[ Her chest rises and falls, strained, slow, trying to form something to say back that isn't scowling furiously at her. That shiver cold heat that is in her limb. Just one sip of the blackwater, just one, oh - she needs to stop thinking about it.
At least Lapis is distraction for the time being. ]
Yes, I am so blessed. [ Her eyes roll. Though she cannot blame her for not understanding what was happening her. If she was not even human to begin with - how could she realise she was talking to a dead woman walking.
She wants her home, she thinks again, not - not England. She wants her palace, she wants her boys, she wants Devi at her side. She doesn't want to die here.
Stop thinking about, Lakshmi, she had made her bed, she would sleep in it. So without anything else to do, she takes the distraction Lapis presents. ] I cannot imagine you rebelled, why were you locked away?
I was a casualty of war. [Lapis shrugs.] A rebel Gem dissipated my form, and my gem ended up being picked up and put into a mirror by my own side. They thought I was a rebel, so they asked me all sorts of questions. None of which I could give an answer for. [Lapis gives a half hearted shrug.] And because I was in a mirror, it wasn't like I could tell them that I wasn't a rebel, that I couldn't show them the rebel base.
[There's a very small hint of agitation, of tension in Lapis' shoulders as she speaks.]
I'm not sure what happened, but there ended up being an evacuation, and the mirror I was trapped in was dropped, and my gem was cracked in the frenzy. Freedom in sight, but out of reach. Eventually those same rebels picked my mirror up, but they didn't let me out. They asked me things too, but they didn't free me either. [Lapis' hands close around her arms, denting the skin underneath.]
For over five thousand years I was imprisoned in that stupid mirror.
[ It's a story, just a story, something to take off -- oh, missing home, her encroaching death, she expects nothing and wants even less from Lapis of all people. Perhaps something to just shut her eyes too, dream of something else to fill the time. So long amongst courtiers at least gave her practise in tuning out too long winded words.
Perhaps she's expecting Lapis to be long winded and over wretched about her imprisonment. She isn't expecting the blunt line of it.
Draw her in. Something, something she might relate to. She's dying, but she has spent a great deal looking down the barrel of an eternity in conflict, always bloody, never ending. Until it claimed her too she supposed.
I didn't. Steven was the one who pulled my gem from the mirror. He even fixed my Gem. [And honestly, even if it's been such a short amount of time, she misses him a lot? He'd know how to better teach her about human bodies and all this stuff anyway.]
[ She stays put, fiddling at the bed she's been laying on. Plucking at the threads idly, a dull sound that she tugs and tugs with. ] Do you miss him, your liberator?
[ And because she can only be so understanding, to a point. ] Is he why you're so adamant in your cowardice?
[ It's nothing she'll forgive, loved ones weren't worth it if someone was willing to sacrifice others for their affection. She could never accept someone for doing that, and refused to let herself do the same. ]
It's not cowardice. [It's partly cowardice.] Steven wouldn't like it if I hurt more people. A few hundred years ago you'd probably be dead. [Lapis gives an open palmed shrug. she clearly isn't saying that as a threat.]
I'm trying not to hurt humans so much anymore. You'd understand if you'd met him. He's very convincing.
[ She shakes her head, not - not cruelly this time. She's met plenty of naive people, in her life, Sir Galahad among them. How desperately he clung to his understand of the world. That his precious Lords could not be part of such slaughter, such cruelty, such treatment of life. ]
Perhaps I would. [ She pauses, trying to form the words. ] You need to understand, then, that you are and you will be, if you ever assist them, the cause of thousands more deaths. They will not be in battle, not all of them, they will be in famine, in disease, in disabuse. You say that it means nothing, now, because many people have such short life spans, then I will put it to you in centuries, for that is how long, if they win, these people will suffer. Just like my own do.
Seems to me like people are going to die no matter what side I'm on. [And Lapis still doesn't understand the concept of fighting with your own species, even if she's experienced it first hand.]
Besides, how are you so sure that this is a bad thing for them? There's plenty of food here, and plenty of medicine. [The word sounds so weird on her tongue, Gems just don't get sick.] Clearly your side of things isn't doing so hot already if they need to resort to stealing these things just to survive.
[ This time at least, she doesn't lose her temper. Accepted apparently this - creature that was not originally human.... couldn't understand how these matters went, the problems that she could so clearly see and had suffer from. It sets her teeth a little, to be dealing with someone or something not human at all but - she wasn't a halfbreed. That had to ... count for something. ]
Because if it really was about helping, why do they need to rule these people? If they just wanted to share with them, why do they have to have them kneel?
[ She swallowed, and far be it for her to share anything part of herself. But at least to put it in context. It is not as though she had much in the way of secrets now, anyway, was it? ( except the only one that mattered. ) ] We might be called exotics and outsiders, but they are just as much the same. This isn't their home, who are they to decide its fate? Should it not be the people that have worked this land, grown up in, call it home, should it not be their choice about their fate?
I'm really not the best person to answer that. Honestly I think it's a plus that they're not wiping the local inhabitants off the face of the planet with their tech. Seems like it'd be easier, honestly, so I think they're being pretty nice at trying to rule them instead of outright murdering everyone.
[Seriously, with all the tech here, and with how much of a pain these locals are, why haven't they just done that?
[ At least she holds her tongue enough for that comment. Pressing her lips together in something like disapproval and a swallowing of her ire over such words. ]
They can't. You can't enslave a dead people. There are no resources to be had when there is nothing left, no one to work the crops, no one to pay them taxes and tributes.
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I was wondering how your little rebellion and whole fight for independence was going. But you don't have to answer that. I can guess.
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At least Lapis is distraction for the time being. ]
Are you finished?
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You know, I was imprisoned once. Not in a cell, but I know it sucks. At least you can still move and speak though. That's always a plus.
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Yes, I am so blessed. [ Her eyes roll. Though she cannot blame her for not understanding what was happening her. If she was not even human to begin with - how could she realise she was talking to a dead woman walking.
She wants her home, she thinks again, not - not England. She wants her palace, she wants her boys, she wants Devi at her side. She doesn't want to die here.
Stop thinking about, Lakshmi, she had made her bed, she would sleep in it. So without anything else to do, she takes the distraction Lapis presents. ] I cannot imagine you rebelled, why were you locked away?
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[There's a very small hint of agitation, of tension in Lapis' shoulders as she speaks.]
I'm not sure what happened, but there ended up being an evacuation, and the mirror I was trapped in was dropped, and my gem was cracked in the frenzy. Freedom in sight, but out of reach. Eventually those same rebels picked my mirror up, but they didn't let me out. They asked me things too, but they didn't free me either. [Lapis' hands close around her arms, denting the skin underneath.]
For over five thousand years I was imprisoned in that stupid mirror.
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Perhaps she's expecting Lapis to be long winded and over wretched about her imprisonment. She isn't expecting the blunt line of it.
Draw her in. Something, something she might relate to. She's dying, but she has spent a great deal looking down the barrel of an eternity in conflict, always bloody, never ending. Until it claimed her too she supposed.
Or this one did. ]
How did you escape it?
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[ It's nothing she'll forgive, loved ones weren't worth it if someone was willing to sacrifice others for their affection. She could never accept someone for doing that, and refused to let herself do the same. ]
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I'm trying not to hurt humans so much anymore. You'd understand if you'd met him. He's very convincing.
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Perhaps I would. [ She pauses, trying to form the words. ] You need to understand, then, that you are and you will be, if you ever assist them, the cause of thousands more deaths. They will not be in battle, not all of them, they will be in famine, in disease, in disabuse. You say that it means nothing, now, because many people have such short life spans, then I will put it to you in centuries, for that is how long, if they win, these people will suffer. Just like my own do.
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Besides, how are you so sure that this is a bad thing for them? There's plenty of food here, and plenty of medicine. [The word sounds so weird on her tongue, Gems just don't get sick.] Clearly your side of things isn't doing so hot already if they need to resort to stealing these things just to survive.
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Because if it really was about helping, why do they need to rule these people? If they just wanted to share with them, why do they have to have them kneel?
[ She swallowed, and far be it for her to share anything part of herself. But at least to put it in context. It is not as though she had much in the way of secrets now, anyway, was it? ( except the only one that mattered. ) ] We might be called exotics and outsiders, but they are just as much the same. This isn't their home, who are they to decide its fate? Should it not be the people that have worked this land, grown up in, call it home, should it not be their choice about their fate?
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[Seriously, with all the tech here, and with how much of a pain these locals are, why haven't they just done that?
A mystery for the ages, honestly.]
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They can't. You can't enslave a dead people. There are no resources to be had when there is nothing left, no one to work the crops, no one to pay them taxes and tributes.