insertmeathere | It's Meme Friday!

And now for a meme made just for the meatship! It's the adventures of:

Thank you Shae for the picture!

+ Post with your character

+ Your tagging partner goes to the Randomizer page and enters 1 - 4 on the True Random Number Generator.

+ Get a number!

+ Each number causes a special effect:

1 - Sex Swap! Surprise, you're suddenly the opposite sex of what you were before. Is your partner too (that depends on them)? If your character has neither, either ignore this one, or feel free to give them one now. Double the surprise!

2 - Soul Swap! Oh no! Looks like something malfunctioned on the ship and now you and your tagging partner have switched bodies. Will you try to fix it? ...Will one of you take advantage of it?

3 - Memory Swap! It appears you and your poor friend were stuck in a malfunction caused by Stacy and she has accidentally given each of you each other's precious memories. Not all of them mind you, but really important ones, especially the type you wouldn't want share around. What do you do now? How will this affect your relationship?

4 - Animal Swap! Oh fiddlesticks. Something went terribly wrong in the sensoriums and you've been turned into an animal. What is it? How does your partner react? Are you turned into an animal too? Can you fix this problem or will you be stuck like this...even when you step out?

+ Tag out all the terrible things that happen

+Profit!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Howard knows all about your mommy. Also, you now know everything about Orc. Let the awkwardness ensue.]

...That...that kinda sucks.

[NOOOOOOOOOOOOO]

"...yeah."

There's a reason he hasn't told anyone -- ANYONE -- about Saya, and it's because he's never really processed it fully. He hadn't wanted to deal with it, hadn't had time. So after what happened, he'd simply buried everything, refusing to remember the sound of her neck snapping, the weight of her in his arms, anything about her up until the point where she'd stopped being a healthy human being and become a monster that he had to deal with because it was his job and they made him that way. They didn't know what it felt like, they felt a minute or an hour of suffering and then it was over, but for him it was never over, it was --

He remembers all the other things. Her smile, her patience, her willingness to give of the best, last years of her life to guide him through his own. He'd taken those memories preserved them inside himself, untouched. Unblemished. There was Before-Saya and After-Saya.

He's not sure what he might do if someone impugned the former.

"I don't want to talk about it," he says, before Howard can speak a word."

"I, yeah, um, I won't - I'm sorry."

And he'll leave it there. The memory is more immediate than a second-hand story, but it still feels like watching someone else; Howard knows the emotions Zouichi felt, still feels, all too intimately, but can't really feel them himself. He can hear the thoughts running through his head, she's good as dead and I have to deal with her, but he can't feel it. And it's probably for the best.

He wonders how much Zou got from him, whether he feels that certain devotion and the betrayal of camaraderie lost, how much he got of starving, splitting not enough enough food for one into twos, how much fear, how much hopelessness. And Zou probably can't feel that either, but it's also for the best.

Zouichi nods; he doesn't quite grasp the fear and despair, though it's closer now than it has been, closer than his memories of monitoring news broadcasts, seeing a man kill himself in front of an audience of millions just to make a point.

But maybe he's a little closer now to understanding why Howard hoards food in his walls. And calls only one person on this ship his friend.

"Let's find out how we can get this fixed."

"Yeah. Let's. This is...this is yours. It feels wrong," he says, trying to talk more about the experience of having Zou's memories than the content of the memory itself. Zou doesn't want to discuss it and frankly, Howard doesn't blame him.

Not wanting to know something is quite a confession from a kid who normally enjoys Knowing Things too much for his own good.

Zouichi nods. One good thing about swapping memories about someone who's been through a nice, long period of extended trauma: there were some things that didn't need to be said.

"Thanks. For understanding."

"Yeah. You too."

Funny, Howard never really cared about his parents. He was angry at them more than anything, after they vanished, but never really sad for them. But he kind of gets it anyway.

"Much as I hate Crazy Stacy in our heads, that might be what we have to do. We can ask her to erase them, maybe."

Saya was never Zouichi's real parent, but she was just as dear to him. And more importantly, she had never, ever failed him.

He'd just failed her, that's all.

"Yeah. Should we head to Medical, in case there are complications?"

"You think if Stacy messes something up in our brains, Medical's going to be able to fix it?" Howard laughs a bit awkwardly. "I'd rather not. Those are my coworkers and if we have to describe the memories we got..." He shrugs.

"I don't know; I'm mostly suggesting this for your benefit, you know. The memories seem to be located in the portion of my memory that I can easily delete, even without the ship's help. You? Who knows; the ship might try a surprise lobotomy on you."

"You can delete memories? Why..." but Howard stops himself before he asks why Zouichi wouldn't delete this one. He knows, on some level. It's a terrible, painful memory, but it's more honest than putting it away. Howard would run from it if it were his, but Zouichi won't.

He sounds nervous, but he makes a decision. "Delete mine from yours, if you can. I'll take my chances with the ship. I don't think you want all of Medical knowing about this if it all goes bad."

"Some of them," Zouichi says. "Not all. And most likely, at least some traces will remain. I'll remember that I've forgotten something. And anyway, I ... wouldn't."

He can't. It was his last memory of her. It was his greatest failure.

"...You can keep mine, if you want." He knows that human memories fade with time, anyway. And he does trust Howard with it; Howard, if anyone, understands what loss feels like. Helplessness. And he doesn't think he could have told Howard any other way, not now and maybe not for a long, long time.

"Do you want me to? If I keep yours, you should keep mine. So we're...on the same page, I guess." So if he understands that drive Zouichi has, that crushing sense of responsibility in a past event he can't change, Zouichi will understand that selfish fear and once-burned-twice-shy paranoia that pushes Howard along.

"I... don't think I could have told you about it. But I trust you. You understand what it's like. That's why... yes. I wouldn't mind if you kept it."

Even the words are difficult for him to say, but he does mean it. "If you want. I don't want to force you into anything."

"Yeah. I get it. I mean, it's not like I went around advertising all of...that." How stupid he felt when Orc hit him and walked away. How worthless he felt burying that kid's body anyway. How dirty and needy he felt first eating rotting food and bottles of children's vitamins, then people's pets and the family of mice in the couch, then sometimes spiders and moths, before the agriculture system started yielding enough to live on. "But we won't talk about it again, alright?"

Zouichi nods. "If you don't mind. It's not something I particularly enjoy reliving."

That's part of the reason he's willing to let Howard keep the memory -- because Howard isn't going to feel the need to talk it over and assign meaning to all his subsequent actions based on a single event. It happened; it was over.

"Yeah. No kidding." Howard's never totally understood people's desires to 'talk it out' anyway. At least, not when it can be easily pushed aside and ignored and buried. "You know what? Let's go get ice cream and shoot stuff in the Sensoriums. That sounds like a great idea right now. I don't care if you don't eat."

Zouichi nods, and follows Howard's lead.

Yeah, he doesn't really feel like eating anyway.

It's Meme Friday!

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Wrap it around here?

yep