Editing Story:ROAD TRIP! (Warhammer High)/Part Two (section)

===Exploring the City of Tribal Kings===


First was a squeal.  “Eeee!  Venus that was amazing!” Remilia said.  She wrapped her cousin in a bear hug.  “I was so impressed!”

“Thanks,” Venus managed, disengaging herself from her cousin.  “Could you tell?”

“I could tell, but nobody else will, Venus, trust me,” Remilia said.

Freya added her own hug to the total.  “You did fine.”

Alex spoke up from the bed.  “Nice job, your Highness.”

“Nobody in this room calls me that, all right?” Venus groaned.  “Except where protocol demands it.”

Jake set the crown on the table and sank into a chair.  “Well…baby, I thought it was great.  Concise.  Leave them wanting more.”

“That was the plan, yeah.  So glad I didn’t stick to the speech,” Venus said, powering down her weapons.  “It sounds so corny now that I think about it.  All ‘From the bottom of my heart’ and ‘Endless gratitude,’ etc.”

“Eh, you would have made it sound good,” Remilia said.

“Suuure.  Anyway.  Who’s hungry?” Venus asked.  Jake snorted at the total incongruity between her appearance and question.

Alex levered up out of his chair.  “Ravenous.  What time is it?”

Freya checked her travelers’ watch.  “Uh…around local noon.”

“Perfect.”  Venus stood up and stretched, the scabbarded power sword waving dangerously.  “Lemme change, then we can go grab some food and be tourists for a few hours.  Then back in uniform for part three.”

“What?” Jake asked.

“Oh, I won’t be having dinner with you guys.  I need to meet the Governor and reassure him I’m not taking over his job or anything.”  Venus shrugged, grabbing the box.

Jake followed her into their room and Venus disappeared into the bathroom.  Jake eyed the clothes he had brought with him in the closet.  “Hey…Venus, what clothes do we have that are appropriate for here?”

“Uh…pretty much anything.  Nocturneans don’t give much a fuck about fashion, really, from what I know.”  Venus stuck her head out of the door.  “Just…dark pants, any length, and a shirt you don’t mind having sweat on.”

Jake selected a few items and hurriedly changed, then passed her recommendation on to the others.  As he returned, Venus emerged, pushing her armored clothing on a mobile rack.  “Okay…I want to leave this on a rack so I can wear it tonight.”  She cast an appraising stare over her boyfriend.  “You look fine.”

“Good.”  Jake grabbed his sunglasses, a going-away present from his parents, and carefully slid them on.  “Awesome.  They fit perfectly.”

“Looks good on you.  Are those from your parents?” she asked.

“Yeah.”  Jake grabbed his wallet.  “Guess I don’t need this,” he said, pulling his Terran drivers’ license out.

“You should always carry an ID on another planet.”

“I mean I won’t be driving any more,” Jake said.  Venus looked up at him, confused.  “I sold the car, remember?”

“Oh…yeah.  Why did you do that, anyway?  You’ll need it at Kouthry.  And your parents might need a car too.”

Jake shrugged.  “They paid for half the car, and I sold it for a third of what we bought it for, so I just gave them the money.”

Venus laughed.  “Man…that’s a shame.  We have history with that thing.”

“We did,” Jake said.  He half-smiled as the memories came back.  “Ah well.  So long, we hardly knew you.  Oh hey, before I forget…” he wandered over to the door, as nonchalantly as he could.  Closing it, he let his hand rest on the handle, trying to phrase his question.  “How, uh…how exactly are you going to come back?”

“Come again?” Venus asked, struggling into her walking shoes.

“In the speech, you said you were going to come back and take leadership of the planet.  When, exactly?” Jake asked.

“At some point in that nebulous blob of time called ‘the future,’” she said, but she didn’t sound like she was joking.  Jake turned around to see her sitting on the edge of the bed, looking up at him.  “Look…I know we haven’t discussed it.  To be honest, I had barely even thought about it.  But…Jake, it’s going to happen.”  She immediately screwed up her face in regret.  “Shit.  Let me revise that.”  She rubbed her eyes, thinking hard.  “See…Dad was really generous.  He knows that I didn’t really know what to do with my life after we graduate.  Military, private business, travel, politics…I don’t know.  I DIDN’T know.  But when we arrived here…it was like my blood had been too cold my entire life, and now it’s the right temperature.  I feel physically different here, Jake.  I feel better.”

Jake crossed his arms.  “Wow.  Venus…that scares me.”

“Scares?”

“That sounds like this planet’s a drug to you, or something.”

Venus looked up at him, hurt.  He stared back, clearly intimidated, but not backing down.  “It’s…”  She tried to find words.  “Damn it.  I did make it sound that way, didn’t I?”

Jake didn’t respond, knowing from experience that it was better to let her work it out on her own.  She fidgeted.  “Jake, I can’t explain it.  When we stepped off the Tide, it was like coming home in the weirdest way.  You know?”  She sighed.  “No.  You don’t.”  She stood, rubbing her hands.  “I don’t want to sound arbitrary.  But…I do have a responsibility here.  It’s not the part of my life you saw back on Earth, I know, but…I do.  I’m a Princess here.  Even if I didn’t feel…whatever the hell I feel here, I would STILL have to come back.  All the time.  I might not have come back permanently, but…Jake, technically, I AM the system Overlord.  Dad’s ceded his position to the Regent, and as the highest noble in the system, I’m the Imperial System Overlord until we leave again.  I will be every time I visit.”  She finally met his gaze again.  “Does that help?”

Jake drew in a long breath, and unclenched his arms.  “A little.  I admit…we haven’t talked about it much.”

“Well…we’ve got time.  Kouthry.  Maybe grad school.”  Venus sank back on the bed.  She looked over at her armor on the stand.  “I won’t do anything permanent without asking.  Of course.  But Jake, this place is home to me,” she said.  She looked up at the burnished breastplate, inscribed with Old Nocturnean words.  She read them to herself, finding some odd comfort in their design.  “It probably always will be.  These are my people.”

Jake nodded.  “In honesty, I think…if it weren’t for the gravity, I could learn to like living like a noble here.”

“Well, first off, the gravity differential is so small that with a little exercise, you genuinely won’t even notice it,” Venus said.  She looked up at him again, smiling coyly.  “And you are a noble.”

“I’m your boyfriend, hon, and nothing more formal than that,” Jake said with a laugh.

“Well…I hope this isn’t too distracting for you,” she said.  “Personally, I think you’ve done an outstanding job at ignoring how completely weird my life is.”

“Not ignoring, disregarding,” Jake said.  “I would be ignoring it if I pretended it wasn’t weird.”  He grinned.  “There are benefits, too.  I don’t live in a hive any more, and I won't, for several more years."

She stood up and grabbed her wallet.  “Do you miss it?”

“The sense of community?  All the time.  The locale?  Fuck that noise,” he said.  “I’ll live surface as long as I can.”

“I bet,” she said, passing him his license back.  “Here.  Let’s go.”