blood sweat tear

[imeanforever]

He's moving her to a different court to see if it'll improve her attitude. She's allowed to fly. It's been a long, long time since she was allowed to -

She is only allowed to fly to her destination, not anywhere else. She notices that she is not where she should be, that she cannot progress to where she was told to go, and she careens out of control when her wings won't flap anymore, and she crashes.

---

with Miles (kappa)

with Minus (kappa)

Comments

[thisvorlunatic]

Silver goes into the house.

[imeanforever]

Promise considers, then follows him.

[thisvorlunatic]

He sits at his comconsole and starts playing that game again. It's very fast and shiny.

[imeanforever]

It is very fast and shiny!

Promise watches him for two and a half minutes, then goes elsewhere to do her own shiny thing. (It is thinking. With fairylights. That is her shiny thing.)

[thisvorlunatic]

Silver plays his fast shiny game.



He plays a lot of his fast shiny game.

[imeanforever]

Promise checks her gate.

It's open. She closes it. She goes to where Silver is. "The gate settled."

[thisvorlunatic]

"Okay, good," he says. "Then I guess you can get your stuff."

Pause. Small sigh.

"I'm eventually going to need to tell other mortals you exist. Sooner rather than later would be somewhat preferable. If I approach the problem from the optimal direction I think can limit the number of people who find out about you to my mother, my father, my emperor, and my boss. Having one of these people find out about you accidentally would be... awkward. But I don't want to go around informing people of your existence without your knowledge and permission."

[imeanforever]

"What are they going to want to do about me, and can they make you do anything about me?"

[thisvorlunatic]

"Well, the Emperor's going to want to trade for those portals but he'll be perfectly content to wait for them; out of everyone I know, I think he has the strongest understanding of the inherent responsibilities of a situation like this. My boss will freak out about the fact that you could fairly casually conquer the planet by wandering around asking people politely for their names, but while he can tell me to do things about that and by custom I am supposed to do as he says, in practice this wouldn't be the first time I disagreed with the decisions of someone whose orders I am supposed to follow. As long as you do not actually proceed to conquer the planet, I don't think he'll even threaten me with particularly dire consequences if I tell him to fuck off."

[imeanforever]

"I could buy a planet, apparently, if I want a planet I wouldn't go for conquest as a first choice. Mostly I want a tree. I should probably go get a branch now."

[thisvorlunatic]

"A completely reasonable set of priorities."

[imeanforever]

Promise smiles a little, and then goes and hops through her gate. To outward observation she just vanishes.

Ten minutes later she is back with a tree branch and a full bag that looks like it was made of a flower petal.

[thisvorlunatic]

Silver has played a bunch more of his game in this time.

"Everything all right?"

[imeanforever]

"I didn't look outside the tree, but it didn't seem to have been damaged. And I got a branch to grow on the inside for me to take off."

[thisvorlunatic]

"That seems like it went as well as can be expected, then. Where do you think you'll put the tree?"

[imeanforever]

"Wherever would be convenient for you to have a big tree, I guess. Near the lake? Is it all right if I grow some fairy food here or would someone accidentally eat it?"

[thisvorlunatic]

"It's not impossible that someone might accidentally eat it, but it seems like an acceptable risk, at least if we mark off a little plot for you with a fence or something so it's obvious that the plants in question belong to someone. That's the sort of thing I could ask my parents to help arrange, if you can't produce a fence on short notice yourself. As for location, I can think of a few spots I could show you."

[imeanforever]

"Once my tree is big enough I can make wood come off it in any shape I want and make a fence. Let's see some places?"

[thisvorlunatic]

Places! They are suitable to house a tree, and for the tree in question to be surrounded by a little plot of land for growing things in. Of the places, the one nearest the lake is also the one with the best affordance for conveniently-fenced extra growing space.

[imeanforever]

Promise plants her branch there.

The harmonics are flat. She can make it grow fast once she's had a good look at the place.

[thisvorlunatic]

Gosh. Tree.

[imeanforever]

Yes. Tree.

She doesn't force it quite big enough to sleep in, right away; she plants some other seeds in an aesthetically pleasing manner, far enough off that they won't be shaded too often once her tree is living-space-sized, and sprouts those.

[thisvorlunatic]

"I should definitely tell the Emperor about you soon if I want to minimize the degree of fuss involved," says Silver.

[imeanforever]

"...Okay."

[thisvorlunatic]

"I'll go call him. I would appreciate if you avoided listening, in case he says any names before I explain."