Royce's Random Thoughts

In celebration of LGBT Pride Month, and the recent release of Shadow of Doubt, this Saturday and Sunday I will be giving away the two previous Salli and Ali adventures Shadow of the Red Vixen and Shadow of Her Sins as free downloads on Amazon.com. Download them and catch up with Lady Salivera and ex-pirate Alinadar as they find love and healing together after lives filled with pain.

They walked out into the docking bay in the opposite direction that Aunt Razi had taken, heading towards the private shuttle docks one level up and about a hundred meter spinward. Ali kept alert for traffic from the automated forklifts and contra-grav load plates that zoomed along, keeping herself between them and Lady Salli as they stuck to the marked pedestrian walk paths.

A short trip up the lift and they emerged into the passenger corridors of the station, with carpeting covering the floors and kiosks selling overpriced goods to a captive audience of transients every few meters. As they walked, Ali let go of Salli’s paw and scanned the crowd for threats. Though this was civilized Foxen Prime, far from the Free Territories or menacing pirates, she'd never falter at her job as Lady Salli's bodyguard, never mind being her beloved. One, after all, logically followed the other in her mind.

As they approached the security station leading to the shuttle docks, a gangly foxen in Commoner civilian clothing, with a recorder monocle pressed into his right eye and a press pass clipped to his belt, shoved off from the wall and approached them, smiling broadly. Ali stepped between him and Lady Salli as he approached, flexing her right wrist slightly in case she needed to suddenly drop her palm stunner from its holster hidden in the billowy sleeve of her shirt.

“Lady Darktail?” the commoner called. “Nef Clawstroke, Oceanic News. How ‘bout a picture for the newsnets?”

Ali caught the stiffening of Salli’s ears and tail, even as the latter answered calmly, “No thank you, young man.” The noblevixen kept walking forward towards the security station, and Ali perforce followed.

The news-hack walked in parallel to them, still smiling and talking, keeping his monocle focused on Salli. “Any comment as Greenholme’s Governor General, on the shocking attack on the colony?”

“It was terrible tragedy. I’m grateful for the assistance by the Foxen Navy and the Stellar Patrol in catching the pirates responsible, and preventing further casualties,” Salli replied smoothly, not breaking her stride.

“Did you lose your eye in the attack?” he pressed.

“All right, that’s enough,” Ali interrupted, coming to a halt and turning to face the news-hack, raising her paw to stiff arm him in the chest before he could follow Salli any further.

“Hey!” he exclaimed, raising his paws. “It's a legitimate question!”

“Ali,” Salli said softly in warning. “Not here.” Ali turned her head slightly in the other vixen's direction, catching in her peripheral vision the suddenly alert looks from the security guards just up ahead. She let her paw drop back down to her side, and Clawstroke wisely took a step back.

“I'm actually here to have my cyber eye repaired,” Salli told him, her tone cooling several degrees. “It was originally lost in an incident some three years ago, a fact you might have researched before confronting us. If you have any further questions I strongly advise you contact Darktail Domain's press office. Good day to you.” She turned away and started back towards the security station, Ali sparing the news-hack a withering glance over her shoulder before following.

“Are you all right, Salli?” she asked. Salli's ears and tail were still stiff with suppressed irritation, but not in deep upset, if Ali was reading her right.

“I'm fine,” Salli replied, flashing her Noble ident at a security guard's scanner plate as they passed through the VIP scan arch. Ali did the same, the arch giving a reluctant beep of approval as it acceptedthe implanted permits for her weapons.

“You're sure?”

“Yes, Ali,” Salli said, relaxing slightly as they entered the much less traveled corridor, heading towards the Darktail Domain's private shuttle dock. “The press may be at times irritating, but it does have its place. It keeps the members of the Council of Countesses honorable in their dealings with the Common Folk.”

“What about when the Countesses deal with each other?”

Salli touched her eye patch, smiling without much humor. “That tends to be a more private affair. Usually.”

TBC

Decided to completely re-write the first opening I started, since figured out how to get the descriptions in this time.

* * *

“Now, you've got all our com addresses, right?” Aunt Razi asked Alinadar for the third time, as they stood in the busy shuttle boardinig area at Foxen Prime's primary highport, in orbit above the homeworld.

“Yes, Aunt Razi,” Ali repeated patiently. The younger foxen girl smiled at her aunt, so recently found. They shared the same fur pattern, primarily black with white paws and socks, and white running from chin to breast, though Razi's eyes were bright blue like Ali's brother, rather than Ali's own golden hue. Razi was even the same height as Ali, short for a Foxen, though with a late middle aged plumpness in comparison to Ali's compact athleticism.

“I won't let her out of my sight,” the Lady Sallivera Darktail reassured Razi, as she squeezed Ali's paw fondly. By comparison to the two other vixens, Lady Salli was tall and spare, her pelt dark brown, save for her thick, lustrous tail which was nearly black. She touched her cheek briefly below her good eye for emphasis. The other was covered with a dark blue eye patch that matched the midnight blue noblevixen dress she wore, hiding the gaping cybernetic socket whose eventual repair was the main reason for their return to Foxen Prime.

The other was to meet the rest of Ali's family, so recently discovered, after she'd been tracked down by her brother after a separation of some twenty years. Ali had already met with Razi and a gaggle of adults brought to Lady Salli's colony settlement back on Greenholme by Salli's sister-in-law, but there were many she'd not met yet, mostly younger cubs that couldn't make the trip.

“Well, all right then,” Aunt Razi said reluctantly. She gave Ali a brief hug. “Call us when you get settled in groundside, all right?”
“I will, I promise,” Ali said, brushing cheeks with her and stepping back. “Now get going. You don't want to miss your shuttle.”

“Yes, you're rght.” Razi stepped away, heading towards the dock where a shuttle waited to take her down to Foxen Prime's western continent, almost on the opposite side of the planet from Ali and Salli's destination.

Ali let a covert sigh of relief. “I thought she was going to take so long to say goodbye she going to miss her shuttle connection,” she confessed to Salli.

Salli smiled in understanding. “Can you blame her? She thought you were dead ever since your family was killed by Bloody Margo's pirate band twenty years ago. She's only had barely a month to talk to you since your brother Lu was able to find you.”

“Yeah,” she agreed. Though that had been a fine mixed up mess, with her Allied Worlds Patrol officer brother arresting the day of that unexpected reunion. “Well, there'll be plenty of time now.”

“Yes.” Salli gave another squeeze, and Ali smiled. She wasn't quite sure what she had done to earn the love of the elegant noblevixen, but she wasn't going to argue with her luck.