Grey couldn’t help it, he burst into laughter. He barely got a second bellow out before he started wheezing instead, then he accidentally inhaled a bit of spit and started hacking and coughing. But no matter how much he sounded like a raccoon in a garbage disposal, he just kept laughing.
Tears quite literally fell from his eyes, and his display was so ridiculous there wasn’t a single gaze that wasn’t on him at that moment.
"Holy shit," Grey wiped at his eyes with his fingers, and then his palms when he realized that wasn’t going to be enough, "now that is some funny shit. Wooo."
He exhaled a final breath.
"Anyway, I don’t have the time for all of this. We’re leaving now. Whatever the love affair you’ve got going on here—."
"There’s no fucking love affair." Amunet’s head whipped toward him.
Grey put his hands up in mock surrender. "Sorry, sorry. I’m just aware of how shameless you are, who knows what you get up to in your free time."
The echo of a rapier being unsheathed echoed. Grey was sure Amunet probably thought it was pretty fast, but at this point it might as well have been slow motion to him.
Still, for the sake of the joke, he didn’t move. At this point, his revenge against the lady was as good as sealed, so he didn’t mind letting her have a few empty wins.
"Oo, feisty."
Brad cleared his throat to stifle a laugh and Mauve wasn’t sure how she felt about all this. Instead, she looked toward where Stella was standing.
Their gazes met, but Stella quickly looked away. Her meaning was obvious enough, she was breaking free of them.
Mauve frowned, but ultimately chose to say nothing.
"There’s a limit to what you can joke about." Amunet said.
"Is there? I wasn’t aware, mom."
Amunet gritted her teeth. She knew that Grey was more clever than this. He was doing it on purpose to piss her off, and the more she acted like this, the more obvious it would be that he was pressing her buttons.
"Whatever." Amunet pulled her rapier back and sheathed it, then she looked toward Jyoti. "I won’t say that I don’t care about you guys, we’ve been through life and death—literally. But right now, you are holding me back. That is the short of it.
"I will be blunt. I cannot lead this alliance because none of you will respect me as much as you respect this asshole. And this asshole has no intention of leading any of you.
"You’ve already seen the level of enemies we have waiting for all of us. The more time we waste, the more we grind our feet, the further behind we will fall. I cannot afford to try and drag you along with me, especially if you’ll all be constantly hoping for someone else to take my place instead.
"Even if I leave, you all still have yourselves and your numbers. Try to accomplish something with it. That is the best I can do for you."
The words Amunet spoke came out with a sort of finality to them, but Grey couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow.
She was a decent public speaker, better than him, anyway. He probably would have just told them to fuck off.
But this worked, too.
Amunet’s words did give Grey another idea, though.
"You." Grey suddenly said, his eyes landing on Zuri.
Zuri blinked and then stood up a little straighter. Despite her earlier words, she didn’t even have the guts to put on a flirtatious smile right now.
"Organize this bunch on my authority. Anyone steps out of line, let me know and we can make a nice little tombstone for them. All the details, you figure it out. The rest, I don’t care about. Know your limits and you won’t be replaced."
After saying that, Grey just started marching away.
"Uh..." Zuri’s mouth hung open. What the hell just happened?
...
"Why did you do that?" Amunet asked after they entered the forest.
"Because I felt like it."
"Do you know anything about her?"
"Other than that she’s kinda hot? No, not really."
"..." Amunet was speechless. "Are you serious right now?"
"Well, I’m certainly not going to do that work."
"Then why didn’t you give it to someone you actually know? Like—" Amunet didn’t finish her words, but she was clearly referring to Mauve.
Amunet hardly knew anything about Mauve, but her intuition for people wasn’t bad.
"Because she’s with us right now, obviously."
Mauve didn’t say anything, just silently following after.
"... You didn’t think through this at all, did you?"
"Why are you so worried about it? You were going to leave them to their own devices anyway."
"It matters. What you just did is more dangerous than leaving them to their own devices. Your words carry a lot more weight than you think right now."
"Good. Then that means they’ll listen."
"You don’t know anything. Zuri is very cunning and she walks around with a mask everywhere she goes."
"A mask?"
"A figurative one. I don’t think any of us have seen her true personality yet, and that makes her dangerous."
Grey chuckled.
"Just because you’re strong now doesn’t mean you’ll be stronger than everyone else forever. You just gave someone you don’t know power over hundreds of people. She could literally just funnel all those resources into herself, and by the time you go and check, even if she hasn’t personally surpassed you, she might have found something or gathered enough power to—."
"Stab me in the back?" Grey finished, giving Amunet a pointed look.
Amunet stiffened.
"I’m not worried about a knife I can see coming. I’m worried about the one I don’t see coming. Luckily for me, someone made pretty damn sure that I don’t see myself getting caught off guard ever again.
"Now, enough yapping."
Grey’s chest pulsed and the Dark Kin Cycle appeared.
Before, it could only take two people at most. But after integrating with Grey, things changed.
"Alright fellas, it’s gonna be a bit awkward, but pile on. Ladies, cling to me preferably. Brad... good luck."