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Vernon is regretting directing his boss to buy this hunk of junk ostensibly known as a vehicle. Not very much, but a little. Mostly because she then made him drive it, and this is a finicky and temperamental beast that keeps listing to the left, but in amounts that change a bit on every single bump. They are driving through what is colloquially called 'the wasteland,' which is a desert about half as hospitable and twice as rocky as it sounds. He is having to adjust often. It's annoying. Not very, and honestly, having a functioning vehicle that is not potentially going to explode is a bit of a novelty for him, but enough that he will think fondly of that other vehicle boss-lady had been eyeing before he steered her this way. That sure would have been nice to drive. It would have been painting a gigantic target on their backs, but still. He can dream.
Yeah, no, he's not being obeyed. This is only a little bit about him.
Bang bang bang bang, come well aimed shots from various abovewards directions.
You'd be excused for thinking what's happening is less "movement" and more "teleportation". It takes less time than anyone here has to properly process visual input, but here's what happens.
He starts dashing towards the policemen in front of him. While he does that, he literally breaks two football-sized chunks of rock from the ground with well-aimed kicks; those chunks break into pieces that just happen to successfully intercept many of the bullets coming their way. Then, he reaches the policemen before the first bullet has had enough time to reach them and pushes them out of the way.
And as for the remaining bullets that would have hit the officers behind him, those he shoots straight out of the air.
"DAMN IT, ZASH," yells someone who is now extremely annoyed with him. "This is our town!! Let us handle our business!"
There are more bullets, but these are less well aimed, and with Zash's interference, just as unlikely to hit their intended targets.
Talking isn't going to help. He's probably at minimum dislocated some bones of these officers, with the rapid movement, but it's less dire than it looks: his movement isn't just fast, it seems to be slightly precognitive, with him seemingly knowing where people are going to shoot before they decide to do it.
The officers are extremely confused and terrified, but Zash doesn't have time for that either. He's going to find shelter, is what he'll do, so that they're less sitting ducks.
Hopefully the Jeneorans will decide to conserve their bullets once it becomes obvious they will not succeed. Bullets are very expensive; you can buy two whole slices of pizza for the price of one.
Yeah, fine, they'll stop. But there will be some more yelling. From various sources in various directions.
"My kid lives here, those fuckers aren't allowed to just walk in like they own the place and threaten to shoot her!!"
"If we can't kill 'em we're absolutely getting their stuff, fuck Julai!"
"And let 'em wander home naked to teach 'em a lesson!!"
"Nah, shoot 'em, it's been a while since we've had heads to mount on pikes, Julai Military Police would scare the scavengers off for weeks!"
This continues to be fair enough, and Zash continues to not want anyone to die on account of him. He lifts a finger to his lips to make sure the officers will sit tight and be quiet and then he'll attempt to go back to where the Jeneorans are, via a circuitous route that will hopefully not allow them to find their quarry.
There are absolutely a couple of the short range folks who'd cut off escape routes that are trying to do so, so he'd better head them off, too.
The rest are generally agreed that even if Zash is going to demand these people make it out alive, they will not make it out with all of their stuff. Or their clothes. There's currently a hotly contested argument about who gets the captain's sunglasses. Some others are still pushing for DEATH.
"There's a $$6,000,000 bounty on my head," is what he says after this argument's been going for a while.
That shuts them all up.
"Hell, we could buy a whole new plant for that..." observes one.
"And then what, huh? You think we'll find anyone else that will fix it again after we sell the last guy who did off?!"
"He did a shit job of it last time! Hasn't been five years and the damn thing's busted again!"
"It don't matter if they were promised a one way express trip to Earth itself, you don't fuck with Jeneora!!!"
"I STILL GET THAT FUCKER'S GLASSES."
He knows what he'd need to say. He knows these people, he knows what each of them care about, he knows how he'd convince them, what to argue. He thinks he probably wouldn't even need to threaten anyone. It's just that...
...he doesn't really deserve it. He doesn't deserve to try to convince them. So there's only one thing he can say.
"Just please don't kill them. They're here because of me, I know they were assholes who tried to mess with Jeneora but if it weren't for me they wouldn't be here. It's my fault. So just... don't kill them, please."
"Zash, you're too damn idealistic for your own good. Those slugs don't deserve your martyrdom," says Rosa.
"I mean, who cares about those idiots now, there's $$6,000,000 on the line --"
"Yeah? And you think you can take him in, genius?"
"Look at him! He'd probably let us if we wove him a sad enough story!!"
"But then his fancy wife would kick up a fuss and then we'd have citygoers sniffing around all over the place--!"
"... Uh, hey," says someone, who has heard the yelling and poked his head out to solve it now that the shooting's stopped. "It does no one any good to stand here arguing while the Julai fuckers maybe start sneaking off, yeah? Does stripping them but letting them keep their canteens and birds and telling them to go tell everyone who the hell kicked their teeth in sound fair enough for everyone?"
There's a heavy sigh.
".... It's no heads on spikes, but I guess it'd be good enough..."
"If we're going to maybe sell Zash off we might as well follow his wishes about his weird moral hangups, right?"
"He does have a point about them sneaking off, better to present a united front."
"And then you can all work out whether or not you want to sell a man who helped you to be experimented on by mad scientists who have been stealing and murdering children on your own time."
They will in fact go debate about that later, but for now, they can all agree to strip the Julai Military police stark naked, give them canteens and their birds and the tale to never fuck with Jeneora Rock again.
"We'll be in the diner if you need us, you know where our car is if we try to skip town, yeah?"
And then he can escort Zash out of there while the townsfolk argue about money, pragmatism, and morality.
...yeah, fine. He supposes that works. The police officers are that-a-way. If the Jeneorans kill them, Zash will... well, be very sad. He's not about to threaten them.
For now, he'll just rest his head on the table and mope a bit.
Yvette sits next to him and pats his back, because, um. She's not okay, too, really.
"... So I'm still not entirely clear on... what all just happened..."
"Locals were pissed that Julai Police walked in like they owned the place and were going to kill them for threatening them in their own home, Zash didn't want anyone to die on his account, and the thing about his bounty got out, and they're all now arguing about what to do about it. Julai Police will probably get to live with a very embarrassing story, if they're not too stupid."
"Eh, just for emergencies, and I think she's twitchy about using it because it makes a fun boom. It didn't look like it got used."