[Witches' Horses] Chevalier de Grammont
Title: admissions
'Verse/characters: le Chevalier de Grammont; Grammont, Martin
Prompt: 60C "ability"
Word Count: 745
Notes: dormouse_in_tea suggested something tricksy and devious. I'm not sure I managed it. This would be after introduction.
"Good morning, Grammont!" he said as soon as he was safely inside her second skin, out of hearing range of anyone who might be standing in the stable.
"It's local midnight," she replied, bemused. "Normal parlance would call this night."
"No, no, good night is like good bye, while good morning is like hello," he said as he shed a bandolier of tools onto her floor, then stuck his head into the hole he'd cut in the wall to start making space for the guns. "I was thinking."
"'Uh-oh'," she said dutifully, and he laughed, the sound echoing in the space, tickling her.
"You have a secondary drive," he said muffledly, then pulled his head out, slid down the wall to sit in an easy cross-legged pose, looking up at her nearest eye. She noted the way it wasn't a question, and quietly started a list that was headed 'Why You Do Not Speak To Engineers' in addition to the 'Words This Human Uses That No One Else Does' she was already compiling as he continued "I was thinking that I could give your guns flick-switch options, let you run the guns off your standard drive while you were using it, your secondary while you were using the standard, or both you and the guns off your secondary. Sort of a stepwise progression of scary, depending on circumstances and situation?"
"I think," she said after a moment, "that it might work better to go 'standard' and 'secondary' for the switches for the guns, instead?"
"Secondary doubles as a set, hmm?" he said absently, then stilled completely as she closed her inner and outer doors, locked them tight.
She was strongly considering flashing a message on the inner side of her human's eyepatch when Martin made a gesture with his forefinger near his temple, smiling in what she decided was a slightly rueful way.
"Sorry, lady," he said. "I know."
"You know what?" she asked, pulling up inner maps of what she could use to fry him and still have it appear an accident.
"I know you're a witch's horse," he replied, "and that you're thinking of the ways you can kill me without anyone guessing it was murder."
She let a silence stretch, then demanded "What are you?"
"I'm not one of Kaschei's," he told her, far too calmly for the name he was invoking. She automatically ran static between her skins, just in case the human-rider was listening, somehow.
"You know I haven't any metal in my head," he continued, "you've put more than enough current through me just watching me work to have spotted the traces if I did. Check again if you want to, I won't mind."
She did, looked at him through every single spectrum she could, very nearly down to the level she could have calculated the percentage of metal ions in his bloodstream. He waited patiently, eyes half-shut and no definable expression on his face.
"If you're one of his, I can't see it," she admitted eventually. "Though if you were I would know exactly why you're here and what you're doing, and as it is I have no idea."
"Not stealing you," he said, half-amused.
"Perhaps you've just never had enough temptation before," she suggested, and he laughed, long and loud and heartfelt.
"Lady, I have seen more wonderful things than you, and not been tempted. Your secret's safe with me--I want to see what you do, not break you to some human's heel."
She hesitated, torn badly between wanting to take him at his word and to kill him for his knowledge, tell her human he accidentally tapped her crackle drive and died of it, keep this secret even from him.
But she would have no guns, if she did, and they would have to find another engineer to finish what this one began, and that one might see her for what she was. Which was an ugly, uncomfortable line of reasoning, and she unlocked her doors, instead of saying anything.
He didn't quite smile, as he rose from her wall, moved to his tools and then returned, sitting down again.
They existed in silence for a while, him sketching with a marking stylus on what she eventually identified as a piece of extruded polymers, until she asked " . . Do you know his name?"
"The real one? Yes," he answered, looking up. "But I don't think he'd thank either of us for the sharing, if he ever finds out."
'Verse/characters: le Chevalier de Grammont; Grammont, Martin
Prompt: 60C "ability"
Word Count: 745
Notes: dormouse_in_tea suggested something tricksy and devious. I'm not sure I managed it. This would be after introduction.
"Good morning, Grammont!" he said as soon as he was safely inside her second skin, out of hearing range of anyone who might be standing in the stable.
"It's local midnight," she replied, bemused. "Normal parlance would call this night."
"No, no, good night is like good bye, while good morning is like hello," he said as he shed a bandolier of tools onto her floor, then stuck his head into the hole he'd cut in the wall to start making space for the guns. "I was thinking."
"'Uh-oh'," she said dutifully, and he laughed, the sound echoing in the space, tickling her.
"You have a secondary drive," he said muffledly, then pulled his head out, slid down the wall to sit in an easy cross-legged pose, looking up at her nearest eye. She noted the way it wasn't a question, and quietly started a list that was headed 'Why You Do Not Speak To Engineers' in addition to the 'Words This Human Uses That No One Else Does' she was already compiling as he continued "I was thinking that I could give your guns flick-switch options, let you run the guns off your standard drive while you were using it, your secondary while you were using the standard, or both you and the guns off your secondary. Sort of a stepwise progression of scary, depending on circumstances and situation?"
"I think," she said after a moment, "that it might work better to go 'standard' and 'secondary' for the switches for the guns, instead?"
"Secondary doubles as a set, hmm?" he said absently, then stilled completely as she closed her inner and outer doors, locked them tight.
She was strongly considering flashing a message on the inner side of her human's eyepatch when Martin made a gesture with his forefinger near his temple, smiling in what she decided was a slightly rueful way.
"Sorry, lady," he said. "I know."
"You know what?" she asked, pulling up inner maps of what she could use to fry him and still have it appear an accident.
"I know you're a witch's horse," he replied, "and that you're thinking of the ways you can kill me without anyone guessing it was murder."
She let a silence stretch, then demanded "What are you?"
"I'm not one of Kaschei's," he told her, far too calmly for the name he was invoking. She automatically ran static between her skins, just in case the human-rider was listening, somehow.
"You know I haven't any metal in my head," he continued, "you've put more than enough current through me just watching me work to have spotted the traces if I did. Check again if you want to, I won't mind."
She did, looked at him through every single spectrum she could, very nearly down to the level she could have calculated the percentage of metal ions in his bloodstream. He waited patiently, eyes half-shut and no definable expression on his face.
"If you're one of his, I can't see it," she admitted eventually. "Though if you were I would know exactly why you're here and what you're doing, and as it is I have no idea."
"Not stealing you," he said, half-amused.
"Perhaps you've just never had enough temptation before," she suggested, and he laughed, long and loud and heartfelt.
"Lady, I have seen more wonderful things than you, and not been tempted. Your secret's safe with me--I want to see what you do, not break you to some human's heel."
She hesitated, torn badly between wanting to take him at his word and to kill him for his knowledge, tell her human he accidentally tapped her crackle drive and died of it, keep this secret even from him.
But she would have no guns, if she did, and they would have to find another engineer to finish what this one began, and that one might see her for what she was. Which was an ugly, uncomfortable line of reasoning, and she unlocked her doors, instead of saying anything.
He didn't quite smile, as he rose from her wall, moved to his tools and then returned, sitting down again.
They existed in silence for a while, him sketching with a marking stylus on what she eventually identified as a piece of extruded polymers, until she asked " . . Do you know his name?"
"The real one? Yes," he answered, looking up. "But I don't think he'd thank either of us for the sharing, if he ever finds out."