Archive of Our Own ^beta

Sticky’s perception of time is pretty fucked, and he probably has the whisperer to blame for that. It kept all of them satisfied but in a haze, only half-present when they were awake. He’d certainly lived at the institute for at least a few years, but looking back, every day blends into a single drowsy repeated routine. No doubt the more heinous and grueling things he’d done were cleanly wiped away by a brainsweeper.

All of this basically means that Sticky’s newfound freedom and alone time with his own mind is what he’s most grateful for -- and also the worst thing he’s actually ever experienced.

There’s nothing for him to do on this island but look at the sea and then immediately look behind him to see if any of the other inhabitants have gotten tired of his cataloging of the stones on the island (mostly just basalt) and have come to push him in. However, none of them seem too interested in murder, besides one of the girls who just shot him a dirty look and muttered something about “cheating on a test.” It’s not the worst thing she could remember him for, so he figures he’s good.

Only as a last resort (Sticky will not stoop so low as to start talking to the seagulls that swoop low down near the shore, or, god forbid, the infant in the house) he goes to the man everyone says saved his life. 

Today, he lingers a little bit after breakfast. Noticing this, Mr. Curtain shoos away the identical looking ones (Sticky thinks they might be called Jackson and Jillson, but those names are so ridiculous that they might have just been their code names for the mission) and patiently waits for Sticky to sit down.

After a bit of silence, Sticky blurts out, “I read your book.”

Curtain’s eyebrows raise and he coughs a little. To be honest, though, this shouldn’t be that much of a surprise. Sure, it’s a little uncomfortable for most adults to acknowledge that Sticky has probably read almost every book they can name (and more), but Mr. Curtain’s book was actually quite famous, and especially in a town as obscure as Stonetown, any celebrity would have half as much trouble being recognized. It would actually be quite believable that a child Sticky’s age read his book.

However, his initial surprise seems to stem from embarrassment rather than incredulity, with all the abashedness of someone who considered writing a self-help book at the age of 30. Indeed, Mr. Curtain is fighting back years of fight-or-flight associated with being approached by adoring fans of what was then his sordid past philosophy. 

Sticky doesn’t know about all this. “Sorry.” he mutters, getting up to leave.

Mr. Curtain sticks out his hand. “No, my fault. Of course, you’re always allowed to read whatever you’d like,” (Sticky thinks back to the heavily guarded library in the institute but decides not to correct Mr. Curtain.) “but I feel obligated as the author of the book to caution you against reading it.”

Sticky doesn’t disagree. He waits for spitting rage, a hand on his arm dragging him to the room full of mud and insects, but it doesn’t come. “I thought it was a bit redundant at times,” he finally says. 

Mr. Curtain sighs. “A valid criticism, but that isn’t the only reason I warn against reading it. It’s mainly the subject matter that doesn’t sit well with me. I fear it’s worse than outdated -- it was never relevant in the first place.”

“Irrelevant?” Sticky asks, shocked. “But you presented revolutionary technology in the book! You connected, not just philosophically but physically, all the neurological pathways in a human to the section in the amygdala ruled by fear.”

“Indeed,” agrees Mr. Curtain. “Yet what I wrote about was nothing more than circular justifications to something I thought I was too wise to experience myself. The experiments, the data -- those were all just window dressing. At its core, what I wrote was no better than a rambling diary of a child trying to make sense of the world, except mine was much more full of hubris.”

Perhaps it’s the remaining conditioning in Sticky from Mr. Benedict, or perhaps it’s simply the amount of hours he sunk into reading and then believing the book (but mostly reading -- it was quite redundant) but he finds himself unsatisfied with that answer. 

“How can that be?” he bursts out. “If the evidence isn’t to be trusted, then what is? The conclusion was visible from the start.”

Sticky’s horrified by his lack of control, but luckily Mr. Curtain doesn’t let him stew for long. “I think that’s ultimately what’s wrong with it; I was leading the witness,” he says. “I fancied myself the smartest man alive -- and perhaps there were things I could do that others could not, but soon I had to confront the fact that it had gotten me nowhere. I thought myself omnipotent, so I couldn’t acknowledge that no being has ever been omnipotent; the weakness of making a stone no being can lift. I’m sure you must have heard it before: the smartest people aren’t the best at problem solving. They’re the best at rationalizing their wrong answer.”

Sticky settles down, upset. It had been his whole life to know the answer, first for the game shows, then for the institute. There was no room for wrong answers. Everything he said had to be right -- even if there were contradictions.

His brain pulled a silly adage rather than any peer reviewed study, as if to add insult to injury. Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit; wisdom is knowing that you shouldn’t use it in a smoothie .

He had been blessed and then cursed with this degree of knowledge, and still there were things out of bounds for him. The book that Mr. Curtain had written was not a rung on the ladder to pull him up but a weight dragging him down. He supposed he’s still only as close to heaven as he is tall.

“What do I do, then?” Sticky says, somewhat desperately. “It’s all I know, gathering evidence to find some semblance of the truth.”

“It is in the nature of science to have a margin of error,” responds Mr. Curtain. “But what pulled me out of my rut were my friends. Good friends, true friends who could love me for what I was. That was the truth I found in the end that I could never tire of chasing.”

Sticky closes his eyes. As much as for every exit there is an entrance, every messenger has a mailbox. The institute is not something he can breach with his knowledge alone. Ideally, he would have the help of the strong, the stubborn, and the dogmatic.

But he guesses that everyone on this island will have to do.