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CHAMBERS, samara b. ([info]tracelines) wrote in [info]pandorarpg,
@ 2011-12-26 13:44:00

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Entry tags:!status: complete, ^date: november 09 2003, character: elijah chambers, character: samara capper

Characters: Elijah Chambers & Samara Chambers
Setting: Chambers home, 9 November 2003, 10:21am
Rating: General Public
Summary: Discussing how to deal with the nightmare-memories and revealing long-kept secrets.

Regardless of how frightened she may have been the day before when she had the run-in with Zarkin Frood, the fact remained that he had given her valuable information about these 'nightmares' that she could use to get her and her family somewhere further along in solving the entire mystery. She and Eli might not be on the best terms at the moment, but that didn't rightly matter because he would put it aside if it meant working on something intellectual—she knew him well enough for that. And maybe none of that really mattered anymore because right now this was what was most important: compiling what they already knew and finding out what else they needed to figure out to solve this matter once and for all.

Eli's part was essential though, because of his access at the Ministry, so she would need his help. She needed to find out what he had already researched on this matter anyhow and amass it with her own knowledge so that they could converge on the same road and stop with all this 'need to know' shite because she had a family to protect and she didn't have time to wait around on her husband and his ideals of when he thought he was ready to let her in on his secrets. This was one that she wasn't going to wait on, whether he was okay with it or not, he would just have to deal with that.

Samara walked into his study, where he always was, with Argus close at hand, and dropped the few books and newspapers she had pulled onto the other end of his desk by the open seat. "Pandora Zurlo," she said simply as she sat herself down in the seat and greeted the golden retriever who walked over to her as she had entered the room.


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[info]skittish
2011-12-27 12:42 am UTC (link)
Eli had been moving between his penseive and his notes on the best, building on what he convinced Roger to do yesterday. It was all rather fascinating and he was looking forward to how he might be able to apply these findings to his official work come Monday. However, all of that was paused when the alert system displayed on his desk told him Samara was on her way. He made sure the more sensitive of his work was away before she made her way in.

After their little spat the other day, Eli wasn't sure what to make of things. Never before had he felt so uneasy in his own house and he couldn't ignore the feeling that his wife was keeping something from him - probably something important. However, there were apparently other things on the agenda this morning.

"Like the idiot who broke into the Department of Mysteries on the 30th?" He said not bothering to hide his annoyance at that because it had caused quite the fuss among the department and really was just plain sloppy. "But perhaps more appropriately the woman who makes the likes of Bellatrix Lestrange appear sane and polite." Eli could have made his own assumptions, pushing further, but he wanted to hear what she had to say.

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[info]tracelines
2011-12-27 01:16 am UTC (link)
"The latter," she replied, "though I don't rightly know the connection between at the moment rather than the obvious. I'm more concerned with the ginger. It's been brought to my attention that she's apparently the one who's behind everything, everything being the murders and these so-called nightmares, which are obviously not nightmares at all. If they aren't nightmares, the most practical next step would be memories so if they are memories, that means that they are her memories. That would explain more plainly why when we wake up it seems more logical to us that the child isn't actually someone we even know." While it was normally rather traumatic for her to talk about it, now that she was actually getting somewhere with all this, it seemed to be easier to consider. "It would also explain why all those who have been murdered so far are those who have been in possession of a memory, because if they belong to her, she obviously wants them back."

Samara looked at him rather squarely, almost challengingly, wondering if he was going to put her off again or just help her with this. "So where have you got so far with this?"

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[info]skittish
2011-12-27 01:30 am UTC (link)
The moment he said it, it seemed obvious that the two were connected. Zurlo wasn't exactly a common last name around these parts and he knew first hand that there was plenty of stuff down in the Department that did all sorts of strange things. Why he hadn't seen it before was probably because he always zeroed in on the smaller details, sometimes missing the bigger picture. Eli had always been so preoccupied with breaking things down, he sometimes forgot how they could all fit together until he was forced to take a step back.

"That's what he died, I mean it had to be why he died - dozens of different ways for a man to get killed down there and any number of them could cause a chain reaction." He was very much in Eli world right now, and anyone else was either along for the ride or left behind. "Something gets broken, wards disrupted, you even open the wrong box and ... but what could it have been? Prophecies maybe?

"I mean if they are memories, which they certainly do act that way, they had to be kept somewhere, stored away." Eli shook his head. That wasn't right. He had back ups of himself stored places, or his thoughts at least, just in case, but he didn't think if they got out it would do that. "But why would they implant in other people? And what made them predisposed to becoming a vesicle?"

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[info]tracelines
2011-12-27 01:58 am UTC (link)
She hadn't even thought twice about it when she first read it, but then he mentioned the word 'box' and it hit her. "The box, Eli! Did you know anything about the box that went missing from the Department?" She shuffled through the Daily Prophets that she had collected over the past week and passed him the one from 7 November that had mentioned Dmitri Zurlo and the missing box.

"If the box went missing on the same night that the 'nightmares' began, then maybe the memories were in that box." She pointed to the article. But what he said was true. As far as she knew, memories didn't seek people out, nor did these specific ones want to be pulled from their minds once they were implanted—she'd tried that once already. "It has to be Dark Magic. These aren't normal memories because they don't act like this."

She sat forward, remembering all the things she'd read in school and all that she'd learned during Obliviator training. "If you pull out a memory and you don't place it in a container, it will dissipate. It's not going to seek out a host like these have, so either that box has altered them in some way or Pandora did something to them that made them different than normal memories."

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[info]skittish
2011-12-27 02:22 am UTC (link)
It was funny how that when there was something to figure out, any prior dispute between them didn't matter. Eli was invigorated by this new energy between them, although not at all willing to admit that it was possible they could have been here two days ago. He might have been a genius, but he was far from perfect or even all the compassionate and empathetic.

He paused when she asked the question about the box and immediately looked at her like she was stupid. "There's any number of things under investigation down there, even working in the department, you don't often know about something until it comes across your lab." Although if it had something to do with memory, he was surprised it hadn't been brought to his attention - that was what he had been in the realm of his research.

"What if the magic was similar to how a horcrux was constructed - not that would account for the dispersal pattern, but it an interesting aside to consider?" Especially if Pandora Zurlo was the one behind all of this. What she was trying to gain was clear, the more interesting part was how she was going about it.

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[info]tracelines
2011-12-27 02:49 am UTC (link)
Samara rolled her eyes at him. "I don't know what you work with, don't patronise me," but she wasn't really all that affected by it. She was more interested in getting results than arguing with him.

She considered his statement. "That would actually make more sense as to how they are behaving. I've never heard of anyone manipulating memories in such a way but that doesn't mean it can't be done. So say the box had horcrux-like magic so that when it was opened, the memories left it and sought out vessels because those pieces of soul have to be attached to objects. In this case the memories had to be attached to objects, but since memories come from humans first and foremost they sought out human vessels rather than inanimate ones because they felt most familiar."

Samara chewed on her lip for a moment. "My next question was whether she was murdering these people because she wanted to or because she had to in order to retrieve the memories from them, but if we consider it as horcrux, she would have to, wouldn't she? We can't pull the memories by any conventional means, but...do you think they might remove themselves if we tried to create a horcrux ourselves?"

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[info]skittish
2011-12-27 03:17 am UTC (link)
"Creating a horcrux isn't something just anyone can do. Dozens of wizards have tried and only ended up getting themselves killed." Even for someone with questionably morals and a desire to push the limits of possibility, Eli had never considered that he would be able to successfully create a horcrux. It was a nasty bit of magic that opened up a world of complications. "It would be more likely that this is some sort of variation on a horcrux." And therefore, more toward where his own personal interests lay. Eli hadn't lied when he told Samara that he had no intention of dying other night. It was just a matter of finding a way to keep living pasted the physical limitations of a body.

It was exactly what made the conversation they were engaged in dangerous. This was one of things he didn't tell other people, not even Samara because it was uncertain and also because it was supposed to be a forbidden thing. People got all sorts of uneasy when you started looking into life after death and that quest for immortality. It was also a dangerous game to be caught up in given the likely qualities of others with similar interests.

"If the recent murders are related to the memories, I wonder if there was an order she was going in, like if certain memories unlock different means for her to return or somehow regain what she once was." It was a slight redirection of topic, but subtle enough. "And perhaps the memories are defining moments for her, and it would be interesting if we knew if she was recreating the memory she wanted back."

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[info]tracelines
2011-12-27 03:54 am UTC (link)
"I know that, Eli. I certainly wasn't suggesting that we go try and make a horcrux just for fun." Not that she wouldn't consider it if it meant keeping her and Eli alive. Samara's morals were nothing if not questionable and her family was more important to her than anything else so the limits to what she'd do to protect them were rather infinite. "But still, if there are similarities then there must be methods of casting the memories out without actually having to kill the vessel it's carried in." She had no idea where they would even start to figure that sort of thing out seeing as this was magic they'd never tampered with before and didn't rightly understand, but that didn't mean she wasn't going to go there.

Samara leaned back in the chair again, considering what he said. "One way to know is to get a hold of Lavender Brown's collection of the dreams. She hasn't posted them in the journals that I know of but there might be a way of getting her to submit some of them to us. I sent her my dream anonymously so if I reveal who I actually was maybe she'd share some of the dreams with me if I asked her the right questions." She considered some of those questions she could ask. "And why would the two of us have similar memories? Does that mean other people who are connected in some manner ended up with similar memories? I wonder if that would have something to do with our own memories of each other or our love for one another..."

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[info]skittish
2011-12-27 05:07 am UTC (link)
"Lavender Brown?" He repeated, unsure that he heard her correctly. That wasn't a name he knew and he didn't understand why Samara would so willingly tell things to a stranger, even anonymously. Really, he would have liked to think she knew better because with the right sort of motivation, Eli knew there was no such thing as anonymous. "And she has a database? All those dreams just sitting around ripe for the plucking - I wouldn't be surprised if someone stole it from her." Especially if this was random, then whatever vehicle Pandora was currently using could certainly need some sort of map to make things easier.

"Is it smart to announce who you are to this girl? You might as well just make a giant sign." Sometimes keeping secrets saved lives. They kept people safe because the fewer people who knew about something, the fewer people who could use that against you. Eli did not like the idea of Samara outing herself to some girl who cared about dreams at the onset.

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[info]tracelines
2011-12-27 05:45 am UTC (link)
"She was in Harry Potter's year, a Gryffindor." Samara had done a bit of research on the woman before she decided to submit her dream to the database. Submitting anonymously had not been an issue to her and she had decided that telling her might make some sort of difference. And the whole idea had been to use the resource in the future if ever she needed it. But apparently her husband thought this wasn't a good idea in the least.

Samara raised an eyebrow at him. "I didn't say I was going to do it quite yet, I only said that we have the option if we were to want the information. I have other sources as it is - she's certainly not going to be the first person I go to. But you're right, it could always be stolen from her." She shrugged. She didn't find this nearly as worrisome as he seemed to find it, maybe because she knew she had no plans to do any of this without express need. Everything she was saying was mostly theory but he tended to be totally literal with it all.

"I don't think she's really all that important, besides the fact that she's the one who has the database. Her knowing who I am isn't really such a worry to me, but I'm not going to go see her without talking to you first."

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[info]skittish
2011-12-27 06:34 am UTC (link)
Harry Potter. He had been the first to die, well, second he supposed, but the first that anyone had taken note of. Then it was a game to work out who died after that in connection with this thing and if that mattered. Surely, you didn't just kill Harry Potter for the fun of it. Well, maybe some people did, but there was bound to be a purpose because it was a high profile death. The kind that was going to start people on a trail.

Unless that was the point.

There were too many variables now, dozens of possibilities of how this could play out depending who was at the helm. His mind was racing to keep up until he caught that one little throw away sentence fragment. It wasn't the most important part, but it was jarring enough to make him notice.

"You have other sources?" He might have done better than to sound so surprised at the face, but he couldn't help it. Apparently, Samara had been busy looking into the nightmares and hadn't shared with him. Eli wondered briefly if that made her or him the bigger hypocrite at the moment.

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[info]tracelines
2011-12-27 07:08 am UTC (link)
Samara sighed, leaning back into the chair. She didn't know how much of this was going to be an issue, but she wasn't going to let him try to turn any of the other night's conversation back on her just because she had one day of not telling him something when she was there - now - telling him all of it. There might be one secret she had, but she didn't have as many as she figured he did. "Really Eli?"

She shook her head before taking a deep breath. "Yes, I have one. I ran into Theodore Nott yesterday in Diagon, after almost being accosted by a slightly crazy but nonetheless informative man by the name of Frood. He not only told me that I was going to be killed by Pandora, he also told Jase that Pandora would make me kill him too, so your son knows about some of it as well. Theodore happened upon us before the man ran off and offered to talk to me and I took him up on the offer. It only happened yesterday, so no, I'm not keeping it a secret."

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[info]skittish
2011-12-28 02:52 am UTC (link)
Theodore Nott. This was seemingly becoming a game where his wife named a number of people he didn't know because they weren't important enough for him to take notice or didn't bother to learn the name. Although there was a pattern here, her telling things to other people. One that it wouldn't surprise him to learn he was somehow the cause of.

"Then perhaps we should talk to him about it." Their son had always been smart, taking after him in that regard. Lying or pretending that everything was fine would likely only make the child worry more. "I mean if I were his age and my parents were going through something like this or not, I would have been aware of it and would want to know if there was something I could do."

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[info]tracelines
2011-12-28 04:04 am UTC (link)
Samara hated the idea, but she knew that they had to tell him something, now that he had skewed ideas of what was going on. And it wasn't like he didn't know that Samara had been jumpy for the past week anyway, so it was about time they explained something to him, but she still wanted to protect him from it all.

"Eli, you've got to be careful how you explain this to him. He may be intelligent enough to understand it, but he still doesn't need to know all the details. He's just a child and deserves the chance to act like one while he's got the time. Which means there is nothing he can do besides let us do what we are are already doing." Samara gave him that 'mother knows best' look she'd perfected over the past five years after spending all her time at home with their son. She knew that Eli was a good father, but that didn't change the fact that he saw himself in Jason and could sometimes consider the boy to be far older than he really was.

Samara pulled out her wand and cast the spell that projected her voice into whatever room her son was in, rather than yell across the house. "Jase, will you come to your father's study for a moment please? We'd like to talk to you." When Jason made his way into the study he walked straight toward Samara who picked him up automatically and set him in her lap. He looked at both his parents expectantly.

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[info]skittish
2011-12-28 04:17 pm UTC (link)
Eli saw his son the same way his father regarded him, which was not as a child at all. "Just because he can't do everything, doesn't mean there can't be something for him to do, to give some sort of peace of mind." He honestly wasn't looking to placate his son, but rather allow him a focus through out all this. Perhaps that way it could be somewhat manageable.

He sat back in his chair watching carefully as Jason entered his study. Eli wasn't sure when his study because some sort of communal living space, but he would deal with that later and only if he had to. Right now he had the pleasure of explaining things to Jason.

"So your mum tells me that you two ran into a man yesterday who said some...interesting things." Despite never trying to talk down to his son, today Eli decided that Jason was going to lead the conversation. That way Samara couldn't get too cross if Eli said something that she would rather he not say. "I was wondering if you have any questions about that.'

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[info]tracelines
2011-12-28 06:50 pm UTC (link)
Jason sat up and looked rather excited. "Oh yeah! Theodore Nott was there too, Da, he was really nice! He told me who Pandora Zurlo was. She was Gellert Grindelwald's most loyal follower. He said 'behind every great man there's a great woman' just like you and Mum." He beamed up at his mother and Samara shook her head, smiling.

Jason looked more serious when he continued. "I know Mum's been worried about the nightmares she's been having, but I think it will be alright. Between the two of you I know you'll figure something out." Jason put a his hand over Samara's hand and looked up at her. "Da would never let anything happen to you, Mum."

She looked down at him and then over at Eli, nodding. Regardless of what she'd said to him the other night, she did believe that to be true. Samara smiled at Eli, saying, "I know he wouldn't, love."

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[info]skittish
2011-12-28 08:17 pm UTC (link)
It was an interesting comparison to hear Jason make. Were he and Samara similar to Grindelwald and Pandora? From what history said he couldn't be sure of their exact relationship, but Eli loved Samara with everything he could. Absent minded, he rubbed his thumb over his tattoo on his ring finger. Eli already suspected that Samara would go to any length she could for something that mattered to her and his was move driven by the desire to know.

There was a fine line between greatness and madness, and Eli had often found men like Grindelwald to be largely misunderstood geniuses - so perhaps they weren't so different after all.

"That's right," he said agreeing, "I would never let anything happened to your mum or to you. And she is having some rather scary nightmares that are upsetting." Eli leaned forward as if to tell his son a secret because in some ways it was. "And I have been having them too, which worried me a little. So I'm going to need you to be extra good, brave and brilliant for us. Do you think you could do that?"

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[info]tracelines
2011-12-30 12:48 am UTC (link)
Jason pulled a face at Eli, one that said his father was obviously being a bit stupid. It was a face Samara had seen on Eli many times before, and she couldn't help but stifle a laugh because the similarity was remarkable. "Da, do you really need to ask? I've already started brewing polyjuice potion, I think I can handle Mum's mood swings."

"Jason!" Samara declared, looking aghast, but the boy just grinned up at her. "You'll be lucky if I don't take that potion away from you."

"Awww Mum, I want to use it!" Jase started whinging, sounding more like a little kid again.

She shook her head. "Do you have any questions about any of this, love?"

"Is Uncle Benji coming over for tea?" the boy asked, disregarding her question altogether.

"Jase," Samara said in a warning tone.

Jason sighed over-dramatically at her. "If you and Da don't get rid of the nightmares, someone might try to kill the both of you like they did the others?" He looked over at Eli for confirmation.

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[info]skittish
2011-12-30 02:59 am UTC (link)
Eli reached over and messed Jason's hair. While an affectionate gesture, it was still something that riled the boy a little, which was exactly what he intended for exchange with his mother. It also gave him a moment to look at Samara and gauge how he should answer that question as opposed to how he was going to answer.

However, it came down to the fact that Jason was too smart to lie to. Samara wanted him to be innocent, Eli didn't want him to think it was worse than it was because dad wouldn't tell him the truth.

"That could happen, but I am a very smart man and your mum, she's pretty smart too. And we aren't going to let that happen - neither of us are going to die anytime soon." It probably wasn't what Samara would have said, but it was a milder version of what he might have told Jason without an audience. "Which is why I need to ask because it's going to take some work and probably more of your mum's mood swings."

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[info]tracelines
2011-12-30 03:28 am UTC (link)
"Jason looked at her. "I think there's a potion for those."

"Alright, I've heard just about enough of these so-called mood swings from the two of you," Samara said, though she had a small smile playing on her lips as she set Jason back down on the floor. "If you have any other questions come ask us, okay?"

"Yes Mum. Is Uncle Benji coming over for tea?" Jase asked again, looking impatient this time.

"I don't know what his plans are. Floo him and ask, love. And don't use so much powder this time!" she called after him as he ran from the room.

Samara turned back around and leaned on his desk, looking thoughtful. "So there is one other possibility that we could try, though I'm weary of the idea seeing as there is obviously other magic at work on these memories and side affects could come into play, but it might still be worth pursuing if other options turn up little results. So we might consider attempting to obliterate the memory itself like you would any other normal memory." Though this wasn't a fix either. Memory charms could be reversed with strong enough magic, but it was still something to try, even if the subject brought a bitter taste to her mouth when she spoke of it. Just thinking of pointing her wand at her husband and saying those words again was almost unbearable, but if it were something that might save him, she'd rise above her own discomfort, like she was attempting to do now by talking about it, albeit with a bit of fidgeting.

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[info]skittish
2011-12-30 05:24 am UTC (link)
Eli leaned back in his chair, listening for Eli to be well out of earshot before he even began to consider the question. He had just told his son they were going to work to solve the issue at hand, he might as well get to that. "I have considered the possibility." He hadn't gone so far as to try it himself set, because while he might know a great about memories, having both the theoretical and practical skill to manipulate them in strange and fascinating new ways - sometimes you just needed someone well-practiced with the basic ability.

"However, the memory cannot be extracted by normal means, and it doesn't seem likely that it can be duplicated properly." And he had tried, numerous times even with other memories just to make sure that he hadn't done it wrong. "So, I am not sure what effect that any attempt to obliviate the memory might cause." Eli swallowed, for the first time feeling like he was standing on true uncertain ground, but the question was already formed. "You've been out of practice for some time, would you be able to successfully perform such a charm?"

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[info]tracelines
2011-12-30 05:58 am UTC (link)
Samara nodded at his counter argument. "I agree with you on that - the true ramifications are unknown until we actually try it. It's possible that nothing at all will happen because of the other magic that is involved, or it might dislodge that magic and have a negative effect, or vice versa and give us a more positive effect. It's hard to tell without knowing the other magic surrounding the memory."

She shouldn't have been very surprised when he asked of her practice with memory charms. After five years she had expected that he would have figured something out of the sort. Whether he really knew or not she was not certain, but she could tell that he was fishing for information. At least this she could answer honestly enough since she performed the charm on Eli only a few months after she quit her training. "It has been a little over five years now since I last performed a memory charm, but I was well within my rights at becoming one of the best Obliviators that the Ministry had currently employed so I don't doubt my abilities, even without daily practice. Do you?"

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[info]skittish
2011-12-30 05:18 pm UTC (link)
"Doubt your abilities?" He asked not really needing the confirmation, but five years was a long time even for someone who might have been on her way to becoming one of the best. However, that wasn't the point. Maybe he was fishing for information, but that meant taking a risk and putting himself out there. It wouldn't the first time he did so.

"If I did, I wouldn't be asking you if you would be willing to try and obliviate the nightmare-memory in my head." It was a simple indirect ask, but Eli imagined it held a lot more weight than the words allowed. He might not have actually known, but he had a notion. Samara was keeping something from him, there had been something wrong with his own head for few years now, but were those two related? And did he really want to know the answer?

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[info]tracelines
2011-12-30 08:34 pm UTC (link)
Samara merely nodded, not sure that she should say anything else on the subject. She could feel the air shifting in the room around her, feel the tension just by the mere mention of memory charms and she didn't like it. Maybe it was all in her own head, but either way, she didn't want to risk getting into this area of conversation like she had the other night. The last thing she wanted was another argument, especially when they hadn't entirely finished with the last one.

"Eli-" she began, but she just didn't know where she was planning to go with this. She didn't know what she had been about to say, but decided to go with an apology. "I'm sorry about the other night. I know I've been a bit difficult to deal with this past week and I want to thank you for being so patient with me and being there every morning when I wake up from these nightmares." Samara reached across his desk to take one of his hands in hers. "I guess I have been having some mood swings. I'm sorry about all of this." What exactly all of this entailed she didn't explain, but she could mean it to include quite a few things if she wanted.

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[info]skittish
2012-01-01 02:13 am UTC (link)
"Okay," he said carefully. Eli had only been joking about the mood swings with Jase because it was an easier way to talk about a difficult situation. He didn't honestly believe that she was having any sort of mood swings - at least not ones that were unexpected. More importantly, he didn't like that she was apologizing for the other night, not in place of answering the almost question he posed. Not when he felt it was the thing that hung in that delicate balance between them. They had entered into new territory the other day with the fight, they were back here again now.

Eli didn't shake her hand off his, but he made no move to acknowledge it. No, he was onto something else. He had always been something of a singularly focused man and now when it was so close he couldn't just let this go, even if it could be better for him to do so. "But that doesn't answer the question, would you be willing to obliviate the nightmare memory from my head?"

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[info]tracelines
2012-01-01 02:29 am UTC (link)
Samara felt herself teetering on the edge of losing her cool again but she was trying not to do that. She didn't want to go down that road again and she had a feeling that if she did, she might give too much away. Still, she couldn't stop herself from squeezing his hand reflexively in response before she removed her hands altogether. She didn't like this. It felt like a challenge and she didn't know what answer was going to throw him toward the wrong conclusions. It didn't rightly matter, though, because she'd already vowed to tell him the truth so she'd just have to deal with whatever he decided to decipher from this.

Samara looked him dead in the eye and replied, "Yes, Eli. I would do absolutely anything for you, you know that."

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[info]skittish
2012-01-03 12:43 am UTC (link)
He didn't doubt that for a second. Eli knew with every ounce of his being that what she said was true - Samara would do anything for him, for their family no matter what that would entail. "Good," he said finally not sure he wanted to chase that line of thought any further just yet.

"But before I let you take a wand to my head to go after that memory, like you said, we do need to know more about how it works, because it really is like nothing I've ever encountered." He sat back in his chair, gaze shifting toward the cabinet where he has tucked his pensieve away before she came in. It wasn't entirely giving away the game because he kept a few different things for his projects in there.

"I mean it's not mine, but it quite honestly does seem like a natural memory, and unless someone out there is smarter than I am, which not to be immodest, but I highly doubt that, it would have to be some sort of dead man's or dead woman's memory as the case might be, but how to insert them and on such a scale?" Unfortunately, Eli didn't have access to any dead man's memories that he could tinker with and not have to carefully report it to the Department. And he didn't think it would be quite so productive to take someone's memories and kill them just to see what he could do - although he did briefly consider it.

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[info]tracelines
2012-01-03 01:42 am UTC (link)
Samara thought for a moment that things were moving on, that she could relax and she did. This was a mistake she couldn't make again. This was a mistake she could never make around him again while they were discussing these memories that were now in their minds that didn't belong to them because the next thing she did was such an obvious give-away that she might as well have told him everything right then and there. When he mentioned dead people's memories Samara's eyes went wide and she looked away from him and down at her hands. It took her a moment to recover from it, because she just hadn't expected this line of talk and it was stupid of her not to, but there it was. She was getting soft after five years; this stupid memory that wasn't hers was ruining everything and she needed it out, dammit.

In one of their earlier plans, Samara and Elijah Senior had considered not modifying Eli's memory at all but rather modifying Elijah Senior's memory so that it would work well enough to be placed into Eli's head once Elijah Senior was dead. Which obviously meant that Elijah Senior would have to kill himself at some point in order for the plan to work. But after they considered it long enough (and they did seriously consider it for a while, for it meant Samara didn't actually have to perform any magic on Eli's mind) the technicalities became much too great for the two of them. Elijah Senior would still need to get convicted for Eli's crimes - it was easier just to do it the way they did.

Not to mention Eli might not have access to any dead man's memories, but Samara now did. She still had Elijah senior's original memories of his research project during the time of the war (as well as Eli's memory of his real research project which he had removed because he knew he'd be going to Azkaban for it and was making a failsafe, which Samara stole) stored in her family's vault in Gringotts along with a few other memories Elijah Senior had included for the time when Eli did figure all this out. Both he and Samara had known it would not last forever.

This would be something they could use, except that she couldn't tell him any of this, because why would Elijah Senior give these extra memories to Samara instead of just giving them to his son before he went to Azkaban? And why would Samara not have given them to him five years ago if not? However, she could create approximate similar memories of her own to experiment with if she had enough information to go by. But she would still probably need Eli's help in the end with the experimentation, which begged the question: if she was willing to do anything to save her family, did that include breaking it if it came down to that? Would she just tell Eli about all of it if giving him these memories might save their lives even if the fallout was losing him? She knew that Jason needed his father and if it meant her losing Eli well-she might have to do it for the both of them.

She looked up at Eli again after that moment and said as strongly as she could without looking away from him because it was key that she not give it away yet, "I can try to recreate it. The memory - it's easier for Obliviators to make false memories when we've got a real memory to work off of and obviously we've seen this one with quite a lot of detail, so I can try to recreate it for someone else. We can put it in someone else's head and see what happens. Make them think they've been having these nightmares every night and see if they keep having them or if they develop the spot because of it."

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[info]skittish
2012-01-03 02:40 am UTC (link)
He noticed her hesitation at the mention of a dead man's memories. She had some and first reaction was jealously, followed by the curiosity to want to know who those memories belonged to and why she was keeping them from him. Only once he reached that conclusion, he felt that it might also be connected to what was wrong in his own dead.

"And I could probably do it better," he said sort of offhandedly. "If we want to see how the memory works with other people, you have to create something as close to the real thing as possible, you might be good at fabricating that, but I could make something very close to the real thing." After all, that had been part of his plan, to not have to worry about death or worse losing his mind, he had started to create back ups. At the beginning they were never quite good enough, he could still tell it was real, it didn't have enough of the nuances. However, recently he was able create replicas of his own memories with 90 percent accuracy. That wasn't something needed for comparably simpler obliviation, which was more of an art where his was a science.

"Because the average person might not be able to tell, but false memories can be recognized as different by an individual and as you know don't quite work the same." In an indirect way, he was telling her that he knew. Or that at least he had an idea. Even as they were scheming to try to put these nightmare-memories into someone else's head, he was calling her on the unspoken game between them.

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[info]tracelines
2012-01-03 03:16 am UTC (link)
Samara was worried now. He knew more than she had ever thought which stood to reason that he had been working with memory in the Department so he could probably tell quite a lot about it all by now. If he was able to create false memories better than she was there wasn't much she could hold over him now in the memory area. Why of all things would he have been assigned to memories?

"Since when?" she asked, not that it truly mattered. She was stalling for time because she couldn't decide if she should delay further or just give in now. She knew that she'd given away too much already. She knew that things were going downhill and at this rate she was better to just tell him and get it over with than to bother with trying to lie anymore. But after lying for five years it was difficult just to tell finally. She'd spent more of their marriage with this secret than without it.

Samara wasn't going to give up yet. She wasn't going to just let him win, not until he made it abundantly clear that he knew what she had done, even if his last statement was an obvious suspicion on her part. She continued to stare at him and replied, "Considering that most people we have available to work with are going to be just average and nothing like, say you, I don't really see the problem with just a false memory. If you want to use your memory creation skill though go right ahead, I'd love to see. I had no idea you'd become so...proficient."

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[info]skittish
2012-01-03 04:20 am UTC (link)
"I do run a research lab that investigates the correlation between memory and emotion in magic, which means I know quite a good deal about how it works." Officially he wasn't allowed to say more than that and Samara didn't need to know that his proficiency had nothing to do with his professional role. She wasn't the only one who kept secrets in this marriage. If anything their whole relationship was speckled, but not necessarily marred by them. Some mystery was good and while he wanted to know everything, it was the quest that really kept him going.

"And the more realistic that we could recreate a memory, the more likely it will act how they do when they are in our heads." That was what it came down to. These memories weren't obeying any of the stupid rules that he had tried to bend and break for years. It wasn't fair there was something out there potentially more powerful than him, just like it wasn't fair that he didn't actually get to know what human flesh tasted like, just had strange nightmare-memories about it.

"So, really unless you are willing to kill someone for their memories that would be the best route to go." He almost asked if she had access to a dead person's memories, but decided against it. Eli opted to raise the stakes of this conversation just a little bit higher because they were here now and why not give things a little push?

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[info]tracelines
2012-01-03 05:07 am UTC (link)
Samara eyed him warily. He'd never mentioned that much about his work before. He may have hinted about things in the past, but had never been so direct so she was surprised to hear him do so now, regardless of the game they might currently be playing underneath what they were "really" talking about.

"Okay then, we'll do it your way," she replied, not willing to argue it further. If he was as good as he said then they'd need to do it this way anyhow, because it meant finding out just what might be causing the spots to appear or even what was drawing the murderer to them.

Samara would be willing to kill someone - if that were actually necessary. He knew that, but that's not why he was asking. He was asking because he knew that she had memories of someone who was deceased thanks to her reaction earlier. He didn't know whose though and they very well could be her father's. "Eli, you know that I am willing to do - or say - anything for my family. There is no price that is too high for you or Jason."

Which was the problem here. She'd already done it and he was asking for them. Would they save their lives ultimately? She didn't know that for certain, but should she wait to find out? She decided to raise the stakes higher because he already had a clue, but it wasn't enough to give her away just yet. "I wouldn't need to kill anyone though. I already have some memories from someone who has died."

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[info]skittish
2012-01-03 05:28 am UTC (link)
It would be a lie to say that he wasn't disappointed. Killing someone would give him the memories he needed to play around with and he could even indulge the curiosity of exactly what human flesh tasted like. And what if they were to kill someone with the nightmare-memory, what would happen then? Now, that would be something he would like to see. It could certainly give him a better situation of what was happening.

And he would figure this out and then find appropriate applications to his own work.

Except there it was. Samara was meeting his bait with her own, only he wasn't going to exchange anymore. No, he was going to carefully step down this path and make sure it led to where he wanted it to go. He wasn't ready for his true ending, so he might even take her lie. Eli just wanted her to know that he knew. "And who might have given you their memories?" The most likely people would be family and they had both lost parents - two fathers and a mother between them. Although given that their fathers were Unspeakables, it had to be one of them if not both. "Benjamin? Elijah?"

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[info]tracelines
2012-01-03 05:58 am UTC (link)
She had the chance to lie, but she hadn't been close to her father, so why would she even have her father's memories to begin with? Sure she could make something up about Benjamin Senior giving them to Benji and her having the access to them in the vault but that they were not actually hers to take. Truly it could be a believable lie, but she was at a tipping point now where she had already revealed part of her lie and didn't really want to go back now.

That didn't necessarily mean she was going all in either though. "I never said that they were given to me." It was the truth; she hadn't said that, but they were given to her. "They belonged to my father-in-law, who was for all intents and purposes my father." She had become close to Eli's parents, particularly his mother, though her bond with Eli's father wasn't exactly that strong until he made his offer to take Eli's place. "I loved him very much." Her father never would have done anything like that for his children or even his wife. This was, in more ways than one, a revelation for Eli. It was up to him where he wanted to take it next.

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[info]skittish
2012-01-03 06:55 am UTC (link)
Eli didn't like to think about his father. It easier to not contemplate the life of a man who went to prison for his work, who ultimately lost his mind, and died a fragment of his former self. The more superficial part of his mind told him he didn't like to think of his father because it bothered him - that fear of losing his mind. It was his most valuable possession and yet that deeper part of him, the one that took things apart to see how they worked knew that aversion was far more significant than that.

"So what? Are you saying that you took my father's memories?" No, that didn't seem right. While she might have done anything for the family, Eli knew that Samara had a close relationship with both of his parents. The problem was that was the safer conclusion to go to because the other one opened up far too many questions, but he said it anyway. "Or rather my father gave you his memories, which probably indicates that I'm not meant to know about them unless it's unavoidable."

To some extent, it had always been her choice, but he was still giving her the opportunity to change her mind. To not take them down this path because deep down he trusted his father and his wife to do the right thing. "So, have we really reached that point? Are you sure this is the time?"

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[info]tracelines
2012-01-03 07:24 am UTC (link)
Samara did not answer his first questions. There wasn't a need to - he knew the real answer already. It was the last that made all the difference. The fact that he asked her if she was ready, regardless of the fact that he would want to know, was touching to her in so many ways he probably would never understand. Regardless of the fact that he would probably not like all the answers, he had asked her of her comfort first, which was a blessing, but it also made her see that it was time for her to stop keeping it from him. It had been five years and he did have the right to know. All of the fallout would be personal to herself alone and she would deal with it accordingly. It was time.

"Are you certain that we can gamble with waiting? If there's any chance that it will save your life, Elijah, then it is time. Our son cannot grow up without a mother and a father. He almost lost you once, I won't let that happen a second time, not after all we've done to ensure otherwise." Samara paused for a moment, not sure if she should continue. She wasn't at all certain if this was something she should tell him or just let him look at for himself. It's not as if he could not watch it all anyhow. But that was not for her to decide. She owed him that much. "I can tell you myself or you can see for yourself. It is your decision."

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[info]skittish
2012-01-03 05:28 pm UTC (link)
He almost lost you once. She almost lost him once too that meant. So, he reached over to take her hands in his, letting her know that he was right here. That for all their trespasses, they worked together and that wasn't something he would blindly abandon. And he needed to hear it from her, as if that would somehow make it more bearable.

"What did I do?" While the other concern was what did she do, he still trusted her to have made what she thought was the right decision at the time. And really what she did was less important compared to what it was that she made disappear - what did she take away from him? "What did I do that would have taken me away?"

For as crazy as he might seem, he actually knew that some of things that he did or thought about weren't considered appropriate or even acceptable. Although he understood that as part of a limited world view that most people had, but he still knew that it was important to not share everything he did. He walked a fine line.

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[info]tracelines
2012-01-03 06:54 pm UTC (link)
Samara sucked in a long breath.  She had gone over this speech a thousand times, but that didn't matter - she couldn't remember any of it when he took her hands in his.  He might be supportive now, but that didn't mean he would be later.  He hadn't wanted it back then, why would he be okay with it after he knew the truth?  But that did not mean she would not tell him.  She had gone this far and there was no turning back now.  She didn't want to hold onto this secret anymore.  She had considered long ago taking the memory of performing the charm on Eli from her mind altogether, but she just couldn't allow herself to live guilt-free of this, especially not when she knew Eli would figure it out eventually and need these answers.  It might have been a bit masochistic of her to torture herself in that way, but she felt like it was a beacon that showed just how far she was willing to go for this family they had created so many years ago when they'd first met in the halls of Hogwarts and never left one another's side.

"You were working on a research project in the Department with Benjamin during the war.  It was focused on Muggleborns and officially was meant to get them help quickly for treating magical illnesses but you were basically creating a tracking device for all them.  The two of you were still working on it when the Ministry fell under Death Eater control, which you remember.  You worked on two deceased Muggleborns and two living Muggles during the project, which is what bothered the magical community the most I believe."

She looked down at her hands for a moment.  "I knew about your research then.  I supported you - I always will.  But we got pregnant in January and by May there was the Battle of Hogwarts and Harry Potter defeated the Dark Lord and Benjamin was killed during that battle.  They were persecuting everyone involved with the Death Eaters, which was going to include you and only you because Benjamin was already dead.  Jason was going to lose his father to Azkaban before he was even born to meet him."  Her eyes turned a bit glassy at the statement.  She hated even the mere thought and she could still remember her despair even now.  "I was going to have to raise him on my own and I was never going to see you again." She squeezed his hands.

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[info]tracelines
2012-01-03 06:54 pm UTC (link)
"Elijah Senior came to us and said that he would take your place in Azkaban. His life was near over but you had yet to live and with a child on the way and-and me, he wanted to see you live out your potential. He would claim himself to be the head researcher on your project and they would convict him instead of you. Your father was a wonderful man." She paused there and sighed, because this was the part he was going to hate her for, the part that might possibly ruin the very marriage she'd been trying to save. But she'd done it for Jason and she had to think about him before herself. "You wouldn't agree to it. You didn't want your father to have the credit for your work. We both understood your misgivings, you did deserve merit for your own work, but in the end it didn't matter because the findings weren't going to be useable by you or the Ministry; they weren't going to touch them because of the nature with which they were handled."

Samara's voice became shaky as she continued and her hands mirrored the movement, but she plowed on. "So we met together in secret and began working on what best to do. We thought up a few possibilities, but in the end the only feasible thing was to modify yours and Elijah's memories with one another's current projects so that when he was convicted they would have the memory of yours and Benjamin's project to pull from him and think nothing more of it. There would be no reason to. I used your and Elijah's original research project memories for study, as you had removed yours when they first began convicting people as a fail safe and I stole them from your study. Once Elijah's memory was set, all that was left was to modify your memory." She couldn't look at him when she spoke, even though she knew he deserved it. It was too difficult. "It was almost too easy to do, even though it was the most difficult thing I've ever done in my life. If it had been only for myself I would not have done it, but I couldn't let Jason grow up not knowing the amazing man his father was, not when there was a way that he could be saved. He needed you and he still does and if it means that I lose you, I am willing to pay the price - I always was." She closed her eyes and a few tears fell onto his hands that covered her own. "I'm truly sorry."

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[info]skittish
2012-01-04 01:54 am UTC (link)
As he listened to her speak of his project, a rather fascinating one at that, because that was what this was all about, wasn't it? The why magic existed, did a pureblood have the potential to be powerful than a muggleborn because of all that history or did it boggle a person down? At it's root is a a research project that dig into their reason for being and had dozens of applications that people could slant to be 'good' or 'evil,' which where perfectly inappropriate and limited views to assign knowledge.

"Does that mean you also have my original memories of my research?" It probably wasn't the immediate response she would have expected, but it was the first thing he vocalized. There was so much he could do. If he had what he did during the war, and perhaps even access to a squib that he could dissect some. He had to have been close if he was moving beyond theoretical and bringing test subjects into his research.

"I mean the nature of that work, the implications..." He stood up from his chair, needing to move. Eli had been expecting it to be so much worse and okay, it was worse because his father had taken the fall for what he did. "Although really do you think I would have allowed them to send me to Azkaban? That I didn't have my own fail safes in place? Do you honestly think I would be that reckless, Samara?"

"And more importantly, it's been five years, nearly half of which my father has been dead." Although crazy long before then. Eli paused then. "My father went mad because of me, well, it we're going to be technical about it, because of you. What were you thinking? Did you imagine you were protecting me from something? From myself?"

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[info]tracelines
2012-01-04 04:38 am UTC (link)
When he first mentioned the research, Samara wondered if he was not going to get angry at all. If he was only going to focus on this research maybe he wasn't even going to worry about the rest of it. If only it could be that simple. "Yes, you took out all of the memories of your project. I have them all."

But there was a swift change in him and he began to move and she saw the waves begin to break. It was coming - she was losing him. She could not lie and say that his words did not sting quite a lot and his blaming her for his father's insanity was rather harsh. She had never blamed herself for that and she would not start now. Elijah Senior had told her not to ever blame herself and she believed in him.

She let him finish berating her with questions before she even tried to address any of them. They seemed to be flying at her like slaps in the face, not that Eli had ever hit her before, but the force with which they hit still felt just as damaging. She took a deep breath and tried to steady herself so that she could actually give answers to him. "If you had any plans in place you did not mention them to us when your father suggested his idea. If we were at all certain that you could have kept yourself from Azkaban we wouldn't have done it, Eli." She didn't look at him when she continued, "The climate was difficult, Eli. We were all scared, we had a short amount of time to plan and take action and considering your flat out refusal to his proposition on the basis of accreditation alone - yes, I honestly did think you were being rather reckless at the time. It's much easier for you to look back now and see that decisions were made hastily, but the situation then was rather dire."

"No, Eli, I will not let you disfigure this into something disgusting. Your father was a noble man, he did this willingly out of his love for his family and his son and I was and still am immensely proud of that man for every day that he spent in Azkaban, even if his mind deteriorated because of it. You might not agree with how we planned it, but it was our decision, it was the best decision and we carried it out for that very reason."

She considered his last questions. There were times in which Elijah Senior and she had discussed that Eli's refusal to allow him to take credit for his research was a step toward that line between genius and madness that he had never truly crossed yet and it had the both of them a little worried. "In the beginning, when we first decided to do it, yes. It was a conscious decision that there might be a possibility that you were beginning to step toward the line you'd crossed before. I suppose if you had given us any indication that you had plans of your own we would not have thought this but you shared it with either of us. In the last five years, I didn't tell you because - well in the beginning it was too difficult and I was trying to focus on Jason rather than the war. After a year or so it just became natural to keep the secret and knowing that you would discover the imbalance eventually, I thought it better that you figure that part out on your own first before I came to you with the whole story."

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[info]skittish
2012-01-04 05:21 am UTC (link)
It was a fine line he walked. It had become an even finer line when he realized that pieces of him were not just missing, but wrong. Eli wondered if she knew, knew how it had become worse in the years since, putting more holes in between what might be considered sanity. Or maybe sanity was really just another way of saying a socially accepted conscience. It had unnerved him, and of course she had to have noticed. He might have been a genius, but he was certainly married to someone who could keep up with him. Someone who he had loved since he was sixteen.

Yes, he was upset with her, upset over this situation on many different levels, but that didn't really help them any. So, he took a moment to pause, his gaze drifting down to his hands. Rather than just using them as a neutral point of focus, he found himself look at his tattoo. He had made a promise. He took a vow. Those were not things he took lightly.

After a moment he turned to her. Eli crossed the room and knelt down in front of her. He took each of her hands in his own, his fingers running over her wedding band that matched the pattern on his own skin. Very deliberately, he looked up at her. "You say you would do anything for me, for our family," his voice was calm, knowing that what came next was a loaded question. "But do you trust me? Absolutely and without reservation?"

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[info]tracelines
2012-01-04 06:14 am UTC (link)
The waves kept breaking in new ways. She didn't know how to react. He was firing questions at her one moment and then kneeling in front of her the next. She just didn't understand what he was thinking. And she didn't know why he was asking her these new questions either.

Samara gazed down at his face, blinking a few times, trying to pull the confusion from her mind. It wasn't that she didn't know the answer, because she did, it was just that she didn't understand why he was no longer asking the other questions. The fog cleared enough and she leaned forward and placed her forehead against his so that all she could see was into his eyes. She had always loved looking into his beautiful blue eyes ever since she'd met him in their sixth year. It honestly hadn't taken much for her to realise that he was the one she wanted to spend the rest of her life with. "Elijah Chambers, I have trusted you since I was sixteen years old and barely knew who you were. Now that I do know you more completely, I trust you more than I trust myself most times. Do not ever think that I disbelieve that you know what you are doing in anything."

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[info]skittish
2012-01-06 04:37 am UTC (link)
That was the funny thing about trust, you didn't always get to know why. Eli had things he kept, things he could always keep, but if they were going to do this, even just a fraction of the possibilities running through his head, he would need to know that she trusted him no matter what.

"Then I need you retrieve those memories, mine and my father's." He wanted his memories back, or at least wanted the option to have them back. The situation wasn't idea, but at the moment it could be an advantage. It would be interesting to see how his own memories might integrate or not integrate into everything else already in his head. It could even be useful, unless it only made him madder. "And we are going to see what sort of things you can do with a dead man's memory to try to figure this out.

"In the meanwhile, we are going to recreate as perfect a version of this nightmare-memory and find a volunteer to insert it into." Volunteer was a pretty generous term, but they were already wading into murky waters on this one. And this time there was no father to take the fall (and the credit) if things went too deep. But if they could pull this off together, if they could figure it out, and if he could figure out how this Pandora did what she did - then that would be something else.

"I also think you should consider going back to work," he added almost as an after thought. "Or at least finding a way to continue your training." At the moment they had a good amount of skill between them, but they could be better and he wasn't just going to let that possibility go unspoken. Especially if they were or could be a truly a great wizard and witch pair like their son had mentioned earlier.

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[info]tracelines
2012-01-06 05:35 am UTC (link)
Samara was not at all surprised by his first request. She was going to give them to him anyhow, so she did not have any problem agreeing to this. "You will have them tomorrow, Eli." She didn't know if Elijah's Senior's memories would help them in anyway, but if they would she was glad to have them.

The next was a plan they considered earlier and she already supported it. Who could the volunteer though? Who did they have enough access to that they could monitor closely? They had family friends, but who were they willing to administer to their little test and when? "We could always use my birthday as cover, if we can get it ready in time. Invite people over for dinner and it will be easy enough to insert the memory without suspicion as to why we asked them over." She really had no trouble offering up her birthday as a cover for their scheming - it was the type of thing she was willing to do, after all.

It was the last thing that he said that took her by complete surprise. It was not that she never planned on continuing her training, because she always had intended on such, but only when she knew that Jason was well taken care of at Hogwarts for most of the year and she would not have to worry about him. That would be another six years. But she didn't necessarily have six more years to live, did she? "But Jase - who would look after him?" she asked, her voice very small. She had not been away from him since he was born and the thought of leaving him now was more difficult than she could imagine.

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[info]skittish
2012-01-06 06:24 am UTC (link)
Eli smiled at her when she mentioned using her birthday as a cover. It didn't give them much time, only four days. "I could probably get you something by Tuesday, and it would be good, but we could also hold off to invite people over for dinner on Friday?" It did seem like the best option. Yes, it would mean 'volunteering' friends or family, but those were also going to be the best people to monitor. He would have to draw up a list of likely candidates and make sure that they were not already suffering from the nightmares. There were suddenly a lot of other pieces in play, but not something the pair of them couldn't handle.

Except that wasn't really the big thing between him. It was his seemingly 'throw away' comment. Not that it surprised him that she would be hesitant about that idea. She didn't need to be working and pulling a salary, being a mother was her job in that time and she had done fine job of it. "He's old enough for some sort of day care. He might even like it - having a chance to start learning and interacting with other adults and children."

And if that wouldn't work, technically Eli did have some flexibility in the hours he worked. "You don't have to decide now, but I want you to seriously consider it. You are a great mum, but you are so much more than than. You said it yourself, you were on your way to being one of the best obliviators for the Ministry and that's something."

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[info]tracelines
2012-01-08 11:37 pm UTC (link)
"I'll send out invitations for Friday then," she agreed, already making a mental guest list of who to owl about the dinner. She was debating whether or not to invite her mother.

Samara sighed and leaned back in the chair, feeling the anxiety wash over her just thinking about the idea of someone else taking care of her child. It was true that he probably needed to interact with other children fairly soon and possibly other adults besides family and the few friends that came round the house, but every single day and when it wasn't even needed?

"I always planned to go back, Eli, when Jase was eleven and was ready to go to Hogwarts. I loved my work, but I love being a mother and I just don't-" she looked at him pointedly as if she were just now seeing him and her eyebrows went up a bit. "Why do you want me to start again now?"

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[info]skittish
2012-01-12 05:14 pm UTC (link)
Eli looked at her for a moment, weighing his response. He had asked her if she trusted him, but he knew that wasn't a fully two way street. Not yet at least. Still, he couldn't deny that they would be better, stronger even, if they were working together. Majority of people might not have understood why the Chambers family worked, but he did.

"Things are happening, Samara, and we need to be ready to take advantage of whatever opportunity that presents itself." He meant that he needed her to be the best or at least most skilled version of herself possible. It was true that he was breaking a lot of ground in his research, but with her on his side and figuring out exactly what they were dealing with...they could be unlimited.

"I don't want Jase to lose either of his parents, and I don't want to lose you," he said echoing her earlier sentiments. Except there was more, because it could never be that simple. "Beyond that you have to know that we could be Great and I want that for us."

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[info]tracelines
2012-01-13 02:05 am UTC (link)
Samara nodded slowly at first, taking in the words he spoke. It was difficult to think that she might be leaving her son but she knew that it would be good for the entire family if she did this now, not to mention it might help save their lives. Finally she nodded more firmly and touched the side of his face.

"Okay. Okay Eli, I'll go back. We'll figure this out and we'll take care of it. I'm not going to lose you," she said and leaned forward to hug him. She wasn't entirely sure of that quite yet, but she tried to sound as sure as she possibly could. He might be busy with the memories now but that didn't mean he couldn't get angry about things later and she couldn't fault him that. He still deserved the chance to be.

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