MY EXTREMELY NECESSARY GUIDE TO WHO THE HELL EVERYBODY IS DO NOT GIVE THIS TO A COP

WHO IS ACTUALLY WHO because apparently I have been letting the word “they” do half my political analysis

I need one place where I can write down who these people actually are before I start turning every annoying person into a representative sample of their entire civilization. Membership is not motive. Ancestry is not evidence. One person is not an entire people. I am putting that in bold because apparently I need the reminder.

A PERSON IS NOT THEIR ENTIRE FUCKING GOVERNMENT

Róise is not the Fire Brigade. One Nameless attacker is not “the Nameless.” Lukas and Frankie are not Saxony. Wyln is not every Voronan house. Hugh knowing creepy Phantom Corps shit does not mean Hugh personally is the Phantom Corps. This should be obvious. Apparently it was not obvious enough for me.

How I Am Trying To File This Without Becoming Insufferable

WHAT I ACTUALLY KNOW: somebody said it, I saw it, or we have enough evidence that I am willing to stop putting question marks around it.

WHAT I THINK IS HAPPENING: my current read. Could be right. Could be red-string-induced brain damage.

WHAT I STILL NEED TO KNOW: the questions preventing me from pretending the theory is finished.

DO NOT BE AN ASSHOLE ABOUT THIS: the reminder that a person, faction, species, government, and historical grievance are not interchangeable categories.

Handwritten addition:
new rule: if I write “they,” I have to stop and write down who I actually mean. if the answer is “all of them, probably,” I am not allowed to keep writing until I can do better. deeply irritating. probably necessary.
What kind of problem:

Current List Of People I Keep Accidentally Turning Into One Big Problem

Some of these files are fat because I know too much. Some are thin because I know almost nothing and am trying very hard not to fill the blank space with prejudice, paranoia, or whatever theory sounded best at three in the morning.

THINGS I AM TRYING VERY HARD NOT TO COLLAPSE TOGETHER

Róise ≠ Fire Brigade

Róise is one woman with her own politics, grudges, choices, and lines she is apparently willing to cross. The Fire Brigade is bigger than her. I know this. I keep having to write it anyway.

one face would be easier. reality has declined to cooperate.
Nameless ≠ Nameless attackers

Some Nameless people have attacked us. That does not magically transform every Nameless person into one member of one secret army. That is not how people work.

cells are not a species. GOD this should not need saying.
Lukas / Frankie ≠ Saxony

I can hate what Saxony does without waiting for Frankie and Lukas to personally reenact the empire every time they annoy me. Apparently these are separate skills.

I can be right about Saxony and still be unfair to Frankie or Lukas. hate that those can both be true.
Wyln ≠ Voronae politics

If I find Voronan magic at a crime scene, that does not mean I get to swivel around and stare at Wyln like he personally left it there. This sentence is embarrassing to need.

I am writing this twice because apparently ancestry starts looking like evidence when everybody gets scared.
Grievance ≠ innocence

People can have every reason in the galaxy to be furious and still do something I think is wrong. Understanding why does not mean handing them a moral blank check.

being hurt does not make everything you do afterward holy.
Benefit ≠ authorship

If somebody gets richer, safer, or more powerful after a disaster, I am absolutely writing their name down. That is not the same as writing GUILTY in red marker. Yet.

follow the money. stop proposing marriage to the first theory that flirts with me.