5Episode 32: Black Siren
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The Lunis family was idling their time away one dull weekend. Ilana was out with Jason on a date while Octus was in the kitchen, eating popsicles and surfing the Web using his CPU. Lance absentmindedly strummed his guitar a few times, trying to think of a song, but nothing would come to him. He called Kristin with his armor.
"Hello? Are you…?"
"Relax, Kristin, it's me, Lance!"
"Oh, sorry, Kristin apologized. "There wasn't any caller ID. Kind of weird."
"No, that's my fault, I'll get that fixed," Lance replied, reminding himself to get Octus to tinker with the armor a bit to fix that issue. Ilana had been having the same trouble with Jason. Then again, since Octus could just conjure up cash at will they could just both get cell phones. But Lance did not want to leave that up to Octus—he always found a way to make sure that Earth technology could go from fun gadget to alarm system in seconds. And what with everyone having this thing on their phones called Siri nowadays…
"Anyway, I was gonna call to ask if you wanted to just hang out," Lance said, not wishing to think of what would happen if Octus learned about Siri.
"Definitely. My parents are out, they won't be back until tomorrow."
"Ok, then, I'll see you there," Lance declared, eagerly ending the call so that he could get on over to her house.
"Lance," Octus began, "I believe the primitive AI functions on Siri may allow us to—"
"Octus, who needs Siri when we have you?" Lance said with a rather uncharacteristically warm smile.
"Well, that's very nice of you, Lance, but…where are you going?"
"Kristen invited me over," Lance explained rapidly as he walked quickly to the garage.
"Don't stay out too long or I will be forced to investigate," Octus warned sternly. Lance shuddered but went out anyway.
Kristin opened the door for him and invited him inside to the living room. They sat down on the couch for a moment, side by side.
"Glad you could make it," she said, ending her remark in a sigh. "You know, sometimes I just look at you and I can't control myself."
"Funny, I was going to say the same thing," Lance said. Without warning Kristin embraced him, and they kissed heavily. Lance dimly remembered that the teenagers on Earth called this "making out". This only lasted for about a minute, though, before he pulled himself out from under her.
"I didn't just come over here for this," Lance said, straightening himself out. His hair was usually messy anyway so there was no need to adjust it. He wasn't sure if Octus could remotely sense his location or hormone levels and didn't want to take a risk.
"That's fine," Kristin said, although she sounded a bit disappointed. She turned on the TV, and much to Lance's chagrin a news story regarding Titan's latest exploits was playing. "What is it with the media and they're obsession with this giant robot?" she groaned. Lance chuckled.
"I swear, it's like the media hired some guys to go be him and then endanger Sherman just for ratings," she added humorously. "But seriously, who do you think is behind Titan? I mean, what is it?"
"Probably just some government experiment type thing," Lance suggested quickly. "The aliens all want something from around here and the government found out, so they're using Titan to stop them."
"But…what?" Kristin asked, leaning her head back on the couch. "What could they possibly want with Sherman? Oh, well, we got rapid-response construction crews working round the clock."
"Yeah," Lance remarked. Even Octus was impressed with how quickly damaged buildings could be repaired or replaced, and this service seemed to only be in Sherman.
After watching a bit more TV, Kristin suddenly got up and turned it off. "I want you to see something," she said.
"If you want me to show you my room next, there's nothing much in there," Lance replied, hoping to guess his girlfriend's intent.
"No, it's not in the house," Kristin replied with a giggle. "Don't be so quick to jump the gun." Lance followed her to her car outside, wondering how a gun could be "jumped". Did she mean to say jump on the gun? It was an Earth expression, sure, but Lance wanted to figure it out to save himself the humiliation of having the more earth-savvy Ilana or Octus explain it to him.
He followed her outside to her car, and she drove to some part of Sherman that Lance didn't recognize.
"Where are we going?" he asked.
"You'll see," she promised. "There are some friends of mine you haven't met yet."
Like Devon? Lance wondered. Kristin tended to skirt around the subject whenever he asked about him—evidently she didn't like to be reminded of the fact that they had gone out before. All she had said was that he wore long-sleeved shirts often to hide his tattoos at school. After some inquiry through Octus, he found out that apparently tattoos had criminal connotations, although Octus had also paradoxically explained that it was just a stereotype and that most people with tattoos simply got them for purely cosmetic reasons. Lance didn't like the idea of getting ink under his skin—who knew what Earth dyes could do to a Galalunan's skin? Kristen had pestered him about it once but she had dropped the subject soon enough.
Kristin drove down a particularly shabby-looking street, parking her car in front of a two-story apartment complex.
"It's on the first floor, seventh room on the right," she explained. Lance had no choice but to follow her, watching as she gave a quick nod to the clerk at the front desk, who seemed to be just a few years older than they were.
"He's with us," Kristin explained to Lance. "Everybody is trustworthy here."
"There aren't that many people around here to trust to begin with!" Lance remarked. "What's up with this place?"
"The place is…mainly for us," she replied. "You'll see."
Something doesn't add up, he thought, But I can trust Kristin. Maybe not these other people, but definitely her. And evidently she trusts me with this.
They arrived at the door and Lance could hear voices inside, although he wasn't sure what they were saying. Kristin knocked on the door and got her answer quickly. A boy just a few years older than Lance with holed jeans, black boots, a nose ring, a black t-shirt with a skull on it, and a green mohawk stood in the doorway, grinning from ear to ear.
"Kristin! Haven't seen you here in a while!" he cried, gripping Kristin's hand with a handshake. "Who's that guy behind ya?" He asked.
"Hey, Neil," Kristin said with a smile. "This is Lance Lunis; we go to the same school."
"This dude doesn't look like your type," Neil remarked. "Doesn't look like our type, in fact."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Lance demanded, instinctively placing a protective hand in front of Kristin.
"Relax, just a joke! Good reflexes, man," Neil chuckled. "Seriously, though, I trust ya, Lance. Anybody who isn't a suck-up or goody two shoes is welcome."
"Thanks for understanding, Neil," Kristin said, relaxed. Neil stood aside as she and Lance entered the apartment.
"Things have been difficult lately, what with the, uh...fuzz crackin' down on us," Neil remarked.
"The fuzz?" Lance asked, but he received no clarification as to what that term meant. The furniture in the apartment was ordinary and typical for a standard apartment, but young people crowded the rooms, mainly drinking some sort of alcoholic beverages or smoking things. Lance was beginning to realize that his lack of Earth knowledge was really putting him in a pickle—chances are everything that typically went on here was either illegal or at least disreputable.
Lance noticed that more and more people were noticing him, most likely because he was knew. He hoped that they all tolerated outsiders the same way Neil did, or…
Suddenly one guy spoke up. "Hey! I know you! You're Lance Lunis!" The mention of his name had no reaction until the guy added, "This is the guy that got Mike Chan in the slammer!"
"You did?" Kristin asked with surprise. It occurred to him that he had never told her about this. "Why didn't you tell me, I could have gotten you in easier!"
"It didn't matter," Lance tried to say sheepishly, but he was drowned out by applause and cheers. "Why is everybody so proud of me?" he asked right after Kristin gave him a quick kiss.
"Mike Chan always came around here and stole from us," she explained. "His gang and ours have clashed before. We all know he was just too cocky, right guys?" she asked, being met with roars of agreement.
"A gang?" Lance repeated. He knew exactly what that was.
"Yeah, man!" Neil said, approaching him out of respect for having disposed of Mike Chan for them. "What did ya think we were, encylopedia salesman?! Of course we're a gang! We basically just go out and steal a few beers or some pot whenever we can, so we're not like, a mob or anything. Don't get the wrong idea about us, Lance. The only time we fight is with Chan or the cops. But when we do, we fight hard! Didn't yer girl tell you all this?" Neil asked, eyeing Kristin.
"Neil, he's on the outside," she said to him. "Like I told you, I…kind of had to downplay it.
"You never mentioned it at all," Lance pointed out. Kristin leaned in close and whispered:
"It'll be all right. Everybody likes you, you turned in Mike. Just chill here for a bit. Neil just says we're a gang to hype everybody up. We're…we're not that dangerous."
"Ok, I'll believe you, but I'm not staying long," Lance told her.
The rest of his visit was uneventful, and primarily consisted of observing everyone else to try and get an understanding of these people, all while ignoring the girls that tried to hit on him. One of them had insisted that dedicating oneself to a specific individual in a relationship was just an "opinion thing", but Lance didn't care. Once Kristin came back from wherever she had been—perhaps talking with Neil, Lance begrudgingly accepted that she was comfortable here—the other girls finally left.
He found it a little odd that she didn't want to socialize with most kids at school, but she was perfectly at home with these...Lance supposed it was okay to call them "criminals". But then he realized that would be hypocritical, considering he himself had been one, what with his various deeds done as a soldier on Galaluna, and when he illegally raced Mike a while back.
"I don't like this," he told her.
"I know," she replied, hugging him. "But thanks for sticking it out. Most of my other boyfriends didn't. Accept for Neil. The others just act like I don't even exist. Maybe it's for their own good." Lance didn't understand why she'd say that.
"I don't want to get involved in their...activities, ok?"
"Deal!" Kristin replied.
"Great, now can we go home?" he asked.
"Sure you can't stick around longer?"
"No, I can't. My family will start wondering."
"All right, all right."
AN: Well, here's a new episode! Finally! This one should be a bit shorter. I simply have to edit some stuff because 1) It looks awful right now 2) Devon didn't exist yet 3) I might change the ending.
Thanks for everybody who waited for this unfair amount of time for something new!
And just an FYI: I'm keeping this at a PG-ish level. So yeah, Lance and Kristin rounded first base, but that's it. No lemons or fanservice here, I'm trying to preserve as much as I can of the original show. Minus the "minimal dialogue" XD
