[Fiction] Echoes ofThunder: Mrs Wakinyan Goes To Washington

[Ptesan-Wi]

Mrs. Wakinyan Goes To Washington
…or, Ptesan-Wi Meets the Great White Ex-Father

Friday, November 3rd 2007


The truce was holding.

It had been a hastily arranged thing, and there was much grumbling from both sides, but for nearly a month, the only gunfire that echoed through the hills of South Dakota had been that of deer hunters… and with the current tensions, even those were few and far between.

The truce was holding, but it could not hold forever, Ptesan-Wi knew, not without a lasting peace. And given the nature of the situation, there was only one man who could agree to that peace for the white men. Unfortunately, arranging to meet that man had been a Herculean task.

For weeks now, Ptesan-Wi had met with functionaries and bureaucrats, climbing her way up the governmental mountain. The most stubborn boulder in her way had proven to be one James Fenberg, Secretary of the Interior. He had, in every imaginable way, dodged any and all appointments with this strange Lakota nova who claimed to be a goddess. And when, in the end, he finally did meet with her, it was obvious that his opinion of the situation was that these “insurgents” should not be “humored” in the least.

And so, the goddess was tempted - so sorely tempted - to do what she had not wished to do, what she had avoided doing through the entire chain of negotiations up to this point. It would be so easy; she could reach into the mind of this Washington czar, reach to his very soul, and show him what her People had gone through, let him feel their pain and anger at what had happened at Wounded Knee, and – in just a tiny measure – let him experience what she had felt of Wakinyan’s death.

In the end, she couldn't do it. And when she left Secretary Fenberg's office, she felt - finally, at long last - defeat settling upon her.

It was with nothing less than shock, therefore, when she answered the phone in her hotel room to hear a quavering but still unmistakable voice on the other end of the line. "Mrs. Thunderbird? I'm Jimmy Carter, and I'd like to help."

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[OOC: Thanks to Nova for the idea of using Jimmy Carter in this role.]