fandomhighdorms | roof - wednesday noonish

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roof - wednesday noonish - 3/18

Liir had called in for work today.

He never missed work unless he was a kitten, but today, he couldn't summon the energy to want to do anything, even cook. He supposed that was a bad sign, that he couldn't even fall into the familiar and soothing patterns of menial labor, but there wasn't much he figured he could do about it.

His father was leaving. Almost certain death was preferable to his presence, apparently, and there wasn't anything he could do about it. And to top things off, last night had been wonderful; the stories, the knowledge, the affirmation of who and what he was. All the nights with his father would probably be wonderful.

Until he left.

Liir couldn't stand being in his room and, unfair to the poor puppy, couldn't stand to look at Makejoy any more than it took to do his minimum duties for the day; even then, the walk had been short. Instead, he was up here, broomless to prevent him from doing something stupid, looking out at the rest of the school, thinking highly uncharitable thoughts and wondering if it was times like this that made people turn to religion.

[open as a roof is]

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He'd come up here for privacy, but he didn't mention it since it obviously hadn't been the best of ideas. Keep one's mouth shut and a foot had a harder time getting in there, Liir figured.

"Fair enough," and his eye caught on the sandwich as he wondered if he'd eaten today. He moved up to the face, since he wasn't actually hungry. And, of course, not to look like a madman.

"Liir, incidentally," he offered, since he couldn't recall being introduced to the other boy.

To Ender, privacy itself was a luxury he'd only gotten used to over the past couple of years. A privilege meant for commanders. And even then, or rather now, there was always Ichigo, even if he didn't see the other boy much, which suited him fine.

"I'm Ender," he offered. By now, he didn't shoot any furtive looks anymore, didn't try to scan for a recognition or some baby getting shoved in his face. Instead, he regarded Liir thoughtfully.

He'd been alone up on the roof. Ender wondered if he hadn't expected company.

"Good to meet you, Ender."

I hope you're having a better day than I am.

"It's remarkable how many people are on this island," he added after a minute, "since I'm sure you've been here at least since the beginning of the semester and we've not even made introductions before."

He'd lived a good portion of his life in seclusion. Privacy had been an unfortunate reality, given mostly because the other two people in the keep didn't care enough to look in on him much.

That had changed while he was in the Emerald City, and since he'd been here. Which, really, was for the better for him.

"I don't really get out much," Ender said, easily. At least not the way people did here. Small talk was wasted on him, and most of the time all the silly quips and introductions just seemed exhausting.

He wasn't very good at getting close to people, and that suited him fine, too.

"I'll wager you don't, either," he added, after a moment, "If there's so many people you haven't met yet."

"Not really. I'm, well, far more used to animals and Animals than I am to people," he admitted.

"Usually, I just cook."

You don't have to talk to people if their mouths are full. And they usually came off of an encounter thinking positively about you when you fed them. So he'd learned early on.

Serving food would work as a good distraction if you didn't want to talk but you wanted someone to think of you anyway, Ender registered, and nodded. He could make a few guesses.

"Useful," he commented. "With animals as well as people." He'd said animals twice, though, so Ender tilted his head and said, "I take it that 'animals' wasn't you being stuck on repeat."

Liir nodded to 'useful'. He didn't consider it dishonest, and so didn't think anyone shouldn't know that he cooked not just for his own interest but as a substitute for talking. After all, as long as he enjoyed his end and they enjoyed theirs, it was a good 'conversation', even if it was had in cookies instead of words. And he was much better at cookies, frankly.

But he shook his head to the second comment.

"There's animals and then there are Animals. The first you're probably familiar with. The second are thinking, speaking, rational creatures who just happen to look like the first.

"Though I've been told they used to wear clothing just like people, before the Wizard."

It was a strategy to cope with people like any other. But Ender tended to spend more time getting away from people, especially their good feelings about him, than towards them, and while he could understand it he couldn't see himself doing it. He'd always had to prove himself through actions in his own way.

The animals thing didn't sound that weird. It made him picture chickens, walking around in skirts and jackets, pigs with hats on their heads, dictating terms. He tried to picture Graff like that, and wondered what he'd be. A turkey, maybe. He gave Turkey Graff a dress in his mind and smiled.

I can still make you look silly, you old bastard.

"Sounds like something straight out of Fandom," he said, honestly, "or straight to Fandom." He thought about Liir's last statement. "I'm taking it we're talking about a real wizard, too." He sounded curious.

"I couldn't tell you," he admitted.

"The Witch didn't think much of him, of course. And there are, well, indications that he didn't so much work magic as want to."

His thirst for the Grimmerie. His fear of the Witch. The fact that he'd used the military instead of any kind of magic to do what he wanted done. Of course, for him, magic was a last resort, but he had his reasons. He didn't think the Wizard had.

"But that's what he was called. He was said to grant wishes to those who did as he asked."

Instantly, his thoughts went to the Scarecrow. He hadn't noticed him being more 'brainy' after his audience with the Wizard; he'd always been something of a pragmatist. On second thought, it might have been his disillusionment with the Wizard that had prompted the Scarecrow's thoughtful actions towards himself. Liir couldn't know, however; he doubted he'd ever see the Scarecrow again, after all.

"I couldn't tell you much about that, though. I wasn't allowed in when the rest of them met him."

Edited 2009-03-18 16:14 (UTC)

The Witch, the Wizard. Liir spoke as if he expected people to know what he was talking about. Or maybe Liir was just talking to himself, and Ender was an audience. He didn't really mind one way or the other. It took the focus off him, and he found he enjoyed the anonimity as much as the chance to get into someone else's head.

"So the Wizard made the Animals strip down," he repeated. He grasped onto Liir's first sentence: didn't work magic as much as want to. He knew people like that. They threw around their weight and pride, hoping nobody would notice their inadequacies. "You make it sound like he was compensating."

[sorry, firefox just lost all of my text *grumble*]

"I couldn't say. I never met the man."

He realized then, however, that Ender couldn't possibly have any idea of what he was talking about. He resettled in his seat, letting his shoulders drop somewhat. The past, memories, history, Oz was easier than Now.

"The Wizard came from this world, Earth," he explained, his hands moving only a little as he spoke, "though no one knows how, since the Deadly Deserts have always done their job in keeping people out."

And in.

"Either way, he somehow wrested power from the Ozma Regent, the Ozma at that time only a child."

And he kept the Lurlinist drivel to himself. It was too ridiculous to repeat, really.

"More than strip, he stripped them of their rights, their privileges, their positions, of everything that made them more than animals. There are some that say certain Animals lost their ability to speak then, but I never met one. No, clothless they were, but they remained angry and loud, those I met, if somewhat scattered. Those that spoke up were either thrown into Southstairs--ghastly place--or killed."

[ np; i would've thrown furniture through the house if that happened! ]

He wondered how and why. It was an academic question to him; he figured someone like Bean or Val would've been more interested in the politics of it. It even sounded a little like Peter, except Peter would know what that kind of stripping would do. It'd cause more strife in the long run, unless you were really good at it, unless you really ground them down.

Power came from pain, but to put down a whole species, you needed a lot of both.

"And you said you didn't meet him," Ender said, thoughtfully. "He's not in charge any more." He wondered if it had been the Animals, or something else.

"He left, voluntarily," he said with a nod.

"I heard about it afterwards. For a while, the Lady Glinda took the helm, mostly to figure out all the madness the Wizard had been up to and hopefully, clean house."

He doubted how much had been done there, not because of Glinda but because of Shell.

"At the moment, however, the Scarecrow is said to rule Oz."

His tone said that he didn't believe it. Especially since he knew the Scarecrow they'd traveled with, Dorothy's Scarecrow, had hightailed it out of the Emerald City as soon as he could.

What would transpire to get a man like that from power? Maybe if he'd been like Ender, he'd have found he didn't want it anyway. Maybe someone had made an impassioned speech, or saved a life, and he'd tearfully bid his goodbye like in the movies. Somehow, he doubted it.

People who tried to make themselves look big to obscure how small they were didn't work that way, if Liir's statement about wanting magic had been right. It was still an academic question. He thought about Bonzo. All you have to do is appeal to their pride.

"That must be a change for the Animals," he said. It wasn't anywhere near what he was thinking about.

"No one's cleared out Southstairs," he said with a shake of his head, "and when the only people inconvenienced are a somewhat-scattered minority, well, people seem to be quite willing to let things stand."

Glinda had, from what he understood, done what she could from the top. From the bottom, however, was 30-something years of easy prejudice and speciesism.

"And the Witch is dead," he added after a moment, not so much going quiet as still. Over a year since her death, almost two, really, but one didn't get over the loss so quickly. The Animals hadn't even gotten over her yet; he figured it was fair for him to feel similarly attached. He had better reason.

"She was their champion. They would have followed her all the way to the Emerald City. But martyrs can't affect much change with no one to lift the banner for them."

Which was where he'd come in. When he could. Or he'd try until they killed him, anyway.

"No," Ender agreed, "They can't."

Martyrs only worked if you needed to maintain a movement. They could work to bring a group together, but that didn't push anything forwards. He made an educated guess and said, "How much are they clumping together around her body right now?"

It made him think of a million soldiers with no one to lead them, because he wouldn't.

"No body. From what Nanny said, she actually... melted."

He closed his eyes and leaned back, against one of the odd fixtures that always seem to be on roofs.

"I suppose they could be going to Kiamo Ko, but I've not seen them. Some seem to be meeting with Princess Nastoya, an Elephant of some age. Others just scrawl her name on the streets. 'Elphaba lives' indeed."

Irritation crept into his voice.

"As if any of them knew her. She'd snap at them for that nonsense. Threaten to turn them into a newt or something" though he'd never seen her do as such.

"They don't have to know her," Ender said, and picked up his abandoned sandwich for a good bite. "There doesn't have to be a body. People need to feel as if there's someone leading them, as if they're part of something, because that means there's power and power will protect them."

He smiled a little. "The irony is that it doesn't. But symbols always work well, because they're power, too. You can get a lot of people with just a symbol."

He hadn't spoken that much in a while. Ben was always a little too busy fishing for details.

"I know. In fact, I'm depending on it."

He was finding more and more people who seemed to understand things. Either that, or he was getting better at explaining them.

He smiled a little in return.

"Which is why I keep it to myself."

"Usually the right option," Ender said. It was the way things worked, no matter what you did. "But once you adopt the symbol, you're going to have to prove you're good enough, that you know where you want to go."

Ender didn't want to go anywhere. That set him apart from his brother, his sister, from Bean, and Alai, and Petra, and probably almost everyone at this school.

"I wasn't so much adopted as born," he said, a play on words Ender might not understand but he didn't feel like explaining.

"But I'm reasonably sure they'll kill me before I manage to foul up too bad."

And no, he didn't sound particularly depressed about that. When his life was over, he wouldn't be around to be upset about it. He was much more concerned about his father leaving, dying, disappearing. It was selfish, and unhealthy, but he couldn't really see that changing.

"I have to try, anyway."

Ender just nodded at Liir's play on words. It had been the same for him in a very literal way, and while he didn't know the specifics, he could get the idea.

"Don't try," he said, matter-of-factly, "Do it. The survival of your movement would depend on your survival. Nobody's going to remember if you try."

Ender didn't miss living in service of humanity. He didn't know exactly what he was encouraging Liir to do, and he didn't really want to.

"I don't care if I'm remembered," he said, firm even if his voice was soft.

Though, he thought privately, if it depended on him, then they really were buggered.

He let that sit for a moment before rubbing at the bridge of his nose.

"Damn me, I haven't even told my father about all this."

Sometimes, being a close-lipped bastard had it's downside.

Edited 2009-03-18 17:56 (UTC)

"I wasn't talking about remembering you," Ender said, bluntly. He shrugged once. "'Humanity asks for survival first'," he paraphrased, for what felt like the umpteenth time in Fandom. "'and then we can find happiness as we can.'"

He let the comment about Liir's father slide, but simply cast him a look. "That one got me in trouble," he said, conversationally, "but it's the truth, unfortunately."

"He's dead where I'm from," he admitted tiredly, "since a couple months after my conception, actually. He came here not too long ago, which is how I got to meet him, though he's leaving soon.

"Going to try not to die."

Yes, that was going to go well.

"Though I will point out that 'humanity' is a tricky term."

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