triplets

Part 1

There's nothing about the mass extinction that had anything to do with fair or unfair. For that matter, most murder, war, genocide, or other reprehensible acts could easily be dragged under the broad umbrella of unfair.

The droplets of justice dripping from the edges of the umbrella while people cry out injustice but never really do anything to fix it.

For that matter, it's unfair that any child should suffer neglect or abuse. And unfair that malice exists at all.

Of course the worst evils aren't about malice, are they?

Her family hadn't held any true malice for her. Maybe her brother, on his worse days, but even he was merely a person who acted how he thought best. It was only that what came so naturally to him as an individual was to cause her pain.

Malice was not the source of cruelty. Only one of many outlets it could utilize.

The monster currently feasting upon her guts didn't feel any malice towards her either. It was a simple being.

Indifference and ignorance were chief in the recipes for unfairness.

The monster didn't know how hard she worked to be here or how miserable her upbringing had been. It was ignorant of her struggles and of how tragic it was for her life to be cut short.

And beyond that, it was indifferent to those struggles.

She didn't easily forgive indifference and ignorance though. Others might, others could choose to use those words as excuses to explain away blame.

She didn't.

She couldn't.

Cha Siyeon wasn't a kind enough person to forgive those who wronged her. And while she knew that there were larger injustices in the world, surely plenty of deaths far more unfair than her own, she could only live her own experience.

And to her, she felt as though she'd only reached a hand outside of the umbrella of unfairness and touched the cool rain of beyond before she was thrown back inside.

Cha Siyeon died angry and bitter.

–

Battlefields held a unique unreality. The stench of blood, sweat, death, soldiers, and atrocities that ought never to have been committed in a sane world all dragged the senses of an individual down to the terrible reality that all of this was really happening.

But the heightened senses of fear, accepting death, fighting death, regrets, pain, helplessness, and power all clouded the senses with a dreadful sort of focus.

No one lasted very long as a soldier without being able to seperate the reality of the horrors around them from the unreality of doing the job in front of you.

Killing the person in front of you.

It's mindless and strips a person of their individuality, becoming only one aspect of a horde seeking out blood and victory.

No matter how noble the goals of war, there is nothing there for those who grieve the loss of every fallen soldier. There is no room for a heart to care about what are the most important things to any one individual.

The ground is the only companion of the soldier.

Underneath their feet and so long as it's there, their life might be extended by just another moment. The moment the ground begins to shake or their feet are torn from the ground, all the unreality in the world couldn't protect them from the harsh reality of death.