Stopped in to a church, I passed along the way
Well, I got down on my knees and I pretend to pray
You know the preacher likes the cold
He knows I'm gonna stay
California dreaming on such a winter's day
The Beach Boys - California Dreamin'
//This takes place during Interlude 3//
START!
The Rigs, Alpha Platform, Medical Area
"...and that's why I fear one day you'll be able to blanket a planet with Aiesu ROM-structs." Luca concluded his rough and thoroughly misunderstood explanation of how ROM-constructs worked to Kaen, spilling more beans than a Nepleslian did on their morning toast. Luca wasn't particularly keen on all the corrections and clarifications Aiesu kept tossing up - they were an impediment to a good story and a very elaborate distraction to keep Aiesu out of the know regarding the VANDR.
"The complex is unusually busy today" the small l'manel frowned. Kaen stood aside Aiesu, pondering visibly the idea of a world filled with Aiesu. His expression shifted through the complete Lorath palette of expression: Mirth, exictement and then finally upon realization disgust as he frowned before trying to laugh it off.
"A world of you would end everything just to prove some stupid point, peep. Mr. Pal... Pavone, have you seen La'al anywhere? She's meant to be doing her job but lately she's been ashore. Every saturday, 9:15, she's on one of the transfer boats into the town. What is she even doing?"
Luca thought for a few moments, looking aside and trying to piece it together. He didn't see Lalah much aside from the occasional report which got delivered personally.
"What has me worried is her job is to manage our secondary sample. It goes missing every time she leaves."
This was news to Luca. "Second sample?" He asked, eyebrow raising at Kaen, then head looking over to Aiesu. "Wait, do you mean another Sourcian?"
"Notable Alien sample, un-recorded Due to the following... Then a big list of things. We call it NADSURF. Its about the size of a fist. Just the core. Dead, for eons. Its radically different from your friend." Kaen explained, but it wasn't setting Luca at any further ease. "Goblins studied it for years before finally releasing it back to the LSDF, deciding it wasn't anything interesting..."
"Do you think she's carrying it with her?" Luca asked. "Where is she - right now?"
"Ashore. Again." Kaen frowned. From the way things had passed, Kaen was surprisingly lenient with La'al. Why though? Luca really wasn't up for speculation with the discovery of a second maesus.
"I could go talk to her right now if you want." He chipped in, before leaning in to Kaen. "She seems to get all knobby kneed around me ... I think she has the hots for me, y'know?"
Kaen pulled his lips into that lopsided old smile that just knew things.
"Thems fighting words. Really though, could you find her? We really need to know what she's doing with her time and were she takes the NADSURF. Its dead so there's no real risk but she wont let it out of her sight." Luca nodded as he started considering the possible locations onshore, then gave Kaen a pat on the shoulder and begun moving...
Sargasso, Spaceport, Pan-CHOW
Elsewhere, Lalah sat at a large table, the silver metal case to her left in the tucked alcove. People walked by, the air hazy and thick with something as meals of strange alien origin to her sizzled and baked in the next room over. Slowly, she searched through her communicator - still getting used to the strange PSG-made interface. Shoulders slumped. Eyes tired, worn with ache and fatigue to the ones.
Slowly, she glanced over her shoulder - grimacing at the sight of some kind of monster, nailed to the wall. It was totally convincing - the blacks of her pupils narrowing visibly as bile built in her throat before the illusion faded and she realized its nature as decor. Stuffed. What she'd later learn was called an alligator had her on edge - her own long tail sweeping beneath the seat as she struggled to get comfortale: the girth of the scaled limb problematic in the booth-like seats.
Nepleslia was a strange flavor. It would be a while before she got used to it.
And then it came. The most perfect thing she had ever seen. Golden, rounded, browned. Perfectly proportioned, reaching up from its white ivory canvas like a tower of sheer love and warmth. It oozed similarly: dancing with glossy sappish amber - dripping and oozing like liquid crystal down into vast caverns in the immense mountainous stacks. The top, clouds touched from the sky, delicately dancing around its rim like the haze of crashing waves - a trophy crowned with strange pink tartish things - glossy and crimson with faint studded green and leaves - sweet precious treasures to mark how proud it was.
And its base kissed her table, met with a tower of some clear strong enamel removing beverage.
She sat in awe, admirng the thing through tired eyes. Horns accentuating the subtle shifts of her head as she went about memorizing the shape of this strange machinaism of love transmision.
The dragon, Luca saw now from a distance had met a new romance in her life. A truer more beautiful feeling than any adult could face and far more nuanced and delicate than any child could comprehend.
"Please enjoy your meal," the server said with a smile. Lalah could feel her tear-ducts welling up as she smiled.
Pancakes are love.
From the other side of the glass on the eatery in the busy Sargasso Spaceport, Luca could see the distinct horns of the lmanel he was looking for. She didn't seem to be doing anything untoward or dodgy, nor was she meeting anyone or waiting - but she did have a lovely looking stack of pancakes which provoked a twinge of envy in Luca.
He spoke into his right hand. "Kaen, I've found her," he said, "alone, I can't see the case from where I am."
On a long chain, the case was cuffed to Lalah's left arm - worn metal twinkling dully as she rose her cutlery. Luca noted this immediately, eyes narrowing as the chain dragged against the edge of the table with a clatter. There was hesitation: taking in the air of her stack and prize before her knife and fork met the thing. Her first portion though delicately held with slender fingers and touch was bliss - eyes half open, seemingly glowing within herself.
Her second was a shaky gouge, ripping into the thing: all semblence of manners and trained behavior vanishing. From time to time, L'manel had the habit of revealing their nature rather than playing kind and friendly. From what Luca could see as he passed through the doors, Lalah was out to kill those pancakes.
Cheeks full, she she set eyes on him as he approached. Fight or flight was visible: arms moving protectively to grasp the case. But she didn't stop eating the pancakes. Visibly he could see she wanted to move but instinct on some level refused to let her. Luca raised a hand for calm, seeing that the lmanel was in a ... more lizard-brained state than the usual professionalism she carried herself with. He pursed his lips, unsure of how she was going to react when he stood far enough from her that she had the clearance to run, but close enough to be visible in the busy diner.
He eyed the empty spot in the booth seating and pointed to it, silently asking if he could sit down. Luca had a gut feeling that the Lorath woman couldn't exactly use words properly, aside from the pleasant complications involved in having a mouth stuffed full of sweet and delicious pancakes.
"Mirshta Palvrone?" Lalah struggled with a full mouth, hands moving to cover herself before clearing her throat. She made a half-hearted salute. She was out of uniform. But still cuffed to the silver case.
Something about how she was trying to remain dignified in the face of being so improper in front of Luca was endearing enough for him to look aside and tell the Lmanel "at ease," before sitting down opposite her in the booth seating, eying the case her other hand was cuffed to. He sat down on the slightly sticky, worn out seating and waited for Lalah to finish her mouthful.
It took her a while before finally downing it - clearing her throat once more now up from deeper tones into something softer with a glass of water. Her lips tightened - eyes firm and forward. Now she knew she was in it. Knee high, probably.
Luca eyed the case first, deciding that there was no avoiding the elephant on the table, chained to Lalah's wrist. "So this is where you go on the weekends?" Luca opened up with, looking around the Pan-CHOW, taking a glance at the menus on the walls, full of deals for guilt-laden food and no questions asked.
"Definitely better than the one on the other side of town," he remembered that one - it was terrible. The pancakes tasted like sheets of lukewarm rubber. Seiren nearly set fire to the place in rage.
Lalah only nodded - fingers gingerly setting her cutlery down as she wiped her mouth. Her eyes every few moments went from him to the pancakes. Too embarrassed to speak, still. Reprimand, any moment surely.
Luca let what he was saying hang for a moment. He could see that she was still enjoying this. "Well, you're not in serious trouble, I don't mind people taking breaks from living on the Platforms so long as they notify people ..."
He then eyed the case. "What I am more concerned about though is you carrying what's in that box around."
"Kaen said it has to be with someone at all times. I don't have the keys to these cuffs."
"Or ... you could leave it back on the base with him." Luca pointed out. "He's someone at all times."
Figuring that he wasn't entirely across what the NADSURF was, or what it even looked like, he slowly begun to slide a hand across the table towards the case.
Lalah pulled on the chain, drawing the case nearer to herself. It was reflex, more than anything.
"It can't be left alone with the same person for too long. We have to take shifts."
"But why?" Luca asked, leaning forward now. "What's so interesting about it? Kaen said it was 'inert', dead." And if it had to change hands every so often, surely he could get a look too.
Hell, what if she's hogging it? Why all the fuss about a ... rock? Luca wondered. "Come on, you can show me what it is. It's not like it's going to run anywhere."
"The case is... Its a PSD scrambler. Nothing's happened yet but... I'd say we're sort of superstitious, really."
He was not up to scratch on his science acronyms. "What's PSD?" Luca asked.
"Um... Psionic Sequence Disruptor. We used it to measure neural activity"
Luca blinked and raised an eyebrow. "Wait, from a rock?" He knew the Lorath really liked rocks for some reason. He saw them dotted around the LSDF's workspace on The Rigs.
"At first we thought it was some kind of machine. We apply a current, it repeats patterns. Like a computer." Lalah explained. "Some of those patterns are on what's called the shumann resonance frequency. Any planet with a magnetosphere has one, you know, a north and a south pole?" Luca nodded and motioned for her to continue, following just.
"Well, I know its a known fact now but the shumann resonance of a planet affects those upon it. Like how when there's an aurora, you can yank the batteries in a radio and it keeps working, because the frequency of the disruption is the same as the radio needs to work? Shumann is the resonance of a world. Something like 7.6 hertz, electrically. Well, that's the same frequency used in neural interfacing gear because its the frequency that when it hits bone cascades with brainwaves - the surface electrical currents of the brain."
"I guess I do feel kinda different when I go from planet to planet, yeah." Luca said, barely keeping up with all of it and more focussed on how the atmosphere and people on a planet were different. "What of it?"
"You can feel it in your bones, right? That first time when someone goes into space and they're beyond its reach and they have that moment that's almost like an epiphany. A religious moment."
"You must mean nearly every day." Luca shrugged. The first time he'd went to space, it was a kick in the balls. The second time, it was a kick in the head. Third time was kicking and flailing, and every other time begun to become more benign and soon he was kicking right back. "It's been a very, very long time. But anyway - yeah, go on?"
"NAU vibrates on the same frequency, electrically..." she said, taking her knife and fork - eyes on her pancakes.
"If its around the same person for too long, the frequency shifts from its normal pattern. As a result, we kind of have to play 'hot potato' with it. We're worried our own brainwaves might kill whatever's left of it."
"Hang on, hang on, how long have you been holding onto the ball then?" He inquired, pointing a finger at the case, which he was still curious about its contents. "What happens if more than one person's walking around with it?"
"It contracts. Gets smaller. Like a clam I guess. We brought it, thinking maybe it was some sort of neural interface. That we could use it to communicate with Rebeka. The existing method isn't really working, is it?"
Luca held up a hand. "Don't remind me." He mumbled. "It's broken the team. The one person she liked the most won't even acknowledge she's gone." He was referring to the Phoenix's resident candyman. Luca slumped down onto the table, resting on his forearms. "The two were practically glued together at the hip, y'know?"
"I know. I've read the reports. Seen photos. Its like she wanted... Wants to be his mother, don't you think?"
Luca seemed satisfied that he'd got everything he wanted out of Lalah, and sighed, burying his nose in his forearms and grumbling in frustration. "All Aiesu thought Rebeka was good for was being a blunt object."
"...Constructs are blunt objects" Lalah frowned.
She sampled pancakes onto her fork, reaching out to offer the forkful to Luca, who looked up and rested his chin on his arms.
Lorath women were known for being particularly condescending to men at the dinner-table but her expression was still polite, warm, friendly.
"I didn't know you could get sugars this refined on Nepleslia." Lalah said.
The Captain sniffed the air just ahead of the pancakes. The strength of the maple syrup woke him up, snapping him out of the funk he'd nearly dug himself into. He bit down on the fork and dragged the pancake chunks off it.
Lalah slid the fork back, her expression melting into syrupy warmth - white lashes nearly falling shut along deep dark skin - teeth flashed cheekily. She was giddy, shuffling the away she sat and already preparing another fork.
"Its good, right? I don't think I've ever eaten anything so rich before. Waffles, pancakes, syrup. Are these your nanational dishes?"
Luca nodded knowingly. "You didn't know? Nepleslia loves its sugary food. Loves a good steak too. Eaten one of those yet?"
Lalah shook her head. "As much as I like it, I try to avoid meat..."
"You a vegetarian or something?" Luca inquired, a little confused given her aspectation.
"Nnnn. Nepleslian meat has a lot of steroids and hormones in it. Its hard enough to keep myself in check with my aspectation as is."
A silence sat between them for a moment.
"Lorath animals don't have the same hormones as Lorath people do.. On Nepleslia, they both smell the same." her voice shifted strangely. Her manner had changed entirely - firm and to the point. "I don't want to develop a taste for Nepleslian..."
It was hard to tell if she was being somber or if this was some sort of lost-in-translation flirting.
Luca knew only one other person who had a taste for Nepleslian, and plenty of people had a taste for Luca - one way or another. He looked aside with crossed arms, perturbed by the idea. "Uhm, erh..." he clicked his tongue, a bit lost for words, "riiight..."
END!
Well, I got down on my knees and I pretend to pray
You know the preacher likes the cold
He knows I'm gonna stay
California dreaming on such a winter's day
The Beach Boys - California Dreamin'
//This takes place during Interlude 3//
START!
The Rigs, Alpha Platform, Medical Area
"...and that's why I fear one day you'll be able to blanket a planet with Aiesu ROM-structs." Luca concluded his rough and thoroughly misunderstood explanation of how ROM-constructs worked to Kaen, spilling more beans than a Nepleslian did on their morning toast. Luca wasn't particularly keen on all the corrections and clarifications Aiesu kept tossing up - they were an impediment to a good story and a very elaborate distraction to keep Aiesu out of the know regarding the VANDR.
"The complex is unusually busy today" the small l'manel frowned. Kaen stood aside Aiesu, pondering visibly the idea of a world filled with Aiesu. His expression shifted through the complete Lorath palette of expression: Mirth, exictement and then finally upon realization disgust as he frowned before trying to laugh it off.
"A world of you would end everything just to prove some stupid point, peep. Mr. Pal... Pavone, have you seen La'al anywhere? She's meant to be doing her job but lately she's been ashore. Every saturday, 9:15, she's on one of the transfer boats into the town. What is she even doing?"
Luca thought for a few moments, looking aside and trying to piece it together. He didn't see Lalah much aside from the occasional report which got delivered personally.
"What has me worried is her job is to manage our secondary sample. It goes missing every time she leaves."
This was news to Luca. "Second sample?" He asked, eyebrow raising at Kaen, then head looking over to Aiesu. "Wait, do you mean another Sourcian?"
"Notable Alien sample, un-recorded Due to the following... Then a big list of things. We call it NADSURF. Its about the size of a fist. Just the core. Dead, for eons. Its radically different from your friend." Kaen explained, but it wasn't setting Luca at any further ease. "Goblins studied it for years before finally releasing it back to the LSDF, deciding it wasn't anything interesting..."
"Do you think she's carrying it with her?" Luca asked. "Where is she - right now?"
"Ashore. Again." Kaen frowned. From the way things had passed, Kaen was surprisingly lenient with La'al. Why though? Luca really wasn't up for speculation with the discovery of a second maesus.
"I could go talk to her right now if you want." He chipped in, before leaning in to Kaen. "She seems to get all knobby kneed around me ... I think she has the hots for me, y'know?"
Kaen pulled his lips into that lopsided old smile that just knew things.
"Thems fighting words. Really though, could you find her? We really need to know what she's doing with her time and were she takes the NADSURF. Its dead so there's no real risk but she wont let it out of her sight." Luca nodded as he started considering the possible locations onshore, then gave Kaen a pat on the shoulder and begun moving...
Sargasso, Spaceport, Pan-CHOW
Elsewhere, Lalah sat at a large table, the silver metal case to her left in the tucked alcove. People walked by, the air hazy and thick with something as meals of strange alien origin to her sizzled and baked in the next room over. Slowly, she searched through her communicator - still getting used to the strange PSG-made interface. Shoulders slumped. Eyes tired, worn with ache and fatigue to the ones.
Slowly, she glanced over her shoulder - grimacing at the sight of some kind of monster, nailed to the wall. It was totally convincing - the blacks of her pupils narrowing visibly as bile built in her throat before the illusion faded and she realized its nature as decor. Stuffed. What she'd later learn was called an alligator had her on edge - her own long tail sweeping beneath the seat as she struggled to get comfortale: the girth of the scaled limb problematic in the booth-like seats.
Nepleslia was a strange flavor. It would be a while before she got used to it.
And then it came. The most perfect thing she had ever seen. Golden, rounded, browned. Perfectly proportioned, reaching up from its white ivory canvas like a tower of sheer love and warmth. It oozed similarly: dancing with glossy sappish amber - dripping and oozing like liquid crystal down into vast caverns in the immense mountainous stacks. The top, clouds touched from the sky, delicately dancing around its rim like the haze of crashing waves - a trophy crowned with strange pink tartish things - glossy and crimson with faint studded green and leaves - sweet precious treasures to mark how proud it was.
And its base kissed her table, met with a tower of some clear strong enamel removing beverage.
She sat in awe, admirng the thing through tired eyes. Horns accentuating the subtle shifts of her head as she went about memorizing the shape of this strange machinaism of love transmision.
The dragon, Luca saw now from a distance had met a new romance in her life. A truer more beautiful feeling than any adult could face and far more nuanced and delicate than any child could comprehend.
"Please enjoy your meal," the server said with a smile. Lalah could feel her tear-ducts welling up as she smiled.
Pancakes are love.
From the other side of the glass on the eatery in the busy Sargasso Spaceport, Luca could see the distinct horns of the lmanel he was looking for. She didn't seem to be doing anything untoward or dodgy, nor was she meeting anyone or waiting - but she did have a lovely looking stack of pancakes which provoked a twinge of envy in Luca.
He spoke into his right hand. "Kaen, I've found her," he said, "alone, I can't see the case from where I am."
On a long chain, the case was cuffed to Lalah's left arm - worn metal twinkling dully as she rose her cutlery. Luca noted this immediately, eyes narrowing as the chain dragged against the edge of the table with a clatter. There was hesitation: taking in the air of her stack and prize before her knife and fork met the thing. Her first portion though delicately held with slender fingers and touch was bliss - eyes half open, seemingly glowing within herself.
Her second was a shaky gouge, ripping into the thing: all semblence of manners and trained behavior vanishing. From time to time, L'manel had the habit of revealing their nature rather than playing kind and friendly. From what Luca could see as he passed through the doors, Lalah was out to kill those pancakes.
Cheeks full, she she set eyes on him as he approached. Fight or flight was visible: arms moving protectively to grasp the case. But she didn't stop eating the pancakes. Visibly he could see she wanted to move but instinct on some level refused to let her. Luca raised a hand for calm, seeing that the lmanel was in a ... more lizard-brained state than the usual professionalism she carried herself with. He pursed his lips, unsure of how she was going to react when he stood far enough from her that she had the clearance to run, but close enough to be visible in the busy diner.
He eyed the empty spot in the booth seating and pointed to it, silently asking if he could sit down. Luca had a gut feeling that the Lorath woman couldn't exactly use words properly, aside from the pleasant complications involved in having a mouth stuffed full of sweet and delicious pancakes.
"Mirshta Palvrone?" Lalah struggled with a full mouth, hands moving to cover herself before clearing her throat. She made a half-hearted salute. She was out of uniform. But still cuffed to the silver case.
Something about how she was trying to remain dignified in the face of being so improper in front of Luca was endearing enough for him to look aside and tell the Lmanel "at ease," before sitting down opposite her in the booth seating, eying the case her other hand was cuffed to. He sat down on the slightly sticky, worn out seating and waited for Lalah to finish her mouthful.
It took her a while before finally downing it - clearing her throat once more now up from deeper tones into something softer with a glass of water. Her lips tightened - eyes firm and forward. Now she knew she was in it. Knee high, probably.
Luca eyed the case first, deciding that there was no avoiding the elephant on the table, chained to Lalah's wrist. "So this is where you go on the weekends?" Luca opened up with, looking around the Pan-CHOW, taking a glance at the menus on the walls, full of deals for guilt-laden food and no questions asked.
"Definitely better than the one on the other side of town," he remembered that one - it was terrible. The pancakes tasted like sheets of lukewarm rubber. Seiren nearly set fire to the place in rage.
Lalah only nodded - fingers gingerly setting her cutlery down as she wiped her mouth. Her eyes every few moments went from him to the pancakes. Too embarrassed to speak, still. Reprimand, any moment surely.
Luca let what he was saying hang for a moment. He could see that she was still enjoying this. "Well, you're not in serious trouble, I don't mind people taking breaks from living on the Platforms so long as they notify people ..."
He then eyed the case. "What I am more concerned about though is you carrying what's in that box around."
"Kaen said it has to be with someone at all times. I don't have the keys to these cuffs."
"Or ... you could leave it back on the base with him." Luca pointed out. "He's someone at all times."
Figuring that he wasn't entirely across what the NADSURF was, or what it even looked like, he slowly begun to slide a hand across the table towards the case.
Lalah pulled on the chain, drawing the case nearer to herself. It was reflex, more than anything.
"It can't be left alone with the same person for too long. We have to take shifts."
"But why?" Luca asked, leaning forward now. "What's so interesting about it? Kaen said it was 'inert', dead." And if it had to change hands every so often, surely he could get a look too.
Hell, what if she's hogging it? Why all the fuss about a ... rock? Luca wondered. "Come on, you can show me what it is. It's not like it's going to run anywhere."
"The case is... Its a PSD scrambler. Nothing's happened yet but... I'd say we're sort of superstitious, really."
He was not up to scratch on his science acronyms. "What's PSD?" Luca asked.
"Um... Psionic Sequence Disruptor. We used it to measure neural activity"
Luca blinked and raised an eyebrow. "Wait, from a rock?" He knew the Lorath really liked rocks for some reason. He saw them dotted around the LSDF's workspace on The Rigs.
"At first we thought it was some kind of machine. We apply a current, it repeats patterns. Like a computer." Lalah explained. "Some of those patterns are on what's called the shumann resonance frequency. Any planet with a magnetosphere has one, you know, a north and a south pole?" Luca nodded and motioned for her to continue, following just.
"Well, I know its a known fact now but the shumann resonance of a planet affects those upon it. Like how when there's an aurora, you can yank the batteries in a radio and it keeps working, because the frequency of the disruption is the same as the radio needs to work? Shumann is the resonance of a world. Something like 7.6 hertz, electrically. Well, that's the same frequency used in neural interfacing gear because its the frequency that when it hits bone cascades with brainwaves - the surface electrical currents of the brain."
"I guess I do feel kinda different when I go from planet to planet, yeah." Luca said, barely keeping up with all of it and more focussed on how the atmosphere and people on a planet were different. "What of it?"
"You can feel it in your bones, right? That first time when someone goes into space and they're beyond its reach and they have that moment that's almost like an epiphany. A religious moment."
"You must mean nearly every day." Luca shrugged. The first time he'd went to space, it was a kick in the balls. The second time, it was a kick in the head. Third time was kicking and flailing, and every other time begun to become more benign and soon he was kicking right back. "It's been a very, very long time. But anyway - yeah, go on?"
"NAU vibrates on the same frequency, electrically..." she said, taking her knife and fork - eyes on her pancakes.
"If its around the same person for too long, the frequency shifts from its normal pattern. As a result, we kind of have to play 'hot potato' with it. We're worried our own brainwaves might kill whatever's left of it."
"Hang on, hang on, how long have you been holding onto the ball then?" He inquired, pointing a finger at the case, which he was still curious about its contents. "What happens if more than one person's walking around with it?"
"It contracts. Gets smaller. Like a clam I guess. We brought it, thinking maybe it was some sort of neural interface. That we could use it to communicate with Rebeka. The existing method isn't really working, is it?"
Luca held up a hand. "Don't remind me." He mumbled. "It's broken the team. The one person she liked the most won't even acknowledge she's gone." He was referring to the Phoenix's resident candyman. Luca slumped down onto the table, resting on his forearms. "The two were practically glued together at the hip, y'know?"
"I know. I've read the reports. Seen photos. Its like she wanted... Wants to be his mother, don't you think?"
Luca seemed satisfied that he'd got everything he wanted out of Lalah, and sighed, burying his nose in his forearms and grumbling in frustration. "All Aiesu thought Rebeka was good for was being a blunt object."
"...Constructs are blunt objects" Lalah frowned.
She sampled pancakes onto her fork, reaching out to offer the forkful to Luca, who looked up and rested his chin on his arms.
Lorath women were known for being particularly condescending to men at the dinner-table but her expression was still polite, warm, friendly.
"I didn't know you could get sugars this refined on Nepleslia." Lalah said.
The Captain sniffed the air just ahead of the pancakes. The strength of the maple syrup woke him up, snapping him out of the funk he'd nearly dug himself into. He bit down on the fork and dragged the pancake chunks off it.
Lalah slid the fork back, her expression melting into syrupy warmth - white lashes nearly falling shut along deep dark skin - teeth flashed cheekily. She was giddy, shuffling the away she sat and already preparing another fork.
"Its good, right? I don't think I've ever eaten anything so rich before. Waffles, pancakes, syrup. Are these your nanational dishes?"
Luca nodded knowingly. "You didn't know? Nepleslia loves its sugary food. Loves a good steak too. Eaten one of those yet?"
Lalah shook her head. "As much as I like it, I try to avoid meat..."
"You a vegetarian or something?" Luca inquired, a little confused given her aspectation.
"Nnnn. Nepleslian meat has a lot of steroids and hormones in it. Its hard enough to keep myself in check with my aspectation as is."
A silence sat between them for a moment.
"Lorath animals don't have the same hormones as Lorath people do.. On Nepleslia, they both smell the same." her voice shifted strangely. Her manner had changed entirely - firm and to the point. "I don't want to develop a taste for Nepleslian..."
It was hard to tell if she was being somber or if this was some sort of lost-in-translation flirting.
Luca knew only one other person who had a taste for Nepleslian, and plenty of people had a taste for Luca - one way or another. He looked aside with crossed arms, perturbed by the idea. "Uhm, erh..." he clicked his tongue, a bit lost for words, "riiight..."
END!
