tushanshu_logs | EVENT | LANDFALL

EVENT | LANDFALL | VALISHAERA

Characters: ALL!
Date: JULY 13-26
Location: Valishaera
Situation: Tu Vishan has made landfall on Siaxhi, to explore the Dreaming Watch City of Valishaera.
Warnings/Rating: Please indicate content warnings in subject headers as applicable.

As Tu Vishan draws near, the heavy jungle visible even from miles out quickly identifies the landmass as Siaxhi, one of the westernmost continents in Konryu and one that has been largely untouched insofar as the kedan themselves have gone. There is a natural inlet along the southeast shore on the continent and Tu Vishan makes for that, though he fills nearly all of it.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Not quite to look through her, maybe, but to understand her more than anything else. Enjolras had never been quite sure what to make of women, especially younger ones, so it resulted in situations like this one. And of course he would never think she lied at all. Midii's truth was her truth, no matter how different it was from anyone else's. It was only fair that she be allowed to speak her story, however she felt it best. Enjolras himself was interested in what she had to say, not in accusations.]

You had been.

[He is nodding and looking up a bit to meet her gaze.] You were a soldier of some kind then?

[She shook her head]

No. Not me.

[Which wasn't to say child soldiers did not exist. They did. Not as a common occurrence, to be sure, but there had been instances of nameless orphans as young as four or five being taken in. Taught to fight. Taught to kill. Sometimes, worse.]

I was about seven or eight, I think, when they first came to our village. They were looking for kids willing to help them, and they were willing to pay. Very well. Enough to feed a very sick older man and three little boys for some time. [It hadn't been the money that motivated her. It had been the thought of taking care of her family, who might have otherwise starved.] I had no other choice but to sign up. It was our only chance.

So I went with them. And they trained me. For more than a year. How to fool soldiers. How to listen. Pay attention. How to gain intel, decode basic encryptions, and most importantly, only get noticed when it was necessary. I had to seem completely innocent, or they'd suspect me.

None of them ever did.

[That news was a relief. Well, at least Midii's part of it. Enjolras was developing something of a soft spot for the girl, and after all, it did feel right. They had to stick together, did they not? He would have hated to hear it had been her, but even something in her tone suggested that it happened, which he hated too. Still, this was not about a world he'd never seen, and the horrible things they did to children not here, but about Middi instead. So, he listened, instead of interjecting, even when she mentioned the group who had come.]

So, you were something of a spy?

[He's choosing the word carefully, or trying to, because if there is one thing everyone that Enjolras knows dislikes, and he himself disdains, it is a spy. But then, other worlds, and the offer that she mentions, that idea that someone could be helped by it. He can almost see Feuilly's face popping up here now, as young as when they'd first met him, and he had point out that what he did was to help others. He would understand far better, though Enjolras IS trying. there is another important question to be asked in all of this, though. ]

Did they care for you while you were trained, at all?

[She nodded absently at the first question. The title alone wasn't offensive to her, It was essentially true. She infiltrated enemy ranks and made them think she was one of them. If that was all that had happened, she wouldn't have been bothered at all. It was the fact that so many people died because of her...right in front of her...that weighed heavily on her conscience.]

Well enough.

They were strict, sure, and there were a lot of things we weren't allowed to do. We got yelled at when we screwed up. Punished, if we broke the rules. But we were fed and had a bed to sleep in every night.

[Well. This was one of those moments when Enjolras was forced, once again, to re-evaluate the priorities and standards he had known at home. Spies, even when one used them, were never quite trusted there, and he had understood why, with it being so EASY to sell one side out to gain a profit, and vice versa. He, himself, had reviled Javert at the barricades when he had learned that the man among them was the inspector and there to ensure that their barricade fell.

It was different though, now that he felt he knew Midii a bit better than at first. Perhaps spying, as it seemed to have been for her, and as it had been done to aid the side she stood on, was not always so reprehensible as it had felt to him then. At any rate, it was not the sort of thing applying to this moment, or to their future, so he simply committed that fact to memory, in the case that her skills may someday come in handy. And well, what she described sounded rather a lot like school had been for him. Well, aside the fact of what she'd studied, really. ]

Not so awful as I had first thought, then. [He spoke those words outloud, musing over them.] But still a rather difficult position to be in at times, I would imagine. After all, for most of us, having someone to report to and such, ends when we finally are allowed to leave the lycées.

Edited 2014-07-28 07:49 (UTC)

[She wouldn't have blamed him for looking differently at her now, reevaluated priorities or no. She was a spy. Part of her still instinctively clung to that training--she had been snooping around some of the kedan local areas lately. Seeing what was going on, and attempting to uncover certain shady deals. Oh, not that she would dare intrude herself. She was sneaky, not stupid; everything she uncovered, once she had enough visual proof for certainty, went straight to local authorities.]

[But there was still that snitch stigma hanging over her head. A lingering uncertainty of whether or not to trust someone like her.]

I never made it that far in school.

But you're wrong. There will always be somebody to report to. If not a teacher, than a boss. Or a commander. Being left on your own can be dangerous where I come from, and not just for me.

[The training explained quite a bit more at least about how she had come to be found here just now. Enjolras was not filled with the immediate distaste he had had for Javert after learning the truth at least, and well, in any place but here, the admission would have been the end of things as far as being friendly went.

At home, Enjolras might have used her, actually, as a young woman could get into many places that men could not, and could also be ignored in a great deal of conversations, even important ones that may have been of use in one way or other. It would not have been a friendly, or even relatively respectful business relationship, but still. He could count on both fingers, and then some, the times that a female spy would have worked out quite well. Why had he not thought of it, why had this not been a tactic? He could almost kick himself for that right now.]

Damn it all. [Those words were actually muttered out loud.] We could have used the women.

As much as he had wished the Revolution and the Republic to have remained pure, perhaps more underhanded tactics would have been of use. And the ends that they had found themselves at, even the ends that they had tried for, would have more than justified the means. In fact, he could think of nothing that he had done in the name of Revolution that had not been perfectly justified by the ends that they had gotten, or desired.]

Wives and mistresses, even servants must have heard so much.

[And then, in the midst of that musing, he slightly remembered that he was talking to an actual girl, and actual spy, and blinked a little.]

Ah, that was probably rude. I was just realizing a mistake we made in trying to keep our victories completely pure. That was something of a mistake, I think.

Then I was luckier than I knew, that my life was not so full of those. At least not those who were worthy of being reported to in any greater sense. Those who I chose to share it with were more than worthy, they were equals. I am glad, too, that they were such who would never have left me on my own.

[The outburst was, indeed, unexpected. Far more positive than she would ever have anticipated. For one who seemed averse to the thought of a spy not moments before, here he was, embracing the thoughts of what someone like her could have brought to his own war at hand.]

Your time is different than mine. A woman would have been no less noticed than a man. But a child... [She said nothing about servants, not knowing whether or not that would be true. Servants were not slaves, but rather highly trained paid officials that were employed by the wealthiest of the wealthy. Often with their own level of respect. Not dismissed as little more than moving furniture.] ...and even then, if we did not remain quiet, we would be called nuisances and thrown out the first chance they got.

[It took a bit of opening his mind to get used to the concept of spying at first, but once Enjolras had realized what could be done, well. Perhaps underhanded tactics would not have been so bad in and of themselves. It was awful to think that way, but sometimes that sort of thought process did come in handy.]

A child would have been even less so then, yes. A part of the endemic problems that Paris was having at the time. Gamines running about everywhere, really no more noticed than the rats, simply something to trip over and complain about. It takes a special sort of coldness to deny the existence of starving children in the street, but many in Paris managed it.

[There's a hint of anger in his words, and Enjolras feels a sort of fire rising in his chest with them, but he clamps down on it for now, a library not being the proper place to rail against things that had been.]

It seems that your world, your universe, perhaps, had a more sensible idea of how to treat relations between men and women at least. It was never our pressing issue, but a good deal many of my friends supported, and struggled with bringing attention to the idea of equal suffrage among the genders.

[Enjolras will not lie and say that it was something he'd deemed worthy of importance at the time. It had been an issue, and he would never have denied that he thought women should be treated equally as possible, without disrespecting them, but gaining control of the new republic had been the first step and many other causes, worthy though they were, had needed to be put aside, and beyond simply agreeing with the terms at hand, he'd not devoted himself to the brainwork needed for it.]

I think too many people tell children that they should be seen and not heard. I have never known many young people when I was not so young myself. Gavroche excepted, and now, you, of course, but shutting someone down, or throwing them out so often cheats us of some valuable ideas or skills. You seem to be a living proof of that.

[She IS living, isn't she? Should he have been more careful with that phrasing?]

[She took note of the questioning look in his eye at that last statement, and knew at once what he was thinking.]

Yes, I am still alive. For now.

[...if only because she couldn't be sure what awaited her if and when she ever returned home. As she had previously explained to Frank. She was no longer in immediate danger. The bombs had ceased. But even for a child of her resourcefulness, there was only so far one could travel on foot, with no food or water, in a corpse-ridden field, and no sense of direction or sign of civilization for miles around.]

[That was something of a relief so far as Enjolras was concerned. Partly because he knew Midii now, but also because the idea of her dying so young was not a very good one. He'd seen one child die before his eyes, and for all that Midii seemed much older, for all that Gavroche had seemed the same, there was still something so wrong in it.]

For now.

[The images he'd gotten from what she had said earlier were not the best, surely, so it came as no surprise, but he still did not necessarily like the idea that there still must be that sort of caveat attached to the idea of living. Just because some things were facts of life, he reminded himself, he did not have to approve of them. He may not be able to DO much, if anything to help for when she returned home, but he could, and should, still be upset by things like that.]

I am glad of that for now, at least. [Though, should he be? Say what you would about life being precious, and the truth of that, some lives were those where it seemed like death might be a kindness. He wouldn't venture to judge a world he didn't know, but he did wonder a little.]

So am I.

[She would have elaborated if he had asked, but she was also glad that he didn't.]

And this, [Enjolras made a little face to indicate the conversation.] has all turned rather depressing, hasn't it? Perhaps we need some sort of new topic.

[She wasn't too surprised at the turn of tone; it wasn't the first time.]

Perhaps.

Did you have something else in mind?

Ah,rather not so much. I do hate to admit I've spent much time lately, wasted it, really, in being somewhat...

[Not simply sad exactly, more like...]

I suppose the word is "empty", really. It makes it hard to find things to speak of very quickly. Still, we can but try. I doubt I've ever seen such a grand library before. I think they have a book for everything that one can think of.

Can you read the local language?

Not so much, actually. Or English, really. The books I've found here, well, book, was actually in part french and part something else. It was odd, really. How it shifted. Some of the words one of my friends used, talking about events in it were on the pages, then a different language and...

I do think, perhaps, we read things in the language we are born with when it comes to these books. I WOULD very much like to be able to do more in the local language though.

[He's nodding to the papers he's placed near himself.]

I've had some thought about it...a paper for our going's on might do some good.

[She knew very well what that was like. Until a short while ago, Midii had been struggling so much with the lack of French that she had been studying English. Damian had been teaching her. When he left, she tried to keep up with her studies.]

I wonder why it translates now.

Written words over the network never did.

[Then he mentioned something about a 'paper']

Do you mean, like a newsletter of some kind?

I think it may be something to do with the nature of this place.

[There is a little shrug from Enjolras.] I spoke with one of the monks earlier. It seems as though this is a realm of dreaming. A conscious sort, though, I've been through a few of them before. Perhaps that is why. Something to do with the power of our minds in the dream, maybe?

And yes, a newspaper. I would very much like to start one, to tell our stories while we are here, to allow for new foreigners to see what is going on. There was a radio program once, I believe but nothing in print.

[And here, Enjolras does look a little excited at the thought. After all, it would be a return to something familiar now that everything else had gone.]

[The Realm of Dreaming]

[Midii had known this when she crossed through the barrier, but there was something about the way Enjolras said it that really clicked. A Dream. They were...in a waking dream.]

Is it possible our subconscious is influencing what we see, then?

[To translate any and all written words into a language their brains actually knew.]

I think that it is, yes.

[Enjolras may not know much about Dreams themselves, as opposed to dreams but even so, he's nodding now.]

The last time that I walked through a dream, it was not pleasant. It consisted of both my nightmares and a nightmare of my companions. But we were able to assist each other.

[Or to try, in his case. He'd been taken out pretty quickly by the guards in Richard's castle.]

I've even found objects in them that have their permanence. I think this is something of the same. She did warn me to be careful, the monk I spoke with. But I do still wonder if we might manipulate SOME things in here.

[She would prefer not to live her own past Dream experience, either. They had been just barely worse than the actual dreams haunting her sleep the first several months after her arrival in Keelai.]

What monk?

[For Enjolras, his own subconscious had created a nightmare then that was worse than anything he'd come here with. The barricade, made out of bodies of his friends...it was too much to think of, really.]

Ah, I did not actually get her name. She was dark haired and we talked a little about this realm and some of the things it does. And warned me to be careful when it comes to dreams and Dreams. Some of the rules are very different.

[The description was too vague. Dark haired could have described so many women. Maybe even someone she had never met.]

Different from normal dreams, or different from the real world?

Ah, from normal dreams in this case. I beleive it to mean, given that she mentioned being very careful here that Dreams like this one we are a part of now,could, if we are not careful, be somewhat harmful to us. I would guess that means an effect that could last in the real world, somehow.

[It's clearly simply a guess, by the tone of his voice there.]

After all, some of those things from the Dream planes elsewhere have done so, yes?

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject