2018-03-15: Why this Bird will Fly
- Log: Why This Bird Will Fly
- Cast: Riesenlied, K.K.
- Where: Vane outskirts
- Date: 15th March 2018
- Summary: Riesenlied prays at the plains of the Goddess. She gets an unusual, but not unexpected visitor.
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Riesenlied has been spending time recuperating in the venerable city of Vane. Once, a floating, majestic city where mages thrived and crafted their arte... and as she has now seen from ancient projections from the deep past, it was shattered by a colossus of mechanical might. But...
She doesn't spend all her time in the city. Riesenlied has taken the time to step out towards a nearby hill overlooking Vane.
Her head is bandaged profusely, a sign of the near-death experience she's had at the hands of Berserk. It plagues her even now, causing jittering anxious bouts and lapses of panic. She's also changed her garments in Lunar...
It's Lydie's gown, a white and blue sleeveless dress of Baskar tradition, with flaring detached sleeves that shape in the form of a blue bird's feathers.
The Hyadean Tainted leader is kneeling at the edge of the cliff, quietly holding her hands together around the Dragon's Tear as she focuses upon it as an implement. An incandescent swirl of photons surrounds her as she channels her power in practice... several woodlands creatures pace up next to her, looking up curiously at her as she smiles back in turn...
She might have chosen to set herself out here because she senses someone. Someone important to her...
<Pose Tracker> K.K. has posed.
Blue skies. Green valley. Life abundant. Lunar has all the look of a verdant paradise to those just arriving, those who have known only deserts and wastelands of extremes all their life.
They had told Riesenlied once. What Filgaia lacks, Lunar has in abundance...
... but the opposite is also true, and one need only be able to perceive it to feel the trace taint of Malevolence that hangs even in a place as beautiful and resplendent as this.
But even with that spiritual taint, there is peace here. The animals, the people, they are all accustomed to or simply don't sense the Malevolence that roots faintly through the air and ground. It is tranquil, and quiet, on this cliffside, as beads of light encircle Riesenlied, as creatures of the forest approach her...
"So, then, you have made it to this star."
... but they are not the only ones.
Just, perhaps, as Riesenlied might have anticipated, they arrive. There is little ceremony, no pomp -- there is just their shadow, before the sight of that white-armored figure the Trial Knight strikes becomes clear. Imposing simply on the face of it, no doubt. But K.K. does not carry themself threateningly. They merely stand there, at the edge of that cliff, horned helm canted slightly towards the left, weight of their stare focused upon the bandages wrapped securely around Riesenlied's injured head.
"But it seems not without marks to carry with you in the doing."
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Riesenlied has been struggling, ever since she touched down in Meribia.
The faint trace of Malevolence is everpresent in Lunar. For someone with sensitivity like Riesenlied, it bothers her, as if appearing like a constant reminder at the back of her mind, like something faintly terrifying appearing only at the periphery of one's vision.
But she withstands, as she lays a hand on a little squirrel's head and strokes it.
So, then, you have made it to this star.
The animals look up towards the white-armored newcomer, and Riesenlied looks towards them in turn.
"Trial Knight..."
She lowers her head softly, trembling softly. "So, this is the star which you call home..." A pause. "It seems like forever ago, when we first had that conversation."
She hesitates for a moment... but then raises her head up. "These are the marks dealt to me by Berserk..." She furrows her brow. "He has passed now. In his last moment, full of conviction of the way he lives..."
She casts her eyes aside.
"... I hope you are well," she speaks. It's odd -- to hope for the health of someone who has helped spread Malevolence throughout an entire kingdom, yet...
The Trial Knight is important to her. This is a fact that cannot change.
<Pose Tracker> K.K. has posed.
So, this is the star which you call home...
"'Tis the place in which I was made what I am. Ever shall I have a special connection to this place, if but for that fact alone."
The animals look up towards them. And for a moment, the knight does not move. Their presence, ominous as it is, should no doubt be cause for those creatures to scatter, as they often do in the presence of something wrong. And yet, the Trial Knight does not frighten them off. Nor do they even ignore them.
Instead, K.K. crouches, one clawed, gauntlet-wrapped hand extended palm-up towards those woodland creatures as if in silent, peaceful offering.
"Do you see it, now that you can witness it with your own eyes, the truth of that conversation?" wonders the knight, even as that hand extends, the metal of their armor groaning only slightly as they lower themself down upon the cliffside. "'Tis a place of wondrous splendor. But the beauty one can see with naught but the blind's eye is not the whole of a story, even if they cannot see the rest. This land is blighted."
That helm tilts up, the unseen focus of that gaze once more settling on Riesenlied as she speaks. At more or less eye level now, the Trial Knight seems to consider her words for a moment.
"There are those who will never change their ways. People who will yet oppose you by dint of your very nature. 'Tis the natural state of things. The thing that inspires love in as equal parts it does hatred." Their head cants. She hopes they are well. An odd thing to ask, likely. And yet...
"Yet well enough to continue on my path. But there is still yet more work to be done." Fingers twitch, faintly.
"And you, Riesenlied? Are you yet full of conviction in the way you live?"
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
One of the squirrels paces up and moves up gently towards the clawed hand of the Trial Knight, possessed of an innocence as it looks up towards it.
"Yes," Riesenlied answers in response to that comment of the truth. "Within my empathic senses, the amount of Malevolence that lingers in the air is... unlike anything I had ever seen in Filgaia. What one land has in abundance..."
The other lacks...
Riesenlied lowers her head for a moment, and a sigh. "At that moment, mere steps away from the door of death... just as I had fallen apart under his jeers, as I struggled with the question of my identity..."
She glances to the open airs. "It was Odoryuk that came to my rescue. And by his own volition, by his own words..."
A pause.
"'Such boundaries can eventually be overcome,' he said. Those are... powerful words I won't soon forget."
She turns towards the Trial Knight, stepping a little bit closer. "Wayside is gone, decimated under the wrath of Id once more. But its spirit lives on -- in its people, in the wings we've been granted. I will not rest until we have seen our people freed from oppression."
Yet, there is hesitation...
"But of you, Trial Knight..." she bites her lip. "Why?"
She-- can't help it. She places her hands to her heart a little more desperately as she gets more emotional and pleading. "Why Krosse? I have but glimpsed a sense of the love in your heart. Why... why must something as horrible as Krosse happen?"
She shakes her head lowly, shivering. "Why must humanity be tried, and judged as a whole -- as a species, not as individuals...? I have given long thought to this, but I still do not understand..."
<Pose Tracker> K.K. has posed.
The squirrel approaches. That clawed hand could so easily just crush the life out of it in an instant. Surely, it has done worse, inflicted worse, on countless others. That hand lifts, fingers stretching out...
... and find the top of the creature's head with a single finger to scratch lightly at its soft layer of fur.
"There is strength, even in the frail. Strength even in the dying. The Blue Star's body crumbles, yet its spirit remains ever-strong. What it cannot handle is what it simply knows not, and even then, it finds ways to overcome if given the time and opportunity allotted to." That finger tucks behind one tiny ear, offering little else but simple affection for the animal that has approached it.
"And in you, I see your world's reflection."
'Such boundaries can eventually be overcome.'
"There is naught in this world that cannot be, Riesenlied. One needs but the will and the strength to grasp it."
Slowly, the scratch of that finger comes to an end as Riesenlied approaches the knight. It is easy and natural, the way K.K. urges that squirrel back towards its kin with their palm, the focus of their gaze on those animals even as they address the Tainted. "Home, and sanctuary, is naught else than where one connects to. It need not be a place. An idea alone could well suffice. You have not faced the last of your hardships, Riesenlied. But by my account, you have made great strides in the fulfilment of your oath."
The words come plainly, around the metallic din of their neutral voice. Like they were simply stating fact, rather than blind praise. But it as Riesenlied speaks next that they pause, their head tilting upward to look at her directly as those pleading words come, all affixed to a single, simple question:
Why?
"Do you know what it means, to truly love a thing, Riesenlied?"
And slowly, the Trial Knight stands, white cape draping behind them with the shift of the breeze as their head tilts in a simple shake. "I would bid you not answer me yet. 'Tis not an answer that can be come to within but a moment, nor easily still. See this world, and your own. The truths of both. When you have, when you believe you can answer me with a full and experienced heart, then I would hear what you would say of it. For now..."
Fingers spasm. But the knight holds strong, the weight of their convictions conveyed in all their depths through that sheer, unyielding stance alone.
"... you need but know this is my path, and one I would seek no other to walk but me."
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
It pains Riesenlied, to see the Trial Knight offer the woodland creature such a genteel motion. Like it were truly at odd with the person who could visit such crime to Lahan, to Port Timney, to the Hollow, and Wehaca... and to Krosse, most recently.
"To truly love a thing..." Riesenlied whispers, finding with surprise that there are tears in her eyes now.
She's said it before, to multiple people.
I love Filgaia. This... is the only world I've ever known. And when I see it suffer so, I...
The words ring back in her head, but it makes her hesitate a little as the Trial Knight offers the question in full.
"I can scarce take at the depth of your designs. But I would think you mean that if you truly loved a thing, you would do anyting to see it flourish..."
She glances aside.
"Even if it meant villifying yourself...?" A pause, and a deeper sigh. "But... yes, I shall take that question well to heart, as I have in the past."
I would seek no other to walk but me.
She bites her lip and... shakes her head. "That is untrue, is it not?" She places her hand to her chest tighter. "There is one who walks with you, even if you do not ask her to. I know her devotion to you is true. The Seraph that stands by your side, in secrecy."
She lowers her head. "... I do not understand what has transpired between the two of you, but ... I know enough she would walk to the ends of the world with you."
A pause.
"Because she loves you."
<Pose Tracker> K.K. has posed.
... if you truly loved a thing, you would do anything to see it flourish...
Silence is Riesenlied's answer, in the aftermath of that wondering question. Whether it is the truth or not, the Trial Knight does not see fit to say. Instead, they just watch the Tainted, as moisture wells at the corners of her eyes, as she hesitates within those words.
"'Tis all that I would ask of you."
And as her words find her once more... the Trial Knight pauses. Their head cants towards their right. The Seraph that stands by their side, in secrecy.
"... She would," they confirm, without a second's thought. "To the ends of all things, she would stride with me. And I would let her, as far as I could." Because she loves you.
"But I would not take her to the very end of this road with me." Because...
"For that same reason that she would seek to follow me there."
Slowly, K.K. advances; they step towards Riesenlied, their booted heels ringing in the air with every step. They reach out...
And despite that hand being used to harm so many, even people Riesenlied cares about -- even Riesenlied herself -- it is still a delicate touch they offer when that metal-wrapped palm rests, briefly, at the top of the Hyadean's bandaged-wrapped head.
"Do not shed your tears, Riesenlied. Not over a thing such as me. You have soared so high now. You have come so very far past the bars that once held you. You know not yet your limits." And for all that they have uttered similar words in situations that have made them seem like an accusation, in this...
"There will be times yet that we come to blows. 'Tis as things must be. But come what may...
"... know that I am proud of you and all that you have accomplished -- and all you have yet to."
In this, their intent is very clear.
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Riesenlied dabs at her cheeks for a moment, with the sleeve of her garment. The Trial Knight advances forward, and Riesenlied does not react hesitantly or defensively; she lets them do so. Their hand is on her bandaged, wounded head-- slowly, softly. A headpat.
It makes her sob a little bit harder, the gesture having a powerful meaning behind just what it is physically...
It feels unfair...
"... I know. I know that," Riesenlied chokes out a sob as she tries to wipe her tears away. "Away from the cage that held me... high into the airs that lift my wings... and up, to the skies of these two worlds where I must still see, with my own two eyes."
They're proud of her, and all that she's accomplished.
It feels... so unfair... that it has to be like this...
"That's... why this bird will fly."
<Pose Tracker> K.K. has posed.
Unfair.
Perhaps it is. Perhaps all of this is. But if K.K. feels regret for what they are, for what must be, it never shows in the implacable knight's body language. Not in the way they hold themself...
... nor in the way that hand gently presses to Riesenlied's head as those quiet sobs continue on from the Tainted before them. Even in this, they stand unflinching. But not, perhaps, unsympathetic.
There are no words. Not at first. But there is a sense of approval there, like some vague measure of warmth perhaps, as that gauntleted hand slips slowly away from Riesenlied. So difficult it is to read them under all that armor. But right now, at least, in this moment? There can be no confusion about the sentiment they carry with them.
"I know. And I yet look forward to bearing witness to how much higher those wings will take you."
Once more, their hand falls to their side. And for a time, they just watch Riesenlied... before slowly stepping towards her right. "Mark this well: the new world you seek is one that you must ever-strive for. And you will yet face many more whose convictions run opposite to your own wish for the world. Even amongst your own kin."
And slowly, they begin to stride away once more -- towards the forest. For once, not letting the light whisk them away as they go.
"But 'tis exactly why you must keep striving for it. And 'tis exactly why that struggle is worth its efforts. You have come far. And there is so much farther still you can go. Remember that, Riesenlied."