name change announcement

[rollplayinghouse]

Who: Maki aka Morning☆Glory and anyone/everyone
Where: Dissonance or in-person at ☆ZRAEL
When: Day 191, afternoon

Morning☆Glory: Hi, everyone.
Morning☆Glory: This is Maki.
Morning☆Glory: Or, rather, as you may or may not know... When I joined ☆ZRAEL, I got a new name from them: Scarlet Artemis Blade Morning☆Glory Night☆Shade.
Morning☆Glory: I'd like to start going by that.
Morning☆Glory: I know that's a bit of a mouthful, so just "Morning☆Glory" is fine.
Morning☆Glory: Or "Glory," if you want something even shorter.
Morning☆Glory: Or whatever you want, really.

[That's the end of the messages at first, but after a few minutes:]

Morning☆Glory: If you're wondering what prompted this, I've been thinking about it for a while, but I remembered something that made it feel necessary.
Morning☆Glory: If you want to know more about that, I'd prefer to talk in private. I'll be in ☆ZRAEL all afternoon.

[Maki will respond to messages about the name, but if you want to talk about her memory, she is in fact in ☆ZRAEL, fussing around re-arranging the kitchen.]

Comments

[bluescreenwhitedragon]

[A text just to Morning Glory]

CEO: That was quick.

[rollplayinghouse]

Morning☆Glory: Yeah.
Morning☆Glory: I suddenly had a lot more incentive than I could have expected.
Morning☆Glory: Are you free to talk?

[bluescreenwhitedragon]

CEO: I wouldn't have bothered texting if I didn't.

[rollplayinghouse]

Morning☆Glory: Can I come over?

[bluescreenwhitedragon]

CEO: Doors are open.

[rollplayinghouse]

[She is there in approximately the amount of time it takes to go down two flights of stairs.]

[bluescreenwhitedragon]

[Not via the balcony? But's it all the rage these days.

And he (semi-)predictably is waiting in the common room, drafting something in a notebook]

[rollplayinghouse]

[She is not as prone to theatrical entrances as some people.

She just comes over and sits down next to him, and says, without introduction:]

I remembered the truth behind my killing game.

[bluescreenwhitedragon]

[Looks up at her, closing the notebook and sliding it to the side as he gestures for her to sit.]

Does that mean you're dead?

[rollplayinghouse]

[snorts]

No. ...Well, maybe. Who knows. But I expected that.

Apparently, I never existed in the first place.

[bluescreenwhitedragon]

That's odd. And to think, I thought you were standing right in front of me.

[rollplayinghouse]

...The person I am now is the person I've built here.

The person I was in the killing game was fiction. My memories were implanted, to build an interesting character for the show. And my actions were manipulated to follow the script.

[bluescreenwhitedragon]

. . .

Says who? Your former producers?

[Huffs]

Not the best character witnesses.

[rollplayinghouse]

"Team Danganronpa." That was the production team, apparently. We were the fifty-third season.

And yeah, it's their word. But there's... evidence to support it.

[bluescreenwhitedragon]

Such as?

[rollplayinghouse]

...We did believe things that don't make any sense to believe if they weren't messing with our heads. Like that were the only people left alive in the universe.

And they could manipulate our memories. Remember the Flashback Light...? They apparently gave us another one to make us think C was part of an evil organization, so I'd try to kill him. But those memories had contradictions with other things we knew.

I guess it's possible some of it was real, but... I have no way to know. According to them, none of it was. My past, my talent. Even the world I remember... was a fictional world.

1/2

[bluescreenwhitedragon]

Well, on one hand, now you don't have to cling to your assassin past as your entire identity.

[bluescreenwhitedragon]

On the other hand, thinking that you can acquire that level of skill - enough to rival a real assassin - just because it was part of a script is asinine.

You tell me if your past was real or not.

[rollplayinghouse]

...Supposedly, we were all fans. Beforehand. We loved watching the killing game, and auditioned to join it. To have our memories wiped and re-written into characters and then kill each other.

It's possible I trained for that.

[bluescreenwhitedragon]

That's not what I asked.

[rollplayinghouse]

...I don't know if it was real. And it doesn't really matter, does it?

You're right. I clung to my assassin past as my entire identity. I was missing a lot of things that other people have, as part of their identity. Family. History. Goals. So I already felt like I wasn't... quite a real person.

Now maybe that's factually true. But either way, there's no point in trying to pull anything more out of my past. I... just have to accept that. And go on from here.

[bluescreenwhitedragon]

That's only because it didn't give you the answer you wanted.

But in either scenario "you" are still yourself. Whether it be a crazed fan who self-taught themselves to be an assassin just to get on their favorite murder show. Or whether you were that orphan who chose to kill so someone else wouldn't have to.

Even when you were with X or that detective.

Still looking for someone to give you purpose and belonging when no one can give you that but yourself.

[rollplayinghouse]

[a bit sharply]

I guess Mokuba didn't give you any purpose or belonging, then?

[bluescreenwhitedragon]

[Laughs and laughs and---]

You want to play with those knives, Morning Glory?

Well - come at me then. Don't hold back!

[rollplayinghouse]

I really don't.

[flat, now.]

I have plenty of my own purpose. I can have that and still want to be able to support other important people in my life. And you can't look at me and tell me you don't want the same thing.