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<h1 id="debarre-2350">Debarre — 2350</h1>
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<p>((Things to maybe add: Ioan actually work on emself instead of others; EW basing his identity around not being her))</p>
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<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 reason to return since.</p>
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<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 in End Waking’s forest with the Bălans and a few Odists besides especially, that he’d never had the courage to come back.</p>
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<p>Given how much the clade 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>
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<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.</p>
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<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>
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<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>
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<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>
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<p>Ioan greeted them at the door. Ey seemed as though ey wwas enough, if tired. Still smiling and bowing to them as ey usually did.</p>
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<p>Ioan greeted them at the door. Ey seemed happy enough, if tired. Still smiling and bowing to them as ey usually did.</p>
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<p>As soon as they’d finished their greetings and settled on the grass in front of the house (End Waking having refused to go inside) along with Douglas, though, ey had mostly stared down into eir glass of lemonade and spoke little.</p>
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<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>
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<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>
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<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>
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<p>“I’m pretty sure it’s me, actually,” ey said, laughing tiredly. “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>
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<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>
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<p>“My feelings towards my work?”</p>
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<p>“My feelings towards her work? That I built my identity around not being her?”</p>
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<p>“That and your relationship with Debarre.”</p>
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<p>The weasel and skunk both looked at each other, ears splayed.</p>
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<p>“I’d thought of that, but, uh…” Debarre cleared his through. “Well, actually hearing it put like that casts it in a bit of a different light.”</p>
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<p>“I hope that she does not mind the memories of sex,” End Waking said, then laughed when Debarre poked him in the side. “We are all adults here, my dear.”</p>
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<p>“I’m the baby, I think,” Douglas said. “I’m seventy three.”</p>
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<p>The skunk grinned. “So young! Debarre and I are both over two-hundred sixty years old. I am pretty sure that we can acknowledge that we can acknowledge the existence of sex, is what I mean.”</p>
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<p>“I hope that she does not mind the memories of sex to go along with the resentment,” End Waking said, then laughed when Debarre poked him in the side. “We are all adults here, my dear.”</p>
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<p>“I’m the baby, I think,” Douglas said. “I’m seventy-two.”</p>
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<p>The skunk grinned. “So young! Debarre and I are both over two-hundred sixty. Still, I am pretty sure that we can acknowledge that we can acknowledge the existence of sex, is what I mean.”</p>
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<p>“And it doesn’t exactly sound like she’s a stranger to that, herself, anyway.”</p>
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<p>End Waking blinked, taken aback. “She actually told you about Zacharias?”</p>
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<p>“Who?”</p>
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<p>“An…erstwhile lover, as she put it,” Ioan said carefully. “I probably shouldn’t go too much into that, though.”</p>
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<p>“Agreed,” Debarre said. “But as you were saying, she was having trouble?”</p>
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<p>“Yeah. I wasn’t expecting her to get completely taken out, but May did kind of force it on her all in one go. She lasted a few days, but I think she was maybe pushing herself pretty hard to appear strong. She crashed really hard yesterday and, despite a pretty pleasant morning, had to step out to Arrowhead Lake, and when she came up, she looked like she was about ready to start yelling at us.</p>
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<p>“May was also trying to stick around as long as she could, I think, since she crashed almost immediately. We made it through the night, but she couldn’t even speak this morning.”</p>
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<p>“Yeah. I wasn’t expecting her to get completely taken out, but May did kind of force it on her all in one go. She lasted a few days, but I think she was maybe pushing herself pretty hard to appear strong. She crashed really hard yesterday and, despite a pretty pleasant morning, had to step out to Arrowhead Lake, and when she came back, she looked like she was about ready to start yelling at us. May was also trying to stick around as long as she could, I think, since she crashed almost immediately. We made it through the night, but she couldn’t even speak this morning.”</p>
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<p>“That’s a shitload to have to deal with, yeah.”</p>
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<p>Ey nodded. “Friend almost gets assassinated, almost goes crazy from a merge, and disappears. Partner freaks out after a conversation, then freaks out when the merge goes sideways and mentions she was thinking of merging down, herself, then requests that I disappear. It’s just…a lot.”</p>
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<p>“Wait, <em>May</em> wanted to merge down?” Douglas said. “Wasn’t expecting that.”</p>
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<p>“Well, I don’t know quite how much ‘wanted’ fits, but I asked if she was thinking about it and she said yes. I couldn’t quite piece together why, though. After End Waking merged down, she mentioned that there was at least a part of her that was feeling vengeful, so I think I was worried that maybe she would be thinking of piling on her own vengeance, or that maybe she would be trying to help make her a better person.” Ey shrugged and added, “Or both. She did seem to have True Name’s best interests at heart when she forced the merge. At least mostly.”</p>
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<p>“Well, I don’t know quite how much ‘wanted’ fits, but I asked if she was thinking about it and she said yes. I couldn’t quite piece together why, though. After End Waking merged down, she mentioned that there was at least a part of her that was feeling vengeful, so I think I was worried that maybe she was considering piling on her own vengeance, or that maybe she would be trying to help make her a better person.” Ey shrugged and added, “Or both. She did seem to have True Name’s best interests at heart when she forced the merge. At least mostly.”</p>
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<p>End Waking nodded. “She did mention being torn, yes. She wanted to kick her out but also wanted to help her get away from Jonas.”</p>
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<p>“She’s certainly softening on True Name.”</p>
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<p>“She’s certainly softening on her.”</p>
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<p>“And how’re you taking it?” Debarre asked. Something about Ioan — eir posture, eir face, something — made it seem like this was the question ey was dreading the most.</p>
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<p>There was a long silence before Ioan answered. “It’s really grating at me. I don’t even know why, either. I think it honestly would help True Name, in the end, if it were just May merging down, but having that be the case with her memories of us together feels like…well, it kind of makes me jealous. Those are our memories that we made together. Our fights and good times, our affection–“</p>
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<p>There was a long silence before Ioan answered. “It’s really grating on me. I don’t even know why, either. I think it honestly would help True Name in the end if it were just May merging down, but having that be the case with her memories of us together feels like…well, it kind of makes me jealous. Those are our memories that we made together. Our fights and good times, our affection–“</p>
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<p>“Probably most of the memories, there,” End Waking stage-whispered, getting a smirk out of Ioan.</p>
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<p>“Yeah. Our affection and our sex, too, for that matter. Suddenly, True Name has all that. I think it also started grating on me after the merge because of how real End Waking’s was. It wouldn’t just that it’s a library for her perusal, but she will have actually lived them. She will have actually–” Ey frowned, as thought digging for the words.</p>
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<p>“Yeah. Our affection and our sex, too, for that matter. Suddenly, True Name has all that. I think it also started grating on me because of how real End Waking’s was. It wouldn’t just be a library for her perusal, but she will have actually lived them. She will have actually–” Ey frowned, as thought digging for the words.</p>
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<p>“She’ll have actually loved you, maybe?” Debarre guessed.</p>
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<p>Eir features fell and ey sighed. “Yeah. That. Putting it that way makes it feel terrible, but it’s exactly that.”</p>
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<p>“I was pulling back when she and Zacharias were getting close,” End Waking said,sounding thoughtful. “And I have been her. We were both Michelle. I know that she is capable of experiencing romantic feelings. They will not be alien to her.”</p>
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<p>“And she’s been you,” Debarre added. “And you’ve got romantic feelings, too. At least, I hope so.”</p>
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<p>End Waking pushed him over onto the ground. “If you imply that I do not have romantic feelings to you again, I will make you sleep outside tonight.”</p>
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<p>“And now she’s been you,” Debarre added. “And you’ve got romantic feelings, too. At least, I hope so.”</p>
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<p>End Waking pushed him over onto the ground. “If you imply that I do not have romantic feelings for you again, I will make you hunt our meals for a week.”</p>
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<p>He laughed. “Love you too, E.W.”</p>
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<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 experienced love for others through another’s memories and experiences, even. You can trust her to integrate that, I believe.”</p>
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<p>“Even though she was struggling with integrating those memories of yours?”</p>
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<p>“Perhaps especially so. I think that she is struggling because it clashes with her personality, not 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>
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<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>
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<p>He shook his head and waved the comment away. “Yeah, yeah.”</p>
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<p>More than one of them had confessed such 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 in that sympatico that true friends can share, but any more felt pretty far out of his league as a gay man.</p>
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<p>More than one of them had confessed such 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, but any more felt pretty far out of his league as a gay man.</p>
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<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>
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<p>“How do you mean?”</p>
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<p>“Well, do you have any worries? Do you think she does? Has she talked about it at all?”</p>
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<p>“Well, do you have any worries about her? Do you think she does? Has she talked about it at all?”</p>
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<p>“Not much. She said she’d been considering it, but that seeing how the current merge was making her struggle had her in doubt. I told her I want to make sure it’d be consensual on everyone’s behalf, this time. I guess–“</p>
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<p>“Whoa, wait,” Douglas interrupted, frowning. “She didn’t even talk with True Name?”</p>
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<p>“Whoa, wait,” Douglas interrupted, frowning. “She didn’t even talk with True Name about this merge?”</p>
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<p>“They talked a few times in a cone of silence, so maybe then, but otherwise not that I saw. She just stopped True Name in the middle of ranting and sent End Waking a message to merge, far as I could tell.”</p>
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<p>“That’s kind of shitty.”</p>
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<p>Ey shrugged. “I suppose, but no need to pile on her or anything, I think she’s beating herself up over it worse than any of us could do.”</p>
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<p>Douglas nodded. “Well, that bit I believe. Think that contributed to her overflowing?”</p>
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<p>“Almost certainly, yeah. Correct me if I’m wrong, End Waking, but I don’t think it’s solely tied to life events, but they can have an effect on it.”</p>
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<p>“Almost certainly, yeah. Correct me if I’m wrong, End Waking, but while I don’t think it’s solely tied to external events, they can have an effect on it.”</p>
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<p>The skunk nodded. He’d started panting in the heat of the sun, so it took him a moment to reply. “It just comes over us like a wave. Some of us more quickly than others. It is slower for me than for either of them, I believe.”</p>
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<p>Debarre chimed in. “I usually have a few days warning. I’ve gotten mine already and was planning on heading out today, but we both wanted to come, anyway.”</p>
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<p>“Is it hard for you?”</p>
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<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>
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</article>
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<footer>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-04-15</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-04-19</p>
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<p>The skunk wilted, a look somewhere between relieved and resigned coming over his face. “Yes. Soon. Thank you, my dear.”</p>
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<p>“Of course. Love you, E.W.”</p>
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<p>“Love you too.”</p>
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<p>There was nothing else for it, then. With one last wave to the skunk (already heading off into the woods, of course), stepped back to the Hadjes’ field.</p>
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<p>There was nothing else for it, then. With one last wave to the skunk (already heading off into the woods, of course), he stepped back to the Hadjes’ field.</p>
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<p>Ioan and Douglas were still standing where he’d left them, so he waved again. “Sorry, back for a little bit.”</p>
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<p>“On your own again?” Ioan asked.</p>
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<p>He nodded. “Yeah. It’s been building up for a long time. We agreed I’d head off when the tent was done, and we just got the nets all hung yesterday. Hey, can we go inside, though? He was right, it’s pretty fucking hot out here with fur.”</p>
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<p>Ioan held back enough to let Douglas take the lead, falling in step with Debarre, instead. “Does it bother you?”</p>
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<p>“Hmm? E.W. asking me to leave?”</p>
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<p>“Yeah.”</p>
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<p>He thought for a bit, then shrugged. “Bothers, yes, but that’s really about it. Helps that I usually just quit and merge down with #Tracker, so it’s not like I’ve got <em>just</em> the relationship to worry about. I’ve got my own stuff going on through him, and other relationships that merge in every now and then.”</p>
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<p>He thought for a bit, then shrugged. “Bothers, yes, but that’s really about it. Helps that I usually just quit and merge down with #Tracker, so it’s not like I’ve got <em>just</em> the relationship to worry about. I’ve got my own stuff going on besides him, and other relationships that merge in every now and then.”</p>
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<p>“That sounds handy, at least.”</p>
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<p>“His overflowing is also way less dramatic than May’s, which sounds pretty painful to watch.”</p>
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<p>Ioan nodded.</p>
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<p>“Ignominy?” Ioan offered.</p>
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<p>“Right, yeah. But she also said that she wanted her to get out of this mess and away from Jonas, ‘that living, breathing sack of shit’, in her words.”</p>
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<p>They laughed.</p>
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<p>“But I’d been thinking much the same, I guess. If she does, I’d probably feel at least a little bit of vindication for the way she jerked us all around without us realising it and all that shit she did with the Council. I’d also feel like there was a fraction less of my friend around, though, too. I love E.W., I’m happy he’s in my life, we get along well for the most part, but there’s also this layer of, like…well, he was part of Sasha and Michelle, and they and I went through a lot together.”</p>
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<p>“But I’d been thinking much the same, I guess. If she does disappear, I’d probably feel at least a little bit of vindication for the way she jerked us all around without us realising it and all that shit she did with the Council. I’d also feel like there was a fraction less of my friend around, though, too. I love E.W., I’m happy he’s in my life, we get along well for the most part, but there’s also this layer of, like…well, he was part of Sasha and Michelle, and they and I went through a lot together.”</p>
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<p>“You talk about those two facets like different people,” Ioan said. “Sorry, not to derail. Just that I noticed that. None of the Odists do.”</p>
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<p>“Most, maybe. I picked it up from Hammered Silver, who spent probably more time with them than anyone. All her instances feel singular, I imagine, but they were two instances in one. Sasha was this really emotional, really caring person. It wasn’t that Michelle wasn’t, just that when she was at the fore, she was much more…I don’t know. Logical? Rational?”</p>
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<p>“And when it was both? When she was in flux, or whatever?”</p>
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<p>“Then she was just tired,” he said, grinning at memories. “But right, before I totally lose track, you asked how I feel. Uh, I guess I feel scared.”</p>
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<p>Ioan sat up straighter. “Really?</p>
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<p>“Yeah. That she collapsed made me confront the fact that, no, I don’t really want her dead or anything, that I really would hate to lose her. Even if she’s not the part of my friend I like the most, not a part that I even remember seeing before, she’s still <em>a</em> part of them.” He hesitated, then added, “And it changed E.W. Not the forking and merging itself, but that he did that. It sounds like May Then My Name used the fact that True Name was all worked up to force her to accept the whole merge all at once. She kind of did the same with E.W. I don’t know what her message, was, but it looked like it scared the shit out of him, so he kind of did it without really thinking. He’s been a bit different since.”</p>
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<p>Ioan furrowed eir brow. “Really?</p>
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<p>“Yeah. That she collapsed made me confront the fact that, no, I don’t really want her dead or anything, that I really would hate to lose her. Even if she’s not the part of my friend I like the most, not a part that I even remember seeing before, she’s still <em>a</em> part of them.” He hesitated, then added, “And it changed E.W. Not the forking and merging itself, but that he evin did that. It sounds like May Then My Name used the fact that True Name was all worked up to force her to accept the whole merge all at once. She kind of did the same with E.W. I don’t know what her message, was, but it looked like it scared the shit out of him, so he kind of did it without really thinking. He’s been a bit different since.”</p>
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<p>“Different how?” Douglas asked.</p>
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<p>“Like…still all worried, and still a little in shock, but also like a little bit of a load was taken off. I can’t explain it, and we never really talked it through. It’s not bad, but I can still tell.”</p>
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<p>Ioan nodded and rubbed eir palms against the legs of eir slacks as ey always seemed to do during stressful conversations. “He did seem a bit freer of speech today,” ey mused. “But that makes sense. He finally got to tell her how he feels, and they didn’t even have to talk to each other.”</p>
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<p>He queued up a sensorium message to Yared, user11827, and a few other friends he’d kept in touch with while following along with (and occasionally meddling in) the political affairs of the system. ‘Reactionary elements’ indeed.</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-04-16</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2022-04-19</p>
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