From Newsgroup: rec.arts.comics.creative

The Legion of Net.Heroes held an election-- AND EVIL WON! Now the heroes
are scattered across the city of Net.ropolis, fighting to take back a
system that's turned against them, as a shadowy figure plots to take the
power of the Universal Office and control everything! This is--
______________________________________________________________________
[ L E A D E R S H I P >
[ ________ ________ ________ ________ ___ ___ ___ >
[ |\ ____\|\ __ \|\ __ \|\ ____\|\ \|\ \|\ \ >
[ \ \ \___|\ \ \|\ \ \ \|\ \ \ \___|\ \ \\\ \ \ \ >
[ \ \ \ \ \ _ _\ \ __ \ \_____ \ \ __ \ \ \ >
[ \ \ \____\ \ \\ \\ \ \ \ \|____|\ \ \ \ \ \ \__\ >
[ \ \_______\ \__\\ _\\ \__\ \__\____\_\ \ \__\ \__\|__| >
[ \|_______|\|__|\|__|\|__|\|__|\_________\|__|\|__| ___ >
[ \|_________| |\__\ >
[ NET.ROPOLIS 2025! \|__| >
[ >
[ Issue #3x32: >
[ "The False Ninja and the False Writer! >
[ A Totally Real Pool of Wine-Dark Grief!" > [______________________________________________________________________>

Everything should change after someone dies. The skies should crack and
fall. Trumpets should sound and the earth should open up and swallow
things.

Life shouldn't just... *go on*.

But it had.

He stood up and cinched his gi shut, took the bamboo sword out of its
holder, and began to practice his swings. Up, and forward. Up, and
forward.

"Accepting" death... what did that even mean? It had happened. He knew
that. But it still hurt. So, so much. And it *shouldn't* have happened,
and maybe if he hadn't been so *stupid* it *wouldn't* have happened,
and...

He took a deep breath in, let it out. Lunges this time. Step forward,
swing, step back. Step forward, swing, step back.

You know someone for years. You're together all the time. You're
together so much that you see everything that sucks about them.
Sometimes you don't even *like* them. But they become a part of you. And suddenly, that part is ripped out. Your heart is ripped out.

More lunges. Lunges until his muscles ached, until his breath was
ragged, until he was covered in sweat.

It wasn't fair. Life shouldn't work that way. If someone dies it should
be dramatic, not a side-note to everything else that's going on, passing
almost unobserved.

His legs gave out and he fell to his knees. Damn it. Damn it damn it god
damn it! What was he even doing!? This wasn't going to bring him back!

Nothing was going to bring him back. He didn't have that choice. All he
could do was move forward, or stop.

And part of him wanted to stop. To stop, and crawl into a hole, and...
just not have to be bothered with living anymore.

But he knew in his sick, stupid heart that that idiot bastard wouldn't
have wanted him to give up. That that man might've been an amoral
asshole who would sell his own mother out for a shiny gold medal but
dammit he had been *alive*. He had been fighting to stay alive until the
moment he wasn't and god DAMN it, if that was the only fucking thing he
could do to make sure that man's life mattered - to keep living, keep
fighting to live, in his stead - then he'd do it. He'd fucking do it.

He rammed his fist into the mat and pushed himself to his feet. Step
forward, swing, step back! Step forward, swing, step back! Step
*forward*, *swing*, step *back*!

And maybe. Maybe someday he'd be able to protect someone. Like he hadn't
been able to protect him. Hadn't even tried.

Damn it.

"Your form's getting better."

He looked up, panting, flushed. It was Cheesecake-Eater Lad, walking
into the little makeshift gym with something in his hand. "You almost
look like a real ninja."

"My--" He started coughing, hacking, and leaned on his sword, all the
fire suddenly gone out of him, looking like the schlubby middle-aged man
he was. "My only power is to make people think I *am* a ninja. The best
ninja there ever was. Maybe if I don't entirely suck at it, I can do
something more than just scam people with it." He laughed and it turned
into another cough. "Mmmm... or at least get better at scamming them,
right? I'm working with you guys, but I'm still a bastard in the end."

Cheesecake-Eater Lad smiled, annoyingly, and gave him a nod. "Never said
you weren't, Mr. Totally Real Ultimate Ninja. But the old boss was kind
of a bastard himself. So maybe that makes it less of a scam after all."

The man who once, in defiance of obvious evidence, called himself the
Ultimate Ninja chuckled. "Yeah, yeah. How's Nina doing?"

Cheesecake-Eater Lad unrolled the paper in his hand; it was a drawing in colored pencils of a ninja leaping into the air and kicking a be-
tentacled creature in the face. "Her art skills are improving."

"Great, so in another decade or so she can pick up her animation career
again." He rummaged around in his normal clothes and found the gold
amulet. It didn't even look like a Nobel Prize, but he put it around his
neck nonetheless and gathered everything up. "I wish I could undo what
we did to her."

"Yeah... Me too."

He pfft'd. "What'd *you* do?"

"Convinced her to join a world full of these kinds of shenanigans. I've
been a net.hero a long time, my family's all here, but she had a whole
life outside of this, and now she's cut off from it..." Cheesecake-Eater
Lad usually had a serene energy around him, even if he was freaking out
in the moment. But for a moment it drained away, the weight of grief
pulling down the lines of his face and the shape of his body, making him
look tired, making him look old.

"..." Comfort and reassurance weren't something he had a lot of
experience with - giving or receiving. But there was, at least, one
thought popping to the front fo his mind. "Shit happens to normies too,
man. She could've slipped in the shower or got hit by a bus or just had
a heart attack one day. You gave her a choice and she picked the life
she thought was better." He stroked the amulet with his thumb. "Shit
happens, and... and all you can do is learn from it, and try and do
better next time."

...wait, was *that* what acceptance was? ...nah, probably not, too easy.

But it had maybe helped. Cheesecake-Eater Lad took a deep breath, and
seemed to inflate back up to his usual brightness. "True e-nough!
Anyway, I came in cos it's dinnertime."

"Cheesecake again?" Actually, he was rather getting used to it.

"Hey, that's the oldschool LNH diet." Cheesecake-Eater Lad put his arm
around his back. It felt nice.

"Thought I was going to lose weight in this place..." But he did feel a
little lighter. ________________________________________________________________________

Drew "let's get moving again, finally." Nilium
--- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2