"Yeh, I were there. I drove the Sahagin spear through her chest,"
It was difficult to surprise Ryanti in this line of work. She had bared witness to his stunning reaction to where they were at, giving away the reality that he had never been in anywhere remotely like a place such as this before. Yet, he was the more composed individual. He was the most prepared. Likewise, his training had also ingrained into his head the reality of betrayal, deception, and most importantly the unexpected.
But Sounsyy did in fact manage to surprise Ryanti sometimes.
His knife slid ever so slightly amongst the bottom of the window’s frame as he glanced over to her. The reflection of his torchlight upon the pieces of glass provided only the slightest light upon his feature, but it was enough for her to notice. There was a hint of surprise in his eyes - yes perhaps it was just what she was looking for. But there was also an element of interest and a layer of perplexity about that glance as well. Ryanti’s eyes trapped light easily, and so they seemed to glow under the very dim shadows of his torchlight being reflected back at him.
"That secret safe with yeh too?"
Her wit. It reminded him of the little spark he saw in her eyes just moments before. Before all of this, he remembered how dead those eyes were. Now there was some life to them, as well as some life that had crept into her lips and gave her some fun things to say. As her light left his own and checked behind her again for a spectre long gone, Ryanti’s lips pursed into a smile. Sounsyy could not see this, but she could probably hear a feint chuckle emanating from his own pair of lips.
The chuckle was the sign of him putting two and two together. It was an easy connection to make. The Captain had just told him about the personality and demeanor of her former Master, and the little sideshow Ryanti was picturing in his head… yes, if he were her, he would have hated her. Hated her so much. So indeed it was an easy connection to make… and an easy action to imagine taking. She had gone the less moral path to obtain her position. She had murdered her.
Sounsyy’s proximity was enough to break Ryanti out of his thoughts and into reality once more. The lack of distance between their shoulders caused his senses to become hypersensitive. He could almost feel every tiny little movement of Sounsyy’s shoulders, even though he only occasionally felt contact. So softly did his hands rest upon what remained of the broken glass upon the frame of the window; the fragments were small enough now to be harmless to him. He was wondering the same thing as her, if the closeness made her feel uncomfortable. He had a brief memory of seeing her in the infirmary.
Then, he felt a sudden harsh pressure on his shoulder. Ryanti’s side hunched over for a tiny moment, as he didn’t expect such a maneuver, but his shoulder then stood firm enough for the woman to leap up into the window. When he returned his glance back to where it was, all he could see was a form hunched up in the window. He turned his head to the side, placing his fingertips upon the torchlight on his chest, telling himself for future reference that he had only seen the illumination of her brunette tail.
He was silent for now – studying with his eyes relentlessly as they followed Sounsyy’s torch. She could hear the crackling of the glass bits as he rested the barrel of his rifle upon the frame of the window when she gingerly climbed through. The size of the chamber was immense, and rings circled around the ovalesque chamber with each ideal ‘floor’. He concluded to himself that those rings were there to stabilize the elevator upon each floor of the rear of this vessel, and that Sounsyy was standing upon one of them.
"Yeh got more rope? I think that's yer power source. If we can get to it. Whoever crosses this should 'ave a safety rope."
When she regarded him, he looked serious. Almost concerned. His face was too stiff to be casual, and he was too quiet for the moment in question to be completely happy with the situation. However, his eyes darted towards her when she regarded him, and when she returned her glance to the empty space, she could hear an “Absolutely.†From him. Ryanti kept his eyes on her for a moment, observing her shape illuminated by his torchlight. Her braid, and her story, was in his mind as he prepared the rope in question.
This was a different kind of group than last time. It was tighter, thinner, and stronger. It felt almost like it was made out of Garlean fibers, and it could be easily assumed that perhaps it was even stolen from Garleans physically or.. technologically.
Ryanti had actually reached his hands back behind him and started fiffled with two metal clamps on each side of his chest.
While he was doing this, he listened to her story. All too often did he hear about tales in which lesser men and women would meet a harsh fate whether or not they expected it so. He could hear the sound of the masts crack. He could feel the spear through her former master’s chest. He could almost picture that look in her eye, and it made him remember Cynthia. She had taken her hand, and killed her. If Ryanti would ever be in the same situation, taking her hand to save his life… would she?
Or would she do the same to him?
No one would ever know the look Ryanti gave her just then as he bared witness to her in a glistening spectre form to what might have been an ironic appearance given what she saw in that hallway. He didn’t know how to looked, or what glance he gave, and Sounsyy couldn’t see anything on his face. He was to her, in that moment, as his job would portray him: a dark shadow, a silent face with tools in his hand, in a location no one would ever be privy enough to know of, doing his job because no one else could. A number.
It was what most saw before they encountered death at the hands of that man.
Ryanti got closer to the window. The shadow was looking out to the enormous, dark, claustrophobic room out ahead of him. A sigh escaped his lips. She was right. It was him that had to go. He had to gather his wits about him and gather them now. It wasn’t the first time, and he was still alive.
When she began to climb back through the window, his face was once again illuminated, and she could see for herself the grim look on Ryanti’s face. There was a slight tension about him. He was still stiff from before. There was something else he didn’t like – not just the idea of trying to tiptoe across the shaft’s stabilizer rings. Something was off.
But her laughter, that allowed his shoulders to relax and for him to finally brief. What Sounsyy received when Ryanti stared back at her was not a stiff expression nor a concerned one. It was a little weak smile, and aquamarine eyes full of life, as they were before. The porclain-haired man leapt up into the small window frame with a measure of finesse and grace, impressive enough considering that he was taller than her.
Now he was close alongside her in the tangled mess that was the window frame, and that is when he answered. “No.†He first said, a chuckle or two emitting from the back of his throat. How did he ever feel like mentioning this stuff? “Though, I must admit that I didn’t really know what to expect at first.â€
With that, he pushed himself over the side, two feet lightly hitting the balcony. He did not give himself the time nor the moment to stare out at the space in front of him just yet. He only glanced upwards. “Not when I first met you out in Thanalan’s sun, and certainly not when I found out you were our Captain for this mission.†He said to her, his back turned to her and his white hair sparkling in her light as he started sliding the rope through the clamps. His back to her was brief as he found himself turning towards her as he started fastening himself, which included wrapping the rope around his waist. “But, quite honestly I’m too old now to find cardboard cutouts on fliers and posters more interesting than the reality behind it all. Sounsyy the woman… the real woman… I was not entirely wrong about what I expected. I knew you probably wouldn’t trust me, especially how we met the second time. I knew those dead eyes were still able to sparkle, despite what a colorful past could do to a pair of living eyes over time…â€
When he was all done, Ryanti had all of his front clamps covered in safety rope, and the clamp at the center of his chest extended the cable outwards in front of him. Ryanti picked up the rope, which had been gathered in a circle, and tossed it to the ground next to the window frame, bending down briefly to find the other end of it. “I think that the real Sounsyy is more interesting than the one I saw in my youth. The period to move on from such black and white views of the world is long behind me. It was about time my perception of you updated.â€
The Halfling emerged from below the window frame, with the other end of the rope in hand. He motioned for Sounsyy to come to the border of the window, adjusting his light to shine dimmer so that she could see him with clarity and he could see her as well. This was a much more dangerous stunt than that time in the hangar. It had to be done with maximum amount of safety in mind. And so Ryanti inserted the rope past the clamps on the front of her, the rope dancing around each of the three on her chest in a very elaborate and specific pattern, as if it was ingrained in him, as if he did it all the time. The task itself was sewn into his unconscious memory. Ryanti was thinking of someone else, of her story about how she became a Captain. He spoke, almost suddenly. “About Sterransa… about how you became a Captain…â€
The end of the rope went through her top right clamp a second time. She could feel the nooks of the rope tighten upon her chest. “The manner in which everything happened, it was probably wrong. It’s wrong to commit murder. It’s wrong to kill. I know.â€
A light sigh escaped him. Ryanti kept his eyes on his fingers doing their work. “When I was being trained in this very field, my recruiter treated me like an animal. Like absolute garbage, like less than a sentient being. I hated him. There were times when I envisioned my hands wrapped around his throat and squeezing...†A light scrunching noise emerged from the rope as Ryanti squeezed it tightly with both of his hands in front of her. “Like that. Until he stopped breathing. I even had dreams about it.â€
There was a solemn look on his face as he lowered the rope, shaking his head but a little in the memory of it, a quiet breath escaping his lips. He slowly lurched the end of the rope towards one side of her waist. “I guess what I am trying to say is… if the manner in which you made Captain is supposed to change my perception of you, it doesn’t. Not by much. I live in a world in which many have done much worse. I myself have murdered in the name of others and even for myself… I have done away with individuals that probably did not deserve to die nearly as much as Sterransa. You should bring up how I got my seventy-seven sometime. Heh, I don’t know… I don’t know what’s right or wrong anymore.â€
Now his right hand maneuvered around her back, and grabbed onto the rope dangling from her waist. It was in that moment that he himself wondered once more if the proximity made her feel uncomfortable. If it were to make her feel uncomfortable if Sounsyy knew what things Ryanti had done. He asked himself that as he glided the shape of the rope across the back of her waist, then around to the other side. As he did so, he spoke. “But… I don’t think any less of you as a person or a Captain… so to answer your question from before, yes. That secret’s also safe with me. Think of it like this safety rope.â€
And with that, and a smile, Ryanti looped the rope over her center clamp, and closed the clamp, binding them two together. He took a few steps back, and the rope stayed upon him. He adjusted his light as he turned his back to her from short and wide to long and narrow. It was only then that he truly understood the vast scope of this room. A loose gust of wind blew his locks around and the Halfling realized he was but a tiny ant in this massive, long abandoned dead Allagan elevator shaft. He would have to circle around the razor thin stabilizer rings to get to the other side. His light shined all about, reviving the appearance of the dead cerment chamber coated in eons of dust and casted out to be forgotten with piles of stories left untold about what came up and down through here. Would they find out?
“I trust you, Sounsyy!†Ryanti said outloud, his breath increasing in intensity as he slowly began to shuffle himself to the corner of the tiny balcony. He bent down to pick up his rifle, placing the strap over his shoulders and the curls of his fingers gripped the side of the window frame. “I’m a little scared!†He admitted, eyeing the difference in thickness between the balcony and the ring. He needed something… one extra bit of courage to begin what he was about to do…
It was difficult to surprise Ryanti in this line of work. She had bared witness to his stunning reaction to where they were at, giving away the reality that he had never been in anywhere remotely like a place such as this before. Yet, he was the more composed individual. He was the most prepared. Likewise, his training had also ingrained into his head the reality of betrayal, deception, and most importantly the unexpected.
But Sounsyy did in fact manage to surprise Ryanti sometimes.
His knife slid ever so slightly amongst the bottom of the window’s frame as he glanced over to her. The reflection of his torchlight upon the pieces of glass provided only the slightest light upon his feature, but it was enough for her to notice. There was a hint of surprise in his eyes - yes perhaps it was just what she was looking for. But there was also an element of interest and a layer of perplexity about that glance as well. Ryanti’s eyes trapped light easily, and so they seemed to glow under the very dim shadows of his torchlight being reflected back at him.
"That secret safe with yeh too?"
Her wit. It reminded him of the little spark he saw in her eyes just moments before. Before all of this, he remembered how dead those eyes were. Now there was some life to them, as well as some life that had crept into her lips and gave her some fun things to say. As her light left his own and checked behind her again for a spectre long gone, Ryanti’s lips pursed into a smile. Sounsyy could not see this, but she could probably hear a feint chuckle emanating from his own pair of lips.
The chuckle was the sign of him putting two and two together. It was an easy connection to make. The Captain had just told him about the personality and demeanor of her former Master, and the little sideshow Ryanti was picturing in his head… yes, if he were her, he would have hated her. Hated her so much. So indeed it was an easy connection to make… and an easy action to imagine taking. She had gone the less moral path to obtain her position. She had murdered her.
Sounsyy’s proximity was enough to break Ryanti out of his thoughts and into reality once more. The lack of distance between their shoulders caused his senses to become hypersensitive. He could almost feel every tiny little movement of Sounsyy’s shoulders, even though he only occasionally felt contact. So softly did his hands rest upon what remained of the broken glass upon the frame of the window; the fragments were small enough now to be harmless to him. He was wondering the same thing as her, if the closeness made her feel uncomfortable. He had a brief memory of seeing her in the infirmary.
Then, he felt a sudden harsh pressure on his shoulder. Ryanti’s side hunched over for a tiny moment, as he didn’t expect such a maneuver, but his shoulder then stood firm enough for the woman to leap up into the window. When he returned his glance back to where it was, all he could see was a form hunched up in the window. He turned his head to the side, placing his fingertips upon the torchlight on his chest, telling himself for future reference that he had only seen the illumination of her brunette tail.
He was silent for now – studying with his eyes relentlessly as they followed Sounsyy’s torch. She could hear the crackling of the glass bits as he rested the barrel of his rifle upon the frame of the window when she gingerly climbed through. The size of the chamber was immense, and rings circled around the ovalesque chamber with each ideal ‘floor’. He concluded to himself that those rings were there to stabilize the elevator upon each floor of the rear of this vessel, and that Sounsyy was standing upon one of them.
"Yeh got more rope? I think that's yer power source. If we can get to it. Whoever crosses this should 'ave a safety rope."
When she regarded him, he looked serious. Almost concerned. His face was too stiff to be casual, and he was too quiet for the moment in question to be completely happy with the situation. However, his eyes darted towards her when she regarded him, and when she returned her glance to the empty space, she could hear an “Absolutely.†From him. Ryanti kept his eyes on her for a moment, observing her shape illuminated by his torchlight. Her braid, and her story, was in his mind as he prepared the rope in question.
This was a different kind of group than last time. It was tighter, thinner, and stronger. It felt almost like it was made out of Garlean fibers, and it could be easily assumed that perhaps it was even stolen from Garleans physically or.. technologically.
Ryanti had actually reached his hands back behind him and started fiffled with two metal clamps on each side of his chest.
While he was doing this, he listened to her story. All too often did he hear about tales in which lesser men and women would meet a harsh fate whether or not they expected it so. He could hear the sound of the masts crack. He could feel the spear through her former master’s chest. He could almost picture that look in her eye, and it made him remember Cynthia. She had taken her hand, and killed her. If Ryanti would ever be in the same situation, taking her hand to save his life… would she?
Or would she do the same to him?
No one would ever know the look Ryanti gave her just then as he bared witness to her in a glistening spectre form to what might have been an ironic appearance given what she saw in that hallway. He didn’t know how to looked, or what glance he gave, and Sounsyy couldn’t see anything on his face. He was to her, in that moment, as his job would portray him: a dark shadow, a silent face with tools in his hand, in a location no one would ever be privy enough to know of, doing his job because no one else could. A number.
It was what most saw before they encountered death at the hands of that man.
Ryanti got closer to the window. The shadow was looking out to the enormous, dark, claustrophobic room out ahead of him. A sigh escaped his lips. She was right. It was him that had to go. He had to gather his wits about him and gather them now. It wasn’t the first time, and he was still alive.
When she began to climb back through the window, his face was once again illuminated, and she could see for herself the grim look on Ryanti’s face. There was a slight tension about him. He was still stiff from before. There was something else he didn’t like – not just the idea of trying to tiptoe across the shaft’s stabilizer rings. Something was off.
But her laughter, that allowed his shoulders to relax and for him to finally brief. What Sounsyy received when Ryanti stared back at her was not a stiff expression nor a concerned one. It was a little weak smile, and aquamarine eyes full of life, as they were before. The porclain-haired man leapt up into the small window frame with a measure of finesse and grace, impressive enough considering that he was taller than her.
Now he was close alongside her in the tangled mess that was the window frame, and that is when he answered. “No.†He first said, a chuckle or two emitting from the back of his throat. How did he ever feel like mentioning this stuff? “Though, I must admit that I didn’t really know what to expect at first.â€
With that, he pushed himself over the side, two feet lightly hitting the balcony. He did not give himself the time nor the moment to stare out at the space in front of him just yet. He only glanced upwards. “Not when I first met you out in Thanalan’s sun, and certainly not when I found out you were our Captain for this mission.†He said to her, his back turned to her and his white hair sparkling in her light as he started sliding the rope through the clamps. His back to her was brief as he found himself turning towards her as he started fastening himself, which included wrapping the rope around his waist. “But, quite honestly I’m too old now to find cardboard cutouts on fliers and posters more interesting than the reality behind it all. Sounsyy the woman… the real woman… I was not entirely wrong about what I expected. I knew you probably wouldn’t trust me, especially how we met the second time. I knew those dead eyes were still able to sparkle, despite what a colorful past could do to a pair of living eyes over time…â€
When he was all done, Ryanti had all of his front clamps covered in safety rope, and the clamp at the center of his chest extended the cable outwards in front of him. Ryanti picked up the rope, which had been gathered in a circle, and tossed it to the ground next to the window frame, bending down briefly to find the other end of it. “I think that the real Sounsyy is more interesting than the one I saw in my youth. The period to move on from such black and white views of the world is long behind me. It was about time my perception of you updated.â€
The Halfling emerged from below the window frame, with the other end of the rope in hand. He motioned for Sounsyy to come to the border of the window, adjusting his light to shine dimmer so that she could see him with clarity and he could see her as well. This was a much more dangerous stunt than that time in the hangar. It had to be done with maximum amount of safety in mind. And so Ryanti inserted the rope past the clamps on the front of her, the rope dancing around each of the three on her chest in a very elaborate and specific pattern, as if it was ingrained in him, as if he did it all the time. The task itself was sewn into his unconscious memory. Ryanti was thinking of someone else, of her story about how she became a Captain. He spoke, almost suddenly. “About Sterransa… about how you became a Captain…â€
The end of the rope went through her top right clamp a second time. She could feel the nooks of the rope tighten upon her chest. “The manner in which everything happened, it was probably wrong. It’s wrong to commit murder. It’s wrong to kill. I know.â€
A light sigh escaped him. Ryanti kept his eyes on his fingers doing their work. “When I was being trained in this very field, my recruiter treated me like an animal. Like absolute garbage, like less than a sentient being. I hated him. There were times when I envisioned my hands wrapped around his throat and squeezing...†A light scrunching noise emerged from the rope as Ryanti squeezed it tightly with both of his hands in front of her. “Like that. Until he stopped breathing. I even had dreams about it.â€
There was a solemn look on his face as he lowered the rope, shaking his head but a little in the memory of it, a quiet breath escaping his lips. He slowly lurched the end of the rope towards one side of her waist. “I guess what I am trying to say is… if the manner in which you made Captain is supposed to change my perception of you, it doesn’t. Not by much. I live in a world in which many have done much worse. I myself have murdered in the name of others and even for myself… I have done away with individuals that probably did not deserve to die nearly as much as Sterransa. You should bring up how I got my seventy-seven sometime. Heh, I don’t know… I don’t know what’s right or wrong anymore.â€
Now his right hand maneuvered around her back, and grabbed onto the rope dangling from her waist. It was in that moment that he himself wondered once more if the proximity made her feel uncomfortable. If it were to make her feel uncomfortable if Sounsyy knew what things Ryanti had done. He asked himself that as he glided the shape of the rope across the back of her waist, then around to the other side. As he did so, he spoke. “But… I don’t think any less of you as a person or a Captain… so to answer your question from before, yes. That secret’s also safe with me. Think of it like this safety rope.â€
And with that, and a smile, Ryanti looped the rope over her center clamp, and closed the clamp, binding them two together. He took a few steps back, and the rope stayed upon him. He adjusted his light as he turned his back to her from short and wide to long and narrow. It was only then that he truly understood the vast scope of this room. A loose gust of wind blew his locks around and the Halfling realized he was but a tiny ant in this massive, long abandoned dead Allagan elevator shaft. He would have to circle around the razor thin stabilizer rings to get to the other side. His light shined all about, reviving the appearance of the dead cerment chamber coated in eons of dust and casted out to be forgotten with piles of stories left untold about what came up and down through here. Would they find out?
“I trust you, Sounsyy!†Ryanti said outloud, his breath increasing in intensity as he slowly began to shuffle himself to the corner of the tiny balcony. He bent down to pick up his rifle, placing the strap over his shoulders and the curls of his fingers gripped the side of the window frame. “I’m a little scared!†He admitted, eyeing the difference in thickness between the balcony and the ring. He needed something… one extra bit of courage to begin what he was about to do…