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Message: <blockquote data-quote="seasong" data-source="post: 505488" data-attributes="member: 5137">Slavery, pt IIMerideth was depressed. And angry. She knew that others had escaped the orcs. That Thera had, in fact, led a slave revolt. But the other slaves were not interested, and everytime an orc caught her plotting with the others, she was beaten.They weren't even angry when they did it, which made it worse. Sometimes they'd even say complimentary things about her spirit... and then patiently explain to her that they have to beat her, because they can't afford to have her succeed.Athan finally spoke with her, quietly, while orcs were sleeping."Merideth, we will get out of here, but not if you die of beatings and exposure before we can. If you don't survive, you won't escape."Merideth glared at Athan, "You're a fine one to talk. You're the prize hen.""Yes, and I'm playing along. Brainless Uthehn, the shaman's pretty. And while they're dismissing me from their minds, I'm watching, carefully.""I can't, Athan. I can't play that game. I can't just give in. Maybe Greppa can, or you can, but I can't."Athan sighed, "So you want the orcs to win?"Merideth said nothing.Athan pressed on, "Right now, the choice is simple: we play along or we die. If we play along, we buy some time to create more choices. If we die, that's it, the orcs won."Merideth said nothing.Athan continued, "Another thing to remember - there's about two or three thousand of us, and less than half that many orcs. They're bigger and tougher than we are, and they've scattered us apart, but there's still that many of us. But until we can work out some way to organize without getting you beat senseless every other night, we have to wait."Merideth, too loudly, yells, "And how long do we wait!? What do we do in the mean time!? If we don't talk, we'll never get a chance to!"Their conversation was interrupted by orcs, and Merideth, eyes full of accusations, was carried off to the beating ring.Note: All three of the PCs took a beating or three over the course of their time as slaves, mostly cuffs, a few punches while held down, that sort of thing... but no one managed to be as continuously provocative as Merideth. Other than the beatings, she was never touched (she was the Shaman's slave, after all), but her essential words were: Never give in, never give up, take the beatings, and come back for more.</blockquote>

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