Aedhai. (Temple.)

[mirror_brightly]

The bite of the field, the curling snap of it, faded away with the red hot twist of nails on glass. It clawed through air and slid across his skull as it parted, flashed off and fell into distal silence

Comments

[first_noel]

It hadn't taken as long as she'd thought it might to work through the red tape of the Vulcan bureaucracy and get permission to visit the prisoners. Helen showed the guards her credentials, agreed to their safety precautions, and was soon standing in front of the cell.

Nero was hunched against the wall, staring at nothing, but Ayel saw her, didn't get up but tracked her with his eyes as she approached.

"Hello, Nero," she said, and nodded. "Ayel."

The robot child was sitting just outside the cell. Helen looked at her, but she was unmoving, unresponsive. She turned her attention back to the Romulans.

[loyalty_ever]

There was...actual sweat prickling on the nape of his neck. From the heat.

It itched ferociously in hair he shouldn't even have.

He blinked back at her.

"What?"

He wasn't going to obstruct their work, wasn't going to tangle up the pledge she'd made with Nero.

He didn't have to be nice about it.

[mirror_brightly]

Her greeting seemed strange here. Why the name felt odd, he couldn't say. Everything was too similar and not similar enough, it burned and chilled in waves. Ayel bristled at her, snapped with talons and clicking warnings. There was some safety in that.

"What?" His question was far more gentle, hovered in the air with the slow churning of sea breeze. He could taste the salt, even if the field around the scored it.

"What do you want?"

[first_noel]

Ayel was trying to intimidate her. It wouldn't work.

She nodded her greeting at him, turned back to Nero at his question.

"I wanted to see how you were doing," she said. "The trial starts the day after tomorrow."

She didn't know how much they'd been told, but they deserved to know whatever she could tell them.