[We're in Black Peak! It's sometime after the fight with Ye Olde Undead Baron Who Is now Dead or ReDead Or wahtever the phrase is. Ethan is back in the training room, as is his wont, practicing intently. MINI START!] * Ethan is dressed in his normal battle gear, having only stopped to clean up and put on a pair of non-bloody, non-torn pants before heading to the training room. Not acceptable, Ethan... not acceptable at all. You let that flying sword surprise you, you barely even touched the Baron... * Ethan launches into a fast, vicious series of spinning katas, berating himself all the while. "Can't afford to do that. Others are counting on you to be their meat shield, soak up damage and attention while they do their thing... Sei'n Ada got royally messed up, Nebrinel got hurt... not good enough!" * Nebrinel walks into the room in the middle of Ethan's little tirade, her previously damaged grey cloak looking, now, no worse for the wear, nor does the rest of her clothing seem to be showing much of the scars of the fight. The two most noticeable things are a slight flush to her cheeks and a complete lack of Plaguebringer strapped to her hip. * Ethan stops his katas and starts pulling throwing axes off of his back, bouncing them off the walls so they rebound back at him and deflecting them away. "Can't get lazy... can't get complacent... they're all counting on me... not gonna fail..." * Ethan bats the last of the axes into the air, catches it, and turns to Nebby. "Feeling better?" * Nebrinel smiles at Ethan. With no actual thinness or smirky to it. "No more so than you, it seems." * Ethan wipes his forehead, and nods. "Lousy day all around, except for the not dying part." * Nebrinel licks her lips and then her hand falls to her swordless hip. "You would be surprised. Compared to last time, it was excessively tame." Nearly being posessed by a psychotic sword benton world desctuction is tame? You lead one hell of an exciting life. * Nebrinel smirks now. "Last time, it hurt more, it came closer to succeeding, and I had to be assisted back to my room by Fyril." The smirk fades. "Still, a failure." Well, I'm in no position to criticize. I can't really claim to never have fallen under the influence of an outside force and gone berserk. Starting to remember bits and pieces of that... not fun. * Nebrinel laughs very faintly. "Pieces? Interesting. But that isn't what I meant by failure." She walks over to practice weapon's rack and pulls off an elven greatsword. Was like every creeping, nagging doubt I've ever had suddenly all coming out at once, at a hundred times the volume. * Ethan pauses. "I assume you mean the failure to complete Plaguebringer." * Nebrinel stops mid-pull and says, "Interesting. Perhaps Plague and our demoness friend share recipe cards. And somewhat, yes." She finishes the pull and strolls all billowy-like over to a practice dummy. Well, I'm obviously no expert, but if you wanna control someone, you take advantage of their fears, their paranoias... Mine were... rather obvious. So were yours, actually. * Nebrinel smirks thinly and hops from foot to foot in front of the dummy. "Your perceptiveness is astonishing. If only it did not speak the truth so often." She begins to circle around the dummy and strike at it, rapidly, but it seems that most of her effort is not going into the strikes, but the dance-like movement. Well, I dunno what your issues are with Xivilai specifically... if it goes beyond the whole 'Ambition cannot abide ambition' idea... but she'd be a pertty good person to be paranoid about, given her power. * Nebrinel continues circling. Crack crackity crack goes the sword on the dummy. "You are a tool, Ethan. To them, you are a tool. I am a tool. Things to be used and discarded." A thin smirk can be seen on her face. "And no, we are not particularly fond of each other." To Xivilai, sure, I'm a tool. To Ada... I dunno. Maybe yes, maybe no. I'm leaning towards no... but those nagging doubts I mentioned ain't going anywhere. * Nebrinel does a slide step, arcing slash, spin, slices, smooth motions, yet somehow off, now. "They never do, Ethan." Well, duh. Warriors are, by definition, paranoid creatures. s'what keeps us alive. That danger sense that lets us dodge the guy coming up behind us with a knife... just well honed paranoia. * Nebrinel 's hits start getting harder against the dummy, her hair whipping around as she moves faster. "It's also what gets you alone, misereable, searching only for the next fight, the next ounce of clarity!" With a final crack on the dummy's head, Nebrinel stops moving, and says, "Were you trained to live, or to die slowly, Ethan Swordbreaker?" * Ethan grins. "Thre are some who'd say all life is just a slow death." And I was trained to kill, actually. I trained myself to live. * Nebrinel runs her finger along the blade of her sword. "Then why do you spend so little time living?" Got no life to live. My entire life's back in Urik. Right now, all I got's the fighting. I wanna live, I gotta finish the fight first. So I train. A lot. *pauses; smirks* Only way this plain ol' human can keep up with you damn mages. * Nebrinel runs her finger along the back edge of the blade now. "Damn mages, damn archers. Is there anything that isn't dammned besides a piece of cold steel slicing through the flesh of your foe?" Food. A comfortable bed. Love, maybe? Used to have all three consistantly. Now... got the first in spades, the second periodically... and only faint sightings of the third. * Nebrinel smirks thinly. "That seems to be the way of love, maybe." She raises her sword again at the dummy. "Elven fights can take more than your lifetime. Ten times more. Have you ever considered that? The life you're looking for might never come." She starts up again but this time, pieces of the dummy are being chipped off. * Ethan raises an eyebrow. "And who says this is an elven fight? Maybe I'm the main character in this little story." And if the life I'm looking for never comes... well, almost had it once, and lost it. Maybe you only get one shot at it. *pauses* If that's the case, I'll just have to settle for the food and the comfy bed, ne? * Ethan downs a coupla donuts. * Nebrinel chips away at the dummy some more. "Always a shame to settle." She chuckles. "A story, though. That's an amusing concept." Be nice to think that I'll do something with my life people will remember me for. Not my goal in life, but it'd be a nice little bonus. * Nebrinel stops swinging for a second. "I have known a few human storytellers in my time, Ethan. None of them would enjoy any of this as a story. This is real life. This is a history." * Ethan falls silent for a bit. "... when you were going nuts, you major worry was that Xivilai, and by proxy Ada, were scheming to snatch power away from you. That sound about right?" * Nebrinel turns on Ethan and narrows her eyes. "You're very inquisitive today, Swordbreaker. And what scheming? The second she does not need as many able bodied people with Great Weapons as possible, I will be lucky to take seven breaths." Well, then, I have a proposition for you. Why Ethan, I thought you would never ask. * Ethan downs three cookies, chews thoughtfully, swollows, and starts twirling his glaive idly. * Nebrinel swings her practice sword up to rest on her shoulder. * Ethan smirks. "Don't flatter yerself." Pretty simple, really. I don't need to. We both know you're not sticking with this little group because you wanna fight the good fight, or that you really care about the fates of any among our group. You want power. Fair enough. Not my thing, but a damn good motivator. * Nebrinel smirks thinly but doesn't speak up. Xivilai promised to help you get that power, in exchange for your help. Thus, I have an interest in making sure both sides live up to their sides of the bargain. You may be dour, grumpy, and ill-tempered, but you're damn good in a fight. * Ethan strokes his goatee. "So here's the deal. You swear not to try'n harm anyone in our little group, in any way, unless in self-defense. In return... you have my word that, should Xivilai..." *pauses* "... or any working for her try to double cross you, I'll have your back." * Nebrinel laughs. "A promise, Ethan? What promise? What double cross? Do you not understand that there are no such things for Xivilai?" She promised nothing to me, and I promised her nothing of consequence. ... okay then. Lemme rephrase. * Nebrinel looks right down into Ethan's eyes. "Don't bother. I'm not out to hurt the girlfriend you fumble for, or Sei, or you. In fact, the number of times I have put my neck on the line for you all would be appalling to anyone with common sense." * Ethan walks up to Nebby, plants the blade of his glaive into the ground, and stands on the back of the spork-point of his glaive so that his face is even with Nebby's. "As long as you got my back, and the backs of the people in our groups, I got your back." (Ha.) You want power? Fine with me. * Nebrinel brings her eyes up as Ethan pops up in height. "You have no idea what I want." * Ethan narrows his eyes. "Doesn't matter. If you want it, as long as it doesn't involve ruling or destroying the world, I'll do my best to help you get it." * Ethan leans in, so he's almost nose-to-nose with Nebby. "But if you ever... EVER... do anything to hurt anyone in our group, except in self-defense, I swear by all my ancestors I'll find a way to stuff your entire body into that nifty Pocketspace in your cleavage, even if I have to do it piece by piece." * Nebrinel smirks thinly. "How thoughtful of you to be imaginitive." * Ethan hops down from his glaive, and pulls it out of the ground. "I try my best." m'serious, though. For once. Play this straight, and you got one hell of a fighter watching your back. Don't play it straight... * Nebrinel shakes her head and says with intense sarcasm. "Straight, Ethan? Remember, I am not the one who stabbed, nor have I used a spell to attack anyone, nor did I leave when faced with overwhelming odds, nor did I leave you to die at the hands of oncoming assassins, nor did I, despite being faced with a threat Ada did not think I could take, harm a single hair on her head." True enough. We both know, though, that if you thought I was standing in the way of what you wanted, you wouldn't hesitate to go through, or over me. m'just letting you know that, as long as what you want doesn't trample over our little group, I'm with you. And warning you that the reverse is true. * Ethan grins. "I wish we could all just trust each other... but we're both warriors. We know better." * Nebrinel says, obviously without her heart in it. "Good to know the paranoia serves you well, Swordbreaker." She swings her sword down to rest its wooden point in the ground. Once you've been betrayed by your own flesh and blood, you start taking a rather pessamistic view of human - and elven- nature. But don't worry, Nebrinel! Despite the fact that I don't particularly like or trust you, and know that the reverse is true, I'll protect you. *grins* S'what I do. S'my life. * Ethan turns and walks out, whistling and twirling his glaive. * Nebrinel smiles a little and doesn't respond as he walks out. Once he's gone, she takes the sword and hangs it up, sighting before saying softly to herself, "Certainty confers clarity. Doubt yields wisdom. Sometimes, I wish you were wrong, Zarias." [Session End!]