* * *
Our first stop is in Bogota
To check Columbian fields
The natives smile and pass along
A sample of their yield
Mouse tossed her head, causing her fiery hair to tumble over her shoulders. Cidriw thought he could double-cross her, did he? Thought he could set a couple of CPUs to trailing her when she went to buy her pills, did he?
It looked like Cidriw's systems were about to experience an unfortunate error. She reached over and casually activated a program on her handcomp.
Mouse popped one of the LSD tablets into her mouth. In 30 micros, she would be lost in a pleasant little fantasy and Cidriw's double-cross could be temporarily forgotten. By the time it wore off, the contents of Cidriw's systems would be in the hands of the Guardians. And they were never merciful to his kind.
Mouse smirked in the falling darkness.
* *
Sweet Jamaican pipe dreams
Golden Acapulco nights
Then Morocco, and the East,
Fly by morning light
Cidriw barely managed to lift his head, his fuschia skin clashing badly with his purple hair. His inquisitors were a pair of nasty looking Guardians, the kind he avoided at all costs on the streets. They'd beat a sprite for looking at them wrong.
The drug lord didn't wince. He was battered, bruised, and bleeding, but if the Guardians thought that that was all it took to break him, they were sadly mistaken.
The green one took a painful hold of his hair. "Name your suppliers, dipswitch."
Cidriw shook his head painfully, feeling hair being torn out in that hard grasp. There were people who could do far worse than these thugs if he gave out names.
The green one's grip tightened as he pulled Cidriw up straight. The light blue one smirked and flicked open a switchblade. "Time to have some fun...."
Cidriw managed to blink his working eye as the light blue one stepped close. The Guardian's hands were shaking, and she was smiling so....
Cidriw cautiously sniffed the air as the knife was laid against his skin. As the knife sliced into him, the drug lord began laughing hysterically. The Guardian was a methamphetamine addict.
* *
We're on the train to Bangkok
Aboard the Thailand Express
We'll hit the stops along the way
We only stop for the best
Arcadia stretched and grinned up at the overhead. They were in the Net now, well away from those frelling CPUs.
The blue pilot snorted delicately. After all these days of paying a percentage to the port manager, the son of a .bat had to go and get himself fired. The new guy was cracking down on cumshaw, too, the bastage.
She snarled, revealing teeth filed to points. She had made it out a hop, skip, and a jump ahead of the CPUs, but she was willing to bet her contact hadn't. She wasn't going to be shipping anything out of that system for some time to come.
A Vidwindow popped up, displaying the mosaic image of a slate sprite.
"Azure Bonds captain, there's no welcome for you at home port." The slate sprite said simply. The Vidwindow closed abrubtly.
Arcadia gaped. They had the nerve to tell her that she couldn't bring her cargo to the Super Computer? She wouldn't be in this frelling business except for them! They had no right to deny her docking rights!
She stood up and stalked deeper into her ship, considering her options. She had too many kilograms of crack in the hold to run to just any system. She needed a big, jaded system close by.
"Computer, give me a list of all the nearby systems with pops over 20,000."
The overhead fluttered through various colors rapidly. "Three nearby systems meet your requirements: Dyson, Peniuum, and Intel."
She nodded, her purple hair trembling slightly. "Set course for Dyson, computer."
* *
Wreathed in smoke in Lebanon
We burn the midnight oil
The fragrance of Afghanistan
Rewards a long day's toil
Mouse ran a hand through her fiery hair. This was not good. Seriously not good.
She'd slipped up. She'd had a nicely buzzed feeling and she hadn't spotted the watchdog before it caught her probe. She'd managed to get out of there before the mindtrap locked her into the CyberNet, but she knew it had gotten a tracer on her.
The Guardians were going to come for her. All because she had gone hacking before the LSD wore off.
Never again, she vowed. The Mouse would never touch drugs again.
She started as a hard knocking came at her door. They were here. It was too soon!
Rapidly entering a command into a command-line Vidwindow, she darted for the other door. She flung it open and froze.
The light blue sprite looked young, younger than she was, but the keytool on his wrist showed that he had achieved full Guardian status.
"You're going to have to come with me, ma'am," he said.
* *
Pulling into Katmandu
Smoke rings fill the air
Perfumed by a Nepal night
The Express gets you there
Arwin Belaneex paused to wave at Robert Sinclair as they passed in the hall. The other Guardian grinned and seemed ready to stop and chat, but Arwin hurried on. She had to get to her rooms. She didn't trust her new roomie. The woman was a born snoop if ever there was one.
Arwin flung open the door to her rooms. Good, her roomie wasn't there. She darted over to her desk and removed the large, clear crystal from its hiding place. If she could get her roomie to go out tonight, she'd be able to use this one up.
The door was slammed open and two older Guardians stalked into the room. Cooper Black stepped forward and snatched the crystal out of her hands.
"Ice, girl?" Black sneered. "Guardians don't need ice. In fact, girl, use of this is enough to get a cadet expelled from the Academy." The orange Guardian tilted his head slightly. "You're a full Guardian, though. We might be willing to brush over this, but I've seen your records. You've got no chance of anything but a quiet dismissal from the service."
Arwin Belaneex quailed inwardly, but she did not let it show. A Guardian could not afford to let fear show when facing a more powerful enemy.
* *
We're on the train to Bangkok
Aboard the Thailand Express
We'll hit the stops along the way
We only stop for the best
Arcadia leaned back, revelling in the sun. It had take a good deal of work, but she had managed to dispose every single nanogram of the crack.
She looked through her shades, peering past the sun. She could just barely see the other side of the system.
The one really neat thing about the Dyson system was that it was a sphere. She had always wanted to see it, but had never had the chance before now.
She grinned, her filed teeth glinting in the sunlight. Selling the crack herself had made her bloody rich. She wasn't going to be leaving this system for a long time to come.
The End
A/N: This is a response to all the 'drug-addicted ReBoot character' fics. It was fun to write.