postictal | ic inbox; entranceway

[Shit. No wonder Alex thought Sans was such a freak. And no wonder Tim was so adamant about removing himself from the equation. Not causing harm.]

but you've survived

so there must be some way to deal with it that isn't

alex's method

i didn't survive

i just hadn't gotten around to doing what i should've done all along

[Oh.]

you said that it spreads

like a human disease or something.

but if that's the case then wouldn't it have affected more than just a handful of people in your world?

[Or maybe it's more than just Tim and Alex and Jay? Maybe it's whole populations.]

yeah.
it would have.

[Do you have any idea?]

[Do you have any idea how it feels to know that you might have ruined the lives of countless, faceless people without any conceptualization of the possible scope? Do you know how impossible it is to track the entirety of those ripples? The people who watched the videos, the people they told, the people those people told?]

we have no idea how big its become

[No idea.]

[So he was wrong. It's not just a handful of people. How, though? Didn't Tim spend most of his time in a hospital? There's something here he's missing. And he's been leery of asking any questions, or knowing more than he should about any of this.]

jay mentioned an audience. is that what you mean?

he posted all of his findings online
all of them

[Every scrap of evidence. Every moment of time. Every record, every pill bottle, every fired gun, every shred of criminal activity.]

he had a fucking following

well shit.

[Holy shit, that explains why Jay and Alex carry a camera around all the time. That explains what Jay meant by "audience. So this is some kind of blog thing?]

[Jay went and put something with the potential to be toxically memetic on the internet, of all places.]

if that many people are affected

wouldn't you have heard about it already?

[And if nothing else...]

do you even know for sure that it started with you?

i dont know
i dont KNOW

theres no way to know for sure
that's always

[I have no way of knowing that for sure! That's always gonna be in the back of my mind. How am I supposed to handle that?]

but im the one thing they all have in common

i'm sorry

that's...a lot to handle

its why i should have listened
if i'm the source i just carried it here

that can't be the answer though

how the hell would you know

[Ouch.]

just

the answer can't be "someone needs to die"

why not
because it "can't" be?
because it'd be cruel or stupid or wrong?

that's how the world is
i don't know where you've been living this whole time

[This is a losing battle.]

maybe you're right

but that's not how wonderland works

you dying would solve nothing

you think i don't know that
the point was to just get myself out of the way for twenty four fucking hours
i knew it wasn't gonna be permanent

[He almost asks then what's the point? He stops himself. That's not what it's about. It's about--relief. Rest. Protecting someone for a little while. It's any number of reasons. It's not about some kind of logical, reasonable point.]

are you gonna try it again

why's it matter

we're friends.

[It should just be simple.]

i'd try to stop you

then what makes you think i'd tell you one way or another

tim i'm not

gonna be like breathing down your neck or whatever

waiting for you to run off again

i just

[Just what, Sans? How is any of this helping?]

i want to help if i can

do YOU tell people when you need help?

['Cause it sure didn't seem like that kind of straightforward admission is his M.O. Not when he's messaging Tim to ask about movies for fuck's sake, instead of what he so clearly actually wanted to talk about.]

[Yeesh. Tim's really going for the low blows today.]

i'm trying

but you're misdirecting

this isn't about me

[Can you blame him?]

[The guy barges into Tim's inbox asking shit about movies that he didn't really want to talk about and then follows that up with hey, just in case we didn't discuss the subject of your extreme suicide ideation enough, are you thinking of killing yourself again? I just want to know so that I can fucking stop you, 'cause I did just a stellar job of that last time.]

[Can you blame him?]

you literally told me it was about you
remember

you're the one who can't let go

[No. He really can't.]

[And yeah, he does remember that.]

that wasn't what i meant

you're trying to derail me. it's not gonna work

[He's the guy who stands between people and the end of things, because being an immovable object is all he's really good for.]

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