ic contact;

[psycholawgy]

You've reached Athena Cykes. I'm currently unavailable, but leave a message and I'll get back to you pronto. Danke! (voice/call → text → video → action)

Comments

[cardboard_journalism]

[she'd answer immediately like she had been waiting for the call same as always]

Heeeey, Athena! How're you doing? Um...

[pause]

Yeah! I wanted to... I wanted to ask you something.

[psycholawgy]

I've been sleeping all day... for a few days now, really. But I'm fine.

[ haha, no, she's not. ]

What is it?

[cardboard_journalism]

That's... that's good! I mean, the batteries of law and justice have to be recharged once and awhile, right?

...so.

I... sorta heard this... joke... going around. I wanted to know if you'd heard it.

[she'd exhale, and take a deep breath]

So, uh, there's this... girl, see. And this girl, she has a friend... and apparently this friend is in some sort of... danger? Yeah, danger, or something... From an unknown but real source. Apparently.

And apparently this friend is sorta dumb. So she can't just tell her outright, so she makes up some weird sort of lie so the friend will do something else.

...

Funny, huh?

[psycholawgy]

Myriam, are you okay?

[ athena isn't getting it. ]

[cardboard_journalism]

I don't know. That's why I'm asking.

Have I got some part of it wrong?

[psycholawgy]

Is this one of those cases where we both happen to be one of the people in the story?

[cardboard_journalism]

...Sure, I can reword it that way.

So, there's this girl named Athena Cykes, and she has this friend, or at least this person who hangs around who thinks she's a friend, named Myriam Scuttlebutt...

[psycholawgy]

Don't be silly. Of course you're a friend.

What makes you think otherwise?

[cardboard_journalism]

Whoa whoa whoa! I didn't say it was us. It's just... some girl named Athena Cykes and some other girl named Myriam Scuttlebutt.

...so Myriam Scuttlebutt is kinda dumb. And apparently she did something dangerous...

Apparently this involved another guy who liked using a bow and arrow...

[psycholawgy]

... Archer, huh?

(Not this again!)

[cardboard_journalism]

Hey, I didn't give "the guy" a name! He's just a guy.

...Right. So Myriam Scuttlebutt is in vague unspecific 'danger' from her interaction with "this guy", and yet it somehow doesn't involve the guy himself or make him any less of a great person.

So, Athena Cykes makes up a story about her life being in danger... to get Myriam Scuttlebutt to do something else.

...With me so far? I think I'm telling it right, but I can't be sure. Kahk kahk kahk.

[psycholawgy]

You can continue. I'm still listening.

[cardboard_journalism]

Okay, well, the punchline is kinda predictable. Myriam Scuttlebutt sort of freaks out. She doesn't "go to the police," but she calls in a lot of favors, from people who investigate this stuff for a living. "Please help my friend." "My friend is in danger." And such. Until finally it's discovered... there was no threat.

...

That's the joke.

[psycholawgy]

Did you talk to Shiho about this? Because, you know, this isn't a joke.

[cardboard_journalism]

So, it's all true then?

[psycholawgy]

Are you mad?

[cardboard_journalism]

Kinda. Friends don't lie to their friends, Athena.

[...pause]

--Okay, they totally do. But, they come clean about it, eventually.

[psycholawgy]

I did it to protect you, because you wouldn't stop talking smack about Archer.

[ they might be friends now, but athena knows what myriam is like... especially after what she did to junie. ]

He wasn't the one who was going to put you into trouble. It was somebody else.

[cardboard_journalism]

So, the ends justify the means, eh?

[huffs!]

...yeah, I got that. Does this mystery person have a name?

[psycholawgy]

Do you think I would tell you? I know you'd write something about h- [ a pause. ] them right away.

[cardboard_journalism]

Oh, so I'm not trustworthy, am I!? Is that how it is??

Maybe there's more newsworthy things to write about than someone who apparently would care about a teenage girl venting her frustration towards a grown man... spirit... guy... because he made her cry!

...kahk kahk kahk.

I don't even care about being mad at Archer anymore, I just want to know how much was lie and how much was truth!

[psycholawgy]

The only thing that was a lie was me being threatened by somebody!

[ she's not going to comment on the first half of what myriam said... for now, anyway. ]

[cardboard_journalism]

...

So, you weren't being threatened, I was being threatened. By an unnamed third person.

[it was probably fourth or fifth person by now, actually]

...And how did you learn about this?

[psycholawgy]

Archer told me.

[cardboard_journalism]

... Did he? --I thought you said Archer didn't tell you to come to me back then.