[Wright Memorial Library]The Con & The Gadgeteer(Minerva)

by **Matthaus** on September 5th, 2012, 4:18 am

3rd of Fall, 512AV

He was a learner of practical skill and reading was not a skill he practiced readily nor had he ever really had the time to do so. But even this building took his breath away. It could easily fill all the peoples in Zeltiva or so it seemed to him. Large and over-reaching, standing so high he doubted any could even brush the ceiling without some sort of grapple.

And then there was the shelves. The lined everywhere, filled with books on subjects he couldn’t (and didn’t want to) imagine. The only downside was the smell. It smelt of parchment and ink, something he doubted he could ever enjoy. But he was here to see if this place really held all the knowledge he had heard about. If it held the secrets he would love to expose.

Besides, it was much warmer inside than building than it was outside but he didn’t doubt that the elderly crone woman who eyed him as he entered did not appreciate his sopping appearance. His cloak was damp as well, cold too. It sent goosepimples up his arms and legs and even down his back, he was sure even his face tightened. The place looked the part. Plenty of things everywhere, plenty of people studying but would it hold anything for him to study?

Matthaus licked his lips, chapped from much too long in the salty air and pulled his hood over his face. Skirting around where he assumed he would run into the crone and be outside in damp air. He raised a hand to cover a cough and ran his fingers over the books, he should ask someone for directions to figure out where the university was. It had to be connected to this place, schools connected to books didn’t they? He turned sharply on his heel, almost missing the sudden loss of balance as his body pitched back, fingers curling around air.

Before him stood a none too happy librarian and few others who had obviously fallen in his trail of water. What fun this would be. Coughing once more he tried to look a bit helpless, schooling his features into a mask of confusion and failing miserably. He looked more like a drown rat who was not happy in the least. “I was only looking for the university.”

by **Minerva Agatha Zipporah** on September 6th, 2012, 12:23 am

Tock was taking etiquette lessons.

Her first class proved to be an absolute nightmare.

She trudged into the classroom none too happily. She wasn't in the mood for this. Not after the last two weeks she'd been through. She'd pre-registered for the classes near the end of last semester, because she needed to learn how to talk and act better for her job. Which was ridiculous, considering she worked in construction.

But after a promotion at work, she was now expected to make an impression on clients. She had to help sell them on upgrades to their homes and offices, and convince them that the artistic carvings she could do weren't just frivolous additions that served no purpose. She had to convince them that they were art, and that such things were important in keeping up appearances and maintaining status.

Which was somewhat hard, since Tock was still working on convincing herself she believed that. On the one hand, she primarily only saw the benefit of practical things. But on the other hand, she was becoming quite the skilled artist, and she refused to believe that her artistic carvings weren't worthwhile, even if they didn't have a 'practical purpose' beyond looking pretty.

But regardless, if she wanted to continue to succeed at her job, she was stuck with this. The lessons were supposed to include not just etiquette, but also literature, and learning how to write better. Then there was giving speeches, which she was just absolutely dreading.

Tock sat in the back, and zoned out through much of the lecture. Learning about talking better seemed to involve a lot of talking, which irritated the hell out of her. So instead of paying attention to the teacher she worked on sketching some rudimentary designs for an Automated set of lungs, vocal chords, and a mechanical mouth. Simple leather bags should work for the lungs, and she was thinking about stripping down some musical instruments for vocal chords. She didn't know the first thing about music, but an instrument was still a machine. She knew machines. If an instrument could make noise when someone blew air through it, then it could theoretically be modified to speak. She just had to include a leather tongue and lips to form the proper sounds, and combine it with Animation programming to teach it how to speak.

Then instead of talking to people herself, she could make her magic mouth do it for her.

Not paying any attention at all to the lecture, she was caught off guard when the teacher came up and snatched her schematic away.

"Oy, 'at's mine!" she protested.

"Can you answer the question, Miss Zipporah?" the woman asked, looking over the schematic with a confused frown.

"Huh?" Tock asked. She hadn't even realized the teacher had ASKED a question.

The professor pointed at the chalkboard, where she had written the words, 'The sailor caught a fish down at the docks.' "Can you identify the parts of that sentence?" she asked.

Tock hadn't even realized sentences HAD parts. She stared at it for a long moment, then said, "Uhhh... the words... an'... the period?"

The entire class laughed at her.

***

After class, the teacher assigned Tock an essay, which she perceived as punishment, since none of the REST of the class had to do one! She had to write about the parts of a sentence, and how the nouns and verbs related to each other (which was going to be hard considering she didn't even know what a 'verb' WAS!), and the worst part of all was the teacher told her that if the essay wasn't 'grammatically correct' (whatever that meant), that she'd have to do it over again!

Grumbling about the complete waste of time, and in NO mood for interruptions right then, she trudged into the library. She barely noticed that the floor was wet, being too preoccupied with her own problems. Thus she merely stepped right over top of the kid on the floor, grumbling at him, "Outta the way, twerp! I's walkin' 'ere!"

by **Matthaus** on September 7th, 2012, 5:24 am

The helpless act wasn’t working. Not in the way he expected, the elderly woman was obviously teed-off but sympathetic in a way that tugged a strand of annoyance within him. Made him want to tell her precisely where she could take all her well-mannered scolding and place it. Instead he scrubbed a hand over his face and pulling his hood back only to catch sight of a foot. Mixed with an accent he couldn’t understand, the elderly woman becoming more flustered as the older kids (because that is what they were, kids) insisted children should be sent home during study hours.

His helpless expression grew more poor by the second, how did one honestly miss a puddle of water? For these people to be falling that much they were either blind or stupid. He had pity for neither. Blind beggars got the best kinds of treats anyhow. In a moment of pure spite he reached his leg up hoping to catch the fiery headed woman, trip her up and sending her sprawling with the others.

“I’m sure you would walk a lot better if you went around people rather than over.” He snapped back snidely, losing what was left of his helpless façade and not really caring whether she fell flat on her face or not. To the elder woman he stood and rubbed his back briskly, “I can clean it if you like, it’s just my sister really needs this book and the man at the docks bumped me into the water and I was in a hurry. If I’d been more responsible—“ or less cold, “I would’ve taken off my cloak at least.”

The older woman smiled wanly, as if she had seen and heard it all, “That’s all well and fine dear but look at the mess you’ve made. Cleaning it up is the only proper thing to do.”

Matthaus didn’t actually want to do that and swiftly tried to add a limp, knowing it would be futile but unsure of how to get out of this growing mess and gathering crowd. He hated audiences. He felt a number of excuses and words he could babble on about bubble to the surface but nothing came out save for a pathetic cough which only set off everyone’s annoyance once more.

He wondered quickly if crying would help.

by **Minerva Agatha Zipporah** on September 7th, 2012, 5:29 pm

Tock stumbled at the unexpected grip on her leg. She fell to one knee, one hand bracing against the floor, her second hand clutching her books to her chest to keep from spilling them, and her third hand (the wooden one strapped to her right wrist) shaking a fist at the poor who'd tripped her.

"Whazza big idea, twerp?" she snapped, pushing herself up. She reached over as the boy was getting up, grabbing him in a double-fisted grip (though both fists, flesh and wooden, were attached to the same wrist, as her left arm was still balancing her books with care). She gave him a shake by his wet cloak, asking, "Whatcha gotta done been--?"

Her voice caught in her throat when she got a look inside his hood. Innocent eyes, soft, pale skin, tousled brown hair...

Her heart clenched and she had to fight back a sob. She looked him over with moist eyes, struggling to keep her lips from trembling. After a moment she cleared her throat, and in a much softer voice asked, "Whatcha doin' all wet fer? Where's yer Ma?" She glanced around, searching out anyone who might claim the boy as their own.

Trembling fingers touched his cheek, while wooden ones stroked his damp hair. She hated kids. In a weak voice she told him, "Ya gotta git dried up'n'warm, o' yer gonna catch a cold..."

by **Matthaus** on September 7th, 2012, 6:24 pm

His thoughts didn’t get far and neither did the librarians lecture. He should have expected it, after all everything had a consequence but the sudden grip and face much too close to his had his entire body shudder for a second. Matthaus was no stranger to getting hit, he did tend to have a big mouth and never ever took kindly to being lied to. Repeatedly.

He couldn’t even speak for a moment to answer the pissed woman’s questioning, his teeth clacking together as he heard the elderly woman shout softly in the background about how fighting was not tolerated in this building. But any sense of fear left as the shaking stopped, the young woman holding him having an expression on her face he had tried and failed to adopt earlier. Matthaus still didn’t dare move and simply looked at the girl in confusion, wondering if he tripped a crazy person. It was just what he needed. Really.

And strangely enough the questions annoyed him, it was genuine pity. Not pity for the sake of it but genuine sadness of some sort. He didn’t want it. His heart pounded louder and louder in his ears, he really couldn’t deal with this anymore. All he could hear was the scolding, the pity and the annoyance. Mingling together, he didn’t know what to feel, what to pretend. Be a good citizen and clean? Apologize? Curl up into the red-head and her weird machine of some sort?

“I can’t.” it came out flat and he now struggled in the grip, trying to drag himself away, “I’ll clean it then go.”

He didn’t even know what he was saying. He didn’t want to answer her but he found it was automatic, “My parents live in Syliras, their not here. Where is your ma? And this city is surrounded by water, there isn’t any ‘dry’.”

At least he hadn’t told the truth, his comments trying to come out snarky but failing and only coming out miserable. This was ridiculous. He only wanted to find out about the schools, he didn’t want to make friends or enemies or be remembered. Matthaus realized he probably looked every bit his age, helpless. If this girl had made the rail of water she could have gotten out of it. Finally pulling free of her grip and he hoped out of her range he pulled back.

“If you aren’t going to help clean I don’t need any other help,” he looked to the librarian, “I’ll need something.”

As if to make matters worse he felt a hacking cough rise up and cursed himself mentally.

by **Minerva Agatha Zipporah** on September 7th, 2012, 8:05 pm

"Syliras?" Tock asked, confused. "Whatcha mean, Syliras? Who's mindin' ya, then?" She frowned, wondering how a boy this young was so far from his parents. Considering how bad her Da had been, her mind immediately jumped to the worst possible conclusion: that he was a runaway. Abusive parents were the first thought she had about why such a young boy would be off on his own without someone to look after him.

She ignored his question about her own Ma; she didn't have one, and she was certainly old enough not to need one. He was not.

The coughing made her chest tighten and her frown deepen. Maternal instincts took over, and when he pulled away she just advanced on him again. She reached for his cloak, trying to outmaneuver any squirming in an attempt to strip him of the sodden fabric. "'Old still," she told him, trying to get at the buttons of his shirt as well. She had a cloak in her backpack she could wrap him in for the time being. "I's gonna wrap ya up in somethin' warm, an' we's gonna gitcha dried up an' 'as some 'ot tea o' sommat. 'Ey done gots 'is good 'erb stuff what at the infirmary. Good fer yer lungs..." She stuck a finger in his face and added, "'Less ya want me ta build ya new ones...?" As if to demonstrate what she meant, the wooden hand waved at him. She had some rudimentary designs for a set of leather lungs already worked out. She just needed a test subject...

by **Matthaus** on September 8th, 2012, 1:07 am

A twitch of irritation mingled with fear shot through him, no one was this interested in a kid. Not in Ravok, he doubted in Syliras and not here either. So what did she want? Matthaus struggled with more vigor but he was tired, cold and really hungry. He was tired of falling in the docks but he wasn’t sure where else to go and the tide kept soaking him…and he was whining way too much. “I look after myself.”

It wasn’t looking for pity it was a simple statement of fact. No one watched him and he didn’t have to watch for anyone save himself. Her fingers felt heated against his skin and now he even felt the creeping’s of a blush, did this lady even realize how old he was? He did not need to be coddled! But Gods the thought of tea or any food make his stomach rumble and deepen the angry flush on his cheeks. No doubt he looked like a bruised tomato.

“Would you let go?!” but her finger in his face stopped him cold, her machine much too close, “I’ll keep my lungs, thank you.”

But his voice ended in a squeak and another cough, their audience dissipating as the elderly woman went off to get some rags, mumbling well naturedly and ushering everyone away. Sighing heavily he felt very old and very young and just very tired. School or no school, what was he doing there? But he no longer struggled and began to shed off the wet clothes, freezing as his cloak was dropped to the floor. The thought of revealing his scars and oddly proportioned body made him pale a bit and rather than take off his shirt he wretched away and hugged his arms around himself. His hair fell around his face, he hadn't had time to really cut it yet and it wasn't a real problem. Gritting his teeth Matthaus ignored the goosepimples flooding all over his skin and tried to go for calm, collected and grateful.

“Shouldn’t you have class or something? I’m sure you’re really busy,” he paused, “and I’m sorry for tripping you.”

As he spoke he inched backwards, very much ready to make a run for it. He could get another cloak and ask about the school another day.

by **Minerva Agatha Zipporah** on September 8th, 2012, 1:52 am

Her frown softened as the boy spoke of looking after himself, and she felt even more sure now that he had fled some sort of abuse. Either that or his parents had just abandoned him. In any case, he was alone, and no child should be alone.

And she wasn't about to let him succumb to poor health as Mikey had.

"Ain't so busy I can't spare a few," she told him. "'Sides, I what 'elps out in the infirmary alla time anywho. C'mon..." She pulled the cloak from her backpack and stepped forward, trying to wrap it around him and put an arm around his shoulders to lead him away. "Ya like puppets?" she asked. "I gots me some nice magic puppets. Kids at the infirmary love 'em..." Mikey had loved her puppets...

Now Mikey was a puppet...

"C'mon," she said again, nodding him to the door. "I's bring a book wit'cha, if'n 'at's what ya want. But 'ey got nice 'ealthy tea down 'ere, an' 'ey getcha some lunch, if'n yer 'ungry. Maybe some clean clothes..." Tock hated kids. They were always getting in the way, tripping people up, getting sick, refusing to listen to what was best for them, and they were generally all around useless little monsters.

She reached out to run her fingers through his hair, her eyes softly pleading. Kids could sure be monsters. They were also innocent and vulnerable and sometimes needed a grown-up's help, whether hey would admit it or not. "Please?" she whispered.

by **Matthaus** on September 8th, 2012, 4:08 am

Her questioning on the puppets it what finally snapped his restraint.

“You think you’re helpful but you’re not!” his teeth clacked loudly, “Are you going to be here every time I get wet, every time I get sick, are you thinking you’re going to be my mom? It’s not goodwill or kindness it’s for your own satisfaction! I don’t care how much you need to pity someone, go find someone else.”

He huffed lowly, “And thank you for the cloak.”

He thrust it back at her, ready to put his own back on but felt his throat burn for many reasons. Pride. Pain. Shame. Fear.

“I only wanted to know about the school. I’ve heard…things—good things—about the school and thought it could help my…my job.” Why was he still babbling? Maybe it was her sincerity (or seeming sincerity), maybe he just missed Rikki. Her fingers combed through his hair and he tensed. Not fleeing. Not thinking, just frozen. He grit his teeth and pulled back again but with marked gentleness, his own expression torn. This was meant to be simpler. Find some information and leave.

“Alright.”

His voice came out cracked and confused. And he looked utterly horrified moments later. What had he just said? Again he could feel the thud beneath his pulse grow louder and louder, drowning out his common sense. He should run. He should run right now or she’d end up like Rikki and he’d have to leave again. But he shook his head, tried to straighten himself out. Matthaus would go, he would something to warm him up and finally dry his clothes then he would get information and hopefully never relive this scenario.

This time it was him who reached for her and he stepped towards the cloak and away from whatever was left of his common sense.

OOC :

by **Minerva Agatha Zipporah** on September 8th, 2012, 5:03 am

Tock recoiled at the kid's sudden outburst. The words burned her ears, sounding so familiar. Are you going to be here...? She stared at him without blinking, her face going pale. Will you come see me tomorrow? Tears burned at the edges of her eyes, but they wouldn't break free. 'Ow's ya keep someone 'round?

She knew the pain in the boy's eyes. The loneliness. The desire to be independent and strong. Not wanting to be forced to rely on anyone else. It seemed unfair that someone so young would have to share that pain.

She expected him to run. But then he said 'alright.' When he stepped forward, she wrapped the cloak around him to warm him, then gathered his sodden one up so she could find someplace to hang it to dry. She started leading him to the infirmary, giving the librarian a grateful smile for being so understanding. The infirmary was on University grounds, so it was only a short walk.

But before they got there, she had something else to say. As soon as they stepped out of the library, as soon as they were alone, she stopped and crouched down before him. Tock was a blunt person. She wasn't one to dance around an issue. She wasn't one to let people put on masks and hide who they were. When it came to personal matters, she had two policies: it was either tell it like it is, or declare loud for all to hear that it was nobody's business. She didn't tend towards anything in between. She also didn't believe in being anything but completely truthful, with a few certain exceptions. She'd lie and cheat when she needed to get something out of it, whether it be leading a man on for free drinks, or covering up her own crimes. But other than situations like that, where the truth had consequences, she was one to throw the truth in someone's face and just not give a damn.

Crouched before him, she looked the boy in the eye, and laid it right out for him. "Ya ain't want my 'elp?" she asked. "Ain't nothin' off me. Ya wanna take care o' yerself? Ya can go right a'ead an' does 'at. I ain't yer Ma, an I ain't thinkin' what as I's gonna be in yer life jus' cause I done nearly tripped over ya." He had asked her, so she was giving him straight answers.

"An' yer right," she said, "I's a bloody selfish vagik. I done lost somebody. Done lost a lot o' somebodies. An' yeah, ain't fer no goodwill o' kindness. I ain't know one thing 'bout ya. Far as I know, yer a right monster what ain't deserve no 'elp. But guess what?"

She looked him dead in the eye and gripped his shirt in her fist, "When I what wanna 'elps somebody, I does it. An' yer gonna bloody take my 'elp, an' git cleaned up an' warm an' 'ealthy, cause if'n ya ain't, I's gonna turn ya inta the guards as a orphan, an' 'ey what's gonna make ya go ta Farson's 'Ome wit' all the other little twerps what ain't got parents, aye? I ain't think ya want 'at. Yer out 'ere alone cause what ya ain't thinks ya needs nobody's 'elp, o' cause ya ain't seen nothin' but trouble from people what 'as 'elped ya..."

She let his shirt go and stood up, staring down at him. "Ya wanna git whatcha want?" she asked him. "Ya bloody take it. I wanna 'elp ya, an' if'n ya ain't want it, too bad. 'Less fer ya think ya can outrun 'is..." She pulled Grippy, her reaching tool, from the holster on her hip. With a touch of her finger to the handle, the arm extended a foot, the metal claw snapping a few times to demonstrate the Automaton's capabilities. She was quite confident that if the kid tried to run off, she could snag him by the seat of his pants before he got far.

"But ya wanna know 'bout the school," she said, retracting Grippy and holstering the tool once more, "I's tell ya whatever ya wanna know. I's getcha some books, see if'n 'ey take twerps like ya inta classes o' not. Whatever ya need. Jus' tell me whatcha done needs, an' I can make 'er 'appen. Ya know why?" She leaned over a bit to meet his eye level, "Cause I's a bloody pain in the arse bitch, an' I ain't take shyke from nobody. Up ta ya if'n ye'd rather 'as me been a bitch on yer side, o' not..."

Some people might say Tock had a 'soft spot' for kids. If you asked her, she'd say she hated the little brats. This one had certainly managed, without even trying, to reach right into her heart and squeeze some sympathy out of her. Which irritated her.

The same way Mikey used to irritate her.

"Now dun lag be'ind!" she snapped, turning and continuing on to the infirmary. She knew he'd follow. He'd follow because doing so would get him something: food, clothes, and the information he wanted about the Uni. And hopefully she could get this charity crap out of her system, and stop feeling so damn guilty and having such a strong urge to help little twerps like this when she stumbled across them.

She glanced back at him. Her eyes softened a bit. He really did look a lot like Mikey.