Ryoko was lounging about in the hallway, floating on her back with her hands upon her head. She often found that defying gravity helped her get a somewhat better handle on her thoughts, as if denying its hold on her allowed her to have a better hold on more pressing matters. Such as her feelings for Ayeka, the Juraian Princess whom she had been engaged to, to cement a political alliance. Certainly, right from the start, she had teased Ayeka, leered at her, come onto her, but most of that was because she'd been about ninety percent sure that Ayeka wouldn't DO anything about it. Not that she would have objected to running the purple-haired princess ragged in bed. Ayeka was a little light in the chest area for Ryoko's tastes, but there was definitely something appealing about the entire package, and Ryoko could just imagine that proper, pretty face contorting in pleasure, lips open in a moan and eyes clenched tightly cl- Okay, that line of thought was definitely not helping her focus. But the point was, even though she was attracted to Ayeka, that sure as hell didn't mean she wanted to get married, or was in LOVE or something like that. She was still quite a young woman by Hyurodan standards, and had never had any desire to settle down with one woman, certainly not an arrogant, stuck-up, spoiled little princess from the Juraian Empire. But still. Ever since the attempted rebellion several days ago, she'd found Ayeka weighing heavily on her thoughts, and not quite as the shackles she'd previously considered her. Ayeka had almost died when her Juraian power surfaced due to emotional trauma, and Ryoko had fought against that power and almost been hurt so that she could save her fiancee and bring her back to sanity with a kiss. She found herself hoping that Ayeka would not be too hurt by these things, for she knew how war and fighting could tear into one. Though she enjoyed a good fight (and more than enjoyed her catfights with Ayeka), that didn't mean she was immune from being shaken by war and fighting. Unbidden came the memory of the great war centuries ago, where she and her mother had united their people against the newest race to rise up and attempt to subjugate them. The Terrans had been like every other spacefaring race to ever discover the Hyurodan; they had decided that an entire race of beautiful women with exotic looks and not entirely "civilized" posteur was obviously put there by whatever deity they worshipped to serve them. But they had not counted on Washu. Washu had looked out on her people's suffering, had seen them killed and enslaved, and had decided that it would be no more. The Hyurodan were powerful individually, but were far too individual, too centered around clans and their own colony worlds, and that allowed the Terrans to strike from afar, using fear tactics to even further divide them. And Washu had stopped it. She and her daughter had united the Hyurodan, forged them into a blade. And on that blade had been inscribed "We will not give in, for we are strong." And it had been Ryoko that had plunged that sword into the Terrans' hearts. It had been a long, system-by-system battle, rickety freighters and hodgepodge fighters along with a few cabbits against squadrons of the Terrans' trained Space Marines. The mention of the Battle of Neptune was enough to make any adult Hyurodan go immediately silent, and perhaps even to shed a tear. Few did not know someone that had died at Neptune. And one day, exactly 197 years, four months, and three days ago, the Hyurodan had broken through the line of Space Marines around Earth, and Ryoko had brought Ryo-Ohki's augmented blaster on line. And standing bathed in the glow of over a thousand crystallized energy gems that would from hereon in be nothing more than commemorative pieces of glass, she had said but two words. "Burn it." She had felt a great sense of savage joy as she watched the blue, white, and green subsumed by red, black, and grey. And she had felt a great sense of horror as she watched the oceans boiling away. And as she had watched the evacuation ships picked off by other furious and vengeful Hyurodan, she had collapsed to the floor of Ryo-Ohki's bridge, sobbing. What had she done? What had to be done. And then she had awoken in a cold sweat, choking back a scream that would have snapped Ryo-Ohki to red alert. Washu had been most put out to receive a message from her daughter in the middle of the night, with the smashed and sparking remnants of the PlanetCrusher augmentation as her backdrop. "Find another way," Ryoko had demanded, and refused to discuss it any further. And so a blockade of the planet had begun, and it had lasted almost twenty years. And every Hyurodan death that resulted from skirmishes during that blockade had weighed heavily on Ryoko's conscience. 'If only I had listened and used the PlanetCrusher.' But every time, she would awaken with a cry of anguish on her tongue, the sight of a burning world in her mind. Washu's answer to the problem was an extensive network of satellites dispersed in Earth orbit, emitting a pulse that kept any manner of conventional power from working. Electricity, internal combustion, even any large or intense fires, all were suppressed. The Earth was suddenly flung back into the iron age. Cabbits and Hyurodan-utilized crystallized energy still worked, however, and a number of Hyurodan colonists had made the Earth their home. It was expected that the satellites would run out of stabilizing power in around 20,000 years. Washu was rather smug when she hypothesized that by that time, the Terrans would be fit to rejoin galactic society... if only because they'd probably be indistinguishable from Hyurodan. Still, the deaths of her own people resulting from her choice, combined with the guilt of what she COULD have done, had plagued Ryoko. She had all but withdrawn from contact with anyone, save for a few brief conversations with her mother when they couldn't be avoided. But over time, Kallista and various other of the newly-assembled royal guard had drawn her out of her shell, and gradually Ryoko had forgiven herself, and found some sort of stability in her life. And then Ayeka had walked through the doors, and her stability had gone straight to Hell. Ryoko sighed quietly and rolled over on her stomach, positioning herself as if propped up on her elbows. WHY couldn't she get Ayeka out of her thoughts? The little priss was kinda fun... well, okay, she was a LOT of fun... but she was also annoying as hell. She got on Ryoko's nerves something awful, and it was getting to the point where she couldn't sleep because she was either fuming about Ayeka or thinking about her in somewhat more pleasant ways. 'I mean, even if I do love her like I told the kid, this can't be normal, I've never acted like this before. Why's Ayeka gettin' under my skin so bad?' Trying anything to change the course of her thoughts, she looked to the door of Empress Misaki's room. Inside, she knew, Misaki was conversing with Emperor Azusa, ruler of the Juraian Empire, deciding what to do about the unrest in their nominal ally's system. It was quite possible that Misaki would come out of that room and tell Ryoko she needn't worry about marrying Ayeka anymore, that there would be no alliance. Of course, the fact that she couldn't figure out how to feel about that one only brought her back to her dazed and confused state of mind. 'I'd hate to see 'em go, but for more reasons than that. I like Ayeka's family too. Misaki's nuts, but she's a neat kinda nuts. Funaho seems like a cold fish on the outside, but you can just almost feel that she's just as girlish and mischievious as Misaki is right under the surface. And Sasami's adorable. I really wouldn't mind her being my little sister. '... I wouldn't mind her being my little sister. Never really thought about having a sister before. Mom split with whoever knocked her up before I was ever born, if they were ever really together. How would that be, to watch Sasami grow up, have her look to me for advice about dating or clothes or whatever. ... Heheheheheh, her entire family would FREAK if she did what I told her to. And I think she'd love to see 'em freak just as much as I would.' Again Ryoko rolled in midair, this time onto her side, propped up with her cheek on one palm. 'But speaking of knocking people up, won't Ayeka be the one freaking when she finally hears the whole story behind how we Hyurodan do it. Heh... she'll probably smack me with a ten foot pole and threaten to scream if I ever touch her again. ... Well, replace "ten foot pole" with "valuable sculpture" and that happened last week anyway, so it might not be as bad as all that.' Ryoko tapped a fingernail against one of her fangs, pondering that. Ayeka seemed to have SOME idea of sexuality, but a lot of it seemed repressed, or qualified as 'dirty'. How she got that way when two of her parents were fairly open and comfortable with the obviously sexual relationship between them was something of a mystery to Ryoko. 'Maybe some people are just... like that. No explanation, no real reason. They just get flustered about sex. 'I wonder what the little prude's doing right now...?' ------------------------------------------------------------ Ayeka sighed quietly, staring at the ceiling. She still felt as if the strength had been leeched out of every part of her body. She wished Kiyone were here to talk to, but when she'd seen her servant's condition, Ayeka had ordered her to get at least six more hours' sleep. Kiyone had reluctantly agreed, and so, Ayeka was on her lonesome again. ... Speaking of which... She did still have quite enough strength to slip a hand under the covers and pull aside the folds of her sleeping kimono. Her back arched very slightly as she let her fingertips brush over the warm, soft cloth covering her crotch. It had been some time since she had been relaxed enough to allow herself the... solitary vice. Perhaps, since she was to be bedridden anyway, and since she had privacy... Well, perhaps she would. Her fingers moved in slow, even strokes, as much out of her weakness as her desire to slowly stoke the fires of her pleasure, fingertips remaining outside the cloth of her undergarments at all times. But that only caused the cloth to move over her soft folds, and Ayeka turned her head aside, pushing it into the pillow to muffle any sounds she might make. 'Ryoko...' Her hand immediately went still, and her eyes went wide. Rather hurriedly, she pulled her hand out from under the covers and lay both hands atop each other on her chest, rapidly assuming a rather proper posture. Any mental desire to touch herself was quite gone, despite her body's protests. Why on Jurai had she thought Ryoko's name while pleasuring herself? Well. Her cheeks burned as she admitted it to herself, but she was indeed coming to find the Hyurodan princess quite attractive... if still massively infuriating. Ayeka could quite easily find herself picturing those wild golden eyes, the elegant lines of Ryoko's neck, the swells of her breasts, those long elegant fingers... Ayeka almost slapped her own hand as she realized it was starting to move back beneath the covers while she was distracted by her inappropriate daydreaming. The Juraian princess scowled. 'Have I no choice of how my body shall behave? I shall not act like some foolish female thing in an uninspired erotic story, powerless to keep from pleasuring myself as if my hands were not attached to my own arms.' She rested her hands atop one another again, the scowl turning into a thoughtful frown. She was indeed finding herself thinking of Ryoko's body in such a way, and she wondered why this was. Certainly, she knew that her mother and Funaho shared such a... special relationship between themselves as well as her father, but she had never found herself entertaining such thoughts. Her brow furrowed as she tried to remember the last time she had entertained erotic notions of anyone she had met... and couldn't. In fact, she couldn't remember ever fantasizing about anyone, specifically, at all. She often merely... did what she had to do... without thinking about much of anything. That led her to other thoughts. Who did she find attractive? Certainly, she knew that her mother, Funaho, and her father were attractive people, but she certainly wasn't attracted TO them. She had been introduced to several princes as possible matches in their travels, and she struggled to recall if she'd found them anything other than boring or annoying. Certainly, Juraian royalty tended towards great beauty, so some of them at least must have been good-looking... So why could she not remember being attracted to any of them? She frowned thoughtfully again. Could it be she was only attracted to women? Well, that was not a big problem. Juraian culture had absolutely no censure against homosexuals, as for millinia they had been quite abundant and spacefaring. They were an old race, and had long ago passed the point where remnants of the need to procreate for racial survival had fallen away from their mindset. However, Ayeka had always naturally assumed that she had preferred men, and it was rather odd for her to personally accept that she might be so little aware of her own nature. Besides, even if she did prefer women, that did not explain why she should find herself thinking of Ryoko. Certainly the Hyurodan princess was beautiful... and sensual in her manner... and lately, she had shown herself to be capable of kindness... consideration... even heroism. 'A better question might be why WOULDN'T you think of her?' quipped some part of Ayeka's psyche. The princess scowled. Because Ryoko was insulting, rude, crude, disrespectful, perverted, and... and... and she was just RYOKO! 'And you're desperately in love with her,' chirped the same smug little tone in her head. 'Oh, shut up,' she grumped back, grabbing a pillow and shoving it over her face, as if to drown out her internal dialogue. ------------------------------------------------------------ Riyata sat in the red-stained sand, staring at the small, angular blue gem resting in the palm of her hand, a hand smudged with dirt, nails cracked and split in some places as she curled her long fingers around the little fleck of crystallized energy. '... My Ada...' She could still feel her dead lover in the stone in her hand. All of the royal guard had at least one power gem issued to them, granting them superior strength. Kallista was the only one who had two, allowing her to fly, and everyone knew that Princess Ryoko had three, giving her the ability to create and manipulate energy. No mention had been made of what would become of Ada's gem, and Riyata supposed they expected that she would bury it along with the dead guard. But she couldn't bear it. To think of Ada left under the soil, all of her, with nothing more for Riyata to remember her by than a bunk that would no doubt host another guard in a few months, and a few special places that only the two of them had gone to be alone. The black-haired Hyurodan clenched her fist around the gem until she felt its edges cut into the skin, closing her eyes, not caring about the blood that trickled out and down from the lines of her palm. Hyurodan relationships were... not known for their depth and endurance. As a society, they were too fun-loving and long-lived to think of something so restrictive as 'love you forever'. At least on the surface. The truth was, they were a very passionate people as well... it was simply that sometimes, what should have been said went unsaid, and over the years, that lack in the words spoken poisoned things. Centuries were a long time to not speak out on your feelings. 'Why didn't I ever tell you?' Here, alone, the tears were impossible to hold back, slipping from between tightly-shut eyelids to trickle down the beautiful but fierce lines of her face. 'Ada... I loved you so much. For over fifty years, you were the only one I wanted. You were my greatest joy, my truest happiness... and I let you think it was just another fling like any of the other guards have with each other. I let you think we were just having fun...' Slowly, she let her fist uncurl, opening her eyes again to look at the blue gem, now flecked with little blots of her own blood. Sliding an arm between her neck and hair, she lifted the thick, spikey raven mane and set the diamond cut blue gem below her own square red one. Riyata hissed in pain as the crystallized energy sank halfway into her skin, the tingling of its power spreading through her body, the rush of it lending the tears that fell from her eyes their own inner light, sparkling as if each had trapped within it its own tiny galaxy as they fell to the sand. "Ada... you'll always be with me," Riyata whispered as she stood, then clenched her fists, turned her face to the sky, and screamed with everything in her, "ADA, I LOVE YOU!" ------------------------------------------------------------ Kiyone tossed restlessly in her bed, trying to convince herself she was actually attempting sleep. She was exhausted, but her mind was far too active with a chaotic whirl of emotions, suspicions, guilt. It was almost a relief when she heard a knock at the door. Standing, she arranged her kimono a little before calling, "Enter!" The door opened to admit the statuesque form of Kallista, the head guard nodding politely and leaning her spear against the wall. "Hey, Blue Fire. Sleepless night...?" The Juraian maidservant blushed faintly at the nickname. Kallista had been calling her that ever since they'd fought side by side against the dozens of rebels standing between them and Queen Washu, in reference to Kiyone's indigo energy sword. "Yes, you could say that. How are you...?" "Eh? Oh, m'fine. Just wanted to come by and tell you again that I was really impressed with your skills." The Hyurodan smiled almost... hungrily, displaying her fangs, and it may have been Kiyone's imagination, but she thought she saw the shark-fin cut of Kallista's hair raise up a little bit, much like the hairs on the back of her own neck were raising a little bit and goosebumps were running up and down her arms at the look in the orange-haired woman's eyes. "I was impressed with yours, too," she replied smoothly nonetheless, managing a friendly smile. "It's not easy to get respect from me," Kallista added in an almost musing tone, slowly sauntering closer, and Kiyone felt as if she could feel the other woman's body heat from across the room. "But you have." She paused, mere inches from touching Kiyone, and seemed on the verge of saying something deeply meaningful, thought-provoking, and soul-baring. "... Hell with it." And then she was all over the Juraian woman, yanking off clothing and stroking skin like there was no tomorrow. Kiyone gasped in pure surprise, arching her head back at the feel of fingers carressing her bared arms and sides, at lips brushing over the skin just above her breasts. "Aaaa... K-Kallista, wait, I-!" She gulped loudly, trying to gather her wits even as she felt herself falling back onto the bed with the Hyurodan guard atop her. There was a loud *clank* as Kallista's armored top hit the floor, and Kiyone shivered throughout her entire being at the feel of hard nipples brushing over her own. The Juraian woman's gasps and attempts to speak were momentarily cut off by the press of soft, hot lips against hers, of the wet carress of a tongue seeking entry. "What's the matter? Don't you want it?" Kallista murmured, lips following the line of the other woman's jaw once the kiss was broken. "Y-yes... I want it, but-" Kiyone's fingers clenched in the sheets. "Is there someone else?" the Hyurodan whispered in the Juraian's ear, breath a soft, hot carress. Kiyone's eyes squeezed shut as a name immediately came to her lips. Then, slowly, she forced her eyes open and her fingers to unclench, raising her hands to lay them on Kallista's cheeks, turning the other woman's head so that she could look into her eyes. "... No. There's no one else." And before she could feel like contradicting herself, she kissed Kallista as hard as she could. ------------------------------------------------------------ Sasami stroked Ryo-Ohki's head lightly, the little creature murring with contentment, its eyes closed and its body at maximum relaxation where it lay in the little princess' lap. "How come you're so scary, huh? I don't think you're so scary," Sasami murmured, switching to scritching behind one of the cabbit's ears, earning a mya of appreciation. "Maybe that race just doesn't like cute fuzzy things?" Mihoshi offered cheerfully, leaning forward across the bed from where she knelt beside it on the floor and playfully poking Ryo-Ohki on the nose a few times. Ryo-Ohki opened her eyes, looking momentarily indignant at being poked, then sniffed Mihoshi's finger a few times. Apparently approving of her mistress's maidservant, the cabbit bestowed her seal of approval in the form of a few licks. "Everyone's gotta be scared of something, riiiight?" "I guess," Sasami replied, seeming unconvinced. She seemed remarkably unaffected by the traumatic happenings of the previous night, and merely turned a curious gaze to her friend and attendant. "So what're you scared of, Mihoshi?" "Ummmmm..." The blonde lay a finger along her cheek as she apparently considered, then nodded with great authority. "Your sister!" Sasami laughed out loud, putting a hand over her mouth. "Ayeka?! How come you're scared of her?" "She's really loud," whimpered Mihoshi, wilting and laying her head face-down on the mattress, as if the mere memory of Ayeka yelling at her was unbearable. "Well, yeah, she is," Sasami agreed, nodding several times and setting her long ponytails to bouncing, Ryo-Ohki mirroring the motion and setting her ears to wiggling instead. "But nowadays she's mostly loud at Ryoko, and not at you." Mihoshi sniffled, the sound muffled by the bedspread. "I know. But she'll be loud at me again soon. I just know it." "Well, that's probably true," Sasami allowed, unable to deny Mihoshi's strange affliction of gaining klutziness in direct proportion to the age and value of the breakable things around her. "I guess all you can try and do is to not make her mad..." "But she ALWAYS gets mad!" Mihoshi wailed, seeming on the verge of bursting into tears. "Um... well..." Sasami struggled for an answer to that, a large sweatdrop collecting on the back of her head. "Maybe you should go get some sleep, Mihoshi, you seem really upset." The blonde sniffled once more. "Okay. But I'll be close by in case you need me." "Thanks, Mihoshi. Night!" "G'night, princess." Mihoshi leaned in to place a little kiss right on the mark on Sasami's forehead, making the little princess giggle, before withdrawing from her mistress' chambers. Sighing quietly and getting herself a bit under control, Mihoshi turned and began the short walk down the hall to the quarters she shared with Kiyone. Her hand was almost resting on the doorknob when her sensitive hearing picked up a pleasured cry of release. That was definitely Kiyone. Then came another, similarly jubilant cry. That definitely wasn't. Her mocha cheeks darkened a great deal more, and she quickly took a step back. Glancing to the right, she saw Ryoko floating in midair and smirking at her. Rather than attempt to explain herself, or her friend, Mihoshi simply squeaked and took off down the stairs in a hurry. She'd just find a nice comfy chair for the night... ------------------------------------------------------------ Ryoko chuckled to herself as Mihoshi ran off like her butt was on fire, then floated upright and set her feet on the floor at the sound of the door unlocking, setting her hands on her hips and waiting for Misaki to emerge. The blue-haired Empress closed the door, then blinked at the sight of the impatient Hyurodan princess before her. "Well? What's the word?" Ryoko asked, trying not to sound TOO demanding. "... We're going home."
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