Stupid Sexy Cryptids [Ch 34, 35]

34: Catfight

"Nexy, can't you use your voice on yourself?” I hissed at the Serval through chattering teeth as the gun and dragon began their plan to undermine the local command structure. “Order yourself to be less high?"

Nexxali's eyes widened. "That's... Oh!" She cleared her throat, eyes lighting up. Her voice took on a deep, bell-like resonance. "Nexxali Everrim, restore cognitive function to baseline parameters. Focus!"

Her pupils contracted slightly, her posture straightened, and the foggy confusion in her eyes sharpened to mere tipsiness rather than wild inebriation. She was still under the catnip effects, but less so.

"Better," she said, then her expression turned predatory. "Keiy, I am no longer impaired. Master command override Nexxali-Alpha-Seven-Seven-Seven. Acknowledge."

The gun's red eyes flashed. "Override acknowledged, Marshal Commandant."

"What?!" Galateya gasped.

"Disconnect from your current user. You report to me now. Full compliance mode."

“KEIY!” Galateya shrieked.

"Compliance confirmed," Keiy stated, turning to face Galateya. "I apologize, but Marshal authority supersedes Beta-Knight authority."

Nexxali grinned through the ice collar. "Did you really think I'd let some servant-less Knight take command? I might be high, but I'm not stupid. Keiy, melt this ice and release us. Carefully."

The spider gun climbed up the wall and flashed superheated rays at both of our ice collars. Just as the ice started to crack, Galateya's hand shot out, grabbing Keiy.

"Oh no you don't!" The dragon yanked the spider-gun away from the wall. "I'm calling the Legate right now to report this entire damned coverup!"

"Like hell you are!" Nexxali snarled through the ice collar. "Keiy! Stop her!"

Galateya yelped, as the gun flashed with an electrical discharge. The gun skittered away, then rushed up the dragon’s leg and torso, wrapping around Galateya's arm like a mechanical octopus. "Apologies, but I must comply with the Marshal's authority."

"KEIY! You're MY partner!" Galateya shrieked, trying to shake off the gun.

“Alas," Keiy stated. "The Marshal's override key supersedes our lovely bond."

“Master command override Nexxali-Alpha-Seven-Seven-Seven! Disable the armor battery of Beta-Knight Galateya!” Nexxali barked.

“You!” Galateya choked as her armor shields turned off with a flicker of colorful hexagons.

“He he he,” Hexxali giggled. “Not so tough now, are you beerch?”

"Voicecast—" Galateya yelled.

The spider-gun fired a brilliant ray of light across the dragon girl’s V-ring, making its innards spark and blacken.

Galateya opened and closed her mouth and then her hair turned into flames.

"You absolute—" She lunged at Nexxali, prying her from the wall. The ice holding us to the wall shattered and I fell down onto my butt with a yelp.

Nexxali grabbed a chunk of ice and stuffed it into Galateya’s mouth. The ice shard connecting with superheated Galateya caused a dramatic detonation of steam. The dragon cried out, pawing at her face.

“Ha ha! Defeated by your own magics!” The Serval laughed, defensively hopping around cat-style.

"YOU FUCKING... Ahhh! That fuckin hurt!" Galateya spat and hissed, rolling across my living room floor, tongue out, scales now shaped like dead bark.

"TAKE THAT, YOU SERVANT-LESS LOSER!" Nexxali yowled back, kicking with her legs.

They knocked over my coffee table, sending old DVDs flying. Keiy skittered around them, occasionally zapping her former owner.

"That's cheating!" Galateya protested as electricity coursed through her wooden scales, setting them alight.

"Nu-huh! It's called tactical advantage!" Nexxali grabbed a couch cushion and smacked the dragon in the face with it. "Something you'd know if you'd ever won a real fight instead of simulating them with your imaginary rock friend!"

"At least I don't get high on LAWN CLIPPINGS!" Galateya grabbed the cushion. The pair engaged in a brief tug-of-war before the pillow tore, exploding in a cloud of stuffing.

I pressed myself against the wall, not sure how to deal with an alien catfight in my living room. 

"You executed your own squad members!" Galateya accused, scales turning rubbery as she tried to pin Nexxali's arms.

"You don't even HAVE squad members to execute because nobody wants to work with you!" Nexxali bit Galateya's hand. “Or maybe you’re such a knob that you don’t want to work with anyone!”

"OW! Did you just BITE me?!"

"Mrrrrowl!" Nexxali yowled, fully committed to the feline combat style. She raked her claws down Galateya's armor in a swipe.

"Stop acting like an animal!"

"Stop acting like you're smarter than everyone when you're literally the worst Omnid commander in the fleet!"

They rolled into the kitchen.

"Even your great-grandmother thinks you're a disappointment!" Nexxali grabbed a spatula and wielded it like a tiny sword.

"Your entire career is built on covering up other people's crimes!" Galateya grabbed a ladle, and they briefly fenced with kitchen utensils.

"At least I HAVE a career!"

"EXECUTING YOUR OWN PEOPLE ISN'T A CAREER!"

Galateya tackled Nexxali again, and they rolled back into the living room, destroying what remained of my coffee table. Keiy perched on my shoulder to get a better view.

"This is highly entertaining," the gun observed. "Twenty credits on the Marshal.”

"I don't have alien money to bet."

"Pity. She's winning."

“Shouldn’t you be helping more?” I wondered.

“I’m not allowed to hurt my own partner, unless it’s educational.”

“This is… educational?” I stared at the catfight.

“I think that it is,” Keiy said. “She could use some friends.”

“How does demolishing my living room help her make friends?”

“Friendship through violence is a good strategy when it comes to prads. This is clearly a bonding ritual."

Nexxali had managed to get on top, sitting on Galateya's chest and holding her wrists down. "Surrender, dragon!"

"Never! You're compromised!” Galateya panted. “You're conspiring with primitives! You're—"

"Smart enough to make friends instead of enemies?" Nexxali grinned, panting. "Yeah, guilty. Maybe if you tried being nice to people instead of lecturing them, you'd have friends too!"

"I don't need friends! I have principles!"

"You have a talking rock and daddy issues!"

"I DO NOT HAVE—" Galateya bucked, throwing Nexxali off. They both scrambled to their feet, circling each other and hissing.

"Admit it!" Nexxali pointed accusingly. "You're jealous that I found something actually valuable on this planet while you're still playing with whack theories!"

"Getting high and forcing a human to feed you eggs with your voice isn't finding something valuable!"

"It is when he's Charmchain resistant! That's more than anyone else has found!"

"He's clearly not that resistant if he's obeying you!"

They both turned to look at me.

"Uh..." I said intelligently.

"Human!" Nexxali commanded. "Tell her you're resistant!"

"Human!" Galateya countered. "Tell her you're NOT resistant!"

"I'm resistant to dragons but susceptible to cats?" I offered weakly after a moment of inner contemplation.

They stared at me, then at each other, then lunged simultaneously. The fight resumed with renewed vigor, now incorporating thrown cushions, DVDs used as throwing stars, and then, Galateya trying to stuff Nexxali into the coat closet who fought back with coat hangers.

"This is all your fault!" Galateya panted, half in and half out of the closet.

"MY fault? You're the one who broke into the house where I was chilling peacefully!"

"I had to check if you were okay! You weren’t! You were hiding in his PANTRY!"

"It's called tactical… relaxing after a stressful mission!" Nexxali smacked Galateya with the hanger, bending it way out of shape.

"It's called being a drunk idiot!"

Keiy zapped them both this time by firing cables at their feet. They yelped and separated, panting heavily.

"Perhaps," the gun suggested, "you could start to resolve this like civilized officers instead of feral beasts?"

"She started it!" they said in unison, pointing at each other.

I raised my hand tentatively. "Maybe we could all just... sit down and talk about this? I could make tea?"

"Tea?" Galateya panted, scales gradually shifting to green moss.

"Boiled plant beverage," Nexxali explained, pulling random debris from her mane. "Humans drink it when they're being civilized. It's actually pretty good."

"I know what tea is, I've read about it in books." The dragon girl declared defensively.

"Don't start again!" I said quickly. "Tea. Sitting. Talking. No more destroying my house!”

. . .

The steam from the teapot curled upward as I rolled a Victorian tea tray trolley from the kitchen into the living room. 

Galateya sat stiffly on one end of the couch, scales currently resembling tree bark. Her crystalline mane had transformed to forest ferns covered in morning dew, making her look like a dryad gator.

"Have you gotten all the violence out of your system?" Keiy asked from her perch on the armrest.

Galateya took a deep breath, then nodded slowly. "I... apologize for the loss of control. The Celesteel resonance from the ships... frustrates me greatly, and then dealing with..." she gestured at Nexxali, "this utterly absurd situation pushed me over the edge."

"Uh-huh," I agreed, pouring the tea carefully into four mugs I quickly unpacked for the occasion, "you're both stuck on Earth, dealing with a… situation that's clearly not going according to anyone's plan. Maybe instead of trying to kill each other, you could try being... friends? Or at least cordial colleagues who don't destroy people's coffee tables?"

Nexxali, who had been licking her paw and attempting to smooth down her disheveled ginger mane, paused and looked up. After a moment, she nodded.

Galateya turned to Nexxali, fern-green hair fluttering. "Marshal, would you be so kind as to simply explain what actually happened to Knight Zyra Blish and Scrutimancer Nadera Korin? And why you felt the need to put the Corpse Seeker and their weapons into diagnostic mode?"

"No," Nexxali said flatly, returning to grooming her fur.

"No?" Galateya's scales flickered with orange. "That's your entire response?"

"Yep." Nexxali picked a piece of cushion stuffing from between her claws. "Classification above your grade, remember? I'm still the ranking officer here, even if I'm slightly impaired by delicious plant matter."

"You can't just—"

"I can and I will," Nexxali interrupted. "Some things are better left buried, dragon. Trust me on this one."

Galateya's jaw clenched, the 'Smaug sitting atop his hoard' mug creaked ominously in her grip.

"So, Galateya," I said, seeing that the dragon was heading for another explosion. "Why are you really here?"

She turned to me. "Keiy and I already told you. Legate Ixthia—"

"No, I mean why are YOU here?" I pressed. "On Earth. As part of this invasion. Not what your great-grandmother wants or what the fleet demands. What do you actually want from all this?"

Galateya stared at me. "That's... not relevant to the mission."

"Humor the primitive human," I said. "I'm curious. You clearly hate being on those ships as Celesteel makes you sick. Your own gun just told us you don't have any Pradavarian servants because you refuse to use blood contracts. You were trained on human fiction instead of military doctrine. Why are you participating in conquering a planet full of the species whose stories you grew up reading?"

"I..." Galateya let out, “I didn’t grow up reading your stories. My GLM was made in Omnithornia by humans of Omnid-inhabited Earth under the management of my Thunderbird Instructor. Their fiction is… slightly different from yours. I read… Larry Plotter books for example.”

“I see,” I said. “Not… Garry Cotter?”

“It’s similar to your fiction, just… slightly different. The overall plot of the orphan boy attending magic school is pretty much the same though, which is weird.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know yet,” Galateya said. “My GLM thinks it’s because there’s a connection between the worlds which the Mothman Omnids can access via dimensional gates. She called it the ‘Finite boundary curve theory’.”

“So you like books,” I said, “that's a start. Do you want to read more local books?”

“Yes,” Galateya let out.

“I can take you to a book shop café in town then.” I offered.

“What are you doing?” She demanded, suspiciously squinting at me.

“Being nice,” I said. “Diffusing the situation with tea, polite conversation and an outing offer. Novel concepts for invading aliens, I know.”

“Sounds like he is asking you out on a date,” Keiy pointed out, picking up the black mug I slid towards her.

Galateya stared at her gun. “What.”

35: The Date Protocol

“Yes?” Keiy asked.

“Since when do you… drink tea?” The dragon girl demanded. “You don’t even have a mouth. Or a stomach.”

“I was given a mug therefore I will hold it thusly and pretend to drink from it.” The symbiote replied.

“Why?” Galateya asked.

The gun shrugged.

“If I understand things correctly,” I said. “Keiy was made from crystalloid vampires, who themselves were made from people. Therefore, Keiy is a person and should be treated like such. My interest isn't simply in understanding you, Galateya. I’d like to get to know Keiy more too.”

Arrays of miniature red lights ignited across Keiy’s hexagonal head below the trio of red eyes. 

“Abyss eternal,” Nexxali chortled into her mug. “Did you just make a symbiote weapon blush? I’ve never seen them do that. Look, look, it's blushing harder!”

Keiy tried to hide her blush behind the “I like big guns and I cannot lie” black mug. It worked poorly.

I mentally patted myself for great progress on my mission of ‘gun seduction’ plot.

“Hey! Stop seducing my gun!” Galateya ground out, somehow guessing my plot, mossy tail lashing.

"I'm not seducing anyone," I lied. "I'm just acknowledging that Keiy is a sentient being with her own thoughts and feelings. That's basic respect, not seduction."

“You literally gave her a mug that says ‘I like guns!’” Galateya waved a clawed hand at the mug.

“We’re in America,” I said. “Liking guns is part of our culture. I’m simply respecting… Gun rights, see?"

"Exactly," Keiy agreed, clanking the mug against her hexagonal head. "The human is simply being considerate. No one has ever offered me tea before."

"Because weapons don't drink tea!" Galateya exclaimed.

"But they can participate in the social ritual," I pointed out. "Just like how Keiy participated in the conversation earlier by providing... extremely detailed psychological analysis."

Galateya's wooden scales flushed with tiny mortified pink flowers. "She was following orders!"

"She seemed pretty enthusiastic about it," Nexxali observed, grinning wickedly. "Almost like she enjoyed telling us about your romance novel collection and inability to make friends."

"I have friends!" Galateya protested.

"Name one," Nexxali challenged.

"My GLM—"

“A friend with arms,” Nexxali specified. 

“Keiy—”

"A weapon that you enslaved from birth with blood magic doesn't count either," Nexxali grinned.

Galateya opened and closed her mouth. “This isn’t fair.” She said finally. “Why don’t YOU name YOUR friends, cat!”

“My friends are classified,” Nexxali stated, whiskers twitching.

“Bullshit!” Galateya growled.

Nexxali looked left and right as if a friend would magically present themselves into the current narrative of her existence. Then her gold eyes settled on me.

“Ash… is my friend,” Nexxali said, wrapping her paw around me. “Right, human friend?”

I nodded.

"You literally forced him to feed you eggs and brush your fur with your voice! That’s not friendship!"

"Nu-huh, feeding and brushing hair is what friends do as a social activity! I already told you, Charmchain doesn’t work on him, so he’s doing it without coercion," Nexxali protested, sliding closer and squeezing me tighter. "I’m a nice friend, unlike SOME dragons who just break into people's houses and ice them to walls!"

Yes, a nice friend who almost killed me a few times until I defeated you with catnip and blackmail. I thought.

"I…” Galateya huffed. “I was conducting an investigation!"

"Into what? How to be the worst houseguest ever?"

Galateya groaned, closing her eyes in surrender.

Keiy set down her mug with a deliberate clink. "Ashford Clifford," she said. "Your offer to take Galateya to a bookshop café. I require specificity."

"What specificity?" I turned to the gun.

"Exact percentages. How much of your offer to take Galateya to a bookshop café is motivated by romantic interest, on a scale of zero to one hundred? And separately, how much of your actions are motivated by a desire to potentially work for her as a valued employee, also on a scale of zero to one hundred?"

"Wait, what?" Galateya choked on her tea. "Keiy, why are you—"

"Please provide an accurate assessment." Keiy intoned.

Nexxali leaned forward with interest. I set down my mug too, contemplating the bizarre position of having to quantify my intentions to a gun.

Front mind: Oh god, math about feelings. This is worse than any job interview. Wait, is this a job interview? Why is the gun asking these particular questions?

Back mind: Play this carefully. Too much romantic interest might scare Galateya off. Too little might close doors. The employment angle could be useful if it permits me to pry more information from the aliens about their weaknesses and plans.

"Alright," I said slowly. "Romantic interest... Let's say… fifteen percent. Galateya is objectively attractive when she's not freezing me to a wall, seems intelligent despite the property damage, and apparently likes books."

For some reason I thought of Shady. The imaginary Wendigo looked at me with a frown. I pushed the thought away, it's not like I was actually dating the alien Princess. Shady was an invasive critter who appeared in my life for three summers and then vanished without a trace, only to show up and to throw the lives of billions of people on Earth sideways.

This percentile declaration wasn't cheating! This wasn't a date, just dragon weakness reconnaissance for the resistance by the Emperor's false identity, a mild mannered electrical engineer!

Galateya shifted beside me.

"Employment interest... Let's say… Eighty two percent,” I added, pulling myself out of my thoughts. “On the account that I have many bills to pay and was looking for a job as an electrical engineer before the whole ‘aliens took over the Earth’ thing. Galateya seems like she could be a sensible boss, especially when compared to the other Frontenachii commanders… since she is actually interested in human culture. The question is, what's the position?”

"Acceptable parameters. Marshal Commandant Nexxali, follow-up query: Would you be interested in serving as Galateya's personal advisor regarding Earth operations?"

“Me?” Nexxali chortled. "Advisor to this draconic wonder? Why would I—" She paused, golden eyes calculating. "Actually... wait. What's in it for me?"

"Unknown at present," Keiy replied. "Potentially... rise in rank, greater independence and greater salary."

Nexxali tilted her head, considering. "She's got no friends, no servants, can't handle being on ships... but she does understand human psychology better than most." She grinned wickedly. "And it would be hilarious to train a stuck-up dragon. Fine. Yes. I'll advise her on how not to be a complete disaster."

"Hey!" Galateya protested. “I am not a—”

Keiy's eyes suddenly ignited with purple light. "Quest threshold reached."

"Quest?" Galateya sputtered. "What quest? Keiy, what are you talking about?"

"Legate Ixthia will explain herself," Keiy stated. "Incoming transmission."

Keiy's trio of pyramid eyes pulsed brighter, the middle eye projecting a hologram that filled the living room with shimmering light. 

Legate Ixthia materialized in three-dimensional glory, reclining in what appeared to be a private bath filled with dark, viscous liquid. Two naked pradavarian males covered in jewelry, a wolf with silver-tipped fur and a hawk with golden feathers, attended to her, one massaging her shoulders while the other held a crystalline goblet to her lips.

"My dearest spawnling," Ixthia's voice resonated with honeyed authority as her antlers jiggled with decorative diamond chains. "Congratulations on reaching Earth intact and locating two potential… work colleagues so quickly. And congratulations to myself for my plans proceeding exactly as designed."

"What plans?" Galateya demanded, "Great-grandmother, what are you—"

"I'm calling to notify you that due to... this development, you will not be returning to the capital ship, my spawnling," Ixthia continued, stretching languorously as the wolf attendant worked a knot from her neck. "In fact, you're never returning to fleet duty."

"Why?!" Galateya stammered out, likely presuming that she was being demoted for fighting with her superior again.

"Because this planet belongs to you. Or it will, as that is your actual mission."

Galateya stared blankly at the hologram.

Ixthia smiled, looking both maternal and predatory. "You see, I've spent the last several cycles convincing the Admiral and the other Legates that Earth should become a Pleasure World. Four billion males! The vast variety of phenotypes! The complete lack of magical resistance! It's absolutely perfect for breeding programs, entertainment facilities, and most importantly..." She paused for dramatic effect, "for establishment of Doctor Iowsh's experimental GLM server farms."

Nexxali blinked. "Doctor Iowsh wants to build server megastructures here?!"

"Yes. A solid enough plan for me to support it," Ixthia interjected. "Doctor Iowsh GLM research facility on Earth-0 was destroyed by a fertilizer explosion, likely caused by a competing Omnicorp. We’ve decided to move his research from homeworld to… a safer location.”

Galateya blinked.

“We’ve just found it. As my Datamancers promise me, this Earth's low Aetheric density should prevent magical interference with quantum processing. The human population could provide diverse training data. The consensus reality field you’ve theorized about could actually stabilize synthetic consciousness matrices to build functional thinking machines!”

“So…” Galateya blinked. “You believed me?”

“I’ve believed you all along, my spawnling,” Ixthia nodded. "You see, my little, colorful darling, your… peculiar education in that peculiar time bubble was no accident. Doctor Iowsh managed your program, fed you human stories so that you could understand these creatures better than anyone else. You were raised to tolerate humans for a reason."

Galateya sank deeper onto the couch, scales shifting to shocked whites and grays. "I don't understand. The doctor... programmed me to like humans?"

"Programmed is such an ugly word," Ixthia's hologram purred. "Let's say... carefully cultivated. Kept inside the time bubble until we found a safe planet filled with humans to the brim, which was inevitable sooner or later according to my Datamancers. As it stands now, you're the only Frontenachii commander in the entire fleet who openly sees humans as sexual partners rather than art. That makes you uniquely qualified for what comes next."

“W-what?!” Galateya ignited pink-red, blooming with more flowers.

“Galateya, your mission is simple: Rise through the ranks by any means necessary. Become the Baroness of Earth when we formalize the colonial structure. You have my full, if discrete, support."

"You want me to become the Baroness of Earth?” Galateya let out. “With humans as... as..."

The dragon girl’s scales shifted to more vibrant pink as she glanced between Nexxali and me, her mane detonating with large cherry blossoms.

"That reminds me," Ixthia's hologram leaned forward, the hawk attendant pausing mid-massage. "Have you managed to determine what's happening with Division 881? Commander Sillicia's reports have been... sparse on details about the loss of two pradavarians Scruts."

Galateya opened her mouth, then closed it, staring at Nexxali. "I... that is... the situation is—"

"Incredibly heroic!" Nexxali interrupted. "Knight Galateya arrived just in time to assist with our most successful and dangerous local operation yet!"

"Oh?" Ixthia asked.

"The human here," Nexxali gestured at me grandly, "single-handedly helped us defeat a secret crystalloid commando group armed with forty thralls… which Commander Sillicia missed since they were roaming outside of their compound!”

The Legate's head tilted.

“He identified the threat, provided critical intelligence, and even assisted in the tactical assault! When the crystalloid thralls ambushed and killed Knight Zyra and Scrutimancer Nadera overwhelming my party with greater numbers, he threw himself into danger to protect Division assets… err, my life!"

"He did?" Galateya blinked.

"He sure DID," Nexxali said firmly, shooting her a look. “The dastardly vampires had a secret artifact weapon that disrupted our corpse seeker. Just when things looked darkest, Knight Galateya arrived to assist us! Her heroic arrival atop of a glider helped us turn the tide against the vamps! It was textbook inter-species cooperation!"

Ixthia's glowing silver eyes narrowed thoughtfully. "This human truly helped eliminate an entire crystalloid commando group?"

"Absolutely!" Nexxali nodded enthusiastically. "Bravely using their own weapons against them! He's proven himself an invaluable asset! One that I wish to keep on as my… pet... err... personal assistant, with your approval of course. My assessment is that he is loyal, intelligent, and completely devoted to supporting Frontenachii operations. A perfect example of local obedience. Also, he… just made me lunch and served us tea!"

"How fascinating," Ixthia mused, studying me through the projection. "What's your name, human?"

"Ashcroft Clifford," I said carefully, not sure where Nexxali’s tall tales were taking me.

"Well… Ashcroft Clifford," the Legate smiled. It was the kind of smile that suggested she was already three moves ahead in whatever game she was playing. "You've just become very important to my plans."

"I have?"

"Indeed. Galateya, my spawnling, you'll take this human as your first consort."

"WHAT?!" Galateya's scales went supernova white, steam literally rising from her crystalline diamond hair.

“What!?” Nexxali choke-hissed, her plans to adopt me as her pet obliterated in a flash. 

In her catnip-induced state, the Serval girl had marketed me too well.