows Frank into the other room. Andy and Stu follow him.
The bridge is standard for a starliner. Main view screen in front that can be disengaged and slide away to show a solid clear plexi-steel window for in-atmo flight. There are six other windows - three on each side of the forward window - stretching along the port and starboard sides of the ship, their steel covers also pulled away. Then there’re the two main work stations - pilot and navigation - one on each side of the room. Bob’s sitting at the station on the left, guiding their decent deeper into the mountain range through the forward window.
At first glance, it looks like Bob is about fly straight into the side of a mountain. Then a huge section at the mountain’s base pulls back, revealing a huge tunnel that Fuck City could have flown through - doing loop-de-loops. Bob flies them straight in, and not five minutes later they’re landing in a huge cavern that could have held five Fuck Cities with room to spare.
As it was, besides Dixie, there were three other starliners, two frigates, a freighter, two battalions and a cruiser parked in various slide docks along the walls. Half the slide docks stood empty.
“Welcome to Rebellion Headquarters!” Frank says. He waves his arms grandly, almost smacking Bob in the head. Bob swats his hands away with the ease of long practice as he shuts down the ship.
“Come on,” Bob says as he stands up from his seat. He gestures out the front window at two guys walking up to the ship. “You need to meet Gerard and Ray. Unfortunately, they are the brains of this outfit.”
“I’m telling Gerard that you said that!” Frank crows as he pushes past the three of them and off the bridge.
Bob rolls his eyes at Frank’s back. “Yeah, I’m terrified, Iero!” He shouts after him.
“You should be, Bryar! Gerard signs your paycheck!” Frank shouts back. Then he says something to the others, and there’s the sound of everyone trooping off the ship.
“What paycheck?” Bob asks the air as he gestures the three of them ahead of him. “Come on. Way and Toro are decent guys, you’ll like them.”
Matt stops halfway out the door. “Toro? I thought you said…”
“I did. That’s how you know we’re the real thing and not the fucking pansies playing at a rebellion to look good to mommy and daddy. We have the third in line heir of the Toro throne co-leading us.” Bob nods, a smirk on his lips. He gestures impatiently for Matt to move again. “Now hurry up. Way is sure to have dinner all set up, and I’m starving. Frank ate everything. Again.”
If Matt had been asked who he thought was leading a planetwide rebellion by Space Pirates against other, more tyrannical Space Pirates, the two guys who met them at the base of Dixie loading ramp would have been pretty far down on his list. Okay, they probably would have been at the very bottom of the list, if they’d made it on there at all.
But two guys in their late twenties - one with a rat’s nest of black hair, sunglasses and ink stains on his fingers and the side of his nose, the other with curls that rival Joe’s and a goofy smile - are not the picture of ‘Space Pirate Rebellion Leaders’.
“Hi! Welcome to Rebellion Headquarters!” Sunglasses and ink says. He has a huge grin on his face. “I know, I know, it’s a terrible name, but I really haven’t had the time to think of a really good one, yet. Most of them have already been used, and at least this one is straight forward.”
“Gee,” Curls says. He shakes his head sheepishly as he looks over at the gathered group of them. “I’m Ray Toro, and this is Gerard Way. We’re the two that asked Bob and Frank to bring you here.”
“And you did that why?” Andy asks. He has his arms crossed over his chest, and he glares at them. Matt nudges him with his hip and mirrors Ray’s sheepish look back at him.
“You were attacked by part of my Familys armada,” Ray says. He raises his hands in a ‘what can you do?’ gesture. “We figured you were either one of their enemies or potentially one of their enemies, given that you crash landed and they tried their ‘surrender or die’ routine. We thought we should help.”
“An enemy of my enemy is my friend?” Joe asks. He’s standing just in front of Pete and Patrick, angled just enough to hide Patrick from Ray’s and Gerard’s line of sight without looking like he was trying to hide Patrick from their line of sight.
Gerard nods. “Totally. Or, at least, the least we can do is show some hospitality to you guys. Crash landing and being attacked all in one day sucks.” He sounds like he’s speaking from personal experience.
“He’s speaking from personal experience,” Frank says. “There was this one time over…”
Bob puts his hand over Frank’s mouth. “Frank, they don’t want to hear that,” Bob sighs. Then he growls and snaps his hand away from Frank, who is grinning innocently at him. Bob scowls and wipes his hand off on the side of Frank’s face. Frank just giggles.
“Space Pirate stories? Who doesn’t want to hear them?” Pete asks. He’s leaning against Patrick and shifts forward to poke Joe in the shoulder, who calmly rolls his eyes and ignores Pete’s snickering.
Bob rolls his eyes. “Okay. Frank, they don’t want to hear about that now.”
Frank pokes him in the side. “You’re just cranky because you’re hungry, Bob.”
“I wonder why that is,” Bob says. He pokes Frank in the cheek. “Pig.”
“Please ignore the FrankandBob show,” Gerard says. “They always act like they haven’t been together forever.” Despite his words, he’s smiling happily at the two of them. Matt’s sure there’s a story - there always is.
Ryan snorts. “We know the type.” He, Kyle, and Stu roll their eyes collectively when Matt raises an eyebrow at them
“I take it Frank ate everything again?” Ray asks. He shakes his head before he hears Bob’s answer. “Frank, you are a pig. Brian sent you two out with enough food for three days, and you were gone eight hours!” He rolls his eyes when Frank just smiles cheekily at him. “Thankfully we have dinner set up in the small dining room. Come on, Gee will explain everything as we walk and eat.”
He and Gerard turn together and start walking towards a small open doorway cut into the stone. There are similar doorways spread out periodically throughout the massive hanger - they look like tiny spots of light against the dark red stone - on this level central level and the other six. There are two massive doorways that start on the third level and extend through the fifth that are directly across from one another along a line that would form a t-junction with the now hidden again entrance - a line that would probably be a pale gold should Matt have dropped into the Trance. Most of the smaller doorways have a corresponding slide dock, but the two larger ones only have large balcony like lips that extend out about twenty yards in a semi-circle around them.
Matt isn’t sure what he is expecting when they walk into the tunnel behind Gerard and Ray. Part of him wants to see something from an ancient science fiction vid, with exposed wiring and hanging exposed light bulbs from the ceiling, but reality continues to not provide. Instead, the walls are smoothed to a dull shine, more from wear and tear than someone deciding today would be a good day to polish the walls, and there are recessed lights in the ceiling spread out every six feet.
“We have no idea who made this place,” Ray tells him when he spots Matt running his hand along the wall. Matt had been following a line of light to discover what looked liked crystal fragments within the red stone. Mostly they just reflected the light, making the tunnel seem larger than its eight foot width and height. “Gerard says his great-great-great-great-grandfather and mother found this place when they’d split from the Jordan Family, and only minor alterations have been made.”
“Mostly technology based improvements,” Gerard says. “And those only in the last twenty years. Elena, my grandmother, was the one to push for the actual Rebellion, and not just the facsimile the Familys allow.” He rolls his eyes. “Drunk and high kids planning stupid pranks and shit. Anyway! Long story short, our group would like to overthrow the Familys and set up a system of government that would actually benefit the whole of Barataria and not just the rich jackasses.
“Most of the people on this planet aren’t actually Space Pirates,” Gerard continues. He turns down the left tunnel when they approach a fork, and then right when they reach a crossroads. Matt really hopes someone else is paying attention to where they’ve been, because he’s lost already. Give him stars and sky and he can find himself where ever he needs to go. Put him underground and he’s completely fucked. “Just decent enough people who want to live good lives. Sure, most everyone likes to think of taking to the skies and earning a couple million in easy credits, but those are pipe dreams. We just want everyone to have a fair shot.”
They take them down another couple sets of tunnels, and then Gerard stops at a closed door. He knocks and sticks his head in. He has a quick conversation with whoever is inside, and then he shuts the door again. “They aren’t hungry,” he says to Ray, who shrugs.
“They don’t eat as often as we do, you know that, Gee,” Ray tells him. He pats him on the shoulder. “They’ll meet everyone at breakfast.”
“But first things first,” Bob grumbles from the back of the group. “Dinner.”
Ray laughs. “Yeah, yeah. Hold onto your britches, Bryar, you’ll get your dinner.”
They walk down another couple of tunnels (left, right, right, left) until they come to another door. Gerard just opens it and waves everyone inside. “We don’t really go for the whole formal dinner thing, so everything is usually just a buffet. Help yourselves.”
They all file into the room, which looks a lot like the mess on Fuck City. Large and open, with food lined up on preserver tables against the wall, and groups of tables and chairs spread out across the room. Bob and Frank beeline right over to the food - Bob for actual food, Frank for the desserts - but Ray and Gerard wait for them to move.
Pete, Patrick, and Joe have a quick conversation between them, all eyebrows and head twists and funny faces, before Patrick throws his hands up. “Whatever. You to want to be paranoid fucks, go right ahead. I’m eating.” He goes the buffet and starts loading up a plate.
Joe and Pete look at each other. Joe shrugs. “Food’s food, dude. And Bob’s not the only one who’s starving.” He follows Patrick to the buffet, and Pete drifts after him with an odd quirk to his mouth.
“We promise we aren’t going to poison you,” Ray says when the rest of them just stand there looking at each other. “Honest.”
“We know,” Stu says. He’s leaning against the wall with his arms over his chest, and he’s mostly laughing at the rest of them.
“You do?” Ray asks. He sort of blinks at them, and Matt knows the guy can’t be clueless or naïve or overly trusting or anything like that given who he is, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t look like any of those things.
“Our ship isn’t exactly working at the moment, so it isn’t like we can just run off on you,” Kyle says with a shrug.
“And if you were going to kill us, you would have just had Frank or Bob do it when we went to board Dixie,” Stu says.
“Less mess and you wouldn’t have shown us your secret hideout,” Ryan adds.
“Plus Andy isn’t freaking out,” Matt says. “He doesn’t say much, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t also very, very loud.”
“Fuck you, Mixon,” Andy tells him in a bored tone. “Are you four going to stop being dicks and eat, or are we going to stand here for the next hundred years?”
“Not hungry?” Matt asks. He’d have thought Andy would be starving, what with the shifting and the battle and Ryan doing all of his poking tests. Matt’s been on the wrong end of Ryan’s ‘tests’ and it is exhausting without all of the other stuff piled on top of it.
Andy shrugs. “Not really. Stomach feels off, but not for food.”
“Ah, stress! It’ll be the end of us all,” Gerard says. “I know exactly what you need!” He walks over to a refrigerator unit set into a recess just off to the left side of the buffet and pulls out a can of pop. He motions Andy over, then hands him the pop. “Root beer. Elena always gave us this when we were upset or sick. It’ll settle your stomach right quick.”
“I thought ginger ale was for settling stomachs.” Andy raises an eyebrow at Gerard, but takes the can. He pops the top and takes a sip. He blinks and swallows, holding the can out a little so he can peer at it. “Huh. Not bad.”
Gerard grins. “Ginger ale isn’t a favorite of mine - root beer is.”
Matt laughs when he sees the look on Stu’s face. “You just made a friend for life, Way.”
“Gerard,” he corrects. He looks a little confused until Kyle points at Stu, who is staring at Andy’s can of pop with dark intent. “I take it you’re a fan.”
“Stu would live off of it if he could find a way to cart it around with him,” Ryan says. He laughs when Stu absently flips him off.
“Well, I promise to show you where we store this stuff, if you introduce yourselves,” Gerard says.
Stu nods. “Done. I’m Stu Ross, that’s Kyle Johnson, Ryan Morgan, Matt Mixon and Andy Hurley. Those three are Patrick Stump, Pete Wentz, and Joe Trohman.”
“Cool. Nice to meet you guys,” Gerard says. He grins big. “I can show you the pantries tomorrow, but for now, we have a full fridge.” He opens the door to the refrigeration unit and steps back.
“Excellent,” Stu says. He dives right in, and the sound of cans being shifted and turned fills the room.
The rest of them roll their eyes but go over to the buffet to load up on food. Andy grabs an apple but otherwise just hovers around Matt’s elbow until they head over to the table that Bob, Frank, Patrick, Pete and Joe had claimed. Then Andy sits as close as he can to Matt without actually climbing into Matt’s lap. Or touching him. Matt doesn’t really understand how Andy manages that, but then again, he doesn’t really know how Andy has managed a lot of things in the years they’ve known each other.
When everyone has pretty much finished their second servings, though Bob and Joe have gone back for thirds (“Dude! Doughnuts!” “Yep. Bob makes them. He’s a ninja and a baker of awesomeness.”), Gerard tells them what had happened that day from their end of things.
“We monitor the airspace around the planet,” he says. “It keeps us busy and makes sure that we have something of a heads up if something really big starts happening. Well, one minute it’s systems quiet, then there’s this huge ship on radar, like a Class Three Venian Cross starliner. It damn near crashes through the atmosphere, spits up a shuttle, then lands on the Plains. Radar got kind of wonky then, and none of our other sensors could even pick up the ship, even though it’d practically landed on our doorstep. Weird, right?
“Right. Well, it gets better. See, all of a sudden there’s this huge spike in the energy readings, which Brian managed to get back online because Brian is awesome, everything goes black, then nothing,” Gerard continues. “The ship is gone. We had already sent Bob and Frank out to see if they could figure out what was going on, so there wasn’t anything else we could do. Then we see that the Toro’s send out an armada.
“Well, shit, we thought. If there were any survivors, there wasn’t going to be anything left to rescue. So we told Bob to do as much damage as he could.”
“You were the one firing from the mountains,” Stu says to Bob.
Bob nods. “You made it difficult, too. One minute I had a shot, the next your ship was in it. Almost hit you once or twice.”
“Evasive maneuvers,” Matt says with a shrug. “If I’d known you were on our side, I’d have stayed out of your way.”
“Right,” Gerard says, jumping in like he thinks Bob is going to start something. From the way Bob rolls his eyes, Matt’s pretty sure Gerard was just being preemptive for the sake of being preemptive. “So there was a battle. And then, BAM!” He brings his hands together with a big crack! “The armada just starts blowing up. One ship after another until all that was left was your shuttle. So we told Bob and Frank to go pick you guys up before the Toro’s sent another armada out after you.”
“So, what we’d like to know, aside from the whole light show at the beginning, is how the fuck did you blow up an entire armada?” Frank says.
Matt laughs and rubs at the back of his head. “Well, to start from the beginning. We were unjustly chased down by these bounty hunters, and in the scuffle, our ship took damage so we were forced to land. Barataria was the only place to be had. We had to leave the ship because things went really sideways, and then there was the armada, and we have no idea what happened. Honestly.”
Bob and Frank exchange a look. They totally don’t believe him. Not that Matt blames them; he wouldn’t have believed that story either. Too bad it was mostly true, if not completely accurate.
“You must be a really good shot, Bryar,” Stu says. “To cause all that type of a chain reaction.”
“You think I did that?” Bob says. He raises an eyebrow at him. “Really.”
Stu shrugs. “You have a better explanation?”
Bob frowns and it’s obvious that he doesn’t. He points a finger at Stu. “I will find out how you did that, Ross.” Stu just shrugs again.
Ray and Gerard have one of their silent conversations, ending with Gerard shrugging and gesturing at them. “Fine, fine,” Ray mutters. “You are such a fucking wuss, Way.”
“Bite me, Toro,” Gerard returns with an easy grin.
“All right, we understand that you can’t tell us everything, and we don’t blame you,” Ray says. “How about we make you a deal? It’s been a long day, apparently more for you than us, and no one thinks all that well tired. We’ve got quarters set up for you, short notice ones, but they should be fine for now. You guys can get some sleep, and tomorrow we’ll show you around, let you see what’s really going on. If we aren’t your cup of tea, we’ll find a way to set you up with a new ship and see you off world.”
“Really? You’d set us up with a new ship?” Kyle asks. He sounds just as skeptical as the rest of them are feeling. “Out of the goodness of your hearts?”
Ray shrugs. “Something like that.”
“Look, we aren’t bad guys here,” Gerard says. “That’s all we’re trying to prove. Just because we’re ‘Space Pirates’ doesn’t mean we’re evil. Take the night and think about it. You’re going to be here a few days anyway - the Toro’s are bound to have sentries all over the plains now and they won’t be going anywhere for a while.”
“And you still have to show me your pop stash,” Stu says. He’s leaning back in his chair, arms crossed over his chest. When Matt looks at him, he just nods. Matt gets the same nod from everyone else, except Joe who just shrugs and yawns, and Andy who glares.
“Yeah, we definitely are ready to crash,” Matt says.
“Awesome!” Gerard says, getting that he isn’t going to get a better answer than that. “Leave your plates; we can take care of them…”
“Meaning he’s going to make us clean up while he runs off to make out with Brian,” Frank says.
“Same difference,” Gerard tells him. “And Ray can show you guys to your quarters. Tomorrow at breakfast you’ll meet the best of us, Brian and Mikey…”
“He has to say that,” Bob says.
“Yep! Brian is his boy,” Frank says, singsonging ‘boy’. “And Mikey is his brother. They’d kill him if he didn’t say that.”
Gerard rolls his eyes. “It also happens to be true. Anyway, if I can finish without the peanut gallery?”
Bob makes a ‘go ahead’ gesture, while Frank snickers.
“You’ll meet Brian and Mikey tomorrow, and we’ll explain everything a little more in depth,” Gerard finishes. He glares at Frank when his snickers turn into giggles. “You are an asshole, Iero.”
“But you love me anyway!” Frank says.
Gerard rolls his eyes but doesn’t dispute the fact.
“And on that note,” Ray says. He stands up, chair scrapping across the stone floor. “I’ll show you to your quarters.”
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After the introducing and the eating and the talking are done, Ray leads them to a small room three corridors (straight, left, right) over from the small dinning room.
(Cave? Matt isn’t all that sure what to call it. The entire complex looked natural enough but Matt is a space brat one hundred percent of the way. He just can’t reconcile ‘natural’ with the complex and systematic layout of the, apparently, never-ending cavern they’d seen so far.
Also, Matt wants to know when caves started coming equipped with bunk beds and curtain separators and bathrooms and closets and shit.)
Ray points out everything that they might need and then excuses himself. “I’ll be back first thing in the morning to take you guys to breakfast. You’re going to want your strength before Gee starts lecturing.”
After a quick discussion involving only eyebrows and head tilts, Pete and Joe select a trio of bunks set into an alcove along the far wall of the room and drag Patrick over there. Patrick doesn’t put up all that much of a fight. He’d been mostly quiet since they’d landed. Matt isn’t really surprised. Matt is pretty sure he’d be quiet, too, if he’d just found out that going home would mean the destruction of the Universe. That’d put a damper on anyone’s spirits.
It had been almost as much of a shock to find out that Patrick was a former half-deity as it was to see Andy turn from Ship to human.
Joe pulls the curtain separator shut with a shrug before any of them could say anything. Which left the five of them staring at one another.
Matt looks at everyone, his eyes lingering the longest on Andy - on the ink adorning his skin like the designs had his hull - before he scratches the back of his head. “Any ideas?”
Ryan holds up a hand. “Wait. Let’s get things straight first before we go jumping into…whatever.”
“Ok, I’ll start,” Kyle says. “Our passenger we thought was just a mad scientist is actually a former deity that’d been kicked off of the Ethereal Plains for mingling too much with humans. And his assistants are actually the guards meant to keep him from attempting to re-enter said Ethereal Plains.”
“Actually, I think Joe’s just here for the doughnuts,” Stu says. He hops up onto one of the other beds and lounges across it.
Andy rolls his eyes. “Your leaps of bad logic continue to astound me, Rossman. Trohman and Wentz both have the same bio-signatures. Meaning if Wentz isn’t human, which we’ve already figured out, Trohman isn’t either.”
“So Joe’s a former deity’s guard who’s paid in fried, sugary pastries,” Stu says with a shrug. “It still works.”
“Moving on!” Matt says before Andy and Stu can go any further arguing semantics. “Patrick is a former deity, Pete and Joe are his guards that failed to stop him from trying to re-enter the Ethereal Plains, and, by doing so, they almost destroyed the Universe. At least, according to the fucked up deities that kicked Patrick out of the Ethereal Plains in the first place.”
“We probably deserve a portion of the blame for that,” Ryan says. “We did ferry them to the Edge.”
“Against my better judgment,” Andy says. He’s crosses his arms over his chest and he scowls at all of them. “I did say that this would turn out badly.”
“Stow the ‘I told you so’s, man,” Stu says. “We aren’t dead, so I say things are going along quite swimmingly.”
Andy blinks for a moment. Matt starts a silent countdown in his head. As he reaches ‘0’ Andy says, “I’m fucking human, Rossman! The only known Living Ship in the Universe is no longer a fucking Ship! Human. How the fuck is that not a bad thing?”
“Granted, not having a kick ass, quantum drive Starliner at our disposal anymore, a fact that has left us stranded on a notorious Space Pirate planet just outside of the recognized edge of the Uncharted Territories, isn’t a great thing,” Stu admits. “But you weren’t destroyed. And it isn’t like being human is all that bad. We’re all doing just fine with it, honestly.”
“‘Starliner to human isn’t a great thing,’” Andy says. His voice has gone that extra growly that sends chills up and down Matt’s spine. It is also the extra growly that would have vibrated the speakers on the pilot’s console until Matt’s feet slid off of them. “I’m so glad you cleared that up for me!”
“I’m not quite sure what you’re complaining about,” Stu says. “You destroyed an entire Space Pirate armada with your mind. That’s pretty damn impressive.”
Matt can see that Andy is about to try destroying Stu with just his mind, so Matt jumps into the argument to prevent the probable (and possibly justifiable) slaughter. “Anyway! We were recapping?”
Ryan and Kyle roll their eyes at him while Andy and Stu glare; Matt so feels like the forever too cheerful optimistic girl that is always trying to keep the heroes in those vids from giving up when things keep going sideways. Matt smiles his most winning smile and gestures for Kyle to continue.
“Right,” Kyle says, his tone the same ‘I’m just humoring you, Mixon’ that all of them have down pat. “So we’ve former deities, former deity guards who may or may not work for literal doughnuts, a Ship that is no longer a Ship, but a human being who just so happens to retain the ability to crush small armadas single handedly, or in this case, single mindedly. And we are currently stranded on a notorious Space Pirate planet, enjoying the hospitality of nice Space Pirates who rescued us from other eviler Space Pirates, the nice Space Pirates are trying to overthrow their corrupt government, and all of them would shit themselves for a chance at Andy if they knew who Andy was/is. Did I miss anything?”
“Yeah,” Patrick snaps, his voice floating over the curtain separator. “You forgot that curtains aren’t soundproof, and I’m going to kill all of you in your sleep.”
“No, he’s not,” Joe says. He pops his head around the partition with a smile. If he’s trying to distract them from the sounds of Pete and Patrick wrestling behind him, it isn’t working. “He’s just a little upset. Idle threats make him feel better. Plus, Pete and I will keep you safe.”
“And just who is going to keep you safe from him?” Matt asks. He doesn’t want to ask, but sometimes his mouth works without any input from his brain. Andy’s yelled at him for years about it but there are just some things that a person cannot change about himself.
“Eh, don’t worry about that. If Patrick hasn’t managed to kill either of us in the past three hundred years, he doesn’t actually want to.” Joe pauses. “Probably.” His smile widens - he’s probably going for reassuring but is utterly failing - before he disappears behind the curtain again.
“They’re older than you, dude,” Stu says to Andy in the resulting silence. Matt’s actually surprised he didn’t make a Wizard of Oz joke. “Which totally explains how Joe knew about all that shit with Cola Corp that only ever made sense to you.”
Andy opens his mouth for what would probably be a scathing retort, but then he snaps it shut with a frown. He rubs at his face with one hand, another wrapping around his torso, and he looks so miserable that Matt just wants to cuddle him. Matt’s pretty sure Andy would attempt to make his head explode if he tried. Matt’s also pretty sure that he’s not going to let that stop him.
“Ok! Executive decision: we are all going to bed,” Matt says. He grabs Kyle’s and Ryan’s arms and pushes them towards the bunks next to the one Stu is already sprawled on. “You two can take those, and Andy and I are going to go over here. Before Stu breaks Andy.”
“Hey!” Stu protests.
Matt smirks at Stu. “We only have one of him, Rossman, and it wouldn’t do to have you destroy him before he’s even two days old!” Matt finishes his proclamation by pulling the curtain separator shut before Stu can say anything else.
(He isn’t going to think about how weird it is that this cave guest room thing has curtain separators in sets of three bunks. And one quasi-double. Pirates are weird.)
Then he wraps an arm around Andy’s shoulders and, ignoring his protests, leads him across the room to the other curtained off alcove with the quasi-double. He pushes Andy at the bed before he turns around and makes sure the curtain is completely closed.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Andy demands. He’s standing at the edge of the bed with his arms across his chest. And he’s glaring. The glare is about a thousand times worse then when it was just coming from a holographic simulation. Matt totally doesn’t wince at the look, though he’ll admit that it was a close thing.
Matt smiles his biggest, cheesiest smile. “We are going to bed! Remember how I told you that we mere humans need to rest every now and again? Well, seeing as you’re human now, you need to sleep! And after the day we’ve had, I am not taking no for an answer.”
Andy raises an eyebrow. “An answer for what?”
“Um, sleep and cuddles?” Matt says, his voice over emphasizing the unspoken ‘duh’.
“No, shut up,” he tells Andy when he frowns. “Today was total shit, and I know that you’re used to not relying on anyone ever for anything but trust me. Almost destroying the Universe, turning from a Ship into a human mid-fucking-flight in space, destroying a shitload of Space Pirates, and everything else that happened today totally warrants cuddles. I will not be deterred.”
Andy blinks. Then he shrugs. “Okay, whatever. You have to be the weirdest fucking person I have ever met, Mixon, and I’ve been around a long, long time.”
Matt walks over to Andy and his hand on Andy’s shoulder. “Pete,” Matt says in his most serious voice.
Andy looks thoughtful for a second before he nods. “Okay. Point taken. Mine still stands.”
Matt reaches around Andy and pulls the covers down. He wonders if the Space Pirates have a bunch of little guest caves set up all the time just in case they have to, he doesn’t know, put up visiting dignitaries or whatever, or if Gerard had sent someone back here to set this place up while the whole introducing/talking/eating thing was happening. It is probably the latter, but Matt can somehow see the former being true as well. Gerard and Ray seem like strangely strategic people. For Space Pirates, anyway. Most of the Space Pirates Matt has had the displeasure of dealing with were all, “Attack! Attack! Kill and plunder!” That doesn’t seem like Gerard and Ray, though.
“It can stand all it wants, dude, just as long as we don’t have to,” Matt says. He sits down on the bed and toes his shoes off. He thinks about shedding some layers, but it’s a little chilly. Makes sense, when Matt thinks about it, because. Cave. The coolness of that fact still doesn’t make him all that eager to lose any layers, so he doesn’t. “Shoes off, man.”
Andy has his eyebrow raised again, but he does what Matt asks. He doesn’t really protest when Matt tugs him down and arranges them on the bed, Andy tucked under three of Matt’s limbs with his head on Matt’s chest.
“This is when you close your eyes and make your brain shut off, dude,” Matt tells him after he’s pulled the covers back over them. They can vaguely hear Patrick muttering to Pete and Joe, and Stu is already snoring, but other than that the cave is silent. It’s warmer than Matt thought it’d be - Andy’s putting out heat like a broken heat modulator - and he is totally feeling the length of the day catching up with him.
“It’s sort of like shutting down for server updates, except you just let your body do what it needs to do instead of hitting the off switch.”
Andy snorts, but Matt barely hears it before he takes his own advice.
|-|
There are people walking past their room, a pair every twenty minutes. Andy can hear them coming and going, even through the thick stone walls and the two foot thick steel door. It’s almost like he still has his sensors except for how he can’t see the sentries and how the sounds are oddly tinny but not. Even with the millions of words he still has in his head (two hundred and seventy languages and dialects organized by dates and popular usage), he doesn’t have right ones to describe what is happening to him, what he’s seeing, hearing, feeling.
It’s more disconcerting than the first time Andy lost a crew. Living beings that aren’t Living Ships have notoriously short lives, after all, even the races that live for a couple of centuries. When they can survive that long, that is. Most don’t.
Andy doesn’t like this. He’s not used to dealing with emotions.
Okay, that’s a lie. Andy has always been a living being, but being a Ship meant that he was closer to a computer than he was to, say, humans. His emotions had never had this sense of, well, urgency.
Andy scowls into the dim lighting. This must be what Maja had meant when she was always cursing the fact that she had hormones. He’s pretty sure that he agrees with the sentiment.
“Emotions are fucking weird,” Andy mutters into Matt’s shoulder.
Matt murmurs something that Andy doesn’t quite catch. Seeing as Matt talks in his sleep, Andy’s fairly sure that, whatever Matt said, it wasn’t in response to Andy.
And there’s another problem right there. Andy isn’t sure if anyone else actually saw what happened out on the plains today (if he had to place a guess, Joe probably did because Joe is that crazy observant). Andy hadn’t been able to do shit until he touched Matt. Nothing.
The logical part of his brain tries to tell him that it’s because Matt is his pilot. Andy tells the logical part of his brain to shut the fuck up. Whether or not Matt had been his pilot when Andy had been a Ship doesn’t really translate over to Andy as a Human.
Andy’s done a lot observation of humans and the other species of the Universe, and of the relationships between separate individuals, between groups, and between groups and individuals. Nothing he has come across seems remotely similar to the interaction between a pilot and his ship. Especially not this particular pilot and this particular Ship.
Matt shifts in his sleep, pulling Andy closer. Andy loses his train of thought.
Outside, another pair of footsteps approaches and departs. Andy wonders whose safety they are there to protect.
“Dude, I can hear you thinking,” Matt mutters. He pokes Andy in the side. “Stop thinking and sleep. Things’ll be easier in the morning.”
“There’s no logical reason to believe that,” Andy mutters back.
“Sure there is. Everything is easier after sleep.” Matt nuzzles his face into Andy’s hair; his breath is tickling the back of Andy’s neck. “Besides, we’ll all be together. Just like Kentucky. And you can think of this as the Universe’s way of making you take a fucking vacation.”
Andy sighs, disgruntled. But he closes his eyes and focuses his hearing on the steady rhythm of Matt’s heartbeat. Sleep comes quickly after that.
|-|
Matt's sure that morning comes bright and early. He can't actually see it for himself - what with the cave and all - but he's sure that the sun is shining somewhere. Inside the caves, or at least in their cozy little corner of them, morning comes bright and early in the form of Pete throwing on all the lights and singing both loudly and off-key.
Matt's response is to bury his head between the mattress and Andy's shoulder. "What the fuck?"
"You should have let me space them," Andy tells him. Under his words, Matt can hear the sound of something - shoe-like if he doesn't miss his guess - slamming into the far wall. Followed closely by Pete yelping. Andy pokes at Matt's head until Matt moves out from under his shoulder.
"Stupid fucker, shut up!" Stu snaps. Something else - also shoe-like, which Pete had better be thankful for considering Stu regularly carries easily thrown weapons to bed with him - slams into the wall. "People are trying to sleep!"
"Quit your bellyaching, Ross," Patrick says. "You've had ten hours. Or do you still want to be abed when the nice Space Pirates show up for breakfast?"
Something else slams against the wall. Matt isn't quite sure what it sounds like, though.
"Maybe we should have warned them about waking Stu up," Matt says.
Andy snorts. "Yes, because waking up a weapons expert when you know they don't want to be disturbed is such a great plan, even when it isn't Stu."
"Point taken," Matt says. Stu and Patrick are still arguing with the occasional comment from one of the others. Pete, Joe, and Patrick sound wide awake, especially next to Kyle's and Ryan's yawn-filled mumbles. Matt feels like he could sleep for another couple of days, so he wraps his arms more firmly around Andy's waist and tugs him closer. "Sleep well?"
Andy shrugs, jostling Matt's head and waking him up a bit more. "Well enough. The sentries were loud."
"What sentries?" Kyle asks. He's poked his head around their curtain and starts making kissy faces at them when he sees them curled up together. Matt flips him off, and Kyle just laughs at him. "And fuck no do the two of you get to stay in bed. Up and at 'em, boys! Patrick says Pete and Joe have some intel to share."
"The sentries that kept pacing outside the door all night," Andy says over Matt's grumbles. Andy gives Matt a firm shove to dislodge him and almost pushes Matt clear off the other side of the bed. Matt decides that getting up would be the safest thing for him to do. "I can't be the only one who heard them."
"That's a two foot thick door, dude," Matt says as he leans down to pull his boots on. "And the wall's are at least another foot thicker. Your hearing might be souped up because you're a Ship."
"I'm human, Matt," Andy says.
"In human form, yes," Matt says. "But you're still a Ship, dude."
"Are the two of you ever going to argue about something relevant to our continued survival?" Ryan asks when they emerge out into the room proper. He or Kyle must have pulled aside the curtain to their bunks, because all Matt sees of Stu is a lump under the covers of one of the bunks. "Now really isn't the time for that."
"And just what is it time for?" Andy leans against the wall across from Ryan, who is sitting on one of their storage boxes - the Space Pirates must have brought their stuff from Dixie while they were all at dinner - next to Joe and Patrick. Kyle is leaning against the end of the bunk beds by Stu's feet and Pete was pacing the length of the room.
"Figuring out if we're gonna help these Space Pirates or not," Joe says. He's looking very zen for the lack of doughnuts, and he's cleaning a wickedly curved knife.
"Wouldn't more information be helpful first?" Matt asks. He sits down on the floor near Andy and starts stretching his legs. They're all knotted up from sleep and exhaustion. "You know, instead of just jumping in to see how deep the water is?"
"Pete and I think their guys are the real deal," Joe says. "There have been rumors of a rebellion here on Barataria for almost sixty-five years. It's all very hush-hush. A legit rebellion, not the one the Familys flaunt as a twisted type of training ground."
"Here's what everyone knows about Space Pirates. They're mean and cruel to the point of being evil. And that's to everyone: friends, family, foes, or random strangers. It's safer to be their enemy than their ally. Any resistance they meet is crushed without a second thought. They're everything the vids makes them out to be, except they're a thousand times worse: slavery, drugs, prostitution, money laundering, racketeering, and simple, plain, old robbery and assault. Those are their trades, and everyone is too terrified to fight back. Right?"
Everyone nods, even Andy, who looks like he's going back through his logs to double check something. Matt find that expression a little unnerving on a fully human Andy, even if it is somewhat comforting.
"Wrong," Pete says. "At least, it was about a hundred and eighty, two hundred years ago."
"What? Were the Space Pirates all free love and happiness?" Stu asks. He's poked his head out of his blankets, his hair a fluffy mess, and he sounds like he's still half asleep.
"No, Ross," Patrick snaps. "They were pirates. Only not nearly as violent and cruel."
"Space Pirates used to have a Code of Conduct that they had to work and live by," Joe says. He holds his knife up to the light for a moment, and then goes back to cleaning it. "Honor amongst thieves, that sort of thing.”
“And now they don’t?” Ryan asks.
“Have you ever known a Space Pirate to give quarter to surrendering ships?” Joe asks. “No, of course you haven’t, because they don’t do that anymore. That went out of style almost two hundred years ago.”
Matt sits up, leaning his back against the wall. “Any ideas why it went out of style?”
“You believe this?” Kyle asks. He flashes a quick smile at Patrick, Pete, and Joe. “Not that I think you guys are lying, but I’m from Neramonda. Space Pirates aren’t on my holiday card list for a reason.”
Pete winces at the planet’s name while Patrick and Joe frown. Neramonda was a planet that the Lafitte Family had razed to the ground twenty years ago. Kyle’s family was one of three hundred that had managed to escape during the attack. Most of those families had scattered over the breadth of the Uncharted, but Kyle’s family had relocated to the Core, where his great-great-grand aunt owned a small mining planet.
“No one from Neramonda sends the Space Pirates nice letters,” Pete says. “So, no offense taken.”
“And yeah, I believe them,” Matt says. He points at Patrick. “Older than Andy, remember?”
Kyle nods. “Point.”
“Anyway,” Joe says. “We have no idea. There just isn’t any information available for the best money to buy. And we’ve tried.”
“The best we’ve managed to cobble together is that there was some sort of coup, probably with Republic involvement, that drastically changed Space Pirate behavior practically overnight,” Pete says. “Then sixty-five years ago, small things started changing. One or two planets a year with money or trade goods or anything else that would look appetizing to a Space Pirate started to be ignored. That number has grown every year. There are less raids than there used to be. Things are still bad, but not as bad as they used to be.”
“And you think this rebellion of Gerard’s and Ray’s is the cause of that?” Andy asks.
Joe nods. “We do.”
“You guys can decide amongst yourselves what you want to do,” Pete says. “But the three of us are staying to help these guys.”
Matt looks at Kyle, Ryan, and Stu, who all shrug at him. He’s pretty sure they wouldn’t have a problem sticking around and helping out if what Pete and Joe think is going on is going on, but they aren’t going to make the decision. That’s for Andy and him to figure out. “Well, Andy? What do you think?”
Andy looks down at him and shrugs. “If the Space Pirates were to become less of a threat to the rest of the Universe, then we might have a chance at cutting back on the Republic’s influence.”
“Space is starting to feel a little crowded,” Stu says.
“And if this is some sort of elaborate trap?” Matt asks. He can’t believe he’s the one acting as the voice of reason here. Weird.
Ryan snorts. “Right. Because a bunch of Space Pirates are going to outsmart us.”
“Seriously, Mixon,” Kyle says. “Did you hit your head yesterday? Should Ryan check you over?”
Matt flips them off. “So, dude?” he asks Andy. “Save the Space Pirates, save the Universe?”
Andy rolls his eyes. “I’m not leaving any of my crew behind to Space Pirates, good or not.”
“All right then,” Matt says. He stands up and slings an arm around Andy’s shoulders. “So. There it is then. We’re staying.”
“You sure?” Patrick asks.
“Like the man said, dude, we don’t leave crew behind,” Matt tells him with a big grin. “So if you three are all set on joining this rebellion, then we’re going to be right behind you.”
“Awesome,” Joe says. He holds his knife up one more time, inspecting the blade closely before he slides it into the sheath at his side. “Saving the Universe, step two: save the Space Pirates from themselves.”
While Pete and Patrick start arguing over what step one of Joe’s plan is - Matt’s pretty sure Pete’s right about it being saving Patrick from the idiot deities - Matt smiles down at Andy. “So much for that vacation, huh?”
Andy snorts. “Please, Mixon. I’ve already explained this to you: I don’t need a vacation.”
“You keep telling yourself that, dude,” Matt laughs. “I like a little delusion in a man.”
Andy elbows him in the side, and Matt just keeps laughing.
The End
Part V - Master Post - Mix - Art