parodeity | WEEK ONE: SUNDAY, POST GROUP MEETING

[You know I'd never fail to do that.]

Oh yeah, you wouldn't have known. He was a hero of the rebellion. He was a vocal activist against Guy Fieri's early rise to political influence, before changing his focus to trying to prevent the Condesce's flooding of the planet once Fieri's hold on the American judicial system became absolute. It's estimated that his early warning of her plans and his efforts to combat it gave the planet at least an extra decade of time.

[ you know what dave can buy this ]

I hope he wore a bow tie the whole time.

'Course he did. He's Bill Nye.

So...you like math?

Yeah, I think it's really awesome. Soothin', but also infinitely engaging for the different ways you can interact with mathematical problems. [Er. He coughs.] Not to, like, intellectualize it. It's just like... nice.

I don't care if you do. [ uh, wait. that could sound bad. ] Intellectualize it. Rose does all the time.

[His heart stopped a beat. It takes a bit more to start up again.] Oh. Oh, okay. Cool.

I've never minded here dissertations even if I give her shit about 'em.

I'd like to talk to her in terms of them. My friends are pretty tolerant of my dissertations, but they aren't always the most eager.

One of the great merits of mathematics, in my opinion, is the way it navigates between the complex and the simple through the idea of first principles. You can move from really basic concepts to increasingly complicated and even counterintuitive ideas, all while relying on those basic elements as grounding points. Yet it is also capable of opening up alternative routes for self-understanding, as you find in non-Euclidian geometry, and when you follow it along you often find that it's capable of negotiating the discrete and the continuous or the finite and the infinite, always by asking its practitioner to change their frame of reference and allow the logic to explain itself. It has a rigour to it that I find exciting, but it also has a beauty that I respect and find calming. By respecting it as it is, you can come to understand things that you might not have previously thought about as comprehensible.

[ all right, then. dave just kind of listens, letting dirk talk himself out. ]

I like that there's always an answer. [ it's not bullshit philosophy, but it's the truth. ] Sometimes it isn't known yet, but it always exists, or theoretically exists. I like the...routine, the steps and rules. I like that it makes shit make sense, even in stupid ways, even shit that doesn't matter. I like - I liked always havin' numbers in my head, all the time.

[It isn't the same ridiculous way of talking as a Dirk or Rose dissertation, but in Dirk's opinion it has the same sincere sentiment. The last part, though. Ow.]

It'd be nice. I am genuinely not sure what Heart put in my head, aside from occasionally fragments of myself, I guess.

I didn't realize how much I was relyin' on it until I woke up here. It's like - someone you see everyday and they're just a part of your mornin' routine, maybe. You say hi when you pass their house and don't talk much otherwise but without that hello it throws you off entirely but...no, that's not puttin' it right. The clock was always there from when I hit the game. I knew when I was, always, and it was...security of a kind, I guess? And no matter what else went down I always had the one truest thing at my core. There was always the clock in every way it could be counted and it was never just...quiet. It was never unsure. I was never...adrift from at least my aspect. I don't think there's a metaphor to explain it. It just is.

[Dirk listens, though he doesn't quite understand. There isn't any way to help or comprehend it, there isn't any way to give him a clock more than on his wrist. There isn't any way to be what he is, a kid who was never really a god, brought back down to earth.]

Yeah.

It sounds nice.

[It sounds like exactly the kind of thing that a kid like Dave could do with.]

This watch is imprecise as fuck but I still had to grab it anyway.

[ ... ]

I like ruined your math dissertation. Do you have a favorite theorem or somethin'.

You didn't ruin it. Anyway, it's super cliche, but Fermat's Last Theorem. It's the funniest theorem in mathematics.

[A pause. Dirk raises his arm and flips his wrist over, so it's inner wrist up.]

My pulse is pretty steady. If you ever want somethin' like that to count.

[It's embarrassing and stupid and awkward. He practically regrets saying it as he says it. It's also stupidly sincere.]

[ it's one of those offers dave doesn't know how to take. his hand almost reaches out, but he hesitates, and blurts: ]

Zassenhaus lemma.

[Oh Dave. He isn't shocked. He doesn't pull his wrist away, either. He leaves it there, with his pulse a steady beat underneath the skin.]

That's a cool one. Why do you like it?

Because people think math is borin' and hard and not...pretty and surprisin' and abstract in an artistic way sometimes. Like the middle child in a sitcom who gets ignored 'cause no one gets them but they have a shit ton of talent and personality if you look close.

[ his hand, caught between reaching out or not, falls to his side. ]

I don't know if I've ever told anyone that one. Rose is more into Fancy Bookology.

I like Fancy Bookology too, but yeah. The Butterfly lemma is one of the most elegant proofs. Do you like geometry or, like, arithmetic better?

[The wrist isn't drawn back.]

It's an open offer. Even if I'm not holdin' it out. I'll probably ask again, some time.

...yeah. [ its noncommittal because it's one thing to rely on dirk for physical protection or to maybe keep his secrets (and dave is perpetually unsure as to how long that will last). but it is another thing entirely to rely on him for comfort, a thing he has never really been good at asking for from anyone and which he could get...

too used to. you can't just carve your heart out on a platter and shove it at someone to skewer again and again. or after half a childhood maybe you stop taking the risk. ]

I like both for different reasons. Geometry is more...relaxing and kind of artistic, which may not be the word I want. But arithmetic is a language class I don't mind takin'. I've always kind of wanted to get into like...harder shit.

Different theories, like field and Galois and that kind of thing, or?

More or less. I only know what I taught myself. What I had time to teach myself. It would have been cool to learn...more. As a nebulous as hell statement. Be challenged in that arena for a change. It's probably why talkin' with Rose was always fun, besides the obvious. She just...expected me to keep up.

Do you want to learn from me? [It's another open offer. Olive branch or maybe Dirk's the one ripping his heart out and putting it in his hand to be taken. Again and again and again.] I'm not, like, an expert, but I know some things. We could go over the complex plane, or try other things.

I... [ it's a weird thought, the idea of learning something from someone else that isn't...terrible. it's one thing to learn cooking from velvet. math from dirk is an entirely different arena. it's something he wants too much, and something that will hurt too much when it gets taken back. ] I...maybe? I mean I'm sure we're both too busy for much. I'm supposed to like spend Tuesday with Vi, and stuff. Plus there's like...all the stuff to figure out. But we can chat about it in some of our meetings?

You think of them as meetings.

[His voice sounds like it falls.]

Uh. Well. [He rubs his arm a little. Focus. Be honest and brave.

God he is not either of those things, but he'll try.]

To me they're time I get to spend with you. I should clarify that, I guess, they're not a matter of business or whatever, they're... me wanting to have time set aside for the two of us, that no one else can take.

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