Within the Apple Ch9B

Emily snuck a glance at Armsmaster, hiding her amusement as she registered his reaction to Magus’ words.

Even the implication that his equipment was in any way lacking in efficiency was enough to clearly set the man on edge, at least to those who knew him well enough, so she wasn’t disappointed to see the slight quiver in his jaw as the tendons in his neck stood out white against his skin.

She didn’t comment on it, however, there was no beneficial gains to be had by poking that particular beast. Not at the moment at least.

The boy, he couldn’t be more than twenty by her reckoning, had been working as he talked though, and the fluid motions he used spoke of someone well used to working with his hands. He’d gathered up the materials they had provided, from the slab of bronze to the small vials of gold and silver, and flicked a stick from somewhere on his person as he got to work.

Right down to the magic wand. He certainly stays loyal to a theme, doesn’t he? She thought with some amusement.

Most of that burned away in the next instant as she watched him casually reshape the materials with a few flicks of said wand, turning he raw bronze into a custom box that he fitted a cell phone into to check the size. Then he started etching into it with careful movements of the wand, leaving visible lettering in an alphabet she didn’t recognize.

“What is that?” She asked softly.

“Elder Futhark Runes,” Armsmaster responded, “At least in part. If it’s all accurate, he’s working with a full set, which I haven’t been able to find full records of. I believe that he’s mixing in rune sets from other sources, however, since some do not appear to be from the same origins.”

She grunted, but nodded as she looked at the magnified imagery they had of the work. There were no less than… three sets, if she were right. Distinctive stylistic differences were obvious on three, but she supposed that there could easily be more, just with more subtle differences.

“He does seem to stick to his gimmick, doesn’t he?” She murmured softly.

Armsmaster nodded curtly, “If this is a power related urge, I can see why he interpreted it as having magical origins.”

That got a look of surprise from her, as she wouldn’t have expected that level of insight to come from Armsmaster. The man was notoriously obtuse with anything interpersonal related.

Of course, this is Tinker related, so perhaps it is not such a surprise after all.

“Fair point,” She conceded.

Power related urges, especially in young Parahumans with little to no guidance, often dictated many changes in thinking. It was all but impossible to ignore what seemed to be self evident, after all, even if it were only self evident to oneself.

It was one of many reasons why the PRT did as much outreach as possible, trying to get young Parahumans into guidance programs like the Wards before they could have their thinking warped too badly by the expressions of their own powers overriding the objective reality for literally everyone else.

“What is your evaluation of his abilities?” She asked.

“Skilled, practiced… efficient,” Armsmaster admitted, sounding only slightly pained as he said so. “I am most curious about his… wand, however. Despite his words earlier, it appears to be a multifunction device capable of a great deal of fine level work.”

Armsmaster’s teeth were grating toward the end as he admitted that, and it wasn’t hard for Emily to work out why that might be. The young Tinker in there had apparently managed to build a compact, lightweight, multifunction tool with miniaturization technology at least on par with Armsmaster’s own… quite possible more capable, in fact, based on what she was seeing.

He was doing work that she knew Colin would require several large pieces of equipment to replicate, from an industrial milling machine to a high powered laser system.

And he was doing it… with a stick.

Colin got up, turning to leave.

“Colin,” She called warningly, making the man in armor pause.

“Director?”

“Don’t antagonize him.”

*****

Hannah found herself staring in fascination as the young Tinker worked.

If Tinker was in fact the correct term. She was no longer entirely certain, given how he appeared to be working the materials with only his wand as a visible tool.

If it were some sort of multi-tool, it was one of the most efficiently built ones she’d ever seen… and she worked with Armsmaster. To Hannah, that made her wonder if the wand wasn’t something else. The way he was manipulating the materials reminded her more of a shaker power than any form of technology, tinker shenanigans aside.

“There we go,” He said as he closed the bronze lid shut over the phone he’d placed inside, then casually waved his wand at it, a glowing thread of visible power surging into the device.

She took half a step back before leaning in again to see the gold and silver that had been plated into the inscriptions begin to glow from that energy.

“That’s it?”

“Let’s test it,” Xander shrugged, pulling out his Spell Phone and opening it with a casual flick. He quickly accessed the local internet, logging onto PHO and browsed around casually while Miss Militia watched in interest. “Seems to be working just fine.”

“A rather high level of effort for what appears to be a simple repeater unit,” A new voice startled them, causing Hannah’s stomach to clench as she winced. “Why did you not simply build your communications device to accommodate cellular network specifications?”

Damn it, Colin… please don’t drive away a potential ally.

Magus, however, only glanced over as Armsmaster walked toward them in his signature Powered Armor.

“My comm device is built to a very different spec,” Magus admitted simply. “trying to mate it directly to every single random minor network I run into would be a pain and reduce it’s effectiveness. It’s just easier to use relays, and avoids dealing with incompatible specs.”

Colin seemed to consider that before shaking his head, the motion exaggerated so that it could be seen even through his helmet. “The Cellular system is a worldwide standard specification.”

“I know.”

Colin seemed to want to argue that point further, but Hannah cut him off with long experience.

“I’m sure that Magus has his reasons,” She said smoothly, her tone one that she was long used to using to draw Colin up before he insulted someone. He paused before speaking, looking at her in confusion, but drew back without further comment, causing Hannah to sigh in not a little relief.

“A multitude of them,” Magus said with an easy smile. “The simplest being that I designed the original system quite some time ago and it works flawlessly, so I see no reason to rebuild it. A relay like this now interfaces with the original specifications of the system, and I can easily adapt it to any new network I come across without compromising the original specifications… which are far superior to anything else I’ve yet to run across.”

Colin considered than before nodding curtly, apparently approving.

“Understandable,” He said. “I am fascinated by your hand tool, however, would you allow me to inquire as to it’s specifications?”

“My… hand tool?” Magus asked, slowly grinning. “My wand, you mean.”

Colin grimaced, not nodded mechanically, as though he didn’t want to but forced himself to do so nonetheless. “Yes. Your… wand.”

Magus chuckled, “There’s not much there to share, if I’m honest. It’s of my own design, but based on designs that date back thousands of years. In this particular case, I use a superconducting carbon sheath surrounding a feather taken from a Phoenix.”

Colin visible blanked for a moment before speaking again, “A… Phoenix?”

“Mystrical elemental that takes the form of a large Raptor?”

“yes, I an familiar with the Mythical stories,” Colin said woodenly. “If you didn’t want to tell me about the construction of your device, I would have accepted the refusal. There was no need to make up a story…”

Magus barked in laughter, casually tossing the wand across the space. Colin caught it automatically, looking shocked by the action.

“You have a scanner?” Magus asked with a shrug. “Go ahead.”

With permission given, Hannah could only shake her head as Colin instantly crossed the room and slid the wand into the scanning receptacle of his own design. It only took moments for the scans to come back, and she found herself treated to Colin being visibly at a loss for words.

“It… appears to be a carbon sheath with a birds feather encased within,” Colin admitted, confused by the results of his own scans. “I confess to not understanding how this could do what we observed.”

“The wand isn’t a tool in the way you think,” Magus said, accepting it back when Armsmaster was finished with the scans. “It is a step up transformer, more or less. I use it to fine tune my magic.”

Colin sighed deeply, “Magic… yes… You do understand that powers are not magical, I hope?”

Hannah grimaced, covering her eyes.

Oh Colin.

*****