dear_mun | canon is Welcome to Night Vale

I take back what I said before. I've been out in this desert alone for so incredibly long, it's beginning to wear on me. Who am I? Am I the real Dana? Or am I the impostor, and the real me died from a stapler months ago? Or some time ago, anyway. Space-time is relative and I don't understand it and I just want to go home.

Worst yet, maybe I'm neither of those and just a figment of your imagination. Please tell me that I'm real, that I'm the real Dana to someone. Maybe I can't verify my identity, but if you say it, I can try to believe it, and try to drink to forget.

I know told Cecil I'm not afraid, but it's a lie, do you understand? My mother, my brother, they're at home and they don't have any idea of what's going on or what's coming. And I can't do anything either, at least not from here. So please, send me to one of those games I've heard about from the other people in here. I know I might not be able to see my family. That's okay. i just want to feel like I'm doing something, or that I'm helping Night Vale, or that I'm doing anything other than wandering in circles for days at a time, bereft of both water and the need to drink it.

Something is coming and I want to stop it. Please help me do that. Please.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

You aren't a figment. Perhaps a vehicle for a story, or the story itself, but your words definitely exist.

It's probably not a comfort, but you're not the only one experiencing this. Multiples seem to be... standard, here. I've spoken to two other versions of myself, and at least four Cecils. Whatever this place is, it seems designed to sustain different versions of the same life. Perhaps infinite versions.

Logically it will sustain you too.

[Carlos isn't even sure if this message will get through. But Dana sounds so lost, he's got to try. He hits "Send" and hopes his phone doesn't start bleeding.]

[Fortunately, the phone does not start bleeding, and she even replies.]

No, it is, actually. If it's possible that multiple identical versions of me can exist simultaneously, then none of us are any more or less real than the others. We all simply are, or are not, if our consciousness is a means to drive a narrative.

But I think if I'd like one part of myself to objectively exist, it would be my words. They're important to journalists, they're important to radio interns aspiring to be journalists and they're important to everyone, really. Words can change how we view things, and they're a lens that can change our very perception. They're--

I'm sorry. I'm just rambling at this point.

Thank you. I really appreciate your kind words, even if your existence, like mine, can't be proven.

[Carlos is astonished. Not only is there a reply, it's coherent, and on the same timeline! He sets aside the book he's wrestling with (no, really, it appears to be teething!) and quickly types -]

You're welcome. And by that same argument, my existence, and yours, can't be DISproven either.

Also, I saw your mother and brother in the grocery store last week. They appear to be doing no better or worse then anyone else in town.

Yeah. I guess so, huh?

That's good, it helps more than you know. At least if they're out there, I think I can continue on.

They're okay. I have to be okay for their sake.

As okay as any of us can be at the moment. Or any moment.

[For a moment, Carlos considers expanding on that - But how would knowing about Strex help her now? Instead, he decides to gather as much evidence as he can and keep her talking until the connection disappears. Also, he realizes Dana might not even know who she's communicating with. ]

This is Carlos by the way. Is there anything you want me to tell your family? Or Cecil?

Edited 2014-03-10 23:07 (UTC)

Oh, Dana. Reality is — difficult, even when we're comfortable with the combination of concepts and experiences we've agreed makes up that fragile idea. But (and I don't know if this helps, but I'll say it anyway; I'll say it, not knowing if it helps anyone but me:) you're real to me, Dana.

[She hangs her head. Sorry, Cecil, you weren't supposed to know she was afraid. An intern does what is asked of them without fear, chases down the truth of journalism even in the most unreasonable and potentially lethal conditions. She can't help but feel she's failed that expectation, a little, by being afraid and wanting to see her family again after so many months.]

[Even so, she cracks a smile while not looking at him and mutters a response.]

Thank you.

And you're real to me, despite knowing that I can't prove it. I believe you're real, and as such exercise control over my own subjective reality, as small as that may be.

...if you are real to me because I believe it to be, and I am real to you because you believe it to be, that may be all that matters. It's a circular logic, but I accept it.

canon is Welcome to Night Vale

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that username haha

I am VERY pleased with it >:D

more like mountain of LIES

Geology rocks. :D

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