The Great Galactic Score!

32

32

While Demi considered the best option for an apology present for an immense, alien, organic ship, that still felt justifiably miffed, Friss continued to try to explain the final part of his plan. The final heist. He had abandoned the Matryoshka doll analogy, though still had the dolls open and sitting in front of him, and had decided to boil everything down to the facts. This, of course, did not sit well with Briyun and now Friss glared at the stoat-like creature, tapping the head of the smallest doll in a fashion that screamed 'I am not annoyed! I always tap dolls hard enough to crack the surface!'.

"So, there's a 'hole' in 'space' and it's 'black'? It 'eats' everything that comes near it and 'nothing' can escape it, not 'even' light?" With every instance of obvious quotation marks, Briyun's pudgy fingers and long claws curled, illustrating the quotes. She didn't need to do that, but she did it anyway, and not always for the right words. "I'm not buying it? And this 'black hole' is at the 'centre of the galaxy' and is 'super-massive'? Nah, mate? Where does the 'hole' go to? Answer me that?"

"I don't need to 'answer' anything! It's a 'fact'! Literally everyone knows about black holes! Everyone!" Friss joined in the air-quotes game and had a marginal degree of greater success at it. "Why are you still here? Your job is done. Off you go. Toodle-oo. Your cheque is in the post."

Friss turned away from Briyun and focussed his attention on Demi, Lap and Bognrd. Except Demi had fallen into the trap of wondering whether she should get Lodka flowers, which never ended well for any party, Lap had wandered off to play with their cuddly toys in a corner, rustling to themself in a way that sounded more than a little like a Thrash Metal lullaby, and Bognrd was putting the finishing touches to a mountainous cake that looked so sugary and sweet, Demi could feel her teeth rotting and arteries closing at the sight of it. She desperately wanted to eat it. All of it, including the intricately detailed hard sugar representations of the crew and Lodka.

"And miss all the 'fun'? Not a chance, Frissa?" Briyun looked around for somewhere to sit, but Lodka, in her petty, vindictive revenge, refused to provide any seating. That they still had floors to walk on was due to Demi hugging a bulkhead and apologising upon returning to the ship. "Nah, mate? I'm in unto the end, so to speak? Even if your plan is complete hooey?"

"Hooey?" Friss' eyes bulged as his fingers gripped the flesh floor before him. "Hooey? I haven't told you the plan yet! I've just had to spend fifteen minutes explaining a fundamental fact about the universe that you, for some reason, seem to think is 'made up'! Hooey?"

Friss took a breath. Then he took another. He looked about to take another and Demi wondered whether he was hogging all the breaths to save for the next time Lodka shot them out into space, but then he spread his fingers, calming himself, before gathering up his Matryoshka dolls. He stood up, moved to where his captain's chair would normally sit, looked around as though lost before stomping his foot.

A necklace was out, Demi mused. She'd never find one with a chain long enough to fit the ship. Chocolate? Without knowing if Lodka ate chocolate, or anything at all, Demi put that apology-present idea on the back-burner for the moment. In fact, she had to put everything on the back-burner as the view screen showed they were nearing the exit of the Flesh-Route in which they travelled.

She girded herself, getting ready for the inevitable, nauseating moment that Lodka spewed them back out into real space. It didn't help. Thankful that she had never had to comfort cheese sprayed from a can, Lodka entered real space and Demi tried to hold onto lunch she had eaten decades before. She knew that was impossible, but it was the only way to describe how horrible the entire experience was.

Real space folded around them and the view screen now showed something Demi had never even considered she would ever see. Partly because floating so close to a black hole was not exactly cruise liner, sight-seeing material, but mostly because she simply had no interest in such a thing. She had interest in it now, as she watched the accretion disk of the black hole spin in the infinite black.