video; un: shiro

[shiro2hero]

[Local man sits at his kitchen table, arms folded and a coffee mug in front of him. He looks... worried. Concerned. And is clearly preparing for a Speech.]

My name is Shiro.

I'm one of the Sleepers who came here from Deerington, the dream world. I don't actually know how many of you out there are in the same boat anymore, so... with a choice like we've been given, I don't know how many of you remember the last time we had one like it.

[He means the vote that ended the dream.]

That vote ended with Julia Sodder's death.

I want to think it's because a lot of us didn't fully understand the consequences. I want to think it was because a lot of people were hurt, afraid, and thought they were doing the right thing. Or they just wanted to protect the people they knew. Regardless, Julia Sodder died. The people she'd brought into her world to save her... they let her down.

[Deep breaths Shiro, because it really sounds like you were trying to say I let her down, there. He folds his hands, and props his chin up in them.]

You can probably see where I'm going with this.

I'm not saying don't give this Pthumerian your opinion. At this point, inaction is probably the worst idea we've got. These beings - they're a part of this world whether we like it or not. They have been for longer than we can probably realize. [He grimaces.] Aside from one...

[Friggin Mother Mercy/Superior.]

We should be careful, I think, to do anything that cuts them off from their world. Even if we think it might help the people we care about. Protect them. We could end up doing something we really regret.

[There's a long pause, Shiro debating his next words.]

Like always, I'm open to explaining anything to people who have no idea where I'm coming from. I'm more than happy to talk about what happened in Deerington. The way I see it, maybe that will help us understand this world.

Comments

[theflyingone]

[ Altaïr should really take care when it comes to certain subjects and Sleepers who entered this world from the Dream. Unfortunately, he has the sensitivity of a brick and does not. ]

I take it that for you that's the worst thing that could happen? I have only heard tell of Moon Presence. I have never seen her do something.

[shiro2hero]

She helped us more times than I can count, back in the dream. And coming here.

She went up against Mother Superior - another Pthumerian, who downright hated us, who tried to wipe us out - and protected us. She's...

Like a guardian, I want to believe.

[theflyingone]

More like a mother than the Mother. Still, I do not place my trust in Pthumerians, except that I trust they will act according to their nature, which is so different from ours.

I do not place my trust in most humans, for that matter...

[shiro2hero]

I guess that's fair. I won't try to force you. All I'll say is from experience?

Her nature is to help us.

[theflyingone]

Do you know if it is due to who she is? or, what she has seen?

[shiro2hero]

Unfortunately, no.

We know she was brought into the world to have Julia. And that's... all her creators - mothers - ever had in mind for her.

[theflyingone]

A shame. But it is not as though we can judge; humans have had children for similar reasons. Heirs, tools, bound to only one sort of life.

If I am to have my own, I would like there to be love.

[ That's personal for him to say, but the general feeling of this city is kinder to children. It has no kings to scoff at the concept. ]

[shiro2hero]

Yeah, that's fair. I guess it was something like my first experience with it - both with Cynthia and Julia.

It's a little better in my world, I think. Not always true, never is. But better.

[theflyingone]

It is an entire world, after all. I have not even traveled far away from the Great Sea and I have seen many peoples each with their own views on how to raise children.

But I do not have Pthumerians in mine. Gods and magic are the subjects of faith and superstition.