Elemorts

Chapter XXIV - Doxonica II

Doxonica felt the corners of her mouth curving in amusement. She leisurely ran her hand through her hair and shook it out as she listened to the blaring voicemail. "You little wretch! You think you're clever? You think I wouldn't know you did it? I reckon Mom put this idea into your head. Or that sleazeball, Mavis!" Aunt Noiry was seething. "Don't you dare think for a second you will get away with this! You will pay dearly! I will show the galaxy what you did! I will burn down your company to ashes and cinders!"

Is that a confession for burning my train down? Doxonica mused as she sat up in her bed.

"Mom said you've gone to Karomoz. You think you're safe there? You think I will let you and that sleazeball partner up? I will come to Karomoz, and I will tear everything—"

Alright, I've heard enough, Doxonica thought with a chuckle and stopped the audio. She looked at the time on her holophone — seven in the morning. Oh my, someone was in a hurry to install the PFTs, Doxonica thought.

She brought up the notifications once again. A slew of missed calls — most of them from Aunt Noiry — texts, voice mails, and emails showed up.

She searched through the mess for correspondence from Ifer and read through the news he had. It was soon apparent that Aunt Noiry's train was completely bust — but most importantly, there was no proof that Doxonica was responsible.

After all, she was just repaying her aunt in kind. Not that Doxonica had ever had any doubts, but her security team had acquired footage of a gangster lurking around the Sonic Boom. He had turned out to be involved in previous acts of terrorism — the same ones Aunt Noiry's company had been notoriously involved with and had suffered penalties for.

So, Doxonica spent an entire day as she methodically took apart the PFTs piece by piece, making sure she would cause no permanent damage. She studied the inner workings with the most powerful microscopes and sonoprobes she had available. She had always been a quick learner — something Grandma Revana always reminded her of. Her efforts finally paid off when she found out that some of the transistors used in the PFTs could easily be caused to overheat if a few circuits were altered ever so slightly.

So, she set to work and carefully made the imperceptible changes. When she was done, she and Ifer reassembled the PFTs, with no signs that they had ever been dismantled.

The next day, they had sold the PFTs to her aunt — at half the price Doxonica had paid for them. I would love to invite you to the inauguration tomorrow, but I am sure you must have your troubles to attend to, Aunt Noiry had said with a concerned look. Little did she know she had just bought troubles of her own.

I wanted to be there at the inauguration, too, Aunt, Doxonica thought. She caught herself smiling in the mirror on the opposite wall, still in her yellow baby doll pajamas. That brought her back to the present. She had almost forgotten she was on Karomoz.

The walls of her room were yellow, as were the tulips in the window, which gave a view of the stark white hangar outside. She had flown her Amphipod Z all the way from Vibraudio to her privately owned hangar on the Karomozian spaceport. Doxonica was the proud inventor of the transport vessel described in lay terms as a 'spacecar.'

It could not only glide through the vacuum of space using its efficient thrusters but, after landing and tucking in its wings and other flying apparatus, it could discreetly move about on the land just like any other campervan. Doxonica had kept it as minimal as possible with only a bedroom with an en suite bathroom, a living room with a kitchenette, and the cockpit up front.

Doxonica threw her sheets back and jumped out of bed. She moved out the door into the considerably wider center of the Amphipod that served as a makeshift living room. In the middle was a circular depression, set with a round coffee table, which was surrounded on three sides by a yellow, leather sofa. Nearer to Doxonica was the kitchenette with its marble counters. As Doxonica gestured with her hand, a hologram materialized above the coffee table. She wondered if there would be any news as she flipped through the channels. She did not really believe so, as there had been no destruction or fireworks — just an anticlimactic disablement of poor Aunt Noiry's train.