2nd Mantra

[stagnantair]

Video; 6:27PM

[Gavin's face appears on the network, looking tired but excitable as usual. He's still wearing his work shirt, it's obvious he's just gotten home.]

Does anyone else work with phones all day? That buzzing is giving me awful headaches. I might have to call off until it stops, if it will? Does anyone know how long these things normally last? The water thing lasted about a month, if I'm backlogging correctly.

[He looks away from the screen a moment, fiddling with the ring on his finger idly, before rubbing the bridge of his nose.]

I can hear it now too, but no one else seems to. It's only effecting the Number's Club, right? The women at work didn't hear it but it was ringing through the headsets all day. I even tested someone else's to make sure it wasn't just mine.

I'll use the time I have to work on my data plotting. Whoever is willing enough to tell me about their Echoes and Pulses, I'd really appreciate it. Mine seem to be random, but I'm new so I can't really say much... I'm looking for patterns and spikes, to see if there's certain times of the month or certain levels when more people Echo at the same time, to see if there's a way to either avoid them or know when they're coming.

Luckily I have a couple weeks of sick days lined up.

[And then he looks wistful.]

I'll miss the clam chowder though...

Comments

[ Handwritten ]

[selfassured]

Most of the time these echo things are random.

There does seem to be a rise whenever something weird happens. The water, the buzzing down in the mines, the lights. The tower or maybe it was just the buzzing near the tower.

video;

[stagnantair]

I've plotted the dates of the happenings, the lights and the mine trips and the tower and whatever, but there's not a definite pattern to them. They're not exactly random though.

Maybe it's just not soon enough.

[ Handwritten ]

[selfassured]

Why are you trying to find a pattern in the first place?

[stagnantair]

Why not? If we just let it happen, the big guy on the other end wins. Right?

[selfassured]

I highly doubt there's a way to just stop everything.

Assuming that there is just one person or corporation or something behind it.

[stagnantair]

You don't even think we should try?

[selfassured]

You're welcome to try.

I just doubt it'll be that straight forward.

[stagnantair]

I doubt that it will be too, but I also know that nothing can get done if someone doesn't move forward.

[selfassured]

You make it sound like we've been sitting on our hands this whole time.

[stagnantair]

That isn't what I'm saying, I just think there should be a way to fight back, even if it's a sneaky way.

[Text]

[steinsgatehaschosen]

If I understand what you mean by "Echo," then mine happened less than a week ago.

video;

[stagnantair]

From what I understand, Echoes happen when you remember something from your past life, or regain some kind of ability or something like that. It seems random, but nothing is really random when it comes to unnatural phenomenon. That's why I'm trying to plot data to see what I can come up with.

I've only had two so far myself, so we're both fairly new.

[steinsgatehaschosen]

So I should expect more of these "Echoes" in the future?

[stagnantair]

Yes. They're apparently triggered by parallels from your past life, or random occurrences.

[text]

[goldenclothes]

Echoes can also happen in conjunction with another person. It appears some of us are connected and feed off of each other.

video;

[stagnantair]

Yeah, I sort of figured that too. But if I put Network members into groups of those who Echo off of each other, I might find patterns anyway.

Though I said it before to someone else, if we find a way to trigger Echoes ourselves outside of what happens naturally it should bring whoever is doing this out of hiding. It'll be a lot easier with people who Echo off each other to begin with.

[text4ever]

[goldenclothes]

I can't say I'd be overly willing to participate in such a thing, but there may well be others.

What I'm not against is seeing who is behind all of this. It all feels rather meaningless without some idea of what it's going towards.

[stagnantair]

That's why I asked for volunteers, no need to feel obligated.

[He smiles.]

I feel the same way. Otherwise we don't even know why we're fighting.

[text]

[goldenclothes]

It seems a thing some of us are more geared towards than others, that seems certain.

[ she considers, briefly, then ]

It began with what I thought to be a dream. I happened then to meet another who ... echoed similarly to myself. A shared memory. We have several now. Others, on my own, but fewer in comparison.

It seems odd. Those I remember make my other self seem medieval, but others speak of being in the future. I don't know what to make of it.

[stagnantair]

[If she's watching his video, she'll see him writing something down off screen.]

That's definitely interesting, the time thing. I'm not sure what to say about it either, but I'd really like to figure it out.

I remembered a solar eclipse, and this ring.

[He holds up his hand to show off the black Tag Ring, the band wise and the head flat against his finger in a hexagonal shape.]

That's all so far.

voice;

[metalbent]

I don't mind. What d'you want to know about 'em? Just when they happened?

[stagnantair]

That, and if they're similar to anyone you've met on the Network.

[metalbent]

Noooot really. I remember stuff about magical elemental magic stuff. Except we called it "bending". A girl called Katara, a guy named Sokka...and I have a metal bracelet from Sokka, I guess.

[stagnantair]

[He's writing this down off screen, but of course Toph can't see that.]

So you actually remember their names? That'd be weird if they were reincarnated with another name and you called them Sokka or Katara by accident. That might trigger an Echo for them though...

[metalbent]

Yeah. I mean, I don't remember any other names. Just those two. Katara's the one I remembered first.

I think we were friends.

[stagnantair]

Do you remember their voices or anything either? I guess I'm asking-- if you could place their voices or faces if you encountered them in this life.

I wonder if that changes or stays the same...

[metalbent]

I'm definitely not going to be able to place faces for you, sorry. But...Sokka's voice, probably. I didn't hear Katara's.

[stagnantair]

I understand that. I'm just wondering if we'll look relatively the same, or our voices will sound the same-- that sort of thing. I really want to know more about triggering Echoes.

[metalbent]

I'm not sure. If I heard the voice...if I hear it again, I'll tell you.

[stagnantair]

Sounds good! Keep me posted, if you want. I really like talking about all this Echo stuff, so I'm here for venting and whatever else.

[metalbent]

I don't mind, but do you want me to like, just come back to this post or what?

[stagnantair]

That, or message me whenever. I'm not picky.

[metalbent]

Will do, guy.

( text )

[argents]

I don't work with phones at all, but studying is next to impossible. Have you found anything so far? Patterns, I guess.

[stagnantair]

Not really, besides that the "events" that trigger them such as the lights or the giggle water, and so on, seem to happen each month.

[argents]

It always seemed like they were trying to flush us out like that, making us react to things. But it's strange, you know, for that kind of stuff to cause echoes.

[stagnantair]

I think it's a virus, or something like a chip they can send waves through.

The trigger is unknown, but if it's air born it makes more sense. Especially if they can harness it into a liquid and dump it into the water supply.

[argents]

If it helps any, when the lights appeared last week, I think the echoes started getting stronger. Compared to the bits and pieces of things they gave back before.

[stagnantair]

Stronger? What do you mean?

[argents]

Like I said, before, a lot of things seemed incomplete, or unrelated. But lately, it's like there's more information, or longer memories.

[ A second later: ]

And stronger powers or transformations.

[stagnantair]

I see... How do you base that, though? The level, like... Your hair changing color would be... I don't know, let's call it Tier One, and big monstery stuff would be Tier Two?

[argents]

There probably isn't a real way, without a scale. But it's the difference between just remembering something, and having what it was that you remembered right after it. Or that's how it is for me.

Tiers sound right though.

[stagnantair]

Yeah, I get that. There's probably not any set terminology for this stuff, I could write a book about it!

[argents]

You could! Coin the terminology first, since nothing is official right now.