Quietly
Curled up in a deliberately surreptitious manner beneath the workings of a vessel that produces aqueous testaments to time, it refused to partake in the vacuous and gesticulation-ridden trivialities inherent to other things that were unlike the nature of it; anything that has a tendency to equate the ostensible with the desirable in an interactive context is sorely lacking in interactive adeptness. This, coupled with what it perceives to be the sordidly redundant Carbonic Dissemination interface it's in at the moment that is a compulsory aspect of its existence (alongside Chromatic Composition Dissemination, at times Jurisdictional Dissemination, and Iberian Dissemination) makes it feel confined to the point of expressive repression. It has displayed an affinity for Britannic Dissemination Prime and Computational Dissemination, fortunately, but these two Disseminative Subprotocols do not provide it with any sort of consolation whatsoever. Not even similar things provide relief from the nebulous machinations of the Primary Interface.
Which is why it now finds itself beneath the workings of a vessel that produces aqueous testament to time, at first to quietly reflect on its time spent with the Primary Interface before it resorted to engaging in an Autonomous Leisurely Informational Text Protocol regarding things that shared one of the two Primary Facets of the Engagement Configurations with it: Internalization Priority. The insights provided by the Autonomous Text Protocol regarding those with an Internalization Priority were profound and compelling; every message, ranging from the repression faced by things with an Internalization Priority at the "well-meaning" hands of other things with an Externalization Priority, the incomprehensibly intricate workings of a thing with Internalization Priority that inextricably affects its interactions with all Interfaces, and the elucidation of the invaluable contributions made by familiar things that had an Internalization Priority. At this moment, it started to admonish the Externalized things - privately, of course - in the form of condescending pity.
"Cold wouldn't cut it, Ashley, and that's the most disconcerting aspect about him; such a degree of coldness is always indicative of a... How shall I put it... A capable mind, so to speak. Last time I checked, it's just how his kind works."
And to think that she made effective reassurances. The plight of the Misunderstood has now become all too real, succinctly expressed by such an ill-informed utterance emanating from one of the very few people who is supposed to typify a greater openness to difference.
You can see it most clearly in the best of things.
Perhaps he saw him as a deviation, which, to her realization, is a fairly plausible assumption given the rigidity of the travesty that is a high school education. As such, he may view him as something to be corrected, to be housebroken, rather than something of indispensable worth to the nature of reality. But he would never understand.
"It's just in his nature, Mr. Collins. Yeah, he might be shut off from us very tightly, but there has to be a reason why he is the way he is."
"I'd wager that you and I are dying to know that very reason, Ashley. It's within our nature to be compelled by the anomalous nature of certain members of our species. Numerous fields of study and inquiry would scramble to be the first to lay their eyes on him."
He turned to face her, but not in an imposing manner. "Wouldn't you suppose that the psychiatric world, in particular, would have a field day with such a subject?"
She had never been more aghast by anything in her life.
Finding a thing with Shared Engagement Configurations were reduced to what it deemed to be a statistical impossibility when it had failed at its first successful attempt at finding and temporarily connecting with a thing that possessed what it initially perceived to be every Engagement Configuration it required for an Effective Mutuality Protocol. The obscured weaknesses of the Protocol, unfortunately, were revealed spontaneously in a particular moment when the two had to cross the dreaded threshold of the Mutual Revelatory Dissemination in which they, as one of the quintessential final steps in finalizing the Effective Mutuality Protocol, had to exchange their Adverse Configurations in order to become connected in a more intricate level. It was spared from the mercy of a progressive revelation of the Protocol's weaknesses which could have allowed it to withdraw and save itself from the Configurative Dissonance it has been trying to amend.
Had the duration of the Effective Mutuality Protocol been uninterrupted by the Mutual Revelatory Dissemination, the truly unthinkable would have happened...
It would have been humanized.
She doesn't really care for the intricacies that entail the average high school education because she got good grades, anyway. All she had to do was to focus on carrying out her assignments in her usual solitary diligence whilst drowning out her surroundings with music. As for actively interacting with others, she knew that she wasn't adept at establishing superficial relationships in the way that a majority of her peers do. She found consolation in such a reality, which also served as a convenient way of ensuring that she doesn't strike up an acquaintance with anybody that could serve as a potential distraction to her and her work.
What surprises her at times, however, is that she has not been met with any sort of stigmatization from other people in regard to her reclusive demeanor - none that she is aware of, at least. People let her be, which some people lament is impossible in a frenetic high school environment. She probably wouldn't care if there was any sort of stigmatization since she was always deeply invested in her schoolwork, dissipating her immediate surroundings in the process.
It's not like she belonged to the Misunderstood, anyway. Life would be infinitely more awful for her to live if she did.
It took offense to being deemed callous, for it was merely the result of an Interface devoid of consideration, devoid of warmth.