phaseshifter | IC Contact

[ It takes her a moment of disturbed reflection before she complies and switches on the video. Whether this is all fake or not, Beckett's distress seems real enough. She isn't about to deny him comfort even if he is just a figment of her imagination. He'd looked at her and seen mercy, and that's important.

Not that she looks like mercy now. She looks more like a sickly hobo trying to disappear into her own sweater. ]

It's happening to ev[static] --ter said it's the nanomachines. It's happening in person t[static] to be frightened. It's alright. You're alright.

[She looks like his anchor in reality, the girl who unlocked his will to live. He drinks in the sight of her through the crackling static. That had been no lie - or had it? When she told him to hold on and wait for Lucita, for Anatole, had something else been speaking? Hope, or self-deception?

He knows just how capable he is of self-deception. Maybe this is what he confesses next, the utter humanity of what he truly searches for. Someone to watch over me.

Her name is Angel It's embarrassing.]

You feel i[static]ny of it was real? We can't [static]reful with what we beli[static] have to -

[This time it's not the static that cuts him off. It's the sight of his own hands flickering ghostlike, right in front of him. In the video it's all of him, blinking in and out, frozen in horrified confusion.]

[ Her brow furrows as he speaks, as if concentrating really hard will somehow help her hear better through the static. Shockingly, it doesn't work. The meaning of that look as he stops speaking makes it through loud and clear, though, prompting a full-blown frown.

It's hard to be reassuring when you're not sure how much of your messages are making it through. That's a problem, but one that's easier to deal with than the deeper questions here. ]

One se--

[ --cond. She holds up a finger before the interference cuts her off, which lasts for almost a full minute - but when the picture returns, she's holding up a page from her sketchbook with words written across it. Suck it, static. Workarounds all up in this bitch. ]

Don't worry!! We're all safe, including you! The nanomachines are just malfunctioning - I used to be able to create similar effects myself back home. I could hide things or make them seem to dissolve into pixels, but it didn't make them not real. The way we see things is being rewritten, is all. ♥♥

[ There's also a smiley face, naturally. Because Angel. ]

[It's probably the smiley face that gets through to him. Sheer ridiculousness. Sheer Angel. If ever there was a girl named Angel. But it short-circuits the spiral of paranoid delirium and clears his mind for an instant of relief. His face twists with it - the first response is tears, because bodies are strange like that, though they're only a faint sheen in his eyes before he cracks a weary smile. His lips form soundless words, as though talking to himself. Clever girl.

With long practice - Norfinbury has been good for that - he grabs onto that clarity and tries to push through the distress to sense. Nanomachines malfunctioning. He's in no state to think too deeply about it but more than willing to accept the explanation from her. It makes sense. It's almost standard. Almost normal.

Which of course leaves out everything else.]

Do you th[static]cting our minds? Our perception of each other? This [static]eels like I've dreamed you. Rhys. [static]rything.

[ Well. The smile is a relief, weary or not. And explaining this as though she completely believes it is actually helping her a little - she's always saying that her feelings don't override her common sense, isn't she? And this is her chance to prove it. ]

It - yes! I've been [static]ame way. It doesn't help th[static]nd Vaughn keep freaking disap[static] promise I'm not a dream. As... far as I know. This is so [static]ing annoying.

Since it's an issue with the nanomachines, I thought we might be able to ask Miller to fix it, but Winter didn't seem especially enthused about the idea. Probably becau[static].

Winter appeared again? [He can latch onto that - a familiar piece of the mystery, sometimes it's all you have. If he can follow Angel's explanation and believe it, if he can put all of this back into the framework of the known, however broken the known is...

It's a desperate man's response, something in him whispers. It's a kind of denial. How long is he going to keep it up?]

Miller has neve[static] before. These things have al[static]emselves out. The breakdowns - [static]epairs - all part of the same process probably.

[The process of slow death, that is. You're such a comforting presence, Beckett.]

She did. Apparent[static] see there's something malfunctioning even from her end of th[static]s, so it seems like [static]tty colossally hecked up. But at least [static] not dying, as far as I can tell. I feel physically fine, anyway. You t[static]ight?

[ She disappears for a slightly more prolonged period, though it's clear that she's talking about something from the way she's waving her hands around animatedly when she is briefly visible. Bless. ]

--nk she is a spy after all.

Physically. Yes. While I'm all here. It's -

[He can't entirely control his response to the sight of her flickering, fading. It's an animal horror, primal, a kind of horror he thought he'd lost - this fight or flight response to the sight of a broken reality. It makes his eyes widen, nostrils flare, jaw lock. But his reasoning mind fights. It's a familiar fight when split this way, Man and Beast. It's easier. A little easier.]

Even if she [static]sn't matter. I'll take my chances with the Russian government. They'll have to ge[static]eative to come up with worse conditions than we're already enduring.

[It's almost a joke. He licks his lips, almost unnerved at his own attempt at humour.]

And perhaps they'll let u[static] abilities they're so interested in.

I said as m[static] --yself. I offered to cooperate with any would-be abduc[static] exchange for hot chocolate. [static] more serious about it than she thought.

They couldn't hold us anyway, right? Not wit[static] --estored. We're too badass.

[ The half-garbled statement is accompanied by half-hearted fingerguns. Who even freaking knows what these people who may-or-may-not exist are capable of? They might have control collars like Jack had.

But still. OPTIMISM. ]

At least in Ru[static]ozen wasteland is normal.

[He sees your feeble optimism and raises you a feeble joke. Surely any minute now they'll get into one of their normal positive feedback loops? They've gotten so much practice at faking it till they make it.]

I look forw[static] seeing your wrath unleashed on [static]ew Russian overlords.

As you should! I have so many pla[static]nleashing my rage an[static]nly some of them involve flower crowns.

Um, you - you nev[static] where you woke up? We want to start [static] you in the morning.

Would the flowers secretly be bombs? No offe[static] world follows a certain logic.

[Look fantasies of violent destruction are occasionally good for you.]

I'm [static]apel. Luck of the draw. [The static rasps with his tense sigh.] It's going to be a long night.

I know far more ab[static] guns with inbuilt stabilising technolog[static] than bombs. But I'm sure we could at least [static] spectacular?

[ Gosh, Beckett would make such a good vault hunter. He's already good at thinking in Pandoran IT'S SO CUTE! ]

[static]ore than willing to stay awake with you until things improve. It isn't as though it'll be hard to avoid falling asleep.

Tiny needle launchers hidden among the petals? You could na[static]thing about bees.

[See this is exactly the kind of quality conversation he's here for. Existential dread is a lot less dreadful when he can focus on keeping up with banter. It's an old and respected battle archaeologist trick, you know.]

Not if [static]rly start tomorrow. I should try to sleep myself. It's [static] you know. The irony.

IC Contact - Snowblind

==> video!

Time for fun with static and by fun I mean JFC WHY

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