[He hates Sherlock, he hates talking to him, and he hates that a jackass like him would probably turn him away for petty asshole reasons. It's why he's put off talking to him about this for as long as he has. But since regaining his memories, and particularly since his talk with Steph, he's been left wondering about something. While his shift in priorities is largely set, it can't hurt to ask in case there's extra info he's missing. Hopefully not, anyway.]
[He notes the correct grammar right away, meaning this is a far more serious question than should be asked to him. Something regarding John, perhaps, as he is their common point of contact.]
[At least he's not turning him away. The guess isn't wrong, either.]
When you died back on 203 you went back to your world like Watson did, right? What I want to know is what point in time you reached compared to him. Was it before, after, or about the same point in time? I might have more to ask depending what your answer is.
He told me the general situation he's in at the end there and it sounds like nothing good. I don't know what he's told you, and I also don't want to get into some drawn out conversation with him about why I'm asking when he's got enough problems on his own.
You don't give a shit about my issues unless you can use them someway, so I figure I can ask you what I need, get an answer if you aren't in full jackass mode, and adjust my priorities depending on the answer.
[All of that seems fair, and Sherlock is a slightly more tolerant man than he had been in the past. He's not about to start talking through what has happened, but a simple date calculation is easy enough to provide.]
I would estimate a difference of twenty four hours at the most, more likely closer to sixteen, with John the further forward.
[It's a lot better than he expected as an answer.]
Thanks.
[He considers a little. Sherlock is still behind Watson, so he can't tell him as much as he'd like, but it's a small enough gap that it may still be worth asking.]
Can I ask your personal opinion on how things were going then? I'm not asking details if you don't want to give them, and I know a little from Watson already. What I want to know is
uh
This is pretty colloquial but it gets the point across. How much were things going to shit? If at all, in your view. I'm not asking out of sentiment for you and I already know his problems. This is for temporal mechanics.
Explain how it is relevant to your temporal mechanics, and perhaps I will explain.
[He's curious, he has little to do with time travel as a concept, and there has to be a concrete reason why Davesprite is asking all this. And why he's asking now.]
Alright. In my world I was a time traveler. One of the basic parts of the way time works there is that time has to go a certain, specific way, or else the timeline splits into a doomed alternate. When I say doomed, I mean basically everyone is ultimately fated to die. Not always immediately, but eventually it's bound to happen because reality won't allow time paradoxes to persist. There's more reason it works that way because basically everything runs on a series of complicated, interlinked, stable time loops, but the premise is still the same. Fail to perform what the alpha timeline requires, and it's doomed.
Relevant experience: I spent some number of months in a doomed timeline before I could go back and fix what went wrong.
I do know that time doesn't work the same in every world because I've talked to other time travelers, but the way they put it doesn't exactly inspire confidence. Time fucks people up if it gets changed. It can be fought, but not easily.
You and Watson came from different points of your world's timeline when you showed up here. Watson said he had no memory or sign of being in Norfinbury when he went back, and he had five years, but by the end his wife was dead and he said you were dying too. The consequences of a doomed timeline don't always show up immediately. Jade's here and she's from a timeline where something happened three years ago that had to be fixed.
So what I'm trying to guess, to be perfectly honest, is how fucked are we? Can we actually go back after this without everything going to hell, or should we change our goals to something centered just on this world and its problems?
[That's actually an interesting conundrum, and one that Sherlock immediately finds himself responding to. It's not necessarily a positive, especially if it means that their absences automatically cause a timeline split wherein they are the anomalies, but it does make sense.]
It has potential merit as a theory.
[Probably not what Davesprite wants to hear.]
However, John is being overly dramatic, I was not dying.
[Ah, blessed ability to lie, thank goodness it's come back.]
[In the strangest way, it helps to have it acknowledged as plausible. Time working this way has shaped his existence for over three years now in one way or another, if not for his whole life considering the number of time loops him existing relies upon in the first place. The code and knowledge placed in him as a sprite expects time to work a certain way. And while he can ignore that urge when he wants to, it feels better for it to be taken as given. Like flowing with the current, instead of fighting against it.]
[It doesn't make the thought of being doomed any easier to swallow, but that's been on his mind as a possibility since the day he arrived.]
You sure? You said you're up to a whole day behind him. A lot can happen in that time, and I don't think he had any reason to be dramatic to me when he was busy thinking I wasn't real.
If he is dying then it's by design at Culverton's hands, and John will show up to save him. He knows it, the evidence will be within his cane, Mary is not wrong. Which means that, technically, he's in no real danger.]
Depends on what signs you can look at. I'm going to assume time is pretty linear in your universe, right? So probably not until you guys start dying.
The first time I was in one there were signs earlier and other sources we could check with, basically. The second time it took like three years, and I didn't know anything bad had happened until I showed up and was told about it. I don't know how that relates to your universe or if you were even technically in the same timeline anymore. You lacking memories of Norfinbury makes it harder to figure out, you know? I'm going off best guesses and anecdotes.
Hard to tell. There were only a handful of people still alive where I'm from, and I'm a floating paradox who lived to tell the tale twice over, if you count a future thing that hasn't happened to me yet. Paradox space has stricter purposes than a more linear universe would have too, probably. You're two people out of billions with no time loops to fuck up.
Precisely. The deaths of one or two people out of billions does not prove anything, especially when many hundreds die each day of natural causes that certainly have nothing to do with the flow of time.
[Hmm. Maybe that should comfort him when he looks at it from that angle. He can't tell or know for certain, but...]
It's something I can't keep myself from thinking about even then. Time traveler, you know? I guess we'll see one way or the other at the end of this, if we get the option to go back on our own.
[If he were John then he would say something akin to not giving up hope, or some other such sentimental nonsense. He's not John, and he's not a fool, but he's not quite the man he used to be either.]
And yet you've been a dick to me for less before. Not going to attack it for being unprovable? Not going to say I'm a dumbass for applying something I know doesn't apply the same way to every universe to one where time travelers aren't a thing? I'm not complaining, but you can't blame me for being surprised, dude.
Obviously you are complaining, and it's getting dull. Your attempt to continue to validate your self worth through assurance that your contributions are not wholly useless demeans your overall position.
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@featherydouche; text; morning 213
I want to ask a question.
[Seriously enough to merit the proper grammar.]
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I have fifteen minutes.
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When you died back on 203 you went back to your world like Watson did, right? What I want to know is what point in time you reached compared to him. Was it before, after, or about the same point in time? I might have more to ask depending what your answer is.
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Why aren't you asking John?
[He's not refusing to answer, he just wants to know.]
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You don't give a shit about my issues unless you can use them someway, so I figure I can ask you what I need, get an answer if you aren't in full jackass mode, and adjust my priorities depending on the answer.
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I would estimate a difference of twenty four hours at the most, more likely closer to sixteen, with John the further forward.
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Thanks.
[He considers a little. Sherlock is still behind Watson, so he can't tell him as much as he'd like, but it's a small enough gap that it may still be worth asking.]
Can I ask your personal opinion on how things were going then? I'm not asking details if you don't want to give them, and I know a little from Watson already. What I want to know is
uh
This is pretty colloquial but it gets the point across. How much were things going to shit? If at all, in your view. I'm not asking out of sentiment for you and I already know his problems. This is for temporal mechanics.
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[He's curious, he has little to do with time travel as a concept, and there has to be a concrete reason why Davesprite is asking all this. And why he's asking now.]
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Relevant experience: I spent some number of months in a doomed timeline before I could go back and fix what went wrong.
I do know that time doesn't work the same in every world because I've talked to other time travelers, but the way they put it doesn't exactly inspire confidence. Time fucks people up if it gets changed. It can be fought, but not easily.
You and Watson came from different points of your world's timeline when you showed up here. Watson said he had no memory or sign of being in Norfinbury when he went back, and he had five years, but by the end his wife was dead and he said you were dying too. The consequences of a doomed timeline don't always show up immediately. Jade's here and she's from a timeline where something happened three years ago that had to be fixed.
So what I'm trying to guess, to be perfectly honest, is how fucked are we? Can we actually go back after this without everything going to hell, or should we change our goals to something centered just on this world and its problems?
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It has potential merit as a theory.
[Probably not what Davesprite wants to hear.]
However, John is being overly dramatic, I was not dying.
[Ah, blessed ability to lie, thank goodness it's come back.]
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[It doesn't make the thought of being doomed any easier to swallow, but that's been on his mind as a possibility since the day he arrived.]
You sure? You said you're up to a whole day behind him. A lot can happen in that time, and I don't think he had any reason to be dramatic to me when he was busy thinking I wasn't real.
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[Not even slightly.
If he is dying then it's by design at Culverton's hands, and John will show up to save him. He knows it, the evidence will be within his cane, Mary is not wrong. Which means that, technically, he's in no real danger.]
How would a 'doomed timeline' be identified?
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The first time I was in one there were signs earlier and other sources we could check with, basically. The second time it took like three years, and I didn't know anything bad had happened until I showed up and was told about it. I don't know how that relates to your universe or if you were even technically in the same timeline anymore. You lacking memories of Norfinbury makes it harder to figure out, you know? I'm going off best guesses and anecdotes.
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If the timeline had become doomed, would it cause the deaths of every occupant or only the ones who had caused the 'split'?
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[Hmm. Maybe that should comfort him when he looks at it from that angle. He can't tell or know for certain, but...]
It's something I can't keep myself from thinking about even then. Time traveler, you know? I guess we'll see one way or the other at the end of this, if we get the option to go back on our own.
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If nothing else, your theory should prove useful.
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[It's so out of the ordinary he drops the caps and punctuation without thinking about.]
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[Fixing that for you.]
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So not completely off. Point stands, what happened? You're about the last person I expected to say my theory has merit.
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2 out of 5 stars
your burns need work
anyway if were done ive got travel to do
later holmes