[She doesn't like that tone of voice, not in the slightest, but she is not the person she was a couple of weeks ago. This, alone, is not enough to get her to flinch back.

At least this time, when she speaks, it's without accidentally pluralizing herself even once. This is Ris, the one Mithos has come to know, with nothing and no one else attached.]

...If you're going to be stupidly selfless, then allow me to be stupidly selfish, just this once.

Even if the possibility was naught-point-one percent that something might have happened to you if you took up the rear, that's a chance I'm not willing to take.

[She swallows hard. It's easier to stay this when he won't look at her, if she's honest.]

If something happened to you here and now... I don't know what to do or who to be without you.

[It's easier to say, but her voice is still trembling. There's no way to say any of this without sounding foolish and desperate, but if that's what she has to be, so be it.

Their game and their promise has been one of the few things holding her together this entire trip, and especially now. He needs to know.]