2022-12-19: Teacher Xander
- Log: Teacher Xander
- Cast: Xander Lovell, Riley Arwell, Solitaire Collier
- Where: Shemeber Plainst
- Date: December 19, 2022
- Summary: Xander has agreed to help Solitaire study the ways of alchemy. Somehow Riley and the axe are a part of the class.
=============================<* Shemeber Plains *>==============================
The Shemeber Plains lie in the east of Zoara, just out of the rain shadow of the Numeira Mountains. Compared to the rest of Zoara, they seem positively Edenic--the soil is rich, and the water is free of chemical runoff. Thick, lush grass covers the Plains, making them prime territory for ranchers as well as farmers. Homesteads and farming villages dot the plains, and some of the larger settlements even have railroad stations. This agricultural network exports food, wool, and other essential goods to Guild Galad, and the handful of settlements in northern Zoara.
While the Shemeber settlements have no formal military, they have long been protectorates of the nearby Saint Heim Papal State. In exchange for a small yearly tithe, they receive the protection of the Church's martial orders, and the right to sell their goods in Saint Halim's markets. Given that many of Shemeber's citizens are devout followers of Granas, the tithe is seen as a sacred duty.
BGM: Grandia 2 - Village of Carbo ~ Pious Adepts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XqprRUVSJo
<Xander Lovell has posed.>
Alchemy lessons. One potion. A young beastfolk girl undoubtedly up to her ears in trouble, and Riley, who has never once created a single thing in his life up to any rational standard or code. ...And a sapient axe. Maybe. Probably. Xander hasn't heard the axe talk.
This hasn't stopped him from setting up three student 'desks' utilizing a tree stump, a large and somewhat flat stone, and a mount of dirt. Mortal and pestels are provided -- okay, one mortar, two pestels, two soup bowls, a longish rock, and a fat stick, GOOD ENOUGH -- as well as small collection of gathered plantlife.
He only has the one travel cauldron, which is kept nearer himself and the makeshift classroom board Xander's fashioned out of a fallen trunk he's sanded the bark off of. Elemental symbols are written there, along with other assorted formulas and notes. His notebook is propped open nearby, displaying sketches of select plants -- the ones he's provided for the lesson.
For all his protests, it seems Xander is taking this at least a little seriously.
"...You don't like needles, right?" he says to Solitaire in place of any other normal human greeting. "So no syringes. Curative candy. Versatile and easy enough to make."
It also does not require any vial to hold it, and can be made in a cooking pot instead of a cauldron. If Solitaire is asking him for help, Xander does not rate her access to resources as particularly high.
<Riley Arwell has posed.>
Riley's eyes shine with excitement and probably a fair amount of mischief as he takes his place in the pedagogical tableau Xander has created. It's a promising sign, he thinks, that Xander has gone to such effort to make a proper 'classroom,' and very Xander of him to do so, as well. To honor his sincerity and hard work, Riley will try not to make something that is an affront against science. But then again, he was never trying to make woefully messed up clockworks or bizarre mystery potions in the past. It just sort of happened without him knowing why. But! He'll do his best this time. Maybe something different will happen.
Xander announces that they'll be making a candy.
"Medicinal candy is an important Xander secret," he asides to Solitaire. "This is very lucky for us."
<Solitaire Collier has posed.>
Solitaire hasn't heard the Fangs talk either but--well she also isn't aware that the Fangs have any particularly special attributes but if Xander and Riley told her about the strange quality of the Fangs of Valmar she probably would find a way to believe it. The world is strange. The other world is even stranger. And at the center of all that--nothing in particular.
Solitaire has chosen to sit on the flat stone. Patience (Nidhogg) is kind of standing up right in front of the mound of dirt.
"You have to learn too," Solitaire tells the axe.
............
"Mmnnnnn..." Solitaire says as to her opinion of needles. It's the anticipation of it, the having to expect a needle piercing your flesh and just take it that bothers her the most. It twigs that part of her brain that tells her to dodge when an sword is coming for her throat.
Riley gets a much more excited, "Mmn!" at his aside. She has never had a classmate before so this is very exciting for her. She isn't smiling. Solitaire doesn't do a lot of smiling but there's this little flash in her eyes of attentive fascination. So this is a Class. From the inside.
Well the outside. It's outdoors. But she understands there is meaning in her sitting across from Riley Arwell.
...............
"Will... Do our best... To not create an aboma... Abomi. Nay. Shion. Abomination."
Fortunately there's pictures. She starts counting on her fingers to try and make heads or tails of the formulas.
<Xander Lovell has posed.>
Most people discover the nature of the hosts of Fangs of Valmar in the middle of a violent confrontation. Solitaire will hopefully not learn the same way. That is, Xander would prefer she not learn about it all.
He would rather a good deal less people knew about it as it is.
The sound Solitaire makes is agreement enough for Xander, and he sighs to himself when she and Riley already begin getting along as classmates. Riley is enjoying this a little too much...
Wait, why is Xander even humoring Riley's inclusion in the classroom?! It's too late to ask this.
"You won't make anything worse than him," Xander assures Solitaire. He's not sure the axe will make anything. He just didn't want the axe to feel... left out...? Xander, get ahold of yourself.
Luckily for Solitaire, the notes are largely for Xander's own focus -- to remind him not to get ahead of himself. Stick to a practical, basic recipe. Do NOT go off on improvisation and other such material. A simple potion she can make and not die with and then be out of here.
"The foundation of all of this is mixing elements and attributes together in the right ratios, then treating it with processes that blend, distill, and transmute those qualities into new forms. All you need to know right now is which combinations of common ingredients will achieve the results you need."
He gestures to the gathered plants. "Despite Filgaia's decline, you should still be able to find traces of these plants across most of the wasteland. Here." He puts the notebook down by Solitaire. "This is what it looks like when it hasn't flowered yet. In which case, you'll need to pry open the bulb so you can crush the petals."
Xander gestures. "So. Go ahead and crush them."
If she asks for a demonstration, she'll get one, but Xander's willing to see how she attempts it first. His gaze drifts to Riley. "You, too."
<Riley Arwell has posed.>
The fact that Xander included the axe in these proceedings has been filed away carefully in Riley's heart as one of his many charm points. So endearing...
Riley nods along with the explanations. He's an experienced forager, and while he's usually on food duty while Xander is on medicine, he knows a few of the more common plants Xander uses so he can keep an eye out for them, and healing candies are one of Xander's staple recipes. So he recognizes the plants pretty well, even if he doesn't know any of the how and why of the way they go together. It sounds like the first step is to grind up some petals. He starts in on the task, humming.
"I'll try not to make an abomination, either! Maybe since it's a candy, the universe will get confused and think I'm just making food..." Riley seems to be able to make food okay, except for when he purposefully poisons it.
<Solitaire Collier has posed.>
Solitaire tries to comprehend Filgaia's decline and fails. It's such an enormous problem it feels beyond her. Even the giant death storm that the talking voice was unleashing seems small compared to what just feels like the natural slow death of a world.
Solitaire nods slowly to Xander. "Understood."
The axe sits there, seemingly inanimate.
Solitaire peers over to the notebook when Xander elects to show what the plant should look like before it flowers and she says, "Look for it...unflowered?"
She nods a few times. She thinks she understands that. It's a different face. The less healing phase of the plant. Then you can be there when the petals show up?
She is capable of following basic directions at least. She grabs the petals and starts grinding them with her hand. She looks up periodically at Xander to see if he's making more sour faces than usual as an indication she's screwing it up.
"The power to make our own candy..." Solitaire murmurs. "This might make us too powerful, Classmate Riley..."
She must never forget the struggling people who are not fortunate enough to make candy on their own. Like Solitaire, for the moment, but it still seems unbelievable that she could one day make candy.
She looks back to Patience. "Don't...slack off..."
..........
Patience solemnly floats into the air and starts squishing the petals supplied to him by hitting them with his shaft.
This is degrading....
"This is noble." Solitaire insists.
<Xander Lovell has posed.>
Filgaia's decline is a problem beyond any Drifter, far as Xander can tell. It's an all-consuming, impossible thing. A problem with no resolution. Without a hint. A promise of death with only fragmented hopes to stall it.
The same poison that kills Filgaia is killing him and Riley. It's killed the Xander that used to be, would have been, already.
So it's stupid, maybe, that he thinks if he can teach someone some dumb little potion he taught himself off of his father's notes, and she runs off and does literally anything else with it, then... something carries on. Something about what could have been, as if it matters while the world dies.
The crushing begins and Xander watches, nodding along. It would be weird if anyone screwed this up, but Xander's seen a lot of weird. SO HE THINKS, AND THEN PATIENCE JOINS IN. Xander doubletakes, then accepts it with a sigh. He left a 'desk' out, what was he expecting?!
Noble. Xander's face has already been a touch more gloom than sour, but the word turns it briefly pained. Only Riley, as usual, inspires something livelier.
"I'm not taking any medicine you make," Xander tells Riley dryly. This has nothing to do with abominations of creation and everything to do with Riley poisoning their food on purpose.
TWICE.
But the task gets done. "Good," he says. "Then the nectar from these, and separating the stems here..." This time, Xander walks through the steps. Solitaire's demonstrated enough basic direction following that he's wiling to go over each individual piece and trust her to pick up on it. He's also closer this time. The focus means his bloodlust is white noise, and Solitaire isn't currently heavily wounded.
Once the base materials are prepared, he steps back. "I can give you picutres of substitutions. Reminders on proper harvesting... things like that. But if you can get this far, you're in good shape. The mixing's the difficult part... Timing matters. Measurements matter. A lot. You understand?"
<Riley Arwell has posed.>
This might make us too powerful, Classmate Riley...
Riley nods solemnly. "That's true. But if our wise Teacher trusts us with such a thing, we must be ready for the responsibility." He flashes a little smile at Xander and it is the smile of someone who should not be trusted with any responsibilities ever.
I'm not taking any medicine you make.
Riley makes a dissappointed sound. "Maybe only you two are being trusted with the responsibility," he amends.
Hisnd then, there is a staggering sight-- the axe raises up into the air and starts grinding its ingredients, too!!
"Th... the axe can do alchemy...!" Riley whispers. "I've gotta get my shit together...!" He starts grinding the plants more earnestly. It's okay if Solitaire makes a proper candy and he can't, but losing out to an inanimate object just seems too cruel!
There are more preparation steps to follow, and Riley carries out the instructions without any obvious glaring missteps. Maybe it's the mixing part he messed up before, with the very important timing and measurements Xander is reminding them of. He waits with earnest attention for that part of the lesson to begin so that, perhaps, he can get it right this time.
<Solitaire Collier has posed.>
"Patience is very capable. He is teaching me how to be strong." Solitaire explains??? to Riley.
"Heh,"
Did the Demon Axe just chuckle at the reactions from Xander and Riley?? Maybe it was just the wind. It doesn't speak or chuckle again.
Patience, Solitaire thinks, is trying to show off.
"If you need someone to test it I don't mind," Solitaire tells Riley because she has no idea that Riley poisons food he gives to his partner let alone what kind of stuff he might feed to some random mousekid off the side of the road.
Solitaire is pretty much uninjured. And her axe is far enough away that she can't really hurt herself in a major way. She might get a bruise on her butt from sitting on a rock but she doesn't complain that it's uncomfortable.
She looks to Patience and tries to whisper to him like she's trying to cheat off the axe's notes in class. "What's measure--ments?"
Proportions. Like eating only half a steak.
Solitaire gets a far off look in her eyes when she thinks about steak.
Or like sewing. You mentioned you did some sewing before?
Solitaire nods once to Xander. "And nectar is..."
Like plant juice.
"Juice..." Solitaire murmurs in awe. "How..um...nectar? How do I get it?"
Seperating stems is easy enough. It's just cutting. She knows a lot about cutting.
So does Patience. Kind of using the tippy top of his blade to get cuts going but then kind of ... stalls out on the nectar farming process. That probably requires a kind of ... fine dextrous moments an axe isn't sure it is capable of.
She looks over to Riley to see how he's doing it.
<Xander Lovell has posed.>
"She might test it," Xander says to Riley with an edge of warning.
Normally Xander wouldn't care at all if Riley poisoned someone else. Right now is beginning to sound like a potential exception...? Xander does not have those, shut up.
Solitaire asks a question, and then stares off into space. Xander opens his mouth, then shuts it, then looks at the ask. He gestures vaguely, ultimately communicating nothing, and waits several long moments before he dares speak because the axe. Might be. Talking? It laughed before! What is even happening.
Measurements... Right. She's an orphan -- a slave. She can't read, but Xander forgot basic arithmatic also likely to be weak. He closes his eye, arms folded as he taps his arm. Then he turns, doing his own math against the tree trunk. With a knife.
He goes into the tent, rummages around, and returns with a wooden cup. Xander holds it, feeling around it, then stabs into it with the knife and carves some of it away, brushing off splinters with his thumb. He places it down on Solitaire's rock. "This much for the flower, half this much for the liquid -- the nectar. You can get it by pulling this part here out. Slowly, or you might lose some. Riley -- do not eat any. And a stem for each finger, but not your thumbs. Does that make sense?"
Meanwhile, Riley is panicking about losing to an axe. Xander sighs.
"...I'm not blinded this time, so maybe we'll figure out what went wrong."
<Riley Arwell has posed.>
Riley makes a disgruntled noise at Xander's warning. He is not going to poison a CHILD. (Well, this is a teenager, but that's still pretty young, and she obviously didn't get much of a childhood, so it counts. She has a lot of life still to experience!) And Riley isn't even sure he's still onboard with expanding the garden. Especially before the curse has even set in this round.
Still, it seems possible his candy might be dangerous even without poison. Neither he nor Xander has dared to try the potion he made last time. "Maybe mine should just be for looking at and nobody tests it..."
Solitaire asks about measurements, and Xander makes her a special measuring cup -- s-so sweet... -- and explains about how to get the nectar out. Riley demonstrates the style pulling maneuver for her when he sees that she's looking to him for an example. He does, in fact, know how to do this from instances where he was harvesting nectar for eating.
...Which he is currently forbidden from doing.
"Because it's dangerous or because it's a precious resource for our continued survival?" he grumps. Does one of those answers mean he might eat it anyway...?
...I'm not blinded this time, so maybe we'll figure out what went wrong.
"Maybe..." Riley says, more heartened that Xander wants to try to help him than really convinced they'll get to the bottom of it.
<Solitaire Collier has posed.>
"...Maybe Patience could try it? Patience can eat anything." Solitaire then frowns. "Though then maybe...not a good test?"
Patience makes a noise like a 'Guhhuh' that might just be some black ichor drifting out of its jaws.
Solitaire learns something new from Xander and it IS very sweet. Solitaire marvels at the cup and turns it around in her hand. It is safe to say she has never seen a measuring cup but now that she has, a measuring cup does make a lot of sense.
"Thank you." She says with absolute horrifying sincerity.
She glances again to Riley as he demonstrates nectar harvesting. This is the thing she's most worried about. But eventually, if haltingly, she does maage to squeeze some nectar out. It's not the most efficient gathering of it and she kind of has to shake the stem for a minute to get the amount neccessary.
One benefit of a measuring cup is that it's clear so it's easy to check the measurements. A wooden cup does not have that capacity so Solitaire has to peer in from above, then back over to the other side, then up to the top of cup adgain, then back down.
She gives Xander a thumbsup that somehow looks both questioning and triumphant.
Solitaire is on the lower side of teenager. She might look a little younger than she is due to being a particular type of beastfolk but they also don't tend to live as long! She is still very serious about everything, especially if it's kind of silly.
Then she realizes a problem.
"Patience doesn't have thumbs." Solitaire says, worried this may be the end of her companion's medical career.
<Xander Lovell has posed.>
Xander regards Patience for a long moment, but does not have the education necessary to determine if this axe should be eating questionable medicine for testing purposes.
But Solitaire thanks him for the cup, and Xander bristles, tearing his gaze away with a huff. "It's part of the lesson." Well, yes, but this whole endeavor has gotten out of hand, hasn't it? He's trying not to think about it.
"Since when has something being dangerous ever stopped you from eating it?" Xander furrows his brow. "Or a threat to our continued survival stopped you from doing anything, for that matter!" Pause. Sigh. "...You can eat one of them."
He does not specify which of the two it is with this permission given, though.
"Eight stems," he says to the axe, then stops and stares into nothing, because he just assumed the axe can count. "...As many as her fingers, without thumbs." Is this... helpful? Xander has no idea. Some of this might be working out the errors after disaster strikes.
Or maybe the thumb thing was a different concern. Xander shakes his head. "I-It doesn't matter. He can do as much or as little as he likes. But if you're traveling together, maybe he can help remind you of whatever he learns here." In all of this, Xander has clung to a simple, practical end goal: increase Solitaire's own odds of survival, in whatever her endeavors are. It's none of his business beyond that.
Xander motions to Solitaire. "Bring your supplies to the cauldron. You can use a cooking pot on your own if you need to. First the nectar, heated until..."
What follows is a slow, careful explanation of the process. Stirring this way, waiting for this color, then adding that, stirring the other way, letting it thicken, so on and so forth. A series of instructions that, as Xander gives, he writes in in notebook trying to doodle out pictographs of each step for future reference. But if Solitaire does it first, he hopes she'll make enough sense of them later on and commit more to memory.
The end of it should result in a sticky substance, thick enough to be molded like putty. Barring any catastrophic mistakes.
<Riley Arwell has posed.>
Riley squints, pondering the idea of giving his candy to a sentient axe to eat. It would probably not be a good test of its safety, no. And yet... "At least it wouldn't go to waste..." he ventures.
Riley is scolded for having no self control about eating ingredients, but given permission to eat the nectar from one of the flowers regardless. He happily does so, observing the discussion of the axe's ability or inability to make medicine without trying to help and letting it be Xander's problem to fix. Maybe this is a little bit because he arbitrarily decided he was in competition with the axe.
At last, Xander gets to the really tough part of the lesson, the mixing and timing. Riley listens closely and scrawls notes to himself with rare seriousness, but hangs back to let Solitaire (and possibly her axe) go to the cauldron first, since he might end up tainting t with some kind of toxic, reality-defying sludge when his turn comes up. "Good luck, Classmate!" he whispers encouragingly.
<Solitaire Collier has posed.>
It seems that Patience has difficulty being the one to axe for help.
Solitaire lumbers over to the cauldron. This is the moment of truth. Is she going to make a comically awful piece of sludge, or is she secretly a potions savante that shall incur Xander's DEADLY JEALOUSY over just how incredible her potions are. Like maybe she'll accidentally make an elixir?!
The sad truth is, the answer's going to be neither of those things.
BGM INTERRUPT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxo3mCjJr8w
Solitaire gives Riley a long look, thinking about something. She holds one finger out, then a second one--she looks down at her fingers and then nods to herself. Whatever she has decided is kept to herself for now because she's making her way to the cauldron and should really focus on that.
She listens carefully to the pro--
--oh wait no she's kind of zoning out about halfway through Xander's explanation.
Oh she's really trying... Solitaire... Solitaire wake up!
Solitaire jolts a bit and then makes a really really focused face. She's got this. She's got--
What's the second step again? She remembers step one.
Okay, tell you what, I remember everything so I'll remind you of the instructions you just try to follow through step by step... You're a tactile learner.
"Tact Isle..." Solitaire nods firmly. And she works on it and...
Okay it looks mostly right, the color is mildly off and the consistency is a bit off but it isn't POISON. It's somewhere between a par and subpar first attempt--distressingly ordinary. She might be able to get better with practice.
"Is that...okay?" She asks uncertainly. "I had my Classmate's luck on my side."
That might've been a debuff actually Soli...
But either way she kind of steps off a bit to give Riley his chance.
"G..good luck, Classmate...!"
<Xander Lovell has posed.>
Riley eats nectar. It's sweet. And tingly! Xander presses a green candy antidote into Riley's mouth without looking at him, his attention remaining on Solitaire and her progress.
When it comes to instruction, Xander's trying his best. He remembers being a student, of alchemy, of medicine, of surgery. He remembers, sometimes, what he needed. He's trying not to let the lump in his throat choke him out the more he remembers it. This is his, it's just him, this is his recipe, he made on his own, this is his teaching, which is different, but because he was taught wrong -- far from it -- but because it cannot remind him. He cannot hear that voice in his head or see that face, or he'll unravel.
Tact Isle. Xander gets what she's trying to say, and it doesn't surprise him. That's what she'd need to cultivate in order to survive this far, right?
Once it's over, Xander inspects the mixture. "Good for a first try," he says. "It should heal minor wounds... It'll harden, given some time, making it easier to store. I like to roll it into spheres, but the shape doesn't matter. Do whatever you like."
Practice, indeed, makes perfect. If Xander's pictoral notes are comprehensive enough -- and the axe is there to help(??) -- she should at least be in position to practice further. Xander glances to Riley... His luck. "...Yes, it was nice of him to lend you some." Or it was a debuff.
But now it's Riley's turn, and whatever patience Xander displayed with Solitaire evaporates with a harsh look of his eye. "Your turn."
The same process is explained, Xander even going so far to place his hand over Riley's to gently correct the way he's stirring the cauldron. Riley's seen it once now, and to reasonably competent completiton. Surely, with stricter supervision, he cannot create another defiance of know reality...?!
<Riley Arwell has posed.>
Aha, the answer was that the nectar was dangerous! Riley eats the antidote as gladly as the nectar. He is blessed with such a caring Xander to let him eat tasty poisons and then seamlessly fix it for him...
Solitaire makes her effort, and it sounds like the result is a success. "Classmate! You made medicine!" Riley gives a little cheer of congratulations.
And then, it is his turn...!
G..good luck, Classmate...!
Riley gives an intense and serious nod. "Thank you!"
Riley approaches the cauldron and does his best to follow the instructions Xander provides, giving him a little smile at the hands-on help with his stirring that sort of belies the harshness of his manner. The execution is not perfect, but as far as Xander may be able to observe, the mistakes Riley makes are ordinary beginner mistakes, the kind that might lessen the potency or alter the consistency a bit but should still result in a workable medicinal candy at the end.
And yet...
When the time comes for the final color change to signal its readiness to be taken from heat, a guilty, disbelieving smile comes across Riley's face. The substance he has created is ... dark. Light-devouringly, impossibly dark. A vantablack candy goo. He takes it back to his station to be shaped into candies(?), his face red and squinched with embarrassment and perhaps a hint of supressed glee. At least even if he couldn't succeed, his candy is pleasingly weird.
<Solitaire Collier has posed.>
Solitaire brightens. "I did it!" She tells ... her axe with genuine joy.
Don't forget to roll it into a sphere!
"Mmn!" Solitaire jogs over to her table and gets to work. She focuses on this while Xander is (re?)teaching Riley how to make his own healing candy. Ultimately, this results in...
A bright red candy axe-shaped candy! Looks like Solitaire's also ended up a little weird in the end.
But as she waits for it to dry as she focuses on watching Riley's own work.
It ... seems like he's doing it right. If he's making any major mistakes, she can't see it. She doesn't really notice the minor ones (Patience does, but he still has no idea how it's going to turn into...)
Well, what it turns into.
"....It looks different..." Solitaire says. "Is he..."
She looks to Patience. "A genius alchemist?"
One of a kind for sure.
Solitaire tries to be proud of her fellow classmate instead of envious of his clear unique talent. She gives Riley another thumbs up.
"Great job." She says seriously.
<Xander Lovell has posed.>
Whatever conversations Solitaire has with her axe, it does seem to be Helping. So that's... good...? And thus, axes that heal you if you eat them. Excellent job, Solitaire. Though all Xander provides to express such a sentiment is a firm nod.
Right as Xander believes Riley is about to create his first Basic Medicine with Beginner Mistakes, the color changes. His final product devours the light, and hope and sanity along with it. Xander stares, at a loss for words, until he finally goes rigid, hair bristled just slightly outward.
"What?! No. How -- ?" He shoves his fingers against his own scalp. "But we -- you -- I..."
All he can do is watch as Riley tries to shape it. He double checks the notes, he double checks Riley's ingredients, he double checks the cauldron, inspecting its residue. "How did any of these properties get in here...?!"
<Riley Arwell has posed.>
Great job.
Riley looks down at his candies and laughs nervously. "I'm sure these are very unsafe." It could be worse, though. At least he's not the kind of bad alchemist where things explode.
"I like that you made yours into axes."
Riley shapes his own candy goo into proper spheres, rebellious though they otherwise might be. He sniffs one to see if it smells sugary, and it does, but something else, too, that reminds him a little of the vibe of his cursed shovel. Could he have brought a dark energy into the alchemical process because he was fixated on competing with a spooky weapon?
"Definitely unsafe," he says. That much seems clear.
Xander, meanwhile, is sputtering. "It's all right, Xander. Now we have another mystery." He does seem almost sentimentally attached to the weird potion. Now there's a collection!
<Solitaire Collier has posed.>
"Oh..."
Solitaire does not put the Dark Gummie into her mouth. "I don't know what you did differently." Solitaire says. She does feel a little bad though. The onyl thing she can imagine being different was that she used the cauldron first but she doesn't think she did anything that ould result in THAT. It really seems like it's a Riley Special.
Solitaire gives Riley two of her Axe Gummies (one is presumably for Xander?). It might be out of pity.
On the other hand, Riley still beats Patience who failed due to an absence of opposable thumbs. Or fingers. Maybe this is part of why they teamed up. Patience brings the attention span, Solitaire brings the ability to hold things.
"It's really amazing." Solitaire says. "Thank you, Teacher Xander."
Maybe she should have brought him an apple.
But she doesn't have any apples...
<Xander Lovell has posed.>
Xander buries his face in his hands. "Undoubtedly unsafe," he agrees. He sighs, peels his face from his palms to look back up, and then going to take one of the spheres Riley's already finished. While it's still malleable, he squishes it in hand, then rolls it into even smaller spheres and stabs them onto a needle. If they harden like that, they'll have tunnels through them: beads, effectively.
Not that he explains himself.
He sighs and shakes his head. It is, indeed, another mystery. Luckily, his preoccupation means he misses Riley recieving some of Solitaire's candy. (Is that lucky? Well, he might've fussed about it.)
"Yeah, sure," he says, not able to look Solitaire or anyone else in the eye right now.
"Just... try to need this information as little as possible, I guess."