003. Audio

[nullorvoid]

Two questions.

[Well, it looks like someone's back on the network now that all the general insanity is...mostly over; audio-only again, because apparently that's just how he's going to do things.]

One: is there some way to get levels on your Pokémon without making them fight? I've got one who's decided he's a lover, not a fighter, which is cute and all but he needs the levels and I'm not going to see if the stupid trees will let me wish levels onto him.

[He pauses for a moment once that's out there, though.]

The other thing is that I misplaced a couple people. Somehow. They were here this weekend; I can't find them as of yesterday.

One's fine on her own. The other's someone who shouldn't be wandering around by herself.

[God, no one explained fourth wall to him.]

Comments

[aufsassig]

Some people flew in from France and handed it out by the boxful. It's kind of a big deal, I guess.

[nullorvoid]

...Is there just something really special about French yarn?

[aufsassig]

Maybe it's tres jolie? Fuck if I know.

Anyway, you're supposed to play games with your Pokemon with it, and it makes them more badass or something.

[nullorvoid]

[The French actually amuses him; you little shit. ...Assuming that was intentional, anyway.]

I'll keep that in mind, I guess. Weird as hell, but everything here kind of is.

[aufsassig]

[Eh, whether you're lucky or you're good, if it all comes out the same, you can nod and smile and say you totally meant it.]

Yeah, tell me about it.

...So there's this chick in Olivine City, a real sweetheart. She's the gym leader over there. You might try with her about getting your pacifist Pokemon to do some shit, she might have some ideas when it comes to getting stronger without really wanting to fight.

[nullorvoid]

Gym leader...they're the ones that pass out the badges, right? I apparently don't need them, but I'm traveling with someone who does, so assuming she wants to get anything done I'll probably be going that way eventually.

This girl have a name?

[aufsassig]

Right, Violet City's the bird guy and Goldenrod's this pink-haired girl with a serious attitude, and the one up in Blackthorn is full of herself and uses dragons and shit.

Olivine is, uh...Ja...nice? Ja...fuck. Jasper? Jasmine. Olivine is Jasmine, there you go.

[nullorvoid]

Jasmine. Okay.

...There a lot of dragons up near Blackthorn, or is that just where that girl who's full of herself decided to set up?

[aufsassig]

I think there's a place up there called the Dragon's Den, which as best I can tell means there's nothing but a shitload of loose dragons in there.

[nullorvoid]

I sure as hell can't think of how else we're supposed to take that.

[...]

So how long have you been here, anyway? I don't think I've asked.

[aufsassig]

Since April of last year. I've made it a full cycle, twelve whole months of batshittery and then some.

[nullorvoid]

I actually would've guessed longer than that.

You one of the people who's okay with being here?

[aufsassig]

Oh, fuck no. You give me the chance and I'd be out of here in a hot minute.

[...]

I just try to make the best of a shit situation, I guess. Don't dwell on it too much. Find a nice guy with a weird thing for bees and get married, I dunno.

[nullorvoid]

[..................what]

...Congratulations on your beekeeper, I guess.

[aufsassig]

I. Hate. Everything.

Like you don't even fucking understand how much I hate everything my life has decided to be this week.

[nullorvoid]

You gonna talk about it, or just sort of dance around it?

[aufsassig]

[...You know what, this is getting personal, let's just get over onto a private channel here for a minute. Not because it's top-secret or anything, but just out of some weird compulsion to...not put it all over the public network.]

...I knew this guy, and he went home and fucking died, and then he came back here so it was always kind of a thing, that if he ever left again the only thing he was going back to was "dead", and then he did go and everything went fucking stupid, and then this weekend he came back and it kind of hit me that in the end probably no one gave a damn about that poor bastard but me.

And I just feel like that's messed the fuck up somehow.

[nullorvoid]

[He just...listens to that, and he mutters something under his breath once it's all out there, but he doesn't seem annoyed or anything when he replies; he's still blunt as hell, because that's probably never going to change, but he doesn't seem agitated and there's nothing judging in it, either.]

So is it messed up because no one else is going to mourn the guy, or is it messed up because you're the only one who will?

There's a difference.

[aufsassig]

...What's the difference? They're basically the same thing.

[nullorvoid]

One deals mostly with his situation.

The other deals with yours.

[aufsassig]

[And then he's just kind of quiet, and the only thing that breaks the silence in the beginning is a little fwump that might just be the sound of someone's face landing in a couch cushion, and then after a while the answer finally comes.]

I think it's about him. I don't...think it's bugging me like "why am I the only one caring here", so much as it is, like...

...I think it's wigging me out, the thought of how close the guy's coming to just...fading away into obscurity. Like it doesn't seem right somehow for a person to just...have no one, like that. It's too close to never existing at all, because as far as everyone around is concerned, you never did.

[nullorvoid]

[And there's silence on his end, too, and it goes on for a while; it's a bit more hesitant than usual, when he finally does say something.]

Yeah, but he doesn't have "no one," from what you're telling me - if he didn't have anyone, we wouldn't be having this conversation.

You know most people are okay with having one person, right?

[aufsassig]

[And all of a sudden this is really awkward on his end, because he's half-tempted to speak his actual thoughts and say something like "no one decent", except that then it gets all jumbled up in shit like "okay but it's not like Alfred was decent either" and "the fuck kind of teen girl soap opera shit is this that I'm lying facedown in a couch going BUT HE COULD DO BETTERRRRR" and you know...maybe, just maybe, there's something weird going on here and a fair amount of it has something to do with the fact that his One Person is far the hell away and there's not a whole lot he can do to get back to where he really wants to be.

...So, projecting like an IMAX on some level, probably.]

Do you have one person? Or are you "not most people"?

[nullorvoid]

Ask me that when you're less messed up.

I've been that one person for a lot of people, though - not the one who'll care about them, but the one who's not okay with them just fading like they'd never existed, and the one who makes sure there's proof that they did.

[aufsassig]

...You know, there's something to that.

Here I am kind of messed up, and I could make it go away if I'd just get rid of the thing that's messing me up, but if I do it's gone forever and maybe that doesn't sit too good with me, either.

Yes, it's about me now. A little bit. Deal with my crabbiness, barkeep.

[...]

Sorry. About dumping all this shit on your head, I mean, you just wanted to ask about animal steroids, you didn't ask for this.