Sista and Atkar

Sista and Atkar

Sista was making preparations for a run into the Twilight Highlands.
"Doing a run?"

Startled, Sista dropped a half full satchel. Atkar was standing in front of her.

"Doing a run?" Atkar repeated.

Sista recovered quickly. "Already finished with the Naxramas run for the week." The two women assessed each other. Finally, Sista broke the silence. "Tiphaine says . . . "

"Don't care what that death knight says," spitting out the words. "Doing a run?" Persistent.
"Bastion of Twilights," Sista said. "Why?"

"I'm running it, too," Atkar announced. Sista kept busy with her bags, continuing with her work without saying anything.

"I don't need your permission, you know." Atkar said mildly.

The hairs on the back of Sista's neck rose stiffly.

Atkar's tone switched to petulant. "I know what to do. I've already been to the Maw of Madness."

Sista straightened swiftly and slung her largest bag across her shoulder.

Atkar jumped backward to avoid being smacked by the bag.

 "Being there and knowing what to do are different things. Just you being here seems to have ruined today's work."  Sista swore.

Atkar felt herself ready to explode. Somehow she managed to hold it in.

Sista winced at her own rebutal. "Listen," Sista tried again, holding in her frustration.

"Actually, I've just come back from a run. I wanted to try something to make the run quicker."

"Did it work?" Atkar asked. She saw Sista's face. "Not so good, huh?"

The bad run had nothing to do with Atkar, of course. On her usual run Sista makes a careful circuit of the main room, killing in small bunches and collecting the goods as she goes along. Her new idea was to kill everything in the room swiftly, using Moonfire to tag groups that then run right to her to die. Then she just cleans up the mess.

Initially, Sista was elated at how well that worked. She cut her time in the raid by at least a third. It was only after she started counting her spoils did she realize that her take was much smaller than usual. Quicker kills, particularly groups, drop fewer goodies. On a normal run Sista clears over 800 embersillk cloth. She cleared just over 600 cloth on the "fast" run. Java is going to be short on mats this week because of Sista's tinkering.

Sista was still groaning about the run when Atkar touched Sista's sleeve.

Sista suddenly had her knife out . . . Atkar was nearly as fast, her own knife gleaming. The two stared at each other, and then, slowly, lowered their knives. The knives went back into their sleeves at the same slow pace.

Sista took a deep breath. That was close. Atkar waited. "So you want to help. Okay, make a run the normal way. You seem to already know it," Sista suggested. "Let's see how you do."
Atkar didn't wait around, diving into the raid. Well, thought Sista, at least she asked.

Sista had some thinking to do. If Atkar is serious about helping with the scavenging, she might show her how to earn "Boon of the Scavenger" to increase the loot on these runs.

Atkar would have to earn Valarjar reputation at Revered to get it. If she suceeds, cool. But even if she doesn't, at least Atkar will be out of her way for awhile.