11-23-2017, 01:46 PM
When one enters another’s mind, just like Kelly did to Malon, they can usually expect a reflection of that person’s personality. A neat and orderly person may have an immaculate structure with neatly ordered thoughts and memories, whereas an outgoing party animal may have colorful alleyways and disco balls hanging overhead.
What he got to see when linking his consciousness to hers was more like a city designed by a hundred insane architects who had each grown bored after building up one or two districts, then given to a painter high on ten litres of coffee for the finishing touches. A medieval castle stood right next to a roman temple, a small egyptian pyramid was overshadowed by a tower made entirely of black rock and a lake’s worth of water precariously hovered over a tropical forest, just to name a handful. And what was even weirder, each part by itself made complete sense. Above this conglomerate of tiny worlds hung Malon - or rather, the manifestation of her consciousness that Kelly’s mind made to visualize another person’s mind.
Though on the outside the girl looked like she was comatose, not responding to exterior stimuli of any sort, she was very much awake. Her consciousness and senses were completely preoccupied with what looked like millions of photographic film snippets that flew around her like a bubble-shaped storm. Each second dozens of these snippets flew through her body and came out on the other side as memories, forming new buildings and landscapes that added to the hodgepodge beneath. Just when Kelly came closer, an iceberg with half a dozen penguins on it came from her head and flew past him to lodge itself into the floating lake. Kelly frowned and approached.
Even though she should be getting glances at the uninvited guest past the film snippets Malon showed no reaction to Kelly’s presence, no acknowledgement. Perhaps it was due to her mind not being nearly as trained in the ways of Telepathy as him, let alone Tearen, which made the procedure a lot simpler - no fear of the patient trying to interfere. Of course the mind was a filigrane thing and one wrong move may cause Malon to receive damage that not even death and a subsequent respawn could heal. Luckily Kelly knew what he was doing. He reached his hand through the storm of snippets and took Malon’s hand, linking his consciousness to hers.
Immediately his mind was invaded by what Malon was experiencing: some memory that had to be Gamzee’s or Karkat was playing right now, there were a whole bunch of gray-skinned horned people around. Then with no visible prompt the scene switched and he saw something of his own life. As if some madman was flipping through TV channels. Kelly engaged the flood of memory, turning it and himself over and around, recontextualizing until it became something he could control, then reached out and did the same in Malon’s mind. Immediately the storm before him calmed and the snippets of films rearranged themselves into neat movie rolls, seven of them exactly, and they flew down into the buildings to lodge themselves somewhere into Malon’s mind to be stored as memories.
I need not sort all these memories. I know now that they are -all- not mine. Let me store them so that I may return when the time is right. Was it Kelly who placed this thought into Malon’s head or was it Malon herself? Not even the traveler of realities would later be able to tell with absolute certainty. In either case his job was done - and Malon was not out of harm’s way yet. To overstay his welcome may still cause new troubles for both of them.
“If you’re looking for a way out, you should hurry”, a voice behind him said. What was even behind in a place like this? Space had no meaning in a mind. And yet he turned around and saw himself facing several girls, all of which bore a certain resemblance to the Maru that Tearen had introduced them to, and to the Malon that he knew her to really be. The one who had just spoken looked like a Hollywood ninja, shrouded in black and with a cold gaze.
“You have our thanks, Kelly”, said another of the Malons with a friendly voice and a smile. This one looked exactly like Maru. Some of the group stepped to the side and revealed a door floating right there, in the middle of nowhere. “But if you take too long, you’ll suffer the consequences.”
“Is that a threat?” he asked but returned the smile as he reached for the door and turned the knob.
“She means that you should lean back as soon as you step through the door”, the ninja said, sounding rather amused. Those were the parting words that he got before exiting her mind and returning to the physical world.
Malon woke up barely half a second after Kelly and darted into a sitting position - her forehead ended up where Kelly’s face had been that exact half second ago. Had he not leant back, he probably would have earned himself a nosebleed for his troubles. She hyperventilated as her senses readjusted to the real world after having been preoccupied with memories for the last few minutes, but it took her a bit before her eyes focused onto the face of the two men.
“Kelly? Strazio? What…” she asked. “Did something happen?”
“Tearen’s last action left us sharing memories with each other. You were stuck re-experiencing them but we were able to help you process it”, explained Kelly.
“... right, that’s what I was seeing then. Thank you… I don’t think I could’ve escaped that on my own.” Hell, she hadn’t even realized that something was wrong with her. She hadn’t even really been her right then. And though she felt quite grateful for his help, she felt annoyed that yet again someone had saved her. Or rather, it reminded her that she was a far way yet from becoming who she could - and wanted - to be.
“Don’t stand up yet”, he warned her as if he’d read her thoughts. “Take it slowly.”
“Yes, that’s probably… you’re right.” Focusing on herself for a moment, she thought. There was no recollection of what had happened after the chunks of memories had filled her mind, up until now where she had ‘woken up’. There were… vague memories of Strazio telling her something. Ganondorf. And a flood of memory chunks. Her mind spun at the idea that Strazio had shared with her days - weeks? - of memories in the span of a few seconds, followed by the same happening with Kelly’s, Tearen’s, Guu’s, Strazio’s, Gamzee’s, Karkat’s and Dane’s. Judging by how she felt okay though, she decided that there was probably no issue.
To break the awkward silence when she realized that both men were still looming around the couch she spoke up: “So, eh… did the others leave? And what are you going to do now?”
What he got to see when linking his consciousness to hers was more like a city designed by a hundred insane architects who had each grown bored after building up one or two districts, then given to a painter high on ten litres of coffee for the finishing touches. A medieval castle stood right next to a roman temple, a small egyptian pyramid was overshadowed by a tower made entirely of black rock and a lake’s worth of water precariously hovered over a tropical forest, just to name a handful. And what was even weirder, each part by itself made complete sense. Above this conglomerate of tiny worlds hung Malon - or rather, the manifestation of her consciousness that Kelly’s mind made to visualize another person’s mind.
Though on the outside the girl looked like she was comatose, not responding to exterior stimuli of any sort, she was very much awake. Her consciousness and senses were completely preoccupied with what looked like millions of photographic film snippets that flew around her like a bubble-shaped storm. Each second dozens of these snippets flew through her body and came out on the other side as memories, forming new buildings and landscapes that added to the hodgepodge beneath. Just when Kelly came closer, an iceberg with half a dozen penguins on it came from her head and flew past him to lodge itself into the floating lake. Kelly frowned and approached.
Even though she should be getting glances at the uninvited guest past the film snippets Malon showed no reaction to Kelly’s presence, no acknowledgement. Perhaps it was due to her mind not being nearly as trained in the ways of Telepathy as him, let alone Tearen, which made the procedure a lot simpler - no fear of the patient trying to interfere. Of course the mind was a filigrane thing and one wrong move may cause Malon to receive damage that not even death and a subsequent respawn could heal. Luckily Kelly knew what he was doing. He reached his hand through the storm of snippets and took Malon’s hand, linking his consciousness to hers.
Immediately his mind was invaded by what Malon was experiencing: some memory that had to be Gamzee’s or Karkat was playing right now, there were a whole bunch of gray-skinned horned people around. Then with no visible prompt the scene switched and he saw something of his own life. As if some madman was flipping through TV channels. Kelly engaged the flood of memory, turning it and himself over and around, recontextualizing until it became something he could control, then reached out and did the same in Malon’s mind. Immediately the storm before him calmed and the snippets of films rearranged themselves into neat movie rolls, seven of them exactly, and they flew down into the buildings to lodge themselves somewhere into Malon’s mind to be stored as memories.
I need not sort all these memories. I know now that they are -all- not mine. Let me store them so that I may return when the time is right. Was it Kelly who placed this thought into Malon’s head or was it Malon herself? Not even the traveler of realities would later be able to tell with absolute certainty. In either case his job was done - and Malon was not out of harm’s way yet. To overstay his welcome may still cause new troubles for both of them.
“If you’re looking for a way out, you should hurry”, a voice behind him said. What was even behind in a place like this? Space had no meaning in a mind. And yet he turned around and saw himself facing several girls, all of which bore a certain resemblance to the Maru that Tearen had introduced them to, and to the Malon that he knew her to really be. The one who had just spoken looked like a Hollywood ninja, shrouded in black and with a cold gaze.
“You have our thanks, Kelly”, said another of the Malons with a friendly voice and a smile. This one looked exactly like Maru. Some of the group stepped to the side and revealed a door floating right there, in the middle of nowhere. “But if you take too long, you’ll suffer the consequences.”
“Is that a threat?” he asked but returned the smile as he reached for the door and turned the knob.
“She means that you should lean back as soon as you step through the door”, the ninja said, sounding rather amused. Those were the parting words that he got before exiting her mind and returning to the physical world.
Malon woke up barely half a second after Kelly and darted into a sitting position - her forehead ended up where Kelly’s face had been that exact half second ago. Had he not leant back, he probably would have earned himself a nosebleed for his troubles. She hyperventilated as her senses readjusted to the real world after having been preoccupied with memories for the last few minutes, but it took her a bit before her eyes focused onto the face of the two men.
“Kelly? Strazio? What…” she asked. “Did something happen?”
“Tearen’s last action left us sharing memories with each other. You were stuck re-experiencing them but we were able to help you process it”, explained Kelly.
“... right, that’s what I was seeing then. Thank you… I don’t think I could’ve escaped that on my own.” Hell, she hadn’t even realized that something was wrong with her. She hadn’t even really been her right then. And though she felt quite grateful for his help, she felt annoyed that yet again someone had saved her. Or rather, it reminded her that she was a far way yet from becoming who she could - and wanted - to be.
“Don’t stand up yet”, he warned her as if he’d read her thoughts. “Take it slowly.”
“Yes, that’s probably… you’re right.” Focusing on herself for a moment, she thought. There was no recollection of what had happened after the chunks of memories had filled her mind, up until now where she had ‘woken up’. There were… vague memories of Strazio telling her something. Ganondorf. And a flood of memory chunks. Her mind spun at the idea that Strazio had shared with her days - weeks? - of memories in the span of a few seconds, followed by the same happening with Kelly’s, Tearen’s, Guu’s, Strazio’s, Gamzee’s, Karkat’s and Dane’s. Judging by how she felt okay though, she decided that there was probably no issue.
To break the awkward silence when she realized that both men were still looming around the couch she spoke up: “So, eh… did the others leave? And what are you going to do now?”