Martian Fireworks

<creatively done snip>

Yasmin was dreaming again…

Captain Quintelle sat hunched over at the bar, an empty martini glass clenched uncontrollably tightly in his fist, the stem close to snapping. Behind the bar, John was slowly sorting his way through the numerous shelves of bottled alcohol behind him, and as he turned to take the next person's order, Jay grumbled:

"Gimme another!"

The bartender stared at him cautiously, as he proceeded to continue cleaning the tumbler in his hands.

"Sir, aren't we meant to be leaving Lunapolis tonight for headquarters? Surely you need to be down in the drive room with Captain Adimar? Sir?"

Jay stared at him, dazed. "That's CAPTAIN to you, boy-o."

John went to say something else, but was instantly cut off as Head Flight Co-ordinater Dianna Wilkins walked in. Her eyes looked from the captain to John, and back again randomly, finally settling her determined gaze on the glass in Quintelle's hand.

"Captain?"

Jay looked up, and groggily grinned at her. "Busy."

She sighed, and hauled him up from his seat, quickly - and indeed, smartly - dodging away as he vomited over the shoulder of her aubergine-like pinstripe suit. Wiping his mouth, Jay shortly gagged on the stench of his leavings, and belched loudly.

"We need to leave in two minutes. Where the hell are the rest of the crew!?" She paused, waiting for an answer. When she was left with an awkward void of silence instead, she carried on oblivious. "You've been here the entire time, haven't you?" She paused again. "Smeghead."

"Pardon me officer," the bartender politely interrupted, "But would you perhaps make old use of my assistance in helping the Captain back up to the drive room?"

"Would you?"

§§§

Adimar sat patiently at the table in the Diner, staring at a holographic depictions screen that stretched across the surface of the entire wall, still sitting on stand-by, black and blank albeit for specks of now clearly dust on its surface. Her eyes stayed fixed on it continuously, and only prised them away as Dianna and the bartender hobbled in, supporting a clearly 100% WASTED Quintelle between the pair of them.

"Hi sis," Jay mumbled coarsely, slamming his hands both down on the steel metal tabletop as he struggled to steady himself down on a chair opposite his co-captain. "Yazz, you okay?"

She turned to face him properly, and the edges of her lips stayed straightly primed ready for a good old Adimar rant.

"Am I OKAY!? Was I okay when you 'accidentally' blew up Lily and made us bring out a new computer? Was I okay when you 'accidentally' blew up half our cargo, and made us all forfeit sixteen months wages? Smeg, was I okay when…"

She trailed off in a weird sort of confused taper as the face of a distinctly important man flashes up onto the table, projected outwards from the computer screen.

“Adimar?” The President called out from the wall, his eyebrows knotted with concern. “We’re in for a whole lot of smeg this time.”

§§§

Five Days Later…

Yasmin and Jay sat at the counter in Puffins bar on board ship, nursing their drinks. She had her favourite drink - water. Or, a least, it had been for a few weeks prior, when that was all they’d had on board ship. Also, she still ate vegetarian. Jay, on the other hand…

…Jay was already drunk.

They were preparing - if that was the right word - for supper tonight. It had been previously decided that they would let Wizzy keep an eye on the airlock repairs: it had risky enough just getting there in the first place, neither of the captains, drunk or otherwise, wanted to be suffocated when they set off for Yerox.

At supper, they would be first meeting Eliza back outside headquarters, then they planned to dine with Thwart, and discuss plans for the extinguishing of the prison-mate rebellion that’d been brewing on the minority planet. Then they planned to set off sometime next week.

Or, Yasmin thought to herself, as Jay banged his head down on the counter of the bar, and his glass smashed on the floor, probably next month at best.

§§§

“Sir, you wanted to see me?” Eliza asked meekly, as she slipped seemingly unnoticed into Thwart’s office. He was looking out from the window, and waved her in lazily.

“Come in, Officer Quintelle. I’ve been expecting you.”

Eliza wanted to roll her eyes, but she daren’t, simply out of courtesy for her elder. “I gathered that.” She paused thoughtfully. “Why did you want to see me, sir?”

He turned around, and she gasped, purely from shock. “Sir, you’ve…you’ve…”

“Shrunk?”

She nodded timidly. “How, sir?”

He stood up, in his now comically-oversized suit, the sleeves literally hanging off his child-like figure. “It’s those damn smegheads from Yerox. They’ve turned the anti-ageing formulae to their own ends.”

She kept quiet.

“There’s nothing I can't do now, Eliza. There’s no way to reverse the formula’s actions. At least, not in this context.”

She stepped forward a minute step, and curtsied politely before she spoke again. “Sir, why ever not? Is there not another part of the formula to stop the internal ageing. Surely, sir, you can simply just…grow up again. Can’t you?”

He shook his head sorrowfully. “I wish. No, they’ve only got the half of the formula. And I can’t risk going to Yerox for the other part. It’s too smegging dangerous.”

“Um…is there anything I can do for you?”

He placed two equally firm hands on her shoulders, and looked eagerly not her eyes, a dark viciousness brewing behind his own silkier, childish exterior. “Yes, yes there is.”

He paused, and let go do her, walked around away from his desk, to the glass cabinet of weapons that hung high on the back wall. “This, my sweet, is my prized munitions collection. These weapons have never, ever come out from this box. Today is when they do.”

Eliza stepped back cautiously, as he carefully unlocked the cabinet, and gingerly handed her a jewel-encrusted dagger, before unhanding it back into the glass confines of the cabinet as hastily as it had been removed. “Sir-”

He cut her off as he sat down again, and smiled precariously back at her.

“You deserve better, Eliza. ”

“How do you mean, sir?”

“Those two - Yasmin and Jay - they treat you like smeg.”

“So?”

“So you need to teach them a lesson. A hard lesson.”

“…Are you suggesting mutiny, sir?”

He nodded.

“If those two are at supper tonight, you have failed.”

She fidgeted uneasily.

“Eliza? Do you hear me?”

She bowed shortly.

“Yes sir.”

He stopped her just as she went to leave.

“Oh, and Eliza?”

She turned back to face him. “Yes sir?”

He looked up sneakily.

“I know there’s a hologram in the crew that’s caused trouble for me in the past. There’s a sturdy holowhip in Adimar’s munitions cabinet.”

§§§

“Are we almost ready?” Yasmin asked, peeved off, as she finished buttoning up her blouse, and walked into the drive room. “I want to get down there a little early, so we can get a few things sorted…”

Jay was standing over by the controls, playing the fool with the replacement Lily. He shook his head as she entered, and took a seat down beside him as Wizzy walked in behind him, and Yasmin gasped out as she opened the munitions cabinet. It was empty.

“Smegging hell! Someone’s taken my jewelled knife. And the holowhip!”

Jay tuned to his sister, her face still a pale pearly white. She dug further into the ambient, and fainted clean away. “My drink!”

He turned back to see Eliza standing in the doorway, bottle in hand.

“Wizzy? You’re here early?”

She nodded innocently.

“Wizzy? You okay?”

She nodded again.

OOC - This will be edited soon. Am going to go play Minecraft now.