fifthofthecovenant | The Last Voyages: IC Contact

Chase glowers at him from the bed. "No need to guess what my dear old dad told you, then," he says when he's given space to say something at all. Between the demeanor and the story, he's pretty sure he's got some disapproval going on, here.

Well, he can disapprove all he wants. Chase did what he had to.

"I wouldn't really care, if he'd killed his father," Wen Ning continues like Chase didn't say anything. "I suppose that makes me unfilial, but that was between them." Though the method probably didn't have to be so unsavory. "It's what lost him his favor, though, because when a man will turn on his own father, well, what else might he have done for power?" In that case, in Wen Ning's opinion, what troubled the powerful old men was that Jin Guangyao dared to go after his betters. But that's beside the point. "One awful old man earned him his place. Keeping it meant his wife, his son, a few of his brothers, what was left of the Wen Clan down to my grandmother, thirteen years with me as his assassin's blade, and I'll never know if he used me more than the once I know of. So. How far does a man who kills his father go for power?"

"As far as he needs to," Chase snaps back. Because that is the kind of man he is. The man who killed his father. Twice. And who was going to kill another boy for his power. He's awful, he gets it. "If you're going to be judgmental about it, you didn't have to bother bringing food to go with it."

Well, it isn't the food's fault. Honestly. "That's why you were so set on keeping me from being bound again? To protect me from men like you?" Because why would he bother if he thought it was a done thing, after all.

That's not where Chase expected that to go. He has to take a minute to find an answer, and the mask of anger cracks a little into uncertainty. "I mean, I was trying to protect you from Corvo, I knew he could do the possession thing, but-- yeah, I suppose so. This is a ship full of bad people, most of them with magic powers. It was only going to be a matter of time."

"Yes, I know what it would be for," he says patiently, though he still doesn't quite sound like himself. He's known people who were cruel just for fun, and that's not what he's seeing here. Jin Guangyao could be perfectly kind to people when he cared to. Did anyone ever ask him where the line was, and why? (Not Wen Ning, someone whose family the awful little sneak didn't wipe out.) Would it have made a difference? "Why take the trouble, though?"

Way to make things uncomfortable, Wen Ning. Chase scowls at him again, and he goes for the answer that, while (mostly) the wrong one, is the more "evil" one. Wen Ning is pushing on this. He gets the evil answers now. "To see if I could. To learn something new." There's always the thrill of discovery, stretching his magic to something it couldn't do before, but that wasn't the main reason.

Even then, he can't quite bring himself to say the really "evil" answer. He has no desire to figure out how possession works, if it has to be to Wen Ning, and he's pretty sure Wen Ning wouldn't believe him even if he tried to use that excuse.

In answer, Wen Ning turns as if he's going to fuss with the food again, but instead he gathers his hair in a loose fist and lifts it up. He doesn't really like looking like he just rolled out of bed, but he looks much more dead with his hair up, the angry black veins visible through thin skin. And it also hides details like the two jagged, thumbnail sized holes where the back of his skull meets his neck. They aren't bloody. He ran out of blood years ago. Just white and torn and deep. "Well, then. There you go. I don't think the nails are very hard to make. You could ask Xue Yang if you had any trouble."

Aaaand then Wen Ning goes straight to the most evil interpretation. Seeing the jagged holes does make him a little sick. The deaths he's caused on purpose have been clean, no blood, no wounds. He is perhaps a little bit squeamish after all.

So he rears back a little from the sight. "Oh my god, I don't want to put nails into you, Wen Ning! I want to keep people from putting nails into you! Or anything else!"

Wow, buddy, are you easy to bait. Wen Ning is a little disconcerted himself. He hides evidence like that for a reason. All his hoods and long sleeves and layers keep that particular vulnerability under control.

Worth it. How else would he have made his point? He lets the curtain of hair drop back down and turns. "For the thrill of discovery, of course."

Oh, if you have seen his movie, you know he is very easy to bait. He's just a little ball of emotions no matter how much he tries to hide it.

"Shut up, I was talking about figuring out how to do the protection," Chase snaps. "There'd be no point to figuring how how to possess you, because I don't want to."

"Oh, but you do want to protect." He's out of ideas, here, and he probably won't know where else to push until Chase has time to work his way through this round. "Eat your breakfast," he says simply, and heads for the door.

Chase kind of stares after him on consternation, but doesn't stop him. Anything to make this conversation end, really.

Though those nail holes are probably going to haunt him for a while. Can't they at least-- cover them up? Fill them in? Something?

He'll only get up to go eat said breakfast once Wen Ning has been gone for a little while. It's even starting to get cold. Ugh.

The Last Voyages: IC Contact

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