Spies vs. House Party (Closed)

[notathreat]

WHO: Yseult, Ellie
WHAT: Yseult takes Ellie on what should be a fairly low-risk mission to infiltrate a house party. There are minor complications.
WHEN: Mid-Justinian
WHERE: Hossberg
NOTES: May contain sexuality talk and vague references to sexual violence. Spiritual successor to the Minrathous Debrief.

Comments

[notathreat]

Yseult really doesn't see it the same way. Ellie's lips part, and for a moment she's left truly speechless, because- how can she explain?

"Yeah," she says finally. "I did. But-"

Ellie pauses there again, fumbling through her own thoughts. And maybe it's an indication of things, but she has to close her fingers into a fist so that they won't shake. It's not Yseult, never Yseult, but even talking about it's hard.

"I can tell myself that all I like. It still feels the same."

[hassaran]

Yseult resists the urge to say does it matter how it feels? because she can see all the signs that this will not go over well with Ellie and she is, if nothing else, a fanatical believer in practicing what she preaches.

"Is it men in particular? Or that it was unexpected?" she asks, brows angled in question. She explains: "It's important to understand, in case similar situations arise in the future."

[notathreat]

It's the right call.

Ellie frowns to herself again, chewing over the thoughts before she puts them into the world, giving them shape.

"I could probably handle it with a woman," she says haltingly. "I wouldn't want to, but I don't think I'd panic either."

It's not the same kind of threatening, somehow.

............hi

[hassaran]

Again with that want. It pricks at something in Yseult's jaw, but she ignores it, posture static, hands loosely clasped where they dangle from wrists in front of her knees, weight on her forearms. She does angle her head forty-five degrees or so when she asks, with less of a preceding pause for thought this time:

"Do you want to kill people?"

This one is not a rhetorical question.

literally was just thinking about this thread lmao

[notathreat]

Wants are a luxury they can't afford with the job that they have, and ultimately it won't stop Ellie from doing what needs to be done. But this question? It's not an angle Ellie was expecting. The frankness of it makes her step back and consider it in total seriousness.

"Specific people? Yeah." It's an ugly, honest answer.

"But I've killed people I didn't want to kill, too. I didn't lose control."

Ellie's proven that to Yseult personally.

"Look, it doesn't matter how I feel," Ellie says, as flatly as she can manage, though Yseult will easily see that it's taking a lot of effort to do so.

"I'm telling you this because I don't want to fuck up a mission by accidentally killing somebody that we need alive."

I sensed it somehow

[hassaran]

"And it is good to know that is something I need be concerned about," could be criticism, but Yseult's tone is only matter-of-fact. It is information she needs even if it isn't information she likes. (That there are some specific people Ellie'd like to kill isn't either, really; those people are likely through a rift and who doesn't know a few bastards who deserve the knife?)

"We can avoid sending you on missions likely to require seducing men, but it won't be possible to avoid the occasional unexpected situation like today's. You will need ways to manage them other than killing."

the universe Knew

[notathreat]

Traveling alongside Joel, Ellie had learned from the beginning to be honest about handicaps, about injuries, about sickness. When someone was depending on you, they needed to be able to compensate and cover. Joel was hard of hearing in his right ear, and Ellie knew to guard that side.

It might be embarrassing to have to explain her weakness to Yseult, but Ellie knows better than to keep it to herself. Things had worked out today, but if Ellie had been alone, it would have been a lot trickier.

She nods slowly, hooks one foot behind her ankle to spare herself the ache of the delicate heeled slippers.

"What do you suggest?" she's got a few ideas already- fast talk, fast hands, judicious use of her powers. It's easier to kill somebody than it is to disable them without a killing blow. It will require more skill in other areas to keep Ellie out of this situation.

[hassaran]

Yseult considers her hands a moment. She doesn't often have to discuss methodology or even think much about it, the lessons she was taught long converted to instinct.

"Learn how to deflect, and how to make yourself unattractive in ways that seem unintentional. Reading a man and giving him what he doesn't want so he chooses to withdraw. How to use sleeping draughts. If I'd been better prepared here I'd have drugged the brandy and he would have awoken in an hour disheveled and cursing himself for drinking so much he couldn't remember us."

[notathreat]

Ellie sinks into her seat, wrinkling her skirts deplorably before she puts out a hand to smooth them.

"When we get out of here, definitely show me how to make sleeping draughts," she says with a glimmer of a smile.

"And how to put somebody off, actually. I broke a guy's finger once and it only made him worse."

[hassaran]

Yseult exhales a soft snort of amusement at this. "Has a man ever expressed an interest without it ending in violence?

[notathreat]

Ellie thinks... and then thinks still more. Because it's hard to say, which sounds really stupid when she stacks it up like this.

"The world I was in before this, yeah." Not her world, pointedly. It's in her file, that this isn't the first time she's fallen through to a different reality. It's the one she picked up her bit of divinity in.

"I worked as security for a bar called the Mermaid for a few months. Those were easy enough to handle. I'd just tell them I was working, and if they didn't believe me, I'd show them. But I don't think the same tactics are gonna work here."

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ idk i was just thinking about it but np if it's too dead

[hassaran]

Demonstrating that she was working security still sounds like violence, Ellie! The hint of bemusement remains. But "no, not often."

Yseult unlaces fingers to smooth a hand over a knee, fabric drawn taut and then released, potential future wrinkle eliminated. She may be about to beat a dead horse but they've got time to kill, too, and it's important.

"Often, the most effective method of navigating these situations is to feign interest. Say no and a man may fight to change that, but most will become complacent if they believe they've won you. And it isn't difficult to convince them, because they want it to be true. Being able to string their hopes along until you get what you need from a situation is invaluable. Like that man tonight; he'll unwittingly help conceal what we've done here because he believes I want to see him again."

<3

[notathreat]

Ellie's quiet, thinking it over, and unconsciously straightens her delicate skirts the way Yseult does, finding the ways to tug the fabric so it falls but straight and attractively. While she doesn't manage the effortless movement, the end effect is nice.

"... I've done that part. Long enough to get into stabbing range, anyway. It's just a matter of doing it for longer."