Gideon Nav (
ninth_cavalier) wrote2024-02-24 10:58 am
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Open Post: The Arms of the Emperor are Never Idle
Gideon spends her mornings in the practice yard, bright and early, despite the cold. She jogs and stretches to get her blood pumping and her muscles warm before she draws her sword, and then after drills she brings Tally her coffee, and then after that it's back to more sword—unless Tally hauls her off to some other activity, which she pretends to hate but is secretly devastatingly grateful for. The absolute worst part of this place is all the time. Endless stretches of time, with barely any work to be done.
In some ways it's just like the Ninth—except on the Ninth she knew her exits. They were few, sure, and near-impossible, but she knew them: buy her way out, fight her way out, trick her way out, or truly earn it.
None of those apply, here.
She breaks for lunch, and wanders the halls trying to locate various Clues and Mysteries that might end up giving her a way out, and mostly just finds people. More and more people.
She's not antisocial. She likes the people here, more than she's openly liked anyone in her life, individually or as a group. But a gnawing restlessness keeps her on the move rather than letting her time fill up with idle conversation as so many here do. She's always hunting for something to keep her busy, to wear out her body so that when she sleeps her mind is forced to rest rather than serving her a lovely buffet of the worst things she's ever seen and even worse things she hasn't, the things she was yoinked away just in time to miss.
Sometimes it even works.
[This post is open in perpetuity until something happens to make me close it, at which point I will edit it and say so! Feel free to find Gideon in the morning doing sword drills, or tooling around inside, opening and closing drawers and trying peel the wallpaper off in case there's flesh underneath.]
In some ways it's just like the Ninth—except on the Ninth she knew her exits. They were few, sure, and near-impossible, but she knew them: buy her way out, fight her way out, trick her way out, or truly earn it.
None of those apply, here.
She breaks for lunch, and wanders the halls trying to locate various Clues and Mysteries that might end up giving her a way out, and mostly just finds people. More and more people.
She's not antisocial. She likes the people here, more than she's openly liked anyone in her life, individually or as a group. But a gnawing restlessness keeps her on the move rather than letting her time fill up with idle conversation as so many here do. She's always hunting for something to keep her busy, to wear out her body so that when she sleeps her mind is forced to rest rather than serving her a lovely buffet of the worst things she's ever seen and even worse things she hasn't, the things she was yoinked away just in time to miss.
Sometimes it even works.
[This post is open in perpetuity until something happens to make me close it, at which point I will edit it and say so! Feel free to find Gideon in the morning doing sword drills, or tooling around inside, opening and closing drawers and trying peel the wallpaper off in case there's flesh underneath.]
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But it's—suddenly the joy of it, the marvel of skin on skin, feels guilty, unearned. This shouldn't even be her mouth, these shouldn't be her hands—she shouldn't be here, with Tally. Every touch, every moment enjoyed, is a tiny theft.
She pulls back, brushes her thumb over Tally's chin again in silent apology. It's not her fault. "Great work today," she says, stepping back entirely, and bends to gather up their practice swords. "Same time tomorrow?"
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"You're not, like, mad that I won, right?" she says, almost instantly regretting how anxious she sounds. "Or... was the kiss okay?" This was why it was so much easier to just be pretty, and not worry about things. Any pretty she'd kissed would have just kept kissing her and not made her wonder what was going on. Of course, a pretty would never have Gideon's personality, either. Being ugly-minded is turning out to be anything but simple.
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She keeps cleaning up, bending to roll up the hideous rug.
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"I totally will," she says, rising to the challenge. "Yeah, let's do this again tomorrow. Ugh, I so wish I could teach you how to hoverboard. That's also a mostly falling-based activity."
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