❛january (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
acperience) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fictionalized2013-01-08 11:40 pm
acperience) wrote in fictionalized2013-01-08 11:40 pm
fanfic; remember death
Title: Remember Death
Series: The Legend of the Legendary Heroes
Character(s): Toale.
Warnings: Mentions of death.
Summary: Toale still breathes, eats, and sleeps, but sometimes he feels like a dead person walking.
Note: Blah.
—
Remember Death
—
It’s strange to think that you can say that you’re one of the few people in the world to know what it’s like to die.
And, well, still be alive.
Toale’s return to life is not a smooth one, however. Returning from the dead—from losing a third of your body—is not merely a matter of undoing the damage. Certainly, his recovery could only be called a miracle by those ignorant of Rule Fragments, as Toale himself once was, and the fact that he still lives is amazing (in more ways than one)—but as the one who was killed, he still feels the burden of death.
For those who die, who quite clearly remembering the feeling of their life ebbing away, it’s not so easy to forget. Were his memory alone not enough, his new limbs would be.
Made of metal and entirely unable to pass as a normal arm and leg, they’re signs of battle; they’re things no normal civilian would have. They’re things the person he once was would never have.
Toale has never had any delusions about what might happen. He knows very well that he can never return to his peaceful life—not with the world at war, not when his country has been wiped off the map. Nelpha is gone, and with it, any sense of normalcy. ‘Normal’ to Toale now is leading an army when he has never had any military background. ‘Normal’ is taking orders from someone who can’t be older than sixteen and whom Toale knows thinks of him as nothing more than pawn.
(Then again, Toale is only nineteen himself—even he feels far, far older—with an entire army under his command and he never wanted any of this—)
‘Normal’ is war.
It’s as Vois said—for an army that’s lost its country, there’s no other place than the battlefield. And for a prince who’s lost his country, there’s no other place than by his people’s side.
Though Toale would rather that his soldiers never have to fight again, he knows that Vois’s favours to them must be repaid. There’s only one group left in the world that would take them—not quite broken, but battered down, defeated, and without a home—and that group is Vois’s. They’re outcasts, in a way, as Toale notes wryly. Strays, without a home and desperate for food from whoever will give it to them.
The Nelpha army is convinced that everything will be fine as long as Toale is with them. He isn’t so sure.
There isn’t much a puppet king can do.
They call him their ruler. He thinks them to be foolish for that, for there’s no worth in being a ruler when your country is gone. If he’s to be proclaimed the king of Nelpha, then that makes him the king of nothing. He’s learned to stop protesting, as it’s pointless—they never listened during times of peace, so they’re certainly not about to listen during times of war—and if there’s anything he can give them now, it’s this comfort.
They were never told that he died. Only a handful of people know. They had no idea how close they came to losing him, and Toale doesn’t intend to be the one to tell them. He never lets any of his feelings show in his face when around his people. He smiles like they expect him to. He smiles and says the right things and has all the right expressions, only dropping the mask around those he knows that either don't care or already see through him. It's a relief, not having to feel like he's the pin holding everything together—but he can't stop.
At the very least, he’ll give his people this false reassurance. Even though he can only see this leading into his death—for what other fate is there for him by this point?—he’ll allow them their illusion of his immortality.
If nothing else, he can offer that.
He couldn’t protect them. He knew from the start that Nelpha was a lost cause, because that was the price for being weak, but in the end, he has to wonder if any of his efforts accomplished anything. All he wanted was to save the soldiers that his father discarded, only to lead so many of them to their deaths.
The civilians, the nobles, the bandits—the end result of following him.
They might’ve died if they’d stayed behind, slaughtered by Roland’s army.
—But the fact of the matter is that they died following him.
As the one who was killed, he feels the burden of death, and as the one who was saved, he still feels that burden.
He lived while his people died. The blood from Derunio that saved him—it could’ve saved someone else.
Someone died in his place.
Someone died so that he could live.
“I’m sorry,” he says to no one in particular.
Series: The Legend of the Legendary Heroes
Character(s): Toale.
Warnings: Mentions of death.
Summary: Toale still breathes, eats, and sleeps, but sometimes he feels like a dead person walking.
Note: Blah.
It’s strange to think that you can say that you’re one of the few people in the world to know what it’s like to die.
And, well, still be alive.
Toale’s return to life is not a smooth one, however. Returning from the dead—from losing a third of your body—is not merely a matter of undoing the damage. Certainly, his recovery could only be called a miracle by those ignorant of Rule Fragments, as Toale himself once was, and the fact that he still lives is amazing (in more ways than one)—but as the one who was killed, he still feels the burden of death.
For those who die, who quite clearly remembering the feeling of their life ebbing away, it’s not so easy to forget. Were his memory alone not enough, his new limbs would be.
Made of metal and entirely unable to pass as a normal arm and leg, they’re signs of battle; they’re things no normal civilian would have. They’re things the person he once was would never have.
Toale has never had any delusions about what might happen. He knows very well that he can never return to his peaceful life—not with the world at war, not when his country has been wiped off the map. Nelpha is gone, and with it, any sense of normalcy. ‘Normal’ to Toale now is leading an army when he has never had any military background. ‘Normal’ is taking orders from someone who can’t be older than sixteen and whom Toale knows thinks of him as nothing more than pawn.
(Then again, Toale is only nineteen himself—even he feels far, far older—with an entire army under his command and he never wanted any of this—)
‘Normal’ is war.
It’s as Vois said—for an army that’s lost its country, there’s no other place than the battlefield. And for a prince who’s lost his country, there’s no other place than by his people’s side.
Though Toale would rather that his soldiers never have to fight again, he knows that Vois’s favours to them must be repaid. There’s only one group left in the world that would take them—not quite broken, but battered down, defeated, and without a home—and that group is Vois’s. They’re outcasts, in a way, as Toale notes wryly. Strays, without a home and desperate for food from whoever will give it to them.
The Nelpha army is convinced that everything will be fine as long as Toale is with them. He isn’t so sure.
There isn’t much a puppet king can do.
They call him their ruler. He thinks them to be foolish for that, for there’s no worth in being a ruler when your country is gone. If he’s to be proclaimed the king of Nelpha, then that makes him the king of nothing. He’s learned to stop protesting, as it’s pointless—they never listened during times of peace, so they’re certainly not about to listen during times of war—and if there’s anything he can give them now, it’s this comfort.
They were never told that he died. Only a handful of people know. They had no idea how close they came to losing him, and Toale doesn’t intend to be the one to tell them. He never lets any of his feelings show in his face when around his people. He smiles like they expect him to. He smiles and says the right things and has all the right expressions, only dropping the mask around those he knows that either don't care or already see through him. It's a relief, not having to feel like he's the pin holding everything together—but he can't stop.
At the very least, he’ll give his people this false reassurance. Even though he can only see this leading into his death—for what other fate is there for him by this point?—he’ll allow them their illusion of his immortality.
If nothing else, he can offer that.
He couldn’t protect them. He knew from the start that Nelpha was a lost cause, because that was the price for being weak, but in the end, he has to wonder if any of his efforts accomplished anything. All he wanted was to save the soldiers that his father discarded, only to lead so many of them to their deaths.
The civilians, the nobles, the bandits—the end result of following him.
They might’ve died if they’d stayed behind, slaughtered by Roland’s army.
—But the fact of the matter is that they died following him.
As the one who was killed, he feels the burden of death, and as the one who was saved, he still feels that burden.
He lived while his people died. The blood from Derunio that saved him—it could’ve saved someone else.
Someone died in his place.
Someone died so that he could live.
“I’m sorry,” he says to no one in particular.