Story: Bloodmoon Rises

## Bloodmoon Rises

The woman formerly known as xXBl00dM00nRisesXx was having a dilemma.

She was sitting in a dull beige Notary Public’s office on Normalcia, one of the only planets in the Galaxy that hasn’t gone full digital, staring at the “Desired Name” field on the piece of paper in front of her. She had to change her name after SAMuRAI stole her identity, since the name wasn’t technically hers anymore, and she could be charged with Identity Fraud if she kept it.

She knew she shouldn’t put down the name of her new account, xxxxBl00dM00nR1sesOverxxxx, considering she was trying to get rid of it. Besides, the StarStreamers were sure to get her name back any moment.

She went with “Bloodmoon” for her name.

Bloodmoon went to work for the last time on the day after the StarStreamers failed to get her name back. She needed to get a bit more money to afford the ticket for the ship to Galdios, and a few more day’s work should cover it.

Bloodmoon always prided herself on living within her own means, but even she had to pay for the electricity all those gaming computers need. She had been working a temp job doing Data Entry for the last 3 months, one of the longest jobs she’d kept in a long while.

It was easy work, especially since she just got an AI to do it for her. The licensing fees for the program were way too expensive for the company to choose it over a human worker, but Bloodmoon had just pirated it, so she didn't need to worry about that.

She was lounging at her desk in the basement when she heard someone come down the steps. This was something that had never happened in the three months she had worked there, she had to go to other people, they never came to her.

It was her boss, a stern, heavyset man named Mr. Smitt. He was looking around the basement, which was crowded with boxes and papers. “Ah, so this is where they put you,” he said.

“Uh greetings, sir,” said Bloodmoon, not entirely sure what to say in this situation. “What brings you down here today?”

“Well, I’m not going to drag this out.” he said “You’ve done good work, your one of our best employees, but unfortunately, we have to let you go.”

“What... why?” she said, very confused why she was being praised and fired at the same time.

“Unfortunately, you breached your contract with us by changing your name,” he said. “Its standard procedure to let go anyone who has breached their contract with us. I’m actually doing you a favor by coming down and telling you now, instead of having you be told when you come in tomorrow.”

“I had my identity stolen!” she said, losing all of her cool mystique as she started to raise her voice.

“Well that’s not my problem is it?” he said, looking at her with a small smirk on his face.

She made it his problem when she knocked him out, tied him up and stole his wallet. She doubted anyone would find him down there for a while.

Bloodmoon laid on a bench in the lobby of the ‘Maelstrom Xpress’ Sapient Creature Transport #34456, bored out of her skull as she thought about all the time she was going to have to kill.

She had bought the ticket to the ship that was heading towards Galdios the soonest, considering the whole robbery thing, but that ship just happened to be one of the slowest ones, with 10 connecting stops before she would be able to get to the planet she wanted. At least it was also the cheapest.

She had only been laying around for a few hours before she got a message on her tablet in her streaming app. It was a Direct Message from another StarStreamers viewer, by the name of smeagolthevile. Bloodmoon vaguely remembered her, as best as she can recall she was that one who was always posting horny things in the chat, but that was about it. She thought she might be in the hospital, like she broke her leg or something.

“Was using clothes to fill holes in your apartment a reference to the Wacky Times of BoBo character who can fix any hole with fabric from episode 329?” she had messaged. Bloodmoon had no idea what she was talking about, but she might be cute, so she thought she’d message back.

“No... that’s just.. how I am...”  Bloodmoon replied.

“Oh do you like, always talk like that?” Smeagol said. “Not just on stream?”

“Heh, talk like what?” said Bloodmoon, a little confused.

“Oh, nothing,” said Smeagol.

They talked for a little bit longer about anime and the last night’s stream, until Bloodmoon decided to try and shoot her shot, even though she still didn't know much about who this person was.

“Did you ever see show, Yaoi on Ice, about the two female hockey players?” Bloodmoon said, casually trying to drop a hint. The show was a very popular show among women who like women (with a few X-rated scenes), and she figured a quick conversation on the subject would tell her everything she needed to know about whether this would work out.

“Oh do you know a good place to cyber-torrent that?” replied Smeagol. “I accidentally put my real age in for my CrispyBall account so it won’t let me watch that one.”

‘Ah, well that's the end of that,’ Bloodmoon thought to herself

“How old are you again?” said Bloodmoon.

“15! :)” said Smeagol.

‘Yeah, nope.’

They talked a bit more and realized they did have a common taste in anime and games, though Smeagol shared none of Bloodmoon’s taste of classic gaming. Bloodmoon even learned Smeagol’s real name, Chloe, and where she’s been staying, a space station hospital named Valetudinarium Station MXXVII.

When Bloodmoon asked about all the horny stuff she says in chat, Chloe told Bloodmoon that she just thinks its really funny and that she likes to make people a little uncomfortable at times.

They chatted for a few hours in all, and by the time they had finished talking, the automated lights of the space ship had darkened to night mode. Bloodmoon got up and stretched, then went over to the route display to see how long the trip was going to take, before she headed back to her sleeping capsule.

Something caught her eye as she looked, and she looked to find that there would be a brief supply shop at a planet called Zadlo, which listed a ‘Valetudinarium Station MXXVII’ among its attractions, with only a short zip-ferry ride over. She had only just met Chloe, but it seemed too good an opportunity to go say hello. It must get lonely at the hospital, so maybe it would cheer her up.

After only a few days, the ship finally made its way to Zadlo. Bloodmoon had edited her ticket for the earlier stop and made sure she could get a ticket to Galdios from Zadlo, so she was all ready to go.

She had been talking to Chloe a lot more. Chloe always seemed up to talk, no matter the time of day or night. Bloodmoon assumed that she must not get a lot of visitors.

Bloodmoon bought some overpriced flowers on her way up to the hospital.

She was directed to Chloe’s room pretty easily, she was in a place called the ‘long term care unit.’ The nurses seemed very happy to see that she had a guest, so Bloodmoon assumed that maybe she got even less visitors than she had thought.

Bloodmoon walked into the room, flowers in hand, and saw Chloe for the first time, sitting up in a hospital bed, not moving from the neck down. She was surrounded by weird animal plushies, one of which was a crab that was almost the same size as her. She had blonde hair that was almost completely shaved off, revealing surgical scars. She had light brown skin and was wearing hospital scrubs.

“Hi nurse, what do y-” she said, turning her head to look at the person standing in the entrance. “What are you doing here?” She sounded a little peeved.

“I- I brought flowers,” Bloodmoon said, holding up the small bouquet in her hand.

“Uh, thank you? You can put then over there” Chloe said, motioning with her head to a large cup on a bedside table across the room. She looked confused and annoyed that Bloodmoon was there.

Bloodmoon walked over and put the flowers in the cup. She glanced at all the stuffed animals. “What are those stuffed animals? Are they those Gene things?” she said cautiously. She vaguely remembered hearing someone in the StarStreamers chat mention them.

“Wait, do you not know about GenePals?” Chloe said, her eyes starting to sparkle a little. “Like how much do you know about them?”

“Uhh, I know there's the little green one and the dog?”

“Oh my god, I have a lot of work to do!’ she said, all the tension in the room disappearing. “Pull up that chair, this is going to take a while.”

It took about an hour for her to explain the whole thing, but even then Bloodmoon would ask what Chloe thought where the funniest questions, and she would get into a laughing fit for minutes on end. BloodMoon didn’t entirely understand but she liked the look on Chloe’s face when she was laughing.

“Alright, no more no more,” she said, still giggling a little. “You’re too funny.”

“If you say so,” said Bloodmoon, a soft smile on her face.

“Oh god, I haven't had this much fun offline in a long time,” she said.

“How long?”

“About five years...” she said, looking away. “There was an accident with a fake GenePal and... I don't really want to talk about it.”

“Okay,” said Bloodmoon, standing up. “I want to know one thing though.”

“What?”

“How can I help.”

Bloodmoon sat on top of a rooftop overlooking JeanPal Incorporated’s headquarters on Zadlo that night. She watched carefully as people entered and exited the building, looking for her target. She could tell security was tight, and she wouldn’t have much of a window if she wanted to get i-

Then she saw the guard walk round the corner and she felt her chest deflate. There were no gaps in the system, the buildings security ran like a perfect machine.

She was here to help Chloe though, to make this company pay her the money they owe her for the settlement. She won the money in court but they have been slowing down the payments to the point that she cant survive for much longer.

The Head Accountant would be able to fix it, according to some digging she did, but he lived and worked inside this compound, so she needed to break in if she wanted to have a ‘talk’ with him. That was easier said than done though.

Then she heard a noise from behind her.

She dodged the first electric baton easily, but almost was hit by the second as she rolled to the side, and she barely had a moment to get up before they were on her.

She sprang to her feet and drew her sword, already blocking an attack before it was out of its sheath. She was fighting for her life up here. It took five more hits before she could get a good hit in, slicing open the synthetic body of one of the guards.

The other guard was on her in a second, using the moment that she let her guard down to hit her hard in the stomach with his baton. The force and electric shock hurt way worse than the feedback system on her VR gear, but somehow she found the will left to keep standing.

She was hit back from the blow, pushed up against the back of the rooftop. That's when she saw three more guards hover up onto the roof. She looked down at the compound below her, then back at the guards in front of her. She knew what she had to do.

“See you... On the bottom floor,” she said, jumping up backwards off the ledge.

She fought in that compound for 5 hours on that day.

She almost made it into the building.

It took a full week of beatings for Bloodmoon to learn her lesson.

It took another week after that for her to get the strength to see Chloe again.

When she walked into her hospital room, Chloe knew that Bloodmoon had failed. It was written all over the cracks and punctures that covered Bloodmoon’s body, and in the sad, apologetic look on her face. She was pushing in a hoverchair with her, though she looked like she should be sitting in it. One of her arms looked so shattered and useless that she was using the purple smoke in her body in place of a hand to push the hoverchair.

“Bloodmoon... Are you ok?”

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll be fine,” said Bloodmoon. “I was hoping I could do you a different favor though.”

“What do you mean?” said Chloe, a little confused.

“I was hoping we could go on a secret trip down to Zadlo.” Bloodmoon said. “I hear there’s a GenePal toy store down there.”

They went to the GenePal Store that day, and the park.

They stayed in the park for a while.

It was a very good day.