FATAL ERROR

“ Hey, let me help you with that. ” Kaveh is quick to take some of Collei's load, taking one of the larger serving dishes from off the kitchen counter before the girl can reach for it herself.

The dishes aren't necessarily heavy. Someone of Collei's age and size should be able to carry them without any trouble. Still, Kaveh can't help but want to take on some of the burden himself.

The architect is well aware of Tighnari's instructions to not allow her to carry anything that could break if dropped. Were the chief forest ranger in the kitchen with them and not in the dining room on the other side of the door, it's likely he wouldn't have let Collei carry any of the food out period.

However, Kaveh is not Tighnari and noticeably lacks the same level of rationale his friend has. Therefore he'll let Collei take out anything she wants out of the smaller dishes. If the food falls, Kaveh can always make more. If one of the expensive dishes breaks, well -- Kaveh's going to stay optimistic about that.

Of course, her sleeves covered those bandages, and surely the architect didn’t know about her health, did he? She understood that Master wouldn’t tell anyone without her permission, but she still worried. Really, Collei worried most of the time. If it wasn’t about this, it was about something else. 

She realized she had her serious thinking face on, and instead put on a bright smile. “Thank you!” she chirped, playing up the situation as if she’d been concerned about carrying the dish he ended up choosing.

It was her turn to choose something now, and Collei cast a scrutinizing gaze over the assorted foods. Her pick ended up being a bowl of rice: not too heavy, and not too difficult to replace if she were to make a mess of things. 

Collei lifted it carefully, and took care not to show in her expression how tightly her fingers were clenched into claws on it. She had to hold it strongly, so that her current bad hand wouldn’t get any funny ideas. (Some days—or weeks, or months—it was a bad leg, or a bad arm. The Eleazar had a mind of its own, and she adapted with it.)

                         VISIONS. they are a light in the sea of darkness.       but for those who have faith, they are little more than badges of conviction.

But then the energy changed. Suddenly he was a cornered animal on the defensive, ready to go on the offensive. Even with his mask on, she could see the subtle shifts of the expression he attempted to wrestle control of back to neutrality. He didn't do a great job; even if his facial expression was under control, his posture remained rigid. A coil ready to spring.

"You have preconceived notions of a scholar you as an individual never met. Whether those notions stemmed from you specifically or you as a piece of someone else ultimately doesn't matter; trying to dissect those thoughts to find a lone source would be a fruitless endeavor.

He wanted to be eloquent. But his words were not eloquent; they were sharp and hurried and direct. 

“To you, perhaps, it is simple. I have no idea how complex your mind—if it could be said that you have one—is. As such, you may be creating a distinction where some ambiguity exists by nature.” There was an evasiveness to how he spoke, distracting and circling around the point in question. 

“I am solitary, and yet I am part of a whole. Like a facet of a gemstone.” Like a shard of a broken mirror. “A great deal of the human experience is conflict with oneself. So, would you ascribe my feelings to an individual ‘me’, or to the greater ‘self’?” 

Couching his contrariness in existentialism was yet another way to put up a barrier between him and Sandrone. It likely wasn’t enough to keep her from prodding, but repeating the same ideas that had been entrenched in his own psyche was a way to comfort himself, to take refuge. 

"Is it as juvenile as you anticipated? You seem to be a ways through it." She smiled faintly, a barely there ripple of amusement across her doll-like countenance. "I'm sure you've formed your judgment already. Are you as critical of the other segments?"

Sandrone asked the question like it was nothing—and, to her, it was. Truthfully, none of this impacted her in any way.

Except it did. The answers may very well have meant everything, depending on what they were. There was something growing in her. It was new, and it was terrifying. For how long had she existed as she was? For how long had she questioned nothing, allowed herself to be moved per Alain's whims?

“Frankly, I’m not sure if it’s worth finishing. Buildings were never my—our—area of interest. And the theories proposed are dull, to put it lightly.” The book was not as humorously bad as he had hoped, as the author had improved with age and experience. This had removed the vast majority of “fun” (if there was any to be found at all) from the activity. 

He should have guessed that she had other pursuits than just interest in his opinion. Sandrone’s follow-up question reached him, and his lip curled reflexively. Her words were plainly composed in such a way as to test him for something, but its meaning was beyond him. And that uncertainty created a reaction like a cornered animal baring its fangs.

Epsilon attempted to wrangle his expression back to neutrality as soon as he realized his face was doing something, with limited success. “Critical of them in what way?” he asked, guarded. 

“Judging the quality of our individual work is part of our purpose. Critique comes with that. Unless you meant in a more…personal sense.” He made sure the bookmark was in place and snapped the book shut, setting it aside. He wasn’t going to be reading any further in this environment.