"what's that song you're whistling?"

shark stopped for a second. "what was it called..." they could hear the lyrics in their head. it was one they hadn't listened to in a long time.

"it's, uh, check 1, 2, or something."

"real fitting that you'd have that in your head."

"man, if you know what the song is, why'd you even ask me?"

"that song's pretty old at this point, isn't it?"

they were pretty sure they did remember listening to it in high school, so it must've been from about a decade ago. "i guess so."

"why's it stuck in your head now?"

time was being really insistent about this.

still, when they thought about it, they instantly realized. "it's cuz of that anime we were watching earlier, someone said something that reminded me of a lyric in the song."

"that was like an hour ago, and it's still in your head?"

"i guess. i wasn't even thinking about it." shark looked at them. an idea was forming in their head, an idea that was stupid and ridiculous enough to be true.

"there's no fuckin' way you knew exactly what words make me think of that exact song."

time clearly couldn't hide their smirk.

"what is even the purpose of doing that? just for fun? am i an mp3 player to you?"

"it's really easy to tell what song is in your head, because you're always whistling or humming it. you've even told me when you're thinking of a song because something reminded you of it. you always tell me exactly what it is, too." they paused. "did you think of mp3 players because that's a lyric in the song?"

"man, shut up. how much did you have to study my music taste for this?"

"it's really not hard. you don't even listen to that much. there's a few songs you're way more likely to get in your head. and you've shown me a lot of your favorites directly."

well, they were right. shark really didn't make it hard, now that they thought of it.

"whatever. if you think you're gonna do some kinda subliminal mind control shit through this then you're out of your mind, though."

"it doesn't make you want to listen to a recording of some guy whispering to you?"

"i already always wanna do that."

"it doesn't take you back to your high school days?"

"you think you can do age regression through a song?"

"music has a way of bringing you back to the time when you first listened to it, right?"

"that usually only happens when you really sit down and pay attention to it."

they still didn't seem defeated. if anything, they only seemed more smug by the second.

"no, you're right," they said, not even trying to hide the fact that they didn't mean it. "what can i really do just by getting a song stuck in your head without you thinking about it?"

they knew. they could absolutely be conditioned to associate a song with a certain activity. there were all kinds of hypnotic suggestions time could give them related to that, too. making them drop or follow a posthypnotic suggestion from the sound of their own whistling, humming, and singing. and a song stuck in their head didn't tend to go away all that easily.

it felt like one of those minor exploits people find in a game that ends up being a gateway to completely breaking it.

"you're still going to show me the music you like, right?" time asked. "we're still going to listen to it together?"

they looked away. "whatever."

"oh, come on. i won't even mind if we just listen to one song on repeat, like you like to do. you can just stare at the music video... mouth or sing some of the words... get lost in it. think about all the stuff it represents. all the stuff it makes you feel. all the stuff it'd be good background noise for."

"you're too transparent about this."

"well, sure. i can't control you without making it obvious what i want to make you feel. it doesn't matter if you know what i'm doing. it'll happen automatically and without you noticing every time. won't it?"

the song was still in their head. it'd been in the back of their head during the entire conversation.

"watch out you don't condition yourself, too," they just said.

"well, if a song that's supposed to make you horny also makes me horny, that'd just be convenient."

they did have a point.