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yeah, it sucked, but none of that matters now cuz my life's awesome and i've got cool friends like you and eddie.
you know what tho... do they not have high school in your world?
cuz i definitely think high school is the variable you're looking for re: the self-esteem thing

[ It doesn't even occur to Cisco that it might make Taako uncomfortable, how he talks about being bullied and hated as if it were just his natural due, or something unavoidable.

And in his current somewhat altered frame of mind, Cisco's surprisingly candid and unafraid of a little tmi. ]

i wouldn't know about what eddie's into, man. i mean, he doesn't seem like it, but seriously, in my experience sometimes it's the totally normal-seeming dudes who end up being into the kinkiest shit.

[ Cisco... maybe that's a little TOO candid. ]

(is modify memory like a real thing?)

i guess at least you know the source is reliable, then, since two already happened.

They got it but I didn't go, skipped that whole school shit until the IPRE academy, it's not like two fucking teenagers could afford to put themselves through school.

In your experience, huh? ;) Are you talking personally?

[What weird shit is Cisco into, the world wants to know.]

(It's real)

Oh for sure, and like, no one who can make scones that good is a liar. You know?

see where i'm from it's free and it's mandatory, at least until you're a teenager
like, if you don't go it's a giant pain and your family can get in a lot of trouble.
so it's like ten plus years in the damn thunderdome, with kids all stuck together in their own fucked up micro society
i skipped a few grades so that means i got out sooner but it also means i was like four years younger than everyone around me most of the time

[ It all sounds way weirder, trying to explain it to someone who isn't familiar with the particular public school system Cisco had gone through. ]

wait i'm gonna feel silly if you told me this before but what's ipre?

and i wasn't saying I'M one of the secretly kinky dudes i just meant i'm not like entirely unfamiliar with their company.

[ He is only making this worse, isn't he? Oh no. ]

(are there side effects?)

sounds logical enough to me.

Edited (i am so sorry) 2017-06-24 05:00 (UTC)

Man I do not regret running away from home if that's what we avoided. Not that we fucked around with uh, the younger version of high school either, before we cut loose, but neither of them sound great. Why'd you skip grades?

[He can guess, but he just wants to confirm it.]

It's the dudes I worked for, Institute of Planar Research and Exploration.

[or "Fantasy Nasa"]

That sounds like the sorta thing someone who's secretly really kinky but doesn't want to admit it would say.

(No side effect, but I can't actually cast it on myself)

sounds like you made the right call, all things considered. how young were you when you ran away, anyway?

[ Cisco wants to ask about a million more questions about that, but he's going to test the waters first, see if it's something Taako minds talking about or not. ]

the work was too easy for me.

[ i.e. the humblest and most roundabout way of saying "I was way smarter than the other kids my age". ]

there's really NOTHING i can say that's gonna make me sound vanilla now, is there?
like i should just quit now while i have some shred of deniability

[ Half of Cisco is curious about this memory stuff because he's got a few things he's tempted to gouge out of his brain, thanks very much, and magic would probably work a lot more precisely than booze and denial. But also, simultaneously, the other half of him is paranoid at the other implications...]

but could you cast it on someone else?
can memories that have been erased ever come back?
is there any way to check if someone's gotten into your head and taken something out? like is there a way to tell for sure?

Twelve or thirteen? It was a long fucking time ago but after our aunt died we were pretty done with being passed around, so we just left.

[It wasn't the worst experience - life wasn't exactly easy, but it wasn't endless struggling, either. They just had to rely on each other to survive.]

So you were super smart, got it.

You're pretty much outta luck, I'm now convinced you're into just the most fucked up shit. You couldn't just be into getting choked or whatever like the rest of us.

[It's hard to tell whether he's being serious on that last part or just messing with Cisco.]

I mean, yeah, the point is to cast it on someone else? I dunno if there's a way to tell if it's been done, if you were alone with someone who could cast it you might never know, but it can be undone by a couple different spells.

[ Passed around? Running away at thirteen? Even if it was a long time ago and he'd had his sibling there, that still sounds pretty fucking awful, to Cisco. At least now he doesn't have to debate whether or not he should ask why Taako had left. From the sound of it, his parents weren't in the picture, and the people looking after him hadn't been all that invested. Which is pretty damn heartbreaking - would be so even if Cisco didn't have weird fumes making him even more of a tenderhearted cauldron of emotions than he usually is. ]

that's brave. where did you two go?
for me, doing good in school was always the escape plan. took a little while, but it worked.

[ He might not have said it himself, but Cisco doesn't correct Taako when he calls him super smart. ]

i guess i made that kinky bed and i've just gotta lie in it
just as long as you're convinced like... if you're gonna think that way, just make sure you're imagining it's harmless fucked up shit and not like, FUCKED UP fucked up shit.

[ What precise terminology, Cisco! And he definitely can't tell if Taako really means it about liking being choked but also he's just going to pretend it's a joke because he's not sure he really wants to know one way or another. ]

doesn't that kind of creep you out, though? like not knowing if there's more you should know but someone's stopped you?

[ Okay it's possible this come close to striking a bit of a nerve. Cisco's not paranoid in the obvious, tinfoil hat and conspiracy theory sort of way. But these days, he's a little touchy when it comes to thinking about other people having power over him, manipulating him, etcetera. ]

Brave, stupid, same thing really. [It had seemed like a fun adventure, and it had seemed like the only option, too. But he's never put too much stock in it being brave.] We stuck with caravans, travelling merchants and performers and shit, anyone who'd let us tag along.

Gods, fine, I won't tell everyone you get your rocks off watching people get murdered or something. Maybe you're just a furry.

[Not that being a furry is The Weirdest thing but he's not gonna talk about anything too gross.]

You're talking to the guy who had his fucking sister erased from his memory so

yeah it fucking sucks

[ The whole traveling with caravans thing sounds both terribly exciting and adventurous, and also depressing and scary. Cisco wonders which one it really was. Maybe a bit of both, all at the same time. Certainly, it's about as different from his own childhood as it's possible to get. Taako, it sounds like, had had almost too much freedom, whereas Cisco had been trying not to suffocate long enough to get away from his family. ]

how about we just both agree to not tell anyone about this part of the conversation,
how about that.

[ Honestly, Cisco's been called worse things than a furry, but he'd still like to cut off this whole rumors about his dubious erotic tastes thing before it ever has a chance to get started.

And then it's hard to worry too much about that, or about hypotheticals where his memory has been messed with, because... ]

wait what???

I've already made a post on that network thing about it.

[No he hasn't, but he'll leave that for Cisco to discover for himself because he's a lil shit.]

So there's a creature that can erase memories and someone used it to take away 100 years of travelling and my memories of Lup. It was pretty shit, but the voidfish is way more powerful than a single spell, it can erase something from the whole world instead of the whole ten minutes I could do.

oh. i must've missed it

[ Cisco is definitely going to check later and be baffled when he can't find it. ]

that's so completely messed up.
why would someone do that to you?

[ Like even if there was a practical reason, it just seems so invasive and cruel, to Cisco. ]

how did you fix it?

We had a little disagreement about how to solve a problem so they wiped our memories of the problem. All of us got separated and forgot each other.

The creature that erased it lives in water, you drink that water, you remember. I got a flask from the portal, a couple months ago.

first of all i don't know who this 'they' is but like, wow, fuck them. not the way to fix things.

if you only got that after arriving here, i guess you don't know if any of your friends have gotten flasks and remembered either, huh?
unless any of them have shown up here?

[ Cisco feels a little guilty for harping on about being afraid of getting his memory messed with; if he'd had any idea something like that had happened to Taako he definitely wouldn't have brought it up. ]

Edited 2017-06-25 02:12 (UTC)

It was complicated.

[He's still furious, at Lucretia, but he also understands why she took the extreme measures that she did, after everything that happened.]

Shit was pretty much about to pop off, back home. The creature doesn't uh, it doesn't work when you're dead? And Barry's a lich, so he knew what we were missing. And now we're teaming up to go sort shit out. Not that I had any fucking clue about this when I was home.

[All he knew was that everything was fucking chaos, they were temporarily trusting Barold because he'd helped them in Wonderland, but he didn't know why.]

I've got one friend from home, but she's from before all this shit.

[ Cisco doesn't know just what Taako means by complicated, but he thinks the takeaway is probably that Taako is more forgiving than he would be. Cisco might look cute and cuddly and harmless but that boy can sure hold a grudge. ]

sounds like you got brought here right in the middle of the action.

[ He thinks it must have sucked a lot for Barold, too. What would he do if his friends were scattered and he knew they didn't even remember him? He would stop at nothing to find them all and bring them back together... ]

did you tell her about it?
the whole mismatched timelines thing is such a pain.

No shit, and I was ready to fucking retire.

[By which he of course means that he was worried that once they'd collected all the relics, the bureau would toss them out on their ass because they weren't useful anymore.]

She knows there's shit I'm keeping from her, but I can't, you know. If I tell her I don't wanna make shit worse.

[He also doesn't want to deal with her knowing that he should hate her, it's easier to pretend everything is fine.]

[ Cisco isn't sure if that 'can't' is one of practicality or otherwise. Like, is there a curse or some other kind of magic preventing it, or is Taako worried it'll disrupt the timelines? Or is it more a matter of not being able to do it because it would just be too horrible, too awkward, too all of the above? ]

i get that. she can probably tell it's not great, tho.
i mean, my friend caitlin was here for a while, only it was a version of her from a few years in my future, and she wouldn't tell me much, but i could tell that stuff's gonna get pretty shitty. so it's good to have that to look forward to.

She knows I'm older which is like, weird for us cause of the whole spaceship reviving us thing, but I can't tell her we're probably gonna die for reals this time.

[Taako has no idea how they're going to defeat the Hunger.]

[ Cisco knows Taako's lived a long time (though he said he was only about 30 in elf years) and that he had said the immortality thing sucked, but none of that is going to make him feel less bad about his friend so casually mentioning he's facing almost certain death. Taako had mentioned that in one of their earliest conversations, but Cisco hadn't known him at all, then. It hadn't surprised him or upset him the way it does this time. ]

yeah i can definitely see how it would be hard to work that into a conversation.

[ He should probably keep his nose out of Taako's business on this, but Cisco's worry and concern and affection are just too much not to say: ]

is it really that hopeless?
like are you certain you're doomed or whatever if you leave and go back?

The Hunger is on our fucking doorstop, it's already got the astral and celestial planes, if my guess is right and half of us don't even remember what we're trying to fight. There's no way we can run, the ship isn't an option anymore.

Short of a miracle, we're toast

[Maybe that shouldn't be so easy to say, but he's tired. Dying seems like a less horrifying option than going back to running.]

Don't like, worry about it though,
It's a problem for later.

no guarantees on the not worrying thing.
but i'll do my best.

[ Cisco doesn't know the first thing about astral or celestial planes, or even very much about the relationship between this place and their home worlds, or about the Hunger, or immortality or even fighting - but even if the details are different, he's helped to whip up a miracle or two in his day. And hopelessness is just plain unacceptable, for Cisco. ]

you ever see memento?
it's a movie about a guy who can't remember anything, but he's trying to avenge his wife's murder.
we could watch it sometime. unless that's like, a horribly insensitive thing to suggest. is that a horribly insensitive thing to suggest?

[ Ah yes, the Classic Technique™ of 'this conversation has gotten too sad, time to take a sharp right turn into pop culture and/or some lighthearted jokes. ]

Nah it's cool, it sounds pretty interesting.

Why can't he remember anything?

[It actually sounds, well, familiar. Magnus gave up his quest for revenge in Wonderland, losing the memories of the man who murdered his wife.

Taako realises that he and Merle will probably never get to fulfil their promise to kill Calen for Magnus. It hadn't really occurred to him before, since it was kinda low on the priority list, but it sucks they won't get to do it.]

he's got a brain injury

[ Probably... well, it's complicated, but he's not going to go spoiling the twist for Taako, now is he? ]

and it isn't like he has complete amnesia, he just can't make new memories, so he remembers his entire life up 'til he got his injury but everything past that point doesn't stick, which makes solving mysteries pretty damn hard.

also the main guy is really hot, just saying

[ What was it Taako said earlier about all the people in earth movies being too damn gorgeous and giving everyone complexes...? ]

What, just cause I'm into dudes you think you can lure me to watch any movie as long as it's got some hot guy in it?

[yes that is absolutely the case and they both probably know it.]

okay but am i wrong?

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