hugtopia | [Video]

[The feed opens on Gladio, sat in his garden, the sun shining down on him. The sky is bright, the weather warm but a cool breeze ruffles his hair. The garden is well tended, green and well kept. The scene might have been a lovely and calm one if not for the serious look on Gladio's face. He's not quite looking at the screen, but off to the side, seemingly lost in thought for a long moment before he heaves a heavy sigh.

Still not looking at the screen, he starts to speak.]

It's been long enough. I've had time to think, so I'm going to tell you why I did what I did.

[He goes quiet again, considering his next words.]

I know... some of you are pissed we did this. You were happy livin in blissful ignorance, trusting this world without question. And for a while I was too. Till I realised how messed up that was.

I was so desperate for a peaceful life I didn't think...

[Gladio glanced at the screen then, his eyes narrow slightly.]

When did we all just roll over and accept this insanity? We were kidnapped from our homes, our families, and trapped in this bubble. We were given the most basic info and told to accept it. The most basic food we can't even really call 'food', and we accepted it. We were given tasks and rules and hoops to jump through, and we accepted it. We were forced to touch, kiss, hold and reveal secrets to strangers, and we accepted it. It was the 'will of the Gods'. We all just nodded and accepted it. Why? Why have we accepted all this? Why do people keep coming and going? Where do they go? Do they just go home? Or are they taken? Are they being hurt? Experimented on like the animals they had us catch? Why do these weird things keep happening? Why can't they answer our questions?

And why are we terrorists for wanting answers? We hurt no one. We destroyed nothing. We're the heroes of this world, right? Here to save the planet. So what are they keeping so secret?

Why aren't you all asking questions?

Why're you just rolling over and accepting their truth?

[Again he looks away, heaved another heavy sigh and brought a hand up to rub tiredly at his eyes. He definitely looked tired. Stressed. His tone shifting from angry to confused to desperate for people to understand, and for himself to understand why no one else was fighting.]

We're forced from our homes... Our families. We form bonds with people only to watch them vanish. And... I don't know bout anyone else, but I didn't consent to this. I never signed up for this world.

I want answers. We wanted answers. And we weren't gettin them. So we went looking for them.

[Here he laughs, low and without humour. A shake of his head and a sardonic glance at the screen.]

The fact the natives reacted the way they did should be a red flag. What're they protecting so badly? What's so secret? What aren't they telling us? Is it about what really happened to this world? Who these 'Gods' are? How we actually got here and why? Where our friends go when they suddenly disappear?

And we're the bad guys?

How's that make sense?

[Gladio shrugged and with one last sigh he reached out and switched the feed off. He'd said what he wanted. Now he would lie down in the sun and try and calm down.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Glib. Naught ever goes that smoothly. There are those of us who would be able to fight and defend should it have come to that, though it's far more likely that we would be overrun and slaughtered if they were truly harboring such secrets. We are outnumbered and on unfamiliar ground, after all, and those outside unaware of your...ambitions.

[He is not an optimist.]

Lucky for us all that was not the case, else the damage would have been far more than the mere trust and goodwill these people have for us. Which is no small loss.

We were all professionals, we're well aware of how things can go, and they wouldn't be the first gods I, nor some of the others, have faced.

I would argue that if they already placed alarms for organic life in their labs, we never earned their trust nor goodwill in the first place. Nor do we have the full scope of what they are doing as of yet, so we cannot rule out any possibilities about what secrets they may have. Certainly, had you raided a laboratory in the middle of Niflheim on my world, it wouldn't have even provided you with the knowledge that my other laboratory even existed.

This is little but peeling back the epidermis. There's quite a bit further to go yet before we play at even the pretense of being fully informed.

And now they still shall not tell us, and be on high alert beside.

[He certainly doesn't trust things where he can't see or understand where they keep their brain, but this seems obvious to him.]

Whereas if we continued to be patient and tease out answers instead of breaking the door down, we might yet be in a position to continue discovering. I like not this idleness, but these people at least had no overt malice towards us.

Edited 2021-07-11 18:37 (UTC)

In two years we've very little in the way of answers and questionable access to anything. No one has told me that which I didn't already know for all the suggestions they make at exercising other methods. Perhaps you are one who has many thousands of years to give away, but I've only approximately forty-seven left and I don't intend to live them here.

They do not even identify us as individuals if they are punishing you for that which you knew nothing of and didn't participate in. If you are unable to continue discovering and are experiencing malice, it is a fault in their inability or unwillingness to differentiate between us. Combined with the alarms they already had in place and the lack of information given the time, their supposed generosity is nothing more than a mere charade to keep us complacent whilst they string us along.

And if you'd found a sympathetic ear, mayhap you would have known of said alarms, and been able to reconnoiter with the help of something that would not have been detected--such as an aetheric construct. What I am saying is that we do have the time to do basic reconnaissance on an unknown target before rushing in and perhaps getting someone killed.

Tis not punishment if they are now distrustful, for they do not know the extent of outside involvement. It's nothing more than pragmatism, and I do not blame them for it.

What about two years says that it was a rush? We cannot gather information if no one is willing to do what is necessary to gather it. You expect people to know of things they refuse to so much as look at, as if that information could be learned through osmosis. There are those of us who worked closely with the natives, and yet there was no information of these alarms.

It is a military tactic. You punish all to force submission. It is not the way of a peaceful people.

I have always been open-minded. Gather information what way you will, but I have not seen any results from you, so it seems misguided to criticize those who have done and gathered the most. If you know of a better way then prove it with results and not empty words. And should you do so I would have no issue listening.

I have been here for two moons, nevermind two years. At any rate, I know enough to call foolishness what it is.

As to being punished--I said that I was not. Unless you count being told to not leave the bounds of the city, which as we were told not to before, is hardly a reaction to what you and yours accomplished.

Then you've no reason to complain.

Otherwise, you have not asked any questions before making presumptions about what we have investigated beforehand, how long we did it, or other methods we have pursued. Should you pursue another method that shows better results than ours, I shall be more than happy to bow to you. Until then, I shall do what is necessary to further our knowledge.

And if you've any interest in learning, then you can stop by the Information Center and peruse for yourself.

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