towerofanimus | The Tale of a Jerk and a Scientist

Characters: Hojo and YOU
Setting: Throughout the tower. Pick a floor, any floor.
Format: Action to start, but I'll match prose, too
Summary: After some time spent wandering his ruined world like a ghost, Hojo has returned to the Tower. His first priority? Research.
Warnings: A complete lack of scientific ethics, which may come up.

[A great deal has gone on in Hojo's absence--he's been gone months!--and this has had the unfortunate effect of upsetting so much of his research. He has absolutely no idea what's happened while he's been gone.

So what's a scientist to do? Make his way through all the floors he had been so carefully studying, trying to salvage what he can. Sometimes he talks to himself. Sometimes he hums. Off-key or tunelessly. Sometimes he scowls and stops to take notes. Sometimes he smiles. And stops to take notes again. He grits his teeth, doing his best to ignore the cold. He's worked in cold (very cold) climates before. Fortunately, he has a Fire Materia, which provides some warmth.

One might find him in the cafeteria, taking samples of the oatmeal.

In the observatory, he spends a long time looking out, studying the strange creatures visible through the glass.

He takes soil samples in the graveyard, and biological samples on floor Forty-One, collecting insects. He plucks a few blossoms in the meadow (Twenty-Five) and in the garden (Twenty-Nine).

He stops in the clinic to deal with a few of the wounds he's sustained along the way.

He pauses to enjoy the morgue (Twenty-Six) and the laboratory (Twenty-Seven), looking for traces of his old research with Fuhito. He doesn't find much, though what he finds, he gathers up. What a shame. So much work lost. All the more reason to work more, and harder.]

So much to do, so much...

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Ryuho does not have a good 'stranger danger' alert from the time I took him.]

Do you think that the stories that they've told us are really true, about our world's being destroyed?

Hmm, that is the question.

I was in the Tower before. I was sent away and spent months on my world. It was lifeless, and I was little more than a ghost--not that I believe in ghosts--unable to affect anything. Now I am here again.

After all that time, I still haven't seen any conclusive proof that our worlds are destroyed, but they might be. My world was on the verge of destruction when I left it, and then I saw it, dead.

Interesting, I have not seem my world since arriving here. Was there evidence that the places you were seeing was the planet that you came from?

My world was not close to destruction, as far as I know. The cataclysm did not extend outside the Kanagawa prefecture of Japan.

I know my world well. It looked exactly like it. I saw the dead, some of whom I was familiar with in life. So it was either my world or an elaborate illusion.

[Hojo still doesn't seem particularly bothered by the fact.]

But there was a cataclysm?

In this place, I could believe either.

[Ryuho notices that, but chooses not to mention it.]

An earthquake, similar to that which tore apart the lost ground. ... I have been told that I was involved, but I have no memory more than eight months ago.

Either is possible. I have found no evidence for either hypothesis. I haven't found much evidence at all here, in fact.

An earthquake? I see, not particularly interesting then. It could be that your world was destroyed by some other means.

I'm of the opinion that if the people in charge were telling the truth, that they would not hide so much.

That's what it seems to be, only alter users did not exist before the first one.

Oh, I don't doubt they're lying a great deal, but about what? It's possible something they say is true. That's what I wish to determine. It's very possible it's all a deception, but it's not unthinkable that something happened to our worlds. [Especially since he was in the process of destroying his.]

Alter users? And am I supposed to ask what those are?

What we may be able to do about it would be more pressing. We appear to be entirely at their mercy.

[He blinks, still a bit unused to the multiple world concept.] Oh, they don't exist in your world?

It probably doesn't matter then.

Yes, that is why I'm conducting my research. How can we take action without knowledge? [He's such a humanitarian.]

No, it probably doesn't matter, but humor me. What are they? [He is curious.]

That's true, although complete knowledge may be unobtainable. If we can find a way to escape, knowing their full motives may not be required.

An alter user can deconstruct matter and use it to form a mentally controlled construct, called an alter. Beyond that, it varies considerably depending on the personality of the user. Elian still has his, so he might be able to explain better.

Again, I am told I was a user before I lost my memory... but I have not been able to summon an alter here. [He doesn't sound like he cares one way or another.]

True, but knowing something would be useful. Such as how to escape and where to escape to. Those would be useful subjects.

Deconstruct matter... That is interesting. Were you biologically altered?

Elian? And is that someone present in the Tower?

Just because you've forgotten, that doesn't mean you can't do it.

Yes, I agree. Especially since the monsters seems to originate from outside this place.

I don't know. Only that after the cataclysm, 5% of children born in the Lost Ground were alter users. I'm not sure if anyone knows why.

[He would know if he could remember.]

Yes. At least, he was here. I have no seem him in some time.

That's true. I may remember how. Although it is possible for a user to loose the power completely in response to mental trauma.

Yes, they seem to come from different worlds, as we do, don't they?

It seems as if there must be some biological reason, but without data, I'll be unable to research the matter.

Perhaps he's disappeared, then. The same thing happened to me, for some time.

You may have experienced trauma if you've lost your memory. Ah, then, interesting as it may be in theory, I suppose there's little point in us discussing a power you may or may not have, which neither of us knows very much about. My own power is science.

I would think so, they look varied enough. I don't think that anything like that exists on my world.

Science sounds like it would be more reliable in a place like this.

The Tale of a Jerk and a Scientist

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