first puzzle | voice

[recinerate]

[beyond was dead, and now he's not.

it's a perplexing position for anyone to find themselves in, of course, but even more so when there's something fundamental about that person that's gone missing - something that should be there, but isn't. beyond has found he is missing such a thing, and has decided to take advantage of the technology of this new place in order to work out his thoughts regarding this dilemma.]

"In the social jungle of human existence, there is no feeling of being alive without a sense of identity."

[his voice is quiet, raspy, almost unnaturally even in tone. he pauses, then picks up with one of many questions currently on his mind, addressing anyone within earshot.]

What shapes your sense of identity?

Comments

[recinerate]

What month is it now? [it was january, for him - not that he was aware of it. days blur into each other behind the bars of a jail cell, and even more so under the influence of heavy painkillers.]

[thelastbullet]

My question first, Beyond.

[recinerate]

[ah, he noticed the evasion. beyond doesn't know what deal he's referencing, so he goes with a vague sort of truth.]

I haven't made any deals yet, Jimmy.

[thelastbullet]

[He doesn't smile, because this isn't a game to him-- but he's caught him out regardless. At least he has the satisfaction of knowing he was right.]

It's late June, I think.

[recinerate]

So you've been here about seven months. [the idea of being enclosed on this ship for that long makes beyond's skin crawl.] What was the last thing you remember before you found yourself here?

[thelastbullet]

[Jimmy's never minded the place- he spent a year in a trench, miserable and muddy. The Barge is an improvement.]

Getting shot.

[recinerate]

[... oh.] I'm terribly sorry to hear that. Were you badly injured?

[thelastbullet]

I died and ended up here, so I think that's probably a 'yes'.

How about you? What's the last thing you remember?

[recinerate]

I closed a case. [which is ... not a complete lie, by a very broad definition. the case did close, although not in his favor. and, of course, there was his incarceration, and death. he remembers the seizing pain in his chest.] I used to be a detective.

[thelastbullet]

And now you're not?

[recinerate]

I have no cases. A detective cannot really describe himself as such without work.

[there's more to it, though - beyond was trained as a detective, but only as an experiment, never expected to fulfill the actual function.

and he was lied to about it, for years and years, until he uncovered the truth. he wasn't a detective, not really - he never was.

and beyond is eternally resentful about it.]

[thelastbullet]

That so? [He doesn't believe it- he knows Beyond is lying to him, and he's keeping track of the lies. One by one, let's see how far they can take this.]

[recinerate]

Indeed. Why, what sort of work did you do, before?

[thelastbullet]

I was a bootlegger. I controlled the im- and export of illegal alcohol in Atlantic City.

[recinerate]

You were a criminal. [he's matter-of-fact in his statement, no judgment. beyond understands the necessity of turning to crime, under certain circumstances.]

[thelastbullet]

Under the law of the United States in 1921, sure. [Under any kind of law, really, but they were only talking about the bootlegging for now.]

[recinerate]

That law was eventually repealed. I would think that should have been taken into consideration for your sentence here.

[thelastbullet]

I'm pretty sure the US constitution doesn't mean shit to the Admiral.

[recinerate]

[beyond laughs at that, quiet and rasping and darkly unfunny. the admiral is a person of incredible ego, he has decided, and beyond is intensely angry at the injustice he believes he has come under due to the admiral's influence.]

I believe your assessment is correct, Jimmy.

[thelastbullet]

Exactly. Whatever it was that got me sent here after I died, it probably transcends any of that.

[recinerate]

Do you have an idea of what that might be?

[thelastbullet]

Yeah, I got some ideas. [Nowadays, he does. When he came here he thought the same: bootlegger, liar, killer. Now, though, he thinks it might be something else. That doesn't give him the power to change it, but he's closer to understanding.]

[recinerate]

And you've accepted your sentence?

[thelastbullet]

It's this or being dead. [And honestly, at first he would have preferred death-- but he's come around on that, too.]

[recinerate]

Some might prefer the alternative. Why do you find this more appealing?