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

[cardistry]

"Yeah," he says. "I have three forms; that's the one with the highest power output. But it's just shaped like a dude, it doesn't really work like one."

[incanted]

"How come we were able to beat it up if it's higher-power, was I just contributing that much mana or something?"

[cardistry]

"The control program wasn't really meant to run all my functions by itself," he says. "Without me in there it was kind of stupid. I think it was having a hard time deciding between killing us first and blowing up the planet first, so it couldn't really manage either one."

[incanted]

"It was smart enough to possess my twin," mutters Bella.

[cardistry]

"All that took was getting her to say the activation password. And I bet it wasn't even all that good at that."

[incanted]

"It did sound like she was arguing with it for a while until it told her it was a limited-time offer." Pause. "Can you possess people when you're all together, like it did Lexi?"

[cardistry]

"...It's not really possessing," he says. "But yeah, I guess I see why you'd call it that. Sure I can. Nobody who's not my wielder, though, which means - just you."

[incanted]

"Uh, so is there a phrase I should learn to avoid ever, ever saying?"

[cardistry]

"...No? Well, yes, but that's a separate issue, and anyway incantations don't work if you don't mean them, and you said you wouldn't torture me."

[incanted]

"...I'm not going to torture you," agrees Bella. "I don't know what that has to do with my question. And I don't think Lexi meant to get possessed, so obviously the meaning-it thing is a little flexible."

[cardistry]

The deck of cards shifts a little on the table.

"It's like this," he says. "The activation password linked them up enough that the control program could engage unison. There's more than one kind of unison, but the kind it was using is supposed to be for if the wielder is too hurt or unconscious or whatever to stay in the fight, and the device has to take over. You're already my wielder; if you say the activation password to me, all you get is a Barrier Jacket. If you want unison, I can do that, but even though I could do it any time I felt like it, I'm not going to unless you ask."

[incanted]

"I appreciate that. What does the other kind of unison do? Kinds? When might I want it?"

[cardistry]

"Unison has the highest possible power output," says Brilliance. "There's pretty much two kinds. One way is like you saw, and the other way it's the wielder whose face is showing and the device is just... backgrounded. If you wanted to do really big magic - especially if you wanted to fight against somebody who was actually hitting back - unison would be a good idea."

[incanted]

"Noted. Not that I should be predicating any plans on you sticking around, I think you've made it pretty clear you're not looking for a permanent arrangement and I only got spoken to at all because the world was going to end. Is there going to have to be some kind of complicated wielderhood-dissolution incantation to get you disentangled or is is that optional?"

[cardistry]

"...I don't know," he says uncomfortably.

[incanted]

"Are you hooked up to Lexi at all still since she was unisoned with the control program part?"

[cardistry]

"Nope."

[incanted]

"Why not?"

[cardistry]

"That went away when I ripped out the control program."

[incanted]

"Fair enough. Is it going to be a problem that you don't know how to unwielderify me? Like, it would suck if that turns out to be fatal, or something, I would really rather live forever. Speaking of which if you happen to have tips on designing a spell for that I would be much obliged."

[cardistry]

"Uh," he says. "I don't think being my wielder would be fatal. Why the hell would that be fatal?"

[incanted]

"I mean ceasing to be your wielder, since if I understand right you don't exactly have any way to know either way given how your last relationship in that category ended," Bella says. "If we try to hack together something to detach you from me so you can go off doing whatever, the detachment sounds like it might in theory not be great for my health, although I am pretty much just making paranoid guesses - actually, I'm not clear on what me being your wielder does besides give me some ethically dubious access privileges and a Barrier Jacket?"

[cardistry]

"...Access privileges in both directions is pretty much it," he says. "And the Barrier Jacket. And the stuff we can do with those access privileges, like unison."

[incanted]

"I would really like to know what access privileges those are, especially anything you can do to me and anything I could conceivably do to you by accident."

[cardistry]

"I can engage unison, put your Barrier Jacket on, put your Barrier Jacket away, and if I'm in staff form or unison I can draw on your mana to cast spells," he says. "I don't think there's anything you could do to me by accident. You could torture me but you'd have to be trying."