Fandom Neuromodulation Clinic (usually Fandom Counseling), Sunday

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal's office was sleek and expensive, and a first glance might take it for old-school, not even a terminal visible. A closer look would show the high-quality HUDs and playback ports quietly available around the space.

Only a well-informed or illegally enhanced scan would reveal the bordering-on-illegal, medical-grade recorders throughout. Hannibal was nothing if not thorough.

Thorough and discreet. Both his patients and his "patients" appreciated that.

He'd acquired some new recordings this week, and was busy at a screen coded only to his eyepiece, sorting through them for distribution between his practice, Chamber's shop, and the back room exclusive to the most discerning clients.

But he'd always be willing to stop for an interesting buyer. Or seller.


[Electronic and chemical stimulation available as therapy! Or for fun, for the right price. Some more benign and legal than others.]

Comments

[uncertain_dume]

Okay, so Dume was blowing off work to be here. Of course he was. Last night had been a hard one, memories not entirely his own screaming up at him while he attempted to sleep, and his head really wasn't in the whole act that he was putting up trying to keep his cover, today.

He'd run through all of his stims last night just trying to clear his head. He kept trying to interface with the world around him by reflex, and the work that it took to detach himself from it all was exhausting. And expensive. And the cheap hits from the retailer in town could only carry him so far, especially if he didn't want to draw the attention of local law enforcement.

He sighed, pulling up the collar of his long coat against the rain as he made his way up the steps to Hannibal's office.

He could continue to function this way indefinitely, just so long as he could keep his head in check, avoid making any connections that could be traced back to him. And Hannibal already knew enough about where he'd come from that Dume trusted him to help more than most anybody else.

[sharp_as_knives]

The door pinged, and Hannibal checked the cameras before smiling and telling it to open.

"Dume." He put his screen to sleep. "What can I do for you today?" He had a few guesses.

[uncertain_dume]

"I want to say 'the usual,'" Dume replied as he stepped inside, an exhausted smile struggling to stick around on his features. "I want to. But it's getting worse. It always does, when I'm in one place for too long."

Too much time spent interfacing with local systems meant that sooner or later, they just clicked. Staying off the grid was hard to do when a large part of you was programmed to tap in to it, to become one with it. He blew out a tired breath and shook his head.

"If there's nothing else for me, it might be time for me to move on."

He'd been saying that a lot lately. This time he meant it all the more.

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal hummed in thought. "I might have a few things. It all depends upon how far you're willing to go and how much you're willing to pay."

[uncertain_dume]

"I'm willing to go..." Dume frowned. "Far. Not so far that I start losing anything, though. I can't afford that."

He tilted his head slightly, frowning. He'd trade emotions, sure. Experiences, fine. Hell, he'd even let the odd memory go, if they didn't strike him as important. The trouble was that a good many of his memories were important. His survival depended on him knowing which way was up.

"But I've never been averse to doing the odd job to make up the difference, if that's what it takes. And I pride myself on the variety of jobs I can do."

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal waved it off. "I'm sure we can come to an arrangement for payment. But what you need is neither simple nor straightforward. You need a way to disconnect. To short-circuit or to interrupt your natural impulses."

[uncertain_dume]

"Which is easier said than done," Dume agreed, sighing. "Those impulses run deep. Disconnecting completely from them would be... I want to say 'invasive.' At least a little dangerous. Doing anything that might put me out of commission for a while isn't much better than the state I'm in right now, even if I do manage to disconnect."

He had his gun, and he had his sword. He had a whole wealth of knowledge on a data-chip gifted to him from his lost mentor. But if he didn't have his health, none of those things did him much good.

[sharp_as_knives]

"That's part of the price you pay, I'm afraid," Hannibal said. "How dangerous are you willing to go?"

[uncertain_dume]

Dume barked out something faintly like a laugh and shook his head at that. The laugh wasn't really a pleasant one, wry or bitter more than anything, but he needed to get it out of his system.

"I'd grab the whole thing by the root and rip it out myself if it wouldn't kill me," he admitted. "That's what I'm aiming to avoid, at the end of the day. I'd go pretty far to stay alive and free."

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal thought about it for a moment, then nodded curtly. "There are two things we can try that we haven't yet. Either has its risks."

He pressed a button and a screen came to life in the air between them. He called up a series of commands and showed them to Dume.

"This is the first. You can think of it as a memory cleanse, like a blood cleanse. We take your memories, store them, and run them through a filter. Anything related to your...connections...is subtly altered to attribute any differences to luck or intervention. We then feed those memories back to you, essentially overwriting yourself with an altered version of yourself."

He shrugged. "There are the standard dangers with any massive overwriting, although they're somewhat mitigated by the fact that most of it will be replacing something with the exact same thing. There are also the standard dangers when the overwritten memories begin to decay. But for a time, you would believe yourself to be simply yourself, without the part of you that is dangerous. And because you have no knowledge of it, you won't be tempted to use it."

[uncertain_dume]

The look on Dume's face probably said volumes about how much he cared for option the first, there. Not that he didn't trust Hannibal. He did. About as much as he trusted anybody. But that wasn't nearly enough trust for a complete overwrite.

"And the second?"

Best to hear both options before shooting either down or opting to just get the hell out of town.

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal slid the first option aside and pulled up the next. "We kill you. We bring those deep, intrinsic connections of you to the fore briefly, and feed that portion a memory of dying. Kill it off, for so long as that memory lasts."

He didn't mention the risks again; he rather thought this one was self-explanatory.

[uncertain_dume]

Yeah, a little bit. Dume hissed between his teeth at that. It didn't involve a full rewrite. Didn't mean having his mind flushed out and slotted back in place new and fresh. It was less likely to leave him completely reprogrammed.

It still involved killing a part of himself off.

And out of the two options, it was, unfortunately, the one he found himself leaning toward.

"What's the process of that one look like?"

The bare bones explanation was a good start. Terrifying, but a good start. He needed to know exactly how it was going to work, though. The idea of being left half-dead, walking wounded, left him more than a little on edge.

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal raised an eyebrow. "Drugs and hypnosis to start, to dull your conscious brain and work directly with the unconscious connections. Selected memories stimulated, to bring those connections to the fore. Then, introducing death and pain to the mix."

He cocked his head at Dume. "This is only partially a rewriting, and more a form of aversion therapy. It convinces the parts of you that utilize your connections that they are dead, and will only cause you pain coming back to life. As your conscious mind isn't being rewritten, you will still consciously know the truth. But a disinclination toward death and pain will make your subconscious shy away from your connections regardless, making you more or less unable to use them. We will, in short, be inducing a psychosomatic illness."

At least he wouldn't play Beethoven during it. Probably.

c

[uncertain_dume]

"Better aware and ill than unable to remember at all," Dume sighed. "I can't afford to not know, Hannibal. My situation doesn't allow for that."

To be on the run and not completely aware why would be...

Dangerous. More dangerous.

"What do you mean, 'more or less?'"

Yes, of course he caught that.

Re: c

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal sat back, steepling his fingers over his knee. "As with any subconscious urge fighting your conscious desires, you might be able to overcome it, should you try hard enough. It's likely you would experience extreme anxiety and physical reactions in trying, however."

[uncertain_dume]

Yeah, that was... weirdly reassuring, in its own way. Dume pursed his lips a little.

"Can it be undone? Reversed?"

Better to know going in what he was in for. Better to know if he was seriously considering making a step that he'd never be able to un-make.

[sharp_as_knives]

"As with any conditioning, it's likely to eventually break down, although similar forms tend to last for years," Hannibal answered. "To reverse it, we could only layer positive reinforcements over the negative ones, which would hopefully cancel them out, or remove the initial memories, although that shares the same problems as any removal."

Namely, being very specific and hoping not to get anything else along the way.

[uncertain_dume]

Dume sighed, reaching up to pinch the bridge of his nose. That made his head hurt. God, big decisions that involved messing with the way his head worked always left him uneasy.

"Do you mind if I ask for your personal opinion on this one? Not just the options, but what you think they might mean for me."

[sharp_as_knives]

"I believe you would be happier with the first, but it might prove more dangerous in the long run," Hannibal said. "I don't believe either should be necessary, but you've made your feelings on that plain."

If Dume would just let him implant memories of better control, and give up the idea of not using his talents...

[uncertain_dume]

"I have," Dume agreed, falling silent again. "I can't afford happier but oblivious. Especially not if the abilities rear up on their own under pressure and it means I have no idea how to deal with them. Or if they find me."

Which would be infinitely worse. Of course it would.

"I need to get rid of them. Cut them out like a cancer, not nurture them and hope nobody notices. They always notice. Better people than me are long dead because of that ability to notice, and there are eyes everywhere."

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal shrugged. "It is, of course, your decision." He'd get his curiosity sated one way or another, as none of these things had precisely been tried before.

[uncertain_dume]

Right. His decision. No pressure or anything, Dume knew he could walk out any time he wanted to. But still, oof.

"... Well..." He frowned thoughtfully for a second, and then blew out an anxious breath. "If I get you to kill it... when can that be done?"

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal hummed in thought. "I'll need a day or two to prepare everything. Mid-week, perhaps."

[uncertain_dume]

"Mid-week," Dume echoed with a small nod. "And any idea of the price?"

Negotiable?

[sharp_as_knives]

"What are you offering?" Hannibal asked.

[uncertain_dume]

Dume considered this seriously for a few seconds, brow furrowed.

"You... collect positive as well as negative memories, don't you? And you're capable of making copies?" Yes, Hannibal, Dume had heard rumours about your side businesses. "I'm willing to pawn a few of the less incriminating ones off. Or... taking commissions, so to speak."

Dume was willing to do a lot of sketchy things in order to guarantee his own safety.

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal narrowed his eyes slightly. "What sorts of memories did you have in mind?"

He wasn't going to show his hand that easily.

[uncertain_dume]

"Oh, I don't know... anything that might come in handy with other patients."

Or clients.

"I don't suppose any would be... helped... in any way... by first-hand experiences with the abilities I'm trying to bury? File the serial numbers off... You aren't going to find memories like those anywhere else these days."

A memory without a face or context was hardly a road map. Particularly not for the sort inclined to come looking for it on the black market.

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal hummed in thought. "True." He thought a moment longer. "Paid in equal time. One minute of memory for each minute it takes me to set this up and execute it."

[uncertain_dume]

That was tempting. A fair enough offer on the surface. But Dume was... well, paranoid by nature, these days. And he needed a moment to consider the implications of that before tilting his head and frowning.

"Not that I don't trust you," he said, because he clearly trusted the man enough to go poking around in his head in the first place, "but what guarantee do I have that you won't unnecessarily pad out the time it takes for you to prepare and run the procedure?"

Because he trusted Hannibal in his head well enough, but he was also well aware of the other man's curiosity, and had a few suspicions of the lengths he'd go to in order to satisfy it.

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal raised an eyebrow. "I do have a professional reputation to maintain. If it took too long, that would be a poor reflection on my skills."

Which didn't mean he wouldn't pad it a little bit.

[uncertain_dume]

Really, Dume would have been shocked if Hannibal wasn't padding it out somewhat. He cracked a faint smile, and then shrugged his shoulders.

"And we wouldn't want that," he allowed. "So, you keep it reasonable, which I have no doubt in my mind you will, and in turn, I dig up the quality memories. The ones specific to my history that don't just involve me as a kid sitting through hours of lectures in preparation of using those skills."

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal thought for a moment, then nodded. "It's a deal. And I'll accept others as well - childhood memories of being cared for come in quite handy."