63 Hours

[kaige68.livejournal.com]

Your challenge (should you choose to accept it) is to crank out 100 words or 1 graphic inspired by the word:
Distinct

Comments

distinct, quest, title, employ chauvinist, highway, correspond, systematic, dance, story

[agdhani.livejournal.com]

“Shouldn’t be you.”
Aman side-eyed the sulking man who walked beside him as he surveyed the men and women selected to undertake the quest for Fort Hamilton. He did not believe Norse had any knowledge of the undertaking assigned to a man who was his equal in title but superior in length of service and personal proximity to Laedan Hallister, but that lack of knowledge of a matter important enough to employ Fenway and those gathered here was enough to make Norse feel overlooked and underappreciated.
The sneering gaze Norse turned over one of the female soldiers they passed reminded Aman how much of a chauvinist the man could be.
“Take it up with the Laedan when he gets back,” Aman grunted, refusing to be baited.
The curve of the other man’s mouth and the arching of his brow indicated he intended to do that. Aman knew his comment had been read as apathy for the mission assigned, apathy Norse would attempt to use in his favor. Despite agreeing with the Laedan that this was not the a mission for the likes of Norse, Aman would not be offended if another man was chosen to lead the field in his place.
His place was here, with his Laedan.
By the time the Laedan returned from his unexpected journey, by the time Norse was able to argue his case for inclusion, Aman and his unit would already be gone.
At the end of the row of soldiers, standing at the base of a crumbling concrete and rebar arch that had once been a highway overpass, a man flanked by two other Kennedy Guardsman, waited with the confident posture of a man on business who was unintimidated by those he waited to address. Aman scowled, wondering which of them the stranger was here to see.
The closer they drew, however, the more he determined this was no stranger.
He had not seen the ruff in a long time, knew him by reputation and past hirings but he wished he did not. The fellow with the distinct lavender eyes was nearly as distasteful of an individual to him as Norse was…for many of the same reasons.
“Nepo.”
“Pleased you remember me.” Nepo offered his hand and was as relieved as Aman was when the smaller, older man refused to accept the gesture. Norse, however, clasped the hand and shook it once in a perfunctory manner.
“Here on business?” Norse asked.
“Somewhere we can talk?”
Norse gestured to a side building used as a barracks and training facility for the Laedan’s forces. “This way…”
“Both of you…if you will.”
Preferring to be included in the ruff’s business with Norse rather than excluded, as it meant no shady secrets woven behind his back, Aman nodded and was the one to lead the way into the barrack house. The soldiers were left standing in the light drizzle that had blown in from the southern sea and would remain there until he dismissed them.
He should have done so now. He would not miss even a moment of the upcoming conversation.
“Can I trouble you for some tea? It has been a long, cold ride…”
Neither had seen a horse and wondered where the ruff had stashed it before coming into the Kennedy compound. Aman and Norse briefly stared at one another, a challenge of command and leadership, until finally Norse growled and stomped off towards the barrack kitchen, losing the right to stay by the product of Aman’s seniority.
“If it’s business you’ve got here,” Aman gestured to the nearest mess table and followed Nepo to it, “it’s customary to correspond through official…”
“Nothing official about this…just questions I’m hoping you can answer.”
“It’s always questions and answers with you, Nepo. You’ll not get any secrets out of me...”
Nepo chortled and nodded at Norse when the man reached the table and thrust one of two steaming tea cups into the ruff’s hands. The other he kept for himself.
Aman refused to scowl or express notice of the affront.

pt 2

[agdhani.livejournal.com]

“Thomas Quentin. You know him?”
“Laedan Channon’s man…?”
“Was,” Nepo emphasized. “Served Hallister for a time, eh?”
“One of many adjuncts, I believe,” started Norse.
“A clerk…more of an errand boy…”
“So how’d he end up in Laedan Channon’s sphere? Graduate from errand boy to a Laedan’s right hand?”
“Damned if anyone knows,” replied Norse. His hands wrapped around the cup and he spoke over the lip of it, inhaling the spiced vapors but not drinking.
His lack of doing so made Nepo lower his cup without drinking.
Norse grinned.
“What do you know about him? Family? Friends? History?”
Norse shrugged. There had never been a reason for him to dig into the background of an insignificant clerk not even when the news came that the man had found a favorable position in Laedan Channon’s cabinet and swiftly rose in rank and prominence.
By then he was no longer Kennedy’s concern. He meant nothing to Laedan Hallister or anyone else in the southern borough.
“Mother was a clerk…with enough pull to get her son into the work,” Aman offered, his voice neutral. It was a common enough thing, the systematic recruitment of the family members of the Fortress staff. Family connections bred loyalty, as each employee and servant knew that a single wrong move could result in the punishment of each individual in the family. Quentin’s hiring was no more, or less, than business as usual in Kennedy Fortress.
He was, however, perhaps the only one who knew the reason Quentin had left Kennedy. The clandestine dance between the clerk and the Laedan’s daughter that had threatened both of their lives.
It had been a wise choice, leaving Kennedy as he had.
The choice years later, for Oasis to marry a Channon to unite the borrows by blood, had come with some suspicion on Aman’s part about the young woman’s motives, but she had, when he had last seen her, appeared committed to the marriage and alliance she had accepted. If there any further connection between her and Quentin, Aman had not been privy to it.
It was a secret he would carry with him to his grave.
For her sake if no other.

pt 3

[agdhani.livejournal.com]

“Is it true he’s Fela?”
Aman’s face lost its neutrality to settle into a frown.
Norse’s, on the other hand, brightened as if he had received the best news he could imagine.
“Never heard it said if he is,” the older man said with a slight rising shrug of one shoulder. He did not know Quentin’s father, had never heard mention of him or seen him within the Fortress. As it was not uncommon for Fortress employees to be married to those outside of the Laedan’s direct employment, he could have been anyone. His mother might not have been married.
“No wonder he left. Shartin’ hard to keep that sort of thing a secret.” Norse gave in and drank his tea at last but the cup to his lips did not hide his excited grin.
“Is it?” How many other clerks and cleaners and cooks might be anthro? There was no easy proof most of the time and anthro had learned to be cautious. How long had the rumors of the Marrocks being Cana persisted? Had that been true too, regardless of the public proclamation to the contrary?
Norse snorted. “Is if you want to keep your head.”
“His mother still alive? Any siblings? Know how I can track his father?”
“Mother died some years back…before he left Kennedy. No siblings I know of…no rumors about his paternity.” There were records about such things, however, records of birth and paternity meant to serve as a basic population census. Many parents never reported the birth of children, and it was easy to lie on the recordings to hide a parent or claim one to be so who was not.
Serving in the Fortress at the time of Thomas’ birth meant it was likely a matter of record, a story Aman had never had reason to look into.
“Does it matter?” asked Norse.
“Who’s asking?” asked Aman.
Nepo shrugged and set the now empty cup on the table. “Client privilege. You know how it is.”
Norse leaned forward, closing the distance between himself and the ruff. “If he’s a threat to Laedan Hallister…”
“No reason to think he is…” Nepo countered casually.
“Except that you indicated he’s lost his place in LaGuardia’s court…”
Nepo only shrugged but did not verbally deny or concur with anything as he rose from the table. “Thank you for the tea…and the chat…”
“Is he coming here?”
Nepo threw a dispassionate glance at Norse but did not reply.
“If he is coming here, Laedan Hallister needs to know.”
“If he’s coming here, I suspect you’ll know soon enough.”
Norse continued hounding the ruff all of the way out the door. Aman remained seated at the table, staring absently across the dimly lit room. Norse had found his purpose, his reason to stay behind, meaning that Aman’s duty to find Fort Hamilton and confiscate its treasures for the Laedan remained intact.
The danger to Laedan Hallister would not, however, come from a weapon in Thomas Quentin’s hands.
If it came at all, it would come wound in the strings of perceived betrayal and accusations that Hallister had sent Quentin to interfere in LaGuardia’s politics. With the Laedan being away, there was no means for Aman to discover if that accusation was true.
He did not want to believe it but he knew Geary well enough to know that it very well could be.