Part 26

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"Minister" the Authority Guide's image appearing on the viewscreen tipped his head to Larran.

"Guide" Larran replied without diffidence, wandering to a row of art stored on shelving at the back of the small office. He realized he didn't like the antique delicate blue figurine with its graceful lines. It seemed so garish and indulgent in feelings that cloyed at him. "It seems there is an order issue surrounding my estate. Won't you....see to management of the disorderly throngs...."

"An order issue, Minister?" the Authority guide blandly asked.

"Yes, Gulmac, it seems there are uncounted numbers of nonconformists descending on the vicinity. Or infesting" Larran paused to strike the figure against the shelf, rending its form "depending on how you look at it." Larran placed the remainder of the figure under his penholder at his desk to show one and all his talent for doing the unexpected.

Authority Guide Gulmac was quick to reassure. "We had dispatched choice informants to access the situation at the first indication of a substantial gathering in your region, Minister."

"I would have thought Enforcers, at this point- Guide." Larran drew the two Glassan pens from his pocket and ran them under his nose, lingering on the scent of his prized captive still lingering on them before placing the pens into the penholder. "Naturally the informants are still accessing the situation. But I have reason to believe you are already aware of the situation and are moving to act accordingly" Larran glanced at the display of Gulnac just long enough to make the thinly veiled threat clear.

"We have reason to believe the crowds will disperse in a reasonable period of time. To confront the multitudes with enforcement at this time would be premature, perhaps leading to violence, and is therefore inappropriate" Gulmac mildly replied.

Larran turned on his heels to face the viewscreen. "What did you say?"

The display had already turned off.

---

Chiana immediately slid nearer to John and rested her forehead into his. "Nice and private under here....."

"Most nice people might give you a pat on the shoulder or even hang one on, but you wanna have virtual sex for casual affection. Whhh" John blew out and snickered.

"Complaining? So I'm way above nice" she smirked into his cheek.

"Oh yeah" John quickly agreed. "Uhm wait. So what've we got?"

"Each other" Chiana leaned into him.

"Pip...."

"Ah yeah, w-we're fixed with s-some device that got frelled when we ripped off the control things." She shifted onto her hands and knees to face John. "I think Harvey's right, we both have some kind of devices in-n o-our brains" she continued but kept nuzzling at his face.

"So the shock that tried to prevent us from removing the control visors and made swiss cheese out of our memory also fried the chip so it couldn't take root like it was supposed to" he snickered. "Well that's some irony. It's almost comforting some good came out of that. Not that I would've appreciated it at the time. Didn't think there was anything more painful than thinking of wasting your life living in a gangsta paradise. Man that was news. So this thing, this other Harvey, it won't let you near, and it probably won't let me near."

"Blocking wha- whatever's in the W's an tryin' to block more with dust" Chiana reached back into his red and pink heart boxers and yanked them down.

"Whoa" John said when her hands started working him "don't overdo it, gal, knowing my luck in this place, all you'll get is dust" he snickered.

"Harvey saved me" she said through a tiny exhale.

"You trust him?" John was doubtful.

She nodded no while smirking at him. "Defeated the other Harvey, an' he can get what we want" she smiled while he flinched.

"Oh gad!" John tried composing himself. "Let's go. Haaaarvey!" he yelled, struggling with his boxers. Chiana hissed her displeasure until she saw him trying to get his erect self into the boxers and cackled her amusement. John scrambled to get the boxers on and stood.

Pulse fire from the Romeo & Juliet reader, still barricaded behind her book, struck John. He looked down. "Oh crap. I think the other head was more dispensable" John complained. Chiana stood with his missing part and planted it back on. John narrowed his eyes and shook his head. "Man....I used to be such a regular guy."

"You're cute" Chiana nodded her admiration of him.

He couldn't keep a smile off his face, looking aside at her. He shook his head to himself at her compliment, blushed and snickered.

Harvey and Sputnik came running in, Harvey holding a blue and red shield between himself and the Romeo & Juliet reader. Sputnik clung to Harvey's protected side.

"Hey Harv" John began.

"What are you still doing here?" Sputnik interrupted as if they were errant children. "You could be dismembered!"

"She's too smart" John looked aside to Chiana. "Yeah, well Harv, it safe to talk with sharp cheddar cheese love muffin on you?"

"It's not safe here John" Harvey adjusted himself under a pulse blast deflected off his shield. "We're at the edge of a buried concept at odds with a certain of your present mindsets. A hair-trigger buried concept."

"Yeah well I-" John began again.

"-You trelk!" Sputnik straightened up, her eyes wide. She looked up and down Chiana then herself, appalled. She zoned in on Chiana's waist, approximated it with her own hands then slid her hands over her larger waist. Her eyes narrowed poisonously on her hands. Folding her arms, Sputnik looked straight ahead with her eyes narrowed.

"Hey well I-" John interrupted himself, leaning closer to Harvey. "Hey bud" he interrupted Harvey sneering at Chiana "don't mention anything having anything remotely to do with your girl's weight for a while, or you're toast." He leaned aside to Chiana's ear "I think orange-red's getting green, way to go Pip."

"Green?" Chiana shot a skeptical look at John. "She's not green."

"Yeah jealous, envious....hey which aisle are we in now....M? O?"

"O was over there" Chiana whipped her head. "Drad book all 'bout male orgasms. Very diss-appointing" she quickly added, walking up behind him and sliding her hands into his red and pink heart boxers "males. We gotta get you doing better...."

"Whoa that's one book I didn't need you getting into" John muttered to himself, pulling books out and putting them back. "Damn where is anything, half this stuff isn't in the right spot....."

"Cutbacks" the librarian was suddenly over his shoulder with her arms folded. "And don't put them back. There's a rule to let the library do it for you, because most plebeians can't seem to understand how to replace them reliably."

"Cutbacks- in my head?!" John whined.

"More like cutouts" Chiana quipped. "As if the wardrobe didn't tell you that...."

The librarian put her hand on her exterior bustle. "Excuse me? I'm not the one too big for her bodice" the librarian swiped her dangling kinky hair from her shoulder, then broke into a snicker and bumped into John with her elbow first, chummy.

John gave her a wry look. "Now don't give her ideas, Tuna." John squinted. "You're name's....tuna?"

She looked at him with wide eyes. "I am not a fish!"

"What is your name?" he asked. He watched, puzzled while she seemed to speak and move but it skipped the answer like he was watching a sort of frame skipping on a scratched video disc. "Did you get that?" he asked Chiana over his other shoulder.

"Ah.....not exactly. But it's Tunai. Part of it" Chiana nodded, her attention on her hands in his pink and red heart boxers. She kept getting different impressions from her hands. It was definitely not real, but she definitely found it interesting.

"Here!" John interrupted in a squeaky voice. He cleared his throat. "We go. Martian Chronicles" he made to hand it to Chiana. "Didn't you used to get visions of things....." he looked back at her. She blinked, noncommittal. "Well here. No wait wrong green, green people, wrong jealousy-"

"Wrong aisle!" the librarian took the book. "Bradbury? Unngh!" she looked up in the air and strode down the aisle with the book. "Supposed to be in the B's! This head is so disorganized I could just scream!"

"And can she scream" John mentioned to Chiana, who laughed. "She should see the way I keep a desk....hey here's one." John sidestepped, but Chiana just hopped her lithe body onto his back and stuck with him.

Finally he managed to find another book. "Lying, despair, jealousy, envy, sex, suicide, drugs, and the good life, by Farber, man there's a bit of everything in there....and what the hell's that doing under M? Here's one for you" he handed a book back to Sputnik. "Seven Things that Steal your Joy: Overcoming the Obstacles to your Happiness, Meyer, right, outta be something in that to help make your millennium, Harv you might wanna study that with her....Here we go, Green With Envy, by Monica, Lewinsky. Well, I'm sure she would've done one. Wasn't it supposed to be filed by last name? Oh well it's all my head. Oughtta get you the 4-11 on bein' green, gray" John held the books over his shoulder.

Chiana released his boxers to snap back against him and took the books. "Yeah got it, just like I thought" she nodded. Chiana dropped both books into the sides of his pink and red heart boxers, causing them to drop down. She looked appreciatively at his rear then turned to smirk back at Harvey.

John cleared his throat. "Let's go somewhere we can talk."

John stopped and looked around at the set he now stood on. Chiana, Harvey, Sputnik, the Romeo & Juliet reader and himself all sat facing one another on couches on a luxury living room set in front of a television studio audience. "Then what have you to say-" Harvey looked around, surprised, his voice dropping to quietly complete the thought ".....Crichton?"

---

"Why?" Tannac asked herself out loud. "After all these years" she halted her spoken thoughts to check around a corner. Finding the adjoining corridor clear, she continued moving and talking to herself. "I break into the frelling Minister's estate after something I dream and dread, and what is probably the most explosive subject this millennia" she remarked while hurrying to back up to the next corner and check around it with her eyepiece. Again it was clear. "Armed up my eema and wielding a multiple facility pulse rifle" she mumbled, hurrying to the next intersection. "And nobody is trying to kill me!?" she hollered down a corridor.

"I might, if you're not a great deal more careful" a voice warned from behind.

Tannac turned to find a black haired and pale tan skinned Sebacean woman smiling tersely at her. "Now would that be a welcome betrayal or a betrayal well met?" Tannac asked, raising her pulse rifle to the Sebacean, her eyes widening with that humor of slight madness.

Orren aimed her pulse rifle forward and crouched to proceed. "You think it's a little odd, then, we're not fighting insurmountable odds?" she looked to Tannac.

"I expected to have been rid of very quickly" Tannac ticked her brow. "Yet here....we are."

"We, yes....Orren. Nus. Clarticies region" the Sebacean introduced herself.

Tannac narrowed her eyes at Orren before a smile crept over her otherwise unchanged face.

"You've been there?" Orren seemed to almost dread the possibility.

"Have you?" Tannac asked, still smiling with her eyes narrowed, now that the Sebacean's reaction had confirmed her suspicions.

"Well I'm not going to stay here" Orren made to continue. Tannac made a swaying bow of her head, gesturing Orren to proceed. "I've searched the upper levels" Orren reported while they hurried to the next intersection of the corridor. "I doubt our objective is in this structure."

"The blistering opposition has made me doubt as much already" Tannac checked around the corner. The Sebacean appeared impressed with Tannac's eyepiece. Tannac gestured to proceed. Orren waited until Tannac began.

"Possibly an indication" Orren informed Tannac while they hurried to the next intersecting corridor. "Ancient Sebacean security systems may be effective against unsuspecting Nebari. However. I have effectively disabled much of it."

"That almost explains some of it" Tannac replied.

The following corridor confronted them with a life-size statue that Orren almost opened fire on. Otherwise there wasn't a trace of anyone or any security. A new possibility entered Orren's mind: the estate was abandoned. "The absence of any guard or even service is more troubling, to me. Could they have already taken her elsewhere?"

"No, she's here, I am certain" Tannac replied.

Orren stopped when she realized Tannac's voice was falling back. Hurrying back, Orren found Tannac resting casually against a painted wall next to a decorative recess containing a statue about halfway down the corridor.

"Have some?" Tannac asked, offering the rest of a package of something she was chewing on and another smaller package. "Huh I try chewing on these squishy little cubes and my teeth are killing me. Did your reference indicate there was another three level structure between this one and the central area of the biodome?"

"What are you doing? And yes, it did. Incidental structure, why?"

"It doesn't look incidental" Tannac gestured with her head. Orren followed to gesture to a mirror of a sort on the wall. Orren looked opposite and noticed the recess with the statue was backed with blue tinted mirrors. Looking opposite again, Orren looked to the high window lighting the corridor and the gleaming reflective trim on the eaves outside. Nearly standing back into Tannac, Orren saw the view of the grounds outside. A long ornate structure with blue roof tiles came into view when she backed into Tannac.

Tannac placed the remainder of the bar she was chewing on into Orren's hand. "It's Nugeth bar, nasty stuff really, I can't wait to throw it up. But after you eat a few bites, it only takes a bite of the Jur, green smaller bar here, to kill you in case you get captured, or worse."

"No thanks I'll pass" Orren absently told her and handed the bar back to Tannac. "You suspect she may be in that structure?"

"Not sure. Mm! Nice structure" Tannac tugged Orren's belt up and admired the Sebacean's rear under the tight black leather pants. "I doubt she's in this one."

"Excuse me?" Orren shooed Tannac's hands from her hips like they were a pesky insect. "This and the adjoining structures are the only two suitable for securing a captive from...."

"Exactly. Why would he think she would be taken by force? Who would dare? Besides" Tannac leaned to rest with her elbow perched on top of the erect anatomy of the male statue "his plan would be to keep her in. There's another important factor."

"What's that?" Orren looked back and frowned, impressed at the statue, before returning to using the reflections to look around without the likelihood of being seen in a window.

"Minister Larran is mad" Tannac added. "At least, that's what Crichton tells me." Orren looked to her in some sort of disbelief. "I believe him."

"Do you believe it's Crichton?"

Tannac bit her lower lip and looked up around the ceiling for a few moments. "Yes" she looked Orren straight in the eyes. "I know" Tannac was suddenly almost childish "I'm silly then. And worse" she widened her eyes and shrugged. She stuck her thin tongue out at Orren. "The Minister wants to keep her here under the fantasy of being her host" she narrowed her eyes, suddenly business. "Therefore he wouldn't keep her in these nice galleries, he'd either have her chained in some cellar or in a fine guest suite in the middle of the place, probably facing gardens like a good host."

Orren was distracted watching Tannac tapping her point on the tip of the statue's anatomy. "Right" Orren tore her attention back to the point "then we stop searching his secured galleries and business facilities and find central accommodations or, alternately, the most remote of cellars for imprisonment. That is crazy. Why were you searching here then?"

Tannac sighed. "I was hoping to kick some eema. And maybe, even, Larran's."

"Hm" Orren said. "Do we split up then?"

"Are you always all business?" Tannac sneered.

"Is this a time to play then?" Orren asked, raising her brows, expecting Tannac to answer sensibly. "Don't answer that" Orren thought better of the question. "Cellar or central accommodation?"

Tannac swung her multiple barreled pulse rifle to face the wall ahead and fired. Orren leapt from the debris, rolled and regained her footing, raising her pulse rifle to Tannac. The air took a few microts to clear however, parting to reveal light streaming in through a gaping hole from floor to ceiling where the high window and wall had been. "Biodome" Tannac answered.

While Orren gawked, Tannac turned around to the statue. "That's too good to hide" she tapped the statue's anatomy. "Enjoy the view" she patted its buttock and then ran straight out of the building, leaping down from their second story to the overgrown garden bed below. Standing without any obvious problem, Tannac gestured up at Orren to follow her.

"Well that's fine for you isn't it, but I'm not a Nebari" Orren refused.

Tannac threw a clawed accessory from her belt up to the overhang. The claw caught the overhang. Tannac gestured to a line between the claw and her belt and braced her footing. "Bring your unwieldy curvy muscular eema down here now, Sebacean, or find your own way out."

After a moment of disbelief, Orren leapt out and took the line, sliding down with practiced skill. Tannac grimaced as the Sebacean's weight pulled at her body. Orren landed and looked around while Tannac released the line and bent into a few poses accompanied by a few pops and crackles. "We'll continue this way down the garden walk" Tannac grumbled and worked a few of her pulled muscles.

"We should remain, or should be less conspicuous" Orren decided while looking Tannac up and down. "This is a larger complex than I'd expected from the report." Orren passed around Tannac to continue down an overgrown path.

Tannac hurried after the Sebacean and stepped in her way. "I lead."

"Why? I have military training, and you are a hap-hazardly trained rebel are you not?"

"I" Tannac squared her shoulders and raised her multiple barreled pulse rifle straight up "have the bigger gun." Tannac wagged her brow and started ahead.

"A liability, I've always thought" Orren remarked to herself.

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