The two of them were moving through the streets, winter's permanent bite hit harder than usual as at this point she normally had enough alcohol in her system to ignore the cold completely. She got to know this town's layout as she had been sticking around for a while now. Usually she stayed on the move, if any of the imperials tracked her down or recognised her it would be a one way trip back into the Empress' clutches. Even with the farmlands nearby this place was small enough to have a light military presence and so near to Arendelle no one looking for her would think she would be crazy enough to stay so close. If anything she had enjoyed a bit of consistency.
The journey from the tavern to where she was living was a short distance; though it usually took her a long time to travel between them as it involved a lot of staggering, poorly lit streets and the world spinning around her. However that paled in comparison to how long it felt with Hans walking by her side. No words were being exchanged. He was outright refusing to show any emotion other than an aura of self-importance and seemed to have no problem with the silence between them, a tense silence that he seemed to thrive in. Part of her just wanted to turn back around, go into the tavern and end the night in a drunken daze just like every other one for the past year. Though this was in the back of her mind, she knew she had to follow this through. Whatever was going on here could provide a brief escape from her drab existence, even if it was only a temporary distraction.
She felt a small amount of relief as they reached her lodgings, the door stood in their way. At the best of times the unlocking it was tricky and the splintered section near the lock was plain to see, a result of her impatience when the door failed to cooperate a few days ago. Kicking it open again almost felt like the right thing to do, a show of force and no dragging out the increasingly uncomfortable silence she felt. Luckily for the door, her first attempt to unlock it was successful. As it opened she stretched out her arm, gesturing for Hans to go in first.
"I'll make myself at home then," he said as he walked past.
The interior of the house was a similar design to the tavern, the perfect combination of homey without breaking her budget. Hans was taking it all in.
"This place is quite a step down for you," he said.
"I didn't bring you here to listen to you insult me," she said. "What you saw in the tavern is nothing compared what I could do to you right here, right now."
He looked aside and sighed, the arrogant grin fell from his face.
"You can drop the threats, truth is I don't how else to talk to you at this point," he admitted.
There it was, acting like his old self when he was as lost as she was, and much to her chagrin she caught herself reacting with sympathy despite their sordid past. She wanted to avoid this rabbit hole; she had been burned by her compassion before and refused to let it get the better of her.
"Do I really have to call you Kira?" Hans said changing the subject; evidently he was uncomfortable with the tension between them after all.
"I haven't used that other name in a long time," she said.
"I was out of the loop as it was, basically a prisoner in my own home whilst Elsa's forces stormed across the land and seas" he said "It made my first attempts to find you a total waste of time, as far as everyone knew you went back to your old reclusive ways and hid away in Arendelle's palace. If I knew I was looking for Kira I might have saved some time,"
She knew her escape was downplayed. What she had gathered were that only a few agents were quietly hunting her and they often fell short, she figured they had to tread carefully so word would not spread. Add to that her almost constant moving and it made their quest to find her almost futile. Imperial officers were likely to recognise her up close so she made a habit of not being in the same place as them.
"Well it can't be known that Elsa's only living family member abandoned her empire," she said.
"I don't know, being a Princess might be a fun niche for your newer line of work. You could even charge extra for the honour of having your land protected by royalty," Hans said
She wanted to be angry with his snide remarks, she had been angry for years now and it served her perfectly well. Despite this, she just could not bring herself to be. The feeling of regret kicked in the moment they left that tavern and she just wanted this to be over so she could go back to drinking herself into a stupor, maybe get into another fight and call it a night.
"Enough wasting time, what do you want Hans?" she asked.
"No more small-talk I see," he seemed disappointed "I'm here on behalf of the resistance, we want to bring Elsa's reign to an end"
"Is that some sort of joke?" she said. The stories she heard about the resistance were usually more along the line of being discovered and executed rather than seeing any successes. She would never have suspected Hans to be amongst their ranks.
"You'd be a huge asset to us; your knowledge of the empire's inner workings alone…" he tailed off, she had failed to stop herself from laughing at him.
"You know who it is you're trying to dethrone right?" she said through bouts of laughter, he was delusional.
"I'm going to assume you're telling the truth because if you were lying you'd come up with something much less insane," she said.
"This isn't funny Anna," he said. It was the first time she had been called that since she ran away from Arendelle. She stopped laughing abruptly, the use of her real name and his serious tone quelled any amusement she felt.
"You seriously think some little club of misfits is going to bring Elsa down? She's an unstoppable force, you either move out the way or you get destroyed," she said.
Hans was being patient with her but she wanted to milk the opportunity to make him look like a fool and planned to continue. She may have felt bad for the man but this was a form of revenge she had no qualms with.
"You need a history lesson Hans? That prison they had you at fail to bring you the news of the world?" She said. He said nothing, his arms were folded as if he was just going to ride this out and wait for her to finish.
"Even when she was at her most vulnerable, when she was reluctant to use her powers for anything other than making dresses and cake-toppers she was still untouchable,"
"No one is untouchable," he said.
"I saw it myself Hans, from the beginning. Weselton attacked us, completely catching us off-guard back when we were too naïve to suspect anyone would strike at us. Our guards did what they could but we had no real chance. Then with a click of her fingers Elsa drove back an entire battalion, the direct power forcing them back. The magic they feared causing a retreat. Arendelle survived but a lot of good people, friends, died that day."
"I didn't know the extent of the damage I must admit," Hans said
"It didn't stop there, shortly after Weselton attacked again, the combination of fear of magic and desperation from our trade embargo drove them forward to true madness. It was obvious they would never back down" she said, pausing to try and keep composure. Retelling this was stirring her emotions but she kept going, more for herself than for Hans' benefit.
"Elsa decided for the good of everyone that Weselton needed to be contained. To strike so they would stop throwing themselves at Arendelle until there was no-one left. At the time it seemed like the right thing to do, conjure an army of ice warriors and snow golems to take control. No one else would have to get hurt, Elsa was hesitant to do it but at least once it was done it was over quickly."
"Anna you don't have to tell me all this," Hans said, growing uncomfortable as she was doing a poor job of hiding her aggravation as she recalled these events.
"Yes I do Hans, you come in telling me you want to stop her? You need to hear exactly what she is." She paused, thinking back to when things truly started to unravel.
"The surrounding kingdoms heard what happened to Weselton. Elsa only did it to protect people, she wanted to stop all the unnecessary death and war but everyone else saw it as a warning, that is was a sign of things to come. Fearing the safety of Arendelle, Elsa set up a spy network to prevent anything like Weselton's attack catching us off-guard again. With each passing report it became clear all the nearby kingdoms planned to form an alliance against Arendelle as a precaution. Elsa employed the same strategy that she used on Weselton pre-emptively this time, striking against anyone rumoured to be uniting against Arendelle. She summoned more ice-based nightmares to fight for her. The more she did the more people feared her, the more they saw her as a tyrant. Soon even she didn't remember the good intentions of it all as she took city after city, kingdom after kingdom in the name of peace and protection. That's what you want to try and stop Hans, a demi-god powerful enough to forge an empire by accident." Her tale was finished; she was flustered by recounting all these events. Due to keeping who she was as secret as possible it was the first time she had spoken to someone about what had happened.
"Now she is someone who is willing to force a permanent winter, just so her army and maintaining forces don't melt away. The consequences of this, food shortages and a high civilian attrition rate are acceptable side-effects for her, she's as remorseless as she is ruthless" she said.
"I must admit I've never heard that side of the story before," Hans said stroking his chin contemplatively, "but by ignoring this you're giving up and avoiding the difficult path, just like Elsa did. Rather than confront your problems or look for compromise, you quickly act out without thinking. It may not be as extreme but where she would lash out at a city you seem to lash out at poor idiots in taverns at the slightest provocation,"
"Don't you ever compare me to her," she said, her nostrils flared as she started to snarl.
"I'm just calling it how I see it, you're so afraid that you don't realise that you're making exactly the same mistakes Elsa did, fear dictating your actions above sense and reason."
That was her breaking point. She lunged at him, knocking him to the floor.
"You don't have to be like her, you can at least try to set things right," Hans said, struggling to get the words out with her hands now wrapped around his throat. It was not until she saw the light leaving his eyes that she snapped out of her blind anger. She realised that all she achieved with this was to reinforce Hans' point, she let go. She stood up and dusted herself off, breathing heavily and recovering from her flash of rage. Hans was content to stay on the floor as he gratefully gasped for air. There was another way she knew how to deal with all the emotional backlash she was faced with, a way she was merrily familiar with.
"I'm going back to the tavern," she mumbled.
"So that's it? Running away again, you don't even want to hear why we need you, what we're planning?" Hans said.
She wanted to put this behind her, she wanted to forget this ever happened but Hans' words affected her more than she wanted to admit. The bridge he presented to her did not have to be crossed, but there was no reason to burn it either.
"You can stick around if you like, keep trying to convince me but for now I have a date with a bottle than I simply can't afford to miss," she said. It was a happy compromise, there was no guilt for giving up but she did not actually have to confront anything real for now. Having Hans around could even be therapeutic. Though she had grown accustomed to what she had become she was far from happy with her life and this could be a way to fix it, even if only a little.