Matters of Black and White

by **Will Stanton** » Fri Jan 17, 2020 11:37 pm

"Well, then maybe it's just the wolf coming into it's own, more," Will shrugged. "Progress doesn't always go in the direction one may have hoped."

by **Samantha McManus** » Fri Jan 17, 2020 11:39 pm

"I could be wrong," she admits. "Just... we're both kind of cooling off after this morning. It wasn't a fight or anything, but..."

by **Will Stanton** » Fri Jan 17, 2020 11:49 pm

"But...she was disturbed? Distant? Pissy?"

by **Samantha McManus** » Fri Jan 17, 2020 11:51 pm

"We just couldn't really... talk about what happened."

by **Will Stanton** » Fri Jan 17, 2020 11:54 pm

"Was she embarrassed about her other half? Some people can be pretty slow at accepting weird sides of their personality..."

by **Samantha McManus** » Fri Jan 17, 2020 11:56 pm

"A lot of it she seemed almost confused about. She couldn't find words for much."

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 12:00 am

"Maybe she should talk to Isolde? She's had more experience with the whole 'being a wolf' thing. Tereza's still quite new at this."

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 12:02 am

"I don't... much like Isolde," she sighs.

"I know she's getting better, but that doesn't mean I have to like her."

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 12:04 am

"Doesn't at all, no. I just don't have a ton of werewolves on speed dial."

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 12:45 am

"I guess I could bring it up. She tolerates Isolde a lot better than I do."

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 12:47 am

"I just...I can only imagine what that kind of change does to a person, you know?

It's not normal. Unlike us," he joked.

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 12:53 am

"Says the man whose head I had to glue back together."

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 1:20 am

"No harm in popping open the hood now and again; getting your fingers dirty."

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 1:50 am

"Speaking of, how've you been since?"

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 3:07 am

Will drummed his fingers a little bit.

"I've been...hanging in there.

This time was a little different; two sets of memories to kind of...." he started, and trailed off again.

"It was a little different. I've been just kind of sitting around and letting myself....readapt, to a certain extent. Mostly...keeping to myself. Just the one of me," he said, deflecting with a joke. "So not quite the same boat, there."

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 3:09 am

"You can ask for help if you're having a rough time of it, you know."

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 3:14 am

"Mmm."

He paused.

"No, I shouldn't leave it at that. I'm...difficult to handle. At the best of times. And I know that. And I'm getting through it, slowly and quietly. This isn't my first rodeo, or mental blowout, for that matter."

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 3:21 am

"I've just dumped entirely too much information on my personal life on you," he points out.

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 3:25 am

"Oh, I figured you just wanted to see people squirm when they had that mental image," Will counted back, joking in a fairly baldfaced, obvious and poorly constructed attempt of deflecting the topic.

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 3:29 am

"Point being, I know I'm a lot."

"I can take some in the opposite direction."

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 3:42 am

"It's just...

...well, I have a whole support system back home. Like, of over a dozen people. Family. Professional help. Colleagues and allies. And there's a whole, you know, process to coping with things. To help prevent, uh, breakdowns of this magnitude. It's a trial and error process figuring out how to keep everything running over here, that's all.

I'm a high-maintenance diva," he said, with an abashed smile that didn't really make it past his lips. "So I do get, to a certain extent, why Tereza would be balking a little bit with your, you know. Your stuff. It's easy to get cold feet."

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 3:44 am

"So tell me what's wrong," she says simply.

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:08 am

"Sam, everything's wrong," Will said, with a disbelieving chuckle. "Everything. And everyone. It's all just ever so slightly off. It's like if the Mandela effect was real, and not some bullshit made up by paranormal charlatans. You're lighting up clubs with wolves; Miriam's mostly not killing people, ASHLIE...ASHLIE's gone," he said, his voice breaking just for a moment. "Everything, everything is five degrees off center. Everything. And every way I know to cope with things, when they get too tough to handle...they're gone, too. They don't work over here, because the people are different."

He closed his eyes and took a breath. "But I'm alive. And I'm here. And Robin's here, too. And there's an end, of a sorts, in sight. And I'll make it through to the end, someway, somehow."

His fingers idly danced over the keys again.

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:10 am

"Is this your way of making the problem too big to ask for help?"

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:16 am

Will sighed. "I'm sorry, Sam; I don't mean to dump on you like that. I just need to vent and cool off, sometimes. You know how it is."

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:17 am

"You do. I'm not denying that."

"But you just made the problem the world, and I'm asking about you."

"You may not have everyone you're used to, but I'm still your friend, aye?"

"Not your goddess. You'll see her in awhile. Your friend."

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:18 am

"You are, aye. And I appreciate it," he nodded. "I'm just sorry I don't have a great answer to your problem."

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:20 am

"Aye, well, the world's not ending, is it? We're not even breaking up."

"You're allowed to need some support too."

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:23 am

"Yeah, but I'm an old cranky man, and you have to give us old timers some extra leeway for complaining about things," he joked.

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:24 am

"Complaining's one thing. Hurting's another."

"And you're hurting."

"I may not have designed what's in that head of yours, but I can help keep it running."

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:31 am

"And you did a wonderful job when you poked around in there. Back to one person! Almost no personality disorders to speak of. Well, except for the usual ones," Will joked.

"I get why you stayed away for a while afterwards. It's not a pretty picture in there, from what I've been told. Hell, even Robin kept her distance, and I never saw Tosh before he was kidnapped.

I be strange," he said, with an abashed smile. "And I be high maintenance. When I'm back home, I try to get smaller tune-ups on a more regular basis, as it were. I let it build up over here."

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:34 am

"So let's not, aye?"

"Can we make it that simple? Let's not do that."

"Let's not wait until you're two people. Or fifty. Or you're five hundred feet tall climbing the Shard."

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:37 am

"Alright, it's a deal. I'll try to keep closer tabs on that from here on out, and come up with something to keep me pointed in the general direction of sanity," he said, vaguely.

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:39 am

"You know you really didn't like it when we had to freeze-dry you and vacuum you up."

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:44 am

"I mean, don't knock it till you've tried it," he joked. Or 'joked', depending on your point of view and degree of telepathic invasiveness.

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:45 am

"I'm saying you're of a sort that makes interventions often take an extreme form."

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:47 am

"You're saying I'm a pain in the ass," Will laughed. "And you're not wrong, per se."

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:54 am

"At this point I'm leaning towards getting Robin to make sure you do it."

by **Will Stanton** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:56 am

"I'm sure she's already keeping an eye on me. Heck, she was here for, what, a couple weeks before she poked you into action?

To be fair, she may just have wanted to steal Jez and Katarina's leftover pizza. Hard to tell with her."

by **Samantha McManus** » Sat Jan 18, 2020 4:57 am

"So you're fine with me rolling up and saying 'Hey Robin, is your dad alright, or should we Clockwork Orange him some more?'"

[Plot] Matters of Black and White

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