bakerstreet | ( picture prompt meme )

It was bad form to spy on a friend. And doubly so when that friend was, perhaps, the only other person in the world. But old habits died hard. And so did Ariadne's continual concerns for Agent's sanity.

Fae was hard.

Harder still, no doubt, when you hadn't grown up hearing stories about it.

Over the past few months--well, she wasn't really sure if it was weeks or months, since time always sort of bled in Fae--she'd watched him struggle, both to adapt and deny much of his experiences at the same time. It was a bit like someone had once explained death to her. Phases of emotions flowed from one to the other. Only she could never really predict what was going to come next.

All to say, there were days when she watched him. Sometimes, it was up close, with conversation and little gifts. Other days--days like today--it was more from a distance.

Like, from a rocky shoal.

She'd seen Agent heading out west of the butte and followed from a distance, tracking his progress toward the beach. There were two in Fae, one with acidic green waters and another with darker, safer waters. And thank the gods, he'd headed to the safe one. She didn't really know what he was doing, but after following from behind, she decided to run down to the far end of the shore and swim out to the shoal. It was arranged a bit like a crown, with three spikes sticking out of the water. Ariadne crouched down behind the middle one, peering out to get a better view of what he was up to.

Of course, she might have asked. He was growing accustomed to her curiosity, her strangely open nature and odd behavior that wouldn't have lasted her five minutes in the world he'd known.

A word that now seems so very far away, one he wonders if he'll ever truly see again.

Finding a safe source of water provided a good place to meditate and reflect, at the very least. Water was always a vaguely calming thing to him. Rain was better, but the gentle lapping against the shore did in a pinch, and he was looking along the ridge for a place to settle in and clear his mind for the time being.

Maybe there were certain things he needed to learn to let go of. Maybe this was simply going to be life, from here on in.

Frowning, he bent low to scoop a stone out of the sand, rubbing his thumb over the weather-smoothed surface.

A breeze carried Agent's scent out to sea and toward Ariadne. It was funny how accustomed to it she'd become. She almost missed it on the days they spent apart. And it calmed her now. In part because of the familiarity, and in part because she wasn't picking up excess adrenaline.

Agent never really struck her as the 'calm' type, but this seemed like a good approximation.

She smiled.

It would probably be the right thing to leave him be, but for some reason, Ariadne wasn't ready to swim back to shore. Seeing him at peace put her in a peaceful state of mind too. Which was probably selfish. But no less true.

He hadn't taken notice of her yet. Scents were not a thing he was attuned to, and if she wanted to creep along after him unseen she likely could. He wasn't thinking of anything save the monumental task of once again ripping down any illusions he had of ever going home.

Joining Freelancer had been the first. Staying in the psych ward until they deemed him dangerous no longer had been the second. Now, once again, a shift in the paradigm that he just has to learn to fucking deal with.

With a small sigh he tossed the stone, watching it skitter and catch at the edge of an opening in the rock. A cave he'd never quite noticed before. Frowning, Wash took a couple of steps closer.

She followed the line of his curiosity and felt her heart leap into her throat.

No.

All at once she was scrambling over the shoal. Gone were any pretenses at stealth or quiet. She leaped from rock to rock, her arms somewhat akimbo, although her balance was, as always, quite precise. Like the stone he'd skipped earlier, only going in reverse.

"Agent!" she shouted, hurrying right for him. "Don't! You shouldn't go in there!" She immediately regretted saying it that way. Based on what she knew about him, the probability of him heeding a warning like that was about eighteen thousand, nine hundred, and thirty six to one.

More or less.

All sense of calm evaporated in an instant as his head turned, eyes falling on the girl as she came rushing up with her warning. He wasn't a fool. If someone looked that panicked and urgently warned you not to do a thing? Probably a good reason for that.

So his stepped halted, though his brow had furrowed in curiosity.

"...why?"

You had to give him that much at least, before he dismissed the warning entirely.

In a carefully-calculated stumble, she came up onto the beach, only just barely getting her feet wet. Well, wetter than before, anyway. She was still damp from her swim, her ragged, white dress clinging to her legs.

She'd feel guilty about spying, and then spying and being caught, later.

For now, she was all eyes.

"Do you see that symbol over the upper lip of the cave entrance?" She pointed above their heads. Scratched into the surface of the stone were two concentric circles. Tiny, little lines radiated out of the righthand side of the outer circle, almost making it look like some sort of half sun. "That's a vrykolakas marking. The cave isn't safe."

"Where does it lead?"

Assuming she knew. She might have simply seen the warnings -- or put them there -- and decided that was that. Better to steer clear of whatever monsters waited in the dark.

But if there were a possibility that it lead somewhere, maybe under the harsh sun and blistering wastes of the desert that surrounded them...maybe giving up came a little too soon.

Ariadne shook her head, a piece of her hair falling across the bridge of her nose. "I don't...I don't think it leads anywhere," she said. "Underground, I suppose." Well, underground without a question. But the probabilities as to what it was like were too variable. The only certainty was that there was, or had been, a vrykolakas down there. Which was more than enough to keep her away.

"You don't want to mess with a vrykolakas," she said. Her hand absently fluttered to her thigh. "Those markings are made by their teeth. They can bite through muscle and bone before you even see them coming for you."

A hard-earned lesson, that one.

She rubbed the ghost of a scar under her dress.

"And armor?"

He does still have that, though he hasn't worn it in some time. Maybe there's even some ammo left in his gun. See how the vrykolakas felt about bullets.

Washington's brow furrowed as he looked back towards Ariadne. "We've been here how long? We've explored every inch of this prison of ours except that, and you're not the least bit curious?"

"Of course I'm curious," she said, just a tad bit defensive. If nothing else, she was curious. She just wasn't stupid. And the odds had always been against her when it came to the vrykolakas. "But I've never had armor," she continued. Honestly, she didn't know how they would respond to it. Or rather, how their teeth would. But if they could do that to stone...

Well. She actually didn't know what Agent's armor was made of, now that she thought about it.

Still, she didn't want him to get hurt.

Ariadne turned around, lifting the hem of her dress until she uncovered the back of the upper part of her thigh. Scars were funny on Alastrian skin, especially when she was pretending to be Human. Nevertheless, it was there. A series of pale, white lines, perfectly mimicking the markings on the cave. "This was from years ago," she said.

At least, she thought it was years ago.

Of course, the second she starting to lift her dress, Washington's eyes jerked away. "Whoa, okay, let's not...how about you warn someone when you're going to do that?" he muttered in a rush, his ears turning a bright red as he cleared his throat.

Ah, but there was a point to it, wasn't there? After a moment he allowed his eyes to dart back in that direction, to notice the mark before skirting away again. "Yeah, well. As nice as it is here, I don't intend on dying here. If there's something on the other side of those tunnels, I want to know. You can stay here, if you want."

Certain humanoid cultural mores had managed to slip out of habit with Ariadne. She realized, after it was already too late, that the body was something of a touchy subject. Although why the upper part of her thigh would bother him was a bit perplexing.

All the same, she covered up again.

And turned to face him, her expression half surprised and half a little bit wounded.

Stay here? And let him face a vrykolakas by himself?

"Do you really think I would do that?" she asked softly.

Edited 2017-09-19 13:58 (UTC)

Why wouldn't he?

Every other person he'd ever partnered with, ever trusted, had found a way to betray him. To leave him for dead, to walk away, or try to kill him themselves. Why would he expect anything else from even this harmless-seeming young woman, when the people he considered his friends had done so much worse?

Things he hadn't said, hadn't stated outright, and so that wounded look of hers might have been understandable. It didn't change his outlook any as he straightened his back, mouth thinning. "It's dangerous. You said so yourself. There's no need to risk your neck over my dumb plan. You've managed to survive her just fine on your own all this time. I doubt you need me that badly."

"I don't need you at all," she said. Because he was right. She'd survived well enough without him. And would be doing the same, if he'd never appeared. The thing of it was, this wasn't a question of survival. "You're my friend," she continued. "I would never let a friend go into battle alone."

If he wanted to risk his life. Fine. That was his choice.

But it would be her choice to protect him.

"Besides. I don't think you even know what a vrykolakas looks like, let alone how to kill one."

"Friend."

The word was repeated quietly, a skeptical look shifting across his face. Friends were a dangerous thing to consider. Friends was giving an opportunity for someone to get in close and hurt you far worse than they could if kept at a distance.

Didn't she realize that? He'd hardly done anything to endear himself while he was here.

"I might not, but I figure if something comes at me and I put enough bullets in it, it'll discourage it from thinking I'm some easy meal."

Ariadne didn't really know what bullets were. So she had no idea if they would work or not. She couldn't even see the probabilities.

But that didn't matter.

Could he really not understand her? After all the time stuck with her and no one else? Did he not see her as a friend?

Maybe not.

But she shook her head a little. It didn't matter. Even if they weren't friends, she wouldn't let some innocent go happily to the slaughter. Even an innocent as puzzling and frustrating as Agent was proving himself to be. "Lead the way," she said weakly, nodding to the cave. She would follow.

"...you don't have to."

Did she not understand that? She was obviously miserable at the idea, terrified of what waited inside, and he'd yet to discover that she was less a liability than she seemed.

Truth be told, if he knew the extent of her strength? He'd be even more nervous about having her at his back, even after all this time. Maine had taught him that lesson the hardest way possible...

She did have to. But she saw no point in trying to explain it to him. "You take point," she said. If she was at the back, she had a better chance of using her abilities without being seen.

And, frankly, the vrykolakas had a tendency to attack from behind.

It was the best of all possible solutions, really. He could still feel like he was in control. And she could keep him safe. Win-win.

Assuming they didn't get overwhelmed. She couldn't quite predict the probabilities for that yet.

One problem.

It left her at his back. And South shooting him in the back hadn't been so very long ago. It still ached, from time to time.

Of course, Ariadne wasn't nearly the spiteful viper South had turned out to be. That was the rational side of him talking. Instinct still hammered in his ears, screamed, clawed, refused to accept anyone lingering back there where they could get the drop on him, leave him for dead, for whatever sort of creature lurked inside.

"I don't remember the part where we agreed that you gave the orders." It's not quite as brusque as it could be, but he's narrowing his eyes at her just the same.

The snarly male she'd first met seemed to be back. And she just couldn't think why. She was going along with his stupid plan. She was even letting him go first. Was it the mere suggestion, coming from her? Or something more.

"All right," she said, feeling a sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach. "Do you want me to take point?"

She'd take point all the way back to the other side of the beach, if she could.

"No."

Alright, now he was just being disagreeable, and he knew it. With a huff, he turned around, staring out at the water, trying to find that calm he'd had earlier that seemed to have slipped away.

"You don't even want to go."

Edited 2017-09-19 16:36 (UTC)

"No," she said. "I don't. But I'm going to. For you. Why do you hate people so much?"

It was one of those strange instances where Ariadne said something without carefully calculating it first. It was easier to have those in Fae. She was out of practice with people. And had infinitely less to hide.

All the same, she regretted it the instant it came out. Enough to lower her eyes and suddenly take a grand interest in a few grains of sand that had sloughed over the top of her foot.

He didn't look back at her, if it made things better. He kept his eyes on that horizon, his jaw rigid.

"I don't have to hate them not to trust them. There's a difference."

Betrayal never came from the ones you hated.

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