Miharu blinked. "Wh-what happened!?" she asked, a nervous tone to her voice. She had never seen a person defeated in man-to-box combat before.
"Yeah, maybe Mr Watsas would make the most sense," she said, quickly hurrying after Naomi. "Unless he's just hiding in the box or something. And if that's the case... can we keep him there more?" She chuckled slightly as she clenched her photon pistol.
Naomi grumbled in displeasure. Based on her previous experiances, whenever mysterious crap like this happens, it's a good idea to not do anything without a sacrificial limb incase things go awry.
She made her way to the Lab, and peeked in the door.
"Watsas, come here and take a look at this."
Watsas, who was working on some horrific looking small cylendrical shaped device full of tangled flesh and meat, replied. "*sigh* What is it, Naomi?"
"You know that moldy old crate in the storage room near the residential deck?" Naomi asked.
"No I do not."
"Well... I think it ate Steve. May want to take a look at it, M'kay?"
Watsas visually shrugged, as best as a robot could. Setting down the tools he was holding and going to the closet, past the sleeping CobaltWatsas, and retriving some sort of Daemonhammer engraved and bejewled with the bones of the damned. "Show me where it is..."
Naomi nodded and lead him to the storage room...
Miharu had stood guard in the hallway between the mystery box and Watsas' lab. She was visibly relieved when Naomi and Watsas returned to look into the box matter.
"Do you think it's some kind of evil crate?" she asked as Watsas arrived. She clenched her pistol, just in case.
"Whatever it is, I blame you Watsas." Naomi commented as the three arrived at the storage room door.
"I blame Zelot." Watsas arbitrarily replied.
"Who the hell is Zelot?" Naomi asked.
Watsas simply grumbled and prepared his weapon. He and Naomi took up positions at the door, preparing to charge into the room. Watsas counted to three and pressed the button to open the door and charged into the room.
This time however, the box was gone and steve was sprawled out in the middle of the floor in it's place, covered in mold.
"Steve, what the frak happened." Naomi asked annoyedly.
Steve moaned and moved about stiffly, apparently not having the energy to get up.
"What box?" Watsas asked
Miharu was obviously surprised by this change and instinctively raised her sidearm to protect herself. Steve was apparently rather lacking in energy as he did not scream in a rather high pitched manner as she expected.
"Are you really who you seem to be?" she asked, "or are you some kind of human-eating, shape-shifting box"
Turning her gaze toward Watsas (but keeping her weapon pointed straight at what may be an evil box), she said, "There WAS a crate here! I swear!"
Watsas was not amused. He lowered the Daemonhammer and walked over to Steve, kicking him forcefully in the abdomen.
"What did you do this time?" Watsas asked coldly.
"Ugh... something bad happened... I don't remember much... but okay..." Steve replied, apparently still confused about the event.
Naomi facepalmed and sighed. "Well, as long as the box is gone, I do not care."
"What Box?" Watsas asked again. "Was it metal, white, and covered in pink hearts?"
"Umm... no. It was wooden and moldy." Naomi replied.
"Good, then we don't have to go through that little fiasco again..." Watsas continued.
"Okay then, I'm going to inform whoever handles storage organization around here that it's their problem now. And then I'm going to sleep." Naomi shrugged in response, before walking off.
"Right, I have to go clean Steve off..." Watsas picked up steve and threw him over his shoulder and carried him to the bathhouse to sanitize him, leaving Miharu alone.
***
A few hours later, once Naomi had made her report, the Ainu commanders began panicking and dispatched security, hazmat teams, maintnance robots, and the Consortium to procedurally tear the station apart searching for the mysterious box...
Swarms of security and hazmats teams were mobialized. Levels by levels, deck by deck....rooms, containers, personal and ships were searched, taking up to days to complete and making everyone on edge.
Where was this box?
What was this box?
Where did it go?
Why was it covered in mold?
What kind of mold was it?
Was it catchy ?
What dangers does it present?
Did the box even exist in the first place?
If it did, how did it get here without paperwork?
The question were endless and no answers to be found.
Lady Kurisho handled the excessive searching and wasted days of efforts with her normal self :With lots of screaming and cussing...... comparing the tea house to something called the "Four oh Seven Seven''.....repeating 'It's a frakin Madhouse......a Madhouse, I tell you'' over and over again.
Days later, the box still had not been located and GC command just wrote up the event as 'no box to begin with ' due to lack of supporting evidence.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
"Hum.... hello?"
It was a young woman, very average and generic looking. She wore a simple set of tan, gold trimmed clothes, the whole supplemented by a decorative cape of the same colour. No doubt; she was of imperial, noble descent, her manner of walking, her composed facial expression, all corresponded with royalty.
At her side, attached to her belt was a short blade, a wakizaki usually used as a defencive weapon.
Despite her assurance, it was with hesitation she entered this part of the station...
She thought for herself, but what the hell hapenned here...
Several of the Tea House patrons noticed the new individual, with mixed looks of surprise, concern, and malcontention on their faces. One of the GCs in the bar walked over to the woman, keeping enough of a distance just in case...
"Who are you? I have not seen you here before... you wear the robes of a noble and bring a weapon? Explain yourself..."
Before either could continue, they were interrupted by the local security system...
"Ohayo! miss!" Steve announced heartedly as he walked over to this newcomer. "You are new around here? I have not seen you before. Come, is there something I can get for you from the bar? Tea, Sake, Whiskey, Cardamine, Water, anything? Do you need someone to take your sword and put it somewhere safe so the metal detector dosen't start beeping. It's annoying as hell. Umm, I didn't get your name, everyone calls me Steve... but you can call me... whatever you want!"
Steve rambled as quickly as he could before running out of breath. The rest of the GC relaxed slightly, seeing as few potential intruders with malign intentions would survive the hormonal onslaught brought about by this man.
Saigo stood up noticing the new girl about..
" Leave her be. I invited her after all."
She then bade the new female to sit next to her so they could start talking Business.
"Oh and Steve will you stop flirting with every female you come across."