[i]The Sound and the Fury...[/i]

The image in the mirror stared back at Echo with a wry, calculating expression on her face. She'd been off shift for thirty minutes and Tana and Holden would be waiting on her by the time she got to the Factory. Thirty minutes and she'd changed three times. Three stupid times. She didn't normally take so long to get dressed, and she fumed at the fact that she was doing so now. It was just that after the awkwardness with Tana and the resulting several days of stress about it, Echo wasn't feeling her normally confident bad ass self. At least when she had time to think about it, that was, and she was thinking way too much right now. 

"Oh fuck you, mirror." With a snarl she began ripping off clothes and throwing them at her bed, leaving her clad in nothing but the underwear and bra she'd put on before her shift. The sleeve of colorful, intermixed tattoos on her left arm from shoulder to wrist stood out in stark contrast to the twisting, tribal-esque ones inked across the right side of her torso. "I am so over this nonsense." Echo snatched up a black flame decorated tank and denim jeans, jamming them on. Boots and jewelry followed as well as a dark blue cap over her vibrant blue hair. With a last obscene gesture at the mirror, Echo snagged up her data pad and ear piece and hurried out of the room. 

Ten minutes later Echo was standing in the door of the Factory, letting the pounding music wash over her like a healing wave. Music always lifted her up, made her feel like her problems were so much less than they had been before. With the right tunes anything was possible, any obstacle could be conquered. With the right tunes she could take on the whole Devastator fleet single-handedly. 

A wildly waving hand caught her attention, and Echo saw both Tana and Holden seated about halfway back through the room, the woman standing up and gesturing wildly with both arms. Echo smiled and began shoving through the relatively small but still noisy and in the way crowd. It didn't take long to reach the small table that they'd claimed, and Echo paused for a second, looking at her two friends. Tana was all long limbs and just the right curves. Black pants and a bright, low cut white short sleeved shirt hugged those curves, showing off a healthy amount of cleavage and well toned arms with vibrantly dark skin. For his part, Holden was the same as always. Denim jeans, a black t-shirt, blonde hair atop a Boy Scout face, and the trim but powerful physique of the professional soldier that he was. 

Echo dropped into the last chair at the table, finding a drink already in place waiting for her. "Ah, you guys know just how to make me happy!" With an expert flick of the wrist she tossed back the fiery liquid, blinking back tears in the aftermath. "Oh hell, what the fuck was that?" Holden and Tana laughed, quickly joined by Echo. 

"Hey Holden, where's Jeannie?" Jeannie was Holden's girlfriend and a scientist in the hydroponics labs. The petite, mousy little brunette knew more about plants than Echo could ever hope or want to know. In all honesty, she hadn't ever even been on Echo's radar as existing until she and Holden got together. Apparently they'd spent about a week working in the same area of the ship and it had been instant connection. Zap. Since then the two of them were almost inseparable. It was to the point that seeing Holden without Jeannie seemed somehow odd. 

"Working on some project. Something about phosphates. Or something. I really didn't understand what she was trying to explain, went right over my head." Holden shrugged. He made no secret of his difficult in grasping the sciency-technical stuff that both Jeannie and Echo worked with on a daily basis. Holden knew security, and fighting, and he knew them well, but a scholar he was not.

Tana snorted, a decidedly unladylike sound that she tended to make when she found something really amusing. "Considering that you're like two feet taller than she is, she must have one hell of an arm." Echo and Tana exploded with laughter at the admittedly lame but still somehow still funny joke, while Holden treated them both to a fake glare of fake outrage, that only made them both laugh even harder. So far, the night was starting off well. 

It didn't take too long of a time, or too many drinks, to get the two girls out on dancing. Holden wasn't one for dancing, particularly when Jeannie wasn't around. As it was he was busy on his datapad messaging back and forth with her. That was fine though, neither Echo nor Tana ever expected the big guy to join them, and would have frankly been rather damn surprised if he had. 

The music was pounding, the adrenaline was rushing, and the crowd was alive. The awkwardness between Echo and Tana seemed to have gone completely, and their previous comfort and familiarity had come back in its place. This, more than anything, had Echo riding on an emotional high, buoyed by music and good company. Hence why she didn't notice just how close she was to the table before she bumped into it. 

Echo immediately jumped back, her eyes going wide even as cries of anger erupted from the three people who had been sitting at the table as their drinks spilled onto laps and floor. "Oh hell, I am [i]so[/i] sorry! I didn't see-" 

Shit. 

While two of the three from the table were desperately trying to pick up glasses and bottles, or clean off their clothes, the third was now looming very close and very angrily right in Echo's face. Unfortunately, she knew that particular loom and the individual to which it was attached. Ansel Mueller. Big, burly. Security guy of some sort, tended to hang around the hangar. And for some reason, he seemed to absolutely hate her. Not a chance went by when Ansel didn't give her one of his well refined and well used glares and on the occasions where they needed to communicate for one reason or another, it was without exception short and uncomfortable. Thing was, Echo had no idea what she'd ever done to earn the guy's apparent dislike. 

"I should have fucking known it was you, Olveira. Why can't you watch where the hell you're going?" Echo tried to smile, forcing it onto her face. The guy was pretty clearly drunk, and she didn't imagine he was a happy drunk at the best of times. Not at all.

"Hey," Echo began. She could feel Tana just behind her. "Hey, I'm so sorry Ansel. I didn't realize I was so close to the table. I'll buy a round to make up for it, ok?"

"How about you and your little friend go fuck yourselves, heh?" Echo was suddenly backing up, her hands raised. Even still she could feel her own temper fraying, heat rising into her cheeks. "You stupid little vacc-rat spacer bitch." 

The world suddenly went cold around her. There it was. The reason Ansel was always so hostile, so angry towards her. Vacc-rat. The modern equivalent of a racial slur. There was a small but virulent portion of Earth's population that blamed the Armani for the invasion, for drawing the attention of the Devastators and the subsequent death and destruction. Never mind the fact that the Armani had lost as much or more than anyone else, that the destruction of the Citadel had been a massive blow to the spacers. And now it was out in the open. Ansel hated her not for anything she'd done, but simply for what she was. It was the worst of old Earth, brought forward into the new life they were trying to build. 

Echo's growing anger had quickly blossomed into all out rage. She stared up into that twisted, snarling expression and wanted nothing more than to knock the ugly look from the big man's blocky face. She wouldn't get the chance, however. There was a punch thrown, but it wasn't Echo who threw it. 

Ansel staggered back, tripping over a chair and hitting the ground. Hard. Tana stood half in front of Echo, her hands balled into fists and rage write large and scary across her beautiful dark-skinned face. She worked the fingers of her right hand, the one that she'd used to knock Ansel onto his ass. "Don't you [i]ever[/i] talk to my friend like that again, Ansel Mueller! Or I swear to god I will not use my fist next time but a fucking chair. You got it, big guy? I don't ever want to hear you saying that kind of trash or I will find a way to get you assigned to cleaning out the waste system by fucking hand for the rest of your life." 

Echo's rage had suddenly dissipated, sucked away by the astonishment she felt at watching Tana not only belt Ansel, but knock him quite literally onto his ass and then scold him like an unruly child. Echo knew all about her own temper, but Tana was not typically one to get angry. Especially not punch someone in the face angry. She was the calm, collected one. Echo was the anger bomb. 

Suddenly she found herself pulled away from the scene of the crime, Tana being jerked along right with her. Holden had taken a solid grip on one of each of their arms and was propelling them without hesitation of pleasantries across the floor of the Factory and to the entrance. The shift from pulsing lights in the darkness out into the lighter conditions outside of the club was jarring and Echo found herself blinking into Holden's face as he spun the two of them around. 

"Go, get out of here. I'll deal with Ansel." 

"Holden, wait-" Echo began, only to be cut off by a curt gesture from her friend. 

"No argument. Get out of here, go back to your quarters, something. I'll deal with this. Now. Dealing with assholes is my area of expertise, remember?" 

Echo sighed and nodded. Tana leaned forward and kissed Holden on the cheek with a quiet thanks. Echo snagged the other girl's hand and pulled her away from the bar and towards the nearest transport hub. "Let's go Fly Girl, looks like the party's over for the time being."