universal star visitor brilliant start!

[incanted]

Eventually Bella and Lexi go to bed - they have to coordinate this; Bella's a reasonably sound sleeper but Lexi's not, so if Bella goes to sleep first Lexi won't be able to drop off with all the random nouns and if Bella goes to sleep second Lexi will wake up when she's trying to sneak around. They get up, and they get ready for school.

+Morning, Brilliance,+ says Bella while she's brushing her teeth.

Comments

[cardistry]

"We kind of both got possessed by the same thing," he says, giving Bella one last petpet and then going back to his own ice cream. "It's dead now, I got Bella to help me kill it."

[incanted]

"...You've been killing things?" Charlie asks Bella.

"I killed a magical program gone rogue that was possessing Lexi and trying to destroy the world, it's not like the neighbors' cats have gone missing," Bella says.

"...Okay then." Charlie finishes his soup and wanders away.

[cardistry]

"You okay?" he says to Bella.

[incanted]

"Frustrated. I know Lexi's freaked out, but she's usually not catty to people."

[cardistry]

"It's no fun getting possessed."

[incanted]

"Yeah, and she was trying to do something nice for me, and now I've been kind of ignoring her to talk to you."

[cardistry]

He shrugs, and goes back to his ice cream.

[incanted]

Bella finishes hers. "Lexi cooked, so it's my turn to do the dishes. Unless there's a spell for it," she adds.

[cardistry]

"I don't have one on hand," he says. "I could make one, but I'd probably wanna practice it on dishes nobody cared about first."

[incanted]

"Would it meaningfully affect the spell if you practiced on, like, paper plates? Would it transfer?"

[cardistry]

"Good question! I think paper plates might need a different spell," he says. "They don't get dirty the same way, you know?"

[incanted]

"All right, maybe at some point I'll swing by the thrift store and get some random dishes. In the meantime..." She turns on the sink and starts scrubbing.

[cardistry]

Brilliance is finished with his ice cream by the time she needs to take his bowl away.

[incanted]

"Look, I can talk to Lexi, this sniping isn't really like her."

[cardistry]

"Thanks," he says, smiling wryly.

[incanted]

"You're welcome."

[cardistry]

He shifts back to deck-of-cards form and sets himself down on the table.

[incanted]

Bella pats him and heads up the stairs to talk to Lexi.

She's back down a few minutes later. "She doesn't wanna talk about it right now. But she says I can copy her math homework if I want, so at least she's not too mad at me. Wanna go to the World of Colorful Sand?"

[cardistry]

"Sure!"

[incanted]

"I wanna invent a spell to be a line of defense against any environmental hazards you weren't in a position to notice - but before I start trying stuff - is my mana at capacity?"

[cardistry]

He checks.

"I think so!"

[incanted]

"Okay, cool." Bella has produced a list of things on an uninhabited planet that could harm her. She gets the notebook containing this list, finds it, memorizes it, thinks hard about wanting all those things to leave her alone, and attempts to incant:

"Safety."

[cardistry]

"Oh, cool," says Brilliance, as a faint mana-coloured shimmer settles onto Bella's skin.

[incanted]

"Something unusual about how that worked?" Bella asks, looking at the pretty shimmer. "Ooh, I'm shiny."

[cardistry]

"I've never seen anything like it!"

He shifts to staff form and glides closer.