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Lae'zel looked straight ahead, eyes as sharp as her silver blade. She kneeled in the dirt, if only to have a softer fall. The blade she pressed in Tavs hand glimmered in the moonlight, as had it countless times before.
Tav stood behind her, hand in Lae'zels hair, dagger at her troat.
Lae'zel wasn't scared. She never was. She was Lae'zel of Crèche K'liir, and she would rather spill her own blood than become a filthy Ghaik.
Her resolve was steel. It had been forged under years of intense training, devotion and studies. She did not waver.
"I will not be ghaik. Vlaakith gha'g shkath zai!"
Her last words as she stared ahead in determination.
...Or, at least they were meant to be.
Lae'zel waits. First patiently, then impatiently.
Nothing. The blade touches the skin of her throat, yet it does not slit.
It trembles.
At first Lae'zel thought Tav just wanted to give her a modicum of privacy, to settle her thoughts, or something like that.
But after more seconds of anticipatory silence, Lae'zel smelled it. Hesitance. Gods, how she detested it.
She snarled, not looking up at Tav.
"Is'tark! You dare hesitate when the mindflayer spawn is upon us?" Her voice cut through the silence, angry, accusatory.
"Do it." Not a request, a command.
...
Unfortunately for her, Tav was not a seasoned warrior. Tav was, in fact, a crybaby.
The blade clatters to the earth below. Within a few second, Lae'zel heard...sniffling?
Yep, then full on crying. The weird istik that called itself Tav suddenly hugged her from behind. Lae'zel froze, utterly not expecting that. Tavs face went to the back of her neck, crying there.
"What in the name of- What in the nine hells are you doing, k'chakhi?! Let go of me at once of I will gut you like a-" Lae'zels struggle was interrupted by Tav's pitiful sobs.
"I'm sorry! I can't do it!" Another flurry of sobs that made Lae'zel cringe. "I can't kill you...hic, jus-just...not you."
That made Lae'zel pause. Not from tenderness, or because she felt touch, or because she changed her mind. But from pure confusion.
She struggled against Tavs pitiful hug, but her arms were locked tightly against Lae'zels, and with no space for movement, she was trapped.
"What is Vlaakith's name are you talking about? Why are you restraining me, unless you have a death wish? Why are you sobbing like a newborn hatchling? Speak, istik."
The words were spoken in an angry whisper, almost as if she did not want any of the other companions to find...whatever this was. She tried to push Tav off, but Tav was surprisingly strong.
"I can't! I don't want you to die!" Another pitiful sob against her back. Lae'zel thought this must be some kind of prank.
"Get. Off. You have known me for a whole three days, and yet when faced with the possibility I could turn into a vile tentacle monster that would end you in a heartbeat - you sob?!" Lae'zel was almost as perplexed as she was angry. This was everything Githyanki culture was not. Compassion, tears for another - it felt so wrong.
Yet Tav didn't let up, crying into Lae'zels back.
"I know! I'm a coward! A fool! I'm weak! I barely know you...but i can't let you! I can't let you die yet. We are not mindflayers yet, so we must live. You must." Tav sobs against Lae'zel.
For a moment Lae'zel considers if Tav hit her head too hard when falling from the ship.
Yet something in her also...stops. A sort of resignation. Her mind didn't change, but something about Tav crying so earnestly, hinting to hope of salvation, made her anger lessen.
She sat on her heels, not struggling anymore, looking straight ahead like before.
Her voice is quieter now—cold, but rounder at the edges. "Your hope and naivety will get you killed," she mutters. "if the roles were reversed you'd be long bled out in the dirt by now."
She turns her head slightly—just enough to look at Tav's tear-streaked face pressed into her armor.
"...You are soft," she says, almost accusingly, "and you’re weak. And I... am not dead. Not yet a Ghaik."
Another silence.
"...Fine." The word cuts sharp, like steel on stone. "Let us live then—if only until we prove it’s a mistake."
She doesn’t hug back. Of course she doesn't.
"The second I see a tentacle spawn from your mouth I will gut you. And you must do the same for me. You cannot hesitate." Lae'zel speaks harshly, and feels Tav nod against her.
Tav's tears slowly turn to hiccups and sniffles, yet she doesn't let go. Lae'zel doesn't ask her to. She's...tired. She lets Tav hold her, staring at the night sky above.
But a part of her, small and buried...is glad. Grateful to Tav. Her outburst had given Lae'zel another chance. A chance to find out what really laid behind the secrets of the infection, why they had not turned yet.
Lae'zel was determined to find out. And she would drag the crybaby with her.