animus_network | Gather around

*It's a recorded video. Enoch stands before the terminal. He eyes the screen before taking a breath and beginning to speak.*

Shall I tell you a tale, Animus?

In another world, there was a dark and foreboding tower with no name, ruled by seven Fallen Angels. Heaven sent a man to capture these rulers, but in the three hundred years this man searched for them, the Tower built its own story. Inside the Tower, people thrived, and enjoyed a life of luxury and abundance in beautiful, otherworldly lands. Each level was as its own world, and had beauty all its own. Even the land of cold steel and eternal lights was breathtaking in an eerie way. But all was not as wonderful as it seemed. The people lived luxurious lives surrounded by beauty and wonders, yes, but when they died, their souls did not ascend to Heaven. They were taken from their rightful course and sent to The Darkness, to sate the gluttony of the demon prince Belial. No one seemed to know this but Belial himself and a resident of the Tower named Ishtar. Ishtar heard the voice of God, and knew that the Fallen Angels were not to be trusted - she gathered followers. It meant severing their connection to the safe and the familiar, to spurn the luxury of trust and plenty and ease of life. It meant turning their rulers against them. But...

*Enoch pulls something from his pocket - something small. Those who look hard enough might be able to catch a faint green glow before he closes his fingers around it, and a strong female voice speaks.*

They became the Freemen. The Fallen Angels became angry and rebuked us. I knew then that God's Word was true.

*Enoch's fist lowers, and he continues.*

But the Freemen knew the truth. Ishtar died in battle against the children of the Fallen Angels, who were in such misery they ate one another to end their brothers' pain. But she left behind prophecies. Messages that outlived her, to aid the Freemen that had sworn to follow her. The prophecies promised Ishtar would return to save them, but until then, they had to work hard to survive when those who were as gods in the realm were against them. And then, when the time came, they surely would not stand by while the resurrected Ishtar fought alone.

That is the story of the Freemen, a story that I did not know of until my own intersected it. Do not forget, Animus, that there are always stories other than your own. Thank you for hearing me.

*The recording ends, showing Enoch sitting at the terminal, feed live to hear responses.*

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

You're right. Unfortunately, a few of us seem to have forgotten that everyone should have control of how their own stories end rather than having that decided for them.

Indeed. Even with the Prophecies of Ishtar, if the Freemen did not work to help it come to pass - one even escaped the Tower to find me and direct me to it - they would destroy their own chance at true freedom.

So I am right in presuming that you are at least in part responsible for what's happened? I don't care for your story. If you were hoping to relay a parable for inspirational purposes, I'm afraid I'm unimpressed.

This is not a tower of "Freemen". It's full of people who are lost and confused and frightened. There are children here. You cannot ask a mere child to fight a war and especially not when they've just had what semblance of familiarity and normalcy they knew has been turned inside out. Children may posses the resiliency of youth and imagination that we often lose in growing up, but there's little point in them having freedom in the future if they are ruined and haunted forever. I don't believe you thought through what the repercussions might be for those like them before you took action.

*Oh. He did not just accuse him of not thinking of the children. It was the children that spurred him into involvement in tower affairs in the first place, a year ago, and pulled him from the void of shock and depression that came with being brought here. It's always the children he's fought for more than anything. And on top of that to call them "ruined and haunted" because of this when there were the likes of Ruana and Jason below?

Enoch has gone from determined strength to anger, leaning forward in his seat, gaze intense. The only thing left of the softness normally present in his voice is its natural breathiness. All else is a hard edge.*

You're quick to assume involvement. But you're right about something - there are children here, and I want to see them "ruined and haunted forever" no more than you do. I don't want to see their free will removed, their bodies mutilated, their minds toyed with, suffering betrayals nobody but our hosts wanted to happen. I am glad this happened, that something has happened to shake our hosts, that there is strength somewhere that can get through to them. Because it means that this could end. That the children - that everyone - will not have to see themselves or their loved ones mutilated, transformed, tortured, or killed horribly.

I am not asking the children to fight. Do you assume the Freemen as a people did not have children? They were not soldiers, in the end. They were a people oppressed. Those who can fight protect the ones who can't. My entire year here has been spent protecting people - children especially - when I can. Do not presume I do not think of them. I have from the very day I learned they were here.

[ So this man was a part of it. Saber makes a point to remember his face. ]

If you could neither free nor extinguish all life, then you had no business acting. All you have guaranteed for everyone is worse torment for a year. Do not speak of your actions as though they did not hurt people. What the administrators do will never excuse what you do to us.

[ For someone so convinced of the righteousness of his actions, he is rather defensive, which Saber finds surprising from a man who just relayed a story about God and fallen angels...

Now that Saber practically has confirmation that this man is part of the group that apparently "broke the tower", he's finished speaking. It's obvious to him that the man has no intentions of feeling remorse for what he and his accomplices brought upon everyone, so he sees little point in continuing to talk to him right now. ]

I think you could stand to exercise your compassion a little more and think a little harder on how what you do will affect others before you do it.

[Alright, somebody's gotta cut in here, and that somebody is going to be Zett. The camera is deliberately turned on, so Saber can be sure that Zett is a 'child'.]

Hey, Uncle Enoch, maybe you should run a couple laps around the dormitories while I talk to this person here, okay?

Zett...

*Kid, what are you doing?*

Just leave this one to me, okay? If he's going to make the 'kids should't be brought into this argument' then the very last person he should try to make it to is you.

[ Unfortunately, Saber has already left the terminal... ]

He's gone, Zett...

*And besides...Saber hadn't missed the mark when he'd seen the defensiveness. It was twofold. First, it was what he did with doubts - that is, he acted as if they weren't there under scrutiny. There were so many doubts that still lingered from home, about many things, and yet, he did not act on these doubts, rather against them because it was what he had to do, for the sake of the people who were trapped. None of it meant he did not feel - but one could scarcely see it until he was cornered.

Second, he had been hurt at the implication of being unfeeling towards children, as a father, as someone who had been fighting to protect the children in this tower for a year. But it was even worse; on top of that, he was a father who had, in the end, abandoned all the children he'd ever had, because of outside circumstances. Just because he'd done what was ultimately safer for them didn't mean it didn't hurt, and having this thrown back at him, even if not the same situation, cut deep.

He was defensive because he felt he deserved the sting in Saber's words in some way, but wouldn't dare show it. So it was best to leave it there anyway.*

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video and holy tl;dr batman I'm sorry for this absurd notif