Post by Leon Loire on Apr 9, 2007 8:44:36 GMT 1
The dams took their leave, the guards motioned forth, and the wave of the crowd came gushing forth. The various colors and shapes of the individuals, all arriving for their own reasons and curiosities, brought a sort of heavenly nostalgia to their host, who felt his dreams edging towards its beginning.
‘Soon… soon it will arrive. The dawn of Liberty draws nearer… like the tide as it returns from the morning…’
It was only about one minute into the crowd’s entrance that Leon Loire recognized a fellow Varronite step near him. Jellar Feint, one of the students that had proclaimed his alliance to the ambitious Senior about one year ago, when the rise of Stern Mason threatened to bring new strife in Varron Academy, and a Captain was absolutely necessary. He commented positively on Leon’s success and thanked him for the invitation, yet before the host could really reply with anything more than a smile, the younger man had nodded and moved on.
‘Fine by me, makes things easier when I need to move on to the business at hand.’
A few more minutes passed as Leon continued to smile and tip his drink to others, speaking a few small words with those he barely knew yet was glad to see, then noticed one of his other invited figures showed her attractive face. It was Charlotte Anders, the clever Hircinian turned enthusiast to the supposed leader. She referred to the day only a week earlier when Mason’s return had brought a bit of internal conflict with Leon, and the Junior had spoken a surprisingly touching boost toward him.
“Girls tend to do that to men when they speak calmly and brightly. You’ll find that women like you hold quite a bit of sway – but let me tell you, those words you spoke helped a lot more than you know, trust me.” Leon responded back to her without eye contact for a moment, then glancing back at her with a soft grin, “Stick around, and you’ll see your faith in me is far from lost.”
Soon enough, another familiar arrived to speak with Leon – his good friend Tyler Scott. Another grin and a followed laugh reacted to Kyukaku’s sarcasm, and a beaming smile watched as Tyler remarked on Charlotte’s presence, before his own girlfriend arrived – Audrey Pierce.
‘Ah, this truly is the best way to do these things… with a light start and a happy commune.’
Nodding towards Bruce Gills, Leon kept on his stool for a few more minutes, chatting idly with Charlotte, Tyler and Audrey as he waited for more of the crowd to enter. He was hoping to allow the mass majority of those desiring entrance to find seats before he began the presentation. Minutes more passed, about fifteen minutes in total since the opening doors, and at last Loire felt satisfied.
Nodding to those around him to take their respectful seats, Leon Loire strode toward the platform awaiting him, his navy eyes intently watching those that watched him.
‘This is where it begins. This is where my legacy shall be set. As the beacon to change, as the spear head of a new front toward progress.’
Now standing in the center of the circular platform, Leon Loire – garbed in the attire that was known to him – smiled brightly at the crowd that surrounded him. He did not expect cheers or applause, he did not expect some sort of chant, he expected nothing; all he desired was the silence of listening individuals, the attention of the crowd’s attentive eye.
He had it, and with that knowledge, waiting a few moments as he began to slowly stroll back and forth across the stage, Leon stopped at mid point, stayed silent, then finally asked the crowd at attention, “Who are we?”
The crowd would know what Leon intended; he was speaking rhetorically. But the question seemed to start the speech with an interesting tone, “After all, really, it’s hard to exactly define a society completely, isn’t it? To claim a group of individuals following the same basic ideas according to statistics may be nice and easy, sure, but really, how accurate is it? How many of you believe in abortion? How many of you believe in the 4th Amendment of this United States? How many of you would like to have children? How many of you are not even sure if you can give a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer to those questions?”
Leon Loire did not speak in modulation; no, he spoke in a sort of comfortable speed, a sort of natural thought as it came streaming from his mind. Thus far it was not aggressive or assertive as it could come from an attorney arguing a case, yet it was still firm, still eye-grabbing. “And in this you can see where it is hard to set the exact lines of society’s various groups. It is hard to claim all politicians are corrupt, or all policeman are honest, or all mothers are loving, or all teenagers are nice, bright-eyed kids who never think of sex, because hell, I’m sure it passes through each and every one of your minds at least once a day! Sure does with me!”
A bit of a relaxed chuckle passed through the crowd, and Leon snickered at himself, and shrugged, “Well hell, who can help it when he’s surrounded by beautiful girls every day, right?”
The crowd laughed a bit louder, and Leon smiled brightly again, waiting a few moments before continuing back to the serious notion at hand, “But you can see my point. It is hard to produce exact, proper details of a group, a class, or a society. Therefore, to categorize these things, to make them simpler, we create stereotypes. Hence, the famous racial slurs arise, the religious discriminations come into play, and our own natural ignorance comes out and yells in joy. It’s natural! It’s to be expected! But should it be accepted? Absolutely not.” Leon had instantly started back into word play, speaking at the same speed, making sure his voice was well heard and modulated appropriately, yet began to force out that stern edge, attempting to emphasize the final statement. It was to be his thesis, the soul, of the speech. It was absolutely necessary the crowd caught on.
“Tell me my fellow Human beings, what kind of social details do you see surrounding you?” Leon opened his palms for a moment, welcoming the audience to look to each other sheepishly and take in their own personal thoughts, their own personal measures of each other.
‘Ah, and there’s the beauty of it; separate opinion, unique thought.’
Leon continued, this time with that intellectual touch, that taste of leadership rising a tinge, “What you all saw came in various levels. You saw people you know compared to strangers; you saw the beautiful to the ugly, the young to the older, the brown flesh to the pink or even the tan skin, the differentiations of our sexual designs, the different tastes of clothing, hair styles, make up, shoe lines, drink choices, friends, and overall facial expression. Within those few seconds, you chose something to spread yourself from others, and to connect yourself with others. And in fact, perhaps some of you played default to one of the larger social groups that we’ve made a rather large deal of lately.”
Leon shrugged, starting to stroll towards his left in a slow, comfortable manner, ready to detail his own thoughts, “What I see are teenagers and adults in their prime, all of varying ages; I see different colors of skin; I see different origins of your ancestors; I see different faiths toward particular entities that none of us can prove exist, yet still hold love towards; I see different choices in sensory liking, different tastes in fashion, different taste in friends and different taste in lovers. I see so many details it’s amazing I don’t just yell ‘Get the hell out.’”
Leon stopped for a moment; frowned a bit, allowed his gaze to slowly oversee the people that looked back at him constantly, wondering of what he wished to speak out. They were interested, that was for sure, yet he had to continue, towards his intention.
“But really, what are such attributes than details of the whole? In the end, we are all Human beings, are we not? And then, from there, the beauty of our species’ variance comes into play. In essence, you cannot allow ignorance to take over your perspectives of each other, because in the end, the only real thing that you must conform to is the fact that you are Human, and accept that, in most cases, the society that Human Race created is, in a whole, good; hence why we define such things. Good is the selflessness of human individuals to help progress society forward; Evil is the actions of individuals or whole groups to taking the progress of society to raise their own status, or to bring harm to society and its individual members.”
Leon took in a large breath – here it was. Here came the point. “Here are the facts: in our community of our school and city, there are two significant social groups that have risen: the presiding Hircinian locals, and the mass transfers from the fallen Varron Academy. According to stereotypes and interpretations from either side, the Hircinians are ‘sheep of the System, conformist, and afraid of their superiors.’ The claims of Varronites like myself include ‘those barbaric rogues that only wish to fight and belittle others.’ Let me ask every single one of you, Hircinian or Varronite: is that fair? Is that correct? Are these stereotypes rightly sourced from truth?”
Murmurs began to rise in the midst of the crowd, the various groups as they stared at each other, however, the silence held strong enough for Leon to continue, “I didn’t think so. These stereotypes, like those we spoke of before, are ignorant, and unjust, and if we refer to Kurtz O’Neill’s words and Captain Blayne’s actions back at school on the fateful day of that uncontrollable riot, we can see that these stereotypes are rightly evil. Therefore, as good citizens of society, as equal human beings, as civilized individuals, we are to fight against these stereotypes and correct them, are we not?”
Leon looked to the crowd with a question first, then with an answer, “So we know our meaning now, our goal: it is no longer a war between the Hircinians and the Varronites, we are past that, there is no truth to those differences described. Yes, our ideologies are different; but really, are they? In the end, don’t we all want to get the hell out of that school? Don’t even the Hircinians accept that the Corporal Punishment System is painful, something they’d love to escape from just like those Varronites I know, only with a different method? And there it is! There really is no difference to us, other than a few beautiful details of difference, something that in truth, we could look to and laugh at!
“Their opinions, and in regards to true alignments of good and evil, neither really opposes the other! We’re both varying methods of good that will conflict with one another over how policies should be followed. It’s natural! It’s political, and above all, the true differences between us is acceptable!”
Leon stopped his speech for a few moments, looking to the crowd as the murmuring grew louder. Leon’s words were echoing the peace the Pillars wished, he was making logical sense, he was starting to share a comfortable place of peace with the Pillars of the school.
And in that, came one of the most important factors of the speech: Leon was, for a time, separating himself from antagonizing Blayne and his Pillars, without making himself a liar if he ever confronted them. After all, when that day ever came, it’d only be politics, and separation of opinion, not just some desire for power or bloody hatred. It would be natural, political, and above all, acceptable.
Yet, the speech was not yet over, and that in itself was not strong enough to support Loire. In order to gain allies, to unite the populous behind him, to prepare his followers and allies for the days to come, he had to target a specific enemy, he had to choose a thing to change that everyone could agree upon without conflict of interest, he had to prepare his allies for what they eventually would venture after as pure politics.
He had to antagonize someone of “Evil.” But in truth, who could fit that? If Leon Loire had just noted that not only were the Pillars not evil, but also not the current enemy, who was left?
And in that came the beauty of the speech.
“However, we know the opinions are important to us, and we know they will affect us in due time, however, there is no time to concern over such things when more drastic dangers are at hand. Politics must be ignored for now; at the moment, both the Hircine and Varron populations are endangered by something of true evil, something of true threat, something that actually acts as the reason why the world thinks of Varronites as barbarians, as thugs, as monsters. If we have no current reason to fight our opinions when our stereotypes must be quelled, how best to accomplish this? How can we cleanse ourselves of the faulty lies of our various groups? How can we clean the Varronites of the lie that we fight only for blood, and how do we cleanse the Hircinians of the lie that they are simply sheep?”
Leon Loire looked to everyone at once, his face neutral for a moment, and then with a tight action of his body, brought the next words to play, “We must begin the destruction of these stereotypes, of these evils, and the best way to start is to prove to Hircine, our majority in power and population, that we are not monsters, that we are not simple rogues, that we have a reason behind our individualities and questions of the System, and why we fight for ourselves and each other. To help Hircine and the Varronites cleanse themselves, we must eliminate the final remaining source of the lies that are led toward the Varronite population: we must destroy the only true source of evil that remains.
“We must destroy the gang known as the Hand of Fate, led by none other than Kvist!”
And now, in this moment, the crowd began to roar in speculation and interest. Most, if not all, of those presiding knew one hatred or another toward the beast known as the Mask, and it was clear that no one in this group would have a terrible desire to prevent war with a man that had blackmailed, tortured, maimed, and brought harm to many innocent people that even stood among them.
“My fellow VARRONITES, and my friends in the Hircine population, I ask you, in all the appeal I can muster, to join ME and my ALLIES as we prepare a final strike against the TRUE Evil of this school’s community. It is time to start the progress toward Change! It is time we start the progress towards Peace! It is time to bring the progress towards Conclusion, in the history of the dying Varronite people! Let the name Varronite mean something honorable and respectable, not terrible and infamous, as our members grow wiser and mature to become honest members of society and live on, and our numbers dwindle, to finally join our friends in Hircine at last. Help me cleanse the lies of our name! Help me justify those who have been harmed by the mad man of the Mask! Help me end their strife, so we may be one step closer to living our lives at long last!”
Leon Loire stretched out his arms in extension, staring at his crowd proudly, as he hoped for the response he desperately needed: agreement, excitement, loyalty, and respect. He needed allies, he needed unity, and he needed friendship. But most of all, he needed that title to become their leader, their representative, their beacon towards Progress in the directions to come.
He needed to become the Leon Loire that Charlotte Anders had revived, and the Leon Loire he had already designed. He had to be the Hero, and lead the People toward the Change they desired.
“It is time my friends, both Hircinian and Varronite! Let Stern Mason bring his own revolution of simple politics and chaos with the Pillars, as we bring the Enlightenment against Kvist and his minions! It is time we cleanse our Good names, and rid Evil of this land Forever!”
‘Soon… soon it will arrive. The dawn of Liberty draws nearer… like the tide as it returns from the morning…’
It was only about one minute into the crowd’s entrance that Leon Loire recognized a fellow Varronite step near him. Jellar Feint, one of the students that had proclaimed his alliance to the ambitious Senior about one year ago, when the rise of Stern Mason threatened to bring new strife in Varron Academy, and a Captain was absolutely necessary. He commented positively on Leon’s success and thanked him for the invitation, yet before the host could really reply with anything more than a smile, the younger man had nodded and moved on.
‘Fine by me, makes things easier when I need to move on to the business at hand.’
A few more minutes passed as Leon continued to smile and tip his drink to others, speaking a few small words with those he barely knew yet was glad to see, then noticed one of his other invited figures showed her attractive face. It was Charlotte Anders, the clever Hircinian turned enthusiast to the supposed leader. She referred to the day only a week earlier when Mason’s return had brought a bit of internal conflict with Leon, and the Junior had spoken a surprisingly touching boost toward him.
“Girls tend to do that to men when they speak calmly and brightly. You’ll find that women like you hold quite a bit of sway – but let me tell you, those words you spoke helped a lot more than you know, trust me.” Leon responded back to her without eye contact for a moment, then glancing back at her with a soft grin, “Stick around, and you’ll see your faith in me is far from lost.”
Soon enough, another familiar arrived to speak with Leon – his good friend Tyler Scott. Another grin and a followed laugh reacted to Kyukaku’s sarcasm, and a beaming smile watched as Tyler remarked on Charlotte’s presence, before his own girlfriend arrived – Audrey Pierce.
‘Ah, this truly is the best way to do these things… with a light start and a happy commune.’
Nodding towards Bruce Gills, Leon kept on his stool for a few more minutes, chatting idly with Charlotte, Tyler and Audrey as he waited for more of the crowd to enter. He was hoping to allow the mass majority of those desiring entrance to find seats before he began the presentation. Minutes more passed, about fifteen minutes in total since the opening doors, and at last Loire felt satisfied.
Nodding to those around him to take their respectful seats, Leon Loire strode toward the platform awaiting him, his navy eyes intently watching those that watched him.
‘This is where it begins. This is where my legacy shall be set. As the beacon to change, as the spear head of a new front toward progress.’
Now standing in the center of the circular platform, Leon Loire – garbed in the attire that was known to him – smiled brightly at the crowd that surrounded him. He did not expect cheers or applause, he did not expect some sort of chant, he expected nothing; all he desired was the silence of listening individuals, the attention of the crowd’s attentive eye.
He had it, and with that knowledge, waiting a few moments as he began to slowly stroll back and forth across the stage, Leon stopped at mid point, stayed silent, then finally asked the crowd at attention, “Who are we?”
The crowd would know what Leon intended; he was speaking rhetorically. But the question seemed to start the speech with an interesting tone, “After all, really, it’s hard to exactly define a society completely, isn’t it? To claim a group of individuals following the same basic ideas according to statistics may be nice and easy, sure, but really, how accurate is it? How many of you believe in abortion? How many of you believe in the 4th Amendment of this United States? How many of you would like to have children? How many of you are not even sure if you can give a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer to those questions?”
Leon Loire did not speak in modulation; no, he spoke in a sort of comfortable speed, a sort of natural thought as it came streaming from his mind. Thus far it was not aggressive or assertive as it could come from an attorney arguing a case, yet it was still firm, still eye-grabbing. “And in this you can see where it is hard to set the exact lines of society’s various groups. It is hard to claim all politicians are corrupt, or all policeman are honest, or all mothers are loving, or all teenagers are nice, bright-eyed kids who never think of sex, because hell, I’m sure it passes through each and every one of your minds at least once a day! Sure does with me!”
A bit of a relaxed chuckle passed through the crowd, and Leon snickered at himself, and shrugged, “Well hell, who can help it when he’s surrounded by beautiful girls every day, right?”
The crowd laughed a bit louder, and Leon smiled brightly again, waiting a few moments before continuing back to the serious notion at hand, “But you can see my point. It is hard to produce exact, proper details of a group, a class, or a society. Therefore, to categorize these things, to make them simpler, we create stereotypes. Hence, the famous racial slurs arise, the religious discriminations come into play, and our own natural ignorance comes out and yells in joy. It’s natural! It’s to be expected! But should it be accepted? Absolutely not.” Leon had instantly started back into word play, speaking at the same speed, making sure his voice was well heard and modulated appropriately, yet began to force out that stern edge, attempting to emphasize the final statement. It was to be his thesis, the soul, of the speech. It was absolutely necessary the crowd caught on.
“Tell me my fellow Human beings, what kind of social details do you see surrounding you?” Leon opened his palms for a moment, welcoming the audience to look to each other sheepishly and take in their own personal thoughts, their own personal measures of each other.
‘Ah, and there’s the beauty of it; separate opinion, unique thought.’
Leon continued, this time with that intellectual touch, that taste of leadership rising a tinge, “What you all saw came in various levels. You saw people you know compared to strangers; you saw the beautiful to the ugly, the young to the older, the brown flesh to the pink or even the tan skin, the differentiations of our sexual designs, the different tastes of clothing, hair styles, make up, shoe lines, drink choices, friends, and overall facial expression. Within those few seconds, you chose something to spread yourself from others, and to connect yourself with others. And in fact, perhaps some of you played default to one of the larger social groups that we’ve made a rather large deal of lately.”
Leon shrugged, starting to stroll towards his left in a slow, comfortable manner, ready to detail his own thoughts, “What I see are teenagers and adults in their prime, all of varying ages; I see different colors of skin; I see different origins of your ancestors; I see different faiths toward particular entities that none of us can prove exist, yet still hold love towards; I see different choices in sensory liking, different tastes in fashion, different taste in friends and different taste in lovers. I see so many details it’s amazing I don’t just yell ‘Get the hell out.’”
Leon stopped for a moment; frowned a bit, allowed his gaze to slowly oversee the people that looked back at him constantly, wondering of what he wished to speak out. They were interested, that was for sure, yet he had to continue, towards his intention.
“But really, what are such attributes than details of the whole? In the end, we are all Human beings, are we not? And then, from there, the beauty of our species’ variance comes into play. In essence, you cannot allow ignorance to take over your perspectives of each other, because in the end, the only real thing that you must conform to is the fact that you are Human, and accept that, in most cases, the society that Human Race created is, in a whole, good; hence why we define such things. Good is the selflessness of human individuals to help progress society forward; Evil is the actions of individuals or whole groups to taking the progress of society to raise their own status, or to bring harm to society and its individual members.”
Leon took in a large breath – here it was. Here came the point. “Here are the facts: in our community of our school and city, there are two significant social groups that have risen: the presiding Hircinian locals, and the mass transfers from the fallen Varron Academy. According to stereotypes and interpretations from either side, the Hircinians are ‘sheep of the System, conformist, and afraid of their superiors.’ The claims of Varronites like myself include ‘those barbaric rogues that only wish to fight and belittle others.’ Let me ask every single one of you, Hircinian or Varronite: is that fair? Is that correct? Are these stereotypes rightly sourced from truth?”
Murmurs began to rise in the midst of the crowd, the various groups as they stared at each other, however, the silence held strong enough for Leon to continue, “I didn’t think so. These stereotypes, like those we spoke of before, are ignorant, and unjust, and if we refer to Kurtz O’Neill’s words and Captain Blayne’s actions back at school on the fateful day of that uncontrollable riot, we can see that these stereotypes are rightly evil. Therefore, as good citizens of society, as equal human beings, as civilized individuals, we are to fight against these stereotypes and correct them, are we not?”
Leon looked to the crowd with a question first, then with an answer, “So we know our meaning now, our goal: it is no longer a war between the Hircinians and the Varronites, we are past that, there is no truth to those differences described. Yes, our ideologies are different; but really, are they? In the end, don’t we all want to get the hell out of that school? Don’t even the Hircinians accept that the Corporal Punishment System is painful, something they’d love to escape from just like those Varronites I know, only with a different method? And there it is! There really is no difference to us, other than a few beautiful details of difference, something that in truth, we could look to and laugh at!
“Their opinions, and in regards to true alignments of good and evil, neither really opposes the other! We’re both varying methods of good that will conflict with one another over how policies should be followed. It’s natural! It’s political, and above all, the true differences between us is acceptable!”
Leon stopped his speech for a few moments, looking to the crowd as the murmuring grew louder. Leon’s words were echoing the peace the Pillars wished, he was making logical sense, he was starting to share a comfortable place of peace with the Pillars of the school.
And in that, came one of the most important factors of the speech: Leon was, for a time, separating himself from antagonizing Blayne and his Pillars, without making himself a liar if he ever confronted them. After all, when that day ever came, it’d only be politics, and separation of opinion, not just some desire for power or bloody hatred. It would be natural, political, and above all, acceptable.
Yet, the speech was not yet over, and that in itself was not strong enough to support Loire. In order to gain allies, to unite the populous behind him, to prepare his followers and allies for the days to come, he had to target a specific enemy, he had to choose a thing to change that everyone could agree upon without conflict of interest, he had to prepare his allies for what they eventually would venture after as pure politics.
He had to antagonize someone of “Evil.” But in truth, who could fit that? If Leon Loire had just noted that not only were the Pillars not evil, but also not the current enemy, who was left?
And in that came the beauty of the speech.
“However, we know the opinions are important to us, and we know they will affect us in due time, however, there is no time to concern over such things when more drastic dangers are at hand. Politics must be ignored for now; at the moment, both the Hircine and Varron populations are endangered by something of true evil, something of true threat, something that actually acts as the reason why the world thinks of Varronites as barbarians, as thugs, as monsters. If we have no current reason to fight our opinions when our stereotypes must be quelled, how best to accomplish this? How can we cleanse ourselves of the faulty lies of our various groups? How can we clean the Varronites of the lie that we fight only for blood, and how do we cleanse the Hircinians of the lie that they are simply sheep?”
Leon Loire looked to everyone at once, his face neutral for a moment, and then with a tight action of his body, brought the next words to play, “We must begin the destruction of these stereotypes, of these evils, and the best way to start is to prove to Hircine, our majority in power and population, that we are not monsters, that we are not simple rogues, that we have a reason behind our individualities and questions of the System, and why we fight for ourselves and each other. To help Hircine and the Varronites cleanse themselves, we must eliminate the final remaining source of the lies that are led toward the Varronite population: we must destroy the only true source of evil that remains.
“We must destroy the gang known as the Hand of Fate, led by none other than Kvist!”
And now, in this moment, the crowd began to roar in speculation and interest. Most, if not all, of those presiding knew one hatred or another toward the beast known as the Mask, and it was clear that no one in this group would have a terrible desire to prevent war with a man that had blackmailed, tortured, maimed, and brought harm to many innocent people that even stood among them.
“My fellow VARRONITES, and my friends in the Hircine population, I ask you, in all the appeal I can muster, to join ME and my ALLIES as we prepare a final strike against the TRUE Evil of this school’s community. It is time to start the progress toward Change! It is time we start the progress towards Peace! It is time to bring the progress towards Conclusion, in the history of the dying Varronite people! Let the name Varronite mean something honorable and respectable, not terrible and infamous, as our members grow wiser and mature to become honest members of society and live on, and our numbers dwindle, to finally join our friends in Hircine at last. Help me cleanse the lies of our name! Help me justify those who have been harmed by the mad man of the Mask! Help me end their strife, so we may be one step closer to living our lives at long last!”
Leon Loire stretched out his arms in extension, staring at his crowd proudly, as he hoped for the response he desperately needed: agreement, excitement, loyalty, and respect. He needed allies, he needed unity, and he needed friendship. But most of all, he needed that title to become their leader, their representative, their beacon towards Progress in the directions to come.
He needed to become the Leon Loire that Charlotte Anders had revived, and the Leon Loire he had already designed. He had to be the Hero, and lead the People toward the Change they desired.
“It is time my friends, both Hircinian and Varronite! Let Stern Mason bring his own revolution of simple politics and chaos with the Pillars, as we bring the Enlightenment against Kvist and his minions! It is time we cleanse our Good names, and rid Evil of this land Forever!”