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Who: Velvet Crowe and You!
Broadcast: Fleetwide
Action: aboard the SS Red Fish
When: right after the Shuffle

[Velvet had woken up in one strange tin can and had only just started to get her bearings when she was suddenly transported to another strange tin can. This isn't how she was expecting today to go.

She stumbles a little but manages to catch herself, oblivious to the fanfare that signals her arrival.]

Where--?

[She takes a moment to steady herself, shaking her head to clear it. She blinks, focusing on her surroundings, trying to make sense of things.]

...Is that pudding?

[Where does pudding fit into all this? And that's not even mentioning the confetti. Actually she hasn't even noticed that yet, or the fact that a lot of it has fluttered into her hair. She looks pretty festive for someone so cranky.]

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[Yeah hahaha see that's exactly what Mikleo is yelling about at him right this moment, funnily enough...]

Um. It just didn't really seem very fair, for me to talk to you like normal when you didn't know. [Especially because he's something she hates. Like he's deceiving her to get information, when if she knew she probably wouldn't want to talk to him.] Though I really don't want to fight you, especially not here. These ships really aren't that large and someone could get hurt.

I didn't have any reason to want to fight you before.

[Not that she seems to be jumping into attack mode now, either. The more he talks the more he proves he's really nothing like Artorius. He's not trying to manipulate her. He's just honest to a fault, apparently. "A good kid," Zaveid kept saying. It occurs to her now, this is why.]

.....that is........a really good point. [HE COULDN'T TAKE THE GUILT OKAY

IMAGINED GUILT OR NOT]

[She scoffs.]

You really are nothing like him.

[Her hatred of Artorius is so intensely personal it's difficult for her to fully project it onto someone else. Especially someone who bears so little resemblance to him. Even if he calls himself a Shepherd.]

[Considering how much she hates this guy, Sorey's just gonna take that as a good sign. And honestly, she's the nicest hellion- daemon, that is, that he's ever met, gruff or not.]

I'm- [Ah, wait. She doesn't like him apologizing for things that aren't his fault.] I don't know if this will make you feel any better, but Shepherds- at least all the legends I've read and been told, they don't enslave malakhim anymore. And I've never heard of that emotional suppression thing, so at the very least, this Artorius's ideals don't stick.

[She shifts and looks away. She hadn't give too much thought about how history would remember Artorius. Her focus was killing him. She didn't think too far beyond that. When Sorey first mentioned the word Shepherd she had thought that must mean history remembered Artorius as some kind of hero or martyr, even after he was struck down.

Instead he wasn't remembered at all. The concept of Shepherd didn't belong to him. He was nothing. His ideals were nothing. Eizen had told her they won, and even though she hasn't experienced that herself yet, it feels a little more like a real victory now.]

Yeah...maybe a little.

[Oh.

That's...that's really nice. It's the first time he's felt good about being a Shepherd since talking to Eizen. If he can offer her even a little bit of comfort, then it's worth hearing the whole truth of the Shepherd legend.

He ducks his head with a smile; he's already getting used to her malevolence.]

I'm glad you defied him. I wouldn't like a world where nobody can feel anything either, so...thank you.

[Gratitude isn't really something she's prepared for. Not that she's never experienced it before, but it's always a little awkward and this feels different somehow. On the one hand it's good to know she didn't completely destroy the future, on the other hand...she's not sure it's really something she should be thanked for.]

...Don't get sappy on me, kid. I didn't do it for anyone but myself.

[She doesn't want him to think she's some sort of hero when she's not. Her motives were selfish and she knows it.]

That's okay. My friend Lailah told me that it's just as important to do something for yourself as it is to do something for others. I don't think there's anything wrong with being a little selfish. [Or, he doesn't think that way now. It's something he has to remind himself of.]

[That's pretty much the antithesis of Artorius' ideas, so if she wasn't convinced before, she would be now. Even if she still knows her own selfishness can get pretty extreme.]

Yeah? Not a bad philosophy.

[Better than all the "birds fly because they must" bullshit, anyway.]

[No, it's really not. Lailah knows her stuff.

Sorey idly bounces back against the wall and his hands, shifting his weight.] ...could you tell me more about it? I'd like to know the truth about how the Shepherd legend really began.

[She blinks a little in surprise. Though she probably shouldn't be. The curiosity feels kind of familiar.]

I...right now?

You don't have to now, if you don't want to. [But eventually yeah, he'd like to hear about it.]

I don't know anything about any legends, [Which is to say she doesn't know what people say about Shepherds in the future.] but I can tell you about Artorius. It's just...a lot.

[It might be a little unclear if she means it's a long story or just a really heavy one. Honestly, though, it's both. She could probably sum it up pretty quickly, but Sorey seems like the type to have questions and want details. Since it's sort of personal for her, it would be a lot to cover in a first meeting.]

I'm okay with whatever you're willing to share. [He's not going to ask her to vomit her entire past onto him, since this deal with Artorius seems intensely personal, but if she's the type who isn't concerned over that sort of thing then all the better. He won't understand where she's coming from if he doesn't listen to what she has to say, after all.

...plus he's already heard a ton of disturbing news today and honestly he's feeling a little numb. Now might actually be a good time.]

[She crosses her arms, idly tapping the index finger of her left hand against her right arm as she considers.]

All right. He used my little brother as a sacrifice to awaken Innominat. [Anger creeps back into her voice here. Even now that she knows Laphi was a willing sacrifice, it still makes her angry. Angry at both of them.] It allowed everyone to see Malakhim, which meant anyone could become an Exorcist.

I was in jail for most of his rise to power. But he was head of the abbey. He led the exorcists that helped bring order to the chaos caused by daemons. He made people feel safe. He was good at that, I guess. [She sounds bitter. There was a time she felt safe with him. It didn't last.]

Only a few people knew his ultimate goal was to rid the world of it's pain by suppressing human's ability to feel anything. The abbey was good at keeping its secrets and spreading propaganda. Most people saw him as a hero and a savior.

[She mostly just focuses on Arotirus as the Shepherd, because that's what he asked about.]

Edited (wording) 2017-04-23 00:46 (UTC)

[Innominat? That old seraph that was supposedly worshiped back in the day? So the crest they'd seen and confused for Maotelus's belonged to someone the first Shepherd had tried to revive to, to suppress people.

Velvet's voice gets sharper, brusquer as she recounts what she knows. The malevolence coming off of her gets a little thicker and stinks like vengeance, like heartache and fury. Artorius had sacrificed her family for this Innominat, and brought resonance to the entire world. And they'd used it to- to enslave seraphim.]

That's...that's all so terrible... [No wonder she's furious and bitter.] Wanting to rid the world of malevolence is a fair goal, but to go to those lengths...

[She looks down at her left hand, clenching it slowly into a fist. Her anger is palpable again. She just couldn't stay completely calm when it came to Artorius.]

He didn't care. He'd do anything...anything...to make it happen. People as individuals didn't matter. Even family...

[She drops her hand and looks away.]

He was only concerned with the bigger picture. Details like people's lives and free will weren't important.

Someone like that would definitely change things, [Sorey agrees, not happily. People willing to abandon their morals and the lives of others always leave a big impact. They wage wars and wipe villages off the map.] It's so hard to believe the origin of the Shepherd legend is so callous; all the stories I've heard paint Shepherds as bringers of peace and harmony, but...I suppose history always is somewhat biased.

Oh, he wanted peace and harmony, all right.

[It just happened to be the worst kind of peace and harmony imaginable. She doesn't know much about history, she was never that interested in study, but she knows the abbey knew how to spin information. It wouldn't be hard for historians to do the same.]

Peace and harmony without freedom isn't real. That's just ruling without objection. [Peace and harmony is a really tall order for a free society though, and while it's not one Sorey is willing to abandon entirely, he can at least admit that the road to achieve it is terribly steep.]

Yeah, well, I won't argue with that.

[She agrees, honestly. And it's probably good he realizes that if he's in a position of power. But talking about Artorius has emotionally exhausted her and left her a little grumpy. Though it says something good about Sorey that she's only a little grumpy and not a lot crankier. Or enraged.]

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