the devil in the details

[isocelesmonster]

Who: Bill Cipher
Broadcast: none
Action: Anywhere in the fleet
When: The night of the 22nd, and ongoing.

Although ostensibly the Golden has a new crew member, there's no new person in attendance at any meals. No new faces in the hall, nothing additional in the laundry. One of the standard crew cabins has been sealed up as tight as a tomb, the brass nameplate on the door unhelpfully scratched out with something sharp. No noises at all come from inside.

It'd take a careful eye to notice the only other change: the same sharp instrument has been used to carve little eyes of providence, no bigger than a fingernail, in strategic public places around the ship. They're shallow markings, not deep enough to interfere with any of the working parts of the craft, and no great works of art - each little scrap of graffiti is a matter of five lines at most. But they're there - and if sometimes the way the gold of the metal hull glints in the pupil is strangely canny, it's probably nothing to be worried about.

(It's not that Bill doesn't care about the flesh puppets that make up his new crew - oh, he does, they're all going to get very careful scrutiny over the coming days - but more important is finding out what his new playground looks like.)

When the fleet sleeps, their minds open and blossom like night-blooming flowers, each one illuminating a new section of the shared dreaming plane. For all of their poetry, few humans realize that the state of dreaming is as real an exploration as whatever meaningless actions they take while awake. It's irrelevant to their survival, most days, so evolution has never sought to provide that particular revelation. They're a young species. Five senses, auditory languages, limited psychic potential, and as far as they know when they dream they're just watching random electrical impulses fire in their brains. Ha!

(There's an expression about a one-eyed man's status in a land of the blind, and Bill intends to make it a reality.)

He steps sideways out of the material world into the closest dream as easily as a three-dimensional being can move along any of their limited axes. He makes himself invisible, at first, just to get his bearings.

[Bill is visiting dreams, as a way of saying hello! His permissions post for this ability is here. I am treating this ability on an opt-in basis. If you didn't give me the okay, he won't be spying on your character at all tonight ~but where's the fun in that~?]
ZOGSLFTS GSRH DVZP ZMW RWOV GSVNV

RH ML NLIV BRVOWRMT YFG Z WIVZN

DSVM NLIMRMT GZPVH BLF UILN NB GSIZOO

YV TOZW R OVG BLF DZPV ZG ZOO

Comments

[flickerflash]

Perhaps I'm just short-sighted. It wouldn't be the first time I got things wrong. Terrible habit. [She peers down at the spyglass.] How far does it go for you?

[tetractys]

[Bill offers her a turn to look through the telescope, although it about two thirds too small for a human to use comfortably.]

TWO EYES WILL PLAY TRICKS ON YOU LIKE THAT! CAN'T FIND THE END, MYSELF. I'M SURE IT'LL TURN INTO SOMETHING ELSE WHENEVER IT FEELS LIKE IT, BUT IF THE TREES ARE NUMBERS IT'S POTENTIALLY INFINITE!

[flickerflash]

Infinitrees. [She giggles, and only takes a moment to try peering through the telescope. Too tiny. But the idea of an infinite forest is not one she dislikes.]

Maybe it's the forest of Pi! [Look it's the only number she likes.] We can find anything in there, I bet. Are you after something in particular?

[tetractys]

[What isn't he after? He is the most ambitious polygon you'll ever meet.]

I WAS JUST GONNA SAY SOMETHING LIKE THAT! THERE'S DEFINITELY SOMETHING IRREGULAR GOING ON. HEH.

[No? Too obscure a math pun for a kid?]

OH, I DON'T KNOW. SOMETHING WEIRD, SOMETHING EXCITING... THE BEST THINGS TO FIND AREN'T TANGIBLE!

[flickerflash]

[Yeah, sadly the irregular pun goes right over her head.]

What's tangible? Is that to do with hair?

[No dear, that's tangleable. SHE WILL FIND IT ANYWAY. Bravely approaching the infinite forest. Hopefully it's not full of creatures from the infinite farm.]

[tetractys]

[Bill follows her down, chattering away.]

HAIR IS TANGIBLE! SO'S A LOT OF OTHER STUFF! TANGIBLE THINGS ARE THINGS YOU CAN TOUCH! MORE ABSTRACT CONCEPTS LIKE "TRUTH" OR "LOYALTY" ARE INTANGIBLE! YOU CAN'T DROP EM ON YOUR FOOT, BECAUSE THEY BASICALLY DON'T EXIST EXCEPT IN HUMAN MINDS!

[The infinite farm would be a riot. Tipping an infinite cow is infinitely funny, Bill would know.]

[flickerflash]

Ooohhh. [Katie has learned a new word. That's kind of cool. She gives him a measuring look.]

Do you think dreams are tangible or in tangible?

[tetractys]

HUH. DO I THINK?

[Bill goes uncharacteristically quiet as they descend through the canopy. For someone that enjoys being the center of attention, he doesn't like talking about his own thought processes. Giving someone, even a child, a window into your psychology never ends in anything good.

He snaps out if it, and doubles down on being breezily cheerful.]

HM! FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A HUMAN, I'D SAY PROBABLY NOT! IT'S NOT A PERSISTENT WORLD, AND NOTHING YOU DO HERE HAS CONSEQUENCES! THAT'S PART OF WHY IT'S FUN!

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

[flickerflash]

From the perspective of a human, dreams are a waste of time.

[She grins, all teeth.] But I think dreams are much, much more important than anyone ever gives them credit for.

[tetractys]

[Bill doesn't have a mouth to smile back with, but his eye curves up in a pleased moon-shape again. It's a good answer. Whether she knows precisely how good is something he's interested to find out.]

WHAT MAKES YOU THINK SO?

I MEAN, HEY, IT'S WHERE I LIVE! THIS ISN'T ME DISAGREEING!

[flickerflash]

[It's a question she can't really answer. Dreams have the power to strengthen her and to hurt her, and even if she could be straightforward, she's not sure she should be in this case.]

Hmm. Well, you just answered it yourself, I think. [Which is also true in its own way.] It's possible to live in dreams. You're proof. You're not the only one. Why wouldn't it be important when it's a home? And humans create new homes all the time.

[And homes have doors.]

[tetractys]

DEVIL'S ADVOCATE HERE: I SAY I'M REAL, BUT FOR ALL YOU KNOW YOU JUST IMAGINED ME!

EVEN IF I'M BEING PERFECTLY HONEST, IT'S ONLY WHAT I'M ABLE TO PERCEIVE MYSELF! IF I DIDN'T EXIST BEFORE YOU FELL ASLEEP, IT'S POSSIBLE NEITHER OF US WOULD KNOW!

[flickerflash]

Perhaps I did imagine you! I'll be very proud of myself if I did. But if I'm talking to you now, you're real enough, no matter where you came from. It'd be very rude to try and tell you you didn't exist.

[tetractys]

HAH! THANKS, KID!

[Bill nudges her gently with ... what could only be very loosely defined as his elbow. It's more like the arbitrary spot at which his arm has decided it bends right now.]

WHAT'S REAL AND WHAT ISN'T IS PRETTY LOOSE IN HERE, ANYWAY! I DON'T GET HUNG UP ON THE EXISTENTIAL STUFF!

[flickerflash]

[Everything's real to the fae, but that's the fortunate (unfortunate?) result of having your feet in two separate dimensions at once. It's not something she really thinks on, because life is far more interesting now she sees weird shit following everyone around.]

Thinking too hard is probably bad for you anyway. You trip over your own thoughts. You could break something if you're not careful.

[tetractys]

OH, BELIEVE ME, IT'S ALREADY BROKEN!

[flickerflash]

Whoops. [She giggles.] You need to stop thinking so much, then. Would you like some superglue?

[tetractys]

NAH! IF THAT'S THE PRICE OF THINKING, I'D RATHER BE A LITTLE OFF! CAN'T JUST SKATE BY ON MY GOOD LOOKS AGAINST SOME OF THE DEEPER DREAM MONSTERS!

[flickerflash]

Well said. I bet you would annoy all the psychologists as much as I do. Have you met many deeper dream monsters?

[tetractys]

[Bill giggles. He doesn't have the heart to tell her what they call him down there in the primordial abyss, in the vast and boiling expanse that is the true, unordered face of the cosmos. Maybe later.]

HEY, IT'S NOT OUR FAULT THEY THINK FREE WILL IS SOMETHING THAT CAN BE CATEGORIZED INTO BOXES! TRYING TO PUT NAMES ON IDEAS IS LIKE TRYING TO EAT JELLO WITH RAZOR WIRE! ALL YOU'LL GET IS A BUNCH OF GOO, AND YOU MIGHT LOSE A FINGER!

[That simile got away from him.]

CAN'T EXPLORE THE CORNERS OF THIS PLACE WITHOUT BUMPING INTO SOMETHING THERE'S NO WORDS FOR YET! I'VE DONE IT A FEW TIMES. MAYBE THEY SHOULD TRY IT!

[flickerflash]

They should try eating jello with razorwire?

[She knows that's not what he meant, but lord that is fun to picture.]

[tetractys]

MAYBE IF I GET TO WATCH THEM!

[flickerflash]

We could take pictures and use them as a warning.

[tetractys]

HAHAHA. I LIKE THE WAY YOU THINK! IT'LL WORK ON BOTH PSYCHIATRISTS AND PEOPLE WHO HATE UTENSILS!

[flickerflash]

[She grins.] And then they'll stop trying to tell people how they ought to think. Or how to eat, really.