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An enormous battleship, shaped in its' lengthy sharp opulence somewhat like a trident, nudged carefully close to the vast yet comfortingly snug house. The place was enormous beyond the reckoning of an eye, and yet also small enough to be housed on a convenient plot of moon-rock that gave it a lovely overview of the verdant green canyons beyond. The vessel was commanding and impressive, bristling with weaponry of all kinds, able effortlessly to pulverise any enemy installation into dust with but a whim. It nudged carefully against the house and one enormous landing-pedestal stamped down with a groan of carbotanium members and pneumatic bracing right on the driveway leading up to the house. The pedestal was, however, just a touch close to the antiquated velocipede carriage and stamped it into a long thin sheet of metal instantly. The car was ancient, long outmoded on the planet Alternia that it had come from, but the owner of the vehicle was somewhat partial to it. A black void opened in the great pointed maw of the vessel and a mobile descenderator dropped with stately ease to the ground, and two figures disembarked.
“Oh shit!” The taller of the two ran over to the landing pedestal and saw that flattened, obliterated body of the vehicle underneath it. The other person just laughed raucously.
“Good! I hated that thing, he always made me watch him washing and waxing it.”
“I'm so sorry! I don't know how I did it!”
“Oh hush, come on he probably won't even notice.”
That was a lie, the Handmaid knew, because he always noticed. He always noticed everything. But if she was going to break the rules by going out with a boy then she might as well break a few more when she came home again. She ran gaily over to the one that she had formally decided was her new boyfriend, and took his hand to drag him away. The Psiionic just followed after her, sheepishly.
“I'm really nervous,” he stammered, “I don't think I'm supposed to be doing this. In fact, I think I'll get in really big trouble.”
“What's the worst that could happen?”
“I could be retuned to my command cocoon and have my neruapses lashed to the electronic warfare suite again,” he mused, “that really hurts.”
She looked at him, he was gaunt and hollow-cheeked, and when he talked about the various tortures he endured daily his eyes took on a subdued, haunted glow. It made him look so-o-o-o-o sexy. She grinned and reached under the doormat for the key, letting him in.
“Well that's something that might happen. But what will definitely happen is you will be invited up to a pretty girl's bedroom.”
“Uh,” he licked his lips, “you sure? I mean I don't want to pressure you or-”
“Come on, this way!”
She dashed stealthily across the corridor, effortlessly dancing over the rather fetching hardwood floors with barely a creak. The passed a long, wide entryway that lead to the dining room when suddenly there came a great flash of lightning that illuminated a tall, dreadful figure at the head of the dining table in silhouette. It had, instead of a head, a grotesquely large, blank orb of purest opacity. The Handmaid just sighed and turned slowly. There was, of course, never lighting on the moon- he just arranged these things out of a sense of drama.
“Welcome home,” said the good Doctor Scratch though no lips or breath formed those words, “you are quite late coming home.”
“Hallo,” she said through gritted teeth, “I didn't think you'd still be up.”
“I'm always up,” he said smoothly, rising to his feet and turning up the gaslights dotted around the walls with a brass knob set in the wall. As the dining room came to light the table was revealed to be laden down with every imaginable food.
“You shouldn't have,” said the Handmaid in a grating tone which hinted at the fact that she really wished he hadn't.
“Nonsense. Won't you ask your gentleman caller to sit?”
In the entryway the Psiionic gave a polite formal bow, bending at the waist stiffly. “I'm sorry to intrude! Doctor Scratch sir! I- I didn't mean-!”
“Now now dear boy, do sit, please. I think you will find the victuals on offer are much to your liking. I do pride myself on being a most excellent host.”
Indeed the banquet was impressive. Seeing that there would be no arguing, the Handmaid grumpily took a seat opposite her boyfriend, and tried to mime at him silently to just eat something and go, and whatever he did not to try an hold a conversation-
“Well then, young man, it seems you have me at a disadvantage!”
“I- I do?” The helmsman looked up into the faceless dome of Scratch warily.
“Not really, but there is a form to be observed in these things. You of course know who I am, and to whom have I the pleasure of addressing?”
“I have no name beyond that of my bond-profession that is both my life and my limitless torment,” replied the Psiionic gravely.
“Ah, most commendable, I like a man who takes his job seriously,” the great dome inclined slightly in approval, “and what do you do?”
“Oh, well recently I have mostly been acting as the living hand of Her Imperial Condescension at the helm of her mightiest ship of war.”
“I see, I expect that takes up a lot of your time.”
“My life is forfeit to the whims of the Empress.”
The Handmaid ground her teeth and tried to stamp on Scratch's foot under the table. Tonight, apropos of nothing, he was wearing steel-toed boots. Of course he was.
“You're being embarrassing!” The Handmaid hissed, “shut u-u-up!”
“Am I? I wasn't aware of it. I see no reason not to show an interest in your friends.”
“You are being so- urgh! Forget it, we're not hungry!”
Scratch lifted a large silver dome that revealed a pile of assorted candies and treats, “Oh? You're certain?”
“Yes!”
She looked over, but her boyfriend was absorbed in the sight. He was actually drooling a little. It was pathetic.
“Maybe,” he murmured, “just a little?”
“You can have sweets any time!”
“Actually, I have a nutrient gel pumped directly into my femoral artery,” the Psiionic sighed, “it's very painful. And it doesn't taste of anything.”
“There now,” Scratch would have been beaming smugly if he could, “all better.”
Dinner went on. The Handmaid was almost apoplectic when they were offered hot cocoa, and when Scratch insisted that a growing lad like the Psiionic simply had to try some of his home-made chocolate cookies she almost had a rage induced aneurysm then and there. The Psiionic had never been happier, in a very literal sense. Chocolate was a new experience to him. As he was huddling by the fire that Scratch insisted on building up for them- as a romantic gesture- the Handmaid grabbed one of the doctor's elbows and steered him off into the corridor.
“What do you think you're doing? I've never been so humiliated!”
“I'm sure I don't know what you mean,” Scratch sniffed, “the young man seems to be quite satisfied.”
“You know exactly what I mean! I have a boyfriend now and there's nothing you can do to get in the middle of it!”
“Ah, I see, this would be an act of youthful rebellion?”
“Yes! And we're going to-” she hesitated, thinking back to the frankly not very informative troll romance magazines that she had managed to purloin and read avidly- “we're going to have the sex in a bucket! And you can't stop us!”
Scratch placed a hand on each of her shoulders in a suitably paternal manner, “I understand entirely. I think it is about time that we had a long, frank and mutually respectful candid discussion about suitable prophylaxis and safe habits.”
“What are you talking about? You had better not be talking about what I think you're talking about!”
Scratch leaned over slightly, “I have a selection of flavoured latex prophylactic sheaths for you to choose from. I made sure to also add some that are ribbed.”
“What?”
“For your pleasure.”
The Handmaid recoiled in the absolute gut-churning horror that can only be experienced by young female being offered a selection of condoms to use with her boyfriend by her adult authority figure.
“I am not going to discuss this with you!”
“I quite understand, it is more a matter for the males to consider.”
Scratch walked directly into the saloon where the Psiionic waited.
“My boy, have you given any thought to the use of flavoured latex pro-”
Even Scratch was surprised by the speed that the Handmaid barrelled into him.
While the spilled cocoa was cleaned up with sterling efficiency by Scratch, there came from upstairs a curious sound as of footsteps- one heavy sole fell on the floorboards, followed by an accompanying dull thud where there would have been a second footfall. Scratch inclined his globe upwards.
“Oh my, I believe he might be awake.”
“This is the worst night ever,” the Handmaid whined, “why can't I just have something nice just for me?”
“Now now, it's important that we observe these little rites-of-passage as a family, now that you are becoming A Woman.” Scratch capitalised the title effortlessly.
“Oh that's nice,” the Psiionic smiled, “I never had any of that, I just got thrown into a horrifying biorganic matrix when I came of age.”
“It is not nice!” The Handmaid slapped his arm, “it's horrible! They're making this impossible!”
From above them, high up the long staircase past the enormous grandfather clock, there boomed an impossibly deep and fearful voice that sounded like the agonised thrashing of a pack of cave-dwelling crocodiles.
“SCRATCH? ARE YOU THERE?”
Scratch sighed and made a placatory gesture, “allow me, I'll see to this.” He walked over to the entry to the saloon and leaned out, cupping a hand to the side of his dome where approximately a mouth would have been and yelling back up the stairs in an uncharacteristically shrill voice, “YES! Yes I'm here! Where else would I bloody well be?”
“YOU MIGHT HAVE GONE OUT FOR GROCERIES.”
Scratch groaned and shook his head, “We don't need groceries!”
“OH, SO WE HAVE THE MAYONNAISE I LIKE THEN, DO WE?”
“You know it isn't good for you!”
“I DON'T CARE.”
“Just come down here, our little girl has a gentleman caller!”
“ARE THEY HOLDING HANDS?”
“I think that might be in the offing!” Scratch was nearly hoarse from screaming.
“HAS HE SHOWN HER A LOVELY NIGHT OUT?”
“YES!” Screeched Scratch, “I believe he has his own transportation!”
“HAVE THEY SHARED CHASTE KISSES BENEATH THE LIGHT OF ANY PARTICULAR MOON?”
“I don't-” Scratch sighed and turned to the others, “have you, ah...?”
“Not, um, not yet,” whispered the Psiionic, “I thought we would take things slowly,” The Handmaid gave him a truly withering look and nudged him in the ribs viciously.
“They haven't done that yet!” Scratch yelled up the stairs at the top of his lungs, “he wants to treat her like a gentleman!”
“THAT,” came the voice, “SOUNDS... TENDER-R-R-R-R,” the bass rumble shook the very foundations of the house, “TELL THEM TO COMMENCE HOLDING HANDS AND SHARING KINDLY LOOKS.”
“Tell them your bloody self!” Scratch screamed, “get your arse down here and-”
“I'M ALREADY HERE.”
And so he was, right in the corner of the room in the exact spot that everyone there was least expecting. He was stood behind a cheese plant. The Psiionic screamed in surprise, a high-pitched girlish sound. The Handmaid just slapped her forehead in frustration and stormed to her feet.
“I hate you all! You're the worst! Come on!” she grabbed the Psiionic's hand and dragged him off towards the door, “we're going out! I'll be back whenever!”
The door slammed closed. After a short time there was the low, powerful thrumming of mighty engines starting, as an imperial flagship lifted off. Scratch just sighed.
“Well,” he said, “that went as well as could be expected. She now thinks we're the worst.”
“I'M PRETTY SURE SHE WASN'T TALKING ABOUT ME.”
“Oh, bugger off back upstairs!”
“I'M ALREADY THERE!”
And he was. Scratch just muttered and cleared the table. He was certainly never already there when there was any work to be done, that was for sure.