Just a little bit

The one in the front just looked at Mark, while the other two started to walk from left and right, so it was easy to surround him. He noticed that their knees bent the other way which made for a weird, bug like movement. It didn't make the situation any less creepy. And the dusty corridor made his nose itchy, twitchy, which was even more annoying.

"A little help?"

Mark looked up, but there was no answer from the vent. She probably moved forward.

The guards didn't attack yet, they were just turning their heads left and right, as if to coordinate any possible strike. Mark raised his hands in a combat stance, ready to defend himself, and just when they lifted their weapons, ready to hit him...

And then an itch in his nose turned into a very sudden, loud sneeze.

"Achoo!"

Mark managed to raise his elbow to his nose just in time, but he also expected to get hit in the head in that moment. He couldn't be more wrong.

With a bang, the guards weapons dropped, as they began to run away, with their weird reverse bending knees making the run hilarious to watch.

"You're supposed to say bless you!"

He shouted at the disappearing behind the corner figures, and then shook his head. It was a weird, long day for him.

"Bless you?"

He heard from above, the head appearing from an open vent again.

"It's our custom. Why didn't you help?"

"Why would I, you seemed perfectly capable of dealing with them. Besides, for all I know you are fucking carrying some deadly fucking disease." She snapped at him. "Oh my holy big giant head, we had sex! I'm going to fucking die!"

Kaliasi looked like panicking.

"Relax, it was just dust. It was annoying my nose for a while already."

The moment of pause followed.

"So you are not sick?"

"I'm not sick."

"Not carrying some deadly fucking alien disease that will wipe out half of the fucking galaxy?"

"No, now come down and let's get out of here." He said, running out of patience.

"... I'm not going to die?"

"Fucking come down already!"

Mark snapped this time.

"Alright, alright, sheesh, fucking drama queen..."

She gracefully pulled herself down, and then descended, falling down, like a cat, on all fours.

"Can we move on now?"

He asked, and lifted his hand to scratch his nose.

She jumped away, like from someone who had a bomb.

"I'm not going to sneeze... Why are you all so scared?"

He asked, wanting some kind of explanation.

"It's a long story..."

"Then make it short."

Kaliasi cleared her throat while thinking.

"Basically, a galactic plague that originated from the primitive world, that sweeped through quarter of the population. The most common symptom was sneezing. You can imagine now why are we all a bit... Twitchy about it, and primitives."

"And with all your advancement and technology you couldn't fight it?"

She shook her head.

"No. I don't know why or how, I'm not a fucking biologist, but I heard that the virus kept mutating, and every cure had to be personalised and applied as soon as possible."

Mark didn't answer. They both stared at each other for a while, until she decided to break the silence.

"Let's move on."

"One moment, we need weapons and I think we just got some..."

He bent down, towards one of the long, blue sticks. It had leathery like part, which he assumed was a handle, because the rest of it just looked metallic.

"No don't!" Kaliasi noticed what he was doing, but it was too late.

He touched the weapon.