Sam’s time with Dan seemed to flow much faster than it did yesterday, the advantage of already being familiar with the subject of study. Dan decided to start the day with tracing practice, going over the same training that they did for most of yesterday, but then, after an hour or so, moving on to Sam tracing only by controlling the magic that was already in his pathways. Figuring out how to stop drawing from the core took another hour all by itself. And once that was done, he was dismayed to discover that his success yesterday in moving the magic from one point in his body to the other proved to be a fraud because without his core in action, barely any energy made it to the new destination.
Not all was doom and gloom, though. He was able to take comfort in the fact that his skills were definitely improving, because by the time lunch came around, he was able to move much more of the energy through his body. Still a minuscule amount, but a great improvement nonetheless. After returning from lunch, they went back to Dan’s office and Sam was once again trying to grab the invisible energy all around him into his body. It proved easier than it was back in the morning, probably because Sam was much more awake. And while Sam didn’t practice anything new gathering-wise today, he still made plenty of mistakes with the pre-basic practice for Dan to feel honest about earning his living. The lesson went longer than usual today, as Sam didn’t have anything else planned for the evening besides meeting with Sarah, so he only stepped out of the office at around eight.
He messaged Sarah to tell her that he was finished with his lesson and she wrote back that she’ll go grab them some mess hall food. As well as buy popcorn and some sweets to truly celebrate the occasion. Meanwhile, she wrote, Sam was to finish choosing a movie and set it all up so that they could begin watching it the minute she got to his room. Some time later, she was knocking on his door with her elbow, her hands otherwise occupied with the great amount of gifts that she came bearing.
“Sorry.” She smiled in embarrassment. “I don’t usually let myself eat this kind of stuff, so I got carried away a little.”
Sam ushered her in and helped her set the food on the table. “It’s fine, just make sure to take everything we haven’t eaten with you when you leave, cause I will surely get carried away more than a little if left with the temptations of them. And unlike you, I’m not in great shape and have to pay much more attention to my diet.”
“Does that mean that you’re not going to eat any of the junk food?” Sarah turned crestfallen.
“Hell no! As long as the movie’s playing, you’re going to have to pry those candies from my cold, magnificently textured hands.”
“Magnificently textured?”
“Yes. My hands are the only part of my body that I am actually proud of. I’ve got the smoothest skin of the palms. Just feel it.”
“Oh yeah, it is pretty nice. But it’s almost the same as mine, I’d say.”
“Yeah, but that’s because you are a Taken. I was this way even before I was changed for the better. In fact, the palm skin is probably the only thing that didn’t change, being perfect as it was. Except the cold, obviously. They changed that. I used to get very cold fingers, even in warm weather. And don’t even get me started on my toes. But other than that, my hands were perfect!”
“I’m sure of it. So what movie are we going to watch?”
“I ended up picking Clue. Seemed British enough.”
“Oh! I love clue!”
“OK. So we’re not watching Clue.”
“No! C’mon,.” She playfully shook him. “I want to watch Clue. I haven’t seen it in ages. Not before I was taken.”
“Fine, fine. We’ll watch the stupid classic.” He started the movie and even before the first guest arrived, they were already eating and chatting.
“So how did it go with Dan?” Sarah asked.
“Nothing to complain about. At least nothing that I haven’t already complained about. I keep hoping for a switch to flip somewhere and signal me starting to catch up with you guys. But I guess that it’s way too much to ask for after just two days.”
“Way too much. But you’re smart, you’ll figure things out in no time. And before you know it, you’ll have the same knowledge base as us, just a couple of levels behind. Levels that you’re going to make up eventually, anyway. So nothing to worry about, right?”
“Sure, nothing besides the thoughts of G.I. Jane somewhere out in the front, and she’s going to die because by the time I meet up with her, I’ll only be level 3 and thus not strong enough to save her.”
“If you think like that, then you might as well just lose all motivation outright. Because even if you were the strongest Chosen in the Web, there ain’t no chance that you could save everyone.”
“That’s the hope, yeah.”
“Sam!”
“You set me up for that.”
“You set yourself up. Stop worrying about the people who are currently fighting to maintain the front because, with or without you, most of them are going to end up just fine. And those that won’t, aren’t your responsibility. Focus on yourself for a change.”
“I’m only focused on myself. I don’t want those people to die because it would make me feel bad. Not because I actually care about them.”
“Sure… So what did you actually do with Dan?”
Sam summed up his lessons for her. “All in all, it was pretty much just like yesterday. Which is pretty nice when I think about it. Not learning something new every day for a change. Not being scared by the magnitude of my meta-ignorance. What about you?”
“I had Intermediate Patterns after breakfast, then Medical Patterns followed by Medical Tracing after lunch. Managed to work out early, thanks to Dan keeping you long, so didn’t even have to skip that.”
“Oh, speaking of workouts: I have spear lessons tomorrow morning and I don’t know if I’ll be recovered enough to exercise in the evening as well. So I might have to bounce on that.”
“You’ll be fine, I’m sure of it.”
“I wish I was feeling the same amount of confidence in myself that you seem to have in me, but we’ll see. I’ll try not to psyche myself out of it too much. Oh, did you know that the two Rulers that are switching with Esther and that other one are apparently racists? Felix and Yvessa seemed to think that they’ll probably want to meet up with me when they get here.”
“Yeah, I know them. About them. Luckily, I managed to avoid having to meet them so far. Thanks in large part to Maurice. They seem to pop up every time there’s a promising young Terran going through the academies. Looking to get their claws into them, I’m sure. But if you don’t want to meet them, you don’t have to. It’s not like they can order you around. Not while you’re still a cadet, at least.”
“Probably not even after because I already have Farris’s claws deep in me. Apparently, he told everyone at his meeting with the general staff all about his new mentee.”
“Oooh! That’s so cute! He’s like your biggest fanboy.”
Sam had to shudder at that. “Dan said that his patronage of me might get the academy to put even more effort into me than they were planning. Which will hopefully prove to be a good outcome, if it is indeed true.”
“I’m sure that it is. Farris saw something special in you and you don’t doubt the judgment of someone like him. Even if he turned out to be a little more capricious than I expected. Only good things can come of this. The only bad thing is that you’ll probably have a lot of the teachers at your beck and call, ready to help you with anything you need, so your friends won’t be your first choice when you need help with your studies.”
“And that’s a bad thing, how?”
Sarah shrugged. “Helping your friends and being helped by them makes the both of you feel good.”
On a dime, Sam decided to take the plunge. “And what if your friends are already out of sorts trying to deal with their own stuff? Stuff that you can’t help them with? Should you still go to them for help despite them struggling as it is? That doesn’t sound to me like what you should be doing to a friend.”
“Well, I don’t think any of your friends are in such a situation, so that’s a moot point. Anyway, even if you ask any of us for a whole week dedicated just to helping you out, we’ll still be able to manage our own studies just fine.”
“Surely not all of my friends, though? Felix? Yeah, probably. He’s a smart kid, will just have to take a break from ‘dating’ in order to catch up. Yvessa? Sure. She’s got a got a good head on her shoulders, and a wider educational background than any of us. But all of my friends? Tsk, I’m not so sure about that.”
“Are you trying to hint that it’s me that won’t be able to manage helping you out?”
“Well, I only met one other person my age so far, and I don’t consider Carl Pines my friend.”
“When did you meet Carl Pines?”
“Didn’t I tell you? It was just after I finished working out—Doesn’t matter, it’s you we’re talking about.”
“What are we talking about regarding me, then?”
“I don’t know? How about the fact that pretty much everyone I met thinks that you’ve been spreading yourself too thin with your studies? And that was before I came into the picture. God knows just how far you’ve already fallen behind having to babysit me for the last week.”
“Then I’m sure god can tell you that I’m doing just fine with my training. Just as I was a week ago.”
“Look, I’m not trying to pass judgment on your decision to study every subject taught here. Sure, I don’t agree with it, but what do I know? You do you. After all, for most of human history, our greatest thinkers were those that spread their knowledge and studies into many different fields. And if you want to try and be the modern day Leibniz, I’m not going to stop you. Quite the opposite. I’ll give you all the help I can.
“Except, you’re not going to accept my help now, are you? Oh, other people are fine, I’m sure. Be they friends, parental figures or actual teachers. But not me, right? Because, unlike you, I need all the help I can get, and I don’t have time to waste by helping you with something. But you, on the other hand, have all the time in the world to help me. Be it as a teacher, as a friend, as a fitness-trainer, or as a personal shopper. I need your time more than you need it, so even if helping me out ends up costing you in this aspect or that, it’s a worthwhile trade at the end of the day.”
Sarah wasn’t looking at him, pointedly staring at the screen instead. But Sam could see that her breathing had quickened, and the many kernels missed by her grasping hand told him that she was most certainly not enthralled by the movie. “I really love this movie,” she finally said. “We used to watch it at least once a year, the entire family together. Must have been more than nine years since I last saw it because Maurice wasn’t a big film guy and I didn’t feel like watching it alone.”
Sam waited for her to continue, but as the minutes passed, he was forced to speak up once more. “So are you mad that I’m ruining this experience for you?”
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
“Don’t be an idiot. I’m sitting with someone from back on Earth, watching one of my favorite movies and snacking to my heart’s content. Nothing you might say is going to make me feel bad about tonight. Even if you spent the entire movie telling me all about your de Gaulle x Churchill fanfic.”
Gasp! “How do you know about those? I haven’t told anyone. And I destroyed all copies that I didn’t send out to the British Museum.”
Sarah laughed. “See… Why can’t we just talk like that for the rest of the evening? Just shooting the crap like we’re on a sitcom, trying to make the people at home laugh.”
“Because we promised to each other yesterday to have this talk? Because, hopefully, we’re both going to feel better about ourselves and each other at the end of it? Because the most highly rated sitcom episodes are never the funny ones?”
Another laugh, less mirthful this time. “A talk. You make it sound like we’re a middle-aged empty nest couple and our marriage is on the fritz.”
“Yeah… I don’t think that I ever had a talk with anyone that wasn’t family before. But we are sort of family now, aren’t we? Brought together due to circumstances beyond our control, with a shared history that only we can understand. It makes sense that our relationship, newly formed as it is, would be both important enough and complex enough to warrant us having to sit down and talk about it.”
“Ugh. What is there to talk about, even?”
“How about the fact that you’re angry at me for worrying about how the things I say and do make you feel?”
“What? I’m not angry at you for that.”
“Really? So there’s nothing that you want to say to me if I told you that during yesterday’s breakfast I spent a large amount of time watching what I say because I didn’t want you to think that I still doubt the existence of this reality? Or that I kept thinking how awful it must be for you to feel so concerned and responsible for me all the time, and what can I do to make you stop that? Doesn’t make you feel even a bit mad?”
“N… no, no.”
“OK. Then I guess that means that I can just come out and say what I’m thinking and fear no retribution from you, right? It’s not going to make you feel mad, or sad, or like a failure, right? Nothing of that sort?” Sarah shrugged and took her second candy bar in a row. “Great, alright then. So here it is:
“Dear Sarah, I think that you are overworrying about me, to your own detriment. Both because the time you spend with me, time that you don’t necessarily have to, cuts into your already meagre study time. But mainly because I don’t won’t you to feel bad with yourself because of me. Which is what happened yesterday when you started worrying that I was thinking that this world wasn’t real. Because you remembered that when we first met, I raised those very same doubts to you. So then you were afraid that you haven’t done enough to squash those errant thoughts from my mind. Ergo, you failed in your duty towards me. And even now, you’re feeling bad because you want to argue with me, but you don’t want to get mad at me. You’re caught between wanting to treat me with kid-gloves to wanting to explain to me why you have to treat me with kid-gloves.”
“I don’t think that,” Sarah said.
“Alright then, so what do you think?”
“I think that I am spending just the right amount of time with you. Whether it is to help you, because I want to, or because I believe that you want me to. And that while it has caused me to fall behind on some of my studies, that’s nothing that I can’t make up just fine. Especially since your arrival has sped up Dan’s return and opened him once again for helping me.”
“Sure, but that’s a factual argument. We can debate until tomorrow, but neither of us is going to be convinced until we see empirical evidence that the other is right. And since it’s only been a week since I got here, I doubt there’s much data from which we can extrapolate an answer to just how much your studies have been affected. So I’m willing to concede this point. I’d love it if you felt more comfortable just leaving me be when you have other things that you need to do. But I’ll also admit that you have been getting better in this aspect, and that there have been times already when you opted to go to your lessons instead of spending time with me.
“But what about the other thing? How do you feel about me saying that you’re all up in your head with unfounded worries about me? That you shouldn’t feel this huge burden of responsibility for me? So much that me telling a stupid joke about life as a book would make you feel so bad? Because you haven’t tried to argue that it didn’t make you feel awful.”
“Fine!” Sarah said. “You’re right. It did make me feel like shit. And later, hearing you say that you were worried about me and how what you said might’ve affect me, made me feel even worse. Now, not only was I feeling bad because of you, I was also feeling bad because of feeling bad. But so what?! Why is that such a bad thing? You joke around all the time about how you feel like shit and I’m pretty fucking sure that no matter how bad I’m feeling due to worrying about you, you still felt worse. Because obviously you are. I’ve been where you are right now and I know what you’re going through. So what’s so bad about having me constantly worried about you? That’s my choice. That’s what’s going to make me happy at the end of the day. And in ten years, I won’t remember anything about feeling bad from worry, but you might positively remember something that I did because I was feeling that way. Isn’t that a worthy trade?”
Sam shook his head. “Fuck no. First of all, utilitarianism of happiness doesn’t work like that. It’s not how you feel in ten years’ time, it’s how you feel all throughout your life that should count. It’s like that goddamn stupid time value of money thing: happiness has an effect both in the present and in your future, but your happiness in the present counts more than it does in the future. So if you want to maximize happiness, you need to prioritize happiness in the present over happiness in the future if they are equal in amount. Second of all, utilitarianism is stupid. You can’t measure happiness. And lastly, you can’t be sure about any of the conjectures that you’ve made. What if I actually suffer as a result of your behavior, not because of your actions, of course, but due to feeling bad for you? Or what if you don’t forget how you feel nowadays? Who’s to say that this won’t develop into some sort of obsession for you, and that you won’t always be wondering if you could have done more to help me out?”
“So what you’re saying I should do is just stop giving a crap about you, then? ‘Oh, here’s Sam, the only person who knows what I went through, and that I can comfortably hold a conversation with because we’re the same age. I wonder how he’s dealing with it all? You know what? On second thought, I don’t really care. Worrying about another human being will just make me sad. Better yet, just go back to training.’ Do you realize how stupid that sounds?”
“I didn’t mean that you need to go that far. But there’s plenty of room to maneuver between not giving a shit about a person, especially a person who you deeply want to care about. And being so stressed about that person’s wellbeing that you start worrying that you’ve majorly fucked up helping him adjust because he made a stupid joke.” He sighed. “I just wish that you would act a little more rational when it comes to me; Yes, you’re not treating me like you would Felix, or Yvessa, or any other person. That’s OK, I understand it, and it makes total sense. But you’re also not treating me as you’re treating yourself, despite us going through the same thing.”
“Rational? Nothing about what we’re going through is rational! We’re living a hundred years in the future. Earth is destroyed and magic is real. Nothing about any of this makes any amount of sense, so why should I? But you’re wrong anyway. Because I do treat you rationally. You just don’t realize it, because you see our current positions as equal. But they aren’t. Because I’m eight years removed from being where you are. Of course I’m not treating myself with the same care that I do you, and that doesn’t have anything to do about how mentally strong I am. Quite the opposite I think that you are much stronger than you think you are, than you think I am.
“So even if you’re right, even if I’m hurting myself by worrying about you all the time, and spending all this time on and with you. I’m fine with that. I’m happy feeling like shit for this whole year. Fuck it, even having to repeat this entire year somehow despite it not being realistic at all. Because no matter how bad I will be feeling when it’s over, you’re still going to be feeling worse than me. So ‘worst-case scenario’ for me: we’ll be equal, starting from the same position of knowledge and advantages in the second year of the academy, with both of us having acclimated to our new life the same amount. But there’s not a chance in hell that we could actually be equal now, is there? Because I’ll still be higher level than you. I’ll still know more than you. And I’ll still be happier and better adjusted because I spent nine years living here and you have just spent one.
“And what really gets me is you saying that I’m not treating you rationally! My entire way of thinking about you is rationality personified. You’re like a formula to me. I’m just trying to do, and to say, and to be the person that I believe would make you happiest and would make the worst period in your life pass a little faster and easier. Because I know exactly how you feel, I know exactly what you’re going through. Not because I’m going through it now, but because I went through it when I was only twelve-fucking-years-old! I had eight bloody years to think about what I went through, to compute whatever made me happy and what made me sad, and to understand how I would have instead wanted to be treated.
“But sure, there is a difference between you and me. I was younger, for better or worse. And I was much happier with the life I had before. I didn’t have the fact that I could walk again, dampening the sadness that the death of everyone and everything I ever knew made me feel. But I also wasn’t thrust straight into the thick of it and forced myself to catch up with people who have had a whole three years and a lifetime to be where they are now ahead of me. I didn’t have that voice in my head that said that once the magic in it runs out, everything was going to go to shit. Afraid, unjustifiably so in your case might I add, that once it’s gone, I won’t be able to keep going. Because I lived my whole life with depression and anxiety and a million other things and there’s no way that I’m mentally healthy enough to deal with the cards I’ve been dealt.
“Everything… everything that I’m trying to do, is because I want you to get out of the other side of dealing with all this shit feeling better than I did. And it doesn’t matter who had it worse because I know it’s you, same way that I know that you’ll say it’s me. I just want to do this my way, for once in this fucking second life, to really follow my heart when it’s telling me exactly what to do. I just want… I just want you to be happy because if in a year you end up feeling like I did after a year… That would be the second worst thing that happened in my life.”
Then she couldn’t hold herself back anymore. She tried hiding it from Sam, turning her head away and stuffing her mouth with popcorn. But she was crying. She was crying. Now I’ve fucking done it. Had to push her, didn’t I? Fucking asshole. Now what? Of course, there was only one thing that Sam could do. He was Sam Anders, after all. His head worked in mysterious fucking ways. And right now it was just echoing the same thing over and over again, driving all other thoughts away. But while his mind could have made it into the textbook for a prime example of social-incompetence, he still wasn’t a complete idiot. Or rather, no matter how big of an idiot he was, he was still driven by an innate want to be a good person, the need to make other people happy.
So he decided to trust in his instincts, and let the sentence thundering through his synapses finally slip from his mouth. “Sarah.” He laid his hand on her hair, smoothing it out a bit before moving his hand to her shoulder furthest from him, holding her in a hug. “I’m really sorry, but you’ve fucked up. You’ve used both the rational brain and the emotional heart to explain your behavior, but they cancel each other out. I know it sucks to hear, but that’s a cardinal mistake in your logic, which invalidates your entire argument. I’m gonna have to go and strike that from the record.”
Sarah laughed, leaning against him while trying to wipe out her tears with the sleeve of her shirt. “You’re an asshole, you know that?” She leaned closer and shut her eyes. “Just a stupid asshole. Can’t believe that I care what happens to you. Ha!”
Sam hugged her tighter, grabbing some of the nearby tissues to give her. “Have you tried being an asshole yourself? Don’t knock it till you try it. It’s great. I can make the people I care about cry, and I don’t feel a damn thing. Better yet, those people are crying because they care about me so damn much. Of course, it’ll still be a couple of years until you’ll be able to master being as good as a loveable scamp as I am. But until then, you’ll be able to enjoy all the benefits that being an asshole guarantees you. Callused feelings being just the first of the bunch. There’s viewing people only as a means to an end. There’s plenty of time to be gained in plenty of different fields, such as pet-owning or bus-riding. There’s—”
“Fine, fine. I get it. I can’t promise to be a full asshole like you, but I’ll try to be just a little bit more.”
“Of course you will. You have to. I won the debate.”
“Careful now.” She smiled while untethering herself from him. “Don’t forget that just because I didn’t threaten you with the use of physical violence like I did to Felix and Yvessa, that doesn’t mean that I won’t do it if that’s what it takes for you to do things my way.”
“No threat of violence? What about all those pinches? And where does running me through a physical gauntlet every single day enter into the mix?”
“One and all, an expression of love.”
“Gee. I wouldn’t want to be your spouse on your wedding night.”
She gently squeezed him on the arm. “What’s the deal with riding the bus, though? I didn’t get that one.”
“It’s a whole thing that I have against people who talk on the bus. Let’s not get into it right now. Let’s talk about something else. Would you rather have Tim Curry as your dad or as your grandpa?”
“Boyfriend.”
“OK then. Would you rather date your dad or your grandpa? It’s Tim Curry remember.”
“No comment. Pause the movie will you? I want to go wash my face.”
She came back less than a minute later and they quickly settled back to watch the movie. Only a third remained at that point, and they spent it on Earth small talk. Their favorite movies, books, shows and music. At least Sarah did. Sam was more than satisfied with letting her take all the speaking roles during that conversation. She told him how much she loved riding the bicycle with her sister and mother, and was just in the middle of making fun of him for not knowing how to ride the bike when the credits started to roll.
Sarah sighed and slapped her legs. “I guess this is it then. It’s getting pretty late and you need to be ready for tomorrow, after all.”
Sam held his hand up. “Now wait just a moment, indulge me you if you will. I was afraid this was going to happen. So I did, in fact, prepare for us another audio-visual piece of entertainment. Starring Tim Curry of course—”
“I’m not watching Rocky Horror—”
“Hush now Sarah! He has other movies, you know? Now, what you need to remember before we start watching: Is that this was made back when it was widely believed that only men want to play video games. So objectifying the actresses was purely a business decision, not an artistic one, and should not count against these magnificent pieces of alt-history narrative. Question, do you consider space the final frontier? That is, the sole bastion that remains free from the corrupting reach of capitalism?”