Thrust 7.

"Moisture director!" A choir of strangely similar voices chimed, "Moisturize daily with Chutney!"

The Vagendra of Manocide wondered what she was looking at, they didn't have anything like this where she was from, not since the third episode of the second season where something horrible had happened with her volcano ray. She pointed out the robot choir sitting on a strange tracked platform that trundled around the foyer of the supreme escalator and the fantabulous people levinator.

"It must be voting season again." Captain Seymour DickLogic grunted, furrowing his brows manfully as if trying to remember something important. A fleet of drones was hovering around in circles, from each one dangled a bright green erkmograph that was chanting something about chutney. He lost count at ten and politely tossed the one that dented his hairdo away. "They should space them, that would soon shut them up."

"In space, no one can hear you vote?" The Vagendra of Manocide politely rescued the dented drone when it came back for another try and equally politely tossed it in a fountain. It drowned, but politely and amongst friends.

"Chutney! I'm Chutney!" A woman dressed in a poor imitation of the Vagendra of Manocide's official dress of doing bad stuff screamed into her microphone, the colour was all wrong and the green ruffles made it resemble a deraged lettuce rather than a deranged vagina, and that was just the microphone. "Vote for Chutney! Dame Thumping Chutney for Moisture Director!" The robot choir harmonised cheerfully, doing chutney acapella impressions.

The crash and squeal of rending gears distracted her from her speech. Followed by a strangely damp thud and a remarkable surfeit of gear wheels. "Sorry, hand slipped." The Vagendra of Manocide put away her weapon. Well, actually it was Captain Seymour DickLogic's weapon but she was holding it. She discovered the reason why space onesies came with trousers that attached to the redskirt or redshirt with velcro(tm). No pockets. Experimentally she tucked the laser nun-chuckers up her sleeve.

"You just sliced my vote trolley in half!" The woman screamed, her green dress turning an unusual shade of purple in some places. "I will sue you for interference!"

"I was aiming for you." The Vagendra of Manocide rescued the microphone from the woman before she clubbed anyone with it.

"What idiot let a child hold a laser halberd?" The woman screamed, if anything she was louder without the microphone.

"Laser nun-chuckers actually." Captain Seymour DickLogic noted calmly, "fully charged too."

"Now, stand still. This won't hurt me anywhere near as much as it will hurt you."

Captain Seymour DickLogic enjoyed the show, secretly wishing he could join in the fun. That wasn't allowed if your face was on the recruitment posters. The medium lolly had finished and was walking away long before the strange noises coming out of the floating erkmographs stopped. Sadly there was no mud or chocolate sauce or space bikinis, but that was just as well, the medium lolly was dealing with a double-lard class land whale in the silliest of ablative dresses.

He sauntered after her and sighed, "can you not tuck my nun-chuckers in your panties? That's a well known way to do irreparable damage to the family jewels." He rescued them and showed her the safety switch. It had pictorial labels, a happy bunnygirl, a dangerous looking bunnygirl and a slider with three different sizes of crotz.

Laser nun-chuckers were actually playground weapons used for training future space cadets as soon as they can suck a blaster. And as such, they are usually orange with a crotz motif. The particular model favoured by captains for close quarters combat and opening official communications being the extra medium. It has a special confetti mode for demands from ex-girlfriends and parking ticket summonses.

The Vagendra of Manocide decided to let him keep the weapon, the battery was almost flat anyway, only two out of eleven crotz were glowing. She commented on the poor battery life and was surprised to learn that the Laser Halberd was rated for only thirty seconds or three strikes.

"Darling, what happened to the microphone?" Captain Seymour DickLogic asked, the erkomgraph drones were orbiting around a pair of feet sticking out of the smouldering remains of the vote trolley and making funny grunting noises.

"I left it somewhere," she beamed at him.

Captain Seymour DickLogic pointed to a cafe and she nodded, they had chocolate fudge sundaes, which were illegal in the Hive Collective for unknown reasons. "You're in luck, they have your size."

"Medium lolly?" She stared at the display of desserts.

"Medium incredible." He pointed, "but you have to eat your salad. All of it."

"Of course darling, anything for chocolate fudge sundae." The Vagendra of manocide chimed cheerfully. Somewhere down on the deck, a vote trolley exploded. Just another exciting day in the last spendadrome before the dangerous zone.

---

A sign glowed cheerfully at them as they reached the navy deck. "Please Employ Redshirts Today!" Unlike all the InYourFaceMatics, it didn't follow them or talk to them or explode. Captain Seymour DickLogic wondered about that and then sorted out the Vagendra of Manocide's panties on show.

"What's that over there?" she pointed, "with all the redskirts?" There was a remarkable number of redskirts compared to redshirts, and they all had their space onesie trousers on. "No hair regulations?" One of them had bunchies and there was an honest pony tail too, but that looked like a guy who was a wall of muscles.

Captain Seymour DickLogic grunted manfully, "the specialty recruitment office. They offer sideways promotions for the ensigns. You'll probably hurt yourself laughing."

"Ah, we just assign them to classes. I have to go see. Won't be long, don't wander." She pointed at the sign, "I'll wait for you there."

"I shall visit the Premium Perfect chiselling centre and get some more Man Up."

"Not the usual darling or I'll swoon." She waved and floated off to see the recruitment centre

---

A robot recruiter greeted the blue haired redskirt. "Greetinatings, Medium-Lolly Redskirt. Welcome to the speciality recruitment centre Gronk. Here is an omniform. Please fill it out while you watch today's show presentations."

"Thank you."

"No need to thank me, I'm a robot." The robot handed over the form and checked his script.

"Like the astrogator?"

This was off the script. "Your astrogator will likely be either a ROBBIE or a MARIA class robot. They have big brains full of cheese." He glanced at his script and wondered who had scribbled on it. "If you don't like the shows, come back the next day cycle for more." He indicated the curtained entrance, "enjoy. But not too much."

The presentation theatre looked like it had been repurposed from an actual theatre. Plush red seats that were exactly the same colour as the uniforms.

"Hello, mind if I sit here?" The young woman with blue hair asked politely. Being disarmingly polite was one of her traits, just before politely setting the orgasmatron timer to the full half-hour.

"Eek!" the young woman sitting in the middle of the back row squealed and back flipped out of her chair with a look of absolute terror on her face.

"Ah. You're a helmsman."

"How can you tell?" The young woman was desperately trying to stop her heart leaping out of her chest. She sheepishly went around and sat in her seat.

"You scream like a girl at the slightest excuse."

"They always make me fly through asteroid fields at full tilt for an entire episode. It's hell on the voice." She admitted, looking in her pockets for her stress medication.

The blue haired woman looked disinterestedly at her omniform and filled in her name. Her real name. "I'll let you into a little secret. Those 'stroids are terrified of hitting you."

"Why?"

"Have you seen the insurance premiums? Think of the no-claims bonus. Not to mention the cost of repairs, the dispute resolution process alone takes years."

"But they're so big and scary! Helmsmen get quad damage ensign nappies!" She looked at the blue haired redskirt, she had bare legs! She was so slim she was probably medium-lolly size, but most important, she wasn't wearing her ensign nappies. She was probably a robot!

"Size matters. Get a bigger ship, laugh at them. If they don't get out of your way, apply excessive science."

"Science?"

"It's what my captain uses. Way more fun than Brillcream."

Someone in a row in front of them chimed in, "Shush, show's about to start-"

The blue haired woman whispered to the woman she was sitting next to, "HMS Upskirt. Daisy Jones."

"USS Ohshitwereallgonnadie 2. Helmsman first class, Nier Miss." She whispered back.

"Two?" The blue-haired woman wondered, "what happened to the first one?"

"Exploded in the construction bay."

The announcer robot had the most amazing uniform, stacked epaulettes, quad tassels and enough braid to anchor a battletug. The lights dimmed except for the spotlight illuminating him, the resultant glittery effects rivalled even a class three combat mirror ball. "And now, ladies and gentlemen. It's time for, Captain Counter-Rotating and his pitch for one of the most secretive branches of the Space Navy since Catering Supplies. Sit back and freak out to the dulcet tones of- Captain Counter-Rotating!" Being a robot had its advantages, the audience went wild, simulated of course but it helped his self-esteem.

"Hello, hello, hello. I am very probably Captain Swashplate Counter-Rotating. Possibly of the fourth secret section. We are purported to fly those missions that are so secret that we probably don't even know we exist, let alone the mission. Which may, or may not, be a cover for something else. And this may or may not be my assistant, Commander Plausible Deniability. We might be here to tell you how awesome it is to fly the best space helicopters in the entire book, or we might not."

Daisy Jones paid attention. Black space helicopters were real. Probably.

Nier Miss wondered about the young woman she was sitting next to, maybe she could transfer to HMS Upskirt, their uniform didn't include the itchy redskirt trousers.