The Contest: Day 6

Day 6 of the Contest, in which Lilly attends a seminar, and we engage in ~*worldbuilding*~

Got a question? Comment? Drop it here in the story, message me on twitter, or ask it on my curiouscat.




-~o~-

November 6th

"Good afternoon, everyone! First of all, I'd like to thank all of you for taking the time out of your busy schedules to come to this little seminar of ours."

There were murmurs of appreciation. Lilly thought the comment was a little bit silly, given what the seminar was about, and who the guest speaker was. The lecture hall was absolutely packed, and not just with grad students. Professors and doctors had come from all over the country to attend this seminar, and Lilly knew that there was at least one person here from the Netherlands, and at least two from the UK. Really, she wasn't entirely sure how Blanchepierre had managed to land this guest. They weren't even really the biggest or most influential university in Missouri - Wash U held that honor - and on the national scale they were practically insignificant.

"My name is Roberta Richwell, I'm the Dean of the Department of Biology and Biosciences here at Blanchepierre University, but you didn't come here to listen to me, so allow me to introduce our lecturer today. As you probably know, this person is a Fellow of the Grand Collective of Moonsingers, where they specialize in the research of Gifts, and the phenomenon that is coming to be known to us as Self-Realization, and they are here to share a bit of the Moonsingers' knowledge of these subjects with us. Please join me in welcoming, and forgive me if I mispronounce your name, Moonsinger Ngene!"

There was a round of polite applause as they took their place at the front of the lecture hall. Lilly leaned in excitedly. She had never met any of the Moonsingers, or even seen any of them in-person before, though she had seen pictures in the media, of course. Ngene had a neatly-trimmed beard, and was dressed in Moonsinger clothing - bright, colorful robes over a pair of loose, poofy trousers and sandals with leg-wrappings. That was one thing that Lilly found interesting about them - as basically the only peoples in the world who had never been influenced by European colonization, given that they weren't around for it, they were notable for, in general, being completely untouched by Western fashion standards, and in general not giving a toss about them. When they visited the rest of the world, they rarely chose to wear suits or T-shirts or dresses or jeans. They had their own clothes, and for the most part they didn't seem interested in eschewing them in order to better fit in to the modern world.

"Hello, everyone, hello!" said Ngene. They spoke English remarkably well, given that there was no way they could have possibly been exposed to a single word of it until four years ago. "Thank you, Roberta. Some of you may know that my folk don't really have last names, but we do have names that were given to us by our friends and family. When I was little, I was called Ngene kuhe i Katale o Tokealaiea, which means 'Ngene whose face is weird-looking'."

There was a bit of uncertain laughter, as if the crowd was unclear whether they had intended it to be funny or not. It wasn't really a fitting name. Personally, Lilly thought that Ngene was quite comely. They continued. "But when I finished puberty, my name became Ngene kuhe i Taea o re Oiki ke Haehe, which means 'Ngene whose voice flows like a river.' I like that name better, but I have grown to like the first one as well. You can call me either, or just Ngene, if you think the other two are a mouthful."

Another bit of laughter, more certain this time. That one was a better fit. They had a beautiful voice, deep and sultry, and Lilly liked their accent. Ngene smiled. "As Roberta said, I am here to talk to you today about all of the very weird things that have been happening to your bodies ever since the Blue Moon - the one that you call the Stranger - came back to the world. So! Let's get right into it. Let's start with the basics. I have watched closely the things that people say about Gifts and Self-Realization on the internet - which is a fantastic invention, by the way, I am jealous that we did not come up with it first - and I have seen lots of people saying things that are only half-true, or outright false. First, what is the difference between Gifts and Self-Realization? I have seen many people say that they are the same thing, but this is not true. They are, in fact, two entirely separate phenomenons. Phenomena. Apologies, the irregular words throw me off sometimes."

More stifled chuckles. The audience seemed to be enjoying these little self-effacing interjections. "There are a few key differences. First, and most importantly, Gifts are manifestations of bodily changes that are not possible within the bounds of normal human biology. For example..." Ngene rolled up their sleeve, revealing that their arm was covered from the wrist up in a pattern of angular lines, which were pale blue and glowing slightly. "My arm! There is no biological process which will naturally cause markings that glow and change color to appear on one's skin. It can only happen with magic."

Oh, hey, so that was the same Gift that Mari had. Her pattern was different, and it was in a different spot on her body, but it seemed like it worked the same way as Ngene's.

"Now, Gifts can cause changes to the body that can look similar to natural biological processes, but which function differently in subtle ways. For example, there is a rather common Gift that causes people to grow very, very tall, to a height of eight feet or more. That can happen naturally, sometimes people have pituitary issues than can cause such growth, but when you compare those cases to those who have grown very tall through the magic of a Gift, you notice a few differences. Gifts are never actively harmful. A person who has grown very tall because of a pituitary issue or other natural reasons will have heart problems, joint problems, all sorts of problems. A person who has grown to a great height with magic will have no medical troubles at all that are a direct result of their height."

Lilly wrote that one down on her notepad. That might explain why she had never had even a hint of back problems, despite the fact that her boobs were very, very heavy. It might also explain how her crazy milk production had never dehydrated her, even when she didn't drink as much water as she should have. But then, she wasn't even entirely sure that her boobs were her Gift in the first place, given that they were gigantic and milky before the Quake had even happened. That would be a good thing to ask Ngene, after the presentation. She hoped that they would take questions.

"Another important difference between Gifts and Self-Realization is that everyone has a Gift. It may be something as small as having an eye color that humans don't normally have, but Gifts are present in all of humanity, as well as some species of animals, such as elephants and chimpanzees. We are not unique in the natural world, in that sense, although it is notable that the overwhelming majority of creatures that display Gifts are mammals. There are a few theories among the Moonsingers as to why that is that I will go into later in the presentation.

"Self-Realization, on the other hand, is a process that does not affect every human being, and as far as we are aware, it does not happen to any animals, although it's especially hard to test that, as I'm sure you will understand once I explain how it works.

"Self-Realization is technically a type of sorcery, in that it is magic that is performed by a person to achieve a desired effect, but it is unique in that its performance is entirely unconscious. When a person has a very strong want or need for their body to be different than it is, they manipulate the magic that fills all of us to make their body change to match those desires or needs, without realizing that they are doing it."

That caused some murmurs and the scratching of pens among the audience. The world had mostly figured out the general rules of Self-Realization and how it worked, but the details that Ngene was filling in were new information.

"Now, these changes are much more constrained than Gifts. The process of self-realization will not allow a person to grow wings, or to have a marking like mine, or to grow flowers in their hair, which is another fairly common Gift. Self-Realization does not cause changes to the body that result in features that are outside the range of normal human phenotypes, but they will, however, allow a person to change in ways that would be impossible without the help of modern medicine or surgery. The most prominent example of this in the media today, of course, is how trans and nonbinary folks all over the world are finding that their primary and secondary sex characteristics are changing to better match their images of themselves, without any hormone treatment or surgery.

"The changes that Self-Realization brings about tend to happen in a span of time that is inversely proportional to the strength of the desires or needs that the person has for them. So, for example, a person who simply has a strong desire to have a beard and a flat chest would find these changes occurring much more slowly in themselves than a trans man who is suffering from severe gender dysphoria."

Hmm. Interesting. Lilly had already met Rose when the Quake happened, so she witnessed first-hand the ways that she had changed as a result of Self-Realization. She had mentioned to Lilly that she wished that HRT could have made her hips a little wider than they were... and then after the Quake her hips had gotten wider. She had mentioned that she hated having hair grow anywhere that wasn't the top of her head... and then after the Quake she'd stopped growing hair anywhere below her eyes. She had mentioned that, although she was very happy with the size of her chest, she wished that she could make them bigger without implants... And they had steadily been growing ever since the Quake. So everything that Ngene had said so far jived with her and Rose's personal experiences.

"So, that is the what of Gifts and Self-Realization, but what about the how? What is the exact mechanism by which these drastic and, in the case of Gifts, sometimes very strange changes happen to a person's body? Even the Moonsingers haven't figured that out completely, but we have made great strides towards this knowledge, especially since we came at it with a pre-existing body of scholarly work on magic and how it works, which is something that was lost down here. I'm sure that this is what you are all here for, so let's jump into it!"

This was definitely why Lilly was here, anyway. She readied her pencil. This was going to be juicy.