snowblindrpg | [network] @curiouschloride | Day 360 | Video | There'll be peace when you are done [open]

[CW: references to religious violence; disrespectful discussion of both Abrahamic and Nahuatl religions fairly likely in comments.]

[OTA]
[The Tess who appears on the screen is a rather tired-looking Tess.]

I, uh.

[She glances down; clears her throat awkwardly.]

If anyone actually, uh. Actually took the blood sacrifice thing seriously? I need you to just not. Please. Offer's rescinded, no blessings for blood. Even if it worked--and it's not going to work; I was just being--I was being stupid. Even if it worked I don't...I don't want that. And I'm sorry, I'm sorry I said all that stuff. I'm sorry for the things I called everyone.

[Her face contorts in guilt, but she forces it neutral again.]

And...if anyone's seen my snake? I know you don't owe me anything, but if you could let me know if he's okay, I'd just...I'd really appreciate that.

[Private to Flynn]

Flynn, I...I'm really sorry. That wasn't okay; none of that was okay. I shouldn't have put you in that position. I'd get it if you didn't want to talk to me again.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I inferred it. What's it supposed to matter at that point? No one gave a shit. Gio's the only one who has anyone left from before, and it's...weird. Awkward.

It matters because it's where you came from. It was your life, and you did say some gods have children with mortals to give them an understanding of normal life. Being...ascended...that doesn't make everything before cease to matter.

Maybe. Maybe it doesn't have to be that way for everyone. For the ones that come after us. Just...a lot of shit happened really fast.

Things that made...all the things you learned, practical and moral, not matter anymore? Things that made your interests and beliefs, cultivated over the course of your life, not matter anymore?

No, I mean, of course it matters. If it didn't matter I'd just, y'know...bathe in the blood of my enemies. And my non-enemies. Just all the blood-bathing. I'm still me. It's just everything else that's changed.

As long as you recognize that it does matter...it always does, where we come from.

[It sounds much like some of what Tess has said in tone: the personal couched in the abstract. Part of it is his time here, but there's a lot of it informed by the upheaval of his own life those centuries ago.]

Yeah. Yeah, you're right.

I'm just never going to get that world back.

I know. [Spoken with all the gravity of a sincere connection with experience. His probably isn't nearly as similar as he's imagining, but he feels like there's enough there, regardless.]

I know. I-...I know that it sounds like sentimental nonsense, but what of those normal lives left behind we choose to carry with us is part of what defines us, too. Especially so if you're meant to hold power over others.

[She chuckles ruefully.]

Would you believe me if I told you that one of our founding principles was that we would all promise each other we wouldn't turn out like our parents?

They were all of the...

[He pauses, realizing there is no way to say this that doesn't make him uncomfortable for other reasons.]

...the persuasion of using their children as pawns?

Oh -- no, I mean....

[She pauses. Thinks about it. Lets out a harsh bark of laughter.]

Shit. They all were, weren't they? Okay, no. No, not Pecos Bill. Will's dad was better than that. Just most of them, I guess.

Enough for you to all agree on it.

It isn't even my world, but...I'm glad you did. The people you all care for will likely be better off for it.

I hope so. We've tried to do right by them. It'd be easy, you know? To just do things the way they were always done. And you kind of have to do some things certain ways, but we always wanted people to have at least some kind of autonomy.

[That's...a concerning turn of phrase, to someone who has spent centuries hearing about how human free will is the special thing that sets them apart from the Heavenly host.]

Do you mean to say the world before- humanity wasn't free?

Huh? Oh, no. I meant that when you reset people to a lower technology level, have them living in a world that's all crisis all the time, it's awfully easy to go fascist and sell it to them as being necessary for their safety.

...I understand. In my day, the heart of most nations was not the palace, but the temple, regardless of who said temple venerated. This place seems to have evidence that isn't the case later. That...we became confident in standing on our own merits.

[A beat.]

I suppose it's different, when the people were used to having more, and the gods are very present in their lives beyond ritual and prayer.

Yeah. And we shouldn't be so present, and someday we'll pull back and just let them do their own thing, but the world's just...it's not safe. They need us, and we need them.

[Well, with all that, it's practically begging to be asked...]

What happened? The war your divine parent was trying to start...?

They started it. I tried to head it off, witnessed for the Body Electric in court, but they managed to fuck those guys over anyway. Took over a bunch of stuff, tried to kill me since I wasn't with them anymore. Then I'm pretty sure they all got killed in...some other stuff that happened. My...father...definitely got killed. Haven't heard from the rest in a decade or two.

And it was this "other stuff" that caused the world to be in such constant peril?

[It must say something that all his time here has not dulled his tendency to want to learn everything he can about other worlds.]

Uh...yeah. Yeah, that'd be an accurate statement.

[You know what stops him from asking questions?]

I, ah, take it you don't want to talk about it. I wouldn't blame you. I'm sorry for prying as much as I did.

It's kind of a painful subject, yeah.

[Though House guessed part of it and she told Flynn the rest...but that was when she was compelled. This guy has been really understanding, in his way, but causing the end of the civilized world is a hell of a lot to ask a stranger to forgive you for.]

Then I'm...I'm sorry, again, for bringing you close to it.

[Awkward, but also very real guilt. He knows what it's like to lose an entire life and all the people in it, several times over, but this sounds much worse.]

Well, you know.

[You know. She'll leave it at that.]

Don't...don't worry about it too much.

[network] @curiouschloride | Day 360 | Video | There'll be peace when you are done [open]

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