Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Koreshi Chronicles: Titan's Tale - TN 1925, 39 Spring

The shorefront was the same as it had always been, framed on both sides by pines Across the dark body of water, the other shore was a shaped shadow outlining a hill. The irregular ridgeline painted ink-black treetops against a navy blue sky. High above, the perfect sphere of a moon shone brightly, its doppelganger turned the world upside-down in the glass-still lake. If you gazed long enough into the water, your senses would trick your mind: that which was reflected became reality and the real world, its otherwordly counterpart.

For nearly four cycles he had been recruiting troubled youths and through patience and steadfastness he had brought them around. He had managed to deal with the most opinionated or reserved, destructive or repressed kids with special gifts and talents in the Badlands. He was proud that he had never lost his temper. Until today.

He tried to analyse how things went so wrong with Lyta, and time and time again he had to come to the conclusion that he was at fault. He knew she was angry. He knew she had feelings for him. He should have kept his mouth shut, dodged her somehow. He knew better, or he should have. Hours passed as he chastised himself, all the while aware that the very source of all this doubt and self-reproach was within earshot, within distance of three simple words: ‘I’m sorry’.

But no matter how much berating he gave himself for handling it badly, he could find no fault in his position. All he could offer her was trust, if she earned it, like everyone else. He couldn’t afford intimacy. Three other words came to mind and he realized it had been more than a decade since he had uttered them. Until today.

There was a method. Kin were bred, not found, he reminded himself. There was the ordeal and then the Academy for those who made the cut. He had systematically built himself a new family since Baja, starting from a clean slate. Every person he cared about and trusted went through an examination, through a trial, and passed. Lyta just assumed that she was different, that because she made an exception for Ti, he would reciprocate. The fact which was inescapable to him was that she was different and that was why things had gone so badly. Ti knew all about her feelings, had read her emotional state and expected the variables. He just neglected to factor in his own interaction. This time his method and his approach failed him. She was not some isolated orphan: she had two brothers and she was a childhood friend.

Ti found himself seriously doubting for the first time if he could handle these three, not just Lyta. He had deep feelings for all of them, and he didn’t know if he could be trusted to be objective. He wondered if this time, it was he who had to earn the trust, if it was his turn to go through his own trial.




Heavy Gear Roleplaying Game

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