A/N: Whoo, new chapter! Before we continue I'd like to thank Rii and BandGeek727, for helping me with the beta work while ckret2 is one vacation. Lovely people. Let's give them a big hand.

And now, chapter.

Oh, I know the game, my friend. I think you can BET on me knowing the game. If there's a game, I know it.
XR

10/08/02

5:02 PM

Commander Nebula was not a particularly tall man, but when you stood at an (ahem) towering 4'1”, the man LOOMED. EVERYONE loomed.

"All right, XR," he grunted, folding his arms over his chest. "What'd you get yourself into this time?"

He looked up, wringing his hands. "Who, me?" Ingratiating smile. Please don't hurt me. Oh, mother of Venus, he was in it up to his auditory sensors.

"Your team says you ran out on a maintenance appointment this afternoon!" Nebula barked.

"Well, you know-" he started to say, intending to continue with some rambling about the meaning of the words 'run out', but suddenly a colder, more manipulative part of his mind asserted itself. He'd gotten his team to back off earlier by acting pathetic.

Yeah, but even XR wasn't stupid enough to think that would work on Dad... right? Would it?

"I'm sorry, sir, it'll never happen again," he said, looking down. Not pathetic per se, maybe, just penitent and docile.

"Hmph, see that it doesn't," Nebula sniffed.

XR swallowed and scuffed one foot on the floor. He felt ill.

A firm hand landed on his shoulder. "I've given him a sound verbal berating, Commander."

"All right. Well." Nebula studied him, frowning, and said "XR, you'll be taking a temporary cut in pay. Understand?"

Pfft. Whatever. XR didn't even get a paycheck. Robot, remember?

"Okay," he said, subdued.

"Thank you, sir," Buzz said with a salute.

Nebula nodded, grunting. "Dismissed."

Buzz herded him off to where Mira and Booster were waiting by the ship with their arms folded over their chests, watching them with matching frowns.

"Hehe, hi," XR said weakly, with a little wave.

"Commander Nebula gave him a pay cut," Buzz explained.

"All right," Mira said. "Well, I'd better get going." She started heading for her personal ship. "Cat doesn't feed itself, you know."

Booster started at this, his eyes widening. "You have a cat?"

She blinked back over her shoulder. "Yeah?"

"Why can't I have a cat?" Booster lamented, looking down at the floor.

"Um..."

Buzz headed off in the other direction. "Yeah, well, I should get going too. See you guys tomorrow."

He turned and pointed emphatically at XR, who cringed away. "You, my friend, had better be there. On time."

XR nodded. Buzz turned and walked away.

Booster looked down at him. "I'd better be going too, buddy."

XR jumped. The departure of the most trusted member of his team suddenly didn't sit well with him. "Oh, uh, bud? Can I spend the night at your place?"

Booster frowned. "Oh... well..."

"You can help me make sure I get to work on time," he said. Booster would like that idea, Boy Scout that he was.

"Oh, okay. Well, I guess that's all right- oh." His eyebrows furrowed. "I have a date with Pamela."

"Oh," XR said. "Well, that's okay- I'll just hang out at your apartment. I'll probably just crash on the couch anyway." He clasped his hands behind his back. "Aaha. Yeah. Well."

"I guess that's alright," Booster said hesitantly.

"Please?" he said, plucking at the leg of his suit. Please. He had to say yes. Everything would be okay if Booster was there.

"Okay," he said finally. "C'mon, buddy."

6:47

Five-thirty came and went without incident. This fully cemented XR's faith in Booster as a protector, and he promptly fell asleep on the couch.

Not fifteen minutes later, Booster wrote out a note and put it on the coffee table. It said 'Out with Pam, back soon. :)'

And then he left.

6:48

He was standing between two large, shadowy figures, each holding one of his arms. He watched as one of them took out a can opener.

The can opener punctured his neck and began to cut around in a circle, then one of the figures reached inside him and pulled out

(whine of a laser pistol)

a beating human heart.

He recoiled in disgust and

(firm grip on his shoulder)

one of the figures took the heart and crushed it between its large, beefy hands.

"Wuah!"

He sat up, staring and ticking. Wow, what a gross dream.

"I need to stop eating silverware before- wait a minute, I didn't have any-" And then he saw the gun pointed in his face.

He screamed, automatically throwing his hands into the air.

"You're late for work, tiny," the thug growled.

XR froze.

The thug grabbed his arm and yanked him off the couch, painfully stretching out the cable. He yelped and pawed at the viselike grip on his arm.

Realizing he was being carried out into the hallway he started writhing and screaming anything that came to mind. "HELP! HEEEEEELP! HE'S KILLIN' ME! I'M BEIN' MURDERED! HE'S GONNA KIDNAP ME AND KILL ME AND SODO-"

One of the apartment doors flew open. "MUNCHAPPAR!" screamed a guy in a too-short bathrobe. "TELL YOUR STUPID FRIEND-"

And then he froze, seeing the thug.

"You won't say a word," he hissed, aiming the gun at the poor guy. He raised his open palms, wide-eyed.

It made a convenient distraction. "HI-YAH!" XR cried at his highest volume, throwing himself into the guy's ribs.

He let out a yell of surprise and XR wrenched his arm out of his grip (which hurt like the Dickens but now wasn't the time to complain) and started kicking him in the shins.

"Ha! Never mess with a space ranger, pal!" he cried. Then he looked up to see the gun aimed between his eyes. Oh yeah, there was that.

He yelped and threw himself to the ground, landing rather painfully and clumsily on his side. He instantly scrambled to his feet. There, the bathrobe guy was still standing there with the door open, staring. He rushed for the apartment and scrabbled his way inside, slamming the door behind him.

Instantly that guy was trying to yank it open. XR doggedly held it shut, biting his lower lip.

A laser shot punched through the door. It just grazed XR's side. He screamed. So did the guy in the bathrobe.

There were more shots, one of which punched a fair-sized hole in his torso, another of which blew his foot off. He screamed obligingly but didn't stop holding the door shut- he was used to getting shot, after all.

There was a pause in the laser fire and the thug yelled, "Get out of there!"

"Make me!" XR called. Another laser beam hit his helmet, shattering it. Hmm. The gun seemed to be running out of charge.

He waited. More shots made dents in the doors but didn't break through.

"Ha!" he called. There was a growl from the other side of the door.

Engine whirring, he pulled out one of his own laser pistols and poked the muzzle of it into one of the holes in the door.

"You wanna give up now?" he said.

The man punched the door. XR cringed.

"I can have another two guys here in ten minutes," he said, "and they'll bring a bomb."

"I'll k-kill you first," he stammered.

"I'd like to see you try."

XR squeezed his eyes shut and flicked the dial of the laser pistol to 'stun'. Then he fired.

There was a silence. He tentatively opened the apartment doors, swallowing.

The thug was lying slumped on the ground.

The guy behind him spat out a few choice words involving XR and his mother. Not that XR had a mother.

He turned and gave him a nervous grin. "Hi there. Uhh... sorry about that. Listen."

He pulled out a wad of Unibucks- probably his last wad of Unibucks but he had bigger problems. "You can have all this if you just don't say what happened, okay? Uh- say he was trying to rob you."

He ran away before the guy could accept or refuse. Well, as fast as he could run on one leg, anyway.

7:43

"How did this happen?" she asked, raising an eyebrow and leaning over his chest.

"I'm a space ranger," he said, frowning up at the ceiling. "I get shot."

"Then why aren't you seeing the LGMs about this?" she asked, picking up a welding torch.

"Mind your own business, Carrie," he snapped.

"Okay," she said, rolling her eyes.

She turned on the welder and leaned over his detached foot. He sighed and studied the cracks in the ceiling.

After a while Carrie leaned back, wiping her hands on her overalls and frowning. "What have you been doing? Your power levels are almost nil and it looks like you haven't eaten in a couple days."

Oh. Yeah. Food. He'd been sorta... it'd just been slipping his mind, sorta.

"Oh?" he said, biting his lip.

"Yes," she muttered, turning away to tidy up her equipment. He sat up, stretching.

Carrie paused in her work for a minute, frowning. "You know, if you are in some sort of trouble..." She pursed her lips.

"Yes?" he said, absent-mindedly. "Oh, and... I'm not..."

"Well, my roommate dabbles in some..." She hunched her shoulders, grimacing. "I don't know, exactly, what she does exactly but... it may be helpful to speak with her."

She sounded doubtful. XR raised an eyebrow.

"Oh really."

"Yes, she's been looking for work..." she said, digging a business card out of her pocket, frowning at it, and handing it to XR.

He studied it. Kila Jookiba, was all it said, and there was a phone number.

"Hmm," he said.

"Yes..." she said, handing him her bill.

He read it, then gave her a disbelieving look. She held out her hand.

He looked down, scuffling his feet on the floor.

"You can't afford it, can you?" she sighed.

He gave her an ingratiating grin.

She put her hands on her hips. His grin faltered and he said rather plaintively "Carrie... I'll get the money, I promise..."

"I'm not about to let you run up a tab," she said. "I know you'll never pay it."

He didn't tell her her sister had already let him run up quite a tab during the daytime hours over the past few months. "Is there anything I can do to persuade you?"

"No, I want the money," she said shortly.

He looked down, sighing. "I don't have it."

"Well, I can't exactly repossess your repair job," she said, folding her arms tightly over her chest. "But you are going to repay me. Within a week."

"Sure," he said with a grin.

"All right," she said. "Goodbye."

He nodded and left the shop. Outside he paused on the sidewalk and opened his wrist communicator. "Hey, Booster? Hi. Oh, no, you don't need to come home. I was just calling to say I'll be heading back to Star Command. Oh, no, nothing's wrong. Just wanted to get home. Okay."

He closed the communicator and set off at a sluggish pace down the sidewalk. Suddenly the fact of what had happened hit him and he ran for the gutter, putting his helmet back and hitting his knees, gagging up the last drops of oil in his body.

A/N: ACTION SCENE! YAY! Tell me how I did, I don't write action scenes often.

And that's it for this week! Next week we have- another chapter. No, no sneak previews for you.

Ta-ta!