text | username: xXx_trueblue_xXx & redlion

[competing]

[With all the information coming out, it's apparent to Keith and Lance that one big elephant in the room has been ignored: the infection among the recruits themselves. Keith is tired and on edge, as he needs nothing to do with the infection to be cranky. Lance is jittery, too. But they have to talk about that elephant before it gets too late.

And for some of them, it might be. That's what Keith is really afraid of right now.]

Hey. It's Keith.

and ya boy, lance! [Because things are already pretty doom and gloom as it stands, and maybe things could use a little lightening up? Or something...

It’s a little more difficult to differentiate between people in a group message like this, but it’s a better idea to get something down on text in case they need to refer to it later, and anyone who knows either of the boys can probably tell them apart pretty easily through diction alone.]

we know your mind-phones have been pretty busy lately, but theres something keith and i wanted to talk to you guys about.

Before we get a move on in attacking Zymandis' agent, we need to look at our own numbers. A lot of us are sick. Maybe less than I thought. Or maybe more. Either way, we have to know who's sick and make a plan to help our own. And I'm serious about HELPING. Not putting someone out of their misery or any of the other stupid stuff I've heard from some of this team. We need to stop this disease. We need to help our own. Once everyone's BETTER, we'll make a plan for what to do next as a team.

[It's harsher than necessary but likely less harsh than how it might be normally, given Keith's frequently frustrated tone of voice. Text mitigates some of it, even if his frustration definitely does become CAPITAL LETTERS.

Lance, meanwhile, is quite eager to gloss over that sharp reprimand because seriously guys — kumbaya.]

yeeeeeah, so — helping! getting a head count is definitely ideal. we cant afford to be silent on this and we definitely CANT be alone right now, cuz every one of us affected and on our own can be a huge risk to everyone here. so we were thinking… since the city shut it down, we can use the middle school. those of us infected can stay there while we wait for our people to find that cure. like a quarantine safe house.. i know its not ideal, but its something. especially for those who dont have any other contingency plans.

[A pause. Well. May as well get the ball rolling, right?]

ill be there.

( ooc; p.s. there is an information plotting post for the quarantine space! )

Comments

[competing]

whys it gotta be one or the other for you?
im not asking you to sugarcoat anything
im just telling you not to be such a raging jerk about every single thing you say
believe it or not theres a middle ground

anyway telling people were gonna lock them up in separate rooms like some kind of prisoner
essentially forcing people to confine themselves
isnt exactly creating a safe space for people to want to admit to something theyre likely already not comfortable with in the first place

but hey why dont YOU try YOUR way and see how many people come forward to you
if your way even lets them

[hedonistic]

i'm just being who i am
if you can't deal with that, that's your problem

[Because it's the only way Kagari has ever known how to cope with the world he wasn't good enough to live in with everyone else. He hates himself for whatever was broken within him, but if he doesn't accept himself for who he is, then who will?]

oh my god dude
you realize you guys are ALREADY CONFINING YOURSELVES, right
you're just doing it in a way where you're gonna risk chowing down on each other

do you think they'd be more comfortable with fucking murdering people?
because that's what's going to happen if you all stay in a communal space
especially if you do manage to seal it up from the outside so your murderous hunger can't go anywhere else
it'll be like filling up a balloon with too much water, until it fucking explodes

sure though, competing quarantines is the way to go
because i guess having a disagreement with someone means i should go off and do it my own way
but i'm the one who has a problem with teamwork

[competing]

..."i'm just being myself so deal with it"?
seriously?
SERIOUSLY thats how youre gonna try and have an adult conversation

[ he has every reason he needs right now to just end this. this guy clearly isn't willing to listen.

but lance is going to try one last time. ]

alright my man im gonna spell this out for you one last time:

one — you have a point
yes. YES we are a danger but thats only when we reach a certain point
if youve been paying attention, you can track this stuff, maybe not to a science, but you can track it enough
so up until that point theres no real reason we should be further locking people up and making them feel like prisoners when the situation is already pretty crappy enough to begin with

two — yeah your suggestion is safer for everyone involved
but i already told you that this whole thing hinges on whether or not people come forward
and thats definitely less likely to happen if they knew the situation they were walking into is gonna treat them like some kind of monster or animal that theyre already afraid about losing themselves to
and keith and i sure as heck arent gonna lie to people about it because they deserve that trust and respect
so without people feeling safe and comfortable enough to put themselves out there, the alternative we have is no one doing anything at all
which just puts everyone in danger and were back to square one

three — no i dont think anyone is comfortable with murdering anyone
thats why i trust them to come forward if they feel like they cant handle this on their own
thats why i trust them to know when theyve reached their limit and put themselves in those individual rooms
or put themselves in from the get-go like youre saying
if we both agree that no one wants to murder anyone, why cant we let it be their choice?

and four — you arent just disagreeing
a disagreement is two people who dont agree on something, not one person being unnecessarily condescending and stubborn
you havent tried to listen to me once, even after ive tried multiple times to meet you halfway on this and try to find common ground
so yeah
you DO have a problem with teamwork
the thing about teams is — that becomes everyones problem too
but you know what man? we got bigger ones to worry about than you right now
so if youre not gonna be part of the solution then just stay out of the way

[hedonistic]

telling people to lock themselves up for their own safety and everyone else's isn't treating them like a monster or an animal

you have no idea what it's actually like to be treated like something beneath human
maybe you can talk to me about that when the only way to get out of isolation is to work for the people who put you there, get a fucking cuff on your wrist that tracks your GPS location, and a babysitter whose explicit job is to put you down if you get to be too much trouble

and you haven't really tried to meet me halfway
you've tried to convince me that my way is too mean, and i've tried to convince you that your way is dangerous
but the great thing about not actually having anyone treat you like you're sub-human is that you can do it your way anyway
me, i'd be lucky to stay alive if i did that, back home
because that's what it really means for people to see you as more of a rabid animal than a person

so all there is left to say is i hope all that Trust and Faith in people doesn't come back to bite you in the ass, man

good luck, i actually mean that sincerely

for the record, i can cook, so if you get food donations that you can't eat raw and can't find someone whose attitude you actually like, drop me a line

[competing]

[ A BIG, HEAVY SIGH. ]

i did try to meet you halfway
i tried to listen and you know i really WANTED to listen
but you mostly kept giving me insults and hostility
it wasnt about liking your attitude man
it was about actually being able to hear what you have to say when you dont cover it in so much barbed wire

because if id known all along that you wanted to TALK to people about this
to advise them about the consequences and the options
thats what you mean right?
not rounding them all up and shoving them in cages
then we could have saved ourselves a lot of time here
because i basically said as much a couple of ways back

[ present people with the options. tell them what's at stake, if they don't already realize it. trust in them to make the decision to lock themselves up. kagari hadn't been stressing that part — the communication. ]

thats what i meant about treating people like monsters or animals
not locking them up individually
but FORCING them into it
and not allowing them to make that choice for themselves

[ you know. like you were forced into it, kagari. speaking of... ]

im not gonna get into what you had to go through
i dont know the half of it and we both know that
it sounds like a real crappy situation but all ive got are words that you probably dont want or care about
but ill say this: we arent in your world anymore
the rules are different now
you can either adapt or fit things into boxes that might not even exist anymore
its pretty much up to you what you do with that

...oh
and if you genuinely want to help, then help
dont wait for someone to ask you to

[hedonistic]

look i'll be honest i'm not going to pretend i'm above forcing them into it

if it were entirely up to me, you guys would be the ones be rounding up each other, since you're all already infected, or we'd get the immune to do it
we'd all be outing ourselves and everyone we know that has symptoms so we don't all die before we can get all this under control and fix it
and i wouldn't feel bad about it, either, because doing it protects them from each other and from doing things they can't take back just as much as it protects the uninfected from them

because the thing about that "choice" is, as soon as someone doesn't take it, they don't really deserve to have it anymore, not under these circumstances

and one other thing: i didn't tell you about my world to make you feel sorry for me or because i can't let go of the rules from japan
i did it to give you some perspective

the world isn't so nice and shiny that you can always do the fair or kind or decent thing
sometimes shitty things just have to be done because there's bigger things at stake
and sometimes those shitty things seem a lot shittier when you don't really know how shitty they can get

i'd ask if you'd rather people hate you for taking their choice away than for not taking every precaution you could to keep all of us alive, but pretty sure you guys already made up your mind at the very beginning

so fine, whatever
you won't read any more complaints about it from me

[competing]

[ lance, for once, finally listens to keith. he could go on, and on and on and on about this with this guy, but it's become really obvious they aren't seeing eye to eye here, and in more than one way.

so he remains quiet.

it was never about having people hate them. it was never about how he himself would feel about this, when all is said and done, because at the end of the day, it's people treating others like people. giving them that choice, a choice that is inherently and rightfully theirs, and trusting they would do the right thing with it.

and maybe that is naive. maybe that is too idyllic.

but even if the world really is that terrible, isn't that even more of a reason not to contribute to it? ]