Heirs of Adventure

[Taataani Onashi]

It was a good thing it was dark, on account of the dumbfounded expression Taa wore on her face. No, it sure weren't a measly T-16. How they'd managed to fit this big metal lummox into a barn, she hadn't a clue.

The mongrel girl ran a hand through her tussled snarl of hair, letting stray tresses fall in her eyes as she rocked back and forth on her heels. A ship. A real actual ship. Didn't none of her kin have no kin'rrou ship.

A sight like that seemed like it deserved a profound statement. Taa stepped forward, slapping a palm on the hull to make sure it weren't just a clever display made of painted wood. It rang with a nice weighty metal din.

"Thing's uglierr than a crross-eyed Gamorrrean."

It wasn't entirely an insult. She turned back into the light of the lamp, a curious expression on her face.

"It fly?"

[Ben Hadrana]

"Dunno," he said with a sigh. "I only found her yesterday."

He walked forward, his footsteps echoing slightly in the dark, and searched along the hull until he came across an old access panel. With a small grunt of effort he pulled it open and pressed a switch, and nothing happened.

"Gonna have to get Ruz up here to help me get her running," he sighed.

[Taataani Onashi]

Ben was nearly pushed off his feet as Taa shoved him away from the control.

"Ain't you neverr tweaked an electronic doorr beforre?"

Bending down to eye level, the mongrel girl inspected the mechanism. Boxy control housing. Overbuilt indicator screen. Big tactile buttons. She spit on the screen, wiping away some of the smudge...then rared back and punched the whole thing with a closed fist.

B-WOT

The control flickered to life, causing the door to suddenly open with an initial rusty whine, leading to an interior softly illuminated by running lamps adjacent to the floor.

Taa blinked a few times, then stood stoic as she could, motioning the way forward with her other hand.

"Ladies firrst."

[Ben Hadrana]

With a bemused 'huh' and raised eyebrows, Ben turned the electrotorch to the darkened interior of the ship. Metal grating was made visible, but the small tool seemed unable to illuminate the darkness enough to get a good idea of what was directly before them.

"Looks like whatever you managed to do didn't catch on to the rest of the ship," he grunted, stepping up on the plating of the ramp and entering his ship. He felt a pulse of pleasure at the thought of this being his ship.

Silence seemed to press up against his ears as he cast the beam of the torch about, seeing nothing spectacular directly around him, until he turned nearly completely around and saw a set of metal rungs at the end of a narrow walkway whose bright yellow paint scheme could barely be seen under the thick layer of dust.

"Maybe we can figure out the power up there," he said.

[Taataani Onashi]

Taa hung back for a moment as Ben took point. When he was well and truly out of earshot...

"Aiiieee! Aaah! Owza! Ooh! Oooo!"

The mongrel girl hopped from tiptoe to tiptoe, cradling her smarting hand as she blinked tears from her eyes, blowing frantically on her reddening knuckles as she anguish danced.

Panting in the throes of endorphin release, Taa thumbed tears out of the corners of her eyes, putting her take-no-prisoners face back on as she bounded into the ship with silent bare feet like she'd been there the whole time. Catching the last of what Ben said, Taa nodded unseen.

"Yep, yep. Up therre. Sounds good."

Still unseen, Taa allowed one last grimace, squeezing her eyes shut in pain.

[Ben Hadrana]

Ben stepped along the walkway, careful to keep his bearings; a slip would mean a fall through the open rampway, which while only potentially injurious to his health, would be certain to injure his pride. Carefully holding the torch, he gripped the rungs of the access ladder and ascended into the cockpit, which was just as dark as the rest of the ship, with dust hanging heavily in the air, moved by the change in pressure and flow by the open entry ramp.

"Wow," he breathed, for some reason pitching his voice just above a whisper. Something about the quiet stillness in the ship just prompted respect, and he obliged it. "Look at this. It's untouched."

Ben wiped a finger along the console in front of the pilot's station, leaving a streak in the heavy blanket of dust. An almost dizzying array of switches and buttons were in front of him, and the farmer's son didn't take long to realize he didn't have much of a clue as to what they all did. He sat in the pilot's seat and set the torch on the console, squinting at the switches.

"Okay," he breathed. "So this is the yoke and yaw and pitch control... that means power activation has to be somewhere right along... here?"

He pressed a button and looked up. Nothing.

"Right. Try again."

It took three tries before he got a response out of the ship; and that was a brief screech of an alarm along with red lights coming on in the console in front of him, and the sound of something clicking throughout the ship. A display blinked, and he wiped the dust covered screen off, revealing a blinking red light along with the text: POWER LOW, FUEL LOW, REFUEL.

He looked back at Taa, his eyes gleaming and a wide smile on his face.

"She works," he said, looking back at the console with happiness pouring out of him like light from a star. "She works!"

[Taataani Onashi]

Still nursing her smarting hand, Taa quickly tucked it out of sight once Ben put eyes on her again. She was the picture of feigned disinterest, but even she was getting tired of the charade. Rocking back and forth from her heels to the balls of her feet, the mongrel girl tapped the fuel gauge with a pause.

"You'rre not gettin' verry farr with a tank that drry."

The gears in her head were turning, and Taa upturned her chin with a smirk.

"Not without a parrtnerr, that is!"

[Ben Hadrana]

Ben blinked up owlishly at Taa in the dim cockpit.

"You're asking to be my partner," he said in bemusement. "Wait wait wait. First you call me all sorts of stupid, and tell me I'm lying to you about this ship, and then once you learn it's real you just flip and want in? Why should I? What can you even do about an empty tank?"

[Taataani Onashi]

Taa smirked at Ben as she drew her finger along the console, tracing a line in the dust. She raised her finger up to her lips, and blew the residual fluff off the tip and into Ben's face.

"Ain't it obvious, hayseed? I'm Onashi. That's what we do. We get things. By hustle orr by muscle."

She raised an eyebrow.

"What, you was gonna go hat-in-hand to some depot with big ol' eyes and just ask forr it?"

Taa's eyes rolled.

[Ben Hadrana]

"Now I'm gettin' just about fed up with all this mouthin'—"

Ben's retort was cut off when with a reverberating mechanical clack, the lights and power in the ship shut down, once more enveloping them in sightless black save for the tiny beam of light from the electro-torch and the dim light that managed to filter in from the front of the barn.

For a beat, both he and she just remained quiet, until Ben's voice cut through the dusty darkness:

"Damn it."

[Taataani Onashi]

In the pitch black, Taa piled on with an unhelpful Ha-Ha at the momentary setback. That was all the naysaying she had for Ben. In the dark, she draped an arm over his shoulder.

"Well parrtnerr, guess this is wherre ourr big ol' adventurre starrts, huh?"