#helessa

Helessa was very, very drunk.

There was something pathetic about getting absolutely hammered alone. She had few other options, however - a desperate need to forget her last assignment had overruled every other consideration and prevented her spending the necessary time tracking down someone to get drunk with. She’d at least had the sense to do her drinking in the privacy of her own room.

She was several bottles in then she realized that she wasn’t quite sure when the hammering on her door started. Hells, she wasn’t even sure what day it was anymore.

The distance to the door from the half arsed attempt she’d made at some kind of comfortable nest by the fire seemed like far too much effort. She’d taken another pull from her bottle, eyes sliding closed again. 

The banging, unsurprisingly, did not stop.

“Sod off!” She bawled, sticking two fingers up at the door. 

The noise continued.

“For fucksake, can’t a woman drink in PEACE?!” Helessa flailed, somehow ending almost upright, bottle still in hand and contents… mostly still inside. As she fought to untangle herself from a particularly malicious blanket, she continued to swear like a landlocked sailor.

Conceding defeat, she shambled her way to the door, blanket stubbornly clinging to one leg. The frame was shaking from the efforts of whomever it was that was so intent on interrupting her pity fest. Grumbling as she unbolted the door, she took a moment to realize that the banging had stopped. Shrugging, she turned, full of intentions to return to the fireside and drink all the rum before she could be interrupted again. 

The door behind her clicked, then swung open.

Helessa was lamenting the demise of yet another bottle when she became aware that she wasn’t alone.

“How’d you gerrin? Door’slocked” She squinted at the figure sat on the edge of her bed.

“You unlocked it.” The voice was clipped, precise.

“I-wha’?” Helessa reached for another bottle. Odd, it was right there a moment ago. 

“I think you’ve had enough, don’t you?” She knew that voice. Not the any-anmy-purple eyed one… the other one. She scrunched her eyes closed, trying to think through the fog in her head.

Images of a sweaty, chubby hand groping too hard-

Her eyes snapped open. “Not ‘nuff.” She grumbled.

“I am quite certain that the memory of tomorrow morning will eclipse whatever horror you’re trying to bleach from your mind.” Dammit, that voice. She knew the voice, but it wasn’t quite right.

“‘S it matter t’you? ‘S my room. My rum. My recr-rep- re-cu-pe-ra-tion time.” She scowled, quite unaware that, half buried in blankets, her not quite dry, not quite blonde hair in a wild tangle, she looked about as threatening as a freshly hatched chocobo chick.

“Ah, yes. From a mission you were supposed to fail.”

“I don’t fail nuffin’-”

Wait… supposed to fail?

The small lake of rum in her stomach suddenly wasn’t sitting so well.

“As you have proven. Quite the shock, I can assure you.” White hair caught firelight as he stood. “I am curious as to how you managed it.”

Sweaty hands, bare skin - too close - please finish soon.Pretend, remember? Pretend, pretend, pretend-

With considerably more coordination than she had demonstrated earlier she found her feet and, free of blankets, bolted for the bathroom. She managed to slam the door shut behind her before parting company with a large quantity of rum.

When she emerged several minutes later, her face still damp from the cold water she’d washed with after aggressively brushing her teeth, her guest was sprawled on her bed, hands folded behind his head.

“Well, I suppose that answers that, then. Not much fun, I take it?”

“Why are you here, Thancred?” She propped herself against the doorframe, her head still spinning.

“Could I not want to check on a friend?” The bandana over his eye was absent, his amber gaze assessing her.

“Are we friends? One job and a drunken night all it takes to get over the moths of loathing one another?” Helessa tilted her head and immediately regretted it when the world tilted in a completely different direction.

“A week in the field watching each other's back seems to prove that we can coexist without wanting to murder each other nicely. The night after was… an added bonus.” Slowly, almost lazily, he rolled to face her, head propped up on his arm. 

Helessa eyed him for a long moment before exhaling, her guard dropping. “I’m f-”

“‘Lessa, don’t tell me you’re fine. The… ten empty bottles say otherwise. If you don’t want to talk about it… then don’t. If you’d rather I left you to your pity party, I will. But if you want me to stay - as company, nothing more - then I’m happy to.” His stillness mirrored hers. 

Damn him. Damn him for teaching her his tricks, for knowing her tells.

Tired of the room spinning, of pretending and yes, of trying to bear this alone, she carefully picked her way to the door, glancing at him as she locked it again. He relaxed, a tiny tug at the corner of his mouth and a small exhale telling her that he had expected her to send him packing. 

Kicking off her boots and stashing her knives in easy reach, she folded herself onto her bed, sitting with her back to him. He didn’t move. Just lay, waiting patiently.

“I don’t think I could do it again.” The words were the closest she could get to admitting to what she’d had to do. How she’d… used her body. 

Twelve, she’d not felt this bad after her first kill.

“Killing… stains your soul. What you did… you tear a bit of yourself away, doing something like that. You give something up.”

She hadn’t realized she’d spoken that last bit aloud.

“‘Lessa… you don’t have to do that again.” His hand on her arm was tentative, his voice soft, almost… concerned.

“I promised. Whatever it takes. Whatever… whatever is needed, for me to-to make a di-difference.”

“Not that. Draw the line somewhere. Keep that one thing just for you. You can do enough, be enough, without that.” 

The bed shifted, warmth - familiar, comforting warmth enveloped her as she bit her lip hard, fighting to keep hold of the emotions spilling from her.

It could have been a few minutes, or a couple of hours. She didn’t know. But he sat there the whole time, his body curled around hers, shielding her from the rest of the world as she came to terms with what she’d done. There was no outpouring of grief, no storm of crying to wash away the feelings eating her alive. Just a quiet examination of what had happened and an eventual acceptance of her limits.

His questions helped. A gentle probing of why, exactly, she felt she had to give everything to have any worth.

She fell asleep halfway through the story - somewhere around being told that her only worth was in a good match and the children she could produce - curled up in his arms.

The sun was high in the sky when she stirred. 

Warm fingers brushed her skin, lips grazed her neck. Even as her head started to protest the rum she’d tried to drown herself in, her slowly awakening body seemed far more interested in the distraction so readily offered.

“This okay?” His words, breathed in her ear, drew a small nod from her. “I’ll stop when you tell me…” That voice - that was the one indelibly printed on her memory, blurred with sleep and heavy with promise.

Ah, she was back.

The blonde firecracker who was rapidly becoming both the bane of my life and my biggest time sink. The one who was firmly convinced that she was so far above me that it was an actual insult for her to be expected to endure my presence. 

It was impressive how someone half a fulm shorter than me still managed to look down her nose during every conversation we had.

“You’re late” I admit, it was hard to keep every hint of smug satisfaction from my voice. I was, after all, the reason she was late.

“Can’t rush a good job.” Her reply was short, annoyed. She knew she was late. And I knew she could have been a lot more convincing in her explanation. I’d seen her in action, charming her way out of the mess I’d landed her in when I whispered rumor and suspicion in just the wrong ear.

The fact she wouldn’t even bother to pretend to be civil rankled.

“You were given a deadline for a reason.” I ground out, working hard to keep a grip on the laid back, relaxed attitude I’d chosen to adopt around her. 

She wasn’t getting under my skin this time, I silently swore. 

“The information wasn’t time sensitive. The time restriction was arbitrary and pointless.” She dropped a few folded sheets on the table in front of me before standing back, arms folded. Twelve, would it kill her to take a seat?

Probably, judging by her expression.

I took my time reaching for the paper, unfolding and glancing over it, annoyance dragging the corner of my mouth down before I could help it.

“It’s in code.” That laid back attitude I mentioned earlier? Yeah, that was rapidly evaporating.

“Well, yes.” Her innocent tone dragged over the tightening strings of my temper.

“Why?” The temptation to scrunch the paper into a ball and throw it back at her briefly had my fingers tightening. Shame it wouldn’t knock that innocent grin from her face.

“You said it was important, and that it couldn’t be allowed to fall into the wrong hands. I wasn’t clear if you were authorised to read it. The Admiral, of course, got the decoded version.”

A ball of paper wouldn’t harm her. And it would be very satisfying. 

The effort it took to refold that paper, to settle for stashing it in an inner pocket cost me far more willpower than I was willing to admit. 

My mind turned over the problem. She hadn’t strictly broken the rules of her assignment. I hadn’t specified that her report had to be uncoded when she handed it to me. I also hadn’t specified that I was the only person she was to deliver that information to. Yet again, she’d found the tiniest loopholes to exploit in her seemingly endless mission to show me up as the fool she believed me to be.

If she was so comfortable being underhanded, perhaps a direct conversation might wrong foot her long enough to clear the air enough to make her training at least bearable for the both of us?

“‘Lessa-”

“Helessa, if you please.”

“‘Lessa. Is there a problem you’d like to air?” I folded my hands on the table in front of me, the very picture of earnest concern. The flicker of irritation my petty insistence caused was replaced by that calculating expression that had piqued my curiosity  the first time we’d met.

“I want a different teacher.”

Ah, blunt honesty. Refreshingly unexpected.

“Well, unfortunately this isn’t that cozy little college down past the markets, with a surplus of teachers to accommodate your every petty desire. I am the tutor selected, I am who is available, and I am who you’re stuck with.”

“There has to be someone else. Someone who-”

“Who what?” I barked the words before I realized how my temper had frayed so badly, before I realized I was on my feet. 

“Who isn’t such an insufferable, arrogant ass who goes out of his way to deliberately sabotage my assignments!” The annoyed she’d been grappling with earlier exploded out of her, the words full of venom and practically hurled at me like knives.

A small voice reminded me to be impressed she’d actually caught me this time. 

Later. Not now.

“Blaming me for your poor work ethic now?”

What? I wasn’t going to just admit what I’d done.

“My poor-” For a moment, I seriously thought she might try to stab me. “Says the person who has to be dragged out of a bar to take my reports.”

“Bars happen to be-"

“Good places to pick up information? Maybe if you’re not too busy sampling every drink on offer and distracted by the lowest neckline.” She snapped, weight shifting. I still wasn’t sure if she was going to leave or take a swing at me.

“So you did bother listening.” I sat again, scrambling to rebuild my composure. So much for not letting her get under my skin. Again.

“Back when I thought you might be worth listening to.”

Ouch.

I remained silent. Nothing I had to say right now was going to help. Unfortunately, she seemed to have other ideas. 

“What have you got to teach me, really? How to get in a woman's bed? I’m already quite good at that, so why don’t you run along, drink and whore around and I’ll go find a proper teacher”

Several things ran through my head.

Firstly, no-one as inexperienced in this work had any right to be as cocky and arrogant as her, and the irritation that had been simmering away over the past few weeks was demanding he be brought down a rung or five.

Secondly, watching her hunt for someone else to teach her before she had to come crawling back and apologized would be highly satisfying. 

The fact she hadn’t seen past my reputation and the facade holding it together was both gratifying and disappointing. Someone with her intelligence and tenacity - untrained as she may be - should have been able to poke at least a hole or two in my supposed drunken wantonness by now.

And did she actually mean women's beds?

Get a grip, Thancred. 

Annoyed, frustrated and tired of this endless wrangling between us - I was stuck with her just as much as she was stuck with me, after all - I discarded all pretense, the carefree playboy persona slipping away. 

“The fact you think that’s all there is to me shows just how much you have to learn.” 

She paused in the act of turning on her heel, my words catching her attention just long enough for her to place what was happening, to really see the change. Surprise cracked that self important expression of hers for a long moment, and I seized on the chance her unwilling curiosity presented.

“It’s easy to underestimate, isn’t it? The drunken flirt with a head full of flowery words and eyes only for… what did you say? Oh, eyes only for the lowest neckline.” From my other pocket, I withdrew another sheaf of folded paper, flicking them across the table towards her.

Slowly, cautiously, she reached for them, unfolding them and, after a quick glance at her handwriting on the page, those glorious green eyes found mine.

Was that a glimmer of respect I saw there?

From the way she tossed the papers back towards me, probably not.

As I tucked the report she’d left on the Admiral's desk away, she finally sat down opposite me. I knew better than  to comment, or to indicate that this was any kind  of victory on my part. This was dangerously close to progress and I wasn’t about to risk it for the sake of taking her down a peg or two.

And… I found that I wanted to hold onto that progress. As fun as hindering her work had been, it had given me quite a few opportunities to see her in action. And despite her stubborn refusal to accept any training from me she had the potential to be good at this work. She didn’t quite have the ruthless edge for some of the dirtier work, but I suspected that she’d pick up enough to find the success she seemingly craved.

It was sobering to realize that even I wasn’t immune to that seemingly innocent charm of hers, even when it wasn’t directed at me.

Pushing aside thoughts of where I’d prefer that charm to be directed, I considered the stubborn woman in front of me. I had thought her curiosity would have pushed her to find out why I had been deemed a suitable tutor for someone training for the role she was slated for. I had been planning on making it part of her training, in fact. But she’d been so focused on her own goals, so quick to assume that they’d actually assign her a substandard teacher… she’d taken me at my worst and thought nothing more of it.

Perhaps the arrogance, the self importance was the persona she’d built. Something to hide that festering insecurity. 

And I… had taken her at face value and been perfectly willing to think the worst of her too.

“Right. We’ve clearly gotten off on the wrong foot.” I began, not exactly sure where my words would take me. “And we both seem to have different expectations of what this… training should look like.”

Across from me, she nodded slightly.

“I’m not about to sit here and explain myself to you. We’re in the business of secrets, and I’m not about to start just handing them out. Part of your training is to learn how to both build and pick apart covers like mine. But, I’ll admit to going about teaching that the wrong way.”

“I didn’t-” She started, before biting her lip. That look of uncertainty was new. And perhaps the most honest thing she’d ever shown me.

“You didn’t realise. I understand that now. I don’t think either of us really knew what to expect from all this.” I took a breath. She wasn't disagreeing, and her expression wasn’t hostile, which was a good start. “If you’re willing, I’d like to suggest we start over and try working together, rather than against one another?”

“On what?”

“On… sorry, I’m not following.”

“Work together on what?”

“Ah.” Did that count as agreement? I’m going to take that as an agreement. “Well… okay, if you want to start now. We’ve been sat out here, in full view of quite a few people, far enough and quiet enough that no one is likely to have overheard us, but we’ve clearly been having some kind of unpleasant discussion and throwing bits of paper back and forth at one another. How do we turn this from what it looks like into something innocuous?”

Honestly, it was a good question. If it weren’t for the paper I could spin it as one of my supposed dalliances, unhappy that one night was all she’d get. As it was, my mind raced, trying to anticipate her response.

“Shake hands.” That calculating expression was so much more endearing when I knew she wasn’t plotting yet more inventive ways to make me look like an idiot. Her answer was interesting, though.

“To what end?”

“The paper. It could have been a contract. Or some kind of order or… something to do with a business transaction. Heated discussions over business dealings aren’t uncommon, so a bit of a disagreement whilst we wrangle the details out isn’t out of place. We’ve… been talking normally for a while now, working things out. Shaking hands would make it look like we’ve resolved whatever the problems were. And deals in Limsa are almost as common as fish in the sea.”

“And what kind of business deal would that be? What difficulties have we resolved?” It was clever. And close enough to the actual truth that it wasn’t implausible.

“It’s a business deal. The details are between the parties involved… the specifics don’t matter.”

“Ah, but when I’m well in my cups later and someone asked why I was arguing with some blonde hellion, I’d have to hint at something.”

Oh, she didn’t like the little grin I gave her as I said that. I think I saw her actually swallow the retort she wanted to hurl at me.

“You… can say it’s a disagreement over the terms of service. I’m sure you can make that sound salacious enough to fit your reputation.” 

She almost managed to keep her voice neutral. I spent a long moment pondering it; I admit, it was mostly for show. But making her sweat and second guess herself wasn’t a bad thing - it was something she’d have to learn to deal with in this line of work.

“It works. Easy to remember, close enough to the truth that it seems reasonable. Fitting for the circumstances. And sets up a good reason for us to meet out in the open in future.” I stood, offering out my hand.

Her movements were a fraction slower, more uncertain. Not a bad thing, all told - some reluctance would hint that I’d got the better of the deal, which suited the dynamic of the conversation well.

Her hand was warm in mine, the grip firm but the skin soft, almost delicate against the calluses on my own. I found myself having to remind myself to let go of her fingers after just a few moments.

Twelve, I was going to need to blow off some steam if we were going to be working around each other more. She was going to be challenge enough to teach and keep up with, without my mind wandering like this. 

Pulling myself together, I indicated for her to lead the way from the secluded little corner we’d laid claim to. Just before we rejoined the general hubbub of the city proper, my hand caught her upper arm, pulling her to a stop as I leaned in to her ear. 

“Lunch, tomorrow. Come as someone who isn’t a business associate.”

Her answering nod was a little stiff, and I didn’t miss the fists clenched at her side.

But if we were going to make this work, we were going to have to learn to at least pretend to get along. And who knew, maybe, somewhere along the way we might actually figure out how to be friends.