[b]Mosaic![/b] "Mosaic..." she whispers. Awe. It's a flattering feeling. She's gone through her kata effectively, the exquisite mathematics it takes to maneuver all those limbs and a four meter weapon that you might have snapped if your knuckles brushed against it in flight. It is unclear to both of you if she had the shot during your flight. It is crystal clear to both of you that she didn't even roll the dice. But now at this range it's impossible to see how she could miss. The breeze blows between you as the glittering dust starts to settle, leaving quartz-diamonds shining in the duelists' hair. "Fine then," she said. She said it with the renewed determination of someone who knew how to be in awe of herself too. "Mosaic. You wish the mountain. You wish your name upon my lips." She shucked some complicated mechanism at her end of the longarm, those rainbow crystals began to glow. "Your prizes lie beyond my rifle. Come and claim them if you can." You can see her eyes beyond the mask. Grey. Feline. Prepared to pounce. [Roll to Finish Her] [b]Ember![/b] In the distance behind you you can see the great, hulking shape of the Warsphere. It descends from the heavens like an unlovely eye, gazing into the ocean's black. Gazing down at your prize. The sea can't help but love it and it's toxic gravity. False tides. False moon. You feel the distant call of a war howl. * You have only begun to develop a sense for the strategic movements of the Silver Divers, but it's as beautiful as their dance. Something the training is very clear on is that the reputation of the Warriors of Ceron does not rely on their physical might or their lightning reflexes. That is why they blindfold you through so many of those exercises, or make you fight eight opponents at once, or make you fight with your arms tied behind your back, or make you fight Plundering Fang before whom you might as well be a fragile little princess all over again. Again and again the lesson, drilling it down so that it pierces below the reputation: they are good because they are [i]soldiers[/i]. The ability to field strip a base camp and move to a point [i]inside [/i]the enemy's search pattern in a single co-ordinated movement was strategic invisibility and worth more than mere chameleonic skin. The popular imagination of a secret Ceronian military base is something like a fortified compound of advanced technology, surrounded by mines and traps. Indeed, the Silver Divers built a dozen of those when they arrived on the planet. They just haven't been back to them since unless they needed to throw a tail. Instead their base of the moment is inside a servitor village co-opted for the task. There's a particular energy in an occupied town, a kind of dazed giddy panic. It's like meeting the devil and oh no she's hot, oh no she's everywhere, oh no we're helpless and entirely at her mercy. The shadows of wolves watch the roads and politely turn around any strays. Many people are holding exotic treasures parceled out from the administration offices, and there's a merry bonfire going as the land, ownership and census records are burned outside. The rabbitlike clerks who collect that information are getting the personal attention of a squad of pheromantic specialists who are working hard to overload their senses to the point where they won't be able to use their photographic memories to recreate the records later. They could probably manage the duty with just [i]one [/i]set of scented gags, the rest must just be for fun. Time for your report. [b]Dolce![/b] "I saw the Skies once," said the Decaying Soldier, leaning forwards on her crutches. It was a miracle of adaptation that she could eat noodles with chopsticks while possessing only six total fingers, and a militarized brain that made her learn to do so while moving. "You know, people talk about it. But they don't get it. They don't get it until they see - a hundred Azura moving at the same time. They hate being close to each other, makes 'em too horny to think. But to see a Satrap and his entire court go to war is like seeing the armies of Heaven itself. I cried afterwards. I tried to bury myself in the mud because my broken body was an offense against them. CO warned me, of course, gave me the blindfold, but I wanted to see what we were fighting for. Still have nightmares about it." - "Politics..." said the Thoughtful Songbird. The Lyri were beautiful, ornamental, charming figures, each one a sylphlike blessing. "Why would you want to get involved in that? Maybe there was a time in the distant past where ordinary people could have political influence, but my bones are made out of custard and fairy kisses and I feel like I risk a compound fracture if a hot guy looks at me too long. Every Lyri on the planet couldn't stop a single Azura from taking whatever she wanted. No amount of political organization or class consciousness can cross the line of military force that is inherent to a genetically stratified society. Much safer just to avoid the whole topic." - "Government? Wrong word," said the Beloved Spy. The slow-witted Stone Tribe intelligence agents were community favourites in a How Do You Do Fellow Kids kind of way, and it was considered a breach of etiquette to break the keyfabe of letting them think they were getting away with it. "They. Design [i]ecosystems[/i]. Self sustaining. Interconnected. To them. We are animals. No malice. Raised up or. Wiped out. Accidentally. Not relevant. They have bigger goals." [b]Dyssia![/b] Servitors are artificial in origin, yes, but they're their own people. They've had their own childhoods, formative memories and unique personalities. A clone like Yaji doesn't. No past and no future, she's a static creature with a rigidly pre-programmed brain. Her ability to self reflect, to learn, to grow is completely stunted. She is what she is and that's a terrible thing to see in a living creature. You see it at her most fluidly cruel. It would take a truly malicious mind to say those things and mean them, but there's no actual pleasure happening there. Her eyes are empty. She's... it's like she's just [i]predicting [/i]what word to say next for maximum effect. That she doesn't truly have any of the emotions like pride or disgust to which she's constantly referring, she's just some hideous quirk of condensed language that has been structured in such a way that makes it say horrible things. The more time you spend with her the more you become convinced that this was never a person, that it is a literal abuse golem. But then, that's your answer. When she's in the flow she literally can't change course. You can flick her whiskers, scratch her ears, probably even stab her with a flaming broadsword when she's in the flow and she doesn't slow down or even process that anything is happening. It's only really her hangers-on, her junior mean-girl cronies, who cover for the gaps in her perception and personality. They're all scared of her but can't vocalize why; the uncanny valley effect of realizing that they're this close to something this wrong has them as trapped and tense as you. Still, it means that when you do make your move you've got a lot of leeway on how to do it.