"She is right here," Gideon says. She's under no oath of silence and doesn't see any reason to. "I've been as civil as you have." Which isn't terribly much but didn't matter as they'd been evenly matched on that front. Confidence and cockiness.

Gideon keeps her machete from too much harm. Instead, she thinks of the screams, of what's happened here already. "Are you expecting anything more or worse than the giant bugs?" Gideon asks. Because beating this guy isn't worth failing to save someone else.