From e5cbf81cb6615e5bcfdec47f6e2f1b4d140f6e58 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Madison Scott-Clary Date: Sun, 13 Feb 2022 16:15:14 -0800 Subject: [PATCH] update from sparkleup --- writing/post-self/neviim/ioan/006.html | 12 ++++++------ writing/post-self/neviim/local/tycho/016.html | 12 ++++++------ 2 files changed, 12 insertions(+), 12 deletions(-) diff --git a/writing/post-self/neviim/ioan/006.html b/writing/post-self/neviim/ioan/006.html index f9dd61875..db354518e 100644 --- a/writing/post-self/neviim/ioan/006.html +++ b/writing/post-self/neviim/ioan/006.html @@ -28,7 +28,7 @@

“Really? Ey gave an actual announcement?” May giggled, giving eir hand a squeeze in her paw. “You are such fucking nerds.”

“That’s nerdy even for me, I think.”

“Would it have been nerdy for the Ioan of twenty years ago? Or forty?”

-

“Forty?” Ey frowned up to the sky. “Good question. I don’t think so. Ey was nerdier then than even Codrin is now.”

+

“Forty?” Ey frowned up to the sky. “Good question. I don’t think so. That Ioan was nerdier then than even Codrin is now.”

“Makes me think that Codrin#Pollux was right about em,” she said. “Ey had changed the least out of the three of you. Not that it was a bad thing, except in that it led to eir crisis of identity over the last few weeks.”

“The whole of Castor seems to have been the most conservative of the three Systems. Codrin, Dear, and even True Name hadn’t changed much at all from what they were like closer to Launch.”

The silence that followed started out tense, then eased into something more deliberate, though ey couldn’t put to words how ey could tell.

@@ -39,7 +39,7 @@

Ey nodded. “Well, alright. To be honest, pretty awful. Much of the clade has dropped all relation to her; In Dreams didn’t tell her about the therapy thing at all, so I had to tell her about it and suggest she contact Sarah directly. Plus, from what I can guess, she and Jonas aren’t getting along nearly so well anymore. I wouldn’t be surprised if she drops out of the whole guidance business entirely — or is pushed out by Jonas — in the next few years, though they seem to have the response to the convergence pretty well in check.”

The smile that May had picked up quickly disappeared and by the time ey finished, she was actively frowning. “It was not my intention to have her left behind. She needs this as much as the rest of us do.”

“I know, May, it’s not on you.”

-

“I am trying to internalize that, my dear. My empathy remains, even if the emotion behind it has transmuted. Empathy and sympathy, as I am sorry that In Dreams left her behind.” After a pause, she added, almost to herself, “I can feel for her, even if I do resent her.”

+

“I am trying to internalize that, my dear. My empathy remains, even if the emotion behind it has transmuted. Empathy and sympathy, as I am sorry that In Dreams left her behind. I can still feel for her, even if I do resent her.” After a pause, she added, almost to herself, “I do not like that I hate her, but I am helpless before that feeling.”

Ioan leaned over enough to give her a kiss to the cheek. “You’re a good person, May.”

She surprised em by turning her head to give the very tip of eir nose a rather wet lick. “I am an utter nightmare and you know it, my dear.”

“You can be both,” ey said, laughing. “Even skunks can contain multitudes.”

@@ -51,12 +51,12 @@

“I’ll have to start digging through etymologies for a good one.”

“I swear to God, Ioan, you are a parody of yourself. Every time I think you cannot get nerdier, you one-up yourself.”

Ey laughed. “Love you too, May.”

-

After a luxuriously long stretch, May rolled onto her front, resting her cheek on folded arms. This seemed like a good idea, given the ache starting in eir back from laying on a rock for too long, so ey followed suit, and they both settled into quiet, enjoying the sun on their backs and the sound of small waves breaking over pebbles below, of the stream not too far in the distance.

+

After a luxuriously long stretch, the skunk rolled onto her front, resting her cheek on folded arms. This seemed like a good idea, given the ache starting in eir back from laying on a rock for too long, so ey followed suit, and they both settled into quiet, enjoying the sun on their backs and the sound of small waves breaking over pebbles below, of the stream not too far in the distance.

Ey could feel the doziness of a nice picnic and warm sun beckoning em to nap, but ey knew that ey’d wake up a pile of aches and pains if ey slept like this.

“Tell me a story, May.”

“Mm?” The skunk sounded sleepy as well. “Okay. How true would you like it?”

-

“As true as you’d like,” ey said, laughing. “Do you have another myth you could share?”

-

“When the second people met the first,” she said after a long pause. “They found them strange and different. The way they thought, the way they lived their lives, all of it was strange to them. When the first people looked out on the world, they saw something different than what they did. They saw more, perhaps, or perhaps they saw it more vividly. None could say.

+

“As true as you’d like,” ey said. “Do you have another myth you could share?”

+

“When the second people met the first,” she said after a long pause. “They found them strange and otherworldly. The way they thought, the way they lived their lives, all of it was strange to them. When the first people looked out on the world, they saw something different than what they themselves did. They saw more, perhaps, or perhaps they saw it more vividly. None could say.

“The second people did not know their own origins, and so they invented story after story to explain where they came from, and through countless years, first one story would take root and flourish, and all would believe that they had come from dust with the breath of life blown into them by a distant God, and then that story would fade and they would all believe that random chance and unchecked chaos brought together the right elements in the right way, the right conditions crushing them into the very beginnings of life.”

Ioan watched as the skunk spoke. Ey was never sure how much of her stories were made up on the spot, were composed from existing ideas, or had been long rehearsed. All the same, it was entrancing watching her speak, that far-away look in her eyes as though she were seeing the story rather than the mountains or the lake.

“When the second people met the first, their stories collapsed around them like castles made in sand, as they realized that they were not the first, that they were not alone, or original, or unique, for did the first people not exist long before them? Did they not look out on younger skies?

@@ -68,7 +68,7 @@

The skunk grinned, dotting her nose to eirs. “I do not see how they could not, my dear. Is that not what exploration is?”