Unity by Carl Stubblefield (epub read online books TXT) 📕

thread appeared to literally catch and suck in the light. An increasing glow caused Gus to shift his gaze to the shard, which was slowly brightening with a shimmering soft white glow. Beads of golden light dripped off the end of the thread and pooled in the shard. The intensity increased to the point where Gus couldn’t look directly at it anymore, and squinted his eyes as he watched BoJack motion with his upper hand and seal off the shard. He handed the tiny crystalline construct to Gus.

Turning it around in his hands, he expected it to be warm like a light bulb, but the shard felt like a simple piece of glass. Looking at it end on end, he could see that it was a perfect hexagon shape in cross section. He handed it back to BoJack.

“Now we have light for the night. You probably couldn’t see it before, but this ether construct is selectively permeable. The interior looks like a mirror so the photons are maintained inside. Only at a certain angle will they be able to pass out, but enough photons are packed in there that we can have light and this will last until the morning. This is called infusing a construct. Your basket appeared to be infused only with MP. I can detect no other type of energy associated with it. An interesting application, but unfortunately it is pretty inefficient. I can create a construct like that for one or two MP. I’m not sure how much you used but I’m sure it’s way higher than you actually need.”

“You want me to make another one and check?”

“Maybe later. Do you have any powers that use something that you recognize as a form of energy? Whether it’s heat, electricity, magnetism, anything as long as it’s something that affects matter in the conventional sense. Try not to find anything that is powered directly from internal energy, but one that uses ambient or external sources to power it.”

Gus pored over all of his abilities and only three seemed to be relevant. Krackle, whose description only mentioned “energy” but not what specific type. Then there were Shake and Shatter, which used vibration or kinetic energy.

“Got one? Now it’s your turn. What did you decide on?”

“Vibration?” Gus said, fearing he would be wrong or misunderstanding the concept.

“Excellent! We’ll need a heat source and that will do well. It will not be as long-lasting as other types, but it’ll give you practice on creating more. Depending on the type of energy you are trying to infuse, that will dictate what form your construct needs to have. You need something that will perpetuate and preserve the energy as much as possible, but still allow some to escape somehow. It’s best to pick something you need, such as this crystal giving light or your vibration providing heat. Mind you, it doesn’t have to be heat, you can use the energy to turn a turbine that creates other effects but let’s keep it basic for now.” BoJack tapped his lip with a finger as he thought.

“We’ll need a fire for the night, how about that?” Gus asked.

“I like how you’re thinking, but let’s make sure you understand some things first. One of the things you need to think about is how to collect and change energy into a usable form, while at the same time streamlining the transition so it’s efficient. That may sound easy, but often it’s the hardest part of this type of crafting.

“Ether in and of itself is an inert form of matter. It requires some other form of energy to help it maintain its form. In one sense, that makes it incredibly versatile as you can use many types of energy to achieve the same ends. The drawback is that if that energy is not maintained, a construct will quickly fall to pieces.”

BoJack was becoming more animated the more he explained. “Am I losing you yet?” he asked, peering at Gus from under bushy eyebrows.

“What about tying something off? I have made some things and it helps them stabilize if I tie them off.”

“Yes, yes. Exactly. It’s probably easiest to think of like a balloon. You can inflate a balloon with air, but if you don’t manage a way to retain that energy, it will rapidly escape. Unlike a balloon, however, a collapsing construct can be very, very bad. Not always, but it should be avoided. Think of a fireman’s hose that is fully engaged but unmanned. It can whip around and cause damage or injury if not controlled. Now imagine the hose is filled with gasoline and is on fire. That’s probably a closer approximation.”

“Whoa.” Gus looked upward, imagining the sight while BoJack continued animatedly.

“But yes, if a construct is formed correctly, it can retain the energy inside and use that to maintain its form. The more ideal the container, the less energy is drained away to maintain the construct and it has more permanence. With vibration, there are a lot of ways to generate energy and heat. How familiar are you with how that ability functions at a fundamental level?”

Gus screwed up his face. “Not… very? Sorry.”

“Okay, that isn’t great, honestly. Vibrational energy can be propagated from waves, like a sound wave hitting a tuning fork. It would help to know exactly how you generate the energy to know how best to capture and maximize the energy.”

“Why don’t we just test it?” Gus offered.

“I guess just give it a try on this piece of wood and see what happens, then we’ll try it on something with more internal energy.”

“Internal energy?”

“Hmm. It’s complicated, but some materials have more ability to absorb and transfer energy. Just like some metals can be affected by magnets but many cannot due to their molecular structure. For now just try the ability on both, and I will observe.” He handed Gus a broken twig about the thickness of a finger.

Gus activated the ability and found that the dry piece of wood shook, more aggressively