[IC Contact -- Snowblind]

[bookofnope]

[There is a click noise. It sounds as though it might be judging you.]

Comments

[rubikscomplex]

Better he died because of cold randomness than some design that no one but one asshole can understand. I don't care if someone else knows why I'm suffering or being tested. I want to know why. The answer, itself, is what matters, not that there just is one. What's the point of having the answer there if you can't know it? It's as good as not having an answer.

And some all-powerful super being. If I can't figure out a way to explain something complex in a way that's generally understandable to the average person, then that's my failing as a teacher and a doctor. And maybe I can't explain something ultra complex in one sitting, but that doesn't mean it's incomprehensible. It just means you have to break it down.

Telling someone 'You won't understand,' is cheap. It means 'I don't have the time or inclination to break it down for you.'

DAY 199 text; @zd (gently bothers but you can ignore this)

[swatsflies]

Winter spoke to us.
Jim was amazing with asking her questions
Turns out the alter can be used as an interface
Like a computer.

[swatsflies]

I don't know if you're hiding
You have to come back soon though
Not just for others
Though they miss you
For yourself, too
You now have something like family here, right?

We got some more history about this place!
There were protests thirty years before things went to hell

evening 204; @guardian; text;

[phaseshifter]

Miss you. ♥

[ Which is all she can type without crying because thIS WOUND IS STILL WAY TOO RAW AGH ]

night 213 - @dickcheese, text

[headjacked]

If your could stop being dead that would be great, Real great. Aewrsome.




Come back soon is alli'm saying.

@totheark; text; Day 217

[0thingsonmymind]

*He's been freaking the fuck out too much to look at the network or his inbox...but he needs to send a few messages while he can.*

beckett
i know you'll probably never get this, i know how unlikely it is that you'll come back even if i can't stop hoping. but i may never get another chance to say this

thank you
for everything, for being my friend, for sticking with me and for trying to understand me instead of just brushing me aside. aside from tim...the masked tim, i mean, i think you were the only one who came close to understanding any of it.
you meant...mean a lot to me. you didn't deserve to get stuck here, and i know its terrible but i'm glad you did. i'm glad we could meet. i hope one day we can talk again.

[bookofnope]

[It's early, he gets the message just as he is leaving the night's shelter, and it freezes him in the doorway, pack slipping from his hand halfway to his shoulders. When he sees the username the first response is a sweet flooding relief - Norfinbury's only truly sweet emotion - but the message rattles him to his core.

He knows what he's looking at. He thinks of his last dreams of Anatole, what his friend had been with his mind whole around his truth. The reminder is the first unnerving thing. The second is a feeling like the nausea of vertigo. Slipping ground. Brian - who is this Brian? How does he live this reversal?

He can imagine. And prays that he is imagining wrong. He rushes to switch the voice feed on, forgetting the cold wind that keeps blowing in from the open door.]

Brian, I'm alive, I'm here.

video

[0thingsonmymind]

*Its been a hectic day, so he doesn't get to messages until after lockdown..and then he nearly drops his tablet when he sees the response. Beckett was back? That was--well, not really great but it was good for him. His fellow seeker was back!

But...with him like this...did they really have that connection anymore? Should he wait until things are back to normal before responding?

No. He can't do that. Instead he switches on the video and sends a response.

His hood is still up (cause its cold) but his mask is off. He doesn't look so great under it. His face is rather gaunt and terribly pale (lack of proper nutrition or sunlight for years will do that). His hair is messy and clearly cut by himself with no style other than to keep it short. He has a similarly scruffy and patchy start of a beard that's only barely beyond its five-o'clock-shadow phase but already obviously uneven.
His eyes are rather hollow and haunted, but he smiles anyway. Its awkward and out of practice, but its a real smile.

His voice is still hoarse though. Getting your sanity back doesn't ease years of speaking as little as possible.*

Beckett! I thought I'd never...I mean...fuck, I don't know what I mean. I just...

*Short pause for a coughing fit.*

...uh. Hi?

video;

[bookofnope]

[The sight of Brian's unmasked face is - Beckett isn't ready for it. It's another, if fainter blow that adds to his mental staggering. One after another, the things he knows his friend by seem undone. But at the same time, the smile gives him something else, something new to grasp onto. This may be the most awkward conversation they'll ever have, and yet there is still some essential recognition. They still know that they are important to each other.

Beckett gives his friendship with agonising slowness, but he gives it for good. And he should be used to people changing. He should be able to see...

He manages a smile back.]

I was starting to think the same. We're in a great deal of luck.

[A pause. Awkward, yes. He might as well acknowledge that and move on.]

How much do you remember? Of - how it was with you before?

Re: video;

[0thingsonmymind]

*He thinks the few friends he has here deserve something, some sign of trust, after everything. He probably won't be happy about it after things go back to normal, but he at least shouldn't regret showing these three.*

Not sure if its good or bad luck, though. Heh.


All of--well, as much as I could then. There are a lot of holes that I usually don't worry about. Unless you mean before everything, then...not all that much.

I, ah, I don't know if you heard but I...I died. So this...

*He kinds gestures to himself.*

this is just temporary.

[bookofnope]

Jade told me. There was - [he pauses, sharply uncertain. The anomaly that had gotten Brian belonged to another realm, another Brian perhaps, he isn't sure yet. He wants to ask and probe, of course, because he wants to understand Brian, and there is the possibility of insight here that he could never gain otherwise probably. But then, perhaps this insight isn't for him. Or for anyone.

He's never let that stop him before, though. It's part and parcel of who he is, the man who is Brian's friend.]

She told me that the creature who caught you was one you'd recognise. That is one reason why I asked. [Another moment's hesitation, though this time more in choosing his words.] This must be a... daunting situation for you to face.

[0thingsonmymind]

*That he's recognize? ...Oh.*

It was like...some sort of gross mockery of the Operator. I guess that's sort of how monsters here work.

*The thing that got Jade had looked like something from her world, at least.*

...yeah, I'm not really sure what to make about it or...do or...anything.

*He sighs.*

But it'll all go away in a few days so it doesn't matter.

*He's accepting of this, though not really happy. Its just how things will end up and there's no changing it.*

[bookofnope]

[So he remembers the Operator. And, Beckett can only assume, remembers what he had been like before this change, the state that he expects to return to. That it doesn't matter, though... that, he is less convinced of.]

Is this allowing you any kind of - insight? About, perhaps, mysteries that you were not previously able to think, shall we say linearly about?

[He doubts it, but the question should be asked anyway. If nothing else it might offer Brian some focus.]

[0thingsonmymind]

I...I don't know. Right now its just really confusing. I'm still trying to figure out how I feel about it.

[bookofnope]

I'm not surprised. It's - [He licks his lips, nervous, and decides that perhaps he should not commiserate about the sudden loss of everything one has defined oneself by.]

But you still know who you were and what you were before. You know that you will return to it.

[0thingsonmymind]

Yeah, I still remember. And I remember how deaths here work.

*Which means after a few days he'll be back to normal and none of his issues about this will matter.*

[bookofnope]

Yes. It's temporary. [Beckett certainly sounds encouraged by that. It's hard for him to imagine it not being encouraging. He makes the assumption almost without considering it.]

You only need to survive - however long it is going to be, and you know that you have your own self to return to.

[0thingsonmymind]

*He doesn't really know how he feels about it. Its all so confusing and makes figuring out if he wants to be like this or not too much for him. He knows he wouldn't normally, but now he understands that he only thinks that because he gave up...however long ago it was. But it wasn't like he could try to be like this normally--he was right when he said it was too complicated.
But in the end it didn't matter. Norfinbury or the @admin or who/what ever controlled the death loses here would take this away. He knows when it happens he'll be grateful but now...
...now he just resigns himself to it. Its depressing, in a way, but also somewhat freeing. Nothing he does these next few days really matters much.*

Yeah. This won't last too long.

*He still sounds kinda depressed about it, though.*

[bookofnope]

[It's not the response he expects, not in an immediate sense, and it frightens him rather out of all proportion - perhaps because it taps into a dread he'd been keeping quiet throughout their talk. What if the change isn't as passing, as on-the-surface, as it seems? What if the effects of the town pass, but the cracks they opened linger?

It's too easy to see how that would happen. It's an intimately familiar story.]

It can't rewrite who you are, Brian, not truly. I don't believe that it can.

[0thingsonmymind]

Its not strong enough for that.

*He's still cerain of that. He's still positive the Operator is all-powerful.*

But it doesn't really make waiting any easier.

[bookofnope]

I admit, I don't know if anything can.

[He's tried to offer comfort now and then. He suspects he's even gotten good at it. But this? What answers can he give that he hasn't failed to give himself?]

That is why I thought... perhaps in this condition you would have some insight into things that are harder to grasp in your normal state. A new perspective? Something to reflect on, to keep you connected?

[0thingsonmymind]

I don't know...I hadn't really had time to think about it yet. Right now I'm just trying to get steady.

[bookofnope]

[Fear making him push too hard maybe. He exhales.]

Can I help you with that in any way?

[0thingsonmymind]

I appreciate it, but I don't think so. I think its something only I can sort out.

*He shrugs.*

[bookofnope]

... I understand. [Yes, very much so. What they have, this connection, means a lot, but some shadows are too deep to be seen into from the outside.]

Though, if you do not wish to be alone as you do, only say so.