He nods. He'll just... do exactly and only the set of things he's prompted to do and otherwise kind of stare vacantly.

The bus rides are short, since the travel between worlds itself takes no time at all and the vehicles are designed for swift loading and unloading. It actually takes more time to get through the hub stations to the correct next lines. After less than fifteen minutes they're in Tide.

Well, that's not horrible. He considers thanking Nocawe but can't seem to make himself say anything.

"Do you need a few minutes?" she asks, pointing at an unoccupied bench near a potted plant.

How does she come up with all these mind-blowing ideas???

He sits near the potted plant. He looks at the potted plant and not at anything else.

The potted plant sits there greenly.

He considers commenting on how nice it is to get to see plants again. That might give people nightmares, though.

"Thank you. I'm fine," he says, getting back up.

"Okay. Ashkon will be in the pool, that's this way." There are signs.

There are signs but also he's nervous. "After you."

She will lead the way.

The Pool is in a huge room, more like an airplane hangar than like a human swimming pool. It's dark and sludgy in there and it's hard to see the Yeerks. There are a bunch of piers for people to get ducked down close to the liquid so their Yeerks can go in and out, and baskets of hair ties and hairnets available for people who need those to avoid their hair dangling into the gloop.

Why did it have to be sludgy. And why did it have to be big. How is he supposed to interact with this and why did it have to be sludgy.

He's pretty sure the part of him that recoils from all this in horror is also the part of him that feels that way about literally everything and just wants eternal dreamless sleep. He makes himself breathe evenly and go wherever Nocawe points him.

Seriously, though, why couldn't they be ominous dark clouds or totally incorporeal or beautiful flower necklaces or literally any other form factor.

Nocawe follows instructions on her device to lead him to a booth around the periphery of the Pool. "My client here is supposed to meet with an Ashkon 1159."

"Of course! Inside or outside?"

Nocawe looks consideringly at her client. "Do you think it will be least stressful to go straight to having Ashkon in your head, or to have a written conversation with him first, or to talk to him while someone else hosts him temporarily?"

How is he supposed to answer that! Okay. Okay, the most important thing here is to breathe evenly and look collected and in control.

"I have no idea. If I end up doing this ten more times I'm sure I'll have opinions by then but also if that happened I'm sure none of the options would be stressful at all so that's kind of unfair of reality, huh?"

"I'm not sure what you mean," says Nocawe.

Shrug. "It doesn't matter. Whatever's convenient."

"- okay, well, it's probably fastest to put him in your ear straightaway," says the staffperson, "if you're ready."

Nod. "Sure, let's."

The staffperson (their nametag reads SPRUCE / TASSHIN 908) leads them to one of the host-dipping apparatuses there and types in a message summoning Ashkon to it, and when there's a confirmation mark on the message indicating that they've shown up, helps situate the host in the recliner-thing. It has substantial armrests and some bars over the shoulders so people don't fall in but no actual restraints and he can push the button himself if he wants.

Sure. That sounds like a thing someone who was capable of interacting with society would do and he would really like to stop being gently pestered to go to Lórien so he'll push the button.

Down he goes.

There is a wet sensation at his ear.

That's allowed.

That's allowed. By him. He gets to allow it.

By the time Ashkon gets all the way in he's smiling nervously.

<Hi!>

<Hi!! Hi, I heard you want to do magic music!> If Ashkon is still letting him move his face he'll grin.

Ashkon is pushing the button to sit them back up but is letting him smile! <That's right, I'm going to go to the University of Brithombar in Lumos and learn to compose magic songs!>

He experiences mild trepidation about the fact that any teachers attempting to punish Ashkon for getting things wrong will have to go through him but, like, it's fine, it's for a good cause and they're probably calibrated for the living and won't really seriously hurt him, and anyway it's bothering him a lot more that he can't figure out if he absently pushed that button without having meant to or if Ashkon is as excited as he is and grins in exactly the same way.