"... 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."

"Fuck, man, why'd you have to go and put it like that."

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."

"Melissa had a grenade launcher!!"

"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."

"That's not...!" Huff. "God. Okay. Uh. Zash, do you. Need a hug."

"I'm fine," he mumbles from where he's still resting his head on the table.

"... Uh huh. Well, I need a hug, so. If it's all right with you, husband dearest."

That makes him crack a smile as he straightens up. "Whatever my brilliant wife wishes," he says, and will in fact hug her. The cybernetic arm doesn't actually feel bad to hug, either.

Hug.

She still doesn't regret her choices but holy shit what the fuck.

Honestly that's a much more reasonable reaction than the one he's having.

Observing this does not, alas, actually cause him to be able to have a different reaction. Sucks to be him (except actually).

Huuuuuug.

"... I should probably get a weapon of some kind, huh..."

"Eh. Only if you can use it," shrugs Vernon, who is having himself a glass of whisky. He's left payment for it on the counter, because he certainly does not want to fuck with Jeneora Rock, thank you very much.

"Ngrm."

"I can teach you how to use a weapon, if you want to learn."

"Not really, I just feel very peer pressured right now."

"Eh. It might help your chances to have something small and concealable, but honestly you're probably doomed if anyone even wants to shoot you in the first place."

"Thaaaaaanks."

Not wrong.

...well, he's confident that with enough time he could turn her into a killing machine but actually he feels like this planet has too many of those already, he doesn't need to help create another one.

Anyway, back to moping.