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Louisa reclined in one of the sleek mess hall chairs, her arms folded, rocking it back and forth on its hind legs slowly as she idly pushed away from the wall with one of her feet. She was staring out of one of the observation portholes in the deck, which now revealed nothing but the dusky blackness of the night sky, and the bright reflected lights of the mess hall. She absent mindedly raised a hand to her collarbone, where a long band of dull burning pain extended from shoulder to shoulder, reminding her of the blow she had absorbed from the komainu.

Her body felt cleansed and restored after a shower and a full meal, but her mind was troubled and producing a sort of frustrated physical discomfort along with it that seemed to manifest in her bruised torso. She was thinking about the final engagement in the mission, when she had killed the spent and crippled komainu -- [color=82ca9d][i]well, that was really attributable to [color=ed1c24]Lang[/color], but that's not what the record's gonna show[/i][/color] -- with a parrying stab of her glaive. She had been so pumped on adrenaline that no other thought had crossed her mind than putting down the ferocious monster, but in its weakened state it had seemed almost... pathetic. In close proximity, as she had lunged in to deal the parrying deathblow, there was a moment where the monster's face was near enough to see in detail, and within sunken and heavily calloused eyelids Louisa had seen its eyes.

And there was a quality in those eyes near-death that was far too human for comfort.

How much was the parasite, and how much was the person? This thought made the certain knowledge of the echidna lodged firmly in her own body somewhere - dormant or whatever though it may be - suddenly unbearably uncomfortable, and she was grateful to be snapped out of her reverie by the nearby squealing of [color=8493ca]Teodora[/color]. She took her foot off the wall, her chair falling back onto four legs with a [i]thump[/i], and she swivelled around to see [color=ed1c24]Lang [/color]walking out of the kitchen laden with alcohol.

[color=82ca9d][i]"Are you really about to walk off with all that for yourself?"[/i][/color] she called across to the conspicuously male pilot.