(no subject)

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Ray makes his way down the stairs, yawning hugely and rubbing at his face. He's got the same two textbooks he's been reading for the past several days with him, although they've got slips and shreds of paper poking out in places, after the fashion of someone who doesn't believe in conventional bookmarks. He's wearing the usual cargo pants, and a black T-shirt that says:

And God said:

∇ • E = ρ / εo
∇ • B = 0
∇ x E = - ∂B/∂t
∇ x B = μoJ + μoεo∂E/∂t

And there was light.

He heads for the Bar to get his morning coffee before looking around for a nice spot to sit.

Comments

[youalleverybody.livejournal.com]

Liam nods to him sleepily from his chair near the door.

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Ray glances up and waves. "Hey there," he murmurs. "Don't mind me- the irradiated Sumatra hasn't kicked in yet."

[youalleverybody.livejournal.com]

Liam grins ruefully. "And whatever Faith put in my coffee hasn't worn off yet. Guess we're in the same boat."

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Ray takes a long pull at his coffee before answering. "She doped you? Do I get to ask what for?"

[youalleverybody.livejournal.com]

"For not sleeping, pretty much", Liam admits. "I was waiting for my brother."

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Ray blinks. "Waiting for- what happened with your brother? Don't tell me there were nightmares involved." He's thinking of Guppy and his sleep dep, honest.

[youalleverybody.livejournal.com]

Liam blinks back at him. "Er. Yeah, now you mention it. His and his friend Claire's."

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Blink. Blink blink blink.

"Okay, didn't know that," Ray says. "He go off looking for a cure or- no, tell you what, why don't I get to the bottom of this cup and then you can tell me from the top? If there's a nightmare rash going around the bar it could be something supernatural that needs dealing with."

Hey, on Ray's world, that makes sense.

[youalleverybody.livejournal.com]

"I think you might be right", Liam says grimly. "When it comes to my brother and Claire, at least. I don't know that it'd be affecting any - almost anyone else here."

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Ray nods, grimly ploughing his way through the coffee. Eventually, he sets the mug aside. "Well, Guppy's mostly having nightmares of what might be happening back home, since he left a cooker turned on when the bar yoinked him here. They've gotten to the point where he's denying himself REM sleep, though, and if they're that bad either he's got one mother of an anxiety lobe in his brain or he's being encouraged by something that's into negative emotional energy, which is what I'm worried about. Hopefully it's just the anxiety thing, but... tell me about your brother and Claire."

[forsaken-bard.livejournal.com]

[OOC: *geeks at shirt* That use of Maxwell's Laws is love.]

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[OOC: *beams* I loved it as soon as I saw it in RL. I need to get myself one at some point.]

[forsaken-bard.livejournal.com]

[OOC: There's a version of that in my Modern Physics book, which gives Newton's Laws of gravitation and the Second Law under the title: In the beginning God created the Heavens and the earth. Though the book uses the integral forms of Maxwell's laws.]

[ilducasaggio.livejournal.com]

Prospero's at the bar counter proper, picking up some breakfast, when he sees Ray in his...interesting shirt. He tries to decipher it, but ultimately decides that the best way to go about things is to ask the bearer of the shirt himself.

The old man makes his way over, a mug of Cathay tea in hand. He lifts a hand in greeting, then inclines his head at Ray's shirt. "Fiat lux indeed," he says, with a wide smile. "One must wonder, Ser Stantz, whether there is room on your garment for the God of the Book to move His spirit over the deep."

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Ray looks down at the shirt for a bit, thinking. "It's possible," he says, "but Maxwell didn't write any equations about fluid dynamics or the air/water interface. These are the basic scientific equations for ... oh, heck our entire understanding of classical electrodynamics, which winds up making them into the equations for 'light'. Fluid dynamics is a lot harder." He smiles. "Good morning, by the way."

[ilducasaggio.livejournal.com]

Prospero chuckles. He didn't understand a word of that, but it's always refreshing to be around somebody who takes his science seriously, the way that Ray does. "You wouldn't happen to be speaking of young Duo Maxwell, perchance? The boy is quick and fleet of thought, but I...should not like to think that your twentieth-century scientist's comprehension of the nature of light is predicated upon Master Maxwell's temperament. And good morning to you, ser."

[gone_byebye]

"Lord no. James Clerk Maxwell. Scottish mathematician in the 1860s. Brilliant man- I think you'd like his style of thought exercise, remind me to tell you about the 'Maxwell's Demon' approach to thermodynamics someday." Ray gestures to the nearest available chair, assuming Prospero hasn't seated himself yet. "I got your note, by the way. I'm really sorry about your hat. I didn't expect my meter to blow up nearly that fast- normally I have enough time to either shut it off or warn somebody."

[ilducasaggio.livejournal.com]

Prospero takes the indicated seat. He takes a sip from his tea, then says, "Don't worry about the hat. I wasn't all too fond of it, really." Though he was getting there. It had been a lovely little chapeau. Shaking his head, he presses on. "But do tell, Ser Stantz--what was the device that coaxed such thunder from the air? Have you taken up weaponsmithy and ballistics?

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"Oh, I took up weapons design a long time ago," Ray says, "although not for use against the living. Never for that, if I have anything to say about it. No, it was one of these."

Ray pulls his PKE meter from his belt and lays it on the table for inspection. "This is a device for measuring psychokinetic energy- PKE for short. Essentially, it lets me classify and quantify the local strength, type, and intensity of energy left by spirit activity. Or by the activity of magic, psychic powers, paranormal beings of just about any stripe, magical artifacts, you name it. This one was constructed last week with special shielding and dampening elements so that I could use it safely on the more potent beings here in the bar, but I tested it against Tim Hunter and it almost gave way. I then went and tested the old, undamped model, and the raw magic around Tim was so powerful that the thing overloaded in less than three seconds."

[ilducasaggio.livejournal.com]

Prospero blinks. "You...have trained this box in the perception of the ether and disturbances thereof? Ser Stantz, methinks your science doth approach mine art from the roundabout edge, in scope and in cleverness. I should like very much to know what senses it deploys, in service of this utility."

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[OOC: NO problem!]

"Not so much trained as designed from the beginning, but yeah," Ray says. "Any spirit or power that interacts with the physical world is going to leave some kind of trace of its presence- otherwise it wouldn't be able to affect the physical plane. This measures the amount of disturbance any such entity or power leaves at the point or points of interaction- the energies in question have a measurable tendency to disturb the everyday matter you and I move in, and these tendencies are pretty consistent across the board for each type of being. Same deal for stuff like pure magic or manipulation of universal energy flow by human or other beings. It's a matter of using an element I don't think you'll have met yet, a substance called americium, that reacts to the presence of those disturbances at a rate that varies based on the strength of the disturbance. Neat stuff, really."

[ilducasaggio.livejournal.com]

"Fascinating. So, it posits a universal frequency at which energy is transmuted or manipulated? An Ur-matrix, binding the practitioners of the craft together? It makes...sense, aye, that such a thing would function here; to the best of my knowledge, all art is practiced by all sorts here, and thus some common token of exchange must be traded for such to be true."

[gone_byebye]

Ray smiles. "That's the beautiful thing," he says. "It doesn't just function here. It functions at home. Working from my colleague Egon Spengler's theories, I designed and built the thing back in my own world so that we'd have a way of quantifying and measuring the relative strengths and presences of ghosts, and it turned out to work just as well for finding traces of magic and the other powers and arts of the mind. It all works on the same principle- just different variations on the initial theme. It's fantastic. We finally have the numbers science wants so much, not just impressions and senses."

[rabidfangurl.livejournal.com]

(OOC from Anakin-mun: My inner physics geek *loffs* you for that. ::dances the dance of Maxwell's equations)

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(OOC: I just wish I'd remembered to put in subscript tags at the right places.)