Sailor Moon Fan Fiction ❯ Eternal City:Crystal Tokyo ❯ Chapter 12

Eternal City, Crystal Tokyo: Part Twelve

The cold light of the stars lit up the sleek craft, a silvery needle in the darkness of space. From the rear powerful engines pushed it forward, while along the needle's length modules for weapons and other purposes dotted the smooth hull. At the bow, a large opening was visible, clearly a powerful weapon of some sort.

But while it was all seemingly peaceful on the outside, within it was anything but. Ruri leaned forward in her command chair, her twin ponytails of blue hair swinging as she asked pleasantly, "Tactical status?"

"I can't find them," the young man growled out.

"Calm yourself," the young lady on the left firmly advised him. The redhead bent over her own set of engineering controls before quietly reporting, "All our sensors appear to be functioning within normal limits, ma'am."

"Thank you, Miyuki," Ruri smiled slightly. She turned back to the young man, "Matthew, is there any way to check the blind spot?"

Matthew scowled fiercely, "As the representative of the manufacturer, I must once again assure you that there's simply no way that an enemy ship could get through the sensor web into our blind spot completely undetected."

"You're certain?" Ruri said, keeping her voice perfectly even.

"Yes, ma'am," he said proudly.

"Communications, use the encoding number 223, then send the signal out, 'Sit still.' please," Ruri smiled at Kei, then as the redhead bent to her work she turned and nodded to her temporary navigation officer Yuri, "Helm?"

"Yes, ma'am?" Yuri smiled eagerly, the black haired young woman's hands hovering just above the control surfaces.

"Use the maneuvering thrusters," Ruri smiled, "bring us about."

A feather light touch on the controls and the silvery ship, the prototype of the Nadesico class gracefully turned in space. The crew in their stations bent forward slightly as on the viewscreen the space outside shifted. The bow of the other vessel appeared first, then the entire ship rotated into view, a sleek wooden Juraian starcraft.

Matthew was bone pale, gazing in pure shock at the ship that had, indeed, been hiding in their blind spot only moments before. "How.." he stammered it out weakly, turning to look up at where Ruri sat calmly.

"It doesn't really matter how they did it," Ruri said to him crisply, "it only matters that she was able to get into our blindspot and exploit it, something that your company had repeatedly assured us was utterly impossible."

"Understood," Matthew accepted his defeat with surprising grace, "I'll contact the company, and authorize the instillation of a sensor node to cover that blind spot, as well as add the node to the vessel's standard plans."

"Thank you," Ruri said gravely. She looked over at Kei, "Communications link, please?"

The image on the screen shifted, and a smiling young woman appeared there. "Hey Ruri, how's tricks?" Minagi said. The former space pirate wore her typical bodysuit, a form fitting number in red and white, her face marked by the scars on each cheek.

"They're going well," Ruri smiled slightly. "I want to thank you and your ship, Hinase, for your assistance in this test run."

"Buy us a drink?" Minagi grinned.

"Why not," Ruri answered, "I'll meet you back on Selene Station, we'll get something there." A short pause, "Did you say us?"

A young woman, looking to be in her twenties, appeared on the screen beside Minagi. Just like Ruri her blue hair was tied up in two tails, but an odd symbol was on her forehead. "Hi, Ruri," Princess Sasami of Jurai beamed, "nice to see you!"

Ruri couldn't help but smile back, "Nice to see you, too, Princess."

The trip back to the docks at Selene was mostly quiet, as each of the crew was occupied with their own thoughts. Ruri found herself considering how much she had in common with Kei and Yuri, the last surviving clones of the original Lovely Angels.

Like them, Ruri was a clone, mass produced back when Nergal was attempting to get into shipping in a big way. Her legal status at the time was still unclear, so for a long time her various clones served as virtual slaves of the corporation. It wasn't until a clone got in to Arisugawa's Locket and appealed for sanctuary that the brown stuff hit the fan.

Kei and Yuri were even worse off than she was, in some ways. Resurrected again and again by the managers of the World Welfare Workers Association, they were the ultimate expendable agents, sent into the very worst of situations, to pull a miracle or die trying. It was astonishing how often they were able to actually save the day, but more often they failed, the gory details spread all across human colonized space.

'No wonder they got the nickname Dirty Pair,' Ruri thought grimly.

After the 3WA finally collapsed under it's own weight, the Kei and Yuri of that era were both slain. It wasn't until a few years ago that an archeological team discovered the 3WA cloning vault, and after some debate a new clone of each person within was created, then the tissue samples and personality recordings were all destroyed.

"Approaching dock," Yuri's voice interrupted Ruri's thoughts.

Recovering her poise nearly instantly Ruri commanded, "Bring us in, please."

"Aye, aye sir," Yuri worked the controls gracefully, bringing them forward to gently slip into the dock with a soft thump.

The Selene space station was the maintenance dock for the entire Earth fleet, situated directly between the Earth and Moon. Large enough to service dozens of vessels it was miles across, like a metallic snowflake hanging in space.

"Secure latches," Matthew ran through the docking checklist, "connect to station feeds, switch over internal oxygen to station management."

"We're home at last," Ruri smiled slightly. She activated the shipwide communication systems from the terminal on the arm of her command chair, "Nice job, ladies and gentlemen. Shore leaves are authorized, standard rotations."

Matthew unhooked himself, standing in front of Ruri's chair to offer her a perfect salute, his expression oddly respectful. "I hope that next time we'll end up being on the same side, more or less," he smiled wryly.

Ruri returned the salute gravely and said, "Let us hope." As he left she let the remaining members of her normal bridge crew leave before smiling over at Kei and Yuri, "Thank you for filling in on such short notice."

"No problem," Kei pushed her red hair back, "it makes a nice change from spending all our time out on assignments in the Lovely Angel."

"Not to mention helping ruin that guy's day," Yuri added with a sly smile.

Ruri lead the two out of the ship and into the sprawling station itself before asking, "Would you care to join us for that drink?"

"Not this time," Kei smiled, taking Yuri's hand, "I promised my partner we'd spend some time alone on the Lovely Angel."

Yuri actually blushed, and Ruri had to fight the urge to laugh. Instead she gave them a cheery wave and, "Have a good time!"

"They're not coming along?" Sasami sounded just a bit disappointed as she and Minagi joined Ruri at the access way.

Ruri shrugged, "Personal business."

Minagi chuckled softly as they set off together. She reached out, taking Sasami's hand, "Just like that last long trip we took together, love."

Sasami blushed slightly before changing the subject by asking Ruri, "So will they fix the problem you found?"

"Thanks to your able assistance," Ruri directed a smile to both her and Minagi. Quietly, "How are things on Jurai?"

"Tense," Minagi replied tersely.

Ruri's eyes narrowed in worry, "Did something happen to the twins?"

"Tenchi's children are fine," Sasami quickly reassured her, "but the nobles are getting surly that Tenchi won't agree to any of their expansionist policies."

"They don't dare oppose him openly," Minagi complained,, "but there's plenty of ways to undermine him covertly."

"And Tenchi's not ruthless enough to deal with them as needed," Ruri sighed. She fixed Minagi with a serious glance, "If he needs backup, let me know. I still owe him personally."

"I'll do that," Minagi smiled.

To be continued...

Characters in this Episode: Ruri is From Martian Successor Nadesico. Kei and Yuri are from Dirty Pair. And finally, Minagi, Sasami and Hinase are from Tenchi Muyo.

Author's Note: Miyuki's name and description are from Miyuki-chan in Wonderland, but it couldn't possibly be her. ^_^ I made up Matthew, thankfully. The Dirty Pair's background comes from the comic book series, and is how I explain Dirty Pair Flash, too. I don't know if Nergal would mass produce Ruri's, but it wouldn't surprise me.