dear_mun | (no subject)

Asari have the ability to manipulate small mass effect fields. I can create barriers to slow projectiles, or a singularity to pull objects or people towards it. I can lift things, throw things, even cause damage by tearing things apart at a molecular level, though some things resist the effects.

Weapons have always been secondary to biotics, as far as my ability in combat is concerned.

[There's a long pause.]

You're a mage then.

[An equally long pause.]

Not really. Mass Effect fields are all based upon firm, scientific principles, and even the manipulation of these fields with the mind via biotic abilities is explainable through the interaction of the chemistry and electrical impulses of the brain and nervous system with element zero and the resulting control is developed over time.

However, I think most of the people who live in the town I'm been stuck in consider it magic, and to an extent, I've simply begun to treat it as such. It's easier than getting into the argument every time someone asks.

[There's that pause again.]

Ah. Well, I can't say I understand the science but I am just a knight and you're a doctor. I will take your word for it.

Although I should say that magic is a science where I hail from, but I don't pretend to be an expert on that either.

I'm an archeaologist. I'm an expert in Prothean technology. I've not spent much time studying myth and fantasy. All I can say is there is a point where the two become indistinguishable, but that point varies depending on any manner of factors.

In short, I'm not expert on 'magic' in any way. What I do follows simple, physical laws, though without eezo, they are laws that seems fantastic to normal physics. There is a reason most races take so long to uncover the nature if element zero and its unique properties.

I suppose I can see your point, Doctor. We call our King and his sons gods and out country holy, something we think of as fact, but to another culture wouldn't we just be people with primitive names for advanced things? I can't say I have thought about it much. I am a soldier and curiosity is not programmed into us.

[After a second or so, his helmet breaks apart into dust and then into light and finally nothingness. He just feels like being a little less formal.]

I will admit to some though. How fascinating it must be to look at the past.

[She offers him a little smile, choosing to ignore the comment about programming, for now.]

Yes. The Protheans were more advanced than any race is in our cycle. The ruled the Galaxy. And then they simply...vanished. In a few centuries, the Protheans went extinct. The mystery was always alluring to me. What were they like? How did they speak? How did they perceive the world? For more than a millennium, we've only been able to guess. I spent decades learning everything I could about them, and I still knew almost nothing.

[She shrugs.]

It was the puzzle that kept me seeking more.

Edited 2013-01-24 20:31 (UTC)

The way you say it... Makes it sounds like you are no longer blind to the answer.

[He looks quite intrigued himself by now.]

They were hunted to extinction by an ancient race of sentient machines. The Reapers. They've returned, and now hunt the modern peoples of the galaxy. But I have known that for years.

I met a Prothean, a living individual, the last of his race. He has answered many of my other questions. How were the Protheans governed? How did they interact with other races? He proved...enlightening.

[That causes some obvious contemplation in him. He's more or less a sentient machine himself and in fact one created to destroy species. But it's a bit jarring to think that it could actually happen. The strange state of affairs in his world mean that he wasn't aware wars could end.]

...I wonder if that is how dragons feel... [He clears his throat. He sometimes just gets lost in thought like that and it's always awkward.] Ah. You know, I wonder if it counts as historical study if there's still one around.

[And then he tries to make stupid jokes.]

[A good many times over, in her galaxy, though she intends to be sure her people aren't among them.]

He is 50,000 years old...oh, and was also buried until very recently. So far as we knew, there were no Protheans left, and in a few years, that will be true again. Javik's alive, but his people, his culture...they're gone. All I can hope to do is learn enough about them from what is left to let my people learn from their mistakes, and triumph in their glories. Maybe then, even after he's gone, Javik and his people won't be truly lost.

Hm...You know, I don't think I ever considered that such a loss could be truly possible.

It's somewhat daunting.

Prothean. Insuanan. Dozens, hundreds of others, some so old that we do not even know their names. The Rachni, whom we destroyed ourselves. So much that has been lost.

If we can learn from them, from their failures, perhaps wecan avoid them.

[There's another one of those thoughtful pauses and he turns to look up at the sky (or whatever there is around here) for a bit. It's all quite complicated. Eventually-]

It must be hard to be a scholar, if one has to think of such troubling things often. I wonder, is it the fate of all things to war against one another until there's nothing left? Now I look back, I'm sure I once thought it so, but I just forgot.

[He gets a melancholic smile, still looking up.]

But then I recall why I forgot and it seems a strange notion to hold. No matter how far back the past reaches, the future extends further and who can say what will occur? I don't think fate can bind, not so long as there are those whose hearts can feel sadness for loss and joy in another's life. Things may repeat and an endless twilight may be what it seems, but it only has to change once, doesn't it?

[And about now is when he realises he's been waxing philosophically to someone he barely knows. He does that sometimes, and it embarrasses him again. So he rubs the back of his neck awkwardly, going a bit red.]

That's what I think anyway, hah-hah...

My people believe in peace, and harmony, but that doesn't mean we won't, or can't, fight. But it does mean we seek peaceful solutions. A compromise is likely to benefit everyone involved.

[She sighs.]

That's the fight we're all in, to one degree or another. And I know that it will change. I just...I hope my people survive long enough to see it happen.

[She holds a doctorate; talking abstracts with strangers is actually kind of comforting after everything she's been dealing with.]

So, I suppose I agree.

Mm. The phrase I've been using is that 'a good soldier wishes to be useless.' I'd rather have no enemies in the first place then see total victory.

No one else values peace like someone who's been in a war. It's something that never goes away.

Have you ever experienced it? Peace, I mean?

[Because he sure as hell hasn't. His first memory is the battlefield.]

[She nods.]

Yes. There was peace when I was younger. War has only come to us recently.

What's it like?

[And he doesn't really get why that might be hard to answer. It's easy to describe war, after all.]

At the time? Baffling, annoying, and frentic. I spent so much time focused on studying the past, trying to prove myself capable. And then Sovereign came, and we could see the war coming, but no one would listen.

No one was willing to even consider the danger we faced, and so I spent years trying to make ready what I could. And we were still not prepared when they finally arrived. Shepard had to destroy an entire system, to buy us time. A few months, and still they didn't listen.

And that is peace...

[He idly fiddles with the hem of his hood, looking down a bit.]

It sounds much the same as war.

It's not. At the time, when I had not seen war, I used the same words. Looking back now, I think it was almost sedate. Occasionally, I had something happen. I knew fighting before war came, wild animals, or pirates, but that was nothing compared to seeing Palaven. Or Thessia.

Goddess, how naive I was. I was a child, pretending I knew what I was doing. By the time we hit Ilos, and found the conduit, I thought I was a real veteran, fighting through the geth all over the presidium.

I was wrong.

I... don't understand entirely the meaning of your words. But I feel a weight upon my heart from the speaking of them regardless. I cannot say if I will ever truly understand.

[He stares at his hand for a moment.]

My very first memory is of the battlefield. I fought and fought, unable to even think until I had killed my thousandth foe and I was the lone survivor. Battle after battle, fight after fight, foe after foe, an endless and lifeless grey. I found awareness and still didn't find meaning. Someone else... Gave me colour, a reason to fight beyond my orders.

[Looking up at last, she can see a rather somber look.]

If roles were reversed, born with light and meaning and purpose to be thrust into the endless expanse of violence, I do not know I could stand it.

[And a little smile.]

It's a brave doctor who can be a soldier too.

It's hard, but there are good reasons to fight, now. We want those times back, we want our children to know peace, like we did. So we will fight, however bad it is, because the memory of better is worth it. Even when it looks like there's no good left, we fight to bring it back.

[She doesn't smile.]

I could fight, or I could run. My mother and I rarely saw eye-to-eye, but she taught me one thing-you can't run. I'm not a victim, and so I will fight because I can, until my people are lost, and then I will still fight to avenge them, until the Reapers are dead and gone.