balance_logs | Field Mission 5: Il Prigioniero, Part 3

	They had discovered one could grow as hungry for light as for food.
	NAVIGATION

1. THE FATE OF WONDERLAND

A. CRESCENDO; FINALE

The beauty of the sentient mind is that hope is hard to kill. Even living in illusion for so long, the Bureau of Balance as a whole believed to the end that a happy ending was possible in Wonderland. That's a good thing, even if an unrealistic dream. Without that vision, that hope, there's no way to succeed. You all know that, don't you?

You knew it when you went back into the tree to save absolutely anyone that you could. Strangers some of them. Strangers most of them. It didn't matter. There's a happy ending to this story; everyone believed in it as surely as they carried out the innocent, as surely as they carried out each other.

You knew it when you got crafty with needle and thread, trying to reassemble the cruel joke Wonderland made with those who lost their way and fell into debt. Nine bodies are saved — including Henrik's, Henrik whose soul is reattached to his body, Henrik whose shaking arms can finally reach out to hold his son.

You knew it when you spoke to a dying Yggdrasil, Maya taking in the suffering and sickness of its years, listening with an open heart until, suddenly, as the tree's consciousness began to collapse, she was taken Somewhere Else. To speak with a man in a sharp suit with places to be. Things to do. Planar systems to devour. You know how it is. A poisoned arrow to Yggdrasil's open wound brought it down for good, leaving Shuichi to hurriedly plant the new Golden Leaf for a new World Tree; leaving Sayori and Angus McDonald to pick up the pieces of their dazed comrades.

You knew it when you tricked the Mirror Maze into glitching apart, giving it quite simply too much to keep track of. The fact that you found a helper along the way certainly didn't hurt, but let's face it: this was genius. The reward is Niel, crystallized, encasing the Compact. Suffering, as he has been for a very long time.

You knew it when three warlocks and a very angry wizard embarked on an ultimately suicidal mission, which just goes to show that the best-laid plans of mice and men sometimes lead to a 50% vore rate. A desperate attempt to keep Adrian distracted for long enough that the Compact could be retrieved was only able to delay him in the end. Just because success is possible doesn't make it guaranteed. Sometimes a fight with the villain ends in stalemate.

Sometimes a fight with the villain isn't a fight at all. Sometimes it's an outstretched hand (or two, or four), and sacrifices from each member of the party, and pain, and . . . self-awareness. Sometimes the villain just wants to let go. Sometimes there are happy endings, but this time Niel — fused into the Tree itself, his life tied up in the dying Yggdrasil, extended by the Compact — just wants it to stop. He doesn't want to hurt anyone anymore.

His friends are holding his hands as they take the Compact and make it stop.

This isn't a happy ending. But that isn't your fault. Hope for a happy ending has, quite literally, saved the world.

The nightmare is over. Wonderland slips away.

2. ON THE EDGE OF THE HORIZON

B. THE PEOPLE

And as suddenly as the myriad indulgences of Wonderland went to ... well, complete shit, there's something of a metaphorical blink of light. Those who were meant to be dead are - both your fellow Reclaimers and the Rolands who could not be fixed in time - but there is still many that are saved. Injuries knot back together at the slightest curative magic. Smog and negativity vanish like they never were, taking the last shambling monsters away with it. The souls of Shadowdale that you have returned to their respective bodies have a new life to forge. Things can be fixed.

If only it were that easy.

Shadowdale, for all intents and purposes, is uninhabitable. For the first time since the Bureau's mission began, an entire city population has lost its home, and must move on. No matter how much blame you may place on yourself for the way things turned out, whether it's guilt or hope that drives you forward, time, and the cycle of life itself, spins onward. And the people who live march on.

To New New Aspen.

Matthew has promised to bring the survivors of Shadowdale to his home, to give them a new chance. You have a couple of options here, if you would like to help them. You may serve as guard, helping escort the people of Shadowdale to New New Aspen. Super convenient for you, since it's right by the Moon Base! You may help them build and settle.

The people of New New Aspen, only months away from Candlenights, are hard at work carving their annual ornaments. You may help the new residents acclimate - whether it's helping them work the fields, start a business, or take part in their new home's most coveted tradition. And you'll have a new ornament to bring home with you, too.

C. THE FOREST

The deadened woods you traveled through to reach Shadowdale at the beginning of this mission seem somehow even more silent, cloaked in demise, than when you first stepped in it. The madness is gone, replaced with double the silence, a stillness like nothing you've ever experienced before. It's almost as if your senses, save for however you perceive the light of the sun, are gone.

At least, until someone speaks to you. A wood elf - he doesn't give you his name, but he does identify himself as someone who was trapped. Someone who, through your efforts to restore the Rolands, you gave life to again.

And he does have a request for you.

"This place has little hope for revival," he says, sniffing slightly, taking in the silence around you both. "At least, it has little hope in your lifetime.

But I do have something to ask of you. Give this place life, the way you did for the people here. Even if you, or even I, for that matter, will never likely live long enough to see it."

That's sort of an existential way of asking you to do some hardcore landscaping. But you will be provided with seeds of all sorts, and you will have the opportunity to plant them as you see fit. If you would like to build a shrine, or remember those who lost their lives here in some other way, you are free to do that as well.

There's something else curious, though: literally anything you plant, regardless of what it is, will eventually produce a viable bud sprouting from the gray, dry soil.

What does that even mean? If you plant a book of poems, are you going to get a poetree?

Are you even going to live long enough to see it in full bloom?

D. THE EXHAUSTION

You might not be on Lucretia levels of exhausted (she is, remember, zonked, and will remain so all the way back to the Moon Base and beyond for a while), but this has not been an easy mission for anyone who dared to test this Grand Relic's powers.

Whether you return from New New Aspen, or whether you finally catch a ride back to the Moon Base from the forest, you are now free to return home. This is your welcome home wildcard, a chance for you to try to recuperate, address anything at all before the next Lunar Interlude begins.

You will find that the Moon Base has an awfully somber feel to it, from the inner members of the Bureau to the people serving the Reclaimers in the town. Word is starting to trickle in on what you all went through.

blurb code by photosynthesis

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It would be nice to have a little bit of a breather.

[She carefully lowers herself to the ground, easing herself into the spot beside him, pulling one knee up and hooking her arm around it so that her foot lays flat against the ground.]

I don't want to, either... but forgetting it is going to be easier said than done, I think.

[There's a lot about that place that's going to stick with her.]

I know it's kind of old news for some people here, but... I'd never gone down on a mission like that before.

[She's never died.]

[He'd offer ice cream, if he had more. And he'll have to remember that for next time.

It takes a moment for that statement to settle on Roxas, but his expression clouds when it does.]

It. It really sucks.

I'm sorry.

[She shakes her head, though she doesn't look directly at him, focusing on the lunar vista before them instead.]

I came back. I'm grateful for that.

[Most people never got so lucky. Being a Reclaimer has its perks.]

I'm just... ready to move forward. See what's next for all of us.

It still sucks.

[He always feels a little helpless as well. He knows he can't protect everyone, but it's still difficult to not do anything.]

But yeah, I hope we get to go somewhere nicer. Or maybe we can go camping again.

It does. But I'll be okay.

[Her face falls briefly, unable to keep a frown from pulling further at her lips. She has so many friends who were dead for good, devoured by the Hunger when their world had been lost.

What right does she have to complain?]

Camping was actually pretty fun. I know it was mostly for team-building, and the tomb we went into had challenges of its own to deal with, but... it was nice, getting to spend time with everyone like that.

Yeah, not having to do missions or anything like that. Another Vacation or something.

[He wants to believe Blake and take her at her word, but her expression suggests otherwise. but he won't push.]

I feel like we earned it.

I do, too— but with things ramping up the way they have been, I wouldn't count on us getting too much time to relax. We should make the most of what we have while we can.

[Who knows how long they'll be on the base this time around.]

... were you okay, down in Wonderland? It feels like everyone got put through the ringer.

[Roxas nods in agreement, but he's still hoping for at least a week of nothing. Two even. He's just tired, and that's how long he feels he could sleep for.]

It wasn't great.

I. I kept seeing things that weren't actually there. People. Monsters, from my world.

It...I got kinda scared.

[She frowns before nodding in response, reaching over to gently lay a hand on his shoulder— a small but genuine offer of comfort.]

It was like Wonderland itself knew how best to scare each and every one of us. What would cut us the deepest.

[Nobody had enjoyed their time there.]

We can leave it behind us now.

[He leans into the touch, mostly unconsciously.]

Yeah.

I mean, I know the relics are powerful, but it's scary to think there was one that could get into our heads like that.

But you're right. It's done now.

[And hopefully the next one won't be like that.]

The scariest thing might be that they're so powerful, we can't really conceive of everything they're capable of.

[It all depends on whose hands they happen to fall into. But...]

We've gotten them all back so far. We'll keep doing the work. Now more than ever, I'm sure every Reclaimer understands exactly how important it is that these aren't left unchecked out in the world.

Yeah. It really feels like it could be anything at this point.

[He gives a determined nod.]

I kinda feel like we need to work extra hard to make sure we can. Or at least, that's what I want to do.

Thinking of logging more training hours in the dojo?

[She glances in his direction, raising an eyebrow. She wouldn't mind helping out, if that's the case.]

Yeah, probably. I've gotta work on my paladin abilities.

And I could always use practice.

[What about you?]

[She smiles a little— it doesn't quite reach her eyes, but they're thinking along the same lines.]

I'm a regular at the dojo, anyway, but after this last mission, I'd like to put in some longer hours. I have a few new abilities of my own to practice with, too.

I can try to help with that that. I'm kind of in the same boat.

Let me know the next time you're going to be there.

We can set up a time that works for both of us.

[His schedule matters, too.]

We'd both benefit from doing some sparring, don't you think?

Yeah, I think so. Gotta be ready for the next mission, right?

[She nods.]

Absolutely— whatever it may bring.

Field Mission 5: Il Prigioniero, Part 3

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