Welcome to Gaia! ::

The Rift, with its crystals and parapets, was an easy place to have private vantage to watch paths throughout the hidden city. Hidden halls and hidden homes, hidden dreams and walking nightmares all encapsulated in a lurid violet glow. The Lieutenant had arrived with a Captain's escort through the Hall.

Kadyrelite. General Ops, inception early 2014. Weapon, plastic Spurs. Teenager.

The General moved, silent steps and leaps from crystal to crystal down to the path out of sight. Straightened, and started to walk up it to meet the girl. "To argue with yourself, you must be in doubt, girl. What doubts trouble you, Lieutenant? What do you define as treason?"

"If you cannot define it, how do you know you aren't a traitor?"

The General came to a stop facing the other officer, within arms reach should the need arise. "If you do not know what is treason, then you do not know what isn't either. I will educate you. "

"What are you a part of, Kadyrelite, and who do you serve?" Schörl's hazel eyes, hard in gaze, sought out the Lieutenant's.

Schörl sucked in her lower lip, looking to the side and up, humming against her teeth at complete answer. "Kingdom....yes. You are a member of a military, Kadyrelite. A collective authorized to use lethal force, and weapons, to support the interests of the organization and most of all, above all, of our Sovereign, Metallia. Hierarchy is important in the military. Hierarchy is very important in a monarchy. monos ,‘alone and arkhein, ‘to rule.’ She rules alone. Metallia's will is our utmost wish."

"Metallia's will is best interpreted by those of rank who she has invested more of her power and mind into. The chain of command is the line of authority and responsibility along which orders are passed. Sometimes orders are explicit and detailed, sometimes they are a goal, and the lower-ranked personnel is given leeway of their cleverness and ingenuity to complete a general task. "

The general stepped forward, taking a hold of the Lieutenant's wrist from salute to pull the limb out and forward. The motion looked gentle, but there was strength and solidity in it that brooked no resistance. The General's second hand caressed open the poor girls palm, dragging fingerpads along fingerpads. "The tasks were clear, Kadyrelite. What were those orders? From Apatite? You do know Apatite, and her rank? What were the goals given to the mission."

"Do you like drawing this out, luv." It was toned as an observation rather than a question. The general's idle petting paused, then reversed to draw the backs of nails lightly over Kadyrelite's half-gloved finger pads, then palm, then paused and petted circles over wrist. That moment and pause was drawn out into a long, purposefully uncomfortable span of time.

"Partial credit is the crutch of children and laggards. You aren't focused, not at your very, very best. I demand the very best. I will have it. " Thumbnail was pressed painfully to the bare heel of the Lieutenant's palm, pressure left to built there in bruise of the tissues beneath. But there was a threat or more, or worse, behind that hard nail. There was something moving in the general's coat. It was unseen, shifting a way a woman's muscles shouldn't under the sleeve and along.

"Those 'secrets' were public in the ranks. Those 'secrets' were the very specific pieces of information any of us were supposed to be angling for. But you weren't being circumspect to get the information, or trying to break their wills. What orders, what information, were you deliberately ignoring and disobeying in favor of your own aims? Your own goals and petty wants. Putting your want above that of the need of the General Sovereign and above the Desire and Want of Metallia. "

"What were they, girl."

"Travel to the moon, Sailor Cosmos, the glowing and uncorruptible members of their kind, and information regarding a supposed future that they're selling and inflicting on the whole of the magical community- THESE are the 'secrets' that were in the orders to find. These an no others. 'Purification', as the Moon Court calls it, is not on that list, Lieutenant. "

"Think. Information drawn from an unbroken subject is peppered by propaganda. There are our own order who know these answers intimately. Captain Linarite for one, the Information Specialists, the very General King Zinkenite who brought her back, could have gifted you accurate report AFTER you had completed the given mission."

"It is a big deal because you deliberately ignored orders. You put yourself and other agents in danger. You put your petty, childish, half-baked wants higher in priority than those of a General Sovereign. You didn't think. These, girl, " Schörl shifted her grip on the wrist, then pushed her thumbnail into the wrist to break the skin. Drew it steadily across, lacerating open the top layers of epidermis. A nose appeared out from the sleeve, scaled and sleek. A head, neck, lengthy body coiling out and curious. The General did not let go of Kadyrelite's wrist as it welled and bled. "Are. a. big. deal."

It was a small matter to lift the lieutenant from her sag by her arm. Up, and took hold of her throat this time for hold. Second hand left wrist to pet the open skin of collar and chest once appreciatively. "Sadly, intelligence isn't something that can be taught. But Cleverness is. The wise fool is a truth we can manage, for this poor girl's sake. She will be wise, clever, better than she is now. Wisdom to seek others, to carry word where it needs to go...many things need wisdom more than plain intellect. And she will be a good soldier then, won't she?"

When you earn your name again, you can be more than a reference, pet.

Nails were pressed against, into, the skin over clavicle and ribs to sheer open another slot. Then a hard tap of nails on sternum over where starseeds were usually accessed. "She's very bad at out of sight, out of mind yet, Strytha. Come beautiful, let yourself be always known. And your warning if she fails you both. "

At last, the General set the girl free of grasp, whether to crumple to the ground or to stand in dazed. painful penitence on Kadyrelite 's own endurance.

"You are dismissed, Lieutenant. I suggest you get to regular Dark Kingdom space, rather than here in the Rift, before taking a nap. Barbary will escort you to back to the Hall of Shadows. Don't dawdle in there or you won't come out. They are less forgiving than I."