expiationlogs | one way or another

Not being able to solve my problem is gonna suck for you as much as it sucks for me.

[It's meant as a warning; she doesn't want Root to have any expectations of one-and-done solutions.

But.]

Dying didn't end or reboot it. I have that answer now.

And here I thought you were going to turn into a cuddly teddy bear with no baggage now that we're together.

[ Root finds it kind of sweet that Shaw keeps warning her about things, because it means she cares enough to warn her. She doesn't think she really needs to say out loud that there's nothing that'll scare her off at this point; Shaw should know her well enough to guess at that one.

She reaches out and brushes some of Shaw's hair aside, leaving her hand tangled in it. ]

[And Shaw presses her palm against it, keeping it in place.]

You shouldn't have shot yourself.

[This, too, probably isn't worth saying out loud, albeit for different reasons; she doubts it's going to make much of a difference. But she says it for herself as much as for Root: she wants to hear the words hang in the air. She hates being responsible, even indirectly, for Root's death, no matter how fake or temporary.]

What happened to you shouldn't have happened, [ she says right back, voice ringing clear like she wants to hear the words, too, her gaze merciless and loving. ]

I can't make it right, Sameen. But I can be with you wherever you're going.

[ It's not about making up to her; she can't do that. It's not about proving anything; Root isn't sure there's anything left for them to prove to each other. But the purity of being there--

Root won't ever leave someone she loves to suffer when she could be there. Not ever again. ]

Edited 2024-11-24 01:30 (UTC)

And if I want you to let me protect you instead?

[There's a note of challenge in her voice, and she punctuates it - or maybe softens it; she's not sure which - by nudging her foot into Root's ankle.]

[ Oh, she doesn't have an issue with that at all. Root thinks Shaw protecting her is hot as hell. She smiles slightly, with hidden slyness, and happily plays footsie. ]

Can't do that from the edge of a building thinking about jumping over, [ she points out lightly. Thinking it's hot isn't going to stop her from pointing out Shaw has a fundamental choice to make: is she wrapped up in her doubts, or is she here with her? They're opposing states of reality. ]

[Yes I can, Shaw wants to insist, stubbornly. It's the only way I could protect you for thousands of simulations. Thousands of fssailed cycles.

But not a single one of those Roots had been this Root - and whether this Root has a flesh-and-blood body somewhere, or whether she exists only in lines of code, there's no denying that the difference is stark. That is the game-changer.]

Okay.

[She says it so quietly that if her back had still been turned, Root probably would have missed it.]

Yeah?

[ Root melts a little, absolutely taken in by Shaw agreeing to stay with her. She reads the subtext without any effort and knows what she's really saying. That's always been how they communicate -- Root using all of her skill at reading people so Sameen doesn't have to say much. In fact, sometimes what she says is deliberately misleading to what she means; the quietness here, the physical closeness, how she leans into her hand--

That's enough for her, even if they don't or can't define it. ]

You gonna protect me now? [ She bats her eyelashes in invitation. ]

I might have to. You shot me.

[And if this simulation's schtick is punishment for wrongdoing...]

If the AI's kaput, will it still care about that?

[ Root will shoot Shaw as many times as it takes to jar her out of the impression that this is the same old simulation. It's at least a new simulation, she's a different Root, and to herself she feels like the real one, full and complex. That has to be enough. She can shoot her, but-- she'd really rather not. ]

It's not kaput, it's reset, [ Root corrects, with all the easy confidence of someone who lives and breathes with a constant understanding of what's happening with their world-altering A.I. ]

It can't care too much. I think the last person who went on a murder spree got community service. [ Root rolls her eyes. ] The worst I've heard of is being forced to tell the truth for a while.

Sounds more like a punishment for everyone else than for me.

[ She really doesn't care about the consequences. ]

[Po-tay-to, po-tah-to, thinks Shaw at that first bit, though she keeps it to herself. It had worked - sort of - with the Machine, after all. Maybe Root will get lucky here, too.]

Community service can mean a lot of things.

[She mutters, under her breath.]

And I'm not a fan of the implications of the truth-telling thing. If it can control what we say sometimes, that means it can do it all the time.

It probably can.

[ Root tangles her fingers in further with Shaw's hair, her palm finding the curve of her skull, softly and without pulling. ]

It's not the Machine, but if we can restore her back to the version before the reset, I trust her a little. I got a look at her code for just a minute, and it looked above-board to me.

Do you think this is you controlling your hand now?

[Shaw reaches up, brushing her fingers lightly over Root's.]

Could you tell if it wasn't?

[ She meets her eyes sadly. ]

Whatever I said, would you believe me?

[ Root can have an intellectual discussion and even an emotional one about the nature of reality and her own existence and the agency she has or doesn't have over it. But she's not sure there would be much point, if Shaw keeps asking questions and not believing the answer. ]

[Shaw has the sense that there's a right and a wrong answer here, and it frustrates her in a strangely undefined, targetless way: she can't pinpoint the cause to Root, or even to herself or to Decima.]

Probably not.

[She says, quietly.]

But you'd believe it. And I like that you believe in things that I can't.

Oh. You want to know what I believe?

[ There's still sadness there, still loss, but it shades bittersweet, Root touched beyond words that Shaw sees this part of her as something good, her ability to believe. Since she's been prompted, she doesn't hold back; the words pour out of her into the still air and she feels each one of them is true. ]

I believe there's no way my brain or an A.I. could guess that you would say that. I believe that we're all a collection of electrical signals in the end, and maybe a computer can't process things the same ways we do, but that doesn't mean it can't copy us. I believe that we're signals in a new environment.

If you took people from centuries ago and put them in a rocket and blasted them out of Earth's orbit, and they saw what's out there isn't God and heaven but a freezing vacuum filled with rocks and gasses, they'd ask if that was real, if they were even real anymore.

But there's something in us that is irreducible. A thing we are regardless of context. I believe that irreducible part of me is here, and so is that part of you.

[Root is right: she doesn't believe it, at least not in the same bone-deep way that Root herself does. It's all just too existential and theoretical for Shaw, who does best with things that are concrete and black-and-white. But hearing Root talk about it with such certainty is comforting, even when it doesn't make proper sense to her.

She shifts a little in Root's arms, cheek digging against the pillow.]

Our shapes.

[See, Root? She remembers your weird tangents, even the ones that exasperate her because they're happening during gunfights.]

[ Root had been fairly certain one or both of them was going to die soon when she initiated that discussion, just as she had been in the stock exchange. And hey, that last time, she'd been right. It feels so strange not to be under that gun now, to imagine a whole open expanse of opportunities to have these conversations with Shaw. She knows either one of them could disappear at any moment, but there's something different between that and thinking they might die. Here, in this simulation, they might come back.

She smiles at Shaw listening to her, at showing she's been listening, and cuddles in closer. She whispers from inches away, ]

Your shape is beautiful. I can still see it.

[ Maybe she thinks she's not real, either. That would make sense to be part of Shaw's doubts; why should her own nature and identity be exempt from what's in question? So she keeps going. ]

The part of you that matters, they couldn't take that away. It's right here with me.

I can see yours, too.

[She can see it in a way that she hadn't in Samaritan's simulations - and whether that's because this is the genuine article or just a more sophisticated sim, it's not nothing.

And Root's reassurance serves a dual purpose - because Shaw doesn't worry about her own identity on a metaphysical level, but she does feel diminished in the wake of her captivity, broken and then pieced back together in a way that's serviceable, but still less than what she used to be.]

Mine's got some new broken pieces.

[She murmurs.]

But I'm working on it.

Yeah?

[ That means everything to her, that she can still see some recognizable fundamental part of her in her, too. That's all Root could really ask for; it's all she needs. Root lives constantly in an ambiguous state of being, accepting all the existential and theoretical nuance a human being can handle, believing in all that complexity as something beautiful and worth saving. Samaritan would squash that, flatten it into something stark and plain.

Root loves the indefinable in the same way she loves Shaw. And being seen-- that's always been something very special to her. ]

None of the important pieces got broken. Not to me. [ She believes that completely, isn't just parroting a line; Root has interacted with Shaw enough now post-captivity that she's established that belief wholly. ]

But I'm still not going to let you go anywhere without me again.

one way or another

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fssailed cycles" well fuck you too, phone keyboard

phone tagging is a fickle mistress

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