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| character:dakarai-n-sehla [2012/12/01 18:09] – Moved training methods to a separate article pinkgothic | character:dakarai-n-sehla [2017/11/18 21:34] (current) – external edit 127.0.0.1 |
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| He always introduces himself as '**Rhaptor N'Sehla**', if at all. | He always introduces himself as '**Rhaptor N'Sehla**', if at all. |
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| | His primary historic achievement is winning in [[place:Taqnateh]] after doing the [[:Sehto gym circuit]] (three years before the active plotline) in attempted (and probably achieved) record time, pushing both himself and his pokémon to and past exhaustion achieve this stubborn goal. |
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| | For an old draft of his experience in Taqnateh, see [[character:Dakarai N'Sehla:Taqnateh|his written back-story]]. For a better canonical reference, read the logs of [[plot:N'Sehla]], though there sadly isn't //much// in-character chronological overlap, even if it showed [[plot:N'Sehla:2008-09-18|the calculating way he trained his pokémon]] very well. For his death in [[plot:Arsaga]], see //[[character:Dakarai N'Sehla:Arsaga Death]]//. |
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| | Technically, he is partly of [[culture:Xhosa]] heritage and the language can be considered his mother tongue, but he's equally fluent in English and only accidentally lapses into Xhosa when he's at the point of complete mental exhaustion. Being coloured certainly hasn't helped him gain respect - while the Xhosa subculture of Sehto is certainly affected by Sehto's egalitarian attitude as a whole, there are still rare groups within it that would heap scorn on him for his mixed heritage. |
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| ===== Personality ===== | ===== Personality ===== |
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| Dakarai N'Sehla before his fall was distinctly inhuman, having a slight autistic streak that he'd never managed to get rid of. With no empathy to guide him, he largely interacted with the world by analysing the facts he could observe, and quickly adopted a few axioms that, while it let him survive in society, also netted him the nickname //Togi Demon//. Most notably, he never raised a hand to har anyone that didn't harm him first, but was utterly famous for the kind of animalistic energy he put into his self-defence, reckless and stubborn in execution, to the point where he was near impossible to deal with once in that state. | Dakarai N'Sehla before his fall was distinctly inhuman, having a slight autistic streak that he'd never managed to get rid of. With no empathy to guide him, he largely interacted with the world by analysing the facts he could observe, and quickly adopted a few axioms that, while it let him survive in society, also netted him the nickname //Togi Demon//. Most notably, he never raised a hand to harm anyone that didn't harm him first, but was utterly famous for the kind of animalistic energy he put into his self-defence, reckless and stubborn in execution, to the point where he was near impossible to deal with once in that state. |
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| His honesty both was and is not the candid sort, instead often considered callous by those dealing with him, though he rarely means to insult anyone. Some social etiquette is best skipped with him, such as '//Do you mind if I...?//', to which he frequently responds with '//I do//.' Generally, asking his opinion is commonly met with a straight, unflinching answer. | His honesty both was and is not the candid sort, instead often considered callous by those dealing with him, though he rarely means to insult anyone. Some social etiquette is best skipped with him, such as '//Do you mind if I...?//', to which he frequently responds with '//I do//.' Generally, asking his opinion is commonly met with a straight, unflinching answer. |
| He certainly has no issue giving people the impression that he's an asshole, though he doesn't deliberately aim for the effect unless a history with the person in question kicks his pride into gear. He's quite capable of being polite - social etiquette notwithstanding - and frequently is helpful to complete strangers, in stray cases even forthcoming. | He certainly has no issue giving people the impression that he's an asshole, though he doesn't deliberately aim for the effect unless a history with the person in question kicks his pride into gear. He's quite capable of being polite - social etiquette notwithstanding - and frequently is helpful to complete strangers, in stray cases even forthcoming. |
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| He has a certain wary prejudice toward other pokémon trainers, but at least as much sympathy, and he takes recent role as //Observer// quite seriously. | He has a certain wary prejudice toward other pokémon trainers, but at least as much sympathy, and he takes recent role as [[:Observer]] quite seriously. |
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| | <hidden Sexuality>Dakarai N'Sehla is asexual - but distinctly not //aromantic//, and //not// wholly alien to sexual interaction. He simply does not seek it out by himself. He can and will use it as a tool, and moreso as a treasured gift, but he takes little pleasure out of the physical aspect of such encounters. Unfortunately, it makes him a bit inexperienced in that regard, so even when he wants to do someone a favour along those lines, it tends to be a clumsily delivered.</hidden> |
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| ===== Appearance ===== | ===== Appearance ===== |
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| ===== Pokémon ===== | ===== Pokémon ===== |
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| | Post-Taqnateh, the pokémon Dakarai carries around with himself are hardly numerous: |
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| * [[pokémon:Iris]] (Venomoth) | * [[pokémon:Iris]] (Venomoth) |
| * Paragon (HootHoot) | * [[pokémon:Paragon]] (HootHoot) |
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| ===== History ===== | Of those, Iris is 'his original pokémon', but both are quite free to do what they want - even leave their custom pokéballs at will. |
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| Dakarai N'Sehla's primary historic achievement is winning in [[place:Taqnateh]] after doing the [[:Sehto gym circuit]] in attempted (and probably achieved) record time, pushing both himself and his pokémon to and past exhaustion achieve this stubborn goal. | Pre-Taqnateh, his line-up was extensive and included the following pokémon: |
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| For an old draft of his experience in Taqnateh, see [[character:Dakarai N'Sehla:Taqnateh|his written back-story]]. For a better canonical reference, read the logs of [[plot:N'Sehla]], though there sadly isn't //much// in-character chronological overlap, even if it showed [[character:Dakarai N'Sehla:Training|the calculating way he trained his pokémon]] very well. | * Fracture (female Marowak with //Bonemerang//, //Bone Rush// and //Thunderpunch//) |
| | * ??? (Jynx with //Powder Snow//) |
| ===== Past Pokémon ===== | |
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| * Fracture (female Marowak with //Bonemerang// and //Thunderpunch//) | |
| * Salt (Parasect with //Slash// and //Spore//) | |
| * Incision (Skarmory with //Drill Peck//) | |
| * Basilisk (male Dragonite with //Outrage//) | * Basilisk (male Dragonite with //Outrage//) |
| * Static (Magneton with //Supersonic//, //Thunder Wave// and //Zap Cannon//) | * Dawn (male [[species:Coronav]] with //Endure//, //Reversal//, //Sacred Fire//, //[[:Types:Light:Solar Flare]]// and //Swift//) |
| * ??? (Jynx with //Powder Snow//) | * Fafnir (male Tyranitar) |
| * Fenrir (male Houndoom with //Crunch//, //Faint Attack// and //Solar Beam//) | * Fenrir (male Houndoom with //Crunch//, //Faint Attack// and //Solar Beam//) |
| | * Incision (Skarmory with //Drill Peck//) |
| | * Kamaitachi (Sneasel) //only in some canons// |
| * Magnolia (female ???) | * Magnolia (female ???) |
| * Fafnir (male Tyranitar) | |
| * Mimickry (Ditto with //Transform//) | * Mimickry (Ditto with //Transform//) |
| | * Salt (Parasect with //Slash// and //Spore//) |
| * Soot (male Muk with //Sludge Bomb//) | * Soot (male Muk with //Sludge Bomb//) |
| * Dawn (male [[species:Coronav]] with //Endure//, //Reversal//, //Sacred Fire//, //[[:Types:Light:Solar Flare]]// and //Swift//) | * Static (Magneton with //Supersonic//, //Thunder Wave// and //Zap Cannon//) |
| | * Strix (Murkrow) //only in some canons// |
| * Yena (female Umbreon with //Zap Cannon//) | * Yena (female Umbreon with //Zap Cannon//) |
| * Kamaitachi (Sneasel) //only in some canons// | |
| * Strix (Murkrow) //only in some canons// | |
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| Of these, //Fracture// was his first pokémon, won in a fist-fight with Auran Collins on Njoty university's campus grounds. | Of these, //Fracture// was his first pokémon, won in a fist-fight with Auran Collins on Njoty university's campus grounds. |
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| ===== Descriptions from Sessions ===== | ===== History ===== |
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| Collected from [[plot:Arsaga]]: | |
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| "I... since Togi doesn't have its own high school, I spent much time in Njoty, as... an outsider... in all senses of the word," he begins, trying desperately to keep his voice level and not skip out of facts in the process. "I wanted..." he trails off at this point, unable to continue for long moments. "...a little bit of respect," he finally whispers. | |
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| Dakarai takes a deep breath, finally finding the inner courage to continue speaking, regardless of how painful it is for him. "Early in twothousand-and-five, I decided I would try to... I would try to show them my worth by completing the gym circuit. I... prepared..." - He twitches abruptly. - "...myself by reading many books on the subject and informing myself about various... related technologies. On the fourteenth of May, I..." Again, his words catch in his throat - and now he whimpers in protest, though to no avail. | |
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| His eyes open slowly, revealing that the swirl of green has slowed and dimmed, making way for a strange emptiness. His voice continues, flimsily: "On the fourteenth of May, twothousand-and-five, I gathered several utensils together to begin working on a project I thought would help me attain my goal swiftly and efficiently. I completed it on the... twenty-ninth of September, twothousand-and-five. The result of my efforts was... a weapon... which... unfortunately... is still in use today." | |
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| "On October the thir-" - "Aren't you forgetting something?" Jagdish interrupts Dakarai's roll, his grip twitching against his scalp. - "...m'lord?" Dakarai asks, his voice sounding utterly drained. - "Shouldn't you be a little bit more specific?" - Dakarai winces, his shoulders sagging a little. "...the device... - weapon... was - is - a whip," he manages to say, with surprisingly little effort, shame tingling across the entirety of his body. He shifts his head slightly in Jagdish's grip, before taking an audible breath and continuing: "On the third of October, I set out to begin, and spent approximately a week capturing and strengthening pokémon around Mount Black." | |
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| "On the eighth of November, in the late evening, I returned to Njoty and battled for and won the Path badge. On the ninth of November, I reached Nahla, and battled for and won the Dust badge. On the tenth of October, I reached Nightclaw and battled for and won the Glin-" - "You can summarise," Jagdish sneers abruptly, interrupting Dakarai again. - "...m'lord?" Dakarai asks, his voice trembling. - "I assure you," the gymleader remarks, icily. "It won't be mistaken for a brag." His fingers flex through Dakarai's hair almost soothingly for a moment. - Dakarai swallows once more, before continuing: "...I progressed one gym a day and reached Taqnateh on the sixteenth of November, twothousand-and-five. I battled, and..." he trails off again, before shaking his head despite the grip on it. "M'lord, please?" | |
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| Jagdish pats Dakarai on his right shoulder, before regarding Raiko and telling him, simply: "It's a little wonder of technology that bundles the energies of pokémon types into [its three strands], selectably." Then he chuckles, before pulling Dakarai's head to the side and tracing his fingertips, one each, down the marks left by Marcus' attack. "It hurts. A lot," he says, simply, his voice thick with venom. | |
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| "Now, continue," Jagdish snaps at Dakarai, pulling his head back slightly again, but without restricting his ability to swallow easily. - Dakarai whimpers softly, before whispering: "On the sixteenth of November, twothousand-and-five, I battled for the Astral badge in Taqnateh... and I won the battle." His eyes drift closed, his last words having been barely audible. | |
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| "Nuh-uh," the gymleader snaps. "You forget, Raiko is //new// here, treat him like a tabula rasa, waiting for your paintbrush to fill him with knowledge," he says in a venomously yet saccharine sing-song tone. Dakarai whimpers, trying to cringe away from him slightly - and it prompts Jagdish to straighten and glance across at Raiko, sighing softly, as though dealing with a defiant little child. "The gym battle up here is designed to be unbeatable, Mr. Zelenka," he tells Raiko. "Trainers wager their lives, possessions and pokémon in return for the Astral badge... perhaps they think that it is a test of courage?" | |
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| "I have won many lives in those battles, Mr. Zelenka. Losing is not usually part of our routine up here... but Dakarai here surpassed our expectations of cruelty." He lets his fingers flex rhythmically against Dakarai's head, like a hypnotic, soothing massage. "Needless to say we couldn't let him go, not after all of that. He was quite... unique." | |
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| "Since then, Dakarai has been our little experiment," the gymleader remarks. "He was trying to fool us, you see," he says, with a note of heavy sadness entering his voice - it's not a mocking one. "He understood quickly... very quickly, because he had focussed so hard on his little share of pride that he was well aware of it. He never wanted to be cruel - he just never realised it. And he's a bright lad," he coos. "I think he understood it the moment we said, 'Dakarai N'Sehla, you are charged with excessive cruelty to your pokémon,' he knew, he knew what he'd done right there and then," his voice drops to a whisper. "But he's a good actor, aren't you, my boy?" | |
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| "He pushed us to come up with the worst things we could possibly imagine. He was, of course, sentenced to death - so many that come up here are, after all, it's unfortunate, but wholly fair." He chuckles a little, leaning down to kiss one of Dakarai's brows, before straightening again. "After eight days... - because, while sentenced to death, that was to come last, and he had a while to go - after eight days, I caught on, by chance... and I asked him, Dakarai, you silly boy... you're hurting yourself, you're making it worse for you, so much, much worse... why do you do that?" | |
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| Dakarai is silently crying by now, tears glittering on his cheeks, soundlessly. - "My sweet boy," he remarks, softly, sighing slightly, before giving his shoulder a soothing pat. "He's a bright lad - and with that... momentary blindness of his life removed, there //was// nothing other than purity, do you understand, Mr. Zelenka?" he regards Raiko with a broad, genuinely happy smile, like the smile of someone who's found enlightenment, a twinkle in his eyes. "He thought he was beyond redemption. He was crafting his own punishment... by manipulating us. The little swindling bastard." He chuckles, last phrase full of fondness. | |
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| The gymleader sighs theatrically, before letting go of Dakarai's head. "Well, he was sworn to secrecy, though. He fucked that one up, unfortunately." His expression darkens noticably. "And every experiment comes with its own terms and conditions. Dakarai, tell me, what did we agree on?" - Dakarai lets his gaze drift down and latch to the ground, his face a frown. "...I live on borrowed time," he says, simply, his tone neutral, even though he looks shaken and beaten to the core. | |
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| He glances aside, his gaze settling down on the ground somewhere, but it's nowhere in particular. "...I knew what I was doing when I broke my vow, Raiko. I don't expect special treatment." His voice sounds hollow. | Dakarai N'Sehla was born in [[place:Togi]] as one of the only Xhosa in the community, his parents notwithstanding. While he wasn't outcast in Togi itself - them being far too used to consisting of wildly different personalities and backgrounds to flinch at even obvious outward discrepancies - he made the error to think of Togi as his home and never truly began investing in emotional attachment to Njoty when he went to school there, which only served to make the quirks of his personality that much more apparent. |
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| Dakarai's glance drifts up to Raiko for a moment, brows twitching as though to say: 'No shit, sherlock,' but without bringing it up. Instead, he sighs softly. "I'm... trying to come to terms with myself, Raiko. Please shut up." Well, that was quite... frank, even if delivered with strange amounts of earnest care. | As such, he was quick to slot into the 'nerdy and emotionally fragile' category, though it was quickly clear to anyone that physically picking on him was a dangerous gamble with one's health. Picking on him from a distance was always sure to net a reaction, however, even if he quickly 'matured' to the point of making his retorts smoothly venomous. Alas, it only made him more of a challenge. He wasn't about to call for backup, after all, and his opinion of anyone didn't matter, so he still made for a good target. |
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| Long minutes pass, before Dakarai's shape stirs and he shifts, slowly pushing himself to a sit, strands of hair coming to rest across his forehead, his eyes drifting closed. A moment later, he's pulled his legs up and is resting his arms over his knees. He opens his mouth to speak, but no words come out, and he merely shakes his head slightly. "Sorry," he remarks, softly, the word barely audible. | After school, he never really made it out of his social niche, dragging himself from low-income job to low-income job, just about managing to keep a roof over his head (in the form of a tiny apartment), though that aspect never bothered him - he had very few material aspirations. The social issues bothered him, though, and he struggled with them, but never fixed them. He managed to shift their focus partly, but never really change their intensity. |
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| Knocked back by Raiko's weight and momentum, [Jagdish] snarls reflexively - skidding across the hard stone ground on his back, bringing up one hand to push against Raiko's shape, fingers curling to grab a hold of the fabric of his shirt. But of course it's not that simple - not with Dakarai, and, retrospectively, it was probably to be expected, but the motion still catches Raiko entirely off guard, arms sliding around him with sudden energy, Dakarai's left arm attempting to come to rest against Raiko's throat, right held in parallel to Raiko's, fingers grasping for his wrist to pull it back and against his spine, all in one graceful motion. | Eventually, he got it into his head that if he tried his hand at the gym circuit, people might at least impart marginal respect toward him, and so he negotiated to fight one of his longer-term bullies, Auran Collins, for one of his pokémon, //Fracture//. He won her off him and started to collect and train pokémon in the area around [[place:Mount Black]]. His lack of preconceptions about it made him surprisingly effective, as he simply deconstructed strategy from the ground up, and outright 'corrected' pokémon perceptions about their moves, such as explaining that for //Bonemerang//, bones don't actually make for good boomerangs, and how to craft a better returning projectile. |
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| There's hesitation, of course - no amount of courage is going to make poisoning oneself easy in a hurry, unless one was truly suicidally inclined, which, despite everything, Dakarai was not. His hands loosely resting on his knees, he flexes them slightly, before squeezing his eyes shut and taking a sip. Eugh, bitter. No surprise there - but a petty part of him wishes for some sugar and berates the man holding the cup for not ceding that courtesy. | Of course, Dakarai N'Sehla was never the type to want to do anything //half-heartedly//, and so he not only set out to best the gym circuit, he set out to do so in the minimal possible time, travel effort included. This pushed both him and his pokémon to the brink of exhaustion, but not before he (technically speaking) achieved his goal in November of that year. He took the normal Sehto gym circuit run, prepared to utmost degree with as much information about it as he could attain (and a rather sinister weapon of his design to better train his pokémon to complete obedience), and got one gym badge a day starting on the 8th (excepting an extra day travel time between [[place:Ehqaj City|Ehqaj]] and [[place:Kzye City|Kzye]], with a night's slumber in [[place:Nahla City]]): |
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| "Drink up - unless you're in the mood for a horribly excruciating and drawn-out death, which, well... knowing you...?" Jagdish mocks slightly, fondly. Something about his calmness seems off, as though it weren't natural to him... not right now. He's gentle in tilting the goblet and a frown touches his lips, pulling their corners down into a grimace. A few moments pass, before the last drop rolls from the metal its crafted from, and Dakarai's face contorts in a sour grimace, moving his head to the side, air hissing from him, before he coughs reflexively, twice, loudly. "Fuck," he mutters, though it's more to himself. | * 08: Path Badge from [[character:Cecile Madhukar]] |
| | * 09: Dust Badge from [[character:Terry Kiran]] |
| | * 10: Glint Badge from ??? |
| | * 11: Feather Badge from ??? |
| | * 12: Haze Badge from [[character:Rose Kaiki]] |
| | * 14: Pyre Badge from [[character:Keith Sirius]] |
| | * 15: Vale Badge from [[character:Yarver Bakema]] |
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| A tremor runs through Dakarai's shape, his hands flexing, and, eyes squeezing shut again, he exhales audibly, in a soft wince. Then he seems to quieten, though, remaining sat as he is... waiting. Arms slide around his shape, pulling him into a loose hug - item discarded with a soft clatter - and Jagdish's gaze shifts to latch onto Raiko, through him, looking quite bitter, his jawline resting against the side of Dakarai's head at height of his cheek bone, holding him silently. | When he hit [[place:Taqnateh]], he managed the battle by the skin of his teeth, much to [[character:Jagdish Tsukinaka]]'s abject horror. Believing it to be wholly irresponsible for him to let Dakarai escape the fate usually reserved for those quite so cruel as he'd been, Jagdish deviated from his usual strictly consensual life-wager and incarcerated Dakarai, dragging him before the legendary Council despite his success in battle. |
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| The hug tightens into something like a grip as Dakarai's shape is gripped by a reflexive spasm and the attempt to curl forward and in on himself - a pitiful sound surfaces from him, mixture of gasp and whimper of pain, and he lets himself lean forward, sagging slightly, his right hand rising to rest against the gymleader's back, fingers curling into the fabric of his jacket as though for support. The softest series of whimpers spills from him as he buries his face into the man's shoulder. | He noticed extremely quickly that he'd made a grave error in judgement and that his obsession had gone considerably too far. Utterly nauseated by the lucid spin on his own actions, he resolved to try and portray himself as the monster he'd been in the Council session itself, not just in actions, but in motivations as well, and succeeded in convincing the Council that he was beyond any form of redemption (an easy task to achieve, given that everyone //in// the Council was biased against him from the start, given the sheer severity of his actions). However, as easy as it was to keep up the pretense in the trial, it was significantly more difficult to maintain a lie of venom and uncaring under Jagdish's attention, and eventually the manipulation came to light. |
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| Jagdish bites his lower lip with visible force, causing the skin to pale further, his eyes closing as he holds Dakarai's now shivering shape. "Shh," he says, softly, whispering, his arms pressed against the suffering shape, circled around it supportingly. Could he imagine what he was feeling right now, other than an horrible, all-consuming cold? Not really - especially since it was beyond Dakarai's abilities to say something as trivial as: "It hurts." It just wasn't part of his vocabulary - but it probably rung true now. | Jagdish was, of course, not pleased. He didn't like Dakarai, so he was disinclined to have his sentence reduced to its fair margin - most notably, removing the death sentence that loomed ahead of him. Fortunately (or unfortunately), Jagdish's sense of professionalism and justice overrode his personal distaste, and [[plot:N'Sehla:2012-12-08-2|he spoke to Solalon about the matter]]. [[plot:N'Sehla:2012-12-22|A later Council session]] resolved the matter in Dakarai's 'favour' (even if Dakarai wasn't //happy// about it), and he was instead 'enslaved' to the gym circuit in the role of //Observer//. |
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| Slowly, very slowly, the trembles subside, defeatedly - he's still breathing, though, a strange calmness setting in, crowding into the remnant of conscious thought as he feels a numbness close in on his shape, pleasant in that it dispells the sensation of stabbing cold. Not finding the energy to speak, his lips move in silence, mouthing 'Thank you,' though he distantly wonders if anyone will ever know what for. Smiling lightly, he decides he has faith that it will be understood, and he lets himself relax. | Since then, his relationship with Jagdish has been increasingly friendly, to the point where the two can be considered rather intense platonic friends who would do practically anything for each other, even if outside appearances still very much suggest the strict, militaristic, hierarchic power dynamic. |
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| Arguably, it's not easy for Raiko to tell the last breath for what it is - he's not at an angle to see those subtle motions; but indirectly, it becomes evident as a violent shudder seizes Jagdish's shoulders, travelling down through his arms, them shifting to cling to the lifeless shape, and silent tears of very real grief leak from his eyes, his teeth gritted to force himself into silence, his cheek pressed against Dakarai's head. | {{tag>[comprehensive]}} |
