Week 5

[airlockedmods]

[As with the weeks before, life in the Fantasy Sweet returns to something resembling normalcy with shocking efficiency. The second floor rest area and Adventure Zone Death Orb Room are spotless again, the demon glitter has been vacuumed, the deflated orbs have been replaced. It's like none of it ever happened, like three more friends aren't dead and stored away in the guest house morgue.

There's a new floor to explore, their "reward" for a job well done.]

Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday



[ooc: Don't forget to to turn in your activity for week 4, submit your memory regains and put in your threads for the Benefactors!]

Comments

[goteachother]

So you're just... trying to get fair treatment for you and the others.

[No one tell Heart about House Elves.]

But why... why try to take over? I'm sure you could do things in a much less violent way. I mean how d'you think women got the vote?

[Not quite the same, Queenie.]

[myocordial]

We evolve through fighting. So... right from the start, a peaceful approach would have been difficult. And then... Do you think humanity would have accepted such a thing? Truly?

[He still believes in his actions and he'll never look at his goal of creating a world his friends could live in as a misguided one. But there is still a change in how he looks at it, now that he's been with these people. His human friends.]

I had no reason to believe such a thing. The humans I'd met did not inspire any confidence.

[Not Banno. And not Krim either, even though he'd been more moral.]

And even then... Even if I had done things the way you think would have been better, then what? Ah, then humans would have so kindly allowed us to live alongside them? It would all have been on their terms, with them in control just as always. That is not the world I desired for my friends.

[goteachother]

And with the roles swapped. With you and your friends in charge.

[And here is the most important question.]

How would you have treated us?

[myocordial]

You've known me for a few weeks now.

Have I ever treated you badly?

[goteachother]

[She actually flinches at that.]

No... no, of course not sweetie.

I... I'm sorry. I just... I'm so tired of being scared.

[Her voice wavers and her eyes are wet but she sniffles, takes a deep breath and, somehow, manages not to start crying. Again. More.]

[myocordial]

[Her response catches him off guard. It snaps him out of his defensive attitude, makes him look at her for a long while.]

...You have nothing to fear from me. You will never have anything to fear from me. You have my word on that.

[goteachother]

Ain' that the whole point? There's always somethin PAL could do to make us turn on each other.

You think if you could save all your friends, give them the world you want for 'em..?

You wouldn'- [kill her or any one of them?]

[myocordial]

...It sounds tempting, doesn't it? A way for me to reach my goal. It would be an understandable offer to make, to tempt me into doing something like that.

But no. [His voice is firm, not a hint of doubt to be found.] I have no interest in something like that.

I don't need anyone to hand me my goal. I intend to reach it myself. To fight for it. I wouldn't do something so dishonorable as kill someone not capable of fighting me, just to make things easier. I don't want a victory like that. It would be meaningless.

[goteachother]

's an empty victory if it's just handed to ya.

[But the alternative is that he and his friends, his people hurting others, getting hurt.

Was it really that different from the things so many other people had gone through over the centuries. Was it really that different from the American Civil War? They had to do this to establish their own personhood, to give themselves meaning. She could understand that... it was a little extreme, insisting they should rule the world, worrisome, certainly. But there was more behind it than just spite and hate and all the things that made her terrified of Ardyn right now.]

Heart? Just... be careful. It'd be awful easy to end up doin something you'd regret, thinkin like that.

[myocordial]

...I have my principles. I don't intend to stray from those.

[Maybe not everyone here believes in his sense of honor, but that doesn't matter to him. It's what he has. And he's not letting go of it.]

Everything I do, I do with complete faith in my actions. So you needn't be concerned. I won't do anything I would regret, I can promise you that.

You're free to hold me to that, if you wish.

[goteachother]

I will. It must be nice, being so sure of yourself.

[But she looks sad even as she says it.]

But having no doubt in yourself, ever? Seems like it'd make it awful hard to grow, learn from your mistakes and all... if you can't accept that maybe you're capable of makin' em.

[It's soft, cautious. She doesn't want to make him upset and she doesn't want to push him away. She suspects there's a lot more room for uncertainty there than he's willing to admit. If only she can help him learn that it's not bad or weak to feel that way. It's normal... human even. And there's a lot more human in there than he's willing to admit too.]