Well, well. Wasn't Marluxia cleverer than he seemed? Neliel had taken him for a snake from the start, and she'd expressed her dislike of him readily enough, but she couldn't know how slippery he was.
Gin had not missed the thinly veiled dislike between Khamja's oldest Ryoka and its newest when he had witnessed them in each other's presence. They acted cordially enough, but there was something stiff about their interactions, as though they were suffering each other rather than actually bonded in trust. It looked to him more like a 'better the devil you know' situation than anything else, try as they might to cover it up.
It was easy to cover up, too. Neither were particularly personable.
He'd heard down the pipeline that Even, the name by which Vexen apparently preferred to be known, had been gathering things for his new laboratory. New things, with a selection of Arrancar and Arrancar hangers-on, and old things, set for an as-yet-to-be-decided point in the future.
He had wondered how he'd get the old items he wanted. The Arrancar were a risky proposition and Even would never be allowed to go himself, not as a new and unproven member, not when the choice he had made when he had joined had never really his. Gin had, of course, figured that Marluxia would be his errand boy. Initially, he had put the reasoning down to tightening a frail alliance, but now it made much more sense.
If Marluxia went, the information could easily be assumed to have come from Ienzo. It would be the obvious conclusion that the Order would draw if he happened to get seen or caught there. The Order didn't know that Even had joined Khamja, so they would factor him in as a potential victim as much as Saix. With the apparent mutual grudge that both Marluxia and Ienzo harboured against Saix, the reasoning for his visit could be explained away with malice.
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Well, well. Wasn't Marluxia cleverer than he seemed? Neliel had taken him for a snake from the start, and she'd expressed her dislike of him readily enough, but she couldn't know how slippery he was.
Gin had not missed the thinly veiled dislike between Khamja's oldest Ryoka and its newest when he had witnessed them in each other's presence. They acted cordially enough, but there was something stiff about their interactions, as though they were suffering each other rather than actually bonded in trust. It looked to him more like a 'better the devil you know' situation than anything else, try as they might to cover it up.
It was easy to cover up, too. Neither were particularly personable.
He'd heard down the pipeline that Even, the name by which Vexen apparently preferred to be known, had been gathering things for his new laboratory. New things, with a selection of Arrancar and Arrancar hangers-on, and old things, set for an as-yet-to-be-decided point in the future.
He had wondered how he'd get the old items he wanted. The Arrancar were a risky proposition and Even would never be allowed to go himself, not as a new and unproven member, not when the choice he had made when he had joined had never really his. Gin had, of course, figured that Marluxia would be his errand boy. Initially, he had put the reasoning down to tightening a frail alliance, but now it made much more sense.
If Marluxia went, the information could easily be assumed to have come from Ienzo. It would be the obvious conclusion that the Order would draw if he happened to get seen or caught there. The Order didn't know that Even had joined Khamja, so they would factor him in as a potential victim as much as Saix. With the apparent mutual grudge that both Marluxia and Ienzo harboured against Saix, the reasoning for his visit could be explained away with malice.
It was all very clever.