Baptized in bad times

Melita

Eating fire is your ambition
to swallow the flame down

The reality of aftershocks made Melita’s eyes widen slightly – just enough to be surprised but certainly very amused at Colt’s response. “Okay, listen, while that is fucking great and I applaud the efforts, that probably sunk everything else.” But then again, perhaps that didn’t much matter anymore – ties cut and severed on misunderstandings and a lack of communication across multiple lines. Colt had stood her ground, which leaders needed to do, but they also needed to have a knack of policies and diplomacy that the Honeybee knew she’d never be able to adhere to either. Hot tempers didn’t make good emissaries, and the demigod would be sorely tempted to burn anything that wronged her. The Accepted had to tread much lighter, perhaps, when it came to these circumstances. Far be it from her to find another approach. “If you’re gonna take on a region, you’re gonna have to figure out how to resolve shit like this, and it can’t be guns blazing every time. The stronger ones will wipe you out without a second thought.”

Glancing out over the waves and sea, and ignoring the bobbing boat below, she narrowed her gaze. “Sohalia strikes me as the type to not want to offend anyone.” Gentle, good, kind, all those adjectives that also brought some timidity and spinelessness, under certain circumstances. “So she wouldn’t say it to your face, but to someone else? Eh.” With Flora as a close confidante, and prone to aiding her best friend through any plight…Melita’s notions aired on those sides of potential.

But with the Queen, she sighed, tilting her head and resting her elbow on the railing. “I can understand both sides. In hindsight, it would’ve probably been best to let Flora know ahead of time. Yes, we know Sohalia can take care of herself, but…if I were to lose my best friend to another region, I’d probably have a fit too. I’m not saying it’s reasonable. Just that I get it. They’ve been through a lot together.” Taking another deep breath, she shook her head, still trying to parse through the many layers. “People can absolutely make their own choices though, and she can’t control that. Like if Ru decides to go. She’ll have to make peace with all of that.” Which, knowing how things had gone down with her and Sunjata, might not be a bad option for the Valkyrie. “However, it sounds like it’s the middle of all this that’s the real problem.”

to be lit up from within, vein by vein
to be the sun

COLT

Well life's got a lot of sticks and stones
And a blade that'll cut you to the bone
But if you're doing what you love and it kills you
Well, you can live with that all day long

She's not even wearing a crown yet, but just the shadow of it descending upon her head comes with an unexpected weight. She had never set out for the desert with any attempt to rule, not beyond her own life anyway, but she also knows there's no way around it. Complaining about the chafing of the reins in her hands after asking to have them is a worthwhile reason to be tossed off entirely. Though a little oil could do the leather and her hands some good.

Lips press together in a line that's shaped in disapproval, though it's not aimed at Mel. There's sense to the things the Honeybee says, and given how swiftly and bluntly she says them, Colt doubts there's been any doctoring to the thoughts before they made it to the tongue. "They drew on me first," Colt mutters, though she fidgets in place beneath the discomfort of what now bears holes after all the smoke has cleared. First hardly matters here, and she knows it, but if she's going to be accused of fighting fire with fire, she wants it known at least she hadn't been the only one lighting matches. When has first or fairness ever really mattered, though? It's always who's still standing and what's been done, and she'd been firmly blazing alone at the party in front of everyone.

Colt's gaze slinks away like a dog that's apologetic for growling. Knowing the aftermath, the political position that Flora had hurled at her back as she walked away, she wishes it had gone differently now. Just like with Sunjata, an argument that's grown stale, but is still lodged in her chest with the ache. Things she's not just lost, but flung away, which had been fine enough when it'd been just nameless men for the night. She's done it to allies now though, as if attempting to prove she can stand alone, despite never wanting to, and worse, not being able to. The rigidity of her pride and the teeth she bares above her wounds have defended her countless times, but it seems she's lost the ability to discern what manner of hand is reaching for her, deciding them all harmful just to be safe.

Snorting in response to Mel's shaping of Sohalia, the image of how niceties can still comes with barbs, Colt's focus swings back. "If only I'd known as much before opening my mouth," Colt grunts, shifting in her lean against the boat edge. She regrets offering Sohalia any position at all, when it's clear to her now how little she knew the woman after all. Unfortunately, regretting is not in and of itself an erasure, more the lesson on using pencil over pen for the next time.

That Mel admits she probably should have told Flora, Colt's head tilts, her gaze angling up a bit sideways from her hat's edge. She's genuinely curious as to why. She's had ranch hands come and go plenty, and some she's been sad about. Maybe not the same as friends, she pays them after all, but still a personal loss at the end of the day. She tries to consider if Thorn were ever given cause to leave because of someone else, if she would feel this same sting of betrayal that Flora seems to. It keeps coming back though that she'd feel that way towards the person going, not the person offering, and even then a quiet understanding that people need to do what's best for them. On the other hand... if someone took her favorite horse for a ride without talking to her, she'd be furious, and she'd not blame the horse. An imperfect metaphor, she thinks, unless Flora truly does consider Soh her's in the way Colt does a beast. An individual still, sure, but hers. Is that the label of best friend, a set of reins?

"So," Colt starts, working over the idea, evidently of such a different mindset that this is a new perspective to squint across. Maybe Colt's just never had a good enough friend. Thorn comes the closest, but it sounds like it still doesn't compare. Then again Sunjata also said he wanted to end things after losing Nate, and she's never felt that before either. Often accused of feeling far too much, Colt is wondering how she's still unable to feel enough in some situations. Maybe all she knows how to feel properly is anger. "You think the slight is specific to Sohalia?" Best friend, Flora had said, had stressed. Not reasonable Mel says, and that's perhaps the first foothold Colt can grab onto here. "Upset that her best friend might be leaving her, but doesn't want to be mad at her friend, so turns it on me, instead?" Choosing a place to put a feeling, even if it isn't right, that Colt can understand. "Or is it just, customary to be polite enough to tell leaders that you've offered someone from their region a rank? Particularly someone they know." A social misstep, however much sense it makes, is another thing she could understand doing wrong. She's no etiquette beyond her ranch and home, and every leader rules a bit differently, is her understanding.

So, if you got a fire, don't lose it
If you got a do-or-die dream, do it
If you got somethin' to prove, go on and prove it
If it's in your blood, fallin' down ain't enough
Gettin' back up, that's the only backup plan you need

Melita

Eating fire is your ambition
to swallow the flame down

Politics were a hard no in Melita’s book. She wouldn’t function well in those diplomatic acts, trying to act like someone she wasn’t as they went ‘round and ‘round deciding upon regional matters. The Honeybee understood weapons and fighting and surviving; her suggestions usually blistered from those components, rather than the vast array of tactful, discrete, and judicious maneuverings. She was much more apt to say ‘cause fuck ‘em, that’s why’ over building lasting bridges between components, which again, was why she wasn’t involved in governmental affairs.

So while they might have drawn on Colt first, she huffed. “But can you shoot faster? Make every shot count? Is that how it’s going to be every time?” Her brows lifted, waiting to see the Accepted’s reaction. When Melita plunged into her armaments, it was because she knew her own might and weight – and even then, it hadn’t always worked to her benefit (see tournaments). It was understanding how far strength went and how aspects could grow – but Colt must’ve known and understood that she didn’t have the means to combat the whole of Torchline, for instance. “Shit always happens around here, and if you make enemies of every other place…,” she shrugged. She trusted the other woman could fill in the blanks.

She leaned back against her railing again, drumming her fingers on the wooden portions. “Yeah, hindsight’s a real bitch, especially when the smoke clears.” And one realized they’d been drifting in on hurricanes and typhoons while everyone else had already shifted away, drawn back into their shelters, smug, content. She’d led a similar life of raised hackles and sharp tongues, thrown knives and imminent explosions. One could argue all of them were justified, but sometimes it hadn’t scarcely mattered. “I get why you offered it. Sohalia had experience in leading and seemed to be interested.” Until suddenly she wasn’t; and therein laid the puzzle. If they peeled away all the knots and unknowns, what might they find? What would anyone admit?

As the conversation spurned to the Luminary though, her eyes narrowed, speculation bright. “Could be.” Friendships were complex, and people even more so. “And some of it might never make sense to you – but that’s where it’s at right now. As for the rank stuff, it depends on the person.” Which she understood wasn’t helpful in the least, but it was also about comprehending the relationships around them. “I bet some leaders here wouldn’t care, and others, way too much. Airing on politeness is probably the best way to go.” That way – well, maybe not as many feathers would be ruffled.

to be lit up from within, vein by vein
to be the sun

COLT

Well life's got a lot of sticks and stones
And a blade that'll cut you to the bone
But if you're doing what you love and it kills you
Well, you can live with that all day long

Colt offers silence in return for Mel's peppering of questions about her quickdraw potential and assurance of aim. Her lips press in tighter, the corners of her mouth wrinkling faintly, as if bearing the shape of the answer without actually giving it, a clear and resounding no. It's an exercise more than a question. Point taken, she glances aside, sighing.

For someone inclined to make razing choices in the moment, Colt is not an unreasonable person when she's of the mind for it. She can appreciate that different people have their own thoughts and patterns, and as long as those don't interfere with hers, she doesn't much care what someone else decides to do or think. Might question it, definitely judge it, but if it's self-contained, it doesn't matter. In fact, there's something to the talents people manage to procure on their own, making choices she never would. Sometimes those can benefit her, and she's grateful for their different versions of a life. This though, this had been something that meant to make her bend in a way she wasn't prepared for, and she immediately shoved back at it.

"Mm," she agrees faintly, jaw working as she rolls her tongue in thought. "Sometimes isn't worth the fight," she admits, to not making enemies of everyone. There's a balance to breaking a horse to ride. Some days you can't give in, most days, actually. The moment you do, you teach the horse that its shit behavior earns it what it wants, which is always less work and its own opinions. If it bucks and throws you out the saddle and you don't climb back on, then it's gonna think bucking is the solution and try it for several other days more in an attempt to keep its back clear. She's always equated training to a conversation being established, but some days it's a damn war.

The best solution is to keep the horse from ever bucking you off to begin with. Easier said than done, and sometimes unavoidable. However, there's some days where even if you can't avoid the fight, submitting to it, letting yourself lose so you might come back better equipped later. There's value to that as well. This maybe should have been a time she let the bronc win out, if only because it's not even a saddle she means to stay seated on.

"Yeah," she admits, when Mel is kind enough to agree that not all her decisions had been poor, at least not when she had the information she had on hand at the time. "I'm not much interested in doing this all alone. Don't think I can, really." Colt admits, unashamed to do so. "Clearly, diplomacy isn't one of my main strong suits." Proof that she needs a strong partner in this. She huffs a mild laugh at herself, tugging her hair into her hand and shaking some of the lingering water out. "Could do with being more careful who I put at my side in the future though." Maybe just avoid anyone's best friends entirely.

Mel's admission that it's not so simple eases some of the strain that remains in Colt. She'd misstepped, and according to Flora, it should have been an obvious one, but maybe it's not so clear cut as all that. Makes it harder to take any steps with confidence, the pitfalls a bit obscured except by those that have set them there, but then Colt has never shied from the potentials of falling, except when it comes to her heart. "Well, useful to consider for next time, but I think it's rightly fucked this time around." An apology feels like a swollen, unwanted thing in her chest, and she doubts the Doubletake would hear it anyway, even if Colt managed to get it out. The damage has been done, or that's certainly what it feels like, and Colt isn't in the habit of crawling back to kiss at toes for forgiveness. She could amend what she'd said, could agree that her and Flora have different views on the approach, and she could regret the outcome. That ahrdly seemed enough.

So, if you got a fire, don't lose it
If you got a do-or-die dream, do it
If you got somethin' to prove, go on and prove it
If it's in your blood, fallin' down ain't enough
Gettin' back up, that's the only backup plan you need

Melita

Eating fire is your ambition
to swallow the flame down

The silence after her questions was telling – so she didn’t press much more into it, her brow arching, waiting for a response, and then letting it sink into the denizens and resin of the ship. “Depends on what the fight is,” she reckoned, making a case to study her fingernails, then glance back up to Colt. “But on this one, probably not. There are going to be worse things than rank disputes and liars. You can probably find someone else to take it on.” Individuals far more trustworthy and willing, not so directly tied or mauled to individuals. There were often many who wanted to make a name for themselves, to carve deep into the earth with all their boldness and grit. She presumed Colt was one of them, to be doing this at all. Maybe Sohalia wouldn’t have survived those plains of desert sands anyway – a land too harsh for those easily softened by other pressures. “You could take it as a blessing – sounds like she might’ve been a real pain in the ass to work with. At least it shows you she wasn’t up to the task.”

The Honeybee couldn’t speak for diplomacy – but she’d been in her uncle’s presence enough to understand it was a necessity, and when one couldn’t employ it, sometimes there were deadly, nefarious arrangements elsewhere. Knowing one’s way around with pretty words and gestures and negotiations skills wasn’t something she’d prefer – drawing a knife was much, much easier – but no one would be inviting Ludo’s demigod into any sort of tactful, foreign policies. “Do you have people willing to go into the desert? Could start there, see if any of ‘em would want to step up. Or weed them out.”

She could hear the way Colt kept herself mired though, and she shifted her glance to stare openly at the Accepted, snorting loudly. “But here’s the thing, and you probably don’t want to hear it,” but Melita was Melita, and she was going to say it anyway. “If you let it be fucked now, it’s going to be fucked later. May want to try an apology with Flora. Not to make it worse, but it’s not great to try and lead a new region with a target already on your back,” even if it was difficult, fresh, and new. The Doubletake was the type to let wounds fester and rot, dragging the ache further, and would willingly make Colt’s life harder just for shits and grins.

to be lit up from within, vein by vein
to be the sun

COLT

Well life's got a lot of sticks and stones
And a blade that'll cut you to the bone
But if you're doing what you love and it kills you
Well, you can live with that all day long

"Ain't that the truth," Colt sighs, fingers raking through the dampness of her salt-drying hair and folding back in on her arms. "I expect some amount of lying," she admits, chin stiffening as she angles her head up. She's not so naive as to think everyone should, or could always be honest. She herself is not above slipping out a white lie now and again, and has certainly done worse than white on plenty of occasions. Yet, loyalty matters to her, and someone doing what they say they will. Ultimately, she wants results, not words, and this blunder of words certainly resulted in something. "Wasn't the lyin' so much as the unexpected attack. All started by someone I thought I could trust." She doesn't blame Flora nearly as much as she does Soh, and at the end of that line is the blame upon herself for offering any damn part of her to that two-face. The sense of betrayal, more than anything, had soured her quick. "If you're gonna lie, at least do it clean and well. Just can't abide someone making a mess of shit for me."

Her boot scuffs across the deck though, and she stares at the wag of her toe, frowning. "Guess I should at least hear it from Soh straight, though." The admission doesn't come easy, half pulled from behind her teeth where they brace against one another. "Could be I've misunderstood something." Doubtful, but she's willing to consider it. Much as Colt has tried to retrace the events, lay them out and pick them apart, she doesn't see how it'd be anything other than it appears.

"Not to give her another chance," Colt decrees, glancing up in firm agreement as far as dodging a bullet in having Soh on her council. "Never that again. Just for the sake of understanding. Could help me understand shit with Flora better too." She could not so easily escape the future potentials of dealing with Flora. Not on her council, of course, but on the other side of it, which is just as bad in utterly different ways.

Chewing on the inside of her lip, Colt considers in the file of her mind who she has. She shakes her head a bit though. "If this has taught me anything, it's to wait and see. I don't know the people I have well enough to trust them with that role, not yet. I knew Soh the best, out of everyone, and that's backfired quite well." A small twitch of her lips, humor always a nice shield. "Although no one else is the best friend of a queen, so perhaps I'm in a better spot." The mother of one though, which she isn't sure is any better. Shit, she's not even sure she can still count on Hotaru. All the more reason to repair things with Torchline.

The potential of not wanting to hear things immediately draws Colt's focus entirely back to Melita. Her gaze narrows faintly, a begrudging, go on. She has often found the things she doesn't want to hear and the things she needs to hear are one and the same.

Something akin to a groan slips from her throat and Colt throws her gaze back to the side of the ship with a snort. "You're right," she says after a moment, and whether that's not wanting to have heard it, or that she shouldn't let it stay fucked, the answer seems much the same. "Although if that's the case, perhaps I should start with an older and much more deserving apology." Her body has started to sag a bit, and the towel falls from between the press of her thighs. "Think I owe Sunjata far more." The march of time had taken some of the sting out of her wounds, and though the loss remains, the hole of it all is steadily being filled by the desert. She had always known she'd been unkind to him, but it had taken her this long to be able to admit as much to anyone else, least of all him.

So, if you got a fire, don't lose it
If you got a do-or-die dream, do it
If you got somethin' to prove, go on and prove it
If it's in your blood, fallin' down ain't enough
Gettin' back up, that's the only backup plan you need

Melita

Eating fire is your ambition
to swallow the flame down

Melita wasn’t quick to trust; much more apt to be suspicious, even overly and overtly so, until someone had proven otherwise. It had gotten her this far in life, and if that was a rallying success, someone else could be the judge of it. The mess, however, seemed to be lying mainly at Colt’s feet, and what she’d decide to do with the cleaning of it, or nothing at all, would amount to another curve and bend in the trail. “How are you going to know if she’s being honest?” Melita quipped with a shrug; figuring if the Luminary had already extended a lie, it would probably be just as easy to spin another wild yarn and hope the Accepted took the lure. Maybe understandings would come. Maybe not – if Sohalia had been furtive and duplicitous before, the Honeybee figured she’d try it again.

She huffed at the other notions though – of comprehending Flora better, of trying to find portions that could be mended once she’d already severed and fractured pieces. It’d take a strong bout of enamel. “And then don’t fire the first shot again if shit goes south quickly,” as a reminder. She could imagine an explanation fumbling into something not at all resembling an apology, and then the rounds would flicker and fly, more disasters on the horizon.

As for being ‘right’, which she proudly gloated over with a wink in Fangorn’s direction, her head whipped around at the semblance and mentioning of her uncle. She’d already been granted the story from his side, and perhaps she’d been hoping that it would all dissipate; Sunjata had let it go, seemingly, but with his lack of emotions at present it was difficult to tell what hurt and maimed and what didn’t touch at all. Instead of broaching the subject with the unknown and feigning ignorance, she snorted, drumming her fingers again along the wooden railing. “So I heard.” There was a muted quality to her voice, perhaps a warning – not wanting to fight his battles for him, but quite willing to throw herself into the ring if necessary. “Probably should start there, yeah. He couldn't have deserved all of that.”

to be lit up from within, vein by vein
to be the sun

COLT

Well life's got a lot of sticks and stones
And a blade that'll cut you to the bone
But if you're doing what you love and it kills you
Well, you can live with that all day long

A shoulder lifts faintly. It's not a lack of care, the shrug, not in this case. More, it's an admission to having few other options, so she'd take it as it is. "Just gonna have to trust my gut." It has only led her astray on a few occasions, and though it hadn't rumbled any one way or another about Soh, she thinks all of her is attuned enough now to the Luminary's methods to catch it in the process. "At the very least, I'd like to see the way she lies to me again." Then she'd know what to look for in the future.

A dry chuckle, knowing her nature has been well put under Mel's heel, answers the suggestion that's layered with the wisdom of someone else used to setting things alight. "I'll keep my trigger finger in my pocket." Like an old dog, she does much better when she isn't surprised. Walking into this by choice is a far different beast from being startled mid-flirt with a business potential, guards lowered in a friend's house, nothing but frivolity expected. Maybe proof she should better equip herself for the abrupt nature of life, but she can only brace herself for so many hours of the day. Everyone pulls their pants down to take a shit, for example, and it just so happened she'd been caught squatting then.

Pressing her lips together, Colt's gaze holds Mel firm before her. The trickster is exactly as blunt as Colt needs, and a fine enough stand-in for Thorn's wisdom all these miles from the House. "You're a good one Mel, I can tell." Not so multi-faceted as Flora, not overly soft like Soh. Just the right amount of straightforward that Colt need not guess, and that makes it far easier to bear whatever it is the Honeybee has to say, either in her favor or otherwise.

As Colt turns more thoughtful, considering older wounds and wrongs, she is a little surprised to hear Mel already knew. Warily, Colt's gaze lifts anew to the demigod, having drifted to the floor, slumping down a little more to reach and regather the fallen towel. "Oh," her voice pitches higher than usual, breath caught in her mouth without word. "He told you," she decides after a moment of consideration. Then, a slow grimace builds. "No," she agrees, straightening a bit, holding out the towel for Mel to take. "He didn't. He just happened to be the closest place to put it all." Shame thickens some of her throat, and she falls quiet for a beat. Colt is aware she can come down sudden and hard, that she pushes when things get bad, because that's better than letting anyone see her actually hurt.

He had, once, seen her broken open, and she'd seen the wear of his own fracturing. The timing had been poor, and it'd been almost cruel that he'd been the one to come to her side that day, when she had nothing left but fire. "I should go," she decides, working past the sting that's resurfacing too forcefully now. "Thanks for the towel, and, everything."

So, if you got a fire, don't lose it
If you got a do-or-die dream, do it
If you got somethin' to prove, go on and prove it
If it's in your blood, fallin' down ain't enough
Gettin' back up, that's the only backup plan you need

Melita

Eating fire is your ambition
to swallow the flame down

There were always options; Melita thought of items to ensure honesty, of poisons or remedies to extract truth. But it wouldn’t be quick, and likely required some effort, and with Colt putting in a majority of her time into the desert, then perhaps she would have to rely on her intuition. Hopefully it would serve her better than the last interim. “I guess. Probably gonna be lame though,” she offered with a matching shrug, maybe as both a warning and a finality of expectations, given the road she’d traversed to get here.

With promises of trigger fingers kept on the safety, she snorted, flickering the sails a little as the wind seemed eager to change pace. Her brow arched at the compliment though, uncertain what she’d done to earn such a decree (and how she’d really never been told she was good before; she wasn’t as apt to believe it). “Thanks?” came as a question, though she didn’t ask more – not when the discussion had already turned towards her uncle. Her jaw tightened slightly, eyes narrowing imperceptibly at the admission. “Yeah, because that was real fuckin’ fair,” she quipped in return, but she could already hear the shame in the other woman’s voice. Whether or not she’d do something about it remained to be seen – Melita might’ve pressed harder, been not so good or nice, but Colt’s decision seemed to be done and dusted. “Good luck. I look forward to hearing how shit went,” unraveled on the beginning edges of a Cheshire grin, meaning it on the latter and the former points. Her uncle first, then everything else to fall into place – with liars and dominions and terrains.

[FIN]

to be lit up from within, vein by vein
to be the sun