??: I thought I LOST you all over again!
??: I didn’t mean to panic like that it’s just…
??: If you knew what they’ve done to me,
??: You’d jump to conclusions too
MS: Dale I’ve got
MS: well a lot feels like an understatement
MS: but a lot of questions
MS: one could easily fill two dialogue trees with the amount of investigation I want to perform here and still have enough left over to take home for dinner
MS: first on my mind is could you bring the pronoun game down to about a three and tell me who THEY are?
MS: do you mean HER?
??: The pronoun…? Oh
??: Among others, yes. There are…what I hesitate to call PEOPLE outside. They are like unto gods in their power here, but I feel that moniker does the genuine article great insult. They have human form, but act with reptilian mind unfettered by the base virtue of compassion. They hunger for the blood and sensation their world deprives them, and take our bodies as demons do that they might find fulfillment here
??: They are not demons
??: I know how to KILL demons
??: They are PLAYERS. They made this world. They will likely watch it burn itself from within. I intend to put that fire out
MS: Daylen…
MS: what did they do to you?
??: There is an entire science dedicated to the manipulation of our essence. Our CODE. It would take time we don’t have to explain the specifics of the procedures I went through that May
??: All you need to know is, h-hhh…
??: I was made to forget
MS: what do you mean time we don’t have?
MS: you’re here now
MS: and I’m here for you
MS: apparently you can pause games now
MS: (not going to lie I’m jealous)
MS: I think Jane will understand if we want to catch up
MS: six years is…a lot to cover
MS: so much longer than we even got to spend together in the first place
??: I haven’t paused the game. I’ve just opened the tactical window. I can’t keep it open for long, and I don’t know when I’ll be able to hold it again, or if I’ll be able to contact you outside of it
MS: Dale do you understand that your saying completely inexplicable shit rather quickly because you think you don’t have time to elaborate on it only forces me to ask you questions that waste even more time than it would have taken to enlighten me off the bat?
??: Mari do you understand that your snide, media literate, commentary has and will continue to cost innocent lives as it prevents me from telling you seconds of vital information?
??: All AVATARS from Bioware-developed games have the power to enter a space called the TACTICAL WINDOW, wherein your mind and, with practice, those of a handful of allies, works almost impossibly faster. If time appears to stop, it is purely an illusion of relativity. It was a function instated to give the players time to think through the more complex combat encounters they built for each other
??: Most of us aren’t aware of its existence, but once I was told, accessing it became quite simple:
??: You just hold down LEFT TRIGGER
MS: oh ok left trigger
??:
MS:
??:
MS: left trigger on what?
??: You just do
??: You’ll know how when the time comes
??: You’ll need to know to stop that salvation you heard about earlier
MS: I don’t care about stopping some fool’s salvation
MS: why can’t you just talk to me?
MS: tell me where you went and why you had to go!
MS: tell me why you can’t stay and how it seems I’m always the one asked to save a world that doesn’t give a DAMN about me!
MS: I mourned you for six years
MS: I loved you like you were my BROTHER, Daylen
MS: and when by some miracle, you clawed your way out of the abyss to speak to me
MS: it couldn’t have been enough for you to have genuinely wanted to see me again, could it?
MS: no
MS: no it was just because you needed to guilt me into going on a harrowing quest with the fate of this xbox in the balance
MS: that’s all I’m good for
MS: Isn’t it?