I know I'm being jumpy. But-- that Witch I mentioned has messed up the lives of everyone I know, and she's no peach to deal with in person. That kinda thing isn't always easy to deal with.
[What was therapy? What did it look like? Was there even therapy for a society geared towards action instead of introspection, towards focusing in on the practical matters instead of even looking at the frustration, sorrow, and pain that lurks underneath everything?
How do you work through being tortured? Through the existential dread that-- perhaps, there is no way to escape fate. No matter how far he runs.]
I've been calling him Sasha, because that's what my boyfriend's uncle calls him. I think it gets my point across.
[The point being that, though he's anxious and jumpy, he's also got nerves so steely that he is willing to potentially anger a god instead of faking deference.
Just because he was good at lying didn't mean that he liked it. ]
I don't know much about martyrs and saints, Mr. Alfred. Words like that aren't normally used in my home, because organized religion isn't that common. It was, once. A long time ago.
But, gathering info on my own is just... something we've had to do. There were so many people around us that we didn't know who to trust with the actual truth. It had been hidden for so long that it sounded like a lie.
I wanted something tangible... because I wanted people to believe me.
...And, I wanted to make a choice to help someone on my own, not because of some destiny or responsibility. It was nothing like that.
[ Where most of this conversation — aside from the lengthy pause before it began — has been bopping back and forth at a pretty rapid-fire pace, there is a pause of days before Alfred replies again.
A snake-with-no-limbs can't exactly skulk back in with his tail between his legs, and yet... ]
"help" is something you can offer. it isn't something you can force on someone.
if someone is drowning at sea, if they're choking and falling unconscious, okay, sure, implied consent, 'please prevent me from actively dying, right here, in this exact moment — but if they're awake and choking, did you know you're still supposed to ask if they want you to help them, before you start trying to get whatever-it-is out of their throat, with a squeeze-the-stuffing-out move or otherwise?
if someone is doing something you don't understand, even if it looks like they're putting themselves wildly at risk, even if they're literally killing themselves — you still need to find out why before you assume that you've got the right to decide what's best for them.
maybe they think they don't have a choice, and if you come in with a new option, they'll seize it gratefully.
maybe they think they're making a conscious and informed choice, and their death is going to serve a purpose that's a lot greater than they are alone, and will be worth every ounce of pain and grief, no matter how awful.
if you just go charging in to interfere, you could fuck everything up irreparably, ruining your relationship with whoever that is — whether or not you already had one.
i would really like to have a sense that you are actually understanding what i mean when i say that, kiddo, before we try to keep going with anything more specific about your case.
[It took Oscar a while to respond as well. Coming from a situation and a world where so much was out of everyone's hands-- including the man who had manipulated the whole of his world's history-- this concept was almost foreign to him in so many ways.
Very little had been done by anyone's choice. Even if they had chosen, they didn't understand the full consequences of that choice.
Not even Ozma, upon taking the option to return from the dead and see his beloved again, fully understood what he was getting into.
The reply came a few hours later-- rather terse, because he didn't know what to say to a snake that could potentially tell everything to the black eyed man that called himself a God: ]
I understand what you're saying.
None of this would have happened if we were allowed such rights back in my home.
It's not something that's regularly offered. I don't know what it is supposed to look like.
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no subject
I know I'm being jumpy. But-- that Witch I mentioned has messed up the lives of everyone I know, and she's no peach to deal with in person. That kinda thing isn't always easy to deal with.
[What was therapy? What did it look like? Was there even therapy for a society geared towards action instead of introspection, towards focusing in on the practical matters instead of even looking at the frustration, sorrow, and pain that lurks underneath everything?
How do you work through being tortured? Through the existential dread that-- perhaps, there is no way to escape fate. No matter how far he runs.]
I've been calling him Sasha, because that's what my boyfriend's uncle calls him. I think it gets my point across.
[The point being that, though he's anxious and jumpy, he's also got nerves so steely that he is willing to potentially anger a god instead of faking deference.
Just because he was good at lying didn't mean that he liked it. ]
I don't know much about martyrs and saints, Mr. Alfred. Words like that aren't normally used in my home, because organized religion isn't that common. It was, once. A long time ago.
But, gathering info on my own is just... something we've had to do. There were so many people around us that we didn't know who to trust with the actual truth. It had been hidden for so long that it sounded like a lie.
I wanted something tangible... because I wanted people to believe me.
...And, I wanted to make a choice to help someone on my own, not because of some destiny or responsibility. It was nothing like that.
I've had too much of that.
no subject
A snake-with-no-limbs can't exactly skulk back in with his tail between his legs, and yet... ]
"help" is something you can offer. it isn't something you can force on someone.
if someone is drowning at sea, if they're choking and falling unconscious, okay, sure, implied consent, 'please prevent me from actively dying, right here, in this exact moment — but if they're awake and choking, did you know you're still supposed to ask if they want you to help them, before you start trying to get whatever-it-is out of their throat, with a squeeze-the-stuffing-out move or otherwise?
if someone is doing something you don't understand, even if it looks like they're putting themselves wildly at risk, even if they're literally killing themselves — you still need to find out why before you assume that you've got the right to decide what's best for them.
maybe they think they don't have a choice, and if you come in with a new option, they'll seize it gratefully.
maybe they think they're making a conscious and informed choice, and their death is going to serve a purpose that's a lot greater than they are alone, and will be worth every ounce of pain and grief, no matter how awful.
if you just go charging in to interfere, you could fuck everything up irreparably, ruining your relationship with whoever that is — whether or not you already had one.
i would really like to have a sense that you are actually understanding what i mean when i say that, kiddo, before we try to keep going with anything more specific about your case.
no subject
Very little had been done by anyone's choice. Even if they had chosen, they didn't understand the full consequences of that choice.
Not even Ozma, upon taking the option to return from the dead and see his beloved again, fully understood what he was getting into.
The reply came a few hours later-- rather terse, because he didn't know what to say to a snake that could potentially tell everything to the black eyed man that called himself a God: ]
I understand what you're saying.
None of this would have happened if we were allowed such rights back in my home.
It's not something that's regularly offered. I don't know what it is supposed to look like.