trans_9 | A girl who can fly should never fall on her sword [Closed]

For reasons that should be obvious, Signum has trouble meeting the elf's eyes as she walks sullenly to the Magic Department headquarters, head less bowed and more simply downcast.

"Vivio mentioned that you would be in charge until everyone figured out what to do with me," the knight says in what remains, in spite of herself, a clear, calm, and collected voice.

"That's the plan for now, anyway," he said. "Would you care to come back to my lab? I'd really like to know the whole story."

No condemnation in that comment, just sincere curiosity. And a certain vested belief that after having an entire day's memorization sucked out of his head, he probably had at least a little claim on the knowledge. But no rancor over the fact.

"Very well," she says. "It's best that we get it all on record. If this happens again, I..."

She trails off, instead quietly following Aibghalien for a few paces.

"It all has to do with this magical tome," Signum says, showing Aibghalien the Book of Darkness. Yes, she'd decided, it was definitely still that. The Tome of the Night Sky - Reinforce - would not have accepted magic taken by force. "Originally, it was the ultimate storage Device, designed to collect spells from around the universe. The Wolkenritter - myself, Vita, and two others you probably haven't met - were programs created to defend it."

"Can you elaborate on what you mean by 'programs'?" He expected it was somewhere between 'construct' and 'force' from everything he had heard.

Since they both could fly easily enough, he eschewed the teleport circle and simply rose up the outside of the Jedi Temple to the large opening he'd cut into the wall. Slow enough so that she could follow close behind. He had the grim suspicion she might start protesting if he didn't look like he was watching her like a hawk.

Signum was thankful for the slow flight. She didn't think it was at all appropriate for her to transform into her armor right now, and she could only manage limited versions of her normal spells with Laevatein in its storage mode.

"Normally, I explain this kind of thing with a computer analogy, since both Mid-childa and Earth had developed similar basic technology by the time someone asked me, albeit silicon-based on Earth, for some reason," Signum says, floating upward. "If you think of the Tome itself as a CPU, we would be the...I'm losing you here, aren't I?" she asks.

"Less than you'd think," he said with wry amusement. Given how much effort he'd spent fighting technological monstrosities on his own world, he'd have been a fool not to devote some time and effort to learning about their workings here on the ship, where resources to do so were actually available. "Go on. You know I won't hesitate to ask for clarification where necessary."

"Well then...the Tome itself is a computer, designed for storing the data and energy of magical spells. It created, as far as I know, five "programs". An administrator - the person who took the name Reinforce when Hayate freed her - and four security programs, the Wolkenritter. All five of us could be manifested as physical beings, although Reinforce only when the Tome was near full capacity, and we all lovingly served the Tome's chosen Master," she explains. Normally, she keeps these sordid details about not really being human to herself, but...at this point, she couldn't possibly feel any more ashamed regardless of what she told someone about her history.

"At any rate, at some point, somewhere in the distant past, someone corrupted the Tome of the Night Sky's programming. It became an engine of unstoppable destruction rather than persistent learning. We became nothing more than cliché villainous henchmen, really," she admits, "serving whomever the berserking Book chose to grant power to."

"It was filled with an insatiable, pointless desire for magic power, draining the life force from its chosen master until they chose to fill it, promising fulfilled wishes and infinite power," she says. "Frankly, it seemed custom-made for the megalomaniacal type, and we were passed around to a great many masters, all of whose wishes were apparently granted with nothing more than the destruction of them and whatever world they happened to be standing on," Signum admits bitterly. She has to add the 'apparently' in there since her form never survived the final conflagration either.

"And after a wish of destruction was granted, the Book would simply reappear, empty, in the possession of another Master, and the cycle would repeat."

He parsed through her words as she spoke, translating and deciphering from context to understand what she meant. And actually didn't arrive too far from reality.

This also began to explain a great number of things about Reinforce, Hayate, Signum, and Vita. He had known there was some sort of history there, but never been quite sure what its nature was.

"Did you five 'programs' always possess sapience, sentience, and free will?" he asked. "Was the corruption of the book directly responsible for your behavior becoming more 'villainous', or was it simply a factor of placing service to the book's Master above ethical considerations?"

"Service was always our primary motivation," Signum says. "The Book of Darkness was simply more appealing to the kind of Master who would do anything for power than the Tome of the Night Sky had been."

"And we've always been capable of senses and independent thought," she adds, "otherwise we'd be poor bodyguards. As for free will...well, let me put it this way. I was created to serve. My personality was written, from scratch, with intent, by some human being in the past, and right at the top of it is 'love and protect your Master'. Even now that I'm no longer part of the Book, and have no Master except whom I choose, I still choose to be a servant and a guardian, and would never seriously consider disobeying a direct order from Hayate except for her own good. I do this because I choose to, but I choose to because that's how I am, and I am how I am because I was created that way. Is that free will?" she asks rhetorically as they alight on Aibghalien's makeshift entrance to the temple. "I don't really care either way. I am myself, and I am how I am."

"Just because the other options are so unpalatable as to be completely unacceptable doesn't mean there isn't a choice," Aibghalien said as he stepped inside, restoring the illusion of a wall behind them with a wave of his hand. He gestured to one of the overstuffed armchairs positioned on the 'livable' side of the lab.

He made a gesture as he moved to sit in one across from it, summoning an unseen servant. "Something to drink?" he asked, as a nearby cabinet opened to reveal several bottles. He had just maybe skimmed a little off the top of his and Stephen's alcohol experiments for Kang's tavern.

"So I'm guessing," he said, folding his hands to prop his chin on them as he looked at her, "that Hayate became the Master of the Book, and your frantic gathering of magical energy was intended to prevent it from draining her life force."

"Precisely correct. Even when she was only nine, the Book had been dormant in her possession her entire life. It left her with paralyzed legs, and would have eventually stopped her heart if left unchecked," Signum says. "This was made all the worse because Earth's medical science had no conception of magic."

Signum sits and, in spite of herself, accepts a drink. She really kind of needs one.

"That was actually the first time I remember disobeying a Master," she continues, "since Hayate explicitly ordered us not to harm anyone and lay down our weapons as knights. For better or worse, though, I was far more selfish than her, and ordered everyone to gather mana in secret, to complete the Book and allow us to live together peacefully for her long, natural life. Or even forever, if that's what she wished. I, of course, had no memory of the Book causing such immense devastation when it was completed, since in the past, the rest of the Wolkenritter and I were invariably sacrificed for our own mana by uncaring Masters."

"That was the point to which my mind had regressed when we encountered each other."

The servant poured a glass of wine -- surprisingly decent wine, considering its synthetic, magical, accelerated creation -- which it then brought over to her.

"You weren't very villainous, though," Aibghalien said. "It would have been much easier and safer for you to gather mana from me had I been far too injured to fight back, and much easier to reduce me to the state had you not given me that caution about going to the med bay once I woke up."

Not that he expects her to listen to this bit of reason quite yet; it's intended to draw more information out of her.

"Well, I'd never attacked someone I was already friends with before," Signum admits, sipping the artificial, time-accelerated wine. Appropriate, she thought. "I also forgot your magic lets you have protection spells up without showing any flashy armor. It's a bit of a weakness in the Belkan and Midchildan styles, as far as surprise attacks go."

"I did, however, usually fight to incapacitate people. Drawing magic out of a living being is dangerous for both parties, and people tend not to want to hold still and let the Book do its work. You just happen to like being an experimental subject, I think."

In spite of herself, she smiles a bit.

She had definitely made him thankful he had continued his practice of casting mage armor on himself as a rule, no matter how innocuous the ship seemed on most days.

"The stories I could tell you," he said, matching her smile. "But clearly I was right to think that whatever the issue was, it was of the utmost importance to you. You were, as far as you knew, in what basically amounted to a hostage situation."

"Yes. Even if I was going about fixing it in an entirely pointless and harmful way that made things worse," Signum says, anger coming back into her voice. "And then repeated my mistake even more pointlessly because of some damned antique."

"I won't say it wasn't a mistake," Aibghalien said, still calm. "I think you recognize that now. But I do think it's important that you recognize that you had reasons for making the mistake, and extenuating circumstances and external factors influencing your decision."

Signum sighs. "I hate repeating mistakes. Regardless of whether I forgot or not, making the same error twice means you didn't learn from it. And I hurt several people quite a lot, twice over. A knight's not supposed to go around assaulting innocent girls or her friends. I could have put, for example, Madoka Kaname in the same physical peril Hayate was in to begin with. It was nothing but selfishness."

"Forgetting it does matter," Aibghalien said. "You can't learn without memory. There's no magic way to 'just know better' if what you've learned has been stripped away."

He drummed his fingers together for a moment, trying to think of how best to put this.

"Signum, for my part, I forgive you. You ought to know that, but I'm saying it explicitly just so you can't possibly claim, even just to yourself, that I don't."

"I appreciate that," Signum says, meaning it despite her curtness. "But I'm not looking for forgiveness from others."

She rests her head on her hand, as long as she's sitting down. Now that she thinks about it, she's very tired after hoboing it up and constantly fighting for however long she was out of touch with the present. Taking a full-force punch from Vivio without any magical protection was also pretty harsh. That girl was scarily strong.

"I suppose I'll get over it and continue living eventually. I've existed for millennia by now, so something like this isn't going to stop me. I want to make sure this can't possibly happen again, though. No one should have to bear the pain of my mistakes, let alone involuntarily."

She gestures to the magical tome she brought in, lying motionless but, in her eyes, malevolently near her. "And that needs to either be destroyed, or somehow repaired and re-merged with the honest Reinforce we know. It shouldn't exist in this world, and has no right to. I don't even know how Stacy got a hold of it. Nanoha knows how to destroy it, and Reinforce should know if it can be fixed or not. It might belong to her version of reality, actually..."

"I know you're not." Though he's glad she recognizes the fact as well. "Still, easier to forgive yourself if those you feel you've wronged forgive you in their turn. Offering yourself up for indiscriminate retaliation or honorable suicide is not going to solve anything but hurt the people he care about you," he added more sternly, as he crossed his arms, "and you know that."

He glanced down at the tome, then nodded. That was honestly the least of his concerns at the moment, though of course he'd keep it safe if she so desired.

Signum leans back and lets out another, deeper sigh. "I suppose that may have been a little immature, or possibly old-fashioned. There's no way Hayate would let me, regardless. I think I've heard enough remonstrations about that from my...victims...to be sure it won't be necessary anyway."

She lets out a bit of a humorless laugh. "Even Ms. Kaname's friend was insistent I should stay alive and aware to make up for it, and she's still in the medbay. The difference between older cultures and newer ones, I guess."

"You're suffering enough, anyway," he murmured, unfolding his arms to look at her over his clasped hands again. "Have you... heard any news, since then? I assume you've been in hiding and out of touch..."

"Other than Nanoha's guess that Hayate was re-podded, not really. I've gathered also that a lot more people were affected by the Clock," she says.

"Actually, I haven't even checked the inbox on my Omnicomm..."

"That was what I was wondering if you'd heard, yes," he said, quietly. "I don't think there's any 'guessing' involved there.

"Well, that's another reason for me to stay awake, I guess. I think only one or both of the Reins and myself are active right now, out of the family..." she says, pondering. "As much as I trust our friends, I had better help defend the ship while they're asleep."

She stops and thinks. "And find someone who can cook for the Reins, unless they've learned how recently."

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject