>We'll leave her alone for now, then.
>Have a quick look around, just to see how much Aya charged the Maiden for daring to defend itself.
>After that, since the crew seems to have things well in hand, and we've made our contribution, go kick back for the rest of the evening.
>Time enough to talk to Neu, as well as maybe having a little look at Ishi's hole, tomorrow.
>You decide to leave Ishi to her work.
>Instead, you take another look around the hold. It's not hard to spot the empty spaces where crates and pallets of goods used to sit, though it's done relatively little to diminish the overall effect of the space being laden with cargo. It would be hard for you to gauge exactly how much has been taken, given that several areas seem to have been rearranged since you were last here, either by the pirates or the crew doing cleanup; it's certainly a sizable amount, though there's an even more sizable amount left.
>Then you decide to kick back for the rest of the evening. The ship seems to be in mostly working order, the crew are in reasonably good health and surprisingly good spirits, you're satiated and in less pain than earlier, and there generally doesn't seem to be a whole lot for you to be doing right now. So you wander around the ship a bit, for want of anything else to do, and eventually find yourself back on deck again. The bright light of day has given way to a smoldery dusk and the wind is cool and steady. Time passes as you watch the sun grow dimmer and then burn out beneath the clouds; the subtle shimmer of the aether flows around you cannot match the spectacle of last night, but still set a strange excitement stirring in you. These are the truly open skies, further from civilization than you've ever been before. It almost seems a little silly when you stop to think on it - being here, right now, adrift in this tiny wooden tub upon an endless sea of sky. And yet, there it is. Pirates or no pirates, you're still glad to have been able to make this trip at least once. Even if it turns out to only
be the once.
>You're not sure how much time you spend up there, but when the duty shift rotates again, you decide to call it a night. The nap you grabbed earlier helped a lot, but the day has still been tiring in the extreme and you probably ought to get some more rest. You return to your room, spending a few minutes idly going through your belongings before taking your nightly dose of Minoriko's medicine; the taste has not improved any since the last time you did this. Then you curl up beneath the sheets as comfortably as you can, doing your best to favor your multiple injuries; this somehow
does seem easier than the last time. You'll take that as a positive thing. All in all, it's a surprisingly okay end to a very unpleasant day. You do seem to be having an awful lot of those lately, though; perhaps you ought to file a complaint with the universe, or something....
>Morning comes almost before you are aware you'd fallen asleep. Judging by the light glaring in through the small window beside your bed, the day has decided to be cheerful once again. Not that the weather seems to be in the habit of conforming itself to your mood lately. You rise lethargically from the bed and stretch, discovering that this is a much less uncomfortable maneuver than it was yesterday. You're reasonably well-rested as well, if not exactly energetic; given the circumstances, you'll take it. You take a glance over your injuries. Most of the smaller ones have all but vanished now and even your leg is largely healed; you'll probably want to favor it slightly today, but you wouldn't go as far as to say it honestly
hurts. In fact, you decide it's good enough to strip the bandage off it altogether and let some fresh air onto your clammy and constricted skin.
>Unfortunately, the other half of your battle scars has not fared so well. If anything, they have grown by a more pronounced degree than on any previous day. The one on the side of your torso in particular seems to have enlarged by more than a whole inch compared to yesterday, and you can notice small changes in nearly every other Blighted marking upon your body, with faint traces that suggest several more yet forming. The sunlight grows sour and mocking for a moment. You push it aside; it's pointless to waste time and energy on feeling sorry for yourself, and there's probably breakfast to be had. And frankly, you could probably use something to wash down that dose of medicine staring chasteningly at you from the nightstand.
>Fortunately, breakfast is both warm and pleasant. Today's is free of kappa-related injuries, but ample in portion size; a cheese omelet and fried ham may be suspiciously similar to yesterday's fare, though you're hardly about to complain, and there's a pleasant sense of activity around you that serves as a buffer from darker thoughts. Miyuki is also looking fairly lively once more, though her injury clearly hasn't recovered as well as your own - one of the problems that comes with being human. You inquire after Neu, once you've made it to the end of your omelet, and are told that her quarters are one of the best places to try at this time of day; apparently she often uses this part of the morning to attend to paperwork.
>And indeed, you find her there. Neu's quarters are somewhat larger than yours or Chisato's, though to a lesser degree than you might have expected. They are, however, quite a bit better-appointed than either. This is less because of fineries reserved for senior officers, and more because genuine care seems to have been taken in their arrangement. The bed
is appreciably larger, you note, and its sheets do not match the utilitarian designs you've seen stocking their linen closet, but most of the remaining furnishings are otherwise similar to those around the rest of the ship. The most prominent feature of the room is a large writing desk, stylish in a sort of conservative way. Its surface is laden with papers and files, scrupulously arranged in tidy stacks, and accented by a flamboyant white quill pen resting neatly in a stolid black inkwell. One document in the center of the desk looks as though it were in the process of being written as you entered.
>Neu greets you at the door with a calm and collected expression; a subtle glance confirms that the hole in her wing is mostly gone now, though the surface there seems less opaque than the rest of the wing, almost as if it were thinner. She inclines her head respectfully towards yours and her antennae gently fan out.
>"I'm glad to see you look better this morning. Is there something I can do for you?"
