He is alone, now.

Vasilia left just a few minutes ago. Reached into her bag, laid a musket across her lap, and let the Coherent push her to the negotiations. She’d asked if he was alright. She could wait, until someone brought a wheelchair for him too. He’d refused.

Ramses had a comfortable chair arranged for him. Maybe she thought it would help smooth things over, get her favor back into the positives. Maybe she’d have done it for anybody. She hadn’t offered an explanation. Nor a path back to the conversation. Maybe she just thought it was safer, that way.

The shouts hurt his ears. More than the constant clamor of the film set. The headache buried between his horns sprouted through his skull, and his hands clasped knuckle-white to keep from flinching. He heard every step on her approach. He heard how angry she was. He knew who the voice belonged to, from the first.

“The Tides are…torturing themselves?!”

The Assistant Secretary of Fear and Doubt always returned his correspondence with interest. 50 pages for each one of his. Hours, of filtering through line after flowing line of titles, polite minutia, couched messages, to arrive at the barest kernel of actionable information. Later. Not today. Next week, for sure.

“Why didn’t they, they haven’t told me a [i]thing,[/i] even though, I asked, but they, what?”

Ramses is indecipherable. This is not how a Captain should behave. Not to a professional.

“Because, yes, no, I’m in charge, here. I asked them aboard. He [i]wanted[/i] to come aboard,”

And then. Nothing. From him. From her. From anyone. Anywhere. Ever.

“He wanted to come aboard, so, they shouldn’t, I would’ve! Done, I [i]did,[/i] no, ah-”

He is alone, now. A small, broken sheep, begging a room full of strangers he doesn’t know.

“Could you [i]please[/i] tell me what’s going wrong?”