parodeity | subnautica ic inbox 2.0;

Dealer's choice.

[ whichever is easiest. he's not sure telepathy would have been easier for his. he'd be too worried about emotions slipping through. ]

I don't really have a lot of plans until, like, February.

[Dirk makes a guess on February. Under the circumstances, he feels his guess is not a thing Dave should be doing? But. They'll get to that when they get there.]

Dreaming would be easier for the physical aspect. [The emotional aspect, of course, comes across most in telepathy. But then, the dreamscape does some of that too, sometimes.]

Your call. You let me pick for mine.

[ february is valentines and he'll organize something for everyone and might have calmed down enough to swap stupid valentines with rose and hotaru and whoever else. party planning is a good distraction. ]

[Yeah, that's his guess.

He gives it another moment of thought.]

I'll do the dreaming so you can get the physical space. And if you want the rest, I'll just... open that up for you, if you ask. [Dirk is still convinced Dave doesn't deserve having to suffer Dirk's emotions, but at least he is learning to ask if Dave wants it.]

Okay. We can do that...whenever you want?

[ dirk actually might have plans with people, unlike dave who nebulously does whatever comes up. he should ask hotaru if she wants him to cook her breakfast again sometime. it was the first time he'd bothered with breakfast in a while, when he'd offered. ]

I can do it whenever.

[Now. In a hundred years. Whenever.]

May as well, then.

[ do it now, he means. they keep flipping topics too fast like always, but at least he thinks ? they kind of agreed to do the thing they came here to talk about doing maybe but.

dave lets go of dirk's hand and sits up, and then. just will get out from under the umbrella thing dirk set up. ]

[Dirk takes apart his umbrella, puts it all back in the sylladex. With a nod of affirmation, he starts to fly off to the monolith.

Like, they could use the ones on base but that'd probably make Dave en more unsettled so. No.]

[ good call dave would be iffy about using the on base ones so YET ANOTHER FAMILY ROADTRIP.

it makes him miss the actual roadtrips they no longer go on. dave will be minimally chatty during the trip, though if dirk gets antsy about silence he might express some dumb opinions about the starsky and hutch television series? ]

[At least there's that. The route to the pods is easy now, and Dirk doesn't hesitate to drop into his. Dreaming has always been a non-issue for him. When he comes out into the dreamscape, though, he does pause.]

There's a puppet warning. I had a pile of hats and smuppets at the foot of my bed, and Lil Cal usually was on my desk. There weren't really any anywhere else. It's your call if you want to skip my bedroom.

I assumed.

[ that there would be puppets, he means. dave rubs the back of his neck, shrugs. ]

The rules about puppets only involve, like, attackin' me with them still.

[ so you know just don't do that and they're good??? ]

That won't happen. I guess we'll start there.

[Get the biggest part over with. He starts conjuring that room up from memory. It stayed the same almost all of his life so it isn't harder. Posters on the walls, the window looking out onto the sea. The achingly hot summer and his fan. Computers, turntables, tv monitor, wardrobifier. Puppets and hats at the foot of the bed, SBAHJ merch scattered around. Lil Cal, without the katana, in his Derse pjs. The TV screen currently showing Geromy, after Dirk's conscious choice not to keep it flickering through his salacious ironic (?) animal people things, because let's just not put Dave through that when puppets are also in the room. Those stupid pictures of Starsky and Hutch. Seagulls, the sord tucked safely away, the rocketboard nearly set aside. A few robot parts here or there but no loose weapons.

Despite himself, an overwhelming sense of... boredom. Sort of. Tired, lonely boredom and isolation. There is no one in this house. There is no one in this house. Dirk is alone and even his own mind can't trick Lil Cal into being alive. Everything is so quiet, and nothing inside a house makes a noise without Dirk having intended that.]

So... yeah. Welcome to my bedroom.

[ why are there furry horse posters. why is this the thing dave focuses on first. why is dirk the way he is?? dave's eyes slide over cal and the smuppets but he doesn't focus on those. his eyes stick to the stiller pic over the closet, and he leans back in faint surprise. ]

Huh. [ the pic of the gray dude nearest cal, too. dave stares at that, though it's close enough to cal it could be misconstrued.

third picture near the tv, too, and he flips his gaze there after a second and snorts. ]

The fuck. [ the quiet isn't something dirk likes, but dave...relaxes further. it's strange to see the bones of his own room, mostly different, and to not feel constantly on guard. but mostly: what the fuck. ]

Edited 2017-01-07 18:13 (UTC)

[It's. The furry posters isn't it. HE LIKES HORSES. Look, at least Dirk's horse posters aren't as bad as Equius's? Or, you know, Bro's awful puppet porn posters. Dirk is tasteful relatively. Leave him alone.

Anyway that's what he assumes is the wtf, not the other posters.]

Which part?

[Because he assumes that but Dave relaxes so. He isn't sure.]

It's just so stupid. You were four hundred years and a universe away, but I was in this room, too. Who starts a paradox? No one can, I guess, or it wouldn't be one.

[ he drifts over to dirk's desk. ]

Why do you have a miniature version of the pony Rose's mom gave her. What paradox is this. Why is life stupid? Did Rose's pony survive the impact post-scratch and not become a baby bib?

[It is pretty stupid, admittedly. And it's part of why Dirk wanted to show Dave at all. He wanted Dave to see the ways things were different, and the way they were the same.]

No. I don't think? The story is that my Bro had a horse a lot like this with him during his rebellion, but normal-horse-sized. [Why is that the story.] Roxy genetically engineered Minihoof for me.

He would have. John was the ectobiologist, remember? He like. Gave everyone shit. I am pretty sure half of the shit he gave us was later killed or used to kill?

[ actually. come to think of it. dave frowns. ]

No one should ever help John make that connection. But anyway I got that dude.

[ POINTS TO THE HORSE. ]

Edited 2017-01-07 18:25 (UTC)

Huh. I guess he survived the impact in the alpha timeline. I always thought Maplehoof was pretty cool.

[ does this mean Dirk's horse thing is because of that. Let's not think about it.

The computer is open to Dirk's chat client if Dave risks looking that way. Five contacts, no new messages. But an extra pair of shades is blinking on the desk beside some spare robot parts. Hi, AR. Good to see you will never leave Dirk's subconscious. ]

[ he obviously has to pick up the shades? ]

You've got some of the posters in the same spots. Fan, turntables, desk by the window. Neither of us ever shut it, did we.

Course not. Which posters in the same places?

[ If Dave inspects the shades closer: Squarewave and Sawtooth as the desktop background, messages from TT to TT. Both in orange. Dirk feels he has to warn Dave.]

I wouldn't talk to him. He's viciously intrusive at best.

[ hopefully Dave listens because AR definitely is not on his best behaviour. If he doesn't listen...

TT: Hello, Dave.
TT: Are you enjoying your guided tour of your brother's past life?
TT: Or perhaps we could call it his current life.
TT: It seems there is a 99.76% chance Dirk is anxious about returning to the psychological equivalent of this bedroom.
TT: It seems there is a further 99.998% chance he fears he has already arrived there.
TT: Are you concerned about returning to the psychological equivalent of your apartment, Dave?
TT: Or are you reassured you have nothing left to lose now that you're already there?

It's a splinter Dirk doesn't really feel he can get rid of: everything he hates in himself, everything he is scared of being. Jealous, arrogant, bitter, manipulative. The AR of Dirk's mind may even be worse than the original.]

[ it's dave though and "tt" catches his attention every time. rose's typing style, her shorthand, but in bright orange and that's never not going to be weird. however, he can't actually reply back for the simple matter of: ]

Dude, I got no clue how to work your shades. You know this. Every time I need you to do anythin' on them I just ask. Actually, how DO you type shit on these. Do you think about it?

[ ok. now he's staring at the shades because how the everliving fuck do they work?

there was no real change to his expression when he read the text, but he doesn't feel like responding out loud. it occurs to him that's stupid since it's a dream run by dirk. everything in here is dirk. splinter or otherwise.

it makes dave wonder if that means the bro in his dreamscape is also a part of him. ]

Three of 'em. [ he gestures with the shades to ben stiller, then the other two small gray square headshots. ] Same location, same shot, each of 'em.

They read eye movement as input. Give them here?

[ TT: Wow. Real surprising. He gets to talk to you, cry about you, dream you into his head.
TT: He demands I get shelved like I'm something dangerous.
TT: I'm assuming because he doesn't like me to say things outside of his control
TT: Am I any less your brother than he is just because he's the real one?
TT: Maybe if I try being more of an emotional wrecking ball and less of a perfectly calibrated non-threatening pair of sentient shades carrying a fully formed personality.
TT: His personality.
TT: It's like not being the original of the knockoff disqualifies me from the Dave's brother sweepstakes.
TT: And really, am I the one who has knocked himself out of the running there?
TT: I never feel obligated to tell anyone anything, not even Dirk. ]

That is such a stupid thing for Paradox Space to insist on.

[ soothing though. Especially compares to thinking of Dave talking to the shades. Creeping unease comes in, the fear that the AR will do to his precarious relationship with Dave what it already did to Dirk's relationship with AR. He half forgets it isn't real. ]

Edited 2017-01-07 21:39 (UTC)

[ ouch.

dave had reached up to his own shades at "read eye movement" to see about taking them off and seeing what splinter-dirk had to say, but dirk says "give them here" and dave moves immediately to do so. his eyes catch most of what was written, and he'd like to reply, but curiosity and something else - anything else - do not make a compelling enough case for him to ignore a request for privacy.

the shades are folded up in his left hand and held out. dave's expression is still save for a very small frown. ]

P space has never once insisted on somethin' not stupid. Next room? Yours is cleaner than mine, 'cept for wall clutter, bee tee dubs.

[The relief when Dirk gets the shades into his hands is physical. They're still blinking away, insisting they have a message. He's no longer terrified what that message is.]

I couldn't ever control him when I was awake. It carries over, except he gets even more aggressive about insisting he's just a projection of me and therefore I don't have any place to even try to stop him. When I was dating Jake, he insisted that he was wingmanning me, when all he ever did was try to manipulate Jake or misrepresent my intentions just enough to warp the scenario.

[It's apologetic; an explanation for why Dirk felt desperate to pull the shades away from Dave. He does not want a projection of a splinter that he can't control to try to manipulate his brother. He does not want the AR to try to fuck with Dave's head.]

So you have more things on the floor and fewer on the walls? The door out is blocked by Captain Snoop. We have to go through the wardrobifier. [The door fades out, leaving them a route that gets them... let's say outside the front door, since evidence suggests, leaving them at the front door to the apartment..]

He is a projection of you. [ they're in a dreamscape; although dave pauses, frowns. maybe splinter powers make things different somehow? he doesn't pretend to know every nuance of dirk's aspect. ] Uh. Probably? You tell me. But that doesn't mean you don't have the place to like, not let it happen. If you tell me to step off on somethin', I will.

[ i.e.: handing over the shades immediately upon being asked to do so. ]

And you don't have to...share anythin' you don't want to. Don't be a dumbass.

[ there's no reason to be apologetic, although dave's gone hard to read for whatever reason. he kind of eyes the wardrobifier (tehcnology is Weird) but follows along. kind of warily because what other horse shit does dirk have hiding in his apartment. ]

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