DAY 64, LATE EVENING: PUBLIC CHANNEL

[alphudo]

[At first, there's a soft clicking noise occasionally accompanied by small bursts of static and shuffling. In particular, it's the sound of the dial of Yuusei's radio being turned on and off while tuned to the public frequency. The sound of a man who clearly doesn't talk to people enough to be comfortable with asking an entire entourage of folks about some thing he found in a book. It's a lot of hesitation, but eventually the clicking at least stops as he brings the radio closer to him.]

I meant to ask earlier, but there was all of that excitement in the Athenaeum, and I never got the chance...

[There's some movement and what sounds like paper shuffling.]

Does anyone know what the word 'aetheric' means? It's an adjective describing a form of interaction with airship machinery, and while airships admittedly aren't my area of expertise, it's still not a word I've ever heard before. Any ideas?

Comments

[anti_nonsense]

Magic technology is my field of expertise... but airship technology isn't something we've developed yet.

[alphudo]

I see... Even so, I'm sure what you do have is quite interesting.

We don't have 'magic' per se in my world... There's Momentum, which seems to have some sort of supernatural properties... [He pauses briefly, glancing elsewhere.] But it's not magic.

[anti_nonsense]

Magic isn't necessarily supernatural. The forms I'm most familiar with are perfectly scientific in theory.

What's this 'Momentum', anyway?

[alphudo]

It's a form of clean energy that powers the city in my world, generated by a perpetual motion machine. As I said, it isn't magic, but I did say 'supernatural' for a reason: the first reactor melted down after its revolutions reversed, and the pool of Momentum flooding its underground chamber became a gateway to the underworld.

[anti_nonsense]

The... underworld.

[She uses a doubting tone, but there's a hint of anxiousness in it, too.]

You don't mean...

[alphudo]

...I do mean.

[He pauses, throwing another glance over his shoulder as he hesitates.]

I fell in it once.