NameIess

"Hey Wynn, get that doctor over here. I think TAAron needs her."

Nameless started to shove himself upright to catch TAAron, but collapsed back to the ground as a sudden bought of nausea overcame him. "TAAron? You alright?"

Untintelligible glanced around. "Hm. must've wandered off. I'm sure he'll be back in time for the attack."

"Think she's good enough to help you? It might be possible."

598. Never under any circumstances are you to think "this mission/battle/fight/legal case/any other kind of thing you're doing, is going too well/is going to be easy/any other variation of that sentiment." Saying it out loud is even worse, and basically guarantees that something's going to go wrong.

"Oh. In that case, She's probably perfect. After all, if she's never lost a patient, she must be skilled."

"Well, you can tell him not to worry. It's only one sort-of Narrator, and we've got a whole bunch of people lined up to help. This'll be easy."

"Uh, yeah. I'm still hurt. And what do you mean weird?"

"Ah. That's good. So you'll be ready for the attack?"

"The One Power? That could be useful, I suppose. What else can you do?"

My guess is that 16's a pulser going to the future: I'm guessing he realized Lasting Integrity would be a safe place to go to the future in, and he burns sixteen days of Cadmium in between walks to make sure nothing's changed, and maybe to get exercise too. Might be a bendalloy ferring too, considering the not needing food part, and with hemalurgy he could even have duraluminum too. I don't think he's anyone we've seen before, and would guess that he won't turn out to be all that important, just an easter egg to people like us. (If this backfires when KoW comes out, feel free to mercilessly mock me).

Unintelligible looked skeptical. "You sure you can help us?"

"Ah. That's bad. It would explain why balefire didn't work though. Do you have any idea what his powers work, maybe some weaknesses he might have?"

Eof nodded. "In that case, we should go inside before the children get too impatient. They've been waiting for your visit all week." "Sounds good. You sure we should kill her? From what I've learned about the situation, she's just doing her best to survive. Maybe we should just take her captive instead."

Nameless gave TAAron an odd look. "Am I hallucinating again, or are you talking to your spren?"

Unintelligible nodded hesitantly. "I haven't mastered my 'glowy powers' yet, but I think I might be able to get them to work if we have no other options."

Wax thought it was aluminum. And he did figure it out later, just before he died if memory serves.

"I don't know. It can't destroy everything, although I've never heard of a living being able to survive. Whoever this manipulator is, he's more powerful than I thought."

Unintelligible reappeared, looking much less glowy than he had earlier. "So, Everyone. When're we going to go kill that woman? Are we waiting on anyone?"

Nameless was silent for a moment, thinking. "I'm not sure how to best describe it. Balefire erases threads from the Pattern. Obviously, that means it erases people and destroys any object or weave that it touches, but that's not all it does. When it removes threads from the Pattern, it doesn't just 'cut' them, like killing someone or destroying something normally would. It burns the thread backwards, getting rid of it back in time, so to speak. That can have some... dangerous consequences. On a small scale, it can be positive. For example, I'm pretty sure that guy stabbed me right before I hit him with balefire. I hit him with it, and so his actions from just before he got hit never happened. On a large scale... the more powerful the balefire, the further back in time it burns the threads. Use too much, and you could destabilize or even destroy an entire dimension. In my world, when balefire was first discovered, it was used recklessly. Entire cities were destroyed with it before we realized what the consequences could be. They almost broke the Pattern itself. After that, well, use of balefire isn't exactly encouraged." Nameless grimaced. "I've not exactly been careful with balefire in the past, but it's especially dangerous to use when travelling dimensions. Not all universes are as stable as my homeworld or the clinic." "That would work. Do you think there's any doctors out there to get the signal?"

Nameless shrugged. "Have any other ideas?"

"Of course concussions heal. It just takes a bit. And no, I don't think there's any way to safely use the One Power in my current state. Even if I succeeded, I'd probably lose control and kill myself trying to make a portal to another dimension." Nameless sighed, lying back down. "I'll probably be recovered enough in a day or two."

"So basically we need to wait until I'm healed up enough to use the One Power?"

Nameless sighed. "All right. So you have a doctor somewhere that can heal me?"

Nameless shook his head, then winced. "I told you, I'll be fine. I've had concussions before."