Gael pushed her way through the crowd. Each of the Thesin in the way made way for her, letting her pass by to get to Jason. She popped out of the Thesin encirclement into the space that they had made around him, stumbling over her feet towards Jason. His hands quickly left his sword, catching her before she hit the ground. He did not plan for it to happen, but his hands fell on her ass when he caught her. Once she was stabilized back on her feet he let her go. The months of dealing with Xev had desensitized him to seeing and touching nude flesh. Gael, likewise had grown accustomed to her naked body being seen and touched in the her time on Debris as a slave. Feeling Jason retracts her hands she threw herself into him, wanting him to hold her, wanting something of home to comfort her. There was chaos all around them but in this instant all she cared about was that her friend, her hero, had rescued her from what most certainly would have been a terrible fate and set her free. She wanted this moment to last forever. Even more so when Jason, lost for what to do, reacted with the only thing he could do, no matter how uncomfortable that he was with doing it in the past, he wrapped his arms around her, hugging her to himself, holding her against his chest.
Despite growing all too accustomed to being sexually teased by Xev Jason had a hard time not having even a stray dirty thought. It was hard to admit, but difficult to deny, that he was attracted to her, but he would never had been brave enough to act on it back on Earth, but now he found it hard not to think that, if he wanted, he do with her whatever he wanted. The old rules that he followed no longer applied so maybe he should act on his impulses, but then why did he do all that he had to save her. While these thoughts went through his head he never lost sight of the fact that they were surrounded by 2 crowds of people that might decided to rip them apart. His senses were fully open to everything around him, making sure that none took advantage of a perceived momentary loss of focus and attacked, Rina, Gael, or himself. In the end, the two shared their moment, but all it could be was a moment. Gael looked up to him with her tearful eyes. She slid up, her chest sliding against his. For an instant Jason believed she was about to him, but instead she moved her lips past his to her ears and whispered, “Thank you.” Having sensed that he was tense having the Thesin surround him she continued, “Don’t worry they’re my friends.”
Jason’s nerves were eased with those simple words. His hands traveled up her back to her shoulders and held her away from him so that he could look into her eyes, “I hope so.” He moved her aside stepping towards the front of the crowd. Thesin blocked his way, but when they noticed him, they moved aside just enough for him to take up a position in front of the the Thesin slaves, staring out on the 2 mobs that were ready to unite and attack them. He looked out onto the aliens who he had learned that they were good people and to humans that he knew were in a difficult situation. The situation that they all found themselves in was ultimately unfair and terrible for all of them. There wasn’t anything that could happen other than one side killing the other given the circumstances. It was unfortunate, but what could he do. What could anyone do other than who ever had set up this whole system, but Jason believed that there had to be a reason for how the system was structured. He didn’t get the feeling through his journeys that who ever had done this to Humanity and presumably all the other civilizations that were now gathered on Debris had malice towards any of the creatures that he had come across.
All 3 of the groups had their eyes on Jason, waiting for what he was going to do. He had met many of the aliens when last he was at Gondaluke while the Humans he felt a sense comradery with just for being Human. He wanted to believe that there was a solution to whatever problem had caused the two sides to riot, but he didn’t know what the cause was. It wasn’t that the Thesin were free, but he couldn’t imagine that was the problem since the riots had started before the cages were broke. Whatever the case may have been Jason had to do something.
He started, “I do not know why you all have taken up arms against each other, but it doesn’t have to be the case. There must be a way we can resolve your grievances with each other.”
A voice from within the crowd of aliens shouted, “You Humans are making our city smell and look like trash!” which was echoed with a several shouts of “Yeah!”
“At least we’re not trying to kill a child!” a voice came from the Human mob. Then another chimed in, “We didn’t choose to be brought abducted from our Humans!”
“Well we don’t want you here either!” an alien shouted back.
The crowds started shouting back and forth at each other with every yell tempting to cause the two sides to break into violence once more. Jason saw that both sides had legitimate gripes, but there was nothing he could do if they insisted on coming to blows with each other. It was then when Sú-Sheh and Awlrek came into view along with Frisxea. Awlrek’s looked like he had been covered in soot and his fur and clothes showed signs of being singed. He had a large bag on his back limped towards the town center. Jason immediately attempted to get to him through the crowd. He cried out for everyone to quiet down and move out of his way as he pushed his way through the crowd. At first it was difficult, but as the people saw him they let him through. Many of the eyes of the crowd followed where he was going and seeing the Tik`rs, those that knew what had happened back at the inn began to feel like they had made a mistake. They ate at the Tik`rs’ diner often, but now that may not be possible. They didn’t know what damage had been done by their action.
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Jason approached the Tik`rs, looking Awlrek up and down. It had been a fair amount of time since he had seen them. It was completely possible in Jason’s mind that Awlrek had just gotten into a scuffle or come home from a hard days work, but he didn’t know Awlrek to do anything with fire nor a reason he’d be out shopping at this time of day. Jason’s head cocked to the side, “Is that some kind of new style?”
Awlrek glared at Jason, smoke rising up from his fur lightly, “Where be wee Rina?”
“Over there with my friend,” his eyebrow raised, curious as to why he would be asking, “Did she do something?”
“Nae, t’inn burnt down an’ the lass was chased by t’mob. I came t’bust me some heads if’n tey ‘urt a ‘air on ‘er ‘ead,” he replied.
Jason’s eyes went wide, standing up straight, the realization of the situation coming clear in his mind’s eye, “I see…,” he said trailing off. He suddenly had an idea. Turning away from Awlrek, he went back to the crowd and walked through it, no one blocked his way as he went to the center of the crowd. All eyes were on him. “If you can’t live together,” he started, “Don’t. There is no need for this. There’s plenty of world out there that we can take for ourselves,” he spoke to the Humans, knowing that the aliens really wouldn’t care if it meant getting rid of them. “Follow me, and we can start a new city. We can build it with our own hands, not having to rely on a magical system or the kindness of strangers, but as a society together.” He paused, giving the appearance of weighing his words in his head before he continued, “Anyone who wishes to start a new society is free to come and be a part as equal free citizens. There is a town, that I own, that we can build into a new home with newer, better laws, for us all. Come with me and I can all but guarantee that you will have better time of it. If nothing else, you will have a place to belong. All those who wish to come, meet me at the town gates, We will set out tomorrow morning.” Jason began to walk from out of the center of the mobs, but then turned and look back, “In the meantime, let’s try not offend and kill one another.”
Jason walked through the crowd back to Rina and Gael, pulling out an ARMS armor device he bought earlier and placed on Gael, causing it to activate and cover her in the device’s unique latex like material, before taking hold of her hand. “Let’s go Rina,” he said as he started walking with the two girls in tow. They met up with the Tik`rs, Frisxea, Dork, and Xev. They had a little meeting between each other and then it was decided that they would all camp out outside the walls for the night.
The now freed slaves and 2 angry, violent mobs stood there not knowing quite what to make of what Jason, for all intents and purposes, a random, mostly unknown Human, had said. Dumbstruck, they looked between each other. At first they pulled closer together, clutching their weapons, not in a threatening way, but now, defensively, hoping not to have to use them. The longer that they spent stuck in the deadlocked standoff the more likely it was that violence would once again break out. Luckily, the gridlock didn’t last long. Murmurs began to arise from the Humans as it became clear that the thing that were rioting over was no longer an issue. The child had been rescued and made it to safety. Some wanted to stay and continue to fight it out so that they wouldn’t have to live in the shambles they had been forced to over the last few months, but the majority dropped their weapons or sheathed them and began to walk away, back to their shanty town one by one until there was only a few left. The few that wanted to fight it out. Of course, they were only so brave when they had the force of the mob behind them. When their tool of insurrection was removed, they no longer had the fortitude to revolt. As soon as it was the case that there was no chance they could win and they’d likely be hurt or killed in the ensuing melee they ran away from the confrontation as fast as they could.
For the alien mob, there was still a threat without the Humans. several dozen Thesin slaves had been freed in the skirmish between Jason and the slaver. It was possible to fix the cages and recapture them, but the aliens couldn’t be sure what would happen to them if they attempted to recapture the slaves. The slaver wasn’t dead, but he was close. Healing the injuries that he had acquired were not cheap. They could throw him into the arena and possibly he’d get healed, by the controllers of the arena, but there was just as much a likelihood that he’d die and even if that weren’t the case no one in the town particularly liked the slaver. He was allowed in the town because he provided merchandise to the town, but over the years of dealing with him the townsfolk of Gondaluke saw him become ever more arrogant and vile as his wealth increased. There was nothing saying they had to save him and really the slaves were his concern as long as he was alive, not theirs. So it was decidedly through chains of half spoken conversations that they would just disperse and hope that this problem took care of itself. Slaves usually ran away once freed so that is what they expected for them to do. Even the town guards held to this line of thinking and walked away to take back up their posts they had abandoned earlier.