Kaidan practically inhaled his next meal when he was allowed full rations. Rahna smiled kindly beside of him and leaned briefly against him before pulling away. A treacherous part of his mind thought that she was so happy that he was allowed to eat again was so she would get more help and wouldn't get into trouble.
He pushed away the thought quickly.
"Have you heard anything from your parents recently?" Rahna asked quietly.
Taking a deep breath to try and dislodge the clump that had suddenly formed in his throat, he shook his head. Without thinking, he found his hand in his pocket, running his fingers over the old, beat-up necklace that he couldn't seem to get rid of. "No. You?"
Rahna shook her head as well. "They never answer any of the messages that I send them. They promised to keep in touch, but they don't. I don't understand."
"I must be broke…'s the only thing that makes sense," he remembered being said in the voice of a sweet, broken little girl. How apt that it should apply to his life…after all this time.
He wondered how Mimi had turned out- where she ended up. He liked to imagine that she was taken in by a nice family that would love her. He hoped that she was happy.
After he realized that he was supposed to say something, he cleared his throat. "Maybe they're just afraid."
Hendel Mitra (one of the guys in their class) leaned forward, an eyebrow cocked curiously. "Why would they be?"
Kaidan took a drink of water as he tried to organize his thoughts. "It's something my dad said before he sent me here. He said that biotics are still really new and people are afraid. Maybe because they think we can read minds or something else that would be awesome if it was true."
Rahna shuddered visibly and rubbed her hands together. "I hope momma and poppa don't really think those things." She looked miserably down at the remainder of her food.
"Hey," Kaidan murmured gently, wrapping an arm around her to pull her to him. "That's probably not what it is. It was just an idea."
Hedel watched them carefully, his eyes slightly narrowed. A few times, Kaidan saw that the other boy opened his mouth to say something, but decided to close it before anything came out.
"What're you playing with in your pocket, Kaidan?" Rahna asked, pulling slightly away from him.
Feeling his heart constrict, he pulled out the old necklace.
Hendel and Rahna both stared at it, confused. "Why do you have a necklace?" Rahna asked.
"And who is M?" Hendel asked.
Kaidan could think of two ways out of the situation he was in. He could lie- saying something lame about, since his middle initial was M, it was the reason he had it. However, he wasn't much of a liar, so he told the truth (just not the whole truth).
"Right before I came here, I was friends with this little girl who was sick," he explained, realizing that, so far, he had done nothing but lie. "Before I left, she gave me the necklace and asked that I'd remember her- in case no one else did."
Rahna pouted out her bottom lip as though that was the sweetest thing she had ever heard in her entire life. Kaidan couldn't help but breathe an internal sigh of relief as he saw any sign of hurt and betrayal leave her eyes.
"Did she get better?" she asked hopefully.
"I don't know- I like to think so, but I don't know."
Mimi decided that, while she enjoyed the high that red sand had offered her- the feeling of power and the ability to walk just like everybody else-, she decidedly hated coming down afterwards. That left her two options- either never let herself not be high, or just don't get high in the first place.
She was pretty sure that she was leaning towards not getting high.
Toby, however, was completely thrilled about the sand.
"Frank, Curt, Jordan," she called over to the boys three of the boys she had taken with her on the last mission. When they stopped in front of her, she looked them over- up and down. "You boys care to do me a favor?"
Frank, not a bad looking guy with his dark hair and brown eyes, gave her smirk that she was pretty sure she could get used to. "Name it."
"I want you get Ana ready," she informed them, handing them each a knife. "Make sure you get her prepared for what's going to happen- remember what I went through."
The boys nodded. "Hey, M…Jo?" Frank asked, stepping towards her- into her personal space. "You gonna watch?"
She could practically feel Toby's eyes burning into the back of her skull as she stepped even closer to Frank. "I'm not much of a watch and see kinda girl, but, for you, maybe I'll make an exception."
A/N: Hendel Mitra is a real character in the Mass Effect Universe (in the books).
