by Taj McCoy El
“That’s better,” Mayah said sternly She put a shaking Riker and an anxious Deanna down in front of Vergie. “Now say hello properly.”
Vergie rolled back onto her belly and extended her head towards Riker and gave him a small nod. Riker stopped being so nervous now that the cat seemed finished pranking him. Riker returned the nod.
“Riker, this is Vergie. Vergie this is Riker,” Mayah stated politely.
Vergie turned her head to Deanna and nodded once again. Deanna however sniffed Vergie’s nose and tentatively put a paw to Vergie’s nose. Vergie took a deep inhale, her nostrils flaring large enough that Mayah thought Deanna would almost get sucked into Vergie’s snout.
“Vergie this is Deanna. Deanna this is Vergie.”
Deanna chittered at Vergie and Vergie chuffed in response. Soon both Rötten were climbing all over the Vergax sniffing her ears and exploring the shadows under her frill. Mayah pulled out six rations, unwrapping them and placing them out on the ground.
“Gather around everyone. It’s time for our evening meal. Vergie…” The vergax tore her eyes from the food to peer at Mayah. “Riker and Deanna get first pick.” The rötten ran over and started sniffing the packages.”
Vergie mewled sadly.
“Calm down. It’s their first meal with us and because they’re new and I don’t know what they like to eat.” Mayah pulled a regular stiletto out and said, “Deanna, this is for dessert.”
Deanna chittered happily.
Vergie sniffed the stiletto and turned away in disinterest. Riker and Deanna each found a plate to their liking and Mayah placed the stiletto on the ground near Deanna’s meal. Mayah took three meat-based rations and put them in front of Vergie and took the salmon ration for herself.
Riker leaned in to eat his food. He came up with a mouthful, looked around and noticed everyone looking at him. Mayah hit him with a glance that had been culminated by generations upon generations of matronly ancestors and little girls who had held grand tea parties. It was the look that said, “don’t you dare.”
Riker quickly swallowed, pulled back and sat on his haunches.
“Guess we should say grace… I was never really good at grace, so I’ll just say grandpa Ugo’s favorite prayer.” She closed her eyes, clasped her hands, and began.
Thank you, God, for fathers and mothers. Thank you, Goddess, for sisters and brothers. Thank you, Creator, for one another. And thank you Most High, because you love us. Àṣẹ… Àṣẹ… Àṣẹ.”
“Okay let’s eat.” She clapped, and they all happily dug in.
✽✽✽
Leaning against the warm lazing cat pillow, Mayah began enchanting club lights so that the food coma wouldn’t completely overtake her. She had cracked two more rations, one for herself and one for Vergie. She mainly did it for the chocolate brownies. But even stuffed as she was, she had work to do.
Things to make better than a bowtie??? She was racking her brain as she enchanted. Well I need more weapons for the skaduweesps. And if they’re the basic level mob then we are going to have so much fun. Area attacks would be nice. Oooh what about a confetti bomb? That’s gonna take a lot of writing—Or engraving. But even low-level light damage might turn the tide?
She tapped her teeth with a nail. Effectiveness plus power…. Could I…?
A plan hatched, popping out of the darkness in her mind.
An Avenue of lights…hehe…hehehe… Yeah… But that means I need to generate more output. Rechargeable, and it has to have some type of barrier effect.
An idea flew up, and she pulled out her control box. She grabbed a few runes that would work for what she was thinking. She went through the firewood and pulled few random pieces out.
Now for materials… I need something long, strong, and flexible. Thread of Iron should work.
She pulled out the bobbin and began cutting off twenty-foot lengths and laid them out on the ground. She quickly realized she was going to need more thread and made a red Thread of Iron and a yellow Thread of Iron. She laid about 100 pieces of thread side by side in the grass and studied them.
“How am I going to braid all these?” she muttered.
She opened her design interface again and drew from scratch. First a circle a foot in diameter, then she made three small holes equidistant from each other then made a hole in the center. Then she planned the armature for spinning the circles around each other, and then the ring in which it would spin, and then groaned in frustration. abandoning the idea of making a cable braider with a huff she saved her incomplete drawing and got up to do it the old-fashioned way.
Keep it simple silly.
“Gah…!!! I really need some way to automate these things,” Mayah yelled in frustration. “Let me make this with reels and a stand and gears? Nah… because it’ll take me longer to build than it will to finish this.”
And she went to gather up a third of the strands and began twisting them into twine. She repeated the process twice more.
✽✽✽
After three rounds of catching chickens, the sacks they had were full to bursting and it was getting dark. the sun was setting behind them and Driskel’s farm was ahead of them on the next ridge. The twilight was casting long shadows, and they walked cautiously avoiding the holes in the ground.
“Eighty-seven chickens. Not a bad haul if I say so myself,” Mephi congratulated himself.
“beep- You’re not hauling anything skunky! so, settle down. -boop”
“Well, if you weren’t being such a trashbot you we would’ve help carry some of the load. This is your penance for being so cold hearted.”
“beep- Who says I have a heart? -boop”
“You’re right. So just be a good trashbot and carry the chickens.” Mephi was walking directly behind Ziggs and gave it a tiny push.
“You guys are crazy. But I’m glad we finally got the team solidified. …Knock on wood. Flarf where’s some wood when you need it?” Mo inquired.
“beep- you could just use your head. -boop”
“Yep sure could’ve used some wood.” Mo scratched his chin.
“Looks like we’ll be doing this again tomorrow. But with only 13 chickens left it should be a snap.”
“Knock on wood!” This time Mo said it with a bit more force.
“Superstitious much?”
“Very much. I have a feeling that tomorrow is gonna be a little harder than today. We didn’t even run into any chickens that seemed to have any elemental abilities. But there’s bound to be a few or Driskel wouldn’t have told us that story.”
“Hmm, would a fire elemental chicken lay boiled eggs, you think? Or would they be fried eggs in the shell?” Mephi licked his lips.
“Don’t know… don’t care.” Mo rolled his eyes.
“beep- somebody’s egg is already scrambled. -boop”
“Hush trashbot or I’ll share your intimate details.”
“beep- You wouldn’t! -boop” Ziggs flashed an embarrassed red.
“What intimate details?” Mo asked.
“It’s all about nunya,” Mephi hinted.
“Nunya, what’s that?”
“Nunya business, as long as Ziggs behaves.”
“That was such a dad joke. How old are you again?”
"I never told you in the first place. So I can’t tell you again.”
“beep- He was born a long time ago, in a galaxy—”
“Trash…Bot… I’m warning you.”
“beep- Okay, okay…-boop”
They walked up to Driskel’s door and knocked. The door swung open and Driskel stepped out.
“Well, how many did you catch?”
“Eighty-seven.”
Driskel’s face remained stony, and he asked, “Did you see any strange chickens?”
“Nothing strange by my account. Why?”
“Nothing, nothing…” Driskel looked out over the field. “You lot’ll be back tomorrow?”
“Yes sir” Mo said without thinking and withered under Driske
l’s harsh stare.
“Good I can only keep these birds cooped up for two days and two nights before they start getting peckish—and by peckish I mean cannibalistic. So if you don’t finish the quest by then I’ll have to let them all loose and you’ll have to start from the beginning again.”
“Understood sir.” Mo sucked his teeth at making the mistake again.
Driskel eyeballed Mo.
“Sorry just using the manners my mother taught me. They kinda stick with you.”
“That they do. Ah well no harm done if your just being respectful.”
“That I am, Driskel.”
“Okay, let’s get these birds in the coop and I’ll give you an official count.”
“beep- Can you help me with these bags? -boop”
“We’re almost there trashbot. You can make it.”
“beep- I got your ‘make it’ right here! -boop”
“Guys, guys…not in front of quest givers. Apologize.” Mo chastised his fellows.
“No need,” Driskel cut in while opening the farmyard gate. I raised seven children and there wasn’t a day that didn’t sound like that. Makes me miss my older ones. But just a little bit, if you know what I mean. Anyway, here we are. Just hand me one bag at a time.”
✽✽✽
Mayah had the three strands of twisted thread laid out on the ground. One black, one red, and one yellow. She cut loose the ends tied to the tree but let the loop they made stay there. She pushed each of the three strands through the loop and walked back pulling the strands so that all six ends were mostly even. She walked back to the loop and braided them into a six strand round braid. Very quickly she was tangled into her work and had to walk the strands to straighten them again.
After the first foot she attached a fabric tag to one of the braids and continued on straightening out strands and making sure each pass was tight before moving on. She added a small fabric tag roughly about every foot.
Sloppy braid work always comes undone.
Mayah had firsthand experience with that. There was a day where one of her braids had come undone. Unfortunately, it was right before the class photo, so that shame would live on in eternity on the living room picture wall. Mo would use it to blackmail her from time to time. Ever since then her cousins would ask her to do their braids because her braids were the tightest and lasted the longest.
After an hour and a lifetime of frustrations at kinks and stray threads the braided cord was ready. It was about nine feet long and very supple. She cut the branch holding it to the tree and looped one last fabric tag through the loop at the end.
Now for the fun part.
She drew the Light (W) rune on the last fabric tag and circled it. Then she drew the Place (Lt) rune on the loose tip of the fabric. She enchanted it, and then heard her favorite sound.
Ding!!!
You have Created
Name:
Braided Rope Light
Type:
Enchanted Light
Grade:
D
Enchantment #1:
Light (W) Creates a marble sized ball of water that casts a pale light 5 feet in any direction Cost 1MP per minute
Material:
Enchanted cotton thread and Ink
Weight:
1.4 lbs.
Damage:
3-4 light damage per second.
Durability:
20/20
Magnification:
x2
Attributes:
The light will create a lit area 10 feet in diameter. Any creatures weak against light magic in this area will take damage calculated by proximity.
Duration:
30 minutes.
Would you like to activate?
Y/N?
She threw it out and activated it. A ball of light glowed on the tip of the fabric and swung there to no spectacular purpose.
I hope this works. If not it was a lot of effort for nothing.
She hollowed out a piece of wood and carved it into a 1-foot long handle. She bored six holes along the top and six holes along the bottom, big enough to get one of the twisted cords through. She then pulled one of each of the cords into the handle from the outside and pulled them through the hollow body and out one of the holes in the bottom. After that she braided and knotted the cords. She engraved a thin line just above the bottom holes and just below the top holes. After that she inked all seven of the fabric tags with the Place (Lt) rune.
Last step. How many Light (W) runes can I use. The more the better. Forty-one plus my stamina? Well okay then let’s go with forty-two.
She opened up her design interface and analyzed the handle. After looking at it from every angle she saw the handle pop up in her screen.
Now to get it working.
“Wait a minute. I want this to be extra strong, right? Let’s do an elemental enchantment first.”
She re-donned her enchanters gear, pulled out four blank stilettos. She grabbed them with one hand and her project with the other. She began the enchantment while chanting, please don’t blow up. please don’t blow up, over and over again in her head.
The iron stilettos fought hard to remain whole but Mayah could feel them slowly moving over the handle and the cords. She smoothed it out making sure not to miss a space and kept it going until the knives crumbled into dust. She felt the click and let the enchantment go. It had taken nearly a thousand mana, and she was breathing hard.
“Whoo…that was fun. But the next part is what’s gonna separate the girls from the boys.”
She let her Mana refill as she drew forty-eight Light (W) runes on the handle, and then engraved them. In intricate detail. the iron enchanted wood was harder to engrave but she knew it was well worth it in the long run. She designed the runes to be in lines of eight. Each group was then circled and connected to both the top or the bottom ring around the holes for the cords. It took her awhile but then she was finished.
“Time to enchant this baby!!!” She clapped her hands together in anticipation and donned her enchanters gear.
She coiled up her project, put her hands on it then began the enchantment. The runes hungrily drank from her mana pool, and she dropped all but a quarter of her stamina into the enchantment to make sure she didn’t run out. She smoothed it over the whole of threads making sure it penetrated into every fiber and empty space. As the enchantment ended, she felt the click. And sat back in the grass.
Riker and Deanna looked at her wondering what she was doing.
“You guys wanna know what I’m doing? Here let me show you.”
She activated her new toy and was almost blinded. Seven balls of light the size of baseballs hung off the cord and radiated a cool watery light. Mayah spun it out over head like she was a fire dancer in a light show. She swung it around and around, and then suddenly threw it forward where it cracked the air. Riker and Deanna flinched.
“It’s my new light whip!!!” she cocked her head and tsked. “Though it would’ve been cooler if it was a line of light. Instead of balls. Maybe I can fix that?” she said shutting off the light.
“Ooh…darkness and bright spots. This is totally gonna ruin your night vision.”
Mayah got back to work making a strand of twelve pieces of thread of iron and twenty-one fabric tags. She pulled out the sturdy needle from her cobbler’s kit and began by sewing the strand first through the other six strands right above the handle and tying off her thread. She wound her way up sewing the fabric tags against the length of the braid every three inches. When she reached the first of the place (Lt) runes, she pierced straight through the middle of the rune making sure not to deface her rune work. She followed this pattern up to the tip, pierced the fabric, and sewed down again, making sure to go through every fabric tag again.
She finished up by making another round through each end of the six strands. She tied the knot off and cut the thread with her diagonal cutters.
She then marked the mana flow runes on each fabric tag. Each ta
g had the symbol twice. Once pointing to the tip and one pointing towards the base. She hoped that she had wired this circuit correctly because if not, that’s a lot of work to blow up in your face.
She coiled the whip enchanted it one last time and bringing the circuits to life. The enchantment clicked and Mayah did a happy dance.
“Now let’s light this sucker up!!!”
✽✽✽
“Eighty seven chickens on your first day. Oi have to say oi’m impressed. Treegan?”
“Yeah boss?”
“What was the record for a three-man team at Driskels on the first day?”
"I believe it was fif-tay-two.”
“Well, it looks loike you lot’ve set a new first day record. But don’t go slapping yourselves happy in congratulations yet. Those last chickens… Oy, oy… That’s gonna be a challenge even for your lot, being pally-dins and all included.”
“So, do you have any training for us tomorrow morning? I want to get out there fresh and fancy free if I can.”
“Oi didn’t have training for ya this morning’. Somehows, you managed to make it into a four hour fiasco of goiantine proportions. And then we sat around throwing refuse at you as if we didn’t have anything betters to do.”
"I thought you were going to train us up?”
We started, but then… YOU TOOK FOUR BLASTED HOURS TO GET DOWN THREE FLOIGHTS OF STAIRS!!!!”
“Okay, Okay I get it… Sheesh.”
“Your kinda slow on the uptake for a speedster.” Mephi chuckled.
“beep- Or, he might be fast for a slowster. Ha-ha -boop”
“There is that,” Mephi said pointing a finger at Ziggs.