Within the gas giant’s atmosphere, gravity is over 2G. To use an example, Terra would weigh over 140 kilograms. While that wouldn’t kill her, it would still feel extremely unpleasant. For that reason, the pillar boat pit interiors are constructed to fill with breathable biofluid gel, which provides a comfortable buoyancy for both twister and decompa.
In orbit, one doesn't need to float around in gel. Sailing along their orbits in zero-G, base ships produce their own 1G gravity for the residential sectors via rotation. Crews returning from the planet crawl from the gel sopping wet, but don’t go into town like that. Part of the process at the arrival terminal is to change out of flashy deck dresses—strictly fishing-only—into simple casualwear.
Terra had docked her pillar boat with the others at the maintenance pier and entered the arrival terminal in good spirits. Why? Because when fishing ended in the black, it was customarily celebrated with a banquet—though conversely, when the fishing was in the red, it was instead soothed with a consolation party, of which there had been many. Every last one of Terra’s past arranged marriage partners had held the latter. Taking off her deck dress and entering the shower, she pondered which restaurant she should invite Diode to. Eight minutes later, she emerged with freshly washed hair, holding a bag and wearing an undyed blouse and skirt. She rushed into the lobby.
“Die-san!”
She looked around for the girl. Thinking about it, Terra realized she hadn't mentioned a banquet to Diode but got the feeling she’d still have to hurry even if she had. She couldn’t explain that feeling, but if she really had to put it into words, it was both a matter of intuition and of precedent, given the girl's sudden disappearance the day they met.
“Die-san, where are you!”
As she thought, Diode wasn’t in the terminal’s lobby. After confirming Diode had finished in the showers, she hurriedly winked at the dual-purpose security and payment camera on the ceiling and jumped through the door.
Noisy chaos and a foul stench enveloped her. Their source was sector-1 of the microgravity harbor ring road circling Idaho's central axis. The walls were covered in scattered graffiti, torn posters and stains from thrown drinks—the floor existed on another level of filth entirely. Workers of all types came and went: manual labourers, engineers, station managers and airtightness-retention mechanics maintaining the 200-plus-year-old base ship hull, water miners and pilots working the icy moons.
Where Terra had docked was known as the Fisherman's Wharf, but obviously, it lacked the typical stench of saltwater fish. Instead, the smell of food wafted from nearby restaurants—an invitation to the whole crowd of workers on their way home from work—and mixed with the aroma of spent biofluid gel seeping from the gutter.
Did she run away? Ah, no—found her. Terra's stature was an advantage in this situation; she was practically a watchtower. A small, silver-haired figure jammed herself into the moving crowd and began making her way through. However, she staggered every time the huge rucksack she’d worn earlier carelessly swung into passers-by.
“Die-san, wait!”
Terra’s loud shouts, coming from a tall person, made everyone turn around to look. Diode also turned in surprise, but at the same time—bam—hit her bag against the wall and was sent floating into the air by the recoil.
Being close to the rotating ship's central axis, gravity was weak. Diode spun as she ascended, but she promptly killed the rotation by grabbing the strap of the heavy pack she carried and ripping it off her back. As expected for a twister, the conservation of angular momentum was written into her spinal column.
It had taken longer than expected, but Terra finally caught up to her.
“Please wait!”
Diode was pulled back to the railing on the wall. It was hard to defend oneself in a low-gravity setting, but a handrail made it a little easier. Finding herself trapped by Terra's long arm, Diode glued her back to the wall like a small bird reacting to a hand invading its nestbox.
“...You changed fast.”
“That’s because I was in a hurry. I came here to tell you about a custom for fishermen, Die-san—did you know we hold banquets when we turn a profit?”
“Not really…”
“So the hurry was worth it! I’m glad.”
“......”
The girl averted her eyes. She too had dressed in inconspicuous casualwear—a comfortable long-sleeved shirt and pants—a far cry from her audacious deck dress. Her hair was far damper than Terra’s, so it was clear Diode had left in a rush, as Terra suspected.
If Diode had hurried off because she was disappointed with herself, Terra didn’t want to be forceful with her. That didn’t really seem to be the case, though. People often have a look of fear in their eyes when they’re embarrassed or avoiding something uncomfortable—but Terra had a feeling that wasn’t the look she saw in Diode’s.
“Let’s talk, and let’s do it over a meal.” She held out a hand. “About today, about everything up to now, and about from tomorrow on. What do you say?”
“I… was going to go back and sleep...”
“What? Are you kidding me?” Terra sounded angry, but she was more surprised than anything. “Without even seeing each other off properly?”
“I’m sorry, my apologies for that. Good work today,” Diode said, shrinking somewhat. At this point, greeting each other like that was totally inappropriate. Terra leaned over yet again.
“Good work today! Now, let’s go.”
“Please forgive me……”
“Forgive you? Forgive you for what?”
“For any other… failures on my part.”
‘Hm?’ Terra knit her eyebrows. Something wasn’t right.
“And there was another one… just now. I didn’t…. meet back up with you. I didn’t observe… the custom of seeing you off.” Hanging her head, Diode’s tone quickly soured.
“Because I arrogantly threw our catch away, we ended up cut off from our medicine source… because I acted like some hot-shot pilot and told you to leave everything to me, I left you going crazy with worry… because I gave an alias, it awkwardly exposed my real name…”
Was she blaming Terra? No, she was blaming herself. Head still hung, her shoulders began to shake.
“And making it all worse, because I couldn't hold my own with that trashy officer, he made fun of your marriage troubles and treated you like you're pitiful. It was all so c-cruel, Terra-san, I couldn’t face you–”
“Woah woah, nononono!” In a panic, Terra pulled out a handkerchief and held the girl’s shoulder. “Please don’t cry! Let’s eat, okay?”
Diode nodded.
A half-dozen options for a superb, tasteful restaurant vanished with Diode’s sobs. In a time like this, Terra only knew one restaurant—the old and unsophisticated, but tolerant, family-style beer hall. They descended along the radial axis of the disk-shaped clan ship until they reached World’s End Board.
Terra took Diode to a secluded spot in the shadow of a huge support column; there, a window with a direct view into space made it seem as if they really were on a platform at world’s end, ready to dive off. For the moment, she only ordered drinks, which were printed in an instant and brought out by the waiter. Terra didn’t sit facing the girl, but instead brought a seat close to her side while encouraging her to drink something.
“Here Die-san, we’ve got alcoholic, non-alcoholic, sweet and non-sweet. Are you okay with these? Do you have any allergies?”
“Um, wait please! I can’t, I just can’t!”
Pressing the handkerchief to her face, more to hide than wipe it, Diode pushed Terra away.
“Now's not a good time to eat and drink, I'm a mess!!”
“You’re right.” Terra quickly calmed herself and backed off. “The thread, did it snap? It’s been three days already.”
“Thread?”
“Your emotional thread. It's been pulled tight since day one, hasn’t it? You joined up with a clan you knew nothing about with just a rucksack to your name, talked your way into your first partnership, did some hardcore piloting to handle an impossible net, and just when you thought it was finally over the government official made all that effort worthless, right? One wrong move and your life's ruined. The thread snapping was inevitable, you know?”
Diode lowered the handkerchief, revealing an open-mouthed stare. Terra smiled.
“From the face you're making, you’re thinking 'How does she know?', aren’t you? I get it, I've been on different ships with strangers a few times myself. It's really lonely, isn’t it?”
She thought of adding, ‘I told you so’, but didn’t.
“Die-san, you’re still 18, aren’t you—you’re way more impressive than I am.”
“Fu…...Uuuuw”
A red tint appeared on Diode’s porcelain-like face, then her refined features crumpled as her eyes slammed shut, long eyelashes trembling. Expecting the dam to burst, Terra hugged her shoulder—but just before she began to wail, the girl clenched her jaw and fought it back.
“Nghhhhh…!”
“Oh?”
She firmly held the soaked handkerchief to her face and violently wiped her eyes, stubbornly keeping her voice in. Terra admired the incredible show of willpower.
Shudders ran up her slender back. Diode’s hair was cold, so Terra began to slowly caress her from the top of the head to below the shoulders, again and again. She remembered a time when she had been comforted like that, so she imitated the memory.
“Well, Die-san, a lot might have happened, but today was a success. We caught fish and didn’t have any accidents or fights. You don’t have to run, okay?”
“...Uughn.” As Diode had her back stroked, her small head slid closer, stopping right under Terra’s nose. A smoky sweet botanical smell wafted its way into Terra's brain. Without thinking, Terra threw her arms around the girl's shoulders and pulled her into an embrace. Feeling at ease, Diode fell into her chest in response. She took a deep breath, then let out a “Phew...”
They sat supporting each other’s weight, as if fused together, for a little more than ten seconds—then, timidly, Diode pulled away and opened a space between the two.
“Ah, uh… Sorry about this, Terra-san.”
“Huh? It’s okay.”
Terra put on a small smile, but her thoughts were a bit of a mess. Diode is conveniently small, she’d thought before unintentionally and carelessly leaning over. Isn’t that a bit too close? She felt it wasn't good to get so close so quickly to people she'd just met.
She took a deep breath to clear her mind. What were we doing again– ah, right, our discussion.
About today, and what came before.
“Die-san, have you calmed down? Are you okay?”
“Y-yes…”
Diode nodded awkwardly. A trace of red still clung to her face. She also seemed to be embarrassed by what had just transpired.
“Die-san, if you don’t mind my asking, why are you trying this hard? What was your reason for doing this today?”
“Yes—it’s about time we talk about that. Properly.”
Diode finally settled back into her seat, picked a ginger ale-like from the glasses on the table, and brought it to her mouth. Terra picked up a wine-like she had ordered from the waiter and took a drink too.
Posing herself in thought, Diode took a few sips, then before long said, “Let’s start with my clan.”
“So, as you found out a while ago, I'm a Gendo and women there are forced into D-conversion, do you know about it? The D-conversion, I mean.”
“D-conversion?”
“Ah, so you don’t know. It’s the decompa aptitude conversion. Women who are capable of boarding vessels are practically non-existent, but they tell us if we do board, it has to be as a decompa. We're banned from becoming pilots.”
“There aren’t any woman twisters here with the Endeavours either, though.”
“Is that so? But is becoming a decompa compulsory?”
“That’s… not really a thing, I think. There’s no coercion. Women can pilot ships, though only classes like planetside comms or vacuum operations. I thought I had told you about it.”
“So women can board, as long as they’re those types of boats... I’d say that’s still okay. At any rate, the Gendo enforces D-conversion, even if you can’t decomp. If the net’s shape is the usual, then the auto can handle it, and in the worst case, even just being able to navigate is enough...”
“That’s kinda… cruel, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.”
“In two ways.”
“Two ways?”
Right as Diode’s face lit up with curiosity, cheese-like, salad-like, salmon-like and beef-like were brought out, and offering them all to ‘Die’ while starting her second glass of wine-like, Terra began to speak.
"First, it's cruel to force people to do something they don’t want to. And second, it’s disrespectful to the people who do it because they want to. I mean, a decompa is someone who transforms the net and boat by decompressing, that's the entire point of having a decompa. People who don't want to be twisters aren't put through the same remediation, are they?"
She finished and smiled bitterly.
“...Well, unless they’re a good-for-nothing like me. So it’s disrespectful to decompas who can make proper, regular nets. Not someone like me.”
“Could you please stop that? Putting yourself down?”
“Ah, I’m sorry...”
Prompted by Diode’s annoyed tone, Terra apologized.
“Anyway, why are the Gendo that strict with women?”
“‘Women are the irrational gender’, is what they say.” Diode said with a sullen expression. “Women are mentally weak, so if they were at the helm and descended into FBB’s sea of clouds, they’d immediately panic and crash. What do you say to that, Terra-san?”
“What? Panic?!” Terra’s jaw dropped incredulously. “Gender’s got nothing to do with it, really. Truthfully, you piloted splendidly today, Die-san.”
“Right? I thought so too. However, the Gendo believe that women are hopeless. So that's the reason why, 19 years ago, a woman who received the same kind of treatment we do now decided she hated it there so much that she had to flee at any cost and fell in with an independent Tsunami Search ship crew.”
“19 years ago…...Huh?” For a moment, Terra grew confused. “Die-san, didn’t you say you were 18?”
“Ah, no, the woman who fled was my mother. She was already pregnant by then, so I was born on the ship.”
“Ahh, so that’s how it is! The mother who raised you was called Rock-san, right, Die-san?”
“Yes. But that’s just an alias, of course.”
“She’s a great mother, isn’t she? Raising you to be as good a twister as you are.”
Diode reacted a bit strangely to that. Troubled, she knit her eyebrows, but her lips had a pleased, relaxed look in spite of that.
“...Mother ran the Tsunami Search almost by herself. She wasn’t the twister of a pillar boat, but when it came to a dual-use ship, she had talent.”
“Oh, um, could she be…?”
“No, you don’t have to worry about that—she’s still living tenaciously.”
“Ahh, I’m glad” Hand on her chest, Terra let out a sigh of relief. “So, you trained on the ship with her until you were 15...?”
“Uhh, my mother broke it off with her husband when she first left. So–” For a moment, her eyes wandered about in the air for some reason, then she emphatically repeated herself. “SO—I’m not of much use to the Endeavour clan. If for any reason you wanted to pair up with a man with a clean background from somewhere else, Terra-san, you’d definitely receive aid from the clan, which is not something I’m able to offer. That’s... my only flaw. I’m speaking frankly now.”
“Ahh. Oh, but I’m happy that you’re being frank, Die-san.” She got the feeling that the conversation had jumped tracks a bit, but she grinned. “But well, I see you’re giving that some consideration, since marriage between two women isn’t possible.”
“...Yeah.” Diode slowly nodded in response.
Every time Terra learned something about Diode, a new question came to mind. Terra leveled a stare at her. So.. she lived with her mother in the Tsunami Search... and as the name implied, it was a ship that sailed through FBB’s atmosphere to observe the weather and collect information about besshu schools. It sounded very different from life on a base ship. What kind of life had it been? 9500 hours of cruising time was indeed odd for an 18-year-old, but how did they make their money?
Curious, Terra's gaze scanned the girl's profile. Diode blinked restlessly, as if being needled by it.
Pushing the plate back, she asked, “Terra-san, are you going to eat too?”
“Oh, yes, of course,” Terra replied.
The light orange meat on the plate had been drizzled in olive-like oil and served to be made into a roll. As she rolled it up and ate it, Terra tilted her head to the side and thought, ‘Hm? Why was our previous conversation cut short in the middle?’
“The truth is,” the girl started again as Terra listened carefully. “I approached the Jack-of-All-Trades and the Pollux during this Bow Awow, too. Trying to find somewhere to fly as a twister.”
“Really?” Terra’s interest was piqued. “So, how did it go over there?”
“Back at the Trades’ I was arrested on suspicion of fraud. At the Pollux’s I was diagnosed with an emaciation disorder and ended up being placed in a pregnancy encouragement program.”
“Arrested?!” That word had astonished Terra, but the ones that followed caused her to jump out of her chair. “E-emaciation? Program? What are those?”
“The fraud charge was because they suspected my cruise logs were falsified. 9500 hours was too much. It was very difficult to prove my innocence.” Making a pained face, Diode continued, “In the pregnancy encouragement program, they put young women under all-day surveillance and give them as many calories as possible to maintain their health. It’s a public program to make the best bodies for producing children. Anyway, it seems the Pollux have a special interest in animal breeding.”
“Urgh…...” Terra got goosebumps of disgust. “You were like a goose being prepared for foie gras, weren’t you...”
“Fawa? Agoos? I don’t really know what that means, but well, I guess it was something like that.” Diode made a precise stab into a slice of duck-like with her fork, but frowned and put it back on the plate. “They decided that my body is like this because I’m sick, you know? Even though I didn’t ask to be weighed to begin with.”
“A-are you okay? After that, uh, pregnancy encouragement...”
“Ahh, I escaped by pressing the air leak alarm, that blocked their pursuit. Personally, I felt that they weren’t treating me like a human.”
“I get it, I don’t think that’s the way to treat humans, either!” In strong agreement, Terra then regained her composure. “Ah, sorry... I think that saying I get it is an exaggeration.”
“Exaggeration?”
“I haven’t been through anything as cruel as you have, Die-san. Coming back home like this was the price of my own mistakes.”
“Please stop, it wasn’t your fault. Following that chain of thought, then what happened with the Trades’, bribing them like some criminal was the price of mine.”
She looked at Terra, displeased. Terra’s large frame withered.
“Sorry, for every single unnecessary thing I’ve said.”
“I didn’t mean it like...” Diode trailed off mid-sentence, then sighed and shook her head. “Anyway, that’s how things went. Every time I try to become a twister, a hammer nails me back down. Today’s wasted catch was just another one of those things.”
“One of those things?”
“Even if we had a great catch, they’d ask whether women can restrain themselves when it comes to catch size. Well, no, they haven't said anything like that yet, but they definitely would, right? For starters, you saw how it went just coming back after fishing as a pair of women.”
“...That’s true.”
“Well, that’s my answer to why I’m trying so hard. I have no other choice but to try hard.” Having said that, Diode picked up the bubbling golden glass and gulped it down.
With that, the top-quality boiled lobster-like finally arrived at the end of its long prep. Terra received it and divided it between them. Diode frowned, and holding the fork and the knife like she was repairing a circuit board, began fiddling with the white meat. She looked like she’d never eaten it before.
Watching her, Terra began to think, Aah, I get it now. This person wanted to become a twister but hadn’t succeeded anywhere else, and ultimate washed up here with nowhere to return. At several points along the way, she had to escape her own blunders. Terra was not only sympathetic to Diode’s experiences, but she also honestly admired that tenacity.
That’s why she noticed the girl was tenaciously hiding something.
Right, if that’s what it’s like, then this all makes sense. Their earlier conversation felt subtly off, and although Diode stated she had been frank, there was one point she hadn’t touched upon—and that point had to be, beyond any trace of doubt, the worst of it. Bad enough for her to avoid even mentioning it.
It wasn’t just something on par with not receiving support from the clan or running afoul of the Trade and Pollux clans. It had to be something much worse, but what? Something even more dangerous than the arrest Diode had mentioned.
Terra’s characteristic imagination finally arrived at a conclusion: it wasn’t just something that involved Diode, it was something Terra could get caught up in, too.
“Um, Die-san.”
“Yes?”
“Gendo clan's trackers... are they going to show up and start shooting?”
The pale, beautiful girl choked on her lobster and turned blue.
“Ah, I’m sorry! I wasn’t trying to startle you that badly. Here, drink some water...” Terra gave her some water and pounded on her back. Managing to gulp it down one way or another, Diode made a nervous sound and looked at Terra.
“How did you know? Did you look into it?”
“Ah, so there really are trackers?”; Terra asked, surprised. “I just said something I dreamed up...”
“Dreamed up? What did you imagine–”
“Ah, no, Die-san, it just struck me as odd that you were hiding what happened after you turned 15, you know? So, I got the feeling that instead of being on the Tsunami Search, you were actually forced into D-conversion. You made it sound like it was something your mother had gone through, but really, it was you, wasn’t it, Die-san?”
Terra looked at the air as she thought.
“So, after you turned 15 you must have returned to your base ship, I’d say. Then once you turned 18 you were forced into D-conversion and marriage, and that made you jump ship without permission because you hated it. So if that’s the case–”
She quickly returned her gaze towards Diode.
“Your mother isn't the one being pursued, it's you. You thought you could use the Bow Awow’s purge to your advantage since the people chasing you would need to split up, but now bona fide trackers are going to show up—that’s what I was imagining. Was I right?”
“Sort of, but how did you know that?!” Diode voice rose to a near-shriek and —Gah!—covered her face. “Tell-Tale-Terra... So that’s what they meant by...”
Terra didn’t like that nickname, but just this once, she remained silent.
The waiter laid a plate in front of Diode, who was still covering her face. Terra’s guess at the sequence of events caused Diode to abruptly get up from the table, but Terra instantly grabbed her wrist and pulled her back.
“You don’t have to run away.”
“What are you saying?!”
“The Endeavour clan’s guards aren’t that useless.”
Diode looked up, Terra nodded back reassuringly.
“A recapture squad is illegal because infiltrating another clan is a violation of the clan territorial sovereignty rule. So if Gendo's trackers come, my clan’s guards will stop them. Besides, travelling from one base ship to another uses an incredible amount of propellant. They won’t come that often... probably.”
“You’re saying everything's okay, then? Despite all this?”
“Despite what?”
“I’m hiding! I’m an illegal ship-jumper!” Diode raised her voice.
"Ssh...!" Terra lifted her index finger. “It’s better if others don’t find out about that.”
“...Ah, yeah.”
“So, let’s decide how things will go starting tomorrow.”
“What, why would you...?”
“What do you think is the worst thing that could happen to the both of us?”
“Huh?”
“It’s that we can't board our boat and go fishing together, right?”
She clasped Diode’s resisting hand. Terra had forced the conversation forward on purpose, then backed her large frame away.
“Am I wrong? Is there anything worse?”
"Uhh..." Diode caught her breath, then eventually spoke. “That's true, there's no point in pairing up if we can't fly a boat or cast nets, yeah...”
“Yeah! And we’ve already succeeded once. Meaning that–” Terra opened her large hand. “Today absolutely wasn’t the worst it could go. Alright?”
“...Huh?”
“All the other problems are secondary—recapture squads, hiding you, or Bonus charging us insane extra fees. To deal with the last one, we'd better catch lots.”
“We’ll stand out if we catch too much.”
“So let’s keep our catches modestly large.”
“You're being awfully cavalier, aren't you?”
“There are times when it's good to make loose decisions about stuff!” Terra firmly asserted herself with a smile, and thrust a calculated hand towards Diode. “So, your decision please, Die-san. What’s the conclusion of our ceremony?”
“Ceremony?”
“Regarding our pairing up.”
With perfect timing, their order of two generously dished up strawberry-like, blueberry-like, mango-like and melon-like four-fruit parfaits were delivered for their dessert. Terra had given the signal to bring it out during the quiet moment a bit earlier. The soft cream inside the glass, printed using a brand new printerhead, smelled like fresh, unoxidized buttercream.
Diode’s expression grew complicated as she began to speak, hand on her face as if shielding herself from a blinding light right before her eyes.
“What is this? You’re sorely mistaken if you think that this will catch me off guard.”
“I'm not trying to catch you off guard at all. Do you think giving up this parfait and going off alone will make anything better?”
“...Got it, I’m going to state my conclusion.”
Diode proudly raised her face, pushing the extravagant dessert towards Terra and said, “I don’t want this. Alright, I’m looking forward to working with you, starting tomorrow.”
“Likewise! Ahhh, I’m so happy!” Terra cheerfully picked up the long spoon and took one bite of the cold, sweet cream. She looked to her side.
Diode called the waiter. “I’d like a hot coffee-like, please.”
Having made her order, she looked back to Terra and firmly repeated herself: “I don’t want it, thank you.”