Post by Sinopia DeStellanova on Apr 12, 2020 11:59:20 GMT -5
"Oh."
She was never sure whether she found her friend's ability to be so sure of herself, and to be able to talk that way, when she had no idea what was going on was impressive or terrifying. Maybe a little of both? Regardless, she just blinked and furrowed her brow, in a space somewhere between confused and thoughtful. Something that did not change as Alya continued.
Sinopia was by no means delusional. Reality could be hard to accept sometimes, and sometimes it took her a little while to come to terms with it, but because of her tendency to think far too long and far too hard about everything, she found it difficult to look away from how things actually were. It didn't mean she was always right, if anything she tended to make everything out to be a little bit worse than it was in order to mentally prepare herself for it, but she was terrible at lying to herself. She was equally terrible at accepting other peoples' lies to make her feel better, they tended to get explained away pretty quickly by her brain, but only when she could identify them as lies.
Something wasn't adding up in her pre-teen mind. As young as she was now, she was even younger when the conflict started, and even younger than that when her family left Vale. Her father told her that some people were trying to get them to live somewhere else and he didn't think they should go. When asked why they didn't just stay home and ignore them, he just said it was because they were being very insistent about it and he wanted to be left alone. That they would go back when people were acting less mean. Considering people kept throwing rocks at her, among other things, every time she left the house, this was very easy for her ten-year-old self to accept. It's not like she ran into a military blockade when she left, her father managed to find a solid route out, so the situation never seemed as bad to her as it actually was.
Her mother was supposed to catch up, and her father said she'd come soon. When months passed and she didn't, her father said she must have gotten taken to Menagerie to see what it was like to live there, and that she'd come back once it was time to move back to Vale. When the war started, while her father was helping her wash the guts of an unfortunate faunus patrol out of her hair, he treated it like a completely separate thing. There were just bad people out there that were hurting them and that's why they had to fight. That later evolved into humans weren't respecting their sentience: their very personhood, so if they wanted to have a place in this world at all they had to fight. The only connection she had to everything else was that faunus were being driven from the kingdoms, so she hadn't been able to fully connect the events.
She had heard a lot about people losing family members. Not always a lot about how, certainly not enough to understand and connect them to her own experiences. Those stories tended to refer to 'parents' or 'spouses' or other vague people she could picture as fighting in the war itself. Even 'children' worked given her role in the war. But 'grandmother'? Further 'grandmother with mobility issues'? That wasn't someone that could fight. That was someone they brought to a safe place to live until they could go somewhere else and maybe made clothes and blankets. If she wasn't fighting, then why was there any need to worry about her at all? Why would she be jailed or exiled? Wouldn't she just be taken to Menagerie with the others, like her own mother?
For everything Sinopia had seen, there was a lot she hadn't seen. She was twelve and stayed out of the fighting almost completely. It's not like she participated in any raids on camps, defended villages, or anything else that would let her see some of the inhumane treatment faunus were receiving. She hadn't been captured, and didn't even know capture was something that happened. She thought everyone was just killed on sight. It was how they made it sound when they told her to avoid the humans at all costs. It's not like she ever read any of the messages she was delivering either. That went against orders and would be irresponsible. So, she always thought that all the faunus that weren't fighting just had a nice plane or boat ride over to the island and would be there once it was done.
This was a clear contradiction. At first, she was planning on saying that she would love to meet Alya's grandmother. It seemed entirely plausible that she'd still be alive to Sinopia, so a meeting could actually happen. But then her friend's breathing got weird, and it became something was wrong. There was something she wasn't understanding, which made her afraid to speak at all. In contrast to her friend, her breathing stopped completely as she tried to piece together what she should do. If talking about it was making her friend sad, then should she change the subject? Her grandmother seemed to make her happy, would she want to talk about her still? Sinopia had no idea, and she was terrified of making her friend feel worse if she said the wrong thing. She had never been very good with words despite her best efforts to be very articulate, and the longer time dragged on, the more her mind kept pulling her towards everything wrong she had ever said as if to remind her that she had no business trying to make anyone feel better.
Her body stiffened again and she was tempted to just sit there until the right words came. Or just do nothing if they didn't come at all. Think until everything was perfect and nothing could go wrong, like she always did. At least that way she wouldn't make it worse. But her friend was suffering, and she wanted to help. She let out the breath she had been holding. Alya had done so much already, and now her friend needed her. If she couldn't think of what to do, then the answer was clearly to not think and just do what felt right.
Slowly, she turned around, making sure that her movements were slow and deliberate enough that Alya should be able to hear them. Then, she leaned forward and started wrapping her arms around her friend's waist. Once again, she was slow as to try to avoid surprising her, gentle so her arms could be easily pushed away whether it was because they were unwanted or because Alya needed to find her balance. She started low and moved upward, to make it clear that something didn't happen to her and that this was her own movements and not her slumping onto her friend's back because something bad happened. If allowed, her grip would get tighter, pulling the other faunus into a tight hug, and she'd rest her head on Alya's shoulder. If pushed away, she'd move away. Regardless, even if she couldn't find the right words, there were ways to communicate feelings and intent without them.
---
1227/8940
She was never sure whether she found her friend's ability to be so sure of herself, and to be able to talk that way, when she had no idea what was going on was impressive or terrifying. Maybe a little of both? Regardless, she just blinked and furrowed her brow, in a space somewhere between confused and thoughtful. Something that did not change as Alya continued.
Sinopia was by no means delusional. Reality could be hard to accept sometimes, and sometimes it took her a little while to come to terms with it, but because of her tendency to think far too long and far too hard about everything, she found it difficult to look away from how things actually were. It didn't mean she was always right, if anything she tended to make everything out to be a little bit worse than it was in order to mentally prepare herself for it, but she was terrible at lying to herself. She was equally terrible at accepting other peoples' lies to make her feel better, they tended to get explained away pretty quickly by her brain, but only when she could identify them as lies.
Something wasn't adding up in her pre-teen mind. As young as she was now, she was even younger when the conflict started, and even younger than that when her family left Vale. Her father told her that some people were trying to get them to live somewhere else and he didn't think they should go. When asked why they didn't just stay home and ignore them, he just said it was because they were being very insistent about it and he wanted to be left alone. That they would go back when people were acting less mean. Considering people kept throwing rocks at her, among other things, every time she left the house, this was very easy for her ten-year-old self to accept. It's not like she ran into a military blockade when she left, her father managed to find a solid route out, so the situation never seemed as bad to her as it actually was.
Her mother was supposed to catch up, and her father said she'd come soon. When months passed and she didn't, her father said she must have gotten taken to Menagerie to see what it was like to live there, and that she'd come back once it was time to move back to Vale. When the war started, while her father was helping her wash the guts of an unfortunate faunus patrol out of her hair, he treated it like a completely separate thing. There were just bad people out there that were hurting them and that's why they had to fight. That later evolved into humans weren't respecting their sentience: their very personhood, so if they wanted to have a place in this world at all they had to fight. The only connection she had to everything else was that faunus were being driven from the kingdoms, so she hadn't been able to fully connect the events.
She had heard a lot about people losing family members. Not always a lot about how, certainly not enough to understand and connect them to her own experiences. Those stories tended to refer to 'parents' or 'spouses' or other vague people she could picture as fighting in the war itself. Even 'children' worked given her role in the war. But 'grandmother'? Further 'grandmother with mobility issues'? That wasn't someone that could fight. That was someone they brought to a safe place to live until they could go somewhere else and maybe made clothes and blankets. If she wasn't fighting, then why was there any need to worry about her at all? Why would she be jailed or exiled? Wouldn't she just be taken to Menagerie with the others, like her own mother?
For everything Sinopia had seen, there was a lot she hadn't seen. She was twelve and stayed out of the fighting almost completely. It's not like she participated in any raids on camps, defended villages, or anything else that would let her see some of the inhumane treatment faunus were receiving. She hadn't been captured, and didn't even know capture was something that happened. She thought everyone was just killed on sight. It was how they made it sound when they told her to avoid the humans at all costs. It's not like she ever read any of the messages she was delivering either. That went against orders and would be irresponsible. So, she always thought that all the faunus that weren't fighting just had a nice plane or boat ride over to the island and would be there once it was done.
This was a clear contradiction. At first, she was planning on saying that she would love to meet Alya's grandmother. It seemed entirely plausible that she'd still be alive to Sinopia, so a meeting could actually happen. But then her friend's breathing got weird, and it became something was wrong. There was something she wasn't understanding, which made her afraid to speak at all. In contrast to her friend, her breathing stopped completely as she tried to piece together what she should do. If talking about it was making her friend sad, then should she change the subject? Her grandmother seemed to make her happy, would she want to talk about her still? Sinopia had no idea, and she was terrified of making her friend feel worse if she said the wrong thing. She had never been very good with words despite her best efforts to be very articulate, and the longer time dragged on, the more her mind kept pulling her towards everything wrong she had ever said as if to remind her that she had no business trying to make anyone feel better.
Her body stiffened again and she was tempted to just sit there until the right words came. Or just do nothing if they didn't come at all. Think until everything was perfect and nothing could go wrong, like she always did. At least that way she wouldn't make it worse. But her friend was suffering, and she wanted to help. She let out the breath she had been holding. Alya had done so much already, and now her friend needed her. If she couldn't think of what to do, then the answer was clearly to not think and just do what felt right.
Slowly, she turned around, making sure that her movements were slow and deliberate enough that Alya should be able to hear them. Then, she leaned forward and started wrapping her arms around her friend's waist. Once again, she was slow as to try to avoid surprising her, gentle so her arms could be easily pushed away whether it was because they were unwanted or because Alya needed to find her balance. She started low and moved upward, to make it clear that something didn't happen to her and that this was her own movements and not her slumping onto her friend's back because something bad happened. If allowed, her grip would get tighter, pulling the other faunus into a tight hug, and she'd rest her head on Alya's shoulder. If pushed away, she'd move away. Regardless, even if she couldn't find the right words, there were ways to communicate feelings and intent without them.
---
1227/8940
