FFM 2025 2: Unplanned Meetings

I may have opened some floodgates with yesterday’s story because I just had to write about those characters again. Whoops. I’m pretty sure I gave myself some kind of a curse with that story too because this one went 41 words over the limit. Also whoops.

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Had someone told Steirdrar last year that he would not only meet a warrior of the Eskel-Zai culture — a rarity this long into the war, many of the clans that had joined it having dwindled close to nothingness — but also become friends with them, he would have looked around to see who had dared this someone to present such an absurd claim to him.

Meeting an Eskel-Zai he could imagine; since he was stationed at the intelligence department, it was an eventuality, as many of the Eskel-Zai still with them were experts at infiltration and exfiltration, the best even at espionage. But having a conversation beyond their work, let alone friendship? No way that would ever happen.

When he finally met an Eskel-Zai, it was with his heart pounding over the false alarm the warrior’s scream had evoked. Without her helmet on, on her knees on the base’s floor, a haunted look in her eyes, she looked like a civilian. A civilian just like the ones he had participated in oppressing as part of the Infini’Republic’s war machine. The other bystanders, startled by her scream as well, thought they were looking at a medical emergency. When Steirdrar swallowed his guilt and approached the warrior like he would approach a hurt civilian, he learned that the other bystanders were wrong — and a whole lot more.

Steirdrar figured he would never see that Eskel-Zai again. The powers that be had given her an instance of Sight in the form of a vision of her family dying violently. Certainly enough for anyone, even a veteran warrior, to decide they had had enough of endless fighting.

Then he met her again, this time the way he had thought he would meet an Eskel-Zai in the first place. Although, the warrior was worse for wear — a broken arm, paint stripped off the armor covering that arm, loopy from whatever painkillers she had taken to make it to the intelligence department to drop off the data she had stolen instead of heading straight to the medical department and having someone else take the data the rest of the way. He assumed he would not see her for days, the healing process and heavy-duty painkillers rendering her unable to do anything productive.

He was wrong again; the gleam of cobalt blue caught his eye in the mess hall that evening, guiding his eyes to that same Eskel-Zai — Agent Ket, according to the briefing on the data she had brought — sitting alone at the corner of a table. She was glaring at the food in front of her, picking at it, her head leaning against the fist of her previously broken arm.

Steirdrar was too curious not to approach. He sat down in front of the Eskel-Zai, ready to get up quickly if she would tell him to go away, but instead the glare turned into a faint smile as she recognized him.

“Huh, it’s you,” she murmured, looking just as exhausted as Steirdrar felt now that he got a closer look, “the iasa’net’tea.”

Despite recognizing the individual words, Steirdrar could not parse their meaning when connected like that. “Pardon?”

Agent Ket waved her fork weakly. “It’s an Eskel-Zai… something. Eyes-with-brains‘s the translation. Like, you’re… what’s the word…” She let out a noise that sounded a half-sigh-half-groan. “Like, you actually use your brains to interpret what you see.”

“Are you trying to say I’m perceptive?” Steirdrar ventured.

“Perceptive… yea, that sounds like the word.” Agent Ket pointed her fork at Steirdrar, her eyes now only half-open. “A fittin’ word anyway.”

Steirdrar nodded. “Shouldn’t you be at medical? You know, because of your arm?”

“Meh, don’t wanna be there. I hate the antiseptic smell.” Agent Ket sighed heavily. “Got my own ward on my ship anyway. Out of everyone’s way. Nicer.”

“Then shouldn’t you be at your ship?” Streirdrar feigned casualness. “You seem fatigued.”

“I guess.” Agent Ket shrugged. “I overestimated myself. Healing tends to do that.”

The gift of Healing? Steirdrar held back his confusion; Agent Kent was not in any condition to elaborate, after all. “Do you want help with getting back?”

Agent Ket looked at him silently for a while, probably trying to think. “…That’d probably help, to be honest.”

Steirdrar bit back a sarcastic response. “I wouldn’t mind helping then.”

Agent Ket’s smile widened a bit. “Thanks.”

After eating, Steirdrar escorted the exhausted warrior to her ship, where she was received by a visibly unimpressed android. Neither asked for his name although they both thanked him individually before disappearing into the ship. Steirdrar chalked it up to the rough mission they had come back from and decided he would look them up for proper introductions the next day.

The powers that be must have been pranking him, because in a way he was wrong once again. When he was heading towards the hangars the next evening, the same gleam of cobalt blue caught his eye, drawing his attention to an armored soldier training with a staff, another staff strapped to their back. He recognized the armor, if only for the still unmended paintjob, the signature shine of Qual metal still uncovered.

Upon his approach, Agent Ket paused her training and took off her helmet, the grin on her face a distinct contrast to the severe moods Steirdrar had previously seen her in. “Evenin’, iasa’net’tea.”

A smirk found its way on Steirdrar’s face somehow. “Evening to you as well. It occurred to me that I never introduced myself.”

Agent Ket chuckled. “Yeah, it never was the time and place for introductions before.” She attached her staff to her back and held out her hand. “Agent Beyari Ket.”

Steirdrar shook her hand. “Commander Steirdrar Urrang.”

“Pleasure to properly meet you, Commander Urrang.”

“Likewise, Agent Ket.”

Agent Ket looked at him up and down, her grin morphing into a sharp smirk. “May I interest you in a spar?” She patted her back. “I have two staffs, after all.”

Steirdrar’s smirk morphed into a grin. “You’re on.”