delta v over delta t when there is no t

[ertia]

In a bar, there is a girl.

She looks like she has saved up all of her decadent and slothful impulses for a solid decade and is indulging them all at once. She is sprawled on a couch with a book she's only half-reading, and an ice cream sundae, and smiiiiiiling.

Comments

[first_and_final]

"I can just run low the whole time. Then I might not be immobilized by pain, either!"

[ertia]

"And then you could read your own books."

[first_and_final]

"Much more convenient, if less gleefully hubristic."

[ertia]

"A bit, yes."

[first_and_final]

"And I do enjoy being gleefully hubristic. But not if it ends with me bored to death."

[taste_tester]

"I don't know if boredom can kill humans where you're from but it doesn't make a dent in vampires."

[first_and_final]

"It's made some attempts on me, but nothing serious."

[taste_tester]

"What is your exotic pain-related deal, anyway?"

[first_and_final]

"Fairy curse: my pain never fades. Fairy blessing: but no matter how much of it there is, there's always enough of me to deal. Not always comfortably deal, mind you, but I get along. And I can pick whether to run low and be a normal person with normal-person-manageable amounts of pain, or run high and have as much pain as I've actually picked up and a proportional increase in mental capacity."

[taste_tester]

"Oh, now that will interact funnily with the vampire deal, we have roomier brains."

[first_and_final]

"Fun!"

[taste_tester]

"Quite!"

And then Addy engages them both in extended conversation about their respective local magics and learns many fascinating things.

[first_and_final]

Milan has so much shit to say about local magic in his original world!

Also: "Hey, Kithabel, it's got to all of me now, you can try suppressing it. Not for too long, please, it's already starting to stack with itself."

[ertia]

Kithabel tries.

Her person. Her person who should not hurt -

[first_and_final]

"That worked, you can stop now."

[ertia]

She stops. "All right, so I don't have to do the thing when it's my turn, good to know."

[first_and_final]

"Yes, congratulations, I will be over here enjoying my perfectly comprehensible agony."

[ertia]

Kithabel ruffles his hair and goes to get books while Addy resumes asking magic questions.

[first_and_final]

Milan has lots and lots of things to say about his world's magic. He never studied thaumatology directly, but he read a few books on it, and he lived in that world for seventeen years and heard of a lot of things. So many things.

[taste_tester]

Addy's all ears!

Maybe she should visit!

[first_and_final]

"...I mean, be my guest, but you might die and also you'll have to get somebody else to open the door for you because if I do it I might die."

[taste_tester]

"Ah, I see. I'll just loiter around here and find somewhere else to go check out, I'm sure more interesting people will come through."

[first_and_final]

"Have fun."

[taste_tester]

"I will, thanks!"

[first_and_final]

"So where was I..."

He was describing yet another of the large number of sorts of people who exist in his world! Living in a world with all and only humans is still a little weird.