fandomhigh | Ethics [Thursday, January 17]

"Today we discuss lying," Anakin said as he closed the classroom door precisely on time. "Everyone lies. 'Of course that doesn't make your butt look big.' 'You like her, I like her.' 'I'm totally okay with you moving on.' 'Everything's fine, why do you ask?' It's how the world goes around because no one wants to be trapped in a conversation where someone whines at you for hours on end about how awful their life is."

He looked around the room. "Trust me. Everyone's life is terrible. They're just not telling you about it. Be grateful."

He reached onto his desk for a piece of paper. "Today we're conducting an exercise to see how well you pass this particular social ritual, then we'll discuss whether you think it is necessary. We're playing two truths and a lie. I'll tell you three things about myself and you have to decide which one is the falsehood. Then you'll all tell three things and we'll see how well you can either read each other or keep things hidden."

He gave them a small smile. "I'm very good at this." He schooled his face to absolute neutrality, put his mental blocks up to bar any psychics in the room from gaining an advantage, then recited: "During a war at home I was known as 'The Hero Without Fear.' I named my children after people I met in Fandom. I've never been beaten in one-on-one lightsaber combat." His eyes challenged them to call him out. "Who's next?"

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Rikku rolled her eyes. "I got hit when I was really little, and it sucked. Happy? That still leaves you with two."

Reno leaned back in his seat, pursing his lips in thought. "One down, two to go, hm? Don't know nothin' about your brother, so I'm not gonna even touch on that one, yoto. The second one, I'm gonna say."

She had, after all, joked with him about jail cells around this place before. And some of the stuff she was going on about when she exploded in that first religion class screamed that she'd be pinned guilty by association, if nothing else.

Hell, her home had burned. Sounded like conviction enough to him.

"You're right," she said, face carefully blank. "Convicted of treason, dire injury to a Maester, and conspiring with the Al Bhed - I bet that one took them a while. Sentenced to death in the Via Purifico, which is a fancy way of saying they tossed us into a sewer with a huge dragon in it. We killed the dragon and shot up the guards at the exit. My brother only speaks Al Bhed."

Huh. Convictions that he hadn't even considered might be on the menu. Interesting to know, really.

"Al Bhed's the name of your language, too?" Casual conversation right now seemed so very much more pleasant, no matter what mental notes he happened to be taking on the rest of it. "Never heard you speak any of it. Wouldn't have guessed you weren't a native speaker of English, yo."

"Al Bhed ec so vencd myhkiyka yht E drehg ed ec y bnaddean myhkiyka dryh drec uha. Dra jufamc numm tevvanahdmo. E secc cbaygehk ed yht raynehk ed ymuit." She shrugged. "Pops thought it was a good idea for us to be able to speak with the Yevonites, so I learned their language when I was little. I don't get to speak Al Bhed much any more. No one else here knows it."

Reno squinted and tried to parse... whatever the hell it was that just came out of her mouth.

"I've never heard anything like it," he confessed. "I'm not surprised that nobody really knows what any of it means."

Rikku lifted a shoulder, carefully nonchalant. "So I don't bother speaking it. I used to run some phrases in the paper, but I don't know that anybody reads them, really."

"Huh." Reno nodded faintly. "Damn shame." He paused, considering for a moment, and then grinned faintly. "How do you say, 'damn shame' in Al Bhed?"

Ethics [Thursday, January 17]

Re: Two truths and a lie: Rikku

Re: Two truths and a lie: Rikku

Re: Two truths and a lie: Rikku

Re: Two truths and a lie: Rikku

Re: Two truths and a lie: Rikku

Re: Two truths and a lie: Rikku

Re: Two truths and a lie: Rikku

Re: Two truths and a lie: Rikku