fandomhigh | Powers, Identity and the World: Embracing the Real You

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powers and identity

Powers, Identity and the World: Embracing the Real You - Friday, Period One

Today’s class was going to be a bit lopsided. Unlike last week, both teachers were present -- Rinoa, sitting nervously on the desk, and Jono, arms folded in the chair behind it -- but this class was Rinoa’s idea, so she was going to be doing most of the talking.

It was only fair. He’d taken over when she had been suffering from some rare exotic avian flu* the week before, so this was his turn. Moreover, he -- well. It wasn’t that he disagreed with her, because he didn’t, exactly. But devoting not just a sentence or two as disclaimer, but an entire class to this issue? That was something she’d pushed for, so he had agreed to let her have this one session just to climb up onto her soapbox.

*completely average cold

“Welcome back,” Rinoa said, feeling suddenly small as she realized it was just-her in charge this time. Okay. Deep breaths. “Over the next few weeks, Jono and I want to talk about your inner circle, and how careful you should be with it -- what types of people to look out for. People are going to use you, deceive you, manipulate you, suck up to you, avoid you, all of that awful stuff, and you need to be aware that it’s going to happen so you know good ways to prevent it.”

All well and good.

“But that’s not what this class is about.” Her hands were reaching up, unconsciously, to touch the rings on a chain around her neck. “Because the thing is, I think -- I think that some of you already know that lesson too well. You know how to hide. You know how to avoid. You’ve learned that no one is safe, so you stay away from the world. Or you’ve turned it inside-out. You aren’t safe, so you lock yourself away to save everyone else.”

She was glancing around the room now, trying to meet the eyes of everyone who she suspected might need this talk. Just based on how they were fidgeting or slumping.

“And you’re wrong.”

Her voice was steady as she continued. “You couldn’t be more wrong. It’s not safer for them, and it’s certainly not safer for you. No man is an island. The problem is fear. You’re afraid. So it’s easier to hide. But that just makes it so much easier for all of your problems to spin out of control.”

She glanced back at Jono, who gave her a nod as if to say she was doing fine. That helped her nerves, so she cleared her throat.

“I’ve told you before that I’m a Sorceress,” she said. “I didn’t tell you what that means. Most Sorceresses go mad. They can’t handle the power they have. They isolate themselves, and they lose their sanities. They turn into crazed dictators, fighting wars. They need to be stopped, forcibly. People are so afraid of Sorceresses that they tried to lock me away, and I was so afraid of what I might do -- of the things I had already done -- that I almost let them.”

Well, she had let them, but luckily Squall had had other ideas.

“I got some advice,” she said. “From an older, wiser Sorceress. A lovely, kind woman who ran an orphanage with her husband and had been a Sorceress since she was just a child. She was the one who told me I had it all wrong. Sorceresses don’t need isolation. They need to be grounded. They need Knights. A Knight is someone who guards the Sorceress from the darker side of her powers. From herself, if need be. He protects her heart, and her humanity.”

She smiled as her fingers traced the familiar grooves on her mother’s ring. “I have a Knight,” she said. “I’m still scared. But I’m safer with a Knight than I would be, hiding away and trying to wish all of my powers away. That won’t help anything. Isolating yourself won’t help anything. It’ll only make it all the easier for you to become separated out from the rest of the world. You need to be tied to the world. You, your essential self, you need other people to keep you yourself.”

She was explaining in circles, but maybe they understood.

“Find someone to trust. Maybe back home no one understands, but you’re in Fandom. People here do. Don’t close that door out of fear. We’ll be talking in weeks to come about who not to trust, but I wanted to say this first: don’t be afraid to trust. Be wise, be cautious, but be open. Not just so you can stay safe, but also so you don’t -- waste your life locked so far inside of yourself that you don’t know how to come out again.”

She shrugged awkwardly. “That’s all I wanted to say.”

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All alone.

Raven Darkholme

Celia Bowen

Karina Lyle

Anders

Alex Mack

Hanna Heller

Elsa of Arendelle

Kaylin Neya

Listen, take notes, roll your eyes, or fidget in your seat and try to avoid eye contact.

So Raven was sitting up and ~~doodling~~ scribbing notes as usual pretty much up to the whole "need a knight" thing. Yeah, okay, it made sense and all but the whole thing sounded a little too close to "find a husband to take care of you" for her comfort. She slouched back a little and stopped glancing up from her ~~notes~~ doodles.

She already had a guy in her life to reign her in, even if he was states and decades away from Fandom. These days that kind of felt like it was the problem, not a solution.

Anders wasn't sure how he felt about the topic. He agreed that trusting people was good: He just disliked the idea that, as a mage, he needed a minder. It wasn't too far off from the kind of thinking that led to Circles of Magi, from what he could tell. (If one knight was good, surely a whole platoon of them would be better?)

Who do you have near you that you can confide in, that you can open up to? Do you tend to isolate? What are the dangers of keeping yourself away from the rest of the world?

Or you can ask Rinoa how she learned to accept having a Knight, or how you can go about finding yourself someone to trust and confide in.

Or, if you happen to like your isolation, go ahead and tell Rinoa she's entirely wrong and you need to be locked in a closet for the good of humanity.

Messy ping all you'd like. And as always, feel free to announce that you have no powers and don't know why you're in this class, should any subject become too personal, painful or private. (Even if you've discussed your powers in past classes, yes.)

"I have plenty of people to confide in, for the first time in my life," Celia said, smiling a little shyly. "And I'll always, always be grateful for that -- I went from having absolutely no one to having more people reliable, good friends than I can count on both hands."

She twisted her right ring finger, a little anxious, as she tried to find the words to explain her hesitation. "However," she added, "at the risk of sounding a little...precious -- I can talk to, and call upon, and rely upon my friends during my time here, and ask their council. But...when I go home, it's just me again. I don't get a Knight. And I can't take any of you -- anyone home with me. So...I have to get the most out of it now, I suppose."

"Why can't you take anyone home with you?" Rinoa asked, out of curiosity. "If you can't, you might be alone in body, but not in spirit. Your friends are still reachable by phone, or e-mail, or letter-writing. Whatever technology is prevalent for you."

"Because my father is still stronger than I am," Celia replied quietly. "And I won't risk his wrath being inflicted on anyone other than myself. It'll be hard enough to write letters without his noticing."

"There are those of us who might be stronger than your father," Rinoa suggested. "If they wanted to risk his wrath in order to be with you, who are you to tell them no?"

"That's their choice," Celia said carefully. "But what about the ones who don't...have powers, who still might want to come? Who am I to say no to them?"

She was saying them, but she really meant 'him,' yes. But class didn't seem like an appropriate time to talk about how much her father didn't like her boyfriend.

"It's still their choice," she said, "although it complicates the matter significantly if people are going to be in harm's way. Do you believe their very lives would be in danger?"

"Yes," Celia said quietly after a long pause, addressing her desk. "Not just those without powers. Those with, as well. And I refuse to let anyone die for me, so...isn't that my choice?"

"It is," Rinoa said, wondering if someone ought to confront Celia's father. Unfortunately, in many cases, that would only make matters worse for Celia. "So what's saying that you have to go back, then? Could you use Fandom to escape him?"

"I don't have a problem trusting people who deserve my trust," Anders said thoughtfully. "If anything I tend to talk a little too much. But I don't like the idea that I need a minder. It's just -- a prettier version of confinement, isn't it? You still aren't really free if you have a knight protecting you."

Rinoa tilted her head to think that over. "Maybe your powers don't work like mine," she suggested. "And he isn't a minder, at least, not the way it sounds like you mean. He never stops me from using my abilities. He isn't there to say 'no' or shake his head sternly whenever I use magic."

She tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear. "Being a Sorceress means that I have more power than I can even explain," she said. "More than I could show you. It's a deep well. When I really let it out, I dive in. He never tries to stop me from that. But once I start, I can go too deep. So far out that I can't find my way back again. I go to a place where I stop being me, and just start drowning in it."

The power was loud, and the power was hungry. It liked being out. It wanted more.

"He's not a fence, keeping me in," she said. "He's a tether. He's the thread I follow to find my way back home."

"I don't understand," Anders admitted. "You don't have self-control? You can't decide you want to use enough power to do this but not that without a knight to keep you grounded? I'm not trying to be rude -- maybe a little -- but that's the first thing anyone with powers should learn. Otherwise you're walking around asking to be an abomination."

She smiled at that. "You're not being rude," she said. "Or, if you are, I don't mind. I think perhaps we're thinking of different scales. If I want to cast spells, freeze that door over, make the windows explode, get my wings out, of course I can use a little and not a lot. It's easy. But sometimes I need to dive in deep. Deeper than any sane person would. Sometimes --"

She bit her lip, wondering how to say this.

"I unmade Time," she said. "Three of us, working together. There was a reason for it, I assure you; this isn't an example of what I might do if nobody's babysitting me. But three of us took Time and folded it in on itself, like a river, until each moment flowed back into itself, and the very fabric of existence began to unravel. Later, when Time reasserted itself, someone was left outside of it -- and so I took myself out of Time to go and find him."

She offered a half-smile. "I'm not sure what the limits of my powers are," she explained. "I'm not even sure if I have limits."

Edited 2015-02-06 19:01 (UTC)

Anders blinked at her for a long moment as he tried to get his thoughts on order. "We're thinking on different scales," he finally agreed. "An unchecked mage at home might burn down a city or summon some demons, but Ive never even heard of someone with enough strength to travel through time -- let alone unravel it. I see why what you do is different."

It was... probably a smarter idea for Karina to just keep her mouth shut and sulk in the back of the class again but, well, she was kinda bored of that and she did have opinions on this.

Lots and lots of opinions.

"If you have powers," because she certainly didn't, thank-you-very-much, "and I mean that as a general-you, not a specific-you, then, maybe this is something I'm missing, but why do you have to talk about it at all in the first place? Like, for some, I get it that it's pretty much impossible to not have them be noticed or acknowledged but... like, why does everyone seem so focused on being all 'oh hey, I've got this, I'm awesome because of this!'? Like, why even bother if you don't need to? I don't get that. What's wrong with just not bringing it up?"

Karina had powers, not that she was admitting it to anyone in class, ever, and she still really, honestly, and truly didn't get it. Her powers were a footnote in her life, a stepping stone for the things she really wanted, not her identity or particularly important to her except for how they could further her real goals.

"You don't have to," Celia replied, glancing over. "But some of us don't ever get to talk about it, at least not at home. Some of us are told not to express that part of ourselves. Some of us are kept closeted and told not to use what we've been given."

She worried her lower lip thoughtfully for a moment. "It's not -- I don't think it's bragging, or anything, though I can't speak for anyone else. I think it's...commiserating. Isn't that the point of this class? How our powers tie into our identity? And never being allowed to express a facet of your identity publicly, for fear of retribution, is a terrible feeling."

She'd lost a parent over not being able to keep quieter about her powers, after all. Celia knew this lesson well.

Karina resisted the urge to shrug. Mostly because she thought it might look more dismissive than uncomfortable and while Karina was definitely uncomfortable and frequently dismissive, she didn't really want to get in shit about it.

And if she just let her mouth run, she would. Karina was well aware of that.

"I guess I just don't get why powers have to be tied into identity," she sayd, after a moment of picking out her words carefully. "I mean, we've done the whole 'you are you, not your powers' class but it kinda sounds like we're right back to people being their powers with the whole having to trust, having to talk, having to do things to acknowledge that people have powers. Like, to borrow from the class title, what if the real you really doesn't need embrace your powers to be the 'real you'?"

Celia considered that thoughtfully, nodding along. "I think the point is that anyone here isn't only their powers," she agreed carefully. "And that if you -- and I do mean the general you, of course -- don't see them as part of your identity, that's wonderful for you. But I think a lot of us do see it as at least part of who we are, and we should be allowed to express that, you know? If I were absolutely phenomenal at knitting, but for whatever reason knitting was outlawed where I was from -- well, then finding a group of people who understand that I love to knit and I'm great at it would be wildly rewarding, and I'd probably want to spend a fair amount of time talking to my fellow knitters about knitting. Again, not to brag, but to share the experience. To share the burden."

A pause, and then, "I'm dreadful at knitting, but I couldn't think of anything else."

"I wouldn't even know where to start with knitting," Karina admitted, a bit more cheerfully than she'd been all class. She could talk about the hypothetical of knitting, absolutely.

"I guess, I just look at myself and figure that, if I was great at knitting, to run with what you were using, and I found a group of people who were also great at it and openly talked about it... I don't know that I'd want to join in. Like, if the options are keeping my knitting secret and being safe, or trusting people to keep my secret safe for me, well, keeping it to myself seems like the safer, smarter option, even if it's not as... fun?"

That got a real, genuine smile out of Celia. "In that case," she said, careful to continue using the knitting metaphor, "I tend to default to thinking that we'd all get in trouble for knitting, then. Everyone's strange, so no one is. Everyone's an outcast...so no one is. If they rat me out -- well, they're putting themselves in danger, too, and it's really by the very virtue of other people being knitters that I would feel secure in sharing my secret. To abandon the knitting thing for a moment -- I didn't admit to my magic, here, until I realized it wasn't unusual. And then it was like -- like finally being able to breathe, after holding my breath for years. Or, you know, knitting in a closet. Whichever metaphor. But that's my experience, as someone who's had to do a lot of hiding and resented it, if that makes sense."

"You don't," Rinoa said, lifting her shoulders. "You, the hypothetical you, could go to classes and never let on that you have powers at all. I know people who have hidden what they are, even from those closest to them. It's an acceptable choice."

She was shrugging again, easily. "There are a lot of advantages to hiding in plain sight. Plenty of people with powers do. Some full time, and some now and then. I can hide who I am, and in the right circumstances, I should, and I do."

"But here," she continued, "here, I don't have to. For some people, that's a freeing feeling. I don't know that it's 'I have powers, and I'm awesome!' I think for some of us it's more, 'I have powers, and I'm so glad I'm not alone.' Or 'I have powers, and I can admit here, and only here, that they frighten me.' Or even 'I have powers. If you do, too, then can we compare notes on how we deal with them?'"

Karina chewed on the inside of her mouth for a moment before deciding that, well, she might as well say what she was thinking.

"Calling keeping it to yourself an 'acceptable choice'," she said slowly, "kinda sounds to me like you think the other choice, of sharing, is better. Isn't that kinda... I don't know, I think if I had powers, I'd find that a bit hard to deal with, I guess. Like, maybe that's the better way for you, and I can't make any judgements about that," okay, she could, but she was being good and trying not to let that show, "but, I guess, if I had powers, I'd think the other way is better than what you seem to think is better so... where does that leave this if we're both sorta thinking the other person is wrong but not actually saying that?"

Rinoa raised an eyebrow. "I said 'acceptable,' and I meant acceptable," she said. "I'm not here to say what's better for you, the hypothetical you. I don't know hypothetical-your situation."

"We might be talking at cross-purposes," she continued. "I was trying to address the many people who choose to hide, not because they don't wish to discuss their powers, or find them to be private, personal matters, or consider them trivial to their identity, but out of fear. Some people don't let on that they have powers because they're scared of what other people will say, of what they might do, of admitting what it all means. I won't say that that's wrong, either, because that's another acceptable choice. But I think it's sad that people need to feel afraid, and I don't think it's safe to live with any part of yourself locked away due to fear, no matter what that part of yourself is."

She shrugged. "If a hypothetical-you thought so little of your hypothetical-powers that you could keep them a secret and not have that secret bring about isolation, or fear, then I'm happy for hypothetical-you, and believe you should continue making whatever choice is best for hypothetical-you."

"Because at home I'm not supposed to, at least not if I don't want to get rounded up," Anders admitted. "And it's fun to make people uncomfortable sometimes."

He tapped his pencil against his desk before he gave a more serious answer. "Besides, it's not as though I did anything wrong. Why should I try to hide something I didn't choose? I agree it's obnoxious if someone mentions their powers every thirty seconds, but I'm not going to lie by omission every day of my life."

"Isn't it pretty obnoxious in and of itself to deliberately set out to make people uncomfortable?" she asked. "I mean, don't get me wrong, I do that too, though not with powers, but, like, claiming you're doing nothing wrong but deliberately setting out to upset people for no reason other than you feel like it, well, that's not really doing nothing wrong, is it? There's a difference between just being yourself and deliberately making people uncomfortable."

"I don't do it often," Anders grumbled, flushing a bit because she had a point. (Not that he intended to directly admit that.) "But if someone has a problem with my magic -- not with anything specific I did, but with the magic itself -- then they have a problem with me. And if someone has a problem with me based on nothing but prejudices and fear, I don't owe them anything. And I certainly don't need to stop doing magic, or stop talking about it, just to make them happier."

Ask her about her friend circle, some of whom are even in this class!

Yes, some of them were, even if Celia was carefully not looking at anyone in particular today.

The reminder that she'd be alone once she left Fandom was a little too painful, honestly.

Jono let Rinoa take point on this, but he's still there. Ask him what he thinks about all this touchy-feely crap.

My co-teacher and I have horrible scheduling conflicts of late, and she was kind enough to take class last week when I had a shitty winter cold, so you get Rinoa-class this time.

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Powers, Identity and the World: Embracing the Real You - Friday, Period One

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