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Kallista was freezing. It was bad enough on the ground, but here on the airship the higher altitude and constant wind made the temperature almost unbearable, especially for a tiefling. It was hard to believe that only a little more than a month had passed since the beautiful fall weather of the last time she was on an airship. She wrapped the fur blanket she'd found in the crew quarters tighter around her shoulders and turned her eyes from the breathtaking view to head back inside where the lamps and body heat kept the temperature at least tolerable.

Entering the crew quarters she saw Tzesira sitting on her bunk looking sullen, although with Tzesira it was sometimes difficult to tell the difference between sullen and angry... or any other emotion for that matter.

Kallista decided it was worth the risk and swooped in quickly to sit next to her, wrapping her arms and the blanket around her friend.

"Oh thank the gods..." she said through chattering teeth, "Don't mind me. I need to steal your body heat."

The monk grumbled and shuffled over to make room. "Well, fuck, whatever - 's not that cold. And what makes you think I have any body heat? I am Winter's fucking child." She'd been thinking of home, and of her future, but she didn't really notice the bitterness in her tone.

"Awwww", Kallista said, her caretaker-sense tingling, "Are we feeling more angsty than usual today? Is it about your trip home? You've seemed a bit out of sorts ever since you got back."

Tzesira leaned away from the tiefling to execute a better glare. "Fuck you. I don't have 'sorts'."

Kallista grinned and held on to her friend as Tzesira pulled away, refusing to give up her new-found heat source. Besides, the hug would do her good.

"Bullshit, you have sorts, they're just not obvious to an untrained observer. There's a very subtle difference between your normal mopey-but-pissed-off and your current mopey-but-gently-smoldering-with-angst."

She just wanted to scream - ever since she'd got back, the feeling haunted her. Every little frustration felt magnified a hundredfold. But what if she did - just screamed and screamed until there was nothing left? Instead she took a deep breath, and blew it out in an indignant snort. "I certainly don't fucking *mope*."

Kallista sighed and leaned her head on Tzesira's shoulder.

"T, I mean this in the nicest way, but you take moping to a whole new level. I should know. I'm pretty good at it myself sometimes."

She lifted her head and relased her grip on her friend, her own body heat finally starting to return.

"Is there anything you need to talk about?"

She'd been sure she'd feel better after she got out of the city, but there was so much waiting, so much idle time on the meandering airship. Flying on the Highwind had been invigorating, but here she just felt like the lumbering pace of the Goliath was dragging her down. Guarding the ship was a joke. Now she told herself she'd feel better when there was some action.... Only wasn't that her problem? And what if she didn't? The words of her masters had cut deep wounds, and she didn't know how to staunch them.

She pulled her knees up to her chin. "This shit is boring as Hell. I just need something to fuckin' *do*."

Kallista tucked her legs underneath her and snuggled further against Tzesira's lean frame.

"Bored, huh? Yeah, there's not a whole lot to do on this ship, not in this weather, anyway. I could maybe find some cards or dice or something? But something tells me that's not your idea of a good time."

"Fuck! I don't even know." That was half the problem - she was full of energy she had no idea how to burn, or how to burn safely.

Kalista rubbed her arms and thought for a moment.

"We could always spar. Or wrestle..."

She stopped herself and turned to her friend with a grin.

"For real, this time."

"Well." She puffed out another frustrated breath. She was tense, and full of undirected anger. On the one hand, she didn't want to snap and hurt her friend. On the other hand, though, she needed to find some way of dealing with all of her extremities of passion, and learning to keep herself in check was a big part of that. maybe not wanting to hurt Kallista would be a big enough incentive. Well, not seriously hurt her, anyway - she wasn't made of glass. She scowled challengingly. "The thing is, I already fuckin' know I'm better than you."

Kallista pulled back and looked at Tzesira as though she had grown another head.

"I'm sorry, what was that? I couldn't hear you over the sound of how much bullshit you're full of."

"Fuck whatever. You know I'm stronger than you and my training isn't just guild crap either." She sat up more, not so casually unfolding herself from her curl.

Kallista tossed the blanket on the bed, the cold completely forget for the moment, and stood up, hands on her hips.

"Guild crap? GUILD CRAP?!" she said incredulously, "My mother taught me how to shiv someone before I could walk! When I was eight my parents locked me in a room with a boa constrictor and told me only one of us was leaving alive! That sort of thing tends to focus your fucking concentration! I could outmaneuver you with both hands and one leg tied behind my back!"

She shrugged dismissively, unimpressed by the boasting. "Don't see what shiv'ins got to do with wrestling. And I don't know what a boa constrictor is but if you could take one when you were eight I can't imagine I'd be real impressed."

"It's a snake! A giant fuck-off snake!" Kallista said, fuming, "I had to beat it to death with a loose brick!"

She took a step to the right, circling slightly as she eyed up the shorter woman.

She got her feet under her, maintaining her crouch and grinning more slyly at her circling friend's exasperation, black eyes narrowed. "Couldn't have been that big a snake. Or I guess maybe if you were really *scared* you might have been strong enough to beat it to death. How long did that take? Was it sleeping?"

Kallista's eyes lit up with fire around the edges of her irises and her hands balled into fists.

"Oh, you are so dead!" She hissed through clenched teeth.

She leaped forward, staying low to try to negate the Shadar-kai's lower center of gravity as she aimed a punch below her ribs.

She snorted, easily twisting out of the way. "Ya ain't playin' with knives now, K." She continued to twist, extending her leg as Kallista's strike brought her in closer and bringing her knee up into her friends kidney. Following on fluidly, she spun off her perch on the bunk and landed lightly on her feet behind the Tiefling.

Kallista dodged to the side, but still took a glancing blow to her kidney, grunting as her leather clothing took most of the brunt of it.

"Ha!" she shouted, grinning with the thrill of battle.

When Tzesira leaped behind her, Kallista's tail shot up and jabbed her opponent in the throat, putting her off balance momentarily. Taking advantage of the moment, Kallista spun around, leading with her elbow, aiming it straight for the side of Tzesira's face.

"Ha yourself," she growled, again flowing with the motion, wrapping her hands around the offending tail and gripping it securely as she let herself fall backwards, pulling the other woman down mid-spin, hoping to bang her head into the wall, or the bunk on the way down. She bounced back into a crouching position as soon as she hit the floor.

The caterpillar of bundled blanket two bunks up snarled. Loudly. After a moment's shimmying and squirming, the blanket unwound just enough to reveal Delona's unamused face squinting over the edge at them.

"...the fuck? Will you two shut up and take the bizarre mating rituals somewhere else? Kord's Balls, some of us have night shift ya know. If you wake me up again I will eat your eyeballs on toast and let Mai make suits out of your skins." Turning her back on them with an emphatic flip, Delona covered her face and curled up again, muttering imprecations against their morals, family lineage, and personal hygiene.

"Gah!" Kallista squeeked as Tzesira yanked her to the ground, "Not the tail!"

She crashed backwards onto the grinning Shadar-kai, the both of them landing in a confused heap on the floor. Kallista raised her fist for a punch, but paused in mid-swing when Delona yelled at them from across the room.

"Oh... ummm... sorry." she said.

"Yeah?" Tzesira snapped at the blanket-bundled Half-Orc as she hopped back to her feet. "I'd like to fuckin' see you try."

She recognized the foul turn her mood was taking at the interruption (frustrated again) - she could exorcise it still, but not if she stuck around. With that in mind she turned on her heel, stalking towards the door.