entranceway | [002: Video]

[if Amanda was quiet before that last event, she wants to be even more so now. She knows she wasn't as vicious as most of the other Lost Ones, but the child she was then...well, it's not easy to shake off that child's feelings. Mostly because she knows they weren't really ever that forgotten. Just shrugged to the side with a smile. She'd nearly convinced herself for the last decade or so that she really was okay with being stuck outside most social circles, with being different the way she was, but…

Well, given what she's fairly sure happened back home, she supposes it's not surprising that some of that anger and sadness had manifested...like that.

She had thought about leaving this at text, but as that's something she was never able to do back home, she's still more comfortable with voice or video and it seems right to show her face. To not hide. Even if she has been doing so since the event ended, she's not doing it now. She looks a little withdrawn, but is forcing a tiny smile into place. It looks like she's curled up in one of the chairs in the library, as if she could hide in it if she tries hard enough]

Hi, everyone. Um. I know I didn't...do as much as some other people, back there but...to anyone I might have hit in the head with a rock or otherwise hurt...I'm sorry. I don't think I would have done that even if I could have when I was that age but...I guess I forgot how much I really wanted...what I had there.

[how can she explain this? She hadn't really remembered it when she was Lost, just knew that the adults would be taking something from her, and now that she remembers...yeah, it's awkward. Deciding anyone who wants to can prod more, she quickly shuts off the feed]

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[Howdy. Small regretful child here, though it might be hard to tell given the way their expression is...kind of on the unreadable side. Mostly it's just blankly, utterly neutral.]

Sometimes Wonderland...does stuff like that. It's, um, it's not...we know it's not really you.

[Amanda's little smile falls a bit and she nods with a sigh. She isn't offput by the child's expression; she's worked with enough people who weren't the best at expressing emotion in conventional ways, it doesn't phase her. Much.]

I'd been warned of that when I arrived but actually experiencing it was another matter. And I'd almost made myself forget what I was like at that age. The things I was trying to hide.

[and is still hiding, actually. But that's a whole other can of worms]

Is it really that common though? It bringing out our...darker sides like that?

Yes.

[Not an ounce of hesitation there. It's just a flat, even acknowledgment with an accompanying tilt of their head.]

Sometimes it...it gets bad. Really bad. You just have to hope people forgive you.

[And they won't always.

That's the really hard part.]

[that's hardly comforting, but at least it's honest. Amanda can appreciate that]

I guess I should be grateful it wasn't so horrible for me this time as it sounds like it was for some other people.

[because she'd been more sad than angry, she supposes. Even being Lost, under that sort of sway, couldn't change that]

I would like to think that if everyone knows we're not ourselves, they would be more understanding. But I guess that's probably easier said than done sometimes.

[Frisk hums their acknowledgment thoughtfully. They've done things, horrible things, that people continue to forgive them for, and they can't always understand it. Strings of broken promises, people they've hurt, people they've killed - and no one seems to believe they were in the wrong, even when they clearly were.]

Gotta forgive yourself too. Can you do that?

[that's...a pretty big question. Amanda's tempted to ask what would make someone so young have such a profound way of thinking about it, but she supposes that might be the effect of Wonderland.

She bites her lip, shrugging a little]

I'm trying. I guess I'm also trying to realize that I actually did have good reason to be angry when I was that age. I tried not to be for so long, to accept the way things were, that they couldn't be changed so I just had to move on with my life. I guess I was repressing a bit more than I'd realized.

So maybe this was sort of a good thing, in a way.

[They were thinking about forgiveness long before they ended up in Wonderland. It's one of the side-effects of being what's essentially an anomaly in the spacetime continuum.

Frisk nods again. That sounds about right. They knew who Frisk was, or they thought they did. Frisk was merciful, and Frisk didn't like to FIGHT. But they did FIGHT, and they fought before now, and that hasn't changed. They can't simply live in denial of that fact.]

Better to acknowledge it.

That way, you can know to do better.

Yeah. [Amanda's voice is a little softer again at that. She doesn't want to acknowledge it here, when she feels like this might be a fresh start.

But it seems like it could get much worse, too]

I guess I'll just take it as a lesson that unbridled optimism can be just as detrimental as cynicism at times. I'm not sure there's a perfect balance, but I suppose I'll be better at figuring it out than I was when I was ten.

[she actually sort of wishes she could have heard this when she was ten, that it really was okay to be angry about the accident. But for all she knows Wonderland could make just that happen one day],/small>

[Learned that one pretty quick. They can still look at the bright side, as they're wont to do, but that doesn't always make things better. Just blinds you to what might be there to hurt you. It gets better, it gets better, it gets better.

It gets better up until the point where you walk off the edge of a mountain, and disappearing off the face of the earth is the only it gets better you care about anymore.]

Wonderland makes you hurt more than you might've.

[002: Video]

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