Some Things Just Can't Be Understood

"Why don't you look outside now and see?" Maple said with a grin. "Though please don't get too friendly with any monsters or anything else outside. Most here are trouble."

Pheobie blushed slightly but shook her head. "I'll stay here. I'm too afraid to look by myself"

The cat meowed indignantly, as if asking if it were chopped liver.

"Eh, fair enough," answered Maple, checking stats on a few screens. "But if you'll be traveling with me you'll be seeing this place, or non-place, quite a bit. So you might want to get used to it."

Maple glanced out his own window for a moment. The space outside was predominantly silver, but many other colors floated about in gaseous ribbons. There were currently no corrupted monsters outside, which had been Maple's main concern despite checking the status screens first. It wouldn't have been the first time a chaotic entity had tricked his sensors.

The cat hopped out of Pheobie's lap and onto a table, so it could look out the window better. It stood very still, its eyes wide and tail twitching.

Pheobie got up to stand behind Maple. "So where are we going?" she asked. She kept enough distance between them so she wouldn't be a nuance, but she could still look at the screens.

"Why, anywhere you want pup," Maple replied. "I don't have a particular destination in mind at the moment. What sounds like a good vacation spot to you?"

After the last mission which ended with him crashing into her world, he needed a vacation. Well technically her world had been a vacation, but still...

"Um... I dunno" Pheobie mumbled with a blush. "I've never been anywhere but home before. I don't know what anywhere else is like"

"Well, would you like a trip to an ocean area? Jungle area? Mountain area?" Maple asked, thinking of worlds he knew were peaceful and generally non-corrupted. "Maybe someplace with little to no people? Or maybe a lot of people who are weird but good?"

The cat jumped over to the windowsill and batted at a purple mouse hovering outside the window. Suddenly the meek rodent morphed into a sinewy snake, and then a large wolf who snapped at the window with green teeth. The cat fluffed up and jumped away, running over to hide behind Pheobie's legs. It turned and hissed at the strange canine now that it was at a safe distance.

The wolf-thing bared its teeth in a grin-like fashion before gliding away.

"I've never been to the ocean before" Pheobie blushed lightly. "I've never even learned to swim... Can we... Maybe go there?" She asked, holding the hem of her shirt and wringing it in embarrassment.

She skuffed her foot on the floor lightly and almost tripped over the cat when it raced behind her legs.

"Sure! I could use a tan anyway," Maple replied cheerfully, bringing up a list of worlds that had good beaches in them. "Let's see here...typhoon season in Seabreeze Shore, that won't do...Johnson's Beach is way too crowded...people still pissed at me in Sea Otter Cove...ah, here we go!"

He highlighted the chosen name with a touch to the screen.

"Whiteflower Beach, here we come!" Maple announced. "It'll be a few minutes before we get there. Go ahead and pick out which room to want to stay in and move your stuff in. Or you can just relax or explore, if you like. Whatever works, dear."

Dear. Oh boy.

Pheobie seemed to blush more at the new nickname. "O-Okay" She mumbled. She scooped up the cat and hurriedly walked off to explore the ship and find a room. She was afraid to look Maple in the eye again, and unsure where the light butterflies in her stomach had come from.

Now Maple felt rather embarrassed, now that he thought more about things. He usually didn't let people get to him like this. He didn't usually just pick someone up and take them dimension-hopping, no matter how sorry he felt for them. If they did that all the time, then there would be a thousand people on this ship. So why-

He shook his head, went to readjust his glasses...that weren't there. He had left them in the last world. He never forgot his glasses. Oh boy, he needed a drink.

He set the ship on autopilot, and decided to see what he had leftover in his food storage.

Pheobie had found an empty room and already retrieved her bag. She rummaged through it, looking for her journal, instead pulling out Maple's glasses.

She had taken them off him when she had put him on the couch the night prior and he hadn't noticed them sitting on the dining room table. She had noticed them when she went back for her things and thought to pack them, but had forgotten to give them to him in her excitement. Leaving her bag, she set back off to find Maple and give his glasses back.

Maple rooted through the food storage, which was so large that he could walk through it comfortably. It seemed like overkill to have so much food for one man, but sometimes he got stranded in a world where he couldn't digest the local food and water. There were also times of long travel in non-dimension, which had nothing a normal being could harvest. Plus sometimes there were guests, like now.

The food had done fine in the crash, being securely packed away. The liquor, however, had not. The glass bottles were smashed all over the floor, their intoxicating contents spilled uselessly on the floor. It made him want to kick something.

Well, this isn't the time to get buzzed up anyway. There's a guest, we're going to the beach, and she's not drinking age, and least I don't think she is...

Pheobie stuck her head in the doorway. "Um... Maple?" She asked softly. "Are you busy?"

Maple jumped, and then turned to see Pheobie there.

"Oh no, just thinking about getting something for the road. Something nice and cold. Beaches are hot, you know," he replied with an embarrassed grin. "Though I imagine you know that much already...anyway, looks like some bottles fell over in the crash, so the floor's sticky and there's glass everywhere, so be careful coming in."

The cat walked in, observing the shelves. Then he gave Maple a questioning look.

Pheobie nodded as she entered. She stepped carefully around glass on the floor until she made it over to Maple. She held out the glasses. "Here" She mumbled shyly.

"Hmm? Oh, thank you my dear! I thought I left those light-years away," Maple replied, taking the glasses and putting them on. He'd need to clean them later, but that was later. "I need to clean up this mess here before someone else up with shards in their feet. I guess you can go check and see if there's any proper...oh wait, I don't have any dressware for girls, for obvious reasons. Guess we'll have to go shop for some when we get there."

The ship's humming running slowed, and there was a dismissive beep.

"Well, we're here already. Go ahead and get any beach-like things you have, and then we'll figure out what you need then."

"... I don't know what you would need at a beach..." Pheobie blushed. "I've never been before. I've never even swam before..."

"Hmm...well then! Go over to the miscellaneous storage area on the other side of the ship and I'll meet you over there," Maple suggested, getting out a broom and pan to sweep up the glass. He would worry about mopping it later. "Then we'll look through and see if there's anything beach-appropriate in there."

The cat went over to Pheobie and mrowed, looking discontent.

"I might be a little while, so you might want to feed furball first."

Pheobie nodded. "Okay!" She chirped happily. She picked up the cat and skipped back to her room.

She fed the cat then went off to the storage area to wait patiently for Maple.

Some fifteen minutes later, Maple arrived at the storage area.

"Now let's see what we have here," he said, unlocking the door. Inside was a huge collection of objects, not at all organized. Here was a box full of worn books, over there were a couple of sets of movie seats, in the corner were some dingy umbrellas. It was hard to tell what would be needed for a certain world, though some things were merely curiosities Maple had picked up along the way.

"Hmm...this could take awhile..." Maple commented, mostly to himself. "Ah, sunglasses and suntan lotion! We'll need those!"

Maple wandered off to where he saw some of the said products on one of the lower shelves.

Pheobie looked at all the items with curiosity. "... Maybe I could help by organising?" She asked "I'm pretty good at that... And it kinda looks like this place needs it"

She looked to Maple for permission. "Would that be alright? It would keep me out of your way while you work"

"Ha! You'll be here for a week before you're halfway done. Don't bother," replied Maple, placing one pair of sunglasses on her head while he passed by. "There's a choir in this chaos, believe it or not. Anyway, perhaps you could get those umbrellas over there and then stalk down some towels?"

Pheobie set the umbrella's by the door and started looking for towels. "But it will keep me busy. And It wouldn't take me that long. Plus I like organising stuff" She tried reasoning with him. "Then you could actually find stuff"

"If you really want to, my dear, then you can do so..." Maple replied, stuffing the suntan lotion into a backpack he found. "...Later! Right now it's beach time! Once we're off someplace else and bored anyway, then you can organize things. Oh dammit, I don't any beach clothes for girls. Eh, it'd be creepy if I did. Oh well, guess we'll have to buy those. Lessee...oh, you can go fix us some sandwiches! Glass is all cleaned up so you shouldn't have trouble getting the food you need for it."