OTA | Sending Crystal

[alankazam]

FORM: Sending Crystal
SENDER: Alan
RECIPIENT: Everyone
WHAT: Maybe y'all should keep closer track of your crystals
WHEN: Waves hands vaguely
WHERE: Everywhere
NOTES: Jack away...I'm sure there's a better way to phrase that

Hello, little rock.

You ask so many questions. All day, all night, and in all voices. What's worse than dying? Who are elves? How do you kiss one?

Listen to me: I can ask questions too. What are stars made of? Who put them there? Do you think they must have been very, very tall?

And — Who do you belong to?

Comments

[justice_is_blond]

[Disruptive. His eyes narrow on his side of the crystal, but he keeps his voice light.]

If mages are treated like anyone else, like people, no one would have to be disrupted by that debate ever again. And as for me, I belong with the Grey Wardens. But the Inquisition's cause against Corypheus is my own.

[alankazam]

We all die alike.

[ Simple, a shrug of a sentence fragment. Mage, templar, and villager have had that in common of late. ]

What's a Corypheus?

[justice_is_blond]

And yet a life lived in captivity is entirely different. And as far as Corypheus... Are you a Rifter?

[Because he's pretty sure the question means yes, but Maker is there a lot to cover if so.]

[alankazam]

[ He's still beginning to piece together what that is, so — ]

No, [ But: ] This is the most news I've had in the past... a while.

[ what the heck is a calendar, he lost track a dozen moons ago ]

[justice_is_blond]

Oh.

[A beat as he tries to put together an altogether different answer than he'd been preparing.]

One of the magisters who went to the Golden City and turned it black and started the Blights is alive and running around and wants to take over the world after murdering the Divine and a great many other people. His name is Corypheus. Or it's the title he's taken now. I'm not entirely clear on that. Either way, the Inquisition has formed to deal with that threat.

there's a bar here my friend affectionately calls the "the golden shitty", just, fyi to the world

[alankazam]

[ Well, that fills in a lot of the gaps. The last he'd heard, the Divine had been killed by some kind of bomb. Like Kirkwall, he remembers hearing. Not that anyone in the caravan seemed to agree on that one, either.

An ancient Magister. The Golden City. The need to oppose that — that he can take on faith.

There's a long silence, while he just. Sits back. To digest all this.]

This is why the Wardens are involved? Travelers spoke of an Archdemon: I thought, an old story. But they insisted.

[ Then it was just another reason to run. The Korcari has deep memories of the Fifth Blight. ]

That's beautiful.

[justice_is_blond]

Not... exactly. There's a slight chance the dragon he rides is one. I haven't seen it, I don't know that any Wardens have. Rumor has it looking different than regular dragons. We're involved... Maker, it's complicated.

[He takes a breath.]

The short of it is that he's connected to the Blight whether there's an archdemon or not. If he winds up using a Darkspawn army we're especially needed. We're here because, again, short reason, where there's a Blight-related threat we should be there.

[alankazam]

Yes, [ He agrees, because it's the rational thing to do. If he thinks that Wardens have a habit of ending up where they shouldn't be as well — he can keep that to himself. ] You should.

So you believe he'll attack the Skyhold?

[justice_is_blond]

He attacked Haven. And even if he doesn't attack here directly, this is where efforts to fight him are coordinated. A Warden presence means we can more rapidly be sent out.

[alankazam]

[ He wouldn’t have been the first, Alan wants to say, but shuts the thought down.

It’s a rare thing to have to consider his people. Patience had never cared about his history, and if you avoided Denerim's chantries (and bookstores, and scholars, and souvenir market), there was no reason for the Sacred Ashes to ever surface in discussion. ]

How tired are you of answering these questions?

[ He doubts he’s the first to ask. The Blight wasn't so long ago, and the Wardens are a point of fascination for all, benign or otherwise. ]

[justice_is_blond]

[That answer gets a chuckle; they're on decidedly easy topics compared to some of the things he has to answer.]

I'm not tired. Ask what you'd like.

[alankazam]

Alright.

Have you ever been in a Circle?

[justice_is_blond]

And here I thought you meant Warden questions. Yes. I've been in a Circle.

[alankazam]

I'm out of Warden questions,

[ In the same manner that one's out of the woods. ]

You don't feel you were treated "as anyone else", during it. How so?

[justice_is_blond]

As non-mages, I said, I believe. But I feel like most people who aren't mages don't get forcibly and suddenly removed from their homes, or taught that they're curses and punishments for sins, or find themselves with quite the list of consequences if they go for a little swim across a lake because maybe they don't want to live in one tower for the rest of their lives. Or, you know, most don't get punished for a kiss when both parties are consenting. There's a word I'm looking for here, where someone isn't held, where someone has options even if they're shitty options, where someone has some control over what they do and when they do it... oh yes. It's called freedom.

[There's no pause as if he's searching for a word in there; he knows exactly what word it is that he wants to use.]

I'm not going to claim that the lives of non-mages are without difficulty or challenges. But I am going to suggest that knowing you can walk down the street and not be attacked before being hauled back to captivity for something entirely beyond your control has been enjoyed by most humans and Dwarves across Thedas. Possibly most qunari too. I don't know enough to say for certain there.

it's called FREEDOM (eagles, fireworks in the distance)

[alankazam]

[ He listens patiently, commits the occasional note to memory. He disagrees with about half of it, but it's that half which is so useful to know. It's the way that people will expect him to feel, probably. Alan doesn't intend to lie to them, but anticipating the situation will give him a better understanding of his options when it comes. ]

"Autonomy". They aren't the same thing.

[ Semantics or not, his point's already blown by the completely incorrect way he pronounces it. ]

How would you change it?

[justice_is_blond]

...Autonomy is defined by freedom.

[His voice is a little hard now. Word choice? Does this man know anything of mages? He'd ask... but he doesn't care to use his name yet and that's where personal inquiries tend to head.]

Captivity is the opposite of freedom, and what we had was captivity. Therefore, while Autonomy is another word for what mages should have, it is not the whole of it. Freedom truly is an applicable word here.

And I would change it with schools where people, mage and not, can come and go as they please. Where one can learn but not be held against their will. Where if someone is afraid of their gift they can stay if they choose to, but it does not cost those who can manage. Where non-mages learn alongside mages and thus can realize we're people too, with the same drives, desires, and fears as anyone else, and the same right to live.

[alankazam]

[ Words will never serve half so well as pictures for ideas. Alan's vocabulary is limited, but that's all the more reason to be precise. ]

If all your options do you harm, is it really freedom? If there's only some control, are you free?

[ The scratching of a stick in dirt. ]

I think there are too many types of captivity to draw a direct opposite. But I like your idea. It sounds nice. What would you teach the non-mages? They'd want a say in it.

[ They. There's nothing to lose in the phrasing, he's already said as much to others, and this man isn't a direct threat. He's loud enough just to make the general area dangerous — but it seems that the Skyhold's a siren in itself. ]

[justice_is_blond]

[...actually a mage, then. Likely.]

Even if all of your options do you harm, you're free to have options. Life can be harsh. I do not believe freedom means safety, or luxuries, or even food on the table. I know better than that. But I do believe in the value of freedom. And even when I was starving on the run as a new apostate, I valued it.

As far as what to teach the non-mages, there's plenty. How many don't know how to read or write, even in this age? How many don't know general procedures for injuries or illness? There's figures as well, numbers, history, things that tutors for the highborn cover but many can't afford. They can also take what classes they'd like and leave the rest, and come and go as they please.

[alankazam]

[ It all sounds very resource-intensive. In a small village, you might manage the attitude of unity necessary. But a small village is the least likely to afford its children from the fields, save in winter. The logistics of it would be a nightmare particularly if kept to large, central towers. All the travel, back and forth... or else, distributed, and neither enough books or scholars to go around.

(That there are too few scholars in the world remains a subject of hot debate among anyone who isn't one.)

Alan knows he wouldn't have been taught beyond his mother's book of letters, or the Fathers' recitations, if his learning hadn't been so specialized, the potential of service to the community so great. There's a little kernel of warmth around that idea, insulating and at once distinctly uncomfortable. That learning, it's what he has left. The idea that it might never have been his, ]

You should try it. [ A beat. ] In the Skyhold, it's small enough to try. You're a Warden, people will listen to you.

[justice_is_blond]

I've done it once already. Just for mages, that time, but I've found a few people who are also interested in widening the scope. The next one will be for all, and likely focusing on survival and basic skill sets that enable it.

[There's some hesitation as he speaks. He's not sure what this other man is thinking, and in light of the likelihood of him being a mage, some of the questions and statements are... not comforting. But that's who he needs to win over, isn't it? The ones who look at Circles as solutions rather than problems.]

Granted, being a Grey Warden doesn't exactly mean much for being listened to, but the usefulness of the plan helps there. If you've some skills yourself that you'd like to impart...

[alankazam]

I should probably get there first, [ Alan lays out, gentle but clearly distractedly. His brain is buzzing. ] I doubt I know anything worth teaching.

[ That he feels like teaching, and that they aren't likely to have covered, more accurately. Learning to survive is grand, but he's not about to stand up and tell a crowd of strangers that it's not cannibalism if you aren't human at the time. He knows from experience how that will go over — and Patience was already more tolerant of him than most. ]

Who should I ask for? To make sure I don't miss it.

[justice_is_blond]

It would help to be here. And do you want the practical, or the magical?

[He doesn't know that he wants to deal with saying his name today. Not like there's a day when he enjoys it, or a day that would be better, but he knows he's a coward sometimes and some of those sometimes he accepts it. If this man wants practical, he can give Merrill's name and wish him a good day. It's cheap. He'll do it anyway.]

[alankazam]

It makes the most sense to observe both.

[justice_is_blond]

[So much for easy.]

Anders or Merrill.

[The second name will confirm it, too.]