blessingone | [ action / voice ] backdated to Tuesday because I was too tired to post it then

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[ action / voice ] backdated to Tuesday because I was too tired to post it then

[ So, Fenimore had spent the last event as

bittyblessing. That had been fine at the time, but, now that the event was over, it had its own issues.

One of them was clothes. Another was pretty much everything else she owned.

Some of her belongings had stayed in the house -- Stella had rescued and retained some outfits, for example -- but, as they lay unclaimed during the event, many eventually disappeared (Shuri and the trash can are particularly suspect in this matter). She had made a brief effort to find particularly important effects, like the locket Shirley had given her -- that disappearance had sent her into a panic until she found it again. But, for the most part, she was too busy sulking to go out into the general social sphere.

Until, well, she woke up one morning to realize that she was down to one clean outfit. One...embarrassing outfit from when she had spent an experiment trying to be a magical girl. (Top and right, respectively, but with added stockings and arm warmers. After all, it was winter at that time.)

Unable to avoid the chore any longer, she can be found in or on her way to either the clothing or item shops, attempting to pretend that there's nothing wrong with this outfit.

She can also be found partway there under a tree, in the same outfit, seemingly attempting to reason with a strange bird sitting on a high branch. It seems that, sometime between her kidnapping and her return after the event, the peepit chick she got for Christmas escaped and has been living the wild life. ] Look, I said I was sorry. Now would you -- ?

[ The bird squawks and turns its back on her. Fenimore huffs as though she suspects the bird to be intelligent enough to understand an apology and reject it, opening her journal, transmitting a request as Voice. ]

Does anyone here speak bird? [Her intended request was for someone who was good at catching birds, but, annoyed, it came out as a more sarcastic one.]

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[She makes a bit of a face as a reminder, but she agrees -- no need to say it out loud.] I'm going to see if my clothes ended up at the clothes store, or at least the right kind of clothing. I might look at the item shop, too.

I guess if they don't, it's skirts and stockings forever, right? [Or you know, new clothes.] Hopefully someone else doesn't have the same taste in clothing as you.

It had better not be. [She's a little more at peace with the outfit now that Sokka seems to think it's okay (his reassurances help in an odd mix of "fatherly compliments" and "hey, good-looking guy likes it" -- bloody experiments -- but she hasn't realized it yet). But she still wouldn't want to have to wear it often. Especially since she'd still have to do the laundry more often to keep up anyway.] It shouldn't be a problem, though. I doubt anyone else is going to pick up a whole closetful in a Ferines style. [The name slips out without even thinking about it.]

[Ferines... that makes him think back. He had talked to Stella about that. She was going to explain the differences, but he stopped her. It was something he wanted from Fenimore. But they'd never got to talk about it when she came back due to that experiment. He turns towards the river and rests his elbows on the railing.]

Hey, you know, you missed another experiment while you were gone. It wasn't that big of a deal, just some weird shape changing. I turned into this freaky gray alien guy. [He glances back at Fenimore.] ... but Stella turned into a oror- oh- umm... something that rhymes with what you just said. [A 'human' in other words.]

[FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF.

That's her initial reaction, summarized, and it shows in her face. She looks shocked and, for a brief moment, maybe even a little scared -- blink and you miss it.]

[But she calms a little after the initial jolt. She is less afraid to tell people she feels like she can trust now, after Atsuki responded so well. And if there was anyone she had met in Luceti she trusts, it would be Sokka. But it's unexpected and she would be lying to say she's not nervous. She still faces Sokka, but her eyes aren't quite making contact with his.]

Di -- [She coughs to clear her throat.] Did she? ...So you two were talking.

She just told me that they're different. [A pause and he decides to be more direct.] We're different. But, uh, that was it. I kinda figured if you wanted me to know more than that, you'd tell me.

[Stella, why do you have to be ~~so generously forgiving~~ so open about that? Fenimore doesn't say anything at first -- before that, she turns to look in just about every possible direction. It's only after she feels sure that there's no one else in earshot that she joins him on the railing, plunking down her own elbows with a sigh (though that's a bit higher for her -- probably more cross-armed).]

...Do you want to know more than that? [Now that they've reached this point, she'll probably tell him anyway unless he gives a firm no, and she can't imagine him doing that now that he brought it up.]

Edited 2011-05-05 02:13 (UTC)

[He considers that for a moment as he watches the water, then turns towards her with a smirk.]

Honestly? It's not going to make a difference to me either way. So, you can breathe underwater and you have glowy hair. My sister makes water float around for no adequately explained scientific reason. I still keep her around. [Back to looking at her.] So it's up to you.

Edited 2011-05-05 02:17 (UTC)

[Looking towards him, she laughs once -- relief -- before shifting to a smile.] ...Thanks.

[But she moves on quickly, looking back at the river.] It sounds like you've already heard the most important part. ...I'm not Orerines -- human. [Her time in Luceti has done wonders for her ability to say "human" naturally, so the slight awkwardness with the word is unlikely to be noticeable.] I'm one of the Ferines. It means "people of the water," just like Orerines means "people of the land." We're completely different species -- it's not just a little difference. My village might have been built on the land, but we're most at home in the sea.

... pretty similar though. [He kicks a stone off the bridge and watches the ripples it forms expand.]

I mean, there's this mermaid I know... she has a fish tail. You've got legs. [Okay so maybe he's not really making a meaningful or heartfelt point here or anything.] So... why is it such a big secret for you, anyway? I mean, there's a lot of people here who do stuff way wackier than take really long swims.

Not everyone's as accepting as you are. [She watches the ripples, resting her head on her arms.] I don't want to take chances, and by the time I know if someone is accepting.... [She also kicks a rock off.] It's not really an easy thing to bring up.

You're joking right? I wouldn't call myself that accepting. I used to hate anyone Fire Nation and Suki had to convince me that girls could be fighters. That's not even getting into all the weird stuff here. [It's kind of hard to grasp why she'd need to keep it a secret here of all things-]

[... unless. He recalls San and Moro's story. They hate humans. They did nothing but evil and despite Luceti being different, those two haven't fully come around. He finds himself thinking back...

Where did those scars come from?]

These Ore-whatever, humans, what were they like in your world?

[She was about to argue against his self-assessment, and had even turned towards him, mouth opening to start, when the question sidetracks her.]

What do you mean, what are they like on my world? They aren't all alike -- everyone's different, just like here. Isn't that the same everywhere? [Because she honestly and unquestioningly believes that there are people in Luceti, and everywhere, who are as unaccepting and cruel as some of the Orerines she encountered -- and more than just Luceti's small resident villain population.]

Okay, I can't argue with that. We met bad people in the Earth Kingdom. A lot, actually. But we also met a lot of good people in the Fire Nation, despite them being our enemies.

[So... what was his point here? Oh yeah.] But you seem to care about it more than Stella does. When we went to the ocean, she didn't even care about the whole... hair thing.

[She's a bit curious about the mentions of places in his world ~~though he might have mentioned one or two of them before~~, but she'll deal with the second part.

She exhales sharply.] Back home, Stella would be the strange one for that. And Shirley is, too, even if she wasn't as reckless as Stella. Most Ferines....

[How to word this? She takes a deep breath, looking down at the water. Her thoughts move down darker paths and her expression darkens accordingly.] It's not something small -- not back home. People die for being Ferines. ...But Stella doesn't seem to care about it.

[... and then it begins to click. It wasn't just being different. Humans were actively trying to hunt them down... get rid of them. It was just like the Air Nomads. Trying to wipe out an entire culture at once.]

... humans, they're the ones doing it. [His expression hardens and he has to keep from getting angered about it.] ... why?

Because we're Ferines, and they're Orerines. [The words are a little distant, without the spite that used to accompany them, but they almost sound practiced -- perhaps she's quoting something she was taught. She stops for a moment before sighing and shifts to rest her forehead on her arms.] That's what I used to think. But there are good ones, ones who treated me like anyone else. ...I started to hope, once, that it was only people who didn't care about the lives of Orerines, either. [Her volume begins to rise, her voice emotional, desperate. Her hands grip her arms tightly.] Even if they treated us even worse than that, whatever they called us, maybe I could start to understand if even Orerines called them evil...!

[She raises her head and speaks slowly, haltingly, as she tries to remember the wording.] "I show the utmost consideration for my fellow human beings, but you aren't human, are you?" [She practically spits out the last part.] Any time they want something from us, there are Orerines who don't care what they do to us to get it. They don't care -- I'm not a human, but I'm not a monster!

[Of course, Sokka's only getting part of the story. Fenimore has no idea that the knight captain she's quoting is actually kind of a douche to everyone, she doesn't quite understand the reprehensible power struggle that is motivating some of the atrocities, and she would never learn back home about what the Ferines would try to do to the Orerines in turn. And there are many details about the first meeting between Ferines and Orerines that are lost to everyone. But, for her, this is the truth.]

["But you aren't human"... those words make his blood boil and he ends up squeezing the rails tightly to prevent himself from going into an outburst that he already knew would be unhelpful to them both.]

That... that jerk, whoever he was, he was the monster. People like that don't deserve to call themselves human! [If he had that bastard right now, he'd... ugh. It's no good. You can't take back what's already done, especially in another world he'll never go to. It's just frustrating. That's the world Fenimore gets to back to!?]

[~~Not for long since she's also going back to be dead but since neither knows this~~ Fenimore stays quiet for a moment. She doesn't really know what to say to that last comment. If that kind of behaviour prompted expulsion from the human race, she personally thinks that would leave a sizeable fraction at a loss. But, while that fraction has decreased from its original 100% to somewhere around a half to a notably smaller fraction over her time in Luceti, it's not exactly tactful to mention in this case. Especially since the anger on her behalf is relieving -- for a case like this, it's certainly not surprising for a friend like Sokka would be, but that strong of a reaction to the speciesism isn't something she will not let herself expect from an Orerines. And, anyway, maybe she would respond the same way if their situations were reversed -- not that she expects that kind of behaviour from a Ferines.

But, relief or not, it's not enough to dispell the entirity of the anger on its own. Her voice is no longer expressing rage, but there is still anger in the tone.] ...I don't want to hear anything like that again. Or.... [Here she stops. She hadn't noticed Sokka see her scars, distracted as she was at the time. As far as she knows, he might think she had only encountered mouthy jerks and heard about people dying -- bad as that might be. Does he really need to know what she went through? It might be nice to have him get angry for her, but it would be at his expense. Who would want to hear about that?

Besides, she preferred hiding it away and pretending it didn't exist. Even if it would never heal that way, it hurt less. So she shakes her head slightly and continues.]

The others don't think it could happen here. ["The people here aren't Orerines." She still doesn't believe Walter, even long after he's left. Humans are humans. A rose by any other name still has its thorns.] But I'm not going to take that chance. ...That's why I care.

Edited 2011-05-07 03:35 (UTC)

[He wishes he could say that what happened to her was unique and would never happen otherwise. But then when he thinks of Fenimore's scars, all he can remember is that little girl, here in Luceti only briefly, after being tortured by flames from heartless Firebenders. How he had to earn her trust and then how hard and heartbreaking it was to try to heal it all. Okay, maybe it wasn't really him. But those feelings were real and they've stuck with him. He didn't like the idea of torture before, but now it just infuriates him.

... those scars on Fenimore weren't an accident. Even if he doesn't find out why they're there, it's enough to know that it was those Orerines... humans who did it. He'd never felt the need to prove humans weren't bad to Moro. She was as much a monster herself in maliciousness. But not Fenimore. What had she ever done to anyone?

He turns to her, trying to keep a calm, even if part of him is still brewing underneath the surface.]

I know I'm not as strong as someone like Adell, but as long as I can help it, nobody will be able to do anything like that here. Not to you... or Stella or Sophie.

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