video;

[thxforthememories]

[The link appears to have been... dropped. It's just sitting on the floor of a hallway in Trion's temple. There's a partial view of a nearby room, the door half-open and sitting strangely on its hinges. The room itself appears... trashed. Like the storm blew through the room as well as the Haven.]

[Everything is absolutely still. Absolutely silent.]

[For several minutes.]

[And then something slams itself down off-screen, hard enough to rattle the Link itself. It actually vibrates a few inches forward at the impact.]

[Someone laughs. There's no amusement in the sound, only smug satisfaction.]

Look! Look, look, look!

[The voice is probably familiar, but the cadence is all wrong. The speaker grabs the Link, jerking it toward the room.]

I did it. I did it so well too, didn't I? You thought you had me -- what was it? What was it? Are you punishing me? Is that it?

No, no. That won't do. I got out!

[More laughter. Delighted, echoing laughter.]

[And all of the sudden, a face pops on-screen, upside down. The smile it wears is sharp, harsh. It's... Kagerou?]

Aren't. You. Proud? Brave Police.

[There is a fevered light in his optics -- both of which are visible now, the scanner no longer marking half his face. And then the feed goes dark.]

Comments

[mccrane]

Not a fool.

[No. Definitely not that. There is an interesting thrill he gets from arguing with the ninja-bot, with constantly having to prove himself...but he doesn't know how he feels. He wants the original Kagerou back, of course, but how has this one come to be this way? Could this happen to them?]

Tell me more, then. Tell me more than I am allowed to know.

[He has to put an arm around Kagerou to keep them steady--to keep himself from going off balance. The way the other vibrates is strange to him, but its not as strange as how it feels when Kagerou stops.]

It is not a trick. This is why I'm acting strangely to you, I believe. [He gestures up at the Lambda.] That anomaly up there has been sending storms.

[thxforthememories]

Poor fool.

[He laughs to himself. No, he won't give that up. He's found somewhere to dig in, some leverage he won't release. It's better that way.]

[His head cocks to one side, as if listening to a silent voice.]

What does he know? What does he remember? If he's as knowledgeable as he thinks he is, surely, he can answer that. Where it began? Hm?

[But the chatter dies. Movement dies. Everything goes rigidly, terrifyingly, still.]

[Until his head slowly shakes back and forth.]

I'm not stupid. Storms are weather. Weather doesn't change you. Doesn't make you calm.

[mccrane]

I can't. I can't answer that. For my Brave Police, it began with Yuuta...do you remember him? He taught Deckard how to be more than a program.

[Surely, something similar must have happened wherever this Kagerou was from...because without Yuuta, Deckard would not have had a personality, and without that Kagerou would not be acting this way at all--strange as it was.]

Weather has not changed me, Kagerou, and you know this to be true or you would not be gripping me so tightly. This is a different world, and I am a different McCrane.

[thxforthememories]

No. [He eyes him, suddenly all suspicion and confusion.] Was it the boy? The little boy? We all remember that one... yes.

He died.

[There's a shrug, as if he'd just said the sun came up this morning. A simple, bland statement of a terrible fact.]

[And that, of course, was where everything went wrong.]

Why.

Why is this -- [A frustrated, animal growl. His fingers clench, clawing at armor in an attempt to ground things, or wake up from whatever this has become.] Why! What's happened.

Not different, no. Not different at all! Just wrong!