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"Hey, Mordin! What's up?"
The door to the research lab swished open and a furry body races inside followed by a cheerful, sauntering Shepard.
"Hmm." Mordin hums distractedly as he leans further into his microscope.
A loud trill from behind his back causes him to pause and pull away from his work for just a second, and his eyes widen as he sees who has come in. He jerks forward and grabs as many of his test tubes as he can manage as the coati leaps up onto his research table, scrambling her paws against the smooth surface and gaining purchase at the last possible second before she goes over the other edge and face plants into the shiny floor. She knocks over some glass tubes in the frenzied panic, but nothing that Mordin supposes cant be replicated or replaced with Cerberus' massive budget. He imagines that they do it on purpose as an act of rebellion to get back at Cerberus by wasting as much of their money as they can since they are stuck and can't leave them directly. And when the coati looks up at him with a bashful grin that looks a bit too put on, he sighs, basically confirming his own theory.
"Zafada," He tilts his head down and nods to the coati staring up at him from his trashed table, "Shepard," then looks back up at her human companion who has caught up and joined their little group. He frowns reproachfully at them both.
"Would appreciate if set experiments back less during visits. Preferably those vital for survival. Lowers moral."
Shephard grins as she leans directly over the scattered test tubes, but unlike her daemon, her smile was all teeth and amused humor with none of the self-awarness and probable guilt.
"Oh come on Mordin, you'll have this fixed in 5 minutes flat. Quit being such a grump."
"At least a grump has enough frontal lobe left to complain" piped a disgruntled voice from behind a pile of beakers.
Shepard's wild, mischievous smile softened at the edges, her lips relaxing while she angles herself to peer around Mordin and get a look at the pipsqueak hiding in the back.
"Well, hello to you too, Mala. How have you two been down here? Working on anything exciting?"
A slight rustling, not loud enough for her telltale twinkling sound like a small metal bell Shephard noted, and the small palm-sized daemon emerged from the cave of science and greeted the two troublemakers.
"Not that they're any better" Shepard scoffs to herself.
Her six tiny eyes blinked in unison, unamused, as she spotted the tipped over vails on the table, and Shephard watches her little chest expand as she huffs and flies over to join the three of them at the table. Shepard always thought that she resembled a small bird like a burrowing owl like those on Earth. If those even existed on Salarian worlds, which they don't, and if burrowing owls were sassy and rude and had way more eyes and brown wings with feathers resembling sharpened knives with large pointy talons to match. "She's cute," Shephard thinks fondly. Small, and so very dangerous.
"Hardly, anymore." Mala bends her head down to preen at her chest knife-feathers with a disturbing amount of nonchalance, "Will probably have to treat you for cross-species rabies in an hour. Then the real excitement begins.
Shepard's mouth drops open and she gapes, doing a comedic double take between Mala and Mordin before glancing down at the spilled vail she has her hand exceedingly close to. She yanks her hand away and and turns her gaze to Mordin with a look of such total betrayal that Mordin can't help his lips from pulling back into a small grin.
"Stop!" Zafada giggles and reaches one claw-tipped paw up to swipe teasingly at Mala. She's a few feet away and doesn't even come close to connecting, but Mala ruffles her feathers and good-naturedly plays at insulted and disapproving as thought there was a chance at all.
When Shephard's betrayed looks shifts to actual pleading and pouted lips, Mordin decides to pity their poor commander.
"Mala jests, Shepard." Mordin reassures, placing his hand closer to the malicious puddle and consequently Shepard as a gesture of good faith.
Shepard sighs and her face falls back into a neutral expression.
"More likely deadly form of chickenpox."
Shepard's mouth snaps shut and she jerks sharply away from Mordin and Mala. She turns abruptly and practically storms toward the lab doors.
"Stop!!! She has autism!" Zafe squeals, giggling so hard that she nearly falls over herself as she jumps off the table to speed off and follow after her other half. Her laughter joins in with Shepard as she starts up with an exiting rant: "Why do I even bother coming in here and talking to you both? I'm being harassed and attacked! There's no love! No respect for your poor Commander."
Their sounds trailed off behind them, uniquely them, as they both head out the door. Shepard, who hasn't paused in her ranting, heads right out the door without stopping. Zafada is right behind her and doesn't pause either, but she does yell over her shoulder, "Bye Mala! Bye Mordin! See you later!" before they are both gone and the door swishes closed behind them.
Though he hasn't been on the ship for that long, Shepard and Zafe have been down to visit them enough and he would like to think that he knows her well enough to not be worried too much about how that interaction went. He could see the jest and playfully irritation skipping across both her and her daemon's words masked as anger. Plus, Shepard hadn't been so sly as to hide the last sight of a grin on her face before she left the room.
"Perhaps wanted to see, know was joking?" Mordin considers. He shrugs. Either way, he had no doubt that they will both be back to bother him and Mala soon. This mock anger gives him at least a few blessed minutes of peaceful research which he will definitely cherish and use appropriately to clean up this latest mess. He signs and begins to clean up the spilled beaker with a small, mischievous grin when he looks at the spilled liquid and thinks of their little prank. He feels a tug in his soul and looks up at Mala with one eye ridge raised. He can see it in the way that Mala focuses intently on him and ruffles her feathers in manner that he recognizes as glee at that thought that she was secretly looking forward to the next time that Shepard and Z barrel their way into their lab to share another moment with them.