primrosella: (Fragile)
Princess Rosella of Daventry ([personal profile] primrosella) wrote2009-09-13 05:40 pm

Quest 120

[Private//Hackable by Friends]

They didn't come for me.

I killed a witch in her sleep and they didn't come for me. I stole from an ogre, I blinded a set of three hags, I robbed graves...and they didn't come for me. They left me alone. They took the others, they took my friends, but they never came for me.

Am I any less guilty for it?

Maybe I am. Maybe I am different. It'd fit, wouldn't it?

Don't go trying to rescue anyone. Don't come to the prison. Don't look. Don't become one more thing for your friends to worry about. Don't end up like the rest of them.

Is that it? Am I really so different after all?

I think I understand now, Megumi.

[/Private]

I see, now. How very clever. First make the animals attack us, then set the stuffed ones on us, and now treat us all like animals. That's terribly clever, isn't it? Three bad things, all in a row, just as we'd all been expecting, and all to do with animals.

But it begs questions, doesn't it? Why this? Why now? Why are some people taken and others left alone? And who could possibly deserve the things being done to the people in there? Prison, punishment, seeking repentance for sins--that's all well and good, but if you have to resort to torture to seek it, how are you any better than the ones you intend to punish? What does it solve? Where does it stop?

This isn't justice. It makes me sick-- This is suffering for the sake of suffering. Fuel for the clock again, is it?

And now it's said that the island is sinking. The deities have as good as confirmed it, in their roundabout ways--"rats drown with the ship", "tick-tock, get out quick", "time is not on your side". Is it so hard to guess what the "exciting conclusion" might be? And what does that mean for the people that haven't or won't or can't accept the parole that's been offered, I wonder? Or perhaps I don't have to wonder at all.

But perhaps the question that's most important of all is this: do the ends always justify the means? Is it worth it to become a monster to defeat a monster? To punish people with the same methods that they themselves are being punished for? Or does answering evil with evil only result in twice as much evil at the end of it all? When is it poetic justice, and when is it just plain cruelty?

Perhaps it's the reasons behind it, in the end, that make all the difference. And no matter what anyone might say, I have a difficult time believing that any of this is truly being done for our sakes.

Cain is recovering, having escaped. Please bear with him.

[identity profile] misterblackbird.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 10:21 pm (UTC)(link)
They have some reason, I suppose. They'll say that they do.

Did he get back to the mainland with Rosella and Sam's help, or just on his own?

[identity profile] primrosella.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 10:29 pm (UTC)(link)
Saying they have one and really having one are two different things.

Uhhh...let's go with getting back to the mainland with Sam and Rosella's help. Is that okay?

[identity profile] misterblackbird.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 10:43 pm (UTC)(link)
Even in merely saying that they do they have some reason there.

[identity profile] horrible-penny.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 10:49 pm (UTC)(link)
I don't think this has anything to do with justice, or making the world a better place, or anything like that. It's too cruel to be helpful.

No one deserves it, anyway. It doesn't matter what they did.

Absolutely! Megumi told her to go pick him up and get him home safe, anyway.

[identity profile] primrosella.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 10:50 pm (UTC)(link)
It still isn't right. What's being done...I can't imagine a single good reason for it.

Bawwwwww ;; All right, cool.

[identity profile] misterblackbird.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 10:55 pm (UTC)(link)
I never said it was a good reason that they'd have.

[identity profile] primrosella.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 10:58 pm (UTC)(link)
Sometimes it's possible to make the world a better place by ridding it of monsters. But this isn't one of those times, and none of this is making anything better.

This isn't justice. It's torture.

[identity profile] primrosella.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:03 pm (UTC)(link)
No, you didn't. Because there isn't one.

You sound a little better today.

[identity profile] misterblackbird.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:11 pm (UTC)(link)
Thank you. I don't feel or look that much better, though.

[identity profile] primrosella.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:13 pm (UTC)(link)
Is there anything you'll let me I can do to help?

[identity profile] horrible-penny.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:28 pm (UTC)(link)
It is. That's all it is.

What's really awful? There's not much for us--people without superpowers or anything--to do about it, except sit around and worry.

[identity profile] misterblackbird.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:31 pm (UTC)(link)
I think I'd do best to rest.

Is there anyone still on the island?

[identity profile] primrosella.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:33 pm (UTC)(link)
I almost think we have the most difficult job of all, really. We have to hold on to hope, for the people who can't manage it on their own.

And do what we can in the meantime...

[identity profile] horrible-penny.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:37 pm (UTC)(link)
Even after everyone's rescued from the prison...

They'll definitely need an infusion of hope. I don't think this'll end after it ends, you know? So many people are hurting and hopeless.

[identity profile] primrosella.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:37 pm (UTC)(link)
...All right. But call if you need me, and I'll come.

I'm almost certain there are. For everyone they took away, I doubt there's any way they could've heard each and every case by now, and some people won't ask to be let out, anyway.

[identity profile] primrosella.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:38 pm (UTC)(link)
Are any of your friends trapped in there, Penny?

[identity profile] horrible-penny.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:41 pm (UTC)(link)
Some of them. I haven't heard from others, but I'm sure they're okay.

What about you?

[identity profile] primrosella.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:44 pm (UTC)(link)
Still? They haven't escaped yet, or asked for parole?

...Quite a few were.

[identity profile] misterblackbird.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:46 pm (UTC)(link)
If the island is sinking, they ought to be gotten out.

[identity profile] primrosella.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:50 pm (UTC)(link)
I promised I wouldn't go trying to rescue anyone, remember? And you're not going back there, either.

[identity profile] horrible-penny.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:52 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm not sure. The ones I talked to were getting out, but the others haven't posted anything. I hope they're just lying low until this is all over.

Are they out now? And okay?

[identity profile] misterblackbird.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:55 pm (UTC)(link)
Now that suddenly seems to be real injustice.

[identity profile] primrosella.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:55 pm (UTC)(link)
Try everything you can to get in touch with them. If it really is sinking, after all...try everything you can think of.

They're out, and that's something, at least.

[identity profile] primrosella.livejournal.com 2009-09-13 11:59 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm told it's very dangerous out there, too.

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