Am smirked, the response on the tip of his tongue. "Judging from what I've seen so far," he gestured at Alex, the wani, and the Russian doll, "It was the opening act of the circus." By now Am could feel it. The raw potential magic in the air around them, floating around the memorial like a haze. Like his mist form. If he could just connect with it somehow, tap into it like you would tap into the sap of a tree...
Looking at Alex, he said accusingly, "And, if I remember correctly, you are the one who is threatening me."
Gave them our reactions, our explosions, all that was ours For graphs of passion and charts of stars..."Yeah! No," said Cornelius, starting off nodding eagerly and sounding enthusiastic before dropping into flat denial. "It sounds more exciting than it is. You'd be surprised how much of a rebellion involves paperwork, especially when you're not in any shape to fight. And according to Tamara, it can get really stressful when you are fighting. Jonathan doesn't think so, but he's practically insane anyway, and even he won't deny that."
He sighed. "I mostly do paperwork, teach young people how to use magic, and look and sound old and wise. The closest thing to the glamorous side of rebelling may or may not have gotten me killed."
"I've fought before. It's no big deal." Vancer dismissed the notion, maybe just a tad smug.
Liena giggled. "Is that why you whine like a bitch everyntime we get new job?"
"Not helping, babe."
Read my stories!Rolling his eyes, Am muttered, "Listening to you makes me want to ascend right now..." How could one person get such a hate for the dead? He could understand hating zombies, but just normal ghosts of people, who don't want to do any harm at all?
Turning to the muscular man, Am asked, eying him suspiciously, "So. Now it's question time for me: Who are you? Are you a friend, or foe?"
Gave them our reactions, our explosions, all that was ours For graphs of passion and charts of stars..."Depends on what you're fighting," said Cornelius. "Grunts? I could wipe the floor with them. Yes, even like this." He gestured up and down his elderly body. "A member of the Imperial Elites? That would take some considerable effort. One of Shaurei's thralls? They're so powerful that when Jonathan killed one of them, it was the talk of the news for weeks afterward. Shaurei himself?" Cornelius shuddered. "I've only seen him face-to-face once. It terrified me. He could kill me with less effort than it takes to swat a fly. I don't know if it's even possible to kill him.
"But hey, if you're fine with fighting, more power to you. The more cynical types would say, 'Have fun with your post-traumatic stress disorder!', but you seem fine to me, and I'm not that cynical."
Am was taken aback by how urgent Alex sounded. He snapped at him, angry at him insisting on being enemies. "What's your deal?! What started this hatred of the dead? I have never done anything to you, so why did you start all of this?" They had more important things to do. Finding out why they were all here, for one thing. There was no time to argue, but Am had to know what Alex's deal was. Maybe then he would understand. Maybe.
Gave them our reactions, our explosions, all that was ours For graphs of passion and charts of stars..."Do you have any idea how much you outnumber us? And then you have another place to go, and then you refuse? You actually can 'ascend' or some such, whatever shit the dead do to get out of here, but while you're still here, there are so many, they're everywhere, there are so many dead people throughout all history that you can barely move without being suffocated by all of the dead around you, can't even step without crunching on a corpse or desecrating some sacred ground. No, I won't stand for it. You already had your chance to live, and now you're taking away ours!" Alex was on his feet, shouting, his voice cracking. "It's disgusting! Injustice! Against natural order!"
Michael coughed pointedly, then addressed Alex. "You do realize where you are, right?" he said. "This is the World War II memorial. It's dedicated to the memory of about 65 million dead people. You want to talk about trampling sacred places? There's a lot of people who'd say you're standing in one right now." Himself included, he thought. His hands weren't exactly clean, but at least unlike someone he could name he had the decency to remember that the dead on both sides were still human.
William puts away his notebook and marbles, listening to the talk of the dead. Dead people aren't scary. They're just people that are dead. He spends a lot of time in the cemetery and nothing bad has happened to him yet.
He meows. "Sixty five million dead people is a lot of dead people. What was the war about? Tell meeeeee," he says loudly, to no one in particular.
Too bad Bianca isn't here. She'd like listening to this. William takes out his book again so he can take notes for her.
edited 18th Nov '11 10:16:01 PM by SnowyFoxes
The last battle's curtains will open on stage!"No. No, I will not accept this as a sacred place. Every single square inch of this Earth that humans can walk on, and some that we can't walk on, was sacred to someone at one point, has been a spot where a human died and was mourned and was buried. The layers and layers and layers stack on top of each other. This is a holy place today and tomorrow it will be where the sewage treatment plant is today. Where does it end, where does it end." He wasn't looking at the tall, muscular man anymore, but at his feet. "There's not even anyone buried here, is there? All the individual gravemarkers, they're also WWII memorials, all of the other WWII memorials in all the individual states, all over the world, all of the impromptu markers of the unknown dead... it's just everywhere, where does it end?"
In a quiet, deathly voice, Am said, "Why don't I ascend...? Well, I believe I can safely say that you don't think this situation weird at all. We, people of all different backgrounds, ages, and universes, were all brought here for some reason. But why? Why would that happen?" He looked, one by one, at everybody, as if trying to bind them together with an invisible rope. There was always a cause, and there was always an effect. But what was the cause? What was the effect?
"There is magic in the air," he whispered, "And I can't leave until I figure out why."
Gave them our reactions, our explosions, all that was ours For graphs of passion and charts of stars..."PTSD only happens when, like, you get bombed and stuff, man." Vancer shrugged again, not taking what Cornelius said too seriously.
Liena was now putting her hands on her head.
"Not true, Vancer. There have been psychological studies that show rape victims can get PTSD."
Read my stories!Cornelius looked up at Vancer and tilted his head. "Are you that narrow-minded?" he asked softly. "PTSD can come from any experience that's traumatic enough. Like, as Liena said, rape. Or torture, or disasters, or abuse, or assault. Anything that the victim can't cope with."
He sighed and rubbed his forehead. "But you seem to be able to cope with what's happened to you. It's possible that you could fight in a warzone all day and never be traumatized by it. I don't know, I'm not one to judge."
Michael saw that he should probably back away from these two before things got violent. He overheard someone discussing PTSD and decided he should chime in. "Just to add on to that," he said as he walked over, "I work with some people who went through the exact same things at the same time. One walked away pretty much fine, and the other is still taking medication about 17 years down the line. There's a lot that just depends on random chance, I think."
PLEASE don't ask for details on that - the response would have to be an enormous spoiler.
edited 19th Nov '11 12:18:43 PM by KyleJacobs
Vancer examined the person who just butted in, just as he was about to reply. "Well, see, there you go, man. Not everyone is gonna get all weak at the knees cause they had to go and punch a mook."
Liena waved at the new man. "Hi! I'm Liena!"
Read my stories!Am shrugged. "I might leave, I might not. But you're not able to tell me what I can and can't do."
Glancing at Noah, he replied, "And while you think you came here of your own will, I know that might be wrong. People know how to manipulate strings... either directly or indirectly. Mentally or with special powers. I remember, just faintly, something like this... Maybe..." The ghost shook his head. "I don't know the details." It was frustrating having his thoughts buried inside his own head, lost in the fog. If only he could wave it away, unearth his past...
But to what end would that get him? He couldn't change past events. What was the point of just knowing, if he couldn't do anything about it? But it felt urgent to him to find these details, find the truth about himself. Why?
Gave them our reactions, our explosions, all that was ours For graphs of passion and charts of stars...Michael started spluttering incoherently at that comment, before he managed to squeeze out a few words. "Weak at the... listen up, you little bastard," he said. He started advancing on the idiot, and before anyone could stop him, picked him up by the throat and held him in the air. "I have seen this guy wake up screaming and drenched in sweat more times than I can count. I've seen him running through a battlefield, no expression, mowing down anyone he sees, and suddenly just shut down - stand in the middle of the bullets staring at something nobody else can see. Even on a good day he acts like a fuckin' robot. No emotion, just goals. Things we need to do. People who need to die. And I respect the hell out of him for it. If I'd been through half of what he's been through, I'd probably end up curled in a ball every time I heard something that sounded like a gunshot. You don't get to brush that off so -"
Michael caught himself. He'd said far too much. If he'd been recorded, odds were pretty good the feds would be bearing down on this place within minutes. He looked around frantically, but to his surprise, didn't see any of the cameras that usually dotted the landscape. Lucky him, he thought. Hopefully anyone who'd overheard wasn't a friend of the government.
edited 19th Nov '11 7:45:22 PM by KyleJacobs

Michael stood, staring at the so-called ghost and momentarily stunned. He'd watched quite a few magic shows before, but that was leaps and bounds ahead of anything he'd ever seen on stage. There was a sense of reality to it that was usually absent from performed tricks. Quitely, he asked, "what the hell was that?"