knowthyexits | (no subject)

Sarah's surprised in how eager she is for these lessons.

The auction had brought multiple promising bids and she had made sure to distribute her chips amidst them all -- guns, self-defense, swords, other weapons -- because she knows all-too-well that allowing skills to rust will be dangerous. For all that her safety seems assured, she's too paranoid and too well-acquainted with disaster to know that it's gone forever. She'd had years of peace with Charley, but that had ended, as well.

It always ends, no matter how much you try and change fate.

She's even more glad that she's won something that her skills lack in. She can wield a knife with great expertise, but a sword is far different from that. She wants to be proficient in as many forms of fighting as she can manage. That's why today brings her a kind of joy that she hasn't felt since she learned to take apart a firearm as quick as she did.

She considers the sword in her hand carefully, hefting the weight up and down. "I'm going to have some very specific questions. They're just curiosities, though."

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She's momentarily surprised by the kindness and the trust given to her, but she reminds herself that here, not everyone is an enemy. Here, there are known substances and she can assess threats as they come. For the most part, there are few threats.

There are human elements that she's been shying away from and at some point, she needs to ask. "So, you know Cal," she finally says, her eyes on the knife after she catches it easily in one hand.

"As much as anyone on the island can claim to, yes," Ishiah replies with a nod, watching her closely. Arming an enemy with a blade is one thing, but offering too much information about a friend is quite enough. While Ishiah is pretty certain that Sarah isn't an enemy and doesn't mean Caliban any harm, he can't help but feel as though he needs to be careful regardless. Some people, he's found over the years, are particularly good about hiding their intent. And no matter how much he wants to relax on Tabula Rasa, the fact is that if anyone from their world arrives on the island, chances are that person will be out for Caliban's head.

(Ishiah can't even blame them for taking that stance. The Auphe are, indeed, a species everyone ought want extinct.)

"And I imagine a question is to follow that remark."

"I'm not really sure yet," she admits, wanting to be honest -- or as honest as she'll ever permit herself to be. "Cal seems to bring on a million questions and refute them, at the same time." In some ways, she's aware that she's the same and if he hadn't found her with the exoskeleton, he wouldn't have known. "How do I get him to stop doing something?" is the question she finally settles on. It's the easiest question to get an answer to.

Especially when there are questions that she's yet to even ask herself.

Edited 2011-07-29 01:55 (UTC)

Ishiah huffs the barest of a laugh, shaking his head upon knowing (or at least suspecting) what type of behaviors have probably led Sarah to ask this question. If there's one thing that Caliban does which surely rivals every bit of Ishiah's own ability, it's that of digging his heels into the ground. Both of them are the unyielding type, even if with respect to different areas.

"I'm afraid that the answer to your question depends," he begins, tilting his head almost as though in surrender. "What is it that you are trying to stop him from doing? There are some areas in which I would have you know that he is unlikely to yield regardless of what you do."

She clenches her fingers around the weapon a little tighter, pressing her lips together. She doesn't want to say this out loud, but she's willing to if it brings her closer to a possible solution. "How do I make him stop forcibly carrying me when he gets it in his head that I can't walk."

"I'm not the best with metaphors," Ishiah replies plainly, his lips pressed together in a firm line— while he doesn't blame Sarah for what seems, to him, like an attempt to hide the real matter at hand, he also doesn't have the time to waste throwing guesses in every which direction. "As I can see that you're perfectly capable of walking right now, I have to either assume that you're talking about a previous incident in which he tried to help you through mobility issues, or that you're trying to refer to something else entirely. If it's the latter, I'd much rather not dance around the topic."

"No, it's...it was neither. It has been neither," she says, sighing as she realizes that she shouldn't have brought it up at all. "He gets it in his head that I can't walk or won't walk somewhere and he picks me up and takes me there because he thinks he knows best," she goes on, a bit archly. "How do I make him listen to me?"

It's not difficult to see the exasperation in Sarah's tone, Ishiah feeling as though he's certainly felt along the same lines many times in the past few years. But there's just nothing to be done. There are ways in which any of them will end up digging their heels deep into the earth, and Ishiah's not sure that it's honestly any of his business to try to go about changing that. So, he shrugs lightly, his expression impassive, although his eyes are still sharp and observant, seeking every fleck of color in hers out, trying to read for the words between the lines.

"You don't," he replies frankly. "If you've asked repeatedly and if it's a perfectly reasonable request, yet he still shows resistance, you'd only find luck asking Niko or Robin for help. Neither is currently on the island."