synopsychic | Holiday Reminder

Hey guys! I started trying to figure out the date again and realized something important. Since we had that month of Liminal weirdness that changed the Jaunt schedule, it shooould be about the middle of February. As much as that means anything here. You know what that means!

...well if you're from modern Earth, you know what that means. If you're not, it's Valentine's Day! It's a holiday for spending time with someone you love and sharing candy with them. Also with friends and family but maybe that's just a Japan thing. Either way, we can do it here.

Anyone who wants to try and make some chocolate, come meet me in the Workshop kitchen. Or...if no one's interested, can I at least get someone who can make ingredients? I need to make a lot of chocolate this year...

Anyway, go out and celebrate with people you love! If you don't have someone you love, celebrate with your friends! If you don't have any friends, I'll be your friend! Let's give PSYCHE-chan one more celebration before we start the next round, okay?

((Did a physical mingle here as well!))

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I suspect he refers to several things - one of which was the binding properties of a marriage meant to be of convenience and farce.

[Alcuin's voice is very bland and neutral.]

There are other Travelers who begrudge her the jaunt wherein she first appeared as well.

... oh. Right. I didn't think about that.

[Now he feels embarrassed, seeing as he was also marked at the wedding.]

If I remember right... Doki Doki no Gakuen? What exactly happened there?

....Many things. I was infiltrating at the time, so you may wish to ask Naoto for a more unbiased accounting.

In barest facts, the Valentine celebration wherein participants bared their souls in confessions of love to other students was sabotaged so that the letters went to all the wrong people. The student government was, I believe, blackmailed, and several convoluted tales of love were forced upon infiltrators to be lived out. Travelers' relationships were damaged, and some have yet to recover. There, also, a marriage was performed between two Travelers, and while they wished to be married, I think the officiant was no less surprising to them than she who lead the other. School activites were sabotaged, intense rivalries and dramatics erupted at every turn. In the end, Naoto discovered the perpetrator of the difficulties.

A more candid assessment from me might read 'it was a blasphemous nightmare.'

Just to be clear, I'm not defending that or Lovers in general, but was that something under her control, or just how that world works? Because stressful as that is, that's kinda how a lot of trashier high school dramas work where I come from.

It was a school specifically tailored to those who were infected with the X-Pressure virus, resulting in the use of S. Tech. I could not say whether or not the circumstances dictated the difficulties. I have no personal experience with high school and cannot make the comparison. Others' observations will be of more use to you there.

For myself, the idea that one may force others not simply to notice one another, but to fall headlong in love with one another is the crux of the matter. As noted, I am not unbiased in my judgement.

Yeah, that's definitely bad. Was she doing that directly? I know there was some serious stuff in the Grid that was all her, but I'm under the impression that what happens on Jaunts isn't usually the Arcana doing stuff directly.

It was decidedly her jaunt. It was there she first manifested a physical form, it was there she marked her first Travelers. Every one of the infiltrators around whom the action swirled was forced into a troubled and complex romantic relationship to have their hearts toyed with. No, my lady, I cannot say if she hand-chose Travelers to fill those roles. But it was she who chose the scenario, and she who chose to put Travelers in that position. It was she who designated the roles Travelers were to fill, as I understand it. Anyone who was put into those places would have suffered the same fate.

Yeah. When it comes down to it, the scenarios we get stuck in are their responsibility regardless of how directly they control it. I gotta say I probably wouldn't have minded it after the fact, but I'm just...used to playing that kind of role? I've done it on TV about a million times, but being forced into it for real...I can understand why you'd hold it against her permanently, yeah.

The children of Elua have but a single holy tenant to follow, Lady Rise: Love as thou wilt.

[He has regained control of the animosity in his tone, gentled back to conversational levels, but his pronunciation of the last phrase is particularly sharply ennunciated.]

To force someone to break that tenant is blasphemy for D'Angelines. It goes against everything we believe. And to have that feeling linger on, where we cannot easily tell if it is of our own heart or that of our overlay? That is worse still, for it is a continual goad and a blind fork in our path.

I am sorry that Psyche and I cannot see eye to eye. Once I would have thought that she would have been one of the closest to my own way of life, but that is clearly not the case, and I fear I shall never be able to forgive her for what she has done.

Still, I appreciate the questions you ask and the time you take to seek to understand other viewpoints. I hope that it is clearer now.

Heh. I wasn't so good at listening to people until recently, and that's because I had a genius detective and the most patient man in existence to learn from. Not to mention a Persona whose whole job was just listening, for a little while. But you're welcome.

I think that the whole overlay thing is...really complicated. Being someone else always teaches me something, whether it's how to Sing and turn my legs into fins or something hidden about myself. I'm not the same person as they are, but there's usually some kind of connection, you know?

[Or maybe she just doesn't want to think too hard about what she's decided she and Tomi had in common regarding Naoto and Ammy, now that she's acted on it.]

Okay that... definitely sounds like a messed up nightmare. I'll have a word with Naoto about this as well, but your opinion of the Jaunt definitely counts a lot, Alcuin... and I'm sorry you needed to go through that.

[PSYCHE-chan, you may need to prepare yourself for a visitor.]

I wish I had a better report for you. I am at your disposal should you wish more details.

I hope I don't have to awaken your bad memories of the Jaunt more than this.

'Twas not your doing, Jean, do not worry. This time of year always has me remembering. I may as well turn it to good use. Perhaps I shall work on writing it down for the library records.

At least that way you wouldn't have to explain it every time someone asks.

Though this whole Valentine's thing reminded me that I... should still talk to you about something that happened quite a while back. I never had a chance to with everything happening so fast. So, uh, if you have time at some point, can we meet?

Certainly. My study is on the bedroom floor of the Workshop. Come meet me there whenever you like.

Holiday Reminder

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