#keiko is baby and has some big ouch problems in her

[space-ninja-fashion-show]

I was thinking about Kohlrabi's, North's, and Keiko's relationships with the Holdfasts and got hit with the realisation that Keiko, steadfast, cocky, too-adult-for-her-own-good Keiko is scared of Cavalero

North finds out about this either via a tiny dropped hint from Lanius, or from their own observations. And look, North already doesn't like Cavalero. They find him to be intimidating and unpleasant and potentially dangerous in the "I don't want the kids or myself spending a lot of time around an attitude like That" way. Learning that Keiko is somehow scared of the guy doesn't make North feel any less intimidated but they Do progress to "if he gets within ten feet of either of the kids I will have to do something about it jic"

(Things would go v differently if Higgins was already around and autonomous at this point bc Higgins is a tiny package of bad ideas begging to be executed and he'd probably have some inadvisable ways of dealing with this. But for better or for worse, Higgins is not yet around)

The reason Keiko is scared of Cavalero?

Well

Back before the attempted jump to Tau, things were already going to shit in the law and discipline department. We know that there was dissent and that those caught doubting the mission of the Zariman were "made an example of." In good ole Orokin fashion, getting glassed was probably a public execution kind of ordeal

People had every reason to give a wide berth to any enforcer of the law stationed aboard the ship

And Keiko? Keiko was what some might call a problem child. Stubborn and sharp-tongued and not one to be pushed around. Only obeying rules she found to make sense. A lot of this was ofc considered disrespect and misbehaviours, and combined with the fact that Keiko overall didn't get along well with her peers, it made her really easy to throw under the bus

She had seen the glassings, probably saw worse too, things she wasn't meant to, and she was disliked and misbehaving by just talking back and standing up for herself, and in the end, can you really blame her for believing those in charge of her when they'd said that if she continued down this path, she'd be taken away by the enforcers too? It was an attempt to intimidate some sense into her. To get her to behave. No enforcer would've cared to apprehend a mouthy kid, no teacher or classmate or cephalon would've gone to the lengths of actually calling them on Keiko, but she had no way to know the threats weren't genuine. No one had ever told her they weren't genuine

To Keiko, Cavalero was a ruthless, flesh-and-blood boogeyman

And now? Back aboard the Zariman? She's just supposed to trust him? When he's just standing there, acting like an ally, giving out weapons? Weapons?! To her?!

Cavalero, Quinn, a goddamn Archimedean, they can all go rot in void corruption for the rest of eternity for all Keiko cares. She doesn't trust them. No one should trust them. The only one she's willing to be around is Hombask bc Hombask had tried to help, thought that sabotaging the biomes would keep things from going to hell, and good thing she's the farthest away from the rest too, so Keiko doesn't have to look at them. Hombask lets her hang around and always has fun garbage to sort through and offered to help her assemble furniture, and even if that's not an offer Keiko would ever take her up on, it's noted