"Well, you know, I was in the neighborhood, and decided to make this punk leave the lovely lady alone," Keith said giving Morrigan a small nod. He turned his attention back to the man in front of him. "By the way, if you're gonna make a name for yourself, you might want to start giving your name so that people actually know it. Otherwise you might want to change what you say you're doing. Change it to something like making a rep for yourself."
The man put his hands up slowly and snorted. "Oh yeah, you must think you're soooo funny."
"I think he's funny." Morrigan chimed in with a cheeky grin, not quite sure how to react to be called lovely or a lady, but very much a pro at being an ass. "And right, you know. Some name you're making, considering I don't even know your name."
The man rolled his eyes as Keith stepped up and took the gun from his hand. "My name is Hendrik," he said sounding annoyed.
"Well Hendrik, I would suggest you leave the little lady alone, you never know what she may do to you," Keith warned giving Morrigan another look. "And you shouldn't be out of your cell, so what are you doing out here?"
"Nice t' meetcha Henderson, I'm Scarlet, or Cade, dependin' on which ring o' criminals I'm talkin' to. As for you," Morrigan narrowed her eyes at Keith, making a face at him. "One, don't ever call me little, or I'll shoot you." And two, jus' didn' feel like hangin' out locked up. Y'know?" She very easily could have just mentioned being attacked. But she wasn't sure who to trust anymore, even more so than ever now.
Keith shrugged. "Okay, but you know I'm gonna have to put you back into that cell. Where did the other guards go?"
Hendrik placed his hands on his head as Keith pulled out some handcuffs. "Did you not hear me say that like no one on this ship are actually real police?"
"You know, he's right. Bunch o' 'em been givin' me odd vibes all day. Few of 'em are for sure real cops, probably for appearances or somethin', but the rest definitely ain't." Morrigan mused, ignoring Keith's comment about making her get back in the cell.
(I'm sorry school is starting to get in the way of things, so my responses might not be very fast.)
Keith stopped before putting the cuffs on Hendrik. "So I should not put you both in cells to be picked off," he commented. "Well so long as you two behave yourselves I have no problem finding my coworkers with you two with me. But just know the moment you step out of line, I do have two pairs of hand cuffs, and a taser."
"Kinky." Was all Morrigan had to say about that, before starting up the chain and joining them up high soon after. "I prefer not usin' the handcuffs though. I bruise pretty easy, y'know, an' tha's an ugly purple."
"I'll only use them if you step out of line. Behave and they stay away," Keith explained offering a hand to help Morrigan onto the deck. Hendrik let his arms flop to his sides.
"How's the gut, I know I hit there when I shot so, just wondering," he asked looking at Keith.
"There is a reason police wear bullet resistant vests. I got lucky and only have bruising. Which tells me that you need to work on where you aim," Keith replied without looking at Hendrik.
Morrigan accepted the hand up, ignoring how close it left her to Keith. “I’m the one who actually got shot.” She pointed out, pulling her hoodie to the side and down her arm to show off the bandaging on her shoulder. “Lucky ass. All ya got was bruisin’.”
"It's called Kevlar sweatie," Keith responded as he pulled her up. The sarcasm thick in his voice. Hendrik rolled his eyes and turned around.
"Oh, would you two just kiss and make up, or beat each other to a pulp already?" he groaned.
"Or punch you in the face," Keith added calmly. "And dump you over the side of the ship. And let the sharks feed on you poor struggling squirming body."
“I like officer cop’s suggestion.” Morrigan said with an innocent-ish smile, raising a hand. “I’m a big fan o’ sharks. Anyways, what’re we gettin’ up to first?”
Keith turned and began began walking away. "First we need to find my buddies, and then we need to get to the bridge and radio for help," he said over his shoulder. "Hendrik you travel in the middle of us. I trust Red more than I do you."
"Comforting."
"Aw, tha's so sweet!" Morrigan cooed, blowing an overdramatic kiss at Keith just to mess with him. "Ya hear tha', Hendria? I'm trustworthy now!"
"About as trustworthy as a swarm of angry bees," Keith muttered, he took up the lead. Keeping to the shadows, and staying low. He was continually glancing back and making sure the other two were following him.
"Less, actually. A swarm o' angry bees are gonna do exactly what ya'd 'spect a swarm o' angry bees t' do. Chase and sting." Morrigan said, skipping along without a care in the world. "I'm unpredictable. Or at least, no' as predictable as those bees. Bees'll do what bees do, but I don' care what I do. Long as it's done."
Keith rolled his eyes. "Big difference." He paused and scanned the area. "Do you have any ideas about who all came to your cell while you were there?" He asked looking back at her. Hendrik stepped to the side, to give a clearer view.
"Oh, yeah." Morrigan rattled off a list of every officer she had even seen near her cell, mentioning which ones gave her weird vibes and which ones showed multiple times. She didn't stop to think that maybe her knowing all these names and remembering the faces and times to go with them was weird, just listed.
Keith listened to her explanations and nodded. "That is not really good. There were only about three of those that were actually coworkers of mine. The rest are not, and I have no clue what they may be doing on this ship other than probably trying to kill you. I knew you were not liked, I didn't know that you were hated this much by other people."
"I've made a lot o' influential people mad, Officer Cop." Morrigan stated, eyeing her nail beds with interest as she followed him. "I steal from the rich, remember?" Kill them on occasion, too. "'Course tha's gonna make some folks butthurt. Pissed you off, didn' it?"
Keith ducked under something and then looked up trying to find a way onto it. "Eh not really. Annoyed, sure. Pissed off, no." He reached up grabbed a hold of something and pulled himself onto it. He then turned and offered his hand to help the other two up. "We try to keep our emotions in check while on duty, otherwise we're likely to make mistakes and just end up with more people that hate us. So while we may get annoyed that we can't catch someone for a while. We don't hate the people we bring in or have to track down."
"How many police officers have ya actually met, Gunner?" Morrigan asked, sounding actually incredulous. Sarcastic too, sure, but she actually sounded like the idea of a police officer not allowing their emotions to get in the way of their job was something out of a myth. And for her, it sort of was. She waited until Hendrik was up before accepting Keith's hand with her metal one, letting him help her up.
"A few," he replied.
Keith ducked under a pipe and stopped. A window could be seen just in front of him. He pulled up to the side of it and peered inside. Then he motioned for Morrigan to come and look at something. In the room were several people. All people he didn't recognize. "Do you know any of them?"
Morrigan did so, looking through the window and studying the people inside the room. "Yeah. Guy o'er there with the gross sideburns? Kiesler. Hit me when I wouldn' talk interestin' to him." She tapped the side of her face, where a mottled and decently fresh looking bruise sat on her jaw. It wasn't one she'd gotten in the attack, for sure. "An' o'er there is Jarsan. She was weird on guard duty. Wanted t' stand in the bathroom with me."
"She was trying to pick her moment," Hendrik spoke up from where he stood. "Everyone on this boat wants you dead girly. And I mean everyone. Whether they admit it to themselves or not, deep down even cop goodytushoose wants you dead."
"That's where you're wrong, Hendrik," Keith corrected. "I don't want anyone to die. Some death is unavoidable however, no matter what you do."
“Don’ surprise me.” Morrigan said, still looking over all of the people in the room. She spoke casually, as though she wasn’t talking about people wanting to kill her. But something did flicker across her expression for a split second, so fast it could have been a trick of the light. Something sort of close to regret. “I’m the kinda girl people want dead, y’know?”
"Get down!" Keith suddenly grabbed her hand and pulled her down to the ground. He hit the ground next to her and let out a quiet groan. Someone had looked up and he'd slightly panicked. Now he was paying for it. Hendrik had also heeded the warning and gotten down out of sight from the window.
“Stupid ass-“ Morrigan muffled a cough with her fist, pulling herself up off the ground, out of sight of the window. “You’re an idiot, ya know tha’? Coulda jus’ stepped t’ the side, but no.” Despite her griping, she reached down, tugging him back to his feet carefully.
Keith was already scolding himself for having panicked like he had, and just kind of shrugged as Morrigan scolded him. Pain was ebbing at his chest and he was struggling to ignore it. Though he didn't want to show that he was in a lot of pain, because he didn't trust Hendrik at all. And his trust for Morrigan was very limited. Despite what he knew.
Morrigan studied him for a moment, golden eyes narrowing suspiciously. Turning away slightly, she brushed herself off, though the places she brushed were a bit…odd. Chest, rib, thigh. And then she arched a brow in Keith’s direction. She was asking where he was hurting, knowing full well how to tell when someone was in pain.
