Author's note: Hey look, I put one at the start of the chapter this time! Anyway, here's the next chapter. Many thanks to those kind fellows who voted or commented on the preceding chapters. I've been getting some nice feedback, which is always good. Any comments, votes or feedback are entirely welcome. Well, anyway, on with the show...
The sun was rising. At this altitude- six-hundred floors above ground- the warm light became petrified and grayish-blue as it spun through the layers of ice-clouds. It cast the room in silver and grey. Mara liked it. It made her feel somehow... peaceful.
She liked that it was an unfamiliar sun; she had grown up on Vesperia and had only been off world once before now. The sun of Theros was smaller in the sky- Theros itself was at the outer edge of the solar system, but the star itself was unusually bright and powerful- and produced a deeper orange light than she was used to. The sunlight coated Theros in an afternoon light at all times. It was the planet whose daylight was locked in a perpetual five o'clock in the afternoon. Consequently, everybody was drinking all the time.
She looked out the window at the swirling mass of thin grey clouds. The tiny particles of ice tinkled against the airtight, durable glass. She longed to open the window and stick her head out into the glinting, crystalline storm. But the windows this high up didn't open. The air up here was notoriously thin.
Sander and Amy were still asleep, curled up at opposite ends of the large bed. Mara had been between them only moments ago, but she found that, once awake, she couldn't just drift off again. That said, she couldn't blame either of them for wanting to sleep in; Sander had been utterly plastered last night, and Amy... Well, Amy had had enough excitement for now.
Sander had been out like a light almost as soon as Mara had guided him back to the suite. Mara had been in need of a stiff drink herself at that point, and Amy had needed anything that could wash that sour taste from her mouth. Since the Shangri-La staff had seen fit to stock only booze in the suite's fridge, they had both sat up for a while, drinking the strange, sweet-smelling liquor that glowed a suspect blue.
It had been the first time that Mara had been properly alone with Amy. Technically, they had been alone before, but that had been different. From Mara's perspective, their last little rendezvous had been little more than fevered lust and desperate, possessive sex. Last night there had been no pressure to do... anything much, let alone anything dirty. The both of them had just been so tired; Amy from being forced to play Sander's sex games, Mara from working non-stop erecting radio relays to convince the Doctor that they had left Theros and taken Amy with them. They had just sort of sat together and got a little tipsy.
For anyone else, sharing a drink with someone you had kidnapped and used as a sex slave would be awkward at best. But not for Mara, who had a complete ignorance of awkward situations. She was able to talk to anyone, in any situation, with remarkable ease and charm. As a result, people warmed up to her very quickly. The liquor helped, but it wasn't long before Amy stopped hunching over defensively and began to relax a little. They still weren't exactly best friends, but it had been interesting to talk candidly with her, if only for a little while.
Obviously, Amy had tried to pry some details out of Mara as to what she and Sander had planned for the next few days. Mara had been entirely honest in outlining what she herself had planned, and had guessed at length about what Sander had in mind. In many ways, this was the most honest relationship Mara had ever had; there was absolutely no reason to hide anything from Amy, since she had no power in this situation. It made a refreshing change from her usual, day-to-day interactions.
She strode across the grey room and perched herself gently on the edge of the bed. Her hand stretched out, almost of its own accord, and stroked Amy's face, causing her eyes to flutter open sleepily.
'Oh good, you're awake!' Mara said brightly. 'I was getting a little bored.'
She stood again, long legs propelling her to the other side of the bed in a few steps. Her bare foot kicked out, hitting the mattress just below where Sander was sleeping, making the whole set-up pitch to one side.
'Hey, boss! It's a big-ass fuckin' new day, Sander. Time to be awake.'
Sander groaned, screwed his eyes shut tighter, and waved a hand dismissively in Mara's face. She kicked out again, her toes prodding him roughly in the chest. He rolled onto his back.
'Fuck off, Mara...'
'Nuh-uh, boss man. Time's a-wasting. Up and at 'em.' Mara skipped out onto the plush carpet, the hem of her white, button-down shirt- the only piece of clothing she had managed to keep on- fluttering around her. She hit out, punching the light panel on the wall, flooding the room with bright, fluorescent light.
Sander sat up, running his hands through tousled black hair, 'Ugh! Fine, I'm up! What do you want?'
'I want to go out, Sander!' Mara exclaimed, exasperated.
Sander opened his mouth to snap back a retort, but paused mid-breath. His brow creased with thought, and he tilted his head to one side.
'That's... actually a pretty good idea,' He said finally. 'I don't know about you, but personally, I need to eat something.'
'As long as we leave this room, I don't really care,' Mara nodded energetically, bouncing on the spot.
'We are on a different planet...' Amy said slowly, rubbing at her eyes. 'I'd be lying if I said I didn't want to check it out.'
'Okay! Let's go, then!' Mara was practically running in circles.
'Right, right. Let's go out. But I want to go somewhere normal. Somewhere that isn't as, y'know, weird as all this,' Sander waved his hands vaguely. 'We've both been here before. Any suggestions?'
'Well, yeah. There is this one place,' Mara said thoughtfully. 'It's kind of hard to find a place that isn't all weird and, y'know, sex-crazed right now. It is the Foundation Festival, after all.'
'So where are you thinking?' Sander stood, stretching.
