B1, Day 2 [public channel]

[whattaprick]

[ There are a lot of things people need to do right now: help the Prince's servants get resettled, get started on figuring out who can work on a cure for the petrification, deal with the trauma of dying in a hopefully healthy and non-self-destructive way, show the new people the ropes of what the Carnival has to work with.

Instead, in the morning of the second day since the Prince was defeated, anyone on the radio gets this: ]

So, I've been wondering.

[ The Nightrider's voice, for those who recognize it, has definitely been better. It's a low, hoarse rasp, and the pause at the end is not just for effect, but to actually catch his breath. ]

Just how old is everyone here, anyway? Here, I'll start. I'm ... pretty sure I'm almost sixty. [ A beat. ] ... Maybe.

[ Why did anyone let this man have his radio back again? ]

[ ooc; Lambert's flat on his back in the medical tent for this, feel free to bug him in person and threadjack each other at will. ]

Comments

[dressedtothe]

[9S hums before replying.]

Us YoRHa are the latest models, so we haven't been around for long. The current generation are all under 4 years old, I think.

But some of the non-YoRHa androids might've been active for a few hundred years.

[whattaprick]

[ The more Lambert hears about androids, the more like golems they sound. ]

Does that mean you'll last hundreds of years too?

[dressedtothe]

[There's an unusually long pause from the other end of the line.]

...I don't know. Maybe?

[Probably not, if nothing can be done for 2B and the rest of YoRHa; he's certain he won't be able to live with the loneliness.]

If I don't die or get too damaged I guess I could.

[But he doesn't really want to dwell on that.]

Will Lambert last hundreds of years? I was always under the impression humans don't usually live that long, but Strange makes it sound like he doesn't look his age. And Lambert did mention he was mutated by magic. Does that change things?

[whattaprick]

He could, if he doesn't do something stupid and get himself killed first. [ Celandine chirps, too cheery about the prospect of near-death considering how close to actual death they've gotten. ]

So witchers are a little bit like androids, like that. But you're right: the magic changes things, at least where we're from.

[dressedtothe]

Technically, he did die.

[Otherwise they wouldn't have won the challenge. It's just a damn shame he totally missed out on everything that happened after he shut down!!

Unless... Lambert doesn't remember dying? He doesn't know how fae revival works.]

...Does he remember dying?

[whattaprick]

[ And at that, 9S will encounter a stone wall of silence for a good few seconds. Finally, it won't be Celandine who answers, but Lambert: ]

I'm right here, you know.

[dressedtothe]

Yeah, I know. But you weren't the one answering.

[:|]

So? Do you remember? Or are there gaps in your memory from when the Prince cast his spell over you?

[whattaprick]

Not really.

[ That is a complete and utter lie, but this is one illusion, at least, that Celandine will allow him to maintain, as fragile as it is/ ]

Mostly, I remember being pissed off. And I know I got turned into something else.

[ He has the changes to show for it, after all. Hard to miss. ]

[dressedtothe]

Weren't you pissed off the entire time we were there though?

[Just sayin'.]

I guess if you don't remember... then it sounds like fae revival magic is kind of similar to what we have [had] back home. Except you got dumped back in your old body instead of a new one.

[whattaprick]

Yeah, but I couldn't do anything about it.

[ He can't say he's wrong ... but hey, perfect opportunity to turn the conversation to 9S instead. ]

What do you mean, dumped in a new one?

[dressedtothe]

YoRHa Number 9 Type-S. That's my identification, but it's also a descriptor of my personality data and the body type I inhabit. That means there are multiple "9S" android bodies in existence. They're just inactive until I die or break this one so badly it isn't worth repairing.

When that happens, my stored memories and personality data is uploaded into one of the inactive 9S bodies.

[whattaprick]

[ There's another pause where both Celandine and Lambert consider that answer, which is a bit more serious than the sort they were expecting to get out of this. Luckily, being jammed into a computer world means they're familiar with some basic lingo. ]

Are those bodies here?

[dressedtothe]

No.

And before you ask, even if had one of my other bodies, I won't be able to restore myself to the spare body in the Carnival. We just don't have the right infrastructure to do it.

[...Not that he'd be able to if he went home either, with everyone corrupted. ]

[whattaprick]

Too bad. Now you've got to deal with just having one body like the rest of us. [ And since this is the Carnival and that's not super factually accurate: ] Most of the rest of us.

[dressedtothe]

[Yeah, he knows that! BUT more importantly...]

"Most of the rest of us?" Does someone have a spare or something?

... Wait, are you talking about that Julien guy?

[whattaprick]

That's the one. Don't ask us how it works, though.

[dressedtothe]

Man that's weird. I guess we could do that back home. Put our personality and memory data in multiple bodies, I mean. But it would get confusing when uploading ourselves back to the Bunker...

[...Now he really has to find this Julien guy and ask him how the whole two body thing works. Better stop 9S before he starts being a nerd and theorising how it all works.]

[whattaprick]

It's confusing enough with the two of us ... isn't that strange? Even if we have the same memories and everything.

[dressedtothe]

What exactly is so confusing about it?

[Whoops his curiosity's found a new target.]

If your memories are the same, I imagine there would be less of the usual mental disconnection that comes from having different memories...

[whattaprick]

Well, for one thing, we don't have the same body, so memories of being a different size are strange. And I think... [ She pauses. ]

In Greysol, daemons were part of their humans, but they were never inside them. And they have their whole lives to grow with each other. Until the Ringmaster cast that spell, I never knew I could exist.