chalk

[alicornucopia]

In Paraasilan, Esmaar, a pair of roommates are about to break a rule that, compared to the one about running in the corridors or even the one about unlicensed teleportation, is there for a good reason.

In unison, they complete their shared spell.

~~~

with Adarin (Aestrix)

with Ekador (kappa)

with Brilliance (kappa)

with the admin (kappa)

with Teah (kappa)

with Katran (lambda)

with Hall (kappa)

with Joy (kappa)

with Kalinda (Christy Hotwater)

Comments

[ending_of]

The administrator looks at her.

[alicornucopia]

"Hello. I'm Keo," says Keo. "I'm very sorry for the inconvenience these girls have caused you, but in spite of that I can only let you out of that circle if you'll let me check to see if you're safe to have out of it. Do you mind if I check?"

[ending_of]

"I have no strong preferences about whether my time here is spent within or outside this circle," she says. "How do you propose to check?"

[alicornucopia]

"I have copious mind magic - which doesn't see anything I'm not looking for - but if you don't want to leave we can skip it," says Keo.

[ending_of]

"I am indifferent on the subject of you checking."

[alicornucopia]

"Well. Then I will, if you don't mind, since it would be more convenient to be able to dismantle the ward."

Inspection follows.

[ending_of]

The administrator is disinclined, as a general rule, to do things. She is unlikely to address any given situation with more effort than it strictly requires, and now that she has fixed the problem of unaesthetic impermanence, she is mildly annoyed to be kept away from her domain but disinclined to do anything about it since one or the other of the girls is certainly going to die eventually without her help. It's conceivable that there might be some circumstance which she would find it necessary to address with unsafe behaviour of some kind, but there are limits to how unsafe her behaviour can be in an ultimate sense; she has an absolute preference never to destroy anything past retrieval, and has in fact ensured that doing so in Elcenia will never be possible again.

[alicornucopia]

"...Do you," Keo asks, "have any physical needs that would have to involve magic or leaving the ward to address?"

[ending_of]

"I'm not sure what you mean," she says. "To the extent that I can be said to have physical needs, I address them with magic."

[alicornucopia]

"But you can do that inside the ward?"

[ending_of]

"Yes. If I could not, I would prefer to be out of it."

[alicornucopia]

"Okay. Girls," says Keo, clapping her hands, "you're moving."

They nod.

They start packing up their stuff.

[ending_of]

The administrator observes this, too.

"Is retrieval of the dead going to become common knowledge?" she inquires, partway through the process.

[alicornucopia]

"Possibly," says Keo.

[ending_of]

"I would find it interesting to discuss that."

[alicornucopia]

"According to Korulen there's a limiting factor in that the retrieved people aren't considered native to Elcenia anymore and therefore need active spells to stay."

[ending_of]

"It's possible. Those details are not transparent to me."

[alicornucopia]

"Well, it's testable," says Keo. "What condition are dead Elcenians currently in while they aren't summoned?"

[ending_of]

"Inactive. Not conscious or subject to change in any way. But they have entered the queue, so at some point they will begin to be woken. Exactly when is unpredictable, but not likely to be in the next thousand years."

[alicornucopia]

"Woken. In what environment?"

(Saasnil hauls a load of belongings out the door.)

[ending_of]

"In my domain. I interfere as little as possible in the activities and interactions of residents."

[alicornucopia]

"What are they like without your interference?"

[ending_of]

"It is pleasingly infrequent that any of them bothers me about anything."

[alicornucopia]

"That's not what I asked."

[ending_of]

"Perhaps you could rephrase, then."