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[extendedbrutalpipemurder]

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voice ✦ text ✦ in-person

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[deuceoftears]

[It's an odd combination of deliberately, aesthetically low-tech and subtly, elegantly high-tech, even clarketech. It's unclear where the soft near-full-spectrum light is coming from; there are panels on the wall that blend in almost perfectly with the abstract dappled greens but could become grid stations at need. There's an efficiency to the layout that suggests space was limited, or that these are standard accommodations for someone not particularly high ranking - or in fact both. Jedao keeps it both very neat and very clean; the only signs of personality are a stack of library books, mostly Earth philosophy and history, beneath the table, and a handful of what look like futuristic protein bars in a leaf-like bowl on the side table next to the sofa. The labels are in an alphabet which resembles, but isn't, Hangul.

Jedao motions for them to sit and pours for each of them.]

I suppose it would be bad manners to leave you in suspense, then.

To be very blunt, I'm interested in what you're capable of. If I asked you to give me a memory, which one would you pick?

[extendedbrutalpipemurder]

[ elias takes a seat, and nods as jedao makes his purpose here clear. ]

Ah, well. I expect I can be clearer than Eiffel has likely been. And as to the memory-- I suppose I would ask why you wanted one.

[deuceoftears]

Because I want to know what it's like. And it seems like the sort of thing served poorly by secondhand reports.

[extendedbrutalpipemurder]

[ Elias pauses a moment, evaluating whether that seems genuine. He has no issue with the idea of it. It's simply-- a very strange request ]

It's quite simple really. I place the memory of an experience in your mind, and you'll know it. I can share the actual sensation of it as well, and back home I'd have been able to imprint so deeply that for the rest of your life you wouldn't have been able to go more than a few moments without thinking of it.

[ He raises his shoulders in a small shrug, suggesting it's a shame he can't do that here ]

[deuceoftears]

Are they real memories from someone, or can you just write them?

[extendedbrutalpipemurder]

It's hardly a memory if I've just invented it wholesale.

[ Jedao please ]

[deuceoftears]

It's a memory if it feels like a memory. It becomes your own.

[extendedbrutalpipemurder]

That's... not how memory works.

[deuceoftears]

Things are memories if you remember them. We didn't really go to Elsewhere, but I remember it.

You don't think so?

[extendedbrutalpipemurder]

Memory is a record of the things a person experiences.

[deuceoftears]

So what is it I have, when I remember that life?

[He's genuinely curious about Elias's perspective.]

Isn't the whole point of your ability that when we remember something, in some way, we experience it? Anew, or - in this case, fresh?

[extendedbrutalpipemurder]

The whole point of my ability is to traumatise whoever is on the other end of the experience.

[ it's really quite simple ]

[deuceoftears]

Why?

[extendedbrutalpipemurder]

[ because he can. ]

To feed my patron.

[deuceoftears]

[It's not not like remembrances. But -]

Why?

[extendedbrutalpipemurder]

In the world I come from, you either feed the Fear Powers, or are fed upon. It wasn't a hard choice to make, really.

[deuceoftears]

Why?

[It's a little different, every time he says it. This time there's an edge to it, something subtle and sad and knowing.]

[extendedbrutalpipemurder]

Why not?

[ he's not going to keep playing the why game like this ]

[deuceoftears]

[Sometimes, the fact that Jedao is technically two years old is more apparent than other times.]

Well, it's a bit unambitious. But I meant, why is it like that?

[extendedbrutalpipemurder]

[ he raises his shoulders a little ]

Why aren't all worlds like that? Fear is an integral part of the human existence-- the world I'm from simply happens to have entities which feed on it.

[deuceoftears]

Anything that feeds can be starved.

[extendedbrutalpipemurder]

Oh, of course.

[ he pauses, sips his tea ]

You'd have to get rid of all life on Earth first. But yes, once their source of fear was gone, they would in time fade away to nothing.

[deuceoftears]

[Jedao discards his first thoughts, because while planetary scouring and basic excision psych surgery are both eminently doable, those aren't options he particularly wants to highlight for Elias's attention. Then, thinking back over it, he frowns.]

If that's true, then what do they need you for?

[extendedbrutalpipemurder]

I'm worth more to it instilling fear in others than as a source of fear myself.

[deuceoftears]

I suppose fear is hard to sustain. Especially on a planetary scale.

[Jedao knows as well as anyone how anything can become normal.]

You never did answer my original question.