Wow! A longer fic by A Tymes. Now this I got to see:

Parting a Cloudy Future

Written by Adrian Tymes

"It really has been too long," Kiyone muttered to herself.

Now that sounds like a challenge for... A SPAMFIC!

Just kidding.

"Yep!"  Mihoshi smiled, enjoying the irony.  "The Emperor of Jurai
*officially* asked us to visit his daughter.  We're *officially*
unofficially on leave."

Heh.

"I wish."  Kiyone pulled her jacket a little tighter, hoping that the
gently building wind and the clouds on the horizon would not break into
storm before they could take shelter in Tenchi's house.  "It's probably
just retrieving some artifact or documents that can't be safely
transmitted.  He trusts us since we helped save his throne, so he pulled
some strings to get the most secure couriers he could."

Besides, even Fed Ex couldn't deliver.

"Nah, he wouldn't do that.  Would he?"

that, would he?" (I think)

"Mihoshi..."  A gust blew her teal hair right up to the corner of her
smile.  "I know you're not actually that naive.  Even if you won't ever
admit it, even to yourself."

"What do you mean?"

Kiyone: See? That proves my point.

Mihoshi: What does?

Kiyone: See? You're doing it again.

Mihoshi: Doing what again?

etc. etc

"Forget it.  C'mon, let's go find Ayeka, and don't let me forget we've
got that message to deliver to Ryoko as well."

Mihoshi: Message. I thought he wanted us to deliver her a massage.

Kiyone: See, you're doing it again. Besides, that silly. It was a typo. Why
would the Emperor want us to give her a masage.

[On the Imperial Throneworld]

Azusa: I hope those two I sent remember to give Ryouko that massage. I'd
hate to have to execute them for failing me.

the street lights' photo sensors had tripped, turning them on and
illuminating cones of water droplets just as they finished their
kamikaze plunges to the streets and sidewalks.  It was a metaphor Ryoko
found entirely too appropriate to the scene at hand.  For not the first

Awkward. I'd reword this.

But the money...yes, the money was there, and it spent as well as any
money.  Better, even, than bills or goods she stole, for those could be
tracked, so some forms of spending were closed off.  This money was as
close to honest as she got, and she would need it if she was to be
truly worthy of a future Emperor's affection.  Sooner or later, she knew
Ayeka would resort to trying to buy Tenchi's love...and while she
doubted that tactic would succeed, it would be less likely to if she
were not a total pauper.

Heh. Nice looking into Ryouko's mind.

Still, as she left a plastic bag with the

dog poo, which she thought was a great joke.

on top of a

garbage can in an alley and backed away, she wondered just how many
non-Earthlings there were on this planet.  She had thought that, once
the Galaxy Police duo left, all the remaining ones had been living at
Tenchi's house.  But here was definitely not there.  She was pretty sure
that someone who knew to ask for this merchandise by name, and who could
pay - and pay quite well - in Jurai scrip, was definitely not native to
this planet.

One would assume if they are using off world tender, yes.

Her customer trudged forward in the shadows.  A camo cloak foiled her
sight, even infrared and ultraviolet, to only a slightly lesser degree
than the alley's shadows provided concealment for both her and her
client from any natives wandering by.

End was awkward. I'd reword that as well, but nothing is coming to mind.

 All Ryoko had ever seen was a

gloved hand, and written communication.

Oh?

Ryoko suspected that what she

faced was actually a drone robot,

Which means it isn't.

controlled by the customer from some

distance away; certainly, the figure seemed to be much smaller than a
normal person.  Perhaps, in the light, it could even pass for an
innocent child, which no one would suspect of carrying poison.

Sasami, then. Wonder why, though.

Ryoko could not shake that impression.  Yes, her merchandise had many
legitimate medical uses.

Mostly for legal medical death used to execute prisoners.

Yes, some people used it their entire lives

with no ill effects - so long as they never ever tried to withdraw.

Heh. Quite the catch.

 But

far more people had suffered side effects, or gone too long without a
dose, and...well, more than once, she had let non-payers simply go
without, and took her rightful money from their corpses.

Nasty stuff, all right. What is it? Hallucinogenic?

The wind howled as Kiyone knocked on the door.  Though she could not
see them, she had felt a few specks of cold

'water' would be better, I think

One minute stretched into an impatient eternity, and Kiyone had to look
at her watch to confirm that sixty seconds were not actually half an
hour.  It would be just her luck to come all this way only to find out
that the Masakis were on vacation and Ayeka was actually here to compare
Earth trees to Juraian ones instead of just hang around Tenchi and...

Oh? So she's here to see Sasami? Didn't realize that.

A clap of thunder muted the door's hinges as Tenchi opened the door.

"You rang, Mith?" he lisped, going with the ambiance the storm provided.

dressed for colder weather, with only a t-shirt and shorts to ward off
the chill, but even so Kiyone had to wonder how much of Mihoshi's
goose bumps were due to the cold and how much were because she had an
excuse to cuddle Tenchi again.

I don't really recall her cuddling him in the TV series all that much,
though from her fantasy world in Washuu's failed experiment it does appear
she is attracted to him, since they were married.

"She's out shopping.

"For drugs. She's bringing us some blow. Want to try it with us?" Tenchi
offered.

"Oh, lemme see!"  Mihoshi dropped her cup and snatched up the pad.
Tenchi and Kiyone simultaneously grabbed the thankfully empty cup before
it could shatter.

Heh. They know her.

 Tenchi let go, allowing Kiyone to set it down in

front of her partner.

Kiyone then looked up to berate Mihoshi, but froze when she saw the look
on her face.

"That's...but he...but..."

"Someone ressurecred Kain AGAIN? Everyone does that to him or Kagato in
these fics! Can't they come up with someone original?" Mihoshi whined.

Ayeka nodded.  "Well...you know the Galaxy Police charter?"

Kiyone: By heart. 'Everyone is guilty of something. It's just a question of
how long it takes to beat the truth out of them.'

"Yes, quite."  The princess looked at the table, off into space,
anywhere that would not meet Kiyone's gaze.  "Particularly the article
that says if over two thirds of those worlds served by the Galaxy Police
no longer want their protection, the GP are to disband immediately?"

Heh. That could be bad.

Kiyone froze in mid-nod, and gulped.  She could tell where this was
going, though her every emotion screamed out in protest that there had
to be some way it would not be as bad as it seemed.  "Yes.  That's to
guard against the GP ever becoming corrupt or obsolete.  If we become
more of a hindrance than a help, we have no right to exist."

Except to take over the galaxy.

"A few hours ago," Ayeka quickly interjected to keep Kiyone from sinking
too far into depression, "my father decreed that the Juraian Empire no
longer wishes the Galaxy Police's protection,

Oh ho. So it's his doing.

 and presented a signed

statement with a number of other nations concurring.

Obviously they know when to toe the line.

Ayeka gestured to the pad in Mihoshi's hands.  "That's got a complete
list of the specific events and problems, but it boils down to
corruption and abuses.  In fact, he specifically mentions you as an
example of what the typical Galaxy Police officer is *not*, and as such
offers you and a few other ex-officers, including Mihoshi, citizenship
in our empire as a means of sanctuary from, and I quote, 'the many
enemies that such a model of what police should be, has undoubtedly
acquired during her service in that organization'."

Well, that's nice. I suppose it makes sense after the TV Kagato incident
that this would happen. Interesting fallout I have never seen happen before.

Kiyone doubled over, her tears flowing freely as her body shuddered from
her sobs.  Ayeka caught her before her head could hit the table, and
propped her on the princess's shoulder, embracing the former officer and
murmuring soothing noises.

Touching on Ayeka's part.

"We're free."  The corners of Mihoshi's lips and eyes floated slowly
upwards on her face, almost as if they had just activated their own
anti-grav units.

Hmm. Interesting reaction. Let's see how well you handle it.

"We don't serve anyone, anymore.  And with the Galaxy Police gone, the
Yagami and everything in it is OURS!"  She raised a fist in triumph as
an expression of pure joy lit up her face.  "We're rich!"

Interesting. She never seemed that material.

"I thought the Yagami always belonged to Kiyone."

Why? I never say any indication of that, other than that was the ship she
arrived in.

"Well..."  Mihoshi pulled her fist down and rested her chin on it.
"Technically, but they helped her pay for it, so there was some
question.  But there's more: a couple days ago, we helped take down a
despot on Sylat 4.  Our spaceship was the largest Galaxy Police ship
present, so his personal fortune was loaded onto the Yagami to take back
to base as evidence.

Oh. Hehehe.

 We'd just gotten back and resupplied when we were

told to report here immediately, so it's still in our cargo bay.  And
that's in addition to all the weapons and equipment we were
issued...though I'm not sure if we want to sell those.  In fact, I think
some of our friends knew what was about to happen, so they stashed some
artifacts on our ship to make sure they never fell into the wrong
hands."

Since theirs were the 'right hands'. :)

"And how it's got all kinds of other dangerous criminals who are
supposed to be locked away for life?"

Which Kain has probably consumed since. :)

"Ye..."  Tenchi blinked.  "Are you telling me *that* gateway is on the
Yagami?!?  It's HERE?!?!?"

"Umm, no."

Hehe. Cute.

Tenchi found he had leaned forward almost into Mihoshi's chest, and
willed himself to sit upright again.  "Anything dangerous?"

"No more than usual.  For instance..."

"A Shihana flower. It's perfectly safe, as long as you don't let it out of
its containment unit on a world with any form of life, as it will then
blossom and kill everything with its spores, right down to the smallest
microbe."

 She pulled out her cube.  "The

complete blueprints for these things.  I think we're expected to sell
them to the highest bidder, so they'll be made for everyone rather than
the designs just being lost."

Actually it depends on who can afford the items in question to ensure they
have them. :)

"No," Ayeka interrupted.

"Huh?"

"Ahem.  As the First Princess of Jurai, on a world claimed by the
Juraian Empire, and with the legal powers conferred by Galaxy Police
membership no longer in effect, you are technically on this planet by my
leave only.  My word is law.

'you two are my bitches now,' Ayeka assured them.

 And I have been ordered by the Emperor

himself to keep an eye on you both until either you leave this planet
or, preferably, accept our offer of citizenship.

since I will have to kill you otherwise.

Mihoshi instinctively stood up and followed Kiyone, but Tenchi's firm
grip on her wrist and his disapproving look froze the blonde in her
tracks.  "But..."

"She'll be fine," Tenchi reassured her.  "Besides,

"you want to have sex with me, don't you?"

"Only if I get to use the razor and shaving cream this time," Mihoshi
informed him.

 I think it might be

for the best if you told Ayeka about anything on the Yagami that might
possibly be have been held for Jurai by the Galaxy Police."

"We have the Declaration of Rights for all free beings in the Empire."
Mihoshi said.

"Oh, that useless document. Burn it," Ayeka said dismissively.

"Are you sure?  I mean, ok, I'll give you a list, but the two saplings
that someone stole from your Royal Nursery probably need better care
than we've been giving them, and I'm sure you'll want to change the
control codes for your battleships we intercepted from some pirates, and
we got enough of the tree fungus someone was going to defoliate Jurai
with that you can make an antidote but there's still quite a few doses
somewhere out there, and..."

Business as usual, then. :)

"Fair warning: I put in some neural manipulation fields to help me keep
my mind focused on my work.  They'll probably trigger for you too.  So
don't think you're going strange if you cycle through what you're going
to feel faster than you think you should."

Heh. Quick way to deal with things, I suppose.

Kiyone's mind archived the fact, but her seat of consciousness was in no
shape to process it.

"If...when...you need someone to talk to, I've been there, and I'll be
here.  But for now, the door on your left.  And if it helps, I'm sorry
anyone has to go through what you're going through."

Bah. She can become a bounty hunter. She'll have more free reign to do what
she wants and she'll still be doing the same thing.

The faintest flicker of a smiled

smile

 briefly graced the corner of Kiyone's

lips, as she trudged off towards the indicated portal.  Through it, she
found an empty field, grass covering gently rolling foothills as far as
the eye could see.  Idly, she realized this must be one of the planets
in Washu's pocket dimension: far above, a bright spot among white,
fluffy clouds indicated the local sun's position.  The air was utterly
still, and the temperature perfectly balanced between warm and cool.

And what exactly is the 'perfectly balanced' temperature beetween warm and
cool, since different people regard different temperatures as being warm and
cool? :P

What Kiyone did not see was the pollen in the air, tuned specifically to
her biology to tempt her towards a nap.

My. Washuu moves fast. Had the set up in place.

>From a one-way observation

portal, Washu watched her part experiment, part mercy mission unfold as
Kiyone laid down and let slumber overtake her.  Only once the subject's
brainwaves confirmed sleep did Washu allow the dream altering machine
hovering nearby to uncloak and settle into place.  It was not just for
the sake of science that Washu had brushed off her prototype
psychological shock reducer.  The focused expression of what some might
call pious hope, were it on a face other than Washu's, showed that it
was not merely to get her name associated with another radical invention
that she now tweaked and twisted the images in Kiyone's mind, trying to
give her some inner peace.

No offence, but this seems a bit of a cop out. People lose jobs, it's true,
but I hardly think the need for mind altering devices to limit their sorrow
over it is necessary. Now if Kiyone proved unable to deal with it for a
prolonged period of time, I could see resorting to this tactic. But as it
stands, Washuu's meddling is over the line IMO.

******

To Tenchi, people like Azusa and his grandfather were always calm,
unflappable types.  Even in the most dire of crises - especially then,
in fact - they were the centers of calm and peace, their hearts as solid
as rocks.  They only ever allowed themselves to show positive emotion,
such as humor or joy

When did Azusa show those?

"No," Azusa interrupted, "I think it best that we use our own couriers
for such sensitive cargo.  Some of these things, if word even got out
that they were not in our possession for even a second..."  He sighed.
"And handing them over here is out of the question.  Too many people
would see.

Emperor of the Galaxy and he has no secret places for doing dirty deeds
(dirty being a relative term)?

Ayeka, I shall send Misaki in a fast shuttle.  Expect her in

ten hours."

"My mother?"  Ayeka blinked.  "Umm...begging your pardon, but would not
Funaho be a better choice?  She is the head of Juraian Intelligence,
after all."

"Indeed.  But the mere fact of a royal shuttle will prevent any inquiry
as to its contents, and speed is of greater importance."

Funaho doesn't use a royal shuttle? Or is the implication there are more
eyes watching the Minister of Intelligence than the somewhat ditzy Captain
of the Royal Bodyguard. (I think that was Misaki's title)

 He smirked.

"You seem to have forgotten about your mother's piloting skills.  Even
our best computers can not navigate hyperspace well enough to reach
Earth from Jurai in under a week."

"I wonder why. I always do it in under four days," Mihoshi mentioned.

Azusa nodded.  "You are quite perceptive, young lady, although I was
thinking more along the lines of bodyguards for Ayeka...and, after the
marriage, Tenchi."

Mihoshi: Oh wow, Tenchi's getting married and he didn't tell anyone. Who's
going to be the bride?

"Which will only make her all the more loyal," Azusa replied.  "Besides,
the Emperor of Jurai has traditionally had two wives,

Ayeka said, "Actually I was planning on ending that tradition, as was
Tenchi. Right, Tenchi?"

Tenchi noted that despite the fact it was a yes or no question, the way
Ayeka said indicated there was only one answer.

and if you object

to Ryoko that strongly, I suspect Mihoshi may make as good a second as
Misaki has."

Mihoshi: I was thinking more along the lines of Kiyone being the second one,
myself.

Ayeka cast a glance at Mihoshi, sizing her up.  "I can not argue with
you there.  They do seem to be soul mates."

Ayeka's impying Mihoshi and Tenchi are soul mates? That's a surprise, or
does she think Mihoshi would simply be easy to manipulate.

"Like I said.  My son may have decided to live out his years on Earth,
but I will not let his decision shorten your life so severely.  Sooner
or later, you will come to Jurai and live at least a decade here.  I
hesitate to offer even such a short interval, but I fear you would never
agree to a suitably longer term, at least until you have been here for a
while.  You will shed your limited perspective, much as a butterfly
sheds its cocoon.  Only then will you be able to make an informed
decision about your future...and perhaps only then will you truly
appreciate the depth of my dear Ayeka's feelings for you."

Later, as Azusa had hoped, after a decade on Jurai Tenchi did indeed shed
his limited perspective of the universe. However, his broadened perspective
told him the universe was full of twits and only he was fit and powerful
enough to rule. So after assassinating Azusa and making himself Emperor,
Tenchi went on a holy crusade to bring the entire universe under his 'fair
and just' rule, which only ended up annihilating 18% of the galaxy's
population before it was entirely under his sway.

"..."

"This is not an option, child.  I fear that may poison your feelings
against the experience, and against me, but I will not let my own blood
live in the primitive ignorance of Earth

in Earth (I think)

Tenchi shook his head.  "What he said was GAAH!"

Ayeka chuckled politely as Mihoshi launched herself across the table to
tackle-snuggle

Heh. I like that term.

The darkness of the underground suited her mood just fine.  She could
hear the rain impacting the surface just above.  Judging by the sound,
it was mostly water hitting water by this point, probably up to fifty or
sixty millimeters deep in some puddles.

Interesting perspective from down there.

******

Tenchi was just managing to gulp down some air despite Mihoshi's embrace
when

air, despite... embrace, when

"Heehee...that tickles!"  Ryoko pulled him a little higher, so his face
would not get in the way of a tighter hug.

Heh. Cute.

"Ahem."  Ayeka waddled closer on her knees, preparing to grab Tenchi
away if necessary.  "If you hadn't noticed, Ryoko, we *do* have
company."

"Hmm?"  Ryoko glanced down.  "Oh, sorry Mihoshi, I thought Ayeka looked
a little different.  Have you heard about the GP yet?"

"She has."  By now, Ayeka's knees were on Mihoshi's back, keeping the
blonde pinned to the floor.

Oh? Why is she so determined to leave her there?

 Instead of struggling, though, Mihoshi just

closed her eyes, smiled, and let out a slow sigh.

"Oh.  Well, sucks to be you."

That's a bit cold, even if Ryouko is in a foul mood, which she isn't.

"Wha?"  The princess looked down, saw Mihoshi under her knees, and began
to move off her.  "Oh, sorry, I didn't-"

Hmm. Odd mistake.

"Nooo," Mihoshi moaned, "please don't stop."

"What?"

"You're giving *such* a good backrub..."

hehehehe. Nice.

"..."

"But could you go a little higher?  Just beneath my ribcage would be
perrrfect..."

Very nice.

through the odds, finally settling on what seemed the most likely: Ryoko
caught Ayeka and Tenchi in a compromising position, and negotiated that
into letting her claim Tenchi's virginity - possibly with Ayeka watching
or even shamed into assisting.  Nodding to herself on her stakeless
internal bet, she opened the door, readying a few choice comments
depending on the angle presented to her.

Heh. How cynical for so young a child. Not that I blame her.

Ryoko lazily lifted her head from Tenchi's chest, where the pair lay in
front of the fire in the fireplace.  Then she looked at Ayeka and
Mihoshi, the latter of whom was clearly blissed out from the former's
ministrations.  "Ohoho, it's like *that*, is it?"

Ryouko: Can I join in?

Ayeka blushed, getting back to her work after a short pause.  "Now, now,
Ryoko.  Clearly Sasami thought I would reserve this treatment for
Tenchi, since he is much more deserving of my touch than of yours.  But
I have not given a massage in a while, and I would not wish to injure
Tenchi with a rusty technique."

"Sure, sure, make all the excuses you want."

Just what I was thinking.

Sasami saved Tenchi from having to answer by loudly sighing and starting
to march towards the kitchen.  "Just...keep it down.  All of you."

Sasami: I need a hit of blow.

"But you said Misaki's coming."

"Trust me.  You can go faster in hyperspace than in normal space; mommy
pushes that to its limit."

It'll be a Mihoshi like landing then.

Sure enough, with a blast of wind, a hyperspace portal appeared just
above the lake's surface, disgorging a sleek shuttle that Tenchi swore
he had seen in some science fiction movie two weeks ago.

Actually it was probably some incident from last week that his mind has
recatagorized as being from a movie, which is what his life is like now.

 The shuttle

gracefully but quickly hovered to dry land and set down...upside down.
A hatch on its side irised opened after a few minutes, out of which
tumbled Misaki, landing on her feet.

"MOMMY!"  Sasami jumped up and ran to meet her mother.

"SASAMI!"  Misaki ran just as fast, meeting and hugging halfway between
shuttle and porch.

Misaki: Did you get your mommy some smack?

"Waiting upstairs."  Tenchi nudged a scooted to the side, followed by
Ryoko.  "She should coming through the door any second..."

"MISAKI!"

"MIHOSHI!"

hehehehe. Yeah. I can see that.

Sasami smiled, backing away a bit.  "It's nothing, mommy."

Mommy (I think it should be capitalized this way. Same goes for later uses
of it.)

Misaki frowned.  "You've never been able to lie to me, dear.  Show me."

And so it's about to hit the fan.

Misaki peered at the bag closely.  "Stims?"

"Uh-oh."  Ryoko hefted Tenchi up and back through the wall.  "Trust me,
we do *not* want to be present for this."

"My little girl has been taking stims?"

Misaki: And not sharing? Bad Sasami! You're grounded for a month.

"No, mommy."

"Then why do you have them?"

Sasami began bawling her eyes out. "They're Ayeka's! She's been making me
buy them for her. And Ryoko's been selling them to me to give to her!" On
the inside, Sasami grinned evilly. Now, with both Ryouko and her sister out
of the way, Tenchi would belong to just her and Mihoshi, just the way
Mihoshi had told her it would go when the blonde came up with the plan.

"Umm, Misaki, ma'am?"  Mihoshi held out her hand.  "I don't suppose
you'd let me hold onto those while you work this out?"

Ah. Mihoshi wants the hit.

"Certainly not!  This is a matter between mother and daughter.  Please
stay out of it."

"But..."

"No buts.  I'm not going anywhere until we get this resolved."

Sasami looked up.  "Even if it starts to rain?"

"..."  Misaki sighed in defeat.  "Well, ok,

okay (always spell it out)

******
just in time to see this scene, decided to warm up the tea from earlier
to see if she could play peacemaker - both between Misaki and Sasami,
and between Misaki and Mihoshi.

Which had her concerned.  Mihoshi seemed to be extremely upset at Misaki
for some reason, and growing more so by the minute.

Hmm. Wonder why.

"Mihoshi..."  Kiyone put a hand on the blonde's shoulder...

...only to feel it get shrugged off immediately.

"..."  Kiyone studied Mihoshi's expression, especially her eyes' tight
focus on the drugs.  "It's you, isn't it?  Sasami was getting them for
you, because you're addicted to them."

Ah. I see now. Interesting.

"No...please..."  Mihoshi opened her eyes, meeting Kiyone's hard gaze.
"If I tell you...you'll hate me..."

"I'll hate you worse if you don't."

"...and yourself..."

Hmm. Sounds bad, all right.

"At first it was ok.

okay

 They assigned me to more and more difficult cases,

and most of the time the toughest cases were also the least
questionable.  So-and-so has a battleship and went pirate.  There's a
hit man on this other planet who's already killed five of our agents.
And so on.  But not always.

Ah. So the GP have been doing the dirty tricks for the universe. Intersting.

"I was still in orbit when they blew up the whole city, just to
eliminate one man.  I think they thought I'd already left.

Seems a bit extreme. Even if they wanted to corner the market on the drug,
worst case scenario is everyone gets it and the playing field remains level.
It's a waste of resources and time, as well as leaving the possiblity
someone will sniff out what they were doing.

"After that...I had a chance to turn things around, right then.  I
could've gone to the news nets with what I'd found.  I could've tried to
reform the system from within.  Maybe...*maybe*...I could've even taken
out every corrupt officer at gunpoint and installed an honest chain of
command.  I seriously thought about that, even checking my combat scores
against the senior officers'.  I might just have been good enough to
actually pull it off.  But I wimped out.

Since she couldn't control the new officers coming in, odds are the system
would have reverted to its previous state

"I was too scared to actually do anything, but I knew the more I did for
them, the worse it would be in the end.  I was afraid that if I left,
they wouldn't let me live for long with what I knew, e

Considering the vaped a city out of spite, probably.

"Not as much as you think.  At least, the evaluations did not blame you
for my mistakes at all.  But I am the reason you didn't get promoted.

Of course she wouldn't want to get promoted.

"Well...I *am* disappointed."

Mihoshi descended into a full bawl.

"But not angry!"  Kiyone crawled towards her friend and hugged her,
patting her on the back.  "I am not angry at you."

The blonde's crying stopped as abruptly as it started.  "Thank you."

Not the way I expected things to go from the beginning. Interesting turn of
events so far.

Misaki smiled.  "That's all he had to do.  Without the protection of the
organization, most of the senior officers are now prime targets for
local law enforcement, especially bounty hunters.  I imagine that more
than half of them are dead by now.

This is way too simple a scenario. If the GP had the resources this
indicates, at the very least their commanders had bolt holes planned, if not
a scheme to keep enough GP resources to protect themselves from any
individual planets or systems. If they were this reviled, something would
have happened sooner. There are other reasons are well, but this comes first
to mind. On the other hand, dealing with the GP's leftover reminents isn't
really the focus of the fic, so it can be overlooked.

 >

"I overachieve at everything, don't I?  I'm even more pathetic than you
are."

Heh. Now that's a mean thing to say.

"Oh, that's right!"  Mihoshi smiled.  "We were going to warn her that
the GP knew about her drug dealing so would she please stop.  Umm...I
guess that's kind of unimportant, now."

"Unimportant for you, perhaps.  But Earth is going to have enough
problems without drug dealers prowling its cities.

Ah, it already has plenty of those.

  We've never been

able to spare our own resources to protect this planet from the likes of
them, so we relied on the GP to do it for us.  That's one of the few
good things they did."

Wonder why. You figure it would have been a market for them to exploit,
unless they think the entire planet is worthless.

"Petition?"  Kiyone caught herself falling off of Mihoshi's shoulder.
"That's a roll of the dice and you know it.  Get a random examiner, with
odds against one who can put the facts ahead of personal prejudice for
or against so-called 'savages'.  No offense, but you really ought to
think of fixing that system."

Misaki: Watch it, dear. This is still an empire, and my hubby still runs it.
He doesn't care much for criticism, and people have disappeared for lesser
reasons than insulting him.

"Mihoshi..."

"At least, not now.  Whatever it is, do both of us a favor and get a
good night's rest, then think about it in the morning, ok?"

okay

And she's right. Best to mull things over, then kill all of her former
superiors. :)

"So...Sasami told her?"

"No.  I did.  Which reminds me, I have one last official duty to carry
out."  Kiyone cleared her throat.  "Ryoko Hakubi, the Galaxy Police
officially requests that you immediately cease and desist distributing
stims within this solar system."

Ryouko's still with him? Didn't think you mentioned that.

"Sure."

"I see a dreamer who needs to find some cause to care about."

"Ouch.  Walked into that one."

Yep

The *whap* of flesh hitting flesh echoed for miles.

She had that one coming.

"Yeah, right.  Even if it were true, why should you care?"

"Because she's going to fixate on either you or Tenchi, and Tenchi is
*mine*."

Heh

"..."

"Think about it.  Why, out of all of us, are you the only one who hasn't
fallen in love with him, yet you can understand him better than any of
us sometimes?  'Opposites attract, likes repel.'"

Actually there's no reason why she should fall in love with him. Not every
woman has the same tastes.

"So, what...are you trying to tell me *you're* in love with me too?"

"Hmph.  Well...in an alternate universe, where a certain dashing young
Galaxy Police officer rescued a pirate and wormed her way into the
pirate's heart before anyone else showed up...maybe it would've been
possible.

And there is probably a fic like that out there somewhere. :)

Kiyone stuck her tongue out.  "Bleah.  And what won't make the news for,
oh, at least a day or two is all those technical files that have popped
up on their 'Internet'.  Hyperspace drives, translators, subspace
communicators, basic galactic history texts...all the usual stuff from
standard uplifters' guides, starting from technology they knew a century
ago.

So basically she gave a bunch of kids a host of dangerous toys and is hoping
they don't abuse or misuse them in their rush to play with them. Right.

"I miss her already.  But I finally got away with calling her 'mother'."

Nice touch.

"Well, except for the fact that she didn't start shooting at me."

"Oh.  Oh, well, I say we hang around this planet and see how it takes
off.  Maybe even 'invent' some of the basics you 'forgot' to upload."

"Huh?  I put out the entire uploader's manual."

"Which never seem to include weapons,

Oh, human's are inventive. I'm sure they can convert completely innocent
items into weapons given enough time and desire. :P

your new job."

"What's that?"

Peals of thunder from another storm in the distance threatened to drown
out Ryoko's words, but the pirate waited for them to quiet down before
replying.  "It's going to be a looong time until your next vacation."

And here we go with the final analysis. Didn't like the whole 'Make Earth
advanced and part of the Empire stuff.' Too forced, unncessary to the
integral plot of the stims, truth about the GP, and about Mihoshi. That was
the interesting stuff, seeing the characters interact at their reactions to
the truth. I think you'd be better off having ending it early with Kiyone
maybe considering how to bring Earth into the fold and making that the
worthy goal she's looking for. What you have here feels rushed and just
tacked on to the end, not flowing well at all with what has come before.
Other than the end, this was a pretty good story I enjoyed looking over.

And that's about all I have to say.

D.B. Sommer



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