STAR TREK: A Long Road (Voyager Fix It Quest)

Jenny froze from the 15th of September to the 20th while the quest author played a hell of a lot of Starcraft. In that time, which flashed by instantly for the two grayzoners (as neither were away of how their conceptual zones intersected with the metazones of other dimensions), Jenny learned three vital things about herself.

The first was that while she was pretty sure she could handle Protoss (what was proxying if not just another form of simplified branchiation), she was pretty sure she wanted to be a Zerg main because she was gay for Sarah Kerrigan.

The second was that she had no idea what a Starcraft was.

And the third was that she was pretty she she was incredibly, impossibly in lesbians with Voyager and Val Jean as the two women watched her, waiting between the infinitely long, infinitely short moment between her realizing that they wanted her to sit between them and her saying, quite loudly: "W-What do you want to watch?"

"I still am not entirely sure what it is we'll be watching, so, you choose," Voyager said, smiling at her.

"...lets watch Owl House, you two will like Owl House!" Jenny said, then hurriedly grabbed a DVD and crammed it into the player, then sat down between the two shipgirls. The show started to play - and, uh, oops. Jenny felt herself shifting into second person present tense as she realized, to your horror, that you'd put in Season ͆ and that was...that was both too far into the show to really make a lot of sense and from a distinctly counterfactual universe where humans evolved from slime molds. Oh god, you were such a fuckup!

The show played and Jenny wrenched herself back to third person as Voyager blinked, then leaned forward slightly.

"Is she spraying spores?" she asked.

"Anyway, s-so, that character is Leucocoprinus Nigricans! S-She's...the main character and, in this episode, there's spores, see, that...magic and..." Jenny stammered, the blinked as Val Jean laughed as Leu threw out her stubby arms and exclaimed as the fleshy, squidgy sponguebeast emerged from the hole and started to roar at her.

"Oh that's cute," she said, grinning slightly. "So, this mushroom girl's in a world where magic works. Like Megus Tu?"

"Or Hysperia," Voyager said.

"Hysperia doesn't have magic," Val Jean said.

"Yes it does," Voyager said, frowning.

"Shh! Shh! This is the part where Amity shows up," Jenny said. "They have a really cute ship, and I think this is...right, this is before Leu asks her out!"

"Okay, but why is Amity just a normal Vulcan?" Val Jean asked.

"Well, she's from the Boiling Isles," Jenny said, then shhed softly. "This scene is really cute!"

The footage continued to play - and Val Jean seemed to like it. Then Jenny felt something warm and sleek and silver slide along her shoulders. Her heart picked up slightly and raced as Voyager leaned against her, ever so casually. The show continued to play and Jenny shifted in her seat, gulping slightly. "Y-You, uh...enjoying...the show?"

"It's a little hard to follow. Since this appears to be season six," Voyager said.

"This show got a lot more seasons because mold spores aren't homophobic," Jenny stammered. "B-But conversely, Adventure Time only got two seasons because they really, really, really don't like dogs."

"...I see..." Voyager said, slowly, her brow furrowing slightly.

The episode wrapped a paragraph later - and Val Jean snorted. "That was pretty good for a kid's show," she said, then sighed. "All I got are a few of the crew's fan fictions, a few vids from the Okampa libraries, a cache of Seska's porn, and whatever Voyager shares with us over the communication grid." She reached up, scratching her broad chin. "And, a few million different repetitive epics."

"O-Oh? Uh, sounds fun!" Jenny said.

"You would be mistaken," Val Jean said dryly.

"Don't disparage your culture," Voyager said, tutting softly.

"What culture? It's drivel that's been reconstituted into fascist propaganda. I bet there were millions of different kinds of Cardassian literature before their modern Union showed up and just ground it into fucking paste." Val Jean frowned. "...I don't know for sure, cause, my databanks don't have anything on pre-Union Cardassian civilization."

"They did," Voyager said, sighing slightly. "B-But the Repetitive Epic did exist before the Union showed up."

Val Jean shrugged. "I guess." She shook her head, then turned to face Jenny, the couch creaking under her. She cocked her arm against the back of the couch, resting her dun colored cheek against her knuckles. Her eyes look right at Jenny - tachyon scans and IR arrays sweeping over Jenny's cheek. "So tell us about this person who can branchiate us."

"Uh...her name is Sidney," Jenny said, a little guardedly.

"Is she any good at branchaiting?" Val Jean asked. Her other hand brushed along her jacket, then rested on the space on the sofa between Jenny's thigh and hers. Jenny was painfully aware of her proximity - and of the slender arm around her shoulders and the warm weight of Voyager's elegant, silver cheek against her shoulder. Jenny flushed and started babbling immediately.

"Oh she's amazing! She can go into the high red and the shallow purple and she once managed three full shifts at the Hospital and she works with Q on inner metafold designs and she built a species called the Hirogen - well, okay, she partially worked with them, them and the Producers, she worked together, with them, it was a group project, and she's really pretty, like, she's a sentient black hole, so she bends like, a lot of light and...and...w-what?"

"You liiiiiiiike her," Val Jean teased.

"Well, I, uh...uh..." Jenny stammered.

"Now now, don't tease the poor dear," Voyager said, chuckling.

"H-Heh, yeah, uh...um..." Jenny's lip trembled. "M-Mew..." she whispered. Oh maybe this plan had not been such a good plan at all. Jenny ducked her head forward. "She...she was my girlfriend and she broke up with me a few updates ago." She whispered, unable to keep the pain out of her voice.

"Oh honey," Voyager said, gently.

"And you wanted to bring us to meet her?" Val Jean asked, sounding a bit surprised.

"...yeah..." Jenny whispered. "I just...I just...I just thought if she saw me with some gorgeous and sex and cool grayzoners, then, well, she'd realize that...that maybe I was cool even if I can't branchiate. Maybe she wouldn't think I'm such a...kid." She sighed. "That's it, see...I..." She felt something click in her brain and...oddly? She didn't feel like crying. The words came out low and grim as she drew her legs up against her chest and rested her chin against her knees. "I don't know how to go from being a kid to being an adult. I still live with my parents. I like shows for kids. But...everything that's supposed to mean I'm an adult feels like its impossible. I can't branchiate, because no one ever taught me, because the upper zones are all fucked up ever since the stupid Pah Wraiths started to scheme, and...and it's like everything I was told about life is just bullshit, you know?"

"Ah, I know those feelings," Val Jean said, chuckling.

Jenny blinked. "W...Wait, really?"

"I'm a Cardassian heavy cruiser with a stealth drive, made, like, two years ago," Val Jean said. "And now, I've got an Okampa crew - kids who were expecting to die in a year or two and now have a whole life ahead of them. Sometimes...the world changes and you're left...spinning your impulse jets without reaction mass. But that doesn't mean you suck. The world's just shit sometimes. And..." Her fingers brushed along Jenny's cheeks. "And you just gotta do the best you can do, right?"

Wow.

Jenny's real fucking gay, isn't she?

"What was that?" Voyager asked, looking a bit confused.

"S-Sorry!" Jenny squeaked. "Flustered! W-when I get flustered, the narrator sometimes gets out of my, uh, control, so, um, uh, uh, uh..."

Val Jean grinned. "You're cute when you go all metatexual."

"H-Ha...ha..." Jenny stammered.

Val Jean grinned even more. "And hey. Call me a scheming grayzoner here, but, I'm thinking..." Her finger slid up, along Jenny's neck, twirling through her frilled feathers. "Maybe your plan's not so bad. I mean, Voyager and I show up on your arms, and Sidney can see just how..." Her fingers release one feather and the entirety of Jenny's frills go FRWOMP and expand outwards with such eager excitement she nearly slaps Voyager right in the face. "...lucky she was to have you. And how stupid she is to not. Then, we get branchiated home."

Voyager clicked her tongue. "A mite deceptive."

"What can I say. My brain says be honest. My keel and disruptor banks say..." She leans in, whispering in Jenny's ear. "Cloak."

Holy shit, Jenny's just really fucking gay right now.

---
What does Jenny do?

[ ] Kiss Val Jean! Kiss her kiss her kiss her kiss her kiss her! (This will go great with the plan! ... "Plan?")
[ ] No! Voyager is right! this plan WAS deceptive. You should just ask Sidney outright. Like AN ADULT!
[ ] Write In