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"[THREAD TITLE]" is a [SEASON NUMBER] thread written on [IRL DATE].
==Summary==
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==Full Text==
Darien knocked on the door of the library with his other arm full of a few thick books, feeling a great amount of trepidation but also excitement that he had someone to visit that would...well, not treat him too poorly. Counting on that kept him confident, and he waited for someone to answer.
aroleplayingcephalopod
He hears running footsteps before the door is flung open, revealing Clover with a flushed face, and her hair held up by an improbable number of pencils. “Hi,” she pants. “I was in the back.” She retreats a few steps. “Also, I can open the door all the way now,” she says proudly.
central-is-growing
He chuckled as he saw it for himself, swinging the door the rest of the way open and edging his way inside. “A demonstrable achievement!” He awkwardly held up the rest of the books in the crook of his arm and set them on the long table they had been using in the center of the room. “I, ah...I came to give these back.”
aroleplayingcephalopod
Clover’s proud smile widens into a larger grin. “What did you think?” she asks, boosting herself up onto a free space on the table. She looks at him expectantly.
central-is-growing
“More trees than I expected,” he said with another short laugh, shuffling through them to make sure they were in chronological order again. “But the detail is incredible! His languages are very thorough. And I do enjoy the wizard fellow.” He tapped the cover of the top book and smiled. “And...it had a good ending. I liked that a lot.”
aroleplayingcephalopod
“The ending is very satisfying,” she agrees. “Sam was always my favorite character. I... I liked how he stayed, no matter how hard things got. I still do.” With a soft laugh, she says, “Aragorn was William’s favorite.”
central-is-growing
“I couldn’t forget him. A lone ranger fallen from grace, trying to do right by his people?” His smile grew a little more sad. “I could only hope to be someone like that. It...made me think.”
aroleplayingcephalopod
Clover’s smile fades, and she looks down at her hands, twisting her fingers together. “Well,” she says softly, “it seems like you’re making a good start.” She looks back up at him. “What did it make you think about?”
central-is-growing
“It made me think of my people.”
Darien stepped away from the table and moved towards a section of writings they had organized detailing High Central and its doings. It was woefully sparse, but Darien could hardly blame anyone here who hadn’t lived in the city proper to know even half of the area’s correct history and inner workings. “The culture was coarse, militaristic, hungry for action and expansion and violence...but...I still feel for them,” he managed to say, rubbing the back of his neck as he picked up one of the records detailing their crimes against the kingdom of the Wilderwest. “That might seem silly, doesn’t it? But I knew them. So many of them were victims of a greater system that only existed to abuse them. It, uh...” He swallowed and put the pages face-down on the shelf, hiding their words. “It made me want to help them. For the first time in so many years.”
aroleplayingcephalopod
Still twisting her fingers together, she mulls over her words. “That’s a noble goal,” she whispers. “Maybe some of them can still be saved.”
central-is-growing
He looked back at Clover. “You think so? Everyone seems rather determined to...remove them.”
aroleplayingcephalopod
She bites her lip. “They need to be removed from power,” she says carefully. “That doesn’t mean they all need to die. Maybe you could still help them.”
central-is-growing
"Perhaps, with the Commander's permission," he said jokingly. But he was a little frightened of her and her flaming blade. "Well, I am in no position to do anything of the sort as it is. It's been nearly thirty years. I couldn't remember my formalities and officers and duties if someone held me at swordpoint. My story feels rather finished."
aroleplayingcephalopod
“Your story’s only over if you give up entirely,” Clover says. “I don’t think you have. Your ambitions have shifted, but they’re still there. You’ve just decided to put them to better use... helping people instead of harming them.”
central-is-growing
“I suppose.” Forcefully distracting himself, he looked back around at the library, which, while in a better state than before he had first stepped inside, was quite the mess. “You’ve been keeping busy, it seems.”
aroleplayingcephalopod
She shrugs. “I’m not any use with the final preparations for the raid,” she says, allowing the subject to move on. “This is a… helpful distraction.” She bites her lip, gazing at her hands. “My son is going on the raid. He’s… too much like Tezz for my own peace of mind, sometimes.”
“Ah, yes, I think I know who that is. The one with the most predictable reaction to my arrival,” he said in realization, shuffling around a few stacks of books out of fidgety need to have things in order. “What do you mean by that?”
aroleplayingcephalopod
Clover grimaces. “That was… largely my fault, I’ll admit,” she says. “I… wasn’t willing to let go of the grudge I was holding against you, then.” She flattens her ears against her head, fixing her gaze on a point across the room. “I have now, though.” She clears her throat. 
“And… Will is always trying to help others, even at risk to himself. I-I’m afraid he’s going to get hurt. Things were supposed to be better, after the first Rebellion. But our children have inherited the war that we started. Or… that we made known to the world, I suppose.”
central-is-growing
“And you don’t want him to risk himself for others? It seems like an admirable trait.” He said this mildly, as it was clear she was upset about it despite what he personally thought. “It spells a type of bravery and selflessness many do not have.”
aroleplayingcephalopod
She rubs her hand over her face. “It’s… he’s my baby. I can’t bear the thought of something happening to him.” She sighs. She’s been honest with Darien up to this point–and quite frankly, what has she got to lose? “I don’t want him to leave and never come back. Not the way Tezz did.”
central-is-growing
“I’m sorry.” He had a brief flash of seeing Tezz’s face for the first time in Bloedrest–tired, grinning, dusty and windswept. “Didn’t expect to see you here, teacher. Need a hand?”
“I can’t say my advice is any good. I spent my life in a hellhole of a city, and never had any family.” He kept his eyes downcast, as he began sorting his stack of books both by author and alphabetically.
aroleplayingcephalopod
Clover hops off her perch on the table, slowly moving closer to Darien. She rests her hand on his arm. “It’s not your fault,” she says softly. “I’m just worried.”
central-is-growing
“Technically, it is.” He gave her a wry smile. “When systems kill, their leaders are at fault.”
aroleplayingcephalopod
Her tail lashes back and forth, brushing the stacks of books. “It’s not your fault anymore,” she says firmly. “You’re trying to fix things now.”
central-is-growing
“Clover, you think too highly of me. All I have done is run. I have done no more harm, but neither have I attempted any good, I really haven’t. I know that. This is the first time any group of people has been able to keep me in one place and hold me accountable for fixing my own mess.” He did little to acknowledge her touch, continuing to sort like it was an automatic movement.
aroleplayingcephalopod
She lets out a frustrated breath. “That’s my point. You’re trying right now. Maybe it doesn’t fully make up for all those years, but it’s a start. You haven’t given up entirely. That’s something to be proud of, in its own way.” She drops her hand, looking away from him. “I would know.”
central-is-growing
“Do you?”
Darien was very, very quiet. He had finally stopped sorting and let his hands rest on the back of a chair while he leaned into it, his shoulders curved, his head bowed. “Does anyone?”
aroleplayingcephalopod
“Maybe not in the same way,” she allows. “But…” Clover takes a deep breath. “I killed my own baby sister. It was an accident, I never meant to… I pushed her and she fell, and her head hit the corner of a table. Klara took it all away from me… but the Archon gave it back.” She wraps her arms around herself. “Gods, I wanted to die when I found out what I’d done.” 
She breathes in and out. “I almost gave up everything. And again, when Tezz was gone. There have been so many times I wanted to give up, and just let everything go. I know how hard it is to keep pushing through that. Maybe better than most.”
central-is-growing
His eyes flickered as he heard this, and he briefly prodded the woman’s mind with his own. Yes, traces of re-insertion and recovery from a procedure he was very, very familiar with.
“It pains me to hear that, and of course I am sorry, but…Clover, I was a tyrant. I was…” His head hurt trying to comprehend it. “I sentenced an entire race to be outcasts. I killed so many. And…” he trailed off, staring down at his hands, which felt like they belonged to someone else. “I can’t…feel it. I think…if I did…I would feel the same as you. I think the true knowledge might kill me. But I don’t have that. It’s…it’s too much.”
Darien slowly sank down to sit in the chair, leaning his elbows on his knees. “You had tremendous grief to overcome. I have…nothing.”
aroleplayingcephalopod
She rocks back and forth on her heels, trying to choose her words carefully. “Darien… you said yourself that many of the others in High Central were victims of that system. Isn’t it possible that you were, too? Maybe not in the same way, but… well, you know what I mean.” She hopes he does, anyway.
central-is-growing
His knuckles were white from how tightly he was clasping his hands together. “Do you know how many people would kill me for thinking anything of the sort?” He was still very quiet, and very serious. “What would they say to that?”
aroleplayingcephalopod
“I never said it’d be easy,” she says, just as quietly. “But you’re working against High Central now. That’ll sway some minds. Maybe not all of them but… it’s a start.”
central-is-growing
He grimaced slightly and nodded, keeping his eyes downcast. He still felt incredibly melancholy. “Perhaps.” 
Darien blinked and focused his eyes on the ground, then his hands, then up at Clover. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t burden you with such things. This is grief from a source which dealt you much pain in your life.”
aroleplayingcephalopod
She lets out a humorless chuckle. “Gods know you’ve seen enough of my mess. And… I don’t mind,” she adds, offering Darien a small smile.
central-is-growing
“I don’t know why you don’t. But I never will.” He put his hands on his knees and managed to get to his feet, groaning very slightly as his joints protested. “I also don’t know how you stand it in here. I spend a week on an island with nowhere to hike to and I’m already falling apart at the seams.”
aroleplayingcephalopod
“Well, there is the hill,” Clover says. “We could take a break from this for the day,” she offers. “There’s a good view up there, at least.”
central-is-growing
Darien shook his head, looking down at his hands again. His fingers still felt strangely numb. “I might…need to think for a while. Though I wouldn’t say no to any new books you might have. I think I understand why people read such things now.”
aroleplayingcephalopod
“Mmm, let me think,” she says, tapping her chin. Something lighthearted, something lighthearted. Clover wanders off, looking through the stacks of books. She returns with a book clutched in her fingers. “It’s a little old-fashioned,” she says, holding it out to Darien, “but it’s one of my favorites.”
central-is-growing
“And what is this one about?” He thumbed through the pages, noting the older style of writing.
aroleplayingcephalopod
“It’s a romance,” she says. “It’s rather humorous, actually. The heroine starts out loathing the hero, thinking him proud and snobbish, but… her views change, and circumstances change. It’s… nice. Nothing truly awful happens in it. Nobody dies.”
central-is-growing
Darien laughed a little. “I like the sound of that. You don’t mind if I borrow it, then? It shouldn’t take me as long to read, hopefully.”
aroleplayingcephalopod
“It barely took you any time at all to read the others,” Clover laughs. “I’m sure you’ll be done in no time. And of course I don’t mind. This is a library. You’re meant to borrow books from here.”
“Well, then I think I shall take these and read them as well. Thank you.”
Category:BOTGD 2
Category:Events
Category:Act I
Category:Clover Rose
Category:Darien Whiteland