KY321B | voice | day 012

[backsassin]

Just want to clarify something I said when I first got here:

Whatever brought me to this place didn’t just get me stuck in human form. It actually made me human.

Case in point: sweat glands. Clawdites don’t have them. Humans do.

On a related note: how do you all deal with being so wet all the time? I know it’s how you thermoregulate, but it feels so gross. I feel like I need to be carrying around a towel…

[ It’s one of many, many complaints Zam has about her new human physiology, but in the interest of not offending her majority-human fellow islanders, she’ll keep them to herself. For now. ]

Anyone else get their species swapped upon waking up here? And more importantly: what are the chances we'll be able to be turned back?

Comments

[lonelynotforsaken]

Maybe? I- but it can't be everyone. Well... maybe it can? I don't know. I sort of have a theory about some of the animals getting brought here the same way we've been. So-so why would they get to stay like they are, but you got changed?

[...]

Not that I'm implying you're like an animal! Oh, god. Sorry! That came out- I just- I-I mean non-human-

Maybe it's because you're a person? L-like a sapient person.

voice | KD201D (little threadjack if that's okay)

[obeir]

[ K's tone is wry; he's teasing Martin. ] Speaking as one of the other resident non-humans, I think I'd rather be likened to an animal than a human.

[ Look, he has complicated feelings about the species responsible for enslaving and abusing him and his kind. ]

[lonelynotforsaken]

I- um. [How do you even respond to that? He can tell K is joking, but he doesn't know the man well enough to gauge where lines might be on humor. Is a human joking about that okay, or only other non-humans? Probably best to just... slide past it.] I'll just... try to avoid comparing anyone who's a person to an animal. That-that seems like a better idea. Nicer, certainly.

[obeir]

[ Oh no, his humour clearly missed the mark. If anything Martin seems even more awkward now. Sounding a bit deflated and apologetic, K agrees: ] You're probably right. Sorry, shouldn't have interrupted.

[lonelynotforsaken]

No, no! It's okay. I just don't want to cause any offense. I'm, um... w-we don't have anybody who's not human where I'm from. Not people, I mean.

[He shouldn't have made that clarification.]

It's just good to be mindful.

[obeir]

[ Unfortunately for Martin it's exactly what K zeroes in on. ]

Not people...?

[lonelynotforsaken]

W-well, we have... animals! And spiders and things. [He's going to try hard to save this.] They're there, they're just not- I mean, I think some animals can be sort of like people. Like a really good dog? Or a cat? When they've got a lot of personality. B-but it's not the same.

[backsassin]

[ Zam actually chuckles at his panicked apologies. ] Hey, relax—I know what you mean. I hadn't heard about the animals showing up here, but yeah, sounds like whatever human-ification effect they're hitting people with only extends to sapients.

Guess we've got to ask ourselves: if the thing bringing us over has some kind of agenda, why's it need all the people on the island to be human? [ A wry huff of laughter. ] I'd guess it wanted a level playing field, but that didn't stop it from bringing me in minus an arm.

[lonelynotforsaken]

I mean, it's just a theory, but we had a really random assortment of birds that some people mentioned, and then my group ran into a dinosaur. So, it... just seems like those might mean there are random creatures being dropped here on the island. There might not even be a consciousness behind it. If there's some sort of-of tear in reality, it would make sense, right? It wouldn't just be people coming through. Just whoever or whatever was unlucky enough to get caught in it.

I don't know why it would trap you in one form, though. Or leave you without an arm.

[salamanca]

Any chance you think that could explain objects? I know I've been thinking, well, if it's here, it probably belonged to someone who was here before... but maybe things can wash up too. Like people.

[lonelynotforsaken]

I don't see why not. Them coming from people who washed up makes sense, as well. Maybe it's a combination?

[salamanca]

Yeah, it probably is. [ A sigh. ] Makes it harder to tell what kind of people came before us. What we have in common with them. If anything we find could've belonged to someone who was here before, but it coulda just washed up by itself too...

[lonelynotforsaken]

What we've found seems like sort of... modern trash? Except what was in those drones, I guess. I saw what you and Kokichi did with them and the computer.

Um... was it a great idea to take the computer completely apart?

[Just. You know? They could have used that later with the password.]

[salamanca]

[ OOPS. Busted. There's a soft "ah..." and a moment of sheepish silence on the other end before Lalo's voice comes back as cheery as ever. ]

Ay, ay, ay, don't worry about it! It'll be fine. I already thought about that. There's one at the other place, too! Where the detective is. We can use that one when we find the password!

'Course, we might need to get the power back on first. But, ah! Details.

[lonelynotforsaken]

And find any other facilities like those two. I want to make sure all the drones are disabled before we get power back to anything here. No one should go through getting captured.

[salamanca]

You think there might be other ones? Now there's a thought... Probably gonna be a while before we get electricity back anywhere. I don't think you have to worry about anyone getting captured, amigo.

[lonelynotforsaken]

I'd be surprised if there aren't, and I don't want to leave things to chance. The electricity turned on suddenly and we don't know why. That means it could happen again without warning.

I just- I want to get to the airfield and start planning. M-making sure we can have supplies and things for people who turn up here. Caches of useful stuff like fresh water and some rations. We need that for when someone doesn't turn up close to a river or-or near fruit or stuff. I want people to have an easy time finding what they need to survive until they can find everyone else.

[salamanca]

[ To the first part, about the electricity: ] That makes sense...

[ To the second part: "Why the hell do you care so much about other people, man?" he wants to say. Logically, he does know why - Martin doesn't want anyone else to go through what he went through - but he doesn't understand, emotionally, why Martin is so invested in sparing others his own fate. It would be part genuine curiosity, part rhetorical question.

But Ben would never say that! Ben is the kind of man who, even if he has a temper, would implicitly understand that kind of empathy. So all Lalo says is: ]

Sounds like a sensible goal. How do you plan to do that, if I may ask?

[lonelynotforsaken]

I've been collecting containers, things to carry water in. I'm going to keep looking for more. Or-or building things from what I can find. There are other people there who are smarter than me.

Once I've got my first cache, I'll walk out for a day and set up the first waystation. It'll have, um... I want it to have instructions on who to contact for directions and a number so that we know where the waystation is on the island. And then I'll go back and get stuff ready to do the next one. And the one after that. I want to make a full loop of the island with a day's travel between each waystation.

[backsassin]

I don't know. I'd expect some random tear in reality to be more... impartial. If it's operating off some sort of observable protocol—like altering every sapient being to be more human—that suggests some amount of intention to me. And if it's not conscious itself, it could've still been created by someone with an agenda.

Or maybe it's just faulty tech. If it was some sort of device that brought us here, maybe it's only configured to transport humans—and what happened to me and Kaydee is just the error it throws when it tries to pull in any other sapients.

[lonelynotforsaken]

I was more thinking, like-like reality here is imposing its will. Because changelings just... can't exist here, you can't be like that. I never really thought of that as being a consciousness. More like the law of gravity asserting itself if you were from a universe where gravity somehow didn't exist?

S-sorry. This is all really cerebral. I'm not explaining well, and I-I'm not- My boyfriend's the smart one. [He'll just... lean back into being a bit of a bumbling fool to make this sound less like a reasoned theory and more just random speculation.]

But tech makes sense!

[backsassin]

No, no, I get it. I hadn't thought of that, but... Yeah, I don't know, maybe some aspect of Clawdite physiology just isn't possible here? Or non-humanness in general, though I'm not sure how that would work.

And honestly, unless your boyfriend has experience hopping between universes, I don't think he'd be doing much better at explaining any of this. It's above all our paygrades. Don't beat yourself up.

[lonelynotforsaken]

He doesn't, but I know K does? [The one who's hopped into this conversation already.] I'm sorry you're stuck as a human, though. I wouldn't mind being something else. We're kind of awful a lot of the time.

And definitely not made for this heat. [A beleaguered sigh. He really does miss the apocalypse at times.]

[backsassin]

Awful's not species-exclusive, trust me. And even humans have good things about them—you all are pretty cute, for one thing.

[ There's a reason she tended to wear a human face back home—she just preferred it as a disguise rather than her actual body. ]

K... Do you mean Kaydee? You mean this kind of thing has happened to him before?

[lonelynotforsaken]

Ah, w-well some people are cute, for sure. Some of us just… are. [He offers a nervous, self-deprecating laugh to follow that.]

But, yeah. He, uh… he mentioned he’s been to other universes before.