PSS Excursionist: The Commons Room
Do you know that feeling where you can sense fear, but by the reek of it, the stench is not pungent enough with familiarity? It is when you come to the realization smell is very much irrelevant to you. That it was by sight did you face fear, through the stare into the eyes of a Teufelshunde can you wince at the growling of your stomach in hunger to run, retreat, to fall back on a plan you so merely felt confident in. That was what Aksel read through not Cu’s expression, but his pupils. Even as he brought the words , ”Are you sure…, into a question, Aksel noticed that he was as anxious as she was. Yet, it did not feel 'justified' for him to worry about her. He was a scrap-scratching Picker, her prisoner, not a friend.
The Captain ignored Pax, yet unintentionally because she was side-tracked in searching for the right words to tell Cu no, that her enslavement must consist of other plans. She refused. But, within the mental expedition, Aksel next experienced a tight crushing weight against her flesh. The pressure, it was building, bruising, but in a strange perhaps even masochistic way, it was relaxing. Though the Villianian winced by the touch of it, she devoured a small slow spoonful of reality. Pax extinguished Aksel’s ego, although the only individual who truly suffers from Aksel’s high-horse-mentality was Nine. Yet Pax also did this through not only putting light physical harm against Aksel, but the Picker had also been the only one to question her plan with direct offense. And though the Captain did not notice Pax snatching away the baton for herself, it didn’t matter. Soon enough, her freedom will go with it also- into the hands of mere Pickers. Pax had just shown her through three pervious actions, that Valriya Sereya Yrenea Aksel was no longer in control of the PSS Excursionist. Pax was as essential to the team as everyone else, though Aksel felt the team regarded the drunken Trakqi far less as a laughful nuisance.
After being pressed against the window, Aksel gave Pax a nod in thanks, though she probably did not care nor wanted it. But she proceeded the mission, which deserved gratitude. Shortly, Aksel grabbed the attention of the rest remaining in the room by speaking up with a firm command, perhaps her last one before they hit the Nomad, “Everyone clear the room, except for you Cu. You stay.”
Once all the dismissed had exited the commons room, Aksel shut the door lock once again with the power of her administrative card. She thought of another option, if only it were not so risky. But trifling with real slavers, especially ones of the Teufelshunde race was a path Aksel was not so submissive to take. Her next apparent step was unknown to Cu and would be raised as an obvious surprise. It would be dangerous, but Aksel was not scared of Cu especially after the help he had given her after the fall. By that one action, she believed he respected her, thus she respected him in the same way also. This esteem exchanged between the two was what weighed Aksel’s decision when splitting the groups.
Cu still remained by the window just where Aksel told him to remain. While his back was turn, Aksel jumped with a kick of the table beside her to give an extra lift into midair and the right acceleration to grapple two hands deep onto Cu’s back, digging two hands deeply within his skin and beneath the fur to remain on. Aksel then fastened her second pair of arms against his neck, choking him. Though it being described seems life-threating, Aksel was obvious, if not at least hinted that there was no motive to kill him as she entertained conversation, “Here me out, Cu…”