At no previous point in this conversation has Gwenaëlle been particularly off-put. Frustrated, baffled, groping in the dark to figure out what version of her Calpernia is disagreeing with in her head, yes; prepared, on the face of what she appears to be, to try and be patient with someone who probably has good reason to react harshly to someone who looks and sounds like Gwenaëlle does.

But that little uptick of sweetness earns wariness that nothing else had. Throughout this entire exchange, her only interest has been in tactics; that doesn’t change now, she’s just suddenly foreseen an immediate future where she actually has to engage with the difficult part and briefly considers just trying her luck with the rift on her own to avoid it.

“We’re the only people closing rifts,” she says, just this side of pointed.