fandomhigh | Rookiehood 101, Tuesday, Period 4

"Sometimes you ain't strong enough." That was Reno's opening statement for the day, yes. He was standing in the classroom well before any of the students arrived, with his arms crossed over his chest and a solemn expression on his face. Possibly the first time some of his students had seen him looking anything but smug, he supposed. They'd have to cope. "Sometimes, you're gonna have to get out there and do shit that you know is too damn big for you, and either you ain't gonna be able to get it done, or else you will, and that'll end up bein' all the worse, yo."

He cast his gaze across the students in the room.

"Every damn thing you do is the direct result of a decision you made. It don't matter if it's orders. You follow 'em, it was you who chose to. And some of them, it don't matter what you're doing for the rest of your life, are gonna stick with you, zoto. They're gonna stare at you when you close your eyes and they're gonna scream at you when you're lyin' down in your bed at night, tryin' not to sleep because when you sleep, it just gets louder."

He'd started to pace, now. Slowly, from one side of the room to the other, in front of the desks. The entire time, his eyes were carefully fixed on a point on the wall, well away from anything resembling eye-contact with anyone in the room.

"Maybe you're one of them people who ain't gonna ever have to choose between blood on your hands or peace of mind. Lucky you. The rest of you..." And now he looked away from the wall, seeking out the eyes of the people in the classroom, one by one. "When you leave this room today, just remember that the right decision ain't always the easy one to make. Sometimes, it'll be the one nobody wants you to make. Sometimes, it'll be the last thing anyone wants to do. And makin' it might cost you everything, yoto. You'll know what I'm talkin' about when you get there. And when you do... Don't let it be bigger'n you, Rookies. You can't take back most of what you do, so do it right the first time."

He grinned. Sometimes, Reno's grins were two inches shy of completely sane.

"No class discussion today. Leave if you wanna, or stay here if you don't. But either way, I want all of you to think about where it is you're gonna go from here, and what hard decisions you might have to make someday, yo. Are you gonna be the one who follows orders and lives with it, or are you gonna be the one who puts your foot down, gives 'em the finger, and decides to do what's right, instead?"

[Open!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Elena nodded. "Sometimes I think no one has clean hands," she said. "Sometimes just surviving means you make those choices, and ... what's the alternative? Being a martyr?"

"You try to make the right choices, the good choices. The ethical choices. But sometimes the right is leaving that begging couple by the side of the road because you don't even have enough food for yourselves. But the good, moral, ethical choice might've been to scrounge up what little bit you could. But you don't do that."

She ran her hands through her hair. "It builds up, y'know? I mean, at first you're like 'okay, this sucks, but I'm trying to survive.' And next thing you know, you're numb to it all. And that's the scariest part of all."

"When you stop feeling it," she agreed. "And why is your life worth more than theirs? Except it is, to you, because it has to be. They wouldn't value your life higher than their own, so it's ..."

She shook her head, not sure she was even putting words around this right.

"I got out of a bad place," she said. "Some people feel obligated to go back and help others still stuck there. I just left."

"You saved yourself," K-Mart said. "You can't exactly go on with life if you don't save yourself."

She smiled sadly. "And besides, just because you didn't stick around to help then doesn't mean you can't go back and help now."

"I can't, actually," Elena said with a wry sort of smile. "Most of it's gone."

It happened. She lifted her shoulders. "Maybe that's the lesson here. We survived, and ... I don't know. If I'd died, I wouldn't expect them to shed tears over me. Maybe we need to stop apologizing for it. We lived, they died, and it might not be fair but since when is life fair?"

Rookiehood 101, Tuesday, Period 4

Re: The TAs

Re: The TAs

Re: The TAs

Re: The TAs

Re: The TAs