Private Barter, Banter, and Backstabs

[Alwine Bergen]

. : Some Market Place : .
: Literally Could Be Anywhere : ​

Alwine adjusted the small pack on her back as she stepped carefully through the bustling marketplace. Her eyes moved deliberately over the stalls, searching for some rare herb that Katrine had asked her to. She hadn't needed to say yes. After all, it had been almost a decade since had Alwine arrived at Figaro Fortuna IV, and had never left.

And why would she? For a few years, life had been everything she had wanted to be. She and Katrine had reconciled, which was a fancy was of saying Alwine did no longer see her as an enemy to be killed. It wasn't friendship, not exactly, but it was mutual respect. And after Kat had Larentia and Alwine married one of the Bergen brothers and had Aethelwulf and Wulfric, the children had become inseparable, making them all welcome in both houses. Alwine loved it. She had a strong feeling that Katrine did as well.

But enough time had passed. Alwine had a very general inkling as to what was happening in the galaxy, and was still weirded out by the fact that time on Figaro Vortuna passed slower than elsewhere, so that it had been a decade for her, while four decades for the galaxy at large.

The chatter around her now was a hum of foreign languages and bartering cries, a steady reminder that the galaxy kept turning, with or without her. She paused at a stall shaded by woven fabric, the vendor's wares a mix of colorful roots and dried leaves. Kneeling, Alwine began to sift through the offerings, careful to still the slight tremble in her fingers. It was just another day, she told herself. Just a quiet errand. Just an excuse to leave her children behind for a moment, and then come right back.

She glanced up, scanning faces without focus. The crowd felt dense but familiar.

Yet somewhere at the edge of her vision, a movement, quick, almost imperceptible, caught her attention. A heartbeat, a flicker of something in the eyes of a passing figure made her pulse quicken. But when she looked again, the person was gone.

Alwine shook her head, forcing a small, tired smile. Nothing but shadows playing tricks. This was what the mind did when one became stagnant for too long.

Absolutely nothing to worry about.

---

Lirka Ka​

 

[Lirka Ka]

Lirka Ka possessed a particularly bad habit of chasing ghosts. Darkness knew she was certainly plagued by them plenty - it was not a cheap hobby, info brokers demanded much and spies were not exactly her forte. Yet that did not stop her, few ghosts remained in her mind from the woman-who-was-once-Lirka-Ka but there still remained one. One who had touched even her monstrous form in her fledgling state.

Alwine Bergen

It had been many years, oh so many years, but to a Sephi mind such decades were little more than droplets in a long and murderous life. That is why the wound felt so fresh, scorned by what should have been the beasts only friend. It compelled her to hunt, to seek, to satisfy the thoughts of what was and what could be. Command certainly wouldn't like it, by most metrics an Imperator of her standing should not have been indulging in such...petty ventures in the middle of nowhere.

Yet, her she was. In this teeming mass of unworthy life, it reminded her of some piddly parody of the great bazaar upon the Darklight yet these were people unburdened by the weight of duty, walking through their lives without ever having that inkling of their capability to be greater. It was repulsive, in its own way. But she was not here for the teeming masses, her pursuits were more focused today.

Even her massive form could be hidden in the thickness of life around the pair, she skulked, she stalked, she weaved between the dark and shadowy places of this bazaar. For her bulk, Lirka was always more agile than she let on. Till eventually, slit-lenses fell upon her quarry. A flash of wicked amusement beneath her helm - the best part about chasing ghosts, was when you actually found them.

Thump. Thump. Thump. Servos whirred, heavy metal footfalls thudded against the earth as the sea of people parted in her wake. It had been long, so long that Lirka had been broken down, remade, time and time again. Mordinae seemed like a distant prospect now, little more than the start of her dark path to damnation. Her form uncanny from what it was, but an artist always kept their motifs. But despite the many years, and her nigh-unrecognizable form, one thing had stayed the same - her voice.

As alien as ever, accent thick, behind it that certain malice of a murderer unrepentant mixed with the glee of finally seeing an old "friend".

"Hello, Wolf."

 

[Alwine Bergen]

Thump. Thump. Thump. People were running away and screaming. Alwine, was not. By the gods, she was back in the galaxy proper for less than an hour and already it was as though the clock had never ticked.

Alwine's spine remained straight as a blade as she crouched by the stall, her finger releasing the dried herbs she had held but a moment ago. She wasn't reading anymore. And her heart was not racing; she'd long since learned to train that reaction out of her body, and yet the tension that was pulling tightly between her shoulder blades could not, would not be denied. A very familiar, very specific kind of tension.

She stood. No rush, no need for sharp movements. She dusted her hands off her on her coat, first the left, then the right, because routine helped her keep calm and carry on.

And there Lirka Ka was.

Even if Alwine hadn't recognized the voice, the sheer presence would've given her away. Towering. Armored. Built like a monument carved by someone who believed subtlety was a weakness. Lirka Ka had always taken up more space than any one person should. It seemed time had only reinforced that trait.

But for all the metal, all the weaponry, all the monstrous refashioning… Alwine saw her. The echo of a woman who'd once been a comrade, then an enemy, then, perhaps, something in between.

Alwine tilted her head, expression unreadable. Calm, cold, sharp as mountain air.

Her gaze moved deliberately, dragging from the helm down to the thudding metal boots, then back up again. She didn't flinch. She didn't step back. She'd fought Lirka once. More than once. And whether or not they were past that now didn't matter. What mattered was that Alwine remembered how.

"Jatha'la rewt uss," a nickname not spoken in a decade, her voice just barely above a whisper. There was no fear in it. Because Lirka Ka was not someone she wished to fear. You didn't fear old ghosts. You acknowledged them, and then reminded them you were still breathing.