Ficlet: Rivalry
For the b7friday ship names challenge, because I just had to. 300 words set in season 4.
Rivalry
The steel boots crunched over the rubble, crushing the smaller pieces. "Didn't invite me, did they?" The voice echoed strangely inside the huge spherical helmet, distorting the words.
"I beg your pardon, my lord?" The attendant looked attentive while surreptitiously lifting a foot and trying to shake a stone out of his shoe.
The figure lifted mail-backed gauntlets and removed the helmet, revealing an incongruously pretty face with a glossy elaborately-waved coiffeur which had not been flattened in the slightest. "They invited Zukan and Boorva and Chalsa and even those idiots Lod and Mida. But not me. I wonder why."
"I have no idea, Lord Cheryl."
"Oh, don't you? I rather think I do."
"My lord?" The attendant hoped it wasn’t going to be the rant about external sex organs again and quickly waved the guards forward with the portable neutron cannon.
"They were matey with Zukan, weren't they? I'll bet he made up the invitation list. Probably told this Avon fellow I wasn't--" she primed the cannon, "--nice company, which is rather ironic when you consider--" she fired it, "--that I actually know how to use a fork."
Cheryl's companions reeled, partially deafened, while she stood impassively waiting for the dust to clear.
"There's someone there!" The attendant ran over to wipe and peer into the faceplate of the space-suited corpse. He recoiled.
"What is it?"
"It has no flesh, but the hair..."
"Yes?"
"It's pink."
"Ahhhh." Cheryl lifted her face to the sub, grinning exultantly. "Betafarl ruling class. Bit off more than he could chew, did he? Right, order the fleet in. Nature does abhor a vacuum, they say." She turned back to the ship. "Oh and invite that Sleer woman as an observer. One might as well take care of that too. I do so dislike rivals."
Well, no one else did The Warlord Cheryl and I couldn't resist.