[hr]Episode Two: Mass Rave[hr]

"I hate Venus." Poole grumbled, leaning into the wall of the corridor to let pass a pair of dark-uniformed men carrying a metal trunk. The entirety of the planet seemed to be narrow, dirty hallways connecting packed rooms with loud vendors, and tunnels leading even further underground. The air hung with the sweet rot of decaying fruit, and flies seemed to be the only thing more numerous than men. Elevators advertising cold drinks, hot dances, or goods of all kinds lined the halls, and where there was vertical space not used for an elevator shaft, walls were covered in layers of graffiti and advertisements. All around them, hundreds of conversations droned on into a single, homogenous noise.

"You know a better place to find ginseng?" Yeva piped up sarcastically, straightening a large map as she spoke. They were on Venus, though more specifically, Area 1D577 -- The seventy-seventh room on the fifth section of fourth layer of the planet's uppermost floor, closest to the planet's surface. Though Venus had been colonized by humanity centuries ago, many of the floors beyond Layer J had been deemed too hot to be made usable, leading to their use as squats. Though this meant their location was safe and clean by Venusian standards, it was still repugnant to the crew's. Air ducts lined the ceiling like rivets, clogged with velvety lines of furry debris, and every corner and edge on the planet seemed to be stained by an unidentifiable black grime.

The crewmates trudged onward, entering [i]another[/i] room of vending stalls. Colorful tarps, tapestries, and decorative awnings lined the ceiling, blocking the air shafts and giving the cramped room a stale humidity. Each of the fabrics seemed to advertise something different, crowding capitalized words in English and Japanese too densely to read without holding up the flow of foot traffic.

"Fresh Lunarian [i]eel fat[/i]!" A vendor shouted at Poole. "Good for muscles, good for protein! Fills the stomach!" Before he could get a chance to rebuke the man's offer, a saleswoman standing at the vendor across his stepped forward, placing a sizable pomegranate in Poole's hands. "Terran fruit! Only one hundred yen!"

"That's alright ma'am, we're not looki-"

"[i]Baozi[/i]! Fresh baozi! Fifty yen!" Barked a third vendor. Understanding that saying [i]anything[/i] would only attract more merchants, he handed the fruit vendor her pomegranate and waded through the crowd, bringing a pair of binoculars to his eyes. He scanned the horizon, looking for the Venusian they had come to see -- Ginseng Joji.

Yeva sniffed as she kept looking between her map and the signs, a childlike gleam of glee in her eyes. This marketplace was a place she could get lost in the crowd, backpack on her back, a couple hundred yen in hand, and spend a whole day wandering about purchasing ingredients. It wasn’t that she needed anything or had the space for it but, well, sometimes want tended to rule her spending habits.

A soft breath escaped her lips as she raised her map as if it were a shield to block out her temptations. Offers and deals caught Yeva's attention every so often as she recalled all the time she could have been studying this map-- like last night. While she was baking cookies, Yeva could have studied the map, instead of staring blankly at the oven while the treats cooked. “It’s not that hard,” she mumbled aloud. Honestly, the map was a jumble of arrows, numbers, symbols, colors, all making her head hurt, but it wasn’t that hard to figure out. Yeah?

Maybe?

“This way,” Yeva piped up and pointed at the narrow corridor between a roast duck-adorned barbecue stall and an outdated-seeming robotics repair store. The trio continued onward, with Poole and Gray closely tailing Yeva.

As the… inventor? Sure. The inventor of this idea-- this Ginseng adventure-- Yeva felt responsible for herding the seven-foot kittens that Poole and Gray represented. See, Yeva needed this Ginseng for it’s millennial old rumors of healing and curative properties. Ancient rumors, not proven by any sort of scientific evaluation, that had survived the exodus from Earth had to have some sort of truth to them, right? Plus, it wouldn’t be bad to find a root that was capable of being re-potted and rejuvenated though-- it was apparently a protocol to dry the life out of them so no one else could cash in on the market. What a selfish shame, really. 

Miracle medicine was probably exactly what Yeva needed to stave off this week's coming cold. A sudden chill crept up on her-- the viruses reminding her they were watching… Waiting.

Yeva felt a sneeze coming on and made [i]that face[/i]

"There." Poole spoke up, peering through his binoculars and pointing just beyond an elevator shaft to a restaurant.  Yeva loudly sneezed behind him, granting her an obligatory "God bless you." Barely noticable in the chaos of the crowds, there was a small green neon sign flickering in the distance, with only two word to entice buyers; [color=limegreen][b]HERBS HERE[/b][/color]. He could smell Joji's stench from where he stood.

[hr]

"Yessir, that's right. Every last bit, first flush to the fourth. Said he was looking to make enough brews to invite the whole planet to tea." Ginseng Joji grumbled, snorting thick fumes of white smoke from his nostrils. He was a squat man of at least eighty, and a classic Venusian in every sense, or in other words, [i]really sketchy.[/i] One hand held an old fashioned tobacco pipe, while the other was a stump capped with a trowel. He took another inhale from his pipe, and began to look into a cabinet, unintentionally -- and without realizing at any point -- puffing clouds of nicotine into the cabinet's drawers, rifling through them, and then tightly shutting them.

"I hope he means to, because that's an easy to over-steep blend he has his hands on. And quite a bit. I don't think I've ever seen a man buy so much ginseng, 'cept for myself." Joji said through an impassably thick mustache. He seemed to have aged a decade every visit, and now sported an eyebrow-mustache combo that made him resemble an abandoned lawn gnome. "He looked important enough, I s'pose. Anyway, enough rambling, let me see if I've any left upstairs." Joji brought the small bamboo-chambered pipe to his lips, sucking gingerly and pulling a stepstool from behind his counter with a twist of his trowel-hand.

"Important how?" Yeva inquired, shaking a small tin of jasmine as she gave it a brief look-over.

"He was wearing a red jumpsuit with a logo on the pocket. Only stood out on account of the ISSP pilots wearing blue jumpsuits, and I believe the Lunarian military has [i]grey[/i], but I don't think anyone official has red. I suppose he was makin' a whole mess of tea, to buy every last barrel. Maybe he works with the city, Venusian garbagemen wear red If'n I remember right. Then again, this was less of a maroon and more of a fire red. I never wore a lot of red, myself. You a warm colors man, Mister Poole?" Joji asked, looking one of the two towering men Yeva was accompanied by.

"I'm a [i]hurried man[/i], Mister Joji." grunted Poole. "The sooner we get off this planet, the sooner I can sit down."

"Ah, yes, perhaps up here." Joji craned his neck upwards, reaching up to a small wooden drawer in the wall, opening it, and sighing defeatedly.

"Looks like I was wrong, not even a pinch in storage. If you'd like, there's another herbal store on Layer Q, though you'd need a riot shield to get there."

Yeva's ears perked, and she leaned closer on the counter, eyeing the old man. "Why's that?"

"There's some hippie-dippie music festival on Layer Q the young people are all excited about. Not a single tea festivals as far as I know." Joji grumbled. "If you ask me, the young people should get more excited about tea than [i]techno[/i]. The same festival happens every year, but nobody gives a damn about herbs."

[hr][hider=Summary]Yeva brings a bodybuilder and a man in a robotic exoskeleton to the most crowded planet in the solar system. Evidently, there isn't any ginseng on the most crowded planet in the solar system. There might be some ginseng several layers into sketchiest parts of Venus, but people host raves and have pet hyenas and shit there.[/hider][hr]