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

[inourhead]

"What's the student's name and situation, please?"

[unblinkered]

"Uh- she won't... be in your records, she's... we've... she's affiliated with..."

He's... going to have to lie about what he knows, since he can't have her demonstrate her magic over the phone. ...Probably.

"Basically... she- her name's Song- or, Pyay, maybe- she doesn't speak English, she's... lost, doesn't have anyone to contact or anywhere to go. We're kind of figuring out what happened, and how to help her, there are people here at the university who can, uh, vouch for her? There's gotta be- someone I can talk to, or something you can do, for..."

[inourhead]

"Sir, I don't see how this is a matter for Residence Life, if she isn't a student."

"What're they saying?" wonders Victoria.

[unblinkered]

"Not a student. So, it's none of their business. Pretty much what I expected."

To the phone: "Right, but- she will be a student, shortly, or- there's... she's important to the university, because..."

He's blanking. He keeps getting distracted by the absurdity of having to navigate all these layers of bureaucracy when magic is involved.

[inourhead]

"Give me the phone," says Victoria.

[unblinkered]

Max doesn't argue. He's got no problems with letting someone else handle this.

[inourhead]

"Hi," Victoria says. "He was a little confused - look, I'm a student, and the girl who needs a place to stay is my research subject. She doesn't speak English, which is why we're calling on her behalf. Can we treat her like an exchange student, or something?" Pause, pause, "Mmhm, hmm - yeah, I understand - I don't have a grant, but - nnnnot exactly. Look, do you not have any empty rooms, going spare...? Mmhm. ...Pet policy? Rats. No, no, I don't mean she has rats. It's mice. No, I understand. Ah-huh."

Victoria groans and hangs up. "No good. Maybe we should ask the professors or something. But they'll steal her."

[unblinkered]

Max sighs.

"So... see, she doesn't sleep, so she doesn't necessarily need a place of her own, as long as it's safe- if there's a library nearby that's open 24 hours, she could just stay there overnight- but she does need food, is the-"

And then he remembers.

"...she might not need... the first thing she did with magic, was... turn an apple core into like, a big peanut, somehow. She might be able to make her own food, but... I don't know what the limits on her power are. So I brought her to the physicists- but then I-"... was told by Gloria, but... "-realized, it'd be easier to just ask her, if I brought her to... you."

[inourhead]

"...turned an apple core into a peanut," says Victoria. She looks through the glossary that Sohng has been writing; neither "apple" nor "peanut" appears yet. "I don't know about just leaving her in a library. She seems pretty placid, but if somebody asks her what she's doing there she can't answer them, not yet, I'm impressed with how much she's already learned but she's not going to be able to handle being quizzed by a security guard in the next few hours. Which might not be such a problem if she weren't black, but, well."

[unblinkered]

"...I'd considered... that's why I didn't want to just let her out on the street, I thought... hm. Library, even... different standards of safe..."

Max had thought to himself, earlier, that since she didn't need to sleep, he could just let her do her own thing at night, but... he'd thought that, as a young black woman who didn't speak English, letting her out on the streets in the dark would not be the safest thing to do. He had to take care of her directly, because of that.

He briefly considers the idea that his consideration of her race ended the instant it stopped being useful as a justification for controlling her... and then does away with that consideration, judging it unpleasant.

[inourhead]

"I suppose we could give her a note to show to anyone who bothers her? 'I don't speak English and am waiting here for my friends from the university'. With phone numbers. But first we'd need to be able to tell her to stay put overnight. Trevor, does your watch have a second hand...?"

[unblinkered]

Trevor checks his wrist. "Yeah, it does. What's that got to do with anything? We going to teach her time?"

Max retrieves his phone.

[inourhead]

"Yes, so we can say 'sit there for ten hours' - let her see your wrist."

Sohng is presently acquainted with the concept of seconds, minutes, and, through further numerical extrapolation, hours. She learns that twenty-four hours is one day. She writes all this down.

[unblinkered]

Trevor, towards the end of this crash course in time, attempts to ask Sohng about Kuigao time. "Kweengow time? Kweengow, Nloggy, seconds, minutes, hours?"

[inourhead]

"Kuigao - maa." She does a little mathematical scratchwork. "Mmmm... two maaso three hour."

[unblinkered]

"And- how many- day- uh, hm..." Trevor begins consulting Sohng's glossary for words that might help him ask how long Kuigao days are.

Max pulls away the piece of paper Trevor is looking over. "They don't have days, actually. Her world- she mentioned there's more than one sun, and we couldn't get her to understand the concept of day and night, until-"

He stops, noticing Trevor's death glare. He lets go of the glossary paper, which Trevor slowly pulls back. "Thhhank you," he forces out, with the restraint audible in his voice.

Max backs up a little.

[inourhead]

"No days. Huh," says Victoria. "...I'm going to go ahead and call my girlfriend and ask if I can take her home. If not we can go with the overnight loitering with a note option." Victoria produces her own phone.

[unblinkered]

"If it helps, as far as I know she keeps the mice caged and asleep. Haven't seen her let them out for anything."

Max checks his email quickly. Liu hasn't responded to the materials question yet- Max sends him a followup email with- he looks up, quickly- Trevor and Victoria's university contact information, informing him that they'll know where the wizard is being kept.

[inourhead]

"Hiiii baby," Victoria says, when her girlfriend picks up the phone. "Uuuum, I have a favor to ask. There's this kid who basically dropped in my lap at school, and she speaks this totally unprecedented language, and - yes, but I'm your nerd - anyway - she doesn't have anywhere to go, she has only a few words of English, she looks about seventeen and she's black and I don't want her to spend the night on a park bench. Trevor can't take her, the fellow who brought her in doesn't seem to want to do it - I know, baby, the problem is she's got mice. I know, baby. ...Maybe. I'll see if I can get that across and get back to you? Okay. Love you too, baby."

Victoria hangs up. "She suggests that the mice could just stay in the office overnight. Now we get to figure out how to tell Sohng that..."

[unblinkered]

"Well... hm. I already told her that the man-eating clowns that devour people in their sleep such that everyone in her world is forced to magic their sleep into mice... don't exist here, but she still didn't seem too thrilled about the idea of sleeping. Had to go buy her these mice, earlier today, since a bunch of hers died for some reason."

Trevor stares.

"...I'm not making that up, by the way. She might be?"

[inourhead]

"Clowns?" says Victoria, first incredulously to Max, then, to Sohng, "Clowns?"

"Klaonso," says Sohng. "Person sleep, klaon eat sleep person."

"...Well, that's disturbing."

[unblinkered]

"And clowns are a type of... 'tlaa', which are... I don't know exactly, they're... monsters? Snake things? She claims that she got sent here when one of them... ate her, or something, I think. Not the clowns, a different thing."

[inourhead]

"Tlaa eat Sohng?" asks Victoria.

Sohng nods. "Tlaa eat Sohng and Pyay - and -" Words fail her, she makes a helpless gesture.

"This is so surreal," murmurs Victoria.

[unblinkered]

"The clowns are, as far as I know, not literal clowns. It's just, the word sounds the same. So... I don't know if that makes it any less surreal, actually."

Max turns to Sohng. It's worth asking again. "Song- Song and Pyay, Earth no clowns, Earth no tlaa- Song and Pyay sleep?"

[inourhead]

"No. Sleep! Hour hour hour sleep - no!"