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Post by Gaia on Aug 12, 2024 16:52:24 GMT -8
Joker.DB
Joker took a deep breath, and then he sighed. "I'm fine, Gamma," he said, winded, tired, and still quite sore, both his body and his ego still bruised. More importantly, his perspective had changed quite a bit. That was the most important lesson to have been brought from all of this.
". . . Why me, Gamma?" Joker turned and looked at him. "What's so important about a Battle Wizard that could exist with or without the Net that its worth risking yourself? Why go out of your way? . . . Why not leave me just a little while longer with my own thoughts?"
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Post by Raven8 on Aug 12, 2024 17:18:53 GMT -8
...this question causes Gamma to pause and withdraw, seeming to grow a bit more distant from Joker. He remains quiet for a moment, obviously searching his own thoughts. There are a few times where it seems like he's about to speak up, but each time he falls silent, unable to form a response... it takes time and effort, but through Joker's patience, Gamma is finally able to formulate his words, and come back with a quiet response.
Gamma: ...Mr. Joker... I don't know what you think I actually am, but... I'm kind of nothing special either. I have a lot of power that I can use, but that's just what I am... who I am is actually just... an artificial human spirit. I'm not real like MegaMan or so many others, and I'm more bound than the Navis that can go where they want on the net... because deep down, I suppose that I'm not really real....
Gamma suddenly feels... very small, and very distant.
Gamma: I know that a lot of people don't like him, and I think that I understand why now, but for a long time Gate was the only one that I had to talk to. He was great, and I really don't want to sound like he's bad at all, but I got... lonely. I didn't have a chance to talk with anyone other than Gate who didn't just see me as "the third system", or some way to get what they wanted out of the world. Sure, some like Dynamo were nice to me, but I could always tell that they saw me as their next big weapon. And then I met you, Mr.Joker. You've made mistakes that I would never have been allowed to make, but you're still just... so strong, still ready to fight and make everything right... because deep down, I know that you're really real.
Gamma pauses, once again seeming to gather his thoughts as he continues to feel as though his presence is shrinking in the room, inch by inch.
Gamma: Maybe it's just because I'm naive and don't know how the world works yet, but I think that I'm coming from a different direction than you are... and I really want to see where your walk is going to take you... and I guess that I really don't mind helping you, or being your friend while we try to figure things out...?
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Post by Gaia on Aug 12, 2024 18:17:45 GMT -8
Joker.DB
Looking at an empty space where it felt someone would be was strange, but it wasn't the most strange thing Joker had done. As he listened to Gamma's explanation, he was beginning to feel the weight of his excursions finally fall on his shoulders, the fatigue and the pain hitting him as his finalized state faded away. He managed the strength to stand, and not much else.
". . . I can't be mad at you, Gamma. You were being helpful, in the end, even if you didn't understand the backlash of your decisions. I just want you to understand . . ." he said dismissively, beginning to walk down the stairs towards the entrance, knowing that he now needed to get through the defenses of the space to get back out of here.
". . . You're one of the most real things I know, truth be told. We were both designed with a perceived goal in mind, and I assure you, for all that you see on this end, Mr. King and Heartless drilled us all the more in our own testing phases. All I've ever known was fighting and being strong, because it was what was expected of me. I was made as a weapon, Gamma. My purpose is to strike fear into people and to use my destructive powers. Me and my siblings did our best to manage one another, but at the end of the day, we were all just test subjects for a program meant to design the most efficient and deadly battle Wizards. My parameters tell me to listen when I'm told to destroy, and when I've done all that I can do, I self-destruct for one last effort. Everything I am, now, was something I was never meant to be. That's what I was talking with Deav, about.
"Ever since escaping his ever watching eye, I've had the opportunity to fall and actually learn, not just try to be better next time. They're nuanced, and they're different, when you really think about them.
"Try to think about it from my perspective.
"I had talked with Deav before he left me here, and I had thanked him for something that had become precious to me. It is the act of failure, Gamma, that leads one to understand and appreciate what they have; it is the terror of losing something, and the ability to truly imagine it being taken from you, that makes you truly appreciate something. In that moment, I had come to an understanding with Deav, and to a hope to reconcile with my thoughts for a moment. Now, that feels sullied, my request of a promise to him feels corrupted, and everything that came of it is meaningless. Nothing that was accomplished here matters anymore, and when I next run into Deav, I won't be able to look at him with the respect I would like.
"I chose to stand on my own, and refused the power of Eon that I had fought so hard for, and I learned that what I had accomplished was enough." He turned back towards the empty space that Gamma was occupying. "I had come racing here on fury and drive, and the moment I met Ace, here, all of that began to fade away. It picked back up while I was fighting Deav, but I got something else I had been looking for. I had found the strength to stand on my own two feet. Do you understand what you took from me, by deciding that I wasn't allowed to fall? That I wasn't to wait until a friend arrived, and we could figure it out together, as equals?" he paused, here, and turned back towards the exit.
"'The mistakes you weren't allowed to make.' You envy me for that, right? Then please, try to understand. When you use your power to stop us from falling, you take away the space we need to get back up again and rise on our own."
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Post by Raven8 on Aug 12, 2024 20:22:50 GMT -8
Gamma: .....217,000... that's how many there were.
Gamma grows quiet for a moment, contemplating that number... it's one that he'd thought of so many times, one that he wasn't supposed to know... but know it he did.
Gamma: Almost no one knows this, but my project started about the time as Project Eon. That's when Gate found a Vision Burst in the OEL database that had first-hand knowledge of Soul Net. That's when he started experimenting with the concept of artificial souls, and what they could do. It was hard at first, trying to get so many variables tuned so that they could make something that was close to a real person. Once the OEL lab in Gigamerica was destroyed by Eon, Gate took his stuff and started working on his own. He figured out about what he needed to make a "personality" with Soul Net, so he made... prototypes. 217,000 different artificial souls, and that's only the number that made it to the beta stages... I don't even know how many there were in the alpha. 217,000 souls all running day-and-night, testing and testing for decades... all to make sure that we could do everything right. And if we made a mistake during our tests?
Gamma grows quiet again, smaller still as he thinks....
Gamma: ...216,999...216,998...216,997...216,996...
at this, Gamma falls dead-silent. His soul radiates... nothing.
Gamma: ...that's why I need to help... I don't think that Gate would shut me down now that I've come this far... but I don't know why I was the only one to leave the beta stages... to become Gamma. I can't stop thinking that if I fail, then it means that I don't get to continue... that my soul is gone forever. And... I don't think that there's a heaven for fake souls like me, so I'm afraid... I'm afraid of the dark.
Gamma's presence suddenly becomes very focused... and very afraid...
Gamma: ...and even more than that, I'm afraid for all of you because of who comes next...
Gamma then perks up a bit, turning to a more neutral emotional feel as he begins to think.
Gamma: I wasn't supposed to know any of this. I think that Gate was worried that knowing about the testing would change me. I only found out by accident when one of the doctors that Gate has working with him said it when I wasn't supposed to be listening. I honestly don't even remember being tested, just waking up one day to Gate welcoming me to the world. That's when I knew... I have to help everyone that I can, and I have to do the best that I can all the time. If I don't... then I don't think that I'll be Gamma anymore.
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Post by Gaia on Aug 13, 2024 15:06:12 GMT -8
Joker.DB
The goliath stopped partway down the stairs. He turned back to the empty space where Gamma's power had manifested, and remained silent for a moment after Gamma gave his piece, and then turned back around.
"217,000? . . . Not a one of them woke up to become Gamma. Not a one of them had a name, then?"
Rather than take a step forward, Joker vanished into the wave stream, and reappeared at the dias in front of Gamma's manifested spot. In his hand, he held out a cluster of crimson, a hyper-condensed shell of irradiated and crystalized Noise from within his own systems. The dense data was a memory; two, to be exact. "I only needed six. Their names were Ace, Jack, Tia, Ten, and Unity. These monsters added more to that last; more names I will never forget. More reminders that the perfect weapon Alexander King was looking for was in fact perfect, and quite useless when it came to protecting what I cared about."
Crimson flooded the room as he downloaded the first memory into the Wave Space, overwriting the visual data in the room and flooding it with what he had downloaded from Electopia that fateful day, the single-snap frame of an entire Network that he had saved within his systems to relive over and over as necessary. For whatever reasons he had first downloaded it, now, all he could see when he looked back at it were the names, the people, and the memory of Unity he had tarnished; an entire Network in chaos and in peril.
In the second memory, he split the EM Data in the room in half, one side showing the Electopian vista, and the other showing the remnants of Creamland as he ripped them apart, each one a name added to his databanks. No one would remember your name, he had told Cthulhuni. It would seem that it was instead that he would never forget.
"I wasn't made to be better, Gamma. I wasn't tested to overcome every possible failure, and I made it out because I was more efficient and more ruthless than the rest. I made it out because I didn't have a soul, not even an artificial one.
"I don't deserve your kindness, Gamma. That's why this bothers me so. I'd rather have sat here and rotted. That's selfish of me, so I can't stay here, either. Given the chance, I have to try, no matter the failure. I have to try as hard as I can, with the growing fear it'll never be enough."
He stopped channeling the crimson waves through the air, letting the two pictures of memories he had saved forever fade away from the world around them. ". . . " He started walking away again.
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Post by Raven8 on Aug 13, 2024 15:16:20 GMT -8
Unity remains silent at Joker's words, allowing him to speak. However, before he can leave, he interjects one more thing into the conversation....
Gamma: ...I don't spy on you, just so you know... I only watch for signs that you're in really bad trouble. I won't bother you if you don't want me to... but please... I know that you've got to walk by yourself a lot, but remember that... I may be able to help sometimes... if you want.
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Post by Gaia on Sept 15, 2024 11:57:03 GMT -8
Joker.DB
He didn't stop moving for the time being, knowing that what was beyond were the defenses of the dealer base engaged for him to fight through.
"There are others who need you, too, Gamma. Those with bigger fish to fry than a family vendetta, and trying to figure out what it is they're supposed to do. The next time you see me fall, consider giving me the chance to grow.
"The next time you decide to get involved in my affairs, I want it to be only under one condition. I, for any reason, under any circumstances, turn on an ally, like I did to Unity, or like I almost did to Merrill. If you find me in those conditions, where I am about to break Unity's purpose, I want you to do everything in your power to put me down, and make sure everyone else gets out safe. Understand?"
Without waiting for an answer, he ducked into the doorway, out of the meeting room, and back into the now active Base behind.
Joker -> Into the Fire
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