"Don't worry, I'm not pregnant," Solae joked lamely to hide her emotional fatigue, her sorrow, and her overwhelming guilt at the situation she could not help but feel she was twice as responsible for as he was. Had she just died (and it would have been easy to do so) then Rene would have had much better chances of escaping and there would not be worlds of people at risk. The violence of her gag reflex made her lightheaded but soldiered through- the irony of the concept was not lost on her.

"I'm practicing my seduction techniques. What do you think?" she continued to jest. As soon as she had felt the rising bile she had cast of Lord Armon's shirt (which had dwarfed her smaller frame anyway) and supposedly incredibly clean exercise shorts. As she slid down to sit on the hard tile floor he could visually affirm she was only wearing undergarments. Solae might have shrieked about her decency and covered herself in embarrassment but she grew tired just thinking of the effort. Rene had almost certainly seen women with even less. If anything surprised him it was that she wore a designer brand tailored to fit only the genetically enhanced bodies of the elite and priced for the exceedingly wealthy as a result.

After a moment she pulled her long legs up to her chest, burrowing her head between the still heavily damaged knees. They were less raw than yesterday but their temporarily disfigured appearance failed to bring Solae any comfort- it just reminded her of everything she couldn't escape. "Mia, tell him what you told me," she instructed softly.

Mia, oblivious willfully or by design, proceeded to verbatim repeat her end of the exchange. With an inappropriate purr in words, and a dangling accent in others, she recited how Solae's parents were confirmed deceased, how Solae was being offered up as a prize to whomever turned her in, and how they had a CLTI located in her thigh that was being shielded. The marquise was fairly confident that Rene would understand her distress even if he could not fully empathize. The CLTI posed a problem for both of them. If she attempted to leave Lord Armon's estate without removing it the rebellion's search would be short and successful. As much as Solae didn't relish the thought of cutting into her skin it was infinitely better than the alternatives.

"I do have some sedatives in storage that Lord Armon's guests used on occasion to assist in falling asleep and engaging in unconventional acts of copulation," Mia offered. Solae laughed despite herself at the absurdity of it all and being trapped in the house of a narcissistic deviant. It was a good thing that Rene was no longer a noble himself; it was a breach of etiquette to laugh openly at the exposure of another, even deceased.