Hannibal's house, Sunday

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal set the large glass of home-brewed dark ale on the end table, along with the tiny pork pies and pickle and the remote control for the music system.

And, because he could surf Google and iTunes as well as anyone, and it never paid to be too predictable, he was playing (not too loudly) Opeth.

He was even wearing a comfortable sweater and slacks instead of a suit. He was picking his battles today, and his battle was how greasy not to make fish and potatoes! Since they'd been so rudely interrupted by eels earlier.


[OOC: Waiting on one, but totally open!]

[OOC the second: Specifics of Jono's story NFB, please!]

Comments

[furnaceface]

//I did throw my hands in the air and walk away from the Boards because I couldn't cope,// Jono noted, quietly watching Hannibal's fingers at play. //It was a mixed blessing. I had finally started getting back into the swing of living an almost normal life. Karla's war was over, and while I had scarred lungs full of poison smoke, at least I still had lungs. But... I was completely headblind, and there was something else in there, chewing at the inside of my skull. This, at least, is the devil I know.//

[sharp_as_knives]

"How long after the change did you return here?" Hannibal asked. Since he wasn't even sure which world Jono had been in for most of that time.

[furnaceface]

//After I turned back to this?// Jono shrugged his shoulders a little. //Not long. Karla, Raven, and Momoko went to Utopia to get me th'day after we got out of that reality. Stayed in Glacia 'bout a week. You actually ran into me my first day back on the island again, remember? At th'Boards.//

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal nodded. "I didn't know how long it had been. So, you have the memories the Weapon X telepath gave you, and you have the memories this Legion gave you, as well as your own."

Here, Jono; have a bit more beer.

[furnaceface]

Lord, did he ever need more beer. Hannibal had an excellent sense for this sort of thing, didn't he?

//Three lifetimes,// he confirmed. //Three bloody lifetimes all crammed up there. Gets a little busy sometimes.//

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal had made a lot of money off his sense for this sort of thing.

"The versions of you that you were last Spring - do those stay with you as well?"

[furnaceface]

//Not quite like this, no,// Jono replied with a shrug. //No more than they stay with everybody else, I imagine. I only had the one, the me with no head, and I remember what I did as him, and the thoughts I had, but those missing years, the what-if between when I broke free from the Program and whatever hell he was walking through? I don't have that. All I've got are speculations based on what he said and did. Why, did you keep any of yours?//

Was there a mobster heart beating in that chest, Hannibal?

[sharp_as_knives]

No, that was in his basement.

Hannibal thought about it for a moment. "Some of it. I made a conscious effort when we first returned to ourselves to file away anything that might be useful or interesting."

Some of Hanna's memories of a female perspective would be useful the next time the island switched him, and the next time he had to help or hunt a woman. And she'd used different hunting techniques, too. The artist Hannibal gave him a few precious, foggy memories of his grown sister. The mobster gave him very little, as it happened; it served more to make him appreciate his uncle.

"I remember being those others, and how it felt. But I don't feel like them anymore."

[furnaceface]

//Then it's the same for you as it is for me, what happened in the spring,// Jono mused. //That's... not much like this at all. But it's difficult to really explain what it's like to have three distinct sets of memories running concurrently. I think I said before, I have moments where I'm any one, or any combination of all of the above. Some moments I'm more me than others, whatever that means. But those other times, those things that the island has done, those are different. Those histories fade when the persona takes its leave.//

[sharp_as_knives]

"And these have not." Hannibal rested his hand on Jono's hip, stroking thoughtfully. "But you feel that dimming them would give you less access to the useful parts of them?"

Hannibal...rather thought there might be other things at work there.

[furnaceface]

//I feel...// Jono reached up to run a hand through his hair, brows furrowed while he tried to piece together more words. The right words. Those seemed harder and harder to find, some days. //I feel..//

He closed his eyes and shook his head.

//I feel that I'd be dimming me. Those things have been so thoroughly a part of me too, Hannibal... Neither of them are real, but here in my head, they're all as much me as that first life was. Blew Gayle halfway to hell three times in my head, came to America three times after that. Twice by air for the chance at a better life. Once on a ship as a prisoner. I loathed myself and I was proud of myself and I was a bloody survivor because I had no other choice. How do I pick? I only lived one of those lives, but that boy who hid in corners and resented everything he was isn't the only me. I'm the sum of all of those parts, now.//

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal thought about it for a moment, then shook his head. "I'm not certain that's true to the extent you think it is. But then, I can't quite conceive of it, either." He'd have to think about it a bit more.

"May I ask you some questions? They may or may not be easy ones," he cautioned.

[furnaceface]

//If I was expecting easy questions, I wouldn't have told you any of this,// Jono pointed out, tilting his head a little in consideration. //I imagine you've got a few, after all that. Can't promise I'll be able to answer them all, but... there's no harm in asking.//

There probably wasn't harm in asking.

[sharp_as_knives]

"Thank you." Have a bit more beer for that, Jono. Now, where to begin?

"This Weapon X program - they had technology to help you control your abilities. Were there unacceptable side effects?"

[furnaceface]

//Beyond the blowing up that it did, once it didn't have a boundless source of psi-energy to process?//

That was a pretty big side effect right there, if you asked Jonothon.

//It... held me back,// he explained. //I could let loose under the proper circumstances, though I'm not entirely convinced that even with the mind-control, they weren't using that tech to keep me on a short leash. Beyond that, no, the job they did with it was practically flawless. A lot of it was artificial, but it was a rather seamless addition to me all the same.//

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal nodded. "Did you ever try to find out how they did it, to perhaps replicate parts of it yourself, as an aid to your control?"

[furnaceface]

//I never really had a chance to, no. I didn't have powers for the longest time after then, so there wasn't anything to control, really. And Kaeleer doesn't exactly have the technological resources to help me along with that. I haven't had time, or anything I might need in order to get a start on that.//

He hesitated for a moment before pressing on, actually giving an uncomfortable little squirm. Fine then, might as well be out with it.

//I've... got no way of really replicating what it is they created,// he added. //I can't really find the resources they used, and technologically, they're well beyond most anything I know. Besides that, their methods of research are...// His hands balled into fists. //... not exactly humane. But if I were to figure out some manner of parallel to that tech, you had better believe I'd find a way to harness it. Maybe not for the same purpose, though. Maybe I'd patch it in to my old collar, instead, as a more reliable power source than my battery packs and as a way to control it without a voice. I haven't accidentally leveled anything I wasn't intending to in decades. For the level of control their tech offered me, I think... I think I have that more or less handled.//

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal covered one of Jono's fists in his own hand and smiled with a bit of fondness and more than a bit of exasperation. "I have no doubt of that; it wasn't what I meant." Though it was very telling.

"I am firmly of the belief that you can learn enough control to keep your body whole should you want to do so," he said quietly but firmly. "I also firmly believe that control will only come once you've come to more acceptance of yourself. But I wouldn't ask anyone with a broken leg to walk without a crutch at first, either."

[furnaceface]

//So...// Jono looked down at Hannibal's hand, tightening his fist for a moment before relaxing his hand, turning it so that he could take the one that was resting on it to hold. //You mean a different sort of control. Not necessarily a restraint, per se. More like a focus. Something in a similar vein, but not... that.//

[sharp_as_knives]

"Not a restraint," Hannibal agreed. "More like a chest tube or bleeder valve - something you could trigger yourself at will, to avoid unwanted explosive outbursts."

That was the nicest way he could think of to put "blowing yourself apart".

[furnaceface]

... It was much kinder than anything Jono generally used. Such as, you know, "blowing myself apart."

//While I was with Weapon X, it was an opening in my chest,// Jono clarified with a small, thoughtful nod. //On one of those strange weekends when I was somebody else, it was a similar setup. Apparently that version of myself carved his own chest open before worse damage could be done.//

Jono would have called that boy a lucky bastard, except that as far as he could tell, he lived in the Age of Apocalypse. And. No.

[sharp_as_knives]

"So with something of the sort as a failsafe, a crutch, perhaps you could learn to metaphorically walk again?" Hannibal asked.

He didn't mean your legs, no, but he was still stroking one comfortingly with his free hand.

[furnaceface]

//It... would work,// Jono mumbled. //No fancy hardware even really necessary, I don't think. Theoretically, all I actually need is some way to... er... vent.//

It was such an appealing prospect. Become whole again. Perform damage control. Stay whole again.

//It would probably work.//

[sharp_as_knives]

"A somewhat more literal use of the term than for most," Hannibal said, smiling into Jono's hair. "Would you be willing to try it?"

It was a trick question, Jono. You'd already said it would work. Unless you wanted to admit you didn't deserve it?

[furnaceface]

And the moment Hannibal said it was about the moment Jono realized exactly what had happened, here. His eyebrows twitched upwards for just a moment, and then he was tilting his head just enough so that he could look at Hannibal from the corner of his eye.

//... Sneaky bugger aren't you? I've got absolutely no sensible reason to say no, now.//

There was no malice in that accusation, at least. If anything, Jono sounded at least grudgingly impressed that he'd been so magnificently backed into a corner, and hadn't realized until it was too late to nip it in the bud.