"Bella, New Orleans. You might also introduce yourself to Alexius from Florida, he's a very ambitious alchemist who discovered his experimental trials outside weren't as thorough as he thought. Zed from Montreal has a very powerful 'finding' affinity, his best trick can't find things for himself but it's potent."

"Where'd you find these people?"

"Well, Zed and Bella and I all bought Alexius's potion - an eidetic memory thing that works perfectly for him, but fills in the gaps in other people's memories with falsehoods. He took the failure badly but owned up immediately and came out of it looking fair and... honorable, I think is the best word. Bella was the one who caught the problem, and fixed it, she has a metamagic affinity and cancelled the effects."

"If it sounds too good to be true..."

"...it usually is. Yeah. We thought he already understood the drawbacks, he knew it wasn't as good for people other than him. But it turned out it was worse in several ways, not just duration. I think he's got potential, assuming he lives, and he probably will, most personal defense is in-affinity for him."

"Well, we're almost to the cafeteria, now. This conversation was great fun, thank you for taking me up on it."

"You're not so bad yourself. Except for the part where you're terrifyingly good at reading people. I will definitely be avoiding pissing you off."

"Oh, don't worry, I have pretty thick skin. Also, I still haven't solved the puzzle, so I would hate to end my fun prematurely by cutting you off. See you around, Theun."

"See you around, Teresa."