Identity

[hazlogs]

It is currently 18:51 Pacific Time on Wed Oct 21 2015.

Location: The Hub Main Floor (Walker HQ)

Frustration has kept the galliard isolated, and even when Salem has been present he's kept to himself. He wanders the shared space, though, moving from one area to another, touching, examining objects, and has even spent time simply watching the twenty-four hour news channel on television. All of this seems to be an attempt to reacquaint himself with the world, or find something familiar within the wash of disconnect.

At the moment, he stands before the bank of computers, fingering the edge of the keyboard but not quite touching any of the keys.

Salem emerges from the guest bedroom he's been using up in the loft area. He touches the railing that prevents people from carelessly tumbling down into the main floor, hesitates as if considering something reckless, then continues on to the stairs, merely trailing his hand along instead. He spies Kavi and offers up a somewhat guarded, "Sleep well?"

Kavi looks up, one hand still touching plastic, but he hesitates before forming an answer. "I-- It's hard to sleep. With so much..." He lifts a hand to gesture by his ear, a suggestion of volume, though perhaps only inside his head. "Not knowing-- Not being connected? I-- I have trouble sleeping."

Salem scratches at the scar going across his nose. "Do you remember the things we talked about yesterday?"

"Auspices," Kavi says, nodding. "Tribes. Spirits and the umbra. I-- I remember our conversation? I--" He turns fully to Salem, back to the bank of computers and holds his breath for a beat. "I'm learning it. But I'm not... remembering it. It's not... mine."

Salem sits down at the bottom of the stairs and stretches his legs out, grimacing. "I understand. I don't know how to fix that, presuming it /can/ be fixed." The boy cocks his head, fixing the amnesiac with his good eye. "Have you thought about what you're going to do if it can't?"

The question is clearly one Kavi had not considered, and he again hesitates before shaking his head. "No, I-- I suppose I'll... I'll have to start over. I don't know if... I don't know."

Salem's expression turns hard and squinty. "You don't think you can do it?"

Kavi's expression changes in turn, his brow knitting, and he gives a smaller, tighter shake of his head. "No. Not that. I just-- If I have to start again? If I can't be who I was? I don't know if... if I can do that, here."

The hardness relents in the youth; he nods and gets to his feet again. "I can, actually, understand that. And if that ends up being your decision, we can help you with that. A new place, a new identity." He rubs the side of his neck, looking rueful. "You'd be missed, of course."

The galliard looks away, and nods after a beat. "If it comes to that," he says. His focus returns to the computers, and he slides a hand across the keyboard. "I want to... I feel like I know something, but. But it's just out of reach, and I'm afraid, if I try, it'll be gone."

"Then don't try." Salem limps over to join him by the computers, pausing at around arm's length to look up at him. "Some things can't be forced, ne? If you try, you just make it worse." He pauses to glance at the bank of computers. "Believe me, I /know/ how hard that is, to just let something /be/. To be, eh... so completely out of control. But raging and stressing over it won't change anything. You can gnaw at the chains, but you'll just end up breaking your teeth."

As Salem finishes, Kavi returns, pulling his hands together before him. The fingers of his right hand wrap around his left wrist, rubbing absently at old and faded scars. "What-- What would you do, if you were me?"

Salem looks back up at Kavi and smirks, the very picture of insolent youth. "Drink. A lot." The smirk fades a little. "...More seriously, I'd probably start playing with alternate identities. If you can't find yourself, if you can't be /Kavi/, then be someone else. Or /pretend/ to be someone else." He scratches his nose. "I personally spent several years as an emotionally unstable, homeless Vietnam vet, for example. At least, that's the part I played in public, to humans."

One eyebrow arches at the smirk, recognizing the humor there, but not quite ready to join in it. His thumb continues to run along the faded line on his wrist as he considers the rest of the philodox's words. "Pretend," he says softly, and then begins wandering back toward the television, though at the moment the screen is dark.

Salem stuffs his hands in his pockets. "Exactly. You're a Galliard, even if you can't remember it. You can make stories. And if you're not feeling inspired..." He shrugs. "Popular media has hundreds of character tropes to mine for ideas. Watch some movies. Watch a /lot/ of movies."

"I never--" Kavi starts, and then looks back over to Salem with a furrowed brow. "I never did, before. At least-- I don't think I did. I feel like that's true. Is-- Do you know? Is that true?"

Salem raises an eyebrow, then thinks about it. "We didn't socialize casually, you and I. Not often."

Kavi lets out a breath, a sigh, and nods acceptance. "That's-- Maybe that's better. I think... It's hard, it's frustrating, to not know who I am? But I think, maybe it's harder for people who did, who... expect me to be someone who isn't here."

Salem limps over toward the entertainment area and climbs up onto the couch to sit cross-legged at one end. "Maybe... you can do something about that. Help the people who knew Kavi to... separate him from who you are now." He eyes the Galliard, head cocked. "You should shave your head."

One hand rises, pulls the long hair back from his face as Kavi considers the suggestion. "I could," he says as he releases the locks, tucking the hair behind his ear. He touches the gold rings, and then lets his hand fall back to his side. "I could take out the earrings." His gaze drops downward and then returns to Salem again. "And different clothes."

"Exactly," the young Philodox says with a nod. "Be drastic, though."

"Drastic," Kavi repeats, rolling the word as if considering its meaning. "Is there-- I don't know where to get clothes, and I... I don't have any money."

"There are shops on the main floor of this building," Salem says. "And I think, if you asked her, Mouse would help with a clothing fund. Shaving your head costs nothing, however. Neither does growing a beard."

Kavi brushes the scruff on his cheek with the back of his fingers, and shakes his head with a faint grin. "I-- I don't know how much of a beard I can manage."

Salem raises an eyebrow. "You never know until you try."

"I haven't shaved since-- Since we... returned? I don't know how long, before that. I don't seem to-- I don't think I've grown a beard, before."

Salem shrugs. "All right, so perhaps a beard will be out of the question. I think the half-groomed scruffy look is 'in' right now anyway." He rubs his own chin and looks rueful.

"Do you..." Kavi starts, and then trails off. He shakes his head, and then starts again. "You remember. All of it, except-- Except while we were gone. Do you... miss your other self?"

Salem looks down at his maimed right hand, rubbing the stumps of the half-ring-finger and missing pinky. "There are definitely things I miss already about being an adult," he says slowly. "And things I'm very much not looking forward to, should it turn out that I'm going to just age normally from here on out." He looks up, the scarred, youthful face very serious. "I suspect that eventually, the way I am now will simply be the new normal." He rakes fingers back through his hair. "That I'll get used to... this."

"That this, that... the way you are now, will become just... how it is?" From the tone, Kavi already knows the question, but he asks it anyway.

Salem looks up. "Just how it is," he agrees.

Nodding, Kavi turns away. He scoops up remote as he passes the TV, and offers it to Salem. "I don't-- I'm not sure what to watch," he says as he settles in at the other end of the couch. "But if you... have preferences?"

Salem accepts the remote with a little smirk that, frankly, looks a wee bit like trouble. Especially with the scars and too-long, unkempt hair. "My preference is mainly black and white B-movies from the forties and fifties, but that's an acquired taste. Perhaps some Back to the Future? It /is/ October 2015, after all."

(Kavi, as it turns out, is not much into Back to the Future. After a few other experiments, the pair watch several episodes of the first season of Arrow instead.)