welcome to the chessboard

[self_composed]

Bella stockpiles hexes.

She already has a ridiculous number, but she wants so many that if it seems most expedient to individually do some manner of hex-magic to every cubic inch of space in her dorm room, she can and still have a ridiculous number left. She wants enough that if Libby turns out to be a particularly dab hand at extortion, to the point where paying up is her best bet, Bella can keep gritting her teeth and handing over tribute up until the point where even this person will believe that this is all there could ever be - and still have a ridiculous number. She wants her ridiculous numbers to have ridiculous numbers.

What does she have?

An Alice. She has one of those.

And she can use what she has to get what she wants, late into the night, hexily disassembling her body's dependence on sleep, and till she should start thinking about catching up on the internet and heading to class.

Comments

[self_composed]

[Nah, it's new. I wanted to pull an all-nighter and I'd been thinking about it for a while. I can sleep normally at will and wake up under circumstances when I would normally have woken up, or at a predetermined time. Otherwise I always feel like it's about ten in the morning after a good night's rest and a cup of coffee.]

[nonbird]

[That's very well designed,] he compliments, yawning. [I want one.]

[self_composed]

Bella adds a hex to his little cloth bag. [Consult your stash of coins.]

[nonbird]

[Aww, for me?]

He yawns again, pauses a moment, and then comes back sounding much less mumbly.

[Well, that's interesting.]

[self_composed]

[Do tell.]

[nonbird]

[I'm not sure of this yet,] he says cautiously. [But it seems like when I make a wish, part of the magic goes into the wish, and part goes... somewhere else. The part that goes into the wish is most of it; the other part is much smaller.]

[self_composed]

[Somewhere else,] repeats Bella slowly.

[nonbird]

[Yes. And no, before you ask, I have no idea where or what it does when it gets there.]

[self_composed]

[Do you think you could watch it go wherever it goes if you were on the lookout for it while making a new wish?]

[nonbird]

[Maybe,] he hazards.

[self_composed]

[Have you had more opportunity to consider perfect recall or any of the other possibilities for things-to-do-with-more-hexes? Would Kolya like to not need sleep, maybe?]

[nonbird]

[Actually... what sorts of things could I do with a pentagon?]

[self_composed]

[Learn to speak Swahili or play the oboe or kick ass at Ultimate Frisbee or cook like a deity or do awesome parkour tricks? Make a neat magic device like my bike, only please nothing conspicuous because I don't want it to be too blatantly obvious to Libby that I'm passing you coins?]

[nonbird]

[I would like some pentagons, please,] he requests. [I'll spend them all on languages.]

[self_composed]

Bella sends him twenty.

[nonbird]

About thirty seconds later: [Can I have some squares, too, actually?]

[self_composed]

[Are you out? Sure.] She gives him twenty of those too.

[nonbird]

[Learning languages with magic feels like cheating,] he reports, after another minute or two. [And the amount of magic a pentagon spends on who-knows-what is the same as the amount of magic a square spends on doing its actual job.]

[self_composed]

[That's interesting... does a hex send a pentagon-sized amount wherever-it-goes?]

[nonbird]

[I think so. I might as well take that perfect memory now; I seem to keep needing it.]

[self_composed]

Bella sends him a hex, tapping her fingers on her knee with intent impatience.

[nonbird]

Very, very shortly afterward: [Yes. And looking back at triangles, I don't think they spend any extra at all. But a square spends a triangle's worth of mystery magic.]

[self_composed]

[That's very peculiar. I wonder what the mystery magic could be doing.]

[nonbird]

[I still can't figure that part out,] he admits.

[self_composed]

[It's not contributing to the wish. Is it just... waste magic? Released to no effect at all? A natural inefficiency of the coining process?]