>>5429686>>5429592>>5429537>>5429390>Art:Shakthi Thevar>Alt text: Rani Velu Nachiya stands between the Marudhu brothers. They wear fierce expressions. It is midday but the winds blow cool. You stand in a clearing alongside Kaori and Nizax while Kasi walks from the horizon with a band of Ponni warriors.
Kasi: Captain Lono of the Great Fleet, I present Amit, Puja, and Uma of the Ponni.
Uma: Kasi told us you wanted to speak to us. You’ve earned that much, Captain.
“Thank you. But I stand here not as a Captain or a candidate but as a person. Someone who learned at sea what hardship and hunger do to a person. I know some on this Island see you as savages, but this is untrue. All of us live and breathe and bleed as equals and it is our duty to each other to let each of us pursue our happiness in peace.
Amit: And yet you demand us to pay reparations to those who plundered our land and people?
“A symbolic act, meant to avoid heavier punishment, and to be collected by a trusted ally.”
You nod to Kasi.
“The repayments aren’t for the merchants, but for The Great Peace, that protects us all.”
Amit: What good is peace when people are forced to stalk the roads where their ancestors once lived with the land? When they feed off the pickings of a merchant’s bag rather than the bounty of the Loa? When their choices are to toil in the mud stained with the blood of their tribe or risk their lives just to get by? What peace is that, Captain?
“The current way is flawed, which is why I’m here to welcome tomorrow.”
