trade my soul for a wish

[from_scratch]

This is a successor to "call me maybe", which is getting crowded.

Cam is dipping a grilled cheese sandwich into a bowl of tomato soup when he feels the summons. He goes ahead and grabs it. Doesn't even drop the sandwich.


with Mark (kappa)

with Adanya (Aestrix)

with Sable (kappa)

with Ari (andaisq)

with Metella (kappa)

with Miles (kappa)

with Isabella (Eva)

with Steel (Rockeye)

with Daphne (Maggie)

with Edie (Maggie)

Comments

[unmarred]

"Lift tube. I like them. They're convenient and fun."

Out they swoop, back into unadjusted local gravity; the short man handles this change with perfect grace. His gloves disappear into some pocket or other.

[from_scratch]

Cam stumbles, but gets back up again in short order. "So what is your name?"

[unmarred]

"I'm not sure if I should be telling it to a magical demon from another universe. What if you steal my soul?"

[from_scratch]

"Make one up, then, I don't care, unless you'd rather I get your attention by naming you after a fictional dwarf or something. I'm Cam, by the way."

[unmarred]

"Well, now I have to know what you'd come up with."

[from_scratch]

"First thing to come to mind is 'Gimli'. I have no idea if Lord of the Rings has stood the test of time for that long."

[unmarred]

"Maybe not for everyone. I recognize it. I read a lot of old books..." They reach a side door, and leave by it. "My name is Mark."

[from_scratch]

"Good to meet you, Mark. And the danger with demons isn't actually soul-stealing. That's just a rumor."

[unmarred]

"What is the danger, then? That you might conjure someone a hat made of antimatter?"

[from_scratch]

"We can't actually do antimatter, but that doesn't substantially limit potential destructive power. An angel or a fairy could kill you too, of course, but they don't have the range or scale a demon does."

[unmarred]

"Do you have any restrictions on what you can conjure besides 'not antimatter' and 'half a clue what you're doing'? And what do angels and fairies do?"

[from_scratch]

"I can't bring things into existence already in motion - although I can do 'under tension', 'in midair' or 'on fire' - and I can't make a vacuum, even inside of something that could otherwise hold one. I can't put things in places I don't have really detailed instructions about and also can't directly perceive, where 'directly' means among other things 'not through a live video feed of someplace I wouldn't know how to get to', although one of the two will suffice. I can't create pure energy without a material substrate. I can't create a mind beyond a certain point somewhere between 'nematode' and 'goldfish' - like, I can make a cat, but it will be a really dumb cat that has some trouble moving around competently and doesn't know how to meow. Though if it manages to move around well enough to find another really dumb cat and they get along, it can have normal kittens.

"Angels change stuff - they need to know more about what they're doing than demons do, by quite a bit, and there are some limits on how much they can change a thing's density and volume in one go, though they can reduce stuff to almost nothing if they take a few steps to do it in. Fairies move stuff around, which they can get creative with but usually don't, and also use to make up for the fact that their wings don't suffice to get them off their ground conventionally."

[unmarred]

"Could you make a cat embryo that goes on to grow up smart? Have you studied the cutoff point?"

[from_scratch]

"I haven't, but the people who distribute pet kittens to their fellow demons have; anything I make in advance of the stage of development where it has a brain can get itself a fully functional brain the long way around. For cats, anyway. If you make a human body it's so far below the level of intelligence it'd need to function that you can't even get it to carry a baby to term, some people have tried. I haven't studied this extensively, I think it might be a hormone thing, human hormones react to mental states that a made body just plain cannot have. So Hell is not full of grotesquely obtained human babies, which is good, that would fuck up the balance of our zero-scarcity anarchy pretty thoroughly."

[unmarred]

"And you don't have uterine replicators, I take it."

[from_scratch]

"Nnno, and I don't think I will tell any of my fellow demons about them, either."

[unmarred]

Mark snorts. "Good plan. Of course, the humans where you're from might like to know about them..."

[from_scratch]

"Yeah, but demons pick up information, you know. I'd have to think about it."

[unmarred]

He shrugs. "None of my business. They're damned useful, but any useful thing can be used for things you might wish it couldn't."

[from_scratch]

"Yeah. So where are we going?"

[unmarred]

"Away. Not back to my hotel room; he knows where that is. I'd be tempted to ask you to whip up a jumpship, if I had a pilot and if I could think of anywhere we could go in the next couple of hours to pull a jumpship out of thin air without anyone noticing... eh. I'll just find us a nice quiet corner for now. Probably in yet a third hotel."

[from_scratch]

"I mean, I can make spaceships that I know how to fly, but they do not 'jump', describe to me 'jumping'."

[unmarred]

"Transiting wormholes. Jump pilots need a lot of delicate neural circuitry whose installation is one of the highest-paid jobs in the wormhole nexus in order to interface with their ships to accomplish a jump, and on top of that they need to have the right kind of brain to begin with. I don't think you can make either of us into a jump pilot. We could hire one, if we had a jumpship, but that would involve more direct interaction with people than I'd like."

[from_scratch]

"Huh. Okay then. And you want to avoid people because the security folks who are about to be very puzzled by my former extremities are looking for you...?"

[unmarred]

"That's one reason, yeah."