call me maybe [Connecticut Yankee] | Glowfic Constellation

connecticut_yankee

"Dead humans. Um. In that case we don't need to worry about what word to use, because it would be a terrible idea to mention Limbo to anyone, at all, ever."

from_scratch

"Normally I might object, but since as far as I know no time-travelers have ever shown up in Limbo, I can't guarantee that people from here would even be warned about a real future event - maybe this alternate universe has a different setup. I do feel I should inform you that the only dead humans in Limbo are the ones who never summoned any daeva. Summon even one even once, and then instead of becoming a Limboite you become some kind of daeva yourself. So that's what you're looking at unless the rules differ here."

connecticut_yankee

"It was a lot easier to take in stride when I thought it was just a strange thing that happens to summoners, since as far as I'm concerned everything about summoning is already strange. Now that it's everyone from your world, it's a much bigger deal."

from_scratch

"I mean, Limbo's better than nothing. It's not great, being a daeva's way better, but it's an improvement over nothing. Unless you're depressed or something, I guess, then it would get really old really fast."

connecticut_yankee

"No, I mean, imagine you're from the sixth century and someone tells you the afterlife you're familiar with is just a local thing.
If the concept of Limbo had been invented yet it wouldn't be so bad, but as it is even most of the non-Catholics would refuse to hear you out."

from_scratch

"Oh, I thought you meant it was a big deal for you. Everybody else would probably run around like chickens with their heads cut off, sure, I buy it. Anyway I genuinely have no special insight into what happens to people from this universe with its time travel shenanigans and no history of daeva summoning. Or your original world, since it seems reasonably likely that you're from either earlier in the timeline of my world - I don't think I'd have noticed any effects from your vanishment - or a third universe, as opposed to one that managed to proceed forward from what we got up to today here. Maybe one or more of these places actually has one or more deities."

connecticut_yankee

"It's a big deal for me too, since it was always just assumed that this sort of thing applies to everyone everywhere. But I at least have a concept of Limbo that applies here, even if I never put much stock in it before, so it's not like consistency has been ruled out.

I very much hope we're in a third universe. If not it means we fail, since one or the other of us would have known if history got a head start."

from_scratch

"It doesn't necessarily mean that we fail. It could mean that just by landing here, our original timelines have been totally rewound back to this point except for our memories. Although that prompts the question of how I got here after you did and from later on."

connecticut_yankee

"I think you've lost me there. Is it something we'd need to worry about?"
Time travel in fiction mostly caught on after it happened to Hank in real life, so he doesn't have pre-existing models to take advantage of.

from_scratch

"I mean, we can't really affect it in any obvious way, so no, but it's interesting to speculate about, and please proceed only after reading a lot of science fiction if you find any way to time travel on purpose. At some point we'll probably want to experiment with sending me home and getting me back, which will give us another couple data points."

connecticut_yankee

"The fact that you were able to copy your music probably means...something. At least that the music isn't completely a thing that doesn't exist yet. Seems more likely if we're not just earlier in the same timeline, but it's not like there's much basis for comparison."

from_scratch

"I'm not so sure. I know extensionally what I can and cannot make, but nobody knows why those things and not only things for which I have more information or why not things for which I have less information; I don't know that this set of things can't follow me around the same way my memories can."

connecticut_yankee

"It seems to be able to, but that could be a feature of your abilities or of the travel.
Would you be willing to try equivalent things from my world?
Rudyard Kipling's 'Jungle Book' came out last year, and Well's 'Island of Doctor Moreau' was due to be released in '96. The only difference being whether they have in fact ever existed."

from_scratch

"Uh... I've read both of those. Can you go more obscure? Ideally something so niche that I don't even have it on a list of things I could choose to conjure somewhere."

connecticut_yankee

"You have the same books? I guess that's not more surprising than you having an England. I don't know what ends up being obscure in the future, but try William Morris, 'The Wood Beyond the World' from '94 and 'The Well at World's End' from '96."

from_scratch

"I have not read those yet."

And here they are, in Cam's hand. He hands them over.

connecticut_yankee

"So they definitely both count as having existed. That should be conclusive proof that my world's time didn't just rewind and it must still be advancing somewhere else, right?"

from_scratch

"Not necessarily. Any books that were published in your world may just be part of my history in such a way that I can get at them. The real test would probably be if I were anticipating a release date - so, in four months, I'll see if I can get a copy of Amn nin Ioan."

connecticut_yankee

"Oh. Or if I knew of any books that would definitely not have been written had there been daeva, since I'm pretty sure my world doesn't have those. But that test seems impossible to attempt."

from_scratch

"The overwhelming majority of people didn't know about daeva in my world until 2009."

connecticut_yankee

"...I want to be flabbergasted that someone actually managed to keep that a secret for that long, but at least it's a good sign for it staying secret here.

I don't know if this would work, but is there some old book that describes summoning well enough that it wouldn't exist if it were false, and if so can you try to create a version published in my world? Because if that works, and there are daeva there, that seems like a good thing to know."

from_scratch

"There were economic incentives involved... And demons are somewhat less useful when there's less technology around to tell us to make, angels likewise, fairies can't do much large-scale stuff that people can't do themselves until you know how to keep atmosphere inside a vehicle... And I'm not sure what you mean."

connecticut_yankee

"If there's a book that wouldn't exist without daeva—or if someone hired makers or changers to build a monument or something—then my world wouldn't have that unless daeva are currently secret there.
Then if you successfully make my world's edition of that thing, it means it does exist and therefore we have daeva."

from_scratch

"Since I've never previously wandered around between worlds that may be as disconnected as ours could be and experimented with this, I don't know if I can aim for Summoning and Binding and have it only appear if it exists in your world instead of getting a false positive from mine."

connecticut_yankee