impure_tale

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Do you know I never fancied ships in my youth? I had in my delusions, as a prisoner given to an obsession with numbers, once predicted that the letters I was receiving included secret 'signals' that I would be exiled to Barbados the following fortnight. This sent me into such a passion that I wrote probably some of the most unkind letters to my wife that I had ever penned -- not of course because I loathed sunshine, just the seas and all vessels that floated upon them.

I'm tempted to suggest this one does not count. Perhaps it is the absence of any real water.

Lucius Malfoy, I am making quick work of your file. I expect that we should meet very soon, but until I have committed this information to memory, we shall have to settle for conversation here. Have you any pressing quesetions?

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[The Marquis considers a moment.] You have made several valid points, so allow me to address each:

The floods can be; at their best they can avail you to certain opportunities you never dreamed of having but perhaps always desired. At their worst, they will completely rob you of your identity and leave you doing things you never in your whole existence wished to do. They are not intentional. This ship moves between worlds and sometimes it brushes too close. Parts of that reality, for a time, taint everything on the ship. Sometimes, in the case of what we refer to as a hull breach, it does severe damage, and it takes longer for the Barge to repair herself.

As for the ports -- the object is for you to experience. You are here to change, not to be changed. It is not for us to simply say "you must not do this" or "you must do that". A person's view of the world around them, their morals, their ethics, only develop because of their personal experiences. When we put into port it is often with a mission in mind, designed to expose you to new experiences that you would have missed altogether, having died, or perhaps even in life. Sometimes these are not entirely trying, either. For instance, if we put into a proper urban setting, think not for even a moment that we will be doing anything aside from spending a ridiculous amount of money. When there is an opportunity to relax and stretch one's legs, use it wisely.

You have actually come here at an unusual time, and the current state of the Barge is quite abnormal. The Admiral is actually quite succinct in his use of power; some would say it is the ability to properly helm the ship that he lacks. However, this is mere speculation; the barge moves through something quite a bit more dense than water. It is possible that no one could do any better. As for the Admiral's sense of moral justice, I think it is safer to say he has none, or rather his position does not allow him to make use of it. I have been given no indication in the years that I've been here, in the few times I have met him, that he has any power over who goes or who stays. He most certainly did not decide that you were an Inmate. Whatever powers reside over the fate of the soul in your own world can be blamed for that, if someone must be blamed. The Admiral merely takes care of the legwork on this particular ship.

Edited 2011-10-17 11:33 (UTC)

[ The idea that the Admiral is not to blame is counter to Lucius' assumptions, chin lifting, guarded and listening with his fingers knit back together. ]

There is no final authority to contradict you, Marquis. I will have to accept your opinion for what it is and see for myself, now won't I?

Tell me, do you believe the actions that led to my being here before my death justify my presence on the Barge? Am I, for the things I have done, that you have read about, in dire need of redemption?

[ His tone is dry, but he's curbed 'caustic'. ]

Dearheart, I am not the church. It is not my duty nor my calling to look upon a person and assume they have some inherent flaw that I must fix. I am too flawed a man, myself.

You are not an Inmate because the powers -- call them God, nature, the Fates; whatever tickles your fancy -- decided you must be rehabilitated; had the Barge not intervened you would be resigned to whatever fate awaits any person who has lived as you lived. A former Warden put it perhaps a little sentimentally, but I find it quite fitting: You are an Inmate because someone that mattered to you would have wanted you to have a second chance.

Do I think you have done deplorable things? Yes. If ever a life was lost because of a decision that you made or upheld, whether it occurred by your own hand or not, then you did not die with a life clean of fault. This includes chosen alliances and the power you have handed people to do harm -- which has in turn opened the rest of your family to the same existence, your child included.

[ A small, dismissive headshake at sentimentality, as well as to correct himself-- but he doesn't quite make it there, going silent at this last part in steely defense and offense both. ]

Speak to me as a father yourself all you like, lay whatever ground rules you choose, but I care not to have you cast judgment--

My family is not for us to discuss.

That's not your choice to make. The end of your file does include information that your son has been drafted to kill for the cause. You cannot claim this is without your influence, intended or not.

[ Anger in Lucius is a thing that manifests in the opposite of the expected; ice over fire, and silence over noise.

This will be his second try in standing to leave, but he does so with more definition and noisier coat flapping. ]

My mistakes, Marquis, involve getting caught and failure to match the task handed me. I do not expect a Muggle to understand the sacrifices I have made.

We are most certainly finished.

Then that only makes you dead and a fool. [The Marquis waves him off] We are done for now, but do not think this discussion is finished.

Oh, perish the thought.

[ ...for all that Lucius is inclined to dig claws in, change his mind and demand more information about Draco, his pride is a thing that dictates such decisions. He sweeps for out without a glance back, fully prepared to carry such momentum from here, all the way to his

cell. ]

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