Ic Arbrell's Personal Logs

Ic Arbrell's Personal Logs Oct 21, 2021 6:09:08 GMT

Post by Ic Arbrell on Oct 21, 2021 6:09:08 GMT

Ic Arbrell, Personal Log Transcript: Stardate 58697.51

Okay.

[He inhales deeply, pauses before a long exhale. There is a second pause of approximately 8 seconds.]

Okay. Wow, I— I hate this. Talking out loud. Making thoughts linear and slow and… imprecise. For “my own” benefit. Note the cynicism.

I guess it’s not precise, the way I think it, though. The way I feel it. But the thought or the feeling, whatever the difference, it knows what it is, as itself, without having to assign communicability to it. It knows itself without needing someone else to know it, and doesn’t a thought become a little less when you turn to look at it too hard? When you try to express it, it’s like a dream, it just… skips into the periphery, and you never— I never— find the right words. And you only get the one chance when you’re saying something out loud. Once you say it, it’s out of your mouth and in someone else’s ears, and they’re gonna hear it how they understand, and—

See, this is why I didn’t want to—

[He sighs.]

But I guess if it’s just for me and the doctor, hi, Doctor, yes, I'm doing this like you said to, finally... it’s fine. It’ll have to do. It’s not about precision, Ic, it’s about processing.

Hi, Elouan. If I ever see you again. If. When. When. Even if I have to raise you all over again, and what I wouldn’t give to do it— When. You won’t understand this. You might not even become a doctor this time. Of course you wouldn’t, why would you need to? I mean your dad and I are both still… good reasons… but you’ll have a big, wide universe to escape to, and you won’t have to worry all the time… about everything. More than anything, you won’t have to look after me anymore. ‘Cause we— this version, anyway— made it out.

[There is a 4 second pause. Then, a sniffle.]

I’ll see you again. And you can listen to this and tell me in that agonizingly tactful way you learned from your dad, even though I know exactly what you think and how you feel already, you can tell me if I did the right thing. Or if I didn’t.

I could feel T’Pren just horrified. About what I did. Not me, but you know, not-not me. And about staying stuck. I don’t even what to think about how I felt when we crossed back over into— what, our regular fucking lives? Except it’s not. It’s not our regular fucking lives anymore. At the very least, it’s not mine.

Or someone else’s.

You know, I planned to say how much I enjoyed working with you, before I— As if that’s better than saying nothing at all. Are you kidding? That’s so stupid. I don’t know when that thought even happened, if it was in my— this me— my head, or and old thought from the other me. I don’t know if there was even a limit there for a while. Regardless, what an idiot. What an idiot, idiot, idiot. Who wants to hear that on the other end of a near-death situation? He probably wouldn’t even have remembered I started saying anything in the first place, so I would have gotten away with saying nothing at all. But I believed so strongly I’d been wrong about that.

I guess it was nice, though, if I could even call it that, to… you know, feel that certain of myself. I mean, I would not have argued with him. Very few would, but it didn’t feel like a good thing, either. Felt like a necessary thing. Felt like trauma. I get it now.

I think I’m drawn to it, in hindsight. I look at the people I’ve admired most, the ones I’ve loved… and it’s there, and it’s there, a rough shield with sharp edges all inward, but presents itself perfectly smooth on the outside, just so the soft thing inside, held at peril of a hundred points, can have that illusion of its well-being. But it’s always bleeding. They all feel different, though. That grey of your dad’s, I think I could feel it more than he could. I’m so glad he’s—

[(indistinct)]

No, I’ve avoided him, too.

What would I even say? It’s not like we’re friends. Not for lack of trying, he’s just… Well, grey again. Grey here. Grey now. I don’t know what I’d do about it, though, the only reason we ever got together was because I left Science. The only reason I left Science is because I couldn’t keep spending my life on the Ellipse. The only reason I couldn’t spend my life on the goddamn Ellipse is because I didn’t—

[There is a pause lasting 29 seconds.]

Causality is a bitch.

End transcription.

Ic Arbrell's Personal Logs Oct 25, 2021 3:01:32 GMT

Post by Ic Arbrell on Oct 25, 2021 3:01:32 GMT

Ic Arbrell, Personal Log Transcript: Stardate 58700.94

Am I a bad person? I mean, I know I'm bad at being a person, but am I a person who is bad?

I’ve never really considered that before. At least, not in these terms. I’ve always been more focused on my being a problem for everybody, and that obviously plays no small part here. I’m a problem. The problem. And it used to be because of things about myself I couldn’t control, so I could accept that, you know? A person can’t help the way their brain works. People can’t help the way they are. It’s not their fault, and they shouldn’t be blamed for it, especially if it’s good for them and it’s not doing any harm. And I’m letting it hurt me, so that doesn’t count. He didn’t do anything wrong.

But this isn’t— that’s not— these are choices, what I’m doing. Long-thought, deliberate, intentional choices. And that makes it my fault.

Before this, I could have found an opportunity in every hour of the day to talk to him. Whether I had the guts to do so or not, on duty, off duty, even if it was as small as a compliment, I could find something to say. I guess that was probably my way of saying it. Lately, I’ve been looking for every reason not to say anything to him at all. I guess it’s just as well. He was probably tired of hearing he looks nice today. I’m not very creative, but that’s always true. He was beautiful even in the days before—

I really hope I forget this. Come on, Talorian wine.

I’m so scared about what’s changed. What keeps changing in the fallout. I can build mathematical models to predict changes in matter or energy all damned day, hell, I can do it in my sleep. But I’m completely blind here, feeling my way through the dark. There are factors I couldn’t anticipate. Of course, my own stupid heart would the biggest one. I’d like to say I was scared today, but stupid is probably more accurate.

What was true in the Ellipse might not be true out here. Or maybe it’s true differently, and different things are also now true, which—

[He pauses, and the sound of a bottle opening and a glass being partially refilled with liquid is clearly audible.]

It wasn’t even about me. Well, today probably was, and I regret it. Me, because I’m stupid enough to be hurt. Me, selfishly leaving. Me, asking these lovely Talorians to cover for me. Me, laying around naked all afternoon getting drunk and feeling sorry for myself. And listening.

He missed me when I walked away. And the horrible person I am, I let him keep missing me. No matter how much I wanted to run back and kiss him, Jovireh or no Jovireh to—I don’t know if she’d judge or pity me for falling in love with him, and I wasn’t brave enough to find out. [A four second pause follows a sharp inhale.] No. That had nothing to do with it.

I let him miss me because it feels like being held. Like spices and rain and a whole lot of other things that scare me to lose, even though I know this is the closest to anything like that we’ll have. And it’s not even real. Just my senses and their old, cruel tricks.

It’s not about me, though. I didn’t say what I said for my health. I said it for his. And now I’m being like this. He should have been glad to be rid of me. That’s gonna make this all so much harder than it ever needed to be.

[A sigh is followed by the clinking of glass, apparently empty. The sound of motion against fabric grates against the recorder, and muffles a jagged breath.]

What do horrible people wear to Talorian banquets?

End transcript.

Guest: Hello, I'm thinking of joining. Could I ask if a new mission/cycle begins in January 1? If so I might wait a few more days to refine the character and wait to start fresh if that were the case. Dec 21, 2021 20:26:45 GMT

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