[he isn't stupid, but he does hum his acknowledgement to indicate he heard viktor. and then as he keeps going, eventually he does get one side fully cleared... and he laughs to himself! it still sounds a little maniacal, but he is genuinely having a good time]
Oohh, this isn't bad...
[back to more flippy flippy twisty so he can get more sides!!]
[he is having a great time, and he already gets another side done, then one more...]
Arpéchéle does not have puzzles. I found a blueprint of one called the 'jigsaw puzzle' from the outside world and commissioned artisans to create some for me.
But I do like them, in the rare moments I have for breaks.
[Damn, they really could build their own. Hmm. It makes him consider something else momentarily, but he glances up to listen to Scien.]
It's a shame you missed the Rec Room.
[This is earnest.]
Piltover has some games which are like puzzles, but... nothing like the ones I saw in there. The only puzzles I ran across were the ones I made for myself trying to invent things. Well, until Jayce gave me the biggest puzzle of all.
[from what he can guess. another side done... scien turns the cube over in his hands, examining the different colors. a faint smile is on his face the entire time because puzzles really put him in a good mood]
Puzzles aren't bad for the brain. It loses efficiency to focus on the same problems without end. Even I do them from time to time.
Magic. [The correction is not mad, and, in a way, not very far off from the Core exactly.] He brought me the puzzle of figuring out how to harnest the arcane.
[Says the title of the show a thousand times. He watches Scien ponder the snube.]
I think... focusing on one problem without end is undoubtedly why... our assistant is now nothing but ashes.
I did not think much about magic until Jayce blew an entire half of his apartment open. It was... interesting. Studying something he claims to have seen, but something I had never witnessed in all my life.
[His eyes lower to Scien's arms, then quickly flick up again.]
It is magic for now, but it will be science once you understand it. People always call what they don't grasp miracles or works of the occult.
[just... speaking from experience. but!! scien has just a few squares left to still puzzle through before he's done]
One girl held the key to saving the entire island. She agreed to sacrifice her life to my procedure that would allow everyone to have more time to live. Her lover took issue with that and stormed the Institute, engaging in a fight with me.
[He would agree, but after everything, he isn't entirely sure if he can confidently say that would be true for them. Jayce clung so tightly to the awe of magic.
His brows crease.]
You let them go... [HE SOUNDS SURPRISED.] But didn't you believe her lover was ridiculous and too emotional?
[It isn't an assumption like usual. It's a question. He's holding the usual cookie cutter up to see if Scien will fit in it or not.]
[WAIT PAUSE. HE SOLVED THE CUBE!! HE IMMEDIATELY BRIGHTENS UP AND LAUGHS AS ALL THE COLORS COME TOGETHER WITH A LAST CLICK. he's truly so satisfied, smiling brightly as he turns it all around. he's laughing with such joy even if it still sounds kinda evil]
[he just laughs to himself as he scrambles it all up again, making it nice and impossible
and then tosses it over to viktor once it's jumbled]
Your turn.
[help]
Anyway, of course I did. Tell me—what do you think? If you were to weigh three thousand lives against one life? Where you know for certain that sacrificing this one life, who actually wants to be a part of the experiment, will be able to improve the lives of countless others? That could be the salvation that your country is looking for?
What would you do?
[there's a clear answer, scien thinks. but he is curious what loopholes and other considerations viktor would look for]
[Serial killer vibes........ Like standing right at the precipice of being a serial killer vibe. The juxtaposition of Scien being maniacally joyous over figuring out a puzzle and Viktor, on the other hand, is viktoratcomputer.jpg about it.
WAH!!!
He stumbles trying to untangle himself quickly enough to catch the jumbled cube. DON'T JUST TOSS IT. He exhales, brows immediately furrowing as he turns the cube to look it over, as if he's checking for a pattern. HE'S ALREADY SHAKING HIS HEAD.]
No... I don't agree with testing science on others. That was my condition for Hextech. It's for improving lives, not destroying them. [He starts on the cube, twisting it rhythmically in a similar sort of pattern of rotation.] It doesn't matter if it's one person, or a thousand.
A single person is not just... a life in a void. They're connected to other people. Their lives are a web, and one thrum can be felt on the other side. One hole can make the whole web collapse.
I both agree and disagree with you, but I don't find that your reasoning is inherently bad.
[it's just different. it's honestly more righteous than scien's is, but he doesn't think that he has the time nor need to be so righteous and good.]
However, I will not allow thousands of lives to be extinguished for one person. That is the choice I made in creating my technology. Whatever I can experiment on myself, I will, but that is not always possible. But even everyday medicine requires clinical trials and risks. While I take it to the extreme end, there is no progress that can be made without calculated experiments.
When her lover came to attack me in the name of love, I did find him to be foolish. I didn't think someone so inherently good and kind would be able to survive knowing that he destroyed a chance for salvation.
[would viktor be able to? if he came to a point one day where it was just one single person's life weighed against thousands?]
But he won against me, and I am not a person who wants to take lives—so I let them go.
[The rhythm of his turning slows into something easy and steady, but it's clear he is doing this while listening to Scien. Because he is looking at Scien mostly aside from the period quick glance down at his hands.]
There is no point to salvation if he can't spend it with the person he loves. [His hands have stopped, momentarily, but then begin again.] It's not a feeling I'm familiar with personally, [virgin] but it is... one I can understand. I don't know how to explain it to you. It isn't... science. It can't be explained. It isn't reasonable. It isn't meant to be.
It's love at its most maddening and illogical. [he agrees] But that love has cost so many other people their chances of salvation. It is selfish in a way that I can't even begin to understand.
[becaus scien cherishes nothing in the world quite so much, and likely never will. not to this extent, when as someone who has become the leader of the country, he has so much more to consider than just himself.]
What happens... is that the Institute gets rebuild. I follow a new lead that was dropped into my lap just before I came here.
I save the girl and her lover both, if I can, before they die to pay for the debt I owe them.
Then it worked out. Without you having to sacrifice a single person for the sake of many. Maybe.
[He rolls the finished cube around in his long fingers, and then he starts jumbling the cube up again. He moves to Scien, placing the cube down on the table and sliding it toward the other man.]
I know a puzzle you'll never be able to solve. [He glances up. Not because Scien isn't intelligent enough. Because it's unsolvable.] Love.
[he'll be honest about that. either way, people would've been saved, but he's not going to spend all that time waiting on a coincidence that might not come. while he doesn't think he was wrong, he also doesn't think he was right. his logic was sound, but his principles were almost compromised....
well. at the rest, he sighs.]
And why would I want to? It's clear enough that love puts more people at risk than it seems to truly help.
[Boy, does he know that sentiment. The first one. WHY ARE SO MANY FUCKS DOWN HERE LIKE THIS.]
I guess it's something you would have to experience to understand. Someone loving you, you loving someone else.
[He, of all people, does not have the answers for this at all. He's a virgin. One shoulder shrugs gently.]
You... had a sister, right? Family? Even if things did not go poorly with them, would you not have come to a frustrating impasse if you cared about them being alive with you, but their death meant helping thousands of others...?
The family was not a loving one. My father and my grandfather both spent the vast majority of their live concerned with the curse—I wouldn't be surprised if they procreated only for someone to take on the work. My mother was killed by bandits and my sister eventually found me to be unsalvageable as a person.
[it's said like a report. facts. that's what they are. even before scien was a reliver, he wasn't particularly emotional. none of this hurts him, the same way that he hasn't been afraid of memshare all week, because all of it is fact.]
If my death would solve the curse, I would be the first to sacrifice myself. But that is because I believe in the persistence of humanity and the right of the average person to live, not individual humans.
[he thinks briefly.]
There are some I would make exceptions for—that I would go out of my way to save. It's not as though I don't think the decision isn't difficult... but I don't think countless more people should pay the price for my selfishness.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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scien will look over at it, and then he's going to just announce:]
I'm going to try. You have until I pick it up to refuse.
[he's not going to steal another man's puzzle.... that's a grave sin.....]
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Go ahead.
[He's kind of curious because they have some stupid rivalry going on.]
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scien will just go then, twisting and turning the cube idly as he tries to mentally puzzle out what it's supposed to do]
The goal is to line up all the colors in solid shapes on each side?
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[He leans his waist against a work table nearby, crossing his arms over his stomach.]
Each side will be one of the six colors you see. Each stack of nine blocks can be moved vertically and horizontally. You'll see as you work it.
[He knows Scien isn't stupid, so.]
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Oohh, this isn't bad...
[back to more flippy flippy twisty so he can get more sides!!]
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I haven't seen any, but since it's a cubic matrix, I assume there might be some that are larger. With more cubes.
Do you like these puzzles, or just... any puzzle?
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[he is having a great time, and he already gets another side done, then one more...]
Arpéchéle does not have puzzles. I found a blueprint of one called the 'jigsaw puzzle' from the outside world and commissioned artisans to create some for me.
But I do like them, in the rare moments I have for breaks.
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[Damn, they really could build their own. Hmm. It makes him consider something else momentarily, but he glances up to listen to Scien.]
It's a shame you missed the Rec Room.
[This is earnest.]
Piltover has some games which are like puzzles, but... nothing like the ones I saw in there. The only puzzles I ran across were the ones I made for myself trying to invent things. Well, until Jayce gave me the biggest puzzle of all.
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[from what he can guess. another side done... scien turns the cube over in his hands, examining the different colors. a faint smile is on his face the entire time because puzzles really put him in a good mood]
Puzzles aren't bad for the brain. It loses efficiency to focus on the same problems without end. Even I do them from time to time.
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[Says the title of the show a thousand times. He watches Scien ponder the snube.]
I think... focusing on one problem without end is undoubtedly why... our assistant is now nothing but ashes.
[HE IS SELF AWARE NOW.]
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[scien will just... glance over at viktor again before going back to the cube...]
I've lost sight of myself as well. It's what I lost my arm over.
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[His eyes lower to Scien's arms, then quickly flick up again.]
Doing what...?
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[just... speaking from experience. but!! scien has just a few squares left to still puzzle through before he's done]
One girl held the key to saving the entire island. She agreed to sacrifice her life to my procedure that would allow everyone to have more time to live. Her lover took issue with that and stormed the Institute, engaging in a fight with me.
I lost. I let them both go.
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His brows crease.]
You let them go... [HE SOUNDS SURPRISED.] But didn't you believe her lover was ridiculous and too emotional?
[It isn't an assumption like usual. It's a question. He's holding the usual cookie cutter up to see if Scien will fit in it or not.]
[1/3]
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How satisfying.
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and then tosses it over to viktor once it's jumbled]
Your turn.
[help]
Anyway, of course I did. Tell me—what do you think? If you were to weigh three thousand lives against one life? Where you know for certain that sacrificing this one life, who actually wants to be a part of the experiment, will be able to improve the lives of countless others? That could be the salvation that your country is looking for?
What would you do?
[there's a clear answer, scien thinks. but he is curious what loopholes and other considerations viktor would look for]
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WAH!!!
He stumbles trying to untangle himself quickly enough to catch the jumbled cube. DON'T JUST TOSS IT. He exhales, brows immediately furrowing as he turns the cube to look it over, as if he's checking for a pattern. HE'S ALREADY SHAKING HIS HEAD.]
No... I don't agree with testing science on others. That was my condition for Hextech. It's for improving lives, not destroying them. [He starts on the cube, twisting it rhythmically in a similar sort of pattern of rotation.] It doesn't matter if it's one person, or a thousand.
A single person is not just... a life in a void. They're connected to other people. Their lives are a web, and one thrum can be felt on the other side. One hole can make the whole web collapse.
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I both agree and disagree with you, but I don't find that your reasoning is inherently bad.
[it's just different. it's honestly more righteous than scien's is, but he doesn't think that he has the time nor need to be so righteous and good.]
However, I will not allow thousands of lives to be extinguished for one person. That is the choice I made in creating my technology. Whatever I can experiment on myself, I will, but that is not always possible. But even everyday medicine requires clinical trials and risks. While I take it to the extreme end, there is no progress that can be made without calculated experiments.
When her lover came to attack me in the name of love, I did find him to be foolish. I didn't think someone so inherently good and kind would be able to survive knowing that he destroyed a chance for salvation.
[would viktor be able to? if he came to a point one day where it was just one single person's life weighed against thousands?]
But he won against me, and I am not a person who wants to take lives—so I let them go.
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There is no point to salvation if he can't spend it with the person he loves. [His hands have stopped, momentarily, but then begin again.] It's not a feeling I'm familiar with personally, [virgin] but it is... one I can understand. I don't know how to explain it to you. It isn't... science. It can't be explained. It isn't reasonable. It isn't meant to be.
[...]
...So now what happens?
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[becaus scien cherishes nothing in the world quite so much, and likely never will. not to this extent, when as someone who has become the leader of the country, he has so much more to consider than just himself.]
What happens... is that the Institute gets rebuild. I follow a new lead that was dropped into my lap just before I came here.
I save the girl and her lover both, if I can, before they die to pay for the debt I owe them.
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[He rolls the finished cube around in his long fingers, and then he starts jumbling the cube up again. He moves to Scien, placing the cube down on the table and sliding it toward the other man.]
I know a puzzle you'll never be able to solve. [He glances up. Not because Scien isn't intelligent enough. Because it's unsolvable.] Love.
But if you ever do, I'd love to hear the answer.
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[he'll be honest about that. either way, people would've been saved, but he's not going to spend all that time waiting on a coincidence that might not come. while he doesn't think he was wrong, he also doesn't think he was right. his logic was sound, but his principles were almost compromised....
well. at the rest, he sighs.]
And why would I want to? It's clear enough that love puts more people at risk than it seems to truly help.
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I guess it's something you would have to experience to understand. Someone loving you, you loving someone else.
[He, of all people, does not have the answers for this at all. He's a virgin. One shoulder shrugs gently.]
You... had a sister, right? Family? Even if things did not go poorly with them, would you not have come to a frustrating impasse if you cared about them being alive with you, but their death meant helping thousands of others...?
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[it's said like a report. facts. that's what they are. even before scien was a reliver, he wasn't particularly emotional. none of this hurts him, the same way that he hasn't been afraid of memshare all week, because all of it is fact.]
If my death would solve the curse, I would be the first to sacrifice myself. But that is because I believe in the persistence of humanity and the right of the average person to live, not individual humans.
[he thinks briefly.]
There are some I would make exceptions for—that I would go out of my way to save. It's not as though I don't think the decision isn't difficult... but I don't think countless more people should pay the price for my selfishness.
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