Graywards join the hug. Aaron might get Alexei to join as well.

Alex will half-heartedly attempt to stay out of it, but allows himself to be pulled in after a moment. 

Group hug!!! 

Group hug!

...Okay that's enough of that. He clears his throat, trying to disentangle himself. "So, how long should it take us to get to the point where we can attune ourselves to the vault?"

(Jamie will graciously allow him to leave, but he's staying, so there.)

One or two weeks? Depending on how much they want to dedicate themselves to it. They can attune themselves to the vault by that timeline and maybe draw a gift from it if they are so inclined.

They should make their way back before the flight wears off.

Oh right! They can fly back then!

(Draw a gift? What does that mean, exactly?)

The vault can store gifts if you give them up, and it's pretty unique in its ability to do so. Most of their gifts are taken from the vault, actually. Downside that the monsters draw gifts from that pool. Topher choose a memory manipulation power for himself because he didn't want to have it used against them.

Up, up and away!

Um! Well, that's horrifying. He's glad Topher has it rather than leaving it for the monsters, though! (Alex agrees with both sentiments.)

Only one at a time? Do they take up one of the spots where they'd otherwise have awakened their own gift, or are they in addition?

Multiple gifts at a time, but it takes the place. They would need to put whatever gift was in that lifeforce aspect slot (if any) and then draw a new one.

That sounds... They must be outrageously versatile compared to anyone else. 

They are! It even lets them have access to the higher Health and Youth gifts that people usually take years to acquire if they acquire at all. It's great.

Health and Youth gifts take longer? Do you have to go in order or something? (He glances at Jamie) Assuming you do it the usual way, anyway.

They take longer, yeah. You don't have to go in order, but the higher ones are harder so it's usually more efficient to go in order. Plenty of people skip wakefulness, though. Gifts tend to be sensory or mental and often stuff that causes government to want to keep an eye on you.

Do you have to register your gifts with the government or something?

Varies per government, though mind-affecting gifts are universally monitored.

Probably a good policy. 

And no one tries to get around it by just not registering it when they get a mind-effecting gift? Or are there ways to tell when someone has one?

There are ways to tell if a person has gifts, with levels of detail including "affects minds" if someone cares to. The security they went through in the portal warehouses had those, much of each was subtle enough that they wouldn't even have noticed.

That's good to hear. So long as the government is actually doing its job, there. 

There is always controversy about that, but that's politics and Temple is far less interested in it.

Ugh, politics. They're of like minds there, yeah.

Now, they are arriving home. Do they want to do some sparring now?