True to her word Karla's cabin was the first one Claire came to in the cramped crew corridor on the second deck. It seemed rather frugal considering she was the captain. The room was about four metres square with a bare single bunk, a steel desk bolted to the wall and an office swivel chair. The floor was littered with an enormous variety of random items: bedclothes, crumpled magazines, discarded sports bras, empty packets of military rations, and even a scale model of an Alliance Mako tank.
Claire wrinkled her nose at the colossal mess and carefully picked her way over to the desk. Lying flat on the desktop was a partially disassembled Vindicator assault rifle, next to it was a framed photograph showing an adult Asari hefting a small purple skinned child, laughing. Judging by the kid's facial markings she could be a much younger Karla D'mel, which meant that the woman was likely her mother or father or whatever it was Asari had (Claire had never been able to wrap her head around that).
No sign of a wardrobe though. After several seconds of fruitless searching she noticed that the ceiling was covered in net bags stuffed with Karla's belongings. Taking off her pumps Claire stepped up onto the bed, wrestled a heavy trunk onto the desk and opened it.
She dismissed a couple of garments out of hand before settling on a white turtle neck and a pair of black cargo trousers. Crossing to the door she locked it with a swipe then pealed off her denim jacket and knee length summer dress. Unfortunately the trousers were too short in the leg and wide in the hip so she picked a worn pair of jeans instead. They fit perfectly.
Having dressed and replaced the trunk (and feeling much warmer in the cool recycled air) Claire meandered back to the cockpit, taking in the layout of the ship as she went.
The Deserts Tears had three decks; the cockpit on deck one, hanger & engineering on deck three and everything else on deck two. There was a shallow flight of stairs leading into the cockpit and Claire counted them absentmindedly. There were thirteen. The door hissed open and Karla looked up from her datapad, Shrub was no longer there so Claire took his place in the navigators nest.
"Found some stuff to your liking I see." She nodded at Claire's new attire.
"Yeah thanks. I was wondering though, where did you get these jeans? I mean they are human design and they're a different size from the rest of your stuff."
"They belonged to Jo, a human doctor I flew with about…" Karla blew a raspberry and looked at the roof as she tried to remember. "…Must be fourteen years ago now. She died though." She didn't seem too bothered by that fact.
"Oh, I'm sorry. You're sure you don't mind me borrowing her old clothes?"
Karla shook her head, the motion restricted by her head crests. "Nah in fact you can have them, they are too long and skinny for me anyway."
After thanking her and making a few minutes of polite small talk Claire broached the subject she was really interested in, namely the energetic Asari herself.
"So Karla if we are going to be stuck on the same ship for two months I should probably know some stuff about you. Maybe just the basics 'where are you from, what's your favourite colour, how old are you.' That sort of thing."
"Sanves, green, three hundred and forty eight." She rattled off with a grin. "You?"
"Earth, orange, twenty six." Claire shot back. "Okay maybe I should ask more specific questions. I just didn't want to seem like I was prying, you know."
Karla spread her hands and shrugged. "Don't worry it's not that easy to get under my skin." Then seeing Claire's raised eyebrow she added: "Unless you are Shrub Velik."
That seemed as good a place as any to start learning about crew dynamics as any.
"All you and him seem to do is bicker, if he bothers you so much why keep him around? It's your ship why not just kick him out. Is there a story there?"
Karla leaned as far back in the pilots chair would allow and blew another raspberry at the ceiling.
"Fine I guess you should hear the truth from me before you ask Shrub for his horseshit version."
"Up went the other eyebrow. "You know what horseshit means?"
"Jo taught me all sorts of expressions. Anyway four years ago I was paid to repossess a biometric scanner from a Salarian who couldn't pay off his loans, it turns out the Salarian (Shrub) didn't take kindly to that and snuck onto my ship to steal it back. Now me being the kind hearted soul that I am I didn't just shoot him in the head and dump his body out the airlock. No I gave him a job: full crew member privileges and a cut of the loot from any job he took part in. I gain a minion, he doesn't get his ass kicked. It's win win."
Claire was sure there was more to it than that but she didn't ask. One of the first rules of investigation was to get everyone's side of the story and try to spot inconsistencies. Asking too many questions would just make them clam up.
"Okay what about the Quarian. Kelron was it?"
"Yeah Kel has only been with us for a few months, he's rock solid though. I think you should ask him for his story yourself, I don't want to talk about him behind his back."
That surprised Claire. Karla did not seem like the kind of person to show any kind of reserve.
She stood and smoothed a crease in her jumper. "Fair enough, do you mind if I go ask him now?"
The Asari made a dismissive gesture with her left hand. "Knock yourself out."
Claire had intended to go down to the engine room and talk to Kelron but to do that you had to pass through the galley, where she found Shrub brooding over a steaming cup of what looked like green tea.
"Hi." She said tentatively. "Do you mind if I sit?"
The battered Salarian actually seemed to perk up at the sight of her.
"Please do. In fact I would like to say that I think we got off on the wrong foot earlier it's just… I'm sure the fact that Karla and I like to but heads can't have escaped your notice."
"Karla was happy to tell me her side of the story." Claire said with a nod.
The bitterness instantly leapt back into his large black eyes.
"Oh I'm sure she was."
"Care to set me straight? I got the feeling she omitted a few details."
"How did she say we met?"
'He'll be angry no matter what I tell him' she thought.
She cast her mind back, edited out the bit about debts, then replied.
"She said she was hired to take back a scanner from you."
Shrub scoffed. "I built that scanner with my own hands; it would have made me a fortune. Security of that grade on a place like Omega? Then some crooked loan shark decides it makes good collateral and sends a thug to break into my shop and steal from me. One night Karla breaks in and takes it.
You spent some time on Omega so I am sure you know that it has absolutely no law enforcement. If it doesn't concern Aria T'loak she doesn't care. Anyway I paid the shadow broker to find out where she was based. I assume she didn't mention her grudge against the broker?"
Claire shook her head and Shrub ploughed on.
"Good, do not ask her about it. That's how I got these bruises. Well I tried to sneak in and get my property back but needless to say the civilian techie lost out to the violent mercenary. She was going to let me go until I told her how I found her. She said the only way to keep my head was to work for her, so until I pay off that bastard back on Omega Karla has me by the horns."
Claire thought about it, her brow furrowed.
"But Omega might not even exist anymore why stick around?"
"Well what would you do in my position?" He seemed genuinely curious.
She didn't have to think about it, her answer was obvious to her. There was something fundamental in Claire's personality that rankled at the thought of what Karla had done, or had been said to have done.
"If I were you I'd bail."
Shrub took a sip of his tea, his head bobbing thoughtfully.
"Thanks Claire it's nice to meet someone with a level head and a clear outlook."
She rose stiffly. "You are welcome. Remember you have plenty of time to think about it, there's nowhere to go for the next two months."
Kelron had yet another opinion.
"Don't pay attention to either of their nonsense."
The broad shouldered, thick armed man hauled himself out of the engine block of the Alliance Trident fighter that nestled in the Deserts Tears cargo bay. He had been waist deep in the fuselage when Claire had stepped out of the lift and was now demonstrating a huge amount of muscle control by slowly lowering himself to the deck so as not to disturb the carefully calibrated nose cannons.
"Could you pass me that ratchet spanner?" He said, pointing to a nearby tool bench.
Not wanting to admit that she didn't know what that was Claire chose the tool that looked most like a spanner without actually being one and placed it in the Quarian's outstretched hand.
"What do you mean?" She asked.
Kelron, who set about tightening the bolts to secure the cannons, shook his head.
"The truth is even though they spend most of there time arguing Karla will never fire Shrub and Shrub will never quit. I don't know if humans have this expression but some Quarians believe we need enemies to keep us sharp. The Quarians need the Geth as much as Shrub and Karla need each other. They both have a lot of anger and no one else would put up with that kind of abuse but since the give and take is equal it balances out in a weird way."
Now finished with the repairs he turned to face Claire and perched on the leading edge of the fighter's wing.
"That's very insightful." She said honestly. "What about you?"
"What about me?"
"Well why are you here for a start."
He grunted and looked her up and down.
"Alright. It's not that complicated really. I was a migrant fleet marine for twelve years, back then my name was Kelron'Baj Vas Iron Bitch."
Claire snorted with suppressed laughter "Sorry! Sorry."
"It's fine. The name wasn't my choice, the Iron Bitch was a Krogan cruiser that the fleet bought from a smuggler in the DMZ. Anyway I was a soldier and fought the Geth during the reclamation of Rannoch. When the war ended in a truce I… had some difficulty coming to terms with it and the admiralty board decided they couldn't risk me jeopardising their newfound peace so they exiled me."
"You don't sound too upset about that."
Kelron chuckled darkly. "Like I said you need enemies to keep you sharp. Besides I've spent my whole life aboard ships, I can't imagine living on a planet just because my ancestors did. The Quarians aren't the same people that fled the homeworld."
Claire didn't know what to say to that so she changed the subject.
"And now you work for Karla."
"Uh huh. She was looking for somebody with knowledge of ship systems and since Shrub was the only other crew member at the time she needed someone who could actually fight worth a damn. She found both in me." His tone didn't sound boastful.
"You don't struggle with her like Shrub does?" Claire asked.
"No. She is my captain, I don't question my orders. Besides Karla is a force of nature, its better to be by her side than be trampled underfoot. With her those are the only possible outcomes."
Again Claire felt she had run up against a brick wall in terms of responses. Perhaps realising he had somewhat killed the conversation Kelron hopped off the wing, set down his tools and tilted his head in the Quarian version of a smile.
"Would you like a drink? The Reapers returning, Omega getting blown up, it's been a hell of a day."
Claire & Kel made their way up to the galley to find Shrub sitting with Karla, laughing airily. Kel shot her what might have been a loaded look then slid in next to his boss.
"So it seems our new crew member has been running background checks on us, cross-referenced and everything. Your inner cop is showing." Karla said slyly.
Claire chuckled sheepishly. "Yeah sorry."
Karla waved a hand and reinstated her trademark grin.
"Don't worry about it I'm actually glad you chose now to surface from Kel's tech cave, me and Shrub have a route." She nodded to Shrub who projected a scale chart of the Milky Way from his omni-tool.
"We are here." He said, pointing. "And the Krogan DMZ is here. Now I calculated that it will take us about seven weeks to traverse that distance so obviously we will have to drop out of FTL a lot but because of the lack of a mass relay network we will be flying as the Carsook flies."
Karla took over seamlessly. It was like a double act.
"What Shrub is saying is that while we are safe as long as we're on the move eventually we will have to stop to refuel which will put us at risk of Reaper attack. We will be passing through a lot of backwater systems so our plan is to wait for as long as we can, drop out of FTL, spent a few hours dumping the core & skimming any local gas giants then jump again before anyone's the wiser."
"So basically we are going to hopscotch our way to Tuchanka?"
All three of the aliens looked confused by Claire's question.
"What's hopscotch?" Asked Kelron earnestly.