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𝗕𝗢𝗗𝗛𝗜 𝗛𝗔𝗟𝗘
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀Well, that just happened.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀Riding the high of the blood he’d just mercilessly spilled—from two unplanned, innocent souls, no less—Bodhi nearly skipped down the dusty path littered with leaves leading to the Runalithe cave. Neither murder was supposed to happen, but why in the great Spirits of Runa would you send the appointed assassin to “scope things out”? It was laughable and silly, the whole thing, but Bodhi didn’t care why they sent him. They had, and he enjoyed himself thoroughly.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀Bodhi, lost in his mind, stopping paying much attention to where he was going exactly and almost passed up the cave. It was well-hidden behind a thick circle of bushes. Not quite conspicuous, but not the ultimate secret base either. It worked, though, as dark and dingy as it was. Bodhi dreaded returning to it. Dark, closed spaces never sat well with him.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀Heading towards the entrance and pushing the bushes aside, he stepped forward. Too late, he remembered there was a brief step down to descend into the cave. He slipped as he panicked, sliding ungracefully down the slope with an unmanly squeak. He’d done that when they first discovered the cave, too! Damn it! Why was he so clumsy even with the ankle balancer his brother had created for him years ago? Bodhi knew why—it was probably wearing off and in need of repairs. It was too difficult to remove it at all, nevermind allowing someone to touch it.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀He stood quickly, grateful that none of the Runalithe crew were at the entrance, gritting his teeth as he swiped his backside free of dust. He stormed through the spacious cave, passing the bunks and heading for the far side of the cave to reach the Lab Cavern. Nahri made her base there, so he stayed as far away as possible. Until he had to return one of her freaky ass devices, anyways.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀He side-stepped one of the thick stalagmites, peeking into the room. It was lit by the distant flowing pool and the glowing green moss on the cave walls. Cozy, but Bodhi wasn’t one to care about or give much notice to aesthetics. “Nahri,” he said, voice flat and obviously annoyed. He had no patience at that point, even as the thrill of his kills flowed through his blood, especially not for Nahri. She already hated him as it were, and he didn’t know how much of her asshole remarks he could take before his kill count rose to three.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀i am no stranger to the dark
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⠀⠀⠀ n a h r i⠀d ' c a t o e ⠀⠀⠀
She heard him before she saw him—of course she did. Bodhi moved like a cartoon character being dragged backwards through a haunted house. A scrape, a muttered curse, a very unassassin-like yelp.
Nahri didn’t look up from her work. The table in front of her was littered with scorched capacitors, a cracked soldering wand, and the sad, half-dismantled shell of the pulse frequency emitter she’d been recalibrating for the past three days. At the sound of her name, her hand twitched, and the tiniest crackle of static jumped between her fingertips and the copper wiring.
She’d already pulled at a blade from the wall when she heard the first thump at the mouth of the cave. Just in case. Always just in case.
The lab wasn’t much—some tables, a few crates, a soft trickle of water glowing faintly blue as it slithered down the rock wall like a lazy vein. The rest of the crew said it looked peaceful. If you could call a barely ventilated, glowing-moss-infested pit of wet stone a peaceful, but in a ship full of noise and people who took up too much space without asking, it was the closest thing she had to silence. No one came hear without a reason.
And Bodhi never had good ones.
A beat passed.
She heard the shift of boots. She smelled blood. And worse: burned metal. Oh. "You used it." Her tone was flat and accusatory. Nahri stood so fast her chair screeched backward across the cave floor.
She could picture it already. The flower-bloom spread of etched brass petals. The sickly shimmer of the countdown pulse. The way the rainbow threads of someone’s life would’ve bent—screaming—into the core before the final ignition left a husk on the ground. It would have been so hauntingly, gruesomely, horribly beautiful--and more importantly, she didn't have any copies. It didn't take a genius to figure he must have done something wrong.
She stared at the burnt capacitor in her hand like it might apologize. Her jaw clenched so tight it ached. It was custom-coded to his idiot brainwave signature. It had taken her six hours and two power outages to calibrate it because his neural patterns beyond something she had any understanding of, and just like that, it was ruined.
"For both our sakes," Nahri exhaled. Calm. She was calm. Collected. Peaceful. "I hope you have something to show for you incompetence." Otherwise Artemis would have both of their heads chopped off was what she didn't say.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀Bodhi leaned against the slimy ass cave wall that formed the doorway to Nahri’s even more slimy cave branch-off, a smug, disinterested look on his face as her chair screeched across the floor and she spat the words at him like venom.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀He stepped into the lab with all the grace of someone who wanted to be annoying, toeing aside a stray rock on the cave floor with a faint clink. The coppery scent of blood clung to him like perfume, and he didn’t try to hide it. Didn’t need to. That was the point, wasn’t it? Let her see what her precious gadget had done. Er, well, what the gadget enabled him to do, anyways.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀“I used it, yes,” he said, voice breezy. “Worked like a dream. Two less names on the list, though they weren’t technically on any list. So . . . call it a happy little accident. Although a list now would be nice, seeing as your weird gadget worked so well.” He raised a blood-stained hand to cover his mouth as he yawned dramatically, stretching with a luxurious moan after. As if he wanted to be annoying, as if that were his sole purpose for existing.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀He waited, savoring the quiet fury radiating from Nahri like heat off metal. There was something delicious about watching her try to contain it, like a kettle rattling just before the boil.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀“You should be proud,” he added with mock sincerity. “Your work was exquisite. One of the guys even pissed himself. Very theatrical,” he lied, aiming to piss her off even further. “You have everything to show for your work, not me,” he finished, nodding towards the gadget he had pulled out, gray particles floating inside. He held it in his palm like an offering, waiting for Nahri to witness the magic flitting about within.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀“But, if I die because you’re about to throw that at my face, please aim for the other side. This one’s still healing from last time,” he added, free hand forming high five in the air meant to separate him from Nahri, eyes glimmering with malice.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀i am no stranger to the dark
Nahri’s hand twitched towards the table, itching to strike him before her mind even caught up. She could feel her pulse stuttering against her throat and her chest felt impossibly tight. Everything was a mess. Bodhi had ruined her device. Her perfect, painstakingly hand crafted, masterpiece and he had the nerve to to joke around about it. His careless posture, his bloody hand, everything was pushing her closer to the edge.
Something about Bodhi always did that, always angered her, always made her want to lose her cool and lash out, dismantle him piece by piece and toss him into a pit of fire. See if the bastard could fix himself up when he was nothing but ash.
But she didn't. She reminded herself that restrain was a tool, and she refused to lose her cool in front of an idiot like him. She exhaled slowly, turning around to inspect the cylinder he held up, a visible mockery of everything she had built. She could almost feel the gray particles in the cylinder staring back at her. Fucking amazing job, Nahri, They were probably saying. This is what happens when you give other people freedom.
She dragged a hand over her face, wiped at the edge of her hairline, and then slowly, deliberately, took it from his hands and set the burned capacitor back on the table.
“Congratulations,” she said, voice low, clipped, and completely controlled. “You managed to turn someone else’s hours of work into… whatever the hell that is. Truly impressive.”
She paused, tilting her head just slightly towards the capacitator, listening to hum of energy emanating from it. She could hear a hiss probably coming out of the action, and the receiver was clearly busted, but what caught her eye was sharp edge jutting out of the grip. She grimly hoped he sliced his hand on it.
"Do you ever think before you press a button, or is that beyond your capabilities?" she finally asked, turning around to face him once more. "Did you even listen to a single word of instruction I gave you? Because I'm not going to be the one explaining to our dearest captain the reason everything is going is because you couldn't stop and use your head for even a second." Inhale. Exhale.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀Bodhi let out a low, teasing whistle, stepping closer with his usual slouching, devilish posture. “Alright, alright, calm down, genius,” he said, voice smooth and deliberately irritating. His grin was wide and sharp, unapologetic, like he knew exactly how much he was getting under her skin.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀He waved the gray-particle cylinder slightly in her direction, letting the faint glow reflect off his mischievous eyes. “I used it. It worked. I can’t help it if you made something defective. You look tired,” he started speaking, voice dripping with mock innocence. “Yeah, you look tuckered right on out, dearest, I don’t blame you. Who could?” Bodhi stated, raising a hand to press against her forehead. After all, she appeared to be sweating or at least a bit exerted. Whether he would get his hand chopped off and fed to him was another matter.
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Nahri didn’t think—her body reacted first. The moment his hand reached for her, her skin went ice-cold, stomach twisting, vision tunneling. She jerked back so fast her chair screeched against the floor and the corner of the table dug into her back, (view spoiler) grabbing his hand with her own and slamming it down on the table hard enough to rattle her tools.
“Don’t,” she snapped, sharp and defensive. Her fingers faintly tingled when she pulled them away, and the hum of the room suddenly sounded louder in her ears. And then—a pause. Her breath caught, and she realized that perhaps she might have been a touch too obvious in her irritation.
Shit. That was not a normal people thing to do. Normal people did not react like that, they did not assault their coworkers for physical touch (or at least she assumed they didn't) and judging by the ever annoying gleam in his eye, she had to do something before he read too far in her anxiety.
She let the silence stretch for a moment, blinking at him, trying to regain control of her thoughts. Then, with mechanical precision, she began pulling apart what was left of the burned-out device, her fingers moving faster than her thoughts.
“Okay,” she continued, voice clipped, “since you’re so determined to prove how little sense you have, you’re going to help me rebuild this. Sit. Down. Hand me the wrench.” She vaguely hoped he would excuse himself so she wouldn't have to deal with his continued nagging, yet at the same time, if he was going to screw with her work, he was going to have to undo the damage himself. Or well, at least watch her undo it.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀Bodhi didn’t flinch when his hand smacked the table. If anything, his smirk only intensified, eyes glinting with the kind of smug delight that he could only manage when Nahri looked like she wanted nothing more than to murder him. He leaned in a fraction closer, elbows resting on the table like her snapping hadn’t rattled him in the slightest.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀“That was hot,” he murmured, teeth flashing as if he’d just said the most hilarious thing possible. His head tilted, studying her as he noted the brief glint in her eye. “Awww, wait—do I make you nervous?”
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀The question hung in the air, low and teasing, as he hovered just over her shoulder. He certainly knew he didn’t, but an opening was an opening. Clearly unfazed by her clipped commands, Bodhi leaned back up off of his elbows, yawning dramatically.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀“What’s a wrench?” he asked innocently, voice dripping with mockery. Before she could bite back at that particular idiotic comment, his hand darted to a shallow divot in the wall where one had been stashed. With the triumphant flourish of a child showing off a magic trick, he snatched it up and slid it across the table toward her, muttering “Whooooosh,” as it went.
