[Citadel, Zakera] Benchwarmers (Open)

"Yeah, Lower Zakera. Some bitter quarian broad is harassing a quarian dude with Relicae's. Yes, that surgery. Some Hierarchy dumbass is trying to be a hero and force her to apologize, and now the quarian chick is glaring at them like she's gonna stab them. No, I don't see any way out of the situation! Send a few knuckleheads down to arrest this woman for disturbing the peace?" The loudmouthed Vorcha could be heard by the group of surrounding people. A few krogan were placing bets on how long it would take the cyborg to beat the quarian to a pulp.

Neela had been out shopping with her daughter, Mina, when she felt the child pull at her arm and she heard the unmistakable tone of an overconfident male Turian. The soldier turned to look where her little girl was staring. A ragged looking quarian was being harassed by the Turian and some kind of full body cyborg. She took cautious steps closer, knowing that she didn't know the full situation, but feeling compelled to keep things from escalating. She channeled all of her authority and the weight of her rank, then tightened her grip on Mina's hand and barked out her question like an order,

"What is going on here Soldier?!

Damn, C-Sec was taking its sweet-ass time getting here. On Omega, a triple murder grand-theft-auto could have happened seven times over. Reem used his Omni-tool to flash a picture at the quarian woman.

"Yeah, bro, damn right!" Nem clapped Kai on the back again. His hand was beginning to get a little numb from constantly slapping what amounted to a ceramic and metal pillar, but a near lifetime of thumping fellow soldier in hardsuits had left him familiar with the sensation.

"Oh, he was bothering you, was he?" Nem laughed mirthlessly at Kari. "So what was he after, huh? What was he hitting you up for credits? Hitting on you? Was he trying to get you to embrace the wisdom of the Enkindlers or some shit? Come on, what did he do that bothered you so much you felt 'abomination' was the right thing to hit back with?"

Nem looked Kari up and down again, and shook his head once. He then cast a lingering eye over at Kai, at synthetic limbs that looked as though they could punch through concrete.

"Girl," he began, his tone sincere, "I would love to see you angry."

Hearing Neela's voice behind him, he instinctively straightened at its tone. He turned, and seeing no obvious indication of rank, merely offered a questioning look, waiting for some indication of who he was dealing with.

If there was one that was ridiculous it was a vorcha calling c-sec to report a quarian threatening a cyborg. So that call had, in all likelihood, been filed under the same type of prank calls as "a yahg stole my pizza" and "a geth stole my fly-car", needless to say C-sec would not be showing up for a long time.

Meanwhile, Kari was getting even more irritated. Not only was the drunken idiot not taking the abomination away. But now more people were showing up. Including a child. How fun.

"Yes", she said glaring at Thaedi. "It was bothering me. It is still bothering me", she said before looking at Neela and trying her best to look sympathetic. "These two are bothering me. Could you please have them removed? I am just trying to keep to myself but they are harassing me."

"I am not an 'it'," Kai said forcefully, hands of metal and plastic and ceramics curling tightly into fists. Then he realized that they had an audience and was struck with a sudden stab of panic. What if that little outburst was enough to get him thrown in jail for disturbing the peace!? Oh Keelah oh Keelah why did it have to come to this?

"I'm... I'm not bothering her," he said as he turned to face the turian newcomer, struggling very hard to keep his voice even. "I just asked for directions and she started calling me an it and an a-abomination..." Keelah don't stammer like that, you sound like a toddler!

Taking just a moment to appraise the situation, she recognized the look in the cyborg's face. "spirits, he's only a child....." She muttered under her breath. She looked hard at the synthetic Quarian a moment, then crouched to Mina's height,

"Mina, take the nice cyborg man over to the vendor over there and have some ice cream while mommy takes care of this."

The child's eyes lit up and she ran over to the strange cyborg, grabbing his hand and pulling him towards a street vendor.

Neela turned to the soldier still staring at her, "Name and rank soldier!"

"You are an 'it'", she hissed finally looking Kai in the eyes. The venom in her voice increasing even more now that the thing raises its voice at her. "And the fact you have allowed yourself to become such an abomination is so shameful that your own ancestors are probably weeping."

"If you were even a quarian in the first place", she sneered her eyes showing a hint of cruel mockery. "Maybe you are just a geth trying and failing to imitate us"

"Shut up!" For the first time in his life, Kai walked towards the thing that was causing him grief. He stood right over Kari, trembling fists still clenched. A pillar of metal and ceramics poised to fall down on her.

"What did I do to you!?" he shouted, his voice cracking. "What did I do to deserve this, what you're doing to me!? Do you just like it!? Do you like seeing me like this!? Do you just not care how other people feel!? F-fuck you."

((See below.))

Nem bristled, his expression hardening. "You first." He said coolly. In the fragile pause immediately after, both quarians behind him took the opportunity to open up and go loud, snapping Nem's head back around to see how things had so suddenly escalated.

He brought his hands up to chest height, six digits spaced apart. "Can we maybe do the tag flashing and dick waving later?" He hissed at Neela, a hint of genuine concern scrunching up the creases between his forehead plates. He returned a hand, lightly this time, to Kai's shoulder.

"Bro, she ain't worth losing your shit over." He urged. He looked over to once more regard Kari, now taut as a bowstring. "For real?" He asked, uncharacteristically softly. His eyes were shadowed heavily under a knitted brow, mandibles dropped low and loose. "This shit all started because he asked for fucking directions?" He shook his head. "Shit, bro. A million people out on this Ward, and you picked her..."

Neela gave him a nod and something clicked in her head, she recognized the ragged looking quarian on the bench. She shot a venomous look at the seated woman, knowing that no more than what already had could come from her. She turned back to the synthetic man and gave him another appraising look. Wory came over her as she began to pick out the individual emotions pouring from him in a torrent. He was close to rage, very dangerous in this situation. With another poisonous glare to the seated woman, Neela swollowed her revulsion at the cause of all theis and took up Kai's other side and tried to talk to him

"Hey, cool down a moment, she is just naive and hateful. Dont worry about her, im sure that between the four of us," her eyes flicked to her daughter, standing, fearlessly, next to him, "we can figure out how to get yo uwhere yo uneed to go."

She spoke in her most soothing tone, one usually reserved for Mina. She hoped and prayed to the spirits that the synthetic man before her could hear her reason, she wasnt sure how strong he was or if she and the un named soldier beside her could subdue him if he didnt, but come the great beyond or high water, she wouldnt let a raging synthetic harm her daughter.

Kari flinched at Kai's second outburst before glaring back up at him silently. She had faced down worse than this abomination. She had survived a Cerberus assault during the attempted coup on the Citadel. Chased by husks on some dead batarian world. And attacked by what she assumed were Sundowners several months ago. And one thing all of them had in common were the synthetic abominations each group had.

She could handle one more. She was sure of that... even if her omnitool and important line of self-defense was on the fritz. She completely forgot about that during this whole mess. And... It seemed it had her blocked in too. She mentally cursed herself for not just getting up and leaving in the first place. So stupid. She was getting too complacent and it was going to get her killed someday.

just do it

"Fine", she said. Continuing to glare at him and the turians as she swallowed her pride. "I am sorry Maybe I should have just given directions after being pestered so it would have just left me alone without all of this stupid nonsense happening", she looked at the turians again. "There? Satisfied? Now please let me go before someone notices all this stupidity and calls C-sec on all of us"

She noticed the turian child for the first time, "and the child doesn't need to see any more of it either."

Just take it and leave. It's the most backhanded apology in the galaxy but she still technically said sorry so just go-

"No."

Ancestorsdammit.

"That's not even close to an apology. That's you still calling me an 'it'. That's you calling me an 'it' while twisting things to sound like my fault!."

He turned his head to look at Neela - he couldn't cry, and his eyes couldn't go red from trying, but everything else was so perfectly replicated that it didn't matter. "All I did was ask what street this was. That's all I did. That's... th-that's all I..."

It was a strange, curiously exhilarating yet terrifying feeling. Like his brain/mouth filter had been damaged somehow during his conversion.

"You are the most disgusting person I've ever met."

The look on his face as he spoke tugged at her heart. She wagered that if he could cry, he probably would be, and all this for a street name. Her face contorted with rage and she turned to face the seated quarian.

"Oh HELL no! You apologize to him properly! All he did was ask you for a street name!"

A small voice, barely audible filtered into the moment of silence

"Uh-oh, Mommy is mad."

Kari clenched the armrest of the bench in frustration. She couldn't handle this nonsense anymore. No matter how dangerous the situation was getting she couldn't take it anymore.

"I did no such thing. If you don't want to accept the apology fine but I have had enough of you and the rest of these people harassing me!" She shouted. Temporarily forgetting the child was there. Her temper finally exploding like some long dormant volcano. "You. Its always your kind, whether its a synthetic monstrosity, C-sec, or nosey Hierarchy busy bodies of just another fucking quarian you people always have to bother me when I just want to be alone."

She looked Kai straight in the eyes before speaking one final sentence. "You are the most disgusting person I have ever seen."

Well, that did it. If it came down to a truly direct conflict, there were no prizes for guessing who would break first. It took merely half a second of direct eye contact for Kai to avert his eyes, all the previous uncharacteristic pride gone. He averted his eyes, bowed his head, hunched his shoulders. Instinctual responses from the dawn of time, making himself as small and pathetic as possible in the hopes of avoiding the alpha's ire.

"Sorry..."

He remained there, completely frozen, every single thing about his body screaming 'please ignore me'. He even felt frozen. He'd be there for a rather long time unless Kari gave up in disgust and left.

Nem winced. Why, exactly, was it that wherever he went, he was at the epicentre of yelling? Like moths to a flame, the angry and vocal were drawn inexorably to him. A more logical mind may have deduced it was because the turian was himself drawn even more powerfully by even the most meagre hint of a good scrap. Nem simply gnashed his teeth and began to see a bloody stalemate unfold. When unable to overwhelm the enemy with force, retreat, regroup, reload and return.

Watching Kai falter, privately impressed though he was with the vitriol Kari had put into her counterattack, Nem decided it was time to casevac Kai before things got physical.

"Alright, alright. Lady, you're a whackjob." He stated matter-of-factly to Kari, interposing outstretched arms between the two quarians. "But you win. I ain't got time to waste in a C-Sec jail for getting in a tussle, and I ain't gonna watch you tear any more holes in my boy here." He latched back onto Kai, suppressing the shiver he felt at the unfamiliar feeling of synthetic skin. "Come on bro, this shit was my bad. You ain't got nothing you need to prove to this mental bitch. Lemme get ya a drink, or what do you need, like an oil change?" He started to pull away, aiming a shove at Kai and cracking a brow plate in Neela's direction, grinning like he was the funniest fucker in C-Space.

"See you round, shitsuit." He called over his shoulder to Kari, offering her a crude gesture as he did so. "Lemme know if you ever wanna party proper, you dig?"

Just like that, Kai had cracked. She didn't like it, but it was for the best, she wasn't exactly keen on jail time either. She held her hand out for Mina, who took it quickly and happily, and followed after Nem and Kai, not paying the suited quarian another glance. Nem's crack made her roll her eyes, but she smiled none the less.