Natural Selection

[Chrishton Radu]

Arms still folded, Chrishton watched and waited. Even the vaguest semblance of a plan had yet to formulate in his mind, despite wishful thinking on his part. His experience told him that Berbiezu wouldn't have made demands of him early on if she knew he was dangerous unless she could enforce her will, be it on him directly or through Cervantes. He got the impression that she knew a thing or two about what he was capable of. This, in turn, made him cautious of what she might be.

His desire to do whatever it took to keep his son safe early on led him to play it safe and do what she asked. The sword of Damocles was now poised over Jasmina's head as opposed to his son's. Now he needed Berbiezu to show her hand.

"Try as we may, there's no hurrying the delights of fate." She said, and Christhon agreed with her completely. Yet he never saw that as an excuse not to act.

While Dorcas was looking at a painting in a way that made him sure she was struggling with the situation, Chrishton scanned the other half of the room - the side toward the gnome's workplace. He wondered if there was a weapon of some kind he might use. While not strictly necessary to take down an apparently crippled witch, he felt bad about not getting to use the last one.

When Cervantes saw Jasmina, he stared for a good few seconds at her. Some latent anger boiled up inside him, blaming her for the worst of his current situation. He didn't know what the witch wanted to do with her and he was perhaps the only person in the room hoping it would be as bad as he suspected.

[Jasmina Apsara]

Jasmina was painfully aware that she had no allies here. Yes, her kidnappers might claim they didn't intend to harm her. Why should she believe them, though? Simply because they hadn't murdered her? At least not yet...

She had no reason to think their intention was anything but harm. Even if the man was telling the truth, she didn't think he would fight for her. He wouldn't risk his life. He probably wouldn't even risk moderate inconvenience for her sake. What was she to do?

In Jasmina's true soul, she wanted to be stubborn. She wanted to fold her arms and furrow her brow, and tell this strange woman how ridiculous it was to order her to sit down. Jasmina didn't want to sit down... not because she especially cared if she was seated or standing, but because she was sick of being ordered around by people who seemed to mean ambiguous harm to her.

On the other hand, Jasmina wasn't certain that this was the particular hill she wanted to die on. If she didn't sit, they would probably force her. They would succeed, because she was so outnumbered, but there would be a scuffle. Jasmina fully expected to have to fight or flee at some point before this ended. She just didn't want to exhaust herself fighting a pointless battle over something that didn't matter.

"I will sit," Jasmina said, with an extreme show of dignity... and sat.

She tried to force eye contact with all of them, and added, "If you harm my baby, I will kill you."

Perhaps it was an empty threat. The killing was, at least. She would indeed attack as ferociously as she could with fists and feet and teeth if they hurt her unborn child, though.

[Dorcas Tansy]

A flicker of a laugh came from Berbiezu's perpetually parted lips. "My dear, I'm certain you aren't a soothsayer." The witch didn't go to any trouble to avoid vocabulary that aggravated her lisp. "You can't tell the future. You can only try to kill us." Berbiezu gave another girlish laugh. Her tone suggested jest. Her surroundings suggested some dark humor to come.

Dorcas became very aware of the way her weight rested on each foot, the thickness of her soles. She found herself making minute adjustments to her posture in reference to the only exit. She saw the gnome skulking in her periphery.

The gnome muttered creative curses in the background like nervous tics. He paced back and forth before a shelf of miniature cannons and occasionally jerked his hand back from lunging for one.

Berbiezu ignored her clearly agitated roommate and turned her back to shuffle over to her vanity again. That's where she had left the ratty little cloth doll smeared with Cervantes's blood. She fiddled with something under a heavy cloth and turned back towards the group. She had a device hanging off the end of one of her canes: something like a priest's thurible, a little metal burner or brazier of some sort, from which oozed a faint smoke. As she shuffled her way back towards the couch where Cervantes and Jasmina sat, the thurible swayed on its chain and flecks of ash sprinkled out here and there. "Moving on, now. . ." she murmured. "This kind smoke will help you relax--"

"Is he--well?" Dorcas suddenly sputtered in Cervantes's direction. She balked and redirected the question to the actual injured party. "Can you--stand up?" Her sentence trailed off more meekly. She had no idea what his state was after a few hours with the witch's tarry salve on his wounds, but she suspected her question was foolish. She had asked impulsively--the cold, strange night seemed a welcome respite from the stuffy chamber with its choking incense and twitchy gnome, and she was grasping at the possibility of leaving this behind.

The witch tsked her teeth against her lower lip and swiveled her head back and forth. She scooted a little closer to Cervantes as if to get a better look at him--as if to make she he wasn't, in fact, thinking of trying to get up and about.

As she leaned, the chain of her thurible slid off the handle of her cane. The tin brazier clattered to the floor and sent a scattering of bright embers across the floor, under the couch, and on top of Jasmina's feet. The gnome startled--"HAA!"--and grabbed for a brass cannon in the middle of his shelf.

[Chrishton Radu]

Chrishton became interested more in what the gnome was doing than the witch. His eyes followed the gnome and he stopped listening to what she was saying to Jasmina.

It was a strange way to go about drawing conclusions about the situation - focusing on the gnome instead of the witch. Perhaps it had something to do with the exhaustion. Years of experience and countless schemes of his own and others, it was crystal clear to Chrishton what was unfolding. He didn't need to see what the witch was up to - she would be busy intentionally masking her motives.

Why was he so nervous? What would have the little man so itching to go for a weapon if not because of something the witch was about to do? Berbiezu might have great control over herself and surroundings, but she couldn't make her gnomish companion into anything but a loose cannon.

If her plan was worrying him so, it must be because she planned to betray Chrishton. After all, Chrish had played things (relatively) safe by bringing her what she'd asked for without any objections. Indeed, a part of him was fine with leaving Jasmina there to her fate and to get on with his life.

But betrayal meant something would happen to his son. That was something Chrishton would kill to prevent, and as he drew a line between the gnome and the weapons he was thinking about lunging for, he began contemplating what had to be done. The gnome, and the witch, had to be killed. Chrishton knew that then and there, but hesitated to act on it. Normally he wouldn't go out of his way to kill anyone, but he was growing frustrated and exhausted with their circumstance. The damned weight of recent events wasn't wearing him down, and he hesitated out of fear that it was anger and exhaustion driving him to conclusions.

There was a sound and a flicker of movement form the corner of Christhon's vision. The witch yelled a start. The gnome went for the small cannon he was eyeballing. Chrishton reacted on instinct.

It wasn't a big room. By the time the gnome got to the weapon, before he could ready the contraption to fire, Chrishton was upon him. He used one hand to prevent the barrel of the cannon from pointing in his direction, and got in close enough to jerk a quick elbow at the side of the gnome's exposed temple. Chrishton wasn't holding back, despite the smaller size of his opponent. If the little gnome wasn't on his toes, it would be a devastating blow. He meant to put the gnome's head into the corner of the shelf.

Cervantes was startled too. He'd been resting in something of a daze, apathetic to the proceedings until the moment there was action. He made a move to get up, but the pain made him grit his teeth suck air between them.

[Jasmina Apsara]

Jasmina gasped, startled, as the embers tumbled over her feet. It wasn't particularly painful - though it might have been if she'd been barefoot and wasn't running on so much adrenaline - but it was surprising, and already on edge, a surprise was the last thing she needed. Before she had a chance to realize she was overreacting and settle again, she saw the gnome move for a weapon.

There was absolutely nothing she could do about that. If she'd been here alone, she might have tried something desperate without thinking, but Chrishton was already handling the situation better than she could.

Instead, she tried to keep out of the way. She turned to Cervantes, and said quietly, "Don't try to move. Just wait. He's determined to get you out of here. We'll help you. Just... wait. Wait till we can all leave, so you don't make things worse."

Jasmina still wasn't sure she trusted Chrish not to leave her behind, but she wasn't relying on trust in him anyway. She'd get herself out of here, whether or not she had anyone's help. An ally or two would just make it easier.

[Dorcas Tansy]

Mere moments held the enormous sum of the impulses of many, acted at once. The scene unfolded as a vignette in the frame of the flickering shadow cast by the stamped copper brazier:

The gnome Shivshin Fairscales was caught as he reached for his deliverance. He hadn't expected to be tackled. He'd meant to reach for the little hidden door by the shelf. It was an ingenious escape hatch, invisible to anyone else and unknown even to his roommate. He'd never before had a chance to use it. He wouldn't now, or maybe ever--when Chris shoved him, his crown winged the edge of the rickety shelf, and the whole thing crashed down. Several oversized weapons in various states of disrepair came down one by one on his tiny frame. The heavy--ornamental, on second glance--brass cannon slid down and whomped him solidly on the temple. It left a dent.

Dorcas looked over her shoulder in time to watch the abrupt destruction of the gnome. Her mouth twisted into a slack pout of anguish. Inexplicably, she felt tender-hearted towards the creature in that moment. His body mustered only a few epileptic twitches before the hell broke loose.

She felt a shudder at her ankles that might have been her cat, if he'd suddenly sublimated to ether. She looked down. The edge of her robe, the old, oily cloth they'd bought off the costumier, had caught a spark.

Berbiezu saw that too; it was curious she didn't see the nearer flames first.

The draping over the back of the couch had caught too. During the three seconds of chaos at the corner of the room, the embers had quietly taken up where they could and begun to multiply. Little flames crept up both sides of the couch where Cervantes and Jasmina sat. The tassels of a footstool near Berbiezu crackled to feed a growing blaze. One especially large ember had skittered all the way to the wall and begun to consume a gauzy tapestry.

Terror slowly slipped onto Berbiezu's face as she realized the spread. She scrabbled backward from the flaming footstool. Her canes outpaced the sluggish feet beneath that crepe gown, and she lost her balance. While she had never seemed sure-footed, at this moment especially, she ought to have fallen backwards.

A shadowy thing lunged out from under her hem, something snakey and shy that only extended for as long as it took to sweep a quick arc around her heels. She was righted. As she heaved her weight forward again onto her canes, a sneer of exertion caused her upper lip to crack. A stream of bright capillary blood washed her incisors.

Dorcas could do nothing but gasp. She backed up against the wall nearest the door and shook her skirt furiously to beat out the flame. She looked up, stunned and transfixed, forgetting her instinct to find her escape.

The witch raised her right cane to point at Jasmina. She had no trouble finding her balance now. The scuffed and splintered tip of her cane aimed at the dancer's middle. "You'll burn before you take away what's mine!" Her voice was as sweet and feathery as ever, but oddly amplified. As she spoke, her lip split further.

Another shadow darted out from her skirt. This one, bolder than the last, swatted the flaming footstool away from Berbiezu and toward the couch. It left a deep scratch in the floor as it retreated beneath her skirt again.

[Chrishton Radu]

Certain in his conviction that the gnome was in league with Berbiezu, Chrishton gave him deliverance in another form. Years of training and experience meant that the unsuspecting little gnome crumpled like a piece of straw under the weight of Chrishton's elbow. It was an execution perfectly delivered. Fairscales, lacking training, strength or reflexes, went down head first and was finished off by the weight of his own gnomish indulgences.

Satisfied with the outcome, there was only enough time for the fleeting visceral pleasure that came with winning a fight. Berbiezu was the real threat, and he turned quickly to meet her, leaving the gnome's macabre writhing unwatched.

"An' yer next, ya bitch..." his words trailed off, his enthusiasm replaced by that of a newborn fire that clambered hungrily up the clothing and furniture around the others.

He started forward to do something, but stopped when he doubted what. Attack the witch? Help Cervantes and Dorcas?

The pain that had been holding Cervantes down gave way to desperation when he saw fire - first on Berbiezu, then catching the filthy and frayed leg of his pants. Ignoring the blistering protestations from his wounded back, he stretched forward to slap out the flames. The movement send him tumbling out of his seat, and left him crawling backwards, away from the witch and the rest of the fire.

At this point, having seen the shadowy tendrils from under Berbiezu's skirt, along with her yelling, Chrishton took action again. He had one of the weapons from the shelf in his hand and pointed at her. Guided by what little he knew about how firearms worked, he gripped what he was certain was a triggering mechanism.

"'At's enough outta ya!" He yelled at the witch, and tried to pull the trigger... which didn't budge.

He tried again after flipping a switch, and a few more times while jiggling what he thought was a knob.

Finally he frowned and flung it at her head as hard as he could.