--- Body Language -- 436 -- LEARNING TO FLY (original) ---
Lupus sighed. "Look, Rue? I've never been good at this sort of thing."
Rue stared at him, his eyes blinking once and his left ear twitching. In Keedrow body language, Lupus knew, this would be defined as a 'blank stare'.
Keedrow people didn't sigh, laugh, or smile the way that humans did. That was to be expected, of course. A humanoid species evolved from lions rather than apes would have a very different body vocabulary.
Rue's tail swished from left to right, the very tip flicking a bit. Impatience.
Lupus looked up, gathering his thoughts.
He waited to speak until he had the right words. "I'm not exactly sure what your problem with me is. You don't seem like a bigot, so I'm assuming that you don't actually have that many problems with being led by a half-human."
He looked Rue in the eyes and widened his own a bit, pulling his lips back just a tad.
"That leads me to think that your problem with me has roots in whatever happened that caused the dissolution of your previous Squad."
Rue looked away, his ears drooping. But Lupus noticed that Rue's knuckles had swollen out, making his claws more prominent on his hands.
"So, if you want to tell me--"
"--I don't," Rue interrupted, and Lupus would have had to have been nearly deaf to miss the distinct increase in the 'ger' sound in his voice.
That meant that the little bone in the back of Rue's throat had flipped into that position that leant a growly undertone to Rue's voice, rather than a breathy or sibilant undertone.
Anger, maybe. Or frustration, or hostile discomfort.
Whatever it meant, it wasn't a good sign.
"Look," Lupus confessed. "I know about the incident, okay? I'm sorry about what happened. But I don't intend to repeat your LAST Squad Leader's mistake, okay?"
"It wasn't an accident. It wasn't a mistake," Rue snarled. "It was an intentional miscalculation BY my Squad Leader that resulted in his death, and the deaths of two of my Sqaud-mates. Five of us managed to get the hell out of there alive, but because of HIM, and his damn depression--" Rue broke off and made a choking sound.
And then he turned his back, those powerful legs putting as much distance between them as possible.
Lupus watched him go, content to wait. Aurelia would pick up the pieces, if Rue's emotional stability shattered again.
Oh Father, Lupus wondered, just why would you assign him to US almost immediately after the dissolution? WHY couldn't you have sent him in for a little therapy?