video.

[dissent]

[ It's late, and Anders is up on the surface, face lit occasionally by the rolling crackle of the sky. But he's not thinking about this strange place called Earth, his eyes distant. ]

Has anyone else met someone they... knew in their Matrix, but who was extracted from a different Matrix?

[ He's fumbling with the question, not sure how to ask what he wants to ask and not daring to voice what underlies it. ]

There are other versions of us still living their lives. It feels like I'm ...

[ A pause, and he decides not to follow up with whatever point he was planning, sighs instead, switches the feed off and tries to work out if there's some way to delete the recording from the network. ]

Comments

[dissent]

Or at the very least easily replaceable.

[lostsoldier]

[ In person there might be nodding here, acknowledgement, but in text form, he doesn't fill that silence with words. Instead: a long, weird pause. ]

hard to know if you're the one they want

[dissent]

[ Yes, that's exactly, terribly it. ]

Yes.

It's good that I'm not the only one. Though it would be better if you weren't so mysterious.

[lostsoldier]

i'm not sure it's good
better than being the only one though

[ another awkward pause. ]

you wouldn't know me anyway

[ translation: he's not hiding from you. ]

[dissent]

Maybe I want to get to know you.

[ Wait, that sounds like a come on when it's only an overture of friendship, how awkward. More rapid texting. ]

Just because it sounds like you understand.

It's fairly irrelevant anyway.

Just as long as I don't get you confused with the other one.

[nightride]

[Hey, by all means, confuse Driver for someone who doesn't have problems relating to people. Also he is completely spying on this exchange.]

[lostsoldier]

[ points to eyes, points to you. ]

private, not anon;

[lostsoldier]

[ Any awkwardness sails right over his head, but he can't make the words settle in his mind anyway. He doesn't understand why this guy would want to get to know him, doesn't trust it, but he doesn't want to be confused with someone else, either. That seems important. He isn't someone else.

Eventually, with a network ID if not a name: ]

is this better
?

private;

[dissent]

Yes.

[ By a great deal, actually. He was right, and Anders doesn't know him, but now he knows who he's not, which is just as good. ]

This is locked? I probably should have been doing that to start with.

private;

[lostsoldier]

from people
not from machines

[ security is relative etc. ]

is it bad if your friend finds out

Re: private;

[dissent]

I think he's probably going to read this with full awareness that I'm talking about him, so we'll see. But I could have stood to be more circumspect.

private;

[lostsoldier]

[ yep, he doesn't go through the trouble of typing out. instead: ]

good luck

private;

[dissent]

Thank you