2nd Ashan 718
The night had passed in a blur of work. Survivors and victims pulled from the rubble, people treated for wounds and others taken to the field hospital - when they could be moved they went on to the Order itself, but there were still a lot of people here. And, as the trial had worn on yesterday, Faith had come to realise something. There needed to be a place where people could come and identify their dead in some kind of privacy, with some kind of dignity. How that happened, in this circumstance, she truly did not know. They had the large room where the dead were laid out. Each of them was covered over with a sheet, but it meant that there was an issue which, thus far, Faith had not considered. People were coming here, looking for missing relatives. They looked among the living, those unable as yet to give their names, and they looked among the dead.
But she was not happy with how that was happening, not one bit.
Famula, Vri and Moseke had marked her and, whilst Faith had a deep and abiding respect for many of the Immortals, those three had seen fit to trust her with abilities to use in their name and she was not prepared to make such a farce of life and death as to have people trailing through a room, staring at the corpses of strangers. The dead, and those who had not yet regained consciousness, deserved and demanded more dignity than that. Faith knew it was a problem but she didn't know what to do about it.
And then, she decided, she knew what she had to do to find the solution.
So, Faith moved, walking out of the headquarters she had set up and she moved and looked out over the sea as the dawn light began to creep up. The darkness of the sky matched her feelings, for a moment, for this was a tricky situation and she felt a strong sense of responsibility that she had to do this right. Yet, there were people who were trapped, people who were injured and she knew that she had to give them precedence, had to put the resources there. Otherwise, they would simply add to the numbers of the dead.
And the dead weren't getting any less so, not at all.
The sunlight burst over the horizon and Faith watched it with a smile playing over her face. It was beautiful, like gold pouring over the water and it was a truly astonishing sight to see it reflecting off the ice of Treid's Teeth, the range of icebergs in the entrance to Scalvoris. No matter how long they lived here, wherever they went or what they did, she couldn't imagine that the dawn looking like this anywhere else. At the end of the season, Padraig was going on an expedition and the sights that he would see there, she was sure. She wished, in one way, that she could go with him but they couldn't both leave the babies, it simply wasn't something they could consider.
Maybe, she thought, the artist he was taking with him would be able to...
"That's it," Faith whispered. Looking at the dawn light turning the sea to a deep amber nectar, she realised what the answer was. "I asked you for a miracle. Thank you."
564 words
Sociology: Religious significance of death
Sociology: Dignity in death is a societal construct.
But she was not happy with how that was happening, not one bit.
Famula, Vri and Moseke had marked her and, whilst Faith had a deep and abiding respect for many of the Immortals, those three had seen fit to trust her with abilities to use in their name and she was not prepared to make such a farce of life and death as to have people trailing through a room, staring at the corpses of strangers. The dead, and those who had not yet regained consciousness, deserved and demanded more dignity than that. Faith knew it was a problem but she didn't know what to do about it.
And then, she decided, she knew what she had to do to find the solution.
So, Faith moved, walking out of the headquarters she had set up and she moved and looked out over the sea as the dawn light began to creep up. The darkness of the sky matched her feelings, for a moment, for this was a tricky situation and she felt a strong sense of responsibility that she had to do this right. Yet, there were people who were trapped, people who were injured and she knew that she had to give them precedence, had to put the resources there. Otherwise, they would simply add to the numbers of the dead.
And the dead weren't getting any less so, not at all.
The sunlight burst over the horizon and Faith watched it with a smile playing over her face. It was beautiful, like gold pouring over the water and it was a truly astonishing sight to see it reflecting off the ice of Treid's Teeth, the range of icebergs in the entrance to Scalvoris. No matter how long they lived here, wherever they went or what they did, she couldn't imagine that the dawn looking like this anywhere else. At the end of the season, Padraig was going on an expedition and the sights that he would see there, she was sure. She wished, in one way, that she could go with him but they couldn't both leave the babies, it simply wasn't something they could consider.
Maybe, she thought, the artist he was taking with him would be able to...
"That's it," Faith whispered. Looking at the dawn light turning the sea to a deep amber nectar, she realised what the answer was. "I asked you for a miracle. Thank you."
564 words
Sociology: Religious significance of death
Sociology: Dignity in death is a societal construct.
