[Video]

[la_belle_rogue]

[Rogue doesn't look happen when she turns on the feed. In fact, she seems grim and pensive. She's sitting at the island in her kitchen, arms folded across the counter top, leaning over them heavily. She takes a moment to gather her thoughts before she starts speaking.]

Ah wanna talk about choices for a minute. This place is very unique, in that it offers up an option that should be the hard choice, and makes it look like the easy choice.

Killin' someone should never be considered the right thing to do. Sometimes it's the necessary thing. Sometimes it's the only thing we can do, when faced with an extreme situation. Life or death. Kill or be killed. But the Barge warps that into an easy go to and it shouldn't be. Not every option is life or death, kill or be killed.

Sometimes we find ourselves between rocks and hard places. And in those times our choices are either bad or worse. But just because a choice might not be a good one, doesn't mean that it's not the better one. Just because a choice leaves a mess behind, doesn't mean it's not better than the alternative.

Now before ya'll start in on how death isn't permanent here, let me just say this: Ah. Don't. Care. Wardens are here ta help people get their lives back, and actin' cavalier 'bout takin' someone's life is pretty counter productive ta that, from where Ah'm standin'.

We've got a lot of extraordinary people here, who can do amazin' things, but we have become frighteningly dependent on one lone miracle. We're treatin' death like a time out. Death should be the hardest choice we make, no matter what world we're from, no matter how many reset buttons the Admiral is willin' ta press for us. It never should be treated lightly. Even in a place where it doesn't stick. And we certainly shouldn't get angry at someone when they choose not ta take a life, no matter what mess comes with that choice. Don't ya see how backwards this is? And we've been doin' it for a long time here. Ah imagine a lot longer than Ah've been around, and Ah can honestly say Ah'm ashamed for not payin' attention t'it sooner and speakin' up about it before now.

[She shakes her head, sits back. What else can she say on this?]

That's all Ah've got ta say.

Comments

[youwill]

Is that all you have to say.

[He's furious. What he portrays now is calm anger, civil and careful. That is the veil. The reality is an anger so deep he has to struggle to keep his heart rate even.]

[la_belle_rogue]

[She made that pretty clear. But she'll be polite. This is a touchy subject, and she knows she's on the less screamingly offended side. But she has a unique perspective here as well. Patience, civility, is required if she's to be listened to at all.]

Ah'd like ta think someone as intelligent as you would understand that Ah am, in fact, talkin' about a larger problem than just yer particular example, Doctor.

[youwill]

Of course. But I hope you would not try to deny that my particular example gave fuel to this fire.

[It helps, in a way, to be reminded that others are just as capable of observing etiquette. But he has been pushed so far.]

[la_belle_rogue]

Ah wouldn't, because yer example put it right in front of me, whereas before Ah was blithely acceptin' of the status quo. What happened t'ya wasn't a good thing. However, when it comes down ta brass tacks, even though y'were puttin' someone's life in danger, they chose not ta fight fire with fire. And there was sincere regret as ta the consequences of that action, instead of shruggin' it off as just desserts and movin' on. Which is how we've been treatin' the death toll.

[youwill]

He fought fire with gasoline. And while you are keen to hold onto his sincere regret, you have made no mention of the fact that he told me to apologize in the most public way possible, and I did. Because he told me to.

His guilty conscious drove him to contrition, but only after a parting shot. Only after he made sure that when I was myself again, I would "remember what guilt feels like."

[He's quoting directly. He's scoured that post since coming back to himself.]

[la_belle_rogue]

Actions should have consequences and heavy meanings when taken ta such places. Ah've said this already once, but bares repeatin'. Ah don't think what was done ta ya was right, but the choice not ta kill ya is also not wrong.

[youwill]

Interesting that this would be brought down to the choices he made, but not the choices that were removed from me.

[la_belle_rogue]

Ah think that particular discussion is already bein' handled. This is a different topic, though not unrelated, as we've both agreed.

[youwill]

I was unaware that the discussion of my free will has been handled without my input. Perhaps you could direct me toward it.

As this is a separate, not unrelated topic, I will say instead that I disagree, and that comparing the death toll we face here to true death is a product of fear of death itself. I have been killed several times, here. I would have preferred the prolonged death toll again.

[la_belle_rogue]

Mah apologies, Ah'd forgotten that that particular upheaval was while ya were not quite yerself. Though Ah'm sure ya could trace it back and add in yer true voice on the situation now.

Now lets take this particular non-lethal action out of the equation. If the circumstances were identical, except for the one variable we've removed, would ya prefer ta death toll, or ta not suffer that and have been subdued, but left alive? Ah'm genuinely curious.

[youwill]

[He swallows back a biting retort, erring on the civil side instead. Civil enough.]

A circumstantial situation. There are several variables to consider. How severe is the subduing? Am I maimed? Will I be left with a longer, harder healing than the two weeks the death toll would last?

[la_belle_rogue]

[She's trying very hard with him to explain her point in this. She doesn't like him, but he has a valid perspective and she wants him to see hers.]

Seein's there's too many option ta count, we'll go with yer experience as it happened, but without yer mind bein' altered into somethin' it isn't. Lets say he was able to render ya unconscious instead, with the same exact events occurrin'.

[youwill]

Then my kneecap and arm are shattered. [He thinks, so much of it is blurred.]

I would require long medical attention, or the efforts of my attacker to speed the recovery process. Logically, death would be quicker.

[It's not quite an answer. He might prefer the slow route, now.]

[godsays]

Maybe it's not about you.

[youwill]

We have already established that it was prompted by what was done to me.

[godsays]

She's talking about killing.

What's the difference between what Dillon did and knocking you unconscious? Besides your injured pride.

[youwill]

This is not a question of pride. It's a mockery of free will. It is an erasure of self.

He remade me in his image. You should understand how that feels.

[godsays]

You're fine.

[youwill]

An easy judgement to pass, when observing from a distance.

[godsays]

You'd know. That's all you ever do.

[youwill]

I do not narrow my gaze.

[godsays]

Yes, you do. You do, like a microscope.

Maybe now you understand what it is when you try to make someone else in your image.

[youwill]

[There. He sees his path, and all at once it becomes easier to breathe evenly.]

If you wish me to understand powerlessness, Zane, then you know the method. You'll have ample time to convince others that spending the rest of my life having my will taken away is justice.

[godsays]

The Barge isn't about justice! That's why I've stayed away from you!

[youwill]

Not far enough that you can't enjoy my torment. Perhaps Arthas was right, and Dillon should improve the whole of the ship.