RP: YSS Miharu Prologue, Day 3

((OOC: Sorry for the wait for my post, working Nekocon staff this year.))

After moving a few lighter containers to their proper places, Masako gazed upon the black matte object in confusion. "What's this?" she mumbled as she walked over to it with a curious eye. "I don't think I've seen this before." Stopping about a meter from it, she crossed her arms under the breasts and began to examine it visually, walking around it as she did.

"He should be done shortly. Saito had Tom go next while James was deciding on how his new body upgrade would appear." Nyton said as he followed Yukari up to the special rice box and decided on which box he would carry.

"New body, eh? Poor guy." Overhearing the conversation, Leutre walked over and greeted Nyton with a friendly pat on the shoulder. "I heard rumor they're forcing outsiders switch bodies. But it isn't true... Is it?" He gave them both an nervous look as he began to fidget with his uniform.

James shrugged and stripped down, noting that the air suddenly seemed quite a bit colder.

"Right then. Time to boldy go where I have never gone before."

Nyton turned away from Leutre as though he hadn't heard the inquiry. Before too long however he turned his head enough to show only a quarter profile of his face. With his mask firmly set in place Nyton hid any obvious signs of his opinion regarding the restriction outside of any inflection in his voice. "The rumors are somewhat true. To be exact only Nekovalkyrja and Yamataians are authorized to serve in the military. Nepleslians have until the end of the year to continue serving. Otherwise we must all have a body transfer to 'upgrade.' At the end of the year we must either upgrade or face disciplinary action." he said with a sort of stern finality to the two last words of his sentence. "However as an added clause to this regulation a soldier can petition for permission to remain as they are on a case by case basis. So there is still hope for those who wish to remain as they are."

Tomi turned away politely during the undressing process. "I was going to get Freeman-heisho out before you stripped... but then I suppose you don't have anything he hasn't seen already. Or so I would hope. If you'd prefer he not see you, go into the examination room and draw the curtain." With that, she reached down and gently shook Tom's shoulder. "Come on, nap time's over."

Leutre sat down on a nearby box and rubbed his chin as he pondered what Nyton said. "I admit a new body does sound nice. But I'll be damned if I give anyone in the Star Army the opportunity to tinker with my head." Leutre muttered the last sentence almost angrily, but when he realized to whom he was speaking he quickly added, "Erm, no offense to present company, of course."

"We're all born with a spark of madness, you see. The part of us that wants to sing and dance and curse and scream. But from what I've seen of the Star Army, they seem..." Leutre frowned and he searched for the words to explain it. "They seem... Rather fond of extinguishing such sparks. Call me superstitious, but I don't trust the whole body changing process. If theres even the slightest chance a new body will cause me to start thinking like the rest of you Yamataians and Nekovalkyrjas... Well, you might as well toss me out the airlock now."

Mara noisily set down the container she had been carrying and stalked back to Leutre, her ears flattened back. She didn't look pleased.

"Alright. Let's put an end to this early on then!" She hissed in frustration as she grabbed his forearm and began forcefully tugging him toward the center of the bay, where the ground opened up to space with only an atmospheric field holding the bay's air and pressure. It seemed obvious she was not going to bother with an airlock: why, when when Leutre could just be shoved out through the hole in the floor?

"Wha... huh?"

Tom woke up, groggily moving out of the chair and swaying about. It'd take a few moments before the drugs completely wore off.

"Woah... uh... that was... eh?"

He shook his head a couple times while leaning against the wall. Then the pain set in.

"Agh! This... SUCKS!"

The Yamataian brought his hand up to his temples.

Yukari had been listening as she organized boxes. She had seen, nearly too late, what Mara was up to.

It did not matter that Mara was not entirely serious with carrying out this act of scaring or teaching Leutre. It was not her place.

"Mara!" she called. "Please stop this. It is not for you to do." Yukari began walking toward the pair of them, a slightly hard look on her face.

Mara's eyes came on Yukari for a brief moment and then she abruptly let Leutre go. "You don't want to die, so don't say it in jest." She began saying heatedly. "What's more, you are a citizen of the Yamatai Star Empire. We never forced you into becoming a soldier and hardly have any expectations from you except that you'd try to do your job and do it well. We might be heartless in flesh, but we do have consciences and we certainly don't want to kill you!"

The sprite pointed out through the hole that showed the inner parts of the star fortress, and the stars beyond. "People are dying out there and we need to try hard if we want to fight well and save the lives of our people! If it's too hard for you to cooperate and try to do your job well, then, consider going away quickly before the ship is stuck in the fighting: I don't want to drag you into a battle you were unwilling to fight and I know it'd be the same for everyone!"

Mara turned her head to Nyton, "Right?" and then to Yukari. "Isn't that so?" Unshed tears glimmered in her eyes - the sprite seemed painfully young.

Tomi raised an eyebrow. "Residual pain after the transfer? There's not much I can do for that... But you can lay down on one of the beds in the main area if you need a few moments to recover. To rephrase that," she drew herself up to her full height, adjusting her uniform with a grin, "It is my professional opinion as the ship's acting medical officer that you should not be exposed to a possibly noisy environment like the cargo bay with such a severe headache. It's bad for morale or something."

Yukari came nearly toe to toe with the sandy-haired Neko, not giving Nyton a chance to respond. She looked into the Neko's sky blue eyes, red and full of tears.

"Mara," she said slowly, and in Japanese. "Veressis-Hei is not from our culture. His lessons are his own. You must not place such harshness on him, as it will lead him to believe his own misconceptions of us."

She smiled warmly. "We are all ambassadors of the good spirit of the Empire. That is what we must show."

However, she then turned to face Leutre. Her face was not cold, but was firm. "You serve the Empire, Veressis-Hei. You will accomodate our rules as best you are able, or you will serve it no longer. Is this clear?"

Nyton had watched the event fly by and while he wasn't expressive he was certainly amused after Yukari halted Mara from jettisoning Leutre. The actions of the ship did indeed seem juvenile plus she had interfered with what was obviously something to be handled amongst the personnel and not the ship itself. This ship sprite has a strong almost idealistic belief in what we fight for. Interesting. I wonder if this was programmed in. If so how do they make AI's lean in one direction of a personality or another. he thought to himself.

"He would actually make a decent soldier if he could control these little outbursts of his. That is, if he has a chance to actually learn to do so instead of getting exposed to vacuum." Nyton said in Japanese with a smooth tone to his voice but an equally stern look on his face.

Leutre frowned as he watched the scene unfold before him. Maybe he went a bit too far. "Erm, look, I'm sorry Mara. I, err, didn't mean to offend anyone. My Da always told me, 'Do not fear death so much, but rather an inadequate life.' I think he was right. Everyone dies, but not everyone truly lives. I humbly apologize if that offends you but it's what I believe. It is who I am, and I wouldn't change that for the galaxy."

Leutre bowed to Mara deeply. As he stood back up, he placed a hand on her shoulder and gave her a sincere smile. "But I envy you in a way. While my cause is one of self-preservation, yours is to keep your brothers and sisters from harm. And for that I have the greatest respect, and for that I'll follow the lot of you to the inferno and back if need be."

Turning to Yukari he returned her firm expression in kind. "Da always taught me that crew is family, and this is no exception. I'll do my best to protect them, regardless of whether or not it serves protocol or some silly Empire. If that isn't good enough for you, then go ahead and toss me out the air--" Leutre suddenly became silent as he realized what he was saying, and smiled apologetically. "Err, then go ahead and toss me out of the Star Army, is what I meant to say."

Yukari, thankfully, was used to looking up at people. She did not flinch from Leutre.

"Protocol will, at times, keep us alive. And it is in many instances important to this crew. Be respectful of it, please, and the crew will respect your way of life in turn. That is part of being with a crew."

Not giving him the chance of a rebuttal, Yukari turned and looked at Nyton with a small smile. "Your Japanese is much better than I had thought," she said, in Japanese of course.

Mara looked at the three as the situation seemed to diffuse itself and then returned to listlessly moving the cargo around.

Nyton watched Mara go off to tend to cargo and listened as they talked things out. Leutre still seemed rather upset but for now was back in control of himself. Yukari had handled things very well in his eyes. He figured he could talk to Leutre later about solutions regarding the restriction if the topic came up again. "I became more fluent while I attended the Kyoto War College. Something I knew I would need to do during my training there." he said, again in Japanese.

"It's also in the professional medical opinion of the medical officer that you keep your eyes locked front unless you want an eyeful," James hollered over his shoulder as he deftly went behind the curtains and pulled them shut.

"I wonder how it feels, waking up in a new body. I hope it won't take too long to get used to. I'd assume it wouldn't go over well to still be figuring things out in the middle of a vacuum while being shot at."

With the situation behind them Nyton decided they should go ahead and get back to work. "I'll talk to him about his options regarding the new reg later, so don't worry about him." Nyton told Yukari in Japanese quickly before he walked over and picked up a box with some miscellaneous supplies. With a step over to Leutre he looked at him and gestured to the box he had been carrying before his near fatal exposure incident. "Well, the boxes aren't going to unload themselves and you have not been tossed out of the army yet. Let's get back to work, eh?" he said with a more light hearted expression to Leutre as a sign to indicate that this scene was over. "At this rate the twins are going to out do us." he said humorously.