“Dispose of me? What do you mean dispose of me? Where the fuck am I? Have we docked? Why is everything dark?” The presumed Jalosk Dal’Virra had teal markings all over his face. The skin on the concave sides of his skull ridges was starting to peel. “I demand to be taken to the chief security officer of the Nexus,” he said.
At least, he tried to say I demand to be taken to the chief security officer of the Nexus. A bout of coughing so intense he nearly passed out choked off most of it. He had the decency to put his yellowish-green hands over his mouth. The sad little useless gesture touched Yorrik, somehow. More than touched him. Why would a saboteur bent on infecting the poor drell of the Keelah Si’yah with that Yoqtan monstrosity care about keeping his germs to himself? He turned to ask the hanar, but Ysses merely hung in the air beside him, watching with interest,
as if concerned only with what might happen next.
“Authoritative interjection: I do not think it is him,” the elcor droned.
“What do you mean it’s not him?” Non snapped. “Why else would this Khar’shan-clan toad be skulking around the ship? Why else would he be awake at all? Airlock that thing and be done with it!”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” sneered Borbala. “You see a batarian and all of a sudden it’s just so simple, isn’t it? Put him in an airlock, no trial, no interrogation, just a bit of laughter and a champagne toast to the universe being exactly as your tiny little brain always thought it was. He’s clearly sick, you fucking peasant.”
The volus’s air filter made that sucking, gulping sound they always did. “You know him,” she rasped.
“Oh, so we all know each other now, is that it?” roared Borbala. “Do we all look alike, too?”
“Yes, obviously you do!” shouted Irit Non. “The two of you were in on it together, admit it! And you meant to frame the volus for your crimes!”
“You did say his name,” said Anax gently, slinging her rifle over one shoulder, finally. “You recognized him.”
“Yes, well, I only met him on Hephaestus. Dal’Virra is scum. His family is only half a generation out of the slave caste. He is a small-time weapons dealer, on the run from his debt and his third wife with two of his offspring, he is judgmental, rude, unpleasant, conservative, and he cannot hold his shard wine.”
“Die prostrate on a burning pyre of all you hold dear, mother of worms,” Dal’Virra said matter-of-factly, and sunk his head in his hands.
“He doesn’t seem to care much for you, either,” observed Senna’Nir.
“And in that, he has much company and always will. But despite—”
“You are a traitor to our people,” Dal’Virra hissed.
“But despite being unworthy to pick up the leavings of my least virile war beast, he is not half smart enough to do something like this. I drank with him for three nights on the station before he realized who he was talking to and started in with that charming patter.”
Dal’Virra scratched his neck furiously, his face a rictus of pain. But he still had energy for Borbala, it seemed. “No wonder you tucked your pyjak tail between your legs and ran away to Andromeda like a coward. Like a slave.”
The batarian matriarch sighed and tilted her head to the right, a sign of how far above Jalosk she considered herself. She chuckled. “Given that I am the only one on your side, you landless craven pustule, I would say you are not half smart enough to wash yourself in the morning, let alone sabotage an Initiative cruiser.”
The drell took a step to approach what Yorrik already found himself thinking of as his patient. The elcor had not often found it frustrating that he could not make his voice carry all the panic, desperation, and fear of their situation. He could not bellow a command at them like Senna could. Like he badly needed to. But he felt it now. He had to make them understand.
“Urgent scream: Do not go near him. Do not touch him. Do not allow his fluids to come in contact with you. Especially you, Anax Therion.”
But for once, that deep monotone was frightening enough. All four of them stopped in their tracks. They retreated slowly. Anax understood instantly. Her arm flared blue as she threw a biotic barrier toward Jalosk. It hissed where it touched the wet, black, sour mess on the floor of the hall. The batarian groaned miserably and vomited again; the barrier held. Yorrik found himself wondering how many biotics were on the ship. A simple barrier would not stop a virus, but it could stop almost anything or anyone else.
“Stern admonishment: What is wrong with you? There is an infection on this ship and you want to go splashing around in the vomit of a sick man? Imperative: He must be isolated immediately. There is an iso-chamber in the medbay, Senna’Nir. It is accessible through the cleanlock vestibule at the end of the hall.” However poorly supplied, the medbay was logically constructed. The iso-chamber was segregated from both the main deck and the rest of medbay by a series of disinfecting fields. A patient could enter from the outside without air exchange between the corridor and the rest of the clinic.
The elcor glanced meaningfully at the blast pattern of the batarian’s bodily fluids. Black globules dripped from the ceiling. Quarantine protocol might well be a sad joke now. But it was all he had.
The quarian commander keyed something into his portable node and released the locks separating the Keelah Si’yah’s sole iso-chamber from the vestibule connecting it to the main deck. The first glass door slid aside. “Sir, would you mind escorting yourself in there?” he said, politely enough.
“Please tell me what’s going on,” the batarian begged, bile crusting on his lips. “I haven’t done anything. I don’t want to go in there. I won’t put myself in your prison cell, son of scavengers. I’ll never leave it. Not when the volus wants my head. Wants my head for nothing. For the vicious crime of waking up. That’s all I did. I woke up. My pod released its seal. I thought I was the first one revived. But I felt terrible, just… just terrible. And it’s so dark. What happened to the lights? I tried to go down to the cargo hold but—” Another bout of nausea hit Anax’s barrier. This time it was full of bright, oxygenated blood. “I was just looking for medbay, you bootlickers. To find some medi-gel for my… my everything. I found you instead. And her. And I’m not going to be locked up for it!”
“If one word of that is true I’m a turian beauty queen,” scoffed Irit Non. “Why didn’t you go check on your precious babies before sneaking around six decks above them? What was so important that you went straight for the cargo hold on an empty ship? What did you do to the datacore, you piece of varren shit?”
Borbala snorted. “Oh please,” she said. “He can’t even spell it. Show that man a datacore and at best he’ll just start looking for a place to stick his meat into it.”
Jalosk Dal’Virra was soaked in sweat and shaking. But not from fear, Yorrik thought. At least, not only from fear. What batarian before this very second would let a volus see him tremble? He started babbling hysterically. “Shut up, you vile bitch! Mother of worms! Mother of dung!” He turned his head toward Senna, pleading. “You can’t force me in there! Quarians have ethics. I’ve heard. So do drell and elcor and hanar. You won’t force me. You won’t. That fat space elephant said not to touch me! He said! He said!”
Anax rolled her eyes and dropped her barrier. Dal’Virra gave a ragged sigh of relief. Then, without a word or even so much as shifting her stance, the drell’s elbow went rigid and she snapped him up in the turquoise bubble of a biotic throw, lifting the miserable weapons dealer off the deck floor and depositing him roughly inside the cleanlock. The door slid closed again. A forcefield inside vanished, allowing him to shuffle into the iso-chamber and collapse on the cot.
Yorrik thumped his head against the glass to get her attention. “Fierce emphasis: Anax Therion, get out of here. You are susceptible. You cannot risk exposure.”