I love how many Red Science experiments are like. you look at them and suddenly, viscerally Understand why the good doctor is Like That

Benthic's motto is Omnes adsint, quamvis dementi, quamvis nefasti - or, translated, Welcome to all, however mad, and however unholy

the doctor is very definitely at least one of these things

the doctor, out at IKEA with some measuring tape, trying to find a new sofa or something for the house. finds a furniture that would be perfect except that it's a wee bit too big. he begins expounding, at length, in public, about the tyranny of spacetime and the treacheries of the centimeter

(freewriting - Selcouth experiments on some Lethean tea leaves.)

You watch as the Meticulous Apothecary performs test after test. They immerse individual leaves in glowing reagents; powder them beneath amber tools; examine them as they burn through an array of lenses.

After every single experiment, they take notes. They write pages of observations. They decant their slime into sealed vials. They rhythmically squeeze lumps of amber in their tentacles. They carefully wrap every individual item before boxing it up, and then for good measure, they label the boxes themselves.

(You are beginning to understand how they remember so much, despite the nature of their work.)

Finally, they turn to you. As I suspected, they write. Traces of irrigo. Sealed/contained/tempered in a way I do not understand, though. Aspects denatured-coagulated through exposure to an unidentified substance. I have a hypothesis guesses, but no way to confirm them.

Guesses?

They have a. They pause. Their tentacles squirm as they consider how to communicate something completely incomprehensible to human senses. They write multiple words and cross all of them out. Something that suggests a relation to death, they finally write. (They underline "something," apparently disgruntled at the generality of the word.)

That makes... quite a bit of sense, actually, considering the supposed providence of these leaves. Aren't there multiple rivers that flow through the land of the dead?

So I hear, they write. But I have no way to obtain a sample. Unlike for humans, death is one-way for us.

There is something peevish in the slant of their writing. You suppose that is only fair.

every day I sweat bullets over the fact that I've committed to none of my characters getting married in-game (because none of them are the kind to marry, for various reasons) and that this means I will never get that coveted +1 to their Specialty Magcat

each of my FL OCs has a Specific Advanced Skill that they are experts in, canon-wise, and it's one of my mostly-pointless[1] goals to get them to 20 (or higher!) in each of those Specific Advanced Skills in-game. that means I want:

• 20 Artisan of the Red Science on the doctor
• 20 A Player of Chess on Rafael
• 20 Kataleptic Toxicology on Wren

Rafael and Wren's are attainable without spouses - their ambition treasures align with their primary stats. the doctor's, however, is not because his treasure gives APoC instead. I have sat here considering whether I want to fudge his items a bit and give him a slightly less fitting destiny to at least get him to 19. but spouse? I am Immovable on that[2]

(some freewriting: Nathan and the Correspondence)

The man who greets you at the door is wan but handsome, of respectable dress and a way of carrying himself that betrays an aristocratic upbringing. His eyebrows are intact, his long hair unsinged - only a few bandages on his fingers betray his true profession. This must be the doctor's... friend? Associate? Partner?

"Colleague, after a manner," he says, with a warm smile. "And you must be the pupil he mentioned. The one who wants to understand the Correspondence on a deeper level."

[...]

"A common mistake for those new to the Correspondence," he says, "is to conflate the sigils with what they represent.

"By way of analogy, take our own language." In normal ink, he writes the word "joyousness" upon the paper. "When we write a word - one that already exists, that is - we are not bringing it into being. Nor are we bringing its associated concept into being. Both existed before the writing, and both will continue existing, even if this particular inscription is destroyed." With two quick strokes, he strikes out his writing.

"So, if we're not bringing a word into existence when we write it, what are we doing?"

Invoking it, perhaps?

"Correct," he says. He inscribes a sigil: THE EAGER ANTICIPATION WITH WHICH ONE BEHOLDS AN OPEN HORIZON. It sputters to life, blackening the paper with little licks of flame. "Not everything about the Correspondence can be understood in relation to human language. After a certain point, the metaphor will hinder your comprehension, instead of helping it. But as a beginner, there are worse misunderstandings to have."