Post by Admin on Sept 23, 2009 18:11:50 GMT -5
Rian:
Rian shivered in the wind coming through the walls of the broken down house they had taken over for the night. He wished that they had been able to pack more blanketts in their saddle bags for the cross country trip but the northeastern winter cold had seemed like an almost mythical thing and easily forgotten in the middle of the Nevada heat.
He would keep this trip in mind for his next soujourn to New York though.
Not only was being this cold uncomfortable, it was down right dangerous. His toes were starting to freeze and his fingers and ears weren't doing much better and that was with shelter. Finally he gave up the idea of sleeping and demorphed and remorphed to his wolf form.
The thick, layered fur, gave Rian all the protection against the cold he would need and he curled up into a ball gratefully in the middle of what had once been the living room of the house.
He looked over at Luce who looked back at him from behind the greyhound's eyes. <<Not a word please. You were right.>> She just got up and came over and laid down next to him, sharing her warmth. He was slightly touched by the gesture though he also realized that as a racing dog the greyhound did not have much extra fur or fat on it to keep it warm. She was probably colder than he was right now.
Still, it was nice. He looked over at Matt. <<Care to join us?>> There was supposed to be a joking tone somewhere in there but it got lost, buried under his fatigue. He had rushed to get to the meeting on time and now he was rushing back, afraid to leave his faction alone too long since things had gotten quite dangerous in Vegas.
Matthew:
Matthew heard Rian's thought speak, shivering slightly under the blankets the covered his human form. He was used to the cold, or he had been once. Being in L.A. had made him soft. There he hardly needed any blankets. Here he couldn't seem to get warm enough. Both of them had morphed to animals more suited for handling the cold. He definitely had a morph that could add to the shared heat.
Giving up on the blanket he focused on the DNA he wanted. He began to bulk up and sprout fur, black and orange striped fur. A dog-like morph would have been a good choice, but the jackal wasn't practical for this. He had his doubts about how warm an animal built to live in Africa would keep him. The Siberian tiger on the other hand was very much built for colder climates. Soon he'd completed the transformation into the large, striped feline and he padded over to where the other two lay. He still admired the strength and grace of this large beast.
<<Cat's and dogs had better get along for one night because this morph is definitely better suited for the cold than I am.>> He contemplated where to lay down, not sure how Luce would feel about him being close to her. On one hand she seemed very practical and probably would have dealt with it for the sake of warmth. On the other hand he wasn't even one of her faction members. He was only traveling with them because he was headed the same way and a little companionship was a nice thing on the road. He finally decided practicality outweighed his fear of what she'd do. Besides, he had the feeling the greyhound needed added warmth more than the wolf did.
<<I'll move if you want me to, if you'd rather not be next to me that is>> he told her privately as he lay down. <<I figured practicality mattered more than any personal opinions or feelings right now.>> He rested his head on his large paws. The only thing to remember with sleeping this way would be to demorph every two hours so you wouldn't get stuck, he kept that as a mental note for himself though he was far better at counting than he had been when he'd gotten his bat morph and lost track of the time he'd spent in it.
Luce:
Luce curled up at Rian's back. Things between her and Rian had been better. They still spent most of their time in silence but it was no longer an uncomfortable, angry silence. Instead it was a silence shared by two people who just didn't have the tendency to talk much.
She was felt very content at the moment, if cold, and she closed her eyes and laid her head on her paws gratefully. She was headed home. Finally home. And she had a home to go to. She hadn't figured out what would be waiting there for her, she didn't know what she wanted, she still didn't know what she wanted. But she knew what she didn't want and that was a good enough beginning.
As Matt's voice entered her head she internally smiled at how cautious he was being. What did he think? That she would rip his head off. Not likely, especially with him being that beautiful cat. Then again, she reflected, the last time he'd met her she probably had been the type to rip people's heads off for random annoyances. The thought made her realize how much she'd changed.
<<It's fine Matthew. I appreciate the extra warmth,>> she said without opening her eyes. <<Though,>> she said growling slightly, <<this privilege does not extend into humanhood.>> She was joking with him, in her own way.
Rian:
The wolf was unsurprisingly not happy about the tiger. Apex predators tended to avoid each other in the wild, not cuddle up like some child's story about peace and love. But the wolf was Rian's most used and most familiar morphs so he didn't really have a problem calming the mind down and settling down for two hours of sleep.
<<I'll keep time,>> he offered. If anyone knew exactly how long the morphing time was it was Rian. He had to face that two hour time limit every two hours of his life.
He didn't let his mind descend into that trap of depression though. There were actual important things to think about. A virus to hunt down and Crayak's game to figure out. He knew he probably would never understand it all but that didn't stop him from wanting to.
<<So what do you think of the whole Crayak business?>> he asked Matt, though he didn't shut Luce out of the conversation.
Matt:
Surprisingly Luce seemed different then she had six months ago on his first return trip from New York to L.A. Even when she made the comment about the privilege not extending into humanhood he realized that she was trying to make a joke in her own way. She was different, and maybe the reason the change seemed so noticeable was just that he hadn't been around her during the transitory period. It was an interesting thought to consider.
Rian volunteered to keep time, and Matt was grateful for that. Considering he did this every day, spending most of his life in a morph now, Rian keeping track would be a comforting thought. The tiger wasn't too keen on spending the night with the wolf, but Matt surprisingly had found his inner tiger a lot quicker than he would have thought. Maybe it was because the tiger had a lot of qualities he'd always wanted and it had a calm confidence that he needed a lot lately. Whatever it was he had a reasonable control on the animal in normal situations. It wasn't battle tested yet though.
Matt heard Rian's question about his opinion on the Crayak issue. He had to pause and think about it for a bit. He'd been raised Christian, believing in heaven and hell, in god and the devil. This was somehow different though, however irrational that thought was. Neither god nor the devil had presented themselves to someone Matt knew in a physical form, and he'd never pictured them as playing a chess game with his life like he did with Crayak and the Ellimist. It was something entirely new and entirely alien to him, but so were a lot of things about his life now.
<<I'm not really sure what to think.>> he admitted. <<I really doubt that we can trust him and the idea that we're being used like pawns in a chess game bugs me a little. At the same time we can't ignore what he told Cassie. But the whole idea that he and the Ellimist are out there, omnipresent and all, is just a little eerie. Makes me wonder how much free will we actually have in this war and how much is just part of their game.>>
Rian:
<<Yeah,>> Rian answered distractedly. His head was laying on his paws and his eyes were staring straight ahead, his ears up and attentive, but Rian's mind was a world away. He didn't like the idea of being manipulated by anyone, especially not something pretending to be a god. And he absolutely loathed the idea that he was falling into someone else's trap.
<<I really don't like this Matt. I mean, why would he tell us about the virus? What is his angle? I really don't even want to go looking for an antidote if it might mean playing into the hands of something like that.>>
Matt:
<<Do we have much of a choice?>> he asked. <<It's like when I helped you save those refugees from the hazing in Chicago. Innocent people, free people, might die if we don't do this. That or they'll lose their freedom, and I'm starting wonder if maybe the latter is the worse option.>> He had to think he'd rather be dead than have a yeerk in his head, rather be dead than not be a detached consciousness constantly watching as you were forced to do things you would never be able to justify.
<<We may be playing into his hands, but how can we justify NOT finding out what we can about this?>> But then again, Matt remembered the disconnect he'd felt between his views and Rian's at the faction leader meeting. He realized Luce wasn't the only person in the group who'd changed, Rian had too. Rian was different somehow from the person who'd left Matt's faction in L.A. for his own in Vegas six months earlier. But the change was harder to figure out, like he couldn't put his finger on what exactly it was. But even as he thought this another realization came to his mind. We're all changing. Luce, Rian, me, Sara.... and not all of the changes are for the better. War did that to people, as history proved time and again. How could he have been so blind in assuming it wouldn't happen to them?
Rian:
<<Well like you said there is a second option. I mean the yeerks aren't doing this to kill humans. They are already short on them. So they will set up hospitals or whatever and treat people with the antidote and infest them. I mean, they won't die.>>
He moved around a bit getting into a more comfortable position. At least the rug they were laying on was keeping his body from being directly on the wooden floor which surely would have leeched his heat away. And the wolf mind wasn't giving him as much trouble as it had a while ago about the tiger.
<<I'm not saying I like it but sometimes you have to give something up to win. If we play into a self declared evil entities hand we're letting it play us like fiddles. And then, when we're wiped out or whatever other future the thing has in store for us who will save people then. Compared to that what is making a few more controllers.>>
Matt:
There is was again, the feeling of a disconnect of mentalities. Matthew couldn't put his finger on what it was yet that had changed in Rian's thinking. It just felt wrong no matter how true the statements were. I'm not saying I like it but sometimes you have to give something up to win. Since when did they have the right to make this decision though? When did they get to choose that others had to give up their freedom or their life because they, as Animorphs, didn't want to play into the hands of an evil entity? They'd already made their choice the way Matt saw it, and they had to investigate this at least a little.
Something came to Matt then, and rather than thinking it over he asked the question. <<What does winning this war mean to you Rian? I have to wonder that, because I also have to wonder when it became our right to make the decision of what other people would sacrifice in this war. When did we get the right to choose for a free human that they would give up their freedom, or their life because some would rather die than lose their freedom a second time? How do you justify them giving that up, all so you don't have to play into Crayak's hand?>>
Were he human he would have shaken his head right now, confused and frustrated at this. <<Being Animorphs, being the fighters of this war, shouldn't make us better than them. It shouldn't give us the right to make decisions for them, but even the decisions we make for ourselves affect them. We made our choice to fight this war. Besides, what if what I caught, the sickness I couldn't morph away, was a test strand of this bio weapon? Letting it go unchecked could end our fight just as easily as if we died trying.>>
Rian:
<<I never said we should let it go completely unchecked,>> Rian said getting angry at the sound of judgement in Matthew's voice. He hadn't had anyone looking over his shoulder, questioning his decisions in a long time and he realized he no longer liked it much. He had gotten used to being his own authority and what right did Matt have to judge him or imply that he was some type of unfeeling monster. And he didn't like that he was feeling a little defensive because of it. It only made him more determined to prove Matt wrong.
<<We should check all our options out but can playing into Crayak's hands really help us in the long run? Help them in the long run?>> In his head he had already drawn a line between his people and everyone else. He could only take care of so many, care for so many and he was at his quota.
<<We aren't any better than anyone else but like it or not we are in the position to make these decisions and they aren't, so we have to make the right ones, the smart ones.>>
Matt:
Rian was starting to get angry and it fueled an almost fear in Matt. He'd never had Rian mad at him before. He'd never had an argument with Rian when they'd been in L.A. together, not a major one. Rian had disobeyed a few orders, but it had turned out his choices had been better than Matt's so it wasn't like that had mattered so much. This scared Matt though, but it also made him equally angry and he found himself fighting to keep from expressing that anger in a growl.
<<You're right, we're in this position where we get to make the choices. We got offered the chance to fight back and we took it. Some of them would take this chance were they offered it though. I admit some of them wouldn't. The only difference between us and them is luck. We got lucky and got ourselves in a position to be given this chance whereas they haven't yet.>>
He took a few deep breaths to calm himself down. Getting angry and fighting about this wouldn't change anything, not for the better anyways. It could certainly make things worse. <<You didn't answer my question though, what does winning this war mean to you? What do you see the point of this war as? Maybe if I understand that I can understand where you're coming from better.>> Here he was, making the compromise, being the bigger man if you will. If only because he needed to understand what had changed in order to see who it was who was really wrong, him or Rian.
Rian:
Even Matt's tone was aggravating Rian. Great, now he was the immature one for yelling. <<What does it mean to you Matthew,>> he asked turning the question right back around and standing up as he did, his anger transferring to the wolf and his hackles rising though he was suppressing the growl. <<Does it mean going home to Sara and you're family?>> Rian had no idea of the events that had taken place to set Sara free but he knew that Matt still hoped of being with his twin one day again. A hope that Rian had worked hard not to hate him for having just because Rian didn't.
<<Do you really think things can ever go back to the way they were? So many of us are fighting for a world that doesn't exist anymore and never will. I'm just trying to make the best of a bad situation. I'm fighting to stay alive and to keep as many of my people alive as possible.>>
A part of him knew he shouldn't have been so narrow minded. He should worry about everyone's freedom but could he? So many times one of his members had come close to dying, to getting captured. And each time Rian had felt like his insides were rotting out at the thought that it would have been his fault. That they had depended on him to make the right choices and that he had failed.
So he really wasn't looking forward to being some knight in the Ellimist's or Crayak's chess game because he knew that if he were a knight then his people were pawns and it would be all to easy for one of those uncaring demi-gods to sacrifice one of them.
Matt:
Matt couldn't help it. When Rian turned the question around and challenged Matt to admit part of what he wanted out of this war was having Sara back, Matt heard a snarl escape the mouth of his tiger morph. He couldn't help being defensive because it wasn't his fault Rian had lost what he had or that Matt had something to go back to if this ever ended. The wolf was standing now and Matt stood up too, his bulk larger than that of Rian.
<<You say that like you're jealous, but believe me I sometimes feel like I got more luck in this war than I deserved. Sara nearly died when she went from being a controller to an Animorph. I used to hope we'd be together again, but now I don't even want to look far enough forward to hope both of us will survive this. To me the war is about taking back what we can, our own freedom if nothing else. It's about all the people who are controllers and can't fight against something they didn't see coming until it was too late. It's about people I knew who lost their lives for this war we didn't start, so far totaling two, Alex and Kristina.>>
Matt forgot in the blindness his anger gave him that Rian wouldn't have known Kristina Parker, who they'd both known in Chicago, was dead. Matt had only learned that from Sara. <<Raven has lost three recruits, the third one before even Alex was recruited. Even though I've come close to know how that feels, several times in fact, I can't care about my faction alone. I have to care about how my decisions effect free people because they will whether I want them to or not. I owe them that much because some of them have helped me and some of them lost loved ones because they were a controller I had to kill.>>
The tiger started to pace as Matt's thoughts went down a path they hadn't gone in a while, one he didn't want to be one but couldn't help being on at the moment. <<I used to wonder why soldiers were so traumatized by their war experience sometimes, but I think I understand it now. I've lost people I've cared about and nearly lost several more. I've barely escaped my own death on countless occasions. And to top it all of I've had to kill people, people who only had to die because I couldn't get directly at the yeerk in their head and it wanted to kill me. I can't justify those deaths Rian, because by all reason they were innocent. They payed for something they were probably fighting every step of the way.>> There was a pause as Matt tried to regain his composure. <<This war is about everything that has happened and shouldn't have happened, the things that can't be undone.>>
Rian:
<<Poor Matt, more luck than he deserves. A soldier who actually had to kill people.>> He knew the words were unfair and cruel even as he said them but he couldn't help himself for some reason. All the stress of the last few weeks, hell, the last few months all seemed to be coming back at once. Matt had had to kill people. So sad.
Rian had killed thousands. And the only thing he hated about it was that he didn't care. Shouldn't he have cared? Shouldn't he have looked at that lake full or corpses and felt even the slightest bit of regret?
But he hadn't. All he'd felt was satisfaction. The kind of calm, filling feeling of doing an honest days work, of completing a project. And nothing about killing that many should have felt good.
So let Matt cry about how he had to fight for the helpless, defend the weak, seek justice. All that Rian heard was something he never had the chance of being again. Innocent. Good. Matt was good in a way that Rian just wasn't. He managed to lead, managed to fight and he hadn't lost whatever it was in him that made him a good person. He wasn't lost.
But Rian was. Rian had given up the most important thing to this war already, his freedom, his goodness. And he hated Matt for still having his. And he hated himself for being jealous.
He began to demorph, talking as he made the transition. Maybe being cold right now wasn't such a bad thing. He needed to calm down.
<<You have no idea why soldiers go home broken. You think it is because of the lives they took? It isn't because they killed people Matt. Those deaths don't haunt them in the middle of the night. No, what scares the shit out of them is the feeling they had when they did it. What haunts them, breaks them, is that they enjoyed it."
Matt:
Poor Matt, more luck than he deserves. A soldier who actually had to kill people. When Rian retaliated with that comment Matt realized that this wasn't the person he'd known anymore. Physically Rian was the same, but on the inside something had changed far too drastically and Matt still didn't know how. It was Rian's next words that revealed this to Matt, gave him an idea of what had happened.
He started demorphing as he saw Rian doing it, not wanting to stay tiger with the risk of getting mad an killing him. <<And I suppose you know because that's the case for you isn't it? You know that's the case because everyone can be fit in a little box with a little label that so obviously says who they are and how they think and why they think that way?>> Matt's mental voice taunted, done trying to be nice about this. He knew he was hitting below the belt with this in some regards, but he couldn't find the means to care. <<You know damn well, better than I do, how wrong that assumption is. There isn't one right or wrong answer to why soldiers go home broken, just as much as there is no right or wrong answer for anything a person thinks or feels. For some it might be what I say and for others what you say.>>
He lost his thought speak ability there and had to wait until he finished demorphing to say the rest. "But there is some truth in you understanding that point of view, isn't there? That's what this war is all about to you now, am I right? It's all death, kill the yeerks and screw anyone who gets in your way. Well let ability to care. Without that you're no better than the yeerks, Rian." And that was true, because the yeerks didn't care who died so they could get their way. That's why the Animorphs had to care, it was the only thing that made them any better than that which they fought.
Rian:
He had finished his remorph at about the time Matt had finished his demorph. Normally it didn't take him so long but he was angry and trying to concentrate on remorphing only reminded him of the necessity of remorphing. And that only reminded him of the trap he was in. The hell of the constant morphing the constant drain on his will power.
For two hours at a time he could be a real boy but when that two hours was up, just like in some messed up fairy tale, Rian had to demorph, and he was reminded of what he really was and what he would never be. Not as long as he chose to fight. He could leave everyone and everything behind, just overstay his two hour welcome and become a permant resident of the body he could live with but no, he demorphed.
And every time he did it killed him. Every time he had to feel that change he wanted to cry, for just a moment he was suicidal again like he had been before. And there was no end in sight. The war wouldn't end any time soon and despite everything he was saying to Matt now, he wasn't a coward and he wasn't a traitor. He wouldn't abandon his faction or his cause so he was stuck in the hell of having the most basic and yet most vital thing permanently out of his reach.
Teri had once asked him why he couldn't just wait until later in life to try to transition. She had been right there with him when he'd begun to look up what the process would take, the time, the money, the pain. She had wanted to know why he couldn't just wait until he was older.
He had told her in all seriousness, though not knowing how prophetic the words were, that if there was an apocalypse tomorrow he could survive without a college degree but he couldn't live without a body. She had shook her head and told him that if an apocalypse happened tomorrow he wouldn't have to worry about it now would he. But even though her tone had been light he had seen that he had gotten through to her. This was life or death for him. He had passed the point where he could just swallow the feeling of wrongness he'd felt all his life. He would change or he would die and he saw that she understood that.
But nothing had prepared him for this. For the sneaky, deceiving feeling of temptation. Just a couple of more minutes, it would whisper to him. Just a couple of more minutes and you'll never have to go through this again. You'll be free. But he always changed. He had a war to fight.
And if he took a little of that pain out on his enemies then what of it. After everything they had done to the planet, to his race, to his country, to his family, to his friends and to him. Didn't they deserve a bit of the same?
"Who says we have to be better than them Matt? We aren't better. They are just one species out there trying to survive and we are another. There is no moral high ground here, just evolution. Strongest wins, strongest survives and the loser goes extinct."
Matt:
Who says we have to be better than them Matt? We aren't better. They are just one species out there trying to survive and we are another. There is no moral high ground here, just evolution. Strongest wins, strongest survives and the loser goes extinct. Matt was standing there listening to Rian's words and he could hear the blood pounding in his ears. He wasn't even sure he could hear Rian correctly. He wasn't violent. He'd never seen a need to resort to it and some of the things he did in morph felt so wrong to him later because of how out of character for him they were, or would have been.
He was changing though, and violence when needed had become a part of him. That was probably why he made his next move. He swung at Rian, feeling his fist connect with something, shouting as he did. "What the hell is wrong with you!"
He took a step back, trying to calm himself down and slightly shocked at what he'd done. We're all changing, he reminded himself. This is just part of who you've become. But could he accept that? It didn't matter now. Now there was something more important to think about.
"You're right Rian," he said finally. "The strongest survives though not unscathed. However, are we talking physical strength or emotional strength? Is one more important than the other? Physical strength ensures that you win the battles. Emotional strength ensures that you don't lose sight of the truth. Because tell me, which is harder? Does it take more strength to stop caring all together because it's too hard to feel all that pain, or to care about every effect your actions might have and carry that burden, to know and care that someone isn't going to see a loved one when this war is over because you had to take their life or they would have taken yours because a piece of scum living in their head was controlling them?"
He stood there, his fists clenched and his face fixed in a glare, hoping something he had said or done was getting through but not having seen any results. "Going emotionally numb is the easy way out, because yes there is a moral high ground. We had it to begin with, because we were capable of caring. All that matters to the majority of yeerks is getting as high as they can in the ranking system and tough shit for whoever they had to step on to get there. We were better than that because humans naturally care, and I for one am not stooping to their level. It's not going to give us an advantage or make us able to win the war. It's only sacrificing the one thing that sets us apart from them."
Rian:
Rian had never gotten into fist fights or wrestling matches before the invasion. He didn't know if that had anything to do with being a girl or if it was just the time they grew up in. Fist fighting simple wasn't as common as it used to be especially since he hadn't done much to inspire it. He had been quiet but he hadn't been a nerd or a bully magnet. Just some weird kid that people left alone.
The two times he had gotten into fights as a human since becoming an animorph it had been against a clear enemy in the form of the gangsters in the den and the scientists in Area 51.
So he wasn't expecting it when Matt hit him and the punch took him by surprise. The punch hadn't been made with any sort of intent to hurt him. At least it hadn't been the type of punch they always teach you to throw in martial arts, something small and directed. The blow had obviously been motivated by anger and as such had had all of Matt's weight behind it.
Rian's head snapped to the side as he stumbled away from Matt a bit, his ears ringinig. His hand came up to touch his cheek and he looked up at Matt. There should have been anger in his eyes. If it had been anyone else he would have been angry, he would have launched himself at them and tried to get them back for the sucker punch.
But it wasn't just anyone, it was Matt. Matt who he knew didn't like to use violence where words would work. Matt who was more responsible than he'd ever been and much better at controlling any anger he felt. And that was only if you actually were able to make him angry. He'd never been angry that Rian had seen. It was that alone that shocked him the most. The thought that he had done something bad enough to get Matt angry.
"What the hell is wrong with you!" The words fell into the silence that hung in the air since no one seemed to be moving. At their sound Rian flinched a bit. It was unnerving to hear the words he'd been thinking for a long time now out loud like that.
He stood up straighter and let his hand fall from his face but he didn't look up and meet Matt's eyes, couldn't. And instead of answering he let Matt speak and every word of the speech just stung more as Rian began to realize the anger induced haze he'd been living in the past couple of months. For a long time now he had given no thought to what was right or fair. He had just concentrated on what hurt the most. And the first time he had even spared a brief moment to think about what he was doing was that morning he'd talked with Suji. And he hadn't liked the fact that, when questioned, he had no good answer so he'd just glossed over it and gone on to planning for the dam.
He'd been like a horse with blinders on and he'd hurt most of the people who'd been close to him including Ember. How often had he ignored her in favor of the next mission, the next blow he could strike against the yeerks? Too often.
"I'm sorry Matt," he said turning away getting ready to head out the door. He didn't know where he was going, where he thought he was going, he just felt like he needed to go. But wasn't that doing what he always did? Running away, shutting people out when he didn't like what they had to say, retreating into his own head. He paused, wondering what he should do, go or stay?
Matt:
Rian turned away from Matt, apologizing has he did, and it was then that Matthew realized he'd gotten through, but had it been worth what it had taken? Matt didn't feel any satisfaction, any relief, just a numb shock at his own actions that had been totally out of character for him. He wanted to say something, anything at all, to Rian, but the fact was that he couldn't even figure out what to say now.
He was worried Rian would leave though, and though he felt it should be Rian's choice whether he ran from the problem Matt felt like he should still say something to try and keep Rian here. A few times his mouth opened, the words not coming to him or vanishing as soon as he tried to say them. Finally, though, something came. "No Rian. Don't apologize. We all make mistakes, and even though now a bad decision could be fatal it doesn't mean we're less prone to making them. Fact is I've made a few and one of them you corrected me on, back in the tunnels when I tried to leave Kat and Ember to fight their way out on their own. You wouldn't leave, and now that I look back we barely escaped even with all of us fighting. The way I see it we're even. Besides, all we can ever do with mistakes is to learn from them and keep moving on."
Luce:
Luce had kept quiet during the argument. At first it was because she hadn't had much of an opinion. There wasn't much she could do about Crayak and she didn't know what his game was. And when the conversation had moved into the ethics of warfare she had even tried to ignore it. It was not an issue she enjoyed thinking about too deeply.
For her there was no one right philosophy that she could follow. She had felt Jals' pure and almost child-like joy at every new thing it had experienced so she knew how the yeerks felt. She had seen Jals' memories of what life in the pool was like, the almost nothingness of it. At the time she hadn't cared, she had just wanted the yeerk out of her head. But now that it was gone, now that she had some distance...
It was a hard choice for them to make. Live as slugs or live as gods because to them, having bodies, living in the world of sight, sound, smell, taste...it was like heaven, at least at first, at least as long as you could shut out the sound of the screaming slave in your head, as long as you could remain immune to their hatred, their despair, their hope. She thought hope was the worst one. The hope that you would die, the hope that you would give up. It was hard to live with someone praying for your death with every moment.
So she understood why so many of them were jaded, were hateful. Why so many of them seemed so ruthless. They had to learn not to care to even begin to survive, to live the lives they lived. It wasn't right. But she got it. And she used to hate them, but now she couldn't.
But that didn't stop her from killing them. No matter how much she could empathize with their situation the facts, when you got right down to them, were that they were slave masters of the worst kind and if they didn't win this war, or at least cause enough damage to make the yeerks think twice about what they were doing, free people, good or bad, would never get the chance to make their own choices.
But did that make it right to kill them?
And where did Sedra come in? Luce still didn't know. She still didn't know what to do about Sedra, what to do about Catherine. And talking about ethics just reminded her that she didn't know. Just reminded her that part of the reason she was so excited to go home was because Sedra was there. And that part of the reason she still felt guilty was because she wanted to see her so badly.
Matt's words made sense, though Rian's did as well but only in the way that would make you ashamed to believe them. But when the argument came to blows Luce felt she should step in no matter who was right. Besides, she had a feeling Rian might be as confused as she was.
She wasn't sure how she felt about that, she normally trusted her leaders to keep their heads about morality so that she didn't have to and seeing Rian weak, not knowing...it made her nervous. She was glad she was the only one here and not one of the others.
Having a faction leader that was five years younger than her made it easy for her to remember that he was still a kid in a lot of ways. It was true that he often came off as older but there were times when Luce was reminded how young he really was. But she felt like he had the potential to grow up into a good leader. She saw that in a lot of them, in Ember, in Suji. They were young now but they'd lead their generation into a new age and so she was a bit more forgiving of their mistakes, at least internally. Outwardly she was as critical as people seemed to expect.
<<Are you both done?>> She asked in a calm voice, pushing the practical tone and hoping it was the right one, that it wouldn't set off either temper in the delicate emotional atmosphere. <<Because if you are I would like to point out that I am very cold.>>
Matt:
<<Are you both done? Because if you are I would like to point out that I am very cold.>> Luce's thought speak broke through the silence that had hung in the air for a little while. It broke through Matt's thoughts, which had turned back to the uncharacteristic punch he'd delivered to Rian's face. Now that he was removed from his anger, from the heat of the argument, he felt shocked that he'd resorted to violence. He'd always been one to choose words over actions when the prior would suffice. Had the war changed him so much that he could and would resort to using action, that he saw it as necessary?
He ignored the thought for now, not sure how to feel about it. It felt like when he'd fought as the crocodile in the sewers and he'd been shocked and sickened by what he'd done, only this time he couldn't blame it on the animal form, this time his actions had been completely his own. But wasn't ignoring it doing what he'd just told Rian not to do? Wouldn't he have to face this eventually? Yes, I will have to face this sometime. Just.... not right now. I need time to think.
"Yeah, I think we're done," Matt said, finally responding to the question. He focused on his tiger morph and after a few minutes for the transformation Matt padded over and lay down again, the tiger's calm soothing away some of his confused feelings. The tiger knew itself better than Matt did, and right now he envied that aspect of the animal. I've never been sure of myself as a leader. I was never sure of myself before then. Can I stay unsure and not lose everything I've worked for? Or is that too much of a risk? Do I need to figure out who I am? So much was changing, and the fact that he hadn't seen it before bothered him. The only problem was, he didn't know how to.
Rian:
Rian turned towards the shivering greyhound when Luce's words entered his head and began the process that would get him back into his wolf form. He didn't know what he was feeling or what he should do or what he believed but he knew Luce was cold and that was something he could take care of.
As he laid down next to her he avoided looking at Matt. Things had used to be so easy for him. Before all this he'd never put himself forward much. He hadn't been a follower but he hadn't been a leader either. He'd been a loner and had alternatively been happy and unhappy as such.
And when he'd lost Bryan he'd suddenly found himself on his own, not particularly unusual for him, and he'd handled it. But then he'd been thrown into this group and instead of making connections with people on his own terms he had just found a substitute for the brother he'd lost in Matt and he had let Matt rule his life.
Matt probably didn't know that but Rian did. He remembered clearly feeling like he didn't have to worry about things anymore because he could just let Matt do the moral thinking for him and all he had to do was play the white knight to Matt's king.
But once he was really out on his own he had gotten afraid, afraid of getting someone killed, afraid of not doing enough, afraid of being weak. He had made the Vegas faction into one of the hardest factions around. Everyone in it had killed at least once and many had multiple times culminating in the deaths of all the yeerks in the pool they'd bombed and drained. And he remembered that he'd been proud of that.
"Does it take more strength to stop caring all together because it's too hard to feel all that pain, or to care about every effect your actions might have and carry that burden?"
Matt's words had felt true in that way that things sometimes did. Of the two of them Matt was stronger and Rian knew it and feared that truth because he knew that their factions were, in a way, an extension of them and if Rian was weak then Las Vegas might pay the price.
<<How do you carry the pain,>> he asked Matt quietly.
Matt:
Rian's quiet question broke through Matt's thoughts and gave him a temporary reason to stop thinking about them. Now he could think about what Rian was asking him. How did he carry the pain?
It wasn't actually something he'd ever thought he'd need to explain in words. Yet, here he was trying to find words to explain it. Here he was reflecting again on being the crocodile in the sewers, on attacking Aubrey's stepfather as a jackal, even on his recent battle in his tiger morph on his way to the faction leader meeting. In two of those situations he'd killed someone and in the other he'd at least done a fair amount of damage.
<<Situation ethics.>> Matt said, using the term he'd learned for a paper he'd written in the year before becoming an Animorph. The idea was that there was no moral code that could be universally applied because each situation was different, thus each one required it's own standard of ethics. It was one he'd unknowingly adopted in the war, because he could only justify each life he took by the fact that, in the end, he was doing it for a reason that was morally right.
<<I try to rationalize what I can. I know the human ends up suffering as much as the yeerk, but a lot of the time I can't think about that until after an action has been made. At the time I'm making the action, it's me or them usually. It also helps that a few former controllers I've met feel like death is better than enslavement, because at least then you're free.>> He thought of Renae, the doctor in Union, as he spoke the words she'd uttered to him.
<<What I can't rationalize I turn into something positive, into a reason to fight. I know winning this war can't entirely make up for the damage I cause getting there, but I have to believe it makes up for some of it.>> His own thoughts seemed.... very simple and very much flawed when voiced for Rian. But holding to these beliefs was what gave him his momentum and allowed him to know the pain he caused without letting it consume him, without drowning in it.
Luce:
Luce knew that the question hadn't been directed at her but considering all that had happened to her today and in the past few days she thought she might be able to help as well.
<It helps to have a code to live by. A lot of warrior traditions in the past had a strict code and normally it was something really simple. "Never surrender." "Semper Fidelis-Always loyal" "Never leave a soldier behind." "Come back with your shield or on it.">> The last was a bit of a joke since surely both boys would recognize the 300 quote. <<I used to like sayings like that but only recently have I come to understand why they were needed, or at least think I understand,>> she said, her voice troubled.
<<Like Matt said, most fights you don't have time to figure out the moral implications of every one of your actions so it helps to have a code, a simple one, that you can remember, that you can stick to. Sayings such as those don't cover every situation but they are a start. So the real question is what is your code Rian? You have to know what you're fighting for and what you'll do to get it and, maybe more importantly, what you won't do to get it. And you have to know those things before going into a fight because you won't have time to figure it out in there. And once you figure it out you're the only one responsible for holding yourself to it.>>
She hadn't meant to say so much and after the first couple of sentences she hadn't even been speaking to Rian and Matt so much as she was speaking to herself. She had lived a long time in a haze of pain induced fury, never thinking to deeply about her actions. It was time to let that go.
Rian:
Rian didn't speak for a while, trying to take in both of their words but in the end he couldn't. Maybe he just had to sleep on it, or maybe it would never make sense. For a second he was afraid that he was simply incapable of holding any sort of morality in his thoughts but that couldn't be so. He remembered a time when he'd had a strong moral code. He just didn't remember what it was or how he had been able to believe it so strongly. Maybe he'd just been naive.
<<Thank you both,>> he said wanting to let them know that he'd heard their words even though he didn't know how to respond to them just yet. <<I guess we should get some sleep, we have a long drive ahead of us in the morning and only trouble at the end of the road,>> though that wasn't exactly true. Ember was at the end of this particular road and he would be very glad to see her when he got home if only to hold her, make sure she was ok, make sure he was ok.
Matt:
Matt listened to Luce's words. She seemed to grasp what he was saying very well, and she seemed a lot different now from the person who had traveled with him six months ago to L.A. to be a seed member in Vegas faction. But, everyone was changing weren't they? Everyone and everything, and he didn't know where he was headed right now because he didn't know where he'd started this journey. He'd never been sure of himself and he felt now like he might lose any grip he had on who is was in the chaos of this war.
Still, Rian's words broke through his thoughts that had started to stray during the silence after Luce had finished. <<Yeah. Really there's trouble anywhere, but we have to face it a little more once we reach the end of the road.>> Because that was where they had to try and combat the trouble. Thus, that was where it became their greatest problem. The drive would take a while so..... <<Wait, drive? I wasn't informed we get to take a car.>>
Rian:
<<I think it hardly qualifies as a car,>> Rian said quietly and then began to laugh a bit as he thought about the van they had in the garage of this house. Getting fuel for the thing was pretty dangerous sometimes but at least they weren't paying pre-invasion gas prices anymore.
<<But you may think more of the car after you experience my driving skills.>> Rian had never learned how to drive before the invasion. He had never had a reason to and since the invasion he had certainly had no chance to learn except for on this lovely trip. Mostly he'd left the driving to Luce.
Rian shivered in the wind coming through the walls of the broken down house they had taken over for the night. He wished that they had been able to pack more blanketts in their saddle bags for the cross country trip but the northeastern winter cold had seemed like an almost mythical thing and easily forgotten in the middle of the Nevada heat.
He would keep this trip in mind for his next soujourn to New York though.
Not only was being this cold uncomfortable, it was down right dangerous. His toes were starting to freeze and his fingers and ears weren't doing much better and that was with shelter. Finally he gave up the idea of sleeping and demorphed and remorphed to his wolf form.
The thick, layered fur, gave Rian all the protection against the cold he would need and he curled up into a ball gratefully in the middle of what had once been the living room of the house.
He looked over at Luce who looked back at him from behind the greyhound's eyes. <<Not a word please. You were right.>> She just got up and came over and laid down next to him, sharing her warmth. He was slightly touched by the gesture though he also realized that as a racing dog the greyhound did not have much extra fur or fat on it to keep it warm. She was probably colder than he was right now.
Still, it was nice. He looked over at Matt. <<Care to join us?>> There was supposed to be a joking tone somewhere in there but it got lost, buried under his fatigue. He had rushed to get to the meeting on time and now he was rushing back, afraid to leave his faction alone too long since things had gotten quite dangerous in Vegas.
Matthew:
Matthew heard Rian's thought speak, shivering slightly under the blankets the covered his human form. He was used to the cold, or he had been once. Being in L.A. had made him soft. There he hardly needed any blankets. Here he couldn't seem to get warm enough. Both of them had morphed to animals more suited for handling the cold. He definitely had a morph that could add to the shared heat.
Giving up on the blanket he focused on the DNA he wanted. He began to bulk up and sprout fur, black and orange striped fur. A dog-like morph would have been a good choice, but the jackal wasn't practical for this. He had his doubts about how warm an animal built to live in Africa would keep him. The Siberian tiger on the other hand was very much built for colder climates. Soon he'd completed the transformation into the large, striped feline and he padded over to where the other two lay. He still admired the strength and grace of this large beast.
<<Cat's and dogs had better get along for one night because this morph is definitely better suited for the cold than I am.>> He contemplated where to lay down, not sure how Luce would feel about him being close to her. On one hand she seemed very practical and probably would have dealt with it for the sake of warmth. On the other hand he wasn't even one of her faction members. He was only traveling with them because he was headed the same way and a little companionship was a nice thing on the road. He finally decided practicality outweighed his fear of what she'd do. Besides, he had the feeling the greyhound needed added warmth more than the wolf did.
<<I'll move if you want me to, if you'd rather not be next to me that is>> he told her privately as he lay down. <<I figured practicality mattered more than any personal opinions or feelings right now.>> He rested his head on his large paws. The only thing to remember with sleeping this way would be to demorph every two hours so you wouldn't get stuck, he kept that as a mental note for himself though he was far better at counting than he had been when he'd gotten his bat morph and lost track of the time he'd spent in it.
Luce:
Luce curled up at Rian's back. Things between her and Rian had been better. They still spent most of their time in silence but it was no longer an uncomfortable, angry silence. Instead it was a silence shared by two people who just didn't have the tendency to talk much.
She was felt very content at the moment, if cold, and she closed her eyes and laid her head on her paws gratefully. She was headed home. Finally home. And she had a home to go to. She hadn't figured out what would be waiting there for her, she didn't know what she wanted, she still didn't know what she wanted. But she knew what she didn't want and that was a good enough beginning.
As Matt's voice entered her head she internally smiled at how cautious he was being. What did he think? That she would rip his head off. Not likely, especially with him being that beautiful cat. Then again, she reflected, the last time he'd met her she probably had been the type to rip people's heads off for random annoyances. The thought made her realize how much she'd changed.
<<It's fine Matthew. I appreciate the extra warmth,>> she said without opening her eyes. <<Though,>> she said growling slightly, <<this privilege does not extend into humanhood.>> She was joking with him, in her own way.
Rian:
The wolf was unsurprisingly not happy about the tiger. Apex predators tended to avoid each other in the wild, not cuddle up like some child's story about peace and love. But the wolf was Rian's most used and most familiar morphs so he didn't really have a problem calming the mind down and settling down for two hours of sleep.
<<I'll keep time,>> he offered. If anyone knew exactly how long the morphing time was it was Rian. He had to face that two hour time limit every two hours of his life.
He didn't let his mind descend into that trap of depression though. There were actual important things to think about. A virus to hunt down and Crayak's game to figure out. He knew he probably would never understand it all but that didn't stop him from wanting to.
<<So what do you think of the whole Crayak business?>> he asked Matt, though he didn't shut Luce out of the conversation.
Matt:
Surprisingly Luce seemed different then she had six months ago on his first return trip from New York to L.A. Even when she made the comment about the privilege not extending into humanhood he realized that she was trying to make a joke in her own way. She was different, and maybe the reason the change seemed so noticeable was just that he hadn't been around her during the transitory period. It was an interesting thought to consider.
Rian volunteered to keep time, and Matt was grateful for that. Considering he did this every day, spending most of his life in a morph now, Rian keeping track would be a comforting thought. The tiger wasn't too keen on spending the night with the wolf, but Matt surprisingly had found his inner tiger a lot quicker than he would have thought. Maybe it was because the tiger had a lot of qualities he'd always wanted and it had a calm confidence that he needed a lot lately. Whatever it was he had a reasonable control on the animal in normal situations. It wasn't battle tested yet though.
Matt heard Rian's question about his opinion on the Crayak issue. He had to pause and think about it for a bit. He'd been raised Christian, believing in heaven and hell, in god and the devil. This was somehow different though, however irrational that thought was. Neither god nor the devil had presented themselves to someone Matt knew in a physical form, and he'd never pictured them as playing a chess game with his life like he did with Crayak and the Ellimist. It was something entirely new and entirely alien to him, but so were a lot of things about his life now.
<<I'm not really sure what to think.>> he admitted. <<I really doubt that we can trust him and the idea that we're being used like pawns in a chess game bugs me a little. At the same time we can't ignore what he told Cassie. But the whole idea that he and the Ellimist are out there, omnipresent and all, is just a little eerie. Makes me wonder how much free will we actually have in this war and how much is just part of their game.>>
Rian:
<<Yeah,>> Rian answered distractedly. His head was laying on his paws and his eyes were staring straight ahead, his ears up and attentive, but Rian's mind was a world away. He didn't like the idea of being manipulated by anyone, especially not something pretending to be a god. And he absolutely loathed the idea that he was falling into someone else's trap.
<<I really don't like this Matt. I mean, why would he tell us about the virus? What is his angle? I really don't even want to go looking for an antidote if it might mean playing into the hands of something like that.>>
Matt:
<<Do we have much of a choice?>> he asked. <<It's like when I helped you save those refugees from the hazing in Chicago. Innocent people, free people, might die if we don't do this. That or they'll lose their freedom, and I'm starting wonder if maybe the latter is the worse option.>> He had to think he'd rather be dead than have a yeerk in his head, rather be dead than not be a detached consciousness constantly watching as you were forced to do things you would never be able to justify.
<<We may be playing into his hands, but how can we justify NOT finding out what we can about this?>> But then again, Matt remembered the disconnect he'd felt between his views and Rian's at the faction leader meeting. He realized Luce wasn't the only person in the group who'd changed, Rian had too. Rian was different somehow from the person who'd left Matt's faction in L.A. for his own in Vegas six months earlier. But the change was harder to figure out, like he couldn't put his finger on what exactly it was. But even as he thought this another realization came to his mind. We're all changing. Luce, Rian, me, Sara.... and not all of the changes are for the better. War did that to people, as history proved time and again. How could he have been so blind in assuming it wouldn't happen to them?
Rian:
<<Well like you said there is a second option. I mean the yeerks aren't doing this to kill humans. They are already short on them. So they will set up hospitals or whatever and treat people with the antidote and infest them. I mean, they won't die.>>
He moved around a bit getting into a more comfortable position. At least the rug they were laying on was keeping his body from being directly on the wooden floor which surely would have leeched his heat away. And the wolf mind wasn't giving him as much trouble as it had a while ago about the tiger.
<<I'm not saying I like it but sometimes you have to give something up to win. If we play into a self declared evil entities hand we're letting it play us like fiddles. And then, when we're wiped out or whatever other future the thing has in store for us who will save people then. Compared to that what is making a few more controllers.>>
Matt:
There is was again, the feeling of a disconnect of mentalities. Matthew couldn't put his finger on what it was yet that had changed in Rian's thinking. It just felt wrong no matter how true the statements were. I'm not saying I like it but sometimes you have to give something up to win. Since when did they have the right to make this decision though? When did they get to choose that others had to give up their freedom or their life because they, as Animorphs, didn't want to play into the hands of an evil entity? They'd already made their choice the way Matt saw it, and they had to investigate this at least a little.
Something came to Matt then, and rather than thinking it over he asked the question. <<What does winning this war mean to you Rian? I have to wonder that, because I also have to wonder when it became our right to make the decision of what other people would sacrifice in this war. When did we get the right to choose for a free human that they would give up their freedom, or their life because some would rather die than lose their freedom a second time? How do you justify them giving that up, all so you don't have to play into Crayak's hand?>>
Were he human he would have shaken his head right now, confused and frustrated at this. <<Being Animorphs, being the fighters of this war, shouldn't make us better than them. It shouldn't give us the right to make decisions for them, but even the decisions we make for ourselves affect them. We made our choice to fight this war. Besides, what if what I caught, the sickness I couldn't morph away, was a test strand of this bio weapon? Letting it go unchecked could end our fight just as easily as if we died trying.>>
Rian:
<<I never said we should let it go completely unchecked,>> Rian said getting angry at the sound of judgement in Matthew's voice. He hadn't had anyone looking over his shoulder, questioning his decisions in a long time and he realized he no longer liked it much. He had gotten used to being his own authority and what right did Matt have to judge him or imply that he was some type of unfeeling monster. And he didn't like that he was feeling a little defensive because of it. It only made him more determined to prove Matt wrong.
<<We should check all our options out but can playing into Crayak's hands really help us in the long run? Help them in the long run?>> In his head he had already drawn a line between his people and everyone else. He could only take care of so many, care for so many and he was at his quota.
<<We aren't any better than anyone else but like it or not we are in the position to make these decisions and they aren't, so we have to make the right ones, the smart ones.>>
Matt:
Rian was starting to get angry and it fueled an almost fear in Matt. He'd never had Rian mad at him before. He'd never had an argument with Rian when they'd been in L.A. together, not a major one. Rian had disobeyed a few orders, but it had turned out his choices had been better than Matt's so it wasn't like that had mattered so much. This scared Matt though, but it also made him equally angry and he found himself fighting to keep from expressing that anger in a growl.
<<You're right, we're in this position where we get to make the choices. We got offered the chance to fight back and we took it. Some of them would take this chance were they offered it though. I admit some of them wouldn't. The only difference between us and them is luck. We got lucky and got ourselves in a position to be given this chance whereas they haven't yet.>>
He took a few deep breaths to calm himself down. Getting angry and fighting about this wouldn't change anything, not for the better anyways. It could certainly make things worse. <<You didn't answer my question though, what does winning this war mean to you? What do you see the point of this war as? Maybe if I understand that I can understand where you're coming from better.>> Here he was, making the compromise, being the bigger man if you will. If only because he needed to understand what had changed in order to see who it was who was really wrong, him or Rian.
Rian:
Even Matt's tone was aggravating Rian. Great, now he was the immature one for yelling. <<What does it mean to you Matthew,>> he asked turning the question right back around and standing up as he did, his anger transferring to the wolf and his hackles rising though he was suppressing the growl. <<Does it mean going home to Sara and you're family?>> Rian had no idea of the events that had taken place to set Sara free but he knew that Matt still hoped of being with his twin one day again. A hope that Rian had worked hard not to hate him for having just because Rian didn't.
<<Do you really think things can ever go back to the way they were? So many of us are fighting for a world that doesn't exist anymore and never will. I'm just trying to make the best of a bad situation. I'm fighting to stay alive and to keep as many of my people alive as possible.>>
A part of him knew he shouldn't have been so narrow minded. He should worry about everyone's freedom but could he? So many times one of his members had come close to dying, to getting captured. And each time Rian had felt like his insides were rotting out at the thought that it would have been his fault. That they had depended on him to make the right choices and that he had failed.
So he really wasn't looking forward to being some knight in the Ellimist's or Crayak's chess game because he knew that if he were a knight then his people were pawns and it would be all to easy for one of those uncaring demi-gods to sacrifice one of them.
Matt:
Matt couldn't help it. When Rian turned the question around and challenged Matt to admit part of what he wanted out of this war was having Sara back, Matt heard a snarl escape the mouth of his tiger morph. He couldn't help being defensive because it wasn't his fault Rian had lost what he had or that Matt had something to go back to if this ever ended. The wolf was standing now and Matt stood up too, his bulk larger than that of Rian.
<<You say that like you're jealous, but believe me I sometimes feel like I got more luck in this war than I deserved. Sara nearly died when she went from being a controller to an Animorph. I used to hope we'd be together again, but now I don't even want to look far enough forward to hope both of us will survive this. To me the war is about taking back what we can, our own freedom if nothing else. It's about all the people who are controllers and can't fight against something they didn't see coming until it was too late. It's about people I knew who lost their lives for this war we didn't start, so far totaling two, Alex and Kristina.>>
Matt forgot in the blindness his anger gave him that Rian wouldn't have known Kristina Parker, who they'd both known in Chicago, was dead. Matt had only learned that from Sara. <<Raven has lost three recruits, the third one before even Alex was recruited. Even though I've come close to know how that feels, several times in fact, I can't care about my faction alone. I have to care about how my decisions effect free people because they will whether I want them to or not. I owe them that much because some of them have helped me and some of them lost loved ones because they were a controller I had to kill.>>
The tiger started to pace as Matt's thoughts went down a path they hadn't gone in a while, one he didn't want to be one but couldn't help being on at the moment. <<I used to wonder why soldiers were so traumatized by their war experience sometimes, but I think I understand it now. I've lost people I've cared about and nearly lost several more. I've barely escaped my own death on countless occasions. And to top it all of I've had to kill people, people who only had to die because I couldn't get directly at the yeerk in their head and it wanted to kill me. I can't justify those deaths Rian, because by all reason they were innocent. They payed for something they were probably fighting every step of the way.>> There was a pause as Matt tried to regain his composure. <<This war is about everything that has happened and shouldn't have happened, the things that can't be undone.>>
Rian:
<<Poor Matt, more luck than he deserves. A soldier who actually had to kill people.>> He knew the words were unfair and cruel even as he said them but he couldn't help himself for some reason. All the stress of the last few weeks, hell, the last few months all seemed to be coming back at once. Matt had had to kill people. So sad.
Rian had killed thousands. And the only thing he hated about it was that he didn't care. Shouldn't he have cared? Shouldn't he have looked at that lake full or corpses and felt even the slightest bit of regret?
But he hadn't. All he'd felt was satisfaction. The kind of calm, filling feeling of doing an honest days work, of completing a project. And nothing about killing that many should have felt good.
So let Matt cry about how he had to fight for the helpless, defend the weak, seek justice. All that Rian heard was something he never had the chance of being again. Innocent. Good. Matt was good in a way that Rian just wasn't. He managed to lead, managed to fight and he hadn't lost whatever it was in him that made him a good person. He wasn't lost.
But Rian was. Rian had given up the most important thing to this war already, his freedom, his goodness. And he hated Matt for still having his. And he hated himself for being jealous.
He began to demorph, talking as he made the transition. Maybe being cold right now wasn't such a bad thing. He needed to calm down.
<<You have no idea why soldiers go home broken. You think it is because of the lives they took? It isn't because they killed people Matt. Those deaths don't haunt them in the middle of the night. No, what scares the shit out of them is the feeling they had when they did it. What haunts them, breaks them, is that they enjoyed it."
Matt:
Poor Matt, more luck than he deserves. A soldier who actually had to kill people. When Rian retaliated with that comment Matt realized that this wasn't the person he'd known anymore. Physically Rian was the same, but on the inside something had changed far too drastically and Matt still didn't know how. It was Rian's next words that revealed this to Matt, gave him an idea of what had happened.
He started demorphing as he saw Rian doing it, not wanting to stay tiger with the risk of getting mad an killing him. <<And I suppose you know because that's the case for you isn't it? You know that's the case because everyone can be fit in a little box with a little label that so obviously says who they are and how they think and why they think that way?>> Matt's mental voice taunted, done trying to be nice about this. He knew he was hitting below the belt with this in some regards, but he couldn't find the means to care. <<You know damn well, better than I do, how wrong that assumption is. There isn't one right or wrong answer to why soldiers go home broken, just as much as there is no right or wrong answer for anything a person thinks or feels. For some it might be what I say and for others what you say.>>
He lost his thought speak ability there and had to wait until he finished demorphing to say the rest. "But there is some truth in you understanding that point of view, isn't there? That's what this war is all about to you now, am I right? It's all death, kill the yeerks and screw anyone who gets in your way. Well let ability to care. Without that you're no better than the yeerks, Rian." And that was true, because the yeerks didn't care who died so they could get their way. That's why the Animorphs had to care, it was the only thing that made them any better than that which they fought.
Rian:
He had finished his remorph at about the time Matt had finished his demorph. Normally it didn't take him so long but he was angry and trying to concentrate on remorphing only reminded him of the necessity of remorphing. And that only reminded him of the trap he was in. The hell of the constant morphing the constant drain on his will power.
For two hours at a time he could be a real boy but when that two hours was up, just like in some messed up fairy tale, Rian had to demorph, and he was reminded of what he really was and what he would never be. Not as long as he chose to fight. He could leave everyone and everything behind, just overstay his two hour welcome and become a permant resident of the body he could live with but no, he demorphed.
And every time he did it killed him. Every time he had to feel that change he wanted to cry, for just a moment he was suicidal again like he had been before. And there was no end in sight. The war wouldn't end any time soon and despite everything he was saying to Matt now, he wasn't a coward and he wasn't a traitor. He wouldn't abandon his faction or his cause so he was stuck in the hell of having the most basic and yet most vital thing permanently out of his reach.
Teri had once asked him why he couldn't just wait until later in life to try to transition. She had been right there with him when he'd begun to look up what the process would take, the time, the money, the pain. She had wanted to know why he couldn't just wait until he was older.
He had told her in all seriousness, though not knowing how prophetic the words were, that if there was an apocalypse tomorrow he could survive without a college degree but he couldn't live without a body. She had shook her head and told him that if an apocalypse happened tomorrow he wouldn't have to worry about it now would he. But even though her tone had been light he had seen that he had gotten through to her. This was life or death for him. He had passed the point where he could just swallow the feeling of wrongness he'd felt all his life. He would change or he would die and he saw that she understood that.
But nothing had prepared him for this. For the sneaky, deceiving feeling of temptation. Just a couple of more minutes, it would whisper to him. Just a couple of more minutes and you'll never have to go through this again. You'll be free. But he always changed. He had a war to fight.
And if he took a little of that pain out on his enemies then what of it. After everything they had done to the planet, to his race, to his country, to his family, to his friends and to him. Didn't they deserve a bit of the same?
"Who says we have to be better than them Matt? We aren't better. They are just one species out there trying to survive and we are another. There is no moral high ground here, just evolution. Strongest wins, strongest survives and the loser goes extinct."
Matt:
Who says we have to be better than them Matt? We aren't better. They are just one species out there trying to survive and we are another. There is no moral high ground here, just evolution. Strongest wins, strongest survives and the loser goes extinct. Matt was standing there listening to Rian's words and he could hear the blood pounding in his ears. He wasn't even sure he could hear Rian correctly. He wasn't violent. He'd never seen a need to resort to it and some of the things he did in morph felt so wrong to him later because of how out of character for him they were, or would have been.
He was changing though, and violence when needed had become a part of him. That was probably why he made his next move. He swung at Rian, feeling his fist connect with something, shouting as he did. "What the hell is wrong with you!"
He took a step back, trying to calm himself down and slightly shocked at what he'd done. We're all changing, he reminded himself. This is just part of who you've become. But could he accept that? It didn't matter now. Now there was something more important to think about.
"You're right Rian," he said finally. "The strongest survives though not unscathed. However, are we talking physical strength or emotional strength? Is one more important than the other? Physical strength ensures that you win the battles. Emotional strength ensures that you don't lose sight of the truth. Because tell me, which is harder? Does it take more strength to stop caring all together because it's too hard to feel all that pain, or to care about every effect your actions might have and carry that burden, to know and care that someone isn't going to see a loved one when this war is over because you had to take their life or they would have taken yours because a piece of scum living in their head was controlling them?"
He stood there, his fists clenched and his face fixed in a glare, hoping something he had said or done was getting through but not having seen any results. "Going emotionally numb is the easy way out, because yes there is a moral high ground. We had it to begin with, because we were capable of caring. All that matters to the majority of yeerks is getting as high as they can in the ranking system and tough shit for whoever they had to step on to get there. We were better than that because humans naturally care, and I for one am not stooping to their level. It's not going to give us an advantage or make us able to win the war. It's only sacrificing the one thing that sets us apart from them."
Rian:
Rian had never gotten into fist fights or wrestling matches before the invasion. He didn't know if that had anything to do with being a girl or if it was just the time they grew up in. Fist fighting simple wasn't as common as it used to be especially since he hadn't done much to inspire it. He had been quiet but he hadn't been a nerd or a bully magnet. Just some weird kid that people left alone.
The two times he had gotten into fights as a human since becoming an animorph it had been against a clear enemy in the form of the gangsters in the den and the scientists in Area 51.
So he wasn't expecting it when Matt hit him and the punch took him by surprise. The punch hadn't been made with any sort of intent to hurt him. At least it hadn't been the type of punch they always teach you to throw in martial arts, something small and directed. The blow had obviously been motivated by anger and as such had had all of Matt's weight behind it.
Rian's head snapped to the side as he stumbled away from Matt a bit, his ears ringinig. His hand came up to touch his cheek and he looked up at Matt. There should have been anger in his eyes. If it had been anyone else he would have been angry, he would have launched himself at them and tried to get them back for the sucker punch.
But it wasn't just anyone, it was Matt. Matt who he knew didn't like to use violence where words would work. Matt who was more responsible than he'd ever been and much better at controlling any anger he felt. And that was only if you actually were able to make him angry. He'd never been angry that Rian had seen. It was that alone that shocked him the most. The thought that he had done something bad enough to get Matt angry.
"What the hell is wrong with you!" The words fell into the silence that hung in the air since no one seemed to be moving. At their sound Rian flinched a bit. It was unnerving to hear the words he'd been thinking for a long time now out loud like that.
He stood up straighter and let his hand fall from his face but he didn't look up and meet Matt's eyes, couldn't. And instead of answering he let Matt speak and every word of the speech just stung more as Rian began to realize the anger induced haze he'd been living in the past couple of months. For a long time now he had given no thought to what was right or fair. He had just concentrated on what hurt the most. And the first time he had even spared a brief moment to think about what he was doing was that morning he'd talked with Suji. And he hadn't liked the fact that, when questioned, he had no good answer so he'd just glossed over it and gone on to planning for the dam.
He'd been like a horse with blinders on and he'd hurt most of the people who'd been close to him including Ember. How often had he ignored her in favor of the next mission, the next blow he could strike against the yeerks? Too often.
"I'm sorry Matt," he said turning away getting ready to head out the door. He didn't know where he was going, where he thought he was going, he just felt like he needed to go. But wasn't that doing what he always did? Running away, shutting people out when he didn't like what they had to say, retreating into his own head. He paused, wondering what he should do, go or stay?
Matt:
Rian turned away from Matt, apologizing has he did, and it was then that Matthew realized he'd gotten through, but had it been worth what it had taken? Matt didn't feel any satisfaction, any relief, just a numb shock at his own actions that had been totally out of character for him. He wanted to say something, anything at all, to Rian, but the fact was that he couldn't even figure out what to say now.
He was worried Rian would leave though, and though he felt it should be Rian's choice whether he ran from the problem Matt felt like he should still say something to try and keep Rian here. A few times his mouth opened, the words not coming to him or vanishing as soon as he tried to say them. Finally, though, something came. "No Rian. Don't apologize. We all make mistakes, and even though now a bad decision could be fatal it doesn't mean we're less prone to making them. Fact is I've made a few and one of them you corrected me on, back in the tunnels when I tried to leave Kat and Ember to fight their way out on their own. You wouldn't leave, and now that I look back we barely escaped even with all of us fighting. The way I see it we're even. Besides, all we can ever do with mistakes is to learn from them and keep moving on."
Luce:
Luce had kept quiet during the argument. At first it was because she hadn't had much of an opinion. There wasn't much she could do about Crayak and she didn't know what his game was. And when the conversation had moved into the ethics of warfare she had even tried to ignore it. It was not an issue she enjoyed thinking about too deeply.
For her there was no one right philosophy that she could follow. She had felt Jals' pure and almost child-like joy at every new thing it had experienced so she knew how the yeerks felt. She had seen Jals' memories of what life in the pool was like, the almost nothingness of it. At the time she hadn't cared, she had just wanted the yeerk out of her head. But now that it was gone, now that she had some distance...
It was a hard choice for them to make. Live as slugs or live as gods because to them, having bodies, living in the world of sight, sound, smell, taste...it was like heaven, at least at first, at least as long as you could shut out the sound of the screaming slave in your head, as long as you could remain immune to their hatred, their despair, their hope. She thought hope was the worst one. The hope that you would die, the hope that you would give up. It was hard to live with someone praying for your death with every moment.
So she understood why so many of them were jaded, were hateful. Why so many of them seemed so ruthless. They had to learn not to care to even begin to survive, to live the lives they lived. It wasn't right. But she got it. And she used to hate them, but now she couldn't.
But that didn't stop her from killing them. No matter how much she could empathize with their situation the facts, when you got right down to them, were that they were slave masters of the worst kind and if they didn't win this war, or at least cause enough damage to make the yeerks think twice about what they were doing, free people, good or bad, would never get the chance to make their own choices.
But did that make it right to kill them?
And where did Sedra come in? Luce still didn't know. She still didn't know what to do about Sedra, what to do about Catherine. And talking about ethics just reminded her that she didn't know. Just reminded her that part of the reason she was so excited to go home was because Sedra was there. And that part of the reason she still felt guilty was because she wanted to see her so badly.
Matt's words made sense, though Rian's did as well but only in the way that would make you ashamed to believe them. But when the argument came to blows Luce felt she should step in no matter who was right. Besides, she had a feeling Rian might be as confused as she was.
She wasn't sure how she felt about that, she normally trusted her leaders to keep their heads about morality so that she didn't have to and seeing Rian weak, not knowing...it made her nervous. She was glad she was the only one here and not one of the others.
Having a faction leader that was five years younger than her made it easy for her to remember that he was still a kid in a lot of ways. It was true that he often came off as older but there were times when Luce was reminded how young he really was. But she felt like he had the potential to grow up into a good leader. She saw that in a lot of them, in Ember, in Suji. They were young now but they'd lead their generation into a new age and so she was a bit more forgiving of their mistakes, at least internally. Outwardly she was as critical as people seemed to expect.
<<Are you both done?>> She asked in a calm voice, pushing the practical tone and hoping it was the right one, that it wouldn't set off either temper in the delicate emotional atmosphere. <<Because if you are I would like to point out that I am very cold.>>
Matt:
<<Are you both done? Because if you are I would like to point out that I am very cold.>> Luce's thought speak broke through the silence that had hung in the air for a little while. It broke through Matt's thoughts, which had turned back to the uncharacteristic punch he'd delivered to Rian's face. Now that he was removed from his anger, from the heat of the argument, he felt shocked that he'd resorted to violence. He'd always been one to choose words over actions when the prior would suffice. Had the war changed him so much that he could and would resort to using action, that he saw it as necessary?
He ignored the thought for now, not sure how to feel about it. It felt like when he'd fought as the crocodile in the sewers and he'd been shocked and sickened by what he'd done, only this time he couldn't blame it on the animal form, this time his actions had been completely his own. But wasn't ignoring it doing what he'd just told Rian not to do? Wouldn't he have to face this eventually? Yes, I will have to face this sometime. Just.... not right now. I need time to think.
"Yeah, I think we're done," Matt said, finally responding to the question. He focused on his tiger morph and after a few minutes for the transformation Matt padded over and lay down again, the tiger's calm soothing away some of his confused feelings. The tiger knew itself better than Matt did, and right now he envied that aspect of the animal. I've never been sure of myself as a leader. I was never sure of myself before then. Can I stay unsure and not lose everything I've worked for? Or is that too much of a risk? Do I need to figure out who I am? So much was changing, and the fact that he hadn't seen it before bothered him. The only problem was, he didn't know how to.
Rian:
Rian turned towards the shivering greyhound when Luce's words entered his head and began the process that would get him back into his wolf form. He didn't know what he was feeling or what he should do or what he believed but he knew Luce was cold and that was something he could take care of.
As he laid down next to her he avoided looking at Matt. Things had used to be so easy for him. Before all this he'd never put himself forward much. He hadn't been a follower but he hadn't been a leader either. He'd been a loner and had alternatively been happy and unhappy as such.
And when he'd lost Bryan he'd suddenly found himself on his own, not particularly unusual for him, and he'd handled it. But then he'd been thrown into this group and instead of making connections with people on his own terms he had just found a substitute for the brother he'd lost in Matt and he had let Matt rule his life.
Matt probably didn't know that but Rian did. He remembered clearly feeling like he didn't have to worry about things anymore because he could just let Matt do the moral thinking for him and all he had to do was play the white knight to Matt's king.
But once he was really out on his own he had gotten afraid, afraid of getting someone killed, afraid of not doing enough, afraid of being weak. He had made the Vegas faction into one of the hardest factions around. Everyone in it had killed at least once and many had multiple times culminating in the deaths of all the yeerks in the pool they'd bombed and drained. And he remembered that he'd been proud of that.
"Does it take more strength to stop caring all together because it's too hard to feel all that pain, or to care about every effect your actions might have and carry that burden?"
Matt's words had felt true in that way that things sometimes did. Of the two of them Matt was stronger and Rian knew it and feared that truth because he knew that their factions were, in a way, an extension of them and if Rian was weak then Las Vegas might pay the price.
<<How do you carry the pain,>> he asked Matt quietly.
Matt:
Rian's quiet question broke through Matt's thoughts and gave him a temporary reason to stop thinking about them. Now he could think about what Rian was asking him. How did he carry the pain?
It wasn't actually something he'd ever thought he'd need to explain in words. Yet, here he was trying to find words to explain it. Here he was reflecting again on being the crocodile in the sewers, on attacking Aubrey's stepfather as a jackal, even on his recent battle in his tiger morph on his way to the faction leader meeting. In two of those situations he'd killed someone and in the other he'd at least done a fair amount of damage.
<<Situation ethics.>> Matt said, using the term he'd learned for a paper he'd written in the year before becoming an Animorph. The idea was that there was no moral code that could be universally applied because each situation was different, thus each one required it's own standard of ethics. It was one he'd unknowingly adopted in the war, because he could only justify each life he took by the fact that, in the end, he was doing it for a reason that was morally right.
<<I try to rationalize what I can. I know the human ends up suffering as much as the yeerk, but a lot of the time I can't think about that until after an action has been made. At the time I'm making the action, it's me or them usually. It also helps that a few former controllers I've met feel like death is better than enslavement, because at least then you're free.>> He thought of Renae, the doctor in Union, as he spoke the words she'd uttered to him.
<<What I can't rationalize I turn into something positive, into a reason to fight. I know winning this war can't entirely make up for the damage I cause getting there, but I have to believe it makes up for some of it.>> His own thoughts seemed.... very simple and very much flawed when voiced for Rian. But holding to these beliefs was what gave him his momentum and allowed him to know the pain he caused without letting it consume him, without drowning in it.
Luce:
Luce knew that the question hadn't been directed at her but considering all that had happened to her today and in the past few days she thought she might be able to help as well.
<It helps to have a code to live by. A lot of warrior traditions in the past had a strict code and normally it was something really simple. "Never surrender." "Semper Fidelis-Always loyal" "Never leave a soldier behind." "Come back with your shield or on it.">> The last was a bit of a joke since surely both boys would recognize the 300 quote. <<I used to like sayings like that but only recently have I come to understand why they were needed, or at least think I understand,>> she said, her voice troubled.
<<Like Matt said, most fights you don't have time to figure out the moral implications of every one of your actions so it helps to have a code, a simple one, that you can remember, that you can stick to. Sayings such as those don't cover every situation but they are a start. So the real question is what is your code Rian? You have to know what you're fighting for and what you'll do to get it and, maybe more importantly, what you won't do to get it. And you have to know those things before going into a fight because you won't have time to figure it out in there. And once you figure it out you're the only one responsible for holding yourself to it.>>
She hadn't meant to say so much and after the first couple of sentences she hadn't even been speaking to Rian and Matt so much as she was speaking to herself. She had lived a long time in a haze of pain induced fury, never thinking to deeply about her actions. It was time to let that go.
Rian:
Rian didn't speak for a while, trying to take in both of their words but in the end he couldn't. Maybe he just had to sleep on it, or maybe it would never make sense. For a second he was afraid that he was simply incapable of holding any sort of morality in his thoughts but that couldn't be so. He remembered a time when he'd had a strong moral code. He just didn't remember what it was or how he had been able to believe it so strongly. Maybe he'd just been naive.
<<Thank you both,>> he said wanting to let them know that he'd heard their words even though he didn't know how to respond to them just yet. <<I guess we should get some sleep, we have a long drive ahead of us in the morning and only trouble at the end of the road,>> though that wasn't exactly true. Ember was at the end of this particular road and he would be very glad to see her when he got home if only to hold her, make sure she was ok, make sure he was ok.
Matt:
Matt listened to Luce's words. She seemed to grasp what he was saying very well, and she seemed a lot different now from the person who had traveled with him six months ago to L.A. to be a seed member in Vegas faction. But, everyone was changing weren't they? Everyone and everything, and he didn't know where he was headed right now because he didn't know where he'd started this journey. He'd never been sure of himself and he felt now like he might lose any grip he had on who is was in the chaos of this war.
Still, Rian's words broke through his thoughts that had started to stray during the silence after Luce had finished. <<Yeah. Really there's trouble anywhere, but we have to face it a little more once we reach the end of the road.>> Because that was where they had to try and combat the trouble. Thus, that was where it became their greatest problem. The drive would take a while so..... <<Wait, drive? I wasn't informed we get to take a car.>>
Rian:
<<I think it hardly qualifies as a car,>> Rian said quietly and then began to laugh a bit as he thought about the van they had in the garage of this house. Getting fuel for the thing was pretty dangerous sometimes but at least they weren't paying pre-invasion gas prices anymore.
<<But you may think more of the car after you experience my driving skills.>> Rian had never learned how to drive before the invasion. He had never had a reason to and since the invasion he had certainly had no chance to learn except for on this lovely trip. Mostly he'd left the driving to Luce.