what in the longdark spitting-pit is that

[inourhead]

This was a bad idea this was a bad idea this was a bad idea.

Holly runs as fast as she can but the demon's faster. She has no idea where Lightning's gotten to; maybe he found a tree to climb. She on the other hand has been diverted into a treeless hill and she's careening down a slope, trying very hard not to trip.

And the demon's gaining on her.

She's never seen anything like it and neither has Crystal; maybe Book knows what it is but Book's asleep. It's mostly mouth - it looks like a cross between a floorlength mirror of a mouth and a snake to propel the mouth along.

And Holly's not fast enough.

The mouth catches her.





But it doesn't hurt.

Where are we?

----


with Minus (kappa)

with Mark (kappa)

with Max (Benedict)

in Terraria (kappa)

with Emma (Marri)

with Erin (Rockeye)

Comments

[unblinkered]

...he nods. And then says "Tross". There are too many words for speech, and her meaning too uncertain, to try to give her an English word. He... thinks she's correctly interpreting the meaning of the speech bubble? If she's not, this could get confusing.

[inourhead]

She looks at the paper again, then smiles and nods.

[unblinkered]

Okay, so... he points to his drawing of the nodding stick figure and says "yes", and his drawing of the head-shaking stick figure and says "no".

[inourhead]

She nods and approximately repeats "yes", then more ably does the same thing with "no" shaking her head.

[unblinkered]

Okay, so now that she-

He hears footsteps in the hall.

The other teachers are arriving- the students will be filing in within half an hour, and he'll have to explain what's going on to Gloria when she shows up in here. The impossible magic angle is not something he expected to have to saddle her with.

Half an hour, at most, is not enough time to teach an alien girl English and learn about her world and how it works. He's going to need to let Gloria take care of her, and she might find out about the swapping, and how's he going to explain this to her anyway, and if people find out, she'll...

Well, hang on. In stories, people keep the magic thing secret because they don't think anyone will believe them, or something, right? What would actually be the problem with telling the truth, here? He's pretty sure the government doesn't actually kidnap unusual people and lock them up in labs as test subjects. How would keeping this secret even remotely help?

So... priority number one, get her to cooperate and stay here and learn English, while he goes and teaches his class. So he'll have to explain...

He points at the strange characters she wrote in her speech bubble. "Word. Kweengow word." He grabs a random book, and points at a word in it. "English word." And another- "English word."

...one of those was actually a Spanish word, but he's hardly going to complicate matters with that.

[inourhead]

"Nlaaki word," she corrects, after a moment's thought, pointing at her speech bubble. "English word." Nod nod.

[unblinkered]

"Right! Yes!" Okay, so...

"Max teach Pyay English word." He points at the picture of Gloria. "Gloria teach Pyay English word."

[inourhead]

She writes some things down. "Pyay, no, Pyay -" she picks up some chalk. "Sohng, English word."

[unblinkered]

...he doesn't have the slightest idea what she's talking about. Has he been calling her by the wrong name, or something? He was pretty sure of how he was interpreting what she said, earlier...

"Sorry- Song?" He points to her. "Gloria teach Song English word?"

[inourhead]

"Sohng. Yes."

[unblinkered]

Right! Okay! That simple mistake is cleared up and resolved for good.

And... hm. He should teach her the word "means"- it'll simplify things for Gloria, probably. So... he needs some existing direct translation. He could use... what does he know... slossmoog, for flat? Did he tell her "flat"? He'll pick something else, now that he knows the name of her language.

He points at the stick figures for "yes" and "no", and says "Yes, no...", points at her, "in Nloggy?"

[inourhead]

"Yes, taan. Suug, hitao. No, kunue."

[unblinkered]

He's... not sure what soog or heetow are, but he can... probably ignore that? Coonway, that's what he confused for slossmoog earlier.

"Yes means taan, taan means yes. No means coonway, coonway means no."

[inourhead]

Sohng writes this down.

[unblinkered]

And... "Soog? Heetow?" He's not sure what those were meant to mean. Maybe she picked up some syllable and thought it meant "maybe"?

[inourhead]

"Taan means yes. Hitao means yes."

[unblinkered]

So... soog... she didn't answer that, so it'd be a part of speech... "and"? Yes taan, and hitao? Or "or". How does one... communicate logical operators?

Well, he could test one, and if she objects...

He'll need to teach "and" first, but that's probably easy. "Or" is the tricky one. He holds up a piece of chalk and says "chalk", and then a stick of gum and says "gum". Then he puts them down on the table next to each other, and says "Chalk and gum."

[inourhead]

"And means ruum," she tentatively concludes, taking notes.

[unblinkered]

...so soog is "or"? Or... some other part of speech. Or they have two words for "and". How can he...

OH

"...room means soog? Or room no means soog?"

[inourhead]

"Ruum no means soog."

[unblinkered]

Good, she inferred it from context, so...

"Room means soog or room no means soog... room no means soog... soog means 'or'?"

[inourhead]

This one she seems less confident in. She makes a wobbly gesture.

[unblinkered]

Hrm. Close enough?

He looks for chalk- he has an idea for what to do to illustrate it more specifically- when there's a knock on the door.

[inourhead]

Sohng jumps.

[alicornucopia]

It's Gloria, of course, and she's very surprised to see Max and Sohng and Sohng's mouse-accessorized backpack. "Wh- huh? Max, who's this?"