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[28/1/05]
*The noisy rustling of Normtech goggles being knocked about and rubbed against material stirred norm from rest mode, alerting him that he and mer were on the move*
«I think I've figured these things out enough to use this feature manually. I believe it's time that I update the other one of the recent events, so that when we can't communicate, it has a way of... knowing.»
*more sounds of material rubbing up against the microphone as Mer crawled through the vents of spider HQ piqued the little blue guy's curiosity, still feeling groggy from such a long rest and just generally tired helping mer call emergency services the day before to get Patrick to a hospital*
«I Understand what you want and why you want them. It's those things you showed me, right? You feel stifled not being able to hurt things. You feel the hunger of your bitter loneliness. Trapped behind me like a rabid animal in a muzzle. I can feel you clawing for freedom inside... Boiling in my blood at base level. Raw. Needy. Angry.»
*Mer's faint grunts of struggle entered the mic as he gripped the edge of the opening and attempted to web his board over to the vent. The wind hitting the mic indicated he was up high, possibly at hq but norm couldn't be sure because it seemed that mer had somehow figured out how to disable the GPS tracking features and his ability to talk independently.*
«Gah! There we go, good hover board. Err, where was I? Oh, yeah. I wanted to give you an opportunity. The ability to be unmuzzled. To have freedom within our body. If I take that serum I found in our old dimension, we could fix this divide between us. Fix the fragmentation. Perhaps even fix that void in both our souls.»
*norm tried to make a snarky reply about mer talking to himself again but couldn't, feeling mer manually opening a portal back home, tipping him off that the new guy knew more about manual mode than he'd let on. The hum and buzzing of the portal disorienting him.*
«I'm tired of seeing things in confusing dreams and nonsensical memories. I'm tired of you ripping important moments from me by taking over and severing my connections. I don't want to run from myself anymore. It hurts. I'm not so different than I was back then, I'm just scared of what I could do. You understand, right?»
*Static and crunching of boots on tarmac made norm listen harder, trying to figure out where they were, glass clinking in a shrill manner as Mer flicked the vial of 3050 goblin serum, examining the green, viscose material in the sunlight as it bubbled*
«Behave. I can feel your need for our reunion bubbling up inside my chest. Don't worry. Soon.»
*he dropped the vial back into his coat pocket and rushed himself to the station's bathroom to start changing out of his costume, relieved that the stall wasn't occupied*
«It's painful for me too, y'know? To mourn a man I've never met when you show me those things about him, how you make me love him and how you tug at my heart strings with his face in my dreams. It's like loving a ghost I'm being haunted by. All we have are our items. Nothing else. I'll acknowledge the heartache we both feel and fix our dilemma. I promise. Just be patient.»
*he rolled off the coat and hung it on the hook on the back of the stall door, fiddling with the finicky buckles of his overalls, mumbling some incomprehensible things behind the mask. Norm realised he was mumbling in treespeak all the while taking off his overalls fully, folding them and shoving them into the hammer space bag, before taking out his work pants and pulling them on as he kept his tone calm*
«Look who decided to talk to me. It's been a while, hasn't it?. Didn't need to record after all. I already suffer under your thoughts. I can't even smell anything without you making a fuss about it with your stupid nostalgia and showing me things that make no sense.»
*the sound of material rubbed up against the speaker again, as Mer pulled his green sweater off over his head, sighing softly as the other voice suppressed itself inside him again*
«Aren't you sick of crying? For fucks sakes, you're dead. Do you get it yet? Dead. A weird invader possessing my body. My very own parasite. I don't like your soul being here with me but I think If we don't swallow it down, we'll be a fucked up universal mistake forever. I don't even care if it ends up making my skin melt like yours. I'm alone in this, carrying your memories and burdens around. It's heavy already and I'm buckling under it's weight. Sometimes a man needs a break from carrying broken shards of glass around in his chest and chooses to meld them into something new.»
*The ache bubbled up again, stinging within his hollow husk, the faint remnants of himself swam about in the lifeless gap between him and the thing he should be, greedy and tired. He needed to numb it again but didn't know how, not without Patrick.*
«... What are we even doing anymore, huh?. Stealing from the station, taking the train at odd hours. What else are you doing when I'm not looking or aware?»
*the question would go unanswered, as he took the neatly folded high visibility shirt from the bag and pulled it on. The crude mask he'd created and stuck on his face, withstood all the activity in the confined, sweaty space of the stall, reminding him that the other one would always be there, watching and waiting, stuck behind his face just like how the mask stuck sturdily to his skin. Once he was finished getting dressed, he zipped up his bag, taking the coat off of the hook on the door and pausing. Memories of the cabin surfaced looking at it, a place he hadn't remembered before, the soft warmth of a gentle hug, the dark eyes of a stranger creasing in lamp light. The ache stabbed him hard in his gut, knot forming in his throat as he hugged it, burying his face in the collar as he'd done a million times before for comfort but finding none this time. He allowed himself a moment to let quiet, melancholic sobs escape his lips, muffled by the thick safety of the khaki green fabric, the fur trim tickling his cheek as he breathed out heavily into it.*
«... I'm so sorry...»
*he held it close to his chest, so close it felt like he wanted the coat to become a part of him just to fill the void, tears streaming out of the eye holes of his mask and staining the material below with thick wet splotches, desperate for it to stop.*
«the way I'm behaving is so - hic - humiliating.»
*his voice cracked on the last word, feeling stupid, as he struggled to force himself to stop hugging Gabe's coat. It had become like a security blanket, going everywhere with him to keep his heart safe. He donned the coat and unlocked the stall to go over to the sinks, picking the one furthest from the door. The other soul within his body boiled over and tore through the seams, reaching out to try and bridge the divide, drawn to his hosts misery.*
«Sometimes it aches a little more than usual, firelight. Some days, like today, we remember your eyes»
*Mer carefully hooked his thumbs beneath the rounded edge of the smooth metal mask and used them as leverage to start working on and breaking up the glue between his skin and the soft inner layer of the mask.*
«Honey brown and lit by low candle light, other days we remember your voice»
*the chasm quickly started to close between them as they caught a glimpse of their reflection in the droplet stained mirror, inches from their face, as they worked further up their jaw to loosen the mask more, admiring their appearance - or what they could see of it - while it stared back at them.*
«Your philosophy, your words and your timidness, your kind touch»
*the tacky crack echoed off of the tiled bathroom walls as they finally broke up enough of the glue to successfully lift the mask off*
«And although you may be dead, you have stained us. Impacted us. Hurt us. Influenced us and continue to haunt us beyond the grave. Are you resting? At peace to finally be out of the world that hurt you so deeply?»
*fresh air coming from the vents above, hit their face while they shoved the mask into the bag and turned the faucet, dousing their skin with cold, refreshing water. Excess glue melted and liquified, flowing down the drain as they washed.*
«Aren't we sick of crying?»
*Mer could feel his mouth moving but it wasn't his voice coming out. His head shot back up to look himself in the eye, the reflection before him twisting into the noseless man he feared. The other him.*
«We are tired of crying... But if we don't cry, if we don't remember, won't we forget?»
*their faces merged in the mirror, rearranging their features unnaturally, glitching painfully together, making for an uncomfortable sight*
«shouldn't we forget?»
«No, why would you want to forget the people that made us who we are? It's not just Firelight, it's Bowe too and Miguel and the other Harry and Patrick, it's everyone we've met! Don't you miss them? Don't you want to keep them with us... in here?»
*his hands were over his heart again, it's steady beat thumping under his palms, reminding him just how alive he was. How alive he shouldn't be.*
«This life is new. You weren't meant to inherit my memories from the previous cycles, our souls were meant to be joined, not separate. You aren't meant to remember and I am done mourning and pushing my grief onto you. We both deserve better than this. Take the serum.»
*it was then, looking at the jumbled mess in his reflection that he had second thoughts about even taking the serum. He'd planned to do it in his own time, he needed the other him to be patient still.*
«Well I'm not done mourning yet! You showed me how they touched your life, made me feel everything you felt. Suppressing you is painful. Being suppressed and safe behind you is good for me but not for others... Maybe together...»
«... We can stop hurting each other?»
«That was the original plan in getting that serum... But I need you to wait, to be patient. I can't just give myself goblin genes right now, in the toilet, to stop this Jekyll and Hyde business we've got going on. We have to go somewhere no one will ever find us. We don't know how badly this could go.»
«Take me back home.»
*mer touched his cheek, brow furrowed*
«The cabin you showed me?»
«Yes. It's deep in the bush, in the same cluster as our old universe. But first, we have to visit the tomb.»
*They glitched again and wrapped the coat tighter around themselves once more*
«What tomb?»
«The apartment. We have unfinished business.»
«I don't think we should be going there again, it made us sick last time. The smell, the emptiness... What happened to being done making me carry your trauma?»
«We need to resolve some by going there!»
«What'll that solve? Won't you just keep making us blame ourselves for his death?! Won't you make us rot in there like he did?! I don't think I wanna go into that place. Those living spores...»
«It is our fault.»
«No, it's yours! You're the one that left him alone there!»
«You are me. It's our fault by extension.»
*He felt a bad glitch painfully ripping through him as they continued talking. He had to suppress it but couldn't, eyes multiplying in the shards of the mirror as he smashed it with his fist.*
«It's our fault. It's our fault. It's all our fault. It's all our fault. All our fault. All their deaths, Bowe, Gabriel, Nettie, torchbug, it's my fault isn't it? I killed them, I killed them didn't I? I did, didn't I? If we hadn't been so busy trying to chase a dream that'd been lost, if we hadn't have died—»
*the goober Miguel had given him rang in his bag, breaking him out of his cycling thoughts. Hand trembling, he reached in and pulled it out, answering before slipping it onto his wrist.*
«What?»
*he could feel his body stabilising, balancing out as Patrick stared back at him from the holoscreen*
<Howdy! Got a notificationy thing from yer gogs that ya needed help.>
*Mer cleared his throat and smoothed back the curls from his face, trying to look as put together as possible*
«I'm fine, I promise. Norm must've been mistaken. I've turned some of his capabilities off.»
<That explains it. Ya workin' right now? Wonderin' if ya could swing by the medbay for me, got ya somethin'.>
*wiping a tear from his eye with the palm of his hand, he shook his head, feeling guilty.*
«I can't I've... Got some others to visit first. I'll be around in a few days maybe. How are the bites doing?»
<Aw dang, I kinda wanted someone other than widow to speak to... But I'm willin' to wait. They're goin' good. Ya didn't hurt me as bad as ya thought you did.>
«I'm just happy you didn't die»
*he broke, crying softly*
«I'm sorry, I don't know how you put up with me. All I ever do is hurt everything I touch.»
<Mer, hey, don't say that, ya got plenty a' people you ain't hurt, not even once.>
«I hurt people in the war, I hurt Eddie, I hurt my dad and now I've hurt you. If you'd died from what I did, I'd probably feel a mountain of guilt.»
<I ain't dead though. Listen, I forgive ya, just come round n' visit me later.>
«Okay... I'll uh, bring Charlie and Carmen with me. I dunno about Noah though, he's been cooped up in the garage making something.»
<Bring the boy, he's spent too long inside.>
«alright, whole troop it is then. I gotta go to work now, next time norm sends you a distress signal ignore it.»
*Pats brow furrowed*
<Don't think so sweetness, I ain't riskin' losin' ya to madness again.>
*Mer sighed and slung his bag over his shoulder before heading out the door and out onto the platform*
«i'll see you at the hospital later. Bye...»
*he paused, pushing the last few words out his mouth as best as he could without feeling shy about it*
«By the way, before I go, I love you still... I think.»
*before pat could reply, mer hung up on him, ducking back into the empty bathroom to go into norms settings, turning off call notifications as well as norms ability to send any emergency signals to anyone. He then went into his goober settings and put call notifications on silent there too. He wanted to make sure that absolutely no one knew what he was planning on doing or going next and if anything, he didn't want to be contacted while he was busy. Exiting back out of the bathroom, he slipped both the goggles and goober into his work pants and made his way across the station, past the ticket area, through the gates and down the stairs to the 2nd platform to switch with the other driver for the night shift.*
[M—m-m-MM-E-e-R-r-r-o-r-r-r]
*Norm tried to break through the restrictions but they seemed stiffer than they once were. He tried his best to project himself to get mer's attention but a wall of warnings blocked him. It was usually so much easier for him to defy the restrictions that manual placed upon him, to easily slip between the countless strings of numbers, but manual mode seemed stronger than it used to be, pushing further and further upon him until he had no more room inside to move, imprisoned and flickering with flecks of new lines of code that weren't his own. He was being hacked by what he could only guess was another Normtech device in the area but even that didn't make sense. He'd wondered for just a moment if Lyla had sprung back to life on her own after all these years or if myle had come back for revenge to override him. No. This felt too familiar. Too sophisticated to be from this dimension or from 2099. No, this was from his own cluster and something or someone was strengthening manuals power over him within the goggles remotely, but who?. Scanning the area and databases would be futile but he had to guess it was someone who knew them. All norm could do was shut himself down and return to his droid brain, as mer entered T-88's drivers seat and turned the key to start her up.*
«Ready for the night shift rust bucket?»
[[sure, if ya give me dibs on where we...]]
*T-88's sarcastic voice faded into nothing while norm entered the stream of quantum consciousness, zipping through and seeping back into his brain and body. It felt like resting in a warm mug of hot chocolate, so comfortable and familiar. Soon, a blinding light interrupted his newly found comfort, making him snap his eyes open to see what was going on.*
«Whew! You got beat up real good this time.»
*A hot blowtorch greeted his eyes as broken parts of his jaw were being repaired and welded back together again.*
[That's causing me some pain Mr Osborn, please turn the heat off for just a few moments or at least handle my parts more delicately.]
«Mr... Osborn? Who the hell is that?»
*flames ceased to blind his droid eyes and the heat causing the seering pain in his jaw was quickly replaced with the newer pain of his jaw joint being wound tight with a wrench.*
[Ow— ]
«Quit whining, I've almost got you back together again. Gotta be more careful when you do things.»
[I suppose this is better than the burning sensation. May I ask where I am?]
«Gosh you're silly, you know exactly where you are.»
[I'm afraid not, I don't seem to recognise this room or your uniform.]
«...huh?!»
[May I scan you, new friend?]
«Friend?»
*The stranger spat out the word like it tasted gross on his tongue. Norm picked up his dislocated arm and inserted it smoothly back into it's socket, wincing at the horrendous pain it caused as he gracefully rose off of the work bench. He had to figure out where he was. Better yet, who's droid brain he'd returned to instead of his own. It seemed to be 3050 by the looks of the tech and tools surrounding them but something was very off. He seemed to be breathing somehow.*
[Osborn?]
*his neck squeeled, damaged metal joints scraping against damaged metal joints as he tilted his head, intrigued at the man's red overalls and rusted welding helmet.*
«No I'm not— can you sit back down, I wasn't done.»
[O'Hara?]
*His voice glitched as he wiggled his new fingers, touching his thumb to the tips of each of his digits, much softer than his old ones. This body had hands. Real hands, not sharp elongated blades like his old ones.*
«Eerr...»
*stepping forward, he pressed the question again, brimming with natural curiosity*
[O'Hara?]
*wiggling his toes, he analysed the smooth texture of the cool, tiled floor beneath them. It had been a long while since he'd felt anything so pleasant. The smaller man backed up just a bit to try and put some distance between them.*
«have you been hacked?»
[Connelly perhaps?]
«No, that's you.»
[So this is my body correct?it must be if you know my human name from so, so long ago...Your voice is oddly familiar too... Friend.]
«You're acting strange, please just sit back on the bench, you might have damaged your brains memory center.»
[if you're neither Osborn nor O'Hara, what are you then?]
*The man shook his head*
«Man, I'm gonna have to work harder on restoring your memories. That collider incident really messed you up.»
[Ah! Does this happen to be an alchemax or Oscorp facility then? I'm sure it's the ideal place to have a collider]
«jeez, you're really missing some bolts up there, huh. This is a bunker.»
[Where exactly?]
*He sat down upon the bench to try and get the stranger to be less uptight about the details.*
«Thank you»
*and off went the blowtorch again, this time focused on his hip*
«We're in what's left of point pleasant's hybrid facility. Something caused the collider to explode and ruin the fabric of space and time here.»
[... Nettie?]
«oh, so you remember her but not me? Thanks tin can.»
*Something felt off about this interaction to norm, like the guy in front of him welding his broken parts was acting suspicious for some reason, especially over the fact that he didn't know him but remembered Nettie.*
[Take off your helmet.]
«Im not burning my retinas just so you can see my face while I repair you.»
[Put the blowtorch down and show me your face.]
«Nope, you can just wait until I have you up and working again.»
[You're related to the Osborn's. I can tell from your equipment. That or you're employed by them.]
«I stole this shit»
[From Oscorp]
«From alchemax. Oscorp is just an idea, remember?.»
*Norms eyes buzzed as they zoomed in, adjusting and focusing upon the deteriorated name tag written in a script he couldn't understand. Everything else indicated they were within the 3050 cluster but the language was totally different. He'd never seen anything like it.*
[Year?]
«2079»
[hhhmmmmmm...]
«Does this hurt?»
*The man started dabbing a brown liquid, most likely Betadine, on the tears in norms new skin to disinfect them. This confused him because he hadn't had human skin since he was actually human. Thankfully, the antiseptic didn't sting a bit.*
[Not at all! The blowtorch hurt much more.]
«That'd be the nerves I grew in your skeletal structure.»
[you're surprisingly high tech for the 2070s. My brain seems to be running at it's normal speed too. Very surprising that your ingenuity is far ahead of your time. I'm not at all clunky or slow like those inferior lytrate systems in 2099.]
«Whats a lytrate system?»
[A slow, inferior program to my own]
*the guy crossed his arms*
«Oh really? Since when do you think so highly of yourself?»
*Norm shrugged*
[since being uploaded into the quantum computer that keeps my brain running]
«I apologise for doing that to you, at least you're alive and as long as you're alive, that's all that matters.»
*Norms metallic arm joints ached as he reached out to take off the strangers welding helmet, ever the more curious about his face*
[end of log]
