Villain Retirement

"Do you understand now?"

"Hm."

"Just nod your head if you under—No. Tell me what I said."

"Instead of migrating the people that want to experience freedom, you want to prioritize the children and next generation of themarians—letting them leave and live in the planet ship away from the older generations and their outdated teachings, and then bring them far away into the Unknown where they would truly be free to explore, with the intent of helping civilizations that are in need of help…"

"Yes, and—"

"…And then we massacre the older generation."

"Yes—wait, no! Where did the last part come from!?"

"From me, Aerith. Killing all of the older generations would ensure no more problems in the future—they would also no longer be able to give birth to another batch of themarians."

"Your mother has a way to prevent us from giving birth. This plan will work—it may take thousands of years, but my race will live in a universe that doesn't abhor them; in the Unknown and beyond that, it will be possible. I want my race to have a future. You've seen what my father alone is capable of doing, they will never change."

"Hm. Do you remember almost a hundred years ago now, Aerith? I have read in the history books that you were able to stop a war from happening—a war being started by a man with a weird mustache. I read that he wanted to segregate and divide the people that—"

"Okay, first of all—our goals are completely different."

"Is it?"

"I am doing this so that the future generations will actually have a life beyond being trapped in a world that hasn't changed for a million years! Our species is trapped in time, Riley."

"..."

"If anything, it's Diana that's like him—she literally wants to create a new race, I just want mine to have the chance to live to our full potential."

"I know your full potential, Aerith. But I do not know what the potential of your kind is."

"Of course, the road will be hard. We will need to teach the next generation about morality and the common sense that the Universe adheres to."

"Hm, there really is no need to explain to me, Aerith. I will follow you whatever the case is…

…but I will kill the ones that remain on this planet."

"Even you won't be able to do that."

"You said so yourself, Aerith. There will be a war. While you are busy salvaging the future generation…

…I will join the war."

"You're not a themarian, Riley."

"No. But I will be the one that will turn them into Nothing. I will make sure their wounded will remain dead—that neither side will survive the war."

"I'm not going to let you do that. My father and the rest of the older generation still deserve to wither in their own time, they still deserve to live."

"But they don't deserve a future?"

"...No. They had their chance."

"..."

"..."

"Are you disappointed? That your image of Megawoman is completely different? That Aerith, the Themarian Princess, would be so cold as to abandon her elders?"

"What is there to be disappointed about, Aerith? I have always known that you are capable of being cruel—Gary is a testament to that."

"...What? Why are you bringing up my son?"

"Why did you bring your son, a man that is filled with insecurities and delusions of grandeur, into a world where he will never be special?"

"My son is capable of doing special things, Riley."

"But you don't know your son, Aerith. I know him more than you do."

"W—"

"Have you asked him about Golden Fox yet? It may have been my doing, but Gary was the one to ultimately kill his lover—have you once talked to him about that?"

"I… haven't had the time to."

"Do you know that your son likes motorcycles?"

"..."

"Do you know of the things he had done in the Academy? Did you know that he was on the Potential Villain list?"

"That is enough."

"You are not a good mother, Aerith. And that is perfectly okay, I don't even know my own daughter's birthday."

"I know. I know I haven't been good to him."

"You were busy saving the world, Aerith."

"And you were busy killing it—and yet you have time for the people around you."

"I only really made a handful of appearances, Aerith."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"...You know, I did try. I tried to make it work. I'm one thou—I'm almost a thousand years old now, and you'd think that would help me be more mature than everyone else, but no. If anything, it just made me more stubborn."

"How old are you really, Aerith?"

"That's not important."

"Hm."

"I have all these experiences, and yet it never truly prepared me for how hard it is to have a child. It's different on Theran—I sometimes do not see both my parents for years, and that was perfectly normal—and when we meet, we're still just the same person."

"..."

"And I'm just not saying that as an excuse for my absence, because there is none. But on Earth, I blink—and then my baby boy has become this… stranger. He's become a completely different person. My husband was the same. The two of us were so in love with each other, and then I looked away for just a single second… and the connection that we had was just gone."

"My connection with you is as strong as ever, Aerith."

"..."

"..."

"...I don't know how Diana did it, but she was able to make a wonderful family—Diana, a themarian that treats other species like they are just part of her experiments. But she did, she was able to raise you and Hannah."

"You could still raise Gary for a very long time, Aerith. The two of you have the time."

"Gary doesn't. He grows old like a normal human—you've seen Silvie, she hasn't aged even a single second since the first time I saw her; she will remain like that for almost a thousand years until she becomes completely identical to what I look right now. But my son, my baby boy… I'm afraid that if I blink again, he'll just be… gone."

"..."

"You will experience this too, Riley. I know you are seeing it now, Hannah is growing old. But you, your face has been unchanged ever since you turned 18—you will live for a very long time, watching those around you wither away. That is the humanity in our mortality."

"I… have never really thought of a life in which Hannah no longer exists, Aerith."

"Oh, she will exist as long as you remember her, that's the painful part. They are in your mind, and you have to carry them forever; you can't touch them, you can't talk to them—the only thing you can really do is watch them live in your memory…

…They are not the ghosts, you are."

"I have to confess that I am not ready for that. I do not know what I will do in a universe without my sister."

"You will, because that is the only thing we can do."

"But I suppose one way or another, the universe will die too…

…I will make sure of it."