He's in a forest! A startled bird or two flaps, nearby, before returning to its business.

...well, it's not a Ninuanni forest. Those don't exist - they λ-exist, rather, which is to say they're very like a Creational forest except for how the trees are only coincidental to each other and if there's a bear it's there for a reason, usually to eat your face, rather than just lounging around crunching beehives or whatever it is bears do in the woods.

Eadmund squints at a tree, which remains resolutely causal. "Jadis?" he says aloud.

She fills in, an outline of whirling snow condensed to a woman. "Yes, my liege?" she purrs.

Eadmund belatedly girds himself for the task of having a conversation with Jadis, who is constitutionally incapable of not being creepy. It's really not her fault. She can't help being what she isλ.

"Jadis, could you and the raven find out where we are? I know it's not your core competency, but it sometimes misses the more... human... side of things. And you're at least shaped like a person."

She salutes languidly, and then she isn't there.

Not that she was in the first place.

And Eadmund will... sit on a log and hope he doesn't encounter a bear, he supposes. It really is so impolite of them to exist whenever and wherever they please. Though of course that's the whole problem with Creation, isn't it.

No bears here! There are small animals, though - birds and rodents and such. A dragonfly buzzes by.

...birdsong is nice. The dragonfly is pretty. He's half-dancing with bored anxiety before too long - he's never been good at waiting, not even before he knew the world was wrong, and his patience hasn't improved.

To amuse himself, he coats the mossy earth with powder snow and begins drawing. (The thoughtless perfection of Royalty does not extend this far. He draws like a twelve-year-old with no experience or training. But it passes the time.)

The Chatelaine returns and bows deeply, then notices his drawing and claps her hands delightedly. "Oh, cute!"

The raven on her shoulder croaks. "Don't condescend, Jadis."

She pouts. "It is cute. I like it. Oh, don't be embarrassed -"

Eadmund's already blushing and scuffing the drawing with his foot. "Report."

She pouts some more, then unruffles. "Well, we're somewhere neither of us knows - not that surprising, given how unbearably fruitful the World Ash is. The mortals are ruled by those among their number who have bound a creature from their own soul, granting them some versatile supernatural technique not entirely unlike spherecraft, though naturally rude and primitive by comparison. Ah, this particular island is desert of thinking life, apart from one unfortunate creature of a class the mortals call husk - one whose familiar has gone rotten within their soul. And, unfortunately, the Ash's protective flame is thick here; I see no waylets by which you could travel back to Ninuan proper, not that you would be much better off if you did, lostling that you are."

"I'm not a lostling, I'm -" stray isn't actually significantly more complimentary, now that he thinks about it "- working on it. Is there food on this island? Water?"

"Oh, yes," the raven murmurs. "Clean water, luscious fruit - even before you arrived, I think, you're not so deep in your Bane to fruit the trees so."

Jadis nods. "You could live here for some time! Until you died, of course."

"Of course. You may both take your leave."

"Ah, but I had a thought," she says. "You would not wish yourself to be mistaken for one without power, would you?"

"...is that so unpleasant here?"

"Dreadful," she purrs. "You would not enjoy it in the slightest. But I have a solution."

She flurries back into snow, for a moment, then condenses back into an unreasonably large white cat.

"...is that a snow leopard you awful woman."

"Yes," she says, unabashed. "Larger than typical. In case you wished to ride on my back."

"Somehow I'll restrain myself. - where'd the raven go, did it leave because it was feeling irrelevant or just hide for some reason -"

"What makes you think I know?" she asks, amused.

Then her ears perk up. "I hear something coming. Large - possibly the, ah, other inhabitant."

The other inhabitant, indeed.

She's not that large, actually - at least, she's not as large as she could be. But she is an adult. She doesn't seem to know quite what she's looking for.

Until she gets line of sight on the kid and the big cat.

"What are you doing here? How did you get here?"

"...I am somewhat extraordinarily lost."

She might notice something about the kid, if she looks a bit closer. His skin is pale, but entirely within human range. His eyes, though... At a glance, they're black. But they dance with points of light, like the night sky. His eyes are full of stars.

And the stars are falling.

She doesn't notice the eyes at first - at least, she doesn't realize she's noticed them. It's just a feeling of hard-to-place wrongness that makes her shiver until, as she's squinting at his face, it clicks.

"Wh- your eyes…?"

She glances between Extraordinarily Lost Boy and the leopard. Do they at least… match.

Nah, the leopard's got big blue cat eyes. They might be conveying a bit more amusement than one expects from a predator at rest, but familiars can be like that. (She's probably a familiar, right?)

"...huh. People often don't notice. I suppose eyes can be human or they can glow red but this is still new and unsettling, is that it? I think my arrangement has a sort of minimum level of distressing when people notice, and it's usually more than anyone would like."

She actually laughs, a little.

"I mean, kind of? Regular people have magic-colored eyes, or dark eyes if they don't have it. Mine are glowing because I'm a husk, but - that's not always red. I guess if I was normal I'd have red 'human' eyes, but I didn't have magic before I became like this."

She pauses.

"What… is your arrangement."

"...depends how much you want to fold in the philosophy of it all? The... minimally philosophical and thus barely true... explanation is that I died, was so incandescently furious about it that I failed to die properly, and thus achieved my true nature, which comes with certain attendant powers and responsibilities and drawbacks and also made my eyes like this."

At least her deal doesn't involve philosophy.

"That's… pretty wild," she says, knowing she probably sounds kind of dumb. "I guess you could say I'm also this way because of how mad I was about something, but I definitely didn't die. Or even almost die. What kindsa powers do you have? And responsibilities."

He looks pretty young to be having responsibilities, but he also looks pretty young to have died, so maybe there's some not-what-he-seems more-than-meets-the-eye stuff going on.

He grins (in a way that really makes it seem like, even if he is more than meets the eye, he is probably not older than meets the eye) and flicks his finger at a fruit hanging from a nearby tree.

It falls, bisected.

"That's, um, roughly the least hideously destructive thing I'm capable of doing that looks like anything in particular, unless you wanted some snow. Technically my clothes are also power? And responsibility, really. But I can't change them, I can just make them exist or not. And they currently exist. If you felt like trying to kill me I could make that not work but it's not what I call pleasant. - and I could make you want something, but, um, inflicting my Bane on you seems antisocial." (He's babbling and he's well aware he's babbling but it's been a while since he talked to someone, all right?)

Jadis curls at his feet, purring up a storm. (She can't really help it. He is being disgustingly adorable.)

She watches the demonstration with interest. Slicing things, making snow, having… clothes… self-defense, mind control. If there's a theme to his abilities she doesn't see it.

"Yeah, that sounds pretty different from normal magic. I mean, the magic from around here. You can't really make stuff with magic, just… constructs? Like, if I knew how, I could make a hammer and bonk things with it. It'd last as long as I was thinking about it. But it'd look like…"

She calls up an experimental glow of unshaped red magic in her hand and - swooshes it, a little. The motion isn't particularly refined.

"I don't even know how you'd go about making it snow. I definitely haven't heard of anyone doing that before."

"Really his isn't for making things either," Jadis says, amusement coloring her voice. "You could in fact say it's for unmaking things."

"Yes, Jadis, you could, but you could also say that it's versatile. And more relevantly, that I don't intend to unmake anything unless I absolutely have to."

"Traitor~" she sing-songs.

"Whatever, Jadis."

Heh, banter.

"I mean, if hideously destructive is an accurate description of what happens if you unmake things necessarily, I can't blame you for not wanting to do that."

She scuffs the forest floor a little with her foot.

"So, you mentioned the clothes are a responsibility - kinda like a uniform, I guess? What does that mean, though, is there any stuff you have to do? Do you have to do any of it here? Do you have a boss."

(Her heart picks up, a little, at that last question. She's remembering the last boss she had. Better distract herself with this weird situation so something she regrets doesn't happen.)

The leopard unfurls herself back into a woman's form. "- you don't mind, do you, it's only that the ruse wasn't really doing anything for us and he's not getting anything out of me being fluffy at the moment because he's too conscious that I'm a monster - anyway. His responsibility is to unmake, to destroy. To head the grand Host that will tear the firmament asunder, slaughter the angels, make what is into not. He is the boss. Or, well, one of a few hundred. A few hundred, heading the thousands who ride in the forces of nothingness, taking back the void upon which Creation was inflicted. But he's a traitor. He'd rather suffer with the rest of you. And of course we always knew he was a traitor - we called him Traitor King from the outset - but it still stings rather. But to answer your question, no, he doesn't have to do any of it here. He might anyway, because it's hard not being what you are, but he'll be awfully sorry."

Though blatantly miserable, Eadmund disputes none of this.

She backs up in surprise when Jadis shapeshifts - for some reason she'd been kind of assuming that he had a familiar because that was how magic worked? Even though in retrospect that was a bit of a silly assumption to make. She tells herself to calm down, since freaking out won't exactly help matters.

"That sounds like - a lot," she says, very aware of the understatement. "Kings and traitors and grand hosts."

She shifts uncomfortably. It's hard not being what you are. That applies to her, too, even if it's on a smaller scale.

"What do you plan to do?" she asks instead, hoping that it'll cheer the both of them up. (Jadis doesn't seem to care either way.) "Since you're going to try not to destroy the world. Thanks for that, by the way, I think it's a good world."

"It isn't," Jadis says mildly.

"...well. It's broken, but that doesn't mean it's all bad. Anyway, I... well. I don't... know? What I plan to do. I'm kind of not planning. The kind of power that I am, we're called Strategists, our whole job is making the plans for how to tear it all down, and I thought, a little while back, what if I just... didn't. Have a plan. A strategy."

He exhales. "Then again that caused me to fall into an endless abyss and land on a desert island in a world I'd never heard of. And it hasn't stopped me dying. Actually I think I might be dying more."

She nods. She - has to keep in mind what he said about the minimally philosophical explanation being barely true - but she can understand the conflicting desires. Wanting to take a break but being afraid of the consequences, which in turn just makes you need a break more.

(It's hard not being what you are.)

She's concerned about the dying thing, though!

"Uh, that last part. Is there anything you… need, I guess? There are people on the mainland, I'm just here because it's. Dangerous. For them, not for me."

He snorts. "Um. The main thing I need is to stop wanting things - I'm dying of Temptation? Being around more people wouldn't help with that. ...possibly I should explain... more of the esoteric nonsense I'm saying. Like how the Bane works."

She can relate, except for the part where she's probably basing that on a pile of wrong assumptions.

She - sits down on the nearest available mossy log.

"Yeah, okay."

"So - who's good for this... Oh. Well.

"Imagine, right, that you're going about your business, one day, and then someone says to you - your brother's dead. House burned down, him and his wife and his kids are all gone. You're heartbroken. It's awful, it's the worst thing that could possibly happen. But you've got a framework for how to deal with it? You know that bad things happen. This is worse than anything you could've imagined happening, but it's in the space that could happen.

"But then you're at his funeral, and you're dressed in black and everyone's crying - and it's a beautiful sunny day, and there's a rainbow in the sky. Birds are singing. There's a fat little bumblebee visiting the nearest flower, dusting pollen on everything it bumps into on the way. It's the perfect day. And your brother's dead.

"And in that moment it seems like the world isn't working like it should work. It isn't supposed to be the perfect day, not when you're never going to see him again and you'll never see his kids grow up and you'll never get to win that fight you were having about whether Romeo and Juliet's a stupid story because he's dead, he's in Heaven or Hell or he's reincarnated into a snowshoe hare or whatever.

"And the moment passes, and you try to get over it, try to remind yourself it's not personal, you know, it's not the universe thumbing its nose at you in particular, it's just a nice day. And... the sun rises the next day and there's a rainbow in the sky, and birds are singing. And you ask someone what the hell's up with this weather you've been having, to distract yourself from how miserable you are, and they look at you funny and ask what you're talking about, and you say it's so sunny and warm, and why are there rainbows anyway when I haven't seen a drop of rain, and they say it's overcast today. Really they wouldn't even say that, they'd think you were talking metaphorically - but it is cloudy, for them. You're the only one seeing the rainbow.

"And it gets worse. Every day, the weather's more perfect, the rainbow a little bigger and brighter in the sky. The birds sing your brother's favorite songs. That damned bumblebee is everywhere you look, getting pollen over your rug or your desk or your cat.

"You haven't seen the rain in weeks, or months, or years.

"And then you walk out your front door and the garden path leads up to the foot of the rainbow. And you think, maybe this can help me. And you walk up the rainbow, and as you walk along it you feel the colors bleeding through you, the birdsong filling your ears, the bumblebee circling like a vulture... and you die. You collapse on that rainbow bridge, the rainbow that was your evidence of how the world is wrong, and you fall through it and through the world. You fall straight through Hell, because Hell has no place for you, into the void. And you could dissolve there, you could be unmade - it'd be easy. But you're so angry, about the rainbow. There shouldn't be a bloody rainbow. Your brother's dead. What kind of world throws a rainbow at people whose brothers have died?

"And you force your way back into the world. But you're not of the world anymore. You're Excrucian. You're more that rainbow than you are yourself, and the rainbows of the world - and bumblebees, and sunlight - see you and they see a hunter, a monster, something that must be destroyed. And they do destroy you. Again and again, you die, in ways more or less ambiguously rainbow-themed, and then you drag yourself back. Because the world is wrong. Because you're the only one who can do anything about it."

Eadmund's quiet but intense ranting subsides. He just breathes, for a moment.

"That's, um, not my Bane. That's Cadwin Belitun's Bane. He's dying of the Perfect Day. I'm dying of Temptation."

She squeezes her fists in her lap, a little, when he brings up a burnt house - but she pushes to control herself. This is obviously not about that.

She can relate, though - the rage and hatred when horrible things happen and not only does nobody seem to know, but they're all having a great fucking day. She imagines that extending to the whole world, and… it's still a little abstract, but she can imagine it as something that could happen. Probably if she was like this kid her Bane would be something like stupid spoiled BRATS - nope, not thinking about this. She takes as deep of breaths as she can without looking like she's trying to interrupt. And so they breathe, together, in that moment.

Finally, she nods.

"I think I understand. Why you can't go back to… well, I was gonna say a world of sunshine and rainbows, but it sounds like that's the whole problem. Do you think that if you died here in an ambiguously temptation-themed way, when you came back, you'd be back here again? Or would there not be a here to get back to?"

"...mm. I wouldn't just explode and destroy the entire - " he thinks about it - "I can take precautions not to explode. It probably wouldn't be environmentally destructive anyway, my Shattering Rite's harder on people than it is on scenery. But there would be a here, still, yeah."

Well that's as reassuring as it is meaningful to be, in this situation.

"That's good. I'll still hope that you don't get killed, anyway. So… you have to stop wanting things? Like a monk?"

It's probably a good thing that he ended up… here, then.

"Well, it would help. When I'm not having a flare-up, anyway - when it gets too bad, the definition of 'temptation' gets pretty loose. Usually I end up poisoned after I eat something that looked too conspicuously nice."

"Yeesh, that sucks. Is there a way to keep flare-ups at bay? Or do they just - happen to you."

"If I knew of a way I'd be doing it. - I guess evidence suggests killing the world makes them slightly less likely, and, you know, if I successfully killed the world I'd stop dying because there'd be nothing left. But short of that, I haven't found anything."

Nod.

"Well, I guess until you figure out a better solution, we can - find unappetizing things for you to eat, I guess? Plenty of that here."

She wasn't actually expecting to survive very long, when she came out here.

"...I'm not your responsibility, you know," Eadmund says gently. "I'm telling you my woes because... well, because it's nice to tell them, but also because you asked. Not because I want you to fix them. It'd be sort of philosophically troubling if you could."

She sits up, awkwardly.

"Oh, uh. Sorry if that made you feel weird? I guess it's just… I've got a soft spot for kids and got carried away."

She shifts.

"What do you plan to do, then? Just stay here? Since being in the actual city would be too temptation-inducing, and therefore bad news."

"I'm not uncomfortable, I just don't want you putting more weight on your own shoulders on my behalf. And I hate to answer your question with a question, but... what do you plan to do? I'm... well, immortal's the wrong word, but I'm not in any danger of cessation. I'll keep. What about you?"

"I don't… have a plan, really. I guess I should tell you my deal, huh?"

"So - I mentioned I'm a husk. What that is, is…"

She pauses a moment to choose her words.

"I didn't used to have magic, and I worked as a servant with my boyfriend."

Blink.

"…That's not because we don't have magic, my boyfriend actually pretends that he does, and most of our coworkers have it for real. But I got -"

(Deep, steadying breath.)

"- fired. I won't go into the details, because thinking about it is making me start to get mad, and I'm trying to avoid that. But - I went home, and I was feeling like garbage. My heart was pounding hard enough to hurt, I could hear it in my ears, and I could feel this heat inside me, and I was hunching in on myself so I didn't punch the next person or lamppost or whatever I saw. I - think I actually lost track of time, because I don't remember the entirety of the walk. But when I got home and looked in the mirror, my eyes were like this."

Gesture.

"And I panicked. Because - husks are crazy evil monsters, more animal than person, and - if you see one you call the guard so they can kill it. I didn't want to die, but I didn't want to go crazy and hurt my boyfriend or any of the kids we watch either. So I ran. And when I got to the docks, I realized that if I swam here, nobody would find me. So I did that. And I've been here for a couple of days now. But…"

She sighs, putting her head on her knees.

"I realized that there isn't any hope for me. I don't know how to survive on my own - technically there's plants I can eat, but I don't know poison berries from edible ones. And I can't go back, because they'll kill me. Maybe I'll get lucky and burn myself out before I starve - I think it progresses, over time, because I didn't have these when I first changed."

She waves a hand at her horns.

"And all the pictures are, like… big, and glowy, and you can hardly tell they used to be people. I've lost track of time once or twice, but I haven't gotten big enough to ruin my clothes yet, and my body still looks pretty much normal, aside from the horns. And the hair."

She shakes her head, laughing awkwardly.

"Sorry, I didn't realize how much I needed to ramble at someone."

"Rambling can help. I certainly did enough of it in your direction."

With the automatic reassurance handled, Eadmund contemplates the extremely familiar flavor of passive suicidal ideation on display here. "...I'm sorry about the stuff that happened to you," he says. "Do you really think the most you can hope for is a quick death, though? I mean - I don't know. You said husks turn into crazy evil monsters, that it's inevitable. But I think... a lot fewer things are inevitable than people think."

(A sheepish smile.)

"I mean… I guess that makes sense, since you've got a new and different kind of magic. But - I guess I don't know what to hope for, if I can hope for. More."

She kicks the dirt in front of her.

"Why, did you have something in mind?"

"Well, not as such. I was kind of just, um, wandering through the endless void hoping something would catch and hold my interest long enough to distract me from the nightmare of attempting to find a meaning under the crushing totality of dukkha."

Beat.

"But I think it could be fun to go somewhere neither of us has been! Like - Disney World is probably a bad idea, come to think of it, given my Bane, but maybe some world where there's a bunch of folks with horns and glowing eyes, where you won't stand out. Jadis, is there anywhere like that you can think of? Demon dimensions or something?"

Jadis looks up from a scrap of bark she's been doing intricate calligraphy on with her razor-sharp fingernail. "Mm? Oh. Demon dimensions tend to be fairly hostile. The World Prosaic can accommodate a surprising amount of nonsense at the right mystical confluences, though, and I believe there's one currently ongoing in California."

"Really? The entire point of the Prosaic is that it thinks magic doesn't exist. What kind of mystical confluences is it having?"

Shrug. "You'd be surprised. And you shouldn't have too much trouble getting there. I know I said there weren't any waylets nearby, but the raven has informed me that I spoke too hastily; apparently it checked and there's one that should get you there pretty decently at the bottom of a nearby undersea trench."

"Huh, a world that thinks magic doesn't exist? And we'll still fit in?"

(She's definitely imagining something preindustrial - after all, there were definitely times before cut gemstones were readily available and people could only use their unaugmented strength.)

"Yes, I'm fr- um."

He attempts to tease out a minimally confusing way to make this a true statement, and comes up empty.

"I was born there and lived there for ten years, before finding out I was actually an immortal god-king of the void who ruled before reality was envisioned, and still sort of consider myself to be 'from' there. Um. It's actually quite nice, parts of it. There aren't people with horns and glowing eyes and I don't really know how you'd fit in, but I do trust Jadis when she says you would."

(She can't help but chuckle, just a little, at his fumbling. It's nice to know some people have lives more complicated than she does.)

"It makes sense that there are nice parts - worlds are pretty big, after all! Um. Jadis mentioned the bottom of an undersea trench. Are we swimming there or can you teleport?"

She's pretty sure she "can" teleport, in the sense that people "can" summon all their strength to lift something heavy off of a kid, but she doesn't actually know how.

"Uh, I would have a pretty hard time teleporting and I kind of enjoy swimming so unless there's a compelling reason otherwise -"

"Mortals breathe, my dear lord."

"- oh, right. Um. It would be extremely easy for me to make you not need to breathe."

"Whoa, really? That's cool. Will you able to also - make us be not wet, when we get out?"

She is going to get a Good Grade in understanding how his magic system works.

Eadmund bites his lip. "Maybe? It'd be, um, complicated - it'd be easy for me to not get wet, but keeping you from getting wet's not the same thing at all really. Do you particularly dislike being wet?"

She thinks carefully.

"It's not too bad," she decides, "and my clothes could probably use the wash anyway. My hair'll take forever to dry at this length, though."

She laughs.

"Okay, I think I'm ready! Unless there are weird side effects to not having to breathe while we go down."

"Nope! Just, uh, you don't actually have to hold still but - metaphorically hold still -"

Eadmund focuses his Wyrd and breathes out the air that's habitually in his lungs. Thinks about the emptiness within, the vacuum that nature so abhors. That which sustains him - that which will not let him die - the core of his un-being -

Looks at Su-Yeong. (The stars in his eyes are brighter, falling faster.) Commits his lie to reality. She is like me, nor is she of you. She wants not. Her breath is of the void.

(He was exaggerating, before, when he said it would be easy. It's easier for him than it would be for many others, even other Strategists. He's very good at this.

He is not so good that the world does not take note. He is not so good that it does not fight back, does not writhe in his grasp as he twists it into shape, burning the very heart of him and making him suffer -

but he is good enough at it that he can. The struggle is weighed in his favor, and the agony, like all things, ends eventually.)

It clicks. "Cool! Okay, the waylet's this way."

He sets off towards the shore.

At first she draws her attention inward, trying to notice if it Feels Like Something, but then she notices that he's quite visibly suffering. She - doesn't say anything, nervous that an interruption might be bad somehow, but as they're going to the beach:

"So, uh, does your magic normally. Bite back."

"Oh. Yes. It didn't bite you too, did it?"

"No, I was fine, it just looked like it wasn't exactly fun for you."

"Oh," he says again.

They walk in silence for a moment.

"...it's no danger to me," he says eventually. "There isn't much that is."

"That's - good."

She isn't sure if she can say much more without coming across like a busybody, but -

"Well, hopefully you won't have to do it again, then. I'm kinda looking forward to seeing what it's like down there, even if it isn't the main event?"

There, something that she at least hopes will convey the appropriate amount of concern-but-also-she's-not-trying-to-fuss-over-you-or-anything!

"The bottom of the sea is nice. I don't think we're going deep enough for anything really fun, but I don't think the geas I put on you would compensate for the, um, total lack of visible light, if we were deep enough for anything really fun. So it's probably for the best."

She laughs.

"Oh, right, it's dark down there. We'll still be able to navigate, right?"

"We do not perceive through light, as you do," Jadis comments. "Milord can lead you by the hand... if your glowing eyes are not themselves enough to light the path."

"I think I'll take the handholding option, 'cause the eyeglow isn't that bright."

She holds a hand in front of her face to demonstrate - cupping her hand over an eye is enough to block the shine, and once it's about a foot away there isn't any visible. She then extends that same hand so Eadmund can lead her.

"Guess you'll just have to tell me what it looks like to your bat-vision."

"Bat-vision, hah."

They reach the shore in short order. Eadmund doesn't slow down; he takes her hand and walks into the gentle surf.

His head goes under the surface significantly before hers, obviously. He's under five feet tall. But it's not long before the waters rise around her face as well.

Even though she knows, consciously, that it'll be fine, she can't help but go through the motion of holding her breath when her head finally goes under the surface. And then she just - keeps on holding it, because there's no tension to it, no pressing sense of wrongness building in her gut compelling her to take oxygen in. (She keeps her eyes shut as well, mostly, since Eadmund's got a good grip on her hand and it feels weird to have them open and not be able to see.)

...actually she can still see Jadis. Even though her eyes are closed and there's not really much light. That's weirder, right? It seems weirder.

Jadis waves sort of ironically, completely unaffected by being underwater as far as she can tell.

That's definitely weirder! She remembers the comment from earlier about not perceiving through light - maybe it goes both ways, for her at least? - and snorts, a small flurry of bubbles drifting upwards.

She gives a little wave back with her free hand. Hee hee.

And Eadmund draws them through the waylet.

The waylet doesn't feel like much of anything - one moment her eyes are shut and there's no light to even block out, and the next, the backs of her eyelids go red as she goes from undersea trench to shallow water, and the sun through the water is murky but significant by comparison. Somehow, even though the pressure's effects on her were neutralized, her ears pop.

Honestly, the ear popping is pretty friendly - it makes the transition between environments feel more real. She doesn't open her eyes, yet - she'd rather wait until she can dry off her face.

And they walk out of the water in pretty short order.

When she opens her eyes, Eadmund and Jadis are pristine bar Eadmund's hair being slightly damp, icing over even as they emerge onto the beach. It's quite warm.

She laughs, a little, at the feeling of sunshine. It was summertime back home, too, but summertime in the middle of the woods feels different than summertime on a beach.

She starts wringing her hair out while she's still ankle-deep in the water. Good god there's a lot of it.

"Nice day out."

"Honestly I prefer clouds, proper English weather. But it's nice for a change. Long as you aren't Cadwin Belitun."

"That's the haunted-by-rainbows guy whose brother died, right?"

"Yeah. Dying of the Perfect Day. ...wouldn't make fun of him to his face about it, but people do make jokes. When it's a little too lovely out."

She looks out at the water.

"I guess that makes sense. Well, it's a good thing he's not here, then?"

She tamps down the feeling that she's going to turn around and he'll be standing right behind her. This isn't a comic book.

"Yeah, he's a bit of a downer in general really."

The water is big and blue and wet. The beach, in addition to the usual skimpily dressed beachgoers, contains... a young woman in an inordinately lacy black dress, holding a parasol.

She's got horns, red-orange-yellow and pointy. Also her skin is grey. Also she's looking at them in bemusement, and Eadmund is squinting back at her.

Wow, maybe she really can fit in here! She waves hopefully.

"I really like your outfit."

This is true - it looks like something she'd like to buy if she had more money.

"Thank you, it was honestly quite rushed but I am proud of the bustle. Did you go swimming. What on earth made that seem like a good idea and what brand of sealer are you wearing that can tank the Pacific ocean, I want a crate of it."

"Why... do you have horns," Eadmund asks cautiously. "I know why she has horns but I don't think you're supposed to."

"Just because I'm cosplaying a Gothic Lolita version of Kanaya doesn't mean I can't put on the facepaint and horns like anyone else," she says mysteriously. "Is she Damara? Those horns are fantastic too, now that I look at them - did you buy them online or make them yourself, are they 3d-printed or something -"

That's a lot of words that she's unfamiliar with! But maybe she can be equally mysterious. She adopts a smile that she hopes is Mysterious Enough.

"Thank you," she says of the horns compliment and ignoring everything else, "they're actually… organic."

(Oh god why did she say that. Now she probably sounds like she skins animals for fun.)

"Whatever that means, it sounds badass," the young woman says approvingly. "Mine are just clay and modpodge like anybody else's."

She glances down at Eadmund. "Are you cosplaying or just a fancy lad, I can't quite tell."

"I am the fanciest lad," Eadmund says gravely. "What is a cosplay."

"It's a hobby where you dress up like a gay alien. We're at a convention where lots of people gather to do that. Well actually we're at a beach a few blocks away from the convention, but."

At the sentence it's a hobby where you dress up like a gay alien Su-Yeong has to suppress a giggle, but at least she suddenly feels like she understands a lot more! Like that they're at a costume party, and that "Gothic Lolita" and "Kanaya" and "Damara" are some of the kinds of available costumes.

… She actually kind of wants to see some more of the kinds. Apparently being out in the sun with other people around has reawakened her sense of curiosity and fun, as opposed to skulking in the woods with only forest creatures for company.

She opens her mouth to say something like "that sounds fun" or "do you want to go in" but doesn't really want to invite more questions from Gothic Lolita Version Of Kanaya that she isn't totally sure would be a good idea to answer honestly.

Wait, there's totally a solution to this.

"Uh, one moment please!" she says to the girl, and then whispers at Eadmund:

"Will anything bad happen if we say that we're not from around here? I think you mentioned it was important that they think magic doesn't exist, but I don't want to sound confident about something and then have zero idea what I'm talking about, y'know?"

"I think she already knows something odd is going on, and it's only important they don't know about magic on a population-wide level. Also I don't care about the laws that decree the World Prosaic not find out about magic, because they also decree that I shouldn't exist - which is, you know, true but hurtful. Say what you like."

She can sympathize with that! She doesn't particularly want to spill everything, but:

"Okay, apparently it's okay to come clean. We're not from around here, and actually we came here because of all the people dressing up as a gay alien - it makes it easier for us to blend in, I think?"

Glance over at Eadmund.

"She's more alien but I think I'm more gay," Edmund contributes helpfully.

"Oh," the girl says, with muted delight. "This is a Galaxy Quest situation, okay. I can potentially serve as a native guide, although you should be warned that most people find me abrasive and off-putting because I casually disregard social norms. But it's much less of a problem at Comic-Con because like sixty percent of the other people here are also autistic."

"I'll keep that in mind!" laughs Su-Yeong. "It probably shouldn't be too much of a problem, though, 'cause I don't think we're trying to move here long term and if we change our minds about that we'll be able to pick up stuff on our own."

She scratches an itch on her shoulder.

"My real name's Su-Yeong, by the way. What about you?"

"Anya. I don't think I had a fake name for you except 'unnervingly good Damara cosplayer'... I'm going to assume you're not actually a troll, because the idea that Andrew Hussie had insight into the fundamental workings of the universe and chose to use it to make Homestuck is just distressing."

She starts walking along the beach towards the city, leaving high-heeled prints in the sand. "How about you, fancy gay twelve-year-old?"

"I'm Eadmund. And I'm not twelve, I'm immortal."

"...those aren't contradicting statements. You can be immortal and twelve."

"Yes, but the immortal part's more important."

Eadmund's immortal twelve-year-old-ness, or twelve-year-old immortal-ness, is charming! Su-Yeong is charmed.

"Yeah, I was born human and the word for me now is 'husk,' not 'troll.' I don't think trolls exist, at least back home. Just stories about monsters that eat people and turn into stone during the day. Or when exposed to sunlight? One of those."

"We've got similar stories, but the one I'm talking about is one where they're gay aliens." She gestures at herself. "Hence the skin and the horns, I'm dressed as one. The story they come from is very engaging but if it was based on real events I'd be very concerned and probably want to find the author so I could shake him down for details. If you're a husk then that doesn't pattern-match to anything except Mass Effect, and I really very strongly doubt you're one of those husks, you'd be eating me."

Nervous laugh!

"No, I don't really feel any people-eating urges. Um… where I'm from, most people have magic. I didn't used to, but then something that—"

Her breath catches but she presses on.

"That made me really mad and embarrassed happened, and… I guess that turns regular people into husks sometimes! I never knew anything about the how, before, because they're supposed to be super rare? Something that can happen in real life, technically, but mostly they're just… the monster in a novel."

Glum glum glum.

"Sorry that happened, I guess. I have had some Days but few or none of them have turned me into a monstergirl."

"Speaking as a monsterboy I can't recommend it."

"I thought you were just fancy."

He catches Anya's eyes.

It's very difficult to do that, actually. But he eventually manages - she looks at his eyes -

- looks at them again -

"Wait, Jenna Moran had fundamental insight into the workings of the universe? That's less distressing and honestly less surprising but probably a worse problem."

"Who?"

"Um. ...I can't actually explain Jenna Moran. She does this big LARP thing about Powers and Excrucians and stuff? Except I guess it's not a LARP, it's just. Really, really dangerous field research. Since you actually exist."

Glance at Eadmund.

"I thought this place didn't know about magic? I guess if whoever was telling everyone about magic— well, your kinda magic, anyway— said she was doing it as a lark that would still count…"

On the plus side this conversation is odd enough to be almost funny, which has a positive effect on her overall mood.

"Yeah, as long as it doesn't get spread to a large fraction of the population or generally accepted as fact."

"Jenna Moran's nonsense is in absolutely no danger of either of those things happening. Most people can barely understand what she's talking about. The ones who do think she's some kind of mad genius, but a literary one, not a scientific one."

Giggle.

"Okay, as long as it doesn't set off your temptation thing."

"I'm honestly not that tempted to destabilize the World Prosaic by telling everyone to listen to a mad prophet. ...well when I put it like that I'm a little tempted. But still not enough for it to be a problem, I died something like three days ago and I'm usually good for a few weeks after."

"Well, let's see if we can't set a new record."

She's not totally sure if it would work like that but hey, optimism.

"Anyway, I… don't actually know all that much about how I'm supposed to work, since it's not like I went to school for huskology. I don't even know if that's a thing, really. But I think it progresses, because when it first happened I didn't have horns and now I do, and there's… pictures. They look more like animals than people. I really don't want that to happen since by all accounts you lose your personality and mind when it does, but so far I think that I'm still mostly pretty much me."

She pauses.

"… maybe it's a bad idea but I kinda want to figure out some spells so that I can have something to show for having magic other than horns and eyeglow and possibly a death sentence. That can go on the backburner, though."

"Aren't some of your animals people anyway?" Jadis asks, fading briefly back into selective existence (in snow leopard form, for emphasis). "Should you be assuming just off what someone looks like?"

"Jesus! What?!"

Jadis waves her hand dismissively. "None of his business."

… Giggle. Even though Jadis' joke flies over her head.

"Well, not regular animals. That I know of. Familiars are different, more like part of a person? I'm pretty sure that's how it works, anyway."

"Familiars are animals that are part of a person, and that makes them people, and not animals. Husks become animals, and that means they aren't people, because if they were people they'd never dream of being part animal. What very tidy rules you people have. Or, I've forgotten, are you animals?"

Blink.

"Uh, I think it's…"

She's got a point.

"It's not about the shape, right? But there is a difference between a pet dog and a dog familiar. A mental difference. The thing that's beastly about husks isn't what they look like, it's that they can't be reasoned with."

She still feels like she's missing something, or maybe being racist against animals somehow? Oops.

"Jadis, are you being cryptic towards any actual end or just for its own sake?"

"Who can saaaaaaaay~" she trills, turning upside down.

"Why are you like this."

"Because attempting to communicate meaningful information across the boundary of self when you don't exist as a person is genuinely difficult,"  she snaps.

She turns right-side-up again. "And because it's funny."

She's not sure how much the second thing is cover for the first, but:

"What's the funny part? Is it that you can be in whatever body you want, so the distinction between you as a leopard and you as a human doesn't matter?"

"No, it's that I'm the only one in this conversation who isn't literally dying of trying too hard to be a person, and that includes all three of you and the human."

Then she's replaced by a quantity of snow, which flumphs to the ground and begins sublimating, and a set of teeth carved from ice, which hang in the air for a moment longer before clattering down.

"I don't think I'm literally dying of that."

She glances at the teeth, then at Eadmund and Anya.

"Uh. Am I counting the number of people here wrong."

"...she doesn't... say false things. So probably, in some sense, you're miscounting. But not in the literal sense, no."

(Her heart is pounding, but)

"W-well, all right. I don't know how to not 'try too hard to be a person' but."

She puts her hands up and shakes her head.

"Nor, obviously, do I."

"You don't have to pay taxes. I assume that makes it easier."