Inbox - Fade Rift

[nonvenomous]

Book/crystal/correspondence/action/whatever you desire.

Comments

crystal, whenever it makes sense timeline wise;

[heirring]

We should make a formal report of our findings. I've my Rifter survey notes to write up as well, and the two ought to marry together well enough.

[nonvenomous]

A written report for the archives?

[ Just to be totally clear. ]

I will condense my notes.

[heirring]

And a notification to Riftwatch of the report's existence. You know how papers here are somewhat prone to being forgotten or overlooked.

[nonvenomous]

I will condense my notes to facilitate your notification to Riftwatch.

[heirring]

Excellent. I look forward to—

[Wait.]

—Do you mean to suggest that you have no desire to be involved in covering the subject with our fellows, Mister Dickerson?

[nonvenomous]

That is what I mean to suggest, yes.

[heirring]

[Wysteria de Foncé neé Poppell has surely faced down all manner of baffling behavior from her fellow members of Riftwatch in general, to say nothing of the specific things Richard Dickerson in particular has done. She has taken a great deal of bizarre behavior more or less on the chin.

But not wanting credit for one's work?! This is a step too far.]

But— Why?

[nonvenomous]

I have no desire to speak to most of these people privately, nevermind via public address.

[heirring]

But—I don't—[this and other blustering, until finally she formulates the correct words in the proper arrangement to say:] But you must be credited for it! And I might say so aloud and the paper may have your name on it, but you know how people are! They will only hear me and that is another issue with the proposal altogether, Mister Dickerson! Surely you are—

[Here, a lowering of her voice from shrill to deadly serious.]

You must be aware of my reputation in the Gallows as a figure of fun for mockery, Mister Dickerson. Were I to present these findings on my own, it's very likely to fall on deaf ears.

[nonvenomous]

[ In room 3A, Wysteria’s voice blusters out of a crystal on a table alone beside a disparate scatter of personal effects. Mr. Dickerson watches it light up in time with the patter of her speech from the foot of his bed, cloaked in blankets. ]

Perhaps they’re overdue for a difficult lesson in respect.

[ Somehow there is a fracture in his saying so, a weakness in the structure of acknowledging it as a problem at all. Ugh. ]

Are you really concerned about this?

[heirring]

[Is she concerned? IS SHE CONCERNED??]

Fundamentally.

[nonvenomous]

[ The trailing glow of her italics has plenty of time to fade before he answers: ]

Alright.

[heirring]

[The sharp breath that Wysteria takes suggests she has planned a long persuasive response to whatever it is that he says, and has been caught off guard by the simple agreement.]

—Good. Excellent. I'm quite pleased to hear it.

[Beat.]

Do you really dislike most of them so much?

[nonvenomous]

Fundamentally, [ he answers, dry from within his blankets. ]

Does their jeering really bother you?

[heirring]

It's highly inconsiderate, [is her prim reply, smoothed over and made impersonal.

So yes, 100%.]

[nonvenomous]

I don't care for it either.

[heirring]

Further, much as I may understand the impulse, in the specific circumstances we find ourselves in—meaning the war and that Riftwatch is itself made up of a rather strange mixed company of people who ought to know a thing or two about being poked and prodded and so on—, it seems to me incredibly reductive.

Do you know it took me at least six months to convince any native mage to discuss magic with me? That's absurd. I had to loiter around Enchanter Julius and Leander's heels before I could see any glyph work demonstrated. To say nothing of the agony involved with having simple questions of decorum answered—!

[Scoff. SCOFF! Somewhere, Wysteria probably has her hand on her hip and is only now realizing how strange it is to try the gesture with only one arm.]

I don't fault you in the slightest for disliking the whole prospect.

[nonvenomous]

[ He’s quiet while he turns his own thoughts over, up now on his bony snake feet purely for the purpose of shuffling them closer to coals burning low in the hearth. There are things it’s unwise to say even in sympathetic company.

And Wysteria has had a difficult year besides. ]

You’ve proven we’re not shackled here the way they’ve previously had the convenience of believing that we are.

[heirring]

Now for every Rifter to simply—WHACK!—lop their arm off, and we might find our way to some respectability.

[Ha ha ha! She's just so funny and perfectly well adjusted to this new state of affairs.]

[nonvenomous]

Yes, [ says Richard, after sufficient pause to consider the WHACK. Exactly. ]

How are you feeling?

[heirring]

Oh, much improved and pleased to be, [is like some dismissive gesture.]

But there is real use in the anchor, Mister Dickerson! It seems very ridiculous that shouldn't warrant some measure of respect given how vital they are to closing the rifts and so on. I suppose you might argue that anyone at all might catch one, and so Rifters are not so significant as all that, but that's clearly absurd.

—I suppose the Venatori will have beaten us to all of this scholarship, by the way. Even if you don't believe all the details of that dream, I suppose they must be doing something with all their Rifters.

How is your face?

[nonvenomous]

[ He’s glad to hear it, an intake of breath to respond -- and then she starts talking. Richard looks from the hearth back to his bed before bracing to sink down stiff before the former to toast the rest of himself while he listens. ]

We’re tools, Miss Poppell. Some of us are more personable or have more inherent value than others.

[ Where do the Venatori fit into this? Less humanely, he supposes, and doesn’t particularly care. Her last question reminds him of an itch at his ear, and he sniffs against the gorilla impulse to reach after it. ]

You were well on your way to transcending that barrier before you lost your arm.

[heirring]

Well, yes, I suppose we are and yes, I suppose I have—has Mister Holden shown the great gun to you yet? You must ask after it if he hasn't. I'm very pleased with it.

But surely, Mister Dickerson, the same thing could be said of just about anyone at all. Rifter or otherwise. The fact that we are somewhat more inconveniently reliant on this place and one another is a complication of the matter, not an altogether different state of affairs. And you've yet to answer my question, you know.

[Relentlessness evidently isn't stored in the left arm.]

[nonvenomous]

Ruggedly handsome.

[ He answers her question, only a little short from beneath the babushka bundle of his blankets in his dark room. ]

We are alien by nature. We don’t have roots here.

[ They’ve been around about this before, surely. An expertly-timed squeeze of his fist around his crystal at her mention of the gun closes out the sound of a very long and weary sigh. The break for it is silent but measurable. ]

You know that it isn’t the same. Or am I to believe your marriage to Monsieur de Foncé was predicated on true love and not the privilege of property ownership.

[heirring]

[Somewhere, she balks—the first sound of some aborted answer creaking out of her. The beat of silence which threatens the form is quickly subsumed before it can take hold.]

I owned that house well before marrying Monsieur de Foncé.

[Nailed it.]