Cats Cradle Chapter 1
Cathy wore a satisfied smirk as she placed the device on the table. A silver ring, large enough to go around a neck, with a single hinge, opposed by an adjustable locking latch.
“This is how we get information in an out!”
Jet inspected it.
“Cat collar?”
Cathy nodded, “The Boskonians used ones just like it to train catgirls, before they perfected their memory wipe,”
Ford looked at her a little bewildered. “So?”
“Well.” Cathy's chest inflated with pride. “It’s not just a collar anymore. It’s got a low powered radio transmitter, capable of sending text messages and regular data. It’s got a mapping device and a low powered on-board computer. It even has the original shock function... but at a much lower power.”
Jet smiled. “Sounds perfect.”
Cathy showed them a small piece of glass.
“This is the fitting monitor for it, concealed as a cheap cat toy and just large enough to hold it in front of an eye. And the collar even got a valid reason to be emitting encrypted radio signals. It comes with biomonitor sensors, which constantly transmit back to the control unit.”
The original designers intention was that it’d give the catgirl's owner a fair warning that they were in danger of killing their pets, rather than just ‘punishing’ them. Cathy used the biomonitor transmitters to transmit more data than the basic vitals. She modified the receiver array to act as a simple passive radar, feeding data to a small onboard computer, which slowly mapped out the base in concert with the controller.
Jet held it in her hand, inspecting with with almost giddy interest while she read through the specs Cathy’d given her. “Now that’s just fucking cool.”
“Don’t break it,” warned Ford.
“It’s nearly unbreakable,” Cathy assured.
“If you’re not able to lift a car it is. I’m still looking at Sato. Did you see the bounty the Senshi put on her?” She had a capitalist gleam in her eye. ”I heard whoever brings her in, automatic named sailor.”
Jet chuckled. “Sailor Gearbox.”
“Beats Sailor Smash, Jet,” Sierra snarked back.
“It is just a rumour,” Cathy said, throwing cold water on the joke. “But they are really willing to pay a lot of money for getting her.”
“Well since I’m not getting paid for this, it’d be rude not to collect on it myself,” Ford said.
Cathy scowled. “But you two live together. Isn’t that a little.... improper?”
Jet shrugge., “It’s legal.”
It was a lot more complicated than she cared to get into really.
Cathy nodded. “Yes, I know... its funny to do the right things just because they are right... until the point where you suddenly cannot pay your bills anymore.”
Ford wore a mercenary grin. “If they’re willing to pay, I’m willing to be paid,”
Cathy took the collar from Jet. “I’ll still have to get used to wearing it.” She didn’t appear to be too thrilled at the prospect. “But once we are in, it should not be a problem.”
Ford sighed, and sat back in her couch. “You make it sound like getting in is the easy part.”
“Well, they are accepting landings,” Cathy replied.
Ford shook her head. “The thing with criminals.... the thing with organisations like this. You don’t just show up at the door... that just screams ‘cop’. You need an ‘in’... you need someone inside to vouch for you and say you’re cool. Understand?”
Cathy nodded.
“If we don’t have that, it’s going to be so much harder to get what we want. We need a little bit of trust on our side.”
Cathy nodded again.
“I was thinking”, she pulled Naoko Satos file out from under the gathering pile on the coffee table, “Sato used to be a major Sammie... that’s why they’re so pissed off at her. According to her bio, she still has that Sammie mentality. We might be able to use that. If she is there, we might be able to use her...”
Ford began to detail her plan.
A green Ford truck was drifting through the darkness of the asteroid belt. Most of the cargo area appeared to have been shot up, with the tonneau cover hanging wide open, held on solely by one clasp. Sunlight shone through big holes, much like those which’d be caused by a standard Fen coilgun.
Spattered inside where the purple remains of a cargo of thionite, the vast majority of which had long since dissipated in the vacuum.
The lights in the cabin were dark, but still, there was life aboard.
“What do you think? How long will it take until they finally receive the radio signal and decide to look after us?” Cathy asked, her head laying in Fords legs.
Ford had originally been a little uncomfortable with it, but finally accepted that the catgirl had to have somewhere to sleep. Besides, Cathy was supposed to be hers now. Ford was in her usual getup, mechanics overalls under an armoured leather jacket.
Cathy was dressed in a sleeveless top with a 3WA writing and some really short hotpants. As long as Ford were petting her new pet often enough, she was okay with this.
“The batteries should keep it warm in here for at least another 12 hours.” Ford said, “And we’ve air for a day, unless their aim was that bad.”
Cathy groaned. “It has been 6 hours already.”
“It’ll take a while before they’re convinced we really need help and no-one else is coming,” answered Ford. "We should be outside their range before we run out of power, after that, the Nova can pick us up if they don’t.”
She was still pining for her poor unfortunate truck. It’d just gotten a new engine and everything after the old one had blown on the way to the last convention. Ford had hated the part of the plan where the Nova had shot up the entire back end of her truck.... she hated it even though it had been her idea.
Nothing but real damage would've done. At least the gunner'd been up to job. But, there really was nothing left to do but wait and listen to some music. The player had settled on the suspiciously apropos Space Oddity.
“A song about an astronaut dying stranded in space, while we’re stranded in space.” Ford gave an amused snort. “That's the definition of irony"
Still, Ford reflected, as she stared out the window, it was humbling. They were only a few thousand kilometres from Nehalennia, but it was still lost in an infinite number of sparkles. She wondered which one was Earth. She wondered which one was Mars. She wondered if Jet ever felt this -small - when she was out in space on her own.
Cathy followed her look out to the starscape and smiled. “That's why I named my craft... why I left Earth... maybe even why I never looked back.” She began to purr. “I don’t know how many hours and hours I have looked up into this dark sky.”
Sierra nodded. “Never saw the stars in Chicago, except when the power went out.”
Cathy nodded. “They just produce too much light... that’s why Astronomers were the first to flee the planet.”
The radio in the front console suddenly beeped with the sound of an incoming radio signal.
“... on a light... unknown truck, please respond... if your radio is not transmitting anymore, switch on a light.”
A female voice with a vaguely Japanese accent, using a radio frequency normally used for short-range communications.
Cathy;s head shot up. She glanced at the radio, hoping their wait was up. “I hope we are not accidentally rescued by someone else” she chuckled. She peered through the windscreen, scanning for the source of the transmission
Ford glanced around, checking her rear-view mirrors. Bright lights shone from an unknown vehicle rising from behind them.
She started to flash her lights. One long flash, followed by one short one, then repeatting the pattern. It was a simple pattern, but one that obviously pointed to life inside.
The radio crackled. “I see you. I’m coming alongside. Use the emergency channel if you still have radio.”
Ford selected the channel on the comm-panel overhead “This is Cally Auron,” she said, “Aboard the Star One. There’s two of us aboard. Myself, and Teela, my catgirl.”
“Copy that,” the voice on the radio answered. “This is Nehallennia One. What happened to you?”
Ford looked at Cathy. Most rescuers normally gave their name.
“We got shot up,” Ford answered.
The lights from the rescue vehicle played across the battered shell of the truck, picking out the holes in the cargobay. Ford held her breath. Long seconds ticked by. This was the make or break moment.
“Great Justice did it?”
Great, let her draw her own conclusions. She’ll believe them more.
“Yeah,” Ford answered, “They shot me up and splattered my cargo across space. I was lucky to get my ass away and get this far.”
“Too bad,” the voice on the other end responded. “How much air do you have left?”
“About a day’s worth,” Ford replied truthfully.
“Great. We might be able to just tow you in to Nehallennia, instead of doing something more complicated.”
Ford Keyed open the channel. “So, To whom do I owe my survival to then, Miss mysterious stranger.”
“Sato, Naoko Sato." the answer came back "And trust me, I’ve been doing this for years.”
Sato had been right. Soon after Ford's truck was being slowly towed towards Nehallennia. Ford could give her that at least, it seemed she hadn’t lost any of her famous experience.
Seeing the open hangar Cathy had the terrifying realisation that this was all very, very real. Suddenly, she wanted to be anywhere else. She stared out the window, pressing herself up against the door.
“Don’t worry,” Ford reassured. “It’ll just be a couple of days. Keep our heads, it’ll be no problemo.” She smiled, before reaching for the collar’s monitor. “Just remember, once we’re in that hangar... you’re Teela, and I’m Cally. Just like we practiced,”
Cathy... Teela, she reminded herself, scratched at her collar. She looked almost forlornly up at Cally.
“I’ve done this before,” Cally said.
The change in gravities as they crossed the threshold to the landing bay sent Cally’s mind through a loop. All tests assured her was psychosomatic. It was still irritating. It faded quickly as she felt the wheels hit solid ground.
“It’ll take about a minute to pressurise the bay,” Sato warned. “Sit tight. You’re among friends here.”
It wasn’t that big of a bay... barely big enough for her truck and whatever was loading beside it. Cally looked out the window, watching a group of Senshi unload what looked like a very fast ship. They were Senshi, but not Senshi in a way. It was hard to put her finger on exactly... but somehow it reminded her of mirror-universe Star Trek, with Spock's beard and the racier uniforms.
It was the little things. A darkening of the colours here and there, some extra flesh bared up top or on the arms, or a tendency towards torn fishnets or the odd piercing and they suddenly appeared far more evil than their clean-cut counterparts. More ‘Goffick’, she snickered privately. They were trying too hard, an aura of deliberate and intentional gloom hanging over them.
If it wasn’t for the fact that they were unloading obvious bales of thionite off that ship, she wouldn’t even have pegged them as criminals. She started to wonder if maybe perhaps, they weren’t doing it for the money like everyone else, but because somehow crime seemed all edgy and cool and anti-Senshi.
They weren’t real zwilniks, not the actively malicious kind anyway. They were just playing at it.
In a way, it made the job a little less risky. It also complicated things a lot. They didn’t seem like the sort to develop ‘ghost hacking’, or whatever Jet called it. Which meant either someone was coming to the station to give Roland his orders, or there was someone else here working behind the scenes. An unknown factor...
Those were always fun. Cally sighed to herself, and took the collar’s remote from her pocket. She keyed in her code, and smiled lightly as it came up green. It was picking up Teela’s biometrics quite happily...
“Calm down, Teela,” Cally said soothingly. “If they wanted to hurt us, there’d be more of a welcoming committee.”
She hoped.
Teela took a deep breath. “I hope so... but we have clearly missed something during the planning. And I hope we did not missed too much. But let's get out of here, I cannot wait to stretch a little bit...”
She yawn, pressing her legs deep down into the footwell until the metal creaked.
“There’re always unknowns going in. Just go with them.” Cally said, before her expression darkened. “Now get out of my damn truck! It’s your fault this happened,” she yelled.
Teela put on a surprised ‘who me?’ face, before opening the door and jumping out. Cally damn near slammed her own the door off its hinges as she got out, projecting fury into the room
“And see if there’s anything left of our load will ya!” Cally held up the remote, backing her anger up with an obvious threat.
Teela eyes widened and she hurried around to the back of the pickup. She peered through the wholes shot through the bay, but couldn't see much. She tried to open the tailgate, but it just fell off, clattering onto the steel floor of the landing bay. Teela stuck her head through the open ‘hatch’ to look at the cargo.
“That doesn’t look good Cally” she shouted back, finally vanishing inside the remains of the trailer. Only her tail stuck out.
“This sucks!” Cally spat, scuffing her boot off the ground. She pressed one hand against the cold metal. “My poor baby” she sighed, “what have they done with you?” Deep breath. “Great... truck nearly wrecked, cargo destroyed or gone... this is really my lucky day...”
Naoko Sato appeared beside her, still half dressed in her pressure gear. She took one look at the truck and whistled.
“Solid work... multiple coil gun bursts... one grazing shot over the engine, the others wrecked the wheels and the trailer. It is astonishing that it was still airtight.”
Cally nodded to her and smiled. “Duct tape, and God’s luck,” she said. “But explaining this lot to Vercetti’s going to be a pain,”
Sato raised an eyebrown “Vercetti? I can't say that I have heard of him,”
“My boss,” Cally answered. She feigned a sigh. “And if I don’t find 40 kilo’s of thionite for him I got paid to deliver, I’ll be coughing up my own furballs.”
Naoko nodded, pondering for a moment. A business opportunity perhaps?
Teela reappeared from the remains of the trucks bay with something purple in her waving hand. “One survived Cally!”
“39 Kilo’s,” Cally corrected. “Good cat.”
“I think we might be able to come to an arrangement,” Sato said, still working the maths in her head. “It might not be cheap,” she warned.
“Better that than spending the rest of my life washing myself with my own tongue...” Cally replied, with a wry smirk. Judging by the look on Teela’s face she obviously disagreed. “I guess I’ll just have to take the hit this time.”
Naoko stroked her chin with satisfaction, “Then, I think we might be able to do a deal. Naoko Sato, Station Commander.”
“Cally Auron,” Cally offered a handshake.
Sato eyed her hand almost distastefully for a moment. She didn’t grip very tight at all.
“This way, Cally, we will talk more in my office.”
Sato’s office was strangely strange, yet oddly normal. Cally couldn’t really think of a better way to describe it. It certainly reminded her of any number of Senshi homes and offices she’d seen - was that a Furby on the table? I also lacked a certain something and it wasn’t something she could put her finger on.
Maybe it was colour. Maybe it was just a bad aura in the handwavium. It made her far more uncomfortable than she ever expected to be.
Teela had been just following Cally around, trying to keep close to her. Most people seem to not even notice her, except the few that smiled at her in a way Teela didn’t really liked at all. Even the few other catgirls she had seen had a strange look in their eyes. They tended to focus on the collar.
Naoko herself was seated behind her desk, her body language announcing to all that she was the one in charge.
“So,” Sato said, checking her monitor. “I can get you 39 kilogrammes, within 3 days. That should be long enough to fix your truck.”
Cally nodded. Three days should be enough to get what they want and get clear out of there. “How much?”
“Since it is a rush, it will be expensive. Hmmm...” She made a show of thinking about it .“But since you’re a first-customer -and a bad-luck case - about seventy thousand, Australian.”
Cally winced. It wasn’t an act. “Shit... “
“We can work out the details later,” Sato assured her.
“You don’t mind if I pay when I get paid for this job?” Cally asked, with mild touch of hope in her voice. “I don’t have that much on me right now,”
“Hmmm.....” Sato made a show of considering once more. She smiled. “Twenty percent a week sounds fair. I may be Senshi, I may be offering a discount, but that does not mean I am a charity.”
“Bloodsucker,” Cally snarled through gritted teeth. The discount was the loss-leader. But, she had to remember that she didn’t really have a choice but to accept. Deep breath. Look reluctant... it’s not like she actually had to pay her anyway.. “Alright,” she relented, exhaling a resigned breath. “I’ll have your money within a week from when I leave,”
Sato nodded her approval, “Good. I’ll throw in the spare parts for your truck for free.”
“Thanks,” Cally forced a forced smile.
“I’ll have someone show you and your pet....” Teela scowled. “.... to your quarters. Enjoy your stay.”
Sato waited in her office until she was sure the catgirl was out of hearing range.
“Any signals?” she asked the Furby.
“Dah e-tah!” It answered. “Uno Big Lady! Small signal. Uno furby lady! Small signal secret!”
So, Cally was transmitting a signal. And the catgirl too. The catgirls was encrypted. Admittedly, it didn’t have to be encrypted much to confuse the Furby,
“Kah may-lah?” it enquired, it’s expression robotically curious. “Doo-moh?”
It cheered as she embraced it. She was smiling as she placed it back on the desk... It was the only thing that damned Stellvian hadn’t taken from her.
“U-nye-ay-tay-doo?” The furby enquired, concerned.
Yeah, she was. She sat there for far longer than she’d intended, letting herself drift on from regret, through bitterness and on through a malignant hate that burned deep. It brought her mind back to business. Somehow, she doubted Cally would be the type who’d be able to get so much cash within a week.
A courier good enough to evade an OGJ patrol with such a shot-up truck could be useful. Perfect.
Still, that signal was intriguing. She’d noticed the collar around the catgirl’s neck. A feral one? That’d explain the radio signals quite well. Still, it was something worth investigating. She keyed in a few commands into her computer. The projector on top came to life, a holographic screen appearing in mid air beside Naoko.
“Hi!” the image chirped with a saccharine cheeryness. Pale brown hair, twin straight pigtails and shining round glasses hiding her eyes behind a reflection of the recorder. She still made Sato wince sometimes.
“I have something I want you to check out for me,” she said.
“Oh?” the image answered, taking on a deliberately curious expression. “Could it be the newcomers?”
“How...”
“You forget,” the image smiled. “I’m the best.”
Sato sighed. “They’re both broadcasting a radio signal. It is encrypted. I want you to tell me what it is,”
“That shouldn’t be too hard,” answered the image. She seemed mildly insulted by the simplicity of the task.
“And,” Sato added the carrot, “one of them is a feral catgirl. I know you’ve been wanting one,and they will be needing a lot of money very soon.”
She started to twirl her hair between her fingers.
“Ooh!” The image suddenly perked right up. “Where are they?”
“Room number AE-85,” Sato answered, trying to look down on the hologram.
The projected screen just drifted a few centimeters higher.
“I’ll make the pet’s owner an offer she can’t refuse,” the hologram responded with a malicious grin “Vivio’s near broken now anyway.”
The holographic screen disappeared before Naoko could get the last word in. She cursed under her breath. The Furby stared innocently back at her.
“Boo e-day,” It warned.
No, it wasn’t. But it was fair. It was vengeance. It was her right Gods dammit after having her life ruined by a bunch of arrogant, self righteous... she took a deep breath, shooting that train of thought clear in the head.
She sat down at her desk and stared long and hard at her computer monitor.
Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering.... but it’d all be worth it. Just keep convincing yourself it was worth it.
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