"Dear, you should sleep."
Sameia entered the Captain's cabin. Without knocking. As she was want to do.
She had permission, but she had been doing it often lately.
The Captain stood at her desk, maps, charts, and blueprints spread across it's surface. Paliano, the docks, the high city... The Crescenzo estate itself. Strong armed from the remanants of the family who had built it generations ago, edited with the unmarked passages and secrets Adelaide remembered from her childhood. A precious document. The key to her success, and to her future.
She looked a mess, as Sam crossed to her. She hadn't slept well, her curls were tangled and knotted in many spots. An empty mug had been pushed to the far edge of the desk, and another was still laying across the small room by the far wall, from when it had been thrown.
She trailed a hand across their shoulder as she came to stand behind the desk with The Captain. Bliss didn't truly notice, still absorbed in the maps beneath her, as she scratched out another plan in ink. She would throw this one out too, eventually. The guard rotations never lined up right, or she would hear a report back from those watching the estate that something had changed, her planned route of entry was no longer available. They shifted their stance, tail flicking irritably as she looked down at the desk beneath her hands.
"I can't sleep yet. I'm close. We're close. I just... Need more information."
The Captain had been saying it for months already. They had been scraping together every ounce of information they could on her mother, on her family, on the physical estate. It still didn't feel like enough. She sighed, straightening up and stretching her back, as Sameia rubbed a warm hand across her hunched shoulders.
When had she become so cautious? When had she started worrying about exit strategies, about supplies and stealth and making sure they wouldn't be seen? Wouldn't be hunted and chased from this plane just like Ixalan?
Oh yes. That's when. When she lost her network. She grimaced, and Sam's tail curled around her own when it paused in it's irritated twitching.
"The first 10 plans were all fine. We're breaking in, taking what we need, and leaving." Sam picks up a crumpled piece of parchment. The latest plan she had discarded. "What part about that wasn't working for you?"
She didn't understand. It wasn't about that. Well, it was, but not like that. The Contessa Crescenzo would be home. She HAD to be home. And therefore it had to be perfect. Adelaide had to make sure it was perfect. Her... Revenge? Ascension? Confrontation.
She needed to be in control of the meeting with her mother. She needed to prove to her that she could succeed her. Or... Something like that. She wasn't sure.
This plan felt like the closest yet. They could get in, lock down the estate, take out any problematic guards, stop anyone from interfering. But she just couldn't account for The Contessa herself. And that was what was irritating her.
"It's just... Not right." She answered lamely. How could she explain this to Sameia? It barely made sense to her. She didn't WANT to be the Contessa. She didn't WANT to stay on this plane. But she wanted her freedom. And that would come with power. Crescenzo family power. Her mother's power.
Bliss sighed, taking a step back from the desk. Even is something within her simmered with resentment at being pulled away from creating their perfect plan, she was at her wit's end. She needed rest, and food, and the company of someone other than her own thoughts.
"You're right. Let's get out of here. What time is it?" Bliss looked around the cabin, grimacing at the state of it. The tankard on the floor slowly rolled back and forth with the movement of the ship. It would need to be cleaned up. Ideally before she was caught up in planning again.
"Just past dawn." Sam looked between the plans of the desk. Nearly identical, differences only in slight timings and choosing one hallway over another. She shook her head.
The Captain groaned, rubbing her burning eyes. "Morning. Hells. Has Ruel-"
"Already finished cooking breakfast. And most of the crew has already eaten." Sam made a small correction to the current draft of the plan. "He saved you some. But you're getting the dregs of the coffee still."
Bliss chose not to care about her tampering in the moment.
Maybe Sam would see something she couldn't. Sameia was smarter than she was. She was better at planning, at strategy, everything that a leader truly needed.
If anyone could make it work, it was her beloved wizard.