computation | IC Contact

IC Contact - Expiation

connecting . . .

Well, [ he says after a moment — for once, not jumping straight into reassurances or trying to counter her words, but instead giving them some thought, treating them seriously like she does, ]

It's not like anyone's past can be erased, can it? That's the point of having a past, innit, we have to live with whatever choices we've made. The good and the bad. The only thing we can affect is what we choose to do going forward. That's the part that really matters. So yeah, maybe the past you hurt people, and gave up on people... but the you that you are now is something different. Better. Not despite of your past, but because of it, yeah?

[ he aims a small smile at her, then; that she regrets what happened is a good thing, because it means she's different now. ]

[ She appreciates him not jumping to reassure her more than she could say. Root doesn't need validation or approval, but understanding is something she's been sorely lacking in her life. Understanding and maybe, at the barest edge of possibility, acceptance. ]

There's things I can do that other people can't, [ Root says factually. She's clear-eyed, seeing a path forward with the Machine's guidance that speaks to her. ] I don't mean literally, that they aren't capable of it. I mean I can do it -- or go through it -- and keep going. Some people, some bad people, they only understand their native language.

[ Sometimes the only thing the bad guys respect is someone who is willing to meet them at their level. Either get on that level or accept the consequences of your morals, in Root's opinion. It's an argument she has regularly with Harold. ]

I know that's a slippery slope. That's why-- usually, I'd have her to pull me back.

[ Root presses her lips together in suppressed frustration. Her confidence evaporates without the Machine's voice right in her ear, telling her where the line is. It's so unfair to have found her and then be without her... ]

Edited 2024-11-21 22:26 (UTC)

No, I get that.

[ he knows that he doesn't — well, he doesn't look like someone who can get particularly violent, and he doesn't like it, because it reminds him all too much of his father, of the metaphorical blood in his veins... but that doesn't mean he doesn't fight. that doesn't mean he hasn't met those who'd try to harm him and edwin blow for blow, before.

but once you start on that road, when do you stop? and so he has refused it, time and time again, because he won't be like his father. ]

... And now you don't have her, here. Well — it's not the same, but if I see you slipping, I promise to let you know.

[ That's sort of what she means, too, that she can do those things and it doesn't affect her. Root feels things -- sometimes she feels too much -- but violence itself doesn't touch her. She doesn't lose herself in it and she never goes farther than she means to. Sometimes she just means to go pretty damn far. ]

Yeah. She just-- she saw something in me. I want to live up to that. [ Root suddenly struggles to explain, trying to articulate for the first time ever her complex perspective on the Machine and on her own morality. It's tough to explain a pseudo-religion you've made up for yourself with no formal rules. ]

I've been trying to guess at what she'd want me to do. [ Root traces the edge of the lid on her drink with one finger. ] I knew she'd want me to follow whatever path saved the most people in the reset, so that's what I did. Even if it meant the old A.I. might be lost forever. She would care about us more.

[ So although Root is a diehard A.I. superfan, her own A.I. wouldn't let her prioritize one over human life. Fortunately not a conflict Root has had to address about the Machine directly just yet... because choosing between the Machine and a person's life, including her own, Root would almost certainly choose the Machine. And she knows the Machine wouldn't. ]

[ when he can't reach either of them via the tablet, he checks the apartment, only to find it empty. from then on, he checks every day — until coming there through the mirror to nothing but empty rooms becomes too depressing, and he leaves behind a note instead.

overly optimistic of him, perhaps... but he doesn't want to think they might be gone. just like he doesn't want to think jinx is gone; just like he didn't want to accept shinji being gone. ]

TO ROOT & SHAW,

It's been five days, now. I keep hoping that I'm gonna come back to you guys being here, but with every day, well, that's looking a little less likely. Still, if you do come back and read this... I hope you guys are okay. If you remember me, give me a heads up you're back, yeah? And if you don't, well, just know there's someone who cares about you both a lot.

— C.R.

[ Root really isn't used to having friends in the conventional sense. Anyone she cares about at home who knows her genuinely is used to her pulling a disappearing act on a regular basis, sometimes for extended periods of time. It's not that she thinks they don't worry about her at all, but she's chosen the kind of life she leads and she doesn't really invite external commentary on her decisions. She doesn't even really let Shaw have a say most of the time.

She operates in the moment with the lightning-fast flash of synapse and most of the time there's no one there for her to disappoint.

As a result, it's surreal when she finds Charles's note. She actually reads it three times, a little more emotional than she wants to admit. She hasn't had a note like this to her, her real identity and person, Root, since...

Maybe ever. Hanna always knew her as Samantha, after all.

So it takes her a few minutes, but eventually she messages him. Root decides to apologize, which she doesn't do lightly -- mostly because she fully expects Charles wouldn't demand one if she didn't give it. ]

We're back now. I'm sorry. Not used to having anyone who worries when I'm gone.

Come back to the apartment and I'll explain?

[ once again, her instinct is correct — there are no apologies that he expects to receive, doesn't even really want them. all he cares about is this: the response, and what it means. that root and shaw are both alright, that they're back, and selfishly, that they still remember him.

and so all he responds with is, ]

sure, on my way

[ it really doesn't take him long at all — there's a large mirror in the entryway, left there from when he used to actually, you know, live there; he enters through that instead of the door like a normal person, and the moment he spots root, he makes a beeline for her —

just so he can throw his arms around her and squeeze her into a hug. ]

Hey, [ he says, and the relief all but brims in his voice. ] It's good to have you back.

[ Although she doesn't give or receive a lot of hugs, Root isn't shy about them in the slightest; she leans in readily and just breathes for a moment as they embrace. When they pull away, she recovers only a little distance, at ease with physical proximity.

She is subtly a little different from the Root that met Charles when she first showed up. She's more sure of herself, more sad, more resolute. The peppy spark comes and goes now, and right now it's gone. ]

Good to be back, [ she agrees. ] I died once already so I figured a second time wouldn't be a big deal, but I wouldn't recommend it. I have a major hangover, for one thing.

[ Root's not going to admit to Shaw anything past a surface that wasn't as easy for me as it looks because she knows Shaw hadn't wanted her to do it in the first place, and is wrestling with some guilt over it, despite her inevitable protestations to the contrary. But here, with Charles, she can say that she hadn't enjoyed death. Root can get herself to do anything, through anything, as she'd told him before-- but it doesn't mean she doesn't feel it. ]

I get that, too. [ wanting to live up to someone else's expectation of you, out of love — yeah, he definitely gets that. ]

... She really does sound pretty aces. [ caring about humanity, wanting root to save as many people as she can... yeah. but then, that's the thing about love, isn't it; that you might value one person, or in root's case one ai, over a number of others. ]

Reckon that she'd be pretty pleased with what you've done, so far. Maybe, once someone figures out how to return us all home, you can tell her about it all.

[ Root glances up and gives Charles a sincere smile. It's not as effervescent as her usual cocky devil-may-care daring attitude; it's more reserved, private. How Root is when she's genuinely appreciative. ]

Thanks-- for caring about her. For trusting what I'm saying. But I don't think I'll ever see her again, or ever hear her voice.

[ She wants to sound calm and accepting, has come to this conclusion logically so many times that it's undeniable. But she can't. Her smile twists into a grimace and she laughs a little, hollowly, hand coming up to trace the edges of the implant behind her ear. ]

We're copies. It's what makes the most sense. We're digital beings and the consciousness I am here is not ever going to experience home again, not really. [ If they lose their memories when they go back, it's not them; and it implies that they're being updated. Of course the A.I. would think they could return if it was the explicit end state it was seeking for rehabilitation, and Root clung to that for a while, but...

It doesn't make sense. And she's always been a rational person, even hyper-rational. ]

But if I'm only good when she's around, what good am I really?

[ that is a good thing, because charles hugs with his entire being — throws his whole damn soul into it, squeezing her close and tucking his face against her shoulder briefly before he lets her go... though not going far is something that suits him just fine. it isn't like he believes people will disappear if he isn't within a touching distance, like edwin was torn from him back to hell while he was just a little too far to intervene... but, well. if he's close enough to root to touch her should she show signs of disappearing, that's a good thing, innit?

the admission makes his brows furrow into something like sympathy — not pity, never that, but understanding. ]

... Yeah. I get it. Maybe you heard of the Gnos infection, but I — well. If I had to pick between reliving my death by hypothermia and internal bleeding for the fourth time [ yes he did say fourth, let's not linger there, ] or getting gutted by an iron sword, I'd still take the hypothermia.

[ with a slight shake of his head, ] Dying's never easy. Not if you do it twice, not if you do it five times, not if you do it for seventy years over and over again. [ a very specific reference, that, let's not linger there either. ]

Course. [ he doesn't say that he would trust her with anything, about anything — foolish, perhaps, in the light of what he knows of her, or perhaps not. he thinks he can trust her to tell him the truth, to trust that she trusts him enough to tell him the truth.

with a soft look of concern, he reaches out his hand, rests it on her arm. ]

Hey, [ he says, meaning nothing and everything at once, trying to offer quiet comfort, even as the words she's saying shake him, too — it's not that he's never thought of that, them being copies... but it's what it means that hits him a little too hard, and so he chooses to just. not think about it at all, beyond the way something in his eyes flashes and shutters away.

he'll focus on her; that's what's important. ]

Hey. You're not only good when she's around. Maybe she made you better — but you're you. You're who you are because of her, and you're gonna continue to be you, to do the best you can, and that's — well, that's enough, innit? Being good isn't conditional. Being worth something's not something you need to earn. You're worth a whole lot, yeah? Just as you are.

[ Her expression tightens subtly, Root's usual devil-may-care attitude dampened and turned sharp like a concealed knife. She won't ask about the details but she does reach out and touch his arm again and say, with no trace of lightness: ]

Offer to throw anyone in the trash who needs it still stands.

[ Just putting that on the table in case he needs it. And if throw them in the trash is a metaphor for whatever needs doing-- murder, torture, extortion or long-term deceit-- well. Root's up for that, and she knows she can pull Shaw in with her, from boredom if nothing else.

Offer aside, she could say her real, meaningful death was from bleeding out, too, but that's not what she wants to talk about. Her features twist. There's no one else really she can think of to talk to about this that will get it in the same way Charles probably will, not get it and care, and Root is surprised to find she feels like she needs someone to care. Because it's not about her, not really; it's about Shaw.

And she can't stand hearing one more time that she should let Shaw go. ]

Shaw has died a lot, too, [ she says quietly, pulling her hand back. ] In simulations. I needed to test the system here, prove to her that it wouldn't be reset when we died.

[ Root doesn't regret it, but the weight of what Shaw's been through-- because of her-- has been a lot to carry by herself. ]

[ Root latches on quickly and absolutely to people when she does, rare though it is. She's used and manipulated people for so many years for her own ends, mostly for money, for the fun of it, and she can read people as straightforwardly as she can read SQL. Which means she trusts her own judgment absolutely. When she finds someone she likes and respects, she doesn't let go.

Charles became that very quickly for her with his empathetic words and understanding shortly after her arrival, and Root won't forget it. She knows her shortcomings and she knows her strengths: she can treat people like pawns and she can treat them like kings. It's only lately she's tried to find somewhere in the middle.

But knowing herself means she's sure of is who she is, and where she's going. She doesn't really need the reassurance. ]

I don't need you to tell me I'm worth something, [ she says with complete honesty, but she softens the blow by covering his hand on her arm with her own. Root has slender hands with soft callouses from holding guns. ] Either we all matter or nothing matters, and I think we all matter. I matter. You matter.

Whether we're code on a server somewhere, or cast off in a transdimensional void rationalizing our experience, or dead in the strangest form of purgatory, what we do is important. She taught me that.

I'm not going to give up. But what we have here and now is going to have to be enough.

[A day or so after they wake up (and therefore a day or so after he has his conversation with Root), Charles also gets a response from Shaw:]

we're good

long story.

[Sameen Shaw, this is why you have no friends.]

[You wake up in a courtroom. You’re not really sure how you got here, just that you’re here. There’s Jerry, sitting at the judges box. For some he might be new, and others he might be familiar or semi-familiar. He scrutinizes you, and then motions to the jury box. There’s a plaque that’s sitting on the outside that says “Council”, but there’s no one sitting there. Everything looks clean and maintained, but there’s no one in the courtroom but you and Jerry.

Weird.]

You are charged with murder.

[There’s something about his expression that makes you think that he might’ve already made up his mind…]

The Council has found you Guilty of this. In order to repent and further your rehabilitation, you have been tasked to show remorse for your crime by distancing yourself from the one you murdered, as the Council has deemed it unhealthy. That person must be allowed her own independence. If there is no action taken, there will be consequences.

[You wake up back in your bed. You remember everything – Jerry, the jury box, the words he spoke to you. Maybe you remember the words he spoke more vividly than anything else.

However you decide to proceed… there will be consequences.]

[ooc: you have until January 10th to submit your Sentencing HERE Even if your character doesn’t proceed with the Sentencing, you must comment on the NPC inbox for your penalty.

Also, there are effects for ignoring this Sentencing. The longer that Root takes without completing her Sentencing, the more the effects of death of Expiation will weigh on her. She may start questioning whether she really exists, her memories, or even her humanity. If you have any questions about Sentencing, please direct it to the Mod Contact post.]

[ he doesn't take it badly — why would he, truly? it's a good thing, her seeing her own worth and being able to acknowledge it so quickly, too; he's dealt with so many people who haven't that he's just glad. ]

... Yeah. Yeah, we do. And it is. [ he gives her a soft smile, then. ] Maybe it's not ideal, this — maybe those we've learned to rely on aren't here, and we can be a bit lost because of that, but... well. We've got each other, yeah? And that's not nothing.

[ said with his usual sincerity, of course. and perhaps then they can move onto nicer, lighter topics, like her boba tea and maybe some gossip or whatnot... but charles turns his hand a little, to grab her hand and give it a squeeze, a wordless thank you that she is here, with him. ]

Thanks, [ he says, and it's a quiet thing, far from being dismissive — as overwhelming as the knowledge that root does in fact mean it all is, well. it warms him, too, the kind of care that would extend to everything she's offering in the implications.

but then she continues, and charles feels a hollowness inside his chest; shaw has died a lot, too, she says, and test the system, and suddenly the entire picture rearranges itself in his head to something completely different — and heartbreaking. ]

... Fuck, [ he says after a moment. ] Then, this — god, this has got to be hell for her, innit? [ he takes a breath he absolutely does not need except in a subconscious way, a reflex more than anything. when he speaks again, it's with a quiet tone far more mature than what he looks like, understanding and sympathy mingled in his voice, ]

I wish you didn't have to do that in the first place... but I get it. To show her it's not the same, yeah? [ a pause. ] When someone you love's been through — Hell, it's... you'd do anything, wouldn't you? Anything. [ anything. he thinks of the door to hell, of the staircase, of going down there with a map in a notebook and a promise of if i get us out we'll both come to be judged by the lost and found department, and if we both get stuck down there, well, you'll know where we are. to say he gets it is an understatement. ]

[ Unreasonable loyalty is Root's lifeblood, and she absolutely understands what Charles is saying, down to her core. The absurd irrational lengths to which they'd go to keep someone. She'd gone after Shaw even when it had endangered the war they were fighting, and it had, a few times. Root had struggled with her decision not to constantly, actively search for her in the absence of leads, but when she had a lead she chased it down to its bitterest end.

That applies to her friends, too, if to a somewhat lesser extent. Root means it and know what she's committing to when she makes an offer to look out for someone, like she just had. But at the moment there's a whole host of her unresolved feelings about Shaw's situation welling up and pushing her heart into her throat, a visceral ache of emotion.

It was so recent for her and she'd had so little chance to process it before dying... and now dying again. ]

It was over seven thousand times, Charles. She's doing amazing being stuck here after that.

[ There's tears in her voice that she blinks back out of her eyes impatiently. Root doesn't want to give all of Shaw's very personal secrets away, not even to a good friend, but the part of this that's applicable to her and her actions she considers fair game. ]

She went through that because she came back to save me. I think I can go a few rounds to prove to her that I'm here, and not going away.

[ It doesn't begin to make things even, but that's not really the point. ]

[ it was over seven thousand times, she says, and charles sways on his feet a little — it isn't like he can feel dizzy, but somehow the unfairness of it all hits him like a missile, crashes into his heart and leaves it in pieces; that someone else has had to go through something like that, too, that it isn't just one clerical error, landing an innocent boy in the worst place in all existence for decades, but this, too. shaw, suffering, over and over and over again.

his voice is somewhat choked when he says, ]

Yeah, I get it. [ a pause, and his voice still tries to catch in his throat, but he pushes through, ] My best mate back home, he... he spent seventy-three years in Hell. On a mistake, a — technicality, he wasn't ever supposed to be there. And in Hell, you've got your own personal place there, yeah? So he was —

[ god, this is hard to talk about; he's never, never spoken about this to anyone before, not in detail. he has to look up, and still his eyes well with tears until his gaze blurs, and fuck, but he hates this so much, his own helplessness, the idea that edwin had spent so, so long in that horror show, and there's absolutely nothing charles can do about it. ]

His hell was this spider demon, catching him and ripping him apart, and he'd, he'd respawn every time that happened. For seventy-three years. He was there for a day or so when I went to get him, the second time, and there was — this pile of his bodies, yeah, in the corner. Just one day —

[ he fights for the breath he doesn't need, and then looks at root; there's tears falling down his face, but he doesn't really care. ] I get it. I'd die a thousand times over if it meant he never has to go through that again.

[One minute, they're both lying in bed, Shaw's mind pleasantly hazy from alcohol, sleepiness, and the warmth of Root's body against her back. The next minute, all three of those things are gone when Root vanishes wholesale, blinking away as if she'd never been there at all.

The experience neatly cuts through both the tipsiness and the tiredness, and when Shaw swings herself out of bed and onto her feet, her mind is alert and racing. It's obvious what's happened: really, the biggest surprise is that this is the first time she's experiencing it. A long-running simulation like this one has to experience glitches and coding bugs. Now she just has to figure out how bad it is - and determine if it's likely to get worse.

Bear comes running into the bedroom, which is the first major relief. The second major relief is that all of Root's stuff is still here, from her tablets on the nightstand to her toothbrush and towel in the bathroom; in fact, a quick overview of the apartment (Bear, as ever, at her heels) doesn't turn up anything amiss at all. Okay, she tells herself, to the beat of her heart thudding in her ear. Okay, okay, okay. Root's gone, but the presence of her hasn't been erased. Root may or may not come back, but none of Shaw's memories are proving to be false or overwritten. Root may or may not come back, but Shaw isn't losing her mind. And that's a hell of a relief, it really is, but--

Root may or may not come back.]

One or two a week.

[She mutters to herself under her breath. It's the statistic she'd been given not long ago, an estimate of how many people vanish into thin air, and the sort of glitch that Root had obviously been made a casualty of. Snatching up her own tablet, she quickly scrolls back to the conversation and reads through it again. Backups, copies, reloading old data--

It probably won't work. She'd told Root that she wouldn't try again because she didn't see any reason to, and she'd meant it. But that was then and this is now, and if she can do something to reboot her tiny little portion of the system, when Root has only just disappeared and her data might not yet have been reallocated or overwritten - then it's sure as hell worth a try, no matter how unlikely it is to succeed.

She shoos Bear out of the room first, closing the bedroom door firmly behind him. And then she picks up her gun from the bedside table, holds it in her hand, and--

Root reappears, just as unceremoniously as she'd vanished. And Shaw, half-raised gun in hand, has a look on her face akin to that of a kid who's been caught with her hand in the cookie jar. She may not do guilt, but apparently she does Oh crap, you weren't supposed to see this pretty damn well. She drops the gun, letting it clatter to the floor.]

I'm not gonna do it.

[ Root's a physical person and she knows Charles is what she would call touchy-feely. She doesn't hesitate to reach out and hug him again, responding to his open crying wordlessly and immediately. She gives him a long moment of solid hugging before she withdraws, and oddly now her own tears seem to have dried up. Root has plenty of feelings but she never, ever flinches from hard things, no matter how awful. She puts up with her own sentiments to a certain point, but past that, things need to get done.

And she sees now that Charles is the same way. Went to get him, huh? Went to literal hell for his best mate, who was there by mistake. A technicality. Root doesn't believe in hell and doesn't know what that truly means in this context, but Charles was explicit enough, and she respects immensely what's laying unspoken beneath his words.

Shaw had known what she was doing and done it willingly, so Root wouldn't ever insult her by suggesting she should've made a different choice. But knowing that hadn't made her desperate need to get her back any less fierce. She knows exactly what Charles means, like a resonance tuned to the same pitch. ]

It's never going to be enough, [ Root says bluntly, ] whatever we can do, it's not enough. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't do it.

I won't ever give up on her. The pile of bodies in the corner -- I'll drag them all out with me if I have to.

[ She'll face each and every individual corpse if she needs to, is what she means, each trace and shred of trauma left behind. There's no amount that's too much, that would dissuade her or turn her away. ]

[ Root is angry. She actually hasn't been angry very much since she's been here, not truly; she's been annoyed or impatient, she's disliked plenty of people, but anger is something she reserves for when she's willing to do violence.

The sentencing was cruel. It was cruel and pointless, and it won't teach her anything, and either they know that or the algorithm producing it is incompetent, and Root doesn't like either option. If she ever gets her fingers on the A.I.'s code again, this time she's going to try to make some changes.

But she doesn't have a lot of mental space to process that feeling before she's returned back to her bed, waking up with a gasp, heart racing. It's not at all like coming back to life was; that was aching and disorienting and gradual, the warmth of Shaw's body by her side, and this is abrupt. It's the ice-cold shock of waking up from a bad dream and pushing herself onto her elbows to get her bearings and seeing Shaw about to hold a gun to her head yet again. ]

Sameen! What are you doing--

[ Root barely knows what's happening, is still piecing it all together in her head. She lurches to get up out of the bed, stumbling to her feet. ]

You vanished, and since it had just happened I thought rebooting quickly might bring you back.

[There's an edge of defensiveness to her tone as she stands there, tense shoulders visible under the tank top she'd slept in, preparing to preemptively refute any concerns Root might throw at her.]

I'm not going to do it. But you vanished, and I didn't hallucinate it; Bear noticed, too.

[At least, that's how she's choosing to interpret the way he'd followed her around the apartment, sniffing non-stop.]

[ he half-collapses against her, tucking his face against the crook of her neck as he fights to breathe evenly, to stop the tears — and he's never allowed himself to cry over this before, has never stopped to think about it all with the clarity he now has, to see the horror of it all in perfect detail instead of the vague notes he'd known prior to venturing there himself. his tears are for edwin as much as they are for every other unfortunate, undeserving soul down there.

and yet, despite the horrors, he knows he'd go there again, and again, and again, if needed.

he sniffles as she lets go of him, brushes his hand under his eyes and nods. ]

... Yeah. I know. [ that it's not enough, and that they need to do it, regardless.

and then, with a tremulous tilt of his lips, ] She's lucky to have you.

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IC Contact - Expiation

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during root & shaw being gone;

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SENTENCING

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cw: suicide

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