Chapter 10
After Kevin had awoken and cleaned himself up, he put on his usual 'combat oriented' undersuit, tied his knife sheath to his belt and strode out into the hall. He always brought his knife with him, even if he wasn't expecting any danger at all. A lesson learned early in the terminus systems. Upon turning the first corner into the hall, he could hear rapid scuffling just beyond the next corner, as if something was going on right outside the mess hall. Curious, Kevin slowed his steps to make himself as silent as possible and he peeked around the corner. There he saw two quarians – Tosh and Kar – conversing in rather audible whispers. They were jittery, and from what Kevin could gather from their body language, excited. Tosh was halfway into the mess hall, and Kar was outside talking to him.
"Did you check? Did you see?" Kar quietly asked.
"Not entirely, but I did see some," Tosh excitedly replied.
"Well, perhaps we should check for more?" Kar pressed, looking around Tosh to see inside the mess.
"Maybe we should let the others-" Tosh said, only to be cut off by his quarian friend.
"We need to make sure first! Come on, let's go!" Kar said, doing his best to keep his voice down.
The young quarian pushed passed Tosh and ran inside the mess hall. Tosh lifted his hands in defeat after having already been bypassed and he shook his head with a chuckle. He turned around and casually went into the mess hall himself, not quite in the hurry that Kar was in. Kevin was left wondering what the heck those two were up to that they felt the need to use hushed voices. Just as Kevin was about to round the corner to follow them, he was moderately startled by the voice that came from right behind him.
"Spying on us already?" Arla accusingly asked.
Kevin's body involuntarily shook itself in response and caused his heart to race temporarily. Embarrassed at having both been startled as well as having been snuck up on at all, he didn't turn around to face her right away. Instead, he tried to play it off as best he could as though he had known she was there. He was banking on the fact that she might not have noticed his quick shake.
"Those two were acting strange, so I was observing."
Unfortunately, she wasn't deterred.
"You haven't even known them for a day and you presume to know what strange is for them?"
"Based on what I've seen, yes," Kevin replied, standing firm.
"What were who doing anyways?" Arla asked, indicating that she had only just arrived.
"Welkas and Rolush. Not quite sure what they were up to, but they were excited about something in the mess hall."
Arla paused. "That is a bit strange," she admitted, immediately heading passed Kevin to investigate. Kevin was soon following behind her so he could find out for himself.
When they opened the door and peeked inside, the found the two curious quarians over by the kitchen, inspecting some items from the refrigerator. There were some items already removed and stacked on the counter closest to their position.
"Great. They're raiding my fridge," Kevin said, half-expecting a chuckle from Arla.
He didn't get one, to his dismay. Rather instead she stepped into the room interrogating the raiders.
"What do you two think you're doing?" She inquired, almost demanding an answer.
"Arla!" Tosh called out, not in the slightest bit phased that they had been caught. "Look! Sealed turian cuisine! A bunch of it, too."
Oddly, Arla's disposition changed dramatically.
"Turian cuisine? Still in the packs?" she asked, genuinely curious and not in the slightest bit upset.
What was this crap? Now she was falling into the same trap that lured the others in! Kevin could do nothing at this point but place an open palm over his face. Kevin flicked a thumb to the direction of the door and took a few steps backward out into the hallway.
"I'm going to go let your captain know you guys have, uh. . . Decided to eat."
Kar waved back to Kevin without so much as a glance. "Tell the others, too! Tell them to hurry up or there won't be any left."
Kevin just stared at them from the doorway for a few seconds, utterly confused. Were they not aware that was his fridge? Not that he was going to eat turian-specific food, but geez. As strange as the situation was, he intended to make good on his threat to tattle, which was not something he usually did.
"Terra. Where is Captain Siri'Kortel?"
"I'm sorry, but I do not currently have any profiles by that designation."
"Ah, crap. Need to do that." Kevin shook his head and simply headed for one of the two most likely locations Siri might be. The first was engineering, and the second was the crew quarters. When he stepped inside engineering and let his eyes quickly adjust to the light from the fully engaged drive core, he peered around to see if anyone was present. Not seeing anyone on his floor, he looked down through the grate holes in the floor.
"Ralik?" He called out, assuming the salarian was manning his coveted lab.
"Yes?" Ralik called back.
"See any quarians lately?"
"Some earlier, but they left for the cargo hold a couple hours ago. Something about a terminal for the quarters?"
"Ah, thanks. Did you show off your lab?"
"Sure did. I couldn't rightly tell, but I think they were impressed."
"Of course they were. Have fun."
"Don't forget to stop at the next discharge point. It's your turn." Ralik sounded as if he had been waiting to say that for hours.
"Yeah, yeah," was Kevin's casual reply. He promptly exited engineering after that, not really wanting to be further nagged by a salarian.
Down the hall, Kevin stopped at the crew quarters and opened the door without even knocking. He was used to a small ship where he was the only crew, and any quarters were his. Even before that, when he was in the military, he was used to a larger crew quarters shared by just about everyone. Knocking was hardly common. Despite the fact that this didn't really dawn on him until after the door was open, he didn't feel the need to apologize. He peeked in to see if Siri was there. Inside he found Siri, Bela and Riik. They were all huddled around a terminal set up on the far end of the quarters with Riik sitting in front in a chair he had pulled over from the table. Once he stepped inside, the three of them stopped what they were doing and turned to look at Kevin. The room fell awkwardly silent for a while.
"Ah, Kevin," Siri said, breaking the silence. "I meant to tell you, but I got sidetracked. We set up this terminal here so that we quarians could share some data and use it as a workspace. I hope that is alright."
"Of course," Kevin said, relieved that they were not upset at his intrusion. "As long as you guys don't fiddle with the ship's systems from here. I'd rather you did that at the VI core." It was meant as a half joke, but once again, nobody was laughing.
"Noted," Siri said with a nod. She turned to head back to the terminal, but was interrupted by Kevin's message.
"Oh, uh. Arla, Tosh and Kar are in the mess. They told me to tell you all something." Kevin shifted his voice slightly and attempted to mimic Kar, accent and all. "Tell the others that there is turian cuisine here, and if they don't hurry, there won't be any left!"
The three quarians looked at each other. Riik got up and Bela ran out into the hall, barely making an effort to move around Kevin. Riik followed, but was not in as much of a hurry as Bela. At the very least, he was doing his best not to run. After they left, Siri began making her own laid back exit into the hallway. She flicked her head, indicating that she wanted Kevin to walk with her. Without anything else to do, Kevin was happy to oblige.
"I'm not quite sure I understand what the deal is," Kevin stated to Siri. "I mean, sure, it's food you folks can eat, but that's all it is, right?"
"You have to understand how we live, Kevin. We generally only eat processed vegetables grown in the liveships of the flotilla. Especially since we've left, all we have is the food we've stored for the trip. It's very rare that we get the chance to have something as. . . How should I put it? Something as 'well prepared' and flavorful as turian cuisine. I suppose you could say it's a treat."
"Ah. Now I see. You guys aren't vegan by choice." Siri nodded to his response, and something dawned on him. "Hey, where's Tyr, anyway? Shouldn't we tell him?"
"Tyr is likely still doing an inventory of what survived the crash. He hasn't had time to take stock until we were finished yesterday, so he's doing it now. I'm fairly certain he'd much rather just be left to his work. I'll just have to make sure enough cuisine survives this ordeal so that he can have some later."
"Fair enough," Kevin shrugged.
"About the food," Siri started. "Were they polite when they asked for some?"
"Uh. . ." was Kevin's lackluster reply as they turned the corner into the mess hall.
The quarian crew was already inhaling the turian food via small straw-like extensions protruding from beneath the chin of their helmet. They had inserted the open end into the piercable cap and literally sucked it up.
"Captain!" Riik called out, tossing a turian food package to Siri. "Top quality stuff. Still sealed and clean. Warmed it for you."
Siri caught the package with one hand an simply looked to Kevin who rose his shoulders, then back to her crew. "Unbelievable!" she declared, clearly pissed. All of her subordinates froze in place and straightened up. "This man risks his life for all of you and you raid his food stores? We're quarian marines, not krogan savages!"
"We're sorry, captain," Riik said, embarrassed. "We just-"
"You just felt like helping yourself?" the captain immediately replied. As she continued, she got closer and closer to Riik who slowly fell into line with his comrades. "You just lost control at the sight of a treat? You just felt like tossing suit waste on those who saved us? You just felt like insulting them as well as me?"
Riik and the others were completely silent. It wasn't parental chastisement, it was military discipline.
"You tepka bosh'tets. You were trained better than this. This is why everyone looks at us like we're scavengers. If I see this sorry excuse for behavior again, there will be repercussions. Am I clear?"
"Yes ma'am," they all replied solemnly.
"Am I clear!" Siri asked once more, with notably more fervor.
"Yes ma'am!" The quarians again replied but with a similar boost in emotion.
"Now finish your food. That's all there is, and you've all already broken the seals. Might as well finish it. And make sure to save some for Garloh. He's busy and can't make it at the moment."
The quarians resumed eating their meals, though to Kevin it looked as though the blissful enjoyment had been taken out of the picture. Siri turned around and stepped up to Kevin.
"My apologies, Kevin," Siri said. She seemed to cool down rather quickly. "They're some of the best marines I've ever had the pleasure of commanding, but they still act like pre-pilgrammage children sometimes."
"That's alright, I wasn't going to eat it anyways. Thanks for taking care of the situation, though."
Siri held up her food package palm up in front of Kevin. Kevin looked down at it and then back at the captain.
"Go for it. You don't have to ask me."
"After what you just witnessed, I most certainly do," Siri said matter-of-factually.
The quarian captain flicked her head towards the table juxtaposed to the one the quarian crew was using and made her way to it. Kevin followed and sat across from her, noticing the mix of apologetic looks from the other quarians. They ranged from 'not really all that sorry' to, 'Oh no, I messed up bad!'. Siri pressed a pair of inconspicuous buttons under the jawlines of her helmet and an increasingly familiar straw flipped out from the bottom of the mask. Kevin always wondered how quarians ate. Another mystery of the universe, solved.
"You're an unusually good man, Kevin," Siri stated, starting the conversation back up. "In fact, anywhere else I'd be suspicious of ulterior motives."
"Anywhere else, huh? I suppose that's why you haven't ordered your marines to commandeer the Kellius."
Siri laughed.
"While I could do it, I have no wish to. You haven't given us any reason thus far not to trust you, and you've certainly gone out of your way to lend us a hand. Even the charitable asari haven't done this much for quarians."
Kevin scratched his head. "It wasn't as far out of our way as you'd think."
"A moot point, I think." She paused to eat some of her food before continuing. "That still does nothing to dull the grand exit you promised. Why are you inconceivably good to us? Most other species. . . Other people would notice the geth in the area and promptly remove themselves from the system."
"I'll tell you what I told Ralik, since he asked me something pretty similar. I have a soft spot for quarians."
"You pity us."
"Hardly, Siri. It's not that kind of soft spot."
Siri simply stared at Kevin a moment before sitting back in her chair and sipping at her food once more.
"You don't believe me?"
"On the contrary, I do. And that's what confuses me. I used to consider myself a hard person to get along with or gain the trust of, outside my people. Your shockingly unusual rescue attempt has me reeling, I suppose."
"So I've gained your trust?" Kevin asked.
Siri laughed again.
"I haven't known you long enough for that. I've been around the galaxy enough to keep trust close."
"Again, fair enough."
Siri tilted her head. It seemed she was surprised that Kevin didn't press the issue. She inserted the quarian proboscis into the food pack once more and continued her delightful meal.
"So. . ." Kevin started. "I picked up on some words my autotranslator didn't correct. Bosh'tet I've heard before, but not 'tepka'. What does that mean?"
"Ah. It's a sort of. . . It's a kind of amplifier word from our old language-based dialect, which is probably why it didn't translate when I said it. How to explain it. It's meant to amplify the social meaning of whatever immediately follows. The common trade language has words that serve the same function, but tepka is far less. . . Vulgar. It's design was meant for amplification, not a curse word adapted to serve multiple purposes."
"I see. That makes a lot more sense now."
Kevin noticed that some of the other quarians were leaving the mess hall, likely due to the fact that they had finished their meal. Almost as if on cue, Siri had emptied her food package as well and stood from her chair and threw the empty pack away.
"If you'll excuse me, captain, I have some more data logging to do in the crew quarters."
"I thought you said you were going to work on that," Kevin said with accusatory point.
Siri paused, presumably to smile. "So I did." She bowed slightly and made her way out of the mess.
At this point, only Kevin, Arla and Riik were left in the room. Riik gave Kevin a mild glare and exited as well, leaving Arla behind. Kevin also stood from his chair to leave, but stopped his walk when he was approached by the remaining quarian.
"Yes?" Kevin casually inquired.
"You and the captain have been chatting an awful lot," Arla said. Her tone was less than friendly, but not nearly hostile.
"Yes, I suppose you could say we've gotten beyond the simple acquaintance phase."
"She doesn't trust you, you know."
"I'm well aware of that. If a quarian captain handed her trust to me that easily, I'd be disappointed."
"You said you don't pity us, but that's what it sounded like to me. A soft spot? Really?" Arla leaned back on a leg and folded her arms in utter disbelief.
"I was wondering if you were listening in. Yes, a soft spot. And if I really did pity you as you say I do, don't you think I'd be treating you more like children or homeless vagrants in need of shelter and food?"
Arla let out a sigh of angst. She wasn't having any of it. Kevin wasn't done making his point, though.
"Remember, you took the food from me."
Arla's head shifted back a bit, as if she was acutely insulted by the words that came out of Kevin's mouth.
"Watch what you say, human, or I'll be pressing your head into the nearest corner." Now the tone was hostile.
"Is that a threat or a challenge?" Kevin asked, arms crossed and unphased. "I warn you not to threaten me, Tavval, but I welcome a challenge. If that's what this is, then I accept."
"Just stay away from our captain. She doesn't need human friends," Arla spat. Once she was done, she stormed out of the mess hall.
Kevin stood still and watched the exiting quarian, wondering what just happened. She was the most accomplished hand-to-hand combatant from their ship, but she was unwilling to make a challenge? Perhaps that wasn't quite the case, then. Arla certainly was a curious one. Riik didn't even give him the pleasure of a leisurely chat, idle threats or not. Arla, on the other hand, made it a point to inform him of everyone's lack of trust even though he was already aware. It was possible she was struggling to deal with the fact that she doesn't trust humans, and that this human just saved her life. Either way, they were only a few days from the Migrant Fleet, so the issue would either work itself out or slip out the airlock.
Kevin finally gave up on those postulations. It wasn't worth worrying about, especially with such a temporary guest. He made himself a quick bite, then headed back to his room to review more audio logs. He half expected someone else to show up as he made for his quarters looking to give more advice on how he should manage his relationships to other people. Fortunately, this did not happen. Kevin plopped himself down on his comfortable desk chair and let out a sigh. This mission was not going according to plan, and things already weren't looking up. Rather than spiral into those thoughts again, Kevin activated his terminal and set to work.
Four entries in, and Kevin was already bored. McRoilie and his team must have hit a dry spell with their research, as three out of four of the entries Kevin reviewed he more or less labeled as 'No new data, brief consensus of the crew'. Each one consisted mainly of McRoilie's quick explanation of how each major player in the research thought the project was going. By this point, Kevin's head was laying on his arms on the desk, tired of hearing this man's voice. When the entries contained useful information, they were interesting. When they lacked anything worth noting, they were torture. The worst part was, he had to listen to the entire log each time because there was always a small chance that something important could crop up at the end.
Eventually, there was a break in the dull, meaningless logs and Kevin perked his head up once the notion of a breakthrough began to play.
"Log seventy-two, time reference is marked as refresher day. Finally, we have some readable and consistent results. Our improvised method of taking readings from the children without frightening them has taken a bit more time to tune than any of us originally planned, but the results are so far unprecedented compared to other more restricted methods. We have set up a playroom where the children are placed for a marked duration. This room has a series of four large scanners used to observe brain functions beyond the walls. Each scanner is able to move independently, and can do so in a spherical pattern around the room. Utilizing these machines, we can separately identify and hone in on each individual's brain and take surprisingly high resolution readings in five millisecond intervals. As far as we know, the children are completely unaware of the scanning process. While they are still only infants, the fact that they are oblivious to the scans should hold true into the future as we continually adapt the decor of the room to fit their growing intellect.
"Onto the results. While I cannot go into detail on these logs, I can say that a lot of speculation is turning to reality. The highly enhanced nervous system and synapse reception is beginning to stabilize, meaning the signals from the nerves in the body should no longer be overpowering the brain's neural functions. The kids are crying a lot less now, thank God. However, there has been one unfortunate result that we have since not come to expect. Due to the fact that the children's neurological system was focusing on adapting itself to match the nervous system, their cognitive development has slowed. They are at the point where they should have begun attempts at walking, but they have barely begun to crawl. While normally this is viewed on a case by case basis, this particular fact is present in all individuals, and not just one or two. I fear this may put a permanent lapse in their development, but this is merely more speculation. These next few months will be more critical than ever. McRoilie out."
Kevin entered an appropriate description for the file and closed it out. Now that his interest had been piqued, Kevin was more than ready to move onto the next audio log. It had been a few hours since he had heard anything interesting, so he wanted to keep the ball rolling. That wasn't going to happen, though. Just as Kevin went to play it, Terra boomed over the audio emitters.
"Alert: We are approaching the next marked discharge location."
Kevin sighed. "Terra, I thought I told you to alert Ralik of this crap."
"The alert has already been sent to Ralik Dolannus, but no response has been made."
"Should have figured," Kevin said with a shake of his head. "Alright, have the haptics ready for me."
"Acknowledged."
Kevin shut down his terminal and pushed himself away from the desk with an irritated sigh. He wouldn't have been as peeved if Ralik had simply asked him to take over discharging for the trip back rather than just assigning it to him. At least his trip up to the neck of the ship was unhindered by further surprise appearances.
By the time he had reached the bridge, he stopped to see that a quarian was occupying his forward pilot seat. While most of the colors were orange-washed by the haptic adaptive interface consoles, the stark lack of customization of the exosuit told Kevin that it was Kar'Welkas. Kevin didn't say anything right away, as it seemed that Kar hadn't even noticed his approach. The quarian was fascinated by the array of piloting gear in front of him. Kevin imagined there would be a small puddle of drool on the floor if quarians could indeed lose saliva to artificial gravitational pull. He simply tapped the curious quarian on the shoulder to bring him to his senses.
"Excuse me a minute, but I need that seat."
"What?" was Kar's initial near-emotionless reaction, at least until he turned his head to see who it was. "Oh! Keelah, I'm sorry! I didn't mean to-" The startled quarian boy jumped up out of the chair and almost fell onto the console trying to get out of Kevin's way.
"No worries, Kar. I just need to set the ship up to discharge the core since a certain forgetful salarian can't do it right now."
"I see. . ." Kar said in a more calm fashion. He moved behind Kevin's chair to watch over his shoulder.
Kevin could tell that the quarian was watching and noting every single button he pressed, every menu he navigated, and every process he initiated. Once they came out of FTL, the glowing blue river outside the viewports gave way to a sweeping vista of several planets closely orbiting a dying star. The planet they had planned to discharge the core at was substantially closer to a second gas giant than the last time they were were. Kevin didn't like that. That probably meant some amount of increased convection in the atmosphere, or more. It wasn't anything Kevin couldn't immediately handle, but shaky situations in a ship he was only moderately comfortable piloting didn't mix well. The approach to the planet was smooth, but as expected, the consoles lit up with various readings and warnings about the turbulence between the two unusually close planets.
However, before Kevin even had the chance to start the process of lowering the ship to the magnetosphere, the quarian behind him piped up.
"No offense intended at all, sir, but may I perform the core discharge process? It's just, you look nervous."
Kevin turned his head slightly. At first he was surprised that Kar could read his face that well, but in reality he was more interested in seeing what the kid had learned about his ship. He hadn't forgotten Siri's praises of this one's ability to pilot a ship, so what harm could he do? Slowly, Kevin stood from the pilot's seat, offering it to Kar.
"Give it a shot, kid. Let's see how you do on a human frigate."
"Th-thank you, sir," Kar said. His voice was calm and collected, but Kevin could easily hear the excitement the boy was holding back. Kar cracked his six digits and brought full attention to the screens.
Kar started the process of bringing the ship into contact with the planet's strong magnetosphere, but he didn't activate any automatic functions. Whether he didn't know about the automatic functions or just preferred not to use them was difficult to tell. Either way, the ship quivered as it cruised within the turbulent area surrounding the two planets. Surprisingly, things seemed to be well under control. The shaking of the ship steadied after a while and the core discharge process had begun – all done without automation. It seemed Siri wasn't lying. This kid could pilot, at least with simple discharge maneuvers. Kevin was no seasoned helmsman, but he could tell when a talent came naturally. It was too bad the kid would be gone in a few days. He could share the piloting duty, and he might like it.
Once the ship was fully settled and discharging the drive core, Kar lifted his hands off of the consoles and sat back, satisfied. His head turned to look out one of the viewports so he could watch the small bolts of electricity collectively scatter away in continuous waves and disappear in the near distance. After only a minute of sitting stone still like this, Kar carefully got up and turned to Kevin.
"Thank you, sir. That meant a lot to me."
"It was nothing, Kar. Good work, by the way. That was slick."
"It was only a simple maneuver. Heh." Kar was certainly taking his compliment in stride. He almost sounded bashful. "Anyways, I'll leave you to, uh. Finish discharging. Sorry about the food earlier."
The quarian immediately ducked out of the bridge and headed for the briefing room. He stopped suddenly for only a second upon noticing his captain leaning against the wall just before the neck opened up into the briefing room, watching them. Without saying a word, he continued on past Siri and made a hasty exit through the round meeting room. Once Kar was out of sight, Siri removed herself from the wall and started towards the bridge, staring Kevin down.
"Ah geez. You're stalking me. I knew it," Kevin said with false irritation.
"You're a hard man to read, Folner," Siri said as she approached passed the airlock.
"Enigma is my middle name. Actually, scratch that. That sounds too feminine for me. How about. . . Obscure?"
Siri tilted her head and rested it on a finger and thumb and said nothing.
"Captain Ambiguous?" Kevin waited for a few seconds for a response, but there wasn't one to be had.
"Digging myself a hole, aren't I?"
This time there was a response. Siri nodded her head.
"Alright, I'm done," Kevin proclaimed. "Really. How long were you standing there?"
"Long enough. Getting to know Welkas, hmm?"
"Nice kid. I'm assuming he's younger than me. He's your star pilot? Kind of weak in the knees for someone who managed to crash land an entire ship without killing everyone."
Siri stopped in front of Kevin as he spoke, but moved beyond him once he was done so that she could stare out the viewports at the growing aurora surrounding the ship mixed with dancing jagged lines of fleeing electricity.
"As admirable as his attempt was, a lot of people still died in the crash. He knows this, and it crushes the core of his soul. As far as I'm concerned, he saved far more than I thought possible, but that acknowledgment doesn't change much for him. For someone so young to have to go through that reality. . ."
Kevin finished where she left off. "That could be traumatizing. Even for a seasoned marine. I was surprised he took the helm at all. Still did good, though. I wouldn't have gotten near that kind of stability trying to maneuver here."
"You did him a great service by letting him take the helm, Kevin. I had feared that he would never want to pilot again. He's too talented to ground, and I would never want to see him shy away from a pilot's seat."
"Once a crazy pilot, always a crazy pilot," Kevin said, staring off into space.
"I'm not so sure about the crazy part. . ." Siri noted.
"Sorry," Kevin replied. "Just remembering a pilot I used to know. She couldn't be grounded either. That sort of passion doesn't let you."
"Very true."
There was a moment of silence, letting the quiet blips and beeps from the various terminals around the bridge take over the ambiance.
"Kar respects you, you know," Siri pointed out. "Even moreso now."
"I barely know the kid. How can he respect me already?"
"He calls you 'Sir'. Among quarians, calling someone 'Sir' in the common trade language or 'Ma'am' in the female case denotes one of two things, and isn't lightly tossed around like in other cultures. Either the person is of a higher military rank and has earned respect through service, or the person is someone that the individual respects in more than one way militarily or not. Perhaps your laid back attitude or ability to actually trust granted you that. I can't really say."
"Well, I'm flattered. I wasn't expecting to gain respect from any of you, seeing as how all I did was pick you guys up. Outside of the military, respect is like trust. It's earned, not given. Sometimes, it's just as hard to gain."
"Well said," was Siri's simple reply. "Well, I have to go check on Riik down in the crew quarters. You've probably already noticed that I like to keep physical track of my people."
"You'll be having more fun than me. I get to watch this thing discharge for forty-five more minutes," Kevin said as he sat back into the pilot's chair.
"Enjoy the view while you can, Folner," Siri called back on her way through the briefing room. "It's beautiful and temporary. Might as well seize the moment while it's staring you in the face, yes?"
"Ain't that the truth," Kevin muttered to himself.
He sat back in the chair to get comfortable, expecting to wait forty-five minutes before setting the ship back on the plotted course back towards the Far Rim relay. It had hardly been a minute, however, before he head footsteps coming up the neck of the ship.
"Back already?" Kevin asked, sitting up to look and see who it was after asking. He was mildly surprised to see Arla approaching instead.
"Are you stalking me too? This is getting a little weird."
"I thought I told you to leave the captain alone, Folner," Arla growled.
"Really? The woman comes to talk to me and I'm the one getting yelled at? This is so typical. Did Ralik send you up here?"
"Shut up for two seconds! Keelah!" she shouted.
"Oh! I get it. You were 'eavesdropping' again. I'm sorry, was that conversation too buddy-buddy for you? Afraid I might get cozy with your captain?"
"She's being friendly to you because you saved us," Arla manage to say, barely containing her anger. "That is all. When we get back to the Migrant Fleet, you'll be nothing more than a used escape pod. Our captain has no need for a random human friend. Never has, and never will. Whatever messed up plan you're hiding, you better toss it out before someone gets seriously hurt."
"Planning?" Kevin shouted with a pseudo-forced gufaw. "You're a curious girl, Arla. You can't stand me, but you make it a point to try and ward me away from a potential friendship split, and even more, you drum up conspiracies about me conspiring!" Kevin wasn't so much outraged at her as he was appalled by her.
"Why can't you just leave us alone?" the enraged quarian girl shouted back. "We're only here for a few days and then we don't have to deal with each other anymore! You're not one of us, so just. Stay. Away." Arla's seething disposition was beginning to break through. She shoved Kevin at the conclusion of her statement.
"Newsflash! I don't answer to you, nor does your captain. If we want to converse, then by God, we will converse. If you want to lock yourself in a corner with Riik and start a human hate group, then go for it! I'm not stopping you. Just don't get in my way."
Arla had reached the controlled limit of her temper. With a quick motion, she kicked one of her feet out, precisely aimed for Kevin's right knee. If Kevin hadn't already been expecting this heated argument to get physical, he might not have had the foresight to watch for an attack and he would certainly have ended up with a broken knee. His keen close quarters combat skills caught the move in time, however, and he moved his leg aside. He countered by swiftly grabbing her foot and throwing it upward, which caused the quarian to involuntarily backflip. Interestingly, instead of hearing an awkward face-down thud from a falling quarian, Kevin watched Arla gracefully land on all fours. She stood upright, shrugging off a light adrenaline-induced pant and stared Kevin directly in the eyes.
"You want your silly challenge? You have it."
"Accepted," Kevin blurted without hesitation. "See you in the entertainment room once this discharge is done."
"Fine." Arla sharply turned one hundred and eighty degrees and quickly left the room.
Kevin let go of a breath and scratched his temple. He also had gotten a small dose of adrenaline from the quick bout, and he turned around to focus on the serenity outside the viewports in order to calm himself and go over what just happened. He sat down in the helmsman's chair and replayed the end of the argument in his head.
As he recalled the fresh memories over and over, one thing held true. Arla was no amateur fighter. Her kick was accurate, swift and calculated. Her reaction to his successful counter was practiced, smooth and set her up to potentially deal with whatever follow-up moves he might have made. It was clear to him that whatever the winning condition for the challenge would be, the fight to get there was going to hurt. Beyond that, he was anxious to see the result of their two very different martial styles when they clashed. It excited him, almost. It had been a while since he had dueled anyone, much less without the intention of killing one another. He didn't consider himself rusty by any means – the moves for fighting were burned into his mind to make it as close to reflex as possible, thanks in part to the Alliance Military's rigorous CQC training and exam sessions. Even still, this fight was different from most he had had in recent years, and he needed to keep that in mind.
Before he knew it, there was only five minutes left on the discharge process. He drew in and released a deep breath, calming his nerves again. He sat up straight to wait patiently for the rest of the process to complete, but an approaching voice from the briefing room slapped away his grasp for concentration.
"Folner!" It was Siri.
Kevin stood and turned to look towards the quarian captain, expecting her to lunge at him for challenging her subordinate. "Yeah?"
"I was just briefed on the situation. A hand to hand challenge is to take place in the room marked 'Entertainment'?" There was no hint of anger or angst in her voice, to Kevin's relief.
"That's correct."
"Arla apologized to me for making the challenge out of anger, but said she would make no apologies to you. She also informed me that while she has additional motivation for winning, she will treat this duel as it should be treated. For sport. I trust you will do the same?"
"I wouldn't have it any other way," Kevin calmly stated. "I'm actually glad to hear that she's bringing this back to a sensible level."
"Should I be worried about what conspired in my absence to cause this to happen?"
Kevin thought about letting Siri know about Arla's accusations and unnecessarily hostile disposition. The thing was, Arla understandably only wanted to protect her captain, but she was good at going about it the wrong way. Either way, he never was any kind of serious tattler, and wasn't about to be one now.
"It's nothing to be too concerned about. Just some differences we need to settle. Combat sometimes makes the best communication medium. Especially when words fail."
Siri paused. "Very good. And I pray to Keelah that you have some manner of hand-to-hand combative skill. If Arla were to win this one outright, she would get nothing from it except fuel for her ego."
"I wouldn't have accepted if I had no confidence in my own abilities, Siri," Kevin stated matter-of-factually.
"Fair enough. We will all be in the entertainment room for when you are done up here." Siri turned to leave.
"Wait, all of you?" Kevin asked, taken aback by the realization that all the quarians would be watching.
Siri stopped and turned her head to look at Kevin. "Of course. Hand-to-hand duels are almost ceremonious in their proceedings, and while they aren't the most popular source of entertainment, they almost always attract crowds on quarian ships. We won't be quite as formal, but you get the idea."
Kevin could swear he noticed an excited skip in her step as she exited the briefing room. He was left speechless, and as a result simply turned around to wrap up the core discharge process and set the ship back on course.
"Good one, Kevin," he muttered to himself. "What have you gotten yourself into this time?"