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location WORKSHOP xxxxx company ZYANYA, PASCHA xxxxx outfit WORK WEAR



School was enjoyable and all (outside of some of the stranger classroom activities the students were subjected to), but at the end of the day, all Ellis ever wanted to do was make. Well, design, mostly, in his case. He was lucky enough to have met other like-minded students, and despite the sting of their prodigious talents far exceeding his own, he found he did not terribly mind their company. For short periods. When they weren't talking. Zyanya and Pascha were respectable in their own rights - but good god did they have a lot of energy. The former was certainly the more egregious of the two; her chatter could fill up the entirety of the lab's workspace when she got going. He had, on more than one occasion, brought earplugs just to tune her out.

But today, he intended to make more of an effort to engage with his young companions - because his family had shipped a crate of defective parts to the school for Ellis and whomever else to do with as they pleased. As a drafter, and not so much a builder, Ellis had little use for the parts outside of using scraps to practice his electromagnetic abilities. Pascha and Zyanya, though - they were tinkerers, capable of constructing wondrous mechanisms without so much as a blueprint. And Pascha in particular was fond of the defects, the little bits and bobs that could serve no other use.

So this batch of odds and ends would be a gift to them.

Ellis was huffing and puffing by the time he made it to the student workshop, tucked away in the back corner of the school. He dropped the crate onto a table with a groan, and it clanked and rattled with all the metal pieces inside. As he took a moment to catch his breath, Faraday - who he had brought along to get out of the dorm room for a bit - popped his fuzzy head out of the crate, then leapt onto the table to streeeetch. Ellis pushed his glasses up his nose, then turned to address the younger engineers.

"These," he announced, miserably, "are a bunch of defective parts. My family runs a few factories where we develop parts for machinery. Sometimes those parts don't make it through QA. Rather than scrap them, we try to reuse them where we can. Consider this a sort of donation to our efforts here at the academy... A chance to have some new toys to play with, assuming you can overcome their deficiencies. Do with them what you will."

He withdrew from the crate as well his own supplies - a drafting set, along with some rolled up paper and a well-worn notebook.

"And please don't mind the cat. He needs some exercise. I only ask you keep the doors and windows closed so he doesn't get curious about the outside world and run off to his death."

Content with his instructions, Ellis settled into the drafting table nearby, spreading the paper flat over its surface. But Faraday, ever friendly and desperate for attention, trotted closer to Zyanya and Pascha, nose twitching. With his tail in the air, he let out an obnoxious mewl in greeting.
　

For once, Pascha was not actively speaking and at the same time was not actively eating. Instead, he was actively listening to Zyanya, a new friend met through… another new friend, Ellis. It was amazing to think that it really was this easy to make new friends, and talented ones, too! He had sort of kind of introduced himself to Ellis… Well, more accurately he had verbally accosted Ellis one day when the other student was innocently working on one of his designs. Pascha just couldn’t resist the temptation! And Ellis didn’t seem to mind quite as much when Pascha offered actual insight after a quick glance at the blueprint in progress. At least Pascha liked to think he didn’t mind as much; otherwise, why introduce him to another inventor?

Zyanya had quickly become someone Pascha greatly looked forward to seeing again and again; she was clever and creative and loved constructing (and deconstructing) devices just as much as he did! Pascha had never met another person like her; he wasn’t sure people like her could really exist. It was like a dream, a really good dream!

The door of the meeting room opened and Pascha made a small sound of surprise as he got to his feet. But Ellis reached a table to unburden himself before Pascha reached him. And as he spoke with a tone of misery, Pascha’s expression filled with glee. Defective parts?? Oh, those were always the most fun to get his hands on! Most were useful for something with a little care and attention.

Oh, a cat. Ah, but Ellis said not to mind the cat, and Pascha did not mind.

Zyanya was already reaching into the crate and Pascha was quick to join her. ”You don’t have to wait for me; I bet there isn’t anything in here that I won’t find interesting. Oohh…” Pascha began pulling out items, running his fingers over them curiously, and setting them on the table. Some had obvious flaws; that was to be expected, really. Any company would discard those parts immediately. But sometimes the less obvious defects were even more fun to discover and correct.

”I could double the range of motion on this arm if I remove this bit here… Oh, and if I then attach it to-” Pascha began to ramble contentedly to himself as he categorized the different bits and bobs. He left the table only long enough to retrieve his tools. He returned to the table with excitement and began to disassemble one of the defective devices. He was still muttering to himself gleefully, barely even noticing that Ellis had begun drafting and Zyanya was paying mind to the cat after all.

”This cog is really shiny and only a little warped… Maybe you could keep it for one of your hair accessories, Zyanya. I’ll see if I can find any others to match.”

Pascha was entirely grateful to Ellis for this bounty of broken bits, but it never occurred to the excitable engineer to give his thanks out loud. No, instead he was immediately enraptured with all of the gadgets and gizmos now within reach and begging to be pulled apart, rebuilt, and repurposed. But even thought Pascha was deeply engrossed with his tinkering, there were some outer influences that slipped in through his firewall to run in the background. One such influence quickly extracted itself into a conscious thought that Pascha responded to without looking up from his task.

”Of course you contribute, Ellis. More than every once in a while. You have a fascinating mind; I wish I could pick it more often.” Pascha was a very hands-on creator; whatever he touched inspired new ideas, new curiosities, and new creations. He was proud of that, of course, but Ellis was a different sort altogether. He created on paper with only the knowledge he had already accumulated to guide him. Pascha had seen a few of these drawings and knew at a glance what would work and what would not, so he could tell: Ellis was very talented. How could a mind like that be anything but an asset to their club?

But a nice big crate of parts to play with was also a huge plus!

Knowing Ellis, he might ignore the comment altogether; compliments seemed not to suit him. He was a very serious person and had no use for frivolous words, even if they were just objective observations. Was it strange to admire the fact that Ellis would reject his admiration? That was truly a frivolous thought, even Pascha knew as much, and he simply discarded it rather than to expend any more focus.

Ellis’ cat had decided that he would not be ignored and had dramatically flung himself down onto the table, loudly airing his grievances at not being the most admired and petted thing in the room. And even then, the feline only barely was able to catch Pascha’s attention long enough for the blonde to reach over and scritch under his furry chin. Were they allowed to bring pets? It had not mattered to Pascha who had no pets to bring, but he had to agree that if there was a jaguar roaming the halls then Faraday should be a harmless and welcome distraction.

”I don’t think you’re a problem either, are you, Faraday? You’re a good kitty.” Pascha smiled at the cat, but was immediately distracted by the part in his hands once more. He continued his spoken stream of consciousness, narrating the different ideas that came to him and listening intently when Zyanya did the same. Faraday did not hesitate to voice his opinion as well, earning the occasional pets and scratches from Pascha when he could be successfully distracted by the earnest requests.

Eventually Ellis came closer to them and Pascha gave the other student a curious smile. He was always more than welcome to participate, but as he usually did not take the opportunity Pascha was curious to see what had inspired him to do so now. But the question that he asked was one Pascha had difficulty answering. Not because he did not know the answer, but because the answer was one he did not want to share.

Well, he could answer the second question at least. ”I haven’t had the opportunity to work with electricity before, but I have an understanding of how it works from the items you’ve brought to us and the schematics I’ve seen of yours. I haven’t been able to put that understanding to the test, of course, as much as I would like to. I don’t have a proper energy source or the means to create one. It’s too bad… I have so many ideas.”

Faraday was a very lovely kitty, nice and soft to pet and so very friendly, but Pascha was silently glad when Ellis took his pet in hand. It was hard to ignore the feline pleas for attention, but it was even harder to resist the allure of the assorted bits and bobs in the crate that Ellis had brought. And it was such a shame to have to pick one over the other; this way, Ellis could dish out the desired affection while Pascha continued his tinkering.

Ellis seemed pleased by his response, though Pascha had not guessed why. He thought to ask, but Ellis had such a contemplative look on his face. Maybe he could not say more without revealing too much? If truth were to be told, Pascha already knew too much. As he had already admitted, his limited understanding of electricity was learned indirectly through Ellis himself and so it was not terribly surprising that he had a more than educated guess of Ellis’ kingdom of origin. But even if it seemed obvious, that did not mean they could just speak of it openly. And even if they were willing to break that annoying little rule, there was the matter of keeping state secrets. At least that was a concern for Pascha, so he imagined he was not even nearly the only one.

Luckily enough, Ellis did eventually decide to share. And Pascha did think himself very lucky indeed, smiling brightly and showing no indication that the choice of words had bothered him the least. And that was only fair as they had not. Pascha was excited to learn how they might help one another; collaborating with other great minds was a large part of why he had been so excited to join his new friends in this club.

”You have a deal! I would be happy to teach you what I know and I’ve always been curious about electricity. There are definitely elements of its use that are just out of my reach, even after all that I’ve seen.”

Ellis was… not quite smiling. In fact, he seemed to be in pain. Why, he looked a bit like he had trapped wind. But even Pascha knew it would be rude to mention that, so he said nothing of it. Besides, he was quickly distracted again by the exciting idea of creating an energy source they could experiment with! ”That is a great idea!”

Ah… What he was putting together then. Pascha smiled a little sheepishly and rubbed the back of his neck. It was such a silly idea, but sometimes the ideas that took him were just silly. ”Well, it’s a prototype, mind… Ideally I might use different parts, and I’ve never actually tested any of these theories, but…” Pascha picked up a small panel covered in switches as well as the wheeled contraption he had been workin on and slid them closer to Ellis. ”I believe I could make the switches on the panel here “communicate” so to speak with this little machine. The, ah… energy pulses? You would know the word… anyway, the pulses from this switch here would trigger the wheels to roll by…”

Pascha happily launched into an explanation of how he believed his remotely controlled vehicle would work. How to make it move and change directions, how to operate the little crane arm he had attached. How much of the project was mechanical, but would be activated and controlled by electricity. If there was any; he never had figured out just how the stuff was created, harnessed, or stored. Only how it might theoretically be used. And his hypotheses were solid even if he had no grasp of the proper lingo when it came to anything electrical. ”I don’t imagine it could be used for much… Perhaps getting into small spaces where the operator can’t reach? Oh, but then how would the operator even see what it was doing? Ah, that is embarrassing; it still has a few flaws to iron out. Still… I do wonder if it would work at all. I also had an idea for an electrically heated kettle, but I’m not even sure why anyone would want one. Wood for a fire is easier to get than electricity, after all.”

Pascha could read blueprints, he understood them and could work from them, but that was the extent of it. He had never drawn one and would probably stumble over trying to explain one to someone else, despite innately understanding what he saw. That Ellis could just take ink and parchment and create those beautifully instructional diagrams was still ever so very impressive to Pascha. If he could do that, he could share his ideas far more easily with others! Maybe he should try to pick up the knack? It was a good idea in theory, but honestly Pascha wasn’t sure that he had the patience for it. Not every task could be improved upon with speed; some things were too delicate for his usual approach.

But gears and wheels, screws and nuts, bolts and plates, those things he could handle. They just came together in his hands, a few paces behind his next thought. It never even occurred to him that what he was assembling was more or less an advanced toy; he just saw it in his mind’s eye and his hands went to work. It was all the same, whether he was making weapons and armor or toys and kettles. But even if building any one of those things felt more or less the same, Pascha had to admit that he really liked making toys and kettles more.

He needed to expand his thinking? Pascha smiled and tilted his head curiously; this was definitely the first time someone had ever told him that he just wasn’t thinking broadly enough. Normally he was told that he needed to reign it in! But as he listened to Ellis explain further, he could begin to understand how his thinking really was too narrow. He could not imagine the infrastructure that Ellis spoke of so he had dismissed it, but what if electricity could be had at the flip of a switch for every household in the world? Well, an electric kettle would be ever so useful then.

Pascha had been quick to dismiss his distance controlled vehicle since the operator might lose sight of it, but what if that could be remedied? He did not know how, but Ellis pointing out how useful his device could be if they jumped that hurdle made him want to do just that! There was so much farther he could reach if he just imagined that he could!

Ellis continued to explain, filling Pascha’s head with terms and concepts that had previously remained beyond his reach. Radio waves, transmitters, receivers; he was learning so much! Once more Pascha was uncharacteristically quiet, his now bright green eyes wide with delighted interest. He only spoke at all when he had a question or needed clarification; he definitely did not want to stop this flow of information!

But all good things came to an end, unfortunately. Pascha shook his head and smiled when Ellis apologized. ”You know a whole lot! I don’t think you should be sorry at all; thank you for explaining it to me! Besides, I talk too much all of the time; you could talk three times as much as this and I wouldn’t mind at all.” Pascha was all too aware that he could be something of a chatterbox. He just couldn’t seem to help it most of the time! But listening to someone like Ellis explain his passion was actually a good way to still the motor on his mouth. ”Oh, could I? I’d love to read them!”

It really was too bad that the university wasn’t geared toward more practical learning, but Pascha supposed he did understand. And not everyone would find the same glee in such learning that Ellis and himself did. ”Maybe they will change their minds when they see just how much we learn from each other. I mean, that kind of goes hand in hand with making peace, right? Learning from each other and understanding one another? One out of two is a good start.” Pascha approached the box as well to help dig through it.

”I think I might understand how a generator would work from your description, but I’ve never seen one. If you give me an idea of what kind of parts we might need, I can help you look.”

Sometimes Ellis said things that Pascha was pretty sure were supposed to be mean, but… as often as not, the words just did not bother him. Why should he be upset that Ellis agreed about him talking too much? He was the one who brought it up in the first place and he did. It was hard not to think so when he could actually see people, even his work peers, start to zone out in the middle of his explanations or voiced thoughts. At least Ellis always listened if he was talking about really interesting engineering things! He might say something mean, but there was a look in his eyes that told Pascha he was still listening intently to every word and that was better than most people could do. And he knew he would be just as interested in anything Ellis had to say; he always was! There was so much to learn from his somewhat cagey designer friend!

”Of course, of course!” Pascha agreed eagerly. He supposed it made sense for Ellis to remind him as some people really did try to get something for nothing if they could. And he did know that nations in particular liked to keep their secrets. But ideas were meant to travel as far and wide as they could! He would give Ellis so many ideas that his eyes would swim! And in return, he wanted just as many back. There was no way he would renege on that promise! He didn’t hold onto a lot of books or notes, but he sure knew how to get them and he could get them for Ellis, too.

Pascha smiled brightly when Ellis admitted that it was nice to think about the school expanding its goals to include the borderless sharing of ideas. ”It’s really, really nice to think about.” Pascha murmured softly, his eyes bright green and looking forward to the day. There was so much to learn! And so many people to meet! So much more collaboration to be had! His little inventor's heart yearned for it.

But for today, it was enough that the school would not stop them from choosing to share ideas on their own. Here and now their club could start the change they wanted to see and it felt great! Ellis gave him a detailed list of important bits that he could start searching for and Pascha nodded and got to work. ”I’m on it!” Meanwhile Ellis began work on a rough draft that Pascha was admittedly very eager to see once it was done! Ellis went on to describe other pieces they would need as he drew them, Pascha unable to resist a peek now and then. The principles definitely made more sense when he could see them, even in illustrated form.

”It’s too bad we can’t have a water wheel. Water wheels are cool! But steam could still be feasible, especially if we employed a condenser to collect any vapor. Of course any system like that will still have a measure of entropy. And there is the rather circular matter of requiring fuel to make heat to create steam. It would be ideal if we could store any energy generated to then be used for further generation. As long as we created a system that created more fuel than it consumed…” Pascha went on for a bit, hashing out a few ideas as he continued his search through the box. He was mostly talking to himself at this point, his voice softer as he was not yet even at the hypothesis stage. These ideas were not fully baked and ready to share just yet, but the dough was definitely rising.

Oh. Oh, he should have realized that Ellis would not be put off by him just neglecting to answer a question. And after all the talk of sharing, he kind of didn’t want to just shut down the back and forth between them. He wanted to be open and communicative with Ellis; he wanted to teach and to learn as much as he could. But he didn’t want to talk about weapons or really anything made for warfare. His attention had been taken by those things for so long; could he really say he had any other advanced achievements to speak of?

But! There was at least one wartime advancement he had worked on that had other, nonviolent applications. And it was technology he hoped the whole world would see one day, so what was the harm in letting the cat out of the bag a little early? ”Well, I did help my team to develop a steam powered locomotive. Oh, and quite accidentally stumbled onto the idea of cooking food with steam and pressure in the process, but that is a little less impressive. If the peace holds, I want to push for expansion. Rails connecting kingdoms that seem so far apart right now. We didn’t dare before and we couldn’t spare the resources anyway and… Oh, nevermind; you didn’t ask about all of that. What about you, Ellis? What is the most advanced device you have ever designed?”

Pascha beamed brightly at the compliment; he had never doubted that he had a fascinating mind, but it was always better when someone else said it. After all, it wasn’t arrogant if he wasn’t the one who had said it, right? And hearing it from Ellis was even better; he didn't even tack anything mean on the end. Not to mention that having his fascinating mind acknowledged by another fascinating mind was quite the ego boost! ”I will! I will definitely think of something.”

When Ellis stopped what he was doing, Pascha was extra glad he had thought to mention that particular project. It really was quite amazing, or at least he really thought so! It would be even better if he could come up with a feasible way to move smaller transportation vehicles made for shorter distances so that individual people and families could-

Those thoughts continued unhindered in the background as Pascha answered Ellis’ questions as honestly as he could. He might have left out the tiniest detail that much of the freight the locomotive was employed in transporting was for use by the army, of course. It was just a habit to obscure things like that even though he didn’t doubt that someone as clever as Ellis would figure it out anyway. They were all at war for so long; it stood to reason that any technological marvel their kingdoms laid claim to was, at least to some extent, used to make warfare. It was really sad. Thinking about it made him want to go right back to tinkering with his electrical kettle idea instead. But he had to remember that, like the locomotive, any idea that had war implications also would have its uses in peacetime. No advancement was a bad one.

Pascha went on to explain some things that Ellis had not asked about how the engine worked, pitfalls they had addressed, improvements that had been made over time. He enjoyed talking about his passion projects and Ellis didn’t mind listening. He could tell, because that twist in expression like Ellis had bitten a lemon never appeared. It usually did when he was just about to say something mean or perhaps had thought something mean and decided not to say it. It wasn’t obvious, Ellis wasn’t a very expressive person, but it was easier to notice when Pascha was focusing directly on him as he was in that moment.

It was a shame that Ellis was never assigned to a larger project. Pascha wouldn’t say so out loud, but he genuinely believed that his friend’s potential was being wasted. Not because improving existing technology wasn’t important; it very much was! And it took a creative mind and plenty of know-how to take something that worked and make it work better. But a creative mind needed to be fed creative projects sometimes! Ellis had said it himself; improving machines and tools that already existed was just much less interesting than creating something new. So hearing that Ellis did have personal projects he was working on, ideas that would expand his horizons, had Pascha’s green eyes lighting up with excitement!

”I hope you find time for it! Personal projects are usually my favorite. Even if they aren’t always the most advanced things I work on, it’s often a lot more satisfying.” Pascha smiled as he thought of the music box he had made for his sister. Something like that wouldn’t have excited Ellis, he was sure, but he had loved making it. It was much closer to his heart than the locomotive.

At least Ellis had decided for himself that he wanted to branch out and Pascha was so excited for him! Helping the family business was great, but Ellis could definitely reach for more. Pascha didn’t doubt it for a moment!

”Uh huh, especially for a big project like that. No matter how many good ideas one person might have, he’s only going to have two hands still. That’s one of the reasons your talent is so brilliant; schematics like yours make it so much easier to share ideas with a large group as long as they have even a fundamental understanding of the subject matter. I struggle to really share my ideas; someone else usually has to act as a go-between. Still, it’s worth the effort.”