[ Alayne is still peering when Chuck asks, her eyes darting sideways in his direction as her chin remains craned. She wears an expression that says perhaps she should not have spoken, if only because RIGs were a thing of science and Alayne's understanding of such matters was poor, bordering on simple. The last thing she wanted was to look stupid in front of Ranger Hansen.
No doubt Isaac would explain it better. ]
There's a light that glows from Isaac's back. Its color changes as his health waxes and wanes. [ She recites the words as they were taught to her; tenets that bare the simplicity of a child's nursery rhyme. ] Blue is best, green is go. Yellow is caution. Red, you must take slow. [ Alayne's lips press together at the mention of red. She'd seen it only just the once and never wished to see it again. ]
Engineer Clarke is a very clever man. He could assist you with your suit, if it please you.
[ it isn't that he thinks her stupid, despite the myriad ways his expression could be interpreted. it's not a concept he's ever heard of before, not for field work. loccent had always been there- tracking his vitals, counting out damage. everything else- everything else had been shared with his copilot.
the thought cuts his gaze away from the girl and her pursed lips, drawn brows. the beat is all he needs, space enough for chuck to draw a breath- push everything else out and down and away. he filters through more than half of what the girl says because it's full of niceties no one really needs, maybe chuck himself least of all. if it please you, yeah, like there's been much time for any of that. there's a frown tucked into the corner of his mouth, directed at nothing. ]
[ He looks away and Alayne draws back, taking the opportunity to survey his suit a little more clearly. It resembles Isaac's less and less the longer she studies it, reminding her instead of the Master Chief's. (Isaac was an engineer, he built things, while Master Chief was a soldier; did the difference in suits lie therein?)
Maintaining a respectable distance, Alayne extends a hand to her side, only for the space under it to be soon occupied by the broad shoulders of her direwolf. Plunking down on her haunches Lady licks her jaws and blinks at the ranger, as polite and demure as her mistress though much less subtle with her curiosity. ]
He keeps me from harm. Surely a man who wears such armor would be familiar with the concept, [ she says, her voice prickling slightly. ] You must protect something.
[ Alayne lifts her eyebrows. ] Or do you care for only yourself?
[ chuck doesn't have anything to prove. not to some slip of a girl, not to anyone. there's a certain brand of finality that comes in finishing up a suicide mission and waking up on the other side of christ knows where. she's giving it a good run, needling at whatever she wants to pry out of him. but chuck isn't a goddamn hero and never has been. if she's looking for some declaration of nobility, if she's looking for a good man buried beneath the armor, she'll have to look somewhere else.
you are your father's son sometimes, he's not so sure. ]
[ In the end, he needn't be a good man. If Littlefinger had taught Alayne anything it was that the very worst men often proved the most useful. Bad men were often driven by changeable things, things like appetite and ambition. Learn how to move these desires and then men followed (whether eagerly or angrily didn't matter, so long as they went the direction they were needed).
Still, Alayne always wishes to find good men. Sometimes they make her feel as though Sansa hadn't been half as stupid as she thought she was; sometimes they fill her with something resembling hope. Good men didn't require wheedling, so good men didn't need as many lies.
But, she reasons, there will always be lies. Always better to arm yourself than be caught unawares again.
He tells her to lead the way. Alayne tilts her head to one side, eyes narrowing ever so slightly as she declares: ]
[ it leaves his brows arching, that's for damn sure. chuck has no talent for navigating the subtleties of polite conversation. for learning the ins and outs in ones interactions with others- the ones that can't be dealt in fists and traded in blows. it isn't a skill he's had much use for and one he hadn't entertained the idea of cultivating- but growing up in the shadows he had, he knows it when he sees it. it feels like politics. pieces lining up just so.
chuck remembers his old man coming back that night, telling him to expect the decommission. there's always been a difference between the men who make the calls and the men who hold the line, and maybe that distinction lies in longevity, but the way chuck had seen in- there weren't a hell of a lot of them that were ever going to make it out of the war alive.
no, she says. and he knows that the right answer is caving in. he knows what he needs to say to move on with the damn thing. but chuck isn't in the habit of jumping at just anybody's say so. ]
Fine.
[ it's punctuated by the tuck of fabric against his side and a shift in his posture.
fine. fine.
chuck turns his back on her and heads back into the hall. he'll manage well enough on his own. always has. ]
[ If there is something Alayne wants to say, she keeps it tucked underneath her tongue as she bites down on the tip, teeth sinking into willful, sympathetic meat that would readily apologize rather than see his back turned to her. Was that what he wanted — for her to be contrite or weepy? For her to fold her hands and no longer be willful or did he want her to fight? Alayne had assumed the later but perhaps she'd been wrong and now she'd never know the answer. Part of her prickles at that fact, niggles with frustrated irritation at both him and her, but another part feels simply sad. (She had prayed for the Hound even though he'd been cruel to her, even though he seemed to take joy in telling her the most horrible things. If given the choice, would she pray for Ranger Hansen?
Alayne doesn't know.)
Fine, he says, and she watches him go, her hands curled in the fabric of her skirt as her pride roots her to the spot and stills her into silence. Lady, however, does not prove as obedient and instead pads forward to his side, looking up at him with her large golden eyes, wounded where her mistress refuses to be as the both of them continue down the hall away from Alayne.
She whimpers once, questioningly at him. (Lady would always express what Alayne would not; the direwolf was more part of her than anyone knew.) ]
[ being followed isn't a sensation like any other. it can't be confused for anything in the world, and while it doesn't raise the hair on the back of his neck, it does prickle at his awareness all the same. to chuck's credit, he carries on a good way down the hall with only the vaguest destination in mind, before he glances back. where he'd half expected to find the girl skipping through her skirts at his back- he finds only the wolf. staring up at him. offering up a whine.
chuck isn't angry, there's nothing to be angry about. but he's not a man who speaks easily about personal heroism. it was one thing to be a damn good pilot, to jockey with the best jaeger the world had ever seen. but where the words go after that, he isn't sure. dying to save the world or blowing himself up for a girl he grew up with and a guy that isn't his friend- they aren't things he has a space for in his head. it's a vast and incomprehensible tangle locked up around who am i and what do i do now.
his gaze lands on the wolf's face, gait slows, and he nods in alayne's direction. the words are low. ]
[ Even from her distant vantage down the hall, Alayne can hear the low whisper of Ranger Hansen's shushing as Lady continues to follow after him, her ears pinned back now in a look of canine contrition. Rather than obey (she can be as willful as her mistress sometimes) Lady resumes a tiny circuit around Chuck, padding not one but two tight circles around him before turning to the spot immediately by his side, the ripple of her back threatening to brush against this elbow.
Again a curious sound, one that refuses being waved off. Alayne, for her part, doesn't call Lady back straight away, instead watching the interaction play out between man and wolf. ]
She's fond of you, [ she calls from a distance, her hands still curled in the fabric of her skirt. ] Though I haven't the slightest idea why. [ The irony of the situation — that when she speaks for Lady, she speaks for them both — isn't lost on her. If anything, Alayne is hyperaware of it and it makes her cautious, wary of him. (To be fond is a strength when it is reciprocated but on its own, it is nothing but folly.) ]
[ the thought rolls over in his mouth, as much as chuck is prone to consideration at all- much less consideration that comes before opening his mouth. having max around was easy. dogs look for leadership and direction, not good people. chuck doesn't need to be kinder or gentler or anything but exactly what he is for max to come padding after him. that the wolf follows his paces, moves in her circles around his legs, keeps their proximity tight- is equal parts familiar and unexpected.
his reply is largely for the animal herself, and not the mistress who speaks on her behalf. chuck's gaze doesn't lift. he watches the fold of her ears and the steady line of her body. ]
Give it a week.
[ it isn't wholly self-deprecation so much as it is wry observation. knowledge gleaned from experience. chuck doesn't keep company and equally- company doesn't keep him. ]
[ Lady makes a noise in response, almost as if she's understood what Chuck has just said and she means to offer protest. But rather than open her mouth to speak she blinks, then blinks again. Then narrows her eyes as she opens her mouth to give a wide and gaping yawn, her tongue curling as she shows her teeth only to have them snap shut a moment later.
Bumping her head against his hand she makes one more vie for his attention. Alayne, still at a distance, remains quiet. So much could happen here in a week (they could die, find themselves somewhere else, be set against one another as enemies or end up huddling together out of necessity against a blistering cold) but that's commentary she keeps to herself. Ranger Hansen was new here; he would learn in time.
Unappeased, Lady snuffles at the ranger and then flicks her tail at him before tracing one last circle around him. But instead of coming back round to his side she breaks off again, towards Alayne. Rather than call her by name, she whistles once to the direwolf — a few notes like the refrain of a lullaby. ]
[ his eyes roll, and it's as much token protest as it is a dry resignation. the unuttered christ why am i even that comes in the moment before he does exactly what he'd intended to avoid. chuck doesn't look back at alayne, as if that somehow makes the entire situation more bearable- but he follows after lady all the same. gait steady and unhurried as his boots hit the ground.
if there's some greater unraveling in his mind about the act, about what it means, or even that he acknowledges that in it's own way- this too is a decision- chuck's expression betrays nothing. ]
[ She doesn't expect him to follow but when he does Alayne has to quell the tiny rush of giddiness that follows. It has nothing to do with her, she suspects (his attention is with Lady, though that may remain pretense) but there will always be something ineffably satisfying in seeing someone move in the direction she desires.
For most people this would be about power, about influence and control and manipulation; but for Alayne it's more about safety than anything else. A man she can move is a man she understands, and a man she understands becomes less of a threat. As young as she is, she's grown tired of living every day balanced on the knife's edge of uncertainty and the more she knew of the people around her, the more she could predict the tides of their moods and the foundations of their desires.
Ranger Hansen still remains grossly unknown to her, a fact that she thinks will be a long time coming to change, but there is something, — some pull — to be found in Lady.
Perhaps he is a wolf, she finds herself thinking. Then: but what of his pack?
Lady returns to Alayne's side and plops herself down, watching the ranger with eyes (more adoring now; she likes him). Alayne looks down at the wolf and only at length acknowledges Ranger Hansen's presence yet again. She resumes their previous conversation almost as if the last few minutes hadn't even happened. ]
Isaac keeps the odd tool, if they are needed. And he is very resourceful besides.
[ for whatever irritation that had passed between them before- whatever tension might remain after a conversation more squabbling than true argument- chuck finds that there is no expectation he returns to. there's nothing held over his head- aggravation, sympathy, explanation or otherwise.
it makes it easier. to fall into step with the girl.
she carries on as if no interruption has occurred, and chuck finds himself abruptly with a result he recognizes. there are those that take the punch, those who dodge, those who return it- and those that sigh heavily through their nose and look the opposite direction. it isn't that he has a particular preference, because to do that, chuck would need to know himself. there are some questions he's never asked, and he doesn't intend to start now. ]
He's an engineer, [ she says, a little (but not all) of her usual primness evident in her voice. Alayne declares this the way he might say I'm a ranger, as if she fully understood what "engineering" consisted of. As far as she could tell it required cleverness and a nimbleness of both hand and mind. She's spent hours (days, nights) in his company, watching him sketch things from his dreams and from his world. Machines, things made of metal (and darker things, too, drawings he hides from Alayne but which she knows exist, having seen him through his share of nightmares).
This time she does not wait on him to turn on her heel and continue back down the hall in the direction that she'd come. Lady lags behind, attentive to Ranger Hansen, nudging his hand once with her snout before trotting off in Alayne's wake. It isn't far because the dorms aren't very large and the wings themselves do not stretch and stretch; the stairs that separate the floors are not steep. ]
[ chuck keeps his silence for every step they take. it isn't locked away like a jealous lover, or stuffed into a drawer like old photographs- but his mouth doesn't twitch and his expression doesn't flicker. chuck shares no likenesses perhaps because he offers none in return. it's the kind of thing one might seek out in others- a sense of belonging, or a lack of aloneness. to be a jaeger pilot means that he will exist perpetually between these two extremes, and there's a quiet understanding of this fact that pours into his bones until it takes root. until it becomes commitment. until it's all he is outside the corps and all he is outside of striker.
all he is outside the drift.
alayne leads the way and her wolf goes on ahead, but chuck says nothing. it is as much a dry resignation as it is a child's petulant (meaningless) protest. ]
[ Alayne knows the way by heart and can find Isaac Clarke's room blind, if need be. There are times when she visits late at night when the lights in the hallways flicker and burn out and there is nothing left to do but feel around in the dark. Luckily there is none of that needed today, with Lady trotting ahead easily and Alayne following with Ranger Hansen pulling up the rear.
Somewhere along the way as they climb the stairs to the third floor she pulls out her watch from her dress and sends him fair warning that they're to arrive soon. When they finally reach the door in question Alayne stands infront it but then fails to knock. Turning on her heel she meets Ranger Hansen's gaze, leveling him evenly with a simple declaration. ]
Engineer Clarke has agreed to this turn of favor. Please do not ruin it with your— [ You-ness. ] —barking.
[ And then before he can so much as respond, Alayne has turned again and is knocking briskly upon Isaac's door. Once, twice, in a careful rhythm — one he'd recognize as specifically her. ]
[ he's sketching in a notebook when he gets the text from alayne. a warning of sorts. they'll be here soon, she says, which gives him enough time to set out a few tools (what he thinks he might need and perhaps some precautions otherwise). he has a vague idea as to what alayne requires his assistance for, so his tools are lined on one of the small desks they've been given.
the knock comes, thankfully, expected, bringing him to slip out of his room slowly at first.
when he meets them at the door, he greets alayne first with a nod and then lady with a careful ruffle between her ears that turns into a gently scratching just along her jaw. turning his attention to chuck is the last thing he does, observing him briefly from top to bottom and stepping to the side of the door to let them in. ]
[ his mouth is open even as her knuckles come to the door, and whatever it is that keeps the words in his mouth is a matter of opinion. he's certainly never been afraid to speak his mind, despite the content or the audience. that he's formed some fragile rapport with a girl who is barely more than that, a girl, that nearly the entirety of their conversations are bickering- doesn't occur to him. she tells him to mind his manners and chuck wants to bark back that this is her stupid idea- that she' the one checking on him. turning up with clothes and questions- herding him around the city like he's some adopted charge.
but the door comes open all the same and the moment is lost.
the man standing there is as much what he expected as he isn't- though this is owed largely to chuck's absolute lack thereof. there's a guarded gratitude in his expression, because there has to be something when he's wearing the guy's clothes- but verbal extensions don't appear forthcoming. lady's tail bats against chuck's knee, and he doesn't look down. ranger hansen. it's the first time in what feels like an age that anyone's said it with that kind of inflection. his spine straightens on reflex, and the dip of his chin is fractional- but present nonetheless. ]
[ Isaac opens the door and, without truly meaning to, Alayne lights up the way a room fills with light the moment a switch is thrown or a candle is lit. Lady takes to the man immediately (much like as with Chuck only warmer), that bat bat bat against Chuck's leg only intensifying before she breaks from her mistresses side completely and pads into the small suite of rooms as if she truly belonged there.
Alayne does not hesitate to follow after, though she pauses long enough to return Isaac's nod with a tiny curtsey of her own. This looks and feels, on her part, almost perfunctory in the way her gaze lowers not out of modesty but amusement, some unspoken exchange passing briefly between her and Isaac before she too brushes past, her hand very briefly touching his elbow as she does so. There is an air about her now that is decidedly different than when it had simply been her and Ranger Hansen. She seems young, not in naive way, but in a way that is self-aware and almost mischevious; a mix of don't be cross with me and look what I've found and he's awful, just wait and see. The transition between one version of Alayne and the next is practically seamless, a deft trading of temperaments. If Chuck is a dog whose bark she must suffer, Isaac is like a modest star whose sunlight she's eager to drink.
She moves about the room with easy familiarity, pausing at his table to study the tools he's laid out, a hand touching his notebook. ] Four hands, Isaac? [ she asks.
[ the question is clear and isaac glances down with a little laugh before he gestures for chuck to follow. it's easy to learn to read someone after time spent in close quarters. he looks down at the tools briefly before nodding at her. ]
Four.
[ he says it with a wave of his fingers, thumb tucked against his palm as he looks at chuck with a slight uptick in his lips. she'd been helpful in prying off his own armor, hands small and deft. no doubt she'd be of use again. looking over chuck once more, he eyes the suit carefully while approaching. there's an ease to his steps as he takes a few steps around him. there's a sense of curiosity that sometimes likes to overtake him. technology doesn't exactly waltz right through the door every day here. ]
You mind if I get a closer look?
[ to touch. he asks it out of courtesy--met with none on occasion. but there's a part in the back, he can see it nestled straight down the middle, that might make for a good starting point; bolted in to various plates that come around. ]
[ they move around each other comfortably. chuck doesn't have a wealth of experience with being the third wheel, with being the any wheel if he's going to try and nail it down. the only real connection he had with a human being extended to his old man- and they sure as hell aren't friends. the only familiarity chuck's ever known has come from the absolutes of throwing himself into someone else's head, of someone else into his own so deep that he could get lost in the spaces where he stopped existing.
he's distantly aware that friendships sometimes bear responsibility for this kind of thing- but it isn't something he wants to think about.
it leaves chuck watching on with a shuttered sort of awareness, and nodding when he's directly asked after. he isn't wary, and he sure as hell isn't afraid- but it's clear that he's at something of a loss all the same. his drivesuit is special- for what it does and what it means. while not necessarily a man who placed particular importance on sentimentality, it's- a stretch all it's own that he's here. allowing someone else to get their hands on it. to take him apart. ]
Poly-carbonate on top. [ chuck steps in and moves into a semi-circle. it frees up just enough of his would be spinal cord for a good look without turning his back entirely. ] 'Ers a circuitry suit underneath.
[ Alayne knows that she is, for the most part, no longer needed here. Like the tools that Isaac has left out in tidy rows on his table, she would play the part of instrument for him — narrow wrists and small hands but clever fingers at his beck and call. While being willfully wielded often held darker connotations for Alayne, she understands that Isaac is an exception. She could brandish him just as readily against her enemies (arguably with more ease and even fewer qualms) and in that reciprocation of vulnerability and control there was a kind of comfort, one born of understanding and shorn up by mutual care and adoration.
Tilting her head, she studies the unfamiliar planes of Ranger Hansen's suit as he turns. The light coming from the window catches the metal vertebrae of the clamp along his spine and she glances sideways at Isaac (to where the muted cyan glow of his RIG is visible from the nape of his neck all the way down his back). ]
Is it like a RIG? [ she asks Isaac, though the way her brow pinches suggests she doesn't think so. ] There is no light.
[ isaac keeps to his side, tipping his head to get a look at the line running the length of his back. there is no light. ] No... [ he reaches out carefully and settles a hand on one of chuck's shoulder's the pauldron nicked a little, but no worse for the wear. it's seen some shit, he surmises, as most suits do. glancing at the coloring, the markings, the logo on the shoulder, his brows furrow thoughtfully.
there are more of you. but he'll broach it later. ]
No, it's not.
[ this suit looks too cumbersome to walk around in. it's built for more than that. isaac has seen all kinds of suits in his day and age. his own is for extreme combat--the kind where the crowds are rough, the atmosphere is thin. he's seen vintage astronaut suits dating back to who knows when (maybe early 22nd century). soldier suits like carver's--large and menacing, frightening to look at through a civilian lense.
[ the nuances aren't his to know. he gets alayne. her apparent fascination with men in uncommon uniforms and collection of would-be protectors. guardians. he can make sense of that. but clarke touches his shoulder (a point of contact he can barely feel at all) and chuck tracks the movement of his features and the sweep of his gaze like he's working towards some kind of calculation.
alayne he gets. clarke- he hasn't got a number for.
he's got next to no reason to mix himself up in this, beyond what he can only assume is an extension of his role with the girl. chuck has a set of the man's clothes for christsake. but there's a bearing to his weight that feels familiar. the way technicians had moved around him in a team- assessing, learning- welding him together. it's in the flicker of his eyes. where they move to his designation, his markings, the notches of his mechanical joints. the line of chuck's shoulders doesn't soften- but it does ease.
his face moves- leaves the engineer to the purview (an extension of trust if there ever was one) to turn themselves to the line of tools. ]
Spine's last. Syncs up t'the circuitry. Plates go on quick, chest an'back usually one guy after the other. You'll need a rachet.
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» action.
No doubt Isaac would explain it better. ]
There's a light that glows from Isaac's back. Its color changes as his health waxes and wanes. [ She recites the words as they were taught to her; tenets that bare the simplicity of a child's nursery rhyme. ] Blue is best, green is go. Yellow is caution. Red, you must take slow. [ Alayne's lips press together at the mention of red. She'd seen it only just the once and never wished to see it again. ]
Engineer Clarke is a very clever man. He could assist you with your suit, if it please you.
» action.
the thought cuts his gaze away from the girl and her pursed lips, drawn brows. the beat is all he needs, space enough for chuck to draw a breath- push everything else out and down and away. he filters through more than half of what the girl says because it's full of niceties no one really needs, maybe chuck himself least of all. if it please you, yeah, like there's been much time for any of that. there's a frown tucked into the corner of his mouth, directed at nothing. ]
Your guardian?
» action.
Maintaining a respectable distance, Alayne extends a hand to her side, only for the space under it to be soon occupied by the broad shoulders of her direwolf. Plunking down on her haunches Lady licks her jaws and blinks at the ranger, as polite and demure as her mistress though much less subtle with her curiosity. ]
He keeps me from harm. Surely a man who wears such armor would be familiar with the concept, [ she says, her voice prickling slightly. ] You must protect something.
[ Alayne lifts her eyebrows. ] Or do you care for only yourself?
» action.
you are your father's son
sometimes, he's not so sure. ]
Lead the way.
» action.
Still, Alayne always wishes to find good men. Sometimes they make her feel as though Sansa hadn't been half as stupid as she thought she was; sometimes they fill her with something resembling hope. Good men didn't require wheedling, so good men didn't need as many lies.
But, she reasons, there will always be lies. Always better to arm yourself than be caught unawares again.
He tells her to lead the way. Alayne tilts her head to one side, eyes narrowing ever so slightly as she declares: ]
No.
» action.
chuck remembers his old man coming back that night, telling him to expect the decommission. there's always been a difference between the men who make the calls and the men who hold the line, and maybe that distinction lies in longevity, but the way chuck had seen in- there weren't a hell of a lot of them that were ever going to make it out of the war alive.
no, she says. and he knows that the right answer is caving in. he knows what he needs to say to move on with the damn thing. but chuck isn't in the habit of jumping at just anybody's say so. ]
Fine.
[ it's punctuated by the tuck of fabric against his side and a shift in his posture.
fine.
fine.
chuck turns his back on her and heads back into the hall. he'll manage well enough on his own. always has. ]
» action.
Alayne doesn't know.)
Fine, he says, and she watches him go, her hands curled in the fabric of her skirt as her pride roots her to the spot and stills her into silence. Lady, however, does not prove as obedient and instead pads forward to his side, looking up at him with her large golden eyes, wounded where her mistress refuses to be as the both of them continue down the hall away from Alayne.
She whimpers once, questioningly at him. (Lady would always express what Alayne would not; the direwolf was more part of her than anyone knew.) ]
» action.
chuck isn't angry, there's nothing to be angry about. but he's not a man who speaks easily about personal heroism. it was one thing to be a damn good pilot, to jockey with the best jaeger the world had ever seen. but where the words go after that, he isn't sure. dying to save the world or blowing himself up for a girl he grew up with and a guy that isn't his friend- they aren't things he has a space for in his head. it's a vast and incomprehensible tangle locked up around who am i and what do i do now.
his gaze lands on the wolf's face, gait slows, and he nods in alayne's direction.
the words are low. ]
Shh. Go on.
» action.
Again a curious sound, one that refuses being waved off. Alayne, for her part, doesn't call Lady back straight away, instead watching the interaction play out between man and wolf. ]
She's fond of you, [ she calls from a distance, her hands still curled in the fabric of her skirt. ] Though I haven't the slightest idea why. [ The irony of the situation — that when she speaks for Lady, she speaks for them both — isn't lost on her. If anything, Alayne is hyperaware of it and it makes her cautious, wary of him. (To be fond is a strength when it is reciprocated but on its own, it is nothing but folly.) ]
» action.
his reply is largely for the animal herself, and not the mistress who speaks on her behalf. chuck's gaze doesn't lift. he watches the fold of her ears and the steady line of her body. ]
Give it a week.
[ it isn't wholly self-deprecation so much as it is wry observation. knowledge gleaned from experience. chuck doesn't keep company and equally- company doesn't keep him. ]
» action.
Bumping her head against his hand she makes one more vie for his attention. Alayne, still at a distance, remains quiet. So much could happen here in a week (they could die, find themselves somewhere else, be set against one another as enemies or end up huddling together out of necessity against a blistering cold) but that's commentary she keeps to herself. Ranger Hansen was new here; he would learn in time.
Unappeased, Lady snuffles at the ranger and then flicks her tail at him before tracing one last circle around him. But instead of coming back round to his side she breaks off again, towards Alayne. Rather than call her by name, she whistles once to the direwolf — a few notes like the refrain of a lullaby. ]
» action.
if there's some greater unraveling in his mind about the act, about what it means, or even that he acknowledges that in it's own way- this too is a decision- chuck's expression betrays nothing. ]
» action.
For most people this would be about power, about influence and control and manipulation; but for Alayne it's more about safety than anything else. A man she can move is a man she understands, and a man she understands becomes less of a threat. As young as she is, she's grown tired of living every day balanced on the knife's edge of uncertainty and the more she knew of the people around her, the more she could predict the tides of their moods and the foundations of their desires.
Ranger Hansen still remains grossly unknown to her, a fact that she thinks will be a long time coming to change, but there is something, — some pull — to be found in Lady.
Perhaps he is a wolf, she finds herself thinking. Then: but what of his pack?
Lady returns to Alayne's side and plops herself down, watching the ranger with eyes (more adoring now; she likes him). Alayne looks down at the wolf and only at length acknowledges Ranger Hansen's presence yet again. She resumes their previous conversation almost as if the last few minutes hadn't even happened. ]
Isaac keeps the odd tool, if they are needed. And he is very resourceful besides.
» action.
[ for whatever irritation that had passed between them before- whatever tension might remain after a conversation more squabbling than true argument- chuck finds that there is no expectation he returns to. there's nothing held over his head- aggravation, sympathy, explanation or otherwise.
it makes it easier. to fall into step with the girl.
she carries on as if no interruption has occurred, and chuck finds himself abruptly with a result he recognizes. there are those that take the punch, those who dodge, those who return it- and those that sigh heavily through their nose and look the opposite direction. it isn't that he has a particular preference, because to do that, chuck would need to know himself. there are some questions he's never asked, and he doesn't intend to start now. ]
» action.
This time she does not wait on him to turn on her heel and continue back down the hall in the direction that she'd come. Lady lags behind, attentive to Ranger Hansen, nudging his hand once with her snout before trotting off in Alayne's wake. It isn't far because the dorms aren't very large and the wings themselves do not stretch and stretch; the stairs that separate the floors are not steep. ]
» action.
all he is outside the drift.
alayne leads the way and her wolf goes on ahead, but chuck says nothing. it is as much a dry resignation as it is a child's petulant (meaningless) protest. ]
» action | isaac » chuck » alayne
Somewhere along the way as they climb the stairs to the third floor she pulls out her watch from her dress and sends him fair warning that they're to arrive soon. When they finally reach the door in question Alayne stands infront it but then fails to knock. Turning on her heel she meets Ranger Hansen's gaze, leveling him evenly with a simple declaration. ]
Engineer Clarke has agreed to this turn of favor. Please do not ruin it with your— [ You-ness. ] —barking.
[ And then before he can so much as respond, Alayne has turned again and is knocking briskly upon Isaac's door. Once, twice, in a careful rhythm — one he'd recognize as specifically her. ]
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the knock comes, thankfully, expected, bringing him to slip out of his room slowly at first.
when he meets them at the door, he greets alayne first with a nod and then lady with a careful ruffle between her ears that turns into a gently scratching just along her jaw. turning his attention to chuck is the last thing he does, observing him briefly from top to bottom and stepping to the side of the door to let them in. ]
Ranger Hansen, right?
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but the door comes open all the same and the moment is lost.
the man standing there is as much what he expected as he isn't- though this is owed largely to chuck's absolute lack thereof. there's a guarded gratitude in his expression, because there has to be something when he's wearing the guy's clothes- but verbal extensions don't appear forthcoming. lady's tail bats against chuck's knee, and he doesn't look down. ranger hansen. it's the first time in what feels like an age that anyone's said it with that kind of inflection. his spine straightens on reflex, and the dip of his chin is fractional- but present nonetheless. ]
Mister Clarke.
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Alayne does not hesitate to follow after, though she pauses long enough to return Isaac's nod with a tiny curtsey of her own. This looks and feels, on her part, almost perfunctory in the way her gaze lowers not out of modesty but amusement, some unspoken exchange passing briefly between her and Isaac before she too brushes past, her hand very briefly touching his elbow as she does so. There is an air about her now that is decidedly different than when it had simply been her and Ranger Hansen. She seems young, not in naive way, but in a way that is self-aware and almost mischevious; a mix of don't be cross with me and look what I've found and he's awful, just wait and see. The transition between one version of Alayne and the next is practically seamless, a deft trading of temperaments. If Chuck is a dog whose bark she must suffer, Isaac is like a modest star whose sunlight she's eager to drink.
She moves about the room with easy familiarity, pausing at his table to study the tools he's laid out, a hand touching his notebook. ] Four hands, Isaac? [ she asks.
(Do you need my help?) ] Or simply two?
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Four.
[ he says it with a wave of his fingers, thumb tucked against his palm as he looks at chuck with a slight uptick in his lips. she'd been helpful in prying off his own armor, hands small and deft. no doubt she'd be of use again. looking over chuck once more, he eyes the suit carefully while approaching. there's an ease to his steps as he takes a few steps around him. there's a sense of curiosity that sometimes likes to overtake him. technology doesn't exactly waltz right through the door every day here. ]
You mind if I get a closer look?
[ to touch. he asks it out of courtesy--met with none on occasion. but there's a part in the back, he can see it nestled straight down the middle, that might make for a good starting point; bolted in to various plates that come around. ]
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he's distantly aware that friendships sometimes bear responsibility for this kind of thing- but it isn't something he wants to think about.
it leaves chuck watching on with a shuttered sort of awareness, and nodding when he's directly asked after. he isn't wary, and he sure as hell isn't afraid- but it's clear that he's at something of a loss all the same. his drivesuit is special- for what it does and what it means. while not necessarily a man who placed particular importance on sentimentality, it's- a stretch all it's own that he's here. allowing someone else to get their hands on it. to take him apart. ]
Poly-carbonate on top. [ chuck steps in and moves into a semi-circle. it frees up just enough of his would be spinal cord for a good look without turning his back entirely. ] 'Ers a circuitry suit underneath.
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Tilting her head, she studies the unfamiliar planes of Ranger Hansen's suit as he turns. The light coming from the window catches the metal vertebrae of the clamp along his spine and she glances sideways at Isaac (to where the muted cyan glow of his RIG is visible from the nape of his neck all the way down his back). ]
Is it like a RIG? [ she asks Isaac, though the way her brow pinches suggests she doesn't think so. ] There is no light.
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there are more of you. but he'll broach it later. ]
No, it's not.
[ this suit looks too cumbersome to walk around in. it's built for more than that. isaac has seen all kinds of suits in his day and age. his own is for extreme combat--the kind where the crowds are rough, the atmosphere is thin. he's seen vintage astronaut suits dating back to who knows when (maybe early 22nd century). soldier suits like carver's--large and menacing, frightening to look at through a civilian lense.
no this is a suit for a suit.
and a circuitry suit beneath. ]
You know what part goes in last?
[ we'll start there. ]
Figure since it's yours.
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alayne he gets.
clarke- he hasn't got a number for.
he's got next to no reason to mix himself up in this, beyond what he can only assume is an extension of his role with the girl. chuck has a set of the man's clothes for christsake. but there's a bearing to his weight that feels familiar. the way technicians had moved around him in a team- assessing, learning- welding him together. it's in the flicker of his eyes. where they move to his designation, his markings, the notches of his mechanical joints. the line of chuck's shoulders doesn't soften- but it does ease.
his face moves- leaves the engineer to the purview (an extension of trust if there ever was one) to turn themselves to the line of tools. ]
Spine's last. Syncs up t'the circuitry. Plates go on quick, chest an'back usually one guy after the other. You'll need a rachet.
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