Questions

“Well, it’s easy enough to get them to give up some land dudes.” Holly chimed in. “I am their God after all.” He nodded smugly.

“We don’t have Kenneth anymore though to act as a proxy though.” Jay mused.

“Na, I can handle it. It’s not like the Hthssthss are at war with the Thssthss. Or the Ssssss and the Thsshths have managed to get hold of some of the bunker buster nukes that killed Jay in the hymenoptera planet raid. And the Hthssthss certainly haven’t got hold of the old ship to ship laser defence turrets and have set them up…” He tailed off. “Honest.” He added sheepishly.

After a short while longer of arguing the teams had gone their own way. Cass throwing up her arms in frustration and storming off shortly after Holly had started to chip in again. Jade chased after her, mumbling something about not wanting to go anywhere near a laser defence turret any time soon. It didn’t take long for her to catch up to Cass in the Officers lounge. There was the electric sound of pumps whirring and bubbles breaking the surface of water. Jade grinned.

“You know, you won’t find many farming tools in there.” She said with a laugh.

“You never know. There may be a deep and meaningful thesis on the subject of irrigation techniques, hidden in the bottom, that we can give the rodents.” Cass said, easing into the hot tub with a sigh. Self-consciously, Jade stripped off and joined Cass submerged in the agitated waters.

“True.” The Doctor said, flicking the controls to turn the pumps a little higher. There was a long silence, permeated with the sound of the hot-tub whirring away. “We should actually do something to help…” Jade said, beginning to feel guilty.

“Na, I already pointed out the supply decks and the farming supplies store on the promenade. They can’t use all of the stuff down there. Doesn’t matter if they do anyway. The Rodents are sorted for kit.” Cass waved dismissively.

There was a long silence, not uncomfortable, but there was an unasked question in the air. Eventually Jade spoke up.

“So, you really think Brittany will come after us? She knows you pretty well, will the security measures be enough?” She shifted in the pool, deliberately not making eye contact with Cass.

“Honestly? No.” Cass said with a shrug. “We’re the same person. So she’ll know what I would do to hide the ship… Fuck, it’s probably what she’d do.” Cass scowled, thinking back to the trap that her original had set for her in Japan.

“You aren’t her you know.” Jade said with conviction.

Cass made a derisive snort but didn’t say anything.

“From what you’ve said, She’d just let the others blow themselves up on the arboretum. Then she’d laugh about it over a chilled glass of puppy blood or something. I know for a fact that no matter how dismissive you seemed earlier, if the… urm…” Jade fumbled for a word.

“Bollocks?” Cass provided with a question.

“No…” Jade said blushing.

“Shit?” Cass prompted, fishing for another swear word.

“Yeah, thanks… if that hits the fan then you’d be trying to help them.” She paused at this point still seeing the angry scepticism on Cass’ face. “Regardless of whether your motivation is to not be like Her or whatever, then it makes you a different person. Someone she isn’t and could never be.”

“That’s just it isn’t it? No matter what I do. I’ll always still be Her. Her genetic throwback.” Cass spat angrily, sinking up to her chin in the warm water as if she wanted to drown it all out.

“Yeah, I had a friend who used to say that too.” Jade said laughing.

“What?” Cass asked, snapping her head around to glare at Jade.

“Yeah. She was an identical twin. So, she had identical DNA to her sister, and she hated toe woman. She used to cry and moan endlessly about how she had this huge shadow to escape from because her sister was more successful. Worried endlessly about being a better person, more successful, if they had the same make-up or hair style. Turns out, she could never get over the fact her sister, even though they were identical genetically, was actually a different person.” Jade shrugged “I always felt sorry for her really.”

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