The Mechanic and the Sniper.

“See ya in a minute.” Rave waved goodbye before vanishing in the old Arcade, leaving John to take the short march around the building. He never really paid that much attention to the outside walls but now that he actually checked the wooden walls of the arcade. Now that he looked closely he saw carvings that were very shallow and had a slight magical glow to them. Like, really, if he looked closely enough he saw a slight pulsation of blueish-purplish light. They could have easily been mistaken as normal wood texture.

‘Wonder what that is for….I should probably ask Travolta.’ John though as he arrived at the backside of the arcade. He saw what fit the description of a shed, three wooden walls build unto the main building with a roof of a corrugated iron sheet. At least he was fairly certain that it was iron by the huge amount of rust, but who knew in the Abyss, right?

The shed contained, besides a metal staircase, nothing besides what appeared to be an arcane fuse box. Cables, material and immaterial, curved into the metal square. Most of them came from the walls like normal cables but the few immaterial ones just started somewhere in the air. In all likelihood, he could find the answer to the question how this place had electricity and internet right there. It wasn’t important right now though.

John followed the stairs and was lead in front of a crude wooden door. He heard two voices from the other side. One he was certain to be Jimmie and the other he had heard just yesterday. He knocked two times and, when there was no reaction, he carefully opened the door. “Hello?” He greeted the two people inside.

Jimmie and Victoria turned their heads. “Oh, hey John!” Jimmie greeted enthusiastically in a very out-of-character way. “Greetings, Gamer.” Victoria said with a tone that betrayed no emotions whatsoever. The mechanic and the sniper stood next to each other, a picture that was somewhat fitting John had to admit, one being oil-stained and with his tool-loaded trousers and the other in her rocker jacket and the band shirt, both amidst a rubble of metal parts and workshop tools. John still wanted to claim that Victory card though.

‘Why do I think of such bad joked while I am around her?’ John thought as he came closer. “You are just in time, I wanted to show this to you too!” “Show what to me?” John asked the worked-up mechanic and blinked repeatedly in confusion. “My suit!” “Wait, what are you going to prom or…?” John was still just as confused when Jimmie pulled a remote from his pants and pressed a button.

A pile of metal parts started shaking, rattling as a plate underneath started rising. A cubic steel case rose from the floor until it stood out a metre from the otherwise even floor. Then it opened. Smoothly the plate at the top parted at the middle and slid to the side, revealing a suit of armour with a very modern design to it. Indeed, it did look less like armour, more like a man of metal.

“You are building an Iron Man suit?” John marvelled, although the paint-job was missing the resemblance was there. “Yeah!” Jimmie exclaimed, causing John to almost nerd out. “Does that even work?” Victoria was stoic about the whole situation, putting a damper on the whole situation. “Only a bit…” Jimmie quietly admitted and grabbed a gauntlet. “I don’t have the materials to make this stuff do more than some minor energy discharges.” He put the thing on, which took more than a bit of fidgeting, and pointed his palm at some wood a metre away. There was some light, there was some smoke.

“Ehh…” John made, that was even worse than his Mana Power Attack and couldn’t even hold a candle to Rave’s Solarbeam (Name Pending). “Screw you, man!” Jimmie grumbled, back in his usual persona, “Not all of us have superpowers and can create Artificial Life from nowhere!” “Uhm, Jimmie, like, could you not?” He tried his best at being subtle while side glancing at Victoria. He had kept Aclysia a secret so far and would like to keep it that way. “Don’t mind me.” The Gunwoman said, “I have joined your little club so I will find out sooner or later.”

“You did? Well, that explains why you are even here but, uhm, you didn’t sound particularly like you were keen on being associated with the Bloodfallen and all that.” John carefully probed. “I said that I didn’t want to get on their bad side.” Victoria responded, “This puts me on their good side. I hope.”

“Joooooooohn!” A shout followed by the sound of two feet hitting on the ground as Rave jumped down the stairs down through the door John had left open. “Whadareya taking so long for? Oh, hey!” The technolovers, today in a light-blue shirt and jeans, eyes fell on Victoria and greeted. “You would be…?” “Victoria Beloozero, I joined today.” “Did ya? Welcome then, they call me Rave.” She shrugged the affair off without a lot of care and walked over to John. After taking his arm she gave Victoria a quick look-over. “With that outfit, we are doomed to be mortal enemies.” Rave finally said, leaving everyone confused to varying degrees. “Ya know, Metal vs Techno, the eternal rivalry!” She said in response to the questioning eyes of Victoria.

“Rave you are spouting the usual nonsense.” Jimmie said. “And ya are building the usual nonsense.” She countered, “Let me guess, they didn’t like your science fair project?” “Hey, it might not be powerful but it’s still Archano-Tech!” “Whatevs.” Rave cut that discussion. Victoria seemed very interested out of a sudden. “Archano-Tech? I heard that takes a lot of skill to handle.” Jimmie adjusted his cap with a happy smile. “Does indeed, a small mistake and BOOM!” He made a dramatic motion. “The whole workshop explodes.”

“We already had the building reinforced so he only blows himself up.” Rave whispered to calm down John. “Thank god, here it thought I had been sitting over a bomb for the last two weeks.” “Ey! I have been working with this thing for a couple of years now, nothing ever happened!” Jimmie complained, “Besides if it explodes you lot can just leave the Protected Space and be fine.” “Yeah, yeah, okay, Jimmie, I admit that you are pretty good at the whole Archano-Tech thingy, stroke your ego with it!” Rave admitted and, after Jimmie straightened his back and stood proudly for a moment, moved to cut him down again, “Then you can go right back to stroking your dick because ya have no girl who does it for you.”

Jimmie opened his mouth and closed it, “For heaven’s sake, Rave, will you let me have anything?” “Ya are still better than me in Smash Bros.” “Not worth that much!” “Neither is your robot, yet here you are.” “Enough!” Victoria intervened while massaging her temples. “Do these two always argue like this?” “You get used to it.” John sighed. “Now that I have a moment of silence, Jimmie can I borrow some clothes from you? I want to go farm some stuff.”

Jimmie smirked at him, only now noticing his get-up. “Skipping school, huh? Yeah, take some stuff but you owe me!” “I sure do. Thanks for all the metal again.” “No problem, how big is she now by the way?” “Aclysia reached over two-metres yesterday.” Rave giggled, “It was fun.” “We found out she could shrink afterwards, so she is pretty small in my inventory right now.” John elaborated as he walked over to what seemed to be a closet.

He took a normal black shirt and jeans that seemed to fit. Using his inventory, he just swapped his current clothes with the new ones. “Really? Show me.” John hesitated for a moment but then gave in. Victoria had already joined with them so there was no reason to be that secretive about it.

He pulled Aclysia from his inventory and put her on the ground. “Hey, can you become big again?” John asked. “Yes, Creator John.” It took about a minute for her to grow from the height of his kneecap until she was a bit taller than him. “This is the height I reduced to first yesterday. Is this satisfactory or do you want….” “No, no, this is fine.” “…to go to my maximum size, Creator John?” Aclysia didn’t react to his interruption until she was done with her original sentence. “I will remain like this then.”

‘She didn’t answer until her response was done completely. Maybe her ‘brain’ isn’t developed beyond a basic action-reaction pattern yet. Or it’s her lack of social understanding. Or both.’ John thought. “Mhm, when I have you out already I should raise your Stats.” He said, “That sounds fun!” Rave said, Jimmie nodded and Victoria looked with a cool curiousity.