Aeric Tanner shut his eyes a moment. What followed was a part of him that Gideon may have only seen a handful of times. That rippling wave of anger that started at his chest and tensed his form from the core to the curve of his boots as he drew a slow breath. The cooler air of the cabin sought to stem the tide of fire but it did little more than to fan it. When he looked to him, that steel was tempered. “If you think I am mad that ya talked with her, I ain’t. Truth is, she ain’t on my horizon anymore. She is churnin’ in th’wake. But what I am mad about is that ya dance around it with me when I give a direct question to ya, Gideon. We’ve been through enough shit, you an’ I. It counts for somethin’ on this boat.”
Gideon Rhames felt that weight press into the hollow of his chest. Felt it in the mark on his stomach, the claws raking his shoulder. The poison burning his insides. Aeric's tide turned, churning waters starting to froth even as steel pressed to his Quartermaster's features. Gideon, though, was the squall forming on the horizon. One bid the other, and the more Aeric spoke the tighter the man's hands filled with leather. "Don't need t'lecture me what it be worth." There was a rough but steady undertone like a current slipped beneath the surface waiting to drag a soul beneath. "Walked away from most'a'that'shit with plenty'a reminders on me. Maybe I..." His lips curled, nose twitching like a foul odor had been breathed before he looked again to Aeric's desk. "Ye ain't ever gone t'th'lengths ye did fer a woman like this. Y'put yerself at risk, n'me with it. Hell y'coulda been killed on th'fuckin' bridge, Aeric. Fuck if I know why, y'never cared a lick 'bout a piece 'nough t'wanna stick yer yer neck out like that. Maybe, I was tryin' not t'cock it up more'n'I already did. Yer th'Cap'n, aye. But yer th'only friend I got. N'.....I fucked up."
Aeric Tanner churned. “I did an’ I ain’t slept a week for it. Watchin’ you get put under steel set me blazin’ down hellfire in my blood, Gid.” He paused and watched him as that gaze locked dead to rights. “I run this ship. This crew. But I can’t do it without a right hand. My fuckin’ decision almost cost me somethin’ greater than a piece of tail. It almost cost me my friend.” He exhaled the tide and let it roll back; his tone matching the sands it took with it. “I fucked up too, mate. Real good. But I couldn’t let’em die down there. An’ I would have raised the Kracken itself were it you. An’ it almost was.”
{ @devil-you-know }