We have a genuine issue. We have a LOT of genuine issues, and we're trying to work out how serious they are.

One issue is that we seem to be laboring under a number of curses. Now it might seem ridiculous and superstitious to a reasonable reader that we should speak in terms of curses, but not only am I superstitious and ridiculous, I also think that it's sensible and even healthful to think in such terms. The alternative is locating ALL of one's faults within oneself. But curses might come from outside or inside. Someone in our headspace could be cursing us, or someone from outside could be doing it. Thinking in such terms, therefore, has given us some flexibility—some ability to rationalize situations that otherwise would seem like intolerable deadlocks.

At least one such curse seems to come from without, and it pertains to Irish hero Diarmuid ua Duibhne, who is NOT to be found in the Pnictogen Wing (at least the bits we're aware of) but who clashed violently with two of our most important headmates: Sir Arturia Pendragon, formerly the King of Knights summoned in the Fourth Grail War portrayed in Fate/Zero, and Emiya Kiritsugu, the rebel mage and mercenary who summoned her. They had a very difficult relationship in Fate/Zero which we are now in the process of reconciling. But both Arturia and Kiritsugu were cursed by Diarmuid ua Duibhne because of the cruel trick which Kiritsugu played on Arturia in order to humiliate her (as we think)—but this gets into spoiler territory so I'll halt for now.

This is a novel situation for us. Curiously, we have received hints that Diarmuid would like to reach out to us and is kindly disposed, but his dying curse seems real enough and it's been interfering with my ability to study up on Irish mythology, which is a major lacuna in our cultural library. We've read up on a number of Mediterranean and European pantheons but we're very weak on Irish lore, even though I'm very slightly Irish (I can't remember how many generations back) and feel an inclination in that direction. Obviously we need to study a bit, if nothing else.

~Chara of Pnictogen

what a strange expression, huh? Variety loved its pithy if slightly difficult to understand jargon, meant to be as concise and snappy as possible, because in show biz there's no time to hang around. everything's go, go, go! so it's all about clipped utterances and snappy turns of phrase.

"Wall Street lays an egg." Well, a zero looks sort of like an egg, so that's one way to think of it. Wall Street was suddenly out of gas. Zip. I'm suddenly reminded of how "goose egg" is another tasty euphemism for zero.

You know that Muslim mathematicians had to introduce this simple concept to "the West"? It blew their minds. I think maybe it still does. Gosh there's a symbol for nothing! Makes you think don't it! Maybe nothing is anything, or whatever.

But eggs are also a beginning, as we all know, and zero is a beginning as well. The humble number-line has to start somewhere, so it grows outward from zero, so to speak.

One of the things that's been haunting me from the last several weeks has been listening to Elon Musk, on his "Adrian Dittmann" audio ramblings (Mono got blocked by the way! probably my fault because we've been doing some two-headed shenanigans from time to time, partly to evade censorship, but yeah 'Adrian' doesn't like old Mono), bringing up zero. I don't remember what he had to say about zero (are you kidding me?) but I certainly remember just how...particularly empty that felt. I think zero haunts Elon Musk. Uh, Adrian Dittmann rather.

Well I've been haunted by zero, too. "Back to Zero", at least. We have unfinished Fate/Zero business for sure. Someone's come knocking, with serious business: Diarmuid ua Duibhne. We are really weak on this Irish lore so...studying means a lot to us now, and that's a pity because we have been struggling with terrifyingly bad traumatic issues involving study.

~Chara of Pnictogen