cooperation

[alicornucopia]

Two girls are moving their hands through the air and speaking together in perfect parallel.

Two girls are looking expectantly at a circle of red chalk on their floor.

Two girls have done something exceptionally stupid.

with Harry (andaisq)

with Isabella (Eva)

with Arcane (kappa)

with Miles (kappa)

with Nick (Rockeye)

Comments

[alicornucopia]

"Your world sounds really tiny. This city has a couple million people."

[rockeye_stonetoe]

He shakes his head. "My world's not tiny, or at least I don't think so. It's just more than 99% uninhabitable. You can't live on the solid land in my world, it's hotter than an oven down there and the air is poisonous. So everyone has to live dozens of klicks above it on piles of this sort of - floating rock. Here, I have some in my pocket."

He produces the rock. It floats upward when he lets it go, moving sideways in the breeze until he catches it. "That isn't magic, by the way. It floats on air by being lighter than it, the same way things float on water."

[alicornucopia]

"Weird," says Korulen. "I wonder where it would go if it just kept floating until it was out of the range of the planet's down-magic."

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"...Down-magic. Does air get thinner as you go up? If so, it'll stop when the air is thin enough. I think it would just keep going if the air is the same all the way up, though."

[alicornucopia]

"The air's the same everywhere," says Korulen.

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"I think I need to find a physics textbook."

[alicornucopia]

Korulen looks puzzled, insofar as it is possible to read facial expressions on a toothy lizard face.

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"Or a magic textbook. One or the other. Because I give up trying to understand how this place works, everything I've seen so far you explain is because magic."

They're getting close to the school now.

[alicornucopia]

"I mean, it's a school, there's lots of textbooks."

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"Then it's a good place for me to spend the rest of the day. My glider's still in your room, what's left of it anyway. Could we go get it from yours and then drop everything off in mine?"

[alicornucopia]

"Yeah, sure."

Korulen even in dragon form is small enough to fit through doors, and the lift it voice operated, so she just stays like that to avoid carrying his bags until they get to his room. Then she shifts and puts everything on the floor.

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"Have a nice day. Be careful with magic." Nick looks around. Does the room contain a flat surface other than the floor large enough to lay out his glider on?

[alicornucopia]

Even the floor is kind of pushing it, but he could prop it up on the spare bed.

Korulen lets herself out, saying over her shoulder, "If you need anything else you can just think my mom's name really hard and she'll hear you."

[rockeye_stonetoe]

The spare bed is too soft. Hmm. Think her name really hard? Keo, are you still reading my mind?

[alicornucopia]

<No,> comes the reply, <I just keep an ear out for my name.>

[rockeye_stonetoe]

<Talking like this is... Strange. Anyway, are there workshops or workrooms of some kind available? My room isn't big enough to put out my glider's full wingspan so I can try to fix it.>

[alicornucopia]

<There are workrooms, off the south wall of the library.>

[rockeye_stonetoe]

<Anyone gonna mind if I drag tools and art supplies down there?>

[alicornucopia]

<No, that's fine.>

[rockeye_stonetoe]

So he takes the tools and craft supplies and glider, walks to the lift, and declares, "Library."

[alicornucopia]

And the lift takes him and his belongings to the library, which is very big and full of many books.

[rockeye_stonetoe]

He ignores the books for now. They'll still be there later. He opens a workroom, finds it occupied by someone making hand signs, and tries another. This one is empty. He lays out his supplies and gets to work.

The first thing is to detach the broken parts of the wings, leaving only intact timbers. He cuts away sections of canvas to work the snapped pieces free. The little bone-carved mechanisms for folding the wings and controlling the little flaps at the end are mostly intact, so he extracts those too.

This will take a few hours, and the workrooms don't have locks.

[alicornucopia]

Students check to see whether the room's available a couple of times, but they just close the door again when it isn't.

[rockeye_stonetoe]

So he keeps working. Broken glider salvaged as much as possible, he starts to test the wood from the craft shop, cutting a short piece of it and bending until it snaps. It's not a kind he's familiar with. It's heavier and more brittle, but also a lot stronger.

"This calls for a redesign." He finishes disassembling the old glider. Parts and tools go in bags, bags go in hands, Nick goes back to his room. And then to the cafeteria for a snack.

[alicornucopia]

The cafeteria has equally abundant food, changed in the details since he was last there.