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SLOPPY. SO SLOPPY. [closed?]

Who: Ada and Klaus
What: Invasion of a mad scientist's lab
Where: Klaus' batcave
When: Klaus is out shopping
Rating: Potentially PG for Klaus' language
Style: A...ction...?
Status: Closed until further notice.

[Getting lost in this horrible city again tends to lead to very interesting discoveries.]

[Namely, this time, the discovery of somebody's lab, full of half-baked ideas.]

Well. It might be a start, but this is ridiculously sloppy!

[Or maybe not so half-baked; some of them look downright complete. But still.]

So sloppy! This is ridiculous, it loses at least twenty-three percent of its efficiency this way!

[Hmph! Well, there's only one thing for it. Whatever invention Klaus had been working on, getting headache over, whatever-- it's getting improved.]

[Now.]

[B(]

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[Oh come on, he just stepped out of the lab for a few moments. How did she find her way in? He purposefully picked one of the deserted business district buildings to discourage this... bluh. Bluh bluh bluh.

He sets down his grocery bags, which contain pretty much nothing but alcohol and a few small electrical or mechanical parts he couldn't Spark together on his own, and clears his throat pointedly.]

Excuse me, I --

what are you DOING?

[HE KNOWS YOU ARE NOT TOUCHING HIS LIGHTNING SWORD, GUUURLLLLL!]

[SHE IS. NOW SIT DOWN AND BE GOOD, BOY.]

[She has it half way dismantled, even, and is rewiring it so it doesn't lose as much power when it works.]

Oh, shut up. You're ruining my concentration.

Well, I --

[Wait what

Did she just

Did she just]

[Suddenly nothing in the world makes sense. Klaus has never been told to 'shut up' before. He's he Baron. You just don't talk like that to he Baron.]

...Fine, then. Tell me your process. I see you've dismantled the power source -- are you attempting to increase the recharge speed?

[SCIENCE WILL HELP HIM COPE...]

[Oh, now you're talking sensible! She spreads out the work a little more so he can see.]

Not at all. There is no need to increase the recharge speed if you make the device so that it doesn't lose as much power upon use. Observe. Creating shorter, better insulated copper wires between each connection, for one, will help retain the electricity as it runs. Aluminum heats up far too much, and loses energy in the process. Using better quality capacitors, too, will help to facilitate the storage and proper discharge of energy as it flows through the unit.

[Then she goes on to describe how she's changing the internal mechanics, of which the mun is not aware, essentially compacting the entire device, making it neater and more efficient. Her set up manages to use-- and lose-- less energy than Klaus' initial design...]

Which, by my reckoning, should make it at least twelve percent more efficient than before.

[Now, this is odd. She can't be from Europa, or she'd recognize him. Queen Albia educates her precious English underwater city, so that can't be it either. Perhaps she's been drawn from a time before he was in power? Because like hell is she not a Spark.]

Ingenious. I admit the low-quality is in part due to my own difficulty in finding decent building material, but these changes should, indeed, increase the efficiency a great deal.

[Okay. He's still a little miffed he didn't think of it. His Spark must really be damped down if he didn't notice those mistakes immediately, and that's embarrassing.

... Oh right, he has no idea who she is. HOLDING OUT HAND FOR A HANDSHAKE?]

Baron Klaus Wulfenbach. And you are?

[Well, Spark or not, she's a mathematical genius. And a proper lady, to boot, but she takes that hand as a powerful man of her time would-- there is no weakness here.]

Countess Ada Lovelace. A pleasure.

[Can we go back to science now? :T]

Now, about the shell of this device...

[Ooh, a countess! The first person of actual rank he's met here. How exciting! Not that he places much importance on rank, but... shh. It's encouraging to find someone whose sensibilities and apparently accepted social structure seem so much closer to his own than anyone else in Prospero.]

What about it? It's certainly sturdy enough. Just a few days ago I was able to use it as a bludgeoning device with almost no resulting damage.

Be that as it may, I believe a sort of extra insulator might be wise on the inside, around the mechanics. A... foam of some sort, perhaps?

[These are new terms. She's learned so much in two weeks, subsisting off the public library and whatever food she can scrounge from the hotel.]

For one, it may be sturdy, but in the even that it should break somehow, at least with some form of cushioning the more delicate circuitry might not be damaged, and it can be rebuilt more easily. Perhaps just as importantly, though, if something were to malfunction with the device itself, it would be good to have something to absorb the shock that it may emit. Even if not lethal or particularly damaging, I assume the distraction could be more dangerous in a severe situation.

[...F...oam...?]

I suppose you have a point.

[Do you hear how grudgingly he's admitting this, Ada? So grudgingly. He's never yet a made a device that's broken, least of all in the heat of battle when it would be most inconvenient. The very insinuation... huff.]

I am afraid I am unfamiliar with foam, however. I assume it is some form of synthetic insulation which came into use some time after the early 1900s?

Ah, yes. I assume so. I did not have access to it myself, either, where I came from.

[Cell phone! ...And she takes it apart right there, and pokes the foam that protects the circuitry in it.]

It appears in most of the more delicate electronic devices, I've found. Things that are likely to be dropped or impacted are more likely to have it.

[Don't mind him just. PEERING AT THAT. Oh man oh man that's actually really cool...]

I see. I'd neglected to dismantle my own communication device in case of the very unlikely situation of not being able to put it back together again, but clearly that was a mistake. The inner mechanisms actually do not look all that complicated...

[She's taken apart every electronic device in her room. ...Some of them are still dismantled.]

Indeed. I had thought they would be more complicated than they are, though quite a bit of it is out of my range if anything should damage it.

[She frowns at all the little tiny circuit boards and computer chips and things. Damn smart phones.]

But taking it apart and putting it back together is fairly simple, and much of the actual mechanics seem fairly straightforward. I must say, the advances they made in technology in just a couple centuries are quite impressive.

[Dayum, Ada. You're a girl with needs, huh?]

Quite impressive. Though the general lack of death-rays, decent airships or clanks leads me to believe that it advanced in an altogether boring, if interesting, direction.

Of course, the records of this world make no mentions of any of those things, and I was also hard-pressed to find any mentions of anything that could be termed a 'Spark' outside of fictional accounts, so I must conclude that such things never existed in this reality. Which is a pity. A clank with programming on the level of our communication devices would be quite something.

...Clearly you have not been searching in the correct places, for I have stumbled across at least several accounts of bombs lethal enough to destroy a city of over one-hundred thousand people, through both the initial drop and the subsequent biological and chemical damage done to the environment. It's referred to as an "atomic bomb", if you are curious, and was developed some seventy years ago, by this world's account.

[Your lingo is baffling.]

I am curious, though-- what is a "clank"? It's not a term I've heard before.

A bomb is very different from a death ray. A bomb can only be detonated once and furthermore aiming a bomb is much more difficult. You cannot rotate the blast of a bomb. It lacks precision and finesse. The bomb has its place but it is vastly inferior to the death ray, which packs the same amount of power.

[SO THERE.]

A clank? A clank is a generally-autonomous mechanical creation designed to serve some specific purpose. For instance, much of my Castle is policed by humanoid clanks with large guns and enough programming to understand orders and the rank of those giving them.

Regardless, it appears to me that they have sufficient dangerous technology already. And knowing how most militaries work, I wager that they've made considerable improvements out of the public eye-- it is never wise to reveal your hand to your opponents, after all.

[Shrug.]

Ah, I see. How fascinating-- how do they work?

[BACK TO SCIENCE]

They run based on a combination of steam and clockwork. Very occasionally I'll introduce electrical components, but I find that tends to complicate matters far past the point that they need to be complicated. They are still by far the most advanced war clanks in the known world.

And the known world for me is fairly extensive. I would know about any underground projects.

...That is, of course, assuming about your own world. I will point out that this world is quite different from yours, as you have so gracelessly pointed out already with your whining about the lack of flashy war toys like a boy robbed of his favorite ball.

[Yes, yes she did just insult your masculinity sir.]

I suppose I should have been more clear. I meant in relation to my own reality, yes. Here, of course, my rank as ruler of the largest world empire means comparatively little.

[He draws himself up a little. Is he mad about that sick burn? MAYBE JUST A LITTLE.]

I assure you, war toys are hardly my main area of interest. They are merely constantly forced into my sphere of focus thanks to my position and what I must do to maintain it. I am not complaining, merely making note of the wide discrepancy between the chosen 'war toys' of this world and my own. Naturally I would prefer what is normal to my own reality; it is a standard that has served me well in the past.

It might be best to consider what you are doing wrong to warrant such a need for so many death devices. Or is it that where you are from, your society is backwards enough to not consider the lives of others important?

[Oh my good raging red fire not you too.]

Unfortunately, the latter is far closer to the truth. Ruling a country of madmen is best achieved through might and judicious use of fear.

[Does he sound kind of snappy? HE IS.]

[She is unfazed.]

I see. A pity that you've trapped yourself in such a situation, then. I would not want such a position in any circumstance.

[Does she sound a little snide and condescending to you? She is.]

To be reduced to oppressing all those that live under your rule must be quite frustrating.

[Get the fuck out, Lovelace, and take your snide and condescending with you.]

One does what one must. I have no right to complain, given that the alternative is have a smoking crater where the country once was. An oppressed populace is better than a nonexistent one.

This is, of course, assuming that whatever alternative would end up in such a situation. Humans are painfully resourceful creatures. And most of them have an instinct to survive-- and an instinct to obtain power-- that often surprises even the best social analysts.

[No way, buddy, you started it.]

Most of them. Clearly you have never met a Spark.

[Which is weird, because he's pretty sure you are one. Or at least, have the potential to think on the same level.]

They certainly have the instinct to obtain power, but this comes with a blinding overconfidence in their own abilities and a never ending drive to create machines of war and creatures with no concept of the sanctity of human life. Thus, left to their own devices, inter-Spark interactions quickly devolve into wars that devastate entire countries.

Thus, I give them someone to hate collectively. None of them can oppose my power, but they refuse to band together and overthrow me out of their hatred for each other. In this way, I keep peace.

...That sounds terribly familiar. In someone I just met, in fact.

[Stare. She might sound a bit irritated, bro.]

In fact, it sounds an awful lot like you, Baron Wulfenbach. And you seem perfectly capable of respecting the basic inherent value of life.

[He'll just. Stare right back. With his one eye. Bitches be hatin'.]

I am capable because I make a conscious effort to control my Madness. It took years of practice to learn to suppress, time that most Sparks refuse to spend doing anything other than building a bigger gun or a monster with more fangs.

Unless, of course, the implication is that you believe my respect for human life is negligible, in which case I really have nothing to say to you. I have killed people. I did it because it would keep the country as a whole from devolving into chaos. I did it my way, and it worked. I will not be guilted for sacrificing one for the good of many rather than allowing that one to go on a killing spree that would have claimed thousands of lives. What other option is there?

Oh, put your pride aside and look at the real trouble of your society. You cannot simply solve a problem by patching up its symptoms; you must look at the source to find what's causing it. If it's possible for these people to learn to control their ah... weakness, then perhaps more time should be spent showing them the value of doing so, and helping them learn ways to control their bloodlust.

[She points at him with the soldering gun she's been using.]

Clearly, you have not examined the issue enough. Much like this device. Given time, it would have fallen apart just from its sloppy, patched-together state. But with the proper structure, care, and thoroughness, I sincerely doubt you will have a problem in the foreseeable future, even if something were to happen to dent its outer shell.

[SDJFDSOIFJDSOIFJDS

BITCH

BITCH YOU DID NOT JUST

YOU DID NOT JUST]

I am actually working towards a way to test for potential and disable it in those ill-equipped to handle it before it has the chance to manifest. Even I sometimes am unable to control myself. But I am smart enough to have fail-safes in the event that that should happen. To trust a weaker Spark with that responsibility when many of them cannot even keep themselves safe, let alone others, is a laughable idea.

And that device is a prototype based upon little more than a memory. It was put together without any of the tools I am used to and without any of the proper materials I would have had in an ideal situation. Despite that, it is both functional and serviceable and performed admirably on its trial run. Your suggestions are welcome but your insults are not, Lady Lovelace. I suggest that you change your tone.

[ALL OF THAT BARELY-RESTRAINED RAGE

ALL OF IT

He is just so over everything right now you don't even]

I cannot say I would trust a test for someone who holds such a double standard for his own society. And make all the excuses you like, even without the tools you are used to, there is plenty of opportunity for you to expand upon your own research once you have your first version made. I could see no effort made to improve upon your design, and yet it shows signs of much use.

[You're welcome Klaus.]

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SLOPPY. SO SLOPPY. [closed?]

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DO YOUR RESEARCH KLAUS GAWD

NOPE.AVI

Keywords relevant.

Your FACE is relevant.

...That IS the point of an icon.

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