[open mingle]

[badfeyth]

WHO: Anyone helping with prom renovations!
WHAT: An open mingle log!
WHERE: District 4, Science Discovery Center Planetarium
WHEN: Anytime until December 2!
WARNINGS: Please warn for content in individual headers!




An open mingle for threads relating to prom setup and the planetarium renovations!

★★★
Possible renovation activities include, but are certainly not limited to:

• Ripping out and disposing of a couple of rows of chairs in the planetarium to make room for a dance floor
• Laying down flooring for the aforementioned dance floor
• Clearing room for and rigging four stations where food can be prepared
• Kitschy photography station design
• Installing light fixtures, darkness shutters, and other aesthetic additions provided by Kaveh
• Playing toolbox dodgeball (IF YOU CAN DODGE A WRENCH...)
• Impromptu caber-tossing match feat. lumber somebody probably intended to use for something important
• Assorted various OSHA violations

Anyone is welcome to drop in a top-level, just please warn for content as needed on individual thread headers!

Comments

[justscribing]

That suggests that targeting things that mean harm isn't actually doing it right. [The flourish of his pen at the end of a word. Down to the next line, he still doesn't look up from his work.] You've modified the spell?

[excaliburden]

[Hmmm... Now that he points it out...]

I guess it isn't. The right way to do it, I mean. [The correct way is to have a point where not a single soul or thing can cross.]

But yeah, to better suit what I needed at the time. It was just a matter of fiddling with it until it worked how I wanted.

[justscribing]

[Alhaitham hums thoughtfully.] Most people find that their abilities are restricted here. Have you tested your barriers since arriving?

[Truthfully, he doubts it will stop anything their kidnappers attempt. They seem to have direct influence to their persons, but it'll soothe at least some people's nerves he's sure.]

[excaliburden]

Oh, I'm definitely much weaker than I used to be.

[A beat, and she rubs the back of her neck a little sheepishly.]

Maybe it's because I'm used to being that weak, but I knew right away. [The strength she's obtained has only just recently become hers.]

I can still make barriers and bounded fields, but they've gone wrong a few times. It is very difficult to predict.

[justscribing]

It would be troublesome if you were to accidently barricade the people who are attending the gala. [It would also be funny. It would also drive Kaveh into frustrated despair.]

How many of these barriers can you have active at one time?

[excaliburden]

Back home, it was more like a range...

[She looks thoughtful, tapping her lower lip with a finger as she thinks.]

I could cast a barrier of protection on a number of our soldiers, so long as they were within a certain range of me. But if they were too far away, I couldn't get a read on them well enough to cast it.

[She wrinkles her nose.]

Here, it may just be a few in a smaller range... but I'll do everything I can, and give it my best try...!

[justscribing]

You'll only need to cover a venue and not an army. If that's the case, is it possible to cast a barrier over the venue, and then a protection spell over one or two specific people within the vanue?

[excaliburden]

Yes, definitely!

[A beat. She considers how her abilities have changed since coming here, andddd follows that up with:]

Probably! At the very least, I'm confident in protection over two specific people, and the barrier over the venue might just have some holes in it...!

[justscribing]

To be honest, I think it's unlikely we'll experience any retaliation for this event since it isn't disrupting one of their experiments. But if it did, it would be best to protect the venue and Kaveh and Ghost specifically as the hosts. Would you be able to sense where holes in the barrier are?

[excaliburden]

[Ahhh...]

I'm not sure... I haven't really tried here. I could practice beforehand, though!

[Kaveh and Ghost, huh...?]

But I can definitely cast a protection spell on both of them! I know them both, so picking them out will be easy. You can count on me, really.

[justscribing]

[He nods once.] Good. Ideally it won't be necessary, but the precaution can't hurt. Practicing beforehand would be best so we can account for any gaps in your defense.

[excaliburden]

In that case... if I practice putting up a bounded field, would you like to see if you can get through it? I'll aim for total impenetrability, even if I don't really think I can do that here anymore.

[She wasn't always great at it back home even before she lost all of her power and strength, after all.]

[justscribing]

All right, we can test your barrier later when I've completed these signs. We can still trial it around the venue. You'll be warding against me, specifically?

[In case they need to tell other people not to try and walk in and out.]

[excaliburden]

Hmmm... I think in this case, I should start with a proper, regular old bounded field. So I'll be trying to block everyone.

Then after we have that, I can try blocking you specifically.

[justscribing]

All right. Then it should be tested later in the evening when less people need to be coming and going. I'll stick around after most have left.

[excaliburden]

That works for me! I don't have anything else important to do today.

[A beat. That does mean she needs to keep herself busy, though, in which case:]

... Did you have anything you needed delivered somewhere?

[justscribing]

[At the end of the current sign, Alhaitham points aside to a stack of finished and dried ones.] You can take those to Kaveh or Ghost. They'll know where to put them.

[excaliburden]

Got it! Okay, I'll go take care of that now, then.

[She'll be back for barriers later, but for now, she carefully scoops up those signs into her arms, and bustles off to deliver them.


A fair bit later, after bouncing around helping out wherever she can, and when most people have called it a day, she comes back to search out Alhaitham again.]

[justscribing]

[Alhaitham will be lingering by the doorway as most of the other people have filtered out, giving Altria a nod in greeting as she approaches.] Ready?

[excaliburden]

Ready!

[She trots over, taking a deep breath, and then nods to him.]

Give me just a little bit of time. It won't be visible, but you can try to come in after a few minutes.

[With that, she heads right on inside to set up her bounded field--ideally.

The problem, of course, is that a Planetarium is a large building, and she does not have near as much power as she used to have. She gives it her very best shot, but by the time the bounded field clicks into place, Alhaitham will find that it's pretty easy to move into the planetarium itself, though eventually, he will hit a wall--an invisible one, set around the area where the majority of the renovations have been done, around the dance floor and some of the area being set up for food. All told, it's perhaps a barrier with a 30 foot diameter, but it seems pretty solid all around.]

[justscribing]

[Alhaitham waits until the signal to move, and then he starts forward. The pace is slow enough that it's the toe of his boot that hits the barrier first and bring him to a stop. Alhaitham presses his hand to it, and then slides around its perimeter.]

It looks like it covers most of the area. [Not everything but enough that most people would be under its protection if something did happen.] I don't have any way to test its response to magic, but I assume it will withstand that as much as a physical blow?

[excaliburden]

Yes!

[The barrier remains solid under his hand, equally sound all the way around. At the very least, even if it isn't as large as she was hoping for, it is consistent.

She moves towards the edge of the barrier to better hear him and speak with him.]

Magic, creatures, and force--all such things are protected from by a bounded field.

[justscribing]

It seems solid. [He's not about to bruise his hand to test it, but that it's working at all is a good sign.] Can you cross your own barrier?

[excaliburden]

Not one like this. I mean, I can, but it will undo the bounded field, because I'll be breaking the rules that were created for it.

If it was just a field intended to conceal the people inside, then me leaving it would have no impact so long as I could still supply it with mana... but if it's a field meant to keep people from coming and going, then...

[Her leaving completely contradicts its existence.


... And then, with a sheepish sigh:]

Maybe if I was a little better at it, I could make a more nuanced bounded field, but, um...

[She's not.]

[justscribing]

[That's fascinating, actually, and makes Alhaitham think of that book on curses he has borrowed from Ghost: magic with expectations so precise that one can circumvent its intentions with some rules lawyering.]

Does that apply even if you specify the barrier to things that are a threat?