by Selina Rosen
"Parents," Drew sighed. The last thing she wanted to do was meet anyone else who insisted that she knew them. "Tell them I'm . . ."
It was Drew's curse that if she gave being sick as an excuse, she immediately started to run a fever. So she quickly dumped that excuse for the one she usually used instead. "Tell them I'm having sex."
"What?" Margot gasped.
Drew looked at the startled look on Margot's face. "Well, I suppose that old stand-by's outtah the question."
"Don't you want to see your parents, my Queen?"
The Queen gave her a hard look, and it took her several seconds to realize why.
"My . . . Drew."
Drew's features softened.
"No, I don't want to see them."
She flopped down on the bed, her face set in a pout.
"No, I don't. They're going to look at me expectantly. And when I don't jump up and down for joy, they're going to get this crushed look on their faces. Then they'll say with a big tear in their eyes. 'Don't you remember me? You used to spit your milk all over me.' Or, 'When you were little you were so cute, you used to chew on the pet zombit. Don't you remember?' It's more that I can take."
Margot had been completely filled in on the Queen's condition, and for that reason she hadn't told the Queen that they had been childhood friends who had grown up together and had no secrets from each other. But it had been hard not to. It hurt that there was no recognition in her friend's eyes, so she understood exactly what Drew was saying.
"You've got to see them sometime, Tara . . . Drew," Margot said softly.
"But does it have to be today? Can't it wait?" Drew felt suddenly lost and abandoned. In a strange place, surrounded by strange things, and strange people. She was surprised by who she asked for first.
"Where's my sister? Where's Stasha?"
"I would imagine that she's with your parents in the morning room."
"Morning room!" Drew scoffed. "Do we also have a noon, afternoon, and evening room? What about a just-thinking-about-morning room, or a not-quite-evening room?"
She ran her hands through her hair, and looked like she wanted to scream.
Margot giggled.
"Now you're laughing?"
"Not-quite-evening room!" Margot giggled again.
Drew shook her head. "Where's my crew?"
"They were given suitable quarters."
"Just great!" Drew had been so absorbed in taking care of her own needs to worry about where anyone else was going. When they didn't try to shove her in a room with Zarco, that had been good enough for her. She could imagine how these people's minds worked, and while she was sleeping in silk, Van and the human were probably sleeping in a drafty box somewhere.
"I want Van Gar put into one of the nicest rooms in the palace. He's not my step-an-fetch-em-boy, he's my Bud, my only friend. The only one I can trust now that I have had my life tossed into the hands of strangers. Van Gar is the only one who knows me, at least he's the only one who knows the same me I know."
She looked at the dress on the floor. "There is no way I am wearing that thing.
"You have a whole closet full of clothes. Stasha had all your clothes cleaned in anticipation of your return." Margot walked to the wall on the right and pushed a concealed button. There was an electrical hum, and twenty feet of silk-covered wall disappeared to expose twenty feet of closet filled with clothes.
Drew rubbed her hands together and trotted—naked—over to the closet, and started going through the outfits. "Cool hologram!"
She pulled out a purple gown, made a face and tossed it into the middle of the room. Thirty minutes later, there was a mountain of clothes in the middle of the floor, the closet was empty, and Drew was wearing a pair of black leather boots Margot had told her were for riding. Drew spun around.
"So, what do you think. Is it me?"
Margot giggled. "Can you not find a single thing to your liking?"
"I can't believe I would ever have worn such crap."
She looked at the bed sheet. "Oh well," she sighed, walked over and grabbed the blue length, then wrapped it around herself in toga fashion. She gazed into the twelve-foot mirror which graced the south wall.
"Divine! Simply divine! Whoever is your tailor?"
"You're not going to breakfast like that!"
"And why not? This is probably the most expensive piece of clothing I have ever worn. Well, that I remember, anyway." She twirled around vigorously, exposing rather more flesh than she believed would be considered proper.
"Well, maybe I should wear underwear. I wouldn't want to appear crude and uncultured."
Margot produced a pair of panties, and Drew slipped them on.
"Well, here I go. Off to meet Mummy and Daddy and all that good rot. Just show me to the just-after-morning-but-not-quite-noon room."
Margot chuckled. "Yes, of course. Would you like me to have these things disposed of?" She indicated the pile of clothes in the middle of the room.
"Disposed of? Are you nuts? Do you have any idea what the re-sale value on that shit is? Just leave it. It looks more homey now anyway."
Margot nodded and opened the door.
"This way, my Qu . . . Drew." She indicated the direction with the wave of her arm.
Drew looked at the expanse of hallway and the Royal Blue carpet that covered the floor. The whole castle seemed to be an odd mixture of the latest technologies and treasures of antiquity, one giant anachronism. Two huge guards fell in behind them. Drew looked them up and down quickly and winked at the cuter one.
"My, I certainly married well, didn't I?" Her question didn't want an answer, and Margot didn't give one.
"In here," Margot waved towards a door, then pushed the button that opened it.
Drew just stood there.
"You're very nervous, aren't you?"
Drew shrugged.
"They're very nice people, your parents. Your father can be a bit rigid, but he is really a push-over, and your mother . . . Well, she . . ." Margot couldn't lie to Taralin."Your mother can be a bit over-bearing, but she usually means well."
"Great, I have nothing in common with either one of them." Reluctantly, she followed Margot into the room.
Zarco got up from the chair he was sitting in, walked over and kissed her cheek, as if he had some right to.
She made a face and quickly wiped the kiss off.
He stiffened, and backed quickly away. "My dear, your parents, Lord and Lady Straight-laced."
The man was very tall and stern looking, as if he lived in constant fear of smiling and thereby breaking his stone face. The woman was short and plump and grinned broadly enough for both of them, but the grin seemed somehow forced and false. Her "sweetness", if it existed at all, was only skin deep, and probably wasted on people she cared nothing about. The one they called her mother ran to her and hugged her, and almost but not quite kissed her cheek.
"Oh, my darling, I thought we would never see you again."
"Lillith, you heard what the doctor said, she doesn't remember. Don't overwhelm her," the father person said.
Drew's stomach was starting to churn, and she felt as if she were going to hurl. She found herself searching for Stasha.
Stasha met her gaze and nodded. She moved quickly and took her mother's arm and led her towards her seat and away from Drew. The only chair empty was the one next to the husband person.
Drew sat down hard, and she must have looked as green as she felt.
"Are you all right, dear?" Zarco asked.
"All right! All right? Do you realize that I went through a whole closet! A fucking roomful of clothes, and there was not a damn thing there I would be caught dead wearing? I'm wearing the fucking sheets off my bed. I have a fucking dresser; like I need any help wearing my sheets! There are bunnies on my walls. Bunnies! Last time I saw one of those, I was eating it, and spitting the gristly bits at the humans sitting at the bar. Kidnapped by fucking Lockhedes, forced to crash land in the desert. I lost my fucking
ship. Hell, I lost two ships, both swallowed up by the Galdart sands. Attacked by giant Hurtellas, then we get to plow our way through a riot. Did you people really have to rescue me?"
Drew jumped up and started to run out the door, but it was closed, and she hit the wall in several places trying to find the button. There was a hand on her shoulder.
"You feel better now, Drew?" Stasha asked.
Drew turned to look at her. She was smiling. Drew shrugged.
"Not really. I could do with a drink about now."
"Let's go get something to eat."
Stasha looked around the room.
"Come on, let's go, I'm famished." Zarco said.
Stasha reached for Drew's hand and Drew let her take it and lead her out.
"I'm sorry about the clothes. It was stupid of me not to realize that in five years your tastes might have changed."
Lillith must have overheard. "The dress I picked was suitable. Whatever you've been doing, Taralin, you must realize that as Queen, you have certain duties and responsibilities. You can't walk about the palace in riding boots and your bed sheets!"
"Mother!" Stasha started to protest.
"If I'm the fucking Queen, I can run about buck naked if I want." Drew spit back venomously.
"Well, at least that hasn't changed. You still have a mouth on you."
"If I didn't, I'd look funny eating. 'I'm sorry my Queen but you've got a lovely piece of lettuce in your ear . . . Oh a thousand pardons I forgot you don't have a proper mouth.' I need a drink." Drew mumbled and made her very best stupid face.
"Oh, very funny, Taralin," Lillith said hotly. "You always have to hurt my feelings."
"I don't even know you." Drew spat back. "And here I thought all this brain sucking was a bad thing. I need a fucking drink."
"Tar, what's fucking?" Lillith asked the father person.
Stasha chuckled.
"It's, ah," the father person smiled and looked embarrassed. "It's a slang term meaning . . . I'll tell you later, dear."
Drew excused herself after breakfast, and Margot followed her.
"I thought you said she was a little over-bearing. At no time did you say that the woman is a flaming bitch," Drew said accusingly.
Margot smiled and shrugged. "I don't know what that is. Lillith has always been nice to me, but . . . Well, you and she never did get along. You got along a little better after you married Zarco."
"Yeah, I imagine that pleased the status-climbing old whore. She probably really loved me only after I had been abducted."
She shook her head. "Erik told me that my parents were Salvagers like me, and that they were slaughtered by space pirates. I had this vision of my parents being bigger than life; bold and brave. Then when they told me I wasn't really Drewcila Qwah, I pictured my father as being the sit-on-his-lap type, and my mother as the home-baked-cookies type. Instead, we're talking the Ice Man and Super Bitch. Do you know where my crew is now?"
"In the guards' quarters. This way."
Margot led her down yet another hall. At the door, the guards bowed, then started to follow them.
"What do you think you're doing?" Drew asked, stopping and turning to face them.
"Our orders are to go with you where ever you go," they said in unison.
"Paranoia in stereo," Drew mumbled. "Tell you what. Let me see that laser rifle."
They both tried to hand her their weapons.
"Just one." She smiled and took one of the rifles.
"OK. This is my rifle now, and I'll guard myself."
"But, my Queen, our orders . . ."
"I un-order you," she said with a smile.
They must have accepted that, because they stayed at their post.
"Do you know how to use that thing?" Margot asked in shock.
"Use it, hell! I cut my teeth on one of these suckers."
Margot led her to the guards quarters. They were warm, and not uncomfortable looking, but nothing close to the splendor of the palace. Van Gar was laying asleep on a lower bunk. Drew crawled into bed with him. Much to Margot's horror.
"Van," she said softly.
No response.
"Van," she said a little louder, shaking him a little.
He still didn't stir.
"Van, damn it, wake up!" she yelled, shaking him as hard as she could.
He startled awake, and sat bolt upright, hitting his head on the top bunk.
"Fuck!" He rubbed his head. "Damn it, Drew!"
"Where's the dweeb?"
Van Gar shrugged.
"Do I look like a monkey keeper?"
"Do you want me to answer that?"
"If you say yes, I'm going to rip your head off and shit in the hole."
"My, aren't we in a lovely mood?"
"Well, I just love it when you scream me awake, and it just really makes my day if I can follow it up by giving myself a concussion."
Drew rolled over onto his leg.
"Why don't you just use the weapon and get it over with?" he grumbled, rubbing at his knee.
"Ah, quit being such a pussy!"
He saw Margot cringing against the far wall. Obviously, she had never seen anything that looked like Van Gar.
Drew followed Van Gar's gaze. "Margot, I want you to meet my pilot, Van Gar. Van Gar, this is Margot—she's my dresser."
"Your dresser!" Van raised an eyebrow. "And did she dress you in this lovely little frock?"
"This 'lovely frock' happens to be the sheets off my bed, smegma breath."
"Sheets!" Van ran his hand over the fabric, apparently oblivious to the fact that it also happened to be her tit.
"This is real silk, Drew! The real shit. Do you have any idea what the re-sale value would be on this shit?"
"The shit that I'm wearing on my disappointing body?"
"I said I was sorry." Van Gar sighed.
"Apparently I'm the one who's sorry. Anyway, I'm wearing about seven hundred iggys in thread."
"Wow!" Van looked mightily impressed.
"You should see the shit I threw on the floor. There was enough fine cloth there to keep us in beer for ten years."
"Then why are you wearing the sheets?"
"This was funeral shit, Van. Long flowing gowns and drek like that. Nothing I'd be caught alive in."
"You mean dead in," Van corrected.
"No. I mean alive. When I'm dead, you can put me in anything. As long as I'm breathing air, I ain't wearin' none ah that shit."
"Queens don't wear sheets, not even silk ones," Van said.
"Yeah. Well, I ain't cut out ta be no Queen, either. Zarco, he thinks he can kiss me any time he likes, and my parents! You wouldn't fucking believe them. My dad is like some stone soldier, and my mother!" She sat up and threw up her hands.
"What's she like?"
"Imagine Erik in a dress, only a tad bit ruder."
Van Gar made a face.
"Yeah, not a pretty picture. My room you would not even believe. The wall paper has flowers and bunnies on it. And get this; I supposedly picked this shit out myself! It's just too scary."
"Bunnies? You mean those horrid creatures from Earth that almost ate Deltoid 4?"
"One and the same."
"Hell, the last time I saw one of those, we were eating it and spitting the gristly bits at the humans in the bar."
"Exactly! Now you can see why it's so important that we get all we can and get out of this place."
She remembered Margot standing there.
"Margot, could you give us a moment?" The dresser bowed and left the room.
"I gottah get outtah here, or I'm gonna go nuts. I want you to go to the spaceport. Not right away, but in a couple of days. Find out what ships the kingdom owns. I figure they owe us at least two, but we'll shoot for three and a bunch of loot."
"What are you going to do?" Van Gar asked suspiciously.
"When I get done with them at the palace, they're going to be praying to get rid of me. Zarco is going to want a divorce, and I want to know wha
t to ask for in the healthy settlement I plan to collect."
Van Gar smiled and nodded.
"So, basically, you want me to go shopping."