Optional Ethics

[Nicole Silvestri]

A young sorceress explores the rights and wrongs of using magic to change reality - through conversations with a Dragon monk, an extradimensional demon, and her own sister who has been left traumatized by her exposure to magic.

 

[Nicole Silvestri]

Optional Ethics

“I should never have let it come this far…”

“I should never have let it come this far…”

“I should never have let it come this far…”

* * *​

“I should never have let it come this far…”

The monk answered her only after a moment of silence, and spoke slowly in that characteristic wise sage voice they all seem to have: “You cannot change the past, you can only…” Nicky raised a hand to interrupt him.

“Actually, I can,” she admitted sheepishly. And then added quickly: “Change the past.”

“OH. You’re one of THOSE.” The monk replied with impressive cynicism is his voice; impressive because there was not a hint of disrespect. He knew about the Dragon, ofcourse.

* * *​

“I should never have let it come this far…”

“You’re damn right you should never have let it come this far!”

The sorceress was stunned by the ferocity of her sister’s response, as that sister raged on: “That’s just like you, isn’t it, Nicky? You don’t notice something is wrong until it blows up in your face! You just go on acting like everything’s alright! How long have I been asking for your help now? You weren’t even here for your own nephew’s first birthday!”

“I was busy with…” What had she been busy with? Her relationship problems, probably. “That’s hardly the same, Becky!”

“It’s exactly the same! You don’t notice when someone needs help until it’s a disaster! How much worse do I have to get before you consider me a disaster, Nicky?” Becky pleaded.

The sorceress bit her lip, guiltily. “I’m sorry…” She sighed. “What can I do?”

“Can you take back the last year?” her sister asked, bitterly sarcastic.

“Yes, I can,” she answered truthfully.

And Becky stared, at once stunned and horrified by the simple honesty in her sister’s voice. Even now, even after the past year, even after what she’d seen and been told, she still couldn’t truly fathom just what her little sister had become.

* * *​

“I should never have let it come this far…”

“You DARE summon me to discuss your relationship problems?” The creature of darkness and fire rose up as its voice boomed, its arms (or tentacles? tendrils?) expanding to make it twice as tall as its already impressive height.

The comparatively small form of the human sorceress next to it just shrugged. “Nah, I summoned you to destroy you. I just figured I’d ask first.”

The large being hesitated, a ripple going through its constantly shifting essence. “So, before you attempt to destroy me… you want to volunteer to me information on your emotional vulnerabilities?”

Another shrug. “I guess so.”

The creature sat down. Or at least, performed some equivalent of sitting down with what passed for its legs (grapplers? coils? offshoots?), which the sorceress was pretty sure it didn’t actually need to stand on. “Very well,” its voice reverberated, “Perhaps it will provide some useful insight into how you humans operate.”

* * *​

It took a long deep sigh, but the monk managed to recover the slow wise voice: “Alright. I will not pretend to understand how you can change the past, so let us assume for sake of conversation you can change whatever you like. What would you change? And most importantly: When?”

Nicky scratched her woolen pom pom hat. “I guess I would… try to encourage her more to make more friends… my wife, I mean… to find more hobbies… some purpose in life besides me…”

“You did not encourage her?”

“I did! But apparently not enough…”

“And when is ‘enough’? If your encouragement had not the desired effect the first time, what would you change to make it effective this time?”

Nicky frowned hard over that question. “I don’t know… if I’d have known, I’d have done it the first time… I guess I’d just try harder, and hope it’s enough!”

The monk squinted at her, and asked sharply: “How far back in time would you have to go?”

“About a year, I guess? At least?”

It was an amusing sight, seeing this old monk literally facepalm in slow motion, then shaking his head into his hand, while trying to make it seem that wasn’t what he was doing.

When he spoke finally, his voice was still slow, but now it was from incredulity: “You are going to jump back in time a year… without having any better idea of what you did wrong the first time… or any plan for how to obtain the desired effect this time? Other than ‘try harder’?”

“I guess that is kind of weak, huh?” Nicky looked sheepish, scratching her hat more. “Every time I tried, she’d get mad at me, so maybe if I tried harder, we’d just have more fights and break up sooner…” She considered this a moment. “And maybe that’s what needs to change.”

“To break up sooner? Because she would have been less devastated, had you not been together as long?” He’d recovered his calm voice once more. “Again then: How much sooner?”

* * *​

“Would you have to go back further than a year? Further back than his birth?” Rebecca’s son - Nicole’s nephew - was sleeping peacefully in his mother’s arms as his mother asked the question.

Nicky nodded. “Likely. Just before his birth I disappeared for a while. My students told me… Desi almost lost it then.”

Rebecca hugged the toddler to her chest. “Then you can’t. He will die. I will die. We’ll both die.”

“Becky…”

“You said it yourself! So many times! We both would have died if she hadn’t performed the delivery!”

“She or another healer of comparable skill…” Nicky had to admit.

“And would one have been available on such short notice, if she hadn’t been your wife? Would your student have been watching me? Would you even have been running that dojo, if you hadn’t married her?”

“I could…” Nicky puffed her cheeks, “…could try to change the past in such a way that we got to you earlier. That it never would have come to that.”

Rebecca’s eyes shot fire. “So that’s what this is? Instead of making amends and reparations and learning from your mistakes, you want to undo them with magic? This must be a dream come true for you, Nicky!”

Nicky had dated a pyrokinetic paladin, and was still impressed by the burning glare her sister threw her.

* * *​

“I admit, human morality makes little sense to me. Changing the present to change the future is commendable, but changing the past to change the future is wrong?” The flame-being turned its eyes towards her - the sorceress was pretty sure its eyes were either those spots of darker fire amidst lighter fire, or those spots of lighter fire amidst darker fire. “Tell me, sorceress, can you make another human love you?”

“Like, with magic?” She guessed its silence was affirmation. “Not her. She’s a Bee.”

“Ah, empowered by Gaia! But a normal, powerless human?”

“Not if they were…” The entity waved an eye-stalk to interrupt her.

Its thundering voice resonated impatience: “All these ‘if’s betray the answer to the question is, in principle, yes?”

She could only nod.

“So why don’t you just do that? Could a powerless human not provide the kind of love you crave?”

Nicky gave this question some serious consideration. “I think they could… not just anyone, ofcourse, but the right one, sure.”

“So why don’t you find the right one and make them love you, and save yourself all these relationship problems?”

“That would be wrong!” she gasped.

“Wrong? Why? No, no, I know what you are thinking…” The creature pointed an eye-stalk (antenna? feeler?) at itself. “Evil demon, right? But I do have some knowledge of human morality. In my interpretation, this would make both you and that person ‘happier’, so why would you consider it wrong?”

Nicky stumbled for how to explain. “It… it wouldn’t be real…”

“Real?”

It took a few moments for the sorceress to realize that the roaring sound of crackling fire was the creature’s laughing.

“Once you would’ve sworn I wasn’t real. How long have you been hunting my kind now? How much is now real to you that once wasn’t? I see the touch on you of beings far worse than I. Only a touch, lucky for you. Can you even tell what is real anymore?”

* * *​

“I think it would have made a big difference if she could just have realized that her dream wasn’t real! She kept imagining I’d be the person she wanted me to be, but that was never the real me!”

“Very good,” the monk inclined his bald head slightly. “That sounds like a specific, feasible variance, at the root of the problem.” He hid his triumph well - it had taken him a long time and a lot of patience to get the sorceress from ‘try harder’ to this point.

“Now then…” he continued, “when did this problem take root?”

The sorceress thought back. “Really… It was there from the start.” She quirked her lips to one side. “So I’d have to undo the whole relationship? Or try to negate the idea before we started?”

“Possibly. Do you believe it would have helped if you had anticipated this from the start?”

“I did anticipate it from the start!” She blew her breath out in frustration. “I gave Desi a very explicit warning before we got together, and tried to tell her again and again after!”

Raising his eyebrows was the closest this monk came to expressing sympathy. “If you failed to negate the idea the first time, I doubt going back and ‘trying harder’ would work.”

“Tell me about it!” She grumbled. “So what do I do?”

“It sounds like this problem took root before you started your relationship. Try going further back? Can you think of a time you might have prevented it?”

Nicky sighed and frowned deeply as she followed the timelines of her memories further back. Slowly she shook her head. “I think it was already there from the moment she awoke…” Seeing the question on his face, she added: “From her coma.” Not entirely accurate, but good enough.

“I see,” another slow incline of his head that was the closest he got to a nod. “Then you would likely have to go back to before her coma to find the root.”

“But that was years and years before! Before I even got my… abilities!”

“Is that a problem?”

“YES!” She threw her arms up in exasperation. “This is ridiculous! Why can’t I change this? History is NOT unchangeable! That goes against everything the Dragon teaches! We can change anything we want if we just find the right trigger at the right moment!”

Now the monk actually showed a hint of a smile, to the sorceress’ astonishment, as he replied: “Yes, but it is as you say: The right moment. History is not unchangeable, but it does have momentum. That is why so many models are needed to find its tipping points: Because they are rare.”

* * *​

“So, you don’t want me to go back and erase the last year?”

“Ofcourse not!”

“But you said the last year had been awful for you?”

“It HAS been! Completely awful!” Rebecca had taken her son up and was walking him through the living room. “I’m on leave from the hospital, I’m on three different anxiety medications… But it was still my first year with my son! I wouldn’t want to lose that for anything!”

“You wouldn't LOSE it, Becky. It’d just… change….”

“Changed by magic! It wouldn’t be real anymore!”

“Real?” Nicky couldn’t help but think back of a recent conservation with a being of whom more than just its eyes shot fire. “It would be as real to you as this year was.”

“That’s terrifying! That’s more terrifying than anything I’ve been scared of this year! Then how do you tell what’s real anymore? And what about the past year as it has happened now? Everything I’ve experienced? It would just… disappear?”

“I’d still be able to see it, but… for you and everyone else, yeah.”

Becky gasped for breath and just shook her head resolutely. ‘No.’

Nicky let her arms hang limply along her sides and sighed in disheartenment. “I just want to help…” she implored dejected, the sorceress reduced to the little sister again.

“I’ve been asking for your help all year! You could’ve helped at any time! That isn’t helping, Nicky! That is… making me forget you didn’t help! That’s forcing a lie onto my mind to make everything seem alright, when it wasn’t!”

The sorceress stared at her sister in horror.

“I know you’re not like that, Nicky, I know you don’t mean it that way. I know you mean well! But that is what it would be.”

* * *​

“Tell me, sorceress, are you aware there are demons who are experts at making humans fall in love with them? They do not use magic to accomplish this. Only words. Lies so passionately and convincingly told, they are accepted as truth. It seems most humans are simply… incapable of believing that anyone could fake an entire personality?”

The tremble in the entity’s voice said what it was too polite to say in words: ‘How does such a naive species manage to survive at all?’ Nicky had to marvel for a moment at the fact that this creature was trying to be polite.

But in response to its question, she could only nod in affirmation, and add mournfully: “There are humans who are experts at this too. I’ve met many, in the Secret World.” The tremble in her voice gave away how much she regretted those meetings.

“Then tell me,” the demon boomed on, unheedful of her sorrow: “Do you consider it wrong to make someone love you that way? Do you consider that love… not real?”

She nodded again. “I do.”

“Then explain to me, what is normal human courtship, if not making someone fall in love with you with words? What is the difference?”

“I don’t lie…” she answered automatically, “I don't hide things from them…” but as she considered her answer, her confidence sank. “FUUUUCK!” she groaned as she reached her conclusion.

The creature’s fire crackled in amusement at seeing the sorceress undermine her own arguments. “Well?”

“One of these human experts…” she explained reluctantly, “I once challenged one to make me love them. She did not lie, or hide anything, and succeeded still…” Nicky growled.

“And even if you don’t lie, can you speak for all humans? Can you say that the vast majority of them do not lie, during normal courtship?”

This time she had to shake her head.

“So where is the line, human? When is love ‘real’, and when is it not?”

* * *​

“Tell me,” these words sounded far more kindly from the monk then when the demon spoke them, “are you familiar with the story of En-Dao?”

Again, Nicky could only shake her head.

“It is a lesser-known tale from Chinese mythology. Lesser-known, because the Dragon does not wish it to be well-known.”

When she just looked at him expectantly, the monk - she had asked him for his name and he had answered that he had relinquished it - began telling:

“En-Dao was a man with a minor talent for magic who somehow discovered the power to travel back in time. Some say a dragon gave him the ability, because he was such a moral, compassionate man, the dragon trusted him alone of all humans to use the ability well.

In this time, China was fractured, and not far from the town where En-Dao lived were the lands of the so-called demon emperor. We’ll call him Fang, since that was his given name according to tradition. Fang was an extremely powerful sorcerer who bound both demons and less powerful mages to do his bidding, and so ruled his lands as a cruel tyrant.

En-Dao could not hope to defeat this man in confrontation, but his unique ability to travel back in time gave him an opportunity. He did not simply want to go back and kill the dragon emperor before he came to power, however. For En-Dao was a virtuous man and believed no human was born evil; humans were turned evil by circumstance and outside influence.

So he set out to go back in time to find and eliminate whatever had turned the demon emperor evil, hoping to turn this powerful sorcerer into a force for good…”

Nicky interjected: “But he failed to find a tipping point? He had to go further and further back in time until he ended up in the time of the dinosaurs and got eaten by a T-Rex?”

Another one of those sighs - Nicky knew them well by now - before the monk spoke, straining to keep his voice calm: “You are an impatient audience. But yes, that is the essence of it. Except for the... T-Rex. As far as we know, he spend eternity looking for a tipping point, and never found it.”

* * *​

“What can I do to help, then?” Nicky asked disheartened.

“I have told you.” Rebecca answered as she put her child back into his bed. “Find my son a place where he will be protected from… whatever it is that wants to take him.”

“Becky, I’ve warded your house, I’ve given him and you magical alarms…”

“Which you’ve admitted will not help against a full scale assault if you’re too far away to respond in time!”

Nicky threw her arms up. “But I can’t guard you and him day and night, for the rest of your life! The only way to offer you more protection would be to place you in some secret world facility that is guarded day and night! I can do that, but that would make you involved in the Secret World! That would put you at more risk, not less!”

“Less risk from the thing that is after him!”

“Yes, but lots of other new risks! The thing that is after him might not even be there anymore!”

Becky sighed long and deep, in way that made Nicky think all that was missing was the cigarette. It was an exasperated sigh, not the kind of resigned sighs that the monk on the mountain had given.

“Nicky…” she began, “maybe you’re right, maybe it will be more dangerous. But at least I would have some semblance of control back! At least I’d learn and understand this Secret World. At least I could feel I was doing something, not just… sitting here and waiting for it to happen, not having any idea what ‘it’ even is, day after day, wondering if this will be the day, knowing I can do nothing to stop it if it comes!” Becky’s face pleaded with her sister, desperately.

Now it was Nicky’s turn to give a long, deep sigh. “You realise if I do that, I’ll be changing your life with magic? What’s the difference with what you just rejected so furiously?”

Becky smiled that patient smile of an older sister. “The difference is, you wouldn’t be replacing my life with a happy lie that you created. You’d just be helping me to shape my own life, to find my own happiness. Real happiness.”

* * *​

“I guess… I guess what matters is whether it makes both people happy, in the end?” The sorceress didn’t sound so sure of herself anymore.

“Aha!” The crackling of fire sounded triumphant. “So we’re back to: Find a normal human who could give you the love you crave, use your magic to make them fall in love with you, and you’ll both be ‘happy’.” This being was apparently incapable of saying the word ‘happy’ without sounding sarcastic. “So why is that wrong?”

This time Nicky had her answer ready: “Because I’d be overriding their free will.”

The way the shadowy fiery form of the entity's body shifted almost gave the impression of a nod. “So, you value free will over happiness, in the end?” Then why are you even considering making someone fall out of love with you with your magic? Is that not ‘overriding their free will’?”

“That’s not what I was considering! I abandoned that idea for exactly that reason! What I was considering…” This time the demon did not bother to wave any kind of appendage to interrupt her.

It simply boomed over her: “You’re considering changing the past - with your magic - to make this person less attached to you.”

Nicky had no answer to that.

So the creature went on: “Would you change the past to make someone more attached to you? Or would that be wrong?”

The sorceress considered this carefully. “If it was to save their life…”

“Now you’re coming up with really far-fetched ‘if’s! If it was for your own benefit, it would be wrong?”

She could only nod.

The being grinned. It had no mouth to actually grin with, but it created the shape of a human grin in lighter fire amidst the darker fire of its form. That was clearly not a natural expression for its kind - it was doing that just so it could victoriously grin at her in a facial language she’d understand. “So, are you trying to save her life? In truth? Or are you just trying to absolve your own guilt, for your own benefit?”

* * *​

“En-Dao found the dragon emperor - Fang - had been evil even at a very young age. He had been raised by abusive parents, and that seemed the source of him turning to evil. His parents, in turn, had been turned so bitter as to abuse their children from having to live in abject poverty and constant hunger.

Thus En-Dao tried to convince Fang’s parents to leave their impoverished village for wealthier lands, but found that just made them embittered from leaving their ancestral home. He tried to have the young Fang placed with foster parents, but the only ones who would take him ended up abusing him as well.

Next En-Dao tried to go further back in time to find a cause for the village’s poverty and famine, and found it had been caused by a war. So now he had to stop an entire war…” Nicky waved a hand to interrupt him.

“I think I get the picture,” she sighed reluctantly. “Some things have been set in motion too long ago.”

The monk inclined his head in acknowledgement. “The butterfly flapping its wings might cause a hurricane years later. The hurricane can be prevented by just stopping the butterfly. But once that butterfly has flapped its wings? Stopping the hurricane might become very difficult, even if it still lies years in the future.”

“Difficult…” the sorceress mused, “but not impossible…”

“Rarely impossible. But the question is if you are willing to pay the price. That is the other lesson of the story of En-Dao. He had other options open to him. He could have killed the young Fang, but that was a price he was not willing to pay.”

“Or he could have raised the child himself…” Nicky offered. “But I’m guessing he did not want to devote his entire life to it.”

“And yet he ended up devoting his life to finding a tipping point.” The monk raised an eyebrow like a teacher waiting for his student to understand the lesson. “I would guess you too have options open to you. The question is if you are willing to pay the price?”

* * *​

“I think you’re exaggerating, Becky.”

Her sister did not argue, so Nicky went on.

“Just because I changed your past with magic, would not make it a lie! It would be the new reality. If I do what you ask, your life will be very different than if I don’t, too! Your future will be changed by magic. That would be the new reality!

Enacting a change in the past instead of the present does not make the new future less real! Using magic to enact that change does not make it less real either! The present isn’t sacred and magic just is!”

Becky sighed as she lowered herself onto the couch. “Perhaps you are right. You probably understand magic and time better than I do, now…” she admitted. “But, Nicky…” Looking up, she patted the empty couch cushion next to her, inviting her little sister to come sit.

The little sister did come sit, and waited for her big sister to explain.

“I do understand you.” The older sister began. “And I understand responsibility. I know you have to use magic to do… what you do. But you can not… you should not use it to alter your own social relationships with people. Not even a little.

Relationships are built on trust, on responsibility, on shared experiences, on devoting time to eachother. If you go messing with that? Soon every time you have a fight with a friend you’ll be turning back the clock to undo the fight. Then you’ll start wondering why even spend all that time on making a new friend, when you can just change the past so that you’re already friends?”

Nicky opened her mouth to speak, but Becky raised a hand to stop her. “I know, I know, I don’t know if you can literally do that, I’m just giving examples. My point is, if you start taking such shortcuts, friendship will become meaningless to you, and you’ll end up very lonely, Nicky. Surrounded by friends, but lonely.”

The honest concern on Rebecca’s face was easy for Nicky to see. Concern for her little sister turned sorceress. And so the sorceress could not bring herself to argue.

She simply listened as her big sister went on: “If you do as I ask? You’ll just be using your magic to protect us from that… thing that’s after us. Just what you were given that power for. With your suggestion? Yes, you’ll undo my… suffering…” Becky winced at mentioning it, and had to swallow before continuing: “But you’ll also absolve us all from the mistakes we made. Not just yourself, me too.”

“Don’t go down that path, Nicky.” Rebecca implored her sister. “No matter what power you have now, you’re still human. Humans are supposed to make mistakes, and learn from them. Yes, you should try to fix your mistakes, as best you can, always! But you shouldn’t try to undo them. You’ll lose your mind, or your humanity.”

* * *​

“It’s interesting receiving a lecture on morality from a being who has none.” Nicky sneered at the creature ten times her size.

“Personal attacks are the refuge of those who know they’ve lost the argument.” It replied calmly. “You wound me, sorceress, I have morality, and one far more coherent than yours. But if it’s any consolation, it’s not yours personally I scoff at, it’s that of your entire species.”

“You think your ethics are better than ours?”

“Obviously, or I wouldn’t abide by them. But let me remind you, you asked my opinion on your moral dilemma. I did not ask your judgment on my ethics.”

The sorceress bit her lip. “You’re right… and I admit your insights have been… useful…”

“Glad to be of service. Is what I would say if I was human and trying to be polite. But as you summoned and bound me here, I didn’t have much choice in the matter. Are you going to attempt to destroy me now? I hope for your sake you’re better at magical combat than at logical arguments.”

She hesitated. “If you… allowed me to send you back to where you came from… I wouldn’t have to destroy you…”

“Ah, we had a friendly conversation about deeply personal matters, so now you've developed empathy for me? Your mind really is less rational, and more emotional, than a Rakshasa. No wonder you can’t figure out what real love is, and that your human seductress could manipulate you so easily.”

Nicky glared at the creature. “Your answer?”

“If I would not risk death to stay here, I would not be here to begin with. I have learned some things from you as well, sorceress. You crave love as desperately as I crave anima. Would you rather risk death, or give up love forever?”

Her silence was all the answer it needed.

“As would I. We’re not so different. What I crave is just more concrete. You can’t even tell when love is real or not. I wonder…”

“What?” she snapped.

“You have so much anima. You’re overflowing with it. Is that why you crave something else? Something so fickle? In my reality, anima is… elusive. I would be tempted to call you ungrateful for what you have, but perhaps… we must all crave something that’s hard to get?”

“Maybe…” Nicky sighed. “That’s sad, but maybe true.”

“And what is true we can only accept, no matter how sad.”

“Yeah…” she sighed again. Sad herself. There was only one option left for her.

* * *​

“Tell me,” this time those words came from Nicky’s mouth, “would the Dragon say the lesson of the story of En-Dao is that he should have killed the young Fang? He failed because he wasn’t strong enough to bear the guilt of that, even if it would save many more lives? That in fact, that was even selfish of him, refusing to save all those lives to keep his own conscience clean?”

“It is not for me to say what the Dragon would say.” The monk held his palms up in apology. “If it was, my mouth would be sewn shut.”

She nodded. Then twisted her lips to one side. “You just made that story up yourself, didn’t you?”

He raised his shoulders slightly. “Someone made it up. Does it matter if it was me or someone two thousand years ago? Does being older make a story better or more relevant?”

Nicky crossed her arms. “Are you just tired of answering my questions now?”

For the second time, the monk showed that hint of a smile. “Tired? Oh, no. You have simply been told all you needed to be told. Dragon models and all.”

“Right then…” She twisted her lips to the other side. “I guess I need to think on everything you’ve told me, anyways…”

“Do that. But don’t think too long. Don’t spend your whole life thinking. If there is one lesson from the story of En-Dao, it’s not to waste your life looking for a perfect solution. Be grateful for the options you have, pick the best one and go with it.”

Nicky had already begun to turn away. She looked at him over her shoulder. “I thought I’d been told everything I needed to be told?”

“That one was on me.”

“Oh, okay, thanks, I guess! Catch you later!” She waved as she began to walk away.

“You are always welcome to return if you have more questions.” Saying those words came easy to him. Meaning them was a lot harder. As the sorceress headed back down the mountain path, the monk returned to his room, contemplating the benefits of having one’s mouth sewn shut. At least, he consoled himself, there could be no better proof of the progress he had made than the patience he had just demonstrated.

* * *​

Nicky was out of patience. “Oh, come on! You’re making me out to be some kind of monster who brainwashes people with her magic! Why does everyone think I’m trying to absolve my own guilt? I just want to help! I made mistakes and they cost you a lot of pain. And they cost Desiree a lot of pain! I just want to take that away!”

Becky took her sister’s hand, soothingly. “And I will be the last to say that instinct is wrong. We both devoted our lives to taking away pain. As did Desiree. And if you can save someone’s life by going back in time? You probably should.”

Nicky frowned in confusion. “But…?”

“But if you feel like you caused that pain? If you feel guilty about that? Then I don’t think you should. Making mistakes is human. Making mistakes that hurt those we love… is part of human relationships. Apologizing, forgiving, making amends, it’s all part of forging bonds. Or breaking them. All of that becomes meaningless if you magic away your mistakes.”

After a moment, the sorceress nodded. “I see what you’re saying, but…”

But her sister wasn’t finished yet: “Not only that, you need to learn from your mistakes, Nicky. I know it’s hard. Do you think it’s not hard for me if I make a mistake and a patient dies? Do you think I didn’t wish I could go back and undo it? You actually could…” there was awe in Becky’s voice, “but I think if you did, you’d never learn, you’d never grow, and it would be worse for you, in the end.”

Nicky sighed. She couldn’t deny her sister’s concern. ‘I don’t want to lose my sister’ - what Rebecca didn’t say was clearly expressed in her eyes. And so Nicky could only counter: “That hardly seems fair to the people close to me, who suffered for my mistakes.”

Becky gave her an encouraging pat on the shoulder. “I’ll gladly suffer a little if it allows my sister to grow. And I’m sure Desiree feels the same, if she loves you. And maybe we both needed to learn something too, her and me.”

“I never seem to learn though…” Nicky shook her head with a weary sigh. “I keep making the same mistakes anyways. And maybe she won’t learn either.”

“Nicky, that isn’t true.” Rebecca’s voice was resolute. “You keep making new mistakes, but that’s normal. Trust me, I can see you’ve grown.”

Nicole looked at her sister skeptically.

“I’m sorry if I made you feel guilty about me.” Becky continued. “I should be more grateful. Without you and her, I wouldn’t even be here anymore to complain.”

“Damn right,” Nicky agreed with a chuckle, “and don’t you forget it!”

“Thank you,” her older sister smiled. “So will you help me again? Show me how responsible you've become?”

The sorceress stuck her tongue out. “I’ll see what I can do.”

* * *​

“Ah, you were expecting one more scene transition back to the sorceress and the demon? To find out what she decided? Did she destroy it? Did she let it go? Did she sent it back to its own dimension? Did she attempt to destroy it, only to fail? Did it escape?”

“We know it didn’t kill her, because we know her conversation with her sister was after her conversation with the demon. Or was it? Time isn’t always linear for this sorceress. That’s why her experience of events jumps back and forth between events so erratically.”

“In either case, I’m afraid I can’t tell you what happened between the sorceress and the demon. That is a story of its own, involving many more characters I deliberately left out of this story. You’ve been told everything you needed to be told. Dragon models and all.”

“If you ask me, this story is far too long already. If you ask me…”

“I should never have let it come this far…”

 

[Nicole Silvestri]

(Originally this story was chapter 3 of "What's Love to a Sorceress?", but I feel like it became its own story.)