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GAUCHO
Doubt comes in on sticks but then he kicks like a horse.
"Yes." He rumbled back, black ears flirting with the top of his neck. "If have power to save a life and not do so, just as bad as killing. You are killing. Egg alone on beach. Even in egg it not safe - it almost get crushed. Gaucho would have brought it back if it hatched and was strong." Nosing toward the small ignorant chick, he huffed. "It obviously not. It choose this."
As she asked if safety was better than freedom, Gaucho fell silent, a look of betrayal upon his stoic features. Of course it wasn't - how could she think the two concepts were even remotely similar? And worse, how could she think he would support the second? All that he had done in all of his time in Helovia, was train. He sparred and fought and conditioned almost every day. Why? To protect. He wouldn't need to protect those around him if they bothered to try and protect themselves. But they didn't. Aurelia strolled happily into the Basin, knowingly and willingly provoking fights, Sohalia disappeared into Gods knew where, before that the Wraiths had come, and even know a murderer walked among them. He couldn't protect his family, those he cared for and valued above all else, at all times. If he made the Throat into an island, at least they could have a haven wherein they could be safe, where they would not have to worry about the plagues and tribulations of the world around them. Further that she thought that he was somehow restricting their freedom, as if this whole second leg of this damned quest wasn't specifically about ensuring that the non-winged among them had the same mobility made the flames on his wings flare up. He wanted to kick her in the face for her ignorance, to transfer the rage that boiled within his core into her. To make her feel his anger, his disappointment, and to swamp the arrogance that seemed to ignite her words.
All he had ever wanted was to make his herd strong so that they could be safe, doing and being wherever and whatever they pleased. But until that time came, he would protect them.
Through clenched teeth he turned his blazing gaze upon her, regardless of whether or not she returned it. "Safety is better than death. Everyone is as free as they allow themselves to be. Our herd .... " Lazy wasn't the right word for it. Perhaps un-motivated was better, but at the moment Mara was still too intently focused on Ampere to provided an apt substitution. "-they do nothing. They rather swim in Oasis and let Gaucho and warriors protect them, than learn to protect themselves. They happy that Gaucho the one with all the scars, not them."
He had always wanted the Throat to be a herd of warriors. They need not all be the caliber that he and his current selection were, but nothing would make him happier than if they had all at least won one fight. But he had been told, on numerous occasions, that that was asking too much. That the herd could decide to give themselves into the protective folds of the warriors so that they would never have to learn to fight.
He did not want this for them, they had chosen it themselves. And here Ampere was, throwing it in his face.
It burned, and it hurt.
He pulled away from her, first with his eyes and then his shoulders, to contemplate the oasis. A dark ear flickered to catch her second question, but more than anything he wanted to ignore it. To ignore her. The two were like rhythmic pulses on slightly different beats. At certain times, they would align, their rhythms beating perfectly in time together, loud and strong. But as time went on, the sounds were pulled apart, the syncopation becoming unbearable. He had thought Ampere knew him, understood him.
Apparently not. He was just some monster who enslaved creatures while they were weak, and did the same to his herd.
"No." He replied, his voice flat and distant. "Gaucho not wonder. Gaucho not wonder about a lot of things because it not matter. This how world works." Flexing his neck around to regard her solemnly, wondering when the spark in her eyes had turned to daggers meant for him he continued. "The way the world is is not right or wrong. It just is. Maybe bonding bad, Gaucho not know. But with out it, these creatures die. Gaucho not have to let that happen." He conceded, his dark skull dropping to the sands to Mara. The snake slithered to him, her gunsteel body raising up to gently nuzzle against his black lips encouragingly.
I sssssssstay. She whispered thoughtfully, before moving to his foreleg and winding her way up to his shoulder, then wither, and finally into his antlers.
He look to Ampere silently. So self righteous, so arrogant. "You never bond. How you even know?"
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