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Maybe the real unethical experimentation on nonconsenting subjects was the friends we made along the way
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"Mostly I just meant that she was a woman, and blonde, and didn't look anything like me. And I've checked for long-lost siblings."

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"Oh. Right. That." She'd been thinking of trying to find someone by their deeds but it's just now occurred to her that she bets this other person would not have predicted being an evil scientist so how would they even predict why their brother would be? 

...she's really buying the story wholesale, huh. Well, she supposes she might as well act as if it's true even if it's not, it's a good practice to inhabit the mindset of someone who does believe it at minimum to understand them better.

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"And, you know, there's a few more heroes today than there were even a century ago."

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Okay, seriously, is he reading her mind. AAAAALOUETTE, GENTILLE ALOUETTE, AAAAAAALOUETTE, JE TE PLUMERAAAAAI—

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"No, I can't. – sorry, that's one of the faces I know too well to pass up."

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"Faces."

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"I have a knack for reading people, and I like to follow logical implications even when they're not relevant. You mentioned that I might not be as different from her as I thought, hence that Beowulf might be more self-similar still; I said that I meant physical similarity, and so you assumed I didn't understand what you'd meant in the first place, which I corrected while you were still thinking about it. Then you made the extremely specific face people make when they think I'm reading their minds. It's not exactly cold-reading, but it's still a bit of a party trick."

Beat.

"And, no, I'm very fun at parties."

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"I'm sure you are. I've never been to one."

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"What, never?"

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"...my social circle is weird," she says, which conveys most of what she means without (hopefully) leaking too much.

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"Ah, that'd explain it. My friends are all completely normal, as well you know."

The winged manikin makes a noise like jingling bells.

"I didn't mean you."

The bells intensify.

"Oh, shut up," Thoma laughs.

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"If they go to parties they are probably more normal than mine," though she can't imagine this man particularly likes the rest of his social circle.

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"You realize you make it harder to let you deflect when you say such intriguing things. Anyway, if you have any clever ideas how to find a long-lost sibling feel free to let me know. Until then, would you like to... what do people do... work on our respective projects in the same room? I've got some stuff that isn't very horrible at all, mostly agronomics."

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"...well I don't have any ideas off the top of my head but I, like, haven't thought about it very long? So I don't want to say it's impossible? Plenty of problems go away when you work on them long enough!"

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"That's the spirit! You know, that gives me an inchoate little fragment of an idea? I'd need a little bit of a soul from someone who... no, that relies on falsifiability... I'd need a lot of little bits of souls... what kind of sample size will get me an adequately low noise ratio while still being feasible to collect?"

The winged manikin flutters off and comes back with an abacus.

"Thank you, Ari." Clatter clatter.

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"...s...ouls...?"

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"I'd give them back," he says distractedly. "I'd be checking to see if there's a difference between normal souls and mine beyond the differences between souls generally... it'd help if I knew of someone who'd certainly reincarnated. You've never had haunting dreams of a past life, have you?"

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"...no. Can you unpack that for me please."

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"Oh, fine. I'm wondering if I could use soul samples to determine what if any factor differentiates my own soul, which must in some way correspond with Yrsa's, from the souls of the general public. Obviously it'd be hopelessly complicated, but if I had, say, two people who dream of a past life in addition to myself, and maybe five hundred ordinary humans, I could make a study of it and come out with an idea of what I'd be looking for if I wanted to find my Beowulf."

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"How do you grab a soul then give it back, please."

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