For all that he always welcomed new arrivals personally, there were very few people Clancy ever actually gave the full tour to. The last was, of course, Ruby, but he refuses to let those memories overshadow this experience. He's sure Mikodez has read his file thoroughly already, even in the short time since it was delivered; he's not sure what it says about any part of this, but that doesn't matter. It's his chance to present it fresh, without any assumptions. Any more than there have to be.
"I found this place abandoned about three years before I came to the barge," he starts, gesturing towards the campground as a whole. "I knew I'd need some sort of base of operations, and it would be easier to build off of existing infrastructure. This campground had been closed down back when the panic over IAAN first hit--please, feel free to interrupt me if you need anything explained, I'm not sure how much background my file gave you. In any case, I was fairly certain it would still be abandoned, and a quick search of the government's bounty network showed no one operating in this area, so I thought it was a good place to start." Use existing materials, build from what's there.
"There were only three of us, in the beginning, but the plan was always to find more kids like us. More Psi kids who'd either evaded capture or--less likely--escaped. We started with the central building." He gestures here to the only two-story structure in the complex of buildings, one that looks a little more permanent than the log cabins scattered around them. "This was the center of everything. I ran operations from the second floor. The first floor was dedicated to food prep and storage. We stockpiled what we could, and resupplied through strategic hits on supply trucks passing through the area. Never the same stretch of road twice, and never with any regular frequency, but enough to keep things running. And what we couldn't steal, we made."
Mikodez listens attentively, even as he looks around around. After the time they've spent together, he's sure that Clancy is at least starting to understand how much information a look can give him to file away behind his expression of friendly interest. He takes in the campground as a whole, the buildings, and, most importantly, Clancy as its touchstone.
As for himself, despite his usual neat suit and careful polish, he somehow manages to fit into the camp, as if in a place where grownups are the dangerous enemy, his presence would simply be accepted as a matter of course. He's perfectly capable of not making all the small adjustments that suggest he's someone who fits in, but that wouldn't make an sort of point.
"The file provided some background. Not as much as I general require but the Admiral's working to different standards. There's also everything you've told me." And said on the network, though he doesn't see any point in adding the obvious. Or in laying out the exact details of what he'd been given.
He strolls toward the central building, walking slowly as he continues to examine his surroundings.
"I can see why this place wouldn't receive much custom, once things started falling apart. This sort of place runs with the help of certain underlying assumptions." He gives Clancy wry smile. "Not to mention the... awkwardness in the 'family' part of family vacations."
He crouches a moment, rubbing some dirt between two fingers between straightening again.
"Not a bad short term set up. How many do you think understood or realized that it couldn't be anything other than short term?"
Even if Clancy weren't already convinced that everyone else was just as suspicious as him, just as ready to use anything and everything they could to stay on top, he wouldn't entirely buy the smiling, compassionate exterior Mikodez presents. He's under no illusions about the likelihood of a bleeding heart surviving in Mikodez's chosen field for as long as he has, alternate universe or no. The man is intelligent and has been doing this for longer than Clancy's been alive; obviously this isn't going to be as easy as it could have been. He'll have to be careful. Fortunately, the East River speech is practically second nature, at this point. It was a good cover. For a while.
He's quiet as Mikodez strolls towards the building, keeping pace a few steps away, offering perhaps a quiet laugh at his wry words--or maybe at the idea of a place like this ever being anything his family would consider a vacation. But at the question he lets the smile fade from his face, instead looking out at the cabins around them. "Not many, thankfully. A few. That's why I arranged things so those who did start to figure it out went tribal before it could spread to the rest. A place like this wouldn't have stayed invisible for long." Three hundred kids, running water, electricity, the raids, the garden--hell, none of it was subtle. It was only sheer isolation that had kept them safe as long as they had. Well, sheer isolation, and quite a lot of work on his part.
Mikodez nods, tilting his head back a moment to take in the construction of the building. "Alien in the smallest ways." The comment could almost be to himself, before he turns his full focus back on Clancy.
"Yes, you managed it quite well. It seems like you would have been on the older side of your 'generation'? From my understanding of the order of events. You certainly received a type of training I imagine wasn't offered to children captured or those who had to hide."
It's a good reminder, that sentence of Mikodez's. Something Clancy
carefully files away. 'Alien in the smallest ways' doesn't just apply to
this camp, or this ship, but also his warden. He can't afford to forget
that for all that he looks like he's from Earth, looks human, Mikodez is
not from any place remotely similar to the Earth he knows.
"I was--am," he answers frankly, hands casually resting in his pockets as
he looks towards Mikodez. "Although the training I received wasn't for my
abilities. That was--self-taught, you could say. All they wanted to learn
at Thurmond was how we got our gifts and how to take them away. Those of us
who were first--we learned the hard way. It's one of the reasons I made
education for younger Psi kids mandatory," he continues, gesturing towards
one of the larger cabins across the field, out towards the lake, a bit of a
hike away. "Not just a primary education, math and history and reading, but
an education in their abilities. So many of the kids that found their way
to us had no idea how to use their gifts. Or even, honestly, that they were
gifts at all. If you tell a child often enough that they were made wrong,
that they're evil or broken or cursed, they'll start to believe you, and
nothing anyone else says will convince them otherwise." Despite his
measured voice, there's an edge to the last sentence; the kind of edge that
speaks of a very strong dislike for anyone who'd say those sorts of things.
Mikodez likes Clancy; he's clever, willing to learn and full of potential, despite how it's been twisted. He's also young, which is a promising combination. Someday, Clancy might know as much as he thinks he does. Mikodez wouldn't mind being there to see it.
As it is, he follows Clancy's gesture, nodding again. "I still find what I've read about the educational systems of your country 'before' slightly appalling, but I was relieved - though not surprised - that you did your best to provide at least some." He takes a box of green tea pocky from his pocket, offering Clancy a stick.
"Yes, that sort of conditioning can be effective on adults, too, but starting young certainly internalizes the message. The wrong one, in your case." He's not unmoved by the treatment of the psi children, but he's practical before all else.
Clancy is used to being liked. After all, he's always been able to make people take a shine to him; in later years, it hadn't even taken his powers. You just had to know how people worked, know what buttons to push. He was attractive, he was passionate, he was smart and determined. He'd made himself into something none of them could ever dream of being. And yet, at the same time he's convinced no one actually really likes him, and everyone is out to stop him. Although, really, when the world proves your suspicions correct, is it really paranoia? None of that suspicion has ever kept Clancy from doing his very best to be friendly, approachable, and charismatic. Even if that's not at all what Mikodez likes.
More often than not he declines these little offers, but this one he accepts, taking one of the small sticks and twirling it in his fingers for a moment before taking a neat bite. "To be fair, the US educational system was appalling even before nine out of ten of its students died," is his possibly surprisingly wry answer, gesturing with the pocky. "But I did try, to the best of my abilities, to give them something approaching a normal life. For at least a few moments a day. So many of them never had it at all. I was ten when my father sent me to Thurmond. I'm twenty now. IAAN hits anywhere between ages eight and fourteen, and I'm good enough at math to work that problem out." There are children out there now who have never known a world where they weren't at risk of dying, children whose parents give them away even before they reach peak risk just because they're afraid of the consequences. Children who can be used, if they're educated properly, taught how to use what they have to set things right.
"If no one tells them they're special, that they aren't worthless or evil, they'll never know it. They'll die never knowing what they could have been. And I refuse to let that happen to all of us," he answers, and for all that it's not the whole answer, and quite possibly embellished, it's not a lie, either.
I'm so sorry, I just found this lost in the wilderness
"Yes, I'll admit that I haven't developed a high opinion of your educational system. I'll also admit that I have the bias of coming from the hexarch with it's universal and comprehensive education, which always makes it easier to look down on others who don't have the same resources and systems in place." His grin invites Clancy to join the joke that's at both at the educational system and Mikodez's expense.
He nods more seriously as Clancy goes on. "A sense of normality is important, a routine - even if it's not what they would have had before, well, you're trying for something new. Theory is often little use if you don't have a testing ground, and at least you could know that even a, hmm, lower quality of life compared to a different generation was far higher than what they would get otherwise." East River seems like a useful microcosm in general, for people, not education. But there's no need to be offensively blunt.
"It's a terrible thing to do to children." He means that, too, Mikodez's care is genuine, if always calculated and controlled. It's nice to occasionally even get to be honest about it. "If it's let to continue, it's also the destruction of your country. I don't have much time for short term thinkers, it seems like the people currently managing to cling to control where you're from are some of the worst of the breed."
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
"I found this place abandoned about three years before I came to the barge," he starts, gesturing towards the campground as a whole. "I knew I'd need some sort of base of operations, and it would be easier to build off of existing infrastructure. This campground had been closed down back when the panic over IAAN first hit--please, feel free to interrupt me if you need anything explained, I'm not sure how much background my file gave you. In any case, I was fairly certain it would still be abandoned, and a quick search of the government's bounty network showed no one operating in this area, so I thought it was a good place to start." Use existing materials, build from what's there.
"There were only three of us, in the beginning, but the plan was always to find more kids like us. More Psi kids who'd either evaded capture or--less likely--escaped. We started with the central building." He gestures here to the only two-story structure in the complex of buildings, one that looks a little more permanent than the log cabins scattered around them. "This was the center of everything. I ran operations from the second floor. The first floor was dedicated to food prep and storage. We stockpiled what we could, and resupplied through strategic hits on supply trucks passing through the area. Never the same stretch of road twice, and never with any regular frequency, but enough to keep things running. And what we couldn't steal, we made."
no subject
As for himself, despite his usual neat suit and careful polish, he somehow manages to fit into the camp, as if in a place where grownups are the dangerous enemy, his presence would simply be accepted as a matter of course. He's perfectly capable of not making all the small adjustments that suggest he's someone who fits in, but that wouldn't make an sort of point.
"The file provided some background. Not as much as I general require but the Admiral's working to different standards. There's also everything you've told me." And said on the network, though he doesn't see any point in adding the obvious. Or in laying out the exact details of what he'd been given.
He strolls toward the central building, walking slowly as he continues to examine his surroundings.
"I can see why this place wouldn't receive much custom, once things started falling apart. This sort of place runs with the help of certain underlying assumptions." He gives Clancy wry smile. "Not to mention the... awkwardness in the 'family' part of family vacations."
He crouches a moment, rubbing some dirt between two fingers between straightening again.
"Not a bad short term set up. How many do you think understood or realized that it couldn't be anything other than short term?"
no subject
He's quiet as Mikodez strolls towards the building, keeping pace a few steps away, offering perhaps a quiet laugh at his wry words--or maybe at the idea of a place like this ever being anything his family would consider a vacation. But at the question he lets the smile fade from his face, instead looking out at the cabins around them. "Not many, thankfully. A few. That's why I arranged things so those who did start to figure it out went tribal before it could spread to the rest. A place like this wouldn't have stayed invisible for long." Three hundred kids, running water, electricity, the raids, the garden--hell, none of it was subtle. It was only sheer isolation that had kept them safe as long as they had. Well, sheer isolation, and quite a lot of work on his part.
no subject
"Yes, you managed it quite well. It seems like you would have been on the older side of your 'generation'? From my understanding of the order of events. You certainly received a type of training I imagine wasn't offered to children captured or those who had to hide."
no subject
It's a good reminder, that sentence of Mikodez's. Something Clancy carefully files away. 'Alien in the smallest ways' doesn't just apply to this camp, or this ship, but also his warden. He can't afford to forget that for all that he looks like he's from Earth, looks human, Mikodez is not from any place remotely similar to the Earth he knows.
"I was--am," he answers frankly, hands casually resting in his pockets as he looks towards Mikodez. "Although the training I received wasn't for my abilities. That was--self-taught, you could say. All they wanted to learn at Thurmond was how we got our gifts and how to take them away. Those of us who were first--we learned the hard way. It's one of the reasons I made education for younger Psi kids mandatory," he continues, gesturing towards one of the larger cabins across the field, out towards the lake, a bit of a hike away. "Not just a primary education, math and history and reading, but an education in their abilities. So many of the kids that found their way to us had no idea how to use their gifts. Or even, honestly, that they were gifts at all. If you tell a child often enough that they were made wrong, that they're evil or broken or cursed, they'll start to believe you, and nothing anyone else says will convince them otherwise." Despite his measured voice, there's an edge to the last sentence; the kind of edge that speaks of a very strong dislike for anyone who'd say those sorts of things.
no subject
As it is, he follows Clancy's gesture, nodding again. "I still find what I've read about the educational systems of your country 'before' slightly appalling, but I was relieved - though not surprised - that you did your best to provide at least some." He takes a box of green tea pocky from his pocket, offering Clancy a stick.
"Yes, that sort of conditioning can be effective on adults, too, but starting young certainly internalizes the message. The wrong one, in your case." He's not unmoved by the treatment of the psi children, but he's practical before all else.
no subject
More often than not he declines these little offers, but this one he accepts, taking one of the small sticks and twirling it in his fingers for a moment before taking a neat bite. "To be fair, the US educational system was appalling even before nine out of ten of its students died," is his possibly surprisingly wry answer, gesturing with the pocky. "But I did try, to the best of my abilities, to give them something approaching a normal life. For at least a few moments a day. So many of them never had it at all. I was ten when my father sent me to Thurmond. I'm twenty now. IAAN hits anywhere between ages eight and fourteen, and I'm good enough at math to work that problem out." There are children out there now who have never known a world where they weren't at risk of dying, children whose parents give them away even before they reach peak risk just because they're afraid of the consequences. Children who can be used, if they're educated properly, taught how to use what they have to set things right.
"If no one tells them they're special, that they aren't worthless or evil, they'll never know it. They'll die never knowing what they could have been. And I refuse to let that happen to all of us," he answers, and for all that it's not the whole answer, and quite possibly embellished, it's not a lie, either.
I'm so sorry, I just found this lost in the wilderness
He nods more seriously as Clancy goes on. "A sense of normality is important, a routine - even if it's not what they would have had before, well, you're trying for something new. Theory is often little use if you don't have a testing ground, and at least you could know that even a, hmm, lower quality of life compared to a different generation was far higher than what they would get otherwise." East River seems like a useful microcosm in general, for people, not education. But there's no need to be offensively blunt.
"It's a terrible thing to do to children." He means that, too, Mikodez's care is genuine, if always calculated and controlled. It's nice to occasionally even get to be honest about it. "If it's let to continue, it's also the destruction of your country. I don't have much time for short term thinkers, it seems like the people currently managing to cling to control where you're from are some of the worst of the breed."