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[wheyoftheadept]

[Saturday is rubbing sleep from her face as she talks, hair disheveled and her bunk in the background.  The sounds is slightly unsynced, just enough to be annoying, and the image is tinted purple.  Still, it's coherent]

Hey, crew.  We've all had a real fucking night an' I'm sorry to add more, but this might be useful.  I think I just a clue from like, some kinda supernatural dream-traveling hint-dispenser?  Called themselves Cain and Abel, gave me a choice between a secret and a mystery, I picked mystery 'cause it meant I could tell you guys about it.

Man, I hope this sounds familiar to someone.

It was Cain I talked to, he told me a story about two brothers who uh - fuckin' hell - one killed the other because they were both in love with some invisible chick named Bell but she hadn't picked him.  Their parents thought the one brother just flipped out and did murder for some fuckin' reason, because they thought Belle was fictional?  Someone who knows what they're doing, start asking me some questions because I don't know how this is supposed to be relevant, but the dude said it was and he was for real.  I got some experience an' I know when the dream I'm having didn't come outta my own head.

Comments

[71lines]

[Oh. That rings a bell.]

A number you'd thought you'd stopped keeping track of, right?

[parannoyed]

You too?

[That's definitely telling, then. It wasn't just a wild guess.]

I don't keep a running tally. I'm not a sicko. But...

A part of you keeps track. Especially when...you think about the choices you've made. And if all of them...were necessary.

[71lines]

I stopped keeping track when I was twelve, really. Back then I thought it'd be important, but after the first two dozen or so, who really cares? If someone wants revenge, then it's down to them and me, but I don't need to linger on every face.

But, if I had to make a rough guess, it's probably pretty accurate?

[parannoyed]

[Wash nods.]

Same. It was close enough.

[His brows furrow as her words catch up to his brain, finally.]

When you were twelve? You were racking up kills before that?

[71lines]

I am a ninja, after all. Not everything's about espionage.

[She sounds pretty proud about it. The ninja bit, at least.]

[parannoyed]

That's too young. You look like a teenager. (I think?)

[He doesn't spend much time with kids and teens, is only aware of the fresh-faced lower cut off that says someone was old enough (or looked old enough) to enlist.]

And that's too young now.

[71lines]

I mean, I lived. That's pretty much the definition of being old enough when it comes to this.

[parannoyed]

Noooo it's not.

Young people can survive. Some people are just survivors.

But...they don't have all the emotional development until a certain age. It means, when you're older, you can survive easier. Even more extremes.

You shouldn't have had to, not that young.

[71lines]

Yeah, but if you don't grow up under pressure, you won't know how to handle that pressure later on. That's how you end up with people desperate to cling to anyone with strength rather than being able to stand on their own.

I mean, we haven't been on a mission together, but would you rather trust your life to me, someone who's been training since I was a kid, or some farmer who's never even picked up a knife in anger before?

[wheyoftheadept]

Mine was when I was four. Ain't hard to do, if you're born in the right place.

[parannoyed]

What the fuck?

cw: mention of pedophilia

[wheyoftheadept]

Dude was gonna sell me to the kind of person who buys four year old girls. Fucked me up good gettin' me there, too. Didn't have much of a choice.

[parannoyed]

The "What the fuck" wasn't directed at you. It was directed at...whoever made it so you had to.

[His expression is very hard and a little hateful, at the thought of whoever was responsible.]

So it's still not rescinded.

[wheyoftheadept]

They got theirs.

My pops' people busted in right after. First real memory I have is my brother carrying me out. Whole ring went down.

[parannoyed]

I'm glad you got out. I can't -

[He can't wrap his head around that kind of thing.]

I know I'm lucky. Compared to some people. At least when it comes to my childhood.

If I ever sound...critical. Of any of the people here fighting so young? It's just that you shouldn't have had to.

[wheyoftheadept]

I chose to. Pops couldn't stop me sneaking out to do it, so he figured he'd teach me to do it right. It was the bargain, I'd stop til he said I was ready, but he had to let me, once I was taught.

[There's a defiant set to her chin, like she's expecting and ready for a fight about this.]

Maybe the kids that come after me won't have to, if I can get the job done.

[parannoyed]

If you have to get a job done to give them that chance...it wasn't a choice.

[He waves a hand vaguely.]

Sometimes it's like that. Circumstance. The fight comes to you.

And you hope it stops with you. I enlisted to fight in the war at 18...hoping it meant others wouldn't have to.

[He shakes his head, slightly more open than he might have been because of the pain killers.]

Didn't go much better...for me being an adult.

voice from the same room!

[garmr]

It ain't a bad thing to learn how to fight. It happens, and you never really get to pick when. So you fight, or you die.

Wishing it was different then doesn't change that.

[Guts is sitting in the opposite bunk of Saturday's room, with his idea of helpful life advice. ]

[wheyoftheadept]

I coulda opted out. I didn't want to. [She's insistent on this point; it matters to her. Maybe cause's it's one of the things she leans on to keep it together.]

...but yeah. It sucks.

[zerofield]

You're strong. To get out of that, even then...

[ It's a lot less deadpan than the usual Tio snark, but that doesn't really make it sound emotional, either. More like it just sounds a little bit dead. ]

[wheyoftheadept]

I was lucky. My magic woke up in time, an' there was someone coming in behind me to break to the ring. If they hadn't, the other adults would have overpowered me anyway.

[zerofield]

I wonder if just being lucky is better or worse.

[wheyoftheadept]

It's pretty neutral, in my experience.

[zerofield]

Maybe. But thinking maybe there's a way out, or knowing there's nothing...

[ She's driving the train of thought in circles with the what-ifs of her own past. Give her a minute. ]

...I should stop overthinking this.

[wheyoftheadept]

Probably. You gotta overthink something, overthink this mystery hint thing.