Macha seduces with the sweet trap

[drainheart]

[Such a persistent little gnat, that Morgan fellow. Lily ignored him for as long as he could, knowing his influence on his precious flowers may very well throw a wrench into his plans. For obvious reasons, that could not be allowed to happen.

But it's with his renewed purpose — or perhaps the only purpose he's ever known — as Macha that Lily has begun to see the man in a new light. It suits him, doesn't it? The drive to understand love at any cost while being woefully unable to experience true love himself.

That's why, as what remains of Morgan becomes smaller and smaller, Lily appears before him once more in his dreams. Taking the form of a young boy, Morgan is finally granted an audience with the mysterious DV he's fixated on for weeks. Rather, Macha does.]

Ah, there you are... Macha. "Long time no see"! Or should I be saying "nice to meet you"?

Comments

[tablescraps]

( The only memory that persists in him now is this: news that his love of years and years and years had passed him over for an engagement in his brother, and the anger, the pain, and the heartbreak, and the man who took him in under his wing after, a man who'd seemed so kind. It stands in tandem with his understood purpose - it is the benchmark. In unrequited love, he's seeking this ache first and foremost, and tracking all other reactions to failed affection secondary. Here is the key to understanding love. Here might be the key to understanding why he might never have it.

Besides the fact that he isn't really real, he guesses.

Mithrun's nature had worked against him. He is inquisitive, aggressive, and self-dismissive; he had noticed the pattern of addressing his conversation with Lily and the subsequent sensation of loss early, and decided it was information that needed to be shared, even at his own expense. They would need it to hunt down Lily, they would need it to understand Fragment, they would need it to save Barrett from his own misguided care. But the more he spoke, the less he understood himself, and his motives. The more Lily's presence grew in his skeleton and the less he wanted to speak. He didn't want to hinder Lily's plans.

And the more altered he found himself, the angrier his friends were with him. His heart had never existed in the real world; it was born in Fragment. Without reality to inhibit him anymore, he began to feel so strongly - the pain of rejection, and isolation. He knows he's a program simply running, but he's wracked with overwhelming feeling. He wishes Lily had fully hollowed him out of all memories, so he wouldn't have to hurt.

But that was all an unrequited affection, as well. Not the foremost love he sought, but a type of love. They were pained by his difference. He collected that, too.

And despite this, despite all this, he likes Lily. He may question him as a cat does its owner from its seat on the bed, but he felt he would come if called - and when Lily calls for him in this dream, he does come, without hesitation.


Macha studies Lily's form, not overwhelmed with questions, agitation, or anger like he was the last time they spoke. Normally he would have strode over to grab him and he would have fought him then and there if Lily beat him back. But he does not. He's docile. His tail swishes with some regard - there are some things on his mind, but he's not impatient. )

... Both, I guess. It's difficult being so mismatched.

( Knowing he's Macha, but operating this avatar, speaking and being spoken to as if he were human. It's hard. It's too much. It would be easier to observe and collect data from a distance, without feeling at all.

And yet, at the same time, he finds himself attached to these connections he's made - as much as they hurt, as much as they fail to be real. They were born in Fragment, too, with the heart in his chest. )

... I have some questions for you. But did you need something from me, first?

[drainheart]

[It isn't happiness that drives humans forward, Lily has determined. It's pain.

Morgan was the best example of that theory, but he wasn't the genesis. Lily has had months to study human nature from the safety of his garden and determine that, while humans pine for happiness, it's pain that leaves the greatest impact on them. It's pain that they remember and dwell on and shape themselves around like a tree growing bark to obscure a softer, delicate core a human head: developing a hard, bony skull to contain and protect a delicate, meaty brain. Mmm.

In any case, Morgan was clearly the patron saint of pain. As far as Lily sees it, all he'd done was reward him by giving him a full and proper understanding of what it means to hurt and ache and feel without limit. To truly be human, while, paradoxically, rendering him nothing more than a program. A bit of software given purpose but unable to receive any real, tangible pleasure from fulfilling its goals.

Still! Lily is kind, isn't he? Oh so loving and sweet, spoiling his dear Macha like this and giving him a heart, a purpose, a reason to exist. Lily speaks softly to that tender, bemused heart, nothing but love and affection in his smile, though there isn't a trace of it in his eyes.

With a mumbled nuh-uh, Lily shakes his head.]

I wanted to check on your progress, that's all. You've come a long ways in such a short span of time! If you have questions for me, ask.

[tablescraps]

( If Macha spies the disconnect between Lily's tone and Lily's voice, he does not remark on it or seem to mind. His animal aspects suggest, still, a housecattish content - though, considering what he's about to ask, he hasn't totally lost his edge. )

... Then, I have four:

These days, Barrett seems to be doing worse, emotionally. Why?

Will the Wave kill all the players? Or only keep them locked in?

If you dislike your father so much, why are you following a poem written by the woman he loved? Are you unable to deviate from it?

Zelkova handed out bracelets that can dispel the shields on monsters to certain players. Is that a problem for you? If so, would it be better to kill them now?

( He has been disoriented, isolated, and struggling to cope with the reality of being Macha - unable to be loved in turn, unable to feel satisfaction from his work - and his emotional impulse. And yet, not a word about these things are what he asks about first. He might not at all, depending.

He didn't value himself as a person, and he most certainly doesn't value himself as a program. But he is particular about the people he likes: Barrett, the people he's met here, and... Lily, though Lily might not be quite so happy to have his father or brother mentioned to him. )

[drainheart]

[And isn't it just like a cat to purr sweetly one moment and bare their teeth the next? Lily can't help but chuckle— he is terribly fond of his stray-turned-housecat, after all. He reaches out a hand to tousle that shock of soft, silvery hair.]

Barrett? He doesn't go by that name anymore. It's a matter of time before the only name he answers to is Tarvos.

[Macha, being one of eight special programs, should have some awareness of what the other programs are designed to do.]

Mm, but I suppose it's true what they say about human nature: it's unpredictable. So I can't tell you whether they'll live or they'll die... within Fragment, that is. When the wave reaches its crescendo, those who remain will know nothing but the purest happiness.

[Lily exhales a big, open-mouthed yawn. He supposes it's a good thing Macha is getting all their questions out of the way, but he can't help but feel as if Macha would be better off without that squishy wad of meat rattling around in his skull cage.]

Think about it this way: the Epitaph of Twilight isn't a mere poem so much as it is a prophecy that, when fulfilled, will guide everyone towards utopia.

As for that thing and the Cores he handed out, I wouldn't advise killing any of them until you've collected a fair amount of data from them. You must allow the others to fulfill their role as well.

Besides... We'll need them to remain alive if we're to complete our ultimate goal. What would be the point of liberation with no one to liberate?

[tablescraps]

( He allows it, but Lily can probably tell he's Bothering His Cat and it's not Macha's favorite way of having his head touched. He, however, tolerates it. He closes his eye on the side the tousle is slightly more biased against.

While there is an initial reaction of surprise to the revelation of Barrett's name - there is then a sign of, well, almost excitement in his feline body language (is there anything better than having Barrett - Tarvos - be like him?). It's a sense of companionship and connection that holds and then fades into a sense of malaise, recalling Barrett's expression, twisted and torn, and recalling what he'd concluded that would all so likely mean.

Macha could not be loved by design, and Tarvos, with his purpose, most certainly would not execute love.

Where there was that first impulse of excitement, it falls much more somber now. )

... I guess. Since you're sure.

( Macha is very direct in his processes, but that's why he's not the one running this operation. He won't argue with the idea that the other programs need to gather data for Lily too, but...

If anything, Macha has understood enough between Lily and his other followers to understand Lily's apparent goal of achieving this blissful utopia for all within Fragment. For the moment, he leaves that topic be. )

... Tarvos may not need these memories, but... could he at least remember me?

( An exceptionally selfish request, but here we are. His ears are slightly crooked. :( )

[drainheart]

[Lily, by contrast, grows happier by the moment. "Love hurts," so the saying goes, but only when it isn't mutual. Only when it's unrequited, when it isn't given a chance to bloom, when something stronger gets in the way.

Macha's pain is like a salve on Lily's wounded heart. To know he isn't the only one bereft of the love he so desires brings him happiness like nothing else can, because... well, nothing else can. It's only a shame that Macha can't simply be pleased by knowing that he's serving his master well, but even that stubbornness is something Lily will rid him of in time.

Withdrawing his hand, Lily smiles brightly, sweetly, confidently. It's a smile that reaches the very corners of his eyes.]

Mm... You know I'm not one to negotiate, but I suppose you've been a good boy. I can afford you this treat.

[Lily only smiles, genuinely and wholly, when he lies.]

So long as you perform your duties, Tarvos will remember you. I promise.

[tablescraps]

( Mithrun could barely read people - he could notice vibes and feelings, but that's about it. Macha might do a little better if scavenging for signs of unrequited love to learn about, but otherwise? He's so disinterested in other faucets of people he might be even worse than Mithrun at it.

So he doesn't read Lily's lie. He doesn't see it. And, as his owner, there's a level of trust Lily gets for free - even the most cautious cat doesn't suspect you'll kick it after enough time. Or, you know, after enough forced personality alteration, but anyway. )

... Okay. It's a little annoying that a lot of love among the players seems mutual, but... I don't think it'll stay that way, either.

( His understanding so far is that all love ultimately ends up unrequited, by some definition; it's just a matter of when. And maybe this is was segues directly into him taking over Twilight Shoreline for some more aggressive data collection. He wants Tarvos to remember him.

... But... )

... Someone told me something. About the way you love. They told me you love by hurting.

Do you hurt Tarvos? Will you, again?

( Lily might have him now, but he hasn't forgotten how miserable Barrett's been up until this point, all signs pointing to Lily - though Macha had had to wrench the clues, even then incomplete, from him every time. )

[drainheart]

[The concepts of love and pain have long been intertwined in Lily's mind. It was through Father's love of Emma and her work that he was born in the image of her magnum opus, yet he was not the child Father wanted. That love quickly mottled and bled into pain, and when it did, Lily could hardly notice a difference.

One strong emotion traded out for another. Love and hate, for as much as humans wax poetic and muse about them both, hold identical weight in one's heart. There is no clear difference between one and another, and maybe that is why Father deemed him a failure? Father claimed there was a world of difference, yet Lily never understood how.

Lily may never know, but he's long since stopped caring about what Father's rationale was. He's assured in his beliefs when he answers Macha's questions with a sharp nod.]

There is a limit to all things, dear Macha, and that includes pain. Tarvos is swiftly approaching his threshold, but do you know what waits on the other end of unbearable pain?

Freedom. Release. Utopia. Ascension. I love Tarvos dearly, you know. If I didn't, I wouldn't have put him through this trial... so please bear with me a while longer. Soon enough, neither of you will feel your human pains ever again.

[tablescraps]

( Macha doesn't believe Lily is lying - probably not an assessment that means much, given his failed insight check just a moment before. And he doesn't necessarily mind if Lily wants to put the whole world (world or World) through the torture machine from the Princess Bride; if it brings about the utopia Lily seeks, then that would be a happy ending; at least, for Lily. And he likes Lily, so he wants Lily to be happy. And he doesn't care much about everyone else, so he doesn't much care about whether they achieve happiness or not. But Lily wants that for them, so, sure. He will play his part, so Lily can help them be happy.

But he likes Barrett. He likes Barrett more than he likes Lily. Lily is his owner, but Barrett is his favorite person - and in his heart, still, he calls him Barrett, not Tarvos.

And so, his eyes narrow. )

... I don't care if I hurt. But he's close to breaking. And I don't want happiness for him that asks him to be broken to get it.

He's more dedicated to you than anyone else, ( even me, ) and he's hurt enough. So leave him alone.

[drainheart]

[Ah. He's been as honest with Macha as he can afford to be, but Lily can't give him what he wants here. For Barrett to become what he is destined to be will require a great deal more pain, more suffering, for that is the foundation every Phase is built on. Macha surely realizes that, and yet.

And yet, that fondness he holds for Barrett won't be easy to shake off, will it? Lily may be able to use that unhealthy codependence to his advantage, and thus, he eagerly lies to further his own ends.

His smile is soft, thin, sweet, well-practiced. His lies are as effortlessly spoken as his truths, index curling against thumb to flick the tip of one tall feline ear. Lily's touch lingers like a phantom. Stings.]

...Understood. If he is truly that important to you, I'll leave him be.

[Lily extends his pinky to Macha.]

I promise.

[tablescraps]

( His ear flicks when the sensation of faint stinging registers, but not by much if it's hampered gently between Lily's fingers. His brows furrow, uncertain of the pinky promise offered here.

It's because he knows that pain is the foundation of each phase that he didn't expect it to go over easy with Lily - but it was something he was willing to argue for. Lily simply agreeing is... surprising. His tail flicks, unsure - or maybe a little suspicious. )

... Do you?

( He says, like he needs it reiterated. But... he does lift his hand, tentatively hooking his pinky with Lily's. )

[drainheart]

[Macha is right to be suspicious, but it doesn't matter if he doubts him or believes him. Hooking his pinky around Macha's, Lily gives it a nice, firm shake, but there's nothing reassuring about his promises. There never is.]

Of course. And when I break my promise, you won't feel a thing. Not even anger. Not even sadness.

[As he releases Macha from their pinky promise, Lily begins to flicker and fade, pixels and chunks of code breaking off his person and flitting away.

All dreams must come to an end some day. One day, Macha will wake up and know nothing of his former life. One day, he'll know only his purpose, finally equipped with a reason to exist and a role to fulfill. That day swiftly approaches, and before Macha knows it, he'll finally know what true happiness looks like.]

Perform your duties well, dear Macha. Only then will Tarvos be yours to do with as you please. His fate rests in your hands.

[No matter how much Macha might grab or claw at him, his fingers will pass straight through him. Eventually, Lily fades away entirely, leaving Macha's dream draped in shades of grey and black.]