Upon Silver Devil: Chapter Two

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Deeply Acus sighed as he paused and turned around, arms crossed. "Yes?"

Acus shrugged, "Guess the girls wanted a day to themselves."

Tala smiled. "It is just us. All the others seem to have vanished. How do you do today, Esk?"

"They took the robot." Esk told them flatly. Hmm, maybe they took him shopping. Androids could carry loads of bags right?

He frowned a little at Tala's question, as if surprised she'd even ask. "I'm fine." He spoke flatly. "I've been looking into your bounties." He looked back to Acus. " In general most are decent enough not to go after you and Silv after what's happened but there's always a few desperate and immoral enough to try. I know Vicky can handle herself, but be aware of it if you head out to the station. It's not that I particularly care if you get yourself killed, but being without our captain would create an irritating power vacuum and if the assholes here manage to claim your bounty, it makes me look bad. " He smirked oddly. "So try not to get yourself killed okay? If I can't do it, i'm not letting anyone else take the glory. Or the credits."

Tala snorted in disapproval. "Taking someone else's property. Of course they would do something rude like that." Never mind that she hadn't returned James to the ship when they had been drinking. That had been different.
"It is good that you care for the captain's safety, Esk," she added, "I knew you had potential here; my intuition is never wrong."

Esk glared at Tala. "I don't give a shit about his safety, I just can't stand to see the two assholes Vicky beat the shit out of actually succeeding in something. Those two couldn't tie their own damn shoes, it'd be insulting if they managed to claim this bounty."

Acus sighed, "I dont plan on leaving the ship on this station."

"Good. I'll put a bullet in their heads if I see them again anyway, just to make a point. Can't have them running off telling people where I am." Esk shrugged. "You still suicidal or decided to stop being melodramatic?"

Acus simply shrugged, " no need for you to know."

Tala swished her tail. "We will not permit you to die because you too are our friend, Acus."

Esk shrugged. "If you were actively trying to kill yourself you'd have done it already. Android isn't here to stop you and there's plenty of sharp implements. If you do, just don't make too much mess. Blood gets everywhere and it's a bitch to get out of the tiny cracks."

Acus snorted, "For the simple fact it'll piss you off I won't do if."

Tala let out a loud laugh and slapped Acus on the shoulder, hopefully not hard enough to bruise. "You are funny. We must have many drinks with you sometime."

Esk smirked. "Well it would be somewhat gratifying to watch the android scrub blood off things but I expect he'd refuse orders with you gone. Unless you hand his ownership over to someone else first. " He pondered that. "What happens to robots who's owners die anyway?"

He flinched at the slap, that so gonna leave a mark. "Either you put something in your will about it or they return back to manufacturing."

"Well, make sure you have a will then. Nobody wants to deal with that crap. "

"I suppose the manufacturer would not free him. Therefore, we must ensure the security of James' future," Tala said firmly. "You must not die, Acus."

"Or just write a will, you know, that works too." Esk shrugged.

"Well yes, but I'm sure most people wouldn't free James if they inherited him," Tala said. "Even if they said they would."

"He's a robot, you don't free toasters." Esk countered.

"You say he is a robot. What do machines built to heat slices of bread have to do with him?" Tala asked, confused.

"Both machines. Objects, not people." He shrugged. Yeah it was a lot easier to think of androids as objects, if you started thinking of them as people it got kinda creepy fast.

"Well slaves are never people, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't be freed," said the minotaur.

"Better yet, just don't keep slaves." Esk suggested.

Tala laughed. "You aliens are so silly. Slavery is not evil."

"Evil's a relative term. Immoral and degrading though... yes." He fixed her with a steely glare. "Have you ever been a slave?"

"No, however my tribe kept several," Tala said. "We treated them fairly."

Esk snorted. "Fairly, right." He clearly didn't think much of that.