<ul>For once, Zilah had nothing in the way of words. When he approached the bed to sit, her legs shifted slightly to provide him with more room. He had fallen into a deep silence and seeing the bottle still in his hands, the female wanted nothing more than to bring it to her lips and drown everything out. Why was this so difficult?<br/><br/>Glancing down at her hands, she remembered she was still in her suit, and realized just how tight it now felt against her body. It was practically choking her. Shifting uncomfortably, her gaze floated over to his face, wondering just how they would manoeuvre their way around this minefield. It seemed that saving their lives had been the easy part and now came the truly difficult part. Hearing him speak, she quietly snickered, shaking her head. This was a different person beside her.<br/><br/>It was difficult to feel relief however, not when her future was covered in uncertainty. <br/><br/>"My being arrested hasn't stopped you yet," studying his face; she immediately recoiled behind her words, only just then realizing what they had meant. Messy, messy, messy. People made her clumsy and messy. She should have killed him when she had her fingers around his neck, but now? Did she have it within herself? Had she ever had it within herself?<br/><br/>However, he'd said it himself. She was still arrested.  <br/><br/>Finding that his closeness was rather distracting, she placed a hand against his shoulder and used it as leverage to get back onto her feet, face contorting with pain. If they ever sent her to prison in this state, she would be targeted in no time. Maybe the inmates would be more merciful than what the Empire had in mind for her. A death penalty was long out of her reach now. They would truly make her suffer for her crimes.<br/><br/>"I started stealing small things at first -- maybe a loaf of bread here, an apple there. Necessities. Times were hard and no matter what my parents did, we constantly went hungry." She wasn't sure why she was telling him this, maybe to draw out some kind of sympathy from him as a last attempt to convince Quen that he should let her go. The computer was fried, maybe along with it had gone its memory. She hoped she'd lodged the bullets well enough. No one would ever need to know she had been here.<br/><br/>Despite the pain, her fingers began to struggle with the suit, slowly peeling her way free of it. Her hands and arms came free first, and she breathed a sigh of relief before proceeding. "It soon became obvious that I was good at it, so it escalated. It was an easy way to get what we didn't have. I told my parents that I had a new job, that soon we could have a normal life again."<br/><br/>Fingers slowly peeled back the suit over the cut on her stomach, the material stuck to her due to the hardened blood. It felt as though a thousand knives were stabbing her simultaneously. Sucking in the air through her teeth, her hands shook through the pain, white spots blurring her vision. The gash seemed ever more angry, the glue in strings and unable to keep the skin tight. Zilah tried not to gag at the sight of it. <br/><br/>"It was my dad that finally figured it out and turned me in. He was always so strong in his morals, so self-aware, and I had never felt more respect for him than I did at that moment. However, I wasn't about to go to jail, so...I escaped and haven't been back since." The suit was rolled up around her hips now, her hands devoid of the necessary strength to do the rest. God, she could sleep for days if someone would just let her. <br/><br/>"Quen..." she breathed out his name, shocked at her ability to stand considering how weak she felt in that moment. The whiskey had been a bad idea. She was about to plead with him to let her go home, maybe attempt to convince him that she was a good person. Her mouth opened to speak, her brows furrowed, but she faltered, "think you can handle stitching me up? Iâ€™m tired of leaking blood everywhere.â€<br/></ul>