[b]Redana![/b]

You don't understand them. How could you? A servitor is an artifical being, no matter how much courtesy you extend to them. Each servitor species has had truths written into their genome, the bedrock of their minds extracted and woven and re-helixed until a new certainty is encoded on the same level that humans know to fear sabre-tooth tigers. Each servitor [i]knows[/i] the meaning life - or at least, [i]their[/i] life. And as the Ceronians know their greatest purpose is to die in defense of their pack, and as the Kaeri know their purpose is to rule the darkness, the Alced [i]know[/i] that it is theirs to sail the stars. When you speak these are not just pretty words, this is an appeal to the instincts that run at the absolute core of these people. You see the promise run through the entire gathered crowd like a shock and a new kind of silence falls. A hungry silence, a craving silence, one that banishes the depression that had filled the Alced.

But it is Hera who places her hand on the top of your kneeling head and plucks you like a weed, holding you so your feet are a foot off the ground and you still don't meet the eyes of the goddess. Instead you meet the abundant eyes of her peacock-feather dress.

"Zeus," she said, "Cloudgatherer, Lightningsmiter, Galaxyfucker, will not assist you in this."

She lifts you a little higher so you can see the mood that fills her real eyes - plenty, peace, luxury, abundance and all denied to you.

"She has tried. She has made promises, hospitality and fair dealing and feasting and all of those things that thrill her so. But every time she approaches Magos Birmingham with peace and justice and fair-play in hand, the sand of Hypnos, brother to death, blows forth to fill her eyes and snatch her memory. And while she rests her children are robbed and collared, and when she awakes she thinks it good. Trust [i]not[/i] the will of Zeus for her daughter Hermes has her wrapped around her finger."

And she drops you unceremoniously - though you are swiftly caught and gathered up by the Alced. 

[b]Alexa![/b]

[I have rolled for you and hit a 10 on Speak Softly with Hope]

"Advancement? Prestige? Ha!" laughed Ramses boisterously. "Some amongst the Order care for such things, but not we of the Coherent. Hermes is the God of Journeys, and where some travel across the stars or up the ranks or to the ends of books, we travel towards the most perfect form of ourselves. We envision ourselves strong, beautiful, powerful - whatever that means in the individual's own eye - and advance relentlessly towards it. Once we have arrived, we perfect it. It is not enough to become a dragon, one must learn a dragon's martial arts!"

And isn't that a thought? Simply grafting tentacles onto your body come with no guarantee that you'll know how to use them. Years of practice, conditioning, training and dedication have gone into being able to move like this. 

"So I won't [i]gain[/i] anything from capturing you. I do it because the union is not currently on strike and I have no reason not to disobey management. I do it because you might reveal a little of that strength of yours and reveal another branch of the Path I have still to walk. I do it because it's an opportunity to dance with two beautiful ladies at once, and who would say no to that?"