[Voice]

[espigeonage]

[It's 11 PM on a Sunday night and Julien is bored.]

Galu, network. Random request: tell me a story.

Any story! Tell me about something that happened to you, or the other you. Or a fairytale, a joke that requires setup, something you read about in the paper, something you want to happen or really, really don't. Let me guess which one it is. I can tell you one, or a poem, or play you something from a dystopian future.

Yeah, I got the password to the other me's smartphone. It's got a lot of weird nonhuman future-music on it, and a couple of movies that haven't come out here yet. Seems like the library's got corrupted somehow, but there's still stuff there.

Comments

[allformii_ko]

If it can be good, then what's wrong with it?

[espigeonage]

Used without thought, it's bad. It hurts people and destroys things, even when you don't mean it to.

Violence always hurts something. There are just times when that seems to be okay.

[allformii_ko]

[Oh, she learned about this one!]

That's why you kill it quick so it doesn't hurt, right?

[espigeonage]

Uh. Yeah, I guess! [cats, man.] And why it's bad to... just bite your friends.

[allformii_ko]

Because if it hurts a lot, it's bad.

[Yup, she's totally got this one.]

[espigeonage]

...yes. Generally it's better not to hurt anyone too much.

[allformii_ko]

Did you used to hurt people a lot?

[espigeonage]

I haven't. The other me was or is more comfortable with the idea. He was comfortable with guns.

[allformii_ko]

[Oh, guns. She doesn't like those. They're too loud and scary. Accordingly, her ears flatten at the thought.]

Was he a bad guy?

[espigeonage]

I don't think so. He was good, or tried to be. But different.

[allformii_ko]

So... [Hold on, she's still trying to figure out this human morality stuff.]

He did bad things for good reasons?

[espigeonage]

I don't know enough about him, but - yeah, I think so. He was willing to be violent to protect someone.

[allformii_ko]

So it's more good than bad, right?

[espigeonage]

Hard question. I guess it depends! I know he was trying to be more good than bad.

[allformii_ko]

[Mrrrr...]

So it wasn't good enough?

[espigeonage]

I don't know, yet. But I'm worried that if I get more like him and start wanting to be more violent, it won't be good enough.

[allformii_ko]

If you try to be good even though you're violent, that's good enough, isn't it?

[She still doesn't see much of a problem with violence herself; people just keep telling her that hurting things is bad.]

[espigeonage]

It's a start, but it's not enough. Or I don't think so, anyway.

[allformii_ko]

You can't just try harder?

[espigeonage]

That would help, I guess. I haven't had to, yet.

[allformii_ko]

Then when you do, that's what you should do.

[Simple!]