Hello, lovely readers! I had a few review suggesting I should give Killian's side of what the world must be like. I wrote this quickly while at the beach, so hopefully it's not terrible.
I lost track of which reviews I had responded to, some just stopped responding for a bit. However, I am reading them all and I absolutely love to see that I have new reviews or followers. It makes me all giddy inside.
Killian's Thoughts on the Modern World
Killian had been in the habit of keeping a daily log of his time on the seas and he found that even while on land, he couldn't quite break the habit.
Life in this realm is quite interesting. For its claims to be the Land Without Magic, there are many...advancements that could easily be mistaken for magic. Emma likes to tell me that it is all technology but even that does not seem a plausible explanation for everything.
Indoor plumbing he appreciated the most. The shower was the most amazing invention of them all. He preferred to call it an enclosed personal waterfall. 'Shower' simply did not convey the wonder of this modern marvel. Adjustable temperature, water pressure options, it was a small slice of heaven that these people just did not appreciate fully.
He hadn't known about the water pressure options until Emma asked him if he had 'played with the shower head'. At first he thought it was a euphemism of the sexual variety, but then she dragged him into the bathroom and turned on the water and began twisting a knob near the top of the shower head. His eyes lit up in amazement as the water pressure changed from a slow, gentle waterfall to one with more pressure, a fine mist to a concentrated jet. Don't play with it too much, she told him and threatened to chop off his other hand if he used all the hot water.
He wasn't so fond of the washer and dryer however. It did not seem safe to place ones garments in a machine that soaked them in water and twisted them around. And the accompanying machine that tossed garments around while blasting them hot air? Yeah, that wasn't magical at all. Emma had showed him that both machines came with different settings depending on what you were washing but it made no sense to him. While they were faster, he still preferred to use a board and bucket method, which proved to be quite difficult to find here. He had spent a decent chunk of money on these new items and he had no interest in letting those machines anywhere near them.
The microwave was one invention he had quickly mastered, only because it provided that delicious concoction they called popcorn and apparently Emma and Henry could not watch a movie without it. Henry told him it also heated meals and even cooked some things but Killian didn't understand why one wouldn't use the stove or oven instead? Those he adapted to the most quickly, seeing as it still used fire and if you can master cooking with fire on a ship, you can cook with fire anywhere.
The television, although he still preferred to call it a magical picture box, was quite the useful invention. While Emma and her lad used it to watch those movies they loved so much, he was most fascinated by a program called The News which came on multiple times a day and provided town information as well as the weather. A woman had a map of their town and temperatures appeared on it, then she was magically able to switch to a statewide map as well as one of the whole country. He still had a bit to learn geographically about this realm, but he knew a few trips to the library should resolve that issue. More impressed than being able to provide the temperature of the current day and days in advance, was that these weather people had the ability to tell him exact time of high and low tide. The first time he heard that he was so fascinated and unconvinced this was possible he immediately strode to the docks to see just how accurate these people on the magical picture box were.
Although Emma teased him relentlessly about it, he was convinced these weather people would make a mistake and went to the docks or shore as frequently as possible to confirm high tide and low tide happened at the time stated. Three weeks in and they hadn't been wrong yet, but Killian wasn't convinced. They'd slip up eventually.
I think Killian will have another cooking lesson with MM soon and I'm thinking about some bonding between Killian and David. Plus I think Emma and Killian are due for some more fluff soon, right?