niteo_nix | [Video] VI [Failed!Lock to Cross & Lavi]

[She's in the Church, only familiar thing really to her, and it's so very accidental, but she's just... staring listlessly at the alter, fingers fiddling with her device. Looking but not really seeing. It's meant to be private, but she's just not concentrating at all. Usually, she'd rather die then let people see weakness like this, but it's such an old fear and frustration that she hardly even stops to wipe away tears, let alone think. Not that she cried for much more then frustration most times, and certainly not since she lost the war with Mary of Guise.

This was frustration, and a great deal of fear too.

At the very least she's manages enough to make sure Lin can't see this, she refuses to give the woman that satisfaction most of all, and she wished she could slap her again. Nor does she even know how to ask this question, so she's just blunt about it.]

Tell me, when I return, if I ever leave this cursed, wretched place, am I to be executed? Is that why everyone remembers me so much?

[it clicks off]

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For death to be paraded.

[He had no idea, and he's not sure how he feels about it-- aside from the obvious distaste. When it was necessary for him to perform an assassination he preferred using quick, direct methods.]

Yet it's fine for you to make these decisions about the lives of others?

It's common... From what I understand of your world, you live a quiet, subtle existence in your goings, however violent they may be. [She understands it, even if she hates it. She wonders if he can understand at all.] It goes further then just dying in mine, you see? Because I am not of common blood, I am a daughter of Kings, great lions of men, and so am a lion myself, thus the death cannot be quiet, not if my enemy wishes to be great. I must be stripped, first of my title, then my life... and then, when my head is stuck on a pike and displayed on the bridge for children to stare at, will they have taken my honour, and the honour of my family. But I accept that too, if that is my fate.

[She opened her mouth to snap at him the usual reply, that she was ordained by God. But somehow, she didn't think he'd find that an answer.] ... I am what I am, because someone must be. I asked the same thing of myself, but if I do not, if I let my country become weak and taken? What sort of Queen would I be? But at least I can do so with some humility. I try to show mercy where I can, and only kill if I must, and only after I am attacked first. [She had standards unlike... There was a cruel tilt to her lips then.] And believe me, that is more then many do, even in my own family.

[He'll try to understand, because for all the absurdity he's heard of her world, she seems like she understands far more than is plain to see. So unlike the commanding types he's used to, so unlike Danzo - and his type is clear to see from miles off.

He noticed the way she was about to snap... glad that she didn't. Confrontation was not something he enjoyed, nor sought. Avoiding it at all costs kept him quiet, but he didn't regret speaking up with her, learning - quietly, slowly.]

You must be strong to stand up for your beliefs.

[It's a different sort of standing than he's used to, but standing, nonetheless, and he appreciates the hardship it must leave her with.]

I hope your fate isn't what you fear.

[She shook her head, laughing dryly.]

It's not strength if I die for them. You can't do anything when you're dead. They dramatize being a martyr, but really... it seems the only thing the dead do is sleep.

[There is the rest, and... it's other part, of what awaits her when she comes back.]

Tell me, do you have leaders whom you truly serve? I don't mean in formal oaths of servitudes that all men give, I mean truly in your heart, is there one who you would see through to the very end?

[He almost sighs when he hears her comment about martyrdom. It's something that got passed around as a child. People dying for the village, being hailed as a hero, but he didn't want that. Shisui had never wanted that. It goes against everything he stands for.]

So it would seem. [He couldn't know. No one did.]

I serve my village. It's my duty to keep the villagers protected. More than duty... you understand?

[She gave a curt nod.]

I do understand completely. That is how I feel for my people. They are my only care... [She pauses for awhile, struggling to find the words.] When I return, I must make a decision. That love you bear your village... I must make myself worthy of the same from my subjects. I must chose to become... removed, have no family, no husband, no children, no earthly ties. [She looked at the painting of Mary on the wall. Divine, perfect, a smile on her lips that spoke nothing of this kind of pain.] Dying for my people isn't enough, I must live for them, and never... anyone else. Not even myself. Does that make any sense?

[It's odd-- that hearing what she has to say brings back all those memories of the things Sasuke told him of his future. What he gives up, for Konoha is almost a mirror image of her own life, her own future.

Yet he can't bring himself to admit that their lives are as similar as that after all. He simply nods.]

A heavy burden.

[She frowned, sighing. He was right.]

I do not want to, I can think of far more merciful deaths then that which is drawn out over the long years of my life, till there is nothing left. Because I say decision, but I do not think I have a choice if I am to be a good Queen.

We cannot control the family we are born in, no more than the time or place.

[He has nothing much more than that to say--]

... No. But we do have the choice to be good people, my lord. We have been given these tasks, and we must find the courage in our heart to face them. Even if it is to kneel before a waiting axe, to bear no grudge and die with grace.

[She sighs tiredly. Elizabeth felt exhausted for some reason.]

Mn.

[Or in his case - does he sacrifice his own flesh and blood for the good of the village he loves. He already knows that it is what will happen. He will find the courage to protect Konoha.

Only his waiting axe will be his little brother.]

... Is there something wrong?

[It wasn't that he talked very often, or half as much as Elizabeth ever did. But the silence was... odd. For as much as she knew of him of course. Which beyond deciphering the passing smile or such wasn't very much.]

I'm fine.

[There's no point in talking about it - after all it changes nothing. He knows he will lead this life the way Sasuke has told, and nothing will change that.]

If you're sure.

[Normally she would of pressed it, asked more questions. But she was still so strung out about this.]

[Video] VI [Failed!Lock to Cross & Lavi]

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