[open post -- winged and once-winged insects]

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad has collected every insect guide he could find in the mansion's library, and now he is camped out in a laboratory it seems to have created particularly for him and Susan -- the room has its own microscope, so that he can stop borrowing Claudius', and every single shelf is filled with glass habitats or mesh tents for keeping insects.

With his single-minded determination, he has filled many of them -- the tents house carefully potted foot-high milkweeds with tiny butterfly eggs affixed to their leaves, or potato plants he hopes will soon harbor potato beetles, or butterflies resting on the mesh. In the glass habitats there are millipedes, gleaming tenebrionid beetles, huge and bumbling scarabs, the dogbane leaf beetle Lancelot helped him capture, shiny blister beetles, leafhoppers in every shade of green, a pair of picasso bugs, an mantis he found in the greenhouse pretending to be an orchid flower.

Many of these insects stay only long enough to be identified and documented. Galahad and Susan between them take careful notes, make drawings, take pictures. When possible, they identify to species; more often, they identify genera or family, country of origin if they're lucky. Then they let their subjects go again. Neither of them has the time nor the inclination to feed and care for the immense diversity of insects living on the mansion's grounds. Potato beetles are one thing, but catching other tiny insects for the tiger beetles every morning is unsustainable. Galahad doesn't mind. Once he has a picture and the notes, the insect is saved, even if they don't see it again.

In the morning he trains with Lan Wangji, so it's an afternoon now when he's perched on a stool in front of the microscope, inspecting a chlaenius beetle to see whether it's possible to confirm a species. Unfortunately, these beetles are too fast and squirmy to put on a slide alive, so he's ethered it first. Now he's working diligently on his sketch, his pale head bowed as he studies the tiny body.

[Open especially to anyone who needs to be reassured that Galahad is back after the mod event and he's just fine now]

Comments

[kadewest]

Kade smiles again, feeling a misplaced sense of the same pride he gets when any student has a breakthrough about their Worlds. "Very well-put," he says. "I find that people--beings--who want you to fulfill a specific purpose according to their specific plans and images like to think they're doing you great favors at every turn, and they get real nasty if you deviate from that and start making choices for yourself." He pauses. "I'm sorry you've been confronted with a you who didn't get to try a different path."

[onthewillowsthere]

"It's all right," Galahad says, slower. "I think... it helped. To know it wouldn't have been better if I had stayed. It didn't help Percival. Or me."

[kadewest]

Kade nods, and listens.

[onthewillowsthere]

"Percival is better than me," he explains. "He's good. But his sister died and he was punished for wanting to have sex with a woman he loved, and he was not permitted to see the Grail. I hope that since I'm gone he is doing something else. Something that makes him happy."

[kadewest]

"Better than you?" There's nothing in Kade's tone but mild curiosity.

[onthewillowsthere]

"His faith was truer. He acted rightly because he believed that it was important to God, not because God was in his ear instructing him."

[kadewest]

"And by acted rightly, you mean...?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"He didn't sin. He was kind and faithful and a good person. He kept the commandments. When he obeyed God, I wanted to be like him."

[kadewest]

"A good role model, then."

[onthewillowsthere]

"He was a good friend."

[kadewest]

"Yes," Kade agrees. "I mean... you also admired him and the way his faith seemed uncomplicated, while yours was more effortful, yeah?"

[onthewillowsthere]

He nods, slowly. "It was hard for me. I did as I was told. He didn't need to be told. He believed."

[kadewest]

Kade surveys Galahad for a long moment. "You know that just because something doesn't come natural, doesn't mean you're necessarily worse at it, right?"

[onthewillowsthere]

A slight frown. That is... exactly what it means, isn't it?

[kadewest]

"You don't agree?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"There are a lot of things I have to work hard at because I'm not good at them. I like having to work hard, but it's different from the things that I'm good at."

[kadewest]

"How do you quantify being good at a thing?"

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad frowns slightly. This line of questioning is beginning to feel like a test, as if he's not giving the right answer. "To be good at something is to be capable. It can be an inborn talent, or something that requires striving."

[kadewest]

"Oh." Kade snaps his fingers. "So what you're saying is that faith seemed inborn to Percival in a way it wasn't to you, and you had less interest in striving for it?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"I tried, because God told me to. Percival didn't need anyone to tell him."

[kadewest]

"Was his faith inborn, or did he learn it somewhere?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"His mother taught him about Christ, but his faith is his. He believes."

[kadewest]

Kade nods a couple of times, slowly, fitting the pieces together, trying to think about what he wants out of this conversation. He leans against the table. "I grew up in the church, you know," he says. "Different church. Same God. My neck of the woods, you accept Jesus Christ as your lord and savior and get baptized and keep on believing and following the Bible, on paper? You're ostensibly golden. Now, in practice... In practice, it gets a little hairy. People have opinions they dress up as truths, and if you happen to have a different opinion... well then, you're acting against truth; that must mean you aren't a very good Christian." He shakes his head, as slow as his nods. "That how things were in the church you grew up with?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"I don't know," truthfully. "God spoke to me and I obeyed Him. No one told me to do differently."

[kadewest]

"Ah," Kade laughs. "The dubious honor of a direct connection to the man Himself." He pauses. Squints. Tilts his head. "Do you think it's cheating, somehow? That you got your marching orders straight from the source instead of getting the chance to develop 'em on your own?"