Jackie stepped forward, the two rabbits kneeling at his feet. Crim had recovered from his beating from Fria, but his arm was frozen was red, burning in frostbite, and every few seconds he would wince from it. “Alright, Crim, what possessed you to attack our extremely, extremely, valuable Fridge manager? Did you want us to starve!”
“…” Crim did not reply, his gaze never leaving the floor.
Fria, however, was desperately trying to appeal “Please! He won’t do it again, I promise! He learned his leason, isn’t that right Crim? Crim!” she punched him, but still he didn’t reply.
“Haaaa.” Jackie glanced back to Mia, who had been sitting on the steps behind them “You ok Mia? nothing hurt?”
“Fine~” she answered back ‘This has become complicated…’ she was entertaining the idea of loading and leaving the bottom floor immediately after freezing the Fridge, would save her from whatever is going on now. But as annoying as this was, and as much as she enjoyed food, she didn’t want to eat an entire ham sandwich again.
[Sorry Crim.]
“Good, so!” his attention now on Crim, he repeated himself “Crim, last chance. Don’t make me kick you and your sister off this ship. Explain yourself.”
“…” he slowly raised his gaze, his eyes momentarily locking onto Mia before finally meeting Jackie “She’s…too strong, she could help the wa-“
“You really want to send a six-“
“Eight”
“-Eight year old out to fight in a fucking war?! Sure she can freeze the entire contents of the Fridge but what about all the other shit that comes with it! You ever think of that? If everyone in that god forsaken make shift passenger hold shared your dumb thinking I’d have a riot on my ship with a bunch of idiots blaming an eight year old refugee for their problems!”
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“B-but-!” he tried to protest, but Fria grabbed his arm.
“No… Crim, it’s not her fault…I know how you feel but, blaming her won’t-“
Crim pushed her off, going back to sulking “…she could do more than simply freeze food with that power…”
Jackie knelt down, grabbing Crim by the neckline and lifting him up “I will remind you that by *simply* freezing that food, she is not only indirectly feeding your ass, but about 200 more, most of those being people who have gone through the same shit you have!” he tossed him, a loud metal bang was heard when Crim slammed into the Fridge’s metal gate.
“…I’m sorry.” Fria whimpered, her eyes downtrodden.
Jackie sighed, looking back to Mia, who was perfecting her Crim sculpture “…Mia?”
“Hm?” she looked up from her work, having just perfected the ears “What?”
“Do you care if these two stay on the ship? I know what he did but they are in a pretty…rough spot…”
“Eh, no.” Mia shrugged, was no harm to her “Attack again…” she raised her unfinished sculpture, encasing it in a box of clear ice “This.”
“Oh, he won’t be free to do that.” He snapped his fingers, two people on standby walking up “Take Crim down below, stick him in a cell for a few days.”
“Can i…”
“And Fria can visit after a day, let him cool his head.” Jackie shrugged “Honestly, too light of a sentence, but screw it, you didn’t even manage to piss her off.”
“Very pissed.” Mia protested, struggling with the fingers on the hand.
“Sure…Alight, get to it! And someone go tell Perry to shove off, we’ve been loaded for 10 minutes and delayed for 2 hours. Harbor master is going to kill me.”
The two men hurried over to Crim, picking his unconscious body up and running down the stairs, Fria watching helplessly. Everyone else with the show over, went about their business, most going up to wave everyone off.
“Mia, you coming? First time on a boat, might as well watch the best cargo ship set sail from the best seat on the boat?” Jackie stopped at the base of the stairs, offering her a hand up.
“Hnnng…” Mia couldn’t get the fingers right, every time she tried they would get jumbled up, squished together, the wrong amount, or wrong length. She exhaled “ok.” Giving up, she tried to shove the small sculpture in her item box, but it didn’t work, full. This caused her to pout.
“well, come on, I think you’ll like this.” He smiled, leading her back up the upper deck.