That's... not my problem

"Fucking finally" Keith swore, looking at the piece of rock floating in the middle of the space they had been approaching.

"What a dirty mouth" commented Kafka in her usual soft voice. "Maybe I should wash it."

"Shut up, angsty kid" Keith replied, making Kafka's eyes twitch. "Can you imagine how awkward it is to live without arms?"

"You have your arms now" interrupted the cloaked person, who, even after a month, hadn't taken off his hood. "We had to stop to explicitly buy you provisional arms just to make you shut up."

"And why exactly do you complain?" rebuked Keith, looking at the person who just spoke. "Do you think I couldn't notice your happiness when you bought the ice cream?"

"..."

With that, the mysterious person fell silent.

"And do you think that if you stay quiet, I won't notice your embarrassment?" Keith smirked, looking at the figure, who seemed to look down to hide his or her face. "No, I will keep pushing you until you apologize."

"What should I apologize for?" grumbled the hidden person. "I don't remember doing anything worth an apology."

"...Really" said Keith with a dark face. "I begged you to stop at the first available planet, but you ignored me. I pleaded for you to help me when this precocious teenager was poking fun at me since I didn't have arms to defend myself, but you ignored me."

"It was not my obligation to help you. My orders were to bring you to this place" the mysterious person argued back.

"So that only leaves the kidnapping, huh?" Keith scoffed, making the cloaked person shrink in guilt.

"Ara ara" Kafka softly laughed, looking at the two. "Even the serene and quiet guy can't keep up with the screeching banshee."

"Do you think you will escape?" asked Keith with a malicious smile, making Kafka look at him with the usual smile she used to hide her thoughts. "I won't forget the humiliation of having my whole face painted with what you call makeup, edgy kid."

"You were quite beautiful" said Kafka with a straight face, knowing that Keith would be able to sense her amusement even if she didn't show it.

"I don't want to be beautiful; my ideal image is not that of an androgynous person" argued Keith with an indignant expression, remembering his inability to do anything when Kafka chose to 'prank' him.

He hated pranks.

At least, when he was on the receiving end.

"And yet, you were beautiful" repeated Kafka with a small smile.

"I'm going to dip your coats in the first pile of shit I find" declared Keith, nodding to himself.

"Do you want to die?" asked Kafka, looking at Keith, her expression unchanging.

"Can you kill me?" asked Keith with a raised eyebrow. "No wait, you probably can. Hmm, then yes, I'd prefer to die than let you get away with it."

"I can solve that" Kafka said with a grin, taking out a knife, not the rusty one, but an extremely expensive one she had 'bought' from a pretty important-looking guy on the planet where Keith had his body 'repaired.'

"Stop arguing, we need to leave" the cloaked person said to the two, who were busy glaring at each other, all pretense dropped.

"I would let you go first" Keith said, following the cloaked person Kafka had called a guy. "But you have as much of a lady as a monkey has of a human."

"Of course" Kafka tilted her head a bit and grinned. "You have all of a lady I lack."

"That only means you don't even qualify as a human being, or that you're even further from being a lady than a man" Keith said before leaving the room.

"At least I have genitals" smirked Kafka, following him.

"The only one who will make use of them will be considered a pedophile."

"Including me?"

"I don't think you can feel sexual pleasure yet; maybe after a decade."

"And yet, you'll never be able to."

"Fuck you."

"I fear you don't have the tools for the job."

"You can't build a house in a barren desert."

"And even more if you have no materials to build it."

"Then I don't have to worry about it. If someone goes to jail, it won't be me."

"Not that I would allow you to start; I'm not even sure you qualify as an organic being."

"I don't understand why it matters. Isn't Nous, the Aeon of Erudition, a machine?"

"As great as it sounds, he still won't fuck anything in his eons-long life."

"Is sex and pleasure all you look for in this life? What a sad little girl."

"What are you supposed to do with your life if you don't enjoy it?"

"Like you did in the bathroom three days ago?"

Kafka stopped at that, her face turning cold.

"Hmm? What's wrong?" asked Keith with a smile, cautiously hiding behind the exasperated cloaked person.

"Repeat what you just said" Kafka said in a frigid voice, taking out her knife, which shone in the corridor's light.

"Don't worry, I didn't peek" Keith solemnly said with a serious face, but it quickly turned into a malicious grin. "Not that I needed to. I must admit, I was surprised—even as horny as you were, you didn't release a single sound."

"..."

Kafka stood still, and Keith sensed her hostility grow to unprecedented heights.

"I can sense your feelings; why would you think I couldn't do it through a thin wall?" inquired the fearless Keith. "Look at the bright side—you learned something else about the ability you were so curious about."

"Hey!" the cloaked person shouted in alarm, grabbing Kafka's wrist just before she could pierce Keith's head with her knife. "Dammit, Elio, you didn't warn me of this."

"Hmm." Keith, who couldn't sweat as his body wasn't made of flesh, recovered his calm, seeing that the dependable yet sometimes childish person could beat Kafka and protect him. Of course, this emboldened him to continue pressing Kafka's buttons. "Don't worry, Kafka, I will follow you everywhere. Of course, I won't peek at you when you're in the bath or your room, but I'll always be near, ready to mock you after a 'fun' moment."

"Can you stop provoking her?" asked the cloaked person, grunting as Kafka violently fought back. "How are you this strong, anyway?"

"Oops." Keith quickly approached the struggling Kafka and blocked her mouth, looking at her murderous expression with a grin. "You can control other people with your voice, right? Don't worry, I'll prevent you from getting a hoarse voice from shouting too much. Be thankful!"

Kafka's expression couldn't express more anger.

"What do you think you are doing?" asked the person under the hood, struggling to keep Kafka pinned to the ground while Keith only stoked the flames. "We won't be able to leave if she doesn't calm down!"

"But..." Keith showed a confused expression, ignoring the furiously struggling Kafka. "Why is that my problem?"

"Huh?" His interlocutor obviously didn't expect that.

"I don't eat, I don't shit, and I don't sleep" Keith explained. "I can stay as long as you two want, but you need to protect me as the S&M lover wants me here, and releasing this feral beast means my death. So yes, until she calms down, I can stay here forever, and you're stronger than her."

"She won't calm down if you keep agitating her!" shouted Keith's unwilling protector.

"Again, I don't care" Keith shrugged.

POP

The three sentient beings looked in astonishment at the arm now on the floor.

There was no way the stopgap they bought would be better than Herta's arm, but Keith tried to hide the precarious state his arms were in.

"Listen: Release me" Kafka used her hypnotic ability, and the cloaked person, after struggling for a few seconds, did as he was told.

But Keith had already run away, shouting for his life and abandoning his arm.

"Someone! Help me!" he screamed, leaving the spacecraft without knowing where he was running, as staying meant death. He didn't know if he could be killed, but he wasn't eager to find out. "A horny kid is chasing me after her embarrassing actions were brought to light!"