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After the debriefing, Clerise had done some soul searching. A serious talk with Dakota and an even more dire one with Balthazar, done whilst practising on the field.

She knew she had to talk to Rep. She needed to, with so much quietly unresolved between them. Not them directly: but Clerise was connected to Sasha and Dakota alike, and so the ties that bind bound her to them also extended to Rep. There was no way Clerise agreed with everything the other man said or did-- but they had an understanding. He respected her, and it startled her to find that he did not, in fact, extend that courtesy to others close to her.

Clerise smiled bitterly as she knocked on Jordan's door, hoping Rep was there.

She was the only one it surprised, she guessed. Dwight had tried to warn her, about Rep in general-- it was something she didn't want to believe.

One phrase Dakota had mentioned stuck to her lungs like tar, rattling in her chest:

'...and then he told us that we were freaks, people who were weighed down by emotions and morals.'

"Rep," she called, knocking on the door again, her voice steadfast. Fear was a weakness, she repeated to herself. Caelius went for the throat, but Rep did too. "You in there?"

The dreaded words. The words no man ever wanted to hear.

"We need to talk, dude. There is so much ******** talk that needs doing."

Clerise had left long before Caelius had proved his point-- she didn't know what awaited the two defectors, Kat and Ryan, and it was unsettling to think about what the Death lead had come up with.

"Thanks," Clerise said, her lips twisted into a frown-- she liked tired, weighed down, her red eyes hazy and unfocused. Talking about Dakota-- and Sasha--

"You saw what I did, what I offered." The words were simple, her tone...crisp. Almost business-like: this was a matter of survival first, emotions later. Balthazar's mind wound around her own like a boa constrictor, tightening around her.

"I need to write an accurate report, but...I wasn't there. Dakota explained what happ--" She hummed, quietly, displeased with her wording. After a brief moment of lip chewing, Clerise continued. "Dakota explained what he saw. I would appreciate your point of view."

The glance at Rep was sidelong, a lazy reptile's glance, tense. The ever-carefree Clerise had checked out: this was some new creature, instead: cautious, guarded, and weary. "I know that some s**t went down, and honestly, I don't really feel up to picking a side. I wasn't there, and the explanation I got is filled with holes."

She cleared her throat. "But I know that you're not about to get executed, so you must have done something right, popular decision or not." A sardonic smile crossed Clerise's face.

There had been so many dissenters-- good people. People with heart. Wilson, Dakota, Eva. Jumpy little Deryk. Clerise still didn't get it, why they had disobeyed direct orders. What had actually happened?

Clerise pushed herself off of the wall, crashing in the chair, making no comment on the décor. Her own room, if she ever got one, would be in a similar state.

"Heh." She reclined into the chair, sinking down against the cushions. "A good a place as any to start. Is the dragon b***h Red? But I thought Dakota said she was a werewolf?" Clerise's curiosity shined through, even if it did nothing but shine a spotlight on her ignorance. It twinged at her mind, but...she had to know.

She rubbed her thumb over Balthazar, at his place around her neck, finger against the grooves of tarnished silver.

"Dakota said something about fog, then that you were all psychically connected. That Bix and Ceres had merged with their weapons, and how things went to hell from there."

"sounds nasty," Clerise said, the grimace on her face an honest one. A shapeshifting monster of immense power? That put it up in the arena of horsemen: dangerous and unwanted. When Rep said that the creature could break people's weapons, any icy jet of fear struck her heart.

Clerise stayed quiet as he explained, the pieces of the puzzle finally slipping into place. The orders clearly given to the hunters, and the resulting aftermath. What had happened to Bix, to Ceres. They had been declared dead, Dakota had said she, she'd held him as he'd wept.

They were alive, now. She didn't know the circumstances behind it, but apparently, they'd fallen. It had been a sacrifice in vain, in her eyes. They were fine now, but the group that had defected hadn't been able to save them to begin with.

"Eliminating the threats," she said, finally, her tone mild. It was easy to say that, because it had not been her loved ones on the line.

"An argument is putting it mildly. He said, and I quote-- 'he told us that we were freaks, people who were weighed down by emotions and morals'." Clerise's voice turned darker at that.

"I don't know your relationships. It's easy to talk about a monster when it didn't start off as someone who you gave a s**t about. Obeying orders seems so easy, to me, from the outside. I probably would have done the same. I barely know Bix, I've never met Ceres. If they were turned, then what's the harm in cutting them up?" The question was rhetorical, and honestly, Clerise didn't even know what her point was. Panic was creeping into her voice, something frenetic, her calm melting away like butter in a hot pan.

"But sentimentality is something that plagues all of us. The defectors were unfortunate enough to have their sentimental ties be attached to the targets. Had Jordan or Harrison been the creatures, would you have struck them down with malice and glee? Would you be mad if someone did the same?"

She ran her hands through her hair, tugging at the roots, distressed. "Sorry. I know--" Clerise breathed, inhaling deeply. "I'm overreacting. I know. I get that. I get what you did. But I also get what Dakota did, and the others."

How do I pick where I stand? What are my allegiances? What's my breaking point?

Clerise bit her knuckle as Rep talked, the dull thud of pain grounding her mind, something real to bind her feet to planet earth.

On the one hand: loyalty was important. She was a dog, in that respect. Once earned, from her, it took a hell of a lot to take it away. But on the other hand? Survival was important, too. Not just the lives of one, but the lives of many, of humanity itself.

"But the catastrophic results were temporary, Rep. To put someone down for temporary suffering is like shooting someone in the heart for an illness. A grave one, but one curable by modern medicine."

She frowned. it seemed like she was doing a lot of that, today.

"But I guess..." It was a hard idea to stomach. "Hindsight is 20/20. No one could have known, and Caelius made the call based on what he saw...He always ********' errs on the side of caution to begin with. Kill first and ask questions later. It's what you do to survive."

Clerise chewed on her knuckle again, her knee bouncing madly. To find out Rep would have done the same to his boys-- well. That broke her heart in its own way, and...she wouldn't say his logic was sound. It wasn't, not to her. But he had what a lot of people lacked: conviction to the forces of authority. He was a weapon to be used, to cull with, at the beck and call of whatever his orders were.

This is what it means to be a hunter.

When he mentioned what Dakota had said, Clerise actually snorted. "He's a boy, Rep! He's young--not the youngest, sure-- but he's bright eyed and bushy tailed, and you wanted to murder something that was his friends five minutes ago."

She reached a hand over, laying it on his arm, and squeezed, her grip tight. "And what he said is a bunch of s**t, because I'd miss you, ********. If you forget that, I'll knock your ******** teeth in." Her tone was grave. Yet another sign that she wasn't valued: that she was a friend in passing and little else.

A friend whose convictions were forgotten, a head not counted when people thought of who they cared about.

"As for Caelius...Someone can fight for the good of us all and not be loved for it. Someone can fight for the good of one and be loathed. It goes both ways in that respect. He's absolutely ruthless, using his power to get what he wants."

Clerise held a finger up. "What he wants is efficiency. Some can answer that call. You follow orders. You fight monsters. One plus one equals two."

"But human beings are flawed. We're cogs in a machine, but we don't run smoothly. We're full of in-fighting, tearing down the walls from the inside ********' out. No one mourns the ruthless dictators unless they're romanticising them. He may be saving humanity in his own way, but the price we pay, as the fodder, is a high one. Worth it? Well, we're alive. But there's Allan. H. Edith. Aria. Why be sorrowful for a man who was a complete tool to you? You can't have your cake and eat it too."

Clerise sighed, her outburst quieting her down. She looked almost sheepish. "Not trying to ********. Lecture. Or whatever. I don't like him. I hate him, actually. The fact that I'm related to him curdles my blood. But I appreciate that he saves us. Just ...Begrudgingly."

Clerise gave Rep a look as he flicked his hand, dismissing Dakota entirely. "He is my friend, just like you are my friend, like Sasha is my friend. Hate him all you want, but there's few enough Moons as it is. Few enough hunters as it is. If you honestly believe the words he said out of rage-- like if he believed yours-- you're an idiot. Seriously. Full retard. You're not alone."

Clerise sighed with a nod. "It's hard. I've been in Life too ******** long. I want to poke and prod at everything." She sounded frustrated, and tapped her fingers to her temples in the process. "We won't know for sure until we get a specimen back in the labs. Maybe Caelius will get one for H as a Christmas gift," she joked, but it was a dry sort of humour, her lips twisted in a not-quite smile.

When Dakota came up, she nodded. "He knows. I gave him an earful, even though it might not stick. He can't do this again, not like how he did."

Clerise rubbed her elbow, frowning. Rep sounded so...resigned. Worn down. Not sceptical, but... "You know, but don't forget." She had a tight knit circle on the island, or what she used to consider as such. Otto, Sasha, Rep, Dakota, Clarice. The rest were tendrils, extending outwards, their grip tenuous at best. She felt her grip on them slipping-- watching everyone argue had been like losing them all at once. Not completely...but.

Well.

Before the debriefing she had been sure, without fear and with conviction that she mattered.

Now she wasn't so sure at all. Her eyes were open, now, to the realities of the island, and Clerise was sure there was more she had yet to discover.

"That's not how the world works. When he dies, he won't go down in any history books. Like the council before him and whoever ruled before them."

They were in a war of attrition.

"It's still unfortunate-- he's a lot like Mimsy's turned out to be. Peh." For some reason, her fingers itched for a cigarette, for the acrid burn of smoke in her lungs. Red eyes widened, startled at the implication that Sasha had given him those scars.

"I knew you guys didn't get along--" The mental image of a cruel Sasha, a violent one, one hard enough to hate...

"She did that?"

His scars matched her own, given to him by Sasha instead of Caelius. His mask had returned instantaneously, war-hardened and disassociated.

But Rep had let her see. Whether or not that actually meant anything, Balthazar was unsure and expressed as much-- but he had. He had explained enough for her report, to provide an opinion that would be in line with what the devil wanted.

Something cold. A world not cast into black and whites, of varying shades of grey. The difference is that he wanted a shot fired then, no matter the cost. Eliminate the enemy, whoever the enemy may be. No matter the reasons, no matter the possibilities for the future, no matter the hope.

Caelius would get facts. He would get what it meant to be a hunter.

Until then...

Clerise laughed, bitter. "I feel...I feel like I've been living wrapped in bubble-wrap."

"The idea of turning into one of the techies, though, is probably the most disturbing mental image I've had all year. And I've seen a drunk, sloppy Jerry try to kiss Clarice."

The humour in her voice melted away for the next part.

"I think he tries too hard to be a good Moon, when it comes to his friends and allies. To protect them even if they've crossed over, if they're in a murky grey area. Some of them are pragmatic, like Harrison. But a lot of Moons have heart." She frowned. "To write someone off over that...well."

She turned a careful eye to Rep.

"He's a retard, but honestly, most of us are." A dark scoff. "Military establishment my a**, is all I'm saying. We're a sorry bunch, the lot of us. Jerry is a walking, talking train-wreck fuelled by the bottle. I broke my weapon and went without for months. Lance has no ********' legs. H got eaten by a ********' kraken--" She shrugged. "I guess my point is that perseverance is a trait of ours. Over bullshit. Be it self inflicted or otherwise."

Clerise brought her legs up, tucking her knees under her chin, listening as Rep carefully and quietly assured her that her life would not be long for this world.

It sent a shiver up her spine, and the Life huntress deliberately had no comment. It scared her, to be honest-- her idea of Sasha didn't mesh with the reality of what those dual hook scars meant. What they symbolised, what they meant. It filled her with a sense of loss. She was swirling in unknown territory, lost and alone and betrayed. Peel one layer back about a person, and you see a few more. Peel it all away, what's left? What's at the bottom? Was everyone truly ugly, deep down inside? Were they all liars? Were any of the trustworthy?

It was an issue the red-headed huntress was going to have to grapple with. Rep, at the least, was coming clean, their conversation a cleansing rain.

"I guess," was Clerise's only reply, running her fingers through her hair. "I ...used to not examine things, to pick things apart. It was an ignorant existence, but I called stuff as I saw it well enough...but. Well. Being in Life has done a number on me, apparently."

A quirked brow in Rep's direction.

"Can you fill me in on any other s**t I've missed by being retarded?"

A snort and a vehement "A. ********. Men!" was Clerise's only reply to that. She chewed on the side of her thumb, idly.

"I'm with you there," she said at long last. "I don't have to like it, but we need to be cogs in a machine. Slotted into place, greased up, and ready to work."

At Rep's sympathetic look, Clerise had to look away. It wasn't a trait to be proud of. Not here. It was ignorance and stupidity, and those were two things she just couldn't afford any longer. "I'd rather be depressed than ignorant. Is it bliss? ********. But it's also a huge weakness. It's somewhere soft and squishy, ripe for a hatchet to dig in."

Clerise stood, suddenly. "Ugh. I better write that stupid ******** report then. I don't know what he wants, but maybe I can account for events more accurately. Who knows what he'll do to me, otherwise." She made a face, nose scrunched in distaste. The redhead moved towards the door, but stopped short of it, turning on her heel.

"Thanks," she said. "For being real with me." There wasn't any sarcasm or ill will in the statement, just an earnest expression of appreciated trust.