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[chaos_drifter]

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[major_rawne]

Hm. I'm not really sure. The only person I knew like that back home was a complete asshole.

[chaos_drifter]

You say that like you do not see me as an asshole, in which case I think most of the ship would disagree with you, or like you see me as a creature with feelings, in which case I would like to know how you came to that conclusion. [Unless, as Hakkai said, they have emotions but cannot recognize them.]

[major_rawne]

Believe me, I think you're an asshole. Just not as terrible as Lijah Cuu, that's all. And... you do seem like someone with emotions, just very muted ones.

[chaos_drifter]

How would you define an emotion? [Hakkai had defined it as a combination of thoughts and physical feelings. They wonder if Rawne defines it the same way.]

[major_rawne]

It's... [This is tricky. Rawne barely understands his emotions as it is.] It's a mental and physical response to outside stimuli.

[chaos_drifter]

Both at once, not one or the other?

[major_rawne]

Often. When I was trying to figure out my emotions, concentrating on the physical sensations helped. Fear is felt in the stomach, for example. Anger in the chest.

[chaos_drifter]

[They have no idea what those things feel like. They have sensed those emotions in their victims, and understand what they are, but have never felt them.] What about arousal? I understand what it feels like, physically, but you felt it because you were lonely. [They were never attracted to him. What takes those feelings over the threshold from arousal to attraction? Their body had reacted to touch, but they had only wanted to understand his thoughts.]

[major_rawne]

I felt arousal because you were attractive and offered sex to me. The loneliness just meant that I was more likely than usual to accept the offer.

[chaos_drifter]

Physically attractive? [Most men seem to like women who are curvier than them, or men who are muscular. Avalon is neither.]

[major_rawne]

Yes, is that odd? [Rawne's more attracted to dangerous people than anything else, and Avalon is dangerous.]

[chaos_drifter]

No. [He is not the first person to consider their default form attractive.] If you were emotionally attracted to me, it would be.

[major_rawne]

No, you're not my type where it comes to relationships.

[chaos_drifter]

That makes sense.

Why do you think I have ‘muted’ emotions? [If more than one person agrees on something about them, does that give them an identity?]

[major_rawne]

Because you react to things, you don't just sit around doing nothing. You stabbed John Doe because you wanted to see if he had a body. That's an emotional response, in my mind, if not a very strong one.

[chaos_drifter]

Interesting perspective. Hakkai agrees with you.

[major_rawne]

Was he your warden, too?

[chaos_drifter]

No, but… [They attacked him.] We talked after the Breach a few months ago, and when I asked about emotions on the Network.

[major_rawne]

That's good. Did he help you?

[chaos_drifter]

The idea of a physical component to emotions was new. I had never thought of it that way.

[major_rawne]

Well, your relationship to your body isn't like everyone else's, is it? Since you're some kind of... spirit or something.

[chaos_drifter]

Passenger. We lack identities of our own. [They have no idea why.]

[major_rawne]

That, right. So now, on the Barge, you have a body, and it's new. You don't have the experience to know what it does. How it feels.

[chaos_drifter]

So I may be able to learn to feel. Did you lack emotions when you arrived?

[major_rawne]

Mostly. Not like you, but all I could feel was anger. The first time I met Quentin, my warden, I tried to stab him.