Incline 33: Hrurim

"HAHA! No." I let out, answering Heiya's request to sit in the front with her. Smacking the back of her head with a jokester's light touch, I shove her on ahead. The poor girl wounds me with such a rude follow up gesture. I scoff and roll my eyes, going around the lorry's front.

"Everything all sorted?" Ivahstar asks, and I nod, smacking the bonnet of the lorry. My nod carries on as my smacks become a gentle caress of painted metal.

"Nin's all loaded and we're ready to go. Ship docks and off down the road." I say and my friend of many years gives a gruff noise. He shifts his head, getting his quills up defensively and warding off my hand. I give a quick pout and tap his door back towards the lorry. A smirk grows across my face as his not-so quiet mutters reach me.

Patting around my coat, I pull out one of the cigars I nabbed from Don Vyacvan's office. I let the fine thing go along my nose and I take in a deep, nauseating breath. My eyes water and I cough myself into a spitting frenzy. This is certainly the good stuff!

Going to need the window open, however. Blowing the back end of the lorry up with cigar smoke will turn us into a fog machine. Can't have that when the driver needs to have his vision free and able. There's also the issue of magic contents.

So close to a buyer... Ivahstar will beat me black and blue, pale me up and black and blue me again. Ah, I hate window smoking. Ruins the clouds and the build-up. Still, finally being on our way is a cause worth celebrating, and I am not at all impatient.

I open up the lorry and hop into the back with my hand lingering on the latch. A hand comes slipping down to pull out my knife. Its edge saws into the cigar and I get a fine grip, slicing on through the rest of the way. The chunk of cut-off cigar lingers on the knife, and I flick it away. Lorry doors close at my behest, and I cut myself a window into the tarp.

One hand grips the trailer frame, and I lean towards it. The sounds of movement and the feelings of it rattle me up. My lighter comes out and becomes my only bit of light for the time being. The cigar takes a moment to light, but when it does... It's glorious. So much heat and smoke right at the start with no huffs from me!

"You're looking quite chipper, hm?" Nin goes, his shell barely able to catch the faintest lick of the flame's light. Even less of the embers as the end of the cigar balances itself out. I hold off on answering his word and let in a deep breath. My chest swells with more than just air, and I happily sigh it all out.

It takes me down all the way to a pair of truly empty lungs. My next breath backwashes too much smoke back into me. Everything becomes all the more mellow and I snicker to myself. If only cigars of this quality were easier to come by. If only cigars were better and easier on the baggage, too. Regular pack of smokes will do me fine, but treating myself certainly makes me doubt my habits.

"Finally, on the move again. Finally, on our way to dealing with Gamtambo. No more dealing with a gods-damned phone line." I answer, eagerly sighing the first two details. The last bit comes out as a miserable mutter. Hate is too kind of a word to refer to my time at that damn phone. Being entirely honest with myself, too, I loathe the fact we're still with Nin.

Don Vyacvan not got an interest in a human-souled osibindah? He certainly prodded Nin for details back at the tower. Should've charged him a taster fee or something. Still, can't complain about the breakfast he offered in the morning. Got me right full, that tasty brunch did. 

"You know, odd as it is for me to say. I've enjoyed our talks." Nin goes, his mood too light for his circumstances. I blink, putting a pair of free fingers to my eyes and squeezing. I knock my fist on the tarp, clearing the cigar of some ash. For only a second, I watch it vanish in the darkness-drowned wind of the underground.

"Who in All-That-Remains enjoys being a slave?" I ask, my bafflement enough to hold me back from huffing another smoky load. My eyes meet Nin's and he keeps the look up. Not a moment of anything coming to those slits of his. I glare a bit, trying to egg something other than this mellow mood. Well, isn't he a bore compared to the usual slave?

"Talks, not circumstance." Nin corrects, his bug things chittering away. I try to drown it out with a busy, tapping away foot.

"Ah, shove it where the light don't shine." I tell him, not in the mood at any point for any level of pedantic semantics.

"You mean like the underground?" he asks, chuckling to himself and I huff a smirk.

"Walked right into that." I let out.

"More like drove." Nin quips way too quickly for me.

"I hate you..." I let out, going breathless and the bad joke gets me at the worst time. It carries on, making a mess of my nose and then sleeve. I whip the offended arm somewhat clean.

"Mm." Nin goes, the silence not even getting a minute to properly settle in. Well, as quiet as it can be for an on the move lorry with a conversing pair of hwardgon in the front. How appalling. Me and Heiya get along so well and Ivahstar is a friend of many years. And here they are, enjoying themselves without me while I do all the work!

The nerve... The nerve of leaving me to babysit in a moving vehicle!

"How much are you even hoping I'll fetch?" Nin asks and I blink, not sure why he can't recall. I guess we never spoke about it before him? Or did all the welding and metal work for his cage deafen him? Eh, guess it doesn't matter. All the more moments to waste away with something other than a smoke break.

"Enough to cover our debt. Or, rather, lost item debt. Not technically needed, but it's what Ivahstar wants. I guess." I tell him, considering a few things I'm not all that sure about. If news about Ivahstar specifically can reach Gamtambo, then the earthquake most certainly did. Gods above and out of sight, they'll hear about it first. All the officers and all the made-men.

"Hurtful. And here I thought I was supposed to make you all rich for a lifetime." Nin says, one of his claws dinging the stolen construction steel bars. I glance his way out of unwarranted worry. A shrug lifts my shoulders and I shake my turning head.

"Ha. Got enough in stashes already to cover that. Shame it's too much of a backache to collect it all." I explain, thinking about all the places I can directly recall. Who knows how many I've forgotten about or have been broken into? So long as I remember the directory, however, I'll never lose them all. Keep it in my head and in a right emerald-rich slab of stone on me person.

I take in another huff from the cigar and knock more ash off. The smoke clogs my nose and my mouth opens halfway through the breath. Three holes of smoky air go away, never to be seen again. The awfully unfresh cavern air comes back inside and I grumble over nothing. Getting so damn pale in this underground land.

"So, how did you meet these two? Heiya shot me and dragged me into a slave trade. Ended up like this not long after." Nin goes, his attempt to strike up the next conversation topic burning out already. My heart won't let this stranger anywhere near that close, and I most certainly don't want him near. My affairs are my own. Especially with Ivahstar.

"On a job." I answer, keeping it quiet for him and me as my thoughts refuse to move.

"Guess we share a common history, then!" he goes, the cage shaking for more reasons than a non-existent bumpy road. I glance out through my makeshift window and eye the stone. A firm 'huh' leaves me and I'm somewhat impressed by it. For a smuggler's route, this is well looked after!

All the stuff on the surface is muddy tracks and trodden grass. Maybe a painted sign that won't last an hour. Guess it's because it's harder to track smugglers underground. Certainly not easier to smuggle with how unending the maze of tunnels is. No wonder the Ibenoroccons and their Water-Vein colonies are so independent. Certainly imagine that causes some friction with the hwardgon. Agadton is actually a target if they come by.

"So... This Smiling Jhurack fellow, what exactly was all that about?" I find myself asking and Nin's mood for once shifts. The shadows of his smile straighten out and my imagination can't even bring it back. None of him is suave and cool anymore, it's all tight and wound. A stress toy that needs something to squeeze itself.

"A criminal I defeated. Nothing more." Nin answers, his words far too cold in tune to fit his choice of words. Defeated? Sounds like he wanted to utterly murder the madman. Gamtambo's the same any time he's near Ivahstar even as a simple name.

"Was an interesting thing to have drip down the circles. Finding out Thrurstradtur-Suhurlodst lost its main problem." I say, taking in another huff from my cigar.

"I imagine so." is all Nin seems to have to say.

"He's like Ivahstar, in a way. One of those people with those immense reputations that you can't believe. Though, I guess with your track record... Smiling Jhurack really was just that." I waffle and Nin's head moves in the dark. If Nin was needed to handle that earthquake-making giant, then Smiling Jhurack certainly fit the reputation. Such an odd thing for a serial killer of all things to have.

"That bastard really was his name." Nin goes, his voice teetering close to something vicious.

"Gamtambo's like that down here. He's that mafia boss everyone knows about. The world-class singer we all hear the tune of no matter where we go." I say, pursing my lips and shifting my jawbone as a few things weigh me down. Mental nonsense can certainly be a taxing mass, utterly weightless as it is.

"But Ivahstar is why that name is so well-known?" Nin asks, his thoughts as sharp as ever, even with his degraded health.

"Yep... Yep." I repeat a couple times clearly, a couple times more barely incompressible.

"Well, aren't I lucky to have been enslaved twice by that man?" Nin goes, his sarcasm not lost on me even with his tone not having much energy to it.

"Lucky is certainly a word right now." I say, taking in more of my cigar and watching it fade away into embers. So much in one huff that it falls apart of its own accord. Right down my front and onto my shoes. I snort and scrape some of it into the floor out of boredom.

"Given where you lot found me, luck is certainly the word." Nin says and I nod, my body having nothing but a treasure trove of 'agreement' for him. Giant of that scale and he survived? Well done indeed. Doing so with no magic left in his system? Bloody bravo. 

Certainly would be bloody if I didn't pop in with the other two at the right time. Then again, we'd be further along this nonsensical revenge trip if we didn't. Earthquake should've happened a long way away. We'd be closing in on Gamtambo if that was the case...

"Get this mess done and dusted." I mutter, sighing myself into a scrunched up mouth. 

"I hope whoever buys me, he doesn't gut and stuff me." Nin remarks, his ears having not picked up my words or his mind not caring for them. I shrug and cling to his voice, not wanting to get bogged down too much in the job.

"Nah, no one's going to bother with that. Too much trouble. Besides, how can anyone prove your value if you're stuffed? So much is right here, in this!" I point out, huffing and smirking about his concerns as he continues to show off where his value is.

"Still... Fancy scary animal. An osibindah, of all things? I'd make one fancy mantlepiece." Nin jokes and I shake my head, heading over to his cage. Wobbling about in my steps, I ground myself away from the lorry's momentum.

"No one's going to put a magicless thing like you at the centre of their collection. We might turn to clay as we die, but that doesn't mean the magic doesn't linger. Your value is in you being alive. We wouldn't be that if you were at all as you are." I tell him, prodding the beast and getting nothing but an annoyed chitter in response.

"Shove off!" he goes and I laugh.

"All you can do is make that demand!" I tell him, knocking him up again with all the love and care I give to a fragile parcel.