i_speak_softly | Forty-Ninth Theory [Action/Voice]

Entry tags:

Forty-Ninth Theory [Action/Voice]

[Don has never been to an ocean before, and last time he was at an amusement park he had to electrify the roller coaster to defeat an enraged colony of nanobots.]

[He is determined that this excursion will be one of pleasant discovery.]

[To that end, he takes the teleporter to the beach on Thursday morning, and spends the next two days exploring the park, the waterfront, and as far out into the ocean as his own limbs can take him. (Or farther, if anyone is kind enough to offer him the use of a boat.)]

[At some point during the two days, he opens his journal and leaves the following message:]

Researchers, experimenters, tinkerers, inventors, curious people of all kinds... join the "Scientists, Hypothesizers, and Engineers of Luceti League". I'm starting it right now and everyone is welcome.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only | Expand All

[Almost-overwhelming is right. Even having been here before, Robert still finds himself stymied by this kind of place - all colours and lights and smells of semi-processed edibles - and what it represents.

Thoughtfully, he studies the amusement park.]

Well, the last time I was here, I had... already stopped by the Hall of Personas. [The slight shiver at those words should not go unnoticed to Don.] ... So... perhaps something else...? I have not gone on any of the rides, really...

[He spent most of the time watching others do so.]

Hall of Personas? [Don can't guess what this is, much less why Robert seems bothered by it.]

... Essentially, it is... a room full of mirrors that, er, project various... versions of yourself, I suppose.

[Robert drops his voice low.] Including... u-unpleasant versions...

... And, er, other people can see them.

Oh... [What kind of attraction is that?] Maybe we should do something else...

[A traumatizing one?]

... It... it might be a good idea. Though... [Less awkwardly:] I trust you...

... The only other person I went in with was... Giles. And, well... [Giles ended up seeing Robert as the junkie he was before... though Robert essentially got to see the same.]

[It is a little intriguing. And he has nothing to hide from his partner...]

It doesn't matter to me; you can decide.

... I think it would be... fascinating. [And then maybe Don can see those facets of Robert for himself, the facets Robert wouldn't be able to show here in Luceti.] And there would be... fewer people during this time.

[So now would be the best time, really.]

[A further display of trust! Don smiles at Robert.]

Which way is it?

[From the entrance, it's not particularly far. Robert begins picking his way through the significantly-thinned crowd, past a few other attractions, until he's left standing in front of the outside of the Hall.]

Ah... well, this is it.

[It's a long passage, rather ominous-looking, studded with mirrors on all surfaces... visually disorienting, of course, but Robert got used to it before.

He's still nervous of what Don might see, but he trusts that whatever it is, it'll be okay.]

[Don peers into the low building, then glances back at Robert.]

Do you know how it works?

I wish I did... presumably it is some sort of Shifted simulation.

... But one just... enters it.

[And Robert steps, nervously, into the room.] With any luck, er... a persona will appear soon enough...

[Don steps in behind Robert. As he moves between the first of the mirrors, a shimmer seems to pass down the row, and images appear in one pane after another.]

[A preteen Donatello, spinning a jo and repeatedly dropping it. Donatello without his gear, an orange circle painted on the upper corner of his plastron. Donatello in a strange costume, lightning dancing from his hands. Donatello with metallic limbs. Don with oddly-short bandana tails and a "D" on his belt...]

Whoa...

[Robert steps slowly, quietly taking in all of these forms of Don, even if there're his own there too, standing across from these versions - all drastically different, spanning the mirrors.

The toddler, bright-eyed, in front of a holographic replica of the Randi Institute, studying it with an obsessive gaze that seems out of place on a face that small. The turtle self - that sends a pang of guilt through Robert, standing next to Don the way he is - with reptilian eyes a stark gray against the pastel colours on his blunted face. The junkie again, with that same hollow drug-addled smile and the scruffy clothes and the needle marks stark on his pale skin. Even the math teacher from the AU, handling a piece of what he'd thought was Third Party technology, but was really Daisy's suit all along...]

... Yes.

... Yours are... fascinating...

[Don turns to look at Robert's side of the hall, his eyes tracing over each facet of his partner's multiversal self.]

Do you - recognize these?

Yes...

[He gestures to each of them in turn.] Myself at approximately three... myself during the species changing event... [... A longer pause, and a lowering of his voice -] ... M-Myself as... as a user...

... And lastly, myself from... from the false world, here.

... What about... yours', if I may ask?

[Don regards Robert's personas with varying emotions - fondness, remembrance, worry - then turns to gesture to his own.]

That's me a few years ago. This one I recognize from an experiment. That one reminds me of an experiment too... the others I don't know.

[The orange-circle-marked Don gets Robert's interest first.]

An experiment...?

[This had to be from before Robert knew him. He doesn't recognize the brand on Don's plastron, though it's mildly eerie.

The junkie persona smiles across at Don and gives an almost-normal wave - almost normal, Uncanny Valley-esque to real social ability. He's almost the same age Don is now, even - he looks starkly different from the professional-looking man nearby.]

Last summer. I turned into him, or thought I was him... [He shakes his head and shrugs, turning back to the mirrors opposite.]

[That wave is - strangely unsettling, somewhere between normal-for-Robert and normal-for-other-people.]

Was that really only five years ago?

Like the false life... [Robert half-murmurs it, studying the... experiment-Don slowly before moving his gaze to the others. They're all so... different from the person standing next to him - the preteen in particular reminds him poignantly of watching his own young self hunched over a console.

At Don's words, though, he looks at his old self again... the man from five years ago.]

Yes...

... It hardly feels like it, but... [Robert exhales slowly and looks into his own self's gray eyes. They have that distant, dreamy quality of somebody obviously intoxicated.]

You miss this, don't you...?

[He ignores the words in his head, trying not to think of how easy it might be to fall back down that crevasse again.]

Similar, but less... cohesive.

[He looks back and forth between preteen-Don and young-adult-Robert. They're so unlike each other - how could they have grown up to have anything in common?]

[The younger Don drops the jo again, and looks down at it despondently. Even though it's just an image, Don can't help murmuring a word of encouragement.]

Ganbatte kudasai, touto-chan...

Edited 2011-08-29 00:09 (UTC)

[The drug use masks the fact that this young adult is still brilliant - still a lover of the sciences, still a genius of a sort... but what good is genius if it stagnates, if it never gets put to use?

Robert steps a bit further, moving slowly away so that the next set of mirrors come into play, showing a familiar figure from the last time he was in here. Quite specifically, a little human boy, scarcely older than nine or ten, hunched almost defensively over a nanocomputer console.

It makes him bite his lip gently.]

... I always... wonder, now, how... h-how I would have turned out if I had friends like I do now... back then.

[The pre-teen Robert blinks curiously over at the similarly young figure of Don, hesitating a moment mid-obsessive typing.]

[The younger Donatello catches sight of Robert's persona, and draws back, curious but afraid, before blinking out of existence as Don moves down the corridor.]

I guess that goes for both of us.

[He slings an arm around Robert's shoulders. Behind him, unseen, an image of a very ancient-looking Turtle fades into view.]

[Robert leans slightly into Don at the touch, reassured and comforted by his presence even amongst things that are fundamentally a little unsettling.

The image of a seriously aged turtle makes him look over curiously, though.]

... The future? ... Or a future, I suppose...

[He wonders how close this persona is to the reality.]

[Don turns to see what Robert is looking at, and stops short at what he sees. The older Turtle notices him looking, and winks, before murmuring a few words that only Don can hear.]

Wow...

[Don might've only heard them, but Robert saw the mouth movements. There's no way he'd be able to guess what they were, though, so instead, he asks bluntly:]

... What did this person say, if... I may ask?

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]

[Action]