Gijo passes literal fucking Mary wearing a uniform in the corridor (unclear which but more likely the assassin had military training),
passes a door with the sound of sobbing, another the sound of fucking.
Two
more pass talking about the history of the engine
control scheme. "But I really don't know any more than that.
Apparently nobody does except maybe the captain."
Other - "I bet the engineer knows."
First - "Mm. Probably."
Gijo
looks after as they pass. Down the hall two people make out
desperately in tears, he tears off her top, lifts her skirt and spins
her to the wall before the act. She shakes iit off and enters the
pilot's grid.
The inside of a large sphere, actively mapping every
direction around the ship in coalescence of all incoming data, with
primary cannon control from a chair set in the center.
She relieves the secondary with a smile (the guy from bed).
Second - "After system check ?"
Gijo
- Smiles back, "How about when the mission's done." She sits and runs
through the sign in checks as he walks away a bit more frustrated than
seems natural.
The
main cannons set on ether side of the hull, wing protected, responding
to check before settling back in. Stabilizers fire their rounds about
the surface, turning it here and there a bit in its slipstream before
stabilizing.
________________
The XO and Engineer lean over he
monitors checking engine status to decimals, the two lovers (crew)
glance at each other from the far sides of the view as the Gunner enters
the deck.
Gunner - "How does it look ?"
Engineer - "Absolutely perfect."
The
male crew smiles at the female from across the room, she smiles looking
down to her data-pad, a glance to the side as he looks at his.
Gunner - "Hm." Starts flipping switches on another monitor.
Engineer - "Excuse me ?"
Gunner
- "The gunnery swivel rotors seem a bit shy. I'm adapting what's left
for the fewer required. Just from their own main draw's pool." A last
flip of a switch and a smile as she turns away. "It'll effect no
outside system's 'perfection'."
Door slides behind her.
Engineer - "I swear to God it's like she's got the run of the ship now."
XO - "So you know."
Engineer - "Do now." Smiles into the monitor. "But the gunnery adjustment checks out. No effect on the overall systems ... "
XO
- "Hm." He watches the two crew exit opposite sides of the room, now
empty but for them. "So what do you think about our quarry ?"
Engineer
- "Well ... our Pilot's right. They don't act without reason. It's
just ... why would any reason or plan it could have even matter now ?"
XO - A last stab for whomever's to rule the aftermath I'd imagine."
Engineer - "Good guess, it would tell us something about who dispatches them."
XO - "And the ship ?"
Engineer
- "Well. If it has Gijo's healing systems strapped to something called
'The Archive', we'd better hope that plan's got nothing to do with us."
XO - "He'd have to know we were ordered after it, the date on the file's got to be a hundred year's older than 'im."
Engineer
- "Maybe. But they say they act intuitively. Called Hecate's
Operators because they never do make sense until the end. And then it all makes sense."
Captain - On comm, "Congratulations gentlemen. You just declassified the ship. Mind turning the ship wide off ?"
____________
Aboard the station in the office of Science and Technology ~
Technology - "I'm getting strange readings from the nova wave." Then distracted by the view from the window.
Technology - "That's useful. Care to elaborate ?"
Science - "It is. Care to look out the window once in a while ?"
Technology - "What the fuck is that supposed to ... "
Out the port, the nova wave appears to be projecting a flickering image of the Earth in an electrical storm spanning the cloud.
Technology - "What the ... fuck ... "
Science - "It is becoming a black hole ... it's ... a projection."
Technology - Walking to the window, "The holographic principle ... holy shit. You
were right. I owe you five useless dollars. It'll kill us all ... "
They take each others' hand.
...
Science - "Wanna fuck into oblivion ?"
Technology - "Since the day I was born."____________
Captain - "But to what purpose !?"
Engineer - " 'Trained by the fates ... to know what to do. Not why, but what. He may not even know why he's doing it."
_____________
A view walking the halls, clearly inhuman and passing unseen. It
snarls unheard past the lovers making, their image glowing too bright,
its pausing bringing argument in the rest.
____________
The Gunner enters the pilot's sphere, two seats back to back, Gijo at hers.
Gijo - As the Gunner sits and taps in, "So I heard you've been complaining to the Captain about me again."
Gunner - "He told you ?"
Gijo - Smiles jacking in, "No".
Gunner - "Well he did tell me you've been complaining about my accuracy. I fixed the weapon servos."
Gijo - "Well done. You know. We really do need to learn to get along."
Gunner - "Do we."
Gijo
- "We really really do. There are no replacements. After the mission
everyone extra goes to the Excalibur with the last of the ruling class
we carry, and I Know how much the Captain loves this ship."
Gunner - "Do you."
Gijo - "I do. Which means he'll keep the best here, which means you and me. Even with your recent ... scores."
Gunner - "My scores."
Gijo - "Yes. They're very recently quite down, I hope correcting the servos corrects the ... "
Gunner - "You seem very bot-like today. You're usually more ...well, stupid sounding."
Gijo - "Huh. Do go on."
Gunner - "I like you better this way."
...
Gijo - "So you don't think the fact that you're banging the Captain's got anything to do with your shit scores."
Gunner - "There it is. While you 'bang' the entire damn crew. Sure you didn't come off the absolute whore line ? Renegade sex-bot ?" Faux sympathetic, "Did they make you wear a 'Hello Kitty t-shirt when you were growing up ... ?"
Gijo - "Whoa."
Gunner - "I mean are you programed to be a slut or do you actually choose to be a blue light special ?"
Gijo - "Oooookay we are having a conversation."
Gunner - Pulls he cords, "We're having a Hell of a lot more than that, you Pocket. Fucking. Pussy."
Gijo - "Ah." Pulls the cords and gets up. "Take your swing you, biological fucking can of bitch sauce."
It swallows them whole, then pauses with a twitch and a bit of indigestion, then begins expelling damage in convulsive waves from the tips of its wings to tail.
A
hard jerk and its own blood pours from its propulsive pores before the
whole beast pops, Centaur intact with guns smoking. More from the pack turn to look from the pack chewing on the
nearby asteroids.
On Centaur's comm while they watch the larvae leap from the asteroids on the view,
the Operator's voice rattles - "This is why I brought you here."
While on the Centaur bridge the nav stations become active, now acting as gunnery, navigation to pilot direct.
The spherical projections surrounding them become active with data for guiding shots and active feed back from the pilot, showing the commands as opposed to the ship's response for that extra bit of prediction as they open fire.
The cannoneers work their three layered gunwale corridors, popping shots as Centaur glides into parallel, blowing back an intended attack.
The many smaller guns above and below dissuading where they can, large central two under Gijo's control only aim with the nose but finish them when they can.
Walking down the station halls to pass one another, past others completely desolate at the end of the world. Two scientists pause in their walk to stare.
1 - "We're all going to die and I've got nothing to lose. I'm completely in love with you. I always was."
2 - "Oh thank God."
They kiss into the madness, then two more in the halls ~
1 - "I fucking hate you. So fucking much." Flicks his forehead.
2 - Knocks her hand away, "Yeah well if I gotta Fucking Die ... "
...
They stare.
...
1 - "I'm glad you're going with me."
...
They kiss into madness.~ (3:02) There's really no helping them, as seen through the revolving windows.
In hissing terror they flee a looming shadow over distant sun's light. A
grown K'Terlu crunches through the stones like a whale through a
school, tentacles snapping to speed of light like whips to sound cracking, to cast its eggs into distant places.
Or at future competition, the broken whelp eaten as it passes, the K'Terlu expels to propel then stops at the Centaur. One eye the size of a world looking down at the ship whose engines struggle against its gravitation.
It breathes enough gas over them like smoke to
carry the sound which booms echoing through the hull ~ "K'Terlu."
And carries on after the fleeing whelps, trailing the same gasses as propulsion, tentacle whipping one aside to grab another, the screams heard as it breathes over it before eating.
________
________________
~ INTERMISSION ~
________________
________
Notes ~ when a whelp grows to adulthood the core abdomen fills the hanging flesh of its wings, while their peaks extend to tentacles and begin producing eggs, whipping the fallopian tentacles to work the eggs through, sometimes defensively like city sized bullet.
(egg)
.jpg)
(hatches when it drifts close enough to a heat source)