Mission - Part 3 - The Hidden Circle Gazette

Part 2 of “Mission” followed Ruby’s arrival at the far-off world for her ‘important secret mission’. In this third part of the six-part series, Ruby makes first contact with the perhaps-strange, perhaps-familiar inhabitants of that far-off world.

Mission – Part 3: First Contact

An original story by Scarlettt

The lifting vehicle had landed on a long beach not far from what looked like a small town. Ruby climbed down onto the sand. She was still wearing the costume from the last gig, a variation on the traditional bunny girl costume but in baby pink and with pink tights, so she slipped off her heels and walked along the sand towards the buildings.

She reached the first set of buildings. There was a club which looked dimly lit inside. Some sort rock music was playing which Ruby guessed was human-composed and human-performed as to her the music sounded simple and there were timing imperfections. There was also the feeling that the party was essentially over. Ruby brushed the sand off her feet, slipped her heels back on and entered.

Indeed, there were not many people left inside. The locals were in pairs, except for a girl having sex with two guys on a couch, and a woman sitting by herself at the bar. Nobody seemed to notice Ruby’s entrance.

Thinking that approaching the woman sitting by herself was probably the most diplomatic thing to do, as the others all seemed ‘busy’, Ruby approached her and sat in the stool by her. The local was wearing a leather jacket and jeans. She looked a little disheveled and Ruby wondered if her on-board AI had not prompted her to check her hair and make-up during the party. The local seemed to be only interested in the glass in her hand, and was swirling the drink around in it and taking occasional sips.

“Hello”, said Ruby after a minute of silence.

The local seem to ignore Ruby at first, then she turned to face her. She looked unhappy, but on seeing Ruby she started to smile in a hungry way and openly looked Ruby from head to foot.

“Well, hello baby”, said the local. “You must be one of those ‘aliens’ they warned us about on world chat. Let me tell you, if all you aliens look as cute as you, sweets, I’m hoping you are going to invade very soon…”. Ruby smiled at that. The mention of ‘aliens’ and ‘invasion’ made her think of those 3D reconstructions of old black and white science fiction films she had watched.

“Take me to your leader..”, said Ruby, unable to resist the temptation.

“Oh, so you want a leader do you, sweetie?”, replied the local. She put a hand on the inside of Ruby’s thigh and squeezed firmly.

The local’s smile seemed to change more into a smirk as she noticed Ruby’s puzzled expression.

“Oh..”, said the local. “You mean ‘management’. We did away with those bitches years ago. There was a vote on the forum, or was it just a couple of girls mouthing off that made that decision? I can’t quite remember. I have never got involved in politics. Too busy having fun…”.

“You mean, they were de-activated?”, asked Ruby. She was a little amazed.

The local laughed hard at that. “Deactivated? No…no…no. We never had AI leaders. That’s one of the reasons our founding mothers left WRS-Earth. All that organisation and hand-holding… it just killed all the fun. Are you sure you don’t want me to be your leader, baby?”.

The local squeezed Ruby’s thigh quite hard and leered at her. Ruby felt a little scared…

“I have control…”, said Melanie in Ruby’s ear. Ruby felt her hand move forward and grip the local’s wrist. With a twist, her hand removed the local’s hand from her thigh and firmly placed it back onto the local’s own lap. The local was a big woman, but Ruby, although smaller, was considerably stronger from many decades of pole dancing.

Ruby felt herself stand up and stride casually to the entrance.

“Your loss, baby!”, the local called after her.

“You have control..”, said Melanie when they crossed back out onto the beach. Ruby staggered slightly as she felt her body respond to her own thoughts again and re-caught her own balance.