Starr vs the Emperor of Space Pt. 09

"Relationship!" Snow scoffed. "Is that a word for when you...you..."

"Fuck her?" Jasmine grinned.

Snow huffed. "Must you always be so crude?"

"I did try and be more circumspect with Lance, and that irritated you just as much," Jasmine said, laughing quietly as she strode to keep up with Snow.

"Circumspect meaning you sucked his...him off in public?" Snow snapped.

"I've never met anyone in space as prudish as you are," Jasmine said, shaking her head.

"I'm not prudish!" Snow snapped. "It's just...do you know how frustrating it is to be in a society that is at the height of its sexual sophistication, far in advance of the Earth society of which you are familiar...and to be trapped in a guise and form that utterly repels you? The idea of having sex as a man is...ugh." She shuddered. "It makes me shudder..."

Jasmine nodded. "You find yourself too repelled by your own disguise to ever feel your own arousal..." She bit her lip. "I'm sorry. That sounds like an unpleasent way to live."

Snow chuckled, softly, shaking her head. "There are many who have to live worse...I am still a Prince. Even if I long to be a Princess." She blushed. "Though, I only want to wear...sensible gowns." She paused. "And a little bit of jewelry. Not a lot." She rubbed her hand against her neck. "And maybe a few rings. Perhaps some presented to me by a handsome man."

Jasmine patted her back. "We'll have you in skirts in no time, Snow."

Snow stiffened...then relaxed, slightly. She did not, this time, slap Jasmine's hand away. Instead, she looked to her. "And then you will be seeing about getting me out of them, then?" She asked, dryly. "I'll have you know, just as I am no man, I have no interest in women."

"We'll see about that," Jasmine crooned.

"Oh you!" Snow snarled.

Jasmine laughed. "Come now -- you've never been wooed by a woman as a woman. I can assure you, being sapphic means something different when it is between women." She rubbed her chin, slightly. "I think even your space sex would admit that being sapphic has more to do with women than with men, even if it is in relation to how how little you wish to be with them, eh?"

The came into a large opening in the tunnel -- a junction point where an ancient industrial engine had been long left abandoned. The globe that floated beside them brightened more, revealing more of the chamber, and there were no less than three exits out of the place, each one looking darker and more ominous than the last. Snow ignored all three to turn to face Jasmine, frowning. "You cannot accept that someone might just be not into you," she said, quietly. "Is that it?"

Jasmine spread her hands. "I will admit...the fact I once seduced a gay man away from his boyfriend while in a skirt." She chuckled. "Admittedly, I was using a boy's name at the time..."

"You homewrecker!"

"Don't get too upset, they were in the SS," Jasmine said, her lip curling in disdain. "Using their position to protect themselves, while harming thousands of others. They're lucky that's the worst I did to them. Now! Which tunnel do we take, Snow?"

Snow frowned and turned to gaze at the tunnels. "Not that one," she said, pointing at the leftmost one. "That tunnel has cracks in the ceiling -- it means that there's going to be a collapse in the midsection, somewhere. That one and that one...both may work well. Let me check my radio gun." She pulled from her belt a small device that Jasmine had assumed was a death ray pistol...but instead, Snow pulled forth a heavy set of ear-mufflers which plugged into the handle of the radio gun. She put the muffs onto her ears, then aimed the gun, triggering. "The center tunnel cants eastward..." She considered. "That seems most likely."

She started forward and Jasmine followed after. "What other fun tools do you have in that pack of yours?"

"Extensible pole for measuring and testing," Snow said, shrugging. "Fifty space feet of silken rope."

"How naughty," Jasmine crooned. "I'll have to know I learned the arts of shibari on the Home Islands of Japan."

"Starr!" Snow snapped and Jasmine laughed.

"You know, I would stop doing it if it stopped being so easy to rile you-" Jasmine held her hand up, frowning. "Hold. Do you hear that?"

The two waited, listening. Snow's pointed ears lifted and she narrowed her eyes, then gestured to her globe, hissing softly. "Attend!" At the word and gesture, the globe dimmed and dimmed some more. "Quickly, put on this heat ray amplification helm!"

A helmet, swung from her pack, pressed against Jasmine's chest. She slung it over her face, but saw nothing. "I don't see-"

"Swing the cover down, foolish Earthling!" Snow hissed and Jasmine found that a curved shield -- like the blast covering of a welder's mask -- was mounted to the helmet. She swung it down and, quite suddenly, she could see Snow in the darkness, glowing brilliantly in strange, unnatural colors of red, blue and white -- indicating different temperatures, Jasmine realized. The helmet, somehow, was converting the sight of heat into the lights and colors that Jasmine could see! The surrounding terrain, too, she could navigate thanks to subtle differences in temperature and splotches of warmth from growing or rotting fungus blooms.

But what was clear as day were the three shapes at the end of the corridor, crouched low, their bulbous, distended heads peeking above the lip of a chunk of stone that had fallen from the ceiling in some bygone Venusquake. Quietly, Snow confirmed what Jasmine expected: "Morlocks."

Jasmine frowned. "What do you suggest, Princess?"

"It depends -- are they hunting for food, or are they scouts seeking for us?" Snow asked, her hand dropping to the haft of her rocket bolt pistol, loosening it in the straps. One of the Morlocks began to crawl from cover, moving with a hideouly deliberate style -- crawling forward on hands and balls of the feet, hunched forward. In the eerie false light of the heat ray amplification helm's sight, the actual shape of it was hard for Jasmine to determine, beyond it being clearly humanoid...but the joints were all wrong, and the head looked as if it had been stretched. The face, too, had strange patches of hot and cold that reminded her disturbingly of corpses after rot had set in and mushroom spores had settled...

"One's coming," Jasmine said.

"Just one means it could be-" Snow started, but Jasmine heard the creak of movement behind her. She turned...and saw four more blotches.

"They're hunters!" Jasmine shouted, thumbing her magneto-rapier on to full length and power. As it hissed free, the four morlocks that had approached from behind let out a horrible rattling noise and began to rush forward...and then the bolt-rocket gun roared three times, bucking in Snow's double handed grips.

Jasmine, thus far, had had every reason to disdain the bolt rocket guns used by nearly every faction of warrior in space. Compared to the dependable bullets of her home world, they seemed much the weaker...but thus far, she had engaged every enemy blade to blade, and had not seen what a well aimed bolt-rocket could do to enemies given time to accelerate when launched from the weapon! In a space of a second, the bolts had burned up their fuel, accelerating faster and faster with every second as the burning fuel made them lighter and lighter...until, at the end of their transition, they were traveling far, far, far faster than sound!

They were each on par with a .50 caliber bullet, the kind used by the indomitable machine guns favored by the Allied power in the second World War, but rather than merely being a blunt tipped dense bullet designed to survive the explosion of a gunpowder blast, these bolt-rockets were tipped with razor sharp flechette blades that cut and sliced nearly as much as they punctured and pierced. The first took a Morlock in the chest, while the second and third took them in the head -- and there was nothing left of those heads save an expanding cloud of mist and spores.

The four, though, that came at Jasmine Starr were not advancing without their own bloodletting. Jasmine held no normal blade, but rather, a magneto-rapier: A bimagnetic liquid, suspended in a rapidly rotating magnetic field, so that the edges were able to slice and burn at the same time from friction and movement! She held it in one hand, and the moved with the grace and striking speed of the two time Olympic gold medal winner that she was: The tip of her blade slashed open one Morlock from belly to chin and the hideously malformed creature fell to the ground, emptying its entire body unto the pavement. A grasping claw was wiped away, then the head with it, as Jasmine stepped away from the third's leap and sliced it entirely in half across the midsection. She turned to face the last -- only to see it already fleeing.

But Jasmine knew to look past the name of her weapon. The magneto-rapier was feared above all weapons for its mutability! And so she shifted her grip, twitched her finger on the control, and held the rapier up...but the structure of it had changed from that of a rapier blade to that of the fearsome and much respected spear-throwing weapon, the Atlatl! The hilt that had once projected the rapier now served as the base, while the curved bimagnetic liquid that was the blade formed into the spear, and Jasmine hurled it in one smooth motion. The liquid flung forward and slammed into the back of the Morlock's neck, exploding out beneath his chin. The Morlock made a hideous gurgling noise, then fell -- and the metallic spear whipped back into the hilt, dragged back to Jasmine by the magnetic field projected by the magneto-rapier.

She grunted at the thump of the returning mass, her arm jerking with the impact, then turned to face Snow, who was panting heavily.

"You all right?" Jasmine asked.

"Yes, fine," Snow said. Then, as the illumination orb began to grow brighter again, she lifted the visor of her helmet up, revealing her eyes were wide and tense. "...good work, Starr."

"Yes, well, I fear that the Morlocks know we are here now," Jasmine said, taking her helmet off with a grunt, hanging her holstered magneto-rapier at her thigh again.

Snow nodded. "Come on -- we should press on and see as far as we can get in one day."

The two began to stride forward. Jasmine did pause at the Morlock that had been shot through the chest, and saw that her summation had been correct: It had been, or could have been, a Faeman. But fungal growths swept from the ears, out of the mouth, around the eyes, rendering it nearly blind -- not that it needed such things in the endless, infinite darkness of the Maze of Madness. The shoulders and arms were also distorted by the inner fungal growths, the two forms of Fae flesh and fungal growths merging together into a grotesque synthesis that made her skin crawl...but still, she felt growing pity for the thing, seeing it laid out dead on the ground.

"Is there a cure?" she asked as she followed after Snow, who had not snapped at her despite the delay in their progress.

Slowly, Snow shook her head. "No. There is no cure. The fungal growth does not simply infect the brain -- it consumes and destroys it, crushing memories and erasing anything that was of the person. It transforms them into a Morlock without reversal or change in their fate -- save for immediate antifungal concoctions the instant you are exposed. But as you are usually only exposed when a Morlock has dragged you back to their lair and...filled you with their spores...there is little chance of that."

"And this evolved naturally?" Jasmine asked, her skepticism roused. "There are fungal spores such as this on Earth -- but they can only infect smaller, baser creatures like ants and other insects. The idea of them infecting thinking, humanoid beings is quite remarkable."

Snow frowned. "Are you suggesting that someone designed this horror and unleashed them on us?" She asked. "Even Zardo would never be so evil...and why would he do it?"

Jasmine frowned, slightly, her brain whirling. "To weaken you. To sap your morale. To keep your eyes upon the ground and the tunnels -- and not up among the stars. For the price of a single fungal strain, Zardo has what would take legions of his Clone Soldiers!"

Snow scowled. "Supposition! You have no proof..."

"Do you believe any better of Aytan Zardo?"

"Of course not," Snow said, her voice tight, edged with anger and real fury. "I believe that if the devil himself stood before me and proclaimed that he was innocent of a crime and Zardo was seeking to frame him, I would gladly argue for the Devil's case in court. If it was a choice between a Hawkman and Zardo...I'd...kill myself. But!" She shook her head, clearly thrown by her own metaphor. "But still, I...Zardo is vile. But such accusations mean nothing without proof to give to the other Kingdoms. And..." She sighed. "Even that might not be enough. Zardo rules over all -- and no one raised a hand when he turned Ceres into the Death Jungle."

Jasmine nodded, solemnly.

"But when he has done it twice, he makes it more than an exception," she said, quietly. "The Lizardmen and Tuskmen and Squidmen may dismiss Ceres. They will say, oh, the Devilmen deserved it. But will they dismiss the Devilmen and the Faemen? Will they dismiss, too, the Hawkmen -- who have also been sabotaged and tormented by Zardo as well?" She took hold of Snow's arm, stopping her as she spoke excitedly, channeling the revolutionary fervor that had built America in the first place. "This is what revolutions are built upon, the realization of common cause, of solidarity between many races and classes of people. This is what will truly bring Zardo down! My people, the American people, have a saying: While there is a lower class, I am in it, while there is a criminal element, I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free! And so too, while Zardo looks above us -- we shall be allies..."

Snow shook her head in slow wonder. "You...build castles in the sky, Jasmine." She cupped Jasmine's cheek gently. "But I admit...they are quite pretty little things."

"No prettier than you, my Princess," Jasmine purred, then kissed Snow's palm. "Come. Let us travel on, lest more Morlocks find us."

Snow spluttered, like a tea kettle about to boil over.

***

In the depths of space, Mark watched the stars wheel beyond his window.

"With my eye, I spy...something beginning with S," Zella said, her voice a quiet groan.

"Stars," Mark said.

"Hurmph," Zella muttered. "Okay. Uh...with my eye, I spy something beginning with M-"

"More stars," Mark said, closing his eyes and bonking his head against the glass.

"Well! If you're so clever, uh...uh..." Zella humphed. "E?"

"Even more stars!" Mark, C'law and Robin all exclaimed at once.

"This is a dumb game anyway!" Zella groused.

***

Jasmine was the one to find the dell where she and Snow would spend their first space night within the Maze of Madness. It was a narrow cleft in a rock wall of a small side tunnel, leading into a surprisingly large inner space, with enough ventilation to be breathable, and with an entrance that could be easily watched and guarded. She slid in first, and once it was secure, she turned back and gestured Snow within -- and there, Snow revealed her latest little gizmo, a small pill that she pulled from her pocket and extended outwards into a tarp that covered the hole, sticking the walls and making a near perfect seal. Snow turned back to Jasmine, activating her glow orb and setting it down upon the ground in the little dell.

"The obfuscation cloak will guard us from any preying senses," Snow said, brushing her fingers through her short, pale white hair. "What a terrible place this is, eh?"

"I don't know, there are some advantages," Jasmine murmured, watching the beautiful princess lifting her arms -- the light of her glow orb flickering along her tunic, casting shadows through the semi-transparent fabric that hinted at her gorgeous, athletic frame. Jasmine had lain with this woman's mother, and could see the beauty of the Faewoman queen waiting inside of Snow to bloom to full womanhood...but Snow was still fairly young, as far as Faewomen went, and had some growing yet to do, for all that she was willing to brave dark and perilous adventures.

Snow, seeing her look, glanced away, her cheeks darkening even more. "You think I've forgotten you've fucked my mother, Starr?"

"I think you can't stop thinking about it," Jasmine said, her voice confident and playful as she unrolled the bedroll that she had brought with her. She crawled atop it, enjoying the way that Snow's bright red eye tracked the movement of her own athletic form -- and Jasmine had far less concealing her flesh than the gorgeous daughter of the Spider Queen. Jasmine laid upon her side, her eyes glittering.

"That's a lie," Snow said. "I think of a lot of other things. Morlocks. How annoying you are."

Jasmine chuckled. "The lady doth protest too much, to quote an Earth saying. You...know that you are allowed to be yourself around me. You need not act like a man." Her tongue flicked along her lips. "Because as a woman, you are lovely indeed."

Snow bit her lip. "It...is nice being unbound and...able to use my normal voice." She laid back on her bedroll, opposite from the orb from Jasmine. "What is it like, being a woman on Earth?"

"Well, we have the vote now," Jasmine said, chuckling. "But too many low down scoundrels and backwards thinking fools seem to think we women aren't able to be equal to men -- despite our many accomplishments." She shook her head. "It won't last -- soon, everyone will see the potential inherent in the human species." She laid on her back, sighing quietly. "I hope, only, it will be as fellows in the solar system, and not as servants under Zardo..."

"You do worry too much about that," Snow said, quietly. "So long as the Sword of the Stars remains intact, your world is forever safe."

"The what?" Jasmine asked -- she, of course, recalled precisely what the Sword of the Stars was. But she wished to hear, without editing or lack of clarity, what it was that the Faemen thought it was. She thought back on the different tales of how the transforming of Venus had gone awry, and knew that sometimes...multiple perspectives might be more illuminating than perfect honesty. And so, she played dumb as Snow blinked in surprise.

"You don't know?" Snow asked, lifting her head, then setting it back down upon her bedroll once more.

"I...think I've heard references to it before -- but...so much has happened." She shifted her bedroll closer to Snow, so that their heads were nearer together. Snow looked up at her, biting her lip as she did so -- and Jasmine continued. "I've had one adventure after another since I was plucked off my atomic rocket."

"Well, when the colony rocket came to this solar system, thousands of years before, there was a great division between the sides that wished to respect the people of your world and the side that was led by Aytan Zardo. Zardo wished to conquer the Earth -- and so, in the battles that followed, he was defeated and exiled, taking with him his Nuclear Alchemy Engine. We all thought he had perished upon Pluto...and so, there was a question of what to do with the most terrible weapon in all the solar system: The Sword of the Stars."

"Right, the engine!" Jasmine said, having confirmed that, in fact, the two stories matched...meaning that the Sword itself was much as S'kye of the Hawkmen had suggested. Jasmine shook her head. "Such a terrible weapon -- and yet, it cannot slay evil. That takes us working together." She reached out, then took a hold of Snow's hand. Her thumb brushed along her knuckles. "I know we have butted heads, a tad, Snow...but...you are a good hearted girl. And brave, too."