“But it takes a particular man to seek refuge amongst those who go headlong into war with the powers you are hiding from,” he replies. Being that man feels hard-won. “Why go where you are most likely to be caught?”
Ezio considers the balance of his own patience. What patience may have done with Larry, what honesty might have done better.
But Larry wasn’t interested in a fight.
A fight, Ezio thinks, takes two. And where he lacked the tenderness Larry needed, he thinks he has the fight Kovacs may demand.
“I could have gone where my family’s enemies would never find me, hidden away in Spain,” he says. “I instead put thirty years into an uprising greater than me, and expect to put in as many more as our enemies will allow. So tell me about yours. I want to know the cause you fought for, even for a time.”
"The first C in CTAC is for colonial," Kovacs says. His voice echoes in this strange hallway. It feels like such a small, weak thing to admit his past goals to a stranger. "Why don't you guess."
It's a tricky thing, the gulf of time between them. Eight hundred and seventy eight years, to be exact. His life was lived closer to Heraclian rule than this man's life, a fact which makes him feel more ancient than this space ship ever could, but he is bolstered by what he has seen of the future, and everything he ever wanted to know of it.
"I do not know this word, but," he says, with a considering gesture, his gaze fixed on Kovacs. "Long before my time, there was the Roman Empire –– an imperial age that ended a thousand years before I was born. The birthplace of Catholicism. They had something called colonia. Military outposts beyond the Italian peninsula's shores, and thousands of little cities and towns awarded colonia despite no Roman soul having ever lived there. Mere legal status so that people governed by their own could be reminded that they were still conquered."
Ezio pauses, and then nods to himself.
"So if I guessed, I would say your Protectorate is the same. Your Falconer, she wanted liberty from it. Your Envoys, they were made legends for being willing to stand for freedom."
What a strange thing, colonialism without unsettled worlds, without cryo. How would that even work? Yet, the word had to come from somewhere. колонијализам certainly doesn't have the rhythm of the languages he grew up speaking.
"Falconer wanted liberty from everything," he says. "It's a nice dream."
Ezio breaks his gaze on Kovacs to look down at bracer. He gets a twitch of a smile while he laces the strap through the buckle, the thin metal sheath clasped to the underside. That delicious little confidence –– he's right, isn't he?
"A dream that persists, if people still talk about Envoys," he replies.
A hard scoff, and Kovacs is too tired to be angry about it. "It's a fairy tale," he says, harsh. "The glorious victory of CTAC over vicious terrorists."
And Ezio, buoyed by the transformations he's seen of shattered brotherhoods, firm: "And you believe that? In your heart, the dream is little more than a fairy story, and if Falconer arrived tomorrow, you would tell her so with this same frustration?"
The question shocks jagged laughter from Kovacs. He shakes his head. "If Quell was here? Right now?"
He turns his head, hand over his eyes. All sounds feel distant. Even Quell's image, haunting him from a distance of inches, feels mournful. The laughter peters off.
He leans against a stone wall, feeling the cold seep into the skin of his back. He hopes his sweat stains the marble.
"That's a good taunt. Try it again when I'm paying less attention."
Ezio watches for a second, and that raw little note –– Quell, a nickname –– makes Kovacs' dismissal of the cause feel that much more desperate. It is not lost on him that in other circumstances, they could kill each other. Here, that cause is the thread Ezio must cling to.
"And a good deflection," Ezio replies. It was a taunt, too, but they both know it; it doesn't need to be said. It also doesn't need to be re-asked. He just heads back off into his mothers' old quarters. Dinnertime.
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What military is? He can't imagine a kennel that doesn't tag its dogs, keeping them on a short, unforgiving leash.
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You weren't there. No one was, not anymore. Those stacks have been fragged. Those memories have been deleated.
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But Larry wasn’t interested in a fight.
A fight, Ezio thinks, takes two. And where he lacked the tenderness Larry needed, he thinks he has the fight Kovacs may demand.
“I could have gone where my family’s enemies would never find me, hidden away in Spain,” he says. “I instead put thirty years into an uprising greater than me, and expect to put in as many more as our enemies will allow. So tell me about yours. I want to know the cause you fought for, even for a time.”
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"I do not know this word, but," he says, with a considering gesture, his gaze fixed on Kovacs. "Long before my time, there was the Roman Empire –– an imperial age that ended a thousand years before I was born. The birthplace of Catholicism. They had something called colonia. Military outposts beyond the Italian peninsula's shores, and thousands of little cities and towns awarded colonia despite no Roman soul having ever lived there. Mere legal status so that people governed by their own could be reminded that they were still conquered."
Ezio pauses, and then nods to himself.
"So if I guessed, I would say your Protectorate is the same. Your Falconer, she wanted liberty from it. Your Envoys, they were made legends for being willing to stand for freedom."
And you, he thinks, wanted a cause.
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"Falconer wanted liberty from everything," he says. "It's a nice dream."
And that's all it fucking is.
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"A dream that persists, if people still talk about Envoys," he replies.
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He turns his head, hand over his eyes. All sounds feel distant. Even Quell's image, haunting him from a distance of inches, feels mournful. The laughter peters off.
He leans against a stone wall, feeling the cold seep into the skin of his back. He hopes his sweat stains the marble.
"That's a good taunt. Try it again when I'm paying less attention."
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"And a good deflection," Ezio replies. It was a taunt, too, but they both know it; it doesn't need to be said. It also doesn't need to be re-asked. He just heads back off into his mothers' old quarters. Dinnertime.