Kingfisher

Fagging for an Upper Sixth

Ida's relationship with the rest of Ivyarch House had become somewhat of a complex one, as despite her unrepentant commitment to her rational ideals and her apparent conviction that she was going to be recovered by the police, she seemed to be intentionally making an effort to integrate into their social structures. What had obviously started as a mechanical policy of appeasement or studying, however, had quickly evolved into the emergence of genuine awkward friendship—and even support for Irresponsible over the Solas and the Vorsnoir in inter-factional war. She tried not to, but Astrid found both it fascinating. Surely making friends with seditionists should have been enough to convince Ida that 'rational liberty' was crap? It seemed not.

And when the cell had gone out on a mission, the rest of the group had become so accustomed to Ida's being there that it had never even crossed the mind of anyone other than Astrid to lock her in her cell and leave her at the House, and Astrid had stayed quiet. Ida's being there was rather interesting and sometimes amusing, and it came with the risk that she might die, and while Astrid was forced to concede that she no longer desired that outcome on a personal level, ideologically it continued to suit her just fine.

What did not suit her just fine was their present situation, the result of Luke's overly ambitious planning. She was jammed in close to her fellow seditionists and their pet rational loyalist in a small hole in the ground; above their heads ran the London-WW1 Railway Line at the junction just south-west of WW7 station; and Luke entirely believed that they were going to use the confluence of these two facts to cut their way through the floor of a slow-moving train and get aboard without attracting the attention of the team waiting for them at WW7 railway station.

"You like to think that you know about this stuff," she said to him, exasperated and without quite as much of her usual collected sarcasm, "but when a situation materialises where it sounds on some level like one of your overcomplicated, machiavellian plans might actually be appropriate, the reality of trying to execute it always reveals that your way of thinking is just far too cumbersome to functionally achieve anything other than, let's think, hiding in something literally called a 'suicide pit,' trying to board a moving train from beneath so as to avoid our supposed allies. Clearly-"

Luke cut her off. "Don't tell me you're about to claim you've got a better idea? Anyone who needs that many words to say 'I don't like your plan' is in no position to criticise other people for being 'cumbersome.' Besides. The plan hasn't actually failed, yet.'

"I would make some comment to the effect of 'emphasis on the "yet",'" said Ida, "but you actually emphasised it of your own volition."

"Trying to criticise Luke's plan aside, then, seeing as we're evidently all too emotional to discuss my comments on a rational level," Astrid went on, with increasing undisguised irritation, "I–"

Ida looked appalled at a member of Irresponsible complaining that everyone was too emotional to be irrational, mouthing 'you hypocrite' and trying to avoid the Error that enjoying herself too much would be.

Luke just interrupted her out loud. "Astrid, please don't try to pretend that you were saying anything meaningful or constructive. You're just-"

"This is the second time I've been interrupted before being allowed to get to the useful content of my comment," she said. "Now,–"

A train passed overhead, plunging the pit into flashing half-darkness and filling the small space with dusty particulates and a heavy clunking noise as both Astrid and Luke continued to talk.

"–disguising lashing out as something logical through intelligent wording, which won't work on other people who are as intelligent as you–"