"You just met me."

"And you gave me a ride in your car! You both seem nice, and you said you'd adopt me if I, quote, 'keep the delicate noncombatant in the car from becoming riddled with holes or squished or something,' and I'm saying I accept your terms. So. Hi, mom! I'll do my best to keep you safe, even if dad will be upset about how I killed someone to do that!"

Zash wishes he could really argue, but, well... he's never really demanded that others follow his own rules. Especially not humans. If humans want to decide that other humans live or die, well, that's a lot more fair than if he does. He's not human; it's just not his place.

"That's all I can really ask for."

"You're just not even going to question how she has decided to call us mom and dad. You're just fine with that."

"You haven't either!"

"Do not call me mom or any related motherly noun, please, I have complicated enough hangups about ever having children as it is, I feel like adopting an adult woman would in fact be too weird for me."

"I'm younger than I look but fair enough!"

"You can call me dad if you want." He's pretty sure he's completely infertile, at least with humans, but he's one hundred percent never going to test that assertion.

"Mmmm I'll think about it, it's not as fun if it doesn't match."

"Zash is fine, too. And 'the Stampede' is a title. Not what I would've picked, but so it goes."

"Zash, probably. If I were going to use your title I'd use it like, 'I'm running with the Stampede' or whatever, but eh."

Snort.

There aren't many roads on this planet, because it is an absolute nightmare to maintain them in the middle of the desert, between the sandstorms and the sandworms. However, it's not a very hilly planet—or at least, not the parts of it that have been settled by humans. So when it's not storming, you can see around for miles. That makes the existence of periodic manmade landmarks easier to have, even if occasionally they get defaced or taken down by a barrage of worms and sand.

One such landmark is the little rest stop they can see in the distance: a lone building that probably serves as a midway point between two or more slightly larger ports of civilisation, for people to recharge their vehicles, get some food, or just spend the night.

"Any objections to taking a pitstop?" asks the driver who is in fact the... least experienced with navigating the planet, actually. She will get a second opinion, thank you, this might somehow be a trap. Or something.

"None here."

If it's a trap it's not an obvious one. "Sounds good to me."

Then they can pull up to the rest stop and see about exchanging money for goods and services or something! She might be able to have a non travel rations based meal, that'd be nice. Maybe someone will even accept her credit chip!!!! She doubts it but let her dream.

Zash leads the way towards the building and then... stops. And raises one hand, to make the others stop, too.

He does have very good hearing. And he can't hear... anyone.

Yvette obligingly stops, and in fact scootches so that Zash is a bit more between her and the building. Her? Hiding behind Zash? Ha, ha, yes absolutely.

Their hitchhiker frowns.

Then sniffs the air, carefully.

"... Don't be weird about this, but I smell blood."

Why do things keep happening! Okay, going after the mysterious green flash of light was asking for trouble, but a rest stop in the desert shouldn't be! This is just the universe making fun of him.

He lowers his arm then lifts a finger to his lips and makes a "come hither" gesture with two fingers before starting to slowly approach the building, drawing his gun as he does so.

Yep let's go poke the thing, though Morgan doesn't precisely draw her weapon. She just continues carrying it along behind her.

Yvette wonders if she should instead go wait in the car or something, but probably she's safest between the two hypercompetent fighters?? So she does that, since Zash didn't tell her to go wait in the car. But, for the record, this is under protest.

...okay, now he can hear someone else. Faintly. And also "hear" them, even more faintly. This is definitely one of the more opaque human minds he's ever met. He pushes open the door to the main store and steps inside.

There are two bodies: one man and one woman, both lying against a pillar in a pool of their own blood. It's not completely dry; the murders were recent. But it's very unclear what happened, it doesn't look like anything was stolen or even that much of a fight took place there.