Chapter 4 #2
Instead, I find myself approaching her station.
"Well fought," I tell her, falling back on familiar military terminology.
She laughs, the sound bright and genuine. "Well fought? It was baking, not combat."
"Good strategy, skillful execution, victory achieved through preparation and adaptability," I list. "Combat and cooking may not be as different as you think."
"Hmm." She's studying my face with that same focused attention she'd applied to her dessert composition. "And here I thought you were just being nice."
Nice. The word sits strangely. Orcs aren't typically described as nice. Honorable, perhaps. Fierce, certainly. Effective when the situation demands it. But nice suggests a gentleness that doesn't align with how I understand myself.
"I was being accurate," I correct. "Your performance was impressive by any standard."
"Thank you." She hesitates, then adds, "And thank you for the ladder thing. And the sugar advice. You didn't have to help."
The gratitude makes me uncomfortable. Helping her had felt automatic. Instinctive. Not a choice requiring thanks, but a necessary action when I saw potential harm.
This is how protective instincts begin, the warning voice in my head observes. Small interventions that become larger investments that become...
I shut down that line of thinking before it can complete itself.
"Your success serves the show's interests," I say, aiming for neutral professionalism. "Drama is more effective when contestants demonstrate genuine skill."
It's a deflection, and we both know it. But Trinity nods anyway, accepting the fiction that lets us both maintain appropriate distance.
"Well," she says, gathering her tools with the same efficiency she'd brought to the entire challenge. "I should probably get to interviews. Magazine features don't create themselves."
She pauses at the edge of her station, then looks back at me with an expression I can't quite interpret.
"Good luck with whatever your strategy is, Korgan. I hope it works out the way you want."
Then she's gone, leaving me alone among the wreckage of forty cooking stations and the uncomfortable realization that my strategy, whatever it originally was, has developed complications I'm not prepared to address.
Weakness, my father's voice reminds me.
Maybe. But watching Trinity succeed through skill and determination hadn't felt weak. It had felt like witnessing something rare and valuable, something worth protecting.
Dangerous thinking for someone who's supposed to remain detached.
Extremely dangerous.
I should probably be more concerned about that than I am.
The interview tent reeks of artificial vanilla and desperation.
Producers have crammed forty folding chairs into a space meant for twenty, creating an intimacy that breeds exactly the kind of gossip they're hoping to capture.
I position myself near the back corner, close enough to monitor conversations but far enough to avoid becoming part of them.
Information gathering, I tell myself. Know your enemies' weaknesses.
But my attention keeps drifting to Trinity, who's fielding questions about her victory with the same easy confidence she'd shown in the kitchen.
Her hands move as she talks, sketching shapes in the air to describe flavor profiles, and something about the gesture reminds me of tactical briefings where commanders would map battlefield positions.
Stop making everything about war, I command myself. She's a baker, not a general.
Though the way she'd assessed her competition during the challenge suggested strategic thinking that wouldn't be out of place in either arena.
"Quite the performance today."
The voice beside me belongs to Jonathan, one of the human contestants who'd barely managed a serviceable crème br?lée. His tone carries the particular kind of false friendliness that usually precedes an ambush.
I grunt acknowledgment without turning my head. Experience has taught me that engaging with obvious provocateurs rarely ends well.
"Must be nice," Jonathan continues, "having natural advantages."
Now he has my attention. I shift slightly, not enough to appear aggressive, but enough to remind him of the size difference between us.
"Advantages?"
"Come on." Jonathan's smile doesn't reach his eyes. "Everyone knows orcs have enhanced senses. Taste, smell, the whole package. Basically cheating when it comes to cooking competitions."
The accusation hits like a badly aimed spear, clumsy, but potentially damaging if I respond incorrectly. Enhanced senses. As if my ability to detect subtle flavor variations gives me some unfair edge in a contest where I'm not even competing.
Strategic patience, I remind myself. Don't take obvious bait.
"I'm not competing," I point out reasonably. "I'm observing."
"Sure you are." Jonathan's voice carries just enough to reach nearby ears. "But you were awfully quick to help that baker when her little friend needed rescuing. Lot of coaching for someone who's supposed to stay neutral."
Several conversations pause. I can feel attention shifting our direction, cameras probably already adjusting angles to capture whatever drama Jonathan thinks he's creating.
"Lane needed assistance," I say carefully. "Providing it prevented injury and property damage."
"Right. Just being helpful." Jonathan's smile widens. "Nothing to do with wanting to make sure your favorite had clear access to ingredients. Or maybe you were sharing some of that enhanced orc sensory information? Hard to tell from where I was standing."
The suggestion that I would cheat for Trinity's benefit sparks something hot and dangerous in my body. Not just the insult to my honor, but the implication that Trinity's victory wasn't earned through her own skill and determination.
He's trying to provoke you, the rational part of my mind observes. Classic misdirection. Make you angry so you'll say something they can use.
The rational part is correct. But rationality is struggling against the urge to grab Jonathan by his smug throat and explain, in detail, exactly what enhanced orc strength could accomplish if properly motivated.
"Trinity Lewis won through superior technique and preparation," I say, voice carefully level. "Her victory required no assistance beyond basic safety intervention."
"Trinity Lewis," Jonathan repeats, emphasizing the name like it proves something. "Interesting how quickly you learned her name compared to everyone else's."
Trap, my instincts scream. Disengage. Withdraw. Don't give them ammunition.
But Jonathan isn't finished.
"Course, maybe that's just standard orc practice. Focus on the weak prey first, establish dominance through intimidation. Classic pack hunting behavior."
The words weak prey hit hard. Not because Jonathan applied them to me, but because he dared apply them to Trinity.
Trinity, who'd faced down a kitchen full of strangers and unknown challenges with steady hands and sharper wit.
Trinity, who'd helped a competitor without hesitation despite her own time pressure.
Trinity, who'd earned every bit of her victory through skill I could recognize even if I couldn't replicate it.
My vision tunnels. Heat floods my chest and shoulders, the familiar precursor to combat rage. Somewhere in the back of my mind, warning bells are screaming about cameras and consequences and political implications, but they're being drowned out by a much more immediate imperative.
Protect. Defend. Destroy the threat.
I rise from my chair with deliberate slowness, letting Jonathan absorb the full reality of exactly how much larger I am than he calculated. The conversation around us dies completely. Someone drops what sounds like a clipboard.
"Repeat that assessment," I suggest, voice dropping to the register I'd once used to extract information from captured enemies.
Jonathan's face goes pale, but he's committed now, probably calculating that backing down would be worse for his screen time than whatever's about to happen.
"Look, I'm just saying what everyone's thinking. Orcs have advantages in competition scenarios, and maybe those advantages extend to influencing—"
The snarl rips out of me before conscious thought can intervene. Not words, not even a roar, just pure frustrated rage given voice. The sound echoes off the tent walls and Jonathan stumbles backward, colliding with someone's chair.
Fuck.
The realization of what I've just done hits immediately. Forty witnesses, multiple cameras, producers who are probably already calculating how to edit this into maximum drama. I've just handed them the footage they've been hoping for: the dangerous orc losing control, threatening innocent humans.
"Whoa, whoa, easy there, big guy." One of the production assistants appears with admirable speed, hands raised in a calming gesture. "Let's all take a step back, maybe cool down a little."
Big guy. As if I'm some unstable animal that needs handling rather than a sentient being who's been deliberately provoked.
"I'm fine," I say, forcing my voice back to normal registers. But the damage is done. Jonathan is playing up his fear for the cameras, other contestants are maintaining careful distance, and the production staff are exchanging looks that speak of crisis management and legal consultation.
"Maybe we should wrap up interviews for today," the assistant suggests with artificial brightness. "Give everyone a chance to process the excitement of the competition."
Code for: get the dangerous orc away from the humans before he does something that requires actual intervention.
I nod stiffly and head for the exit, very aware of every camera tracking my movement, every whispered conversation that will probably become interview footage about "the moment things got scary."
Political disaster, I assess grimly. The kind of incident that reinforces every negative stereotype about orc emotional control.