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brb_lootingI: PLAYER INFO
Name (or internet handle): Zackary
Age: 19
Contact: iamtheuberlorax on AIM, Plurk, LJ, and tumblr
Current characters in Road of 'Trode: Kadin and HAL
II: CHARACTER INFO
Name: Matthew
Dreamwidth Username:brb_looting
Fandom: Fire Emblem 7
Age/Appearance: Adult male, bright red hair, a bit short and not particularly broad, but well-muscled. In canon his age is ambiguous, but it’s implied that he’s older than the 18 year old protagonist, and he’s looking to get engaged, so he’s probably early to mid-twenties at the youngest.
Wiki Links: http://fireemblem.wikia.com/wiki/Matthew
Matthew is from a game series called Fire Emblem. They’re all turn based strategy rpgs with a medieval war campaign backdrop. Matthew’s adventure in particular involves a bunch of squabbling nobles, tensions between larger empires, and then this one d-bag who wants to open a doorway to the realm of dragons and unleash a whole ton of hellfire into the world because he has massive abandonment issues.
The story focuses on three nobles from Lycia which is a loose federation of feudal style cities. Ostia is the capital of the Lycian Alliance, and Hector is second in line for the throne when the bulk of the story begins. Matthew is a spy in service for house Ostia, and although he originally works for the Marquis Uther, Hector’s brother, Matthew swears his allegiance to Hector in the early chapters, and then is bound to Hector by law later when Uther dies.
For the most part, Matthew is a side character, his only concrete appearances after being recruited being when he is shown crying over Uther’s death, and when his girlfriend and fellow Ostian spy is found dead strung up as a warning on the edges of enemy territory. After the Final Boss (a massive fire dragon) is defeated, peace prevails over the land, and the ending text says that Matthew continues to work for Ostia as a spy. HOWEVER there is a sequel to this game that revolves around the children of those nobles from earlier, so peace didn’t exactly prevail over the land for that long at all really. Since Matthew doesn’t appear in the sequel, I don’t plan on giving him any memories from it, but his canon experiences will include several years of working as a spy post dragon apocalypse as he watches rising tensions between the nations.
Canon Point: A few years post game, A support with Serra not reached. Meaning that he doesn’t have the ending that involves pining after a nun. Not that I have anything against Serra, it’s just the open ended and unresolved Matthew arc gives me more issues to work with as a player.
Personality: Matthew is one of those eternally cheerful people, but with a bit of an antagonistic edge. He laughs and jokes at nearly everything, and while sometimes this kind of joviality is encouraging and optimistic, his teasing can cross the line into ‘just plain dickish’. However he’s only very rarely actively malicious, although he definitely has that potential. When he sets about to avenge his brutally murdered girlfriend he creates an elaborate hostage situation ploy when it’s proved he can’t overpower the other man with speed, or strength. It’s also worth noting that he is a spy, and is well versed in all the insidious activities that come with that. Being an expert in behind the scenes operations, he’s not fond of being exposed, or on the front lines. He’s clearly got a coward’s streak, but isn’t too sore about it and prefers to think of himself as just making the more intelligent choice. He definitely has an expedient mindset, and would argue that the ends justify the means.
The ends are important to Matthew however, and while he decries chivalry and honor, he’s no less horrified by senseless brutality than the rest of the army. Sure he’ll rob a noble blind, but burning villages and killing innocents, or breaking the back of the civilians to pay for a war effort, are things he will not stand behind. Matthew always allies himself with good-hearted people, and puts a great deal of stock in intentions. Uther and Hector and to a lesser extent Eliwood and Lyn stand out to him as exceptional, just and kind leaders, and as the story progresses he becomes willing to overcome his characteristic cowardice to defend Hector.
Reason for playing: Moral quandaries are my faaaavorite? Also I really like this game but tag slow since the two muses I have in here right now are challenging for me for various reasons. I’ve been playing Matthew on and off for a long time now, and I know from experience that it is easy for me to tag non-canon mates with him as well as adapt him to AU premises.
III. ARK HISTORY
Name: Matthew
Age/Appearance: He’s 26, and his clothes are significantly less faux medieval. Although he probably has a bright red hoodie and wears things with a fuckton of pockets. He’s got some miscellaneous scars on his body, but they’re mostly on his torso so they’re easy to keep covered.
History: Matthew was born as the only child to an extremely poor couple in Twin City. They weren’t homeless, but they were about as close as you can get. He had very little food growing up, and despite his parents basically working himself to death, Matthew had to resort to stealing to get enough to eat. This eventually caught up with him though. At the age of 15 a particularly bad tempered wizard cursed him as Matthew was making off with some loot. Terrified by this, and in large amounts of pain and desperation, Matthew contacted a sleazy Mage he often fenced items too. The man agreed to “cure” Matthew, but took the opportunity to try out some experimental magics and observe the results. The spells and potions were a success, but unfortunately for the Mage, Matthew escaped as soon as he could run without fear of falling through the floor. Which was a while honestly. By then his parents had assumed he was dead, and although they were devastated emotionally, financially not having to care for a child had helped their situation some, and when Matthew saw this he decided to run away until he could help support them himself. With his new ability he was able to sneak onto a train, hopefully to a better life.
Having successfully snuck into the Capitol, Matthew now had no idea what to do. He sort of thought that he would just be able to steal the goose that laid the golden eggs then waltz back to his family, but things didn’t really work out that way. Over the course of several days, Matthew got picked up for numerous small offenses such as loitering, out past curfew, trespassing, theft, (littering, jaywalking? How strict is the Capitol?) etc. He managed to evade arrest every time however, only managing to be detained when other thaumicly active people were brought in. When it was worked out that he was a Twin City citizen he was handed off to be deported. By that point though enough word had been circulated about him and the nature of his powers that the Capitol Intelligence Managing Agency (name totally up to be changed, just needed something to call it) (EDIT: The intelligence agency is actually nameless in order to appear more fictional. Disregard further mentions of CIMA.) figured he could be useful and offered him a deal.
Matthew took it in a heartbeat. Now legally employed, he began sending supplies back to his parents. They currently live in the upper middle class in Twin City, and Matthew contacts them regularly through VR. For the first two years of his employment at CIMA he basically worked a desk job while he was trained to be a good spy. He learned everything from combat and weapons to interrogation techniques, undercover work and finer control over his own powers. While working there he met a girl named Leila. They were both incoming recruits, but she was the top student from a high class school who had been preparing for this all her life and he was the urchin brimming with untapped natural talent. Obviously they were immediately pitted against each other in the boot camp like organization, and after many months of UST ridden rivalry they got assigned to a cooperative mission and wound up making out vigorously as well as passing the mission with flying colors.
After this they were promoted to full time CIMA agents and assigned their first actual missions. Due to his familiarity with the setting, Matthew was sent back to the Twin City to tail and report on the Malova family as they were highly active in Twin City politics, as well as suspects for a major part of the black market. CIMA had been watching them through VR means with limited success for many years, and now they finally had someone that could blend into the Twin City seamlessly. He began noticing very disturbing things, disappearances, traces of magic that Matthew did not understand or recognize, and the seemingly immobile ages of many of the family members. He kept digging vigorously to find the truth, and though he managed to piece the information together in theory he could never get any definitive proof. In a fit of desperation he followed and surreptitiously interrogated the youngest child of the Malova’s to try and get some information from the 10 year old girl.
He did get affirming information, but again, not enough of any substance to prove anything to the Capitol. And when Mikuláš Malova was assassinated by a rival family, the capitol withdrew Matthew from the Twin City. In their minds the threat was over, Matthew was getting recklessly overinvested, and they had bigger problems to worry about than the fates of slum dwellers in the Twin City. This dismissal chaffed at Matthew, but on his suggestion his family had moved out of the Malova’s radius of influence, and he eventually put it out of his mind. From then on he was mainly assigned to internal Capitol affairs, or Chasm Cities, possibly because his higher ups were worried that Matthew might defect or abandon them if left on his own in the Twin City. It was during this time that he was first assigned to work under Uthadrin and Hecton. They were the military officers in charge of the division of CIMA that Matthew worked for. They were both charismatic, highly likeable people, and Matthew quickly became much more loyal to the two of them than he had ever been to the city itself. Despite this, Matthew could not really fight the urge to do a little under the table work. Out of respect for his bosses, he never stole anything belonging to the Capitol, but he found ways to slip out from their fingers and periodically steal some ridiculously expensive treasures, whether it was art, precious metals, or even a book.
Leila and Matthew saw little of each other due to assignments, but thanks to VR and dedication, they grew closer and closer. On his twenty fifth birthday Matthew resolved to ask Leila to marry him. Seven months later he had still not done it for fear of rejections, and Leila was now assigned to a highly dangerous and immersive position within one of the major pirate factions, so even anonymous VR contact was risky. Many more months later Matthew had finally concocted a definitive plan and date for when and how he was going to ask her when he was delivered a package which contained the bloody and mangled remains of his would be fiancé. The pirates had found her out and murdered her, ripping out her gill implants and sending them back to the Capitol.
He was unable to grieve for her however, as he was leaving on a mission of his own at the time involving a manic and dangerous terrorist cult worshiping the Chasm giants by a creep who wore too much violet. He and a small group of fighters had to be sent to neutralize the threat before they could gather enough magic to pose a serious threat. Once that was over however, Matthew was given a regulated mourning period. Two weeks into this he gained his VR memories.
Residence/Job: A spy for the Capitol Intelligence Management Agency. He follows people, does paperwork, assassinates people sometimes, and also just generally gathers information through a wide variety of research methods.
Skills/Powers: Adept at disguises, both in VR and real space, a very accomplished liar and thief, and has the handy ability to control the tangibility of his body and any objects he’s in contact with, however it takes concentration and effort to do so. He can easily grab a person and pull them through a wall, but doing so with several people, or a large object of some kind would be significantly harder. This power is also limited by magnets and electrical current. He cannot phase through magnetic objects, and electric currents ruin his concentration and short out his ability to be intangible. If he’s very quick he can jump through an electric fence, but he will most likely leave chunks of himself on the fence and it will be a wholly undesirable experience. Tasers and electric collars are his Achilles’ heel, although one particularly resourceful person once captured him by tying him up with Christmas lights (or whatever the ark equivalent of decorative lights is).
When he becomes intangible, he also becomes harder to see. Think the opacity slider on photoshop.
Resources: He’s taken care of quite well within the Capitol and also periodically has large amounts of cash from fencing whatever he most recently stole.
IV. SAMPLE
Arrival:
As he was home alone, there was no one to notice or worry about Matthew’s sudden, uncanny stillness for three and a half minutes. He simply lay there, slumped over his desk, unmoving. When it was over he groggily sat up, rubbing at his face. Had he dozed off? Late nights would be the death of him. He has to organize the mission files and get to cracking that coded message from Bern they’d intercepted, make sure the wyvern knights weren’t getting too antsy, and-
Where was his candle?
Matthew frowned at his desk. His candles and abacus and ink pot and quills were all gone. Had he been robbed? No this…wasn’t his desk was it? Was it? It was too smooth, no wood he knew of was this polished. Matthew blinked, looked up at the fluorescent lights in the ceiling. Not candles. Not lamps. How did he know what those were called? Ugh what…
He shook his head. Things started trickling back. The network, pens, trains, computers, phones, plumbing. Holy shit he has to go take a shower right now. Running water is the single most important technological advancement of all time. Wait no, stop. There are more important things to think about first. All the castles and candles and lances and swords were just a glitch? Yeah, there on the screen to his left was the terminal, blinking slowly with the message “CONNECTION TIMED OUT: UNKNOWN FAILURE OCCURRED. Unable to retrieve file Leila_log_04.rfp because the uploading process was interrupted. Windows will notify you when a solution to this problem has been identified.”
Suddenly the rest of it comes back in a dizzying wave. His life in Twin City, his powers, his job, his friends, everything that was different. And everything that was the same. That blood tinged box that had been haunting his nightmares flashes back up, but now it’s accompanied by a vision of her hung up in a tree. His head spins as the conflicting names and places all try to assert themselves in his memory. He reels, hands going to clutch at his temples. As he finally acclimates to the new/old experiences suddenly crowding his head, it really sinks in. Someone, or something had hacked his session. Or something. The experiences were all way too real and complex to be random feed glitches, but the people and events were all too familiar for it to have been made by someone else. Was this some kind of virus that had hijacked his own memories?
What a worrying notion.
He hadn’t asked for this. He had just wanted to rewatch one of their logs together. He wanted to see her try not to smile at his jokes again. Instead he got a whole second life with her. He laughs a little bit. Just a small airy chuckle. He got to meet her again. He got to win her over again. He could remember two first kisses, and two first times, and two first fights, and two long wonderful relationships, and two times that he couldn’t work up the nerve to ask her to marry him, and two funerals. He had gotten a second chance, and he’d done the exact same thing. He’s pathetic. He tries to make himself laugh again, and chokes. He slumps back over his desk, back shuddering and hands fisted in his hair.
Name (or internet handle): Zackary
Age: 19
Contact: iamtheuberlorax on AIM, Plurk, LJ, and tumblr
Current characters in Road of 'Trode: Kadin and HAL
II: CHARACTER INFO
Name: Matthew
Dreamwidth Username:
brb_lootingFandom: Fire Emblem 7
Age/Appearance: Adult male, bright red hair, a bit short and not particularly broad, but well-muscled. In canon his age is ambiguous, but it’s implied that he’s older than the 18 year old protagonist, and he’s looking to get engaged, so he’s probably early to mid-twenties at the youngest.
Wiki Links: http://fireemblem.wikia.com/wiki/Matthew
Matthew is from a game series called Fire Emblem. They’re all turn based strategy rpgs with a medieval war campaign backdrop. Matthew’s adventure in particular involves a bunch of squabbling nobles, tensions between larger empires, and then this one d-bag who wants to open a doorway to the realm of dragons and unleash a whole ton of hellfire into the world because he has massive abandonment issues.
The story focuses on three nobles from Lycia which is a loose federation of feudal style cities. Ostia is the capital of the Lycian Alliance, and Hector is second in line for the throne when the bulk of the story begins. Matthew is a spy in service for house Ostia, and although he originally works for the Marquis Uther, Hector’s brother, Matthew swears his allegiance to Hector in the early chapters, and then is bound to Hector by law later when Uther dies.
For the most part, Matthew is a side character, his only concrete appearances after being recruited being when he is shown crying over Uther’s death, and when his girlfriend and fellow Ostian spy is found dead strung up as a warning on the edges of enemy territory. After the Final Boss (a massive fire dragon) is defeated, peace prevails over the land, and the ending text says that Matthew continues to work for Ostia as a spy. HOWEVER there is a sequel to this game that revolves around the children of those nobles from earlier, so peace didn’t exactly prevail over the land for that long at all really. Since Matthew doesn’t appear in the sequel, I don’t plan on giving him any memories from it, but his canon experiences will include several years of working as a spy post dragon apocalypse as he watches rising tensions between the nations.
Canon Point: A few years post game, A support with Serra not reached. Meaning that he doesn’t have the ending that involves pining after a nun. Not that I have anything against Serra, it’s just the open ended and unresolved Matthew arc gives me more issues to work with as a player.
Personality: Matthew is one of those eternally cheerful people, but with a bit of an antagonistic edge. He laughs and jokes at nearly everything, and while sometimes this kind of joviality is encouraging and optimistic, his teasing can cross the line into ‘just plain dickish’. However he’s only very rarely actively malicious, although he definitely has that potential. When he sets about to avenge his brutally murdered girlfriend he creates an elaborate hostage situation ploy when it’s proved he can’t overpower the other man with speed, or strength. It’s also worth noting that he is a spy, and is well versed in all the insidious activities that come with that. Being an expert in behind the scenes operations, he’s not fond of being exposed, or on the front lines. He’s clearly got a coward’s streak, but isn’t too sore about it and prefers to think of himself as just making the more intelligent choice. He definitely has an expedient mindset, and would argue that the ends justify the means.
The ends are important to Matthew however, and while he decries chivalry and honor, he’s no less horrified by senseless brutality than the rest of the army. Sure he’ll rob a noble blind, but burning villages and killing innocents, or breaking the back of the civilians to pay for a war effort, are things he will not stand behind. Matthew always allies himself with good-hearted people, and puts a great deal of stock in intentions. Uther and Hector and to a lesser extent Eliwood and Lyn stand out to him as exceptional, just and kind leaders, and as the story progresses he becomes willing to overcome his characteristic cowardice to defend Hector.
Reason for playing: Moral quandaries are my faaaavorite? Also I really like this game but tag slow since the two muses I have in here right now are challenging for me for various reasons. I’ve been playing Matthew on and off for a long time now, and I know from experience that it is easy for me to tag non-canon mates with him as well as adapt him to AU premises.
III. ARK HISTORY
Name: Matthew
Age/Appearance: He’s 26, and his clothes are significantly less faux medieval. Although he probably has a bright red hoodie and wears things with a fuckton of pockets. He’s got some miscellaneous scars on his body, but they’re mostly on his torso so they’re easy to keep covered.
History: Matthew was born as the only child to an extremely poor couple in Twin City. They weren’t homeless, but they were about as close as you can get. He had very little food growing up, and despite his parents basically working himself to death, Matthew had to resort to stealing to get enough to eat. This eventually caught up with him though. At the age of 15 a particularly bad tempered wizard cursed him as Matthew was making off with some loot. Terrified by this, and in large amounts of pain and desperation, Matthew contacted a sleazy Mage he often fenced items too. The man agreed to “cure” Matthew, but took the opportunity to try out some experimental magics and observe the results. The spells and potions were a success, but unfortunately for the Mage, Matthew escaped as soon as he could run without fear of falling through the floor. Which was a while honestly. By then his parents had assumed he was dead, and although they were devastated emotionally, financially not having to care for a child had helped their situation some, and when Matthew saw this he decided to run away until he could help support them himself. With his new ability he was able to sneak onto a train, hopefully to a better life.
Having successfully snuck into the Capitol, Matthew now had no idea what to do. He sort of thought that he would just be able to steal the goose that laid the golden eggs then waltz back to his family, but things didn’t really work out that way. Over the course of several days, Matthew got picked up for numerous small offenses such as loitering, out past curfew, trespassing, theft, (littering, jaywalking? How strict is the Capitol?) etc. He managed to evade arrest every time however, only managing to be detained when other thaumicly active people were brought in. When it was worked out that he was a Twin City citizen he was handed off to be deported. By that point though enough word had been circulated about him and the nature of his powers that the Capitol Intelligence Managing Agency (name totally up to be changed, just needed something to call it) (EDIT: The intelligence agency is actually nameless in order to appear more fictional. Disregard further mentions of CIMA.) figured he could be useful and offered him a deal.
Matthew took it in a heartbeat. Now legally employed, he began sending supplies back to his parents. They currently live in the upper middle class in Twin City, and Matthew contacts them regularly through VR. For the first two years of his employment at CIMA he basically worked a desk job while he was trained to be a good spy. He learned everything from combat and weapons to interrogation techniques, undercover work and finer control over his own powers. While working there he met a girl named Leila. They were both incoming recruits, but she was the top student from a high class school who had been preparing for this all her life and he was the urchin brimming with untapped natural talent. Obviously they were immediately pitted against each other in the boot camp like organization, and after many months of UST ridden rivalry they got assigned to a cooperative mission and wound up making out vigorously as well as passing the mission with flying colors.
After this they were promoted to full time CIMA agents and assigned their first actual missions. Due to his familiarity with the setting, Matthew was sent back to the Twin City to tail and report on the Malova family as they were highly active in Twin City politics, as well as suspects for a major part of the black market. CIMA had been watching them through VR means with limited success for many years, and now they finally had someone that could blend into the Twin City seamlessly. He began noticing very disturbing things, disappearances, traces of magic that Matthew did not understand or recognize, and the seemingly immobile ages of many of the family members. He kept digging vigorously to find the truth, and though he managed to piece the information together in theory he could never get any definitive proof. In a fit of desperation he followed and surreptitiously interrogated the youngest child of the Malova’s to try and get some information from the 10 year old girl.
He did get affirming information, but again, not enough of any substance to prove anything to the Capitol. And when Mikuláš Malova was assassinated by a rival family, the capitol withdrew Matthew from the Twin City. In their minds the threat was over, Matthew was getting recklessly overinvested, and they had bigger problems to worry about than the fates of slum dwellers in the Twin City. This dismissal chaffed at Matthew, but on his suggestion his family had moved out of the Malova’s radius of influence, and he eventually put it out of his mind. From then on he was mainly assigned to internal Capitol affairs, or Chasm Cities, possibly because his higher ups were worried that Matthew might defect or abandon them if left on his own in the Twin City. It was during this time that he was first assigned to work under Uthadrin and Hecton. They were the military officers in charge of the division of CIMA that Matthew worked for. They were both charismatic, highly likeable people, and Matthew quickly became much more loyal to the two of them than he had ever been to the city itself. Despite this, Matthew could not really fight the urge to do a little under the table work. Out of respect for his bosses, he never stole anything belonging to the Capitol, but he found ways to slip out from their fingers and periodically steal some ridiculously expensive treasures, whether it was art, precious metals, or even a book.
Leila and Matthew saw little of each other due to assignments, but thanks to VR and dedication, they grew closer and closer. On his twenty fifth birthday Matthew resolved to ask Leila to marry him. Seven months later he had still not done it for fear of rejections, and Leila was now assigned to a highly dangerous and immersive position within one of the major pirate factions, so even anonymous VR contact was risky. Many more months later Matthew had finally concocted a definitive plan and date for when and how he was going to ask her when he was delivered a package which contained the bloody and mangled remains of his would be fiancé. The pirates had found her out and murdered her, ripping out her gill implants and sending them back to the Capitol.
He was unable to grieve for her however, as he was leaving on a mission of his own at the time involving a manic and dangerous terrorist cult worshiping the Chasm giants by a creep who wore too much violet. He and a small group of fighters had to be sent to neutralize the threat before they could gather enough magic to pose a serious threat. Once that was over however, Matthew was given a regulated mourning period. Two weeks into this he gained his VR memories.
Residence/Job: A spy for the Capitol Intelligence Management Agency. He follows people, does paperwork, assassinates people sometimes, and also just generally gathers information through a wide variety of research methods.
Skills/Powers: Adept at disguises, both in VR and real space, a very accomplished liar and thief, and has the handy ability to control the tangibility of his body and any objects he’s in contact with, however it takes concentration and effort to do so. He can easily grab a person and pull them through a wall, but doing so with several people, or a large object of some kind would be significantly harder. This power is also limited by magnets and electrical current. He cannot phase through magnetic objects, and electric currents ruin his concentration and short out his ability to be intangible. If he’s very quick he can jump through an electric fence, but he will most likely leave chunks of himself on the fence and it will be a wholly undesirable experience. Tasers and electric collars are his Achilles’ heel, although one particularly resourceful person once captured him by tying him up with Christmas lights (or whatever the ark equivalent of decorative lights is).
When he becomes intangible, he also becomes harder to see. Think the opacity slider on photoshop.
Resources: He’s taken care of quite well within the Capitol and also periodically has large amounts of cash from fencing whatever he most recently stole.
IV. SAMPLE
Arrival:
As he was home alone, there was no one to notice or worry about Matthew’s sudden, uncanny stillness for three and a half minutes. He simply lay there, slumped over his desk, unmoving. When it was over he groggily sat up, rubbing at his face. Had he dozed off? Late nights would be the death of him. He has to organize the mission files and get to cracking that coded message from Bern they’d intercepted, make sure the wyvern knights weren’t getting too antsy, and-
Where was his candle?
Matthew frowned at his desk. His candles and abacus and ink pot and quills were all gone. Had he been robbed? No this…wasn’t his desk was it? Was it? It was too smooth, no wood he knew of was this polished. Matthew blinked, looked up at the fluorescent lights in the ceiling. Not candles. Not lamps. How did he know what those were called? Ugh what…
He shook his head. Things started trickling back. The network, pens, trains, computers, phones, plumbing. Holy shit he has to go take a shower right now. Running water is the single most important technological advancement of all time. Wait no, stop. There are more important things to think about first. All the castles and candles and lances and swords were just a glitch? Yeah, there on the screen to his left was the terminal, blinking slowly with the message “CONNECTION TIMED OUT: UNKNOWN FAILURE OCCURRED. Unable to retrieve file Leila_log_04.rfp because the uploading process was interrupted. Windows will notify you when a solution to this problem has been identified.”
Suddenly the rest of it comes back in a dizzying wave. His life in Twin City, his powers, his job, his friends, everything that was different. And everything that was the same. That blood tinged box that had been haunting his nightmares flashes back up, but now it’s accompanied by a vision of her hung up in a tree. His head spins as the conflicting names and places all try to assert themselves in his memory. He reels, hands going to clutch at his temples. As he finally acclimates to the new/old experiences suddenly crowding his head, it really sinks in. Someone, or something had hacked his session. Or something. The experiences were all way too real and complex to be random feed glitches, but the people and events were all too familiar for it to have been made by someone else. Was this some kind of virus that had hijacked his own memories?
What a worrying notion.
He hadn’t asked for this. He had just wanted to rewatch one of their logs together. He wanted to see her try not to smile at his jokes again. Instead he got a whole second life with her. He laughs a little bit. Just a small airy chuckle. He got to meet her again. He got to win her over again. He could remember two first kisses, and two first times, and two first fights, and two long wonderful relationships, and two times that he couldn’t work up the nerve to ask her to marry him, and two funerals. He had gotten a second chance, and he’d done the exact same thing. He’s pathetic. He tries to make himself laugh again, and chokes. He slumps back over his desk, back shuddering and hands fisted in his hair.
