Written for "We are Silent" which is a part of We Day. We are Silent is for people who have no voice, and teaching us first world people what it's like. I have to be silent for 24 hours. In real life, anyways. On here, I'm going to be posting up a storm.
She smiles as Aurox enters the room and gestures to the sticker on her shirt. She's going to do this, this time. Her label reads "we are silent for anyone who needs help" she intended the label to hit close to home and it did, that was certain. While she was blind, she'd needed a stalwart, but all she'd had was a flaky mother and an aloof father. Missing a sense of family and a sense of sight, she'd needed help and only recently gotten it from Nyx.
Aurox sees the pack of labels and writes under the words we are silent, "For those who've lost control" he thinks about the time Neferet had covered him in smothering tendrils of Darkness, trying to force him to shift. Then he remembers how Heath took over and almost cost him his life. He's lost control of himself, lost himself time after time, being a vessel; it comes in the job description. Then, he vows to take control of his own life, finally.
Damien has his own sticker on, when he comes to eat breakfast. "For those who've died before their time," is his reason. He thinks of Jack as he takes this day of silence. Jack never had to die, he was young, and a victim of senseless violence. Jack was killed as a sacrifice, not as himself. Damien knows that jack deserved a long, happy life, and to die as himself, not just as a faceless, nameless sacrifice. That hurt him most, beyond that he never got to say good bye. Jack had been the best person he'd known and he had died as an arbitrary sacrifice. No more than a warm body. He hopes one day Neferet sees the amazing life she cut off and repents. Not that that's likely.
Shaunee looks somber. She has a lot after what happened with Erin. She wants to believe that her best friend, her Twin died a hero. Had she? Her label reads "for the misunderstood, the unheard," she'd wanted to add 'unsung heroes' but that seemed like pushing it. Few people believed what Thanatos had told her about, how Erin had died a double agent, helping the High Council. Shaunee is glad to see that Erin had indeed been the great person she'd known, but it's worse now as well. It's easier to see someone go over to the dark side and pay for it than to see someone lay down their life, nobly. Damien nods to her as Shaylin passes Aurox a note. He understands what she's going through.
Aurox reads it, and it says "thank you for participating. Is this all of us?"
Aurox responds by shaking his head, just as Aphrodite enters the room. Shaylin sees sincerity in her aura, like she's actually doing this for a reason, not just because the Dark Daughters and Sons are. Shaylin decided that maybe she could get along with Aphrodite LaFont.
Her label reads "for the people I didn't save." Aphrodite has let people die by hiding her visions, and she wanted to commemorate them. She can't believe how many innocent people died because of her selfishness. The homage to them is the least she can do, glue stains of her silk shirt be damned. She decides that there are more important things than that shirt, after all. She almost grudgingly respects Shaylin for giving her the opportunity. Almost. She'd never really get along with the True Sight girl.
Zoey and Stark enter, Stark's label reads "for those who've made mistakes," the young warrior thinks of his mentor. That day plays out vividly in his mind. The splatter of blood on the divider still haunts him. Not to mention when Neferet made him shoot Stevie Rae. He's a danger, a bunch of the time, and he knows it. He looks down at Zoey , who is in his arms, smiling up at him and saying so much with her eyes that words would pollute the moment. He can also say that he saved her life. As long as he's saved Zoey…
Zoey sees Heath and Shaylin exchanging notes and sighs. She doesn't want to admit it, but it's not fair of her to expect Aurox to be Heath, no fairer than Kalona wanting her to be A-ya. Her label used to read "for love lost," but she'd changed it. That had seemed a little too obvious, and she hadn't done this to guilt Aurox into becoming someone who'd died mere weeks ago. Her label reads "for victims of bullying," she'd chosen it because that was how she'd started. She gets almost nostalgic as she thinks about how, at the start, Aphrodite had seemed like the villain, because she had been a hateful bully. Hell, she'd bullied all of us, and that was how the circle had originally united.
Stevie Rae and Rephaim arrive shortly after, holding hands. Stevie Rae's label reads "for being the first," she means the first red High Priestess, or the first ravenmocker. Anytime where a person has to go beyond their comfort zone and start something, be it good or bad, voluntary or not. She looks at the odd little circle they've amassed and smiles to herself. She's glad, despite everything she's had to endure, that it all happened. Nyx gave her so much that she'd have to be either bratty or pessimistic not to appreciate all of this. She had an affinity, a consort and possibly the best friends on this earth, what more could she want. Her silence is to honour Nyx for giving her all this.
Rephaim's label says "the oppressed and the stigmatised," Damien had helped him to find the words. He feels like they describe him and his brothers. They were seen by everyone as monsters, forced to serve Neferet and Kalona, particularly the latter. It was only recently that Kalona had begun to work on treating his children as though they were equals to him, before that they were slaves. Rephaim doesn't want anyone to have another's will forced upon them, not after experiencing it firsthand. And even still, he battles his stigma at school. The fledglings outside the circle are wary at best and few people trust him. Purely because of whom he was born to. He looks at Stevie Rae and thinks 'at least she trusts me.'
Erik walks in late and his label surprised Shaylin. "For the broken," it reads, a reference to their first conversation. Erik was trying to be a better person, a better friend and it was working. Shaylin had told him his aura was—albeit slowly—improving. He was done being so fragmented by insecurities and the desire to be better, always fucking better that it broke him. He is going to be a whole person, finally, and he is never going to have to worry about being 'good enough' or 'better' again. That, Erik is determined of.
Kalona and Thanatos arrive late after fighting to get a shirt over Kalona's wings. Kalona's reason is simply "failure," it is only because he failed that he is here now. He only met these people and became Thanatos' warrior because he'd failed as Nyx's. He was happier with Thanatos as well, there was no meddling consort to vie with and there was no boundary between love and warrior he had to stay on one side of. Kalona felt free with Thanatos, so he was silent for failures both fortunate as his had been and costly as they could be. Even immortals learned from failures, so he hopes that, someday, people would learn from their mistakes as he had.
Thanatos is silent for the departed, particularly those who die alone, with no one to hear them, or worse, no one to care. The old saying "if a tree falls and no one hears it, did it make a sound?" sums up her statement. She takes a moment for all those people whose final wishes go unheard, as her family's had. As a High Priestess of Death, she hears those last words and last wishes even if no other does, and it saddens the normally stoic vampyre.
She walks the circle from the dining hall to the temple, lifting a sign to hang above the circle of candles she'd lit. The light of the flames enhanced the lettering on the sign, making it stand out. "We are silent to hear Nyx,"
Back at the Mayo, a certain fallen High Priestess observes the day too; though her label is different form the others. The others were about not only themselves, but other people. Neferet, call her selfish, had written simply "for Emily" on hers as a perplexed White Bull demands an answer as to why she too observed this moment of silence.
Finally, after a night of prayer and meditation, and a day of little sleep, they are permitted to speak. The first words come from Zoey Redbird, who speaks hesitantly. "Stark?" she whispers, "I love you. Only you," she whispers. Stark feels as though he's just won the lottery, or something equally prodigious. He kisses her gently, murmuring "and I love you, mo bann ri."
There'll be a second chapter tomorrow. Thanks to KShade for beta-ing this at a moment's notice…