Rory shook his head slowly at her. He hadn't had the same amount of notice. Perhaps it had been posted at about the same time intervals, but that was not the same thing. "I could tell you all the ways in which those two situations were different," he responded tiredly, then said no more about it. The ball was in her court on that one. He didn't feel too convinced she'd actually understand what he'd tell her anyway; if she wanted to treat the issue like something that was black-and-white, well... Possibly she wouldn't accept that it wasn't.
But the two situations had been nowhere near the same. They only had two common denominators, really: their supposed time frame, and the subject.
There were a lot of things about what passed through Roana's mind that Rory could not understand, or rather, he couldn't understand how she couldn't understand. It was as if her willingness to risk herself somehow justified her doing anything she pleased, because it was selfless and for the greater good.
But it wasn't.
And she tried to turn his own bitter, powerless words back against him.
"My advice?" he hissed, bristling again as his eyes narrowed and flashed. "I had just lost my friend to the guardian they spoke so brashly of defeating! It was not advice, it was a sense of helplessness—powerlessness—to dissuade them—Ronin—from his stupid plan! I wanted to stall them, to prevent this from happening at all, because you know what? You know how it went, yeah? Ronin died!" Surprise surprise! The lethal monster killed more! Who coulda thunk it?
It had not been, and never would be, advice. He had wanted them to wait, to find things to live for, so that the allure of the outside world would not be so strong.
He supposed he should've known it was doomed from the start. They saw a foe to vanquish. A puzzle to solve. A world to find. Freedom on their tongues, in their lungs—
Rory had liked Ronin. That was entirely beside the point, though; he had liked Ronin, but had it been him standing there instead of Roana, well, Rory still would've stood where he was.
"Wow, you spoke to a god, congratulations," he interjected acerbically, fully aware that Roana was unaware that he was Abandoned (most, in fact, were unaware of this fact; the list of those who knew was short and sweet). And again, the simple center-of-everything logic: oh wow we have military experience and we're here, obviously it's so we can bust your sorry asses out of here!
He didn't want her good intentions. He didn't want her self-declared martyrdom. He didn't want her thinking she knew anything about this place after only mere months in it, much less enough to make informed decisions about their future—as if they were all sheep and too dumb for their own good. As if they needed guidance. As if they needed help.
Didn't she understand how patronizing, how disrespectful, and how vile-tasting this whole affair was?
"How about I don't let anyone try to breach it," he said. "Or did you not hear me deny the Ascended the same thing you're wanting?" He denied Natural Ascended, no less; if this was about Outlanders, it was either because it was a convenient narrative, or because they had the bad taste of showing up to do monumental things with .. well, Outlanders.
"We never asked for this—for any of this. We didn't ask Ronin to make some choice for us. We didn't ask anyone to defeat the demon and bring down the barrier. I'm sorry he's dead, but he has no right, either, to just decide what's going to happen. Do you know what it's like to have a bunch of random people arrive and just put their boot on your back without even noticing and then say 'oh, hey, this shit sucks, lucky you we've all arrived to make things better!'?" It wasn't only rhetorical; he was interested in hearing if she had been through something similar.
Because if she had been, by everything holy and unholy, he might just give up reasoning with her entirely.
"Because that is exactly what you're doing here, so high on your grand idea of being some bloody martyr or force of good, or whatever—I don't doubt your intentions. You're misguided, not evil. But like I said. This is not your thing to be doing. This is not your choice to be making. Why can't you just accept that we don't want your sacrifice?"
But the two situations had been nowhere near the same. They only had two common denominators, really: their supposed time frame, and the subject.
There were a lot of things about what passed through Roana's mind that Rory could not understand, or rather, he couldn't understand how she couldn't understand. It was as if her willingness to risk herself somehow justified her doing anything she pleased, because it was selfless and for the greater good.
But it wasn't.
And she tried to turn his own bitter, powerless words back against him.
"My advice?" he hissed, bristling again as his eyes narrowed and flashed. "I had just lost my friend to the guardian they spoke so brashly of defeating! It was not advice, it was a sense of helplessness—powerlessness—to dissuade them—Ronin—from his stupid plan! I wanted to stall them, to prevent this from happening at all, because you know what? You know how it went, yeah? Ronin died!" Surprise surprise! The lethal monster killed more! Who coulda thunk it?
It had not been, and never would be, advice. He had wanted them to wait, to find things to live for, so that the allure of the outside world would not be so strong.
He supposed he should've known it was doomed from the start. They saw a foe to vanquish. A puzzle to solve. A world to find. Freedom on their tongues, in their lungs—
Rory had liked Ronin. That was entirely beside the point, though; he had liked Ronin, but had it been him standing there instead of Roana, well, Rory still would've stood where he was.
"Wow, you spoke to a god, congratulations," he interjected acerbically, fully aware that Roana was unaware that he was Abandoned (most, in fact, were unaware of this fact; the list of those who knew was short and sweet). And again, the simple center-of-everything logic: oh wow we have military experience and we're here, obviously it's so we can bust your sorry asses out of here!
He didn't want her good intentions. He didn't want her self-declared martyrdom. He didn't want her thinking she knew anything about this place after only mere months in it, much less enough to make informed decisions about their future—as if they were all sheep and too dumb for their own good. As if they needed guidance. As if they needed help.
Didn't she understand how patronizing, how disrespectful, and how vile-tasting this whole affair was?
"How about I don't let anyone try to breach it," he said. "Or did you not hear me deny the Ascended the same thing you're wanting?" He denied Natural Ascended, no less; if this was about Outlanders, it was either because it was a convenient narrative, or because they had the bad taste of showing up to do monumental things with .. well, Outlanders.
"We never asked for this—for any of this. We didn't ask Ronin to make some choice for us. We didn't ask anyone to defeat the demon and bring down the barrier. I'm sorry he's dead, but he has no right, either, to just decide what's going to happen. Do you know what it's like to have a bunch of random people arrive and just put their boot on your back without even noticing and then say 'oh, hey, this shit sucks, lucky you we've all arrived to make things better!'?" It wasn't only rhetorical; he was interested in hearing if she had been through something similar.
Because if she had been, by everything holy and unholy, he might just give up reasoning with her entirely.
"Because that is exactly what you're doing here, so high on your grand idea of being some bloody martyr or force of good, or whatever—I don't doubt your intentions. You're misguided, not evil. But like I said. This is not your thing to be doing. This is not your choice to be making. Why can't you just accept that we don't want your sacrifice?"
