those bells are ringing | caustic

[Ivan]

[align=center]

[table]
[tr]
[td][/td]
[td]

IVAN
slav. "god is gracious"
---
a son
a brother

[/td]
[td][/td][/tr]
[/table]

ALYOSHA, MY DEAR, MY ONLY SON, I'M AFRAID OF IVAN —

"It's just a guess. I thought ... maybe you wanted to go somewhere else too." Ivan shrugged in response, though his eyes flashed curiously.

If not space, then where? He failed to understand why Caustic thought his secrets were foolproof. To be sure, there was much Ivan had yet to know, but the blood of this trail had already been spilled, and Ivan wasn't ready to let go of an injured prey.

Ivan stepped forward, following Caustic down the stairs. His pace is characterized by a light-footed politeness. The young feline glanced up at the wolf. "It's strange to think," He thought. "That before, I was so vexed with him and his experiments." It had been a morbid fascination that twisted his heart, his poor beaten heart that tried to hard to find reason in an unreasonable world.

Ivan took in the cages, his features naturally hardening, but there seemed to be no sign of other animals here, from what he could tell so far. The lab was something that he supposed he expected of Caustic. Unlike the main room, this area had signs of living. Caustic lived by his work perhaps. Now Ivan could understand why the wolf appeared so distraught at the explosion. This meant something much more to him than a life in Tanglewood.

Ivan, having seat himself on the stool now, was silent up to the point when Caustic revealed his opus magnum — Ivan snickered at his own thought of this piece of machinery being compared to a work of literary genius. A small huff of breath left him, but he was largely unimpressed mainly due to how broken it was. It couldn't be helped, perhaps. After all, it had exploded.

"Well," Ivan blinked, glancing at Caustic as if trying to react based on the wolf's facial cues. "I have no idea what this is, but it looks very complex to what machinery I've seen. Are you something from the future? The history books here only go up to the 60's. I've never seen anything like it. One of my brothers, you know, he was named after a futuristic dystopian novel. I'm not, I come from a large Russian novel." He frowned and furrowed his brow as if just realizing something. Why where his siblings christened after British books while he was the only Russian? Well, save Atticus. He had never thought of it before.

"I think I've gotten off track." He had been trying to show off again. "Can you tell me what this was going to be used for?"

— I'M MORE AFRAID OF IVAN THAN THE OTHER ONE.

[CAUSTIC.]

[align=center]

DR. CAUSTIC

[table][tr][td]

[/td]

[td]

It's such an innocent way to say that, that Caustic merely desired to go somewhere else. He wanted to go home, to Wattson knocking on his lab door with morning coffee, the waft of chemicals and his pristine lab. He nearly salivates at the thought as he thinks of home again.

Caustic merely glances at the boy when Ivan studies the cages. He doesn’t say anything, tail drooping at the realization that maybe he shouldn’t let Ivan see. The boy was too young to understand how Caustic operated- his experiments had to continue at all cost. In the scientist’s world view, anyone who was not a friend was a future test subject to be disposed of. Science gave him purpose when no one else could.

He studies Ivan’s face when he reveals the machine, trying to figure how confused the boy must be. "Are you familiar with the Many Worlds theory, boy?” Caustic questions, tilting his head. "It’s simple- the theory of the existence of multiple dimensions. It’s true. Octavio and I are... not from here,” Why is he telling all this to a child? Is this giving him some kind of closure?

"It’s a portal device, Ivan. I’m from the year 2733."


SPEAKING

[/td][/tr][/table]

[Ivan]

[align=center]

[table]
[tr]
[td][/td]
[td]

IVAN
slav. "god is gracious"
---
a son
a brother

[/td]
[td][/td][/tr]
[/table]

ALYOSHA, MY DEAR, MY ONLY SON, I'M AFRAID OF IVAN —

Maybe he did think that there was the possibility of other universes. Parallel timelines. Maybe there was a world where Ivan wasn't a cat living in a radioactive swamp. Maybe he was a human. Maybe he had seen Napoleon. To be sure, even if Ivan had thought of these things, they were merely fleeting daydreams. He had never taken them for reality, or entertained the actual possibility of it. The reason was it would shatter Ivan's little world that he had constructed through laws of logic and morality. This sort of broke him.

Ivan was silent for a long time, staring blankly at the portal device. He felt stupid for thinking so carelessly of it earlier. "That's ... that's not true." He finally muttered. The fur along his spine rose uncomfortably. The thought had never entered his head that Caustic would lie to him, but Ivan wanted to shut out his ears.

"Are you even a wolf, then?" Ivan felt himself oscillate between faith and rejection. "Doctor, are you even real?"

Without any sort of warning, Ivan suddenly put forth his paw and slammed it against the the table, crying out in pain. He glanced back at Caustic, but if he were a figment of Ivan's imagination, he didn't fizzle from existence, and still the pain throbbed terribly in his foot. How quaint would that be, if he was so utterly miserable and lonely that he had thought up the persona of an intelligent wolf that he thought could understand him?

— I'M MORE AFRAID OF IVAN THAN THE OTHER ONE.

[CAUSTIC.]

[align=center]

DR. CAUSTIC

[table][tr][td]

[/td]

[td]

Caustic watches him for his reaction- studies him, in fact. He is a man of logic- science ruled all. Science explained anything that needed to be asked. Philosophy is a distraction from answers, as far as he's concerned.

"It's true, I would never lie to you," perhaps, in someways, that was a lie itself. He tries to remember when he's lied to the boy and when he's excluded information.

"No, we're not. Octavio and I were humans," he answers, recalling holding the smaller's head in his heads and placing a kiss upon his forehead.

The wolf lurches back with a start when Ivan slams his paw down, and Caustic reels in his brain, trying to figure the best to do. "I'm real, Ivan," he says, placing his paw on Ivan's.

[/td][/tr][/table]

[Ivan]

[align=center]

[table]
[tr]
[td][/td]
[td]

IVAN
slav. "god is gracious"
---
a son
a brother

[/td]
[td][/td][/tr]
[/table]

ALYOSHA, MY DEAR, MY ONLY SON, I'M AFRAID OF IVAN —

In the Allegory of the Cave, prisoners existed underground all their lives in a dark cave, chained up to their necks so they could only see one wall. The prisoners could only see the shadows of objects illuminated by a bonfire lit behind them. One day, one of them would be released and after rubbing the sores created on his neck and hands from the chains, he climbed out of the cave. But, as he was so accustomed to the darkness of the cave, he was painfully blinded by the light of the Sun, which stood as the true light, the Truth.

This pain was something similar happening to Ivan now as he mulled over the implications of this revelation. There was, of course, the physical throbbing in his paw, but it was quite insequential to his inner pain. "And nobody would believe you anyway, you fool holding the lantern searching for an honest man. You aren't like them, they wouldn't understand." Just as the prisoner enlightened by the Sun is put to death by his cave-dwelling peers.

Ivan steadied his breathing for a moment. He nearly flinched when Caustic's paw covered his own, but he stilled immediately with a blanked expression on his face. Caustic was human, and not even part of this world.

Oh, Ivan tried to hard to be a rationalist and snide behind his tower of liberalism and reason, but maybe all his heart yearned for was faith. The physical world had only shown him so much, even then he could not experience it all fully because he cannot see the vibrant colors. He wanted to see something beyond his scope of physicality and reason, yet he did not know how to find it because he could not fathom it through reason. And it very well might be that philosophy was useless as Caustic thinks, but does not dare to tell Ivan. Either way, maybe it just didn't matter.

"I know you wouldn't lie, no, and I know you're real, but I said that, didn't I ... Without even thinking. Ah!" He flinched again, for no reason. "But this brings up so many problems. I don't mean because you're human. I think ... I think I am not so frightened about that. Perhaps I even admire you further. No, it's the worlds theory ... I was saying a lot of stupid things just now, I even hit my paw on the table — I do that a lot, but I'm fine now, I'm not going mad." His speech was awkward and rambled, and he spoke so quickly and fluidly as if he was pouring out his heart.

A rather sudden and abrupt tranquility came over his countenance. "You can't go back, can you? You and Octane?" He asked in a softened voice. Was it acceptance? He was not sure. The holes in his Caustic puzzle were fitting together given this theory. He felt bad.

— I'M MORE AFRAID OF IVAN THAN THE OTHER ONE.

[CAUSTIC.]

[align=center]

DR. CAUSTIC

[table][tr][td]

[/td]

[td]

Ivan is... interesting to him. Perhaps, the boy fills a Wattson-shaped hole in his chest. Caustic's interest is piqued by few and his respect piqued even fewer. He has an affinity for the brilliant. Caustic prefers the company of other intellects (Octavio excluded, of course) and Ivan is no different.

He sees opportunities for the boy to grow, mold into someone. Too bad he was a cat and his work would never be appreciated. Caustic didn't have the heart to tell Ivan his thoughts on Philosophy- a confusing topic with too many contradictions. Perhaps, the boy wouldn't have storms raging in his heart if he took a more logistic view.

"As far as I know, no, we are trapped here."

[/td][/tr][/table]