Apocalypse: Fairy System by Macronomicon (fox in socks read aloud txt) 📕

“So I had an issue with throttling the gas output, but I managed to figure out what functioned as a resistor in the Myst regulators you gave me.”

He pointed to a little chunky piece of steel and pried it open to show the regulator encased in soft foam. “Since you claim Myst from an engine acts as a sort of radiation, the first thing I thought of was a way to increase the resistance to decrease the regulator’s release speed. So I busted the regulator open and checked the walls, and sure enough, the business end had what looked like a piece of glass electro-plated with gold.

“The walls and receiving end are coated with a material I don’t recognize, but they aren’t immediately important. I would guess they are some kind of one-way transmissible material.”

“So it’s like a laser, with a one-way mirror on one side and a slightly less powerful mirror on the other,” Jeb said.

“Eh, more like a leaky fuel tank. My theory is that when the pressure in here reaches a high level, the Myst actually reverts back to a gaseous state, until the pressure forces it out the gold side as light again. Once that happens, the floodgates are open, and it drains out until it’s empty again, but never faster than the gold resistor here will allow.

“So I took a few pieces of glass and electroplated them with varying concentrations of dissolved gold and just recently got a regulator plate that limits the gas output enough that the machine doesn’t leak fuel everywhere and catch fire. There’s a fuel sensor and a manual disconnect, so the robot can remove the Myst power from the fuel supply if it ever gets overfull, too.

“I don’t have the same weight restrictions I would if this were a drone, so I was able to put a honkin’ DC engine in there, which gave me enough power to overclock the motors in his joints and give Buddy some sick moves.”

Eddie pulled up the robot’s control pad, and pressed a few buttons.

The motors turned over and caught, filling the room with a loud rumble. Eddie put his hand on the chassis of the robot.

“Feel that!”

Jeb followed suit and remarkably, the robot barely trembled despite twin motors blasting away inside it.

“Now, a normal bomb disposal robot is pretty much just a fancy RC. I had to add some thinkmeats to it, which took up space and caused some heating concerns, but I think I did a pretty good job, all things considered.”

He pushed another button, and Buddy’s arm with the fireball wand whipped up and aimed at Eddie, the rangefinder zooming down to the 20ft minimum in a fraction of a second.

Click click click. The robot dry-fired the wand three times at Eddie’s heart before moving on.

The arm spun to aim at Jeb’s center mass a split-second later, sending a wave of ice down Jeb’s spine.

Click click click.

Did Eddie just almost blow us up?

Eddie entered another command and the mechanical arm relaxed back to its resting posture, tucked in tight against the armor.

“Remote control is a little too slow. I’ll program this a bit further with some strong friendly-fire protocols, but it should help rapid response times if it locks on to its targets by itself, at least.”

Jeb glanced at the old man’s damp clothes, shock of wispy hair and the huge dark circles under his manic eyes.

“Good job. Remember when I bought you today?”

“Yeah, what of it?”

“That was two days ago. Get some sleep. I can’t afford to have you slip up making something that dangerous. You could’ve just blown up the entire house.”

“But I’m almost done!” Eddie whined. “I’ll lose track of what I was doing!”

“Your owner demands it,” Jeb said, grabbing him by the shoulder.

“You’re just as bad as the dean.” Eddie sulked as Jeb shoved him out of the basement. The old man literally hissed as the light of morning struck his eyes, shielding his face from the wrath of the sun.

“He went out here to check on Eddie.” Mrs. Lang’s voice came around the corner as Jeb shoved the thin old man in question towards the front of the mansion.

“Here,” Jeb said, pushing the roboticist forward when Mrs. Lang appeared around the corner of the building. “Make sure he gets eight hours of sleep. At least. And don’t allow him to put a cot in his workstation, either.”

“Sure, boss,” Mrs. Lang said with a smile, her hand digging into Eddie’s shoulder.

A moment later, she was steering the scientist away, leaving Jeb with Rufio.

“Find anything suspicious?”

“I found a stack of nudie magazines, but they featured keegans, so I assumed they belonged to the previous owner.”

“Seriously?”

“Hell no, old man. Where did you come from?”

“You’re not gonna be satisfied until you check everything, are you?”

In response, Rufio crossed his arms and scowled. He had a bit of mayo on the corner of his mouth. Mrs. Everett must’ve fed him already. Excellent.

“Alright, right this way,” Jeb said, guiding him to the storm shelter, where the teen spent the next fifteen minutes alternating between geeking out over magic robots and looking for trap doors to hide children in.

“Alright, that’s enough,” Jeb interrupted when he saw Rufio checking the same corner the umpteenth time in a row. “It’s not me, and if you keep this up much longer, I’m just gonna find someone else to help me. Now can we talk about how this plan is gonna work, or do you wanna leave?”

Rufio took a deep breath and shook his head. “Nah, man. I can’t just trust some rando who shows up wanting to house kids out of the ‘goodness of his heart’. I’ll take a pass.” The teen turned toward the door.

“More of your friends will die,” Jeb said.

“It’s my problem,