Fic: Runway Strikes Back, DWP, Andy/Miranda, PG-13
There were many ways to kill someone. Andy knew, because she’d pictured a lot of them during her eighteen month tenure at Runway. It was one of her favorite pastimes-part guilty pleasure, part stress-relief.
The usual victim was, almost inevitably, her boss. Her frustrating, terrifying, gorgeous, demanding boss. Who, as it turned out, was also a great deal more resourceful (and had much better aim) than Andy would ever have given her credit for.
Even on her most creative day at Runway, Andy would not have pictured Miranda encountering aliens, though. She liked to confine herself to the realm of the at-least-somewhat-possible.
Andy snorted (very quietly) in disbelief at that last thought. She checked the sights on the plasma rifle one last time before adding it to their growing stash.
“Something amusing?” Miranda asked from her station at the command center.
“No,” Andy said, and picked up another plasma gun. “Where on earth did you find all these weapons, though?”
Miranda raised one eyebrow.
Andy rolled her eyes. “It’s just an expression!”
Miranda gave Andy one of her best over-the-glasses glares. Its effectiveness was surprisingly undiminished by the three months she’d spent without access to any of her usual beauty products or her team of personal trainers and stylists. In fact, it almost looked like there was a wind machine that affected only Miranda’s hair.
Andy could only gape as a conveniently backlit Miranda slowly rose from behind the console-allowing Andy plenty of time to admire the fit of her tight, pinstriped jumpsuit. “Please confine your conversation to remarks that are directly related to defeating the Noritayna. In case it has somehow escaped your notice, I am in charge of the fight for our survival.”
Sadly, this was the literal truth. The other resistance cells had fallen within a matter of days, and it was only through a series of very lucky accidents that they had been in a position to hijack this small ship at all. Miranda really was a pretty amazing woman, however annoying she might be. She had held them all together single-handed, forced them to work together, to eat regularly (even the models!), to stage small rescue missions planetside to bolster their small numbers. She had parceled out assignments with no regard for swollen egos or any sort of seniority or social standing, and she demanded-and got-excellence from her entire crew.
It was an amazing success story-it was just too bad the odds against any of them surviving to tell it were so staggering. The occasional broadcast they were able to pick up made it very clear that they were all destined for a long and painful death as soon as they were caught. And they would be caught. It was a statistical impossibility that one spaceship could elude several entire fleets of them indefinitely. Especially a spaceship staffed almost entirely by clackers, Andy thought, uncharitably.
At that very moment, alarm klaxons began to shriek and huge (previously absent) red lights suddenly started flashing. Andy rolled her eyes again. If this were a movie, she thought, it would have really cheesy special effects. At least the aliens are CGI, though, and not extras in terrible bodysuits…
“Come along, Lieutenant Sachs,” Miranda said, sweeping past Andy in a pair of very much non-regulation spike-heeled boots that matched her jumpsuit perfectly, “and bring a few of those rifles. We may need them.”
“Yes, Captain,” Andy said, and she grabbed a crate rifles and took off running after the most infuriating boss ever. How does she walk so fast in heels that I have to run to keep up? she wondered, not for the first time. At least I get to stare at her ass, though. Bonus! Andy shrugged and kept running through a series of monotonous grey corridors that would have been a sci-fi director’s nightmare.
The Noritayna were a very advanced race-obviously, since Earth had been in their grip within the first week, and the only remaining organized human resistance was being led by a fashion editor. Andy found it amusing that, despite their numerous eye-stalks, they saw the world in shades of gray and thus had no use for other colors. She sometimes wondered if this fact alone would have doomed them in Miranda’s eyes, even if they had not also set out to systematically eradicate or enslave all human life.
Andy’s moment of introspection had cost her several precious meters in her fight to keep up with Miranda (all sci-fi stories must use the metric system-it’s a requirement). By the time she made it onto the bridge (even stolen alien ships have to have a bridge), the others were already manning/womaning their Battle Stations™ (or in one case from the former art department-currently in charge of menu-planning-possibly both). Andy skidded to a halt in front of her own station and started passing out plasma rifles.
Miranda shot her another glare. “So glad you could join us, Leftenant. I hope we didn’t drag you away from anything important.”
Cdr. Kipling leaned over and whispered something in Miranda’s ear from his station on her other side.
“I meant Lieutenant, of course. Sorry. I forgot I wasn’t book-Miranda for a moment. Where were we?”
Before everyone could recover from the thought of Miranda apologizing for anything, the ship rocked from the incoming fire of a fleet of Noritayna craft, even the smallest of which was several times larger than their tiny vessel.
Of course, Andy thought. The classic underdog story. Only this underdog is about to get chewed up and spit out, whereas in an actual movie, some sort of deus ex machina would come down and save us.
Ensign Nate Cooper looked about ready to piss himself as the size of the enemy fleet became clear on the obligatory viewing screen-not that it would have been immediately apparent if he had, since the only job Miranda would let him perform was cleaning out the Noritayna equivalent of Jeffries tubes. With his own toothbrush. And the knees of his hideous acid-washed denim jumpsuit.
The ship was now shuddering constantly from impact after impact by the Noritayna’s strange energy weapons. Andy had never been so profoundly grateful for a seatbelt in her life. Thank God for Miranda’s insistence on relying on old-fashioned textiles over inertial compensators and whatever kind of artificial gravity the Noritayna had managed to invent. Imagine if she had trusted technology instead-they’d all be flying over their Battle Stations™ after every volley! What kind of lame-ass sci-fi movie would THAT make?
First Lt. Blunt Charlton was gleefully firing back. All that aggression was good for something, after all-maybe two somethings, if the amorous look on Lt. Cdr. Brazilian’s face (What? It’s a nationality!) was anything to go by. Despite all of Emily’s vicious return fire, however, the enemy kept coming. The computer was reporting what Andy recognized as section breaches in the Noritayna’s weird language of clicks and hisses, and Andy was positive she was going to have a lot of cuts and bruises where her harness kept her strapped to a seat that was not designed with human physiology in mind. Well, I will if I survive, anyway, she thought gloomily.
Miranda was still barking orders, of course, maintaining control, rallying the troops, etc., but Andy thought she could see a feral glint in her eye-the cornered animal refusing to back down, refusing to go out without a fight. Even she had to see that it was impossible, though. Without a miracle, well…they were toast.
Just as Andy was getting ready to give up, a horde of aliens suddenly materialized on the bridge. The one with the most eye-stalks walked right up to Miranda, and, after tracing an admiring appendage over her perfectly tailored cerulean safety harness, he(?) began speaking.
Andy stared. Actually, they all stared-those who were still breathing, anyway (the ones who’d attempted to fire on the intruders had been vaporized right away). Their astonishment was certainly understandable-it was the first attempt at (peaceful?) contact the aliens had made. Ever.
Miranda made a little gesture in Andy’s direction, and Andy jumped to attention. So she hadn’t spent the last three months trying to learn the Noritayna’s strange language in vain! It was a weird, tonal language, though-easy to misinterpret.
“Um, I think he’s saying that he admires your leadership style,” Andy managed to stammer out. “Or possibly your, um, your children’s tentacles? It’s hard to say.”
Miranda sniffed disgustedly in Andy’s direction and then turned back to Stalk-y and made partial eye contact (partial on his side, anyway-since he had more than five times the number of eyes Miranda did, it was hardly a fair match-up). “Ask him what he wants,” she said, though her eyes never left the “face” of the strange bendy-looking purple creature in front of her.
Andy made some noises that were her best approximation of “What do you want?” although for all she knew, she could just as easily have been insulting his mother-in-law instead.
The alien made a horrible sort of gargling noise and waved several of its eye-stalks rather wildly, which it eventually became clear, was their equivalent of laughter. Many of the other creatures were “laughing” too. Andy was depressingly certain that she must have said something really embarrassing in Noritay.
When the alien leader had managed to control his reaction somewhat, he turned to Andy and said “Tell your leader that it is a formidable opponent.” He made a kind of slow, sleeping motion with one tentacle. “I call it and its first egg to the circle of tentacles.” There was an immediate rumble of low-pitched clicking from the other aliens at this strange pronouncement.
Andy stared for a second, and then turned to whisper to Miranda. “He says that you’re a formidable opponent. And he’s calling you and your, um, first egg to something called the ‘circle of tentacles.’”
“…Which means?” Miranda asked, after Andy paused for a few moments.
“Basically, he’s challenging you to a one-on-one ritual combat. With your oldest child as your second. They’re a very clan-oriented society. Or it’s possible that he wants you to do a ceremonial dance with him. But I’m pretty sure it’s the combat.”
“What are his terms,” Miranda asked very quietly out of the corner of her mouth. “What do I get if I win?”
Andy relayed Miranda’s question to Sir Stalks-a-lot. A great rush of gargling and stalk-waving answered her. His response, taken with his obviously self-assured demeanor, was rather chilling, but Andy the eternal optimist felt a Tiny Ray of Hope™ spring up anyway.
“Winner-takes-all,” Andy said, with a certain amount of disbelief in her voice. “He wants to fight you for the planet.”
There was dead silence on the bridge for the space of at least twenty seconds.
“I accept,” Miranda said, with a brief, tight nod. “What are we fighting with?”
Miranda’s assent was fairly obvious, so Andy just translated the question. Captain Stalk-er motioned an underling forward, and the underling gave Miranda some sort of handheld weapon. It actually looked rather like a scimitar, only a bit thinner. The crew of the U.S.S. Runway stared at each other in mutual disbelief. Miranda was going to have a sword-fight with a tentacled alien? For the safety of the free world? Surely not. But the aliens were all acting very serious, so Andy had to assume that this was, indeed, the case.
The aliens formed a solemn half-circle behind their leader and a slightly taller lavender creature with only four eye-stalks. Stalks-by-Night indicated with hand motions and some terse instructions to Andy that the Runway crew were to form a similar half-circle behind Miranda. Andy was about to join them, but Miranda indicated, with an impatient twitch of her head, that Andy should join her in the middle of the open circle. She darted a half-fearful, half-helpless glance in Nigel’s direction, but he just gave her a glimmer of an encouraging smile and a quiet “Go get ‘em, Six.” Andy returned a rather wan smile in his direction and walked over to Miranda’s side.
Some bizarre ceremonial phrases about eggs and stalk-bearers were exchanged, Miranda and Argus-Lite touched swords, Andy and the other second backed off, and the duel began. It was immediately clear that Miranda was at a fairly severe height and weight disadvantage. It also became clear that the alien was not used to fighting someone with opposable thumbs. Several times he tried moves that would probably have been devastating to someone of his own race, but Miranda was able to keep him from disarming her. God, Andy thought. All that and she fences, too?
Miranda had been nicked in a few places. There was blood dripping from her left forearm and staining her jumpsuit in several other spots. But she was holding her own. Which was certainly more than the rest of them would have been likely to manage.
As soon as everyone realized that the outcome was not a foregone conclusion, the aliens began cheering their leader on with an endless stream of piercing high-pitched whistles. It was a very unpleasant noise. Andy didn’t think she could stand to listen to it much longer without stabbing something, and that would have invalidated the terms of the ritual combat. Instead, she made eye contact with Emily, Nigel, and Serena, jerked her head a little, and then started to chant “Miranda” as loud as she could. The upper echelons of Runway took up the cry almost immediately, and the rest joined in soon after.
Andy saw Miranda freeze for a split second, and then she seemed to gain a sort of second wind. She took the offensive, finally, and began really whaling on the Lavender Menace. And then she did the unthinkable-she kicked him. In the knee. Or what passed for knees on their planet (it looked to Andy as if they bent the other way).
The results were rather spectacular-he collapsed to the ground and gave a long, agonized wail. There was a collective gasp from the semi-circle of aliens, and a great deal of agitated stalk-waving from the leader’s second. Their swords clashed twice more, but the alien was hampered by his inability to stand or move around, and a powerful twisting blow from Miranda sent his weapon flying. The Runway crewmembers in its path ducked quickly and the sword flew past them end-over-end and embedded itself, quivering, in Miranda’s Battle Station™.
There was complete silence for several moments, and then pandemonium . The entire Runway crew started hollering in a very undignified manner that they would have considered unspeakably embarrassing a mere three months earlier, the aliens began a slow, mournful chant with a lot of clicking and waving of tentacles, I-Heart-Stalks bent his head forward in an obvious signal of concession, and Miranda held her blade at his neck. Or the most neck-like place he had, anyway.
“Do you yield?” Andy asked, since she wasn’t entirely sure if this meant Miranda would also have to fight the alien’s second. Miranda masked her exhaustion well, as always, but she was sweaty and dripping blood, not to mention breathing rather hard, and Andy doubted she was up to another fight.
“Your egg-parent has triumphed, stalk-less one,” said the alien. “Your civilization may continue in peace. We will return to Norit. I am dishonored.” He turned to his paler-lavender second and removed a small, shiny pendant from around his neck. The aliens knelt (and Andy discovered that their knees did, in fact, bend backwards-it was a very disconcerting sight) and began to chant again. Stalkmeister climbed painfully to his feet in spite of a now obviously shattered leg and attempted to place the pendant around his second’s neck (this was harder than it sounds, due to the eye-stalks extending in every direction). It was also made difficult by the fact that the second refused to accept the pendant. Three times, Mr. Stalk-y tried to give his second the pendant, and three times the second pushed his tentacles gently, but firmly, away. There was something vaguely like a cheer from the crowd of aliens, and then their leader slowly placed the necklace back around his own neck.
“How do we know that you’ll leave us in peace?” Miranda asked, now that this piece of ceremony had been accomplished. Andy relayed her question faithfully.
“You have my word as First Tentacle,” said the leader.
Andy gasped. “Um, Miranda, I think this is their, uh, king? President? Emperor? Whatever you want to call it. He just referred to himself as ‘First Tentacle.’”
Miranda gave him a long, hard look. And then she grinned. Andy recognized the look, although she hadn’t seen it in a while. It was her shark-smelling-blood-in-the-water look. “Well then,” Miranda said, sounding quite pleased with herself, and not at all as if she’d been preparing to die less than an hour before, “I imagine he’s authorized to negotiate treaties, isn’t he?”
Andy stared at her. “Probably. But, um, Miranda, you’re…not.”
“Andrea,” Miranda said. “Do you happen to know where the president of the United States might be at the moment.”
“No.”
“Neither do I. What I do know is that we have the perfect chance to strike a deal while the Noritayna are still reeling from their defeat and before all the politicians (wherever they’re hiding) start talking each other out of demanding any meaningful concessions.”
Miranda’s logic had a certain irrefutability to it, Andy had always found. She had to admit that it made sense, in a twisted way. Her ability to argue was further impaired by Miranda grabbing her face and kissing her soundly, right in front of over a hundred Runway employees and aliens. It was hard to tell which half of the contingent was more scandalized, but Andy couldn’t really bring herself to care. She only had eyes for Miranda…the current ruler of the free world.
~~Epilogue~~
The world had recovered surpisingly well from its time under Noritayna rule. The politicians had been the first to die, so it didn’t really astonish anyone that a lot of unpleasant things came to light, but under the benevolent dictatorship of Planetary President Priestly, the planet developed by leaps and bounds. A very beneficial trade partnership with the Norit system jump-started the Intergalactic Space Exploration Progam. And of course former Cdr. Kipling and First Lt. Charlton made themselves useful as Chief of Staff and Secretary of War, respectively. Lt. Cdr. Brazilian was made Secretary of Fashion (an important post in the new administration). * The Chief of Staff was generally considered the nicest member of the administration, mostly because he gave the terrified young interns his golden rule for dealing with the rather intimidating President: he told them to see First Lady Sachs-Priestly instead.
*For the curious, Ensign Nate Cooper was one of those unfortunate souls vaporized immediately by the Noritayna who beamed aboard the U.S.S. Runway. He was not missed, although Andy did occasionally get a craving for one of his grilled-cheese sandwiches.