One, two, three...
Shael bounced the ball against the wooden beam that climbed the wall and extended to the ceiling. The rubbery toy slapped against her hand when she caught it again after it bounced off the rafter and flew back to her. She welcomed that slight stinging sensation it produced across her palm. Since her primary hand and arm had been in the cast for over over a fortnight, and the itching there towards the end made her want to either hammer it against something hard or jam something long and thin in between the spaces.
Seven, eight, nine…
When Nabi finally cracked the cast open, Shael immediately went to pick up her gun, only to nearly drop it. The muscles in her arms had greatly thinned with inactivity and her fingers could barely close into a full grip.
“You will need to retrain your muscles, build them up again.†Nabi’s assessment eased Shael’s initial panic and impatience; the Xaela gingerly took her hand, helping to open and close it into a fist. “And I have just the thing to help do that.†Nabi beamed as she handed her the small blue ball.
Shael paused in her exercise, examining the object in her hand. It had tiny yellow winged creatures painted on it, and when she squeezed it hard with her fingers, the soft orb ballooned out on one side to stretch out the painted pattern. Shael thought it was a butterfly, until Nabi corrected her, saying they were supposed to be fireflies. The smuggler still recalled with some amusement how she had teased that it should then have been green not yellow, and the large wings still made them look like butterflies. Nabi pouted, but only for an instant, then they both chuckled.
“Now I painted them on, because I expect those patterns to fade in the next sennight since you will be using this ball eversun. Fifty tosses to strengthen your arm and fifty squeezes for your fingers!†Nabi took her hand and proceeded to show her various exercises in grip and coordination. Shael vaguely remembered how she yelled at her and pushed her away when she had first come to her inn room at the behest of the innkeeper. And here she was now, still making sure her recovery was completed.
Fifteen, sixteen, seventeen…
Shael resumed her exercise of playing catch with the wooden rafter. She recalled laughing, albeit briefly, when she had teased Nabi. When had that snuck its way back into her life? She hadn’t laughed since last time she was chatting with Shooey. There was still a pang of guilt that tugged at her, that she had laughed when he was no longer there to laugh with her.
"Remember when I said... people have that person? That they rely on? Shooey was mine. My one person."
The wooden beam let out a small creak of protest as Shael tossed the ball just a little harder, its return sending a burning prickle through her palm. She still didn’t know why she had answered Tserende honestly when he had asked about Shooey. She chided herself for getting carried away during their hunt in Doma, and letting her mouth run too freely. He had remembered her mentioning him, and asked about it as they decided to go for a drink in the middle of the Ruby Sea. Shael first blamed herself for relaxing a bit too much around the mercenary. But she knew better. The absence of her former first mate was like a void that sucked all the light out of her day, and she had been angry in that darkness since the day he died. A part of her was tired of that blackness. And somehow, here in Kugane, around two strangers she met through attempted robbery, she had started to see some slivers of light.
But until that conversation under a crooked pine tree, Shael had been afraid to speak of Shooey. That like her nightmares, whenever she thought of her best friend, she thought she would again feel that crushing weight that would rob her of breath and control, that she would have to resort to rage just to be able to function. But in that, in refusing to think about him and talk about him, no one else knew just how important he was to her.
So when she screamed about railed about it, about how he died, about how it was her war and not his, and that she had only dragged him into it to be killed by the side they were working for… Shael found, in the after, that some of that heaviness had actually lifted.
Tserende listened and remained silent for a long time before he answered. “You have at least two people with your interests in mind, even if it may not be exactly what you had before.†Shael had not met his gaze, but his voice was somber yet thoughtful, and she felt his hand upon her shoulder. “They are not going anywhere, either."
Forty-eight, forty-nine, fifty.
There was a distant throbbing in her fingers as Shael snatched the ball from the air after her fiftieth toss. She had been throwing a bit harder than she should have as she had reflected on what had happened in the last few suns.
"I feel like... the train is coming, you can hear it, but we are just waiting to see if it actually comes. I don’t like it." She had warned Tserende of Elam, who had apparently approached him about hiring him. Grave had tried to coax her back into his employ as well for another job. And her old acquaintance was also interested in doing business with Nabi as well. Shael twisted and rolled her shoulders, suddenly feeling tension there. She didn’t like him showing up in Kugane, much less getting rather uncomfortably comfortable with the two people that she especially did not want him to know.
“Sod it,†Shael muttered as she rose to her feet, tossing the ball onto the haphazard pile of blankets upon her bed. Elam and his business put an end to all she cared about in Ala Mhigo. She was not going to let that happen again.
Snatching up her gun with her left hand, she stalked out of the inn room.
Shael bounced the ball against the wooden beam that climbed the wall and extended to the ceiling. The rubbery toy slapped against her hand when she caught it again after it bounced off the rafter and flew back to her. She welcomed that slight stinging sensation it produced across her palm. Since her primary hand and arm had been in the cast for over over a fortnight, and the itching there towards the end made her want to either hammer it against something hard or jam something long and thin in between the spaces.
Seven, eight, nine…
When Nabi finally cracked the cast open, Shael immediately went to pick up her gun, only to nearly drop it. The muscles in her arms had greatly thinned with inactivity and her fingers could barely close into a full grip.
“You will need to retrain your muscles, build them up again.†Nabi’s assessment eased Shael’s initial panic and impatience; the Xaela gingerly took her hand, helping to open and close it into a fist. “And I have just the thing to help do that.†Nabi beamed as she handed her the small blue ball.
Shael paused in her exercise, examining the object in her hand. It had tiny yellow winged creatures painted on it, and when she squeezed it hard with her fingers, the soft orb ballooned out on one side to stretch out the painted pattern. Shael thought it was a butterfly, until Nabi corrected her, saying they were supposed to be fireflies. The smuggler still recalled with some amusement how she had teased that it should then have been green not yellow, and the large wings still made them look like butterflies. Nabi pouted, but only for an instant, then they both chuckled.
“Now I painted them on, because I expect those patterns to fade in the next sennight since you will be using this ball eversun. Fifty tosses to strengthen your arm and fifty squeezes for your fingers!†Nabi took her hand and proceeded to show her various exercises in grip and coordination. Shael vaguely remembered how she yelled at her and pushed her away when she had first come to her inn room at the behest of the innkeeper. And here she was now, still making sure her recovery was completed.
Fifteen, sixteen, seventeen…
Shael resumed her exercise of playing catch with the wooden rafter. She recalled laughing, albeit briefly, when she had teased Nabi. When had that snuck its way back into her life? She hadn’t laughed since last time she was chatting with Shooey. There was still a pang of guilt that tugged at her, that she had laughed when he was no longer there to laugh with her.
"Remember when I said... people have that person? That they rely on? Shooey was mine. My one person."
The wooden beam let out a small creak of protest as Shael tossed the ball just a little harder, its return sending a burning prickle through her palm. She still didn’t know why she had answered Tserende honestly when he had asked about Shooey. She chided herself for getting carried away during their hunt in Doma, and letting her mouth run too freely. He had remembered her mentioning him, and asked about it as they decided to go for a drink in the middle of the Ruby Sea. Shael first blamed herself for relaxing a bit too much around the mercenary. But she knew better. The absence of her former first mate was like a void that sucked all the light out of her day, and she had been angry in that darkness since the day he died. A part of her was tired of that blackness. And somehow, here in Kugane, around two strangers she met through attempted robbery, she had started to see some slivers of light.
But until that conversation under a crooked pine tree, Shael had been afraid to speak of Shooey. That like her nightmares, whenever she thought of her best friend, she thought she would again feel that crushing weight that would rob her of breath and control, that she would have to resort to rage just to be able to function. But in that, in refusing to think about him and talk about him, no one else knew just how important he was to her.
So when she screamed about railed about it, about how he died, about how it was her war and not his, and that she had only dragged him into it to be killed by the side they were working for… Shael found, in the after, that some of that heaviness had actually lifted.
Tserende listened and remained silent for a long time before he answered. “You have at least two people with your interests in mind, even if it may not be exactly what you had before.†Shael had not met his gaze, but his voice was somber yet thoughtful, and she felt his hand upon her shoulder. “They are not going anywhere, either."
Forty-eight, forty-nine, fifty.
There was a distant throbbing in her fingers as Shael snatched the ball from the air after her fiftieth toss. She had been throwing a bit harder than she should have as she had reflected on what had happened in the last few suns.
"I feel like... the train is coming, you can hear it, but we are just waiting to see if it actually comes. I don’t like it." She had warned Tserende of Elam, who had apparently approached him about hiring him. Grave had tried to coax her back into his employ as well for another job. And her old acquaintance was also interested in doing business with Nabi as well. Shael twisted and rolled her shoulders, suddenly feeling tension there. She didn’t like him showing up in Kugane, much less getting rather uncomfortably comfortable with the two people that she especially did not want him to know.
“Sod it,†Shael muttered as she rose to her feet, tossing the ball onto the haphazard pile of blankets upon her bed. Elam and his business put an end to all she cared about in Ala Mhigo. She was not going to let that happen again.
Snatching up her gun with her left hand, she stalked out of the inn room.
