2023-03-09: Avatar Tuner

• Log: Avatar Tuner
• Cast: Elhaym van Houten, Lily Keil, Fei Fong Wong, Emeralda Kasim, Tidus, Citan Uzuki
• Where: Sin
• Date: March 9, 2023
• Summary: While taking a rest from the expedition into Sin, Elly relates an experience she had while contacting Sin with Regulus.

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<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.

 
A little while had passed.

There was labor, of course. Everyone has to help, one way or another, and Leon had had a pretty good idea - if they're going to be here in this force, they ought to put a little groundwork into things.

If you can call it ground.

Still, some loose structural objects, useful perhaps to stall a possible rush of Fiends and to shelter wounded in their recovery even if they might have little hope of a long-term defense, are scattered around. It makes something like a perimeter. There is, for once, a medical space that is *not* clogged with the wounded... yet.

And there is a portable stove, and so, there are hot drinks, too.

Elly had asked the Wolves - and, specifically and additionally, *Tidus* - to join her, when the dust settled, because she had something to share. Elly slouches in her seat at the head of a smallish table - an Al Bhed-constructed folding chair, produced from a chamber in the Fahrenheit that seemed to overflow with the damned things. She sips from a pottery cup, full of a dark, strong-brewed tea.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUYQOAzwFig

"Thank you all," Elly says, "for joining me." She still seems rather harried, but then, even for someone as battlehardened as the Black Wolves - or, for that matter, Tidus, if all in their own ways - this has been an eventful recent period.

"So... I don't know quite where to begin..."

Elly seems about to say something, but falters slightly, looking at the ground (flesh? surface? at least here it is... relatively stable) and sipping the paradoxically-familiar tea.

<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

Lily has been quiet since the battle with Krelian on the Fahrenheit, and this has been no exception. Not silent--she responds to greetings and questions and statements--but quiet, contemplative. Within Sin this is even more pronounced; she can feel the power exuding in all places, the death and despair and fear in here.

How many has it swallowed over the years?

But when Elly asked her to join in, Lily accompanied her, and she has some tea, too. It has been eventful...

"Then take your time," Lily advises Elly. "Just start wherever you can."

There is a lot on her mind, too.

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei Fong Wong is curious but also nervous abuot this chat. While he imagines this might be something that involves Yuna and her team--taking some time to mostly hash it out with the Wolves is a relief. Big crowds make Fei a bit anxious as his ability to spot danger diminishes.

He fidgets in his folding chair, clearly struggling to get ocmfortable in it, but when Elly speaks up he stops and gives her the all of his attention.

"Well, we're already in Sin, so." He quips. "We'll be patient, don't you worry."

He sips at the tea.

....

He's drinking tea inside of Sin.

...

Fei is going to have weird dreams about that later.

<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

"...So you two are currently living in Sin," Lily quips, and goes back to sipping her tea.

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei holds the cup of tea, frozen--like he has just been blasted into a pillar of salt that hasn't been blown away yet.

<Pose Tracker> Emeralda Kasim has posed.

Emeralda was very helpful with setting up the camp, both because she can carry an awful lot without complaint and is good at setting it up but just from willingness. She wanted to do *something*, and this is what she can do, so she's doing it.

Or, well, was doing it. Now she's sitting in a folding chair, which she is carefully balancing on its two back legs. Every once in a while it tips forward, she catches herself, and then she does it again, to no more negative effect than an occasional 'thunk' when it touches down. She has not even spilled any appreciable amount of tea. (There was a little bit of sloshing at first.)

"Is it a dangerous thing?" Emeralda asks, because she has been kind of worried about a Sinspawn attack (or something else, possibly) inside of Sin.

Then she looks at Lily, then Fei and Elly, then Lily again. Her face says it all: she doesn't get it.

<Pose Tracker> Tidus has posed.

    Tidus had overheard Shalune and Lunata talking about some kind of radio transmission, and Jecht--and when he'd asked about it, they'd immediately gotten cagey and awkward. Having something like that going on in his life right now too, he'd let it go, but... when Elly invited him to talk with her and the Wolves, he hadn't needed to think twice about accepting.
    
    They know *something*, and if it's about Jecht, he wants to hear it.
    
    He's not a big tea guy, but he doesn't mind a hot drink right now. He's got a cup himself, which he's slurping carefully from as he sits at the table. Elly speaks, and he nods her on. He'd tell her to take her time, but... Lily already said that!
    
    He does snort with a laugh at Fei and Lily's back-and-forth about Living In Sin, though.
    
    Emeralda gives a good prompt, at least, so Tidus tries to do the same by asking, "So how'd this all start?"
    
    ...It's *a* prompt, certainly.

<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.

    They have made an encampment of a sort. Once again, Citan is given to reflect on how much like a living thing Sin both is and is not. It is strange at once how alien the circumstances in which they now take their rest is while still affording them the opportunity to be anything but: refuse to focus on a few choice elements of their surroundings and blot from memory the last few hours and it may as well be a cave in which they are now camped.

    Someone brought tea, which also helps with matters.

    Perhaps it is only fitting that it is into this moment which Elly speaks, bringing up the matter about which she had spoken before. "Yes. We are not in any hurry," he says, agreeing with Lily.

    This is before Fei makes a particular turn of phrase, and Lily remarks upon it, of course.

    He somehow -- barely -- manages to keep a straight face at Lily's quip. The twitch at the corner of his mouth betrays a hardfought battle.

    Taking a sip of the tea also helps with this monumental task.

<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.

 
Elly looks up at Lily and Fei with a faint, sheepish, but deep felt smile. She takes a sip of her tea - and nearly chokes at what Lily says, although she manages not to, even if the swallow takes immense effort and her face is flushing. She exhales with force afterwards.

"I don't think so," Elly says, "although... I -" She's still red. "I mean I can't be sure. It's important, but it's not like speaking an ominous name, or anything, I think."

"Mm," Elly answers Citan, her face settling a bit before straightening up. "Alright... well, Tidus, to get started I need to explain something specific."

"Regulus is a Gear, obviously, but it's an unusual Gear... an 'Omnigear'. I suppose you could think of it as an ultimate Gear, or something like that. But... Regulus is what we called an 'ECM' Gear. Electronic Counter Measures - essentially, it interferes with the communications and operations of other Gears, and supports its allied Gears."

"It's sort of an inheritance, but that's a long story too... it doesn't matter. I went out with the others, of course, but Regulus doesn't have a lot of defensive weaponry. And Regulus can support other Gears, but it can't do much against Sin directly. It can't 'hack' Sin - it's composed of myriads of pyreflies, not cables and computer blocks." Elly sips her tea.

"When Riesenlied told us that it wasn't - Jecht - in charge of Sin... That it was Seymour... I got, um, I got a little frightened," Elly says, looking at the ground, "and I suppose I panicked because I was trying to pray and --"

Elly takes a deep breath.

"Regulus received a transmission," Elly says. "It was said to be from the 'Eldridge Mainframe.' Or at least something quick to it - Regulus changed the, um, the display language, I think it could tell I was panicking." She takes a deep breath.

"So... I think it was a message from, um. From Jecht," Elly says, "and he was um very vulgar but I suppose it's understandable and he was -- I think maybe it woke him or, he's awake, or -- I mean, I did write down exactly what he said, when we were in the Fahrenheit to unpack everything."

"That's how I 'knew' he could hear you," Elly says. "He told me, through Regulus." ("Something about a Communication Sphere blowing up," Elly adds towards Tidus; it may make more sense to him.)

<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

Lily actually smiles at Fei's reaction--no, maybe it's at Elly's that turns it from a grin to something more heartfelt. She is amused, either way.

She sees you, Citan. ...But she doesn't explain for Emeralda. That's her parents' business.

The explanation--part of it Lily already knew, of course. And Elly... Elly tried to pray, but--

"Eldrige Mainframe?" Lily wonders. "That sounds like a computer term," she says. And then--

"Wait, a message from Jecht?" she says, surprised. "So that's how..."

She's thoughtful. "So even 'here', he has some part of himself able to be more than just 'awake' or 'conscious' but... 'present.'"

<Pose Tracker> Emeralda Kasim has posed.

Emeralda may not have gotten the joke, but she will remember it anyway, and spring it on Fei and Elly when they least expect it.

This is the right and responsibility of any teenager.

Mostly she listens, continuing to tilt her chair back at awkward angles. Eventually she tires of this and lets it sit upright with one last 'tik' as she gently lowers the front legs down -

"What language was it sending?" she asks, curiously, because she has found that she's remarkably good with languages and she wants to know if it's one of the ones she's seen before. "And, wait, you got a message from Jecht?" Emeralda's brows furrow as she thinks about that.

"Why was he sending message from a mainframe?" is her eventual question. The word 'mainframe' makes sense to her, even if the rest of it doesn't have the same built-in recognition. "And what's an Eldridge? Is it a place or a thing?"

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei Fong Wong sets down his little teacup on his lap. His face is still pretty red in of itself. Maybe it should be surprising considering how long they've been together but yet it still keeps happening.

Fei's eyes widen faintly at the words 'Eldridge Mainframe'.

"I'm amazed...he can even send a message out." Fei admits.

He frowns, though, "Did you...say the Eldridge Mainframe?"

A surge of fear wells up within him. He's not sure why just yet but it causes his body to tremble and his hand to spill some tea. He carefully sets the cup down.

He thinks for a moment and then looks to Tidus, "Guess you'll be able to settle some things with your old man, huh? I mean, if he's cogent enough to send messages out."

<Pose Tracker> Tidus has posed.

    When Elly addresses him specifically, it occurs to Tidus that this would probably be easier for her to explain if he *weren't* here. But she did invite him, so he's not going to sweat that. Instead, he nods as he listens to what she says about Omnigears and Regulus and ECM Gears. It interferes with communications, got it, the look on his face says.
    
    "Right," he says aloud when Elly pauses to sip.
    
    So she panicked over Riesenlied's news and started to pray, and her Gear got a message, and... got a message from Jecht. Tidus immediately makes a face. "You're telling me Jecht answered your prayers?" he says. But then she adds about him being coarse, and he makes even more of a face. "Okay, *that* sounds like Jecht."
    
    He heaves a sigh and hangs his head. He'd do that even with that last bit about the communication sphere. The others might be more shocked to hear about this, and rightfully so, but Tidus... manages. It helps that he'd already overheard Shalune and Lunata discussing the matter, and it helps even more that he'd already talked to Yuna recently about this possibility--that there might be enough of Jecht inside of Sin to communicate coherently, that he ought to think about what he would say to him if so. Still, it really figures that this is how it's actually happening.
    
    Fei brings up that very matter and Tidus looks up at him. "Yeah, sounds like it," he grouses. "Have you heard anything else from him since, Elly? ...Have you sent anything else *to* him?"

<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.

    His gaze meets Lily's for a moment and he looks -- fleetingly -- touch chagrined. But only a touch, and only because he can tell that she had caught what he had been struggling to hide.

    He is certainly not going to elaborate, himself -- not for anything less than becoming cornered without an escape route, that is, of which there are presently plenty. Emeralda's parents, for one, comprise an escape route.
    In the sense of, 'you should ask your parents'.

    Bit by bit, Elly winds her way towards what she had found when they had fought Sin. He, of course, already knows well what Regulus is capable of, having fought alongside Elly while she used it several times already. "You might think of an Omnigear as being something akin to a legendary sword in a story, or the like," he adds. "Except, as we have seen, they do exist, and their power is greater than even the tales had suggested. ...They are ancient, as old as or perhaps older than the Zeboim civilization. Ahem, in any case," he says, smiling apologetically as if he had just intruded on the conversation in error, "it is as Elly says. Her Gear is skilled at communications and support operations." Which doesn't make it harmless or incapable against non-Gear opponents, but...

    "Yes, I recall. Sin is host to two souls. But, it seems as if there is something more...?" he prompts Elly.

    And she gets down to it. She contacted something within Sin.

    "The 'Eldridge Mainframe'...?" Citan echoes, wrinkling his brow. "Yes, you are correct, that would indicate quite a powerful computer. I wonder if perhaps it might be some remnant of a Zeboim machine?" It would follow, given the descent of the Spiran people and what they had taken with them from Filgaia. But that's not all--

    She'd made contact with Tidus' father.

    "You were able to contact Jecht? That is... unexpected. I had been under impression that..."
    He glances sidelong at Tidus and, as if recalling his earlier musing on the same subject, falls silent.

<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.

 
Elly nods once to Lily. "I don't know if it... woke him or if he was... I don't know," and she seems dreadfully embarrassed about this.

Back to Emeralda. "It was just, I don't know what you'd call it since it was so similar here," Elly says. "The vernacular. Regulus was programmed hundreds of years ago, so the messages use the same letters - they're slightly different now but not much - it just talks in this sort of, literary way. I suppose they just wrote and spoke differently then."

Or did they? Were you there? Well, some people were, but none of them are here, so never you mind.

"And yes... a mainframe is a powerful central computer. Um. I don't know," Elly says as she glances at Emeralda. "I suppose if he's 'in' Sin, it must be in here, but... we haven't encountered any electronic computers, have we? I suppose they might have had them in Zanarkand, long ago..."

Fei asks something. "Yes. I thought it was breaking it up, like a Solarian word: el-Dridge, but that's like, I can't compare it to something, that just doesn't flow at all. And 'Dridge' would be a very strange word, it seems incomplete. So I don't know if it's a place, or a name."

Elly glances at Tidus, who might have an answer. ('old man Eldridge,' Elly thinks, restraining herself from a total flight of fancy.) But Tidus has a big question of his own.

Elly's fingers lace together over the warm sides of the cup. "No," Elly says. "There weren't any messages when I went back in. I landed all in a rush and hurried out to meet everyone because I'd come out of the entire thing really well, comparatively... I hope Shalune is alright." APPARENTLY SO but you never know. What if she has trauma?

"And he might have overheard me," Elly tells Tidus, "but I didn't send a message back."

Elly looks up at Tidus. "If you want to send a message, I'd be glad to," Elly concludes, voice getting smaller.

But to Citan she says: "... Yes... that it wouldn't be possible to do something like that. I'm not sure how it happened..."

<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

It's not surprising to Lily that Fei can still get so red.

"Does that mean something to you?" Lily wonders of Fei, when he asks. But then she looks back at Tidus. His father... it' something that makes her very thoughtful. Much like Citan's statement.

She was under the same impression as Citan, after all.

She nods back to Elly. "There's a lot we don't know," she says. "Why all this is here... whether it's formed of the pyreflies itself or made of real things Sin's devoured..."

Hmm. The vernacular. That's... interesting.

"Do you think the pyreflies could interface with the system? After all, the Spirans use them for video, audio... all sorts of things. The people of Zanarkand might've had much more advanced usage of them. Right?" to Tidus.

She does not kn about this Eldrige, of course.

"Shalune will be fine," Lily thinks. "She always is."

A message...

"Hm. I..."

"I feel something," she admits. "Presences. All around. But I've been trying to block them out, I admit. There's just too much 'presence'."

<Pose Tracker> Emeralda Kasim has posed.

Asking her parents might be part of the joke that Emeralda takes advantage of.

"We saw computers at the ruined city," Emeralda says. "...Kasim City." Where she remembered, at least a little bit. She hooks her legs around the chair legs, using her ankles to hold it in place. It's a flexible thing, but not an 'I-am-an-ARM' flexible; any agile kid can do as much, and probably most of the adults too.

"Which is why I asked, what language was the Eldridge Mainframe sending? Because if it's the old language, Zeboim, then, that means something, doesn't it? But if it's something else, that means something else..." Emeralda has been getting more thoughtful lately and she certainly looks it here, lost in thought - almost serious, but not quite.

You can only look so serious when you're hooking your feet so you don't swing your legs.

"Maybe you can say hello to the mainframe! Or I can, maybe it can talk to Crescens..." Crescens is *not* an ECM gear, so it is unclear how much that would use actually be. "...and then we can talk to Jecht, if Tidus wants to?"

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

"It's hard to believe there'd be a 'mainframe' at all." Fei admits. "But since Zanarkand was higher tech-- perhaps it came from there."

Or well New Kasim City anyway.

"Yeah, and Kasim City too." Fei admits, largely to encourage Emeralda. He leans back in his chair, thinking about this for a moment. Lily asks him if it means something and he frowns deeply.

"Maybe..." Fei says, almost to himself. "It just gave me a bad feeling. Might just be my usual bunch of nerves."

He smiles sheepishly at that. "If it's a super old computer from the Zeboim era, that might explain why Krelian was so invested in Lunar to begin with. He might be after that 'Eldridge Mainframe', come to think of it?"

He's not sure why else Krelian would have been up here, frankly speaking.

He looks to Tidus and he says, sympathetically, "Hey, we'll support you--no matter how that goes down. It's not just you'n'him anymore." Course support might be just an encouraging presence. Fei doesn't want to push into such a personal matter carelessly.

Older than the Zeboim. It IS a relief knowing there are these super powerful gears around and Fei can just sort of worry less about Weltall going berserk because of it. Maybe Elly can just hack Id into submisison.

"It would make sense for a Zeboim machine to have been brought up to Lunar, though." He admits.

It is a little sad seeing Emeralda being so serious, still, but Fei is more proud that she seems to be growing up well--just because it's faster than he expected doesn't mean he's not proud. Maybe it would have always been a little too fast for him.

"Or punch 'im if you prefer." Fei says. The thought of punching a dad cheers him up from all the serious concern going on.

<Pose Tracker> Tidus has posed.

    Tidus catches the sidelong glance Citan sends his way and grimaces at him. "Yeah... I wouldn't have guessed it either. I mean, I've sort of communicated with him before as Sin, but it wasn't... words? It was images. Feelings." He pauses. "...Yuna and I talked recently about, 'what if he could talk normally though?' and I've had that on the brain, though. I know this isn't because of that, but... man, what timing."
    
    For a moment, he falls silent. It gives Elly time to respond to everyone, and it also gives him time to wrestle with how he feels about this. It isn't enough time, but it's more than he might have had. He looks up when Elly looks back at him.
    
    "Yeah, Zanarkand has a lot of... I guess it's super high-tech compared to what Spira has. I don't know how it compares to Solaris, though. I know how to use a computer but I'm not a techie or anything." He pauses. "Doesn't 'eldridge' mean 'magic' or something? I think I heard Lulu say something like that once. I could be wrong."
    
    He pauses at what Lily says, mouth opening, then shutting, then opening again. "I don't know," he admits. "The Zanarkand I came from was... uh..."
    
    A dream? Not the actual city of the past, just a recreation? He shakes his head.
    
    "Maybe it did. We both have blitzball and all, and lots of lights and screens and stuff, and sometimes there were fiend attacks. But now that I think about it, I almost never saw pyreflies around." Tidus considers this, then adds, "Maybe they were all getting used up."
    
    He nods to Emeralda when she brings up Kasim City. "Yeah. The Al Bhed's ancestors were from there." He pauses. Zeboim is the same as Zanarkandian, so it'd sure make sense if it were that language... He instead quietly says, "Yeah. We can do that. I mean, we should *try*."
    
    Fei's support gets him to perk up a little--at the least, he smiles back. "Thanks, Fei. That means a lot." He laughs at the suggestion of face-punching. "Hey, I'm keeping my options open! But right now, I don't think anybody has the tech to transmit a punch through a sphere."

<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.

    "In feeling, if not in words..." Citan muses, before lapsing again into silence as he gazes into the depths of his steaming cup. It is possible that some things transcend such artificial attempts to convey meaning.

    "Yes, and it still does not answer a very singular question," Citan concludes, nodding at Elly's summary. "When you contacted Sin through your Gear, why did it find a mainframe, however old it might be? And how is it that it managed to then form a means for you to speak with Jecht?"

    With what remains of Jecht, at that, which from Elly's summary seemed to be lucid enough for his son to recognize him as himself.

    "The Pyreflies..." He falls silent for a period, holding his cup of tea that much more tightly in his entwined fingers. "Yes, it had slipped my mind, but you are correct, Lily. I wonder if you might not be on to something."

    Might it not be one of the reasons why Krelian took an interest in Lunar?

    "It might be. There are not many machines that survive the fall of Zeboim, and fewer still that are in a largely functional state," he says. "It is why they took such interest in the ruin of that city, for one..." And Emeralda for another, which is something he does not say in her presence.

    There had been something else. He had heard about their attempts to breach the inner sanctum of Macalania Temple, and perhaps that is also part of the same conceit: to understand ancient Spira and the civilization from which it had derived. Would not a Fayth have been of great value to those ends?

    'Doesn't elridge mean magic or something,' Tidus speculates, and, to be fair, it even takes Citan a moment to realign the syllables that fair degree to realize--

    "...Ah, 'eldritch'. The words are similar, but I do not think..." He shakes his head as he trails off, for Tidus continues.

    He has heard about the Dream of Zanarkand. Even now, it scarce seems possible. Yet, from the Fayth, and from the Pyreflies -- from the memories which Pyreflies keep and transmit...

    It becomes an echo, traveling down through the ages.

    "Yes... I think that you should try," he says, gazing up for a time at the 'ceiling'.

    "Though, I do think you are correct. It would not be possible to transmit anything like 'a punch'." It can be hard to tell when he makes a joke, sometimes, but the look in his eyes tells a very different tale from the rest of his serious expression.

<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.

 
Tidus experienced images, feelings - he seems, maybe not positive, but comfortable with it. Lily speaks of them in somewhat more ominous terms. Are they the same phenomenon, and they're seeing it with different eyes? Elly wonders, more or less, and when Tidus is thinking, she answers Lily.

"It's possible... but I don't think it's the same 'kind of technology'. It might work on similar principles... a lot of scientific theories come out of analogies, after all. Maybe if we had thousands of years to think on it, we'd discover something like Pyreflies on Filgaia." Assuming the thousands of years, of course.

To Emeralda, she says, "Oh - yes. It showed me it in the vernacular, then Solarian, so... I don't know, but I imagine I can do a check." A pause, then. "Oh...? It might be possible. Maybe the 'mainframe' is in Sin somewhere, and if we can find it, we can take it out. It might be something like..."

Elly attempts to think of the most recent case she's heard of of an artificial intelligence.

Oh, right. Demetrioi.

Elly sips her tea instead of finishing the thought. She looks to Fei. "... That would make a lot of sense," Elly says, slowly. "It might have information he needs, for whatever reason... and it makes sense, too, that he wouldn't simply say it. If he were to attack the Al Bhed, more than they've already suffered... well, if Sin falls apart over water, they're the only ones in Spira likely to go digging through whatever might be left."

There are also Diggers, of course, but even the Thames would have to hump some heavy gear out to Spira, somehow.

Tidus mentions something else. A possible meaning. Elly's brow furrows. "... It might be... some sort of a record about magic? An enchanted computer?"

But Dr. Uzuki seems to validate it. "... Alright," Elly says, straightening up. "Then, if you want to -- we'll try to send him whatever you want to say. If you'd prefer, though - I mean," a momentary pause, a gulp of the last of her tea. "... I don't mind being a telegram girl and sending it along. I promise I'd let you know any response." She reaches into a pocket to take out the slip of paper she wrote the message upon, handing it to Tidus.

She even wrote down the cusses, though she did elide the extended, rhapsodic, multi-U cuss.

<Pose Tracker> Emeralda Kasim has posed.

New Kasim City, where the Al Bhed - or the people who would one day be the Al Bhed - lived. Which shares her name. It's been one of the things Emeralda has spent a lot of time thinking about, often late at night when she'd really rather be asleep.

Eventually she comes to a conclusion, at least for today. "Then let's try! Let's send him a message," Emeralda says. "You can write it, and I can copy it in Zeboim in case that's what their mainframe needs to recieve. Or Lily can," she adds, though Emeralda wanted to do something useful as she'd been feeling pretty accessory, having not been part of the Sin-attacking team (SOMEBODY had to stay back to make sure the ship wasn't being invaded or Bevelle overrun).

A momentary pause, then: "I bet you could transmit a punch if you tried really hard. Or at least make their side explode. I wonder how you'd do that?" Watch out; she's going to turn into a hacker, or possibly a phreaker. "...maybe we shouldn't, though. Especially if you want to try to find the mainframe in here. Because it might explode."

<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

The language does matter; it's funny, how that language got around. For Tidus, it's the language of Zanarkand; for them, the language of the Zeboim. And for Lily, a language she's known but didn't think about until...

She shakes off the thoughts. She doesn't need to get lost in her own world at the moment.

She does not figure they could transmit a punch either... But she's prety sure Citan was kidding.

"Hm. Maybe that's why they're so many on Spira then," she reflects at Tidus. "Since your technology isn't as ubiquitous, so it doesn't use them up'. ...Maybe that's the difference in a lot of things..."

Not the same kind of technology. Lily glances down at her hands, seeing the circuitry there faintly pulsing as she draws on just a little bit of magic to keep herself warm in this cold place.

"Maybe," she says of Krelian, but talking about him seems to make her broody. Which might make sense, gven rhow well things went with him.

"Yeah, let's try," she agrees. She was also off the Sin directly team, fighting Sinspawn.

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei's eyes widen as Tidus says eldridge means magic! "IT does?!" Then Citan explains he probably meant eldricht. "...Oh."

Don't worry Tidus, Fei can be a dummy right along with you.

It's strange hearing about the Zanarkadian civilization though the idea that Tidus is from 'the past' is also--

--ACtually, Fei thinks, maybe it actually isn't really all that strange after all. There's a whole bunch of people he knows that are secretly from another age. He doesn't know how Tidus managed it but he doesn't really need to does he?

"Maybe someday." Fei grins at Tidus.

But he looks at Doc...

And his cheeks color again when he realizes Citan's joking. It took him a minute.

"Well whatever it might have been--it seems to be under Jecht's control and that's better than it being under Seymour's control far as I'm concerned."

He punches his fist into his palm.

"I'm definitely gonna punch him in the schnozz!" Fei says.

<Pose Tracker> Tidus has posed.

    Dummy brothers!!
    
    Citan raises some very good questions that Tidus didn't even consider. He sure doesn't have an answer to those, either--only a hapless shrug. The talk of Solaris's interest in Zanarkand--or rather, Kasim City--gets him to murmur a low, "Hmm. Yeah, they've been messing with Spira a bunch, huh..."
    
    The correction on eldridge vs. eldritch gets a blush out of Tidus, and he rubs the back of his neck. "Oh! Uh, whoops, heheh. Well, I *did* say I might be wrong," he says with a sheepish grin. It fades soon, though, as the topic turns to the 'mainframe' of Sin.
    
    It's clear Sin isn't totally biological. But he's not sure about it being a Gear, either. But then, that doesn't mean it's *not* part computer either. Aren't there weird stone steps inside? And Yu Yevon might be summoning it, but summoning doesn't preclude there being machina bits... right? Tidus finds he's not sure about that. He doubts even Yuna would know. The insides of Sin are new territory for all of them, literally.
    
    Elly hands him a slip of paper. He accepts it and reads it. He makes another face. "To be honest, I've been thinking about what I'd say to him, but I always figured I'd be saying it to his face, not... through a sphere," he admits. "Texting doesn't hit the same." He looks down at the paper--at one of the other things he and Yuna talked about. She'd dismissed it at the time, but... everything she says has meaning to him.
    
    So: "Okay. I'll save my stuff for later. For right now, I got something else to ask him about. Don't say it's from me, I don't want him to know anyway." He grins again at Fei. "You're right though. Anyone's better than Seymour--even Jecht."
    
    Once he has a pen, he'll scribble down a message and hand it back to Elly. It reads: 'How do you feel about Braska making you into the Final Aeon?'

<Pose Tracker> Tidus has posed.

    Dummy brothers!!
    
    Citan raises some very good questions that Tidus didn't even consider. He sure doesn't have an answer to those, either--only a hapless shrug. The talk of Solaris's interest in Zanarkand--or rather, Kasim City--gets him to murmur a low, "Hmm. Yeah, they've been messing with Spira a bunch, huh..."
    
    The correction on eldridge vs. eldritch gets a blush out of Tidus, and he rubs the back of his neck. "Oh! Uh, whoops, heheh. Well, I *did* say I might be wrong," he says with a sheepish grin. It fades soon, though, as the topic turns to the 'mainframe' of Sin.
    
    It's clear Sin isn't totally biological. But he's not sure about it being a Gear, either. But then, that doesn't mean it's *not* part computer either. Aren't there weird stone steps inside? And Yu Yevon might be summoning it, but summoning doesn't preclude there being machina bits... right? Tidus finds he's not sure about that. He doubts even Yuna would know. The insides of Sin are new territory for all of them, literally.
    
    Elly hands him a slip of paper. He accepts it and reads it. He makes another face, though it turns into a smile at Emeralda's offer. "<Thanks, but don't worry, I know Zeboim,>" he tells her in the language in question. Switching back to common, he adds, "But hey, if you *do* figure out how to transmit a punch through a sphere, let me know. I'd love to hear about it." Even if it might not do him any good.
    
    Lily suggests that maybe it's *because* there's less technology around that there are more pyreflies in Spira. "Yeah... It makes sense. It's like... it's like Gear fuel, right? The more there are around, the more fuel you gotta use, until there's less to go around. Or something." They're more or less on the same page!
    
    Still, he does need to think on a message. He focuses back on it with a grimace. "To be honest, I've been thinking about what I'd say to him, but I always figured I'd be saying it to his face, not... through a sphere," he admits. "Texting doesn't hit the same." He looks down at the paper--at one of the other things he and Yuna talked about. She'd dismissed it at the time, but... everything she says has meaning to him.
    
    So: "Okay. I'll save my stuff for later. For right now, I got something else to ask him about. Don't say it's from me, I don't want him to know anyway." He grins again at Fei. "You're right though. Anyone's better than Seymour--even Jecht."
    
    Once he has a pen, he'll scribble down a message and hand it back to Elly. It reads: 'How do you feel about Braska making you into the Final Aeon?'

<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.

    Tidus seems uncertain, but then, none of them truly can be. "Yes, and while they appear to have decided to abstain, in the wake of present events... I do not think they will continue to stay their hand for long." As Elly says, if they're seeking the remnants of Zeboim and it comes to their attention -- if they don't already know -- what might just be bound up with the heart of Sin, they will surely come to claim it.

    If it can be claimed.

    "There is much we do not know about ancient Zeboim. Or their heirs here on Spira," he remarks to Lily. Was it the awakening of Sin that shattered that civilization? There are gaps in even his understanding of the chain of events, and understandably so.

    "I think we will have the time to do so," he tells Elly. "We have quite a road left to travel, and while we should not delay... it is important to make the time to say certain things."

    While they can still be said, he does not add aloud.

    "Precisely," Citan says to Emeralda's remark that it probably isn't a good idea to try to transmit a punch, since it might just destroy the mainframe -- insofar as it may or may not be possible in the first place. He lifts his cup of tea to his lips.

    "You may yet have your chance," he tells Fei.

<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.

"Alright," Elly tells Emeralda, with a glance towards Lily and a firm nod. "It's a plan. I suppose it sounds so simple when we put it like that, doesn't it...?"

"I've never been able to transmit anything like this," Elly says, "so I can't be sure it will work. Then again, from a certain perspective, it's now worked one hundred percent of the times I've tried it..."

"As for punching," Elly adds, perhaps a tentative effort to join into Fei's ebullience (relatively), "I have been able to send commands to other Gears, sometimes... so, I suppose that would... hm... It wouldn't be hard to make one punch itself. But of course... you need arms to do that!"

The talk of Pyreflies and Gear fuel makes Elly muse. It does seem logical, but it also seems... it's hard for her to put her finger on what, because it always reminds her of Ether. But the limits on Ether are always what you yourself can do, and it doesn't seem to connect to the environment, at least as far as she can tell: not unless you make it.

Elly smiles a little wanly. She is perhaps one of the few to understand 'texting', right now. When Tidus writes his message down, Elly looks at it, nods, folds it and slides it back into her pocket. "I'll remember."

With a look towards Dr. Uzuki, she says, "Then I think I..."

"... may try to get a little rest before doing anything... It's been a busy time, hasn't it?"

"And if any of you do spot something that looks like a computer while you're in here... I suppose let us know," Elly muses. "I'm sure Hammer could dig it out, if he'd be willing to come into this place."

<Pose Tracker> Emeralda Kasim has posed.

"Oh, right..." Emeralda knew perfectly well that Tidus spoke Zeboim because she's held a conversation (if a short one) with him in it before. She feels vaguely embarrassed from offering now.

She demonstrates this mostly by starting to tilt her chair again, though not actually as far as before, and not really meeting anyone's eyes in favour of drinking her tea.

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei asks Hammer if he's willing to dig out a computer from inside Sin over empathite radio.

"Bruh." Hammer says.

"I'm sure I could convince him," Fei tells Elly.