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Who: Jace Beleren and Armand St. Just (and OPEN if anyone else wants to multithread me)
Where: Level 5, wandering around
When: Not too long after Jace has arrived.
Warnings: Jace will read Armand's mind a little bit.

The ship was large enough that learning its layout quickly would be prudent, particularly considering that it was being used to hold and rehabilitate dangerous inmates. Jace was still trying to figure out exactly what the ship was and how it was able to operate the way it did. The only thing he had ever been in or heard of that came close was Tezzeret's stronghold.

Jace made his way down a hall, tired and still not fully recovered from his recent ordeals. He would need to rest, and while a nice little island vacation would have been preferable, Jace wasn't going to complain about his current location. An opportunity like this did not come along often, and given that this ship seemed to be in constant motion, the chance that any Planeswalker would encounter it even if they tried was slim.

It lacked the defining characteristics of a Plane, and it seemed to not have proper mana production, though Jace could feel some coming from above him somehow, rather than off to the side or below him.

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Armand was on his way to the library, or her way if you prefer, but he preferred to think of himself still as male. This was only temporary, after all. He'd finished reading Great Expectations and dearly needed a break from Dickens, so he was considering snagging Candide before Sexby came back for it.

Mostly, though he was in a habitual reverie. He walked these few steps from his cabin to the library many times a week. What did it matter that today he was a woman, still sporting ill-fitting 18th century men's clothes? But today there was someone in the corridor. And it wasn't Ethan.

Armand smiled and gave a quick bow. "I don't believe we've met, monsieur."

Jace turned as he was approached, and then returned the quick bow. "We haven't, I only recently arrived," Jace said. This would be a good chance to learn the layout of the ship.

He cautiously reached out with his mental senses, feeling the woman's mind carefully. She didn't feel like a mage upon first examination, so Jace went in, trying to ignore as many memories not pertaining to what he was looking for as possible.

Jace still had to deal with very odd thoughts on the outer most regions of the woman's mind. One of them being that she was only temporarily female, and her clothes were male. How odd. How did one temporarily change from male to female?

Realizing he was distracted Jace concentrated on his task, seeking the layout of the ship.

Armand was completely oblivious to the poking around in his mind. He nodded at the admission of being new. "This is likely an odd time to be arriving. Many of us aren't quite ourselves. The Barge took on water sometime yesterday." This explanation was giving as if he expected it to make perfect sense. "Are you assigned to live on Deck Five?"

It seemed Jace had chosen well. Armand appeared to know most of the ship, though it seemed 'level zero' would need to be investigated. And the library was on this floor, that was convenient.

Since he was still withdrawing as Armand spoke, Jace was actually able to determine what he was really saying, more or less. Jace had to withdraw completely before he spoke.

"Yes, I believe I am assigned to this deck," Jace said.

"How exciting!" Armand said cheerfully. "We'll practically be neighbors. It's a joy being so close to the library." In truth, Armand wasn't sure he liked Jace yet, but he hadn't seen any reason to justify the feeling yet. The man was a little intense, but some Wardens simply were. "Do you want to see the library? I was just going over to return a book."

"Yes. What sort of selection does the library hold?" Jace asked. He was curious about that, and while he wasn't sure he would come across anything particularly useful, Jace remained optimistic that he'd find something to read.

"I'm Jace," He said, deciding he should introduce himself.

"Oh, and I'm Armand. Armand St. Just, not the one with fangs. And I haven't delved much into the non-fiction. Reading literature from after my time has been quite absorbing enough." This size and shape probably just emphasizes how much of a mental butterfly Armand can be when he's not depressed.

"I think they are working on organizing it better."

Not the one with the fangs? Was Armand talking about a vampire that shared his name?

"I think I would be more interested in the non-fiction as well," Jace remarked. He had little interest in reading about stories of brave adventurers going to strange lands, or whatever it was adventurers did.

"There are books from your future?"

"I know there is some. I simply don't know much about it." Armand didn't mean to dismiss Jace's interest in non-fiction. He simply was too easily bored by it.

"Yes, there are many, many books after my time. It was 1794 when I accepted the Admiral's offer, and there are hundreds of years of books after that." Yes, he was very excited about books.

"I'm afraid that unfortunately means little to me," Jace remarked. "Knowing what the year was for you when you came aboard the barge means little if I've never been to your plane."

The idea of books that could potentially have not been written yet from his point in time being available to him was interesting. But how would he know the difference? "Although books from the future have the potential to be interesting, I think there might be material from the past I'd be more interested in."

"There are other planes?" Most the people Armand had met on the Barge seemed to be from places that used somewhat the same calendar. Not quite everyone, but very few had no idea of European dating.

"But the past from what point? If you're not from the same... place, how do you know? My future is the past of most people on board."

"There are many. Haven't you noticed that since you arrived here?" Jace asked. And he shrugged again.

"I don't know. All I know for certain is that when I travel from plane to plane I go to a point in time close enough in the future to account for the time I spent away from it, and whatever time it would take to travel between them. I could very well be from the past or future relative to where you are, but your time system seems odd," Jace paused for a few moments.

"That number, 1794... it's a measurement of years, right? What significant event happened that started that measurement?"

"The dates roughly measure from when the son of God--sadly, not one acknowledged by everyone but a predominant part of my world--was born as a man to live among us." Armand is politic enough to know that not everyone believes as he does.

"Many people here seem to come from places that measure exactly the same, but they mention years hundreds and even thousands after mine."

The child of a God was born to them? Jace briefly thought of the religious group he'd been sent to investigate, the one that believed Planeswalkers were closer to divinity than any other beings aside from gods. Being the object of such attention and blind adoration had been very unsettling.

"How long did your plane record history before that point?" Jace asked curiously.

That god child must have been something special to cause such a big impact and still be worshiped nearly two thousand years later.

"I'm not enough of a scholar to be certain, but certainly a few thousand years."

"It sounds like civilization where and when you're from is considerably younger than it is in some places I've been," Jace remarked. "Although not all planes I've been to had the same level of advancement."

It was interesting to think about this ship holding people from the same plane but different points in time.

"That may be so. You might have to talk to the magical people to find anyone who knows much about planes. All this talk is over my head." Armand wasn't the most studied person. "You could talk to one of the Doctors I suppose. They know a lot about time."

"It's over a lot of people's heads, actually. Most people in the multiverse don't even know there are planes outside their owns," Jace said. If he wasn't a mind reader or a Planeswalker, he probably wouldn't know.

"Wich Doctors would those be?" Jace asked.

"There are a few people here, aliens, who only go by The Doctor. There's one who is very thin and wears suits and--what was that word? trainers. He has spiky brown hair. There is another brown-haired one who's all curls and wears a long scarf. And one with fair hair who wears a fawn coat." Armand has to stretch his imagination to come up with distinguishing details. "With all the medical doctors on board, I guarantee that if you shout 'doctor' in the dining hall, someone will answer."

"It's odd that they all go by the same title." The Doctor didn't really have the same importance if there were several people that laid claim to the title.

Most of what Armand said about the clothing made little sense to him, so Jace took a brief look inside his mind again to get a good idea of what the Doctors looked like. Since Armand was thinking about them, the information was easy to obtain.

"It's because they're the same person. I don't understand it either. I don't know why they look different, but it's the same person from different times." Armand shrugs, helpless to explain what he doesn't understand himself.

[ooc: I think it just makes his brains harder to read but not unreadable]

It was interesting, she was a smidge tipsy...and had barely drunk anything at all! What she may have lost in the size of her frame, and it wasn't all that much, she was still - barely - over five feet tall, she should have made up with increased bodyfat so...?

Ach, she'd lost her train of thought.

Kurt dropped down from the ceiling and rounded a corner, "Oh! Hallo!" She exclaimed, as she moved aside to avoid plowing into a new face, "Have we met?"

Because the fellow very well could have been a young lady a few days ago. It was better to check.

[ooc: Jace won't attempt to get past shields in order to avoid any unfortunate accidents. But he will be very confused about what Kurt is.]

Jace was startled from some deep thinking when something short, blue, and furry rounded the corner and nearly walked into him. The face was human, but her ears were pointed, and the blue fur made identification of her species impossible.

He spent a few moments staring in surprised silence and taking in details, before he realized he was probably being rude. "No, I don't think we have. I just arrived," Jace said. She seemed a little drunk, and Jace still had no idea what she was even after several more moments of thought.

Maybe she was some sort of hybrid, but... between what? Was that even possible?

The man just sort of stared. She was used to that. Purim was her new favorite holiday, and so she was filled with Purim cheer as she smiled a bit goofily back, flashing the man a friendly fangy smile, "Welcome then!" She stuck on tridigit hand out to him, "Kurt Wagner, at your service!" She practically sang in a high musical voice. "Oh! Ja, it's a man's name. I usually am one. A man. There's been a flood. Which I think is Barge slang for a wild magic surge that causes random weird effects...such as gender switching." She rambled happily, "Happy Purim!"

Definitely drunk. Jace reached out and shook the hand that was offered, noting the odd number of fingers, most of the races he'd encountered had four fingers and a thumb. "I'm Jace Beleren. I've always been a man," He said, since he wanted to avoid any confusion on that subject.

He wasn't sure what 'Purim' was, but the way Kurt said it, Jace suspected it was a holiday. A holiday that involved alcohol, although most did in his experience.

Her tail swooped up to sway woozily over her head, as if it just noticed Jace itself and wanted to have a look. "You know you're on the Barge when you have to introduce yourself in such a way, ja?" Kurt laughed and shook his hand, not as firmly as she would have liked, but she wasn't sure if that was due to her new girliness or the rum. She stood on tip toe and took measure of him, tapping her chin. "Warden!" She decided, "You're a Warden. You look far too calm and nonbelligerent to be a new inmate."

Being under such open and honest scrutiny was a little odd. Normally Jace had more discrete people observing him. "I am," Jace said, "Are you also a Warden?"

Unable to hold his curiosity back anymore, he carefully reached out to read Kurt's mind. He was surprised to immediately encounter resistance, and withdrew without attempting to force past whatever it was that stopped him. Was she- he, a telepath? Jace had never encountered another aside from Nicol Bolas, and had no idea what another telepath's mind might feel like if he tried to enter.

"Ja, a Warden." Kurt nodded and blinked. If she hadn't been a bit ferschnickered she might have noticed the gentle probe. Instead, she smiled blankly up at Jace, trying think of something to say. "We've having a Purim party."

Edited 2010-03-01 02:20 (UTC)

"I can see that you've been celebrating," Jace remarked, looking down at the odd blue woman. Man.

"I've never run into anyone like you before. What are you?" He felt very foolish to have to ask such a question, but Kurt matched no being he had ever seen or any illustration or description.

"Maybe too much celebrating." Huh. She felt fuzzier than she should. Ach. No more rum.

...

Ha! Fuzzier.

"Hmm? What am I?" Kurt looked down at herself. Oh! The blue and the tail. "Human...ish. Mutant human. And this and that. What are you?"

Jace stared as Kurt looked down at herself. The announcement that she was a variety of human was odd, and Jace wondered what sort of plane would produce humans that looked like that and didn't just start calling themselves something else.

And what she meant by 'and this and that' was anyone's guess since Jace wasn't sure he could get into her mind without causing any harm. She certainly looked like someone had taken inspiration from several species and made a new one.

"I'm human," Jace said. He had hoped that he was obviously human, and glanced down to check. No, definitely human looking.

"Around here, you never know. We've human looking people coming out of the woodwork - but are actually Angels, demons, vampires, Time Lords, aliens, and such." Kurt crossed her arms, "Ach, I'll be glad when this flood is over. I'm so short."

"I don't think I've ever seen an Angel or Demon that could pass for human," Jace said, thinking about that. The presence of demons here was a little troubling.

Mistaking a vampire for a human could be possible. He had no idea what a Time Lord was, but if the name was at all accurate they would probably be very powerful. "So not only did you get turned into a woman but you became shorter..." Jace was glad he hadn't been around for whatever had caused this. He didn't think it would be bad, but he liked his body the way it was.

"Has anyone here tried to reverse it?" Something like that was beyond Jace's ability, but there might have been others that could. He wasn't even sure he would have been able to stop it if he'd been there when it happened. Disrupting or negating a spell cast by another mage was one thing, but magic like this sounded like it would require a completely different approach.

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Have a tipsy Girl Nightcrawler with Xavier Brand Mental Shielding

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