01 [Text]

[conflictresolution]

Has anyone been experiencing occasional instances of apparitions in this fog that has rolled in everywhere? I've found little evidence that this is a common occurrence, but I remain a new addition to this place.

[Silco had seen fog and plenty of smog. He knew the difference between thugs lurking in the obscurity and the phantoms out of the corner of one's eye. Time to see who was useful.]

Comments

[conflictresolution]

[Well, that's a respectable age.]

Children wet the bed. It's not their fault. How embarrassing all the same.

[shadowofpride]

Now you know why I didn't want to talk about it. What about you? Are you going to tell me what you saw?

[conflictresolution]

Hardly. As you said, the incident was a long time ago and thus has no bearing on who you are now.

A big hairy dog.

[shadowofpride]

That's true... [A kid probably would find those words reassuring. Pride on other hand, doesn't really care since he made it up.]

A dog? Is it your dog?

[conflictresolution]

No. I don't own pets.

[shadowofpride]

So why a dog? A friend's dog? Were you attacked by the dog?

[conflictresolution]

The city where I live is always haunted by an old dog these days.

[shadowofpride]

[....]

Oh! A metaphor! Something from your past constantly haunting you?

[conflictresolution]

Perhaps. It seems we both must endure the past in the fog.

[shadowofpride]

Maybe it's like that for everyone else. That's what you're looking into, right? If people see something in this fog.

[conflictresolution]

Indeed. If these ghosts are for viewed by all, perhaps there is opportunity to learn how to dispel this fog and its effects.

[shadowofpride]

To overcome the past! [The obvious answer anyway.] But, I don't have accidents anymore. Maybe that isn't it.

[conflictresolution]

We may not all plagued by the past.

Everyone has accidents. Your current ones are likely just different than wetting the bed.

[shadowofpride]

Yea, but I'm not haunted by those accidents.

If not the past, than whatever is bothering us. That is, I'm guessing no one has seen anything good in this fog.

[conflictresolution]

What are you haunted by? Mistakes made? Paths not taken?

No, I expect there will be many that will endure whatever the fog has in store for us.

[shadowofpride]

[Nothing. Homunculi are not troubled by the past or make mistakes.

Or so he would have believed, at a different time of his life. Either way, he still wouldn't tell a stranger what's really on his mind.]

I don't know if any of it is really serious enough, but I guess worrying my parents might leave me one day. They've been very nice to me since I came into their family, but sometimes I have bad dreams where I'm all by myself.

[conflictresolution]

Are you adopted?

[shadowofpride]

Yea. I don't have any reason to believe they would ever leave me. They give me anything I want and the best care I could ever ask for! But sometimes my head starts thinking about bad thoughts. Is it going to last forever? Will they just get tired of me one day?

Stuff like that.

[conflictresolution]

That is a common line of thought of children adopted into families. You do make it sound like your current family cares for you.

What are you going to do now that you aren't with them here?

[shadowofpride]

Find a way back to them of course! [Actually, he doesn't know himself. He knows things go very south back home, so...was there anything to come back to?]

I'm sure there's a way, we just need to solve this place.

Besides getting sentenced.

[conflictresolution]

And until then, you have someone to take care of you?

[He assumed that most children who weren't of the Undercity required more attention and care.]

[shadowofpride]

[There's a bit of a pause before a response is written.]

No, I don't. But that's ok. Everyone I've talked to have been helping me when they can. [Kid doesn't want to inconvenience others too much.]