coming clean (starplot)

[reallymean]

I'm sure some of you have already discovered the reason for Liminal Space's current shape, but for those who haven't, Star is one of the living Arcana once more. Their restoration wasn't my work alone, but it was my idea to make the attempt, and my plan that we followed. The resurrection, and any consequences it might have on the Jaunt or Jaunts to follow is my responsibility. Not my team's, not the result of some plot by the Arcana or any outside forces. Mine.

Before anyone asks, I don't have any intention of resurrecting the rest of the fallen Arcana. I don't think it could even be done the same way a second time. With one exception, we don't know enough about how and where they died - and I suspect even making the attempt would be so against the idiom of that exception as to guarantee failure.

Comments

[desperate_times_right]

Fine. I know you've all been through things I can't imagine and think I'm a dipshit about this stuff 'cause I'm new, whatever. But I've been trapped before too, you know? And just because this is better than whatever you got away from doesn't mean it's real freedom, or even good for you.

[reallymean]

You take far too much pleasure in painting yourself as the victim of anyone who disagrees with you on any point to be lecturing anyone about their perception.

Maybe diplomacy will fail. Maybe having the physical manifestation of hope back in the universe won't change anything for the better. Maybe having Arcana who genuinely believe we're people in our corner won't help us. Maybe you'll get to say 'I told you so'.

But I'd rather try and fail than do nothing.

[desperate_times_right]

If they thought we were people in a way that actually matters, they'd have stopped all of this already.

[reallymean]

People have done much worse than this to one another, without holding any illusion whatsoever that the ones they were doing it to weren't people.

And I don't think they can just stop this, once they've set it into motion. If they could, don't you think they would have once they started taking losses?

[desperate_times_right]

I'm sure whatever they'd have to do would be unpleasant enough for them that if it really is possible they're trying to avoid it. They could have dampened our powers back there, even if their stupid rules say they can't outright warn us, and they chose not to. I don't know what else they're choosing not to do.

I fail to see the benefit to them thinking differently about us if they continue to use us like this.

[reallymean]

I didn't get the impression that they knew the risk of us drawing the Nation Eater was significantly higher than the risk of the locals drawing it until it reared its ugly head - and afterward, I noticed a distinct lack of anyone asking to have their powers dampened. People discussed severing the natives of that world, but not cutting ourselves off, even though we've seen the Arcana shut down most of our access to the network and liminal space before. If you're going to blame them for how we used our powers, you're going to have to reserve a lot of that blame for all of us.

And the benefit is that maybe they'll consider our opinions. Maybe they'll move to save people if things get desperate again. Maybe when this round is over, they'll change how they proceed the next time, even if it's just to ask the people they want as recruits.

[desperate_times_right]

Next time? Unbelievable.

[reallymean]

No, inevitable.

[desperate_times_right]

I suppose our new kinder overlords will ask everyone on every world they're risking with this, too.

I don't know how you can see any hope in this.

[reallymean]

Do you really think they started the war between the Aurigan Empire and Earth? Or created the Nation Eaters? Or staged the conflicts in Purgatory?

Every world we've visited, events have already been in motion before we ever arrived. War, plague, famine, monsters - those exist on worlds the Arcana have never touched. I may not like what they're doing, but they're acting on situations that are already there, not manufacturing disasters.

[desperate_times_right]

And investigators have never made a mess on a jaunt? Swung the balance of power? We all but put a crown on the direct successor of the Protectorate ourselves in Fallen Wrath, is that something they would have chosen on their own? Hell, on another jaunt I had an overlay nearly wipe an entire settlement off the map because an investigator tried to set her on fire.

We don't create those situations but we can change the course of history, and there's no way to be ready for all of the consequences.

[reallymean]

Given that the Nation Eater went straight for the towers, and those were likely to have been turned on even if we hadn't ever returned to the Vale, there's a very good chance that Chara and everyone else in Fallenheart would have been dead. So no, they wouldn't have chosen it for themselves. They would never have had the chance.

The only way to be sure you don't change the course of history is to never do anything. Our small group can shift the balance on a world - but we could shift the balance on our own worlds, too. Many of us have. And we didn't stop to get a consensus before stopping a war or pushing back against a tyrant.

[desperate_times_right]

And you'd be okay with that, if it was your own world? Some superpowered strangers from another dimension just show up, ruin things for your faction, then move on? A war you're fighting was sparked by something an investigator did on a centuries-old jaunt? Do you really think popping into some other world for a couple of weeks and changing it is the same thing as changing your own world yourself?

[reallymean]

My world was destroyed in a war that spun out from an invasion of transdimensional parasites. I've seen a woman - not one of the Arcana, just a woman - rip her way through countless dimensions in pursuit of a selfish wish.

There is far worse than the Arcana out there. There's far worse than us.

[desperate_times_right]

That may be, but that doesn't mean this is a thing we should be doing!

If things work out like you're hoping, I hope none of you ever think about my world, even in passing. If someone I love gets hurt - gets killed - because of intervention, I won't stop until I tear this whole thing apart.

[reallymean]

I don't know what you've decided I'm hoping for, but it's certainly clear that continuing this conversation is pointless for both of us.