Chapter 389: Inspection Check

Time passed slowly aboard the spaceship.

There weren’t long corridors to walk down, numerous rooms to enter, or different crew members to visit.

Cero spent most of his time with Nolan inside the navigation room. He learned a lot about the Jinx and their planet. While he wasn’t overly interested in those subjects, they were what Nolan was most inclined to talk about, keen on keeping his life and business private. Cero had doubts that Nolan wasn’t an upstanding citizen on Jin, but there was no way to clear or confirm those doubts for now. The fact that Nolan dodged the topic of Jin being at the center of these parts’ black market wasn’t definitive proof of anything, though it certainly renewed Cero’s interest each time.

Tina and Gina spent most of their time working out, enjoying the various video games they had brought with them, and tormenting Roka. Cero steered clear of the two, feeling that fraternizing with them would be a betrayal towards Roka, who had been a victim of their bullying for many years. The fact that he had already fraternized with someone else from her past strengthened that feeling.

Three days had passed since leaving Wor, and it would take four more days to reach Borg, a planet approximately halfway between the take-off point and the arrival point of Jin.

"I’m sorry it has to be like this," Roka whispered. Her left hand rested on Cero’s arm. "Having you hide in an empty closet is a bit..."

He stared at her hand for a moment, noting that she was growing more comfortable with casual physical contact.

"It’s alright."

There hadn’t been much progress on that front since the night they had slept side by side.

Cero had jumped into his own bed the next night so as not to pressure Roka, leaving her at liberty to choose between her own bed and joining his. Roka chose her own bed both times.

"Hurry it up, will ya?" Tina complained, standing a couple of steps away with her arms crossed. Her left index finger tapped her right bicep repeatedly.

"Or get a room," Gina sighed. "Get in the closet with him, Roka, if you can fit in there."

The last part made Tina laugh hysterically.

Roka ignored them, partly because the joke didn’t make sense as they were both taller and bigger than her. Instead, she nervously looked the closet over, checking for... She wasn’t too sure what.

Roka finally let out a sigh, and her hand withdrew from Cero’s arm to rest on the closet’s handle. It was better to leave the closet open so anyone could see at a glance that it was empty.

"Brings back memories, huh?" Her hand was trembling slightly.

"Go on," Cero said with a nod. "It’ll be fine."

Roka took a deep breath, returned the nod, turned, and walked away.

"What’s the big deal?" Nolan asked as Roka joined them. "You must have gone through checks and inspections when coming back to Wor."

"Yes, we did." Her answer was stern, almost rude, and deterred Nolan from inquiring any further.

The last inspection had gone quite horribly.

’This whole thing is getting too fishy, even for me.’ Nolan thought with a sigh. ’If this is a political and official trip, why not say that? We wouldn’t have to waste our time on random checks and inspections...’

Indeed, not even travel through space allowed one to escape bureaucracy.

Whether in the air or amongst the stars, officers are tasked with keeping track of every vehicle’s comings and goings. Numerous checkpoints are stationed across the civilized parts of the galaxy, and Nolan had been chosen for a random inspection.

"Yes, that’s right," Nolan explained, showcasing the various legal merchandise that was supposedly being exported from Wor to Borg. "The people there spend a lot of money to get these. I would know; my friend is from Borg, an online friend, and he says that..."

Nolan’s ramblings quickly annoyed the two officers. They spent some time looking the three Worka up and down, studying their (fake) documentation, before taking one last walk around the ship.

They didn’t spend more than a moment on the closet in which Cero was standing, invisible as the air they were breathing.

"Thank you, have a good day!" Nolan said cheerfully as the officers stepped off the ship’s ramp. "Ugh." His cheerful smile disappeared as soon as he turned around to face the inside of the ship. "Them finding Cero would get us in a ton of trouble, JUST for going through the trouble of hiding him. Couldn’t he get some papers as you did?"

"Nope," Cero answered, deactivating his Invisibility Skill.

Having waited for the last moment before the officers boarded the ship to activate it, the two Worka and the Jinx couldn’t spare more than a second to glance at him without attracting suspicion towards that closet.

His Invisibility was explained to them as newly-developed camouflage technology relating to the watch around his wrist. Such technology already existed, but the kind that could fool officers of the Intergalactic Union Of The Living did not... Until it was (allegedly) secretly developed on Wor.

"That went better than last time," Roka whispered, her head peeking into the closet, hands holding its frames close to her shoulders. "I felt like I was going to pass out when he looked your way."

"It wasn’t the last time," Cero corrected. "We went through two inspections after that one."

With his back against the wall and her head peeking inside, their faces were actually quite close.

"I know, I know..." Roka momentarily looked down, biting her lip. "We need to figure out something better in case we get stopped again."

"I have an idea about that." Cero paused, and Roka waited for him to explain. "Can I get out of here first?"

"Oh, yes! S-Sorry!"

The spaceship was back on its itinerary a couple of minutes later.

’I don’t understand why they’re going through all this trouble to hide him. The twins don’t seem to mind either.’ Nolan thought. ’What happened on their last inspections? Roka seems to be squeaky-clean, so it couldn’t have been that bad.’ He scratched his chin, perplexed. ’Right?’