(Untitled)

[river_meimei]

It's been a while since River was in the bar.

But now Serenity has lifted off from Southdown Abbey with a fresh store of fruits and vegetables in the kitchen and wedding rings on Simon and Kaylee's fingers, and the crew is shipbound again, with a door to Milliways around any corner

Comments

[mapmakerchur]

Furry feet walk past River's table.

After a moment, they walk back, and Chur crouches to peer under the table. "H'lo, ker River," she greets.

[river_meimei]

River glances up at her, and then beams.

Solemnly, "I listened to your book."

[mapmakerchur]

Chur purses her lips in delight. "I thought you might have finished it by now," she says, and twitches an ear. "Did you enjoy it?"

[river_meimei]

Seriously, "There were logistical flaws in the argument."

Which, because River enjoys a challenging puzzle, is not a 'no'; this is spoken more as a confidence between two colleagues.

[mapmakerchur]

Chur sneezes a soft laugh. "No one understands the interface that well, at least none of the oxy-breathers I've met. I don't, and I stay awake through it." Fortunately for River, Chur isn't thinking about how humans must drug themselves to stay sane in hyperspace, merely about how hani brains usually redirect the input into dreams.

Then, conspiratorially, "Have you thought about making a model yet? I know I did, and got my ears good and pulled for using up a week's worth of clay."

[river_meimei]

River brightens.

"I have modeling clay. For Christmas."

Then, drooping slightly, "The parallels aren't exact. Not enough dimensions."

[mapmakerchur]

Chur flicks an ear. "If you're patient, you can usually get the outside of a vane column to look right." Another ear-flick, self-deprecatingly. "At least I thought so, when I was a kitten. Doesn't help much with the physics of the thing, you're right - you almost have to experience what your stomach does when it's not all real in order to visualize some of the equations."

At least that's what it took for Chur. River, of course, may not have been so hampered.

[river_meimei]

River's eyes shift to the table leg. She's not smiling so much now.

"Too many variables."

[mapmakerchur]

Chur dips an ear. "Too many indeed," she agrees. "Did you notice towards the end the part about overjumping? Narukkitkkak, one of the scientists ker Pyanfar knows, suggested that..." And then she says something in Physics Geek, a language her mun can neither speak nor translate from.

[river_meimei]

River's mun just blesses the fact that craziness allows for River's Physics Geek to be incomprehensibly garbled.

River frowns, considering that.

"It's fallacious," she says eventually. "Time skips sideways. You'd turn your head inside-out."

[mapmakerchur]

Chur shakes her head. "No, see, if you're just on the very edge of the shadow..." She extrudes a claw and draws in the dust. "It works with Tysetehamin's Postulate - Tully says Bok's Third Law is pretty similar? Besides, I've been up and Walking when only two-thirds of me were real and half of that was asleep. My insides aren't decorating my outsides yet."

[river_meimei]

"They could be," River says absently. She's studying the dust.

She touches the line with a finger.

"He'll have to be very skilled. It's in the timing."

[mapmakerchur]

"Probably why he hasn't tried it himself," Chur agrees. "It's theoretically possible - knnn can carry ships that don't have vanes through jump. Then again, knnn go..." Up? Out? Chur settles on "above the interface faster and higher than any oxy-breather's ship. I think you need the five brains to get the timing down."

[river_meimei]

River looks sulky.

"Collaboration doesn't make the addition come out."