Armature Noir: Sigma BLACK

"What do you mean you can't let it through customs? Don't you know who I am?"

The Ithacan Transorbital Control SysAdmin's eyebrows wavered. "Uh, yes? I have your passport details in front of me. Mistiare Blue Matthews."

"The Sapphire Knight." the red haired woman said, putting her hand on the officer's desk and leaning forward.

The SysAdmin paused, then looked up from Miss Matthews' deep, creamy cleavage. "It doesn't say that in your passport."

Misty paused, drew away from the desk and lapped the office. When she returned she slapped the desk four times, which the SysAdmin felt was totally unnecessary. "I realise that they train you to be literally as unhelpful as possible but come the fuck on. I have merchandise! I'm on the front cover of Vogue!" the SysAdmin gave her a bland, mindless smile. It was unbelievable: she actually couldn't believe it. The man was a trashy stereotype of robots. "This month! There's a billboard in the foodcourt!"

"Miss Matthews, please, that isn't relevant to ... anything. The fact remains that you simply cannot transport a custom, military grade Armature into Ithaca."

Misty narrowed her one visible sapphire blue eye, and fingered the pendant on her choker. The SysAdmin wasn't sure, but it seemed like she was mentally wrestling with something. "Do you have ... do you have any idea who I'm ... I can't believe I'm going to say this ..."

"Yes ...?"

"Do you have any idea who I'm working for?"

"Yes!" the SysAdmin replied brightly, and Misty felt hope tugging faintly at her heart. "Mister Aleksander von Panzerborn, ah, pardon me, Domoto Daisuke-sama. Yes, I know who you're working for. Also I do not give a shit. Also get out of my office."

-v-

Stepping out onto the concourse, Misty took a deep breath, settled her Dantian, recalibrated all seven Chakra and all that other Zen bullshit and was radiant once more. Literally radiant, as sunlight hit the crystals in her (perfectly applied) make-up. Heads turned. As she circled her sapphire pendant with her thumb, misty mentally weighed up the options. She should have known better than to try a charm offensive with an aerospace port official, but when all you have is a hammer ...

"So I can either call my new boss to get a bribe or I can steal my own giant robot." Misty put her hands on her golden ratio hips and laughed incredulously. "Steal my own giant robot. What is this job?"

Seven hundred meters further down the concourse, two more women were crying their sorrows into boxes of spicy noodles. The one of the left was a statuesque young woman with dark purple hair cascading over her breathtaking rack and pooling onto the bar. The other was straight-backed, green-haired and extremely pretty in that 'obviously does charity work; doesn't date' kind of way. "I realise that strictly speaking the Armatures belong to us, but that doesn't mean it's not stealing, Miss Lina."

"Fairy, baby-"

"Faryn."

"-, I realise you get off on this whole chivalrous warrior code of honour thing, but beggars can't be choosers." Lina said as she wrapped fried noodles around her inexpertly wielded chopsticks. "You can't be the last of the Pilgrim Knights without a suit a of armour."

Faryn frowned. "Yes, but the man said-"

"The man lied, baby." Lina said, pointing her chopsticks at her fellow mercenary.

"Yes, but the man said we could submit a request to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and they would consider allowing us our Armatures." Impossibly, Faryn straightened proudly. "After all, he considered a representative of the Pilgrim Knight Foundation to be a net gain to Argo-3!"

Lina gave the green-haired woman a flat, incredulous look. "Did you ... believe him?" Faryn blinked slowly in response. "Well, let's not go there. Anyway doing it legally got us into this mess in the first place, and we need to be at Domoto's place in about four hours. We'll pay lip service to the bureaucracy later."