[Fingers all clumsy. It's been a long time since she's had to use them and apparently the CDC's comatech isn't up to scratch with Cerberus's. At least not the stuff they're letting them use in the field.]
FROM: shepard.lydia@cdc.org
More or less. None of this answers my question/s Khezek.
I'm alright. Didn't really know I was feeling this bad in the first place
[Something had been knocked offline in the fight with the goddamn squid, she thinks. Not to the extent on Ajna when the EMP had taken all her cybernetics down, but she'd been hit. Couldn't see straight. Nothing big though, nothing she'd been worried about.
[ Well, more like six or seven, but who's counting? Besides Shepard.
The remaining trees growing off the shore are thinner and more widely spaced than they had been at the first camp, so close to the thick forest. It makes them harder to climb and move through, but that's not keeping Jasper out of them. It's better than walking. Walking left his mind too open to wandering in dark places he didn't want it to go, especially after all that happened, after who's been missing, and he'd done enough walking during the move. He uses the personnel tracker like she said to, but it's difficult to look at a screen while hopping branches. It's for that reason that he doesn't realize the light indicating her presence has been flashing until he's right above her.
He drops down behind the stump she's seated on and lands with a soft thud, knees bent in a crouch. It would have almost been stealthy if his white head wasn't such a dead giveaway. ]
Hey.
[ He doesn't move to stand yet and just watches her, waits for her to turn. His eyes are tired but there's an alertness to them, and they're tinged with a little more red than usual. ]
[It feels like longer than six or seven minutes, but she blames that on her decision to fill it with skimming the comm. She's tired of reading, doesn't actually register much with the headache that's building behind her eyes - but it's better that staring into the distance or studying the lines of camp as it comes up. She's already decided that in the next half hour she needs to get off her ass, see what she can do to help with building the perimeter defense. But right this second--
Right this second her legs feel heavy and her chest hurts, breathing all thick from the wet Macha air.
The whisper of the dirt and grass that signals Jasper dropping from the trees overhead is low enough that most probably would've let it slide. But for all the clumsiness in her fine motor skills that waking up out of a month long coma has bred, it's left her tense and over sharp elsewhere. She's already turning where she sits when he speaks.
He's the first person she's seen and known well enough that recognize the difference that doesn't like like absolute shit. The thought unwinds something in her chest that she doesn't think about too hard - instead wets her chapped lips, clears her throat with a horrible scratching noise. It sounds like she's been yelling, hoarse and wretched when she talks.]
I take it the whole running around in trees thing is still working out for you.
[ The response is flat. None of the excitement that was in his first text when he realized she was awake. He finally stands and straightens out the quiver and bow slung over his shoulders, made of bone and carved in Corvo's sigils. The bow is straightened, but there's something about his posture that is not, and it's telling. He grips the bowstring tightly at his chest and doesn't stand as tall as usual, hunched with his head turned slightly away from her, either guarded or listening. Or both, with the way his ears are raised. While he's certainly less tired and haggard-looking compared to some of the others around the new camp, he's on edge. Alert eyes and ears are taking her in, the slouch in her spine, the roughness in her voice. He reaches for the canteen at his hip and unstraps it, handing it to her without mention. ]
Haven't really had much chance to do any, by the way... me or the other cadets.
[ He had drawn out the reasons why already. No one had time for push-ups or running drills when they were being attacked, captured, and attacked again and again. There was another reason too. More personal, one that cut deeper than the fiery blades of Neraki spears when he was locked in that cliffside cage. ]
Not with Aeryn gone.
[ It's quiet. He's assuming she already knows, even if he hadn't been the one to tell her. He hadn't been able to. He could draw everything else out, but not that. ]
[The fact that no one's been drilling isn't exactly revelatory information. While she'd have more than trusted Aeryn to keep the program rolling for the time she'd been under but it's not like there wasn't a precedent for it taking a backseat to the upper echelon bullshit the multiverse might throw at them. Given what she'd gleaned from the comm, Jasper's own ludicrous drawing and subsequent interrogative conversations with anyone who'd made the mistake of wandering too close to her, she's less than surprised that no one's been dedicating a few hours in the day to doing push ups and running laps.
The fact that Aeryn's gone doesn't really have much to do with it, she thinks. Won't have much to do with anything going forward, she tells herself because it keeps her from batting an eyelash in the face of Jasper's low tone and the prickly line of his shoulders.]
We'll probably keep drilling on hold for a few days.
[Which is the more mechanical follow up to that than is fair to him. Jasper isn't Crichton who probably couldn't tolerate the idea of anyone missing Aeryn except for him. Jasper is-- not a child, not really. But close to one.
She's not great with kids.
Tipping back the canteen, she takes a long sip - scans the foliage above them for a beat. When she drops her chin and passes the canteen back--:]
They might let you send her a message if you asked.
[ Tense shoulders only prickle more, and he doesn't reach to take the canteen, not immediately. He hadn't been expecting much, but something about Shepard's near bland reaction doesn't sit well in his tightening throat. He's holding back, but red-rimmed red eyes narrow slightly on her.
Aeryn was half of what made PKN7, was the one who got under his skin enough to make him join. In the a slew of awful choices that come with being young, it was probably the best decision he made since entering the CDC. His race is meant to endure long centuries and the quiet test of time, not the rapid and more often than not painful day-to-day changes this service requires its recruits to handle. Without all the extra help PKN7 offered in strengthening, in teamwork and bond building, in catching up not just with the tech and things he didn't understand, but keeping up with it... without all of that, he has no doubt he would've also been a name on one of two lists already. The shorter one.
Now that the other half of PKN7 is sitting in front of him, alive and maybe not one-hundred-percent, but still here after all that happened... well, it's hard to choke that tightness back down into his chest and follow her example. Hers and Aeryn's. To be strong and stony-faced like them, like a solider, like the proper elf he's never successfully been. ]
No. Don't need to. She told me not to... to get attached.
[ He finally takes the canteen back then, glaring harder while placing it back on his hip with fingers that can't quite get the straps back together the first time. ]
It should start up again soon though. She's probly already started it over on the... Quota or Quartet or whatever it was...
[ The Qohol, he knows. He'd keep the name of the crew she'd been moved to tightly locked in his memory, but the fact that they took her away from the Neheda crew means they don't deserve his respect. ]
[There's a long list of things she needs to do before the program winds up again given how long she's been out and Aeryn's absence. Lalonde was gone too. Brown-- something in her walls off at the thought of Nicolas Brown. The point is she's down people and now, whatever she might have played at before, it really is her being short. Which means rearranging class rosters again, scrambling to assign material and make sure everyone's prepared to fly by the seat of their pants for the hundredth time in a row. There'd be messages to send, calls to make. Christ, she'd need to find someone to run off PT sessions and--
It'd be easy to get lost in the details (there's something appealing about the thought, the minutiae wrought opportunity unfolding out in front of her invitingly); but Shepard forces her attention to narrow, to stay in the arm's length worth of distance between them instead. Harder, but more fair, she thinks. Does that look on Jasper's face - the pinch around his red, bright eyes - some justice, right? Besides, at least the Crichton issue was something definitive to tackle: a subsidiary of losing Sun, but the most annoying and therefore the easiest to think about. Hard to be tender when she's too busy being irritated at John's self-imposed martyrdom.]
I've seen him. [Which on its own doesn't sound optimistic, she knows. But she'd not going to lie to Jasper's face and give him something mollifying like 'he'll be fine'. Right now Crichton seemed dead set on making a dumb decision somewhere down the road; the fact that he didn't know what it was going to be yet just made her feel gun shy and more jumpy. Unpredictable shit.] I'll take care of it.
You don't gotta. Tryin' to take care of everythin's probly why you ended up like you did.
[ Praise be, the boy does have a WIS score after all. Not that it took a high roll to see what Shepard put herself through for the sake of others on a regular basis. Anyone with a decent spot check could see how thin she wore herself. Other tabletop puns.
Though in all seriousness, Jasper is not about to let her do it again. Even has a solution to offer: ]
Maybe he can help get it started again. Be more than just the snack-bearer and help run training too. If anyone knows how Aeryn would've run things, it'd be him. Besides... might be good for him.
[ Jasper knows what it's like to need a good distraction. Without his familiar around to keep him better grounded, he's always seeking them out. Regularly running PT might be a positive distraction for John, especially with the amount of kids in the program. John is great with kids... though right now kids might not be great with John. ]
After he gets a little more crazy out.
[ Not that he blames John for feeling like he does, but even he felt the need to call him out on the level of stupidity he'd shown the Captain on the comm. ]
[There's a flicker in her eyes, a fraction where her mouth pulls at the corner and something in her goes soft and sharp all at once. This isn't how this is supposed to go and she isn't here because she cared too much or some bullshit. She'd made a few stupid mistakes in the field, caught a streak of bad luck and been put down for it. It's not a mystery; it's just tactics. Little things - that's all it takes and suddenly you're waking up from a solar month of being dead to the world. Or you're just dead. She wonders, for a split second, how Nicolas Brown died. Whether it was fast or slow. If he'd thrown himself to it the same way he'd thrown himself to the jehke at the drop and at her during his evaluation, blade flashing: a hot flash of reflected light against the danker, greyer Ajna sky.
She should be down with the bulk of the crew working on stripping the surrounding forest and building some kind of perimeter line. She should be on her feet, tackling the long list of BS she has in front of her (self-imposed as half of it is). Instead she's sitting on a stump at the edge of camp and for a second, there's a pang of heat in her chest about it. Something sour at the back of her tongue. For a second, she looks tired and old at the prospect of keeping Crichton any closer than he already is.]
It's a good idea, Jasper. [Not 'Khezek.'] There's going to have to be some-- restructuring. I'll think about what to do with him.
[Good to know the kid was thinking, though. Putting Crichton to task was something that had occurred to her earlier; though if there's any pride in the shared sentiment, she doesn't have the perspective to recognize it at the moment.]
You're leading your green cell, right? Have you talked to your people yet?
[ Jasper's thin white brows go straight up at the use of his first name. Way up. For a second he has to wonder if it's really Shepard sitting in front of him, or a shape-shifter in her form, but it's an idea that is quickly dismissed. He hadn't exactly liked being called by his last name, the one his grandfather so reluctantly allowed him use, but he'd tolerated and gotten used to it with Shepard. It was sort of the same way he tolerated and let Corvo get away with his odd, sometimes creepy routines around the rover. It was just his weird way. It was her militaristic way.
It makes him want to try something. ]
Thanks... Lydia...
[ There's a heavy pause after as he watches her, uncertain... ]
No... that's weird. You're Shepard.
[ And witht that settled- ]
Yeah, I contacted all but one. He's in stasis now... but I left his a message to get back to when he's feelin' better.
[If the look that streaks across her face at the use of her first name is any indication, it's probably not an experiment worth repeating. Lip curls, nose wrinkles briefly, and there's something in her shoulders that goes all uncomfortable and stiff over it which is less about Jasper and more about everything else. No one calls her by it and the lack of use makes it feel like it's not something she owns, something sterile and strange.
She lets it pass without comment - bigger fish to fry and if she wants to get Jasper back over it, she'll have ample opportunity.]
What's your plan for them? What're their strengths? Weaknesses? Who's going to be trouble?
[ That briefly wrinkled frown goes mostly unnoticed as he's suddenly bombarded with questions. They aren't even very difficult ones, just unexpected and.. well, he hadn't really given most of them much thought. He's still getting used to the idea of being a leader, even for a group so small. ]
I don't really know about makin' a... a plan. They're not all fire users but close, all but one, the only Longhorn outta a bunch of Leapfrogs. They're all real strong in their own ways... pretty sure they're all stronger than me, actually. I don't think they'll give me much trouble...
[ And even if he did, he's not sure how much he can share with Shepard. There is no gag order placed against sharing Cell details with anyone on Grey, but he already knew a few things about his team that should be kept between them, for trust's sake. Still, the uncertainty of his new role weighs heavily in his words and posture. He grips the bowstring at this chest even tighter and glares down at the ground, unable to meet her questioning look. ]
I've never been a leader for anythin' or anyone before.
[It's an off the cuff remark, sincere in how easily it comes - like it shouldn't mean anything to say it, butting right up against the edge of being dismissive about what clearly look like concerns in his posture. The hesitation isn't a point of worry. Who wouldn't be wary in this environment? This is like throwing someone in white water rapids and expecting them to learn how to swim.
But she's leaning forward now, that worn look in her face layered under something sharper, something more alert now.]
But you can't work effectively if you don't know what you're working with, understand me? If you're responsible for those people and what they're supposed to do down the road, you need to make sure you give yourself the best chance to know how to make whatever gets handed to you happen.
[ It's a lot of things he doesn't understand all at once, and he's barely gotten started. But he has worked on a small, close-knit team before. He wasn't a leader among them, but the situation isn't as foreign as he thinks. And it's like Shepard says, he just needs to know what he's working with. Except he would tweak that, just slightly... he wants to know who he's working with too.
He's still looking away when he speaks, glaring slightly as if to cover his nervousness with anger. The usual. ]
Well, I'm glad you're back. Any advice you have to give... I'll listen.
[ Listen, but not necessarily take, and edit, like he's already quietly doing. She's still on Grey, for reasons he still doesn't understand, especially as a Commander in her own world. But the last time he brought it up, she'd nearly bitten his head off for asking. He still trusts her, still remains curious, but there is hesitation too. ]
How did you get to know your team, when you were commandin'?
['What.' 'Who.' It's all varying language for the same concept. There's a reason she reads every file, personnel or otherwise she has access to and it isn't because she's much of a bookworm.]
Invading their space, mostly. [Which is a raw, humorless kind of a joke but still one by technicality - some vague attempt to soften that note of anger in him, maybe.] Asking a lot of questions helps, but the more important thing is being available when someone wants to talk. In my experience, everyone wants to say something eventually. You just have to make sure they think to come to you first or you're in the right place when they start.
[Is that even helpful advice? She doesn't know - it's unquantifiable, gut instinct that she doesn't really get how to communicate. Not a learned skill, not really; maybe if it was, she'd have better luck applying it here.]
[ His frown deepens slightly, not really liking what he's hearing, Even if it is honest, good advice. ]
So be available to talk and get lucky... alright.
[ No, he clearly does not know the connotations of what he said just then at all. He's still glaring at the ground as he says it, and when he looks back up at Shepard, he's still serious. ]
I'll start by readin' all their files soon as I'm back in the rover. Before that, there anythin' I can do for you?
[ Still firmly serious, but he becomes less so when his ears perk and head tilts slightly. ]
Need a shower or some food or anythin'? I still got some jerky, and some khesau meat from a hunt the other day.
[The files are a good start, though enough of the crew is squirrely about their existence that she makes an effort to close her teeth around the encouragement on at least that point. He's already decided to do it - doesn't need her backing a move he's already fixed. But the rest--]
Someone beat you to it, but thanks anyway.
[Because as appealing as the idea of sitting in a compartment shower for the next five hours and ignoring the things she needs to get done, that's not actually going to do anything about getting her up to speed much less out in front of any potential crap headed her way (because let's not even pretend that there isn't always something coming).
And she could leave it there easily enough. Instead, forearms across her knees, she studies him for a beat. Nothing but time is going to fix the raw note in her voice, but there's nothing especially rough when she asks:]
[ The moment of studying is returned, as he turns his head up long enough to stop glaring at the ground and look her in the eye. He's mentally debating asking... no, telling her something important. It's a debate that doesn't last more than a few tense seconds. It's like she said - everyone has something to say eventually, and right now Shepard is in the right place at the right time. He hadn't been ready, when Aeryn questioned him. Now, in the light of recent events, he doesn't have time to wait until he's ready. ]
There's... somethin' else that happened, that I didn't draw. My father came through here while I was in stasis, with the temp rescue recruits. Tried to find me, maybe to kill me. I dunno. He left before I woke up.
[ It's all very low and quick, as though he's afraid of being overhead, and there is an effort being made to keep his voice flat and calm. It's an effort, but it doesn't disguise all of the anger simmering beneath the suface. ]
If he comes back with anyone new, I need to lie low for a while. Figure out a plan. If you see another elf with long white hair and blue eyes, let me know. But don't kill him.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ATTACHED IMAGE:
d105
What's your location/stasis?
[And not more that a few seconds later:]
FROM: shepard.lydia@cdc.org
Thank you for the drawing. It's very helpful.
no subject
Stasis?? Im not in stasis any more.
[ A similar pause, as he double checks the sender. ]
FROM: khezek.jasper@cdc.org
SHEPARD YOURE AWAKE.
no subject
Status. Sorry.
[Fingers all clumsy. It's been a long time since she's had to use them and apparently the CDC's comatech isn't up to scratch with Cerberus's. At least not the stuff they're letting them use in the field.]
FROM: shepard.lydia@cdc.org
More or less. None of this answers my question/s Khezek.
no subject
Im fine I guess.
Looking for materials around the new camp. Driftwood and stuff.
[ Others are cutting down trees, to use in making fortifications. He can't stand it, but can't stop them either. ]
FROM: khezek.jasper@cdc.org
Oh yea we moved camps. Sorry I didnt add that to the picture.
You feeling better?
no subject
I'm alright. Didn't really know I was feeling this bad in the first place
[Something had been knocked offline in the fight with the goddamn squid, she thinks. Not to the extent on Ajna when the EMP had taken all her cybernetics down, but she'd been hit. Couldn't see straight. Nothing big though, nothing she'd been worried about.
Figures.]
FROM: shepard.lydia@cdc.org
Can you give me details on the new camp location?
FROM: shepard.lydia@cdc.org
In person. Whenever is convenient.
[Typing is hard.]
no subject
Sure. Where are you? Ill come over.
no subject
By the rover line up in camp. South end. I'm sitting on a stump.
[Thanks, tree murderers of the group.]
FROM: shepard.lydia@cdc.org
Just use the personnel tracker on your comm.
[Surely they covered that in your tech demo class, Jasper.]
no subject
Ok be there in 5.
[ Well, more like six or seven, but who's counting? Besides Shepard.
The remaining trees growing off the shore are thinner and more widely spaced than they had been at the first camp, so close to the thick forest. It makes them harder to climb and move through, but that's not keeping Jasper out of them. It's better than walking. Walking left his mind too open to wandering in dark places he didn't want it to go, especially after all that happened, after who's been missing, and he'd done enough walking during the move. He uses the personnel tracker like she said to, but it's difficult to look at a screen while hopping branches. It's for that reason that he doesn't realize the light indicating her presence has been flashing until he's right above her.
He drops down behind the stump she's seated on and lands with a soft thud, knees bent in a crouch. It would have almost been stealthy if his white head wasn't such a dead giveaway. ]
Hey.
[ He doesn't move to stand yet and just watches her, waits for her to turn. His eyes are tired but there's an alertness to them, and they're tinged with a little more red than usual. ]
no subject
Right this second her legs feel heavy and her chest hurts, breathing all thick from the wet Macha air.
The whisper of the dirt and grass that signals Jasper dropping from the trees overhead is low enough that most probably would've let it slide. But for all the clumsiness in her fine motor skills that waking up out of a month long coma has bred, it's left her tense and over sharp elsewhere. She's already turning where she sits when he speaks.
He's the first person she's seen and known well enough that recognize the difference that doesn't like like absolute shit. The thought unwinds something in her chest that she doesn't think about too hard - instead wets her chapped lips, clears her throat with a horrible scratching noise. It sounds like she's been yelling, hoarse and wretched when she talks.]
I take it the whole running around in trees thing is still working out for you.
no subject
[ The response is flat. None of the excitement that was in his first text when he realized she was awake. He finally stands and straightens out the quiver and bow slung over his shoulders, made of bone and carved in Corvo's sigils. The bow is straightened, but there's something about his posture that is not, and it's telling. He grips the bowstring tightly at his chest and doesn't stand as tall as usual, hunched with his head turned slightly away from her, either guarded or listening. Or both, with the way his ears are raised. While he's certainly less tired and haggard-looking compared to some of the others around the new camp, he's on edge. Alert eyes and ears are taking her in, the slouch in her spine, the roughness in her voice. He reaches for the canteen at his hip and unstraps it, handing it to her without mention. ]
Haven't really had much chance to do any, by the way... me or the other cadets.
[ He had drawn out the reasons why already. No one had time for push-ups or running drills when they were being attacked, captured, and attacked again and again. There was another reason too. More personal, one that cut deeper than the fiery blades of Neraki spears when he was locked in that cliffside cage. ]
Not with Aeryn gone.
[ It's quiet. He's assuming she already knows, even if he hadn't been the one to tell her. He hadn't been able to. He could draw everything else out, but not that. ]
no subject
The fact that Aeryn's gone doesn't really have much to do with it, she thinks. Won't have much to do with anything going forward, she tells herself because it keeps her from batting an eyelash in the face of Jasper's low tone and the prickly line of his shoulders.]
We'll probably keep drilling on hold for a few days.
[Which is the more mechanical follow up to that than is fair to him. Jasper isn't Crichton who probably couldn't tolerate the idea of anyone missing Aeryn except for him. Jasper is-- not a child, not really. But close to one.
She's not great with kids.
Tipping back the canteen, she takes a long sip - scans the foliage above them for a beat. When she drops her chin and passes the canteen back--:]
They might let you send her a message if you asked.
icon is what's on the inside
Aeryn was half of what made PKN7, was the one who got under his skin enough to make him join. In the a slew of awful choices that come with being young, it was probably the best decision he made since entering the CDC. His race is meant to endure long centuries and the quiet test of time, not the rapid and more often than not painful day-to-day changes this service requires its recruits to handle. Without all the extra help PKN7 offered in strengthening, in teamwork and bond building, in catching up not just with the tech and things he didn't understand, but keeping up with it... without all of that, he has no doubt he would've also been a name on one of two lists already. The shorter one.
Now that the other half of PKN7 is sitting in front of him, alive and maybe not one-hundred-percent, but still here after all that happened... well, it's hard to choke that tightness back down into his chest and follow her example. Hers and Aeryn's. To be strong and stony-faced like them, like a solider, like the proper elf he's never successfully been. ]
No. Don't need to. She told me not to... to get attached.
[ He finally takes the canteen back then, glaring harder while placing it back on his hip with fingers that can't quite get the straps back together the first time. ]
It should start up again soon though. She's probly already started it over on the... Quota or Quartet or whatever it was...
[ The Qohol, he knows. He'd keep the name of the crew she'd been moved to tightly locked in his memory, but the fact that they took her away from the Neheda crew means they don't deserve his respect. ]
You seen John yet?
no subject
It'd be easy to get lost in the details (there's something appealing about the thought, the minutiae wrought opportunity unfolding out in front of her invitingly); but Shepard forces her attention to narrow, to stay in the arm's length worth of distance between them instead. Harder, but more fair, she thinks. Does that look on Jasper's face - the pinch around his red, bright eyes - some justice, right? Besides, at least the Crichton issue was something definitive to tackle: a subsidiary of losing Sun, but the most annoying and therefore the easiest to think about. Hard to be tender when she's too busy being irritated at John's self-imposed martyrdom.]
I've seen him. [Which on its own doesn't sound optimistic, she knows. But she'd not going to lie to Jasper's face and give him something mollifying like 'he'll be fine'. Right now Crichton seemed dead set on making a dumb decision somewhere down the road; the fact that he didn't know what it was going to be yet just made her feel gun shy and more jumpy. Unpredictable shit.] I'll take care of it.
no subject
[ Praise be, the boy does have a WIS score after all. Not that it took a high roll to see what Shepard put herself through for the sake of others on a regular basis. Anyone with a decent spot check could see how thin she wore herself.
Other tabletop puns.Though in all seriousness, Jasper is not about to let her do it again. Even has a solution to offer: ]
Maybe he can help get it started again. Be more than just the snack-bearer and help run training too. If anyone knows how Aeryn would've run things, it'd be him. Besides... might be good for him.
[ Jasper knows what it's like to need a good distraction. Without his familiar around to keep him better grounded, he's always seeking them out. Regularly running PT might be a positive distraction for John, especially with the amount of kids in the program. John is great with kids... though right now kids might not be great with John. ]
After he gets a little more crazy out.
[ Not that he blames John for feeling like he does, but even he felt the need to call him out on the level of stupidity he'd shown the Captain on the comm. ]
no subject
She should be down with the bulk of the crew working on stripping the surrounding forest and building some kind of perimeter line. She should be on her feet, tackling the long list of BS she has in front of her (self-imposed as half of it is). Instead she's sitting on a stump at the edge of camp and for a second, there's a pang of heat in her chest about it. Something sour at the back of her tongue. For a second, she looks tired and old at the prospect of keeping Crichton any closer than he already is.]
It's a good idea, Jasper. [Not 'Khezek.'] There's going to have to be some-- restructuring. I'll think about what to do with him.
[Good to know the kid was thinking, though. Putting Crichton to task was something that had occurred to her earlier; though if there's any pride in the shared sentiment, she doesn't have the perspective to recognize it at the moment.]
You're leading your green cell, right? Have you talked to your people yet?
no subject
It makes him want to try something. ]
Thanks... Lydia...
[ There's a heavy pause after as he watches her, uncertain... ]
No... that's weird. You're Shepard.
[ And witht that settled- ]
Yeah, I contacted all but one. He's in stasis now... but I left his a message to get back to when he's feelin' better.
no subject
She lets it pass without comment - bigger fish to fry and if she wants to get Jasper back over it, she'll have ample opportunity.]
What's your plan for them? What're their strengths? Weaknesses? Who's going to be trouble?
no subject
[ That briefly wrinkled frown goes mostly unnoticed as he's suddenly bombarded with questions. They aren't even very difficult ones, just unexpected and.. well, he hadn't really given most of them much thought. He's still getting used to the idea of being a leader, even for a group so small. ]
I don't really know about makin' a... a plan. They're not all fire users but close, all but one, the only Longhorn outta a bunch of Leapfrogs. They're all real strong in their own ways... pretty sure they're all stronger than me, actually. I don't think they'll give me much trouble...
[ And even if he did, he's not sure how much he can share with Shepard. There is no gag order placed against sharing Cell details with anyone on Grey, but he already knew a few things about his team that should be kept between them, for trust's sake. Still, the uncertainty of his new role weighs heavily in his words and posture. He grips the bowstring at this chest even tighter and glares down at the ground, unable to meet her questioning look. ]
I've never been a leader for anythin' or anyone before.
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[It's an off the cuff remark, sincere in how easily it comes - like it shouldn't mean anything to say it, butting right up against the edge of being dismissive about what clearly look like concerns in his posture. The hesitation isn't a point of worry. Who wouldn't be wary in this environment? This is like throwing someone in white water rapids and expecting them to learn how to swim.
But she's leaning forward now, that worn look in her face layered under something sharper, something more alert now.]
But you can't work effectively if you don't know what you're working with, understand me? If you're responsible for those people and what they're supposed to do down the road, you need to make sure you give yourself the best chance to know how to make whatever gets handed to you happen.
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[ It's a lot of things he doesn't understand all at once, and he's barely gotten started. But he has worked on a small, close-knit team before. He wasn't a leader among them, but the situation isn't as foreign as he thinks. And it's like Shepard says, he just needs to know what he's working with. Except he would tweak that, just slightly... he wants to know who he's working with too.
He's still looking away when he speaks, glaring slightly as if to cover his nervousness with anger. The usual. ]
Well, I'm glad you're back. Any advice you have to give... I'll listen.
[ Listen, but not necessarily take, and edit, like he's already quietly doing. She's still on Grey, for reasons he still doesn't understand, especially as a Commander in her own world. But the last time he brought it up, she'd nearly bitten his head off for asking. He still trusts her, still remains curious, but there is hesitation too. ]
How did you get to know your team, when you were commandin'?
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Invading their space, mostly. [Which is a raw, humorless kind of a joke but still one by technicality - some vague attempt to soften that note of anger in him, maybe.] Asking a lot of questions helps, but the more important thing is being available when someone wants to talk. In my experience, everyone wants to say something eventually. You just have to make sure they think to come to you first or you're in the right place when they start.
[Is that even helpful advice? She doesn't know - it's unquantifiable, gut instinct that she doesn't really get how to communicate. Not a learned skill, not really; maybe if it was, she'd have better luck applying it here.]
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So be available to talk and get lucky... alright.
[ No, he clearly does not know the connotations of what he said just then at all. He's still glaring at the ground as he says it, and when he looks back up at Shepard, he's still serious. ]
I'll start by readin' all their files soon as I'm back in the rover. Before that, there anythin' I can do for you?
[ Still firmly serious, but he becomes less so when his ears perk and head tilts slightly. ]
Need a shower or some food or anythin'? I still got some jerky, and some khesau meat from a hunt the other day.
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Someone beat you to it, but thanks anyway.
[Because as appealing as the idea of sitting in a compartment shower for the next five hours and ignoring the things she needs to get done, that's not actually going to do anything about getting her up to speed much less out in front of any potential crap headed her way (because let's not even pretend that there isn't always something coming).
And she could leave it there easily enough. Instead, forearms across her knees, she studies him for a beat. Nothing but time is going to fix the raw note in her voice, but there's nothing especially rough when she asks:]
Do you need anything?
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There's... somethin' else that happened, that I didn't draw. My father came through here while I was in stasis, with the temp rescue recruits. Tried to find me, maybe to kill me. I dunno. He left before I woke up.
[ It's all very low and quick, as though he's afraid of being overhead, and there is an effort being made to keep his voice flat and calm. It's an effort, but it doesn't disguise all of the anger simmering beneath the suface. ]
If he comes back with anyone new, I need to lie low for a while. Figure out a plan. If you see another elf with long white hair and blue eyes, let me know. But don't kill him.
He's mine.
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