text; un: sai

[daimeinashi]

[Sai hasn't entirely worked out how to use this whole magic jewelry network thing yet, but the thought-typing is relatively straightforward enough. So:]

is it truly wise to be rescuing the qorral ?
should a significant number of them perish, it will be far easier to complete our secondary mission of stopping the mining efforts

Comments

text; un: shuyi

[gunah]

[ The others seem so ready to disagree without considering the possible merit to his words. Shuyi can't quite do so, not when she has thought the same about those who should have been more familiar to her. ]

And the primary objective: prevent the Deemers, by whatever means necessary. Will more die if they succeed?

[daimeinashi]

perhaps
we are unfamiliar with this dimension, and cannot know the consequences of completing our mission or failing to
however, we have no choice but to cooperate with ALISTAIR, should we wish to return to our worlds

the possibility that we may need to kill the deemers is not one we can discount
there is no need to harm the rest of the qorral as yet, but i do not see the use in going out of our way to protect them, either

[gunah]

I do not condone killing the Qorrals by action or inaction. But I understand, I do not condemn you or your thoughts.

[ What right does she have to do that? ]

Do you believe the Timeline is worth taking a life for?

[daimeinashi]

you believe lack of intervention is the same as killing?

[That's such a strange point of view, to an assassin. The next part is even stranger, because he was never allowed to have a sense of morality. The were brainwashed out of all such things, any markers of personal identity that could interfere with following orders.]

i do not know
but i would do so regardless, in order to return to my village

[gunah]

To stand by and do nothing means choosing to let them die. That is the same as having their blood on your hands.

So it is your village that is worth killing for?

[daimeinashi]

why? what guarantee is there that our intervention would even have been successful?

why should we be obligated to risk our own safety by default? if some of us were to die in attempting to rescue them, would you claim they killed us?

[This is so confusing, he doesn't understand a n y of this. He wants to, because of Naruto, but it's starting to feel like a miracle that people outside of Root and its training ever get anything done at all without suffocating under the weight of all these variously intricate expectations.]

i do not know how to answer your question, though
what is worthwhile, and what is not...those things are meaningless to me
i have been killing for my village as far back as i can remember
there was never any question of worth involved
i had my orders and i followed them
as a sword follows the motion of its wielder's arm

all i know is that i must return to konoha
i will do whatever is necessary to get there

[gunah]

It must be so easy to be nothing but a sword, never needing to know right from wrong.

[ If she could make a text message sound terse, she would. But then the guilt hits her. Maybe he doesn't understand, that maybe his lack of perceived choices is something to be pitied rather than scorned. ]

I believe... You and I are once dust and we will become dust given time, but the choices we make reverberate. Whether we choose to turn our faces away or to rush in and help, those choices are what makes us who we are.

If you have never had to choose, then you have never lived your life.

SORRY i accidentally archived this notif somehow falskdjgf

[daimeinashi]

[She's right, though. In a sense. Before, he had no basis for comparison, because he didn't live. But it's true--attempting to live is difficult. He doesn't know how. He was never given the tools.]

you are correct
i was never meant to exist

[That he should attempt to do so at all is in contradiction with all of his training. Danzou has realized it himself, he's sure, what with the warning he was given about emotions when he asked permission to keep the name "Sai" and remain with his team a bit longer.]

no worries!! :>

[gunah]

[ That's not the response she expected at all, when she was already gearing up for some kind of rebuttal. It makes her regret feeling any anger toward him. ]

Why do you say that?

[daimeinashi]

"you have no name, no feelings, no past, no future. there is only the mission"

that is how we are trained in root

[gunah]

What was the mission?

[daimeinashi]

no, you do not understand
there was not one singular mission
there were many
but each particular mission was to be the sum totality of our existence
we lived and died in the biological sense, but we were not to see ourselves as alive, as individuals
each mission was a self-contained existence, to be discarded upon completion
even the name "sai" was meant to be an identifier of convenience for a singular mission

[But then Naruto happened, and he's a bit attached to it, now.]

[gunah]

[ She thinks she understands how it feels to be just a tool used by someone else for their own agenda, and it's hard for her to admit that his situation is that much worse. How does it feel to be denied an identity? ]

And in your duty to ALASTAIR, you would forsake all for the sake of the mission. Is that so?

[daimeinashi]

[He doesn't feel much of anything about it, honestly, but perhaps that is to be expected from a child brainwashed into believing that he truly did not exist as an individual person. He has no regrets about the life he's led, at the very least.]

my loyalty is to konoha
i will do whatever is required to return
at the moment, making myself useful to ALISTAIR is my best option for doing so

[gunah]

In that matter then, we aren't so different.

I would do anything for my home, whatever they ask of me, even if it means never returning.

[daimeinashi]

yes
i would as well, without question

[Though there has been one recent exception: when he didn't follow through on orders to kill Sasuke and indeed committed to helping Naruto retrieve him, in order to attempt to understand bonds. But what would he do if Sasuke directly threatened the village in a more immediate way than allying with an enemy? He is pretty sure he would not hesitate, should the order come directly from the Hokage. It's something that may yet trouble him in the future, as he learns to be more aware of himself.]