Languages 101

[buryyourfriends]

[Now that everything has calmed down, Seto can ask a question that's been rattling around in his brain. So there's a new message on the Rock of Communication in messy handwriting.]

Hi. I hope this is okay to write on.

Is there a way to talk to someone who can't talk? I don't think something like that is in my world, so I don't know if there's something like that.

[Well there was a way to talk to someone without words in Seto's world but he's not touching that with a ten-foot pole.]

I'd like to learn if there is a way so I can talk to them more. I'll be here too sometimes if you want to talk in person. I have a blue jacket on.

- Seto

[And indeed Seto can be found by the rock, if anyone would rather speak in person.]

Comments

[buryyourfriends]

[Seto doesn't push it when the Drifter doesn't mention what he said. It's there, for the Drifter to do what they want with it.]

It reminds me of a fairy from a storybook.

[The ones that his Grandpa read to him on the odd occasion. They usually were helpful to people.]

What else can it do?

[hyperlit]

[The open one hand underneath it, about a foot lower, and let it chime softly, bringing up a secondary HUD. The soft, translucent pink reflects a rough map of Ensō, though it appears to have been labeled with blocky, geometric shapes as opposed to any actual writing.]

intuits what i need
labels enemies/allies

[buryyourfriends]

That's so cool...

[It really is and, if Seto is being completely honest, he wants to touch it and find out everything it did. What the symbols meant on the map, how it was displaying the Drifter's words, how it could tell the difference between enemies and allies. It was the same feeling he got whenever he encountered something in his world from an age before he was born - like that box-thing that might be a mirror but was something else instead.

It's obvious from Seto's expression that he's curious - he's never been good at hiding what he felt for too long - but he'll hold off. He didn't want to break it by accident.]

Did you learn to how to speak with hands before finding it?

[Seto can make an educated guess about it - either the Drifter learned first and then found their friend or they learned incase it broke.]

[hyperlit]

all drifters carry them
learned after voice died

[They were not born mute, nor were they born a drifter. Both language and sprite were achieved out of necessity, just the same as their occupation. A lonely searcher, desperate for a cure, could not afford to do anything but drift in the hunt for it.]

[buryyourfriends]

[After their voice died.

Seto can connect the dots there, that they did have a voice. He knows about 'death that really isn't death' - his Grandpa had a more complicated word for it - but this was the real kind of death. The kind Seto knows too much about.]

You're still very loud.

[It's a weird thing to say, but it's the best way Seto can put it.]

Do you want to start now?

[hyperlit]

[Loud. Perhaps not the word they would use for themself, but they are not one to argue semantics. It would accomplish very little, in the grand scheme, and the boy’s meaning is clear enough when paired with the proper context.]

[The Drifter bows their head, ever respectful.]

if you wish
yes

[buryyourfriends]

[There is actually some context the Drifter is missing but Seto isn't going to elaborate on it either. It's too soon after the Water to talk about that kind of silence and why it scared him more then the bodies did.

So instead Seto nods and smiles.]

I do.

We can wrap this here because I don’t know asl

[hyperlit]

[Very well.]

[So they will begin.]