M!A: Split Identities – Page 3

flyawaythief:

“A dirty old sheet is one thing I’m not going to scavenge. People only throw those out when they’re really messed up.” Shudder. “I could just take a fresh one, I guess. Would have to find a secluded place to hang that hammock… sleeping on the ground and on a bench doesn’t attract that much attention, but making a hammock, that’s an unusual sight around here.”

“Depends on the people throwing it away. I’m sure some people just wouldn’t want to deal with a bad stain on some. Though I suppose it’s true that’d be hard to find… And though I hesitate to suggest outright committing more crimes outside of gem searching, it’s less of a concern when you’re on hard times anyway and it’s necessary… If you do steal one, take it from a hotel or such. I know they aren’t the best of choices, but you could aim for an empty room. Those are usually washed, and it’d be better than taking it from a store that might have better security for thefts.

As far as attracting attention…”

“Well… true, it’d be noticed if you set it up in the park… But so long as there’s something to hang it from, there’s no reason something like that can’t be used where there are less prying eyes. Just because you’re on the run doesn’t mean you need to be tied down to how most might act in that circumstance. You’re free to move and be as creative as you want with how to act and live right now, after all. Things don’t have to be all bad, even if they’re a temporary problem. Could even consider yourself Aladdin right now~ Things seemed to work out for him.”

flyawaythief:

“I am always sore.” Streeeeetch. “These days I make a pillow out of my shirt and lie on that. It’s nice to be outside, though the sun just might bleach my hair at this rate. Can you imagine me with light hair?” A laugh.

“I’ll just go back to the park.”

The image of a fair haired magician did manage to make Kid chuckle lightly, then he tilted his head.

“We need to set up a day for you to relax at some point…Maybe get you another massage, even. Though… an idea for a bed right now. It shouldn’t be too hard to get a sheet or such, so I think a bed along the lines of a hammock would work better than just a shirt pillow… Get you off hard ground, in any case.”

flyawaythief:

“…… Mmm, so you’re now saying, in some really weird way, that if one of us dies then things just sorta keep going and nobody realizes that a Kaito sorta… vanished? Dropped dead? Bit the dust, all that? And that ‘cause I found my Pandora, I made all of us harder to kill?

“I don’t follow that last bit. I’m the only one who has immortality. Aaaaand even then it isn’t absolute. I have at least one death condition that I’m aware of. It’s not like I’m sharing my lifeforce or whatever with all the other Kaitos.

“Also, I don’t know why I did what I did. It just sort of happened. I didn’t mean it.”

“… Not really. People would notice if, say one of us died in front of them. And if no other Kaito is sharing the universe at the time, then it’d still be noticed in world as a whole. Just the crossing over makes it more likely for there to be more than one in the same dimension.

And you attaching Pandora to yourself didn’t change anything about the rest of us. When I say ‘collective Kaitos’, I mean if we think in terms of all Kaitos as a whole. Umm… a being made up of smaller versions of itself, if you will. Killing one of its parts would make it smaller, until you completely get rid of it.

The individual versions are us without dimension crossing. The larger being is all of us together with the crossing, in terms of existence. With us together, we’re harder to be destroyed.

You using Pandora strengthened a part of the being. Not all of it, just one unit. If we all did that, the being would be impossible to kill. Never said it’d be impossible to kill the ones who use Pandora, just makes it a lot harder. It’d still be best if none of us died normally, though, immortality stone or not…

The last part… If Pandora was gone from all the worlds, there wouldn’t be any dimension crossing. Period. And no chance for ‘immortality’. You choose not to destroy it, so people still can even if all the others might be destroyed. If we all do what we set out to, you’re the one that’d still be letting people talk to alternate selves, because Pandora would still exist. It’s not entirely a good or bad thing…”

flyawaythief:

“Woah, that’s a big wall of text!”

Pandora-Kid might have lost interest there.

“Maybe breathe once in awhile so you don’t pass out in front of me. Handler wants to ask if you can break up those walls so she can follow better! Her brain has trouble reading biiiig paragraphs.”

(Hush, you.)

“So… you’re saying there’s more than one Pandora, and it’s ripping up the universes?”

“Ah… sorry.” Tends to get out of hand with rambling when a train of though catches hold.

“That’s basically it, yeah. Though, not ripping in any ‘end of the world’ type of way, just enough for some interactions to keep the chain of potential immortals going.

Think of it like how you have infinite lives in some video games, but where you have to reset to a certain point because of it. Except, instead of one person having all those lives, it’s spread infinitely though the universes. Doesn’t do much for them separately, but if they can interact with each other, the collective ‘Kaitos’ could, say, have two or three ‘lives’ in one universe.

It wouldn’t care about the individuals though, so it’d be the death of one, but if there’s more than one Kaito in the universe that happened in, then to the world, he never died. One is dead, but there’s still an existence.

Finding and using Pandora increases the resistance to death for each individual Kaito, making it even harder to get rid of all of them, and thus, granting a sort of ‘immortality’ to us.

…But that might also mean that if we all destroyed the Pandoras, then the holes would close and we wouldn’t be able to see our other selves again. …So while what you did might not have been the best of plans, situations like that might at least let us continue talking like this. It just also makes it harder to entirely get rid of the problem of people looking for it.”

flyawaythief replied to your post: “…” “…” “Don’t see him around right now~” “So,…

Pandora-Kid blinks. “But I already found it. Is there just one?”

Aahh… The magician had been half-hoping this version of himself wouldn’t speak up… Does make it harder to defend his theory. But this is fine, he’ll keep building as needed.

“…No, or else the story around it wouldn’t be known in all of the universes. If were only kept in one, it’d be unfair and would give no benefit to disrupting the universe. Why have all the ones looking for it able to cross to meet other selves when what we’re looking for wouldn’t exist in other worlds? Then everyone would converge on one and royally screw up any reality that does exist as is.

And aside from that, it’s not as though you’re entirely immortal in all senses of the word. More likely the jewel containing Pandora is different for each of the universes, and possibly the effects as well, but all of them make it harder to be killed. So the more of us that find the gem in out universes, and if we chose to use it like you did, wouldn’t it be that much harder to get rid of us entirely? Basically, it adds another level of longevity to all of us as a person collectively if we find it ourselves. On our own in universes, even with parallel selves, it could be easy to kill us, but with both the interacting between universes and the possible added benefit of magical help in surviving from the gem itself, whoever searches and successfully manages to use Pandora for each of their selves really would be nigh unkillable.”

“…”

“…”

“Don’t see him around right now~”

“So, about this new parallel dimension theory. What if it’s related to Pandora? Like, because all of us Kaitos are working towards the same goal, for the most part, in finding it, it’s caused a big enough disturbance between the worlds to allow people to visit other selves. It already supposedly grants immortality, so I don’t think anything we try to come up with is too far fetched… And I know it’s silly to base things off of books, but has anyone heard of the Chrestomanci series? They have a character – or a title carrier, more like – that is known for being a skilled magic user who can appear in parallel worlds and has nine lives. Not quite immortality, but a scary coincidence nonetheless. They also tend to be the types who want to help solve problems of the magical kind.

I’m not saying what goes on between all of our dimensions is the same, since each of us individually has one life, and whatever allows us to meet ourselves doesn’t just apply to us Kaitos. But what if the ‘immortality’ someone might get is to have all those lives between universes connected similar to this, in that there’s more than one of them, endlessly rotating through the universes, so no one could really ‘die’? Would be hard to test, especially with some of the differences between some of the worlds throwing things off already… But either way, a gem that already bends the laws of nature might have a hand in putting easy-to-pass-through holes in the universe.”

“The first one was expected, but really, who sent that one? ~~Because we’re not the only split Kaito(u), technically.~~”

“Guess they just want to get him up to date and see how he takes everything that’s happened? Though, my biggest concern is for the other split one of us, considering…”

“Ah… right… he’s been doing a lot better, but this… …I’m not sure how he’ll take it…”

These two don’t really mind the small embarrassment of a protective father. Heck, just the other day, they wouldn’t have thought they’d have that. Even if he’s mad at the other, the thought of him possibly not approving had been a concern, when the collective Kais though about it. Wouldn’t have changed how he felt, but it was nice to know the decision on who he picked was supported.

…

“…But there’s definitely going to be some time before we’ll bring up Sugaru and Spider…”

“Yeah, that’s the harder part. Since it’s… more than a little strange. Then again, what isn’t nowadays?”

“True… Especially just with the fact I’m talking to myself more than usual right now… Other universe selves are one thing, but… Oh, hey, speaking of-”

“No. Your parallel dimension talking tends to give people a headache to think about. Don’t start.”

That awkward realisation that he might have to explain that he’s dating a detective, who has a part of him also in love with the assassin who’s tried to kill Kid, to his father… Isn’t that going to be a fun topic…

oldmxn:

“But I what?” Toichi asked, the smile on his face not leaving at all when Kaito pinched his face. The adult understood the male’s action very well. After being quiet for a minute or two his facial expression turned a bit more serious, his eyebrows furrowed. "I am not aware of the things you’ve been through ever since what happend but… I apologize for everything.“ It wouldn’t surprise him if Kaito hated him– but the least he could do was apologize.

The magician drew his hand back, a touch shakily.

That… that was real skin. Not a mask, no prosthetics, even the pencil mustache looked too real and attached to be fake… Not to mention that voice… Guess he should be glad for shock, because the teen felt so many various emotions right now, they would have overwhelmed him. However, two that were coming forward were confusion and anger…

“I thought you were dead!” He spat, fingers that had touched the other’s face clenching into a fist that fell to his side, still trembling. A faint happiness at seeing, really seeing his father again might be there as well, but it lost out to the sheer hurt and betrayal cutting him right now.

“It’s been eight. Years. Where have you been!? Why are you back now? Even if you haven’t been in touch here, Kid made international news, how could you not-?”

Kaito’s voice started to get affected as well and he got choked up. An apology? That was all he had to say for everything the teen’s had to go through? He’s nearly been killed on multiple occasions, had hell to deal with with robots and classmates and police, lying to everyone he cared about, been responsible for someone’s death…

Like hell would an apology after showing up out of the blue would be enough to cover for all of that.