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Dottore hears a strange, melodic little trill coming from behind him. Looking away from the dormant ruin machine he'd been studying, his eyes fall upon Childe, who is disinterestedly kicking the stone floor beneath his feet. He looks bored; he's now pulled out a spare catalyst that he'd picked up along their way, no doubt assessing it for its viability in combat.
He is, however, not the only one with a curious eye.
There is a small blue creature floating just beside his head, leaning in over his shoulder as Childe brings the weapon closer to his face. Dottore sees the Eleventh’s Vision glow just before the catalyst is imbued with Hydro energy and begins to float out of his palm. This seems to fill the small creature next to him with greater curiosity - it makes drawn-out cooing noise as it scoots in a little closer, its incorporeal form almost vibrating as it watches the catalyst's ornate spinning rings. The magical properties of the weapon, however, must have been compromised long before Childe stumbled across it. Dottore can see it falter in place for a moment before suddenly letting out a spark of energy, falling back into Childe's palm listlessly. The creature lets out a squeak of surprise, quickly ducking back behind the Eleventh's shoulder. Childe just chuckles lightly, bringing his free hand up to try to coax the little thing back out as he continues studying the catalyst's potential.
Dottore clears his throat loudly to catch Childe's attention. As soon as he has, he crosses his arms over his chest and shoots the boy a disparaging look.
"And what exactly do we have here? " Dottore asks, tapping his foot against the ancient stone.
Childe looks at him blankly, seeming perplexed as to why he has earned the Second's annoyance. "Uh. A catalyst?"
"You- Not that, you simpleton!" Dottore snaps. He points an accusing finger at the creature still hiding behind Childe's shoulder, causing it to recede even further from view. "That! That thing! Where the hell did you pick that thing up?"
"Geez, just be more specific right off the bat… I thought you would have noticed by now." Childe taps a small glass orb hanging off his belt by a gold chain. "Remember when I told you I picked up this little trinket in the city while you were sleeping in?"
Dottore lets out a huff. "And I'm supposed to just immediately connect the dots from there? I'm fairly certain that knick-knack wasn't alive when you showed it to me this morning."
"If you had shown just a bit more interest in it from the beginning, you would already know everything there is to know," Childe sighs. "But if you want to hear the story now, I picked this up from a traveling merchant while I was out exploring outside of Sumeru City. We started chatting about his wares, and- Well, to make a long story short, this little fella suddenly popped out and seemed to take a shine to me! The merchant mentioned how he'd been having trouble making use of it for his purposes, and that it was also too meek to send off with a stranger, so he offered me a discount to take it off his hands. I didn't see any sense in passing up the opportunity."
Dottore narrows his eyes at the creature, which is still hiding cautiously behind the Eleventh's shoulder. He had initially thought it might be a little spirit of Childe's own doing, one of those little Hydro mimics that he so often conjured whenever the mood struck him. Now that he's gotten a better look at it though, he recognizes it as a seelie. Just a… very, very small one. That is a bit interesting in and of itself; juvenile seelies are a rare find. Though even if he could convince Childe to relinquish a bit of custody to him, Dottore suspects that any attempts to experiment on such a unique creature would not go over well with a certain other seelie he knew. He suppresses a shiver at the thought, turning his attention back to the rascally Eleventh.
"Can I not leave you alone for five minutes without you getting into some outlandish hijinks?" Dottore complains.
"It was way longer than five minutes," Childe retorts with a pout. "It's not that big of a deal, anyway. It's not bothering you."
"That's beside the point. You're not really going to keep that thing, are you?"
"Why wouldn't I?"
"Are you absolutely certain Columbina would be pleased to see you waltzing into the palace with that thing?"
"Uh… That's a good question, actually. Would she not?" This almost seemed enough to make Childe doubt the entire transaction, glancing back at the innocent little blob nervously. But after a moment, he just lets out an awkward chuckle. "Wouldn't it have been worse to just leave it somewhere it didn't feel safe, though? I don't know. But if it's happy, that may be the best thing for it. Uh... Regardless, maybe we just keep this between us for as long as possible. What she doesn't know won't hurt her."
Dottore rolls his eyes. "I'm not making any promises."
"Hey, that's too cruel. Give me a break here," Childe pleas lightly. The seelie makes a small cooing noise, and he reaches back up to offer his hand to it. "I really do think it'll be a lot happier out on the road though, as soon as it can come out of its shell."
Though the seelie seems to find security in cowering behind the young Harbinger, it suddenly shies away from Childe's hand as he brings it up. Childe sighs, retreating to give it some space.
"Although I'm not sure how easily it's going to be able to do that," Childe remarks pensively. "It seemed super peppy and friendly back with that merchant, but as soon as I got back into the city it hid away again. This is the first time I've been able to coax it back out, but it seems to have all but lost interest in me. I'm not sure what's wrong with it now."
Dottore turns away then, having long since lost interest in the exchange. "Well, be quiet while you're figuring it out. I'm not here to get wrapped up in your misadventures."
Childe mutters something that is surely derogatory in nature, but Dottore is content to let it slide off his back. For now, he can forgo his pride for the sake of digging into this ruin machine before him. It really is a marvelous specimen… They don't usually come this clean so deep in the rainforest, where rust is want to seep into their joints and circuits and leave them either entirely unsalvageable or battle-crazed and difficult to deal with. This one is sleeping dormant, but its outer components are shockingly well-preserved. He wonders if this one has wandered in from the Lost Nursery, or perhaps from even deeper within the Dahri Ruins themselves. It's a shame he has neither the time nor the resources to collect the unit as a whole, but he'll just have to make do by grabbing as many workable components as he can. With Childe along for the ride, he should be able to make a decent haul. First, he has to-
Dottore hears another little trill from behind him. This time, it's closer than it was before. Sure enough, as he turns his head, he comes face to face with the little blue seelie that had just been so timidly hiding behind Childe. Evidently, boldness had suddenly stricken it - it appears to be rather actively trying to see what Dottore is doing.
Dottore blinks at it vacantly, then fixes his attention on Childe. The Eleventh looks a bit wide-eyed with surprise, but his hand is currently pressed to his mouth, unmistakably withholding a snicker. Dottore glowers at him.
"Can you please keep this thing over with you?" Dottore asks in exasperation, swatting his hand behind him to shoo the seelie away. It flinches back, but not as much as Dottore would have expected. "It's very distracting."
"It just started floating over there on its own," Childe remarks in amusement. "And I can't really control it, you know. Just ignore it. I want to see what it does."
"Childe, I'm serious," Dottore argues, trying futilely once more to slap the creature away. Its previous fearful reservations, however, seem to have mysteriously vanished into thin air, and it merely floats a bit closer as Dottore's hand phases through its incorporeal body. The only thing the Doctor accomplishes is giving himself a dreadful chill as he makes contact with the eerie, spiritual substance that keeps it together.
"It's not hurting anything."
"I beg to differ. Just-"
Before Dottore can argue further, the seelie suddenly perks up as it finally gets a good gander at the automaton over Dottore's shoulder. Quick as a whip, it zips over to the machine on the ground, phasing completely inside its chest plate until it has gone completely out of sight.
"Oh, dammit!" Dottore explains, shooting a venomous glare back at Childe. "See what you did?!"
"Me? And what's it gonna do in there, anyway?" Childe shoots back defiantly, shrugging his shoulders. "I don't think those things can do much damage as they are now. I doubt it's going to start making a mess."
"As far as you know! This is why you can't just gallivant around the place doing whatever you please; making dubious deals with merchants, picking up stray seelies-"
"Dottore, look."
As Childe nods in the direction of the ruin machine, Dottore follows his gaze with an angry snap of his head. What he is met with, however, causes his ire to wane.
The seelie has popped back out of the ruin machine's chest plate partially, the white nucleus of energy at its center glowing brighter than it had been before. It squeaks at Dottore, regarding him almost… expectantly.
Dottore furrows his brow, suddenly curious. Without another word, he leans over and begins to remove the chest plate from the machine.
Upon removal of the piece, the seelie begins excitedly dancing around a component at the automaton's center - a chaos core, nearly perfectly preserved. As close to "brand new" as was possible for an impossible ancient mechanism, and still thrumming strongly with energy. With a core like that, the machine ought to have still been fully functional… Something must have gone awry with its processing or ambulatory functions, with that leading to its current state of inertia as opposed to a loss of energy, as was often the case with these machines. Fascinating.
Dottore looks back to the seelie with a raised brow. It's practically vibrating with excitement at this point, its own core glowing so strongly it nearly hurts to look at. That is… also fascinating. Sure, Dottore would have found this component on his own anyway, but the little creature had obviously intended to lead him straight to it. This is strange behavior for a seelie to exhibit. Why had it been so instantly drawn to the most valuable mechanism in the machine? Was it simply drawn to the energy it gave off? Or-
"Aw. It brought you to a treasure." Dottore nearly jumps out of his skin at the sound of Childe's voice, which is much closer than he would have thought it would be, and discovers that the Eleventh had sidled up beside him at a certain point to get a good look at his work. "I didn't think it would be able to do that. That's what the merchant said, anyway. That's why he was trying to sell it off as a companion."
"Hey, back up!" Dottore hisses, stepping back to put some space between them himself. "What are you even saying? Does this look like treasure to you?"
"No," Childe says plainly. "Not to me, anyway. But what does it look like to you? "
Dottore opens his mouth to argue, but the question leaves him speechless. He ponders that for a moment.
Well… maybe "treasure" is going a bit far. But it is the exact thing Dottore had been hoping to find.
He looks back at the seelie, still waiting by the core expectantly, and he finally moves to disconnect the piece from the machine. After carefully pulling it out and bringing it closer to his face to inspect it, the seelie suddenly lets out a delighted trill and zips up to float beside Dottore's head. Before he can intervene, the little blue creature's ghostly form brushes against his face contentedly, as if it's attempting to nuzzle his cheek. Dottore sputters awkwardly at the sensation, attempting to shrug the thing off, which is of course fruitless. Childe just laughs at the sight.
"Wow! It's really taken a shine to you, hasn't it?" Childe puts a hand on his hip, tilting his head to the side thoughtfully. "Huh. Maybe it wasn’t specifically me that the little guy got so excited about in the first place. You and I have been traveling together for some time now… maybe it just happened to pick up your scent on me as I was chatting with the merchant."
Dottore, utterly defenseless to the ghostly apparition's continued gestures of affection, merely shoots a tiresome glare at Childe. "Don't be an idiot. It's a specter of an ancient, mystical race of near-divine beings - not a goddamn bloodhound."
"No need to split hairs. All I'm saying is that it seems to be more suited to act as your companion than my own." Childe grins broadly then, unhooking the glass orb from his belt loop. "Since that's obviously the case, I suppose you should be taking care of this. I won't even ask you for what I paid for it; consider it a gift. I'm much happier knowing it can live the rest of its days serving a real purpose, anyway."
"Hey, wait!" Dottore cries out, but with his hands full both literally and figuratively, Childe moves too fast for him. The container is swiftly hooked onto one of his own belt loops, which seems to excite the seelie even further. It starts bouncing up and down in a circle around Dottore, melodic little chimes bubbling from it at every turn. "Oh, damn you! Who said I even wanted this thing, anyway?"
"Don't be so heartless. Look how happy the little guy is," Childe says, jutting out his lower lip. "Besides… don't you find it the least bit interesting? Who knows what else it could find for you?"
Dottore purses his lips, his eye catching the seelie yet again. It stops in front of him, as if feeling his gaze, letting out a quizzical squeak and tilting its body to the side.
It is all rather compelling, if Dottore were to tell the truth. It would almost be foolish not to test the capabilities of this thing further. That's supposed to be his duty as a scholar; to exhaust all possible outcomes of a scenario until the ideal conclusion is reached.
And it does have a… certain little charm to it.
The seelie tilts over even more, seems to somehow lose its balance - despite having no true physical form or equilibrium to speak of - and ends up twirling around in a circle before managing to right itself in the air. Once it shakes itself out, it continues to regard Dottore curiously and expectantly.
…Shit.
Dottore clears his throat loudly, stuffing the chaos core into his jacket and trying to compose himself.
"I suppose it would be worthwhile for the sake of our current mission to allow it to stay," Dottore announces officially. "From a purely practical and scientific standpoint, of course. It would be a shame to let such a specimen go completely undocumented."
"Uh huh," Childe drones, rolling his eyes. Dottore wants to snap back at him, but fears that he'll only dig himself in deeper. Then, Childe smiles warmly at the seelie, chuckling as it lets out a pleased little squeak. "It sure is a cute little fellow, isn't it?"
Dottore scoffs loudly at the statement. "As if that has any bearing."
"That… doesn't sound like you're denying it, though."
The little blue seelie merely watches as its new companion begins to berate the younger man for his insolence. It tilts itself to the side in bemusement once more - and it is, in fact, very cute for doing so.