well-behaved doors

[campanas]

Pen' was just going to go practice singing. (She likes singing. The words are all lined up for her already and she doesn't get them wrong.) But this doesn't look like the practice room. So it's probably the magic restaurant.

Pen knows about the magic restaurant! You can go in it, and get food or things to drink (she has bracelets!) and then you just go back out the door and it's been no time at all and you're right where you went in.

She goes in. She is going to have cake.

Comments

[campanas]

"What do you do when you wind?" asks Pen.

[beheld_beauty]

"What's the world like?" Rose asks Glass.

[thaumobabble]

"It's got its share of nastiness, which is very much concentrated in the dragons, I am not sure about this project of yours. My dragons have a penchant for treasure-hoarding too, but I think these guys are literally insatiable, which can't help. It'd be a perfectly nice world if it didn't have any dragons in it at all, but I suppose picking them all up and putting them somewhere else would be a complicated project."

[beheld_beauty]

"Safe for Jane, safe for standard-ward visitors?"

[thaumobabble]

"The world is, nothing will happen if you just walk through the door. If you want to know if the dragons can punch through your defenses usefully, you want Aurora, not me, if you want to be sure, but - there's some metacausality I don't really like floating around them. Sort of like Callahan's attractor for invariably winning lethal contests, but toned down. They don't have to win, but if you're in a fight with them it does have to be a fight, they've got a metacausal conspiracy objecting to circumventing them completely. I really don't think I like the idea of combining that with torching when they have to share space with humans, however cute the babies are."

[aestrix]

Yvae looks especially sad. Procellor frowns. "If you put the anchor down without permission, and without fulfilling the 'immortality to our children' part of the bargain, there will be a problem," he says, carefully. It's not a threat, but it is a warning. "If you don't do either, then I suppose I'll be disappointed, but we won't have a quarrel."

Ilayse jumps up and down a little. I do this! she says, and a little breeze swooshes around Pen.

Procellor glances at her, then warns, "Be careful, sweetie. Indoors that could be a problem."

Sorry, daddy, says Ilayse.

[thaumobabble]

"With any luck there's a mutually agreeable situation, but finding it means negotiating with the reality that exists, not a fiction," says Glass. "For example, if we just moved all the humans in the world to some part of it that did not have any dragons or any avenue for dragons to use to travel there, I'd have fewer misgivings about immortalizing some dragons. Moving the dragons would also work but I think you guys would be harder to move. You can close the door now, by the way, I've had a good look at the world and you're right here to be a dragon example."

[beheld_beauty]

"Does the insatiable hoarding thing look like it admits of editing, or should we call Lazarus for a consult on that...?"

[thaumobabble]

"Mmmm..." Glass squints at Procellor.

[aestrix]

Procellor closes the door. He looks between Glass and Rose. "Er. I don't mind being a test subject? If it kills me, though, wifey outside will not be pleased. But if my species has an 'insatiable hoarding' tendency, which I honestly think is completely true, I wouldn't mind being free of it."

[thaumobabble]

"I don't think it's attached to anything that could kill you, and I do think we could change it, if you agree - I think the agreeing is important."

[beheld_beauty]

"Is that sufficient to render them reasonably close to harmless, do you think? In disposition if not in theory."

[thaumobabble]

"It'd go a long way. They're not inherently murderous as a species."

[aestrix]

Procellor shrugs. "Alright then. Hit me with the magic fixer-thing, I consent if it'll let my children have immortality."

[thaumobabble]

"It's not a direct step from here to there. You're the test subject for the procedure, but your kids will have to agree to the change too for them to be safe as immortals."

[aestrix]

He shrugs again. "Okay, fine. But you test on me first, understand? If it goes wrong then I'll just be the results of the failed attempt and they'll be fine."

Yvae noses him, worried. He pats her, a little.

[thaumobabble]

"That's fine. I really don't think it will harm you."

[beheld_beauty]

"I would feel safer about it if Lazarus were consulted. When we tried editing Ansharil... well, we should have called Lazarus first then and I will do it now. You understand."

Glass does understand, Lazarus is fetched, Lazarus confirms Glass's diagnosis, Lazarus goes away again.

"All right. Are you ready?" Rose asks Procellor.

[aestrix]

Procellor nods. "Ready. I'm thinking very consenting thoughts."

[beheld_beauty]

She starts trying coins. When she gets to a hex (in her husband's beautiful colors), it disappears from her hand.

"All right?" she asks Procellor.

[aestrix]

He blinks a few times, saying nothing in reply. He's got a bit of adjusting to do in his head. Then he looks at Rose's Jane-gem, and tilts his head.

"Huh. That's interesting. Yeah, I'm fine. A large portion of what I did for the past several centuries makes absolutely no sense now, though. That diamond I started a war over wasn't even that pretty," he says, vaguely confused and embarrassed.

Daddy? asks Pyranir. Are you okay?

He grins at his child. "Yeah, I'm alright. I do believe I need to tell your mother about this, though."

[beheld_beauty]

"Go ahead. There's no rush."

[aestrix]

He plants a kiss on Yvae's head, gives Pyranir a pat on the head, and then heads outside to have a heart to heart with his mate. A few minutes later, both return, the mate in question in a human form and not looking particularly pleased about it.

Procellor says you - his exact words were, 'Rewired his brain to make some actual sense when shiny things are involved' - I'm not sure what he means but he wants me to consent, too? she says, a little confused. Did you hurt him?

"No, dear. I'm fine," he says, brightly. She gets a kiss on the cheek. "It's actually really nice to not want to covet and collect all gems and treasure everywhere. Who knew."

His mate makes an uncommitted sound.

[beheld_beauty]

"Procellor volunteered to be the test subject for a magical edit that removed his impulse to hoard," says Rose, "which in Glass's estimation makes dragons a sufficiently safe target for torchability. Since he didn't want us to try it for the first time on one of the little ones."

[aestrix]

Oh, she says. ... That is something he would do, yes.

He grins at her. "Will it help if I say I'm fine again?"

It might not - she begins, and then he interrupts her by taking her hand, twirling her around a little, dipping her, and kissing her. Every hatchling in the room rolls their eyes and looks away. It takes a little while, but eventually he rights her and goes on like nothing happened, aside from the vague grin on his face.

A little dazed, she says, ... Okay. Consenting now. Mate says it's fine, it's fine.