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To say that it had been a stressful week for Newtopian politics would be like saying that King Andrias had been a bad father figure.
After the aforementioned tyrant’s defeat at the hands of the Calamity trio, it had been decided that Lady Olivia would take a 4 year term as a provisional ruler. Through these 4 years, the plan was to not only undo the damage done by Andrias’s attempted invasion, but also use this as an opportunity to address systemic issues in Amphibian society. The former king’s imperialistic ambitions had been built upon centuries of exploitation and subjugation, and as long as these evils persisted it couldn’t be said that Andrias had truly been defeated.
The first year had been spent putting out the immediate fires, some of which were literal, while laying the groundwork for a more equitable future. Massive resource extraction had devastated ecosystems across Amphibia, and the only way to undo the destruction was to shut down and dismantle all of these operations. Of course, this ecological damage had also affected the food supply, making areas that had managed to better stave off Andrias’s efforts even more vital to sustaining the world’s people. One such place had been Wartwood, thanks to the protection it had enjoyed under one Sasha Waybright. This meant that not only did Wartwood have increased political power in the restructuring efforts, but that suddenly newt nobility had incentive to secure access to land and resources in the area through…less than scrupulous means. Marcy and Olivia had foreseen such behavior, and had made sure that no one could extort farming communities like Wartwood moving forward.
In year two, attention was attended to building upon the groundwork of the first year and righting more wrongs of the past. One issue that had taken center stage had been the extreme taxation, extortion, and political subjugation of frog communities by both toads and newts. Frogs had been forced to give up more than their fair share of taxes to the newts for centuries, with the toads all too happy to use their position as collectors and enforcers to skim funds for themselves. None of these taxes had gone to projects addressing the needs of frog communities, and even if they had, the frogs had no real say in the matter! This combined with how widespread the toad practice of extorting farmer frogs for food had been, left only one option in the new administration’s view. Reparations.
Given Lady Olivia’s control over the royal funds, a large portion of the calculated theft of resources (plus inflation and the standard royal loan interest rate) were able to be paid back quite quickly. However, toad and newt tax contributions would be needed to cover the full sum. Oddly enough, convincing the toad towers of this plan had gone much better than expected. There had been some grumbles at first, but Sasha’s influence, as well as a certain speech that she had made back during the war, had inspired the toad leadership into believing that this was the right thing to do. Most newts had taken this example to heart as well, and public approval for the reparations plan was near unanimous.
The newt nobility, however, was a different story.
They were livid at the suggestion that they had benefitted from injustice, and indignantly claimed that this was an overreach of the provisional government’s authority. This week in particular, confrontation over this issue had reached a fever pitch. At one point, there was legitimate fear that these nobles, frustrated by not getting their way, might hire mercenaries to attempt a coup. While such a strategy would be unlikely to succeed, no one wanted more bloodshed after just surviving the previous war.
After General Yunan had blown up in yesterday’s meeting however, something had changed. Do you want your children to die in the next war, all because you refused to part with your coin?!? Somehow, this grim reality hit home, forcing the newts to begrudgingly accept a large tax rate in order account for the wealth they had accrued (largely through exploitation). Things were changing in Amphibia, and there was no going back.
Given public approval for the plan, and the provisional government in general, there weren’t even many socially acceptable ways for the nobles to express their displeasure in public. Not to mention, Anne Boonchuy and Marcy Wu were unequivocally seen as heroes, making any slander against them a very inadvisable practice.
Sasha Waybright though, wasn’t quite so universally beloved.
Sure, she had fought to defeat Andrias, but her own attempted coup and the damage it had done to the city hadn’t been forgotten. Wartwood had a soft spot for her for obvious reasons, but this wasn’t Wartwood. In fact, her defense of the town during the war, her efforts in getting the toads on board with the reparations, and the way that juvenile speech kept getting quoted at them, made most nobles all too ready to direct all of their hostility towards the arbiter of Strength.
Sasha knew all this, and had braced herself to have a pretty not great time whenever she made her way outside the castle to walk the streets. She also knew that one outburst from her could have political ramifications that would set back months of hard work. So when nobles spoke loudly about “The violent monster pretending to be a person”, or made jokes about how the eye she lost must be “her own form of reparations”, she simply grit her teeth and kept moving. Sometimes, they would even demand that she perform menial labor for them, saying “The harm we’ve caused must be addressed not simply with words, but action, correct?”. Quoting her own goddamn speech at her, simply to try and humiliate her. As much as it turned her stomach inside out, she would comply, telling herself it was all for the sake of those she cared about.
Don’t lash out. Endure. For what is strength without persistence, right?
Today had been especially bad, probably due to the finalization of the new taxes as a part of the reparations. Sasha had needed to grab a new power crystal for her electric guitar, hoping to join Anne and Marcy for a jam session in their room to relieve the stress of this week. However, the various interactions with incensed nobles had slowed her return to the castle, and she was starting to get frustrated. Then, suddenly a line had been crossed.
Sasha felt a sharp pain in the right side of her head. As she touched above her right brow, she pulled her hand down to find her fingers stained with blood. As she felt the warm liquid run down the right side of her face, her brain began to put together what had happened.
Someone threw something at my head. A rock? Why didn’t I see it comin—Oh. That’s why.
Some noble, feeling particularly bold, had thrown a substantial stone at the right side of her head. The side where she had lost an eye saving Marcy from the Core.
“So sorry about that, Waybright! I just thought a vaunted hero such as yourself would have no problem dodging a simple stone from a mere civilian. Maybe being a hero is easier than I thought?”
As rage, shame, humiliation, and pain twisted together in Sasha’s mind, she knew that she needed to get out of there. The injury had brought on an intense migraine, unsurprising given its proximity to her eye prosthetic. Before anyone could have the satisfaction of seeing her break down, she ran back to the castle full sprint, appearances be damned.
This is what you deserve this is what you deserve this is what you deserve this is—
That singular thought, one that Sasha had spent several therapy sessions fighting, reared its head once more. What if it was true? What if redemption was just a comforting fairy tale, and the reality was that she was being treated the way she deserved by these nobles?
What did that mean for her relationships? How could she believe that she deserved her girlfriends’ love?
At this point, she recognized that this was a downward spiral.
Remember, these aren’t rational thoughts. A traumatized, spiraling mind is an unreliable narrator. her therapist’s words came back to her.
Finding herself outside the door to the room she shared with Anne and Marcy whenever they came to Newtopia, she hoped that their jam session would help bring her back to a better emotional place.
-
As Marcy fiddled around on her drum kit, a pit of worry began to grow in her gut.
“I wonder what’s taking Sasha so long? It’s not like her to be late to…well anything.”
“Yeah, she’s usually so stereotypically Geman about that. ‘If you’re early, you’re on time. If you’re on time, you’re late. If you’re late, that’s unacceptable.’” Anne recited in a mocking tone.
Marcy nodded, “Yeah! She was never late to any of our hangouts, and even if she’s eased up on us about it now, she’s super particular about showing up on time herself!”
As she thought about it more, Marcy noticed a pattern.
“The only times she’s been late are…the couple of provisional government meetings she was asked to attend, or when she’s gone out to pick up something for us in…the…city…” a realization began to dawn on Marcy’s face.
Anne gave her girlfriend a thoughtful look “You think that something about Newtopia is making Sasha late?”
Marcy looked down, deep in thought. “Maybe…I can’t think of what would be different here though. It’s not like there’s a ton of traffic for her to get caught in on foot or anything. And the buses here run on a much more reliable schedule than LA’s public transit does.”
As she continued pondering the topic, Marcy’s logical thought process succumbed to sheer dread. The fact that she couldn’t even imagine any specific scenario that she feared allowed her brain to wallow in murky anxiety about an undefined bad thing that was definitely happening to Sasha.
“I just…have this bad feeling in my gut. Like there’s something going on that I should be noticing, something that’s affecting Sasha”
Anne gently placed her hands, one robotic and one flesh and bone, on Marcy’s cheeks, holding her gently. As she stroked her left cheek with her non-metal thumb, she pressed her forehead against her girlfriend’s
“Mar Mar, I get that you’re trying to be more attentive to what others’ wants and needs. And I’m so proud of how much you’ve grown. But you are not required to be omniscient to be a good girlfriend, or even a good friend, ok?”
Not getting a response from the girl, Anne continued.
“You’re thinking about how your actions impact others as best you can, and trying to take note of what others are dealing with. None of us can be expected to know every problem that others are facing without being told. I’m not saying you’re wrong to be worried, I’m starting to get worried too. But even if something is wrong, it’s not your fault for failing to predict or prevent it.”
Marcy finally relented, giving a weak smile. “Thanks Anna-banana, I needed to hear that.”
Anne smiled back at Marcy, wishing she could simply caress her girlfriend’s worry and self-blame away. “Anytime Mar Mar. How about this? Let’s noodle around a bit until Sasha gets back, blow off some stream after this week from hell. If half an hour goes by and she’s not back yet, we’ll go looking for her. And when we’re with her, we can ask if something’s going on. Does that sound good to you?”
Marcy’s smile widened in anticipation, flapping her hands in excitement “Yes please!!! Oh oh oh! I had this really cool groove that I was working on that I wanted to show you! It’s based on a 7 against 11 polyrhythm, which I first looked at because it was a funny meme but it actually sounds really fun and it’s not that hard to pick up! Did you know there’s this really cool trick for practicing any polyrhythm you want? Let’s say you want to play an X against Y polyrhythm. You start by drawing X rows of Y numbers, and then…”
Marcy’s info dump eventually gave way to a noodling session that started out with some shared idea about where the downbeat was, but gradually became more avant garde. It was as if they were pouring their pure emotions into the sounds they were throwing out, giving little care for where in space those sounds landed. Eventually, they both realized that they had no idea what they were doing, and laughed together in the sheer relief of getting to vent their feelings.
After they had stopped playing, Anne started peppering Marcy’s face with kisses, only stopping to gush about how cute and smart her girlfriend was. As Marcy started to return the favor, suddenly the door to their room opened.
The mood in the room changed instantly.
Anne and Marcy turned to look at the door to see Sasha, tears running down her face, bleeding from a small gash above her right eye, and teeth gritted against a pain that seemed to be barely contained within her body.
“Sasha!” both girls shouted, rushing over to their girlfriend’s aid.
“Please…no shouting…migraine…” Sasha whimpered, suddenly dropping to sit on the floor.
“Right.” Anne said, lowering her voice, “I’m so sorry. Marcy, can you get the—”
“Already on it.”
Marcy was digging through the medicine cabinet in their bathroom, grabbing both what she needed to clean and bandage the gash as well as some specially made Newtopian pain relief for Sasha’s migraines.
“C’mon Sashy, here’s your medicine.” Marcy said as she angled a small spoon of the inky liquid towards Sasha’s mouth. “Just have to swallow one spoonful, and then you’ll start feeling better.”
Sasha reluctantly stopped gritting her teeth long enough to swallow the liquid. It tasted…swampy…but she had to admit that there was no better treatment for her migraines on either world. As she waited for the medicine to kick in, Anne appeared at her side with a pillow.
“Ok Sasha, Marcy has to clean and dress your wound now. I know the meds haven’t kicked in yet, but we really don’t want that to get infected. You can scream or bite into this pillow if you need to.” Anne said as she handed her the pillow, proceeding to wrap Sasha in a tight embrace.
With Sasha’s face partially buried in the pillow, Marcy began applying alcohol wipes to the gash. As she did, Sasha wails could be heard even muffled by the pillow. That was all it took for tears to start running down Marcy’s face as well. One of her girls was hurting, was in so much pain that she never deserved, no matter what Sasha or anyone else ever said.
“I know sweetie, I know it hurts. You’re doing so great, you are so strong and we both love you so much” Anne cooed, placing gentle kisses on the wailing girl’s temple.
Marcy finished placing bandages on the now disinfected gash, and joined Anne in holding their suffering girlfriend. As they rocked back and forth, kissing Sasha’s face wherever it wasn’t covered by the pillow, the lieutenant’s wails softened to whimpers. Her meds suddenly kicking in, the piercing pain in Sasha’s head subsided. This allowed her to remove her face from the pillow, giving soft looks to the two people she loved most.
“Th-thank you. I *sniff*, I’m sorry I’m late—“
A pair of lips on her own quickly cut off her apology. As Anne pulled away from the kiss, she started running her left hand gently through Sasha’s hair “You have nothing to apologize for. We are just so glad you’re here in one piece. We were about five minutes from heading out to look for you.”
Sasha wiped the tears from her eyes, a gentle smile appearing on her face. “You two are the best. You know that, right?”
“We feel the same about you, Sashy.” Marcy responded, taking her chance to steal a kiss from Sasha.
As she pulled away, Marcy realized that she couldn’t hold back her questioning any longer.
“Sasha, please tell me what happened. I know something’s going on. You’re only ever late when we’re in Newtopia, and today you….you got hurt. Please…” Marcy pleaded, as tears continued to trail down her face.
Sasha grimaced, knowing that there was no getting out of explaining the situation. Anne and Marcy deserved to know, and apparently saying nothing hadn’t resulted in preventing this from causing them incredible duress.
“Ok.” Sasha started with an exhale, “Y'all know how the newt nobility have been super pissy about the reparations plan, right?”
Anne and Marcy nodded. Of course they knew how unbearably frustrating the nobles were.
Sasha continued, “So basically, they know that they can’t say or do shit about either of you or the provisional government because of y’all’s popularity in the city. But…”
“…people don’t see you as a hero in the same way they do us.” Anne finished, having suspected something along these lines for some time. Newtopians she had conversed with tended to see Sasha as a model of redemption, someone who managed to turn her life around. They certainly loved her famous speech, using it to convince their children to take responsibility for their actions. None of that meant that they’d be willing to put themselves between Sasha and the nobles though.
Sasha nodded, “Right. And since I defended Wartwood during the war…”
Suddenly the gears started to turn in Marcy’s mind. “…the nobles blame you for the reparations.”, the realization falling from her lips as her thoughts began to spiral.
“They—they blame you for the reparations because you kept Wartwood untouched during the war, keeping its ecosystem safe and its agriculture running, leading to frog communities having increased political power, diminishing their own. How could I not have seen this coming?! Of course they’d see you as a perfect scapegoat! If they could get you to lash out, they could undermine your involvement in the project, potentially inciting a rift with the toads! And if you kept enduring it, then they could aim to bait Anne and I into doing something reckless when we inevitably found out, in an attempt to sow distrust between the provisional government and the rest of the city! Goddamn it, we just had to keep quoting your speech, constantly bringing their attention back to you, and now look what happened!!” Marcy was frantic by the end, long having gotten up to pace the room in a panic.
“Marcy” Anne tried to cut her off, giving her a look that tried to remind her of their earlier conversation
“No Anne, this is different. This is my job! To help plan this societal restructuring! And—“
Before Marcy could continue to blame herself, she found herself suddenly restrained from her pacing. Sasha’s hand had found hers, gripping it tightly.
“Marcy, please stop blaming yourself.” Sasha pleaded. “Come, sit with me. Please?”
Seeing the desperate look in Sasha’s eyes, still red and wet with tears, Marcy took a deep inhale. Held it for 3 seconds. Then exhaled, and returned to sitting and embracing the shaken girl. “Ok, I’m here Sasha. Sorry, I just…wish that you didn’t have to deal with this.”
Anne waited for the three of them to get settled again. “Ok, Sasha can you finish telling us what the nobles are actually doing? I get the motive now, but not what actually happened.”
Sasha shut her eyes for a moment, before continuing. “I mean before today it was all pretty low level stuff. Gossiping loud enough for me to hear as I walked by, calling me a ‘violent monster’, making jokes about how my missing eye must be my form of reparations. The worst that it had gotten before this was guilting me into doing labor for them, claiming that the toad uprising had damaged their property and that it was my responsibility to fix it. Hah, it’s funny. In those moments, suddenly they’re quite fond of my speech.” Sasha chuckled, trying to lighten the mood.
Clearly it had failed, as she looked at her girlfriends’ horrified faces. “Sasha…that’s horrific. Dehumanizing you, claiming you deserved what happened to your eye, exploiting you for free labor?! This is absolutely not ‘low level’.” Anne tried to keep her voice calm, to make it clear that she wasn’t upset with Sasha. But now the waterworks had started for her as well, tears welling up in her eyes. The dual-wielder needed to know that this was not ok. “If this ever happens again—not that we plan on letting it—but if it does, you tell them to fuck. off. Ok?”
“Yeah Sasha, I can confirm that basically none of the nobles suffered any major damages that day, except from when the castle fucking took off into the sky” Marcy exclaimed, using some uncharacteristic language for her. “I want to make sure that you know that they’re wrong. You don’t deserve this. This isn’t justice. This is powerful assholes taking advantage of you.”
Sasha’s face contorted into an expression that was difficult to decipher. “On good days, I’m able to remember that. But after putting up with it for so long, it gets so easy to believe that this is all just me reaping what I’ve sown.”
Sasha paused, before continuing.
“So then today was more of the same, but turned up to 11. Must be because the plan was finally made official. But in addition to the usual harassment, some newt decided to chuck a rock at my right eye. Fucker missed, thankfully, caught me above the brow instead. But since it came from that side, I couldn’t see it coming. Then he made some crack about how he thought I would dodge it, and maybe being a hero was easier than it seemed if I could do it.”
Sasha felt Anne and Marcy’s grip on her tighten, their hands beginning to shake with rage. She had to admit, the nobles really had thought this plan out. Even with her managing not to rise to their provocations, the rage radiating from the other heroes of Amphibia was palpable. As she noticed hints of blue and green creep into her lovers’ eyes, she reminded them “Remember, you two going on a rampage is exactly what they want.”
“We know. We’re not going to give them the satisfaction. But we’re allowed to be fucking furious that someone did this to you.” Marcy uttered, her words laced with venom. Sasha could only imagine what kinds of vengeance the strategist wished she could carry out.
“Yeah, and to be clear, we’re going to do something, alright? Letting this continue happening to you isn’t an option.” Anne said firmly, leaving no room for debate. The blue fading from her irises, she gently guided Sasha’s face to look into her eyes. “Can you do something for me? Even if it seems silly? I want you to say out loud that you didn’t deserve this.”
Sasha’s eyes darted to the floor, thinking back to the voice in her head telling her the exact opposite earlier.
Anne stroked her face with tender care, her eyes full of both love and heartbreak, “Even if you don’t fully believe it yet, I think saying it out loud will help.”
Sasha, feeling her resistance crumble, took a deep breath. “I didn’t deserve this.” It felt strange to say, like the words didn’t make sense to her. But it also felt like a small weight was lifted from her shoulders, so she kept saying it. Eventually, Anne and Marcy joined in with their own rejoinders of “You didn’t deserve this”, until the words had been etched into Sasha’s mind through sheer repetition. Once the words had been repeated enough times to risk losing their meaning, the three of them opted to remain holding each other close, Anne and Marcy showering Sasha in tender affection as the latter allowed herself to bask in her girls’ love and care.
“We’re not letting you walk the streets of Newtopia alone for awhile, ok? No one gets to treat our Sasha like that, nobility or not.” Anne stated full of conviction, as if laying down an edict that the very universe would be forced to bend to moving forward.
“Yeah, and I’d like to bring this up with Olivia and Yunan, if that’s ok. They’ll probably have a better idea of how to shut this down without playing into these jerks’ hands”
The Sasha of old would have protested, insisted that she could take care of herself. But today, she was content to let herself be loved. For once, she didn’t find herself questioning if she deserved it, instead simply accepting it as a fact. She was loved. She was loved. The simple power of that reality welled up inside of her, as she wrapped her arms around her two wonderful girlfriends. She pulled them in tighter, basking in the strength that their love gave her. She wasn’t going to succumb to her most self-deprecating thoughts, she wasn’t going to let these arrogant newt bastards break her. She made a commitment to become the kind of person she was happy to see in the mirror, and nothing would stop her from seeing that through. “I love you both so so much, thanks for looking out for me”.
Anne and Marcy leaned even further into the embrace, their heads resting in Sasha’s shoulders. This kind of vulnerability would have been unheard of from Sasha years ago.
“If it’s alright with y’all, can we play something? I have some feelings I kinda wanna get out.” Sasha asked, looking between her two loves.
“Of course, did you have a particular song in mind?” Anne inquired
“In fact I did” Sasha responded, getting up from the hug to go set up her guitar, “I’m sure you’ll know it”.
After tuning her guitar, Sasha began to play.
G F# B E D G C B E A D
Seeing the recognition in Anne and Marcy’s eyes, Sasha began to sing solemnly
When I was a young boy, my father
Took me into the city to see a marching band
He said, "Son, when you grow up would you be
The savior of the broken, the beaten and the damned?"
He said, "Will you defeat them? Your demons
And all the non-believers, the plans that they have made?
Because one day, I'll leave you a phantom
To lead you in the summer to join the black parade...
Sasha’s voice raised to a harsh scream for the second loop of the prelude, as if aiming to defeat her self-hatred and her opponents with her voice. Fuck the nobles, fuck the voice in her head, she would defeat them.
As the last line of the prelude hung in the air, Marcy’s high octane drum fill lead into Anne throwing everything she had into the riff leading into the first verse. Their sound was urging her on, pushing forward. Sasha’s soul had been set ablaze.
Sometimes I get the feeling she's watching over me
And other times I feel like I should go
And through it all, the rise and fall, the bodies in the streets
And when you're gone, we want you all to know
We'll carry on, we'll carry on, and though you're
Dead and gone, believe me, your memory
Will carry on, we'll carry on, and in my
Heart, I can't contain it, the anthem won't explain it
Anne jumped in to sing the second verse, her eyes brimming with defiant love as they met Sasha’s own.
A world that sends you reeling from decimated dreams
Your misery and hate will kill us all
So paint it black and take it back, let's shout it loud and clear
Defiant to the end we hear the call
Anne continued on to the second chorus as Sasha rejoined her. Shouting the lyrics at the top of their lungs, with Marcy’s drumming becoming even more intense, they all felt strength welling up inside of them. They weren’t ignoring the trauma and pain that had been exacerbated this week, but rather they were leaning into those feelings. There was a strange power in shouting to the world something fucked up happened to me, it wasn’t fair, and I’m still here. Shedding the mask of perfect heroes, who silently bore the pain of the world without cracking, was exactly the liberation they needed.
On and on, we carry through the fears (Oh, oh, oh)
Disappointed faces of your peers (Oh, oh, oh)
Take a look at me, 'cause I could not care at all
Do or die, you'll never make me
Because the world will never take my heart
Go and try, you'll never break me
We want it all, we wanna play this part
I won't explain or say I'm sorry
I'm unashamed, I'm gonna show my scars
Give a cheer for all the broken
Listen here, because it's who we are
I'm just a man, I'm not a hero
Just a boy, who had to sing this song
I'm just a man, I'm not a hero
I don't care!
At this point all three of them were belting the last chorus, their combined sound reverberating throughout the castle. Fuck what they’d been put through. Fuck everyone who doubted them. They were survivors, and this was not their time to die in any sense of the word. The three of them were living, messily, rambunctiously moving forward one day at a time. Sweat rolling down their faces, blood pumping vigorously through their veins, and each gasp of air they took between words were all testaments to their existence that they were determined to make heard by the whole city. We are here. We went to hell, came back on fire, and dealt with your bullshit and yet we’re still here. We’re not going anywhere. These feelings radiated from the girls, making themselves felt by anyone within earshot. The final lyrics burst from their lips, reaffirming a promise that the three of them had made to each other years ago when the war had ended.
We’ll carry on