Week 79: Meanwhile, directly after the mission

"That went pretty well, eh?" Dani approached Fenris as the two of them and Stephen walked back from the prison. Hugo and Silvia had gone off somewhere, which Dani was all too glad for - she was sick of Hugo gushing over Silvia when she wasn't around, and he'd been way worse since meeting her again. She kind of couldn't blame him for it really, but that didn't make it any less annoying. Tansai, on the other hand, had headed off on her own to return to the mainland. So that left the three of them alone, and that meant that talking to Fenris was the thing to do. Hopefully, she wouldn't still hold her stupid misplaced grudge.

"I was keeping an eye on your vision while you were in there, I gotta say you did some damn cool stuff. Really fucked with them, you know? The Ai-Jinn aren't gonna be recovering from that any time soon."

Fenris was still a bit on edge, she was walking along with her bow ready and an arrow nocked, but then they were in a war zone, so that behavior wasn't unexpected. "The raid went well yeah," Fenris gestured back the way they had come. "But I didn't do anything particularly impressive. I got spotted. It was Silvia and Tansai who blew the generators." She didn't sound bitter or angry, she was just commenting on what happened, if anything the German woman seemed a bit distracted as she scanned the area around them. She sighed. "I guess now we see if that was enough for Silvia's brother."

"Hey, not only did we knock out their power source, we slagged their turrets and shot down a sizeable number of their active combatants," Stephen chimed in, counting out the three items on his fingers. "If that ain't enough for this Yuki bastard, he can go and fight the fuckin' fight himself. I didn't quit the fed, join Oracle and come here just to sign myself up for another goddamn war."

Stephen glanced off in the direction that Hugo and Silvia had wandered, scratching at his stubbly beard growth as he did so, and sighed. "Sure hope Silvia's got herself a self-preservation instinct. I ain't sure exactly how much she feels she gotta see her brother, but however bad it is it ain't worth dyin' for it. Hugo's too dumb not to help her even if it's suicide, and fuck it, I'm too dumb not to help Hugo, so we got a lot ridin' on the lady's judgement here. Shit, Tansai's smarter'n all of us put together." He still held his rifle in his other hand, and was idly flicking the safety on and off as he spoke.

"Yeah, but you've gotta do this kind of stuff sometimes, dontcha? I mean, back when I worked for the big AJ they were all about solidarity and standing by the team and all that, and now that I'm working for and with guys who aren't all assholes I can really get behind that. It might be risky, but you've gotta do your part," Dani explained with a shrug to Stephen. "And maybe you didn't do the big stuff, Fenris, but you were part of the team doing all that shit and you can't say they wouldn't have had it harder without you, can you? Anyway, you obviously had your convictions about the Ai-Jinn and you were followin' through on them. I like that, good to have people around who just do shit."

Fenris was quiet for a little while, a little unsure of Dani's change of heart. Then she shrugged to herself. It meant she might actually get to know the woman, so she would go along with it. "It is nice to finally be able to kill some Ai Jinn. Though I was mainly just going for the Medics, I don't want Silvia's brother running off and getting himself killed. The less people he has to fight, the better." Fenris was still very alert and on edge. "And Stephen, that's exactly why we're here. Everyone's hoping it'll be fine, but if it's not, it's our job to make sure nobody dies."

Stephen scratched his beard once more, a sure sign that he was deep in thought, and eventually turned to appraise Dani and Fenris, a pensive look on his face. "Eh, fuck it," he muttered with a shrug, and then began talking in his slow drawl.

"It ain't like every single Ai-Jinn out there is an irredeemable asshole, you know. For a start, Dani and Han are outta the corp, and shit, you and him are both assholes in your own special ways, but you don't deserve to die, you hear what I'm sayin'? Most of them folks grew up as kids bein' told what was right and what to do and it ain't their fault their parents and bosses ain't nice people. Can't blame a soldier for the orders he gets given, and 'specially not for the orders that got given to someone else," he said, looking pointedly at Fenris as he said the last part. "Folks we killed today were soldiers and I ain't gonna shed no tears for 'em. But all you knew about them is they were soldiers, and there ain't nothin' nice about killin' a man on account of where they came from or who tells 'em what to do. Ain't like most of them got much choice about it."

"Sometimes you just need to kill someone, you know? There are some things which just can't be forgiven." There was a determined edge to her voice, it was clear that she wouldn't be dissuaded from her views any time soon. "And these people had a choice Stephen. They didn't have to join the Ai Jinn. And they definitely didn't have to join the army. I mean you must have heard the rumors, you must know the stuff the Ai Jinn get up to. And these people chose to support that. They should be prepared for the repercussions."

Stephen did have a point about all this. "Hey, Fenris. Were your parents rich? Just wondering."

Fenris turned to look at Dani, a puzzled look plastered across her face. "What? I suppose they must have been, but what does that have to do with anything?"

"Well, you keep assuming people have all these choices, and most people don't. They can't afford to turn down work for little things like personal values. In a lot of Ai-Jinn territory, either you work for the corp or you scrabble through the dirt - they've got their fingers in a lot of pies, and if you try to do your own thing... Criminals aren't nice, are we? It's the same wherever you go, you gotta work for someone to get by and that means taking whatever chances you get. Ai-Jinn army recruiters come to your town and tell you 'we'll give you lodgings and food, all you have to do is fight for us' and no way is your average Citizen Wei gonna turn the opportunity down on moral grounds. Hell, I was an agent with the Ai-Jinn, we all knew about the shady shit going on with torture and brainwashing and god knows what, and you know what? None of us gave a shit, because the Ai-Jinn gave us what we wanted. What we thought we needed." A nostalgic smile came over Dani's face as she remembered just ignoring all that bullshit. "I get why you hate the Ai-Jinn so much, I read the reports on the Captivity Ship-17 incident. You want to take it out by killing Ai-Jinn, I'm not going to stop you. But for all that the propaganda says otherwise, there's more to the Ai-Jinn than just the corp, and if everyone could afford to be choosy like you can then I bet you'd have way less soldiers to bleed."

Fenris was looking between the other two agents, definitely feeling very defensive. She didn't really get why they were targeting her so much. "There are more options than just the Ai Jinn. No matter how poor you are. You could join the UIG, or Lanzas or any of the Corps that don't have their own territory. It's not like the Ai Jinn stop people, no matter how much they might want to. Hell! You could even join the resistance! There must be plenty of that to go around."

Dani simply shrugged in response. "The Ai-Jinn hire a lot, lots of construction work and military expansion. If you're looking for work in Asia, or in the field elsewhere for that matter, you're gonna get offers from the Ai-Jinn before any of the other corps, often of the variety you can't refuse. The UIG have a fuckload of tests and checks you have to go through, do you really think most people could get in? Hell, I bet some of us would have a hard time of it. And while I'm all for going against your local big authorities, rebelling doesn't exactly put food on the table, does it? You can't live without money, and round here it's the Ai-Jinn who pay out. Trust me, I could show you endless charts and studies on this shit."

"They're everywhere doin' everythin' and strikin' out on your own is hard, specially when you been raised to believe the rest of the world is a shitpile and you oughta stick to what you know. These kids get brainwashed from the beginnin' to think that their corp is best - all of 'em do it. I can't talk for the Ai-Jinn, but I was raised in the Fed and they feed us so much bullshit about what goes on out here your average WF Joe is convinced that the Ai-Jinn all have three heads and breathe fire while the EI barbecue babies to celebrate birthdays." Stephen stopped, aware he was starting to ramble a little, and marshalled his thoughts.

"Look, point is, most people don't have much choice about where they're from and who they work for, and it don't make 'em terrible people. None of those folks today deserved to die just 'cause they was Ai-Jinn. None of them did nothin' to you. And I ain't exactly any kind of expert, but what you do and what you say makes me worry a little, sometimes, 'cause it don't seem healthy, and I don't wanna see a friend lose themselves to somethin' like that. Probably the shittiest possible way I could go about tryin' to do somethin' about it and I know it's kind of outta the blue but, hell, like Dani says, sometimes you gotta just do somethin'."

He stood up again, and made to stroll away. "Ain't gonna pester you no more about it, but you think on it, y'hear?"

"Hey! Like I said, I didn't kill them just because they were Ai Jinn. I killed them to make that place easier for the resistance to handle. I'm just saying that it's nice to strike back at those assholes, to actually hurt them in some meaningful way. And if that means helping them loose Taiwan, then I'm all for it." It seemed like everyone had an opinion on what had happened, and how she should react, but none of them really got it. Must be some Fed thing. "And these people chose to fight for the Ai Jinn, so I see no reason why I should hold back."