FFXIV Write 2023 #5: Barbarous

(( Hey there! You might want to check the tags for trigger warnings - I rarely go too in-depth on triggering topics, but I do briefly mention uncomfortable stuff!))

I think about it endlessly, in the days that follow - I force myself to look at my own point of view as if it were another's, I try to step away from my own past, my own hurt; but that's like asking someone to step out of their own skin - I simply cannot.

Every night I fall asleep, and I see their broken bodies. I hear their screams - I feel the boots in my ribs, the hands grabbing, the chemicals burning under my skin; among other things that I can't even speak the words for, things that no person should ever endure, or even have to witness. I can't even blame the survivors who eventually went on to take their own lives, despite attaining freedom in the end - the things done to us, to dehumanize us... they're hard to live with every single day.

And in fairness, I even tried. I tried once, by my own hand - and many, many more times have I chased Death, snapping at its heels, hungry for something that could conquer me. Take me down. Something powerful enough to make it all stop.

I excel at surviving, however - unwilling to truly give up the ghost - and now here I am, still surviving in a world in which Garlemald has fallen, and I am told that this land of hateful bigots has innocent people in it... but I cannot find them. I don't know how else to tell him that I've walked their wastes, when I still cannot bring myself to walk the sands of my own homeland. I walked among them.

I let them prove to me what they are - their rhetoric about us hasn't changed, despite the loss of all that matters to them. Even as they starve, and freeze, they are full of hate for that which is different than them -

"Beast."

"Savage."

"Beastman."

FFXIV Write 2023 #5: Barbarous

(( Hey there! You might want to check the tags for trigger warnings - I rarely go too in-depth on triggering topics, but I do briefly mention uncomfortable stuff!))

I think about it endlessly, in the days that follow - I force myself to look at my own point of view as if it were another's, I try to step away from my own past, my own hurt; but that's like asking someone to step out of their own skin - I simply cannot.

Every night I fall asleep, and I see their broken bodies. I hear their screams - I feel the boots in my ribs, the hands grabbing, the chemicals burning under my skin; among other things that I can't even speak the words for, things that no person should ever endure, or even have to witness. I can't even blame the survivors who eventually went on to take their own lives, despite attaining freedom in the end - the things done to us, to dehumanize us... they're hard to live with every single day.

And in fairness, I even tried. I tried once, by my own hand - and many, many more times have I chased Death, snapping at its heels, hungry for something that could conquer me. Take me down. Something powerful enough to make it all stop.

I excel at surviving, however - unwilling to truly give up the ghost - and now here I am, still surviving in a world in which Garlemald has fallen, and I am told that this land of hateful bigots has innocent people in it... but I cannot find them. I don't know how else to tell him that I've walked their wastes, when I still cannot bring myself to walk the sands of my own homeland. I walked among them.

I let them prove to me what they are - their rhetoric about us hasn't changed, despite the loss of all that matters to them. Even as they starve, and freeze, they are full of hate for that which is different than them -

"Beast."

"Savage."

"Beastman."

FFXIV Write 2023 #5: Barbarous

(( Hey there! You might want to check the tags for trigger warnings - I rarely go too in-depth on triggering topics, but I do briefly mention uncomfortable stuff!))

I think about it endlessly, in the days that follow - I force myself to look at my own point of view as if it were another's, I try to step away from my own past, my own hurt; but that's like asking someone to step out of their own skin - I simply cannot.

Every night I fall asleep, and I see their broken bodies. I hear their screams - I feel the boots in my ribs, the hands grabbing, the chemicals burning under my skin; among other things that I can't even speak the words for, things that no person should ever endure, or even have to witness. I can't even blame the survivors who eventually went on to take their own lives, despite attaining freedom in the end - the things done to us, to dehumanize us... they're hard to live with every single day.

And in fairness, I even tried. I tried once, by my own hand - and many, many more times have I chased Death, snapping at its heels, hungry for something that could conquer me. Take me down. Something powerful enough to make it all stop.

I excel at surviving, however - unwilling to truly give up the ghost - and now here I am, still surviving in a world in which Garlemald has fallen, and I am told that this land of hateful bigots has innocent people in it... but I cannot find them. I don't know how else to tell him that I've walked their wastes, when I still cannot bring myself to walk the sands of my own homeland. I walked among them.

I let them prove to me what they are - their rhetoric about us hasn't changed, despite the loss of all that matters to them. Even as they starve, and freeze, they are full of hate for that which is different than them -

"Beast."

"Savage."

"Beastman."

FFXIV Write 2023 #5: Barbarous

(( Hey there! You might want to check the tags for trigger warnings - I rarely go too in-depth on triggering topics, but I do briefly mention uncomfortable stuff!))

I think about it endlessly, in the days that follow - I force myself to look at my own point of view as if it were another's, I try to step away from my own past, my own hurt; but that's like asking someone to step out of their own skin - I simply cannot.

Every night I fall asleep, and I see their broken bodies. I hear their screams - I feel the boots in my ribs, the hands grabbing, the chemicals burning under my skin; among other things that I can't even speak the words for, things that no person should ever endure, or even have to witness. I can't even blame the survivors who eventually went on to take their own lives, despite attaining freedom in the end - the things done to us, to dehumanize us... they're hard to live with every single day.

And in fairness, I even tried. I tried once, by my own hand - and many, many more times have I chased Death, snapping at its heels, hungry for something that could conquer me. Take me down. Something powerful enough to make it all stop.

I am too good at surviving, however - unwilling to truly give up the ghost - and now here I am, still surviving in a world in which Garlemald has fallen, and I am told that this land of hateful bigots has innocent people in it... but I cannot find them. I don't know how else to tell him that I've walked their wastes, when I still cannot bring myself to walk the sands of my own homeland. I walked among them.

I let them prove to me what they are - their rhetoric about us hasn't changed, despite the loss of all that matters to them. Even as they starve, and freeze, they are full of hate for that which is different than them -

"Beast."

"Savage."

"Beastman."

FFXIV Write 2023 #5: Barbarous

(( Hey there! You might want to check the tags for trigger warnings - I rarely go too in-depth on triggering topics, but I do briefly mention uncomfortable stuff!))

I think about it endlessly, in the days that follow - I force myself to look at my own point of view as if it were another's, I try to step away from my own past, my own hurt; but that's like asking someone to step out of their own skin - I simply cannot.

Every night I fall asleep, and I see their broken bodies. I hear their screams - I feel the boots in my ribs, the hands grabbing, the chemicals burning under my skin; among other things that I can't even speak the words for, things that no person should ever endure, or even have to witness. I can't even blame the survivors who eventually went on to take their own lives, despite attaining freedom in the end - the things done to us, to dehumanize us... they're hard to live with every single day.

And in fairness, I even tried. I tried once, by my own hand - and many, many more times have I chased Death, snapping at its heels, hungry for something that could conquer me. Take me down. Something powerful enough to make it all stop.

I am too good at surviving, however - unwilling to truly give up the ghost - and now here I am, still surviving in a world in which Garlemald has fallen, and I am told that this land of hateful bigots has innocent people in it... but I cannot find them. I don't know how else to tell him that I've walked their wastes, when I still cannot bring myself to walk the sands of my own homeland. I walked among them.

I let them prove to me what they are - their rhetoric about us hasn't changed, despite the loss of all that matters to them. Even as they starve, and freeze, they are full of hate for that which is different than them -

"Beast."

"Savage."

"Beastman."