"...random things, 'cause they don't control it."

"Do you have examples?"

"Usually the precogs stop them in time... uh... I mean, if they didn't do that, people would die a lot... I think a girl in my VR batch would've set things on fire? They tell you what you would've done, if you would've done something."

"Huh, that sounds like a good system."

"Before VR," puts in Brian, "people who wanted to be eclipsed, or couldn't find a psion to lock them down and didn't have a choice, had to go out away from civilization and not eat much so it'd be safe."

"'Wanted to be eclipsed'?"

"You can get locked down so your powers don't do anything if you don't wanna sit through VR and learn magic," says Jackson.

Right, because there are some people that would turn down magic.

If this line of inquiry continues sooner or later Daria's going at say something that actually offends the only people they've met in this universe.

"I'm sorry, should I save the questions for later?  I'm sure you you didn't sign up to pick up interdimensional hitchhikers when you picked your route."

"It's fine," says Brian. "We just won't necessarily know all the answers."

"I still feel like we're missing a lot of things you'd take for granted... Can you explain eclipsed like you would to a little kid?"

"Uhhh," says Brian.

"Um," says Jackson, "...so if you were like, eleven, I'd be saying, soon there's going to be a shadow over the entire moon, and when that happens, people your age sometimes get magic, it probably won't happen to you but just in case you need to not eat for two days leading up to the moon shadow, water is fine though, and that makes sure that if you do get magic everybody's safe, and if you get it you can decide if you want to go to virtuality for two years until it settles down, or if you want to get a psion to come lock the magic away so it can't hurt anyone and then you can go back to normal and decide if you want to get unlocked later."

"Oh, eclipsed, I see. That's... weird. Kind of cool, but weird. Sorry, Dar, looks like there's no magic for you."

"Is that not how necromancy happens, then?" says Brian.

"Mostly anyone can do a little, although some people are less powerful than others. The hard part is knowing what you're doing, there are a lot of small details you need to get right."

"Is it the same for everybody?" asks Jackson. "The details?"

"...yes?"

"Oh."

"Your magic doesn't have consistent rules? Seriously?"

"It has some, just not so you can do a thing exactly like someone else."

They find a new dimension and the magic system has not making sense built in. Uuuugh.

"So what're the rules? How do you figure out how to do things, if someone else can't teach you?"

"Psions can only do mind stuff and computers can count as minds. Mages do other stuff. Uh, you can't precog more precognition. You have to work on stuff longer to get it to be better and it takes most people about the same amount of time to figure out how it works for them."

"Computers count as minds? - Daria, has there been any research about how necromancy interacts with digital stuff at home?"

"A little, April Adams was working on it, the short redhead from London? But everyone thinks she's crazy, you don't get anything off them."

"I mean they count for psions. That's how we do VR," says Jackson.