[console] [video]

[quiet]

[the boy who appears on the screen is a handsome one, with artfully scruffed brown hair, hazel eyes, and a small, friendly smile. he looks directly into the camera with the sort of confidence that comes from public speaking experience.]

Well then. I feel a bit like a tourist on a very, very strange island. As much as I do enjoy traveling, most of the time I attempt to prepare more thoroughly.

[another little smile, this one more wry.]

In any case, my name is Gansey, and I'm looking for a companion. An exploration companion, to be precise. Maps are delightful, but actually learning your way around a place is even better. An experienced Traveler with some free time or other newcomers like me would be equally welcome. I'll be here in the Hotel lobby for a bit, and I've picked up one of those handset radios if that's your preferred method of communication.

[he gives a bit of a wave, and the video goes dark.]

Comments

[commandandcontrol]

She's used to the bow being returned awkwardly but it was better than her trying to do the handshake thing in her opinion, because it was weird and uncomfortable and also unsanitary. There's apparently a wrong way to do a handshake? Much better to just leave that entire subject off the table.

"Yeah, exactly. I was here a few years ago, the exact period is different in 'realspace' than here." She actually made finger quotes on the word realspace. "But not hugely different."

[quiet]

Gansey is quite used to handshakes, but he's the 'when in Rome' sort, and he'd rather be the one feeling awkward than making someone else feel awkward. So this all works quite nicely.

"Realspace?" He mimics her finger quotes. "You consider this place more real than your home?"

[commandandcontrol]

Sonja furrows her brow at that. An interesting assumption.

"Well, no. I meant to cast a humorous strike at the concept of reality entirely. Does Keeliai not feel real to you? It can't just be a shared Mass hallucination can it? Do you think your mind creative enough to invent all of these people and places to this fantastic level of degree on your own?

"But in the end when we go home we don't remember anything. Was it a dream or is there something else, something sinister or just whimsically ignorant?"

[quiet]

Gansey's not really expecting all that, and in the end he gives a shrug.

"I tend to just go with believing that all places I am are real. Reality is malleable and time isn't a fixed line. But, to answer your question, I do believe that there are minds creative enough to imagine this place. Populating it is a different story." There's a casual sort of confidence in his answer.

"Ah, so we return home and don't remember anything? That's interesting." He rubs his thumb over his bottom lip. "Why are your only options 'dream', 'sinister' and 'ignorant'?"

[commandandcontrol]

"I suppose you wouldn't have gotten the full spectrum of reactions to being forcibly brought here, yet, huh?" He seemed to be a naturally optimistic type.

"Not everyone reacts well. There are only so many explanations for actions that cause so much misery."

[quiet]

"No, but I also don't think that any amount of reacting has much to do with what's true. I mean, I'm not exactly thrilled to have been yanked out of my life and into someone else's political mess taking place on the back of an enormous space turtle, but I don't really think that my personal feelings matter in the greater view of what's going on here. In general, the universe doesn't much care how one feels about it, or at least that's been my experience."

Gansey really doesn't look terribly impressed. Naturally optimistic is taking it a bit far, but he's well aware that the machinations of life, the universe, and everything don't particularly care about one's individual plans, and that complaining about it achieves precisely nothing.

"Narrowminded thinking, that's what that is."

[commandandcontrol]

"I don't believe that anything happens by pure chance," she replied, curtly.

"Call me narrowminded if you want, I call it discriminating. You can't plan for every possible outcome, only the most likely ones."

[quiet]

"Oh, I don't believe in coincidence." Gansey smiles and shakes his head. "Or pure chance. But that still leaves a lot of options. If there's one thing I've learned in my life it's that just because a greater purpose isn't clear doesn't mean there isn't one. Maybe what you're striving for isn't what you're meant to get, but at least you're going somewhere."

He tilts his head, looking at her.

"So to you, the most likely outcomes are either that you're at the whim of a fanciful, purposeless magical spell, some sort of sinister agent, or a mass hallucination? That doesn't give you much personal agency."

[commandandcontrol]

"Well, see, that's where you're wrong. Because I've been dealing with sinister agents since I was a child, and they haven't won yet."

[quiet]

"And was that due to action or reaction on your part?"

[commandandcontrol]

"In part." She didn't do it alone, any of those times. But she was definitely integral. Well, she played a role.

Dammit, don't question her about this, you're triggering her anxiety!

[quiet]

"So you had help. Because you were part of something bigger, clearly. And probably not in ways you always entirely understood." He shrugs affably. "At which point we come back to personal agency, which is clearly not a subject you want to address."

He hadn't meant to upset her, and Gansey knows anxiety when he sees it.

"Not that I have any substantive theories myself, but you might want to take a fresh look at reasons foreigners are still arriving even after the war has supposedly been won."

[commandandcontrol]

Whatever. Shut up. When did she stop winning this argument?

"Maybe I will!" Oh goooood that was such a lame comback, what are you, twelve?

"Whatever, I didn't want to argue anyway." Stop talking.

"Do you know what sector you wanted to see first?"

[quiet]

All the way back at the beginning, in Gansey's perspective, but Sonja's milage may vary. He does his very best not to smile at her 'comeback', only to nod as though she hadn't just pouted her way out of the discussion.

"I much prefer a polite but spirited debate, myself. But no, I haven't decided where to start yet. Do you have any recommendations?"

At least he's not drawing attention to her sulk.

[commandandcontrol]

Thank god. You are a considerate gentleman, Gansey.

"I'm a little fond of the Fire Sector, although it's a little bit of a 'rougher' neighborhood. The water sector is nice too."