Stir-Crazy

“And that, Lethri, is why Father Goodfellow HAD to have secretly hired a peryton hit squad to get revenge on me!” Lethri, sitting on a cast-iron toolbox, let out a yawn. “Uh huh, yup, that is very interesting. Did you finish your soup yet?” Alya suddenly looked quite sheepish. “That isn’t important right now.” She said, glancing over to the forgotten tomato soup bowl. Explaining the intricacies of the conspiracy to kill/discredit her was a mite bit more pressing than some soup. The small girl got up from the toolbox and walked over to the soup. With a frown, she picked up the wooden bowl. “You won’t heal very fast if you don’t take care of yourself. You know that, right?” “I know that” Ayla replied, “but this is crucial to my investigation! Soup had to wait. Now I just need to figure out what to build to destroy them all!” “Mhm” Lethri said, with a practiced boredom. “Well, now that your little lecture is finished, it is soup time.” She picked out the spoon from the bowl, and brandished it in front of Ayla. “W-Wait Lethri, that soup is cold! And also, I don’t even like tomato soup.” “Should have thought of that 30 minutes ago. Now, here comes the peryton.” Lethri said as she shoved the spoon into Ayla’s mouth. Ayla grimaced around the spoon as the sickly sweet taste traveled down her throat. She tries to lift her arms up to get the spoon out, but the thick casts stop her. Seeing her difficulty, Lethri smirked a smidge. “You’re so quiet this way. It's very calming.” Ayla spits out the spoon. “Witch! Demon! Stop tormenting me!” As Lethri picks up the spoon, she says “I wouldn’t be tormenting you if you had just listened to me. Perytons mainly hunt by sound. Why in the world would you think that going out and making enough racket to wake every circle of hell was a good idea?” She bonks Ayla on the head with the spoon. “Ouch. Also, for your information, I was completely silent. I even wore puffy slippers.” Lethri stared at her. “It isn’t my fault that hammering stuff is loud.” Lethri rolled her eyes. “Ayla, you have to think about your actions. You got ripped to shreds by the perytons, I don’t think I have to tell you that. But you could have actually died. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?” Ayla frowns, and readjusts her casts. “I was trying to help people. Those heavy crossbows would have gotten rid of the peryton problem once and for all. If it’s just me, then I’m willing to take the risk.” “Ok then, think about it this way. If you died, then all your work, all your blueprints, would be effectively trash.” Alya’s eyes widen, and she shrinks back into her bed as Lethri keeps going. “I know you’ve been teaching me, and I’ve learned so many things, but even I can’t make any sense out of your machines. Sure, I can understand a little bit, but not enough to build it, or continue it. Best case scenario, I sell the blueprints to some guild workers who manage to cobble together some half-baked prototype. Otherwise, it never sees the light of day again!” Lethri is about to continue her tirade, when she glances towards Alya. She is shaken, shivering underneath the covers of her bed. “I’m sorry Ayla. I didn’t mean to start shouting at you-” “I’m sorry” Ayla’s voice is uncharacteristically quiet. “I’m not the one you should apologize to, Ayla.” Lethri says. Ayla frowns. “I just, like, I wanted to help people. Every time I set something up it feels like it blows up in my face. Literally sometimes. You were there for the last one. I thought that this time I could put my skills to some good cause. And then that would be me. Not the weird menace that people only keep around because I can throw money at them.” “Yah, ok, but getting yourself killed isn’t going to solve that. At best they’ll just write on your gravestone ‘Alya Tenyo, blew some stuff up once’” Alya scowls. “When I die, I’m gonna make them build a huge tomb for me. Biggest one in the whole graveyard.” “That’s the spirit,” Lethri says, a smile returning to her face. Alya laughs a bit at this, “Aren’t I supposed to be your teacher or something? You’re acting more like an adult than I ever do.” “We all have off days. Its ok”