ARC III

CHAPTER FIVE

Brent's Notes: Philosophy 103, Assignment 2, Reading.
Holbach, Paul. Reason and Responsibility, The Illusion of Free Will, pge 418 to 422

Hard Determinism.

(pge 418) '… when he does not act according to this impulse, it is because there comes some new cause, some new motive, some new idea, which modifies his brain in a different manner…'

States that our will is determined by our surroundings. – and most powerfully, by our desires to preserve ourself.

He counters a possible comeback, by saying those who act counter to their self-preservation are under the control of powerful emotion, or are temporarily mad.

(421) 'To be undeceived on the system of his free agency, man has simply to recur to the motive by which his will is determined; he will always find this motive is out of his control. It is said: that in consequence of an idea to which the mind gives birth, man acts freely if he encounters no obstacle. But the question is, what gives birth to this idea in his brain? Was he the master either to prevent it from presenting itself, or from renewing itself in his brain?'

(421) '… Because he is unable to unravel all these motions; because he cannot perceive the chain of operations in his soul, or the motive principle that acts within him, he supposes himself a free agent…'

SATURDAY NIGHT

Brent stood on his back verandah, looking down over the town. Mile after mile of suburbia rooftops glinted silver in the moonlight, interspersed with orange street lights. The white lights and taller buildings of the city framed the horizon to the right, while the black silhouette of the river and forest reserve marked the left.

He sipped his tea, his eyes seeking out landmarks in the darkness.
It was Saturday. Brent wasn't partying and he wasn't gaming, Right now, he was on one of the frequent breaks Louise had suggested he take.

He'd read the same advice in the Uni prep guides. Frequent, short breaks to stop you getting frustrated. But for him, those had always meant YouTube videos, checking Facebook... which had often been extended from 'just one quick video' to hour long diversions.

Louise had banned them somehow. Right at the moment, his phone was nothing more than a set of eyes and ears for her. It was more than frustrating... especially when he wanted to use google maps, or actually call someone.

It worked fine when people called him. It was a slightly eerie feeling though, knowing she could be listening in at any time though.

She wasn't listening all the time. She wasn't even listening most of the time. Brent gathered she had a lot of study to do herself. She mostly seemed to drop in and out every few hours, and mostly just hung around while he was actually working on his assignment. Like today.

He'd put in a few hours each day with her during the week, but today was almost entirely devoted to the philosophy assignment. He had needed to do some prep work for another two assignments that were still a few weeks away, but besides that...

With Louise helping him, the assignment had gone from a probable fail, to a definite pass. But... 'helping'...
Was that even the right word?
She had help him a bit, But mostly what she did was bully, cajole, berate...
She drove him absolutely wild. She really did. But as irritating as she was, was no other option. He needed to get this done...

There were quite a few times they'd started cursing at each other and he'd stormed off. But there was simply nothing else for him to do. It was somewhat embarrassing to realize just how addicted to his phone and computer he truly was.

He'd always come back within half a hour. Louise had sometimes been there, sometimes taken longer. He gathered she was doing her own things at the same time.

With Louise as his jailer, he'd made amazing progress. He'd done as much in the last three days as would normally take him two weeks. He was utterly, utterly exhausted, but the end was in sight. They'd finished the initial readings, gone over their notes to find an angle to take on the assignment, discarded the readings that didn't relate, re-read the readings to get more detailed notes on the direction they were taking, written an assignment 'map', with bullet points summarizing each paragraph, and were close to finishing the rough draft.
And that was going to be it, for tonight.

He couldn't write any more. The words were starting to come out funny. He needed sleep, he needed several waking hours of not-assignment-doing. Right now, his mind was full of assignment, and it all just became a mess of words. Once he was fresh, the mistakes would jump out at him again like they normally did. But... that wouldn't be till tomorrow.

He still hadn't quite finished the rough draft though. So he wasn't quite done...
He grimaced, grabbed his empty cup, and headed back inside.

SUNDAY

She agreed with him about the break.
But she still wouldn't let him game. 'Not relaxing enough'. Instead, he was going for a walk.

Apparently, the local park was too close. Apparently, walking around the house and then gaming wasn't relaxing either.

She'd interrogated him on the local area, and what people actually did in their free time, and shortly after he'd found himself getting off a bus just before the bridge leading into the city.

The bridge went over a gorge that fed into the river the city had developed around. The gorge was right next to the city, and it constantly amazed Brent that it hadn't been spoilt - concreted over with the cliffs topped with houses.

Perhaps the rockface was unstable or something?
Or perhaps the area had always been considered a picnic spot.
The walkway that had been bolted into the side of the cliff had certainly been there long enough, while the gardens and buildings in the upper area - where it opened out, did suggest an early 19th century design.
He shrugged, shouldered his backpack (just a bottle of water and a few fruit. He wasn't going to be gone long), and crossed the road, starting off up the path
He wondered if Louise was 'here'.
He had his phone peeking out of his pocket, and earphone in his ear, but hadn't said anything. He wondered what she made of the bus. If she'd seen it.
It was fifteen minutes later, and Louise still hadn't said anything.
The air was full of the roar of the water, birdsong, and admittedly, Brent's heavy breathing.
He was taking it easy, but the path was still going uphill, and it had been a while since he'd done regular exercise...

He stopped, taking a swig from his waterbottle.

The gorge itself was nice. The weather was still chill - though a tad muggy. The walkway wound it's way up alongside the walls of the gorge. Black granite interspersed with the greenery of whatever vines, plants and trees had managed to find a crack or cranny. Granted, the brown of the water wasn't too appealing, but the way it rushed and tumbled over the rocks below awoke something in him.

He still wasn't sure he was glad he came. But it was nice to do something different, he supposed.

'Is that area safe?'

Ah. Louise was there. Brent panned around slowly, letting her see it.
'Yes, perfectly fine. The walkway has been here for decades, and it's never collapsed. This place gets a ton of visitors from the city, so they keep it safe'
'Ah.' She sounded relieved. 'So they have the city guard keeping the goblins away?'
Goblins? Brent winced. 'Goblins?'

(one hurried explanation later)

'But what about other wildlife. Tigers? Bears?'

Brent smiled. 'Australia doesn't have any large land predators', he said.

Louise sighed in relief.

'The snakes and spiders killed them all.'

LATER

It was Sunday night. The trip had been relaxing. He was still tired, but the walk had refreshed him enough to tackle the assignment with fresh eyes. Move paragraphs around, catch some spelling mistakes, re-write some awkward phrasing...

It'd still taken almost three hours, but somehow - with Louise helping him, it hadn't seemed so painful. With her here, it just seemed to flow, somehow. She completed him, and through their study session, he found that she wasn't really irritating after all - that her irritation only covered up how much she cared.

That's how these things were supposed to go, weren't they? A cute girl helps the protagonist study and they fall for each other? Though it was usually the other way around... the guy helping the girl.

But - this was real life. Irritating was irritating. Both the assignment and Louise.

Brent sighed. Still... annoying or not, she had helped him. Really saved his ass. And he supposed at least one part of the trashy romance trope was true. She really was improving him. Whether he liked it or not.

Growing romance? No. Just... no. She was arrogant, and obnoxious, and way too smug for her own good. Though... she had helped him. That wasn't nothing...

What had even driven her to help him so much anyway?
A puzzled frown marred his features as he finally... finally, shut down his computer, and drifted off to sleep.

OMAKE

'Louise. Hey, Louise. I want to show you something.'

Louise blinked her eyes. Focused. Took possession of the mobile eye.

'Ever seen one of these?'

Louise blinked in alarm. A spider sat there, on the wall, as big as a man's hand. Brent was holding his phone right in front of it.

'Brent?' Louise held her voice as steady as she could.

'Brent? What are you doing? What are you doing?'

Despite her best, she couldn't keep the rising nervousness out of her voice.

She heard Brent laugh. 'What's the matter, scared of spiders?' The camera zoomed closer, and the spider filled the screen. It moved, slightly.

'Don't worry, it's harmless.'

Louise was not reassured. 'Of course it's harmless', she said nervously. 'It's only a baby. But what about it's parents?'

Brent frowned. 'What?'

'It's a baby araign. When they're that young, their parents aren't ever far away. They're Very protective of their young, and as a big as a dog. So GET AWAY FROM IT.'

AUTHORS NOTES:

So another chapter bites the dust. This one pretty much marks the end of the assignment arc...

Regarding the omake, it occurred to me that Australia's wildlife might not be so intimidating to someone from a fantasy land.