high-energy physics

[warpfairy]

Federation political prisons are not particularly uncomfortable. She's not going anywhere, but she can read, she's considering taking up an instrument, the only really awkward thing is that she doesn't particularly want to be supervised while she's sweating her way through her next pon farr one way or another but that's years off. That and she wishes she'd taken longer to get caught. But she was running out of the really low-hanging fruit anyway.

This is what she signed up for. She makes up imaginary profiles of people on the planets she got to, people who can live longer fuller lives with the stars in reach, one per day. One per day and she'll have loads of estimated impact left unused when she dies. Perfectly reasonable tradeoff and she can still read books.

Someone wants to interview her about Vulcan; they don't want to lose anything that anybody remembers; she gives the interview and then picks up some poetry.

Comments

[lintamande]

"I think the King realizes that outcome needs to be avoided," Rúmil says.

[subtly_artistic]

"...presumably by agreeing with the Valar, one way or another."

[lintamande]

"Yes."

[warpfairy]

"I realize I'm not getting a balanced understanding but they sound like they might be more trouble than they're worth."

[subtly_artistic]

"...I don't think so, they've been highly inconvenient to a small subset of people in - in their care, but on net compared to viable alternatives, no."

[lintamande]

"They fought and stopped Melkor; no one else could have done that. They created the world and might actually be necessary to it, I'm not sure. And even beyond that - no one has died in Valinor," Rúmil says, "no one goes hungry or wanting for anything at all, everyone can study anything that interests them and usually find a Vala or Maia who will help with the research insofar as they're able - and on some tasks, they're tremendously able. Even with the slow pacing we are growing in leaps and bounds as a people. When they err they err very badly. But I don't think even Bella wishes she'd been summoned to a Noldo tribe besieged by monsters in the Outer Lands, where death was permanent..."

[subtly_artistic]

"...I mean, I could have helped with the monsters. Once I was convinced it was a science fantasy world. But. Yeah."

[warpfairy]

"All right. But I'm not sure they're a high bar to clear with such versatile magic on hand."

[subtly_artistic]

"Yeah."

[lintamande]

"I think we can do much better here," he agrees, "and 'paradise for Quendi' is a shockingly easy problem compared to the ones we'll be solving."

[subtly_artistic]

"Quendi are easy mode. ...Except Fëanáro. He's at least a medium."

[lintamande]

"What's a hard problem?" says Fëanáro wonderingly.

[subtly_artistic]

"Oh, if we were trying to import Materian gods or something, that would be really hard."

[lintamande]

"What about people who become gods, what are we going to do about those?"

[subtly_artistic]

"I'm not sure if ascension will happen outside Materia - there are some magical changes associated with it. If it does, well, I guess we maybe have a hard problem on hand."

[lintamande]

"We should just do it first. Just in case."

[subtly_artistic]

"If ascension happens outside Materia, getting there first seems like a plan to me."

[lintamande]

"How powerful wizards are we? Compared to ones in Materia? How many are there who are more powerful than us?"

[subtly_artistic]

"...power levels in Materia are prrrrretty much calibrated by how good you are at killing things, maybe if you have a soft specialty how much money you make. It's hard to evaluate us on either scale. If we go by something like mana capacity we're, maybe tenth or fifteenth percentile among people you can call wizards, now, but that underestimates us because we've got better-customized spells."

[lintamande]

"...a more selective teleport, maybe a teleport that takes other people and not you, would be a good next spell if we are expecting trouble. Also, those personal space rings you tried for someone in the Outer Lands! They work!"

[subtly_artistic]

"Oh good! Maybe we can work out an arrow deflection variant that works on energy weapons too."

[lintamande]

Rúmil nods. "I think Fëanáro's parents would be very much happier if they learned he had spells so that no one could touch him without permission or fire on him at all. And that reduces risk rather neatly."

[subtly_artistic]

Bella puts it on the list.

[lintamande]

The Quendi would also like to build themselves a nicer house. This one is a little stressful to live in.

[warpfairy]

T'Mir is perfectly happy living in her ship but it's not really designed for more than one person to inhabit.