knowinginthedark | [Journal and Event]

Hah... haha... *he brings his knees up, resting his forehead against them.*

I can... I can say that nothing remains. I can't feel him on my back. I feel like I'm having half the thoughts I used to have. Like a wall formed, suddenly, and it's all I can communicate with.

It really worked. But...

That does mean I'm probably in trouble, now.

Because of concerns over your existence, right?

Well... *Juudai thinks for a moment.* ... I might be able to reach out to my contacts and see if anyone can say for sure if your existence is still unstable or not, but for now it seems stable, just from my own observation.

Well, you have to remember, not only was I unconscious for three weeks, but I'm still probably working off of enough residual from Chacu Challhua-- who was really the only reason I got here in the first place, let alone lasted this long without confronting anyone until... Well, three weeks ago.

Well, other than that cat telling us to come here.

*Juudai looks at him curiously.*

A cat told you to come here...?

Yeah, a cat. I'm minding my own business, barely staving off just entirely succumbing to ennui, and a talking cat with a robotic leg shows up and tells me to come here, instead-- that things'll work out if I "replace" the person that I am, here, since the world I was from, well...

I really wasn't joking about the feeling that the world was "falling apart" around me, because apparently that's just what it was going to do, eventually. Just as a natural course of things.

Huh. A talking cat. That's a new one.

Not something I'm familiar with, but, I have come across this whole 'displaced person from a breaking apart alternate reality needs to replace the person in this reality to survive' thing before with someone else.

It was a few years ago now, but I'm guessing whoever this cat is, it told more than just you to come here.

Oh, yes, I picked up on that pretty quickly, too. I didn't think myself special or anything like that, after all-- though I was going to put the matter of "why is a cat telling people of alternate timelines and possibilities to come to here" to the side until I got the whole thing with my existence handled, since it was honestly very fascinating to me.

Of course, this was before I had to spend several months even finding the "Mamoru" of this world. I think by then that cat had gotten stuffed into a cage by someone else? I haven't kept up with what was going on there since I was.

Preoccupied. *he rubs the back of his head with his free hand*

Huh, guess the cat might've been dealt with by someone else...? Hmm. *He gets his D-Pad for a moment and makes a quick note about the cat and people from alternate timelines, in case it comes up again.*

Well, as I said, there might be ways we can find out how stable or unstable your existence is here and if it is unstable, it could be possible to find ways to anchor your existence here without any of this 'having to replace your alternate self'. I can't make promises right now, but it's something we can look into.

If you at all feel like something isn't right, then contact me straight away. Otherwise, hopefully we have time to look into this for you and try to figure out a solution if it needs one.

That said... since I feel it's probably best to ask, going forward for now, would you prefer to be called 'Mamoru' or continue to go by 'Satou, Tarou', mostly so I know what to call you.
I understand if that's difficult to answer right now. I'm sure that is still a bit of a confusing area for you.

Oh, well... yes, I guess this is going to be a problem, isn't it.

Until I know what's going to happen... I guess "Tarou" is fine, for right now. Most people who've heard of me would know me by that name anyway, and there's no point in causing confusion on purpose.

Besides, in hindsight... I'm pretty sure Chacu Challhua was amplifying how that name was starting to sound, anyway. So I'm sorry I ended up snapping at you, before. It was a name I had chosen, anyway.

Though maybe I should've spent a little more time making it not sound so generic.

It's fine. I understand. When I was connected to Uru all those years ago it definitely amplified how I felt and reacted to things. Mainly things like injustice, kinda feeding into the whole hero persona I'm known for.

Oh, right, you are sorta a "hero", in a sense. "This world's hero". *he repeats that in that same sorta "cold" tone he was using before, but it's more obvious he's aping on how he had been acting during that whole encounter*

I'd actually heard of you before-- in my world. But it was kinda more in passing? Once I started really researching a lot more things about here, and when you said you had been the Earthbound God Uru's host, well...

I think a lot of things clicked for me, on what went "wrong", there. On why my situation wasn't sustainable.

It was interesting how you mentioned that there were no other Dark Signers, nor Signers in your world. I wonder if anything happened to them, or if somehow, they just never existed in your world at all, other than yourself.

Here we have two sets of Signers, granted there is some weird 'dimensional' reasons we have two sets.
Then there were five people, myself included, that became Dark Signers. Though interesting note is that none of the five of us were controlled by Chacu Challhua.

How strange. It may just be that Chacu Challhua in my world was too late. Or even just far too early. Or that, well-- the butterfly effect that caused me to agree to go on the expedition that led to my death, it caused everyone else who would've become a Dark Signer or a Signer to just... Simply not make the fatal decision to follow that path.

A person who may decide to stay home in one instance, or to go traveling around the world in another, or to not take a specific risk or met someone in particular-- it's impossible to confirm, but it's likely that my choice simply made it improbable. *it's a little... fatalistic of a theory, but he is the one living the whole thing...

I guess there is no way of ever knowing for sure if that was the case, but I know there's plenty of theories about how different choices can cause different timelines or possibilities to occur or not occur. It's a bit over my head most of the time, but I guess it's not out of the realm of possibility that something did or did not happen that didn't meld right.

Likewise, I don't think we were really 'supposed' to have two sets of Signers here, but like I said, there are some strange dimensional reasons we have two sets.

I'd say there's more than "reasons" for it-- there's so many things that simply never matched up to where I was from. Nothing like "SAI", or even anything that acknowledged Psychic Duelists, existed in my world, outside of the most niche of research. Accepting that monsters were present in our lives was like taking a fairy tale seriously.

It's why I ended up doing research. It seems like... a lot of things happened because of the presence of people who probably shouldn't have been here, possibly. You admitting to what you were... Well, it made a few things much more clear, but I might need to retrieve my notes first before I can do more research.

Yeah, come to think of it, a lot of things have developed or changed here because of people or Duel Spirits that have come from other worlds, timelines, dimensions and so on and it's kinda interesting comparing it to how things were in your own world where these things may not have happened.

*Juudai then gives him a small smile.*

I feel your research would be a real asset to this world.
I know we have some uncertainties right now and you did say you weren't fond of staying in one spot but... I honestly would love to have you as part of SAI's research team.

*he looks sheepish at that* Well... I appreciate that, really! I'll admit, I'd gotten so used to people just plain not... Taking my research seriously at all, so there was really more of a benefit to just being here compared to where I was.

*hangs his head right after that, though* Me sticking around however, other than the talk of my, you know, existence, probably is going to depend on... a couple other things.

*he gestures to the cuff* Namely if I get sent to jail or not after I recover fully, but, well.

I was catching up on what happened while I was out, news-wise. I think I might end up having at least one visitor, just circumstantially.

'One visitor'? Someone you're expecting to visit you?

But yeah, it depends on what the police and OOPARTS decide to do, though I'll be honest that the police tend to kinda... side wave 'supernatural occurrences', I don't think they really like dealing with it. A lot of stuff like this gets dealt with by OOPARTS and/or SAI a lot of the time.

That said, I'm going to try and see if I can push to get you put under my watch at SAI, sort of as a 'rehabilitation' case.

Rehabilitation... would probably work out as a reasoning, yeah, but...

Uh... that report about people suddenly reappearing, including that tourist group from a couple New Years' back? *he fidgets with the thin hospital blanket, obviously uneasy*

I guess there's no reason to hide it, but that group was my fault. But so was... everyone else that showed back up, too, it sounds like. And given how the report was worded, it's pretty likely that includes... Everyone I might've fed to Chacu Challhua in the revenge he drove me into, over the years. From back in my world.

*Juudai gives a slow nod.*

I see. I figured the people suddenly appearing was connected to you and Chacu Challhua.

*His face becomes more solemn for a moment.*

I remember how the Earthbounds we had fed on souls. I definitely have some... memories... of doing that myself. Of Uru influencing me and it feeding on the souls of people I dueled, even those I held close to me.

But... those people came back and so did these people. They're disorientated, but they're okay.
Granted I never thought that some of those that returned were possibly from your own world, so, they may need some extra help establishing lives here.

Edited 2022-01-01 21:49 (UTC)

They might. I mean, it's better than them appearing in a world that likely doesn't exist anymore, right? Least a better fate.

I wonder why it is though-- that they do come back. Were they just... Batteries for the Earthbound Gods, kept around even after being drained? I know that Chacu Challhua had his own limits, I could feel it when it happened, so I know it wasn't a feint, but just... Why, really?

Though honestly, I just expect at least one of them is going to try to attack me on sight, for what I did. I still remember a lot of that very clearly, and I wasn't exactly the most... accommodating sort when it came to "believing they had purposely left me for dead" and all, so my old team might not be accommodating in turn.

*suddenly, it may be very clear why he said he doesn't work "well on teams"*

*Juudai takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly.*

Right. So some of these people you knew and I assume after you were bound to the Earthbound, you attacked them in revenge because you believed they 'purposely left you for dead'. Is that right? Just making sure I understand the situation and how much danger you think you're in right now.

Yeah, it was kinda, well... most of what the first couple years with Chacu Challhua involved-- it was sorta part of the deal he had me agree to. That I could get revenge on them in exchange for doing a Dark Signer's duty.

In hindsight though, I realize honestly... a lot of why they ended up running off and leaving me there, was probably just because of his own manipulations. Earthbound Gods seem to have the ability to affect probability, just slightly enough, to cause a death of their host target.

But it's not like they'll realize it. From their perspective, hey invited some nerdy freshman in college to go on an expedition in another country, he jumps at the chance, they freak out and leave him because of some ghosts... and then months later he pops up and sacrifices them to his god that he met on the way back?

*... he flops back onto the hospital bed, the cuffs clanging a little*

Maybe if I'm lucky, they'll count that all up to a crazy hallucination. Or aliens. That seems to be a running theory.

Okay, well, just in case, while you're in here recovering, I'll make sure there's some kind of security watching you and will tell them to not let anyone else see you other than specific people myself, or OOPARTS say is okay.

And if you are eventually released into my care, then I'll continue to make sure you remain safe, if you really do feel one of them may try to attack you if they find out where you are.

Other than that, if you are faced with one of them at any point, either contact myself or Onni from OOPARTS and we'll try and help explain and defuse the situation.

*giving a weary thumbs up*

Sounds like a solid plan. Though I'm still mildly hoping that "aliens" really does become the driving theory.

... you're really serious though about "rehabilitation", huh. I'll admit, I didn't actually uh...

Expect that even if I survived this, even if I had won or lost against my alternate, I'd be allowed to even stick around.

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