towerofanimus | (no subject)

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(no subject)

Characters: Ienzo (now a big boy) and you.
Setting: Room 2-12 and some other places.
Format: Either!
Summary: Science Boy is back in the tower, except he's... significantly less of a boy, now.
Warnings: Ienzo is a ramblin', gamin' man.

Room 2-12.

[Ienzo found it extremely disheartening how long it took him to realize that something had gone amiss. The color palette wasn't even that similar; everything was a shade of grey here, it seemed, whereas everything was a shade of brown when he had gone to sleep last. Ienzo withheld most of his immediate reactions upon realizing that his body was not responding to movements; truthfully, it was enough to upset him considerably (what if he had been drugged was a recurring thought), but there was no use showing that. He noticed that there were several other people in this room, which only reinforced that notion.]

[He found the trunk quickly, and pulled on his clothes quickly before continuing. The letters were the second order of business. He read them both in detail (looking confused at the second), and stowed them in his pocket shortly afterwards. From the same pocket, he conjured a pen, and tucked the two journals in the trunk under his arm. Then, only then, did he bother to talk to anyone. He started with the people in his room, though branched out into the hallway. Whoever he asked, the question was the same:]

Excuse me. Can you tell me why I am here?

Floors 1 through 5.

[Greetings, Tower. Did you miss him?]

[Of course, game mechanics are a beautiful thing, and Ienzo doesn't remember anything about his last stint in the tower of souls. Though some other people might, and they would be remembering Ienzo as a little kid in an oversized lab coat who talked so quietly he didn't even use capital letters. Well -- and I know this may be surprising -- the lab coat actually fits now. He's been taken from a much farther point in the timeline, and is now nineteen years old. And yes, he is still quite short.]

[Anyway.]

[Ienzo's strategy for Tower exploration amounted to this: move up the floors one at a time, looking thoroughly at each one. Of course, he could see from the elevator that there were forty-eight of them, so he didn't expect that he would cover the entire Tower in one day; in fact, as soon as he stepped up the staircase and into a forest, he simply decided that he was done with exploration for the day and moved down to the lower floors again. Passerby might find him walking around, inspecting things so mundane that most people wouldn't even give them the time of day, or else sitting down on any available surface (except the floor) to take notes.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Ah, I see. [While a normal person might ask about this boys parents, Tohko avoids that line of discussion. After all, if he grew up there, it probably meant that he had no parents or that they were horrible to him. Since she knew the pain of losing parents, she wasn't going to make someone else talk about it.]

Well, it's great that you got used to the cold, even if the others did complain..what sort of science were you studying back home? Biology? Physics?

[Ienzo has never been... particularly sensitive about the topic of his parents. It had never been treated as a secret that he was not allowed to know until he was older; the rest of the apprentices, and Master Ansem, all knew that he was perfectly capable of handling the concept of death. Though really, if Tohko didn't want to talk about it, he wouldn't bring it up. Science is far more interesting anyway!]

Well, I was tutored in many sciences as part of schooling, obviously. But our studies mostly related to a kingdom of biology which, I suspect, may be unique to my cluster of worlds. It has to do with a sort of emotional and spiritual center within the body that is called the 'heart' -- though obviously, it is not the same as the blood-pumping organ in your chest. There is a scientific name for it, but in general conversation, 'heart' is much easier.

[Tohko shook her head, excited.]

Oh, I've heard of this before, don't worry! It's something scientist in the past believed in, and it's something that pops up in stories a lot, so I know what you're talking about. However..in my world, it was shown that the heart has no spiritual significance..at least, not one that scientists can find. It's amazing that it actually has some spiritual significance in your world!

..If I'm not mistaken, would the scientific term be 'soul'?

No, I'm afraid that it's not another simple word. The scientific name is, quite literally, scientific. Our 'soul' has more connection to the mind, though there is no entity called a soul -- in the same vein as a heart -- that we have found.

...Though to be technical, this really isn't the heart at all; ancient peoples called it that since they had nothing else to call it and didn't know better, and the name stuck, even as the organ and the spiritual heart evolved together. Fortunately, most people are not aware of the existence of spiritual hearts as more than a faerie tale, so the problem is somewhat avoided... but not entirely, of course.

[Tohko puzzled over this, trying to burn the information onto her brain.]

Ah, I see. I apologize for jumping to conclusions then. What is the scientific term then?

[Tohko nodded.] Right..I think I get it. However, why is it fortunate that most people aren't aware of the existence of spiritual hearts? And..how did you study these spiritual hearts? Why? What did you discover about it?

[You'll have to pardon Tohko. When it comes to stories, she loves all the details, so she always gets curious when it comes to interesting details about other worlds.]

[Kingdom Hearts doesn't ... actually have a scientific term for the heart, canonically. They're really bad at scientific things in general, because children's game and Disnye doesn't want to confuse the babbies. Though they almost certainly would have a name for one in-universe. So pretend that name is here!]

For the simple reason that I don't have to determine whether they're speaking about a spiritual or physical heart, because they can only talk about the latter kind. [ n_n ] Mostly we studied the heart's reactions to certain other substances called Light and Darkness. They rest... [How to explain it...] somewhere in the realm between magical energy and elements -- hydrogen, helium, and so on. Every person has a different ratio of Light to Darkness in their heart, and too much of either can be unhealthy. We wanted to find out what parts of the Light-Darkness spectrum were actually harmful to physical and mental health.

[Ah, don't worry! I know that..but Tohko does not. xD; However, I shall pretend that the name is in here somewhere!]

..While it is a little convenient, isn't is sad that people don't know much about it? It might be useful to them.

[Tohko nodded again.] Right, I understand. While those experiments sound useful..they also sound a little dangerous. What if the Darkness got out of hand? And..you did grab volunteers for those studies, right?

[Tohko has read too many stories where mad scientists did stuff like this without the person wanting to be involved. It was usually the first sign that you wanted to stay away from that person. Hopefully this boy had slipped away from that first sign.]

[ ... ]

The story went that many years ago, all people were aware of the forces of Light, and how it lived in their heart. However, the people then began to fight over ownership of the Light, and through their quarreling gave birth to Darkness so great that it swallowed everything; the entire world. Only the hearts of children, untouched by greed, were pure enough to rebuild the world. Supposedly, that 'new world' is the one that society moved on in.

Of course, it's all fiction that's happened to be passed down. Those who were actually aware of Light and Darkness may have spread it, or it may have come to be on its own. But either way, I don't doubt that if the power of the heart -- and Light and Darkness, by extension -- were to become public knowledge, that account would actually become true...

[He appears to have become all caught up in explaining that old faerie tale, surely not on purpose. Some of your questions won't be answered. What a shame.]

['Tis a shame. However, Tohko is good at dealing with people who don't listen to everything. She smiled.]

While it is fiction, it's still a pretty sweet story. However..if that story were to become true, due to public knowledge, that would be pretty terrible. I don't think it's right..but I can see why you do it.

My Master had hoped that one day, the collective consciousness would become pure enough that all people would use the powers of the heart for good. Unfortunately, that... never happened on our world [as he could attest to himself if he felt like talking about it, or indeed admitting that part of his life happened at all], and because of the situation we find ourselves in now, I doubt it ever will. I haven't sensed 'hearts', exactly, from most people I've met so far... they seem to contain Light and Darkness as normal, but their scent is different somehow.

[Tohko sighed.]

That's a shame..but what sort of situation happened to make you think that the collective consciousness will never become that pure? And they probably smell a little differently to you because most of the people in here are from alternate universes. I'm sure my heart smells differently to you, even though I've got one, so that could be the reason..and some being here don't have hearts, because their either androids, ghosts, or beings that don't require them.

Oh, no... 'situation' in particular. Just the nature of humans.

[Though he does give her a funny look.]

How would you know if androids or ghosts would or wouldn't have hearts...?

I see..and that nature can't be changed?

[Tohko then chuckled a little.]

Well, since androids are made completely of metal, you would have to introduce a soul or heart in them in order for them to get one. As for ghosts..they may have very small hearts, but they're probably rather weak and will eventually fade away. Such is the fate of all ghosts.

Well, no, but that wouldn't happen at the drop of a hat.

[He paused to think about her explanation, frowning.] ...Well, there truly is no way to know whether an entity can contain a heart, even if it were a ghost or an android, unless you tested it on an actual ghost or android. Really, anything that has sentience should technically be able to grow a heart, which is analogous with developing emotions. I would assume ghosts could still retain hearts, since they are still sentient and in most cases still do have emotions... though that does bring up the question of whether the heart would feel the need to create a new body for them. Or perhaps the fact that they still have a heart is the very reason they are ghosts at all, because their heart made them a new body after their heart and will separated from the body!

[Here he goes again...]

Ah, I see.

[Tohko smiled and chuckled to herself as she heard this. A heart growing because a person had emotions. While she could kind of see it, it made her think that Wilhelm, if he didn't already have one, would probably never have a heart. Maybe.]

Ah, alright then! I think I get it! Would it be possible for a person to have a shattered heart-one with bits and pieces of it missing?

I... would imagine so. [Hm.] There is much documentation of entities whose hearts have been destroyed completely and have continued living with only their power of will, so I would imagine that someone with a semi-heart would function the same way. I may have observed this before in an experiment, but I would need to have the records on hand to che--

[...]

[Dammit.]

[If she asked, well, he had already said he couldn't quite remember, hadn't he? And that was the truth. A fracturing heart in a Light-and-Darkness study sounded like the sort of thing that would become an unfortunate accident. Obviously that was all it was. An accident.]

...Ah, I'm sorry. [He clears his throat.] Well, maybe. It was several years ago, these studies.

[Tohko paused for a moment, staring at him. She had asked because she was curious if, in his world, that could have been what bothered Chia..and what screwed up her sense of taste. The fact that he had observed this in an experiment..]

In an experiment?! Just what kind of experiments were you doing?

[Urk.]

As I said, the heart is very unpredictable, and the only way to know for sure how it will react is to conduct experiments. As part of our studies, it stands to reason that we would have to affect the Light and Darkness within hearts.

[His tone has deepened somewhat, now that there is no longer any pretense of a cheerful mood.]

I know what you said. However..that doesn't mean those experiments weren't dangerous. Knowledge is great, but you have to think about the people sometimes...please, at least tell me you experimented on volunteers.

Medicine. Consider medicine. How many times do you think that faulty, potentially dangerous solutions were made and administered to patients before a formula worked properly? There is no way to make any true discovery in this field without harm coming to others.

We tested on animals.

[Tohko sighed.]

However, while doctors and scientists were working on cures and medicines, they did everything in their power to try and see if the patient would be hurt and did everything they could to prevent it. I'm not sure you can do the same with with Light and Darkness.

..Why type of animals?

[Humans, technically, are animals too. She's still suspicious.]

And how long, exactly, have you been studying Light and Darkness to attest to this?

[And that is all he will say.]

You know perfectly well that Light and Darkness as you know it don't exist in my world. I've told you already-in my world, doctors and scientists of old saw the heart as a spiritual center, but in modern times, that's been debunked, and it's thought that things like that are unscientific and foolish factually.

However..I have read plenty of books, even though they are fictional, and I'm guessing that it would be hard to control and use foresight with Light and Darkness like you would medicine.

And you depend on that? The made-up product of fantasy writers in a world with no concept of a spiritual heart? This is not guesswork and imagination, child, this is quite real, I assure you. For someone with such a sophomoric understanding of the true facts as they were in a real world, you have absolutely no room to be questioning the authority of someone who has committed himself to this for his entire life!

[I just realized that Ienzo doesn't have a "Vexen rage" emote. This needs to be fixed immediately.]

It is all I can depend on! It's not like I live in your universe where these things exist. I have to work with what I find. And I'm not saying that this is quite real in your universe. And even if you have studied this for your whole life, I will question you again and again if I have questions and concerns about what you were doing!

[She has argued with Wilhelm before and not backed down, Ienzo. She does not give a single fuck anymore. Maybe.

However, that situation does need to be fixed ASAP!]

Edited 2012-12-22 04:26 (UTC)