Chapter 6: Tactical Jellybeans / Perception - Quentin Angus

Kolyat didn't relax until he slid into the driver's seat of T'Vashne's shuttle, and even then the thick knot of tension between his shoulder blades only eased a little. He waited while Indigo piled her bags and trombone case into the back seat, distracting himself from any burgeoning awkwardness by turning on the navigational holodisplay and performing some needless checks. Still, the quiet shuffle of the soles of her boots on the metal flooring, the feeling of her presence, even unobtrusive, set him on edge for reasons he couldn't quite understand. He turned to glance at her over his shoulder, only for his furtive gaze to instead land on her belongings in the back seat as she straightened up and rounded the shuttle to sit beside him.

The walk from her dorm had been quiet and rushed, with both of them lost in thought. Anxiety permeated the streets, Tayseri's emergency lights a hazy wash of dim orange along furrowed brows, tightened mandibles, and searching eyes. When Kolyat and Indigo arrived at the transit hub, she'd faltered before the emergency security scanners and glanced back the way they'd come, back at her home. Kolyat waited, his bag of art supplies bumping against his knee, but she didn't turn back to face him until he reached out to brush his gloved fingers against the dark sleeve of her jacket. (A quiet gasp hitching in her throat, her lower lip released from the pinch of small white teeth - she turns, blinking at him, the distant look in her green eyes replaced with confusion. "What?"

"Are you all right?")

A silly question on his part given the circumstances, and one he never liked answering himself, but he'd asked anyway, his uneasiness inspiring a mild hypocrisy. She brushed off his concern with the answer he'd expected—I'm fine, don't worry—and they'd continued on in tense silence, passing flatbed trucks and X3Ms until they reached T'Vashne's C-Sec shuttle.

The seat beside him squeaked as Indigo sat down and adjusted it for her shorter stature. Nerves climbed the inside of Kolyat's stomach, like he'd swallowed a mouthful of live seaworms, and he fought them down. The click of metal on metal as she fastened her seatbelt nearly made him wince, and he wished he'd never offered to give her a lift.

It was that same feeling from her dorm—that awkward uncertainty that stretched between the two of them like a widening sea, only now he couldn't escape it, or her. He'd put them both in this situation, and no NavPoints could help him navigate whatever conversations or feelings were bound to ensue.

Steeling himself against his own confusion, Kolyat fastened his own seatbelt, shadows sliding over him and Indigo as the canopy doors lowered and sealed with a mechanical click. Driving would help—a sense of purpose bolstered by the ascending hum of the eezo core as he eased the shuttle up and into the airway. He could focus on something other than Indigo or his jumbled thoughts; he had something to do.

"It's good to be moving," said Indigo, her words an offering to the silence. She crossed one leg over the other and folded her hands on her lap.

"Yeah," Kolyat mumbled, but even in the quiet, cushioned near-darkness of the car he still felt agitated. With a glance to his right at her, he untinted the windows. Having them dark triggered the familiar tightness in his chest that came with enclosed spaces—not that he'd be advertising that to anyone. His fears were his own.

"These seats are really comfy," Indigo commented. Her tone was light, but anxiety played in the way her hands fidgeted with the hem of her shirt. "Padded leather and everything. You guys are holding out on us civilians."

"Wearing the uniform has its perks," said Kolyat, humouring her.

"I'll say. So many pockets—think of all the jellybeans you could store."

Unsure of what she was talking about—not that that was a new experience—Kolyat wrinkled his nose at the image of beans in gelatin. Humans did weird things with food. "That sounds disgusting and impractical."

"I wouldn't say that. You could chuck 'em at people if you're ever in a pinch. Tactical jellybeans. I mean, you said you don't have a gun."

(- the weight of it surprises him, solid in his thin-gloved palm. He rests a finger on the trigger for a moment, hard angles unrelenting - "This will do," he says, his voice toneless, each word a stone dropped into empty water -)

Kolyat bit the inside of his cheek, his tongue dry and sour. The memory flashes only lasted a moment, a ghostly image of Mouse's face lit by orange beams, but if he didn't get a grip on himself he'd crash the shuttle. His fingers had curled around a pistol that wasn't there, and he relaxed his hands and breathed out slowly, focussing on the glow of the dashboard's interface. Gods and seas, he just wanted to get home, preferably in one piece, and go to sleep.

A flicker of concern passed over Indigo's face as she watched him, but she glanced away and stretched out her legs, evidently having noticed his slip but deciding not to comment on it. "So, do you think this qualifies as misuse of C-Sec property?" She gestured between them, a hand waving in the small space between their seats.

She was joking, but Kolyat knew he'd get an earful from Bailey and T'Vashne once they got wind of this. "Only semantically. It's not like I'm taking you for a joyride."

"Well, semantics aside, thank you for doing this. I really appreciate it."

"It's fine," Kolyat said, his voice raspier than usual. He cleared his throat. "You don't need to thank me." He caught the odd look she gave him, but she didn't press the issue.

Instead, she peered at the C-Sec ID holo in the corner of the windshield, where a holographic T'Vashne surveyed the car with shrewd grey eyes. "Murena T'Vashne," she read. "Is that your boss?"

"My superior." She'd appointed herself his parole officer during his community service, but now she was... what? His babysitter? Handler? She and Bailey kept him busy with clerical work and odd tech jobs, a spare body to fill out a uniform. And now he sat in her shuttle, returning empty-handed after failing his assignment as a chauffeur for contraband. At least he could get Indigo to safety, not that he expected that decision to be welcomed back at the precinct.

What the hell are you doing, Krios? he asked himself.

He still didn't know.

"Oh, is she the lieutenant who you were talking to at the coffee stand?" Indigo pronounced it differently to Bailey, with a ff sound in the middle, a quirk of her soft accent.

"Yes." He side-eyed her and smirked. "Nosy, aren't you?" Teasing... he could handle teasing. He could keep her at arm's length that way.

"I prefer the term 'energetically curious.' Besides, I can't help having ears. Will you get into trouble?"

"For what?"

"For using her C-Sec shuttle as a taxi service?"

"I'm not a taxi service. It's not like I'm asking you to pay me." Indigo opened her mouth, and Kolyat held up a finger to cut her off. "And I'm not going to. You've already thanked me. I've got the message."

She looked like she was about to protest, but then she raised an eyebrow. "Okay, how about 'person smuggler,' then?"

He chuffed. "You seem keen to push the crime angle."

"There's something appealing about tempting an upstanding young officer into skirting Citadel Security Transport procedure. We just waltzed right through the security scanners, no ID scan needed."

"You didn't tempt me into anything," Kolyat argued, watching the traffic ahead. "This was my idea."

"True. Well, still, since you're quaking in your law-abiding boots at the prospect, I reckon the role of evil mastermind in this venture falls to me." A teasing smile tugged at one corner of her mouth. "So that makes you the Igor."

"The what?"

"Never mind," Indigo told him, laughing. "It's not the most flattering analogy, anyway."

"Why am I not surprised?" He snorted. "And I'm not quaking in my boots."

"Well, you seem nervous. And there's no way this is strictly allowed."

Kolyat sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, exhaustion slumping his shoulders. "Just... just don't worry about me."

She still looked sceptical, but pressed her lips together. "Okay."

They fell into a silence, save for the irritating sound of Indigo picking her nail polish. Why did she bother painting them if she was just going to chip it off?

Tayseri sprawled beneath them, a dark and broken blur, the emergency lights and brakelights of shuttles bathing the streets in a dim, eerie glow. Beside him, Indigo watched the cityscape pass, the bright red of her curly hair extinguished by the gloom. She'd turned away from him, but Kolyat could see the faint reflection of her troubled expression in the window.

Driving made Kolyat feel a little better, but anxiety still encroached upon his thoughts when he thought of the reason he was here in the first place: why hadn't Powell shown up? Who was he smuggling for, and what had made him turn to C-Sec? Was he involved in the blasts, somehow? It seemed too convenient to be a coincidence, but anything was possible. And why had T'Vashne and Bailey deemed it fit for Kolyat to chauffeur the merchandise between wards, alone?

("— just a pickup, Krios. You can handle it. Just don't dent my car, and you'll be fine."

He opens his mouth to protest, but Bailey cuts in. "I believe the Detective gave you an order. I suggest you follow it.")

That was all he'd been doing for months now, following orders; penance for his attempt at murder. Bailey didn't protest him staying on after his community service, but how long would that last? How long until he fucked it all up? About thirty galactic standard minutes, or as long as it took to get back to Zakera. He glanced at Indigo, who was still lost in thought. It wasn't like it was her fault he'd put them in this situation.

The traffic was piling up; on the dash, the shuttle's analytics showed multiple no-fly zones sectioned off by holographic barriers, forcing them into a winding route around the locked-down districts. The nav readout estimated another half hour to Zakera, and Kolyat drummed his fingers on the dash, restless.

"So, what's Kahje like?" Indigo asked as he came to a stop at an intersection.

Kolyat cast his mind around for a fitting description, something interesting, only to be met with endless memories of crashing waves, the salt-sting of sea spray, and oppressive rain. "Wet."

Indigo raised her eyebrows. "'Wet,'" she repeated, nodding. "You're a regular wordsmith, you are. You should write travel brochures."

"It's accurate enough." He chuffed. "Just look it up on the extranet."

"Why would I do that when I can ask a friendly local drell?"

("—not the most person-oriented guy, you know," Lang advises him, unperturbed by his scowl. "You could stand to be a little more—") Kolyat arched a brow. "'Friendly?'"

"Well, 'local drell', then."

"A forty-five-minute drive isn't really local."

"Fine. 'Drell', then," Indigo conceded, laughing. "One out of three isn't bad."

"If you say so."

"Anyway, I was thinking, I might do what you said and go to the Shrine of the Enkindlers for research. You could come, if you want."

He couldn't think of anything worse than spending more time around overzealous hanar. "I'd rather avoid the proselytism. Something tells me you would, too."

"Please, I was raised Catholic," she said, waving a hand. "I know how to navigate enthusiastic religiosity."

He didn't know much about human religion. "You don't seem very devout."

"Nah. I'm a rebel. What about you?"

"What about me?"

"In the lift, when you fixed my translator. You were praying. The shoe goddess who isn't a sneeze, remember?"

Kolyat narrowed his eyes. "Where are you going with this?"

"Nowhere. I'm just curious."

"Energetically curious," he corrected her, and she laughed. She sounded innocent enough, but knowing her, she'd have another twenty questions ready to go. "It was just to see if it translated. It didn't mean anything." Hopefully that was enough to shut this particular line of conversation down, but it turned out he didn't need to.

Ahead, the lights changed, and a pink flash in the corner of Kolyat's eye was his only warning before a car overtook him in a horrendously illegal move. "Shit!" He banked a hard left to avoid a collision and slammed the brakes so hard he was surprised his foot didn't punch a hole through the shuttle, only to floor the accelerator a second later to avoid a pile-up behind them.

Thrown forward in her seat by the momentum and immediately snapped back upright in her seat by her seatbelt, Indigo let out a short, sharp scream that startled him more than the blaring horn behind him. "Jesus fucking Christ!" she yelled.

"Asshole," Kolyat muttered, glaring at the car as it sped away.

"Bloody fucking hell." Indigo blew out a shaky breath and wiped her palms on her trousers. "God, that scared the shit out of me." She rubbed her forehead, and Kolyat noticed she was trembling.

"Are you okay?" he asked, puzzled by her overreaction.

"What? Yeah, peachy." She looked paler than normal and started picking at her nails again.

Kolyat suffered the irritation for a few minutes before finally asking, "Can you stop that?" The click-click-click felt like a prickling again his frill.

Indigo shot him a withering look, jaw sharp with tension, but stopped and folded her arms. She was shivering, and she pressed a hand to her sternum, where the seatbelt crossed her torso between her breasts.

Kolyat eyed her. "What's wrong?"

"Apart from everything? Nothing." She offered a wry, fleeting smile that didn't convince him.

"Are you going to be sick or something?" Kolyat asked. Humans went pale when they felt sick, right? Gods knew that would be an even worse way to end today's shift.

"No."

"You're shaking."

"Nothing gets by you, does it?" she said, and he rolled his eyes.

"Gods, do you have to be so obnoxious all the time? I'm just trying to—"

"Sorry, sorry," she interrupted, raising a hand in placation. "Sorry." She took a deep breath through her nose and out through her mouth, a universal calming gesture. "It was the car. It scared me." She scratched the Y-shaped scar above her eyebrow and wiped her palms on her trousers again, eyes fixed on the dashboard. "I was in a collision a few years ago, so it kind of puts me on edge."

Oh. That made sense. "You should have told me," he muttered, then cringed at the withering look she gave him. "Sorry. I'll try to drive more gently, if that helps."

"Thank you."

"What happened?"

Indigo didn't look surprised at the question, but a tiny sigh preceded her answer. "It was pretty standard." She held up a fist. "One car." She held up her other fist. "Another car." She clapped them together with a bony sound of knuckles hitting knuckles. "Boom."

"Head-on?"

"No, not head-on, thank God. I would have died if it had been. It was my fault—I was speeding. Late for a test in my last year of school. It hit me in the side—the passenger side, otherwise I would probably have died then, as well." She let out a chuff-like laugh, bitter and rueful. "Most of the initial damage was from the seatbelt, actually. Had huge bruises where my body jolted against it. Felt like I'd been cut in half. I could barely breathe or move without pain for days."

Kolyat frowned, trying to ease the cold feeling of unease that suffused his chest. He glanced at her and caught her profile, her face locked in thought. "Initial damage?"

"Hm? Oh, yeah, we crashed into the ground after the collision. I mean, I say, 'we'… the other car was one of those V.I.-piloted cargo shuttles, so there was no-one in it, thank Christ. We weren't that high up—I'd pretty much just taken off and I was going up into a higher lane, and I just didn't see the shuttle coming from the side. Hitting the ground did more damage, because the seatbelt didn't snap me into place immediately, so I had a face-first acquaintanceship with the dashboard, which broke my nose. And then the seatbelt kicked in and I ricocheted back into the seat like a ping-pong ball and passed out. So, that was fun. Got this nice little scar on my forehead and a lifetime of insecurity behind the nav-wheel as a souvenir." She said it with her usual flippancy, as if the whole thing was a funny story, but the tension at the sharp line of her jaw and the way her fingers twisted in her lap betrayed her discomfort.

"Gods."

"Yeah," she agreed, laughing a little, her expression wry. "I mean, I was speeding when I shouldn't have been. I was late for a test. And I ended up dropping out of school anyway. Also... well, you know how I told you about my Grandpa?"

("My grandfather died," she says, picking her nails, blue-black paint flaking away. Her eyes are far away, lost in the memory of grief, and the familiarity of it strikes him -) "I remember."

"I had to go to hospital—the crash cracked some ribs and fractured my arm—and he was staying there because he'd fallen and broken his hip. The tumor messed with his co-ordination. Anyway, so I snuck into his ward for a visit, all beaten up and feeling like utter horseshit… almost like I'd just lost a fight with a skycar." She snorted. "I don't know what I was expecting when I went to see him. I just wanted to be reassured and told that everything would be okay, like I was a little kid again, you know?"

He sort of knew. He'd felt the same as a child, but after his mother died and his father left, he'd locked himself away, avoided his aunt and uncle.

"And he was always there for me. I loved him so much. But... well, the tumour, it ate away at him; eroded his brain. He fought for a year, but… well, it wasn't a good fight. He changed. Most of the time he was just Grandpa, but over time he kind of lost himself. He had no filter at all, he forgot stuff, he got really angry over the weirdest things. Sometimes he was... he could be a real arsehole," she admitted, following the statement with a dry, humourless laugh. "God, I know I shouldn't say that, but it was true. He could be so venomous. I don't know whether it was the nature of the tumour, or his personality, but I'm not sure if he ever really accepted what was happening to him, if he ever made peace with it. He'd get so angry and spiteful, and it was just horrible knowing he felt that way, and under all that anger there was a lot of fear, you know? He was scared, and he hated the world—hated God—for taking his mind away. I don't know if he ever..." She pressed her lips together and tightened her jaw, a universal plea to oneself to keep tears at bay.

A chill settled over Kolyat at her words, ice in his gut. Not for the first time, he wondered if Thane had made peace with his own fate, and abruptly cut that thought off. They'd barely talked about it since those hours in the interrogation room after his hit attempt. He couldn't. He wouldn't. It was selfish, but who had been more selfish than Thane Krios?

Still, Indigo's situation was different. There was love there, even through the pain and grief, he saw it in her eyes and heard it in her voice. Between Kolyat and Thane, there was only death, silence, and atrophy. An empty ocean, the lonely crash of waves.

Indigo sniffed and sighed, breaking him from his thoughts, still lost in hers. "Anyway, at the hospital, he and I were talking about how I'd missed my test, and he was fine, he was saying it'd be okay because I could just take the test again and hopefully I'd still get into university, and then he suddenly pointed at my bandaged nose and started laughing at me."

"That's awful." Gods knew he had more than his fair share of trauma, but he'd never been laughed at for it.

"Yeah. Cancer's a bitch." Her voice cracked, and when he glanced over she was wiping her eyes, thin lines of dark blue ink smudged with tears. "Aw, fuck, my eyeliner. Sorry, all this shit has made me anxious. I don't talk about this very much... like, at all... and it's still... I'm still very sad about losing him."

("—the only good thing I ever added to it." The tears streak hot down his shameful face. His father puts a hand on his shoulder, the weight an anchor in this sea of confusion-) "It's okay," Kolyat told her. He reached over and put a hand on her arm, like his father had done.

Indigo gave a tremulous, grateful smile and blinked the tears away. "Sorry," she said again. "I don't normally blather on about this stuff. We've had a weird day, haven't we?" She let out a breath, which sounded steady enough to tell him she'd regained her composure.

"It's okay," Kolyat repeated. A short silence fell. He expected another of her jokes, or some sarcastic self-deprecating comment, but there was nothing. His hand was still on her arm, and he retreated, clearing his throat.

It was an ample time for a better man to share his own sorrows, but the words stuck in his throat. What could he even say, anyway?

My mother was tortured and murdered when I was nine. I was hiding in the next room; I heard it all.

I left Kahje because I thought my estranged father was dead. I found out he's an assassin all my life, that everyone has been lying to me for my whole life.

That politician, Joram Talid? I tried to kill him. I had a gun to his head, my finger on the trigger.

How could he tell her any of that? He'd taken her truths for granted, something he himself would hate, but what she knew of him was little more than a lie. He wasn't young Officer Krios, who smiled at her jokes and fixed her translator, he was a screw-up, a failed hitman, the son of a murderer. A selfish fucking asshole, who answered her vulnerabilities with silence. She didn't know him, couldn't; she wouldn't want to if she did. So he just kept driving, watching her out of the corner of his eye as she frowned at the smears of makeup on her fingertips.

Gods, he was such a piece of shit. Though it was she who'd been open with him, it was he who felt torn open; flayed to the bone.

You don't owe her anything, Krios, he reminded himself. Silence yourself before things get out of hand.

They reached Tayseri's upper wards, the Presidium Ring casting giant curved shadows across the ward arms. Tayseri's upmarket commercial zone and CBD were located here, along with attractions like the Museum of Galactic History and the Gaeron Botanical Gardens. It appeared the streets had been spared from the attack, still neon-lit and bustling with activity.

His thoughts turned to the blasts again. One after the other, in multiple sectors of the ward… it felt orchestrated, but to what end? Where had the explosives come from? Smuggled through Customs, perhaps, or created somewhere in a hidden base? He'd recognised the sound of gunfire before the power went out… maybe Tayseri C-Sec would be able to trace where the weapons came from, if they found them. Gods, it was frustrating—he'd been pushed into a situation he had not been prepared for, failed his task, and now...

"Let there be lights," Indigo said, distracting him again as she gazed out at the brighter streets. Something out the window caught her attention and she pointed. "Oh, hey, there's Reyanommond, the new auditorium. I'm performing there soon, unless they call off the concert."

Kolyat looked out her window at a glass-walled building domed by a protective barrier, the words OPENING SOON scrolling in circles. "Isn't the Dilinaga Concert Hall still under repairs? Why build a new auditorium when you could fix up the old one?"

Indigo shrugged. "I don't know. The more the merrier, I guess? It's not like they aren't working on Dilinaga. That asari who's running for Tayseri City Council, Tanis Oteni—"

("Vote Oteni, vote for the people!" a voice chimes from the human's bag-) "The one you joked about kidnapping?"

"Yeah, her. I read that it's part of her initiative to restore the ward, using the arts to fundraise for the repair effort. Reyanommond is her design, her baby—she even named it after her father."

"Sounds like an elcor name."

"That's right."

"I take it you voted for her."

Indigo nodded. "The other Intendant, Beresh, I think is his name? He's really slimy. He wants stronger surveillance and increased Customs restrictions—he even said he'd get C-Sec to implement stop-and-frisk if he gets elected, to weed out the 'unsavoury types.' It's just a bit too police state for me. Plus, he's funded by Terra Firma, who can just go fuck themselves." She made a face. "It just adds to the whole 'humans are bullies' mentality, and with good reason."

"People are scared," said Kolyat, thinking of Talid and his supporters. "And angry."

"Yeah, that's why I think Oteni's approach is better. Bring people together, rather than tearing them apart. We do that well enough anyway."

She was right, but Kolyat doubted the effectiveness. "It's naive. No-one's going to care about a concert when the Citadel's being blown to bits around them."

"I don't know if that's true," she argued, sounding offended. "Sometimes when things go to shit you need to escape for a while, and music helps with that. It brings people together. Every species creates art, it's... soulful, you know? And I mean, I'm sure it's the same for you, with your painting."

And there it was, her assuming things again, drawing conclusions about him with no reason. He glowered through the windshield. Everyone was always making assumptions, thinking they knew better, thinking they knew him.

("Did you see that drawing he did?" Aunt Tuleni asks, hushed and worried. "Those jagged lines, all that red... He's seen things no child should see, and I don't know how to talk to him. I don't know how to do this, Mieren. He barely talks, he fights at school... Arashu preserve him, if only his father hadn't left-")

Gods, that memory still embarrassed him, made him feel like the child he had once been. He cut a sharp glare at Indigo, curling his lip at her presumption. "You're sure, are you? You always are."

She blinked, surprised at his change in tone. "What?"

"Stop acting like you know me."

"I... I don't mean to, I just—" She broke off with a sigh. "Look, we've both had a shit day, so maybe let's not do this."

"You're the one being presumptuous and obnoxious."

"I'm just talking! God, why are you always like this?" she demanded, and a low growl uncurled in his chest in response. Normally he liked the sound of her soft voice, alien in its lack of subtones, but the sharpness of it grated against him, peeling back his scales like a blade.

"You don't know what I'm like." He bit the words out. "We're not friends."

An uncomfortable silence followed. Kolyat glanced to the side and nearly cringed at the look on her face; her jaw tight, a knot between her slender brows. He felt like he'd been hit with a cryo blast, regret slamming into him.

"Well, aren't you a fucking bucket of charm? Why would you offer me a lift if you don't even like having me around?"

"I never said—"

"I never know where I stand with you. Why ask me about my life? Why talk to me at all?" She looked close to tears for a moment, but then she blinked and the vulnerability was replaced by scorching anger.

"I just meant..." He sighed. "I don't have many friends. I never have."

She huffed. "Well, gee, I wonder why," she snapped. "What with your shining disposition and all."

Kolyat said nothing.

"I just thought we were... I don't know, you talk to me, you know?" Her voice was softer now, the barbs replaced with hurt.

"Only because you talk to me."

Indigo crinkled her nose and frowned at him. "Wow, okay. I didn't realise all this was just some kind of weird social retaliation thing."

"You only talk to me because I'm a drell." Because that was it—that had to be it. Why else would she?

Silence. Indigo stared at him with disgust. "Excuse me? How shallow do you think I am? I talk to you because I like you. Fucking arsehole." Her words cut sharp and short, vindictive and biting.

"I saw how you looked at me when you first saw me. You stared at me." (- the scanner grid leaves him blinking as he enters the transit hub. A human with a long mane of orange hair watches him and he scowls, another alien staring at the exotic drell - but then she blinks and smiles apologetically, embarrassed, looking away, just as something tall slams into him, knocking the air from his lungs -)

"Wha—okay, fine, yes, the first time I saw you, fine, you being a drell threw me a little."

"So I'm right."

She made a frustrated noise, a thin human growl in her throat. "No! Jesus, what do you want me to say?"

"I don't want you to say anything."

Indigo shut her mouth, lips tight with anger. A bitter feeling of satisfaction settled over Kolyat for a split second, but then she said, "Well, too bad. You don't get to say shit like this to me and think you can get away with it. God, and to think I thought this day couldn't get any worse. You're a real dick, you know that?"

"You don't know me."

"So you keep saying. Jesus, what is your problem?"

"I don't have a problem," he groused, and Indigo laughed, scathing like boiling water.

"You're the most problem-laden person I've ever met!"

"Well, it's none of your business. You should just leave me alone."

"I was only trying to—ugh, God, fuck, okay. I'm done." She slapped a hand against her thigh in frustration, her movements sharp with fury. "Let me out."

"What? No."

"I mean it." Indigo braced a hand on the door as if she could open it mid-flight and jump out. "Pull over and let me the fuck out right now."

"Like hell. I'm not leaving you here to get blown up."

"So, you're abducting me and holding me hostage to your bullshit? I don't think so."

"I'm trying to help you."

"I don't need your help," she snapped, and Kolyat almost laughed; he'd growled that exact phrase to his father and Shepard, right before (the lamp shatters, distracting him - "What the hell?" - an armoured fist slams into his jaw, pain splitting his head, and the gun drops from his hand - fuck, fuck it all, why did everything go so wrong -)

The memory left him with the ghost of impact on his face, a dull ache behind his cheek, coiled under his jawbone.

Indigo was silent. Kolyat glanced at her and saw not her face but her spill of curly hair swept over one shoulder, a curtain between them. He could see the faint reflection of her in the window, pale and drawn, the dark shape of her mouth a flat line. For a moment, she looked as lonely as he felt, and shame oozed over his scales like oil.

"Indigo, I—"

"Shut up," she snapped, and he closed his mouth at the venom in her tone, her words sharp and cold like slivers of ice. "You didn't want me to say anything, right? That goes both ways. If you won't let me out, at least let me have some peace and quiet."

Minutes passed. Every thought in his head seemed to have disappeared.

"God, I'm such an idiot," she said, her voice small and hurt.

What? "You're not an idiot."

"Shut the fuck up, okay? Just shut up." She paused and wiped her face, and he thought for a horrible second that she was crying again, but when she looked his way her eyes were dry and harsh, burning into his. "I thought you liked me."

It was confusing, because he did like her. He'd liked her since they'd met, when (-"won't stand for this!"

"Then you'll sit," he says, and pushes the turian towards the security gate. Movement to his left - he glances over at the red-haired human girl who is laughing quietly, her green eyes catching his for a moment as she turns her face away- he can't help the twitch of his lips in response, but hides it from the transit officer -)

Some part of him had known from those furtive glances, stifled smiles... he had felt something between them, a shared kinship, the sense of something worth pursuing... it was the same feeling he'd had in her dorm room, alienation and companionship. But he'd retreated, because of what? Self-preservation? Fear?

"I'm just..." He trailed off and bit his lip, frowning. Why should he have to explain himself? It wasn't like she'd understand. He didn't fully understand.

"Just what?" she bit out, eyebrows raised.

Goddess of oceans, she was wearing on his already-thin patience. "I'm just not very good at expressing myself," he said.

She snorted. "Gosh, what a revelation."

Kolyat clenched his teeth. "I'm sorry, okay? I didn't... I didn't mean it."

"Okay." She still didn't look at him.

"Sometimes I just say things that... I don't know." Kolyat sighed. He could feel the words on his tongue, hard like iron in his mouth, but the shame of it all made him want to swallow them down. He fought the compulsion. His eyes felt hot, the lights of the street blurring in his vision, and he blinked, confused at his own reaction.

"I'm sorry," Indigo said. "I'm sorry for getting angry, and pushing you. I know I can be a bit much sometimes."

"So can I," he conceded, and she gave a soft snort.

He may not deserve her friendship, but surely he was allowed to want it, right?

He could tell her... he could. It was like he was back on the cliffs, above Elhenakir's Ridge, the sound of crashing waves reaching him from below, the Domes dotting the seascape... Jump, Krios, something whispered in his mind. Take the plunge. See where the current takes you.

Maybe the waves would push him to shore.

"My father's sick," he told her, finally. "Dying. It's called Kepral's Syndrome. Rahkhana is a desert planet, so living on Kahje can damage the lungs."

"How much time does he have?"

"He said he doesn't know. We don't talk much. He left when I was a child."

Indigo didn't say anything for a long moment. He could feel her eyes on him, and the raw compassion on her face stripped him bare. Nothing got by him, she said, but the same was true of her. "How come?"

"He..." Gods, he couldn't get into the whole assassin business right now. "My mother was murdered."

"Oh, Jesus, Kolyat. I'm so sorry—I can't even imagine." She reached across to touch his elbow, fingers pale against the dark leather of his jacket.

(blood pools across the floor, her head heavy in his lap - her staring eyes, glassy and hollow - her mouth half-open, split lips dry and bloody, her jaw hanging loose. No breath, no pulse, no warmth, his mama is gone, a shell, but he can't leave her -) "Trust me, you don't want to."

Indigo was silent for a long moment, and withdrew her hand. "What happened to you? After he left, I mean."

"I lived with my aunt and uncle. And then I came here."

"To become a cop?"

"I'm not a cop."

She sighed, but then was an exasperated amusement to it. "You and your pedantry. C-Sec officer, then. Same difference."

Kolyat's breath froze in his lungs for a moment. It was now or never... "It's not pedantry. I'm not with C-Sec."

"What? What do you mean? Was that turian onto something?"

"No, no. Not exactly. I am with C-Sec, sort of, I'm just... I didn't go to the Academy or anything." His heart was pounding again, and he stared at his gloved hands, illuminated by the light of the dash. "It started out as community service after I was… I was arrested. So... that's it." Silence.

He cringed and glanced at Indigo, dreading her response.

She stared at him, eyes wide with confusion, the alien whites of her sclera visible around the dark green rings. Her mouth opened, then closed. Any other time, he might have been amused at an Indigo who was at a complete loss for words, but right now he wished he could teleport out of existence. "So..." She closed her eyes and shook her head, then opened them again. "So, wait, what? Huh?"

"I... Fuck." He scrubbed a hand down his face. Gods fucking damn it, he shouldn't have said anything. Another stupid, thoughtless mistake.

"You're serious?"

He chuffed, sharp and bitter. "Do I look like I'm joking?"

"So, what, you're a criminal?"

"No! Well, yes." He sighed. "Yes. But not now. And only once."

She responded with a short, sharp laugh. "That was not a very good explanation."

"I did something bad. Something, as in singular."

"But… bad as in crime."

"Yes."

Indigo fell quiet for a moment, looking out the windshield as she processed this information. Kolyat had no idea what she was thinking. "Well," she said, turning to him again, "what happened?"

"I hurt someone." He swallowed against the dryness in his throat, like he'd been breathing the smoke again. "I was stopped."

Indigo didn't look away from him, her gaze as sharp and forceful as a javelin to the face when he met it. She had pensive eyes, thoughtful and expressive, and to see her mulling him over made him feel more exposed than ever. "You mean you would have kept going had you not been stopped."

"I... I don't know," Kolyat lied. He knew he would have carried out the contract if Shepard and his father hadn't stopped him, and that knowledge scared him more than anything. "Are you okay?" he asked. He felt like a door had been opened, and she could either step through or flee.

"Yeah, I'm fine, it's just... weird." Indigo frowned and pursed her lips, the plum-coloured gloss of them shining. "I mean, I never got a dangerous vibe from you."

Kolyat snorted, and Indigo's startled gaze snapped to him. "What kind of 'vibe' do I give off, then?"

She shook her head. "I don't know. Am... am I in danger?"

"No!" Gods, he should never have said anything. ("On the floor," he snaps, shoving the turian to his knees, a sick thrill of power coursing through him -) "I know I can be… rough, but I don't want to hurt people. I was sick."

"Sick? Like, mentally?"

He didn't want to get into the metaphysics. "Yeah."

"Are you seeing anyone about it? Do you have help?"

"Yes. I'm—it's better. I'm getting better."

"Thank you for telling me." Indigo eyed him for a moment, then smiled. "Don't look at me like I'm going to run around saying you're a menace to society."

And there it was, that acceptance that he didn't deserve. He released a tight breath. "Good. I'm sorry I upset you. I didn't mean what I said."

"I know. It's okay. I get it."

Again, those three words. I get it. I get you. What it meant was: I see you. I understand you.

"And... we are friends—if you want. I trust you." Kolyat surprised himself with that last sentence, three words of his own, and noticed the almost imperceptible widening of her eyes.

Indigo's soft smile widened, showing her teeth, and she blushed. "Well, good. So, friend, thank you for the ride."

"You're welcome," said Kolyat, and he meant it.

Lies of omission still hung over him, but maybe now the shadows would ease.

I hope all is well, and that you are taking care of yourself. If you are so inclined, please do consider leaving a review! I'd love to hear some thoughts.

I also did some cover art for this chapter, which you can see tumblr or DeviantArt :D
Stay strong, and clear!