Tup swallows hard and chews at his bottom lip again and starts up the stairs before answering.

"Thank you, sir." He tips his head just a little, making tentative eye contact. It's nothing like the military bearing he was trained into, or that his brothers still display, but he's forgotten a lot of that too. Not all of it, but enough it's not his automatic default the way it still is theirs.

He pauses at the door leading out onto the roof, squares his shoulders, and finds the nerve to fully face the General, to look him in the eye and smile tentatively. "I wouldn't have made a soldier again, but... I love this life. My garden and my classes and my brothers. Thank you for giving me that chance."