[OPEN] an animal, bipedal and featherless

[horkbajir]

Who: Toby and You!
When: Between the end of the Dorchacht dream and whenever the diplomat teams leave Aefenglom
Where: Around Aef; primarily around the Coven, but also elsewhere.
What: Toby trying to use transmutation magic to fake being human enough to fool the Dorchacht witches. She could use some help.
Warnings: none, will add if that changes.


Toby, a very tall lizardlike alien, doesn't want to be human. That is, she doesn't want to be human and not Hork-Bajir, she doesn't want to renounce her species, she finds self-transfiguration and being without her blades and tail and everything else disorienting and not pleasant. She does, however, admit to curiosity and an awareness that it may be practical, especially in the near future. It had been a casual interest before trying it in the dream; now, she has to learn a lot and in not much time.

While she does forgo her other classes for Transmutation and looks into anatomy, she knows hands-on experience and actually trying it herself will be essential.

[a] a plucked fowl in the lecture room

It may be in the Coven between classes or out in the city. On a couple of different days a class goes out to an elaborate fountain in the Entertainment District, a broad basin featuring an assortment of carved Merrow and aquatic Dragons cavorting with dolphins and hippocampi admist a variety of flourishes and spouts. Each transfiguration student picks a statue and tries to magic a block of wood into its likeness, which some manage better than others.

Toby finishes early and looks around, holding her miniature. If you don't look busy she may turn to you with a question. Her voice is very deep and on the guttral side.

"Pardon. Would you let me examine your hands?" Or the way your jaw works. Or, if you're not digigrade, how you walk. It really doesn't matter if you're a Monster or nonhuman or not, just as long as you look more human than she does. "I'm making a study of anatomy and physiology. My body doesn't work the way yours does and I need to mark the differences."

[b] a featherless biped with flat nails

One big issue with transforming herself is the exact shape and appearance to take. It's easier for her if she keeps a similar mass. Wiry though her build is, her tail, her blades, her height, and the density of her muscle and bone guarantee that the shapes she takes are large. Always over six feet, with degrees of muscle, general stockiness, or fat differing each time. Her features and coloration change, the weird redness of her dream attempt becoming less pronounced. Her hair definitely changes, and her proportions become more average.

She's told friends and acquaintances that she's trying this and asked for help. Maybe you watched her do it, saw the unpleasant shiver and the impression of something being turned inside out and settling, or maybe you see her afterwards and have feedback. Maybe it's time to go out in town and see if she can pull off acting human, too?

[c] I am looking for a human Wildcard! If you think of something else, go for it!

Comments

[horkbajir]

This is the kind of thing she knows she'll encounter again and again when - if - the war ends against the Yeerks' favor at home. Practice in first impressions will be very important.

"I could say the same for you," she counters, though it's not entirely true. When she arrived, the throngs of human people, some of them altered somewhat but largely recognizable, was very strange. Before she'd only seen four half-grown youths, three or four Controllers, and gifted books and magazines bearing their images. It's been about six months now, and she's much more used to them. "The fur on your face isn't the same composition or color as on the rest of your head, have you noticed? Why is that?"

Toby cants her head. "Perhaps. I only know it as stories and the product of technology beyond my understanding, but my understanding is limited."

[bloodwit]

...

"The fur on my face - we call it hair. And typically, at this length, it's called a beard. But humans will groom it into different styles, which that may warrant calling it something else."

Viren's mouth presses into a thin line, bringing a hand up to pinch the bridge of his nose. But his claws are sharp, and the enthusiasm of that gesture had that hurting more than he'd anticipated, so the hand drops back to his side. Actually, having kids, answering completely weird questions isn't entirely out of his skillset. Still. He pushes down the disappointment of hearing about her lack of understanding of magic.

"When humans grow older, their hair may start changing color. Sometimes in patches, like the one on my beard."

[horkbajir]

She's tempted to see what he has to say about the hairy stripes humans have instead of brow ridges, but she already knows about eyebrows and their use in communication. It really doesn't seem like a fair trade for horns.

Also, how old 'older' is, because it's going to be some ridiculously high number what with how long aliens live. The human form she makes probably won't have many signs of age, just so she doesn't have to work out how wrinkles change and the extent of grayness.

"You may begin to understand how wearying it can be when your body is the subject of constant comment," she says in a dry tone. "If you like you can continue, but I'm not a passive item to be observed, and I intend to understand what I can."

[bloodwit]

Viren makes a face at that.

And then he sighs, heavily, to regard her with a reserved sort of wariness.

"Fine. If you are amenable to my questions," he doesn't suspect he will have too many more, anyway, what with her opening explanation; startling as others' appearances may be from time to time, he's becoming more and more accustomed to seeing what he, at least, regards to be the unfamiliar and fantastical (.. and thus, fascinating). "Then, if you still seek to understand, I will comply with yours."

He does dip his head, now, intended as a cordial gesture.

[horkbajir]

She copies the gesture, though her long neck and forwards-swept brow horns exaggerate it into something deliberately measured, and smiles. It's recognizable, even if it doesn't entirely look like a human smile. "Very well. My name is Toby Hamee, seer of the concealed valley. I have two hearts and my blood isn't iron-based, so it isn't red."

That's definitely question bait. "How long does it take to heal when your skin is breached? Does every break become a scar?"

[bloodwit]

Toby, hm? "Lord Viren, High Mage of the Kingdom of Katolis. Though, it seems any of my titles would mean little here."

He can acknowledge that much, as much as he'd like to strut about with any titles still intact.

"But as for healing, it depends on a number of factors - for example, the location of the wound, its severity. Minor scrapes or cuts could take a day to a week; to heal properly, deeper wounds could take weeks, perhaps longer."

He pauses, then, debating. After a moment, he slowly extends his left hand, palm upward. She may be able to discern a thin, pinkish line of a scar, running horizontally, across the center of his palm. It's healed enough here that he'd removed the bandages some time ago.

"And, likewise deeper breaks," although, he'd hardly call the type of his scar he's exhibiting to be severe, "are more likely to scar."

[horkbajir]

"We are all dispossessed here. One Mirrorbound arrives as important as any other, it seems." She's still a Seer, but here all that means is that she is on par with any reasonably bright alien.

Toby leans in, extending her head down on her long neck, to inspect the mark. She can't see as many shades of red as humans can, but it's darker and has a different texture than the surrounding skin.

"How old is that? It takes a grave injury to scar one of my people for longer than it takes to shed our skin. We heal very quickly. Here." Toby brings her enormous hands together and draws a wrist blade across one narrow, deep green palm, mimicking Viren's scar. Dark blue-green wells in the slight cut. In less than a minute it's started to darken and the shine of liquid fades as a scab forms.

[bloodwit]

"It's a few weeks old, by this point."

He allows his hand to fall back at this side, attentive as she demonstrates - pretty much, minus the presence of a wrist blade, in the same manner he'd received his own wound, if lighter. But it's what's to follow that is what's awe-worthy: how quickly and visibly the cut heals before his eyes. Eyes widened, he looks back up to her.

"That's... incredible." A man of magic as he is, and as rooted as his own world is in it, he couldn't begin to guess at the scientific process behind it all. There's a minute shake of his head, standing straighter again. "No, humans are incapable capable of that, at least not without outside assistance."

[horkbajir]

"That old? Hm." Good thing humans have to make their blades and choose to carry them. They seem to do everything on a longer scale. Growing up, healing, learning, dying.

Toby smiles at the reaction, widely enough to show a glance of yellowed grinding teeth. "It won't take an hour before this disappears entirely. My people were created such that we don't worry about accidentally injuring ourselves or each other. It's been very helpful for learning magic. Apparently, my blood is a commodity here."

That was a bit dry. The thought that there are people who'd want that kind of thing from her - Monsters to stave off moon-madness, Witches to focus and enhance their spells - troubles Toby.

[bloodwit]

Oh, Viren fucking bets her blood is a commodity. Should it have belonged to a magical creature of his land, he can only let his imagination run wild envisioning the potential of that type of blood.

Dry as her comment is, it's met with a thin, brief smile, one that quickly disappears in lieu of the purported seriousness of the matter.

"I can see how that might be, yes, considering how often blood seems to be used in spells," He ventures, somewhat cautiously. He knows Witch blood to have certain appealing properties to it; he's not quite sure of the precise interaction there with her own, but he runs with what's been shared. So keeping his tone appropriately empathetic, mindful of the dreadful implications,

"With yours in particular, I hope you haven't run into any trouble."

[horkbajir]

Her regenerative abilities don't extend to limbs, but Toby could certainly replace a great deal of blood and tissue if it came to that. Here, of course, being infused with magic to the point where her body carries it means she can also use it herself.

Toby remains wry. "I'm a match for just about anyone who would try. My hope is anyone with an interest is dissuaded before I have to hurt them too badly. Until recently I haven't specialized very much but put some hours into abjuration - negating spells used against me."

She's well over six feet tall, strong and fast, and all those blades. Toby doesn't know how to effectively fight people who don't heal like she does without severely wounding them at best. Even just grabbing them with her hands and restraining them will probably cause injury.

[bloodwit]

"I would hope so." A nod. "And that does sound as if it's a wise course of action."

He can't help the, now familiar, envy that coils in the pit of his stomach, an ugly snake to keep hidden. He idly wonders if most Witches here are aware that they're subject of that type of wanting - it's hard not to be aware, he's certain. Especially when faced with the predicament special to Monsters.

But Viren inclines his head, remaining conversational. He looks off to the side, briefly, with an air of remaining troubled but curious all the same, accompanied by a uncertain pause,

"And... you also had the same success, in that dream - ?"

[horkbajir]

"They didn't even think I was a Witch in that dream. Not until it was too late." The words are boastful, the tone even, and Toby shifts, running a long and heavy finger down the back of one of her wristblades. She'd encountered relatively minor trouble herself, nothing on the scale her Bonded had when he decided to try and learn more.

"Actually, that's why I'm doing this now. Some of them have ways to see through illusion, or be aware of it. Transmutation is more difficult both to accomplish and also to pierce, so I am-" she exhales, resigned and a bit irritated- "trying to learn how the human body works enough to pass as one."