+Hey, you,+ he says brightly.

+Didja have a good time?+

+Mhmmmmmmmmmm. I fucking love Jellybean,+ he says happily.

+And here I thought you guys didn't pick favorites,+ Bella teases.

+We also don't follow rules when not following them is more fun. Jellybean is definitely my favourite candy,+ he says, laughing.

+Well, I'm glad you enjoyed yourself.+ Beat. +So, I want an aura. Do you want to help or should I ask around about borrowing somebody?+

+...I kind of do,+ he says. +Maybe. Let's talk. Where are you?+

+Just at home. On the couch.+

+Well, can I come be there?+

+Yeah, sure.+

Brilliance appears next to her and hugs her immediately.

"I don't want you to borrow somebody else," he says. "I wanna do it. But I wanna talk about it first. I just - don't know exactly what I want to say. Maybe I just want to snuggle about it," he half-jokes.

"We can snuggle about it," she says, snuggling up. "If we start and you don't like it, we can stop and I can borrow somebody," she adds.

"I am liking this snuggle," he says, snuggling back. "And that. That too."

"Have you done any enchanneling? I don't need, like, complete information about what you got up to upstairs, but maybe you'd rather try something little first?"

"I haven't done any enchanneling. And yeah, we should probably start with something little."

"Okay, I can break up the design I had in mind into smaller pieces." She squeezes his hand.

He smiles and leans his head on her shoulder.

"I'm glad I don't necessarily have to look into borrowing anybody. That could be weird. I guess I could go ask that person who helped Golden if necesary."

"Why, who helped Golden?"

"I didn't get her name, this was just in passing."

"Oh. But... she must've not gotten off on it, so if she helped you out she wouldn't get off on it then either, and you'd rather it worked like that if it's not gonna be me?" he guesses.

"Exactly. I mean, I'll borrow another Joker if I have to, but it wouldn't be my first choice."

"I think it'll be fine," he says. "I want it to be fine."

She rubs her thumb in circles on the back of his hand. "Why wouldn't it be fine if it weren't fine?"

"I dunno," he says, leaning on her. "It's not like I've never done it before - I mean, I've never done enchanting, but I've done stuff that hurt. With the Jokers. And it was nice. But it still seems different."

"Different how?"

Wryly, "Well, you're not a Joker?"

"Yeah, but, the problem here probably isn't that I fail to be six feet tall, right? What non-Joker features do I have that make it different?"

"You're not - one of me," he says. "I want to trust you because I like you and I love you and if I can't I'm kind of fucked anyways, and I think I can trust you because you've never done anything that really made me think I couldn't, but that's different from knowing I can trust you because I know exactly how you work because I work the same way."

"And I guess it doesn't help that I do work the same way as eleven other people, most of whom have their own Jokers and enchant through them."

"Yeah. Like, that's evidence, but my feelings don't have to care about the evidence."

Bella nods, and sighs.

Brilliance hugs her.

Hugs.

Snuggly hugs.

"You could show me what you're feeling about it," she reminds him after a silence. "Maybe then I could help."

"...Help like how?"

"I'm pretty good at picking apart what I'm feeling. And making it go away if I'm sure I don't want it."

"I don't think I work the way you work," says Brilliance.

"Yeah. There's that."

"And I don't think you can make what I'm feeling go away. And I don't think it would help if you tried."

"I didn't mean - directly or anything."

"Yeah. I know. Even just talking, though. I don't really want to try it."

"Okay."

Yes. Hug.

"You're sweet."

He smiles.

"Lemme know when we've snuggled about it enough," chuckles Bella softly.

Bella giggles. "I think I can cast while snuggling, if you want."

"I think that is the best way to enchant," he says, snuggling some more.

"To Planet Rainbowsand, then?"

"Yeah."

And it's... well, nice.

"Okay?" murmurs Bella, when the spell is cast.

"Yeah," he sighs, snuggling up a little.

"Say when you want the next bit. And if you ever stop wanting me to divide up the spells into little bits, too."

She's not planning to sleep tonight, and tomorrow's Saturday.

It takes a while - several hours - but Brilliance does in fact get around to saying, "You can do bigger bits now if you want."

"How much bigger?"

"A little bigger?"

That takes a little more subdividing trickery than just cutting spells in half a few times, but eventually she says, "Okay, I have something. Now?"

"Yeah."

Casting!

"It's really pretty," Brilliance comments between spells.

"Thanks!"

"I have way more planned than I expect to need for my aura, in case I'm off about how much I need for my aura. Do I seem aura-y to you yet?"

"Not in any way I can tell," he says. "But - I think you could do a big spell now, if you wanted."

"You sure?"

"Yeah."

Brilliance curls up close and makes happy sounds.

"Good?" she murmurs, hugging him.

"Very good," he beams. "Very very good. Fuck."

"Another one?" she laughs softly.

"Yeah!"

Another spell is cast.

"Do you maybe wanna take a break and have sex for a while," he says breathlessly when it's over.

"Sure," breathes Bella, squirming into a new position accordingly.

A break is taken.

"...Not much," says Brilliance.

"Little bit means we're about halfway there," she says. "There's no reason it has to be even mostly continuous if you want to go do something else, though."

"We could totally do the other half," he says. "Might have to take some more breaks in the middle."

"I could see my way to accommodating you," giggles Bella. She asks Lexi to tell Charlie that she won't be home till late, and not to wait up. And she composes another spell.

Brilliance snuggles up and sighs happily even before she casts it.

And onward!

And onward. Brilliance continues to like it. Breaks become more frequent. Those two facts are not in opposition.

Bella checks in on his status re: continued enchantment routinely, although increasingly briefly as the responses continue to be affirmative.

He likes the checking-in. The responses continue to be affirmative, but it's nice that she wants to know that.

She does want to know that! She doesn't want to - well, okay, at this point given all those faces and these lovely breaks, she does kind of want to hurt Brilliance, but she doesn't want to upset him.

Good! Because at this point he definitely wants her to hurt him, but he doesn't want to be upset.

"Cool," he says, hugging her. "I love you."

She kisses his forehead. "You're adorable."

"I am, it's true," he beams.

"And so humble," snorts Bella, snuggling up. "Does this feel like full strength to you - like the other Bells when they're not withdrawing or flaring? Half of them wear their auras out all the time."

"I dunno," he says, wrapping his arms around her and kissing her cheek. "I'm not usually seeing the other Bells from up this close."

"I could get up and wander off a bit," she says archly. "If that would help."

"Noooo," he says, hugging her some more. "Stay. Snuggle."

She stays. She snuggles. "You are terribly, terribly cute."

"Yep," he says. "Wanna enchant some more?"

"Yes." She kisses his cheek and whips up another good-sized spell and casts it.

Brilliance snuggles and hums and sighs and shows her how much he loves her.

They can totally take another break.

Brilliance snuggles Bella while she talks to her sister.

"Am I done yet? I think this is about the same magnitude of enchanting everyone else did before they plateaued," Bella wonders.

"I think I'm not done yet," says Brilliance.

Bella laughs. "You particularly fond of the sensation of enchanneling and want to burn off the rest of the design I invented for leeway, or you wanna do something else?"

"Good question," he says. "Let's do the rest!"

And then they can have a nice, long... break.

Fuuuuun stuff.

It involves a lot of Brilliance pushing love.

Bella approves most enthusiastically of this component.

Brilliance approves of her approval!

And then snuggles.

Of course. Part of this complete breakfast.

"I love you," he says, snuggling her. "I love you so much."

"You are adorable and I'm terribly fond of you," Bella replies.

"Awwwww," he giggles.

Nuzzles.

Snuggly nuzzles! Snuggly-kind-of-shivery nuzzles. Brill may be done channeling, but the channeling is not done with Brill.

"Ooh, burgers," he says. "Sure!"

Brilliance has a burger. Delightedly.

"They are awesome," he beams.

"And, I take it, still present," she laughs softly.

"Mmyep. Hey, I wonder if my repair function would get rid of them," he says idly.

"Do you want to try it?"

"Sure!"

They're already holding hands. "Restore," incants Bella.

"Is that unwelcome?"

"Mmmmaybe."

"I can think of at least three ways to fix it. Two of 'em involve me."

"Go on."

Bella laughs. "You want a list? I bet you can think of them all yourself."

"I want your list," says Brilliance.

"Miscellaneous self-injury. Standard issue agony beam. A certain incantation that isn't 'pants', if you're there now."

"I could be persuaded." This section of her village is stylized rope bridges between treehouses and towers. She comes to a stop inside one of the treehouses.

Does the treehouse have comfy places to sit and/or snuggle?

It does! Enormous beanbaglike poufs. Bella flops into one and holds out her arms invitingly.

Brilliance hugflops onto her.

Snuggly hugflops. "Comes in about a thousand flavors because it was designed for some folks rather attached to their variety," she says. "Got a preference?"

"Surprise me."

It's kind of weird selecting a type of pain rather than just a nice clean integer, but Aurora contemplates her options and goes with depressurization in a vacuum. Since she's not sure if he even needs air pressure to be comfy, this should be novel. She starts him up at one triangle. "How's that?"

"Weird!" says Brilliance. "But in a good way. More?"

Nudge-nudge-nudge. Ten triangles. "I'm going to be very timid about moving this unless I get actual numbers," she says. "I don't want to spook you."

"Timid's okay," he says, hugging her. "I like timid. Go for more?"

Nudge-nudge-nudge twenty.

Bella carries on nudging up in piecemeal increments of ten when prompted and snuggling her boyfriend.

"Yeah, stars are everything from ten thousand to just shy of a hundred thousand," says Bella. "It doesn't seem like a lot? Wow."

"It's nice," he says dreamily, putting the coin away and wrapping his arms around her again. "I like it. But it's, you know, middle of the road."

"It should not come as a surprise to me that Elspeth wasn't kidding when she judged the Joker Trauma Olympics, should it."

"Guess not," shrugs Brilliance. "I wanna have sex like this, do you wanna have sex?"

"Sure."

He grins and kisses her.

The agony beam requires no attention to maintain! How convenient.

Not literally, since there's that convenient coin storage feature.

They might have to go back and make more hexes to declaw them with, but yes. Yes she will.

"Right now, or you want it slower than that?"

"Slow-ish. I dunno, hundred at a time?"

"Okay." She pecks him on the cheek and starts hopping up in hundred-triangle increments toward evil range.

"You wanna hang out here or back off?" she asks.

Nnnnnf. She squirms up into a closer snuggle.

Bella makes a happy sighing whimpery noise.

Love. Love and kisses.

Kisses and happiness.

And sex?

She's game!

No, indeed. Brilliance is similarly occupied with more immediate concerns.

Looooovely.

That will be okay with Bella.

It'll be okay with Brilliance too!

"Mmm... down," he says. "A little at a time, but fast?"

Bella slides down in fifteen-triangle intervals, several per second. "Like this?"

"Yeah," he sighs, curling up and nestling his head on her shoulder and sending love.

She enjoys the loves and continues to slide down the positive integers.

"It's weird," Brilliance murmurs. "The agony beam, I mean. It's not really that much like Pants."

"It's not? Could just be a flavor thing."

"Maybe," he says. "Give me, like, half a star of some totally unrelated flavour?"

Bella contemplates her options, goes with heat (variety: radiant, as though baking) and hits him as requested.

"Nice," he breathes. "Ooh, I like that one. What's it like changing between flavours?"

"A little change or a big change?"

"Little one, first?"

Baking becomes boiling.

Boiling becomes sharpness (subvariety: that generated by e.g. a whip).

Aurora giggles. "Stella made up version one, I think there've been some additions since but yeah. It's all based on, like, actual possible injuries, why does that make it obvious it's designed by someone who doesn't like pain?"

"It's - it's abstracted," he says. "Like you're relying on the magic to cover the details and it's not doing that great a job."

"I guess that makes sense."

"I wonder if you even can use pants," he muses. "It's a little more - hands-on. The way some spells are, you know?"

"...Some of 'em are involved, yeah. I have no idea. Are we just calling it 'pants' now?"

"It's a cute name for it," he says. "It's funny. I like it."

"Okay then," chuckles Bella. "Well - I don't know how much my own lack of masochism would interfere with its use."

"You know what," he says, "let me down off this one and try it."

Bella tapers him down from where he's at. "Um, am I at much risk of accidentally overdoing it given that I don't know what I'm doing pantswise?"

"I don't know what the interface looks like exactly from that side, but it didn't seem like it took that long to figure it out," he says. "If I yell, stop?"

"When," he murmurs, smiling at her.

"Well, this is complicated and I don't know what to do with it," Bella murmurs. "...It's like a nerve map. Except plenty of it isn't located in your actual body."

"Yeah," he says. "This body's only part of me, remember? I've got other places that can hurt."

"Yeah." She swallows. She runs her fingers through his hair. "...I'm not clear on how this maps onto triangles. I think I'll start really small and we'll see what kinds of coins you can make off of it? Okay? ...And, uh, I don't think it comes in plain, any flavor requests?"

He shrugs. "Okay, that sounds good."

"No requests, huh. Uuuum." She decides on what she most commonly does when she feels like making a little coin on the spot. Biting. She doesn't know if that makes any sense applied to a non-location, but she's going to try it again, very, very gently, over in the nonlocations.

"That's not even a triangle," Brilliance reports.

Okay, a little less gently?

A triangle is not far off. When he gets one, he shows it to her and then tucks it away.

Bella kisses his forehead. "Okay, so that's one. How far up d'you want to go?"

"Star-ish is a good ceiling for now," he says. "Lots of room to get it wrong and still be okay."

Kisses. "How's it sweet?" she asks. "Sheer benign ineptitude?"

Brilliance laughs. "I don't know, maybe. Get better at it and we'll see."

She starts moving around in idle, drifty patterns, as though trailing her fingers through a pool of water to watch the ripples. She cycles through flavors as they occur to her. A dozen kinds of sharp.

"This takes way more concentration than the agony beam," murmurs Bella, hugging back.

"I'll bet," he laughs. "Mmmm."

"I have to actually have some idea what I'm doing. I have zero personal experience with most of the flavors on the agony beam." She settles on a single flavor (papercuts, writ large) and goes up and down his spine and then into the disembodied section again.

Papercuts up and down his spine produce quite the face.

Nnf. She will try that again.

"What about it in particular," she murmurs, not quite forming the sentence into a question. She draws her fingers through his hair again.

"Mmm... I dunno, it's - not exactly better, but it's sexier when it's on my body," he says. "And I like the way you move it, almost like you're using your hands, you know? It fels, I dunno, intimate." He smiles.

So not the flavor, not the particular location. "I think that was the general idea, was that it'd be intimate," she murmurs, smiling, and she slides from papercuts to burns, because she's bumped into hot stoves before, and she fingerpaints imaginary burning all over everywhere.

Well, she could guess, but it's more fun to experiment. She does have so many places to reach out and touch.

Well, when she finds the good ones, Brilliance will let her know. Emphatically.

That is good of him. Feedback is important! To help her improve!

If she plays her cards right, she might improve her way right into having to clean up this beanbag.

"You are just," murmurs Bella, laying her palm against his throat and filling it with thorns, "endlessly fascinating."

"I love you so fucking much," he breathes.

Bella kisses him, in reality and with fictitious frostbiting cold.