OPEN | so be easy and free,

[poleaxed]

WHO: Jone and thou
WHAT: jock stuff.
WHEN: Post Orzammar.
WHERE: The training yard & Tennis Court.
NOTES: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

a. FOR TRAINING.

If you need a sparring partner, Jone is at the main training yard during most daylight hours. She may have promised to work over some new techniques with you. She may have promised to assess your skills. She may have never spoken to you before, and you're just here to train.

For once, she isn't cajoling from the sidelines, trying to get new combatants. That doesn't make herself easy to miss, though. The self-described six-foot bitch, ginger hair shining in the sun, is always up for a go.

"Hullo, then. Let's get to it."

b. FOR TENNIS.

Or maybe you're here for another sort of skill. The Tennis Court is completed and ready, and Jone looks to be happily in her element. Shirt-sleeves peeled back to reveal solid muscle, she bounces a tennis ball against her racket, ready and waiting.

Maybe you were promised a match. Maybe you want a rematch. Maybe you're just curious. If you stare a second to long, Jone will wave you over. "Oi! We doing this or not, mate? If I stand out around much longer I'll start peeling."

c. FOR EVERYHING ELSE.

There's wildcard.

(I'm up for anything. If you're not sure, feel free to hmu.)

Comments

[nonvenomous]

It’s better to relax. He knows this, and makes the effort, letting off slack through the line of his shoulder even as he draws in a breath alongside her count --

He jerks against her, any sound he might have made strangled behind the clench of his jaw.

But the arm is back in, fingers flexed under the moon and stars bearing witness to this weird spectacle.

“Thank you,” is only polite for him to say. “May I see your anchor?”

[poleaxed]

Jone pats his shoulder, knowing he won't want any more comfort than that. Unable to imagine such a thing, honestly. He's such a singular person, she fears infringing on that grand independence.

"Um, alright, lad." She holds out her hand, surprised to find how green it is, even more than usual.

[nonvenomous]

A pat at his shoulder is just the thing, the adrenaline-fueled rattle of a late shiver stifled beneath the lock of a held breath, only just now expelled as he peers seriously at the sliver glowing in her palm. They are still on the ground -- probably for the best, with static creeping at the fringes of his vision.

“Is it painful?”

Given givens, he is not especially shy about clawing his thumb in to dig here and there, where the shard shines brightest.

[poleaxed]

Jone does not react at all to his prodding, which may make her admission a surprise. "Yeah, reckon it does." She considers it. "Think it's been aching a while. Didn't notice."

[nonvenomous]

Silas sighs again, more deeply this time, and releases her hand back to her to think without it.

“You should tell me if it does anything else strange,” he says, after a moment. “Or if the pain worsens or persists.”

[poleaxed]

"What's..." She frowns, thinks, and disliked either. "I don't mind telling you, but Maker, Silas, I blasted you across the courtyard. Sure you're alright?"

[nonvenomous]

“I’ll feel the worst of it tomorrow.”

The hot run of blood from his brow notwithstanding. He ignores it, busying himself instead with the process of plucking carpentry nail-sized splinters from his studded leather plate: the haggard resolve of a freshly bell-rung scholar who’s been flung ass over kettle by a monster or two in his lifetime.

“I am finished training for the evening.” To be totally clear.

[poleaxed]

"Yeah, I got that," Jone says. She doesn't want to turn the conversation back on herself when it feels like Silas is acting odd, odder than usual, but she isn't sure how to ask after someone who is neither simpleton nor child. "Should I... only tell you about it?"

[nonvenomous]

The largest of the splinters extracted, he leans to push himself up to his feet, careful to exert no pressure on his freshly rejoined right arm as he does so.

“No,” he is swift to clarify, strained as he twists to dust stiff at his seat, “any healer should do. It’s not uncommon for anchors to develop secondary characteristics. We’ll just want to keep an eye on it.

“The Provost should be notified as well, if you're comfortable with speaking to him.”

[poleaxed]

Jone's expression is characteristic of someone trying valiantly not to cringe, and ending up looking like they're suffering a sudden ailment, medical or mental. "Are you comfortable with the Provost?"

[nonvenomous]

“I’m not comfortable with any of them,” isn’t the most reassuring of qualifications, issued after a crisp pause with his mouth open in the dark, “but here we are." Subordinate.

His training dagger is -- somewhere. He scans for it, only to decide just as quickly that he doesn't care.

"Will you be alright?"

[poleaxed]

"Then fuck 'em." If they don't pass Silas' muster, why bother? She doesn't owe them anything. Maybe she'd bother if it were Flint, but it ain't, so she won't.

"Me? I'm brilliant. Might chop me hand off later, but that's a personal choice. Am I alright. Fuck, Silas, can you heal yourself any?"

[nonvenomous]

“I will in the baths.” Everything about the stoop of his posture and the sore hitch to his hip when he shifts his weight indicates this is where he is likely headed next. The only thing he is less interested in than the dagger is making a case for her to confide in Serah Stark.

“Please don’t chop your hand off without assistance.”

[poleaxed]

"That an offer?" Jone begins slowly to stand, offering him help on the way up. She's helping him there, that isn't (currently?) up for discussion.

[nonvenomous]

“Provided you’ve taken the time to think through the ramifications.”

Sore as he already is in places and a little addled besides, he welcomes the help with all the dignity he can muster along the way.

[poleaxed]

"Wish it weren't me main hand," Jone grumbles. "If I tell you it's done some other odd shite, what'll you do?"

[nonvenomous]

“I will reference research notes on known abilities associated with anchor shards to gauge whether or not we should worry.” Dick is reasonable, as ever, haggard and limping. “It might behoove you to work out what kind of stimuli are likely to cause a discharge in the meanwhile.” In the interest of not blowing her friends apart.

The look he slants up at her in aside isn’t quite shady.

[poleaxed]

"I didn't mean-" She groans. That sounded particularly childlike. I said I'm sorry! Andraste Almighty.

"And if I tell you, you'll keep it to yourself, yeah?"

[nonvenomous]

“If that’s what you prefer, yes.” Easy, unbothered by protest. She did say she was sorry. “Bursts of concussive force are not unheard of,” for the record.

[poleaxed]

Jone cocks her head to the side. "You been studying this? Or has your own hand-?"

She can't quite finish the sentence.

[nonvenomous]

“Not mine.”

Someone Else’s.

“Provided there are no negative side-effects, it should have a positive effect on your lethality in combat.”

[poleaxed]

"It's magic," Jone hisses, "I can't just go pissing that around. You can get away with it, you're serious. Respectable. I'm the Monster, remember?"

[nonvenomous]

Non-comprehension cinches at crow’s feet, pulling cracks into the blood cooling sticky at his temple. They’ve made good progress across the yard, but he stops to face her in the moonlight, one eye tooth shown just shy of a grin.

“Jone,” he isn’t so addled he can’t pause to be selective with his word choice, “what are you concerned they will do to you?”

He’d almost said afraid.

[poleaxed]

The afraid is implicit. She squares up, teetering on resentment. "Our god," she says, "ain't a fan of knowledge."

[nonvenomous]

It is a little cruel. Silas is a little cruel. Squared up on, he holds fast, for all that his posture lacks its usual poise. He keeps his voice quiet to match hers, kind in that one very specific way.

There is potentially something here he hadn’t realized before, or hadn’t thought too hard on.

“After Corypheus is defeated?”

In that unlikely event?