Clare (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
demisemidemon) wrote2012-04-17 09:09 pm
demisemidemon) wrote2012-04-17 09:09 pm
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Rubel finds her while she's washing from another job. He's human, with no yoma aura, so he can sneak up on her; Clare can't sense him coming. He spends a bit of time in smug reminders of what she already knows -- he wouldn't be Rubel without the smugness -- and then, while she dresses, he gives her her new orders.
The deaths started less than a month ago in the town of Strah, but 27 people have already died. That's too many.
Either it's very hungry, Rubel smirks, or there's more than one yoma involved. Sit tight, he tells her. The others will arrive in five days. They'll take the yoma down in a group.
"How many people will die in the meantime?"
"Well..." Rubel shrugs, unconcerned. "Two or three, I suppose."
Clare sheathes her claymore and clicks her pauldrons into place. Two or three is too many, too.
She starts walking.
"Leaving already, Clare?" She can hear the amusement in his voice, and the sharp watchfulness that always underlies it. Rubel's job isn't just to collect money.
She doesn't care.
"I don't like waiting," she says, without turning. "I'd rather finish the jobs quickly. That's all."
"Heh." She can picture his tight lizardy smirk, the dark glasses that hide his eyes and the dark hat that shades his face. "Go, then. It's our job to hunt yoma. What you do with your life is up to you."
There are five yoma.
One has wings.
It's a hard fight.
Rubel smirks at her afterward. (Rubel always smirks. But sometimes, like now, there's more smugness than usual in it.) "So you survived," he says.
Clare has never understood his love for stating the obvious.
She wants to wash off all this reeking blood, not deal with Rubel. "The job is done," she tells him, since he likes the obvious so much, and starts walking again. "Go collect the money for five yoma."
"Ohh," drawls Rubel, pretending surprise, with a sharp glint in his smiling eyes. "You fought five yoma. Not bad." It's more than not bad, especially for a warrior as low-ranked as Clare, but she's never expected praise from him. Not sincere praise, anyway. Luckily, she's never wanted it. "How noble of you to risk your life for these ungrateful villagers and fight alone against a pack of yoma." Clare doesn't stop walking, but she does turn enough to watch him over her shoulder. Rubel's light, amused voice is full of calculation. "Was it because when you remember your old self, you feel drawn to help?"
Rubel knows something of why Clare became a Claymore. Teresa's death; the yoma that terrorized Clare, the village that kicked her out. Teresa protected her, loved her, died in front of her. Clare would have given anything to keep Teresa, in any way she could have, and Clare knew as a child that human life was helpless life.
Rubel knows something of Clare's reasons, but she has no desire to give him any more information. He already has enough.
It was the organization that killed Teresa, after all.
"Like I said," she says, without turning around, "I'd rather finish the jobs quickly. That's all."
She leaves, and Rubel doesn't stop her.
The deaths started less than a month ago in the town of Strah, but 27 people have already died. That's too many.
Either it's very hungry, Rubel smirks, or there's more than one yoma involved. Sit tight, he tells her. The others will arrive in five days. They'll take the yoma down in a group.
"How many people will die in the meantime?"
"Well..." Rubel shrugs, unconcerned. "Two or three, I suppose."
Clare sheathes her claymore and clicks her pauldrons into place. Two or three is too many, too.
She starts walking.
"Leaving already, Clare?" She can hear the amusement in his voice, and the sharp watchfulness that always underlies it. Rubel's job isn't just to collect money.
She doesn't care.
"I don't like waiting," she says, without turning. "I'd rather finish the jobs quickly. That's all."
"Heh." She can picture his tight lizardy smirk, the dark glasses that hide his eyes and the dark hat that shades his face. "Go, then. It's our job to hunt yoma. What you do with your life is up to you."
There are five yoma.
One has wings.
It's a hard fight.
Rubel smirks at her afterward. (Rubel always smirks. But sometimes, like now, there's more smugness than usual in it.) "So you survived," he says.
Clare has never understood his love for stating the obvious.
She wants to wash off all this reeking blood, not deal with Rubel. "The job is done," she tells him, since he likes the obvious so much, and starts walking again. "Go collect the money for five yoma."
"Ohh," drawls Rubel, pretending surprise, with a sharp glint in his smiling eyes. "You fought five yoma. Not bad." It's more than not bad, especially for a warrior as low-ranked as Clare, but she's never expected praise from him. Not sincere praise, anyway. Luckily, she's never wanted it. "How noble of you to risk your life for these ungrateful villagers and fight alone against a pack of yoma." Clare doesn't stop walking, but she does turn enough to watch him over her shoulder. Rubel's light, amused voice is full of calculation. "Was it because when you remember your old self, you feel drawn to help?"
Rubel knows something of why Clare became a Claymore. Teresa's death; the yoma that terrorized Clare, the village that kicked her out. Teresa protected her, loved her, died in front of her. Clare would have given anything to keep Teresa, in any way she could have, and Clare knew as a child that human life was helpless life.
Rubel knows something of Clare's reasons, but she has no desire to give him any more information. He already has enough.
It was the organization that killed Teresa, after all.
"Like I said," she says, without turning around, "I'd rather finish the jobs quickly. That's all."
She leaves, and Rubel doesn't stop her.