Scene #1731:

Owner	Pose
Arthur Lowell	Here we are, back again. A traditional suburban home, copypasted into expansion hundreds of times, Sims-style, forms its basic foundation and shape, making up the core of its aesthetic. However, someone's added a distinctly skull-themed aesthetic that goes so far as to have a floor or two of the structure be entirely shaped like a skull. The titanic structure which shouldn't ever be able to hold itself up as high as it does sits atop a spire that similarly shouldn't be able to hold itself up at all. The tallest spire on the Land of Spires and Frogs has what seems like a normal suburban lawn on it, though there's several strange explosive magma traps on the lawn and the lawn itself hasn't been cut for a year and a half. The fortieth floor is still devastated from some kind of massive explosion take out a large portion of the floor, while the second floor appears to have been subjected to some kind of incredibly violent breach from something the size of a fridge. The Warpgate through which Kyra might arrive is actually an extremely unusual green spirographic-design gate in an empty room up there. Getting down to where Arthur probably is means heading down several dozen stories of stairs, a dangerous proposition indeed, but Kyra could find him around the massive skull that makes up the fourth and fifth stories of the home, a large two-story room with a massive pipe organ near the "face" of the skull and a mess of alchemy equipment opposite it, and between them an assortment of furniture. Dried bloodstains are still here, on the stairs on the way down, but that was nearly a month ago now. He's tried to clean some of them up, but a lot of it is still left to deal with. Arthur himself is in less of a horrible mood these days, apparently, back in high spirits! He's got a bunch of punchcards set aside for the work today, and he also grabbed a few snacks for Kyra to munch on while they do this whole tutoring thing.
Kyra Hyral	Currently not motivated by an immediate need to heal someone, Kyra arrives at a more liesurely pace, taking in her surroundings and lead-up to Arthur's Escheresque house. In particular, as she crosses the lawn, she does so with her mPad in hand, carefully mapping out where the lava boobytraps are just in case she has to get here in a hurry again. It would be a sad, sad thing to get whacked by Arthur's defenses if she was just coming to help. One thing she does notice right away is...nothing's been cleaned up here. The hole on the floor where he was attacked by the drone is still here. The /bloodstains/ are still here. "Dude needs to alchemize himself a maid-bot or something." Kyra mumbles as she ascends lots and lots of stairs, dragging along her backpack as she does so. Arthur would note that her backpack is a different one this time-shaped /entirely/ like a small moogle. It looks like the creature is clinging to her back when she wears it and for the case of this visit, it's visibly filled with stuff. Of course, she's also brought the aurumal autodoc with her which she procured a strap for at some point. "HEY ARTHUR!" Kyra shouts as she climbs the stairs to the fourth story, "I'M HERE!"
Arthur Lowell	"'EY!" Arthur calls out from his alchemy lair of sorts. "How's it HANGIN', KY?" When she gets to the door, he'll be on his feet and aggressively right over to her. "Yeah girl yeah gimmie dat skin." He aggressively performs something like seven different cool-kid handshakes on her free hand in the span of something like half a second unless Kyra can get away. Holy shit this is a little much. Either way he'll immediately turn back around and say, "ALRIGHT! Take the LOAD OFF, even if it is fuckin' CUTE, let's figure out where to GO from here! Kick back with some CHIPS over there or somethin' if you WANNA." He squats down at the pile of alchemy punchcards and immediately rushes through them. "So HEY, how's the GUN been treatin' you? Solid BACKUP?" He's tossing cards haphazardly to one side. "Anything you feel like you're LEARNING from the thing? I mean, if that's a NO, don't gotta worry 'bout it, still kinda STAGE ONE here."
Kyra Hyral	Right away, Kyra's completely blown away by the difference in mood between now and the Arthur of a few weeks ago. "Hi!" she's equally cheerful and completely unintimidated by the sudden long chain of high fives, fist bumps, and finger wagging that Arthur initiates-even if she's unable to keep up or 'get' half of them. "Wow, you're just super special excited today...let me guess, hunting down those robots was it, right?" It was all over the broadband and Syndicate band at that one point and Staren even made a follow-up report. "Mad catharasis?" A grin spreads across her face as she holds up the HEAL LASER with one hand. "It's fantastic! Works like a charm and apparently can even work on the non-organic folks like Kotone. That surprised the /hell/ out of her the other day, heh heh. I could have used it on a Transformer too but he didn't get damaged enough. But...like I said, there are some snags. I can use it to replace the cure spell but if I ever want to do a group heal, I'm SOL. I'd need something with spread-like that grenade launcher you were talking about!" Kyra seems a little too excited at that thought. "There's also, uh, something else. My white magic's got other spells in it besides just the straight-up cure. More advanced stuff that I still use when supporting." She frowns. "I mean ideally I'd want to stop using white magic all together while I work on the replacements and the...mental stuff-" she taps her head, "But when I go out and do my thing I find I need to use the non-cure spells too. Like esuna...probably the most important. It cures persistent effects like poison."
Arthur Lowell	"Nah, this is just ME." Arthur says, turning and grinning. He's still tossing cards as he does. One of those teeth gleam dramatically for a moment. "But the ROBOT HUNTING, that WAS pretty great. She had a REMOTE BODY but I got a chance to PUNCH the lady in charge of that. Just BAM, right in the gut. INSTANT STRESS RELIEF." He picks out a card for a grenade and another for a revolver and DUNKS them into the console. Then he stretches, as if working something out of his muscles, before miming a punch. "Nothing like dealing with the PROBLEM at the SOURCE, HEAD ON, right? With your FIGHTING FISTS? Just no more FUCKING AROUND, go and BREAK SHIT right at the SOURCE!" Then he gestures to the cards. "Alright, let's see if we can AMP THIS UP. Take a look at the CARDS whenever you wanna. Meantime..." He almost instantly zips over to a big chair he set near the table and flops down into it dramatically. "Gettin' any STABILITY on the MAGIC? Not that you NEED to at THIS STAGE, actually, and I DIDN'T, but you might be gettin' LUCKY. Otherwise we just take the REGULAR ROUTE here."
Kyra Hyral	"Seriously?" Kyra's eyes widen at the thought of Arthur being like this ALL THE TIME. It's a little overwhelming but at the same time it results in her liking him just a little more. Hooray for feisty creator gods! "Oh hell yeah, I'm all for breaking shit! Especially if it involves /blowing it up/!" Kyra taps her fingertips together excitedly, "Not so much the punching part though, it's not how I work. Anyway..." She unloops the golden rifle from over her shoulder in case that's going to factor in the alchemy today. The backpack follows, thunking heavily against the ground like a martial artist's secretly weighted clothing. She unzips the backpack, the zipper of which is around the moogles neck so opening it looks a little like she's tearing it's head off. Cute? "It's not been more stable...uh, actually my friend Soan said it might be getting worse. The effects are starting to get kind of /wild/." Kyra then briefly describes the latest incidents, the one that happened in Terra Majora which triggered by using Banish on a tree. Instead of clearing corruption, it polymorphed it into a monster. Then there's the latest incident where her forearm turned into a crab claw when she tried to cast a basic poison removal spell. All the while she speaks, she removes stuff from her backpack: more darts, a number of different chunks of extremely pure elemental metals that she picked up from Odin, a vial filled with dirt from that particular swamp in Terra Majora. "None of that stuff has ever happened before when the magic's frayed. Worst part about that crab claw thing is it happened in front of some classmates. -oh, hey, let's bring out that dragonball card too, I've been dying to see what happens if that gets thrown in." She drops the rest of the stuff in a pile next to the machine and starts helping herself to the snacks Arthur put out there. "Got some metals here too, like, we can get a theme going to follow the gold from last time."
Arthur Lowell	Arthur ponders. For a moment, he takes that wise posture again. "Can't be the gun." He says. "Or if it is, it's a part of what you're missing here." He nabs the dragonball card off the pile as he thinks. "Hmmm. Anything else been going on recently? With the life and all?" He gestures to the metals. "Looks sweet, let's see what we can get into it. I'll try to find something antidote-ish, maybe..." "Hmmm. Gonna be honest, either you're looking at some kind of really, /really/ coincidental spiritual disease linked up with that creator deity you were talking about before, or you're still grapplin' a bit with the problem. Shit like this, it's psychosomatic practically ninety percent of the time 'cause of something. Like I said before, not gonna judge or anything, but why'd you can the worship thing? What's the mindset here? Important thing here's figuring out what links with what." Arthur honestly has ideas of several potential causes, but he's not going to be pushing anything in particular until both of them are on the same conclusions.
Kyra Hyral	"It's still only been happening when I use my white magic...though, I don't think it's triggered when I've cast cure lately. Just other stuff in the class." Kyra looks thoughtful as she picks up a solid chunk of platinum. "Well, Unification happened recently, I think that's a pretty big deal but I don't want to blame it. But at the same time my parents have not been very approving of my interactions with the multiverse, even if it does get me some sweet extra credit at school. -oh, here." Kyra takes a small-ish flask off her belt that contains an orange liquid. "This is a Remedy, the potion equivalent of esuna." she sets it down so it can get carded. She's silent for a long time after that, looking thoughtful, perhaps even unsure about how much detail she wanted to lay out. Arthur's promise to not judge helps and eventually gets her talking: "Oppression. I realized that all the teachings of Cosma from our parents were just oppression meant to control how we acted. That's what they were all about all along-" Kyra starts to sound whiny, "Controlling our lives-/my life/-from the moment I was born to when I get handed off as part of some dumbass arranged marriage like every one of my brothers and sisters!" Whininess quickly transitions to full blown angst with little provokation, but in the process it does seem like realization hits her. "Control...hm. Maybe the limiter was part of it. Anyway I stopped with the religion because that meant they had one less tool to use on me."
Arthur Lowell	Arthur gives Kyra a contemplative look. He grabs another card, a console controller. Maybe this will be something useful, maybe not. He also takes the chunk of platinum and the Aurumal Autodoc for now. "Alright. I think I'm locking on to the issue a little more. Not all the way, but maybe." He crams the cards together, double-punching several and stacking many on top of one another, adding in the Remedy, a stack of darts... "Ugh, man, forced romance. Lemme tell you. Like full on half the romance I see these days ends in dying. You don't wanna go into that unless it's worth it." He scratches the side of his head a bit sheepishly, awkwardly. "Or I guess you oughta have good bodyguards at least. As for the religion... Yeah, solid reason I didn't do the whole commandments thing. Best to let dudes figure that out themselves, I'd say, not like I'm the perfect morality paragon myself." He pauses a long while between motions, as if stuck in a ponderous loop. "Hey, Ky, This might be a little left field. I think it might help a bit if I hear the answer though. Who are you?"
Kyra Hyral	"Yeah? What are you thinking? I've got..theories but no real proof, I guess." Her gaze darkens a little and she nods vigorously, "Forced, yeah, but I'd be so lucky if there was actual /romance/ involved with an arranged marriage! Souji was lucking out with my little sister Tira. They actually had chemistry. But she..." Kyra trails off. 'Like full on half the romance I see these days ends up in dying.' She seems to hesitate before continuing, "...I make a poor replacement for Tira. My parents know it. Souji knows it." She doesn't outright say it but the implication is pretty clear. Tira is -dead-. She tries to switch to a more lighthearted subject rapidly after that: "You're the chillest creator god I've ever met, Arthur. I mean, technically you're also the only creator god I've ever met but I still think you're pretty chill." His question makes her pause, brow furrowing in confusion since this does feel like one of those questions that sounds simple but actually has deep philosophical implications. But at the same time, maybe her immediate answer would reveal something important? "I'm Kyra Hyral, white mage, chemist, and /eventual doctor/." she says with the same slight cockiness she uses when introducing herself to new members of the Union.
Arthur Lowell	Arthur takes a look at Kyra and winces. Rubbing the back of his neck, he makes a bit of a sympathetic face. "Yeah, I... I know how that is. Half of it anyway." Relationships troubles and losing a sister, both things that are a little sore with Arthur Lowell, it seems. Then a softer smile than his usual wide grins. "Hahaha, yeah, I keep it cool, make everything chill. You know my opinion on the puny mortals thing." Before he launched the alchemization, Arthur sits on the edge of the platform and props his chin up on his elbow, propping that on the knee of a crossed leg. "...Nah." He says, when Kyra answers who she is. "That's not what I mean. Look, someone asks me who I am, I tell 'em. Someone says, 'who's Arthur Lowell', there's a really solid answer. Rocket-powered jerk. Know-nothin' punk. Intergalactic hoodlum. I know it sounds kinda like a joke. But I'm meanin' a whole identity. So that's what I wanna know. You don't want mom and dad tellin' you who you are." "So... Who are you?"
Kyra Hyral	Kyra gets a little quieter, not unaware of Arthur's track record with deadly, deadly relationships. His sudden alarm with Morgan was certainly not going to be forgotten anytime soon either. "Yeah." she mutters, "I want out. Still working on that. But...yeah, circle of trust on this, right? The multiverse doesn't need to hear about my relationship bullshit." As she might have suspected, Arthur's question carried more weight than initially assumed. "So not just a name and a Job, an identity. Hmm." The white mage falls silent for a long moment, considering the question again. "I am the vicious healer. I am the aggressive scientist. The multiverse's student." She pauses a little bit at that last one, slightly unsure. "Aren't those all like...titles you've earned?" she asks, circling back to what Arthur answered to this question.
Arthur Lowell	Arthur gives a lot of nods about that secrecy thing. "Yeah. Not gonna bring it up." He says, with a serious look. "That kinda shit, you decide how it gets dealt with. You need help or anything, you let me know, otherwise word's mum and shit like that." Then the other issue. He makes a plaintive gesture during the long silence in which Kyra has to think of her identity. "I'm not feeling it, Ky." He says. "It's a good person to be. But I don't think you're one hundred percent decided there. It's not something you earn, where you just do things and an identity comes up around it. You gotta decide it." He cups his chin with his hand in a semi-thinker pose. And with one foot he kicks the Alchemiter, making it spit out the new gun in a flash of light! ARTHUR crafted the AURUMAL AUTO-DOC+PLATINUM+DRAGONBALL+CONTROLLER+REVOLVER+GRENADE to make the GLEAMING GRENADIER'S CURE-ALL. ITEM COST: 7000 BUILD GRIST, 900 STEEL, 400 GOLD ITEM DESCRIPTION: It has become yet pimper. The CURE-ALL, as it may be shortened to, is primarily a six-chamber revolving grenade launcher that draws mana into powerful spheres of magic before launching them, regulating the MP drain by way of a control panel mounted on the side, meant to determine what levels of specific healing energy payloads should be used, though at the moment it's focused mostly on REGENERATION and REMEDYING, with later content yet to come. The orbs explode on impact, doing AoE white magic! The assault rifle body has further reduced power but retains its healing capacity. The thing is now plated with gold and platinum, making it outrageously bling. Grabbing it by the midsection, Arthur hoists it up and offers it, stock-first, to Kyra. "Here. Little interface on it now. Way your spells normally work, it's just pre-conceived payloads, right? I want you to think about what you need to fit you best. See, the other gun, think of that like how things were with faith. You had just one toolset, one thing that you could use, and it didn't fit sometimes, or it didn't fit the right way. This time, I want you to pick a setting, we'll come back to this and make something a little more permanent with the settings you work out." Leaning back, casually, "And, you know, think about this in general. You wanna not be told who you are, you better have something to counter 'em with, right? Try and find a steadier definition. Don't gotta be now, and don't gotta be permanent, and you don't even gotta tell me. Fuck me, what do I know, right? But you oughta have an answer ready, and you oughta believe in it one hundred percent." He gives a quick grin. Hey, if faith was telling her who she was all the time, maybe she just needs to start telling herself? Not that easy, but he figures it'll experimentally get things closer.
Kyra Hyral	Kyra frowns, "So it's not geniune because I took too long to answer? I mean, it's like...not really something I've thought about that specifically, you know? I've just wanted to be something that my parents /didn't/ want me to be after I realized what I was missing." She looks troubled and a little put out at this conclusion, though. It bothers her enough that she even doesn't get all THAT excited about the alchemy in progress. She does, however, very carefully read the description of the result. Regulate her MP drain via the item? Sounds legit. She takes the CURE-ALL and her eyes widen a little at the weight-platinum and gold plating will do that. "Yeeeesh, I might need to do some push ups if I want to carry this around. -oh, yeah, standard spells usually take certain amounts of MP. Stronger the spell, more MP it needs, pretty basic physics." She falls silent, listening to Arthur as she fiddles with the payload interface, getting acquainted with it. "I'll think about my answer." she admits, "But how am I gonna believe in it if it isn't permanent, though? I mean, it's like, you're always going to be the rocket powered jerk, right? I mean, I get it, I need to figure out what I want to be doing with myself, don't I?"
Arthur Lowell	"Oh, no, it's plenty genuine! I'm just not feelin' it." Arthur says, shrugging! "I mean, you might be exactly what you said, sure! But I can't really tell you think that one hundred percent." He looks a little uncertainly somber at the part about her parents. "Ky, that's lettin' 'em control you just as much as worshipping whats-her-face." He says. "Make your own decisions. Stopped clock's right twice a day. Be what you wanna be, doesn't gotta be everything they don't want." He grins and laughs a bit at her reaction to the gun. "HAH! Time to get SWOLE. Do you EVEN LIFT?" He flexes. GUNSHOW. There's not a lot of gun to show here. It's an /ironic/ gunshow. Then he gestures approvingly. "Yeah, that's all I want you to do. Think about it! Try and decide more about who you are, not who you aren't. Shit, there's plenty of things you aren't, only one thing you are." He stops to consider the question of really believing in it. "See," He says, grinning and winking. "That's the faith you dropped. Get some of that back. This part, I can't tell you how to do it. Honestly, it's something you'll figure out in the moment. Pick what you are and believe in it, 'cause you'll have a moment you need to. Way I see it, your MP will straighten out and you'll be right back on track to killin' monsters and gettin' money." He gestures pleasantly to the gun. "Let the Cure-All teach you. Pick some settings, see what works. Figure out how you deal with dynamic identity, what fits best, how you can pick something and stick with it confidently. Come on back and I'll get you hooked up with something bigger."
Kyra Hyral	"Ohhhh, huh, I see." She was unsure, Kyra realizes, and he must've been able to pick that up from her voice. When he quite logically points out that trying to do everything opposite of her parent's wishes wasn't any better than following them, she reddens. "...uh...been doing that over a year." she mutters, embarassed. Kyra huffs and actually leans the CURE-ALL down so she can remove her hoodie entirely. She's got a sleeveless shirt on underneath it plus her reams of ammo and other guns. She's also got some skinny-looking pale arms which she flexes to add to the ironic gunshow. "Hwooorgh." she deadpans. Kyra picks up the cure-all again and helfs it over her shoulder, wobbling for a few seconds before straightening and getting her balance. "...I'll play around with then. And get my shit straightned out." She rubs the back of her head, "And I'll be back /when/ I do." It's a start, at least, spoken as a when instead of an if.
Arthur Lowell	"Attagirl. Go figure out a COOL PERSON and then BE 'EM. Already got a HELL of a HEAD START on the COOL PART!" Arthur says, cheerfully and encouragingly. "You get THAT done, you'll be a HAPPIER PERSON guaranteed, and the MAGIC FIXING is somethin' I'm guessing is gonna be a GOOD CHANCE BONUS. Way I see it, no way you CAN fail! I got some FAITH in you myself." He grins, giving a little double-pistol wink gesture again while that tooth gleams brightly. "You have a GOOD TIME out there, hope the GUN works fine." "And don't let ME get ya DOWN, kid. I'm, what, some DUMB GOD? Pffft. What do I KNOW, right? You judge whatever I SAY, you decide if it's worth CARING about. But you come back with an ANSWER, I know I'll be HAPPY. And I'm PRETTY SURE you will too!" He gives a quick thumbs up. "GOOD LUCK, Ky!" She does seem like she's leaving!
Kyra Hyral	This draws an immediate, slightly smirky, smile out of Kyra, "Oh, you think I'm cool, huh? That's some high praise coming from a coolkid like you." It actually goes a long way to counter that slightly put-out mood from earlier. Sure, it was easier said than done but it does make her realize that she's never really considered those questions before. She knew exactly what she DIDN'T want to be but like Arthur made a good point that she had to figure out the converse. "Oh hell yeah, I can't wait to try it out-" she nearly falls over as she starts trying to pick her stuff up and decides to set aside the Cure-All for now. "Oh yeah." she razzes him, "You just created the universe and all, what to you know~ Say, uh, I'm really appreciative of all the help you're giving me, Arthur. If there's anything you need from me, anything at all, just ask, alright? Like if you get attacked by robots again and need someone to give your regen a jump start-" She holds up her pointer finger and pinkie, other fingers curled into a 'call me' gesture. "Or if you want some EXPERT SUPPORT-" oh no, it's definitely time to go, his way of speaking is starting to infect her. Dangit, it's just so enthusiastic! "-while you're out hunting killer robots, I'll come runnin' if I'm not indesposed." She shoulders the Cure-All again.