James Potter (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
pottershotter) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
entranceway2016-05-24 06:00 pm
pottershotter) wrote in entranceway2016-05-24 06:00 pm
Video
[James pops up o the screen, in what is clearly a pre-planned and perhaps even rehearsed message. By now he's been in Wonderland so long that the network devices are no longer a mystery to him, and he's nicely centered in front of a blackboard and grinning.]
Hullo! I'm James Potter - yes, that one, and if it sounds vaguely familiar it's likely because my future son is going to be a rather famous wizard.
[He waves a hand though, like it isn't a big deal. No one can fourth-wall James Potter harder than he's already fourth-walled himself.]
Now that that's out of the way, I've been thinking a lot about Wonderland lately, and how long it keeps people here. When I first arrived, it was fairly common for people to vanish after a year or less, but lately I've noticed more and more of us have been staying longer and longer. I'm not certain why either, but it does present one awkward problem - counting ages. [James vaguely gestures at himself.] I'll wager a guess that no one would believe I'm in my twenties, right? And it's hard to feel I'm twenty-two when I'll never look the part as long as I'm here.
[He's right. Frankly, he looks like he's barely out of school, and even that's being somewhat generous.And there's the pesky fact that he's only scheduled to live until twenty-one at home, but that's not the point.]
So, I've been thinking about how to reconcile the two ages in a way that won't take ages to explain in casual conversation, and I think I've got it.
[He steps aside and reveals a formula on the board - A (+W).]
The 'A' stands for age - the age you were when you arrived - and the 'W' is the amount of years you've spent in Wonderland. For myself that would be...[Underneath his formula he writes 17 (+5)]. So, I'd write it this way, and in conversation I'd say "seventeen and five" - you know, like that song about the blackbirds and the pies? I forget how it goes, but it'd be like that.
Does that roll off the tongue as well as I think it does? I'll keep trying to make it happen either way, and maybe it'll start to catch on. I could start a trend here! But I'd also welcome theories on why Wonderland seems to be keeping us longer and longer, because frankly that should be alarming everyone at least a bit.
[On that cheery note, he waves the camera goodbye and shuts it off.]
Hullo! I'm James Potter - yes, that one, and if it sounds vaguely familiar it's likely because my future son is going to be a rather famous wizard.
[He waves a hand though, like it isn't a big deal. No one can fourth-wall James Potter harder than he's already fourth-walled himself.]
Now that that's out of the way, I've been thinking a lot about Wonderland lately, and how long it keeps people here. When I first arrived, it was fairly common for people to vanish after a year or less, but lately I've noticed more and more of us have been staying longer and longer. I'm not certain why either, but it does present one awkward problem - counting ages. [James vaguely gestures at himself.] I'll wager a guess that no one would believe I'm in my twenties, right? And it's hard to feel I'm twenty-two when I'll never look the part as long as I'm here.
[He's right. Frankly, he looks like he's barely out of school, and even that's being somewhat generous.And there's the pesky fact that he's only scheduled to live until twenty-one at home, but that's not the point.]
So, I've been thinking about how to reconcile the two ages in a way that won't take ages to explain in casual conversation, and I think I've got it.
[He steps aside and reveals a formula on the board - A (+W).]
The 'A' stands for age - the age you were when you arrived - and the 'W' is the amount of years you've spent in Wonderland. For myself that would be...[Underneath his formula he writes 17 (+5)]. So, I'd write it this way, and in conversation I'd say "seventeen and five" - you know, like that song about the blackbirds and the pies? I forget how it goes, but it'd be like that.
Does that roll off the tongue as well as I think it does? I'll keep trying to make it happen either way, and maybe it'll start to catch on. I could start a trend here! But I'd also welcome theories on why Wonderland seems to be keeping us longer and longer, because frankly that should be alarming everyone at least a bit.
[On that cheery note, he waves the camera goodbye and shuts it off.]
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[He only feels a little bad about that. Clearly Evelyn's husband wasn't here long, so.]
The only people who have been here as long as me that I really know are...Philip and you.
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[Five years of Wonderland solidarity.]
Hm...come to think of it, I don't know Philip very well either.
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[Which is weird for Souji because he just naturally gets to know everyone he spends a decent amount of time with.]
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That makes him sound so mysterious! Though, I suppose he is a bit - since he's the only one who's hit five deaths, as far as I know.
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[You know, since "he" wasn't technically around for it. But he heard enough about Tom and Annie that he has his doubts about how alright this is for Philip...though, it hasn't proven to be an issue thus far.]
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But it seems like Philip lost his voice, and that's all.
[Not that that's not a big deal, but it's better than losing a part of your personality or identity or a significant chunk of your memory.]
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[He sighs.] Then again, when is Wonderland ever what it tells us it's going to be?
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[And when it does tell them, it's like it's speaking a foreign language.]
Can you remember what the others had lost that Christmas? I didn't know some of them well enough to be able to tell.
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No, when I came back most people didn't want to tell me much of anything, because of how my future self had been.
[James has bits and pieces of that story now, but he's grudgingly accepted that he won't ever get much more.]
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