#also justice

[mikkeneko]

Justice is in the house, and he’s not happy. Warning for some blood and gore in this chapter.

[alchemists-sketchbook]

Super quick Anders doodle bc I wanted to experiment with colors and stuff

[maepersonal]

I am about to cause problems on purpose.

[mikkeneko]

What role will Justice play in your fix? I know some people treat him like a bad guy, while others make him seem like a friend and protector. Personally I'm a bigger fan of the second option, but I'm still curious

Hey there! :) Sorry for the delay in replying to this ask, but I wanted to wait until I had time to answer it.

From the context and timing I was unsure whether this was asking about Justice’s role in One Elegant Solution specifically, or in my fics more generally. I’ll answer the second first. Pretty much all of my fics are Justice-positive, in that I try to value Justice’s personhood and his good intentions and efforts. Sometimes I like to explore the darker aspects of Justice’s character and personality (such as in ‘What These Walls Have Witnessed’ which is the closest I’ve ever come to Demon Justice,) but always in a way that is intended to be sympathetic to his character.

For OES specifically – the idea of exploring the darker sides of Justice’s character are not even on the radar there. He is an unambiguously positive force and character in that setting, very much a friend and protector and source of conviction and strength. Since OES is set in an explicitly friendmance setting, I’m playing Justice and Anders as a lot more closely in sync than I have in some other settings; their thoughts on most matters are, for the most part, the same, so there’s not really any easy way to distinguish between them.

However, there are a few times when they do diverge, and Anders notices a lot more when that’s the case. I do intend to try to do some things with Justice later in that story that speak more specifically to him as a character and person than to Justice-and-Anders the melded identity. Nothing bad, I assure you. :)

[mikkeneko]

Man every time I read this comic I imagine it with Justice

Hawke: Justice! Juuuuustice! The Chantry has taken my sister!

Justice: THIS WILL NOT STAND!

Justice: JUSTICE IS SERVED! I BRING YOU... THE VIOLENT OVERTHROW OF THE THEOCRACY!

Hawke: Actually... um... I just wanted my sister back.

Justice: YOU HAVE NO CONCEPT OF JUSTICE.

Justice: ENJOY YOUR NEW WORLD ORDER.

[beammetothemoon]

It’s way too late to be thinking about this, but I’m playing the new Ace Attorney and I really just want a DA cross-over.

[mikkeneko]

For some reason I’m really craving papa/mentor Anders. Not just for his own kids, but for kids of all ages. Let’s have some Anders* trailing around the wilderness followed by a flock of magelings of all ages (just like that Mad Dad Emu post.) Pity the  foolhardy Templar or angry townsman who confronts them, because then you have to deal with Mad Dad Justice.

Or heck, not even necessarily magelings, just displaced children/orphans from the MTW. Let’s have an Anders Cave full of chaotic kids and teenagers that Anders is trying to keep a handle on, giving fire magic lessons and doling out sandwiches and kissing scraped knees well with healing magic.

*and Hawke too if u dig

[mikkeneko]

I don't think Anders in Awakening killed his Templars

The physical in-game evidence doesn't tell us anything either way. Yes, the Templar bodies showed burn damage -- but Anders had been using an undirected AOE fire spell on a darkspawn a moment before. Anything in the way would have been caught in it (and this is DAO game engine, so we know friendly fire with mage magic is a thing.) There's just no solid indication in that scene whether Anders killed them or not.

But I don't think he did. And here's why:

Awakening Anders isn't a killer.

That's meant as a personality assessment, not a moral call. In a game where the primary gameplay mechanic is killing stuff, being a killer is hardly a condemnable trait. Indeed, it's a survival trait necessary for success in this world... but not in the Circle.

In the Circle, the rules are reversed. Aggression and violence are very heavily discouraged -- not only discouraged, but actively weeded out. A mage who does violence on other mages is a mage that's likely to get himself singled out as a maleficar. A mage who does violence on templars is a walking dead mage. A troublemaker like Anders, who escaped from the Tower seven times running, would likely not have survived to be recaptured six times running if he had harmed Templars on his way in or out.

Would this time have been different? Anders had no way of knowing that he was about to be conscripted, stopping his return to the Circle forever. Without that knowledge, would he have found it worth the risk to try violence on his captors, knowing that failure -- or even, in the long run, success -- would be a death sentence? Would he have decided that this was the point of no return, nerve himself up to do it, and be successful in his attempt, all in one go?

Personally, I doubt it. After a lifetime of conditioning against violence, I doubt Anders could have made the jump to mankiller that smoothly. Most humans require significant psychological conditioning to be able to kill other humans -- that's why militaries and police academies require extensive training. Anders can do it, but he needs help. For most of Awakening, the Warden provides that help -- the Warden can point to a group of bandits and say "Fireball that" and he'll do it. But that's a far cry from being able to do it on his own.

Once the Warden left, Anders would be without that external motivation. But he'd have had a taste of what it's like to be empowered in that way. He’d have had all of Awakening to watch the Hero of Ferelden murder their way to success, safety, wealth, accomplishment and glory. I have long thought that a good deal of Anders' motivation for joining with Justice was that he felt that he lacked the conviction, courage, and ruthlessness to succeed -- by which I mean, to kill -- on his own. Anders is not a killer and he knows he's not a killer; once left without the protection of the Warden and in danger of the Templars once again, he would feel the need to change that. Because at this point he knows he's past the point of no return. He must defend himself to the death -- theirs or his.

And I think that's a large part of why he agreed to join with Justice. Because Justice is a killer. He kills without hesitation or doubt. And Anders wanted -- needed -- that for himself.