Firmament

So Rainboa, anything last words, or are you ready to head into the Cafe?

Eat and drink for now. You need sustenance

Drink tea. Eat. Be less hungry.

That's what I'm thinking too. Let's get inside.

...man, the interior of this place looks pretty nice. Definitely got that Brand New feel, the way everything's still clean and shiny and un-stained. Even that Loppe kid working behind the counter looks happy to be talking to a customer right now. He obviously hasn't been working long enough to have gotten jaded by the service industry. Enjoy that innocence while it lasts, kid.

Anyway, there's someone else ordering a drink right now, so we've got some time. You guys figured out what you wanted to get?

I want to feel(?) the feeling(??) of citrus again. Specifically, hot chocolate dissolved in citrus. I remember that my favorite drink, before I died and became a part of this Eidolon, was hot chocolate made with Citrus.

That... sounds a little adventurous, even for me. Let's put a pin in that idea for now. Anyone else?

Tea! Smoothies! Want!

Oh yeah, a fruit smoothie does sound pretty good. So does an iced tea. We can see what they have. What about food though?

.. don t.... no not eat please..

Listen, we've already talked about this. I haven't eaten since yesterday afternoon. I need food to live. If I keep not eating, I'll get sick and die. I'm even feeling a little lightheaded and weak, and I bet it's from going without food for so long. Ergo, doing what you want me to do will literally kill me, a person whom you just said was your friend.

Do you really want to be responsible for killing a friend by not eating?

If so, I'm gonna have to revise my stance on taking your advice. And take back that Friendship Point too.

Just pick something you like for food, but maybe avoid eating living things? It'd probably be garudan-racist to assume you'd enjoy live worms or mice but if there's an aquarium with a fish in it, try not to order that particular fish.

...

On second thought, Rainboa... how about I just handle the order by myself. Don't worry about it. I'll take care of it later, on my own.

For now, let's just... scoot around the counter, and pick out a seat. Those plush reading chairs in the back corner look like nice places to get set up, yeah? Comfortable, there's a nice view out the window, network connection is looking pretty strong, there's a little table to set up the laptop on... and there's even an empty power outlet. It's perfect.

I'll be setting up my machine for a sec. You got any last things y'all wanted to talk about? Ideally non-food related things?

I'm not human racist. I think i used to be one, part of one? and i think magic was made up.

Magic is not illegal in where we from. I think. In where we from, magic is not real. Fiction. Fake. Trick. Unlike here where it is. Real. True. Actual.

We have to abide by the laws of physics, else what we're trying to do won't work. And our worldline is packed with hunams. As in, there are only hunams. And the space age was when we decided Earth began to get boring, and shot big science missiles into the sky. Soon after that, we shot people to the moon and gathered moon dust...

Wow. There really is a lot you don't know, huh.

First of all, "Magic" can't just "not work" somewhere. Mana Gates and Souls are the only reason anyone can heal their bodies, connect to The Dreaming, remember anything, and generally do all the things you need to do to be alive! I'm not trying to make you feel stupid here... I know there's plenty of primitive worldlines out there, where science and technology isn't as advanced as it is here. The one you came from must just not have worked out basic Astral Theory yet. That, or your memory just got jumbled together in that Eidolon hive-mind thing you've got going on, like ususal.

That aside, I've never heard of a worldline where the people named their homeworld "Earth". You sure you're remembering the name right? Because that's literally just a word for dirt, and since you seem to have forgotten how to say "Human" right, I'm having a hard time taking that seriously. More than that, though, it's incredibly hard to believe that your people actually visited the Moon, let alone that they did so by strapping themselves onto missiles, and shooting themselves at it. I don't mean to offend whatever mythology or legends your pre-manatech civilization may believe, but... let's be realistic here. There's no way your people actually flew to the Moon. You'd have to be completely insane to think that plan would work, let alone to try it.

Quiet corner... Help keep Rainboa mind off Cafe with magic-lesson?

First of all, anyone with any self-respect doesn't call it "Magic". Magic is what you call card tricks and sleight of hand, or made-up rituals from Ye Olden Times that ususally only had placebo effects, or other phenomena you don't understand yet. What I study are the Spirit Arts, and Astral Theory. And though yes, I could spend my whole day off giving you an entry-level course on "Magic"... turns out I don't actually want to do that today.

If you wanted to learn about "Magic" so bad, you shouldn't have skipped class.

Anyway, think I've got the laptop set up, there's no customers at the cafe counter, I'm still feeling a bit woozy, and the barista keeps looking at me and making me feel guilty for not buying anything yet... so I'm going to go place an order already. If you don't want to go with me because you're deathly afraid of food or whatever, you can just... stay here and watch our stuff I guess?

Actually... hmm. I've got an idea.

As an Eidolon, you're obviously some kind of Spirit, right? And I know you're sorta... disconnected from my body, and my senses, and all that right now. Or whatever is going on, where we're not being part of the same person anymore, and can only sorta hear one another's thoughts? But even Spirits without physical manifestations can usually sense and interact with concentrations of Mana. And my Compad and Laptop are both Manatech, so... theoretically, I think you should be able to use them, even without me?

So yeah, if you want to try, I bet you could figure out how to use my Compad or Laptop, while I go talk to the kid behind the counter. If you really do want to learn something, Kiri's live video of the lecture we're skipping should be streaming to my Compad still. Today is supposed to be about the Branching Worldline model of Cosmology, I think. If that sounds fun for some reason, the link to it is in my chat history with Kiri. Just don't send them any messages while I'm gone, alright? Alternatively, the laptop's got Beast Hatchers 3 installed on it. Feel free to start a new save file and play that for a bit, if you want. And if you just want to take a nap or whatever, that's fine too.

Just, whatever you do... try to stay out of trouble, okay?

I'll be right back.