Diary: Page Eight
Apr. 8th, 2006 11:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shosenIt’s one of those nights, when your brain is spinning so fast and you need to sort it out, but you can't stop them long enough to even try. Avenhar once told me to begin at the beginning. It's funny, because I tend to start at the end. It worked when I had to tell her about Sakti, I might as well try it now.
The trip seemed easy when I read the letter, except for the location, I suppose. Go with Doctor Vines into the Plaguelands to retrieve something. I thought I might learn a few things, or at the very least, have something new to think about. Be careful what you wish for.
The Plaguelands are… well, Jessa says they're still alive, but I'm not entirely sure. It almost looked as though the land itself were like us, dead but not all the way there. It was, it… if there are spirits in that land, they must be screaming. (I wonder if Zue'laji could hear them. If he could, how did he manage to make it through the entire trip?) This is what was done to us, what the Apothecaries are studying. That last fact certainly did not sit well with my travelling companions.
I know the story behind the Wanted posters now, if what I was told is the truth, anyway. Jessa was an experiment. She's been dead only a year. All this talk about developing a new Plague, and Faranell's already got one. He just wants to work in some obedience factor that isn't right yet. If that's true, then I have to re-evaluate some of my recent assumptions. Unless I'm still right, and She miscalculated.
I'm getting side-tracked. The source of Jessa's problems with the Apothecaries is quite apparent. Borel's as well, since they're obviously in love with one another. Tabaqui… there's more to hers than just that, more than I know still I think, though I certainly know more about these people now than I could have expected at the start of the journey.
One thing at a time, focus damn it. She's different, looks different, but it's her. The one I owe for standing on a beach talking to Forsaken about their thoughts on death, who thought we'd all get along if we were undead, who'd stood there and admitted to killing for the Apothecaries' goal. Whatever's happened since then and now, she's different, and part of that change is a resentment, rejection, of what they're trying to do.
I still say "they." Whatever my position, my uniform, I'm not one of them, am I?
Borel and Jessa, they say it's possible to leave, to get away. Difficult, but possible. Not that their method would work for me. Thunder Bluff would have a warmer welcome for a fierce warrior and a priestess of faith than it would for a damaged warlock. But I'm drifting again. Even if it is theoretically possible, it isn't a possibility right now.
What we chose not to do determines who we are as much as what we do. Damn him.
Enough of that. It can wait, has to wait. I just… But I'm worried about the connection I've made. Still an assistant (and don't I just shudder at that word now, dear Valtenress) but… That dream I had, how long will I stay in this position? And what happens after, because this work is an infection in itself.
I thought recently that the Apothecaries were all selected because they were dysfunctional. That the Society was designed to fail. But tonight there was something wrong with Doctor Vines. Something different than normal, anyway. Is it possible for even research into the Plague to corrupt you? I'm a warlock, I should have the answer to that, but I don't.
Tabaqui was right though, he certainly sounded more like an Apothecary, at least until she called him on it and he back-tracked. There was nothing of that frank and simple belief in a cure that managed to inspire me after our first conversation. Instead, there were shades of things far too close to home.
I heard my mother in his assessment of the people he died with and the place he met his fate. Her arrogant belief that she was better than the people who worked for us, even though she was nothing more than a wealthy farmer's wife. He was… rude just doesn't seem to cover it. It sounded like… they were unworthy of sharing his death, and the place was beneath him.
Whatever he said about it later, I cannot shake that feeling. Nor am I absolutely sure that he always remembers that his research is on people who think and feel. Valtenress says she knows what she's doing, but faith is often blinding. But I can't really tell, regardless of how I feel, not with the surety that Tabaqui showed. Scientists are clinical, and though I'm nowhere near one, I'm certain even my own observations could be considered callous at times.
But what he said to her at the end, there's no excuse for that. When he's angry, he's quite the jerk.
And when he's talking about the cure now. "My research. My work. My ability." Him doing this while no one else is willing. The focus is all wrong in everything he said: not on the cure, but on him.
It reminded me of myself.
It was never about helping people for me; it was about their gratitude and appreciation afterwards. Self-centered. Who cares if I was doing good? The reasons, the motivations, were selfish. Those things never lead to anything good. Seeing them in the one person (because he's right, at least, he is) working towards the cure is frightening.
Because we are a society without a future. If I'm wrong, and those in power are actually trying to give us one, then there are only two ways to get it. We need a cure, or we need a new Plague. Thanks to Jessa, I know the later exists. Without the former…
This is all too big for me. I am a selfish, spoiled little brat who is incapable of seeing things beyond the impact they will have on myself. The worries of our society, fear for the world, the land, all the people in it, it's just too big.
What have I gotten myself into?
The trip seemed easy when I read the letter, except for the location, I suppose. Go with Doctor Vines into the Plaguelands to retrieve something. I thought I might learn a few things, or at the very least, have something new to think about. Be careful what you wish for.
The Plaguelands are… well, Jessa says they're still alive, but I'm not entirely sure. It almost looked as though the land itself were like us, dead but not all the way there. It was, it… if there are spirits in that land, they must be screaming. (I wonder if Zue'laji could hear them. If he could, how did he manage to make it through the entire trip?) This is what was done to us, what the Apothecaries are studying. That last fact certainly did not sit well with my travelling companions.
I know the story behind the Wanted posters now, if what I was told is the truth, anyway. Jessa was an experiment. She's been dead only a year. All this talk about developing a new Plague, and Faranell's already got one. He just wants to work in some obedience factor that isn't right yet. If that's true, then I have to re-evaluate some of my recent assumptions. Unless I'm still right, and She miscalculated.
I'm getting side-tracked. The source of Jessa's problems with the Apothecaries is quite apparent. Borel's as well, since they're obviously in love with one another. Tabaqui… there's more to hers than just that, more than I know still I think, though I certainly know more about these people now than I could have expected at the start of the journey.
One thing at a time, focus damn it. She's different, looks different, but it's her. The one I owe for standing on a beach talking to Forsaken about their thoughts on death, who thought we'd all get along if we were undead, who'd stood there and admitted to killing for the Apothecaries' goal. Whatever's happened since then and now, she's different, and part of that change is a resentment, rejection, of what they're trying to do.
I still say "they." Whatever my position, my uniform, I'm not one of them, am I?
Borel and Jessa, they say it's possible to leave, to get away. Difficult, but possible. Not that their method would work for me. Thunder Bluff would have a warmer welcome for a fierce warrior and a priestess of faith than it would for a damaged warlock. But I'm drifting again. Even if it is theoretically possible, it isn't a possibility right now.
What we chose not to do determines who we are as much as what we do. Damn him.
Enough of that. It can wait, has to wait. I just… But I'm worried about the connection I've made. Still an assistant (and don't I just shudder at that word now, dear Valtenress) but… That dream I had, how long will I stay in this position? And what happens after, because this work is an infection in itself.
I thought recently that the Apothecaries were all selected because they were dysfunctional. That the Society was designed to fail. But tonight there was something wrong with Doctor Vines. Something different than normal, anyway. Is it possible for even research into the Plague to corrupt you? I'm a warlock, I should have the answer to that, but I don't.
Tabaqui was right though, he certainly sounded more like an Apothecary, at least until she called him on it and he back-tracked. There was nothing of that frank and simple belief in a cure that managed to inspire me after our first conversation. Instead, there were shades of things far too close to home.
I heard my mother in his assessment of the people he died with and the place he met his fate. Her arrogant belief that she was better than the people who worked for us, even though she was nothing more than a wealthy farmer's wife. He was… rude just doesn't seem to cover it. It sounded like… they were unworthy of sharing his death, and the place was beneath him.
Whatever he said about it later, I cannot shake that feeling. Nor am I absolutely sure that he always remembers that his research is on people who think and feel. Valtenress says she knows what she's doing, but faith is often blinding. But I can't really tell, regardless of how I feel, not with the surety that Tabaqui showed. Scientists are clinical, and though I'm nowhere near one, I'm certain even my own observations could be considered callous at times.
But what he said to her at the end, there's no excuse for that. When he's angry, he's quite the jerk.
And when he's talking about the cure now. "My research. My work. My ability." Him doing this while no one else is willing. The focus is all wrong in everything he said: not on the cure, but on him.
It reminded me of myself.
It was never about helping people for me; it was about their gratitude and appreciation afterwards. Self-centered. Who cares if I was doing good? The reasons, the motivations, were selfish. Those things never lead to anything good. Seeing them in the one person (because he's right, at least, he is) working towards the cure is frightening.
Because we are a society without a future. If I'm wrong, and those in power are actually trying to give us one, then there are only two ways to get it. We need a cure, or we need a new Plague. Thanks to Jessa, I know the later exists. Without the former…
This is all too big for me. I am a selfish, spoiled little brat who is incapable of seeing things beyond the impact they will have on myself. The worries of our society, fear for the world, the land, all the people in it, it's just too big.
What have I gotten myself into?