Further Questions

Andrew seemed quite shocked and numb after everything that had happened, and Exotica couldn't blame him. She decided that it was best to simply let him recover for a moment while she took in more of a sense of this world. The walls were not made of stone or wood but rather of a strange material that had paper with decorative patterns over it. The patterns were crude and repetitive and did not seem to have been painted.

Meanwhile, Andrew was starting to wonder why Exotica was examing his walpaper so intently, but decided it was best not to say anything because he wasn't sure how she would react. Besides, now that the creature was gone, Exotica was by far the most striking thing in the room. It wasn't just her body, as magnificent as that was. She had a dynamic beauty that permeated her whole being. The most beautiful thing about her was her eyes. They were radiant, like fallen stars, filled with keen intelligence, courage, and something he couldn't quite put into words, something beautiful and yet alien and unnerving. He laughed slightly, fully aware of how silly any of his thoughts would have sounded if he'd said or written them. It was stupid anyway, this woman was completely out of his league. She was too old for him, and she was a princess... from 1500 years ago... Once again, it sank in to Andrew that a sorceress/princess and a knight from 1500 years ago and some kind of talking dog had just appeared out of nowhere in his bathroom, and he found himself unable to think anything. He didn't want himself to remember the thing again, so he stared intently at the wallpaper himself.

Exotica, meanwhile, turned her attention to the strange glowing box. It was made of a strange, hard material and in its front was a glass screen illuminated by a weird light. She knew from the senses Gryffid's spell had awakened in her that this was not magic--it was based on physical, not spiritual, forces. There seemed to be writing on the screen, in a clean, straight font. She also noticed several stylized icons around the screen. She moved her hand forward to touch the screen. "Wait! Don't touch the computer!" She turned around swiftly. Andrew was startled. "Um, I'm sorry, it's just that my homework is on there, and, um, I don't think my teacher would believe it if I said that my homework was accidentally deleted by a time travelling princess."

Exotica laughed, then frowned thoughtfully. "So I could potentially delete all of that just by touching it? Isn't that rather impractical?"

"Well, not by just touching it, I just wanted you to be careful. I'm sorry." He blushed slightly.

Exotica didn't notice, however. She was too enthralled by the glowing box. "What is this?" she said, awed.

"It's a computer," said Andrew. "It prcoesses information."

"What do you mean by that?" said Exotica. "How do you store your writing in it? Having all of Gryffid's magical knowledge, I'm aware of the possiblity of writing information to be stored in a sphere of ether rather than written on paper, but I assume this doesn't use magical forces at all. How does it work?"

Andrew realized he was at a complete loss to explain how a computer worked. When Exotica had first showed up, he'd felt an instinctive sense of superiority over someone more ignorant even though he'd been attracted to her and even awed by her in other ways, but now that she'd asked him to explain the computer, he'd realized just how little he himself actually knew about it. "Well, it's encoded in the memory."

"I thought only living things could have memory. Is that alive somehow?"

Andrew shrugged. "Not really. Its 'memory' is, um, written in electrical charges. This is more my mom's thing. I'm a history nerd, not a science nerd."

Exotica frowned, reminded of Andrew's family. "Where is your family? How long will it be until they come back?"

"I don't know. My parents are out for dinner with some friends. My sister is shopping, and she's the kind of person who could take hours."

"Would you say that your family is trustworthy?"

"Huh? Well, I guess so. Maybe not my sister, if you tell her anything she'll tell it to everyone in our school. But none of them is evil or anything."

"That is good to know. I'm glad the D'Honaires have kept their honor even after all this time, even if like any family they have their foolish youths." Andrew smiled slightly, glad that Exotica seemed to think of him as a man of honor. "Far too many of our nobles lack it, and I suspect the same is true in your time."

"Um, we're not really nobles," said Andrew. He took a deep breath. "There aren't any anymore. We're a democracy now, sort of. Some noble families kept their money, but we're not one of them, we're kind of upper-middle-class now. My father is an engineer."

For a moment, Exotica said nothing. The sounds of Fred's snoring filled the room.

1. Exotica questions Andrew further.
2. Exotica decides to make some clothing through magic before anyone arrives. (She decides to create clothing from her own time, at least for now, so that her story will be more credible.)
3. Andrew's sister returns unexpectedly early.

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