legionworld | VALOR'S DAY [Modplot]

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VALOR'S DAY [Modplot]

VALOR'S DAYUniversally celebrated through the United Planets, this yearly holiday celebrates the hero Valor, a Daxamite responsible for helping many UP species like the Braalians and Winathians to colonize their worlds over a thousand years ago. Valor's Day has over time evolved into a general holiday that promotes togetherness, charity, and good will through the galaxy.

Valor's Day celebrations through the UP are know for their displays of multi-colored lights, decorated trees, garlands of various plants and flowers, and "goodwill" carols. Valor's Day is also associated with Valor pageants and "origin" plays, and the playing of the blootsplort horn and tringlebells. Traditionally, gifts are given between different individuals, with each species having their own specific gift-giving traditions.

Legion World is no exception when it comes to the festivities. Garlands of rainbow flowers and wreathes of fragrant grasses decorate the halls and common areas. In some places where it won't interfere in Legion operations, goodwill carols play. The music is played on alien instruments and is probably very different compared to what some of the Legionnaires might be used to hearing around winter holidays, but it has the same mix of cheer and brightness as Christmas carols.

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The reaction from the telling, no matter the source, is going to be terrible. There's no getting around that, no softening what he's done. Locus swallows tightly, still staring towards the house for a moment or two longer, before finally shifting his gaze back to Wash.

Who doesn't look nearly as triumphant about this news as he ought. Perhaps because he too will be under their scrutiny.

"...wouldn't you prefer if he no longer associated with me?" Why make this play at helpful advice, if that's the case? It doesn't make sense.

Broadcasting someone's past without their consent benefits nobody. Wash has nothing to feel triumphant about there - nobody in the Legion does.

"Yep," he says simply. "My life would be a hell of a lot easier without you in it." A beat. "But this isn't about me. Just because I don't like it doesn't mean it has to stop." It's Living With Reds and Blues 101: you learn to put up with a lot of irritating shit, or you lose your goddamn mind. "York is the kind of person who needs people, and he's picked you. You need someone at your back who treats you like a human being instead of an attack dog, and you have him. I don't like you near my friends, but that doesn't mean what you have won't work." Especially since breaking it off would hurt York and would probably mean a backslide for Locus. Wash has broken plenty of things over the past few years; he's determined not to continue the pattern here.

"Plus, you've convinced me that you really do want this second chance." And that's the crux of the matter - that's what Wash's reasoning keeps coming back to every time seeing Locus near someone puts him on edge. "I had mine, and it involved being adopted by idiots." He gestures to the house. "He's your idiot."

Edited 2016-12-22 20:11 (UTC)

"For now."

Locus lets out a breath, and some of that fight-or-flight tension along with it.

"I expect that will change when I tell him."

Which pretty much says he's already decided he will. He doesn't want to, of course, things would be much easier if he could ignore his past and start fresh. But if Wash is right, that won't be an option forever.

If this...friendship is destroyed in the process, at least it will be on his terms.

"Maybe." He knows York, yeah, but it's also been years since he's seen him. Wash knows he's changed in that amount of time, that's for sure, but he only has an inkling of how York might have changed. It's still a bit of a gamble.

"The best thing you can do is be honest. Tell him the whole story." There's always going to be issues with Locus avoiding taking responsibility for his actions; hopefully that won't wreck his version of the story too badly.

If he were more empathetic, he might put himself in York's position. Locus himself knew now the value of painful honesty over a comforting lie, and surely York would prefer the same. Unfortunately, empathy was still far from his strongest suite.

Fortunately, he'd already made his decision. He would tell York, to the best of his ability...and of course personal bias would play some part. The same would be true if anyone told the story.

"...he has poor taste in friends," he notes abruptly, glancing back in Washington's direction.

Wash snorts - it's the closest he's going to get to a laugh right now. "No kidding. Wait 'til you see his taste in women." York seems to like women who can and will wipe the floor with him. Wash has never understood it.

Locus simply shakes his head at that. Relationships are, predictably, something he stays away from. For good reason. But York seems to thrive on social interaction in a way he doesn't. It's entirely possible he'd engage with people who aren't the best fit for him, or capable of hurting him, simply to sate that need.

One of the many reasons he's grateful the furthest his own needs seem to stretch is occupying a room with someone. Quietly. Preferably the opposing end of the room if it can be helped.

"He was one of the first people on the station to speak to me. You must not have had the time necessary to warn him."

"Somehow, I'm not surprised it was him." It's actually a pretty accurate assessment of the situation; it's not like Wash goes hunting down new recruits so much as he just happens to run into them. Despite Legion World's size, it's somehow a really small ship.

"The only people I warned before talking to you myself were Kid Q and Brainy."

"What precisely did you think I was planning to do?"

Granted, he hadn't known about Locus's abandonment of Felix or his change of heart, but he hadn't ever exactly gone off-mission at any point. If the Legion wanted him to do something, he'd do it. That much hadn't changed.

"I don't know." It's a very straightforward admission, but given that Locus had known most of the situation, there's no reason not to tell him. "I didn't know what point on the timeline you were from, and I didn't know about your conversation with Santa. I was covering my bases."

"In the instance that I decided to attack the Legion?"

It would have been a ridiculous move, suicidal even, considering the defenses here. Then again, he can appreciate a certain level of paranoia. He has his own, and Washington had no reason to suspect that he would be in any way friendly.

But there is always his own survival to consider, above all else.

"Or any of its members, yes." Well, as long as they're not mincing words. "You can't blame me for being cautious."

"And they took your precautions to heart."

And he had to sit through a psych eval. Which was all sorts of enjoyable for everyone involved. He's still a little resentful over that.

But no. He can't really blame him for that.

"Surely you understand by now my purpose in being here."

"All I did was give them the information. The precautions were their idea." Psych evals are fun for absolutely no one, but Dr. Ryk'rr is nothing if not thorough and Wash does feel a bit better knowing Locus had talked to her.

"Same as the rest of us. Fight the good fight, defeat interdimensional time Cthulu, and go home." That's what it boils down to for all of them, isn't it?

"...And what if our purpose was better served here?"

It's a thought that's been rolling around in the back of his head for some time now. If there's a fight waiting back in their universe, it's one he has no business taking part of. He's done enough damage.

Here, there's a fresh start. There are people who can be trusted to steer him in the right direction. There is, in fact, a real purpose to fighting again, as there had been during even the more horrific portions of the Great War.

That gives Wash pause. He has something to go home to - he has a lot to go home to - but Locus has lost his partner and his equilibrium. He has nothing but a criminal record and whatever he finds here.

Wash had been the same before the Reds and Blues had adopted him.

"When it comes to that," he finally says, "there's no our. I need to go back to Chorus, but that doesn't hold for you." He sighs. "I guess, after Chronoblivion's gone, you'll need to make a decision."

"...and what would you do, in my stead?"

He states it as though it would be obvious fact, the choice that he would make. But there's a question there, genuine and honest, masked behind that front of certainty.

Nothing is certain anymore. Tonight proved as much.

Wash stops again. This line of questioning is every bit as dangerous as the near-fight earlier had been, just in a different way.

"I'm not having that conversation with you right now," he finally says, tone even. "Given what I know about how you think, and what you used to think about me...no. Bring it up again in a month or two, when you know who you are when you're not following orders." Locus' world has been turned upside down, and he'll be looking for stability the only way he knows how, and Wash can't be that for him. He can't validate Locus' choices, or make decisions for him - worst case scenario, it'll pull them both into a downward spiral that neither of them can afford to be in. Wash has a firm enough sense fo self to draw that line - hopefully Locus can respect it.

He'll leave it be. That doesn't make him pleased about it, or Wash's assessment of him. This time there's no helmet to hide the way his eyes narrow, the tense way his jaw works.

Of course. Of course he still thinks that. Why would he choose to be cooperative now? It was a momentary lapse on his part, he knows that now, and he nods past Wash's shoulder to the exit to the biome.

"Then I believe we're done here."

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VALOR'S DAY [Modplot]

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