That wasn't supposed to happen

[whatamithinking]

The parameters are recalibrated, the dial is spun, and a new universe is selected.
It won't be home--they haven't collected anywhere near enough coordinate data to think they can find home yet--but it will be another step closer.
And who knows, it might be interesting.
Edie steps through the portal first.

Comments

[iamnotpolaris]

"Yes. Yes it is."

[not_only]

"Um, and the 'vampires'?"

His language doesn't even have a word for those; it has to be loaned in from English.

[iamnotpolaris]

"Vampire is a term many universes use for types of near-human who consume blood."

[not_only]

"...And they come in a 'terrible' variety? And a 'moderately friendly' one, too, I guess. How unfriendly are the terrible ones?"

[iamnotpolaris]

"The terrible ones will kill people to get their blood. The moderately friendly ones take significantly less and prefer to use willing donors."

[not_only]

"Oh."

[iamnotpolaris]

"Yeah. Some universes will work harder to kill you than it sounds like Terraria does. Luckily my sister and I are good at not getting killed and have an excellent escape vehicle."

[not_only]

"Terraria has worked pretty hard to kill me. It just doesn't do it all at once. Oh - I forgot to mention that if it starts raining, flying fish will attack you. We should warn your sister so she knows to come inside if it rains."

[iamnotpolaris]

"Ah."
'Edie, if it rains, come inside, flying fish will attack you.'

[whatamithinking]

'The fuck. Okay, sure, I guess it's not objectively weirder than the animate flesh-statues.'

[not_only]

"And there are giant slimes. You've seen slimes, right? The... round hopping things? In the rain there are enormous ones about as tall as you are. Carrying brightly coloured umbrellas for some reason. Running into a normal slime aboveground isn't much more than inconvenient, but the big ones were scary the first few times I saw them."

[iamnotpolaris]

"Oh, yeah, the ones in the snow place drop pretty balls."

[not_only]

"They do. I like those ones."

[iamnotpolaris]

"And the snow place has penguins! Penguins are cute. It's a little sad to think of a blob hopping on a penguin and exploding it."

[not_only]

"It happens sometimes."

[iamnotpolaris]

"Yeah. These animals don't even have the rudimentary minds that normal animals do, so I'm not actually upset about it, but. Cuteness."

[not_only]

"They don't? I guess I'm not surprised."

[iamnotpolaris]

"When my sister said you were the only mind within her range she meant it, yeah. So--given that I'm pants at describing universes to someone who grew up in a completely different cultural context from me--does it sound fair to suggest you tag along until you find somewhere you feel like staying?"

[not_only]

"Yes," he says. "Do you think Terraria might end up being a good place to stay in between random universes, if you don't already have somewhere like that? As long as you stay on this island and don't go back to mine, it should be perfectly safe most of the time... well, unless a strong monster attacks, but I'm used to those."

[iamnotpolaris]

"It might. And we're used to being randomly attacked by monsters, some universes have random monster attacks, the fact that Edie would be useless against these ones is new but not insurmountable."

[not_only]

"One thing I do really like about Terraria is that I can build my own house however I want wherever I want and then live in it. It's almost like having my own Sphere."

(This is a term referring to some sort of personal domain that winged ones have.)

"I guess that part will be different with more people around, but I don't think that's bad, necessarily."

[iamnotpolaris]

"I mean, neither of us is going to think it's strange if you want to set up new houses and live in them every so often."

[not_only]

He giggles softly.

[iamnotpolaris]

"The whole Unfading thing sounds really convenient."

[not_only]

"It is. I don't know any winged ones personally, but I used to see them flying."