oh, baby, you're the only thing in this whole world that's pure and good and right

[unfatalist]

WHO: Ignis and YOU!
WHERE: All over Chroma!
WHEN: Various times in the month of September!
WHAT: Catch-all prompts for the month of September, some open, some closed! See below for links to open top-levels.
WARNINGS: Will be marked in their individual threads!


MUSIC BOXES - OTA! | FREE FOOD - OTA (new CR encouraged)!

Comments

[bittybat]

[The onion ring Ignis had given damian is already gone by the time the man has tucked the rest into the paper piece. Damian may not have even chewed, honestly. Anyway, he's super glad for the rest of them!!

How easy it is to please Damian Wayne after all.] Yes. Gotham, New Jersey. [He lifts his eyes to watch Ignis again, but his hands and mouth are busy consuming the corpse of the fried onion.

He at least talks when his mouth isn't full.] Father is an outlier, but not completely. There are several... or were several leading families whose ancestors established Gotham in the beginning.

Father's family was and is one of the most wealthy in Gotham. I'm not going to pretend my grandfather, Thomas Wayne, had clean hands. It's unlikely. Gotham isn't a perfect city. It's ugly at its worst.

But Father is compassionate, and he's used his family's empire to try to rebuild the city from the inside. Nearly all businesses in Gotham are owned by Wayne Enterprises so he can regulate how they work within the city. Education, medical, nuclear, pharmaceutical, all of it. He wants to help the people flourish, have good lives.

He feels he can understand them better if he tries to live a life like theirs sometimes, even though his is nothing like theirs at all.

[unfatalist]

...I see, I think. So it's a sort of de facto monarchy, then.

[Oligarchy is probably closer, but do oligarchies exist on Eos? Signs point to no.]

It's fascinating just how many similarities there are, between your experience — and your father's — and mine. The family I serve also established the city we live in, ages ago. I believe it's actually named after the founder, even.

[He hums a little while he works, dipping in the next batch of onion rings.]

Does he face any political challenge to his...I suppose it would be fair to call it "rule", wouldn't it?

[bittybat]

[Interested, Damian glances up at Ignis, expression curious. But Ignis doesn't exactly elaborate in detail, and Damian doesn't ask yet.]

All the time. [Idly, he flips an onion ring back and forth between two fingers.] The criminal underground especially. They love making attempts at ransoming his buildings, or materials, or even his employees.

Sometimes, they try for him specifically.

Most of them only want the money, or the means to sell his product to get money. Others, the worst ones, want his prestige.

[unfatalist]

His prestige. Meaning, I presume, to depose him and take up his position themselves, and presumably to control Gotham in a much more selfish manner than your father does?

[Tale as old as time, always just the same no matter what spin you put on it. Sometimes it's an invading army headed by a megalomaniacal emperor, sometimes it's the criminal underground within your own territory.]

He manages to evade them, though. Somehow?

[bittybat]

Yes. They think enslaving a city means they're powerful. It just means they're stupid.

[A tale as old as time indeed. Damian lifts his eyes at Ignis again, eating another one of the onion rings. It might not be terribly filling later, but right now, it's doing a damn good job.]

My father is resourceful. He may be born into money, but it never stopped him from learning. He's extremely intelligent.

[unfatalist]

[It's subtle, but he's definitely watching the way that the onion rings are disappearing at a rapid pace into the bottomless void that is an adolescent boy's stomach, and honestly that's the reaction that's making the whole thing worthwhile. A recipe so delicious his audience can't help but inhale it.]

Is that common, that people born into money don't take advantage of those resources to receive a good education?

[He tilts his head a little, curious.]

I would've assumed it was the opposite, honestly, but — you might say my personal experience was something of an outlier, and more than a little biased.

[bittybat]

Not all of them are fools, I suppose. But a lot of those born into money, without having worked for it, believe they can merely buy what they want. Clothes, cars, travel? Buy it. People? Buy them. Prestige? Buy it.

Money talks in Gotham. [The onion rings are just too good, Ignis. Stop. It's also a good comfort food, even if he wouldn't admit it. Having something fried reminds him of home. Not necessarily the Manor, but the city.] If there's something they desire, they purchase it rather than earn it.

Do you not have a handful of insufferable first-class elite at all in your world?