trans_9 | Home is where the tart is [Open]

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Home is where the tart is [Open]

Despite not requiring much in the way of food, Zouichi did know how to cook. But with friends and acquaintances from wildly different backgrounds, he figured he could stand to expand his repertoire. So today he was trying out desserts. The inside of one of the Sensoriums had been transformed into a brightly-lit kitchen, its counters covered with baking pans, bowls, fruit, flour, and a multitude of other ingredients.

Zouichi, wearing a dark blue apron, was just taking a batch of chilled dough out of the refrigerator, rolling it carefully out between waxed paper sheets. It was looking pretty good, or so he thought. Nothing had even exploded yet!

From somewhere within the kitchen, the smell of cake wafted up into the air. Caaake.

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"Yes, I know. I met one when I first arrived here. He was not very familiar with the idea of spaceships, but I haven't really seen him since."

Obviously! Wait, why was actual grease out of the question?

"Oh, right. How did you get into that bet again? And what do you get when and if you beat her?"

Howard nods thoughtfully. "Isn't there a unicorn or something making up a Friendship Department? I think that one's a girl, though. Don't they only talk to virgins or some weird magic thing like that?"

Because he found the shampoo first!

"I think I get to keep the ray gun. And, you know, my pride. Mostly I just made a claim I couldn't back up, so now I have to actually back it up, which sucks."

Zouichi blinked. "Really?"

Um.

"I haven't heard anything like that. Anyway, Lash should have offered you a prize if you do manage to piece the ray gun together. It's not really fair otherwise."

Like Howard's going to think anything of it, Zou. At least you've dated.

"I don't know. Maybe it's just specific to unicorns from a certain universe. And anway, isn't a ray gun a prize enough? Not like I'd use it, but I'd get to say I made something."

~~Well, that's good, because he sort of likes unicorns and also he is saving the occasion for someone special okay Howard~~

"Maybe this ship is getting to you or something. I mean, think of all that candy Lash has."

...and the T-shirts of wolves howling at the moon.

"Who said I'm not going to try and get some candy out of it too?"

Although Zouichi has a point, and it's been bothering Howard a lot lately. The ship has been getting to him. He ran across a battlefield to help Kon, stayed in the medic tent treating Kang despite the risk, blew up at Kaya when she called him a coward. He wouldn't have done any of these things a few months ago. He doesn't like it.

"You don't think the ship really changes us, right?"

He doesn't like it almost as much as he doesn't like that ridiculous t-shirt.

"Aha. And now it comes out." Wow, he was worried about you for a second there, Howard.

Zouichi considered the question. "I'd be surprised if it didn't change us. We're all a product of our experiences, myself included. You can't expect to stay anywhere for an extended period of time and not have it affect you at all."

Zouichi himself has changed, although he's not sure if it's entirely for the better.

"Yeah, but...I mean, we've only been here what, four months? Five? However time works here. That's not very long, even if we do a lot in that time." He drums his fingers over his lower lip. "I mean, I'm not saying we shouldn't change, but what happens when we go back home and we've gotten all soft and, I don't know? Courageous?"

"You're the only person I'd know who would lump 'soft' and 'courageous' together."

He shook his head. "Besides, I thought you weren't planning on going back home. Weren't you going to someone else's world?" Going soft is something that Zouichi has to worry about, but not Howard. Howard's not going back to the FAYZ... is he?

"I'm special like that."

He shakes his head and licks crumbs off the "I don't have any plans yet. I mean, I'm not going home if I can help it, unless I know Orc's stuck there, but who knows what happens at the end of all this? Maybe we won't get a choice."

At least if they don't have a choice, he won't end up feeling resentful that Zouichi ultimately chose the mission instead of doing something safe. He knows Zou prefers that sense of purpose to the alternative. He knows Zou wouldn't choose a safe, docile life in someone else's universe when his world is still overrun by zombies and evil corporations. That doesn't mean Howard doesn't wish he would, if it ever came up.

"If it turns out we don't have a choice," Zouichi said, "You need to get off the ship before we return to our worlds. You don't need to go back there."

Nothing wrong with running, Howard. Unless you're Zouichi. Then there's something wrong with it. Anyway, why should Howard feel resentful about it?

"Yeah." He nods, a little solemn.

Because he's not going to stop worrying about you just because you're off the ship, Zou. And odds are he'll never know what happens to you afterwards, whether you save your world or die trying or both. So not cool, Zou.

But onto happier subjects! "So I hear we got a real Han Solo on board. How do you think he'll react when we tell him we got a carbonite version of him in someone's basement?"

Well, Howard, if you ever die and become a ghost, you can haunt Zouichi and find out.

He raised an eyebrow. "I think he'll be either appalled or flattered. Maybe both. It's not every day someone commissions a statue of you."

"You'd think if someone was going to make a statue of you, they'd choose the highlights of your life. Not the 'frozen in carbonite' moments."

"I don't know about you," Zouichi said, "But my proudest moments have been the ones in which I've been captured and encased in carbonite for the personal enjoyment of a discriminating private collector."

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Home is where the tart is [Open]

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/wrap?

wrap!