⦿ ) video

[latkje]

[ This is Nash. He has a pleasant but lazy expression. ]

I don't like to live in the past. It makes me feel old. But when a thought eats at you, sometimes the only thing you can do is take a bite, right?

Anyway, a few weeks ago something the Initiative did put people in their wrong bodies. I don't mean to drudge up bad memories, but— think about it. What are we, really? Hands, feet, fingers, eyes?

We've all got bodies, but souls? [ He shakes his head. ] Not for me to say.

But if the Initiative can keep our fingers and toes and move the rest around, it means there has to be something else, right? And whatever that something else is, the Initiative can mess with it it.

[ The implications are spooky, so he takes a moment to be spooked. And then waves that all away, shrugging. ]

You ever stop to think, and not know how to start up again?

Comments

[latkje]

People seemed to think they were in the wrong bodies, at least.

[battlesleep]

Thank you.

In response to your question, the soul and the body are two parts of a whole. That one can be moved from the other except by death is indeed disturbing.

[latkje]

Disturbing is one word for it, yeah.

You're new, right?

[battlesleep]

I have been here under a month, yes.

[latkje]

Everyone who was here for the switching remembers it.

I mean, wouldn't you?

My name's Nash. I know it says, but I repeat myself.

[battlesleep]

I would. It seems like an event worth remembering.

I am Tannor. It is good to meet you, Nash. You have been here much longer than me, then?

[latkje]

That depends on how you count time.

For some people six months is next to a lifetime. For others it's not long at all.

[battlesleep]

It is a significant period of time to me.

A great deal can happen in six months.

[latkje]

And nothing, too.

I guess there's been a lot of running, not so much moving forward.

[battlesleep]

You do not see results from your actions in this place yet?

[latkje]

I don't think I'd know where to look, to be honest.

[battlesleep]

The playing field is too large?

[latkje]

The past is as infinite as the future. And I haven't read all the history books, yet.

[battlesleep]

There will always be too much history for any one person to know it all.

[latkje]

Especially without a head start.

But I guess that's the whole idea, huh?

[battlesleep]

Do you think so?

[latkje]

We have to rely on the Initiative's intel. At least, at the beginning.

And no one's been here for much more than a year. So far.

So what would you assume from that?

[battlesleep]

I would assume that not everything here is necessarily as it seems.

It is easier to hide something from an outside population than those who have lived in it for years.

[latkje]

One could even call it a strategy!

[battlesleep]

Quite possibly. I would not be surprised to learn that it was.

A place such as this does not seem easy to trust.

[latkje]

Yeah. But it depends a bit on how easy trust comes to you.

[battlesleep]

In a population of soldiers, I imagine trust would not come easily to most.

[latkje]

I don't know. To be a soldier, you have to believe the guy telling you to march knows where he's going.

[battlesleep]

But that trust is usually given because the soldier has made the choice to follow such a person.

[latkje]

Not everyone joins an army because they want to. And not everyone follows because of trust.