revivalproject

Entry tags:

Casing

WHO: Tony and Donnie!
WHERE: The Forge
WHAT: Forgin'.
WHEN: Backdated, mid-May
WARNINGS: Poor workplace safety

"Come on, leave him alone, what is this, this is ridiculous," Tony grumbled, loosely gesturing with his free hand toward the distraction the DATA unit was being. They were supposed to be working on a more analog suit, and Tony had clearly made the mistake before he'd even left home by bundling up the turtle-thing to move out of the library. "Or her, I don't know, I don't know how to sex a turtle--stop that, that's not an invitation." DATA had taken it as an opportunity to thoroughly catalogue this new information, and while the animal seemed content enough to sit completely inert on the workbench, DATA kept scuttling around it and prodding at it like the robot was looking for a way in. The forge itself may not have been the ideal environment for a turtle, and it was possible that they were being so still because they were too hot, which Tony only considered as DATA went obediently still was well, one leg poised to poke and camera trained innocently on Tony. The mothcats could and did leave the library if they weren't having a good time, though. Maybe none of the animals were particularly bothered about eyeballs appearing around them. The turtle would probably prefer sitting around the grassy pools when Tony was working outside.

It was not a settled debate. DATA's fixation might have been the determining argument to bring the turtle back, though. "Can we focus?" Tony invited, handing a new component to the robot, a kind of trade for the turtle who finally gave a weak pump of their little legs as they were lifted into the air. "Test it when you're done. Properly. With that one. If there's anything about turtles in there when I get back, I'm taking you apart and making him a new habitat," he instructed. The robot watched them go, until the glare from the door opening made its camera shutter, and they were gone before it could properly adjust.

Outside, Tony crouched at the edge of a persistent puddle, a crater gouged from repeated launches and a few crashes, to set the turtle near the water and sit on his heels to watch. It wasn't dramatically more mobile, but gave a wiggle a little closer into the mud, sending a ripple across the puddle like a socialite dipping her toes into the rooftop pool and settling in for the afternoon. "I'll bring you a margarita later," Tony promised, stretching back up and considering the armor heaped against the side of the forge. Time to start sorting out what could actually be used.

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With every descriptor, Tony became more convinced that the turtle named Raphael that he had met had more in common with the little guy in the mud, and as a result looked skeptical when Donnie corrected the misattribution. "Uh..." he tried to formulate an explanation, but Donnie was handing him goggles, which Tony flipped around in his hands inquisitively before lifting them up to his eyes, pushing his glasses up to his forehead. "Okay but--Why do you keep saying that, are we defining 'mystic' in some way like--I'm not the expert on the different brands of magic, that's not my area."

"No? Yes? Full disclosure, I don't know, mystic just sounds slightly more palatable than magic and more sophisticated."

With Tony actually humoring him with the goggles, Donnie started drawing up something else with his mystical magical purple phenomenon. Through the goggles it was clearly sourced from the turtle, and a sharp eye might catch the brief, vague glitches in the purple output, suspicious echoes of red, blue and orange.

None of that stuck to any of the mystical tech that Donnie conjured, in this instance a drone. Rotors spun and allowed the thing to hover, the design not too dissimilar from his battle shell.

It was a little harder to argue against this thing that apparently detected magic, making Tony wrinkle his nose and try to determine what mechanism exactly was at work, dropping the goggles slightly to glance between looking through them and directly at the shimmering construct. "Okay, well, listen, plenty of magic is just science we don't understand. Yet," he rationalized. Donnie wasn't doing a magic trick, he was just doing incredibly advanced science. Without thinking about it. Was he thinking about it? "What's the process, walk me through it--Let's say I can do this, too, if I just concentrate or whatever..." he proposed, hand up and finger in the air to try to mimic how Donnie was holding his hand.

"Okay, yeah, let's...let's go with that." Donnie could accept that. Not that any of the magic he'd seen resembled or produced anything that he could hope to explain off with science, and that really was what pained him. His brothers took to using magic weapons like ducks to water. Clearly there was something they understood in it. So why couldn't he?

"Well...it's not too different from when I'm getting ready to design or build things. Only I'm not using physical materials. ...energy is the material- or...whatever this is. Magic is an energy?"

If he managed not to get too distracted by the lights, Tony would be able to make it out as Donnie shrugged and started again, dismissing the drone in a shimmer of pixels like 8-bit dandelion fluff. It was like watching schematics drawing out in real-time, brief as things quickly took form once key parts were pieced together. This time it was a sizeable drill, easily half as wide and high as Tony was tall, inner workings quickly encased into the more solid lines of a finished product that twisted up into a point.

As impressive as that was, Tony figured out quickly that no more information was forthcoming and he dropped his poised hand, head tilting to slide an impatient frown from the assembling drill toward the kid. So there wasn't a process that was going to be replicated. "You're doing magic," he concluded flatly, accepting that he wasn't going to convince Donnie otherwise. "Great, I've been letting a wizard into my shop, unbelievable, next you're going to be leaving lizard tails and fairy dust all over my stuff." The lizard on the ground looked up like they might be interested in a bit of fairy dust, blinking slowly at the shimmering lights.

That might as well be an accusation for how Donnie took it. He was torn between being elated that this was some brand of magic he could finally get, and feeling some weird dread bubble up in his stomach as he couldn't tell if Tony was joking or not. The latter showed by the flicker in his earlier enthusiasm, even as his drill started to decompile.

"Well, you don't have to worry about that," he said almost sullenly. "It stops working after a while, and only after I've been in the caverns for some time."

Still looking like this was entirely distasteful to him, Tony rolled a hand and his eyes before they were hidden behind the goggles again for one last assessment of the way the manifestation dispersed as he said, "It doesn't, though. Not really. You're the one doing that, not the caves, they're over there, they're just rocks." And if Donnie was going to be launching his body into the air under this tenuous power, they should probably figure out how to define their own boundaries. Dropping the goggles, Tony asked, "Have you talked to Billy? He makes stuff. I don't know if he has it figured out, he can't explain it to me, either, but he's been doing it a few years, I'd say he's put in the hours."

Donnie wasn't completely committed to trusting whatever mystical contraptions he managed to conjure if they were only going to last temporarily. This was still a testing phase, and he'd been ecstatic to find that his constructs still behaved like one would expect if they were built like they were supposed to be.

Tony's apparent disapproval certainly dampened his earlier excitement. Still, the man had a good point.

"I...yeah, I just don't know how that connection even works. And it feels like a connection, like...I dunno, the cave is supplementing something and then it's just not there anymore."

The glow of his purple markings had been fading along with the rush. He hadn't quite figured out how long the power-up lasted in regard to how long he hung around in the caves.

"Billy? No... When you say he 'makes stuff' is it like..." He gestured vaguely where the drill had been.

With a slightly impatient nod and flapping hand, he did get it, Donnie wasn't listening, Tony explained, "That place is full of the same junk they use as a power source here. Have you tried touching a data point yet? They refined them, into these crystals..." He shifted back and forth on his heels like he might dart away, and was clearly annoyed by the interruption that would make, and held out both hands expectantly instead. Donnie had a beat to decide what that could possibly mean as Tony continued, "If you can figure out how they work, maybe you can make a battery pack. For your...magic." At long last, the chestplate of the Iron Man armor came sailing out the door of the forge, to settle across Tony's arms, the weight yanking him down an inch as the soft blush of the repulsors died. Without the light, it was easier to see through the glass over the unibeam in the centre, where the crystals that Cal had helped him with still glowed faintly.

"Billy's thing is, you know, more permanent. In theory. According to him, anyway," he finished with a sniff.

"....right-" Donnie grimaced, feeling stupid for not following along there. He dragged a hand down his face. "That's why I was even in there in the first place- to refine a secondary power source for my tech-bō!"

His thoughts scattered briefly when part of Tony's suit came out to join them. Had he seen this thing in action? Probably not, but even if he did, Donnie's attention was still effectively diverted.

"Ugh, that is so cool."

Show and tell. Donnie pulled his compacted staff out, thumbing a button to expand it. With some minor fiddling, he opened a slot to extricate a thin, smaller version of the standard charging rods used around Temba.

"I'm not sure how much of a concentration would be needed to replicate the charge the raw version offers...people." Oh, but he was obviously already thinking about it. Tony could practically see the gears turning in the kid's head.

"Billy a...magic person then?"

"You're charting new stars there, sweetheart," Tony said with a helpless shrug as he extracted his own power source, then let the chestplate thunk to the ground where it rested against his leg. The alien turtle meandered curiously toward it, raising their head to taste the air. "I don't think anyone's thought too hard about what this stuff has been doing to us. Gives them the heebie-jeebies to go in there. I'm baseline, so..." He looked aside briefly, not exactly hesitating as he searched for the right words to be not exactly lying, "It just shorts me out. The suit. What I do know is, this stuff, it might have also protected the Agrii from one of those storms, the same ones that pull the plug on people's powers."

On Billy, he nodded and suggested, "He's usually hanging around the hospital, if you want to ask him about it."

"Yeah, Tommy said it makes him explode or something," Donnie said, distracted by the power source Tony produced and the armor there. And then the turtle. Why was it even there?

"It did boost my tech- almost overloaded my goggles. By the way, can I...?" he asked, looking at his goggles meaningfully.

Tony did bring up an interesting point however. "Wait, it does? Has anyone tested this theory? ...or I guess it'd be difficult if it affects people so differently... But if it's somewhere to potentially weather these supposedly bad storms?" He had yet to experience one so he had no idea what to expect aside from screaming moons, apparently. And that was hard to believe.

"I'll make note of it. Haven't really been by the hospital much and then there's that guy with the sunglasses who always seems in a Mood." He made a face, replacing his staff's battery source before compacting it for storage.

Those goggles were about to disappear into Tony's workshop if Donnie hadn't said anything, and somewhat reluctantly Tony went, "Oh, hm," and handed them back. Quickly, he was pointing out, "I don't know if that's an effective solution, to cram us all into a hole where half of us are on the brink of nuclear meltdown. I think Tommy might have meant that literally, he can make things explode, the friction when he goes too fast. That's a deathtrap. I'm just saying, that place, these crystals, they're boosting powers, and the storms are doing the opposite. They're doing the same math. Figuring out that equation might help us figure out how the storms work. They're not natural, they're deliberate, a gun aimed at us."

Which was only part of their problem. "You've met him, too?," Tony wondered, the question clearly not directed at Donnie as his mouth twisted to the side and he glanced away, considering "Maybe...keep your distance. Give Tommy a call instead, tell him you want to meet his brother. Stick together."

Donnie was all too eager to replace his goggles on his head. There, all was right with the world. ...well okay no, it would take a lot more to fix things here but in his little sphere of personal concerns, a vital piece was restored.

The concerns Tony brought up made sense enough, and the further explanation of Tommy's abilities made him mouth an 'oh' in understanding. Yeah, that would be...bad.

"Well maybe not like everyone. But I guess that's a good point, and it won't even really make a difference for people without powers, huh..." Something to think about. If they could find a counterpoint, maybe use the crystals to their advantage? No, maybe he's looking at it the wrong way. There was something there, there had to be- something they could use to potentially solve this storm business.

"'Met'," Donnie clarified with air quotes. "Mostly I talked to him once over the network and he did not seem interested at all in talking science. I saw him when I was working in the greenhouse and we just sort of looked at each other and he left. Talk about rude."

He tilted his head at Tony's suggestion, arching a brow at the look on the man's face. "...sure?" Was there something he missed? Nothing about the man really made Donnie itching to get to know him any better.

Donnie didn't need to be the one freaked out, just cautious, so Tony mirrored a raised eyebrow in return and downshifted to insist, "Perfect. Can't have somebody else figuring out what you can do, then who's going to clean up this mess?" He flung a hand back toward the forge and Donnie's attempt to make sense of what he found in there while Tony continuously interrupted that progress to scatter through them and make both of their lives harder.

"Heeey, most of that mess was there before I got there!" Donnie insisted with a light snort. Thoroughly diverted from further questions regarding suspicious men with sunglasses. ...Okay,other men with sunglasses.

Although pointing forge-wards is a reminder that he still has an actual battle shell to work on. It's nearly finished, he'd just gotten sidetracked by battery searches and weird caves.

Turning, the turtle sways a bit and tilts a little too much to one side, momentarily dizzied by the abrupt movement and the cave's effects petering out.

"Woah, hey," Tony cautioned, the chestplate thunking to the ground as he stepped around it with both hands out to steady the kid, the sudden movement startling the animal and sending it diving into the puddle. "I've got no business getting on your ass about drinking alone in a cave, but I do have to draw the line at drunk flying, that's intervention territory, that's a community problem." That was a lot of words for Tony to duck his head to catch Donnie's eye, anxious and inquisitive. He seemed okay a second ago.

Donnie waved a floppy hand about almost dismissively despite being more or less held up Tony at this point. "'m fine. Caffeine crash. Without the caffeine. Comparable to," he added in afterthought.

"It'll..." WORDS what are words. "-normalize, just gimmee a sec... I think I was overdoing it."

That floppy hand only had Tony's lip raising in a grimace as his focus darted between it and Donnie's drooping eyes. Caffeine crash sounded like an undersell to him. Maybe he was a little too quick to encourage the kid to experiment with the mysterious crystals' effect on his system. With the next unnerving waver, like Donnie thought he was going to step away under his own power, Tony scooped him close instead, practically knocking into his shoulder as Tony looped an arm around him like he was about to lead him through a crowded bar. Very casually, and a little too loud to lean into the effect, he said, "Listen, there's your proof, cave isn't doing anything at all, that's all your energy that you just discharged." The only thing he had to shoulder through was the half closed door to the forge, where his eyes had to adjust before he spotted DATA right there at his feet, peering up at them innocently for not nearly long enough before it was leaning over hopefully to spot the little animal. Tony sighed at the robot with only a slight shake of his head, and continued on to get Donnie sitting down so he could get some water into him.

Just as well the rest of Donnie wasn't seeming to want to cooperate with him at the moment or he would have objected a lot to the closeness. He wasn't the touchy-feely sort, but he didn't particularly mind not being alone passed out somewhere in this instance.

"Potentially," he said, unconvincingly, but he didn't think he'd run nearly enough tests to claim such proofs. But maybe tests could wait. He took a moment to stare down at the reason they'd stopped- oh, it's you again.

And then things were moving again, or rather they were moving again. His feet were barely doing anything by that point, save to make some effort to keep him level enough not to make the height difference any more awkward. After all, Tony had about nine or ten inches on him at least. Just as well he was sitting down, looking blearily at the wall for a second.

The wall was interrupted by Tony dropping into a crouch before Donnie, where he could warily watch for signs of any greater damage and lift a mug between them in a move that wasn't quite an offer, more of a taunt to see how well Donnie handled that mechanical test. Either way, it seemed like a good time to suggest, "Sleep it off, sweetheart. We can talk about why your drill wouldn't work when you're not running on fumes," with an encouraging pat to his cheek. In the meantime, Tony would be nearby trying to get his robot to focus and get this armor finished, and he could get Tae here quickly if he had to.

It took Donnie a moment to realize what he was being offered, a delayed response in his focus even though Tony had appeared in front of him. He reached for the mug, half hoping it was coffee, suspecting it was otherwise.

Normally he'd scoff at the suggestion to sleep, but in this case he supposed it wasn't a bad call. "Yeah, uh-huh, okay," he muttered in that distracted sort of way, like he had better things to do. In this case it was probably nap. Just a quick shut-eye, no all-night welding or anything tonight. Afternoon? Well, whatever time it is, maybe it'll still be day at some point when he woke up.

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