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[falselife]

You have reached the mailbox of one (1) Juniper
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[falselife]

i try not to
but you
make it
so
ver
y

difficult

[freightcars]

[ at first, he doesn't recognize the name or understand why they're texting him — until he scrolls up to the prior message, until he sees the photo ID, and

ho
lee
fucking
shit ]

Oh hell
no this isn't
You're not who I sent this to
I'm
Fuck, sorry, I don't know how the hell this happened

[falselife]

only you did, though
tell me, how much do you think of me
how often do you think about what you did to me

or have you moved on and found yourself someone new to ruin

[freightcars]

every day
feels like I'm ruining a lot of things lately, if you want the truth of it

I'm sorry
I never meant for that to happen
I didn't want any of it
I know that doesn't matter because it doesn't undo it and it doesn't fix it but
I just want you to know I didn't want it either

[falselife]

it doesn't

how often do you lose control
how often do you hurt people

[freightcars]

twice since I've been here
what happened the second time isn't what happened the first time
the first issue was fixed
the second was whatever that buff santa claus asshole did to the city

[ conveniently... leaves out all those times before here... ]

[falselife]

the first time
when you murdered my friend, you mean
before you found a new way to assault tieflings, apparently

[freightcars]

Your friend and a few other people
I'm still working it out with them, but yeah
That's what I mean.

what the hell is a tiefling?

[falselife]

how is that going?
i wonder, though
how many more will you have hurt, before you're done settling things with the first group?
how many apologies will you make, before you stop?

[ She almost doesn't answer his last question, having purposely made the comment about tieflings purely to see if he, like so many from the world she knows, blindly disdain her kind, but, ]

me and molly

[freightcars]

[ He wants to say "I'm not the only one who got affected by it," he wants to offer up excuses and he wants to defend himself, but ultimately...

Does he deserve to?
He doesn't think so. ]

I offered them the same thing I'm gonna offer you now
If there's anything I can do to make it right
Anything
Name it

[falselife]

what would possibly make this right
what could i possibly want from you

[freightcars]

Think it's different from person to person
Revenge, maybe
Help, if something like this ever happens again with someone else
Money
I don't know
If you had to think about the one thing that might make you feel better about what happened, maybe I could give you that

[falselife]

revenge rarely has the effect you'd like it to
i don't trust you or your "help"
and i don't want your money

[freightcars]

if you change your mind
it's a standing offer.

[falselife]

i will remember that
among other things

mostly, i think
i just want
for you never to hurt anyone ever again

[freightcars]

you might not believe me but
I want that too
more than anything.

[falselife]

so what's stopping you?

[freightcars]

other people taking control of my god damn brain

[falselife]

molly says you told him you remember everything
do you?

is it you, in there? or does something external control your physical self?

[freightcars]

I do. All of it.

what happened the first time wasn't the same thing that happened the second. they were two totally different scenarios, two different causes, so the feeling was different for both of 'em

you really wanna know the details?

[falselife]

yes
explain it to me
everything

[freightcars]

the first time was me
I mean the source of it, it wasn't the city
before I came here, where I'm from I was
well it all came out more or less on the network when... everything happened with your friend but I'm
I was a prisoner of war, I got
Brainwashed, basically, turned into a sleeper agent
Say the right words in the right order and I
Something else takes over, it's me but it's not, it's a
Weapon, a soldier. It takes orders, I take orders and I do what I'm told to do
There was a man here who found the words
Used them on me, gave me a list
Your friend was on the list
When I'm like that, I'm not... myself, I don't
It's like who I am is trapped in a box in the back of my mind, behind a thousand walls of steel and concrete and I can't do anything to stop myself. I can't even think, I don't think, I'm not a person, I'm a tool
But it's still me, in the end
It's still me, so when it's over I remember it and I feel it and I know what I did


What happened with you was different
It was like that god damn garland was inside of me, it was like it
It was a god damn urge, it was like an addiction, it was like a burning
thing
that I couldn't stop, it was just waves on waves of need and hurt and drums all going off at once that drove out every god damn thought in my head except
that I just
needed to do that
it wasn't a choice
and at points I knew that I needed to stop, and I wanted to, and I tried, but as soon as I started pulling back it just
it's like it took over and I didn't
I don't know
There are others, other people who felt it, other people it touched that could probably explain it in a way that makes more sense. I'm sorry, it's hard to put into words.

[falselife]

[ Juniper doesn't say anything to him for a long time, longer than it reasonably takes to read everything he's just sent her. She doesn't like it. She doesn't like how many things in there strike a painfully familiar chord with her. ]

like you're screaming yourself raw even though no sound comes out

[ Nope, nevermind, too personal, he doesn't get to have her story, and she immediately regrets giving him even that. ]

mistletoe, too
before you got to me, i'd been cursed by the mistletoe
i hurt someone, too
but only after he told me yes, and meant it
and after i told him yes, and meant it

[freightcars]

[ Noted, viscerally noted, but he knows better than to pry at that scab. ]

Mistletoe wasn't so bad. Ran into that before... what happened
the garland was
worse

I didn't want to hurt you.
I didn't mean to hurt you.
I think with the way this city's been...
I think we haven't seen everything it's capable of and it's not just me that's susceptible to it, it's everyone
It's just
That time it was me, and it was you
And because of
What I am
It's worse
Harder to stop, harder to get away for the people unfortunate enough to be around me at the time
Even if I don't mean to be, I'm a risk. I know that. I don't know how to stop being a risk, I don't think there's a way to make myself immune to what this place does or I would

But if it does happen to you again with someone else
With one of the other people like me, or worse
I can try to stop it
That's the only thing I can think of that might help

[falselife]

i think, sometimes
that this place wants all of us to hurt each other
but that some of us
answer the call more easily than others

one of the other people like you?