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 think I'd like to be outside for the turning into a dragon part; I know dragons can fit in here, somehow, but it doesn't seem like it would be comfortable," says Milan.

Out the back door he goes.

[ertia]

She follows him.

[first_and_final]

And he...

...turns into a mesmerizingly beautiful dragon.

He keeps the ever-present sparkle, now applied to resplendent silver scales. He is pretty small for a dragon, smaller than any they've met today, but not by much. His wings arch from his back and catch the light and scatter it in every direction; the translucent membranes cast dazzled half-shadows on the grass of the lakeshore. The long curve of his tail gleams like crystallized fire.

It's a bit much, but in kind of a glorious way.

He looks down at Kithabel with beautiful silver eyes and says, "...I'm still sparkling, aren't I."

[ertia]

"Yeah."

[first_and_final]

"That's mildly embarrassing." He folds his wings. "...So, the magic vampire crush is... less, I'm going to go with less, like I'm not a vampire anymore but I still very much have—"

—a crush on her. Oh, there it goes.

The main thought in Milan's head during the brief flash of mental overshare is: fucking finally. He has been waiting far too long for Kithabel to get her due share of outrageous cheating. Kithabel deserves all the outrageous cheating she wants, because she is great.

[ertia]

Well, that's a pleasant if partial distraction from her fear of the whole mind-sharing thing. She does not like the mind-sharing thing it is not pleasant she doesn't even have anything in particular to hide which makes her feel kind of silly for being so scared but she was scared anyway but it'll be over soon and oh gosh he's so pretty.

[first_and_final]

Well, if she's going to be mentally oversharing at least she's only sharing her reservations about the oversharing, which he already knew about, and how pretty she finds him, which was explicitly and repeatedly named as a precondition for this entire thing that is happening and therefore comes as no surprise to him at all—

And there it goes again. No more mental overshare.

"Well, that was relatively painless," says Milan. "Are you omnipotent now?"

[ertia]

"I -"

As soon as she has a thought she can tell the difference. Things around her twitch. Low momentum means lots of concentration and waiting time. Omnipotence means -

"I'm gonna have to be very careful," she says. "Ummmm."

Okay, first thing she wants is a more accustomed level of control. She doesn't need slow response times, but she does want her magic to respond to intention, not passing whim.

Affecting how you sorcer with sorcery is notoriously impossible.

She's omnipotent and does it anyway.

And then she laughs and laughs and laughs and hugs him tight.

[first_and_final]

The outrageously sparkly silver dragon giggles and carefully hugs back. With an outrageously sparkly silver wing.

[ertia]

There is no call to be so careful! Kithabel is impossible to injure! Snuggle.

[first_and_final]

Snuggle!

"...I was thinking I'd want to turn humanish again immediately but actually I feel like going flying first," he says. "Wings are cool."

[ertia]

"Oh, are they?" She sprouts a set. "Huh. Could take or leave 'em." They go away and she rises into the air on her own. "Let's fly."

[first_and_final]

Milan flies.

He is less than perfectly graceful at first, because he's not cheating at flight, he's actually using his actual wings which he has only had for a couple of minutes. But holy shit it's so much fun. And he is kind of getting used to being so outrageously sparkly. Whee!

[ertia]

Kithabel zooms around him, cackling.

[first_and_final]

"I am so fucking pleased that you finally get to be omnipotent!" giggles Milan.

[ertia]

"I bet I'm pleaseder!"

[first_and_final]

"I am deeply disinclined to make this into a competition!"

[ertia]

"Suit yourself." Zoom! She can make sonic booms! She can go that fast and not make sonic booms! She can make sonic booms that sound like woodwind instruments!

[first_and_final]

And Milan has glorious sparkly wings!

"...I'm kind of shamefully delighted about my stupidly ostentatious sparkly silver wings and I might keep them when I turn humanish again!"

[ertia]

"Go for it!"

[first_and_final]

"Yeah, I'm gonna do it."

He changes in midair. Now he is humanish sparkly Milan with glorious sparkly silver wings and lovely sparkly silver tail and shining silver dragon eyes (he glimpsed their reflection in the lake and adored them) and he is just a little taller than he used to be, but not that much, and flying with wings continues to be so much fun. Redesigning his clothes on the fly (heh) to fit the wings and tail was kind of hard, but he thinks he did okay.

[ertia]

"Oh. You're. Still really pretty."

[first_and_final]

...Milan grins.

[ertia]

Kithabel looks at him for about six seconds, and then she makes a "fuck it" gesture and kisses him.

[first_and_final]

Flying kisses! THIS IS THE GREATEST THING IN THE HISTORY OF THINGS.