Gift for diamondsjack part 2
Title: Space Oddity (subtitled: Ungrateful World) Part 2
Pairing/Group: Butoukan-centric
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: SPACE AU. Looong. Stupid boys. Blood. Random appearances by other groups not Butoukan.
Notes: This fic may have possibly broken a mind. The possibly broken mind hopes the fic treats you well, diamondsjack!
Summary: Take one tiny ship, five people and send them to an unknown planet for a totally easy mission. Will they survive? Will the ship blow up? Who knows.
INDEPENDENT STARSHIP BUTOUKAN
Tsukada was checking the status on the cloak when Yara called him aside and into the engine room. He made a few adjustments and glanced at the speck of a planet that was slowly growing larger and larger. The planet was designated as C785-MU, but Senga had glanced at it’s brown and rocky surface and gave it a name.
“Yume,” Senga had said, “because it dreams of being prettier. That makes it a little prettier. Somehow.”
“Okay,” Yara had replied and everyone had left it at that.
“I’ll be right back,” Tsukada told the other three and followed Yara back to the hallway leading to the engine room. Yara maintained his silence until they entered the engine room and the door slid shut behind them.
Butoukan was running at her full capabilities and that meant everything was quiet even in the engine room. Thousands of lights blinked around them, green and blue - everything working correctly.
“I thought you should know,” Yara said, “if anything happens to me - which it won’t - you’re in charge.”
“I - what?” On ABC they didn’t have a designated leader. Goseki was the one they looked to, but they all knew their jobs and they knew what to do if he wasn’t there - which had happened a few times. “Why?”
“Because I can count on you.” Yara clasped his shoulder. “You’ll do the right things and most especially the most important thing. You’ll get everyone home.”
Tsukada glanced around, suddenly nervous that there might be someone else listening. Of course no one was. Was Yara actually suggesting that Yara couldn’t count on the others? Tsukada bristled inwardly at the thought. “You can count on the others. I -”
Yara laughed. “Yes, I can. But you’re the dependable one. Yamamoto is a well disguised spaz. Hamanaka deserves the title space cadet. And Senga is too young and doesn’t focus without direction.”
“But I only know weaponry and the cloaking device -”
“That doesn’t matter. All you have to do is order them to get Butoukan home.”
This was most certainly not a position that Tsukada had ever thought to find himself in. “This isn’t - nothing’s going to happen to you.”
“Exactly,” Yara said and slung his arm around Tsukada’s shoulders, nearly dragging them out of the engine room and down the hallway, “but I thought you should know. We’ll have future missions and it’s best if you’re in the know.”
“Nothing’s going -” The door to the deck slid open and Tsukada swallowed his words as three pairs of eyes landed on them.
“I had Tsukada refresh me on a few things about Butoukan‘s guns. Everything’s fine.”
The other three turned away reluctantly and Tsukada doubted very little that all of them knew Yara was lying. Because Yara was horribly, badly lying. Even before they had left, Yara had already known just as much about the ship’s guns as Tsukada had.
Senga cleared his throat. “No ships - Fleet or MornMu - are in the area. Yume shows no sign of technological activity.”
“Good,” Yara said. “Let’s go meet Yume.”
Transmission between ENBUJOU SPACE STATION and TRIPLE S VETERAN
“And you would be four out of five. Not a bad score so far if I do say so?”
“Huh?”
“Forget it. Sorry, it’s a private joke.”
“This is Muro Tatsuki of Veteran. I - we - were curious about Bun-chan.
“Of course you were. Hey, didn’t your little brother just join the Fleet?”
“Another one - how did you know that?”
“Tsubasa keeps me up to date on things.”
“Oh, oh. Right. Um, so about Bun-chan?”
“All of you guys are the same. That’s, that’s quite reassuring actually.”
“What do you mean?”
“Hamanaka is fine as far as I know and no you cannot talk to him. He’s currently out of contact.”
“A secret mission? Hey, stop that, Ito -”
“Just make sure he comes back in one piece!”
“Ito, you‘re being rude!”
“He hasn’t blown up yet.”
“. . . what’s that supposed to mean?”
PLANET C785-MU aka Yume
“Rocks, rocks and more rocks. And yet there’s oxygen.” Yamamoto grumped through his dust mask. “That doesn’t quite make sense.”
“Yume produces most of its oxygen from algae in its shallow oceans,” Tsukada responded matter-of-factly. “Which we also have to check out.”
Senga was sitting down on a rock, taking a reading of the ground below him with a scanner, and he looked up from it. “Really? An ocean?”
“More like a massive pond of green sludge,” Yara further clarified. “Does anyone have anything interesting?”
Yamamoto slid a small tube filled with dust into his belt. “I’m getting minute traces of lithiliaum.”
“But it’s not going from the ground, rock, soil, whatever under here,“ Senga announced. “Whatever lithiliaum is.”
“It’s interesting, is what it is,” Yara said.
Figuring the gun at his belt, Tsukada was scanning the skies. Dull purple everywhere he looked except for the big orange sun in the sky. “They’ve been experimenting with lithiliaum as a power source for small weapons. It’s been promising,” Tsukada explained, “but it only occurs naturally and they’ve been unable to find sources large enough to make it worthwhile.”
“Cost effective,” Yamamoto guessed.
“Yeah, that would be it.”
“Which begs the question - if Yume has lithiliaum, why haven’t the MornMu colonized it? Or claimed it? It’s close enough to their territory that Fleet wouldn’t have said much.” Tsukada couldn’t an expression on Yara’s face thanks to the mask and goggles he was wearing, but his tone of voice seemed worried.
“Maybe the MornMu don’t know about lithiliaum.” Senga stood up and brushed his pants off. Dust clouds bloomed.
“Might be,” Yara said doubtfully.
Tsukada was fairly certain that the MornMu knew about the uses of lithiliaum. He knew in fact because MornMu and Fleet scientists had worked together on its usage after the truce. Yara probably knew too.
“Bun-chan,” Yamamoto said into his communicator, “how are things at the ship?”
Hamanaka’s voice chirped through the earpiece Tsukada was wearing. “I keeping getting blips of life signs, but I haven’t seen anything so far.”
“We found traces of lithiliaum.” Yara said. “Can you configure Butoukan‘s scanners to look for it?”
“I think . . .” Hamanaka’s voice faded out and the four of them started glancing at each other. “Okay. I could, but I would need a sample of it for Butoukan to be able to do that. I don’t think Takizawa thought we’d find anything close to that here so he didn’t put the information in her computer banks.”
“It’s getting pretty late.” Yamamoto had his arms crossed. “We wouldn’t go much further before we’d have to turn back anyways.”
“The idea was to get a general idea of what Yume was made up out of anyway? Right? So we could use Butoukan to look for those specific things,” Senga continued off of Yamamoto’s words in a heartbeat.
Butoukan could scan for certain minerals, but she had not been set up to scan and recognize and categorize things. She had to be told what to look for and then she would look for it, with a great range and far more efficiency than her crew on foot could.
Yara shook his head and laughed. “It is pretty miserable out here, isn’t it?”
“It’s dusty,” Yamamoto said.
“I’m all clogged up,” Senga agreed.
Tsukada wiped the sweat from his forehead. “And lithiliaum is the most interesting thing we’ve come across.”
“Well, Bun-chan, if you’ve been listening - it looks like we’re heading back,” Yara said.
“Yes!” Senga cheered and slammed hands together with Yamamoto and then leaped and hugged Tsukada. Tsukada hugged back, laughing.
“I’ll have food waiting,” Hamanaka said dryly, “but you have to take a shower before you eat it. I’ll see you in a few hours. Hamanaka out.”
“I call first dibs on the shower,” Yamamoto said immediately. Yara glanced at him and Tsukada could see Yamamoto’s shoulders stiffen. “After Yara, of course.”
“But Yara didn’t call first dibs.” Dusty and crumpled, Senga managed to look more confused than usual.
And Yara laughed and laughed.
Tsukada was pretty sure he was the only sane one on Butoukan‘s crew.
The walk back started of energetic, but the denser gravity than they were used to managed to dull even Senga’s energy - just like it had when they had first started out. The mood, however, was definitely lighter and Yara started making jokes and Senga and Tsukada laughed, while Yamamoto pretended not to laugh and Hamanaka would comm them from time to time with details of what he was making - no matter that it was pre-processed food since they had used up the fresh food a day ago.
Dusk was falling - a bloody red on a darkening purple sky - and they were only fifteen minutes out from Butoukan when Hamanaka commed them, his voice tense. Tsukada could clearly see the lights of their ship in the distance as Hamanaka’s voice said, “Those life form signals are increasing. I don’t like the looks of it. Hurry back.”
“You heard him,” Yara commanded, “let’s hurry back,” and together they moved into a jog. “What don’t you like the looks of, Bun-chan?”
“The signals are starting to swarm around you. And around Butoukan, but they’re keeping their distance from her a little more. She’s bigger.”
Senga hissed and Tsukada turned his head to look at him. “What is it?”
“I saw something. White. Moving. Out of the corner of my eye.”
“Great,” Yamamoto managed between strides, “the swarming wildlife of Yume.”
“Don’t talk,” Yara said. “Keep moving.”
Tsukada kept his mouth shut, but he kept his ears and eyes open. He heard nothing except for their own harsh breathing as they ran. But he did see glimmers of white behind rocky outcroppings, shining pink with the sunset and bits of white darting here and there. Predatory and hunting mannerisms, he thought.
He wished he could get a better look at them. Yume’s landscape was rough and there were plenty of places for whatever these things were to hide from view. Senga stumbled next to him and he grabbed his arm and helped steady him.
“Keep going,” he urged and fell back to where Yamamoto trailed them. Tsukada caught him by the elbow urged him to move faster. “You too.”
“Trying,” Yamamoto panted, but his strides became a bit longer. Slightly quicker.
Tsukada fell back another step. They all had combat experience - at least training - but Yamamoto specialized in medical and Senga was specialized in communications and engineering. Tsukada would protect their back.
Butoukan was right in front of them, the lights on the deck shining and the cargo bay at her back open and waiting for them. The ground was evening out slightly - they had landed Butoukan on a relatively flat area.
“Hurry up,” Hamanaka hissed in his earpiece. His voice was low as if he was afraid whatever was stalking them could hear him.
Tsukada caught the movement out of the corner of his eye. It was no small lurking and creeping movement, but one of the things launching itself into the air in an attack. His gun was in hand as it side leaped onto Yamamoto right in front of him, Yamamoto yelling in shock and falling backwards with the thing on top of him.
He shot it once. And then again and again and the creature recoiled, some warped, pale, and giant relative of a spider with an alligator face. It crumbled under and squealed under two more shots and Tsukada thought he heard someone calling his name. Yamamoto’s name. But he was pulling Yamamoto up and grabbing him by the waist and hauling him forward.
Blood was wet against his fingers and he tried not to think about it. Yamamoto was walking with him, attempting to run with Tsukada as his crutch. “It’s okay,” he heard Yamamoto mutter under his breath. “It’s okay.”
“Tsuka-chan!” Senga screamed and he looked up to see Senga and Yara almost at the cargo hold, just twenty yards away. He wanted to yell at them to turn around and go in - they were almost there, all of them - but he didn’t have the breath and rather suddenly he ran out of ground.
The rocks and dirt met with him hard and he could feel something scrambling at his legs, trying to gnaw. He kicked at it and fire blindly in its direction, trying to roll over and on top of Yamamoto. Attempting to protect him. Something tore into the back of his calf and he bit his lip and fired again.
He missed because it bit him again, harder and deeper. A gun fired - guns were firing, Senga and Yara’s - but this was closer and suddenly the jaws around his calf loosened and fell away altogether. He looked below him and Yamamoto - his goggles lost and his eyes wide - had a gun in his trembling hand.
“Between your legs,” he whispered, already struggling to get up. Tsukada fought to get up with him, ignoring the red hot pain running up his leg.
And then he wasn’t struggling as a hand grabbed him by the back of his jacket’s collar and hauled him up and forward.
“Move it,” the owner of the hand said, before firing at the oncoming wave of creatures advancing their way. Tsukada’s stomach churned and he lurched his way forward as fast as he could, now using Yamamoto has a poor sort of brace and firing at the side while Yara backed them.
The creatures weren’t leaping at them anymore. The leapers had apparently been the brave ones or maybe the sacrificial goats of the rest of them. Now a mass of creatures were methodically coming after them, inevitable and terrible. They weren’t worried that their prey would escape. They were too many to escape from.
Senga was right in front of them, one foot on the cargo bay ramp. His goggles and dust mask were off and he fired behind them with a pale, set face. Tsukada didn’t dare look back but he could hear them, moving faster than they were limping forward and they were so close, but they weren’t going to make it. Yara’s firing was growing more frantic and urgent; Senga wasn’t even aiming.
Something whirred, a loud unnatural noise that didn’t come from the creatures and from the sides of Butoukan two of her guns slid out and immediately fired two white hot pulses of plasma laser at the creatures. They let out a horrible mass squealing and suddenly Tsukada’s feet were stumbling up the cargo bay ramp. Senga was still firing, but he was pushing and shoving Tsukada and Yamamoto further up, into safety.
Tsukada lurched up the ramp and collapsed on the floor of the cargo bay, his leg on fire. He twisted around and watched Yara take backwards steps up the ramp as it ever so slowly raised off the ground. Butoukan‘s guns were still firing. Two shots and then a pause. And then another two shots.
The creatures were shrieking and screaming and yet they still marched forward. But the ramp was closing the opening and they weren’t moving fast enough. The guns fired again.
Something changed.
Maybe they sensed that they were losing their prey. Maybe the lasers finally scared them. Whatever it was, they started jumping again. The marching stopped and they launched themselves forward at the cargo bay - most were too far away and couldn’t make it through the closing gap, but two did.
Yara was still firing but the firing stopped when one of the creatures landed on him and he went sprawling to the floor, his weapon torn loose from his grip and spinning across the floor. The other creature landed and scuttled its away towards Senga.
Senga was still standing. Yara was down. Tsukada brought his gun up and started firing rapidly. The creature screamed, raised its head and shrieked at him with bloody teeth. Another shot and five more and six more. Most hit the creature with little flashes, smoke rising from its body.
It started to crumple, but Tsukada’s gun was losing power. Circuits were failing in it. It hadn’t been built for this much rapid firing nor too last as long as it had. Its shots were having less effect.
And then something else fired, something with a bright red laser burst that knocked half the creature’s head off. It collapsed, leaking white ooze on the cargo bay floor and Tsukada looked behind him and Hamanaka stood there, his thin arms shaking from the recoil of a large laser rifle.
The creature that had been after Senga was dead as well, multiple small holes riddled through its body. One of its legs twitched and Senga reflexively shot it again in the head.
“Yara!” Yamamoto yelled and hobbled his way to the dead creature and the weakly moving body underneath it. But it was moving.
Senga and Hamanaka both dropped their weapons and Senga bolted to help Yamamoto shove the creature off of Yara. Hamanaka knelt next to Tsukada and stopped him from attempting to crawl forward.
“You’ll just get in the way,” Hamanaka said, his normally blank face sweaty and pallid. He pulled off his jacket and wrapped it around Tsukada’s calf, pressing hard against the worst part of the wound.
“I know,“ Tsukada hissed and clenched his fist, tears rising in his eyes.
Senga - mostly Senga - and Yamamoto hauled Yara up and away from the dead creature. Close enough that Tsukada could see Yara’s side drenched in blood and the streak of blood where they had dragged him.
His eyes were open and they met with Tsukada’s. Then Hamanaka’s. “Nice aim,” he said with a crooked smile and then coughed.
A line of bright red dribbled from his mouth.
“I need to get him to the medbay,” Yamamoto said grimly. His left shoulder was soaked with blood and his face was tired and tense. “Now.”
“Bun-chan,” Tsukada shrugged Hamanaka off and struggled to his feet by himself - Hamanaka’s jacket fell of his injured leg and he wavered for a second before steadying - “go help take Yara to the medbay. I’ll be okay.”
Hamanaka looked at him doubtfully and he forced a tenuous grin.
“I’ll be back,” Hamanaka promised as he threw Yara’s arm over his shoulder and wrapped an arm around Yara’s waist. Senga did the same thing on Yara’s other side and Yamamoto wrapped his good arm under Yara’s legs. They disappeared behind the cargo bay door and Tsukada wobbled his way to the lift in the cargo bay.
It would take him to the engine room and from there it was a straight shot to the deck. They had to get home.
Transmission between ENBUJOU SPACE STATION and TRIPLE S ABC
“I thought you weren’t going to pick any of us for your special project, Takki.”
“Goseki! It’s nice to hear from you.”
“I thought you weren’t going to pick any of us.”
“I didn’t.”
“He’s still involved though, isn’t he?”
“But I didn’t pick him.”
“Technicalities, Takki.”
“Are you upset about this?”
“No, I was sort of expecting it. Kawai’s disappointed -”
“Ha! How well do you think he would have lasted in close quarters with Yara?”
“. . . that’s an interesting thought. Kitiyama keeps sending us messages, wanting to know if we know what’s going on.”
“He doesn’t trust me?”
“. . . they’re a bit protective.”
“I can’t tell you and I can’t tell them.”
“I figured that, but I also figured that I could tell Kitiyama I had asked and he would stop bothering me. And maybe message you every day.”
“Hm.”
“What?”
“It makes me happy that all of you try to take care of each other.”
“I - don’t get sappy on me.”
“You haven’t asked if I can tell you anything about how Tsuka-chan’s doing.”
“You wouldn’t tell me anything except that he was fine the last time you saw him. And Tsuka-chan can take care of himself.”
INDEPENDENT STARSHIP BUTOUKAN
“They’re crawling all over the ship,” Senga said, his voice tight. If he looked up he could see them clinging to Butoukan’s deck window, their ugly beady eyes glaring in and their teeth snapping uselessly against it. As they crawled over, they left streaks of white dust and slime. The ship was made to be small and light as much as starships could be, but she was tough. He tried not to look out the window and instead concentrated on the console in front of him.
Tried to figure out why Butoukan still had power, but why her engines wouldn’t start.
Hamanaka pushed away from the pilot’s console and brushed the hair from his eyes. “I don’t know what’s going on. She hasn’t taken any damage.”
Tsukada’s jaw was tense and his face pale, which made Senga worry even more. He had stopped forcing a smile shortly after Hamanaka had wrapped a makeshift bandage around his leg. “What’s going on?”
The hatch opened and Yamamoto climbed out, his arm held awkwardly to his chest and his shirt still bloody. “I - WHAT THE HELL?”
“We’re trying not to look at them,” Hamanaka admitted, his fingers dancing along the console.
Tsukada shifted in his seat. “Is Yara -”
“Coherent and talking and a jerk and stupid,” Yamamoto said. “I think he’ll be fine if we can get out of here.”
“We’re trying.”
“Yeah, well, I’m here to tell you why the engines won’t start.” Yamamoto pulled the sample vial full of the dirt he had taken. “Guess what lithiliaum does to crystal designed engines like the one Butoukan has. Or more like what it does to the circuits that tell the engine what to do?”
Tsukada’s eyes widened. “They lock down.”
Wasn’t Yamamoto the one that hadn’t known about lithiliaum? Senga shook his head. “But we still have power. Which means the engine is still working and the circuits are working.”
“They are, but they aren’t,” Tsukada said. “Lithiliaum reacts with the circuits in a way that makes them unable to receive, er, understand any new signals. The circuits will still allow the same amount of power to be used and it can be redirected, but it won’t allow any more power to be produced.”
“Which is why we can’t take off,” Hamanaka finished in understanding. He narrowed his eyes. “How do you know this?”
“And we didn’t bring back enough lithiliaum to cause this did we? Does it really take that little?” Senga asked.
Yamamoto shuffled his feet and slid the vial back into his pouch. “Yara was the one that mentioned it when I told him. And then I went to take a sample from one of the dead creatures in the cargo bay.” He cleared his throat. “They’re covered in it. All over. I actually think they’re producing it.”
Tsukada’s eyes darted to the window even as the door behind him slid open. “And they’re covering us.”
“More than close enough to cause a reaction. Which is interfering with our systems.”
“Yara!” and Senga was up out of his seat and rushing to throw one of Yara’s arms over his shoulders. He wasn’t wearing a shirt, just the bandages that nearly covered him from shoulder until they disappeared under the loose pants he wore. He was shaking with the effort of standing.
Yamamoto had wrapped Yara’s other arm over his own shoulders - his good side and good arm - and was growling, “You’re not supposed to be moving. Why the hell did you come up here? How the . . . the elevator from the cargo bay to the engine room, wasn’t it?”
Yara inhaled a little and Senga felt him settle more of his weight against him. “I figured I would fall off the ladder. And look at all our house guests,” he finished, gazing at the disturbing view in front of him.
“You shouldn’t move!”
“Not so afraid of me right now, are you, Yama-chan?”
“Shut up,” Yamamoto muttered. “You shouldn’t have done that.”
“Had to,” Yara simply said and then he glanced to the side and smiled at Senga. “I really think I need to sit down. My seat.”
Yamamoto shared a look with Senga - and Senga could be oblivious, but Yamamoto was obviously angry. They helped lead Yara over to his chair and sat him down gently in the chair to the right of Hamanaka‘s. Yara was gritting his teeth, but Senga heard his hiss of pain as he let go and backed away.
“You - you had to come up here?” Tsukada asked once Yara was settled.
“We need to get out of here and we need to get out of here soon. Prolonged exposure to lithiliaum eventually damages the circuits and when that happens. If that happened, we would lose all power.” That was all Yara really had to say. Butoukan was airtight and mostly computer run. If she lost power, they would still be able to manually open doors and hatches, but oxygen would stop being produced and all possible communication would be lost.
They would be going nowhere, possibly for forever.
Takizawa had made it very clear that while being a state-of-the-art ship, Butoukan was very small and very alone. He wouldn’t be able to rescue them.
Hamanaka had swung his chair, his expression flat. “How do we get out of here?”
“In theory if we power everything down and start it back up, the circuits - if they haven’t been damaged yet - should react as if they hadn’t come into contact with lithiliaum.” Yara really wasn’t looking good, his eyes half-closed and his breaths long and labored. “Briefly, that is.”
Senga chewed on his lower lip. After coming on from a power down it would take Butoukan some time to warm up enough for flight and even longer for the engine to warm up enough for exiting the atmosphere. “How briefly?”
“We’re covered in those things. Very briefly.”
His fingers tapping on the arm of his chair, Hamanaka was shaking his head. “I wouldn’t be able to get her off of the ground fast enough.”
Yara took a deep and heavy sigh. Yamamoto’s fingers twitched, his mouth pursing itself into a grim line. “Which is why I have to be up here. Before we power down Butoukan I have to override her safety codes and program her for immediate flight startup.”
Hamanaka’s mouth twisted. “Flying cold up through atmo?”
“If we make it that far,” Tsukada said. “If the circuits are too damaged we blow up when we restart the engine, right?”
Senga had thrown himself back into his seat and opening up various commands on his console, studying frequencies. “If we make it through atmo with a cold ship, our communications system will probably end up shot.”
Yara’s eyes were definitely closed this time. “Are all of you against this?”
“No,” Tsukada said. “It’s probably our only chance. We can do it.”
“We can,” Senga echoed, turning away from his console.
Hamanaka was already looking down at his screen, already preparing.
Yara had opened his eyes and his fingers were already flying over his console. “That’s what I thought. Senga, once I shut down the engine, you’re going to have to manually start it up and then get out of there as fast as possible. If anything is going to go wrong, it’ll go wrong in there.”
“Why me?” He knew how to manually restart an engine, but he had never done it before. Tsukada and Yamamoto would probably have been better choices . . . except -
“Because Hamanaka needs to pilot,” Yara stated, “and the rest of us are rather useless physically at this point. Use one of the emergency seats in the hall. You probably won’t be able to make it back here before we take off.”
“Right.” This would be a very bad time to throw up, he thought, but it was exactly what he wanted to do.
“Tsuka-chan -”
“I’m burying the cloaking program within the weapons system and changing what circuits it draws from - tougher ones. It won’t be the same, but it should work. We still don’t want to expose ourselves to the MornMu, do we?” Tsukada was smiling and it was tired and pained and stretched thin, but it was a genuine smile. The knots in Senga’s stomach loosened.
“Move out,” Yamamoto told Senga, standing next to his chair. “I know something about communications. I’ll see what I can do to save it.”
This close Senga could see through Yamamoto’s torn shirt and the white bandages he wore underneath it. Or mainly the bandages that were supposed to be white, but were mostly red. In his rush to treat Yara, he had barely done anything for himself. Yamamoto tapped him on his shoulder to get his attention. “Hey, we all have our duties. Move.”
“You’re pretty stupid, too,” Senga said under his breath, getting out of his seat. “As stupid as Yara and Tsuka-chan.”
“Maybe that’s way Takki picked us. We’re all stupid.”
“Hey, you two,” Yara said, “we have a show to get on the road.”
Transmission between CRUISER NEWS and TRIPLE S QUESTION
“So, we have a ship here. It looks a little lost, Yamapi.”
“You’re in a neutral territory. Lost could have quite a few meanings.”
“Lost as in lost. We’ve tried comming it a several times. All we get back is gibberish.”
“Gibberish?”
“Mm, random computer sounds. Ishigaki has been going through it to see if it’s a code, but he hasn’t come up with anything.”
“Could it be MornMu?”
“It’s not like any MornMu starship I’ve ever seen. It’s closer to our side of the boundary. I’d say it looks more like a Fleet ship than anything else, but it’s not broadcasting its signal. And, hm . . .”
“What is it?”
“The shipis tiny and, I think, high tech. Akun thinks she’s a new design.”
“Wouldn’t we have heard something?”
“You mean you, right? We really don‘t tend to hear what any of the higher ups are saying.”
“Yeah. Sorry, I was talking to myself.”
“We got it. So what’s your opinion on the matter?”
“She hasn’t made any hostile actions towards you has she?”
“I don’t think she’s even picked us up. And I mean, she’s flying well enough, but concerning everything else, something’s off.”
“So we have two choices.”
“Leave her as she is or have the NEWS come pick her up.”
“Wouldn’t that make the MornMu happy.”
“Yamapi?”
“Have Ishigaki send Massu the gibberish. Just keep her in your sights.”
CRUISER NEWS
“Could you shut up?” said Yamamoto’s voice, not sounding quite like he meant it thanks to its light tone. “You’re going to wake up Yara.”
Yara groaned and thought, too late.
“See?”
“You were the one that started it!”
Senga.
“You were the ones getting loud!”
Someone was giggling and if Yara was to take a knowledgeable guess he would bet that it was Tsukada. Clearly the rest of Butoukan‘s crew had committed themselves to their playful bickering rather than go quiet and allow Yara to fall back asleep.
Just as well. His body ached, but in the distant way that meant the medical technicians on NEWS weren’t skimping on the drugs, and his mind was fuzzy from too much sleep.
“All of you are completely useless,” he moaned and opened his eyes. NEWS‘ infirmary as an off-white, almost warm and pleasant, and his eyes adjusted quickly. He had been conscious when NEWS had picked them up, but after their escape from Yume - damn Senga and that stupid name - Yamamoto had taken to drugging him with a vengeance.
“Sorry,” Senga squeaked and then burst into a giggle.
“All of you,” he repeated, “useless.” They were the only ones in the room. Four of them stuck in beds; Tsukada was across from Yara and Yamamoto was to the right of Tsukada. Across from Tsukada was Hamanaka - the only one that hadn’t closed his eyes against the bright flashes of lithiliaum burning on Butoukan‘s hull as they had rushed upwards through Yume’s atmosphere. Vaguely he remembered Yamamoto worrying about Hamanaka’s sight.
No one seemed worried at the moment, but he took a moment to study Hamanaka and Yara felt his lips twitch upwards. “Bun-chan, you look like a bug.”
Hamanaka’s cheeks flushed red and he hunched his shoulders, half-hiding the large black lenses that covered his eyes. Sitting on Hamanaka’s bed, Senga burst out into uncontrollable giggles and leaned his head against Hamanaka‘s back.
“Senga,” Yamamoto said, “maybe you should think about sleeping for a few more hours.”
“Has he slept at all?” Yara questioned.
“It’s been two days,” Tsukada informed him. “He’s slept some.” And then in a lower tone he added, “But not much I think.”
“Tsuuuka-chan,” Senga whined, “don’t tell him that.”
“He slept with me,” Hamanaka admitted, cracking a nervous smile.
So many ways to take that and for a second Yara pondered the possibilities.
“You didn’t have bandages.” As if that was a reasonable excuse for sleeping on the small medical bed with a crew member.
Yamamoto fussed his arm pressed against his chest thanks to a sling. “It’s mostly healed,” he said with a dour look, “I don’t really even need to stay in here.”
“Exhaustion,” Tsukada said the word slowly, “that’s why you’re still here.”
“I’m not tired anymore.”
It was easy to see where this conversation was going - in fact Yara suspected that it was probably remarkably similar whatever they had been discussing before - and he interrupted. “Did I miss anything important?”
“NEWS sent Takki a message.” Tsukada pushed his covers further down his waist and sat up straighter. “And Takki sent one back for us.”
“Oh.” Yara flashed through everything that Takizawa could have said. That the higher ups in Fleet could have made him say. “Well, he can’t say anything about us blowing up the ship. That‘s the one thing we didn’t manage.”
Tsukada grinned. “He said we did a good job under the circumstances and that once Butoukan has been repaired, she’ll be listed under ‘exploratory vessel’. Under Fleet.”
“And we’re still her crew?”
“As long as we’re alive,” Yamamoto groaned. “I guess the higher ups are seriously considering taking over Yume. Giant spiders that want to eat you and produce engine-disabling powder from their skin? The best reason ever to claim a planet. And then Takki hinted about a surprise.”
Great, the sounded absolutely fantastic except in the way it was not. “A surprise?”
“No idea,” Senga chirped in, “but NEWS is dropping us back off at Enbujou.”
“We’re between hyper-jumps at the moment,” Hamanaka told him and then glanced down at Senga with his big black medically issued glasses and said, “You’re annoying.”
“That’s okay.”
The door to the infirmary slid open and Yara had a moment of wondering if they were really on NEWS because the person standing in the doorway was a member of Kisumai.
“Senga, are you okay?” As soon as his eyes landed on his fellow crew member, Nikaido was flinging himself into the room. “Takki mentioned that something happened and -”
Senga launched himself at Nikaido, wrapping his arms around his friend. “I’m fine! I missed you!”
Nikaido’s entrance had started a flood of Kisumai crew into the infirmary and before Yara could blink, all six of them were there, surrounding their seventh crew member and patting him down and hugging him as if they had to physically prove to themselves that it really was Senga.
“You’re really okay?” Miyata asked and before Senga could answer with another affirmative, Yokoo spoke up.
“Oy, Tsuka-chan, you look like someone tenderized you.”
Tsukada laughed, “Have you taken a peek at Yara?”
Fujigaya perched himself at the end of Yara’s bed and shot Yara a smile. “He’s seen. He just doesn’t want to stare in horror so he’s trying not to look.”
“Those things are huge,” Kitiyama was saying from where he had taken Senga’s place on Hamanaka’s bed.
Tamamori had found a place sitting next to Yamamoto and Yamamoto was too far in shock to say anything about it for once.
“Hey! Hey!” Koyama stood in the doorway, looking disappointedly at all of them. “I know I told you that you had to be quiet. They’re supposed to be resting.”
“They were already up,” Nikaido said defensively.
Yara waved his hand. “It’s all right, Koyama. It’s not going to kill us having them in here. Maybe.”
Koyama didn’t seem quite ready to believe Yara, but he did let it go. “ABC will be joining us before we make another hyper-jump. Thought I should let you know before . . . So another one of this won’t take you by surprise.”
“ABC and Kisumai. Do you know anything about Takki having a surprise for us?” Because Yara deeply suspected this was it.
Koyama tilted his head back and forth, gave a knowing grin. “I might have heard something about MAD and Veteran docking at Enbujou just before we arrive there.”
The rest of Butoukan‘s crew were too distracted by the rest of Senga’s Kisumai crew to pay attention to the conversation. Well, if they hadn’t overheard, he wasn’t going to spoil the surprise for them.
Except for Fujigaya, who was still perched on his bed. “Awesome,” he said, “but isn’t that . . . Well, where’s Yara’s . . .”
“You’re not being very subtle,” Yara said dryly.
“Heh.”
“There’s a rumor that Shock is heading Enbujou‘s way.” Koyama may have been a bit more than amused.
If Shock was coming, MA was without doubt right behind. Maybe Takizawa wasn’t such an ass - meant in the kindest terms. Or maybe Yara was feeling a touch more benevolent towards the man because he knew that he would likely get a front row seat for the meeting between Takizawa and Koichi.
“So,” Kitiyama was saying, “how was Butoukan? That’s her name right?”
“I like her,” Senga said and paused. Yara watched as he glanced around the room, eyes falling upon every Butoukan member. Having retrieved a deck of cards somewhere, Tamamori was convincing Yamamoto to play a game with him. Kitiyama was moving his hands back and forth in front of Hamanaka‘s glasses, attempting to determine how much he could see with more than a little glee. And Tsukada and Yokoo were engaged in a deep conversation, heads together and ignoring everything else.
“She’s not Kisumai,” Senga laughed, “but that’s okay. She isn’t supposed to be.”
Which was exactly how it was supposed to be. Yara leaned back against his pillows and allowed Fujigaya to regale him with tales of ‘Stupid Things Senga Has Said’.
For the moment they were going home - to their own ships, the people they had been with for years. That was comfort in knowing. And while they were home, Butoukan would wait.
And that was an entirely different sort of comfort.
Pairing/Group: Butoukan-centric
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: SPACE AU. Looong. Stupid boys. Blood. Random appearances by other groups not Butoukan.
Notes: This fic may have possibly broken a mind. The possibly broken mind hopes the fic treats you well, diamondsjack!
Summary: Take one tiny ship, five people and send them to an unknown planet for a totally easy mission. Will they survive? Will the ship blow up? Who knows.
INDEPENDENT STARSHIP BUTOUKAN
Tsukada was checking the status on the cloak when Yara called him aside and into the engine room. He made a few adjustments and glanced at the speck of a planet that was slowly growing larger and larger. The planet was designated as C785-MU, but Senga had glanced at it’s brown and rocky surface and gave it a name.
“Yume,” Senga had said, “because it dreams of being prettier. That makes it a little prettier. Somehow.”
“Okay,” Yara had replied and everyone had left it at that.
“I’ll be right back,” Tsukada told the other three and followed Yara back to the hallway leading to the engine room. Yara maintained his silence until they entered the engine room and the door slid shut behind them.
Butoukan was running at her full capabilities and that meant everything was quiet even in the engine room. Thousands of lights blinked around them, green and blue - everything working correctly.
“I thought you should know,” Yara said, “if anything happens to me - which it won’t - you’re in charge.”
“I - what?” On ABC they didn’t have a designated leader. Goseki was the one they looked to, but they all knew their jobs and they knew what to do if he wasn’t there - which had happened a few times. “Why?”
“Because I can count on you.” Yara clasped his shoulder. “You’ll do the right things and most especially the most important thing. You’ll get everyone home.”
Tsukada glanced around, suddenly nervous that there might be someone else listening. Of course no one was. Was Yara actually suggesting that Yara couldn’t count on the others? Tsukada bristled inwardly at the thought. “You can count on the others. I -”
Yara laughed. “Yes, I can. But you’re the dependable one. Yamamoto is a well disguised spaz. Hamanaka deserves the title space cadet. And Senga is too young and doesn’t focus without direction.”
“But I only know weaponry and the cloaking device -”
“That doesn’t matter. All you have to do is order them to get Butoukan home.”
This was most certainly not a position that Tsukada had ever thought to find himself in. “This isn’t - nothing’s going to happen to you.”
“Exactly,” Yara said and slung his arm around Tsukada’s shoulders, nearly dragging them out of the engine room and down the hallway, “but I thought you should know. We’ll have future missions and it’s best if you’re in the know.”
“Nothing’s going -” The door to the deck slid open and Tsukada swallowed his words as three pairs of eyes landed on them.
“I had Tsukada refresh me on a few things about Butoukan‘s guns. Everything’s fine.”
The other three turned away reluctantly and Tsukada doubted very little that all of them knew Yara was lying. Because Yara was horribly, badly lying. Even before they had left, Yara had already known just as much about the ship’s guns as Tsukada had.
Senga cleared his throat. “No ships - Fleet or MornMu - are in the area. Yume shows no sign of technological activity.”
“Good,” Yara said. “Let’s go meet Yume.”
Transmission between ENBUJOU SPACE STATION and TRIPLE S VETERAN
“And you would be four out of five. Not a bad score so far if I do say so?”
“Huh?”
“Forget it. Sorry, it’s a private joke.”
“This is Muro Tatsuki of Veteran. I - we - were curious about Bun-chan.
“Of course you were. Hey, didn’t your little brother just join the Fleet?”
“Another one - how did you know that?”
“Tsubasa keeps me up to date on things.”
“Oh, oh. Right. Um, so about Bun-chan?”
“All of you guys are the same. That’s, that’s quite reassuring actually.”
“What do you mean?”
“Hamanaka is fine as far as I know and no you cannot talk to him. He’s currently out of contact.”
“A secret mission? Hey, stop that, Ito -”
“Just make sure he comes back in one piece!”
“Ito, you‘re being rude!”
“He hasn’t blown up yet.”
“. . . what’s that supposed to mean?”
PLANET C785-MU aka Yume
“Rocks, rocks and more rocks. And yet there’s oxygen.” Yamamoto grumped through his dust mask. “That doesn’t quite make sense.”
“Yume produces most of its oxygen from algae in its shallow oceans,” Tsukada responded matter-of-factly. “Which we also have to check out.”
Senga was sitting down on a rock, taking a reading of the ground below him with a scanner, and he looked up from it. “Really? An ocean?”
“More like a massive pond of green sludge,” Yara further clarified. “Does anyone have anything interesting?”
Yamamoto slid a small tube filled with dust into his belt. “I’m getting minute traces of lithiliaum.”
“But it’s not going from the ground, rock, soil, whatever under here,“ Senga announced. “Whatever lithiliaum is.”
“It’s interesting, is what it is,” Yara said.
Figuring the gun at his belt, Tsukada was scanning the skies. Dull purple everywhere he looked except for the big orange sun in the sky. “They’ve been experimenting with lithiliaum as a power source for small weapons. It’s been promising,” Tsukada explained, “but it only occurs naturally and they’ve been unable to find sources large enough to make it worthwhile.”
“Cost effective,” Yamamoto guessed.
“Yeah, that would be it.”
“Which begs the question - if Yume has lithiliaum, why haven’t the MornMu colonized it? Or claimed it? It’s close enough to their territory that Fleet wouldn’t have said much.” Tsukada couldn’t an expression on Yara’s face thanks to the mask and goggles he was wearing, but his tone of voice seemed worried.
“Maybe the MornMu don’t know about lithiliaum.” Senga stood up and brushed his pants off. Dust clouds bloomed.
“Might be,” Yara said doubtfully.
Tsukada was fairly certain that the MornMu knew about the uses of lithiliaum. He knew in fact because MornMu and Fleet scientists had worked together on its usage after the truce. Yara probably knew too.
“Bun-chan,” Yamamoto said into his communicator, “how are things at the ship?”
Hamanaka’s voice chirped through the earpiece Tsukada was wearing. “I keeping getting blips of life signs, but I haven’t seen anything so far.”
“We found traces of lithiliaum.” Yara said. “Can you configure Butoukan‘s scanners to look for it?”
“I think . . .” Hamanaka’s voice faded out and the four of them started glancing at each other. “Okay. I could, but I would need a sample of it for Butoukan to be able to do that. I don’t think Takizawa thought we’d find anything close to that here so he didn’t put the information in her computer banks.”
“It’s getting pretty late.” Yamamoto had his arms crossed. “We wouldn’t go much further before we’d have to turn back anyways.”
“The idea was to get a general idea of what Yume was made up out of anyway? Right? So we could use Butoukan to look for those specific things,” Senga continued off of Yamamoto’s words in a heartbeat.
Butoukan could scan for certain minerals, but she had not been set up to scan and recognize and categorize things. She had to be told what to look for and then she would look for it, with a great range and far more efficiency than her crew on foot could.
Yara shook his head and laughed. “It is pretty miserable out here, isn’t it?”
“It’s dusty,” Yamamoto said.
“I’m all clogged up,” Senga agreed.
Tsukada wiped the sweat from his forehead. “And lithiliaum is the most interesting thing we’ve come across.”
“Well, Bun-chan, if you’ve been listening - it looks like we’re heading back,” Yara said.
“Yes!” Senga cheered and slammed hands together with Yamamoto and then leaped and hugged Tsukada. Tsukada hugged back, laughing.
“I’ll have food waiting,” Hamanaka said dryly, “but you have to take a shower before you eat it. I’ll see you in a few hours. Hamanaka out.”
“I call first dibs on the shower,” Yamamoto said immediately. Yara glanced at him and Tsukada could see Yamamoto’s shoulders stiffen. “After Yara, of course.”
“But Yara didn’t call first dibs.” Dusty and crumpled, Senga managed to look more confused than usual.
And Yara laughed and laughed.
Tsukada was pretty sure he was the only sane one on Butoukan‘s crew.
The walk back started of energetic, but the denser gravity than they were used to managed to dull even Senga’s energy - just like it had when they had first started out. The mood, however, was definitely lighter and Yara started making jokes and Senga and Tsukada laughed, while Yamamoto pretended not to laugh and Hamanaka would comm them from time to time with details of what he was making - no matter that it was pre-processed food since they had used up the fresh food a day ago.
Dusk was falling - a bloody red on a darkening purple sky - and they were only fifteen minutes out from Butoukan when Hamanaka commed them, his voice tense. Tsukada could clearly see the lights of their ship in the distance as Hamanaka’s voice said, “Those life form signals are increasing. I don’t like the looks of it. Hurry back.”
“You heard him,” Yara commanded, “let’s hurry back,” and together they moved into a jog. “What don’t you like the looks of, Bun-chan?”
“The signals are starting to swarm around you. And around Butoukan, but they’re keeping their distance from her a little more. She’s bigger.”
Senga hissed and Tsukada turned his head to look at him. “What is it?”
“I saw something. White. Moving. Out of the corner of my eye.”
“Great,” Yamamoto managed between strides, “the swarming wildlife of Yume.”
“Don’t talk,” Yara said. “Keep moving.”
Tsukada kept his mouth shut, but he kept his ears and eyes open. He heard nothing except for their own harsh breathing as they ran. But he did see glimmers of white behind rocky outcroppings, shining pink with the sunset and bits of white darting here and there. Predatory and hunting mannerisms, he thought.
He wished he could get a better look at them. Yume’s landscape was rough and there were plenty of places for whatever these things were to hide from view. Senga stumbled next to him and he grabbed his arm and helped steady him.
“Keep going,” he urged and fell back to where Yamamoto trailed them. Tsukada caught him by the elbow urged him to move faster. “You too.”
“Trying,” Yamamoto panted, but his strides became a bit longer. Slightly quicker.
Tsukada fell back another step. They all had combat experience - at least training - but Yamamoto specialized in medical and Senga was specialized in communications and engineering. Tsukada would protect their back.
Butoukan was right in front of them, the lights on the deck shining and the cargo bay at her back open and waiting for them. The ground was evening out slightly - they had landed Butoukan on a relatively flat area.
“Hurry up,” Hamanaka hissed in his earpiece. His voice was low as if he was afraid whatever was stalking them could hear him.
Tsukada caught the movement out of the corner of his eye. It was no small lurking and creeping movement, but one of the things launching itself into the air in an attack. His gun was in hand as it side leaped onto Yamamoto right in front of him, Yamamoto yelling in shock and falling backwards with the thing on top of him.
He shot it once. And then again and again and the creature recoiled, some warped, pale, and giant relative of a spider with an alligator face. It crumbled under and squealed under two more shots and Tsukada thought he heard someone calling his name. Yamamoto’s name. But he was pulling Yamamoto up and grabbing him by the waist and hauling him forward.
Blood was wet against his fingers and he tried not to think about it. Yamamoto was walking with him, attempting to run with Tsukada as his crutch. “It’s okay,” he heard Yamamoto mutter under his breath. “It’s okay.”
“Tsuka-chan!” Senga screamed and he looked up to see Senga and Yara almost at the cargo hold, just twenty yards away. He wanted to yell at them to turn around and go in - they were almost there, all of them - but he didn’t have the breath and rather suddenly he ran out of ground.
The rocks and dirt met with him hard and he could feel something scrambling at his legs, trying to gnaw. He kicked at it and fire blindly in its direction, trying to roll over and on top of Yamamoto. Attempting to protect him. Something tore into the back of his calf and he bit his lip and fired again.
He missed because it bit him again, harder and deeper. A gun fired - guns were firing, Senga and Yara’s - but this was closer and suddenly the jaws around his calf loosened and fell away altogether. He looked below him and Yamamoto - his goggles lost and his eyes wide - had a gun in his trembling hand.
“Between your legs,” he whispered, already struggling to get up. Tsukada fought to get up with him, ignoring the red hot pain running up his leg.
And then he wasn’t struggling as a hand grabbed him by the back of his jacket’s collar and hauled him up and forward.
“Move it,” the owner of the hand said, before firing at the oncoming wave of creatures advancing their way. Tsukada’s stomach churned and he lurched his way forward as fast as he could, now using Yamamoto has a poor sort of brace and firing at the side while Yara backed them.
The creatures weren’t leaping at them anymore. The leapers had apparently been the brave ones or maybe the sacrificial goats of the rest of them. Now a mass of creatures were methodically coming after them, inevitable and terrible. They weren’t worried that their prey would escape. They were too many to escape from.
Senga was right in front of them, one foot on the cargo bay ramp. His goggles and dust mask were off and he fired behind them with a pale, set face. Tsukada didn’t dare look back but he could hear them, moving faster than they were limping forward and they were so close, but they weren’t going to make it. Yara’s firing was growing more frantic and urgent; Senga wasn’t even aiming.
Something whirred, a loud unnatural noise that didn’t come from the creatures and from the sides of Butoukan two of her guns slid out and immediately fired two white hot pulses of plasma laser at the creatures. They let out a horrible mass squealing and suddenly Tsukada’s feet were stumbling up the cargo bay ramp. Senga was still firing, but he was pushing and shoving Tsukada and Yamamoto further up, into safety.
Tsukada lurched up the ramp and collapsed on the floor of the cargo bay, his leg on fire. He twisted around and watched Yara take backwards steps up the ramp as it ever so slowly raised off the ground. Butoukan‘s guns were still firing. Two shots and then a pause. And then another two shots.
The creatures were shrieking and screaming and yet they still marched forward. But the ramp was closing the opening and they weren’t moving fast enough. The guns fired again.
Something changed.
Maybe they sensed that they were losing their prey. Maybe the lasers finally scared them. Whatever it was, they started jumping again. The marching stopped and they launched themselves forward at the cargo bay - most were too far away and couldn’t make it through the closing gap, but two did.
Yara was still firing but the firing stopped when one of the creatures landed on him and he went sprawling to the floor, his weapon torn loose from his grip and spinning across the floor. The other creature landed and scuttled its away towards Senga.
Senga was still standing. Yara was down. Tsukada brought his gun up and started firing rapidly. The creature screamed, raised its head and shrieked at him with bloody teeth. Another shot and five more and six more. Most hit the creature with little flashes, smoke rising from its body.
It started to crumple, but Tsukada’s gun was losing power. Circuits were failing in it. It hadn’t been built for this much rapid firing nor too last as long as it had. Its shots were having less effect.
And then something else fired, something with a bright red laser burst that knocked half the creature’s head off. It collapsed, leaking white ooze on the cargo bay floor and Tsukada looked behind him and Hamanaka stood there, his thin arms shaking from the recoil of a large laser rifle.
The creature that had been after Senga was dead as well, multiple small holes riddled through its body. One of its legs twitched and Senga reflexively shot it again in the head.
“Yara!” Yamamoto yelled and hobbled his way to the dead creature and the weakly moving body underneath it. But it was moving.
Senga and Hamanaka both dropped their weapons and Senga bolted to help Yamamoto shove the creature off of Yara. Hamanaka knelt next to Tsukada and stopped him from attempting to crawl forward.
“You’ll just get in the way,” Hamanaka said, his normally blank face sweaty and pallid. He pulled off his jacket and wrapped it around Tsukada’s calf, pressing hard against the worst part of the wound.
“I know,“ Tsukada hissed and clenched his fist, tears rising in his eyes.
Senga - mostly Senga - and Yamamoto hauled Yara up and away from the dead creature. Close enough that Tsukada could see Yara’s side drenched in blood and the streak of blood where they had dragged him.
His eyes were open and they met with Tsukada’s. Then Hamanaka’s. “Nice aim,” he said with a crooked smile and then coughed.
A line of bright red dribbled from his mouth.
“I need to get him to the medbay,” Yamamoto said grimly. His left shoulder was soaked with blood and his face was tired and tense. “Now.”
“Bun-chan,” Tsukada shrugged Hamanaka off and struggled to his feet by himself - Hamanaka’s jacket fell of his injured leg and he wavered for a second before steadying - “go help take Yara to the medbay. I’ll be okay.”
Hamanaka looked at him doubtfully and he forced a tenuous grin.
“I’ll be back,” Hamanaka promised as he threw Yara’s arm over his shoulder and wrapped an arm around Yara’s waist. Senga did the same thing on Yara’s other side and Yamamoto wrapped his good arm under Yara’s legs. They disappeared behind the cargo bay door and Tsukada wobbled his way to the lift in the cargo bay.
It would take him to the engine room and from there it was a straight shot to the deck. They had to get home.
Transmission between ENBUJOU SPACE STATION and TRIPLE S ABC
“I thought you weren’t going to pick any of us for your special project, Takki.”
“Goseki! It’s nice to hear from you.”
“I thought you weren’t going to pick any of us.”
“I didn’t.”
“He’s still involved though, isn’t he?”
“But I didn’t pick him.”
“Technicalities, Takki.”
“Are you upset about this?”
“No, I was sort of expecting it. Kawai’s disappointed -”
“Ha! How well do you think he would have lasted in close quarters with Yara?”
“. . . that’s an interesting thought. Kitiyama keeps sending us messages, wanting to know if we know what’s going on.”
“He doesn’t trust me?”
“. . . they’re a bit protective.”
“I can’t tell you and I can’t tell them.”
“I figured that, but I also figured that I could tell Kitiyama I had asked and he would stop bothering me. And maybe message you every day.”
“Hm.”
“What?”
“It makes me happy that all of you try to take care of each other.”
“I - don’t get sappy on me.”
“You haven’t asked if I can tell you anything about how Tsuka-chan’s doing.”
“You wouldn’t tell me anything except that he was fine the last time you saw him. And Tsuka-chan can take care of himself.”
INDEPENDENT STARSHIP BUTOUKAN
“They’re crawling all over the ship,” Senga said, his voice tight. If he looked up he could see them clinging to Butoukan’s deck window, their ugly beady eyes glaring in and their teeth snapping uselessly against it. As they crawled over, they left streaks of white dust and slime. The ship was made to be small and light as much as starships could be, but she was tough. He tried not to look out the window and instead concentrated on the console in front of him.
Tried to figure out why Butoukan still had power, but why her engines wouldn’t start.
Hamanaka pushed away from the pilot’s console and brushed the hair from his eyes. “I don’t know what’s going on. She hasn’t taken any damage.”
Tsukada’s jaw was tense and his face pale, which made Senga worry even more. He had stopped forcing a smile shortly after Hamanaka had wrapped a makeshift bandage around his leg. “What’s going on?”
The hatch opened and Yamamoto climbed out, his arm held awkwardly to his chest and his shirt still bloody. “I - WHAT THE HELL?”
“We’re trying not to look at them,” Hamanaka admitted, his fingers dancing along the console.
Tsukada shifted in his seat. “Is Yara -”
“Coherent and talking and a jerk and stupid,” Yamamoto said. “I think he’ll be fine if we can get out of here.”
“We’re trying.”
“Yeah, well, I’m here to tell you why the engines won’t start.” Yamamoto pulled the sample vial full of the dirt he had taken. “Guess what lithiliaum does to crystal designed engines like the one Butoukan has. Or more like what it does to the circuits that tell the engine what to do?”
Tsukada’s eyes widened. “They lock down.”
Wasn’t Yamamoto the one that hadn’t known about lithiliaum? Senga shook his head. “But we still have power. Which means the engine is still working and the circuits are working.”
“They are, but they aren’t,” Tsukada said. “Lithiliaum reacts with the circuits in a way that makes them unable to receive, er, understand any new signals. The circuits will still allow the same amount of power to be used and it can be redirected, but it won’t allow any more power to be produced.”
“Which is why we can’t take off,” Hamanaka finished in understanding. He narrowed his eyes. “How do you know this?”
“And we didn’t bring back enough lithiliaum to cause this did we? Does it really take that little?” Senga asked.
Yamamoto shuffled his feet and slid the vial back into his pouch. “Yara was the one that mentioned it when I told him. And then I went to take a sample from one of the dead creatures in the cargo bay.” He cleared his throat. “They’re covered in it. All over. I actually think they’re producing it.”
Tsukada’s eyes darted to the window even as the door behind him slid open. “And they’re covering us.”
“More than close enough to cause a reaction. Which is interfering with our systems.”
“Yara!” and Senga was up out of his seat and rushing to throw one of Yara’s arms over his shoulders. He wasn’t wearing a shirt, just the bandages that nearly covered him from shoulder until they disappeared under the loose pants he wore. He was shaking with the effort of standing.
Yamamoto had wrapped Yara’s other arm over his own shoulders - his good side and good arm - and was growling, “You’re not supposed to be moving. Why the hell did you come up here? How the . . . the elevator from the cargo bay to the engine room, wasn’t it?”
Yara inhaled a little and Senga felt him settle more of his weight against him. “I figured I would fall off the ladder. And look at all our house guests,” he finished, gazing at the disturbing view in front of him.
“You shouldn’t move!”
“Not so afraid of me right now, are you, Yama-chan?”
“Shut up,” Yamamoto muttered. “You shouldn’t have done that.”
“Had to,” Yara simply said and then he glanced to the side and smiled at Senga. “I really think I need to sit down. My seat.”
Yamamoto shared a look with Senga - and Senga could be oblivious, but Yamamoto was obviously angry. They helped lead Yara over to his chair and sat him down gently in the chair to the right of Hamanaka‘s. Yara was gritting his teeth, but Senga heard his hiss of pain as he let go and backed away.
“You - you had to come up here?” Tsukada asked once Yara was settled.
“We need to get out of here and we need to get out of here soon. Prolonged exposure to lithiliaum eventually damages the circuits and when that happens. If that happened, we would lose all power.” That was all Yara really had to say. Butoukan was airtight and mostly computer run. If she lost power, they would still be able to manually open doors and hatches, but oxygen would stop being produced and all possible communication would be lost.
They would be going nowhere, possibly for forever.
Takizawa had made it very clear that while being a state-of-the-art ship, Butoukan was very small and very alone. He wouldn’t be able to rescue them.
Hamanaka had swung his chair, his expression flat. “How do we get out of here?”
“In theory if we power everything down and start it back up, the circuits - if they haven’t been damaged yet - should react as if they hadn’t come into contact with lithiliaum.” Yara really wasn’t looking good, his eyes half-closed and his breaths long and labored. “Briefly, that is.”
Senga chewed on his lower lip. After coming on from a power down it would take Butoukan some time to warm up enough for flight and even longer for the engine to warm up enough for exiting the atmosphere. “How briefly?”
“We’re covered in those things. Very briefly.”
His fingers tapping on the arm of his chair, Hamanaka was shaking his head. “I wouldn’t be able to get her off of the ground fast enough.”
Yara took a deep and heavy sigh. Yamamoto’s fingers twitched, his mouth pursing itself into a grim line. “Which is why I have to be up here. Before we power down Butoukan I have to override her safety codes and program her for immediate flight startup.”
Hamanaka’s mouth twisted. “Flying cold up through atmo?”
“If we make it that far,” Tsukada said. “If the circuits are too damaged we blow up when we restart the engine, right?”
Senga had thrown himself back into his seat and opening up various commands on his console, studying frequencies. “If we make it through atmo with a cold ship, our communications system will probably end up shot.”
Yara’s eyes were definitely closed this time. “Are all of you against this?”
“No,” Tsukada said. “It’s probably our only chance. We can do it.”
“We can,” Senga echoed, turning away from his console.
Hamanaka was already looking down at his screen, already preparing.
Yara had opened his eyes and his fingers were already flying over his console. “That’s what I thought. Senga, once I shut down the engine, you’re going to have to manually start it up and then get out of there as fast as possible. If anything is going to go wrong, it’ll go wrong in there.”
“Why me?” He knew how to manually restart an engine, but he had never done it before. Tsukada and Yamamoto would probably have been better choices . . . except -
“Because Hamanaka needs to pilot,” Yara stated, “and the rest of us are rather useless physically at this point. Use one of the emergency seats in the hall. You probably won’t be able to make it back here before we take off.”
“Right.” This would be a very bad time to throw up, he thought, but it was exactly what he wanted to do.
“Tsuka-chan -”
“I’m burying the cloaking program within the weapons system and changing what circuits it draws from - tougher ones. It won’t be the same, but it should work. We still don’t want to expose ourselves to the MornMu, do we?” Tsukada was smiling and it was tired and pained and stretched thin, but it was a genuine smile. The knots in Senga’s stomach loosened.
“Move out,” Yamamoto told Senga, standing next to his chair. “I know something about communications. I’ll see what I can do to save it.”
This close Senga could see through Yamamoto’s torn shirt and the white bandages he wore underneath it. Or mainly the bandages that were supposed to be white, but were mostly red. In his rush to treat Yara, he had barely done anything for himself. Yamamoto tapped him on his shoulder to get his attention. “Hey, we all have our duties. Move.”
“You’re pretty stupid, too,” Senga said under his breath, getting out of his seat. “As stupid as Yara and Tsuka-chan.”
“Maybe that’s way Takki picked us. We’re all stupid.”
“Hey, you two,” Yara said, “we have a show to get on the road.”
Transmission between CRUISER NEWS and TRIPLE S QUESTION
“So, we have a ship here. It looks a little lost, Yamapi.”
“You’re in a neutral territory. Lost could have quite a few meanings.”
“Lost as in lost. We’ve tried comming it a several times. All we get back is gibberish.”
“Gibberish?”
“Mm, random computer sounds. Ishigaki has been going through it to see if it’s a code, but he hasn’t come up with anything.”
“Could it be MornMu?”
“It’s not like any MornMu starship I’ve ever seen. It’s closer to our side of the boundary. I’d say it looks more like a Fleet ship than anything else, but it’s not broadcasting its signal. And, hm . . .”
“What is it?”
“The shipis tiny and, I think, high tech. Akun thinks she’s a new design.”
“Wouldn’t we have heard something?”
“You mean you, right? We really don‘t tend to hear what any of the higher ups are saying.”
“Yeah. Sorry, I was talking to myself.”
“We got it. So what’s your opinion on the matter?”
“She hasn’t made any hostile actions towards you has she?”
“I don’t think she’s even picked us up. And I mean, she’s flying well enough, but concerning everything else, something’s off.”
“So we have two choices.”
“Leave her as she is or have the NEWS come pick her up.”
“Wouldn’t that make the MornMu happy.”
“Yamapi?”
“Have Ishigaki send Massu the gibberish. Just keep her in your sights.”
CRUISER NEWS
“Could you shut up?” said Yamamoto’s voice, not sounding quite like he meant it thanks to its light tone. “You’re going to wake up Yara.”
Yara groaned and thought, too late.
“See?”
“You were the one that started it!”
Senga.
“You were the ones getting loud!”
Someone was giggling and if Yara was to take a knowledgeable guess he would bet that it was Tsukada. Clearly the rest of Butoukan‘s crew had committed themselves to their playful bickering rather than go quiet and allow Yara to fall back asleep.
Just as well. His body ached, but in the distant way that meant the medical technicians on NEWS weren’t skimping on the drugs, and his mind was fuzzy from too much sleep.
“All of you are completely useless,” he moaned and opened his eyes. NEWS‘ infirmary as an off-white, almost warm and pleasant, and his eyes adjusted quickly. He had been conscious when NEWS had picked them up, but after their escape from Yume - damn Senga and that stupid name - Yamamoto had taken to drugging him with a vengeance.
“Sorry,” Senga squeaked and then burst into a giggle.
“All of you,” he repeated, “useless.” They were the only ones in the room. Four of them stuck in beds; Tsukada was across from Yara and Yamamoto was to the right of Tsukada. Across from Tsukada was Hamanaka - the only one that hadn’t closed his eyes against the bright flashes of lithiliaum burning on Butoukan‘s hull as they had rushed upwards through Yume’s atmosphere. Vaguely he remembered Yamamoto worrying about Hamanaka’s sight.
No one seemed worried at the moment, but he took a moment to study Hamanaka and Yara felt his lips twitch upwards. “Bun-chan, you look like a bug.”
Hamanaka’s cheeks flushed red and he hunched his shoulders, half-hiding the large black lenses that covered his eyes. Sitting on Hamanaka’s bed, Senga burst out into uncontrollable giggles and leaned his head against Hamanaka‘s back.
“Senga,” Yamamoto said, “maybe you should think about sleeping for a few more hours.”
“Has he slept at all?” Yara questioned.
“It’s been two days,” Tsukada informed him. “He’s slept some.” And then in a lower tone he added, “But not much I think.”
“Tsuuuka-chan,” Senga whined, “don’t tell him that.”
“He slept with me,” Hamanaka admitted, cracking a nervous smile.
So many ways to take that and for a second Yara pondered the possibilities.
“You didn’t have bandages.” As if that was a reasonable excuse for sleeping on the small medical bed with a crew member.
Yamamoto fussed his arm pressed against his chest thanks to a sling. “It’s mostly healed,” he said with a dour look, “I don’t really even need to stay in here.”
“Exhaustion,” Tsukada said the word slowly, “that’s why you’re still here.”
“I’m not tired anymore.”
It was easy to see where this conversation was going - in fact Yara suspected that it was probably remarkably similar whatever they had been discussing before - and he interrupted. “Did I miss anything important?”
“NEWS sent Takki a message.” Tsukada pushed his covers further down his waist and sat up straighter. “And Takki sent one back for us.”
“Oh.” Yara flashed through everything that Takizawa could have said. That the higher ups in Fleet could have made him say. “Well, he can’t say anything about us blowing up the ship. That‘s the one thing we didn’t manage.”
Tsukada grinned. “He said we did a good job under the circumstances and that once Butoukan has been repaired, she’ll be listed under ‘exploratory vessel’. Under Fleet.”
“And we’re still her crew?”
“As long as we’re alive,” Yamamoto groaned. “I guess the higher ups are seriously considering taking over Yume. Giant spiders that want to eat you and produce engine-disabling powder from their skin? The best reason ever to claim a planet. And then Takki hinted about a surprise.”
Great, the sounded absolutely fantastic except in the way it was not. “A surprise?”
“No idea,” Senga chirped in, “but NEWS is dropping us back off at Enbujou.”
“We’re between hyper-jumps at the moment,” Hamanaka told him and then glanced down at Senga with his big black medically issued glasses and said, “You’re annoying.”
“That’s okay.”
The door to the infirmary slid open and Yara had a moment of wondering if they were really on NEWS because the person standing in the doorway was a member of Kisumai.
“Senga, are you okay?” As soon as his eyes landed on his fellow crew member, Nikaido was flinging himself into the room. “Takki mentioned that something happened and -”
Senga launched himself at Nikaido, wrapping his arms around his friend. “I’m fine! I missed you!”
Nikaido’s entrance had started a flood of Kisumai crew into the infirmary and before Yara could blink, all six of them were there, surrounding their seventh crew member and patting him down and hugging him as if they had to physically prove to themselves that it really was Senga.
“You’re really okay?” Miyata asked and before Senga could answer with another affirmative, Yokoo spoke up.
“Oy, Tsuka-chan, you look like someone tenderized you.”
Tsukada laughed, “Have you taken a peek at Yara?”
Fujigaya perched himself at the end of Yara’s bed and shot Yara a smile. “He’s seen. He just doesn’t want to stare in horror so he’s trying not to look.”
“Those things are huge,” Kitiyama was saying from where he had taken Senga’s place on Hamanaka’s bed.
Tamamori had found a place sitting next to Yamamoto and Yamamoto was too far in shock to say anything about it for once.
“Hey! Hey!” Koyama stood in the doorway, looking disappointedly at all of them. “I know I told you that you had to be quiet. They’re supposed to be resting.”
“They were already up,” Nikaido said defensively.
Yara waved his hand. “It’s all right, Koyama. It’s not going to kill us having them in here. Maybe.”
Koyama didn’t seem quite ready to believe Yara, but he did let it go. “ABC will be joining us before we make another hyper-jump. Thought I should let you know before . . . So another one of this won’t take you by surprise.”
“ABC and Kisumai. Do you know anything about Takki having a surprise for us?” Because Yara deeply suspected this was it.
Koyama tilted his head back and forth, gave a knowing grin. “I might have heard something about MAD and Veteran docking at Enbujou just before we arrive there.”
The rest of Butoukan‘s crew were too distracted by the rest of Senga’s Kisumai crew to pay attention to the conversation. Well, if they hadn’t overheard, he wasn’t going to spoil the surprise for them.
Except for Fujigaya, who was still perched on his bed. “Awesome,” he said, “but isn’t that . . . Well, where’s Yara’s . . .”
“You’re not being very subtle,” Yara said dryly.
“Heh.”
“There’s a rumor that Shock is heading Enbujou‘s way.” Koyama may have been a bit more than amused.
If Shock was coming, MA was without doubt right behind. Maybe Takizawa wasn’t such an ass - meant in the kindest terms. Or maybe Yara was feeling a touch more benevolent towards the man because he knew that he would likely get a front row seat for the meeting between Takizawa and Koichi.
“So,” Kitiyama was saying, “how was Butoukan? That’s her name right?”
“I like her,” Senga said and paused. Yara watched as he glanced around the room, eyes falling upon every Butoukan member. Having retrieved a deck of cards somewhere, Tamamori was convincing Yamamoto to play a game with him. Kitiyama was moving his hands back and forth in front of Hamanaka‘s glasses, attempting to determine how much he could see with more than a little glee. And Tsukada and Yokoo were engaged in a deep conversation, heads together and ignoring everything else.
“She’s not Kisumai,” Senga laughed, “but that’s okay. She isn’t supposed to be.”
Which was exactly how it was supposed to be. Yara leaned back against his pillows and allowed Fujigaya to regale him with tales of ‘Stupid Things Senga Has Said’.
For the moment they were going home - to their own ships, the people they had been with for years. That was comfort in knowing. And while they were home, Butoukan would wait.
And that was an entirely different sort of comfort.