[Ft. Lauderdale] Good Moaning

"Thunks."
Mirala stepped out of the cab, flicking an eye over at the small knot of youths staring at her from across the road. Certainly not the fanciest part of town, made all the more obvious by the garishly illuminated front of the tech shop she'd come to visit. It spoke to the desperation of the proprietors that a large flashing "ALL WELCOME" sign had pride of place in TorsionTool's display window.
A hanar would be convulsing on the floor right about now.

It was almost a relief to enter the relative gloom of the shop interior. Mirala chose to wander over to a slowly rotating display of omnitools glowing a sort of sickly purple, and began to examine it.

The shop, to be frank, is unpleasant. It's obviously not cleaned often enough, the shelves are occasionally half-filled, as if the proprietor didn't care about restocking, and the five-and-a-half foot tall, musclebound gang enforcer in one corner was horribly obvious. As was her pistol and military grade combat armor.

The man at TorsionTool's kiosk was less intimidating, four foot nine, maybe sixteen, obviously not all that enthused to be working here.

"Yo there, miss!" he called, "You lookin' for something?"

The customer gave a little spasm of surprise at the sound, turning to face its source and smile at it - faltering slightly as she noticed the impressive musculature of the thug behind the bar.
"Yas, thunk ye. Ah'm fer ein om-nay-tul lookeeng, mane's boogard."
The alien stopped for a moment, thinking.
"Thet was wring soonded, didnae? M'translitter plantim's worin' oot."

--

Mirala wasn't really looking at the display, anyway. She was conspicuous enough, without a prayer of passing unnoticed. Of course, if the place was as desperate for any sort of sale as they looked, she'd doubtless have been called out to soon enough anyway. She turned toward the teenager with something approaching the sort of grin Linya would favour, widening her eyes and letting the smile drop a couple of inches as her gaze passed over the guard.
"Yes, thank you. I'm looking for an omnitool, mine appears to have given up the ghost."
Or at least that's what she would have said, had she not deactivated her translator before leaving Asharia's house. Even after a year's study, her English wasn't exactly up to snuff - not least because her most regular native-speaker contact possessed a somewhat incomprehensible accent from some island off to the northeast.

Frown. Give it a few seconds.
"I do apologise, I believe that might have sounded rather odd. My translator implant's in need of replacing."
A lie grounded in truth. An occupational hazard of asari longevity is that unlike in many other species, who didn't live long enough to have issues, their various implants - ports for biotic amplifiers, translators, haptic implants in the fingertips - had a habit of eventually wearing out. This necessitated the occasional swap-out.
Of course, Mirala's own translator was barely fifteen years old.

A look was passed between the ganger and clerk. The ganger shrugged.

"You, uh, you need a new translator? Or an omnitool?" asked the clerk, "We've got em both. They're all right there. The, uh, C-Vs have inbuilt translators, we can' really do an operation to replace an implant in here, though."

Mirala shook her head, not registering the wordless exchange between the humans.
"Nae plantim opiretions fer moo, jast an omnaytull. Nowt floshuy, jast soomathong t'held moo eever 'til mane gits bock foxed from m'noice."
Another smile.

--
Or at least doing her best not to visibly register anything.
"I should be fine without implantations for now, thank you, just the omnitool. Nothing too fancy, I'll only need something to tide me over until my niece has repaired my own device."
Damned vowels. Fortuitously, the matriarch could understand far more than she could communicate.
The bit about her niece was true-ish, too - young Qixoni had quite a way with machines, and she had been lucky enough to survive the war where her mother, tragically, had not.

There was a short conversation as the two tried to figure out what the hell the Matriarch was saying. Definitions and interpretations were argued over, notes were written out, and, eventually, a conclusion was come to.

"We've got a line of Serrice's," says the clerk, "Disposeable, cheap, but it'll tide you over till your, uh, nurse gets yours back to you. You want it?"

The asari's eyes widened at the suggestion.
"Serrice?"
Figures she'd pronounce that right.
"Didna thunk ye'd hoff thase oot hare. D'ye bran uff ah lookeeng tike?"
A sheepish smile.
"Maught boo eftar halpon wath translittery thungs, pissobloo?"

--

Mirala's smile stayed where it was during this exchange, though she could hardly pretend not to notice. At the mention of the omnitool's model her eyes widened in genuine, if slight, surprise.
"Serrice? I wouldn't have expected to see those on Earth. Would you brain if I had a look at one?"
Wait, was it "brain" or "mind"? Damn.
"It might help resolve this translation issue, possibly?"

There's a confused glance between the two.

"Uh, they're on the rack, if you want to buy it, just bring it up here," says the clerk.

A quick investigation of the omnitool packages on the rack would reveal 'Serice MK III Disposeable Omnitool'. Not an actual Serrice, but close enough that the shops local clientele (Or owners) probably didn't notice the difference.

It is very reasonably priced.

Over she went to the rack, studying one for a minute or two before bringing it over to the counter.
"Shad dee nercely. Thuank ah's eftar gwin f'root."

--

Once glance at the horrifically mistranslated Thessian (ha ha) on the box was enough to tell her that this was no asari-made device. Fortunately, she'd no intention of actually using the thing once she'd left.
"I believe it will adequately serve its purpose. I'll buy it."
Hopefully it wouldn't fall apart before she got back.

The clerk's utterly baffled by Mirala's mangled english, but manages the transaction without incident.

Mirala ends up with one not-actually-serrice disposeable omnitool, at the cost of a few credits.

"Thunk ye."
With the box under her arm, Mirala left the shop only a few credits lighter than when she'd entered. As soon as she was out, she removed the article from its container and began fiddling with it to try and summon a cab.

Easier said than done when the omnitool somehow mysteriously defaulted to English, forcing her to go hunting for the language options.

Twiddle twiddle.
Oh, come on.
Vocal translator. There it was. She tried a couple of experimental Thessian phrases (to which it responded in a monotone to shame an elcor).
"HELLO, WORLD."
"AAAARGH, WHERE IS THE TRANSLATION ERROR VOLUME CONTROL BEING."
"NO, NO, THAT'S JUST TRANSLATION ERROR."
"TRANSLATION ERROR."

Well, she was outside a tech shop. Back inside, then.

"HELLO ONCE MORE, APOLOGISINGS BUT IS THERE ANYTHING TO BE DOING WITH THE LOUDBEING? IT IS PAINING THE SKULL TO BE HEARD."
Thought you were rid of me, didn't you?

There's a jump as the sheer volume of the shitty speaker surprises the clerk, in the middle of a transaction with a new customer.

"Uh, wait a moment," says the clerk, he finishes the transaction and then turns to Mirala. "Can you hand me the tool? I'll fix it, just, uh, stay quiet."

Mirala nodded silently, allowing her eyes to wander... what was that?
Something or other was poking out of what looked like a storeroom near the guard. Maybe something completely innocent, but... if so, why wasn't it out on a shelf? What else would a tech shop's storeroom be used for, if not for stock?

She could probably answer that herself, given the stern young lady behind the counter, but still.