Having her hands folded, resting on her thighs, she closely listened to his flood of words. At times, she would have liked to interupt this stream, to ask questions, to dig deeper or to just protest. However, she could restrain herself from doing it, finding it a better solution to hear him out until the very end. Some of his words made her heave a sigh of relief while others visually concerned her. Sometimes she stared directly into his eyes as he spoke, sometimes she shook her head and looked down, above all when he tried to convince her he wasn't a nomad supporter. It was no secret Elena nursed a certain hatred of everything infatuated with nomads, but she decided she would trust him for now. However his prolonged speech arose some questions for her, and as he had straightout offered her to talk about it now, with him and nobody else, she wouldn't be restrained voicing them. Funny how her actually simple request to send regards to Maren and Leon had derailed into this, thought she for a second. After he had finished, there was silence, a rather awkward one, while Elena was scratching her forehead, wondering with what to begin.
"You see, I know these are problematic groups. Auxesia less, because I'm not as well-informed about them as I am about the Commune, but I'm going to simply believe you there. The Commune, well, the problem is - they are Janus-headed. The houses only get to see one of their faces, the Raiders, the ones boring their lives out at trade lanes and pirating traders to make a living. Probably, the governments just believe they are a more or less well-organized pirate pest, similar to the Rogues, maybe. However, there's their other side, the one I've alluded to while I was speaking to Hussaini. This crazy idea of humans being pressed into a collective. Just like the nomads seem to have their hive-mind, Hussaini and the others want to adopt mankind to this. But your point stands again, I'm absolutely sure there are more than only a few in the Commune not realizing what they are secretly striving for. Brain-washed people, some who maybe just wish for a simple peace between humans and nomads, nothing more. No playing God." She shook her head. The amount of times she had mentioned God today had already surpassed the monthly average. And all that even though she wasn't really religious.
"So, to get it right, you're basically one of those guys who deal with nomads and their crazy fanatic followers from time to time?", she went on, choking on her own words for a moment before catching her breath again. "I got it, it's good to have friends in space, and it's good to have a wide range of friends. Hell, I know what you are talking about, I can consider myself friendly to ninety percent of Liberty, if we neglect the outlaws. But -- why nomads, or infectees? What do you need them for? What favours can they give you that make it worth dealing with them? Just getting you out of such bulls.hit situations like right now? Or is there something else?" She stopped again to think about something. One of the names Hussaini had mentioned kind of reminded her of someone. "So, following my female intuition, as you've rambled about your stance with nomad sympathizers, these two entities Hussaini mentioned are infectees as well, correct? 'Unschuld' and Gaster? The latter one being a Commune guy as well, if I'm not mistaken?" She raised an eyebrow, mumbling. "I still don't get how you can become friends with infectees... how is that even possible. How can you feel okay with that?"
