[Little Rannoch, The Citadel] Playing Host (closed)

It just occurred to Kenec that he hadn't given Arbitrary his address.

Yet, said quarian was on her way at this very instant to his apartment. This meant one of two things to Kenec's (admittedly paranoid) mind; either Arbitrary was spying on him, or his personal information was available for all to see on the Extranet with just a search.

How could that be?! He'd always watched his step, always looked over his shoulder, never went to shady looking sites. He'd even stopped using the dancing elcor .gif he found! There was no way that Arbitrary could have known where he was without illicit means, without violating his trust in the woman!

The fact he trusted a very violent, very unstable mercenary quarian (the fact that they existed still made him shudder in self loathing from the memories of his own stint as one) that threatened him with violence, flirting, and melancholy within a very short time span whenever they talked spoke volumes about him, but that's not important.

Threatening with flirting was totally a thing Kenec believed in now. Damn war.

The apartment itself was small - a living room area that had a couch and a chair as furniture as well as an old HV set and a terminal for Extranet browsing, a kitchen area with a fridge to keep the nutripaste. a waste disposal bin for the used up tubes, as well as a cupboard full of cleaning supplies, and a tap for water. A bed and shower were contained in a 10 x 10 area, with the shower taking up three feet of the area in a sealed chamber. There were no pictures, no sign of paint beyond the default "sterile white" it came with, and no window to the outside world - which made it rather different from the other apartments, since they had at least one near the door to look out onto the neighborhood.

Thus, if he was going to get a sudden, expected unexpected drop from Arbitrary, he needed to clean up.

There was nothing at all to clean up. It was perfectly, disturbingly spotless, even for a quarian. And still he scrubbed away with his one hand on the countertop in the kitchen area.

Kenec had to be an excellent host, after all, and it'd be unquarian of him to have a messy household.

Especially if Arbitrary had one of her mood swings. He'd need to get into practice, and quick.

Arbitrary was not one to knock, as was noted when, instead of being a civil person, she simply hacked past the door VI and opened it on up, sauntering in as if she owned the place. "Oh, hi Kenec."

She took a quick stock of the area immediately after entering the abode. It almost looked homey. Her own place was normally cluttered with all kinds of schematics and half finished something or others so the sheer cleanliness of it all was at the same time familiar as a quarian and disconcerting as a mechanic. "Nice place. A bit smaller than I'm used to but hey. Moving on up from a runabout." Oh the Luvshakh. What an amusing name for a ship.

"How're you holding up? I can tell not well, if the OCD is anything to go by. Went through that phase. It passes...mostly.." Truth be told she kept her weaponry spotless all the time forever. But that was different. She took a seat at the nearest seat-looking object and simply watched him, completely unaware of the potential awkwardness of the act.

"GAH SHIT." Kenec yelled as he stumbled against a wall as soon as Arbitrary decided to, as a wise man once said, "fuck politeness" and sauntered on inside. He looked at her with wide eyes, and he noticed he didn't have his shawl on. He thought that she'd be civil and knock so he could get it. A grave mistake on his part, really. There wasn't even anything overly obscene about the stump of an arm - there was no empty sleeve dangling like a macabre noodle, there was no jutting bone or muscle. It was, quite simply, a stump where his left arm used to be.

The fact Arbitrary could see it, judge it, made him shiver. Almost cry, really. His breathing was heavy, his heart pounded in his chest like thunder, and his vision blurred a bit as he looked at the woman that had just interrupted his carefully built equilibrium. But, if there was at least one good thing he'd gotten good at, it was acting perfectly fine when it was a big pile of varren shit. He stood up on shaky legs, cursing himself for his cowardice. For Arbitrary's rudeness as well, but not out loud. "You uh, frightened me. Heh heh."

Ok, so his acting had deteriorated in the passing years. You try to keep it up when you're in a coma. "You... I should get my shawl."

Arbitrary looked over to his arm and shrugged her shoulders. "If you want. Not like I care, my limbs are synthetic. I'd pop one off but getting them back on is a bitch, nerve connections and what not." She wasn't exactly one to judge people on their limbs, as the notably artificial glow of cybernetic eyes behind her faceplate betrayed.

It was always impressive how fast Kenec could run.

Granted, it wasn't a run so much as a fearful stumble as opened the door to his bedroom - a closet of spare suits shown, as well as a sterile white light coming down from the ceiling. He quickly wrapped his shawl around his shoulders, the grand majority of it draping over his left stump. His stance relaxed visibly, like the intricate wave patterns of his shawl were like a protective shield against the shame he felt.

He returned to the living area and sat across from Arbitrary, his one arm resting on his chair as he tried to keep calm around the woman. Another difficulty; his doctor had told him to see more people. Men, women, didn't matter. That was because, frankly, Kenec was terrified of people. The fact he went to that gathering after months of confidence building was a major step towards integrating into normal society again.

Of course, he got thrown up on when he went, setting back all that progress to square one.

Now, timid and almost shrinking from the woman, Kenec gathered enough courage to speak; "I've been doing well. I lived." He bit his lower lip briefly, hoping it wouldn't set off the woman.

Arbitrary nodded her head. "Living isn't always the same as being alive. Keep that in mind." Most people thought Arbitrary to be a very violent, terrifying individual, more likely to gut you than help you.

These people would be right.

However, something in her wasn't the same after the Reaper War. She figured she was just getting a bit soft. "Hell, you know you're not living when -I'm- counseling you." She chuckled a bit, standing and walking out to the window, arms folded behind her as she took in the view, for whatever it may be. "But that can be fixed. You are quite fixable. I'm...not. You actually haven't changed all that much. Just become less of a people person, maybe a bit cynical. Losing your arm can do that to someone."

She looked at her hand for a moment, as if contemplating something. "At least you didn't get set on fire and left to die. If I hadn't been on a planet that was for all intents and purposes in a vacuum I'd probably be dead from an infection. As it was, the suit sealed and I was stuck in a sterile bubble like a child for two months. Lost both of my hands and had severe scarring over my body."

She figured being able to in some way relate to Kenec would make him more at ease around her. Less likely to judge. "Never got rid of some of the scars I've picked up, even with all the reconstruction. Some things you need to remember."

Kenec looked at the woman as she explained what had happened to her, suddenly feeling rather terrible about himself. She'd lost more, been through more... to an extent. "Maybe I don't feel like I'm alive right now, Arbit." He muttered, not referring to the woman by her real name. Either he forgot, or didn't care to anymore. "It's like a dream. Giant robots killing the galaxy, billions dead, turned into husks. Whole worlds burned to a cinder, mass relays not working anymore. Geth on Rannoch." He clenched his remaining fist, taking a sharp intake of breath.

"Our Admirals selling us out to the machines after one of them kills four million of our people. For his own selfish fucking pride." Kenec growled, grinding his teeth the more he thought about it. "The ship I was born on destroyed, the ship I lived on sacrificing itself to kill just a few geth ships above Rannoch." He lets out the breath through his nostrils, shaking his head. "...all for a fucking planet we based our entire culture around."

"Good fucking job, quarians... good job getting what we could have had centuries ago. Selling out to the machines, letting them inside you like some fucking... perversion of a virus." He got up, his rage invigorating him and overriding his fear. "Nothing can fix me, Arbitrary. Not doctors, not... not friends," The fact he considered Arbitrary a friend either spoke volumes of how his social life was, or how much he could identify with her. "I've always been broken. I fucked and I drank and I drank dairy like I was... like I was a fucking parody of a quarian, pretending that he would be accepted by the galaxy... that I could forget what I was."

He shook his head, chuckling softly, sounding a bit off. Bitter and genuinely finding it humorous at once. "You lost limbs to a fire. So did I. Console exploded right in front of me - boom!" He chuckled more, the memories coming back to him in a slow tide. "Shredded right through my arms - meat was hanging off, I'm pretty sure some marrow cooked... and my artificial arm started to melt." He patted where his stump was. "Permanent nerve damage. Doctor's say it'll be two decades before I can have a replacement... twenty years as a fucking freak."

Kenec quite suddenly lashed out and pounded his fist against the window, closing his eyes and shaking his head. "And you saw. You saw, and you know. I see the stares people give me. That I'm an invalid. Useless. Even you got replacements. Me?"

"I can't be fixed, Arbit." He spat. "I ain't broken, and I ain't gonna take the fucking coward's way out... but I don't feel alive."

Arbitrary walked over to Kenec and patted him on the head a couple of times. "You do understand that you could still get a limited prosthetic right? I mean they've been around for thousands of years. Dicking about with a stump seems unnecessary."

She removed one of her gloves, showing the shimmering metal and synthetic muscle underneath. It was all quite steel colored. "I figured skin wasn't really a necessity, covered by the suit all the time. Yeah people are going to look at you but fuck them. The only person that can fix you -is- you." She wished she had some kind of..something she could do to make the statement more dramatic, but she was unfortunately lacking at the moment. "No psychologist is going to do that. Then again the last one I was involved with I punched in the faceplate so maybe I'm not the best opinion on that. Stop caring what other people think. Your life isn't over because you're not at 100%. Do what I'm doing, refocus your pursuits."

Yes, this was Arbitrary giving a fucking pep talk. Sometimes people needed a kick to get them going. "You flipped shit when I came in here and saw your arm. Take the shawl off. Best you get used to it with someone who doesn't care that it's not there first."

"I care, Arbitrary." Kenec looked at her prosthetic and felt no small amount of envy towards the woman. She could function, she could be useful. Granted, she killed people for a living, and frankly that should have been enough to dismiss Arbitrary's claims of self fixing. But it was never claimed that Kenec was sensible, or logical. "I care because... I don't know. I want people to think I don't care, but I guess it's transparent."

He reluctantly shrugged off his shawl, more out of wanting to please the woman than anything else. He rolled his stump slightly. "I don't want one of those. That'd... that'd just draw more attention. I'm a quarian, Arbitrary. We are quarians. Like it or not... we like to feel useful. Like we're contributing to the group. I mean... I guess because you're an exile, you may not..." Kenec suddenly realized what he said and backed off a good too feet, holding an arm in front of his faceplate. "Oh fuck, that... that was a bad thing to say."

"...Ancestors." He shook his head. "I'm wallowing in self pity. Playing the victim card. Fucking dammit!" He looked up at Arbitrary, narrowing his eyes slightly. "How do you do it? How are you so... confident?"

Arbitrary paused for a bit, not at the exile comment but towards his asking how she was so confident. She sat back, thinking on it for a good minute or two before speaking once more. "Because, a long time ago, I accepted that this was just how things were, and the only way to fix it was to stop living in the past. I'm not a confident person, I'm an optimistic person. That optimism gives confidence as a side benefit but it is very fragile at times."

She laced her fingers together, leaning forward a bit and looking down towards the floor. "I have psychotic breaks. That's where most of the..Arbitrary you see comes from. From when my anger and hate towards those who have it 'better' overpowers my optimistic side. But I've seen things and done things you couldn't even fathom, Kenec'Getha." She realized she was getting a bit off topic, as well as developing a particularly sharp tone to her voice and stopped for a moment, retracking her rant. "I don't try to be what I'm not anymore. I simply..am. Pitying myself for what I am is not worthwhile. You still have your mind, still have your body for the most part. 20 years is a long time but it is a finite amount of time. Your replacement will likely be cloned tissue. Will 'fit' your body." She looked at her hands again. "I don't..feel things. I know it's a fake signal running through my nerves. It all feels artificial and deadened. Any feedback I get is pain from the rejection syndrome. The price to pay for efficiency, I suppose. It was a bit interesting when I ended up beating a husk to death with my own severed arm a few minutes before the crucible fired but..I digress."

Skepticism was something that everyone should have a healthy amount of. It prevents the making of rash decisions, of being easily swayed in your opinions, and it acts as a kind of shield against disappointment. Right now, Kenec was skeptic of what Arbitrary was saying. "So... you just accept it? But... I mean... how?"

Kenec shook his head. "Alright, look, you just explained how... but, it's like, why accept it? If you could change what happened to you, wouldn't you? Not being an exile, not relying on machines to live... couldn't you get clone limbs? Aren't there drugs to help your psychological condition?" He thinks for a moment, sighing. "Course, I'd probably get something to help me if I could... but it's never that easy, I guess."

"...I made a smudge on the window." Kenec suddenly went to the kitchen, pouring a good amount of soap onto a rag and wetting it in the sink. "If only it were as easy as wiping away the filth on a window. I suspect I would've avoided a lot of problems if it were." He looked at the soapy rag for a few moments, blinking a few times as he realized something.

"Arbitrar-... Ani..." The man looked back at Arbitrary, wringing the rag of excess water with a hand. "I have to ask. Why are you so nice to me? I'm a fuck up of a quarian, I'm actively hostile to another exile, and... well, it's not like I've done you any favors before. You met me as a shitty Pilgrimage kid who thought sex was a good thing to do casually, and now I'm just... well, shitty."

"Unless misfits have to stick together. Understandable, I guess."

Arbitrary chuckled a bit, shaking her head. "I'm nice to you because you're naieve but not entirely without merit. And it really is just as easy as that."

She shrugged her shoulders. "I don't have cloned limbs because they're a weakness. I don't get 'help' because every time I've tried it's gone wrong. I learned to survive by myself and for myself."

There were many things both true and untrue in her words. She put out a -very- confident front, as she needed to for people to have any confidence in -her- considering her unique ability to lose composure at the worst times. "Besides. I'm not a misfit. I fit exactly the way I want to. Of course I'd change things if it had turned out differently, but they didn't. Work with what you have, not with what you want."

"I'm not 'naive', Arbitrary." Kenec noted with the slightest bit of annoyance in his voice. "I mean, I'm not going to go 'durr hurr I'm so mature and cynical' because that'd be stupid." He walked over to his window, meticulously wiping off the marks left on the window by his fist. "But I'm not some kid anymore. I served my people in a war that almost killed us, and being in physical therapy for half a year... it's given me time to think. Look back, y'know?"

"Turns out I'm not exactly the cool guy I thought I was. Keelah, everything I did... and hanging out with Thel during the start of my Pilgrimage." Kenec shuddered, shaking his head. "Still... better than being dead, even if I'm terrified of most people."

"You can help yourself to a tube of nutripaste, by the way. Y'know, if you're hungry." He tossed the rag into the sink, taking a seat and rubbing his right temple through the helmet, a headache beginning to set in. "I'm sorry for rambling on like this. I know you've probably got better things to worry about - like your mansion and asari maidens."

He sounded more than a bit bitter about that, though at which part wasn't really known. "...how're you not sick constantly? Like, one partner I'd get. But..." Kenec trailed off, realizing his own dalliances didn't really give him room to talk. "...nevermind."

Arbitrary grinned. "Mind melding is a wonderful thing. I'm pretty sure I've got a few blue daughters running around out there somewhere. Terrifying thought, no?" She casually put her glove back on, stretching a bit more out of habit than any real neccesity. "The suit only comes off on a rare occasion. Or when I find a Quarian or Turian that particularly tickles my fancy and I have a few shots of immunoboosting agents on hand."

She seemed rather relaxed now, and she made a mental note not to refer to Kenec as naieve anymore. She did have to admit it had been quite a while since she really talked to the boy, after all.

"Only mind melded once. While drunk. And with another quarian." Kenec sighed, putting his faceplate in the palm of his hand. "I'm shocked I haven't gotten a disease at this point. Or, y'know, died." He shrugged, counting his small blessings. "I don't really understand the appeal of asari - I mean yeah, they got kind of the same facial structure as us, but that just makes it kind of uncanny valleyish for me. Similarities, but very important differences."

"Like humans." Kenec noted. "They have hair for example, and they look like quarians, but it's not close enough to be really... attractive for me." He leaned back in his chair, adjusting himself with a grunt. "To each their own though."

He did raise an eyebrow at the quarian comment. "You mean like Thel. And on more than a few occasions you've made passes at me... not that I wasn't tempted to accept, but it's like... you're terrifying. And nowadays, well..." He grunted. "I'm not focusing on that anymore."

Kenec of course didn't mention this might have had something to do with how he saw himself; an invalid, heavily scarred freak of nature that had done so many terrible things he wasn't deserving of emotional or physical affection. Not that it needed mentioning at all, considering the quarian was always an emotional, social being that gave off so many cues by his posture it was like reading a book.

"Don't try mind melding while drunk. You see weird things and show weird things." Kenec chuckled, relaxing a small bit as he noticed Arbitrary do the same. "Though, I have had one non-sexual mind meld. An asari matriarch, mother of a friend before the war... she showed me what Rannoch looked like."

"So... I guess it can be nice, I guess. If a bit disorientating."

Arbitrary shrugged in response to Kenec's disinterest in Asari. "I'm not really much one to care about that kind of thing. Guess it comes from being an evil exile. Distance from your own species tends to do that and all." She stood, beginning to pace back and forth, contemplating something.

"Kenec, do you have a properly sterilized room here?" Yep, mood swing time. "And a roughly three hour block free on your schedule?"

Arbitrary was a rather scarred individual herself. Unlike Kenec though even if she was bothered by it to some extent she didn't let it get in the way of her fun-having ways. "Also, being mostly synthetic helps with the whole not getting sick thing. It's just the rejection syndrome that sucks."

"Err, yes..." Kenec said, uncomfortable now. "But... why me, exactly? Moreover, uhh... well, there would need to be drugs, sterilization of the room itself, protection, immuno-boosters..."

He cleared his throat once. "Plus you'd uh... have to try not to stab me. I mean, let's say I do agree. I'll be sick for like, what, a week? Two?"

Kenec shook his head. "Let's talk a bit more. You know, about stuff. See, uhh... I mean, it'd... yeah. Just to not have it feel like a fling, I guess. Not that I'm asking for a... relationship, since you got your asari, but... it's just, casual sex and I... it's led to bad things. Neyla, Arla, Paro, that... one asari." He seemed more ashamed the more names he mentioned. "Keelah, I'm a manwhore."

Arbitrary watched him, rather curious at his reaction to all of this. She reached into one of her suits many pockets and produced a couple potent immunoboosters. "Always be prepared. And really don't worry so much. The fact that you have been able to do that means you should be able to handle this."

She patted him on the back, seeming a bit cheery about the whole thing. "Besides. I think you might actually need this. If only to remind yourself that you still can. For me, well, you're a decent person. Maybe I want decent for once." Not to say that the asari she was with weren't decent, Kenec was just different. Maybe a bit broken currently, but different in a good way. "I'm up for doing all the prep work if you're up for it."

"..." Kenec was probably going to regret this later. In fact, he knew he would. He could practically feel the eyes of his Ancestors on him as he was to, quite literally, become an "exile fucker".

Still... his doctor said that he needed to loosen up, to speak to others more often, to regain his confidence. She'd... she'd encourage this. Right?

Letting out a deep sigh, Kenec looked up at Arbitrary. "Alright. But we talk after, got it? I'd rather not... how do humans say it... 'hit it and quit it' immediately."

At least he was honest about needing some sort of excuse for his weakness. "And I mean it. Talking. Like, actually getting to know each other and stuff. You might be terrifying, but... you're still one of the few friends I have left. And a quarian at that, even if you are an exile."

The evil exile nodded her head. "I'm an exile Kenec, I'm not rude. Well. Mostly." She had kind of barged in and all. The quarian waited to follow Kenec's lead on this as, despite her spying ways, she did not know the exact floor plan of his apartment and was not going to pretend she did lest she stumble upon some creepy room full of dolls or something. "Lead the way."