« Back
Generated:
Post last updated:
lure of discovery
Salmons and Carmines in Azurite
Permalink Mark Unread

They make their way out the emergency exit unmolested.

Permalink Mark Unread

Back to the car they go.

Theo drops Sadde off by the passenger door then gets in the driver's seat.

Permalink Mark Unread

"So?" Willow asks when they get back inside the car. "How'd it go?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"He saved three people and mmmmight have turned someone into a vampire."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I fed them my blood, they were then dead."

Permalink Mark Unread

"That sounds like oh yay but also oh shit."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's at least a lot of 'oh yay'? He saved at least three, perhaps four, people's lives! Why am I the only one who's excited about this?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"That is good but the maybe vampire might kill more, do we even know who it is?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Theo does, and we're obviously hanging around to make sure they don't kill anyone else. Right?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Okay but what, is Theo going to camp out in the morgue overnight, are we going to take it in shifts, are we all staying here indefinitely until they open their eyes if they ever do?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well... yeah? One of those?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm just– plan seems like it has changed a lot."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So presumably we try make a new one," says Theo. "We don't even know that she's for sure dead, I'm not sure she even got the blood before she died, my turning took something like twelve hours so hopefully hers won't take longer than 24, if necessary hopefully one of you can drive and take my car."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I can't drive," he sighs, "but anyway yeah the plan would change when we get a possible new vampire."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I haven't driven in like a year, since I learned, but I know how."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Potentially convenient." Sigh. "Should we be keeping watch on her, perhaps, in case it's 'if you're dead and have vampire blood in your system and it's been at least five minutes since you died and it's after dusk', because that sounds vaguely vampire-like and would mean we should."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, probably."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Are you coming with? I'm not sure it was great for stealth, but it could be useful?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Didn't seem to be bad for stealth, either? Well, a bit, but like, you managed alright."

Permalink Mark Unread

Shrug. "Yeah, okay, and we can always hide in a supply closet or something," eyeroll, "if we get boxed in."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yep!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Good luck?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Thanks," he responds, then off they go.

Back towards the ICU unless he hears anything about where she is en-route.

Permalink Mark Unread

She is in the ICU! Completely recovered! It was a miracle!

(They're running some tests on her, but apparently they resuscitated her and she got better.)

Permalink Mark Unread

He stops off in an empty room attached to a deserted corridor.

"– Apparently she got resuscitated and got better."

(Any information on the other patients?)

Permalink Mark Unread

(Miracles! Miracles everywhere!)

"Oh. That's good, then? If a bit anticlimactic."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm thinking we wait a minute, in case she does turn out to be a vampire but just less… high than I was."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, right, good thinking."

Permalink Mark Unread

So he does!

Permalink Mark Unread

The girl does not seem to be lunging at anyone, and no one seems to think she is very pretty and very noteworthy.

Permalink Mark Unread

… Okay good. "Doesn't seem to be one, not unless she's displaying zero of my noticeable traits."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Are there any unnoticeable traits you have we should be worried about?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… What, like my enhanced brain? I just meant of the traits that would be obvious externally, I'm noticing none."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I was joking, never mind. She's probably not a vampire, then."

Permalink Mark Unread

Shrug. "Probably not, but I have her name anyway if we want to check up on her when we're more public, see if she got some sort of contagious magic. Anyway, let's go?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, I guess."

Permalink Mark Unread

He picks Sadde up and off they go.

Permalink Mark Unread

"So...?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"She got resuscitated, doesn't seem vampiric, made a miraculous recovery."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh. So you're four out of four."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, and we should possibly follow up with these people covertly in the future, make sure they don't unexpectedly die or have some side effects."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If there are side effects they'll happen to me first, won't they?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Unless they occur more quickly if it healed more of you…"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay, point. Also that old lady saw us."

Permalink Mark Unread

"What?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"She opened her eyes briefly but we were out pretty quickly afterwards, so she didn't get a proper look at us. And, like, mysteriously-disappearing near-adults after your mysterious miraculous recovery, it's weird but I doubt anybody would actually believe her."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We should make this a thing."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Do it a few times a week, maybe? There are hospitals a bit further afield we could go to, too, in case we don't want to centralize all on one place or in case they don't frequently get new people into their ICU."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We don't all have to come along each time anyway, so it's possibly just… as frequently as you want to."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And we might want to come up with a plan that scales."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We are kinda lacking in terms of bodies that can heal people, so I could, like, let some blood into some containers but then we have an issue of transportation… So, yeah, planning is probably a good idea." He shrugs and does his seatbelt up. "Right now we should possibly get back, though, it's getting a bit late."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Is it... bad that it's late? Given your vampireness?"

Seatbelt!

Permalink Mark Unread

"… No but you all presumably need to sleep? If you'd rather I can go drive other places and we can work all night or something."

Permalink Mark Unread

"– I mean, you'd literally be saving lives. So we should maybe do that."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We shouldn't push ourselves so far we literally cannot cope but yes it sounds like a worthwhile endeavor. Also we had a couple of tests to run."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We did," agrees Theo. "Should we go do another hospital and then go do the tests?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Sounds good."

Permalink Mark Unread

He gets out his phone and finds directions to the other hospital and starts driving.

Permalink Mark Unread

And Sadde looks at him from the corner of his eye every now and then and bites his lips.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo carefully keeps his eyes on the road.

Permalink Mark Unread

Poor Sadde will pine quietly.

Permalink Mark Unread

The next hospital takes about half an hour to get to. "I will go scout again, then, and be back once I know what it's like?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm honestly thinking we might be superfluous."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You might be," he agrees, "but since I'm going to be running around holding my breath and using echolocation for the first bit, hopefully meaning I don't lose focus, then running around with one of you afterwards while I'm not, you might be of some help or at least reduce the worst-case scenario."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, probably."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Back in a bit."

Off he goes.

Permalink Mark Unread

This hospital has no conveniently open emergency exits.

Permalink Mark Unread

How much security is there at – any of the doors? He's only going to start echolocating once he's inside and can actually do it effectively.

Permalink Mark Unread

There is a nonzero amount of security.

The employees' door is, however, a large set of double doors that opens on card swipes. Perhaps he could jump in while someone else was walking in or out...?

Permalink Mark Unread

If anyone seems like they're walking in or out, sure, he could. He's conveniently fast and nimble, how… convenient.

Permalink Mark Unread

Isn't it just? And look there's a couple of nurses.

Permalink Mark Unread

– And he's in, and he's looking what's around, and then provided it's all safe he is shutting his eyes and paying careful attention to his surroundings and he already stopped breathing earlier.

It continues to be uncomfortable. But bearable.

Permalink Mark Unread

This hospital is larger and more spacious and has more blood banks and a larger ICU.

Permalink Mark Unread

And now he knows where everything is and he can go back to near that employee door and pay attention for when someone's leaving and then follow them out!

Permalink Mark Unread

That takes longer than five minutes, after which Sadde calls him.

Permalink Mark Unread

Fortunately he typically has his phone on vibrate because it bugs him when people's phones always make annoying sounds, so he manages to just go into a small empty room on his way back and answer the phone to say – "On my way out."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Anything wrong?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Big hospital, took a bit to get in, haven't noticed anything wrong at least."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay. See you in a bit, then."

Permalink Mark Unread

He hangs up and continues on his way out.

Permalink Mark Unread

Another six minutes sees more people using the door.

Permalink Mark Unread

Through the door he goes! And back to the car.

Permalink Mark Unread

"We good to go?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yup, but might take a bit to get in because I used an employee door. So. Kinda required that I was stealthy."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So, should I not come with, or...?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… You can still come with but it might require waiting or finding another entrance, is what I mean?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ah. Well, do let's go."

Permalink Mark Unread

So he picks Sadde up when he's out of the car and goes around to look for an easier entrance, preferably one nearer the ICU!

Permalink Mark Unread

There isn't an unsupervised one!

There's the ambulance entrance there, though, being opened for an outgoing ambulance just now.

Permalink Mark Unread

He assesses how quickly he can run with Sadde in tow and then… decides that it is probably not wisest to use that entrance.

Back around to the other entrance he goes and then puts Sadde down briefly, saying, "Gonna wait for someone to use the staff entrance."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Makes sense, I guess."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mmh," he responds, and then they wait.

Permalink Mark Unread

Ten minutes in, and still no one.

Permalink Mark Unread

… Ugh waiting so long is boring.

"Do you want to circle around again perhaps?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"And do—what exactly?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hope one of the other entrances is less manned now?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"...after ten minutes?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"They have to get less manned at some point, but okay, we can wait here for another twenty minutes if you'd prefer."

Permalink Mark Unread

"The main entrance is gonna remain a main entrance, the ambulance entrance is gonna only be open for ambulances, the emergency exits are exits, I'm not sure anything can change meaningfully, here."

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo shrugs.

Permalink Mark Unread

"We should probably wait here," he concludes.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Sure."

Permalink Mark Unread

More waiting!

Permalink Mark Unread

Fun, isn't it?

Permalink Mark Unread

No. No, not particularly.

Permalink Mark Unread

Yeah, pretty much. (Sigh.)

Permalink Mark Unread

 

 

 

Oh look there's someone walking in.

Permalink Mark Unread

He picks Sadde up and then if the way seems clear follows in after.

Permalink Mark Unread

Whee~

Permalink Mark Unread

And strategically through the corridors. ICU-wards.

Permalink Mark Unread

ICU contains: someone who was shot! Four people who suffered accidents (one motorcycle accident, one work-related accident, two car crashes)! A degenerative disease patient! Someone who suffered an aneurysm! Someone with a pulmonary edema!

Permalink Mark Unread

He reports these to Sadde and then they go to the motorcycle accident guy, Theo feeding him some blood relatively shortly.

Permalink Mark Unread

There seem to be no problems with his recovery.

Permalink Mark Unread

Next person! Work-related accident, so long as it's a nice blunt impact trauma thing, work okay?

Permalink Mark Unread

Yup!

Permalink Mark Unread

Two car crashes! Oh boy, if Theo had a tail and were actually, y'know, happy about this fact instead of just like 'okay cool I'm healing people and it's horrible this even happened', his tail might actually be wagging!

Permalink Mark Unread

The healed people do not express opinions about Theo's lack of a tail.

Motorcycle accident guy calls a nurse, though.

Permalink Mark Unread

Sigh.

Does he get the nurse to, like, look around for what's causing the miracle. 'Cause if not he'd rather just keep going right now, thanks.

Permalink Mark Unread

He's just rather confused about his health.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo will keep going, taking Sadde with him, in that case! Over to the curtain for the aneurysm guy and then quietly, to Sadde, he asks, "Should we test on this guy too? I'm not sure aneurysm is as clear cut."

 

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't see why it wouldn't work."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Nor me but just checking – so, try it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

He does! Then prepares to move on to the pulmonary edema patient with Sadde.

Permalink Mark Unread

Aneurysm guy doesn't wake up immediately.

Permalink Mark Unread

Well that's possibly only to be expected because of maybe brain damage but Theo will wait just a shorrrrt bit longer…?

Permalink Mark Unread

Guy opens his eyes.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo continues to have good reflexes and he's happy he checked and so what if there are two weird reports of miracle workers he's already going to the person with pulmonary edema and – "Pulmonary edema, what do you think?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Won't hurt to try."

Permalink Mark Unread

He tries it. "Same goes for the person with the degenerative disease or not?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Seems like good regeneration is gonna be a plus, although it may not fix the underlying problem if it's chronic or genetic or whatever."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod.

Any change in the person with pulmonary edema yet?

Permalink Mark Unread

Whatever magic Theo's blood works seems to also work on this person.

Permalink Mark Unread

Over to the person with the degenerative disease, then, and try it there.

Permalink Mark Unread

It is very fulfilling to see how alive they are coming!

Permalink Mark Unread

It is! And now he will leave, with Sadde.

Permalink Mark Unread

He will have to wait a bit longer for the door to be opened. During which time Sadde will pine some more.

Permalink Mark Unread

He waits, he doesn't respond to the pining.

Permalink Mark Unread

And eventually someone leaves the building.

Permalink Mark Unread

So they follow them out, then go over towards the car.

Permalink Mark Unread

And Sadde gets inside.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo does too! "So I think that was a success."

Permalink Mark Unread

"No almost-vampire scares?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Fortunately not."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Anything particularly exciting?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm—not sure I'd qualify anything about the situation as 'exciting' except for the whole lots of people are alive because of us thing." Pause. "Because of Theo."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I think you can take some credit," says Theo. "Since, you know, watching me and making sure I don't do anything stupid and stuff."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You didn't actually need that at any point."

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Prior to today, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Then they," he gestures at the other two on the back seat, "or at least Matt deserve as much credit, I think."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, I meant 'you' generally."

Permalink Mark Unread

Small smile.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well who'd you save?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Four various accidents, guy with an aneurysm, pulmonary edema case and then also decided to try a degenerative disease and that seemed to work fine."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I hope you got their names," comments Matt. "Should probably check on them, especially that last one."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod.

Permalink Mark Unread

"So, back for some tests?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah."

Back they go.

Permalink Mark Unread

Willow shows them where the abandoned building her parents own is.

Permalink Mark Unread

– And Theo can enter them just fine! He's slightly hesitant at the boundary of the first one, but only the first time, so he's pretty sure that was just placebo-slash-nocebo.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Your mom doesn't seem to count as owning your house, nor do Willow's parents count, here, but you can't walk into my place," he summarizes.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Seems to be the case," agrees Theo.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hypotheses?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Use?" Willow suggests. "Theo uses his place much more than his mom does, you guys use your place, no one uses this one..."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I was gonna suggest residence – people might only have one 'permanent residence', so this place might have no residents? Then Theo has residence at his place, maybe he's allowed that even though he's a vampire." Shrug. "We still haven't tested he's able to be invited in."

Permalink Mark Unread

"That's true. But then if multiple people live in a place can any of them invite a vampire? Could Manfred and Helen invite Theo to my place?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Some lore has that anyone in the place can invite a vampire in..."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So we should possibly try if he can enter my house, see if the invitations have to be re-given to a vampire or if they can retain it from before, and then work forwards from there? Could see if they can be rescinded, too."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So we go to your place, if Theo can't get in I try inviting him, if that fails you do, if that fails that's that, if it succeeds you try rescinding it, yeah?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Sounds right?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"What else did we have to test?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"See if my projectile intuition is any better. I'm sure I can find a stick to throw somewhere. Then I'm running at an out-of-the-way tree."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ah, right. Okay, let's do that."

Permalink Mark Unread

He does! And, shocker, his projectile intuition is better, quite dramatically noticeably so! Throwing a stick far into the air in a big field and then running to stand almost exactly where it's set to land has never been so easy!

Running into the tree is slightly less fun but he is quite a bit less breakable than he used to be. He runs into it a few times, confirms this, and then decides he doesn't want to break any bones (which he still seems to have, at least) nor does he want to take it down – just, apparently, damage it quite a bit – and so he stops.

Permalink Mark Unread

And next they have invitation tests.

Permalink Mark Unread

Turns out the invitation did not carry over from before Theo was a vampire!

Sadde is unable to invite Theo into Matt's house.

Permalink Mark Unread

(Matt's parents are sleeping right now, quite fortunately.)

Matt is able to invite Theo in – all the drawbacks associated with coming near the house and the aversion to entering disappear, quite quickly – but then Matt can't rescind the invitation.

He tries a few different wordings. Tries intending it really hard. Theo darts out of the house and then off the property and then tries returning and is totally unimpeded.

"… Doesn't seem like it can be rescinded," concludes Matt.

Permalink Mark Unread

"...noted. It's interesting that the game seems to be stacked against humanity, both in the sense of human beings and the sense of Theo's own internal sense of humanity."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Vampires are usually kinda like that. In the stories. I think."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mm."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I think that is probably it for today, then," comments Theo. "Seeing as it's now getting very late, and you guys probably need to sleep, and– my mom will be back tomorrow, I don't know if you guys recall? But we might not be doing all that much during the day – not that we usually do all that much – is what I mean."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, you should probably drop us off at our places, I guess."

Permalink Mark Unread

Matt waves.

Permalink Mark Unread

And Theo goes to drop the others off at their places.

Permalink Mark Unread

Willow's huge mansion (of course the largest house in the city is her family's) is between Matt's house and Sadde's so she's dropped off first.

Permalink Mark Unread

Then over Sadde's-house-wards they go!

Gosh. Just the two of them.

Permalink Mark Unread

Yes but unfortunately Theo is not interested so.

Permalink Mark Unread

Terrible shame, that.

He wasn't even particularly sure that he wasn't interested, was he?

Permalink Mark Unread

He seemed pretty sure the last, oh, fifty-seven times Sadde came onto him.

(Sadde did not come onto him fifty-seven times, he came onto him arguably-twice and got progressively more annoyed by it as Theo insisted on becoming hotter.)

Permalink Mark Unread

(Poor Sadde.)

Unfortunately it doesn't take too long to get to Sadde's house. Plus it's perhaps a bit too late to be trying anything.

Permalink Mark Unread

Not as far as Sadde's concerned it isn't.

"See you tomorrow? Unless you wanna stay with your mom all day? Which is probably a good idea."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'll call you, let you know?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Alright. Good night, then."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You too," he responds, then off he goes.

Permalink Mark Unread

 

 

Theo's mom is actually quite sympathetic and understanding the next day, and it's not wholly down to the sway – she gets the recording of Theo so that it's approximately balanced out, though not canceled, and still acts similarly.

She's not really sure she's doing the 'mothering' thing quite right – she tries, she's usually good at things she tries to do, but there isn't clear feedback on this sort of thing and she feels like she's doing a lot of it wrong because she's going against a lot of the typical pop culture on what mothers should do.

But she thinks she did okay, seeing how her son turned out.

Vampirism… somewhat included.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo texts Sadde a bit after six to let him know that she plans on staying around for at least a few days but 'should be cool' with them doing things, like the hospital.

He's told her quite a lot about what they've done, actually, trying to fill her in on the details of his life after his recent undeath.

Permalink Mark Unread

Did he, ah, tell her about the. Little incidents. At the start?

Permalink Mark Unread

He did.

This might be part of why it's now a bit after six instead of him texting a bit earlier.

That plus the crying.

Permalink Mark Unread

Part of the 'vampirism somewhat included' too.

Permalink Mark Unread

I'm very sorry you're having to go through this.

Permalink Mark Unread

Thanks, he responds. At least we saved some people.

Permalink Mark Unread

Yeah. And we're gonna save more and I know it's not gonna be enough but it's the best we can do.

Permalink Mark Unread

Maybe it'll scale.

Permalink Mark Unread

We'll figure it out. You'll be okay.

Permalink Mark Unread

Hopefully.

Permalink Mark Unread

The next few days are uneventful. Sadde meets Theo's mother, and is awkward, but they like her alright. They perform some more tests, visit that hospital and others, Theo eats animals daily, and Sadde continues to pine silently.

By the third evening following Victoria's arrival, news of the Moorstone Miracles, as they're calling the mysterious recoveries of people in the environs of the town with the larger hospital nearby, have spread enough that some of the braver—or more desperate—souls are making their way there, hoping to find salvation. The fact that cancer has been the only malady not cured thus far does not seem to deter some of its more able victims or their loved ones.

Permalink Mark Unread

Then, one day while Theo and Sadde are both present in the house, there's a knock at the door!

Theo pauses. "I don't think that's Willow or Matt?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"You're the one with super senses," she shrugs. "Willow had a thing with her family, I think."

Permalink Mark Unread

He goes doorwards, in that case, quite quickly! And opens it.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hi!" says Ev, who is on the other side holding a pack of cookies.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Hi," he responds.

Permalink Mark Unread

She blinks at him a bit, slightly confused. "How've you been? I didn't get a chance to speak to you after– everything."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Um," he responds. "Not as bad as I could've been?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Sadde reaches the door soon after.

"Oh hi."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hi there!" responds Evelyn.

She hands the pack of cookies to Theo.

Permalink Mark Unread

… He takes them. "Thanks."

Permalink Mark Unread

She smiles at him.

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Did you… want something?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, I wouldn't want to impose," responds Evelyn, looking between him and Sadde, "but I wanted to catch up? On things?"

Smile.

Permalink Mark Unread

She blinks slowly. Then looks at Theo.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo looks back at Sadde and looks a little confused. Back to Evelyn, "Um. Sure?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Great!" she responds, coming into the house. Pause. "Is your mom back yet?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Yeah, why?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't think I've met her yet, is all."

Permalink Mark Unread

"She's very nice," Sadde pipes in.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm sure she is!" agrees Ev. "Is she around, or…?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"She's doing some work right now, actually," responds Theo. "Upstairs, but I can go get her if you want?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh no, it's fine," she smiles, looking around a bit.

Permalink Mark Unread

Aaaand since Theo isn't, like, being a good host and stuff and honestly she's spent more time here than at her place these past few days: "So do you want, like, something to drink...?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"That'd be nice, please!" she smiles.

Gosh, isn't she smiling a lot.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo leads them kitchen-wards. "Um, what do you want to drink? Tea, coffee…? Juice?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Pause. "– Coffee? Thanks."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So how've you been since school ended?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo goes to get the coffee.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, I've been good! Relaxing from schoolwork, doing… approximately nothing, actually." Shrug. "It's been fun."

Permalink Mark Unread

She grins. "For certain values of 'approximately nothing' it can be pretty fun, yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Music, reading, IM-ing, cooking. Yeah, not actual nothing."

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Be back in a minute," says Theo. "Should tell my mom."

He leaves the kitchen.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I've been doing more-or-less the same. Hanging out with Theo and Matt and Willow, too."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh? Sounds like fun."

She looks around at the countertop and, seeing no mugs, grabs a couple out of what looks likely to be a cupboard containing mugs.

One slips out of her hand.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Careful—"

It falls.

It stops before it hits the ground. It hovers there for less than a second. Then it finishes falling, and fails to break.

"Lucky," she exhales. "I really hate cleaning broken dishes like that."

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn crouches down to pick it up! "Phew." She places the mug down on the side and frowns. "Sorry, I'm not usually this much a klutz."

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo is standing by the island in the kitchen when she looks back up. "… It's fine," he responds, frowning.

Permalink Mark Unread

Sadde jumps, a little. "You should work on not being so silent," she remarks.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hm?" asks Evelyn, tilting her head. "– Oh, hi there." She turns to face him, smiling a little. "Sorry about, almost the mug."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, like I said, no problem." He turns to Sadde. "Uh, can I have a word?"

To Evelyn again, he smiles and says, "Just a sec."

Permalink Mark Unread

She blinks. "Um, sure. Be right back?" she tells Ev before following Theo.

Permalink Mark Unread

When they're outside the kitchen, Theo asks, "Do you have any idea what that was?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"...what?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"The mug!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"...I thought you said it was okay? People are clumsy sometimes."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It is!" he responds. "But I have no idea how a mug stopping in midair could be clumsiness!"

Permalink Mark Unread

She raises an eyebrow at him.

Permalink Mark Unread

"It fell, nothing hit it, it took about," pause, "that long to hit the ground."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And it is uncommon for mugs not to hit the floor instantly upon being knocked over?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"That was longer than it'd take a mug to drop. From the cupboard. The top of the cupboard."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If you say so."

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Didn't notice anything?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Not really, but you're the one with the supersenses and eidetic memory. Maybe the vampire house has magic in it, now? Stuff can't break if you don't want it to?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Do you wanna try that? Because I don't want, like, a pen to break, but perhaps I don't care about pens as much as mugs so it might not be a fair test."

Permalink Mark Unread

"How, with Ev here? Bit implausible."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, I can fetch you a pen and go finish making her a coffee?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, the pen, right, was thinking about the mug. Well, sure, I guess."

Permalink Mark Unread

So he goes back, fetches her a pen, and then returns to the kitchen!

Permalink Mark Unread

...and it occurs to her that she will probably ruin the carpet if she tries doing this here so she decides to try to break it in a sink instead.

Permalink Mark Unread

Probably a good idea.

It breaks just fine.

Permalink Mark Unread

She disposes of the evidence and returns to the kitchen.

Permalink Mark Unread

Where Evelyn is smiling and sipping from a mug! She is also mostly looking at Theo, but when she notices Sadde has entered she drags her eyes away from him to say, "Hey."

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo is standing near the island in the middle of the kitchen.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hiya," she says, going for the fridge.

Permalink Mark Unread

"So! I hope Sadde passed along the offer – I can get a message around if you want a party, or just blend into the crowd or something…?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah! She did," he responds. "I'm not really in the mood for one right now, doing okay just having a bit of a quiet time, but thanks."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It wouldn't be a bad idea, though, in general, even if I can't convince Theo to go."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I was thinking of having one in like, a week? I had a few friends over at the weekend but it was mostly an out-of-town crowd, so– I didn't really think of inviting you."

She looks at Theo a bit apologetically. Then also at Sadde, but mainly at Theo.

Must be the sway.

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's alright. I'd love to go in a week."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I will send you the details, then! It's gonna be an all-day thing, sunny with a pool and stuff – you might want to bring swimwear – and then snacks in the evening."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Awesome! I'll be there. Can I invite Willow and Matt, too?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah! It's a pretty big place, can hold a bunch of people – like last time."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Cool." She looks at Theo. "And you're not coming?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Probably not?" he shrugs. "I mean, I might, but I doubt it and I'm not sure how much you want… late RSVPs or whatever."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, it should be no problem!" responds Evelyn. "Feel free to just drop in if you decide to. Could just come for the evening if you're not up for a swim-party."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod. "Thanks."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And by the way did you see those miracles on the news?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I did!" she responds. "Kinda weird."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. It's maybe a terrible thought but I kinda want to get healed too so I can figure out what's up with that. Everyone says they just wake up alright, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I didn't hear any – uh, maybe many – of them saying that they had some sort of religious experience? And I'd expect it to be well-publicized if there were some new miracle drug, so I dunno." Shrug.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Miracle drug that fixes everything from broken bones to degenerative diseases. Everything except, apparently, cancer."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Apparently," she agrees. "Maybe it does cell regrowth, or maybe they just haven't tested it on cancer yet? Seems a bit implausible, but so does the whole thing, really. Bit too much for a coincidence, not really enough for… whatever it'd be if not a coincidence."

Permalink Mark Unread

"A pattern?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, but it's weird that something would heal so many things, so well and so suddenly advanced from before? So, a pattern but with the only explanations being… really implausible?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm not sure it's as implausible as that many coincidences, but yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I haven't really been able to come up with any hypotheses that aren't laughably ridiculous."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, miracle drug or drugs seems to be– about it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Aliens," she starts ticking off fingers. "Vampires. Angels. Demons. The simulation hypothesis, with a rather more active simulator."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mm, so, hyper-advanced medicine, the supernatural, and… gods?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"That seems to sum it up, yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, I'm currently… not expecting it to be the supernatural or gods? That seems somewhat less likely than 'coincidence', to be honest."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well yeah but it's no longer completely implausible."

Permalink Mark Unread

"In comparison, I guess? This whole thing just seems really implausible, though, and then it went and happened."

Permalink Mark Unread

"A week after I sort-of dropped dead, too."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah." She frowns a bit.

Permalink Mark Unread

"That's my point, if I'm that confused then something I believe must be false. Someone has much greater capabilities than I'd previously expected possible."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Not really enough evidence to work out what way our beliefs are wrong, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mmhm, ergo why I kinda wanted to get really sick and see if I couldn't figure it out."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, difficult to arrange and you don't seem to actually be planning on it, but would it even give you that much info? I mean, if people are keeping quiet about it, I guess you might get some more info, but if they honestly don't know…"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I could attach a camera to myself! Or pretend I was sleeping! Or something." Shrug.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I guess?" Shrug. "I suppose they haven't really done it with many people, so perhaps they aren't even checking that kind of thing."

Sip.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well, if they are, will they, what, not heal people with cameras?"

Permalink Mark Unread

She shrugs. "They haven't been healing everyone and they're limited in the hospitals they pick – maybe they'll not heal people with cameras or maybe they'll just remove the cameras."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Could be wireless, but depending on how good their tech is – apparently ridiculously – they could block it or something."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod.

Permalink Mark Unread

She shrugs. "I'm itching to figure it out, it's so frustrating."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, especially if it could be used, like, large-scale."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mmhm. Maybe these hospitals are, like... a test drive? Of whatever?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Could be," she agrees. "In which case it's sorta sensible – clinical trials are important – but they're not going through the regular channels, which is kinda worrying." Shrug. "I mean, if they have good reason to keep secret then– well, I don't know the reasons, so I can't really judge them, but still."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Something that can cure literally everything except for cancer is... I mean it sounds something that ought to be a secret by default, depending on what it is, at least at first."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If you can screw with it and end up with some super not-virus, yeah. Which you probably can, if it's a medical thing."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And even if you can't, it's... very high leverage? People could charge so much for it, whoever controls it could have a lot of political capital."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm not trying to shame them for not releasing it open-source or whatever, I'm just saying that… they seem to be doing clinical trials on patients without permission, which while it seems to heal them and that's better than the alternative, isn't following the regular standards for this kind of thing. Like, FDA and whatever."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Right, yeah, and I just mean they might not have governmental backing or lots of resources and this might be the best they can do."

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Hm, I don't actually know what the government's like, systems in place for that kind of thing. I assume not many people get such a novel development on such a tight income, though?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Which makes the supernatural or alien explanations more likely, if the aliens also don't want to crash any markets or reveal themselves."

Permalink Mark Unread

"At least they're maybe being polite, not destroying our economy?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo laughs a bit.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Beats the alternative for sure."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Anyway! I will see you guys… some other time? Maybe in a week?" she says. Then she looks at Theo and holds up her empty mug questioningly. "Where should I put this?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, I'll take it," says Theo, doing as such. "It was nice to see you?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'll be there! See you."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Bye!" she responds, then off she goes.

Permalink Mark Unread

 

 

"So the pen broke so it wasn't just a weird vampire-house thing."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. I mean it's not impossible the mug just failed to break for ordinary reasons."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's not impossible it failed to break, no, but I heard when she last touched it and when it fell down and then when it hit the ground and they did not line up."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Maybe you got distracted?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Retroactively distracted in how long it takes for something to drop to the floor?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Distracted while it was falling so it took less time than you think it actually did...?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't think so?" he says. "I seem to be either good with times or I know I'd be guessing and inaccurate. This is an example of 'it took this long, basically for sure'."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay... I kinda wanna drop lots of mugs now and see if we can't replicate it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I sort of want to do the same? I guess we could go buy some cheap mugs and drop them but it might turn out they need to be here long enough to – I don't know, be contaminated or something – or it might turn out it was Evelyn."

Permalink Mark Unread

She pauses. This thought hadn't occurred to her before. "—Do you think she knows?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"About the vampirism or the shapeshifting or her own magic, if she has it? Because I have no idea to all of the above, but she was acting sort of weird earlier? – Might've been the sway, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

"She was, a bit," Sadde agrees. "And in a way I'm not sure was altogether caused by the sway? Like, she decided to come to your place sorta on a whim and stuff. And she's never shown any undue interest in me, but I guess that's not evidence any way about her knowing about the shapeshifting."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And I wasn't a vampire until a week-ish ago, and have hardly spoken to her since, so I don't think she knows about that, and it's totally reasonable for her to randomly pop up at a classmate's door and bring cookies, that seems in-character from what I know of her, but… I mean, why would she purposefully do magic in front of us?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I dunno. I still didn't see any magic."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Were you watching the mug?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, I even warned her about it!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"What did it look like it did? Fell normally with no interruption and no slowdown whatsoever?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I think so?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Is that you expressing a lack of extreme confidence, or just clarifying that you do in fact think that, or…?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Both. I do not have an eidetic memory, I did not notice anything amiss with the mug."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Weird," he declares. "I am pretty sure I'm not mistaken – she knocked it, it fell, it stopped falling temporarily, it then landed."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So if you're right it was fast enough my merely human senses couldn't detect it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, I am pretty sure you should have been able to detect it, which would suggest either something was – or is – screwing with you or with me."

Permalink Mark Unread

"...screwing with people's perceptions and memories is actually pretty likely. Considering."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, which, not so fun and not so easy to detect." Sigh. "I guess I could go be creepy and stealthy at some point, maybe go to the party and watch her."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Speaking of the party—maybe you could actually go."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If I stayed indoors during the day it might work, but I probably can't go out swimming for much? I mean, if people are sort of going in and out I could probably do that, wouldn't get too bad in a short time in the sun, but I'd probably end up staying inside to try to be careful."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. Could go when it gets dark, too."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah," he agrees. "She… helpfully sort-of suggested that."

Permalink Mark Unread

"—yeah, right, she did, hmm."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Which could have just been her being polite," says Theo. "And I definitely could be reading too much into it. But it seems sort of like she might have been trying to drop subtle hints."

Permalink Mark Unread

"She didn't seem to react weirdly to the vampire possibility, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

"She was – at first – mostly just discarding it out of hand, yeah?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And we probably don't have enough information otherwise to work out if she's magic nor if she knows it. So next step is probably the party."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm not sure that's even a next step, it's not like she'll do magic in public like that if she can. Probably."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Next step could be stakeout? But it might be a long while and it might be difficult to tell she's doing magic from afar and I don't know how we'd find out without, like, confronting her about it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"—hey uh how likely is it that she may, like, not know it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… I have no idea? But if it's probably messing with one of our perceptions I'm gonna say 'not negligibly so'?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Dooo we have an overwhelmingly good reason not to just tell her about it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"No? – The 'confront her' option wasn't being ruled out, didn't make that clear, I was just assuming that we were trying to think of ways to do it other than that and using that as a fallback."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Right, I meant that it wouldn't necessarily need to be the fallback option. She was in the shortlist of people who we considered trying to test the magical vampire love thing with, wasn't she?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Sort of? It was more 'I can't think of basically anyone! Like, I would say her because of her reputation, but I don't know her', but yeah, I get you." Shrug. "It's possible she was dropping subtle hints and we didn't respond appropriately. Or maybe she doesn't know. Or maybe I'm wrong and it's some weird vampire thing, but we don't lose much by telling her, no."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Weird vampire thing? About the mug not breaking?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Perhaps my supersenses interact weirdly when I'm more than ten meters away from the source of what I expect will be a loud shattering noise. Or something. I'm not expecting it with any high chance, it was just that we have a potential magic thing here and then a clearly screwed-with magic thing, so we shouldn't necessarily be too sure there is other magic involved."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We're postulating new magic, anyway. New vampire magic but still."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Or just that the previous vampire magic doesn't extend as well as we thought and it turns out my memory has a bunch of weird perception flaws in that I haven't noticed yet. Which is possible, so long as I'm enough better than a human that it typically doesn't matter and so long as that doesn't preclude the other memory things we've noticed."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Right but, Occam's Razor, assuming it doesn't work in the straightforward extension of what we've seen so far is an extra postulate and I'm not sure it's actually more likely than other magic."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I honestly have no idea how to apply Occam's Razor to some things that I previously thought were… pretty much impossible? Because it's a choice between 'more, similar impossible things occurred' and 'previous impossible thing manifested slightly differently'. Which to me suggests that the previous impossible thing wasn't as we expected, I think, except we have two instances of magic so I have no idea how to adjust for that?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well, impossible or no, there's a substantial difference between the impossibility of 'greatly enhanced senses' and 'senses that look greatly enhanced but actually behave weirdly at different distances,' especially when 'weirdly' is set to a specific hypothesis."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I was thinking more the memory thing, that it felt like I had a perfect ability to remember how long things lasted for but actually turns out I'm not super amazing at them, or something."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well but we did test it, you seemed at least as accurate as we could reasonably have our devices be."

Permalink Mark Unread

Shrug. "Do you think we should go find her now, tell her, or wait until later sometime?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"...it would be kinda weird to do it right after she left but uh. I don't actually know of a good reason to wait."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Slightly weird except for the fact we didn't have it established whether we'd reveal it to her, so she'll probably understand?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mm. I guess."

Permalink Mark Unread

Out they go, then.

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn isn't too far away. She's on the sidewalk, in a bit of sun (for it is sunny today), a few blocks away.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Maybe don't stay in the sun?" she tells Theo.

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn pauses to take a phone call!

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah," agrees Theo, then he moves to the shade of a nearby tree. "What are we doing, just shouting to her and asking about the mug?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"What no we're telling her about vampires first."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Are we showing her proof, because we're in public so, what do we use as proof?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"The memory that you woke up in a morgue after dying?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Okay, so we're just relying on the whole 'everything is really unlikely anyway' aspect?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mmhm. And then we show her evidence." Pause. "I'm still slightly unsure we should actually do this but I can't find a very good reason why that would be."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Possibly because she might have magic and she might be hostile? But she doesn't seem it – though that could be a façade – and it seems uncharitable to assume that – but not necessarily a bad idea to do so – and… I'm not really sure about reasons other than those?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well, why aren't we telling the world at large?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Because we expect they won't collectively believe us, because we expect they might attempt to exploit us, because we expect there might be a really bad fear reaction, because we don't know what else is out there, because we're still at the preliminary stage and don't know how well these things can scale? I think?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"And how do those worries apply to single individuals like her?"

(Okay even in the shade that sun is really annoying.)

Permalink Mark Unread

"She won't be able to discard it as special effects, she is probably not in a position to exploit us, fear reaction will be manageable if produced, still don't know if she's magic, doesn't need to scale to tell her."

He is somewhat visibly uncomfortable.

Permalink Mark Unread

She notices. "Okay sounds good to me I'm gonna go tell her."

She jogs up to Ev.

Permalink Mark Unread

When she's nearby, Ev turns her head and then says into her phone, "Uh, be back in a minute."

She hangs up and looks slightly confused.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hi!" Look around, no one close enough, "So, Theo is a vampire, he's the one who caused the miracles, we think you might be able to do magic, possibly not consciously." She says this in a low enough voice that she won't be heard over the phone.

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn pauses, for more than a second. Then she looks at Sadde assessingly. "Do you want to offer some proof for this?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"He woke up after dying, remember? But sure, except, you know, the sun is pretty unpleasant and even the shade only offers mild protection. So, uh, better not offer some proof outside. Although, hmm, Theo, do you suppose you could just appear here fore a second then go back to your shade? ...possibly your house?" She does not raise her voice to be heard.

Permalink Mark Unread

So there's a bit of a blur and then Evelyn feels a tap on her arm and then he's gone.

Permalink Mark Unread

She looks over at her arm, then at the tree where he was before, then around herself and then: "Okay."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So the thing is he has supersenses and an eidetic memory and he's very very sure the mug you dropped there actually hovered over the floor for a bit before failing to break and, you know."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… I don't remember noticing that, but I suppose I wouldn't. Uh. I'll just– let my friend know that I'll be busy, that okay?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Sure."

Permalink Mark Unread

So she does. "Back to Theo's place, then? And maybe explain some more about the fact that he's a vampire because you did give that as a suggestion earlier I think but I didn't really think it would. Y'know. Be true."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. I was, uh, sounding you out. Sorry about that."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's okay." Shrug. "I mean, it's what I'd probably do in your scenario."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. And Theo's convinced there was some magic going on with your mug but I didn't notice it so we decided to just—ask."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm pretty sure I haven't noticed any magic, but if that was magic and it's all as subtle as that, I wouldn't have, yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It is very subtle, yes. Hey, remember that gender thing I do? Not actually makeup!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Seriously?" she asks. "I was sort of in awe of your makeup skills but didn't ask for tips because I think I've been doing okay myself."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean I am also good at makeup but. I genuinely change genders. That is a magical thing I have been able to do since basically always. And the magic makes sure no one actually believes me when I tell them it's magical."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I… think I believe you about it being magical? But that could be because I expect I'm either hallucinating or Theo is a vampire, so either I'm hallucinating and you can be magic or I'm not and you can also be magic."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well after being beat upside the head with it people do believe it, it's just they'll invent the most amazing rationalizations on their own. It's actually quite funny."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It sounds like it would be, yeah. – 'Beat upside the head with it'?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Like, shown conclusive proof that it's true. Such as by seeing me naked in both forms, or, apparently, believing it just because it also happens to be true that Theo is a vampire so why wouldn't Sadde be a shapeshifter."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ah," she responds. "Well it's at least convenient that it doesn't, like, turn you into a snake every so often. Or modify your looks in ways you wouldn't want it to, I don't think it does?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Um."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Does it turn you into a snake every so often?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"No, but I don't control whether I'm a boy or a girl, it's just about how I feel that day, and my emotions can affect it in other ways if they're strong enough."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… I suppose you might want to look male one day while not feeling male? And affect it how?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"When I was little I had a few... incidents... where I, ah, turned into the Hulk. When people bullied me."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Huh. Ouch."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And when Theo died I had to leave because otherwise I'd go all white and spook everyone."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh." Pause. "Magic wouldn't cover that, or magic would but people would be weirdly spooked anyway?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"The latter."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hm." Pause. "I'm pretty sure I haven't noticed any effects of my magic, if I have it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Which does not rule out its existence, as I think I've exemplified."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, especially if you only have two examples of it so far. But for you two, you're exemptions to your own 'don't notice my magic' magic things."

Permalink Mark Unread

"...more or less. I mean, I see myself naked. I'd have to actively forget seeing myself naked to not realize that had changed. And Theo... took a while to notice he was a vampire. And there are other, uh, very annoying mental things related to being one."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mental things like…? Or are you keeping them secret?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Like him not noticing people are people when he's hungry. Or rather, instead of getting hungry he instead starts seeing people less as people."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… And more as food or just as pieces of scenery that he desires to chew on?" Pause. "Not that there is actually much or perhaps any difference there."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I gather it's more the latter, but you'd better ask him."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod.

They should be back pretty shortly.

Permalink Mark Unread

Yep! There they are.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo opens the door when they get to it.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… So hi there," says Evelyn, looking at him.

Permalink Mark Unread

"There's this other thing where if the vampire has more information about you than you do about them, modulo a few things, you like them more and pay more attention and stuff."

Permalink Mark Unread

She keeps looking at Theo, then opens her mouth a bit, mouthing some words pensively. "Information like what?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo shuts the door behind Sadde. "Like your appearance or memory of how you talk."

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Oh, so I like you more and pay you more attention, then? Or do I have more information over you, I'm not totally sure here?" She smiles, then freezes a bit. "Never mind, I think I've answered my own question."

Permalink Mark Unread

She snorts, then sends Ev the audio.

Permalink Mark Unread

Now she has: more sway over Theo than people usually do!

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo looks between her and Sadde, then shrugs. "So we think you might have magic."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Any ideas how to test it? I mean, I don't really want to go dropping your mugs in case they do break, but that's the only thing we have confirmed to have worked probably-at-least-once."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well... my magic is about emotion, so maybe something along those lines? I'm not sure, really."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I didn't want the mug to smash? But I'm not sure it'll be the same type of want if I drop it now because this is like 'here, magic magic' and it… wasn't very noticeable before so I somehow doubt that's going to work all that well."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. And there weren't any other things like that before? Where things you didn't want didn't happen though they should, or did that shouldn't?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… None that come to mind? Uh, I'm pretty good with people and sometimes they do unexpected things but in a good way, not sure if that's a similar thing?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Are they unexpected things you wanted?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Usually? Not always, but it's usually, like – I'd been trying to get this pair, two of my friends, to stop bickering over pointless things and getting worked up and they had a major blow-up, obviously not great, and then I realized I'd have to go clean the mess up, not usually fun, and about two hours later I find out that they'd both agreed to coincidentally go apologize to the other."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay, not majorly suspicious but, do you have other examples? Might make a pattern."

Permalink Mark Unread

She thinks for a few moments but then says, "Nothing coming to mind? There have been other times but none specifically stand out as being weird."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay... I'm not sure how to test it. Maybe, uh, see if you have telekinesis?"

Permalink Mark Unread

She tries looking for something to affect and settles on a pen on a nearby table.

 

"… Doesn't seem so."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay, so maybe if you try dropping it...?"

Permalink Mark Unread

So she picks it up and drops it and tries to not have it hit the floor with as much speed as it should.

Not like it'd break or anything anyway, but still.

Permalink Mark Unread

There's a slight draft. Neither of the humans notice it.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Something definitely happened, there. Slight draft."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If we're literally unable to notice anything..."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It was only a small thing, I'm not sure you'd be able to notice it with your senses, so it might not be messing with your perceptions. At least not this time."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If I have a magic that does things for me, that's nice. If it doesn't allow me to know when it does things, that's going to slightly annoy me."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay, but... Hmm. Is your magic only literally causing things to not fall down fast enough?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It would be better than nothing because it might be useful if I ever get pushed off a cliff but it would mean my friends deciding to make up was a coincidence. Which is totally possible, but it might not literally just be this."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hypotheses?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Things happening how I want them? I am not, however, sure how to narrow that down except by saying 'well clearly it isn't all the time', so it's not a very useful or specific hypothesis."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Twice is not a pattern," she sighs.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I could try dropping the pen again, confirm it wasn't just two flukes and a bit of inattention or something?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"We'd still only have Theo's senses and word for it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… I mean, is there a moderate chance it was in fact two flukes, or are we pretty certain that it's either Theo's senses gone wrong or ours not being good enough?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I am pretty sure it was not in fact two flukes. Feel free to test it again, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

So she drops the pen again!

Permalink Mark Unread

No breeze.

But it does kinda fall on its head and twirl a little bit before finishing its motion.

Permalink Mark Unread

… She does it again.

Permalink Mark Unread

This time it bounces a couple of times.

Permalink Mark Unread

Pause. "This doesn't look particularly magical…"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Not in the sense of directly breaking the laws of physics, it doesn't."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Which the mug apparently did?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Pretty sure. You could keep dropping it a few more times, see if it always-or-usually does something weird or if it just drops normally sometimes?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"What, you want her to try dropping the mug again?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"No, the pen, see if it repeatedly bounces and whatever. Not conclusive or anything but it should at least help to show it wasn't just a mistake, if it wasn't."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah?" responds Ev. "I can do that."

She drops the pen a few more times.

Permalink Mark Unread

The first time she tries, something equally suspicious happens to make the pen take a bit longer to fall. The second time, she gets distracted by a stray thought.

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Sorry, what did you say?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I didn't say anything."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Nor me."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh," she responds, then she shrugs.

Permalink Mark Unread

"...so are you gonna keep doing it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Huh?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Dropping the pen?"

Permalink Mark Unread

She looks a bit confused. "… Uh, yeah?"

She goes to do it.

Permalink Mark Unread

Distracted again.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… You okay?"

Permalink Mark Unread

She turns to look at him. "Yeah? Why wouldn't I be?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm convinced there's magic going on now."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ma– Oh? Why?"

Evelyn then seems to notice the pen in her hand.

Permalink Mark Unread

"You don't happen to have typical memory loss or, like, inattention or something? Typically?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… No."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You keep forgetting you have to do something to the pen," she explains.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah," she says. "I don't think it's quite memory loss."

Permalink Mark Unread

"What is it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Inattention? Because I can remember dropping the pen and I was able to remember it then but it just wasn't important because something else was happening?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Huh. Alright, I guess. Weird magic that makes things you want to happen kinda happen in inconspicuous and plausibly deniable ways, and then makes you stop paying attention to it if you do it too much."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Or maybe I'm just stuck with some screwy inattention when it comes to doing tests like this. No guarantee magic has to be useful, is there?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well, so far it seems like it has been, at least a bit, but that could be an issue of our sample."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's somewhat under your conscious control. And it did manage to stop a mug from breaking, and possibly made weird good things happen in your life with other people... In a plausibly deniable way... Hmm."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If it even did that, which we don't have confirmed because this could all just be coincidence." Pause. "Probably not with the mug, though, since Theo says it acted weirdly."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It definitely stopped. So you at least have the mug going for you, with the drawback of inattention here."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mug and pens, there is no way the pens weren't doing something and you just happened to become distracted while trying to do them. What's interesting, though, is that it took a few tries for you to get distracted."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Pens were sort of… probably but not certainly affected after the first one. But yeah, that's interesting. Could try dropping something else, see if it's a certain amount per object."

He fetches a key.

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn takes it! And drops it, aiming for it to, like, not hit the floor.

Permalink Mark Unread

It doesn't really have anywhere else to go. It hits the floor.

Permalink Mark Unread

After there's no response from Theo, she picks it up and tries aiming for – slower at the floor?

Permalink Mark Unread

It catches on her finger before dropping.

Permalink Mark Unread

Hmph.

She picks it up again and aims for it to, without using her body, land slower.

Permalink Mark Unread

It doesn't actually do anything, as far as she can tell.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hovered," says Theo.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… I didn't notice anything."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Me neither."

Permalink Mark Unread

"– How long did it hover for? Any idea?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Less than half a second?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… We could try taping it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Do let's."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Might wanna use your phone because of the informational thing. That we're calling sway."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, okay," she responds, and hands him her phone.

Then, when he's ready, she drops the key!

Permalink Mark Unread

What for, exactly?

Permalink Mark Unread

She has no idea! She instead decides to inspect the key and the floor, looking for clues as to why she might be doing this.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Ugh."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ugh," she echoes him. "Should we try chanting about what we're doing, or something?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… You can try, might work."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We are testing magic, we are testing magic, we are testing magic..." she starts.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo joins in.

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn tries to keep it in mind and tries to drop the key again, aiming for it to again land slower without touching her.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo notices it hovering again.

Permalink Mark Unread

And he catches it on video with her phone, then opens it up and tries playing it for them to see. In slowmo.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. Definitely magic."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm pretty sure that's long enough you two should've noticed."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I agree. So, magic that makes you ignore its effects if you don't have supersenses. Why."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Might just be a lower level of the thing I get if I try it too much – easier to ignore? But it seems different."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So if you want things to happen and they're small enough, they happen, but you can't do them too much or you get distracted, and people don't really notice," she summarizes.

Permalink Mark Unread

"That tentatively seems to be the case, yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"...can you try something bigger?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Like a stapler, or a loaf of bread, or a chair…?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Let's go with 'make something float without dropping it.'"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ah," she says. "I can try?"

So she tries it.

Permalink Mark Unread

Tries what, exactly?

Permalink Mark Unread

"That seems to be a no."

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn looks at him curiously, then a moment later – "Ugh."

Permalink Mark Unread

"No but wait. Just. Like. Focus on it? A lot? We can chant again."

Permalink Mark Unread

"That was more to snap her out of whatever. Maybe I should try an actual snap next time."

Permalink Mark Unread

Eyeroll. "Okay, so chant?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Chant.

Permalink Mark Unread

She tries to drop the keys and make them hover, again! (Focusing on the chanting, because that could be useful.)

Permalink Mark Unread

Isn't that piece of lint so interesting looking?

Permalink Mark Unread

When she doesn't seem to be doing it, Theo tries poking her.

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Hm?" Pause. "Okay, ugh."

Try again?

Permalink Mark Unread

The piece of lint continues to be very interesting.

Permalink Mark Unread


What's also very interesting is that someone is chanting about the current situation, though, so she can just– drop the key.

Permalink Mark Unread

She can! And it will fail to be dropped and actually float there. And the longer it stays that way, the harder it is to not just regard it as completely uninteresting and undeserving of any note.

Permalink Mark Unread

It'll drop again not too long after, in that case. She'll go study the mightily interesting wall instead.

Permalink Mark Unread

"So did it work?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah," says Theo. "It definitely hovered longer that time."

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn turns to him as he speaks – then sighs again and picks up the key.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay so you can make stuff float. That's actually pretty rad." She grabs the pen, and puts it on her hand palm up. "Make this float from here?"

Permalink Mark Unread

This all feels extremely ridiculous – magic, extremely weird – but she does try.

Permalink Mark Unread

It is not significantly harder than making the key float.

Permalink Mark Unread

Then it's not all that long until she starts staring at dust motes again.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo snaps his fingers.

"Apparently it works, then."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And I have a hypothesis about what the relevant powers here are."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Looks like all we've shown is a weird telekinesis…?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Not quite. There was wind, and the key got caught on her finger once, and it was all very plausibly deniable until it wasn't."

Permalink Mark Unread

"The wind I was counting as part of the weird telekinesis, and the key getting caught – yeah, plausibly deniable until not."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So… ability to, at the least, do some telekinesis and wind manipulation, with the constraint that it all has to be plausibly deniable or else I forget about it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Do you have any friends you talk to fairly often? Perhaps daily? Or weekly? Bonus points if they're likely to call you at any point during the day."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… I have a bunch I speak to relatively frequently, and then 'has a chance of calling me out of the blue' stretches to– like, half the school?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Try to do the thing you did to the key and the pen, but this time to the event 'someone will call you.' Make it general, to start."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Just literally. Anyone will call me, try to make it happen?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

So she does.

… She's not really sure how to do this, since the telekinesis thing was much more obvious.

Permalink Mark Unread

And yet, ring her phone does.

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Should I pick up?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I think so."

Permalink Mark Unread

She does! It is a friend who is asking if she wants to go shopping tomorrow and also does she need some drinks or something brought to the party because like that can be done.

It's a pretty short conversation.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Try it again."

Permalink Mark Unread

She does!

Permalink Mark Unread

Yep, there it goes, ringing again.

Permalink Mark Unread

Another conversation. Same person says they totally forgot but they were wondering if their boyfriend from out of town could come too? She sort of assumed yes but she didn't actually ask and she was totally planning to and she hopes she's not interrupting Evelyn while she's busy or anything.

Again, a brief conversation.

Permalink Mark Unread

Sadde just taps her finger against her chin.

Permalink Mark Unread

"So I can make somewhat-unlikely events happen too. On demand."

Permalink Mark Unread

"My hypothesis here is actually that that's your magic. Making things more likely."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… So I'm not super into physics but I'd expect it to be quite unlikely for some wind to just conveniently make something hover."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't think it was wind, but like, quantum mechanics? There's technically a nonzero chance that anything will happen, including stuff failing to obey gravity for a fraction of a second. In very simplified terms."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… I think that's even less likely?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure it is."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Then maybe it was wind," she shrugs. "My point is, I think your thing has to do with that."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Does anybody know the forecast for tomorrow?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Why?" asks Theo, getting his phone out to look it up.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Sunny with a chance of sun, I think."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I was thinking I might see if I could change that. It wouldn't be very reliable as a test but if the weather does something unexpected for a few days then that could at least give indication I could do large effects…"

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Yeah, sunny," says Theo.

Permalink Mark Unread

"If you can change the weather that's actually pretty awesome."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It wouldn't be guaranteed to be me, the weather is sometimes wrong and this thing sometimes seems to screw up anyway… but yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If my guess is correct doing anything staggeringly unlikely would probably fail to work for too long."

Permalink Mark Unread

"A week of rain shouldn't be too unlikely – would be annoying since I like the sun – but yeah, something like snow probably wouldn't work."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I used to like the sun," sighs Theo.

Permalink Mark Unread

Pat pat.

Permalink Mark Unread

Eyeroll.

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn smirks.

"Okay, so, preferences for weather? I could try to just do a lower temperature or, like, have it be foggy until mid-morning and then return to usual, or…?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Foggy until mid-morning works I guess? There should be other tests you could perform to—try to make someone else call you, and then try to make a specific person call you. Someone who's likely to call anyway. And then... try to make someone who's unlikely to call you do?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, yeah, there are definitely smaller-scale tests, I was just thinking it might be useful to try some large-scale things, see if I have a hard limit on size if this is how it works."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, makes sense."

Permalink Mark Unread

Soooo, how about she try making it go foggy tomorrow morning.

Permalink Mark Unread

There is absolutely no feedback.

"Are you gonna try to do the calling people thing? And do you have more ideas for tests?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I am going to do the calling people thing! I was trying the weather thing and I have no idea if it worked or not but at least I didn't end up losing focus."

She tries the calling people thing. She picks Oliver, one of her friends.

Permalink Mark Unread

Ring ring.

Permalink Mark Unread

She looks at the caller ID! Is it in fact Oliver?

Permalink Mark Unread

Whaddaya know, it is!

Permalink Mark Unread

So she takes the phone call and then it's over and she tries – hm, how about Kirsten, couple of years younger, emo-ish, doesn't really like her all that much.

Permalink Mark Unread

Kirsten does not seem to want to call her and why did she want Kirsten to call her anyway?

Permalink Mark Unread

Well Kirsten's always been rude hasn't she.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo snaps his fingers again!

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Hm? Oh. Lost focus."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I think I win."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Should I see about making it snow, then, if I lose focus then?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Maybe?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, snow might be quite nice for a change," says Theo, eyeing the nearby patch of sun filtering in through a window.

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn shrugs. To Sadde: "Objections or just don't have strong opinions either way, or…?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It sounds like a good test."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Might act weirdly since I tried to get it to rain, earlier."

She tries it anyway.

Permalink Mark Unread

Tries what?

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Uh, what was I gonna look up again?" she asks, getting out her phone.

Permalink Mark Unread

"You weren't," says Theo. "You were trying to make it snow."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ah," she says. "I'll try again."

So she does.

Permalink Mark Unread

Does what?

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn stands there, somewhat confused and trying to hold onto the thought.

Permalink Mark Unread

But why. This thought is so boring and mundane.

Permalink Mark Unread

… She remembers not thinking that but she's sometimes wrong.

So instead, she looks at Theo patiently.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I assume it didn't work, then. Again."

Permalink Mark Unread

"On the other hand it probably means it's something within her purview."

Permalink Mark Unread

"She could try other things, see what doesn't even trigger that? Like, world peace tomorrow, any problems with trying that? I don't really expect it to work."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah I'm pretty sure it won't even distract her."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I expect world peace tomorrow is more likely than atoms in a pen mysteriously deciding to disobey gravity, but probably not more likely than wind holding it up temporarily. Not that that means anything, really, but still."

She tries for world peace, tomorrow.

Permalink Mark Unread

She can keep trying, it really doesn't go nor does it distract her.

Permalink Mark Unread

… Really doesn't go? She can tell if something goes or not?

Permalink Mark Unread

She can tell she's not getting distracted, so perhaps it did work but if it didn't it failed to work silently.

Permalink Mark Unread

"So it might have gone or it might just not work," she says, shrugging. "Maybe let's hope for world peace tomorrow."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Somehow I doubt it," says Theo. "Unless someone stages a coup with mind control, which– okay, maybe they could."

Permalink Mark Unread

"...that sounds like it would not bring peace somehow."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Might bring an end to fighting if they mind-controlled everyone?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Let's hope that doesn't happen."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It is probably quite unlikely. But it might not be absolutely unlikely if they were in fact scheduled to do it tomorrow anyway." He shrugs. "Maybe you should try doing things like making some medical breakthroughs more likely to occur, if you can just do 'more likely' instead of 'have it happen'."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I haven't actually tried that yet!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah that sounds like a good idea, too."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Anything in particular? Cancer cures, malaria cures, degenerative disease cures, I don't know what there even is for me to try to increase in likelihood? – I guess I could go for 'all medical breakthroughs'."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Go for each of them separately, it's probably easier."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I was expecting it to be easier to be more general, since they're likelier to happen anyway – I guess if I'm just blanket increasing the chance, though, it's more to cover." Shrug. "Cancer first, or malaria…?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hmm you do have a point, though, the probability that at least one of them happens is higher than that any specific one... Well I dunno, does order matter?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Order I try them in? Or order of the results occurring?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Former."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't think it'll matter if I can't do any of them? But it might turn out that when I can't do something I'm still doing something, just not – immediately visible things, when it comes to floating pens." Shrug. "And if I can do them then I should probably get around to doing them, trying the general one first because a wider variety of breakthroughs is probably better? If I have a stamina thing?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"If you have a stamina thing then it probably doesn't matter if you go for the wider option or the few option first, since either way you'll find out if it's too large or not?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"No, I mean – like, if I have a mana thing. Which I might, might not. If I do the broader thing and that uses up some charge for today or whatever, that's maybe better than doing any individual thing? I'm not sure – it all relies too much on how it works, I think."

Permalink Mark Unread

"True. General thing sounds like it should go first, then. But, uh, honestly in any case these are big enough projects that they're likely not gonna be affected on the scale of days."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Right, but it might mean the breakthrough is more likely to lead to a proper tool or medicine, or it might just speed it up a few percent," she shrugs.

She tries it: increasing the chance of a useful medical breakthrough of some kind in the relatively near future.

Permalink Mark Unread

Doesn't feel like anything.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Either can't do it or it worked," she reports.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Maybe try malaria next?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Unless Sadde objects, Evelyn will do so.

Permalink Mark Unread

Yes she has several objections to eradicating malaria.

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn would be delighted to hear them, of course, but gosh Sadde didn't voice any of them aloud.

So she tries it.

Permalink Mark Unread

No feedback.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Either went through or isn't doable, again." Pause. "I wonder if I can use it to answer questions, make a pen move left if yes or right if no. Since it's magic. Might be versatile."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Don't see why not try. We could start with questions whose answer we know—perhaps questions whose answer you don't know but Theo or I do, or something."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay, so first maybe try some basic addition, something that should hold true? Or should we focus on something observable, like, is it currently raining?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Should possibly go into the kitchen," suggests Theo.

Permalink Mark Unread

Kitchenwards they go.

"Math first, sure, then rain, then, maybe, I hold some fingers behind my back and you see if you can guess whether it's an odd or even number of them?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod.

So she takes the pen off Sadde, hands the key back to Theo, and then puts the pen on the table. Left means yes, right means no.

Can she get the pen to move in the right direction for whether two plus two equals four?

Permalink Mark Unread

The pen doesn't move, no. It's a nice pen, though.

Permalink Mark Unread

It is a nice pen! She was expecting it to move, though.

Permalink Mark Unread

Sadde sneezes, and bumps against the table when she does that, making the pen move left.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Well left is the direction I was going for, with 'yes' to 'two add two is four'."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Your magic is kinda annoying," comments Theo.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yep," she responds. "Quite."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It could've been a coincidence..."

Permalink Mark Unread

"As with, what, like all of my magic." Sigh. "Maybe I should pick particular directions, have yes, no, some other options."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I think just doing it multiple times should be enough to clear up any coincidences?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I guess if I get distracted that'd be evidence."

Pen moves to the left if it's raining, pen moves to the right if it's not.

Permalink Mark Unread

Sadde steps away this time so the coming sneeze doesn't do anything.

Except it does, and the pen twitches to the right.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hold up a number of fingers? Then maybe we repeat the tests."

Permalink Mark Unread

She holds up a number of fingers behind her back.

Permalink Mark Unread

Left for odd, right for even…

Permalink Mark Unread

"You know," she says, and picks the pen up. "It might be easier for you to do this if—" And she holds the pen so it's standing on its tip, being held up by Sadde. "If you try to influence which way the pen will fall rather than trying to make it move."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Sure," she says. "Seems to have worked okay lying down so far but it's not like it matters."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's worked by making me sneeze and I don't like it."

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn shrugs and takes the pen off Sadde, then holds it in a similar position.

Once Sadde has returned to position: left for odd, right for even.

Permalink Mark Unread

Left! "...okay, that was correct, try again?"

Permalink Mark Unread

She does!

Permalink Mark Unread

Left again! "This one failed."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hm. Try again?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Another success!

Permalink Mark Unread

… And again?

Permalink Mark Unread

Failure.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Seems like it's probably not working," she says.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Try the rain thing again?"

Permalink Mark Unread

She does! Left for raining, right for not…

Permalink Mark Unread

Right.

Permalink Mark Unread

And again?

Permalink Mark Unread

Right.

Permalink Mark Unread

… Third time? (Well, fourth.)

Permalink Mark Unread

Right.

Permalink Mark Unread

"So, not exactly conclusive but it looks like it works for facts I know and not for facts I don't. Which isn't very helpful since it might not even work, it might be me pushing the pen by accident."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I could hold the pen, and you don't tell me which side you pick to mean what, nor what question you're asking?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, that will probably work better?"

Permalink Mark Unread

So she gets the pen and holds it with a finger and waits for Evelyn's instruction.

Permalink Mark Unread

Left for raining, right for not (again).

She tells Sadde to let go of the pen.

Permalink Mark Unread

Right!

And they do it a few more times, and it turns out to consistently fall to the side that's correct according to Ev's knowledge.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well it's a shame I probably can't do divination, then."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Might be able to check your beliefs more accurately, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Hm?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"In case you don't know what you think about something," he says. "It might work on the subconscious."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Was a long shot, anyway."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah," he agrees. "Okay, so you definitely have telekinesis and probably the ability to get people to call you on demand unless that was a freak event, which, probably not because you got distracted. This might be weird telekinesis."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Not the 'making things likelier' idea?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It could be, that fits what we have here."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It sounds... no offense, but kinda lame, to be honest."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Maybe it gets better over time or something."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If you see any level-up windows, let us know."

Permalink Mark Unread

She smiles. "Will do."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm trying to think of any more tests or other ways this power could work b—oh. Okay I thought of one, if it's what I'm thinking."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Care to tell the class?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well... Maybe this could come with, like, a passive power?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Liiike? Being generally lucky?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"No, like, being able to... sense? Things? Relating to it? Like it makes much more sense for this power to be a thing if you could... tell... when you could use it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I can tell when I use it wrong," says Evelyn, "but I don't think I've noticed anything else, odd?" Pause. "Then again maybe I wouldn't because extra sense, or maybe I wouldn't because it's magic."

Permalink Mark Unread

"This magic does like being obtuse and hard to notice. But, like, maybe that could be it. There could be something else you never noticed, maybe, which you could now that you know to look for it."

Permalink Mark Unread

… It is presumably not immediately evident just now that she has her mind open to the idea?

Permalink Mark Unread

Nothing obvious, no.

Permalink Mark Unread

If she looks just a little deeper, like she's the evil character getting a redemption arc in a Disney movie, gosh doesn't this sound like fun?

Permalink Mark Unread

Well what's she looking for exactly?

Permalink Mark Unread

She's not sure! She's just trying to check over each of her senses and see if there's anything quiet that she previously overlooked, like a weird fuzz over certain things in her vision, or a quiet sound in her ear, or light taps on her skin. If she notices any sort of internal pull to something, that could be interesting, but it might just be her wanting to talk to people.

Permalink Mark Unread

Nope, no vague objectiveless sensorial input whatsoever.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm not noticing anything."

Permalink Mark Unread

"What'd you look for?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Weird things in senses – like, fuzz or something interesting that I'm looking at, noises that I didn't notice, some sort of synesthesia thing – weird pulls towards things, generally anything I wouldn't usually notice as a sense but that might be curious?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hmm, I'm not sure that's... how it'd present."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean I don't have any idea how it would present. I can't think of any… sort of similar case that would definitely manifest a certain way, I've got nothing to go off here."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It... I don't think it would be like something you would normally just notice? Like, if I hadn't actually paid attention explicitly for a magical thing making me pay lots of attention to Theo I don't think I'd've detected it as a thing-that-was-going-on-in-my-brain by just looking for any ways my brain was misbehaving."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… So I should just go about my day and note how I'm acting and go 'huh I don't recall why that' or what?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"No, I meant more like... You should come up with specific hypotheses about possible things like that and try to see whether they're the case?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Like I would be more likely to notice the local vampire is interesting and go visit him with cookies and wish him well?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"...not quite what I meant but why did you, uh, decide to do that?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I had at least passing acquaintance with him, he died, he was apparently not dead, he came into school and– it felt like a thing I should do? Go say hi, reassure him the social scene is still available if he wants to get back into it, people aren't permanently frightened or superstitioned away from him, I should know, and if he wants to get back into the swing of things I can help? … Plus cookies."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hmm. Okay, see, if there was any magic making you... more likely... to do this, for some subconscious reason, you might not have noticed it, and what I meant is that... Like I said, I wouldn't have noticed the sway thing if I weren't looking for itspecifically, or something like it. So if you have anything like a passive aspect to your magic, like a new sense, or something that influenced you to come here today, you should first think about what it could possibly be, and then try to look for it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… So it could be a weird sense that I haven't noticed, or it could be me getting sort of – pulled towards certain things, maybe unlikely events, I'm not really sure, or… uh, I'm not really sure. There's a huge number of things that are 'potentially magic' and 'not currently noticed', and I'm not sure how to narrow that down with 'unlikely' or 'linked to luck'."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It was sorta clear once I had narrowed down enough to be able to look at it, so there isn't a very big penalty if you just come up with bunches of hypotheses and test them sequentially."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So. Somehow being able to notice luck or chances, or possible events?" Pause. "I don't think I'm precognitive but I'm not sure how to check other than just knowing or not."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Could try focusing on a single event, seeing if it'll occur."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hm. Okay that might work but I'm not sure what to focus on. Chance of rain the day of my party?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Might be a bit too far in the future? And too out of your control, maybe."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Chance I'll get a phone call before I go home?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Sounds good."

Permalink Mark Unread

She tries finding out what the chance is that she'll get a phone call before she goes home!

Permalink Mark Unread

Who knows.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Didn't get anything."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay so you can't get chance of stuff happening... which is weak evidence against that being what your magic's about... hm."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Could try… chance of something breaking in the next month, looking at the object? It might be a visual thing."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Might work, yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

So she tries looking for the chance a mug – one of the mugs in the drying up – breaks in the next month.

Permalink Mark Unread

That... pretty much depends on what people do, right? Like she could perhaps drop it, or bump against it, or maybe it's wetter than it looks and slips...

Permalink Mark Unread

Right, but how wet is it at the moment, how soon is someone gonna pick it up, how likely is it that it actually would slip or someone would bump against it or whatever?

Permalink Mark Unread

Who knows! It really depends on a lot of possible actions, all these things she could do to influence that, the possibilities are endless.

Permalink Mark Unread

… Probably not actually endless?

Permalink Mark Unread

Yup, endless, even if lots are only variations on the same theme.

Permalink Mark Unread

… That is a lot.

She frowns.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Something wrong?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"There are a huge number of ways that mug could break," she says, still looking at the mug. "That one." Point.

Permalink Mark Unread

She looks. She blinks. She looks at Ev again. "Yyyes? There. Indeed are."

Permalink Mark Unread

She frowns and looks at the mug a bit more.

Does anything… seem more likely, more likely than the others?

Permalink Mark Unread

What an odd question. Her actions are all as likely as she wants them to be.

Permalink Mark Unread

But then, if she decides to go and nudge it, there's not as high a likelihood it'll actually fall as if she were to pick it up and drop it. She might nudge it wrong.

Permalink Mark Unread

Eh not really, if she wants it to break it will. She knows just how to.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm assuming you care if I destroy one of your mugs."

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Sorta, why?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I– sorta, that mug. Just…"

She trails off, still frowning.

Permalink Mark Unread

Yep, several things she could do to break it, all there, dancing before her eyes.

(Sadde watches Evelyn's face in fascination.)

Permalink Mark Unread

"… So– is it just me, or."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Does seem kinda weird, yup."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Does sound it. Yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Care to share your conclusions with the class?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"She's acting funny," says Theo.

Permalink Mark Unread

"– The mug is fascinatingly destructible."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I got that you think so, but like, can you elaborate?" she asks Ev.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't know how to elaborate? I wouldn't usually look at a mug and think of all the ways I could destroy it and how easy it'd be, I wouldn't usually plot out in detail how to do it – it's fascinatingly destructible."

Permalink Mark Unread

"That's really vague!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It is really vague!" she agrees. "I don't know how to pin it down further! I literally just looked at it, thought about how to destroy it a bunch, and maybe I'm just in a weird mood today."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Let's not chalk anything up to coincidence, though. Try something else?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Chance… of the oven being turned on? In the next, like, hour?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Sounds reasonable."

Permalink Mark Unread

So she looks at the oven and focuses on that!

Permalink Mark Unread

There are also several ways of making the oven be turned on in the next hour.

Permalink Mark Unread

Gosh. She is utterly shocked.

Any novel ways? Ooh, is there a Rube Goldberg machine she can do for it, she's always wanted to have a really convoluted setup to achieve a trivial thing.

Permalink Mark Unread

...yeah, actually, she could build one if she wanted to. She could even build one with people as some of its elements, and they needn't even know this!

Permalink Mark Unread

… She wants to know more and like – okay slotting a vampire to go where she wants is going to be hard, any chance she can – without just asking mysteriously, asking mysteriously is cheating – get him to go turn the oven on—

"This is weird."

Permalink Mark Unread

"What is?"

(Yes. Yes she can.)

Permalink Mark Unread

"I have the weirdest compulsion to set up a Rube Goldberg machine."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… To turn the oven on?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, like – I was thinking of all the ways I could do it and then that came to mind and I had some ideas."

Permalink Mark Unread

"...so, what, you can think of, like, ways to accomplish a goal? Ooor... to make it more likely, perhaps?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah it seems like that might be the case."

Permalink Mark Unread

"That sounds like it could be useful."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Can you include your own magic in that?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"As one of the possible ways to influence something? You know, I'm not sure, I wasn't thinking of it just then. I'll try?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, maybe if this is a magic thing you can figure out new ways to apply your magic, or more efficient ones, or whatever."

Permalink Mark Unread

… So she looks at the oven and thinks about how to turn the oven on including ways she could try to do it with her magic.

Permalink Mark Unread

Well they were always possibilities but if she wants to constrain to that, she sure can! She could pull on this thread and bring to fore an urge of Theo's to bake—she could pull on that one and make the AC unit misbehave and make the room really cold—she could entwine a couple of those threads to something that would make the oven turn on on its own—

Permalink Mark Unread

… She didn't know Theo liked to bake. She sort of assumed he lived on pasta. Though he does have an oven so he presumably uses it for some things.

"Hazarding a guess that you like to bake?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Me? Uh, yeah, sometimes?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"This is weird. It's like I'm thinking of all these things on my own but they're – not quite what I'd usually think about, not quite directly mine?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"What do you mean?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's like a really weird inspiration for planning but it's more insistent than my usual planning urges are."

Permalink Mark Unread

"...is it really? Or is it possible you just never paid attention before?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It is entirely possible that I haven't paid attention before strongly enough but usually – it's." Pause. "I'm not sure how to phrase it? This is sort of like if I were going for 'stereotypical but powerful evil mastermind, plot all the ways I can possibly direct people into my system under my command', instead of – busybee-organization-ing?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"How do you usually go about busybee-organization-ing?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Slowly and more politely and quietly, in comparison?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Right, but, what does it feel like from the inside? ...you could try doing it now and see if it changed? Or if you notice something you hadn't before?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I usually… have some particular goal in mind… or some group of people where the goal is just for them to work together?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, there are the two of us here."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… It's usually a larger group, two people isn't all that challenging to manage."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well try to think about how you'd... I dunno, do something to a large group, then? Or think back on some other plan and... something?"

Permalink Mark Unread

She thinks about her party planned for next week and how she's going to manage people and keep things from getting out of hand… and realizes she mostly has a cached list of steps to take, people she watches out for, signs something's going to go badly, ways she can reduce this with convenient timing of food and so on…

If she tries replanning, ignoring what she already has cached?

Permalink Mark Unread

Well then she can obviously rethink those things—she has them cached for a reason, it's because it's useful that's the reason—but she knows all the ways she can act, or not act, and everything she needs to set up and organize to make this more likely than that, and if this happens then she can do that but if something else happens then she can do that other thing instead...

The possibilities are endless, really.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… It's happening with other things, too. I'm pretty sure it wasn't like this before, but I don't know when 'before' ended?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well, Theo became a vampire a few days ago, I've had my magic as long as I can remember—I wonder if I should try doing something to it now, maybe it's changed, too—but maybe you just never noticed it before. People have managed to fail to notice my skin was literally ruby red."

Permalink Mark Unread

She shrugs. "I don't know? Maybe it came in in bits, I just didn't notice, but I'm not sure I can actually find out now that it's happened."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I guess. Is this—thing—giving you full formed plans, or just, like, making them more obvious, or, what?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's like a lot of pieces of inspiration for what I could do and then I can think more about that idea and think of ways to implement it. Like, oven – if the weather were cooler and the heating were broken, it could be used, or if I asked Theo for some muffins to see if he can still do that while he presumably doesn't eat human food."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay... so steps to make things more likely sprout into your mind. Or making your goals happen, I'm honestly not sure there's a difference here and might just be anchored to my idea."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I think it's sort of – ways to make things more likely, ways I could implement my goals, ways I could plan for things to go the way I want? But they're all pretty similar."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And you can definitely include magic there."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Definitely include it as a goal, or a method, or…?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Method, I meant, but, uh, as a goal might be—nice? Making it more likely you'll figure out how to use it better, maybe?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It might help with plans to get used to using it, maybe."

Any chance?

Permalink Mark Unread

Chance of what?

Permalink Mark Unread

Any method she might be able to use to clearly improve her abilities to use her magic?

Permalink Mark Unread

That depends on what she means by 'magic,' here. To do the little cantrips she's been doing it suffices to be very relaxed, and pay lots of attention to what she's doing. Maybe hyperfocused, even, and she's vaguely heard of some drugs that could help, too.

Permalink Mark Unread

… She's not sure how much she wants to try drugs, really. But maybe, depending on the side effects.

Permalink Mark Unread

Practice paying attention to things that don't matter probably helps, too, and to the threads.

Permalink Mark Unread

She has heard things about, like, checking you can read and checking clocks make sense, as a way to help you lucid dream… Maybe that would help.

Permalink Mark Unread

It would!

Permalink Mark Unread

She will get to trying to make that a habit, then!

"Works on itself," she reports.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Did you get any new things?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… By just looking at it? Nope, but I know how to get better at using what I know I have?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Could you see if you can improve the sense itself, using it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"The planning-type sense? I was mainly looking at the small luck-changing thing instead."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm still confused about what you actually feel when you're using this sense thingy."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's not really a sense? It's– more just knowing how things fit together?" Pause. "Well I guess that could seem like a sense, sort of seeing how things will ripple forwards and what they'll affect?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hmmm... So can you do it the other way around, then? Like, instead of trying to figure out what you need to do in order to achieve some goal, figure out what happens when you do something?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… I think so? That's sort of how it was going, sort of back-and-forth, but I started with a goal not an action, so I haven't actually tried it." Pause. "How's screaming, I could see what happens if I scream?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Sure. As long as you, like, maybe don't."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't plan on screaming, no, but I might be able to see what'd happen anyway? Or if that doesn't work I could try something a little less – dramatic."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Eh, go ahead."

Permalink Mark Unread

She tries looking at what happens if she screams! Presumably not as much jumping from Sadde and Theo now they know it's a possible idea.

Permalink Mark Unread

Not from Theo, yes from Sadde. It is quite likely she will scowl at Ev if Ev screams. And depending on how she screams and when she could, say, cause that one mug to break.

Permalink Mark Unread

Huh.

"I might be – might have been – able to get you to break that mug, if I screamed in a particular way. So yep, it works."

Permalink Mark Unread

"This is much cooler than it looked at first."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It does seem to be! Less just small boring telekinesis."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Do you guys have any more ideas for stuff you could test?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"So you said you only tried the luck-changing thing, how about you try applying the planning power to itself?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"To… use it more effectively? Or to generate ideas of what I could look at for maximum interest or something?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Both?"

Permalink Mark Unread

She has a look at using it more effectively first!

Permalink Mark Unread

It's... much harder to focus on the sense like this.

Permalink Mark Unread

… She could try looking at it kinda sideways, see if there are things she could do to make herself more able to focus on it?

Permalink Mark Unread

Using it more effectively is... hard. She has to learn to follow the threads, and what it means to pull on them.

Permalink Mark Unread

… That sounds like it's practice and maybe drugs as a solution. Again.

Permalink Mark Unread

Not quite, no, just practice (and maybe drugs) won't get her to pay attention to the right things.

Permalink Mark Unread

… She's not really sure what would, so how about some routes she could take, things she could do that might be of interest to her?

Permalink Mark Unread

The only way for her to pay attention to the right things is paying attention to these things here that are entirely ordinary and normal and not worthy of notice at all.

Permalink Mark Unread

So, practice at paying attention to the less important things. Okay, she needs to take up meditation and mindfulness or whatever, sounds like fun.

Are there any current things she could do in her situation she'd probably find beneficial? Or is that too broad a search…?

Permalink Mark Unread

No, not the less important things, these less important things. There's a specific kind of less important thing she needs to pay attention to.

It's a bit broad, yes.

Permalink Mark Unread

… She'll try to pay attention to the broad class of less important things that she needs to pay attention to, trying to keep the class of things in mind.

"There are – specific unimportant things I need to pay attention to, to be better at this?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"What things?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"There are…" Pause. "Threaaads? There are sort of threads. Places."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Um?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't have much information on this. There are threads. Why do I not have much information."

She frowns.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Could be another drawback, part of the – making you forget what you're doing but less so?"

Permalink Mark Unread

She looks at one of the threads and tries discerning more detail, still frowning.

Permalink Mark Unread

It is about as uninteresting as anything could be.

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Yeah, just threads," she says.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… What color are they?"

Permalink Mark Unread

She shrugs. "Does it matter?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay but where are they, what do they do, what are they for?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Just – around, between things." She shrugs. "Apparently I'm supposed to pay attention to them but it seems like it's just like a lucid dreaming thing, pay attention to the unimportant." She pauses and frowns. "Except not."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay but what do they do? You never mentioned any threads before."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Just – I'm confused, hold on a second."

She specifically wondered if this was just like the lucid dreaming thing again, general mindfulness, and the response was no and that the specific threads are what she should pay attention to, which should only be if they're important or as a general technique, but there shouldn't be the exclusion of other things if it's just a general technique—

"Why are we doing this again? Apparently drugs will help some, I think ADHD medicine."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Weeee are doing this to get you better at using your magic sense," she sighs.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean yes, but drugs will help some with that." Pause. "Not that I really want to use drugs, but still?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"This magic is kinda annoying."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It is. The threads, Ev?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Continue to be boring and I can, like, stare at them when I'm bored someday?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Wwwhhhhhy not today?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Because we could do less boring things to try to improve my ability, or just set other things in motion?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"But didn't your magic thing tell you that was the thing to do to improve it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, but like, it wasn't insistent and there are other things we can probably do too – like, if I spend a bit longer finding other things to do?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I guess," she says dubiously.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Do you think I should stare at the boring threads some more?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Kinda? This system has pretty consistently made interesting things seem boring."

Permalink Mark Unread

"What about them is boring? Are they dull, do they do nothing, or what?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"They're not really, like, actual threads."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Wouldn't that make them more interesting? Actual threads are normal and mundane, threads-that-are-not-really-actual-threads are interesting."

Permalink Mark Unread

"But, like – they're still boring." Pause. "But I think you have a point."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, they're probably supernaturally boring, ergo interesting."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Supernaturally seemingly boring, uh, would be weird? But still think you have a point. So should I, like, do something here? I'm really lacking ideas for the boring."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You could just look at them. Try to keep watch on them, paying attention to them, like you said would help."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Right," she agrees.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Maybe we could chant again."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't know that I'd forget about them – I mean, I haven't yet – it's just that they're really boring. Sort of."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Then we chant to remind you that they are not in fact boring."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… I'm not sure that's gonna help. Like, I can look at them while they're boring, it's just going to be boring, and I doubt that'll be solved by having chanting." Shrug.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Alright, no chanting, then, I guess."

Permalink Mark Unread

So Evelyn goes and looks at the boring threads that probably shouldn't be so boring.

Permalink Mark Unread

They continue to be boring.

Permalink Mark Unread

What color are they. Or do they not have color. Do they have anything mappable to a sense or are they just boringly there.

(Sigh.)

Permalink Mark Unread

They do not have a color. They're just... boringly there.

Permalink Mark Unread

Are they between less boring things she can possibly stare at? She can probably get away with that for a bit.

Permalink Mark Unread

Actually, yeah! They're connecting... lots of things to lots of other things. In different ways and—intensities?

Permalink Mark Unread

… Does there seem to be anything interesting about the ways and intensities? Or, in fact, anything that can draw her away from how boring this all is? Or actually just anything that seems like it could be neat in another context even if it isn't, here?

Permalink Mark Unread

Physically closer things have stronger intensities, threads connecting humans to things are particularly thick but things to humans are particularly thin, Theo's threads extend a fair distance farther than hers or Sadde's.

Permalink Mark Unread

"They're attached to people and things and the vampire has thick threads and they're kinda still being really boring."

Permalink Mark Unread

"What do they look like?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Shrug. "They are just sort of there other than the thickness."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Can you do anything to them?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I think I might have been poking at them earlier," she shrugs. "What should I try, stretching one or something?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, I guess?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Can she touch the thread in any way. Or like, mentally poke it.

Permalink Mark Unread

It feels very pokeable, yes. Possibly even with her hand.

Permalink Mark Unread

She tries poking it with her hand. One of the ones pointing out from Theo at some inanimate object.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo feels an urge to open that cabinet (said inanimate object).

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo goes over to it and opens it! Then pauses and fetches out a plate.

Permalink Mark Unread

Sadde raises an eyebrow.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Any particular reason you just got a plate out?" asks Evelyn.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Fetching some chips. In case anyone was peckish."

Permalink Mark Unread

Sadde shrugs and looks at Ev again.

Permalink Mark Unread

Can she poke the thread between Theo and the bowl from afar, because like, if she can she's totally gonna.

Permalink Mark Unread

Bit harder? But yeah.

"Got anything?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo looks down at the bowl, momentarily.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Maybe? I can poke them."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"And Theo went to get a bowl and then looked at it when I poked at the cupboard and at the bowl. Between him and them. So."

Permalink Mark Unread

Pause. "Seriously?"

Permalink Mark Unread

She shrugs.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oooh that's cool, your magic's silly these threads aren't boring."

Permalink Mark Unread

"They are extremely boring to look at."

Permalink Mark Unread

"But actually probably rather useful to use."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. What should I try next, something between you two?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"That seems potentially interesting."

Permalink Mark Unread

Any neat thread she can poke between them? Are there several of them, she'll poke whichever looks least boring.

Permalink Mark Unread

Several of them, yes, with varying degrees of boringness.

Permalink Mark Unread

Least boring one she can identify within a couple of seconds! She pokes at that.

Permalink Mark Unread

Sadde glances at Theo, then at her again.

"—was that you?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Quite possibly. Or maybe it was just a coincidence."

She pokes it again.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Was definitely you," she declares.

Permalink Mark Unread

"That is – vaguely neat I guess? Okay so the threads can do non-boring things, yay threads, but they're still horribly boring."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It feels almost like you contradicted yourself there."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I have no idea what you even mean by them being boring."

Permalink Mark Unread

"They are – somehow extremely uninteresting to look at or talk about or want to talk about or do anything with?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"What does that translate to in practice, though. Like, watching paint dry is boring, but I can still do it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean I can still do this too, unless it gets more extreme – it just means, uh, I don't think I'm gonna go look at a situation and be like… 'Know what'd be a thrilling solution to this? It'd be poking the threads'."

Permalink Mark Unread

"But if we were like that instead and just asked you to do it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, yeah, and I might think of it on my own anyway, I just – I dunno, wouldn't think of it straight away maybe?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"But that also sounds weird, like, if you had a test tomorrow you'd study for it even if it's boring and there are less boring ways of acing it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"But if the less boring ways have pretty good chances of making me ace it without undesirable consequences I'd probably rather those?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well sure, but maybe there aren't, and you can also use this to figure things out?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, yeah, I'm still – probably – going to use it for things."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Can you tell what a thread does before touching it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I can tell what things they're between but I haven't guessed what it'll do yet."

She tries looking at some threads in case they care to give her information after being boring.

Permalink Mark Unread

There is no "after" they are always boring.

Permalink Mark Unread

Can they stop that? Is there a thread clearly labeled 'makes threads boring to Evelyn', can she stop that thread from being so annoying, that'd be cool.

Permalink Mark Unread

Doesn't look like it.

Permalink Mark Unread

Okay well can they just give her information while being boring? She's not really sure how that'd work, but still…

Permalink Mark Unread

Mm there's definitely a difference between the different threads, even those connecting the same things. Something beyond how boring or thick they are, almost a flavor. The flavor doesn't actually explain itself, though.

(And 'threads' is inaccurate anyway, they're laid out in many more than just  one dimension each and several of them connect more than just two things.)

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's really annoying they're so boring," she comments.

Permalink Mark Unread

"—you know, this is kinda making me think that I might have more control over my shapeshifting than I think."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It might be messing with your head, yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I have no idea how to even, I dunno, start going about this. I've had it since I was one."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Does it feel like anything when you shift?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Nnnnnot exactly? It's more an absence of feeling—like it's totally normal and expected that I should look like this and not something else and it doesn't even make sense to imagine otherwise?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Even when you change color for emotions?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yep."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Huh. Pretty sure I don't usually feel other colors."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't feel other colors, that's the point, it doesn't really feel like anything."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ah," he responds. "But looking male or female is presumably different?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Moooore or less? I mean, there is a sense in which some days I'm a boy or a girl, so yeah, kinda, but it's like—I feel like a girl, I look like a girl, it takes a bit for me to notice yesterday I didn't."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… I mean I'm pretty sure I feel as I should, but I feel different from before I was a vampire."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Your power isn't about shapeshifting, though, and you feel like people are snacks."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, but it doesn't seem like something to remark on, necessarily, that you feel like– you."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, I sometimes don't feel like me? But usually that's not a physical thing."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's not that I feel like me, it's that I—don't feel dysphoric. Like, I don't feel like it's weird at all to look like whatever I look, no matter how weird it should be to one day wake up a different biological sex."

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Huh, okay. Uh. I'm not sure how you would go straight from that to doing something with it, no."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well the obvious thing to try is figuring out whether I can purposefully feel like whatever."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Which sounds hard to do unless it gives you some sort of mechanism? Or we resort to something complicated like drugs?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Drugs... might work but I'm not sure it's the right frame of mind. I could see something like meditation helping, here, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn gets her phone out and taps a few times and shows Sadde the phone. "The internet is so convenient."

The phone is on a page that explains some meditation techniques.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't think I'm gonna learn to meditate meaningfully today, and besides, it's gonna be really boring."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Probably not as boring as staring at threads, but yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I dunno, I've never been one to really sit still and not do anything."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I've never been one to stare at bizarre non-objects somehow in but not clouding my vision, but here we are."

Permalink Mark Unread

"No I just mean this would be really really—" Pause. Frown.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Boring?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yes."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Has anything seemed supremely boring to you, Theo?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Not that I know of? Things have been made – very unimportant, like I try to ignore them by default?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Is that related to magic stuff directly?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's – personhood, I sort of default to ignoring it if I'm hungry, so sort of."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Feels like it's the last thing I should pay attention to, like pretty much anything else is more relevant or noteworthy or should be higher priority."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… The threads are kinda like that too, so, this is a little bit of a pattern."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I should heed my own advice and try doing the meditation thing, probably. But, maybe not now, because it will likely take a long time and it's probably best if I do it when I'm not around other people with other things to do."

Permalink Mark Unread

"What are we gonna do in the meantime? I don't think I've heard much about the intricacies of vampirism – what's it like?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Pause. "Not quite how I expected it to be."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Did you have expectations about it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"If you had said to me 'you are gonna become a vampire, what do you think it'll be like' I wouldn't have said 'I will do as people say if they have photos of me'."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well, but you'd probably not have said much beyond 'crave blood, dislike sunlight' either."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, probably not."

Permalink Mark Unread

"He has super enhanced senses, speed, agility, strength, an eidetic memory, blood thing, sun thing, photo thing, am I missing anything?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Rehealing that hasn't been thoroughly tested but appears to work on flames, sharp objects and blunt impact trauma; memory is not-literally eidetic but yeah that's close; there's also the – biting thing – and blue eyes, they weren't so blue before; and possibly don't need to breathe, mostly but not totally tested? Plus I don't need to sleep as much."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Is it just me or does that sound tempting?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It sounds very tempting, yes, except for the biteyness."

Permalink Mark Unread

"The ignoring people are people thing sounds hard – hard to imagine and probably hard to get around – and I quite like the sunlight, but yeah. Tempting."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We don't know how to turn people yet, anyway."

Permalink Mark Unread

Pause. "I mean, my power might work to help with that."

Permalink Mark Unread

...well it doesn't seem like Sadde has anything to say to that. It's a pretty good idea.

Permalink Mark Unread

"So, who should I aim to turn? Or should I just plan to turn someone and hope it works with that – yeah it might work with that."

She tries: turning someone into a vampire! How can she do this?

Permalink Mark Unread

Do...... what, exactly? What does 'turning' consist of?

Permalink Mark Unread

Becoming a vampire from a human by some… method?

Permalink Mark Unread

She's getting nothing. Naturally or supernaturally.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Doesn't seem to work."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Might be the magics have limitations on how they interact, might be turning is impossible other than me?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Or maybe it's just that she doesn't know how to even begin doing it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"What if we suggest, like, me biting someone while trying to turn them, or them drinking my blood, or them dying with my blood in their system…?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Seems worth a try?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn tries looking for some sort of solution to turning someone into a vampire using one of those methods.

Permalink Mark Unread

She might as well be looking for some sort of solution to turning a bwarp into a merf.

Permalink Mark Unread

She… is not in fact looking for that. This is a human, this is a vampire, she draws a metaphorical arrow and is trying to resolve the question-mark.

Permalink Mark Unread

Yes, sure, she can also do the same thing for a pickle jar and a refrigerator.

Permalink Mark Unread

… And gets no response, okay.

"Doesn't seem like it's working."

Permalink Mark Unread

"How do we distinguish between the hypotheses?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"See if I can get anything for you and shapeshifting? – Doesn't necessarily distinguish. See about something like getting myself the ability to fly?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"What do each of those hypotheses say about this idea?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Pause. "I don't recall the actual wording of the hypotheses."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It was just that there might be limitations on how the magics interact, or that turning is impossible, or that you need enough information to know how to start doing it," says Theo, helpfully. "Trying to find out how to fly with your power, if you mean magically, is probably not going to work as I'd expect flight to be another power. It probably works fine if it's just that turning is impossible, and it probably fails if you need enough information to know how to start, unless 'messing with chance' is enough to get you to fly."

Permalink Mark Unread

"She did make objects fly..."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Maybe that counts? I was thinking of that more as brief levitation, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I guess. Anyway, if she tries it and fails we get absolutely no information—it could fail even if turning is impossible, or if she needs more info, or if it's another problem—but if she succeeds it could still be that there's another power that does flight but she found some other way—unless she finds a way to get it—or that she has more information about flight than turning into a vamp."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So it doesn't really conclusively do anything either way," he says. "You could try looking for more magic, which would also not be conclusive but would hint at things."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Or we could try other plans involving magic that she does know about, or plans not involving magic she couldn't conceive."

Permalink Mark Unread

"… Like a plan for me to go heal more people, d'you think that'd count?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"That certainly involves your magic and I think she'd be able to normally come up with one yeah?"

Permalink Mark Unread

So she tries that!

Permalink Mark Unread

She could probably just ask him.

Permalink Mark Unread

What about if she wants to make a plan to present to him, for some reason!

Permalink Mark Unread

A plan of what?

Permalink Mark Unread

A plan for him to go heal people! Like, with whatever mystery healing he does – was it his blood? She thinks he might have said that, but she was mostly paying attention to 'what why since when do vampires what' not the specifics, so she might have that wrong.

Permalink Mark Unread

Well, pretty much depends on the details of the goal: how many people she wants to heal and in how much time, as well as other constraints. She could tell him to go to this place at this time, she could go with him, guarantee he's giving these people blood...

Permalink Mark Unread

Well she'd actually like to try to coordinate as many people as possible to be healed on the coming Saturday. She can optionally go with him but if she'd be better served doing something else here that's also doable.

Permalink Mark Unread

As many people as possible? Well, she could get a lot of his blood and dump it into several water systems, as well as get some more animal blood for Theo to replenish his own...

Permalink Mark Unread

What sort of side effects might there be from this?

Permalink Mark Unread

Her being arrested, people being suspicious, people learning about vampires, widespread panic...

Permalink Mark Unread

Clear ways to decrease this panic and such? Or possibly another less drastic plan that appears to result in no really bad side effects against her but still gets quite a few people, how about that?

Permalink Mark Unread

She's gonna have to settle on specific compromises if she wants to plan for them.

Permalink Mark Unread

Okay so she'd rather not on the panic, and if she gets arrested she is okay with that so long as she gets released just fine from it, and if people are suspicious… what are they suspicious of? She doesn't care about people finding out about vampires or magic, but she'd care if they were suspicious this was some evil plot and correspondingly wanted to start witch hunts.

Permalink Mark Unread

Her head is filled with a dizzying flurry of information that completely breaks her concentration.

Permalink Mark Unread

"— Well it seems like it works for that unless 'tries to confuse me with information overload' is an equivalent failure to 'no response'."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay... so I guess we can rule out bad interactions with magic?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Probably. At least for now. … I could try focusing on the results of attempting different turning methods, see how black-boxed it is for me to get information about turning?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I guess? Sounds as useful as any other plan."

Permalink Mark Unread

What if Theo bites someone with intent, what happens if he does that to… uh, Matt, let's go with Matt. She can probably get Matt's cooperation here.

Permalink Mark Unread

Presumably Matt will lose some blood?

Permalink Mark Unread

… And can she see, magically, other results from this? Or is she gonna have to just do guesswork.

Permalink Mark Unread

She can't really magically derive consequences of actions, it's the other way around. Unless she looks at the threads.

Permalink Mark Unread

Sigh.

Are there any threads that look not-very-boring that might be related to Theo and Matt and biting or, like, something. She doubts it, but still.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Not-very-boring"? No.

Permalink Mark Unread

Sigh.

"I tried 'biting with intent' and got 'victim loses blood, poor victim'. Possibly non-magically derived."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Did you try building a plan or?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I suggested Theo bite Matt – with intent – and was wondering what'd happen, more."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh. That seems like it doesn't work, I guess."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It didn't work all by itself, no, but I might be able to get something out of the threads eventually."

Sigh.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. Guess your power treats each direction of the causality web pretty differently, huh?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Seems it," she agrees. "At least we worked out it's pretty much causality-related with a side of making unlikely things happen by– magic."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Not sure I'd call that a 'side,' seems to be just the main thing."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, by direct application of magic I can levitate things – I was thinking the planning thing was probably the main thing, since direct applications for small things is probably less helpful."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ah. Yeah, I guess."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Do you get different results if you try someone dying after being injected with blood, or ingesting it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"– I'm not sure I'll get anything useful, like I say it didn't give much last time, but I'll try?"

So she does.

Permalink Mark Unread

They'd probably die, she guesses? There's a possibility they might be turned, some mythology has that, who knows.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Not getting anything magical on this, nope."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, you'll probably need the threads or to just know what causes what."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Which, again, is boring." Sigh.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mmhm." Pause. "Any ideas for other experiments to run?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I think it's just gonna be a boring rainy day when I poke at threads, basically."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Or you could do that on your own when you get home because no matter how boring they are they're probably super useful. I'm gonna try to do the meditation thing when I get home."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, yeah, that's what I meant – rainy day in the future."

Permalink Mark Unread

"No what I meant is you should do it today."

Permalink Mark Unread

Pause. "I guess that probably makes sense."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yes, I make a habit of making sense."

Permalink Mark Unread

"That sounds like a hard habit to keep around magic."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Fortunately I didn't have the habit before I turned!" jokes Theo. (Then he sighs.)

Permalink Mark Unread

She giggles. "Well. I think, ah—we're all out of things to try with your power, then."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. Poking at the threads, plus seeing what sorts of things I can do before forgetting I'm doing them with the – direct thing. – I'll see you guys sometime soon, then?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. Write down whatever you're doing so you won't forget."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo shows her to the door.

Permalink Mark Unread

She waves, and then off she goes.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I think I ought to probably go, too? And we meet again tonight for saving lives?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"And I'll try poking at my brain to see if there's something else boring that I'm overlooking?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I guess? Good luck with that."

Permalink Mark Unread

"See you later."

Permalink Mark Unread

Off she goes.

Permalink Mark Unread

Later, Theo pulls up at Sadde's house in his car to pick her up for nighttime activities! By which is meant vampire-related healing, not anything else, of course.

Permalink Mark Unread

Of course. Because he is quite gay and she is a girl today so she's not even pining a little bit.

Permalink Mark Unread

Yes, that.

So they go to some more hospitals! A new one a bit further away – Sadde can nap in the car if she's tired or something, Theo should be fine to do this – and then also back to one of the larger ones nearer-by.

Permalink Mark Unread

She naps, and people are saved.

Permalink Mark Unread

And the night passes by and Sadde is dropped back home.

Permalink Mark Unread

She decides to spend the next day trying to do the meditation thing.

Permalink Mark Unread

Evelyn spends a while trying to motivate herself to stare at threads and realizing they are Super Boring and trying to do it anyway.

Permalink Mark Unread

They are super boring! But the boringness loses some of its strength when she knows it's magically induced.

Permalink Mark Unread

Which is convenient! She tries to deduce things about how things are linked together, what happens if she, for example, pokes the threads between some non-fragile inanimate objects, things like that…

Permalink Mark Unread

Most objects don't have very strong threads between them, and pulling on them is... distracting. As in, forget-what-she's-doing distracting.

Permalink Mark Unread

She's gonna try pulling the larger ones, if she can find any between inanimate objects, and if not she puts a reminder (and an alarm for a minute away) on her phone to remind herself what she's doing.

Permalink Mark Unread

She cannot find any large ones between inanimate objects. Plenty between herself and inanimate objects, though.

Permalink Mark Unread

Can she poke one side of the thread or is it just the whole thread is pokeable? Because she wants to poke the middle, the side at her, and the side at the object.

(With notes on what she's doing so she doesn't forget if she goes and picks an object up.)

Permalink Mark Unread

Just the whole thread is pokeable, yes, she cannot pick a side to poke.

Permalink Mark Unread

She'll just poke it wherever along it, then.

Permalink Mark Unread

She feels an urge to touch the object.

Permalink Mark Unread

Well clearly she touches the object and then she pauses and puts the object back.

Same with another object, if she pokes the thread between her and it?

Permalink Mark Unread

The thread she touches makes her want to lick the object.

Permalink Mark Unread

She… does not get quite as far towards completing the action, this time. Light touches.

A different thread, to this same object?

Permalink Mark Unread

Her arm twitches towards the object.

Permalink Mark Unread

And is there any noticeably different pattern, or shade, or something synesthetic, to the threads, such that she might be able to guess what does what?

(So boring. Not that boring. So very not-that-very-actually-boring.)

Permalink Mark Unread

Yes, actually. There are differences between the threads that she can detect before touching them.

Permalink Mark Unread

Is there a nice synesthetic map so she can actually get to know what these are or is it a vague intuition or, like, what.

Permalink Mark Unread

None of the above. There is a difference but she has zero intuition about it.

Permalink Mark Unread

Can she tell if two lines have the same difference from another line, or if they're different, like, magnitudes of difference…?

Permalink Mark Unread

Yeah, she can compare them pretty finely and tell when two threads are identical or similar or whatever.

And given that they're not really threads and not really unidimensional, she can actually vary some between them, somewhat continuously.

Permalink Mark Unread

So she can poke different… parts… of the object with the threads, okay, that seems weird.

What about on her end, can she move around slightly where on her she affects? Or is this going back to the other – connections – that make her want to lick things, instead?

Permalink Mark Unread

Other connections, yes.

More or less. This is really just a metaphor and it doesn't map correctly to the thing, it's all just one great big fuzzy field but threads is easier to grasp without going insane.

Permalink Mark Unread

Well she'll poke for the clicky bit on the end of a pen, then.

Permalink Mark Unread

She feels appropriately motivated to press it.

Permalink Mark Unread

So she– almost does! Then stops and tries poking-or-connectioning-or-whatever the nib instead.

Permalink Mark Unread

Same dealio.

Permalink Mark Unread

Can she somehow poke the pen to herself instead?

Permalink Mark Unread

Much harder.

Permalink Mark Unread

 

… Fortunately she was being careful, and about a minute later she does in fact (by way of phone alarm) recall that she was testing things.

She keeps testing things, for a while, before she gets bored again and wanders off for food.

Permalink Mark Unread

That evening, Sadde's waiting for Theo to pick him up again.

Permalink Mark Unread

And Theo does!

… And looks at Sadde as he gets in, just a little.

Permalink Mark Unread

Which is only to be expected, since he's. You know. Getting into Theo's car.

"Willow said she'd pass, today, seeing all those sick people was getting to her. Any word from Matt?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Of course it's only to be expected.

"Doing a thing with his parents. Movie night or something."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh. And Ev? She coming?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Not tonight. I think tomorrow, though."

Theo looks at Sadde again! It was probably quite a long look, for a vampire, seeing as upgraded perception or whatever, but overall not that long.

Permalink Mark Unread

Who is definitely not paying attention to that, no, sir.

"You know, if you'd asked me how I'd feel about saving several lives a day during the summer two weeks ago I'd have expected it'd be... grander. Somehow."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Maybe we need, like, a tally." Pause. "That you can see."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm not sure that will help. Might just end up turning them all into numbers."

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo shrugs. "Maybe we should go find some of them, later, I find out how they're getting on or something. Might be a bit creepy."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yes, bit creepy."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Then I don't have to do it, do I."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Nope, probably not. My feelings are superfluous anyway."

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo shrugs. "Not if it'd make you less likely to come along, but I guess I can do it myself anyway."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You could, I guess. You haven't been—uncontrolled, lately, but I'm not sure how much of that is one of us just being around all swaying."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And then if I do go uncontrolled it's probably going to be awful and there's no guarantee I'll snap out of it for a while…"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Pretty much, yes."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So it's probably. Still a good idea for you to stay."

Smile.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. We should maybe see whether Ev can't get her power to come up with a plan that doesn't overwhelm her mind, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Could invite her 'round for an hour or a few before we go, tomorrow, have her brainstorm?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, probably a good idea."

Permalink Mark Unread

"– So I've been thinking."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Good habit, that."

Permalink Mark Unread

He smirks. "Once in a while, yeah."

Pause. "So anyway. I'm less conflicted about a thing."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mmhm?" he asks, looking out the window.

Permalink Mark Unread

"You."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mmhm?" he asks again, this time looking at Theo.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I was being kinda ridiculous."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mmhm?" he repeats, encouragingly.

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"Mmhm."

Permalink Mark Unread

"That was me encouraging you to go on."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And so I'm probably up for casual sex and biting."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

 

 

"Terrible timing, you know."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Because we're going to heal people?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yes."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Awkward, that."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yes. So why, exactly, did you choose this moment...?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Thought you'd want to know sooner rather than later."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You could've phoned me about it earlier, so soonest is probably not your criterion, here!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Soonest in person?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Pfah."

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo smirks a little.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh shut up."

Permalink Mark Unread

He raises an eyebrow (still smirking).

Permalink Mark Unread

He shuffles uncomfortably and looks out the window again.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Something on your mind?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yes."

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo waits.

Permalink Mark Unread

He'll keep waiting.

Permalink Mark Unread

Tap tap on the steering wheel, then.

Tap tap.

Tap.

Permalink Mark Unread

Mmhm sure tap ahead.

Permalink Mark Unread

He does.

They might pass quite some time like this.

Permalink Mark Unread

Yep.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Don't care to share?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"What, can't you guess with your super vampire senses?" he asks, looking at Theo with a raised eyebrow.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… I'm afraid we're en route to a hospital right now, so uh." He snorts a bit. "I think that's a no-can't-really right now."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh no that wasn't what I was thinking of at all. But what a dirty mind you have, huh?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm afraid I have no idea what you're talking about."

Permalink Mark Unread

He snorts. "Of course."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Anyway, if that wasn't on your mind…?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hmm?"

He's just hellbent on making this hard, isn't he?

Permalink Mark Unread

"What was?"

Apparently he is, yes.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, you know. This and that."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Uh-huh."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yep."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Sounds like fun."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Uh huh."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You sound just so thrilled to be here today."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I have an uncomfortable boner and I'm trying to make you just as uncomfortable."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Aww."

Permalink Mark Unread

"No, not 'aww,' you should be feeling guilty about it!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh," responds Theo. "I'll tell my feelings to get right on that, then."

Permalink Mark Unread

He punches Theo's arm.

Permalink Mark Unread

Who snorts. "You seriously – just punched me because – oh my god, I thought I was supposed to be the immature one."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You're a vampire, you can take it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yes but still."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Deal with it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You deal with it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You were the one punched."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You're the one with a boner. Plus you missed an opportunity for a joke."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And what, pray tell, was the joke?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well, see," he says, "I told you to deal with it."

Permalink Mark Unread

(Click here to skip the explicit content.)

He facepalms. "Really? Alright, then," he says, and starts unzipping his pants.

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Dude, it was a joke."

Permalink Mark Unread

He grins and zips back up.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo rolls his eyes. "Do you jerk off often, in cars, then?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't ride cars very often," he shrugs.

Permalink Mark Unread

"… So is that a yes or a no?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well by definition it's a no, isn't it? If I don't ride cars often I can't very well jerk off in them often."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Proportionally to when you ride in cars it might be you do it a lot."

Permalink Mark Unread

He snorts. "I don't think I've ever done it, no."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Nor me!" says Theo. "But then my memory was pretty poor as a human, maybe I'm forgetting something."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yes, who knows, maybe you did it all the time."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Wouldn't you like that."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't actually care whether you did it often, merely whether you do it around me."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Little busy right now, I'm afraid."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh? I'd've thought your vampire senses would let you multitask."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I expect I could."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So the business objection doth not apply."

Permalink Mark Unread

"But that'd mean I had to multitask, and I'm not sure it's legal to jerk off while driving, y'see."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Pretty certain there isn't, like, a law about it. But of course," he starts innocently, "I could help."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well, public indecency probably covers it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Except there's no one around, and even if there were it's not like it's super noticeable unless you're looking for it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"No, no, I was just talking about laws that probably prohibit it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ah, so I see."

Permalink Mark Unread

"To be fair you probably could help."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yep, that's why I suggested it."

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo looks around a little and then shrugs.

Permalink Mark Unread

...well, then. He gingerly reaches over to unzip Theo's pants...

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo makes no move to stop him.

He raises an eyebrow, though.

Permalink Mark Unread

Well that's kinda hot isn't it. He reaches inside and tries to... well, reveal him, for lack of a better word.

Permalink Mark Unread

He is revealable! It seems like being a vampire has not changed him too dramatically from what humans look like, gosh, how wonderful.

Permalink Mark Unread

He wasn't particularly expecting it to have changed.

His hand starts moving.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo looks down and then at the road.

"… I've gotta say I wasn't expecting this."

Permalink Mark Unread

"What were you expecting when you told me that?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Not to be jerked off in a car!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"You picked the time and place to say that, and I don't see you objecting!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm not in fact objecting!" agrees Theo.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Would you object if I helped myself, too?" he asks, unzipping his own pants again with his right hand.

Permalink Mark Unread

Theo snorts. "Feel free."

Permalink Mark Unread

He does.

Permalink Mark Unread

"We're probably pretty close."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Does that mean I should stop or accelerate?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Probably stop." He looks around a bit. "I don't think I have anything around to clean up with."

Permalink Mark Unread

Sadde looks at him for a second. "How sure are you of this?" he asks, and before Theo can answer, unbuckles his seat belt and... well, goes down.

Permalink Mark Unread

"– Apparently," says Theo, pausing as Sadde goes down, "not sure enough."

Permalink Mark Unread

Sadde's mouth is too full to form a reply.

Permalink Mark Unread

Gosh oh no whatever will Theo do.

… Sadde is actually rather good at this.

Permalink Mark Unread

Yes. Yes he is. He has lots of experience plus a mouth and two hands.

Permalink Mark Unread

It won't take all that long, in that case. Which is fortunate, since, nearby.

Permalink Mark Unread

Not long indeed.

Permalink Mark Unread

 

And in fact it doesn't take that long. Theo manages to keep the vehicle going steady just fine, though.

Permalink Mark Unread

Sadde zips Theo and himself back up (he's not done, because he'd actually have no way to clean himself up) and straightens up, licking his lips like the cat who got the cream.

Permalink Mark Unread

Rather.

It doesn't take long before they're there – Theo smirks at Sadde a bit along the way – and then it's time to save some lives.

Permalink Mark Unread

It is!

The hospital has: sick people.

Permalink Mark Unread

Sick people get healed, provided they have the right types of injuries or illnesses that Sadde and Theo are pretty sure his blood will help with…

Permalink Mark Unread

One of them is pretty close to death. And is awake.

Permalink Mark Unread

Okay well he goes and consults with Sadde and – "Should I just feed them anyway, be careful and hope they don't see me?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"...maybe you should let them."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And, just, let the rumors grow a bit, have someone with a better description to give to the media? I'm not sure if we're still prioritizing keeping things quiet."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, that's the point, no need keep quiet I think."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod.

Back to the room and how struggling are they, do they seem likely to call out if he waits a moment, are they going to be able to speak very loudly—

Permalink Mark Unread

Too many tubes.

Permalink Mark Unread

Oh that's such a shame – well it sort of is because suffering but it's more convenient for Theo's purposes.

He bites his hand and moves over to the person and feeds them some blood.

Permalink Mark Unread

His eyes widen but he can't really do much except his heart rate picks up and his health monitors start beeping—

Permalink Mark Unread

And Theo takes them in briefly to make sure it's not anything bad like sudden onset of death

Permalink Mark Unread

Nope, more like sudden onset of what the fuck is this dude doing here.

Permalink Mark Unread

Cool.

Theo's gone, then.

Permalink Mark Unread

And Sadde's waiting.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Went fine."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Cool. We really should start using Ev for this."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, it's probably a good idea. I wonder how remotely she can work."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Text her and file under things to test."

Permalink Mark Unread

He does so, and then off they presumably go!