intelligent nametags

[thaumobabble]

Jane alerts everyone to the existence of a new Bell, the nature of her wives and children, and the presence of her mother-in-law.

She stands ready to move in anyone who wishes to attend this new party.

Glass stands ready to receive them.

Comments

[prima_sequentem]

"What kind of character assessment do you do on a world?" wonders Libby.

[thaumobabble]

"It apparently falls under my metacausality-sensing aura feature," says Glass. "I can tell things about templates, and apparently entire worlds count. This one is by far the nicest; Aegis put it as 'made of cotton candy'. Sunshine is particularly appalling."

[prima_sequentem]

"I wonder if the worlds should get profiles too," she muses.

[thaumobabble]

"Maybe, but I get very indistinct senses, and I don't think Cam can talk to the worlds themselves for us. I might get better at reading what I sense over time and then I could potentially generate enough information that it doesn't make sense to just fold it into the Bell profiles."

[prima_sequentem]

"I was thinking that world profiles would run more along the lines of - a name, your impression, a list of templates known to be present, important safety information, details about technology and magic levels... they wouldn't only be useful for worlds containing Bells."

[thaumobabble]

"If some other people want to invite me to have a look at their worlds, I'll be happy to," says Glass. "But we're talking about the Bellbook, not a hypothetical Worldbook."

[prima_sequentem]

"I'll design the Worldbook later, then."

[thaumobabble]

"Cool, let me know where I need to show up and what format you want my results in when you've got that. Anyway. And to avoid confusions like the one Aegis had about my mother-in-law being the queen, maybe an entry for tentative expected approach - or past approach, for when you all update your old profiles."

[jovahs_heiress]

"And perhaps we no longer need an entry for people with keys to the Belltower, with Jane operating it at her informed discretion. Although literal keys should probably still be kept on hand in case something happens to her again."

[thaumobabble]

"And local magic is worth knowing about, and inventing terminology for recurring species is a good idea - I think we're only ever going to see more than one sort-of-thing that needs an invented name if they're named in English. I think English is on some level a meta-language for our multiverse. 'Witch' needs clarification; 'sarion' doesn't."

They continue to fiddle with their profile template until they have something they all like.

[prima_sequentem]

Libby thinks this template is very reasonable!

[thaumobabble]

Glass inaugurates it.

[jovahs_heiress]

Angela follows.

[dark_light]

Amariah takes the book next.

[she_sells_seashells]

Shell Bell follows suit.

[beheld_beauty]

Rose is the last of the committee to add something.

[prima_sequentem]

"Very tidy," says Libby. "Who wants to work with me on the Worldbook?"

[thaumobabble]

"I will, if you like. Do you anticipate needing much help?"

[prima_sequentem]

"It's always nice to get a second opinion on something like this."

[thaumobabble]

"Okay then. What are your thoughts?"

[prima_sequentem]

"Well, for one thing, has anyone else noticed that the Sunny worlds seem to be twins where everyone else is at most cousins? I wonder if we should be dividing up worlds by family."

[thaumobabble]

"Ooh." Glass closes her eyes, thinking. "I should visit the other Sunny worlds, real quick, and see if I can detect that and if there's anything else like it."

[prima_sequentem]

"Go for it," says Libby.

[thaumobabble]

"Jane," says Glass, and she disappears.

She's back a minute later. "I hate those worlds, I hate them, they're nasty," she says. "They're similar all right, and no others I've checked are that close, but there's a weaker resemblance between Aurum and Eos."

[prima_sequentem]

"Interesting. So a 'worldfamily' entry might be a little premature, but I think I'll put one down anyway in case we find more Sunny worlds and run out of cute sun-related things to name them after. Apart from that... a list of common intelligent species would be good, so we have some standardization for species names besides the ones that Bells happen to be. I haven't heard anyone coming up with a term for Aianon's species other than 'demon', for example, and that's also the generic term for nonhumans in the Sunny worlds. And there's some species overlap between this world and Thilanushinyel, as evinced by the two completely different types of dragons chatting over there."