Language LOL: Translator Malfunction

[rumham]

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. ))

Comments

[westfallcorndog]

Jim pulls away from Harrow like he's something foul and the immediate response of his floating hand is to flip him off. Man, fuck you too! If that's how you feel about him after going to Tamr--

Wait, wait, hold up. The other Jim is miming archery, which can only mean one thing. THAT is the man he knows. Slightly embarrassed and sufficiently confused he stows away his middle finger and crosses his arms while the Jims converse.

"Jim... und Jim. Ja, okay. Okay." Evidently not okay judging by the sarcastic tone. He has to turn around and pinch the bridge of his nose as he thinks this over. Did he know there were two Jims? This feels like news to him. He's certain he's never seen him with a clone...

"Ah!" He shouts, suddenly wheeling around. He shakes a pointed finger at the two of them. He DOES know where he's seen two Jims! When the Jim he knows was split into two in the Nightmare! Light, the effects must not have worn off yet. What a predicament.

Harrowheart puts his cold fingertips on Bearded Jim's arm -- the one he bit, of course -- and delicately and sincerely apologises, "Ewiddan, Jim." A few seconds and he thinks to add, "Hähnchenflügel Jim."

Then he turns to the Jim he knows and, pinching his own stomach, says, "Dick Jim."

"Nicht Jim und Jim, okay? Hähnchenflügel und Dick."

[boldygoing]

Reassurances or not, Jim has rather vivid memories of how it felt to be a worgen's chewtoy, and the rude gesture isn't exactly doing the zombie dude any favors. That being said... yeah, okay, he doesn't look particularly bitey right now, just... baffled? Annoyed? Hard to tell.

"I'm sure he's a... perfectly friendly guy when he's not trying to eat people," Jim reluctantly agrees, though he still keeps a somewhat wary eye on him. It makes it all the harder not to flinch away when Harrowheart approaches and puts his hands on him again, looking like he's had some kind of epiphany. And then... what? Jim's German is bad, but he'd swear that that means chicken. Chicken something, anyway. That's confusing enough before he breaks out an unflattering name for the other captain, and Jim's eyebrows make a break for his hairline.

"Wow, rude."

[smartass_captain]

There's almost a smile at whatever 'chicken' thing Harrow is calling his younger companion. With the short fluffy hair and the beard, yeah he can sort of see it. But it goes out the window when Harrow gestures to his stomach and the to Jim.

Did...did this asshole just call him 'the fat one'? Forget about the whole 'dick' thing. Sure he doesn't go running goddamn marathons like the other one tends to but...And he was sticking up! For Harrowheart!

How fitting then that the only words Jim knows in German are the words most apt for this exact situation.

"Du Fickfehler." He seethes, shoulders tense as a rod. "Why do I even bother trying to be fucking nice to you? You've been a total asshole even before this shit with Felix!"

[westfallcorndog]

Harrowheart didn't expect this in the least. How? How did he not see this coming? Because he was only teasing, of course. He was only having fun. Just a joke between friends, something a little inappropriate to lighten the mood after everything that has happened and is happening.

The insult Jim just levied at him tumbles through Harrowheart's mind, bashing up his thoughts like a flail. A fucking mistake. He barely hears the foreign words Jim berates him in after that, but he does catch Felix's name. Is that what this is about? It is, isn't it? He's holding what Felix did against him and blowing up over a joke.

Harrowheart's hurt and confusion slip away to cold-eyed, tight-lipped glaring. His nostrils flare, and he points an accusatory finger at Jim. He hasn't got the wherewithal to translate his Common words that he presses through grit teeth. "Fuck you, Jim. You and Felix both, you couple of self-important goat-fuckers. It was a joke. A joke. For a laugh! You know? 'Hah-hah!' But if I hear you call me Fickfehler one more time, I tell you what, ain't anyone gonna be laughin'."

Over his shoulder the lights of his runeblade's eyes grow brighter still. A fight! Oh, it's absolutely thriving!

[boldygoing]

Until this very moment, it had not occurred to Jim that there might be more than the Nexus translators on the fritz. But with Harrowheart and the other captain practically toe-to-toe, their body languages screaming at each other, it's only a matter of time before somebody throws the first punch - or worse, if that evil-looking sword has anything to say about it.

"Whoa, whoa, hey!" Jim may be wary as fuck of Harrowheart still, but this isn't the first time he's jumped into the line of fire to keep the heat off his doppelganger. With this very zombie, in fact. There may not be much space between them, but he takes a step between them, making him impossible to ignore. "Do you two really want to find out the hard way if the anti-violence field is down too?"

[smartass_captain]

Ha ha? Excuse me?

In what world is humiliating Jim in front of his younger companion supposed to be a fun joke between friends? Jim's bristling, grinding his teeth and ready to step way too far into Harrowheart's personal space and say something even more venomous when his companion is between them suddenly and easing Jim back with a hand on his chest.

It nearly gets the brunt of Jim's verbal assault thrown toward the younger one instead but Jim checks his tongue at the last minute and takes the step back. Glowers at Harrowheart for a moment before very clearly turning away from the death knight.

"Forget about him, he's clearly not in the mood to be fucking civil."

[westfallcorndog]

The act of the younger Jim stepping between Harrowheart and the Jim he knows is enough to surprise Harrowheart out of his mood. He looks at the strange Jim with confusion, a mix of recognition and distance. He looks so much like the man he normally calls a friend, and yet there's something different in those eyes.

When the Jim he knows steps back Harrowheart snorts. Jim mumbles something Harrow doesn't understand and Harrow mutters back in Common, "Yeah, fuck you too, Jim..."

Oh. Right. Two Jims. He gestures vaguely to the bearded one and half-heartedly assures him, "Du bist okay."

And with that he's on his way. Let Jim spend time with himself if that's how he wants it.

[boldygoing]

Jim watches Harrowheart go, if only to make sure he's not about to come back at them both and make good on what sounded an awful lot like threats in whatever language that was supposed to be. "Why is that guy your friend again?" he asks, glancing over at the other captain with a steep frown.

[smartass_captain]

"Fuck if I know, some days."

Jim throws his hands in the air in clear frustration of the whole thing. He's seriously pissed off now and the adrenaline has him pacing even before Harrowheart is out of sight.

"We've fought some really bad shit together. He's saved my life and I've saved his. We've shared beers and just hung out before, but lately..."

Jim doesn't know.

[boldygoing]

Jim is not about to give out any advice on this, not really knowing or understanding their friendship beyond what he's seen and heard so far, not that his counterpart would be in any mind to hear it if he did. And so far, it's not exactly looking favorable for this Harrowheart guy. But there's gotta be something more to it than the werewolf being a total dick, otherwise the other captain wouldn't be giving him the time of day, let alone looking happy to see him.

"Can't say I'm sorry to see him fuck off right now either."

[smartass_captain]

"I really don't know why he's decided to be such a complete fuckwit recently. I haven't seen him all that much. Not since..."

Jim shakes his head.

"Not since we all trekked to Tamriel to get Harrowheart's runeblades back for him. The sword in his back. It's two blades that can join together."

[boldygoing]

Well, isn't that interesting? Jim eyes his frustrated companion, trying to get a read on whether or not this is one of those things he can ask about without being a nosy prying asshole. If it wasn't, the other wouldn't have mentioned it, right? Like Jim Kirk wouldn't want to know more about that kinda shit. "Somebody took 'em? Why?"

[smartass_captain]

"...They have a will of their own. Harrowheart fell outta favor with 'em somehow, and they went looking for a new owner. Someone who'd have a reason to use them."

There's still so much of this story Jim doesn't understand and never will. Things no one will tell him about the hows and whys. What Jim knows is that for whatever reason, they targeted Felix. Enticed him, empowered him when he needed to feel strong. They lied to him and were there for him when Jim wasn't. He failed Felix, and because of it...

"They're dangerous. They'll kill their wielder. Drain everything out of them. Their life, their soul...." Leave nothing but a pale lich, a puppet they can move at their leisure. Is that what's gotten into Harrowheart? Does he hate Jim now because the blades do? Have they stripped away more of his own willpower when they accepted him back? Already the guilt eats at Jim and he sighs bitterly.

"Don't ever touch them. I've already had to rescue someone close to me from their clutches."

[boldygoing]

Yeah, Jim doesn't understand what the deal is anyway, but it's hard to miss the signs that something awful must've happened to put that sort of look on the other's face. The swords kill the person using them? Maybe that's why this Harrowheart guy is undead. Or why he's such a dick.

Either way, hearing what it does, he nods immediately. "Right, noted, don't touch the swords." He's been dead once before, and he never wants to do it again, let alone anytime soon.