This chapter is going a little shorter this time, since there's not much else going on in it.
1/5/18: Reworked to flesh out Mustang's conversations and backstory, and to account for changes to the plot.
Chapter 22: Die Young:
Pax Officers' Quarters
Leaving Europa
February 1st, 2841
After her stolen assault shuttle landed in the hangar bay of the Pax, Mustang explained to Darrow and the others what had happened during Pliny's betrayal. While Sevro went to summon the Telemanuses for a war meeting to plan their next move, Theodora, Darrow's Pink valet, left to arrange for food and refreshments to be sent to the war room before returning to her own quarters for some rest. Mustang normally kept her emotions guarded like Golds were expected to, but between figuring out the truth about Darrow, her emotional armor was cracked. While Darrow and Roque discussed why the latter had been ordered to let Aja escape during the battle over Europa, Mustang left the medBay and headed towards her quarters. She had ten minutes before the strategy meeting and she wanted to seek Kavax's advice and resolve her inner turmoil before the meeting began.
When Sevro had been dispatched to summon the Telemanuses, she'd told him to pass along a message to Kavax, asking him to meet her at her stateroom before the meeting. When she arrived in her room, she turned on her dataPad and pulled up all her research. With everything set up, she sat down on the bed to wait. A minute later, as a heavy, thundering knock sounded from the door that was too loud to come from anyone but a Telemanus. Taking a deep breath to steady herself, she opened the door to find Kavax and Daxo waiting outside in the hallway. She quickly ushered them inside and turned on a jamField. Both men quirked their brows in confusion as they noticed the familiar pop of the jamField activating. Once she was certain they were alone, she turned back to the two Telemanuses and brought up her datapad.
"What's wrong, Virginia?" Daxo asked cautiously, unsure of what was going on. "You look troubled." Mustang couldn't help but offer a sad smile at his concern. The Telemanuses had always been more caring than her family was. While she still cared for her father and brother in the way that one instinctively cared about their blood relatives, she still remembered when her father had let her baby sister die in the womb because of his cruel Darwinist philosophy that he didn't even practice when it came to his own son. She and Adrius used to be inseparable before their mother died, but afterwards he became distant and cold. The only member of her biological family she'd ever had a unanimously positive relationship with had been Claudius. Her elder brother had always been there for her, helping with her studies, taking her on trips to see the world, and generally helping her have a chance to be more than the daughter of the ArchGovernor for a while.
But then Karnus au Bellona had murdered him, and her family had never been the same. She and Adrius had been split up for protection against assassination attempts, and she'd been fostered out to the Telemanuses. Truthfully, she felt that her father just couldn't bear the sight of his remaining children after the death of the one he considered the perfect son. In any case, she reflected, it had been for the best. The Telemanus family had helped her come to terms with her brother's death and fill the void he'd left behind with love and laughter. Pax and Daxo had been like brothers to her. Thraxa was like the older sister she'd never had, and Kavax had been the kind of father she wished her own had been. While she wished Claudius had still lived, she ultimately wouldn't want to change her childhood with the Telemanus clan. She finally finished gathering her thoughts and looked up to face her surrogate family.
"There's something I discovered while I was on my way here," she began. "Something had been bothering me ever since I crafted Takashi's false credentials, but I couldn't put my finger on it, but today, I finally put the pieces together." With a trembling hand, she brought up a backup of the video file from her data pad and pressed play. Kavax and Daxo watched the hanging in silence. Their jaws dropped when they heard Eo say Darrow's name. Their eyes darted towards her, silently asking if this mean what they thought it meant. She held up a finger, signaling for them to wait until the video was finished. Once Eo's last words left her long dead lips, Mustang closed the video and erased it from her datapad completely.
"Darrow is a Red," she finally said. As the words left her mouth, it occurred to her just how different Kavax was from her own father. If she shared this with him, he would have executed Darrow in a heartbeat, her own thoughts and turmoil be damned. But Kavax, for all his boisterousness in battle, knew that there were times when one needed to stop and think. It was part of why she had always looked up to him more than her father, and it was also why she loved him like one as well. Ever since she was a little girl, she had always sought his counsel by the fireplace in his estate. Now, she waited to hear his advice. The towering Telemanus patriarch was silent for a long moment as he considered what to say considering this revelation.
"Virginia," he finally began, voice soft and comforting. "We have always known our hierarchy is needlessly cruel to maintain the luxury Gold enjoys. The rise of groups like the Sons of Ares was inevitable. We all know this. So," while it's certainly a surprise to see them attempt such a bold move as to carve a Red into a Gold to infiltrate the ruling class and bring the hierarchy down from within, it is not particularly in expected that they would take such a desperate gamble. In fact, considering this news, Darrow's sometimes contradictory behavior begins to make sense. He left for the Academy "to become one of your father's killers" as you once put it, because he believed that to be the quickest way to climb the pyramid and put himself in a better position for when it was finally time to strike, and he distanced himself from you because he fears getting you caught in the crossfire of his crusade"
"But he'll destroy my family," Virginia protested. "My father hanged his wife. He hanged her. How can he even look at me? Does he want me to help him destroy my people?"
"I doubt genocide is what he or the Sons wanted," Daxo interjected.
"After what we've done to his people, after what my father did to him, how can they not?" Her hands shook while she unbuttoned the top two catches on her jacket, as it would help her breath through this. "How can I live with this? If I don't report him, millions will die."
"And if you do, you accept that billions should live as slaves," Kavax commented. "If it is not Darrow, someone else will rise. Ten years from now. Fifty. A thousand. The downfall of the hierarchy is inevitable, no matter how much it costs the lowColors to achieve victory. All we could do is pray that someone worse would not rise in Darrrow's place. We both know that your father is a cruel man, Virginia. You once said that if you could be something else than a titan like him, you would be. Now is the chance to prove it. Yes, there is a high chance of your father and brother being killed in the chaos. War is inherently messy and unpredictable. But at least with you on board you can try to ensure that they are taken alive."
"And I know that Darrow doesn't want genocide because if that was what either of they wanted, the Sons of Ares wouldn't have gone to the trouble of carving him in the first place," Daxo commented. "In fact, the increasing violence of the Sons' attacks suggests the Sons are divided over their long-term goals. It's likely that the agents responsible for Darrow's carving have gone to ground until the time is right, while the extremists who opposed the infiltration plan have continued to commit acts of terrorism in Ares' name." Mustang blinked. That… made sense. It would certainly explain the Sons's expansion beyond Mars in the last two years.
"You're right, Kavax," Mustang admitted. "But I don't want to accept that the only way forward is the sword. I always believed that the reformers in the senate would be able to gradually reconfigure the system into one that was fairer to the lowColors. I refuse to believe that violence is the only solution."
"You're right," Daxo admitted, a wry smile on his face as his eyebrow crept towards the angel tattoos on his scalp. "It's not the only solution. But we all know that Gold is too stubborn and secure in their power to voluntarily change from within. There will be a time for diplomacy and reform eventually. But as much as you may hate it, the time of violent uprising must come first. That's why you and Darrow make such a good team. He is the iron fist, breaking conventions and tearing things down from the outside, and you are the velvet glove, gently bringing others around to your way of thinking." Mustang couldn't help but smile at the comparison. But there was one last thing she needed to hear before she could be satisfied with her decision.
"But he was never one of us," she said. She knew it didn't matter, but it was the only thing she could think to say. "If they learn what he is, Gold will never trust him no matter what he looks like." The two Telemanus men were silent for several seconds. Suddenly, the room shook with Kavax's booming laughter.
"Virginia," he answered warmly. "You should know by now that there is more to a person that blood relation. It does not matter that he was not born a Gold. Pax made him one of us. You make him one of us. And if we damn all that, I say he's one of us. So, one of us he is." Daxo gave his surrogate sister a hug as she broke down in tears at Kavax's seemingly boundless ability to move people just by showing them kindness and compassion. Compared to the elder Telemanus's limitless humanity, her father's stoic pragmatism seemed downright cruel. She'd been thinking the same thought herself, but after having her confidence in her choices shaken by the discover of Darrow's secret, she needed to hear it from Kavax before she made her final choice.
"Thank you, Kavax," she replied, feeling relieved as she felt the storm of emotions within her finally subside. "You and Daxo always manage to know exactly what I need to hear to help me." The two Telemanuses brought her in for a group hug, and as they sat there on her bed, it occurred to Mustang that the Telemanuses had been more of a family to her than her own had been.
"Any time, Virginia," the younger Telemanus remarked. "Regardless of blood relation, you are family. Now, I do believe we all have a war meeting to attend." Mustang laughed as she and the Telemanuses finally untangled from the group hug. With an exhausted sigh, she deactivated the jamField and lead the way as the three of them headed down the corridors of the ship to the war room. While their conversation was brief, everyone else had already arrived ahead of them. Shiro and Darrow both gave her concerned looks as she, Daxo, and Kavax walked into the room. She just flashed both men a reassuring smile as she took her seat at the table. Now that she'd gotten her indecision out of the way, it was time for the strategy meeting to begin.
The iron fist and velvet glove bit is a reference to the Game of Thrones AU fanfic And The Giant Awoke, when Tywin Lannister is describing his and Olenna Tyrell's role in keeping order in Westeros. I thought it fit with Darrow and Mustang's dynamic when it comes to strategies.
Just kind of wanted to clarify in terms of ages that Shiro turned 26 while he was living on Luna with Mustang. We're going to switch back to a chapter from Shiro's point of view, then we'll be getting one from Darrow's perspective (was originally going to have it from Mustang's POV but then I thought I should give Darrow a few minutes in the spotlight). After that, everything's going to be focused on Shiro's perspective for the rest of the fic (with the exception of one more chapter for Darrow)