World Tree MUSH

The world is named Hartford, but it is formerly one of the myriad ones named Earth. It also has a fairly odd year numbering system compared to most Earths, with calendars on billboards and suchlike referring to "719 4A" or references to "the Fourth Age."

Nevertheless, New York City looks more-or-less exactly how you'd expect it to in the first quarter of the twenty-first century by a different sort of calendar. The buildings are tall, the traffic is voluminous, and the people are hurrying to their destinations. It's just that there's also greenery here and there, with a few buildings that seem to be covered in vines or grown out of a tree, and there's various beings of other species here -- elves, goblins, hulking ogres in three-piece suits, and there's quite a few richly-dressed individuals in expensive cars who seem to have anemic skin, pointy teeth, and red eyes.

Which isn't to say that it's all noise. There's a coffee shop called the Early Latte, which has a relatively subdued atmosphere, and has people of all species sitting around inside it. A bored-looking blonde elf woman is sitting behind the counter.

Out of the "Employees Only" door walks a tall stocky human girl in her early twenties with hair dyed black with a single red streak, dressed in an anarchy-symbol T-shirt and a plaid skirt in all the colors of the rainbow. "Arright, see you tomorrow!" she calls back inside, before she makes a beeline for the counter. "Hey, Gem, couldja get me a latte to go?"

     Diantha's wanderings once again dump her into a city, as she comes to another version of Earth. The vine dropped her in central park, which was nice, but even before she works up the courage to venture into the concrete jungle of the city, she begins to notice it was inhabited by a few races that are familiar to her, even if they aren't an exact match to the ones from her world. 

     The fact that nature seems to be trying to retake its place in the city, or growing in harmony among the buildings, depending on your point of view, also puts her at ease a bit more. As she begins to wander down a street picked somewhat at random, she begins to smell the scent of coffee, something she only had the opportunity to try once before, but feeling a bit thirsty, she decides to follow it. Moments later the door to the shop opens and the dryad quickly makes her way in so that the door doesn't smack her on the rear before she's gotten clear of it. For the moment, she doesn't say a word and looks a little bewildered as her gaze flits around the room before eventually falling on Serrah and Gem.

  Sometimes, you just never know where a Vine is going to drop you.

  There is one traveller in the hustle and bustle of New York's streets that absolutely doesn't belong to this place. Humans and more fantastical races might occupy the streets here, but dolphins are probably not a common sight outside of an aquarium or tropical seas. So there are the occasional passers-by that stare when a dolphin of all things goes floating by -- floating, through the air, as though it were swimming, with the occasional languid kick of its flukes.

  What the hell?

  It's probably not a wild animal. Its head this way and that, regarding the travellers with way too much calm intelligence to be wild. It's also wearing some kind of strange, slender harness made of links of a very fine, thin metal; shimmering opalescent every time the light strikes it. Five white marks like stars are on the dome of its melon at its brow, and the astrologically-minded would recognise that the form the constellation Delphinus.

  Weird.

  The city is too loud to notice that the animal is making rhythmic clicks to itself, echolocation, although some of those clicks are low enough that they could otherwise be heard. Expert control of fins and flukes keep the dolphin from actually bumping into anyone, but when it does, its skin is damp but not wet, and the momentum of its movement suggests that it is, in fact, the several hundred pounds that it looks like.

  How the creature fits into the doorway of the Early Latte is anybody's guess, and so is the why. Maybe just for a breather from the crowds of people. Fortunately, the cafe part of the coffee shop has enough room for the dolphin.

  The beaked snout turns left, then right; cocking a weather eye toward the inside of the coffee shop. No delicious smells of coffee... dolphins can't smell. Movement does bring the creature to look left again, abruptly, eyeing the dryad in evident curiosity.

  Nope. Never seen one of those before.

  Depending on how tuned Diantha's senses are, she might feel the curious splash of sonar -- a tingly sensation against the edges of one's hearing and sense of touch.

  "Excussse me." The dolphin's jaws don't move, so there must be some other mechanism driving his speech. The voice is definitely male, though it's high, and the upper register warbles a little, sibilants hissing and fricatives stuttering. "I don't-t mean to be rude, but what are you? I've never ssseen one of your kind before."

  Or a lot of the folk here, really. But this deer-elf-person-thing seems a lot more approachable.

  The counter is also eyed, appraisingly; sunken eyes skipping over the riot of colour of Serrah's skirt, and the pointed ears of the elven woman at the counter who clearly doesn't have enough to do.

Gem and Serrah both look over at Diantha as she enters. The elf wrinkles her nose at the dryad's attire, and her ears twitch slightly. "Uhhhhhh ..."

Serrah raises her eyebrows. "Betcha she's from another world," she says; there's something kind of scratchy and androgynous about her voice. "Or ..." She shakes her head. "Blossom, whatev." Everyone in Hartford who isn't living under a rock knows about the World Tree at this point, considering it's filled up a solid half of the social media buzz these days; it's akin to the moon landing or some other such historical epoch, although not much has actually changed for the man (or elf, or vampire ...) on the street.

Gem blinks, and settles down. "Oh, well then." She shrugs, rings up Serrah's order, and then puts on her Customer Service smile for Diantha. "Welcome to the Early Latte! What can I get for ..." Then there's the arrival of the dolphin, why is there a dolphin. "... you?"

Serrah giggles. It sounds distinctly different from her speaking voice. "Okay, the dolphin is definitely from another wor-- Blossom."

     Diantha is probably even more surprised to see Ecco come swimming in the door after her, and though she politely moves a bit to give the dolphin some room, she can't help but stare. She's certainly seen a dolphin before, in fact, it's one of the animal forms that she can shift into, but swimming through the air was quite the trick, and she finds herself wondering what sort of magic is making that possible. She does hear some of his echolocation sweeping over her, more than your average human would certainly, those large pointy ears aren't just for show, and her tail twitches slightly from the tingling sensation. 

     The voice breaks her out of her dumbfounded stare though, and she blinks, her gaze swiftly shifting from sweeping down Ecco's body to locking upon his eyes, or at least one of them depending on her viewing perspective. "Well, I've witnessed a lot of strange things since I was kicked out of my world and into this strange network of... blossoms, but I never would have guessed today I'd end up talking to a dolphin who can swim through the air. My name is Diantha, and I'm a dryad, sometimes also referred to as a Daughter of Cenarius where I come from." 

     She also hears the human and elven woman speaking, but doesn't pay them much attention even if they were talking about her, at least until the elven woman greets her directly. She returns the smile with a friendly one of her own. "Yes, well, I would like something to drink, and I hope perhaps you could recommend something sweet and refreshing? I'm rather thirsty."

  The dolphin's head tilts when he notices that he's being noticed. Very much so. He's no stranger to humanoid expression, and he warbles a sigh through his blowhole at the incredulity. Honestly, just because you manage to get your fins on some tech that frees you from the basic need for oceanic environments...

  "Carry on," he chatters simply, to the people at the counter. "Don't-t mind me. I'm not-t ready to order," he adds, although he has to wonder privately if they'll actually pick up on the playful sarcasm of the assertion. "And yessss. I am." Duh.

  He swivels his attention back around to Diantha, turning and twisting to face her, although he seems to be pretty mindful of where his tail goes. It wouldn't do to go thwhacking over painstakingly-assembled store planograms and displays, would it? See, he's a considerate customer. Except not really a customer. Mostly, he's just getting out of the crowded streets for a few minutes.

  "I can't-t, actually," he clarifies. "Swim through the air. I'm wearing a piece of t-tech that makes it-t happen." He pulls himself upright, and whistles a short melody. It's eerie, dissonant, and yet oddly harmonic; but the important takeaway is that more than song, it's also language, and it has a meaning: The world is a pretty bizarre place, but things happen for a reason, and it takes all kinds because it has to take all kinds.

  ...That sure seems to be true today. Thanks to whatever arcane technomagic that powers the World Tree's translation, the meaning of the song is clear, even if the eerie harmonies and dissonance might not all be audible to some of his humanoid audience.

  "You can call me Ecco. As you so astutely sssurmised," he observes with a languid sideways flick of his tail (but not too much, lest he knock anything over), "I am Tursiops truncatus, the common bottlenose dolphin. ...Ssssort-t of," he muses, half to himself. "Anyway, that-t's not important."

  Blinking somewhat owlishly, he swivels to face the counter, pulling himself up into high-body stance as he does. (It's a bit less crowded on the floor, that way.) "Nothing for me. I don't think you sssserve tuna here. I'm just getting out of the street-t for a while." A short pause. "Nice establishment-t you have here. I'm not a total stranger to human citiessss. The Pan-Pacific coast-t of my world hasss quite a few."

Okay, good, the dryad thinks this is as weird as Serrah does. (Although Serrah does seem to be better at hiding her reaction than Gem.)

When Diantha makes her order, Gem hmms. "What do you think we should give her, Serrah?"

Serrah shrugs. "Can't go wrong with a mocha latte -- that's coffee, chocolate, and milk," she adds, in case Diantha isn't well-versed in coffee-based foodstuffs. "Or like, just a hot chocolate or just chocolate milk if your priority's on 'sweet' instead of 'coffee'."

Everyone in coffee shop becomes more subdued at Ecco's song. The translation certainly worked well enough there. Serrah even starts nodding along in agreement. Gem looks pensive, and slightly contrite.

Although when Ecco says he isn't a customer, Gem's smile becomes slightly more strained.

Serrah nods. "Well, New York is on the Atlantic coast," she says. "Got the same oceans where you're from, huh?" She considers this. "Actually I think I know of a seafood place right by Brooklyn Bridge that serves to mermaids, they'll probably have tuna that's good for, uh, dolphins." She isn't quite able to keep it out of her voice that she can't 100% believe she's having this conversation.

     Diantha nods as Ecco introduces himself and states his actual subspecies. She isn't aware of Latin yet, so the scientific name just comes across to her as a fancier, perhaps antiquated name for his species. The word bottlenose does get another nod out of her though. 

     "It's a pleasure to meet you Ecco. I don't think we have your exact species of dolphin where I come from, the bottlenose tideskipper looks close, but has a harsher, more rough transition between the darker gray on their backs and the lighter gray or white on the belly, and also have a raised ridge above the eye that trails off toward the sides of their bodies, which is usually colored an even darker gray, or sometimes golden yellow." 

     With that bit of information given, she turns her gaze back towards Gem and Serrah for the moment, pondering their suggestions for just a moment before going with the first one. "Mocha Latte it is then. Thank you. You say there are mermaids around here too? They're even generally considered to be a myth on my world, likely just mistaken identity with people who just saw a naga."

  The dolphin's head turns between the two others, following them visually as much as he does audibly. None of this really matters much to him. He can taste things, but dolphins of his world never really developed a serious taste for human cuisine; at least, not on a wide scale. Only the eccentrics, and they were considered pretty weird.

  Never mind that his sense of taste is muted. None of those descriptors hold any real significance to him.

  Ecco flicks the end of his tail diagonally in the human equivalent of a nonchalant fidget. New York is on the Atlantic coast, Serrah tells him, and the dolphin makes a dismissive clicking sound. "I know that-t. There's a New York-k in my world, although it doesn't look like thisss, and it's half underwater. The sea levelsss are much lower here," he muses, half to himself.

  "Same oceans, different continentsss," he confirms, looking up to Serrah. "Our polar capsss experienced partial melting, but lunar coloniesss, a terraforming project on Marsss, and exploratory deep-space vesselsss have alleviated the overcrowding issue somewhat-t. Now EnviroSci can focus on getting the planet's ecosystemsss back on track-k. It's slow work, but it's working."

  Ecco doesn't roll his eyes, but the brief movement of his head suggests he would if it would actually be visible to his audience. "Oh, for the love of Ifni," he half-mutters, at all the staring and incredulity. It happens everywhere he goes. He's slowly getting used to it, but... not yet.

  "Thanksss," he adds, to Serrah's recommendation of a seafood place that serves to mermaids. "Wouldn't mind meeting a few merpeople. There are plenty of mythologiessss about them where I'm from, but they don't-t actually exist-t-t."

  "At least... not that I know of."

  He turns a little sideways to squint an eye at Diantha, considering her descrpition. Doesn't sound familiar. "A cousin to the Atlantic Striped Dolphin, maybe. Or the Common Dolphin. Some of my best friendsss are Commons and Stripeds. We also have Atlantic Spotted Dolphinsss, too, but it's rare to see the pelagic speciesss near coastal human settlementsss."

  The dolphin tilts his head, although it's such a subtle gesture that it could be missed. His neck just doesn't flex that way naturally. He doesn't frown, with his face fixed in that perennial dolphin-grin, but it carries across in his voice. "Yeah, I always thought-t mermaids were weird. So they're real, here, huh? How on earth do they get around the city...?"

Gem nods and straightens up. "One mocha latte!" she says. "That'll be three dollars and --"

Serrah clears her throat. Gem blushes slightly and finishes, "-- t-two Hartford dollars and forty-nine cents."

Serrah blinks at Diantha. "No mermaids?" she says. "I mean, of course there are nagas here, too. But yeah, mermaids have their own cities and everything." It's like she's being told that there's a world that doesn't have sea lions.

She and Gem both sound interested in Ecco's description of his world. "Your world definitely sounds cooler than this one," says Serrah. "Wonder if the Hartford empire would have control over the other planets and stuff ..." There's a note of bitterness in her voice.

She just looks nonplussed when Ecco talks about mermaids being part of 'mythologies.' But the question is easy enough to answer. "They have amphibious magical wheelchairs and cars," she says. "I mean, the Fish Market restaurant is right at the edge of the water, and they can come right up to the order window at high tide. But they've basically got all kinds of ways."

Gem smiles, and goes to grab Serrah's coffee. "They'll probably want to come up with some kind of 'swimming through the air' thing of their own when they hear about you, Mr. Ecco."

"Excellent point!" says Serrah, accepting the cup.

     Diantha chuckles a bit and nods to Serrah's reaction to there being no mermaids where she comes from. "Well, like Ecco, not that I know of, but I've been around for over eight hundred years, and though I did spend a few centuries in a sort of dream world while my physical body slept, I've certainly been around a bit. If there are mermaids on Azeroth, they are extremely good at hiding. Then again, almost no one had seen a pandaren either in the last ten thousand years, but then it's suddenly the entire continent where they live is discovered along with more living on the back of an enormous turtle. So I suppose anything is possible." She offers with a grin, then nods to Ecco's sentiment about wanting to meet a mermaid. 

     "It would be pretty interesting to meet some I can't deny. Though I'll pass on the fish. I don't eat meat, even fish." Her gaze again drifts back to Serrah as the girl picks up her order. "What did you get out of curiosity? I've only had coffee once, and I'm assuming it's a bit fancier here with all the technology."

  "'Cool?' I'm talking about what it wasss before it broke, unfortunately. What'sss that old human adage? 'Be careful what-t you wish for.' My world isn't cool, it'sss fundamentally broken." Ecco's explanation sounds a little grumpy. "And I'm the only one who'sss not broken along with it. I think we can sssafely blame this one on alien invadersss. Maybe you can come visit-t if it ever gets fixed, but you definitely don't-t want to see it as it-t is now."

  Slashing his tail diagonally in an expression of displeasure, one that might have created a small swarm of bubbles if he were in the water, Ecco looks from left to right, surveying the coffee shop again. There's really nothing here for him; not any of this looks appetizing, let alone stuff that he could physically eat.

  Magical wheelchairs and cars. Well, that does make sense. "Oh. So like a ssspider-walker. That'sss how we get around on land." Ecco throws his head up and slightly to one side, as though to indicate the harness he's wearing. "I got thisss offworld. But-t when we're on shipsss, dolphins wear harnesses with manipulator armsss and use mechanical walkersss to get around."

  "Huh. I'll have to come back-k here. The Fish Market sounds interesting." There is probably something there he can eat, yep.

  Ecco twists slightly, giving Gem the fisheye; even with his starkly non-human features, the bland skepticism of his expression is unmistakable. So is the huff of air from his blowhole, and the heat of it forms a miniscule, easily-missed cloud of water vapour. "It'sss just 'Ecco,' if you please. You make me sssound like an old man..."

  He ducks his tail and straightens it in analog of a shrug. "Probably. I mean, there'sss not much not to like, here. Except-t I'll probably die if it gets taken off while I'm over land. That part-t's not so good. But it isss convenient. Unfortunately I'm no engineer, and I have no idea how the t-technology works in it-t..."

  He trails off, because after all that, he has to stare at Diantha a little bit. Eight hundred years old? Panda-people in hiding for ten millennia, hiding on the back of a giant turtle? Well, blow me down and pick me up, his brain's swapped with a trout. He stares for a second or two, before shaking his head in clear bewilderment. "...I guessss I don't have any room at all to talk-k about weird."

Serrah nods slowly. "Yeah," she says. "I mean, there's miracles and stuff which obviously can't happen. But in general, 'anything is possible seems about right.'" She shoots Gem a grin. "Also, we found someone who's even older than you!"

Gem laughs. "Oh, stop, I'm only 213!"

"Hmm?" Serrah glances at her coffee. "Uh, just a regular latte. I just got done with my shift, I clean dishes and stuff here, and I was just grabbing a pick-me-up before I head out."

She raises her eyebrows at Ecco's brief outburst. "Okay, sorry," she says. "It sounds just about as uncool as this world now, yeah."

Gem looks contrite at the correction. "Oh, I'm sorry," she says. "But, uh ... yeah. I meant more, they'd probably reverse-engineer something from first principles. Or at least someone will." She shrugs.

But then Serrah shoots Ecco a grin at his last comment. "Trust me, Ecco, we're all weirdos in our own way."

     Diantha looks more closely at Ecco's harness as he talks about it a bit more, wincing a bit as he mentions if it is ever taken off of him while over land he'd die, and she assumes the same would happen if it were to malfunction. 

     "Well, I hope it's pretty reliable than, for your sake. That would be a pretty awful way to go. I'm actually able to shapeshift into a dolphin like the ones from my world. I've beached myself a few times before shifting, so I can somewhat imagine what it would be like to get stuck on land like that..." She trails off awkwardly and is happy for the change of subject as Ecco speaks of what she had just mentioned about her world is on the weird side. 

     "Yes well, dryads don't grow old, we just stop aging once we're adults. In theory, I could live forever if no-one actively succeds in killing me. As for the turtle, I do wish I could have seen it with my own eyes. I've only heard stories. Apparently, the turtle wanders the seas and is so large that an entire island has formed on his back shell. But as wonderful as my world may sound sometimes, it has it's problems too. War seems to rage constantly, and it seems even more violent and frequent in the last 30 years or so." 

     Finally she turns back to Gem, realizing she still is waiting for her to pay for her drink, and remembering her saying something about Hartford Dollars, she looks more than a little embarrassed as she reaches into a small cloth pack which she wears around her waist, pulling out some gold and silver coins, as well as some of the elven money that she was paid for a recent job she wishes she could forget ever happened. "Will either of these be ok? I'm sorry, I didn't stop anywhere to exchange my money." She's not so used to buying things, as she pretty much never needed much back home.

  "So it-t isss," Ecco sighs. The fellow seems to have to keep reminding himself that weirder stuff than his world is out there, although the fundamentally broken nature of his world is pretty weird even by his own standards. That he fisheyes Gem at the elf's assertion of her age is a given.

  The dolphin's tail swishes in a negatory diagonal slash. He warbles a sigh again. "No, it-t isn't uncool. Just-t broken. Really broken... I guess you're right about that-t," he asides, in response to Serrah's assertion about weirdoes.

  He bobs in place a little, swivelling to watch as Diantha checks out the harness he's wearing. It looks to be woven, the texture not unlike the weave of an automobile's seatbelt, only linked, like something metallic. It's flat and low and quite thin. When the light strikes it just so, it shimmers, opalescent; there is an almost matte sheen to the finish. Its colour seems hard to pin down, changing over a whitish washed-out spectrum wherever the light reaches.

  "Actually, that's why I have it-t," he comments, in response to Diantha's observation about accidentally beaching oneself. "I fell through a Vine and beached myself off the coast of Central America. A goddess named Athena found me. Demigoddess, maybe." He swishes his tail in lieu of a shrug. "Anyway."

  He glances back, before startling, as though remembering something. "Ohhhh, ssssnap. It'sss later than I thought. I have to get back to my world and check on some people, there... hopefully I'll sssee you later!" he adds, turning in a tight, graceful arc (surprisingly narrow, and without knocking any of the store displays over), and headbutting the door open to push his way through it.

  If he were underwater, there might be a swirl of bubbles in his wake. Instead, there's just a curiously cool breeze, and then he's gone.

Gem and Serrah peer down at the coins. "I, uh ..." Gem looks nervous. "I'm not sure if ..."

Serrah groans. "Okay, y'know what." She looks at Diantha, and there's a measure of reluctance in her expression. "How about ... I pay for it now, and we can go to the exchange center after we have our coffee and you can pay me back there."

Gem raises her eyebrows, but doesn't comment.

Serrah nods at Ecco, and looks quite interested when he mentions Athena. "A goddess, huh?" She taps her chin thoughtfully. "The gods haven't been doing much with this world lately." She shrugs. "Oh well. G'bye, then!"

She can't help but smile a bit at the feeling of the breeze. "Well, he was a cool guy."

     Diantha nods to Ecco as he explains how he got his harness. "Well, that was rather fortunate. Avoiding death and also getting a very useful, and quite pretty I might add, harness." She says with a smile, then as Ecco suddenly explains that he has to go back to his world, her heart pangs at the fact that she still can't go back to help her world. 

     Still, she gives the dolphin a farewell wave. "May Elune light your path!" She says in parting before turning back to Gem and Serrah, though more focused on Serrah as she makes that kind offer. "Oh thank you, that seems like a good solution but is very kind of you to offer. What's all this about being cool though? I didn't touch him but was he less warm than your average person or dolphin?"

Serrah seems mostly embarrassed at the praise as she pays for Diantha's drink. "Yeah, yeah, it's just ... easier to do it that way, y'know?" As if she's trying to deflect criticism, or it's somehow uncomfortable.

At the question about coolness, Serrah just looks blank for a moment, then turns to Gem, who chuckles. "I made that mistake too, about fifty years ago," she says. "'Cool' is a slang term which means ... mm ... 'interesting, in a good way.' Or maybe 'good and interesting', maybe ..." She doesn't seem to notice she said 'maybe' twice.

Serrah shrugs. "Pretty much, yeah," she says softly.

     "Oh, I see, I should have expected that different worlds would have all kinds of new slang I've never heard, but I guess I didn't really think about it much." Diantha says in understanding of the definition of 'cool'. She looks around a moment, her eyes lingering on the door a moment before sweeping back to Serrah and Gem. "Do you think I'm cool? Also, what else is there to do in this city? It's still rather crowded and noisy for my tastes, but I still feel somehow less repulsed by it than most other-world cities I've been to so far..."

Serrah has to stop herself from saying 'no, I think you're hot'. She knows that there are several reasons this won't go over well -- not least of which would be having to try to explain what that slang term means.

"I do think so, yeah," she says, sipping from her coffee. "The World Tree as a concept is pretty cool, and you're different from the dryads in this world. So basically, yeah, it's all kinds of interesting." She smiles. "Gonna have to hop onto one of the ... Vines, on my next day off."

She exchanges a glance with Gem as she considers the question. "Honestly, you can do pretty much anything in New York," she says. "Anything that isn't violent, anyway. Or, I mean, you can, but the police would come down on you like a half-ton of bricks." She shrugs. "I dunno, what kind of stuff did you have in mind?"

     Diantha smiles at being acknowledged as 'cool' and nods to the notion of vines. "I have to admit, though I'm still worried about what's going on back home since my first vine trip was not intentional and seems to at least for now, have been a one way trip, it has been a pretty wild ride hopping between blossoms, and most of it has been good." 

    She winds up pondering what Gem says a bit and shaking her head as she comes up a little empty. "Well, I don't know, certainly nothing that would get me in trouble, but as I said, I don't usually do cities, so this is all new and a bit of a culture shock for me."

Serrah frowns. "Oh, jeez, sorry to hear that," she says. She pauses, and shakes her head. "Damn, I don't even know what I'd do if I was like ..." She shrugs. "Just forced into another world with no way back. That must really be terrible."

She shrugs. "Well, like ... heh, now I'm even drawing a blank." She grins. "I'm just too familiar with New York City. It's my 'ordinary', y'know? There's just too much." She pauses. "Of course, I usually spend my rest days just resting, so like ..." She shakes her head. "I mean, I'm not about to invite a dryad to a loud and noisy arcade or something, so ... hmm ..."

"You could go the opposite way," says Gem. "Show her the university's library?"

Serrah shrugs, and looks to Diantha. "I 'unno, are libraries your kind of scene?"

     "It isn't a great feeling, no. Particularly since there was a major attack that happened to an elven city not terribly far from the forests where I was born, so not only was I not able to help, I have no idea what is going on now. But I've decided that driving myself crazy trying to find my way back isn't going to help anyone, and the loss of one dryad isn't going to be the end of the world, at least I hope not!" She explains, then thinks a moment about the offer. 

    She didn't have a clue what an arcade was but if it was noisy it didn't sound enjoyable to her. She did know what a library was though. "Hmm, I wouldn't say I've spent a ton of time in them, but on a strange new world, I guess it would be a good way to learn about the world and people, assuming I can read the writing."

Serrah shakes her head. "Wow, yeah, that's rough," she says. "But ... yeah, I guess all you can do is put one foot after the other." She shrugs. "It's what I do."

She nods. "All right," she says, getting out her smartphone. "I mean, if you can read the menu or the sign on the shop, there's no reason you can't read anything else here. I know there's a dryad one near here with mostly stuff in English, sooo ..." She opens up the map. "Aha, yep, it's just a couple blocks away."

At that point, Gem hands over Diantha's mocha latte. "Don't forget your coffee!"

     Diantha nods and grins a bit, but decides against correcting that she doesn't have feet. She looks up at the menu, and indeed can read it, though some of the words she can't comprehend the meaning as they are not things that exist where she comes from. 

     "English huh? Where I come from it's just generically called common. I believe it is just the language humans on my world use and it was spread from there, but I never really thought much about it or asked." She ponders as she turns to Gem, taking the latte with a smile. "Oh, thank you, I almost did." She says in a thankful tone, taking a few sips as she follows Serrah out into the street once she's ready to go.

Serrah shrugs, and grabs her coffee with her free hand. "It's just the name of the language here, I guess," she says. "Dunno why we understand each other, but oh well."

She leads Diantha down the street, watching her phone for a few seconds, but she quickly puts it away. Their destination is fairly obvious: it's one of the buildings which, on closer inspection, appears to have been grown out of a single tree.

A couple of this world's dryads are walking out at that moment: they have leaf-colored hair, but in contrast to Diantha, they're fully humanoid, and their ears are shorter and seem to be serrated, like certain types of leaves. They pause, looking curiously over at Diantha.

Serrah hesitates. "So, uh, yeah," she says uncertainly.

     Diantha follows, still wondering what this thing Serrah calls a phone does, as no one has yet explained it to her. She just knows it seems to display pictures. Once they arrive, she looks up at the building and smiles. "Yes, this looks lovely. I think I will defenitely feel more relaxed here." She says with a nod, then turns to the humanoid dryads that are walking out of the library, and greets them with a wave. "Hello!"

The dryads smile and nod in greeting. "Hello!" says one of them. Apparently recognizing that Diantha is just a dryad from another world, they turn off and resume wandering away.

Serrah smiles. "That's good to hear!" she says. "So, uh ... guess I'll see you around, huh."

Diantha Windsong watches as the other dryads walk away for a moment, if only out of curiosity as she'd never seen humanoid ones before. But soon she looks back at Serrah and nods. "Sure, I guess I know where you work now right? I suppose if you're not planning on doing anything at the library as well it would be rather boring just watching me read..."