etraya | un: antigoneiguess

[oh great, he can fly. why can everyone else fly!!! LET KNIFE FLY.]

Um. Okay. Hang on, I guess.

[and unless he turns this shit off himself, he's gonna get her hotmiccing the entire time as she takes her little scurry-steppies around busy areas and hides from traffic (WHY IS IT SO LOUD AND SMELLY AAAAAAA) and dogs (AAAAAAAAAAAA) to find...ssssomething. something tall? sky-based.

oh hey this building has a ladder. climbing ASMR time only it's bad because the pace is really weird and hard to envision someone little doing it.

panting:] Ho-okay. Fuh. Uh...let, let's see...um... Oh, hey. That's a lot of water. And a big bridge-thing? I can see it from here. But uh... It'd take a long time for me to get that far. Like...maybe a day on foot?

[He should turn this off. But it’s actually incredibly funny to hear, so as he remains floating above the skyline, keeping an eye out for planes and birds, he waits for Antigone to finally have some sort of coherent response.]

Okay. I can tell you’re on a roof, but still vague. Pick out some things closer to you, like within a five minute walk. A billboard, anything that’s overly colorful? Maybe any places with a lot of greenery?

You mean aside from the maybe two trees I've seen the entire time? [she puffs, still catching her breath.] Urh...okay...if...if the sun still moves the right way, that bridge issss...north of me. Slightly west and north.

[what is a billboard. should she even ask. she's not asking. it'll just be words.

instead, she counts out the number of buildings by the nearest crossing facing north, then lists out their roof colors, then any street-facing coloration or signage without going into the verbiage (that legally distinct mcdonalds logo is now just "yellow arcs pointing down," for one), then the number of poles with color-changing lights, then the number of horseless wagons sitting static on the side of the road...

that one takes some recounting when people get in to drive them.]

Good enough.

[Maybe not the way he'd consider telling someone to navigate, considering how long that took, but it did work in the end. He's flies low enough to the tops of buildings that he's able to pick out the shape of that small little creature he's beginning to think of as a friend. He lands a little awkwardly as he begins to hover just an inch above the ground before dropping the anti-gravity, and as for what he's wearing, it's... not his normal wear.]

Don't envy those tiny legs in a place like this, that's for sure.

Edited 2025-08-01 03:18 (UTC)

[she's moved off the edge of the roof when she sees him coming, all the space in the world he needs to plop down given while pulling a too-big satchel of stuff along with her.

dry:] Yeah, it's almost like folk my shape don't belong here. Except not really! Did you see all the damn dogs these people trot around! I thought someone was going to try and rope me and drag me down the street for show!

[~~funny you should say that~~]

They would probably think you were a feral raccoon before a dog.

[Is this supposed to be a compliment?]

Do you have any humans you can hang out with? So you don't need to scuttle around everywhere?

[uneasily:] I'm not...into the idea of being baggage. That doesn't really make a good case for me being around at all, does it?

That's... not what I was trying to say.

[But it is, isn't it? Human privilege.]

It would be easier for you if you could ride around on someone's shoulder, right?

[Why does it feel like he's digging a deeper hole?]

Edited 2025-08-01 15:46 (UTC)

Only until people started stopping us to be nosy. I don't see others toting kitsune around that way, so it'd be real conspicuous, yeah?

[she waves it off.] This ain't what you came out here for, right? You wanted to see the tool.

I do.

[Although he feels a slight pang of sympathy there's no good solution for Antigone, is there? She's going to be spending this whole time running around on all fours...]

[BRO SHE'S NOT GONNA SCURRY!! STOP THINKING ABOUT RACCOONS!!! actually don't stop it's really funny

Antigone nods, rummaging in a pocket and lifting a purple planchette bigger than her hand, holding it up and to her eye. there's a little off-color glint in that concave glass; she may as well peep his magic makeup while he's there.

what ho, science boy: any latent magical energies swirling around you and your fancy duds?]

[ALL HE KNOWS IS RACCOONS!!!

What's funny about the magical energy around Jayce isn't that he's emitting any himself- he really seems just like a normal non-magical human. What's unusual is that there is a bright blue magical energy still present, clinging to his skin like cigarette smoke does to the walls of an apartment. He's not radiating it like he's the natural producer of magic, but rather that he's been around it long enough he's the one impacted by that radiation.]

Oh! Is that a magical item? What does it do?

Sees magic stuff. [she tilts her head with it, squinting.] So I can tell that like...well, for one, that magic is there, and then kind of get a feel for what sort. Abjuration, transmutation, all that junk...

It's sitting on you like a bad stink. Did you attune to something a while back?

[What sits on Jayce like a bad stink is raw, unaspected magic. The type that could be used for anything, and represents nothing specific.]

Huh? Attune?

[Not a word he's familiar with in this context.]

No. But magic has been the core of my research for about ten years. Oh, and I have this?

[He lifts up his wrist, where a bracelet is latched there. At the center is a magic stone, although it's "used up," like a stone that's run out of charges. It doesn't carry any stronger magic than the rest of him does.]

What does it say about this? Does it say who gave it to me?

[she draws out a thinking sound before lowering the planchette, the squint remaining.

she shrugs.] That little thing isn't doing much but sitting there, Long-Term. You've got more energy on you than anything you're wearing.

[a beat.]

Maybe someone can attune to you. [much to consider.]

[A little disappointing to hear about the stone on his bracelet, but... Not surprising. He determined it was empty long ago. But it would have been nice to hear there was magic just a small spark left in it.]

Attune to me? I can't do any magic.

[Does he really have enough of it clinging to him that he could use it somehow...?]

You don't have to. It's like...mm.

[she holds up a finger, stuffing the planchette away, then going into the satchel to ferret a bit before unrolling a carefully-packed red chocobo feather.]

Like this. [she twiddles it by the stem.] This thing can house a spell that I can activate later, if I wish. You're already storing something that can be used, and I bet someone clever enough could use that material for something.

So maybe watch your back around any warlock weridos? Don't wanna get put into another big experiment.

But I thought...

[Hang on. This is changing a lot for him.]

Mages take the natural magic present in the environment and use their own bodies to channel it into specific uses. I also understood that items could be infused with magic, through harnessing that natural magic. But you're implying that by being around it long enough, I'm a magical item?

[she stares at him rather blankly. Knife's knowledge of magic has been scrounged up through the need to survive...and having it stuffed down their throat by powers bigger than them. the ins and outs aren't something they learned beyond what would and wouldn't hurt them.

...maybe they should've studied a bit.

Antigone shrugs, gently rolling the feather back up in its cloth wrapping.]

There's people and things out there strong enough to exploit anything. You're as much a magical item as you are a blood-filled item. So I guess look out for vampires, too.

[He already knows at least one vampire. A nice one, at least...]

Great.

[Deep breaths.]

It's a good tool. I'm guessing it can see things invisible to the naked eye? So if the anomaly is invisible to use, that could pick up on it?

That's what I'm thinking. [beat.] ...If it's magical in nature, anyway. I squinted at some of those metal wagons, and there's not a lick of anything on them that can't just be seen regular.

This world, Earth- is very similar to the world a few other people in Etraya know. Even the name is the same, and what it lacks in magic, it has instead present with science, electricity, and nuclear energy. I'm not surprised you're not picking up much with it, but because this "cosmic anomaly" is so foreign even by this world's standards, I wouldn't be surprised if it was at least somewhat magic in nature. I'd say keep trying it out, but it's probably not going to show you much overall.

Something you should try to keep an eye out for instead is signs of its presence. We know it changes people's minds, but maybe it leaves behind a signature, somehow? Traces of arcane? Maybe even physical manifestations that alter the world around it, even with it imperceptible.

[Yap, yap, yap... Antigone turns and looks out at the skyline while Jayce is explaining, and it's a credit to Jayce that she's still marginally listening.

Wow, surprise surprise, they think. I'm of next to no use here. I knew I wasn't a fucking chosen one for a real purpose. Unless it's to watch people fail, I guess. Whatever.

she steps over to the edge to peer down.]

I guess...if people still act like people, I can sort of get that. But if we don't know how people here normally are, it's gonna take forever to figure out something's wrong.

[He says nothing, but keeps a wary eye out as Antigone stands so close to the edge.]

We can't go by personality alone. Humans here act like any other human I've met. There's good, there's bad, there's shades of gray. We have a short period of time to work with, and other problems to contest with- like the superpowered individuals of this world that might be wrecking havoc against their normal standards.

That's why we'll need to work together. I don't know your particular skill set, Antigone, but there's one thing I think I've noticed you're good at, and it's gut instinct. Trust it.

[one ear flicks as a cat's would, venting out a little fluster that Knife would rather die screaming than admit to. Antigone's face stays pointedly out of view while she grimaces and then levels it out - as if unsolicited compliments were as sour as lemon.]

Where I'm from, "superpowered individuals" either get shoved into towers, shoved into armies, or shoved into a hole by other such before too much of the population gets decimated.

[she nods toward the downtown area, the tallest buildings.] That what those are for, then?

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ever just sit on a comment bc u thought u hit enter 80 yrs ago

all the time

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