Originally posted this in the Jack thread...
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Jack had precious little to do with her time in the below-decks hold other than read and stare at the walls. Fortunately, the the files that Shepard provided her gave her ample reading material. It would take her days to go through it.
Footsteps on the stairs caused her to look up from the datapad for the first time in hours. She expected Shepard, but instead it was a quarian who braved her domain. The alien looked surprised to see her.
"Who the **** are you?" Jack said, climbing to her feet to block her path into her quarters. She looked the newcomer from head to toe. The quarian's mask made it impossible to see her expression, but the glowing eyes behind the surface did not flinch.
"I'm the person who keeps the engines running and your air flowing." She gestured to the storage area beyond. "May I?"
Jack didn't break her gaze. She wanted to teach the uppity **** a thing or two about respect, but she knew better than to mess with anybody who kept a ship up and running, especially when she was on it. She smiled, but did not move. "Don't let me stop you. Get to work, grease monkey."
"Thank you," the quarian said and stepped around her, her focus shifting to the lockers and containers in the room. She approached a large crate that Jack had chosen to store her belongings, which is to say she had dumped an armload of dirty clothes and gear in a sloppy pile on top of it. She started transferring them to the lid of a neighboring crate.
Jack stepped towards her. "Hey! What are you doing with my ****?"
"Your '****'," Tali waved her hands, "Is on top of my '****.'"
Jack thought back to the dossiers she had been reading, and about the personnel aboard the ship. The identity of the quarian suddenly registered. "You must be Zorah."
"Tali'Zorah Vas Neema. How do you know my name?"
Jack waved the datapad. "Read all about you. You and your friends. Took out a lot of Cerberus ****heads, didn't you?"
"Not nearly enough."
"Huh." She looked at the datapad. "They don't like you very much."
"The feeling is mutual." Tali rummaged through the crate and came up with a shrink-wrapped box for her efforts. She checked the part number and placed it under her arm. She walked back towards the stairway.
"What the **** are you doing on their ship?" Jack asked.
Tali stopped and shook her head. "You know, I ask myself that every day. But I'm not here for them."
"Yeah? How'd you end up here then?"
"The same way you did." Tali stopped at the base of the stairs and looked back to the human. "Nice meeting you."
Modifié par ElectricZ, 24 décembre 2010 - 04:51 .