Library, Monday

[intotheout]

Bill was overjoyed to see his sentient mistletoe friend again. Tip . . . not so much.

"I'm fifteen," she told it. "And at work. There will be no kissing happening."

She wasn't sure how it managed it, but the mistletoe totally managed to blow her a raspberry before going back to playing tag with her pet robot.

[open!]

Comments

[intotheout]

"That's okay. If I get really annoyed I'll just get my practice sword and whack at it a bit." That had been quite cathartic to do in the park on Friday, after all.

Though one would hope she wouldn't cry while attacking sentient mistletoe.

[justice_undone]

"You practice sword fighting?" Breq asked.

It wasn't a weapon she had experience with herself, but I was relieved to know that Tip had a way of protect herself. She would have suggested guns though.

[intotheout]

"Just for the last couple months," Tip said. "But yeah. I got tired of feeling like my only option when things got weird around here was my creepy gun."

[justice_undone]

"Do you find a sword better than a gun? Or just another option?"

Breq would have thought a gun was better. Her troops had once without any effort taken down a huge army of people who for some reason liked swords.

[intotheout]

"My gun erases things. At least sword wounds you can maybe survive."

[justice_undone]

"Erases things?"

Now that was interesting.

"How?"

[intotheout]

"No idea. It's a Boov gun."

[justice_undone]

"How much of the target is erased? Is there any type of armor that protects from it?"

More specifically, could it penetrate Radchaai armor? There was no way of knowing that though, and she preferred not to have to grow back an arm or a leg.

She also ought to find out more about the limits of Earth medical technology.

[intotheout]

"Not that we ever discovered. It just erases the armor, too. And . . . I guess it probably depends on the range? It just kind of takes big circular chunks out of anything it's aimed at. You don't even get any light or sound for warning, you just point, shoot, and whatever you were aiming at is . . . gone."

[justice_undone]

"That sounds like a very powerful weapon," Breq said, then added:

"And unless you do want to kill someone, perhaps a sword might be better. People can always regrow a limb."

Not here, Breq.

[intotheout]

"Um," said Tip. "I mean . . . no."

[justice_undone]

"What..." Breq began. "Oh. You can't regrow body parts here."

Considering space travel here she wasn't that surprised, actually.

[intotheout]

"Not so much," Tip said. "They're starting to do pretty good with prosthetic replacements, at least."

[justice_undone]

"Perhaps I should have guessed," Breq said. "Another reason not to use that gun unless you want to truly get rid of someone."