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Post by Linyü on Jun 21, 2020 2:01:09 GMT -6
Now it was San’s turn to fall silent. He wanted to ask--- if this meant she was saying yes; if she was ready; if this hurt her. There were so many things he wanted to ask. But the words wouldn’t come; and many of the questions were not his to ask.
After a time, she spoke again, slowly. “-I was… somewhere else for a long time.-” She looked up now, at some empty spot upon the wall, much the way she used to do. “-It… hurt. To be here. To be… present.-”
At that quiet, solemn admission, all questions vanished from San’s mind. He sat in silence, waiting for her to marshal her next words. And slowly, she did: “-I thought… I would leave. Join the others.-”
Briefly San’s mind returned to the thought he had had at the end of her evaluation, and he wondered now if she had been present for it, if she knew where those ‘others’ had gone. But she didn’t elaborate, and he didn’t ask.
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Post by Linyü on Jun 21, 2020 2:04:08 GMT -6
“-I’ll do it,-” she said. “-For you. You were… kind. You spoke to me. You asked me questions, and you kept talking, even when I didn’t answer. After a while it was… easier.-”
She looked down again.
“-I didn’t think I would want to come back. But I… I’ll do it. For you.-”
“-Good,-” San said. “-Thank you.-” He spoke because she had finished saying what she had wanted to say, because he felt that he had to acknowledge what she had said. This was what he had been sent to do, after all; he had made his request and she had given him her answer. Yes, she would do it. Yes, she could work with them. No, he wouldn’t need to make excuses to Hachi, or watch as their superiors terminated her despite everything they had done.
And yet the words felt insufficient, and his own deeds rang hollow now.
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Post by Linyü on Jun 21, 2020 2:04:18 GMT -6
Every word she spoke had been a knife to his chest. ’For you,’ she’d said. ”I’ll do it for you. You were kind. You spoke to me.’ Such little, paltry things to be weighed against what she must have borne, and yet still she chose to be here for his sake. Her service to the ones who had done this to her, bought for the price of merely a little kindness from a single stranger in a strange land.
What have I done, San thought. What have I done?
A rustling at his side. San turned to find her staring at him. When he met her gaze, she looked away, and then back again. “-Is this… not enough?-” she said.
San had to swallow once, hard. But he had been Watchful long enough that when he spoke, his voice was even. “-No,-” he said, smiling. “-I was only surprised. It’s the first time I’ve heard your voice.-”
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Post by Linyü on Jun 21, 2020 2:04:29 GMT -6
Her eyes moved slightly, searching his face, though for what, he could not guess. San inclined his head slightly. “-It’s a very pretty voice. I’m glad I could hear it.-”
It was a cruel thing, what he had done. What he did now was crueler still. He watched as she blinked, then averted her gaze once more, her fingers fretting at the fabric of her skirts. A nervous tic, as though she had been flustered by what he had said.
This. This was the price of her loyalty. Cheap words from a liar’s mouth. And he had been fool enough to think he was saving her with this. Who did he think he was? What had given him the right?
Better this than leaving her to die, the ghost of his past self pleaded. Surely even this is better than that.
But some things were worse than death.
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Post by Linyü on Jun 21, 2020 2:04:47 GMT -6
“-Do it like I did,-” San heard himself say. The words felt as though they came from a great distance, as though he were outside himself. “-Let them know you’re here.-”
Under his guidance, Rei activated her own earpiece. “-Will they understand me?-” she said. Her eyes, when she looked up at him, were the green of summer leaves, large and expressive.
“-We understand you just fine, little lady.-” Hachi’s Common carried a heavy accent, but San saw her ears twitch, saw the comprehension in the subtle changes on her face.
“The rat speaks,” said Nana.
There were times when San was glad she had no understanding of Xin.
“-They don’t all speak Common, but they know enough. Numbers, colors, directions, words like ‘guards’ or ‘objective’. If it’s more complicated, Hachi and I can translate.-” San explained it to her, off the line, so the others wouldn’t hear.
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Post by Linyü on Jun 21, 2020 2:05:02 GMT -6
It wasn’t a perfect system, but it would serve. And if it didn’t, there would be time enough to adjust. He didn’t say so to her, but for a first mission they wouldn’t rely on her too much.
She nodded, and some of the suffocating feeling in San’s chest lifted. Hearing her speak for the first time ought to have been a milestone, but just as with the earpiece, nothing about it had felt quite right, and he was wretchedly glad to have a reprieve from it again. But the relief was only momentary. There was no undoing any of what had happened today.
What she had said haunted him as he smiled and made his excuses to her. It lingered in the back of his mind as he told her he would return in the evening with more details; it followed him as he left the room and closed the door behind him, dogged him as he walked down the halls, rested on him like a weight as he leaned himself against a wall somewhere else in the warrens and closed his eyes.
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Post by Linyü on Jun 21, 2020 2:05:13 GMT -6
He thought of a boy, tied to a chair, facing down an old man with an ultimatum. Sign away your life, or die. Except it hadn’t been quite that simple; he had his sister to think about, he’d thought. He would have done anything for her.
In retrospect now he saw what a fool he had been. His sister was an asset. If she took the deal, they wouldn’t have killed her simply to spite him. And seeing the way she was now, he thought she would have survived just as well without him. Somehow, she would have made it work.
But even so, the choice had been laid out for him, black ink on white parchment. Join or die. Submit or die. Kill or die. There had been no pretense. These were the people who had killed his parents. And no one had been kind, not until he had been thoroughly educated on how little place there was for kindness under the Watchful gaze.
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Post by Linyü on Jun 21, 2020 2:09:38 GMT -6
And so when Juu smiled at him, when Hachi looked out for him, he understood that it was a working relationship, and that this was merely their way of making sure things ran smoothly. It was as cold and impersonal as the trainers had been when they struck him for being out of line, as calculated as the old man's speech had been when he had made San that offer five years ago. Kindness was, at best, a management style, and not a common one at that. … Perhaps he was underestimating Rei's intelligence with all of this. She had to have known that she had never left the place that had terrorized her before. Perhaps she understood, perhaps she was choosing to… But no, no matter how he thought about it, the idea felt like only a convenient lie to comfort himself. ’For you,’ she’d said. What have I done?-----
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Post by Linyü on Jul 31, 2020 20:23:21 GMT -6
The time came, and the unit gathered in the meeting room. By the time he had arrived, Roku and Nana were already there, settled into different parts of the small, cramped space. Rei, who was quartered there, sat perched on her ledge. None of them spoke to one another.
San went to lean on the wall not far from where Rei sat, that she might get his attention or speak to him if she wished. She didn’t look up, but he saw one of her ears angling toward him.
San didn’t know what the job would be, but he wouldn’t have to. They never got much notice for the kind of short, easy tasks that constituted a new member’s trial by fire. All there was to do now was to wait for Hachi to come in with the briefing, and maybe run Rei down on some of their signals. There might even be time for them to show her around their territory afterwards, though he doubted Nana would stay for that.
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Post by Linyü on Jul 31, 2020 20:23:54 GMT -6
The door opened. Everyone looked up; Hachi strode in. There was something about the briskness of his bearing that made San frown, even though Hachi wore a smile as he looked to each of them in turn.
“So,” Hachi said, and clapped his large hands together. “There’s been a change of plans.”
San’s frown deepened.
“We’ll be raiding the Bell House tonight,” Hachi said. “New orders, fresh from the top. Apparently they’ve gotten a tip, and we’ll be looking for some serious contraband.” There was a pause, before he arched a brow, smiling. “They didn’t say what, but based on all the secrets and fuss… Who knows? One of us might just get a promotion out of this.”
The news about the Bell House wasn’t a surprise to San. Their guard had been doubled and then tripled over the last week, so anyone with eyes could tell that something was afoot there.
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Post by Linyü on Jul 31, 2020 20:24:10 GMT -6
And normally he wouldn’t have balked at the assignment either; their unit had been on many raids before, even a few high stakes jobs. The Bell House was on their territory; they knew it fairly well. The heightened security would be a thorn in their side, but still nothing they couldn’t have handled.
But Rei would be with them tonight, unless that had changed too. “Are we bringing everyone?” San asked carefully.
“What?” Hachi glanced at him, confused at first, and then at Rei next to him, as if only just noticing she was there. But Hachi only shrugged one shoulder. “Oh, her. Well, she can just tag along and keep out of the way. They won’t be looking for anything like her, and she hides pretty well, doesn’t she?”
“Hachi,” San said. Even he didn’t know whether he meant it as a plea or an admonition.
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Post by Linyü on Jul 31, 2020 20:24:25 GMT -6
“What, you think your rat can’t handle it? Leave her then.” Nana snorted through her nose, speaking without even looking up from the weapon she was cleaning. “I’m sure the higher ups will love hearing they wasted their money.”
“That’s not--- She’s new,” San said.
“San.”
The sound of Hachi’s voice calling him brought San up short. For a moment, he stared at Hachi, wondering if maybe Hachi meant something else by it. But he could see the warning in Hachi’s eyes, and he remembered what Hachi had said to him when San had asked him about Rei’s ‘medication’.
’I shouldn’t need to tell you that an agent doesn’t let his emotions get the better of him… Or do you mean to do this every time someone breathes on a girl in your presence?’
San looked away, falling silent, hands clenched into fists. Roku, sitting on a crate, flicked an ear. “So,” said the cat, “we strike tonight?”
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Post by Linyü on Jul 31, 2020 20:26:11 GMT -6
“That’s right,” Hachi said, picking back up where he had left off as though San had never spoken. “Seems like it’s urgent. The goods might be moved soon, but they’ve got confirmation that it’s still on the premises now.” He turned to Roku. “It’s short notice so we won’t have time to run recon, but you’ve been keeping tabs on their new patrol patterns, haven’t you? So? How bad will it be tonight?”
Roku twitched his whiskers and gave his estimate, and the discussion turned to mission details. San forced himself calm. The decision had been made, and there was little he could do about it now. The only comfort to be had was the fact that they wouldn’t be relying on her. It was as Hachi had said; she could stay out of sight and keep herself safe, and that would be enough.
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Post by Linyü on Jul 31, 2020 20:26:32 GMT -6
She was watching him when he glanced her way. He mouthed the words, ‘I’ll tell you later’ in Common; she nodded once, very slightly. Then San turned his attention back to Hachi, and made an effort to pay attention. He would need to keep his wits about him tonight. This was the one element he had any control over, and for Rei’s sake, if nothing else, he was determined to make no mistakes. ----- The Bell House was their nickname for the residence of Wen Yusheng, a merchant with strong ties to the older nobility. It rested in the northernmost aspect of the mercantile district, as close to the residences of the ministers as was permitted, which spoke to Wen Yusheng’s aspirations. There were no bells in the house, or at least none large enough to be used as an identifying landmark; the name came from some obscure poetic reference, courtesy of Hachi, who had a fondness for such things. It made for a system of code names that were difficult to guess, and the rest of the unit merely memorized them by rote.
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Post by Linyü on Jul 31, 2020 20:26:45 GMT -6
It was a large home, with eight courtyards all told. Unit Nine depended on stealth and the element of surprise, both of which necessitated a team of few members, but truthfully tonight it would have been better to have more agents to cover the premises. Time was of the essence, and they could only proceed so quickly with the threat of increased patrols. Unfortunately, each unit operated alone except in very special circumstances, and they had been chosen for their knowledge of the area as much as anything else. When they set out that night, their numbers were unbolstered.
By the time they reached the outer walls, Hachi had already doled out their assignments. San was to take the west side, starting with the outermost chambers. Hachi would search the innermost chambers of the northern building first. Nana would take east, eschewing her usual position as bird’s-eye-view support. Roku would be keeping an eye on the situation from the central courtyard.
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