rumham: (Huh?!)
rumham ([personal profile] rumham) wrote in [community profile] nexus_crossings2018-01-18 11:54 am
Entry tags:

Language LOL: Translator Malfunction

You know what's cool? Chatting with your pals. Reading the Internet. Navigating the roads because you can understand the Gods-damned street signs. You know what's not cool? Not being able to do any of that. By that metric, one might describe today in the Nexus decidedly uncool.

It's utterly without warning that the multiversal hub goes from automatic to manual translation. Shop signs, radio and television broadcasts, conversations on the streets between vendors and friends and businesspeople are suddenly a jarring cacophony of dissonant languages. Then there's the silence. Then there's the shouting. Turns out people get pissed off when nobody understands them!

Momentary chaos dies down as the average people of the Nexus come to grips with their new situation. Shopkeepers wait outside their stores and stands with expectant expressions, impatiently waiting for the translator to pull itself together and start working again.

Except...

It sort of doesn't.

No, it super doesn't.

Citizens of the Nexus, it would appear you're going to have to adjust...

((The temporary LANGUAGE LOL is now underway! It's freeform fun until you're done and participation is completely optional. Don't feel like this event should stop you from making threads which are unaffected by the LOL in the mean time. If you want your Language LOL'd character to interact with a non-LOL thread, please ask the OP if they want to play that dynamic first. For the OOC and organization post, GO HERE. ))
not_the_question: Hell Bent (eyebrows question)

[personal profile] not_the_question 2018-01-19 05:25 am (UTC)(link)
One of the problems of knowing over five billion languages is that when the TARDIS translation circuit (or the Nexus translation circuit, in this case) breaks down, it can take the Doctor awhile to notice.

Such was the case today. He didn't understand why people were in a mass state of confusion and figured they were panicking over nothing.

The problem is, usually these days, he spoke Queen's English. If only because that was what most of his companions spoke and why use the translation circuit when he didn't have to? But today was different.

Since he had Missy in the vault, he had gotten used to slipping into Gallifreyan every now and then. Which, isn't normally a problem when translation circuits are working, but when they're not, well.

As the Doctor speaks, it might sound more like he's singing. It's more like middle-English chant than Gregorian Chant. But it's clearly not anything that anyone else can translate. Oops.

He might eventually realise what's happening, but it might take him awhile too. Curse his intelligence.

Edited 2018-01-19 05:28 (UTC)