V3 Chapter 2: Life On Deck

After we finished choosing our rooms and settling our luggage, we head to the control center that is now transformed into a briefing room for a meeting about our roles in the ship.

To be honest, it made me dumbfounded since I didn’t know that the control center had that kind of feature until Kana fiddled with the controls and the room suddenly changes.

I could see that the others are dumbfounded as well except for professor Einstein who is grinning like a mad scientist who is about to do an experiment on a human test subject.

It’s not my first time seeing him do that since he often grins like that when he sees something interesting or when no one wants to raise their hand during recitation.

I know that he’s a kind professor since he hardly gives us any assignments and he’s a likable guy but he scares me sometimes.

Anyways, Ms. Leane recovered from being dumbfounded and told everyone to take a seat at the conference table.

So we did that.

As we sat on our respective seats, I notice that there are still a dozen or more empty seats.

Well, this ship is supposed to house an army, so it is to no surprise since we only have twenty-two people on board and one maidbot.

Originally, we’re only supposed to be seventeen but four people joined in the ride at the last minute.

Those four people are Favion and the three from Luna’s fanatic club.

Favion couldn’t let Maple go alone while the three join in hoping that we will bump in to Luna which will never happen. Not in a million years.

(Note: Remember the trio from Luna’s fan club? If not, go to Vol. 1 Chapter 5 part A.)

I don’t mind the extra company, but I just wish they could have told me that they were coming beforehand.

Oh well!

The more the merrier.

Anyways, there are more girls than boys.

I did expect that there would be more girls than boys since I invited Clarissa, Feini and Sophie along but I didn’t expect that the number will be far more greater since I thought that Sophie would bring one or two of her occult club buddies who are majority boys but she brought a girl instead which is probably one of the occult club member since Sophie does not really hang out with people outside her circle.

I also didn’t expect the Luna fanatic trio to show up but since they’re all gorgeous so it's a big plus.

By the way, Ms. Leane is gorgeous as well or to be more precise, she’s hot.

How hot is she?

She has all the assets of a woman, the curves, the twin mountains, the valley, the two hills, you know what I mean.

The sad thing though is that Ms. Leane always wears military clothing which doesn’t reveal much of her assets.

Right now Ms. Leane is wearing a bullet proof vest which is over her white long sleeve buttoned blouse and a blue jeans.

She kinda looks like a body guard in those old action movies.

I wonder why she likes wearing that bullet proof vest of hers since it won’t really protect anything much unlike a barrier that protects the whole body and absorbs shock.

Bullet proof vest nowadays is just for coslay or fashion for military geeks.

Maybe she just like wearing the damn thing or for training?

I did trying wearing it once out of curiousity and man that thing is heavy.

Putting on that thing felt like I've gain 10 more kilograms or more.

Speaking about heavy clothing, only I, Ms. Leane and Professor Einstein are wearing heaving clothing while the rest are dressed in a summer style fashion.

Even Kana, who’s usually seen wearing a lab coat is now dressed in a purple t-shirt with a printed red text that says “Hacking is life!” and a denim shorts.

I usually don’t give a damn on what I wear but seeing them all dressed in a summer get up makes me feel out of place.

I should probably change into a summer get up later.

I think I have some short sleeve hoodie lying around somewhere.

By the way, I’m wearing a white hoodie and a black jeans while Professor Einstein is wearing lab coat over a green sweater and black formal style pants.

While I was thinking to myself, Ms. Leane starts the meeting.

By the way seating beside me is Clarissa who is on my left and Wren who is on my right.

Across me is Aeris and Ace while the others are all over.

As for Louise, she went to the pantry to make tea for everyone.

Anyways, Ms. Leane starts the meeting.

“Ehem! Now that we are all seated, let’s begin the meeting shall we?”

We didn’t say anything and wait for Ms. Leane to continue.

“So, since we have cleanbots, I won’t assign anyone on cleaning duty.”

Roc suddenly rejoices.

“Hell yeah!”

Which got our attention and made us stare at him.

As a result, Roc lowers his right fist that was up in the air and behaves.

Maple suddenly stands up, point and makes fun of him.

“Bwahahaha! You suck!”

All of a sudden we heard a gunshot which shook us all.

Bang*

We look at the direction where the gunshot comes from.

As we did, we saw Ms. Leane pointing a silver handgun with a small barrel while the muzzle is still emitting smoke at Maple’s direction.

We didn’t see Maple fall down or scream in pain so I’m guessing she missed intentionally since Ms. Leane is a professional markswoman after all.

I heard from gramps that she could snipe a target kilometers away with a crappy rifle.

“These maybe rubber bullets but it still hurt like hell. So if you don’t want the next bullet to be in between your eyes, I suggest you behave. Got it?”

Ms. Leane said with full of authority.

Maple didn’t say anything nods nervously.

“Good. Now sit down!”

Maple does as what Ms. Leane said.

I’m guessing she’s still pissed at what Maple did to her earlier because she didn’t do that to Roc when he was rejoicing.

Ms. Leane put her gun away and continues.

“So, what we’re going to do is, we will group ourselves into seven with three members each for kitchen duty which we’ll do on a rotational shift. By rotational shift, I mean each meal will be prepared by a different group so that each one of us will have plenty experience in cooking. If you ask why we have to do this, it is because cooking is a vital skill for soldiers. You can’t fight with an empty stomach right? And also, Louise would participate in every group as a supervisor so none of you won’t be able to ditch.”

No ditching huh…

I can make Louise do all the work then.

“If you think you can dump all the work on Louise, I made sure you can’t but if you manage to do so, it’s a day in the brigs for you.”

It’s not like Ms. Leane will watch us all the time so I’ll do it when she ain’t looking.

“And if you think you can cheat behind my back, think again. I have eyes and ears everywhere. Got that?”

I don’t know why but for some reason, I feel threatened so I better not cheat…

“Yes Ms. Leane.”

Everyone responded in unison like we were in class.

“Good!”

She said with satisfaction.

Wait a minute! Is she reading my mind??

Suddenly, Louise arrives with a tray of tea cups with her and start distributing the tea.

As Louise handed Ms. Leane her tea, she thanks her.

“Thank you.”

After Ms. Leane received her tea, she continues.

“Now, we will group ourselves using the popular random selector app to be fair but before we start, does anyone have a question?”

Professor Einstein whom I didn’t expect, raises his hand.

Ms. Leane who was a bit surprised, reluctantly calls out to him.

“Uh… Yes! Isaac.”

Professor Einstein stood up like an obedient student which I find funny in a weird way.

“Does that include me too?”

He asked.

“Yes, that includes you too.”

Ms. Leane answered him.

“But I don’t know how to cook.”

Mr. Einstein said modestly.

Ms. Leane refutes him.

“Then you will learn.”

“I seriously don't know how to cook! I might even end up giving everyone food poisoning.”

“All the more you should learn.”

“But...”

“Quit whining and just do it already!”

Ms. Leane who was fed up said angrily.

Everyone starts laughing.

“Ha ha ha….”

“Hi hi hi…”

“Hu huh hu…”

I don’t know why they’re laughing, I just laugh with them anyways.

“Ha ha ha?”

As they say, if you are in Earth, do what the Earthlings do.

“See what you did? You made us a laughing stock!”

Ms. Leaned complained with a hint of embarrassment.

Professor Einstein apologizes sincerely.

“Sorry…”

After a while, the laughter died down and Ms. Leane resumes.

“So… Let’s start with the parings.”

Ms. Leane turn towards Professor Einstein who’s sitting beside her.

“Hey Isaac? Do you mind connecting my tablet to the holoprojector for me?”

“Sure!”

Professor Einstein accepted her request.

Ms. Leane hands over her tablet and Professor Einstein takes it.

After receiving Ms. Leane’s tablet, Professor Einstein starts fidgeting with it.

“Let’s see here…”

Professor Einstein mumbled to himself.

“This should do it.”

All of a sudden, a hologram image of a table with seven rows and four columns appeared in the middle of the conference table.

Every first cells in each row are labeled with the name of each group which is “Group 1” to “Group 7”.

Bellow the table is an icon that looks like a rounded rectangle with a white text on it that says start.

Professor Einstein gives back Ms. Leane her tablet.

“Here you go.”

“Thanks Isaac.”

Ms. Leane said her gratitude and takes her tablet.

“It was my pleasure.”

Professor Isaac said with a smile which made Ms. Leane cheeks reddened a bit.

I guess Professor Einstein has a killer smile if he could make Ms. Leane blush.

Or maybe Ms. Leane is into Professor Einster.

I did notice Ms. Leane acting weirldy around Professor Einstein from time to time around campus like how she would suddenly blush when bumpping into to Professor Einstein or she would try to get his attention and such...

It's definitely the latter.

Professor Einstein, you lucky bastard!

I could hear the others whispering to one another and some of them are whispering about the chemistry between Ms. Leane and Professor Einstein.

I guess I am not the only one thinking that way.

“Quiet everyone!”

Ms. Leane who just recovered scolded us and everyone turned silent.

After that, Ms. Leane continues.

“Alright! Let’s start with the groupings.”

Ms. Leane taps on her tablet and the empty cells starts shuffling with our names.

Toot Toot Toot Toot… Ta-taa*

The shuffling stops and an icon that says finished with an animation of a party popper at each side setting off appears.

After that, the icon disappears, and the list of groups with our names appears.

As I browse through the list, I saw my name on Group 1 together with Sophie and someone named Harumi Nishida.

I’m guessing that’s the girl that Sophie brought since she’s the only that I can’t remember the name.

(Note: I’m pretty sure you already know that Linel has a problem on remembering people’s names.)

By the way, I have met that Harumi girl before during our finals exam and at that time, Ace was pressuring her to give up the steel briefcase while Zack and I were clueless on what to do.

We resolved the matter peacefully and end up fighting her later on since we sabotage her base.

Anyways, the groupings may be random but it seems a bit strange to me since those who are grouped together seem to have a similar trait except for my group of course since we have nothing in common.

For example, Group 5 which is composed of Kana, Zack and Mathias have a similar trait which is being an odd ball.

Another example is Group 3 which is composed of Favion, Eri and Ace who have a similar trait of being the cool guys.

Not to mention that the Luna fanatic trios are in the same group.

I’m totally convince that the groupings was rigged.

(Here is the list of groupings)

Group 1: Linel Silvercrest, Harumi Nishida and Sophie Ferz (The misfits)

Group 2: Aeirs Hope, Wren Fenrisel and Clarissa Avel (The candidates)

Group 3: Eriline Harlens, Favion Aldetore and Ace Spades (The adults)

Group 4: Lokki Ragnarok, Roc Star and Maple Free (The brats)

Group 5: Kana Ishizawa, Mathias Cruz and Zack Waver (The deviants)

Group 6: Crisselda Aristole, Viola Falfeti and Shirley Holmes (The groupies)

Group 7: Isaac Einstein, Leane Hawkeye and Feini Zayongi (The elderlies)

Some of us seem satisfied with the groupings. Some are disappointed and others don’t give a shit.

As for me, I’m alright with it since Sophie and I get along just fine and both Haurmi and Sophie are cute so yeah. I'm very satisfied.

Not that I’m looking forward to it, I’m just saying.

Anyways, speaking about the others being disappointed, Wren is throwing a fit right now.

“I refuse to accept this!”

“I’m sorry princess but once the groupings have been set, you can’t change it.”

Ms. Leane answered back in a cool manner.

“Says who?”

“Says me! Now if you aren’t satisfied with the groupings, then suck it up. Things won’t always go your way you know! Besides, I don’t hear anyone else complaining.”

Wren takes a look at everyone.

As she reaches me, she stares at me for a bit.

Then her stare turns to glare.

What did I do to her?

After that, she sat back in her chair, crosses her arms and legs and did her trademark.

“Hmph!”

Suddenly, Ms. Leane calls for our attention.

“Ehem! Now that’s over…”

Then she turns towards me.

“Where are we heading?”

Where are we heading?

Now that she mentioned it, we don’t have a destination do we?

Well, it is because I plan this trip on a whim and didn’t have time to think about where we should go.

And also, our preparation time was short so yeah! Case closed.

I decided to tell Ms. Leane the truth.

“Yeah… About that…”