do you want my presence or need my help? (part LXVIII)

(Roleplay entry. Continued from part LXVII.)

1.3 Table@Leng
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East: (Rolls the dice, smiling.)
South: (Looks from the dice to West.) "Looks like you break, Asa."
West: (Stares tersely at the other players.) "I do not follow."
North: (Smirks.) "Perhaps not, but neither do you have the strength to lead. You would do well to heed your instruction, if only to defeat it."
East: (To North.) "Now, now. There is no need to chastise a student looking for orientation."
(To West.) "Vishwamitra is... a friend. Or rather an accomplice.
South: (Watches, hiding a grin.)
West: (With pallid affect.) "I don't remember him mentioning any of you. And I don't know that I care."
North: (Pointed. Bitter. Removed.) "Memory is such a fickle thing. Do you even care? About anything? Have you, ever?"
East: (Watches West, waiting for an answer.)
South: (Watches the others, waiting for an answer.)
West: "I... used to."
(Wind blows, sweeping the Plateau.) "What was that?" North: (Watches nothing.) "Change, I think. Or perhaps, meeting something which was always there, but was avoided. Perhaps now, something else will take its place."
East: (Smiles.)
South: (Watches with curious eyes.)
West: (Flat. Cracking.) "...Perhaps."
North: (The smallest of smiles.)
East: (Lightly.) "Not so hard to believe he and we would get on, now, is it?"
South: (Watches West.)
West: (A smile–cold, cruel, and the faintest bit human–breaks.) "That man loved to get along with every enemy."
North: (Shares in the pained smile of West.)
East: (Closes eyes, basking in West's cold smile.) "Mmmm... but he could deal." (Opens the eyes, gazing–soft, flirtatious–at West.) "Can you?"
South: (Smiles at West, adding.) "You would start by rolling the dice, and counting that many stacks leftward from the right end of your side of the tiles. That is where you break the wall."
West: (Watches South for a moment.) "What if I refuse?"
North: (Scoffs.) "By all means, try. Had I the desire to wholly reject my choices, I might attempt it, as well."
East: (Winces, and sighs, a touch wistful.) "You have to discover for yourself what that really means, I think." (To North, wryly.) "Though I do think he understands that would also be a choice, dear."
South: (Indicates the gong fu, looking East, North, West.) "Would any of you like some tea?"
West: (Eyes East, South, North, like a caged animal. Picks up the two dice slowly. Rolls 7.)
North: "Ahhhh... I believe I have had sufficient." (Turns the tea cup upside down with the right, and only, hand.)
East: (To South.) "Yes, please."
(To West.) "Now, push all the tiles further left than those seven another inch or two further left, and I will deal."
South: (Pours tea for South and East.)
West: (Crossly, to East.) "I thought you said I was dealing."
North: (Most coldly amused.) "No one said that."
East: (Smiles to West, bittersweet.) "You will be, in time. When you sit where I do now. For now, all you have to do is break the wall, and learn."
South: (Gestures to the cup of West with the gong fu, questioning.)
West: (Moves the tea cup from right to left, so South may pour, and breaks the wall.)
North: (To West.) "I hope for your sake you are as stubborn about trusting everything else as you are about trusting this. You will need it before we are done."
East: (Begins dealing the tiles to every direction, serene.)
South: (Pours the tea.)
West: (To North, suspicious, terse.) "You remind me of her."
North: (To West, adamant, terse.) "Yet her I am not."
East: (Pauses the dealing to smell and sip the tea, sighing, pleased.)
South: (Reveals Orchid, and looks East. Refills the cup of East, smiling, free.)
West: (Takes up the tea, smelling, suspicious.)
North: (Witnesses, patient.)
East: (Deals out the last tiles to each direction.) "And now... we play." (Discards 4 Bamboo.)

1.4 holographic image exfiltration passively intercepted by Gearhaven Security during the Countess' rezday party
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