View Flat HTML
View Metadata
Search Post
For the city that hosts the congress of nations, Deqla looks surprisingly uncrowded to the eye. The streets are all relatively wide, letting in plenty of sunlight and allowing sufficient of room for bicyclists and pedestrians to coexist with public transport and delivery trucks, while only a handful of buildings cap out over ten stories tall. It was a city that was designed by people who knew what the future would look like, and had plenty of budget to make whatever was needed to further Aramaia's status on the world stage to visiting diplomats and dignitaries happen. Further away from the congress and the local universities, the work is rather less extravagantly maintained, but even the side streets are well lit and relatively clean to help keep crime statistics down. What they don't have is a lot of people in them on early weekday afternoons, which makes the fact that her appearance is completely unobserved a bit less unusual.
An ordinary college girl from another dimension entirely appears out of thin air with a faint "pop".
This is not her friday evening lecture on political science.
Okay, girls, orient, something just happened that shouldn't have. Are any of you missing time?
Sharp discontinuity, nothing I recall there too. Why are we suddenly... downtown? Lindsey?
I've got no more of a clue than the other two of you. Have we got our purse still?
She checks; their black leather purse is still slung over their shoulder, and inside is still her wallet, her phone, her apartment keys, and... a hammer?
She pulls out the hammer.
And something SLAMS into her brain, like molten metal pouring across her thoughts. It hurts, but in a glorious way. Like she's being reforged. Like the hiss of a brand on skin, marking her forever.
Box Of Hammers (Lego Dimensions) 100
You can buy this box of hammers instead. This box comes with a dozen or so hammers, each of which grants the one holding it a copy of the Builder Power * Builder: You can build a mountain, if you do it brick by brick. Given all of the relevant pieces, and some sort of instructions on what to make, you can build almost any object quickly and efficiently by slotting the various pieces together. IKEA instructions are no match for your building might.
She bulls through the pain and keeps her feet. She barely even blinks.
What fucking Random Omnipotent Being has decided to fuck with her today? Giving her magic Lego building powers? And... Teleporting her?
We totally just got isekaied, didn't we? We have a power, we're in a new place, we're being railroaded.
Yes, and?
Orient, get the lay of the land, find a way to succeed. It's that simple.
Let's see if the locals are comprehensible.
She picks a direction that looks like it's towards the city center and walks. Soon there'll be someone to talk to. The whole city can't be deserted.
Liv fidgets with the body's hands a little to keep herself occupied as she walks.
... Probably for the best to put away the magic hammer for now. She stuffs it back in her purse.
Once out of the alley they started in, there are a handful of people visible walking down the street and two cyclists. The locals' English is noticeably accented, and a handful of words might need some context clues or more immersion to come naturally, but it's perfectly understandable to their ears. This person is talking to one of their coworkers about their new project, that woman is talking to her boyfriend about about going to see a play later, this old man is chatting with the person running a street pastry vendor... none of it would be astonishing to hear on Earth, but the lack of smartphones is immediately obvious and the fashions are noticeably different from what they're used to.
She pulls out her cellphone and checks the bars on it. No signal; not surprising.
She quickly checks that she has her backup charger and cord (yes and yes), then shuts off her phone completely. Best to conserve battery, there's no telling if they even have electricity here. It'll keep for a week if she's careful with it.
There's asphalt here, so she can pretend to be... exceedingly lost.
She walks up to the street pastry vendor. "Excuse me," she says. "I'm quite lost, I'm on a road trip and I think I made a wrong turn a while ago. Can you tell me what city this is? And if you know where I could get a map around here I'd appreciate it."
"...This is Deqla," the vendor replies, a little nonplussed. "You're on 23rd street near Tressamine. There should be maps at any of the visitor's centers, I think there's one about four blocks that way? Some museum or other."
"Thank you very much," Liath replies. She nods her head amiably and starts off in the direction indicated, scanning her surroundings as she goes.
Oh shush, I'm not at my best after having been transported to a completely different city, quite possibly in a country or world where none of our ID is valid, we have no bank account or legal tender, and we don't even know if they have electricity. The fact that they have cars is a good sign - they likely have alternators and sparkplugs, yes? - but physics here could be completely different.
Get to a tourist destination, ask there if there is a local embassy or town hall, go to the embassy or town hall, provide my legal ID and the contents of my wallet, explain that I don't know how I got here, show the phone's capabilities, that ought to at least get us a place to stay for the night if the local authorities are any decent. Ideally it gets us a legal ID we can use to get a job. The magic hammer ought to make us fit for manual labor at least.
You're just going to hand over our phone to a random authority on another planet?
Do you have a better plan for getting us accommodations than "local homeless shelter"? If they even have those?
I am entirely aware and so I will endeavor to keep the phone and build the infrastructure to run it. There's more important things than porn on that.
Upon entering the museum, it proves to have both electric lights and air conditioning, though the outlet models look unusual and the woman sitting at the front desk doesn't have a computer. There are a dozen or so people visible from the entrance looking at various exhibits and placards, and the floor is covered in some kind light blue tile of tessellating hexagons.
"Welcome to the Museum for Aramaian History. How can I help you today?"
Behind her is a banner proudly proclaiming a new exhibit showcasing 'Groundbreaking technologies from before the dawn of steam!'
"Afternoon. I'm actually looking for directions to the local embassy, and a map to get there if you can spare one; I'd offer to pay you, but I haven't any local currency." She fishes out her wallet and shows a $20 Canadian bill, all smooth plastic. She rubs the back of her head. "I'm sorry, you must get confused tourists all the time."