#seriously odette is a sassy asshole

[prettyandsarcastic]

A Favor

Odette proves a point. 

“Hey, Bash? What would it take for you to do me a favor?”

The engineer looks up from the list of supplies he’s double checking, eyebrow raised. He finds Odette, their resident princess, leaning over the railing of the stairs leading down into the docks. It’s hard to reconcile the Odette standing in front of him with the picture in his mind of what Princess Odette might look like. Her clothes are a borrowed, mismatched assortment of things the crew had – leggings from Aya, an extra shirt of June’s, a jacket from Ryona. But there’s a different air about her now that hadn’t been there in those first few days on the A6 – a confidence that squares her shoulders.

“That’s a loaded question,” he chuckles, “depends on the favor.”

Odette tilts her head this way and that, as though considering his reply. After a long moment she says, “I need your help with something.”

“Okay?”

“Would you help me get a weapon?”

Bash can’t hide his surprise. That’s certainly not what he was expecting. “Didn’t,uh, didn’t Damon give you a dagger?”

Odette nods, pulling the dagger from the waist of her pants for emphasis. “He did, but I’m pretty sure he only gave it to me to see if I would accidentally disembowel myself with it. Don’t get me wrong, I can use it, just not with any semblance of skill and I’d more likely end up hurting myself.”

“Alright,” Bash says slowly as he turns to put the supply list down and move toward the crates of weapons Oppo’s workers brought on board. Behind him, he hears the metal echo of the stairs as Odette descends. “We’ve got plenty of guns, just depends on your preferred kind.”

“I’m not a gun girl,” she answers.

“Don’t tell me you’re scared of ‘em?” he wonders with a laugh.

He hears Odette scoff a laugh, the sound reminding him suddenly of Damon. “I’m not afraid of anything, and there’s black hole where my heart should be.”

Bash turns to look at her, blinking owlishly. Her statement is so unlike the young woman he’s coming to know as a friend that for a moment he struggles with a reply. “That’s… bleak.”

Odette crosses her arms, but won’t look at him. “Things I learned from my mother.” She shakes her head and continues, “Anyway, you really think the youngest princess was going to be allowed to learn to use a firearm? Unlikely. I’m a trained archer.”

“Like a... bow and arrow?” he questions.

“Yep!” She smiles, bright and wide. “You know Nos Vega, I figured you’d know where I could find one amid all the shady markets and weapon vendors.”

Bash breathes a sigh, closes his eyes and tries to rack his brain for any of the sellers that might have what Odette’s looking for. Finally, he looks at Odette’s hopeful, open expression and tells her, “I might know of one guy. But his prices -”

She interrupts him, a sly smile sliding across her lips as she says, “Let me worry about that.”

.

.

.

Bash can barely swallow down his surprise the entire trip back to the A6 while Odette practically skips beside him with her new tactical-tech bow and quiver slung over her back. To say that he’s impressed with her would be an understatement. She had somehow managed to negotiate the price of the bow to less than half of the original exorbitant price the vendor had been asking. And all because Odette had noticed that it was missing a few parts, though she was confident that she could repair it. Besides, she’d said to the vendor making sure that her voice carried, he wouldn’t want word getting out that he was charging top dollar for broken merchandise.

“How did you do that?” Bash finally asks, once the A6 is within sight.

“Do what?”

“Haggle that well.”

A burst of laughter erupts from Odette. “It’s just a slightly more aggressive form of diplomacy,” she replies. After a beat she throws him a smile and adds, “Plus I’m incredibly charming.”

“Yeah, but there were other bows, why’d you pick the one that was busted?”

That sly smile takes its place back on Odette’s face. “What are you talking about? The bow was in perfect condition.”

Bash stops suddenly, confused. “But you said...”

Odette turns as she digs into the pocket of her jacket, that smile still firmly in place as she presents him with an assortment of parts sitting in the palm of her hand. All the parts that Odette had told the vendor were missing from the bow. He goes back over their visit to the weapons vendor, how Odette had picked up the bow and showed it to him, telling him about the different parts, pointing out unique features and the things that she was looking for in a bow as her hands moved from one part of the bow to the next in an excited flurry.

“You… dismantled it when you were inspecting it,” Bash realizes and he can’t stop the grin that overtakes his face. There’s an anxiety there as well, nagging at the back of his mind – if that vendor manages to figure out what Odette had done…

“In my defense, he was asking way too much for it,” she says with a shrug. Then she pulls the bow from her shoulder and goes about reattaching all the pieces she’d removed as they continue walking.

“Where the hell have you two been!?”

Bash and Odette stop at the raised voice, looking up to see the Captain, Damon and June all standing on the ramp into the ship. They’re all geared up, looking as though they’re just getting ready to head out. And it’s then, seeing the anger coloring Cal’s face, and the annoyance pinching Damon’s that Bash remembers he and Odette hadn’t told anyone they were leaving. Fuck.

“Sorry, Cap -”

Odette steps forward before he can finish. “It’s my fault,” she says, her arm held out in front of Bash’s chest. “I asked Bash to help me get myself a weapon.”

Cal scoffs. “Why am I not surprised? Do you even truly appreciate the situation you’re in, Princess? You should have come to me first -”

“For what!?” Odette snaps, her voice sharp. “So you could tell me no? Or maybe I should have gone to Damon, who probably would have laughed himself sick had I asked. And June, well, June can barely even look at me so asking him to help me was out of the question, too!”

June, Bash notes, has the decency to look ashamed as he casts his gaze down though he doesn’t say anything.

“You still should have come to me first!” Calderon shoots back through gritted teeth. “I am the Captain of this crew! Zovack’s clan has the run of this city, what would you have done if someone recognized you?”

“And what do you think they would have done to Bash?” Damon adds.

The Princess throws up her arms. “Why does no one take me seriously when I say I can take care of myself?”

At that Damon laughs, actually laughs. “Maybe because you haven’t proven it,” he replies and there’s a challenge to his tone that has Calderon turning to raise his eyebrow at the second-in-command.  

The glare that Odette aims in Damon’s direction would have had anyone else shrinking under the intensity of it. But Damon seems to realize something then, and a grin starts to spread across his face.

“Fine,” Odette says. And then she’s looking around the junkyard until something catches her eye. She moves from Bash’s side to pick up an old, small tin can before coming back and presenting it to him. “Throw this as far as you can.”

“Okay...” he trails off and takes the can from her outstretched hand.

Odette nods as she pulls an arrow from the quiver, loads it into the bow and waits. Bash tosses the small can between his hands, considering – she had told him to throw it as far as he could. He passes the can back into his metal hand with finality, then he reels his arm back and hurls it with more strength than his flesh and blood arm would ever be capable of.

He watches the can so sailing through the air, has a moment of doubt that he may have gotten carried away. But beside him, Odette moves. She turns, pulls back the draw, her eyes tracking the can as it tumbles further and further from them with an intensity in her expression Bash has never seen before. A breath passes through Odette’s parted lips, Bash hears the snap of the string against her forearm...

Her arrow meets the can at the height of its arc, a tinny thwink! echoing back to them.

A slow round of applause has Odette turning back to the A6 where both June and Calderon wear near twin expressions of surprise. Damon, on the other hand, has kept his mask of neutrality firmly in place.

“We done here?”

It’s not my best writing, but it feels good to write again.

#andromeda six #andromeda six traveler #andromeda six fic #a6 game #a6 traveler #bash #calderon #damon #june #odette #seriously odette is a sassy asshole #and i love her dearly