Homestar Saga

Chapter 91: Agents of Pixa

Overseer Tem was a gross reminder of the place pixens held in society. He was old, fat, with a permanent sneer and beady, hateful eyes. Vanity had required him to dye his hair back to its original purple shade, but he hadn't bothered to do anything about the graying of his body hair, of which he had quite a lot. He wore a solid gold codpiece over his speedo, and he'd paid considerable money to make sure the body glitter covering his sagging flesh would stay in place as he moved. Earrings full of gemstones dangled from pointed ears that drooped from the extra weight. Worst of all, his blue skin was mottled and splotchy, a telltale sign of flox addiction.

Yvian assumed he had been handsome, once. The Pleasure Guilds never employed anyone who wasn't. Tem had followed orders and kissed ass and worked his way up the ranks until he was the highest ranked pixen in Trelg space. That still put him below anyone that wasn't a pixen, but it also gave him license to lord it over his own kind. As long as Overseer Tem obeyed the Guild, he could do whatever he wanted with the pixens under his employ. Yvian didn't have to imagine what a man like him would do with his modicum of power. She'd seen it before. More times than she liked to think about.

Overseer Tem had a modest office on the second level of Fico Station, near the Guild Headquarters. It was garishly furnished, with loud colors and proud depictions of female pixens in the nude. He sat behind a fancy metal desk with a large potted fern sitting next to it. Six heavily muscled pixens stood behind him.

Tem's bodyguards were handsome, perfectly manicured, and clearly not very bright. Roid enhanced muscles bulged under crossed arms. Each of them had a belt strapped over their short shorts. The belts held a blaster pistol on one side, and compliance club on the other. Six sets of eyebrows furrowed slightly as the bullyboys tried to look threatening. There was a time when the men would have terrified Yvian, but now? She was having trouble taking them seriously.

"There is no New Pixa," Tem glowered at Yvian's sister with bushy brows. As the only member of the crew with people skills, Lissa acted as Pixa's Official Representative. She stood before the Overseer in tight fitting black void armor, but she'd removed her helmet to reveal large violet eyes, perfectly pointed ears, and a cascade of silky green hair. Her skin was a lighter shade of blue than the Overseer's, and shone with health under the harsh florescent lighting of Tem's office.

Yvian stood a little behind her and to the right, wearing her helmet. To the left stood Captain Mims. The Captain was tall, lean, and predatory. Even standing still, he gave off an air of quiet menace, like a Vrrl waiting to pounce. He wore the same armor as Lissa and Yvian, and the silver visor of his helmet hid the terrifying visage of a human.

"There is," Lissa countered. "You've seen the scans. You've read the N-mails. There are pixens living there now."

"There are not." Tem was firm. "Scans and N-mails can be faked. There have been no livestreams, no face to face contact, no proof that what you say is true." Despite his ridiculous appearance, the Overseers voice was forceful and confident. "Our Homestar is gone. Has been gone for four hundred years. To claim otherwise is a deceit and a blasphemy."

Yvian grimaced. It had been six months since they'd opened Pixa to habitation. No, she corrected herself. New Pixa. The other pixens had objected to calling the planet by the name of their original homeworld. She'd expected a flood of immigrants, a great wave of her people taking their rightful place on the new world. Instead they'd received a trickle. Only the most desperate of pixens had risked making the move. Barely ten thousand. Enough to start a colony perhaps, but a far cry from the three hundred million living under the yoke of the Confederation.

"There will be," Lissa assured the man. "For now we have to maintain information security. You know what will happen if the Confed gets the nav data to find our planet."