Admiral’s Personal Log: 1 May 2286; Xanthe Council Reckoning, 92-Gamma, QQ-87.

I’ve never felt comfortable on the Earth—I was always a bit ‘itchy’ here, ever since I looked up from my mother’s apartment balcony in Vancouver at the night sky. Dim and distant as the stars were because of all the light pollution, I just wanted to be *out* there.

Until now. Over the past month, Commander Avedra and I have, well, deepened our relationship. I have shown countless aliens around the Earth in a diplomatic capacity before, been to more functions and ceremonies than I can count. But it’s different at this level of intimacy, I’ve found. Suddenly I find myself in museums, parks, galleries, scenic overlooks, and I realise I’ve come to know them for the first time. Being in love with Avedra has revealed Earth to me through *her* eyes.

We’ve known each other for years, since before I was an Admiral. We’ve been in love for a month now. But I have never been more grateful to her. As to the rest of the UNS Odyssey crew, I have it on good authority that they’re having the time of their lives. Though most of them don’t realise it, after our strange visit to the Hourglass Nebula, they truly deserve it.

***

New York City

Tomoko Langley was hunched over a bar that sat along the 42^nd Street Canal. Even as a parade of noisy and colourful skiffs and gondolas sailed past on the broad waterway, limned by deathless neon and holographic projections of a million advertisements in languages human and non, she had eyes only for her cocktail, a blue drink served up with a purple fruit garnishing it. She’d forgotten what it was called.

She wanted the bartender to surprise her. Somehow, it didn’t land.

The bar itself was a din of conversation. Humans, Vorii, Felsian, and even a few Xanthe who probably thought they were ‘slumming it’ carried on a prismatic series of chats. But two voices stood out above the din and she groaned.

“I got her signal riiiiight… here!” said a rather intrepid looking, dark-skinned woman in a UN Fleet uniform with the green piping of the UN Corps of Engineers. The left side of her head was shaven, the rest dominated by a perfect cascade of dark curls.

“Yes! Mission accomplished, Commander Skye!” chimed a distinctly Ukrainian accent that could only be the helmswoman, Lieutenant Legasova.

“You owe me a drink. Conveniently, we’re at just the right place for it…” Skye said with her Irish brogue as she and Legasova took their seats on either side of their doctor.

“Whatever you two are up to,” Tomoko growled, “The answers are no, no, not on your life, and fuck off. If you die while fucking off, I’ll heal you up when I’m back on duty.”

“Calm down Tomoko, I can sense when you’re sad from a continent away,” Skye said. Her first name was Nexia—an affectation of parents who wanted to eschew traditional names—but everyone addressed her by her surname, as was her preference.

“That’s exactly what happened too, we were tromping around County Cork when Skye said something about her ‘Tomoko Senses’ tingling and set up the tele-portal to get us to the Big Apple.”

“No one calls it the Big Apple, I keep telling you. Also, yes, I’m sad, and I prefer to be sad alone.”

Skye frowned and leaned in. “I just wanted to say, I know you were at UNHQ today. And… if you were there, I know you were in the Peace Garden… and I know what that does to you. You’re not alone, Tomoko.”

“Well, what if I want to be?” she looked up with glistening eyes. “I… I’m sorry, none of this is worthy of me, and our colleagueship doesn’t give me the right to tell you to fuck off and die. I also retroactively apologise for all the times I threatened to airlock one or both of you.”

“Water under the canal bridge, Tomoko. Me and Olha can eff off, but, you know, take care of yourself. We only have one of you and breaking in a new CMO on the Odyssey is dashed difficult,” Skye said.

Tomoko stared into her drink and suddenly downed a good quarter of the cocktail glass. “I’ll keep that in mind…” Tomoko sighed and squeezed her eyes shut. On one of her good days, she’d be calmly soothing some junior officer, frightened of what he saw in a wormhole, extolling the merits of UN Fleet Counselling, and how mental health was every bit as important as physical health. She’d sit on her stool, immaculate in her white and grey uniform, and her slightly anachronistic lab coat; an Admiral of the physical body. Now look at her. “Look, when we were at Hourglass, I saw some things. Did some things. And I’m not going to tell you what it is because I can’t. But I’m just… catching some feelings about the aftermath. Admiral Chase and Commander Avedra are going to get married, and I’m just… here alone, with my drink. You know?”

“Are you not pleased for them?” Legasova asked.

“Are you kidding? I’m ecstatic they finally gave into it. Those two had more chemistry than a pharma-factory. You know the ensigns called them ‘Chavedra’? Some of the artsy ones even drew fanart.”

“Oh… my gods,” Skye laughed. “Are you serious? How did I never find out about this?”

“A good doctor is like a bartender. You just seduce people into giving up all their secrets while you give them their medicine,” Tomoko said with a languid smirk.

“Whoa,” Legasova said, eyes widening behind her glasses. “I have connections with the ensigns, how come I never heard about this? Am I not cool?”

“You work on the bridge, so, by definition, no. I, on the other hand, am like a confessor. Except by ‘confess’ I mean ‘show me the weird STD you got from shoving your genitals into a space slug.’ At that point there are no secrets left to shame anyone.”

Skye’s eyes widened. “…Please tell me you made that up.”

And for the first time that night Tomoko grinned.

***

United Nations Peace Garden

Meta-Secretary Sophie de Montchalin frowned as she looked at the ostentatious pile of flowers that had been stacked up underneath The Knotted Gun statue and the note that always accompanied them, almost every year without fail, except when Langley was on a long-term mission aboard the Odyssey.

‘Je me souviens.’

I remember.

De Montchalin was probably never going to forgive herself for being the architect of the mission that had gotten Tomoko Langley’s husband killed by a comet. You didn’t work at UNHQ and not gain a stack of regrets tall enough to build the next space elevator. It came with the job.

“Ma’am, your shuttle is ready,” said a masculine voice from behind her.

De Montchalin straightened the brooch in her lapel—a small model of the first hyperspace-capable starship humanity had ever built—and flicked a bit of pollen off the low-cut white silk shell she wore beneath her black and blue suit. Like a bruise, she thought. “Let’s head to KSY,” she said finally, with a sigh, before following the man to the shuttle port floating above the seawall that hemmed in the East River.

***

Kyoto Spacedock and Yards

“You’ve never had sushi?” Admiral Alexandra Chase asked with a melodious laugh. “How, in all this time? You’ve been coming to Earth for, what, fifteen years now?”

Avedra walked alongside her beloved admiral, each of them now dressed smartly in their blue uniforms—Alexandra’s with gold piping and white trim, her own with just a bit of red. “Because I’d often go to New York, and invariably a human crewmate would say ‘you have got to try the pizza,’ and before I could say no, I was roped into eating yet more pizza. Hardly a terrible fate,” she said with one of her winning grins.

They paced along the outermost ring of the Kyoto Spacedock and Yards, or KSY as virtually everyone called it. The multi-storey-tall viewports afforded an unparalleled view of the Earth below, seemingly motionless. The station was locked in a geostationary orbit above the city that lent it its name.

“Alright, that’s it. Last stop on Alex Chase’s Whirlwind Tour of Human Culture is… Fumiko’s Bullet Train Sushi! Deck 43. Come on!” Alexandra laughed as she took her Amazonian companion by the hand and led her with schoolgirlish delight to the turbolifts. For the first time in a long time, she didn’t care if she was recognised, even here among this nexus of UN Fleet personnel, their ships bristling from the circumference of the station like stately spores.

***

“Okay, I have to admit this is really fun,” Avedra said firmly as she plucked another plate of nigiri off the conveyor belt, and the maglev-shaped trays that the belt delivered it on. “It’s like bitsized fish, but raw. And delivered to you on a train, what’s not to love?”

“See?” Alexandra said with delight, “Human culture in travel-sized form.”

“I’m going to associate sushi with you forever, you know,” Avedra said with that megawatt grin of hers, baring the incisive fangs that Vorii were known for—and that Alexandra had gotten to know very well.

“That’ll be my legacy. Admiral Alexandra Chase, Associated With Sushi,” she said as she swept her hand out before her.

“I’ve had a lot of fun on this trip, Alex, you know that, yes?”

“Well, thank you. But I was helped along by a goddess nebula and the fact that I got to propose to you in a rotating restaurant atop a perfectly preserved 20^th Century telecom tower.”

“The CN Tower was indeed a delight. But it was you I needed. …Alex, I wanted to ask, we’ve moved so quickly, and you know I’m ready to bend the regs when we need to but… maybe we should talk about how this affects us aboard the Odyssey. And if, well, one of us needs to transfer… not that I want it to come to that! I just… wanted to clear the air…” she said as she put her left hand on Alexandra’s, their engagement rings mingling.

Alexandra sighed heavily and took a shot of her hot sake. “I thought about it. I’m not a fool, I know I need to be able to order you to your death if I need to. And you need to leave me to die if it saves the ship. But that’s the job, Avedra. It’s what we do. And we’re going to have the best people around us to check us if we’re not perfectly clear-eyed about what we’re doing.”

Avedra smiled and leaned in to kiss Alexandra softly.

The sushi bar was open to the station deck, and a crowd milled past in multiple directions just a couple of metres behind them. A few took a picture of the famous couple.

“That brings me to my next question: is Doctor Langley… Tomoko going to be alright? She seemed a bit shaken up after Hourglass,” Avedra said quietly, changing the subject and stuffing her dark green lips with some ebi nigiri. She ate the chitinous tail like nothing.

“I feel a bit bad about that. I meant to check in on her more. In-person, I mean. I kept sending texts and she said she was fine. I know she’s not, but she needs to be left alone. If you hover over her, she’ll just lash out. And I know she’s thinking about Jack…” Alexandra frowned and poured herself and Avedra another cup of sake.

“That reminds me,” Avedra said as she pulled out her datapad—a palm sized piece of glass that came to life with holographic images as she tapped it. “Our next mission briefing was being led by someone whose name struck me as very familiar, but I couldn’t place it…” She then held up her pad to Alexandra. It displayed the image of a middle aged, fair-skinned human woman with dark rimmed spectacles and chestnut hair to match her eyes; she looked like a nerdy girl with planet-controlling energy.

“Ah, Mademoiselle de Montchalin, what about her? …Oh shit.”

Avedra’s eyes widened. “What’s wrong?”

“What’s wrong is that Tomoko is going to start stabbing people left right and centre if they’re in the same room together without any forewarning… Arigatou gozaimasu!” Alexandra called out to the chefs before she quickly dashed off with Avedra, thanking whatever powers existed in the universe that paying for necessities like food was a thing of Earth’s distant past.

***

Hong Kong, 1969

Sophie de Montchalin shielded herself from the monsoon rains, the air impossibly warm despite the torrent. It all meant that she felt comfortable in the rain despite the sleeveless, short dress she wore. Her hair was twisted up into a style that fit this period of human history, and she kept her datapad in a fashionable purse that—in her little story here—had been given to her by her cheating husband, whose ceaseless business trips to Japan and America were really a cover for his affairs. Unbeknownst to him, of course, she was seeing a dashing young gamine reporter who’d moved into the tiny apartment next door.

None of that mattered now, however. The story was on pause, the computer would do nothing to advance it. Instead, she was meeting someone else here. It seemed a seemly setting for what she had to say to her.

A yellow and red taxi grunted past, one of the smoky groundcars of the age, aesthetic in its own way. And in the wake of its smoke suddenly appeared a pair of durasteel doors that slid open to reveal a deeply nonplussed looking Tomoko Langley, who seemed even more annoyed by the rain.

De Montchalin opened her umbrella and walked over to her. “Sorry about the monsoon.”

“You can shove that umbrella and your LARP so far up your ass that you’ll be burping cosplay for the rest of your life.”

The Meta-Secretary frowned. Some part of her was genuinely hurt by that. But the rest of her knew she deserved it. She stood alone beneath the umbrella while Tomoko dashed over to the awning that de Montchalin had hidden under moments earlier.

“You’re extremely lucky that Admiral Chase warned me that you were going to lead the Odyssey’s next mission briefing.”

“It’s why I wanted to chat.” Her elegant Louboutin heels clicked on the cobblestone pavement, Kowloon apartments crowding in around them, limning flickering incandescent light that seemed to catch every raindrop. “I know there’s no amount of apology that can bring him back, Doctor Langley. And I know if I told you that I live with this every day of my life that it wouldn’t matter a damn to you. But I am sorry, Tomoko. And I do live with it. I just… hope you and I can work together, as professionals, for the good of the United Nations.”

Tomoko leaned against the wall. Two metres from de Montchalin and yet impossibly far from her. She folded her arms and propped one foot against the façade. “If you want me to not murder you ritualistically in the briefing room, we have a deal. If you want us to be best friends, no. Absolutely not. …What even is this, anyway? Why are we here?” She looked around for any markers of time and place. Chinese and English signage. De Montchalin’s dress. “We’re in… southeastern China. Late 20^th Century?”

“Close enough. Hong Kong, in the late 1960s. A time of great upheaval and unrivalled passions.”

Tomoko almost, almost cracked a smile it seemed. “These VR Suites really were made for someone like you, huh? Every time I try to go into one I… just can’t think of anything to do. You know, aside from the cliches. A nice tropical beach, that sort of thing. Doesn’t answer my question, though. Why here?”

“I… wanted to talk to you somewhere I could be vulnerable. Someplace I’d look like just some cosplaying dork rather than the monster of UNHQ, leering from her office in the Secretariat.”

“I’d say you were a manipulative little shit, but then you did just tell me your evil plan, so I guess I have one up on you.”

“Friendship isn’t easy to come by in this job. And I won’t insult you by asking for yours. But I just… I just want you to see me as something more than… what you think I am.”

Tomoko sighed heavily, “Ah, Meta-Secretary I… look, let me give you a free piece of advice. All my bluster and threats are just that. Because I like not being in a UN Fleet Rehabilitation Centre being taught for the next ten years about how murderous violence actually isn’t the path to peace. I’m not really going to hurt you. And here’s some more free advice. Stop caring what other people think about you. I hate you? So fucking what? You’re a Meta-Secretary. One of the Secretary General’s spooky flying monkeys who pulls strings no one knew even existed. You’re on KSY giving a mission briefing to the command crew of the UN’s flagship. You don’t need my approval. You don’t even need my forgiveness.”

“I just…”

“Sophie!” called out a familiar voice. It couldn’t be… A dapper young woman in a perfectly fitting grey suit and tie dashed through the sheets of rain, her slick short hair matted around her skull from the crushing rainwater.

“Shufen?” de Montchalin said with a panicked expression on her face.

“Who’s this drink of water?” Tomoko said languidly, clearly not realising that de Montchalin thought she’d stopped the narrative programme.

Shufen Leung, intrepid reporter and connoisseur of men’s suits, wasn’t supposed to be here.

“Sophie, who’s this?” Shufen asked as she pulled out her silken pocket square and ineffectually wiped down the damp sleeves of her heather grey blazer.

“Uhhh… Computer: pause narrative programme Sophie’s In the Mood For Love?” she squinted her eyes shut and blushed.

“…Seriously? That’s what you called this?” Tomoko asked.

A negatory squawk sounded from the sky. “UNABLE TO COMPLY: VR Suite is experiencing Error 200-X-9A. Stand by.”

Tomoko’s eyebrows shot up. “Wait a minute. That means that main power’s been disrupted and the computer’s struggling to resync all the data.”

“How do you know that?” Sophie asked.

“I’m a CMO, you get to learn all the VR Suite malfunction codes by heart, trust me.”

***

Solar flares were supposed to be predicted weeks in advance. This one was supposed to drift safely away from Earth’s orbit, yet some exotic lash was drawn to KSY, knocking out several key systems for minutes at a time before backup power kicked in.

Chief Engineer Skye was bent over the control panel for VR Suite 69. “This is going to take me a minute, Admiral.”

Alexandra rubbed the bridge of her nose. “Literally or figuratively?”

“Well, you know, multiply everything I say by a factor of ten or twenty and you’ll be in the ballpark. Add another ten for good luck.” The VR Suite owners were working on a fix for the power grid that fed the suites, meanwhile, but plenty of other engineers had been seconded to tend to other parts of the station. Thus, Skye was functionally on her own here.

Avedra pecked at her pad, “And both Tomoko and the Meta-Secretary are stuck in there in the meantime? Isn’t there an emergency override?”

Skye snorted, “For the purposes of inspection, yes. For the real world, ehhhh, you take your chances. You think I tell you about every VR Suite malfunction on the Odyssey?”

“…Wait, how many times has it malfunctioned?”

“Oh, forget I said anything, Admiral! Could you hand me the sonic wrench?”

***

“So, how do you know Sophie?” Shufen said as she lit a cigarette for herself, offering one to Tomoko.

“Sweet, deathsticks. Don’t mind if I do.” Tomoko took a cigarette between her lips and inhaled deep when Shufen lit her up.

“WARNING: Safety protocols have been disengaged. The UN Surgeon Major warns all sapient lifeforms that smoking tobacco products is unsafe and has long been proven to be a pulmonary health hazard.”

“There’s that weird voice again!” Shufen said.

“Yeah it does that, kid… wait. Safety protocols disengaged?”

“This is very bad…” Sophie said as she pecked at her pad. “Huge power outages all over KSY. Some stray solar flare.”

“Sophie, why are you speaking like this? I know we live a bit of a strange life, but you have to admit, this is all starting to seem a bit much…”

Tomoko looked into Sophie’s eyes as she looked up helplessly between her and Shufen. “Meta-Sec… Sophie. Talk to her. For now, she’s real.”

Sophie swallowed thickly and looked at Shufen. “My love, something strange is going on and you’ll need to trust me. Terrible forces have been awakened in Hong Kong…”

“You mean besides the riots and the flu?” Shufen said with an unsurprising roguishness, like gallows humour came easily to her. “Dare I ask what’s worse, love? I know you’ve always had a hidden life. We’ve just never talked about it.”

“It’s… coming back to haunt me, Shufen. I’m sorry. I didn’t want it to be this way.”

Shufen stepped out into the rain to meet Sophie, staring straight into her eyes in a way that made her go limp, letting the umbrella fall to her side as her holographic lover drew in close. “We’ll face it together, Sophie. Ma Cherie.” And she drew the Meta-Secretary in for a kiss.

Tomoko pantomimed gagging as they did so.

***

“Okay, now just give me the transphasic pliers and the nuclear screwdriver and I think we’re in business…” Skye said. In another moment, once she got the proffered tools she flipped a switch in the guts of the machine and stood back up to look at the display screen.

The computer’s voice chirped up, “Welcome to the KSY VR Suite: holographic mania, and fun for the whole family! …Ksssht… Now deploying Vorii Ritual Combat Programme, circa 1969.”

“…Skye, that does not sound good in the slightest,” Alexandra said. “Avedra, wasn’t the mid-20^th Century a bit of a tempestuous moment in Vorii history?”

Avedra bared her teeth in a grimace. “Yeeeeeah this is not going to be a good time.”

“Ritual combat? Are they going to get hurt? I still can’t get the safeties back online!” Skye asked.

“It’s… a euphemism. Whereas humans killed each other for sport during antiquity, in our early spaceflight years, the Mandate of the Northern Continents did… something else… in public… for sport.”

“You don’t mean…?”

***

Suddenly Hong Kong disappeared in favour of a vast arena, of seemingly similar tech-level, but peopled entirely by a sea of green faces.

“I’m going to go out on a limb here and say the malfunction’s getting worse,” Tomoko said urgently.

“What ‘malfunction’ what are you talking about?!” Shufen yelled, “Who are you? And what are you doing with Sophie?” She seemed to need someone to direct her rage and uncertainty at.

“Kid… Shufen…” Tomoko put on her best doctor voice and held up surrendering hands. “I’m not doing anything and I’m… an acquaintance of Sophie’s. I came to the V… to Hong Kong to work something out with her. Some stuff from our past. Then all this started happening.”

“What’s ‘this’ then? Where are we?”

“LADIES AND GENTLEBEINGS! Tonight, we have a very special presentation for you! Three exotic aliens from *PLANET NOT FOUND* called %SPECIES are here to seduce one another for your entertainment. You’ve thrilled to the Astral Twins, melted to the dances of the Sun Sisters, and now get ready for the seductive, unrelenting power of unrequited love across impossible distances, it’s SOPHIE IS IN THE MOOD FOR LOVE!”

“This is like a really bad nightmare,” Sophie said as she blushed bright red. She knew the cheering Vorii weren’t real but the whole point of the VR Suite was to trick you into thinking it was.

“Oh you ain’t seen nothing yet. … Wait a minute. Oh no. No no no no no. I refuse!” Tomoko said as she marched across the arena to hurl invective at the announcer who sat next to the ostentatious booth of someone who could only be the Verdant Queen of the Northern Continents. But she didn’t give a damn. “I am not sleeping with either of them for your enjoyment!”

Gasps went up around the crowd of thousands.

“Ladies and gentlebeings, it seems one of the %SPECIES is refusing to participate! Surely she knows that denying the Verdant Empress her Trial by Ahamaron is a crime punishable by exile to the Chain of Ice!”

“I got your Chain of Ice right here, She-Hulk…!”

“TOMOKO!” Sophie said urgently, putting her hand on her shoulder.

“You cannot possibly mean to say that you want to go through with this!”

“The safeties are off, we don’t know what’ll happen. It’s… it’s safest this way. And I don’t want you to get hurt, understand?” Sophie sighed. “Look. I won’t tell anyone. Except Shufen of course…” she said as Shufen approached, hands in her pockets, clearly trying to keep it all together. It only made those bewitching brown eyes even more intense.

“The green women. They want us to be intimate?” Shufen asked, just loud enough to be heard over the burr of the crowd.

“Yeah, it’s pretty gross actually,” Tomoko said, “But I’m human, so I really don’t have a right to judge.”

“Sophie,” Shufen said softly. “I have loved you since the day I saw you move into Mrs. Chan’s apartment. I know we’ve already made love a few times but… my true feelings remain unspoken upon your skin…”

“What? How long have you been running this narrative programme?” Tomoko interjected.

“SHH!”

Shufen continued. “If it’ll save our lives here and now, well, maybe this isn’t how we planned it. I know we wanted to be better than your husband but. I think fate will forgive us. We don’t know if memories are all we’ll have left of each other. Let’s make the memories that belong to these strange days the best we’ll ever know…” The tender kiss that followed caused the crowd to jump up and cheer.

“Alright, ladies and gentlebeings, we’ve got contact! But will the irascible third party member find a way into this tryst, or will she be exiled to the CHAINS OF ICE?”

Tomoko was about to swear at the announcer before Shufen gripped her shoulder. …Holy shit, her eyes. Even Tomoko had to admit they were melt-worthy.

“Tomoko, yes? Do you speak Japanese?” she asked in the language.

“Enough to get by,” she said flawlessly, suddenly grateful for her Montrealer mother’s endless lessons in her youth.

“Whatever history has passed between you and Sophie, you must use it. We will make love. All of us. Here, in front of these green people. But it’s clear that they will only be swayed by true, smouldering passion. I’ve sensed your anger at my love. In any other circumstance I’d take a swing at you. But we’re bonded now, the three of us. And in that anger I sense a tool that will delight the woman I love in places she does not yet know she has. Give her what she needs. Or so help me, I will end you when we get back to Hong Kong.”

Shufen stepped back and peeled off her blazer, her white collared shirt beneath soaking wet from the monsoon, and undoing her grey striped necktie to the cheers of the audience. She unbuttoned her shirt slowly, revealing her small, bare breasts beneath as she fixed her gaze on each woman in turn.

“After what looks like a pep talk from the grey one to the angry one, I think we’re back in business folks! Sophie’s In the Mood For Love is way behind on points so far, but judging by this strip tease from %NAME I think they’re in with a shot, folks, what do you think!?”

The cheers were somehow getting easier to ignore—Tomoko was certainly getting better at drowning them out, at any rate. But as she shed her lab coat the cheers grew louder still.

Okay, that was the most validating thing that had happened since she arrived for shore leave, admittedly. She undid her silver collar and began to peel open the jacket of her uniform. “Sophie, I want you to enjoy what I’m about to do to you because we are never going to speak of it again…” she said with a shuddering breath. Tomoko didn’t quite believe her own words. She tugged open her jacket with a sharp yank, its snaps popping open, and shrugged it off, revealing herself to be wearing a simple but brief cream coloured bra with a thin lace trim at the cups. She peeled off her pants, revealing black and pink boyshorts before shaking her ass at the Empress’ dais and tossing her trousers up to it.

The crowd was ecstatic.

“The judges are giving style points for this, ladies and gentlebeings!” the announcer said breathlessly. “Come on, angry lady, use that anger for something good!”

“Sophie, I’m going to say this exactly once,” Tomoko said with the most smouldering voice she could muster, “Lose the dress.”

***

“So, you’re telling me…” Alexandra said fretfully, “That all we’ve accomplished is changing the scenario, but nothing else?”

“Look, these people have hotwired this whole rig to do things that are massively illegal in UN space. Imagine trying to fix a machine where the laws of physics were backwards and written in Caesarean Cipher. That’s what I’m dealing with. I can fix it, it’s just tedious as hell and I have to think upside down,” Skye said with a grunt, “I need another few minutes. Even if we get full power back online I’m still going to need to manually summon a gate for them to exit. Which reminds me, Commander, I’m going to need you to write up some basic code for a gate override. It’ll make this go faster if we do this all at once.”

“Avedra, not to split your attention but… what happens if the Trial by Ahamaron is not completed?” Alexandra asked.

“In those days the punishment was exile to the Chain of Ice, a polar archipelago known for a vast population of Sno-Cats and little else. You’d work at a research station or a hydroponic farm.”

“Sno-Cats aren’t the most ferocious creatures, as I recall.”

“Nope. They’re quite cuddly actually. Little snowballs.”

“The Chains of Ice don’t sound so terrible, actually…”

“In a delightful irony, those who refused to partake in Trial by Ahamaron often ended up falling in love with one another on their exile assignments. Rebellion is a powerful aphrodisiac.”

Despite her nervousness, Alexandra laughed.

***

Sophie de Montchalin was a gangly woman who turned her every angle into an asset with how she dressed. Thus, her powder blue dress was perfectly flattering, and she knew how to bend and turn as she unzipped it to send the crowd into a frenzy.

Underneath she wore period-appropriate lingerie; a white lace bra with thick straps and conical, almost bullet-like cups, and high-cut white satin panties with scalloped lace. A garter belt hooked into nude stockings that disappeared into high heeled pumps that matched her dress.

She stood primly, as the Meta-Secretary she was, spine straight and staring into Tomoko’s eyes. Suddenly she was staring at the ceiling as Tomoko pounced on her and set about conquering her like an infamous general.

Their lips locked with a ferocity that shocked the both of them. Sophie clawed Tomoko’s back until she drew blood, after which the doctor pinned Sophie’s wrists into the sandy floor of the arena and bit forcefully on her lower lip, pulling it away with her as she broke the kiss, drawing blood from that prim face.

“Hit me,” Sophie breathed.

“What?”

“Hit me!”

Suddenly, Shufen, naked as the day she was born, knelt next to the two women and grabbed Tomoko by her dark, curly hair. “My Sophie wants you to hit her. So. You’re going to do it, Tomoko. Look into my eyes.”

She did. And damn it all, she understood what Sophie saw in this girl.

“You’re going to do what she says,” Shufen said firmly, as much with those eyes as with her lips.

Tomoko looked back at the pleading political executive and slapped her so hard across the face that her glasses were knocked away and her hair shaken from its up-do.

“Yes! Just like that! Punish me, Tomoko!”

Another loud slap across the other cheek, followed by an aggressive bite on her neck. She’d leave marks, draw blood, give her what she deserved. She’d put Sophie de Montchalin in her place. “Oh you smug bitch, how I’ve longed to do that…”

“Yes, yes, I’m a smug bitch, what else!?” she mewled as she writhed beneath Tomoko.

Shufen, meanwhile, set about pleasing Tomoko from behind, peeling the shorts down and then just ripping them from her body. The dexterity of the gamine’s fingers was more than a revelation.

“Fully functional indeed…” Tomoko muttered approvingly to herself as she began to grind on the fingers.

The crowd became easier than ever to ignore as their constant, wild cheering dissolved into white noise. It created the strangest aura of intimacy for what was happening between the three of them.

“You’re a repressed nerd who wants to be a whore…” Tomoko whispered in Sophie’s ear.

The crowd obviously couldn’t hear, but the low-resolution jumbotron showed the whisper in close-up, and Sophie’s orgasmic reaction clearly conveyed something to the crowd.

“Ladies and gentlebeings we have our first orgasm on the board!” the announcer said as a horn sounded.

That’s going to get *really* annoying, Tomoko thought. “You’re a whore who trades in her suits for these mini-skirted dresses from our savage past because you need to be bent over and taken by someone who just uses you. And now I’m using you…” She clawed into the cup of Sophie’s bra, seizing her small breast with a mighty clenching of her fist. Sophie’s back arched so sharply she lifted both Tomoko and Shufen off the ground. “Nnh… Me, the one who got away, who doesn’t snap to attention when you call, who disrespects you, who spits on you…” For emphasis she spat on the woman’s beautifully smooth cheek, still red from the slap. “That’s me… I’m taking you like a penny-whore of old…” Tomoko pressed her fingers into Sophie’s womanhood. One, two, then three. Just like Shufen was doing to her own increasingly well-used pussy.

“Yes… yes, I want to be a whore for you, Tomoko. Are you going to bend me over my desk at the UN?”

“I’m going to make your personal assistant watch. I’m going to make you say ‘I’m Sophie de Montchalin, United Nations aristocracy, and I love getting turned inside out by the people I betrayed!’ I’m going to fuck you from behind and you’re going to look at your PA straight in the eyes and say ‘I’m a slut.’”

The horn sounded again. And again. …And again.

“A hat-trick, ladies and gentlebeings! Sophie’s In the Mood for Love isn’t just making up for lost time, they might actually win the Empress’ Cup!”

“Please make me do that… make me wear something embarrassing that she wouldn’t expect…”

“Oh you would want that wouldn’t youuuuuuuuuu…oh my god…” Tomoko said as she found her asshole was extending in ways she didn’t think possible. Shufen’s skill was indeed unparalleled.

Shufen grabbed Tomoko’s hair again and yanked it back to whisper in her ear. “Every lash you give her, I’ll repay to you. Just us. My hand inside you. And you’re going to scream my name, Tomoko. Keep going.”

The horn blared again.

***

“Normally I wouldn’t recommend stealing a hovercar from the UN Intelligence Service but…” Commander Avedra said as she brought over the ends of the jump leads she’d wired to the commandeered buggy.

“Desperate times, et cetera,” Skye said. “My sister works for UNIS, she can make it go away.”

“Even though we stunned two UNIS agents?” Alexandra asked.

“Yep.”

“And tied them up?”

“Yes! Look, my sister practically owns this station. This is her sector. Granted, I won’t know what to tell her when she asks me why we couldn’t just ask nicely for the buggy battery. We are all one big happy UN Fleet after all.”

“Eh, I was getting antsy,” said Avedra as she folded her arms across her chest. “Also, there is an ancient human saying I find useful in times like these.”

“What’s that, love?” asked Alexandra.

“ACAB.”

***

Tomoko clawed into those perfect stockings, tearing ladders into them, while her other hand tugged down Sophie’s bra, revealing her small but shapely breasts, one already clearly mauled, the other waiting for its first slap, its first scratch. They came quickly. As did Sophie.

The score horn blared yet again.

“You sit up there in your New York office, moving us across your star charts like chess pieces… and you know why? Because you know one day one of us is going to descend from the heavens like a fucking goddess to put you in your place and punish you for your sins…”

“YES!”

Horn. Horn. …And more horn.

“Ladies and gentlebeings, the judges are trying to assess whether that was three orgasms or four! But as we lack an expert on %SPECIES physiology it may be hard to tell!”

“You live for that, don’t you? You wanted me to come down from the Odyssey… march into your 42^nd Street Canal apartment and take you by the neck and tell you… ‘Slut, you’re going to wear this bright red see-thru lingerie tomorrow, something your PA would never expect you to wear…’ Then I’d leave you wanting and waiting…”

She pistoned in and out of Sophie’s sex now, finally pushing her thumb inside her to ensure she could put all her strength into claiming her.

“Oh gods yes! YES! I’d wear my sluttiest lingerie! Under my most conservative suit!”

“And then the next day, it’d happen. I wouldn’t tell you when. I’d just show up and you’d know your life as you knew it was over. You’d be turned out, in front of your PA, who’d be shocked… Ah!”

As Tomoko continued the fantasy, she found her body clawed and claimed by Shufen, who continued to be impressively sensual. Rough when she needed to make a point, but otherwise using strategic touches to light her whole body on fire. The right touch to a muscle here, a delicate whisper on her neck there, a single fingernail pressed deep in the valley of her back…

And then, just as suddenly, a two-digit thrust into her ass. Unceremonious, dirty, payback for how she was despoiling the beautiful French princess of Shufen’s digital dreams. Tomoko knew she needed to be punished too, punished for her sick, vengeful feelings. For her crusade against a woman who was, frankly, among the nicest UN officials she’d met. Well… not nice. Lots of them were ‘nice.’ Sophie was kind when she wanted to be. A mouse in a maze who somehow ruled it. That was impressive in its way.

Thus, Sophie was surprised at the shockingly tender kiss she found herself sharing with Tomoko. Two silver tears trailed down Sophie’s cheeks as she did so. And Tomoko suddenly embraced the other woman, lifting her off the ground and kissing her down her neck and sternum, gripping her tight with a fierce and needful passion.

Three words wanted to volcanically erupt from the CMO, but Tomoko had just enough discipline left to not let that happen. Not here, not like this. De Montchalin was in her forties and yet, in other ways, still so young. She wouldn’t do that to her.

But she was going to make her come her brains out.

Her fist was suddenly a steam engine, and the score horn practically marked time like a second hand from there on out.

“LADIES AND GENTLEBEINGS, we have a new world record here that will go down in the ages! The Verdant Empress herself is having the vapours and has called for the Royal Feeldoe to sate her urges! History is being made tonight, with an astonishing final score of…ZZZZTTTTTZ.”

“Remember, Tomoko, you and me…” Shufen whispered before she disappeared along with everything else. All that was left was the sea of indistinct blue that greeted any VR Suite visitor before a programme started.

And then a gate opened, framing a triumphant looking Chief Engineer Skye. “Praise me, for I am the queen of Tír na nÓg!” she shouted.

Admiral Chase was behind her, as was First Officer Avedra. And, just for good measure, Lieutenant Legasova showed up and poked her head over Avedra’s shoulder.

What they saw was a near-naked Tomoko with half her arm shoved up the Meta-Secretary for UN Fleet Strategy’s pussy and said Meta-Secretary squirming naked underneath her---her period lingerie having disappeared with the rest of the VR Suite programme.

Skye blanched.

Tomoko looked up. “… … You breathe a word of this, and I will use each of your intestines for skipping rope. I swear to whatever gods exist in whatever godforsaken nebulas out there…” she pulled her fist out of Sophie; she moaned; everyone else’s eyes went wide, “…I will do it because I have all of your medical records and I know exactly how to do it.”

“Well, folks, I think we all learned a very valuable lesson today,” Alexandra said as she began pulling people away from the gate one by one. “And what that lesson is… I’m sure I’ll come up with before our briefing. But I’m quite certain that it doesn’t involve thinking overlong about everything you did not just see.”

The gate remained but with a privacy barrier summoned up.

“Tomoko… thank you, truly,” Sophie said with the most tired voice. “And please… please know that I am so, so sorry.”

Tomoko sighed heavily and looked at all the blue nothing. The stuff dreams were made of in the 23^rd Century. “I… I know. I’m sorry too. I still need more time. What happened to Jack was… well. No one could’ve stopped it. And I needed someone to blame, so I picked you. But after what we just did, well, shit.” Tomoko laughed. “Yeah, after that, I can’t hate you. You’re just… you’re just a dork.”

They sat side by side, naked. Tomoko’s clothes were in a pile a metre away, but she hardly noticed.

“You’d be welcome to join me in Hong Kong ’69 again.”

“I… I’ll think about it, Sophie, how’s that?” And she meant it. She really did. Gods alive, she found a soft spot for a woman she’d made a dart board of during an especially weak and drunk moment.

“Oh no. Shufen! I hope she’s alright… I… I think I need to check on her…” Sophie began to get up.

“Sophie Sophie Sophie…” Tomoko said, tugging the other woman back down to the floor. “Listen, maybe you know this maybe you don’t. But this doesn’t get reported on the newsnets. Holographic programmes sometimes achieve hard-takeoff during VR Suite glitches. It’s possible that Shufen remembers everything that happened. And that she’s going to be a human woman on 1969 Earth who’s seen Vorii, and me in a UN Fleet uniform. She’s going to need you more than ever. And it’s not impossible that you’ll get a visit from the AI Containment Office. If… shit. If they give you trouble, just talk to me. I know someone.”

Sophie grinned wide. “You think I don’t?”

Tomoko blinked and then reached over to tickle Sophie, “You arrogant slut!” The two dissolved into a pile of laughter.

***

Admiral’s Personal Log, Supplemental.

It’s been a hell of a day, to say the least. But all in the day’s work for us. While I won’t violate her wishes by describing matters in detail, I think my old friend Tomoko Langley has achieved something of a breakthrough in dealing with her greatest pain. We all want someone to blame. Some author, a god, a personification of everything we can pour our hatreds into. Someone we can say *caused* our misery. But none of it is true. That’s one of the hardest lessons of all to learn. And much as I cared for Tomoko, I knew I wasn’t the woman to teach it to her. Often, that kind of lesson is best taught by the most unexpected people, in the most unexpected places. A freak solar flare while you’re in a VR Suite? Well, I daresay that qualifies.

The briefing has been moved to tomorrow. Now that KSY has full power again, we’ve got another 24 hours of shore leave to enjoy up here. I promised Avedra that I’d try her favourite Vorii food joint---an elegant seafood restaurant on Deck 14 called The Ice Chain. Appropriate enough after everything we’ve been through.

***

Sophie adjusted her elegant sun hat, cream with a pink ribbon cinching it. Her white dress—interrupted only by a pair of pink bands circling her waist—came up to a boatneck that flattered her collarbones. A white-gloved hand pulled away her sunglasses, which she needed to beat the summer heat of midday Hong Kong.

Painted lips curled into a smile as she saw her favourite reporter for the South China Morning Post standing under a telephone pole, blazer draped over her shoulder, hooked by an enticing finger.

“Shufen!” she called out.

The other woman paced over coolly. “So, ma cherie, what’s our next magical adventure going to be? I feel like slaying a dragon.”

Sophie laughed as she dashed over in her high heels to bundle Shufen into a tight hug. “You remembered!”

Shufen smiled and cradled the back of Sophie’s head, “How could I ever forget?”