abheirrant | ❧ i n b o x

[Carlisle, unfortunately, suspects there is going to be more science.]

Let us start with the short version.

All right, let's see. [ He puts a hand to his chin for a moment, thinking over how to phrase this. There are some pretty advanced concepts involved, and even the simplest analogy that comes to mind is above Carlisle's current grasp of physics. So... perhaps a more philosophical approach? He'll try to keep it light on the math, anyway. ]

Short version: "Psionics," as a field of study, describes the ways in which conscious minds can directly interact with matter, energy, and force. It differs from magic in that it's both universally consistent and empirically verifiable.

[ And it differs from "The Secret" in that it's not just New Age bullshit. ]

[Carlisle's brow knits as he slides the page with the glyph under the mug with the sap.]

How is it consistent when the abilities vary between individuals? Or are there more technomancers in your world?

"Technokinetics," and no, not that I'm aware of. But - understand, that's like asking how chemistry can be consistent when acids and bases have different properties. Chemical phenomena are extremely diverse, but they're all explained by the same underlying forces. It's the same way with psionics.

[Carlisle makes a mental note of the corrected term, but he may still call Qubit a technomancer until the heat death of the sun.]

And you believe magic cannot be explained in the same way?

That's just it. If it can, then by definition, it's not magic.

[ He's growing more animated, starting to talk with his hands. Apparently this is something he's put a lot of thought into over the years. ]

The thing about magic is, it can't be defined by what it is - only what it's not. Let's take the glyphs you drew in the supermarket way back when, for instance. They produced enough energy to reduce several dozen zombies to ash, but how? All you used was ordinary chalk, CaCO₃. Inert at room temperature, electrical insulator, no psionic properties whatsoever. Nothing about the pattern you drew should have conducted any kind of energy. Or - the one you just carved into my door. The material of the door is unchanged, the glyph itself is literally made of nothing -

[ He catches himself rambling, pauses to dial it back. ] It's just the pattern, right? The only thing that changes a glyph's functionality is the pattern of lines and shapes. Its position, the materials it's made of - none of that matters.

[There's something about Qubit just kind of rambling for a bit that's actually... kind of comforting. Familiar. Carlisle catches himself smiling despite the fact their two methods are at absolute odds with one another, all because he recognizes the passion Qubit has for such thorough explanations.]

You do have a point, though the glyph doesn't produce the energy. The glyph reacts to the energy contained within it as dictated by those patterns and shapes, as well as any inscription one may put here.

[He points to the page beneath the mug, specifically to a space between the two largest circles where he's scrawled what appears to be a sentence in what could be more magical symbols, but they're likely just another language.]

[ Qubit tilts his head sideways to inspect the symbols. Arcane sigils, a foreign language - either way, it's Greek to him. But he gets the concept, essentially, and he nods. ]

Hm. Sort of like a digital circuit.

[ He honestly hadn't thought of it that way before. Hardwired logic in the lines, a "program" of sorts in the margin... but it's still magic, he recalls, before he can get too caught up in speculation. It's interesting, sure, but that's beside the point. ]

However. A glyph has no physical reservoir where energy is stored. The energy itself comes from your soul, which is a whole other can of worms. And there's input, but no interpreter to parse it.

What I'm getting at is, a glyph is essentially a metaphysical construct. Its effects may be concrete and observable, even measurable - but the principles behind them are not. And, I'm reluctantly forced to postulate, cannot be.

[Unfortunately, Carlisle has no point of reference for most of the terminology Qubit uses. He picks at his sleeve, casting his eyes toward his companion.]

Just because you cannot observe the principles behind something does not mean there are not ways to observe them. Perhaps we simply haven't discovered them yet. Something may work without either of us knowing how.

[Says the walking conundrum.]

Oh, of course. Naturally. I'm not at all trying to say "everything I don't understand yet is magic." If there is some sixth or seventh fundamental interaction that ties it all together, then by all means, I'd love to be the one to discover it. It's just ...

[ He taps his finger on the table a few times, debating how to phrase it. ]

... For practical purposes, I have to accept - at least until I can prove otherwise - that some phenomena are real without being explicable by any science known to man. Which flies in the face of virtually everything else I believe in, but -

[ He lets out a sigh, frustrated. He'd love it if unraveling the mysteries of existence were the only thing on his plate. But he's lived that way before, and there's really no going back to it. Not without losing sight of what truly matters. ]

[There's that smile again behind Carlisle's mask -- it's born of understanding, however sobering it may be.]

But we must accept, however difficult it may be, that there are some phenomena we simply can't explain, even if for a time. Did you know from birth there were other worlds out there, and that you could travel to them? Did you emerge from the womb knowing about these psionics and how they operate?

[He doesn't really mean for those questions to be answered, and so he continues:]

There is no shame in not knowing everything, Mister Qubit. You're still likely the smartest person I know.

[ Carlisle's right, of course. Qubit's ongoing frustration with magic is just one facet of something deeper. He'll never know everything. For all the vastness of his intellect, no matter how much he learns, there is always more. There will always be things he doesn't know. There may be things he cannot know, or that are unknowable. It's a hunger that will never be sated - and like all such hungers, it must not be overindulged.

But as dark as that line of thought is, the compliment draws a wry smile out of him. It's been a while since anyone explicitly told him that, and... well, it feels good. He doesn't like to think of himself as the kind of person who gets starved for external validation, but he is absolutely that kind of person. ]

Only "likely"? I'm losing my touch.

[ He's about to add something more sincere, but a distinct click from the teakettle draws his attention. It's been a few minutes, steam's rising from the top, and it's shut itself off automatically. ]

Ah. Water's done. [ He's just gonna go ahead and pour it into the teacups right away, sooo, hope this is the kind of tea where you're supposed to do that. ]

[It is, thankfully; the one in the mug for Qubit ends up a traditional, warm brown, while Carlisle's is more of an amber color, tinted by the sap he poured in. Last but not least, Carlisle places a couple of fingers on the glyph beneath his mug: it ignites, shining brightly for a few seconds before the light dissipates, the lines erased from the page as they appear to evaporate into steam.

Speaking of steam, his mug is now doing a lot of that. Carlisle seems pretty pleased.]

So in your world, is everything like this? [He gestures toward the kettle.]

[ Increasing the evaporation rate? He was wondering how having tea would actually work for Carlisle, considering his lack of a functional digestive system... ]

... Hm? Like - oh. [ He sets the kettle back down and unplugs it. ] Don't know that I'd say everything, but yeah, small appliances like this are common in most parts of the world. You'd also see electric toasters, microwave ovens, and so on.

[Lack of a functional digestive system, and he's an undead, rendering him largely impervious to mind-altering substances. Should the same defenses that protected Qubit from Carlisle's compulsion try to do the same for the sap in the tea, he may find that it doesn't have the same qualities anymore; the sap from the Goop Festival, once so potent that it left anyone who consumed even a small amount of it completely inebriated, isn't even trying to affect him anymore.

That's because Qubit is alive, and thanks to the glyph, it has been changed to affect only the dead. Carlisle closes his eyes as he brings the mug to his face, inhaling deeply.]

Such, ah. Appliances are either manual or magical in mine. The latter if you have the coin or the capacity for it.

[ It so happens that Qubit's psi-defenses don't do anything against chemical intoxicants or mind-altering substances (ask him about Scarecrow sometime), but he might notice the lack of effect in a few minutes. He swishes his teacup gently, letting it steep. ]

How prevalent are magic-users where you're from? I think you've mentioned healing magic is rare, but...

[Carlisle does the same, hoping some swishy encouragement will help his own drink work faster.]

Most people have some capacity for magic, though only trained magicians cast or channel, as I do. Many must utilize glyphs like these, but they do have the ability to activate them, even if they know not how to write them. Magic itself as a convenience for daily life is fairly common though, especially among human populations.

Edited 2020-02-26 18:51 (UTC)

[ Qubit nods, mentally taking note of the terminology. In general he's a stickler for calling things by their proper names, as demonstrated by his ongoing refusal to call eksth'alva anything else. ]

So you could take an ordinary teapot, paint it with the right glyph, and end up with a magical equivalent to this? [ Motioning at the kettle. ] That's interesting. I assumed you had to be a magician to do anything at all with it.

Oh no, not at all. Being a magician takes time and training, and most haven't the interest in such pursuits for what can ultimately be fickle work. An enchanter should have no trouble with employment, while an illusionist may have a much harder time making money. No one wants work from a mediocre illusionist. While someone may have the capacity to use magic, they might have a completely separate vocation, and instead utilize magic through glyphs like these as written by a glyphcrafter. For example:

[He takes that now-blank sheet from beneath his mug and draws three figures on it. While his illustrations of plants are precise and detailed, his humans could use some work.]

I told you about my uncles. Uncle Boris hadn't any magical ability [he taps on the figure on the far left, then moves to the one on the far right] while Uncle Benistad was a fabulously talented magician, completely capable -- if not better -- in multiple schools of magic. However, Uncle Benistad -- the schools in which he was gifted aside -- was also tragically lazy. Uncle Boris, while he could not activate even the most basic of glyphs, took a great interest in the craft and wrote many himself, and so if either of them needed magic that was out of his brother's purview, he would craft an appropriate glyph and let Benistad activate it. They both technically took part in the art of magic, even if one did no magic at all.

[He taps the central figure.]

My father, while not as talented as Benistad, had the capacity for magic, but no real interest in it. Uncle Boris crafted glyphs for him, as well: enchantments for his arrows, fire-starters, simple charms and the like. Anything he needed and could not buy from another glyphcrafter while out and about. He'd simply carry the glyphs with him and activate them as necessary, but no one would have called him a magician.

Edited 2020-02-26 22:49 (UTC)

[ So you don't need any magical ability to write glyphs, only to activate them... yet activating glyphs doesn't count as "doing magic." It's like the difference between writing code and running it, apparently? Not a perfect analogy, but... well, he gets the gist. He'll have to ask about these "schools" of magic in a second, but first, context. ]

What did they do, by the way? Your father and uncles.

They were primarily hunters. My family have long lived in Bear Den, and just as long been not only its protectors, but the protectors of the entire region. Their work often took them farther than that, as they were called to deal with both beasts and aberrations alike. Each of the brothers was talented in a particular way, and they complemented one another's skills. They were excellent at what they did. Nigh unstoppable when they were together.

[Unlike him. He swirls the mug again, idly this time rather than purposefully.]

As such, our family isn't exactly unknown. Most people knew who I was, and what stock I came from, before I ever met them. It created a lot of expectation.

Edited 2020-02-28 02:09 (UTC)

Ah, right. I remember.

[ Carlisle's mentioned some of that before. How he comes from a family of local heroes, and was expected to follow in their footsteps. How, through no fault of his own, he killed the very people he set out to protect.

That's verging a little close to personal territory, though, for both of them. Qubit drops the topic. ]

You've mentioned "schools" of magic a few times, what does that mean? Is it just how spells are categorized?

[Carlisle doesn't seem too bothered by casual conversation regarding his family, but he's happy to change the topic all the same.]

Yes, it is largely categorization. Most trained magicians specialize in one, maybe two schools. Only the most talented and ambitious would study further than that, as it takes years of intense study to master the many applications of even one school.

[He gets back to drawing on the paper before him, scrawling out a series of symbols. Give him a second, Qubit -- he wants to make sure these are legible.]

Uncle Benistad, for example, fell into the latter crowd. He was primarily an evocationist, but enchanting and abjuration were other specialties of his. [Carlisle mutters to himself.] Though some would assume his main talent was in charming.

[ That gets a chuckle. ] Bit of a ladies' man, was he?

[That gets a smirk out of him, however subtle behind the mask.]

Let's just say he was a man of many interests, both professional and personal.

[Carlisle finishes his little drawings, seven sigils that apparently have some meaning to him.]

These are the seven primary schools. While there are others, they are outliers, their uses and teachings kept secret to but a few.

[He starts at the top of his page, pointing out the sigil there.]

Evocation, the art of conjuring, summoning, and manifestation.

Transfiguration, the art of changing, reshaping, and altering.

Abjuration, the art of warding. [That would be one of the ones etched on the door to Qubit's lab.]

Charming, the art of enchanting.

Illusion, the art of figments and deception.

Divination, the art of scrying.

Reparation, the art of mending and construction... as well as deconstruction. [That one appears on the door, as well.

He pauses there for any further questions.]

Edited 2020-03-02 22:56 (UTC)

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