so there was this deck of cards, right

[lexicality]

Jessica's house is cute. Lexi could see doing a lot of her homework here, listening to the calming chatter of gossip and getting help from Jessica on math (Bella's no help there) and helping Jessica on English. Forks isn't so bad. She doesn't mind the rain as much as Bella does.

Jessica goes to pee before they even start their assignment, after just introducing Lexi to her mom and dad as "one of Chief Swan's kids", and Lexi doesn't want to do work by herself or she wouldn't have come over in the first place. She sits on the couch and plunks her bag down and waits. There's a random deck of cards over there; she picks it up and flips through it. She's been trying to learn to bridge-shuffle.

Comments

[incanted]

+...Not killing six billion people is extremely fucking important, but since not torturing people is also extremely fucking important I would have to be looking at a clear risk before I'd start trading them off against each other,+ Bella says slowly. +I will get jumpy if you say certain things, but it looks like that's kind of mutual, right, and being jumpy doesn't lead directly and unerringly to torturing you.+

[cardistry]

+I am not going to blow up your planet. I am not going to blow up your planet!+ says Brilliance. +I am really, really, really not going to blow up your planet! You could blow up your planet if you fired me up and cast the right spell, you'd probably even live through it if you transferred out quick enough, does that sound like fun to you? I bet it doesn't! Because you don't want to blow up your planet! And neither do I!+

[incanted]

+I'm pretty used to caring more about people not dying than anyone else around me,+ Bella says.

[cardistry]

+Yeah, well, maybe you do,+ says Brilliance. +I don't know, I'm not you. But last time I blew up a planet, I didn't even have a concept of six billion people. I'm not sure I could do it again even if I had to. And I don't have to, your house is not a secure lab in the middle of a military complex, I can just transfer out if I get scared enough. Wouldn't even have to knock down a wall.+

[incanted]

+That's good, I guess.+

[cardistry]

He sighs.

[incanted]

+We good? I want to help you not be scared of me, I don't know what to do to that end though.+

[cardistry]

+Not be scary?+ he suggests weakly.

[incanted]

+What'm I doing that's scary besides being slightly skittish around the resident superweapon I just met, or is that about it?+

[cardistry]

+...yeah, that's pretty much it,+ he says. +I mean, it's not that I don't get why you'd be skittish. I don't know. Maybe it would help if... if you talked more about why you feel like that, when it comes up? So then it's a conversation about us both being people with feelings, and not a conversation about how dangerously unpredictable I am?+

[incanted]

+Yeah, sure, I'm good at that kinda thing. You want to do some of that about the wildcard remark or is that just going forward?+

[cardistry]

+Might as well. If I know where you're coming from, maybe I can be less scary.+

[incanted]

+That'd be swell. So, like. Wildcards aren't - consistent. Like, I can't think of an actual card game example right now, but the idea is that it can be one thing one moment and another the next, so if you're going on about how you're like that, then no matter how sincerely you don't want to do something awful at this moment, I have no particular grounds to believe that you aren't going to change your mind next week.+

[cardistry]

+Gotcha,+ he says. +Whereas what I mean when I say I'm a wildcard is more like... I'm a person who wants things and does stuff, and sometimes the things I want might change unexpectedly or the stuff I do might not be what somebody else wants, but that's part of being a person, it's okay for me to be like that. It doesn't mean every single thing that's true about me might just up and disappear any second. It's just, you know, today I'm a Black Ghost deck, tomorrow I might be something cute I saw in a casino, maybe next week I'll be tarot cards, but any which way I'm still gonna be me.+

[incanted]

+Cosmetic changes don't alarm me,+ says Bella dryly.

[cardistry]

+Well, good,+ snorts Brilliance.

[incanted]

+I don't suppose you have a list of the bits of you that are stable. I could produce a list of those things about me, probably in order, too, but I'm weird.+

[cardistry]

+Not really,+ he says. +I just know 'em when I see 'em. Not wanting to blow up any planets is pretty damn stable; it'd have to change for some kind of reason, and I can't imagine one at all.+

[incanted]

+Anything I might find an unpleasant surprise that's somewhere between that and turning into tarot cards?+

[cardistry]

+Not that I can think of when you put it like that.+

[incanted]

+What do you mean, when I put it like that?+

[cardistry]

+It means I can't think of any but that might just be because I don't have a good idea of what you'd find an unpleasant surprise.+

[incanted]

+Mm. Well, I guess I'll let you know if we run into any and you can calibrate.+ She hmmms. +Anything else I could be doing to be more - hospitable?+

[cardistry]

+I don't really know,+ he says. +I'll let you know if we run into any, how 'bout that?+

[incanted]

+Sure.+ She repositions on the couch, grabs her notebook. +What spells have you got already installed that you don't mind telling me about?+