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<p>Ey grinned, shook eir head. “Try again.”</p>
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<p>“Young gentlethem.”</p>
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<p>Ey laughed. “I don’t know what your hang-up is, you nut. I learned it from you.”</p>
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<p>“What, ‘fuck you too’?” The skunk shook her head. “It just sounds so strange coming from your mouth.”</p>
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<p>“What, ‘fuck you too’?” May shook her head. “It just sounds so strange coming from your mouth.”</p>
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<p>“I’m not as good at the well placed profanity as all of you.”</p>
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<p>“It is an art we have perfected. It increases the impact when they do show up. Even True Name does it, I am sure.”</p>
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<p>“She has once or twice, yeah. You two still sound similar enough in terms of your voices, so I feel like I’m used to it.”</p>
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<p>“Alright,” ey said, wiping eir face. “What should we do for dinner?”</p>
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<p>This seemed to deserve another moment of silence, one of acknowledgement rather than thoughtfulness, and so ey let it play out, the muffled clatter of the rest of the cafe coming through the cone of silence suddenly much more present.</p>
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<p>“What news from Castor had you thinking about <em>Perils</em>?”</p>
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<p>“I’m sorry?”</p>
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<p>“Well, I do not associate aliens or time modification or the…ah, struggles that Answers Will Not Help experienced with what happened with Qoheleth.” She hesitated, added, “Or Michelle’s struggles.”</p>
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<p>“Well, I do not associate aliens or time modification or the…ah, struggles that Answers Will Not Help experienced with what happened with Qoheleth.”</p>
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<p>Eir mind raced. How could ey possibly bring up the Name? That Codrin now knew it and that knowledge — at least at one layer of remove — had propagated through the clade? Surely she knew that, at least, but how could ey say that out loud to her?</p>
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<p>“Mx. Bălan?” True Name was frowning, whether at eir silence or expression ey couldn’t guess. “I am guessing that the answer is complicated.”</p>
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<p>“It…uh, yeah. What Codrin heard on Artemis…I mean…”</p>
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<p>And yet ey couldn’t stop emself from thinking, <em>Holy shit, I don’t think she knows.</em></p>
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<p>“I can’t picture anything having a bigger tail than you, May. Definitely outrageous.”</p>
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<p>“I thought you liked my tail.”</p>
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<p>“I do!”</p>
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<p>She laughed and dotted her nose against eir cheek. “Excellent, I shall allow you to live another day. I had considered becoming a panther for some time, but I like my tail too much.”</p>
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<p>“Excellent, I shall allow you to live another day.” She laughed and dotted her nose against eir cheek. “I had considered becoming a panther for some time, but I like my tail too much.”</p>
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<p>“You know, I’ve always wondered,” ey said, getting an arm around her. “Why did the most political stanza of the clade stay skunks? Wouldn’t it be more effective to be humans? It’s not like the majority of folks on the Systems are furries.”</p>
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<p>“Only three of the ten are skunks anymore, and you have met all three. Besides, I think End Waking is the only one of the three of us who has not spent time in human form. Some of me in other relationships were — or perhaps are — humans. I spent six months with you in that form, even, remember?”</p>
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<p>Ey nodded. “It was pretty weird.”</p>
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<p>“Right, that makes sense.” Ey hesitated, composing eir next words carefully. “You talk about her quite a bit. I know that–“</p>
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<p>“You asked, Ioan,” she interrupted, frowning.</p>
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<p>“I know, May, I just mean in general. I know you’re consciously working on how you feel about her and I keep bringing her up besides. Just an observation.”</p>
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<p>The moment of tenseness lingered, then passed as she wilted against em, sighing. “I know. I did not mean to get snippy. You are right, and I am not sure how I feel about that fact, that she is so often on my mind. My feelings remain complex.”</p>
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<p>The moment of tenseness lingered, then passed as she wilted against em, sighing. “I know. I did not mean to get short with you. You are right, and I am not sure how I feel about that fact, that she is so often on my mind. My feelings remain complex.”</p>
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<p>“Oh, I definitely get that.”</p>
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<p>“You seem to enjoy her company more.”</p>
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<p>Ey shrugged. “I guess. It started out as a way to keep things smooth between our clades during the convergence, but now it’s just a thing to do outside the house.”</p>
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<p>Ey laughed and shook eir head, leaning forward to ruffle over her ears. It was a much more pleasant response to a note from True Name than ey’d expected. “You’re right, I don’t. I’ll just have to trust you on that. Skunks are so weird.”</p>
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<p>Debarre laughed and poked at End Waking’s thigh. “Where’d this sense of humor come from?”</p>
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<p>“The audacity of weasels never ceases to amaze,” he said. “I have a sense of humor. The squirrels and I share our private jokes. I practice them before the fire.”</p>
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<p>“Fucking weirdo,” Debarre said, rolling his eyes. He tucked closer to the skunk all the same.</p>
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<p>That End Waking was so open to touch over the last few weeks was something he was keen to take advantage of. He knew that neither of them were necessarily the cuddly type, and most of the time, he was happy with the level of physical contact he got from the skunk, just as he was with the partners his other forks had settled down with. Still, it was nice every once and a while. A bit of touch to keep him grounded. It tended to happen when their relationship picked up again, after both of them had spent months or years apart, each living their separate, more cerebral lives.</p>
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<p>That End Waking was so open to touch over the last few weeks was something he was keen to take advantage of. Neither of them were necessarily the cuddly type, and most of the time, he was happy with the level of physical contact he got from the skunk, just as he was with the partners his other forks had settled down with. Still, it was nice every once and a while. A bit of touch to keep him grounded. It tended to happen when their relationship picked up again, after both of them had spent months or years apart, each living their separate, more cerebral lives.</p>
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<p>Before long, however, they set the cloak aside to get dressed, and Debarre watched as End Waking prepped a sizeable hare and pushed it onto a cast-iron spit and set it over the fire, a tilted pan beneath it catching the drippings.</p>
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<p>They dined on the hare and squash roasted in the fat, both pungent with thyme. They stayed up until it was well and truly dark, chatting.</p>
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<p>Worn out as they were, though, they didn’t last much longer, eventually retreating to the makeshift tent that End Waking had set up using the patched fabric that had been his previous shelter strung over a rope and draped over his recovered cot. Narrow as it was, they had to huddle close — the only time the skunk was consistently okay with close physical contact and intimacy — sharing each others’ warmth beneath the cloak and a few blankets besides.</p>
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<p>“E.W.?”</p>
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<p>“I like it when you call me that.”</p>
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<p>“I’m a sucker for nicknames,” he said, tucking himself back against him.</p>
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<p>“That you are.” He rested his snout over Debarre’s shoulder. “What were you going to ask, my love?”</p>
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<p>“That you are.” He rested his snout over Debarre’s shoulder. “What were you going to say, my love?”</p>
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<p>“I…well, all these little changes are coming to the System. The ACL changes, the cones of silence…”</p>
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<p>“I do not use those.”</p>
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<p>“Well, but you never leave here and you gave up on all the politics.”</p>
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<p>“You are worried external engineers will tamper?”</p>
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<p>He nodded.</p>
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<p>“I do not know that they have a good enough understanding of the subtleties to do so. The System is greater than the sum of its component parts.”</p>
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<p>“Well, maybe not intentionally changing things. Just knock on effects, maybe.” <em>Or maybe internal politics encouraging changes,</em> he added, mentally.</p>
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<p>“Well, maybe not intentionally changing things. Just knock on effects, maybe.” <em>Or maybe internal politics encouraging changes,</em> he added mentally.</p>
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<p>“I imagine they will be careful, even around the subtle things.”</p>
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<p>They lay silent for a while, Debarre thinking and, if the slow slackening of his arm around his chest was any indication, End Waking slowly falling asleep.</p>
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<p>“E.W.?” he whispered.</p>
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<p>There was a long, long silence before the skunk replied. “Sleep, my love. There is work to do in the morning. Sleep, and dream beautiful dreams.”</p>
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<p>“I do not fork often, you know that.”</p>
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<p>“There was a plank through your leg, E.W.,” he retorted. “That wasn’t just going to heal okay on its own.”</p>
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<p>It was the skunk’s turn to roll his eyes. “You are no fun.”</p>
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<p>May Then My Name, having finally calmed down enough to speak, said, “Well, thank you, Debarre.”</p>
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<p>May Then My Name, having finally regained her composure, said, “Well, thank you, Debarre.”</p>
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<p>Debarre nodded.</p>
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<p>She sighed, smiling weakly at End Waking. “I am glad you are okay, skunk. I would be lost without you.</p>
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<p>“The trees do not know how to kill me, May Then My Name,” End Waking said, frowning. “There is no virus within them. Debarre was right to get me to fork to fix, I will admit, but I would have done so anyway had it landed more fully on me.”</p>
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<p>“If you can swing a hammer, then yes, that would be wonderful.”</p>
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<p>“I should just pinch myself whenever I start thinking that there’s something I need to do,” ey said to the water. “Pretty sure May doesn’t want it, she’s happy working on her emotions without me meddling, and I’m pretty sure True Name doesn’t want it, since she seems content…what was it, maintaining that level of connection after so long a time of disconnect?”</p>
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<p>The lake didn’t answer, not in anything other than the water lapping at the shore and the chatter of the creek.</p>
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<p>“This is stupid.”</p>
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<p>Ey sat for another hour, just watching the lake, the clouds, the trees, trying not to think about how complicated it was for one person to be so split among instances.</p>
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<p>Ey sat for another hour, just watching the lake, the clouds, the trees, trying not to think about how complicated it was for one person to be so split among so many instances.</p>
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<p>The walk back was spent unwinding the thought processes that led em here in the first place. Unwinding and re-coiling into a careful skein, now with fewer knots than it had had in it before, though it still remained tangled.</p>
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<p>“Good walk, my dear?” May said when ey returned and plopped down onto the couch.</p>
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<p>“Very. It’s nice out there.”</p>
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<p>It wasn’t until they’d made it back to bed and curled up together that ey was finally able to truly let go of the topic, though; even throughout eir writing, a small portion of eir mind had been dedicated to the question of what eir role was between the two skunks and why it both rankled and felt necessary.</p>
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<p>She bowed to em and May then trudged off down the path.</p>
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<p>May glared after her down-tree instance with her paws bunched into fists and ears splayed, then whirled on Ioan, waving a cone of silence into being.</p>
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<p>“Ioan, I am not at all happy,” she said, voice frigid. “I know that none of this is your fault except inasmuch as you have been meeting her for coffee, but I am having a hard time keeping my anger to myself.”</p>
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<p>Ey took a long breath, scrubbed eir hands over eir face, and paced in an abbreviated line before her. “I know, May, I don’t blame you. I’m completely baffled. Go ahead.”</p>
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<p>“I spend two hundred fucking years trying to get away from that life, from all of her fucking schemes, from what she did to Michelle,” she said, voice quickly rising in volume. “And then I spend the last three trying to calm down so that I quit burning up whenever I so much as think about her, and now this. Look at us! Hiding in the woods from assassins. <em>Assassins!</em>“</p>
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<p>Ey took a long breath, ran eir hands through eir hair, and paced in an abbreviated line before her. “I know, May, I don’t blame you. I’m completely baffled. Go ahead.”</p>
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<p>“I spend two hundred fucking years trying to get away from that life, from all of her fucking schemes,” she said, voice quickly rising in volume. “And then I spend the last three trying to calm down so that I quit burning up whenever I so much as think about her, and now this. Look at us! Hiding in the woods from assassins. <em>Assassins!</em>“</p>
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<p>Ey averted eir gaze from her. Nothing ey could say would help, and ey knew some remote part of emself was feeling much of what she was, too.</p>
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<p>“Her and fucking Jonas are still doing whatever the fuck it is that they do, and now they are doing it to each other. Every time I think I can just settle down with you and get away from that, it just seeps right back in. I know that you were trying to do right by us, meeting up with her, but I really, <em>really</em> wish you had not.”</p>
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<p>“May, I–“</p>
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<p>She sniffled and nodded. “You too, my dear. Good luck, and do not die.”</p>
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<p>“No, Ioan, I don’t,” he said. “Just tell True Name that I’m waiting. You can ask her all the questions you want.”</p>
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<p>“Alright, fine,” ey growled. “Anything else?”</p>
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<p>“Nope! That’s it for me. You can go back to your hidey-hole and get all smoochy with–“</p>
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<p>Ioan completed the gesture ey’d held back since the beginning, bouncing Jonas from the sim. Ey held back the urge to scream out into the yard just as True Name had done earlier at the lake.</p>
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<p>Ioan completed the gesture ey’d suppressed since the beginning, bouncing Jonas from the sim. Ey held back the urge to scream out into the yard just as True Name had done earlier at the lake.</p>
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<p>Ey sent May a quick I’m-okay ping, then started riffling through the perisystem architecture for information on how to completely sweep a sim. There was nothing in there ey could find about checking who was swept, but it was still possible to sweep everyone who didn’t currently have their home set to the current sim, and to receive explicit confirmation that this had been completed and how many instances it affected.</p>
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<p>Focusing on the set of steps required, ey triggered the sweep, then checked the log that it had left, eyes-only, for em in the architecture.</p>
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<p><em>Seventeen swept.</em></p>
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<p>After a moment’s concentration, a second End Waking stood beside the first. “I will be staying with you, my dear, do not worry. No need to risk more than a fork.”</p>
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<p>Ey bent down to pick up the two bundles of firewood while the new instance of End Waking picked up one of the sets of gear and held out his paw. Ioan took it in eir hand and stepped back to Arrowhead Lake. They dropped off their loads, then returned to pick up the second two bundles and the tents.</p>
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<p>End Waking set to work immediately, picking out a flat spot in the trees to set up both tents. Ioan was pleasantly surprised when they turned out to be fairly modern gear — at least, modern to the 2100s — thin nylon with carbon fiber spars and a seal-strip entrance which was kept sheltered by a fold in the fabric. The camp beds were of a strong fabric lashed to carbon fiber frames by some springy cord, providing a reasonable amount of give. The bedrolls turned out to be sleeping bags with foam pillows that expanded quickly when the seal-strip was undone.</p>
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<p>Throughout the whole process, May, True Name, and eir fork sat by the edge of the lake, far off to the side. Ey couldn’t tell if they were simply being silent or if they were talking in a cone of silence, but, other than a brief nod to End Waking from May, they seemed keen on taking the space for themselves.</p>
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<p>Throughout the whole process, May, True Name, and eir down-tree instance sat by the edge of the lake, far off to the side. Ey couldn’t tell if they were simply being silent or if they were talking in a cone of silence, but, other than a brief nod to End Waking from May, they seemed keen on taking the space for themselves.</p>
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<p>Once the tents and camp beds were set up and Ioan had been shown where and how to start the fire, End Waking bowed politely and said. “We will talk soon, Ioan, I am sure. Until then, please keep you and yours safe.”</p>
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<p>Ey nodded and returned the bow. “Thanks again, End Waking. You’ve been a huge help today, and yes, we’ll be in touch.”</p>
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<p>When the skunk had left, ey quit and merged back down to eir root instance.</p>
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<p>They sat in quiet well into the evening, instead, each of them trying to digest the day in their own way.</p>
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<p>“‘Blew up’?”</p>
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<p>“Yeah, just yelled at him for sending assassins after you two — he confirmed that Guōweī mistook you for her, May — and told him to fuck himself.” Ey shrugged helplessly. “I was pretty upset, I guess.”</p>
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<p>“I am surprised that you stuck around long enough to listen to him, my dear,” May said. “He sounds like he was in rare form.”</p>
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<p>“I mean, I don’t know what he’s like the rest of the time, but he was doing a really good job of being as insulting as possible. The ‘my skunks’ part. “I don’t have the training your pretty little skunks have”, he said, and ‘sometimes mommies and daddies fight’. All these little things”</p>
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<p>“I mean, I don’t know what he’s like the rest of the time, but he was doing a really good job of being as insulting as possible. The ‘my skunks’ part. “I don’t have the training your pretty little skunks have”, he said, and ‘sometimes mommies and daddies fight’. All these little things.”</p>
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<p>True Name ground the heels of her palms against her eyes. “I am sorry that you had to go through that, Mx. Bălan. It does indeed sound like he was in fine form. Did he explain his reasons for having you along as amanuensis at all?”</p>
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<p>“Just that he needed me to witness and write about what happens and leave the rest to the grown-ups.” Ey thought back and shrugged. “That was most of what he said. He wanted to talk with you, wanted me to witness, and wanted the whole stanza there.”</p>
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<p>May frowned. “Including me?”</p>
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<p>“She is not sane at all, my dear,” May said at the same time.</p>
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<p>They frowned at each other.</p>
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<p><em>I’m glad End Waking gave us two tents,</em> Ioan thought. <em>It’s been civil so far, but…</em></p>
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<p>Out loud, ey asked, “So, what’s next? We head back tomorrow and build you a room, but then what?”</p>
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<p>Aloud, ey asked, “So, what’s next? We head back tomorrow and build you a room, but then what?”</p>
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<p>“What is next is that I try to salvage what I can from this. I imagine that my options will be severely limited if I am to continue existing as I am and still meet Jonas’s demands, but that does not mean that I will set my goals aside.”</p>
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<p>“‘Continue as you are’?” May growled. “I cannot believe– “</p>
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<p>There was a moment of tense silence, her jaw working as though straining to hold back some larger outburst.</p>
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<p>Ey pointed her toward the tent with one cot in it and watched her slip inside, then sat and waited for May to come back, staring at the fire and trying not to feel bad enough for the three of them. </p>
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<p>Everyone was off in the morning. Tired, grumpy, sore.</p>
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<p>The narrowness of the cots had frustrated Ioan and May throughout the night. They <em>could</em> both fit on one, but only if they straightened out rather than their usual tight curl. At one point, they tried dragging the cots to be side by side, but the frames against each other made a hard ridge that was impossible to rest on comfortably. In the end, they’d fallen asleep, each on their own cots, facing each other with arms tangled enough to get at least some contact through the night.</p>
|
||||
<p>The narrowness of the cots had frustrated Ioan and May throughout the night. They <em>could</em> both fit on one, but only if they straightened out rather than their usual tight curl. At one point, they tried dragging the cots to be side by side, but the frames against each other made a hard ridge that was impossible to rest on comfortably. In the end, they’d fallen asleep, each on their own cot, facing each other with arms tangled enough to get at least some contact through the night.</p>
|
||||
<p>Whether or not True Name had actually slept seemed up in the air. She had shrugged noncommittally when asked, but it certainly didn’t look like she had.</p>
|
||||
<p>Conversation was equally awkward. May apologized stiffly to her down-tree instance over breakfast of further sandwiches and True Name accepted graciously enough, but then they fell back into silence.</p>
|
||||
<p>After breakfast, there was little else to do but head back home. They left the camp set up. Ioan couldn’t begin to guess how to take down the tents, given how distracted ey’d been while End Waking had been setting them up. <em>Besides,</em> ey reasoned. <em>Best to keep them around just in case things go sideways.</em></p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -24,14 +24,14 @@
|
|||
<p>So out of place was the humor that it took em a moment to catch up. Ey laughed tiredly and shook eir head. “For theatre nerds, you guys have no imagination. Coffee?”</p>
|
||||
<p>May leaned up and dotted her nose against eir cheek. “You, my dear, are an utter delight.”</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name followed them into the den. “Please. I am going to fall over if I do not have something.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May flopped down onto her usual beanbag and rubbed her paws over her face while True Name sat at the dining table and Ioan made coffee. “If it is alright by you two, I am going to take a shower after coffee, as hot as I can stand,” May said. “And then we can work on the addition.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May flopped down onto her usual beanbag and rubbed her paws over her face while True Name sat quietly at the dining table and Ioan made coffee. “If it is alright by you two, I am going to take a shower after coffee, as hot as I can stand,” May said. “And then we can work on the addition.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Sure. I can start by mirroring our room and then stripping personal items while you’re getting cleaned up.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Thank you both,” True Name said, tracing a claw along the wood grain on the table, an incredibly familiar gesture from years of living with May. “Again, I mean. I really do appreciate all that you are doing. Perhaps we can discuss boundaries and expectations later, but I am also looking forward to a shower.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ioan nodded, finishing up the coffee prep — eirs black and both of the skunks’ sweet and creamy — and carrying the mugs to each of them. “I guessed,” ey said, setting one down in front of True Name. “Let me know if you need anything different.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey sat down carefully by May and held both of their coffees while the skunk scooted in close against em as usual before handing hers over. It felt good to be back in a more comfortable setting, back where May and em could could at least get close, even if everything still felt nerve-wracking. </p>
|
||||
<p>They drank in silence for a while, minus a thank you from each of the skunks, the three of them doing their best to un-cringe from last day’s worth of anxiety.</p>
|
||||
<p>It worked a little too well, perhaps, as ey had to nudge May awake to finish her coffee and shower, and the prospect of levering emself out of the beanbag felt out of reach. All the same, ey needed to at least get the other room created, then perhaps the three of them could nap.</p>
|
||||
<p>Once May was on her way to the shower, ey stood, finished eir coffee, and began to work. Ey dumped a series of intents into the sim. A doorway cut itself out of the wall opposite the doorway to eir own bedroom. A room extruded itself beyond the doorway, filling itself with all of the very same stuff that eirs and May’s contained. The sim’s boundaries whined in protest at not having enough for the windows to look out on and, too tired to think of any other options, ey mirrored the view of the yard as well so that True Name’s room looked out over yet more grass and dandelions.</p>
|
||||
<p>Once May was on her way to the shower, ey stood, finished eir coffee, and began to work. Ey dumped a series of intents into the sim. A doorway cut itself out of the wall opposite the one to eir own bedroom. A room extruded itself beyond the doorway, filling itself with all of the very same stuff that eirs and May’s contained. The sim’s boundaries whined in protest at not having enough for the windows to look out on and, too tired to think of any other options, ey mirrored the view of the yard as well so that True Name’s room looked out over yet more grass and dandelions.</p>
|
||||
<p><em>If she stays for any real length of time, maybe I can just mirror the rest of the house and she can have a full setup.</em></p>
|
||||
<p>That was enough for now, though. Ey got started going through the room from top to bottom, wiping it of eirs and May’s presence. Anything that wasn’t the bed, the nightstands, and any other furniture was evaluated and either left for its decorative value or swiped away to nothingness. A damp May joined em partway through the exercise, and by the time they were done, the room was left clean and neat, sparsely decorated without being oppressively empty.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Hopefully it’s not too bleak,” ey said once May had fetched True Name. “I gave you some ACLs over the space if you need to make or recycle anything. Just let me know if the room itself needs changing.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -48,11 +48,11 @@
|
|||
<p>Ey wanted to ask her how well that fit her monologue, that idea that to be built to love is to be built to hate yourself. Ey wanted to go back sixteen hours or however long it had been and kick Jonas’s ass. Ey wanted to go back twenty-four hours and warn True Name, to go back three and a half years and warn the True Name ey’d first gotten coffee with.</p>
|
||||
<p>Instead, ey said, “You’re a good person, May.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She tightened her grip around em. “Thank you, my dear.”</p>
|
||||
<p>When True Name finished her shower and grooming, looking far more herself than she had since the year before, they sat around the dining table to hash out boundaries.</p>
|
||||
<p>When True Name finished her shower and grooming, looking far more herself than she had since the month before, they sat around the dining table to hash out boundaries.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I do not want to impose on you more than I already have,” she began. “I will certainly stay out of your private space, and I figure a closed door is a plain enough signal to be left alone. Should I stick to my room for the most part?”</p>
|
||||
<p>May let out a snort of laughter. “I am sorry, True Name. I do not mean to laugh, but I have never heard you so deferential in my life.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The skunk canted her ears back. “I am in shock, May Then My Name. My coworker of two centuries just tried to kill me. My life’s work has been cut off from me. I have been invited to stay with one of the two up-tree instances of mine who dislike me the most, and I have never had to live with anyone before, not since before we uploaded. The offer remains for me to dig my own sim.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May bowed apologetically.</p>
|
||||
<p>May bowed her head apologetically.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’d feel better if you stayed,” Ioan admitted. “It’d be too easy for you to either disappear into your new sim forever or wind up with another attempt on your life whenever you left.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May nodded readily. “You are safer here where no one can act openly against you. It may not be the most comfortable of situations, but I would also prefer that you not die.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Good points. Both of you. I would prefer not to die as well.” She straightened up in her chair and smiled, a hint of that confidence showing through. “So, to my question. Do you have any thoughts?”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -70,7 +70,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“Naps all around,” True Name agreed. “Again, thank you two.”</p>
|
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</article>
|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-13</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
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|
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<p>Well, except perhaps True Name.</p>
|
||||
<p>There were few enough people he hated in the world, though certainly a great many who grated on his nerves. True Name and her ilk, though, were universally among that number. He knew he could never hurt anyone, but, well, everyone had their fantasies. He knew he should never wish harm befall anyone, but some people…</p>
|
||||
<p>This latest development was putting this to the test.</p>
|
||||
<p>He’d continue work on the cabin while End Waking went for his walks — they’d gotten the floor and stove in place, as well as the A-frame, but the canvas of the tent still needed to be strung, and he had a few ideas for improvements — and all the while, he’d swing steadily between the poles of feeling nauseous at the thought of one less fraction of his friend in the world, one more death of one of the lost, and wild fantasies of popping champagne upon hearing that her final instance had been destroyed.</p>
|
||||
<p>He’d continue the work on the cabin while End Waking went for his walks — they’d gotten the floor and stove in place, as well as the A-frame, but the canvas of the tent still needed to be strung, and he had a few ideas for improvements — and all the while, he’d swing steadily between the poles of feeling nauseous at the thought of one less fraction of his friend in the world, one more death of one of the lost, and wild fantasies of popping champagne upon hearing that her final instance had been destroyed.</p>
|
||||
<p>Part of him wondered if End Waking was going through the same. He wanted to ask, but didn’t want to risk that pushing the skunk over into requesting that he leave with the tent not yet complete.</p>
|
||||
<p>So, Debarre just kept working, kept fantasizing. He’d gotten the last of the canvas lashed down over the sides of the frame and was on to working on the front wall of the tent. At least there was productivity to lean on, even if he couldn’t lean on his partner at the moment.</p>
|
||||
<p>So, Debarre just kept working, kept fantasizing. He’d gotten the last of the canvas lashed down over the sides of the frame and was on to working on the front wall of the tent. At least there was productivity to lean on, even if he couldn’t lean on his boyfriend at the moment.</p>
|
||||
<p>He jumped, startled out of work and reverie by two sensorium pings in short order. The first came from End Waking, the word ‘company’ muttered quietly, and the second was a ping of arrival from the sim itself.</p>
|
||||
<p>With the new tent, End Waking had made the default entry point around a small rise from home, leaving it a short walk around — or a shorter but much steeper dash up and over — the ridge.</p>
|
||||
<p>Debarre opted for the up and over, nearly tumbling down the other side of the hill to where the form knelt in the clearing. End Waking was just making his way through the trees on the opposite side, so they converged on the visitor at the same time.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -114,7 +114,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“Confirmation at last,” End Waking said dreamily.</p>
|
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|
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|
|||
<p>Ey kissed the back of her ears and shushed her to sleep.</p>
|
||||
<p>What kept coming back again and again was the feeling of just how small this project felt — if ey’d been assigned to it as amanuensis, might as well call it what it was. There were so few people involved. True Name and Jonas, then em, May, and End Waking on the periphery. Five people, three clades. It was intimate, in that sense. True Name and Jonas were larger-than-life most of the time, but having been forced into sharing space with her, ey was far more able to see the True Name of today as just someone caught up in a storm and Jonas as the force behind that storm.</p>
|
||||
<p>And then there was emself, as powerless as Codrin#Castor had felt almost four years back.</p>
|
||||
<p>The next morning saw both of the skunks more relaxed than ey’d seen them yet. They talked pleasantly over breakfast, and True Name even stuck around, sitting on the couch and watching the snow melt off the balcony while May and Ioan worked, her on her monologue and em reading back through the volume of <em>An Expanded History of Our World</em> that focused on the Council of Eight — and the Odist and Jonas clades — in the centuries after its dissolution.</p>
|
||||
<p>The next morning saw both of the skunks more relaxed than ey’d seen them yet. They talked pleasantly over breakfast, and True Name even stuck around, sitting on the couch and watching the snow melt off the balcony while May and Ioan worked, her on her monologue and em reading back through the volume of <em>An Expanded History of Our World</em> that focused on the Council of Eight — and the Ode and Jonas clades — in the centuries after its dissolution.</p>
|
||||
<p>After lunch, True Name returned to the couch with a glass of water and, after a moment’s hesitation, May had joined her.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Why are you spending today out here?” she asked, finally voicing a question ey’d kept to emself until now.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Honest answer or pithy one?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Both.”</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name laughed. “The pithy one is that I am bored and lonely, and this seems to be my best bet at solving either. The honest answer is that I am bored and lonely and, even if the circumstances are not ideal, I want to at least try not to mope in my room all day.”</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name laughed. “The pithy one is that I am bored and lonely, and this seems to be my best bet at solving either. The honest answer is that I am bored and lonely and, even if the circumstances are not ideal, I want to at least try not to mope in my room all day as I am sorely tempted to.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“You’ve said you spend most of your time working interacting with your instances, yeah,” Ioan said, turning eir desk chair to face the couch. “I imagine it’s been pretty quiet.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yes. My instances, some up-tree cocladists, instances of Jonas, those of my…friends.” The last word sounded almost bashful for reasons ey couldn’t place. She shrugged and continued, “And now I am without all of those. No instances, none of my up-tree cocladists are responding, I do not wish to speak with Jonas for obvious reasons, and the relationships I have with my friends are largely bound up in that.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May nodded. “I do not know if we are the ideal company for you, given our interests, but at least we can try, I suppose.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -71,7 +71,7 @@
|
|||
<p>Her face contorting with the strain of holding what must be a very large high-priority merge from End Waking at bay without either remembering or forgetting it, True Name gasped. “May… May Then… Why…”</p>
|
||||
<p>May’s expression softened further, picking up a hopeful smile. “Please, my dear. I think you need this. I think we <em>all</em> need this, if we are to move forward, if you are to be able to move past what Jonas wants of you. Please accept. Please.”</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name nodded shakily, attempted a dry swallow, and then let End Waking’s centuries of memories crash into her.</p>
|
||||
<p>The change was immediate and more dramatic than ey’d anticipated. Ey had been expecting a shell-shocked look and maybe a few minutes of silence, but instead True Name’s expression melted into a glazed, ischemic stupor. The glass of water she’d been clutching at but had yet to drink tumbled to the floor and, as all her muscles gave out at once, she began to slide off the couch.</p>
|
||||
<p>The change was immediate and more dramatic than ey’d anticipated. Ey had been expecting a shell-shocked look and maybe a few minutes of silence, but instead True Name’s expression melted into a glazed, ischemic stupor. The glass of water she’d been clutching but had yet to drink tumbled to the floor and, as all her muscles gave out at once, she began to slide off the couch.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Shit. Shit! Ioan!” May shouted.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey was already on eir feet and halfway around the table, thankfully in time to catch the skunk before she slid down into the pool of water on the floor. Ey managed to get eir arms under hers enough to hoist her up into the couch again while May ducked around to lift her feet so that they could lay her out on her back.</p>
|
||||
<p>They both stared down at her.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -89,7 +89,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“Can you explain what happened, at least?”</p>
|
||||
<p>She nodded, swallowing down that wave of tears as best she could. “We are good at forking and merging. Very, <em>very</em> good at it. I am pretty sure you know that, though.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Did something go wrong, then?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“End Waking has not merged down in more than a century and a half. Even when Michelle quit, all she had to do was let the memories fall onto her and then quit herself. He has diverged quite far in that time, as is to be expected, which means the potential for conflicts.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“End Waking has not merged down in more than a century and a half. Even when she merged down when Michelle quit, all she had to do was let the memories fall onto her and then quit herself. He has diverged quite far in that time, as is to be expected, which means the potential for conflicts.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Eir frown deepened. Ey thought ey could tell where this was going. “Aren’t those usually just when memories don’t line up, though?”</p>
|
||||
<p>May gave the barest hint of a shrug against em. “You have met her, and you have met him. Their viewpoints are almost diametrically opposed, yes?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey nodded.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -121,7 +121,7 @@
|
|||
<p>Ioan backed slowly out of the room, sliding the door shut quietly behind em. May sounded on the verge of tears once more, but, of all the things ey was not supposed to fix, perhaps least able to fix, this certainly felt like the top of the list.</p>
|
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|
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|
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|
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<h1 id="ioan-balan-2350">Ioan Bălan — 2350</h1>
|
||||
<p>It took about six hours for True Name to recover from the merge to where she could stand up and walk well enough to get a glass of water. Her expression remained glazed and she was unable to speak. It wasn’t until the next morning that she was able to hold a conversation, though she remained quiet and largely confined to her room, refusing the offer of coffee.</p>
|
||||
<p>May spent much of that time by her side. Ey wasn’t sure what it was that the two did while in her room, if it was just May sitting by the skunk’s side, if she was just being present, if the two were having their own quiet conversations, or sharing what affection she was comfortable sharing with a down-tree instance she had resented enough to shock.</p>
|
||||
<p>May spent much of that time by her side. Ey wasn’t sure what it was that the two did while in her room, if it was just May sitting by the skunk’s side, if she was just being present, if the two were having their own quiet conversations, or sharing what affection she was comfortable sharing with a down-tree instance she had resented enough to shock so severely.</p>
|
||||
<p>All three, ey suspected. Ey checked in on them a few times, knocking and listening for permission to enter. Each time, True Name remained curled in bed with May seated nearby, whether on a chair beside it or sitting up on the bed itself. Ey’d ask if they needed anything, they’d both decline, and then ey’d go back to pacing holes in the rug or the yard or around Arrowhead Lake.</p>
|
||||
<p>The rest of the time, May was out with em, almost always as close as she could be, whether that was tucked in against eir side on the beanbag, hugging around eir middle from behind while ey cooked, or, at one point, requesting that ey sit on the floor outside the bathroom while she showered, just so that she could talk and, in her words, feel eir presence.</p>
|
||||
<p>The mood throughout remained somewhere between anxious and remorseful.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -64,7 +64,7 @@
|
|||
<p>True Name laughed. “It is no less than you deserve, I am sure. But come, once you are able to, let us walk to the rock at the end of the lake. I want to see the stars before we head back.”</p>
|
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|
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<p>There was still work to be done, of course. May still had her monologue, which she tried taking in a few different directions, some of which worked well and some less so. Ioan coached her in writing as best ey could, talking her down from fits of perfectionism that left her threatening to tear the whole thing up.</p>
|
||||
<p>For eir part, ey still had a few projects on eir plate, not least of which was the upcoming book project that had been requested by Jonas. Ey poked at this every now and then, outlining the events to date and throwing a few thousand words at it here and there.</p>
|
||||
<!--ONLY IF SELECTED LETTERS GETS FUNDED-->
|
||||
|
||||
<p>Mostly, though, ey dealt in letters to and from the other members of eir clade. Vast, dramatic events were happening elsewhere — as they always seemed to when an Odist was involved — and ey couldn’t simply put them away to deal with all that was going on at home. The break from dealing with the affairs of True Name and Jonas was a welcome one.</p>
|
||||
<p>The one conversation of note came on the fourth day after the merge, when the skunk asked, “How did you two get together?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Both Ioan and May had stared at her until she held up her paws.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -63,7 +64,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“No more monologue?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I am so sick of looking at it that I think I might scream if I even catch a glance.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey laughed and leaned down to kiss the side of the skunk’s muzzle. “Well, alright. Don’t fall over onto the table or anything.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The rest of the afternoon passed easily enough. It was slow and boring, perhaps, but neither seemed to want any excitement. Ioan walked. May did not manage a hand-stand, but she did wind up laying half off the couch, head nearly to the floor, for half an hour. They made lunch. They read.</p>
|
||||
<p>The rest of the afternoon passed easily enough. It was slow and boring, perhaps, but neither seemed to want any excitement. Ioan walked. May did not manage a handstand, but she did wind up laying half off the couch, head nearly to the floor, for half an hour. They made lunch. They read.</p>
|
||||
<p>But always, there was an air of waiting. They were waiting for True Name to return, yes, but ey felt like they were also waiting for the other shoe to drop. They were waiting for her to feel whole again. They were waiting for everything to fall into place (or at least close enough) so that they could do this meeting with Jonas and get it over with.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Do you think she’s just out there walking?” ey asked at one point.</p>
|
||||
<p>May shrugged. “If she is anything like True Name, yes. If she is anything like End Waking, then she is exploring. Climbing trees and walking along ravines.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -104,7 +105,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“Well, come on, then. Let’s get some food in you and we can take it easy for the night and finish in the morning.”</p>
|
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<p>But here ey was, feeling like all of the stress of the last day, of the last few weeks had filled em up to overflowing. Presented with the sudden silence and stillness of the field, ey realized just how much ey’d been running on desperation and borrowed time.</p>
|
||||
<p>With the slightest break in the pressure, that loan was called due.</p>
|
||||
<p>Realizing that ey couldn’t see the subtle rises in the land for the tears in eir eyes, ey simply sat down in the grass and cried. <em>If I am overflowing,</em> some remote part of em thought, <em>then I can certainly see the appeal to it. Catharsis indeed.</em></p>
|
||||
<p>Though there was certainly nothing ey could have done to stop it, ey decided to just own it and let it take its course, hollering curses into the cone of silence ey had the presence of mind to set up, clutching at the grass to keep emself at least anchored to the ground. Ey’d watched a good friend (for that’s what True Name was, wasn’t she?) nearly get assassinated in front of em, had dealt with eir partner’s lingering resentment towards her down-tree instance come into conflict with her constant presence, had watched May push True Name to near catatonia after encouraging her to accept a century and a half’s worth of memories from End Waking. Ey had watched both overflow in the span of a few hours.</p>
|
||||
<p>Though there was certainly nothing ey could have done to stop it, ey decided to just own it and let it take its course, hollering curses into the cone of silence ey had the presence of mind to set up, clutching at the grass to keep emself anchored to the ground. Ey’d watched a good friend (for that’s what True Name was, wasn’t she?) nearly get assassinated in front of em, had dealt with eir partner’s lingering resentment towards her down-tree instance come into conflict with her constant presence, had watched May push True Name to near catatonia after encouraging her to accept a century and a half’s worth of memories from End Waking. Ey had watched both overflow in the span of a few hours.</p>
|
||||
<p>And when ey stopped cycling over the last two weeks, ey simply wept for the sheer relief it provided.</p>
|
||||
<p>When ey’d cried emself out and cleaned emself up, ey levered emself up off the ground and trudged back toward the house. The least ey could do was say hi and get another cup of coffee.</p>
|
||||
<p>Douglas Hadje was sitting on the stoop of his house, waiting for em.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -56,7 +56,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“She’s…well, she’ll get by. I just hope it doesn’t last too long. Thanks for letting me stay. Please tell me you put coffee on.”</p>
|
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|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-13</p>
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|
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|
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|
||||
<h1 id="debarre-2350">Debarre — 2350</h1>
|
||||
<p>Neither Debarre nor End Waking had visited Michelle’s field in decades, and certainly not since it became Douglas’s. End Waking had last seen it on the day that she had quit in 2306, and had had little desire to return since. There were no dandelions in the forest; he had specifically requested so from Serene.</p>
|
||||
<p>Neither Debarre nor End Waking had visited Michelle’s field in decades, and certainly not since it had become Douglas’s. End Waking had last seen it on the day that she had quit in 2306, and had had little desire to return since. There were no dandelions in the forest; he had specifically requested so from Serene.</p>
|
||||
<p>It had been much longer for Debarre, going clear back into the 2200s, back when Michelle and Sasha were still alive and coherent enough to speak to without getting overwhelmed into silence every few minutes. The memories of her were painful enough as it was — that last visit with her in End Waking’s forest especially — that he’d never had the courage to come back, and then never a reason, which came with its own ache.</p>
|
||||
<p>Given how much the clade that she’d left behind was struggling, though, it felt fitting to accept when Douglas invited him and End Waking over to talk with Ioan.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Ey’s in a funk, and from what ey says, I think you two are the only others that know why,” he had said, paused, then added, “Except maybe those I don’t think any of us want to see.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Both of them stood still after arriving, just bathing in — or struggling against — the waves of memory that came with the sudden onslaught of warmth and sun and the baked goods scent of dandelions thick in the air.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ioan greeted them at the door. Ey seemed happy enough, if tired. Still smiling and bowing to them as ey usually did.</p>
|
||||
<p>They finished their greetings and settled on the grass in front of the house along with Douglas, End Waking having refused to go inside. After, though, ey had stared down into eir glass of lemonade and spoke little.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ioan greeted them at the door. Ey seemed happy enough, if tired. Still smiling and bowing to them as ey usually did. They finished their greetings and settled on the grass in front of the house along with Douglas, End Waking having refused to go inside. After, though, ey had stared down into eir glass of lemonade and spoke little.</p>
|
||||
<p>Finally, Debarre nudged em gently with an elbow. “Alright, Ioan, you’re gonna need to spill it at some point, here. What’s going on? All we were told is that you were feeling rough about the last few days.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey sighed and plucked at a dandelion. “Right, sorry, you two. Or three, I guess. I know I’ve been a bit of a mope of late. You alright to talk about True Name?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey sighed and plucked a dandelion. “Right, sorry, you two. Or three, I guess. I know I’ve been a bit of a mope of late. You alright to talk about True Name?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Ioan, I appreciate you asking, but please do not worry about us,” End Waking chided. “If we have come to help <em>you</em>, you need not spare our feelings. We can pretty well guess who would be at the center of this.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’m pretty sure it’s me, actually,” ey said with a wry smile. “I’ve been stuck between May and True Name for days now, or years if you count the time since the convergence and I started trying to smooth things out with the coffee dates.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’ve just been struggling with it all. It’s been too much from the moment everything with True Name happened. The last few days were the worst, though. True Name didn’t really handle the merge all that well. She collapsed and was nearly unresponsive for several hours, and since then, she’s been struggling to integrate various chunks of memories.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -56,7 +55,7 @@
|
|||
<p>He laughed. “Love you too, E.W.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“What I am saying, though, is that it will not be alien to her. She will have experienced love for others, and the loss of that love. She will have already experienced love for others through another’s memories and experiences, even. You can trust her to integrate that, I believe.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Even though she was struggling with integrating those memories of yours?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Perhaps especially so. I think that she is struggling because it clashes with her personality, not that she feels that she might love Debarre. Though, my dear,” he said, nodding to Debarre. “I can guarantee that just about every Odist is at least a little in love with you.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Perhaps especially so. I think that she is struggling because it clashes with her personality, not that she feels that she might love Debarre. Though, my dear,” he said, nodding to Debarre, “I can guarantee that just about every Odist is at least a little in love with you.”</p>
|
||||
<p>He shook his head and waved the comment away. “Yeah, yeah.”</p>
|
||||
<p>More than one of them had confessed as much to him over the centuries, and it wasn’t until he’d actually conceded that something about End Waking landed in that sweet spot of attraction and personality match enough to at least try dating that they’d stopped. He was thankful that they seemed happy enough to live vicariously through him. He had liked Sasha and Michelle, loved her in that sympatico that true friends can share, friends who had shared trauma, so he didn’t begrudge them their feelings, but any more felt pretty far out of his league as a gay man.</p>
|
||||
<p>Instead, he nudged Ioan with his elbow again. “So if you don’t need to worry about it from True Name’s side, and you know you’re worrying about it from your own side, how do you feel about it from May’s point of view?”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -84,7 +83,7 @@
|
|||
<p>He nodded and accepted that paw. He had a feeling he knew what was coming, so even just the touch as they stepped away from the sim was worth it.</p>
|
||||
</article>
|
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<footer>
|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-13</p>
|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
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|
|||
<p>“I did not. If you make me a cup, I will love you forever.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey nudged her out of bed so that ey could get up as well, saying, “I thought you were going to do that anyway, but I guess a cup of coffee is a small price to pay.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Douglas had beaten them to the coffee pot, which made the process all the easier.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Hey, May,” he said, kissing her cheek and returning the offered hug. “Figured that was you this morning. Feeling better?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Hey, May,” he said, returning the offered hug and kissing her cheek. “Figured that was you this morning. Feeling better?”</p>
|
||||
<p>She nodded and slumped down into a chair, cradling her coffee in both paws. “Mostly, yes. I am still below baseline, but it was more important that I see you two than to return all the way.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Well, glad to see you made it through.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“You will not quit me so easily, Douglas Hadje, doctor of incredibly boring things. How are you, though? Has Ioan caught you up on everything?”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -73,7 +73,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“I do not know,” she said eventually. Her voice sounded far away, older than Ioan had ever heard it sound before. “I wish I did, but I do not know.”</p>
|
||||
</article>
|
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<footer>
|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-13</p>
|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
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@ -41,7 +41,7 @@
|
|||
<p>The skunk padded over to the kitchen, swiping a few of the dishes that Ioan had left prepared into being, lining them up in a row. “Yes, and I cannot easily let that go. I want her to be other than she is specifically to not be so under his thumb. I want her to be better than she is to be less of what she has become, and yet even those thoughts feel like distortions. Choose your plate, my dear.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey picked one mostly at random, winding up with a grilled cheese sandwich and some soup. “I had been wondering as to your reasons. I felt like the idea just kind of popped into my mind based on what she was talking about at the time, what with Zacharias and all, but it came at such an inopportune time for me to actually ask why. Is it…I mean, do you feel the need to fix things like we’ve been talking about with me?”</p>
|
||||
<p>She hesitated, sighed, shook her head. “I do not know, Ioan.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey nodded.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey nodded, letting the subject drop. It didn’t seem open to discussion.</p>
|
||||
<p>May picked up a plate of mashed potatoes and asparagus, shooing em back to the dining room table. “I just think that she has become so singular a person that she cannot but be controlled by Jonas. Her role in guiding the System is no less real; she did the work that she does and she did it both well and proudly. But she built herself into a tool without realizing it, and over the centuries, Jonas has been teaching himself to use that to his advantage, to use her as a tool.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“And rounding her out more with merges would help make her more of a generalist?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Laughing, she set her plate down, tugged out her chair, and fell heavily into it. “Generalist is a very utilitarian way to put it. You are not wrong in that it would allow her to be more than a unitasker, but it would also make her more of a person, harder to control. Someone as focused as her is easy to pin down.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -99,7 +99,7 @@
|
|||
<p>True Name nodded. “Yes. Now, fuck off.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Righto!” He turned and winked to May, adding, “So wonderful to see you again. Cannot say I share your taste in partners, but times change, I suppose. Mx. Bălan, I look forward to speaking soon.”</p>
|
||||
<p>And with that, he stepped out of the sim.</p>
|
||||
<p>May’s shoulders slumped. She let go of eir hand, moved over to kneel beside True Name, and hugged around her shoulders. “I am sorry, my dear.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May’s shoulders slumped. She let go of eir hand, padded over to kneel beside True Name, and hugged around her shoulders. “I am sorry, my dear.”</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name did not return the gesture. No surprise, perhaps; neither she nor End Waking were all that big on touch. Instead she said, “I apologize, you two. I do not know how they got the address to the sim.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ioan cursed. “Guess that does mean it’s compromised.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She nodded.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -147,7 +147,7 @@
|
|||
<p>Still grinning, True Name nodded. “That is quite enough of the topic, yes. I am going to go outside for a bit and then I am going to go to bed.”</p>
|
||||
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|
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|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-15</p>
|
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|
|||
<p>Ey imagined that she must have made it into bed at some point, though she still woke well before them, as when they finally managed to pry themselves out of bed, there were two steaming coffee mugs sitting on the edge of the kitchen counter, one black and one sweet and creamy, and the skunk was once more sitting outside on the chair, tail wrapped around her feet and coffee held against her chest.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ioan sent her a gentle sensorium ping, just to let her know that they were awake, then sat at eir desk. Ey had no clue where to even begin, but if nothing else, ey had to have something comforting in front of em, something known. </p>
|
||||
<p>“Well, nothing for it,” ey mumbled, swiped a new notebook into being, and began to compile notes from the last few weeks. The work ey’d already done on the topic was useful enough, but it was starting to feel like it was not directed enough in the face of all that had happened.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey began with a timeline, starting all the way back at the arrival of the Artemisians and that first meeting with True Name. Then followed the list of the times they’d met for coffee through the years. Ey dug through eir memories for any that stood out as particularly interesting. These were primarily early on, ey found, when they were still feeling out each others’ boundaries, though the last few before the assassination attempt held some fascinating insights in the context of all that had happened since, as well.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey began with a timeline, starting all the way back at the arrival of the Artemisians and that first meeting with True Name, then followed with a list of the times they’d met for coffee through the years. Ey dug through eir memories for any that stood out as particularly interesting. These were primarily early on, ey found, when they were still feeling out each others’ boundaries, though the last few before the assassination attempt held some fascinating insights in the context of all that had happened since, as well.</p>
|
||||
<p>There was also information to fill in on the master timeline for the <em>History</em>, as well. Information about Zacharias, about Jonas, about End Waking’s divergence from True Name.</p>
|
||||
<p>Finally, the last almost three weeks were laid out in much finer detail. The assassination attempt, the clearing of the house, the meeting with End Waking, all the way up through the meeting with Zacharias the night before.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Ioaaan,” May whined, pawing feebly at eir arm. “Hungryyy.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -42,7 +42,7 @@ Ey chose the last of the poor skunk’s risotto, added a healthy dusting of
|
|||
<p>“Please,” she said gratefully.</p>
|
||||
<p>The three of them stood and walked into her room. Ey was somewhat crestfallen to see that ey really had just mirrored the view out of her window, as there was the chair she had been sitting in before lunch. That would mean ey’d have to place the new plot of land first, then modify the house again.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ah well, easy enough.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey dumped a chunk of reputation into the purchase of the environment. Ey had plenty of reputation to spend and it wasn’t very pricey, but it was still a noticeable ding, and ey was sure that Jonas would be keeping tabs on eir acquisitions. There was nothing to be done about it, though.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey dumped a chunk of reputation into the purchase of the environment. Ey had plenty to spend and it wasn’t very pricey, but it was still a noticeable ding, and ey was sure that Jonas would be keeping tabs on eir acquisitions. There was nothing to be done about it, though.</p>
|
||||
<p>The environment landed on eir mind much as a pending merge might, demanding to be placed somewhere. Ey instructed the sim to put it in the corner formed by the fence of their yard and True Name’s bedroom, expanded to be a mile on a side.</p>
|
||||
<p>Once the pressure of the environment left eir mind, ey was free to instruct the sim to let the window view the new land, and from there to add an extension of the balcony, a second stairway down, and a door leading out from her room to the balcony.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey slid the door open, beckoning to the two skunks. “Alright, let’s head out and check on it.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -58,13 +58,13 @@ Ey chose the last of the poor skunk’s risotto, added a healthy dusting of
|
|||
<p>May, who had been quiet up until then, said, “Thank you for coming back.”</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name tilted her head. “It was not safe there, May Then My Name. This will be better.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yes, but thank you all the same.” She laughed and waved a hand. “I am sorry, disregard me. I am still not yet at baseline and it has me feeling emotional.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The other skunk’s expression softened and she leaned forward to give one of her paws a squeeze. It looked stiff and awkward, but it was at least an attempt at a gesture that was more in line with May’s mode of interacting.</p>
|
||||
<p>The other skunk’s expression softened and she leaned forward to give one of her paws a squeeze. It looked stiff and forced, but it was at least an attempt at a gesture that was more in line with May’s mode of interacting.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I understand. I do not think I am there, yet, myself. I will see you at dinner, yes?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ioan and May both nodded and made their goodbyes. As a last concession to giving the skunk privacy, ey made a small gate in the fence leading into their yard so that they wouldn’t have to go through her room if they needed to go out into her plain for any reason. It meant pushing through lilac bushes, but ey figured it’d be rarely used.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Can you work on the beanbag, Ioan?” May asked once they were back inside.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Sure. Need some pets?”</p>
|
||||
<p>She nodded.</p>
|
||||
<p>Asking how she was feeling felt counter to simply providing what she’d asked for — something ey enjoyed plenty, as well — so they made themselves comfortable on the amorphous cushion. It didn’t seem to be time for talking at all, so they settled on soft music instead.</p>
|
||||
<p>Asking how she was feeling felt counter to simply providing what she’d requested — something ey enjoyed plenty, as well — so they made themselves comfortable on the amorphous cushion. It didn’t seem to be time for talking at all, so they settled on soft music instead.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey wasn’t sure what May was doing, whether it was simply soaking up the affection and close proximity or some more thoughtful task. For eir part, though, ey went back to work on organizing events as they’d happened. Who knew what would come next.</p>
|
||||
<hr />
|
||||
<!-- maybe -->
|
||||
|
|
@ -75,7 +75,7 @@ Ey chose the last of the poor skunk’s risotto, added a healthy dusting of
|
|||
<p>“Are they not working together?” May asked.</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name leaned back against the couch and stared out the picture windows into the yard for a few minutes as she thought. “Perhaps not, no,” she said at last. “It is difficult to reconcile those two parts of me. They are arguing, in a way. Each is strident in their belief, and some higher part of me will occasionally get stuck trying to get them to just settle down and fucking agree on a course of action or the next sentence or whatever it may be.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ioan nodded, saying, “Sort of like Michelle and Sasha?”</p>
|
||||
<p>She shook her head. “No, not quite like that, thankfully. There are some similarities — the sense of there being two parts of me, the internal split — but it is lacking the dire nature, whatever it was that made her completely helpless before the duality of her self. It is still something that I have some visibility into. I can respond as True Name would or as End Waking would, but I am still just me, and I am learning to unify those natures. I will perhaps never be singular, but I will doubtless unify into a synthesis before long, just not yet.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She shook her head. “No, not quite like that, thankfully. There are some similarities — the sense of there being two parts of me, the internal split — but it is lacking the dire nature, whatever it was that made her completely helpless before the duality of her self. It is still something that I have some visibility into. I can respond as True Name would or as End Waking would, but I am still just me, and I am learning to unify those natures. I will perhaps never be singular, but I will doubtless unify into a synthesis before long. Just not yet.”</p>
|
||||
<!-- somewhere in here, talk about the fact that EW got in touch with her -->
|
||||
|
||||
<p>May fiddled with eir sweater vest from where she lay against em. “I will admit that, for a while there, I was considering merging down with you before I saw how poorly End Waking’s merge went.” After the silence stretched out, she laughed nervously, adding, “Sorry, I suppose that is a pretty awkward thing to say.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -120,7 +120,7 @@ Ey chose the last of the poor skunk’s risotto, added a healthy dusting of
|
|||
<p>She laughed and nodded to em. “Yes, of course. There is much to think about.”</p>
|
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@ -33,7 +33,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“After that second coffee, yes,” May said.</p>
|
||||
<p>Breakfast, it turned out, was a Scandinavian affair, or so ey imagined. Dense, dark bread, a tray of cheeses and meats, and a separate tray of vegetables both pickled and fresh. It was strange to call a meal such as breakfast ‘refreshing’, but the word fit quite well. Quite good, and both of the skunks certainly seemed to appreciate it, eating the lion’s share of the food, though May also swiped up a side plate of bacon to go with it.</p>
|
||||
<p>May nodded towards True Name, grinning. “Alright. Payment accepted. You may begin.”</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name nodded. “I had an idea as I was walking last night. Or perhaps it is only a sliver of an idea. I suspect that it will not even get me out of whatever it is that he has planned, but if might soften the blow.”</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name nodded. “I had an idea as I was walking last night. Or perhaps it is only a sliver of an idea. I suspect that it will not even get me out of whatever it is that he has planned, but it might soften the blow.”</p>
|
||||
<p>They both nodded.</p>
|
||||
<p>“My guess is that, if he wants me to ‘step aside’, as Zacharias said, then he would like me to truly disappear. He would like me to essentially never be seen again.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Thus the assassination attempt,” Ioan said.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -67,7 +67,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“Too <em>much?</em> How on Earth did that work?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I was a fucking mess at all times. I cried at the drop of a hat.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“You still cry a lot,” ey observed, then laughed when she poked at eir knee.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yes, well. I had attributed it at the time to simply being torn up over no longer being in a relationship. My fork was happy, I was heartbroken. In the end, though, I think that my goals were starting to drift from hers. I was diverging in more fundamental ways than either of us had expected.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yes, well. I had attributed it at the time to simply being torn up over no longer being in a relationship. My fork was happy, I was heartbroken. In the end, though, I think that my goals were starting to drift from True Name’s. I was diverging in more fundamental ways than either of us had expected.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“And the next time she asked, you just said ‘no’?”</p>
|
||||
<p>She nodded. “She asked me to consider it, and then the topic simply never came up again. I think that she was already expecting to write me off after the merge in systime 31.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Did she wind up expressing her own emotions differently from that merge?”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -77,7 +77,7 @@
|
|||
<p>Ey shrugged. “I hadn’t gotten that far in the thought process. Is it something you’re still uncomfortable with?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I do not know, my dear. If you had asked me just then, I would have said no. If you had asked me five minutes before then, I would have said yes.” She patted eir knee, smiling. “But I will endeavor not to snap at you either way. How about you, though?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Much the same, I think. Your answer has me wondering, though, if she was more intentional about a merge like that, it could work. She could have some of your memories of emotions that she thinks might help while still respecting your privacy.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“And that is why I did not snap at you. It is a good point, my dear. There is no need for her to have all of my memories wholesale, and with what memories and personality traits and whatever else goes along with a merge, she would hopefully wind up with a synthesis as she says, rather than a replacement. She would still have all 226 years of being True Name, and all those years of being End Waking, just that she would also have some of me in there.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“And that is why I did not snap at you. It is a good point, my dear. There is no need for her to have all of my memories wholesale, and with what memories and personality traits and whatever else goes along with a merge, she would hopefully wind up with a synthesis, as she says, rather than a replacement. She would still have all 226 years of being True Name, and all those years of being End Waking, just that she would also have some of me in there.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Is that something you could talk her through?”</p>
|
||||
<p>She looked thoughtfully out into the yard, at the faint greening of the lilac branches. “Perhaps, yes. We would have to be very deliberate about it, but it should be possible.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey nodded, watching the skunk’s gaze drift in and out of focus, the way she would occasionally chew on her lip when thinking. Watched, and thought about what such a synthesis would look like. There wouldn’t be any concrete changes in eir partner, but what would this new restless, unsettled True Name look like with yet more memory heaped onto her? Ey knew ey could never know the whole of May and that ey was biased besides, but she seemed so much more happy and comfortable than her down-tree instance, even before End Waking’s merger. More comfortable, feeling less of a need to dump all of her energy into forward motion. What would that look like with True Name?</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -114,7 +114,7 @@
|
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<p>“Well,” True Name said, shrugging. “Fuck it.”</p>
|
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</article>
|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-13</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
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|
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<p>“Perhaps you will learn from your merge,” End Waking said.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Perhaps. Perhaps it will become a part of me, perhaps it will live within me alongside that of you and that of True Name.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Still feeling fractured?” Ioan asked.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I am of two minds, Ioan. I do not know if I will feel… I do not know. I am not comfortable speaking further on this just yet.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I am of two minds, Ioan. I do not know if I will feel…I do not know. I am not comfortable speaking further on this just yet.”</p>
|
||||
<p>They spent the rest of the night in quiet, May leaning against eir side while True Name and End Waking spoke quietly about the plain and the forest.</p>
|
||||
<p>Finally, though, a week to the day after the decision had been made, Ioan awoke to find May and True Name already sitting at the table, speaking earnestly in a cone of silence. Once they noticed em, True Name waved it away and May grinned, saying, “Sorry, my dear. We did not want to wake you.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey poured emself a cup of coffee before joining them. “Appreciate it. Hope I’m not interrupting.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -93,7 +93,7 @@
|
|||
<p>It was more than an hour before May forked beside em, took eir hand, and led em from the room. Neither of the skunks on the bed had moved or made a sound other than May asking True Name if she was okay at one point and the other skunk shaking her head.</p>
|
||||
<p>Once the door was shut behind them, May let out a shaky sigh and padded over to the kitchen. “That was very hard.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Why, do you think?” ey asked.</p>
|
||||
<p>The skunk took a moment to pour herself a glass of water before replying. “I want to be here with you, and I also want to be in there with her, and I also want to go back in time and tell her I do not want to merge, and I also want to go back in time and merge instead of End Waking, and…a-and…”</p>
|
||||
<p>She took a moment to pour herself a glass of water before replying. “I want to be here with you, and I also want to be in there with her, and I also want to go back in time and tell her I do not want to merge, and I also want to go back in time and merge instead of End Waking, and…a-and…”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Come here, May.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She clutched the water to her chest with both paws, stumbling blindly around the kitchen counter so that ey could guide her to the beanbag.</p>
|
||||
<p>She sat down and let Ioan rub her back. Only once she could manage a sip or two of water, she said, voice hoarse, “Did I fuck up, Ioan?”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -109,7 +109,7 @@
|
|||
<p>The skunk rolled until her face was nearly pressed against eir belly to let em pet. “I do not know,” she mumbled. “I do not think even she knows.”</p>
|
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</article>
|
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<footer>
|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-23</p>
|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
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@ -24,7 +24,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“Would it make sense if I added a cot or something in there? I could at least sleep nearby.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She perked up and tilted her head. “One moment. Or…well, come with me.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May led em to True Name’s room where the skunk was slouched over on the bed, head resting in the other instance of May’s lap, the two of them tucked into the nest of pillows in the corner.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Let me reduce–” The May who had stayed with Ioan quit, leaving the other instance of her to quickly incorporate the merge and continued, “–conflicts. True Name, are you able to speak?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Let me reduce–” The May who had stayed with Ioan quit, leaving the other instance of her to quickly incorporate the merge and continue, “–conflicts. True Name, are you able to speak?”</p>
|
||||
<p>The answer was a long time coming. “Some,” she croaked.</p>
|
||||
<p>May nodded. “I am not going to leave, but it is getting close to bedtime. I am also not comfortable not being near Ioan. May ey sleep in here with us?”</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name slowly rolled her head to the side enough to squint at Ioan through one eye. Her cheek-fur was a mess of tear tracks. “Ioan?”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -53,7 +53,7 @@
|
|||
<p><em>“Think it’s overriding the bits of her and End Waking that aren’t keen on touch?”</em> ey asked.</p>
|
||||
<p><em>“Must be.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p><em>“How are you doing with it?”</em></p>
|
||||
<p>She sighed, at which True Name squinted up to her, then over to Ioan, offering a faint smile before settling back into processing.</p>
|
||||
<p>She sighed, at which True Name squinted up to her, then over to Ioan, offering a weak smile before settling back into processing.</p>
|
||||
<p><em>“I do not know, my dear. It has activated all of my care instincts, so I am happy to make her comfortable in all of the ways I know how. It helps, then, that those are all of the ways she knows now, too, or at least is learning. If I focus on that, I feel very positive. It is only when I get distracted and ruminating that I begin to spiral. It is more comfortable for me to focus on caring for someone now than it is to think about boundaries or Zacharias or Jonas.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p>Ey kissed between May’s ears, murmuring, “You’re a good person, May.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The skunk lifted her snout to tuck it up under eir chin.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -81,13 +81,13 @@
|
|||
<p>“No. The message was individual-eyes-only. I haven’t even shown May.” After a moment’s thought, ey added, “But I can unlock it for you, if you want. It’s in an exo I haven’t looked at since.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Sweep the whole sim,” she snapped.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey nodded, swept the sim of everyone but the three of them, and instructed the perisystem architecture to print out the <em>0 individuals swept</em> receipt onto a slip of foolscap, which ey handed over.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Move back, May Then My Name,” she instructed, quieter this time. When the skunk obliged, she crawled closer to em and set up a cone of silence with secure visual ACLs. She was panting and shaking, though ey was pleased to see that at least the anger that had swelled briefly had subsided once more into something more manageable. Ey didn’t think any of them were up for a shouting match. Once she’d knelt beside em, whispered, “Show me.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Move back, May Then My Name,” she instructed, quieter this time. When May obliged, the skunk crawled closer to em and set up a cone of silence with secure visual ACLs. She was panting and shaking, though ey was pleased to see that at least the anger that had swelled briefly had subsided once more into something more manageable. Ey didn’t think any of them were up for a shouting match. Once she’d knelt beside em, whispered, “Show me.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey drew the sheet out of the air, holding it up for True Name to see the fully redacted text, then unlocked it for her eyes only and handed it over.</p>
|
||||
<p>She read it through top to bottom a few times, set it down and kneaded her paws against her face, then picked it up to read it once more.</p>
|
||||
<p>Finally, shoulders sagging, she handed it back. “Re-secure it and destroy it, please.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey did so and held up eir hands. “I’m sorry, True–“</p>
|
||||
<p>She patted eir arm with a shaking paw. “Please do not apologize.” After dropping the cone of silence, she continued, “I should have…I should have learned from…I am sorry.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May held out a paw once more, and this time True Name took it, letting herself be guided back to the nest of pillows, where she slumped down once more, expression glassy. “Could themself have peeped — And seen my Brain — go round —,” she mumbled.</p>
|
||||
<p>May held out a paw once more, and this time True Name took it, letting herself be guided back to the nest of pillows, where she slumped down once more, expression glassy. “Could themself have peeped — And seen my Brain — go round —” she mumbled.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Rest, my dear. It is okay,” May said quietly. “Do you want company?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Too much…but I…” After a shuddering breath, she shook her head. “I will…be fine. We will speak later.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May nodded and crawled back over to Ioan, nudging em to lay down so that she could tuck in against eir front. She remained tense, and when ey sent a gentle sensorium ping, she sniffled and shook her head.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -98,7 +98,7 @@
|
|||
<p>Warmer than expected, perhaps. May was still in eir arms, as usual, but the position felt off with the addition of a second warm bulk.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey tried to puzzle it out through the fog of doziness that still surrounded em. Eventually, ey gave up and levered eir eyes open, blinking a few times to bring the world into focus.</p>
|
||||
<p>At some point in the night, True Name had apparently rolled over and wound up curled in May’s arms, much as she was curled in eirs, and with with eir arm resting atop May’s, ey was left hugging two skunks.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey lay there for a while, groggily trying to piece together eir thoughts on the situation. As far as ey could remember, in eir still sleep-addled state, ey’d never been this close to True Name before. There had been the occasional casual touch, a few touches out of necessity — grabbing her hand to get away from Guōweī, lifting her after End Waking’s merge — but even going back to when ey’d first met her, there’d been very little touch. It made sense, given her personality, and yet here she was, all cuddled up with the two of them. If nothing else, ey should probably decide whether or not to extricate eir arm from the situation to ease that awkwardness.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey lay there for a while, groggily trying to piece together eir thoughts on the situation. As far as ey could remember in eir still sleep-addled state, ey’d never been this close to True Name before. There had been the occasional casual touch, a few touches out of necessity — grabbing her hand to get away from Guōweī, lifting her after End Waking’s merge — but even going back to when ey’d first met her, there’d been very little touch. It made sense, given her personality, and yet here she was, all cuddled up with the two of them. If nothing else, ey should probably decide whether or not to extricate eir arm from the situation to ease that awkwardness.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ah well, ey was probably worrying too much about this, just laying there and ruminating.</p>
|
||||
<p><em>“You almost certainly are, Mx. Bălan,”</em> came the barest whisper of a sensorium message. <em>“Especially if you are mumbling.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p>Ey jolted at the words impinging on eir senses, getting a sleepy grumble out of May.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -153,7 +153,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“It’s really gratifying to see it going so much more smoothly this time.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Agreed, yes,” she said between sips. “I was not expecting her to turn into a cuddlebug, but I suppose that will level out before long. Was that awkward, this morning?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey shrugged. “A little, I guess. Just hard making it work in my head. Doesn’t fit with what I remember of her.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I cannot picture you getting cozy with <em>just</em> True Name, no. I can barely picture her getting cozy with anyone, and that is certainly not even bringing End Waking’s general touch aversion into the equation.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I cannot picture you getting cozy with <em>just</em> True Name, no. I can barely picture her getting cozy with anyone, and that is certainly not even bringing End Waking’s general touch-aversion into the equation.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’d assume she got cozy with Zacharias, if they were together.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May’s expression soured. “We will need to talk about him soon, but I cannot talk about him now.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Of course.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -218,7 +218,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“Of course, my dear,” May said, giving her paw a squeeze. “Go and walk. There will be time for discussions to come, especially once we are finished with this unpleasant political business.”</p>
|
||||
</article>
|
||||
<footer>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-23</p>
|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
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@ -60,7 +60,7 @@
|
|||
<p>The skunk smiled faintly. “Twenty minutes’ walk up-river, then. He will know that you are coming.”</p>
|
||||
<p>After End Waking quit, Debarre started to trudge up the faint trail that they’d already worn heading up along the river.</p>
|
||||
<p>He knew that May Then My Name was right, that he probably needed to at least take into account that if Sasha and Michelle could change enough to make the Odists, then surely True Name could change enough to become someone that even her up-tree instances could like, just as he knew that he probably shouldn’t take that out on his boyfriend, frustrated as he was.</p>
|
||||
<p>Still, it was hard to square the image of End Waking and True Name meeting up voluntarily. What was it that he’d said when Ioan had come by asking after camping supplies? <em>“I will help but I will not speak with her”</em>?</p>
|
||||
<p>Still, it was hard to square the image of End Waking and True Name meeting up voluntarily. What was it that he’d said when Ioan had come by asking after camping supplies? <em>“I need to be better to her than she might be to me”</em>?</p>
|
||||
<p><em>Remember that you love him,</em> he thought, even as he trudged up the path. <em>Even if you’re working to undermine all that shit that she’s done with Jonas, at least you still love E.W.</em></p>
|
||||
<p>The skunk was crouching at the edge of the stream, washing his paws after having apparently just finished gutting a trio of large trout.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I understand if you are upset, Debarre,” he said, keeping his gaze on his paws as he scrubbed rather than looking up to him.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -91,7 +91,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“I have never caught anyone hitchhiking on you, though I have on May Then My Name and Ioan.” He shrugged, gathered up the line of fish. “But speaking of fat, can we go back to cook these? I am not ready for you to stay over, but I would like to eat dinner with you, if you are up for it.”</p>
|
||||
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|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-15</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
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@ -32,7 +32,7 @@
|
|||
<p>End Waking shrugged. “You know more than I on that end. I do not keep up with either LV beyond what you and Ioan care to pass on. There are messages from the clade, but you know my feelings on them.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Mmhm.” Debarre hesitated, then added, “Though if you do wind up going through them and come across any juicy details about those politics you don’t care about, you could always share them with me.”</p>
|
||||
<p>He laughed and shook his head. “Should my life become so boring, you will have more to worry about, my love. I am better at being a pest than you give me credit for.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Fine, fine. I’ll just get them from May Then My Name.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Fine. I’ll just get them from May Then My Name.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“You will have to put up with her ceaseless flirting.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Debarre grinned. “I’m pretty well used to it by now. You’re really going to go to this thing, though?”</p>
|
||||
<p>End Waking nodded, chewing on a mouthful of tisane-bits. “Yes.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -63,7 +63,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“I will.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“And call if you need?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Debarre, shut up,” End Waking said, patting his knee. “Go. I will keep you up to date.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Fine, fine.” He gave the skunk’s paw a squeeze and grinned. “Love you.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Okay, okay, I’m going.” He gave the skunk’s paw a squeeze and grinned. “Love you.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Love you too.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Debarre quit, rather than bothering with stepping back home. The pile of experiences caught his down-tree instance in the middle of a sentence — thankfully something unimportant — and he had to spend a minute reconciling the memories with the ones he’d made since.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Well, that was interesting.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -71,7 +71,7 @@
|
|||
<p>He laughed. “You’re right to worry. Shit’s gonna get really weird here. Life’ll get both more and less simple real quick.”</p>
|
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|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-13</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
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@ -41,7 +41,7 @@
|
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<p>Ey liked it immensely.</p>
|
||||
<p>The busiest section of the library was far and away the wing that had been built to house the massive information dump from Artemis. This took the form of a squat, pentagonal building — one wall for each Artemisian race and one for their shared knowledge — that bored its way deep into the ground, a slow-sloping spiral winding down along the shelves to allow visitors to browse their way back in time until, at the very bottom, only firstrace had any material. Translation efforts were still underway, but there was more to read every day.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey stayed away from this for the day. Ey wanted cozy, not awe-inspiring.</p>
|
||||
<p>Eventually, having loaded up on a few random finds — trashy sci-fi, some contemporary phys-side fiction from decades after ey’d uploaded, even a bit of furry fiction from early in the 21st century ey considered bringing home to show May — ey parked emself in the glass garden and arrayed the books out before em on the table.</p>
|
||||
<p>Finally, having loaded up on a few random finds — trashy sci-fi, some contemporary phys-side fiction from decades after ey’d uploaded, even a bit of furry fiction from early in the 21st century ey considered bringing home to show May — ey parked emself in the glass garden and arrayed the books out before em on the table.</p>
|
||||
<p>The sci-fi proved to be a little <em>too</em> trashy for eir tastes, and while the contemporary fiction was certainly intriguing, it was far too dense for reading when ey was trying to have a lighter, easier day. The furry book struck a nice middle-ground, at least, even if ey couldn’t keep the species straight in eir head.</p>
|
||||
<p>Eventually, though, ey gave up and just sat in the sun, watching the way it filtered through the glass leaves and branches of the trees.</p>
|
||||
<p><em>No better way to realize just how tense you are than by relaxing,</em> ey thought. </p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -150,7 +150,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“I’m sorry, True Name, that sounds…I don’t even know. Impossible.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Oh, no, do not get me wrong,” she said, smiling. “It is not unpleasant. It is not what I — or even May — wanted, but it does not feel like a bad thing. It is difficult, however, as some contexts remain confusing. You are one of those contexts, Ioan.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Not knowing what to say to that, ey simply nodded, feeling the flush of warmth to eir cheeks.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yes, see? Look at you.” She laughed. “It is complex for all of us. We are all hyper-aware of boundaries, not even wishing to test them. May is…of me, and now I am of her, so that boundary is smaller between us, perhaps, but we are all three very aware of <em>your</em> boundaries.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yes, see? Look at you.” She laughed. “It is complex for all of us. We are all hyper-aware of boundaries, not even wishing to test them. May is…<em>of</em> me, and now I am of her, so that boundary is smaller between us, perhaps, but we are all three very aware of <em>your</em> boundaries.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“You’re telling me,” ey said, smiling cautiously. “Every time I think about it, I just wind up feeling super awkward and freeze up, so I have no clue as to how to even begin to approach it.”</p>
|
||||
<p><span id="cuddle"></span>“Well, here. May I sit next to you? If it is awkward, then it is awkward. If we find a boundary, we will discuss it, but then at least we will know and quit fucking tiptoeing around the topic, yes?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey stiffened, trying to cover a wave of anxiety with a chuckle. “Uh…well, sure.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -217,11 +217,13 @@
|
|||
<p>She laughed, shaking her head. “I do not think I ever will, but there is little that I can do to change that. I will change and he will do whatever the fuck he wants and I will do my best to wash my hands of it. Will you be ready?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Sure. I do not imagine my part in it will be big. Just be there to witness, perhaps lose an instance if he decides to go after us, too. Have you spoken with End Waking?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I sent him a simplex message,” she said. “I will ping again tomorrow if he has not replied.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“If he has not had another tree fall on him,” May grumbled. “And you, Ioan?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“If he has not had another tree fall on him,” May grumbled.</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name winced. “A truly unpleasant experience.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“And you, Ioan?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey shrugged. “I’ve got my notes all in order. I don’t want to do it at all, but I’m ready, I guess. Did you talk with Debarre about this?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“No. I…well, he is not ready to engage, I think. I would like End Waking to bring it up with him, if possible. I have meddled a bit much of late.”</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name smirked, leaned over and tugged at May’s tail. “You have, yes.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May pulled her tail around to hug it protectively. “Yes, yes. I know. I am perhaps as struck by the need to help as Ioan.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May pulled her tail around to hug it protectively. “I know. I am perhaps as struck by the need to help as Ioan.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The conversation trailed off from there, Ioan and May cozying up and chatting via sensorium messages once True Name had started to doze, using May’s thigh as a pillow. She caught em up on gossip from Debarre — one of his boyfriends visited and was, apparently, quite the looker — and ey accused her of leaving em for the weasel, as ey always did when she visited him.</p>
|
||||
<p>Eventually, even they fell to silence, and when May started to nod off as well, ey roused the two skunks. “Come on, beds are comfier than couches.”</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name nodded groggily and stood, swaying for a moment before gaining her balance once more. “Thank you two for talking this evening.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -236,9 +238,9 @@
|
|||
<p>Ey stretched out on eir back and stared up at the ceiling, letting May settle in against eir side to use eir shoulder as a pillow. “As nerve-wracking as it was in the moment, I think I’m just…over it. Maybe it’s the fact that my introduction to your stanza was through you getting all cuddly that it just doesn’t feel like a huge deal to me.” Ey ducked eir chin to kiss atop her snout. “Though obviously it’s complicated, since that led to you and I getting together, but you’re also just a cuddly person all around.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She tucked her snout up under eir chin, rubbing it against eir jaw at the ticklish kiss. “I am, at that. What do you mean by ‘over it’, though?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I guess after a certain point, it just felt like the anxiety about touch was wildly out of proportion to whatever worries I had. We have other friends we get cozy with.” Ey grinned, adding, “She just about fell over when she tried to sit on the beanbag. Would’ve been funny if she hadn’t also started panicking.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I think she is struggling with touch-hunger, yes.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I think she is struggling with touch-hunger.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“She said as much, yeah.” Ey shrugged, then mumbled an apology for jostling her. “I guess I’m just used to the fact that one just pets skunks.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“That is just what one does,” May asserted. “And, I will note, not what you are doing right now.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“That is just what one does,” May asserted. “And not, I will note, what you are doing right now.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey laughed and ruffled a hand over her ears before petting the fur down again. “Fine, fine. But that’s what I mean, I guess. It’s just how skunks are, in my experience. I’m sure some of it’s my denseness around this sort of thing at play, but what made me anxious was her freaking out. She’s done a pretty good job of taking our concerns to heart, but I hadn’t picked up on her own anxieties until then. I’m over it, but she clearly isn’t.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Well, perhaps all of our preparations only made her more anxious,” May mumbled, chin dipped low as ey rubbed behind her ears. “She still has all of those memories of solitude and professionalism, as well.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Given what True Name had said in confidence, ey could certainly imagine a boundary around physicality being tested even in the slightest pushing the May portion of her back and letting that of End Waking or True Name come to the fore. Ey supposed, had ey internalized that better beforehand, the conversation that had followed her spike in anxiety would have been different, and perhaps more productive. Ey could have spoken to her as ey might have spoken to True Name <em>qua</em> True Name, rather than as ey might to May — even if that original version of her was, as she had said, dead.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -248,7 +250,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“A context shift between me and True Name.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Oh, damn.” Ey rubbed eir hands over eir face and groaned. “Sorry, May. Uh, it was about something True Name shared in confidence.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She frowned, nodded. “I will not ask you to betray that, of course.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Maybe I’m more stressed than I’m giving myself credit for, if my mumbling’s getting bad enough to break someone’s confidence.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Maybe I’m more stressed than I’m giving myself credit for, if my mumbling’s getting this bad.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The skunk’s expression softened and she leaned forward to touch her nose to eirs. “I do not blame you. There is so much going on these days.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey pressed eir nose to hers before leaning back and nodding. “Right, and I feel like it’s all super important all the time. Oh well. What were you going to say? If I can respond, I will.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May shook her head, and nudged em to lay back down. “No, it is okay. Whether or not you answer is probably too much information to share. I think we are both perhaps too stressed to continue, anyway.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -256,7 +258,7 @@
|
|||
<p>She laughed and squirmed back against em. “You are an enormous nerd and I love you a lot, Ionuț. I would, but you would just mumble more, I am sure.”</p>
|
||||
</article>
|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-13</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
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<article class="content">
|
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<hr />
|
||||
<p>Ioan had never been one for bars. Ey knew that there was an enormous variety of them, that doubtless some would play to eir aesthetic and likes — the one at the base of the System Central Library came quite close — and that not all of them subscribed to the “if it’s louder, that means everyone’s having more fun” school of design.</p>
|
||||
<p>There was just something about the idea. Too much that took place in bars was, at best, confusing. At worst, it was distressing. Ey had no desire to be around the types of drunkenness that bars seemed to attract. May had a list of types of drunkenness she’d gotten from somewhere, ey knew, and ey didn’t like any of them.</p>
|
||||
<p>There was just something about the idea. Too much that took place in bars was, at best, confusing. At worst, it was distressing. Ey had no desire to be around the types of intoxication that bars seemed to attract. May had a list of types of drunkenness she’d gotten from somewhere, ey knew, and ey didn’t like any of them.</p>
|
||||
<p>Still, this is where Jonas had requested that they meet when ey messaged him.</p>
|
||||
<p>The venue was of the sultry, dark, wood-paneled variety, with warm, dim lamps hanging pendant over each of the tables and a row of lights above the bar itself. Conversations were kept low by the dimness, with groups of three or four huddled in booths while those at the bar drank alone.</p>
|
||||
<p>Doubtless Jonas knew of eir distaste, as well, and doubtless this had factored into his decision on venue for this pre-meeting meeting. Ah well, at least it wasn’t a club.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -64,21 +64,21 @@
|
|||
<p>“I think you will.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“And why’s that?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Because you love to hear yourself talk,” ey said. “And because Zacharias is right. This is almost cartoonishly evil, and villains love talking about their grand schemes. I’m ready for your monologue.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Jonas raised his eyebrows and a slow grin spread over his features. That feverish glint ey’d seen last time shone through for a moment before it was suppressed again. The idea that Jonas might be losing it made em anxious. <em>Stretched too thin, maybe?</em> ey thought.</p>
|
||||
<p>Jonas raised his eyebrows and a slow grin spread over his features. That feverish glint ey’d seen last time shone through for a moment before it was suppressed again. The idea that Jonas might be losing it made em anxious. <em>Stretched too thin, maybe?</em></p>
|
||||
<p>“You see, this is why I like you, Ioan,” Jonas said. “The whole Bălan clade, that is. You hit that sweet spot between patient and impatient where you can stay calm, but you don’t just wait forever.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey waited.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Alright, then, a bit of a preview.” He finished half of his drink in a few swallows. “There’s a bunch of changes coming in the pipeline–“</p>
|
||||
<p>“This AVEC?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Zacharias frowned, but Jonas was already nodding, “Got it in one. That’s right at the top of the list. See, the LVs are too far away to communicate effectively with phys-side and getting further every day, and that puts us in a unique position, here. Suddenly, we differ from the LVs in a fundamental way. I really can’t overstate how big of a deal this is, Ioan.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Suddenly we have to prove our greener grass to those phys-side.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Right. The direction that we need to take with Lagrange can’t just be the same old one we’ve been taking before. In this, True Name and I disagreed.” He shrugged, rocking his glass gently back and forth on the table before taking another sip. “She wanted to continue on her path of subtlety, I disagreed.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Right. The direction that we need to take with Lagrange can’t just be the same old one we’ve been taking before. In this, True Name and I differ.” He shrugged, rocking his glass gently back and forth on the table before taking another sip. “She wanted to continue on her path of subtlety, I disagreed.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey snorted. “Disagreed? You tried to assassinate her, Jonas.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“What are bullets but a disagreement?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ioan rolled eir eyes.</p>
|
||||
<p>“You and I disagree, then. It’s like I said, though, sometimes mommies and daddies fight, Ioan. We’ve spent the past few years trying to hash it out. For all her focus on subtlety in guiding the System, she can be a real bitch when it comes to trying to get her point across.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Bullshit,” ey said flatly.</p>
|
||||
<p>Jonas laughed. “Oh?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yeah. A few reasons.” Ey started ticking off points on eir fingers as ey spoke. “First, True Name didn’t start down this path in the last few years that we’ve been learning from Artemis; she was a mess when she first got in touch with us with Codrin#Castor’s first letter during convergence, so things were already in motion then. Second, The Guiding Council on Pollux is almost twenty years old now, predating the arrival of the Artemisians by nearly ten years, and I think that’s because third, you–” Ey nodded to Zacharias. “–apparently dropped everything on her across all three systems at the same time not that long after the launch. You two got more openly together on Pollux, and as far as Codrin#Castor can find in the perisystem, you quit shortly after telling her there. End Waking thinks — and I agree — you’re trying to push each of the Systems in a different direction politically. Maybe you think having different political environments is more stable across societies separated by distance and time. Maybe it’s some giant experiment. Who knows. It’s your long game.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yeah. A few reasons.” Ey started ticking off points on eir fingers as ey spoke. “First, True Name didn’t start down this path in the last few years that we’ve been learning from Artemis; she was a mess when she first got in touch with us with Codrin#Castor’s first letter during convergence, so things were already in motion then. Second, The Guiding Council on Pollux is almost twenty years old now, predating the arrival of the Artemisians by years, and I think that’s because third, you–” Ey nodded to Zacharias. “–apparently dropped everything on her across all three systems at the same time not that long after the launch. You two got more openly together on Pollux, and as far as Codrin#Castor can find in the perisystem, you quit shortly after telling her there. End Waking thinks — and I agree — you’re trying to push each of the Systems in a different direction politically. Maybe you think having different political environments is more stable across societies separated by distance and time. Maybe it’s some giant experiment. Who knows. It’s your long game.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The longer ey spoke, the more serious Jonas’s expression grew, and by the time ey finished, he’d leaned back in his seat. “Well then,” he said. “I suppose I don’t have much more to add, then, do I? I have my conversation with True Name cut out for me.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“And what conversation is that?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Jonas was back to grinning. “Oh, fuck off, Ioan. I’m not going to tell you all of my secrets! We have our shit to work through and you have to be a good little clerk and take all of your notes so that you can come back to me with a story to publish. That’ll seal the deal, and we’ll be ready to go our separate ways.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -118,7 +118,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“And hopefully still a good one, in the end,” May added.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yes. If I am honest, a less than ideal but still good life is far more than I had in front of me even before all of this nonsense.” She smiled wryly. “Perhaps I ought to thank him for that. I am not unhappy with what I have now, even.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The conversation wound down from there, and as evening dimmed into night, they fell into silence. The fire was kept low, only enough light and warmth to keep the dark at bay.</p>
|
||||
<p>Eventually, with eir lower back hurting and May starting to nod off, they made their goodnights. True Name gave May and em a hug around the shoulders and a nose-dot to the cheek in turn and padded off to her tent. End Waking stated that he was going to watch the fire for a while longer and then head to bed himself — he’d set up a tent of his own a ways off from True Name’s for this fork to sleep in — leaving May and Ioan to walk back to the house together in the dark.</p>
|
||||
<p>Eventually, with eir lower back hurting and May starting to nod off, they made their goodnights. True Name gave em and May a hug around the shoulders and a nose-dot to the cheek in turn and padded off to her tent. End Waking stated that he was going to watch the fire for a while longer and then head to bed himself — he’d set up a tent of his own a ways off from True Name’s for this fork to sleep in — leaving May and Ioan to walk back to the house together in the dark.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’m happy to hear her talking about a future,” Ioan said, once they’d cleaned up and made their way to bed, em slouched against the headboard and May in eir lap, slouched against eir front in turn.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I am too, yes. I am pleased that other than a few short fits, she has been at worst determined, and at best hopeful.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey nodded and tucked eir chin up over the skunk’s head. “I think that’s where I am, yeah. I want this over with, and sometimes it even feels like this might even be the best outcome for everyone.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -139,7 +139,7 @@
|
|||
<p>She sat up in eir lap and poked em in the chest with a dull claw. “Rude.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey grinned. “Well, okay, not stress-shedding, just normal shedding.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She scrubbed a paw at her flank until she came up with a little bit of shed fur to sprinkle over eir front. “Yes, yes. But I can say the same for you, my dear. A year ago, I do not think I could have pictured her giving you a goodnight kiss.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Covering for the heat rising to eir cheeks by brushing the errant fur off eir front, ey shrugged. “I’m used to skunks being all touchy, thanks to you.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Covering for the heat rising to eir cheeks by brushing the errant fur off eir front, ey shrugged. “That’s on you. I’m used to skunks being all touchy.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yes, but True Name?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’m not sure she’s that anymore,” ey said carefully. “So I guess you’re right. I couldn’t imagine the True Name of a year ago giving goodnight kisses to anyone, much less you and me.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She grinned, nodding. “Agreed, yes. And you are okay with it?”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -164,7 +164,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“Another time,” ey mumbled, pushing eir face into her soft fur, coarser guard hairs tickling eir cheeks. “I can’t imagine I’m going to be able to sleep tomorrow night, so we might as well get some tonight.”</p>
|
||||
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|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-23</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
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<p>Both of the other skunks nodded, and Ioan had to quell eir instinct to disagree. They were too tired, too keyed up, too quick to overanalyse to get anything out of forking across the prairie to wargame however many countless scenarios. Better for the four of them to sit around the low fire, sip their coffee, and watch the sun rise, May slouched against eir side and True Name and End Waking sitting apart, silent.</p>
|
||||
<p>Eventually, however, coffee long gone, they forked. End Waking and True Name’s down-tree instances each went to their tents to sit and meditate as best they could, while May and Ioan’s down-tree instances returned home to try baking a cake — something demanding enough while still remaining relatively mindless.</p>
|
||||
<p>The only words they spoke to each other was May saying, “Good luck, have fun, and do not die.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The four forks held hands and paws and with nothing other than a shared shaky breath, stepped from the sim.</p>
|
||||
<p>The four forks held hands and paws and, with nothing other than a shared, shaky breath, stepped from the sim.</p>
|
||||
<p>End Waking immediately flinched, crouched. They found themselves in a boardroom. A large plain of a table, notepads and pens, a second table huddling against the wall with a pitcher of water and a stack of too-small glasses.</p>
|
||||
<p>And yet it still felt too small — even to Ioan, who spent more of eir life inside than unbound in a forest, the ceiling was just a few inches too low, the chairs just a few inches too close to the walls. Too small, and yet too long. There was room for a table half again as long, and yet the table was set in one end of the room, leaving the other end empty and unbalanced other than a wheeled whiteboard. End Waking, who hadn’t been indoors, never mind in a room too small, in nigh on a century, looked on the verge of panic. His eyes were wide, tail hiked and bristled, paws clenched in a way that reminded em of May.</p>
|
||||
<p>And yet it still felt too small — even to Ioan, who spent more of eir life inside than unbound in a forest, the ceiling was just a few inches too low, the chairs just a few inches too close to the walls. Too small, and yet too long. There was room for a table half again as long, and yet the table was set in one end of the room, leaving the other end unbalanced, empty other than a wheeled whiteboard. End Waking, who hadn’t been indoors, never mind in a room too small, in nigh on a century, looked on the verge of panic. His eyes were wide, tail hiked and bristled, paws clenched in a way that reminded em of May.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I do not know if I can–“</p>
|
||||
<p>May squeezed his paw tightly. “You do not need to keep these memories, skunk, but you cannot leave.” She added in a near whisper, “Please do not leave me.”</p>
|
||||
<p>His nod was jerky, distracted, but still a nod.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -54,8 +54,8 @@
|
|||
<p>He shifted smoothly to accommodate this response. “Quite well, quite well. Feels like it’s been a bit of a vacation for the both of us, eh? You enjoy a bit of time off at the lake?”</p>
|
||||
<p>That grin of hers widened, and she nodded. “Quite a bit, actually. We never quite got to roasting marshmallows, but it is really hard to go wrong with potatoes roasted in the embers. They get a little smoky, even the insides.”</p>
|
||||
<p>End Waking stared at True Name as though she was an Artemisian, suddenly having made their way across the light-days back to Lagrange. Hell, Ioan was staring at her like she was an alien. So quickly and smoothly had her anxiety been transmuted into this calm, friendly social efficiency that it was as though the last months had been erased from her features.</p>
|
||||
<p>There was some other conversation going on here, ey realized. It wasn’t just that they were talking pleasantries before a meeting, but that there was some exchange of information that took place on some subtler plane of existence. They were feeling each other out, listening to tone of voice more than the content of words, watching features and postures rather than seeing an old friend. There was some deeper level of communication that ey simply couldn’t latch onto.</p>
|
||||
<p>With that in mind, ey could at least do eir best to focus on the subtler forms of language around the room.</p>
|
||||
<p>There was some other conversation going on here, ey realized. It wasn’t just that they were talking pleasantries before a meeting, but that there was an exchange of information that took place on some subtler plane of existence. They were feeling each other out, listening to tone of voice more than the content of words, watching features and postures rather than seeing an old friend. There was some deeper level of communication that ey simply couldn’t latch onto.</p>
|
||||
<p>With that in mind, ey could at least do eir best to focus on the less direct forms of language around the room.</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name had talked em through the stanza and their roles beforehand, at least. She herself had been focused on the politics, of course, but also acted as consensus builder among the members of her stanza.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey knew well that May had been focused on swaying individual hearts and minds toward a cause that initially had been True Name’s, and then later simply shaped by her as best as could be managed.</p>
|
||||
<p>End Waking had been instrumental in tracking, understanding, and to whatever level possible, influencing financial markets phys-side, though he’d admitted to Ioan, one night out on the plain, that the chances that he’d actually had a dramatic effect on the markets was astoundingly low and that the financial trajectory had likely been set by forces larger than they could manage — at least, that was the hope that had kept him going.</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -63,9 +63,9 @@
|
|||
<p>The Only Time I Dream Is When I Need An Answer had acted as a manager, scheduler, and clerk for the enterprise. Wickedly intelligent, she had done more than block in times for meetings; she had organized meetings between precisely the right individuals at precisely the right times.</p>
|
||||
<p>To Know One’s True Name Is To Know God had settled comfortably into data analysis, collecting both the raw data that she could from the perisystem feeds and the net phys-side as well as the information collected by her cocladists and the Jonases. She was a being of reports.</p>
|
||||
<p>To Know God Is To Answer Unasked Questions had done her best to specialize in the fields of information and game theory, but this had more often come down to simple information security and hygiene. She decided where and how far information traveled.</p>
|
||||
<p>Do I Know God When I Do Not Remember Myself and Do I Know God When I Do Not Dream worked as a mismatched pair. When I Do Not Remember worked as a propagandist while When I Dream worked almost entirely on the perisystem, translating back and forth for her cocladists and finding the best way to worm her way through the inter- and intrasystem text channels.</p>
|
||||
<p>Were ey pressed to name each of them without knowing this information, ey didn’t think ey’d be able to. Ey knew the three skunks of the stanza and could readily tell them apart, but the rest simply looked like a gaggle of the very same woman: short, soft, round face and curly black hair. However, there were indeed differences there to be seen. Why Ask Questions was just a centimeter or two taller and more open of expression. When I Do Not Remember and When I Dream both had a hunch to their shoulders that ey could not quite explain; perhaps a posture that stuck after too much writing.</p>
|
||||
<p>As it was, ey did eir best to guess, and when introductions made their way around the table, ey found eir guesses to be correct to the last. </p>
|
||||
<p>Do I Know God When I Do Not Remember Myself and Do I Know God When I Do Not Dream worked as a mismatched pair. When I Do Not Remember worked as a propagandist while When I Do Not Dream worked almost entirely on the perisystem, translating back and forth for her cocladists and finding the best way to worm her way through the inter- and intrasystem text channels.</p>
|
||||
<p>Were ey pressed to name each of them without knowing this information, ey didn’t think ey’d be able to. Ey knew the three skunks of the stanza and could readily tell them apart, but the rest simply looked like a gaggle of the very same woman: short, soft, round face and curly black hair. However, there were indeed differences there to be seen. Why Ask Questions was just a centimeter or two taller and more open of expression. When I Do Not Remember and When I Do Not Dream both had a hunch to their shoulders that ey could not quite explain; perhaps a posture that stuck after too much writing.</p>
|
||||
<p>As it was, ey did eir best to guess, and when introductions made their way around the table, ey found eir guesses to be correct in each case. </p>
|
||||
<p>At last, the parade of bows and greetings out of the way, each of the thirteen — counting em, Jonas, and Zacharias — pulled out a chair and sat down, though ey noted that End Waking didn’t sit so much as hover on the very edge of his seat. He still looked wide-eyed, feral.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Aaalright,” Jonas said, plopping his hands, palm down, on the table. “To business. I’m pleased to see you’re alive, but can’t say that I’m pleased to see you’re about.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I imagine not, no,” True Name replied, folding her paws on the table before her. “From what Ioan says, you know the general facts of what I know. There has been a long-running plan, perhaps mostly operating as a back-up plan, to shift one or more of me to the side depending on the status of the System. This revolved around the use of Zacharias as a tool to shape my responses while incomplete information kept me from recognizing this. Tell me, though. Are you still leaning on the multiple-Systems-multiple-governments strategy?”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -73,7 +73,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“You believe that this tripod will be the most stable political structure?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I know you don’t agree, but it’s not a tripod, True Name. By this point, the three Systems are so far apart that they are no longer three branches of the same government. They’re three countries, and three countries with identical governments yet divergent societies are unstable.”</p>
|
||||
<p>True Name made that setting-aside gesture, as though tabling the topic for the moment. “And you,” she said, nodding to Zacharias. Her expression was calm, curious, interested. “You have been working on this with Jonas since around systime 36?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Oh, thereabouts,” he said, grinning. “Though if I am honest, I have always been working with the two of you. It is not that your own goals had no effect on me, my little stink-bug. I played Jonas as much as I played you, and I played my own game when I could.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Oh, thereabouts,” he said, grinning. “Though if I am honest, I have always been working with the two of you. It is not that your own goals had no effect on me, my little stink bug. I played Jonas as much as I played you, and I played my own game when I could.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Bullshit,” True Name said calmly, turning back to Jonas. “And so what is it that–“</p>
|
||||
<p>“Oh, fuck you,” Zacharias laughed. “You do not get to dismiss me so easily. You and I rule together, quite literally, in another life. There is no reason that I should simply be waved away.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Nah, it’s bullshit,” Jonas said, just as calm as True Name. “If you were worth anything to this conversation, you would’ve been part of the preparations.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -153,7 +153,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“May, what–“</p>
|
||||
<p>“One moment, my dear,” she said, then turned to face this new True Name with a grin. “Will there be a change of name?”</p>
|
||||
<p>There was a vanishingly faint hint of rehearsal to the words, well masked to anyone who didn’t know her as intimately as ey did. Ey realized this must be their plan. Hers and True Name’s and End Waking’s, the one they’d been working on for days.</p>
|
||||
<p>“There has to be,” When I Do Not Remember said, and a brief tense from May confirmed that the trap had been sprung.</p>
|
||||
<p>“There…there has to be,” When I Do Not Remember said, and a brief tense from May confirmed that the trap had been sprung.</p>
|
||||
<p>While he lacked the context for whatever had surprised her cocladists, even Jonas sounded impressed by the display. “I won’t let you leave as True Name. Stability, remember? That name means too much here.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The other seven members of True Name’s stanza nodded as one, and Unasked Questions said, “You cannot be us. You cannot be who you were.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The skunk bowed. “You may call me Sasha.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -162,12 +162,12 @@
|
|||
<p>All of the rest of the Odists, however, were shouting. None of them looked pleased.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Not Sasha of the Ode clade, just Sasha,” she said calmly but loud enough to be heard. “I will not relinquish the form, just as I will not relinquish the past, but if you want me out this badly, so be it. I rescind my membership in the clade.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“As do I,” End Waking said, getting a smile from Sasha.</p>
|
||||
<p>“<em>That</em> name is unacceptable!” When I Dream hollered. “No. You will pick something else.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“<em>That</em> name is unacceptable!” When I Do Not Dream hollered. “No. You will pick something else.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“No, I will not.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Shut the fuck up, When I Dream,” Jonas shouted. “All of you, shut the fuck up.” He turned to Sasha and grinned icily, eyes overbright. “You always were a little snot. You want to be Sasha? You want to dive back into mediocrity and wear your weakness like a badge? Please, by all means, be my guest. Beg for pity again. Hunt down all your little friends who kept you feeling just bad enough that they could baby you without letting you think you were their plaything.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Shut the fuck up, When I Do Not Dream,” Jonas shouted. “All of you, shut the fuck up.” He turned to Sasha and grinned icily, eyes now burning overbright. “You always were a little snot. You want to be Sasha? You want to dive back into mediocrity and wear your weakness like a badge? Please, by all means, be my guest. Beg for pity again. Hunt down all your little friends who kept you feeling just bad enough that they could baby you without letting you think you were their plaything.”</p>
|
||||
<p>At this, most of the stanza bridled, and there were a few louder murmurings.</p>
|
||||
<p>Jonas waved it away. “Crawl back to Debarre and…fuck, what was his name? user11824? Crawl into their arms and let them prop you up long after you should’ve died.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Murmurings grew to mutterings.</p>
|
||||
<p>Murmurings grew to angry mutterings.</p>
|
||||
<p>Jonas only laughed, and that bitterness was all the more evident. “Go. Be Sasha. Live your silly little life. And you,” he said through clenched teeth, jabbing a finger toward Ioan. “Write your little story. That’s what you’re here for, isn’t it? Write your little romance and fuck your little girlfriends and put on your little plays.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May rolled her eyes.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Get out. All of you.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -220,7 +220,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“If I am still here, do you not think that I agree with her? At least to a large enough extent to trust her?”</p>
|
||||
<p>The weasel straightened up and, when May gestured to the spot beside E.W., he slowly lowered himself to a crouch as though still ready to bolt. “I’ll listen, but this had better be good.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Sasha bowed, sitting quietly and fiddling anxiously with the hem of her tunic while May caught him up on the events of the past few months, letting the other three of them interject with corrections and confirmations. Throughout, Debarre waited, and while he didn’t relax fully, by the end of the discussion, he was at least sitting all the way down.</p>
|
||||
<p>“So you’re now Sasha,” he said slowly. </p>
|
||||
<p>“So now you’re Sasha,” he said slowly. </p>
|
||||
<p>“A new Sasha. Related, but not the same Sasha you and I remember.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’ll buy that at least,” he muttered. “You still make me really fucking nervous.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She smiled faintly. “Do not worry, my dear. I make myself nervous.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -256,7 +256,7 @@
|
|||
<p>The three skunks laughed while ey and Debarre leaned across the circle to shake hands.</p>
|
||||
</article>
|
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|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-23</p>
|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
|
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@ -130,14 +130,15 @@
|
|||
<p>“Besides, it’s not like you guys don’t hyperfixate on things.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Mmhm,” she mumbled sleepily. “But all the same, we have been slowly drifting away from what we used to be over the years, and in the face of all that we have seen, that is not such a bad thing.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“How do you feel about her apology?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“How do you mean, my dear?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“How do you mean?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey shrugged. “It felt…I don’t know, a little rehearsed, maybe.”</p>
|
||||
<p>May curled in against eir side, yawning. “Perhaps. She said what Debarre needed to hear, I think, and it was no less earnest for that. As much as he means to us, that is no bad thing, either.”</p>
|
||||
<hr />
|
||||
<p>Ioan wasn’t sure why ey kept feeling surprised at the number of loose threads from just one event that needed tying. The business with Qoheleth had been about as complicated, and had required meeting with several other Odists in order to finish the story, and each one came with a different tenor.</p>
|
||||
<p>The same was true here, as well. Many members of the clade — some of whom ey’d not yet met — visited and requested time with Sasha or with the three of them. Still, ey realized, this culmination came after two and a quarter centuries for some, so perhaps it made sense.</p>
|
||||
<p>Not all of these interactions went nearly so smoothly.</p>
|
||||
<p>A scant few weeks later, May stumbled in the middle of a rehearsal, falling to her knees, panting before pushing herself to her feet. She managed to make it through the rest of the scene before forking off so that she could continue as best she could while her root instance ducked back home.</p>
|
||||
<p>Not all of these interactions went smoothly.</p>
|
||||
<p>Barely a month after that dinner with Debarre and Douglas on the field, two of the most dramatic happened within the span of a week.</p>
|
||||
<p>May stumbled in the middle of a Wednesday morning rehearsal rehearsal, falling to her knees, panting, before pushing herself to her feet. She managed to make it through the rest of the scene before forking off so that she could continue as best she could while her root instance ducked back home.</p>
|
||||
<p>Once there, she darted over towards where Ioan sat at eir desk, working through the process of writing Jonas’s book. She knelt beside em, clutched a pawful of eir shirt and set up a cone of silence. Ey felt the ACL-scape of the cone shift several times until it was just about as secure as could be made.</p>
|
||||
<p>“May? What–“</p>
|
||||
<p>“Zacharias! He has been pinging me once every few seconds for the last minute!” She was on the verge of hyperventilation, eyes wide and tail bristled. “I do not know what– <em>fuck!</em>“</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -149,22 +150,22 @@
|
|||
<p>“Ioan! I need to…can I–“</p>
|
||||
<p>“No. No coming over.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“A neutral place?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey thought quickly, sent a message to Douglas. “Do you need May there?” ey finally replied to the fox.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Do you need May there?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yes!”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey sighed. “I’ll ask. No guarantees.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“No, I…no,” the skunk mumbled once ey stepped back into the cone. She’d managed to sit up and while the panicked look on her face had calmed, the beginnings of rage had taken its place. “Or…well, I can, but he cannot come here.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Maybe Douglas’s to keep him from being too much? I figure if Sasha’s reaction was anything to go by, it might quell him, or at least keep him distracted.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The skunk sat, silent, for a moment, holding onto one of eir hands tightly. “Alright. Will Douglas be around to sweep if needed?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“No, I…no,” the skunk mumbled once ey stepped back into the cone. She’d managed to sit up and while the panicked look on her face had calmed, the beginnings of rage had taken its place. “He cannot come here.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Maybe Douglas’s to keep him from being too much? If Sasha’s reaction was anything to go by, it might quell him, or at least keep him distracted.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The skunk sat, silent, for a moment, holding onto one of eir hands tightly. “Will Douglas be around to sweep if needed?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey nodded.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Now?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yeah, I think so. Do you need anything before we go?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yeah, I think so. I’m not sure I trust that he’ll leave you alone if we put him off.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I–“</p>
|
||||
<p>They were interrupted by a rapidly crescendoing thudding sound followed by the scrabble of claws on the glass of the sliding door, Sasha finally finding purchase and whipping it open. May dropped the cone of silence.</p>
|
||||
<p>“What the fuck is happening?!” she shouted.</p>
|
||||
<p>“You too, then?” May said bitterly.</p>
|
||||
<p>Sasha frowned, straightened up, and brushed out her tunic. “Yes. He just about knocked me out with the amount of adrenaline he sent my way. You look ready to go. Do you have a plan?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“What the fuck is happening?!” Sasha shouted.</p>
|
||||
<p>“You too, then?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Sasha frowned, straightened up, and brushed out her tunic. “Yes. He just about knocked me out with the amount of adrenaline he sent my way. You look ready to go, though. Do you have a plan?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“We’re going to meet him at Douglas’s field. That’s about the start and end of it, though.” Ioan took a deep breath and tried to tamp down the urge to pace. “Do you want to come?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey watched the heat of anger rise to her features as well. Both skunks were quickly heading towards fury. “Yes. Let us get this the fuck over with.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey watched a complex set of emotions play out over her features. She stood still for nearly a minute, working to master them, before nodding. “Yes. Let us get this the fuck over with.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ioan sent a message to Zacharias spoken aloud for the skunks’ benefit. “The Field#002a0b1.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The reply was frantic. “What?! No!”</p>
|
||||
<p>“There or no meeting.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -173,15 +174,15 @@
|
|||
<p>Douglas stood at the top of his stoop, arms crossed, frowning. “Ioan, what is this?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Zacharias made it out of the whole thing alive,” May growled. “And now he is losing his mind and wants to meet. I will not have him at our home.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Douglas’s frown deepened. “So you’re bringing him here? The ACLs are pretty locked down right now.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yes. We need somewhere where someone can sweep him if need be.” She grinned humorlessly, adding, “And if this place freaks him out, all the better.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yes. I do not want to meet him at all, but I do not imagine he will simply leave me alone.” She spent a moment composing herself, plastering a mask of confidence over her anxiety. “We need somewhere where someone can sweep him if need be.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“If you say so,” he said, paused, then continued, “Alright, he should be able to enter.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ioan nodded and sent a brief ping to Zacharias.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ioan nodded and sent a ping to Zacharias.</p>
|
||||
<p>He arrived within a fraction of a second, yelped, and fell backwards, paws balled up into fists and pressed tight against his eyes.</p>
|
||||
<p>“How long has it been for you, my dear? Since you were forked?” May said, kneeling down before the fox. Her voice had grown cloyingly sweet, that ‘my dear’ carrying nothing but spite.</p>
|
||||
<p>“How long has it been for you, my dear? Since you were forked?” May said, kneeling down before the fox. Her voice had grown cloyingly sweet, that ‘my dear’ taking on a spiteful tone.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Y-yes,” he gasped. “Did…did we have to meet here?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Where better?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Where better?” Sasha said. She stood nearby, arms crossed, impassive, looking almost bored, though Ioan could see the energy it was taking for her to keep that up.</p>
|
||||
<p>Zacharias moaned. He forced himself to lower his paws to the ground, gripping at clumps of grass and dandelions. Finally, he opened his eyes and stared out toward the horizon of the field. “I–“</p>
|
||||
<p>“What did you want, my dear Zack? You sounded on the verge of panic.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“What did you want, my dear Zack? You sounded nearly on the verge of panic,” May said.</p>
|
||||
<p>“It is Jonas!” he said, finally snapping out of his daze. “Jonas! He has gone crazy! He killed all of my instances!”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Did you expect anything else, little loverfox?” Sasha asked. There was no humor or sweetness in her voice, the last two words carried venom in them.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I…I mean–“</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -193,18 +194,24 @@
|
|||
<p>He reached out to clutch at May’s paws. She startled backwards, but did nothing to push him away. “I cannot…I cannot just disappear! Months! It has been months since I have seen anyone. Anyone! I have to…to be near–“</p>
|
||||
<p>“No,” she said flatly.</p>
|
||||
<p>“But–“</p>
|
||||
<p>“No.” The skunk shook her head, leaned forward and touched her nose to Zacharias’s. “Not me. Not Sasha. Not us. You are on your own, my dear. I will not accept any further messages or merges. No contact.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“No.” The skunk shook her head, leaned forward and touched her nose to his. “Not me. Not Sasha. Not us. You are on your own, Zacharias. I will not accept any further messages or merges. No contact.”</p>
|
||||
<p>He slouched once more, eyes still wide. “May Then My Name, I–“</p>
|
||||
<p>She extracted one of her paws from his and slapped him firmly across the snout. “And that is for before.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“No contact.” She extracted one of her paws from his and slapped him firmly across the snout. “And that is for before.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Yelping, he fell back onto an elbow. He opened his mouth to respond, but May had already nodded towards Douglas, who swept him from the sim.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’ve never seen you like that before,” he said, once they’d made their way inside, the four of them clutching glasses of water. “I knew he was a shitbag, but God damn.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She remained kneeling for a moment, then started to shake, crumpling down onto the grass, panting heavily. Ioan knelt beside her until she’d cried herself dry while Douglas and Sasha sat on the steps leading up to his house, watching in silence.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’ve never seen you like that before,” he said, once they’d made their way inside, the four of them clutching glasses of water. “I knew he was a shitbag, but goddamn.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I am…not okay,” she said, whispering down to her glass. “I am not okay.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“It is not a mode either of us are comfortable with,” Sasha said quietly, “but it is the only mode that would have gained us peace. Any weakness would be taken as an opening.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Douglas nodded. He didn’t look convinced.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I am sorry. After 226 years, one learns to use contempt with precision, however dear the cost.” She reached out to take one of May’s paws in her own. Both of them looked exhausted. “Even so, I do not expect that is the last we will hear from him.”</p>
|
||||
<p>They didn’t stay long after. Ioan eventually promised Douglas that they’d catch up another time and then gently nudged the skunks to quit and merge back down.</p>
|
||||
<p>They didn’t speak for the rest of the day. Ioan and May collapsed onto the beanbag and stayed there through much of it, each processing in their own way, while Sasha disappeared outside to lose herself in the wilderness, not returning until late that evening, bearing a lanky hare and double-pawful of chantarelles, which she cooked down into a simple stew. They ate on the balcony to enjoy the late summer’s evening as best they could.</p>
|
||||
<p>The rest of the day was silent. Ioan and May collapsed onto the beanbag and stayed there through much of it, each processing in their own way, while Sasha disappeared outside to lose herself in the wilderness, not returning until late that evening, bearing a lanky hare and double-pawful of chantarelles, which she cooked down into a simple stew. They ate on the balcony to enjoy the late summer’s evening as best they could.</p>
|
||||
<p>Sasha joined them in bed that night, and they took what comfort they could from each other’s company.</p>
|
||||
<hr />
|
||||
<p>The most dramatic of meetings came as Autumn began creeping over the edge of the hills. Quieter, perhaps, but bearing the most weight, the most finality.</p>
|
||||
<p>If I Am To Bathe In Dreams arrived late on a Saturday afternoon on a few minutes’ notice and bowed formally to Sasha.</p>
|
||||
<p>The more dramatic of the meetings, however, came that weekend. It was quieter, perhaps, but bearing more weight, more finality.</p>
|
||||
<p>The rest of the week had remained tense, with Sasha wafting in and out of the house to follow her unsettled moods while May remained quiet, nearly silent, as she stuck by Ioan’s side. Ey knew ey should probably start laying in supplies for her overflowing, but ey was still distracted trying to pick apart the events with Zacharias. In light of eir desire to keep both of them safe and close, much of the fury that had come with eir first meeting with the fox threatened to reappear every time ey thought about the two skunks.</p>
|
||||
<p>Which, naturally, was quite often.</p>
|
||||
<p>It was not exactly the best of timing, then, when If I Am To Bathe In Dreams, an elegant, if severe-looking skunk, arrived late on a Saturday afternoon on a few minutes’ notice and bowed formally to the three of them.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Ioan, I believe Jonas hired you as an amanuensis?” she said.</p>
|
||||
<p>“He did, yes. Do you need me for that, too?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Please. This story is not over, will not be over for a long time yet. Listen. Watch.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -221,7 +228,7 @@
|
|||
<p>It took the skunk a moment to swallow back a rising wave of emotions before she could manage a shaky nod and a hoarse, “Understood.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“We are of one mind, then,” she said, bowed, and stepped from the sim. A few seconds later, three sheets of paper scrolled out of the air above the dining table, all set as individual-eyes-only for each of them. Ioan read through eirs several times with a hollow feeling in eir chest.</p>
|
||||
<p>Sasha stood still for a long minute, head bowed, then stepped outside without a word, at which point May burst into tears.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ioan did eir best to comfort the skunk, but after an hour, she gently pushed em away. “I need…I need the house to myself, please.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ioan did eir best to comfort her, but after an hour, she gently pushed em away. “I need…I need the house to myself, please.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Should I head to Douglas’s?”</p>
|
||||
<p>She shook her head. “I do not know, Ioan. I just…I just need the house. If you can…I mean, if Sasha will let you stay at her tent, you can stay, but I need the house.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Now?”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -229,7 +236,7 @@
|
|||
<p>Ey waited until ey could breathe properly after the squeeze, then kissed the top of her head. “I love you too, May. Please be safe, okay?”</p>
|
||||
<p>She nodded once more, relinquished her grip on em, and nudged em out toward the back door and outside.</p>
|
||||
<p>Sasha had set up a tent similar to E.W.’s, though she had skipped the process of building it herself, instead creating from similar materials off the exchange. She’d set it up nearly on the other side of the lake from their house, so that she could have the solitude that she needed without having to create some new sim of her own. When the need for space struck her, it never quite got to the point that it did with E.W. She would need away from their presences, she would say. They felt like a constant weight on her shoulders. Light, yes, but continually present.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ah well. This was the first time that May had overflowed in this living situation — and so dramatically, too; she’d never given em so little notice — so perhaps it would be helpful after all.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ah well. This was the first time that May had overflowed in this living situation — and so dramatically, too — so perhaps it would be helpful after all.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey took eir time walking around the shore of the lake, using it to vent the emotions that had built up over the last few hours through tears, through shouting into a cone of silence, cursing.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Ioan? Goodness,” Sasha said.</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey’d managed to mostly clean up with a handkerchief, though clearly eir eyes were still red-rimmed and eir countenance…well, who knew? Glum, perhaps?</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -252,7 +259,7 @@
|
|||
<p>“That it is. You are a good person, though. You love your partner. She knows this. I know this. You are good to her and it will all be okay. We may hope for neat endings but all we get are more beginnings.” She smiled, adding, “And yes, you may stay until she is feeling better.”</p>
|
||||
</article>
|
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<footer>
|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-13</p>
|
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
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@ -99,11 +99,11 @@
|
|||
<p>“So long as that works for you.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I think it will. It is a way to be earnestly myself.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ey nodded. “And I’m guessing you don’t miss the social part of that life too much? Jonas or Zacharias or the rest of your stanza.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She poked at eir side with a claw before slouching against em. “You do not need to ask stupid questions, Ioan.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She poked at eir side with a claw. “You do not need to ask stupid questions, Ioan.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Right, right,” ey said, laughing. “I figured no love lost, but–“</p>
|
||||
<p>“I did not love any of them, as friends or otherwise,” she said, waving away the rest of eir comment. “Now that I have known other kinds of love, I am confident of that.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Her tone wasn’t upset or dismissive, but was assertive enough that ey dropped the point. “Well, writing sounds like a good career shift, then.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Says the writer.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Says the writer.” She slouched against eir side.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I liked what you’ve gotten down so far, and I have a few notes. We’ll talk about it when we’re back at a desk, though.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Of course. I will be leaning on you a lot for help.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I mean, you’re leaning on me now.”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -116,18 +116,18 @@
|
|||
<p>“I agree with what May said, Ioan. Should I want anything beyond that, I will come by it honestly. I will not manipulate my way into anything.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I appreciate that.” Ey hugged an arm around her. Ey was grateful for her looking out at the lake rather than at em, given the heat ey could feel rising to eir cheeks. “While we’re being honest, though, I think we’re sort of in the same boat, given what you share with May. We can both imagine that, but not necessarily the path from here to there. May called it ‘the concept versus the mechanics’.”</p>
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<p>“Precisely. I imagine the same applies to you, that you will come by it earnestly.”</p>
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<p>Ey nodded. “Basically. Is it something you’d want?”</p>
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<p>Ey nodded. “Basically. <em>Is</em> it something you’d want?”</p>
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<p>“God, I have no fucking clue, Ioan,” she said, laughing.</p>
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<p>“Definitely same boat, then. It’s a problem for future Ioan.”</p>
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<p>They fell into silence again. Part of em was itching for more pebbles to toss into the water, but ey was too comfortable to get up to collect more from the beach.</p>
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<p>“That is a part of the reason that I kept that of my old cocladists,” Sasha murmured. “I kept some doubt from E.W., enough to keep me grounded without keeping me torn. From May, I am keeping a little bit of overwhelming emotions. The possibility of simply falling for everyone around me is alluring. I can taste it in the memories, like a little bit of saccharine, gritty on the tongue. But I am keeping a little bit of caution from True Name so that it remains a new thing for me. I am of three minds Like a tree In which there are three blackbirds.”</p>
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<p>Ey turned her words over in eir mind, along with whatever snippet of verse it was she’d quoted. The thought was complete. Nothing ey could respond with would add to it. It was curious, and hinted at things beyond eir ken, but it was complete.</p>
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<p>Instead, ey said, “You’re a good person, Sasha. All three of you are good people.”</p>
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<p>She laughed. “And you, dear, are a dork. But come, my tail is falling asleep, and my fork’s conversation with May has wrapped up and the one you love misses you greatly.”</p>
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<p>“And you, dear, are a dork.” She laughed. “But come, my tail is falling asleep, and my fork’s conversation with May has wrapped up and she misses you greatly.”</p>
|
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<p>They walked back, then, hand in paw, following the trail as it dipped down to the water or ducked up into the trees. Back home, back to May, back to whatever it was that life had become.</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-18</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
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</li>
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<li class="done4"> Conflict — After assassination attempt on TN, learn about TN getting pushed out by Jonas, May offers to merge down, turns into big discussion<ul>
|
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<li class="done4"> <em>To hone is to trade ends for perpetual perfection</em> — The danger in ceaseless memorialization is how close it lies to idolatry. To elevate the dead to such a status as false god (for what being that is limited to the perfection of memory is not false?) is to ceaselessly perfect the imperfectable.</li>
|
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<li class="done4"> <em>To hone is to trade ends for perpetual perfection</em> — The danger in ceaseless memorialization is how close it lies to idolatry. To elevate the dead to such a status as false god (for what being that is limited to the imperfection of memory is not false?) is to ceaselessly perfect the imperfectable.</li>
|
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<li class="done4"> CHAPTER Ioan 2350<ul>
|
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<li class="done4"> <a href="009.html">May’s No Way 2</a> — Upset about the situation; that it’s politics is bringing up a lot more bad feelings about True Name</li>
|
||||
<li class="done4"> <a href="010.html">Clearing the house</a> — Ioan goes to clear the house and lock down ACLs. Bounces all the assassins, meets Jonas and talks with him for a bit. He’s a dick. They still decide to stay the night at the lake with some basic camping amenities, EW comes over to help, TN is elsewhere, stomping around the lake off sending messages and such (EW brings two of things, Ioan corrects to three)</li>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-09-23</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-10-07</p>
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Reference in New Issue