WEEK 1

[bathymetric]

Well, you've now met the brains of the operation, as well as the shockingly nice-looking young lady in charge of day-to-day business. Now all that's left is to get used to your accommodations - there's 24 other people in similar shoes to yours to meet in this building, you know! And who knows how much longer you might have them...

The daily routine in the facility quickly becomes obvious - the only way to tell time moment to moment is to check the strange device The Professor gave you, but at the same time every day the lights in and out of the facility go up, and at the same time every night they go down. Otherwise, it's almost maddening sometimes, how little happens in here. At least you have a few rooms with enough to hopefully keep you occupied. Who knows what secrets they might hold? And there's always that vending machine, if you can find something that fits in the coin slot...





MONDAY | TUESDAY | WEDNESDAY | THURSDAY
FRIDAY | SATURDAY

[ ooc: Welcome to Peace Week! Enjoy it while it lasts. Remember, office hours for The Professor's Assistant are over here if you're interested, while regains can be deposited over here! ]

Comments

[nothingcanstop]

...An uncle. You know, the...brother of my mother, like a parent but a little more easy and relaxed?

[ Are humans so weird that--wait. Wait, this one...she hadn't got a good look at her before, but Jasper definitely isn't a human. She doesn't have the same...fleshy look. ]

[hardnosed]

Never heard of them. Sounds complicated.

[ She states this very dismissively, but narrows her eyes, like she's trying to get it. ]

Are you talking about a supervisor?

[nothingcanstop]

No, I don't work for him, it's... It's family.

[ She's going to try explaining this gently! Maybe that'll work! ]

[hardnosed]

I don't know what that is.

[ jesus christ ]

[nothingcanstop]

[ Well Fuck ]

Oooookay then! Well, it's like- he's my mother's- wait, you probably wouldn't... [ Internal clock. Thinking. Thinking- ] Hey, you're a...a Gem, right? [ Taking a long guess there, but she's got a rock on her face, so, ] How do...Gems...how were you born?

[hardnosed]

That's right — me and her. [ Thankfully, she answers the other question instead of dwelling on Rose, for once. ] And Gems are made, not born. We emerge fully-formed from wherever it is we were injected, after incubating deep in the crust of the earth.

[ AS. ONE. DOES. ]

I'm not a Kindergartener, but you wouldn't get the technical explanation anyway.

[nothingcanstop]

[ She didn't think Jasper was a Kindergartener, like, look at the SIZE of her- ]

Alright! So you guys are uh...grown...but that still means someone had to inject you to start, right? Do you know who that was for you?

[hardnosed]

Whatever nobody technician designed the place. [ And she did a terrible job with the Beta Kindergarten, so it's not as if Jasper owes her anything. ] Some Era 1 Peridot.

[ She shrugs. ]

I don't know the rest of her designation. It's not the kind of thing anyone cares about, when they come into existence.

[nothingcanstop]

[ jasper can you give her something to work with here, anything, absolutely anything, ]

Alright... Well, when you say you were fully-formed, I assume that means you were...this size, had an idea of who you were, how to talk and walk and...all that?

[hardnosed]

[ She grunts by way of an affirmative, and also no, she absolutely cannot. ]

I knew who I was. I had all the information and skills I needed to fulfil my purpose as designated by the Diamonds. Everything else, you learn from experience.

[nothingcanstop]

Right! Experience! Well... For me...and I'd imagine a lot of the others here, we don't really come out like that, when we first wake up. We're a lot more...small and helpless and need to depend on someone, to teach us how to get around and understand things, and keep us safe.

[ She can do this. This seems easy to comprehend, right? ]

That job usually falls to the ones who...made us. Our family. They bring us into the world and guide us through it.

[hardnosed]

[ She gets it. Sort of. She sort of gets it. But— ]

But that's so inefficient. Trying to get a task done when you're playing escort is bad enough — how do you accomplish anything like that? [ Something occurs to her. ] And how long do you incubate?

[nothingcanstop]

Well, once you make the choice to...to have kids--that's what they're called, when they're first born--then that partly becomes your job. It's a conscious choice, to...change your priorities.

[ That feels a little hard for Della to say. Something uncomfortable rises on her face. But-- ]

It's important. To help the next generation grow. By making that choice, you become responsible for them.

[hardnosed]

Okay.

[ She really doesn't understand these earthlings at all. ]

So protecting them is your primary mission until they're strong — strong for your kind, anyway. [ was it really necessary to dunk on ducks while trying to comprehend family structures ] When Gems of the same type come out of their holes, if it's set up right, it's usually simultaneous. Is there a word for that?

[nothingcanstop]

[ ...You know, that jab included, Jasper kind of reminds her of Penny! It seems her explanation is working, so! A little smile. ]

Yeah! Well... It can be earlier, or later, for people too, but that kind of bond is called having siblings. Brothers for boys, sisters for girls. For when it's simultaneous, it's called twins. My brother, Donald, is my twin. We're the same age.

[hardnosed]

[ oh no why's she doing that with her face ]

And an uncle — is somebody's brother.

[nothingcanstop]

Mother. Mother's brother. We call the ones who...uh, made and/or raise the kids parents. A woman's a mother, and a man's a father.

[ We're learning! We're bonding!! ]

So, my Uncle Scrooge is my mother's brother.

[hardnosed]

[ And that's the guy who has a vault! Before she can take this conversation right back to the beginning, now that everything's been contextualized, she remembers: ]

You're not human. [ I mean, yeah. ] You think all of that still applies to them?

[nothingcanstop]

Oh, I know it does. I've talked to some of them about their parents, my kids, my brother, and none of them have looked at me funny.

[ She counts those off on her feathery fingers. ]

As far as I can tell, families are a human thing too.

[hardnosed]

It must be an organic thing. What are you, anyway?

[nothingcanstop]

I'm a duck. You never seen one before?

[hardnosed]

Never. [ Even someone with as little care for earth's creatures as Jasper can note similarities between Della and the tiny flapping earthlings (TM) that also have bills, but they're so clearly different species that it doesn't cross her mind to draw any real parallels. ] Humans are the only sentient species on the planet I know of — besides us.

[nothingcanstop]

Wow... [ Wait for it... ] Most everyone's just been surprised I'm not...you know, a non-sentient duck. It's honestly kind of refreshing to see someone who knows as little about me as I know about them.