[MISSION LOG] BRAVE NEW WORLD

[onemind]

CHARACTERS: All
WHERE: The Station + Concordia
WHEN: Day :000 - ???
SUMMARY: Leaving the Station; the arrival and first days on Concordia. Concordia pt.1.
WARNINGS: Will update as necessary.

IT'S EARLY IN THE DAY and something feels strange. It’s not unlike when a new Host - not one of your brood, but close enough to feel the tug - comes awake on the Nesting Deck. But it’s just the initial tug. There’s no noise, no hum of confusion or volume. Today, it’s just there: a sensation of presence that a moment ago wasn’t. Soon after follows a prickling awareness of urgency. A small electric bolt through the mind. Cathaway doesn’t use words in the mind, but her meaning is nonetheless easily understood: come to her on the hangar; your presence is required.

On the hangar there is a sleek, low profile transport ship. Before it stand Cathaway and Prince and in their company is a stranger: a short woman with warm skin and dark hair, wearing unfamiliar colorful clothes and a quick, pleasant smile. You’ve never seen her before, but you know she’s a Host.

“This is them?” Her voice is light and sweet. Prince, occupied by a databank, glances up at her then nods once. There’s a tension in his shoulder and through his jaw - a distinct contrast to Cathaway and the stranger who lack both.

“Lovely.” Her tone is breezy and easy, delighted. “Hello, it is so nice to meet you all! My name is Carata. My partner and I have been away on duty for a few months, but it’s become clear that we need backup on our assignment. We are hoping you can help.” Carata motions to the mission equipment in neat kits at her feet. There is one for each young Host.

Prince folds his pad down into its smallest form. His expression is set and serious.

“You will be joining Carata and Nirad on the planet below to assist them with their mission. Your datapbank will provide you with information about the planet and the city where you will be stationed. This mission is covert and the planet itself has no contact with other planetary races, so you will need to do your utmost to blend in.”

Cathaway sharpens slowly beside them: a dull pencil being sharpened to a point as her attention curves back to this place, this instance. She unfolds her hands. “You’ll be provided with an earpiece that should allow you to interface with the local technology and a fake identity for your cover on world. Please mind both carefully and be sure to keep your databanks offline. It would be inconvenient if they were networked while on planet.” From the way she says it, it sounds like ‘inconvenient’ might be an understatement. “This mission shouldn’t be inherently life threatening. Your primary goal is to investigate the anti-android movement. Carata and Nirad will be able to tell you what your databanks do not.”

“You should listen to them,” Prince adds. “Rely on their experience and knowledge to help you succeed in your task. Be mindful, and treat them with the respect they have earned.”

At this Carata laughs. It’s a bright, joyful sound, her hands coming up to clasp in front of her chest, “Please, teacher, you are too serious. I am sure they will do very well. Come along then! Gather your things; we must leave as soon as possible. I do hate to leave Nirad alone for too long.”

Turning her back to the Hosts, Carata takes Cathaway’s hand for a moment Nothing is said, but there’s the distinct impression of something passing between them. They release their grip, then Carata turns to Prince. She places her hands on his shoulders and goes up to her toes to press a kiss to his cheek. He doesn’t return the gesture, but those with sharp eyes will note he does lean down slightly to make her job easier.

Gather your gear, get anything from your rooms you might not want to leave behind. In two hours, everyone attending the mission will be buckled or strapped into the transport as Carata readies the ship for takeoff. She explains, neatly and concisely, what they believe the enemy to be doing in Concordia. Then, with a turning of the deck, the ship is freed from the embrace of Station 72.

It will be a long time before you see this place again.

     I. THE WHEELS ON THE BUS
The flight to Concordia is surprisingly short. By the time Carata's finished her explanation, you've passed into a new universe. It comes with a strange wave of something akin to nausea. Outside the transport's starboard viewports lays Opia in all it's glory: a beautiful blue marble speckled with sixteen landmasses and swathed in thing clouds like spun sugar. From this distance, clusters of light burn from specific points on the continents like a map of grounded constellations. As one of the great megacities of Opia comes curling from around the edge of the planet, the transport ship begins to descend.

Atmospheric entry is smooth. The transport drops at the outskirts of Concordia on what is, hilariously, some kind of large parking garage. It has engaged the most sophisticated of its cloaking technology to do this and Carata urged everyone to disembark quickly so the ship can return to orbiting the planet before it's detected.

"It will be back," she says flippantly. "When we've finished our job."

The ship departs. It's quiet and still for a handful of minutes; Carata seems unconcerned and gives little in the way of direction or instruction. The city flashes around them - bright lights and neon masking the fading of natural light - and nearby, a roadway hums. Eventually the sound of a car pitches louder. A set of headlamps shear from the long line of cars and in moments a long, squarish transport van pulls up and parks at the top of the garage. The side door slides open to admit everyone. In the driver's seat is an android - shining metal and cheerful as it greets every host by name. Beside the android in the van's passenger seat sits a tall, dark skinned man who - much like Carata - is obviously a host.

Welcome to Concordia.

     II. HOME SWEET HOME
It's a long drive into the city. The buildings get taller, the lights get brighter, the streets get busier. There are throngs of people on the street, dogged by endless rows of neon bright advertisements. Traffic is either miserable or flowing depending on the neighborhood and trams run on tracks fifty feet or more above the roadways. Streams of people files from the pavement to the subways, countless numbers of escalators leading down.

When the bus finally stops, it's in front of a building as tall as any others. The signs here mark this section of the city as BETA BLOCK and when you get out and into the building lobby you find that the door opens for you automatically. A chime rings through the interfacing ear piece and when you enter the elevators, the only floor accessible to you is NUMBER EIGHTEEN. When you disembark, a kind voice welcomes you by home in your ear. There are a large number of rooms here in Bearing - stake your claim, everyone! Nirad and Carata already have a couple of rooms in the Southwest corner of the building, but the rest are open. Time to settle in!

     III. FEET ON THE GROUND
You're given the rest of the night to sleep (or...whatever), but by 9AM the next morning everyone is awoken by Carata's voice in their head. She's clearly not shy of using her symbiotic connection.

( Good morning! I know this is quite a lot to get used to. I believe this is your first true assignment? But I have always believed that the best way to learn something new is to jump right in. ) The words are accompanied by the sensation of someone clapping their hands together, a cheerful kind of practicality. ( You’ve been given a credit card. I encourage you to go out today and learn what you can about this place. Talk to people. Listen to the news. Be sure to remember your cover identity, and don’t hesitate to call if you find yourself in trouble. )

There is nothing pressing to the suggestion, just the sensation- light. Airy. Fun. She switches track after a moment, a thoughtful addition: ( There is also a rally in town today. It’s being run by The True Children of Opia, some minor little hate group-- ) She seems to wave off the unsavory aspects as she forges ahead, ( They aren’t affiliated with Humans + Humans 1st, but they do have very similar ideologies and it is quite probable that there is overlap in their membership. If you would rather, it is also quite likely that there will be protestors there as well, both members of Mind Life and those who are adamant about pursuing digital resurrection. Please do be careful, though, sometimes those rallies can be a little... ) An image of an oily substance catching flame, quickly and hotly.

( Whatever you chose, simply do your best to get your bearings. ) She seems to realize the unintended joke there, given the name of their current residence, and a bright happy flash of color accompanies it. What a delightful surprise. ( Prepare yourself for what is to come. Nirad and I will continue our investigation in the meantime. )

---

((OOC Notes: This is the catchall log for the first stages of the Concordia mission. You'll notice there's no set ending date, so use this log however you like - alternatively, feel free to start your own logs in the setting! Don't worry; we'll be keeping a close eye on things, so if something big starts to happen that necessitates a new long, we'll make sure to keep our bases covered and all of y'all updated. Just be aware that dating forward farther than :010 may get a little dicey.

If you have any mission specific questions, direct them to the OOC post here.))

NAVIGATION • SETTING • FAQ • MOD CONTACT • GLOSSARY

( CODE BY WHAMBAM )

Comments

[erbier]

[ His manners are different, even without the symbiote she would be able to tell. He does not speak like those from the modern worlds, nor the various Earths. The question itself gives him away and that piques her interest somewhat, finishing the twisting of her hair as she perches on the arm of a chair. She is not exactly comfortable in the Bearings, nor anything resembling a modern accommodation. In her Godking's palace there had been little in way of furniture, it was mainly a wide open spaces with battered carpets and floor pillows to sit on. She prefers the floor, but the common room has too many chairs and other things in it to really allow for it with ease. She finds it both cluttered and impersonal all in one, but her opinion on the decorating is irrelevant beyond the way she never quite settles down comfortably in a chair here.

She contemplates his question, to what depth she is in the mood to answer. ]

I rest intermittently. My world had little by way of daylight.

[ It was not always pitch black, but their skies were choked with ash from the world's perpetual burning... The sun never really made it all the way through, days were grey. Nights were black, and night was not a time to be asleep. ]

The lights do not disturb my sleep. But there are far too many of them and they are far too bright. I do not see the point, beyond garishness.

[ She sort of shrugs? The people of Concordia seemed to like garish things. They were so wasteful and indolent. ]

[unsea]

[ In conversation, one gets what they offer. An exchange of words is as much an exchange of observations.

Gently, he parries: ] It's an incredible feat of engineering. [ It reminds him of Alina, as though she were finally as vast and incomprehensible as he had told her she was. Everywhere at once, and overlooked as easily as she would be, should eyes that didn't understand her look upon her: terrible and beautiful. The city reminds him of that, and he has to wonder - what purpose do they have? What does the light keep at bay in a place like this? His world is candlelight and fireplace, glass and mirrors that keep halls and rooms well-lit and warmed against the encroaching dusk.

(He marvels at the lights, but he does not seem to fear the thought of the darkness.) ]

They're going to disturb mine. I heard mention of quarters. Are there any without windows?

[ Like this, his words suggest he is reliant on her knowledge. And truly, he is. She did not awaken with him - so she must have done so before. Things are too new and too many, and despite their dormitory's name, he has definitely not found his bearings. ]

[erbier]

[ She just nods impassively, she doesn't understand the feat of engineering well enough to appreciate it, but if he finds it impressive she has no real call to argue with him. She is easy that way. While she is supportive of the Hive's goals social conscience and connection, she felt it was not incompatible with retaining one's own opinions. Especially on something so trivial, it draws no judgment from her, although... plenty of things do. She can be stubborn and taciturn when offended, and her sensibilities can be quite puritanical. ]

I believe all the quarters have windows, but they can be blocked.

[ She crosses her ankles. ]

The rooms are very... [ Not naturally tech-savvy although she is learning she has to hunt for the right description. ] Customizable. You should be able to make yourself comfortable.

[unsea]

[ Then, he'll just have to block the windows, as she said. Otherwise, it will be absolutely impossible for him to find any time to rest, if the city is as lit during the night cycle as it is during the day. Judging by the sheer amount of brilliance coming in as of that moment: it will be. Which means, he'll have to locate curtains or step out to purchase them. A little exploration won't hurt, and there is - supposedly - a card that is... a stand-in for currency? ]

Customizable, [ an echo, as her turn of phrase makes the most sense to him. Moreso than any other tech-related terms he's seen on the databank. ]

Is there a room for the wash? The last question I'll ask, I hope, as you've been exceptionally patient with me.

[ It's for the blood hidden by the black of his clothes, actually. ]

[erbier]

[ She quirks a tired but bemused smile, as if smiling is not really something she does much. ]

You can ask me whatever you like. It is overwhelming enough to awaken, without being brought to a new world so soon.

[ She will not forget her own awakening any time soon. There had been so many of them all at once. Sometimes she thinks she might be jealous of those who have come after, one or two at a time, it seemed so much more manageable than the roomful of screaming voices. She remembers going to Cathaway with tears in her eyes certain that all the noise would drive her insane. She remembers slowly finding a rhythm and a peace as she found each piece of her brood... She looks down, her tiny smile just a little bit warmer. ]

The wash-rooms are shared, we have been taking turns.

[ She finds the copious amount of free-flowing water almost as frivolous as all the lights, but then again she grew up in a barren wasteland. The first time she saw the Station's pool she was torn between utter terror, disapproval, and curiosity... ]

[unsea]

I am used to a life where I must be on the move at moment's notice. The way things are now is - familiar.

[ Having to transition from rude awakening, to no longer being the only voice in his own head, to arrival here, at the Bearings - it is comparable to the rapid mobilization of troops, of long marches to and fro - on the trail of semi-mythical beasts. To war. And the battlefield. He has been in motion while on the cusp of exhaustion for weeks now. No need to lose his momentum now. He'll rest when they're through here. He'll allow himself to be overwhelmed when they're done.

There is no rhythm to be found. There is a resistance within him - firmly opposed to the call of the Nest. ]

Like barracks, [ he comments, about the Bearings, the shared rooms and the turn-taking. The word is nearly a laugh. ] We are little soldiers, are we not.

[erbier]

[ She cannot think of anyone who has shrugged off the trial that is acclimatizing to the symbiote quite so nonchalantly. Not even herself and Ren, who had bonded over emotional scars like rabbits being strangled by the thorny overgrowth of a berry bush. They were pleased with its new challenges and potential, but... still struggling to settle in to it all.

She supposes he isn't missing anything but simply pushing through it. Not truly hurting anything to focus more on function than staring into the great deep heart of the Nest. There was give and take to all of it, there's no reason to judge him, not yet. He is not her brood besides, his effect upon her is meager. ]

I do not see myself as a soldier.

[ She won't speak for anyone else, she knows some of the hosts are quite invested in the martial aspects of it all. She does not think this either, but if she were to be anything it would be a spy. Subtle, manipulative, ruthless beneath her pretty face. ]

The caravan I travelled with as a child also moved often, but I still did not take to all this as quickly.

[ Compliment, maybe, she does like people who can hold their own and control their emotions. There's curiosity as well. ]

[unsea]

[ He is a part of the Nest's whole. And he wills himself to remain at a distance. ]

There are other eyes than the ones that look upon the mirror.

[ There are others. Others who might see any of them in such a way. As they are connected to the Nest, to this sensation of wholeness, they all have so much more to lose. They exist internally and externally, at the same time. There are parts of them that are made of others, that cannot be controlled. That can be lost. And he despises it. Not because he would hate to lose them, but because they are vulnerabilities and weaknesses he did not ask to take on. They are him now, and he feels resentful towards them, more and more. He feels colder and more alone than he had before his own awakening.

And she is a briar patch, lovely and painful to look upon, be she of another Brood or not. Blossoms that hide hook-thorns, waiting to catch at the unaware passerby. A sharp tongue, sharper eyes. ]

My only other option is to drown -- [ he gestures, to everything at once, with gloved fingers. ] -- in all of this. I move forward, or I am lost to it, and I will not bend my knee at such meager challenge.

[ There is something intense in his words, something darkly regal and commanding. He is a man used to leadership, and the burden and the madness and the stress attributed to it. ]

[erbier]

[ The undercurrent of his charisma reverberates through her, the kind of sensation which raises up a dust cloud of memories, little things seen from the corner of the eye, evaporated when examined closely. Emotions half-formed. The voice of a King, her fear of drowning as the torrent of the world's cruel cycle of death to death to death washed in around her.

She blinks placidly as the Darkling, ignoring what stirs in the recesses of her mind's eye. An indistinct shadow play from behind a wall of ice: a burning sun, a creeping horror, a garden deep underground. ]

Of course.

[ She understands. She understands what a simple choice survival can be. Body, mind, and soul she is covered in the scars of that journey, all hidden away behind her youth and pretty face. ]

Though I would not call this challenge a meager one. [ She tilts her head, a birdlike gesture of bemused curiosity. ] The entire universe has opened before you.

[ A thing Cathaway had said to her, about opportunity, about room for growth. Ilde is still mulling it over, and in a way voices it to see how someone else reacts to the concept of it. ]

[unsea]

[ What he picks up through their tenuous connection is imagery he could not begin to understand without her conveying her experiences. It's like a fever-dream, one that flashes before his eyes like thunder, like light pooling in cupped hands that lashes at him. What a unique soul this young woman is. Unique, and utterly enigmatic. ]

The entire universe before me.

[ He echoes her words, as if sampling them for himself. Determining if they remind him of an old recipe - whether it's something he favors or something that he doesn't have the particular tastes for. Indeed, he calls it a meager challenge, but it is one of the largest he has faced. Not even leading the Second Army was as precarious as having his mind torn open by a symbiotic entity to allow the thoughts and feelings of countless others to flow through him. However -- ]

I wonder if our savior's truly knew what they were doing, when they saved us. If they knew, then, who they were opening the universe to.

[erbier]

[ That statement pierces, a brief shrill jolt of emotion and anxiety. She swallows it down, the expression on her face unchanging despite a faint downward turn to an already sullen mouth. Yes. She has asked herself such a question as the days have progressed. She has wondered if she herself is irredeemable, unworthy. She wonders about some of the other hosts, even ones she loves.

She looks away. ]

I do not know if they have the luxury to question such things.

[unsea]

I can understand their urgency. The need for conscripts often outweighs the caution one must show.

[ There is fire in his voice. The licking embers of a dying pyre. Bodies, burnt and limp upon it - male and female and child. Beyond them, the watchful eyes of witch hunters. Fanatics. Disciplined but desireful of violence they feel is due. He envisions them, and he hates with the resignation of someone old, someone who has seen the flow of history and knows that it has not and will not change.

-- she looks away, and he clears his throat. A slight, almost apologetic noise: ] Then again, perhaps they think something of ourselves that we do not. Leaving us to certain death would be easier, if they thought any of us could be a danger to -- [ The Nest. ] this.

[erbier]

[ He disturbs her. Each new statement with its familiar terrors stirs the vat of her memories. She looks up again, her chin tilted down, a kind of sullen and wary expression. She cannot call him out directly, not on such vague tremors, but the mixture of fear and excitement is troublesome to her. His fire and his darkness, just beyond the ability to taste, remind her of a madman she had worshiped.

To say she has fully separated herself from her sycophancy for Godking Dreus would be incorrect, but every day she spends away from his hypnotic poison is another day of clarity. It would not be unfair to say she had been addicted to the toxic magic that bled from his every pore. Addicted to his charisma and his vicious heat, stunned and numbed by the immensity of his madness and the atrocities he committed.

Lost in the electricity stirring under her skin, she almost forgets to answer, and when she does, it is distracted, ]

Cathaway speaks often of our hidden potential. She has more faith in me than I have in myself.

[ It was a tumultuous relationship she had with their elder host. Ilde loved her and resented her, longed for her praise but also longed to overpower her. The closest thing to a mother she has ever had, with all its tensions. ]

[unsea]

[ Respect, and a competitive, near-resentful edge, linger within him when he considers Cathaway's existence - were he aware of Ilde's own feelings towards Cathaway, he might find that his own are similar. They are the same feelings he felt towards the dead woman, currently entombed in the Station's crypt until further notice. He has not replaced one with the other, but something is shattered inside his head at her death, and he has pressed those foundering emotions towards someone who is yet living and breathing. ]

Cathaway is undoubtedly more experienced in the matters of the Nest.

[ That's that they're called now. He has gone from leader, to member. His pride surges: fitful and resentful of such a perceived demotion. ]

"Hidden potential", is such a curious way of putting it.

[erbier]

Unreachable, perhaps. Had she left me where I was, even before the Enemy came, my only destiny was to die.

[ Waiting for the cup run over, for the fire that burned inside of the Godking to finally exceed all restraint. The world already burned, perpetual, smoke clogged skies, but there was a ragnarok to come in which there would be nothing left to so much as even smolder. ]

[unsea]

How must it have been, for a savior to reach forth and offer an escape from destiny itself.

[ It makes him wonder, what sort of history would result within their worlds - all of their worlds, but his most of all - without their presence. He does not know the importance of anyone else, but his own existence in the context of his country had been as vital, as essential, as hers. The woman in his mind's eye. Bathed in light, white-haired, passionate - his mirror. ]

Is not destiny inherently mutable, then? Given the right tool.

[ His turn to posit a question to her, in the hopes of witnessing how she reacts. ]

[erbier]

[She looks at him, such a thoughtful gaze that pierces right to the depth of the question he asks her. She does not care if perhaps it was rhetorical, it was a worthy question. She was not raised in a dogma which believed in such things. Destiny was fixed. Death was the destiny of all, and it was implied to be brutal. What was mutable was how much one might suffer before that point... She contemplates this idea deeply, even without his provocation. It shows in her eyes.

When she answers, she lowers them once more. There is a sorrowful fondness to it all. She had loved the assured instrument of her demise. Seen the mortal man beneath the Godking, a man who would lay his head at her knee and weep at times, so sorry for what he had done. So in love with her innocence. ]

It seemed as if destiny itself had reached out to me. That I had earned a second chance, by following the mandates set by my Godking...

[ An inhale, an exhale, deep and nourishing. ]

Seeing the multitude of means and beliefs in the universe, I question that certainty. Perhaps convincing me of my... ascendance was only convenient.

[unsea]

[ He was assured at a young age, that his destiny belonged to him. That no other, besides himself, was possessed of the ability to become the master his fate, or to command his soul. His heart, he was instructed to hide away - and dutifully, he did. In doing so, he took the first steps of the sovereign - polar opposite of the supplicant. She speaks of mandates set forth by another, and the thought of obedience is so foreign to him, unless it is given to another as means to an end. ]

I, too, once served a king.

[ He does not admit that he had served many kings, over many countless years; that he, wrapped in falsity, was biding his time. Like a serpent. ]

Forgive me if I do you wrong, as I do not understand the ways of your world nor your heart. But, I learned what we are certain of, we must create for ourselves.

[ For a moment, he closes his eyes, his teeth snagging at his bottom lip - a boyish gesture - and he spreads his gloved fingers, apologetically. ]

I don't mean to lecture. You remind me a little of a woman I knew.

[erbier]

[ There is something almost shy in her face, hesitant. When she describes her past with words, there are few who understand. Her brood tolerates her well through the shape of emotions, but even the majority of them do not truly see the meaning of her sycophancy. Other broods even less so. The Darkling's statement that perhaps he understands is unexpected, mistrusted, but she listens. There is a great gaping gap between what she knows, but the chess pieces are at least similar. The set dressing easy to comprehend between one to another. ]

I do forgive. [ It seems right to say so, to acknowledge that their experiences are different but to appreciate his empathy. ] Do you mind, telling me more of this woman?

[ His ability to hear her own experiences with understanding rather than rejection makes her feel as though she can ask. As though she would like to offer some understanding in kind. ]

[unsea]

[ If only because they both belonged to a court, in one way or another, he could understand the language she used and the direction from which she approached. Ilde seemed to look from the bottom to the top, and he was so very used from looking down upon others. In many, many ways. Being beholden to another, however, is not something new to him. Though he rebuked his king, in the end. Usurped him and sent he and the remains of the royal family running into the night.

Does he mind, telling Ilde more? Of course not. Politely, he locates a surface upon which he can lean, and gestures with his hands as he speaks. Tight, delicate little motions to emphasize one word or another, spoken in an accent of curling vowels and thick consonants: ] Her name was Genya. [ His tone suggests she is not dead, despite his referring to her in the past. ]

She was, like all of us at Os Alta, a soldier. Powerful, beautiful. She was favored by the tsar and the tsaritsa for her unique talents. The king and queen dressed her in livery and used her the way monarchs use their subjects who could not speak out against them. It isolated her from her peers. They drove her to near madness, such was her grief from their betrayal.

[ There is something deeply sad, in his eyes and in the frowning corners of his mouth. It suggests that her story is not the first of its kind. ]

[erbier]

[ Ah, a true court with a king and queen in finery, with servants to abuse and factions of intrigue. Ilde smiles sadly, acknowledgement of the concept, all though not fully understanding. ]

Dreus was mad, and he made us madmen with him.

[ Perhaps a surprisingly blunt thing for her to say, but it wasn't as if she was ever delusional about her king. But awareness had not changed the realities of the situation. ]

[unsea]

Such is wont, when madmen are made like gods. [ Whether they are self-made or raised to such heights does not matter.

He respects her candor, however deeply he loves his tales and his stories. A result of their different worlds, indeed. ]

In the end, she was given the choice between rescue or reimbursement. Excluding our unknown enemy's involvement, do you think you would have chosen either?

[erbier]

[ His acceptance is... interesting. Her stories make many of the other hosts sad, confused, angry at the cruelty of it all. There are a few who grasp mad kings or dead worlds, but never quite to the degree which truly eases her sense of isolation from them all. This one... is comforting, in a way. His question is not. ]

One cannot be... reimbursed for suffering.

[unsea]

[ He grasps the idea of mad men and martyrs, men driven by ambition and single-minded desires. Molding the world into their own images, praying to the bones of every forgotten saint, lost and buried in overgrown vales, twined into the nests of gargantuan birds, lost on the dark shores of the Unsea - among shrieking monsters that were once men. It's not a far leap from that to mad kings, dead realms. ]

Vengeance is its own currency.

[ Something sharp in grey eyes, as his mouth curls into a smile. ]

[erbier]

[ She catches the look on his face, watches it without reaction for a moment before she pushes to her feet. She strokes the soft tail of her braid thoughtfully. ]

I will have to think on that.

[ Not offended, not quite dismissive, but she is excusing herself from such a dangerous conversation. For now. ]