The Plan
Location: Jensen's Office
Time: Morning of Day 21, Month 6, Turn 2
Players: Ashwin and Roa
Scene: After Jensen confesses to murdering Luren, Ashwin and Roa confer on what to do next. Among other things.
OOC note: Some cursing and fairly stong adult themes here.
The first clue that something is a bit amiss (well, even more amiss than things have become thus far), is Morley standing out in the hallway, scuffing his toe and looking utterly miserable.
Inside, the office is exactly how it was last left. Tidy mostly, save for a few skewed hides on the desk. In the chair facing the desk (and so currently facing no one) sits the little Telgari weyrwoman, stiff backed, poker faced, hands clasped in her lap. She waits.
One of the few advantages of Roa's escort is the warning it offers from time to time. Ashwin's usual poker face tends towards the grim as he comes striding down the corridor, and he claps Morley on the shoulder as he passes him on his way in the door. He's found a change of clothes, but has chosen not to don a knot of any description - not a Tillek knot, not a Lieutenant's knot, not a Captain's. The door shuts behind him with a click, and he turns back from pushing it closed.
She looks up as the door opens, but for once the Telgari has nothing to offer. No words. She's only watching him. It is, after all, the first time she's seen Ashwin since he was locked up for a murder he didn't commit. And what she thinks of him being out, if it's relief that he's all right or anger at the exchange that had to be made, none of it shows through. Roa only waits.
There might be a bit of wariness in the way Ashwin watches her for a moment. There's no lunge, though, and after that moment he shifts to walk towards her, tugging his untucked shirt straight in something that might be a nervous gesture on another man. "We're going to fix this."
"Damn straight we are," is the weyrwoman's soft response. Ah. Well, perhaps it's that tone of voice that made Tialith pick her. Or perhaps all weyrwomen acquire it as part of the new training. One arm lifts, hand gesturing towards the seat on the other side of the desk.
"And when I say we," Ashwin continues quietly, although he does move around to settle into Jensen's seat, "that's not a 'we' that includes you."
"Ashwin." A small pause. "Captain." One eyebrow lifts. "I am going to pretend you didn't just say that, and then we can continue on down a path that will actually be productive. Now. I have a plan. It's a shitty plan, but Faranth help me I've been up and down this all night, and it's the best I can come up with."
"That's not my rank." Ashwin might be allowing others to say it outside this room, but here his response comes fast, and through gritted teeth. One foot comes up to brace him against the leg of Jensen's desk, and his gaze turns to the hides on its surface. "Tell me your plan, then."
"You won't like it. At all. Brace yourself." Roa closes her eyes, but as they have been doing for near the past seven, they snap open again immediately. "There's some dance happening in a few days. It'll keep people busy. A good time to break him loose. Then I'll...oh...can you pick locks?"
"I have the keys," Ashwin points out, almost dry for a moment. "I don't need to pick anything." He's watching her, expression slipping back to his usual, neutral offering - past that hint of something else she's usually offered into that stoic face she used to know so well.
Blink. "Oh. Right." Roa clears her throat softly. "I'll have Tia ready and waiting in the dragon baths. I'll get supplies together. There'll be one other thing I'll need..." the Telgari shakes her head distractedly. "I'll take him somewhere that's...well...it's safe as I can manage, and he'll have to keep his head down until his name's cleared. I..." she lowers her head to stare at her hands. "You'll be sticking with him, I presume?" It is, or sounds to be, a genuine question. Curious but carefully aloof.
Ashwin is silent in the wake of this outline, his gaze dropping with hers to her hands. "I'll be relieving the man on duty," he begins softly. "I won't ask any of them to take the fall. I can't be here when it comes out, or we're back where we started." One of the pair locked up, and now the other hidden away safely. "I don't want to run." Again, that gritting of his teeth.
"You have, then, a better idea?" Roa asks softly. Because she sure as shells doesn't.
"No." Ashwin's reply is short, soft. "Where?"
"Ah. Now we get to the part you're not going to like. I mean, quite seriously not going to like. Possibly loathe. So brace yourself. Are you ready?" Roa is staring very intently at the desk, the pattern of the grain. It's usually so covered in papers...but Jen's not here to spread them out is he.
"I loathe running," Ashwin observes evenly. "I loathe hiding. I loathe that I don't see a way either of us will ever be able to lift our heads again, or use our names." And if this is better than Crom, or worse, then there's little hint of that in Ashwin's voice.
She exhales slowly, Roa's eyes still locked on the desk. Tracing the grains over and over again with her eyes. "The island," is all she says.
Maybe he thinks she means Ista, for a moment. Not for long. Ashwin's eyes come up from her hands to her face, resting on her profile for a moment in open disbelief. "No." His reply is flat. "We'll find another place."
"Think about it," Roa says to the desk. One hand comes up, and she begins ticking each point she makes on her fingers. "It's the only place there's protection from thread," Tick. "No one will find you. No one will even *think* to look there." Tick "As much as the stories would have all of them as slavering bloodthirsty beasts, there are women there. There are children there. There are thirty one dragons flying and fighting thread and they haven't lost a one." Tick tick tick. "There's a Reachian weyrwoman whose queen is going to have a clutch. It's safe. Or safer than anywhere else, at least." She hasn't yet chanced a glance upwards.
"There are other safe places." Perhaps Ashwin hasn't failed to give this question some thought. "Holdless caverns at Igen. Population changes there all the time. Every Hold's got places like that, even if they're not as big. We're not that distinctive."
"Your pictures will get circulated around. How do you plan to travel from one hidey hole to the next without getting spotted? How do you plan to eat? How do you intend to chart threadfall to make sure you don't get caught out in it?" Roa shakes her head slowly. "They won't find you in the west. You won't have to keep running."
He knows more about this than she. It has been his unpleasant duty from time to time to track down men whose pictures have been circulated, to hunt them out in the places where they would hide. It is that knowledge and experience which will win this argument for her, rather than her own words. "We'll run once, and that's all. We'll never come home."
And now her eyes snap up, seeking his. There is tension there. Something frantic, barely contained. "Yes. You will. I swear it."
It takes a moment before he's willing to meet her eyes, and there's little or nothing to be read in his quiet gaze when he does. "Don't cheapen your word by giving it on this."
"Don't think I can't do this. I *can* do this. I wouldn't suggest it, else." Roa's fingers have found one another in her lap and they press downward, heels of her palms grinding into her knees.
"You have no idea how you're going to do this," Ashwin disagrees quietly. "You're right. It's a shitty plan, but I have nothing else. Just be honest about what you're doing. Don't make it something it's not."
"I have some thoughts on where to begin," counters Roa, though the counter is, frankly, feeble. Thoughts on where to start? "A little bit of faith in me would be nice, Ash."
It would seem Ashwin thinks so too. "You have thoughts on where to begin." His reply is flat. "Try to understand if that doesn't comfort me." His gaze turns away, fixing on the wall. "Say goodbye to me. Don't hide from what it is."
"I'm not. I-" Eyes close. Snap open. There is a soft curse growled out, unidentifiable. "Fine. On this point we'll just have to disagree." Roa pushes the chair back, rising up into a stand. "There's a lot to do."
Ashwin watches her rise, eyes drawn over to her once more. "I've thought about parting," he observes so quietly, so evenly. "I didn't think of it happening like this."
"Can't say as I did either. Thought you'd just be going back to Tillek, or off to some hold with Jensen or just..." Just done with her. Just around. "It's not forever," Roa insists a final time.
"Yes, it is." Ashwin's own insistence is quiet, but sure. "I want your word. After a turn, I'm done hiding where you say. I want to know someone's going to come, give me the option of taking my chances here, at a Hold somewhere."
"Oh. So. What. I can manage to smuggle you out of a weyr. I can manage to get an image of the area and get you there. I can manage to bring you back in a turn. But unravel a puzzle? Faranth forbid *that* could be done?" The Telgari's brows are drawn down in confusion and sheer frustration. "Clarify for me, please, precisely what it is you think I'm incapable of managing?"
"If you can unravel this one, I wish you'd done it a long time ago." Ashwin doesn't rise to match her mood, bringing up one hand to massage the bridge of his nose. "A picture of a place in your head is one thing. This is another." Finally there's a flash of something in his eyes - frustration, perhaps. "The last thing you say to me is going to be that this will work. That it won't last."
Roa's arms come up to wrap slowly around herself. "Something else you'd prefer to hear, then?" she asks, her gaze finally settling more squarely on him. On his face.
"Like I said." Whatever that fleeting flash was in Ashwin's eyes, it's gone. "I'd prefer you called it what it is. Let me say goodbye to you without trying to wave my words away. This has been something. I want you to end it honestly."
"Stubborn," is the quiet assessment. "And not in a good way. Fine. We'll play it your way, and when I'm right I expect some shelling impressive apology happening." Roa takes a final step forward, around the desk, and extends a hand. As in, for a handshake. "Goodbye, then."
She's so good at drawing reactions from him. To this - her step forward, her extended hand, his mouth opens slightly, shock seeping into his face. Then, slowly, he shakes his head, both hands remaining just where they are. "No. Just go." The words are mumbled, face closing back over even as he turns his gaze away.
The extended hand moves to settle lightly on his shoulder and then, gently, to creep up his neck to get lost in his hair. "You *are* awful with women," Roa murmurs.
"Just you," he replies, just as soft, disavowing claims he made some time back. His face stays turned away, but his head tilts back into her touch a little.
She breathes out slowly, back bending, shoulders curving, to rest her cheek on the top of his head as her other arm lifts wrapping around him in half of a hug. "Sorry," Roa murmurs, "I'm told I'm oblique." A tiny smile that vanishes. "I'm not...hanging on by so much, just now. Don't make me take it seriously. I will, probably 'bout an hour from now. Can't do it yet."
He might press, and certainly he wants to, that much she must know from his attempts so far. Yet he's silent, and after a moment he reaches up to catch at her arms, to see if he can pull her down into his lap. The door is closed. Morley's outside. "I don't like oblique," he's murmuring, turning his head up to her. "Let me be direct." The goodbye will not be forced - or will not be voiced aloud. In this, as before, he bows to her wishes.
Of course he can pull her down. She practically flows with that little tug, was waiting for it, maybe. Roa's arms wrap around his neck, head tilted back, lips close to his. "Be direct, then," she whispers.
Silence from Ashwin - after watching her for months, it seems even the few days he's had to keep himself from her have been too many. He has no reply, for his lips are on hers, one foot bracing against the leg of the desk once more so he can keep her in place, one hand already going to gather up her skirt - the hem, as always, so disobligingly long.
* * * * Fade Out and Back In Again * * * *
She's spinning, hands squeezing and releasing as her body is caught, and she just clings to him even after there is nothing but tiny shivering aftershocks, and the colors behind her eyelids have faded and returned to something else, those nightmare images that are becoming so familiar. Her face, she finds, is buried in the crook of his neck, arms wrapped around him, legs clasped around his hips. She's shaking a little, but maybe he'll attribute it to something other than fear. Roa is quiet except for her uneven breathing. She can think of nothing to say that won't hurt.
No nightmares plague Ashwin - he is quiet, save for his own gasping breath, turning his head to press his face to her hair. It's nearly a minute before he speaks, and even then it's a false start. His second try is more successful; he lifts his head, pulling back enough that he can look at her face, his hand coming off the desk to catch at his pants where they threaten to slide off his hips. "You own me, Roa." He doesn't duck the words, does not glance away to shield himself or her from their impact. Simply looks at her face, still flushed, pupils still widened. "I don't know how that happened."
Her fingers come up to cup his face, to simply hold that eye contact as Roa swallows sharply. "It's an even trade, I guess," she murmurs as her thumb lightly traces his bottom lip, fuller from all that kissing. "I can't believe I-" but she stops, looks away, and just shakes her head. "I knew better. I could have fixed this, and I didn't and I knew better. And you're leaving." Her gaze moves back up, meeting his, perhaps hesitantly. "I love you. And you're leaving."
Ashwin is silent as she speaks, the only sound the clink of his belt buckle as he shifts his grip slightly to keep his pants where they belong. His other hand is still on her hip, keeping her close. If her words, and her gaze come hesitantly, his are quiet but steady, pale blue eyes waiting to meet hers. "Is that what this is?"
One of Roa's hands travels from his cheek to his forehead. To gently push pale hair away from his face. For a woman who uses her words, she needs very few, suddenly. "Yeh, Ash," is all she murmurs, "That's what this is."
Ashwin drops his head then, but it's not to avoid her gaze. Rather, it's so that he can close his eyes, leaning his forehead into her touch. He swallows, then nods, and then he's straightening up, hand unwinding from her hip and pulling her skirt back down a little way before it joins his other. Now his head is ducked because he's fastening his pants, cinching his belt shut, and addressing quiet words to the floor. "We could have chosen better, both of us."
As he begins to get himself in order, Roa looks to herself, silently readjusting bits and pieces of clothing that got pulled off or shoved around, settling her skirts more fully down around her legs. Her hair is drawn over her shoulder and she begins to rebraid it as she watches him. "What choices would you have made differently?" she asks, softly.
Ashwin is buttoning his shirt when she speaks, and still his gaze stays down, as though a man accustomed to dressing for a dawn patrol needs to keep an eye on his buttons so he can fasten them. But he breaks off his efforts, lifting his head to look over to her - tired, grave, but certain. "Not a single one." Simple as that.
Her brows draw down at this because...didn't he just say...? The little leather cord is picked up and used to tie off Roa's braid before it's coiled up and around and settled at the nape of her neck. "So, when you said we both could have chosen better, you just meant me?" There is bemusement in her tone. Tired. Weak. But there.
"No." Ashwin is unbothered by the apparent contradiction in his words, and his gaze goes down as he finishes off his buttons, tucking his shirt back in. "I could have chosen differently, chosen better. But I'd have chosen this anyway." He's very nearly offhand, as though what he says is no great thing.
A slow shake of Roa's head as she just continues to observe, still seated on the desk, feet dangling. It's easy to imagine, for a moment, that this is their room. He's dressing because they just woke up together. Everything is fine. "C'mere."
One hand comes up to swipe through Ashwin's hair - so shaggy now, but uncut, at her request - and he takes the couple of steps required to bring him over to stand before her, as silent and politely enquiring as he's ever been when working.
Roa only tips herself forward so that she can settle her cheek against Ashwin's chest and slowly wrap her arms around his waist. She stares off into the middle distance, saying nothing. Just...keeping him there for a little while.
It might be that he's relieved, that she has nothing to say. He simply exhales, and wraps both arms around her, tucking her in under his chin, eyes closed. What can he say, after all? His next words must be to send her away, and so he stays silent.
Her hands move along his lower back. Rubbing small circles half for him, half for her. She has frantic fingers, after all, and it's a comfort to put them to use. Roa doesn't say anything either. She can see a little too clearly the way the end of this road is creeping up on them. Her hour is up. It's hitting home.
But the hour ticks on regardless, and Ashwin allows her only so many minutes before he speaks, his voice sounding through his chest where her ear is pressed into it. "I need your word you won't go in to see the Captain. You can't, you'll see him when we go. You need to keep his..." A brief pause. What to call Penny? "The journeyman away from him as well."
There's a small shake of Roa’s head against his chest. "You have my word I won't visit him. Penny gets to have her goodbye. I won't budge on that. We'll work with you to time it if that's necessary, though."
"Name me one time you've been anything but trouble." Despite his words, Ashwin's growl is affectionate, almost amused. "Dinner tomorrow, then. I'll take the watch myself. I don't want the men involved in this."
"I don't know," Roa muses on a sigh. "I'm quite obliging when I'm naked. Or seated on desks, apparently." She still has not pulled back or removed her arms from around him. "Tomorrow at dinner. I'll get her there."
"Don't tempt me again," Ashwin mutters, and for a moment there's nothing wrong - he's teasing her, preparing to start something playful, squeezing her in against him. The next moment, he's beginning to unwrap his arms, ready to shift away. "Night after that's this party. I don't want to see you until then, understand?"
He's pulling away? No. Not good at all. Her arms tighten, fingers pressing harder against cloth and skin. But after a moment's protest her grip relents and Roa slowly straightens, eyes downcast. At that sharp request there's only a faint wince before she nods. "I'll get supplies together. Figure out a reason why I won't be at the party. We'll wait until it's late enough that drinks have been around a few times. Tia and I will be waiting in the dragon baths."
"Right." Is there an elegant way to do this? A gentle way to say their farewells, after the words that have passed between them? If so, it eludes Ashwin, for he simply nods. "Night after tomorrow, then." Her will is that he not press the word 'goodbye' on her, and he does not - left silent, in its absence.
Another nod. "Night after t-" but Roa's voice cracks and she looks sharply away, blinking rapidly and swallowing considerably. "And dinner," she murmurs finally, sliding off the desk and doing a final resettling of her clothes. "Don't forget."
"Right." That one word is Ashwin's only agreement, delivered with a quick nod. And suddenly, he's almost keen for her to be gone, backing up another step, and clearing his throat - her tears, perhaps, or maybe he simply has no more words yet, having exhausted them all. He's as stoic, as blank-faced as he's ever been.
There's one final glance, more stolen than anything. Eyes flicking up, over to him, before they slide away and to the exit. Roa's fingers sweep over the top of her head, smoothing wayward wisps flat, and she's walking towards the door, hand wrapping around the handle, opening it.
Ashwin is quite still as she leaves. It's only as the door begins to pull closed behind her that he gulps a deep breath, and then another, steadying himself against a surrender that he refuses to allow. This lasts all of ten second before he's backing up, and sinking down onto the edge of his Captain's bed, to lean forward and bury his face in his hands.
Time: Morning of Day 21, Month 6, Turn 2
Players: Ashwin and Roa
Scene: After Jensen confesses to murdering Luren, Ashwin and Roa confer on what to do next. Among other things.
OOC note: Some cursing and fairly stong adult themes here.
The first clue that something is a bit amiss (well, even more amiss than things have become thus far), is Morley standing out in the hallway, scuffing his toe and looking utterly miserable.
Inside, the office is exactly how it was last left. Tidy mostly, save for a few skewed hides on the desk. In the chair facing the desk (and so currently facing no one) sits the little Telgari weyrwoman, stiff backed, poker faced, hands clasped in her lap. She waits.
One of the few advantages of Roa's escort is the warning it offers from time to time. Ashwin's usual poker face tends towards the grim as he comes striding down the corridor, and he claps Morley on the shoulder as he passes him on his way in the door. He's found a change of clothes, but has chosen not to don a knot of any description - not a Tillek knot, not a Lieutenant's knot, not a Captain's. The door shuts behind him with a click, and he turns back from pushing it closed.
She looks up as the door opens, but for once the Telgari has nothing to offer. No words. She's only watching him. It is, after all, the first time she's seen Ashwin since he was locked up for a murder he didn't commit. And what she thinks of him being out, if it's relief that he's all right or anger at the exchange that had to be made, none of it shows through. Roa only waits.
There might be a bit of wariness in the way Ashwin watches her for a moment. There's no lunge, though, and after that moment he shifts to walk towards her, tugging his untucked shirt straight in something that might be a nervous gesture on another man. "We're going to fix this."
"Damn straight we are," is the weyrwoman's soft response. Ah. Well, perhaps it's that tone of voice that made Tialith pick her. Or perhaps all weyrwomen acquire it as part of the new training. One arm lifts, hand gesturing towards the seat on the other side of the desk.
"And when I say we," Ashwin continues quietly, although he does move around to settle into Jensen's seat, "that's not a 'we' that includes you."
"Ashwin." A small pause. "Captain." One eyebrow lifts. "I am going to pretend you didn't just say that, and then we can continue on down a path that will actually be productive. Now. I have a plan. It's a shitty plan, but Faranth help me I've been up and down this all night, and it's the best I can come up with."
"That's not my rank." Ashwin might be allowing others to say it outside this room, but here his response comes fast, and through gritted teeth. One foot comes up to brace him against the leg of Jensen's desk, and his gaze turns to the hides on its surface. "Tell me your plan, then."
"You won't like it. At all. Brace yourself." Roa closes her eyes, but as they have been doing for near the past seven, they snap open again immediately. "There's some dance happening in a few days. It'll keep people busy. A good time to break him loose. Then I'll...oh...can you pick locks?"
"I have the keys," Ashwin points out, almost dry for a moment. "I don't need to pick anything." He's watching her, expression slipping back to his usual, neutral offering - past that hint of something else she's usually offered into that stoic face she used to know so well.
Blink. "Oh. Right." Roa clears her throat softly. "I'll have Tia ready and waiting in the dragon baths. I'll get supplies together. There'll be one other thing I'll need..." the Telgari shakes her head distractedly. "I'll take him somewhere that's...well...it's safe as I can manage, and he'll have to keep his head down until his name's cleared. I..." she lowers her head to stare at her hands. "You'll be sticking with him, I presume?" It is, or sounds to be, a genuine question. Curious but carefully aloof.
Ashwin is silent in the wake of this outline, his gaze dropping with hers to her hands. "I'll be relieving the man on duty," he begins softly. "I won't ask any of them to take the fall. I can't be here when it comes out, or we're back where we started." One of the pair locked up, and now the other hidden away safely. "I don't want to run." Again, that gritting of his teeth.
"You have, then, a better idea?" Roa asks softly. Because she sure as shells doesn't.
"No." Ashwin's reply is short, soft. "Where?"
"Ah. Now we get to the part you're not going to like. I mean, quite seriously not going to like. Possibly loathe. So brace yourself. Are you ready?" Roa is staring very intently at the desk, the pattern of the grain. It's usually so covered in papers...but Jen's not here to spread them out is he.
"I loathe running," Ashwin observes evenly. "I loathe hiding. I loathe that I don't see a way either of us will ever be able to lift our heads again, or use our names." And if this is better than Crom, or worse, then there's little hint of that in Ashwin's voice.
She exhales slowly, Roa's eyes still locked on the desk. Tracing the grains over and over again with her eyes. "The island," is all she says.
Maybe he thinks she means Ista, for a moment. Not for long. Ashwin's eyes come up from her hands to her face, resting on her profile for a moment in open disbelief. "No." His reply is flat. "We'll find another place."
"Think about it," Roa says to the desk. One hand comes up, and she begins ticking each point she makes on her fingers. "It's the only place there's protection from thread," Tick. "No one will find you. No one will even *think* to look there." Tick "As much as the stories would have all of them as slavering bloodthirsty beasts, there are women there. There are children there. There are thirty one dragons flying and fighting thread and they haven't lost a one." Tick tick tick. "There's a Reachian weyrwoman whose queen is going to have a clutch. It's safe. Or safer than anywhere else, at least." She hasn't yet chanced a glance upwards.
"There are other safe places." Perhaps Ashwin hasn't failed to give this question some thought. "Holdless caverns at Igen. Population changes there all the time. Every Hold's got places like that, even if they're not as big. We're not that distinctive."
"Your pictures will get circulated around. How do you plan to travel from one hidey hole to the next without getting spotted? How do you plan to eat? How do you intend to chart threadfall to make sure you don't get caught out in it?" Roa shakes her head slowly. "They won't find you in the west. You won't have to keep running."
He knows more about this than she. It has been his unpleasant duty from time to time to track down men whose pictures have been circulated, to hunt them out in the places where they would hide. It is that knowledge and experience which will win this argument for her, rather than her own words. "We'll run once, and that's all. We'll never come home."
And now her eyes snap up, seeking his. There is tension there. Something frantic, barely contained. "Yes. You will. I swear it."
It takes a moment before he's willing to meet her eyes, and there's little or nothing to be read in his quiet gaze when he does. "Don't cheapen your word by giving it on this."
"Don't think I can't do this. I *can* do this. I wouldn't suggest it, else." Roa's fingers have found one another in her lap and they press downward, heels of her palms grinding into her knees.
"You have no idea how you're going to do this," Ashwin disagrees quietly. "You're right. It's a shitty plan, but I have nothing else. Just be honest about what you're doing. Don't make it something it's not."
"I have some thoughts on where to begin," counters Roa, though the counter is, frankly, feeble. Thoughts on where to start? "A little bit of faith in me would be nice, Ash."
It would seem Ashwin thinks so too. "You have thoughts on where to begin." His reply is flat. "Try to understand if that doesn't comfort me." His gaze turns away, fixing on the wall. "Say goodbye to me. Don't hide from what it is."
"I'm not. I-" Eyes close. Snap open. There is a soft curse growled out, unidentifiable. "Fine. On this point we'll just have to disagree." Roa pushes the chair back, rising up into a stand. "There's a lot to do."
Ashwin watches her rise, eyes drawn over to her once more. "I've thought about parting," he observes so quietly, so evenly. "I didn't think of it happening like this."
"Can't say as I did either. Thought you'd just be going back to Tillek, or off to some hold with Jensen or just..." Just done with her. Just around. "It's not forever," Roa insists a final time.
"Yes, it is." Ashwin's own insistence is quiet, but sure. "I want your word. After a turn, I'm done hiding where you say. I want to know someone's going to come, give me the option of taking my chances here, at a Hold somewhere."
"Oh. So. What. I can manage to smuggle you out of a weyr. I can manage to get an image of the area and get you there. I can manage to bring you back in a turn. But unravel a puzzle? Faranth forbid *that* could be done?" The Telgari's brows are drawn down in confusion and sheer frustration. "Clarify for me, please, precisely what it is you think I'm incapable of managing?"
"If you can unravel this one, I wish you'd done it a long time ago." Ashwin doesn't rise to match her mood, bringing up one hand to massage the bridge of his nose. "A picture of a place in your head is one thing. This is another." Finally there's a flash of something in his eyes - frustration, perhaps. "The last thing you say to me is going to be that this will work. That it won't last."
Roa's arms come up to wrap slowly around herself. "Something else you'd prefer to hear, then?" she asks, her gaze finally settling more squarely on him. On his face.
"Like I said." Whatever that fleeting flash was in Ashwin's eyes, it's gone. "I'd prefer you called it what it is. Let me say goodbye to you without trying to wave my words away. This has been something. I want you to end it honestly."
"Stubborn," is the quiet assessment. "And not in a good way. Fine. We'll play it your way, and when I'm right I expect some shelling impressive apology happening." Roa takes a final step forward, around the desk, and extends a hand. As in, for a handshake. "Goodbye, then."
She's so good at drawing reactions from him. To this - her step forward, her extended hand, his mouth opens slightly, shock seeping into his face. Then, slowly, he shakes his head, both hands remaining just where they are. "No. Just go." The words are mumbled, face closing back over even as he turns his gaze away.
The extended hand moves to settle lightly on his shoulder and then, gently, to creep up his neck to get lost in his hair. "You *are* awful with women," Roa murmurs.
"Just you," he replies, just as soft, disavowing claims he made some time back. His face stays turned away, but his head tilts back into her touch a little.
She breathes out slowly, back bending, shoulders curving, to rest her cheek on the top of his head as her other arm lifts wrapping around him in half of a hug. "Sorry," Roa murmurs, "I'm told I'm oblique." A tiny smile that vanishes. "I'm not...hanging on by so much, just now. Don't make me take it seriously. I will, probably 'bout an hour from now. Can't do it yet."
He might press, and certainly he wants to, that much she must know from his attempts so far. Yet he's silent, and after a moment he reaches up to catch at her arms, to see if he can pull her down into his lap. The door is closed. Morley's outside. "I don't like oblique," he's murmuring, turning his head up to her. "Let me be direct." The goodbye will not be forced - or will not be voiced aloud. In this, as before, he bows to her wishes.
Of course he can pull her down. She practically flows with that little tug, was waiting for it, maybe. Roa's arms wrap around his neck, head tilted back, lips close to his. "Be direct, then," she whispers.
Silence from Ashwin - after watching her for months, it seems even the few days he's had to keep himself from her have been too many. He has no reply, for his lips are on hers, one foot bracing against the leg of the desk once more so he can keep her in place, one hand already going to gather up her skirt - the hem, as always, so disobligingly long.
* * * * Fade Out and Back In Again * * * *
She's spinning, hands squeezing and releasing as her body is caught, and she just clings to him even after there is nothing but tiny shivering aftershocks, and the colors behind her eyelids have faded and returned to something else, those nightmare images that are becoming so familiar. Her face, she finds, is buried in the crook of his neck, arms wrapped around him, legs clasped around his hips. She's shaking a little, but maybe he'll attribute it to something other than fear. Roa is quiet except for her uneven breathing. She can think of nothing to say that won't hurt.
No nightmares plague Ashwin - he is quiet, save for his own gasping breath, turning his head to press his face to her hair. It's nearly a minute before he speaks, and even then it's a false start. His second try is more successful; he lifts his head, pulling back enough that he can look at her face, his hand coming off the desk to catch at his pants where they threaten to slide off his hips. "You own me, Roa." He doesn't duck the words, does not glance away to shield himself or her from their impact. Simply looks at her face, still flushed, pupils still widened. "I don't know how that happened."
Her fingers come up to cup his face, to simply hold that eye contact as Roa swallows sharply. "It's an even trade, I guess," she murmurs as her thumb lightly traces his bottom lip, fuller from all that kissing. "I can't believe I-" but she stops, looks away, and just shakes her head. "I knew better. I could have fixed this, and I didn't and I knew better. And you're leaving." Her gaze moves back up, meeting his, perhaps hesitantly. "I love you. And you're leaving."
Ashwin is silent as she speaks, the only sound the clink of his belt buckle as he shifts his grip slightly to keep his pants where they belong. His other hand is still on her hip, keeping her close. If her words, and her gaze come hesitantly, his are quiet but steady, pale blue eyes waiting to meet hers. "Is that what this is?"
One of Roa's hands travels from his cheek to his forehead. To gently push pale hair away from his face. For a woman who uses her words, she needs very few, suddenly. "Yeh, Ash," is all she murmurs, "That's what this is."
Ashwin drops his head then, but it's not to avoid her gaze. Rather, it's so that he can close his eyes, leaning his forehead into her touch. He swallows, then nods, and then he's straightening up, hand unwinding from her hip and pulling her skirt back down a little way before it joins his other. Now his head is ducked because he's fastening his pants, cinching his belt shut, and addressing quiet words to the floor. "We could have chosen better, both of us."
As he begins to get himself in order, Roa looks to herself, silently readjusting bits and pieces of clothing that got pulled off or shoved around, settling her skirts more fully down around her legs. Her hair is drawn over her shoulder and she begins to rebraid it as she watches him. "What choices would you have made differently?" she asks, softly.
Ashwin is buttoning his shirt when she speaks, and still his gaze stays down, as though a man accustomed to dressing for a dawn patrol needs to keep an eye on his buttons so he can fasten them. But he breaks off his efforts, lifting his head to look over to her - tired, grave, but certain. "Not a single one." Simple as that.
Her brows draw down at this because...didn't he just say...? The little leather cord is picked up and used to tie off Roa's braid before it's coiled up and around and settled at the nape of her neck. "So, when you said we both could have chosen better, you just meant me?" There is bemusement in her tone. Tired. Weak. But there.
"No." Ashwin is unbothered by the apparent contradiction in his words, and his gaze goes down as he finishes off his buttons, tucking his shirt back in. "I could have chosen differently, chosen better. But I'd have chosen this anyway." He's very nearly offhand, as though what he says is no great thing.
A slow shake of Roa's head as she just continues to observe, still seated on the desk, feet dangling. It's easy to imagine, for a moment, that this is their room. He's dressing because they just woke up together. Everything is fine. "C'mere."
One hand comes up to swipe through Ashwin's hair - so shaggy now, but uncut, at her request - and he takes the couple of steps required to bring him over to stand before her, as silent and politely enquiring as he's ever been when working.
Roa only tips herself forward so that she can settle her cheek against Ashwin's chest and slowly wrap her arms around his waist. She stares off into the middle distance, saying nothing. Just...keeping him there for a little while.
It might be that he's relieved, that she has nothing to say. He simply exhales, and wraps both arms around her, tucking her in under his chin, eyes closed. What can he say, after all? His next words must be to send her away, and so he stays silent.
Her hands move along his lower back. Rubbing small circles half for him, half for her. She has frantic fingers, after all, and it's a comfort to put them to use. Roa doesn't say anything either. She can see a little too clearly the way the end of this road is creeping up on them. Her hour is up. It's hitting home.
But the hour ticks on regardless, and Ashwin allows her only so many minutes before he speaks, his voice sounding through his chest where her ear is pressed into it. "I need your word you won't go in to see the Captain. You can't, you'll see him when we go. You need to keep his..." A brief pause. What to call Penny? "The journeyman away from him as well."
There's a small shake of Roa’s head against his chest. "You have my word I won't visit him. Penny gets to have her goodbye. I won't budge on that. We'll work with you to time it if that's necessary, though."
"Name me one time you've been anything but trouble." Despite his words, Ashwin's growl is affectionate, almost amused. "Dinner tomorrow, then. I'll take the watch myself. I don't want the men involved in this."
"I don't know," Roa muses on a sigh. "I'm quite obliging when I'm naked. Or seated on desks, apparently." She still has not pulled back or removed her arms from around him. "Tomorrow at dinner. I'll get her there."
"Don't tempt me again," Ashwin mutters, and for a moment there's nothing wrong - he's teasing her, preparing to start something playful, squeezing her in against him. The next moment, he's beginning to unwrap his arms, ready to shift away. "Night after that's this party. I don't want to see you until then, understand?"
He's pulling away? No. Not good at all. Her arms tighten, fingers pressing harder against cloth and skin. But after a moment's protest her grip relents and Roa slowly straightens, eyes downcast. At that sharp request there's only a faint wince before she nods. "I'll get supplies together. Figure out a reason why I won't be at the party. We'll wait until it's late enough that drinks have been around a few times. Tia and I will be waiting in the dragon baths."
"Right." Is there an elegant way to do this? A gentle way to say their farewells, after the words that have passed between them? If so, it eludes Ashwin, for he simply nods. "Night after tomorrow, then." Her will is that he not press the word 'goodbye' on her, and he does not - left silent, in its absence.
Another nod. "Night after t-" but Roa's voice cracks and she looks sharply away, blinking rapidly and swallowing considerably. "And dinner," she murmurs finally, sliding off the desk and doing a final resettling of her clothes. "Don't forget."
"Right." That one word is Ashwin's only agreement, delivered with a quick nod. And suddenly, he's almost keen for her to be gone, backing up another step, and clearing his throat - her tears, perhaps, or maybe he simply has no more words yet, having exhausted them all. He's as stoic, as blank-faced as he's ever been.
There's one final glance, more stolen than anything. Eyes flicking up, over to him, before they slide away and to the exit. Roa's fingers sweep over the top of her head, smoothing wayward wisps flat, and she's walking towards the door, hand wrapping around the handle, opening it.
Ashwin is quite still as she leaves. It's only as the door begins to pull closed behind her that he gulps a deep breath, and then another, steadying himself against a surrender that he refuses to allow. This lasts all of ten second before he's backing up, and sinking down onto the edge of his Captain's bed, to lean forward and bury his face in his hands.