Post-Event Reaction Log!
Who: Everyone. EVERYONE.
What: The event is over.
When: From 12:01 AM on the 28th to all day after
Where: All over da place!
Summary: With the event over, people will be waking up in whatever homes they moved into, perhaps next to someone they normally wouldn't.
Rating: I dunno it could get kind of steamy :o ( Read more... )
What: The event is over.
When: From 12:01 AM on the 28th to all day after
Where: All over da place!
Summary: With the event over, people will be waking up in whatever homes they moved into, perhaps next to someone they normally wouldn't.
Rating: I dunno it could get kind of steamy :o ( Read more... )
[Robert inhales shakily. It's clear that this has been extremely difficult for him.]
Th-though what was done to us was... beyond reprehensible, and disgusting... and e-entirely unnecessary for any purpose I c-can ascertain...
... w-well. The a-argument that Luceti is a c-complete fabrication in and o-of itself, while not necessarily i-incorrect, is logically i-irreducible, and leads to several possible errors of j-judgment...
... Wh-while I am loathe to a-accept things without proof, and cannot n-necessarily say that our existences here are o-objectively provable... I think it w-would do better to look at the fact that an o-objective reality likely exists...
... H-However unpleasant that seems.
... [Robert exhales slowly, trying to keep his composure. Using logic at least helps.]
A-At any rate... I... I must agree that... h-having family that was close was... interesting.
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[But it's good for him to have a scientist-type talk him through this. He needs a little logic right now.]
Yeah... having family... In this alternate reality, I had a brother, and we spent a lot of time together, we looked out for each other. That's... something I never had a chance to experience back home. [With a sister there, but still. Same sibling-type feelings apply.]
I'd like to hope there's an objective reality out there. I thought I knew what it was, but after this past... ten days or so?... I have to question everything we're experiencing.
There really is no way to prove that this right now is reality, is there?
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I... had a brother too, a foster brother. D-Don. ... He was also my partner... perhaps our r-relationship was something that... that the Malnosso c-could not alter.
[That's a comforting thought, if it's true.]
... At home I was... an only child. So... I h-have never experienced that kind of familial setting...
... A-And yes... I... I-I would hope there was an objective reality myself. Considering the... logical traps that result otherwise...
... But no. There... is no real way to prove it. All w-we have to rely on is our subjective, e-easily modified perceptions. I mean, I c-can take readings with my n-nanocomputer, but that is only so helpful...
[He sighs shakily, kind of leaning forward a bit.] I apologize, Mr. M-Mulder. I... w-wish I could be of more assistance.
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But that's interesting, that your relationship remained the same even during the experiment. Maybe it's a sign that it was meant to be? I'm a believer in past lives, and I once learned that the people closest to me were always close to me, even in other lifetimes. Maybe... maybe that means something similar.
[And ok, how to start making himself come to terms with any of this latest stuff though...]
Yeah... Science can't explain or measure everything. We often take it for granted that the reality we're experiencing is the truth. But when our perceptions fail us, what do we even have left?
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Ah, w-well... on Terra that sort of thing would... well. It would be considered extremely... i-implausible. But perhaps your physics are different... th-that has been demonstrated often enough here, at any rate.
... What it might mean is that it was too engrained in our c-consciousnesses for the Malnosso to manipulate it.
... In fact, much of m-my relationships stayed in some c-capacity. It was more the d-details that changed around them.
[Robert makes a thoughtful sound.] Science, at least Terran s-science, does manage to explain a significant percentage of wh-what the universe is capable of...
... When our perceptions f-fail us, though, we only have whatever proof of objectivity left. On T-Terra that would be data gathered from sources o-outside of human error, such as scanners... But here there is... little of that to be found. And... and the Malnosso can... m-manipulate us on such a basic level ( ... )
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None of my world's scientists could do this so completely either, and certainly not on such a massive scale. There are methods they could use, but, they don't have anything like shifting...
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... It's... beyond disturbing, really.
Perhaps there's some way... to resist it...?
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I wonder, if they could be resisted... So far it doesn't sound like anyone's discovered anything, but I refuse to believe that there's no way. We just haven't come across the right answer.
[Too bad he's not more scientifically inclined though. He can do leaps of logic and figure out some things, but working out how to resist something like this... it's beyond him.]
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[Robert, while being scientifically inclined, has never had this sort of problem put against him before.]
... I c-certainly hope there is a way. This... this sort of barbarism being allowed to occur... is just disgusting.
[And it isn't as if the Malnosso could benefit from this in any visible way or at least no way that Robert will know about until Bil's broadcast.]
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[He's dealt with enough weird stuff in general that he hopes something will somehow click someday and suddenly make sense...]
It can't go on like this forever. We're going to have to find some way out of it... or it's just going to get worse until we do. I know I for one don't want to be living a fabricated life.
[Which in some sense is painful to admit, because while he was living it, he'd liked that fake life. But that's exactly the danger of the thing.]
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... And neither do I. [Robert would far rather suffer with all his knowledge than be ignorant and happy.] ...
... This may be rather macabre of me to say, but... this place has no real release. Not even death, apparently. So... so the only thing to do is to... find a way to counteract these horrors. Somehow.
[He isn't optimistic, but Robert still wants to try.]
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Not even death is an escape... I've heard about that. [There's some disturbingly curious side of him that almost wonders what that must be like to experience, but he's not that eager to know firsthand.] That they go to all of that trouble to revive us at all, it must mean we're valuable to them. As test subjects and apparently soldiers for their wars... but still...
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I certainly h-hope so... Though, ideally, I would wish for open communications or transportation channels between the many worlds here...
[Robert doesn't want to leave or forget Don.]
That would seem to make... sense. In a horrifying sort of way. Why bother if we were irrelevant?
... I wonder how they even do it. [Revival from death is not impossible on Terra, but it's certainly risky and time-consuming...]
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[He'll never stop being an idealist about things like that...]
We have to keep being useful to them, disturbing as that prospect seems. At least until we can gain an upper hand.
I can't imagine what sort of power it must take to revive the dead, and not just revive them, but essentially restore them back to life. Back home... I know of ways people can come back, but usually as some kind of undead, something that can't even be called a normal life. What the Malnosso have... it's beyond anything I know of.
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[Robert's a bit of an idealist too when it comes to things like this. Because clearly what worked for Terra will work for everybody!]
... Terran medicine is capable of some degree of restarting life, but the process is... difficult at best, and brain deterioration tends to set in quickly once oxygen levels drop, meaning that sometimes the kindest thing to do is to allow death to stay permanent.
The Malnosso are capable of... well, incredible things.
But they misuse it...
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[He knows it'd be tough keeping it away from corrupt individuals, but anything to have it out of the Malnosso's hands.]
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