Is a thought that tragically occurs but thankfully doesn't stick. It's a departure from the formality he's used to, but she probably means special project like a fun side gig, a hobby; not a highly illegal experiment that'd get you arrested in 194 countries. Or a euphemism. ]
Yeah, that's— that makes sense. The direction's fine. [ He's pushed out of his chair to better reach the tea, shifting some garbage Orlesian poetry onto the spill to halt its progress. Whoever had said the libraries (and Orlesian) would be pointless was right. Once that's done, he reaches for one of the scrolls she's just dropped. ] Is this your research?
In part. It is a combination of mine and Mr. Stark's, including some exploratory notes taken from conversation with a number of Riftwatch's mages. In addition to our work with the rifts, we've been exploring how to utilize lyrium as a conductor for Fade energy. [Fade-iation sounds absurd.] Not raw lyrium, obviously. But how the refined product might be adapted for use by non-mages to achieve similar effects. Personally I would like very much to study the abilities some Rifters like Madame Baudin have developed, as I believe that may reveal some interesting link between the two, but we are still very much in the preliminary stages of the research.
[Somewhere in there, she has fetched a seat in one of the other chairs and has set her chin in an upturned palm.]
[ Fitz stays standing for a moment to carefully rearrange the desk, shifting stacks over to the edge or onto another stray chair so they can see each other across it. He isn't really looking at what he's doing, focus on her while she talks. He eases back into his chair somewhere around Madame Baudin. ]
Yeah, sorry— [ One hand comes up to pinch the bridge of his nose as he sifts through what she's said, what he already knows. ] Madame Baudin— what are her abilities, exactly?
[ He's heard of her. Maybe? He's working with an entirely new set of data, here. It's kind of a mess, not helped by how much of the literature considers every single useful topic off-limits or seems more interested in fear-mongering. ] And why not raw lyrium?
Madame Baudin - she is the Provost's wife -, expressed months ago that in a life or death situation she found that her rift's shard expelled a sudden force of magical energy which could be directed at an enemy. I care less for the combat applications and more for the question of how the energy is generated and released, and whether all shards have the potential to do so and if not - why? I've been here for over a year and have noticed very little change in my own connection to the thing. [She wiggles her fingers for emphasis, that sickly green gash blinking cheerfully in her palm.] Granted, I believe Madame Baudin has been afflicted with a shard for quite some time. I don't know that anyone has done a survey...
[Actually, come to think of it-- While continuing to talk, Wysteria produces a pen from... somewhere? Up her sleeve, perhaps. Or maybe it's drawn from the up twist of her hair, or a pocket in her skirts. One moment, her hands are open and in the other, she is in possession of a writing implement and taking a note in the corner of one of the pages on the table between them.]
As for the lyrium. In it's raw state, it's quite hazardous to anyone who isn't a dwarf or a Tranquil - a mage, who has been... let us say forcibly divorced from their magic, and who has had their relationship to this plane changed as a result. I've never actually met a Tranquil, but I have seen some version of the process of creating one. For anyone who is not in one of those two groups, exposure causes madness and death and madness-related death.
The difficulty, of course, is that raw lyrium is the sort which channels the same energy from the Fade that a mage does. It's used for permanently enchanting objects - for making flaming swords and magic rings and all those sorts of things -, whereas processed lyrium is primarily used by Templars and mages and in draughts and alchemical blends and so forth and is perfectly[ish] safe for handling and consumption and so on, but has very little permanence. And naturally is is all more complicated than that, but that is the most general overview. I might recommend a few titles from the Gallows library if you're interested in the subject.
[ This is, objectively, a lot. But also: this is his jam, and he's usually either the one rambling or listening to Jemma ramble, so there's nothing immediately offsetting about the sheer quantity of words.
Not on the social side, anyway. The processing side is another issue, and she's only a couple of words in when he glances at the table for his notebook. It's half buried under one of the stacks he just moved, and once he's got it clear of that it's somehow gotten some tea on the corner, but he ignores that in favor of flipping it open to take notes. Extremely messy and extremely scattered notes, like mdm baudin? and rift shard/weapon/energy and dwarf/tranquil immunity. Notes that require context or translation, later, and emphasis on assigning shorthand meaning to new words.
In between the notes are new thoughts, not paraphrased: raw lyrium=create? and lyrium/darkhold/dark matter. The scratch of his pen stops a few seconds after she pauses for breath. He's looking at the notebook instead of her, clearly caught up in thought. ]
And— [ Start, stop. He does that a lot, tangibly switching thoughts mid-sentence. ] Sorry, where did you say you were from, again?
[ She didn't, but he's still got the tone of someone who's lost track of something. ]
[In the long, long line of questions that she might have anticipated - having been in the reverse position and having been the one asking a seemingly unending series of them -, that clearly had been nowhere on the list. Wysteria's own pen pauses midway through scratching out a few book titles (which she is going to give him regardless of whether he requests them; they are important reading and he will need to do his studies if he is to be useful to them).
She blinks at him.]
Oh. Er-- Imperial Kalvad?
[It sounds like a question. That's not what she means.]
[ Fitz, a veteran of making things sound like questions when they aren't or making things sound like statements when they're questions, doesn't miss a beat. ]
Is that... [ Where do you even start with this line of questioning. He wrestles with indecision for a moment, then shifts his gaze up to her. ] That's a country, yeah? Do you have a name for your planet?
[ Maybe that's a big leap. Does her world do planets yet? When did society make the leap from grasping stars and constellations and other, actual worlds? ] Or— your technology, actually, let's start there. What's it like.
Ah, it's-- yes. It's a planet. I mean, no. I mean that we have planets, but that Kalvad is a country on-- [she sets down her pen. Re-calibrates.] Kalvad is currently - or was currently, at the time I left it - going through a period of change. So it is difficult to--
[Start big, go small.]
Kalvadan technology is a combination of mechanization and enchantment. The empire used to be build on its interests abroad and local agricultural markets. Small industry, local production, and so on, but in the last generation as Talent has become more widely accessible, we've moved into automation. For example, when I first began my apprenticeship my work revolved around the maintenance of enchantments on the large looms in the spinning district. They do textile production? And er... [Wysteria glances about the room as if trying to grasp the particulars.] We have lights indoors? Other than candles, I mean. Not everywhere. We had lamps where I grew up. But in Somerset, the city's prominent quarters have all been tied into the-- well, the concept of the Veil here is not so different from it. The space between spaces. But the magic there isn't like it is here. Or it hasn't been for some time. It is more [searching for the word] formulaic?
[ More magic. "Talent"? There's a passing irritation at the classification, if only because it's generally very vague and unhelpful. But then she keeps talking, and there's some actual promise in her attempts to explain it — the space between spaces. Formulaic. That means rules, logic. ]
Like Hell. [ He says, casually, then deeply regrets the fact that he's just said "Hell" in an academic context. His gaze drops to his notes. Breaking eye contact makes it easier to think; he isn't really looking at them. ] There's an object in my world that's from another dimension. A space between. It's capable of things that look a lot like magic— enchantments, whatever.
[ It's an uncomfortable topic. Too little to do with science, too much to do with Ophelia. And because, ultimately, relating things he doesn't understand about other worlds to things he doesn't understand about his world doesn't gain him much ground. He glances up again, fidgeting idly with the pen in his hands. ]
Well-studied, [is the prompt response.] Though it's much less dangerous than the kind here as well. Magicians-- er, mages is what that word means. Or partly. There are other kinds of magic users where I come from as well, but that's-- forget about that. It's not really an important distinction. Magicians in Kalvad don't have to worry about demons or being turned into abominations, and magic in Kalvad is usually much weaker than it is here. Or rather, the mages are. The average Thedosian mage seems to be able to channel more energy from the Fade than what an average Kalvadan mage can assemble. So the danger in Kalvad is more to do with how certain things are augmented by magic rather than the casting and raw ability itself. But that's really true with mostly anything, I suppose. A fork's pointy end could technically be dangerous depending on what you use it for. Which is a stupid analogy, but you get what I mean.
But also I mean that the shape of magic in Kalvad is just... different from how it's formed here. I could draw you diagrams of magic there, but the closest equivalent here is runes and ward sigils. Which isn't to say there isn't order to magic in Thedas, but it's a different kind of arrangement entirely.
[Is this too much? It feels like too much, and she can't tell if it's because it's really too many details or if it's because they've all become strangely unfamiliar in her own mouth for having hardly spoken about them.]
[ Magic with diagrams sounds great, honestly. He can cope with things being new or impossible on the surface as long as they've got some kind of internal logic. It feels like a stepping stone between what he knows and what they're dealing with here, and he's fully ready to compare forks to nuclear fission when she asks him a question.
Now it's his turn to freeze up, but it feels different. Wary. ]
A book. [ Is the flat answer, landing like a dead weight. After a beat: ] The Darkhold. It's... made of material from another dimension. Material we've got in our world, but... it behaved differently. [ Which is a lot of words to say nothing concrete. Carefully, ] It contained all knowledge, but it'd only show you what it wanted. Or what you wanted it to show you, maybe. But— [ A short breath, delibrate. ] It's back in Hell where it belongs.
[ There's an edge to the last sentence, a blend of reproach and regret. His confidence steadies immediately after, like he's cleared some kind of hurdle; he drops the pen, leans forward onto his elbows and lightly drags his hands over his face. ]
So it's not what caused this. [ hoPEFULLY. ] But that's something in common between three worlds. We've all channeled energy from other dimensions.
[ nts: very specific questions for the next Rifter survey ]
[ please do not ask him about Hell he cannot give you answers ]
No— yes. We are. Yours and ours and this one, counting the Fade. [ Dreams or dimensions, same thing. ] We've probably all been poking holes into the same dimension this whole time.
[ He doesn't know what the Fade looks like, and he's only seen the halfway to Hell. It's wild speculation, honestly. You gotta start somewhere. ]
Oh. [She laughs. It's a bright noise, cheerful and honest. Good humored self deprecation (which is rare, particularly today though Mr. Fitz is hardly in the position to appreciate it).] This one. Yes of course. I was thinking perhaps of Miss Davies or Miss Jones. And I believe Madame de Cedoux is some kind of hedge witch as well.
[Cue another note scratched alongside 'Rift shard energy?' which more or less equates to 'what is magic everywhere?' She punctuates it with a satisfied hum, saying,]
This is precisely what I meant about fresh eyes.
Edited (HTML I swear to god) 2020-03-09 23:17 (UTC)
[ More names. He almost writes them down, feels a bit weird at the prospect of making lists of people with special abilities — shards, whatever — and doesn't. He'll remember them. Maybe.
Her pleased comment earns a brief smile, polite and restrained and very obviously out of practice. ] You said you want to test the lyrium. Because of its connection to the Fade, or— [ a quick glance at his notes ] The shards' capabilities. Have you worked out any methods for that?
The use of lyrium is all still very theoretical, [which she says promptly enough that it definitely doesn't sound exactly like 'Really, I swear; I know nothing about any secret tech in Tony Stark's chest cavity and have certainly not sworn an oath to not blab outright about it,' but it does sound slightly fishy.] But conceptually, we have some ideas of how processed lyrium might be reactivated, so to speak. As I said, it is still very much in the development process. But should it work, I have every intention of incorporating the theory into my project's design. The stability of processed lyrium rather than being reliant on someone who could do proper enchantment would—
[Well. In any case.]
If the rift shards are drawing on the same energy as the rifts themselves, I would expect Mr. Stark's thaumoscope might be adapted to measure that power on a finer scale. Given what happens when a person with a shard is removed from others like them for long periods of time, I don't believe they're fully latent when not actively closing a rift or blasting out energy fields. I suspect they're simply emitting... Fade stuff at a level so low that we don't realize it. From there it's just a matter of taking measurements from the afflicted population.
—Oh. [She writes down two additional notes: rifter vs thedosian? mage vs. ...not mage?]
That makes sense. [ Back to science and away from Hell is clearly more comfortable; he leans back in his chair, frowning down at his notes. ] It'd be helpful to know what sort of energy it is. Fade stuff, obviously, but— if they're conduits, or if they're generating energy of their own. And if they respond to rifts and other shards because they're... batteries? Circuits?
[ He trails off, visibly ticking off a few silent thoughts before switching back to out-loud thoughts, a little abrupt. ] Or they're just magnets. Has Stark said anything about magnetic fields?
[If that is a little overly prim, who can really say? Anyway, that's hardly the point.]
But a magnetic-like response doesn't seem so far removed from some of the reactions the shards have - not just to the rifts, but to one another as well. You likely haven't experienced this yet, but if you go on any long missions where you're the only one with a rift shard, you'll find that it eventually begins to be uncomfortable to be on your own. They must share a kind of resonance, or provide direction somehow. Like how a bit of metal can draw a compass point around, while the rifts themselves act as poles.
[ A pause as he chews on that information, giving his hand and the shard embedded there a dubious look. It's hidden when he's outdoors, usually, but wearing gloves inside? Weird. Finally, a very scientific observation: ]
That's creepy. [ The shards being connected tracks, of course, because they're very literally parts of a whole — it's more the impact on the host that's creepy. Forced connections and reliance. ] Have you run any tests on the range? Do they behave any differently when in direct contact with other shards?
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Is a thought that tragically occurs but thankfully doesn't stick. It's a departure from the formality he's used to, but she probably means special project like a fun side gig, a hobby; not a highly illegal experiment that'd get you arrested in 194 countries. Or a euphemism. ]
Yeah, that's— that makes sense. The direction's fine. [ He's pushed out of his chair to better reach the tea, shifting some garbage Orlesian poetry onto the spill to halt its progress. Whoever had said the libraries (and Orlesian) would be pointless was right. Once that's done, he reaches for one of the scrolls she's just dropped. ] Is this your research?
no subject
[Somewhere in there, she has fetched a seat in one of the other chairs and has set her chin in an upturned palm.]
You may of course ask me any questions you like.
no subject
Yeah, sorry— [ One hand comes up to pinch the bridge of his nose as he sifts through what she's said, what he already knows. ] Madame Baudin— what are her abilities, exactly?
[ He's heard of her. Maybe? He's working with an entirely new set of data, here. It's kind of a mess, not helped by how much of the literature considers every single useful topic off-limits or seems more interested in fear-mongering. ] And why not raw lyrium?
no subject
[Actually, come to think of it-- While continuing to talk, Wysteria produces a pen from... somewhere? Up her sleeve, perhaps. Or maybe it's drawn from the up twist of her hair, or a pocket in her skirts. One moment, her hands are open and in the other, she is in possession of a writing implement and taking a note in the corner of one of the pages on the table between them.]
As for the lyrium. In it's raw state, it's quite hazardous to anyone who isn't a dwarf or a Tranquil - a mage, who has been... let us say forcibly divorced from their magic, and who has had their relationship to this plane changed as a result. I've never actually met a Tranquil, but I have seen some version of the process of creating one. For anyone who is not in one of those two groups, exposure causes madness and death and madness-related death.
The difficulty, of course, is that raw lyrium is the sort which channels the same energy from the Fade that a mage does. It's used for permanently enchanting objects - for making flaming swords and magic rings and all those sorts of things -, whereas processed lyrium is primarily used by Templars and mages and in draughts and alchemical blends and so forth and is perfectly[ish] safe for handling and consumption and so on, but has very little permanence. And naturally is is all more complicated than that, but that is the most general overview. I might recommend a few titles from the Gallows library if you're interested in the subject.
[Deep breath.]
no subject
Not on the social side, anyway. The processing side is another issue, and she's only a couple of words in when he glances at the table for his notebook. It's half buried under one of the stacks he just moved, and once he's got it clear of that it's somehow gotten some tea on the corner, but he ignores that in favor of flipping it open to take notes. Extremely messy and extremely scattered notes, like mdm baudin? and rift shard/weapon/energy and dwarf/tranquil immunity. Notes that require context or translation, later, and emphasis on assigning shorthand meaning to new words.
In between the notes are new thoughts, not paraphrased: raw lyrium=create? and lyrium/darkhold/dark matter. The scratch of his pen stops a few seconds after she pauses for breath. He's looking at the notebook instead of her, clearly caught up in thought. ]
And— [ Start, stop. He does that a lot, tangibly switching thoughts mid-sentence. ] Sorry, where did you say you were from, again?
[ She didn't, but he's still got the tone of someone who's lost track of something. ]
no subject
She blinks at him.]
Oh. Er-- Imperial Kalvad?
[It sounds like a question. That's not what she means.]
no subject
Is that... [ Where do you even start with this line of questioning. He wrestles with indecision for a moment, then shifts his gaze up to her. ] That's a country, yeah? Do you have a name for your planet?
[ Maybe that's a big leap. Does her world do planets yet? When did society make the leap from grasping stars and constellations and other, actual worlds? ] Or— your technology, actually, let's start there. What's it like.
no subject
Ah, it's-- yes. It's a planet. I mean, no. I mean that we have planets, but that Kalvad is a country on-- [she sets down her pen. Re-calibrates.] Kalvad is currently - or was currently, at the time I left it - going through a period of change. So it is difficult to--
[Start big, go small.]
Kalvadan technology is a combination of mechanization and enchantment. The empire used to be build on its interests abroad and local agricultural markets. Small industry, local production, and so on, but in the last generation as Talent has become more widely accessible, we've moved into automation. For example, when I first began my apprenticeship my work revolved around the maintenance of enchantments on the large looms in the spinning district. They do textile production? And er... [Wysteria glances about the room as if trying to grasp the particulars.] We have lights indoors? Other than candles, I mean. Not everywhere. We had lamps where I grew up. But in Somerset, the city's prominent quarters have all been tied into the-- well, the concept of the Veil here is not so different from it. The space between spaces. But the magic there isn't like it is here. Or it hasn't been for some time. It is more [searching for the word] formulaic?
no subject
Like Hell. [ He says, casually, then deeply regrets the fact that he's just said "Hell" in an academic context. His gaze drops to his notes. Breaking eye contact makes it easier to think; he isn't really looking at them. ] There's an object in my world that's from another dimension. A space between. It's capable of things that look a lot like magic— enchantments, whatever.
[ It's an uncomfortable topic. Too little to do with science, too much to do with Ophelia. And because, ultimately, relating things he doesn't understand about other worlds to things he doesn't understand about his world doesn't gain him much ground. He glances up again, fidgeting idly with the pen in his hands. ]
Formulaic as in well-studied, or not dangerous?
no subject
But also I mean that the shape of magic in Kalvad is just... different from how it's formed here. I could draw you diagrams of magic there, but the closest equivalent here is runes and ward sigils. Which isn't to say there isn't order to magic in Thedas, but it's a different kind of arrangement entirely.
[Is this too much? It feels like too much, and she can't tell if it's because it's really too many details or if it's because they've all become strangely unfamiliar in her own mouth for having hardly spoken about them.]
What sort of object? Could you describe it?
no subject
Now it's his turn to freeze up, but it feels different. Wary. ]
A book. [ Is the flat answer, landing like a dead weight. After a beat: ] The Darkhold. It's... made of material from another dimension. Material we've got in our world, but... it behaved differently. [ Which is a lot of words to say nothing concrete. Carefully, ] It contained all knowledge, but it'd only show you what it wanted. Or what you wanted it to show you, maybe. But— [ A short breath, delibrate. ] It's back in Hell where it belongs.
[ There's an edge to the last sentence, a blend of reproach and regret. His confidence steadies immediately after, like he's cleared some kind of hurdle; he drops the pen, leans forward onto his elbows and lightly drags his hands over his face. ]
So it's not what caused this. [ hoPEFULLY. ] But that's something in common between three worlds. We've all channeled energy from other dimensions.
[ nts: very specific questions for the next Rifter survey ]
no subject
[Later: questions about whether that's a literal or a metaphorical hell, but that's really more simple curiosity than it is academic intrigue.]
no subject
No— yes. We are. Yours and ours and this one, counting the Fade. [ Dreams or dimensions, same thing. ] We've probably all been poking holes into the same dimension this whole time.
[ He doesn't know what the Fade looks like, and he's only seen the halfway to Hell. It's wild speculation, honestly. You gotta start somewhere. ]
no subject
[Cue another note scratched alongside 'Rift shard energy?' which more or less equates to 'what is magic everywhere?' She punctuates it with a satisfied hum, saying,]
This is precisely what I meant about fresh eyes.
no subject
Her pleased comment earns a brief smile, polite and restrained and very obviously out of practice. ] You said you want to test the lyrium. Because of its connection to the Fade, or— [ a quick glance at his notes ] The shards' capabilities. Have you worked out any methods for that?
[ She'd said "still in research", so maybe not. ]
no subject
[Well. In any case.]
If the rift shards are drawing on the same energy as the rifts themselves, I would expect Mr. Stark's thaumoscope might be adapted to measure that power on a finer scale. Given what happens when a person with a shard is removed from others like them for long periods of time, I don't believe they're fully latent when not actively closing a rift or blasting out energy fields. I suspect they're simply emitting... Fade stuff at a level so low that we don't realize it. From there it's just a matter of taking measurements from the afflicted population.
—Oh. [She writes down two additional notes: rifter vs thedosian? mage vs. ...not mage?]
no subject
[ He trails off, visibly ticking off a few silent thoughts before switching back to out-loud thoughts, a little abrupt. ] Or they're just magnets. Has Stark said anything about magnetic fields?
no subject
[If that is a little overly prim, who can really say? Anyway, that's hardly the point.]
But a magnetic-like response doesn't seem so far removed from some of the reactions the shards have - not just to the rifts, but to one another as well. You likely haven't experienced this yet, but if you go on any long missions where you're the only one with a rift shard, you'll find that it eventually begins to be uncomfortable to be on your own. They must share a kind of resonance, or provide direction somehow. Like how a bit of metal can draw a compass point around, while the rifts themselves act as poles.
no subject
That's creepy. [ The shards being connected tracks, of course, because they're very literally parts of a whole — it's more the impact on the host that's creepy. Forced connections and reliance. ] Have you run any tests on the range? Do they behave any differently when in direct contact with other shards?