The Language I Spoke Yesterday

History

I leaned back in my chair, feet on my recently cleared desk. My office had been completely reorganized. Every file had been alphabetized in the cabinet, as well as the books in the bookshelf. The newspapers had been sorted by date and set in three piles, tied neatly with lengths of suture.

It was relaxing to think that I could probably find things now, just as soon as I figured out where some of my random papers and notes ended up. In the meantime... I reached out and untied the nearest stack of news. It also happened to be the oldest stack.

Something at the margins drew my attention. It was some sort of cat creature with moons on it, looking skeptically at the title of the article. On the other side, a strange looking lizard with a beak seemed to be angrily trying to eat the first letter.

The two creatures littered the article, looking shocked or sick, depending on where in the sterilized story they happened to be drawn. They appeared to have their own personalities, as well, with the cat tending to shy away from even the smallest amount of gore, while the lizard attempted to eat the things that made him angry. At one point, the lizard appeared to be attacking something with his tail.

At the end of the article, a small picture of a marine had been completely blacked out. The two likely options were: Andromeda simply had a generalized hatred of marines, or that particular marine was connected to her in some way. The first was likely, considering her family was destroyed by the World Government and murdered in front of her eyes. The second had more interesting implications.

"Hey, Captain!" Bepo called from the doorway. "Ikkaku and Andromeda are back! They made a little mess in town so they came home."

I raised an eyebrow at my first mate. "A mess, huh?"

He nodded happily. "They stole things. Sounds like something Andromeda would do, huh?"

/-/-/-/

Penguin helped me get my stolen goods cleaned and dried, and I got them comfortably on my bed. At some point, I'd have to try for a new mattress. I frowned, nibbling my pinky as I wondered at the logistics of it.

"I'll probably need Law's help..." I admitted with a shake of my head.

"For what?"

I nearly pissed myself. I jerked around with wide eyes and a racing heart to face the rudely amused captain. "Captain!"

He snickered. "You're usually a bit more perceptive than that, Tomato-ya."

"Shut up, Dr. Speckle." I scowled and tried to cool my cheeks. "It's rude to sneak up on people. Didn't anyone teach you manners?"

"Not particularly." Law raised an eyebrow. "Did you read nothing you drew on?"

I opened my mouth to say something, but closed it as my face turned an intensely warm shade of crimson. I had penciled in Moontail and Sharkthing on a couple of corners, looking properly shocked and appalled at the sterile way journalists had covered the eradication of Flevance.

And then there was the one face I had scratched out completely. I did it without thinking, the same way I had rebelled against everything he said, or argued or screamed at him.

"Anyway..." I mumbled into the void. "Did you need something, Captain?"

An evil glint appeared in his stoney grey eyes, causing a shiver of fear to run from the top of my head down to my fingertips and toes. "It's occurred to me that you've never had a physical. Or received any vaccines. I think it's time to change that."

I groaned, but couldn't see any way to escape.

/-/-/-/

"Andromeda... You, uh, forgot to deal in the captain." Penguin glanced nervously between myself and Law.