MISC: The Old Spacer's Song Singing "Fuck You, Earth"

[Drew Perron]

Leftenant Radison had worked his way up, step by step, over the heads of his 
fellow trainees; when he'd ratted out the men selling pot and homemade porn, 
he'd become the sargeant's favorite. He always scored number one on both 
marksmanship tests and sanity tests, he took hazing with grace and dished it out 
twice as hard, and he followed the rules to the letter, helping expose and drum 
out those who couldn't hack it. He was the number one fighter pilot of 
Capitatriarchy Base H-728.

And none of that mattered when his S-Fighter exploded into stargas! Because of 
*her*!

But who was she? She was the number one ace-pilot of the spaceways! The number 
one fly in the ointment and the number one gnat stinging the Capitatriarchy! She 
was Jezebel Harble, tough-as-nails transgender princess of the spaceways!

"That was stupid of them!" cheered Vance Sputnik, astral dreamer, hanging tight 
to the safety pressors! "In the face of your jinking and switching, they were 
sitting ducks!"

Jezebel shook her head, her purple ponytail sparkling in the light of ion beams. 
"Harble's Law, kid, there ain't no such thing as stupidity! The Capitatriarchy 
of True Earth doesn't care how many of their goons they waste if they can close 
their claws around us - and it's still closing in!"

Suddenly, a thoughtspark glimmered in their minds! .o(Gay MacRainfall on the 
line from the Sparkling Homestead!)

"Gay! Never thought I'd be so happy to hear your televoice!" Jezebel flew a 
crazy figure-eight, S-Fighters crashing into each other in the wake of her ship, 
that mode-morphing polyfighter, the Queer Bedfellow!

.o(Same to you, you crazy slut! Did you manage to snatch the treasure?)

.o(It's in our back pockets,) telechirped Vance, using his affinity with the 
Rainbow Stream that flows between all truly open hearts to send an image of it 
in their hold!

"But not for long, if Militindustry Incorporate has anything to say about it!" 
Jezebel's hands ran across the cybronic interface, the guns of the Queer 
Bedfellow pulsing infraviolet! "And for all the firepower Alonza installed on 
this babe, we're still outnumbered, thirteen thousand to one and climbing!"

.o(Make that thirty thousand!) teleyelled Vance, hands to his forehead. 
.o(Capital ship is chugging thru astral space right for us!)

.o(Then it's time to do something *really* stupid,) telesaid Gay, their mental 
voice scintllating in the high-dopamine range. .o(The Sparkling Homestead is 
going to open the hearts of every S-Pilot in a forty-klick range!)

"WHAT!?" Jezebel nearly ran straight into a transgravitic mine, juking out just 
in time! "Gay, it's too dangerous! Engaging with such resentful, closed, 
hate-filled hearts is gonna drain every spoon you have - and then some!"

.o(This ain't a democracy, Jezebel, it's an anarchist commune! You may have been 
President of Old Earth for two whole weeks, but in this polyfamily, your concern 
is noted, appreciated, loved - and filed in the wastebasket!) Gay telespoke with 
ultrasubconscious passion. .o(We've already formed the Pentacle Heart - centered 
on the thing we collectively love the most!)

"So why ya formin' it on a stuffed crust pizza," muttered Jezebel, blushing 
furiously. "All right, all right - but on my mark! I'm diving right into the 
heart of the storm!"

.o(A whole-ass masochist like you wouldn't have it any other way!) Jezebel and 
Vance could feel the spectral energy coruscating on the edges of Gay's words. 
.o(We're charged with hedonism and hope! On your mark!)

Jezebel drove the Queer Bedfellow through a torrent of coherent light and 
charged particles, closing in on the command wing at a hundred times the speed 
of sound! This would require thought-perfect timing! She readied the call just 
below the surface of consciousness, to trigger the moment she saw the glow of 
the Head Oppressor's gleamaward! "And..."

.o(MARK!)

Psychic love shot across the cosmos faster than light, faster than darkness, 
faster than conscious understanding! It burst across the cold thought-shields 
the Capitatriarchy enshrouded their agents in - burst and burrowed, digging in 
towards their hearts! And those hearts responded, reaching desperately for the 
light, for love, even as the conscious minds enclosing them fought against the 
kind intrusion!

Jezebel kicked the Queer Bedfellow's astral engines into overdrive! Vance caught 
onto the powerful hyperthought, guiding the ship on a path down the Rainbow 
Stream right towards home!

But they weren't out of the starwoods yet! The S-Pilots were trauma-trained to 
keep attacking even as tears poured from their eyes and painful hope beat 
against their breasts! Jezebel poured every erg of piloting skill she had, and 
every drop of love she had for the Queer Bedfellow, into bobbing and darting 
through the eye of the storm!!

Gay screamed wordlessly! .o(cold) .o(resentment) .o(pain) .o(one way) .o(doesn't 
matter) .o(Doesn't Matter) .o(Give Up) .o(GIVE UP!)

Tears flowed from Vance's eyes, nails digging into his hands as the psychic 
stream funneled thru his brain! "...hurts..."

Jezebel kicked backwards! Feet on the controls, she grabbed Vance's face and 
kissed him passionately! "Don't give up on me, motherfucker!" she murmured into 
his mouth, and grabbed his crotch, squeezing tight!

"Mmmmmmnh!" The screaming delight of a single moment burst across his brain, 
channeling back along the Rainbow Stream into his family, and back outward into 
the Incorporate forces - cracking hearts left and right, ion banks going silent 
as pilots and controllers alike wept for a lost life!

They flickered past the edge of the gravity well, locked hard onto the astral 
stream, and BOOSTED across the cosmos in a wink and a flash!

Another televoice came over the connection, softer, tired from struggling, but 
satisfied with a hard, worthwhile accomplishment. .o(queer bedfellow, do you 
read? this is maxine. gay's all right but needs to introvert. how are y'all?)

Jezebel set the autopilot with her big toe. "Just fine, Maxine." She lifted 
Vance's soft, brain-pummeled form out of his spacechair. "We're gonna do the 
same. See you at home."

.o(see thee soon!)

Two relative hours later, the Queer Bedfellow eased into the docks at the hidden 
asteroid known as the Sparkling Homestead. The hatch opened by itself, and Gay, 
sipping on a cannabis smoothie and stretching, made her way inside. "Jez? Vance? 
How ya doin?"

A pile of blankets and pillows lay in front of a crystalline statue depicting 
Aphrodite Hermes in loving union with themself. Vance's head was sticking out, 
and he finger-waved to Gay. "She's fast asleep, as ever after one of these 
really hard ones."

"Awwwww." Gay knelt down, running her fingers thru Jezebel's hair. "Good job. 
We'll alert the Tellurians we got their artifact back from the museum."

"Hey," Vance said, "What do you think she'd say if I told her she's my hero?"

Gay chuckled. "She'd say she's just another old spacer, and that you're a 
soft-hearted nerd."

"Yeah, that's what I thought. Big tsundere."

"I know, right?" Gay leaned in and kissed Jezebel's cheek. "Sleep tight, 
princess of the spaceways."

----

Author's Notes: So, people were talking about "pulp" and what it means and I got 
Inspired. I might well come back to this.

There are a *lot* of Heinlein references in here. I've always felt that his work 
is struggling to be queer trans anarchism, even as the belief system that work 
is written under rejects it.

Drew "anyway, fun!" Perron