If war were a game that a man or a child Could think of winning [Open]

[not-prncss-tldr.livejournal.com]

Lafiel staggered out and away from the sensorium pod, clutching her bruised jaw. Blood pooled between her teeth, coppery and salty in her mouth and she swallowed it.

There was a special kind of humiliation that came with being physically bested and though Lafiel knew she was in the right, it still stung.

Master Chief or Captain Kirk would have known what do immediately, but she had only exacerbated the situation. She knew this to be her own fault. The punch had been a predictable consequence of her actions.

She couldn't even curse for fear of spitting more blood.

Comments

[not-prncss-tldr.livejournal.com]

Lafiel swallowed down more blood, making herself feel faintly queasy. "It's nothing. I was careless during training." She replied, full of pride.

[kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com]

Katara gave her the typical "mother hen" look. "I know when someone's been in a fight, or got a free shot anyway. Here, hold up your chin a moment."

She opened the pouch and the water streamed around Lafiel's jaw, where it swirled a moment, glowing momentarily and then fading. The blood stopped, and her jaw should feel a little less sore.

"How did this happen?"

[not-prncss-tldr.livejournal.com]

"I cannot reveal that." was what she intended to say, although it came out more like "I'g g'not rbeel dad".

She rubbed her jaw where the pain had been. "Thank you."

[kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com]

Even if she didn't understand what she said, Katara clearly understood what she meant and shook her head, muttering something that sounded suspiciously like "worse than a boy."

Katara shook her head, sighing. "Can you at least tell me why it happened in the first place? You know, Stacy doesn't allow people to fight anywhere unless you do it in the city."

[not-prncss-tldr.livejournal.com]

"I humiliated my subordinate in the simulator." She said, as if that explained everything.

[kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com]

Katara sighed, shaking her head. She'd been around enough people to know when pride was going to prevent actual details from being spilled: it was just as well anyway, it wasn't important right now. What WAS important was helping Lafiel anyway.

"You signed up to be a pilot then," Katara said, giving the woman a smile. "How's that working out for you, aside from the punch in the jaw?"

[not-prncss-tldr.livejournal.com]

"I am enjoying it quite a bit. This is the job we Abh were designed for, after all." She grinned red and turned to go to the med bay. Katara would follow or not, it was her choice.

[kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com]

Katara would follow, of course. She wasn't one to be left mid conversation. "I remember you mentioned the Abh before, but I don't know a lot about them. Would you care to enlighten me?"

[not-prncss-tldr.livejournal.com]

Oh Katara. You don't know what you've done. She can unleash deers as teal as her hair. "A long time ago, we were engineered as slaves who could live their whole lives in space. The blue hair we all have was a mark of slavery. Due to a set of events that noone quite understands, we freed ourselves, stealing the spaceship Abriel. Although we fled, we could not slake the suspicion that our home city was planning to recapture us. So we turned back...and bombarded their city. We destroyed everyone in it. That is why, to this day, all Abh carry the guilt of the mission. We preserve the culture of our home city as well as we can...Anyway, almost all of us live our whole lives in space. We are known as 'The Kin of the Stars'."

[kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com]

On the contrary: Katara was always interested in knowing more about people, especially when it came to people on the ship she was starting to warm up to. And in this case, she got to know Lafiel a little better.

"I see you have that in common with someone else," she said, winking, but was serious too. "But I'm glad that in spite of all of the things that happened to you, you were able to make a home in space. In my world we're far from ever reaching the point of space travel. It's the kind of power most people would think was only possible with magic, or the Avatar. But you say you were 'engineered' as slaves. How is that possible?"

[not-prncss-tldr.livejournal.com]

Lafiel tried to come up with the words but started drawing blanks. The technological differences were just too great. "Ah, genetic engineering? Does that exist where you come from?" Naturally she assumed Avatar was a primitive spaceship.

[kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com]

Katara shook her head. "I'm still grasping a lot of the terms that you guys use on the ship. As far as I know, the very little I know about genetic manipulation is what Meluly told em about, and it was very, very vague. I'll be the first to admit, my world isn't anywhere near as advanced as anything on this ship."