What Some Take For Magic At First Glance [Opentastic]

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

Howard has avoided The Warehouse entirely for the last few days. Something about wandering around in it alone seems like a profoundly unsettling prospect. Even when he returns to it, he decides it's a better idea to work out in the front yard than actually lounge around the living room.

Today's project is a roller fridge. Having found three sets of identical rollerblades (for someone with six legs? Or just three right feet?), Howard's set to dismantling them and fixing them to a mini-refrigerator he found in an unclaimed house down the tracks. He eventually plans on recalibrating the fridge into a freezer and attaching a handle to drag it to and from Hydroponics, but actually putting wheels on it seems to be the most difficult task so far.

After several failed attempts to use a candle-lighter to weld some sort of axle on, Howard gets a drill and an extension cord out. The sound of the drill upsets the cat, whom he's zipped into an old backpack, bar her head. He doesn't want her to run off onto the tracks, after all, or leave her alone in the house, and despite all the random junk he's accumulated, he hasn't yet found a small leash or collar.

She growls at him and struggles to free herself, but he routinely calms her down with cat treats and a sock full of catnip when the noise scares her too much. To keep her attention, he slips one of the cat treats up his sleeve and out of sight. That's just sleight of hand.

The fridge, on the other hand, may require more creativity. He sits with the backpack full of cat on his lap, chewing on a hangnail, trying to figure out how exactly he's going to give it wheels that can swivel.

Comments

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Top. Makes it easier to scoop ice cream out that way."

Howard nods. "Same. All the electricity got blown a few months in where I'm from. Did they even have electricity back on your world?" He guesses probably not, but you never know.

[governorkang]

Kang nodded. That made sense.

"We didn't even have printing presses," he snorted, smiling. "Picture something more medieval, but with magic and multiple races, humans included."

Basically, like a fantasy novel. He was reminded of Councilor Kanner, and how he'd known of draconians.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"I'm picturing Lord of the Rings. You got elves and dwarves and stuff?"

He walks around to the backyard and grabs a broken-down rolling desk. Probably better to destroy one desk than multiple chairs. He comes back and turns it over, revealing swivel wheels. "Are these casters?"

[governorkang]

"No rings of power, or orcs, but yes, there are elves and dwarves. Used to share a valley with the latter." Kang'd never been all that fond of elves, though. The feeling was mutual.

He grinned, "They are. I think we're set, once those are removed."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Yeah? What're they like? They always seemed super snotty from the movies and books, at least, the ones we have in my world." Although Tolkien never mentioned draconians, as far as Howard knows, but it's his closest comparison.

Howard pulls a screwdriver from his pocket and after a small struggle with the desk, removes one of the casters. "Let's try it with one before we ruin the whole desk. Three wheels is still workable. Two or none isn't. You wanna set it on fire, big guy?"

[governorkang]

"What, the elves or the dwarves? Haven't had too many personal experiences with elves that didn't involve them shooting arrows at my men and I," Kang said dryly. "Everything I've heard, they tend to think they're better than everyone else. Dwarves do too, to a degree, but they at least know how to have some fun. Don't ever try to outdrink one."

He paused, digging through memories, "We need protective gear of some kind, I know that. Gloves, goggles, a leather apron."

Maybe this wasn't such a good idea, to try and figure it out on his own.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Wow, so exactly like our books."

"Hold on one minute." Howard runs into the Warehouse, checks Albert's ledger, and returns with protective gloves, large Hollywood-style sunglasses and what looks like a doctor's labcoat. "I can't find goggles big enough for your head, man."

[governorkang]

Kang shook his head, "Not exactly, but some things seem to be constant."

He eyed the labcoat and the sunglasses, and flared his wings slightly. "I doubt the coat will fit me." He paused, an idea coming to him, and glanced around, then checked a pouch hanging on his belt. It was pure luck he'd brought the one component with him.

"Do you have anything made of granite lying around? And a fire extinguisher, for just in case."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"There's probably some world where dwarves are ten feet tall. Just to be contrary."

Howard slips the coat on. "Dude, no. That's for me. And I have so many fire extinguishers." It's one of the first things he takes from every unclaimed building. Hopefully there's never a fire. That would be highly unfortunate.

"I don't know what all the different rocks are, but there's a part of the backyard that I made a firebreak in as practice."

[governorkang]

Kang laughed, and settled his wings, "It's entirely possible. Show me where; I need some granite so I can give myself some protection."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

Howard leads Kang around back, where he has indeed built a firebreak next to an outcropping of rocks. It doesn't appear that he's used the area for anything yet, though. "Is the granite for like, some kind of magic thing you do? And are those granite?"

[governorkang]

"Some kind," Kang said, amused. He knelt down to take a closer look, and picked up a smallish rock. "This piece is. Should be enough."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Right on. Work your voodoo," Howard says, putting a pair of the sunglasses on and wrapping his arms protectively around the cat. "Try not to blow up my house. That would kind of ruin the benefits of the experiment."

[governorkang]

Kang took out a little bag of what looked like glittery dust, and moved a wing forward, positioning it in a way that he could sprinkle some of the dust on it and have none fall to the ground. Then, he chanted a few words in another language; the dust and the granite rock disappeared.

"That should do it. Keep a fire extinguisher ready." Now he just needed to play with the torch.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

Howard grabs a fire extinguisher, hunkering a bit behind one of the rocks. He very nearly asks himself if a roller fridge is worth it.

The answer is, obviously.

"Go for it."

[governorkang]

Moving anything even possibly flammable out of the way, even his clothes (the spell only affected his person, not anything on it), Kang messed with the settings. It only took about thirty seconds of flames for him to realize he needed something for his eyes, and he reached a hand out towards Howard, "Hand me the other pair of glasses so I can see what the hell I'm doing."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

Howard does, using his free hand to cover up Emergency Rations' face. Maybe they should have thought of that before turning on the welding torch, which, for the record, is Super Freaking Bright. "Think it's working?"

[governorkang]

"Don't know yet," Kang was careful to try and keep the flames directly off of his scales, even with the spell. He could still feel a good bit of the heat, and he knew he wouldn't be able to do this for more than five or ten minutes at a time, or he'd run the risk of overheating. It was warm enough on Stacy already.

Unfortunately, he hadn't moved something wooden quite far enough away to avoid the sparks.

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Jesus!" A large plank of wood (which, for some reason, neither of them thought to remove from the fire break) goes up in flames almost instantaneously. Howard drops the cat, whips the fire extinguisher out, and sprays it. And Kang.

[governorkang]

Oh, shit. Kang let out a string of curses and turned the torch off, the caster only half-welded to the fridge, and poorly at that. The coldness of the foam was a bit of a shock after the heat.

He took the sunglasses off and stared at the plank of wood, also covered in foam, "...that probably wasn't the best of ideas, in hindsight."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Is the fridge okay?" Howard clearly has his priorities in order. "I mean, you're not hurt or anything, right?"

[governorkang]

"I'm fine," Kang snorted, scooping some of the foam off of him. "So is the fridge. I don't think I'm doing this right, though."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"What are you talking about? Setting my backyard on fire was totally in the plan."

[governorkang]

Another snort. Kang eyed the fridge, "I will make sure this gets done for you somehow, even if I'm not the one doing it."

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Don't worry about it. I'll just take it to Karis or something. You know Karis, right? About this tall, kind of dead-eyed?" Dead everything else, too. It's kind of sad to think about how happy she'd seemed when she was alive, but Howard's seen more upsetting zombies.