02.08.01 - Screwing Around
"So, what's the deal with making your own merc company?" Nare's apartment is amazing, she's got a window view into the nebula outside the Citadel, a sound system in every inch of the place, more toys than a whole store and, the first Rebecca's ever seen of this, a nine thousand credit gaming rig. It has more processing power than some militarized aircraft and she's apparently not used for its intended purpose in four months.
"'Cause you'd a done great in Blue Sun. I know we might seem like we're cool, calm, and collected, but that's just cause we're really, really, really good at covering shit up." The Asari has a cigarette in her mouth and medigel on most of her skin, the cool touch of wet nanomachines healing her play-marks apparently a pleasant sensation.
Rebecca takes the cigarette out of Nare's mouth, and takes a drag before returning it, and continues applying medigel. "I was never going to stay, with a mercenary company. The money isn't in working, it's in owning." She exhales, "I'm not going to be anything but the top. I refuse too at this point."
"Oh, you're one of thoooose." Nare nods approvingly, taking the cigarette out of her mouth and, to make more work for Rebecca, ashes it on a part of skin already medigel'd, the hiss of pain and burning skin alike seems to draw a smile out of her paradoxically.
Rebecca smacks her behind the head, once, hard, "Stop that." Then rubs a little medigel on the burn, "This shit's expensive, but yeah. Need to wrack up a high score so that when a Spectre lands on Omega they hear, 'and careful around the Worthy Fists, because Rebecca Dinozzo' and then get a read out of a hundred different combat worthy feats."
Nare smiles, picking out another cigarette from a pack of them she's burning through, apparently three a day's her average, and lights it up. As it rests between her lips, nearly dangling out of her mouth she speaks, "You coulda done that plenty o' ways. Merc commander seems..... well, not the worst way, but couldn't you have gone into like, hitmanning? Assassin work?"
"Keep the glory for yourself, not a platoon-level split." She stretches out with a sigh and a pop of blue skin rippling with tense muscle, still relaxing. This whole conversation being aftercare really, a return to normality after hours of abnormality.
Rebecca pulled out a clove, and lit it, "When you join the marine corps, there's this thing they promise you. If you work hard, work really hard, you get a leadership position." She took a long hard draw watching the kretek crackle, and spark. "I instead got wrapped up in a black-ops program. Never got the thing I was promised. Now it's the galaxy's problem."
Nera smiles again, patting at Rebecca's arm, "Hey, I think you're a great leader. You pissed off my employers enough to have to be one." She reassures, making it clear that being pleasant, kind and loving is just in the Asari genome rather than any sort of learned skill of theirs.
"Thank you, there's like a... It's stupid, but there's also a very personal point to the whole merc troupe thing." Rebecca admits, now putting the medigel down and grabbing a muscle relaxing oil. It had been over a scented tea candle, getting warmed to skin temperature, "When I woke up on Omega, I tried my best to get myself killed. Everyone who cared about me made sure I didn't. Now I have a merc troupe where you can go and try to get yourself killed just to join, and hopefully the leaders and shit I pick can point that energy to making their own thing."
Rebecca focused on the muscles mostly because it was a thing she was learning. Whenever a talent reached an acceptable point, she had to read and study and do a new one. She refused to let any knowledge or skill be outside of her grasp if she wanted it. Why have money, if it meant she couldn't train herself to learn what she want, "I actually, when the platoons get bigger, am going to encourage people to split off and go their own way if they choose."
"Ideologically effective, you might not make as much money though." Nare's laying on her front, the criss-cross of whip marks on her back freshly healed from the medigel, letting Rebecca work at shoulders tight as steel wire.
She laughed as she kneaded steel back to cord, "Being rich doesn't get you in the history book, being connected, crazy, and leaving rooms full of jellified people however? That does. I'm just building a network so that people have to be aware of me." Quieter to herself, afterwards a bit dark, and angry, "Now... Not noticing me is their biggest mistake."
"I wonder what its like inside your head." Nare mumbles into the pillow, the sweet and pleasant voice, just at a middling pitch for a femme speaking muffled by the cloth, "Just....all that swirling around. If we ever get together, I'd wanna see." She admits with a relaxed sigh.
Rebecca nodded, "Lisa described it as 'A woman who loves what she hates. Or perhaps hates what she loves.' Made me feel bad to hear that's what she's thinking when I say I love her, but that's life."
"She's a Matriarch." Nare turns around, baring her front to Rebecca as she continues speaking, "They're long past like, being dishonest to people they care about. If you hate her because of what she's thinking.....why stick around her?" The Command says as she closes her eyes again, waiting for the warm touch of oil.
Rebecca had to slip away, just for a second to allow the woman to move, and returned lifting a thigh and resting the calve on her shoulder, working the muscles and tendons along the inside of it. "I don't hate her, I love her, but like... Then what does what she said mean then? I ask, but I never get it." She sighs quietly, focusing on loosening the tendon gently.
"Probably some like-oh Goddess that's good-" As a pop of the joint echoes, Nare is forced to exclaim.
Rebecca was proud and smiled to herself, she didn't get much practice even if she really wanted it.
"Like," The Commando puts on a faux-ancient Asari voice, deepening and roughing it up as best she can, mostly coming out funny rather than accurate, "The truth lies within your understanding or some other drek."
"I only live a hundred years, I'm never going to learn what that meeeeans I hate it." Rebecca whined, leaning her head on the calve next to her.
"Hundred and fifty average now for humans I thought?" Nare says with a curious tone.
She shrugged in response, "I don't look it up much, not worth knowing to me. I'll die when I die, and until then I'm going to fuck the galaxy until it bucks me."
The Asari grins at the word choice, "You're still in the Maiden phase I suppose. Its what I am! Only.......seventy. Very young I know." Nare looks to Rebecca, considering, "I'm getting good at estimating human ages, I thiiiiiiink you are......twenty three."
"Twenty six, but holy shit." Rebecca said with a small whisper, "You're the only one whose got close. Even other humans go 'Oh, you must be like thirty.' Because my skin is leathery from the sun and not moisturizing."
"Why would skin be a way to tell? You just look into their eyes, their behaviours, the way they smile and act. Its surefire." Nare says confidently, before giving out a breathy sigh as Rebecca moves onto her thigh muscles with powerful hands.
"Because, not every species are personified sonnets," Rebecca scoffed with an eye roll, "Some of us just have to be like... Awkward and clunky sometimes."
"We're not that special. Human and Asari social neurons are identical." Nare says with closed eyes.
Rebecca stopped for a second and looked at the Asari, "Ma'am. When an Asari laughs, the entire room stops to listen." She moves to the other calve.
"Ma'am, when you laugh, the room starts to shiver." Nare chuckles.
Oh my god she's so sweet, Rebecca melted a little, "That is one of the nicest," She stopped, "Ugh, that's great. I'm going to hold onto that for a while I think."
"I think I'll be leaving the Citadel in a few days, so after that, whenever we next see eachother. Going on a job by this human supremacist group or whatever. They want us to comb through a ice planet for something." The Asari shrugs.
"I can definitely afford your contract, the fuck you doing with human supremacists?" Rebecca moved onto the other thigh, rubbing it, "No money can be worth that."
Nare laughs a beautiful, gorgeous laugh, full of joy and future wealth. "A cool, sexy, gorgeous one hundred kay a week is what I'm doing."
"Ah. Yeah that'll do it unfortunately," Rebecca said wistfully, "I'm probably going to stay here and keep killing cops for a bit."
"They want us to find a body or some shit. On a whole planet." Nare continues to describe the job as Rebecca makes smalltalk, "From what I heard, their ship got opened up, and they got vented, hit the atmo, and went all the way through it on fire."
The muscle seems a tiny bit tense on the opposite side, and needed more work. So she focused on the woman talking, and let her hands be her affirmant.
"Wild stuff, I wonder what they want the body for. Like, they're dead, nothing survives a re-entry, not even a Krogan." She says with a very firm emphasis.
"There's still techno-zombies running around on the Citadel some days." Rebecca laughed, "It's given me new ideas about what dead and alive is."
"Well, lets be clear here, there's not gonna be a like, body left really, once you're having plasma form on your skin from atmospheric effects, there's not gonna be a flesh chunk left. What I think we're looking for is like, hard-suit chunks." The Asari admits with a sigh.
"Just enough to fake like whoever you're looking for recovered." Rebecca offered.
"Maybe yeah. Unless they had some cutting edge Spectre made hard-suit that lets someone stay unjellified from hitting the ground at the speed of sound. Which'd be cool. I guess." Nera lets her voice drone on as the last of her tension is pushed out, fully relaxing into Rebecca.
"Mother fucker." Rebecca whispered to herself. "If you find them, just put two in their head. For the love of god."
"Fuuuuuuck no, respectfully, the finder's fee is thirty five million in chits, no tax, no record, that's retirement money. I can go, sit down, hire myself a harem, make a business and gamble my money away at the same time." Nare laughs, looking at Rebecca with dark, amused eyes as she puts her other leg on the taller woman's shoulders, "Do you get told you're pretty often?" She asks with a hum.
"Used to never happen, ever." Rebecca admitted, "The mercs I was with found me... Incredibly unsettling. Even other enlisted would look at me like I was freak. They'd hear a lot about me before working with me I guess." She wasn't looking at Nare's face anymore, thinking whether she was going to bring her head down or not, "The new people I'm with do it constantly, and it makes every day better. Now I call everyone I think is pretty, pretty. I know it means something."
"Its interesting, I know why some idiots might not think you are." Nare starts off, looking up at Rebecca with the oddly cold eyes, "But they just can't see it, the roughness, the scars, the eyes that even forged of steel still shine with history and lessons learned. You're the tapestry of your life, writ in smiles and scars, burns and callouses." She touches Rebecca's hand, manipulating it so she's put her fingertips to the human's palm, brushing alongside the replicated skin that kept the features of her old arms.
"Even the artificial skin tells story, more, even, than some real skin does. When I look at you, I see every part of you, and I think that's very, very pretty." The Commando compliments with a smile that comes easily to her, crinkling eyes and a brightening of the surrounding light intermixing with the supernatural allure of her kind to draw Rebecca's gaze up and into Nare's own.
"That's..." Rebecca's eyes crinkle a bit, "I don't think... A lot of people seem to be able to compliment so easily. It means a lot, especially when it's... Close. I'd say you're beautiful and fun, but I'd be fucked if I imagined you haven't heard it a million times over by now."
"I'm only seventy, and I wasn't having sex 'till I was fifty." Nare chuckles, but nods to Rebecca's point. "Its not about, in my opinion, the words per say. I could have stopped all those words," Nare pulls her legs free to shift and lean up, "Leaned in close," The Asari leans in to just an inch or two away, letting the scent of relaxant oil and tea candle mix, meeting eyes with Rebecca and giving a gentle, alluring smile, "And said," She teases her own words with another stop, "You are gorgeous." Nare breathes out the word, letting her shoulders drop in relief after getting it out, like admitting it openly was a weight off her. Saying the truth as she believes it relieving her.
Its played up, its flirtatious and obviously half for show, though there's certainly a very real, very honest appreciation of Rebecca's beauty from the Asari underneath the silk and honey of her smiling act.
"I really like pretty words," Rebecca admitted, as she whispered to Nare, "I love the way some people can make them create connections and feelings you never thought possible. I'll try it your way though, but full warning, my words suck."
With a small, measured breath, and after leaning in, slowly kissing the crook of the woman's neck, Rebecca whispered, "I notice you. You stand out because you're beautiful and strong."
"See?" Rebecca says as she pulls back, "I was really thinking on that one too."
"And it was beautiful." Nare assures with a joyful look on her face, "Your affection is a rare treat, a compliment from you is worth more than gold and riches could be." She throws her arms around Rebecca and hugs her with a chuckle that is small, short and warm.
Rebecca, having spent six months in Omega, and before then spent years being flown to different time zones, sometimes multiple times a day, ahd a keen inner clock, and with a small sigh she said, "I'd have really liked to hire you. I gotta keep the wheels spinning unfortunately." She bonks Nare's head with her own , "Those space-nazis are blessed to be able to afford your attention."
"Appreciate it, really." Nare accepts the compliment with a grin.
Then she pulls away, puts her soft suit on, then her hard suit, attaches her gun, knife, and checks her omnitool to look and make sure no RFID tags are missing, a warning that she has left behind gear. It surprised her, in a world of technology that things like this hadn't become more common. Maybe other people were just higher functioning then her.
"Good bye Nare." Rebecca says with a small smile. Fuck, being a mercenary is so fucking cool.
Purgatory is alive. The clubs always alive, bodies and drugs spilling across the floor in a tidal wave of detectable, heard and felt emotion that moves as if it was a physical thing across the writhing patrons on the dance floor and even moves to the seated people's to arc at their hearts, tempt them to life, asking them to live.
Ras is leaning on the edge of a safety rail above all that, the chit of sale from a massive shipment of Red Sand firmly in hand as she finally, with great relief, lets out a sigh, having finally managed to catch up on sales after Rebecca made life for Blue Sun difficult on the Citadel.
She was watching Rebecca who took everything too seriously. She could hear the mercenary talking to a bartender, "Hey, I know you're skimming from the till, I've been letting it slide, but keep it under fifteen percent alright? I can't hide that on the books, you're going to get CSEC down here thinking we're doing tax-crimes. If you need more money ask, don't fucking steal from me alright? I need to keep this place running, that's it. If it happens again, I'm going to put you on a personal improvement plan."
"Rebecca, stop harassing the help." Ras laughs from above, leaning her chest onto the railing and staring down fully now, glimmering purple light behind the polarized glass of the helmet. It'd been two months of working together now.
She points at the bartender, handing him a chit, "Order drinks for everyone, void the cost and put this in the till. Don't steal it." Her eyes glared at the stupid fucking Salarian. Waiting, just a moment for her books to show the updated totals properly.
Rebeccah climbed the stairs quickly and then reached Ras, "Sorry. I don't like dirty books on the clean side, and people deserve a warning."
"Mhmm, but this is an unlicensed club. We don't report income." Ras finds this whole situation amusing, "Its why they close us down every two-three months, for the PR bump." She's gotten a new envirosuit, one that's a little better made, and with gold filigrees on the curves and angles of her body, a luxurious piece.
"You still have to pay taxes on illegal busines— Have you not been filing the 101-422(c) forms?!" Rebecca mutters angrily, "Ugh."
"Can't exactly report Red Sand sale, and they won't let you fill it out online without a Source of Income description." Ras murmurs annoyedly, "But stop mathing at me on my day off. I sold a billion creds of Red Sand ten hours ago, we can calm down. Enjoy life!" She's bubbling and happy again, starting to do a tiny dance that's effortlessly adorable.
"Why?" Rebecca tilted her head, but still grabbed her by the waist dancing with her, "I mean why calm down."
"A-aha." Ras still stutters from Rebecca's forward and direct demeanour now that they both are playing games of this sort, "C-careful, we still h-have a lot of cleanroom time l-left." She says, reminding Rebecca that this next one's going to be mask off, for the first time. The bronchal infection cleared up last week, and filterless existence doesn't seem to be getting Ras sick anymore.
Rebecca moved her hands from the side of the waist into a small hug, "I mean, I have self control. Most of the time I'm trying to keep you from dying." She still wasn't sure if Ras was actually planning to undo her suit, or was just testing Rebecca's commitment. Either way, it bugged her, luckily she had ways of getting even. Especially when their hips touched.
"Sure, but you were the one that s-s-said," Her voice turns to a naked stutter once Rebecca was suddenly very close and very present, "I-its romantic for m-me to get sick." Ras finishes her thought, putting three-fingered hands on the side of Rebecca's waist, letting them trail down to her hips nervously.
"I believe," Rebecca whispered pulling Ras in close, "My words were 'the risk and sacrifice,' was what made it romantic. It wasn't that you had to get sick. It was choosing someone you want so badly, you'd risk getting sick, because it was the only way. Like fighting through a platoon, to reach someone you care about at the end of the hallway."
Ras stutters something that sounds like the first attempts at words in living history, but breathes aftewards to get control of herself, "There i-is something we have to t-talk about with, uhm, b-business. You wanna k-kill two birds w-with one stone? Go-go to the clean room and t-talk there?"
"Ri-ri— right now?" Rebecca said freezing just for a second, she felt her confidence drain as the enormity of mask off time hit her, "Oh, I was... I had. Yeah um."
"Y-yeah." Ras agrees, finding it massive as well, "Uhm, yeah. D-did you not w-want too? W-we can do it a-another time that's, uhm, its, uhm, f-fine." She starts to stutter and then barely gets out the word fine.
"I uh, no no, I just had an outfit in mind an um," Rebecca admits quietly, "I had this lacey thing, that's like... It's mostly cleverly placed tape.*"
"O-oh! Uhm, w-want to meet me there?" The Quarian offers thoughtlessly, blushing incandescently when she realizes what just left her mouth.
"Yes," Rebecca said eyes going wide at the thought of being... Of making an art show out of herself, for someone who might not have seen... Everything like most of her partners. Letting a bit of her worldliness finally show. "Oh, uh, knock three times if I should be going for the mass accelerator because you're in trouble."
"Huh?" Ras asks confused.
"Like... Do you not worry about that? That we might get ambushed consistently going to a room where we're definitely both... ahem pre-disposed." Rebecca said with a small blush.
"I, uhm, downloaded some drone flashforge designs. Like, twelve of them, and keep a tank of omnigel to use them." Ras states her own paranoid solution, "If someone ambushes me, I should have more guns than them pretty fast."
Rebecca nods, "I'm very lucky that you're smart." She gives her a small kiss on the helmet. A tiny print appearing on the plate that makes her giggle at the idea of Ras walking around with it.
"'Cause you'd a done great in Blue Sun. I know we might seem like we're cool, calm, and collected, but that's just cause we're really, really, really good at covering shit up." The Asari has a cigarette in her mouth and medigel on most of her skin, the cool touch of wet nanomachines healing her play-marks apparently a pleasant sensation.
Rebecca takes the cigarette out of Nare's mouth, and takes a drag before returning it, and continues applying medigel. "I was never going to stay, with a mercenary company. The money isn't in working, it's in owning." She exhales, "I'm not going to be anything but the top. I refuse too at this point."
"Oh, you're one of thoooose." Nare nods approvingly, taking the cigarette out of her mouth and, to make more work for Rebecca, ashes it on a part of skin already medigel'd, the hiss of pain and burning skin alike seems to draw a smile out of her paradoxically.
Rebecca smacks her behind the head, once, hard, "Stop that." Then rubs a little medigel on the burn, "This shit's expensive, but yeah. Need to wrack up a high score so that when a Spectre lands on Omega they hear, 'and careful around the Worthy Fists, because Rebecca Dinozzo' and then get a read out of a hundred different combat worthy feats."
Nare smiles, picking out another cigarette from a pack of them she's burning through, apparently three a day's her average, and lights it up. As it rests between her lips, nearly dangling out of her mouth she speaks, "You coulda done that plenty o' ways. Merc commander seems..... well, not the worst way, but couldn't you have gone into like, hitmanning? Assassin work?"
"Keep the glory for yourself, not a platoon-level split." She stretches out with a sigh and a pop of blue skin rippling with tense muscle, still relaxing. This whole conversation being aftercare really, a return to normality after hours of abnormality.
Rebecca pulled out a clove, and lit it, "When you join the marine corps, there's this thing they promise you. If you work hard, work really hard, you get a leadership position." She took a long hard draw watching the kretek crackle, and spark. "I instead got wrapped up in a black-ops program. Never got the thing I was promised. Now it's the galaxy's problem."
Nera smiles again, patting at Rebecca's arm, "Hey, I think you're a great leader. You pissed off my employers enough to have to be one." She reassures, making it clear that being pleasant, kind and loving is just in the Asari genome rather than any sort of learned skill of theirs.
"Thank you, there's like a... It's stupid, but there's also a very personal point to the whole merc troupe thing." Rebecca admits, now putting the medigel down and grabbing a muscle relaxing oil. It had been over a scented tea candle, getting warmed to skin temperature, "When I woke up on Omega, I tried my best to get myself killed. Everyone who cared about me made sure I didn't. Now I have a merc troupe where you can go and try to get yourself killed just to join, and hopefully the leaders and shit I pick can point that energy to making their own thing."
Rebecca focused on the muscles mostly because it was a thing she was learning. Whenever a talent reached an acceptable point, she had to read and study and do a new one. She refused to let any knowledge or skill be outside of her grasp if she wanted it. Why have money, if it meant she couldn't train herself to learn what she want, "I actually, when the platoons get bigger, am going to encourage people to split off and go their own way if they choose."
"Ideologically effective, you might not make as much money though." Nare's laying on her front, the criss-cross of whip marks on her back freshly healed from the medigel, letting Rebecca work at shoulders tight as steel wire.
She laughed as she kneaded steel back to cord, "Being rich doesn't get you in the history book, being connected, crazy, and leaving rooms full of jellified people however? That does. I'm just building a network so that people have to be aware of me." Quieter to herself, afterwards a bit dark, and angry, "Now... Not noticing me is their biggest mistake."
"I wonder what its like inside your head." Nare mumbles into the pillow, the sweet and pleasant voice, just at a middling pitch for a femme speaking muffled by the cloth, "Just....all that swirling around. If we ever get together, I'd wanna see." She admits with a relaxed sigh.
Rebecca nodded, "Lisa described it as 'A woman who loves what she hates. Or perhaps hates what she loves.' Made me feel bad to hear that's what she's thinking when I say I love her, but that's life."
"She's a Matriarch." Nare turns around, baring her front to Rebecca as she continues speaking, "They're long past like, being dishonest to people they care about. If you hate her because of what she's thinking.....why stick around her?" The Command says as she closes her eyes again, waiting for the warm touch of oil.
Rebecca had to slip away, just for a second to allow the woman to move, and returned lifting a thigh and resting the calve on her shoulder, working the muscles and tendons along the inside of it. "I don't hate her, I love her, but like... Then what does what she said mean then? I ask, but I never get it." She sighs quietly, focusing on loosening the tendon gently.
"Probably some like-oh Goddess that's good-" As a pop of the joint echoes, Nare is forced to exclaim.
Rebecca was proud and smiled to herself, she didn't get much practice even if she really wanted it.
"Like," The Commando puts on a faux-ancient Asari voice, deepening and roughing it up as best she can, mostly coming out funny rather than accurate, "The truth lies within your understanding or some other drek."
"I only live a hundred years, I'm never going to learn what that meeeeans I hate it." Rebecca whined, leaning her head on the calve next to her.
"Hundred and fifty average now for humans I thought?" Nare says with a curious tone.
She shrugged in response, "I don't look it up much, not worth knowing to me. I'll die when I die, and until then I'm going to fuck the galaxy until it bucks me."
The Asari grins at the word choice, "You're still in the Maiden phase I suppose. Its what I am! Only.......seventy. Very young I know." Nare looks to Rebecca, considering, "I'm getting good at estimating human ages, I thiiiiiiink you are......twenty three."
"Twenty six, but holy shit." Rebecca said with a small whisper, "You're the only one whose got close. Even other humans go 'Oh, you must be like thirty.' Because my skin is leathery from the sun and not moisturizing."
"Why would skin be a way to tell? You just look into their eyes, their behaviours, the way they smile and act. Its surefire." Nare says confidently, before giving out a breathy sigh as Rebecca moves onto her thigh muscles with powerful hands.
"Because, not every species are personified sonnets," Rebecca scoffed with an eye roll, "Some of us just have to be like... Awkward and clunky sometimes."
"We're not that special. Human and Asari social neurons are identical." Nare says with closed eyes.
Rebecca stopped for a second and looked at the Asari, "Ma'am. When an Asari laughs, the entire room stops to listen." She moves to the other calve.
"Ma'am, when you laugh, the room starts to shiver." Nare chuckles.
Oh my god she's so sweet, Rebecca melted a little, "That is one of the nicest," She stopped, "Ugh, that's great. I'm going to hold onto that for a while I think."
"I think I'll be leaving the Citadel in a few days, so after that, whenever we next see eachother. Going on a job by this human supremacist group or whatever. They want us to comb through a ice planet for something." The Asari shrugs.
"I can definitely afford your contract, the fuck you doing with human supremacists?" Rebecca moved onto the other thigh, rubbing it, "No money can be worth that."
Nare laughs a beautiful, gorgeous laugh, full of joy and future wealth. "A cool, sexy, gorgeous one hundred kay a week is what I'm doing."
"Ah. Yeah that'll do it unfortunately," Rebecca said wistfully, "I'm probably going to stay here and keep killing cops for a bit."
"They want us to find a body or some shit. On a whole planet." Nare continues to describe the job as Rebecca makes smalltalk, "From what I heard, their ship got opened up, and they got vented, hit the atmo, and went all the way through it on fire."
The muscle seems a tiny bit tense on the opposite side, and needed more work. So she focused on the woman talking, and let her hands be her affirmant.
"Wild stuff, I wonder what they want the body for. Like, they're dead, nothing survives a re-entry, not even a Krogan." She says with a very firm emphasis.
"There's still techno-zombies running around on the Citadel some days." Rebecca laughed, "It's given me new ideas about what dead and alive is."
"Well, lets be clear here, there's not gonna be a like, body left really, once you're having plasma form on your skin from atmospheric effects, there's not gonna be a flesh chunk left. What I think we're looking for is like, hard-suit chunks." The Asari admits with a sigh.
"Just enough to fake like whoever you're looking for recovered." Rebecca offered.
"Maybe yeah. Unless they had some cutting edge Spectre made hard-suit that lets someone stay unjellified from hitting the ground at the speed of sound. Which'd be cool. I guess." Nera lets her voice drone on as the last of her tension is pushed out, fully relaxing into Rebecca.
"Mother fucker." Rebecca whispered to herself. "If you find them, just put two in their head. For the love of god."
"Fuuuuuuck no, respectfully, the finder's fee is thirty five million in chits, no tax, no record, that's retirement money. I can go, sit down, hire myself a harem, make a business and gamble my money away at the same time." Nare laughs, looking at Rebecca with dark, amused eyes as she puts her other leg on the taller woman's shoulders, "Do you get told you're pretty often?" She asks with a hum.
"Used to never happen, ever." Rebecca admitted, "The mercs I was with found me... Incredibly unsettling. Even other enlisted would look at me like I was freak. They'd hear a lot about me before working with me I guess." She wasn't looking at Nare's face anymore, thinking whether she was going to bring her head down or not, "The new people I'm with do it constantly, and it makes every day better. Now I call everyone I think is pretty, pretty. I know it means something."
"Its interesting, I know why some idiots might not think you are." Nare starts off, looking up at Rebecca with the oddly cold eyes, "But they just can't see it, the roughness, the scars, the eyes that even forged of steel still shine with history and lessons learned. You're the tapestry of your life, writ in smiles and scars, burns and callouses." She touches Rebecca's hand, manipulating it so she's put her fingertips to the human's palm, brushing alongside the replicated skin that kept the features of her old arms.
"Even the artificial skin tells story, more, even, than some real skin does. When I look at you, I see every part of you, and I think that's very, very pretty." The Commando compliments with a smile that comes easily to her, crinkling eyes and a brightening of the surrounding light intermixing with the supernatural allure of her kind to draw Rebecca's gaze up and into Nare's own.
"That's..." Rebecca's eyes crinkle a bit, "I don't think... A lot of people seem to be able to compliment so easily. It means a lot, especially when it's... Close. I'd say you're beautiful and fun, but I'd be fucked if I imagined you haven't heard it a million times over by now."
"I'm only seventy, and I wasn't having sex 'till I was fifty." Nare chuckles, but nods to Rebecca's point. "Its not about, in my opinion, the words per say. I could have stopped all those words," Nare pulls her legs free to shift and lean up, "Leaned in close," The Asari leans in to just an inch or two away, letting the scent of relaxant oil and tea candle mix, meeting eyes with Rebecca and giving a gentle, alluring smile, "And said," She teases her own words with another stop, "You are gorgeous." Nare breathes out the word, letting her shoulders drop in relief after getting it out, like admitting it openly was a weight off her. Saying the truth as she believes it relieving her.
Its played up, its flirtatious and obviously half for show, though there's certainly a very real, very honest appreciation of Rebecca's beauty from the Asari underneath the silk and honey of her smiling act.
"I really like pretty words," Rebecca admitted, as she whispered to Nare, "I love the way some people can make them create connections and feelings you never thought possible. I'll try it your way though, but full warning, my words suck."
With a small, measured breath, and after leaning in, slowly kissing the crook of the woman's neck, Rebecca whispered, "I notice you. You stand out because you're beautiful and strong."
"See?" Rebecca says as she pulls back, "I was really thinking on that one too."
"And it was beautiful." Nare assures with a joyful look on her face, "Your affection is a rare treat, a compliment from you is worth more than gold and riches could be." She throws her arms around Rebecca and hugs her with a chuckle that is small, short and warm.
Rebecca, having spent six months in Omega, and before then spent years being flown to different time zones, sometimes multiple times a day, ahd a keen inner clock, and with a small sigh she said, "I'd have really liked to hire you. I gotta keep the wheels spinning unfortunately." She bonks Nare's head with her own , "Those space-nazis are blessed to be able to afford your attention."
"Appreciate it, really." Nare accepts the compliment with a grin.
Then she pulls away, puts her soft suit on, then her hard suit, attaches her gun, knife, and checks her omnitool to look and make sure no RFID tags are missing, a warning that she has left behind gear. It surprised her, in a world of technology that things like this hadn't become more common. Maybe other people were just higher functioning then her.
"Good bye Nare." Rebecca says with a small smile. Fuck, being a mercenary is so fucking cool.
★ ★ ★
Purgatory is alive. The clubs always alive, bodies and drugs spilling across the floor in a tidal wave of detectable, heard and felt emotion that moves as if it was a physical thing across the writhing patrons on the dance floor and even moves to the seated people's to arc at their hearts, tempt them to life, asking them to live.
Ras is leaning on the edge of a safety rail above all that, the chit of sale from a massive shipment of Red Sand firmly in hand as she finally, with great relief, lets out a sigh, having finally managed to catch up on sales after Rebecca made life for Blue Sun difficult on the Citadel.
She was watching Rebecca who took everything too seriously. She could hear the mercenary talking to a bartender, "Hey, I know you're skimming from the till, I've been letting it slide, but keep it under fifteen percent alright? I can't hide that on the books, you're going to get CSEC down here thinking we're doing tax-crimes. If you need more money ask, don't fucking steal from me alright? I need to keep this place running, that's it. If it happens again, I'm going to put you on a personal improvement plan."
"Rebecca, stop harassing the help." Ras laughs from above, leaning her chest onto the railing and staring down fully now, glimmering purple light behind the polarized glass of the helmet. It'd been two months of working together now.
She points at the bartender, handing him a chit, "Order drinks for everyone, void the cost and put this in the till. Don't steal it." Her eyes glared at the stupid fucking Salarian. Waiting, just a moment for her books to show the updated totals properly.
Rebeccah climbed the stairs quickly and then reached Ras, "Sorry. I don't like dirty books on the clean side, and people deserve a warning."
"Mhmm, but this is an unlicensed club. We don't report income." Ras finds this whole situation amusing, "Its why they close us down every two-three months, for the PR bump." She's gotten a new envirosuit, one that's a little better made, and with gold filigrees on the curves and angles of her body, a luxurious piece.
"You still have to pay taxes on illegal busines— Have you not been filing the 101-422(c) forms?!" Rebecca mutters angrily, "Ugh."
"Can't exactly report Red Sand sale, and they won't let you fill it out online without a Source of Income description." Ras murmurs annoyedly, "But stop mathing at me on my day off. I sold a billion creds of Red Sand ten hours ago, we can calm down. Enjoy life!" She's bubbling and happy again, starting to do a tiny dance that's effortlessly adorable.
"Why?" Rebecca tilted her head, but still grabbed her by the waist dancing with her, "I mean why calm down."
"A-aha." Ras still stutters from Rebecca's forward and direct demeanour now that they both are playing games of this sort, "C-careful, we still h-have a lot of cleanroom time l-left." She says, reminding Rebecca that this next one's going to be mask off, for the first time. The bronchal infection cleared up last week, and filterless existence doesn't seem to be getting Ras sick anymore.
Rebecca moved her hands from the side of the waist into a small hug, "I mean, I have self control. Most of the time I'm trying to keep you from dying." She still wasn't sure if Ras was actually planning to undo her suit, or was just testing Rebecca's commitment. Either way, it bugged her, luckily she had ways of getting even. Especially when their hips touched.
"Sure, but you were the one that s-s-said," Her voice turns to a naked stutter once Rebecca was suddenly very close and very present, "I-its romantic for m-me to get sick." Ras finishes her thought, putting three-fingered hands on the side of Rebecca's waist, letting them trail down to her hips nervously.
"I believe," Rebecca whispered pulling Ras in close, "My words were 'the risk and sacrifice,' was what made it romantic. It wasn't that you had to get sick. It was choosing someone you want so badly, you'd risk getting sick, because it was the only way. Like fighting through a platoon, to reach someone you care about at the end of the hallway."
Ras stutters something that sounds like the first attempts at words in living history, but breathes aftewards to get control of herself, "There i-is something we have to t-talk about with, uhm, b-business. You wanna k-kill two birds w-with one stone? Go-go to the clean room and t-talk there?"
"Ri-ri— right now?" Rebecca said freezing just for a second, she felt her confidence drain as the enormity of mask off time hit her, "Oh, I was... I had. Yeah um."
"Y-yeah." Ras agrees, finding it massive as well, "Uhm, yeah. D-did you not w-want too? W-we can do it a-another time that's, uhm, its, uhm, f-fine." She starts to stutter and then barely gets out the word fine.
"I uh, no no, I just had an outfit in mind an um," Rebecca admits quietly, "I had this lacey thing, that's like... It's mostly cleverly placed tape.*"
"O-oh! Uhm, w-want to meet me there?" The Quarian offers thoughtlessly, blushing incandescently when she realizes what just left her mouth.
"Yes," Rebecca said eyes going wide at the thought of being... Of making an art show out of herself, for someone who might not have seen... Everything like most of her partners. Letting a bit of her worldliness finally show. "Oh, uh, knock three times if I should be going for the mass accelerator because you're in trouble."
"Huh?" Ras asks confused.
"Like... Do you not worry about that? That we might get ambushed consistently going to a room where we're definitely both... ahem pre-disposed." Rebecca said with a small blush.
"I, uhm, downloaded some drone flashforge designs. Like, twelve of them, and keep a tank of omnigel to use them." Ras states her own paranoid solution, "If someone ambushes me, I should have more guns than them pretty fast."
Rebecca nods, "I'm very lucky that you're smart." She gives her a small kiss on the helmet. A tiny print appearing on the plate that makes her giggle at the idea of Ras walking around with it.
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