taxonomites | 019 ± [location: langwe & gale's] [visual: for Tony] down to a science

After much deliberation, Aximili decided that the best design for his tunnel system would be a wheel around the city with spokes going in toward the center. That would provide tunnel access to as much of the city as possible. He has finished the "wheel" and is now working on a "spoke." He digs out an exit to the surface between the Northern Island and the workshop (not that he knows what they're called) and with a great deal of relief, demorphs from the foul Taxxon morph he has been using to dig. He wants to inspect the area aboveground to see where the next tunnel entrance on the "spoke" should be.

Aximili trots toward the nearest street, looking for a place with real residents; it had become clear to him that the majority of the humans who walked around the city were nothing more than automatons, perhaps unintelligent androids. He was trying to provide a tunnel system for the people who needed it. He looked and felt very out of place on a street. It must be perhaps the second or third time in his life that he has walked on a street in his Andalite form.

He is pleasantly surprised to see a sign for a mechanical workshop. Perhaps he can commission help for his tunnel project. Aximili opens the door and peers inside without crossing the threshold. «Hello. Is anyone available for assistance with a project?»

"Possibly!" a cheerful voice called from above. Glitch had wanderd up to the office to move some paperwork around (and refill his pocket with caramels from the candy stash) and was descending the stairs back to the main floor. "Depends on the scope and moral intent of-"

And then the headcase laid eyes on the Andalite and...well, see icon. Congrats, Ax, you're Glitch's first nonhumanoid alien.

"Oh my. Um." He made it down the last few steps and smiled uncertainly, wracking his half-a-brain for how to proceed. There was absolutely no default response for blue people with eyestalks, so he went into customer service mode. "Um, yes, hello. Come in?"

Ax registers the strange human's alarm (is that metal on his head?) and the size of the workshop (smaller than he likes) and says,

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Ax registers the strange human's alarm (is that metal on his head?) and the size of the workshop (smaller than he likes) and says, <I think it would be better if I morphed to human. Excuse me.> Then he shuts the door, not wanting to frighten the human further with the morphing process.

Within a minute, the door opens again, revealing a darker-skinned, androgynously pretty teenager dressed in a tight white T-shirt, shorts, and no shoes. "Better," he declares, stepping inside. "Bet. Ter."

"But-" Glitch began as the door closed, then sighed in frustration at himself. Good job, halfwit. Something- someone comes to him for help, and he goes and offends them. His mental self-flaggration came to an end when the door reopened, and he blinked.

"Better," he repeated, as it seemed to be the Done Thing, then shook his head. "No, no, I'm sorry, that was very rude of me." He crossed the shop area and gave Ax an apologetic smile. "I I used to be friends with a shapeshifter but he just turned into a terrier, and there was..." A girl, a vicious bitch but she was gone now and trying to remember her was painful.

"Basically I'd love to help if I can, Mister...um." Vague 'name, please' gesture goes here.

Edited 2010-07-20 14:39 (UTC)

"'Shapeshifter' is not the most accurate term," Ax says, somewhat admonishingly. "Its usage as a noun implies that the morphing power is inherent to my nature. However, I was not born able to morph." The words sound oddly formal coming from a teenager's mouth - not to him, of course. "It would be more accurate to say I am morph-capable. Capable. Bul." He enjoys that mouth-sound. So many explosive consonants.

"I am Prince Aximili-Esgarrouth-Isthill," he supplies. Upon gauging Glitch's reaction, he amends, "Prince Aximili will do. Or…" He hesitates, then says with a touch of uncertainty, "My human friends call me Ax."

Pardon Glitch while he looks around for a few more feet to stick in his mouth. Metaphorically speaking. Still, he does love gathering information, and nods along with the reasoning behind the label.

"Morph-capable it is, then," he says with a smile, and that really does roll off the tongue nicely.

The reaction to the formal name is a wide-eyed gawk before Glitch schooled his expression, stepped back, and swept into a full bow. Perceived presence of royalty mode: engaged. "Pardon my informality, sir, I am Master Ambrose Evedward Langwe, Lord Rigmarole, realm's engineer and chief adviser to Queen..." And that's where he always runs out of memory. "To...to the Queen." There's a pause as he straightens and offers a rueful smile. "Well. I was. Everybody just calls me Glitch now. Nice to meet you, Ax."

Hey, if friends call him that...

Ax listens in polite bewilderment. The only word he locks onto in Glitch's recitation is "engineer," a word he rather likes.

"An engineer is exactly what I need. In light of the recent systems failure in the city, I have decided to create a tunnel system beneath the city in case of another emergency. If there had been a tunnel system in the previous one, there would have been a safe way to transport material despite the extreme weather conditions. I have already started the project, but I have not installed ladders for the tunnel entrances, nor is there any reinforcement of the tunnels to prevent collapse."

He gestures stiffly toward the door; Ax's body language is still not quite human. "I have dug a tunnel entrance near here, if you would like to see for yourself."

Good job, Ax! The best way to deal with Glitch (especially when he's all tangent-y) is to give him one point to latch on to and focus on; he'll be much more useful now.

"Oh?" he said with a grin, interest piqued. "That's--huh, that's a brilliant idea. It's been a long time, b-but I think...the mauritanium mines back home, I came up with a way to shore them up while taking up minimal space, maybe the same design can work here."

He nodded at the offer of an inspection, took his travel toolkit (it had a flashlight) from its peg by the shop entrance, and held the door for Ax. "Lead the way!"

"What is mauritanium?" Ax muses as he steps through the door and heads north. He moves strangely, as if laser-guided; in fact, he is, since he has a nearly eidetic memory and an excellent sense of direction.

After a few minutes' walking, a tunnel mouth yawns ahead, wide enough to accommodate three adult humans at a time. It descends nearly vertically to the horizontal tunnel below. The walls of the tunnel are slimy and exude a foul smell.

"I have not yet installed a tunnel at this entrance. It is freshly dug, and therefore slippery," Ax apologizes. "The smell and the slipperiness will abate with time. I can go down first and assist you if you believe that will be safer."

"An element from my world," Glitch replied, quite happy that Ax seemed to know where he was going. It gave him brain-space to remember-- "It's one of the magical metalloids - magic's a a a fact of life where I'm from - and it was used as a...power-booster in a few of my inventions."

Damned if he could specifically name any of them at the moment. Not consequential, especially once they reached the tunnel entrance. Glitch's sensitive nose wrinkled as he grimaced, but he set the reaction aside, squared his shoulders, and nodded.

"It'd probably best if you go down first, then," he replied. "I'm kind of clumsy these days, s-so help would be appreciated."

"Magic?" Ax just boggles at him a little. The so-called vampires he observed earlier already stretched his credulity to the breaking point; his only reaction now is pure bewilderment. Even with direct proof of a multiverse (which had heretofore been only a popular speculation among Andalite physicists) it was hard to believe that one such universe contained magic. This attitude will probably seem contradictory to Glitch, since Ax can morph and is a blue four-eyed space centaur.

"Yes," he says, changing to a more comfortable topic, "I will go down first. First-tuh." He stops to contemplate which morph best suits the situation. "I will morph a chimpanzee. Zeeee. They are excellent climbers, and very strong. I will climb down the tunnel. You will throw down your toolkit, then you can jump, and I will catch you. I advise you to look away now, as most people find the morphing process disturbing to watch."

First he demorphs. A pair of Andalite legs bursts out of his chest. The knees in his human legs reverse direction, and he falls onto all fours. His spine shoots outward from the small of his back, the vertebrae bare and white, then becomes encased in flesh and fur (except for the blade.) His arms become thinner, and extra fingers sprout from his hands. Waves of blue fur wash over his body. Finally, the stalk eyes appear from the top of his head.

His next morph is slower, as he's only used it once and therefore lacks experience. It would seem logical for his morph to chimp to be almost a mirror of his demorph, since humans and chimps are similar, but morphing is never predictable. His fur changes first, from soft and blue to coarse brown-black. His face bulges out into a rubbery muzzle. His front legs migrate up and twist around his arms like spaghetti until the four limbs become two thick, muscular arms. His tail is retracted into his spine; the hooves on his hindlegs melt into the foot-hands of a chimpanzee.

Then he scampers down the tunnel entrance as if it were a climbing wall at a gym, not a treacherously slippery, nearly vertical slide. «Toolkit first, please. It is safe to jump. This morph is genetically almost identical to humans, but it is far stronger than a human. I will have no difficulty catching you.»

The screwdriver rose from the table and drifted across the workshop, landing neatly in DG's outstretched hand. She didn't have to look up from the machine that she was working on.

It was an air filter. She hoped that she'd never have to use it, but she'd learned that it was better to be safe than sorry in Taxon. She wanted to make sure that they had plenty of supplies and plenty of options if things went wrong again. (She remembered the city they'd found after their trek through the tunnels. The empty buildings and the bodies stacked in the streets surfaced in her dreams from time to time, whether she wanted them to not. Prophecy or memory, she didn't intended to take any risks.)

As she worked, DG hummed softly to herself, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

Edited 2010-07-20 15:01 (UTC)

Glitch, meanwhile, was working on a blueprint. A blueprint of what had yet to be decided, but he was certain a steam whistle needed to be involved somehow. His draftsmanship wasn't what it used to be, but it served its purpose.

He glanced up when the screwdriver began its flight, and grinned in delight when it reached its intended destination without incident. It was good to see DG becoming so comfortable using her magic, but couldn't resist a little teasing.

"Show-off."

DG turned her head when Glitch spoke, grinning at him. It was true. She was becoming more comfortable with her magic now. Of course, she had lots of gaps in her knowledge, but Piper and Tara had been invaluable and the fact that her powers would help her defeat the witch - when they got back to the O.Z - spurred her on.

"I'm just practicing."

"Nothing wrong with that," Glitch said with a shrug. "I mean, I know that if I could make things come to me with a wave of my hand, I'd be doing it all the time."

And his pockets would hold an even bigger magpie's collection of miscellaneous shinies.

"Your pockets aren't big enough to cope with that, Glitch," DG pointed out, with an affectionate laugh. She'd been thinking along the same lines. Glitch had many endearing features. His magpie-like tendencies happened to be one of them.

Edited 2010-07-22 21:41 (UTC)

"It'd make emptying them more interesting," Glitch remarked, almost absently, then laughed and shook his head. "O-or I could add more pockets."

"If you ever emptied them," she pointed out. She could easily imagine Glitch replacing everything he managed to remember to remove.

"I think I'm ready to try something new," DG added, turning the screwdriver over in her hands. She just wasn't sure what.

"Ha!" Glitch shot back. "That's to give you something to do when you're borrowing stuff." All part and parcel of DG having her choice of his wardrobe. Yes, even the coat.

He perked up at her next statement and tilted his head to study her, trying to figure out the context. "Oh? Magically or mechanically or..."

DG grinned at that. (It was the only reasonable response.) Most of his clothes were safe from her, although shirts and similar items disappeared from his wardrobe from time to time.

"Magically," she answered, still turning the screwdriver over and over. Not quite nervous but not quite sure, either.

"Oh," he said again, because magic almost instantly put him out of his depth. Still he smiled, got to his feet, and wandered over to crouch beside her. "Well, there is a lot you need to learn with that, but you've got good teachers with Tara and...and Piper." He nodded and touched her arm. "Anything you set your heart to, you can do, I know it."

"And I've got you to keep an eye on me," she pointed out, placing her hand over his. DG knew that she would have been lost without Tara and Piper's help. They'd been friends as well as teachers. But she wouldn't have minded seeing Tutor again.

"Ditto," he replied with a flick of his eyebrows. Arguably he needed supervision more than she did.

On the subject of magic, though: "I'm gonna ask Tony to come by later and see if the compound is going to work. I'm hoping the galindium will do the purifying on its own but...it might need some guidance. Magical guidance."

There was no point arguing with that. Really, they both had moments were they needed supervision. More or often than not, they simply had moments were they needed to know that somebody was there.

"Magical guidance?" she repeated, feeling, as she often did, both buoyed and alarmed by his faith in her. "Are you sure?"

"Not sure-sure, but the odds are pretty good," Glitch replied with a shrug and a hesitant smile. With his free hand he smoothed back a lock of her hair. "It'd be good practice for you."

At least he assumed it would. He didn't quite remember all the thins magic was used for back in the the O.Z., but this seemed plausible. (Not the exact circumstances, of course.)

"Then I'll take them."

After all, they'd both thrown themselves into things - their trip across the O.Z sprang instantly to mind, of course - with considerably worse odds.

Tony glances at the tablet, when it turns itself on, and smiles a bit when he sees Glitch show up on it. "Hey, Glitch." He shuffles some things around in the background, mostly miscellaneous books and notes, before he replies.

The news that Glitch might have figured something out excites him, so he's prepared to drop what he's doing and head over there. "I'll be there soon. Is there anything you want me to bring with me, or do you have it under control?"

Glitch nodded. "I'm pretty sure I've got everything, and and if I don't I can always hatch it as a business expense." Which is to say no expense since things for the shop didn't take away any credits.

"Yeah, and if something goes wrong, I can always hatch it for you. Anyway, see you soon."

Having said that, Tony moves off in the direction of his door, heading for Glitch's workshop. He arrives there in short order, having hurried to do so. This was important, and he didn't want to let even one second of the day slip by, if he couldn't avoid it. Once there, he looks around for any signs pointing to the actual workshop, and once he spots what appears to be the door, he opens it and walks in.

"Hey, Glitch, it's Tony."

"Hey!" Glitch called from the depths of the shop. "Come on back."

He was at his worktable, in the open space behind the shelves that made up the retail area of the shop. Half of the table top was occupied by what looked like a chemist's jumble sale, the other half clear aside from a notebook with scribbled equations and a container holding the compound.

He smiled like a proud parent. "Sorry it took so long to get back to you but...well, you know how things have been."

"You don't have to tell me twice," Tony calls back. "Whatever you figured out, it must be good." Tony hopes it is, anyway. He's not the type to put all of his eggs in one basket but sometimes, doing that is unavoidable.

He makes his way back to where Glitch is working, and immediately, takes in everything that lies before him: the table covered with just about everything under the typical chemist's sun, and a container containing something. It's the container that draws Tony's attention, but he keeps his excitement under wraps. If it doesn't work right, then no one can say he got too excited.

"Yeah, I know. It's been a real picnic, hasn't it?" Tony frowns momentarily before shaking it off. "So, I'm guessing you came up with something, and you want to test it."

019 ± [location: langwe & gale's] [visual: for Tony] down to a science

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[ location: Langwe and Gale's ] - hmm, we'll just pretend I'm not horribly late, shall we?