[Kratos doesn't feel it, but he knows what that pause means, and it takes his breath away. He can't remember the last time one of them tagged the other. Not that he can, anymore -- but if the fact that Yuan hadn't been able to follow through on killing him weren't enough, this would be it.

[Something in him loosens, and he isn't sure whether it's the wary tension he's carried for years, or the seal itself. Either way, Kratos submits to his hand being cuffed, and then turns to allow the same to be done to the other. If just being cuffed were enough to activate the seal, they would have already had problems.]

You say that as though I'm the one who has a problem with being bearded.

[Although it does make Kratos wonder, now, how much of his dismissiveness toward the need to shave over the last twenty years had been a result of the seal.]

I don't think it's selfish.

[This is soft, very nearly a non sequitur of an afterthought, but it's true, nevertheless -- now that Kratos knows what's behind Yuan's objection to his being so human. Now cuffed, Kratos tests his reach. Limited, more so than the bed; and with his arms nearly behind him to curtail any attempts to attack. Still ... he eyes the distance between them, and shifts again, resting his hands on the bar.]

I'm going to wind up kicking you.