ioduanlogs | [OPEN] at least they haven't melted yet

Entry tags:

[OPEN] at least they haven't melted yet

Characters: Antarcticite + you??
Date: Throughout September.
Location: Throughout Aifaran.
Situation: Various affinity-specific open prompts!
Warnings/Rating: Prompt 2 might be a bit unsettling for people with a fear of heights. Otherwise go to town!

Faith 4: Fortune Favours the Perch (OPEN)

This is, quite frankly, more attention than Antarcticite has received in their several centuries’ long lifespan, and they don’t like it one bit.

The mottled butterfly is fine company, of course. It isn’t the first one that Antarcticite has ever seen, given that they often stayed in solid form long enough into the very early spring to see the snow begin to melt, and the beginnings of flowers blooming among the frost. Late winter butterflies in their home were small white things though--they didn’t dazzle the bystander like this, let alone spend this much time perched on anyone’s ear. Antarcticite spends several hours seated quite still on a rock overlooking the sea with their insect companion, loathe to move lest they frighten it off.

Eventually it does take flight, but whatever time Antarcticite would like to spend mulling over the pleasant mystery of that encounter is used up by the arrival of several kedan Ban Om devotees, all of whom seem to think it is perfectly appropriate to push their odd trinkets towards their hands. Startled and discomfited, Antarcticite scrambles down off of the rock and begins to back away along the surf.

“No,” they insist earnestly, holding up both hands to ward off the gifts, “no, I don’t need anything like that..!”

The kedan exchange confused looks with each other, before several begin speaking at once to try to explain the gesture--but Antarcticite, rather overwhelmed by all this attention at once, appears to be a hair’s breadth away from turning tail and bolting directly into the sea.

Sci-Tech 1: Mission Grime (OPEN)

Antarcticite is not familiar enough with Aifaran’s technology to be truly unsettled by most of it backfiring on them out of nowhere in the days immediately following their foray into the shunt with Rutile and Padparadscha. Maybe yimos are supposed to spontaneously turn on and off; it seems a strange functionality to design into a device, but given the other strange things they’ve witnessed since their arrival, they don’t find it too surprising.

What does strike them as alarming is the skytrain suddenly grinding to a stop several hundred feet above the ground.

It’s only alarming for them because they know that even should the train collapse, shattering them upon impact, Rutile would (most likely) be able to reassemble them. (They think. They hope.) Given the reactions of the living things around them who begin to mutter and pace and panic, however, they would not be so easy to reassemble after impact.

The train conductor’s voice crackles across the loudspeaker with, “Attention, passengers, there’s been, uh, a mechanical issue with the train. Just sit tight, response personnel are on their way--”

Above them, the lights flicker ominously, before fizzling out into nothingness. A hushed silence falls over the whole train car.

“...just, uh. Just hang in there, folks.” Click.

Somewhere else on the train, a baby starts to cry. For their part, Antarcticite gets up and approaches one of the windows, as though trying to determine how best to open it.

Meta 2: The Tide is High (OPEN)

Ending up shoulder-deep in rising seawater might be a life threatening proposition for other Dreamfolk beset by the dreaming sickness, but all Antarcticite discovers upon coming to their senses is that the vast majority of the white powder covering up their translucent crystalline structure has been washed away by the salt. They startle the poor Erol’an rescuers who come to fish them out, but frankly, they’ve seen stranger things than a human-shaped crystal that walks, talks, and speaks at this point.

They wade ashore and gratefully accept the towel that is given to them, delicately dabbing at their exposed arms and legs with a worried frown creasing their brows. Obviously both Rutile and Padparadscha have found an adequate substitute for the powder flowers that they used back home, and for the waterproof resin that kept the powder from running in the rain; they will simply have to seek them out and enquire about it.

Once they’ve dried off, and are able to fend off the Erol’an do-gooders who keep trying to offer them tea and food. “No, thank you,” they insist mechanically, “I don’t eat.”

A few of them blink. “...you don’t… what?”

Antarcticite sighs.

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Tony doesn't take the train often – why bother, when he can fly everywhere? – but he's experimenting with leaving the armor in the workshop to do grunt work while he's out on jobs. It's an extremely weird experience, semi-consciously controlling the suit in the back of his mind while he goes about his day, but he thinks he's starting to get the hang of it. (He hasn't accidentally set anything in the lab on fire, yet, anyway.) It's mentally exhausting, though, and tends to leave him with a nasty headache by the end of the day.

The train ride is a nice opportunity to relax a little. He's not really sleeping – several miles away, the suit is doing a casting run of some custom hardware one of his clients had requested – but he's managed to fall into a light doze. Which is rudely interrupted by the train coming to a sudden halt, and all the power in the car dying.

Tony groans and squints his eyes open. Golly, this looks like a job for Overworked Supergenius Mechanic Man! Oh goody! He stands and looks around the car. "I sure hope I get paid for this," he mutters to himself. Then addressing the rest of the passengers, he says, "It's okay, everybody. Probably just an electrical short. I'll go check it out. Stay in the car - if we can't get this one moving again we'll get you transferred to another train. Just sit tight." He nods at the person studying the window latches: they've got the right idea. "Let's see if we can open up some of those windows so it doesn't get too stuffy in here."

The calm, reassuring authority comes automatically, even though he's not technically in charge of anything. As is often the case in situations like this, most people are just happy to have someone else take the lead, and many of the passengers relax as soon as he's delivered his announcement.

Edited 2018-09-03 02:29 (UTC)

The window latch comes open without too much difficulty; on temperate days, it is no doubt enjoyable for living things to have some air circulation in a cramped vehicle like this while traveling across the city. Stuffy or breezy, it would make no difference to Antarcticite--not now that the Dreaming has seen fit to make them solid at such outrageously warm temperatures.

They glance backwards towards the human who appears to have taken control of the situation, experiencing a modicum of relief that they are careful not to let show on their face. They turn to face Tony and incline their head once politely; they probably come across as courteous, but, uh. Weird.

"Mechanical things seem to break down so often," they remark upon straightening, then gesture to Tony. "It's wise of the city to keep maintenance workers on hand just in case of an emergency." Yeah, weird.

They turn back to the window, frowning. "That's as far as I could get it to open." For safety reasons, the window doesn't lower itself by a wide margin, but it's narrow enough that Antarcticite, lithe as they are, could probably maneuver themselves through it. ...if they had a reason to, at any rate.

"Not an employee," Tony says tiredly, "just a guy who can fix anything. Want my business card?" he jokes, with a wan smile. If the other person's body language is a little off, Tony doesn't care; Dreamfolk bring all kinds of weirdness with them, and different social conventions rank pretty low on his weird-o-meter. "That's good enough, we just need a little air flow. I'm Tony, by the way." The introduction is an afterthought. Not because he's trying to be rude – he's just distracted and his head hurts.

He walks over to the door separating the cars. Fortunately, there's an emergency release lever, and he can see one on the outside of the next door, too, which means he doesn't have to lockpick his way up to the front and yell at someone about public transit safety features. Tony looks over the car full of nervous passengers and selects an Erol'a who looks young enough to be a Crest but old enough to have some authority as an adult with the other races. "Hey." Tony puts his hand on the kid's shoulder. "I'm going to head up to the front - can you make sure people don't leave the car? It's not safe to go out on the elevated track, so we need everybody to stay put." The kid looks surprised by being singled out, but nods confidently.

Then Tony turns back to the other Dreamer. "You want to come, or are you gonna stay?" They'd seemed to have the same inclination to take charge that Tony had, so he figured he'd offer.

"...I'm Tony, by the way."

"Antarcticite." It is who they are, as well as what they are, which is how Antarcticite has explained themselves to others in Aifaran who have given them strange looks over their introduction. Thankfully, they receive no such odd looks from Tony, who has already turned his attention back to one of the other junior Dreamfolk onboard the train to deliver instructions to them. The surety with which Tony takes control of the situation raises him considerably in Antarcticite's estimation; true, he will likely not survive the impact should the train come crashing to the ground, but he makes a good impression in the interim.

"You want to come, or are you gonna stay?"

That's a question that effectively snaps them out of their macabre reverie. Antarcticite blinks, then straightens their shoulders and nods once. "I'll come with you," they say and step after Tony. A beat before they add, a little uncertainly, "I don't have any business cards." Whatever those are.

"Antracti—" Ant... what. "Sorry. Is there a shorter version of that?" Tony's aware that that's kind of a rude question, but he really doesn't think he's going to be able to wrap his brain around that mouthful of a name right now. Asking for a nickname seems slightly less tacky than just referring to them as 'hey you.'

He opens the door and steps out onto the little platform connecting the two cars. Whatever happened to the train didn't feel like a derailment, but just in case, he peers up and down the tracks to check. "Looks fine on the tracks. Just a power outage." He might be reassuring the other passengers; he might just be muttering to himself.

A weary sigh, closed eyes, and, "Antarc will do," Antarcticite supplies.

They follow Tony towards the door leading out onto the small connecting platform and don't crowd him as he glances about outside. "Looks fine on the tracks. Just a power outage," Tony says.

Antarcticite snorts. "Yes," they agree and fish out their yimo, scowling down at its blank screen before pocketing it again. Useless device. "I don't understand how all of these machines are supposed to help this city function if they are always malfunctioning. Have you been here long? Is this normal?"

"Cool, that's way better." If he weren't so tired, that might have sounded sarcastic.

Tony frowns and glances back when Antarc pulls out their BSOD'd yimo to scowl at it, pausing before opening the door to the next car. "No, it's not normal. Your yimo's down too?" Tony pulls out his own to check it. It turns on, but clearly isn't happy about it. It lags and glitches out, and after a couple seconds Tony takes pity on it and shuts it down. "Yeah, that's definitely not normal. An EMP...?" Tony mutters, half to himself. "No, I would have felt that. Getting some weird interference with Extremis, though." He hadn't recognized it until now: he'd brushed off the extra mental strain and uncomfortable staticky feeling in his head as fatigue. "Maybe we hit some kind of electrical field. Probably blew the fuses on the train."

Padparadscha hasn't had the experience of being lured out into the sea just yet, though they have noticed the...interesting gatherings once or twice on their ventures closer to the shore. They'd assume it was some bizarre ritual related to one of the city's religions if not for the fact that Dreamfolk were turning up within it every so often.

There's one very recognisable Dreamfolk involved this time, though, and Padparadscha gives a soft laugh at Antarcticite's predicament as they approach across the sand.

"It's a nice colour, but I wouldn't leave yourself like that too long. Those birds that keep coming around might take an interest, huh?"

Well this is almost as mortifying as being caught with one's trousers down in a society where that actually matters.

With very wide eyes, Antarcticite tugs the towel that they have been provided more securely around themselves, hiding as much of their crystalline structure from view of the senior gem as they can. "I don't know what happened," they fumble to explain themselves to Padparadscha in embarrassment, and send a fleeting look around for their still-damp clothes. Did one of the Erol'an take them away to be dried? "One minute I was walking back towards the Bridge, and then suddenly..." They send another uncertain glance out across the waves, unsettled.

Padparadscha gives a soft laugh, waving a hand. "I've seen it happen a few times this month. It seems there's something strange going on with the sea again, though this is a little different to the other times."

They had the sea get a bit overly enthusiastic about their presence once a while ago, but it hadn't been anything like the scale of what's going on here. They do have to wonder if it might not have anything to do with Rutile's trip out to the barrier.

"In any case, it seems like you were far from the only one affected, but I doubt the helpers here will have much that's suited to help people like us."

"No, probably not," they agree, their eyes still on the surface of the waves as they come rolling in towards the shoreline. Whatever fear Antarcticite has felt towards the sea in the past, it has never been substantial enough to shake them like this--but then again, there was no semi-sentient but unseeable force at work on Earth that seemed to seize control of their body and force them to do things that they would never consider otherwise.

Recalling their condition, they look down at their bare, crystalline legs in embarrassment, tightening their grip on their towel. "I haven't seen anything at all like the powder flower berries we used at home," they admit, "I'm not sure how to..."

(Evidently, the thought of simply going about as they are, without any powder, has not occurred to them.)

Well, they were certainly going to encounter that problem before long, and Padparadscha laughs softly before tapping their own arm.

"It's not powder here, no, but I spoke with the scientists of this world not long after I arrived. There's an alternative now - and it doesn't wash off so easily as powder does, so you may not need to worry about it for a while after this."

True, long enough exposure to saltwater would probably still damage the coating and them, but it's certainly more efficient than the powder and resin combination that could wash off relatively easily regardless.

"We'll have to go back to the Dreaming Bridge for that, though."

If there is a noticeable difference between the remaining powder that still coats Antarcticite's limbs and face, and the substance that adheres to Padparadscha's body, Antarcticite can't discern it. They nevertheless peer with keen curiosity at Padparadscha's arm; some relief wells up inside of them. It will be good, they suppose, to have this sorted such that they won't have to worry about it as much going forward... and not to have yet another immediate reminder of the dramatic change that has transformed their existence.

"I don't mind leaving," they volunteer, then look awkwardly around for their clothes again. "If, ah, I can find what happened to my uniform..."

"It isn't dry yet," an Erol'an tells them apologetically, returning with the folded garment in her hands. "Not completely, at any rate. You're sure you won't be too cold from the damp?"

Too cold? Antarcticite tries not to snort and sneaks a hand out of their towel to pluck up their uniform. "I'll be fine, thank you."

Padparadscha laughs slightly at the exchange, waving a hand to the Erol'a. "It's a kind gesture, but we don't feel cold in the same way living things do. I'm sure it will be fine as long as the salt has been washed out of it."

Sea salt can damage, but cold doesn't hold much of a concern for people like them. Some of the surrounding helpers look even more confused overhearing that statement than they did at the comment about not eating earlier, and Padparadscha's faint, amused smile lingers as they start to turn away.

"Ah well. No use staying exposed longer than you need to, right?"

For Antarcticite especially, the cold would be a welcome familiarity from the strange heat of the tropical archipelago.

"Ah well. No use staying exposed longer than you need to, right?"

"No--I've already had one of those gyroshei come after me once," they agree with apprehension, and then hurry behind one of the raised tents on the shore to quickly shimmy their way back into their uniform. It is, as predicted, still damp, but it conceals most of the crystalline structure of their torso from view. They come back out shortly afterwards and stride quickly across the sand to catch up with Padparadscha.

"Sorry to make you wait," they apologize, chagrined, then head for the path that will lead back to the Dreaming Bridge.

Oh right, the birds. Padparadscha lets out a deep laugh at that. "Oh, I've had the same problem as well. Even when I'm covered up, there's a lot left uncovered."

They flick their hair back a little to make their meaning clearer. Even with a coating, there's always a person-sized amount of Padparadscha's gemstone visible.

In any case, it's not too much of a concern to have been left waiting for something like that, and Padparadscha just waves a hand and starts heading back towards the Bridge with them.

Once they get there, Padparadscha leads them up to their room, gesturing in the direction of the communal bathrooms.

"It'll be less messy if we do it in that tiled room, so if you want to wait in there a moment, I can find the new coating."

Padparadscha's hair is indeed A Lot--rather magnificently so. Antarcticite has never been overly concerned with appearances, in part because they do infrequently had company against whom to compare themselves. Still, it's difficult not to feel a bit lacklustre and uninspiring when standing next to one of the most competent and dazzling warriors among the lustrous.

They follow Padparadscha back to the Dreaming Bridge in pensive, introspective silence, and almost don't realize it when they stop and Padparadscha gives them those instructions. Antarcticite blinks once, then looks down at the spotty coverage their arms are offered by their remaining powder. "Ah, all right," they agree, they turn to head into the bathroom.

It's empty within, mercifully, but they still find themselves standing stiffly in front of on of the mirrors, tugging at their still damp uniform. It's one thing to have Adamant or Rutile cover them with powder or resin, but quite another to be so exposed in front of a gem of Padparadscha's calibre.

It doesn't take long for Padparadscha to come back in with a medium-sized cylindrical container, the lid still on it, a brush, and a cloth. The former two things are set aside for the moment as Padparadscha wets the cloth under the tap water.

"I'm not sure how this would react to going over remaining powder, so I'll ask you to wash the rest of it off first. I'd do it for you, but with the difference in our hardness, it'll be easier on you to do it yourself."

While Padparadscha has fine enough control over themselves that it's unlikely they'd break Antarc unless they intended to, it would have to be a scrupulously careful process. At least the brush doesn't have to be pressed down or anything else that might cause a crack.

"...I'd do it for you, but with the difference in our hardness, it'll be easier on you to do it yourself."

The comment is hardly intended as a slight--Padparadscha is, as always, a pragmatist--but Antarcticite cannot help but flinch and look aside. Wordlessly, they tug off their damp uniform again and fold it neatly aside, then step beneath one of the shower heads to wash the last remnants of their powder from their structure. It's a surreal experience, watching the water cascade across their arms and carry away with it the powder that they last remember applying to themselves in the clinic on Earth. But that isn't so, is it? They can remember the Chord Shore, and Phosphophyllite in their strange alloy prison, and the Lunarian arrow that struck and shattered them. This powder must be some creation of the Dreaming's; there is no good reason to feel the loss of it so keenly.

When they are finished, they stand translucent before Padparadscha, self-consciously folding their arms across their chest and averting their still quite blue eyes to the side. "It feels strange to be like this," they admit uncomfortably.

While Padparadscha has the cloth ready to clear out finer areas that the shower water might not hit, for now it seems like the more general stream of water has done a fine job overall. Nonetheless, they hand over the damp cloth before going over to borrow a towel for them to use.

"Go over between your fingers and around your nails once more, and any other place that might be harder to get to. Better to be safe with it than sorry."

In the meantime, though, they start to twist open the container, holding it rather carefully as they do. It's made of something softer than stone, so Padparadscha doesn't want to risk breaking it, even if they're generally on good enough terms with the local scientists that getting more wouldn't be much of an issue.

"Being a little bit uncovered is normal for me, but I think having our cover washed away completely is a bit strange for all of us, huh? It often means we've just been fixed."

They comply with Padparadscha's instructions, taking the cloth and carefully cleaning the remaining powder from their fingers. It's a good thing that this experiment is taking place indoors and out of sight of the gyroshei, because Antarcticite is all silvery sparkle and gleam and glitter now without the powder covering them up; no massive magpie would be able to resist such a prize.

"...I think having our cover washed away completely is a bit strange for all of us, huh? It often means we've just been fixed."

"It makes me think of Sensei, a little," they admit in a wistful sort of voice. "He is usually the one who had to fix me when I got careless and lost parts of myself. It didn't happen often," they're quick to add, as though being seen as even remotely incompetent in front of Padparadscha is unconscionable to them. "But--sometimes I wasn't fast enough."

They pause in their navel-gazing to look instead at the container Padparadscha is holding, their curiosity piqued. "That's the new cover?" they ask.

Padparadscha gives a soft laugh at that. All gems have their moments of failure - considering Antarcticite's low hardness, it's remarkable of itself that they weren't broken more often.

"Rutile has been the one fixing me for a long time now, but then, it's been such a long time since I was truly broken that I've almost forgotten how it feels."

Being 'incomplete' and being 'broken' are two different things, and while Padparadscha is incredibly used to the former, it doesn't present much opportunity for the latter to happen, especially with their hardness taken into account.

Once they twist the lid off the container, they show the contents to Antarcticite - it's a smooth, fairly thin liquid. "It is. It's similar to something they use in this world called 'paint', but made with gentler ingredients."

So it's essentially a drying liquid pigment - something that will wash off eventually with enough exposure, but otherwise stay fairly firm.

A strange thought, to be so old that the experiences of one's life have been forgotten over the years. Antarcticite cannot imagine forgetting what it was like to be broken, or to be shattered into a million tiny pieces, bits of their consciousness falling away fragment by glittering fragment. But Padparadscha has well over a thousand years of life under their belt that Antarcticite can only hope to experience here in Aifaran; surely if they will have to change a little in such a lifetime.

(Lots of things must be subject to change in such a lifetime, they think privately to themselves, recalling that glimpse of melancholy that Rutile had shown them when Antarcticite first arrived here.)

"How long does it last?" They come back to themselves and look questioningly to the senior gem, already reaching out with almost naive curiosity to dip a finger into the solution.

"It's lasted since I initally used it, and that was a few months ago now. It seems as if it stays well unless you're exposed to something like saltwater for too long, and even then it stays better than powder."

Perhaps about the same as powder with resin, but the removal of the resin step means this is honestly a more convenient option regardless. The fact of having to cover oneself with an additional layer whenever doing any work that involved water had always been a bit of an inconvenience, Padparadscha thought.

"Though I don't think venturing out into unknown seas is something any of us would consider a good idea anyway."

Padparadscha dips the brush into the coating, letting it cover most of the bristles but not quite to the base.]

Antarcticite looks at the white solution coating the bristles of the brush, and ends up extending an arm out towards Padparadscha without thinking. So often in their past, the responsibility for seeing to this part of the process belonged to Adamant, and occasionally Rutile if they woke in the dead of winter to continue their work. It does not occur to them to take the brush from Padparadscha instead--at least, not yet.

"...Though I don't think venturing out into unknown seas is something any of us would consider a good idea anyway."

"We ventured into that city in the shunt," they point out quietly, frowning a little as they say so. Their sense of duty and loyalty to the senior gems had compelled them to follow after Padparadscha and Rutile, overriding any instinct that might ward them off from behaving so recklessly. They peer up at Padparadscha again, curious. "Does that happen here often? Breaches from other worlds just--appearing out of nowhere like that."

Padparadscha would have to take over for at least some part of it anyway - nobody can see all of themselves - so they very carefully stabilise Antarc's hand with their own and start to apply the solution. There's a certain awareness to the motion, as if they're being extremely mindful of the amount of pressure they apply. Even a heavy touch from such a difference in hardness could produce serious damage.

Their expression grows more serious at that question, though they continue their work. "I believe that's the first time we've had one so large in the time I've been here. Usually the breaches are the other way around - things like the ship Narrakra disappearing for a month or two before that, though the crew reported having been lost for years."

Conan was beginning to wonder why it was that he kept running into this exact situation everywhere. Just how many of these devotees were there? And why hadn't they figured out yet that cornering dreamers with their trinkets was not working?

Casting a glance around for a convenient distraction, Conan notices a small cluster of gyroshei a short distance away. He fishes through his pockets to retrieve a coin and whistles loudly to get their attention, then angles the coin to catch the light and tosses it right in the center of the Ban Om devotees.

In retrospect, this perhaps should have been handled differently.

Only one of the gyroshei seems taken with the shiny coin, which is most certainly a blessing given the sheer immensity of the birds, and the one that lets out an ear-splitting squawk and launches itself into the midst of the Ban Om devotees is perhaps a juvenile. The kedan scatter with shouts of surprise and upset--and Antarcticite, stunned into wide-eyed motionlessness by the size of the bird, can only stare at it as it pecks the ground around the coin.

"What is that--" they start to say, but the rest of their sentence turns into a yelp as the gyroshei, spotting Antarcticite's far shinier crystalline hair, makes a lunge for their forelock. They scramble backwards, narrowly avoiding contact with the bird's beak.

....Of course. One problem solved just creates a new issue to deal with.

But after his last encounter with the gyroshei, Conan had prepared. They might have been absurdly huge birds, but they were still birds. All he needed was a distraction.

He retrieves a whistle from his bag as he walks up behind the gyroshei. Taking a deep breath, he blows into the whistle, creating a unpleasantly shrill noise that grates on the ears of everyone in the area. Startled at the unpleasant sound, the gyroshei makes one last half hearted reach for Antarctite's hair before taking to the air and leaving.

It is probably a good thing for the gyroshei in question that Conan succeeds in frightening it off when he does, for Antarcticite has managed to get a hand around the hilt of their sword. Thankfully, there is no need for them to unsheathe it and make a bloody mess in the sand, which is not something they would have particularly enjoyed doing, anyway. They have never been forced to kill another living thing before; death is final for animals in a way it just isn't for gems.

They quickly look to the clever junior who managed to spook the bird into flying off and, gathering their composure, straighten and square their shoulders. "Thank you," they tell Conan with a rather formal nod. "I appreciate your help."

"Glad to help," Conan says. "For both nuisances. I'm not sure which one is more annoying."

"The bird," Antarcticite replies flatly. "I would say the bird was definitely more annoying."

"At least it didn't actually carry you off," Conan points out irritably. "I had to get rescued from one a few days ago."

"It what?" Startled, Antarcticite looks after the departing gyroshei with clear apprehension on their face. "I thought they weren't interested in living things as prey."

"I think it wanted my glasses and watch, and ended up trying to carry me off." And Conan, unfortunately, was all of three feet tall and thirty pounds. When a bird that large picked him up, there wasn't that much he could do.

"Ah," they reply wisely, as though they are on the cusp of solving all of Conan's problems with their reply. They gesture with a gloved hand at his glasses. "Then you must remove them, and the birds won't trouble you anymore."

"I'm not going to take my glasses off just because there are some nuisance birds around. Besides, I need them."

Not to see, but as his disguise. The night vision and zoom function were useful as well.

"You need them?" Antarcticite repeats, bewilderment taking over their features. "What for?"

"For the usual reasons people wear glasses?"

This person was aware of what glasses usually did, right?

Not remotely.

"They don't seem to offer much in the way of protection for your face," they muse aloud.

"They're worn to correct vision."

Antarcticite looks properly startled then, though surely their confusion isn't too much of a mystery. It isn't as though gems have much need for visual aids, as any imperfections in their physiology are chiseled away at the time of their rather unconventional birth.

"Oh," they reply, frowning thoughtfully, and tilt their head some as they consider the wire frames sitting on Conan's face. Being a living thing sounds as though it is awash with inconveniences. "Well," they start again, rather awkwardly, but seem rather at a loss for what to say that won't come across as insensitive. ...or barbaric, as suggesting that Conan seek replacement eyes might not go over well.

What kind of a reaction was that? Conan peers suspiciously at Antarcticite. He was behaving like he had something more to say.

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[OPEN] at least they haven't melted yet

Sci-Tech

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Faith

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the best life coach

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