Open Post: What a yarn

[sporesprouter]

There's still quite a bit of winter yet, according to the calendar, not to mention whatever Dark is, and Tress got an idea for a project fairly recently. It's appropriate and it gives her a chance to stretch out a skill she hasn't really gotten an opportunity to use in a while.

So she's in a cozy parlor, sitting curled up in a big comfy armchair right by the window, a basket of yarn at her feet, and she's knitting. It's still too early to be immediately obvious what it is she's knitting, but she's moving with the easy confidence that indicates it's definitely not a new craft she's just now decided to take up.

Sometimes, after all, it's nice to go back to something old and familiar.

Comments

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"So you think of it as having some sort of sentience?" Susan asks. "I rather think whatever it is hasn't got any higher-level thinking ability at all. It seems to me to be pure dumb happenstance."

[sporesprouter]

"It all seems kind of... intricate, for pure dumb happenstance. I might be wrong, obviously, but I don't think I am." She frowns thoughtfully. "Lan Wangji has the ability to communicate with spirits through his cultivation. When he first got here, he used that ability and got a response. He said it was just laughter before falling silent. And it would be consistent with what it seems might be happening here. The house, or whoever's behind it, is keeping itself amused, sometimes at our expense."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

But Susan isn't convinced. "My sister once told me of a house she visited," she says. "Populated by invisible hosts, and with queer things inside. A book of spells, for example, with pages that would only turn one way, and which tempted her into awful things." Oh, how she wishes she'd listened to Lucy more closely when Lucy told her of the Dufflepuds! But by the time Susan came back from America, she'd quite put Narnia far from her mind, and had only been cross with Lucy for making up more silly stories. "She said the house was terribly frightening, and the hosts, though merry with their provisions, seemed threatening. She came to realize they were all rather silly in the end."

[sporesprouter]

"Oh, I very much don't think it's out of the question that our hosts will turn out to be rather silly in the end. But I think there's at least enough evidence of actual hosts with some sort of intelligence that it should be at least considered when working on theories. It just... seems like more than random happenstance."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"If there's any intelligence there, perhaps I shouldn't goad it," Susan says, thoughtfully. "I shouldn't want to be punished for impudence."

[sporesprouter]

"I don't think you'd be the first to try and goad it," Tress says, "but I still tend to agree with you on that."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"No? What have others done?"

[sporesprouter]

She smiles, almost fondly amused. "No real specifics come to mind right now¹," she says, "but I think you can imagine, given some of the personalities it's brought in."

¹If only Tress were the puppet of mine to witness a certain someone planning on actually making a wager with us...

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"I suppose I might," Susan allows.

[sporesprouter]

"I thought so," she says, almost laughing. "It's an interesting bunch of people we have here."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"As eclectic as any true society, I think."

[sporesprouter]

She nods. "A small one, but yes. I think it's a good thing."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"I'm inclined to agree."

[sporesprouter]

"It's practical, anyway. The more variety there is, the more ways to solve problems there are."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Susan regards Tress for a moment and then, carefully, ventures, "I do think there ought to be more collaboration."

[sporesprouter]

"I don't think that's a bad idea. Trying to do things alone can work, but only so far."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"And we ought to have a better sense of each other's abilities, here. Some, I find, are more obvious about their skills than others.

[sporesprouter]

"I agree that it would probably be useful. But I think some people also come from places where their abilities are feared or outright hated, so it may take them some time before they're ready to be obvious about it."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Oh, I don't mean it that way," Susan says, with a slight shake of her head.

[sporesprouter]

Tress blinks and shakes her head. "Oh, of course. That's what I get for jumping to conclusions."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"No, no, naturally," Susan says. She takes out a delicate paper fan and sets it to the side. "I shouldn't want to make anyone uncomfortable. If it's an ability they rather don't want others to know about, then they mightn't use it in the service of our community. I merely meant that the collaboration would lend itself to having a better sense of how our strengths might be best employed."

[sporesprouter]

"I don't disagree with you on that. It's like my ship back at home. When everyone's working toward the same goal and knows what they're doing and why, things go so smoothly." She frowns thoughtfully. "I'm just not sure if it's quite that simple here. Our necessities are provided, so there's no urgency as far as that goes, and I think there's a variety of goals that the people here have."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Susan would agree, but she's curious about Tress's assessment. "Such as?"

[sporesprouter]

"Getting back home, for one, or carving out their best life now that they're free of home. Just enjoying themselves, for another..." She smiles a little. "Bringing people together in service of all of us... And that's just larger goals. Obviously different people will have different small goals for themselves whether or not they realize that's what they are."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

In truth, Susan would classify all of those things as smaller goals. "I see," she says. And then she asks the question she's started asking others, too: "Do you suppose the resources here might be finite, and we've just not yet discovered the limit?"